THE HOSER REPORT

        BAS     STA   SLA   PST   LUA   PLU   WST    TPS   AIM    PRP
BAS     0       7     2     3     19    4     10     9     0      3
STA     5       0     4     6     16    2     8      5     0      5
SLA     2       1     0     1     10    6     3      3     0      5
PST     12      6     0     0     9     5     4      8     1      7
LUA     8       17    1     7     0     4     13     13    0      10
PLU     4       1     3     7     18    0     5      3     1      8
WST     4       5     5     2     11    8     0      6     2      7
TPS     3       5     1     1     14    1     4      0     1      3
AIM     0       3     0     1     3     1     1      3     0      0
PRP     3       5     2     4     5     5     9      6     0      0

BAS/PST         12-3
LUA/SLA         10-1
LUA/PLU         18-4
WST/BAS         10-4

1) SEPERATION - the warriors are physicolly separated, instead of in-close melee.
2) 1ST ACTION - determine who gets first action as warriors close.
3) ACTION - either an attck (Goto 4), a fient (Goto 8), or not act (Goto 10).
4) DEFENSE PLAN - the defender will dodge, parry, or just let it go.
5) RESULT - is the defender hit (Goto 6) or missed (Goto 10)?
6) DAMAGE - assess damage and result on abilities and next actions.
7> BRANCH DOWN - Goto 10 for evaluation.
8) FEINT EFFECT - was the opponent thrown off guard or was it ignored?
9) RESULT - assess penalties to defense and initiative.
10) EVALUATION - assess fatigue and evaluate ability to continue for both warriors.
11) NEXT ACTION - does the attacker go again (Goto 3), does the defender counter-strike
(switch roles and qoto 3), or do the warriors break away due to defense, strategy, etc.
(Goto 1)?

              ST    CN   SZ   WT   WL   SP    DF   Hand
Original:     10    13   16   15    9   10    11   R
Final:        11    13   16   15    9   11    11
Increases:    NEX Riposte + 8, SP to 11

              ST    CN   SZ   WT   WL   SP    DF   Hand
Original      13    11   13   12   11   13    11   A
Final:        13    11   13   13   11   13    11
Increases:    NEX Decisiveness + 4, WT to :3

