Re: [DL] Rolling attributes

[balance@tubas.net]

On Wednesday, January 30, 2002, at 09:31  AM, William Ogden wrote:

> I noticed in my game that 2 in particlar were always first to be a d4, 
> Mien and Strength.  The ones that everyone wanted multiple dice in were 
> Quickness, Vigor, Cognition.

So everyone's fas, healthy, and somewhat intelligent, hmmm...


> I decided to do the following:
> Mien - use as a "reaction" roll
> Knowledge - used to remember misc educational things (one dime novel 
> uses a Knowledge check to recognice what kind of ship the posse sees)
> Nimbleness - moving on unstable ground

These all work. I've been slowly teaching my posse the bad side of 
making combat-munch deadlands characters. The first is that the Mien 
skills are very useful... Point out the advantage of making an opponent 
broken! First, you get a tone of advantages, second you get chips!!! 
Having at least a few characters built for the various mental contests 
is really mandatory if the Marshall runs the game right.

Also, it's important to remember that this is still a place where law is 
important, even if it's the frontier. My posse effectively controls a 
town: One character is the drunken town mayor, another was the sheriff 
until an unfortunate incident involving Doc Holiday, another is a 
deputy, and the remaining heroes are 'advisors,' Mad Scientists on 
retainer, etc.

They still aren't in control. The local Judge has a grudge against the 
mayor and will be quite happy to prosecute him for any misdeed he can't 
justify. The characters have both physical enemies (The abominations 
that are drawn to the evil werewolf mine thingy outside of town) as well 
as social enemies (A mad Scientist they;ve become enemies with, the 
local representatives from black River who are working hard to appear to 
be fulyl 'in the lines' of the law, etc.)

> Strength - used as a "minimum Strength" for firearms (I had one char 
> with 2d4 st using a shotgun; seemed a bit unrealistic.  This rule was 
> that you ST had to be at least equivalent to the damage, using a wpn in 
> 2 hands increased your st by 1, a long gun (rifle or shotgun) increased 
> it by one as well.  An increase equated to either another die, or bump 
> in the die size, and those could be exchanged for each other as well.  
> For example, Bob has 2d8 ST.  This is equivalnet to 3d6, so he can 
> shoot a Colt .45.  A Winchester does 4d8, but as a long gun used in 2 
> hands, 2d8 is enough for it as well.

I do have a player character like this, but I require strength rolls for 
many heroic feats, so he sees it as a serious liability and wants to 
raise it to a d6 immediately. Again, while it may not be needed for 
shooting there's a lot of reasons to have it for helping to save people 
from a burning or collapsed building, wrestling an NPC that must be 
taken alive to the ground, etc.

--
Brett

LORD, WHAT CAN THE HARVEST HOPE FOR, IF NOT FOR THE CARE OF THE REAPER 
MAN? (Reaper Man, Terry Pratchett)