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Systems & Settings => Rolemaster => Topic started by: Thot on October 17, 2023, 01:49:36 AM
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Levelling is a staple of many fanatsy RPG's such as RoleMaster. I also use it with great enjoyment in my current campaign.
But for some campaigns, that may not be the best solution to the matter of experience. Many RPG systems do away with levels entirely, and it works for them. So, if you wanted to houserule RMU into a levelless system, how would you do it? I personally, having thought about this a bit too much, have come to te following conclusion, maybe fitting most for campaigns with a certain horror feel about them:
For levelless RMU, just treat everyone as Level 1, and hand out additional DP's per session (or per time period in the case of NPC's). The learning costs become rather simplified: Only the very first rank in a skill is learned at the lower cost, and all further ranks are learned at the higher cost.
Resistance rolls are treated normally: Characters will be level 1, but poisons, spells and diseases will be of their regular level.
Casting spells "higher than your level" should be treated as normal (with the caster's level always being 1). Thus, magic is inherently unstable and dangerous, and learning a spell list to level 50 will usualily not done for the higher level spells, but for that additional bonus to the spell casting roll.
Under such a levelless setup, campaigns will be more deadly and more cruel, but this can be fitting for some campaigns.
An alternative that is maybe a bit more forgiving would treat all resistance rolls as level 1 on both sides, and would do away with the whole notion of overcasting. This would basically remove levels from the game, and make all dangers based on other stats alone.
One caveat for such a levelless setup would be that it might lead to highly specialized characters... wizards good at two or three spell lists to level 50 even relatively early in the campaign., for example. These are usual outcomes in levelless RPG'sd, and while that may work in some campaigns, it can quickly go on everybody's nerves in another. So handle with care.
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I hand out DP after each session that can be spent according to normal rules. When enough DP has been assmebled you advance a level by raising stats, update RR and reset the costs for buying skills.
If you want to further reduce the impact of level in the game you can tie things to the number of ranks, but I don't see the need.
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I agree with Pastaav.
Using the optional rule "DP as XP" reduces the feeling that levels are milestones.
It´s not levelless per se, but it feels alike, a bit.
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I would do it along those lines :
- provide DPs per time period, with skill costs according to the profession but also according to how the character spent their time during the elapsed period. I would likely provide DPs per fairly short periods and allow players to accumulate DPs in skills that have a high cost.
- resistances are bundled into relevant active skills (so, for instance, the Toughness skill is use to resist Diseases).
- characters get access to spell lists by actually getting trained, or reading, about them (so basically, you know a list as soon as you have one rank in it). Each list is a separate skill, and the spell level provides a modifier to the skill roll. Thus, there is no "overcast" special rule because you can always try to cast a spell - but if your skill is too low, all you'll manage to do is to fry your own brain (and maybe other brains in a 5' radius in case of dismal failure). In this scheme, ritual magic is merely spellcasting with a very long preparation time (and props), and extending prep time to cover rituals would likely be the end result (using a geometric scale, for instance).
- stat gain would be covered by DP spending as well.
That's all off the top of my head, of course.
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Many things in RMU looks like GURPS that is an levelless system.
So take a look at GURPS and get some ideas from that, a great RPS
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>The learning costs become rather simplified: Only the very first rank in a skill is learned at the lower cost, and all further ranks are learned at the higher cost.
That has an effect that the first rank of everything is easy and advancement is hard. It will result in lower skill totals for characters with the same number of DP as RAW. That could be ok, but it will complicate picking appropriate powered foes. You could reset that second rank cost at some interval (every 60 DP makes it work pretty much as RAW, but could also be some time interval, after a new "significant" use of the skill, etc).
>- provide DPs per time period, with skill costs according to the profession but also according to how the character spent their time during the elapsed period. I would likely provide DPs per fairly short periods and allow players to accumulate DPs in skills that have a high cost.
That creates a player incentive to have more downtime and put off action of any kind. I think it would be ok if you as GM are setting the pace of events, but less well in a sandbox environment where the PCs set the pace.
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>- provide DPs per time period, with skill costs according to the profession but also according to how the character spent their time during the elapsed period. I would likely provide DPs per fairly short periods and allow players to accumulate DPs in skills that have a high cost.
That creates a player incentive to have more downtime and put off action of any kind. I think it would be ok if you as GM are setting the pace of events, but less well in a sandbox environment where the PCs set the pace.
True, but even in a sandbox, even if PCs do nothing, events have a way to push them to do something :)
At least in my book, sandbox does not mean that the world only moves if the PCs do something. It means that PCs are free to ignore what happens around them and do whatever they want - and suffer the consequences.
