Sup?

I generally prefer to game straight out of the box without much house rules but there's one thing I feel is missing from the weapon stats and that is some sort of "chance to break" or durability.

Essentially I am thinking to give each weapon a durability rating using chaos stars. Once you've rolled enough chaos stars the weapon is downgraded with some hefty minuses, say perhaps -2 DR and -2 CR and / or some trait like Unbalanced or In Need of Repair or some such (doing something bad though I am not sure what exactly). I want a character to think twice before using the weapon but be able to if desperate enough. If another chaos star is rolled while the weapon is in this state it breaks permanently. If taken to a relevant craftsman before it can be repaired and rebalanced for a smaller fee, say a tenth of its original cost.

Then, after perhaps ten repairs, and now I am just typing as I think, a certain weapon got get an additional trait - I Know your Knocks and Crannies Like the Back of my Hand (name subject to change). This would give a small but noteworthy bonus, a fortune die sounds about right, because of a character having become atuned to a certain, unique weapon and learnt it's every imperfection and inbalance.

Anyways, that last piece I am not so sure about but what I want to get out of this idea is something along these lines:

a) adding to the gritty feeling by adding the risk that your sword breaks while fighting for your life (I also like to think that it adds to the credibility of the game, or immersion if you will.)

b) adding an additional moneysink for the characters to deal with

c) forcing additional interaction with the world by either getting old weapons repaired or buying new weapons

d) being a relatively minor addition to the rules and something that can be tacked on without changing anything (just keep adding those chaos stars)

To me this seems like a really good and somewhat slick house rule but the question is, is it? I would also need some help in determining how many chaos stars a standard hand weapon should take before breaking. I do not want weapons to break to often while still being a real concern and something that characters needs to take into account before heading out. Essentially what I want your help with is telling me if this rule will do roughly what I want it to do, in your opinion.

Thank you for reading.

Interesting idea... will probably use something like that. Money sinks are often needed in some way or another...

Just a suggestion. Instead of the -2 CR/DR thingy.. wouldnt it be better to use the existing rules for weapon quality? (p 72, roleplay rulebook).

An average weapon would become downgraded to a poor quality weapon (triggering the extra misfortune dice), while poor weapons might simply break (unless you take care of your weapons, repairing them and such). A broken weapon could probably still be used as an improvised weapon though i guess, but then you might as well use a chair.

When it comes to superior weapons I'm more sceptical though... it should take ALOT of bad things and mistreatment happening to such a weapon to degrade it to an average weapon (although it should be possible). Otherwise it would be very hard to explain those very old superior weapons that exist.

Freiduin said:

It can be resolved by adding the possibility of repair/reforge tests. Let's say, a succesful repair test removes the effect of one chaos star of damage, and a comet rolled removes another one. Chaos stars rolled on the repair test add one to the damage (perhaps to a maximum of 1, so that an overal success with two chaos stars rolled doesn't mean the weapon has one more damage than before the repair attempt). Repairing a weapon from "poor" to "normal" state would be difficulty 2, from "normal" to "superior" difficulty 3 or even 4.

Personally, I like the idea of adventurers actually giving the maintenance of their weapons some thought.

By the way.. if one apply such rules to weapons.. they probably should be applied to armors as well. Armors take a lot of polishing, bludgeoning out buckles and what need takeen care of to keep in perfect trim. Although i guess such rules perhpas should be based on how many crits the armor is subjected to.

-Chaos star (hey, wasnt that in the first rules example above.. whell, i guess it would be simpler to use the chao stars for this too, It the rules follow different sets of armors compared to weopns it migh become just "too complicated" to keep the game running it the fast mode it has currently during combat.

Sorry fot any mistakes or raveling om langueage or grammatical error in the post abou. My sleepinomg drugs i just too much and about 20 in ago are bginnig to maek it really hard to me for foucs. Uope pe eveyoneundersud *WWY O WAS NOT HEAR .-hear.(at least not mentally) Going to bed to seeep now and see if that I anc natnuarivia following thesforums tommorrorr. Seeyha all fot theniii kight(over and´d nigth)

Thank you for your comments.

