Blood and Guts: Feedback

[Tzeentch]

Yes, my game, and probably most other people who would use this supplement I suspect. I'm mostly basing this on other feedback to Vigilance's works. But anyone's welcome to prove me wrong.

While interesting, this is a tangential issue to my original post and subsequent followups.

So why now?[/b]

You appear to have not read my original post. I'll quote it for your convenience:

I'm usually not particularly picky about RPG sourcebooks getting facts right, I can get scholarly books on the subjects I care about, or I simply know firsthand how things work. But the author of the book seemed to care about feedback so here is some.

You pointed some things out, and the author gave a perfectly reasoned reply according to his own research, and yet you still decried it as having "lack of research and attention to detail."

Because he gave no reasoning aside from that's how he decided it would be. Again, to quote:

When I refer to the TOW and the Superhornet, all equipment in fact, I am referring to the equipment IN THE BOOK.
There are many models of TOW and Superhornet.
There is only ONE MODEL of each in THIS BOOK.
And in fact, those are the only TOW and Superhornet game stats in the entire d20 Modern game.
I am referring to THOSE.

I'll admit to have difficulty parsing those sentences, so maybe I misunderstood.

I'm not quite sure what research he actually conducted in any case. Many of the issues I noted are easy to check using Google. Even some of the websites listed as references in the book should have been able to head off problems.

According to a reasonable standard set forth by d20 modern and other rule books for that game, I find that Blood and Guts compares very well in terms of the amount of detail that goes into it.

<shrug> Which brings up an interesting point about the general laziness of d20 Modern and RPG research as well. But in any case I expected more from Blood & Guts then you did it seems.

 

[Vigilance]

Re: Re: Re: Blood and Guts: Feedback

B&G has some interesting parts I will borrow for my own games, but the lack of research and attention to detail is quite unfortunate.

I did over 200 hours of research on the game, and I think it shows.

You compain about the lack of model designations for weapons and vehicles.

The vehicle weapons in the game are a 900% increase over d20 Modern, from 3 to 27.

The combat jets and combat helicopters and submarines in the game are an INFINITY increase over d20 modern core rules (since there were none).

There is also rules on aerial combat, bombing, and submarine warfare.

When I mention a TOW in the game, you have no trouble knowing what Im talking about- its about the TOW in the game.

As the introduction to the game states- this is a beginning, and I had to draw the line somewhere. A "mere" increase from 3 to 27 vehicle weapons was where I drew the line, alone with a ton of prestige classes, feats, new rules, and a lot of new vehicles.

Could MORE have been in the book? (Which seems to be the crux of your argument about models and variants) Sure. I could have done 1000 pages on this subject. I thought 90 something was enough.

And by the way- most of your suggestions are addressed in the new edition which will be out in less than a week anyway .

Chuck

 

[Vigilance]

Because he gave no reasoning aside from that's how he decided it would be.

Well- I *did* write the book. I promise to call you at home and write my NEXT book according to YOUR reasoning, ignoring my OWN opinions whenever possible

[quoteI'm not quite sure what research he actually conducted in any case. Many of the issues I noted are easy to check using Google. Even some of the websites listed as references in the book should have been able to head off problems.

<shrug> Which brings up an interesting point about the general laziness of d20 Modern and RPG research as well. But in any case I expected more from Blood & Guts then you did it seems. [/B][/QUOTE]

I conducted over 200 hours of research, many of the Model variants and vehicle variants were quite clear to me. However, since there was only one of each in the book, and since, in game terms, there seemed little difference in capability to my untrained eye, I usually only gave one version.

Also- the game was read by 2 gulf war vets, and I have received a lot of helpful feedback from many members of the veteran community from the day I posted the TOC to the game. I welcome all feedback, even yours

Most military weapons are very good at what they do, resulting in death and destruction of their target. Dead is dead. It doesnt matter, in game terms, that one weapon would reduce a tank to ashes and another merely to smoking cinders, again in my opinion.

I sincerely promise to use other people's opinions in the future whenever possible

And again- my tongue is planted firmly in cheek, I am not upset, in fact I expected feedback exactly like this- and I value it and take it seriously, and when possible and helpful- it is taken into account- as an example- due to YOUR feedback- YOU- TODAY- caused me to go back into the text and change the elite unit feats to allow reservists to take them.