Incidentally, time-driven development was used in a number of fairly old-school games, with various moderating mechanisms. One I especially liked, but which might be fairly difficult to translate, was the Bushido system of Zanshin. But other d100-based classless/level-less systems had a built-in learning mechanism that allowed you to increase skills as long as you had downtime and money. The underlying assumption being, obviously, that everyone wanted to have a powerful character but no one wanted to play slices of life, and, as such, the GM set the pace of "adventures" and downtime occurred in-between adventures. But even in a more free-form setting, the system can work if world events conspire to make the characters' lives interesting.
My basic assumption is that players want to play interesting things. The corollary is that people who abuse the learning system tend to have a short shelf life with me. Fun > Balance > Realism also applies to player behaviour.
A possible incentive (which was the underlying incentive of all BRP derivatives, I believe) is to have direct field experience more specific (you only increase skills you actually use) than downtime training, but more efficient from a time (and money) perspective. Add to that that finding learning sources become increasingly more difficult as your skill increases, couple that with world unrest, and I don't think there is anything to fear.
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One of the most fun sessions I ever had happened when the players ignored the quest and were doing pranks on each other and doing "downtime" acticities. To freeze level advancement after a really good session did not feel reasoable so we changed the rule so I handed out DP for hours of play with extra bonuses if the player achieved something special. It is not suiting for every campaign, but it had the big plus that the players could act out the characters without having to worry about not gaining experience.
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You could reset that second rank cost at some interval (every 60 DP makes it work pretty much as RAW, but could also be some time interval, after a new "significant" use of the skill, etc).
This might be used in a method similar to BRP/RQ: when the character uses the skill in a critical situation or otherwise significantly, they are awarded an experience mark by that skill. In BRP/RQ, this allows you to roll for advancement at a suitable time, but in RM it would, as you say, reset the rank cost for the next advancement. This would also motivate the players to use their character's skills with more variety.
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You could reset that second rank cost at some interval (every 60 DP makes it work pretty much as RAW, but could also be some time interval, after a new "significant" use of the skill, etc).
This might be used in a method similar to BRP/RQ: when the character uses the skill in a critical situation or otherwise significantly, they are awarded an experience mark by that skill. In BRP/RQ, this allows you to roll for advancement at a suitable time, but in RM it would, as you say, reset the rank cost for the next advancement. This would also motivate the players to use their character's skills with more variety.
I think the significant-use-of-skill reset might work for secondary skills when you have to work to find occasions to use the skill. For skills that give you OB I don't see the motivation to wait for lowering of the cost before you buy te rank since the benefit of a high OB/strong spell is too good to ignore.
Like Thot noted in the initial post unlimited purchase of ranks will mean characters will have strong initiative to focus all their effort to their primary spell or primary weapon. Resetting the cost for secondary skills after use can make those skills more attractive, but I think the cost for the second rank need to be massive if players should consider to not dump all their DP into their main attack.
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Resetting the cost for secondary skills after use can make those skills more attractive, but I think the cost for the second rank need to be massive if players should consider to not dump all their DP into their main attack.
I see your point. But, alternatively, the GM could re-educate the players by offering adventures with little or no violence. How high is your Charm? Climb? Persuade? Lock picking? Etiquette? Riding? Swimming? etc. etc.
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If it helps, I think Brian Hanson and others on the RMBlog did talk a fair bit about levelless RM, including RMU.
E.g.: https://www.rolemasterblog.com/no-profession-level-less-house-rules/
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If it helps, I think Brian Hanson and others on the RMBlog did talk a fair bit about levelless RM, including RMU.
E.g.: https://www.rolemasterblog.com/no-profession-level-less-house-rules/
there are a bunch of blog posts on this. I had a short one here, but a quick search should find more. good comments from readers as well IIRC
https://www.rolemasterblog.com/a-few-quick-thoughts-on-level-less-rolemaster/
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[...] You could reset that second rank cost at some interval (every 60 DP makes it work pretty much as RAW, but could also be some time interval, after a new "significant" use of the skill, etc).
That's an interesting approach, but I am a bit wary about the additional bookkeeping involved here. The player then has to track for every skill whether it has been reset, and whether he has bought 1 rank since the last reset, or 2. A solution for "first rank/second rank" is a bit simpler there.
But one could of course also increase the number of ranks you can buy at the first cost, like "the first 5 ranks you buy in a skill is the first cost, all beyond that the second cost". 5 is just an example number here, I am not sure what a good number would actually be if one wanted to do this.
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1. Reward individual DP for skills used successfully. 1 DP first time /daily. +1 DP each open ended high roll.
2. Reward general bonus DP after each session.
3. Reset skill costs every 60 DP.
4 cap maximum number of total ranks to level x 2.
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That's an interesting approach, but I am a bit wary about the additional bookkeeping involved here. The player then has to track for every skill whether it has been reset, and whether he has bought 1 rank since the last reset, or 2. A solution for "first rank/second rank" is a bit simpler there.
