Talk about the game, or about whatever else you want.  We're all just here to have a good time.

First order of business, as folks start filing in and working on character stats - we agreed in the other thread that the PCs are a band of mercenaries, but you may choose any career you want (in terms of char gen) as long as you can justify why you would be in this group.  Use any of the sample careers from the rulebook, or if you prefer we can work out a custom one.

Similarly, combat styles from your career (which are more "professional" than the ones connected to culture) are probably going to be custom for most of you.  The Warhammer world gives too many options for me to want to stat out a bunch of them ahead of time.  Or if this group has been together for a while then maybe you've even developed a combat style that you all share, and we can create that together in this thread.

Lastly, if anyone wants to play as a human from outside of the Empire then we'll work out your culture options, since it's obviously going to be at least a little different from the current offerings.

Hi.

I'm thinking of playing either a human blacksmith/ex-town guard or a dwarf troll slayer (or equivalent).

I was wondering what others might be thinking of playing.

I am an elf.  Still working on profession but, most likely, will be some level of magic.

We seem to be a quiet group. I am still reading through the system and some warhammer background. I will be an elf with a good bit of mystical arts! Still working on the actual numbers and I am working on my background.

On a personal note, I am in my early 50s and have been gaming since I was 12…so for a very, very long time. I started rp’ing with the d&d boxed sets and have played pretty much everything since.

Looking forward to telling some good stories with you guys!

Yeah, we do seem to have lost some of the energy from the interest check thread.  There were a couple people there who haven't popped in here yet so I'll message them and see if they're still interested.  If not then I'll open up the game to whoever else wants in.  For now we have four players, which is fine, but with RPOL being what it is I would always rather have more at the start and then see where things go.

I'm 40, and also started with a D&D boxed set, though I suspect it was a different one than yours Maberos - I had the black box starter set with the red dragon on the cover.  Didn't find my way to WFRP until a couple years into 2e.

With regard to Mythras, I've made one previous attempt at running a campaign but I'm hardly an expert on the system.  We can all do a lot of learning together :)

I'm here, but had a busier than expected last couple of days.

I'm 50, from the UK. I started out on Line Wolf 'choose your own adventure ' books before picking up a copy of 1st edition WFRP in the late '80s. I don't get D&D until 3rd edition and didn't play much of it really. I had most of the 2nd edition WFRP books, but haven't played in years.

Another question, since we're coming at this having played various editions of WFRP - I understand that some folks have strong opinions about the Storm of Chaos and the way that it changed the official setting.  To the extent that I'm relying on my WFRP books for setting info, it's still extremely recent history.  Do you all care?  Do you have a preference about if I keep it in, remove all references to it, move it a couple decades into the past, anything?  I don't know how much this is going to matter, but since it even affects things like "this town currently has a lot of refugees from the invasion, or maybe it doesn't" I'd like to take your preferences into account.

Personally I'd prefer the 1st edition time before the Storm, but I'm happy going with the majority.

I know more about the lore of Blood Bowl than Warhammer Fantasy!  I am ok with whatever you decide.

Looking for connections…calling all elves!!

Hey everyone, Milas here, the Halfling Barber-Surgeon of the Company.

I've been playing since 1999 where I say a group playing AD&D which I knew from Baldur's Gate 1.
Since then I've been playing a whole host of different games including WFRP1 and 2.

I don't have a strong opinion of Storm of Chaos, but it does give some spice to the world.
Edit: Meaning, refugee camps, stories about the invasion, general upheaval. An environment where a mercenary company can thrive.
This message was last edited by the player at 12:50, Sun 19 Nov 2023.

Separate question, something that might be fun to discuss as a group - what kind of reputation does your company have?  Or do you even have one at all?

A name for the group might also be nice, come to think of it...

I got a char gen question that's relevant for everyone, so I'll answer here - rolling for Social Class is optional, and if you do it's just flavor text and does not change your starting money or equipment.

As for a name, a bit cheap perhaps, but "The Grudgebringers"?

In reply to Milas Peterson (msg # 15):

That is just a little dwarfy!  :-)
This message was last edited by the player at 14:22, Sun 19 Nov 2023.

Glorin approves!!

:)

It's the mercenary company you control in 'Dark Omen' and 'Shadow of the Horned Rat'

In reply to Milas Peterson (msg # 18):

Do you know why the dwarves have a book of grudges?

Because they sure can't be the bigger man!

——
Grudges are a big dwarf thing. Heck one of their best blood bowl teams is the Grudgebearers. However, I will do what the group wants to do.

Heh, nice one! :-)



Oh, I know.

And I'm certainly not married to the name...


As an aside, connections.


Some history about Milas, if you see a possibility of a connection, shoot me a PM.
This is a first draft and can be easily changed if you have a cool idea.

Milas' family is landed gentry, and he got a good education; he was destined to become a Physician. However months after starting his apprenticeship, his family was assaulted by the Ufferman's Pikers, a ruthless mercenary company often hired for intimidation and coercion. Milas is still figuring out the exact reasons for this action, facts are few and hard to come-by. With his parents killed and the estate sacked, he as abandoned by his (human) master after the first missed apprenticeship payment.

Soon after, he joined the <company> and started apprenticeship under Bruno Khan, the then company's Barber-Surgeon. After his untimely demise, Milas has taken over that role.

Coming back to the Storm, it looks like the votes from the active players so far are either "preferably not" or "don't care too much."  That said, as Milas pointed out earlier, the Storm does create some changes in the setting that give mercs more of a reason to be doing their thing.  Biggest points in my mind being the refugees, economic disruptions, and decimation of many of the proper armies and militias (which is why they aren't the ones going out and solving all the problems with bandits and beastmen and so on).

At the same time, as I've been going through Sigmar's Heirs and trying to pin down a starting location and get an idea of what's happening their according to canon, I find that I like the province-level general impressions but I don't feel inspired by a lot of the given details about specific towns and such.

So with all that said, I'm going to declare "slightly alternate history."  It's still the same Empire that we more or less know and love, it did not have the massive invasion that was the Storm of Chaos, but it has been dealing with a seemingly endless string of smaller incursions from various directions.  Armies are still tied up with that, villages are still getting razed now and then, trade routes disrupted, loyalties questioned, and so on.  But the details vary from what's officially written in the WFRP 2e books, in ways that will be discovered in-game when they matter and ignored when they don't.

And zooming in a little bit, the campaign will start out in the town of Männerholz, in the province of Ostland.  More details to come in the first IC post, and if it's helpful (which it probably will be for me at least) I might also set up a separate thread where we can keep track of setting details as they come up - notable NPCS or organizations, favors owed, etc.

Sounds good to me. I'm thinking that Glorin has come from one of the minor dwarf-holds in the Worlds Edge Mountains and fled as far west as he could, ending up in Ostland.

After he rested up for a while he signed up with the company when he realised he needed some coin to survive while he figured out how he could redeem himself or die trying.

That reminds me - WFRP is pretty generous about languages for foreigners and non-humans, and the majority of the party falls into those categories, so I should probably do something about that.  So if your native language is something other than Reikspiel, go ahead and take Reikspiel for free at the default of INT+CHA.  And you may put some of your bonus character points into improving it.  And if you do have Reikspiel as your native language, you can take the same freebie for one language spoken by someone else in the party.

For those of you who thought you were already done with your character stats, you may reshuffle some of those points if you want to.  Sorry about that.

Hi everyone.

Seeing those dice rolls I guess I'll be playing the company's mascot :D

How do we handle blackpowder wepons which might not be as present in the east as in the main provinces?

And did we have annidea about the company's Combat Style?

Question on Points during Bonus Distribution: any and all Standard Skill may be developed, right?
This message was last edited by the player at 08:58, Mon 20 Nov 2023.

Right now I don't think anyone has taken a career that would give them access to guns right from the start.  If you wanted to purchase some, there might be someone making or importing them in Wolfenburg or Salkalten, but they will definitely be in shorter supply than elsewhere in the Empire.

If you're interested in obtaining guns, the free supplement Mythras Firearms has the stats for them.   Prices aren't listed there so I'll use the WFRP books as guidelines for that (starting at 70gc for a blunderbuss in Altdorf, and going up from there).



Yes, those points can go into any of the standard skills.

Hey, everyone! I'll be giving the books a look-over when I'm home tonight (at work at the moment), and I'll get my character whipped up after that.

Right then.
Filling out the charsheet might take a bit from the mobile phone but otherwise I am finished.

---

Have also passed that 50 threshold, also started - surprise, surprise - with DnD red box around start/middle of 80ies. Played a lot of different systems, one RuneQuest ;), another WFRP 1st :D. Yeah, of course, Enemy Within. Never managed to get beyond that Death on the Reik and don't think I even finished that. GMed, too, kind of happens sooner or later.
Am a pharmaceutical engineer (with university diploma at that), last two years project manager for a 180MEuro construction site, construction and technical utilities. Yeah, all the nice apparatus were under soneone's else's lead :/. About to be finished (ye gods have I said that often this last year, lol), not sure where to head next. Got wife, two twin daughters, two dogs and a home away from where I work, so at least Tue-Thu I am not with family at all but live at my small rented appartment (helpful for rpging, hehehe). Oh, yeah, almost forgot:  Central Europe.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:44, Mon 20 Nov 2023.

LOL, it's hard enough on my laptop.

I presume Theism and Sorcery are the only magic available?

In reply to Ludwig Wohlschuh (msg # 30):

With a little Folk Magic thrown in.

I think most magic in the setting fits best under Sorcery.  Folk Magic will cover hedge wizards and maybe some of the minor "legitimate" spells, Theism will cover High Magic and probably that's it.  And if dwarven rune magic ever comes up, my thinking is that will be covered by Mysticism, but the only skill rolls are by the runesmith as they inscribe power into the item.

Uh oh, am I going to have a problem with the lame German puns that, by my understanding as a boorish English speaker, are a mandatory part of the Warhammer experience?

I am looking at the Elven Scout for a Profession.  Anyone have the full pdf rules?

In reply to GM (msg # 33):

I do recall a demon called Zahnarzt, i.e. dentist, and indeed many names in WFRP allude to the nature of some persons and thus are sometimes a bit spoiler-like.
If one encounters a Bright Wizard called Dunkelnacht (dark night) a German-speaking person might get a bit suspicious.
Well, Wohlschuh does come from 'pleasant/comfortable shoes' and thus I guess you may call it a pun since Ludwig was an cobbler apprentice.
Other than that: no, surely not as a player. As a GM, yeah, I did that often, e.g. names alluding to crafter professions in German... Mueller, Schmied, Holzfaeller,... or personality traits, e.g. Sprunghaft for erratic attitudes or Aufwiegeln for an agitator to stay "true" to the Old World setting. Same so for French names from Bretonnia or Italian/Spanish names for the south and Polish names for the East. Of course, you have to be cautious of ä, ö, ü :D. And yeah, as a GM I did thus cringe sometimes at PC 'fantasy' names you typically see in DnD or Star Wars games.
So no, puns are the realm of the GM.

In reply to Player 4 (msg # 34):

Scout Bounty Hunter, Explorer, Pioneer, Ranger, Wayfarer… Scouts are those who thrive beyond the reach of their native civilisation. They may be pioneers seeking out new territory or rangers employed by the military to keep an eye on the borders. Some are employed to seek out natural commodities which they sell to merchants of more settled lands, whilst others are hired to hunt down fugitives. A few are scholarly explorers, high ranked men seeking to document new cultures or simply folks cursed with chronic wanderlust. Hardened by their life, scouts often live from what the land provides, understanding the plants, animals and seasons of the wilderness they inhabit. Skills
Standard Skills: Athletics, Endurance, First Aid, Perception, Stealth, Swim;
Combat Style (Specific Hunting or Cultural Style)
Professional Skills: Culture (any), Healing, Language (any), Lore (any), Navigation, Survival, Track

Hello! I'll be playing a dishonored Bretonnian Knight Errant who is trying to find glory and restore his honor within the Empire.

And since everyone else is sharing gaming history... I'm 24 years old, I've been playing since I was about 16 years old after graduating from Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines video game into the tabletop and the rest is history. I've played many games since then including some WFRP1. Glad to be here! :)

Alright since we are sharing.  I started gaming in 1978 when AD&D came out new in bookstores.  Played for a few years in high school.  Joined the military and played 2E and Warhammer in Germany.  Played some Super Heros and 40K Warhammer there too.  Played some Werewolves, 3.4, 4 and some 5E.  Just keep returning to 2E and 1E when I can find them.  Still have most of the Warhammer 1st edition books and most of the 1E and 2E as well. Have missed WRFP and not sure I understand the Mythras system yet but trying.

Woohoo, I'm not the youngest one here!  Which always seems to happen no matter how old I get or what game I run.

In other news, since I'm having some difficulty logging in for work right now and therefore don't have to feel bad about doing this instead, I'm going to officially Get The Game Started.  I know most of you aren't done with your character sheets yet, and that's fine; you can still do some IC dialogue and planning and such, and if dice rolls come up soon enough that we need to pause for it then we'll do that.

One other note - you'll see that in the first IC post I've put in some questions about setting details relating to each character.  I haven't written questions for everyone yet since you're all at different levels of figuring out who your characters are, so I'll be editing the post to add the others in there as ideas get more fleshed out.  If there isn't a question for you in that post yet, check it again later on to see if I've added one.

I don't quite get the Comabt Style Street Brawler... does it imply that obe does not need to learn Unarmed separately?

If you take the Street Brawler style then you can just put points into that rather than the Unarmed skill, because when fighting unarmed you would get the benefit of your combat style.  If you do not take it then you would only be able to use your Unarmed skill (without any extra benefits) when fighting without a weapon.

I've updated the initial IC post so there is now a question for each of you.

There's one more player in the wings who is debating between a couple different ideas, and other than that we've got the full party, more or less ready to go.  Let me know if you have any setting questions as you decide on your course of action.

Btw, what exactly is the assumption where the current scene takes place?
Except for an obvious fire there is not much to go by.
I kind of assumed some sort of camp, but that really depends on the size of our company.
Anyway, you guys caught me flatfooted by not joining Ludwig for a trip to one of the kocal inns :D

We have 7-8 players, and my working assumption from the start is that the entire mercenary "company" is just the PCs.  Whether you pay for an inn or camp out on the outskirts is up to you.  Or if you want we could even slightly retcon to say you've been traveling, heard about a request for mercs to deal with the raids, and are just now getting to town to apply for the job.

I think camping on the outskirts of town is probably in keeping, we'd be outsiders, not necessarily trusted yet to set up camp in town, so I can see us just outside the town walls.

I think we'd need to hire a few extras, 'red-shirts' or whatever you want to call them, just as fodder, unless we are going to be a small operation.

My thought is to start with just you folks, but you're definitely free to hire some redshirts if you have the money and the willing fighters.

Though if I'm going to be outvoted here then we can figure out how to work with that and change plans accordingly.

Oi, in that case I need to adjust my passions.
Don't know, thought we'd be a company not a group.
All good, just need to adjust

The way I see it, we're still a company; it's just us being the company ;-).

You're a "parents' garage" kind of company rather than a "Silicon Valley campus" kind of company.  Your line of work just requires you to be out of the garage more often than not.

Hmm, admittedly, I'm struggling most with the Love passion. Any family member implies that it will very, very likely never come into play.
For inspiration: what did you guys pick?

In reply to GM (msg # 23):

So do we have a major language issue?

Takes Language at 51% to be fluent enough for general conversation. Below that (but above 25%) it' fragmentary and simple.
While our two Elves and our Halfling may also spend points during Culture Phase to reach that threshold for Reikspiel, our Dwarf may not. And presumably neither our Breton companion.
So unless you have INT+CHA at least 36 and put those max 15 points during Bonus Phase into it...
I don't know about you guys but I personally would be unable to be consistent with IC posts with phrases like in the example in the book.
"Where temple?" is quite a different story than understanding the inticacies of beer vs wine or puns about shaving a dwarf's beard.
Anyway, I'd say it would utterly ruin any reasonable interaction with local people.

