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Post by Oiseau on Sept 16, 2004 20:22:52 GMT
Oops. Old habits. I read the Lone Wolf series in French (Loup Solitaire), which is why I spell Kai like Kaï (in French, a Kai Master would be pronouced Kay Master if it wasn't written Kaï).
This is also why I use +2H instead of +2CS sometimes (Habileté), and why I refer to books as LS-2 instead of LW-2 when I don't pay attention. ^_^
To get back on topic ... Yeah, the rules, overall, would really require clarifications and balancing. Assuming the player has every Special Item and always picks 8 or 9 to begin just results in players being forced to cheat. The Kai series wasn't like that. I remember my friends and I used to ignore the Sommerswerd +8CS bonus except when the text itself mentioned the Sommerswerd as an option. Like the good china, you didn't use it for every occasion. Then you hit the Magnakai series and you can't even play the adventures fairly with the darn Sommerswerd. Sure, there are various ways you can "adjust" things yourself, but it always feels like cheating.
Lone Wolf has always been my favorite gamebook series, which is why I take these flaws deeply to heart. Would it have killed them to play-test the books, especially everything after Book 8 ? The result would have been a most excellent series.
The Oiseau
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Post by Ghost Bear on Sept 16, 2004 22:11:26 GMT
Well, Joe playtested each book using low, medium and high stated characters. The problem with this is that as you increase the number of books, the amount of playtesting you need to do increases drastically. For instance.
You play through the first book, using low, medium and high characters.
When it comes to book two, not only do you have to playtest the book using low, medium and high characters as if you'd just started playing in Book 2, but you also need to test it using your original characters from the first three books.
When you hit Book 3, you need to test for the two mentioned above, as well as Book 3.
In book 4, you need to follow the same pattern, but you also need to cater for those who do not posess the Sommerswerd (who've played only Books 1 and 3).
So even with just the first four books, already we're starting to get silly in the amount of testing you have to do. I'm assuming that after Book 7, Joe had to draw the line someplace, or he'd never get the books published.
-GB
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Post by Black Cat on Sept 16, 2004 23:40:53 GMT
Well, Joe playtested each book using low, medium and high stated characters. The problem with this is that as you increase the number of books, the amount of playtesting you need to do increases drastically. He didn't need to increase the number of testings. The testing with a high CS (like 25 or 30) would be for players who have Sommerswerd, disciplines, etc, and the test with low CS (like 10 or 15) would be for rookies with no bonuses at all... but I agree that it is hard for a player who didn't play any book to start at book 9. Anyway, my point is that I believe that there's an error in the Rules Handbook about replacing bonuses from Magnakai disciplines by their Grand Master's equivalent in the way it is written. It's either:" don't substract them but add them" or "add 15 to your CS and then replace the discipline bonuses".
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Post by Evanta on Sept 17, 2004 1:53:32 GMT
He didn't need to increase the number of testings. The testing with a high CS (like 25 or 30) would be for players who have Sommerswerd, disciplines, etc, and the test with low CS (like 10 or 15) would be for rookies with no bonuses at all... but I agree that it is hard for a player who didn't play any book to start at book 9. Anyway, my point is that I believe that there's an error in the Rules Handbook about replacing bonuses from Magnakai disciplines by their Grand Master's equivalent in the way it is written. It's either:" don't substract them but add them" or "add 15 to your CS and then replace the discipline bonuses". I think the problem is that the low-high ends were just far too extreme for Joe to write the books in a way so as to cater for both extremes. If he ever gets the books published one more time, we might want Joe to make the books more balanced (i.e. lowering the CS bonus of items that people come across)
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Post by Oiseau on Sept 17, 2004 5:24:45 GMT
Better yet : For items which you MUST have acquired, like the Sommerswerd, include all bonuses in the starting stats of the character in future books. That would balance everything (that's actually what was done in the Grand Master series, after the author realized he couldn't keep things unbalanced in such a huge way).
Anyway ... All of this is a sterile debate. Everyone will play the books in a way which appears to be logical to them. I just wish the rules (and gameplay balance) had been better defined from the start.
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Post by Ghost Bear on Sept 17, 2004 7:52:38 GMT
Anyway, my point is that I believe that there's an error in the Rules Handbook about replacing bonuses from Magnakai disciplines by their Grand Master's equivalent in the way it is written. It's either:" don't substract them but add them" or "add 15 to your CS and then replace the discipline bonuses". Well, adding the bonus for Psi-Surge to your starting stats makes no sense. Some opponents in the GM series are immune to Kai-Surge and Mindblast. They'd certainly be immune to Psi-Surge. As an aside, am I the only one who thinks it strange that the weaker form of Kai-Surge is called Mindblast. Wouldn't it make more sense to refer to it as Psi-Surge?
