Topic: Problems with HARP

[islan]

Okay, so I'm a fan of RMSS, and I picked up the HARP core book hoping to use it to replace D&D 3.0 for me.  Everything looked nice, until I started going through the chargen with a test character:  a dwarfen (half-elf) cleric.  And almost instantly I found myself running into problems.

Most of the problems are centered around game design choices (why do they have a Sniping with ranged skill instead of a Sneak Attack with melee?) so not too hard to fix or gloss over.  The big problems, though, started coming up between the armor and the magic system.

I first realized that the maneuver penalty from armor affects weapon skills (as they use the Agility stat).  The problem with this is that a character's DB is also highly determent on their OB, which in turn is determined by their weapon skill:  so by taking a penalty to their weapon skill, are they not effectively lowering their DB, the exact opposite of the goal of armor?

This also lead me to try my hand at making my own armor (something I was looking forward to with HARP ever since I heard of it).  But the end result, shall we say, was a grievous disappointment.  Mixing and matching among the Chain, Rigid Leather and Soft Leather pieces, I came out with a suit of armor that was just like a full-set of Rigid Leather, only worse (higher MinMP, higher CP).  This greatly perturbed me.

It also eventually dawned on me that clerics would take Cost Penalties for magic just like any other spellcaster, something I was not counting on.  This also leads me to what a mess, as it seems to me, that is the magic scaling.  Flipping through the spells, I began to cringe a little at their overly-generic names, but even more so at the questionable merits of scaling, particularly when you are trying to scale damage.  The healing spells, as I believe others have pointed out, are incredibly odd in their effects (I was instantly given the image of a tank-dwarf charging into battle with two clerics following close behind like something from Team Fortress).  Though it is a very rare moment, I hate when I have to exclaim while reading an RP book "What were they thinking?!"

I really want to like HARP, I really do, but right now it is really making me want to push it away.  Is there something I'm missing?  I would really appreciate it if you can help enlighten me.

[GoblynByte]

Most of the problems are centered around game design choices (why do they have a Sniping with ranged skill instead of a Sneak Attack with melee?) so not too hard to fix or gloss over.  The big problems, though, started coming up between the armor and the magic system.

Well, they have the Ambush skill for melee weapons.  Wouldn't that cover it?

I first realized that the maneuver penalty from armor affects weapon skills (as they use the Agility stat).  The problem with this is that a character's DB is also highly determent on their OB, which in turn is determined by their weapon skill:  so by taking a penalty to their weapon skill, are they not effectively lowering their DB, the exact opposite of the goal of armor?

I'm not sure what you mean here.  You take a penalty to you OB (weapon skill) to enhance your DB.  Yes, the armor drops you OB a little, but it also enhances your DB at the same time.  Once your weapon skills get high enough the penalty you take to OB will be easily overcome by the amount of OB you have available to devote to defending.  And it makes some sense that when wearing heavy armor you may rely on active defense a little less expecting that your amor will absorb passively allowing you to concentrate more of you OB to overcome the penalty recieved.  It would more affect you at lower levels, though.

This also lead me to try my hand at making my own armor (something I was looking forward to with HARP ever since I heard of it).  But the end result, shall we say, was a grievous disappointment.  Mixing and matching among the Chain, Rigid Leather and Soft Leather pieces, I came out with a suit of armor that was just like a full-set of Rigid Leather, only worse (higher MinMP, higher CP).  This greatly perturbed me.

It also eventually dawned on me that clerics would take Cost Penalties for magic just like any other spellcaster, something I was not counting on.  This also leads me to what a mess, as it seems to me, that is the magic scaling.  Flipping through the spells, I began to cringe a little at their overly-generic names, but even more so at the questionable merits of scaling, particularly when you are trying to scale damage.  The healing spells, as I believe others have pointed out, are incredibly odd in their effects (I was instantly given the image of a tank-dwarf charging into battle with two clerics following close behind like something from Team Fortress).  Though it is a very rare moment, I hate when I have to exclaim while reading an RP book "What were they thinking?!"