@ Freiduin. That is a very good suggestion, to just downgrade the weapon quality instead of making up some other modification. I'm still in the process of digesting all the rules so it hadn't even crossed my mind, but it fits naturally, thank you.

Maybe an easy rule of thumb would be that a poor quality weapon halves the durabilty rating while a superiour weapon doubles it?

About armour, yes I considered that but I do not see an easy way to control the when and how since there's only one roll and any chaos stars rolled affect the weapon first and foremost. If you have any ideas let me know, as I said I am still learning the rules so might easily have missed an obvious opportunity. All in all though I think that it is probably enough for the players to deal with weapon durability and I do not see any real additional game effect of also giving armour a durability rating. The rules system is fairly light and I feel it is important to keep modifications to a minimum.

Another thing all together though are shields, if anything they should in need of repair the most, but since they use exactly the same rules as armour they share the same difficulty of adding a durability trait.

@ Ferozstein. Yes, a system like that might be needed although I am unsure if it doesn't risk complicate the whole process needlessly. Food for thought in any case, thank you.

All in all the first stop is to find the right amount of chaos stars for a standard hand weapon of average quality.

Just to be clear I'll type out the mechanic first. Each weapon will have a durability rating. This rating will consist of a number of chaos stars. On top of any other effect each chaos star rolled when using said weapon will be added to a sum which will be saved between encounters and sessions. Once the sum of chaos stars reach the durability rating the weapon quality is downgraded one level and then starts over again or resets if you will.

Example:

A normal hand weapon of average quality has a durability rating of (picking a number at random) 6 chaos stars (if it would be of poor quality its durability rating would be 3 and if of superior quality 12). Once, after many heroic fights the total number of chaos stars rolled with that weapon reaches 6 it is downgraded to poor. The count of chaos stars begins again, now towards 3 chaos stars because of the weapon being in poor quality (which also would add an additional misfortune die to any roll).

Now, how shall we determine the right number of chaos stars? I'll try to make an educated quess although math is not one of my skills so feel free to point and laugh and correct me.

1. The default difficulty for melee and ranged combat is easy (1d).

2. The risk of rolling a chaos star on a challenge die is 1/8.

It is completely arbitrary and ridiculous to try to establish how many rolls per combat a given weapon will see but for arguments sake I am thinking that getting one chaos star per encounter while perhaps not a sure occurance is not going to be rare either. So, roughly one chaos star per (combat) encounter.

How often do we want the weapon to break? Certainly not every session, probably not even every adventure either, but as stated before a weapons durability should be something that needs to be taken into account by the convervative adventurer.

So, drawing from this exhaustive mathematical formulae I judge that the durability rating for a standard hand weapon of average quality should be......(drums)......uhm.......ehh......8 chaos stars! (applause) Better to start to high than to low at any rate.

The next step would be to find the most durable and the most fragile weapon in table 9-5 and work from there but I'll leave it like this for now, awaiting your comments.

Again, thank you for reading.

We will be testing the following rule for the next few sessions:

[Proposed Rule - Item]

Breakable Weapons

Some weapons are fragile, particularly weapons with wooden hafts. Even though they are fragile, they are still commonly used because they are powerful weapons. Reading the rules, for example, there is no reason why everyone in the world doesn’t use a spear. According to the stats, it is a superior weapon.

To balance the weapons list, we are adding a new weapon quality called ‘Breakable’ similar to the ‘Unreliable’ quality. It will be applied to all shafted or otherwise breakable weapons.

Weapon Quality: Breakable
These weapons have durable forged heads that are often mounted on more fragile shafts or are otherwise breakable. An unfortunate strike from an enemy or an unbalanced swing from the wielder could snap the shaft or damage the weapon, rendering it useless. If at least as many Chaos Stars as the weapons ‘Breakable’ rating are rolled during an attack or parry, then the weapon breaks and is useless until it is repaired. Repairs are simple, assuming the character has access to a simple shaft or other materials needed to repair the damaged weapon, and may be done without consequence after combat. Breakable weapons without a ‘Breakable’ rating are assumed to be Breakable 2.

