r_b_bergstrom
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Posts posted by r_b_bergstrom
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Every useless success might be an extra damage like the star wars rpg
The GM's Toolkit has an optional rule that's similar. Each extra success is +1 damage, up to a maximum damage bonus equal to your Ranks in the relevant skill. I proposed using that rule to one of my players, and he balked at the idea, since PCs are so fragile already. He kinda has a point. A PC typically goes down with the second hit, unless they're wearing a lot of armor.
It also wouldn't solve the parallel issue of using reckless dice on non-attack actions. Extending that would be intuitive, but a bit clunky and dubiously balanced. Each extra success increases a numerical value associated with the action (duration for conditions, steps on a progress tracker, additional healing or fatigue mitigation, etc) by 1, up to a maximum set by your skill level. It could work, but there'd certainly be ripple effects.
But again, I'm a little off-topic for the thread, and don't mean to hijack it.
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I recently ran a big fight in the sewers against skaven. I couldn't help but notice that the ratmen don't have Night Vision. Seems like an oversight. How on earth do Skaven survive and thrive in an underground environment? Lots of lamps? Warpstone nightlights?
Their Observation checks are still decent because of their Scent ability, but everything else was penalized by 2 or more misfortune in the dark. A yellow die on Observation doesn't really make up for 2 black on your attack rolls. Especially for an NPC, since that Observation yellow is at best converted into a black die on the PCs Stealth check.
Just checked the 2nd Ed sourcebook: Old World Bestiary. They had Night Vision in 2nd Ed, but for reasons unknown it was dropped for 3rd Ed.
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I accidentally played with higher difficulty early on. Misinterpreted what they meant when they said "Average" difficulty is 2 dice. It was not an improvement. So many PCs falling off the end of piers or out of trees. Certain location cards became really dangerous, and spellcasting was suicidal. The total difficulty wasn't a problem, just the increased frequency of Chaos Stars.
That said, simply buffing up the potency of active defenses would probably work out okay.
The math of the Red dice works out such that they only keep up with the green dice if the pool is small or the difficulty high. For low-difficulty high-characteristic rolls using action cards, green dice are much better. The bonus successes the red dice add are usually wasted (only the first 3 successes matter). Increasing defenses could help even that out. That is a "balancing the dice" issue, but I suppose it's a little off-topic for this thread. My bad.
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We use the singleton rule, where only 1 PC can buy any given card. Character niche has been a bit of an issue, and the Dwarf and Wizard can get kinda competitive about damage output and territorial about skills. The jury is still out on whether limiting each card to one character has helped or exacerbated those envy issues. The other two have no interest in taking part in that competition.
It definitely makes the characters more diverse, though, and I think that's a good thing. We see more social and support actions than I initially expected, and that's kinda cool. Everyone seems to be having fun.
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Does all Action cards have 1 challenge dice as default on them? or just the ones with vs. Target Defence
No.
If it says "vs Target Defence" you roll 1 Purple die, plus Black Dice equal to their Defence rating, plus any extra dice shown in the upper left corner of the card.
If it says "vs Target {insert skill and characterstic here}" you roll Purple dice and Black Dice based on the Opposed check chart in the rule book, plus any extra dice shown in the upper left corner of the card. The chart tends to make opposed checks much harder than normal attacks.
In all other cases that I can think of, you roll only the Purple and Black dice shown in the upper left corner of the card.
The GM is always freely empowered to modify difficulties as he or she sees fit, but those are the defaults.
If there's no action card involved, the GM sets whatever difficulty they feel is appropriate. Note however that Average (2d) Difficulty is very poorly named. 2 Purple is definitely above the actual average difficulty of most action cards.
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It's important to remember Intuition is not mind reading or even lie detecting, it's "there something more, he's hiding something, he's nervous, he's very glad you asked that, he's holding back". It's also not evidence to convince a 3rd party.
I agree it's not mind-reading, nor is it evidence to convince an NPC 3rd party.
However, it is explicitly lie detecting.