Okay, you lost me on the rest of this stuff.  I personally haven't encountered any problems with the spells "in theory," but my practical experience with both magic and making armor is relatively limted, so I'll have to rely on someone else to add  input here.

[Ecthelion]

I first realized that the maneuver penalty from armor affects weapon skills (as they use the Agility stat).  The problem with this is that a character's DB is also highly determent on their OB,

Could you elaborate on this? There is no direct connection between OB and DB, so the above statement seems strange to me. Only if you think in terms that a character would use his OB for parrying then a reduction of the OB would also affect his defensive capabilities.

which in turn is determined by their weapon skill:  so by taking a penalty to their weapon skill, are they not effectively lowering their DB, the exact opposite of the goal of armor?

In general in HARP armor does have a positive effect on the DB. If considering the value OB+DB then beyond Soft Leather armor the heavier armors have a neutral effect on this value, but the character has better protection against surprise attacks.

This also lead me to try my hand at making my own armor (something I was looking forward to with HARP ever since I heard of it).  But the end result, shall we say, was a grievous disappointment.  Mixing and matching among the Chain, Rigid Leather and Soft Leather pieces, I came out with a suit of armor that was just like a full-set of Rigid Leather, only worse (higher MinMP, higher CP).  This greatly perturbed me.

There was IIRC a comment from Rasyr on this here in the forums, something along the lines that the sets of armor can better be designed for good maneuverability and protection than armor by the piece. The latter though can still sometimes have its merits.

This also leads me to what a mess, as it seems to me, that is the magic scaling.  Flipping through the spells, I began to cringe a little at their overly-generic names, but even more so at the questionable merits of scaling, particularly when you are trying to scale damage.

Can you elaborate on this?

  The healing spells, as I believe others have pointed out, are incredibly odd in their effects (I was instantly given the image of a tank-dwarf charging into battle with two clerics following close behind like something from Team Fortress).  Though it is a very rare moment, I hate when I have to exclaim while reading an RP book "What were they thinking?!"

Perhaps the reasoning was to have a very simple healing system in contrast to the very detailed on from RM. I would give the healing spells a chance. After all also this part underwent some playtesting and it might work better than you expect.

[GoblynByte]

In general in HARP armor does have a positive effect on the DB. If considering the value OB+DB then beyond Soft Leather armor the heavier armors have a neutral effect on this value, but the character has better protection against surprise attacks.

I think the numbers would still be beneficial.  Plate armor provides a bonuse of +60 to DB and a minimum MP of -20.  If a character devotes 20 points of his OB to DB when not wearing armor, he could choose not to devote those same 20 points while wearing plate armor and still have a DB 40 points higher than before and his OB won't be penalized anymore than when he wasn't wearing amor.  I hope that sentence made sense, 'cause it confuses me and I wrote it. 

[islan]

I think the numbers would still be beneficial.  Plate armor provides a bonuse of +60 to DB and a minimum MP of -20.  If a character devotes 20 points of his OB to DB when not wearing armor, he could choose not to devote those same 20 points while wearing plate armor and still have a DB 40 points higher than before and his OB won't be penalized anymore than when he wasn't wearing amor.  I hope that sentence made sense, 'cause it confuses me and I wrote it. 

Yeah, it took me a little while, but I got it.  But  if Plate Mail offers you +60 to DB but really only +40 when you take into account the MinMP, then why not take a lighter armor that offers the same amount (+40, that is) but with a smaller MinMP, which frees up your OB more?  Really, I would see everyone just running around in Soft Leather Armor with no real reason to invest in more heavy armor as the drawbacks actually completely phase out the benefits.

I guess I can see that armor provides more of a bonus against attacks that you don't get to parry against (ie, surprise), but even then you'll still find yourself dumping a bunch of DP in the Armor skill just to make full use of that benefit.

[Duskwalker]

I first realized that the maneuver penalty from armor affects weapon skills (as they use the Agility stat).  The problem with this is that a character's DB is also highly determent on their OB, which in turn is determined by their weapon skill:  so by taking a penalty to their weapon skill, are they not effectively lowering their DB, the exact opposite of the goal of armor?

