Author Topic: How much do you customize your game ?  (Read 11073 times)

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Offline Cory Magel

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #40 on: October 07, 2017, 01:53:16 PM »
The speed at which ICE operate is almost uniquely slow in my experience
It's not, you likely just don't know the amount of time it normally takes to do this stuff.

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and the idea of the staff being the freelancers is missing the point. The objective in using freelancers is to bring in extra capacity at the point it is needed.
I think it's you that misses the point.  With a full time staff, previously, using the same type freelancers that are now doing all the work, RM took many years to put out the previous editions.  Now the full time staff is gone and it's, effectively, just the freelancers.  That is the point.

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As a snapshot Eclipse Phase, as I mentioned above, has managed an average of 1 new product release per month for the last eight year, Paizo has put out an average of 6 rulebooks and 3 adventure paths each year for the past 8 years. Pinnacle Entertainment have put out more than 20 supplements per year for the past 14 years. Evil Hat have 35 publications for the latest incarnation of FATE since 2013 or just over 8 per year.
What type of supplements? What quality? What's the page count and unique material. What is the status of people doing the work?
I just don't believe you're comparing apples to apples. There are a lot of variables that we don't know about your examples.

96 publications for Eclipse Phase?  I find less than half that available.
Paizo is one of the best staffed and funded examples, not in the same realm.
Pinnacle has 280?  Exactly what are you including there?  Likely a lot of uncomparable stuff.

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This is all rather academic as ICE do things ICE's way. The target appears to be almost exclusively the existing players and we all already own RM in its past incarnations.
I still question if that's really the goal (existing players). If it is, I question the choice based on both the customer bases past behavior and demographic... unless this is really just a hobby for those involved.
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Offline Peter R

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #41 on: October 07, 2017, 03:02:32 PM »
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This is all rather academic as ICE do things ICE's way. The target appears to be almost exclusively the existing players and we all already own RM in its past incarnations.
I still question if that's really the goal (existing players). If it is, I question the choice based on both the customer bases past behavior and demographic... unless this is really just a hobby for those involved.

ICE have made absolutely no effort to reach out to the non-RM playing public for the public play test. There was no effort to promote the public play test across the blogosphere for example. Do you know of any efforts to draw in other communities?

It is the logical to then infer that if they are only asking us to play test then they are designing for us.

If they were designing for new players then they would value the input of new players, not avoiding it.

Can you draw any other conclusion?
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Offline Peter R

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #42 on: October 07, 2017, 03:54:15 PM »
The speed at which ICE operate is almost uniquely slow in my experience
It's not, you likely just don't know the amount of time it normally takes to do this stuff.

Quote
and the idea of the staff being the freelancers is missing the point. The objective in using freelancers is to bring in extra capacity at the point it is needed.
I think it's you that misses the point.  With a full time staff, previously, using the same type freelancers that are now doing all the work, RM took many years to put out the previous editions.  Now the full time staff is gone and it's, effectively, just the freelancers.  That is the point.

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As a snapshot Eclipse Phase, as I mentioned above, has managed an average of 1 new product release per month for the last eight year, Paizo has put out an average of 6 rulebooks and 3 adventure paths each year for the past 8 years. Pinnacle Entertainment have put out more than 20 supplements per year for the past 14 years. Evil Hat have 35 publications for the latest incarnation of FATE since 2013 or just over 8 per year.
What type of supplements? What quality? What's the page count and unique material. What is the status of people doing the work?
I just don't believe you're comparing apples to apples. There are a lot of variables that we don't know about your examples.

96 publications for Eclipse Phase?  I find less than half that available.
Paizo is one of the best staffed and funded examples, not in the same realm.
Pinnacle has 280?  Exactly what are you including there?  Likely a lot of uncomparable stuff.

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This is all rather academic as ICE do things ICE's way. The target appears to be almost exclusively the existing players and we all already own RM in its past incarnations.
I still question if that's really the goal (existing players). If it is, I question the choice based on both the customer bases past behavior and demographic... unless this is really just a hobby for those involved.

I pointed out that Paizo was on a different scale. And I never said that very publication was a full on multi hundred page supplement. I just said they were putting out content. I included things like free new designs for character sheets, floor plans to source books and adventures.

The point is that regardless of your budget you can get your hands on something new. Whether that is a free set of floor plans or book of NPCs for $4.99 or a supplement for $14.99. What is more , all of these things once released they stick around so new players have a whole back catalogue they can start to download for free at first and then the cheaper things to the full on supplements. All these things keep the cash tills ticking over. The basic business model for games companies is feed the addiction.

