Eclipse Phase Review.

[Lago PARANOIA]

This is neither here nor there, but one thing I heavily dislike about all editions of D&D (it gets really bad in 3E and unacceptable in 4E) is the fetishization of signature weapon users. It's bland and pressures the DM into providing weapons that fit the character's idiom.

And for what? This kind of thing is barely tolerable as it is in games where it's a reinforcement of some other kind of genre convention, like Star Wars. In D&D it's just stupid. There's really no reason why someone should stick with a Lucern Hammer or a pair of bastard swords their whole careers, especially in a game like D&D where you continually replace and upgrade equipment.

Of course, you already know my feelings on vertical advancement. Though I also feel this way about horizontal advancement, too. At the very least Polearm Gamble should become Weapon Gamble, where in addition to the polearm effect you get things like being able to shift away if you're using a light blade, daze on your next hit if you're using a mace, swing your axe in a massive arc to hit two enemies if you're using an axe, etc.. all in the same feat.

[iambane]

I'm not making is a "Me vs The World" argument. I am responding to the people who made this a "My way or you're a retard" argument.

When it comes to Science Fiction gaming I enjoy a very lengthy and specific skill list. I also tend toward %-dice rolling.

This really has nothing to do with Frank Trollman's point concerning Eclipse Phase's skill list. You can try and make it about that, but it won't be. Instead this was about Frank's suggestion to condense the skill list into something very short.

Again I cite Eve Online as a great example of what I love.

[Username17]

EVE Online is not a roleplaying game and you interact with he large skll list by being required to grind a large number of tasks. This is equivalent to you saying that you like collecting Power Modules in Super Metroid. While doubtless true, it's not even relevant to what constitutes a good idea in a science fiction RPG. Or any RPG for that matter.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty2]

(Double Post)

[RandomCasualty2]

Of course, you already know my feelings on vertical advancement. Though I also feel this way about horizontal advancement, too. At the very least Polearm Gamble should become Weapon Gamble, where in addition to the polearm effect you get things like being able to shift away if you're using a light blade, daze on your next hit if you're using a mace, swing your axe in a massive arc to hit two enemies if you're using an axe, etc.. all in the same feat.

There's nothing inherently wrong about giving weapons a unique identity. It's okay if polearms are good at one thing and axes do another thing and swords are good for something else. That's not so much the problem with 4E (and really D&D in general plus a bunch more RPGs).

The problem is that they didn't let you get enough of those abilities, so you're forced to actually be a swordsman and that's it. Weapon abilities are something that fighters could potentially learn like a 3E wizard learns spells. That way PCs who wanted the extra bookkeeping could pay small amounts of gold to master swords and polearms, and your basic players could just stick with one weapon if they didn't want to put in the effort. But that shouldn't really cause any huge imbalances either way.

In any case, once you've got skill in one weapon, getting equivalent skill in a secondary weapon should be at a greatly reduced cost.

[Lago PARANOIA]

That doesn't solve the problem of weapon stratification, though.

When you pick up Heavy Blade Opportunity, Polearm Momentum, Polearm Gamble, and Weapon Focus/Expertise: Heavy Blades that locks you into picking up polearms for the rest of your life. The only way you could solve that problem is by having Weapon Opportunity feats that give a different (or same) benefit to various weapon categories.

That way when someone invested in all of that polearm crap gets Mjolnir, they don't toss it in the trash because it's incompatible with all of their previous feats. And in that respect 4E is really bad about it; at least in 3rd Edition weapon-specific feats sucked monkey fuck so 75% of weapon guys could be given a magical battleaxe or a magical longsword and wouldn't care.

[RandomCasualty2]

That doesn't solve the problem of weapon stratification, though.

When you pick up Heavy Blade Opportunity, Polearm Momentum, Polearm Gamble, and Weapon Focus/Expertise: Heavy Blades that locks you into picking up polearms for the rest of your life. The only way you could solve that problem is by having Weapon Opportunity feats that give a different (or same) benefit to various weapon categories.

