Personality Traits and Relationships

[rstites]

One question I got from a player was what do the various levels for personality traits and relationships mean.  There's tables showing what an ability is roughtly.  Anyone have one for these that I could point him at?  I started this by telling them just to write out whatever personality traits fit their character concept, so I'm partly (mostly?) to blame here! :)

Ross

[Der_Renegat]

Hi Ross!

The ratingnumbers always mean the same thing:

they measure how useful an ability is.
This can be as an active ability in a contest or an augment.

So in a relationship-contest the numbers could mean how much you can get from this relation in terms of help for example.
Low rating - little help. Big rating - much help.
Other possibilities might be:
information, money, psychological support, getting strength from a relationship - like love, hate or rivalry, etc.

The same with personality traits.
How useful are they?
How much do they "give" you ?
How much impact has that trait ? Is it weak or strong ? Helpful or distracting ?

Remember that only the significant abilities appear on your charactersheet.
Those that matter or make a difference.

I admit being able to translate pure numbers into something meaningful needs training. This is one of the HQ learning curves.
You can practice this by creating NPCs or try to write up a character from a novel or film you know.
Here are some suggestions what numbers might mean.
Note that a friend-relationship could have any rating, it depends how deep/useful/supporting that relationship really is:

13 - a new relationship with little significance
17 - somebody you meet sometimes by chance, you know a few things about this character - an acquaintance
5M -  you know a few more personal things about this character or your relation got some depth added
5M2 - a real good friend
15M2 - a lover
5M3 - real tight friends for life

hope hat helps a bit

best

Christian

[Mike Holmes]

I agree with Christian, but I tend to be a bit more radical about it. That is, I think that the rating pretty much only means how much the ability will affect the dice roll. That is, I don't think it says much of anything at all about the actual in-game intensity of the relationship. That is, a character with Loves Griselda 17 may feel more strongly about her than another with Likes Griselda 17W2.

The numbers can be thought of as intensity, just as most people think of ability levels as a ranking of ability and such, but often it's just best to ignore this feature. Put another way, in practical play, you don't often make comparisons like this or anything, you just bring up the rating when the ability seems to make sense in a conflict. The problem with making a feeling proportional to the ability level is that it means that a character who is young and might reasonably love his mother intensely isn't allowed to start with the relationship at a level that seems to suffice. I mean I think most people would have a three mastery relationship to their mother using Christian's chart.

Some people fix this by altering the level of the relationship to match a chart like Christian's. That works fine, I guess, and has a certain allure as it will focus things even more on relationships. But dramatically I think it's a bit too much, and really only an attempt to satisfy some desire for there to be a proportionality between relationship rating and intensity. Further how do you balance this?

In practice it's simply not neccessary. For one character, his love for his mother, while intense, simply doesn't come into play much in the situations in which he finds himself. In another, his hate for his mother will come up again and again and be rated very highly. There's a real question as to whether or not relationships affecting things is "realistic" (I think it is, but for argument's sake...), so consider this a dramatic thing. If you feel that you want the relationship to be more potent in terms resolution, raise it up with HP. But don't ever let that affect how you narrate your character's feelings.

BTW, the same goes for personality traits. These never limit a character's reactions. Is the character Timid 17? Then he gets a penalty where appropriate, but the player never is required to have him run away. Is he Greedy 7W? Then the character may have to roll against this to resist doing something greedy, but the player is never required to do something with it other than as the result of a contest. Does the character have "Loves Griselda 17W2?" Then he gets a +6 when attempting to save her, but is not required to do so - he can walk if he feels that it would be more interesting.

The abilities you take do not inform how you must play, they just give interesting incentives in different directions. Same with relationships. It's just a bonus or penalty in the right circumstances. You can play around it however you like.