It works well in BRP, RQ, Cthulhu etc. Players merely put a check mark by the skill when the GM tells them to.
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That's an interesting approach, but I am a bit wary about the additional bookkeeping involved here. The player then has to track for every skill whether it has been reset, and whether he has bought 1 rank since the last reset, or 2. A solution for "first rank/second rank" is a bit simpler there.
It works well in BRP, RQ, Cthulhu etc. Players merely put a check mark by the skill when the GM tells them to.
Yes, but in BRP, you either have a cross or not. You'd have to do two crosses, and while that sounds simple, in practice people will easily loose track, I predict.
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I think one mark would be enough? Whenever the GM thinks you have used the skill in a dramatic situation or something like that, they would tell you to mark the skill. Then you, as a player, know that the next time you develop it, you can use the lower cost for the first rank (and remove the mark). If you already have a mark on the skill, you cannot earn additional ones.
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We’ve given thought to levelless variants of RM. we’ve always decided to keep levels as a framework for XP and DP. Partial DP awards and such is just too much bookkeeping in a game that already requires a lot of bookkeeping.
What we focused on were decoupling levels from mainly Spell casting and manner of Resistance rolls.
Those are the two places level is most tied to the rules.
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What we focused on were decoupling levels from mainly Spell casting and manner of Resistance rolls.
Actually, considering how DP-based RM is, it's not really hard. A caster level in a given spell could merely be the level at which he masters the list in which the spell is, and you may just give a DP-cost to the RR level: a magical, a disease and a poison RR level should suffice.
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What we focused on were decoupling levels from mainly Spell casting and manner of Resistance rolls.
Actually, considering how DP-based RM is, it's not really hard. A caster level in a given spell could merely be the level at which he masters the list in which the spell is, and you may just give a DP-cost to the RR level: a magical, a disease and a poison RR level should suffice.
I don’t know that we are saying different things.
We came up with a system for spell casting that was a combination of skill, stat and level of spell - ignoring character level from the equation.
Resistance to spells, poison, etc were decoupled from levels altogether and was based on stats, race bonus etc. it does take some management though because level is really ingrained in the system.
Nonetheless, I’ve never understood nor agreed with level based resistance. Never made sense to me why Joe Fighter was more resistant to spells, poison etc because he was 15th level.
This was a carry over (I believe) from the conceit in DnD and unfortunately stayed around in games regardless of whether it made sense.
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I don’t know that we are saying different things.
I don't get this sentence… Do you mean that you think we're not talking about the same thing? I think we do. You said you created a levelless-system and got into some issues…
We came up with a system for spell casting that was a combination of skill, stat and level of spell - ignoring character level from the equation.
Resistance to spells, poison, etc were decoupled from levels altogether and was based on stats, race bonus etc. it does take some management though because level is really ingrained in the system.
There. As I said, though, the thing is that RMU is pretty much already levelless, and more rank-based. Skill proficiency is based on the number of ranks one has in said skill, not one's level. Similarly, ultimately, spellcasting is based on the number of ranks one has in the spell list in which the spell is, more than the spellcaster's level: just exchange the spellcaster's level with his list's number of ranks and you get it. What's left is the RRs' levels. What I said is what a GM has to do is merely give a rank cost to RRs and that's it. A character could simply buy RR ranks, and resist spell, disease or poison based on the appropriate number of ranks.
That being said, and I've been saying it for years, since RM2, the system provided rules to manage poisons without consideration for the character's level, the luck-based RR and the CON-based RR, and this may easily apply to disease as well, meaning a character may only have to actually develop ranks for some RR against magic.
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I don’t know that we are saying different things.
I don't get this sentence… Do you mean that you think we're not talking about the same thing? I think we do.
I think he means you might actually be saying the same or similar things. He's not sure that what you're saying is different from what he is saying.
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I been thinking a bit on the resistance roll aspect of levelless RM. To base the RR level on number of ranks is the obvious solution, like body development and exhaustion are linked. Having more skills that everyone must buy is on the other hand not nice.
Has anyone tried to run a game where the number of ranks determine the RR, but it is up to the player to motivate what skill they use to defend?
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There was the suggestion in beta that RRs are based on number of ranks. One of the suggestions was:
--Essence RR is based on ranks in Power Projection skill
--Channeling RR is based on ranks in Channeling skill
--Mentalism RR is based on ranks in Mental Focus skill
--Physical RR based on Body Dev
And then of course Fear RR is based on Leadership (which is actually RAW)
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If you don't want level to be a factor, just remove it. There's no need to substitute ranks in anything, as removing level from both sides of the equation is itself balanced, though it evens things up between low and high level characters. If you don't want that evening, it is better to just use levels (other than pacing development, that's pretty much all levels do). Trying to introduce RR skills that are neither "must take" (in which case, why add the complexity when it's already folded into level advancement?) or not worth it except in edge cases is not that easy. The approach suggested by Hurin is obviously pretty broken. Mental Focus is already a useful skill that is generally nice to have. Power Projection and Channeling are of marginal utility. The skills are also going to have different costs for different professions, altering the balance between Realms (probably to the disadvantage of Mentalism users once one takes into account how much better the skill that resists them is).
