The Conclave

The Ordos Majoris - Hobby, Painting and Modelling => Inquisitor Game Discussion => Topic started by: Ynek on April 22, 2011, 09:59:28 AM

Title: Revised house rules for parrying, and some other assorted combat rules.
Post by: Ynek on April 22, 2011, 09:59:28 AM
Some of you may remember that my local gaming circle (all three of us) have never quite liked the LRB's rules for close combat. We all do some sort of sword martial art, and we've always thought that Inquisitor dealt with close combat in a relatively inelegant way. I've already posted up a summarised version of our house close combat rules on this forum, so I won't repeat anything that you've already seen before.

However, this is our most recent additions to our house rules - namely, modified parrying rules, which combine parrying and dodging into a single, elegant rule.

Anywho, any criticisms or areas for improvement that you can spot would be greatly appreciated. ;)






Parry/dodge:
In earlier versions of the Inquisitor rules, parrying and dodging were dealt with separately. However, in a real fight, an individual does not observe an incoming blow, and decide: "I think I'll parry this one. I'll dodge the next one, though."
In truth, when a person is in a fight, they do whatever they have to do to avoid their opponent's weapon, whilst ramming their own weapon as hard as they can into their opponent's body.
To parry/dodge, roll a D100. If the dice roll is less than their weapon skill, with a negative modifier equal to however much their opponent passed their attack roll by, the parry/dodge is successful.
Characters which have no hand-to-hand combat weapon cannot parry, and thus, are at -25% to their parry/dodge test, since they can only dodge.

Parry penalty:
In earlier versions of the rules, a weapon had a parry penalty which is applied to the user's chances of success in parrying an incoming attack. In this version of the rules, a parry penalty is still applied, but it is only half of that which is described in the Live Rulebook. (Since some of the parry/dodges will be dodges rather than parries.)

Counter-Attack:
If a defending character passes a parry/dodge test by nine tenths of their required dice roll, then they may immediately make a counter-attack at half weapon skill. Any attempts to parry/dodge this counter-attack are at half weapon skill. (Since the character being counter-attacked is in a rather compromising position of having committed themselves to an attack, only to be attacked themselves. Their defences in this situation are probably wide open.)

Multiple weapons:
When a character who is carrying multiple close-quarters combat weapons makes an attack with both weapons simultaneously, the defending player must halve their weapon skill unless they also have two close-quarters combat weapons equipped. (Shields do count as weapons in this case.)

Power weapons and the Parry/dodge rule:
In earlier versions of the Inquisitor rules, parrying a power weapon with a non-protected weapon had a 75% chance of destroying the parrying weapon. Since in this version of the rules, the parry rule also represents dodging, there is a chance that the defending character didn't parry the incoming attack at all, but instead simply dodged it.
To represent this, power weapons now have a 25% chance of destroying the opponent's weapon if they make a successful parry/dodge. (This assuming that the defending character is making a conscious decision to try to dodge the power weapon  rather than parry it. For this reason, instead of a 35% chance of weapon breakage, which would reflect 50% parries and 50% dodges, there is a slight preference towards dodging.) If the defending character doesn't have a weapon with which to parry, they receive a further -25% modifier to their test. (As they can no longer parry, and are forced to dodge.)

Shields:
Shields are an excellent way to protect yourself from incoming close-quarters attacks. A character with a shield gains +30 to their weapon skill for all parry/dodge rolls so long as they have the shield equipped. In earlier versions of the rules, different types of shields, such as bucklers, tower shields and so on were dealt with separately, with each offering different bonuses. However, in this version of the rules, all shields are treated with a singular, flat modifier of +30.

Unfamiliar weapons:
If a character picks up a fallen character's weapon, or finds a sword sitting against a wall somewhere, the odds are that they won't be particularly familiar with it, and will not therefore fight their best when using it. To represent this, all weapon skill tests with an unfamiliar weapon are at -20% chances of success. (Using an unfamiliar weapon is, in reality, an experience akin to using your off-hand. So, in this instance, I used the same modifier.)









New Special Skills:
Competent Combateer: The character is well versed in the subtle, yet brutal art of close quarters combat, and thus, is more likely to make a successful counter-strike, or to defend against counter-strikes. A competent combateer only requires to pass a parry test by half of their required dice roll in order to make a counter-attack, and parries against counter-attacks with three quarters of their weapon skill.

Familiar Weapon: The character is very intimately familiar with his weapon, and knows exactly how to use it. They gain +10 to all weapon skill tests involving the weapon, but only with the familiar weapon. If they find a knife sitting on the floor somewhere, it will not be familiar.
Title: Re: Revised house rules for parrying, and some other assorted combat rules.
Post by: SpanielBear on April 22, 2011, 12:07:30 PM
I mostly like it, and think it's certainly worht a play-test or two, I have to say, however, that I don't like the flat-rate for shields. A buckler that works mostly on the wielder's dexterity, and a massive tower shield that one hides behind are two very different kettles of fish. If nothing else, the individual possessing a huge, weighty body sized shield isn't going to be dodging with much grace. I get the desire to streamline combat, but I have a feeling this might be too much simplification.
Title: Re: Revised house rules for parrying, and some other assorted combat rules.
Post by: precinctomega on April 25, 2011, 01:06:48 PM
That's basically how it's done in INQ2 (which I will finish shortly; promise!).  In fact, it's almost exactly how it was done to begin with, then in playtesting we found that the mental arithmetic of calculating the exact amount by which an attack test was passed and then applying that exact amount as a negative modifier to the parry test was a bit of a drag.

Instead, we borrowed the rules for degrees of success from Dark Heresy.  So each degree of success confers a -10 negative modifier on the parry test.  We found it a bit easier to manage and that it had basically the same effect.

I seem to recall that our rules for Unfamiliar Weapons (we use the same expression) are actually even more ruthless, halving the wielder's WS or BS when using it.

R.