I apologize if this has already been addressed. I was surprised not to see it mentioned in the BWG book itself.
I have a group in play (we’re doing a Middle-earth game) and I want to update them to BWG. Do I have to re-burn the characters? (Please say no).
I know that weapon speed has changed and that there’s now stride instead of a speed multiplier. Is that the only thing that would change on their character sheets?
Thanks in advance.
Yeah, that’s enough. There may be some subtle differences in the way the characters start if you re-burned them, but they’d just change anyway as the game progresses. Adapt the Stride and Weapon Speed and move on. 
There are certain cases where trainings are now traits, in such a case, I’d just grant the trait and be done with it.
Yea, that’s my thought. Convert weapon speed and stride, grant the traits that replaced trainings. If someone is in the progress of learning one of those trainings, give them a Char trait to reflect their path.
People should also read their traits to make sure none of them changed, and if they did, decide whether to use the new trait or grandfather the old trait.
Frank
Thanks very much, everyone. Good to know I won’t have to tell my players that they’ll need to re-burn their PC’s – they might have burned ME at the stake.
One of the great things about BWG is that it’s one of the easier version upgrades you’ll see. Way easier, for example, than going from D&D 3rd to 4th.
That said, there’s a couple more things that can affect a character than what’s described above. I would take a close look at each character’s weapons and armor. There are a few subtle changes in the weapons chart, like the post I made in commentary forum on how long swords are slightly better compared to other weapons 'cause their weapon speed increased. Also, the new armor stats are more closely aligned with what was published in the Adbu than the “official” BWR rules. Some racial weapon bonuses were toned down a bit, perhaps, depending on your interpretation of previous rules (I’m definitely not the only player who thought elven spears in BWR were one-handed).
The list probably goes on. But even with all these little tweaks it’s amazing that your the fundamentals of your character sheet don’t change hardly at all.
A FreeMarket smiley to everyone at BWHQ!
Peter
Cool!
Well we used the characters tonight with the BWG rules and everything went great. It was also the first time the PC’s were using scripted combat. We only started about two months ago and I wanted to wait until the new rules came out. I’m glad I did. They told me they don’t want to use Bloody Versus ever again, even for mooks, because they thought it nerfed their characters and that Fight! was the way to go.
The only snafu was my bad. The six baddies had one archer and I didn’t realize that I needed to use the range and cover rules for the PC engaging him, because that PC had a melee weapon.
Question (which probably belongs in another thread, but whatever) since the Range & Cover rules are more abstract where time is concerned (everyone is moving around, etc) does it really jive when there’s only one or two archers and everyone else is fighting and dying in mere seconds?
What trainings/traits would these be? I’ve been reading BWG and noting the many changes, but I’m sure many small ones still escape me.
Sprint Training now = Sprinter Trait.
Actually, when a fight’s going on and it involves an archer, just use the rules for archery in fight. You only need to switch to range and cover when someone has successfully disengaged.
Precision Training has also been changed into the Deadly Precision Trait now.
Hm. Well, the archer was sort of off by himself. I will start another thread to get clarification.
I think that’s a good change. 5 trait points is a much steeper (and much more fair) price for that ability than 2 of your general skill points. Spending 4 general skill points on +1 to most positioning tests and +2 (or so) to damage was a bit abusive. I certainly used it to prove some point or other by burning up an example of a 4LP sorcerer/spearman who kicked serious ass with a spear and had gifted+sorcery with a decent amount of skill points to grab some social abilities and inconspicuous. With speed 6, reflexes 5, longest stride, and a spear skill of 6 doing 4/8/12 damage with brawling as a FoRK and Armor Training to boot - Sorcery skill of 6 was icing on the cake. Not many resource points for spells, but since the point was not to make a playable character but just to be as big a munchkin as I possibly could, I just took white fire, a spear and heavy mail (underneath which I was naked, shoeless, and of course friendless). This also relied on Neophyte Sorcerer having Sorcery, which it no longer does (another of Luke’s druthers).
I agree with you. I’ve been playing a knight that started with Sprint Training and was on his way to learn Precision Training but when BWG came I spoke against my own benefit by saying that I shouldn’t just get those traits. It’s a good change to make those abilities into traits and since it’s a good change it’s cheap to get the traits for a couple of skill points each, or for some routine test training time. It seemed better to just reallocate those two trait points and the training time into something that made sense.