First post, first question...

[Smokestack]

Hello. Just got up to speed to speed with TOR, and I really like what I've seen so far. Really evocative of Tolkien in the writing style and art selections. I'm prepping to run my first game soon, so hopefully everything plays out well.

On to my question; one of my players has a pretty well designed Daleman character, but wants to have her be very capable in melee combat without a shield. Long sword as a favored weapon, in fact. The Swordmaster virtue was taken as her first, but we both wonder if it is maybe a little underwhelming for the character concept. So here's my proposed modification; that the encumbrance bonus to parry is applied only when fighting in a defensive stance, unless using a favored weapon, in which case it applies in all stances.

What do you all think? Too much? Not enough? Any feedback is much appreciated, as my knowledge of the system is cursory at best, and I may well introduce something that has consequences I didn't see right away...

[Yusei]

I'd say: too much. The Swordmaster virtue is very powerful as it is. After spending some XP on her weapon, she will be able to consistenly hit even in defensive stance, and be almost unhittable (except on a Sauron). Allowing that on any stance would simply remove the cost associated with the virtue (ie. a high TN), and remove the costs associated with using easier stances.

I don't think it would be fair to the other players to give her such a powerful defence for the cost of just one virtue. If you still want her to be hard to hit in open stance, you could add a new virtue to add on top on the first one. It would be very powerful, but at least it would add a cost (in XP).

[Rich H]

The Swordmaster virtue is about fighting defensively and gaining an advantage from that. If the PC is using a Longsword then that adds 3 to their Parry. That is an already incredibly powerful virtue - especially when the character gets a Longsword skill of 4 and will be able to regularly hit opponents in Defensive Stance as well as being incredibly hard to hit.

I think your proposed alteration would be far too overpowering and would invalidate lots of other characters' capabilities. Do what you want though, it's your game, but if I was a player of another character in your game and saw you do this, I'd want a Daleman or I'd want one of my Virtues improving to a similar level.

[qwercus]

Dear ladies and gentlemen,
I have not posted in this forum before but I am enjoying it for a quite long time already now . There are some really helpful comments and discussions to find here - congratulations and thanks to all contributors! I'd like to ad a potential house-rule to the discussion, which also aims on better balancing out fighter-characters versus non or minor-combat characters. This may also be a potential solution for your problem, smokestack.

In the group I am going to GM, I plan to calculate parry not based on wits. IMHO wits maybe quite useful in combat, but I think the rule as written underestimates the role of physical strength and intiution for acting defensive in combat. Therefore we plan to calculate parry as: (body+heart):2, rounded up. I made up some test-characters using the wonderful online character-generator that is available in the ressources-thread, and the rule seems to work quite well to me. Now, high witted characters who do not focus on combat are no parry-masters anymore and should keep far away from combat On the other hand, fighters from dale or Beornings with a minor focus on wits have never the less reasonable parry-values for fighters.

I would highly appreciate your comments on this potential house-rule.

[Yusei]

Aren't you afraid that Wits will become a useless attribute?

[Woodclaw]

Dear ladies and gentlemen,
I have not posted in this forum before but I am enjoying it for a quite long time already now . There are some really helpful comments and discussions to find here - congratulations and thanks to all contributors! I'd like to ad a potential house-rule to the discussion, which also aims on better balancing out fighter-characters versus non or minor-combat characters. This may also be a potential solution for your problem, smokestack.

In the group I am going to GM, I plan to calculate parry not based on wits. IMHO wits maybe quite useful in combat, but I think the rule as written underestimates the role of physical strength and intiution for acting defensive in combat. Therefore we plan to calculate parry as: (body+heart):2, rounded up. I made up some test-characters using the wonderful online character-generator that is available in the ressources-thread, and the rule seems to work quite well to me. Now, high witted characters who do not focus on combat are no parry-masters anymore and should keep far away from combat On the other hand, fighters from dale or Beornings with a minor focus on wits have never the less reasonable parry-values for fighters.

I would highly appreciate your comments on this potential house-rule.

I'm with Yusei on this one, while the current combat set-up isn't perfect it takes all the 3 scores into consideration. Lets do a bit of a combat breakdown:

BODY

• Base Damage
• Adds to attack rolls
• Adds to Protection rolls

WITS

• Base Parry

HEART

• Calculate base Endurance
• Calculate base Hope
• Adds to Valour rolls
• Adds to Wisdom rolls

As the list clearly shows Wits is currently the least important score in the basic combat (I'm not taking Combat Tasks into account), using a different score for that would turn Wits into a potential dump stat.