Brainstorming:

1. allow up to 30pts to be spent on Language (Reikspiel only) during Bonus Phase
   
2. allow every character a couple of Experience rolls. Naturally enforcing those to be spent on Language for those that need it to reach those 51%
   
3. allow Training.
   One can assume that interaction with the population (where at least some will have Language at 60+) during daily life can be be counted as such. And the expenses (13 silver for 65%) would be buying daily articles or evenings spent at the local inn.
   Thus increasing the skill by 1d6+1 for those 13 silver.
   Only issue here: you cannot benefit from Training repeatingly, it must be combined with Experience rolls
   
4. raise the one with the worst Language to 51% and give the same number of points to everyone else to distribute as Bonus Points.
   
5. adapt Culture of both Breton and Dwarf to include Language (Reikspiel).
   Btw, Halflings have Mootish for their own language in the Old World.
   
6. any combination of the above
   
7. enforce fragmentary speech.
   Don't like that myself, but added for completeness. It's like enforcing a low INT character to play stupidly. Difficult.

I like both one and four.  Either would work to fix the issue and not penalize others. I am not familiar with tje experience rolls yet, since I am still ready the core book.

Thanks for bringing this up Ludwig, and for working through the options.  I thought that I had at least kind of solved the problem but if a more thorough solution is desired then I have no problem with that.  I'm going to go for the simplicity of option 1 from your list - everyone who's not an Imperial human gets a free +30 for Reikspiel, and everyone who is gets a free +30 for one of the other languages represented in this group (which is by far the most multicultural I've ever encountered in a Warhammer campaign, not that I've been in very many).

In reply to GM (msg # 53):

My #1 (I was referring to being allowed to put up to 30 pts into that Professional skill rather than just 15, not just grant everyone 30 additional points) was misunderstood but your decision is a perfectly reasonable approach.
+30 it is to any Language other than your own.

Another option would be that we have developed a 'company language'. This would allow full speech to each other, but broken speech to anyone outside of the company.

Not to say I won't be happy spending some more points... ;-)

In reply to Milas Peterson (msg # 55):

Was thinking on that, too.
Does not solve the NPC interaction though :D

I was thinking about NPC interaction being a potential source of comedy, but if it's the kind of thing that's likely to become annoying rather than entertaining then I'm okay with getting rid of it.

Let's just stick with the simple version, free points for everyone!

I was assuming that Folk Magic is reserved for Mystic, Priest, Shaman and Sorcerer careers and thus not available for other careers even though, per Mythras rules, available to be picked up as a Bonus Phase skill.

Also, I was further assuming that Theism and Sorcery are the only available magic systems for the Old World setting, i.e. no Animism (for PCs anyway), no Mysticism.

I was also assuming that, except for the careers above, no cult membership is available.

Was I wrong?
Is magic, at least Folk Magic, readily available?
May we be already part (layman) of a cult?
This message was last edited by the player at 12:41, Mon 27 Nov 2023.

I already have access to Folk Magic for being an Elf.  There are several ways to pick up magic but remember there are prices to pay for some of it.

In reply to Ludwig Wohlschuh (msg # 58):

There might be deeper implications that I haven't fully thought through, so let's call this 90% but not 100% solid, but the way I'm seeing it right now is:

Cults are already a thing in the Warhammer setting, even with that same term used in the books - the cult of Sigmar, the cult of Shallya, etc.  Lay membership is definitely an option.  It would imply that you have a significant level of devotion to that particular deity; it's not mutually exclusive (i.e. you could join multiple cults if you want to) although it might be hard to keep up with the expected duties and observances in more than one.  In Mythras terms, this would be the Common rank of cult membership - see p198 of the core book.  But (as I understand it) it's still common practice to acknowledge and occasionally pray to any of the deities even if you are particularly drawn to a specific one of them.

Folk Magic - as Aldwin said, elves get access to it as a cultural skill.  Hedge wizards also get as a career skill, and if you want to declare that your character has some latent magical talent that would eventually manifest as a Hedge Wizard career change in WFRP rules, then we can work out how to make that happen here.  But it does carry all of the in-setting risks of being a hedge wizard, like the whole "witch hunters will execute you without a second thought" thing.

Yeah, I suppose the only thing that needs deciding at this point is whether any character might pick up Folk Magic as his Bonus Phase (Combat Style or) Professional Skill.
I read your post as No.
Mostly because of the witch hunter dilemma.
I totally agree with this.

The next thing, well in the future I believe (at a minimum 3 Experience Rolls in the future), to decide is whether Sorcerers, in Old World case the Eight Colleges of Magic, provide Folk Magic or just Sorcery. Same so for Theism cults.

I personally like the idea of Hedge Wizards and Elves using Folk Magic only.
While the Magisters of the Colleges are too aloof to teach Folk Magic it is essentially Petty Magic in the Warhammer games, so maybe available but not 'advertised' as such.
As for the religious Theism cults... well, these have Petty Magic, too, probably less frowned down upon.
In both cases maybe only allow it to be taught to Devoted rank?

With MP recovery at 1/10th of highest skill (which I presume to be either Folk Magic, Devotion or Shaping) it is set in between medium and rich magic setting.

That brings up another question for me.

Can I teach the Folk Magic if I wish?  I could teach Ludwig if he wishes. Am I able to learn more if I want? Heal would be a good one to know.


And what magic level are we going to use?  I assumed it would be mid level so rolled the 1d3+3 for spells.  Is this right or do I need to adjust?
This message was last edited by the player at 21:13, Mon 27 Nov 2023.

I am very tempted to dump the entire +30 into Khazalid and speak it better than Reikspiel. Lol.
Could I just dump +10 into it (to gain fluency) and the rest into Mootish?
This message had punctuation tweaked by the player at 00:13, Tue 28 Nov 2023.

Folk Magic is definitely better for replicating the Petty Magic spells from WFRP.  My gut says that requiring human wizards to learn a whole different magic skill before they're allowed access to the good stuff might be too much of a points tax, so maybe I would pick a few Folk spells for each college and bump them into that college's Sorcery instead.  On the other hand, it might be a fair trade if magic-using characters are that much more powerful than everyone else in Mythras, but I don't have enough experience with the system to actually know if they are or not (my previous attempt at running this game did not have any casters).  None of you is going to wizard school yet anyway, so there is time to figure this one out as we all get more comfortable with it.

As a side note, Maberos is a wizard but also an elf, taught by other elves, so his spell access works a little differently than it theoretically would for a human getting formal human training.



Sure, go for it.  Though there will still be the problem that a human who learns it from you now has illegal magic.



Yes, but... I'm thinking with elves learning magic as a natural process rather than an academic one, you would need to spend some time meditating in a setting that relates to the relevant spell.  So for instance to learn Heal, you would need to spend time hanging around with healers while focusing on the ambient magic to start putting things together (and without getting in the healers' way, lest they get annoyed at your presence).  The amount of time would be the standard 1 week that it says in the book to learn a new Folk spell.



That sounds good.



Sure, go for it

Done. Gertrude now speaks all of the languages in the group. The ones that matter, anyways. :)

In reply to Gertrude Hoffmann (msg # 65):

We have Reikspiel, Bretonnian, Mootish, Khazalid and Eltharin in the group.

Two are covered by Native and the house rule.
One can be added as your Bonus Phase additional Professional Skill.
How did you get three additional Professional Skill, Language?
Human Culture does not allow for it.
Ahhh, Career! Lots of those offer Langauge.
Nice.

I believe the group has found its 'Face' :)

That's pretty much it. Started with Reikspiel and took Khazalid as a Professional Skill. If I dumped all those bonus points the GM gave us into Khazalid, I would actually have it higher than my Reikspiel. They let me dump the extra in Mootish, though. :)

I ignored Eltharin, because no one cares about the Elves. :)

Yeah, those Professional Skills are tough to get and Language being one of those... and since you can only allocate bonus points to either Standard Skills or those Professional ones you have already picked up during Culture (up to 3), Career (another up to 3) and Bonus (another 1, unless one chooses a Combat Style instead)... well, suffice to say: I can only talk Reikspiel and Khazalid. Emhasis here being 'talk', did not even go for Literacy.

So, everyone finished with CharGen already?

I have skill distribution and gear left which I'm struggling with a bit, I have PMd the GM regarding it. I'm also doing some overthinking regarding the combat style which I did before but then decided on something, so that problem is back :D

Aldwin - it amuses me greatly that you took my minimally creative chapter title that referred to the starting bad guys in this adventure, and decided to make it your company name :)

Maberos' player has some things going on in real life and will be unable to post for a little while.  If you guys have an idea of what you want to do once the introductions are done then you can move on without him, and once he's back he'll catch up on whatever he missed.

It worked and was fitting so I ran with it.  Like scissors.

Everyone good?  Or need help getting anything set up?  I purchased the Core rules and have been reading them.  Still dont quite understand magic or experience rolls but think i got a handle on everything else.

If you guys are on to planning what you're actually going to do about the alleged beastmen then I'm good.  This is the part where the GM sits quietly and grins while listening to your heated discussions around the table >:)

Experience rolls - I don't like that the book keeps referring to it as "rolls" in situations when you're not rolling for anything, e.g. spend 3 to learn a new professional skill.  I'm just going to refer to them as xp if that's okay.  But if you spend it on increasing a skill that you already have then there is a roll involved.  The idea there as I understand it is that if you're already good at a skill then it takes more work to get even better.  Some games model this with increasing point costs, Mythras and other BRP games instead model it with decreasing the probability of a big increase in your score.

Also, I forgot about this until I reread the relevant section just the other day, but remember that you add your INT to your die roll when rolling to determine whether you get a bigger or smaller increase.  I'm going to add a reminder to the House Rules thread where I have a change to the xp rules.
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:24, Fri 01 Dec 2023.

If you dont like the XP Rolls we could just use the WFRP exp system.  From what I am understanding from the Mythras you only get a 1d4 increase on the skill you use the Roll on anyway.  Seems kind of weak advancement since this is PBP.

I'm travelling this weekend, so I won't be able to post much/at all.

In reply to GM (msg # 74):

Well, I guess we still have some intro open, one being our Elven Mage to join us along the road.

So we can (and did) forge ahead and do some 'planing'

In reply to Aldwin Moonshadow (msg # 75):

I do actually like the system overall, it's just a quibble with the terminology.  Also, in the House Rules thread you'll see I increased the amount to (hopefully) make up for the slower pace of play-by-post - 1d6+2 if you roll higher than your current score, or 2 points if you roll lower.

I got swamped by work and studies so I haven't actually finished my sheet, what's left are the skills. I'll try to get done as soon as possible.

The essential criteria here is the 'how often' dilemma. Much more than the 'how many' issue. Not just a Mythras issue, of course.

A challenge in every Forum based game, especially in those systems where some trackables reset at the end of a session. And yes, XP allocation, too.

I my own WFRP4 game (which I had to close in Feb'21 after 2.5 years due to inactivity of the players) I had about 100 IC posts (excluding mine) as a session.
When I write 100 I refer to consequential posts, not mono-phrase-posts.
Note that that is to be seen as a threshold, a session will end at appropriate moments, i.e. not in the middle of a fight.
During that time the characters received about 1.300-1.500XP in essentially three adventure arcs. Then again, my approach is low, grim and dark, definitely not epic-level. So, yeah, progression/ develolment was fairly continous but not 'Jumping to Heroism'

Ludwig's percentiles are mediocre. Like everyone's I guess since 45 is the bigget advancement you can have. Add twice the average characteristics, let's say 20-25, and you might reach 70 for skills you were able to develop since culture, bolstered with career and finalized with Bonus Phase.
I 'envy' those of us who had a nice cultural combat style... wahtever that means, lol.
If one looks at the classic adventurer skills (Athletics Perception, Stealth, Swim) I do hope there won't be too hard challenges ahead, :D.

And yes, INT is important for development. Kind of saw that too late, but hey, you can't have everything.
And yes, houserule will certainly be a big contribution. I personally would have preferred less emphasis on a die roll (1d6+2/+2 vs 1d4+1/1), but that's only personal taste.

And let's not forget the CHA bonus which explicitely (per RAW) is supposed to only come into play if there is opportunity to benefit, e.g. 'City Adventures'. Don't expect that a lot in a mercenary style game but we'll see.

Well, long text, the essence being: 'how often' or 'how long is a session'.

My concern is that unless this system is less brutal.  Getting 2% for a bad Exp roll sucks.  At least WFRP gives you 10% for your EXP.  Going up less than 10 percent for some of these characters with out a good Combat skill is going to kill them off fast.  If the other creatures are less brutal than Warhammer then it might be ok.  Will just have to see. Combat seems pretty close from what I have read.

Well, but in WFRP you cannot advance from Training alone.

The systems are too different, imho, to be comparable in that regard.

Anyway, should we just spend money to purchase basic gear or should we play this out?
Tents, Lanterns/Torches, Provisons, Ropes, Hatchets, Tinder, ...
So far I have not invested in any of those.

Would be good to know what season it is, too.

The season is spring, and I'll go ahead and say that basic provisions, tents, an allegedly finite number of torches, etc can get rolled into my initial "you start with what gear it would make sense for you to have."  You're a group of mercenaries living off the land at least some of the time, so you have what you would need for that.  Which I guess would include a hatchet or two for firewood; if someone wants to really abuse the free extra weapons I just gave you then I guess I'll regret it later :)

Cool, I'll add the money back then. Do note that I did pay for the additional weapons.

Checked a bit maps and stuff.
50 miles of Salkalten.
That's typically already Nordland.
I don't mind, the only thing that would be interesting is whether Männerholz is more or less very near the border between the two provinces, correct?
Also, fairly close to the coast (~25 miles if we find ourselves near the edge of the Forest of Shadows).
Strictly opc, of course, Ludwig's geography skills are... well, you know.

As a mercenary, he might be remotely aware (or at least interested) of provincial borders
This message was last edited by the player at 16:01, Sun 03 Dec 2023.

Sure, so that would mean you have extra on top of the freebies.  One or two hatchets for "group camping supplies," and then another one that Ludwig has stowed away for emergencies.

In reply to GM (msg # 85):

Na, was referring to a shortspear and a knife. Can't wield a hatchet :D

Okay, or that.  Knives are also useful for camping.

By the way, I'm happy for you all to strategize to your hearts' content, but if you're waiting on me for anything please let me know (or remind me if you already said something and I missed it) so I'm not holding up the game unnecessarily.

Aldwin is ready to proceed.

In reply to Aldwin Moonshadow (msg # 88):

Seconded

Do we know from the hiring process where these attacks took place or do we have any leads?

In reply to Aldwin Moonshadow (msg # 90):

Only the info from first IC post... as far as I know.

I do think we need to do some "Gather Informationen" activity in town to find merchants, teamsters, guards, generally survivors, to learn more.
Or to talk to the Baron.
I was more under the impression the 'hiring' was more a matter of a general search "Wanted - Bold Adventurers" rather than a conversation with the Baron himself...

Note: reason why Ludwig wanted to go to the Whistling Tinkerer ;)

I had thought of it as "you've already spoken with some representative of the baron and agreed to take the job," though I didn't say that as explicitly as maybe I should have.  And if you guys want to rewind it a bit from there then we can do that.

As far as talking to people now, I'm not seeing any one explicit Gather Information skill.  As I'm understanding it, you can use Influence, Streetwise, or possibly even Locale depending on who you are talking to (or Bureaucracy and/or Courtesy if you are specifically trying to talk to the baron or one of his agents).

I will also say up front that for this kind of info gathering, I'm going to interpret die rolls as "how much info do you get" rather than "do you get anything, yes/no."

rolled 2 using 1d100.  Streetwise 41.
Critical.
I guess Ludwig has quite a good idea where we might find people to talk to, might even find victims rather than just rumour mongers.
The talking, though, if it requires Influence skill, is most definitely done by someone else :D.

He offers his ideas to his companions.
If you'd rather pick up a couple of names for various inns, bathhouses, brothels or merchant guild house,  mercenary guild house, ... I wait for those, otherwise I will just come up with some myself in my next IC post... in 12h or so

For this roll you definitely know who to talk to and how to talk to them.  Some folks are more comfortable around the gruff underworld types than the eloquent bards and diplomancers, right?

I'll post your result in the IC thread momentarily...

Purchase a Mail Shirt?!?
Begging your pardon but just covering Chest and Abdomen that's 1.800 silver, 90 gold.
About factor 100 for what we started with.
And that second Healer's Kit is 7 gold, 10 silver alone.
This message was last edited by the player at 13:24, Sat 09 Dec 2023.

