HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: dv52151@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (SilverFang Ahroun)
Subject: Re: WereVamp->Ars?
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Sat, 3 Oct 1992 20:21:18 GMT

tdunn@ecst.csuchico.edu (Tim Dunn) writes:

>Then again, I don't think of myself as a rl (who does?) but I do appreciate
>a good, steady set of mechanics that allows the referee to determine *exactly*
>what is/is not allowed, and for the player to create a character knowing 
>what the character is capable of doing.  

Well, that's all well and good for other genres but I think that the system
White Wolf uses, albeit a little flawed as far as dice oriented combat,
works well for the genres it covers. I've found that the quality of play
in a vampire/werewolf game is very high if the Storyteller keeps more to
the roleplaying aspects of the game, uses the "Number of dice = target
number " in place of dicerolls and immediately kicks all munchkins, 
gunmongers and nongenre players out of the campaign. The white wolf
games are definitely ones where one bad apple can spoil the bunch.

>Unfortunately, the VampWolf system fails in that regard -- sure you're good,
>but if the referee tosses a Diff 9 at you, you're screwed.  And don't think
>it doesn't happen.  One character had a 10 Willpower and was cheeky to an
>Elder.  The elder tried to Dominate him.  No go.

Bad call on the storyteller's part. If you smart off to an Elder and the
Storyteller wants you to be Dominated, then he dominates you. End of Story.
Letting dice make the storytelling decisions in a case like this is IMHO
something that shouldn't happen in any system, but especially not in
Werewolf or Vampire.

Diff 9 isn't that hard to make. Yes, the only people who will get
it often are those whose specialty that activity happens to be, but 
then if the Storyteller wanted you to do it, he wouldn't have given
you a Diff 9 (Pretty much a superhuman task.)

>The difficulty system is too contingent on the referee's whimsy.  Is it a 
>6 or a 5?  No, wait, it's written in here _somewhere._  Look in the book,
>I'll look through the _Player's Escalation Guide._  This brings up another
>point -- has anyone noticed the severe power disparity that the Player's
>Book introduces?  It's as bad as Champs3.

That's the way it is SUPPOSED to be. Yes, difficulty numbers are supposed
to come from the storyteller, not from a chart. You decide how hard it
is to do something, and using 6 as the average target, adjust from there.
Storyteller whimsy? Yes, that's exactly right. Much of Vampire/
Werewolf/Ars Magica depends on the players just shutting up and letting
the Storyteller work.         

Player's Book has some problems, in that it leads to more powerful
characters. The storyteller has final say on character approval though,
so if he thinks a particular power or character would mess the game
up, he shouldn't allow it.


Axly
From: jacobus@symphony.cc.purdue.edu (Bryan J. Maloney)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: RFD: GURPS disad limits
Date: 6 Oct 92 19:08:20 GMT
Organization: Purdue University



On the subject of allowing characters to take advantage of the "lowering
attributes does not count against the disadvantage maximum" rule:

I allow it, because every one of my players who has taken advantage of it
regretted it the FIRST time and EVERY other time that character was played.
Simply put, one-dimensional characters tend to either die fast or turn into
virtually useless appendages in my campaign.

Just kind of works out that way for some reason.
From: kucloak@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu (Bryan Kennedy Reed)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: SRII: Deadly Combat
Date: 29 Sep 92 22:47:37 CDT
Organization: University of Kansas Academic Computing Services

They weren't kidding when they said that the new combat system is
deadly.  We got in our first second edition firefight tonight and we
had on character almost die and I would be six feet under if I hadn't
played dead for a while.  Whoever mentioned that in Cyberpunk (or
Magicpunk, if you wish) when the lead starts flying, find something
big and bulletproof to hide behind, wasn't kidding.  Unfortuneately I
discovered that Orcs are not bulletproof.