[qwercus]

Good point, thanks for the reply.
I think I overlooked that other side of the coin due to the strong feel of inconsistency I have thinking of lore-masters, bureaucrats and other bookworms as being exceptional good dodge-masters in combat-situations.

It seems to me that I could now either stick on the old rules as written or expand the impact of the wits-attribute. For example by allowing it to be used as a “joker” attribute bonus (by spending the regular hope point) to wisdom-checks and certain skills in appropriate situations, when a rational approach makes sense (and is appropriately role-played). Like when resisting dreadful spells or when using herbal or alchemical knowledge or books for a healing roll or using technical knowledge to pick a complicated mechanical lock/trap (craft) or making up a clever strategic plan that takes best advantage of a region’s environment and the enemies weaknesses as a battle commander (battle).

In addition, it would be up to the GM to stage scenes where being able to call upon a wits-attribute bonus really makes the difference for the players. And there already are some really important skills related to wits, like stealth (avoiding dangerous combat), lore (remembering useful knowledge, like weak spots of monsters), hunting and riddle.

[Glorelendil]

I think I overlooked that other side of the coin due to the strong feel of inconsistency I have thinking of lore-masters, bureaucrats and other bookworms as being exceptional good dodge-masters in combat-situations.

Bear in mind that non-player characters don't use the same rules & stats as players, so the only "lore-masters, bureaucrats and other bookworks" to which you refer are going to be Heroes, and who wants to play a hero who is useless in combat?

[Smokestack]

Thanks for the replies, everyone. I'll try to explain my reasoning a bit more. In comparison to a couple of other Parry increasing virtues (notably Small Folk and Great Strength), Swordmaster seems a bit more restrictive.

Hobbits are probably one of the smallest creatures to be involved in combat on a regular basis (I can't remember too many foes listed in the books that are smaller, in fact, but I could be wrong), so a +3 Parry (if you used your +3 for Favoured Attributes on your Wits score) against foes larger that you is pretty much a +3 all the time, in all Stances.

Great Strength, unless I've read it wrong, provides a +3 Parry bonus in all Stances provided the character's encumbrance score is less than 12. Keeping to less than 12 is, IMO, pretty easy, and in a game that seems to focus much more on not getting hit as opposed to "taking it like a man" a Parry bonus looks a lot more appealing than heavy armor outside of very specific scenarios.

Again, my knowledge of the system is only theoretical at this point, as I've yet to play, but am I that far off base? I'll probably run the game with the RAW first, because I think it's always a good idea to do that at least once, I just wonder if my system-fu is good enough to tweak this game without it falling apart...

[doctheweasel]

Hobbits are probably one of the smallest creatures to be involved in combat on a regular basis (I can't remember too many foes listed in the books that are smaller, in fact, but I could be wrong), so a +3 Parry (if you used your +3 for Favoured Attributes on your Wits score) against foes larger that you is pretty much a +3 all the time, in all Stances.

This one depends on the LM a great deal and how they define "larger." An Orc is surely larger than a Hobbit, but is a small goblin tracker? What about a warg?

It definitely is in effect most of the time — as advertised in the writeup — but I wouldn't say all of the time.

Great Strength, unless I've read it wrong, provides a +3 Parry bonus in all Stances provided the character's encumbrance score is less than 12. Keeping to less than 12 is, IMO, pretty easy, and in a game that seems to focus much more on not getting hit as opposed to "taking it like a man" a Parry bonus looks a lot more appealing than heavy armor outside of very specific scenarios.

It's less than 12 Fatigue, not Encumbrance. That isn't very easy, especially over a long trip. It also means that you are forced to wear very light armor, which increases the chance of a wound (and the chances of receiving one aren't mitigated much by parry, since most come from Eye results).

Again, my knowledge of the system is only theoretical at this point, as I've yet to play, but am I that far off base? I'll probably run the game with the RAW first, because I think it's always a good idea to do that at least once, I just wonder if my system-fu is good enough to tweak this game without it falling apart...

I think the virtue as written is in line with what a player should expect of one. Your change allows someone with a longsword and a shield to receive some incredible parry bonuses.

Your player has a choice between more damage (two handed) or defense (shield). They should live with that choice rather than have the consequences of it house-ruled away.