![]() Well, folks, we're back to the Old World. Let's just pretend the End Times never happened and go back to being a band of randomly rolled murder hobos. Warhammer Fantasy RP 4e is a continuation of the rule set of WFRP 2e, with changes made to improve upon aspects of 2e that received some critique. Low-level combat is no longer an exercise in whiffing, trappings are less of an obstacle to career progress and more a general suggestion for successfully roleplaying as your career, guns are now actually viable, there's a point-build system for those who don't wish to throw the dice to decide what your characteristics are, and more. New features such as Ambitions and Motivation help round out your character to make them not be a complete murder hobo, as well as give valuable XP and mechanical benefits for fulfilling them, and there's an interesting downtime system added that lets you go on Endeavors to earn money, craft, seek out experts, and other stuff. In addition to the core rulebook, there are a number of adventure modules made for the game, including a remake of The Enemy Within adventure path from first edition. SunAndSpring fucked around with this message at 05:45 on Dec 14, 2019 |
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# ? May 18, 2024 18:49 |
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Didn't post the rat catcher skills/items. How is everyone supposed to know the small but vicious dog is back.
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ChaseSP posted:Didn't post the rat catcher skills/items. How is everyone supposed to know the small but vicious dog is back. ![]() The small but vicious dog evolves into a large vicious dog at the highest tier.
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Not gonna run a game till the real rules are out but my group likes what we see. I like them going back to 2e mindset and refining that, I like that instead of going through a job chain you just kinda are a thing and focus on improving it, and I REALLY like they kept the 'yea even if you're a jr witch hunter or whatever at low level you kinda suck poo poo' while smoothing things out and giving us options beyond just killing rats to progress.
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I fuckin love that rat catcher. That's the look of a man who loves his job and or life at the least.
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some definite rough areas/weird choices, which is to be expected of a not-fully-edited version, but on the whole it does look like a pretty good refinement of the WHFRP system I'm curious to see how it'll play out- I think the talents that give bonus success levels to tests are going to have a big impact on combat effectiveness, and an uneven distribution is going to have a substantial impact on what builds/weapons are considered "good" in this edition and how you use them- i.e. if you want to swing big 2h weapons around I think you're really pushed towards partner fighting with Drilled, whereas dual wielders have many more options, with fencing weapons and the ancient-but-noble-art of punching people in the groin being particularly choice (Dirty Fighting gives +1 SL to offensive and defensive melee (fist) tests [and note SL's give extra damage on attack successes] and +1 damage per iteration, so spending 300xp on two purchases makes your fists better than hand weapons [equivalent damage on the attack but more likely to hit and with better melee defense] and only scales further from there while still being able to leverage all of the good non-fencing talents) LGD fucked around with this message at 22:07 on Aug 1, 2018 |
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Huh? Maybe I'm blind or its in another part of the book, but the only bonus I'm reading for Dirty Fighting is +1 damage per purchase of the talent. Nothing about extra SL.
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Hidingo Kojimba posted:Huh? Maybe I'm blind or its in another part of the book, but the only bonus I'm reading for Dirty Fighting is +1 damage per purchase of the talent. Nothing about extra SL. see that bit where it says "Tests: Melee (Fist)"? it looks innocuous, but it's actually extremely important, because you get an extra SL on any successful use of the skill tied to the talent (look at the Talent format sidebar on page 132) e: this also obviously has significant impact on the value of other talents- i.e. currently the Perfect Pitch talent (normally obtainable via the random talent table or 3rd tier Entertainter) is absurdly good for spellcasters, especially those who don't want to spend a round channeling, because it directly adds SLs to their casting roll LGD fucked around with this message at 22:58 on Aug 1, 2018 |
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Wow. Yeah, that changes things. Edit: Also, that one change seems to make fully statted characters who specialise in combat considerably more deadly than NPCs using the more abstracted system in the back of the book. At least in that the NPCs are going to have to get a lot more lucky to successfully hit an experienced combat PC than the PC does to hit them. Hidingo Kojimba fucked around with this message at 23:14 on Aug 1, 2018 |
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Appearntly the game is going to also cover new ground fairly early on. Ulthuan is stated to be planned as an early source book.
