Chained Simple Contests

These are the house rules I have been using with reasonable success in my Hero Wars campaign for the last couple of months, as well as in a number of one offs for about six months prior to that. To understand them you probably need to have read at least the rules summary on the official site, and preferably the actual rule book.

This isn't the site that was nominated, but the other one is a year out of date and I no longer have access to it. These are the evolution of the same rules. I guess that counts.

1. Motivation.

As written, the rules allow for three ways of resolving actions :

1. Ability test. The character rolls against an appropriate ability. If he succeeds, he is successful.

2. Simple contest. The character rolls against an appropriate ability. His opponent (or the world) rolls against an appropriate ability. The one that succeeds better, is successful.

3. Extended contest. The character and opponent engage in a series of simple contests, bidding action points, until one has none left. The first to run out, loses.

The problem is that extended contests are slow, and can involve too much paperwork for my tastes. There are occassions when they are useful, but I want something in between. Slower and more detailed than a simple contest, but faster and less book keeping than an extended contest. Therefore I present...

2. The Chained Simple Contest

If anyone has a better name, please let me know - this ones stinks.

The basic idea is that the characters engage in a series of simple contests, with the result of each one feeding into the next. This can be stopped as soon as a satisfying conclusion has been reached.

The examples below are centred on combat - purely because that is the most likely source of conflict. However, I'll give some ideas for applying this to other areas later.

3. Basic Resolution

Both sides roll against their appropriate ability, deciding their success level as per normal. Once both have their success level, these are compared on the following table.

After applying the results of this contest, run another contest. Stop when a clear winner is decided - someone is too hurt to continue, surrenders, runs away, whatever.

4. Augmenting

Since only simple contests are used in this system, only bonuses to target numbers can be tried for. Use the normal rules, subject to the following.

The result of an augment normally only lasts for one simple contest - the one that is about to occur. If the augment is to last an entire chained contest, then augmenting counts as the action for that 'round'. The opponent can still attack as normal, but only he can inflict damage - if you win the round, nothing happens.

As a rule of thumb, augments are limited to one per affinity, one mundane ability, and one character trait (strong, brave, tough, etc.). Not sure what I'll do about animists and sorcerors.

Optionally, characters can get a +1 for each complete 10 points in a suitable ability as an augment without rolling.

There is a slight change to the result table for augments. Use the following :

5. Multiple Opponents

Multiple opponents can be handled two seperate ways, moderatly arbitrarily.

All the opponents count as a single group. One - normally the leader - will make the roll, the others will each add +3 to his target number. As damage is done, the 'extras' will get knocked out, hurt, killed, whatever.

Each opponent gets a seperate attack. Only the 'main' one can be defended normally. Against the others, a win for the outnumbered character means 'no effect'.

6. Optional Rules

What follows are rules that add a certain level of complexity to the contest. Use them or not. I'll mainly use them to add nastiness to opponents that should be 'memorable' in some manner, and ignore them the rest of the time. Bit like the comparable rules in the book...

6.1. Edges and Handicaps

I advise treating all augments as bonuses, not edges - save them for extended contests proper. However, some creatures are notable for their huge weapon or armour ranks. Therefore, I'm using this system to represent this.

Work out the result as usual. If the creature in whose favour the edge was applied WINS, work out what the result would have been if the edge had been given to them as a bonus. If that result is better, apply it instead. Armour is the opposite of this - it applies if the creature it favours LOSES.

An Example
We have an Orlanthi weaponthane (Sword and Shield 10W, Sword ^3, No Armour ^0) fighting a Dragonsnail (Kill Things 12W, Toothed Maw ^5, Shell ^10). The masteries cancel, so the example stays simpler.

The first round, the Orlanthi rolls a 5 and the dragonsnail a 17. The Orlanthi wins (success vs. failure) and would normally HURT his opponent. However, the Dragonsnail's shell would, in an extended contest, cause a handicap of -7. (Shell rank of 10, minus the sword rank of 3.) Giving the dragonsnail a +7 bonus (as it lost this contest) means that it would have succeeded, giving it a -3 to its next action. This is a better result from its point of view, so it takes that instead.

The next round, the Orlanthi rolls a 14 and the Dragonsnail an 11. Both fail - remember the -3 for the Dragonsnail from last round - but the Dragonsnail narrowly wins the contest. Normally, the Orlanthi would suffer the -3 next round. However, the Dragonsnail has an edge of +5. (Toothed Maw rank of 5, minus nothing because the Orlanthi is unarmoured.) This +5 would have been enough to give the Dragonsnail a success, and so our Orlanthi is HURT.