Chuck

 

[Tzeentch]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Blood and Guts: Feedback

I did over 200 hours of research on the game, and I think it shows.

You'll note that pretty much all of my complaints are directed at the equipment chapter. I am not in a position to judge the accuracy of most of the book as I am not particularly interested in completely realistic special forces campaign setups (which would be horribly boring) and it's not something I know much about or care to research on my own (I know a lot about Radio Recon and that's it). I trust your research on the matters unrelated to equipment.

You compain about the lack of model designations for weapons and vehicles.

Yes.

The vehicle weapons in the game are a 900% increase over d20 Modern, from 3 to 27.

Which is good yes, and B&G does follow the same pattern with regards to presentation and (AFAICT at the moment) damage. My complaint was never with the number of vehicles or weapons presented.

When I mention a TOW in the game, you have no trouble knowing what Im talking about- its about the TOW in the game.

As I have no idea which of the TOW versions you used as the model the problem is I don't know why TOW is in the game. I thought I was clear on this.

And by the way- most of your suggestions are addressed in the new edition which will be out in less than a week anyway .

Will there be a "upgrade path" for current owners?

Well- I *did* write the book. I promise to call you at home and write my NEXT book according to YOUR reasoning, ignoring my OWN opinions whenever possible

I may be coming off a bit strong, but you might want to be careful about appearing too hostile to your customers.

I conducted over 200 hours of research, many of the Model variants and vehicle variants were quite clear to me. However, since there was only one of each in the book, and since, in game terms, there seemed little difference in capability to my untrained eye, I usually only gave one version.

And this is true in most cases. With the poor resolution of the d20 mechanics there really is little to no difference between a FIM-92A and FIM-92B Stinger-POST. But that's not what I was getting at.

Also- the game was read by 2 gulf war vets, and I have received a lot of helpful feedback from many members of the veteran community from the day I posted the TOC to the game. I welcome all feedback, even yours

Even veterans have differing tastes, as I'm sure you've noticed. I happen to be a bit more of a technophiliac then most, partly because it's part of my job. If I was really trying to impose my experience on B&G you would see page after page of suggested rules for TPFDDing special ops and making sure the players create load plans for the aircraft they are deploying with.

I sincerely promise to use other people's opinions in the future whenever possible

I don't think I'm asking for much, and I guess you've had other people have the same general comments. Just a little more detail to raise the bar above the blandness of base d20 Modern.

 

[Vigilance]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Blood and Guts: Feedback

Will there be a "upgrade path" for current owners?

Definitely

Also- Im grumpy today- but my tongue was firmly planted in my cheek on all those comments

And in fact- I did a quick jump back into the book to address your elite units issue- because you were right on the money- so I was obviously listening to you too

My goal for the game was to provide a solid base for GMs to run military games with a focus on special ops, and then for me to build on in later products- I think I succeeded, and in utter complete modesty think its the best product of its kind ever produced for the d20 modern game.

Chuck

 

[gribble]

Hi Vigilance,

I really like Blood & Guts - I think you're right that it's the best source material on this topic to date for d20.

Of course, nothings perfect, and I have found a couple of issues:
1) You've probably already noticed this, but just in case you haven't - the Air Force officer "Rank table" seems to have an error - all the data is just showing the rank number (i.e. O-1).
2) Special Training/MOS and Elite Unit assignments - these are effectively equivalent to feats, but generally seem more powerful. E.g. Most elite unit assignments provide you with +1 to hit (the equivalent of 1 feat - weapon focus), plus other benefits. Ditto the various special training/MOS packages - which generally provide you with a bonus feat *and* bonus class skills. I realise there is a trade-off here between realism & balance, but I was wondering if you had any "behind the scenes" comments on the balance issues here? I can't see why a military character would choose to take a standard feat over one of these packages.
3) Special Forces Talents - there doesn't seem to be many to choose from... seems to me that most characters with 10 levels of a Special Forces prestige class would have the same talents... are there any plans to publish more of these, for instance maybe a stealth and/or disguise tree?
4) Again, under Special Forces Talents - the Ambush Talent (Strategy tree). It states that if the enemy forces fail to spot the ambushing forces then they don't get a partial action in the surprise round (implying they would if the ambushing character didn't have this talent). There are a couple of issues here - first you don't get partial actions in d20 modern, and second, if the enemy forces fail their spot checks, surely they would count as unaware anyway, and according to the d20 modern rules unaware combatants don't receive any actions during the surprise round. The talent can be fully described by the first sentence, as the remainder of the description is just the standard d20 modern surprise rules...

