cegorach said:

You kind of kill your own point, so I'll use it to make mine again. A character like the sword master is the product of several decades if not a century or more of training, this is rules wise expressed with the special Sword Master only action cards, he can do more, yes it does make him special compared to a soldier. Now if you where to have the SM as an advanced career then any character ranking into it would effectively be removed from your game as the training would take longer to complete than the majority of the groups life expectancy, in other words, the player would, following the lore lose the character. Its not just good marketing sense its also good lore sense if we ever want to see these careers as playable.

What special "Sword Master Only" actions? anyone can use them.

I'd rather sword masters not be a playable class than make them Lame.

To be honest this whole debate is kind of silly, if you don't like them the way the rules handle them then don't use them, all I can say is that its a cool career with a lot of roleplaying potential in it. Remember role playing is not about how cool or ub0r or kickass your character is, we have MMO's for that, its about playing a role. If all this at the end of the day is about dicerolling then FFG has that awesome descent game or Talisman, just for you... Sorry that was a bit mean, but I tire of this fanboyish "if its not just excactly like I imagined it then its lame" attitude that seems run through gamers these day. Too much WoW I say.

Wow, way to resort to ad hominem.

Where did I say that I wanted to be kickass or ub0r or whatever? I am saying that if someone comes across an NPC swordmaster or Wardancer in game, I want them to think *wow* this guy is awesome, he is the pinnacle of his skill - I do not want to mess with him. Also if after playing an extended campaign a player is accepted to be a wardancer I want them to feel proud, to feel that they achieved something.

If a swordmaster is only as good as any starting thug, soldier, mercenary then that removes alot of the mystique the class has - they become "just another career" rather than something special and I think that it is sad.

There are no swordmaster only action cards (per RAW) anyone can learn the styles of the swordmaster or the wardancer which again to me takes something from the "specialness" of these amazing warriors. In my game I will reduce access to the special classes until later, and likely restrict the special actions to members (current or past) of the appropriate career.

Actually the swordmaster actions are sword master only, you need his speial class ability to use them, to use the sword master cards you need to have the Way of the Sword, for the wardancer you need to have Ritual Dance and for the ironbreaker you need to have the Ancestor. The only way to acquire these actions is if you have the careers and they do create a significant difference in character design and ability trust me a Sword Master won't be bested by a goblin unless he is really unlucky, read the cards its right there on them ^^.

Also I did a little looking about its not on the card, but on the pamphlet that came with the box. Under new action cards it states:

The Way of the Sword represents the masterful combat abilities of the Sword Masters of Hoeth. The Wardancers of Athel Loren practice various Ritual Dance. The elite dwarf Ironbreakers us abilities inspired by their Ancestores.

Now the wording is crap, I will grant you that, but I at least read them as meaning that you need the career to take them, also for example the Sword Master of Hoeth has under his career type description: Sword Master, its all a little er uncomplicated, I think we read too much into things, the game sorta assumes a basic level of "common sense" that we as gamers seem to over look, we are too used to rules being described in minute detail and everything spelled out in the rulebooks, but I may just be making an ass out of me and umption.

BTW everyone I'm sorry for my tone, it does seem like I have been commig off like a grumpy old fart in my last few posts that was not intended and so here it is, my second "sorry didn't mean to" in a week. ****, christmas really does get the best out of everyone doesn't it.

Kaptain O said:

My story. Back in the 90s I bought Warhammer RPG when I was really into the table top battles game. Most of the guys I gamed with were rpg fans so I thought it would be a perfect fit. Turns out no one wanted to play it. Partly because, in the core book, there were no named "unit" guys from the table top game. I had to admit I really could see why they didn't want to play a farmer or merchant. They were so ingrained with the idea of those classes being weak and NPC ish, (From other RPGS) the whole project was met with disdain, thus I never did play it.

So for me, if one player is a wardancer, then I can explain to that player, that they are special without the need to map out their careers. Not to mention the game is brutal and someone could die very easily before becoming what they really want to be.

That said, I totally understand people that don't like this because they are preserving the feel of the setting. I must say one of the more refreshing things about being on these forums is that there's not always a player first attitude (yeah play whatever you like) like some other RPGs, in fact, preserving the STORY and SETTING is very important around here and after years of other RPGs where the player group is made up of 5 character that don't make sense in a party, it's nice to see that concern.

