Talk:Mano a Mano

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Virtues

What constitutes a positive virtue of an RPG system depends on the environment in which MaM is used:

Paper & Pencil RPG / Turn-Based Computer RPG

• uses verbal narrative or description (or pictures in a computer RPG)
• complete and flexible rules trump simplicity/ease of use
• multiple attacks per combat round is good
• GM dependency is OK (in a computer RPG the machine does the GM-ing)
• players should not need to know each other's stats
• dependency on combat maps is bad (except in a computer RPG where it is OK)

Board Game / miniature-or-action-figure based RPG / Computer Strategy Game

• uses strategic modeling - dependency on combat maps is fine
• simplicity/ease of use trumps completeness
• one attack per combat round is better
• players referee each other - GM dependency is bad
• players need to see each other's character sheets (except in a computer strategy game)

Action Computer Game

• simplicity/ease-of-use is not an issue (unlimited memory and calculations)
• completeness and flexibility can be less than in an RPG.
• attacks should be handled individually instead of lumped into rounds
• players should not need to see each other's character sheets
• human GM dependency is bad
• dependency on combat maps (in the game) is fine

MaM 2007

Playtesting

Now that MaM 2007 is taking shape, it's time to think about what rules and scenarios we want to playtest.

Rules

I think we want to test the rules in at least four phases:

• Basic MaM 2007 rules: Sin Frijoles system, old sharpness rules, one-on-one and group battles
• Blow-by-blow system: same scenarios as basic rules
• Game design: create new templates, weapon lists etc. (Generic and Squawk)
• Hack & Slash RPS: test in computer game form

Character Templates

Name:       Human
Speed:      2    0 CP
Agility:    4   -3 CP
Absorption: 6    3 CP
Power:      8    0 CP
ABILITIES:
Running     2    3 CP
NATURAL WEAPONS:
Unarmed Strikes*
Weapon Hands*
---------------------
Total CP:        3 CP

Recovery Phase

At the beginning of your turn (or the end of your turn in the blow by blow system) you:

1. recover one stun damage
2. calculate total damage = lasting + stun
3. check whether your damage penalty has changed

You only check your damage penalty on your turn. When you take damage your damage penalty changes when your turn comes around again.

Shared Rules and Important Changes from MaM 2006

Turns

Each character has one turn per two-second round and one or more actions per turn. Each character recovers from stun damage and recalculates damage penalties once per turn.

Encumbrance

Encumbrance reduces speed and movement instead of affecting combat rolls.

Toughness

Weapons no longer have toughness. The weapon breaking rules should be removed because we don't use them

Hit Points

We don't use hit points and hit point pools anymore

Total Damage

Total damage = lasting damage + stun damage

Health

Health = 1 + the character's two highest athletic ability modifiers. Health is the maximum total damage a character can take without being incapacitated and falling down

Speed

Speed is your maximum number of attacks per round. Typically, small creatures have more speed and large creatures have less. Speed is a little different from agility. Speed emphasizes strength and energy and agility emphasizes coordination and reflexes, but the main difference is that agility affects the success of actions while speed affects how fast actions can be executed in series.

Speed CP  Description     Examples                   Notes

  5   30  extremely fast  shrew, tasmanian devil
  4   15  very fast       cat, fighting cock, ninja
  3    5  fast            dog, trained fighter       (cinematic human speed)
  2    0  medium          horse, normal person       (realistic human speed)
  1   -5  slow            python (ambush predator)   combo attack is not useful
  0  -15  very slow       turtle, sloth              can only do one quick action per turn
 -1  -30  extremely slow  plant, snail               no actions, not even quick ones

Can individuals of a given template have a different speed?

some sort of ability-based advantage could potentially increase a character's speed by one more than his template. This would be no small CP commitment, and would represent at least an extremely above-average athletic condition of that character, and perhaps also a very high level of martial prowess. -BFGalbraith

The speed CP scale above started from the idea that you could get +1 speed every 5th level of some ability. So we could do that, or we could have an individual speed bonus that has 5 times the CP of an ability.

Size

The following guidelines should help template creation. Power increases faster than absorption because larger creatures often have less speed and attacks per round. Creatures with equal power and absorption can't hurt each other with normal unarmed attacks.

   Mass      Power  Abs Agi  Examples

  < 1 g       -2    -2  10  small bug
   1-9 g      -1    -1   9   shrew, hummingbird
  10-99 g      0     0   8   mouse, largest insects
 100-999 g     1     1   7   rat
  1-9 kg       2     2   6   cat, fox, rabbit
 10-39 kg     3-4    3   5   dog, heaviest flying bird
 40-199 kg     5     4   4   human, deer, wolf
200-999 kg    6-7    5   3   cow, lion, horse, bear, moose
 1-9 tons      8     6   2   giraffe, hippo, rhino, elephant
10-100 tons   9-10   7   1   whales, largest dinosaurs
 > 100 tons  11-12   8   0   biggest whales

Agility and Absorption

Although they usually balance each other out, absorption and agility have a CP value:

Abs/Agi    0   1   2   3   4   5   6   7   8   9  10
  CP     -45 -30 -18  -9  -3   0   3   9  18  30  45

Is this chart updated with the size chart above? -BFGalbraith

Weapon Size and Strength Requirements

Weapons reduce your attacks per round if you do not meet their size and strength requirement. The size requirement is less than or equal to the power modifier of the template the weapon is designed for. If you are using a weapon designed for your template or a creature the same size, you can ignore the size requirement. The strength requirement is compared to your strength ability.

