I'd like to start of by complementing the staff of Columbia Games on an excellent job. The quality of your Hârn products is superb. I have enjoyed every single one of your publications. My friends and I have spent many hours enjoying the lurking secrets of Hârn.
- I'm hurt. I (N. Robin Crossby) have never been on the Columbia Games staff, but I have had a bit to do with various Hârnstuff...
I have a few questions/comments for you:
Q1. I have looked through the rules of Hârnmaster and have found insufficient coverage of conventional fire rules. The only real rules regarding fire are under the Shek P'Var section. Since these fires probably burn under different laws than those of regular camp fires I would like to see some rules for fires. Ahhhh... Will Fiery George survive his dash out of the burning barn or will he be a pile of ashes!
A1. - Most of the fire involved with the lower complexity Shek-Pvar spells is normal, although its origin and behaviour may not be. You are right though, an article on fire might be useful... but since you are the first to bring this up, I wonder how much need there can be?
Q2. Again, I have looked for adequate rules for poisons and the sort. What if Studly Fred just finished a whole jug of spoiled ale. My how will he feel in the morning. Or what about Clumsy Jack who just stepped in a pile of poisonous gas emitting mushrooms, will he choke and turn blue or run away laughing.
A2. - Of course, we could not include everything in 144pp. I seem to recall that I had more extensive rules on toxic ingestion, but had to cut them... perhaps it's time I published them?
Q3. Also, what about disease. Friendly pooch just bit the intruding character in the leg. Oh my what about rabies! Oh my was that mosquito big! I hope I don't get some tropical disease!
A3. - The same goes for disease...
Q4. I still cannot see how your injury table can apply to little children. I'm sure it would take a heck of a lot less injury points to chop of that little obnoxious kid's arm than some big 270 lbs. bouncer's arm.
A4. - Injury points are by-products of injuries, not really a means of measuring sheer damage, but I suspect you mean Impact not IPs. I don't have a lot of characters who spend their time chopping little kids, even obnoxious ones, but the point is the same for smaller creatures, "surely it takes less impact to cut through a smaller chunk of meat?" The answer is yes and no. If all other things are equal, it would be true, but combat differs markedly from the butcher's slab where the meat lies still on nice solid tables. Smaller bodies have less inertia. Hence, in cases where blunt weapons or significant armour are used, the chance of cutting through or damaging bones in a smaller arm is reduced by the arm's greater ability to roll with the blow. Added to this, the tendency for younger mammals to have more flexible bones in the first place, tends to compensate for the fact that there is less actual meat to cut through. Now while all of this is true, these are matters of degree and are very contextual in application. My analysis was that having different Injury tables for each size of creature, that would be used only in specified contexts, was not worth the added complication to the system and was, therefore, not a good use of space.
Q5. Hey! Why not incorporate new rules into some small generic adventures. The three rules above could easily be employed in some adventures to irritate any character. What are we going to do now that we all got poisoned and only have 24 hrs. to live unless we find the anecdote.
A5. - I try to keep rules in rule modules and environment in environment modules. If they get mixed up, stuff gets hard to find and you can't use it if you can't find it.
Q6. We need more skills!!! The occupational table would of course have to be modified!
A6. - Like what? To be honest with you, there are several skills in Hârnmaster that I personally would prefer to remove. Skills like Cartography which seems to me to simply be a specialized form of Drawing, were included only because the playtesters (therefore, the publisher) wanted them. I cannot really think of any useful skills that we have not included...
Q7. One question about skills. Let's say some occupation says you get Cooking-1. Well, now what about the noble that suddenly got stranded in the forest for the first time and has to cook this rabbit. Can't he now open up Cooking at Base ML? That's just as good as Cooking-1. Sure the guy that got it through his occupation had the advantage of upgrading this to Cooking-2 or 3.(I'm not sure about 3). But anyway why learn to cook when you're 14 when you can learn just as much at 21 in the forest on your first try! The same problem goes for idiots that pick up some random weapon for the first time. Some occupations would give you the same opening skill as this idiot got. Unfair?! But then again I might not be understanding something.
A7. - As I recall, Cookery opens at SB3; I don't recall any occupation opening it at less than SB4. The only reason to use an option point to open Cookery in the pregame is if the character intends to improve it to more than SB3 by expending additional option point(s); this is true of a number of other skills as well.
Q8. Are there any plans in the future for a more advanced strategic combat system. I realize you like a combat system that involves the most role-playing, but sometimes when a player character's life is on the line the player likes to have as many options as possible.
A8. - I agree that when a character's life is on the line, it is vital to have as many tactical options as possible. That is why Hârnmaster includes more tactical combat options than any other major roleplaying system. As a matter of fact, providing the maximum number of options was my primary design paramater when I invented the system. I guess, from your point of view, I failed?
I'm not sure what you mean by a more advanced strategic system... My system has been accused of being too complex (something I deny by the way) but never of being too primitive (until now that is)...
I suspect that a comprehensive combat system can only exist within the context of a roleplaying game. This is the only situation where a player is willing, eager in fact, to take a little extra trouble to maximize his options and, therefore, his survival chances.
Q8i. The target rolls are a little too random.
I have been fencing avidly lately and have noticed that what I aim I generally get close to. If I aim for the head I don't hit the knee (Chest maybe, but anyway). I realize that it is supposed to represent a 10 second time period where you wait for an opening, but that seems too arbitrary. I rather pick the place where I'm going to make the little suckers bleed.
