STILL Not Dead (Terrors & Tactics Updade)

So, the next update will be coming soon. The delay came because some terrain rules work also required tweaking the trap rules to allow for damage based on the margin of failure for the evade check to be a standard option; which in turn required cleaning up the traps and hazards rules before I could progress there.

The new update coming later this weak will have the revised companions, the oxymancy, toximancy, poison expert and revised pyromancy talents, revised traps and hazards, and the start of the terrain section (which might actually end up being shorter than I was thinking it would need to be... the difference will probably be in the form of extra traps, hazards and afflictions so the GM doesn't have to design as many out of the box themselves).

I'm looking forward to it.

kind of wish there was a way to thumbs up on this forum :p

So, slight delay (as you may have noticed).

It turns out I had to rebuild the traps section AGAIN due to some really broken things happening from the initial changes.

On the plus side, a change of format for traps and hazards to make them more conducive to the terrain section means I was able to squeeze in several more examples of traps and hazards employing more of the mechanics; the Bear Trap, Gorgon Glyph, Repulsion Rune and Trap Floor; in addition to the existing Hunting Snare, Fire Projector, Gas-Filled Hallway, Poison Needle Trap and Wilderness Pit Trap.

I'll be re-compiling/bookmarking the PDF this weekend (half my main testing group has the flu) and should have the new version out Monday.

As one Nintendo developer said, better a delayed game than one that's rushed and flawed. I'd figured it was Ash Wednesday-related. Still, it's good that you were able to fit more traps in

Okay, the new update is FINALLY up. If anyone with the link has problems getting it let me know.

Oximancy, Toximancy and Poison Expert are the major revisions to classes.

Hazard & Traps got an overhaul with the default damage now lining up with general skill-related failures (i.e. margin of failure).

New Section on the Environment with sub-sections on design principles (use of default elements, conservation of detail and standard procedures), constructed terrain, natural terrain, lighting, weather & atmosphere.

Next up will be Exotic/Planar Terrain and then taking all of these elements to lay out specific environments.

As I started working in depth on the environmental features I realized I would have a lot of duplication if I included everything for each specific environment; trees and underbrush are nearly ubiquitous so there's little need to repeat them in a section for forests, swamps, hills, etc.

Instead I managed to fit each of those major categories onto a couple of pages each (four for constructed, two facing pages for natural terrain) so they can be referenced easily and the Forest section will now essentially include a list of common elements.

For example, Forest Terrain would be something to the effect of...

"Trees are the defining feature of forests. Younger forests have more small trees and lots of underbrush. The older a forest gets more large and fallen trees and less underbrush will be found. Extremely ancient forests are almost always widely spaced large trees (sometimes filling multiple squares on their own) with mostly open ground between them as the forest canopy starves the smaller vegetation of light.

Game trails, natural fields, inclines and water features are interspersed between the trees and undergrowth in a forest. Most travel through forests by men and beasts will be along game trails or roads carved through them and many of those follow creek beds and similar sources of water. This means such features are likely to be found in areas where PCs enter into conflicts.

Though dimmer compared to direct sunlight, lighting is still considered normal in most forests during the day. During the night the lighting in forests typically becomes darkness as the canopy blocks out any moonlight that might reach the forest floor. Some more exotic forests, particularly where Eldritch are common, might be illuminated by phosphorescent fungi or moss that provides dim light during the night.

The forest canopy will typically catch much of any precipitation that falls in its area, but it also magnifies the darkness of overcast skies, causing all but the brightest lit parts of a forest to become dimly lit when dark clouds cover the area.

Dense forests and undergrowth often break up wind, so only the strongest winds will play a direct role during conflicts in a forest, but the wind through the canopy will make detecting sounds much more difficult. The reduction in wind also means that fog can often linger longer and become denser than it would on open ground."

At least that's the theory right now. As I get more of the exotic terrain done the description for forests will likely be expanded to include fitting examples, much like the phosphorescent fungi already has been.

