Eclipse RPG

[Bracken]

Hi again Ravien,

I think I have a better understanding now. Multiple opponents are quite, quite brutal. Not sure how much I like this, but I suppose with the right tactics (defend against two and attack the other and pray you hurt him real real bad) you might be able to overcome. Is their any penalty if you make more than one attack or defense  in the same action?

Example:

Bob is fighting three Orcs. He decides to attack one and defend against the other two. Since he is performing all these actions atonce is he at any penalty? (other than expending say 3 of his 5 actions)

Also, (and again, sorry if I have missed this in a previous posting) how is it determined who is the attacker/defender. Does each combatant chooses secretly (as in TRoS with the red die/blue die concept) or do they just state what they are doing. If so, who declares first? Is there a way to choose to go defensive at the last moment after you realize you are both attacking?

Also, I don't agree with you that if both attackers go defensive the action  is not used. That pause took time, and the action should be wasted.

Bracken
PS: Ravien, a lot has been developed on the game since this thread was started, with many new things coming to light and some changes made over the course of this post. If it is going to take you much longer to get a rules pdf out, I'd suggest you repost the revised combat mechanic with the additions and changes that have occured so it's a bit easier to understand evrything as it stands now.

[Ben O'Neal]

Ok, after considering Bracken's suggestion and looking over this thread, I have concluded that it might be beneficial if I started two new threads -one on the combat mechanics in Eclipse (which seem to have garnered the most interest), and one on the social interaction mechanics (which I am most interested in)- and leave this one going for the rewards mechanic, which Mike is being very nice in helping me work through :) If this is a Bad Thing here at the Forge, then I'm sure Ron Edwards will strike me down appropriately ;)

But before I start the new threads, I'll deal with all the latest comments and those I missed last time, starting with the newest and working backwards.

Is their any penalty if you make more than one attack or defense in the same action?

Example:

Bob is fighting three Orcs. He decides to attack one and defend against the other two. Since he is performing all these actions atonce is he at any penalty? (other than expending say 3 of his 5 actions)

You cannot use one action to do more than one "thing" (with the sole exception of casting a spell and performing a physical action simultaneously, but that's a special case). An action in Eclipse is not like a "round", in that it is not a measure of time as such, but is simply the doing of a thing. At character creation, you will be able to do less things within a given period of time (a round) than later on when you are more advanced. You cannot swing a sword in two directions at once. So taking your example, here's the simplest form of what we might see:

Bob has 5 actions, why not. Each of the 3 orcs have 2 actions each. Bob would use his 1st action to deal with orc #1's 1st action, then use his 2nd action to deal with orc #2's 1st action, then use his 3rd action to deal with orc #3's 1st action, and then he would cycle back, using his 4th action to deal with orc #1's 2nd action, and finally using his 5th action to deal with orc #2's 2nd action. Now he has run out of actions, and orc #3 still has its 2nd action remaining, and thus Bob has been "overwhelmed" by the 3 orcs, and orc #3 can strike Bob without Bob being abe to defend. And that would conclude the first round.

This is the simplest possible example. In practice Bob would be sufficiently powerful to kill each of the orcs before they got their second actions (unless he rolled really, really poorly), and would have various abilities and he would be able to manouvre and dodge and all sorts of other stuff. And of course, the orcs would also have other options available. If the orcs all had the Concert Fighting ability, Bob would be screwed (probably). If Bob had the Battle Trained ability (negates Concert Fighting, grants 1 extra action per round for every opponent more than one), Bob would wipe the floor with them with actions to spare.

So in summary, under default conditions, when faced with multiple opponents you must "cycle" your actions between them. I picture this in my head like how such duels are portrayed in movies, with the hero alternating attacks and defenses between foes. I hope that made sense.

Also, (and again, sorry if I have missed this in a previous posting) how is it determined who is the attacker/defender. Does each combatant chooses secretly (as in TRoS with the red die/blue die concept) or do they just state what they are doing. If so, who declares first? Is there a way to choose to go defensive at the last moment after you realize you are both attacking?