One more thing - if the player is willing to take a relationship as a flaw, then they are free to take it at whatever level they like. This is a way to get around the "balance" problem, if you really want to have high relationship ratings without bending the rules. And it seems accurate - strong central relationships often end up going against a character. For instance it can be the resistance the character rolls against to avoid doing something that the relationship asks (or it can at least penalize augment in such a contest).

Mike

[Der_Renegat]

I agree on what Mike said.
When i wrote the reply i wasnt sure to include the scale or not, because there is no absolute scale concerning intensity of, for example, emotion.
The intensitiy is, like Mike said, a matter of gameplay, not numbers.

There reason why i decided to include the scale was to give Ross some kind of idea, what ratings could mean theoretically.

So however strong your love for your mother may be, what you can get from your mother might be much less. A relationship "to mother 17" might be totally reasonable.

best

Christian

[Lamorak33]

Hi

Note that a friend-relationship could have any rating, it depends how deep/useful/supporting that relationship really is:

13 - a new relationship with little significance
17 - somebody you meet sometimes by chance, you know a few things about this character - an acquaintance
5M -  you know a few more personal things about this character or your relation got some depth added
5M2 - a real good friend
15M2 - a lover
5M3 - real tight friends for life

You see, i think this is a really, really unhelpful. Its impossible to create a new character with anything like the ratings you quote here, using the rules leastways.

Say new player says he has a friend who he has been  'real tight friends for life'. You say, 'uh huh, but that's a rating of 13 and you have up to 20 points to spend on it.'  Man, he needs 50 points just for that wonderful bit of characterisation they thought of! The beauty of Heroquest is that it all a matter of relative scale. Here is wherethe resistance and situational mods are your friend. I mean the resistances likely to be between 14 and 5W. thus a 5W relationship is going to pay off 75% of the time(if I have the probabilities right).

Do you know what I mean?

Regards
Rob

[rstites]

The abilities you take do not inform how you must play, they just give interesting incentives in different directions. Same with relationships. It's just a bonus or penalty in the right circumstances. You can play around it however you like.

One more thing - if the player is willing to take a relationship as a flaw, then they are free to take it at whatever level they like. This is a way to get around the "balance" problem, if you really want to have high relationship ratings without bending the rules. And it seems accurate - strong central relationships often end up going against a character. For instance it can be the resistance the character rolls against to avoid doing something that the relationship asks (or it can at least penalize augment in such a contest).

All of your other arguments aside, I still want to attempt to link them somehow so that my players can conceptualize them.  It doesn't need to be a hard link.  Also, it would seem to me that personality traits and personal relationships are all double-edged swords so are equally flaws and bonuses in most cases.  I can see how a relationship to the clan, temple, etc. would be seen mostly as a bonus, but a relationship to a parent, sibling, spouse, or child can be as much of a problem for the character as it is good. 

For personality traits, that's where the question came from.  One player took an Obstinate personality trait and was attempting to find a good number for it.  I didn't see any reason he had to pay any points for it as it would be a flaw as often or more often than a help, so then the next question is "what does a 13, 17, 1W, etc. mean for an Obstinate trait..."  I winged it at the time and it sounds like I might as well just do that again, but I thought it was worth asking.

My gut feeling is to charge no points for most relationships and any personlity traits and simply allow the players to write them as it fits their character concept.  That's my favorite character creation method in any game:  write down the stats and skills that meet your character concept, show them to me, and let's play.  (I hate accounting, especially in an RPG.)

Ross

[Mike Holmes]

The "Accounting" in HQ exists to create constraint. A character with a few well thought out abilities is better in play than one with a zillion details worked out. A HQ character already has a ton of abilities to look through when contests come down, so allowing more is problematic.

The idea with Flaws is that the player has a disincentive because the ability will be used mainly against his character. All abilites are double edged, so that doesn't make them all flaws. The ones you "pay" for can and are used against you, too. Just not as often and consistently as flaws are.

So ruling that all such abilities are flaws is potentially problematic if players go hog wild with them.

