Wise Turtle Publishing

Clay, I've got a quick question. Will the Weapon ability exist under the revised rules or will it be replaced by the more encompassing Attack?

I'm statting up a Veritech for a project I'm working on (http://platonicsolid.blogspot.com/2009/ ... ments.html) and would like to be as faithful as possible to OVA revised.

Weapon, like the rest of the damage Abilities, has been rolled up into Attack.

That said, I'm still going back and forth how exactly to handle it. As the rules state now, Weapon is simply a "flaw" that gives a -5 Endurance kickback. I'm considering making this -10, or even something more complicated:

Weapon could give an amount of Endurance equivalent to -5 times your Level in Attack. Look familiar? Yes, this means by taking the Weapon Flaw, it would work exactly as it did in the original game.

But I'm not so sure this is a grand idea. Part of the reason for ditching Weapon to start with was the terrifying amount of "free" perks a, say, +4 Weapon could ring up.

So use either method that appeals, and let me know what works out for you!

By the way, just checked your blog entry. What was it you were looking for with "tactical dogfighting?" Just out of curiosity. Noticed that all games put on trial failed in this regard.

I've followed the change to having everything fall under attack - sounds good if the perks and flaws really make it customizable and give it depth. Uniqueness can come in describing the attack of course - but some players I noticed also like that uniqueness in the game mechanic behind their attack.

One of my player's critique was that all characters tended to look alike - I believe she meant in creation wise where everyone used power attack, etc. I worry that the ability 'Attack' could come off flavorless - but with good perk and flaw options I have faith!

The weapon flaw giving endurance break - would a counter perk be obviously increased damage? Maybe taking certain flaws means you have to take a certain perk or give access to a special perk - or vice versa instead of just giving endurance. Throwing out some thoughts.

Character creation is one point where it does not have to be super simple, in my opinion - easy, sure but easy is not the same as simple to me. If overly simple then characters might look cookie cutter especially those that take combat abilities.

Something else came to mind - would there be a limit on how many perks and flaws taken or could someone take every perk, balance them with a bunch of flaws and have an all encompassing attack?

One more thing with flaws and perks - I personally favor not having different levels of a perk or flaw (at least no more than two) - it leads to min/max for veterans and sometimes confuses new players who don't know if one level is fine or if they should take 5 levels of such and such perk. One or two options to a perk seem comfortable.

Erinak wrote:I've followed the change to having everything fall under attack - sounds good if the perks and flaws really make it customizable and give it depth. Uniqueness can come in describing the attack of course - but some players I noticed also like that uniqueness in the game mechanic behind their attack.

One of my player's critique was that all characters tended to look alike - I believe she meant in creation wise where everyone used power attack, etc. I worry that the ability 'Attack' could come off flavorless - but with good perk and flaw options I have faith!

This is a valid concern, and it's one I wrestled with on and off. But it turns out in practice that you end up with much more interesting writeups, not blander. Instead of just Martial Arts, you can have a character with "Flying Roundhouse Kick" and "Dragon Monkey Back Fist"

Sure, it's all lumped under "Attack" but I think it's a modest detriment for the boon of simplicity.

Though, I wonder if I should encourage Players to add a descriptor to Attack, like

Attack +3 (Wind Sword Style) or Attack +2 (Way of the Drunken Monkey Fist) etc. Hmm.

The weapon flaw giving endurance break - would a counter perk be obviously increased damage? Maybe taking certain flaws means you have to take a certain perk or give access to a special perk - or vice versa instead of just giving endurance. Throwing out some thoughts.

You certainly could, and this is part of why the new Attack ability appeals to me. There's no longer any arbitrary restraints like with the old Weapon Ability forbidding Extra Damage Perks. But as far as forcing certain Perks to be taken with certain Flaws, I think that only limits creativity.

Do affinities carry over to the revised attack?

The rolled up Attack ability worked out great. During the play test I could look at a character sheet for a player and I didn't have to do any processing to figure out which subsystem I was looking at. Great streamlining.