This new combat system will certainly affect the way our characters go
about our business.  We'll be a lot less likely to look for a fight.
I was wondering if other groups have had similar experiences.-- 
		
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  Invincibility depends on one's self;	   kucloak@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu
  The enemy's vulnerability on him.	    bkreed@oread.cc.ukans.edu
 		  --Sun Tzu 		      Bryan Kennedy Reed
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From: z_copeab@ccsvax.sfasu.edu
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: a GURPS question
Date: 26 Sep 92 17:11:40 CST
Organization: Stephen F. Austin State University

In article <00961260.028DB480@abby.chem.ucla.edu>, doug@abby.chem.ucla.edu writes:
> In article <BuyAyJ.J1J@comp.vuw.ac.nz>, Nathan.Rogers@comp.vuw.ac.nz (Nathan Karl Rogers) writes:
>>
>>A question for all you GURPS players/GMs out there.
>>
>>How should I (as a GM) handle clerics - based on the AD&D concept of the
>>cleric class where characters have skills/powers bestowed on them by their
>>chosen deity according to their personal ability and standing in their church.
>>
>>My thoughts so far:
>>
>>Every cleric should have to take the Fanaticism disadvantage (-15 points) and
>>a duty (or sense of duty) to their church/deity (about -5 points).
> 
> Fanaticism is certainly NOT appropriate for many, if not most clerics.  You
> need Fanaticism if you want to play a Brother Jed type, or a holy crusader of
> some sort, but your average cleric isn't a fanatic.  
		      ^^^^^^^

	But your typical PC isn't *average*, unless you are in a 25 point
campaign :-). In most fantasy settings, where the actions of the gods can be
felt on the world, fanatacism *will not* be uncommon.

	I'll have to check, but I don't think Fanatacism implies a "Convert or
Die" attitude.

Brandon Cope
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: WFRP: Castle Drachenfells
From: jamie@kauri.vuw.ac.nz (Jamieson Norrish)
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1992 06:34:40 GMT
Organization: /u/student/jamie/.organization

In article <20810@plains.NoDak.edu> dhenry@plains.NoDak.edu (David Henry) writes:
   I dunno, I still think it bears repeating for any newbie WFRPers out there:

	   THE DOOMSTONES SUCK RAW WARP PHLEGM! STAY AWAY!


Well, there you have it; the general consensus. :-)

   That said, let's move on to Castle Drachenfels, which (I'm guessing) is
   probably the last WFRP thing we'll see in a long while to forever from Carl
   Sargent. There is no adventure, per se, although a good half-dozen narrative
   hooks are included in the back of the book to get your players going there
   (my favorite one is "I Left my Heart in Castle Drachenfels").

Carl Sargent has left? Or is he working on something else for Games
Workshop? Or what? Anyone who can write an adventure that's as good as
Power Behind the Throne (that was him, wasn't it?) needs to be chained
to a wp.

   As for Lichemaster, it's just a retelling of the Warhammer Fantasy Battle
   scenario, "Vengeance of the Liche Master." An okay scenario, with certainly
   a heart-stopping jump start into adventure for new characters. It also
   includes one of the best Skaven encounters of all time. Still, for post-
   Enemy Within releases, I'd still recommend Death's Dark Shadow for starting
   a new party of characters.

Yeah, DDS is quite an amusing little product, filled with typical WH
detail. It also has the fault of being just slightly unbelievable -
this one village is really a happening place! However, a bit of
editing (read cutting) of the adventures, and it's an ideal little
setting for your players to wander into.

Jamie
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
From: mmcalees@cs16.UVic.CA (Michael McAleese)
Subject: Re: Where Are Sauramund's Advice Column Issue #1 to #8?
Organization: Those Dudes
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 92 01:59:45 GMT

In article <1992Sep30.162158.1@eig.unige.ch> uldry@eig.unige.ch writes:
>Dear Sauramud,
>
>I got a little problem, I wanna know where I can find the first eight of 
>your issues. Can you answer me quickly ?
>
>	The Great and Lonely Fu
>	Uldry Francois
>	19 Village-Suisse
>	CH-1205 Geneva
>	Switzerland

   Y'know, I get more requests like this...  Does anyone know if 
rec.games.frp.archives is actually archived somewhere with ftp access?

-- 
*     mmcalees@csr.uvic.ca (Michael McAleese) : I speak only for me...       *
  "Man can believe the impossible, but never the improbable." - Oscar Wilde
  (For snooping governments: heroin, cocaine, FBI, CSIS, CIA, albatross...)
From: doug@abby.chem.ucla.edu
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: a GURPS question
Date: 28 Sep 92 19:15:29 GMT
Reply-To: doug@abby.chem.ucla.edu
Organization: Department of Chemistry, UCLA

In article <1992Sep26.171140.1194@ccsvax.sfasu.edu>, z_copeab@ccsvax.sfasu.edu writes:
[stuff deleted]
>
>	I'll have to check, but I don't think Fanatacism implies a "Convert or
>Die" attitude.
>
>Brandon Cope

No, it doesn't... I just used that as an example where Fanaticism would be
appropriate.  I don't see a cleric of the God of Thievery as being "Fanatic"
about much of anything... I'll have to go back and read the description of the
disad again, but it just doesn't seem universally appropriate, which is my
whole point.