MonsterEnvy fucked around with this message at 00:27 on Aug 2, 2018 |
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yeah, that's one of the things I'm curious to see in practice- I think the "successful use of the skill tied to the talent" (as I read it) may be a limitation that keeps things reasonable for at least some of the game, since you'd only get your bonus SLs if you succeed in beating your own skill, so you'd still be able to get hit on a truly horrendous roll vs. a good one on their part (though if you succeed you'll crush them) that said this stops being a consideration when your modified skill eliminates actual failure as a possibility, something I think advantage might make happen pretty quickly if people play intelligently this also ties into the size rules, which are hugely influential- the bonuses you get for being big are substantial but since nearly everything is an opposed test of success levels I think the effective -10/size penalty large dudes are at is going to make them feel much less threatening than they should against characters with combat skills (unless they're seriously beefed up from the base book stats)- the fact that a giant will instantly splatter you if it hits and you're at a big penalty to parry it doesn't do much to change the fact that an effective WS of 10 is hard to take seriously, especially as you accumulate advantage, and unless I'm badly misunderstanding things its hard to imagine a 4th tier combat career not being able to clown a dragon from the back of the book e: MonsterEnvy posted:Appearntly the game is going to also cover new ground fairly early on. Ulthaun is stated to be planned as an early source book. that's quite exciting- the empire owns and seems like one of the best places to set a game but that area of the old world is also extremely well covered by previous editions LGD fucked around with this message at 00:18 on Aug 2, 2018 |
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LGD posted:yeah, that's one of the things I'm curious to see in practice- I think the "successful use of the skill tied to the talent" (as I read it) may be a limitation that keeps things reasonable for at least some of the game, since you'd only get your bonus SLs if you succeed in beating your own skill, so you'd still be able to get hit on a truly horrendous roll vs. a good one on their part (though if you succeed you'll crush them) Remember you suffer a -2 SL penalty for each step larger a monster is then you when you use WS to defend. So while the dragon may only have an effective 35, if you try to defend using WS that is -6 SL LGD posted:
Plus Elves tended to get the short end of the stick. Non of the previous games lasted long enough to cover much elven stuff, so I am glad they are doing it early this time around. MonsterEnvy fucked around with this message at 00:36 on Aug 2, 2018 |
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I always played "city elves" from Marienburg.
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MonsterEnvy posted:Remember you suffer a -2 SL penalty for each step larger a monster is then you when you use WS to defend. So while the dragon may only have an effective 35, if you try to defend using WS that is -6 SL that's true, I did overstate it somewhat- it would be fairer to say that was likely true of any combat character where you're likely to invest in a high dodge (especially if you get step aside like the duelist) or where you're likely to be stacking multiple talents that will impact your defensive WS tests (duelist again, pit fighter, protagonist, soldier [in pairs or in a cave], guard, etc.) since it's pretty easy to pick up close to a half-dozen extra SLs without trying too hard (i.e. a guard officer who took shieldsman twice + reversal twice + the shield's defensive property [completely reasonable/affordable from a character building perspective] is at +5 SLs and WS 100+ vs. the dragon's effective +6 and WS 35 - the dragon basically has a round or so to get lucky before the guard accumulates enough advantage to win every exchange [unless they roll 96+ a bunch and run out of fortune I guess]) LGD fucked around with this message at 01:37 on Aug 2, 2018 |
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Am I interpreting things right in that the species advances you get for skills and talents are just one off things and you can't, say, buy Animal Care until your career allows for it or keep buying Attractive if you rolled it?
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SunAndSpring posted:Am I interpreting things right in that the species advances you get for skills and talents are just one off things and you can't, say, buy Animal Care until your career allows for it or keep buying Attractive if you rolled it? Yea I think so, the species stuff is just a little bump kinda thing.
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I'll have to pick this up and take a look some time.
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sexpig by night posted:I like that instead of going through a job chain you just kinda are a thing and focus on improving it Wait, seriously? Job chains are the whole reason I ever had any interest in checking out WHFRP. That's a bummer.
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Can you break out of your original career chain and change classes in 4e?
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Night10194 posted:Can you break out of your original career chain and change classes in 4e? Yeah. If you've completed your current stage of the career, you can rank up or change to another career in the same class group (warrior, burgher, peasant, academic etc.) for 100XP. You can pay an extra 100 to change career (but not rank up) before completing your current stage, and an extra 100 to change to a career outside your class group.
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Ah, excellent. The 'swap to whatever Basic you wish, regardless of if you've finished your current' was a good rule in 2e.
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Night10194 posted:Can you break out of your original career chain and change classes in 4e? yea you can still change jobs and all when it comes time to rank up, you just can start as a low level version of whatever you want and grow into it if you'd rather not take three jobs you're not that interested in to be a Witch Hunter.