No, i roll a 17 for starting silver. Gm stated in pm that mail is 600 per location.  That is why I removed the healing kit from inventory.

Interesting.
I am using Revision 3, 3rd Oct 2018
Table on p.58 says 900/ location.
Anyway, mail would still be far too expensive, no? 600silver/location is still well beyond 17silver...
We did get free armor

Maybe I am using the wrong version. The book says the roll is multiplied my 75 for my background.  Did I screw up?  Just went by the creation list. 1275 silver was my start.


Mines says 2016 edition.  What was our starting money was it set or did we roll by the book?
This message was last edited by the player at 13:34, Sat 09 Dec 2023.

In reply to Aldwin Moonshadow (msg # 98):

Either you or me, lol.
I went with House Rule of getting 2d10 Gold crowns and that's it.
Plus the weapons of your Main Style and either 2AP or 3AP armour covering all except head location.

Ok, Ditching the mail shirt.  2d10 is what your newer edition states?  Will roll that.

08:38, Today: Aldwin Moonshadow rolled 6 using 2d10.  Starting gold.
This message was last edited by the player at 13:39, Sat 09 Dec 2023.

In reply to Aldwin Moonshadow (msg # 100):

Nah, it's in the Charachter Generation thread here.


Btw, should that heavier leather armor not entail -5 to Initiative?
6 locations at AP3, ENC 4ea (2 base multiplied by 2 for Leather), 6*4=24, divide by 5, rounded up...
This message was last edited by the player at 13:51, Sat 09 Dec 2023.

Clarifying the points that have been raised here:

-After a PM from Aldwin I compared armor prices in Mythras and WFRP 2e, and based on that I adjusted mail to having a base cost of 600sp per location, not counting adjustments for availability or quality.  I said it in the private thread but not out here since it hadn't come up yet; now that it has I'm saying it here as well.  As I'm writing this it seems like it might be helpful to start keeping track of modified prices in the House Rules thread for future reference, so I'm going to add this there as well.

-starting money - yes, stick with 2d10 crowns, not with what the Mythras rulebook says.  This might make things tougher at the start, but in my mind that's always been a large part of what WFRP is about anyway.

-armor penalties - d'oh, I forgot about the material modifier.  Despite what I just said in the previous paragraph, I'm going to be generous and let that one slide.  You can thank me when that 1 point of initiative saves one of your lives :)

-----------------

In other news, since this has come up in a private thread, I want to put it out publicly that if any of you are feeling like your original skill choices don't fit with how you are understanding your character now that the game is moving, you do have permission to move some of those points around and potentially even swap out one or two skills entirely.  The one exception to this will be if you've already rolled for one of your skills then it's stuck where it is.  And please do PM me if you're doing this so I can at least try to keep track.

Okay, so we have Armour Initiative penalty nailed down.
What is the final Encumbrance of the "heavy leather armour" ?
I have it at ENC 2 (base laminated) x 2 (leather material) x 6 locations = 24
Half of that while worn, i.e. ENC 12.
Couple of weapons and other gear I'm threatened to become burdened (anove STRx2) already...

And: is the Laminated Leather AP3 version at 180silver/location?

Damn, I think I made a mistake during Culture Phase.
Must all skills listed in Culture receive at least 5%?
Sorry, guess I have to adapt since I did not put 5% to each of them...

---

Corrected
This message was last edited by the player at 18:43, Sat 09 Dec 2023.

No, sorry, my wording may have been unclear.  Each skill in which you spend any points must get at least 5; you can choose to not invest at all in some of the available skills.



Yes, let's stick with that price.



Oh yeah, encumbrance.  To me it's always one of those things where I feel like I want to get into the grittiness of it, but then right away it feels like a headache that I don't actually care about enough from the GM's side of things.  So if it's okay with you all, I'm going to say to not worry about crunching the numbers with encumbrance, just don't get ridiculous - you can carry all your basic gear, it's fine, but you can't carry around two greatswords, an extra suit of armor, an ogre cadaver that you want to study later, and the Gromril Anvil that you retrieved from the ruins you were exploring with your 160 torches.

But if you all want to vote in favor of the bookkeeping then sure, we can get into that.

I am in favour of keeping it fairly straight, without being too nitpicky.

Why?
Right now, with average human STR, Ludwig is close to being burdened.
12 ENC from the heavier leather armour
7 ENC from weapons (and I don't even have a shield)
5 ENC from other gear (and I don't even have rope, lantern, torch, tent,...)

So picking up another weapon (I already scratched off the Shortspear due to ENC), a helmet or general better armour will slow me down and make every combat roll at -20 (we are using the flat modifiers, not the factors). This is a big impact on combat prowess. And it applies to any skill with STR or DEX, e.g. Athletics, Evade, ...

Good armour is very important in Mythras.
But it comes at a cost.
If one looks at the various special effects during combat, many have a huge impact on an opponent who is burdened. E.g. a *Bash* into an obstacle enforces an Athletics at -20. -40 for a burdened foe.
Cannot help but think of the fight between Bronn and Ser Vardis in the Vale (Game of Thrones). They all laugh at Bronn for not choosing heavy armour but he easily defeats the Vale knight because he exploits his foe's weakness.
Being strong enough will prevent being burdened, but the average human will likely be burdened with a full suit of mail or plate, a target shield, a handweapon and a spare weapon, i.e. many knights.
Just hammering away is not going to work against a heavily armoured knight with a shield. You need tactics and exploit the weaknesses.
Enforcing a careful consideration beyond a default "Get the best armour you ever can".

So, well, not using ENC reduces the richness of Mythras combat.

Naturally I agree to whatever we decide.
Given the cost I guess it will take some time for anyone of us to invest in heavy, rigid armour anyway.

---

Shall we proceed to the next day and the journey?

Yeah, I'm good with moving ahead in the IC thread, but right now I need some direction from you guys - if you want to tell me "we just follow the road until we see something interesting" that's fine, I will give you your something interesting [insert evil GM noises], but I at least need to know that that's what you're doing before I cut off other options.

--------------

Ludwig, thank you for that analysis.  I had not considered all of the tactical aspects there, and I appreciate you laying it out like that so we can make a better decision about what's good for this group.

That last IC reminds me of a question: do the races have different Movement Rates?

Mythras Creatures chapter has dwarves and halflings at 4m, elves and humans at 6m.

Since it is not mentioned in the Character Generation thread here...

Ah, right, thanks for that reminder.  Since WFRP does have different speeds for this, I will change it to 5m for halflings and 7m for elves.  I will update the char gen thread to include that info.

In other news, I'll probably update the IC thread tomorrow, unless I have insufficient brainpower by then and have to push it off until Friday.

Hiw large are these marble blocks, i.e. how much effort/strength was required to move them?
Would 2 people suffice? 3, 4, half a dozen? Or would it require some gadget?
Or would it require Engineering to determine that?

Further, I assumed Perception allows for finding any tracks whereas it does take Tracking to follow those or determine type, numbers,...
This message was last edited by the player at 08:38, Sat 16 Dec 2023.

Perception would show you that there are tracks there, though you might not get everything, and (by itself) it definitely wouldn't be enough to actually follow those tracks unless it's something obvious like if one of them had stepped in brightly colored paint.  In this case what it's giving you is more like an overwhelming number of random footprints, like what you would get when a bunch of people are running around in the same place.  A successful Track roll would be needed to turn that into anything useful.

Aldwin - I'm going to edit my last IC post to make this clearer, so if you want to edit your response you can do that.  Or if you want to stick to what you said, you can add in a Perception roll (I'll allow you to augment it with Track) and we'll go from there.

The marble blocks aren't that big (about 1½ x 1½ feet, and less than a foot thick), but they are quite heavy - I'm calling it 100kg for ease of math.  That means that one person with STR 10 could push one of these blocks along the road, or two people with a combined STR of 20 could lift one.  Every full 10 points of Brawn gives you an extra 5kg of lifting or 10kg of dragging, so that would decrease the required STR by a bit.  A successful Brawn roll would let you drag or lift up to double your usual capacity for a short time, like about long enough to get one block from the middle of the road to the edge, or onto a cart that was close by.

There are six of these blocks spread across the road, standing up on the narrow edge
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:56, Sat 16 Dec 2023.

I just remembered that I meant to come back to this and never did.  Between Ludwig's convincing argument and the lack of votes to the contrary, we can go with the baseline encumbrance rules, but skip the weight modifier for leather.  So you're taking ENC 6 while wearing the free armor.

Here's my ruling for the moment - now that you know where to look, the tracks are easy enough to follow but you're following them into hostile territory with a lot of unknowns.  So from a metagame perspective I am telling you that yes you can definitely follow the tracks, and a Track roll will determine how much advance notice you get when you're getting close (ie a good roll lets you know that you should stop and prep for your next move, a bad roll means you might get close enough for them to potentially spot you before you realize it - you would still have a chance for a quick Stealth roll or something like that but you would definitely still be in an uncomfortable spot).

Hmm, I am still unclear about numbers involved here.

It was three wagons, accompanied by guards.
Probably breaks down to
1 Wagon Train 'boss'
2 drivers per wagon, i.e. 6
5 guards

They got pretty much overwhelmed.
Still, maybe I missed it,  no assessment how many fies we are talking here.

Regardless.
Yes, sure, going into the forest is not the best of ideas. Beastmen live there, it's their turf and they are probably better at both stealth and perception.
Admittedly, though, I am somewhat at a loss what else we can do.
Even if we wait in hiding they might likely notice us. And we have no idea at all when the next merchants might arrive.
Which leads us back to the initial idea to be hired as guards ourselves.

I suppose we could set up a counter ambush here, but I don't think that would work if the Beastmen already know we're here.

I think the best option is to dismantle the roadblock and head back to town to sign on as caravan guards heading through the area.

In reply to Gertrude Hoffmann (msg # 115):

I agree on 2nd paragraph

I'd agree too.

Sounds like the smarter of the two ideas.  Not sure tracking to an ambush is a good idea.

Is Aldwin the only one with Tracking ? Ludwig sure does not have it, he is a town's person.
Maybe I did miss it, but I still think we have no idea at all how many foes we might face? I would rate that very interesting info indeed.

Aldwin has tracking but he got it from Scout Profession.  Think he might be the only one.  Could be a trap.  Not sure we should follow them to thier camp.

In reply to Aldwin Moonshadow (msg # 120):

I thought we just decided to head back and try to hire as mwrchant guards?
Regardless, we will face these beastmen raiders and numbers would be good to know

Confirming that you have not obtained any info regarding numbers.

I only just now realize we have lost our Bretonnian Knight Errant Louis...

Yes, unfortunately he messaged me that he had to drop the game right after he had finished working out his stats.  I think that our roster of active players is down to:
Aldwin
Gertrude
Grimm
Ludwig
Milas

Aldwin, you have a Passion at 70%?
How so?

Passions under character creation thread.

Select one each for Loyalty, Love, and Hate.  For Imperial citizens, it is common to be Loyal to your hometown or province, Love a family member, friend, or romantic partner, and Hate a rival or group of rivals.  However, you do not have to stick to these options if you have a different idea in mind.  For simplicity I'm ruling that all three of these passions will start at POWx2 (slightly different from what the book says but not drastically so), and then add 40 to one, 30 to another, and 20 to the last one.

POW (15)x2=30+40=70%

You should have a +40%, +30%, and a +30%
This message was last edited by the player at 20:07, Sun 31 Dec 2023.

This message was deleted by the player at 20:05, Sun 31 Dec 2023.

Exactly.

Anyone know where I can get the pdf for this Mythos that is current?  I am getting fed up with all the differences in this old version I have.  So it should be a 12 not 15.

If you bought it on DriveThru it should automatically add updated versions to your library; if you bought it on the Design Mechanism website then I don't know.  I don't see anything that explicitly says what the most updated version is, but the latest I'm seeing in my DriveThru account is the one that says 3rd printing, October 2018.

The version i have is first print on PDF.  There are loads of difference from this and the Suppliment from Design Mechanism.

I didn't think this would come up so soon in the game, but the latest IC action proved me wrong.  So...

The Mythras core book does not have rules for madness; those are in a supplement which I have.  If you all are feeling comfortable with the basics and ready to throw on some more then I can go over what that looks like, but if you still need some time to get your feet under you then I can hold off on this for now and leave the consequences of that post as just ominous flavor text.

In reply to GM (msg # 130):

Same here. Drivethru and Version 3 from 2018. At the time I bought this it was still running as Rune Quest 6.

Aldwin, do note, however, that the race stats are not from Mythras 'Core', but from here in the Character Creation thread.

You also may want to check the other attributes, too, you may have made the same mistake of POW with the others that added a fixed number instead (or in addition) to die rolls.
Don't forget to lower Luck Points, Magic Points and skills Conceal, Drive, Insight, Perception, Willpower and maybe Professional Skills if you have ones using POW... Folk Magic and Survival comes to mind. And your Passions.

Btw, I only checked those rolls when I kind of tried to assess whether I should humbly ask GM for one or two re-rolls :D.
Turned out that the misperceived 'rotten rolls' were just as bad as most everyone else, so I did not harrass the GM after all ;).
It fits with Old World anyway, to be 'common' and not 'heroic'.
On hindsight I maybe should have switched INT and SIZ but since I'm anything but a Power Player I chose the non-too-bright fellow.

GM, can we handwave the moving of the stones (at two people per stone we can easily move them out of the way) and the return to Männerholz ?
I don't want to flood IC with 'fast-forward' posts that might be at odds with your plans.

Oh and yet another BTW:
Happy New Year guys!

Edit: I am impartial to using Madness Rules. It would fit Old World for sure. Which book was thst again? I don't know the rules
This message was last edited by the player at 10:51, Mon 01 Jan.

Let's save the worrying about other people's character sheets for the private threads.

Madness rules are in the Mythras Companion.

It seems like the consensus is to move the blocks and then return to town.  I'll update the IC thread shortly.

Happy New Year to you as well!

Since you mention Fatigue, a question.

During Combat
CON seconds, rounded up to Combat Rounds (each 5sec)
Once this time has elapsed, Endurance rolls are called for to prevent Fatigue

1. Those Endurance rolls are required each Combat Round after the intial elapsed time?
   So for the average human at the end of 3rd Combat Round and then again each further Combat Round? I presume those are made at the end of the respective combat round?
   Or after each increment, i.e. average Human every three Combat Rounds?
   
2. The "Skill Grade" listed in table on p. 79 does apply to that Endurance roll ? Or does it not?

Thought we had discussed before but do not find anything with a search...
Do we use Weapon Reach rules (p.106)?

Thanks for making that table Ludwig, that's helpful.  Now on to the questions...



After each increment.  On top of that, I will say that you only need to count rounds during which you were doing something active - if you spent a whole round hanging back and surveying the scene, or hiding behind a rock, or something else that involves little to no serious motion, then it doesn't contribute to fatigue unless there are extenuating circumstances (but it also definitely does not count as "rest," so if you've already had a couple rounds up strenuous combat then you don't reset to zero because you were able to spend one round standing still).



No, that only applies after you have already taken one or more levels of fatigue.  Any penalty would apply to subsequent fatigue rolls if you're still fighting after six rounds, etc.



I don't think that we discussed this before.  My intention for now is that yes we will use those rules, but if it turns out to be too difficult to keep track in this format then we might drop it later (and I have no desire to update combat maps every round - did that when I used to run D&D on here, and found it was far more work than I wanted to do).

Updating Combat Maps can become a huge and tedious chore.
I used Google Drive to put the map there, allow everyone to edit their tokens themselves, provide the link and that's about it. Easy, uncomplicated and naturally never on the job computer.
Typically we are all mature persons who have no interest for cheating so it works alright.

[Cough, cough]... perhaps... due to the terrain and maneuvering, an augment with Athletics skill is called for.

Lol, okay, admittedly the Augment Rule is perhaps the most subsceptiple to exploit :D
Just wanted to make that obvious.

Anyway, a miss, so any further post require an unfolding of the foes' actions

In reply to Ludwig Wohlschuh (msg # 139):

I don't think it's "exploiting" so much as "making up for all the points you didn't get in char gen" :)

But there is also the significant limitation of needing to convince the GM that an augment makes sense in that situation, as opposed to no modifier, or even being capped by the second skill.