Per the Player's Guide, page 22:
"Intuition (Int) Basic Skill. The ability to trust instincts about people, places and things. The gut feeling that lets a character know if someone is lying, ...
Specialisation options: detect lies, ..."
So "I am not the Black Cowl" (Intuition alarm, he's holding back/hiding something) - is it that he is the Black Cowl or is it that he is pretty sure he knows who is but not willing to reveal it or something else....
And truly lastly, the Black Cowl will surely spot you spotting them - if you do, the next thing that happens is that you've got a sword sticking right through you.
The (potential) issue is not the Black Cowl. The Cowl has plenty of ways to cover his tracks, or make the PCs regret having been so bold.
The issue is the other suspects, being innocent and ignorant, are very easy to cross off your suspect list. Per the notes on pages 58 to 59 of the adventure, the two major NPCs that aren't the Black Cowl have officially never heard of the Black Cowl prior to the Witch-hunter showing up at the party on Day 8. You can cross them off your suspect list by simply asking them on first contact "have you heard anything about this mysterious crime boss who wears a black cowl?" Since the Black Cowl is mentioned on a few of the PCs Background cards, that's not an unreasonable question for them to ask right away.
The stock response from 2 of the 3 major suspects is basically either "No, I've never heard of him" or "the witch-hunter mentioned him yesterday, but I'd never heard of him before that" depending on whether you ask the first or second time you see that NPC. Either response, as written, would allow for a low-risk intuition check from the PCs to find out if this statement is a lie.
There are several routes around this problem.
- You could really obfuscate your rolls. The players don't know the real difficulty of the check, so they can't be sure they didn't need another success to get to the truth.
- You could crank up the Intuition difficulty due to plot relevance and/or some crazy Tzeentchian influence, openly and regardless of who they're interviewing. Then apply some really nasty chaos-star or bane consequences if the PCs botch the roll. Difficulty 4 purple, and double chaos stars means you give offense and make a permanent enemy even if the NPC was innocent. Or whatever.
- Each NPC can be given a minor secret to cover up, so that they're all lying a little bit. Perhaps they were approached by the Black Cowl (or one of his minions) with a bribe or blackmail. They tell the PCs they'd never heard of him, but a good roll reveals this to be untrue. Now you still have to ferret out exactly what it all means, but at least there's no single roll that eliminates 33% of all possible suspects.
- You could bolster the cast list with extra nobles and guild leaders so that there aren't 3 or 4 obvious Black Cowl suspects. That's a lot of work.
There's a lot of ways to handle it, but it could blindside the GM if you aren't prepared. It's potentially a critical issue. I find it a little surprising the adventure as written doesn't offer any advice on the topic at all.
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Heads up about PCs and Intuition checks: If the PCs start narrowing in on the Black Cowl, they may start throwing Intuition checks at the various NPCs that could potentially be behind the mask. GMs need to be prepared for that.
Baerfaust in particular is a real easy suspect to eliminate if he's NOT the cowl, due to his low Fellowship and lack of Guile. If they're using Intuition on him, remember to add his Fierce Confidence ability as 3 black on the roll. The overall difficulty will still be low, but the big pile of black dice may raise just enough doubts. What you really don't want is for the PCs to fail the check but still infer clues out of the difficulty.
Other ideas on how to discourage metagaming on Observation and Intuition checks: http://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/86947-observation-tests/
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I don't like making secret rolls for the PCs. There's plenty of mechanics that give players some degree of control over their rolls, and if the GM rolls without the PCs knowing that you're basically undercutting some of their character power. Also, given the constant incremental Advancement in the system, it's relatively easy for the GM to forget that a PC had a particular option the player is unlikely to overlook if you ask them to roll.
Examples: Stance, Fortune Points, Assists, and the rerolls granted by various blessings, career abilities (gambler, etc) , and some runes and items.
Fortune points in particular seem a sticky wicket to me, since they don't necessarily represent the character doing or knowing anything in order for the player to use them. They're just fate and narrative power, which certainly seems applicable to intuition and observation checks.
My table includes a Runesmith and a Ranald Initiate turned Gambler, so it's really a no-go with my current group.
