RE: Move through

[Daniel Lawrence <dan@aquest.com>]

-----Original Message-----
From:	Orion Furmanski [SMTP:thelaw@expert.cc.purdue.edu]
Sent:	Friday, August 28, 1998 2:24 AM
To:	Wright Frazier
Cc:	Steve Ames; gmlist@ns1.cioe.com
Subject:	Re: Move through


Another excellent point: do mages have to have line of sight....?

There is already some skill that permits mages to jockey for line of sight
in combat, no?  However, I think this single skill doesn't cover the full
extent of combat targeting that mages need to NOT toast their own party
(was my grammar ok? Lotsa negatives..)  75% of my AQ characters have been
mages, all of which have been combat-ready. Time and time again, people
jump in the way of a Bolt, run into a 'Ball, etc.  Dammit, Alyx has
adventured for about 20 game years, give or take, and GM's claim she STILL
cant guess-timate casting distances. "Are you an elf?"--"No, dickhead, I'm
fucking OLD and should be GOOD at this by now!!"  Pardon my venom. =(

[Daniel Lawrence]  Then you will excuse mine.... after about the two millionth time having
combat slowed to a crawl cause everyone has to know distances from each combatant to
each other combatant.... if i hear that particular question it always sets me off. I am very
specific about saying how long 10 feet is on the board... and if you have been in combat
that many times... then you should be damn good at figuring out how far you are. And lastly 
I would wonder why you would play in a game run by so called 'dickhead'?  Its no fun for us
dickheads either.....

	The best I've seen as a rule for the above is an intelligence
check. Why not extend the "line-of-sight" skill to include movement, AND
account for innocent 'Bolt bystanders. Or make a new couple of skills out
of this. Also, lets make a distance-judgement skill for mages to reflect
that with experience comes ability. It's like learning to play darts:
concentrate, then put the dart in a 3-square inch area.  With Fireball or
Bobble, this translates to dropping the edge of the spell in between two
people in melee w/each other--very tricky.

OK, my rant has made me a target; fire away!
Orion