I’m bored, so let’s redo the Basic Magic Dart vs. Basic Ranged Shot. Same as above, but this time we will not add the extra <P> to the caster’s casting check and we will allow him to channel at the discretion of the player. Round 1 (FIGHT!): The Wizard Channels. Pool: <P><BBB>®[W][Y] Result: +2 power, for a total of 6 power Note: 1 less <P> The Wizard casts Magic Dart (Spellcraft(Int); 3 power). Pool: <P><BBB>®[Y] Result: (3+4) – (5+2) = Minimum 1 damage Note: This is the same difficulty listed above, but the <P> comes from channeling instead of from arbitrarily adding an extra <P> Note: The Wizard has 3 power left Archer fires. Pool: <P> <BBB>®[Y] Result: (5+4) – (5+2) = 2 damage Wizard’s Orc: 13 wounds left Archer’s Orc: 12 wounds left Note: The Wizard could potentially suffer 1 wound if he rolls 2 banes during his cast Note: The Wizard could potentially suffer 1 chaos star miscast. Note: The Archer does more damage than the Wizard. Advantage: Archer Repeat this every round for 3 more rounds, 4 rounds total. At this point, the Wizard will be low on power and must spend 2 rounds channeling to cast again. There after, he may cast twice ever three rounds. At the end of round 4, the total is: Wizard’s Orc: 10 wounds left Archer’s Orc: 6 wounds left Three rounds later, when the archer’s Orc is dead, the Wizards Orc will be at 8 wounds. As you can see, the Wizard is still weaker than the archer. The Wizard still must contend with miscasts. The Wizard still must make 2 rolls each round, once for channeling and once for casting – giving him twice the chance of failure. All this WITHOUT punching him in the kugelsachen with an extra <P>. Only when we discard the ‘1 success only’ caveat and allow boons, comets, and additional effects to count does the Wizard start creeping up in damage. Even then it’s only ignoring 1 soak, which in this case would change nothing since we are already at zero damage and ‘borrowing’ a wound. But this generosity also brings with it the potential for miscasts, and in this case, a 1 stress + 1 fatigue potential. Please be kind. Don’t stand on your caster’s kugelsachen.

A lot of it have been archived in the Strike to Stun 2nd Edition Forum. Look for the posts marked [Archive].

You got a hammer?!? All I got was a rock... No, it's just a hammer.