Related thread with brainstorm list of ways to keep metaknowledge about Observation checks from interfering in the mystery / scenario: http://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/86947-observation-tests/
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Heroes Call has some additional optional rules for the various career tiers Intermediate/Advanced/Elite/Heroic becoming available at Rank 2/3/4/5, respectively. It's an optional rule, though, so if the GM wants you can make all of those available starting at Rank 2 as well.
Pedro Lunaris reacted to this -
Stealing stuff from other adventures, so SPOILERS:
My PCs expressed an interest in Theodosius Von Tuchtenhagen, who's barely more than a footnote in the adventure. If you need more character development on him, the Black Fire Pass adventure presents some extra annoying habits, and makes him a murderer, too. His pet wizard has a different name and slightly different description there. I had need for a minor conspiracy to embroil him and one of the PCs fathers in. So I made them both members of The Gourmand Society from Lure of Power. Pretty minor stuff in the big picture, but useful for flavor.
My PCs were very active with various subplots, and it took 12 sessions to get to the Triad fight. They'd been to the Tannery and Sluice Drain on day 4 thanks to a Ranaldian blessing, and killed a bunch of skaven henchmen then. So I needed to add a little something to the Triad fight to adjust for their XP and make it more interesting.
So I stole the final chapter of The Edge of Night. It's got (loose) rules for trudging through a booby-trapped sewer, followed by a 3-room fight against skaven. I added 12 clanrat henchmen and 1 non-hench gutter-runner to the Triad, and it proved a good challenge for a 2nd-rank Knight of Myrmidia, Trollslayer, Bright Wizard and Ranaldite. Set it up like Edge of Night's fight. Henchmen and gutter-runner in front room. Skrabb & Grott in second room and cause a rally step when they join the fight. Back room had Krasskulk busy forging the bell. 1 PC was KO'd but none died. Worked like a charm, and felt properly climactic. It was a lot of cards (actions and monster) though, and took up a ton of table and mental space. Consider yourselves warned.
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The player at my table with "Fear Me!" seems to have stopped using it. Last session, the party ambushed three groups of skaven henchmen, and even though he was going before them, he chose not to use it. He figured any of his Melee Attacks were likely to deal 6 to 9 wounds after soak, whereas the Fear Me would at best do about half that in stress-damage split between the three stacks. Running the numbers after the fact, I agree with his gut instinct on that. A typical clanrat henchman has a 66% chance to pass Fear 1, and a 95% chance to not be Frightened, and that's before any bonuses from A/C/E.
I think the issue here is the henchmen rules. Physical attacks are effectively buffed up vs henchmen, but psychological effects aren't. Henchmen have about 1/3 the wounds on non-henchman, take bonus damage from crits, and share wounds. A single Basic Attack can kill 2 to 4 with a good roll. Fear and Terror, on the other hand, are no better against Henchmen than they are against named characters. The henchman rules make it easier to kill a henchman, but do nothing to make it easier to get him to retreat or surrender.
A couple possible solutions spring to mind:
- I could just stop using henchmen, but then I'd have to settle for much smaller fight scenes (or a lot of dead PCs).
- I could make henchmen just auto-fail the fear test, but that could be a problem if a PC ever gains Fear 3. It's probably too good overall, at least if I keep interpreting the Fatigue as Wounds. If it were simply knocking down A/C/E that might be better balanced. I haven't been doing that, because letting A/C/E absorb fatigue like that also buffs up the monsters. Hmm.
- I could add an extra purple die to all henchman Fear and Terror tests. That would drop the clanrat fear test success (and no-bane) rates from 66% (and 95%) to 44% (and 88%). Total stress-damage would be 8 points split between the three henchman groups, so it's about on par with just using a Melee Attack.
- I could rely more heavily on Morale trackers, and make them shorter. Every time I've used them, they've been kind of extraneous, as by the time the monster's morale broke there wasn't more than 1 monster left. Maybe I'm making the trackers too long, or not moving the counter often enough. I'm not sure what exchange rates I'd have to set up to make Fear 1 move the Morale tracker further than simply killing 3 of their comrades would. I dunno.
