Masteries -- Parry

[beckett]

A player in my group remarked how there are Masteries that allow a hero to raise their Ranged Damage Rating (Dour-handed), their Close Combat Damage Rating (Fell-handed), not to mention Masteries that raise Hope, Endurance, and skills but none that raise the Parry rating. It seems reasonable to assume that as a hero learns and grows, they might get better at parrying blows does it not? I'm curious why this was left out of the game mechanic.

Thank you.

[Rich H]

Don't know why it was left out but there's one in my Additional Rules supplement:

ADDITIONAL MASTERY
The following Mastery is in addition to those
detailed within the Adventurer’s rulebook.

THWARTING
You have become an expert at avoiding your
opponents' attacks. Raise your Parry rating by one.

[Rocmistro]

+1

I'm all for additional crunchy bits.

Rich, would you/do you rule that your Mastery gives +1 parry all the time or just in a close combat stance?

[beckett]

Thank you, Rich! This is great! Where might one find your Additional Rules supplement? Also, if any of the designers would like to share their thoughts on why this was left out (was it error or a balance issue?), I'd love to know. I'm as curious as a Hobbit

Don't know why it was left out but there's one in my Additional Rules supplement:

ADDITIONAL MASTERY
The following Mastery is in addition to those
detailed within the Adventurer’s rulebook.

THWARTING
You have become an expert at avoiding your
opponents' attacks. Raise your Parry rating by one.

[Rich H]

See the link in my signature beckett, there's a whole lot of them.

[Rich H]

+1

I'm all for additional crunchy bits.

Rich, would you/do you rule that your Mastery gives +1 parry all the time or just in a close combat stance?

That's the way I play it, +1 all the time.

[jamesrbrown]

You can find the original thread for Thwarting called Tweaking the Combat Rules in the old C7 Forum archive. Enjoy the discussion!

[Yepesnopes]

The Master Parry house rule is fine. Yet, I still miss the "flavour" that a better warrior should also be better at defending and not only at attacking, and that this should be decoupled from the stance he/she decides to adopt in combat.

Has anyone toyed with the possibility of rolling less attack dice in favour of a bonus to parry? i.e. a character with Swords 3, could roll 2 dice to attack his/her enemy and "save" 1 dice for parrying the enemy's attack (if any). To say something each die "saved" for parrying could add +1 or +2 to parry.

Cheers,
Yepes

[Evening]

I remember this the first time around.

Given the TOR system was tested for synergy prior publishing, I just assumed there was a valid mechanics reason a Parry increase wasn't included. Perhaps one of the developers could shed some light on the pros and cons discovered while testing.

[Throrsgold]

Has anyone toyed with the possibility of rolling less attack dice in favour of a bonus to parry? i.e. a character with Swords 3, could roll 2 dice to attack his/her enemy and "save" 1 dice for parrying the enemy's attack (if any). To say something each die "saved" for parrying could add +1 or +2 to parry.

Was wondering this exact thing on my drive home tonight. Two player-hero Dwarves died today, sacrificing themselves so that the Rohirric hero with them could escape to report his reconnoitering of the disposition of Isengard to Theodred. Just before the Dwarves fell, they were facing 5 Orcs each with more coming (each Eye of Sauron they rolled generated another 1d6 Orcs to join the fray...one player rolled a new game high of 8 Eyes in one session...all during this fight!). Only 1 in 5 Orcs seemed to hit, but 4 points of damage per hit took its eventual toll). Anyway, I was wondering about a mechanic that might let them increase their Parry and thought of what Yepesopes' post is about...I already use the House Rule of Battle Dice being utilized as a Parry increase and that works, but is very infrequent. I wondered if trading off Skill Dice as a Parry increase would be unbalancing. Thought I'd check the forum and see if anyone had any input...lo and behold, there was this thread...and Yepesopes' thread derailing post.

Thoughts?