Well well well, being away for a while, and whoopdidoo, a new child board, which is ace.
Well, I (mostly) use the HB11 combat rules with RMSS/FRP critical charts from Arms Law, way cooler for the martial arts buffs, and for me
I sometimes switch combat rules to fit the encounter, whilst this might seem insane, or foolish, it fits with certain cinematic elements and when the story is important, also to speed things along. Sometimes death is more likely, maybe a necessity, other times, there is need to keep people PCs and NPCs alike, alive. So I like the combat option in for HARP for this very reason. Sometimes the players need to be kept on the toes, other times they can go in hacking and slashing. Of course, the switch is announced beforehand. Whilst this again can ruin story and suspense (and suspension of disbelief), I find it useful, so players don?t commit unnecessary ritual suicide when testing their newly forged Blade of Beard.
Open-ended rolls break damage cap (Core and ML), unless I use H&S (not needed) or HB11 (use the standard 99-00).
I have added a manoeuvre for ranged combatants, mainly for characters using bows, which is basically
to shorten the load time another round for a penalty (-10 for short bow/sling -15 composite bow/light crossbow -20 for long bow/heavy crossbow), this enables characters to shoot with bows and slings every round with the speed loader talent, crossbows are rarely used in my games, its a weapon which most cultures don?t have, for various reasons, but this can also shorten down their reload time. Also I have some house rules on breaking damage caps for insanely high rolls (for missile weapon only at this point, most people don?t use missile weapons in my games, even though they should), methinks I actually got the idea in some thread on these boards.
I have added combat option for characters with more than 20 and 40 ranks in jump and/or acrobatics (such as a jumping charge or acrobatic charge to overcome obstacles, or jumping/moving over/around an opponent to get positional modifiers), opening up for nice combo attacks with a possible bonus from the bonus column. This is perhaps not realistic or feasible in a two second round, and having to make a manoeuvre roll before the attack might by some be considered overly nice or whatever (but with so much spent in improving these skills, I enjoy giving extra rewards), I find it to be cinematic and it works well for me, as with all rules, they are guidelines, and its GMs (i.e. my) discretion as to when they can be used. Of course rank requirements also apply to weapon/attack skill used.
I also use some house rules for healing found on these boards, written long ago by someone which nick I can?t remember, but basically they were goodie! And whilst magic is not prevalent in my games, at least not healing spells, and especially major heal, it helps when they actually find a healer, or someone learns the spell. The house rules basically makes the healing spells heal over time, rather than immediately.
