Topic: The Winners!

[Thom @ ICE]

Arms Law - Thrill of the game post

With many incredible posts, it was decided that this post (1st post by LonePaladin) managed to capture the thrill of gaming, the thrill (and agony) of Rolemaster, and the thrill of Arms Law.  Well done....  All of the other posts will continue to be considered as we look forward to next week's selection of the best Arms Law - Fumble post....

My tale goes back nearly 30 years to my high-school days. My friends and I have primarily played a different fantasy RPG (it had "basic" and "advanced" types at the time), with a smattering of other systems and genres. At our local game store, we encountered Keith.

Keith had a milk crate filled with rulebooks we've never seen before, accompanied by some spiral notebooks, a cardboard box crammed with unpainted miniatures, and a pair of ten-sided dice. He was wandering the store, looking for a group of open-minded players to introduce to a unique RPG system.

You guessed it: Rolemaster.

Keith played things fast and loose. He didn't bother dragging us through three hours of character-creation; rather, he just handed out pre-generated characters, explained the important bits, and turned us loose. Before the sun has set, we've had a tavern brawl, a run-in with an angry boar, and a knock-down drag-out with about a dozen orcs.

You can bet we showed up next week for more.

Keith kept things moving. We never worried much about encumbrance, or counting ammunition. The only thing we really counted carefully were our coins. When we gained a level, he would take up our character sheets, and the next week he'd hand them back with updated stats. We took this in stride, and didn't give the rules much of a critical eye.

Memory fades after a couple decades, so I can't tell you what the other players had for characters. All I remember was my own: a cleric. I came into this with the preconceptions of the unnamed RPG above, so I had to learn a lot of new things with this character.

The good news? I could wield a sword. My skill with it didn't compare to the fighter and the rogue, but I was competent at it.

The bad news? No heavy armor. I accepted this as the Cost of Doing Business and focused on smiting the bad guy and keeping my friends intact.

For all that my cleric was competent with a blade, the dice didn't care. He only hit about one time in six. I remember one of my friends remarking that he couldn't hit the right side of a fat cow. This bad luck stayed consistent over several months of play. I was pretty quiet about it -- I was having fun, after all -- but frustration was gradually building.

About the time we were 6th, maybe 7th level, we ended up having to fight off a young dragon of some sort. (The type isn't important.) We had the front-line types in its face, keeping it busy; the rogue was looking for spots that were amenable to a knifing; the mage was pelting it with blasts of fire and lightning and such. My hapless cleric was off to one side, futilely swinging his sword at its flank and doing no good whatsoever.

My frustration finally gave me an idea: perhaps it was my dice? I had the usual dice superstitions that all gamers naturally develop. So I ran to the front of the store and bought a brand new pair of ten-siders. I get back to the table just in time for my turn.

The new dice rolled, in order, a 96, a 98, and a 90.

Keith tapped these into his calculator, along with the dragon's Defensive Bonus. He asked me, "What's your OB?"

I stood up, slammed my hands on the table, and cried, "Does it matter?! I HIT HIM!"

It turned out to be a middling strike -- I think, maybe, a 'C' critical. The dragon managed to paralyze my character with a tail-slap to the neck, so that was the only real contribution I made to that fight. That didn't stop it from etching itself into my memory, and I always think about it when I crack open a copy of Arms Law.

[ironmaul]

I haven't been reading the thread as I've way to much other things going on, but that story is hilarious!!! Congrates to you!

[markc]

Congrats.
MDC

[Khorah]

Congrats!!

[GrumpyOldFart]

Congrats. Nicely done. 'Thrill of the Game' indeed. 

[Thom @ ICE]

This week was a difficult selection. Lots of great tales of comedic value; flying spiders who go splat, foolhardy thieves trying to shoot people in the back, and bloodthirsty dwarves attacking orcs and opossum....

But the one found to have classic comedic value, was one that referenced the classic - unseen, imaginary, deceased turtle ruining the perfect plan.

We've always interpreted Rolemaster dragons as having incredible senses: If you're invisible, they'll hear you moving about; if you're silent, they'll feel your feet touching the ground; etc.

So, the party was ecstatic when they finally arranged a flawless ambush. The rogue had the Background Option that ensured he had no discernible odor. He was both Invisible and Silent. He was Flying, drifting on a magically summoned breeze. The dragon could not smell, see, hear, or even feel the rogue's presence. The party even arranged a distraction so that the dragon was busy casting counter-spells and could not spend a round casting Presence.

