New Erfworld Campaign - "Darkness Rising" - Rules

[BLANDCorporatio]

Ok Exate, yours was the drop that made me post a thread here. Y'all check it out.

[MarbitChow]

I understand that it's frustrating (well, not for the leaders / casters, who are drinking from the XP firehose). I know it doesn't completely fix the problem, but the next two scenarios have features that I think will mitigate the differences somewhat.

In one of these scenarios, the current situation is reversed. You defend the city. I'll be adding 2 heavy ballistas (stationary, requires Heavy to fire, grants Fire attack for 3d6 + Combat) so the heavies can join in the shooting. There will be significantly more gump-level units, so the leadership bonus, while still valid, will be granting XP on a much lower ratio as higher levels progress. The other scenario will be a more traditional dungeon-crawl type in an enclosed space, so range will not really be a factor at all.

Also keep in mind that, in the current scenario, if it weren't for the Bats, all of your fliers would currently be dead (getting shot down as they entered the field), there would be twice as many archers (since the fliers dropped most of them), and the bodyguards and casters would be the next targets. I've gamed this scenario in the players' favor significantly, because I wanted to see how things behave past the first few levels, but as has been pointed out in the past, Healers / Leaders / Casters are usually the primary targets. They'll level faster because (in theory) over time, they die faster. Five rounds isn't enough to demonstrate this.

I'll confess that I'm not really interested in running scenarios when two sides just line up against each other and smash until one side wins. I want to see strategy, forethought, and complex tactics, not just number-crunching. I want to be fair to all players as well, and I want everyone to have a good time. I also want situations where players level in the middle of a battle, and a new ability turns the tide.

After this scenario completes, we'll do a post-mortem on what you all feel works and doesn't work.

[BLANDCorporatio]

I'll confess that I'm not really interested in running scenarios when two sides just line up against each other and smash until one side wins. I want to see strategy, forethought, and complex tactics, not just number-crunching.

My paranoia is acting up, and I want to see this as a response to the DoE-trolling thread.

Anyway, all that's fine. I'm planning, with DoE, for something with a very different flavour. Battles are short, sharp and shocking, with the overarching map/world/story hopefully more interesting, and where the more significant tactical decisions are who to send against what, in what formation, and what development paths to pursue. At least, y'all can be assured it will look and feel rather differently to the games currently in progress.

[MarbitChow]

No need to get paranoid, BLAND. That wasn't a comment against other games; I was just thinking that the only way I could really make the game 'fair' to everybody easily was to (1) remove casters & leadership and (2) remove the environmental factors, so it becomes ranks of units marching against each other. That was already done in the initial 'farmland' scenario, and I'd like to be able to create a system that supports more than just that.

Part of the reason for placing the traps on the map in the current scenario with ineffective scouts in it was to set the stage for potentially using the same tactic when you all are defending. Heavy melee units could start out beyond the wall, but out of RLOS until they're ready to strike.

[ETheBoyce]

I'm not drinking from any EXP teat!

[MarbitChow]

I'd like to get your opinions on XP. If we were to change the system so that everyone divides up the XP evenly after each scenario, how would you prefer deaths to be handled?
Do you get to create a new character at full xp, or lose all XP except the min to keep your current level, or a percentage of the xp, or start again at level 1?
If it's not full XP, do you think PCs should be allowed to 'catch up' when they die?

[Exate]

I'd like to get your opinions on XP. If we were to change the system so that everyone divides up the XP evenly after each scenario, how would you prefer deaths to be handled?

The player commandeers any present friendly or captured enemy NPC unit for their use.

[BLANDCorporatio]

If we were to change the system so that everyone divides up the XP evenly after each scenario

Which will help our melee, and us in general when that one mission in narrow passages comes

how would you prefer deaths to be handled?

What Exate said are nice options. Ultimately though it boils down to how easy you expect death to be, and have the penalty for dying inversely proportional to that.

So for example, if scenarios are such that you'd expect a careful player to not die, then punish the careless and/or unlucky with a trip to level 1 land. OTOH, if you expect combat to be very deadly for PCs, it may be recommendable to allow the player to recover some fraction of XP.

[WaterMonkey314]

What happens to us players if, say, Triage gets killed and Bill raises him as an Uncroaked? (What abilities, if any, do Uncroaked retain?) Do I get to continue on as zombo-Triage?

Also, what's a Bone Horror?

[Werebiscuit]

There is a certain amount of ambiguity in the Dance-Fighting rules, in that the phrase "in the formation" is used, but what exactly a "formation" is never gets defined. Is it synonymous with "stack"? Does it mean "every allied unit in the hex"? Or "all allied units adjacent to one another"? Depending upon the meaning of that phrase, those of us who leveled might be able to snag a +2/+2 bonus by taking Dance-Fighting, or we might not be able to get any bonus from it at all since we're spread out all over the place, in different stacks, using different attack types and targeting different enemies. I would appreciate clarification on this.