But I think in the case of "maneuvering around between the trees" I'll be kind and leave it as just no modifier.

-----------

I'll give it a day or so for players who haven't posted their actions yet to do so, and then I'll update the IC thread with the assumption that anyone who hasn't posted as definitely gotten a lower initiative roll than the beastmen.

Update: Grimm just notified me that he has to drop the game.  With our numbers dwindling, I'm going to post in WP and see if we can get a couple more players to retcon into the group.  And of course if any of you know someone who might be interested, feel free to send them along.
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:10, Sat 06 Jan.

Sad to see Glorin leave.
I don't exactly expect Milas to be a melee combattant. Have high hopes on Aldwin, though.
Not sure if Gertrude and Ludwig can persevere against those beastmen.
Mutants/Beastmen in WFRP were always mostly cannon fodder but since WFRP4 this had changed since the system has become deadlier. And Mythras is set up to be even dangerous to the most experienced characters.

Anyway, hope Maberos, Milas and Gertrude chime in.

Alright, we have a new Grimm, and another possible new player so far.  I'll give them a chance to get caught up before they (and you) have to worry about getting stabbed.

I am the new player for Grimm.

As any good Trollslayer, Grimm doesn't really need, or want to wait to get stabbed...

And thank you for welcoming me to the game.

In reply to Glorin Grimmarson (msg # 143):

Welcome on board.

Thanks, Ludwig.

GM, so, some questions about the current situation:

1. If I scream intimidatingly at the beastmen, can I affect all of them?
   
2. If yes, does that cost 1 AP, and/or would that be my action prior to us entering initiative?
   
3. Does that scream require a successful skill check vs. the Slayer combat style?
   
4. Also, what are the specific results of a successful scream? Meaning, by how much does an effective intimidating scream lower the targets' mental resistance?

That one line in the Combat Style Traits table is the only mention of the ability at all, so it looks like this will be entirely up to GM interpretation (except for the magnitude of the effect, which is "one grade harder" - Standard to Hard, Hard to Formidable, etc).  Since the ability is attached to a specific combat style, I think it will mainly only affect opponents who you have attacked or defended against using that combat style.  On the other hand, as I understand it, it would take effect automatically once you have done so.

I think it would make sense to allow one other option, which would be for you to make an Influence roll to intimidate your enemies, augmented by your Combat Style (so that's +12 in your case), if you put yourself out there to show what a clear threat you are.  However, in this case it would only take effect if the attempt succeeds, so the beastmen would not be penalized on their rolls to oppose your Influence.  Since this is not wrapped up in actually making an attack it would be its own action, either the freebie while they are advancing or as your turn (at the cost of 1AP) once we're officially in combat.

For the question of how many are affected, I would say that taking an action to shout at all of them (the Influence option) would potentially affect all of them, whereas the free bonus attached to a combat roll would only affect the individual(s) with whom you are engaged.  Although if you break off engagement for reasons other than fleeing from combat ("I'm not wasting my time on this weakling, I'm going over there to fight the real threat") then I would rule that your former opponents are still affected as long as nothing happens that would restore their bravery.

I feel like I had a lot of run-on sentences there.  Hopefully this is clear enough but if not then let me know.
This message was last edited by the GM at 15:06, Mon 08 Jan.

Thanks! That's perfectly clear, yes.

Got my first in character post up. Let me know if I need to edit anything (if I've misunderstood the situation, or if I got any rules wrong).

Unfortunately, I'm going to have to drop out of this game. Work has picked up and I just don't have the time this game deserves. Sorry about the inconvenience, but I hope you all have an excellent game. It was nice playing with all of you. :)

In reply to Gertrude Hoffmann (msg # 149):

Sad to see you leave

Sorry to hear it Gertrude, but thanks for letting us know.  Best of luck with real life!

The Warhammer Curse continues.  The last 4 Warhammer games I have played in have fallen apart.  Looks like number 5 is coming.

One new player just joined and there's another in the wings, statting up a new character.  Roll to invoke Miracle Max!

Also, Ludwig will be rolling on Gertrude's behalf for this battle.  If the game (and the PCs) survive past that then we'll decide what to do afterward.

If we survive?

With a Trollslayer amongst the ranks, Myrmidia's blessing will be upon us all!

Plus, Grimm might get to taste glorious death! Though not likely with such *lesser* foes.

I kid, I kid. WHFRP can be pretty swinging, so, fingers crossed.

Also, if we're using action points, does the following mechanically make sense/is it legal?:
  Grimm takes two attack actions (1AP each), each aimed at a different engaged beastman
  Grimm takes the "Delay" action, aiming to parry one incoming attack (1AP)

He won't be moving into cover. That's a tactic for non-Trollslayers ;)

Gertrude did not include the Initiative penalty from the light version of the offered armour, -3.
So her Initiative is actually 18 and thus acts after the beastmen.

Readying weapons.
Since everyone has their weapons ready already Ludwig did not spend any APs on doing so, Ludwig took only the free action Ward Location.
So moving behind the tree, Take Cover, was not a necessary action to take? Awesome

Aldwin, GM already rolled your Initiative, see dice roller log. It's 24, you act before the foes.
Also, any bow requires APs to reload, a new shot just now won't be possible. Most unfortunate. Your long bownhad a load of 2, so after each shot you need to spend two proactive actions to load, i.e. 2 AP.

I was assuming the beastmen spend their first AP of the round to Move.

Since they have higher Initiative I presumed they attack on their 2nd AP... don't see those attacks though yet?
Anyway, what shall we do with Ludwig's preemptive Parry/Attack? I.e. that botched roll of 55v51?
I suggest to apply it to the Club wielder, okay?
So that'll be my 1st AP this round.
The Club wielder needs to Change Range (1AP, i.e. his 2nd). He does close with Ludwig, no effect from my 55 roll. He can use his 3rd AP to attack Ludwig.
The spear wielder can simply attack on his 2nd AP. I will parry with my net, my 2nd AP. Against his 3rd AP I am unable to parry.

So staying behind cover is just cost of 1AP, yes? No roll required?
I'll do that, so that'll end my round.
This message was last edited by the player at 06:25, Wed 10 Jan.

I am completely lost with this system.  He rolled 24 so minus 3 for light armor so 21 is my initiative.

Takes 2 actions to reload.  So I am done after one shot.   With reload.  Editing post.
This message was last edited by the player at 11:24, Wed 10 Jan.

Don't be become overwhelmed. It only looks complicated but actually is not.
I have no idea whether GM included your armour in the Initiative roll. But really it does not matter since your roll was so much better than the beastmen.
All that counts is: you come before them.

Do note that once we are all engaged in melee your shots will become more difficult for shooting into a melee... (p.108 Firing into a crowd, hard difficulty so at -20)
Grimm is also facing off vs 2 (I allow/cheat to have Gertrude help Ludwig as I pesune Grimm is the better fighter than Ludwig ;)), so he needs help.
If you can, Grimm might be thankful if you were to join in melee instead. You could engage the club (reach is short) wielding foe fighting Grimm and with the long reach of your spear (I think you mentioned having one?) could keep the foe at bay.
Just a suggestion.

Ranged weapons are awesome but reload is tedious

Hmm, I think I overreached too much.
Guess going AP by AP is better so kindly just rate thenIC posts as 'plans' that might well need adjustment as the combat flows... e.g. if an attack of foes force to take other action like standing up again after being tripped

Action Points - while you have a few to spend, you can only do one per turn.  For example, if you have higher initiative than the beastmen, it would look like this:
1) you spend an AP for whatever you do on your turn
2) the beastmen do their thing, and you decide to spend an AP to react (parry, etc)
3) you still have one AP left, so you get another turn.  If the beastmen have already used up all of their APs between their own action and reacting to you, then the round is over and you go back to 1

So having more AP doesn't let you do extra stuff all at once, but it does let you either have more reactions or have another turn within the same round.  If the bad guys use up all of their AP before you use up yours then that would result in you getting to take a couple of actions before they can go again.

What has happened so far (up to the point of my last IC post) is:
1) you all had a free action
2) start of round 1 - Aldwin acted
3) beastmen spent 1 AP moving, Grimm and Ludwig were given the option to spend an AP reacting

What happens next (including your IC posts that I have not read yet at the moment I'm writing this) is:
4) Grimm, Ludwig, and Gertrude all act, and will spend 1AP each
5) Aldwin can go again and spend 1AP (it's okay to post before the other three have all posted, but if timing matters then your action would only occur after theirs)
6) if the beastmen have not used up their remaining AP reacting to you guys then they will go again
7) if any of you have AP remaining after all that, you can take one more action
8) start of round 2 - Aldwin's turn (which can be posted before 7 is done, same as what I said for 4 and 5).

--------------

Aldwin - yes, I did forget to include the armor penalty when I rolled your initiative.  As Ludwig points out, it's still high enough for you to go first.  And yeah, there are a lot of moving parts here but I think once we've done a couple of rounds it'll be a lot easier to keep it all together.

Ludwig - yes, just the AP to maintain cover, no roll needed - I thought about it and then decided I didn't want to push that hard just yet.  Both of the beastmen are close enough to count as "in combat with you" but that doesn't (yet) mean anything about reach - you can still reach either one of them with your net though.  All of your preemptive rolls haven't triggered yet because the beastmen have not yet taken the actions to trigger them.  And now it's your turn, so you can add something proactive to your IC post.  You've spent 1AP so far (maintaining cover) and have two remaining, of which you can spend 1 now, and then save the third either for another reaction or to go again after the beastmen take their second action.

Put my in character post up. Grimm is NOT explicitly trying to gain cover from the fallen tree. I'd prefer for him to have full freedom of motion to swing his axe. Plus, as a Trollslayer, Grimm isn't terribly interested in things like cover.

If anything in my IC post seems wrong, let me know.

Hello everyone, I'm one of new players.

With a grumpy elf. Who have a Dwarf Grudge(TM) against Beastmen. :)

Currently in the middle of hashing out the details with our illustrious GM, so I would also like to ask my Co-Players for input on needed skills.
Do we have medical?

I want to make my guy into a "human style" wizard, since I can start with Petty Magic so I will, with silly backstory explaining why Rhuobhe is grumpy and calls for extermination of Beastmen in Empire's borders.

BTW, he doesn't know Skaven exist, since rat-bois are better-Beastmen in the end. *beatific smile*

His fighting style is meant to be mostly spear and shield, like those cheap Glade Guards from Wood Elf armies. His hobby is Craft:Cooking because GM allows me to. I plan on him to learn Alchemy, because magical meals and War-Crimes against Beastmen. What magic I want him to learn? Since he's nationalist, Eonir from Laurelorn Elf Kingdom, he is distrustful of Teclis and his Crayon Magic. That leaves Empire Battle Magic, Alchemy and Elementalism.

Glorin, I fully understand why your dwarf wouldn't hide from attacks. But then you, as his Player, should consider getting him a Halbeard since it's basically an Ax on longer handle. He'll reach enemies faster.

Aldwin, GM told me that you are our resident elf ranger. I'll leave archery and scouting to you! :)

Hmm.
I must be completely off then?

The club has Short reach, my Net has reach Long.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:13, Wed 10 Jan.

Glorin, the Syntax for a line breaker is <hr>. If you do otherwise, e.g. "____" or "----" it ruins my view on the mobile and I need to swipe left right left right...

Rhuobhe, Milas is a barber surgeon and thus very likely has good First Aid and probably Healing, too.

Good to know that we got a healer to stop us from bleeding out, and thanks for the info.

 And I must tell you, dice roller shows it's love for me. I jested about my elf being grumpy. He's also stupid! :D
Now I "know" why all those elf wizards booted him out of the door. Like a smelly unwashed militia-elf he is. :P

Imagine, Rhuobhe is elven equivalent to Bretonnian Peasant. God, please my sides. *double facepalm*

In my IC post, I used <hr> to draw a vertical line. Could it be something else?

EDITED to add: Here's my post, with [code] blocks around it:



EDITED again to further add: Glorin's Initiative Bonus is 10. Not sure what the total value is for this combat, as I wasn't running Glorin when the combat started.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:32, Wed 10 Jan.

Gimp them filthy Beast-things, yes yes! ;)

Glorin, thanks for checking.
Weird.
Probably something with new site layout, dunno.
Will have to observe this and maybe contact Jase...
As for Initiative it perhaps was never rolled ? Beating that 19 with armor on is a challenge anyway.

Rhuobhe: don't mind the rolls too much. I have commented way above already: none have really rolled especially well. If you compare with Point-Buy it's probably a lot better than you might think at the moment.
I think going with fixed number of APs instead of dependency on Dex and Int is the best decision our GM has made at the start of the game :D.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:48, Thu 11 Jan.

I understand Ludwig. But, to be utterly honest, I was merely feeling funny because of how my backstory, that I joked about to GM, fit those same statistics.

Low CHA and INT. It fits an idiot who can't take a hint and seemingly have problems with learning magic. :)

And remaining stats of my guy are at worst, average, so no real rancor against RNGesus here.

Overall order of events is more or less correct, but the "maneuver/exploit cover" that Gertrude and Ludwig did was a reaction that took place on 19.  It still cost 1AP to be able to react but did not take up G's or L's turns, so they can take their own actions on 18 and 14 respectively.  For Gertrude that's the failed attack that you posted in IC; for Ludwig I'm guessing that would be the delay action?  Or do you want to change it now that I've clarified the discrepancy?

Aldwin - you didn't specify which one you were aiming at, so I rolled for it and determined that you hit the one with the club that was going for Grimm.  It doesn't defend, so you can choose one special effect to go with your attack.

Grimm - the beastman with the sword attempts to parry, and...
  GM, for the NPC beastman, rolled 85 using 1d100.  parry (64) vs Glorin.
...fails.  You can also choose one special effect to add to your attack.

Once Aldwin and Grimm choose their special effects I'll apply damage, and then we'll be at the beastmen's turn in cycle 2.  The one with the sword has used up his AP for this round since he tried to parry, but the other three each still have 1AP remaining.

I haven't heard from Milas in a while, so I'm afraid he's probably out.  Rhuobhe, if you want to reassign some of your skill points in light of that information you can do so (we can talk about it in the private thread if you prefer).

I'd choose Press Advantage against the sword weilder, keeping him from defending further (if I understand the rules correctly, which I honestly may not!).

Do I need to change my IC post? Or is this OOC notice good enough?

Ah, many thanks for the clarification.

Only 'dilemma' I now have is your revelation that they have 2 APs :D.
Ludwig never fought beastmen before (a background decision) so he would have no chance to know.

Ludwig cannot defend (with net) against the club due to reach, he needs either ball'n'chain or unarmed to parry (or Evade, of course). He'll keep his head warded though, so he'll trust in the other options.

Yes, he delays for a beastman's attack and reacts:
Parries the spear with net.
Parries the club with Street Brawler (which we now know will not happen as it has already spent its 2nd AP to close range, yes? edit: you state above that only sword wielder has spent his 2nd AP ???)
That'll be my 2nd AP then and the 93 roll, so fail regardless.

---

Ludwig Delays with trigger of an attack as his proactive action
This message was last edited by the player at 06:14, Fri 12 Jan.

Posting here works just fine.  In the future you can include special effects in your IC posts together with attack and defense rolls, if you already know what you intend to pick.  You don't have to, but the option is there.

Press Advantage means that the target is not allowed to attack on their next turn, the narrative assumption (as described in the rulebook) being that your attacks are forceful enough that they are pressured to focus entirely on defense.  That said, it does specify that this effect only works on targets who care about defending themselves in the first place.  This beastman does, but be aware that in the future you might encounter other enemies that don't (that seems like the kind of thing that Chaos brain rot could do).  Of course, you won't always know in advance which ones do or don't care...

Thanks for the information!

Aldwin,
Circumvent Cover is not applicable at the moment
Duck Back not applicable at the moment
Disarm might be a good choice against the club wielder, as Size difference is negligible.
Impale is always good, especially as it will make the beastman less effective because of the arrow stuck in it.
Marksman makes no sense, they don't wear armour
Overpenetration not applicable
Pin Down typically only applies to modern weapons, GM decision.
Rapid Reload is nice if you intend to keep shooting.

Hope this helps.
Cheeers

So is the first on I hit not already Impaled.  Is'nt that the effect of the weapon?  Or does that have to be called out.  Seems like if you pounded a long bow into someone it would automatically impale it.