Anyone got any other ideas I'm overlooking?
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If you're rolling for the NPCs, Fear 1 will usually be no big deal, but every once in a blue moon it will completely wreck someone. This is because two banes are much worse than failure on most Fear checks. On a Fear 1 check, Failure means just 1 stress (or wound), which is usually not a big deal. Double-banes means 1 stress (or wound) per turn, plus a reduction of all the victim's future dice pools. A pretty typical henchman Discipline pool would be 1 red, 2 blue, and 1 white vs 1 purple (assuming Fear 1). 30% chance to fail, and only a 7% chance for double-banes. About 1 roll in 200 will both fail and also generates the 2 banes. That's pretty unreliable, but when it happens it would be pretty memorable.
Just a specification: the Frightened condition (that a character receives if he or she generates 2 banes in a Fear or in a Terror test) only diminishes chances of succeeding (converting one less die to a stance die) and generates stress if the character with the condition stays engages with the source of the condition. So what 2 banes would translate is the frightened character trying to disengage from the source if possible.
You're right in that most Frightened characters are going to disengage on their next action. My 1 stress per turn was assuming the Fear source pursues you, which they usually would.
I now see there's actual several ways to interpret the text on pages 90 & 93 of the Player's Guide and also the Frightened card. Ambiguity and ripple effects abound.
The phrase "first confronts the creature" on page 90 kinda sounds like it means "when first engaged". If so, this creates a paradox. How could you ever resolve Thundering Shot? That action can only be used if disengaged, but it gives the attack Fear 1. That makes no sense, so "first confronts the creature or situation" must mean "when you first see the creature or situation" instead of requiring engagement.
If that's the correct intepretation (and I believe it is), then it seems to me that the "Dependent" effect of Frightened is not based on being engaged. It's still a little vague, but if most Fear checks are going to happen when you first see the Fear source (and thus aren't engaged), having Frightened only last while engaged would make Frightened really weak. You'd almost always get over it before even taking a Stress.
Instead it seems to me like the phrase "as long as the circumstance mandating the effect exists" on page 93 is more likely to mean (at least in the case of Frightened) "until the end of the encounter". I'm a little uncomfortable about how that reads so much into the rules, but it seems more functional and logical. It doesn't render Frightened completely pointless the way the other interpretation would, and it works for cases of Thundering Shot or fights where you first see the Greater Daemon at Medium Range. Seems to me that disengaging only protects you from the effects of Frightened while you're disengaged, it doesn't necessarily make Frightened go away... but that's just my interpretation.
Then there's the issue of whether or not the engagement clause on the first sentence / effect of the Frightened condition also applies to the second sentence / effect on that card. I'd been reading them as two independent effects, but I see now that's not the only way to parse it.
Hmm...
I think I would only permit it to have effect on a group of adversaries (rather than on a single target) as a Sigmar's Comet effect. But one thing comes to my mind: discussing the Blunderbuss, someone (wasn't it you, r_b?) came up with the definition that an engagement could be a target. But I'm thinking only if the specification is target engagement, right? If I'm not mistaken, a lot of cards would really change if "target" could be an individual or an engagement.
The Blunderbuss example is irrelevant here. Blunderbuss affects a whole engagement only because the Blast quality (page 98) says it does. You can only target an entire engagement if a card or power says you can, and that's pretty rare if you aren't using a Blunderbuss.
In the case of Fear Me, the action targets a single victim. Only that victim is Influenced, and only that victim can get the Stress or black die from Fear Me's boon lines.
However, Fear Me also gives the active character a Fear Rating (Fear 1 or Fear 2) for several turns. Per the rules discussed above, Fear ratings affect everyone nearby, as soon as they "first confront the creature or situation", whatever that means. So only 1 target is Influenced, but everyone nearby has to take a Fear test.
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The numbers are on a scale from 1 to 5, with the former meaning that that the organisations in question despise each other, and the latter meaning that they are close allies.
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- Those who follow warrior gods typically have a bit more respect the wielders of winds that are potent on the field of battle.