No initiative, no rolling of dice. Declarations of intent define the action. "I wait to see what my opponent does" is the same as saying "I defend this action". "I take a swipe at his head" is the same as saying "I attack this action, and if I deal damage, it will be to his head". Who declares first? The players, every time. Why? For the same reason as below:

Is there a way to choose to go defensive at the last moment after you realize you are both attacking?

No. I want to avoid 'intent stacking'. ie: "I wait to see what my opponent does" "He leaps forward to attack you" "In that case, I will attack him, hoping to force him into the defensive" "He notices your attack, and chooses to defend" "Ok then, I cease my attack and drink a Pepsi".

You get the point. One action = one declaration. The players choose what they are going to do, the GM chooses what the opponents will do, and describes the action to the players.

Also, I don't agree with you that if both attackers go defensive the action is not used. That pause took time, and the action should be wasted.

Sorry that I didn't make that clear, but that's exactly what I meant. If both choose to defend, then that action is "wasted", in that no offensive action occurs. There can still be circling, leading, and pressing, but no attacking until the next action.

So, to reiterate, your goal in design is to have the rules provide difficult challenges for the characters to overcome. That's a cool goal, and an unusual one. Usually, it's the GM job solely to prepare appropriate challenges, and, at best, the system only informs them of what level of challenge is appropriate. But what I'm hearing is that you want the system to produce appropriate challenges. That would be a very interesting addition to your game.

Well, that's the plan :) To see perhaps what I mean you might be interested in taking a look at the Eclipse Social Interaction Mechanics thread I will create after this post. The entire mechanic includes challenges and rewards and helps drive play, and practically requires no external components. I might give you a bit of heads-up though, it's rather complex (as you can imagine a social interaction mechanic might be), and as you are no doubt aware, my communication skills are still developing, but I welcome any questions and probes to clarify.

For example, putatively the physics in Indiana Jones are those of our world, but he manages to take punishment that would kill anyone, and generally do impossible things. If you modeled the physics of the world, Indy would die. If you modeled the dramatic expectations, then he manages to survive because it's appropriate for him to do so, despite the risks taken.

This is an important and complex issue. Note that D20 provides "plot immunity" to characters in the form of Hit Points. In most editions there's little chance of a character with a lot of HP going down in the current conflict. In fact, in a well designed scenario, you'll find only the last fight as the one in which there's any significant chance of character death.

This "plot immunity" was perhaps one of the things I wanted to get away from with Eclipse. I guess I believe that "plot immunity" should stem from smart player choices rather than an in-built air-bag, so-to-speak. I think I can accomplish this through giving players alot of power, and whilst this might seem counter-intuitive, I see it as simply the other side of the coin. In D&D, characters (ok, high-level ones) are basically invincible, especially with all the buffers built in (like an inability to kill yourself by teleporting into solid stone or die from leaping off a 400ft high cliff), but really aren't all that powerful in terms of what they can achieve. For instance, a high-level rogue can't sneak up behind a high-level wizard and plunge a dagger into the base of his skull. So D&D would be provides "plot immunity" by wrapping everyone in bubble-wrap and giving them plastic toys, where Eclipse provides "plot immunity" by stripping everyone down to their bare ass and giving them sharp metal sticks. The risk is higher, but so are the rewards.

Interesting. The problem is that this mechanic, like many others, makes the character less interesting for having "lost" the fight. So you're penalizing the player. This indicates to the player that they're goal is to win each fight, as a personal player goal - not just as a character goal. Again, this can be detrimental to heroism, depending on whether or not its tactically sound in the game to play it "safe".

When you say "many others", are you referring to many others in Eclipse? Or other games? If you are reffering to Eclipse, would you care to elaborate so I can "iron them out"? Also, I'm not 100% certain I understand what you are saying here. It seems to me that you are saying that by penalizing players for losing fights, I am encouraging them to want to win (encouraging both players and characters), and that this can be detrimental to heroism? That doesn't make much sense to me... because I don't know many people who like losing (unles there's a win to be had by losing, in which case they are still trying to win), and I doubt that I need to incentivise that sort of attitude. As far as I can see, allowing them to prevent themselves from dying -at a cost- seems like a perfectly mechanically sound way to implement a degree of plot protection, that can't be abused but is still a handy thing to fall back on when you really need it. If you could perhaps explain more what you meant I might be able to understand better?