You only get a special effect if you have a better success than your foe, the mechanic being called Differential Rolls.

There is nothing automatic about it, specific weapons allow some specific effects to be chosen.
E.g. a mace can Bash, a spear can Impale. And no, a longbow cannot Bash, just as a mace cannot Impale.
Many special effects are independent of weapon used and a lot more choices are available in melee in comparison to ranged combat.

Since arrows, sling bullets, quarrels,... can only be parried with shields or evaded (which leaves you prone) ranged weapons often generate special effects (since not to parry or evade counts as a failure, the differential is minimum 1, i.e. one special effect). And you have to specify that. For your long bow Impale is an option but not a must and not a default either.

So yeah, you do need to specify which specific effect(s) you want to apply if you generate one.

Also, these special effects normaly need to be called before you roll damage and location.

So is Impale your choice?
You already rolled an 8 on 1d8, so a second damage die (to pick the higher) is not going to make a change. It will cause an increase of difficulty for the beastman until he removes the arrow, i.e. he now has -20 to his rolls.

It's a fair guess, that 8 damage (same with Glorin's attack by the way) to a leg might already cause a Serious Wound (reduce that location's HP to 0 or less) so opposed Endurance rolls (vs your 34 or Glorin's 49 respectively) would be called for. Failing those will have the beastman fall down, prone, effectively out of combat.
Awesome.

Ludwig's summary pretty much covers everything, I'm just going to add that while the official rule is that you pick effects before you roll damage, I'm not going to be a stickler about it here.  It's a slow enough format already without the extra waiting to see whether or not the opponent had a successful parry to then see how many effects you get and decide which one(s), and only roll location and damage after that.  I suppose it's possible that this could lead to occasional metagame abuse, but I'm going to put that aside under "we're all relatively mature people here to roll virtual dice and tell an interesting story that occasionally involves severed limbs and Pythonesque blood fountains, and if anyone feels the need to cheat while doing this then we should talk privately about that."

For now, Aldwin, rest assured that you have significantly injured one of the beastmen, and take your pick of what extra benefit you get with said injury - the beastman is losing a bunch of hit points and getting something else to worry about.

As for Ludwig's commentary on specific special effect options, I'm going to offer my own thoughts - some just opinion, some GM rulings that are relevant here:
Duck Back - yes it's applicable.  You're in the forest, it's a safe bet that there's a decent tree within a few feet of you, you may choose to take cover behind said tree as your special effect.
Marksman - avoiding armor is one reason to choose this effect; another is the expectation that a different hit location is going to affect the target differently.  In this case, you could choose to use this effect to move your hit from the leg to the abdomen.  In terms of game mechanics, the difference is that a Serious Wound to the leg means that he drops to the ground and can't use that leg anymore, and a Serious Wound to the abdomen means that he risks going unconscious altogether.  That said, I will show my hand a bit and let you guys know that I am using some of the underling rules here (modified by how I think beastmen would really behave), so hit location is going to be less important for the ones that aren't the leader of this group.
Pin Down - I agree that the mental image that this feels more like suppression fire from a machine gun, but I will allow it here in situations where the target could reasonable believe that more incoming fire is imminent, and that they should care about it.  I don't think that's the case right now, so don't use this effect for your current shot, but there could be situations in the future where it's a valid option.

I will just go with the impale.  Still not getting all this extra stuff.  Beastman is disabled with leg hit so I'm planning to leave him.  He was shot at range so not near me.

Plan to switch to shield and spear and engage some of the others to help.
This message was last edited by the player at 13:33, Sun 14 Jan.

Good luck! Disabling the leg of the Beastman is good enough, in my opinion. You can retreat and leave the evil NPC to bleed out.

Things got a little muddy there, but this should be where we are now with initiative:

Round 1, Ludwig still has 1AP remaining (since you didn't have to worry about reacting to the clubber)
Round 2 starts with Aldwin completing his weapon swap
-then the beastmen will have their turn
-then all PCs will act

For right now, everyone can post intended reactions for when the beastmen act (and of course Ludwig can post his remaining action for round 1).  Unless you say otherwise, I'm going to assume that anyone who is attacked does want to parry.  Once we're clear on likely reactions then I will post the beastmen's turn, and then we'll continue from there.

So, yes, Grimm will save all his AP for parrying any incoming attacks.

So I make sure I'm following the rules, can you check my understanding below? NOTE I do NOT want anything re done or re rolled, I only seek to understand the rules, and how we are applying them.

Grimm started with 3 AP.

He uesed 1AP to attack Sword beastman.

He has 2AP left. He is going to reserve those for parrying. He could parry up to 2 attacks.

If I gotten anything wrong, please let me know!

If Grimm is truly using a battleaxe it only has reach Medium, even on a two-handed use. I thought from first IC post it was a great axe.
So between the club's reach of Short and the battleaxe's Medium there is no need for any Change Range.
And attempting to prevent a Change Range (both options) does cost an AP, i.e. Grimm would have been required to spend one.
Way I see it, that 55 is an Attack instead of a Change Range. At -20 for the arrow stuck in it a failure, as is Grimm's Parry (at 1AP)
This leaves Grimmm with 1 AP to spend as the beastmen only have 2 APs

Cannot find anything either on both opposed roll as being exactly the same but would probably presume higher skill wins?
Interesting. Does Design Mechanism have a forum?

As for opposed rolls both failing it runs down to rerolls or GM decision as far as I read.

---

As my last AP in Round 1, Ludwig will attempt to parry the failed spear attack.
See IC

As for reaction to Round 2 actions.
If the Spearman chooses Struggle to get his spear free I will oppose with Street Brawler. Admittedly I am uncertain if this requires AP expenditure from Ludwig.
If he rather attacks with another weapon my net is being used for the pinning, so I would drop my Ward Head from my ball'n'chain to parry with it, but only if it succeeds in its attack.
Ball'n'chain has Reach Medium, so if the foe only has a Touch option available it's two steps and I'll let it close but oppose with an attack.

Also, since Gertrude is calling for help (and needs it, too) may we now use Passion Loyalty to Company to augment our skills?
This message was last edited by the player at 17:20, Sun 14 Jan.

I used this for the parry against the spear guy.  Since you didn't have to spend an AP preventing the other one from closing range, you have one left over after that, which is the one I referred to in my previous post.  You can't parry again against an attack that has already passed, but I would allow you to convert the same roll to an attack that will largely have the same effect (plus 1d4 damage).

It doesn't look clear to me in the book, but I'm thinking that it would not cost you an AP to resist your enemy's potential Struggle to free his weapon.  But I think that you would be limited to rolling a same combat style that includes the net since it's the net that has his weapon pinned.  Unless I'm picturing this all wrong.

Loyalty to Company could augment an action that is directly going to help Gertrude, e.g. to attack the one that's attacking her.

Grimm's weapon is indeed a great axe.  I double checked that before deciding on the beastman's action.

Grimm - I think I might have counted wrong before.  Unless I missed something, your actions so far have been 1) intimidating the whole group, 2) attacking the one with the sword, 3) fending off the one with the club.  But I think the intimidation was your free action that I gave you before we started counting initiative, which means that you also still have one more AP for round 1.  By my understanding of the rules, you could choose to delay and use it on a reaction during the beastmen's first turn in round 2, after which you still have your full 3 AP for round 2.

I will delay that 1 remaining AP to use it on a reaction during the beastmen's first turn in round 2, yes. And, if I need to use a second AP on a second parry on the beastmen's turn, I'll do that too.

Ah, yes, my bad, of course, do you the 93 roll. Sorry, forgot. Excellent.

Okay, let's see.
Then the 14 is indeed an attack with the net instead.
I partly agree (will accept your ruling always of course!): yes, not use Unarmed but the original style for the struggle, but Brawn should at least be an option ?
Would not apply it here (my Brawn is worse than the style), though.
One could perhaps also say that the opposing struggle on Ludwig's part would remain that original 14 roll? Just brainstorming, though, that original roll approach does not smell right after reading the Grappling rules.
I think costing an AP to maintain the struggle on my part, too, is the best approach. Looks awfully powerful otherwise?

Ouch, a great axe does incredibly more damage than a battleaxe. 2d6+2 vs 1d8+1

Awesome.

I will edit, adjust IC and add damage and location.

I don't think it is possible to transfer APs to the next round.

Ah, so with Delay it is possible.
However, Grimm, I strongly suggest to attack instead as the beastman cannot oppose and thus you get a Special Effect... Just like Ludwig did just right now.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:48, Mon 15 Jan.

I have a little trouble seeing how Brawn would apply with a net specifically.  The book describes Pin Weapon as "using his body or positioning to hold [the weapon] in place."  In my mind that completely makes sense for Brawn to be the skill you would use to keep your opponent pinned, but it's also not how I see it working with a net - my understanding is that the weapon is pinned because it's tangled up in the net, not because you're pressing it down.  Of course it's also possible that I misunderstand how gladiators' nets are used...
OTOH I just spotted that Entangle requires an opposed roll of Brawn to break free, so I guess if that's the rule then it's only fair to apply it to Pin Weapon as well.



I see maintaining a grapple as a more active process.  But Entangle doesn't go by original attack roll either, and in my mind it's a much closer comparison.



As far as I can see, none of the similar situations (grapple, entangle, etc) require spending an AP to oppose the escape attempt.  I'm inclined to leave it as is for now, but if it ends up feeling like a cheap exploit in practice and making combat less fun then we can change that.

I agree.
And the Struggle action does indeed mention those examples. It makes sense to have that mechanic also on Entangle.

On hindsight, the net is a complicated thing, lol.
If we don't survive (right it looks a lot better than I thought it would) I would probably not make another pit fighter :D

Pit Fighter? Like those Roman Gladiators with trident and net?

It's nice thing in a duel, but in a sloppy mass-combat like with a Beastmen raiders, not so good like spear and shield if you ask me. :)

In reply to Rhuobhe (msg # 190):

Nah, Ludwig is not a glorious gladiator but the dirty nasty 'fight clubs' in the shady sides of towns.
Fist fights against other humanoids or animals.
Later weapon training with ball'n'chain, shortsword and net.

Yeah, "next time" definitely with a combat style to include a shield.
Didn't want to play a soldier, though or temple guard or mercenary. I become a merc, see, not start out as one.
Well, that was the conceptual idea anyway :).
I actually did pick up Light Infantry, but it is at such low percentile that it was truly only for fluff sake.

Aldwin - Mythras rules are persnickety about moving and attacking being separate actions, so it would be 1 AP to reach them from across the road, then the beastmen get their turn, then your second AP to attack.  Charging is an option, but it requires "at least one full combat round of movement at running or sprinting speed" to set it up (which seems a little excessive to me, but that's the rule as written).  The effect of charging is that your attack roll is one level harder, and your damage bonus increases by one step if you hit - in your case, from +0 to +1d2.

The more I think about it, the more this feels really weak - using up an entire round just to move, and taking a -20 to your attack roll when you do finally close, just for the chance of rolling an extra 1-2 damage compared to what you would normally get.  Not to mention the chance for your opponent to hit you first if they have a long enough weapon.  I'm not going to change anything yet but I'm definitely going to check around the forums and see what people say.  You guys have any opinions about this?

Anyway, back to Aldwin's move - are you okay with this?  First action to move into position, spear means that you can reach the one with the club but it can't reach you back, then second action (when your turn comes around again) to actually hit it (you can keep the roll you already made).

That is fine. Ap to move, 1 to attack ans save 1 for parry.

On Charge, don't forget that the size of your attack also increaes one step.
I think that is perhaps the most important thing there as it might allow you to overcome a parry.
E.g. if Aldwin attacks normally his size is M. All our foes' weapons are also size M, so if they succeed on their parry, damage is completed negated. On a charge, though, Aldwin's spear becomes large and thus a parry would only reduce half the damage.
It makes a difference if fighting against shield bearers.

Btw, I assume we are rounding from the attacker's point of view? In Mythras one always rounds up, unless specified otherwise (e.g. running speed increase from Athletics).
If Aldwin were to charge and does 7 damage...
a) Aldwin's damage is halfed, so 3.5 rounded to 4, so 4 damage OR
b) Foe parries half the damage, i.e. also 3.5 rounded to 4, thus Aldwin does 7-4=3 damage.

In Classic Fantasy Imperative, advertised as 'these are the rules the authors use in their own games' they have adjusted the Charge of Mythras a bit, it is now a simple proactive action to take, i.e. not Move+Attack

and

Essentially it is dropping that weird 'run/sprint a whole round before impact'.
That speed requirement of run/sprint becomes relevant when encumbered or fatigued as the distance is shorter or you  ight not even be allowed to run at all if overloaded.

Apart from that, Mythras is indeed unfortunately murky on moving in combat.
I read it as: as long as your foes are within your normal Move you do not need to spend a separate action to both move and then attack.
But since we had the beastmen expend a move earlier we better stick to that.
I do expect though that Ludwig would actually not have to spend a move to attack the club wielder at Gertrude, they are standing close. However, to reach Grimm, who explicitely did not take cover behind the tree, a move needs to be made.
As for Aldwin, yeah, I also imagined he is a bit further away from the melee.

My 50 pence
This message was last edited by the player at 05:58, Tue 16 Jan.

Okay, my guy is ready to go. :)

With that said? He's a somewhat defensive fighter. If you guys are familiar with Warhammer:TotalWar games, think Wood Elf Glade Guard with Shield. Lightly armored, skirmishing type who hides behind a shield while poking holes with a spear.

Basically elf variant of town militia. ^^

But my  guy also knows a Petty Magic spell that is equivalent to applied bandaging. Sort like First Aid done right, but no healing involved in not-Light injuries (outside of stabilizing the worse injury so it can heal later). And sorry but rules on Mana Regen are such that I'll likely try to not cast any magic unless we are, as a team, in the shitter or safe and recovering.

It'll take us, the Players, a lot of XP to make our little dudes into Hero Units. I can't wait.

Actually the MP regen is set quite high.
So, you did not go Sorcerer then? Must have misunderstood earlier notes.

Anyway, do we gave reasonable First Aid along our group? I only have 31. Anyone picked Healing ?
Or must we put all our hope on our Elf?

Aldwin put several points in Healing and First Aid.  Will at the first opportunity learn some form of Folk Magic to heal.  Will help us in a pinch but not sure how the Magic feedback will work.  Not planning to use that anytime soon.  Still trying to figure this Combat system out.  Seems like a lot more than what the 1st edition Warhammer was.

We have daily MP regeneration. It means that my dude can regain like ~5 MP per day. While having 14 as his maximum.

That makes, at least me, think that ... magic is a panic-button on healing. Especially if you have just "Cantrips" that stop bleeding out. It's faster than Heal Skill or First Aid Skill.

As for learning magic? My guy will gladly help, everyone. The more of us can stop another from dying ... the better the odds.

It's Warhammer verse. Skaven are under every town and all forests are full of Beastmen and Greenskins. :P

EDIT: And you have 30% chance to stop people from dying ! I have only 22% First Aid.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:50, Tue 16 Jan.

Gimm has a 20 on first aid. No training in first aid/healing. And no healing supplies (currently, at least).

Aldwin has 57 in Healing and same in First Aid.  i kind of skimped on everything else but combat because I knew how deadly the game is.

It reminds me of GURPS, and there once you are skilled enough ... and remain cautious, combat stops being super-deadly. Becomes just deadly.
Pity we live in Warhammer, no? Combat is inevitable and full of nasty stuff.

Did you knew that Goblins cover their pointy sticks, and arrows, with shit in Warhammer? :)

And we have any real damage-reducing statistics, except a tiny spell my dude have. Wich works on Single Hit Location, and reduces damage from one hit by d3 ... I dunno if I will ever use it.^^

EDIT: I forgot about the point I was trying to make.
How we should treat combat? Not like D&D combat wich is downright ... safe, in comparison. We should treat it as something where if we don't cheat like Skaven, we are suicidal. Using environment to our advantage? Yes. Stabbing enemy in the leg and running, so they bleed to death with disabling injury to the leg? Yes.

And of course, if we can, double-tapping foes. Sadly, we can't afford mercy or luck to save our enemies.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:22, Tue 16 Jan.

I agree with all that.

And yet, I'm currently protraying a suicidal dwarf.

