Quote from: rkhigdon on January 20, 2023, 09:44:34 AM
I've always been interested in Savage Worlds, but every time I've had the opportunity to actually play there's been some sort of twat at the table who has ruined the experience for me.  It's worth noting that the local SW scene was dominated by a (somewhat) prominent game writer/designer who is an actual douche.  He's since left the area so things might be better, but I still see a lot of the old names on local game postings so I'm leery. 

However this thread has convinced me that I might be better served to take a different approach to getting the game on the table.  I'm thinking I just need to bite the bullet and run a game with my existing gaming group who I can trust to keep things fun at the table.  While this might seem like kind of a minor revelation, it's notable to me in that

a) I generally don't lay out a lot towards a new game unless I've had some substantial experience with it first.  In this case I've played some Savage Showdowns miniatures games, but have little actual experience with SW as a full on RPG.
b)  This well outside my groups wheelhouse.  While a couple have some experience with multiple systems, most know nothing but BXD&D (and a couple don't know even that very well) so this could be quite the stretch for them.

I'm wondering if there's some good resources online, say free adventures and the like, that I could use to defray the costs od this lettle experiment a bit?

I can sympathise a lot with not being able to find a group because everyone in your area is a cunt. On SW. Parhfinder for Savage Worlds is perfect for people who just play DnD. It takes a lot of the terms you're familiar with in DnD and converts them to Savage World Rules. A big trouble I used to have with getting people to play SW, is there's no classes. Yoy build your character through edges. And people just couldn't wrap their heads around that. Savage Pathfinder offers Class Edges. They are edges that give you the abilities of a class from DnD. And it's all the familiar ones. That alone convinced a long time group of mine to finally try Savage Worlds.

Quote from: Dropbear on January 19, 2023, 07:31:40 PM
@Tenbones Your dissemination of all this info about SWPF (and in general, your discussions about SW) has brought me to a precipice. I bought all the Savage Rifts books with the credit I got from NKG for trade when I sent in my entire D&D 5E collection that's been gathering dust on my shelf for the past three years.

So now to pitch to my group Savage Rifts (and also Primeval Thule using SWADE + Fantasy Companion) as our new main games...

Woo!! that's a big jump in octane from 5e to Savage Rifts!

Well if you ever have any questions feel free to ask us. Also let us know how your games are going!

When I was still new to Savage Worlds, I too thought that Shaken would lead to a lot of "shield regen" moments. In actuality, that had only ever been a rare case. Most of the time, KOs are quick to happen. Usually when one is Shaken, unless their Parry is extremely high, it is unlikely they'll get away without any wounds after the following round.

I also have been thinking a lot about Toughness and Soaking. I like to interpret Soaking as using Bennies to give your Toughness an added +4 bonus, since in a way, you need to roll a 4 on Vigor to soak the Wound. This also means the attack had hit you as intended, past your armour, and also means you're bleeding. It's just that t'was but a scratch.

Sorry I don't know where I'm going with this post LOL. I just felt like making a SW-related post early in the day 

I really never see Shaken being an issue. Fights go pretty fast for my group. And when they don't... it's *always* high-tension because we all know that the longer the fight goes, the more chances of something wild happening.

Wounds? I can definitely see the case for having more if you want to draw combat out. But I'm not convinced I can't do that with other tools in the bucket.

Tenbones, I'd like to get your opinion on something: what tools/tricks/tactics do you use to counter high Parry + high Toughness characters (talking about 13 Parry 15 Toughness that sorta character)? I tend to use Tests of Will and Wild Attacks, but I'd like to hear more from fellow experienced GMs (I don't trust reddit or the peginc forums, I am willing to bet I have more experience than 99% of their community).

Our experience with gonzo characters via the new Super Powers Companion is that almost no fight goes beyond 3-4 rounds of action, but those rounds are still fun and meaningful to play.

The party are a brick with Toughness 15, and rolling d12+d8+2d6 damage. A blaster with a 3d6 ROF 2 ranged attack and a force field which makes her -5 to be shot (but her melee skills are limited), and a crowd control type who can teleport and stun but who is a pacifist so no lethal attacks.

In the last fight the team took on a fast melee Wild Card, along with two Extras with guns and four Extras with paired melee weapons.

The bad guys got the jump, and in round 1 the Extras did some damage to the blaster while the brick took a couple of them out.  The crowd-control guy teleported to a roof and started stunning the shooters. When the Wild Card enemy turned up he focussed on the brick and put him on the deck in one round, but the rest of the party mopped up the Extras. Next round the enemy Wild Card got machine-gunned by the blaster, wounding him severely so he fled the field*. The party drove off the last couple of Extras and (most importantly) healed the brick who was incapacitated.