Yeah, basically your first weapon talent may cost you a feat, but learning that talent with other weapons shouldn't. It should just be some training time and maybe a small GP gold cost. So I'd have feats like:
Heroic Weapon Trick
Heroic Weapon talent
Paragon Weapon Trick
etc.

Basically when you took heroic trick, you'd get to choose one weapon to actually be trained in and it'd give you a trick based on the weapon, but you'd have the option of learning other weapons if you wanted too. And all that would take is some extra training time.

I can understand wanting to keep the game simple for newbies, so I'd stick with the idea that upon taking the feat you only start with one base weapon, but getting extra ones should be a very minor cost if you want to go through the trouble of writing that down on your character sheet.

[erik]

When it comes to Science Fiction gaming I enjoy a very lengthy and specific skill list. I also tend toward %-dice rolling.

I guess what this sort of statement craves to be followed up with is some sort of explanation. I don't understand how having more skills or using percentile dice is inherently more (or less) enjoyable. They are tools which function well in some regards and poorly in others.

Skill list length is a mechanical consideration that has implications on how specific skills are in the setting and how skills are distributed amongst characters. Percentile rolling is a particular random number generator that has it's own quirks and implications as well. It appears the popular contention here that they (well, in particular the skills) are not desirable tools for a sci-fi role playing game.


Having more skills makes things more specific and specialized and sometimes that is a good thing, to some extent. Having device hacking be determined by a different skill than melee combat is a helpful segregation. But obviously there are limits to how long a good skill list should be.

Surely you wouldn't want a game with 65,536 skills each with different percentages to track. Yeah, you could accurately simulate how you are better at stunt-driving a 2001 Honda Accord versus a 2010 Ford F-150, or that your number 3 pencil drawings have more artistry than your charcoal rubbings. But certainly at a certain point the skill bloat becomes unwieldy.

So it comes down to where on that sliding scale you think things should remain for a role playing game. Is there a good reason for someone to be expert in the use of weapon A while not being expert in the use of a very similar weapon B? Is it necessary for a character in a game where you can grow new bodies, fly starships and digitally corrupt minds to differentiate between pointing and firing two different pistols, or worse, swinging two different sticks, with different attachments on their ends? Is there a mechanical benefit to having multiple weapon expertise instead of focusing on one to get a higher skill with it? If not, people are simply being given loser trap options to punish them for not focusing on one or two weapons.

In Sci-Fi a character can be completely awesome and a main character even without ever fighting at all. That is pretty impressive considering how cool fighting is.

"Okay, I am going to sneak and fight my way though the corridors full of genetically augmented guards and robotic surveillance drones in order to steal the files."

"Ooor, I could just hack a drone remotely and use it to log in and download the files for us."

Technology is like magic in that it provides tons of alternatives to solve almost any situation through non-combat means. I would contend that having someone specialize in a zillion different weapons is a waste of conceptual space, and a waste of character skill potential if that made them worse at using just 1 or 2 different weapons instead.

As for percentile dice, they are just another means of random number generation. Random number generators vary on their distribution of numbers and predictability. Percentile dice are quite predictable, but there's no real bell curve. Adding 1% to your skill is the same benefit at 20% as it is at 90%. This isn't inherently a bad or a good thing.

It does tend to either leave characters with depressingly low skills (I would never want to rely upon someone who is only 80% capable of completing a task... that's a horrendous failure rate for many actions), or near-automatic success skills. The irritation I usually find with percentile systems is that it either things are "standard" or non-stressful situations and I don't need to use my skills beyond simply having them, or stressful situations come up and if my skills aren't >90% effective, then I am going to be failing with disastrous results, far too often.

[shau]

That way when someone invested in all of that polearm crap gets Mjolnir, they don't toss it in the trash because it's incompatible with all of their previous feats.

I don't agree with you that this a is a bad thing. Fiction is full of characters that specialize in a specific weapon or style and people want to play characters like that. I am not on board at all with the idea that established sword fighters like Musashi, Dread Pirate Roberts, and Zorro throw their swords away as soon as they find a pick axe that is slightly more magical than their sword. I don't want Thor throwing away Mjolnir to use Excalibur either.