Power minus  Strength minus
 Size Req.   Strength Req.   Usability

 +2 or more    (ignored)     unusable (too small)
 +1 or +2      (ignored)     easy
     0         0 or more     easy
     0        -1 to -4       difficult
     0        -5 or less     unwieldy
 -2 or -1      (ignored)     unwieldy
 -2 or less    (ignored)     unusable (too big)

Is this chart updated with the size chart above? -BFGalbraith

If the weapon is unwieldy, you can only do one normal attack per turn. You don't get a secondary weapon attack. A weapon that large may increase your encumbrance penalty too, reducing your speed and movement.

If the weapon is difficult to wield but not unwieldy, you can only attack once per turn with the weapon, and you may not use the weapon as a secondary weapon. You can still do a powerful attack with the weapon.

Should this effect of weapon size on attacks per round replace weapon agility?

Power

Power is also used to see if you meet the size requirements of a weapon, and to determine your carrying capacity (CC) - the mass you can carry without an encumbrance penalty.

 CP Size   Mass/   CC =
    Power St.Req  Mass/Enc  Example

-72   0     1 g     1 g     bug
-56   1     2 g     3 g     shrew
-42   2     5 g    10 g     mouse
-30   3    10 g    30 g     rat
-20   4    20 g   100 g     rabbit
-12   5    50 g   300 g     cat
 -6   6   100 g     1 kg    dog
 -2   7   200 g     3 kg    big dog
  0   8   500 g    10 kg    human
  2   9     1 kg   30 kg    cow
  6  10     3 kg  100 kg    moose
 12  11    10 kg  200 kg    giraffe
 20  12    30 kg  500 kg    hippo
 30  13   100 kg   1 tons   elephant
 42  14   300 kg   2 tons   brachiosaurus
 56  15   1 tons   5 tons   fin whale
 72  16   3 tons  10 tons   blue whale

Is this chart updated with the size chart above? -BFGalbraith

Movement

Movement is the distance a character can move per turn. Movement is how fast the character can move in meters per round. One meter per round is 0.5 meters per second, 30 meters per minute, 1.8 kilometers per hour or a little over one mile per hour.

Stride

Stride = 1 + running (ability modifier) - lame (disability modifier). Stride determines your movement on the ground. If stride is greater than zero, movement is stride multiplied by (speed - encumbrance). If stride is 0, movement is 1. If stride is less than 0, movement is 0.

Swimming

In water, movement = (speed - encumbrance) multiplied by swimming ability modifier.

Flying

In the air, movement = (speed - encumbrance) multiplied by flying ability modifier.

Climbing

While climbing, movement = (speed - encumbrance) multiplied by reach.

Grappling

Grappling actions are rolled like normal attacks (combat bonus vs. combat bonus.) If you are (fully) successful, you may choose whether you want to end up in a hold with the dominant position or if you want to release the hold. If you fail your opponent gets to decide whether to release the hold (but does not have a dominant position if they did not already have it.) If you are half successful, the only change is that your opponent loses their dominant position if they had it (i.e. you would then be in a neutral hold.)

Posture

Characters can grapple while standing (clinch fighting) or lying down (ground fighting.) On the ground, the penalties and rules for getting up from a lying down position apply.

Restricted Movement

Both grapplers have a -1 modifier to the success of any attacks while they are in a hold. If one grappler has more power he controls the direction they move. If they have equal power, they move slowly in the direction the grappler with the dominant position chooses.

Position

A grappler can be in a dominant, neutral or inferior position relative to an opponent. Either one grappler's position is dominant and the other's is inferior, or they are both neutral. The grappler with the dominant position has a +2 to all actions against the grappler in the inferior position. The grappler with an inferior position has a -1 penalty to all of their moves (in addition to the penalties from being in a hold.)

Size (Power) Advantage

For push, trip, throw, disarm and similar moves, the attacker and target add 3 times their power to their rolls (or three times the difference between their power bonus is added to the more powerful character's roll.) Strength may also be added to both attacks.

Fall, Slam

When a character falls down they take damage as if hit by a normal attack, except that the sharpness of the attack is based on the surface they hit and they take at least two points of stun damage. If a character falls from a height the damage is increased by 1 for each meter they fall. If a character is pushed or thrown into a wall instead of the ground they take damage as if falling.

Examples

• The basic clinch is a standing, neutral position hold, common in boxing but also captured by the soap opera cliche of two men struggling for control of a handgun. The fighters are similar in size so it is difficult for them to move in the direction they want, and it can be more difficult to strike each other effectively.
• Another cliche from TV and movies is using a hostage as a shield. In this case the hostage is in an inferior position. The hostage-taker is still a serious threat with one free arm, but he can't move quickly like this.
• Being grabbed by king kong is a standing hold where he has the dominant position. Because he is so much larger, his movement is not restricted, but you do occupy a hand, which limits his actions slightly.
• In The Princess Bride, the hero has the dominant position when he chokes the giant, in spite of the difference in size. The giant has much more control over their movement, but cannot attack the hero easily.

