Looking for system crunchers

[BTRC]

In the vein of "be careful what you wish for", I've finally gotten the new BTRC site up after a long gestation (www.btrc.net), and I'm using its forum to help debug EABA v2. Anyone who is up for number-crunching, blindtesting and generally finding the breaking points of an rpg is welcome to join in.

Right now the playtest docs are up to chapter 5 (advanced combat), and most of the bugs have been worked out, but a new swarm of bloodthirsty min-maxers will undoubtedly set me back a few weeks of editing...

I don't expect to convert anyone from GURPS, but quality players are quality players, regardless of system, and outside opinions are always useful.

Registration is required to keep out spambots, but is fairly painless.

[Agemegos]

What do these initialisms refer to? GURPS I know. What are BTRC and EABA?

[BTRC]

BTRC is Blacksburg Tactical Research Center. It's been making games since the late 80's. EABA was the working title for an rpg developed about ten years ago, and in keeping with the acronym-themed titles kicking around, it meant End All Be All rpg. The name stuck. ;)

I've been working on a 2nd edition of it for a while, and the new web site gives me a chance to utilize a much larger pool of testers than the old Yahoo group could conveniently handle.

GURPS is far from unknown to me. I've played it quite a bit. One of the original playtesters, in fact. My first game publishing credits were in Autoduel Quarterly, and my first published supplement was for GURPS Space. GURPS playtesters can be extremely astute and pointed in their critiques, so what better place to scout for critics?

And they're also exceptionally loyal to their system, so I don't think Steve has to worry that I'm going to poach anyone off him...

[Agemegos]

Well, I'm hardly an exemplary GURPS playtester, but I hope you won't mind my taking a look and offering perhaps a comment.

[Mylon]

Automatically, I'd like to say the difference between "average" and Human Limit is pretty significant, both in terms of reliability and maximum possible result. The system suffers from the kind of inflation that plagues a lot of dice pool-based systems. Tack on the dice from skill levels and this issue becomes more readily apparent.

This was a big problem I had with Scion. At some point players are going to be tossing 20 dice and at that point the results are going to be so predictable it won't be worth rolling. The same problem is going to occur here, but it won't quite be as absurd.

[ak_aramis]

Since it's Keep 3d or Keep 4d with the right advantages, it really does top out pretty well. And a 24 is still pretty hard even with übermenschen...

[BTRC]

Actually, I do not think it is possible for a human to get a skill roll of more than 9d+1, and even that is an extreme case. The expectation of the system is that 4d+0 represents the absolute lowest skill roll for a Bachelor's degree or "professional" level of talent, while 6d+0 is minimum for a PhD. I think there is a chart on page 2.5 that shows the approximate percentages for a given roll in the system vs. a particular difficulty. This might address your question on dice inflation.

Remember that the core system has been around for a decade and has shown itself to be pretty solid. The "best three" mechanic does an excellent job of capping rolls. It gives a different curve than "3d+X" for the more difficult tasks. I won't say "better" because that might start a flame war...;)

Hey, join the BTRC forum and ask questions there (you'll get more informed answers). I don't mean for this thread to be a major discussion, it's just to point people at the EABA playtest if they are interested.

[vicky_molokh]

I vaguely remember the local discussion of the 7th Sea 'roll x and keep y of them' approach to dice, and IIRC the conclusions were that the system is not sufficiently transparent, and has weird, unintended spikes/turns/whatever in the probability distribution curve.

As for EABA in general, IIRC you have logarithmic approach to damage. I'm curious: how does that interact with multiple attacks, e.g. autofire, shotgun pellets, bee swarms etc.?

[BTRC]

warning: long, technical post (mod should feel free to delete if it is straying from original intent)

I did not want this to be a thread about EABA in general. Sigh. I tried to get out, but they keep dragging me back in...

EABA deals with any wierdness of a "roll X keep Y" in two ways. First, it is almost always "best three" and always Nd6, so everyone is on the same page. Second, you can always drop one die for a +2. So, if you are rolling 5d and keeping the best 3, you can choose to roll 4d+2 and keep the best three. It makes sure that you always have the best possible roll available to you.

As far as transparency goes, I figure most GURPS (or Hero) players have the percentages on 3d6 memorized (at least I do), and yes, "Nd6 keep 3" is not as obvious. But from a GM'ing standpoint I've never had a problem with that. In the heat of real-world action, you do your best with what you've got. You don't min-max the percentages before you act. If you think you're better than the other guy, you act one way, if you think he is better than you, you act a different way.

The damage system and scaling works out fine, but it is not a standalone. Damage is generally "2x delivered energy = +1d". In real-world terms translated to EABA, a 9mm is 2d+1, a 5.56mm is 4d+1, a 7.62mm is 4d+2 and a .50 cal is about 6d+2. The system works out because of the armor and personal injury mechanics. For instance, the EABA model is that armor has dice of rating just like damage. You only roll damage that exceeds the armor. This gives much more realistic penetration and damage mechanics than a "roll dice, compare to armor" model.

A simple example: A 9mm bullet hit will always, always be stopped by a level II ballistic vest. Blunt trauma yes, penetration no. A rigid level II protection would minimize even the blunt trauma. The disconnect between game effect and real effect is better imagined if you secure the bulletproof vest to a frame and stand a foot behind it. Barring hits to a weakened, previously hit spot, no 9mm hit will do anything to you if it hits that vest first, because the bullet will be completely stopped, every time.

So, a realistic damage/armor mechanic would make sure that maximum damage from a 9mm in a game could never exceed the value of a level II protection, or as a practical matter, limit the amount exceeded to a reasonable equivalent for any blunt trauma effect. This is not the case in most games. Armor is usually just given a fixed value that stops some statistical fraction of penetrations.

However, if you rate armor and damage in dice and only roll the difference, then a 2d+1 bullet hitting a 2d+0 armor means that you take exactly 1 point of damage (our blunt trauma effect). A 3d+0 attack hitting a 2d+0 armor does 1d of damage. You get a variable effect because you could hit or miss something vital after penetration, but the amount of that variability is far more limited (1 to 6 points) than if I had rolled 3d+0 and then compared it to an Armor of say 8 (25% chance of 0 points, up to .5% chance of 10 points). Hit location effects and damage type notes (as in many other systems) deal with extra or lesser effects from things like head or extremity hits, but the specifics of the injury system is really a separate topic from damage and armor interaction.

Shotguns are counted as multiple small hits (assuming buckshot) that interact with armor individually, but the total damage done through armor counts as a single effect for any injury purposes like being stunned. A multi-tined claw would be the same way. Sequential projectiles like autofire are simply separate attacks. Special cases like extremely rapid autofire or continuous beams can have an effect similar to one I believe used in GURPS Space, where you can get one hit with increased damage based on the amount of time the beam is in one spot (amount you made your roll by).

[zorg]

Originally Posted by Brett

What do these initialisms refer to? GURPS I know. What are BTRC and EABA?

The acronyms have already been answered... Note that BTRC has made a number of pretty sweet games/supplements, available on e23. On the board games side, I can highly recommend Black Death and Soft Landing, on supplements, Stuff! can be used (and useful) with Gurps without noticeable problems.

I say this to point out that BTRC isn't some weird loonie outfit, but a producer of quality game stuff.

I'm not affiliated :)