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How about having the RR rolls simply be based on the Stats (or stat bonuses) that the characters have - In vs Channeling, PR vs Mentalism etc.? Not sure how the new RMU differs from the old ones in this regard, but I'm sure there must be a way to use the Stats directly in this way.
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How about having the RR rolls simply be based on the Stats (or stat bonuses) that the characters have - In vs Channeling, PR vs Mentalism etc.? Not sure how the new RMU differs from the old ones in this regard, but I'm sure there must be a way to use the Stats directly in this way.
That is already the case. I think we are talking about bonuses on top of that, since spellcasters can keep increasing their bonus to the SCR (and thus the RR/attack roll) by gaining ranks in the spell list, but defenders can't.
I wouldn't say the approach I lay out above is 'broken'. It was one way to allow targets to develop a skill that helps them resist spells. Again, casters can keep increasing the number the defender needs to roll to RR because casters can keep gaining ranks in the list. But targets have no way of improving their resistance other than set bonuses for armor or items (and casters can get items too). Once you reach the higher levels, therefore, the bonuses available to resisters pale in comparison to the bonuses the attackers get.
On the other hand, Rdan makes a fair point about the particular skills I mention being unevenly distributed. I would note further that they also generally favour casters, since they are cheaper for casters overall. Another suggestion to get around that would be to allow ranks in the Fortitude skill to be used for RRs, since that's a skill that Arms users tend to be better in.
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I can't speak for RMU, although much of our changes were instigated during the RMU process:
https://www.rolemasterblog.com/further-deconstruction-of-resistance-rolls-saving-throws/
https://www.rolemasterblog.com/random-musings-resistance-rolls-rolemaster/
With that said, we've had great success treating "physical attack" RRs based on stats.
On the other side, Rolemaster in all it's forms, is condusive to tinkering and houseruling to a degree that other systems aren't. Isn't that the predominance of posts here?
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There was the suggestion in beta that RRs are based on number of ranks. One of the suggestions was:
--Essence RR is based on ranks in Power Projection skill
--Channeling RR is based on ranks in Channeling skill
--Mentalism RR is based on ranks in Mental Focus skill
--Physical RR based on Body Dev
And then of course Fear RR is based on Leadership (which is actually RAW)
The problem with the idea in the beta was that having Essence RR be based on Power Projection means a lot of characters need this skill just for the RR aspect. The skill does not make sense for most characters.
The new idea I had is that any skill can provide resistance provided the player can present a good argument for why the skill is suiting.
A few examples of what I imagine...semispell user X prefer to use power point development when he tries to resist magic. Elven fighter Y prefer to use his meditation skill to defend against mental attacks. Scholar Z is very religous and prefer to use his Religion skill when defending against Channeling magic.
Spell users will get resisting spells for free, but the rest can also get a two times in defense if they plan their character well. Using RR as level 1 for everyone is a possitbility, but that it is equal easy to land a spell on the sect leader and his goons might not be desired.
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Spell users will get resisting spells for free, but the rest can also get a two times in defense if they plan their character well. Using RR as level 1 for everyone is a possitbility, but that it is equal easy to land a spell on the sect leader and his goons might not be desired.
Actually, you might want to do something here - still use levels for resistance, but do not assign resistance levels according to "experience", but according to scenaristic importance. So your goons will be level 1, but your cult leader will be level 10 - but only for resistance purposes. Skills, and skill development, is not correlated with level anymore.
You can even use different "levels" with that - a leader might have a high resistance vs mental magic, but a normal resistance to physical aspects (physical magic, poisons, and the like). A spy and assassin might have a moderate resistance to mental magic and a high resistance to toxins.
But when you get to this (resistance uncorrelated with experience, but correlated with role), you can remove level and assign a resistance modifier instead. Which allows you to keep the casting bonus - characters will be able to overcome resistance more easily with spell proficiency, but this resistance will still vary from individual to individual according to something that is more ingrained in "the way the world works" (scenaristic importance) than in practical and measurable values.
You still have to know what to do with spells that allow to detect a target's level, though. Does it measure field experience (DPs), or does it measure that "relative importance in the world" thing that can be thought as Destiny ?
And if you assign resistance capability to Destiny, you are just one jump away from allowing characters and NPCs to trade it for actual survival - escape certain death ? Spend destiny. The villain escapes certain death, but they use up something vital and, from then on, are closer to their demise (and so their Destiny has unraveled a bit and their resistance to aggression is lessened).