Actions

            QUICK ACTION    POWERFUL ACTION

STRIKES     attack          powerful attack, flanking
AIMING      aim             aimed attack
TAKEDOWNS   push            trip, throw
HOLDS       hold            wrench, choke, disarm, reversal
RELOAD      load, unload    replace a clip
DEFENSE     evasion         defend (evasion + single attack)
STANCE      drop, brace     stand
ARCHERY     draw(light)     draw(heavy), draw and fire
OTHER       close door

Basic Attacks

Attack

A normal attack counts as one quick action. A normal attack can be a strike with a hand weapon or natural weapon, throwing a weapon or firing a bow or gun.

Aimed Attack

An aimed attack has a +1 bonus to hit. You may not do an aimed attack while grappling.

Flanking Attack

A flanking attack has a +1 bonus to hit. You may not do a flanking attack while grappling.

Powerful Attack

A more powerful hand to hand attack. A couple of normal attacks has a better chance of hitting at least once, but a more powerful attack does damage quickly and hurts larger and armored characters more easily.

Grappling

Push, Pull or Shove

Successfully pushing, pulling and tripping up a standing opponent forces them to move in the direction you want, and puts them off balance so they must make an additional ability check or fall down. If you are standing when your opponent falls down you must choose whether to let go of them or follow them to the ground. This is a grappling action.

Trip, Sweep or Attacking the Legs

Successfully attacking a standing opponent's legs with enough power puts them off balance so they must make an additional ability check or fall down. This is a grappling attack.

Throw

Successfully throwing your opponent causes them to fall automatically. They can still make an additional ability roll to avoid damage from falling but they end up on the ground. If you are standing and choose to fall onto them you can cause additional damage as if successfully striking them, but do not have to roll again. Even if they successfully avoid falling damage, your opponent cannot avoid the extra damage from you falling on them.

Hold

A quick, and usually painful, grappling hold is like a normal attack except that a normal attack is not a grappling move and cannot improve your grappling position, but a hold can.

Wrench

A wrench is a more painful and potentially damaging hold with a +3 damage bonus.

Choke or Strangle

A choke is a grappling attack with a +3 damage bonus which only causes stun damage. A choke always causes at least two stun if it is successful, regardless of armor and absorption.

Disarm

Disarm is a grappling action which forces your opponent to release his weapon or other possession. If you are successful, you take the weapon from your opponent. If you are half successful, the opponent drops their weapon. If you have at least two free hands, you have a -1 to disarm. If you have one free hand you have a -2 to disarm. If you are holding something in each hand, you have a -3 to disarm and the opponent drops the weapon if you are fully successful.

Archery and Marksmanship

Drawing a Bow

Drawing a bow counts as one action, separate from firing it. Drawing a light bow is a quick action. Drawing a more powerful bow is a powerful action, depending on whether you meet it's strength requirement. A very powerful bow will require a powerful action for anyone, and be impossible for characters with too little strength.

Keeping a Bow Drawn

The strength and concentration required to keep a bow drawn prevents you from performing any other actions until the bow is fired.

Drawing and Firing a Bow

A light bow can be drawn and fired as a single powerful action.

Drawing a Crossbow

Drawing a crossbow can take several turns depending on the crossbow and the equipment used to draw it.

Aiming

Aiming gives you a +2 bonus to hit with your next missile weapon attack. If you get hit between aiming and the next attack, you lose the bonus. You may not aim while grappling.

Reloading

Replacing a clip of ammunition can be one powerful action or split into two quick actions (unloading and loading). If rounds must be loaded individually, each round requires a separate quick action. Some weapons take one or more turns to reload. (A "Brown Bess" musket can be fired about 3 times per minute with training, suggesting 9 turns to reload and 1 turn to fire.)

Other Actions

Evasion

By moving defensively, a character can get a +2 passive defense bonus until the end of the character's turn. Defense is only used once per turn, but the bonus applies every time the character is attacked before the end of their turn.

Defense

Defense is evasion combined with a normal attack.

Drop

The character drops to a low crouch, sitting, kneeling or prone position on the ground. While a character is on the ground, they move more slowly (-2 movement, -2 to all hand to hand combat rolls except for grappling) but they are harder to hit with missile weapons (+2 to avoid a missile weapon, even without cover, unless the attack comes from above.)

Stand

Standing up can be done as a single powerful action or two quick actions. After the first quick action the character is still on the ground but braced to stand up quickly. The character can be forced to the ground while braced to stand by any of the attacks that can take a character down from a standing position.

Other quick actions include things like pushing a door closed. Slower actions could count as powerful actions or take a certain number of turns.

Modifiers

To simplify keeping track of success roll modifiers, there are only 10 different actions and positions to be aware of. A character can only be in one of these positions at a time. For example, a character cannot do a flanking attack while aiming or grappling.

Standing

This is the normal position with no modifiers.

On the Ground

While a character is on the ground, they move more slowly (-2 movement, -2 to all hand to hand combat rolls except for grappling) but they are harder to hit with missile weapons (+2 to avoid a missile weapon, even without cover, unless the attack comes from above.)

Aiming while Standing

When a character aims a missile weapon they have a +2 to hit.

Aiming on the Ground

When a character aims from a sitting or prone position they have a +2 to hit plus the penalties for being on the ground: they move more slowly (-2 movement, -2 to all hand to hand combat rolls except for grappling) but they are harder to hit with missile weapons (+2 to avoid a missile weapon, even without cover, unless the attack comes from above.)