Well warhammer is about as lore heavy as you can imagine, most other settings are thin little floosies compared to the 30 years of baggage that this game lugs about, good and bad. I having played a lot of games down through the ages I can safely say that WFRPG has by far the most rabid fanbase I have ever come across, the slightest deviation from what they see as the "right" way of playing the game or any warhammer based game and debates get heated real quick, hell I have done it as well once or twice.

UncleArkie said:

I understand what you are saying, but the FAQ says you are wrong:

Errata/Clarifications/FAQ Page 4

(NE W) Are Traits Restrictions?
In and of themselves, no. An individual trait only becomes a restriction
if another rule interacts with the trait and defines a restriction.
A trait is merely a design element that other design elements may
interact with. The Slayer trait does not mean that only Slayers
may access or use cards with that trait. However, there is a greater
possibility of an interaction between traits associated with careers,
action cards, or special abilities.
For example, the Troll Slayer career ability interacts with the Slayer
trait on that career path, while the Wardancer’s (AT) special career
ability works best with the Ritual Dance trait found on cards, as the
Ritual Dance cards look for other cards with the Ritual Dance trait.
However, by themselves, neither the Slayer nor Ritual Dance trait
connotes any usage restriction.

The traits Slayer, Way of the Sword, Ritual Dance and Ancestor are traits and do not represent restrictions on learning or using the actions they are on.

Kaptain O said:

You see now I just went and joined your camp, that is silly, just very, very silly and IMO actually deters from the game and the careers, I think I am going to ignore that part of the erratta.

Actually I am not, who is to say that a worthy warrior should not be honoured by learning the way of the sword, of course learning these things would have to have them go and train with the appropriate faction of elves or dwarves, problem solved, rules are in compliance. Sure you as a soldier can learn it, if you can find someone to teach you.

Might actually be fun having a SM in the group trying to teach the pitfighter how to part the waters, while the big brute keeps using force, lots of good roleplaying there.

UncleArkie said:

I'll be ignoring that part of the erratta I think - I will make traits restrictive - of course as you say there may be some rp situation where the restriction is removed due to good roleplaying and great story but as a general rule those techniques will be unique fighting styles. The careers will also for the most part be left out of creation and will require rp/story to get into.

If you want to run a ZOMG HERO game with a troll slayer, swordmaster, wardancer, ironbreaker and kick ass from day one I could see using them but imo those are (with the possible exception of troll slayer) "elite" careers that should have a certain amount of "woah" associated with them when people meet one.

I do agree with you to some extend, the wardancer starts with 4 agi for free making 5 agi a 5 point investment, then get the action card that allows him to swap his melee attacks to agi and we are in a land where the beginning War Dancer will with a handweapon specialization make mince out if almost every opponent he meets, scary, very, very scary.

UncleArkie said:

compared to a human or dwarf in a str based class (like soldier) who start with 3 or 4 str and can buy up to 5 str for 9 or 5 points (remember the human gets 5 extra points to spend so that 9 is more like "4" and then have them get troll feller strike or dual strike or the 2 handed weapon card (thunderous blow) and that human soldier is just as good as the wardancer - on all of his attacks rather just the ones that use agi.

to be fair I dont have the toolkit yet (its wrapped under the tree, an awesome gift from my son) but so far the careers are all very well balanced, and that is the problem - imo a wardancer should not be equal to a watchman. I guess thats just pretty fundamental to me and we may have to agree to disagree if in your vision of the WW they are equal. Good thing is the game is very easily house ruled, I am currently putting a document of all the house rules I will use (kinda like my version of the errata) for my players.

For a basic career its pretty awesome, a watchman will most likely get his ass handed to him in a handbag if he goes up againt him. Also and I have presented this argument before, the career watchman player is not your regular joe watchman, he is a hero to be and will be pretty awesome compared to other watchmen, making a rank 1 watchman and saying that he is repesentative of the city watch is not what this is about, hes not. At least IMO. The heroic potential makes the character more powerful than the normal average person, that PC's are lowpowered beginners with no oommphh is a v1/v2isem that should be killed off as fast as possible, if you want that kind of game then take away 10 CP's at generation and let them suffer.

Having played through the demo with a Sword Master in the party, I can say this: he isn't THAT badass.

