SR 5th ed. Martial Arts from Run & Gun

[Elrik]

Hey!

I could be doing this wrong, I am going to ask before I put in a ticket.

I just got Run and Gun (Thank You!)

Most of my PC's have a specialty of Martial arts in their Unarmed Combat.

But with the Run and Gun edition, I can buy my martial arts special under Unarmed Combat and then buy it again under the Qualities Tab. Both cost me Karma.

I read Run & Gun again last night and it said that picking a martial arts was a specialty, but if I only select the Martial arts under the Qualities Tab, the +2 for Specialty does not get added.

If I pick a Specialty for Martial Arts under the Active tab, the Martial arts I picked does not populate the Martial Arts Styles under the Qualities Tab.

Am I doing something wrong or not understanding the rules?

Thank you again!

[Mathias]

In Run & Gun, the "Learning Martial Arts" table on pg. 128 is separate from the "Martial Arts Styles" sidebar on pg. 135. On the qualities tab, you're adding the items from pg. 128. On the skills, you're adding the specialties described on pg. 135's sidebar.

[voydangel]

Mathias is correct...

To put it another way (aka: without needing to re-read pages of stuff), I believe you have simply misunderstood how martial arts styles work under the new 5e rules. Don't take it personally, a ton of people have because of how poorly worded the rules for martial arts styles and their specializations are in Run & Gun. Here's how they work in a nutshell:


To gain a martial arts style, you need to purchase the martial arts style for 7 karma (R&G p128). For that 7 karma you get 1 free technique from that style.

Period.

...

After purchasing a style, you may then purchase additional techniques for that style for 5 karma each.

Additionally, after you have purchased at least one martial arts style, you may purchase a specialization for your combat skills for that style (such as "Unarmed: BARTITSU", or "Clubs:BARTITSU", or "Blades:KENJUTSU", etc).

Purchasing a specialization in a martial art does not give you the style as though you had purchased it as a stand-alone style. They just happen to cost the same amount, and the paragraph explaining this is, again, very poorly worded.

...

Also note that most people agree that the rules as intended (RAI) for martial arts specializations are that you only get the +2 when performing a technique from that martial art rather than it acting as a flat +2 to the skill any time you could conceivably be "attacking with karate" (or whatever). So the specializations are more limited than the book makes them seem in that regard as well.

Finally, many people also assume that the RAI for the sidebar on p135 is that it is an incomplete list, and we should feel free to add martial arts specializations to that list since they forgot to add a few obvious ones, and didn't add a few of them in multiple places like the descriptions of those styles indicate should be done.


Hope this helps.

[Elrik]

Thank you gents!

That is ridiculous. Learning Martial Arts is a skill, and the Techniques would be a sub skill related to the parent. If you spend the Karma or Dev points to get the skill that implies, to me, you spent the time to learn the Skill - Martial Arts (Karate for example).

So understanding what is written...

You can take a martial arts as a Quality, pay the karma and get one free technique. The Martial Arts itself gains no +2, but the techniques you use do get a +2.

At that point you can also take the Unarmed skill specialization of the Martial arts of the same name, thereby gaining the +2 to the martial arts and techniques. You can never have more then a +2 in regards to any martial bonus or technique bonus for yourself or your foe(s). No stacking above 2.

So by their rules I can take a Martial Arts Quality but never had taken Unarmed Combat? That I default? You learn a formalized, in depth System, say Aikido, which takes a great deal of conditioning to do it right, and you have no unarmed combat skills, and only increase with a stat????

I could be right off the rails on this one.

Alright, thank you very much for your input! I will fix this for my game.

Elrik

[voydangel]

Originally Posted by Elrik

You can take a martial arts as a Quality, pay the karma and get one free technique.

Yes

Originally Posted by Elrik

The Martial Arts itself gains no +2, but the techniques you use do get a +2.

No. you get no bonuses or penalties of any kind for simply having a style. Having a style merely dictates which techniques you can have/buy.

Originally Posted by Elrik

At that point you can also take the Unarmed skill specialization of the Martial arts of the same name, thereby gaining the +2 to the martial arts and techniques.

You only get +2 when using a technique if you have a specialization in the appropriate active skill for a style that has that technique (and obviously you can't use a technique you haven't purchased). You do not get the +2 any other time*. Note that if you have both "Karate" and "Jeet Kun Do" and you buy "Counterstrike" - then it count's as though you bought it for both (since there's no stacking bonus for Counterstrike). In that case you would get a +2 bonus to counterstrike rolls regardless of whether you had a specialization in "Karate" or "Jeet Kun Do".

Originally Posted by Elrik

You can never have more then a +2 in regards to any martial bonus or technique bonus for yourself or your foe(s). No stacking above 2.

Yes, but with a few odd exceptions. The yes part is: If we continue the example above and have both Karate and Jeet Kun Do, if you were to purchase "Yielding Strike (Counterstrike)" from Karate, you would not count as having it from both. You could therefore buy Yielding Force (Counterstrike) again from Jeet Kun do, giving you a total bonus of +2 when making a counterstrike. If you then bought/learned the Aikido style, learning Yielding force (Counterstrike) a 3rd time would give you no further bonuses. The exception is: There are a variety of different ways to get more than "+2" total, but this is done by stacking multiple techniques, styles, specializations, and qualities all together. I give an example at the end of this post.

Originally Posted by Elrik

So by their rules I can take a Martial Arts Quality but never had taken Unarmed Combat?

Yes. Note than not all martial arts style are designed to be used with unarmed, and some can be used with multiple skills depending on the situation, so this isn't exactly a completely odd situation.