Aimed Attack and Flanking Attack

These attacks have a +1 modifier to their success roll.

Evasion and Defense

Evasion and Defense give a character a +2 passive defense bonus until the end of the character's next turn. This bonus helps them to avoid any attack which they don't counter and which is not a counter to their attack.

Clinch

When a character is grappling and standing up, but does not have the dominant position, they have a -2 to all combat rolls.

Ground Fighting

When a character is grappling on the ground, and does not have the dominant position, they have a -2 to all combat rolls against characters they are grappling with, and -4 to most combat rolls involving other characters. (The exception is missile weapon attacks directed at the character by characters who are not grappling with him - which have no modifier.)

Dominant Position (Standing)

+2 to all combat rolls against the character in the inferior position. -2 to all other combat rolls.

Dominant Position (on the Ground)

+2 to all combat rolls against the character in the inferior position. -2 to combat rolls involving other characters you are grappling with simultaneously. -4 to most other combat rolls (exception for incoming missile weapon attacks - no modifier.)

Basic (Turn by Turn) System

To move in formation, characters may delay their turns until they are sequential. Characters recover stun and recalculate damage penalty at the beginning of their turn. If a character's total damage is less than half of their health, they can move and do a full turn action. A character can perform a powerful action, quick action, combo, counterattack or covering action as a full turn action. If a character's total damage is at least half of their health, they can only move half as far and perform one quick action.

Combo

A character can perform one quick action in a combo for each point of speed they have, plus an extra quick action using a secondary weapon if they have one. If a character splits their attacks between multiple targets they may only attack each target one time per combo.

Counterattack

This full-turn action has no immediate effect, but until your next turn you can do one normal attack to every character within reach who attacks you. If you use a missile weapon you must choose which characters you will counter and your speed limits the maximum number of characters you can counterattack.

Covering

Covering another character is similar to counterattack, except that you choose an ally to defend, and you are not limited by reach. If you don't have enough reach to hit the attacker, or for some reason you can't parry their attack, you will be hurt by the attack when you successfully defend your ally (i.e. "taking a bullet".)

Speed Requirement

To be consistent with the blow-by-blow system, all powerful actions should require at least 2 speed. If we aren't worried about consistency, at least aimed and flanking attacks should require 2 speed.

Powerful Attack

The damage bonus of a powerful attack is +1 plus your speed.

Blow by Blow System

This system allows more detail, flexibility and improvisation in combat.

Toughness

Toughness = health / speed (rounded up.)

Damage Penalty

Damage penalty = total damage / toughness (rounded down.) Damage penalty is only recalculated at the end of the character's turn. Characters recover stun and recalculate damage penalty at the end of their turn.

Actions

Actions = Speed - Damage Penalty. Characters get an extra action when they use a secondary weapon. (They cannot move with this action.) Quick actions count as one action. Powerful actions use more energy and count as two actions. Some actions take more time, keeping you busy for one or more rounds. Speed does not help with these actions.

Movement

Characters can move before each action. A characters stride, swimming, flying and reach is the distance they can move with each action. Optional Rule - Sprinting: Each time a character uses more than half their movement with any action, they take one point of stun damage.

Aimed and Flanking Attacks

flanking attacks and aimed hand to hand attacks are usually avoided in favor of two normal attacks.

Powerful Attack

A powerful attack has a +3 damage modifier

Constant Defense

A character who always defends uses defense or evasion to counter the first attack against them after their turn.

Action, Formation, Interfering and Covering

A character may have several chances to use their actions between the end of one turn and the end of their next turn, so the character's turn is the last chance to use the actions the character hasn't already used moving in formation or interfering with other characters' actions.

1. At the beginning of an action the character whose turn it is, and any characters moving in formation with that character, can perform one action each. Formation actions have to be planned before the turn begins.
2. If they do not perform an action, the turn ends. Otherwise, the opposition has a chance to interfere with them by performing one action each. Interfering is an opportunity, not an invitation: The game doesn't stop so everyone can be asked if they would like to interfere.
3. Then, any characters who have not performed an action but are providing cover for the character whose turn it is or the characters moving in formation can perform one action to interfere with the opposition. Characters interfering with interfering actions should announce their general intent in advance - "I'm covering Jimmy" - but don't have to choose a specific action or target until the opposition has chosen their interfering actions.

Traditional Pools

This is a system for tracking damage and actions that superficially resembles MaM 2006:

Health counters are shared between stun and lasting damage and one health pool for each action. Action counters are shared between ready, used and hurt (damage penalty) pools, with two single-counter pools for a (ready) secondary weapon attack and (used) defense action.

 Damage                Health (by actions)             Actions
 __________ __________ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____   _________ _________ _________ 
|  Lasting |   Stun   |  1  |  2  |  3  |  4  |  5  | |  Ready  |  Used   |  Hurt   |
|          |          |     |     |     |     |     | |         |         |         |
|          |          |     |     |     |     |     | |_________|_________|_________|
|          |          |     |     |     |     |     | |   |2nd  |   |Extra
|__________|__________|_____|_____|_____|_____|_____| |___|Wpn. |___|Defense

Characters begin by filling one health pool for each action with their toughness in health counters or the remainder of their health counters if it is less than toughness. (The remainder should go in the first health pool.) Characters place their action counters in the ready pool - plus an extra action counter in their secondary weapon pool if they have any secondary weapons.