-Doug Gibson
 doug@abby.chem.ucla.edu

Neither UCLA nor the National Science Foundation has a clue what I am doing.
They just pay me to do it.

"We have to tear you to shreds because we care." - EAC
From: laird@think.com (Laird Popkin)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: The Primal Order - Is it worth it?
Date: 6 Oct 1992 21:59:02 GMT
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge MA, USA
NNTP-Posting-Host: django.think.com

In article <17890@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> e5af046@cezanne.ucdavis.edu writes:
>Hi!
>
>A question:  I was browsing through the store the other day, and I picked up a
>copy of Wizards of the Coast's "The Primal Order."  Due to circumstances beyond
>my control (read:  shrinkwrapping), I was unable to read any of the material
>within.  Today, however, I just notice a post in rec.games.frp.announce from
>WOTC for "Pawns:  The Opening Move," which I am inferring is supporting materialfor TPO.  Should a prospective god-maker buy TPO, and P:TOM?

Short answer: yes.

Long answer: TPO is a great sourcebook for creating and playing "gods".  In
my campaign, PC's won't be ascending to godhood any time soon, but TPO ads
a depth to the campaign because it allows me to model gods, and give them
motivations and ways of doing things, so that when the PC's are effected by
divine intervention, either directly or indirectly, it "feels right".  The
basic mechanism is that gods slowly accumulate "primal base", which
generates the "primal flux" which they spend on day to day things such as
performing miracles, powering their cleric's spells (to use AD&D
terminology), maintaining servitors, and so on.

Pawns is a book of extremely powerful creatures, which can be used as
servitors of gods (which is what they were designed for) or simply as
"monsters" in high-powered fantasy campaigns.  It includes info on how the
gods create the creatures, which helps you create an appropriate "ecology".
For example, if a deity felt that something was important, they might spend
more "primal energy" to create and maintain a creature to defend it than
for something less important, or one deity may adopt the strategy of
creating many "inexpensive" minions, while another may create a few, more
powerful ones.

>(I am considering doing an Ars Magica campaign, the information in TPO may be
>useful as, as of yet, I have not seen the Pax Dei or the Maleficium in any
>stores in my area...)

As someone mentioned, TPO (and Pawns) have conversion rules for using the
creatures in a variety of RPG's.  Good idea...

>Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

You got it.  Bias alert -- wI was a "playtester" for Pawns, and WotC gave
meee a free copy of TPO for reference (thanks!).  But that aside, TPO is
one of the best gaming books that I've read in a long time.  Similar to
when I read the GURPS Basic Set for the first time, long ago, I kept saying
"of course!  Why didn't *I* think of that?" every few pages.  WotC is doing
great stuff...

-- 
- Laird Popkin, Thinking Machines

Connection Machine: Massively parallel supercomputer.  Also a cool black
cube with more blinking lights than you can shake a stick at.
From: betel@camelot.bradley.edu (Robert Crawford)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: Clerics in GURPS (Was Re: a GURPS quest
Date: 29 Sep 92 16:28:34 GMT
Organization: Bradley University

euacla@eua.ericsson.se (Claes Frisk) writes:
>If I remember correctly, a similar system is used in Ars Magica.
>But, in Ars Magica you've got three categories: saintly, diabolic and faerie
>(I dont remember the exact words).
>In a more complicated religious systems, you can't directly convert plusses
>for one religion to minuses for another.
>It will be very hard to determin exactly which god is hostile/neutral/friendly
>to which.

	True, but this opens the window for the affairs of the gods to
bear upon those of the adventurers and/or society. When two gods
suddenly find themselves in a feud after hundreds of years of
cooperation, then things get very interesting for their priests...

--
	Ya know, there's a _lot_ of wine in a gallon!