Some thoughts on dance fighting :-
Dance fighting must be declared by all units wishing to participate in the dance fighting bonus - losing an attack that round in the process, thereafter all units so declared are considered to be dance fighting and may use whatever other option available to the individual unit to stack with the dance fighting bonus on condition that the unit remains in the same spatial "formation" to other declared units. Should any unit move not in accordance with other units the dance fighting bonus is lost by all. Formations can be "broken" by enemy units causing gaps to appear in the formation but not by reducing the size of the formation.
I.e. if you pick off the ends the formation remains but breach the middle and the formation disintegrates. Formations CAN be set up with gaps to counteract this effect

[MarbitChow]

I appreciate the feedback on Dance-Fighting, but I think I'm going to leave it as a simple +1/+1 bonus for every 2 units in the stack who have dance fighting. Leadership costs 3 AP and grants +3/+3 at 3rd level, 4 AP for +6/+6. Getting a +4 / +4 bonus from dance fighting costs 8 AP, spread out over 8 units, so I think it's fine to keep it simple.

[MarbitChow]

Are Combat Modifiers and some Additional Abilities too expensive?

I've been thinking about the melee players a lot. The Casters are mostly ok, I think - they've got a decent amount of options in place. Fighters, however, still seem to be lacking options, or more accurately, all seem to be heading along the same ultimate path. The 'Heavy' ability, right now, is basically worth about 5-6AP worth of abilities, if you add up Well-armed, Well-protected, and Beefy, which makes it a no-brainer for anyone not going the leadership route. I'm thinking of adjusting the costs of the following abilities, in order to give fighters more options, and not just see everyone to ultimately take Heavy.

Block (0.5 AP): Get Defense +3 and Combat -2 for the round.
Mighty Blow (0.5 AP): Get Combat +3 and Defense -2 for the round.
Guard (0.5 AP): Get Combat -2 for the round. A single adjacent ally gains +3 Defense for the round.
Interpose (0.5 AP): Get Defense -2 for the round. A single adjacent ally gains +3 Defense for the round.
Support (0.5 AP): Get Combat -2 for the round. A single adjacent ally targeting the same enemy as you gains +3 Combat for the round. Ally's attack will occur after your attack if ally would normally act first.
Coordinate (0.5 AP): Get Defense -2 for the round. A single adjacent ally targeting the same enemy as you gains +3 Combat for the round. Ally's attack will occur after your attack if ally would normally act first.

Well-armed (1 AP): Unit gains an additional +3 Combat
Well-protected (1 AP): Unit gains an additional +3 Defense

If I were to make these changes, they would not take effect until after the Ruin Hex is completed. Also, anyone who had already purchased one or more of these abilities would get the extra AP refunded and able to be used on other abilities.

Thoughts?

[Werebiscuit]

Yay ! Some combat lovin !....

Those prices would induce me to spend my banked AP (well 1 .5 of them anyway...)

[Exate]

We did discuss this a bit previously, or at least I did. Heavy was, and remains, the single most efficient way to boost your stats independently that we've got. Your suggested change would reduce Heavy's efficiency to only slightly greater than that of taking the abilities which provide each of its boosts individually, which is probably a lot more sensible in terms of balance. Anyone who wants to really max out their personal stats will end up taking Heavy, Well-Armed, Well-Protected, and Beefy given these prices, which is now actually possible as a build- probably good if you're shooting for options and diversity. You might want to introduce mount mechanics at some point and make them good, though, which would be a bit of a kick in the pants for those who took Heavy before mounts were a thing.

None of the PCs have really pushed the Attack Modifier system; its primary utility so far has been for line units and mooks. I at least am still not inclined to go for Attack Modifiers even with the cost reduction because I feel there are better options available given my current build, but if I were rebuilding my character from the ground up I might go for it. The cheaper prices definitely mean that there will be more tactics available in large-scale mook combat, at least.

Beyond that, the abilities that affect multiple units still have vastly superior efficiencies in my view, as long as you can make them trigger:
-Dance-Fighting in a full stack of dancers is +64 to the stack's stats overall (+8/AP), and is otherwise worth much less. A must-take if you can get a full stack or more to take it with you; if we could pop slightly better units/pop them faster I would want us to be popping dance fighters for this reason.
-Leadership in a full stack is +(16*level), currently +48, to the stack's stats overall (+16/AP). As long as you have more stacks than warlords on the field it's a must-take. Since we're looking at large scale battles with far more units than that involved, it's what I'm saving up for.

[HerbieRai]

Would these lower costs affect ranged non caster units as well?

[MarbitChow]

Would these lower costs affect ranged non caster units as well?

Yes. These prices would be available to all units, caster and non-caster alike. Sorry I didn't make that clearer.

[The Colonel]

WELL ARMED, WELL ARMED EVERYWHERE!

[WaterMonkey314]

Would these lower costs affect ranged non caster units as well?

Yes. These prices would be available to all units, caster and non-caster alike. Sorry I didn't make that clearer.

Oh - this might be useful in that I'd like to make Triage a bit less squishy.

[MarbitChow]

Ok, I don't think anyone's going to object to getting these at reduced rates, so consider official. As soon as the Ruin Hex is completed, these prices will go into effect.

[HerbieRai]

Do they enact retroactivly? In other words, can I buy Mighty Blow X2 right now for my 2 AP, then when the hex is done I get an extra AP since the costs went down to .5?