Branches and Leaves

This system for tracking movement and actions removes the need for one counter per action.

Actions are represented by a slider and health pools are arranged in rows perpendicular to the action slider. Health pools are emptied top to bottom. Once a row is emptied, the action next to that row is "hurt" and the slider can't move back there. The last space in the action slider cannot be used unless the character uses a secondary weapon. A separate "toggle" counter keeps track of whether extra defense has been used. It is left on "Y" when the character plans to use it automatically and left on "N" when the character doesn't plan to use it.

Actions     Health
   __  ________________ 
5 |__||________________|
4 |__||________________|
3 |__||________________|
2 |__||________________|
1 |__||________________|
0 |__|
  |__|<--Secondary Weapon
               __    __
Extra Defense |__|Y |__|N
 __________  __________ 
|          ||          |
|  Lasting ||   Stun   |
|  Damage  ||  Damage  |
|__________||__________|

Calendar

This system for tracking movement and actions only requires four counters:

Similar to branches and leaves except that there are no stun and lasting damage pools, there are only two damage counters and their position in the health area indicates your lasting damage and total damage. There are two extra spaces in the health table for the damage counters to "drain into". The width of the rows is the character's toughness. The player may need to shade in columns of the health table to indicate his character's Toughness

Actions      Health
   __   __ __ __ __ __ __ 
5 |__|-|__|__|__|__|__|__|
4 |__|-|__|__|__|__|__|__|
3 |__|-|__|__|__|__|__|__|
2 |__|-|__|__|__|__|__|__|
1 |__|-|__|__|__|__|__|__|
0 |__| |__|__|
  |__|<--Secondary Weapon
               __    __
Extra Defense |__|Y |__|N

Racetrack

Similar to calendar except the health rows are connected end-to-end and are parallel to a horizontal action slider instead of perpendicular to a vertical action slider. You could shade in the spaces to indicate your character's toughness and actions or you could draw a special racetrack to fit your character. The following generic example has lots of actions for fast characters and lots of toughness for healthy characters, but normal creatures would not use the full capacity of both (which would mean having 30 health.)

                ___________ ___________ ___________ ___________ ___________ ___
Health  ___ ___|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|
Action |___|___|___________|___________|___________|___________|___________|
        2nd  0       1           2 __    __  3           4           5
        Wpn.        Extra Defense |__|Y |__|N

Hack and Slash Real-Time Role-Playing System (Hack and Slash RPS)

The Hack & Slash RPS is a variation of Mano a Mano for "button-mashing" computer and video games where each individual action is affected by input (like fighting games and shooting games.) The normal Mano a Mano rules or other variations may be more suited for a real-time strategy or role-playing game.

Unless otherwise noted, characters can move and perform actions at any time if it doesn't interrupt their current action. Movement does not have to be connected to actions, which might result in halting, irregular movement that feels less responsive.

Characters

Target

The target of the character's current action. The game may allow characters to have other targets or choose a next target during the current action. The Hack & Slash RPS is only concerned with the target the character intended (or most likely intended) to hit when they started their current action.

Action

The character's current action

Action Time

The time the current action started

Ignore List

A list of characters who have failed to interrupt the current action

Chance to Interrupt

Each action only gets one chance to interrupt another action. The current action may have already used it's chance and not be able to interrupt anymore.

Half Success

Whether the character's current action is limited to half success because an effort to interrupt it was half successful

Actions

Interruptible Period

After this time the action cannot be interrupted.

Effect Time

When the action's effect takes place. Effect Time is usually the end of the interruptible period. (Any animation after the effect time is usually follow-through animation.)

Duration

The duration of an action is the period from the beginning of the action until another action can be performed. The duration of a character's quickest attack is one round (two seconds) divided by the character's speed, and conversely a character's speed is one round (two seconds) divided by the duration of the character's quickest attack. Speed can be used to design the character's animation, or the animation can be used to determine the character's speed.

Interfering

Actions that overlap in time can interfere with each other. An action can be interrupted any time between it's beginning and it's effect time. Each action can only be used to attempt one interruption. A half-successful interruption limits the action's maximum success to half success. A half-successful interruption of an action that is already limited to half success has no effect.

When your action's effect time comes up, do the following for your target and all characters targeting you if the current time is within both their action's interruptible period and your action's interruptible period and either your action or their action can interrupt:

1. determine success (with a roll or pre-rolled totals for example)
2. if your action is successful and it can interrupt, your target's action is interrupted
3. if their action is successful and it can interrupt, your action is interrupted
4. if the result is half-success and your action can interrupt, your target's success is limited to half success
5. if the result is half-success if their action can interrupt, your action's success is limited to half success
6. their action can no longer interrupt
7. your action can no longer interrupt

Damage Penalty

The effects of damage penalty and encumbrance on actions and movement can be adjusted to fit the game design or difficulty level. Characters may need to move fast to flee from losing battles, or reduced actions might not feel right or fit the animation.