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Post by outspaced on Sept 17, 2004 8:35:56 GMT
As an aside, am I the only one who thinks it strange that the weaker form of Kai-Surge is called Mindblast. Wouldn't it make more sense to refer to it as Psi-Surge? I think it's because Mindblast has a lower CS bonus, and it doesn't have an EP penalty if you use it. Trying to explain Psi-surge in the brief recap of Magnakai Disciplines could have become and information overload, and also undermined the value of Kai-surge in the series.
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Post by Ghost Bear on Sept 17, 2004 11:37:29 GMT
hmmm yeah, good point. I forgot that Psi-Surge went up from 4 to 6 in Book 12.
Incidentally, I think Kai Surge might be my next chosen skill in Legacy of Vashna. It's rather funky. Then Grand Nexus for The Deathlord of Ixia... Got a sneaking suspicion it might be useful, despite having not played that book.
-Ss
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Post by Sol on Nov 26, 2004 23:02:44 GMT
A good way to balance a reprint of the series:
Just change the number that you add to your CS roll when generating your character. In later books, with this number raised, the person writing the book will find it easier to guess what the player's combat skill will be. At least when the book is played as a stand-alone, the player can have a good chance to reach the end even when compared with a player who has the Sommerswerd or other items.
It is also SO important to have at least 1 possible path where all the enemies are weak or avoidable... Lone Wolf should always have at least 1 way to get by on sheer experience with the books or smarts.
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Post by Zipp on Nov 30, 2004 22:22:59 GMT
If the question was whether you could use Psi-surge in the New Order books, wouldn't the answer be no?
You aren't a Grand Master in those books. You aren't even Lone Wolf.
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Post by Peregrine on Dec 1, 2004 5:19:05 GMT
You aren't a Grand Master in those books. You aren't even Lone Wolf. Actually, you are. (A Grand Master, that is. Not Lone Wolf.) Supposedly with all the preceding Disciplines, too.
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Post by Zipp on Dec 1, 2004 19:33:11 GMT
Oh really? I haven't read it in a loooong time. But how many years have passed since... oh wait, weren't you present at the battle during the Dawn of the Dragons? You've been studying for a while, right?
Still, I always assumed that Joe was trying to set up a whole new deal with this one, and doesn't he write the books to circulate around your magnakai powers (for instance, not having to roll dice for maneuvers easily accomplished by magankai huntmastery, etc.)?
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columbob
Kai Lord
Up the Irons!
Posts: 161
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Post by columbob on Dec 1, 2004 19:43:32 GMT
I think it takes 10 years (MS 5070-MS 5080 or so) for the first 5 Kai lords to reach the rank of Grand Master.
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Post by BenKenobi on Dec 2, 2004 8:16:46 GMT
The New Order serie doesn't imply the loyalty bonus. The character is a brand new character... it cannot use powers from a previous book because you didn't play a previous book with it !!! In GM serie, you can use Magnakai powers for the reason that you have played the Magnakai serie and you inherit them from your previous game. In the New Order, you can't inherit them from a previous game ! A proof: in the rules section of the book, the author describes the Magnakai basic skills and gives you the rule for the use of Curing - 10 points in the whole book. So you can't use the Magnakai Curing (1 point for each section). I assume that if the author doens't specify the use of Huntmastery, Weaponmastery, etc. it means that you cannot use them at all. From the other hand, at the beginning of the book it says that it could be helfpul if you completed the previous adventures: books 1-2x. Now, the question is: it is helpful if you complete the previous New Order adventures, but how it can be helpful to complete 1-20 Lone Wolf's adventures ? I get stuck...
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Post by Peregrine on Dec 2, 2004 8:34:17 GMT
I think it's assumed that Weaponmastery is already included. There are, as I recall, references to "using your Magnakai skill of...", as there are in the Grand Master series--usually with the meaning that "you protect yourself but don't come off entirely unscathed, because you don't have the Grand Master version". But Psi-surge? It probably gets the same sort of use outside of combat, but in combat I think it's always all or nothing--you take Kai-surge or you get no bonus at all. It might have made sense to reduce the Kai-surge bonus in light of this, but then it'd be inconsistent with the Grand Master series experience of those who never played a Magnakai book. Ooh, actually, I know what would have been good. Offer Mindblast to all players, and Kai-surge only to those who take the Discipline. In fact I might play it like that if and when I play a New Order book again...
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