Pinnacle has 280?  Exactly what are you including there?  Likely a lot of uncomparable stuff.

Incomparable to the whole load of nothing that is ready for RMU? Yes it is different, it exists and is on the shelves ready to buy. I am not being intentionally harsh or abrasive but the description of what I was suggesting above such as a book of the extracted races or just the arms professions would be small supplements. Intentionally so. Little and often for pocket money prices are easier to complete and bring to market. Rolemaster Companion I costs $15 on RPGNow. Chop that into several booklets for example arms professions, the races, the qabbals, the package deals for goods, the additional monsters, the poisons and nefarious things. Turn those into seven $2.99 supplements and you have dodged the difficulty of the incompatible spell lists, avoided the arcane magic. You can throw in some attractive RMU character sheets and even interactive spreadsheet character sheets as digital downloads. If new enthusiastic players buy them all, and in the past we all bought everything, that is almost 50% more income ($20.93 vs $15) for less than half the content. I would bulk each PDF download out to about 15 to 20 pages including art and covers.

So no, I am not saying ICE can churn out a 133 page companion a month.
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Offline Cory Magel

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #43 on: October 07, 2017, 04:05:13 PM »
ICE have made absolutely no effort to reach out to the non-RM playing public for the public play test. There was no effort to promote the public play test across the blogosphere for example. Do you know of any efforts to draw in other communities?
Well, 'ICE' is, again, pretty much part time freelancers or volunteers that are scattered around the USA and UK.  I'm not going to say those in charge couldn't have tried harder, but it's not as if I can really give them much grief over it knowing the situation.

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It is the logical to then infer that if they are only asking us to play test then they are designing for us.
I was part of the process before the Beta went live and the stated goals were to simplify RM in order to gain new users (the only way RM will survive long term) and try to unite the RM2/RMC and RMSS/RMFRP crowds (in the hopes of obtaining customers in the short term).  I won't go into detail on how things progressed from there, but I will say I've asked many times since which was/is the more important goal, because I don't see what we have appealing to non-RM users any more (maybe even less) than the previous editions.

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If they were designing for new players then they would value the input of new players, not avoiding it.
I wouldn't say avoiding, I'd say not making a more concerted effort to seek it out (and, due to everyday life, may very well not have the time to).

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Can you draw any other conclusion?
For some time my conclusion has been that there have been problems and road-blocks with the process, both specific contributors and the overall reality of the situation.  Some, I think, could have been addressed much sooner and some were unavoidable.  I also think the current problem is that, in my opinion, we have an RMU that does not address the issue of the perception of RM by non-RM users and that it will also have the same diminishing return of existing customers that RM suffered moving from the RM2 crowd to the RMSS one.

If RM is to be a 'hobby' done for the sheer pleasure of the creators without much concern to profitability, they should do whatever they want.  If they intend for it to make a come-back and survive in the long-term we need to not be very concerned with what the current fan base thinks and focus on combating RMs past/existing reputation.
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Offline Peter R

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #44 on: October 07, 2017, 04:14:37 PM »
If RM is to be a 'hobby' done for the sheer pleasure of the creators without much concern to profitability, they should do whatever they want.  If they intend for it to make a come-back and survive in the long-term we need to not be very concerned with what the current fan base thinks and focus on combating RMs past/existing reputation.

I am not going to disagree with you there.

I wrote this back in 2015 http://www.rolemasterblog.com/who-is-unified-rolemaster-rmu-for/. It seems nothing has changed.
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Offline Cory Magel

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #45 on: October 07, 2017, 05:19:16 PM »
You touch on a number of points I've been making over the last few years too.

Kind of getting back to the threads point: I do not think RMU is a good representation of possessing the good of all the RMs and removing the bad from them and creating a unified RM.  I think too much of it is just plain new overall to succeed in uniting the customer base.  A lot more time should have gone into asking the fan base what they've customized, why, and how.  For example; do RM2 users like the RMSS round better?  Do the RMSS users like the RM2 profession bonuses better?  Does one group like how the skill system works in the other better?  And, possibly most importantly, if they (generally speaking) didn't modify it it's probably not broken and if it's not broken...
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Offline B Hanson

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #46 on: October 07, 2017, 05:25:35 PM »
We’ve been diving into these issues over at the Rolemaster blog.com.

