IMPACT! MINIATURES

Dark Lord · Joined: 23 May 2006 Posts: 2658

Well I have some written down on this, I did it awhile ago. Let me find it and polish it up.

It really wasn't much different than what we have now. The way you got the number of successes needed was vs. an opposing attribute.

Example a player has an Attack score of 3 and his opponent has a Defense of 4. An Attack Challenge would us the Attack attribute vs (Defense - 2). Instead of getting Momentum for extra successes he would inflict wounds on his opponent.

Iirc where I was stuck was figuring a way for weapons and armor to be incorporated without creating massive amounts of dice to roll. But I'm sure there are several solutions. Have armor add to wound points for example and have weapons inflict bonus wounds. Also you could have a rock paper scissors type system with weapons and armor. It could have D&D style types like Piercing, Slashing, & Bludeoning.

Then have armors that protects against only 1 or 2 of the three but never all.
Leather works vs. Bludgeoning but 1/2 damage from Slashing and fails vs. piercing.
Chainmail works vs. Slashing, but 1/2 damage from Piercing and fails vs. Bludgeoning
Plate works vs. Piercing, but 1/2 Bludgeoning, and fails vs Slashing.

you get the idea.

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MidniteXpress · Joined: 14 Feb 2009 Posts: 128 Location: Scotland

Dark Lord · Joined: 23 May 2006 Posts: 2658

I finally actually played in the game last night.

Ugh!

That was HORRID!

We did an experiment at our month RPG meetup group. 12:00pm to 4pm was OD&D, and then 6pm to 10pm was 4E with the descendants of the OD&D characters mopping up for their grandparents.

OD&D went pretty well, we had two PC's die and they didn't fight all the stuff I wanted them to. I wanted a TPK! lol

But 4th Edition...oh god, who likes this? We didn't actually get started until 7 or so because we were all new to the game except one person, and granted their were 7 PCs so combat was a little slow but there were 7 PC's in OD&D too!

We had two combats in the game, and they were very nearly back to back. Also they were both cut short by GM interference; in the first the monsters ran away and in the second we quit after the boss was dead. The game ran over by two hours too. So in 5 hours we had 2 partial combats and I had about 8 turns.

The GM even commented that "huge combats" like the one we were in were "a little slow". Huge? There 7 PCs and 5 ogres. Now, granted 7 PCs is a lot, but 12 total is nothing...or at least it shouldn't be.

In the last fight I was stunned in the first round, and just as I was coming out of it I was very nearly stunned again. I said to my friend next to me, "If I get stunned again I'm gonna just go home." Because at that point it was around 11-11:30pm and I was so unplugged from that combat I couldn't take it anymore. At one point it was the wizard's turn, and I got up and took a leak and then talked to the shop owner about a board game and when I came back the wizard was taking her turn. I said to my friend, "Did you roll my Daily Power for me?" He said, "No, it's still the Wizards turn."

It was somewhere around then that I went to sleep mentally.
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"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody."
Bill Cosby

Thadrin · Joined: 03 Apr 2006 Posts: 177

I've been having a great time with 4:E.

In fact, I'll be starting a new campaign on wednesday, playing a Halfling Sorceror.

If one players turn is taking that sort of time then the GM was a moron. Probably the Wizard's player as well.

Seriously, it's really a very quick system most of the time. Unless she had found a way to attack half the enemies (and really, if you were playing level 1 guys she shouldn't have many powers that do that) the maximum her turn should have been would be:
"I'll move here, minor action and then I'm using this power on him. It's a (type of attack). so it will catch him too."
*roll*
(dice)+(modifier...does that beat his (defence)? He takes *roll*. X damage.
The other guy: *roll* "(total) vs (defence)?". *roll* X damage.
"I'll spend my action point."
"This action on him"
*roll*
"X vs Defence?"
*roll*
"X damage."
"Right who's next?"

If your turn takes more than a couple of minutes then you're doing it WRONG. I've had turns take twenty seconds.

Dark Lord · Joined: 23 May 2006 Posts: 2658

No, he's not a moron; he's a very good GM, I run in several of his games and they run very smoothly. He's also my friend. The Wizard's player was a newbie, but not a moron, and she's my friend as well.

Most of the people at the table are new to 4th edition, but are 15 year veterans of role playing at minimum...more in most cases.
And calling my friends morons isn't really gonna convince me that I should consider your opinions.

Oh, your example also leaves out continual damage modifiers, saving rolls every turn for both PC's and monsters, as well as monster attacks that use powers and Attack of Opportunity chain reactions that happen.
This last battle was 7 level 6 PCs vs. a Green Dragon and several kobolds.

The game was a compare contrast to an OD&D session played earlier by all the same "morons" who had moved through it quite quickly and role played the hell out of situations.
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"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody."
Bill Cosby

Thadrin · Joined: 03 Apr 2006 Posts: 177

Saving throws: roll a D20 at the end of your turn. 10 or more saves. Not tricky. You don't roll at the end of everyone's turn. If that adds more than ten seconds then there's sopmething very wrong.

Damage modifiers should be right there on the character sheet. They're not difficult.
OK, I apologise for calling your friends morons. Maybe it's just that your friends didn't know the system very well and it seemed clunky to you because you need to actually know how it works, like they clearly do with 3.5. There must be a reason why that piece of crap system seemed better.