The bad thing about allowing specialization is that the rules generally screw people who want to be a generalist or who want to do something like fight with a weapon in each hand. That is a real problem, but I don't think making everyone equally adept with a halberd as they are with a dagger is the way to solve it.

[Username17]

I don't agree with you that this a is a bad thing. Fiction is full of characters that specialize in a specific weapon or style and people want to play characters like that. I am not on board at all with the idea that established sword fighters like Musashi, Dread Pirate Roberts, and Zorro throw their swords away as soon as they find a pick axe that is slightly more magical than their sword.

Uh... terrible examples dude. Musashi spent a good deal of time fighting with a frickin oar because he got an extra +1 out of it. Dread Pirate Roberts stopped fighting with a sword at all and just insulted people to defeat. And Zorro spent much of his time fighting with a whip or a pistol.

If anything, that list of characters lends huge support for the idea of ditching your signature weapon for a better one and never looking back.

-Username17

[Josh_Kablack]

I don't agree with you that this a is a bad thing. Fiction is full of characters that specialize in a specific weapon or style and people want to play characters like that. I am not on board at all with the idea that established sword fighters like Musashi, Dread Pirate Roberts, and Zorro throw their swords away as soon as they find a pick axe that is slightly more magical than their sword. I don't want Thor throwing away Mjolnir to use Excalibur either.

The solution is that "Has Excalibur" should be an ability selected by the player instead of the more common RPG set up where players can merely select the ability "fights well with sword" and cross their fingers that DM whimsy or random treasure rolls get them a level / opposition appropriate weapon of the chosen type.

In 4e D&D retraining rules were introduced to help allow characters to re-allocated selected abilities to cope for magic weapons of unanticipated types. But then the small print taketh away, as in 4e, players get to select not merely "fights well with sword" but also "hits harder with sword", "hits more often with sword" and "gets to do something extra when fighting with sword" and "gets another benefit when fighting with sword" as feats and can only retrain one per level. And if that's not dumb enough, the higher-end sword/hammer/dagger/spear/pick feats all have different ability score prereqs - and there is no method for changing ability score allocation. So characters focusing in one weapon have to set up for the feats 12-20 levels before they can take it.

Thus in 4e, if Zorro finds himself in Camelot and recovers Excalibur, he's going to keep right on using his rapier for the next 5 levels, unless Excalibur is +2 to +4 enhancement better than the rapier he has now and comes with other compensation. (Seriously, he's losing out on +1 to +3 to hit from Weapon Expertise, +1 to +3 to damage from Weapon Focus, another potential +1 to hit from Nimble Blade, another +2 damage from Light Blade Precision and crits only half as often without Light Blade Mastery) This is ass because presumably Excalibur is in the game so that the swordsman PC can use it. Heck, in this set up there is no reason for Zorro to even go on the quest to recover Excalibur in the first place. Even he does get Excalibur, he's just gonna want to use Transfer Enchantment to slide that Excaliburness onto his rapier - and that ruins the whole trope of having Excalibur in the setting to begin with.

[Murtak]

Even in a very combat-centric game splitting up axes and swords is only a good idea if swords and axes are meaningfully different from each other. And the difference better be something among the lines of "is useless against one-third of the opposition". I can't think of a single game which goes that far. Shadowrun has by far the most diverse weapon setup I can think of and even then the unique capabilities are few:
- ranged
- silent
- concealable
- legal

Thats a damn short list. But DnD only has two entries on that list (ranged, capable of AoOs). And indeed in DnD most weapons are interchangeable to such a degree that you won't be able to tell the weapons being used by what happens in combat. Whether you use a falchion, a greatsword or a greataxe is pretty much flavor text. By forcing characters to choose one of the three you don't magically increase character diversity. All that happens is that the characters that already exist get fucked over more often. And I can't even see a reason for it. Are there any fictional characters which are good at fighting with a longsword but suck at fighting with a rapier? Heck I don't even think this applies to real-life.