I think there are no such things as "real-life heroes" that go out again and again and risk their lives. Real heroes do what they do because they are thrust into a situation to which they must react, and do so bravely at that time. Even the heroes of literature don't do it for the glory in most cases, but based on their moral convictions.

Good point.

In any case, none of this addresses the fact that if the rewards make the characters, say, more able to kill things, that it will inform the players that they're supposed to be about killing things. If you want play to be about character values, then perhaps the rewards should add to those?

Ok, I see your point. However, there are two main reasons why I won't mechanise character values. One, Eclipse is not about player/character values, in a similar way to how life isn't about values. Values exist, sure, and can play a large part in a person's life, but they are not what life is about. If I wanted to boil down exactly what Eclipse is about, I guess it would be about interacting with others in various ways, and improving one's self. Secondly, I've studied quite a bit of philosophical and psychological perspectives on morals/values, and I can safely say that if I made a mechanic for how morals work, and how important they are, then I would have ignored at least 6 hundred other perspectives. Very few people agree as to where they come from, what purpose they serve, and how much authority should be placed on them, and so a mechanic that tried to define these things would meet alot of disagreement and would no doubt be house-ruled to death. I know TROS does this to an extent with its Spiritual Attributes, but to prove my point, I personally do not agree that following my dreams will improve my effectiveness, and I certainly disagree that I should gain any bonus for doing things that I have a vested interest in, as such a concept is entirely contradictory to my own life experiences. But I'm only using this example to make my point.

Right now, the rewards simply make characters more able to do whatever they want to do. This might be killing things, it might be falling in love, it might be making other people feel bad, it might be becoming famous and revered/feared, or it might be making money. Player values are a means, as it were, not an end, and I don't wish to step in that muddied pool.

The problem with using the open Jury debate method is that it can take a long time to determine that a Jury is hung (can't decide). So what I'd think might work well is something where the proposing player states the level that they think is appropriate, and perhaps a short reason why. Then the player to their left either agrees or proposes another level. When it gets back to the starting player, they propose a level again, based on what they think the consensus is likely to be. Then each other player goes thumbs up or thumbs down. If there are any thumbs down, no reward is given. If all are thumbs up, then the player recieves the modified reward.

That, or something like it, could be done in short order. This kind of organization is good to keep it clear how to conduct these things, and prevents them from going forever.

During play gets the best results. It means that players are reminded again and again about this important part of play. The problem, as you mentioned is it bogging things down. What might work is to have the rewards come at the end of each scene or at some reqular interval like that. The GM just asks, "rewards?" and the players make their suggestions at that time.

Then I'd have the rewards only get spent between sessions or something. That way recalculation only happens dong that down time as opposed to during play.

Hmmm, I'm liking these ideas. I think I might go for this or something very close, but unfortunately, whilst it sounds good in theory, I'll have to see it in practise before I can be definitive. Thanks!

From an earlier post:

So, does the player track these separately - Reputation, and Evil Deeds? Do they cancel each other? Is there any incentive to stick to the good side, or is it entirely the player's option?

I'm leaning towards tracking both (good and evil) Reputations seperately. That way, you can get all sorts of complex interpretations for the reputation scores, like "he's a really good king, but has his occasional black moments", and "he is a terrible king, but he's always nice to the ladies". You get the idea. I'm thinking I'll just leave the reputations as the scores, and let players/GMs attach the relevant meanings to them based on what they've done, as this is flexible yet workable. As for incentive to stick to one side, I'm not sure I want to step into the depths of mechanising how an evil player might accrue people hunting them down, or a good player might accrue followers, and just leave this up to the GM. After all, different species and cultures will react differently, such as a pirate culture, where someone with an evil reputation will be a hero, and the good guys will be enemies. So again, I think I might leave this to GM interpretation, allowing them to use their player's reputations as guides when planning adventures, letting them use the most powerful mechanic ever devised: Creative Reasoning!

Cool - does this mean that you're considering an abstract wealth system? That is, does the player keep track of electrum pieces, or does he just have a rating that represents his purchasing power? There are some strong arguments for the abstraction, even in the name of realism.