The following weapons are breakable:
Halberd Breakable 3
Improvised Breakable 1
Javelin Breakable 2
Lance Breakable 2
Lasso Breakable 1
Net Breakable 2
Quarter Staff Breakable 2
Spear Breakable 2
Sling Staff Breakable 2
Whip Breakable 2

Note: With the exception of ‘Breakable 1’, this will not be an overly common occurrence.

[Rule]

Perhaps armors could be damaged when critical hits strike them. (I know its not ideal, but it uses the current rules). The severity of the critical hit (1-3) would affect how much damage was dealt to the armor. An armor might be able to take a number of crit severities equal to 5 x (Defense + Soak value) with a minimum of 10 (5 is simply too low).

I'd probably make an exception for when it comes to wizards robes though.

Those robes seem to follow a wizard throughout their long careers, where they keep upgrading them, embroidering them etc making them more and more fanciful. Either simply say the are magical enough (due to their constant proximity to the wizard themselvs) that they don't get damaged/shreaded... or you might allow a simple casing of the Cantrip spell to completely repair the Wizards of robes.

I'll probably go with the last suggestion (the Cantrip one), since it fits perfectly with the class and still costs the wizard a bit (in the form of 1 spent power).

@ NezziR. Seems like a nice house rule. Personally I am not sure if I want to let swords and what not get away but I am eager to hear how it works out for you.

@ Freiduin. Actually having critical hits wear down armour isn't half bad at all. I'll have to give that one some thought but it should work well enough. Good catch with the wizard's robe too, I would never have considered them.

Anyone familiar enough with the system or probability to make an educated guess as to how many chaos stars a standard weapon should have in durability?

bladerunner_35 said:

Well, this is a special kind of probability since you just keep rolling and add every chaos star until you reach a fixed number. It is pretty advance math, but i'll try to explain it in laymans terms (without getting too deep into the math behind it).

The first dice you roll has 1/8 chance to be a chaos star. On average you'll end up with a chaos star after 5 rolls (I've rounded it off). (There is some pretty advanced math behind this number. Just remember, this is a simplification that is near enough).

And now for the easy part.

Every dice after the first will take 8 full rolls to get a chaos star. (still simplified, but near enough).

This would give a formula looking something like this: 5 + 8 x number of rolls after the first one

So.. if you for example wonder how many rolls on average it would take to get 5 chaos stars, if you roll 1 such dice every roll:

5 + 8 x 5 = 45 rolls

So, it would take 45 rolls on average to get 5 chaos stars. (A whole lot of rolls in this game, i'd say).

As you can see, each chaos star beyond the first one increases the number of rolls needed by 8.

NOTE: Remember, that the above isnt the correct mathematical way to do this, but the result will be close enough. I'm trying to do this as simple as possible.

NezziR said:

My Issue with"Breakable 2" is that not only is that 1/64 chance to roll double Chaos Stars when you roll 2 Challenge dice, but how often do you ever roll 2 challenge dice? I don't recall any melee attacks that add a challenge dice and although I'm sure there are it is easy to just not use them to remove any chance for weapon breakage.

I had included a version of breakable on my "new weapon" post for spears and lances - let me know what you think.

Excellent work Freiduin!! Really very good of you, thank you.

So that would mean that my proposed 8 chaos stars for a standard weapon would require 69 rolls to break. Indeed, a lot of rolls. Even at your calculated 5 chaos stars. It is impossible to say without significant gaming experience, what would be the sweet spot but around 4-5 I'd say.

So, a nice ordinary sword of average quality would have a durability rating of 5 chaos stars (3 if it is of poor quality and 10 if it is of superior quality). Sounds like a decent beginning to me, now for the rest of the weapons....and thanks again man.

Some very good solutions here! I am trying to stay within a minimalist approach (not having to track anything other than the quality of the weapon).

In order to beak an opponent's weapon: defender must use parry or block action, results 1 comet + 2 boons. Effect: reduce weapon's quality by one level. If weapon was of poor quality, it breaks.

Chance for your own weapon to break: 1 star + 3 banes. (No other requirements as you may have hit, missed and hit a wall, a tree, etc, so long as it makes sense). Effect: reduce weapon's quality by one level. If weapon was of poor quality, it breaks.

