Warriors & Warlocks out on PDF!

[frankthedm]

If I wanted to do dark fantasy with competent (not super-human) heroes that get better and better yet fights against 20 orcs remain dangerous

Maybe WFRP?

 

[Matrix Sorcica]

Maybe WFRP?

WFRP 'heroes' start out with approx. 07% chance of hitting an opponent. Hardly competent. Besides, I'm not a huge fan of the career system. That said, WFRP does have a lot of good going for it..... Worth considering, thanks.

But M&M looks a bit intimidating if I want to use it for fantasy. Seems to me a great deal of "system mastery" will be required. True?

 

[Silvercat Moonpaw]

But M&M looks a bit intimidating if I want to use it for fantasy. Seems to me a great deal of "system mastery" will be required. True?

Yes. Since it's point-based with a bunch of options character creation is tricky for the uninitiated (actual playing of the game is as simple as True20). You can make mistakes if you don't have a good grasp of what the various pieces do.

However it's no more intimidating for fantasy than for its main purpose of superheroes.

 

[Aus_Snow]

But M&M looks a bit intimidating if I want to use it for fantasy. Seems to me a great deal of "system mastery" will be required. True?

I'm not really sure how it compares with other systems that way, because it's so subjective. But what Silver said in the above post is true. Personally, I found the way the corebook is set out very easy and helpful, and the writing nice and clear. YMMV, as they say.

For fantasy in particular, well, the corebook's not oriented that way. . . per se. It does include a number of fantasy elements, quite explicitly (a few fantasy beings statted up, for example), but still. On the other hand, you can do pretty much anything with the system, once you feel confident enough with it. And there's tons of help, advice, and already figured out / statted out stuff available*, especially at the AtomicThinktank forums. Oh, and then there's W&W.

You might also want to check out Elric's post in the other M&M thread currently active here, for he is wise in M&M's ways.

* For instance, here and here (in the second place, it's worth looking at the D&D Conversion and Fantasy Archetypes [? - I think] sections near the bottom of the page, them being of particular relevance to your question). There are others. Sites, that is. But they should give you an idea of some interpretations of pretty 'standard D&D' fantasy seen through the M&M lens.

 

[Matrix Sorcica]

Thanks, all.

 

[Elric]

Thank you for the reply. A sweep/spin/whirlwind style attack I assume?So how many actions would it take to put down one fang face assuming 8th level cinematic characters?

I just did a post on my roll call thread about this. I ran a simulation for "how many attacks does it take to KO the defender" in the most basic combat scenario you could have in the game, and plotted how many attacks it took (since a character will be getting 1 attack a round, this is equivalent to rounds). The average ended up as 9.35 attacks, with a standard deviation of 5.2.

This number is shorter (and has a higher variance) than it would be if you gave the defender hero points to spend on defense (or, for a villain, the GM used GM Fiat to duplicate the effects of a hero point, which gives a PC a hero point each time he does it). However, attacking a stunned defender (which happens in group fights) will speed things up.

If you were fighting 7-8 non-minion enemies with a group of 2 in M&M, chances are they'd be quite a bit weaker than you individually, because otherwise you're going down

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

If I wanted to do dark fantasy with competent (not super-human) heroes that get better and better yet fights against 20 orcs remain dangerous, and with magic similar to the Force (dark side corruption and all) and rituals for Conan-like sorcery, . . .

The Black Company Campaign Setting fits quite well, small teams of low level anything can take down epic PC/NPCs with a well planned ambush. Grab True Sorcery, which expands upon the BCCS with rules for magical taint.

Just suggestin'