Most things are a multiple of the weapon damage plus one of the modifiers from your stats. Not rocket science. Gone is the "I might crit... so I'll roll again...and then try and work out how much damage I did." Roll a 20, max damage. Easy.

A 6th level PC has a bunch of attacks to choose from, but still shouldn't need more thanm a couple of minutes to get through it all, unless she's stood in the middle of a bunch of Kobolds who ALL get AoO on her.

4th edition is so much smoother and more fun than 3.5 it's untrue.

3.5: "I'll hit it with my sword. Roll to hit. Did I hit? Take this much damage...just be thankful I didn't want to Grapple him!"
4th: I'm going to Break the shell! I hit him really hard with my sword, smashing his armour! Did I hit? Cool...I roll 3 dice of damage and add my strength mod. Then I get to spend my action point and do it again!"

Give the system time, and don't judge it on the fact that a bunch of people who aren't used to it were slow. Seriously: If your 4th edition games are not a hell of a lot more fun then you are doing it WRONG.

Trust me, having played both for years I know what I'm talking about.
(BTW - Character creation and levelling is a MILLION times faster in 4th. No more micromanaging points...thank GOD.)

Dark Lord · Joined: 23 May 2006 Posts: 2658

Sorry, but it is not a faster game than Savage Worlds, Unisystem, or even Cortex. It's also way more expensive.

I didn't list all that stuff because it was hard. I listed all those thing as steps in the turns that you omitted. It all adds up to longer turns.

And I don't think I need to "give a game a time" to enjoy it. If I have to take weeks of repetition to learn it to make it fast...then it isn't a fast system. I learned Savage Worlds in 10 minutes and it flows like melted butter.
_________________
"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody."
Bill Cosby

Thadrin · Joined: 03 Apr 2006 Posts: 177

Never heard of Unisystem or Cortex.

I'll grant you Savage Worlds seems a lot faster. I think it's meant to be a very different experience though. Never actually had a chance to play it, though I have read he main rulebook. I'd like to try running it at some stage. if I ever get time.

D&D4th doesn't take weeks of repetition, but equally you can't just pick it up and expect to get it right. Should only take a couple of sessions to get everything going smoothly though. It kicks 3.5 into touch. The stuff you listed should be a matter of a couple of seconds to look up and or roll...not several minutes.

Dark Lord · Joined: 23 May 2006 Posts: 2658

Dude, it was 7 level 6 PC's fighting 5 ogres and a goblin.

Even if everyone had known exactly what to do and taken half the time we did the fight would have taken an hour.

That's too much.
Not to mention the bizarre stuff like clerics not being able to use shields, adding weird stuff like wisdom to damage modifiers and the general way that in our entire 5 hours of gaming not one PC even got bloodied. And the first time I saw it played only 1 PC was bloodied and they healed right away without even using an action.

Not to mention the absolute bland choices for leveling characters. Yeah, it takes no time to level your player because your list of choices is about 4 items long...3 of which do virtually the same things.

It's not like we're all a bunch of noobs. I have been role playing since 1986 and I started on Moldvay Basic D&D. I think I can handle D&D 4E. The combat system is garbage IMO and I think I have enough experience to judge what is a smooth and fast system and what isn't.

And I'm pretty sure that a system with 4 different AC's and attacks that use mods from 4 different ability scores is not a fast system...not to mention the 25 different powers a player has and all the condition modifiers added during a turn AND the AoO chain reactions that ensue. When you have a clsuter of 5 ogres and 4 PCs all marking different targets and one ogre attacks something else, and every person gets a free attack, including some of the ogres it's big fat mess...doubly so when you complicate it with all the other mess listed.
That's a bloated and overly complex system, albeit in disguise as something easy simply because the core classes are all homogenized and nobody bothers to play anything over level 3, or fight of any sort of scale.
I can run a fight in Unisystem or SW that has 15 to a side and it will take 30 minutes. Can you say that about D&D?

But whatever you like man, tho I'll pass...especially since the core rules cost nearly $100 and then to make anything decent you have to buy the perpetual list of supplements that will usher forth.

I guess I am just not as smart as you are. Having fun giving WotC your money for Collectible Role Playing Game...and remember, he who spends the most, wins the most!
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Bill Cosby

Nyarlathotep · Posted: Tue Jun 30, 2009 5:34 pm Post subject:

Me? I prefer Hackmaster.
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Dark Lord · Joined: 23 May 2006 Posts: 2658

lol We were actually just talking about that game and the DM from the D&D game said he would consider running it as a one-shot.

I asked him if he had ever seen what the DM from the comics looks like.
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Nyarlathotep · Posted: Tue Jun 30, 2009 7:04 pm Post subject:

If you've ever played 1st edition DND, that's essentially what Hackmaster is. Only with more tables.

And I do love it so...
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Dark Lord · Joined: 23 May 2006 Posts: 2658

Nyarlathotep · Posted: Wed Jul 01, 2009 2:10 pm Post subject:

It's true that there are a lot of differences, but the underlying structure was DND1.

Unfortunately, Kenzer & Co. no longer have the DND license (which they won because Wizard decided to re-print old Knights comics in the Dragon Magazine CD without getting approval). They're now in the process of re-doing the entire thing.

Hackmaster Basic is apparently available now.

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