Almost enough said on this. Of course, the maneuver penalty lowers your DB, but the DB bonus gained by the armor is high enough to counter this. There are more developed rules concerning armor in "Martial Law". In addition to the bonus, heavier armor reduces the amount of damage (all aspects) while light or even no armor increases it.
Also, for characters with low QU bonus, armor is the best chance to get a high DB (they are hardly effected by the penalties, if at all).
Of course, heavy armor reduces one's ability to move (and believe me, as an active swordfighter I can ensure you on this!), so its perfectly OK to have one's OB (and therefore the capability to parry, i.e. increase DB) reduced.

This also lead me to try my hand at making my own armor (something I was looking forward to with HARP ever since I heard of it).  But the end result, shall we say, was a grievous disappointment.  Mixing and matching among the Chain, Rigid Leather and Soft Leather pieces, I came out with a suit of armor that was just like a full-set of Rigid Leather, only worse (higher MinMP, higher CP).  This greatly perturbed me.

It also eventually dawned on me that clerics would take Cost Penalties for magic just like any other spellcaster, something I was not counting on.  This also leads me to what a mess, as it seems to me, that is the magic scaling.  Flipping through the spells, I began to cringe a little at their overly-generic names, but even more so at the questionable merits of scaling, particularly when you are trying to scale damage.  The healing spells, as I believe others have pointed out, are incredibly odd in their effects (I was instantly given the image of a tank-dwarf charging into battle with two clerics following close behind like something from Team Fortress).  Though it is a very rare moment, I hate when I have to exclaim while reading an RP book "What were they thinking?!"

Concerning MPs, I absolutely disagree on your comment. I've found it highly entertaining and rewarding to customize armor and I usually end up with much better and more sensible (character back ground oriented) results than by taking a full set (I do have problems with certain pieces of armor though, e.g. chain boots).
The CP will almost always be higher whit custom built armor. "College of Magics" explains, that the magic energy is more easily focused through a single homogenous obstacle (full set) than through many small heterogenous obstacles (custom made). As a rule I agree on that, but I also like spell casters not to wearing heavy armor, but using spells to better their defense.
Your cleric will have to deal with the same problem of CP, not when his god sends him the power, but when he casts the spell himself (also explained in CoM), but you may well design a talent reducing the CP for clerics (something similar has been introduced with the paladin profession already).
Personally, I love the HARP magic system. Playing for 18 years now and having played well over a dozen different systems, I consider this the absolute best. With the possibility of scaling each spell to your wishes you have an incredible flexibility when it comes to spellcasting. At the same time you can scratch those stupid spell lists in RM, where the same spell could be read up to tenn times with only a little more effect attributed to it. If you don't like the "overly-generic" names, rename them (I actually was forced to this for my anglophobe and not anglophone players as I'm from and playing in Germany) and give them cool names. The system of learning a single spell and being able to develop it until you become a true master is great.
What you mean by odd effects of healing spells, I can't figure out. Same with the damge scaling, please elaborate.

[islan]

What you mean by odd effects of healing spells, I can't figure out. Same with the damge scaling, please elaborate.

I don't have the book in front of me, but I recall that there is a fire elemental spell that has a scaling option of something like +2 PP for +10 on the damage roll.  However, when you scale a spell up by +2 PP, you receive a -10 to the roll.  So, you end up expending more PP to get a -10 before determining hit and then a +10 after to the same exact roll since attack and criticals use the the same table.

As for the healing spells, the Major Healing says that it heals half of a character's concussion hits.  So, if you have two clerics who can scale the spell up, targeting one fighter together can turn that fighter into an unstoppable killing machine, or so I interpret it.

[ReaperWolf]

I see what you mean, as presented you really are better off wearing lighter armors constructed of superior materials.

That in mind, Martial Law presents an optional rule demonstrating the benefits of wearing heavier armor types. Simply put, chain and plate reduce the severity of criticals. Conversely, wearing no armor or light armor increases the severity of criticals.

