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Old 09-27-2010, 03:20 PM   #31
JCD
 
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

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Originally Posted by Rocket Man View Post
Minor counter-quibble: The "Contact Weapons" chart on pg. 65 (first printing) says a high skill level and some kind of protection such as heavy boots or gloves each add 1 point to the kick or punch, and that high strength also adds 1. Hence, my +3.
Ah. I interpreted it this way:

Quote:
A person with a high fighting skill wearing gloves will do a +1 damage. Additionally, wearing boots will add a +1 to kicks.
The prose or my reading skills is fuzzy. But since I generally totally ignore the -3 to punching damage anyway, the point is moot... :)
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Old 09-27-2010, 03:25 PM   #32
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

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While I agree that the d666 is a flawed mechanic, I don't think that making In Nomine more like GURPS is a good idea. There's already a perfectly good "GURPS In Nomine" product for that.
I'm not arguing making IN a lot more like GURPS. Changing to a 3-18 range with CD = margin of success is a far cry from the potential complexity of GURPS. I don't want two page character sheets, weird point totals, hit locations and modifiers out the wazoo.

What changing the range REALLY does is to still allow celestials to be amazing at what they do (through higher stat bases), but allows mortals to be competent at what they do. Right now a mortal can really only be good at something by (a) being hyper specialized or (b) by using optional rules. And the line between being terrible and competent is less sharp with a bigger range.

Obviously the ranges (I suggest 10 stat base for humans; 13-14 for celestials) would need to be adjusted, as would the max level 6 in a skill, in order for things to work.
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Old 09-27-2010, 03:42 PM   #33
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

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Originally Posted by JCD View Post
But since I generally totally ignore the -3 to punching damage anyway, the point is moot... :)
You too, huh? I wonder how many of us actually use that penalty?
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Old 09-27-2010, 06:59 PM   #34
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

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Yeah, saw it linked here a while ago. but a total root and branch re-write rather than conversion...
Here's the link anyway, because I said I would.
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Old 09-28-2010, 03:28 AM   #35
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

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Originally Posted by ScaredofScissors View Post
I'm not arguing making IN a lot more like GURPS. Changing to a 3-18 range with CD = margin of success is a far cry from the potential complexity of GURPS. I don't want two page character sheets, weird point totals, hit locations and modifiers out the wazoo.

What changing the range REALLY does is to still allow celestials to be amazing at what they do (through higher stat bases), but allows mortals to be competent at what they do. Right now a mortal can really only be good at something by (a) being hyper specialized or (b) by using optional rules. And the line between being terrible and competent is less sharp with a bigger range.

Obviously the ranges (I suggest 10 stat base for humans; 13-14 for celestials) would need to be adjusted, as would the max level 6 in a skill, in order for things to work.
I don't have the materials with me, but I like this idea and ran with it. I made a LARP system heavily influenced by IN rules (its first test case was an IN LARP), and in it, while I kept the 12-scale, I widened the range of human normal within it. Changing IN to an 18-scale is a great idea.

Now I'm not numerate enough to do this off the top of my head, but generally when you change the scale and not the randomizer you've changed the odds of success, often more dramatically than you intended to. Someone would have to do the math. literally, for this to work. I like a high degree of randomness in a game, as knowing an action will always succeed tends to make cocky players. If you have to roll for success, there should always be a tangible possibility of failure. You don't roll to walk down the street, after all.

And Keep. The. Check Digit. Talk about a delicious bit of randomness--sure you've got the stats to succeed 49/50 times, but even then you can't guarantee it isn't merely a fizzling success. Or maybe you fail 49/50, but once in awhile you totally rock the house.

Or as a Marine once said to me--"Yes, but is he lucky?"
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Old 09-28-2010, 05:48 AM   #36
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

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Here's the link anyway, because I said I would.
You did and thank you. I shall have to check it out.
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Old 09-28-2010, 05:36 PM   #37
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

Organized in roughly descending order of what I think most needs to be addressed...

Reorganizing the Book
I haven't seen GURPS In Nomine in person, but the ToC online looks like a huge improvement. The intro page on The Symphony is a nice addition, and doing a separate section on "the Realms" (now with Limbo!) seems wise.

It seems a little strange to me to separate Skills/Advantages from Songs/Artifacts, rather than grouping together in a larger Resources section, but perhaps this is a quirk of the GURPs rules. One of the major problems with the original IN Core Rules wasn't that there was a Resources section, but that there were two. I wonder if this kind of replicates the issue without actually using "Resources" as a heading in two places as IN Core did.

Also, "On Being Celestial" is something of a misnomer when it's describing not just resonance and dissonance, but things like using Essence, perceiving disturbance, and even combat. (Maybe "Playing in the Symphony" is a generic catch-all? But now I'm picking nits with what seems to be a good solution...)

Organizing Information Across the Line
I actually don't mind buying supplements to get more specific rules on geases or Fate/Destiny examples. I thought the Core Rules gave enough to go on for such things. The only piece of info I've seen in a supplement that I thought really needed to be in the Core Rules is the explanation of Limbo (which I notice is in GURPS In Nomine, so good job there).