Right now, I'm just using gold pieces, but I'm interested in this abstract "purchasing power" thing. How does it allow for players to save up money? How would it be modified by the success of a thief? How could a merchant gamble away all his gold? You don't need to explain the whole concept to me, a link would be great.

Why not a mechanic for this? I mean, what's the difference between social combat to make someone look bad, and a conflict intended for you to browbeat someone into giving out info or somesuch? I see all these, money, social conflict, and info as all part of the same pool of contests, potentially.

Ok, yeah the gaining of info might work pretty well. I actually have already accounted for this, but I was thinking on a more different level... actually, I don't know what I was thinking. But it's already in there.



Phew! Sorry for the length of this post, but at least I have now addressed all the issues raised. As I stated earlier, I will soon (probably tomorrow, maybe the next day at the latest) be creating a thread on Combat Mechanics, and one on Social Interaction Mechanics, and I will keep this one as a discussion on the Reward Mechanics.

So far, to summarise rewards, we have the handing out of attribute points and reputation according to the risks that players undertake. The risks are voted for by the GM first --regardless of who the rewards will apply to, whether one player or all of them-- who states what risk level is appropriate, and gives a short reason why. Then the player to the left can either agree or propose a new risk level, and if they are proposing a new risk level, they must also give a short reason why. This continues around the table until it gets back to the GM. The GM then calls for the vote on whatever was the most agreed upon risk level, and if everyone gives the thumbs up, then the reward is given to whoever it applies to. If there is no most agreed upon risk level by the time it gets back to the GM, then they must call for a vote on the lowest possible risk level. If anyone gives the thumbs down at the crucial vote, no reward is handed out.
If the majority of players also agree that the act to which the reward applies was a negative (evil) one, then the reputation points are doubled, and scored seperately as Negative Reputation.

The risk levels and their rewards are as follows:

Low = 1 attribute point, 1d4 reputation points
Mild = 2 attribute points, 1d6 reputation points
Moderate = 3 attribute points, 2d4 reputation points
High = 4 attribute points, 2d6 reputation points
Severe = 6 attribute points, 1d20 reputation points
Impossible = no attribute points, 4d6 x10 reputation points

Reputation points are modified according to the number of witnesses:

0-10 = 0
11-20 = +1d4
21-30 = +1d6
31-40 = +2d4
40+ = +2d6

The Risks
Risks are measured by qualitative assessment of the chance for some significant negative outcome. Note that a significant negative outcome does not include things such as losing a bit of money when gambling, but is more telling of losing all your money from gambling. The decision should be made completely ignorant of what actually happened due to poor decisions/unlucky die rolls, and should be an objective decision based on the potential if a character has average luck and makes smart choices.

Low: Low risks mean that were, say, 10 similarly effective characters to do the same thing, only around 1-2 would: be killed, suffer grevious bodily harm, have their Ego heavily damaged, have their Reputation heavily damaged, lose all their possessions, succumb to the will of another person, be taken prisoner, be caught.

Mild: As with Low, but if, say, 10 similarly effective people did the same thing, around 2-4 might suffer a significant negative outcome.

Moderate: As with Low, but if, say, 10 similarly effective people did the same thing, around 4-6 might suffer a significant negative outcome.

High: As with Low, but if, say, 10 similarly effective people did the same thing, around 6-8 might suffer a significant negative outcome.

Severe: As with Low, but if, say, 10 similarly effective people did the same thing, around 8-9 might suffer a significant negative outcome.

Impossible: Against all odds, in the face of certain death, you have chosen to sacrifice your life for the benefit of those you care about, or you have faced death with bravery in fighting for a cause. This does not mean that you have died, only that you had accepted death and would face it on your feet with honour. In addition, all other players including the GM must have been certain you would die and agree that your death would have been worthy, not stupid.


