Equipment Emporium Supplement

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Joe the Rat
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement

Post by Joe the Rat »

SmootRK wrote:Joe the Rat,
This is a large document. I think it is awesome, but I had a thought regarding getting it down in size. Perhaps this document only covers equipment, that is, Not Armor & Shields and Not Weapons. Instead, each of those topics can have their own Supplement accordingly (including the revisions you have made).

I might even suggest an Animal (mounts, guard-critter, pet, livestock) Supplement where all the extras for barding and such goes. Additional sections may be applicable as well.

In order to keep things together, I suggest a common naming theme:
Equipment Emporium: Weaponry
Equipment Emporium: Armor and Shields
Equipment Emporium: Gear and Services
etc. if you decide on breaking it up more.

??? Thoughts?
This would speed up finishing on things significantly - There are parts that are essentially complete (arms and armor), and parts that need significant love (the vehicles and animals portions in particular). It would not be difficult to tag the GM section to each.

I suppose one question is how narrow would we want to make each? I'd prefer a smaller series of ampersand titles to keep the spine-count down

Equipment Emporium: Arms & Armor (may include siege weapons)
Equipment Emporium: Gear & Outfitting (equipment, clothes, baggage, more quick-grab kits)
Equipment Emporium: Goods & Services (possibly consolidate hirelings and retainers here as well)
Equipment Emporium: Animals & Transportation (a bestiary of new or presented animals could be included)
Equipment Emporium: Magical Curiosities (all the magic item stuff we left out because it was getting too big)

(Obviously there are other ways to break this apart; Animals could easily be its own section - its just that a significant portion of transportation (anything land-based) involves animals.)
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SmootRK
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement

Post by SmootRK »

Yes.. that is essentially the idea, however the divisions end up going. It will also lend to more focused efforts to tidy up or fix any issues, as we can approach them one at a time, soliciting the forums and such for input (without as much info overload for those who look into the issues).
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Solomoriah
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement

Post by Solomoriah »

You do remember there is an Armor and Shields supplement, right? If at all possible, I'd like to see just one such supplement. Combining your work with that one would be a good approach, in my opinion.
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SmootRK
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement

Post by SmootRK »

Solomoriah wrote:You do remember there is an Armor and Shields supplement, right? If at all possible, I'd like to see just one such supplement. Combining your work with that one would be a good approach, in my opinion.
It is my understanding that Joe completely absorbed the contents of the first armor spplement into the emporium already. The original author ought to be given credit on the emporium as well.
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Solomoriah
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement

Post by Solomoriah »

I hadn't realized that.

EE is too big, IMO. Additional armor and shield types really need to be in their own supplement, so that the special combat rules that have been proposed for Combat Options will have a better place.

I really want to keep each supplement as stand-alone as possible. The shield splintering rule needs the additional shield types; if we have a proper Armor and Shields supplement containing both, it becomes effectively stand-alone. I'd prefer to see additional weapons treated the same way, honestly, with the remaining equipment comprising EE.

Having options is good, but keeping things compact is good too.
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LibraryLass
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement

Post by LibraryLass »

Solomoriah wrote:=The shield splintering rule needs the additional shield types.
...Why?
It originated among B/X players, who only have the one type of shield, and it works perfectly fine in that.
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Solomoriah
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement

Post by Solomoriah »

Let's look it over:
Shields-shall-be-splintered

This rule is an option that allows for shields to have a larger impact in combat.

Whenever a shield wielding character is hit with a natural 20, he may sacrifice his shield to reduce damage received.

Wooden shields reduce damage by 3, metal shields by 6.

Large shields add 1 to the damage reduction, small shields deduct 1.

Magical shields add their magic bonus to the damage reduction.

If the character is not proficient with shields (like a Thief) deduct 1, add his specialization bonus if specialized.
The Core Rules don't have "wooden" or "metal" shields, nor are shields available in a variety of sizes. Equipment Emporium (or Armor and Shields) is needed to make this make sense.

It's all a matter of dependencies. I don't like to let supplements get too expansive, to cover too much ground, because they start becoming dependent on each other. The shield splintering rule depends on the additional shields (or else it would be a lot shorter). Sadly, it also depends on specialization; however, that dependency would be easier to cover with a disclaimer than the other since it's a smaller bit in the first place.

But now that I think about it, the whole purpose would be to mitigate the effects of a critical hit, which makes it a combat options issue. Crap.

...

Part of this goes back to my blog post: The Difficulties of Sharing. Combat Options is MY supplement, and I kept it small because that's how I wanted it. I never heard of any variation of this shield splintering business until I saw it here, and though I can't give you a logical reason, it feels wrong. Whereas, the armor and shield specialization rules seem perfectly fine to me... a natural fit with the rest of the supplement.

I will say that I'll publish the Combat Options without the shield splintering rule. I won't say for sure if, in the end, I'll add it back in. There's just something about it that I don't like.
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LibraryLass
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement

Post by LibraryLass »

Ah. That.

That's... a strange variation. That's the first time I've ever seen anyone's take on it vary based on the type of shield and I've been playing or running campaigns using Shields Shall Be Splintered since around 2009.

Here's the blog post where the rule first originated in 2008: http://trollsmyth.blogspot.com/2008/05/ ... tered.html
With my houserule, you get the usual -1 to your AC with a shield. However, any time you take damage, you can opt instead to say your shield absorbed the force of the blow. The shield is shattered and must be discarded, but you don't take any damage from that hit. It's quick, it's easy, and it's valuable.

...

What about magical shields? I'm kinda meh about the idea of mundane swords being able to shatter magical shields. On the other hand, I certainly don't want a warrior being able to just ignore hits every round because his shield won't break. Maybe each +1 gives the shield a 10% chance to survive the blow? Maybe I just won't have magical shields in my campaign? Seriously, in the quarter-century-plus I've been playing D&D, I think I can count the number of magical shields in my games on one hand.
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Solomoriah
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement

Post by Solomoriah »

Ah, so it's recent.

In a game with different mechanics (such as, for instance, my other game Realms of Wonder), a shield is a sort of parrying weapon and not a kind of armor at all. This sort of question is natural to solve in such a game.

But changing the nature of the Core Rules is off limits, for good reason, so shields have to remain a sort of armor. I'm cool with large shields that are more encumbering but give +2 on AC, and bucklers that only affect one attacker per round, as an option in EE.

Trollsmyth's comments about how to handle magic shields aren't so easy to brush off for me. We do, often, have magic shields in my campaign, and even if we didn't, simply ignoring the issue won't work for a published supplement. I personally dislike the idea that a character would choose to sacrifice a valuable magic item willy-nilly (though in extremis I can see it). Further, the rule makes sacrificing the shield a choice of the user... someone with reenactment experience might jump in here to clarify, but I don't think in general you have a choice when your shield breaks.
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Joe the Rat
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Re: Equipment Emporium Supplement(s)

Post by Joe the Rat »

Mmm.. Okay, back on track, I'll cleave off weapons to work on a supplement, and splinter the armor and shields over to existing work (I have a couple tweaks to cross-reference). Straight-up Equipment is next, and from that, we'll see what fits well.
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