Removing attributes from HQ

[Mike Holmes]

Jamie,

I don't get it. What actual play are you refering to? Are you in some game where what you describe happening happens? Where you are a player, and the Narrator is playing like this? Or are you the Narrator?

First, if you're doing it yourself, then you have only yourself to blame. Presented with two abilities like Charge and Large, the Narrator can choose whichever he likes as primary. In the case of a charge, I'd find it hard to justify, personally, using Large as primary, but...Anyhow, you can set the resistance any way you want (you don't even technically have to refer to any ability at all). So, ummm, just don't do that.

Anyhow, if it's other narrators, well, you're going to have to convince them to use your rule. Why not just convince them to use the other abilities as primary? Seems easier to me.

That is, there's nothing in the rules that's making people play the way you claim they are. They can already play just the way you want them to, and still be in the regular rules. In any case, I fail to see how a Narrator is "encouraged" to use Large in the examples you give. Are you telling me that the Narrator's you play with are actively trying to make the opposition win conflicts? If so, then you've got larger problems with agenda than a small rules fix like this can address.


All this said, I think that using Large this way is fine. Actually I disagree that narrators should have to use the same logic as players in coming up with how abilities relate to action. That is, the players have heroes, the center of the action. They need to have this sort of focus. But if there's a charging dinosaur, and the Narrator only wants to emphasize that it's Large...well, that seems fine to me. It's not a hero, and really doesn't deserve the same treatment.

Now, if it's the T-Rex from Lost World... sure. But then that's a judgment call, and, again, completely allowed by the rules.

Anyhow, your objections here and that of Mandrake above indicate a further problem, that you guys have "combat" in your games. Don't do that. Oh, have fights when they're appropriate. Have brawls, if it sounds fun. Allow contests to murder people. Assassinations are good, too. But it sounds to me like largely the problem comes down to not really having embraced the same idea that you say you want to embrace, which is that of character goals driving contests. A dinosaur is charging? The player's goal for his character is? Run away to get to high ground where the dino can't charge? OK, how's that combat? How will large help it? Maybe as an augment to it's charge, I suppose. But it won't be primary.

Large is only a problem if you see it as useful in every combat situation, and you see every confrontation with a "monster" as a "combat." Just don't do that. Frame all contests individually and you'll find that all abilities come into play, not just the seemingly broad ones.

Again, have trouble with Narrators who don't get that? Then small rules fixes like this aren't going to help.

Let's see, I had a Troll in the game with Large 15W (Shadow World Troll - 11 feet tall). He was involved in several contests, and I used his Large rating once - yes, a fight, but one against Okhfels, the guy with the Strong 10W2 (which I believe got used as an augment here). There were some chasing contests with it, some negotiation contests...in the end it ended up helping Okhfels and gang in a heroquest, augmenting with it's shaman abilities (did I mention it was a troll shaman?). I think that having Large come up once for an 11 foot troll is about right, no?

Okhfel's strong ended up being an augment in many cases, but was only primary once or twice that I recall. And in those cases the goals were like "Restrain Character X" or something where, in fact, use of it as primary made it more goal oriented, not less.

I think you're attacking symptoms of a larger problem. I don't have that larger problem, so, of course, I don't have the symptoms that your system might deal with.

Mike

[Web_Weaver]

I don't like standard modifiers at all, I'd rather just use the regular system. That is, I'd prefer if players had "Sword 5W" rather than +3 for a sword. Why? Because it makes you take each ability into account on each contest. Having any ability that you can just say, "I get a +3"...that's not a detail I want in my game.

And how is two rating systems easier to grasp than one? Because it's like D&D?

Firstly, I have no idea how D&D works, but hey, if you don't like standard modifiers fine. But, they work for me precisely in the opposite direction. I don't want people taking into account weapons as abilities in my game, it would muddy my agenda (I think).

I don't see how this is more "specific" or varied between players...you seem to be allowing precisely the same descriptions for abilities. Large is not a broad ability - it's actually useful in rather few situations. Tall is actually a very narrow ability.

The actual broadness is not my point, its that they COULD be expressed in the same way as broad abilities, and in my opinion it would help.

As for Intelligent, quick, etc. yes, these are broad. I'm not sure what the problem with the normal rule for broad abilities is, and I'm not sure how a variation to the broad ability rule is supposed to be more like the broad ability rule than...well, the broad ability rule.In any case, I usually just ask the player to narrow. In which case we have the same solution. Allowing them to keep some broad bonus doesn't seem to help the situation that I can see.

I am not suggesting any change to the Broad Ability Rule, I think I need to restate a point that may not be clear:

I propose that if you wish to play an out of the ordinary character (as defined by the other characters) you may be tempted to use abilities like Tall or Strong to show how that character is different.

So a Troll character with a group of human characters may have a Large ability. I think this is a bad idea, and would assign a Large modifier and if the player wanted to use large like abilities I would suggest he picked a narrower, more specific, and more customised to his character, ability.

As far as it being "an easier flag to deal with for narrators," well, I dunno, it might stand out this way, but then you're de-emphasizing all of the cool little abilities that don't get such treatment. I don't see how a normal ability is at all a difficult flag to deal with to start.

I think this stems from the same misunderstanding? I am not really over-emphasing attributes, just banning their use and using an augment in exceptional circumstances.

