Grim-n-Gritty: Revised and Simplified
- Thread starter KenHood
- Start date
ENWorld is now hosting the rules at http://www.enworld.org/forums/local_links.php?action=links&catid=19
Thanks, ENWorld!
The latest version of the rules is dated 4-7-2004.
Changes:
*Corrected a couple of typos.
*Clarified explanation of figuring base defense bonus.
*Moved the dice cap and sneak attack rules to a variants section.
*Added a variant rule for Dexterity as the universal attack roll modifier, rather than Strength for melee and Dexterity for ranged. (Also added a feat, Brute Force, to go along with this variant.)
Again, thanks for the suggestions and requests for clarification. I look forward to hearing some playtesting discussion.
Thanks, ENWorld!
The latest version of the rules is dated 4-7-2004.
Changes:
*Corrected a couple of typos.
*Clarified explanation of figuring base defense bonus.
*Moved the dice cap and sneak attack rules to a variants section.
*Added a variant rule for Dexterity as the universal attack roll modifier, rather than Strength for melee and Dexterity for ranged. (Also added a feat, Brute Force, to go along with this variant.)
Again, thanks for the suggestions and requests for clarification. I look forward to hearing some playtesting discussion.
As always, www.giant.net/~hagen/Grim-n-GrittyRevised.doc and www.giant.net/~hagen/Grim-n-GrittyRevised.rtf are also download points for the file.KenHood said:
Hagen
Etiquette_Gnome
First Post
I think it would be great if you gave the same treatment to your psionic rules, personally. But other than that, I think I'm going to try out at least a one-shot game with this sytem.
mafisto
First Post
Playtesting
Okay Ken,
A few playtest scenarios, and I have to agree with your more recent assessment - DEX is a better melee attack stat than STR. It seems to balance size differences better, and allows 'dodgy' classes the ability to last a whole six seconds longer in combat (better than nothin'!).
I'm still not fond of some of the revisions, but that's a matter of personal preference rather than structure; combat flows smoothly and intuitively, and it's very fast. My personal preference comes in on the 'very fast' part of the equation - my players are adapted to the increases lethality of the older rules, but this would drive them over the edge.
Hmm... I guess that's not personal preference at all, but rather player preference. Well, the DM is the servant.
Regardless, I'm very impressed by the thought you put into this. I was expecting to hate the 'pip system' but I found it very fun & simple to use. If I start a new campaign (perhaps years from now) I'll be using the revised rules.
Okay Ken,
A few playtest scenarios, and I have to agree with your more recent assessment - DEX is a better melee attack stat than STR. It seems to balance size differences better, and allows 'dodgy' classes the ability to last a whole six seconds longer in combat (better than nothin'!).
I'm still not fond of some of the revisions, but that's a matter of personal preference rather than structure; combat flows smoothly and intuitively, and it's very fast. My personal preference comes in on the 'very fast' part of the equation - my players are adapted to the increases lethality of the older rules, but this would drive them over the edge.
Hmm... I guess that's not personal preference at all, but rather player preference. Well, the DM is the servant.
Regardless, I'm very impressed by the thought you put into this. I was expecting to hate the 'pip system' but I found it very fun & simple to use. If I start a new campaign (perhaps years from now) I'll be using the revised rules.
mafisto said:
Yep!
One of my goals: Increase the speed of combat. In Real Life (tm), fights tend to be nasty and short. No more than a handful of seconds.
If the rules end up giving you those results, then they're working according to design.
Heh! Pull the other leg!
DM's are manipulative SOB's with God-complexes.
Hmm. Maybe that's why I liked being a DM more than a player...
The pip system was "borrowed" (i.e., stolen) from Fudge, one of my favorite RPG systems. (The Fudge dice bell-curve on success is the best I've ever seen.)
When I first made the switch to Fudge, my players thought the pips would suck. After one session of combat, they were hooked.
I'm fond of it because it's visual. One look, you know where your character stands and what penalties to apply. Even though it's as abstract as hit points, it doesn't feel like a number. It feels more like the gas gauge on a car. When you're on the last couple of pips in the Severely Wounded column, you get the same sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach as when your gas needle hovers on the red line, below "E."
---
One act of evangelism for the system...
Now that you've seen how intuitive and quickly it works, your players may buy into the same features. Why not take their characters, convert them into this system, and run a couple of major, old battles in the new rules? Pick a couple of fights about which they reminisce. That way, they remember how the fights worked under the old rules. It will give them a more immediate, visceral response when they're run under the revised rules.
There's no risk involved for their characters, since it's just a couple of test runs. Very little effort is necessary to convert a character to the new system. Just figure attack, defense, soak, and weapon damage/crit DC. (Not like the old rules which required a lot of multiplication and consultation of charts.) You can track it all on a single 3x5 card for each character.
Once you're done, if there's no "buy in" by the players, just chunk the cards.
Despite the fact that many RPG'ers have more progressive ideas about politics and morality than most folks, they are rabidly conservative when it comes to their rules. They hate change. They hate trying new stuff. They immediately respond with suspicion and derision to variation or innovation.
Why, if I recall correctly, a few years back, there was this big RPG company that wanted to revise their core rulebooks and create a third version. Hordes of naysayers came out, crying the apocalypse of gaming had arrived. There was speculation. There was derision. There was suspicion.
But in a short while, after trying the rules, people bought into it. The game almost completely blew away all competition and became the dominant system in RPG's.
Then, that company went for another revision. Yet again, people freaked out.
Strange thing: Once folks tried the new revision, they found out that they liked it. Sure, everyone has their golden calf about which they feel some resentment when it got changed, but overall folks liked the fixes.
I'm talking about D&D 3E and 3.5E.