Damage penalty is based on the ratio of total damage to health. This can be expressed as a fraction, such as full health, 2/3 health, 1/3 health or a percentage, like 90% or 10% health. There must be at least two degrees of damage penalty: fully healthy and incapacitated. There can also be degrees in between or a continuous penalty calculated from the ratio. For example:

• four degrees: full health, 2/3 health, 1/3 health and incapacitated
• three degrees: full health, half health and incapacitated
• three degrees: full health, nearly-wasted (10% of full health) and incapacitated
• continuous: a separate damage penalty calculated for each individual health point

The effects of damage penalty may include:

• slower actions - the length of the action animation and duration are both increased
• slower movement - the character moves at a slower but constant speed.
• less powerful actions - powerful attacks are replaced by less powerful attacks that have the same duration
• less powerful movement - the character does not jump as far or gets pushed around by water currents
• delays between actions - duration increases with damage penalty, and the character acts exhausted when directed to perform an action during the delay between action animations.
• halting movement - the character can still move fast, but not continuously, acting exhausted and stopping or moving slowly between actions.
• less defense - the defense action may be affected depending on how it is controlled
• less success - attack modifiers can be reduced so that fewer attacks are successful (or a percentage of attacks can be changed into feints and wild swings that don't count but are still seen)
• less damage - damage can be reduced (by a modifier or percentage.)

Success Rolls

Player skill may be used instead of success rolls. Players should not be able to spend CP on abilities that are not useful. Those abilities can be removed, ignored or determined automatically. For example, if archery depends entirely on player aim, then archery ability has no CP value. On the other hand archery has some CP value if:

• archery depends entirely on a success roll
• if you fail the roll the arrow doesn't shoot straight
• player aim determines whether you hit while the roll is still used for armor
• accuracy is affected by combat bonuses without success rolls

Even in River City Ransom success rolls are not 100% replaced by player skill, no? Also, I wonder how strongly this would divorce Hack and Slash from the mainstream "Blizzard-style" RPGs...

Seperate Optional Rules Section

I am thinking that "optional rules" should have their/its own section at the end of MaM. This way it will be easy to grasp the basic system without having to consider possible optional rules. Also, advanced players interested in optional rules will be able to find them without having to sift through the entire system.

Keeping optional rules close to default rules makes it easy to update optional rules when default rules change. It reduces the amount of cross-referencing needed. It encourages a selective approach to optional rules. It also makes optional rules easier to use so we can have a range of options from simple to advanced rather than hiding them away for advanced users only. This also means our default rules can be very basic, because popular but not essential rules are right where they need to be.

But we do want the basic system to be easy to grasp without having to consider possible optional rules, and less importantly, it is nice if advanced players can find optional rules quickly. Visually seperating optional rules from default rules without removing them from the context allows the reader to decide how much attention they want to give to optional rules. It also makes them easy for advanced readers to spot. Also if the optional rules are seperate wiki pages, we can easily create an appendix summarizing the optional rules if we want. Here is just one example of how they could be visually separated:

Optional Rule Mounted Combat When the Animal Attacks When riding an animal, the animal will fight automatically if it is trained to do so. Every time the animal attacks or defends, the rider must make a roll using their riding ability to stay mounted. The difficulty of this roll is 10. Stopping the Attack To keep the animal from attacking the rider must make an animal handling success roll every time the animal is attacked, and every round that the animal's attacker is visible. The difficulty of this roll is 10 if the animal is unhurt, or 15 if the animal has stun or damage. Animals that do not Fight Animals trained to be ridden but not to fight will not attack if they are being ridden. Instead, they will try to run unless the rider makes a successful animal handling roll. This has a difficulty of 15 if the animal is unhurt, or 20 if the animal has stun or damage. Charging Instead of having the animal attack, a rider may use the animal's speed to do a charging attack. (See Action/Attacking.) Vehicles Vehicle combat is similar to mounted combat, but most vehicles will not fight or try to run from an enemy. Ramming When a driver rams a target, their driving ability modifier or the vehicle's agility - whichever is lower - is used as the attack modifier. A successful ramming attack results in an automatically successful ramming counterattack by the target against the part of the vehicle used to ram (usually the front.) Head-on and Broadside Collisions If the vehicle and target are moving in different directions (or if only the vehicle is moving) the extra charging damage caused by the speed of both the vehicle and the target is added to the damage taken by both. Rear-end and Sideswipe Collisions If the vehicle and target are moving in the same direction then the charging damage is based on the difference in the distances the vehicle and target moved in that direction since the beginning of their last turn.

I must admit I'm much more concerned that the extra rules will add to the learning curve, than I am about some need of an advanced player. (Of course specific pritings can include and exclude whatever rules they like under the liscense.) For the purposes of this site, this suggested option might be best.--BFGalbraith 2005.12.07

Special Armor Bonuses

Weapons have special bonuses based on their design. Some help you parry, others are used for grappling, and some help you hit by reaching around defenses. Armor can also be designed to have special advantages and we can reflect this with similar special bonuses:

• Padded and ablative armor (bicycle helmet) absorb more blunt trauma, explosions, etc.
• Tough, flexible armor (leather, chainmail) resists cutting (including some stabbing weapons)
• Hard/smooth/angled/springy/stretchy armor deflects peircing attacks

The ideal armor would combine kevlar (springy/stretchy/smooth with ablative padding) and chainmail (tough against cutting.) This would be reflected as a very high absorption bonus. This composite of clay and metal would be ultra-heavy, so in practise some types of armor are more specialized:

• ("Blu") extra absorption against Blunt/Bludgeoning weapons - padding, clay, foam
• ("Cut") extra absorption against Cutting (not impaling) weapons - chainmail, leather
• ("Imp") extra absorption against Impaling weapons - lamellar? kevlar (no clay backing)
• ("B/C") extra absorption against Blunt and Cutting weapons
• ("B/I") extra absorption against Blunt and Impaling weapons - kevlar (with backing)
• ("C/I") extra absorption against Cutting and Impaling weapons

Weapons with low sharpness are usually blunt/bludgeoning weapons. Weapons with high sharpness are usually cutting weapons - even if they are mainly used for stabbing. To qualify as an impaling weapon, the weapon must be specially designed with a long narrow tip. Natural weapons are often impaling weapons so they can penetrate vital organs even through bone.