>>ReaperWolf

[Fidoric]

I don't have the book in front of me, but I recall that there is a fire elemental spell that has a scaling option of something like +2 PP for +10 on the damage roll.  However, when you scale a spell up by +2 PP, you receive a -10 to the roll.  So, you end up expending more PP to get a -10 before determining hit and then a +10 after to the same exact roll since attack and criticals use the the same table.

Hi Islan,
I think you misread the elemental bolt scaling options. The +2 PP increase do not give you +10 OB. It allows you to increase the attack size of your bolt. That is, your OB is decreased by 10 (+2PP = -10 spell casting) as you said. However, your attack gains a potentially greater impact as each attack size is associated with a damage cap.
Tiny attacks are limited to a 80 crit, small attacks to 90, medium = 100, large = 110 and huge = 120.

Eventually, the higher you upgrade a spell, the more difficult it is to cast but also the more damage it can do. That seems to be sound logic to me. Thus the higher you go up the levels, the higher your spell skill (and so your OB) and the less significant the OB loss, meaning you will probably cast upgraded spells more often with better results.

Not sure I'm very clear, but I hope it helps you.

[GoblynByte]

Really, I would see everyone just running around in Soft Leather Armor with no real reason to invest in more heavy armor as the drawbacks actually completely phase out the benefits.

I guess I can see that armor provides more of a bonus against attacks that you don't get to parry against (ie, surprise), but even then you'll still find yourself dumping a bunch of DP in the Armor skill just to make full use of that benefit.

I think you're looking at it wrong.   Take two characters each with an OB of 100 and enough in their amor skill to wear any type of armor to full potential.

Character A, wearing Soft Leather armor, would get a +20 DB and a +100 OB.

Character B, wearing Plate armor, would get a +60 DB and a +80 OB.

Character A would need to devote 40 points of his OB to get the same DB as Character B which would bring him down to an OB of 60.  Character B has the same DB and a higher OB without even devoting any of his OB to DB.

[Duskwalker]

Character A would need to devote 40 points of his OB to get the same DB as Character B which would bring him down to an OB of 60.  Character B has the same DB and a higher OB without even devoting any of his OB to DB.

And the heavier armed character B even has this DB the whole time, against attacks from the back, even if unaware.

And, please, don't overestimate that quickness bonus on DB. There are characters who do NOT have a QU Bonus of +15, but maybe only +2, so their DB is only +4. Without armor, that is lousy!

I consider the HARP rules for armor to be short and concise and, most important, easily playable and would personnaly never ever fight without armor...even though we use blunt blades. Believe me, they hurt!

[islan]

Hi Islan,
I think you misread the elemental bolt scaling options. The +2 PP increase do not give you +10 OB. It allows you to increase the attack size of your bolt. That is, your OB is decreased by 10 (+2PP = -10 spell casting) as you said. However, your attack gains a potentially greater impact as each attack size is associated with a damage cap.
Tiny attacks are limited to a 80 crit, small attacks to 90, medium = 100, large = 110 and huge = 120.

Not entirely off, it seems to me.  When you upgrade it's damage size, sure you're increasing your damage cap by 10 but that'll only matter if you hit you damage cap, and otherwise the increase of damage size translates to just a base +10 to the roll.

I think you're looking at it wrong.   Take two characters each with an OB of 100 and enough in their amor skill to wear any type of armor to full potential.

Character A, wearing Soft Leather armor, would get a +20 DB and a +100 OB.

Character B, wearing Plate armor, would get a +60 DB and a +80 OB.

Character A would need to devote 40 points of his OB to get the same DB as Character B which would bring him down to an OB of 60.  Character B has the same DB and a higher OB without even devoting any of his OB to DB.

Ah, but Character A would need to spend much fewer DP's in the Armor skill than Character B.  These extra DP's can instead be spent on other things to increase the DB (and OB), such as Talents.

