Monday, February 20, 2012

Ok, there ARE some things that bug me about Castles & Crusades...

...such as the extensive armor list. It's a bit of that "AD&D complexity" filtering through, I think. It's not as onerous as the AD&D polearm list, thankfully.

But I mean, come on. Greek Ensemble? I really just want the good old list that includes leather, scale, chain mail, banded, plate. Done.

Sorry, it's Monday morning. I'm mourning the weekend.

Maybe this is all just fueled by my recent readings of the Rules Cyclopedia as well as my PDF of the ACK system (the latter of which I am really liking, and not for the domain control rules either).

Hmmm...

9 comments:

  1. When they start selling thirteen different named codpieces separately that's when I have to draw the line. Although, the right codpiece makes or breaks the whole armor thing you're going after.

    In GURPS you buy each body section separately. And for a while I liked it. But now that I've been playing AD&D just buying a suit of leather or chain is much easier.

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  2. ACKS is becoming my favourite of the new/old school rules.

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  3. Remember how you guys thought it was odd that my dwarves we Greek sailors? It was because as I was describing the dwarves to you I looked down and saw "Greek Ensemble" on the C&C equipment list and thought, "There has to be a reason that exists."

    ACKS is really great, I had a chance to play it with the guys who wrote it at GenCon this year and they are really nice.

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  4. @Tim: agreed, the codpiece proclaims the man ;-)

    The more I hear about GURPS the less I like it!

    @Rich: that's hilarious! As for ACKS, it really does seem to be a labor of love. I'm kind of surprised how much I'm liking it. I'm really thinking that I want to either run it directly someday, or at least steal from it to run some Rule Cyclopedia-based gaming action. I'm not really into all the proficiencies, or what they've done to the classes. But the d20 ability checks and combat actions are pretty cool.

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  5. I think you are supposed to pick the arms & armor that you want to be available in your campaign, but I agree that it is pretty silly to bother giving these things separate entries. If you want to do the Mazes & Minotaurs thing, I think you would be better off having leather, linen (=ringmail or scale maybe), breastplate/greaves = mail, and maybe a 'Dendra Panoply' = plate.

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  6. @Mike: true, one can choose what armor to allow in one's game, but if you look at the armor list in C&C it has the armor classes spread across some strange armor types. But then again, one could also simply change the names of the armor associated with each armor class.

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  7. My bigger problem with C&C is the saving throws. Hated 'scaling' saves in d20 and it is worse, if anything, in C&C.
    I've effectively tossed out most of the SIEGE system, in that I rarely require rolls to use skills and don't use 'primes'. Otherwise I do like the class system though.

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  8. @Mike: interesting, I don't find myself having any issues with the SIEGE engine system. I'd like to hear more details on your approach to/use of (or lack thereof) of the SIEGE mechanic. Did you ever write about it on your blog?

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  9. I would just say "I'm wearing Roman legionnaire armor, stats as Banded Mail" or "I'm wearing partial metal gladiator armor with a crested horsehair helmet, stats as Studded Leather" and it doesn't make any difference whatsoever.

    The only places I could see it coming in is if the Druid says "I wanna wear leather armor that's really thick so it's just like Platemail in all respects" and I'd say no, your armor restrictions keep you to leather unless you find something special like dragon-hide or ankheg carapace.

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