The problem with this approach is that it doesn't work well when there is a huge difference in skill levels - if your opponent criticals every time, these rules will never come into play. To a certain extent, this is true anyway - a handicap of -10 is not going to matter much to someone who has a 2 mastery advantage over you. However, it is worth considering giving some creatures extra abilities to provide protection anyway - allowing them to augment their attacks with "immune to normal weapons" or similar.

6.2. Regeneration

In Hero Wars this is normally dealt with as 'regains one AP per round' or similar. I'm going to allow such creatures a 'regenerate' ability of 10 per AP specified, which they can use once per round to heal themselves, as per normal. It'll take them a while to recover from INJURED, but they have some chance even from DYING. Unless the party finish them off first.

6.3 Keep Going Till Death

This is a tough one to play with. The rules normally allow creatures to fight down to -40AP without ill effect, if they have this ability. One possibility is to use rules similar to those above, representing it as regeneration, or a huge armour rank. I think I prefer the following system.

The creature ignores all effects from wounds. They take no penalty from HURT or INJURED results. To represent the keep going situation, they also don't suffer from escalated wounds the way normal characters do. In other words, where the result chart reads "If already HURT/INJURED..." they ignore those effects. Always apply the minimum effect possible. However they CAN be killed. Keep track of the penalty they would be suffering if they noticed their injuries. If this is large enough that they wouldn't be able to use their current ability at all, they suffer the DYING result, and they do notice that.

6.4 Immunity to Normal Weapons

Certain creatures are immune to 'normal' weapons - mainly undead, other world creatures, etc. If fought using the 'wrong' weapons, they ignore all effects if they lose that round. The one exception is if they fumble and their opponent criticals - that should stop anyone.

If the creature is only partly immune, having an ability of 'Immune to normal weapons 10W' for instance, there are two ways to play this. The first is to treat this as an augment to their normal attack. This will down play the effectiveness of the immunity. Alternatively, after each attack, roll a simple contest of 'Immune' vs. the attacker's weapon ability. If the creature gets a victory, he is safe, otherwise he takes the damage.

6.5 Followers

Followers are kind of awkward under this system. Normally they lend APs, but of course, here there are no APs. Instead, each follower grants a +3 bonus to the target number of the main attacker. They also protect the attacker from damage. A marginal victory knocks one follower out of the fray for the next round only. A minor or major victory knocks one follower out permenantly. A complete victory remains a complete victory.

This keeps the 'feel' of the followers - they don't add much other than survivability to the main character - much the same. I've added the extra skill bonus 'cos I don't like the "lone hero takes on hoards of lesser mortals with no danger" idea. Where all this breaks down is when both sides have hordes of followers - the winner will always be the one with the bigger horde. My inclination is that when the numbers of followers get 'big' on both sides, add all the skills together, and then cancel masteries. This gives the advantage to the small band of highly skilled fighters over the large group of unskilled hackers.

7. Applying The Idea To Non-Combat Situations

So far, I've talked about combat. This forms a nice easy point of reference. However, nearly all the ideas apply equally to other conflicts. To illustrate this, I'll talk about applying it to a debate here.

The main difference is, of course, that no one in a debate actually gets injured. But their chances of winning do. Therefore, everything above applies, just some of the terminology needs to differ. When someone gets a result of "INJURED" on the resolution table, they are not, in fact, injured - no blood is spilt. However, their chances of performing any skill related to the contest is halved. Thus they may try to use "Obscure Knowledge" to augment, but the penalty means they fail. Of course, what they remember is correct, but no one believes them. Their credibility is blown.

Other characters - or the character themselves - may try to "heal" them. Instead of calling for the local White Lady, they drag in impressive looking tomes. An appropriate, successful skill, undoes the damage. People are convinced again. The character is healed.

Long term effects are, of course, up to the Narrator. It may take a couple of weeks before people stop teasing him in the pub - normal healing due to time rules. Alternatively, the effects may be more or less permenant. I'd probably penalise the character's relationship abilities to reflect this.

"Glorantha" is a trademark of Issaries, Inc. "Hero Wars", "HeroQuest" and "Issaries" are registered trademarks of Issaries, Inc. Used with permission. Glorantha and its derivative works are copyright Issaries, Inc. All material on these pages copyright Graham Robinson. Mail me with comments. See the official web site for more information.