That said, I do kind of resent paying for a full book and finding that a good portion of its content is in another book I own. If In Nomine were to get a second edition, nothing would please me more than to see the material in each book being basically mutually exclusive so that when you buy a supplement on The Marches, you don't get pages upon pages on stuff covered even better in Superiors 3.

Detecting Disturbance
The fact that this is so frequently house ruled -- and that there are sets of optional rules in the GMG -- should probably indicate that the default rules for detecting disturbance simply don't work. It's not really practical to calculate a different range of detection for each character in a group based on their respective Perception scores. Personally, I'd suggest a very simple scale, like: If you are within [notes of disturbance] yards, you get a Perception roll + [notes of disturbance] to detect it … but practically any other house rule I've seen would be better.

Character Creation Basics
Yes, the first vessel should be free, and attunements probably ought to be cheaper at character creation (maybe all for 5 points, Choir and Servitor alike?). Five points per Force seems a bit much to me, but some kind of bonus does seem appropriate, perhaps along the lines of the bonus points Asmodeans get for Roles. (Say, Blandine always gives some bonus points for Marches-related skills, Michael always gives some bonus points for combat skills or Songs, mortals always start with extra bonus points for mundane skills, and so on.)

d666
I see the rolling of 3 dice, with potential for 111 and 666 interventions, to be crucial to In Nomine. I really like the check digit, but I see it as less crucial. I do think the probabilities are screwy due to rolling 2d6 for target numbers, but I don't know of an easy way to fix that, and it wouldn't hurt my feelings if In Nomine 2.0 left the d666 as is.

Still, I see it as problematic that investing points to raise a target number from 9-12 is pretty much pointless, but putting points to raise a target above 12 is extra-super valuable. (Perhaps raising any characteristic, skill, or song to a level where it would push any known target number above 12 should cost twice as many points?)

I don't quite follow the suggestion of rolling against 3d6, but I'd like to. If anybody's interested in kicking around more specific ideas, maybe we could do a separate thread proposing variants for just the issue of d666 with better probabilities, so that we don't get too waylaid here..?

Combat
I don't mind that it's hard to get killed in celestial form. I wouldn't mind if it were easier to shear off Forces. (Actually, I think most combat takes too long, and would be in favor of just making everything do more damage.) I think maybe it should also be easier to force a celestial/ethereal out of a vessel, using some non-secret Song (but extremely loud, disturbance-wise) in the Core Rules. As for unconsciousness, it's actually pretty hard to intentionally knock somebody out without doing permanent damage or killing them, so I don't mind the rule as is.

I think it's awesome that, unlike D&D, Songs and powers in In Nomine have a wide variety of uses, not just boiling down to how useful they are in a fight. That said, I wouldn't mind seeing one or two more Songs with a bit more guaranteed kick for higher base Essence cost and degree of disturbance.

A separate book expanding on combat rules would be neat. Actually, I'd buy that for In Nomine 1.0, in case other PDFs are ever in the works.

Third Side
Count me as one more against this for the Core Rules. It would be interesting to explore the possibility of a third side in greater detail in an Ethereal Player's Guide/The Marches redux, but it sounds a bit much for the basic game, which is really about Heaven and Hell.

Grigori
They're already mentioned in the Core Rules. Mentioning their resonance, dissonance condition, and the resonance/dissonance of Fallen Grigori is worth the extra paragraph(s).

Superior Interaction
I think the level of interaction with Superiors depends on the campaign, and I think that was more or less clear from the rules, but maybe Invocation Modifiers shouldn't be quite so generous. (The bonus from being in a Tether could be smaller, and the penalties for recency of last contact could be greater.)

Fiction
I like that there is fiction in the book. I wouldn't suggest adding any more or taking any away. I always send my new players to "A Bright Dream" and "A Dark Dream" on the SJ Games site to give them a sense of the game. Unfortunately, this did result in one player wanting to play a gun-toting Mercurian.

Also, I would buy a well-written In Nomine novel, separate from the rule books. I frequently get the itch to write one, but, you know, nowhere to submit the manuscript until it's licensed to some fiction publisher...
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Old 10-06-2010, 01:20 PM   #38
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

In G4e, Awareness(Symphony) becomes Detect(Disturbance) {Very Common (in this setting): base 30 points, Vague -50%, Power Modifier: Celestial -10%} Net 12 points.
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Old 10-06-2010, 02:33 PM   #39
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

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Originally Posted by hcobb View Post
In G4e, Awareness(Symphony) becomes Detect(Disturbance) {Very Common (in this setting): base 30 points, Vague -50%, Power Modifier: Celestial -10%} Net 12 points.
Except that Awareness (Symphony) also detected things other than Disturbance. (Artifacts and Tethers come to mind immediately...)
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Old 10-07-2010, 04:28 PM   #40
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Default Re: In Nomine Second Edition: What have we learned?

Detect (Symphonic Anomalies)? O:>
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