Now, that said, it's also true that a keyword includes under it, all abilities that all characters with the keyword have. Some people interpret this very broadly, and say that any relationship gained by association with people at home counts as a homeland ability. Meaning that, since all of your siblings are in your family, and that's part of your homeland, that you can take individual relationships to them all and the abilities are all covered under the keyword. Same with all of your friends. Anyone you've ever met in your occupation is covered there, they say. Anyone you've met and gotten to know as a result of your belief system are covered by the magic keywords. Etc.

This gets very complicated. There's a real question as to whether or not a keyword is meant to encapsulate all of the abilities that character X has gotten as being a member of the keyword, or if the keyword is only meant to give the character those abilities which pretty much all members have. So, not all people have brothers, so you don't get a relationship to your brother. But almost everyone does have family of some sort, so most homelands do give you a family keyword. Get the picture?

If you want me to "prove" one or the other, I can argue both sides pretty effectively. I have "proof" that it's supposed to work either way you want to go. So it really becomes a choice.

The former view, that keywords include everything is alluring, because once you've tasted relationships and personality traits, you feel like you can't get enough of them. In fact, I know of lots of people who, in their games, make relationships free for the taking at some level, simply because they like players to have lots of them. OK, I get the impulse there.

This latter view, while actually somewhat simmy, does create constraint, however. Less tends to be more here. Keep in mind that the player can allocate more of his narrative or free abilities toward relationships as well. So, while I wouldn't say that it's terrible to open up to more relationships etc, I would say that one should still have some way to constrain this. The rules as written do pretty admirably here.


Anyhow, the problem with allowing these at any level is that then the question becomes "why aren't all of my abilities from my keywords and such simply set at some appropriate level instead of at 17?" Well, the answer is that you get points to raise these up if they seem important - so they're only at the same level if you don't adjust them. That said, these points are few if you're using the "starting character" rules. I strongly advocate bumping the keyword and point levels up to give the players more flexibility and to make the characters more "accurate" to their vision.

But I don't advocate skipping it altogether. Because, again, you want the player to pick and choose what's important to them. If they're listing everything about the character just to make the character "accurate," then what happens is that you don't actually know what's most interesting to the player. Oh, he has Loves Mother at 10W3? That must be the thing he likes about the character most? Oh, no? His Might Be in Love With Griselda 17 is the thing that he's most interested in.

That's one way to think about ability levels. Not as ratings of in-game magnitude, but simply as an indication of how much the player is interested in that ability coming into play. Certainly that's what I always say that HP expenditures to raise an ability level up are about. It's never cost effective really to raise an ability up with a HP as opposed to bumping. Raising an ability is a sign to the narrator that the player wants this to be something important in play.

Again, again, that's not to say that I think that associating a magnitude to an ability level is always a bad idea. I just think that encoding it is a start down the road to people arguing about whether their character should be Strong 14 or Strong 18W3 to represent the human "scale" of the rating system. I mean, by the argument about setting relationships on that same scale, a character who is the strongest man in the country should be 18W3 or so. But then that becomes an ability that's far too useful - I mean does being that strong make the character that much more able to deal with things than his occupation abilities at, say, 10W (which is otherwise higher than a starting character can have)?

The system and balance are intended to be more arbitrary than that, and have less of a link to some universal scale than people try to force it to have. Basically it's a slippery slope that's really unneccessary to go down.

I don't want to seem like I'm in denial here, but the simplest tactic is not to talk about it. If a player asks what the rating means in-game, do this:

Player: "What does obstinate 17 mean?"
Narrator: "What do you want it to mean?"
Player: "Oh, that he's often hard to convince, but not in every case."
Narrator: "17 is just fine then, or a little higher if you want to spend some points on it."

Here's the key, just answer "X is fine then" no matter what they say. I know the fear is that some player will say, "His Personality Trait X is rated lower than mine, but he's playing it as more intense than mine." But this just doesn't happen in actual play. Once you get going, the players will "get it."

