Quote:
Originally Posted by buzz
How did your playtest of this product go? What was awesome about the book when used at the table?
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I mentioned some of this in the review -- essentially, everyone loved the fact that there was basically nothing they could do in melee combat that the book didn't already cover. "Okay, with my Power Blow I rolled... whoa, that's a great damage roll! Can I cut through BOTH his legs?" My response: "Let me just turn to that page... ah, here we go. 'Extreme Dismemberment'. Here's what you need to roll to carry the swing through to his second leg."
The rules for Styles made it easy for players to build PCs with martial training. We used the rules in a WWII-era game, and one player knew Judo and Jujutsu. She listed all of the techniques for both styles on her sheet, and used that as a reference for what she was trained in in combat. (And, as she was a great roleplayer, she'd even try less effective Judo (which is a sport more than a combat style) moves in combat when it seemed appropriate, since that's what her character was primarily trained in.)
I have yet to run an outright "Martial Arts Game" with these rules. Instead, I've just been using them as needed to flesh out characters and make rulings in combat. For example, in my last game session, we pulled this book out when a bad guy fell and one player asked, "Hey, did they update Stamp Kick to the new edition? Because I want to boot this guy in the head, hard!"
(I do plan on running a few dedicated martial arts adventures at Hallowcon next month, so I'll probably come back to this thread and comment on how it went. The theme this year is pirates, so whoever runs cold steel through the most pirate hearts will be the winner each time. Arrrrr. <grin>)