Anyways, it's a great addition to d20, and I'm looking forward to further suppliments.

 

[Tzeentch]

My goal for the game was to provide a solid base for GMs to run military games with a focus on special ops, and then for me to build on in later products- I think I succeeded, and in utter complete modesty think its the best product of its kind ever produced for the d20 modern game.

I thought it was money well spent

 

[Vigilance]

Hi Vigilance,

I really like Blood & Guts - I think you're right that it's the best source material on this topic to date for d20.

Thanks

Actually- that was a joke on my part- to the best of my knowledge its the ONLY d20 modern military book

Still- thanks

Of course, nothings perfect, and I have found a couple of issues:

doh! I knew it was too good to be true

1) You've probably already noticed this, but just in case you haven't - the Air Force officer "Rank table" seems to have an error - all the data is just showing the rank number (i.e. O-1).

Yep- got that one- and its fixed in the latest update which went out moments ago- all you guys who already bought the game can download the newest version for free.

2) Special Training/MOS and Elite Unit assignments - these are effectively equivalent to feats, but generally seem more powerful. E.g. Most elite unit assignments provide you with +1 to hit (the equivalent of 1 feat - weapon focus), plus other benefits. Ditto the various special training/MOS packages - which generally provide you with a bonus feat *and* bonus class skills. I realise there is a trade-off here between realism & balance, but I was wondering if you had any "behind the scenes" comments on the balance issues here? I can't see why a military character would choose to take a standard feat over one of these packages.

There were some behind the scenes discussions. Let's address each type of feat in turn:

MOS Packages- these are essentially occupations minus the wealth bonus. When you look at the more potent occupations in d20 modern, they provide you with a feat- some new class skills- and some wealth. So for a feat you're getting an occupation with no wealth modifier. Also- with the exception of MOS Infantry- I wouldnt really consider the bonus feats MOS packages grant you as optimal. If I gave you a free feat would it be Surface Vehicle Operation (Earthmovers and Bridgelayers)? Air Traffic Control Expert?!? I know I'm picking the worst feats- and there are some good ones in there- but my point is you dont pick the feats- I do

Advanced Training- some of these provide a bonus to hit in a certain environment- some of them provide some skill bonuses- nothing to write home about. I think the fact that you only get the bonuses in certain environments makes them balanced.

Elite Unit Assignments- +1 to hit and some skill bonuses is better than Weapon Focus. But here's the rub- Elite Unit Assignments have 2 or 3 feats required before you can take them. As a feat gets harder to take prerequisite wise, it's ok for that feat to edge up in power.

Is Spring Attack better than Weapon Focus? What about Whirlwind attack? You betcha. That's because those feats are harder to get. Many of the elite units require 2-3 feats- this puts them up a feat chain to the level of- say- Spirited Charge (x3 damage with a charge attack) which is a LOT more powerful than weapon focus.

Lastly there's the thing that applies to all three of these- the requirement your character be on active or reserve duty. The fact that your character might get yanked out of bed and dropped into a hellhole half way around the world also justifies a benefit in game terms in my opinion.

3) Special Forces Talents - there doesn't seem to be many to choose from... seems to me that most characters with 10 levels of a Special Forces prestige class would have the same talents... are there any plans to publish more of these, for instance maybe a stealth and/or disguise tree?

Well- I like those ideas for more talents

My thought was that unless you jumped from one special forces class to another you could never get more than 3 or 4 anyway- and since characters would likely have different classes, and different MOS packages- that made the range of abilities pretty big.

Still- there's no reason to expect that you WONT see more special ops talents in a future product or web enhancement. (Have I mentioned the War on Terror supplement and the free British Special Ops Web En both just around the corner? Who says this isnt the era of the shameless plug?)