I expect -- once folks overcome their resistance to change and try the revised GnG rules -- they'll come to much the same conclusion as folks who switched from 2E AD&D to 3E D&D. I think they'll end up hooked.
Northcott
First Post
Well, I finally cracked and registered at ENWorld for the sake of this thread. So much for my resolution to whittle down on the number of messageboards.
Anyway, I've thrown these new rules at my group, and there's some debate about them, but they seem to be digging it overall. Most of us like the quick n' nasty side of things; the debate comes in what flavour people prefer.
A couple things I'd wanted to throw into the mix as possible additions/ideas that we may end up playtesting in the future:
1) The use of 2d10 instead of a d20 in combat provides a nice curve that makes variant skill levels more important, and reduces the chance of pleasant or unpleasant surprises. A natural 20 is now a 1 in 100 chance, while most rolls will fall in the 8-12 range. Makes it a little easier to calculate your odds stepping into a fight.
Mind you, the 2d10 gig starts to fall apart when applied to non-combat skills, due to the painful difficulty in some DCs... but that's a story for a different time. I figured some folks might like to wrestle with that idea given the overall open tone of this thread.
2) It's been my experience that while dexterity/speed is certainly a key ability for a combatant, brute strength should not be underestimated. It provides not only extra damage, but can make blows harder to block with increased force (there's a reason why epees and greatswords didn't meet on medieval battlefields), and increased muscle mass provides valuable protection for interior organs and bones. The bigger body is harder to hurt. With that in mind:
2 a) Strength bonus, halved and rounded down, is added to the "to hit" factor.
2 b) Strength bonus provides one free "pip" in the "lightly wounded" category per point of strength, providing a one-time "Soak" that is diminished by wounding, yet can be healed.
I'm still chewing over the last -- it's probably waaaaay too much. Perhaps as with 2a, it should be halved and rounded down in lethal, but left full in non-lethal?
Either way, the basic rule alteration is brilliant. It addresses the parts of the d20 rules that I liked the least; the rules were so well tailored that they practically become a genre unto themselves. To capture the flavour of realistic historical games, Harn, or Old West gunfights, this kind of process seems to be far superior.
Anyway, I've thrown these new rules at my group, and there's some debate about them, but they seem to be digging it overall. Most of us like the quick n' nasty side of things; the debate comes in what flavour people prefer.
A couple things I'd wanted to throw into the mix as possible additions/ideas that we may end up playtesting in the future:
1) The use of 2d10 instead of a d20 in combat provides a nice curve that makes variant skill levels more important, and reduces the chance of pleasant or unpleasant surprises. A natural 20 is now a 1 in 100 chance, while most rolls will fall in the 8-12 range. Makes it a little easier to calculate your odds stepping into a fight.
Mind you, the 2d10 gig starts to fall apart when applied to non-combat skills, due to the painful difficulty in some DCs... but that's a story for a different time. I figured some folks might like to wrestle with that idea given the overall open tone of this thread.
2) It's been my experience that while dexterity/speed is certainly a key ability for a combatant, brute strength should not be underestimated. It provides not only extra damage, but can make blows harder to block with increased force (there's a reason why epees and greatswords didn't meet on medieval battlefields), and increased muscle mass provides valuable protection for interior organs and bones. The bigger body is harder to hurt. With that in mind:
2 a) Strength bonus, halved and rounded down, is added to the "to hit" factor.
2 b) Strength bonus provides one free "pip" in the "lightly wounded" category per point of strength, providing a one-time "Soak" that is diminished by wounding, yet can be healed.
I'm still chewing over the last -- it's probably waaaaay too much. Perhaps as with 2a, it should be halved and rounded down in lethal, but left full in non-lethal?
Either way, the basic rule alteration is brilliant. It addresses the parts of the d20 rules that I liked the least; the rules were so well tailored that they practically become a genre unto themselves. To capture the flavour of realistic historical games, Harn, or Old West gunfights, this kind of process seems to be far superior.
Northcott said:
I'm a fan of bell curves in task resolution, but the d20 system is the d20 system, so I takes whats I gots and does whats I musts.
To quote Tyler Durden, "Skinny guys fight until they're burger."
The suggestions about strength are logical, but they add complexity. The goal of the new GnG is to revise and simplify.
The Dexterity as primary attack stat is a variant rule. That way, if you think Dex should be prime, use that. If you think Strength should be prime, use that.
For the Dex as prime attack stat variant, I added a Brute Force feat to cover the issue of strength blasting through parries, etc.
Keep it simple. Keep it simple.
Our tendency, as gamers, is to add complexity, because reality has a lot of variables, and we want to imitate it. Butterfly wings aflutter in Mexico cause hurricanes in China. Sometimes it's best just to sit back and imitate life in broad strokes, rather than details. Get the spirit, not the letter.
Northcott
First Post
Re: d20/2d10 -- what can I say? I'm a curve junkie. 
It doesn't work worth a damn in standard d20 task resolution, being built for the linear mechanics as it is, but with your altered combat system it holds some interesting promise. I may be looking at a test run in the near future, if I can get a breather from the swiftly-growing work pile.
Re: Simplicity -- good point. Point taken.
It doesn't work worth a damn in standard d20 task resolution, being built for the linear mechanics as it is, but with your altered combat system it holds some interesting promise. I may be looking at a test run in the near future, if I can get a breather from the swiftly-growing work pile.Re: Simplicity -- good point. Point taken.
Blacksad
Explorer
Northcott said:
Bwahahaha!!! My Evil plan is working
![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
err...Perhaps I should mention to Mr. Kenhood that I've done a PDF of the revised rules and posted them at Nutkinland (I've also modified a bit some font size, so that the OGL and the Critical Hit Effects takes only one page each), is it OK?