- Since wizards are intellectuals and seekers of knowledge, they share quite a bit of common ground with the devotees of Myrmidia and Verena, as these goddesses are patrons of learning.
You list two good reasons for the Cult of Myrmidia, Goddess of Strategy and Martial Prowess, to like a) battle wizards and b) wizards in general. Despite those two good reasons, you list the relations between her cult and the bright wizards at a very low "2". That puzzles me.
Also, you gave Sigmar's cult very high opinions of wizards across the board. Since the Witchhunters are the Templars of Sigmar, that seems like a mistake. Shouldn't devout Sigmarites be very suspicious of wizards?
EDIT: Rather than a 1 to 5 scale that could be misinterpreted, it may be more useful to either use words describing the relationship ("allies", "neutral", "suspicious", etc) or possibly dice codes (2 white to 2 black) for social checks. Either would make this chart easier to use in the middle of a gaming session.
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It is a little silly when they also publish an advanced version of the career, also with the Specialist trait. Pistolier and Outrider both have "Specialist", for example, and clearly they are specialists in shooting and riding and other pistolkorps-y things but there's no XP break for it.
It's a very minor gripe, I suppose, but I wish that "Specialist" was instead a half dozen different traits so they could have careers build on them. Sort of like how the dwarven "Slayer" careers have their own trait.
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You are correct. Injury level is defined on page 87 of the Player's Guide. Easy (1d) if the target has only normal wounds. Average (2d) if they have one or more critical wounds. To that you add the difficulty modifier in the upper left of the card, and potentially the additional purple mentioned on the card if you are engaged with an enemy. So a total of 2 to 4 purple on the roll, or exactly 3 purple in your example.
While we're on the topic of healing magic and the Player's Guide: on page 89 of that book is a "new" rule limiting all healing methods (including this blessing) to one successful use per patient per day. It's worth mentioning because you'd never assume that limit from just reading the card or the original core set rulebook.
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Page 47 of the Player's Guide:
"During career transitions the Specialist trait is never considered compatible -- even with another career with the Specialist trait."
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I'm amazed by the people thinking about which character is in front and which is in the back of an engagement. One of the aspects I like the most about 3 ed is the abstract measurements. I think of an engagement (of combat, actually) as a constantly changing mess. I would describe someone being on the front of a blast shot by the damage taken, not by a previsouly determined position.
I agree completely. That was exactly my reaction to this discussion. Doesn't the rulebook compare engagements to rugby scrums?
The other thing is about blackpowder in general. I think I'm going to start house ruling all "regular" blackpowder weapons have a Reload 2 quality (I just made that up): they need 2 Reload manoeuvres, and add 1 challenge per Reload manouevre not made when it shoots. This 2 manouevres doesn't need to be done together, they can actually be splitted between diferent actions if the player so wishes. And that means it's more difficult to reload a blackpowder than a crossbow (yes, even a Hochland Rifle).One thing to keep in mind in regards to that is their price. As-is, blackpowder weapons are pretty much not worth it, and your change would make it more so.
Handgun vs Crossbow comparison: Both do the same base damage, take 2 hands and a Reload. The handgun has Pierce 1, and a better CR, but it also has less range and the Unreliable trait. That either breaks even or maybe very slightly favors the handgun. But the handgun costs 13 times as much as the crossbow.
If you add a second reload on the handgun, it'll never see any use. At least not at that price. So if you're going to bump up the Reload rating, I'd consider either dropping the price or increasing the damage by a point. Something to compensate, or else your attempt to add flavor may effectively remove flavor (by removing all chance of such items getting used by the PCs). Just a thought.
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Here's a dozen possible options you could pick from:
1) Only allow one check per location or clue, ever. Let the PC with the best Observation check, and all others in the room add white dice for assisting. If they ask to check there again, explain that the consequence of failure was that their characters are now convinced there's nothing there. Just like how failing a Charm roll might actually upset the NPC you wanted to charm. Or like how failing an attack roll means the foe gets to counterattack before your next action.