I ran some numbers just for fun. I’m sure I made a mistake somewhere (I didn’t spend a lot of time on it - lot of cut/paste), but it should be pretty close. Let’s do a test. For this test, we will use a spell and a bow. For this test we will assume that all rolls generate 1 success and no other effects (good or bad). Flame Blast (recharge 2) vs. Basic Ranged Shot (recharge 0) Test 1: Flame Blast vs. Basic Ranged Shot Both participants have 4 in their relevant statistics and are train in the relevant skills. The archer is armed with a standard Shortbow (DR:5, CR:3) and is using a basic action (Ranged Shot). The caster is armed with an attuned staff and is casting Rank: 1 Flame Blast. The targets are 2 Orcs (Def:1; Toughness 5; Soak:2; 14 Wound Threshold), armed with bows and miss every turn. All participants are in reckless stance. An extra <P> of difficulty will be added to casting for this test. The caster will not channel and cast in the same turn. The engagement takes place at medium range (and has no additional range modifiers assigned). Round 1: The Wizard Channels. Pool: <PP><BBB>®[W][Y] Result: +2 power, for a total of 6 power Archer fires. Pool: <P> <BBB>®[Y] Result: (5+4) – (5+2) = 2 damage Wizard’s Orc: 14 wounds left Archer’s Orc: 12 wounds left Note: The Wizard could potentially suffer 1 wound if he rolls 2 banes Note: The Archer does more damage than the Wizard. Advantage: Archer Round 2: The Wizard casts Flame Blast (Spellcraft(Int); 6 power). Pool: <PP><BBB>®[Y] Result: (4+4) – (5+2) = 1 damage Archer fires. Pool: <P> <BBB>®[Y] Result: (5+4) – (5+2) = 2 damage Wizard’s Orc: 13 wounds left Archer’s Orc: 10 wounds left Note: The Wizard has a higher difficulty to hit. Note: The Wizard could potentially suffer 2 chaos star miscasts. Note: The Archer does more damage than the Wizard. Note: At 1 success per channel, and not channeling and casting in the same round, it will now be 4 rounds before the Wizard can cast Flame Blast again. Advantage: Archer At the end of the 6th round, when the Wizard has cast again, the score will be: Wizard’s Orc: 12 wounds left Archer’s Orc: 2 wounds left Then the cycle starts again. Total of 6 rounds. Lightning (recharge 6) vs. Basic Ranged Shot (recharge 0) Test 2: Let’s try something different. Same as above, but substitute Flame Blast for the Celestial Wizards Lightning. The difference is, this is a Spellcraft vs Defense, so more dice for the Wizard. It also costs 7 instead of 6, so one more round of channeling for the Wizard. It also has a recharge of 6, so we’ll have to bump it up two round to 8 rounds total. At the end of the 8th round, when the Wizard has cast again, the score will be: Wizard’s Orc: 10 wounds left Archer’s Orc: 0 wounds left Then the cycle starts again. Total of 8 rounds. Magic Dart (recharge 0) vs. Basic Ranged Shot (recharge 0) Test 3: OK, let’s back to a basic spell – Magic Dart. Same as above. The difference is Magic Dart has no recharge, costs 3, and only has for a difficulty. But oops, Magic Dart doesn’t do enough damage to bypass the Orcs toughness and soak (damage and mitigation are equal, netting zero wounds). We will have to be satisfied with the ‘1 minimum damage’ rule. Round 1: The Wizard Channels. Pool: <PP><BBB>®[W][Y] Result: +2 power, for a total of 6 power Archer fires. Pool: <P> <BBB>®[Y] Result: (5+4) – (5+2) = 2 damage Wizard’s Orc: 14 wounds left Archer’s Orc: 12 wounds left Note: The Wizard could potentially suffer 1 wound if he rolls 2 banes Note: The Archer does more damage than the Wizard. Advantage: Archer Round 2: The Wizard casts Magic Dart (Spellcraft(Int); 3 power). Pool: <P><BBB>®[Y] Result: (3+4) – (5+2) = Minimum 1 damage Note: The Wizard has 3 power left Archer fires. Pool: <P> <BBB>®[Y] Result: (5+4) – (5+2) = 2 damage Wizard’s Orc: 13 wounds left Archer’s Orc: 10 wounds left Note: The Wizard could potentially suffer 1 chaos star miscast. Note: The Archer does more damage than the Wizard. Advantage: Archer Round 3: The Wizard casts Magic Dart (Spellcraft(Int); 3 power). Pool: <P><BBB>®[Y] Result: (3+4) – (5+2) = Minimum 1 damage Note: The Wizard has 0 power left Archer fires. Pool: <P> <BBB>®[Y] Result: (5+4) – (5+2) = 2 damage Wizard’s Orc: 12 wounds left Archer’s Orc: 8 wounds left Note: The Wizard could potentially suffer 1 chaos star miscast. Note: The Archer does more damage than the Wizard. Advantage: Archer The Wizard must now channel again – repeat rounds 1-3. In 7 rounds total, the archer’s Orc will be dead, and the Wizard’s Orc will have 9 wounds left. It looks to me like that extra <P> is killing the Wizard. Without it, he could channel (with an easier channeling test) and cast in the same turn for the same casting difficulty. He would still be behind (in all cases), and his rolls would be generally tougher (more risk, greater chance of failure) but he would be closer. The difference is, Wizards have better results, in the above listed cases, if we have the potential to roll other beneficial results, other than a single success. Therein lies the reason to choose a Wizard. Consequently, those other positive results also come with negative results...

I guess we'll have to disagree on this one. I understand your points, and I'm a heart beat away from thinking the same, but... I'd be interested to see how bad or well your casters perform and if they resent the added difficulty. My caster accepted his lot when I assigned the additional dice, but he was very discouraged and started wondering (aloud at times) what the benefit was to being a caster. He was very relieved (and a bit indignant) when I announced that we were going to try it without. We plan on removing it next week and trying that. I'll let you know how it goes.

Chipacabra said: I haven't found the rule itself, but I've found a rule that references the (imaginary?) rule. In the rules for the rally step, it says that spellcasters move one towards equilibrium just like they do during their end of turn. Yeah, this may have been where I got it. I'm not sure now. That would mean there are no automatic shifts toward equilibrium during combat, but only during the rally phase. If we can't find it soon, I'll update the caster quick reference sheet.

