SO as to no hi-jack the thread, I am making my response over here in a new thread. I will take your questions in reverse order since the second one is really just a link to the HARP website.Woas said:
The HAPR website can be found at http://www.harphq.comWoas said:
On it you will find a number of downloads, including a 16 page character creation booklet, the entire combat chapter, and the majority of the chapter that contained the monsters (i.e. all the monsters are here, just not the rules/guidelines for encounters).
As to why it "does D&D better than d20", I cannot answer that, as I did not make that claim. I was only repeating what somebody else had said. IIRC, that may have been Teflon Billy (but I could be wrong, so don't hold me to that statement).Woas said:
As for a description of what HARP is and how it works, that I can do very well, and most assuredly without breaking any laws, as not only do I work for ICE, but I am also the guy who wrote HARP.
HARP is descended from Rolemaster, a system that had unified resolution mechanics over 20 years ago. I have no idea if RM was the first to have such or not, nor do I make any claims to that effect. I am stating this, however, to show that unified resolution mechanics are not a relatively new thing and to show where I came up with the mechanics for HARP.
One of the goals I had when writing HARP was to make it compatible with Rolemaster. Thus, I used the static manuever (SM) table and the moving maneuver (MM) tables as my starting points. The SM table was a single column table with different degrees of success built into it based upon what the total roll was. This included giving a bonus to another skill. The MM table had a single column for each difficulty (Routine, Easy, Light, Medium, Hard, Very Hard, Extremely Hard, Sheer Folly, and Absurd). It was a somewhat complex table in that you would take the result and the roll against that to determine success or not (it could also be read other ways as well).
Well, for HARP, ICE wanted a lighter system than Rolemaster, something along the lines of an introductory system, especially since Rolemaster had such a stigma (things like chartmaster, rollmaster, etc..), even among those who had never played the system. At first I had thoughts about creating a Rolemaster Lite, at least until I realized that there was no easy way to do so. Therefore, I took a number of ideas and some of the core concepts from Rolemaster and reworked them from the ground up, and eventually ended up with what is now known as HARP.
HARP uses unified machanics as well. The most basic type of roll is the all-or-nothing roll. Roll and add your skill bonus and any difficulty mods (which are multiples of 20 -- Medium is +0, Routine is +60 and Absurd is -100). A total roll of 101 or higher is a success. Almost all rolls in HARP can be handled using this method.
However, that did not leave a lot of room for variability, so I created the Maneuver Table to handle all other sorts of rolls. The maneuver table can, with slight squeezing, fit on a 3x5 index card. Not like the half and full page tables of Rolemaster.
This table has 4 columns labled as follows: Percentage, Bonus, RR, Utility. They are used in the following manner:
Percentage - This table is used for complex actions or actions that may take a long time (the GM determines the time increment based upon the type of action - picking a lock may take rounds, while crafting a sword may be measured in days, etc...). As with the all-or-nothing roll, you roll, add bonus, and apply the difficulty mod. The result given on the table determines what percentage of the task is complete.
Bonus] - This column is used for resolving skills or actions that may help or hinder (if fumbled) another action by the character (or even to another character). As before, roll, add skill bonus and difficulty mods, and look up the result. This result is either a bonus or penalty to the action it is attempting to aid. Most Lore skills fall under this column (such as using Lock Lore to aid in picking a lock you have never seen before).
RR - RR stands for Resistance Roll. This column is used to determine the effectiveness of a magical attack, a poison, or any other effect that may be resisted by a character. Roll, add all mods (skill & difficulty) and look up the result. This is the number that the character must roll above (using the appropriate skill) in order to resist the effect.
Utility - This column is used for non-attack spells. The better you roll when casting the better your result. Roll high enough (of course, adding in appropriate mods), and you can gain increased effects (increased range, # of targets, etc..). You can get double or even triple effect with a good enough roll.
Combat - Combat works slightly different from other skills. One of the assumptions in HARP is that you may actually hit your foe but not hard enough to do damage. Thus we decided to ignore this if it happened. To resolve combat, you roll, add in your skill bonus, and subtract foes defensive bonus (rather than difficulty). If the result is a positive number, then you have hit your foe hard enough to damage (thus a miss and a hit that is not hard enough to do damage are treated equally). At this point, after you have determined whether you hit or not, you THEN look up on the appropriate critical table what damage you have done.