Probably does not work for all settings, but has a certain appeal for those where fate, or soul, is a significant parameter.
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There was the suggestion in beta that RRs are based on number of ranks. One of the suggestions was:
--Essence RR is based on ranks in Power Projection skill
--Channeling RR is based on ranks in Channeling skill
--Mentalism RR is based on ranks in Mental Focus skill
--Physical RR based on Body Dev
And then of course Fear RR is based on Leadership (which is actually RAW)
The problem with the idea in the beta was that having Essence RR be based on Power Projection means a lot of characters need this skill just for the RR aspect. The skill does not make sense for most characters.
That's a feature, not a bug.
If you allow characters to use any old skill they can try to justify, they'll use ones they are very good at, and have already bought. This kind of defeats the purpose. The skill used to resist should be something that doesn't already have a common use. That will allow the system to help balance all the skills by giving value to VERY underused skills (I've literally never had a player spend points in Channeling or Power Projection). But more importantly, it also means that building up a skill to defend against spells comes at a cost. If it were essentially free, then the balance of the game tips a bit too far towards resister rather than caster.
If you're not worried about resisting becoming a bit too easy, then yes, I think you can do what you say. Personally, I'm leaning towards making it a specialization of Fortitude (so it costs additional DP to build it up) or Channeling/Mental Focus/Power Projection.
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On the other side, Rolemaster in all it's forms, is condusive to tinkering and houseruling to a degree that other systems aren't. Isn't that the predominance of posts here?
Most of the RM2 companions were house rules. :) The RMSS/RMFRP companions included optional rules.
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The problem with the idea in the beta was that having Essence RR be based on Power Projection means a lot of characters need this skill just for the RR aspect. The skill does not make sense for most characters.
That's a feature, not a bug.
If you allow characters to use any old skill they can try to justify, they'll use ones they are very good at, and have already bought. This kind of defeats the purpose. The skill used to resist should be something that doesn't already have a common use. That will allow the system to help balance all the skills by giving value to VERY underused skills (I've literally never had a player spend points in Channeling or Power Projection). But more importantly, it also means that building up a skill to defend against spells comes at a cost. If it were essentially free, then the balance of the game tips a bit too far towards resister rather than caster.
If you're not worried about resisting becoming a bit too easy, then yes, I think you can do what you say. Personally, I'm leaning towards making it a specialization of Fortitude (so it costs additional DP to build it up) or Channeling/Mental Focus/Power Projection.
There are reasons why most characters might want to have Channeling and Mental Focus, while power projection is hard to fit into most character concepts (even including spell users). Having rules that make the essence realm more powerful is possible, but it might not be suiting for most campaings.
Even more important I don't really understand your objection. Level based RR comes for free by the core rules so to require that you have some suiting skill to base the RR on in fact raising the requirement to get a RR bonus for characters that ignore magic. I think my idea fits well with the topic of the discussion being levelless RMU.
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Even more important I don't really understand your objection. Level based RR comes for free by the core rules so to require that you have some suiting skill to base the RR on in fact raising the requirement to get a RR bonus for characters that ignore magic. I think my idea fits well with the topic of the discussion being levelless RMU.
Level based RR is core, as you say, and both sides (caster and resister) get a level based bonus. But the caster actually gets a second bonus that increases with level so long as the caster spends points in the skill: the ranks in the spell list. At low levels, this doesn't cause much disparity because resisters get set armor bonuses and a realm bonus that makes the playing field relatively equal. Once you start getting to the higher levels, though, that disparity can get quite large.
So, that is one thing I think that needs to be taken into consideration, and why I like to offer to all characters a skill that allows them to keep pace with the casters so long as they also spend points in it. This is especially something to consider if you are removing the core level bonuses themselves.
That's my 2 cents at least.
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Level-less Rolemaster has been talked about for the past 30 years. :)
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...why I like to offer to all characters a skill that allows them to keep pace with the casters so long as they also spend points in it. This is especially something to consider if you are removing the core level bonuses themselves.
The question if there should be a skill to boost resistance against magic seems like a different topic than levelless RMU, but probably no use to split the discussion inte a separate thread.
Anyway, I must say that in my book, a fighter who needs to devote 9+12+9+12+5+7= 45 DP each level to get resistance, will probably not agree that he has been giveb a meaningful chance to spend the points.
If the scheme with a skill boost resistance should work for arms users the resistance building skill must not be from a magical category or the cost will be too high for arms users. Having mental focus as single resistance skill for all realms could be one alternative that might work.
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Well that's why I suggested making the skill a specialization of Fortitude, since Arms Users get that cheap.