A8i. - Medieval combat techniques have very little to do with fencing, but I experimented with about a dozen aiming systems before settling on the one that Columbia Games published. When a system allows players to get really specific about aiming, players object, and they object just as much when no aiming is allowed. Clearly a compromise is absolutely essential, and that's what I gave you. The aiming rule as written may be ignored for optimum gameflow or included to give characters maximum choice, or both. I can't see how I could have done much better, but these are matters of taste and, as a system designer, I can't win. However, nearly everyone who has criticized the combat system has called it too complex, not insufficiently advanced.
Q8ii. What about feints? Disarming? Shoving?
The effect in combat of stepping forward or back? Forward better chance of hitting/less chance of defending. Backwards would be the opposite. What about a leaping attack (Ballestre). Or a running attack (Fleche)? I don't think the addition of the maneuvers would necessarily cut down game time.
A8ii. - Earlier, pre-publication versions of Hârnmaster had an action option called Press and another called Back, but they were unpopular with playtesters (hardly used). You have to realize that introducing fencing into a medieval environment would be anachronistic. It is pretty difficult to feint with a 3-4 pound weapon. Of course the running attack (Charge) is already included. Of course, the specific act of moving forward, backward or turning, is PRESUMED to occur several times in a ten second combat round. If you seriously want to IDENTIFY manoeuvres that take less than a second, you'll have to resolve combat in rounds that last less than a second. My experience with games that do this tells me that nearly everyone would be bored spitless.
Q8iii. In an advanced combat system it might be more realistic to cut down the 10 second rounds to a smaller scale. 1 or 2 would be preferable. I personally like as much control of the characters as possible in melee. 10 seconds is too long in my opinion. According to that length span. If one character were to engage an opponent, loose initiative but on the counterstrike injure the opponent and then on his attack finish the opponent. Wouldn't have much of a chance of catching up to some one that got a 10 second head start instead of three. In a ten second system engaged characters get to move vast distances across a board in relation to engaged opponents. This is realistic only to a certain extent.
A8iii. - The judgement on whether a system is "realistic" or not is made based as much on the realtime to gametime ratio as on the specific things you can get done. A system that took thirty minutes to complete fifteen seconds of action would have very little tempo and would feel more like a mental exercise than a real combat. In order to get some kind of tempo, you have to streamline. Even as it stands, you can cut the Hârnmaster scale to one or two seconds, or even to a half second (reduce disengaged movement etc. in proportion) and adopt a slightly different attitude; the game would still play more or less the same, but it would seem to drag. Very few people want to drag combat out so that the realtime to gametime ratio is more than 10:1, even if their game lives are at stake.
Q9. When does a character/monster (dragon?) actually finally die due to Injury Points? Without rolling a K(x) roll how will they die during combat? Sooner or later they will practically become immobile but that means fatigue not death. 50 small razor blade cuts would definitely not make me just crawl on the floor with an overburden of fatigue and injury points. I'll be trying to pump some blood back inside me before the lights go out.
A9. - No one dies due to Injury Points; IPs are an effect not a cause. I believe I have addressed this issue recently in E-mail. Check out the messages.
Q10. How about having some contest or something for: Best Adventure, Best Ivashu invention, Best Myth, or whatever. I wouldn't mind a couple of free issues of Hârnlore!
A10. - Interesting idea, we usually reward good material with publication and cash, but if you'd prefer a few issues of Hârnlore... :-)
Q11. Where is that Earthmaster site that is in the middle of a mountain. Will you make an adventure for it!!!!
A11. - I have no intention now or in the future of developing Lahr-Darin. Any character discovering the place would take over the world immediately. Most GMs would not appreciate that...
Q12. Hey! How about some adventures on Yashain. Since Yashain is an ever changing place. And there are no particular geographical regions or boundaries for that fact why not make up a series of adventures that are just on Yashain with no particular place in mind. Since getting from A to B in Yashain might involve some difficulties if one walks or uses any other conventional means why not just never really create an overall map of Yashain. Panaga is just a little area of Yashain, to get to the desert there are a lot of barriers if you plan to walk there(cliffs, high mountains, etc.) Just have little individual regions that can be interconnected by non-conventional means. This could mean you could produce adventures at a faster rate than on Hârn since you wouldn't have to worry about consistency with the rest of the Hârn material. (This would be a good place to have a contest and publish the best adventures.) An adventure the length of 100 bushels of rye would be not toooo! difficult to make. My players go through those kind of adventures in a couple of weeks or so and it takes me a couple of weeks at least(if not a month or two)to make an adventure of that quality. Now if a whole bunch of people did this I could for two weeks(or so) of effort have ten instead of one. That would keep me and my players very happy!
A12. - Have you seen Staff of Fanon?
Q13. The idea of a player oriented Hârn book would be great. I think it would give you greater profits also. Since most of your stuff is for GM's only players don't buy the products. And in my group there are more than five players besides myself. Hey! That's at least six times the sales. I'm sure you already thought of that.
A13. - I agree... now you make sure all the players you know buy it, and maybe I'll make some money for a change...
Well that's all for now. I'm sure I have given you a mountain of stuff to handle for now. Excuse my grammar, if there are some mistakes. Please continue to produce your excellent products.(At a faster rate and on time would be nice, but you can't always have it all!)
Sincerely, Andres.