WarFlail's Archives - January 2003

Go to WarFlail's Archives - February 2003

Mounted Combat & Jousting Feedback

As I sit here twiddling my thumbs waiting for my copy of HM3 to arrive, I am delighted by the positive comments some HârnForum members (who are lucky enough to have already received theirs) are making about the Mounted Combat and Jousting rules I wrote for HM3. Examples:

Just got my copy of HM3. Specially love the new mounted combat article. - Kalle

I received my HM3 a few days ago. I read the jousting rules and I loved them! They are much easier to use, much faster and even more detailed that the ones Auran (and I) used for earlier tournaments. Excellent work, Bill! :-) - Sir Eldaen

Can't wait to try out the new mounted combat rules, either. :-) - Spartan

Also good are the mounted combat rules, and the jousting rules. - Fastred

Starting with Combat 19 however we have mounted combat rules and followed by Jousting rules on Combat 25 & 26 (two pages for jousting). I haven't tried them yet, but reading through them they seem workable and function much like regular combat in sequence which is a good thing. - Padriag

I really appreciate that the hard work was worth it. Thanks, everyone! :-)

Site of the Day

Darkfuries: Role-Playing Games Resources by Brian K. Moseley

The best way to describe Darkfuries' products is to call them campaign enhancers. These resources can be used in any campaign setting, including Hârn, to add to its flavour, be it through high quality floorplans, extensive background information or detailed NPCs. Check it out!

And here's another reason to take a look: the highly professional cover and interior artwork of the e-books were done by none other than the Hârn community's very own Castlewalls!

News From Dicey Business

DICEY BUSINESS is sent to all gamers on Columbia Games' mailing list, highlighting the new features added to www.columbiagames.com in the past two weeks. There are two editions of Dicey Business: Hârnworld and Boardgames. Editions alternate each week. If you wish to change your subscription please email: grant@columbiagames.com.

This edition is the HârnWorld edition.

HÂRNMASTER AND HÂRNPLAYER THIRD EDITION

Hârnmaster and HârnPlayer Third Edition are in the mail now. If you preordered your copy will be arriving any day now. Below is a summary of significant changes to the game. Thanks to everyone for their patience.

CHARACTER
The Hârnmaster character generation system has been expanded to give players a richer Hârnic experience.
Occupations: Characters have a wider variety of occupations, and can begin play with years of experience (higher skills).
Military: details for enlisting in the army are given.
Appearance: new tables for Complexion, Hair Color, and Eye Color.
Contacts: characters begin play knowing (potentially) influential people, which allows them to explore relationships and perhaps advance their social standing.

SKILLS
Skill Bases: the skill base attributes for some skills have been changed, including:
    Stealth: now Agl Hrg Wil
    Initiative: now Agl Wil Wil
    Foraging: now Dex Sml Int
    Herblore: now Eye Sml Int
Many OMLs have also been raised.
New Skills:
    Dodge: now a skill that can be improved.
    Condition: a skill that allows characters to improve their Endurance with physical fitness.
    Rhetoric: three new specialties Command, Diplomacy, and Intimidation.
    Ritual: three new specialties Liturgy, Theology, and Scriptor.
Specialities: each specialty is a separate sub-skill and characters may have as many as they wish. Instead of a 10% bonus, characters now enjoy two point ML increases for skill development rolls of a specialty.
Mental Conflict: revised to bring into line with Hârnmaster Religion.

COMBAT
Mounted Combat: introduction to horse breeds and detailed rules for mounted combat.
Jousting: rules to amuse knights and perhaps win the favor of a lady. Jousting Pole added to weapon data table.
Outnumbering: penalty applies ONLY to Defense Options (including Counterstrike), NOT to Attack.
Flails: all Flail weapons have higher impacts. The one-handed Ball & Chain and two-handed Warflail are now the most dangerous blunt weapons.
A/D: weapon modifiers now expressed in 1d100 scale and a few have been changed (such as Longknife).
Kurbul: defense values for Kurbul armour are reduced to B4 E4 P3 F3 (from B4 E5 P4 F3). It was formerly just a little too good for its low price and weight.

PHYSICIAN
The healing rules are improved and easier to use. All characters may attempt treatment rolls to aid a wounded friend. A treated wound usually heals. Bloodloss and infection remain optional.

PSIONICS
Psionics is no longer an exclusive GM Routine. Psionic talents (if any) remain hidden from players until activated (if ever), but then operate like any other player skill.
Talent Generation: there is a more generous allowance for talent generation rolls.
New Talents: Transference and Transmutation. have been added.

BESTIARY
Bestiary Table (with revised stats).
Rules to handle creature size.
Articles for Gargun, Ivashu, and Yelgri which follow the format of our HârnQuest articles.

CAMPAIGN
No major changes.

TREASURE
Major and minor artifacts section has been extensively rewritten.

HÂRNQUEST 3

There are more new articles for Hârn coming later in February. The major site in HQ 3 is Olokand greatly expanded with a large section on the Chelebin Tourney. A Hârnmaster Bestiary article on horses is also planned. Look for sneak previews soon.

Autoship is best way to get the new HârnQuest releases. Autoshippers also get a free PDF copy of each article. Join now via our website by placing an order in the Columbia Games Store.

Hârnic Religions Calendar

The following, by Phil Hendry, is a handy Hârnic calendar showing all holy days and festivals for each religion.

Hârnic Religions Calendar (PDF)

HârnMaster & HârnPlayer Shipping!

The latest word from Columbia Games is that the long-awaited HârnMaster and HârnPlayer have been sent in the mail to everyone who had pre-ordered. This is very exciting news indeed!

New Link

The newest addition to HÂRN LINK is the following site:

Orbaal, From Far Off Shores by Joel Bisaillon

Aside from a downloadable character sheet (in .XML format) and a couple of nice scenic images of various parts of Orbaal, there currently isn't a lot available on this site. However, the plan is to make it into a campaign site for an ongoing OpenRPG game based in Orbaal. As this is a work-in-progress, be sure to check back on it from time to time.

SlackFlail...

Happy New Year and sorry about the lack of recent updates here. A significant portion of the past few weeks was taken up looking after MiniFlail while Mum went back to fulltime work for a while. There was also a period of downtime as I upgraded my ageing computer to something a bit more modern.

To be frank, though, there hasn't been much Hârn-wise to announce lately. Despite Columbia Games' announcement some months back that the eagerly anticipated HârnMaster Third Edition (HM3) would be out in November 2002, there is still no sign of it anywhere. Nor is there any sign of HârnPlayer Third Edition or HârnQuest 3, which should have been out by Christmas. This has caused a certain amount of consternation among the HârnForum community, particularly among those who had their credit cards billed for these non-existent products back in October. :-(

The delays are not entirely CGI's fault, though. HM3 had been mostly done for ages, except for the Mounted Combat rules. There were some fundamental problems with the original rules in HM1 (HMC didn't even feature Mounted Combat), that upon closer inspection were found to be linked to other problems with the Bestiary stats. So around November, I was summoned to rewrite those rules, which took some weeks to finalise. So I suppose I am partly to blame as well...

BTW, seeing as the Mounted Combat rules are core to the Jousting rules I wrote for the Tournaments article in HârnQuest 2, the Jousting rules had to be left out of the final article (but will definitely appear in a future one, perhaps in HM3 itself, or perhaps in HQ3...).

Go to WarFlail's Archives - December 2002

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