This all said, if you do decide to go with the plan to rate these things on some overall scale to show magnitude, I don't think it'll be hugely problematic. It may simply seem odd that in a swordfight that some dude's "Love My Mother 10W3" with a -20 improv penalty is being used to easily defeat some other guy using "Swordfighting 10W." At that point isn't it highly dramatic in nature? And if that's the case, then shouldn't you use my arguments about drama as the source of figuring out the level? Instead of in-game reasoning?

If you really want to do the in-game thing, consider the scale in terms of rarity and "legendariness". There are lots of smiths in the world, but how many are masters? Very few. If there is only one master smith in the village with a 10W2 rating, then there ought to be only one person in the village with a 10W2 rating for a relationship. 17 represents an "everyday" or "starting" relationship. What you have with your co-workers when you're new (and your keyword is 17). You'll note that what I'm saying is that the normal method already gives you about appropriate levels.

So how about this?
Aquaintances - 13
Associates  - 17
Developed friends  - 2W (you'll note that this is easily achievable for starting characters)
Deep Yet Normal Relationships - 7W (still attainable for starting characters)
Very Intense Relationship - 15W (Might take it as a flaw for a starting character, because it's obsessive)
Only Relationship Like It In the Village - 10W2 (more experienced characters may well have these without needing to take it as a flaw, but only if they focus on it)
Only Relationship Like It In the Country - 10W3 (pretty much have to be at heroic level to get this sort of intense without it being a flaw)
Poems that Last Ages Are Written About It - 10W4 (Really heroic level, legendary)
Minor Religious Movements Are Based On Relationships at This Level - 10W6 (cult of Mary, Mother of Jesus, in the Catholic Church)
Major Religious Movements Are Based on This Mythic Relationship - 10W8 (Aphrodite as Goddess of Love)

Etc.

Put another way, the level the system gives you is indicative of the maturity of the relationship based on how the mechanics are attached to a certain level of experience. If you can only buy a 7W to start, then that must mean that 7W is as intense as normal, non-obsessed characters get, meaning that it's pretty strong.

Mike

[Mandacaru]

My gut feeling is to charge no points for most relationships and any personlity traits and simply allow the players to write them as it fits their character concept.  That's my favorite character creation method in any game:  write down the stats and skills that meet your character concept, show them to me, and let's play.  (I hate accounting, especially in an RPG.)

I say your gut feeling is a far better place to start than trying to use scales. I'd avoid using any sort of scale at all for any number in HQ as no number will stand up to five minutes scrutiny and then you'll think the system doesn't work. The number reflects how important it is going to be, end of story. I don't think you even need to wing that, just say, "sorry I've no idea what the numbers mean yet, except that larger numbers mean more important, but I'm sure we'll find out once we start playing".

For chargen, I'd go with some sort of mix 'n' match approach which seems right. E.g....Some people allow flaws at any rating at all - I don't like that as it predefines things as flaws and de-emphasises the double-edged nature (or could do). Some allow any numbers at all for relationships. Some allow anything at all for anything.

I think that whatever you do the key is to emphasize the personality traits and relationships above other things. I allow relationships to be raised at half-price and have them grouped as mini-keywords (i.e. everyone in my stead, then individuals may have extra ratings) raisable for 1 HP.

Sam.

[Der_Renegat]

Maybe a lot of confusion concerning relationship ratings is that the word relation is misleading.
The HQ rating does not necessarily measure the intensity of a relationship. That was my scale was all about and what i wanted to show (which was a bad idea).
It does measure what you can get out of that relationship. So however strong the love to your mother may be, that doesnt mean you can get as much from her.

instead of: Love for mother 10M2
get useful help from mother 5M

Maybe it helps if you think of a relationship as "exploiting that relation", instead of intensity.