I have thoughts about migrating Grimms personality a bit over time.

But currently, I'm aiming to have him live up to the Trollslayer ethos - at least for a bit.

Dwarves take their grudges very seriously, despite ... often ridiculous reasoning behind them.

In human terms? Dwarves are so fucking petty. And prone to rash decision ... they will stubbornly stick with forever. As for your Slayer, do you have some rough goal for him? As a Player?

For example, I played a Slayer once, but it dragged my party into fun, if short, campaign revolving around a lot of ultraviolence. Take note that it was in Warhammer RPG ruleset that is so much less deadly than Mythras or GURPS are.

Thing I remember was that for some silly reason dice gave me the highest Initiative possible for a dwarf. And I randomly rolled the Skill that increased it further. GM after my character's rather mindless, and kinds unimpressive from perspective of time, death talked with me about why it was silly.

So if you don't mind I would like to give you some ideas about how to make difference for your character.

Why he become a Slayer? What kind of secret shame drives him onwards so?
What he imagines as his ideal death?
What You, the Player, would wish for your guy to accomplish ... while seeking that ideal death?

Helps in finding reasonable motivations for behaviors. I did so with my Rhuobhe. He have Dwarf-like grudge ... that he won't decide as settled as long as one Beastman lives in Empire's forests. :)

Nighty guys!

GURPS, yet another system that does not get enough 'love' here on RPoL.

I wished I had the time to join diverse VTT Platforms (there is an quite some dedication for GURPS on FoundryVTT) for roleplay but truth simply is: forum-based is for my situation the only manageable option I have to indulge in this hobby.
Unfortunately, typically, forum-based is too anonymous so that dedication of player-base is often not strong enough to really complete campaigns. Few games here reach 5000 posts and more.

Oh well.

So where were we?
Aldwin is tearing into the club wielder threatening Gertrude.

Grimm, do you stick to the decision of Delay rather than Attack for your 3rd of Round 1?

Gertrude will keep up her warding, also use her hammer for warding for right leg and hope to be able to withdraw. However, also no percentiles put into Evade, so I am lost how to be able to retreat.
Edit: one more AP than the foe, hurray, she can retreat end of round
Since the club has reach short she can use Unarmed for any parries that might come about.

Ludwig as outlined somewhere above.

Rhuobhe... not with us IC yet
This message was last edited by the player at 06:51, Wed 17 Jan.

Work is a little on the busier side this week, so that's less time I have for posting and less brainpower for thinking through tricky rules questions.  With that said, I will try to answer what questions I've missed here...

Charging - Since Aldwin already confirmed actions for this round, I'm going to stick with that for now, and maybe make a different ruling about charging later on.

Also, on a recommendation from another forum, I just downloaded Classic Fantasy Imperative today.  When I have time to read it I might change some of the rules for this campaign based on what's there.  I don't know how far it goes with making combat more survivable (which I assume is one of the goals for a product that looks like "how to run D&D in Mythras), but since this is Warhammer and not D&D I want to make sure things stay sufficiently dangerous.  Sticking at least somewhat close to what Rhuobhe describes (though I don't plan on rolling for effects of shit-covered weapons at least).

Movement more generally - Ludwig, I think you might be right that I was being overly strict about movement requirements.  Also for later review.  For the record, I had understood the setup as Aldwin being on the other side of the road from the rest of you, so it did require some movement for him to reach Gertrude (Aldwin, did I get that wrong?)

Healing - this was mainly going to be Milas's shtick :(

Rounding - if it's ever ambiguous, round in the players' favor.

Magic points - I don't think I actually said anything anywhere about what refresh rate we're using, but I guess I should now.  I think 1 MP per hour is a good rate (and still more limited than WFRP 2e's system of "cast all the spells you want as long as you don't fuck up").  Fluctuations in the winds of magic might affect that, of course, but assume it's 1/hr unless I say otherwise.  I'll update the Rules Reference thread.
And in case it comes up, I kind of like the option of burning Fatigue for extra magic points (p117 of the core book) if you run out, though I would say you only get to do this once until you can get back up to full again.  What do you all think, does that feel to you like it fits the setting?

Casters in the group - we've had one or two that got at least part of the way into char gen and then had to drop before they could be active in the game.  Right now it's just Rhuobhe.  I've had one more RTJ for a possible wizard but not confirmed yet.  And that brings me to...

Updating the cast - my plan right now is to keep puppet-Gertrude until the end of this fight, then swap her out with Rhuobhe and pretend he's been here all along.  And if the other player does join in for real, pretend for them too.  Is that okay with everyone or am I pushing too hard on the suspension of disbelief?

------------

Okay, I think that's everything.  IC update within the next hour...
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:50, Thu 18 Jan.

You are correct with my positioning across the road and my intent to attack from behind.


What is the penalty for a fumble??  99%
This message was last edited by the player at 02:56, Thu 18 Jan.

In reply to Aldwin Moonshadow (msg # 206):

I hate waking up too early! :)

Fumble? In Mythras and Warhammer it's probably something as fun as Curse of Tzeentech for mishaps with magic. So ... pain, dude. Pain.


GM I do so have some proposals of using Luck points in similar way that in Warhammer RPG people use Fate Points. And bonus recover method for Luck Spent.

On the magic, I always saw the Color Magic, that uses the Winds Channeling Skills, as different from dude choking up his personal reserves to cast spell or two.

"Luck Usage" - Two main methods. One is temporarily Spending Luck points to be lucky, similar to how Mythras handles it. Rerolling a roll, for example, once. Or minimizing the damage from enemy attack. Bam it's bad luck for them, yeah. As fuel for some special spells.

How to recover it during gameplay? Waking up next day, alive ... you may do a Willpower check at Difficulty set by GM. Success restores 1 Luck. Critical Success restores all luck spent. Failure restores no luck. Fumble, the critical fail, makes you lose one more point of luck who's a fickle lady.

The second use of Luck is the permanent burning of Luck Points. You burn it? You permanently lose a luck point. It's a sacrifice to the heartless RNGesus to bribe the Fate in character's favor. That permanently reduces the maximum Luck Points character have.
Example 1: Our Trollslayer wants to die fighting a troll, but our characters to be spared since it's a super-monster who'll eat us alive after him. So he burns Luck Point to alter the outcome of the combat, his inevitable death, in a way that gave him Gandalf's Last Stand. He fell into a endless hole with the Troll as the bridge they fought on conveniently broke. Party is saved, Trollslayer met a noble death. Troll isn't a danger anymore.
Example 2: Our Rhuobhe was stabbed by a bandit in the gut. But unfortunately I, Player, failed his willpower roll for a last-time hurrah casting to prevent bleeding out. Despite spending Luck on the re-roll! RNGesus was so thirsty for my character's blood. I decided to burn Rhuobhe's Luck point and after combat that our party luckily won, people check my guy if he lives ... and noticed that he's just looking dead since torch fell on his body and accidentally cauterized the injury. Rhuobhe will live, with some care, lucky elf he.

And that isn't a invitation for Players to cheat. It's a chance for Players to have a limited ability for averting fate dictated by RNGesus. After all our Characters are heroes-in-the-making.

"Magic" - How fit the Channeling into Mythras paradigm? Simply, to let magicians regain MP faster than daily regeneration. Meditation. A Skill for magic used for regaining magic. Changed the MP restoration calculus from daily to quickier one. One session of meditation takes two hours and is exhausting like fitness workout. And is an equivalent to a day's worth of MP regeneration.

Skaven wizards eat Warpstone shards for that.


That was for personal MP of a Warhammer wizard. Using Color Magic? Well ... using battle magic Fireball spell, you are pooped after setting a small group of foes on fire. As a magical master! With Color Magic it's doable for a relatively well trained novice to use same Fireball to fry a bigger group.

How I see it: One dude spent a lot of his personal energy to throw balls of flames on people. Second dude Channeled Red Wind into the spell, overcharging it into a explosion akin to D&D version of the Fireball, so he supplemented all that firepower not from personal reserve but by relatively minor risk of being Warp-Taken or summoning Daemons by accident. :P
This message was last edited by the player at 04:52, Thu 18 Jan.

Admittedly I 'cringe' at those proposals, Rhuobhe.

GM you set MP recovery at 10% of highest magic skill in your original house rules thread: link to a message in this game
Which goes a long way in the direction of 'magic rich'. Glorantha is magic rich, Old World most def is not. Imho.
Magic in Old World is rare and dangerous, it is Chaos.
At 1 MP per hour this game might quickly get a completely different spin.
I certainly would strife to put on some Theism... only 6 EXP rolls away, though :).

Luck Points, why not start out with RAW? They are already quite powerful, as always with those points the issue is: when do they revover. Daily again makes this game a lot more heroic/epic rather than ususal grim dark of the Old World. It would dramatically increase survivability, no doubt. Do we want that, I wonder?
There's an interesting passage on combat pacing in the book.

I have not truly read through CFI but yes: it is the better side of DnD. And a completely new magic system leaning on, yes, DnD. Much more intresting combat etc. I purchased it for exactly Movement rules, i.e. to check how they 'solved'the Mythras murkiness about it. It goes hand in hand with the adapted Charge rules. Essentially it is a lot easier to 'digest' that Mythras, i.e. for us old guys it's feeling comfortable, Old School with rules evolution so to speak.

Implementing stricter rules for movement has one huge disadvantage on the GM: maps. Only natural to shout for overviews when movement becomes another tactical consideration.

Aldwin, as for Fumble, make a tick in your charsheet on that skill. When you put an Experience Roll on that skill you get an extra increase of 1%.
Btw, if you truly shield bash, you let down your advantage of longer reach with your spear, i.e. you get inside its reach and thus become attackable. Just saying ;)
This message was last edited by the player at 06:15, Thu 18 Jan.

As long as we are within Sprinting distance I humbly suggest not to bother with AP expenditure on Move actions unless it truly is only Movement and not Move+Attack

Gertrude has 4 HP in leg, so it would be a serious wound. Thus opposed roll of her Endurance (10) minus 20 Fatigue equals what?
v attack (02)
Short: leg useless, drop prone

Nah, better not:
Gertrude expends 1 Luck Point to enforce a re-roll on the beastman's attack...

TO address the 'cringe', Ludwig. :)


Old World not magic rich? Magic is permeating everywhere in Old World. Elf fuckery with the Winds of Magic only lessens the pressure under "daemons are comfortable" level. Magic is of the rich variety in Old World. And also unstable and dangerous, too. Mythras and D&D have very different magic. Practically static and absolutely safe, by comparision.

In Old World a fumble during casting a spell is a certain risk to life and limb, and not for the wizard alone. Wizard risks so much worse than mere hazard to life and limb. So it is the reason behind my idea of "safer recovery of MP is the daily, while the risky one is the hourly" because I don't wanna see what 'Tzeentech Fun or critical fail for wizards' roll would cause when you try to hurry magic recovery.


"Using Luck Points like Fate Points from Warhammer RPG" - I admit that the idea of a chance to recover spent Luck points, as a daily, is nowhere existing within Warhammer. But the standard recovery method is a mess in Play By Post style. "Recover everything" once per Play Session works differently without soda and chips to bribe GM with. ;)

That is why, IMO, it's easier to give GM a mechanic that he or she can control slightly better on "Luck Recovery". With a chance for Players to fumble it too.


And the Luck Burning ... there is no method to recover from it, like you can't regain Fate Points in Warhammer, so having a chance to survive better in Warhammer World is an option. Not a necessity. I remember that in one campaign my players burned trough these rapidly and then the luckiest one had to retire character due to crippling injury that he survived by RNGesus's mercy on surgery rolls. But without leg he wasn't an adventurer material anymore and rest of party was dead by then. Another campaign, with a Trollslayer, was hilariously lucky for them during the frequent combats of "Imperium in Flames" official campaign modules. Character had to be retired, a halfling, because idiot ate a visibly Warpstone laced cake. And fumbled his mutation resistance roll.

Take not that thanks to existence of Toughness characteristic combat is less 'realistically deadly' in Warhammer. And very frequent, compared with D&D or IRL. ;)

Aldwin - penalty for a fumble depends on the specific skill and circumstances.  During combat, it usually means that your opponent gets an additional special effect, provided that their own roll was successful.  On the other hand, you get an automatic 1% improvement to that skill at the end of the adventure - if you've survived then you've presumably learned from your mistake.

That said, since you already used your current action on the successful attack, the shield bash roll hasn't happened yet.  You said earlier you wanted to save your third AP for a parry so I'm going to apply that roll to your parry when it happens on the beastmen's turn.  And I guess if no one attacks you then I'll read it as you're spending your third AP on a shield bash and your fumble will kick in at that time.

Luck - I'd rather not do the daily maybe-refresh thing, but I do like the other idea, essentially emulating burning a Fate point in WFRP.  Let's make that official.  I will add it to the House Rules thread.

Magic - oh yeah, I forgot about Channeling (been too long since I've played proper WFRP).  I'll need to think over what I want to do with that; remind me if I haven't answered this one in a few days.



D'oh, you're right, I must have skimmed right over that when I was looking for it yesterday.  I'm kind of torn now, because on one hand you're right that magic is less common in the Old World than in Glorantha or Barsaive or what have you, but on the other hand when you do have a character with magic, the only limit the rules give them is their willingness to risk the Eye of Tzeentch (okay, the minis game has other limits with the winds of magic, but I'm just focused on the RPG).



I will probably do this going forward.  Let's finish this fight before I make it official.

Put Grimm's action up.

I may still be misunderstanding how rounds are working. I think I get to use all my APs now, but I'm unsure.

If I don't get to use all my APs right away, here's the sequence:

1st AP spent is a swing and a miss.

2nd AP, if applicable, is a swing and a connect on the left leg for 9 damage. If Grimm happens to score a special effect, it's press advantage again.

3rd AP, if applicable, is to delay in preparation of paryying an attack

If I misunderstood anything, let me know!

Thought I'd ask
That beastman hits her right leg.
It is just confirmation when exactly this warding will be in effect.
At least theoretically she probably will have done that at the end of Round 01 (it is a free action), but I did not specifically say so.
It's just the difference of 1 pt of damage, so no big deal. Just so I know.
If it was in place the Ward will leave her with no damage

rolled 97 using 1d100.  Gertrude oppose Trip attempt, Evade 22-20, i.e. 02.Right, Gertrude is prone

No.

Rounds are the increment for every combattant to use all APs respectively
Cycles = Expenditure of each AP according to Initiative
Reaction = Expenditure of AP outside Initiative but only as reaction to a proactive action

R2C1
Aldwin, with possible reactions of beastmen
All beastmen, with possible reactions of PC
Gertrude action with possible reaction of beastmen
Etc
Etc

Right now we have gone through Aldwin's C1 and the beastmen's C1 and now it's your and Ludwig's C1

Oof, this reminds me of a really math-heavy system from my country. The combat-action sequence of events, I mean. Similar lethality, too, if you compare the equivalent effects of being stabbed here and there. Though the only dice used there were D10 and D100. :)


GM, I would propose that to not have a round of combat take weeks to months? Players should write down the "battle plan" for their characters, including necessary rolls and their purpose, then you do the NPC reactions. Should be slightly faster, even if we will have less immediate control unlike in a Tabletop session.

Which is exactly what I attempted to supply originally and which was quite a failure because of misunderstanding ;D

The key to Mythras however is that combats take at most 4 rounds... and not endless whittling down of HPs
This message was last edited by the player at 18:23, Thu 18 Jan.

Understandable.

But, despite appearances, combat was less lethal in Warhammer RPG that I played and GMed for a long time than it is in GURPS or Mythras rules I have in a PDF from here.

On the other hand, Armor in Warhammer RPG was practically worthless unless it was something awesome, like magic armor +AP extra hard, wich usually meant "Not for player character who are chumps, not great heroes.". :)

Saying that, about involving my guy, maybe ... if our Halfling dude is absent. Midget got eaten/kidnapped by Beastmen while the group was busy fighting. Gertrude is retiring? Maybe we could exchange her in next pit-stop of the group for my guy?

Depending on the circumstances he could have been chasing you, trying to catch up from being held up, or traveling in the same direction.


Aldwin? From where is your Elf if I can ask? Maybe your guy knows my elf as an introduction to the group.

Aldwin is from the Great Forest.  Defender of the Ways and former Elven Soldier, Defender of the Homelands.