Here is my most recent thoughts:

http://www.rolemasterblog.com/rmu-mission-accomplished/
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Offline Peter R

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #47 on: October 07, 2017, 06:17:08 PM »
You touch on a number of points I've been making over the last few years too.

Kind of getting back to the threads point: I do not think RMU is a good representation of possessing the good of all the RMs and removing the bad from them and creating a unified RM.  I think too much of it is just plain new overall to succeed in uniting the customer base.  A lot more time should have gone into asking the fan base what they've customized, why, and how.  For example; do RM2 users like the RMSS round better?  Do the RMSS users like the RM2 profession bonuses better?  Does one group like how the skill system works in the other better?  And, possibly most importantly, if they (generally speaking) didn't modify it it's probably not broken and if it's not broken...

I don't see RMU as being an attempted union of the two. There is a lot of HARP DNA in there as well. We cannot change where they started from.

The play test seems to be going nowhere. I think something needs to change.
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Offline intothatdarkness

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #48 on: October 07, 2017, 06:23:53 PM »
I'd actually call it enhanced HARP honestly. It has more in common with that than any RM stuff at this point.
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Offline B Hanson

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #49 on: October 07, 2017, 06:59:19 PM »
I'm hearing, and feeling, frustration. Peter and Adrian have fledgling publishing endeavors plus a number of RM projects they could move on. IntotheDarkness has 3-5 bolt-on modules for RM or RMU for alternative settings. I have a ton of stuff--I can revise, refine and publish 150 docs at $1-$2 per, have several larger projects and a list of future projects.

Honestly, I don't even care about $$. I want to turn this ship around using new market strategies (self publishing, OSR, OL, blah blah), open and cross ecosystem strategies etc. Is that even possible? I have my own opinions--you can read them all on Rolemasterblog.com.

The best strategy? Unleash the creative talent of third party authors via OSL for both RM, RMU and Shadow World. Run every publication through a verified channel like RPGnow. You know what? Players/users that see a stream of new and creative content WILL take a look at the game system.

As a business consultant, business owner and long time entrepreneur in a variety of industries I see a clear path to growth. Growth is scary or at the least unpredictable. We saw that with Shadow World. I get that.

On the other side, the industry has changed. IP holders can allow third party content in a way that doesn't threaten the core brand equity  because USERS DON'T EXPECT IT! Not every module will be written by Gygax. Buying third party open license material does not damage a brand. (btw: people still look for Shade of the Sinking Plain..hahahaha...it sucks..I have many copies and 3 still in shrinkwrap).
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Offline intothatdarkness

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #50 on: October 07, 2017, 10:15:27 PM »
You should look at the amount of activity on Kickstarter for the new Top Secret that's coming out late this month or next month. Amazing stuff for a game that's been out of publication for well over thirty years. And most of their module development is going to be freelance/open source. ICE is missing an opportunity here, I think.
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Offline jdale

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #51 on: October 08, 2017, 12:48:31 AM »
I think the market has changed and just finding a middle ground between RM2 and RMSS would not have been a good outcome. The current version of RMU removes some unnecessary, intimidating complexity, like the BAR, or compare the old moving maneuver table (in both RM2 and RMSS) to percentage maneuvers in RMU. Some changes are inevitably going to be matters of opinion, but I do certainly think that a new, naive player is going to have a better experience with RMU (in its finished final state) than they would with RM2 or RMSS. There is more intimidating material in TL and CrL but keep in mind those betas are in an earlier state than the current A&CL and SL betas and it's something that is being addressed.

While I think that Peter R's expectation about the speed with which supplements can be released is unrealistic (at least if we want to maintain system coherency and balance), there's no doubt that supplements can be released much faster than the core. That will to some extent depend on how many people step forward to write for the system, and also to what extent we can revise existing books versus having to write new material (I don't know if there are contractual issues about revision -- to be clear I have zero information and there may be no issue with this), but definitely faster than the core even if it's all new material being written. I think the long public playtest process has been hard on the development team and that may slow things down a bit, only because I suspect not all of those involved will want to turn around and jump right into another book, which is unfortunate, but at the same time I think the core will be better because of the time spent.
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Offline Peter R

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #52 on: October 08, 2017, 04:37:29 AM »
While I think that Peter R's expectation about the speed with which supplements can be released is unrealistic (at least if we want to maintain system coherency and balance), there's no doubt that supplements can be released much faster than the core. That will to some extent depend on how many people step forward to write for the system, and also to what extent we can revise existing books versus having to write new material (I don't know if there are contractual issues about revision -- to be clear I have zero information and there may be no issue with this), but definitely faster than the core even if it's all new material being written. I think the long public playtest process has been hard on the development team and that may slow things down a bit, only because I suspect not all of those involved will want to turn around and jump right into another book, which is unfortunate, but at the same time I think the core will be better because of the time spent.

