A small group of investigators chased someone through the village streets of Arkham and I used the chase rules to see if they caught him. Some parallel evolution at work there, would be my guess, judging from how long they worked on 7th Edition.īut let me ask you a question: have you ever actually used the Chase rules? They mirror one of my favorite mechanics from Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition, advantage.

I really like the Bonus and Penalty die rules, also. “I’m assisting her lockpicking attempt by keeping the rest of the group quiet. I also like that players can ask for bonus dice after particular situations. This is much easier than calculating if a certain advantage adds a +2 or a +5 bonus, or whatever other mechanical advantage depending on the rule system, and let’s me be freer in awarding them. Conversely, a disadvantage imposes a Penalty die, and the player takes the worst result of the two rolled tens-dice. Essentially, in any situation in which the investigator has an advantage, the player can roll two tens-dice and pick the better result. What is new is the Bonus and Penalty die mechanic, and I like it a lot. I like how frail the investigators are, but then again investigators in CoC have always been frail and that’s nothing new with the recent edition. But boy, it is delicious when a Dark Young connects with an investigator and I get to roll 4D6 damage. I can’t argue with that, really, and there can be a fair bit of “I swing and I miss,” with the combat rules.

For me, they just slow down gameplay too much. I’m not saying that BRP combat rules can’t be fun, or that they don’t create drama. I think that these days I much prefer a more narrative style of combat, the kind some indie RPGs have explored. This is something that a lot of other systems struggle with, also (i.e., D&D). I agree that combat is easy to understand, but I wouldn’t say that it’s “quick.” This is actually one of my main complaints with BRP, that whenever a game falls to combat it seems to take forever to make it around the table. It’s really easy, quick, and appropriately lethal. If he succeeds and I roll a Hard Success, I win. If we both succeed, the tie goes to the attacker. If I succeed and the Deep One fails a Fighting (Brawl) roll, for example, I hit it and do damage. This works very well in the latest edition.Ĭombat, for example, is pretty simple. I think the first time I saw this was in Robin Laws’ HeroQuest, in which one player’s roll and level of success was compared against another player’s (or the GM’s) roll to determine the margin of victory, or who won and how well they won. I also like the types of successes – regular, hard, extreme – and comparing those successes against others during opposed rolls.

It’s a simple system and I’m glad the core mechanic hasn’t changed. This makes everyone feel empowered, and less confused (I think) than trying to pick up more complex D20 systems. Occasionally a new player will say, “Oh, I don’t have that skill.” Well, I reply, you can always try to roll under the base percentage, right there on your character sheet. Along with this, I really appreciate how the character sheet is so transparent to new players and can function as a real game aid. I mean, that sentence encapsulates 90% of the rules already. Role this number, get under the number over here, and you’ve succeeded. It’s just so easy to explain to newcomers, either to the system or roleplaying more generally. I really enjoy bringing new people into roleplaying games, so the best part about Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition, and the BRP engine in general, is the simplicity of the basic, D100 rule mechanic. You’ve played many role-playing games what do you like about CoC7? I think we’re familiar enough with the rules to critique them, and I wonder what you find as your personal favorites. We’ve been playing Call of Cthulhu almost exclusively for the past two years, using 7th Edition, the latest edition of the rules originally penned in 1980 by Sandy Petersen.

Call of cthulhu 7th rpg character sheet