I'm not seeing any problem here, and I'm seeing a solution that would produce lots of problems, IMO, as well.

I am not seeing any added problem, as I am hardly changing any rules at all. I am just treating exceptional circumstances as similar to say weapon bonuses. (Which you appear to dislike so we may have no common ground here.)

[Web_Weaver]

Mike,

Sorry crossposted there, but in our games we have multiple GMs with multiple agendas so it gets very murky. (Possibly best left to individual GMs to post if they want to address those issues as different issues arise in different games due to those differing agendas.

I don't do combat, so I agree with you on most of your points. Mandrake uses combat in a very gritty RQ style and makes it work very well, HQ can be used this way effectively but HW was better suited to it in some respects. Different game, different agenda so no problem, best to keep the issues separate.

As I posted in my crosspost, I think you may have believed I was making a bigger change to the rules than I am suggesting, and I am addressing the way I have observed play and narration as well as issues I have with the way that the rules encourage different interpretations.

[Web_Weaver]

The attribute problem is most clearly expressed in the whole issue of size on page 206 of HQ.

Here a human size in expressed as 6 (large and small). Large and Small are considered inappropriate abilities, Big or Slender are not to be raised, outside of "racial norms" (no idea what that means). All size stats given in the creatures section are as compared to this base of 6. It expressly states that size can be used in contests.

In my view its just a cut & paste job from Anaxil's Roster with little regard for how the system works and only a slight nod towards the changes from HW to HQ (i.e. it stops worrying about specific trample rules).

This does not work for me at all, everytime size is used you need to keep in mind relative sizes of creatures and how this effects things. (At least that's how my mind works). I would prefer to just sweep this issue away. It doesn't help me arrive at suitable resistances but instead confuses me.

[Mandrake]

The line from AR is what led to my inital assertion that Large is essential a rating of comparative size (RQ's Size if you will).

Jamie and I have different approaches to narration but we "suffer" the same group of players. Trying to find a consistent approach that works with both gamist narration and narrative narration can get a little trying.

[Web_Weaver]

I gave up on consistancy long ago :-)

[Mike Holmes]

You do have me confused now. I was under the assumption that your notion was to take a Large 5W and convert it into a Large +3 (potentially along with adding some ability like "Bulky" as well that's more specific). A standard bonus, I don't see how this creates relative size references, instead it just makes the demarcation between sizes more fuzzy. I don't have a specific problem with that, but I don't see how it accomplishes your goal, other than that it means that the ability can't be used as primary. The complaint seeming to be that otherwise they're overused (forget about the term broad for a moment, which I think means the same thing).


Let's try this from a different standpoint...how do I know an ability is an "attribute?" I mean, if I think it might be a broad ability, I can ask for it to be narrowed - we all agree that this works. But let's say that there's something on the borderline. When do I know that it deserves this special treatment?

Anyhow, again looking at the last two posts, I think I'm seeing where the problem lies right there.

Mike

[Mandrake]

As two narrators in the same gaming group have conflicting ideas on one concept (Large) I'm not surprised you are confused.

I see Large as described in Anaxial's, a measure of comparative size. Jamie does not. I think it's the use of Large as a predominant example of an attribute throughout this thread that's perhaps causing the confusion.

Yes, 3 narrators with different agendas does cause problems in and of itself but recent session of the 3rd campaign (the one we both play in) have led both of us to examine certain aspects of the game. At some point, we will have to document campaign specfic house rules I think just to show how different they are (and to prevent "those weren't the rules last week arguments" when we switch campaign)

Jamie's issue, as I understand it, is "monsters" using one significant "attribute", be it large, tough, strong as a generic resist all. Of course for his campaign, as narrator, he can simply choose not to do it, but each of us has historically tried to influence the other two or at least find some degree of middle ground on a concept. Without wanting to cite specfic examples, we have both disagreed with the ways that they have been used in the 3rd campaign which is perhaps what started Jamie on this topic in the first place

It's looking to me, that has the 3 playstyles (narration styles?) we have evolve, we will end up using increasingly disparate house rules to suit our specific needs and agendas.

[Mike Holmes]

The whole comparative/relative thing and Anaxial's Roster are, I think, missing the point entirely. Frankly I don't think that HW was all that different than HQ in this regard, and so I don't see how these creatures have some problematic "hold-over" problem with Large.

Large is an ability just like "Dragon Pass Geography." I've heard some people complain about the ratings that creatures have been given before (mostly that they're too small somehow). But never have I heard that these abilities were somehow any different than any other abililty.

All abilities are "6-based." That's the default level. Every being has a 6 in everything that's not on the character sheet. If a creature isn't "average" in something, if it's worth noting that they're different, then you mark down the ability on the sheet with some rating larger than 6.

These abilities are used to figure out who wins contests. In addition most people prefer to say that they describe the character in-game as well, but even that's not neccessary. But, if you do, then I can see no reason why a larger creature shouldn't have a larger rating, and why those ratings can't be compared. And why those abilities can't be used in contests.

The only objection that sounds sane to me is that the ability is too broad, so it gets used too much. That I might buy. But that's a matter of contest framing style, or of not using the rule for broad abilites to force the ability to get narrowed down. Dinosaur says Large? Change it to, I dunno, Titanic or whatever you think is narrower. But in any case, there are still goign to be legitimat cases where you can use that ability.

Mike