[TavishArtair]

Even in a very combat-centric game splitting up axes and swords is only a good idea if swords and axes are meaningfully different from each other. And the difference better be something among the lines of "is useless against one-third of the opposition". I can't think of a single game which goes that far.

Fire Emblem?

... Just saying.

[Leress]

Fire Emblem?

... Just saying.

Fire Emblem doesn't go that far, each weapon has a reduced percentage to hit. It only really reaches 0 when the it is completely outclassedd (Skill, Str, Def, Spd)

[Draco_Argentum]

The fact that skills are divided up into more categories has real effects, but those effects are not flavor effects. They are numeric effects. And as such, we can quantify those effects and judge them good or bad.

I disagree. The difference between a well rounded individual and rain man is flavour and mechanics.

[A Man In Black]

That way when someone invested in all of that polearm crap gets Mjolnir, they don't toss it in the trash because it's incompatible with all of their previous feats. And in that respect 4E is really bad about it; at least in 3rd Edition weapon-specific feats sucked monkey fuck so 75% of weapon guys could be given a magical battleaxe or a magical longsword and wouldn't care.

Even with those guys, they still don't ever have any reason to switch out of their particular TWF/2h/1h&shield style.

It's kind of sad that in "iconic" D&D party, fighter/rogue/cleric/wizard, either all of the 2h martial weapons or all of the 1h martial weapons except rapier are completely useless to that party.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Even with those guys, they still don't ever have any reason to switch out of their particular TWF/2h/1h&shield style.

I never said that 3rd Edition was blameless; they embraced that stupid shit, too, with feats like Power Attack and Improved Shield Bash and those stupid focused discipline schools from Bo9S.

However, in 3E a barbarian/ranger/fighter wouldn't sneer at you if they were using a +3 flaming warhammer and shield and you awarded them a +4 acidic scimitar. That makes it a vast improvement over 4E, where awarding someone with a +3 frost rapier an (artifact) +6 lightning warhammer will get laugther.

[A Man In Black]

I never said that 3rd Edition was blameless; they embraced that stupid shit, too, with feats like Power Attack and Improved Shield Bash and those stupid focused discipline schools from Bo9S.

However, in 3E a barbarian/ranger/fighter wouldn't sneer at you if they were using a +3 flaming warhammer and shield and you awarded them a +4 acidic scimitar. That makes it a vast improvement over 4E, where awarding someone with a +3 frost rapier an (artifact) +6 lightning warhammer will get laugther.

I didn't get the impression that you meant that 3e was blameless. (I think we're overall in agreement.) I was just pointing out that the seeds were planted in 3e; specifically, getting new weapon proficiencies is needlessly expensive and class abilities (or feats that amount to class abilities) frequently don't work or work poorly with certain fighting styles.

Part of this comes from making different weapons matter, which was a stated design goal (IIRC) for 3e. It's very difficult to make different weapons matter and also make players willing to chuck fighting with The Most Optimal Weapon +3 in favor of using Close But Not Quite +4, even if they invested no resources that only work with TMOW+3 and don't have to invest anything in being able to use CBNQ+4. Even if you generalized the weapon-specific feats in 3e, you're going to have trouble making a high-level fighter with Improved Critical (and who has done the math) care about a +4 warhammer over his +3 scimitar.

The goals of "make the difference between a sword and a mace matter" and "don't make people feel like they're locked into using only one specific weapon" work at cross purposes to each other. Personally, I favor WHFRP 1e-style melee weapons which more or less boiled down to hand weapon, 2h weapon, polearm, and spear, but nobody seems much interested in systems like that.

[RandomCasualty2]

The goals of "make the difference between a sword and a mace matter" and "don't make people feel like they're locked into using only one specific weapon" work at cross purposes to each other.

Not really. You can totally design a system where you can swap weapons the way a wizard swaps spells. It just means that you need very few abilities that focus you on a single weapon.

[A Man In Black]

Not really. You can totally design a system where you can swap weapons the way a wizard swaps spells. It just means that you need very few abilities that focus you on a single weapon.