[Lamorak33]

Hi

Maybe a lot of confusion concerning relationship ratings is that the word relation is misleading.
The HQ rating does not necessarily measure the intensity of a relationship. That was my scale was all about and what i wanted to show (which was a bad idea).
It does measure what you can get out of that relationship. So however strong the love to your mother may be, that doesnt mean you can get as much from her.

instead of: Love for mother 10M2
get useful help from mother 5M

Maybe it helps if you think of a relationship as "exploiting that relation", instead of intensity.

Well, no,not really. The way I see it is that for some reason they put the chart that you wrote dowwn in the book, instantly consigining every character ability under 20 to 'crap'. Its just not that simple. Nor is it, in a narratavist sense, a big deal. What is important is how difficult a contest is. Some Narrators make resistances up on the spot to create a dramatic challenge appropriate to that scene. Tell them they're great and make the resistances fit that profile. Heropoints are a huge bonus that help bridge the mediocrity gap after all!

Regards
Rob

[Der_Renegat]

Well, no,not really. The way I see it is that for some reason they put the chart that you wrote dowwn in the book, instantly consigining every character ability under 20 to 'crap'. Its just not that simple. Nor is it, in a narratavist sense, a big deal. What is important is how difficult a contest is. Some Narrators make resistances up on the spot to create a dramatic challenge appropriate to that scene. Tell them they're great and make the resistances fit that profile. Heropoints are a huge bonus that help bridge the mediocrity gap after all!

Rob, i dont know how that is going to be helpful for Ross´problem. It sounds as if you are saying: it doesnt matter what the rating is as long as the narrator comes up with an appropiate resistance, which is only the half truth.

[Lamorak33]

Hi

Rob, i dont know how that is going to be helpful for Ross´problem. It sounds as if you are saying: it doesnt matter what the rating is as long as the narrator comes up with an appropiate resistance, which is only the half truth.

To answer the original enquiry then I would have to say that do not refer to charts that purport to say 'how good' a particular rating is, like the one given. Its just very missleading in my opinion. Its also a problem born out of a creative agenda not well supported by the Heroquest rules.

Regards
Rob

[rstites]

Interesting discussion here.  I think the idea of just defining personality traits and relationships as how much the character can get out of them is a good way to describe them without trying to tie them to anything concrete and has the advantage of working the easiest with the default character creation.  I'll probably let relationships that are tied directly to a keyword to move up directly with the keyword:  a relationship with the Orlanthi temple should be higher for someone with a high keyword in Relgion: Orlanth, for example, or similar for someone with a strong background in their culture/clan.

Thanks for all the suggestions.

Ross

[soru]

Its also a problem born out of a creative agenda not well supported by the Heroquest rules.

I think that's mostly only true if you confuse the player and the character, or use the chart in the wrong direction.

If you instead say:
1. the _player_ wants a particular ability to be important.
2. as a consequence, the _character_  has that ability at a significant level.
3. as a consequence, the _character_ is the type of thing indicated in Mike's chart.

everything works out cleanly.

Some people skip stage 3, but there is no particular problem with doing it, _unless_ you use a chart that doesn't at all match up with the character creation and experience rules, like Der_Renegat's.

It's just a matter of trusting the system to be a reasonable-enough guide to in-game flavour and genre.

[Lamorak33]

Interesting discussion here.  I think the idea of just defining personality traits and relationships as how much the character can get out of them is a good way to describe them without trying to tie them to anything concrete and has the advantage of working the easiest with the default character creation.  I'll probably let relationships that are tied directly to a keyword to move up directly with the keyword:  a relationship with the Orlanthi temple should be higher for someone with a high keyword in Relgion: Orlanth, for example, or similar for someone with a strong background in their culture/clan.

Thanks for all the suggestions.

Ross

If you really want to crunch it up, then why not run all combats as a series of simple contests, with a damage level system similar to the world of darkness games. Thus the loser of a combat roll loses the appropriate number of health levels?

Regards
Rob