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So for a campaign I ran years ago we tried level-less. Rules were fairly simple: The GM (/me) handed out DP instead of XP/EP each session/or whenever. DP could be spent whenever characters had an appropriate rest or whatever (we are generally pretty lax on that). Each skill could be developed at the usual costs - first rank at cheaper cost, second at second cost etc. We did it after first - so technically characters were getting DP early.
Every X DP (I can't recall how many DP we used at the time) was a "new level" reseting costs back to usual and moving the character up for spell casting and the like.
Players... didn't really care for it - was good for reactionary skills / learning; but the bookkeeping was a major pain. May be easier with software these days.
Eventually the system we settled on was what is now called milestone levelling (we called it "level when the GM feels like it" system), because we also hated calculating XP, and I hated to calculating XP to give them. The one thing we always did was allow players to prebuy a few ranks of stuff for the next level if story appropriate. Generally new or rarely used skills that got a sudden boost (players get some lessons on sailing, one takes first 2 ranks in Sailing, or a crash course in herbs - a rank in herb lore).
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Level based RR is core, as you say, and both sides (caster and resister) get a level based bonus. But the caster actually gets a second bonus that increases with level so long as the caster spends points in the skill: the ranks in the spell list.
So the simplest solution would be to get rid of that second bonus and simply attack and resist with Stat-based bonuses. Casters would still often have the advantage, as they usually have better stats in their magic realm Stats, but not necessarily.
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We are playing an almost levelless RM2 campaign for about 11 years, using skill costs of 1/*, 2/*, 3/* etc based on the corresponding stat bonusses. (Consequently, classes are redundant to some extent, too.) DP are granted for every session and can be spend immediately to improve skills. My observation on character development is that especially at low levels characters are more similar in the sense that every character is proficient with at least one weapon. At higher levels characters differ to a larger extent as they don't have to waste their DP on 'general' skills that they are not interested in such as perception because they couldn't use them otherwise. This leads to more focussed skills and fragmentary knowledge, e.g. a spell list developed to rank/level 50 but no expertise in Attunement. This works for us but I must admit that we don't care much on min-maxing and skills should only support the character's role.
However, we didn't find a solution for the spell RRs mentioned here and we still use levels only for that purpose (derived from the total DP spend).
Level based RR is core, as you say, and both sides (caster and resister) get a level based bonus. But the caster actually gets a second bonus that increases with level so long as the caster spends points in the skill: the ranks in the spell list.
So the simplest solution would be to get rid of that second bonus and simply attack and resist with Stat-based bonuses. Casters would still often have the advantage, as they usually have better stats in their magic realm Stats, but not necessarily.
So far, this seems to be a valid option to me as it doesn't favour certain classes but I am missing that the expertise of the spell list is not considered. It should be harder to resist a spell cast by someone having 20 ranks in that list than by someone having only one rank.
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...higher levels characters differ to a larger extent as they don't have to waste their DP on 'general' skills that they are not interested in such as perception because they couldn't use them otherwise.
This may go off on a tangent, but I'm surprised to see Perception mentioned in this context. Isn't it often one of the most important skills for situational awareness (or do you use a separate skill for that?), detecting ambushes, hints or clues in the environment etc. etc.?
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Level based RR is core, as you say, and both sides (caster and resister) get a level based bonus. But the caster actually gets a second bonus that increases with level so long as the caster spends points in the skill: the ranks in the spell list.
So the simplest solution would be to get rid of that second bonus and simply attack and resist with Stat-based bonuses. Casters would still often have the advantage, as they usually have better stats in their magic realm Stats, but not necessarily.
Yes, generally, though note that the benefits to the defender from armor can be substantial: up to +15. So I would say your solution is definitely the simplest, with the one downside that it might actually give a slight advantage to the defender. And neither side being able really to increase their bonus beyond items (there is no skill that gives a benefit to it).
But if you're happy with that, then yes, that's a good suggestion.
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...higher levels characters differ to a larger extent as they don't have to waste their DP on 'general' skills that they are not interested in such as perception because they couldn't use them otherwise.
This may go off on a tangent, but I'm surprised to see Perception mentioned in this context. Isn't it often one of the most important skills for situational awareness (or do you use a separate skill for that?), detecting ambushes, hints or clues in the environment etc. etc.?
Of course, players select useful skills if DP are left. This results in a set of skills that all characters share and that is what I mean by 'general' skills. In our current group, I think, only the Thief and the Seer developed Perception. This may be affected by the usage of the skill, too, since I use Perception mainly as a conflicting skill for Stalking. Whenever any other information/knowledge than pure detection of a hidden object is involved, I would prefer another, appropriate skill, e.g. Stonecraft or Stone Lore to find a raw diamond.
However, I think, a levelless Rolemaster would result in a smaller set of 'general' skills in general, even if you allow restricted skill development (e.g. costs of 2/5) in shorter time intervals (which would approach costs of 2/* if the time intervals are small enough).
