Combat Style Encyclopaedia gets Book of Schemes update (phase 1).
Now all special effects from Book of Schemes are available in the Combat Style Card pages
There are also 26 new Combat Styles from various campaigns and Armies and Enemies of Dragon Pass included In addition there are 11 new Combat Style Traits – mostly from Book of Schemes.
Overall count is now 742 Combat Styles and 132 Combat Style Traits.
You can find the Encyclopaedia here.
Explanation what Combat Style Cards are
Scribbling the combat results on pieces of paper has been the tradition of my game since the start. Sometimes it can be messy to remember when the stun location ends for npc #4. Here is a more structured approach that might help.
Add your player characters to the sheet one row at a time if you expect them to live for multiple fights. Now you have your own template.
Example of the template
Either print out the template in multiple copies for you to scribble the turn results. For the current fight use one of the copies.
Add the NPCs. Mark their initiative and action points.
For each round and turn mark the actions as they happen. Mark the current round turn combination with X so you know.
Mark the remaining hit points on locations that have been hit (or print out enemy from MeG). Abbreviations: LL Left Leg, RL Right Leg, A Abdomen, C Chest, H Head, LA Left Arm, RA Right Arm…
| Status | Turn |
| Bleeding (location) | Mark once per round until healed |
| Blinded | Mark to each turn that is affected |
| Charging | Takes a full round, mark to each turn in the full round |
| Dead | – |
| Difficulty Grade (number) | Mark DG-1 for Difficulty Grade 1 if needed for each round affected, or just use -1 |
| Disarmed | Mark each turn one at a time until armed again |
| Disengaged | |
| Entangled(location) | Mark each turn one at a time until free |
| Flee | |
| Gripped(location) | Mark each turn one at a time until free |
| Major Wound Must Heal | Mark up to 2xHealing rate rounds for abdomen,Chest, Head |
| No attack | Mark each turn affected |
| Overextended | Mark the next turn |
| Pinned Weapon | Mark each turn one at a time until free |
| Pressed | Mark the next turn |
| Prone | Mark each turn one at a time until free |
| Shocked(location) | Mark to each turn that is affected |
| Stunned(Location) | Mark to each turn that is affected |
| Surrendered | |
| Unconscious | Mark to each turn that is affected |
| … |
For example if npc #1 gets hit on left leg and right arm so that left leg has only 2 hit points left and RA is on -5 hit points and gains No Attack for 3 turns.
For example: LL 2, RA -5
Mark the No Attack to the status field and mark abbreviation N to each of the turns NPC # 1 is not able to attack
When the NPC #1 is hit with spell “Shock” add or modify the status to Shock and mark the turns affected.
You can find other useful charts for Mythras Players here
I added to the Combat Style Trait selection 80+ Combat Style Traits bring the whole number of selectable Combat Style Traits to be 135+ when you create or update your enemy. This should now contain pretty much all the Combat Style Traits published and a few campaign specific ones. You can select the combat style trait to be used like in the below picture
UPDATE: Divided the Combat Traits into subcategories:
to make it easier to select from the long list of traits.
You will find more on MeG here
Here is a list of Sorcery Spells for Mythras. You need to go to appropriate reference tome to see the description and details of the spells so you need to own those reference tomes to go into detail.
This first version contains theist spells from RAW rulebook, Thennla books, Fioricitta, Book of Schemes, Fenix papers and Assabian Rites.
The list has now around 175 spells when counting also the few overlapping versions
The link to file is here
There is a new version of Annilla that has taken into account the current understanding of what the cult has. In RQG there would be no MindLink or Mindspeech as they are embedded into the system there. I also added some spells (with a note which I added at the bottom) that I thought would be useful for what the cult presents.
Here is the link to the one pager.
Here is a list of Folk Magic Spells for Mythras. You need to go to appropriate reference tome to see the description and details of the spells so you need to own those reference tomes to go into detail.
This first version contains theist spells from RAW rulebook, AiG, Thennla books, Fioricitta, Book of Schemes, Fenix papers and couple I have adopted in addition from RQ Glorantha. The ranks and spell costs are in this version from AiG also for RAW spells.
