Karma Mechanics in Realistic Settings

[Henry Fitch]

I've been looking at the Nobilis 2ed promo stuff a bunch lately, and the system just seems... well, beautiful. I love it. It appears to strip away randomness without losing anything, while greatly reinforcing the feel of its characters and setting.

On to an actual question. Has thing type of system (straight karma varied by resource management) been used in any other types of settings? Specifically, has it been used for anything marginally realistic, or at least with human beings as PCs? If it hasn't, could it?

[Valamir]

I think it depends on how "realistic" is defined.  If "realistic" is defined to include the possibility of that 1 in a million golden bb, then no Karma really isn't appropriate.  If "realistic" recognizes that a 1 in a million outcome does not seem very reasonable if it occurs the first time someone tries something then Karma would work fine for many applications.

In fact, I'd say there are plenty of old school sim games that made ample use of karma, although they probably didn't realize they were doing it.  But even the basic admonishment to "not roll the dice every time you cross the street" is karma in action.  The assumption is that the character is skillful enough to accomplish the act without needing a roll.

Many old sims had tables that equated a given sim level with a corresponding level of accomplishment.  White Wolf took this to an extreme with its description of the capabilities of each of the 5 levels of a skill.  I don't know how common place it was, but I know of groups that used those levels as a guide for when to roll and when to assume success.

[Paul Czege]

Hey Henry,

Epiphany is a diceless game that (except for the magic system¹) is all Karma and resource managment. Uncertainty in the outcome of conflict resolution comes from how a player apportions their advantages between offense and defense, and how that compares to what the opponent did. The characters are humans in a hyperborean setting.

Paul

1. The magic system makes use of a random draw from a resource pool to determine the spell or type of mana available available to the caster (ala Magic: the Gathering). Spell effects are not random.

[Fabrice G.]

Hi Henry,

well, there's a french game named Abyme a sourcebook for Agone (the later is soon to be translated in english).

You have "caracteristics" that comprehend the ability of the character, but also his equipement, his supporter, etc. (ie the combat represent the martial aptitude, the fact that the character has bodyguards or not, the quality of its equipment,...)

They  have an 1-6 range, and the player has to explain why he has such point.
The system consist in comparing the value of the characteristic with a difficulty value assigned by the GM (1-6 also). The interesting thing is that if the difficulty is over the characteristic, the player has the option of sacrifying point of the appropriate characteristic. As the points represent many things, the GM and the player have to explain the loss (ie, for combat: wounds, the loss of follower, broken sword...and it works that way for every thing).
The major benefit is that the player has to initiate in-game action to recover those precious point (did he broke his sword, now to recover his point he can buy another one, engage a bodyguard, ...).

The game is set in an fantasy setting heavily influenced by a kind of wonderfullness (magic comes by the arts, or by making little creatures dance, etc.) so the setting isn't particularly "realistic", but at least you play human characters who can do "normal" fantasy things...

BTW, as for Nobilis 2nd edition, it's avaible in french and all I can say is WHOA !!!

Fabrice.[/b]

[Ron Edwards]

Hi there,

I would like to take "realistic" in the generalized sense that I think Henry was using, meaning that player-characters are not special beings of some kind aside from being protagonists.

My basic claim is Yes, that a karma mechanic much like that found in Nobilis (i.e. resource based) would be very usable. I think it represents a functional, interesting, and under-explored avenue of resolution design, and the more people start experimenting with it, the better.

The only concern is a certain "flatness" of play based on the lack of springboarding that comes from a good Fortune system, which concerns me a bit regarding (1) an old design of mine which used the Karma/resource method for non-magical resolution and (2) playing Nobilis, which unfortunately I haven't done yet.

Therefore it might also be interesting to see the Karma/resource mechanic combined with a Fortune mechanic regarding things in play that are not about conflict resolution, such as setting up features of the circumstances of the conflict rather than resolving it.

Best,
Ron