4) Again, under Special Forces Talents - the Ambush Talent (Strategy tree). It states that if the enemy forces fail to spot the ambushing forces then they don't get a partial action in the surprise round (implying they would if the ambushing character didn't have this talent). There are a couple of issues here - first you don't get partial actions in d20 modern, and second, if the enemy forces fail their spot checks, surely they would count as unaware anyway, and according to the d20 modern rules unaware combatants don't receive any actions during the surprise round. The talent can be fully described by the first sentence, as the remainder of the description is just the standard d20 modern surprise rules...

Anyways, it's a great addition to d20, and I'm looking forward to further suppliments.

Man- is my face red. D20 Modern has bitten me a few times now. I have read that book cover to cover more times than I can count, and designed 4 games for it, and there's little differences between it and 3E that I havent caught yet.

Let me ponder that and figure out what to do for the ambush talent

Chuck

 

[gribble]

Actually- that was a joke on my part- to the best of my knowledge its the ONLY d20 modern military book

Well, there was Afganistan d20... it wasn't d20 modern though, and IMO B&G is better.

There were some behind the scenes discussions. Let's address each type of feat in turn:

MOS Packages-

Still not entirely convinced, because an additional occupation and an additional feat clearly aren't balanced, even without the wealth bonus... but I'll agree that the combination of a "sub-optimal" feat and 2 or 3 extra "class" skills probably balances with the disadvantage of requiring a military allegiance.
There really shouldn't be "sub-optimal" feats though, should there? Or were they intentially created as sub-optimal for use in these packages?

Advanced Training-

I'm really sceptical here... +1 to hit (equivalent to one feat), plus +2 to eight skills (equivalent to 4 feats!) is balanced just because it's only usable in one environment? Especially if that environmet is Urban? Even with the allegiance disadvantage taken into account I'm not convinced they're balanced. Obviously I'm free to do whatever I like with my own game, but in your opinion, do you think it's reasonable to house rule them down to only 4 skills (say Hide, Knowledge (Tactics), Spot and Survival)?

Elite Unit Assignments-

My turn to go Doh!
I didn't notice the pre-requisite feats... I agree they're ok when you take that into account.

Well- I like those ideas for more talents

Thanks. I'm happy to pass on a couple I've sketched out already if you'd like to use them "officially".
I've been trying to put together a "room entry" type tree as well... designed for quick and lethal entry to rooms occupied by hostiles (and possibly hostages as well), but thats proving sort of difficult. Possibly a survival-based one as well.
I've also put together a few more feats for use with the Commando Training martial arts style... based on the sorts of things you'd expect commandos to do in hand to hand combat (fighting when prone, sweeping - trip - attacks, disarming etc).
Speaking of which, there was one other thing I noticed which seemed a little odd - I'd be grateful if you could explain the reasoning:
A couple of the martial arts maneuvers in B&G allow the target to make a saving throw - the DC is always (10 + attackers Str + attackers lvl - defenders lvl). I was wondering why you chose to subtract the defenders level - effectively taking the defenders level into account twice, once for lvl based bonuses to the save, and once for the DC - instead of making it similiar to the D&D monks stunning fist attack (10 + attackers Str + 1/2 attackers level)?

Man- is my face red.
...
Let me ponder that and figure out what to do for the ambush talent

It's an easy mistake to make. It's the little subtle differences that always trip you up...
Some ideas (feel free to ignore them) - Allow the ambushers to take full round actions in the surprise round, or limit the targets of the ambush to "partial" (i.e.: move or attack only) actions in thier first normal round. Those were what sprang to mind when I realised it didn't do much as written.

 

[Vigilance]

Still not entirely convinced, because an additional occupation and an additional feat clearly aren't balanced, even without the wealth bonus... but I'll agree that the combination of a "sub-optimal" feat and 2 or 3 extra "class" skills probably balances with the disadvantage of requiring a military allegiance.
There really shouldn't be "sub-optimal" feats though, should there? Or were they intentially created as sub-optimal for use in these packages?

