Egypt Needs Characters (and a few mechanics)

[Mithras]

Hi all,

I've been sketching out more ideas for this Ancient Egyptian game, a game that's going to focus on trying to maintain the eternal balance and the power of the Egyptian state (see The Kap thread).

Stats For the Kingdom
To represent the linkage between the success of Egypt and the player characters, I was considering giving the actual kingdom a set of attributes:  War 15, Economy 17, Diplomacy 11, Religion 9 for example. These ratings set the type of dice used by Egyptians in related fields (even vaguely related). 0-4 = 1d4; 5-8 = 1d6; 9-12 = 1d8, etc.

Scenarios may end with the following situations arising from the plot:

Restore a lost shrine to Osiris +1 to Egypt's Religion attribute
Fail to stop a Libyan incursion -2 to Egypt's War attribute

Character Attributes
How does this simple system relate to characters? Well I was angling for a more powerful link, using Power points or something, but I seem to have missed that completely. However, character stats will range between 1 and 6 and players add the relevant dice roll to the attribute to beat a target number. I'm thinking of minimizing or doing away with skills altogether.

Character attributes will (at the moment!) address the theme of balance - mainly by using a Pendragon rip-off ... Opposed stats, linked in pairs. Four pairs.

Nobility & Humility (related to work and profession)
Honesty & Deceit
Wisdom & Ignorance (don't like ignorance, too 'negative')
Strength & Agility.

Since 7 was an Egyptian magic number the player always has 7 points in each pair, allocated how he prefers (Nobility 1 & Humility 6 for a labourer for example).

I intend to link these pairs somehow to the attributes of the kingdom. Perhaps like this:

Economy – Nobility/Humility
Diplomacy – Honesty/Deceit
Religion – Wisdom/Ignorance (see why I need another stat there?)
And finally War – Strength/Agility

I want my labourer to repair his uncle's dried-brick hut? The player uses Humility (6) and adds a roll of 1d10 (for Egypt's Economy score of 17). In darker days of famine, plague and depopulation when Egypt's Economy is at 4, the task is harder, and our labourer only gets to add 1d4 to his score.

Other Aspects of Char-gen
The Egyptians considered there to be 7 (that number again) aspects of 'self' including the Shadow, the physical body, the Spirit Double, the Astral Body, the True Name and so on. In another game these might make quite nice attributes! But here I want to use them as empowering devices that can be gained by characters on their journey. There'll be no experience in the normal sense. It upsets the balance. You can shift points around at suitable junctures but not keep piling on points to upgrade those combat skills. When you discover an aspect of self you gain some nifty power (don't know what yet...). And then there's Hekau - Egyptian magic. I guess everyone knows some Hekau, its de rigeur to have learnt some spells before you die to help you get to the Underworld intact... We've got to have lots of mysterious magics.

That's the extent of my notes so far. I'm not happy with the 'religion pair' (Wisdom and Ignorance). I need two stats, and one must reflect religious power/piety and the other an equally useful opposite. It's tough ... I'm not worried about trying to incorporate intelligence into this, other stats will handle much of the workload and the player's brain will take up the rest.

Answering my own question, I have a very vague idea about trying to implement the 2nd edition RuneQuest mechanic of POWER. You have a lot, the gods notice and favour you. But you are the centre of attention on Earth too, making it hard to sneak around!

[lumpley]

I have no idea for flavor or what, but for Wisdom/Ignorance you could use Wisdom/Superstition.

-Vincent

[Paul Czege]

How about Skepticism/Superstition? Insight/Superstition?

Paul

[Mithras]

Skepticism... as an attribute.... what could you do better than someone else if you had Skepticism 6?

If one attribute is Magical Power/superstition then skepticism might be defence against magic perhaps?

The superstious guy understands, believes in and sees magic everywhere. He can use it. The skeptic does not see magic, cannot comprehend it, is afraid of it. Is defended against it by virtue of magical ignorance. No - something doesn't seem quite right about that ... I must think harder...

What about Obscurity (lack of charisma, and power, and connection with the gods) and Power (link with the gods, magical aptitude, inner power, charisma, presence).

Power is used to work magic and defend against magic. Obscurity is used to blend in, to be disguised, to sneak, hide in shadows, to be forgotten..)

[Epoch]

I like a lot of the concepts, Mithras.

How 'bout Knowledge/Intuition as the "religion" pair?  I was going to go with Knowledge/Faith, but I think that's too much a modern dichotomy.

I would suggest that you steer clear of the "skepticism = magical resistance" thing.  First off, it's been done to death in other games -- Mage: The Ascension is the stand-out example -- second, I think it's too modern.  The people of this time wouldn't regard skepticism of magic as being an enlightened attitude, surely?

Or you could do something like the Power/Obscurity dichotomy, something where each side is a different kind of magic.  You might go with Perception/Action, or even Blessing/Curse.

