In the duel between Achilles and Hector in the Iliad, Achilles throws his spear… and misses. Hector throws his spear … and misses. Achilles realises he threw away his best weapon and succeeds with Divine Intervention and Athena brings him back his spear. Now inspired by his Hate Hector passion, Achilles then charges at Hector with his spear, and rolls… a 01. Critical hit to the head. Doing impaling damage. For location he rolls at 19 – the head (technically the neck). Hector either fails his parry or the 12 points he blocks with his sword is insufficient. Achilles drives his spear through Hector’s neck and gloats over his dying foe. A kindly GM lets Hector make a final Death Speech, reminding Achilles that he is fated to die in the war as well.
I hate attritional combat systems. Now two amazing, perfectly matched warriors are going to match attack and parry, attack and parry, for a long time. Like any of the great duels in the Mahabharata. Maybe they will decide that their stalemate endangers their friends. Maybe they will decide to quit and fight again in more advantageous (re: more Rune Points) situations. Or maybe they will have one heck of a duel that ultimately gets resolved when one character crits, or another fumbles.
Taking honor and geas seriously. You should watch Richard August squirm about whether his fellow players’ plan is honorable.
We’ve seen repeatedly in our game the limitations of Sword Trance. It does mean that it in a straight duel, the Humakti wins. And it means the Humakti can cleave through lesser foes. But it has LOTS of limitations. Not least being it is a pretty weak spell to Dismiss.
As Greg’s Brekun story makes clear, anyone who fights a close combat with a Humakti who has prepared themselves for the duel on the Humakt’s terms is an idiot. But there are so damn many ways to deal with that, that once again, I consider this to be a non-issue. You can certainly ask Richard August how well this actually works in practice.
Combat in my game seems to always start with a long prep time. Accompanied by Ennio Morricone of course.
Ok, now I cast Bladesharp. Is he moving to attack? No? Then now I cast Protection. Hey, is that the Trio you are playing?”
“Hey I better start the fight, because I just blew most of my spirit magic and it only lasts two minutes!”
“I roll Divine Intervention for Hector.” “You get it, what do you ask the gods to do?” “I wanna give a real mean speech to Achilles and let him know he is DOOMED.”
Passions and Runes really were the most important change for RQG. Rune Points and Augments are nice and fun, but those two make the characters sing and breath.
Played by Richard August