Robert Crawford 			betel@camelot.bradley.edu
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
From: tomault+@cs.cmu.edu (Thomas Galen Ault)
Subject: Listing of Disciplines in Vampire
Organization: School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon
Date: Sun, 4 Oct 1992 02:42:15 GMT

I was wondering if some kind soul could send me a listing of the disciplines
in Vampire and the powers under each.  I only need the names, not full (or
even tiny) descriptions.  I am working on a MUD whose theme is based on
the Storyteller series, and I don't have the cash to go out and buy the
games themselves.

Also, I'd like a basic summary of Werewolf (I know a lot abou Vampire, but
relatively little about Werewolf), if that's not too much trouble.

Thanx in advance.

Tom Ault
From: cm182s182@pdrome.UUCP (Clayton Miner)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: Star Wars questions
Date: 1 Oct 92 11:00:28 GMT
Organization: The PowerDrome BBS [(716)825-3614 Excelsior]
X-BBS-Software: EXCELSIOR! v0.960

Someone posted a question regading the awarding of experience points in Star 
Wars.  I tend to stay within the limits of the 3-10 points but *per session* 
(we game for 3-4 hours per week) so the players do tend to go up in skills 
fairly rapidly.  I have also bee nawarding 'entertainment points' for good 
thinking, good roleplaying, banter, being humerous and etc.  The players are 
allowed to trade in entertainment points at any time at a rate of 3 points for 
a Luck Point (another house rule...luck points are spent to increase the 
number of dice you add to your skill roll at a rate of 1 to 1 [one LP, one 
extra die]), 6 entertainment points for a 'free' skill point and 12 
entertainment points for a 'free' force point.
 
The rules regarding command and control for fire teams does do a lot to make 
the stormtroopers more efective but then so did increasintg their fire skill 
to 5D for stormtroopes who have been in the field for a while..
 
Personally I would like to see a corss over between RL Interceptor for damage 
purposes for starfighters, frieghters, and what not ("Dusty, we took a hit on 
the port side and the gav compensators for the ventral turret and the life 
support in the cargo bay is out!") but as for the actual combat resolution, I 
find the system as written is more than satisfactory.  I did create my own 
damage tables to allow for more varied rsults (surprise, surprise, I did this 
years ago and it looks a lot like the damage tables to Dream Park...) and 
reworked *all* vehicle stats to put them all in the same scale...  gotta oll 
more dice but my players like having everything in one consistant system...
 
Skeksis
From: krischel@aludra.usc.edu (Blackstar)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: SRII: Some questions and Comments.
Date: 1 Oct 1992 18:13:57 -0700
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
NNTP-Posting-Host: aludra.usc.edu

In article <BvGJsE.Jpw@watserv1.uwaterloo.ca> sichen@norton.uwaterloo.ca (Simon Chen) writes:
>Anyways, physical adepts, like other mages and adepts,
>can become initiates by joining magical orders.  
>

You don't have to be part of a magical order to initiate.  But it saves a 
lot of karma, so it helps....


>>3) Possible misprint. Mana combat spells ... three of the four 
>>   Manabolt, ManaMissile ... are listed as physical and I think 
>>   they should be Mana spells - otherwise what real difference is there
>>   between these and the Power series of spells?
>

Most definite misprint.  It seems that they overdid the emphasis on the
fact that the spells did Physical damage, and it leaked over to the Spell
Type.  If you take a look at the entire spell description, the target
for Mana series spells is Willpower, whereas the target for Power series
spells is Body.


>>>>>[Blackstar]<<<<<
From: porterg@gems.vcu.edu
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: Milleniums End
Date: 6 Oct 92 16:41:26 -0400
Organization: Medical College of Virginia


It's no surprise that Millenium's End shows some similarities to TimeLords.
The designer of ME borrowed some game mechanic ideas (with permission), and
I (designer of TimeLords) helped playtest the game.

It's a pretty good game.  Unlike TimeLords, which is a broad spectrum system
to say the least, ME concentrates on a particular genre, and does a pretty
good job of it.  While hideously expensive from a production standpoint, the
hit location overlays are a very nice idea.

Greg Porter
BTRC

Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
From: mark@cheers.jsc.nasa.gov (Mark Manning)
Subject: Net.Book.Riddles et al....
Organization: Simulacron I
Distribution: rec.games.frp.misc,rec.games.frp.dnd
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 14:39:13 GMT

Hello there!