Originally Posted by Elrik

That I default?

Yes, if you wanted to take an action that used a skill you don't have, you would have to default on that skill. Having a martial arts style and no active skill to go with it follows the exact same rules. Especially since you never really "roll" your style. The style merely dictates which techniques you can have/buy.

Originally Posted by Elrik

You learn a formalized, in depth System, say Aikido, which takes a great deal of conditioning to do it right, and you have no unarmed combat skills, and only increase with a stat????

Yes, you could choose to have a style and no unarmed skill or no blades skill or whatever and always default on your rolls whenever you wanted to use a technique or make an attack that needed those skills, but I don't know why you would. You could also increase your skills later by simply spending karma to gain and increase the appropriate combat skill(s) as normal.

.....

Example: Say you have AGI 6, REACT 5, & Unarmed 6 with no specializations. You also have the "Jeet Kun Do" Style and chose "Counterstrike" as your 1 free technique. This is our base character. Let's name him Bob.

Bob would roll 12 dice when attacking with unarmed (AGI 6 + Unarmed 6).
When attacked by someone, Bob could use the counterstrike technique, and would roll 11 (REACT 5 + Unarmed 6) dice to do so.

Later, Bob decides to specialize in Unarmed: Jeet Kun Do.

Now Bob still rolls 12 dice to make an unarmed attack (AGI + Unarmed), but when using any techniques that are listed as "Jeet Kun Do" techniques, he gets +2 dice.
In this case he only knows "Counterstrike" and so would be rolling 13 (5 REACT + 6 Unarmed + 2 for specialization) dice to make counterstrike rolls.
If he later bought another Jeet Kun Do technique, he would get +2 dice when using it as well, assuming the technique requires a roll of some sort.

Later Bob learns "Yielding Force (Counterstrike)".

Now Bob still only rolls 12 dice for a regular attack (AGI 6 + Unarmed 6), but when making a counterstrike roll he rolls 14 dice (5 REACT + 6 Unarmed + 1 Yielding Force + 2 specialization).


Specializations can be really good (as usual), or a waste - depending on what all tech's you have or plan to get. For something like "Kick", "Randori", or "Bending the Reed" a specialization would give no benefit. Whereas for something like "Called Shot (Disarm)", a specialization would net you +2 dice on the disarm roll, but it's cumulative with the -4 for making a called shot, so you would end up with only a -2.

.....

Stacking bonuses and penalties example: Some other techniques and qualities can be combined though, so if you had the "Sharpshooter" quality, Knight Errant Tactical Style, a specialization in "Unarmed: Knight Errant Tactical", and had purchased both "Called Shot (Break Weapon)" & "Broken Fang" techniques, then when you made a called shot to break weapon you would roll your base dice -4 for a called shot, but then reduced to -2 (due to Sharpshooter), further reduced to only -1 (due to broken fang) and then increased by 2 more dice (specialization) for a total dice pool of base +1 (a total of a 5 point effective difference from baseline).



*:Although, like I said earlier, this is up for a little debate. (Some people like to give the +2 whenever the GM/player agree that it would make sense to be able to fully utilize the martial art in question. The problem here is that not everyone can always agree on when is appropriate due to varying degrees of people's real life knowledge about various martial arts styles.)

[Elrik]

Thank you voydangel.

I think I need to re-read and think on what you have said. The Martial Art Qualities are to access the Techniques. That is all I really see it as. I know there is more to this but I have to think on it.

[voydangel]

Yea, it's rather confusingly written but hopefully I was at least a little bit helpful.
Anyway, you got it right - "The Martial Art Qualities are to access the Techniques" is pretty spot on.
Cheers

[Alistair]

I look at it like this as it helps me understand why this separation exists:

Consider the following situations, using Unarmed Combat as a basis:

1) Learning techniques is completely different from being good at hand-to-hand combat. There are all kinds of people in gyms and dojos who can flawlessly execute techniques, but are horrible at actually fighting (Repertoire of martial arts techniques, but low, or even lack of, an Unarmed Combat Skill and/or a lack of skill specialization). Think about the One-Trick Pony Quality: they can perform, for example, a flying kick just like in the latest action trid, without any skill in Unarmed Combat or Martial Arts, but unless circumstances and luck were on their side, they'd never connect with it, despite their ability to still incur the game effects of the Flying Kick technique.

2) There are people who are good at fighting because they have the experience to know general good techniques and best practices, plenty of dirty tricks, can keep their head and think quickly and fluidly in the stress of a fight, and have seen enough different combatants to know what to expect from an opponent. However, they haven't been trained in or practiced any special techniques as part of a formalized style (High unarmed combat skill with a lack of martial arts techniques or skill specialization).

3) There are people who have gotten good at fighting by practicing a formal style of martial arts, but may lack knowledge of specific techniques in that discipline. However, they are much more competent combatants than most when they have a chance to employ their martial arts training (Has a style specialization attached to Unarmed Combat but lacks the repertoire of Techniques from choosing the style). Some GM's may, in the interest of practicality or realism, disallow taking a martial arts skill specialization without learning the style, but RAW, it's fair game.

4) Lastly, there are people (often but not always Adepts) who are combat monsters, and have devoted a lot of time and effort (reflected in the Karma investment) to making other people hurt. (Both a repertoire of techniques and a martial arts skill specialization) Think of someone with a high Unarmed skill with both the MMA Style Wrestling AND Subdual Combat skill specs, and the MMA Wrestling Martial Arts Style, using the Constrictor's Crush Technique to put someone in a rear choke. They'd be rolling a fistful of dice and only someone just as skilled would stand a chance against it.