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This may go off on a tangent, but I'm surprised to see Perception mentioned in this context. Isn't it often one of the most important skills for situational awareness (or do you use a separate skill for that?), detecting ambushes, hints or clues in the environment etc. etc.?
I've gotten rid of perception as a catch-all skill... and of all perception skills as well. I've tried using the active skills as perception skills. The rationale being, if you're good at something, you probably also learned to notice things related to that. So if you want to detect someone trying to sneak on you ? Roll an opposed Stealth skill. You want to know if someone is lying through his teeth ? Roll an opposed Befuddle skill. And so on.
The good thing: it seems to works.
The less good thing: there is no attribute difference between the active use of the skill and the perceptive use of it. I could compute it, but it would generate two different scores (one active score and one perceptive score) and I'm not sure this is something I need to have.
The thing that might annoy some people : you cannot simply be good at detecting things - you also have to be good at doing them as well (or vice versa).
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This may go off on a tangent, but I'm surprised to see Perception mentioned in this context. Isn't it often one of the most important skills for situational awareness (or do you use a separate skill for that?), detecting ambushes, hints or clues in the environment etc. etc.?
I've gotten rid of perception as a catch-all skill... and of all perception skills as well. I've tried using the active skills as perception skills. The rationale being, if you're good at something, you probably also learned to notice things related to that. So if you want to detect someone trying to sneak on you ? Roll an opposed Stealth skill. You want to know if someone is lying through his teeth ? Roll an opposed Befuddle skill. And so on.
The good thing: it seems to works.
The less good thing: there is no attribute difference between the active use of the skill and the perceptive use of it. I could compute it, but it would generate two different scores (one active score and one perceptive score) and I'm not sure this is something I need to have.
The thing that might annoy some people : you cannot simply be good at detecting things - you also have to be good at doing them as well (or vice versa).
This is great, agree wholeheartedly. We talked about this back in 2018 but your approach is spot on.
https://www.rolemasterblog.com/inherent-ability-or-skill-another-look-at-perception/
https://www.rolemasterblog.com/rolemaster-skill-deconstruction-perception-skill/
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I notice that second link is essentially just suggesting the use of appropriate complementary skills, which I think is great.
I do like the idea of using an appropriate subject matter skill. E.g. if you are noticing natural things in a familiar environment, Survival is very appropriate and I could see using that in place of Perception.
On the other hand, if you take it too far, you stop hiring city guards from anywhere besides the town prison because only thieves will notice thieves sneaking around. I don't think that quite makes sense. Maybe in that case a guard vocation would be a reasonable alternative?
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On the other hand, if you take it too far, you stop hiring city guards from anywhere besides the town prison because only thieves will notice thieves sneaking around. I don't think that quite makes sense. Maybe in that case a guard vocation would be a reasonable alternative?
You can do that, i.e. having several active skills covering the same perceptive scope.
Or you can say that only by being adept at hiding can you really be an expert in noticing people in the shadows.
I would tend to use the former if the skill system was based on vocations and not on specific, limiited-scope skills (kind of a BoL-like skill-as-profession system). You could even have different modifiers to indicate deeper or more superficial familiarity (e.g. the "burglar" skill covers searching at +0, as is the "investogator skill", but the "guard" skill covers searching at -20).
If I use a discrete skill list with little to no overlapping, I would use the second interpretation. If you want to be good at detecting traps, get ranks in Mechanisms skill. If you want to be good at noticing sneaky bastards, get ranks in Stealth.
It's not ideal, but then again, I moved away from perception-only skills for a reason, and I find the trade-off more acceptable than the previous status quo.
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Forum fumble, ignore the present post :-/
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I like being able to use Herbalism rather than Perception to find herbs in the wild.
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I like being able to use Herbalism rather than Perception to find herbs in the wild.
RAW is Perception or Survival, with Herbalism or Region Lore as complementary skills. So if you dropped Perception, it would be Survival as the skill for searching for natural things in a natural environment.
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RAW is Perception or Survival, with Herbalism or Region Lore as complementary skills. So if you dropped Perception, it would be Survival as the skill for searching for natural things in a natural environment.
Which, if you think about it, makes all kinds of sense.
Maybe it comes from our way of thinking: there are (at least) two ways of learning how to do something. The first is by actually learning that particular thing. The second is by being immersed in an environment where you have to do that thing to thrive, even if you don't learn it specifically.
The first leads to one or more perception skills.
The second leads to one or more active skills that happen to include perception in the corresponding environment.
For those who don't mind the bookkeeping and the long skill list, having both makes sense (but then again, it would probably be better to have perception skills cost a fraction of the DPs of active skills to balance things out a bit).