If I'm not mistaken: Chaos stars could have an entry on the spell. If you can't resolve all of the chaos stars, you draw a miscast card. The rules just say to 'resolve the miscast card'. It doesn't say it makes the spell fail (unless of course the miscast card does). You can get in the position where there are miscasts to resolve no matter if you succeed or fail at casting.

dvang said: See, I'm leaning the other way because I don't think that casters should channel and cast in the same phase very often. They almost HAVE to if they want to be any where near half as effective at damage output as say... anyone. If they don't channel and cast in the same round, then after the first round, they are casting every-other round. That means I would take a cross-eyed halfling with a pile of rocks over a caster if I wanted something dead. I think they are already getting their 'penalty' when they channel and cast in the same round. I mean, they have to roll twice (two chances to fail), and the cast is more difficult. That's just my opinion though.

I suppose you could do it either way, depending on how deadly you want it. When there's finally an official ruling on this, I'll bet it will say "It's like this, but you can do it like this instead if you want it to be [more/less] dangerous. I'm sacrificing and tolerating 'a few spells can't fail if you cast them under optimal conditions' to avoid 'high level spells are too dangerous to even consider casting'. I think that extra <P> can make things just TOO dangerous. There are cases where you will have <PPPP>, that has the possibility of 4 chaos stars. I think 3 is bad enough without adding another, but then I've killed characters already so I'm cautious of making things more difficult.

You don't miscast them. They are generally simple spells (like Magic Dart). Some are less simple, and contain multiple , so, they can still fail but can be assumed to be reliable enough that there is no possibility of a miscast (there aren't a lot of spells like that). Keep in mind that if you channel, there's still a <P> added to the roll. So, even a reliable spell can miscast if you are not careful.

Updates to 'Summary' based on this thread. The last 3 bullets were added: • If you fail to achieve at least one ‘success’ during an action card resolution roll, negative or beneficial boon and bane side effects on the card, or from other sources, may still be activated. • ‘Effects’ are defined as lines that are not ‘Success Lines’, or simply Boon, Bane, Comet, or Chaos Star effects as well as standard effects like fatigue and stress reclamation, or boon and bane effects from talents, conditions, and other sources. • Damage is defined as any amount of damage (damage potential minus mitigation), positive, negative, or zero in value. Failure to do damage, due to a failed action card roll for example, would be considered NULL damage, or no damage. • If the damage of a successful attack is zero or less than zero, the attack still generates a minimum of 1 wound. • If the damage is not NULL, but is equal to zero or less, and critical effects are generated, those crits are converted to standard wounds and added to the minimum 1 wound for a total damage done to the target. Note: This is post damage mitigation calculation so toughness and soak have already been considered. • If you fail to generate a success during an action card resolution roll, and so have NULL or no damage, any crits generated have no effect and are ignored. • Any "critical" words without a plus are non-cumulative criticals. Anything with a plus is cumulative. So, two "inflicts criticals" will only cause 1 critical. Two "+1 critical" will inflict 2 criticals. A "inflicts critical" and a "+1 critical" will also cause 2 criticals. • Boon effects do not apply if they are in directly reliant on a successful hit and a success is not generated. If you miss, you have no potential damage and thus cannot change wounds into criticals. If the action gave you a free maneuver, for example, you could still get that boon effect. • This is an assumption, needs official statement: If the rules say it "converts a wound into a critical" rather than "inflicts a critical", it is a cumulative critical effect, like a "+1 critical". Note: The fact this is an assumption also means it is also unclear if a triggered weapon critical stacks with other crits. A weapon’s CR ‘converts a wound into a critical’. This implies that it is a +1 crit and thus will stack (though it can only be triggered once, like other triggers). Note: While the last line is an assumption, I believe it to be correct.