NezziR said:

I'd include Block, as well. Shields break all the time (or just get beaten into uselessness, a la Sean Connery's "Time Bandits" scene.)

Freiduin said:

That's solid gold. Thank you. i will totally be using the downgradable.

For superior items: Why not have a Chaos Star and 2 Banes = downgrade. Everything else is a Chaos star = downgrade.

I really like the idea that the GM can produce varable results with the negative effects that the players roll. It keeps the players guessing and allows the GM to tailor the negative effect to the situation. Sometimes, a damaged weapon will add to the scene...sometimes it will not, so hit them with Fatigue or something. =D

Excellent thread !

Let's say considers the weapon's size = the weapon's "breakability" :

your weapon downgrade a quality level (rulebook p.72) after a number of chaos stars equal to the weapon's encumbrance (rulebook p.74).

I think it's a good solution (auto-congrat, sorry)... If you want more chaos star needed, you might switch it for the weapon's DR (rulebook p.74)

Great rule/solution. I'll take this for our house rules, too.

The only thing I am wondering about is if this should be something that the GM should keep track of and secret(I know that he/she doesn't need another thing to keep track of). If the characters asked you could tell them " Your trust battle ax has seen better days, the leather is worn and frying and there are a few deep nicks in the dulling blade." When it was getting close to breaking. You would just describe it to a worse and worse degree as it degraded. An experienced warrior would know that the weapon is getting rough looking but wouldn't know exactly when it was going to break or become unuseable. I just have this picture of a slayer carring in his broken ax wrapped in a blanket with a concerned look in his eyes... "Can it be saved, blacksmith? sniff, sob"

Sorry to necro such an old thread but since I haven't managed any regular games of WFRP3 I am wondering if anyone ever used one of these house rules for breakable weapons and if so, how they worked?

Thanks in advance.

For unconquered chaos stars, I have a d10 chart (made from the alternate effects in the Players guide). One of the entries is "weapon damaged." The quality goes to poor and to fix cost is equal to the price to upgrade (50%). For superior items, they go to standard. Poor goes to unusable.

Seems to work fine.

jh

Thanks Emirikol!

And since the above is to short for a post I'll give you another round of thanks for your Player's Guides!

Emirikol said:

Here's my basic effects list (mostly from the players guide). I keep a d10 next to me. It's just there to give inspiration for the most part and works well.

GM’s Suggested Effects for Unresolved Star or Comet
Chaos Star
1. Fall prone o rdrop an important item or weapon
2. Suffer severe penalties (one purple or more) to fugure related tasks or render them impossible (i.e. break a lock you were attemping to pick, if you also failed the check; get ejected from court for offending a powerful noble, etc.)
3. Suffer an environmental mishap, such as falling from a high place, breaking through ice, or spraining an ankle on debris (fall prone)
4. Discover a new or unexpected hazard or enemy, suffer he effects of worsening conditions (weather, mud, etc.) or otherwise advance the story ot the detriment of the active player.
5. Suffer a large amount of fatigue or stress (1-3 short of unconsciousness)
6. Suffer a wound or convert a normal wound to a critical
7. Make an enemy or attract the attention of foes
8. Negatively affect party tension (advance to next mishap location on the tracker)
9. Weapon becomes damaged (drops one level of quality; cost to fix is equivalent to damage)
10. Hamper an allies action (grant them a purple) or other ill effect (Players suggest!)

Sigmar’s Comet
1. Cause critical effect or extra progress on a progress tracker
2. Gain a yellow blue to a future related task or confer bonus to ally
3. Receive aid from unexpected source, make new ally
4. Open a new avenue of approach, reveal an unsuspected information source, or otherwise advance the story for the benefit of the player
5. Recover a large amount of fatigue or stress (2-4 points)
6. Cause a foe to suffer an environmental mishap, such as knocking him off a bridge or dropping a chandelier on him.
7. Reveal an OMEN, lose a corruption point, or
8. Opponent drops a weapon or shield (maneuver to recover); or
9. Perform act so heroically, that party tension is reduced by one.
10. Regain a fortune point or Other positive effect (Players Suggest!)