I think I have different expectations of what a modern supplement looks like. The way RMU is set up, as long as the race/profession/creature rules are adhered to then balance should not be an issue. It is also my belief that criticals are also being constructed on a points basis. If that is also true then new critical types and tables, which are a firm favourite with many people are balance guaranteed. Creature Law has all the archetypes so new monsters are also going to be kept in balance.

I am not entirely sure what you mean by system coherency in a RM context. If it is ICE's intention not to fill supplements with optional rules, then I applaud that. I personally was never a fan. On the other hand every single GM at some point will change the RAW to fit their game world. RMU is sort of generic by which I mean it still carries much of its DnD heritage forward so is best suited to playing in World of Greyhawk or the Forgotten Realms. If by coherency you mean future supplements remaining coherent all past supplements then the onus for that is surely with individual GMs. All supplemental material is optional and GMs should evaluate and use what fits their game and discard the rest.

That last point is another good reason for going towards more frequent, more tightly focused, smaller supplements rather than 100+ page books. If I buy a 25 page supplement on Barbarian Warriors with professions, new weapons with individual weapons tables for new barbarian weapons (I don't even really know culturally who the barbarians were, I am imagining celts or scottish highland warriors and lot so blue woad!) and maybe some new skills to drop into the categories. By making that choice to buy that supplement I know what I am getting. I want barbarians in my game so I buy a $3 book on Barbarians. If I buy a 100+ page supplement that is not clearly themed such as a RM2 companion then chances are 90% of the content will not be used. RMSS supplements look better organised but the bigger and more wide ranging a supplement becomes, such as taking on an entire realm of magic, the less likely the information is going to useful. The chances of you needing Buddhist monks and European paladins and Caribbean Voodoo practitioners all in the same game is slim.

Ironically BHanson plays RM in shadow world and has had to change just about everything to make RM work with the setting. Intothatdarkness plays in a modern setting which is neither fantasy (RM) or science fiction (SM) and has had to change just about everything to make RM work with the setting. I play in the Forgotten Realms and everything works straight out of the box. My customisations are not to bend the game to the setting, it is to make RM faster to play with less record keeping and less dependence on the rule books at the gaming table.

I think there was a long period before you [JDale] became a public spokes person for the beta test that I would have described the RMU play test as one of the worst examples of project management for a games testing that I have ever encountered. The impression I got was of 'dump and run' the pdfs were released and then no one seemed to be coordinating any of the testing and no one seemed to have a plan of action. I may be completely wrong but that was the lasting impression.

I would say that even now it does feel like that there is a lack of impetus.
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Offline Cory Magel

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #53 on: October 08, 2017, 11:56:26 AM »
It is also my belief that criticals are also being constructed on a points basis.
I don't know if I have the formula I used anymore, but this is how I created the critical tables in the Channeling Companion.

Quote
I am not entirely sure what you mean by system coherency in a RM context. If it is ICE's intention not to fill supplements with optional rules, then I applaud that. I personally was never a fan. On the other hand every single GM at some point will change the RAW to fit their game world.
I think the optional rules are an effort to appease both the RM2 and RMSS camps and do complicate RMU, which somewhat contradicts JDales first two sentences in his last post.  Existing RM users will do as you say, eventually create their own optional rules anyhow, and new players don't need that complication.  Again, who is it really aimed at?

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That last point is another good reason for going towards more frequent, more tightly focused, smaller supplements rather than 100+ page books.
I figured this is what was coloring your statements about the amount of material being put out by other systems.  RM was, originally, intended to be integrated with other systems and eventually grew into a full system of it's own.  I think taking a somewhat similar approach again could be good, which would benefit from what you say here I think.  The only danger would be ensuring there are no unintended balance issues when combining all the various minor works.

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I think there was a long period before you [JDale] became a public spokes person for the beta test that I would have described the RMU play test as one of the worst examples of project management for a games testing that I have ever encountered. The impression I got was of 'dump and run' the pdfs were released and then no one seemed to be coordinating any of the testing and no one seemed to have a plan of action. I may be completely wrong but that was the lasting impression.

