Editing RuneQuest (section)

==System==
''RuneQuest'' has developed in many different ways over its 40-year history. This section focuses on the current edition ''RuneQuest Glorantha'' (RQG).

===Character creation===
As with most RPGs, players begin by making an adventurer. Starting by creating a family history, adventurers are then developed through a number of dice rolls to represent physical, mental and spiritual characteristics.

''RuneQuest'' adventurers gain power as they are used in play, but not to the degree that they do in other fantasy RPGs. It is still possible for a weak adventurer to slay a strong one through luck, tactics, or careful planning.

=== Task resolution ===
Tasks are resolved using three basic systems, simple, opposed, or resistance rolls. All three use a roll-under percentile system to determine success of actions. Bonuses can increase or decrease the target number. Success or failure is further subdivided into categories, derived from the target number:
* Critical success (1/20 of target number)
* Special success (1/5 of target number)
* Success (target number or less)
* Failure (above the target number and specifically 96-100)
* Fumble (1/20 of target number and specifically 100).

For example, if a character has climbing target of 35% and his player rolls 25 on a D100, the character has succeeded. If they had rolled 01, that would be a critical success, rolling 06, a special success, and 85, a failure.

====Combat====
The game's combat system was designed in an attempt to recreate live-action combat. Perrin was familiar with mock medieval combat through the [[Society for Creative Anachronism]]. 

In RQG, as in most previous editions, a combat round is divided into Strike Ranks, which provide an initiative system based on the character's dexterity, size and weapon. These are assessed sequentially. An attacking character will roll their skill, and if successful the defender has the option of parrying or dodging the attack.

The ''RuneQuest'' combat system has a subsystem for ''hit location''. Successful attacks are normally allocated randomly (or can be aimed) to a part of the target's body. In ''RuneQuest'', a hit against a character's leg, weapon arm, or head has specific effects on the game's mechanics and narrative. This was an innovative part of the game's combat system and helped to separate it from the more abstracted, hit-point-based combat of competitors such as ''Dungeons & Dragons''.

=== Advancement ===
Rules for skill advancement also use percentile dice. In a departure from the level-based advancement of ''Dungeons & Dragons'', ''RuneQuest'' allows characters to improve their abilities directly; the player needs to roll higher than the character's skill rating. For the climber example used earlier, the player would need to roll greater than 35 on a D100 in order to advance the character's skill. Thus, the better the adventurer is at a skill the more difficult it is to improve.

===Magic===
Adventurers in ''RuneQuest'' are not divided into those who do use magic and those who do not. At the time of the game's release, this was an unorthodox mechanic. 

Although all adventurers have access to magic, for practical [[game balance]] purposes, an adventurer's magical strength is proportional to his or her connection to the divine or natural skill at sorcery. One of the innovations of RQG is that characters all have connections to the various runes of Glorantha, and these are used  in the casting of magic. For instance, to cast an Ignite spell, creating a fire, the player would need to roll under his fire rune affinity.

The exact divisions of magic vary from edition to edition; RQG addresses spirit magic, rune magic, and sorcery. Other forms, such as dragon magic, exist but are not normally available to adventurers.

===Other rules===
The ''RuneQuest'' bestiary contains a large selection of fantasy monsters and their physical stats. As well as traditional fantasy staples (dwarves, trolls, undead, lycanthropes, etc.), the book contains original creatures such as goat-headed creatures called broo, and the headless three armed giants called maidstone archers. Some of its traditional fantasy creatures differed notably from the versions from other games (or fantasy or traditional sources); for example, elves are humanoid plant life. Unlike other fantasy RPGs of the time, ''RuneQuest'' encouraged the use of monsters as adventurers.