The party consists of a Troll Slayer (by far the most badass), a Reiklander Mercenary who specializes in greatswords, a Reiklander Coachman (with scale armor, crossbow and longsword) and the Sword Master, who only has his Hoeth sword and leather armor. The SM rolls one more die than the rest, has the worst durability (only 12 HP and leather armor), and currently very limited ranged attacks. The Slayer is harder to hurt, has far more HP and does slightly less damage. The Mercenary is more durable, has a crossbow for ranged attacks, and does similar damage. The Coachman is great at range, hard to hurt in melee, though his melee skills are limited to surviving until one of his buddies can help him out, whereupon he whips out his crossbow and starts racking up kills again.

So, since the designers seem to have done a good job at balancing the starting classes, and since the Sword Master, Iron Breaker and Wardancer are NOT the elite classes that some seem to want them to be, I would suggest a simple name change to the current classes (Sword Master Initiate, for example) that indicates that these characters are somewhere along the way to becoming the killing machines that their namesakes suggest they are.

It is definitely a good time watching the Reiklander greatswordsman and the swordmaster discuss the finer points of their respective crafts and how their styles differ.

T

I haven't done much of an analysis on the Wardancer/Swordmaster/Ironbreaker actions, but it seems to me that, for Wardancers at any rate, so much of the power of the actions is dependent on the synergies from having lots of the Ritual Dance actions that going into the career after character creation is a trap choice.

Katsue said:

Trap choice? Please clarify what you mean by this?

I'm guessing he meant crap choice. He probably thinks that unless you start as one and take the max 4 actions, you are hamstrung. Picking up just one of the Ritual Dances isn't going to be very useful by itself. If you don't start with several, you are at a disadvantage to someone who was able to start with several. But that's no worse than becoming a Wizard's Apprentice or Initiate, if you don't start as one. You are supposed to buy all the starting basic spells/blessings that a starting character gets separately, which means that you can't even acquire all the stuff someone who starts with that career has while in the career, because there are more action cards than you can take.

UncleArkie said:

Actually, I didn't 'kill' my own point at all and thank you for using your rebuttal to make mine again.

Yes, Sword Masters etc are the result of years of expert training.

Which is why even a 'beginning' Sword Master would have stats somewhat above the scrub level PCs start with.

You know, maybe with a few attribute and skill advances that would be represented by say an ADVANCED CAREER.

But yes, the lore indicates that progression through these kinds of careers would be outside the scope of playing time.

Which is why people are making the very simple point that the lore is being rubbished for the benefit of the hard of thinking.

Really want to play a SM? Start as an advanced character then. Not rocket science.

Maybe the Swordmaster in the game is at the beginning of his training. He has completed the first stages at the White Tower (thus gaining the career ability). He now is tasked with wandering the world for ten years honing his skills in combat before returning to Ulthuan where the 'real' training begins in earnest.

There you go - an excuse for humdrum 'Swordmasters' in keeping with the 'lore'.

Not sure why I'm worrying about it though. The chances of my players using either kind of Elf is nil - it's been the same since D&D 2e where it was established that any Elf would be so mercilessly mocked that any attempt to create a 'character' is doomed to failure.

Bertolac said:

Thats not very nice now is it.... Does keep the pointy eared little bastards out though.

I just noticed that the Sword Master and Ironbreaker Careers have a trait with the identical name and War Dancer has the trait Ritual Dancer. That strongly implies that there will be Advanced Careers of these Basic Careers, since Career changing is based on number of Traits in common. It doesn't seem logical that each of these Careers would have a unique Trait that is not shared with other Careers unless they were going to have higher levels of those careers the same what that Slayer, Wizard, and Priest already do.

Magnus the Pious said:

Ok I'm new to the whole Warhammer roleplaying system, but the fact that you can't tell if a thief was a swordmaster or burgher or whatever seems to make sense to me. Players need to treat every enemy with a bit of wariness. Who knows what paths a man has walked in this time. You run across a man stealing some bread who last week was a wealthy burgher. Or you get stopped by an old guard who was once a swordmaster of legend fallen out of favor, disgraced and forced to work as a common guard. It's much more like the real world that way as you never know what the stranger across from you has done in his life. Players can't trust a person's job to define all his abilities.

UncleArkie said:

Had a laugh at this one. Just had to make the same excuse myself on another forum.

For me it is waiting for the game to arrive in the mail from the USA to Oz when most everyone who might be bringing it to me is most likely off on holidays if they have any sense.