I would say that even now it does feel like that there is a lack of impetus.
Oh yes.  Much feedback being provided was, and likely still is (I have stopped paying attention partially due to it), invalid because the 'testers' were not using the material as-is. There are individuals that would vehemently argue something was wrong only for us to find out they had intentionally applied some of their own house rules, pretty much completely nullifying the results.  To be blunt there's a small handful of people that post regularly whos feedback I would be willing to trust without much concern.
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Offline Peter R

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #54 on: October 08, 2017, 01:54:06 PM »
Oh yes.  Much feedback being provided was, and likely still is (I have stopped paying attention partially due to it), invalid because the 'testers' were not using the material as-is. There are individuals that would vehemently argue something was wrong only for us to find out they had intentionally applied some of their own house rules, pretty much completely nullifying the results.  To be blunt there's a small handful of people that post regularly whos feedback I would be willing to trust without much concern.
[/quote

My personal play testing didn't really start until last year by which time jdales new tables were and they did make a big difference. There are many different types of broken though. Whilst combat worked; the feedback that I got, and I agree with, was that it [combat] was not fun. That sort of feedback then is really hard to quantify. In the early days I could only really test character creation as none of my players were interested in playing it having read the rules. Mind you it took me years to get them to move from RM2 to RMC and they still grumble when they fail a skill test with anything between 101 and 110 which would have succeeded under the RM2 rules. There is no helping some people!

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Offline Ecthelion

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #55 on: October 08, 2017, 04:59:05 PM »
I think the market has changed and just finding a middle ground between RM2 and RMSS would not have been a good outcome. The current version of RMU removes some unnecessary, intimidating complexity, like the BAR, or compare the old moving maneuver table (in both RM2 and RMSS) to percentage maneuvers in RMU. Some changes are inevitably going to be matters of opinion, but I do certainly think that a new, naive player is going to have a better experience with RMU (in its finished final state) than they would with RM2 or RMSS. There is more intimidating material in TL and CrL but keep in mind those betas are in an earlier state than the current A&CL and SL betas and it's something that is being addressed.
I agree that some complexity was taken out of the system. And that is a good thing. Still my biggest concern is with character creation and character creation will in many cases be the first thing new players will get to know of RMU. And, from the experience I had with my test characters, I had the impression that it now takes considerably longer to create a usable RMU character than it took to create a RM2 (sans optional rules and companions) and also longer than it took to create a RMSS/RMFRP character. The simple reason is that now a player has to do the old character creation for level 1 and then level up the new character two times more until it is at level 3, which is the suggested starting level. My fear is that people will shy away from a system which on the one hand requires so much preparation time for the first play session and then is also a quite deadly system.

Offline Cory Magel

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #56 on: October 08, 2017, 10:49:55 PM »
My fear is that people will shy away from a system which on the one hand requires so much preparation time for the first play session and then is also a quite deadly system.
Anyone remember that character creation is one of the things RM critics picked on?  Even if the new system, as a whole, is less complex (which I am not remotely convinced of) if people don't get past character creation it's a moot point.
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Offline Peter R

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #57 on: October 09, 2017, 04:25:05 AM »
Interestingly, the post I have just put up on the rolemasterblog is related to both character creation and game customisation.

http://www.rolemasterblog.com/thought-experiment-part-one-two/

If anyone has time to create a starting character at any time this week could you take a look?
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Offline Witchking20k

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #58 on: October 09, 2017, 08:25:12 AM »
I house-rule based on the campaign we are trying to play.  But, none of the games use the rules of any version of RM in their entirety, and I have some core concepts that carry over from campaign to campaign. I'm of the same mind as Cory- now that I have built my own core rules I will likely never "upgrade" because for me it's not an upgrade.  I also try and re-interpret the rules as written as often as I can rather than add whole new rules.

That said- setting material is always welcome and should be continued area of focus for ICE (probably more so than a new version of RM in some ways)
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Offline Peter R

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Re: How much do you customize your game ?
« Reply #59 on: October 09, 2017, 10:06:36 AM »
I house-rule based on the campaign we are trying to play.  But, none of the games use the rules of any version of RM in their entirety, and I have some core concepts that carry over from campaign to campaign. I'm of the same mind as Cory- now that I have built my own core rules I will likely never "upgrade" because for me it's not an upgrade.  I also try and re-interpret the rules as written as often as I can rather than add whole new rules.

That said- setting material is always welcome and should be continued area of focus for ICE (probably more so than a new version of RM in some ways)

As I said above every experienced GM should mould the rules around the setting. If you have current house rules about character creation could I nudge you to take a look at my little experiment?
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