Armour Tests and Fellowship Focus

[Morgoth]

A lot of good points Murcushio.

There is one other big reason to get out of defensive stance. You're fighting one big enemy. He's likely to hit you either way, and he can only hit one of you at a time. If there's only one troll we're fighting, everyone goes to forward stance.

But yeah, if the defensive hope engine worked, it would significantly alter the balance of power.

[aramis]

In general, I allow the free hope on the armor test if you intercept the hit aimed at your focus.
Likewise, I allow using it to attack you focus' engaged target.

I'm pretty casual about it, because my players run low on hope often enough.

[Rocmistro]

Murcushio:

All well thought out responses, and I'm not denying the validity of any single thing you propose, I just don't agree that the "game-breakingness" is anywhere near what you suggest. I have found Twice-baked Honeycakes so far to be the most imbalanced thing in the game. I've also played in a total of 6 TOR campaigns now, to one extent or the other, and no one ever played a Hobbit with King's Blade, so I can't speak to the gamey-ness of that, but I'll concede that it might be equally broken.

It was my intent to write out a big response, but my neighbor just threatened us with litigious action because of stormwater runoff, so I don't have the energy. You win.

Aramis:
I think your proposals are good about allowing hitting and protection tests on behalf of the aided companion. I believe the ruling about restoring hope use is something like "which directly affect your fellowship focus". One might argue those rolls 'directly' affect your fellowship focus.

[Murcushio]

Murcushio:

All well thought out responses, and I'm not denying the validity of any single thing you propose, I just don't agree that the "game-breakingness" is anywhere near what you suggest. I have found Twice-baked Honeycakes so far to be the most imbalanced thing in the game. I've also played in a total of 6 TOR campaigns now, to one extent or the other, and no one ever played a Hobbit with King's Blade, so I can't speak to the gamey-ness of that, but I'll concede that it might be equally broken.

You know, I had a feeling Twice-baked Honey Cakes was going to be real powerful. Before I took it, everyone in my Fellowship was scrambling around hastily revising their progression plans with regard to how much Travel they were going to buy. (Taking a trip through the Heart of Mirkwood in which your GM goes incredibly light on the Fatigue checks and you still rack it up high will do that to people.) After I bought it, with my incredibly high Wisdom of two, people are already starting to breath easier and revise their plans back down again; it's making the rolls that much easier.

It's worth noting that almost none of the Virtues or Rewards in the game scale up in power; they provide a static benefit and that's it. Twice-baked Honey Cakes, as well as both the nerfed and un-nerfed King's Blade, are two of the ones that do. King's Blade becomes more and more likely to fire off every time you raise your weapon skill; and the honey-cakes... every time you buy another Virtue, that Virtue gets better! Buy Great Strength, your honey-cakes get better. Night-goer? Your honey-cakes get better!

It's going to be awesome.

I can't even imagine what a full party of Beornings all with that Virtue would be like. You could conceivably drop the TN all the way to zero.

[Stormcrow]

Honestly, if there is a problem with the game, it's that there is little reason to be in Forward stance after you get 3 ranks in your weapon, and little reason for Open stance after you get 4.

Why is this a problem? As you improve your ability with a weapon, you also improve your ability to defend yourself with that weapon. Badass warriors should be allowed to be badass warriors, and options shouldn't exist just for the sake of having options.

You also don't necessarily need to beef up the adversaries to make a fight more challenging. Turn out the lights. Stage an ambush during a thunderstorm on a treacherous mountain path. Have the fight take place in squelching marshland. Complications help control runaway weapon skills, especially if the complication is one-sided, affecting the heroes and not the adversaries.

[Rocmistro]

Honestly, if there is a problem with the game, it's that there is little reason to be in Forward stance after you get 3 ranks in your weapon, and little reason for Open stance after you get 4.

Why is this a problem? As you improve your ability with a weapon, you also improve your ability to defend yourself with that weapon. Badass warriors should be allowed to be badass warriors, and options shouldn't exist just for the sake of having options.

You also don't necessarily need to beef up the adversaries to make a fight more challenging. Turn out the lights. Stage an ambush during a thunderstorm on a treacherous mountain path. Have the fight take place in squelching marshland. Complications help control runaway weapon skills, especially if the complication is one-sided, affecting the heroes and not the adversaries.

1. I guess it's not a problem so much as it makes for a flat game.

LM: "ok guys declare your st...."
Heroes: "DEFENSIVE!!!"

2. Agreed. This goes back to what I was saying about the LM finding ways to break up the "synergy engines" of the party, not to screw with them or punish them, but just to keep the game fresh and interesting. I absolutely agree it's his duty to do things like that.

[Stormcrow]

I guess it's not a problem so much as it makes for a flat game.

LM: "ok guys declare your st...."
Heroes: "DEFENSIVE!!!"

If you throw those complications into the mix they're much less likely to do this. If you're fighting in the dark in cramped quarters (TN +6) you may have trouble hitting from a defensive stance (TN 18).

[Glorelendil]

I can't even imagine what a full party of Beornings all with that Virtue would be like. You could conceivably drop the TN all the way to zero.

I very much doubt the virtue is intended to stack...

If you want me to spell out the logical argument for why that's true I'm happy to do so, but in the meantime I'll assume you are being facetious.

[Glorelendil]

I guess it's not a problem so much as it makes for a flat game.

LM: "ok guys declare your st...."
Heroes: "DEFENSIVE!!!"

If you throw those complications into the mix they're much less likely to do this. If you're fighting in the dark in cramped quarters (TN +6) you may have trouble hitting from a defensive stance (TN 18).

That's a good point, Storm, and I think that's an excellent way to "counter" too-easy attack rolls. But...I see a difference between the tank/dps synergy and the stance issue. The former is a clever manipulation of rules on the part of players, whereas the latter is just inherent to the core mechanics. So to counter the former is to rebalance the decision of the players, but to counter the latter is to address a design limitation.

I agree with Roc that there's a problem with stance design, in that in most situations the mechanics aren't deep enough to provide interesting/meaningful choices at high weapon skill levels.

[Rocmistro]

I guess it's not a problem so much as it makes for a flat game.

LM: "ok guys declare your st...."
Heroes: "DEFENSIVE!!!"

If you throw those complications into the mix they're much less likely to do this. If you're fighting in the dark in cramped quarters (TN +6) you may have trouble hitting from a defensive stance (TN 18).

Sure, that's fine, but how many times can you do that without it seeming a bit forced and ridiculous?

This reminds me of a D&D campaign where our players had reached like 18th level, and of course in 3.5 with no limits on multi-classing and the expectation of just "getting" magic items at certain level benchmarks, the GM had to populate an entire cave full of pre-buffed, invisible Ancient Red Wyrms in order to provide us a threat. Rocco's axiom clearly states that if you have to populate an entire room full of pre-buffed invisible Ancient Red Wyrms, something in your game (and probably the system) is amiss.