2) Only allow one check per day or per act. This is the less extreme version of the above method. You're temporarily convinced there's nothing there, but you can come back later with a fresh perspective after thinking about it for a while.
3) Allow additional attempts on the spot, but make each subsequent roll have escalating difficulty. Ever have that experience of looking for your lost keys and you search the same room again and again only to eventually find it in plain sight somewhere you just could not think to look at? So frustrating, right? You can simulate that by adding +1 purple per check that preceded it. Eventually the banes and chaos stars will start to look daunting.
4) Allow the rolls, but award Stress and/or Party Tension for each one after the first. "I all ready looked over there, Frederick, I'm tellin' you it's not there!"
5) Make each subsequent search take longer, or make more noise. Eventually an NPC will hear them or walk in on them. Can be combined with methods #3 or #4. These are great bane and chaos star consequences, for example.
6) Make your rolls per room instead of per sub-location within the room. The scenario says there's a 3-die test for checking the shelves. Don't roll when they check the shelves, roll when they check the room in general. Difficulty is 4 dice if they don't go into detail, reduced to 3 dice (or even 3 purple plus 1 white) if they specifically mention the shelf.
7) Use the die roll only if the PCs search the room but fail to mention the specific part of the room the clue is in. If they specifically check the shelf, they automatically find the thing that's hidden there. If they just toss the room, they roll the 3-dice.
8) Reduce all search difficulties everywhere to some standard number you're okay with, probably 1 or 2 purple. Use that same difficulty whether the hidden thing is plot-critical, trivial, or completely nonexistent. It's a bonus to the GM in that the PCs can't metagame the difficulties, but also a bonus to the PCs in that the hardest difficulties have been reduced. Everybody wins.
9) Make all searches have a difficulty of exactly 1 purple, but with a variable (hidden) number of successes needed to reveal the clue. Similar to the mechanics the game uses for First Aid checks, and the recovery rolls from Diseases/Insanities/Criticals. The 1 purple is so there's a chance of stress or location-specific consequences. If the scenario notes call for a 3-difficulty die roll, translate that to mean they need a net of 3 successes to actually find the clue. Tell the players that this is the way you're handling it from now on, but never tell them the actual number of successes needed to find a specific clue in a specific place.
10) Base the difficulties on who hid it, not how well they hid it. An NPC who's very careful and secretive sets a 3 or 4 die search die difficulty on his bedroom and office even if there's nothing there. Let the PCs know that's how it's going to work. They still get metagamy info, but it's more about the personality of the NPC instead of revealing "the clue is on this shelf somewhere". It's worth noting that "NPC is private and detail-oriented" does not mean "NPC is hiding an evil secret" but either could result in high purples on the search.
11) Take the approach that the Gumshoe RPGs use: Clues are meant to be discovered, they exist to advance the plot. Make clue discovery automatic if the player's search the right places. No rolls at all. Fast and simple, and it favors the players so most of them won't complain. One small problem is that Intelligence and Observation are slightly devalued this way, so it might not be an ideal method if a PC has invested heavily in those stats. (As those with low Int + Obs will still his spotlight moments.)
12) Make clue discovery automatic so the plot doesn't stall out, but still roll the normal number of dice just for the bane & chaos-star results. If you technically failed the roll, you still get the clues, but it means you've left evidence of your tampering that the villain will later notice. This keeps the plot from stalling out (which can often happen if the PCs miss a vital clue) but it still rewards players for investing in Intelligence and Observation.
Hope at least one of those (or a combination of a few of them) is helpful to you. Personally, I've been using method #1, but I'll probably swap to #9 or #12 now that I've thought more about it.
Pedro Lunaris and Emirikol reacted to this -
As the others have said, don't be reluctant to make the PCs inaction lead to consequences.