The party got to be cool, the enemies were a threat as a group and there were definitely high tension moments. It was a cool fight that only took about 3-4 rounds and less than 30 mins to play. The pace of Savage Worlds is much more rapid than other games we play.

* One of the things I particularly like about supers as a genre is that it makes sense in context for enemies not to fight to the death. They are there for a reason - some kind of nefarious plan, and from their perspective the PCs are an obstacle to achieving that. If they can no longer achieve their objective they will pull back and try again another time / way. Once the campaign is a bit more advanced and the PCs have thwarted multiple gambits the villains will try to actively eliminate them, but we haven't reached that stage yet.

Mudbanks - you posted while I was writing this (and I'm not Tenbones, but...): those things are key. Numbers also count in Savage Worlds, either in terms of gang-up or Rate of Fire. Any attack can Ace so weight of attacks means more chances to Ace and that is tense from a player perspective in my experience. I also use enemies with attacks versus other defences using powers. My players are terrified of Entangle and the effect is so good it has actually been down-powered slightly in the new Companions so Pinnacle clearly agree with this assessment. Monsters with area-effect stun attacks are another tool in the kitbag.

Thanks for sharing, dbm! I may consider Stun and Entangle when I plan out my next encounters. I've also been thinking of doubling my NPC numbers. Usually the fighter of the party clears out a group of 4 extras very quickly (like within 2 rounds), so I may double that to 8.

Quote from: mudbanks on January 21, 2023, 03:06:58 AM
Tenbones, I'd like to get your opinion on something: what tools/tricks/tactics do you use to counter high Parry + high Toughness characters (talking about 13 Parry 15 Toughness that sorta character)? I tend to use Tests of Will and Wild Attacks, but I'd like to hear more from fellow experienced GMs (I don't trust reddit or the peginc forums, I am willing to bet I have more experience than 99% of their community).

Well, first off, Parry 13, Toughness 15 is very uncommon for a standard game. You really only see numbers like that in a Supers game or Rifts, in which case the "to hit" and damage numbers generally scale with the defense. You also see that on Gargantuan creatures, but the +6 Scale modifer means you're practically "automatically" hitting, then just hoping to roll big damage (assuming you can penetrate Heavy Armor).

But generally, combat in Savage Worlds heavily favors coordination and tactics. Is part of that high Parry coming from a shield? Well get someone to Disarm or otherwise destroy the shield (see Breaking Things). Tests (previously known as "Tests of Will") can be used to give allies a bonus on their attack via the Vulnerable condition. This bonus stacks with Wild Attack. Allies can also provide Support, which stacks up to +4. And then there are Comprehensive Modifiers, which can stack up to an additional +4.

Essentially, if the party is facing such a gonzo threat, their best bet is to try to provide the heaviest hitter with the best opportunity to land a blow, then have him try to deal high damage. Spending a Benny to reroll damage (especially with the No Mercy edge) is probably better than attempting to repeat tbe tactic next round. Note that as the foe takes on Wounds, their own actions will become penalized, meaning the most dangerous part of the fight is going to be the beginning, with the end sort of slogging out.

Also worth mentioning that while Savage Worlds doesn't have explicit "morale" rules, intelligent foes typically have self-presevation. Once they hit 3 Wounds or so, they are pretty likely to give up rather than fight to the death. Beasts may just simply try to run away. Exceptions may exist depending on the creature's Edges/Hindrances. Deathwish or Heroic might keep a character fighting, for example.

Quote from: mudbanks on January 21, 2023, 03:06:58 AM
Tenbones, I'd like to get your opinion on something: what tools/tricks/tactics do you use to counter high Parry + high Toughness characters (talking about 13 Parry 15 Toughness that sorta character)? I tend to use Tests of Will and Wild Attacks, but I'd like to hear more from fellow experienced GMs (I don't trust reddit or the peginc forums, I am willing to bet I have more experience than 99% of their community).

dbm and mudbanks nails it. Those are some *high* numbers. Even in my game where everyone was high Veteran/low-Heroic in a fairly high-fantasy setting, that's some hefty stats.

First and foremost - I always do things in context. It's not like PC's walk around advertising their stats, so I never make enemies do things with some foreknowledge (unless they have it) of what a PC's stats are. If they PC's have those stats, and start whipping the fuck out of my monsters, they earned it. Smart monsters run away, or try different tactics...

My first option: Ranged attacks. You can have all the parry you want... but a hail of arrows is still TN 4 unless you have some other means of protection. Getting past that Toughness? Well that's a different matter.

Second option - Could use poison with touch attacks, (works well in conjunction with ranged).

Third option - Gangup attacks w/ Grappling works good too. Ignore that Parry and start rolling Athletics against a mass of attackers. Grappling in general is a *very* good way to slap some penalties on that badass PC. Give them Vulnerable, and Distracted, keep them unable to move. Hell toss in friends with Reach on top of that... I'll bring that bitch down with Goblins.

