Topic: Some questions from a newbie on the HARP system

[Abdanck]

I was playing Rolemaster for years, and i was impress by the good work done on HARP to make it easier and more "user friendly" for the lambda RPG gamer.

But i have some question :

• No rules for Low Hit points / Power point malus ?
• No Fatigue/Exhaustion rules ?
• There is any Channeling rules to give/receive power point ?
• Thee is any Armor transcendance rule to bypass the Spell cost armor penalty ?
• All the "Balance skills" (Tightrope Walking, Stilt Walking, Skiing, Surfing, etc..) are now Acrobatics ?
• No more Reverse Stroke in the combat maneuvers ?

[Ecthelion]

I was playing Rolemaster for years, and i was impress by the good work done on HARP to make it easier and more "user friendly" for the lambda RPG gamer.

But i have some question :

• No rules for Low Hit points / Power point malus ?

Low hit points incur a penalty to Initiative. Other than that no reductions to activity due to low hit points or reduction to spell casting due to low PPs. The system is supposed to be simple and probably thus got rid of such penalties. But if you would like to have it, it is easy to add rules similar to those in RM.

• No Fatigue/Exhaustion rules ?

Don't remember, we never used them in RM and never search for such rules in the HARP books.

• There is any Channeling rules to give/receive power point ?

AFAIK no.

• Thee is any Armor transcendance rule to bypass the Spell cost armor penalty ?

Yes and no. The system allows for spell casting while wearing armor. The better the skill in the spell the better the chances for the spell to succeed. Therefore increase spell skill for better spell casting while wearing armor. Other than that a spell caster can use a Spell Adder to reduce the penalties.

• All the "Balance skills" (Tightrope Walking, Stilt Walking, Skiing, Surfing, etc..) are now Acrobatics ?

That would be an option. HARP tried to cut down the skill list. Personally I would say that Tightrope Walking, Stilt Walking are covered by Acrobatics, but would add spearate skills for Skiing and Surfing. But that's up to you.

• No more Reverse Stroke in the combat maneuvers ?

That's correct.

[RandalThor]

Like Ecthelion said, HARP is supposed to be less complex than RM. All of the things you mentioned can easily be implemented, but I would think seriously about doing so, because then you run into the situation where you might as well just go ahead and play RM. (Not saying that is a bad thing, just saying.)

Personally, I like HARPs combat better than RMs, The whole different ATs never has really sat well with me. Especially when you have a weapon that says it ignores the AT of the target, so they are considered AT-1. But, the tables are done in such a way that they have taken the limiting of movement heavy armor incurs and AT-1 is better than AT-20 in some instances because of this. (I think that the best way to handle that situation is to say the attack is handled by either the AT-20 column or the AT-1 column, whichever is worse for the target.) With the HARP method, all you do is get rid of the Defense Bonus granted by the armor, easy-peasy.

[Old Man]

Personally, I like HARPs combat better than RMs, The whole different ATs never has really sat well with me. Especially when you have a weapon that says it ignores the AT of the target, so they are considered AT-1. But, the tables are done in such a way that they have taken the limiting of movement heavy armor incurs and AT-1 is better than AT-20 in some instances because of this. (I think that the best way to handle that situation is to say the attack is handled by either the AT-20 column or the AT-1 column, whichever is worse for the target.) With the HARP method, all you do is get rid of the Defense Bonus granted by the armor, easy-peasy.

How did the combat seem without the bulk damage of the combat tables in additional to the critical results damage? Did it go slower or faster?

[RandalThor]

HARP's combat is inherently faster than RMs because you only have a single roll, there is no separate critical roll. Even if you use the Hack & Slash rules from the Harper's Bazaar (which I like), there is still just one roll. And, yes, without the 30+ different tables to flip through, combat can be even that much faster.

In HARP you have tables by critical type - crush, puncture, slash, etc. - with mods depending upon the weapon used, namely the size of the weapon. The size modifier is only applied if an attack resulted in a hit, meaning they succeeded in connecting, thusly modifying the result up (for more damage, used for larger weapons/attacks) or down (doing less damage, used for smaller weapons/attacks). So, if two combatants attack something, and they both get the same result, and everything else is equal/normal (no special abilities or magical effects) the character with the 2-handed sword will do more damage than the one with the dagger. (Hack & Slash just has different columns for the different size categories of weapons: tiny, small, medium, large, and huge.)

[Ecthelion]

HARP's combat is inherently faster than RMs because you only have a single roll, there is no separate critical roll. Even if you use the Hack & Slash rules from the Harper's Bazaar (which I like), there is still just one roll. And, yes, without the 30+ different tables to flip through, combat can be even that much faster.

Interestingly it is a misconception that HARP's combat is faster due to the single roll attack resolution. This feature does in fact help a bit (you don't roll a critical on every attack anyways), but most of the effect of faster combat resolution comes from the fact that damage on the HARP attack tables starts much earlier than on the RM attack tables and that penalties in combat affect not only OB but also the DB (the Qu Bonus of it). Therefore inferior opponents have a harder time parrying enough to avoid blows, and any combatant taking a critical that accompanies a penalty in turn gets hampered more than in RM in his ability to parry and often quickly gets hacked to pieces.

We tried the more RM-like combat system for HARP in our last session and, although this has a two-roll combat resolution, combat went just as smooth and quick as with HARP's standard combat system or H&S.

[Old Man]

A further Q - does HARP deal well with high HP creatures (say Dragons or Giants) which would take forever to grind down as you don't have the bulk damage from the Arms Laws plus the Crit damage? ( A quick glance at 2nd ed shows the HPs appear less - Giants at 200 as are Wyverns ... Not the 400 was it of a Cyclops.)