The rogue had maneuvered into a perfect position, floating above the dragon's back, a dwarven axe in hand. His ambush maneuver was flawless, and with forty-plus ranks of ambush, an open-ended critical was not unlikely. Given his OB, positional modifiers, and surprise, he couldn't fail to max the chart.

Until.

He fumbled. Somehow, despite his improbable position, he stumbled over an unseen, imaginary, deceased turtle and (this was probably pure malice on the GM's part) dropped his axe.

The next session was spent plotting a way to recover enough of the poor rogue's body to restore him to life.

Next week - non-Fantasy settings... So bring out your favorite examples of arms law impacting your non-Fantasy game play....

[markc]

Congrats on the win, Peter Mork.
MDC

[Chorpa]

Grats Mork! If anyone would win ofcourse it would be the infamous unseen, imaginary, deseased turtle. That pesky turtle must have haunted every RM/MERP group in one way or another. 

[Thom @ ICE]

This week the winning post was from JimiSue, and was from a Spacemaster game, but the reason why it won was how well it covered the Rolemaster system of combat, with modifiers and a critical, and most importantly a great bit of roleplaying.

I was playing an Anarchist, and another player a Con Artist in a game of sub-legality. We were level 7 or 8 or so. My character was a schemer for sure, an explosives expert, yes, but also pretty darn good with a stun pistol - although in that entire game I had always rolled really poorly with it, so no one believed she was any good.

My character had something (I forget what) that the con artist wanted, and decided that to pass the time on the long hyperspace journey that he would try and steal it from her cabin while she was asleep. He managed to get the cabin door open, but as a paranoid schemer I had previously stipulated to the GM that I would get the computer set up to sound an alarm if the door was opened, and that she always slept with a stun pistol under her pillow.

So my character woke up, the GM gave me penalties for being groggy, and also because I said I didn't bother really opening mty eyes, i'd just shoot towards that bright glare, but I rolled open ended high, and with my OB it was enough to max out even after penalties. Only a mk 2 weapon so it maxes at 110, did a few hits and an A stun critical. Other player doesn't look too worried. A stun results are not too bad on the grand scale of critical results.

Then I roll a 97, and his character got knocked back out of the room, and was down and stunned for a significant number of rounds. My character just muttered "I *said* I didn't want to be disturbed!", ordered the computer to relock the door and went back to sleep.

She wasn't bothered again

[JimiSue]

This week the winning post was from JimiSue, and was from a Spacemaster game, but the reason why it won was how well it covered the Rolemaster system of combat, with modifiers and a critical, and most importantly a great bit of roleplaying.

Thanks, I feel so special <sniff>

I must remember to say thanks to my mate John who was playing the other character, for making it possible to relate now, 20 years down the line

[markc]

Congrats, JimiSue
MDC

[Thom @ ICE]

When it comes to something different... there's one story that struck me as completely different and again, a comic twist at the end...

Congratulations to roblowry!

This is not a story so much about how humorous the critical tables are, as how humor of the tables can appear in unexpected locations.
We were playing a low level party, all 3rd level or less. It was your standard group, a fighter, a mage, and a cleric.  We entered town looking for trouble. Er adventure. We learned that a handmaiden to the queen had recently gone missing. Adventurers assemble.

After some investigation we determined that the handmaiden was kidnapped by a vampire and his henchman. We tracked them to an abandoned farmhouse just outside the city. It was getting late in the day, so we knew we had to move fast.

Exploring the cellar, we discovered a coffin. We opened it. (Drum roll) It was the handmaiden, freshly bitten, but not yet a vampire. We decided to lock her in and drag the coffin back to the city.  However, we were not getting out of there that easily. The vampire sent a pack of rats against us.

Rats, ok not that bad of a fight. First round, the party kills a couple of rats. The cleric gets bitten. Not too badly just an A Tiny. Roll the critical on the cleric. 100! Foe loses one of his eyes. An easy fight just got a lot tougher. Several rounds later, there were lots of dead rats, a fighter and mage with a few nicks and cuts. But the cleric was a mess. His face was covered in blood, bleeding from a pair of bites. His eye was torn from its socket, barely attached with a few strands of flesh.