So he shouldn't recognize my elf's garbs as ex-military Glade Guard, aka militiaelf, of the Laurelorn. :)

Yeah, 1st ed (played), 2nd ed (ppayed + GMed), totally skipped 3rd and 4th (played + GMed) is - imho - the best edition of WFRP.

As for GURPS only very brief episodes, all of those 4th Ed.

Mythras? Well, guess it was RuneQuest 3, Avalon Hill, not the original two eds. And all sorts of editions from then onwards.

I think I read above from GM that Rhuobhe's intergration will be established handwave-like. Nothing speaks against a fluffy integration though, imho :D

Acrually, let me spend a Luck Point, too, on my attack.
A waste [shrug]

Apologies, I now realize, Aldwin, that you perfectly know what you are doing.  I did not expect you to leave your spear impaling your foe, see. It's actually very well done.
This message was last edited by the player at 06:21, Fri 19 Jan.

We could potentially do something like this, with breaks if there's a radical change in the situation.  I'm not 100% sure how much time it will save, but we'll see - as it is, right now I'm finding that it takes me far longer than I'd like to write up one cycle at a time, between making the beastmen's dice rolls, looking up rules that I haven't memorized yet, and actually putting together everything that everyone has posted up to that point.  It's not a problem per se, except that it means I can only do it when I actually have that much time; if I'm running through an entire round in one post then I expect it will take longer, and so it may be a longer wait until I have the time to write it and post it.  But OTOH maybe it'll start going faster as I get more familiar with the system.  We can always try it once and then decide as a group that we do or don't like the outcome.

I also estimate that the effort for GM is actually higher if done in complete rounds.
If done cycle by cycle and action by reaction the storyflow is done all by itself without GM being required to describe, check back and forth etc. I think.
On the other hand it takes players to check a lot and regularly whether something comes up that affects them.

It's the "pain" of forum games and rules mechanics that allow for reactions, interruptions and even adjustments of previous rolls via luck points, or fate, fortune, resolve and resilience (to name WFRP4 equivalents). Further complicated if adhering to initiative as one's attack may have become obsolete as the foe is dispatched by someone acting earlier.

I think we just have to be patient as we all get more familiar with the mechanics as we go.

Clearly, Gertrude's player did not see the need to invest at least some points into Endurance, Evade or Willpower, i.e. the Resistances as they are called on the charsheet. Not yet sure why Brawn is there also, maybe because of Impale to retrieve one's weapon? Whatever. I most definitely have already seen some things on Ludwig's 'build' that I would probably do differently. But then again, maybe more from mechanics' perspective than from fluff and setting. E.g. mechanically it would be easy to learn Folk Magic from any of our Elves, but this would be - imho - completely at odds with Old World. Same so about learning any magic actually, except that all higher magics take two skills.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:52, Sat 20 Jan.

Yeah, Mythras puts a lot into "here are the rules to make things happen, you decide what is or isn't actually possible in your campaign."  Which, technically, is the same for all RPGs by the nature of the medium, but it seems to me to be more explicit here than something like D&D.  Or games like WFRP that are explicitly tied to a setting and are written for how that particular setting is supposed to work.

Okay, combat stuff...

Grimm - reactions like parrying need to have AP available to do them, but they don't have to be officially declared ahead of time.  For playing on a forum it's helpful to say something about it, like you did in your IC post, but it's not a Delay action unless you are sacrificing your turn to wait for something else.  Otherwise it's just "on my turn I will attack, and if they attack me I will spend my last AP to parry."

I think for future combats it will be helpful (for my own organization if nothing else) to be more explicit in the post about where we are in rounds and cycles.

And now that it is relevant, here's what happens if someone with a shorter weapon reach gets close to someone with a longer weapon reach. The quick version is that the person with the longer weapon (Grimm, in this case) cannot use it to parry attacks from the shorter weapon, and can only attack with weak moves like pommel strikes, so weapon damage is reduced to 1d3+1 and weapon size counts as two steps smaller if your opponent parries.  If you don't like that, your options would be to switch to a different weapon or spend a turn changing range (which the beastman could oppose, but that arrow in its leg will at least give you an advantage).

lol, instant correction in the IC: to resist a Trip. Hey Grimm, 63 Brawn is plain awesome, whyever did you not help moving those stones out of the way :D
This message was last edited by the player at 16:50, Sat 20 Jan.

So since this is Aldwins 1st round in actual melee combat do I start my checks from here or when I fired my first arrows?

Aldwin, I believe you to imply asking a question about Initiative order, yes?

From what I read in Mythras combat. Yep, it starts for you from the moment you started shooting.

As side-note, I fully intend to give GM writeup on my guy's plan on action. But perhaps concerns raised by my Co-Players aren't to be dismissed as wrong. Combat is indeed a messy affair.

I think I'll just have to be explicit and to the point in combat OOC. Things will be fair this way and GM can tell me where and what I do right and what I do wrong. :)


And as a totally different tangent. Anyone among you watched that somewhat old French movie "Brotherhood of Wolves" ? With Monica Belluci. While, as a rather pretty if dramaturgically lacking tension, movie it would be a failure. Something similar happening as an adventure would be fun.
I remember doing something similar, but with a real werewolf, in D&D for my players.

He he he, their faces when they faced a werewolf on 1 level, because CR is for wimps without a sense of adventure, going trough "Och, dear!" to "No, you will not pass." was truly nice memory.^^

Heck, my Players become very creative in their approach to various challenges I created for them afterwards. If a mite too Warhammer-tier paranoid, but it isn't my fault. :P

Well, could be I wasn't controlling the character at that point?

Or, we could go with moving stones doesn't get the troll slayer closer to death, so why bother?

<shrug>

Your call!

In reply to Glorin Grimmarson (msg # 229):

Lol, don't know either:D

I think Aldwin is not referring to Initiative but to Fatigue roll?

Yes Fatigue.

Aldwin, unfortunately Ready Weapon is not a free action.
Which reminds me: not quite clear whether readying two weapons, e.g. net+ball'n'chain or spear+shield, counts as one action or two?

And... the Defender of the Ways combat style per Character Creation thread does not include the longsword. So it is a different style perhaps, maybe from Career or Bonus Phase? Thus only max +30pts to be allocated.

All combat styles seems to cover three weapons. Though most times specific, e.g. shortsword, but also as group, e.g. shield or spear.

Thought I was told Defender of the Ways was:  Long Sword, bow and Spear
This message was last edited by the player at 23:04, Sat 20 Jan.

Does it matter much?

As long as Aldwin's style has just 3 weapons, it could be a variant style. I see no advantage to Aldwin's personal style having a short sword vs. a long sword.

Page 87.

Sample Combat Styles

Evel Ranger -  Sword, Spear, Shield and Bow
This message was last edited by the player at 00:38, Sun 21 Jan.

I'll say depends on situation.  If you have two hands free and are drawing two weapons from sheaths, then sure, single action.  One weapon in your belt and another on the ground a few yards away?  No, that would have to be separate.

Aldwin - I thought I also remembered us discussing swords but I can't find that anywhere.  But also you've got a second combat style on your sheet which overlaps with the first one, so I have some thoughts on reconciling this to fit (the ones in the book are sample combat styles, not the actual ones we're using for this campaign).  We'll discuss more in the private thread.

Fatigue - EDIT: I changed my mind actually.  I'm going with the book's advice on p79 to ignore certain sources of fatigue if it's too much bookkeeping.  We've already discussed how much effort is going into running combat, so I'm declaring that fatigue due to the physical activity of combat falls under "too much bookkeeping" and we're going to not do that.  Note that fatigue can still happen for other reasons during combat, such as a Bleed special effect.  I've added this to the House Rules thread.
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:57, Sun 21 Jan.

By golly, of course it is perfectly okay to adapt that Style from [Bow, Spear, Shield] to [Bow, Spear, Sword]. Even with a cultural style. To add the shield on top, however, is a bit unbalancing, don't you think? One Style to cover all?
The longsword can even be used two-handed. In general the difference between using short sword vs longsword is rather big, I think. The former is a close combat weapon (short reach), the latter with its reach of long and size... whatever.

Well, Elves and Dwarves excel in all versions of WFRP, surpassing humans in almost every way, except fluff. Of course we can keep that image. I was only referring to what was written in the original thread and the limits of development of a 2nd, 3rd combat style during character generation.

Hello people! Looking forward to playing with you.

I'm a long-time PbP afficionado, Warhammer fan and HEMA nerd, who dislikes d100 systems, so this will be very, very interesting for me :D Always wanted to give Mythras a spin though!

In reply to Player 5 (msg # 238):

Welcome!

Welcome Player 5. How your character will be named?

I was thinking Ulyseo Klausberger, if the GM is ok with that :D

Sure, I'll change the character name momentarily :)

Ludwig - Aldwin has two different combat styles.  We're getting everything straightened out in a private thread.  If you have further concerns, please message me privately about it.

GM, an edit is called for.
Ludwig is prone :(
The original attack was a 54
Ludwig's opposed Brawn to prevent the Trip was only a 49, beastman wins. Ludwig uses his 2nd AP to try to stand up. IC to follow

That being said.
These are not concerns but comments supposed to be helpful for anyone to learn the system and the 'translation' from Old World setting.
Anyway, will no longer comment if it upsets.

I presume we do not retro Gertrude about Fatigue? I.e. she stays out of combat being winded or tired?
This message was last edited by the player at 15:24, Sun 21 Jan.

According to Grimm's character sheet, as a devotee of the Dwarf Militia, Grimm knows how to swing a hammer.

And yet, I can find no "hammer" in the Mythras rules.

Does hammer mean "great hammer" (which is in the Mythras rule book)

Or does hammer in this case equate more to "mace", which is also in the Mythras rule book?

I checked MRQII, written by the same authors.
Under Military Pick they had written 'also called a warhammer'.

CFI has a warhammer, but no data on reach.

Thst being said, GM earlier ruled in case of Gertrude (same combat style) to indeed use the data of mace.

Hope this helps
This message was last edited by the player at 16:07, Sun 21 Jan.

Thanks!

If mechanically, Hammer = Mace, then may Grimm retroactively have a hammer?

The character sheet shows no equipment purchased.

I believe Grimm has enough coin to have afforded a hammer (aka Mace).

The benefit would be to have a shorter/smaller weapon for these in close moments.

But totally understand if that's considered dirty pool at this stage of the game.

I skimmed over two pertient things that my inner nitpicker wants me to chime in, but needed a moment to write it down in a more polite way.
My friends often complain to me that I'm too rude. Wimps that they are. ;)

"Everyone couldn't learn Petty Magic" - There are methods, existing within Warhammer universe/setting, that could be utilized for that. Because if rules don't prevent Player from something? Player should be capable of this something.

How to pair it up with "unlike elves, not every human have a magic talent" to allow others usage of Petty Magic?

I know that rules-as-existing don't support it. But there is magic using race in Warhammer that, seriously, isn't talented at magic. Doesn't have wizards, even. I'm talking, of course, about Glorin's kinsmen.

Dwarfs use rune magic. Ergo, it doesn't require you to be capable of spellcasting to use type of magic!

How do we translate it into magic usable by our human friends who want to use Petty Magic? And find explanation that is lore-friendly without something weird happening like "Daemon possessed him, but was successfully exorcised. Now your soul is half-stretched into the Warp. Yer a magic man, Harry!" ... wich may be a fine explanation. After all sometimes You gain ability to magic as a Chaos Gift. Mutation, I mean.

But we don't have Warpstone to feed our friends with and hoping for the best, no?

So if there are types of magic usable by magically deficient people. Here are canon-compliant ways to do it: Hedge Magic's part dealing with semi-magical poultices and potions. And more academic, despite lies told to people by Teclis simping Gold Wizards, the art of Alchemy.

Of course those gifted with magic make better alchemical potions. But that's besides the point.

So how a person without the Talent, does Petty Magic? Petty "Runes". Cause while Dwarven runes are the most infamously known world wide? Elven crafters of magic items do them as well. If in different way since for elves runecraft serves as glue between magic imbued into the item and said item. Where in Dwarven Runecraft magic is inherent in said rune, regardless of place it's put on.

How it translates to the game? Flavor option mostly. Character learns Folk Magic skill. Learns Petty Spells. But must remember to always prepare the props and reagents needed for activation of said spells. Outside of this RP requirement, by Lore, it's probably good way to both satisfy the Player and give deserved respect towards the Warhammer Lore.

Take note that there is not small chance that if Mountain Clan Dwarves hear about you using runes ... you'll be written down in Book of Grudges. It is claimed that human runes, that copy some of Dwarven Runemagic principles, were Grudge Worthy Theft.


Cool, right? :D

Noice! :)

P.S. When I mean Named-By-Rules:"Folk Magic" I intend to use the more Warhammer'ish term, Petty Magic. Ok? Just to avoid confusion, I'm explaining myself. :P

P.S.2. Hedge Magic encapsules a whole magical tradition of human users of magic who discovered things from so-called first principles. It's both Petty Spells, Herbology and so-called Petty Alchemy. Today it's a dying art because Priests hate competition. Atrittion of idiot-magic-users unfortunately applies also to Hedge Magic users who are daft idijits, and College Magicians like to steal young and impressionable ones to "Embrance True Magic and forget those superstitions" ... and for a Witch Hunter a witch is a witch is a witch. It calls for some burning!

P.S.3. So how a not-Talented guy uses Petty Magic to heal a bleeding out buddy? "Obviously" he had a "magic healing potion" prepared beforehand. Reciting the mnemonic, recipe in secret Hedge Magic language, he mixes the final portion of reagent (like drop of patient's blood) to active the spell.
How it looks:
<b>In Character</b> - I quickly pull out the crystal vial that asshole Rhuobhe insisted on being essential help for young elf children to learn spellcasting safely. Fuck you dude and your resting-bitch-face, seriously no need to sound like haughty noble speaking down to people when teaching us these recipes! Ok, done ... lets mutter the recipe to not mess it up, my ritual Athame to put a bit of patient's blood into the brew. It shines! Gods bless me it worked! Now pour it onto that neck injury. Good, he isn't bleeding out anymore.

OOC: I cast Folk Magic "Heal" to stop my buddy from bleeding out. Yahoo, I didn't fail my 11% chance, go me! :D
Rhuobhe failed certain interaction rolls so his pupil misunderstood him for massive douche.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:27, Sun 21 Jan.

D'oh, thanks for catching that.  I'll go back and edit my previous IC post.

Gertrude - we're far enough in, let's leave it how it is for her.  Especially since her fatigue was the impetus for Aldwin to run over, and everything that came after that.

Hammer - I agree that it's a surprising omission.  I did make a ruling previously to just use Mace stats and call it a hammer instead, so stick with that.  And yes, Grimm, you can have one since you have a combat style to go with it.

Petty rune magic - there's a lot to unpack here, but I appreciate you throwing the ideas around.  Running WFRP in the past I always thought of it as if someone starts out as not-a-caster and then picks up a magic career later in the game, that's their latent magical talent, that they had all along, finally coming out.  Works fine if it's one character doing it, feels like it would be a big stretch for the whole party to all have latent magical ability that is supposed to be rare.  But I do like the idea of "petty runes and potions" as a way to work around it, like the Owl House but with a much greater risk of burning at the stake.  And I do think that the Witch Hunters are still unlikely to listen patiently to an explanation about proper licensed wizards giving magic to people who aren't doing it in the state-sanctioned way.

For the record, I had planned that if anyone wanted to get into dwarf rune magic I would adapt the Mysticism rules from Mythras for it, but right now it seems moot - only one dwarf in the party, and he might get access to the goodies someday but good luck getting them to teach you the process.

----------

Separate news - Aldwin has informed me that he needs to take a leave from the game but might be back in a few weeks, depending on things outside of the game.  I will take over his character for now and we'll see where things go.

I hope everything works out well for Aldwin's player.

And thanks for the answer on the hammer. I decided to try my luck with evande to just change range - and it worked, surprisingly. But, I will add the hammer to the inventory for next time.

All the best Aldwin and hoping for a speedy return.

Spend Luck Point of Regain Footing roll

rolled 67 using 1d100.  Brawn 51.
Bother, with the dice roller luck I had in this fight I expect the beastman to roll a critical on its attack :P
This message was last edited by the player at 05:35, Tue 23 Jan.