They weren't created specifically for the packages- but clearly not all feats are created equal. When I look at Power Attack and Builder I see one of those feats has "sub-optimal" written all over it

I guess my point here wasn't to say the feats you have to take suck- just that they're probably not feats you would choose if I made the MOS packages exactly as is- but said- "pick any 1 feat".

I'm really sceptical here... +1 to hit (equivalent to one feat), plus +2 to eight skills (equivalent to 4 feats!) is balanced just because it's only usable in one environment? Especially if that environmet is Urban? Even with the allegiance disadvantage taken into account I'm not convinced they're balanced. Obviously I'm free to do whatever I like with my own game, but in your opinion, do you think it's reasonable to house rule them down to only 4 skills (say Hide, Knowledge (Tactics), Spot and Survival)?

Well- you can house rule it that way of course. To take another stab at convincing you they're balanced (because I really think they are). Another reason they have a little extra punch in the skill department is that you really need 5 feats to get that bonus all the time. And unless you've taken all the terrain warfare packages, then the GM has total control over when you can and cannot use the feat.

In playtest, each of my PCs took a different terrain specialization so they were always covered. And then they all took Urban Warfare (I think they knew I was writing War on Terror and counted on a lot of house to house fighting lol).

So- when they were in Urban environments- which has been 2 adventures out of a pretty lengthy campaign- they were very effective.

However, when they're anywhere else- every PC but one (the lucky chap whose terrain is where they are) has a wasted feat. One that does nothing for him.

As has been pointed out numerous times in the course of the Great Ranger Debate- an ability that is completely under the GM's control when it occurs and when it doesn't needs to have some extra punch.

My absolute last point- I don't really think those feats that give you +2 to two skills are worth a feat. So that factors into my making a feat that primarily adds to some skills a little better.

Thanks. I'm happy to pass on a couple I've sketched out already if you'd like to use them "officially".
I've been trying to put together a "room entry" type tree as well... designed for quick and lethal entry to rooms occupied by hostiles (and possibly hostages as well), but thats proving sort of difficult. Possibly a survival-based one as well.

I'd be happy to see them. I'm putting the finishing touches on a web enhancement of british special ops classes right now. If I like them, I will put them in with the new classes if that's ok with you

I've also put together a few more feats for use with the Commando Training martial arts style... based on the sorts of things you'd expect commandos to do in hand to hand combat (fighting when prone, sweeping - trip - attacks, disarming etc).

Well- the martial arts rules in Blood and Guts are pulled from my martial arts d20 Modern book Blood and Fists, which has about 130 more maneuver feats (Im not kidding) and about 39 more styles than what I included in Blood and Guts- which is the bare minimum I thought special ops characters would need.

If you need more martial arts- or just want what I consider to be a fine book with martial arts feats, weapons, and classes, I'd suggest you check out Blood and Fists

Speaking of which, there was one other thing I noticed which seemed a little odd - I'd be grateful if you could explain the reasoning:
A couple of the martial arts maneuvers in B&G allow the target to make a saving throw - the DC is always (10 + attackers Str + attackers lvl - defenders lvl). I was wondering why you chose to subtract the defenders level - effectively taking the defenders level into account twice, once for lvl based bonuses to the save, and once for the DC - instead of making it similiar to the D&D monks stunning fist attack (10 + attackers Str + 1/2 attackers level)?

I've had a lot of people ask me this in Blood and Fist threads. It's a mechanic that not a lot of people seem to care for. My reasoning was that the save should get a little EASIER to make as you rise in level, since the consequences for failure go WAY up. If a maneuver blinds you 1-4 rounds at 3rd level, your penalty for failure is getting tagged with 1-4 attacks. At 15th level (where a character can have 3 attacks) your penalty for failure is 3-12 attacks.

So that was my reasoning

It's an easy mistake to make. It's the little subtle differences that always trip you up...
Some ideas (feel free to ignore them) - Allow the ambushers to take full round actions in the surprise round, or limit the targets of the ambush to "partial" (i.e.: move or attack only) actions in thier first normal round. Those were what sprang to mind when I realised it didn't do much as written.

Hmm those sound pretty good- let me ponder it a little more.

Thanks for all the feedback though

Chuck