   I'm writing this to let everyone what has happened to the
Net.Book.Riddles, Net.Book.WMI, and anything else I was going
to post.

   The first thing which happened was that our Usenet server
had a hard disk crash which didn't do the posts any good at
all.  Nor did it do anything for our connection to the Usenet.
Or, in other words - we were out of it for a while.  But I'm
back.  So I'm going to try posting the Net.Book.Riddles again
to the rec.games.frp.archives.  If it doesn't make it this time
then I'll post it on rec.games.frp.misc (which, to me, seems to
be the closest secondary area to post something).

   Then there is the second problem.  I keep the Net.Book.WMI
(Weenie Magic Items) and the Net.Book.MI (Magic Items) on my
IBM PC XT at home.  Well, I got a new disk drive to add to my
collection of things stuck in the box.  Got a new RLL controller
for the PC, placed the newer, bigger, disk drive first on the
chain of things, and managed to wipe out everything I had on
both hard drives.  Also, since the new drive isn't the same size
as the older drive, the controller wouldn't allow me to format
the two drives as different sizes.  This is a problem which, I
have been informed, can happen on XTs.  The XT is just too stupid
to understand there are two different sized disk drives.  SO I
had to revert everything to its old set-up.  Luckily, the old
disk drive controller will allow me to use the new disk drive as
well - but only if it is formatted as the older drive.  (Which
means I can only use half of the new disk drive's space.)  The
only good thing about this is that I _DID_ do a backup before
starting this whole thing.  The only bad thing is, the backup I
made was made by hand (ie:No software package did it).  So it is
taking a _very_ long time to get everything back up and going.
When I do though, I will post the Net.Book.WMI to rec.games.frp.archives
(or rec.games.frp.misc).

This has been a public service message for those who care about such
things!  :)

Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
From: kabreuer@cip.informatik.uni-erlangen.de (Klaus Breuer)
Subject: BTECH: MechWar 1.0 non-beta ready
Organization: Student Pool, CSD, University of Erlangen, Germany
Distribution: rec.games.frp.misc
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 04:03:03 GMT

Hi all!

The subject says it all - lots of improvements.
For details, see rec.games.board

Ciao,
Klaus

PS: MS-DOS only
---
Klaus Breuer, Rudelsweiher Str. 6b, 8520 Erlangen, Germany
** "Geez, I need a _reason_ for everything?" --Calvin 
** "Should I or shouldn't I? -- Too late, I did!" --Hobbes
From: IK20001@MAINE.MAINE.EDU (Society for Creative Solipsism)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: THIS NEWSGROUP IS SUPPOSED TO BE GONE!
Date: 1 Oct 92 12:59:51 GMT
 <6354@blue.cis.pitt.edu.UUCP> <1992Sep28.194005.15981@muddcs.claremont.edu>
Organization: University of Maine System

That you like being on rec.games.rpg is all fine and good
for you...but it isn't on my system...so your post on how
you were `here to stay because rec.games.frp.misc' was too
big showed up on rec.games.frp.misc, on my system...:-)
--
Eric Alfred Burns, Lord Sabre            "Faith is a fine invention
Society for Creative Solipsism            When Gentlemen can *see* --
"It's all in your mind"                   But *Microscopes* are prudent
IK20001@maine.maine.edu                   In an Emergency."
|-}----------                                     --Emily Dickinson
From: jamie@kauri.vuw.ac.nz (Jamieson Norrish)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: WFRP: Castle Drachenfells
Date: 29 Sep 92 19:31:26 GMT
Article-I.D.: kauri.JAMIE.92Sep30073126
Organization: /u/student/jamie/.organization

Basically, I'd like to know if this is any good, and if I should buy
it. In the same vein, is Lichemaster worth it? I won't ask about the
Doomstones campaign, since I know the general consensus on those
particular modules. :-)

Jamie
From: loydb@fnordbox.UUCP (Loyd Blankenship)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: White Wolf's Upcoming Vampire LARP
Distribution: world
X-NewsSoftware: GRn 1.16e (7/4/92) by Mike Schwartz & Michael B. Smith
Date: 3 Oct 92 04:00:23 CST
Organization: Texas Net Illuminati

 npb41275@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Noah Ban) writes:
>
> Will each player have to buy the set, or do you need only one per group?
>

As far as I can tell, there's only need for one set.

Loyd

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Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc