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Gamer's Corner => General Discussion => Topic started by: Hdog on December 19, 2018, 10:49:24 AM
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Hi
Can someone please clarify 'holy arms',in terms of what it is 'holy' against. Is it evil creatures only? Evil being defined as the demeanor,, in say creatures and treasurers, or is it at the DMs discretion? Or is there some other classification? Thanks.
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What's the context? E.g. in the context of the Paladin base list "Holy Arms", it's holy in the sense that the paladin's power is holy, but the spells will operate in battle against any foe. I suppose you could say it's at the discretion of the paladin themself to decide what are the appropriate foes to do battle against.
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...and if you mean in terms of Large and Super Large creature criticals:
-anything blessed by a Supreme Entity(nature, Gods, Aliens, etc.) as in water or oils or something actually used in the construction of the item itself(a gem, the metal in a sword, etc.).
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Ok, in the context of; someone finds a Holy Weapon. What is it holy against? When it was created was it made holy against something? To me Holy sounds as though its got it in for 'evil' creatures (the opposite of holy). But undead, are not evil, according to rolemaster, it says they are; Hostile, Cruel, Protective. Therefore i cant have a Holy weapon against undead.
Question: can i have a holy sword against undead, or does the undead thing have to be evil for the holy bit of the sword to work.
Or, can the DM create a weapon, that is holy against undead or Rabbits or trolls, end of story - It does not matter what Rolemaster says about their demeanor.
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We've always treated any holy weapon as holy on the Large and Super Large crit tables, unless the descriptions specifically states "Holy vs. Dark Elves" or something very specific.
In the case where the item was "holy vs. <type>" we resolved those crits on the Large Crit table versus that type of creature/being. Holy vs. Undead, all crits are resolved on the Large Creature Table - Holy Arms. Against any other creature it was just normal attack tables.
It's your game world so you can state very specifically what it is "holy versus" or you can be general and state that it is a "holy weapon" that resolves crits on the holy crit table. One of my PCs has a +25 Holy Battle Axe. It simply resolves crits on the Holy Table, it's not specific to a creature or "alignment."
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We tended to treat Holy weapons weapons similar to Spectre...they were considered consecrated in some shape or form and worked that way against all targets. I did toy with modify it to make them more specific, but decided that was more trouble than it was worth. The compromise? Holy weapons are quite rare in my setting, and many of them actually predate the time period the PCs are in.
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It sounds like a blurring between Holy and 'slaying against...'.
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It sounds like a blurring between Holy and 'slaying against...'.
It always was a little blurry, wasn't it? The absence of firm alignments like DnD has (Lawful Good, Chaotic Neutral) makes it harder in RM to define what a Holy attack should be especially damaging against. Don't get me wrong -- I'm not arguing that RM has to have DnD alignments. I'm just noting that in the absence of them, RM kind of made Holy weapons a new class of weapons, above magic but below slaying. I don't thing they are really tied (in the Rules As Written anyway) to any specific class or alignment of creatures; they are just like 'slaying-light'.
Whether it would be better to tie them somehow to specific creatures is a good question; I'm just not sure how exactly you would do that without alignments and designations of creatures as 'good' or 'evil'.
I like what RMU (and previous editions to some extent too) has done in giving Paladins spells specifically against demons and undead. So I guess you could say Holy weapons only get their bonuses versus those classes of creatures. RMU also has some spells that are clearly the Paladin channeling his/her god, and so the extra power applies to any creature (even one that is not inherently evil); these would be spells like Holy Strength.
But even RMU has to wrestle with these issues with spells like Holy Aura, which gives Holy criticals to all creatures 'of darkness' in the area of effect. Here the rules are leaving it up to the GM to decide what counts as a creature 'of darkness'.
It might be possible to further define that. I would say a creature is 'of darkness' if it:
--Is a demon or undead
--Is possessed by a demon or undead (our party had an awesome exploit for this: the party Sorcerer would possess creatures and then the party Paladin would smite them!)
--Has learned a spell from an Evil spell list
--Worships a God or other divine entity that is inimical to the caster's deity
That might not work for all settings though.
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It sounds like a blurring between Holy and 'slaying against...'.
In my setting "of slaying" weapons were specifically crafted to slay certain things. Because of how I did magic it was an easy split, really.
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When I consider something 'Holy' it applies in one of two ways.
Lesser form: Any opposing faiths members (enemies of the faith to which the item is associated).
Greater form: Any foes trying to harm or kill the wielder (or possibly their allies) of an item that is aligned with that characters faith.
When I say 'faith' I mean that that character is officially a member of a church the holy item is associated with.
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I think the first question should be: to which god/spirit/demon/other-supernatural-being is the item/weapon dedicated to? Answer that question and the answer to your initial qustion becomes obvious: the enemies of the god/spirit/demon/other-supernatural-being that the item/weapon is dedicated to.
For us, we were like Spectre, the "blurry pseudo-of-slaying" weapons that I believe most of us used. But if you really think about it, knowing the god/etc… that the item is holy to should give you the enemies of the god/etc… for which the holy properties act against. Otherwise you just have a fancy "Of Slaying" weapon.
Nightblade ->--
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Thanks for all your comments. All brilliant to read and get a better understanding.
Whilst Holy (to me) certainly sounds as though it is the opposite of evil, trying to define evil, per race, per character, per monster, per session would get a bit tedious, and i guess step on the toes of a slaying weapon. Much better, as one of the comments suggests, is to keep it simple and just roll on the holy table - job done. This may detract from some aspects of the great fight of evil Vs holy - in the interest of game play, i think this will suit my/our needs.
At the end of the day, as long as you apply a rule that fits your world and are consistent with that rule, its down to each DM, isnt it?
Thanks to you all for time - case closed!!!!!!!!!!(for me)
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I think the root of the whole thing is simple: AL was originally a "drop in" for D&D, and D&D had alignments and Holy weapons. So you had to account for the weapons in the rules. When RM grew into its own system, without alignments, the Holy thing remained but became fluid.
I personally don't see an issue, since Slaying crits are nastier than Holy. Just limit how many Holy weapons you introduce and any problem (IMO) is solved.
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I personally use "holy" and "unholy" items and spells as items and spells imbued with the direct power (and permission) of a given deity, both meaning the same and merely depending on POV (i.e., such an item would be called "holy" by people favourable to said deity and "unholy" by people unfavourable). Their advantage is to inflict holy attacks (against any target) and bypass some protections (some beings may only be injured by holy weapons or spells), whilst their main drawback is to identify their user as an important personality of said deity.
OTOH, slaying weapons and spells are only slaying against given targets.
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At the end of the day, as long as you apply a rule that fits your world and are consistent with that rule, its down to each DM, isnt it?
Yes, most definitely. Glad you found what you were looking for.
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Just FYI also, the Channeling Companion has Holy Weapon and Holy Spell critical tables for 'Normal' sized creatures.
If you didn't already know about them, you might find them preferable to using the core 'Large/Superlarge' Holy table.
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Well spotted, ive never seen that table before. Will Defo use that. Thanks for help.
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Hi
Can someone please clarify 'holy arms',in terms of what it is 'holy' against. Is it evil creatures only? Evil being defined as the demeanor,, in say creatures and treasurers, or is it at the DMs discretion? Or is there some other classification? Thanks.
I believe that Spell Law has a section on it, and probably Channeling Companion does as well. Holy arms inflict holy criticials vs Large/Superlarge Criticals. In some cases, it states that people that are against the item's faith take A holy critical for touching the item.
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The Channeling Companions 'Holy' critical tables were created specifically to replace the Large/Superlarge tables against normal sized creatures.
What the effect applies against is really up the GM and how they want 'Holy' to work in their world.