Skills:  I tend to not like games that do away with skills altogether (yeah, well, Amber is in many ways my favorite game, but...).  What if you had them, but minimized them in some way.  I'm thinking of taking a page from Mike Gentry's Buffy system, and let everyone choose a "specialty" skill that they're good at and nobody else is.  This might work really well if the idea is that the PC's are a group of people from the Kap who've worked together for years -- each has a specialty that they're really good at, and all the other ones know.  You could also potentially make everyone take a weakness, something that they're terrible at.  Then assume that everything else is simply stat-based.  It allows a bit more differentiation in characters without being too complex.

[Mike Holmes]

I like Vincent's superstition. I was thinking Obstinance, or something, but I think I like Superstition better. I see priests with high Wisdom casting "light" spells, and high Superstition casting "dark" spells. I'd change Deciet to something a little more PC. How about "Artifice"?

Interesting that with seven points for stats that you can never have a balance. That may not jibe with the Egyptian sense of things. How about a pyrimidal seven level scheme that favors balance.

Code Select Expand


Level  Stat 1  Stat 2  Total
1      10        1        11
2      9        3        12
3      8        5        13
4      7        7        14
5      5        8        13
6      3        9        12
7      1        10        11

So, you get more total points for being in balance, but to be truely outstanding at something you need to get out of balance. This has a sort of balance all it's own. Also note how the sevens show up neatly when you are balanced (just happens that this is the lowest number you can do this with mathematically and keep the pyramid with straight edges). You can have little pyramids on the record sheet to show where the character is at statistically and just mark the stone to the left or the right when you shift stats. Below the marked stone you can find the actual stats.


Also, I'm not a fan of lots of different polyhedra for one game, and the breakpoints for dice use seem inelegant. How about the Egypt stat sets the basic target number. So, use d10s (or d20s if you must) and rate Egypt from one to ten. Roll that or less on the player dice to generate successes.

Any of that make sense?

Mike

[Blake Hutchins]

I like Power/Obscurity, or maybe Tradition/Rebellious or Tradition/Apostasy for the religious pair.  The Strength/Agility split is one I don't like.  It's too traditional to be an effective dichotomy here.  All other stats come off as personality characteristics.  What about Bravery/Rage, or Bravery/Caution or Prowess/Cowardice for possible substitutes?

Best,

Blake

[Mike Holmes]

I like Strength/Agility in this case. I see it referring to armies and the like. You can either have a lot of force or be mobile. A big dilemma in the ancient world. I could see Bravery/Discretion, perhaps.

Going against tradition in a game about supporting the state seems wrong. The superstition/skepticism thing balances well. You can either do a lot with magic but are suceptible, or you cannot and are not. OTOH, this is likely to result in a lot of players going to the superwstition end. At least I wouldn't pass it up.

How about Day/Night? Ra/Set. Even stronger elements of the light and dark magic that I mentioned.

Mike

[Mithras]

Mike, wow. That table is quite ... lovely.  Very elegant. I didn't notice that the stats can't balance. A bit stupid really when the game universe is all about 'balance'.

I too am not enamoured of multi-polyhedrals. The big flaw with The Window I think, but I thought I might give it a shot. I'll see if your system can be substituted instead.

Strength/Agility. It does stand out a bit, doesn't it? Bravery/Discretion is a nice substitute. Either fight or flight/sneak/hide/scout etc. That will do nicely, and its still a personality attribute!

The religion attribute pair is still a problem. Essentially I have Fate versus freewill. Magic will work whoever you are, I don't see it as a person-dependant thing. Fate versus Action/Freewill?  Fate versus Luck. At one end you have position and power within the temple, at the other you are a free independant spirit. Tradition/Spirit. Either you are part of the hierarchy and the temple institution, or you are a free spirit, relying on your own will power and determination. Both are powerful, useful and related to overcoming magical forces.

Tradition/Spirit. That should do it.

[contracycle]

Sanctity/Pragmatism occurred to me.

These 7 aspects of the soul/self: could they be used as as organising structure?  I was thinking that it might serve as a thematic link to the locus, the land.  Say you construct 7 zones on the charsheet, horizontally.  In the leftmost column, you place an icon and word for the section of the soul - ba, ka, whatnot.  In the next column, you indicate the current values of the kingdom, symbolically linking aspects of the soal to aspects of the state/land - the physical body element corresponds to the material landscape, etc etc.  In the third column, you display the balanced pair and their specific values.  This means more pairs would be required to fill all 7 zones; although it could be worse - one interpretation of the soul-aspects I saw listed 9.

Another possibility might be that, with an explanation of the aspect of the soul and how these are interpolated into frex the Kingdom values, you might ask the player to propose an opposed pair of their own, thematically appropriate to the zone/aspect.  I don't know how elegantly that would work; it could be used to cover professional skills and the like.  A slight variation might be the capacity to select one side of a pair based on character creation, and to invent its counterpoint (rather than opposite).

So, you end up with a charsheet that can be made to look like papyrus (easy enough to download a texture), has heiroglyphic symbols down one edge, and is arranged in columns.  Do all text with a strong brush font and I think you'd have a funky concept.  I could do a rush over the weekend, if you liked the idea and would be in a position to nail the 7 zones down firmly.

