D&D vs WHFRP

[el-remmen]

I've always loved the warhammer setting, even if I wasn't a huge fan of the rules - and a lot of that gritty flavor made its way into Aquerra.

 

[kengar]

WFRP (2e) is my FRP of choice. I ran my group through Ashes of Middenheim a few months ago and they loved it. None of them had ever played WH before. I had heavily tweaked the module because I thought it was too linear as written, but the grim & gritty was a blast. They still rib one player about having caught "galloping scumpox" and debate whether it was from the bar wench or falling in the sewers while fighting mutants. (It was the sewers, but I'll never tell )

The randomness of char gen is how its written, but many groups pick a starting career. I like the rolling twice then pick between method. The 200XP bump to any basic career option makes it largely a moot point to me.

Combat goes quick and deadly. There's a nice balance between detail and speed of play. Some folks like more distinction between hand weapons, etc. but it doesn't bother me.

Re:insanity in WH: Going nuts isn't the end of a PC. Most idsorders are totally playable.

Re: magic. Wizards (legal ones) are tolerated (sometimes even respected) in more cosmopolitan areas (big cities, etc.) of the Empire. Small backwater villages are another matter. Peasants tend to be ignorant about the distinctions between a licensed imperial wizard and a chaos mage. Now, they might be too scared to rush him, and they might just leave him alone hoping he leaves sooner. But if a mage hangs around and starts casting spells, eventually the torches and pitchforks are gonna come out.

 

[Henry]

Hey Kengar, perhaps you or another player of WFRP could answer one or two rules questions, if you don't mind? I'm making sure I have certain things down:

First of all, am I correct in assuming that the most Magic attribute a beginning character can have is 1 (apprentice wizard or hedge wizard)?

Second, how does skill mastery work, exactly, and does it apply to only skills listed in the "skills" entry, and cannot apply to Weapon Skill or Ballistic Skill? If I understand it right, if you take a second career (basic or advanced), and it has a given skill listed in its entry, you can tak a +10% skill mastery on use of that skill for 100xp?

Lastly, if a character is casting a spell, say a spell that takes a full action, rolls their d10, doesn't hit the target, and has to keep casting, is the next interval another full action before they make another cast roll? I also assume for a spell that takes a half action, they can't make more than one cast roll in a round, because of the "only 1 attack or 1 cast in a round" rule?

Everything else seems pretty self-explanatory.

 

[kengar]

Hey Kengar, perhaps you or another player of WFRP could answer one or two rules questions, if you don't mind? I'm making sure I have certain things down:

First of all, am I correct in assuming that the most Magic attribute a beginning character can have is 1 (apprentice wizard or hedge wizard)?

I'm 99% sure that's right (don't have books here at work). No starting PC is going to have a Magic score greater than 1.

Second, how does skill mastery work, exactly, and does it apply to only skills listed in the "skills" entry, and cannot apply to Weapon Skill or Ballistic Skill? If I understand it right, if you take a second career (basic or advanced), and it has a given skill listed in its entry, you can tak a +10% skill mastery on use of that skill for 100xp?

Right. Since WS & BS are their own attribute and other skills are rolled on using the related attribute, you can't ge skill mastery in WS or BS (they just improve directly). Once you have a skill any new opp to take that skill can be used to improve it like you describe (up to +20% iirc). So lockpicking (an Ag skill), would normally be rolled v your Ag score. By taking it again, it's v. Ag+10%, etc. But you can only take a skill once per career, and only if it's available in the advance scheme of the new one.

Lastly, if a character is casting a spell, say a spell that takes a full action, rolls their d10, doesn't hit the target, and has to keep casting, is the next interval another full action before they make another cast roll? I also assume for a spell that takes a half action, they can't make more than one cast roll in a round, because of the "only 1 attack or 1 cast in a round" rule?

Everything else seems pretty self-explanatory.

You can only cast a max of 1 spell/round, regardless of casting time. If I understand the first casting question correctly. Youdon't have to keep casting. Once you fail your casting roll, you're done. If you decide to try again, then you're starting the whole process over. So ye, it's a full action before you make another castnig roll. Most people will spend the half action on a Channelling roll to help their casting before beginning the spell proper.

Make sense?

 

[Cergorach]

WHFRP is like fantasy Paranoia, you don't have clones, just a lot of backup commoners (that die just as quickly). Big difference is that you don't have to worry about one AI making live difficult, now you have scores of folk that squash you like the bug you are (and don't really notice you anyways)...

 

[Henry]

You can only cast a max of 1 spell/round, regardless of casting time. If I understand the first casting question correctly. Youdon't have to keep casting. Once you fail your casting roll, you're done. If you decide to try again, then you're starting the whole process over. So ye, it's a full action before you make another castnig roll. Most people will spend the half action on a Channelling roll to help their casting before beginning the spell proper.

Make sense?

The way I read the spellcasting section, casting continued if you failed to make the target number the first round, meaning for example, if you tried to cast a magic dart (target number 5), and only got a 4, you'd keep casting for the casting length, making another roll next interval (half action, full action, etc. whatever the casting time listed as) to see if you got it. Otherwise, I don't understand the comments in the casting section about "extended actions", nor the comment about getting damaged and making a check to see if you blew the casting. I'll look it up tonight and give the part I'm talking about tomorrow. The Black Industries forums seem very hard to track down basic rules questions, unfortunately.

 

[LoneWolf23]

*minirant: One of the few things I don't like about W2e is the "Colleges of Magic" and their close association with the authorities. I would prefer that magic have been made more underground. I understand the reasoning behind the Empire's support for a training ground for Wizards (untrained Wizards are more dangerous than trained ones) but it still seems off that on one hand Wizards should be so reviled by the general populace and Witch Hunters should have such free reign to persecute Wizards and on the other Wizards are one of the most powerful and influential groups in the Empire. /minirant*

Why do you think the peasants and witch hunters are so quick to condemn the Wizards? it's because they're so influential with the nobles, in spite of being Magic-wielding freaks.

...People at the bottom always resent the people above them.

 

[Henry]

OK re-reading the casting section, I apparently misread the section on casting a spell being an extended action; I see that if you can't cast it, it's shot and you have to start again from scratch next round. Sounds to me like 2 dice is the optimum to use, because your chance of rolling all "1"s is 1 in a 100, and your chance of doubles is pretty low, only causing a minor effect if it happens (or if you're really unlucky, you blow the local area to hell).

Player: "I want to cast a light spell." (roll... oops, tzeentch's curse.. roll... roll.. roll... roll... Oh, crap...)

GM: "I'm sorry -- within 20 miles, all milk curdles, babies are born with hooves for the next day, and a chaos demon drags you off to have his way with you."

 

[kengar]

OK re-reading the casting section, I apparently misread the section on casting a spell being an extended action; I see that if you can't cast it, it's shot and you have to start again from scratch next round. Sounds to me like 2 dice is the optimum to use, because your chance of rolling all "1"s is 1 in a 100, and your chance of doubles is pretty low, only causing a minor effect if it happens (or if you're really unlucky, you blow the local area to hell).

Player: "I want to cast a light spell." (roll... oops, tzeentch's curse.. roll... roll.. roll... roll... Oh, crap...)

GM: "I'm sorry -- within 20 miles, all milk curdles, babies are born with hooves for the next day, and a chaos demon drags you off to have his way with you."

One of the reasons I love that game!

 

[Henry]

Yeah, not too many games where you're doing the equivalent of lighting a cigar with a bazooka's back-blast next to gasoline depot.