The new talents look good - you can do a lot of upfront damage as an acid specialist, but pyromancy looks like it can chain off of itself without having to make a sustain hit check, since by RAW, it looks like pyromancy's extra heat damage is triggered by any the player imposes, even if it's from pyromancy. I'm not sure if that's an intended feature, but if so, it still has a delayed activation like you were talking about.

The environmental effects look interesting - it'll be good for the GM to have that codified. I especially like your advice at the beginning of the section. The conservation of detail section looks like it's a product of long DM experience of having players over-focus on trivialities.

Re: Conservation of Detail... it so so so is experience speaking.

As to Pyromancy, that is definitely unintentionally broken and why I'm glad I have you and others looking at this stuff.

I just reworded it in my master copy to clear up the intent (change in italics) and it'll be in the next (hopefully not so delayed) update.

Pyromancy: You gain heat resistance and can change any damage you deal to heat. When you deal heat damage with an action, you can also deal Focus heat damage to the target at the start of your next turn.

So yes, the intention is that each action dealing heat damage does a little more the following round, but its not supposed to chain off itself infinitely.

So, the terrain seems to be working out; with the obvious need for more exotic stuff at higher levels. I'll be working on that this week.

However, in the category of "how is this only just being discovered now?" is; What happens when you use an enlarged spell (burst) and your implement only has the Melee range?

Basically, I need to do a little cleanup on the enlarge mechanics that were built back when every implement option was ranged (and some just had "did not provoke" as a trait).

I've got a few ideas, but thoughts and suggestions are always welcome.

I don't think I understand the issue - every implement has a ranged option, even the battlefists and runic weapons. If you're talking about melee-ranged attacks not having their own enlarged version, then you could either use the Ravager and Disabler's wall mechanic, or you could make it a melee burst, like the old 4e Sword Burst power, which was a close burst 1 implement attack that was pretty much standard in optimized builds. Either way, a review of the enlarge spell mechanics wouldn't hurt.

Yup... never mind. Must’ve been someone looking at an older set and me remembering an older set where implements like battlefist had ONLY the melee 10 category. This thing really is getting quite enormous.

It does still probably warrant a look in the sense of “how does the burst spell keyword interact with Melee 2+ ranges.” Particularly since the in the revamp the point of those was so those with those traits could make spell attacks in close without provoking.

By the same token, the original point of the “blast” area for spells was, before implements with melee range became fairly ubiquitous, meant to give spellcasters a close combat option akin to 4E’s Thunderwave and other close spells. And how do you get the equivalent of a 4E “close burst” out of any of them?

As is clear from the above confusion, the very first thing to do looks like it should be actually refreshing myself on the rules as they currently exist. I am definitely glad to have more eyes than just my own on this.

Hey, don't feel bad - a writer I follow has the same problem. He has to use the fan wiki to refresh his memory, because he doesn't have one version of the story in his head, he has about five or six slightly different versions thanks to the editing process.

As to the close burst question, right now, it's not possible, I think. You can make melee bursts with other effects like aspect auras and certain boons, but not with attack spells.

Hmmm... looking it over, I’m wondering how it’d work if I removed the “ranged” from the burst and “melee” from the blast and left those contingent on the implement.

So, for example, flame strike with ranged implement would be “ranged burst 1” and with a melee capable implement it could be a “melee burst 1.”

Similarly, flare could be a melee blast 3 or a ranged blast 3.

Alternatively, do I add some additional area keywords (making Wall its own thing in the process) and give more variation to the spells?

Or do I perhaps remove the area keywords from the spells and instead make them something a player assigns to each spell a la the “basic enlarge” feature (so if you took flame strike it could be targeted, a burst or a blast depending on which you chose when selecting it), perhaps with a “shape spell” talent to let you add a second shape to each of your attack spells.

I’m not sure which of those, if any, I actually like. But it looks like I’ll have a few days without much else going on to figure it out. Any input is welcome.

I was thinking about the first version, but I was worried that it might interact with certain spells in unforeseen ways.

I was originally thinking you could combine the first and third options: each time a player took a spell, they could assign burst, blast, or targeted, and have those keywords work at melee or range, but I noticed was that barring the origin square, a ranged burst and ranged blast look a lot alike.