[contracycle]

and you could even emboss an osiris relief into the page, too.

[Epoch]

Mike, wow. That table is quite ... lovely.  Very elegant. I didn't notice that the stats can't balance. A bit stupid really when the game universe is all about 'balance'.

I gave this a fair amount of thought last night, when I was being bitter about being dateless on V-Day.  :)

I think that the table looks a bit better than it is.  Here's my thought:

From a game point of view, you want people to be unbalanced.  Yeah, yeah, the ideal of the game is balance, but the characters are only interesting if they have strong points and weak points.  Now, how willing are people going to be to decrease their weak stat 2 points for every one point that they increase their strong stat?  It strikes me that if I'm looking at my character, dropping my, say Strength to 5 just to get one point of Agility isn't going to look good to me.  And I suspect -- depending slightly on the die system, sure -- that balanced characters are going to dominate the game.

Now, perhaps the opposed-dichotomy pair attributes will alleviate this problem -- the prince might say, "I don't care if my Humility is 1.  That's not what I'm about."  However, this puts you in the position of fighting yourself -- the more you emphasize that both sides of the stat are good/important/balanced, the less people will want to play unbalanced characters.

On a philosophical plane, look at the Kap, and what it's used for.  The idea is that princes get to know a bunch of exceptional young men who they can make chancellors and priests and whatnot, if they become pharaoh, right?  That sounds to me like it's acknowledgement of the fact that no one man will ever be "balanced" -- rather, only by having friends and allies who compensate for one's weaknesses can one achieve effective balance.

I might go so far as to disallow balance in the chargen process.  It's a goal to strive for, not a place to start from.

[Mike Holmes]

Hmmm...Mr Sullivan (despite being a dateless wonder) has a point. :-P

And I did fall into one of my own favorite pitfalls: making a symetrical system for the sake of the symetry. I've been considering other alternatives. The obvious simple one is to go with the opposing stats adding to eight with a minimum of one (stats range from one to seven, and balance at four). Or the original system where balance is an unobtainable ideal. Or you can go the opposite rout where you balance at four and get two points for each one you drop which gives you an incentive to get away from the middle balance:

Code Select Expand

Stat A  Stat B  Balance
1       10      1
2       8       2
3       6       3
4       4       4
6       3       3
8       2       2
10      1       1

In this case, however, I'd think that you'd have to give some sort of incentive to stay balanced. Perhaps a "Balance" stat calculated from adding all number from the each stat in the Balance Column (equal to the lower of the two stats, BTW, and coincidentally) in the chart above. So a character would have from four to sixteen Balance depending on his other stats. The balance of all players would form a pool that the pharoh could use to defend Egypt against her foes, or something like that (perhaps Egypt's d20 target stats must average the same as the characters' average Balance). So, it's better for the character personally to have unbalanced stats, but better for Egypt if they are balanced. There's your trade-off.

Or perhaps balance points can be used to purchase the seven forms. Lots of possibilities.


I've been thinking about resolution mechanics and I've had some ideas there as well. One is that, when rolling against a particular stat you could also roll against it's opposite to avoid negative effects. So, if I'm rolling against Bravery for successes to defeat a giant magic scarab, I also have to roll against Discretion or suffer negative side effects. So, I roll my 8 Bravery, but also I roll my 2 Discretion. I manage four successes on my Bravery rolls, but none on the discretion side. The four is enough to defeat the big beetle, but since I scored no Discretion successes, I am wounded in the process. Would work well, you see, with a "no opposing roll" system. Harsh tasks (like a really big beetle) would just lower the target. Anyhow, this would mean that unbalanced characters would succeed a lot, and well, but often at a cost due to their weaknesses. This gives more incentive for balance, FWIW.

Anything useful there?

Mike

[Mithras]

Mike,

Yup - that's got me thinking a good deal. Balance points: using them to support the kingdom, using them to buy Aspects of the Soul, rolling both sides of each attribute.

Its all gone in, let me ruminate and see what comes out the other end!

I like contracycle's idea of setting up ASpects of the Soul as Aspects of Egypt, too.  

Great ideas - I feel like I should be paying you guys a consultancy fee or something ...  :)

Regards

[Epoch]

Mike,

Yup - that's got me thinking a good deal. Balance points: using them to support the kingdom, using them to buy Aspects of the Soul, rolling both sides of each attribute.

I like Balance points too, though I'm not sure that we've yet pegged exactly how they should be used.

Its all gone in, let me ruminate and see what comes out the other end!

I like contracycle's idea of setting up Aspects of the Soul as Aspects of Egypt, too.  

Great ideas - I feel like I should be paying you guys a consultancy fee or something ...  :)

Okay, send money to...  ;)

I like the whole "giving Egypt stats" thing.  I would suggest that it's at least partially independent of the PC's.  They are, after all, not solely responsible for its health.  It should definitely be influenced by the PC's, though...