After the past several play tests, some rules have been changed. As always this is not a definite rules change, just the progress of developing the rules to be as tight as possible.
Knock Back
The knock back rules were tested with the to hit roll rather than the damage taken. This worked fine, but did not take into consideration characters who were extremely strong.
So the Knock Back has been scheduled for another play test. This time it will be applied to the Damage Roll.
How does this differ from the to hit roll and damage taken roll?
The to hit roll did not take in to effect the characters strength and is rolled before damage.
The damage taken was a result after the target had made a damage resistance roll. Knock back was then applied to the target based upon the actual damage taken.
However, with the knock back being applied with the actual damage roll, before any damage resistance is rolled by the target. We get the cinematic effect of targets being knocked back without actually taking damage, They pick themselves up and brush off the dust and race back to the fight.
Character Creation
The last play test was all about the character creation process. The play test team created two identical characters utilising different methods of character creation.
The first method was the original character creation process. A set number of increases to Statistics and Specialisations, followed by a choice of an additional Perk. This was quick, but did not allow enough room for characters to become unique.
The second method although slightly longer process, was a point buy system where players would apply the Racial and Roles templates and then customise their characters in a way they visualised their character.
It was agreed that the point buy system was a more favourable way of creating the character by the majority of the testing team.
It was also agreed that providing a point purchase chart with all the costs, would reduce confusion and speed up character creation using this method.
POW to NRG
I have decided to make changes to the POW (Power) to NEG (Energy) in regards to the points used to use Powers in CORE RPG. We originally used POW to monitor the points used as Powers were original known as spells. But due to the CORE RPG being a set of universal rules, I decided to change spells to Powers. This could cause some confusion.
The reason Spells are now called Powers is that the CORE RPG Powers can be used for psionics, super powers, abilities as well as spells and magical effects.
Perks
It was suggested that Perks be upgradeable. Originally I was going to have a Perk tree for gaining improved Perks. I had not considered the possibility of upgradeable Perks. But this suggestion by Thrin allowed for even more customisation for characters. Each Perk will eventually have a list of upgrades available to improve the Perk.
Each upgrade will increase the Perk level. The level is used for spending development points to improve the perk.
Super Heroes
This has been a headache to say the least! But is almost ready for some play testing. I envision players being able to choose the powers that their character can use. Then they use Energy to activate their powers.
Some of the powers will be permanent, This will permanently reduce a characters NRG pool.
Therefore the more powers a character has the less likely they can use them all at once, or the powers will be weaker than a character who has less powers to manage.
This is still only theory, and a thorough play test will be required to see where tweaks will be made. I have created a Power Level chart which allows for different scales of Super Hero Campaigns, from street fighters to cosmic beings.
Want to be involved in play testing?
Contact GMD on Discord. Let me know what time and what day you are available for play testing and I will endeavour to accommodate you and get you involved. The more the merrier!