[islan]

I should just sum-up to say that, while armor may have benefits, they seem highly questionable.  Indeed, I can't help but feeling the benefits from a lot of things (such as scaling) is questionable, so that you don't know if you're actually playing better or worse than you did before.

[GoblynByte]

Ah, but Character A would need to spend much fewer DP's in the Armor skill than Character B.  These extra DP's can instead be spent on other things to increase the DB (and OB), such as Talents.

That would be true if you could devote as many ranks as you wanted.  But with a cap of 6 ranks at 1st level (and three more per level beyond the 1st) you're never really going to have that issue.  No combatant worth his salt is going to put less than 6 ranks in both weapon and armor skills at first level, and any other character type is not likely to cap out in either (devoting DPs to other skills).  And I'm not so sure Talents would realy give you the full return on your investment there.

Furthermore, once you get past 10 ranks in Armor there's no real reason to put more in since that, combined with various stat and special bonuses, will likely counteract the penalties of even the heaviest armor from the basic armor list.

[choc]

Ah, but Character A would need to spend much fewer DP's in the Armor skill than Character B.  These extra DP's can instead be spent on other things to increase the DB (and OB), such as Talents.

Charactr A is dead after the first ambush. B not. :b

Clerics can learn the holy symbol spell (and use it to compesate armor CP). So much for the armor suffering of clerics/mages.

[GoblynByte]

Also I think this is reasonable from a "realistic" standpoint.  In situations where agility and mobility are the key (a one on one fight) you're not going to be wearing full plate armor.  You'd wear the full plate armor when you're going into massive battles where attacks can come from every angle and all at the same time.  I think this would be pretty historically accurate.  In such situations you'd want a suit of armor that protects your back without any effort from your sword.

[GoblynByte]

I should just sum-up to say that, while armor may have benefits, they seem highly questionable.  Indeed, I can't help but feeling the benefits from a lot of things (such as scaling) is questionable, so that you don't know if you're actually playing better or worse than you did before.

You're really going to like it when you start reading about hit locations, then. ;p

[islan]

You're really going to like it when you start reading about hit locations, then. ;p

Heh, is that suppose to be a good thing or a bad thing? X3

Of course, whether or not I'm willing to pay upwards $100 for the rest of the game books is really all determined on my view of the main book, which is why I bought it first.  To begin with I thought was going to be a big fan of it, but now I don't know what to think.  And from what I have heard, I'm not the only one who has experienced these problems with this game.

But I also recognized that it has a rather strong fan base, which makes me conclude that it has to be doing something right, which is why I am here now, trying to figure it out.

[ReaperWolf]

Furthermore, once you get past 10 ranks in Armor there's no real reason to put more in since that, combined with various stat and special bonuses, will likely counteract the penalties of even the heaviest armor from the basic armor list.

That's precisely the reason why I'm seriously considering converting the Armor skill into several talents. The same goes for Mounted Combat. Skills like Armor and Mounted Combat aren't active skills like Duping, Perception, or Weapon Skills, after all you don't execute maneuvers with these skills. These skills are passive skills, their sole function is to mitigate some or all of a penalty to another skill/maneuver. That sounds like a talent to me.

As in all things, YMMV. Like most of us, you probably won't run ICE products "as-is". Think of the ICE product lines as toolkits as opposed to rigid rule sets. If you're anything like myself, you'll have to shop around the HARP/Rolemaster resources for mechanical odds and ends to make HARP conform to your tastes.

>>ReaperWolf

[Ecthelion]

I think you're looking at it wrong.   Take two characters each with an OB of 100 and enough in their amor skill to wear any type of armor to full potential.

Character A, wearing Soft Leather armor, would get a +20 DB and a +100 OB.

Character B, wearing Plate armor, would get a +60 DB and a +80 OB.

The last part is only true for characters who don't get any DB bonus from their Qu stat. For a character with a +10 Qu bonus or higher it is rather +40 DB and +80 OB - as the maneuver penalty also gets added to the DB - which yields the same sum of 120 for OB+DB as for Character A. For characters with a lower Qu bonus the result is somewhere inbetween.