HOSE KNOWS Questions and Answers

Q: How do you feel on Mr. Saltich's statement that a lunger gets an attack bonus for going 10-10-10-L? Why would kill desire have an effect on this attack bonus if it does indeed exist? A: I feel that that strategy has always worked well for me. I believe Dan said lungers as a style get the bonus, not that kill desire directly increases your attack percentage. If there is an attack bonus for kill desire (I can only hope) it perhaps arises from the notion that not trying to kill means only making weapon contact, whereas when you try to kill you actually try to push your weapon through the opponent. This is speculation, you may want to ask the moderators Q: What are the drawbacks of each special tactic? What are the real advantages of each special tactic? A: Each character can be thought of as a set of numbers in the computer (or more accurately, in a data file). If you have HR #2, these are listed in the article on character design. Briefly, they are skills and capacities. I doubt that tactics would have any effect on warrior capacities, with the possible exception of taxing endurance. Where I think they come into play is in skill percentages. A reading of the rulebook tells us that while using a tactic may boost some performabce aspects of the fighter, the overall effectiveness is reduced. This indicates that there are more penalties than bonuses. However, if you are concerned about (for example) parry, losing 20% of attack ability will not be a large concern. Using a tactic boosts the appropriate area(s) by "x" number of skills while in use. What you seem to want to know is specifics, so I'll stick my neck out (remember, I don't play all of the tactics because of my team roster). Lunge, bash, and slash most certainly boost initiative and attack. The bash probably costs you heavily in dodge ability, maybe parry also. Conversely, the lunge costs parry heavily but probably minor penalties to dodge and riposte. The penalty for slashing would be in responsiveness and riposte. The decisiveness tactic of course helps dccisiveness, but I'm not sure about attack. It probably also helps responsiveness, at the cost of riposte and initiative. On the defensive side, the parry tactic boosts parry, but definitely inhibits riposte and initiative, maybe attack. Dodge gives you the equivalent of added defensive actions, the cost is probably in initiative and attack. The riposte tactic boosts riposte and attack, hurts initiative, decisiveness, and parry. I haven't the slightest idea what responsiveness does. Q: What are the key stat types for each style of warrior? A: This question presumes style should be selected first. I select it last. However, there will be style limitations based on stats. In general, the AIM should have high WT and DF (15+, 17 preferrred). If the SP is 11 or greater, consider STA, PST, or PRP. For high SZ, think about BAS, LUA, or SLA. The BAS should also have a high ST, that is less important for the SLA or LUA. In fact high SZ/low ST makes a very good slashing combination. I would hesitate to make a LUA with less than SZ 9, try PLU instead. Endurance burning styles (particularly WST) should have as much WL as possible. An easier rule of thumb is let the low-value stats (SZ, SP) point you towards a group of swIes, then maximize high-value stats. Make the character the style you're most familiar with. Q:Can any warrior "pretend" to be another style, with slightly lowered effectiveness? Would you prefer a SLA vs. a TPS or would you like your SLA to act like a slightly lesser LUA? A: As I said in HR #2, the reason I prefer the PLU is that they can do almost anything that does not require decisiveness. I see no reason why experienced fighters can't try these things. You might be surprised how well a lunger can riposte, or how well a basher can parry. Your ezample sounds like a great trick to pull. I recommend a SC (a good lunging weapon). Remember, the parry tactic is supposed to neutralize the slashing tactic but is vulnerable to the lunge. Q: I have a TPS with 20 wins and 14 losse. ST 14, CN 10, SZ 9. WT 17, WL 9, SP 16, DF 15. WL has been improved twice, CN once, ST once, SP once, DF once. He has 6 parry skills, 4 attack skills, 2 defense skills, 1 decisiveness, and 3 initiative skills. He is learning very slowly. He is in the Champion class. Won 6 of his last 11 fights & learned 7 skills. All of my other warriors are just beginning or are Initiates. Do I want to send him to the DA or keep him around for bloodfeuds? I am currently trying to improve WL if challenged, SKILLS otherwise. Any suggestions, or am I just being impatient? A: If there is a luck factor assigned to individual fighters, we can guess what factor was assigned here. Its tough to learn when losing, and harder yet when you're busy raising attributes. You've spent a minimum of 6 fights (out of 34) raising attributes. Given an original WL of 7 I'd bet `the figure is 15 fights and wouldn't be surprised if it was 20, leaving maybe 15 for skills. That would mean he is averaging around 1 skill per turn. With a 17 natural WT. His individual W/L is a respectable .588. If your team W/L is lower than .588 keep him around, but forget about more attributes! You need skills. Badly. I'm sure that most every other gladiator in the Champion class has more than 16 skills (if not, I'm setting up a team in your arena). You'll probably have to challenge low to win, which of course will not help your learning. If the learning average does not pick up and the W/L keeps dropping, can him before he damages the team W/L. One final consideration. With a high WT and a high SP, this fighter will have a relatively high decisiveness. Coupled with a poor endurance this will mean trouble (unless of course you challenge LUA, BAS, and the like; do you really want to do that?). Remember, TPS will learn decisiveness skills.

UPDATES

For those of you charting attribute increases vs. skills (HR #7), I can report that increasing ST from 10 to 11 will NOT effect attack percentage. Since I know that extremes in strength can cause increases in the attack and parry percentages (I have seen gladiators increase to 15 and 17 to get expert attack), it appears that there is a "dead spot" in the table. For those of you interested in quick lungers, the following design should be informative: ST CN SZ WT WL SP DF Original: 10 14 10 19 11 9 11 Final: 11 14 10 19 11 9 11 Increases: NEX Initiative +3 skills