I'm not so fond of the idea of an XP penalty, but there's plenty of other ways to use the mechanics to reinforce the storyline. For example:
The nemesis organization sheets are great for keeping the players informed and on-task, via their Agenda and Stability tracks. Even if you don't have a sheet that matches your storyline, you can just set up a progress tracker to do roughly the same thing. Put a couple of event markers on it, and figure out some consequences if the marker gets there. Then get really overt about moving the tracker. If the PCs let time pass without acting against the villains, move their marker closer to doom, and don't be shy about what it represents. At the end of each session, write down what space the tracker is on, and when you set it up again the next session you should recount to the players what actions (or inaction) made it move to its current position. If the PCs have enough clues to understand the villain's goal, tell them "see this next event marker? That's the point at which he summons a greater demon to destroy the village." That should get them motivated.
As the Player's Guide suggests, you should give out a fortune point with each discovered clue, and another when they defeat a henchman or move to stymie the villain in any significant way. This reinforces and rewards things they do that advance the plot.
You could make up some clue cards for major plot points, and hand them out when the players find out details. This gives tacit acknowledgement that the thing they found out is really important. Taking it a step further, you could make each clue card do double duty - it lists the clue itself as well as a bonus they can trade it in for when confronting the villain.
- You've figured out how the bad guy is killing people, so this card gives you a bonus yellow die on your resilience checks against his poison.
- You're so fired up over the innocent people he's murdered, so you can trade this clue card in for +1 damage vs the villain.
- This clue is the proof of the villain's evil plans, so it's your get out of jail free card you can use to get the city watch to look the other way when you murder the bastard. etc.
If the players uncover the villain, but walk away from him, overtly bump the villain's power. He knows you're on to him, and it's just a matter of time till you come for him. He doesn't have to be subtle now, and starts walking around openly armed and armored, or enchanted, or surrounded by guards. If they'd taken him out when they first figured it out, he'd have rolled over easy, but now he's had time to prepare. Don't be subtle about it. Put the bonuses on the table in an obvious way. Make a villain talent or condition called "The PCs are on to me!" and increases his rolls or damage or something. Make a big deal of fetching monster cards out of your box or binder to be his bodyguards (or better yet, the assassins he sends after the PCs). As Valvorik suggested, give them corruption for pleasing the chaos gods when they decide not to expose the villain's evil ways.
Or just let the villain win. It's perfectly in keeping with the Warhammer setting. Innocents die. Demons are summoned. The town burns to the ground. The Elector Count dies and is replaced by a paranoid and heavy-handed despot. Chances are your players will take it better than you think they will. I ran an Amber campaign where the PCs dithered so long I literally had the villain succeed in destroying the universe and killing everyone. I expected the players to be upset, but they took it really well and excitedly signed up on the spot for the next campaign I ran regardless of the system or setting.
Pedro Lunaris reacted to this -
I think the reason people worry about the opposed checks is they think it's too easy.
Which is just plain weird, given that most opposed checks end up with 1 to 2 purple difficulty. Default difficulty for most other actions is actually lower than that. Attacks are 1 purple, and there's plenty of printed action cards with zero difficulty. I'm not disagreeing with you, I've heard the same complaints and I just don't understand them. If you raise the difficulty on opposed checks you're basically making those actions just that much worse than all the other action cards. Seems weird to me.
A better reason to be unhappy with opposed checks is because they're asymmetrical, especially if one or both participants have lots of yellow dice (since the defender's yellows turn black). If I roll Stealth vs your Observation, it favors me. If you roll Observation vs my Stealth it favors you. Same contest, but very different rolls and results. Unless this is directed by an action card, there's no clear-cut rule for who should get to roll and who merely provides difficulty in any given situation. There's also technically nothing that stops you from asking for an Observation check after I pass my advantageous Stealth roll. It can get a little ugly.
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It's doable.
A couple years back I ran a short campaign I called Everhammer. It was a blend of Warhammer's dice with most of the other mechanics of Everway. I was running for a group of old school gamers who just couldn't enjoy a game without some attack rolls, and Everway is normally diceless. The fusion worked pretty well, great for pickup games.
You can read about it in my old blog posts: http://www.transitivegaming.blogspot.com/search/label/EverHammer
It's pretty similar to what you're talking about, being mostly Warhammer's core dice system without all the crazy bells and whistles. It added some Everway bells and whistles, but they were mainly narrative instead of mechanical so it stayed light and simple.