The party staggered from the farm house, dragging the coffin up the stairs. It was mere minutes from sunset. So they quickly set fire to the buildings to keep the vampire busy. We then started back to the city, dragging the coffin with the handmaiden inside. About halfway back the mage asked is we should keep an eye out for the henchman. So the cleric picks up his eye and asks, "How about this one?"

Next week we'll pick out the best of the rest... 

[markc]

Congrats, roblowry.
MDC

[Thom @ ICE]

And the final first round winner for Arms Law.... Yammahoper
Congratulations!!!

The Intrepid party I shall draw this telling from was small for an adventuring group; a Druid, a Mage and a Cavalier, all with materials drawn heavily from RMCI and II. 

Characters in RM are already uniquely memorable.  Our adventures had already become more story and character driven than combat, but Arms Law guarantees no GM will ever want to fully remove combat.  Arms Law is for players and Gm's who enjoy tension.  Massive combat bonuses are not required to cause tension or excitement.  Arms Law critical tables insure just picking up the dice will cause instant tension.  This simple fact makes combat in RM always enjoyable and not a tedious exercise.

I have been a GM a long time.  A PC must be or do something extraordinary for me to recall their Name.  This episode did that in spades.  A combination of roleplaying and that magic Arms Law can bring.

After a successful information gathering expedition, the group was heading home.  A striken elven NPC begged aid from the party, requesting they cross the border into the cursed elven city to complete the task he had failed at.   Now I expected the players to say no.  The Cursed city of Elven Undead was a place to avoid, as ordered by their commanded, and as was very clear to a group of experienced gammers with 4th to 7th level PC's.  The 4th lvl Cavalier would have none of it.  He swore aid, to seek this dark vessel placed on this ancient high kings alter and shatter it, "...though it be my death me of."   Burton Hubbard, the player, through mutual laughter informed us that since ending a sentence with a prepositional phrase was wrong, the Cavalier redused to do it.

So to certain death the Cavalier went, alone, because the druid and mage believed the definition of party did not include commitment to certain death.  After two battles with lesser wights that were quite tense and spetacular in their own right, the fallen Elven Paladins ring brought our lone hero through trap and twisting streets to the kings tomb.  Within was the Major Guardian Wight cursed to haunt the kings rest, protect the perversion of the tomb and guard it against intruding Cavaliers.  So the wight advances, easily winning initiative, and strikes at this 4th level albeit Platemail clad mortal with his +30 eog sword of cold, a foe already stunned by the intense cold radiating from its undead bulk...and fumbles, resulting in dropping the blade, including requiring two rounds to recover.

Our hero weilded a mighty blade: a +10 two hand sword of superior design, which he tossed aside without a thought and almost screamed, "I'm going for its blade!"  As picking up an object from the floor is a most routine mnv, yet being in combat is anything but routine, also considering the wight HAD already had its action, I demanded an easy manuever to grab it, which our hero did even with stuns stiff penalty to mnv.

Next round, I anounce that the wight will either blast with magic, physical attack, or try to dominate the Cavalier through the power of ITS sword.  The d10 roll demanded everyones attention and resulted in mental domination.  After a brief discussion if the wight should have 1/2 its will because the sword is tied to it but it is not holding the blade.  we compromised with a -30 to its will, enough to swing the contest it turned out, as both the high mental stats and solid die roll of Burton prove out by winning the contest by 30+ points, well over the 25 needed to allow him to attack freely.

Breaking the shadow filled lock of the wights cold gaze, an "over head crush" was declared, a house rull of mine were all Qu DB is sacrificed to gain a set +25 to OB and x1 1/2 hits.  Burton scored a D crit, so a critical was rolled, and one of the rarest events in Arms Law combat occred right there.  Burton, rolling under the Mythrel column on the SL critical table, rolled a 96, followed by an 01.  The Cavaliers mighty blow crashed down on the wight, splitting its skull, causeing it to instantly fall, shrieking, dieing a wights death in one round, which meant flashy pyrotechnics as its bulky form was sucked into darkfire, and was gone.

The hero did it.  Several Co points lower, maybe lucky he escaped the last rounds cold crit, definitely LUCKY:  Right there Arms Law shined.  Many systems do not have the built in mechanic to display luck at work.  Foes do not fall until beaten down.  RM's Arms Law manages to not just allow lucky strikes, but in no small part because of them, keeps every battle full of tension.  Just pick up your dice GMs and ask "What's your DB?" to see for yourself.

