House Rules: Alternative MA

by Tim Dugger

From rasyr@wavegate.comMon Jun 9 12:29:43 1997 Date: Wed, 5 Mar 1997 00:18:05 -0500 From: Tim Dugger Reply to: rolemaster@tower.clark.net To: Multiple recipients of list Subject: Alternative MA - longish

Martial Arts: The Substitute

MA would no longer be classified as four seperate degrees, instead only two degrees would be used, Basic and Adanced.

Basic: This would be the version that any character wanting to learn MA would be learning (for example - a Mentalist). It would have a maximum attack potential of a Medium attack (i.e. 120) This would include the most basic strikes and blockes associated with any type MA.

Advanced: This skill degree would be open mainly for those whose life revolves around MA training. It would include the advance MA attacks styles and forms, and would max out at a huge attack (i.e. 150).

To offset the reduced expenditure of development points, the MA practitioner would have to learn a lore skill for each style of Advanced MA that they want to learn. This skill would be under the Lore*Technical category. A character would be allowed to learn more than one style at a time, and the different styles could give the character bonuses to certain other skills during combat, if the GM was lenient, but I wouldn't recommend it.

The Catch: A Martial Artist would only be allowed to use a number of skill ranks (of the MA attack skill, both cat and individual skill) up to and/or equal to the number of ranks he has in the style skill. This means that if the MArtist has 10 ranks in each of the MA category and the Advanced strikes skill, and 7 ranks in chup style and 5 ranks in the monkey style, he could only use a max of 7 ranks of the cateegory skill and seven ranks of the Advanced strikes skill when attacking using the chup style. Also, he would only be able to use 5 ranks of each when attacking using the monkey style. Another disadvantage would be that somebody who learns a Lore*General skill called "MA Styles" could learn a lot of information about the characters training from making a skill roll to see if they recognize it. Plus, the character would need a teacher for each of the various styles they wanted to learn.

Weapon Katas: The character would also have to learn a style skill for weapon kata that they wanted to learn. I would also negate any penalty for using a weapon kata that currently exists, and allow the character only half of any bonuses the wepon may have due to their training to use the weapon in a manner that does not exploit the weapon to its full advantage. Iwould leave the manner for determining the amount of extra damage the way it is.

NOTE: The character would still have to learn an equal or greater amount of basic MA ranks than Advanced MA ranks. Also, the number of Advanced MA ranks may be higher than the number of style skill ranks, this is to simulate the character learning, but not fully understanding certain elements of the style. The style skill will represent the characters understanding of the actual training in progress.

Additional Note: I would NOT allow the MA skills or the style skill to be anything other than normal skills for the Martial artist. The Advanced MA skill and the style skill (under Lore*Technical) should be restricted skills for all non-martial artist.

Let me know what you think of this. Thanks

-- 
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Rasyr            \  
Located at:       \
rasyr@wavegate.com \
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timothy.dugger@universalsystems.com  \
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Democracy is based on the assumption that a million
men are wiser than one man. How's that again?
I missed something.
				-Lazerus Long-

Autocracy is based on the assumptio that one man is
wiser than a million men. Let's play that over again,
too. Who decides?
				-Lazerus Long-
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