Reputation
Every character starts with some reputation determined by their social class and a roll. For example, upper-class characters start with 100 +4d6 x10 reputation points, middle-class characters start with 4d6 x10 reputation points, and lower-class characters start with 4d6 reputation points (these are my 3 social classes, and each one means a different thing for different species). Reputation gain is the only way to gain Ability Points (AP), which are the strongest currency in terms of what they can buy. Reputation is also the only way to increase your social class in-game (and decrease it). Such increases are achieved at various reputation "benchmarks" (can anyone think of a better word?), as given below:

0 or less = society expects you to kill yourself, -20 penalty to all rolls
20 = fall from middle-class to lower-class
100 = 1 AP when you first reach 100, fall from upper-class to middle-class, rise from lower-class to middle-class
200 = 1 AP when you first reach 200, rise from middle-class to upper-class, +20 bonus to Core Ego, +2 bonus to all rolls
500 = 2 AP when you first reach 500, +50 bonus to core Ego, +5 to all rolls

There are also many other subdivisions and further benchmarks unique to various organisations and reputation plays a large role in advancing through the ranks of an organisation. For example, to become a king/queen one must have a reputation of at least 1000, be a member of whatever organisation kings and queens are chosen from (royal families, political nobility, spellcasters, whatever), and also manouvre through all the other contenders and possibly even assassinate the existing ruler. But all of this is simply in my head right now (goddamn it's alot of stuff to work out!).

Summary
This reward mechanic is currently the only way a character can increase their reputation and their attribute points and the only way to gain ability points (AP). Social interaction provides it's own rewards inherent to the mechanic, and thus doesn't need to be directly rewarded through this main one.

So this is what I have so far. Any comments/criticisms/suggestions/questions are welcome. I'd like to keep this thread to discussions on the reward mechanics from now on (and anything else that isn't combat mechanics or social interaction mechanics), but if anyone wishes to mention something about the other aspects of Eclipse before I've created the new threads, I'll be happy to recieve private messages.

-Ben

[Bracken]

You cannot use one action to do more than one "thing" (with the sole exception of casting a spell and performing a physical action simultaneously, but that's a special case). An action in Eclipse is not like a "round", in that it is not a measure of time as such, but is simply the doing of a thing. At character creation, you will be able to do less things within a given period of time (a round) than later on when you are more advanced. You cannot swing a sword in two directions at once. So taking your example, here's the simplest form of what we might see:

Bob has 5 actions, why not. Each of the 3 orcs have 2 actions each. Bob would use his 1st action to deal with orc #1's 1st action, then use his 2nd action to deal with orc #2's 1st action, then use his 3rd action to deal with orc #3's 1st action, and then he would cycle back, using his 4th action to deal with orc #1's 2nd action, and finally using his 5th action to deal with orc #2's 2nd action. Now he has run out of actions, and orc #3 still has its 2nd action remaining, and thus Bob has been "overwhelmed" by the 3 orcs, and orc #3 can strike Bob without Bob being abe to defend. And that would conclude the first round.

This is the simplest possible example. In practice Bob would be sufficiently powerful to kill each of the orcs before they got their second actions (unless he rolled really, really poorly), and would have various abilities and he would be able to manouvre and dodge and all sorts of other stuff. And of course, the orcs would also have other options available. If the orcs all had the Concert Fighting ability, Bob would be screwed (probably). If Bob had the Battle Trained ability (negates Concert Fighting, grants 1 extra action per round for every opponent more than one), Bob would wipe the floor with them with actions to spare.

So in summary, under default conditions, when faced with multiple opponents you must "cycle" your actions between them. I picture this in my head like how such duels are portrayed in movies, with the hero alternating attacks and defenses between foes. I hope that made sense.

Got it!

No initiative, no rolling of dice. Declarations of intent define the action. "I wait to see what my opponent does" is the same as saying "I defend this action". "I take a swipe at his head" is the same as saying "I attack this action, and if I deal damage, it will be to his head". Who declares first? The players, every time. Why? For the same reason as below:

Hmmm..... I suppose this works, although should two characters ever come face to face (as sometimes happens) I suspect arguments will occur.

No. I want to avoid 'intent stacking'. ie: "I wait to see what my opponent does" "He leaps forward to attack you" "In that case, I will attack him, hoping to force him into the defensive" "He notices your attack, and chooses to defend" "Ok then, I cease my attack and drink a Pepsi".

You get the point. One action = one declaration. The players choose what they are going to do, the GM chooses what the opponents will do, and describes the action to the players.

Both of these things make sense now that they are described.

Looking foward to seeing what else you have coming.


Bracken