The list has now around 130 spells when counting also the few overlapping versions between AiG and RAW.
The link to file is here
Here is a list of Theist Spells for Mythras. You need to go to appropriate reference tome to see the description and details of the spells so you need to own those reference tomes to go into detail.
This first version contains theist spells from RAW rulebook, AiG and couple I have adopted in addition from RQ Glorantha. The ranks and spell costs are in this version from AiG also for RAW spells.
The list has now around 430 spells when counting also the few overlapping versions between AiG and RAW.
The link to file is here
Updated: There are now all the Theist spells mentioned in the grand index document included. This means Taskan Empire, Shores of Korentia, Sorandib and Fioricitta. In addition also Book of Schemes. It means 510 theist spells overall (with some overlap and small variations of some spells)
Here is a starter set of resources for a Mythras Player (not the GM). This is a subset of all resources available at NotesFromPavis blog plus additional cheatsheet by Duke Herb that I find useful
The starter resources summary for Mythras GM can be found here
Book of Schemes by Dan True is a must addition to any GM’s toolbox for running Mythras. It joins my very short list of essential references alongside Monster Island. Book of Schemes concentrates on running a campaign in a city and brings alive a city that can be placed in a medieval or earlier campaign. More extensive review later on – there is loads of good stuff in the book.
Special effects get several new ones especially suited to city campaigns but useful also elsewhere.
I added the new special effects from the book to two of my GM and player charts. I will update the other charts later on.
Updated ones:
Tactics for selecting special effects
Reference sheets
Later on will update also the one pagers for special effects
It is worth your while to take a look at the Book of Schemes….
My friend Antalon from the Mythras forums wrote an essay on how to be a great player in the Mythras roleplaying game. Here goes:
—-
I Game Master nearly exclusively. I am, however, a bad player. By this I mean that when I am let loose as a player, I just act an arse! Almost instinctively I look for ways to disrupt, betray and connive against my fellow players and the Game Master’s world, plot or adventure. (What inner trauma this reflects is for a different occasion!) As I consider my own behaviour, it got me thinking about how the players I have now, and over the years, have played at my table, especially with Mythras.
Some of my sessions in recent years have been nothing short of a triumph… so I’m a great Game Master then? No. There is a lot of discussion and advice ‘out there’ about what it takes to be a good – or great – Game Master. I’m firmly coming to the view that a Great Game is absolutely a collective effort: Great Players maketh the Game Master! Players have as much or maybe more responsibility for the success of the game as the Game Master – this is, if you look for it, well established advice. There is also a plethora of good player advice generally, essentially boiling down to respecting each other: don’t be an arse like me when playing!
So, how do we help players be great at Mythras specifically? Here, I set out my observations and preferences for player behaviour that mark the difference between a successful – that is, engaging, satisfying, surprising, dramatic, and funny – and unsuccessful game. My views also reflect recent experience with players that are new to Mythras, and fairly new to roleplaying in general. My hope is that I can improve my own behaviour as a player, whilst also easing the introduction to Mythras for others, and help players make their Game Master great!
In brief, players should:
Be driven, be passionate! The Passion mechanics are, technically, an optional rule. But just use them! Getting players to express what make’s their character tick, and what drives them to ‘adventure’, is the first ‘way in’ for a player and Game Master to know what the character and the game world is about. Playing to their passions makes the players invested in the game and makes decision-making much easier: passions ‘tell’ the player what actions or reactions ‘fit’ a situation.
Finding the right way to express the passion can be difficult. There are two ways around this. First, be flexible, and allow passions to be ‘re-expressed’ as the character’s personality solidifies in the player’s and gaming group’s mind. Second, set some thematic guidelines for choosing passions. Discuss what your table wants from the game and what is suitable to reflect the themes of the adventure or campaign setting. For example, for a Monster Island game I asked players to propose three passions based on an ambition or personal goal, a vice or dependency and fear or superstition. From this, across the players, I got “love to create mayhem”, to “total faith in Sarnai” (one of the other player characters), to “loyalty to companions” amongst others. This was not necessarily quite what I anticipated, but it got the players invested, started a discussion and, somehow, this eclectic mix of passions worked!
