Rolemaster II is a tabletop role-playing game system that was first published by Iron Crown Enterprises (ICE) in 1982. It is known for its complex rules system, which provides much customization and flexibility for players through a metric ass-ton of optional rules. Rolemaster II also has a complex character creation process, which allows players to create highly detailed characters with a large variety of skills, abilities, and talents. The game’s killer app, though, is a detailed combat system that considers various factors, such as weapon type, armor type, and environmental conditions.
Having played this game recently again, I'm now certain I did not play Rolemaster RAW when I was younger. We started this series with a few questions - was RM II as awesome as I remembered it? does the game still stand up and fight?!
At the core, Rolemaster II is a skill and percentile system. Roll d100 and add relevant skill stat. GM adds modifiers. Reference a chart for degrees of success or failure or partial success/failure —gasp! Even combat comes down to this. You will spend more time generating your character to get its initial skill stats sorted. We used the core Shadow world setting focussed on the Bay of Izar - which was perfect for a 5-6 session run, including a session zero to set things up. Sessions were about 3 hours long. I had four super enthusiastic players, and I wore the gamemaster hat. If I remember correctly, two players had previous experience with Rolemaster. We met on Sunday across 4 time zones on Zoom and used Role as our VTT, mostly to post up images and maps and roll dice. I did throw together some convenience macros for rolling checks.
Rolemaster has a TON of options spread across a dozen Rolemaster Compendiums. It was the player’s pick, but they owned teaching the group any option they selected from any of these compendiums. Our fearless party: Philonexus, centaur bounty hunter; Vanderjack, rogue of the port of Izar; Elessar, an elven foreigner to these lands in search of the masters of yore. And Deronil, last of the Deathless Regiment —think Sardaukar. They have set themselves to see the Oracle at Scalu. Starting at the Port of Izar, the characters sailed across the bay and narrowly avoided getting kidnapped by the ship's crew; there’s a handsome bounty for those of the Deathless Regiment. They made landfall and began the trek to the ruined acropolis of Scalu, where they were looking to speak with the Oracle. It turns out a whole campsite of folks was at the acropolis to see the oracle, and a group of ruffians were organizing the crowd into a queue...for a small donation. Some snooping around almost gets the rogue eaten alive, but creative problem-solving gets the players an audience with the oracle and avoids a fight with the ruffians. The oracle was the real deal, and she gave out stone-cold advice to questions. 🙃
A favorite moment for me was the first fight. I made it low stakes, but with the random damage effects table 🤷🏾♂️ I said we can always retcon a bad ending. The characters, while sailing across the bay, were attacked during the night. The small quarters and the narrow hall between them made for a frantic scene. Poor Philonexus is trapped up on the deck. He can't make it downstairs to help, but the crew above are trying to net and lasso him! The combat tables per weapon are still wild - and the critical hits tables are lethal for sure! We, by the rules, would have lost our fighter.
All told, Rolemaster is long in the tooth but still a lot of fun to me. Provided I have some players with experience to help carry the game load. This was easily one of my favorite game series of 2023. I'd play this game again and with the same crew indubitably!
Wow, a blast from the past! Sounds like you had fun.