If it's the way wizards switch spells, then you're just locking people into using many weapons, or cutting them off from a significant chunk of their options. I can't come up with a system like the one you're describing where you wouldn't either choose the weapon that has the good spells and stick with that, or where you need a whole golf bag full of weapons in order to use your whole list of options.

Even if your locked-in resources don't force you into using a certain weapon or certain sort of weapon, if weapons are significantly different then people will solve the game to figure out which weapon is best for them and use that. Unless the margin between good and bad is so small that it's smaller than a tier upgrade people will still turn their noses up at a tier upgrade of the wrong type.

And if the difference between the good and bad weapon is so small that it's smaller than a tier upgrade, in what sense does the difference between weapons matter?

[RandomCasualty2]

If it's the way wizards switch spells, then you're just locking people into using many weapons, or cutting them off from a significant chunk of their options. I can't come up with a system like the one you're describing where you wouldn't either choose the weapon that has the good spells and stick with that, or where you need a whole golf bag full of weapons in order to use your whole list of options.

Well, it is admittedly a difficult balancing act. It's much like balancing a wizard, where most of the time a 1st level wizard is spamming sleeps or color sprays instead of using magic missiles. And the same with fighters, you're probably going to get various levels where swords are better than axes, just like some levels have enchantments better than illusions.

Now, the first thing you want to do is go a maneuver or power system similar to 4E. However, instead of grouping maneuvers by arbitrary schools, you group them by weapon types. So you'd have the school of swords, the school of axes and so on. You can also use the ToB system of only letting someone prepare a given maneuver once.

Now you may think that the best method is going to be clearly to cherry pick your weapons, however, going multiweapon is expensive and has drawbacks:

• Swapping weapons has a cost. Either you're paying an action or you're spending a feat on something like quick draw. Even with quick draw, you may well have to drop your current weapon, making the change either irreversible or more costly.
• Using a different weapon means that you're probably not using your best magical weapon. Depending on what that means, you can easily justify picking up some extra abilities for the swap.
• You can also toss in a few minor incentives to constrain yourself to one or two weapon schools, similar to a specialist wizard.

However, it should be noted that it's going to be pretty hard to set it up, because you want the benefits of using different weapons to be more or less equal to using the same weapon. So that means you get a slight benefit from using different weapon styles to make up for the above.

[A Man In Black]

How does that system stop fighters from just using the weapon that lets them cast the swordy equivalent of sleep, and turning their nose up at the weapon that lets them cast swordy burning hands? This system just smacks of weapon-specific fighter powers in 4e, but at least those powers were still useful if you didn't have a hammer or heavy blade or whatever. People are still going to pick the weapon that lets them use the good abilities, then turn their nose up at the bad ones, or else carry around a golf bag full of situational crap.

I don't get what you're trying to do. You're making a system where your options are Be Sword Guy (or Be Mace Guy or Be Spear Guy or whatever) or Be Golf Bag Guy. Both of those options are lame.

I'd prefer a system where you use a Hanzo sword until you find Mjolnir, and use Mjolnir until you find Excalibur, without ever having to worry about Weapon Focus (katana) or not being able to use my Hit A Guy With A Hammer ability or even worry about the fact that a hammers crit or hit more often than longswords. The problem is that this runs at cross purposes with making katana guy different from hammer guy.

[RandomCasualty2]

How does that system stop fighters from just using the weapon that lets them cast the swordy equivalent of sleep, and turning their nose up at the weapon that lets them cast swordy burning hands?

Nothing. It's up to the game designer to make sure that there aren't any ridiculously better options.

I don't get what you're trying to do. You're making a system where your options are Be Sword Guy (or Be Mace Guy or Be Spear Guy or whatever) or Be Golf Bag Guy. Both of those options are lame.

Really, I'd like a system where sometimes it's in your best interest to throw a nonmagical dagger even if you do happen to have a greatsword +2.