I avoided Stance entirely because I didn't want to deal with recharge. Simplified the way dice pools were calculated. Used "freestyle" results for boons/banes/comets/eagles. Replaced Warhammer's 6 Characteristics with Everways 4 Elemental Attributes. Off the top of my head, I think I kept Fatigue and Stress to keep manoeuvres under control, but they weren't as omnipresent as they are in Warhammer. It was all very free-flowing and liberating compared to Warhammer. Things were light and off the cuff, and I could improv whatever I wanted without fear that a boon effect or "perform a stunt" would upset delicate balance or undercut the value of some action card.
I made my own wound cards, and used a reduced damage scale with simpler math but more meaningful crits. Probably 40 cards total since every wound was a crit and it only took 3 or 4 to drop a PC. Actually had two decks, one was physical wounds, the other was shame/insanity/social damage type stuff. Didn't take much work.
I also used location cards. Everway has a whole bunch of picture cards with no mechanics on them, I just made up location effects to go with those pictures.
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If your GM is not using the "minimum stay" optional rule from the player's guide, a Reiklander human coachman can acquire and train Education for a total of 2 XP.
Coachman to Bounty Hunter is 0 XP (Basic, Rural, and Urban in common).
Bounty Hunter to Watchman is 0 XP (Basic, Combat, and Urban in common).
Watchman to Burgher is 0 XP (Basic, Bureaucrat and Urban in common).
Acquire for 1.
Train for 1 more.
Return to Coachman for free.
I feel like the Reiklander Adaptable power is stupidly brokenly game-wreckingly good, so I use the "Minimum Stay" rule in my campaign.
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The answer to both questions is essentially the same: Actions exist that specifically do these things, but they aren't basic actions that just anyone can do. You have to buy them with XP.
The GM might allow a Perform a Stunt action to roll Leadership or First Aid with a success getting rid of 1 Stress. I'd keep the amount of Stress cured very low though so you don't set a dangerous precedent or undermine the value of the action cards they didn't buy.
I would definitely not allow Perform a Stunt to interrupt actions, though, as that would be so powerful it would see tons of play. You'd undermine the value of the existing interrupt actions, and end up with all sorts of ripple effects. Combing a general interrupt ability with the group initiative rules would make larger combats much more complicated. This sort of thing works okay in D&D because each person has their own initiative roll and movement rates are set in stone. It's not such a good mix for Warhammer, IMHO.
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Yes, you can run it out of the core set, but you may find some extra supplements very helpful.
I'd say tailor your purchases to the PCs they build. Signs of Faith if they build a Priest. Winds of Magic if they build a Wizard. Lure of Power if they build a noble. Black Fire Pass if they build a dwarf. Omens of War if they focus on combat characters. With the exception of the Wizard/Priest supplements, you can probably hold off and buy the others staggered over time instead of up front.
If your group takes their time and really gets into the investigation and social scenes of The Enemy Within, they could easily end up as 3rd or 4th Rank (level) by the end of the campaign. The core set mostly focuses on 1st and 2nd Rank play, so you may eventually want to pick up Hero's Call, which is a supplement that covers the higher ranks. If your group ignores the mysteries and NPCs, the campaign could run much shorter and then Hero's Call would be a waste.
I kinda hate to say it, but the Player's Guide has so many useful clarifications, corner-case rulings, optional rules and (out of place) GM advice that it's probably worth buying as well, despite the high pricetag. I recently compiled a list of all the new rules and content in the Player's Guide, if you're interested. http://www.transitivegaming.blogspot.com/2013/07/whats-actually-new-in-wfrp-players-guide.html It's sort of a page-by-page review.
Action Cards - Challenge Dice - Where the rules?
in WFRP Rules Questions
Posted
Off the top of my head: Assess the Situation and Guarded Position default to 0 dice. (Assess only if unengaged.)
I'm pretty sure there's other support actions that follow that pattern, and a handful of spells or blessings. Can't remember which ones off the top of my head, but the PCs at my table have a few of them.