THE CHALLENGE SYSTEM

One of the suggestions recieved was for an explanation of the challenge system. It appears that the only thing many managers know about it is that they never get the people they want. Its actually quite simple. What I am about to describe is the manual method we used to use years ago. Of course the computer handles this tedidus chore now, but I believe there have been very few changes to the actual method. If not totaUy accurate, it should give you a better insight as to what you're up against. First, turnsheeets were sorted by challenge type, as below. DARK ARENA BLOODFEUDS TV CHALLENGE NORMAL CHALLENGE RANDOM Note that the priority of challenge decreases as you move to the right. Dark Arena is an automatic challenge (assuming no moderator error of course). These people are the first out of the "available" pool. Next, bloodfeuds have to be determined. The reason that there are only two sheets in the diagram is that hardly anyone ever dies (makes sense, huh?). The total number of sheets were counted, and a random number generated via die rolling. The number corresponded to an indivudual strategy sheet, which was then removed (what I'm saying in my verbose fashion is that everyone has an equal chance of getting pulled). A check is made to see if the challenged warrior is in the available pool. The only reasons a warrior would not be in the pool is that he is either not playing, DA, or already challenged and removed. Assuming the challenged warrior is availablee the connection is automatic unless he is trying to avoid. There is a 20% chance of avoiding a bloodfeud, 80% chance of avoiding any other challenge type. Lets assume that your opponent did avoid your bloodfeud. The first challenge is then crossed off. It used to be that the avoid on the opponents sheet was also crossed off, but now they are not expended (no longer neccessary to double-avoid). If your second challenge is a normal challenge your sheet goes into the normal challenge pile, the opponents sheet goes to its respective pile. Of course, you can always double-challenge. If you had done that, the second bloodfeud challenge would have to be determined as the first was. If successful (the odds of missing a double-bloodrued challenge are 25:1 against), both fighters are removed from the pool. This process continues until all bloodfeuds have been determined. The process is repeated for Tournament Victor challenges. Since the number of DA and bloodfeuds will be small, you can see the enormous (I'll say it again - enormous) advantage of this challenge type. In effect. you cut to the front of the line. Take it from someone who had 3 Tournament Victors at the last Tourney, you almost always get who you want. Conversely, the chances of a hostile manager getting a challenge on you are slim. About the only thing that can mess you up is if the fighter you challenged is not in the pool. This challenge type can really make life miserable for your opponents (if you like to feud). They'll have to use an avoid against you almost every turn. Which of course means they only have one left. If you have two powerfull friends... By the way. there Ejit be T.V. challeirgers ,`now that we've had a Tourney. This status will be good for 6 months or until the next Tourney, whichever comes first (32 months have elapsed since the last Tourney). Now the normal challenges are determined, using the same procedure as the above cases. If you get who you want, both fighters are removed from the pool. If you use both challenges and come up empty, your turnsheet goes into the random match-up pile. The bulk of turnsheets are in the normal challenge pile, meaning you could be in a long line. Many things can happen. Your fighter can get challenged out by someone else. The fighter you want may have got his challenge through, or been removed by someone else. Or not even playing that turn. And Or course, he may be avoiding you. Lastly, remaining fighters are "randomly" matched. The computer won't let you get anyone farther away in the rankings than one class. In the old days remaining turnsheets were thrown into the air, and how they landed was how they were matched (we eventually went to the paper bag method, all those sheets were a pain to pick up). Conceivably, the arena champ could draw the lowest ranked fighter. It made for some interesting fights. Is it to your ad+antage to challenge? If there are people available whom you can beat, my opinion is yes. If you can make a good challenge, it lets you dictate the terms. Why wouldntt you want this? Some people never challenge and do fairly well, its a personal decision. Looking at my own AD team performance, the breakdown looks like this (through 33 turns): When Challening When Challenged Random Wins 33 30 31 Losses 18 18 23 Kills 3 0 2 Slain 0 1 1 W/L .647 .625 .574 The .625 was a surprise (I thought it would be much lower), but then again I also make good use of the "if challenged" option on the turn sheet. Your own percentages may surprise you.

ODDS & ENDS Questions and Answers

By the time you read this both Tourneys will be over. If you would like to write about your Tourney experience, I'd be glad to print it. A manager wrote me asking if I could obtain a copy of the Duelmasters Handbook for him, he is in an alliance against the author. I asked Mike about this, he said no problem, Its available to anyone regardless of arena politics. Just like the HOSER REPORT. If I was that worried about "giving away secrets", it wouldn't be published. Besides, there is no "ultimate secret" or position in the game. Well, except for the size 3 TPS. By the way, response from HOSER REPORT readers has been little short or overwhelming. Mike has gathered so much info that yet another revision will be out soon. Therefore, I'm holding back somewhat from reprinting anything. It may be quickly outdated, and I'm plain out of room this issue. There has been increasing talk of a boycott, from LA, Phoenix, and Georgia. LA or Phoenix would be the logical place for it to begin, thats where the highest concentrations of managers are. I personally don't think it will come about, because no individual has stepped forward to organize (those of you itching for action don't expect me to organize it). I have not confirmed it, but have heard that there are almost 50 Hyborian games in progress. Significance? RSI's cash flow is not as heavily dependent on Duelmasters as it once was. Therefore for a boycott to get managements' attention, it will have to involve a fairly large number of managers. Has anybody seen the rules for the new "Advanced Duelmasters" RSI was telling us about? It has been a while now. Next issue will contain excerpts from the Handbook, 3 replacement characters for readers to design, perhaps a wrap-up on skills, some excellent letters that got here just a day late, and whatever else you send me. Good luck on the sands. Jeff Morgan