There is an interesting idea idea elsewhere for a "Nemezis" orange dice.

I think this could be very useful, particularly if it had a chaos star.

I think the 'unreliable' quality is not quite balanced (sorry if I misunderstand the rules):

A blackpowder weapon blows up in your face when you roll a number of chaos stars equal to the unreliable rating of the weapon.

The weapons in the rulebook have either 'unreliable 1' or 'unreliable 2'

This means that you have an 'unreliable 2' weapon and stick to only using it in situation that has one challenge dice, most ranged weapon actions, you are safe from misfires!

It also means that an 'unreliable 1' weapon is going to blow up 1 time in 8 on average! Ouch!

Having an orange dice with a chaos star could be used to tone down the chances of a misfire; the orange dice has to be the chaos star for the weapon to explode (1 time in 12 now); and an 'unreliable 2' weapon now can misfire, though it is very unlikely.

Sticking with the rules, yes Unreliable 2 weapons aren't too dangerous with unfancy attacks etc.

However eventually you'll be in situations against uberfoes who add a challenge die automatically to all attacks on them (see the Winds of Magic box), the GM gives a monster Improved Dodge as once of its action cards (which I would certainly do for monsters able to additional cards and whose natures warrant it), you have a crit or there is a location effect etc. etc.

Making sure PC's have chance to shine and to see their weaknesses count are things GM's need to attend to managing.

Rob

Don't forget that Blackpowder weapons have the Reload property. The player must spend a maneouvre to reload, or else gains an additional challenge die when using it. So, the player could choose to fire it every round, but is now rolling <PP> and risks rolling two chaos stars.

I had not noticed that!

Thanks

That definitely makes things more interesting.

{though I'd still like an orange d12 at sometime!}

OK, so 2 chaos stars is do-able.

The other situation is the 'unreliable 1' weapons.

These will misfire on 1/8 chances with a single <P> challenge dice and the only effect is that it blows-up in your face!

The original rules have misfires at about the same incidence (on a double digit on d100) but after that there were some alternatives.

My thought is, when a misfire occurs roll [W] and have a selection of results:

{C} OK, it blows up in your face, about 1/4 (?) of the possible results

{B} something breaks making the weapon useless until repaired

*B* you left the rammer thing in the weapon, the weapon causes +1 damage though you need to replace the rammer!

*S* charge did not ignite but you can fire again next round

Any other results the weapon needs to be reloaded, about 1/3 (?) of the possible results.

Obviously there are paired effects like *S*{B} where the {B} negates the try again result of the {S} and *B*{C} where the +1 damage is done to you when the weapon blows-up.

I'll try these alternatives and what my players think.