[yammahoper]

Holy crap!

I admit to being a bit embarressed by how excited I feel right now. 

I have to call Burton and thank him for doing what at the time I thought was an incredibly bad decision bound to kill yet one more character.

[Thom @ ICE]

And the winner this week....   Khorah.
Of course, a tale of magic, mystery and the timely fumble by your foe.... 

Ahhh.. Channeling.. the ability to wield your god's power to heal or harm..

In a new adventure we had started, I was convinced to roll.. an evil healer who quietly infiltrated the party..

Dominick was a fresh acolyte of Zatar, champion of Charon! He wielded some healing magics, but also chose to learn some offensive spells as well, notable the list known as Dark Channels.
In his first foray with his new traveling companions, Dominick followed his fellows into a mine that they had scouted earlier. having found the nest of greater spiders, we adroitly dodged them and were able to get into the lower levels.
We were assailed by numerous goblins, which all swiftly fell to our blades. As we entered the final cavern where the villagers felt the pests had penetrated into their mine, we found that the goblins were being led by none other than a troll!
Being so low in power, we felt that this might not be a battle we could win. However, we had also taken some wounds in getting to this point which would greatly hamper our abilities to leave, such as a broke arm carried by myself, and a sprained ankle on one of the fighters.
As we were bemoaning the fact that the situation seemed hopeless, the GM said we "thought" this was a forest troll, which could be stunned. Being somewhat hesitant to reveal my abilities, we fought on, taking even more damage. Reluctantly, I said, I raise my arm, ball my fist, and release Dark Stunning. Luckily, the dice rolled well, not only overcoming the ESF (given that I was level 1 and this was a 2nd level spell), but almost a maximum hit on the BAR table.
A beam of pure black energy flew from my fist and squarely hit the troll in the chest. The troll rolls his RR... and fumbles, followed by an open ended roll. The amount of stunning that took place knocked the troll unconscious.
The goblins, seeing their leader felled in one shot, begin a retreat, leaving us the victors on the field. The rest of the party were somewhat impressed by the felling of the troll and decided that traveling with a healer that followed an evil god might not be as bad as it had been made out to be.

[Khorah]

Wow..

Thanks a ton!!! This will score me some nice bragging rights at our next gaming session.. good thing I am GM'ing

[yammahoper]

Excellent moment KHorah.  Congrats

[Thom @ ICE]

Sorry for the delay - on the road this week, but finally got around to doing the judging.

And the Essence winner is....

Another essence example, but now of the other side:

After a long hiatus playing another RPG system, my group decided it was time to move on and, at my urging, went to try RMFRP.

My nephew is a veteran of RM as well, so he was tasked with playing the magician, as it was deemed too hard to play effectively by newbies. Now he has some particular tastes in power playing and he likes getting the max out of his characters, so his mage, at level 6 possessed Light law to level 10 and he was dabbling in casting lightning bolts. Using all he could muster he could pump one out every 3 rounds, which is quite ok, but with some risk.

Now the party, most are 10 year RPG veterans, were using party tactics when they were assailed in a tavern by some rogues. The rogues attempted to escape with some loot and the party was furiously trying to stop them.
In the courtyard of the inn, the party saw the culprit (there was only one left now) running away. The fighter and the party scout were going after him, but the mage, bow wielding ranger, cleric and magent were just out the door, using ranged attacks, hoping to catch the would be thief.
Then disaster struck: as the magician was prepared for casting his lightning bolt; he rolled a 02 for his casting: resulting in an automatic fumble! Overcasting and taking some other spell penalties, he knew this was bad and I was internally laughing, because I knew he had overplayed his hand... The fumble however resulted in a 201 result on the attack fumble chart: 8d10 hits (killing the mage) and 10!!! E electricity criticals, which were dutifully rolled, but there is a catch: The 96-99 result reads: " Bolts streak across the ground seeking new victims." This came up TWICE! as well as the 100 result, blowing away his ashes and chance of revival.
I ruled an E electricity critical rolled on each of the rest of his nearby party members, which also turned out very deadly for all of them!

So the fighter and the scout, after hearing a terrible crackling behind them, looked back to see their crew vaporized and in death throes, from one miserable failure... They did catch the rogue, but the campaign suddenly came to an end.

And next.... mentalism...

[VladD]

This made my day and it was Friday already!

I'll split my prize with the disintegrated mage's player... as a consolation prize