However, this experience of such varied passions made me conscious that care is needed to ensure passions are not too contradictory, either with each other or between different player characters. Passions could risk outright intra-party conflict. None of us want to condone the “that’s what my character would do” argument! Share choices of passions with the other players, and if they are not working, discuss it and fine-tune. However, there is a balance. Passions should – perhaps ‘must’ – aim for ‘dramatic tension’ between player characters: think about the best weekly TV drama, it is the tensions between the recurring characters that make it worth watching!
Play with the players. A feature of play nowadays is often reliance on video-calls or virtual tabletops. This has exacerbated the practical and real-world social difficulty many players face if – in character – they challenge or engage with each other’s characters. How many times have your players watched passively whilst another player declares – unilaterally – they are “stabbing the prisoner in the face”? This is not a Mythras-specific issue. But, the singular thing that moved my games from okay or good to Great was how, by mutual consent, players focused their attention on each other. In this way, they gave ‘permission’ for each other to respond to or interrupt one another’s actions. Sometimes the interruptions could not prevent an action occurring, but this fuelled the in-game drama. In this player-to-player focused game I found that I too, as Game Master, had ‘permission’ to invite interaction between players, to open opportunities for intra-party drama. It also shifted the focal point of attention from me as Game Master to a shared, inclusive, and animated dialogue. If players act true to their character’s passion where everyone feels welcome to respond to character action, then drama follows, and the game group reinforces positive engagement.
Focus on the described scene and your character motivations. The core mechanic of Mythras is a very simple ‘roll equal to or under’ on percentile dice. But system challenges do exist. Two examples are Mythras-centric: the expenditure and accounting of Action Points (especially combing with movement); analysis-paralysis of combat special effects. With modest effort a reasonable level of system-mastery can be achieved. But players do not need to master Mythras to be an excellent player! What players need to do is listen to the Game Master’s description of event, listen to other player’s choices and their descriptions, then describe what they – the player character – want to achieve and how this could happen. What the player wants to achieve is often informed by their passions. The Games Master’s job is then to translate, or suggest, how to reflect this action with game-mechanics. Focus on the drama and visceral responses, do not allow outcomes to be framed as an optimisation choice. New players in particular find it much easier to simply be narrative: “I leap forward and try to drive the bandit back with the savagery of my attack, I want to stop them threatening Sarnai who is trying to cast healing magic!”, which could be handled as a Press Advantage or Bash special effect. Surely all I’ve done is just describe roleplaying? Yes. But the art of listening and description is an art to be nurtured!
Enable other players to voice their action without undue debate or barracking! This is advice to me as a player and a Game Master. Having established ‘permission’ for player-characters to interrupt, this does not mean that you – as a player – should interrupt. When it is another player’s go, it is for them to state their action. Do not comment, criticise, suggest, scrutinise, analyse or otherwise pass judgement on another player’s choices. I realised what a difference this made when I noticed one of my groups patiently allowing each player to voice their actions on their turn without commentary. The outburst of the player that interrupts saying “No! You should do …” We did not debate this concord. It just happened. And I found that this simple act of respect for each other hugely strengthened trust between players, and the success of my game. It also facilitated in-character interruptions. To be clear, I do not intend that your character passively accepts the actions or consequences of another player-character, remember play with the players and be passionate. The desperate cry of “No!” invites a response between players: “I stab the bandit in the face anyway, and then grin savagely at Sarnai!”. Or, a player shouts-out to the Games Master “Wait, Layla needs to stop this!”, leading to an adjudication of the drama between characters (“Okay, make an Opposed Combat Style roll, if you beat Muammar, then you managed to parry his stab to the bandit’s face!”). But, what if a player asks for advice? In this case, wherever possible, describe your own character’s perspective and their motivations: “what special effect is best?”… “Well, Layla wants to get out of the fight quickly, so she would want you to help us escape… what could you do to help?”. Questions on the rules should be answered by the Game Master.
So, in the end, I’m not sure if this is really very Mythras specific? But, it does not matter. I think these are the things that I should do when playing. I want my players to do this, as it will make my games successful. Our shared responsibility, as players and Game Master, is to make the game a success. Whenever I play, this is how I think I can contribute to that goal.
Notes From Pavis 