(Note: if you use kevlar without the backing it still gives you an absorption bonus against impaling weapons - including bullets - but you don't get the regular absorption bonus, so it's only going to deflect the lightest grazing hits.)

Disabilities & Using Abilities During Combat

Seriously guys. Don't allow players to take disabilities for negative CP. In fact make them pay double CP for disabilities if they want to be crippled and lame and blind and deaf and missing pretty much all their limbs and sensory organs because thats pretty much what they want anyway. Players who take disabilities can bite me.

Its pretty much an established fact that lawyers can just like see waves of sound bouncing off of your face. But at what cost? What cost indeed. If you use an ability to compensate for a disability it should require the minimum effort of 1 hitpoint per round. For example -- a blind person may use a cane to collect sensory data.

At times a GM might ask players to perform an ability check during a round of combat. My opinion is that players should not add their ability bonus to the check unless they specifically have established that they are using the ability. If the check is called before the player's turn and the player stated the use of the ability before the beginning of combat. The player would be allowed to add their ability bonus. If the check is called after the player's turn then the player would not be allowed to add their ability bonus the unless they specifically spent at least 1 hit point to use the ability.

--ulrich 11:00, 2005 Jul 2 (CEST)

LOL! - A blind person might also use a cane to fight evil - which will take more than 1 hit point per round :-). Seriously, placing limits on disabilities is essential to good gaming. A good rule would be that a character should not have more than one disability unless (A) she has a sucking character template (and then those should be her only disabilities) or (B) GM's permission (or allowed by the specific game.) Another good rule (especially if you have lots of small quirky disadvantages in the game) is to allow no more than 10 (or fewer) points of disadvantages. (This is one of those optional rules so important it should not just be in an appendix.)

I'm not sure I understand everything you are trying to say about ability checks, but we do need a rule for arbitrary actions during combat, to avoid the whole "while I fight these guys, I'm searching for traps, and burying bodies" problem.--SerpLord 15:17, 8 December 2005 (CET)

Fix Cross-References

Cross references like "(See Abilities/Skills.)" need to be hyperlinked to appropriate sections. Other text can also be hyperlinked. The only cross references that should be in (See ...) format are ones that are more helpful than distracting when you read the printed rules.

New Structure for Linear Reading

Areas that (probably) need attention:

• front and back covers, title page.
• how to create a book version
• floating tables (messy when opened in OpenOffice.org)
• (See Chapter/Section.) references
• Complete System
• Game Design
  • Adventures (basic definition of an Adventure/Scenario/Campaign/Sourcebook and what goes in it.)
  • Supplies (paper, pencil, hex mats, blank forms for templates, occupations, ability and equipment lists)
  • Templates
    • (emphasize designing templates)
    • Make a Template (follow the template structure and order more closely: dimensions, abilities, armor, limbs, weapons, CP)
  • Occupations
    • Requirements (abilities, training, social class, etc.)
    • Perquisites (equipment, income, social status, etc.)
    • other limitations (minimum/maximum number of occupations, starting occupations) part of Requirements?
  • Abilities
    • Availability (some abilities are limited to certain templates)
  • Equipment (explain how to design equipment - this is not about CP!)
• Character Creation
  • placement of missing limbs information and CP
  • placement of build information and CP
  • Occupations?
  • Character Equipment
  • Make a Character - Character Generation Example (review for consistency)
• Character Development
  • Developing Abilities through Training and Experience
  • Changing Occupations
  • Inventory Management or Acquiring and Losing Equipment (see Character Equipment)
  • Making Equipment
    • Equipment CP (see Armor and Weapon CP in the Template CP rules)
    • Make an Item - Equipment Generation Example

Things BFGalbraith noticed

When I was working on the How-To-Play adventure for www.SquawkRPG.net , I found that following things probably need to be included in Mano a Mano IMHO:

Rules for varying Height and Reach for individual characters (perhaps something as simple as +1 or -1 CP for an extra 1/2 meter, with no such option for zero-reach characters?)

Character templates have minimum and maximum heights, if you are outside that range, the template does not describe you. A full 50cm reach difference seems like it would also mean you are mutated beyond your template. We should consider (at least for future editions of MaM) templates that don't allow build variation (mecha) and and templates that allow extraordinary variation (mutants.)