Maybe you could keep burst as ranged burst, blast as melee blast, keep targeted, and add wall like you did with the ravager and disabler - or call it a line 6 and keep Wall of Fire/Ice Wall/Briar Wall/Rolling Thunder as the single-space zone power, perhaps with full damage like Acid Cloud. Line instead of Wall might work better for the Ravager and Disabler as well, since it's a little more linguistically intuitive. You could assign these keywords like how the basic implement attack gets assigned - though if you do that, then targeted is likely to be the most popular, since it's more precise than the others.

***
By the way, how are you and your family doing with regard to the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic?

We’re thinking its all ridiculously overblown and the odds are it got here months ago and the nasty bug going around via the schools to all the families a month back could very well have been it. But we have to live with the situation.

Fortunately, my dad doesn’t go out much, my job is a one-man shop, and they still haven’t shut down our actual places of businesses yet.

* * * *

The main difference between ranged bursts and blasts is how cover is determined. Bursts determine cover from the burst’s origin. Blasts are always determined from the action user.

The main way to show the distinction is by the example of a target taking cover around a corner wall. They have cover from a ranged blast no matter what, but a burst could be cast just to the side of the target and catch them with no cover at all.

As a result attaching them to the implement’s base range wouldn’t be inherently unbalanced. It might even make sense since the single target attack can reach that far, but a blast spell suddenly loses significant range with the spread. So a flare can hit a single target at 10 paces or anyone in an adjacent 3x3 area. If you’re powering it up with focus or a minor action I don’t think a 3x3 area at 10 paces is not unreasonable.

I’m going to try out a few different things I think and will post the options here once I work them out.

Cool! I'm looking forward to it.

WRT coronavirus, I remember a nasty bug going around work before this whole thing started, now that you mention it. And you did mention that half your gaming group was down with the flu a while back. Something to think about. And regardless of the actual severity of the pandemic, the media's definitely overblowing it - much of the actual panic can be laid at their feet.

we had a pretty hard flu and cold season this year too

Oof. I hope everyone's doing better.

Okay, I’ve got a new version up with changes to the areas.

First and most notably; I’ve renamed ‘Blast’ to ‘Spray’ to make it easier to tell apart at a glance from ‘Burst’ areas. Burst, Spray or Wall feels a lot easier to keep straight.

The primary mechanical clarification is in the targets section in chapter 1 where I rewrote the Melee/Range entries to cover point of origin. Melee areas of all types always uses the action user as its origin point. Range always uses a square in range for its origin.

As to spellcasters. I ultimately kept the area types for the individual spells because it helps set them apart, but I did change the areas in Enlarge Spell to not include range/melee (so just burst 1 or spray 3) and use the implement for whether the spell is a melee burst or ranged burst or a melee blast or ranged blast (and targeted was always melee targets or ranged targets).

Letting the player choose their areas for each spell was way too generic to the point I could almost replace the entire attack spell section with “choose area, choose defense, choose damage type, pick one basic condition and three focus conditions.”

While this is a viable way to build a game, experience has told me most players prefer a list of thematic options to a complete free form build for powers. Flare and Flame Strike conjure images for players to hang ideas off of that (Spray, Dodge, heat damage + shadowed, shadowed x3) just won’t.

Next up for me will be the exotic terrain rules.

In other news, a friend of mine is starting to code the rules for Roll20 (the virus is having at least one positive outcome) so there will likely be Roll20 support for Ruins & Realms by the time the game is finally released. I’ll keep you apprised on that as well.

First pass-through says it looks good: using spray instead of blast is a good way to differentiate it from burst, since not every type of directed attack like that is going to be an unsubtle blast of magic. Look at Ezra and his acid-spraying projector.

I understand why you kept the area types tied to individual spells - while going full Gurps like you described has its strengths, it also has its weaknesses - not only are the bits generic, they're going to be Lego-ed together regardless of flavor. Now, if you were to ever do an abridged or microlite version of your rules set, genericizing the attack spells might be a good idea, but this ain't Gurps, and it ain't Microlite either.