Tests - I don't ever put this as a "thing" to consider doing, because I *always* use Tests with my NPC's. No PC typically has all their stats at high levels. SO targetting the stat they're weakest at for a Test is always a solid choice. And don't forget to use your GM Bennies! If my NPC's *know* they're going up against a beast with ridiculous fighting skill (13 Parry!) and they can take a hit like a freight-train (15 Toughness) then you bet your ass I'm going to do it dirty.

Do not forget your NPC's own Edges and Special Abilities - Blinding a PC is *BRUTAL* (Darkness is the same thing). Weapons with AP (be it magic or special materials). Support, Support, Support! Maybe one of your goblins has Pack Tactics! Then watch the fireworks!

Of course there's always Magic. Lower Trait, Entangle - BRUTAL. Oh that Fighting has that Parry real high? Lemme drop it a couple of dice. SPEND THE BENNY, MAKE THEM FEEL IT.

It depends on the circumstances of course. While those are high ratings, I've taken down PC's with slightly beefier stats with good old fashioned goblins that play smart and fight dirty. But I'm always respectful of any PC in my campaigns that reach those kinds of power-levels, because I make sure they earn it, and I like letting them throw their weight around. This way when they run up against NPC's that *do* fight smart, because they might know something about their abilities, or are on that same level - the PC's give them that respect right back. It's good to let the players show some fear in their eyes... hehe

Appreciate the responses everyone!

I ran the Earthshaker adventure (one of the three adventures written for the Fantasy Companion) over the weekend using archetype characters from Savage Pathfinder. Two of the players were brand new to Savage Worlds.

I ran the chase scene blind. Hadn't read the rules up until hours before the session, because chases had never interested me very much. It went pretty smooth. Both the chase and the fight inside the mobile fortress took a while, but individual combat rounds flew by quickly. I like how SWADE handles chase mechanics. Using a second action deck to represent relative distance is a neat idea. If I'd had more time to prepare, I would have modified the encounter to use the quick chase deck.

Nobody got too fancy with using tests, support, ganging up, wild attack, or any of the other mechanics. Everyone pretty much played straight. Fights would have been over more quickly if people were using the rules to their advantage. However, with most of the group being brand new to Savage Worlds, that was to be expected.

Players liked the flexibility in character options, and the various hindrances went over well. They liked the flavor that went along with their hindrances.

The very first campaign I ran was sold upfront as a "testbed" for Savage Worlds. I told my players, this was more about me testing *everything* before I started trying to get tricky and do my own thing.

Combat checked out fine. As did all the usual stuff for survival etc. (I'm big on environmental play). But the sub-systems were another matter. I had literally no idea how they would play out, and I was very skeptical of the Battle System, Chase System and Dramatic Tasks, specifically.

I was won over on all counts. *Especially* the battle system. When I ran the Chase system, it took a minute to set up and get my head around, but it immediately raised the stakes of the encounter and actually ended up killing a PC with great drama (and my players still talk about it to this day - as that event turned into big sub-plot for the campaign going forward. Basically the goblin commando that caught and killed the PC, beheaded him and later used that PC's skull as a cod-piece... yeah the PC's were hunting for that guy for a long time). The Dramatic Task system is very dynamic and you can use it to have small-to-large events and let your PC's dynamically use their best skills/abilities to do cool things.

But that Battle System... for sandbox GMing? It's a thing of magical beauty. Most times big heavy sieges are background affairs where the PC's do their thing, and what happens in the background is depending on the success/failure of the PC's. The Battle System lets you do both. You can run large battles - skirmishes - even massive fights. I had a battle of over 70k troops on *each* side... and due to the rolls and the breakdowns of the numbers... 80% death-toll, ridiculous carnage. No PC will feel like they didn't put themselves through the wringer. It's over the top, but simple to run. And it's VERY satisfying. Every PC can contribute, no one is left out. You can scale it to literally any size.

Yup the Mass Battle mechanics are great. I had a lot of fun running MBs. Despite being heavily narrative driven, they are also tied to strategies and math, so there's still some mild number crunching going on. However, because everything is resolved so quickly, things never stop moving. You constantly feel like characters are moving, there's ferocious fighting going on, spells are being slung, etc. It's really something else and you have to play it to believe it.

I would LOVE to run an Hour of the Dragon-esque scenario using Savage Worlds one day.

Pinnacle are currently running a Kickstarter for SW called Legend of Ghost Mountain. This is a wuxia implementation, new powers, new game world, and a campaign to go with it. And also mass battles are apparently a big thing in the campaign.

It looks really cool.

Yeah I'm all in on the Print edition.

I *suspect* this is going to be the testbed for their Martial Arts Companion which is supposed to be coming out in the future.