Have your say on the next Fabled Lands book

A guest post today from Paul Gresty, author of The Serpent King's Domain, the seventh Fabled Lands book, which has been funded by the generosity of Kickstarter backers. As the book is nearly ready for release, Paul recently posted a KS update in which he canvassed the opinions of the backers on several rules points. Then we realized that there are a lot of other experienced Fabled Lands players out there who for all sorts of reasons may not have backed the KS campaign, but who might still have useful answers to those rules questions. So take it away, Paul..

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Excellent news. I heard from Kevin Jenkins recently that he's expecting to send us the finished cover for The Serpent King's Domain in the very near future. Once that's done, we're pretty much ready to move on to printing and shipping to Kickstarter backers. That's the Megara hardcover edition. A paperback edition from Fabled Lands Publishing will follow soon after.

We're fortunate in that the crowdfunded development of this book, in which backers are aware of each stage of the process of creation, allows the opportunity for a dialogue with the book's ultimate readers. Your viewpoints are, frankly, a valuable resource, one that we'd be crazy not to tap into. And so, before we move on to printing, I'd be very curious to get feedback from you on a couple of points of game mechanics.

CALCULATION OF DEFENCE

We've already talked about this on the Fabled Lands blog and the FL Facebook page, but I think the point remains somewhat ambiguous. For a long time there's been debate concerning whether any bonuses to COMBAT conferred by a character's weapons are added to the character's Defence score. I think even Dave and Jamie have found the point somewhat contentious – take a look at the wording of the front matter of the different editions of the various FL books, and try to spot the differences.

Dave, Jamie, Richard S. Hetley (editor of The Serpent King's Domain -- demo here) and I have discussed this point at some length lately – and the ultimate ruling is that any COMBAT bonus from weapons does not count towards Defence. The logic of the matter is as follows, as explained by Richard:

"Nothing else in the game gets two categories of items to boost it. I always presumed that armour existed to raise Defence since weapons have their own use. The numbers bear this out. Thanks to the documentation efforts of others, I see that the highest enemy Combat in the first six books of the Fabled Lands is only 15, so enemies roll 27 at their best; the highest player Defence item is already +10; plus your personal Combat of (probably) 12; plus Rank of a mere 5 and you're at 27 with plenty of slack and no need for a weapon. The absurdity was only visible after multiple books, where the enemies are unable to match a player using all these statistics together. Given that players get this strong after adventuring for long enough, enemies should have been made stronger in the first place to match them."

So, let me throw this open to all Fabled Lands players. What are your thoughts and opinions on the subject?

THE CASE OF THE JADE DEFENDER

A couple of people have pointed out that the description of the Jade Defender, a weapon obtainable in The Court of Hidden Faces, specifically states that a weapon's COMBAT bonus does count towards Defence. That is, it's a COMBAT +3 weapon, that possesses an additional quality of adding an extra +3 to a player's Defence – making it a COMBAT +3, Defence +6 weapon in all.

We've talked about that too. And the overall view is that, in light of the most recent analysis of the rules, that description was incorrect. Should the Jade Defender itself therefore be considered a COMBAT +3, Defence +3 weapon, in that case, to account for that extra Defence bonus – or can it still be viewed as a COMBAT +3, Defence +6 weapon? Me, I'd probably opt for the latter view, even considering that this greatly increases the weapon's value. Retconning the rules is one thing, downgrading that hard-won weapon you've come to rely on is something else.

HOW DIFFICULT SHOULD WE MAKE SPIRIT COMBAT?

The mechanic of spirit combat is a new addition for The Serpent King's Domain. This was partly conceived as a way of presenting enemies that would be a threat to even very experienced characters. A player's spirit combat values are calculated quite differently from physical combat. Rank has no bearing on spirit combat; a player's base Defence score is equal to either the base MAGIC or SANCTITY score (whichever is higher). The player's Nahual value is used in place of the COMBAT stat – and opportunities to increase Nahual are rare (and the player may not want to increase Nahual to its highest level). The choice of weapons and armour that the player may use in spirit combat is limited.

A little background on the evolution of these combats: Richard was the first person to playtest the book, and he found that these spirit combats, while challenging, were also fairly tedious – in some cases, players and enemies would miss each other round after round, only occasionally getting in slight, scratching blows that took a long, long time to whittle down Stamina. And so he rewrote the stats for every spirit combat in the book, increasing each enemy's offensive punch, while also reducing their Defence. In essence, he made it so that enemies hit harder, but die faster.

Some of the combats are difficult. They're meant to be. But this is where, again, I ask your opinions. Can a fight be too difficult? When you, as a player, run up against a really hard fight, is it a welcome challenge – or is it just flat-out frustrating?

I'm going to quote some points from a recent email discussion we had on this subject because I feel that, without giving away stats or spoilers, it demonstrates the sort of threat levels the player may run into. Dave asked if a player could always back away from a spirit combat if they didn't feel ready. Richard's reply:

“You can retreat from one introductory-level fight and one significantly harder fight. The introductory-level one, hopefully, teaches you just how much you need to strengthen yourself before doing the rest. The harder one is escapable. Two other fights are ones that you initiate when you are ready. They are another introductory-level one and, well, a certain other one that's really tough. And the remaining two fights are each unique. One is introductory-level and you can't escape. Another is really tough, but you can only get it after completing major plotlines in other books.”

What do you think, as players of the FL books? Your views would be much appreciated and could make a big difference to this next book and the direction the series takes from this point. You can post comments as replies to this post or on Facebook page (link above). Or, of course, feel free to contact me directly at paulgresty {at} gmail . com (no spaces).

And in particular I'd like to thank the Kickstarter backers for their ongoing support and patience throughout the development of The Serpent King's Domain. They're the ones who have made this book possible.

Paul Gresty