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I think it will ultimately work very similarly to how it did in most cases in WHRP 2E - since advancement in the attributes/skills/talents a job offers isn't actually capped there's not nearly as much need to funnel people into catchall classes like "Champion" when a specific career can easily have its own natural progression I'd expect switching careers to still largely work in the same manner- i.e. changing what you're doing entirely probably requires starting over from the bottom, but picking up new facets or synergistic abilities should be fairly quick (since you can leverage overlapping attributes/skills/talents to quickly advance if desired) on the face all you're really losing is the ability to go basic career->broad mid career->thematically very different end career, but how much that matters is extremely debatable (since you can still career hop to be well rounded if that's what you want or just directly move to your desired end career without worrying about managing intervening steps, even retaining rank if you're moving to a related career [the book gives an example of a Rank 3 Master Apothecary moving directly to Rank 3 Scholar by accepting a teaching position]- the GM can also offer you a chance to move to a career you're otherwise unqualified for if the story dictates) it is different, but I don't think it'll change how most characters play out much
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Yea and you can still just pay extra to get other class stuff with approval and all. Really all that's changing is, yea, now you don't need to spend time as a "Champion" because that class was written to give you a hefty bump in Sword Boy Skills to let you become a Warrior Priest like you want to be anyway. The book basically says if you can justify it the GM should let you transfer to a matching appropriate job or something without having to start fresh. The jobs are very clearly broken into specific tiers that are divided from each other, so while, say, an Alchemist's job path obviously is meant to show you growing from some nobody apprentice to a master alchemist in your own path, there shouldn't be anything stopping an Herbalist from the peasant section being allowed to just take the appropriate next rank as Alchemist if the story calls for it. Basically now character job swapping should happen as a result of the story shaping your character into a different form, not just because you have to check a few boxes before you can be the class you want. sexpig by night fucked around with this message at 23:47 on Aug 2, 2018 |
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really the only thing I don't like is the odd rule that you can't pick up talents from earlier tiers of a career - since talents stack now it can create some perverse incentives re: character advancement/career selection/lateral moves to related careers I'm likely to ignore it, but really its something they should probably just drop
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LGD posted:really the only thing I don't like is the odd rule that you can't pick up talents from earlier tiers of a career - since talents stack now it can create some perverse incentives re: character advancement/career selection/lateral moves to related careers Uhh you can I am fairly sure. Edit: Nevermind was thinking of skills. Yeah a bit strange, but understandable. It gives you a reason to stay in your current career longer.
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Yea I get the logic behind that but my group will almost certainly ignore it in all of the three times it's likely to come up at all.
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:Wait, seriously? Well there is a job chain. But if you are not liking the current job you can always start over in a different one.
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MonsterEnvy posted:Well there is a job chain. But if you are not liking the current job you can always start over in a different one. Yeah, I think I misunderstood what he was saying. I just really like the idea of building characters from a sequence of careers -- it's a nice middle ground between freeform multiclassing and being locked in to your initial choice.
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Plus each rank in your job has a different title and suggested trappings and social status and all so it does still feel like 'rising in the ranks' even if you do stick to one. Plus they kept the fun poo poo like Slayers needing the required head of their Slayer 'rank's foe to advance there and all.
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MonsterEnvy posted:It gives you a reason to stay in your current career longer. Why is it important that the design encourage that, versus hewing closer to the player’s concept of their desired character? Is there a balance issue?
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Subjunctive posted:Why is it important that the design encourage that, versus hewing closer to the player’s concept of their desired character? Is there a balance issue? Kinda, classes are built around their progression so a Warrior Priest will gradually become bigger and better at smashing and smiting. It's a little cheap for a rando get access to the top level Warrior Priest stuff just because they wanted the good hammer smashing talent. It's not a huge deal, like said everything about this is covered in 'yea but if your gm/group is fine with it who cares it's your game' but it is possible to cheese the system by job hopping if you super care about that. Like, I don't get why you would, and they don't seem to care that much either, but you can, so they try to encourage people to find a career that fits their concept and stay on it.
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I do think that talents being locked to a career tier is pretty dumb and I'd houserule it out if it makes it to final. Really screws over wizards since one of the most useful wizard talents to have, Aethyric Attunement, is only for the Apprentice Wizard.
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SunAndSpring posted:I do think that talents being locked to a career tier is pretty dumb and I'd houserule it out if it makes it to final. Really screws over wizards since one of the most useful wizard talents to have, Aethyric Attunement, is only for the Apprentice Wizard. Thats why you need to study as an Apprentice.
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Yeah like it makes perfect sense you wouldn't know poo poo about properly using magic if you haven't gone through the basic schooling for it.
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No, it's more that when you become a Journeyman Wizard, you lose access to Aethyric Attunement.
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SunAndSpring posted:No, it's more that when you become a Journeyman Wizard, you lose access to Aethyric Attunement. Yeah cause you are skipping the step where you would be learning that.
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MonsterEnvy posted:Yeah cause you are skipping the step where you would be learning that. but you are not you are simply arbitrarily becoming incapable of achieving greater professional proficiency by virtue of moving on in your career
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Super-Numerate in 4th Edition is one of the dumbest things I've ever seen. It is extremely baffling and I'm desperately curious what prompted the change from the 2nd Edition version of it?![]() Who is this GM getting furious over someone using a calculator and what is this circumstance that in-game requires the use of a calculator?
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# ? May 18, 2024 18:49 |
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it works pretty closely to the 2nd edition version I'd say, providing extra SL on gamble and evaluate I think its less egregious if you make the (fairly reasonable) assumption that the game is using the "simple handheld calculator" as a method of concretely quantifying what the sort of things a PC with that talent is capable of doing (i.e. calculations involving large arbitrary integers can be done in your head with lightning speed) rather than being a feat that gates the player's access to an anachronistic out-of-game tool
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