If we look at a sufficiently large template (an 18 meter giant for example) a 0.5 meter reach difference is only like a 5 cm difference for a human. 1 CP per 0.5 m might work. We can set the minimum for all templates at 0 (could reflect disability or damage) but how do we set maximums? The easiest solution is to only allow it if the GM approves and/or assume that templates reflect the upper limit of the race's reach. The complicated solution is to add a new number to the template (especially complicated because now templates present options with multiple CP values instead of a fixed package of features.) --SerpLord 14:38, 11 September 2006 (PDT)

An explaination of "Kick" (from what I understand it's supposed to be like "pull" but you spend the hit points after firing the weapon instead of before...)

your guess is as good as mine :-) --SerpLord 14:38, 11 September 2006 (PDT)

An example of how to calculate the CP of the max range of a weapon (so a decent archery example... the correct answer is "you DON'T caculate CP of the max range of a weapon," but an example of how to caculate max range is needed.) In other words, we need a clear example of pull.

The reach of a ranged weapon is it's effective range. The CP of reach is 1 CP for each 0.5 m, or 2 CP/m According to Wikipedia, an AK-47 has an effective range of 300-450 m. Depending on whether you take the high or low estimate, that's 600-900 CP. (Imagine that we are fighting on an open plain and you have an AK-47 and I have a knife. I can move a few meters every time you get a shot off, so you'll get a dozen chances to shoot me before I reach you. It's potentially like a guy with a knife fighting 20 guys with spears.)

One nice thing about MaM is that it has been created by people who have really shot bows bows and firearms, have had their arms twisted into submission, been choked out, knocked out, slowly beaten down, been cut by knives, have done full-contact stick fighting, etc. :) I think you are forgetting "kick" in the above CP formula. Kick is Pull for fire arms, and the difference is that you spend the hit points as you pull the trigger, instead of before you pull the trigger. Body-power subtracts from kick before you spend the HP (parrelled to how it effects pull.) So for a 400 meter range weapon, with a kick of 4, the actual "reach" listed on the character sheet would be 100, and the total range would be 400m (4HPx100m.) In that case the reach of the AK would be worth 50 CP, and that would be about right IMHO. (And THAT's why we need an example of Kick in the rules.) -BFGalbraith, Sept. 12, 2006

The relationship between pull and range is complex, but here's a rough formula: 120 m + (20 m for each +1 pull), but no less than 20m. --SerpLord 14:38, 11 September 2006 (PDT)

I couldn't find any equipment mass calculation rules (they were probably removed when we were attempting "fuzzy size",) which is pretty important in the case of generating Armor.

Armor is way more important (players expect characters to be slowed down by heavy armor.) There are 3 main factors involved in Armor: Cover, Absorption, and Toughness. I would think that for primitive technologies, the mass of this would be something like "(Cover + Absorption + Toughness) times 20% of Carying Capacity = armor mass," and that for advanced technologies it might be something like "(Cover + Absorption + Toughness) times 10% of Carying Capacity = armor mass."

Here's an empirical approach: For midieval armor divide the mass by the cover bonus and get a "mass per Cvr" value. Then we can divide that by the weight of a large man (100 kg) and get an estimate of the weight per cover for any species (based on that species' upper weight limit.) Modern high-tech armor may be 1% better, and some vital areas of the body require less material to cover and still give a +1 bonus. (For example a titanium chest plate that covers my heart could have +1 cover and +5 absorption, but only weigh 2 or 3 kg.)

Armor Type  mass/Cvr  Abs  Tgh
Padded       1% /Cvr   1    2
Leather      2% /Cvr   2    3
Scale        4% /Cvr   3    3
Chainmail    3% /Cvr   3    3
Brigandine   5% /Cvr   4    3
Lamellar     4% /Cvr   4    4
Plate        5% /Cvr   5    4

The "ideal" formula for the armor's mass is the wearer's mass times the cover and absorption of the armor, divided by 100. Padded, Leather, Chainmail, Lamellar and Plate approach this ideal. Scale and Brigandine are a little less efficient, but they are inexpensive and just as useful in many situations. Toughness is more an economics issue (how much do I want to invest in this much armor?) --SerpLord 14:38, 11 September 2006 (PDT)

We might not want hard and fast rules for weapons, but we might give a "general guidline" of five levels less than it's power bonus.

If the weapon is mace-like (maximum power, minimum mass) then it could be a whole size level lighter. If the weapon is fist-like (minimum power, maximum mass) it could be a size level heavier. In other words a 1 kg mace has at least as much impact as a 3 kg sword. There is also variation within families of weapons. A sword with a +3 power bonus is not balanced the same as a sword with a +2 power bonus. --SerpLord 14:38, 11 September 2006 (PDT)

Boiler Plate for MaM "Design"

Some adventures are a sequence of challenges like an obstacle course. However, players often want to be able to try anything they want with their characters, so an engaging environment for the characters to freely adventure in - letting the story develop naturally - is usually better than forcing players to follow a story line.

For example, if the PCs are likely to end up fighting in a village market, the GM should have a village market combat map prepared. (Instead, the GM may choose to have a blank sheet of Hex Paper, and use "pieces" to show where various Village Market obstacles are on the hex paper.) The more specific the location, the more important it is for the GM to have a specific map prepared. The GM may also have a selection of general terrain maps, for conflicts that take place in general types of areas, instead of taking place in very specific locations.

You will need one piece for every important character in the game. You will also need a piece for every significant object in the game, which is not already part of a combat map. (By significant object, I mean any visible object that the players are likely to interact with. For example, if there is a discarded spear the players are supposed to find out in the open, it would be best to have a piece for that spear, if it is not part of a map.)

After studying this tutorial, these should be all the reference materials the GM and players need to play the game. Some of the pages can help players create their PCs, others are designed only for the GM's use.