Ok, so that tells how things are resolved, but tells little else about the game, so I will give a somewhat brief overview of the rest of the system. I will take it in the steps given for character creation....
1) Profession - the first thing to do is to decide what profession you want your character to be. HARP contains 11 basic professions. Each profession lables a number of skill categories (skills are divided into categories such as Athletic, Combat, Mystical Arts, Outdoors, Subterfuge, etc..) as Favored. What this means is that the skills within that category cost 2 development points for each skill rank purchased. Skills in Non-Favored categories cost 4 points per rank.
Each profession also gives the character 20 free skill ranks, divided up among those favored categories. The player may use these on any skill within the category to which they are assigned. For example, a character may gain 6 ranks in the General Cateogry. He may place those 6 ranks in any combination of skills from that category. These free ranks represent the basic training that the character receives in his profession.
2) Stats - Players now determine their stats for their character. There are three different stat generation methods provided and the player is allowed to select whichever one they want (some GMs will tall players to only use a certain method, and this is quite alright if all agree to this before hand). Once stats are determined, the player figures out the stat bonuses (which are applied to skills), and how many Development Points (DPs) that they have (DPs are based on the 8 stats). DPs are used to purchase skills, talents, stat increases, etc...
3) Race - The next step is for the player to select the race of their character. You have the standard fantasy tropes (elf, dwarf, halfling, human, gnome), plus one that replaces the venerable half-orc. My boss didn't like the connotations of rape that are almost always implied with the half-orc, so I made a new race called the Gryx. The Gryx are fierce looking, but HARP has them as a relatively gentle race (and although they make excellent fighters, they prefer not to unless they have to. Of course a GM could make them warlike if he wanted.
One thing that HARP does not have is half-races. No Half-elves, no half-orcs. Instead, by spending a nominal 1 or 2 DPs, the character may acquire a Blood Talent. A 1 pt Blood Talent means that you are, at most 1/4 of another race, while the 2 pt version means that you are a half-breed between your base race and another race (and yes, you can have up to 2 lesser Blood Talents if you want).
4) Culture - The next step is to select your character's culture. each race has a default culture (often according to standard fantasy tropes), but the character is not limited to this. The player may, if he wishes, select another culture in its place (a character is only allowed to have one culture). Thus you could have a Dwarf from a Sylvan culture or an Elf from a Deep Warrens or Urban culture if you wanted. With the culture, the character gets his starting languages, and 20 free skill ranks divided among several different specific skills which represent the basic skills taught by the culture to its young.
5) Spending DPs - The final step is to purchase additional skills, talents, and/or a few other options to round out the character. A first level character starts out with double their base amount of DPs (and begins at 1st level). He may spend them on several things.
Stat increases - yup, you spend DPs to raise your stats. While this may increase your stats bonuses right away, any changes to your number of DPs do not go into effect until the next time you go up a level.
Skills - As mentioned above, skills cost either 2 or 4 DPs per rank. Some skills require that you select a specialty. This is often the Lore type of skills, however, you can choose how wide or narrow the specialty is. Other require a specific specialty (such as Riding, which requires a type of animal). Weapons, for example, are learned in groups (short blades, long blades, bows, crossbows, etc..), while the Resistance skills must be purchased separately for each type of resistance (Stamina, Will, and Magic). Spells (see below) are also learned individually (as skills). Your hits and Power points (used to cast spells) are also skills to be learned.
Talents - Talents are special abilities and such. Things like special one time bonuses, night vision, dark vision, etc...
Starting Options - there is a small list of things that a player may spend DPs for only at the time of character creation (like being a noble, or having a small magic item, etc..
Fate Points - these are points that are used to adjust die rolls. They can save a character if used wisely.
Spells - In HARP, spells are what is known as scalable and they also have no levels. Spells are divided into Spheres based upon profession, and only characters of that profession may learn spells from that Sphere, unless they have a talent that grants them access. The exception to this is the Universal Sphere. The Universal Sphere contains spells that ANY profession may learn if they wish to spend the development points to do so.
By scalable, I mean that the spell has a base form. At the time of casting, the character may spend extra power points (if he has enough skill ranks in the spell) to change some of the spell's parameters. This can include making the spell more powerful, making the spell have a greater range, or long duration, etc... Each spell has its own list of scaling options.
I hope that this answers your questions....