I'd prefer a system where you use a Hanzo sword until you find Mjolnir, and use Mjolnir until you find Excalibur, without ever having to worry about Weapon Focus (katana) or not being able to use my Hit A Guy With A Hammer ability or even worry about the fact that a hammers crit or hit more often than longswords. The problem is that this runs at cross purposes with making katana guy different from hammer guy.

I don't like this system because it makes you still a one weapon user. It's just that your one weapon happens to be whatever magic weapon you happen to have at the time and often times, that can damn well be more limiting than class abilities in some systems.

"Take the best weapon I have and repeatedly hit people with it" is boring as hell. I realize it should exist as a style for newbies, but I'd like the possibility of being batman too, where you've got a batbelt full of weapons and gadgets.

[A Man In Black]

Really, I'd like a system where sometimes it's in your best interest to throw a nonmagical dagger even if you do happen to have a greatsword +2.

Most systems have this. Throwing a dagger is a better choice when there's a guy aaaaaaaall the way over there. In fact, the only reason you wouldn't do this in most games is because a bow or a gun or a lasergun is a better choice than a dagger.

I don't like this system because it makes you still a one weapon user. It's just that your one weapon happens to be whatever magic weapon you happen to have at the time and often times, that can damn well be more limiting than class abilities in some systems.

"Take the best weapon I have and repeatedly hit people with it" is boring as hell. I realize it should exist as a style for newbies, but I'd like the possibility of being batman too, where you've got a batbelt full of weapons and gadgets.

But Batman only fights with one of two weapons: his Batarangs or fists. In fact, Batman is so devoted to these fighting styles that he's been known to leave the cover of a tank to use them. His Batbelt full of gadgets is full of problem-solvers, not more ways to hurt people.

I'm fine with having people play one-weapon-using PCs. Most characters in fiction fight with two different weapons tops unless their entire schtick is "arsenal guy", and even those characters default to one or two weapons unless the situation calls for something specialized. The problem, to my mind, is that it sucks when characters turn into Sword Guy and turn their noses up at a new shiny hammer, but it's really hard to prevent that while still making weapons meaningfully different.

Your proposed system of weapon-specific powers is 100% what I do not want. I do not want people to feel like they can never get rid of their Guisarme or else they can't cast Evard's Swarm Of Black Tentacleguisarmes. I don't want people to switch weapons just because the only good level 7 power is bola-only. I don't want people to carry 17 weapons in order to have a good mix of powers, nor do I want someone to be the guy who uses claymores and nothing else.

I think it's just fine and not limiting at all that Mjolnir is the best weapon for you to use because it is the best weapon you own. You seem to be implying that weapon choice is the only way you can differentiate different melee classes and that isn't true at all. The game can be made interesting in other ways.

[RandomCasualty2]

Most systems have this. Throwing a dagger is a better choice when there's a guy aaaaaaaall the way over there. In fact, the only reason you wouldn't do this in most games is because a bow or a gun or a lasergun is a better choice than a dagger.

Honestly, not really. Even if you didn't have a bow, throwing a dagger generally isn't worth the trouble of drawing it and throwing it. The range penalties to throw it beyond charge range are generally so bad, it's never worth doing and charging does more damage anyway.

But Batman only fights with one of two weapons: his Batarangs or fists. In fact, Batman is so devoted to these fighting styles that he's been known to leave the cover of a tank to use them. His Batbelt full of gadgets is full of problem-solvers, not more ways to hurt people.

Well going by Arkham Asylum, you've got tossable batarangs, a remote control batarang, explosive gel, a bat grapple that can pull people off ledges, ropes to do inverted grabs, A cape that distracts foes and lets you do glide kicks.

That's a good amount of weapons.

I think it's just fine and not limiting at all that Mjolnir is the best weapon for you to use because it is the best weapon you own.

But some people want their characters to use a specific weapon. A dwarf player probably doesn't want to use a rapier, and an elf may not want to use a maul.

Not everyone runs a Diablo style character who just wants to use whatever weapon happens to be the best that he owns. Many players want to stick to some certain concept and it's actually annoying to them to have to choose whether to abandon their concept by equipping Legolas with the double bladed axe of awesome.