All the best for Aldwin's Player.

GM, I'm just trying to give justifiable reasoning that sounds not too far fetched from game-lore perspective. It is, like I often forget to tell, a proposal that should be under Your jurisdiction for the applicability. :)

Rhuobhe - totally fine, I'm happy to throw ideas around for adapting our specific campaign to the setting.  And while I try to stick to canon where I can (and where I remember the details) it's pretty much a guarantee that there will be some deviations here and there.

Grimm - switching weapons would have required a Ready action anyway.  I think you did just fine here.

Everyone - the bit where the one with the sword had a successful attack against Grimm, despite the penalty for kneeling, got me thinking that it doesn't make sense for the Arise special effect to be defensive only.  Any objection if I make a house rule to say it can work in either direction?

No objection from me, no.

In reply to GM (msg # 252):

This will hugely benefit the players with their 3rd AP as an attack will be unopposed in most cases and thus a Special Effect comes with a simple successful roll. Albeit at -20 (crouch, knee) or at -40 (prone) this offers a new opportunity to skillful fighters to recover from a bad situation.
This house rule would also make any Entangling weapon (which have a free follow up Trip) less effective.
The sword-wielding beastman would have been at 60 (64+passion augment 16-crouch 20 = 60) to attack Grimm.
A foe closed in with Grimm (i.e. Touch or Short reach; no parry with great axe but Unarmed possible) will find it a lot easier to regain his footing.
I expect to see Trip Opponent less often.

Not happy, but no objection.

I might make a call for generating a new character (seeing this encounter more as an intro and considering that the original group that set out has changed a lot anyway), but I have to sleep that over to ponder some more.

I have no objections to that house-rules. Why? Because it benefits the Players more.

Ludwig, I appreciate you pointing out all the little details that I didn't think about.  Similar to what Rhuobhe said, I'm inclined to stick to it on the rationale of "it benefits the players."  This is a campaign about a mercenary group, in a setting where combat is to be expected, ported to a system where combat is a lot more dangerous.  By the nature of being PCs, you are going to be the targets of a lot more attack rolls than anyone else.  So if a rule change like this tips the scales a little bit in your favor then I'm okay with that - it means that you can engage in combat that little bit more freely without having to keep a Shallyan priestess on retainer and within earshot at all times.  Now if it skews things to the point that combat is too easy and less fun, that would be a problem of course, and I'll reconsider.

Keep in mind also that choosing Arise as your special effect means not choosing a different one.  So maybe you've overcome the tactical disadvantage of being off your feet, but you've given up the opportunity to create a different advantage by disarming your opponent or nicking their artery or whatever else.

As for the passion bonus, since you point that out, I haven't been applying it for most of this combat.  Personally I feel like it's... not cheating exactly, but it doesn't feel "right" to me to say that your passion gives a bonus to every attack roll.  One attack here and there, sure, but not every single roll.  Though I guess I should maybe come up with a more specific rule for it, since some of you wanted to play smart and take "Hate Beastmen" passions? ;)

Ludwig - if you do decide that you want to change your character that's fine with me, just send me a PM with whatever you have in mind and we'll go from there.

Grimm had a good damage roll, Aldwin had the opportunity to start the next round by attacking a guy who was at a severe disadvantage, so I figured we can just call it here and move things along rather than taking the extra time to mop up.  Rhuobhe and Ulyseo can pop into IC now, Ludwig will remain in his current form for the moment and if you do decide to bring in a different character then we'll roll with it when that happens.  Sound okay?

Mkay. I guess if Ulyseo is okay with that Rhuobhe can wait with him in the next "pit-stop" our party does.

No problem, I'm fine with either option :D

Grimm, there's not much so far, 100 posts should be no problem to read back on.
Still, Ludwig shared some essentials in last IC

With only Grimm and Ludwig being the only player-controlled characters in this scene I suggest to fast-forward back to town so we can join up with Rhuobhe and Ulyseo.

Agreed.

Just to be clear on the rules on healing from injury.

Ludwig had his minor wound treated with First Aid. Further mundane healing is not allowed and since it is minor it takes 1 day to recover Ludwig's Healing Rate HPs.

Right?

Or Rhuobhe casts his healing spell on ya to hasten it. :)

But yeah, hurry up to the town guys.

We're in town - just need a bit of gentle nudging, likely from the GM, as to where our new friends can be found!

Well, the Whistling Tinker tavern that Ludwig checked out early on is probably a good place to try :)

Grimm did make a comment in the latest IC post about wanting to talk to the merchant first to get some money and then hit the tavern afterward.  But for convenience of gameplay, I'm going to nudge you in the direction of the tavern first, handwaving minor expenses incurred there (no buying a round for the whole room!), and suggest that picking up new PCs and maybe some intel before you proceed with The Quest might be the thing to do here.

In other news, I've decided to make it official that we will use the optional sanity rules from Mythras Companion.  The threat of losing your mind is a fun part of WFRP, so why lose that just because I insist on trying a different system?  I've added everything you need to know for the moment to the Rules Reference thread, but here's the quick summary - you have a stat called Tenacity, which is basically sanity hp, which is equal to your POW.  Scary stuff makes you lose it, and if you lose too much then you become overwhelmed by fear and maybe just flee the scene, or maybe become dangerously paranoid for the next 1d12 months.

Och dear.

Should I write down Paranoia in my character sheet? :P

Not yet, but let's see where the next adventure takes us...

As a side note, this reminds me of an idea I had once to do a Paranoia/WFRP crossover.  After all, the Sigmarites are all about rooting out mutants and traitors to the Empire; why wouldn't they deputize a bunch of poorly trained hooligans with questionable motives?

Would that not be a perfect moment for Rhuobhe and Ulyseo to post IC as they sit inside the Whistling Tinkerer... ?

In reply to Ludwig Wohlschuh (msg # 269):

Will do. In a few hours, making dinner.

Busy couple days at work, hopefully I can get caught up and update as needed tomorrow...

It must be noted that we are not an established mercenary band. I was also under the wrong impression at the start.
Meaning, we're not a band of 20-50 mercenaries for hire, with a captain, sergeants, logistics, etc etc.
Instead we are a small troop of individual mercenaries that have banded together for this particular task. And have also made similar arrangements before game start so we know and trust each other (and have an appropriate passion perhaps).
Whoever was our spokesperson (I'd say it was Gertrude for she has the appropriate skill set) has made a contract with a representative of Baron von Kennicht. Whether anyone was present to sign the contract may also be a bit murky, literacy again. It is more likely the deal was struck with handshake and spittle.

Ok, I'll try to complain to Ulyseo about it.

FWIW I thought of it as being that you were a small group that is already established as working together, rather than just coming together for the first time on this mission.  Which is also part of why I had suggested just retconning the change in characters rather than making the effort to write folks in or out.  But doing it this way is fine too.

In reply to GM (msg # 274):

Ah, so Rhuobe and Ulyseo are also already part of the Band and just had something else to do.
Also a good idea I think

I was a bit confused after all but let's roll with it.

You think a shitty elf like Rhuobhe would talk to strangers so friendly like, GM? :P

Lets roll with it, inquire about beastmen kills Wolfgang and Glorin have, exalt in envy and so on.

Lol, now I am confused.
What shall it be?
Already known/part of the band or not?

Let's go with the first (already known), to get the ball rolling faster.

Ok with that, posted accordingly

Ok, I edited my post to reflect the fact we all already known one another. And put up a new post.

Ok, I'm in the process of reading Mythras right now, so I'm not fully familiar with the wound rules (I know there's a bunch of HP per hit location, but I haven't reached yet what having lost HP there actually means now).

Wondering whether it's a good idea to heal that before going off to hunt more beastmen.

I think absent magic, Ludwig needs rest to heal fully. But, the GM can clarify that for certain.

In the meantime, I think finding the other merchant whose stone blocks we found to add to our pay for the job is a great idea.

Grimm, the character, will of course grumble about not getting to chance death again right away - but I, the player, think having a fully healed Ludwig and more coin on the line is a good thing.

However, I'm open to just diving headlong back into the beastmen too, if that's what everyone else wants to do.

Minor Wound: Hit Location still has positive Hit Points, Days to heal each HP
Serious Wound: Hit Location is reduced to zero Hit Points or below, Weeks to heal each HP
Major Wound: Hit Location is reduced to a negative score equal or greater than its starting Hit Points, Months to heal each HP

So yeah, applying First Aid (only for Minor Wounds) is important.
If we have magic available, all the better.
Rhuobhe mentioned he has Folk Magic Heal. Able to heal Minors only but heals all lost HP on that location.

Well then, let's break out that Chaos warping magic and to heal Ludwig's wounds and really get the tavern patrons on our side!

But, all kidding aside, I *do* think we should heal Ludwig. And I think we should seek out the "stone" merchant for more coin.

The latter doesn't have to happen in character. That's up to you all and the GM (with final say).

Take note that Major wounds generally lead to death. Without intervention of magic OR healing skill to stop the immediate consequences of Major Wound.


Wat?

That isn't Petty Magic, my buddy. Description I have works as follow: Stabilizes worse injury, heals minor wound by 1 HP in one location. That is why I call it magic first aid. :)

Also, Ludwig is about to be exchanged, so don't bother, he can rest for those 3 days, stay NPC, or disappear altogether.

The Sorcery Regenerate also works on Serious Wounds.


Takes Theism I guess to heal major wounds (admittedly I have no idea anout Animism or Mysticism, both of which high magics I don't see in the Old World setting, but as always: YOWWV).

Also, Correction: one heals number of HPs depending on Healing Rate per increment given.
E.g. Ludwig takes two days (not three) to heal his minor wound of 3 pts
This message was last edited by the player at 08:58, Sat 03 Feb.

A little extra clarification about healing - the rule is "no strenuous activity," so some light walking around, crafting that doesn't involve very heavy materials, gathering info around town, etc would all be permissible.  Going out and Adventuring will probably prevent healing.  Although if it ever comes to this, I would probably still allow minor wounds to heal at a slower rate even with some activity like marching across the Empire.

As a side note, as much as I like the Mythras system from my experience with it so far, I don't care for some of their organization choices.  For example, the fact that wounds are described on p110, while healing is on p80.  Or how earning and spending xp is stuck in the middle of the "miscellaneous stuff" chapter, alphabetized under "character improvement."

If you guys are having fun with the banter that's fine, you can let me know when you're ready to move ahead IC.  For interactions with the merchant Unersatz, we don't necessarily need to have every line of dialogue, but at least a sense of who's going, what approach you're taking, and some kind of roll to see how well you get what you want from him.

Well, I think we have outlined the idea already.
Essentially it all runs down to telling the merchant that his wares are still around and if he were to provide a wagon, horse/ox and a teamster we would make sure to protect properly and bring back the stone.
Why a teamster? My guess is that this will run down to a chase and we would not want to have an accident and maybe need to pay for a damaged/destroyed wagon.
Not sure if he can provide one, but we definitely need a wagon.
We also expect to be attacked by more of the beastmen. Maybe they want those stones for a herdstone or something. Either way, hope is we can whittle them down some more.
The merchant might argue that if we were to accomplish the Barons task he will have it easy to recover his stones. So he must be convinced that his stones are to be carried away soon.

Rhuobhe, either you cast the spell, which will entail threat of the Eye of Tzeentch and thus does require a roll, and if successful Ludwig's leg will be completely healed (GM uses the 031118 version).
Or you don't.
The wound has already been treated by Aldwin, so further mundane treatment (First Aid or Healing) is not possible.

I personally prefer some consistency in the story flow. But if no one has interest in an exchange with the merchant we can handwave that.

Gertrude is not listed as NPC, so we probably ought to assume she slipped away having had her fill of mercenary life.
Or she did the talking and negotiating... she does not have Commerce to perhaps be counted as an augment.
rolled 3 using 1d100.  Gertrude Influence 57
rolled 84 using 1d100.  Gertrude Insight 52

Ludwig is also to be written off the plate. With no social graces to speak of he would have accompanied the negotiating, if only for his sheer physical presence which hopefully has inspired some confidence that the job can be done.
Grimm would surely add to that confidence inspiration on part of Unersatz.
Thus might be considered as an Augment, perhaps using Brawn? I thunk Grimm had Brawn 60+, so that'll be an Augment of 14% (Critical Range×2, or 20% rounded up, not clear there).
Not (!) as a threat or menace to Unersatz but to inspire confidence.
rolled 39 using 1d100.  Influence 31
rolled 32 using 1d100.  Insight 31

All Elves and Humans have both Influence (2xCHA) and Insight (INT+POW) as a cultural skill. In OOC #105, GM did not insist on RAW as concerns the 5-15 percentiles to be allocated to the cultural skills. Still, I would presume Ulyseo to be better than Ludwig at least.

True, true. Sorry for not rolling the magic stuff yesterday Ludwig. First try is 75 and a failure vs Petty Magic skill of 51. No chaos manifestations, luckily.

75 the failure at 75 vs 51 skill.
18 the success at 18 vs 51 skill. Ludwig is healed. Rhuobhe is 2 MP less for the day.

In reply to Rhuobhe (msg # 291):

Like I said, it was never worth the risk given the pending 'leaving' of Ludwig.

Does that mean you would like to play though kind of moment by moment? Or, is it okay if we "cut" to the exchange with the merchant?

I'm fine either way.

Well, I like role-play and mostly that implies interaction with NPCs which is often a back and forth.
Since we all seem to lack social skills, though, or indeed have character builds that do not entail the charming, smiling rogue type or noble courtier I am perfectly fine with a GM wrap-up.
I also like names and a living world. It's not just 'a local nobleman'but Baron von Kennicht. It's not just 'a merchant' but Unersatz. And we may meet them again later in the game, or their cronies. If we slight someone, they might well come back to us and give us trouble rather than the pure sandbox style.
I also prefer to have PC personalities and not just an accumulation of stats and skills.
It makes games more interesting. To me anyway.
I also prefer to have some sort of explanation of Gertrude leaving, or Milas etc etc rather than have them disappear just like that.
Who knows, maybe one day we have to save Gertrude in a completely different town because she was part of the crew we do help her evennkf she is broke.

All of that, however, pales in comparison to actually playing Mythras :D

I'm good to move from the tavern to Unersatz's house.  I would also like to play out some of the dialogue there, though it doesn't need to be the exact blow by blow (it's not like I know that well how to play a savvy merchant).  Maybe you also learn some other things about him that will or won't be useful information in the future.  If Gertrude was the only one of you with even decent social stats then it makes sense to say that she is with you for this one; whoever wants to speak for her can do so.  After that she decides she's done with field work.  And I do like the idea of augmenting with someone's Brawn to make the argument of what excellent guards you will be - only one augment per roll, so whoever has the highest score and has tagged along for the negotiation.  I'd rather have a new die roll in the moment when it happens rather than sticking to the ones that Ludwig posted upthread here.

One thing I want to settle before I post an IC update though - are you guys going over there this evening or waiting until tomorrow?  I think it could make a difference in what sort of impression you make and where things go from there.

Right, Ludwig's just accompanying then for impression, not talking except maybe ask a question or two.
Grimm's better at making a physical impression, i.e. granting a higher Augment.

Gertrude has Influence 57

If we want to not have some awkwardness about who talks for her we can have Johannes along instead. He's not as good as Gertrude, but if Unersatz is a righteous, respectful (of Sigmar) man, there may be some hidden bonus. Only one Augment is possible, though, andnI think Grimm beats any other ideas.

Either way, I suggest to try to learn some info about Unersatz, maybe get an angle of approach there.

And go to him early morning.

I agree with early morning / next day for the trip to the merchant's.

Ok, next morning it is.

I'm generally fine with whatever the group decides, both as a player and as a character. I know PbP is slow so I like going with the flow unless it's important in the plot or for the character. So, morning it is.

P.S. Ulyseo has Charisma 8 and Influence 31%. He tried hard growing up (or others tried for him, most likely) to become a nicer and more pleasant person, and he TRIES, but dammit if he's not an insolent, flippant prick who never takes things seriously. He has a long way to go still. But I don't mind taking point, if you're up for hilariousness.

mymy, guess we all focused on the term Mercenary and bumped the combat skills and forgot about social. Well, except Gertrude.

Anyway, Johannes has Influence 41 which looks to be the best value of the active players/characters?