Joe: Yes, Affinities work as before, though the bit about working against specific kinds of targets has been removed and placed separately as a different Perk.

Eisenmann: Glad to hear it!

Is the revised 'Attack' going to have more options for perks/flaws? I mean I realize that the 'Special Perk/Flaw' option is available but I always have issues decided how much a given ability should cost. For instance, a specific NPC/Villian I was designing was supposed to be like Death incarnate and have a deathtouch ability. I realize any sort of instant incapacitation attacks are rather... harsh but it seemed to fit with the theme of the character. The problem was, there were no perks/flaws anywhere close to giving me guidelines for a cost or how to resolve such an ability. The closest I remember seeing was the old way Entangle worked with the 'if you beat by 7' clause but that seems to have gone away. Any suggestions for this sort of ability?

I think a true "death touch" is a bad idea on many levels. The best way to handle it is to make an Attack that is very Inaccurate – After all, it's probably harder to use the Vulcan Death Pinch* than simply punching somebody – but loaded up with tons of Extra Damage. If you watch enough anime, the sure-fire instant death attack usually doesn't finish the heroes off; it just weakens them horribly after a lucky, but narrow, escape. You can also use Entangle, Stun, and other Perks to represent "the slow paralysis of death!" If you think out of the box, you'll often find the tools were there all along.

That said, there will be a lot more Perks and Flaws this time around. Unfortunately, "Instant Death" will not be one of them.

* Yes, I know it's not a death pinch. Bear with me.

LOL! Well you're obviously right and thanks for the suggestions. I guess I wasn't really looking so much for an 'instant kill' perk so much as an idea for how to represent it in game. I remember BESM having an 'Incapacitation' perk for their attacks but it was a temporary effect that I think was used more for like 'stone gaze' or sleep type effects rather than auto-death.

I'm glad to hear about the perks and flaws anyway though, it will definitely add diversity and options to our character's move lists. The expanding Abilities/Weakness section look promising too. My group is already adopting this combined 'Attack' ability in place of Martial Arts, Weapon, and Power Move but certain things have come up that while I'm sure will be addressed with Revised edition but like Strong is supposed to increase the damage (I assumed the damage multiplier) of Unarmed, Martial Arts and 'Melee' Weapon effects? Considering everything is under attack now, how will Strong or any other ability/weakness that depends on those sorts of factors be resolved? Will it be like BESM with some kind of perk or whatever that specifies 'Yes this is a muscle based attack that can benefit from Strong'?

Curse my impatience >_> I swear I'm not trying to milk spoilers out of you Clay, honest ^_^

Take a look at the blog for a post concerning this very topic.

In any case, I very much want to hear all issues and problems you come across while playing the new rules.

Actually, you've made me consider redescribing "Entangle" as "Incapacitating..." It's certainly more open to interpretation...

How could I forget that it was monday? lol Oddly enough that was exactly how my friends and I were going to make it work until Revised edition, except for the part about the Ranged, Strength Powered. I didn't really think that far ahead. But we agreed that ranged would be free since it was very situational and most of the time never gave any advantage or bonus but if it had ranged it wouldn't benefit from strong.

Here's another question that one of my players has constantly bugged me about. The way the perk 'Will Attack' is written, it says it 'affects your opponent's mind directly' and that 'your opponent can only use willpower and related abilities to defend'. How does this work with the Ability 'Armor'? Armor shouldn't be subtracted if it's a mind based attack, but a 0 cost perk that removes armor from the equation seems a bit overpowered as well. Because it doesn't specifically mention armor in the text, I make my friend take armor piercing but of course that only reduces it so much unless you put insane amounts of points into it. So... first of all, are Will Attacks reduced by armor? And is it the same in revised edition?

Uh, Clay...? Did it do that thing again where it didn't tell you that this thread had a new post? Just wondering because normally you seem so quick to respond and it's been nearly 10 days and I haven't heard from you in this thread nor the Mecha thread. o.O Sorry if I seem impatient.