Scrumblydumpus said: So my group cant quite figure out how the coordinated strike action works. I understand the single success (one hammer) effect, but not... well... the entire rest of the card. could someone spell it out for me please? Several Coordinated Strikes comes come at and after the 42 second mark

Very awesome! Just a note, the text at the bottom (with the symbols) doesn't print very well in black and white. At least it doesn't on my Cannon laser. It's almost like the white border around the letters is taking precedence. If you replaced the symbol notes (which won't be used after the 1st or 2nd games) with a blank puzzle piece track (froo made some blank outline pieces), then you could use your stance tracking token on the sheet itself and free up those tracking pieces. Also, if it were me (read this as 'if I had any skills in this area'), I would move the equipment and notes to the back and leave that area to put wound and condition cards on. It's about the right size for 2 side-by-side cards the same size as the wound and condition cards.

Here's a paste of a long conversation, else where in this forum, where a lot of these things were covered. Though we haven't had an official response yet, no one has corrected the solutions that follow. As a side note, I sent several questions to FFG. I got a reply back stating that mine and many other questions were being compiled into a FAQ as we speak. YEA! [PASTE] The Question is: Can you trigger boon and bane effects on an action card, even if you fail to succeed during the action roll? dvang said: Quote: "Conversely, a character might fail to accomplish his action, but still trigger some beneficial side effect from boons." This says exactly that, if you miss (fail the attack action) you can still trigger boons from the side effect lines. This is where I had problems; ‘beneficial side effect’ could mean the reduction of stress or fatigue available at all times (and not on a card at all), or effects from talents or conditions. Thus, it could be saying, “Conversely, a character might fail to accomplish his action, but still trigger some beneficial side effect from boons such as the regeneration of fatigue or stress.” However, I think it is saying, “Conversely, a character might fail to accomplish his action, but still trigger some beneficial side effect from boon results on the action card or elsewhere.” dvang said: There is no "minimum of 1 wound to use a critical". No, there’s not, but it’s an incidental effect of the process. If you hit and do zero or less wounds, the ‘1 wound minimum’ kicks in. Consequently, this same ‘condition’ causes crits to be converted to wounds. So, if you hit and you do zero or less wounds, there is a minimum of 1 wound. If, during this resolution, you generate crits from card effects or from weapon CR ratings, those crits would be converted to normal wounds and added to the total. So, ‘A successful attack that generates zero or few wounds = Minimum 1 wound, +1 wound per critical generated’. Summary: • If you fail to achieve at least one ‘success’ during an action card resolution roll, negative or beneficial boon and bane side effects on the card, or from other sources, may still be activated. • ‘Effects’ are defined as lines that are not ‘Success Lines’, or simply Boon, Bane, Comet, or Chaos Star effects as well as standard effects like fatigue and stress reclamation, or boon and bane effects from talents, conditions, and other sources. • Damage is defined as any amount of damage (damage potential minus mitigation), positive, negative, or zero in value. Failure to do damage, due to a failed action card roll for example, would be considered NULL damage, or no damage. • If the damage of a successful attack is zero or less than zero, the attack still generates a minimum of 1 wound. • If the damage is not NULL, but is equal to zero or less, and critical effects are generated, those crits are converted to standard wounds and added to the minimum 1 wound for a total damage done to the target. Note: This is post damage mitigation calculation so toughness and soak have already been considered. • If you fail to generate a success during an action card resolution roll, and so have NULL or no damage, any crits generated have no effect and are ignored. I hope I didn’t muddy things up trying to logic this problem into submission (yeah, I used logic as a verb). Short Answer: Question: Can you trigger boon and bane effects on an action card, even if you fail to succeed during the action card roll? Answer: Yes. This would also apply to other effects listed on the action card such as a Comet or a Chaos Star. Short Answer: Question: If you fail to hit, can you still spend boons on crits and do damage anyway. Answer: Technically, you can buy them, but they have no effect. You can only ‘convert crits to damage’ on a successful hit in which the total damage is zero or less. Thanks to dvang for helping me bounce this around.

froo said: The ability to purchase more of the standee bases, so that we can print off our own monsters. Perhaps something with a second slot in it so we can put numbered tracking tokens into it so that we could track multiple monsters without getting mixed up. (maybe even just do this with rings with numbers on them in the same vein you have the stance rings) They wont fit the thick ones, but they will fit ones you print. More info here

Sorenthion said: I still can't find where it says you gain/lose 1 power if you are under/above equilibrium. All I'm seeing is where it just says you slowly recharge or lose power. Is there anywhere in the book where it clearly states that it's 1 power per turn? Pfft... I can't find it either now. Perhaps I imagined it. If I come across it again, I'll post it here. Otherwise assume that I am out of my mind.

