Difference between revisions of "EwindaleMoss/BrawlvMartialArts"

Revision as of 08:06, 5 April 2010

Again, sticking mainly to the modification of 1E, I ran into a problem. That problem being that I have people who engage in backyard wrestling, mixed martial arts, toughman competitions, and the occasional drunken fistfight sitting around our play table. To them, Brawl and Martial Arts were boring. The only time a kick was differentiated from a punch from a flying knee was in a minor weapon change. This also helped spawn our changing the rules behind Initiative (roll once at the beginning of combat DnD style to cut down on unnecessary dice rolls.) As per that change, speed ratings of weapons become the limiting factor of "How many times can I feasibly attack with this weapon in 3 seconds?"

That's all well and good for archers and axemen, but what about the guys using their fists?

The modified multiple action per turn rule becomes the crux of this now. The idea behind said rule being that there should essentially be multiple pools. Every character starts with an attack pool, a move pool, and a defense pool in combat. Penalties for multiple actions start at -3, then -4, -4, etc. You move your full rate, you've used up your move pool. You sprint, you've sacrificed your attack pool to double your move. You want to leap from a balcony, swing on a chandelier, and take off someone's head on the way down; the leap and the swing take a -3 and -4 for being multiple actions, the attack still has its full pool (barring increased difficulty or negatives for attacking something as you pass.) In this way, I could move, attack someone, and have an untouched dice pool to parry attacks at a later point in the combat. So far, a couple dozen sessions of testing has shown this to work pretty well. Always looking for other feedback tough.

So, a large move chart was made under the assumption that (after doing some timing of individuals at local Tae Kwon Do and Karate dojos) fists can technically attack 5 times in a turn. (Speed 5) This also assumes one action per turn per two limbs which is in line with much of the game's transformation based charms. Summarized, feasibly, with a large enough dice pool, a Martial Artist could attempt to punch someone in the head ten times per round maximum. This ties in with a modification to the multiple action per turn rule. One pair of limbs actions can only attack one target. So a martial artist could attack one individual 10 times or two people 5 times each with the basic thoroughly unscary punch rules in the Core book. To attack someone 10 times, he starts at -3 and ends at -13. To attack two people, he can't move at all, and takes a -3 through -8 to each set of five attacks.

I'll say it for you; that's a lot of attacks. However, weapons (like Tiger Claws) modify the attack rate down, as do other moves. Also, once I have time, you'll also find that soak has been scaled higher to make fast martial artist versus giant in superheavy plate with a daiklaive very David and Goliath (6 decent attacks dealing 3L in a round and a soak of 6/6 vs. a single attack dealing 15L on a guy with a soak 22/22. It becomes a matter of skill in assault and playing at strengths vs. looking mainly at charms.)

Now, for the difference in how the Martial Artists works versus the Brawler.

The Brawler is undisciplined and wild in his movements. He swings wildly, full of uncontrolled power. He plays dirty and seeks to break his opponent into itty, bitty pieces without concern for self. While the Brawler still has to understand certain methods of attack to grasp others, his style of learning isn't as structured as Martial Arts which to attain truly scary results may well need more than an average human's lifetime and a great deal of specialization. No, the Brawler learns quickly and can fly into a berserk rage while attacking, losing use of his mental faculties while snapping his foes in two.

The Martial Artist, once, may have been able to understand the Brawler's ways, but not any more. She is refined, graceful, and methodical. While she can adapt to any situation, she prefers to adapt the situation to her. Her movements have been well-defined by those that came before and their pinpoint deadliness is no haphazard guess; they are well-known fact. Her attacks have precise rungs of learning in order to progress. Every part of her becomes a weapon; open palm, closed fist, elbow, knee, and foot. She learns the methodology of leaping, the power of spinning, the horrifying ability of a perfect master to liquify flesh, obliterate bone, and otherwise permanently cripple in a single strike.

Each dot in an ability allows you to purchase 4 moves from the lists. You must buy the prerequisites first (of course), but are otherwise not limited. You may buy specialties in the schools of attacks in order to purchase more moves but they are only gained at 3 moves per dot and only for that particular school. This stings a bit for martial artists who have more categories than Brawlers. However, the pinnacle of Martial Artists is reaching the Crippling moves (which often require 5 MA and 2 specialty in a particular school to think about learning and have nasty accuracy and difficulty penalties.) in order to deal Agg.

As another note, even if an attack deals Lethal damage (as almost all of brawling does, and most every second tier and up MA move) it is still SOAKED as bashing.

EwindaleMossEwindaleMoss/BrawlvMartialArts/MartialArtsMoves
EwindaleMossEwindaleMoss/BrawlvMartialArts/BrawlMoves

Can these moves be learned by mere mortals? If they're heroic mortals and have been working at them for a long time. Their ability to hit with them would still be fairly crap compared to any of the Exalted, but it is feasible. Lunars now make truly scary Brawlers as most of the Brawl attacks scale greatly with higher attributes (The Sun and The Moon in the hands of a maxed out on Strength and Dexterity DBT is positively horrifying particularly to mortals).