For those who prefer to keep a short skill list (including specialties), then the second option is probably preferable.
The same logic can also be applied to knowledge in a number of cases. You have an apothecary skill ? You probably know something about herbs, and something about reagents as well, and a fair deal about poisons and diseases, and basic medicine, though at various 'equivalence levels' if you want to nitpick. You have a guard skill ? You certainly know how to look for suspicious activity, and to discern lies, but you also know the basics of the most common trade languages in the area, and basics of administrative work, and common trade routes and what usually is traded. This really favours a 'occupations as skills' kind of system, which I find easy to use but requiring quite a bit of on-the-fly judgment call (but then again, that's GMing for you).
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Interesting points and I tend to agree with many of them, but perhaps I'd not go all the way to "professions equal skills" thinking. That's too D&D for me. In real life different people may have the same profession (e.g. teacher), but specialise in very different specific skills and abilities (some are better at relational competence, some are better in their subject field knowledge, some have good knowledge of pedagogical models and teaching methods etc. etc.). Similarly, one guard may be better at human relations, while another is great at smacking them over the head. So, professions are better as training packages that provide lower rank costs (or bonuses, free/low-cost ranks etc. depending on the system) to a variety of skills, but a player can still choose which professional skills their character focusses more on.
In the example of a guard or an apothecary, I'd see it as a profession or a training package that provides skills or possibilities to develop in the mentioned areas, rather than simply saying, for example "you are a guard and thus you can detect lies".
Insofar as getting rid of the Perception skill and simply using opposing Stealth rolls, I'd argue that someone may be trained (or forced to learn in order to survive) to pay attention to their surroundings, but still be too clumsy at moving stealthily themselves. But I admit it is a strange skill covering perhaps too many things... :/
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Interesting points and I tend to agree with many of them, but perhaps I'd not go all the way to "professions equal skills" thinking. That's too D&D for me. In real life different people may have the same profession (e.g. teacher), but specialise in very different specific skills and abilities (some are better at relational competence, some are better in their subject field knowledge, some have good knowledge of pedagogical models and teaching methods etc. etc.). Similarly, one guard may be better at human relations, while another is great at smacking them over the head. So, professions are better as training packages that provide lower rank costs (or bonuses, free/low-cost ranks etc. depending on the system) to a variety of skills, but a player can still choose which professional skills their character focusses more on.
In the example of a guard or an apothecary, I'd see it as a profession or a training package that provides skills or possibilities to develop in the mentioned areas, rather than simply saying, for example "you are a guard and thus you can detect lies".
Insofar as getting rid of the Perception skill and simply using opposing Stealth rolls, I'd argue that someone may be trained (or forced to learn in order to survive) to pay attention to their surroundings, but still be too clumsy at moving stealthily themselves. But I admit it is a strange skill covering perhaps too many things... :/
Fair enough - you are of those who think that skills must have a reduced scope of applicability because it creates more variety. I must admit that I am not, or at least, that skills that are the drivers for the way the game is played should be in very limited numbers (two dozen, tops) and that others should be background only in use. I also think that variety is not provided solely by technical definition of a character, but also (and I would say mostly) by his demeanour, behaviour, and cultural background quirks. Which means that a reduced number of skills that have a wide scope is manageable and actually easier to handle.
I must admit that it is also a reaction from previous RM games where my players had an idea of what their character was (which is good) and invariably fell short in terms of skill allocation ("but my character should have this skill given what they did"). *and they were right*. I went through a phase where I simply told the players to define the characters as they wished ("tell me how good or bad you are with the various skills, and you'll have the corresponding number of ranks") except for spell lists, which worked fine for the particular campaign but was probably not easily portable. So I went back to the "limited resource available" method of character development (DP spending), but I compacted the skill list and removed all non-active skills by either merging them with active skills (perception skill, notably) or make them background skills (all knowledge skills) that work from a different point allocation that is age- and -background- based instead of being based on field experience (and those background skills are not rolled - either you know, or you don't).
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Fair enough - you are of those who think that skills must have a reduced scope of applicability because it creates more variety. I must admit that I am not, or at least, that skills that are the drivers for the way the game is played should be in very limited numbers (two dozen, tops) and that others should be background only in use. I also think that variety is not provided solely by technical definition of a character, but also (and I would say mostly) by his demeanour, behaviour, and cultural background quirks. Which means that a reduced number of skills that have a wide scope is manageable and actually easier to handle.
Indeed, I've always preferred skill-based systems, such as MERP/Rolemaster and Runequest/BRP/Cthulhu. I can understand the kind of system you prefer and I must say that I also abhor too long skill lists, since they make it impossible to remember all the skills that are available both for the GM and especially for the players. In my own non-magic system (inspired by MERP/RM/BRP), I've cut the number down below 50, but I hope to get under 40 as playtesting continues.