Most excellent start. You are free to add my material (in my sig) to the downloads section.

dvang said: Adding an extra <P> to casters could make some spells difficult to cast indeed. Rank 1 Flameblast, for example, a staple Bright Wizard spell, would incur <PPP> to cast if you use a default <P> and channel in the same round. Then they should power up before they cast, so they aren't Channeling and casting in the same round. Channeling and casting in the same round *should* be difficult. It's taking 2 actions in the same round. i see your point, but that would still leave them with <PP>, where as an archer could do the same (or greater, depending on the bow) damage with a bow with only a <P> difficulty. I think that's gimping casters. I checked, most direct damage spells (firing an arrow-like missile) are Spellcraft-vs-Defense. So, it's essentially the same thing, except a cast has to bother with channeling and a greater chance of failure. Casters are supposed to be powerful. They run the risk of going insane. They could blow themselves up if they mismanage their power. They take a lot of risks. There has to be a payoff there somewhere... With only the difficulty listed on the card, if they don't channel and cast a missile like spell, it's close to the same difficulty, range, and damage of a bow shot. They just have to worry about turning into a gibbering pile of goo, but that's their problem. The next and subsequent turns, they will likely be forced to channel to stay even close to the archers damage output, but at a much increased risk! And that's without adding the extra <P>! It gets worse in melee as a lot of spells state 'Add <P> if engaged with an enemy'. So let's say our imaginary protagonist, Accolyte Cannon McFodder, is in combat. That goblin, with only one hitpoint left decides to go for the gold and charge the Accolyte, catching him off guard and low on power. He channels (because it's after round 1 and he's forced to), and casts his most wimpy spell (but one that has the best chance of succeeding) Magic Dart. His difficulty, without adding extra challenge dice will be: For the card <P> For channeling <P> For being engaged and that's just for a basic cantrip every caster learns on his first day of Wizard Kindergarten! That's 2 chances for a miscast. I think this situation can best be .Take that same Wizard, not engage, on the first round of combat (so no need to channel), fresh and in full possession of all his faculties. I don't think it's unreasonable that he would only have to his cast - it's a cantrip. Remember has no chaos star. There's no reason he should be sucked into the warp for a practice spell. Keep in mind that the extra difficulty die doesn't just increase the chance of failure. It also increases the chance of miscast. Be careful you don't wreck them in their first fights!

Here's how we will be handling it. This is a clip from an email sent to my group: [Rule] Firing into a melee engagement: No one likes accidentally hitting a friendly in combat. While accurate, it's not a fun rule. But, you have to admit, it could be dangerous. Someone could lose an eye! One would assume that if one were firing into a melee that included friends, they would be very careful. Conservative: Firing into melee combat in a conservative state will cost one additional recharge to the action card used (due to the extra aiming time). If the action has a zero recharge value, it will add 2 recharge tokens to the action card (essentially making it unusable for one turn as a recharge token is removed at the end of your turn). A miss is a miss unless the card states otherwise. Reckless: Firing into melee combat in a reckless state incurs a penalty to the shot. A miss is a miss unless the card states otherwise. Optionally, we could add 1 stress to the shooter on a miss (sort of a "Whew! That was close!" thing). [Rule] I think combat is pretty dangerous already without adding danger elements, however, if you wanted to up the stakes you could add something like: {S} A randomly determined friendly takes 1 unmitigatable wound {SS} A randomly determined friendly takes normal damage

doc_cthulhu said: As for the cards I've no idea why they should be "added" to the sheet. For now I'm going with that not being necessary. They can easily be added to the borders like Fatigue and Stress though. Check this one out Doc: Shadowspawn's Character Sheet As you can see, he didn't name them, he just made anchors that say 'TALENT'. That keeps them generic so any talent can be socketed there.

Sweet! Cut/Paste gaming goodness!

Sure, as long as they are near each other, in the same engagement for example, 1 stand up (or mini) could represent anything you want.

I would soooo be behind this. That's a great idea.

There's probably a lot of questions queued up. Usually is on release of a new RPG. If I had to guess, I'd say they were compiling them for a FAQ and/or Errata.

Check out some of the reviews in the Emperor's Decree section. There's also a pretty complete review at Strike to Stun.