Finally, I like how you tied the melee/ranged aspect to the implement's properties - it gives a lot of mechanical heft to their differences, and from a fluff perspective, having only certain implements be capable of melee implement attacks is perfectly logical. You take a wand into a knife fight and you're going to get a broken stick and a stab wound, and an amulet, crystal, or set of goggles is just going to make you look foolish. But a stout staff, a pair of armored gauntlets, or a rune-scribed weapon? Now those make sense in terms of casting melee spells.

Glad you approve. The other part of my thinking on melee vs. ranged areas with the spells is that the way bursts and sprays have a bit more feel.

Before it was either a close spray or a distant burst. But now burst spells are the superior option at range since they can be placed to go around cover, but in melee they require you to be out and away from your allies because they’re bursting from you in all directions (unless you’re an interdictor at 5+ who use can shape spell) which can still be useful in some conditions (particularly if you’re a beefy warcaster or militant astral).

By contrast, sprays are no better at bypassing cover at range than any other ranged attack, but in melee are much easier to direct away from your allies because they’re directional.

Different strengths, different weaknesses, but neither completely useless in some situations. The main examples being someone with all sprays (formerly always melee) having to engage multiple targets across a chasm... enlarge spell is useless for them. Similarly, finding yourself stuck in close quarters where you can’t NOT be adjacent to an enemy would make the burst (formerly always ranged) near useless.

Now they can both be used to greater or lesser degrees, with the main limiters being the implements you have chosen to employ.

Another aspect of the feel is purely thematic. Flame Strike as a burst could be used at a distance like a fireball OR you could literally call the fire down on top of you and walk away unscathed. Flare, by contrast, can now blind multiple people at range, but cover between you and them will always protect you from the blindingly hot light spray.

Relatedly, another reason for keeping the area keywords attached to the spells was that I’d likely have had to add walls to the possible areas for Enlarge Spell to account for what you’d need the Wall spells to be (Ice Wall as a Burst or Spray would be a big roughly spherical/conical block of ice).

The problem there is that Walls are, generally speaking, the best form of area since you can automatically weave it around allies and cover. There’s a reason it’s almost invariably limited to spells that do less than normal damage... it’s almost too good otherwise.

By keeping the area keywords, I don’t need Enlarge Spell to include a Wall area.

* * * *

One other interesting element from testing is I actually had someone using the rules for a Nentir Vale based campaign successfully build a necromancer character without using the Shadow NPC rules. In addition to Summon Ally for undead minions; they also managed a pretty effective “Steal Strength” spell using the Guided Assault spell and Cryomancy.

The result was an attack that targeted Will (astral spellcaster), did cold damage + check vs. fatigue to the target and gave spellcaster a bonus to attacks and, for a focus, to damage... fluffed as using necromancy to steal the life and strength of the target (left cold and weakened) to boost their own attacks.

It’s always nice to see the degree of creativity the players can bring to using the mechanics, even without the optional bits, to achieve their character concepts.

I hadn't realized that Guided Assault used the original implement's target defense and damage type - makes sense, and must be a new change. I knew that necromancy was possible via summoned minion and refluffing, but the rest of it is rather creative, especially given how necromancy tends to work in a D&D setting (being given to the caster by a god of necromancy). All in all, very cool.

Guided Assault got changed back when I added the basic implement attacks as a way to let it present in different ways for different spellcasting paths.

Since it’s also has the buff keyword that improves accuracy and damage, it’s been a common choice for many of the Benedictors I’ve seen in the testing... so having it target different defenses and do different types of damage (which can in turn gain riders from talents) helped to make the multiple Benedictors more distinctive from each other.

I clearly didn't pay attention to that one. Good change, though, since it lets the caster essentially use an enhanced version of their basic implement attack, if they're so inclined.

It's impressive that even in my absence, and total disregard for the state of the forum some dedicated members are still interacting with each other. I'd like to think that maybe I can start working to get this forum back on track.