[DNAwesome] Mechanics so far

[dindenver]

Hi!
  So, this is the starting framework for the mechanics so far:
In order to resolve a conflict, we need to know 3 things:
1) What Traits your character is using
2) What Traits the other character is using
3) The Scope of the conflict. This determines what dice is rolled. For instance, a Personal conflict might be no die or 1d4, a conflict that effects a nation might be 1d20 and a global conflict might be 1d100.

To see how these Traits are made, see this thread:
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=26348.0

So, each side adds up the following:
100 for each Super Power used
10 for each Power used
1 for each Ability used
-1 for each Mark in play
-10 for each Weakness in play
-100 for each Super Weakness in play
  and adds their die roll (Players always troll the same size die).

  The winner gets a number of effect points equal to the amount that they won by (Their total-the other total). They spend those points to affect the game world:
Target:
One person - 0
Self - 10 (Add 10 to the other cost if you are not the only person affected)
2-100 people - 10
101-1,000 people - 20
1,001-1,000,000 people - 50
1,000,001+ people - 100

Effect
Add a Standard trait - 1
Add an Ability/Mark - 2
Add Power/Weakness - 20 per Arena Tag
Add a Super Power/Super Weakness - 100 per Arena Tag
Hospitalize - Net Value*
Incapacitate - Gross Value*

Duration
One Scene - 0
One Day - 1
One Week - 2
One Month - 5
One Year - 10
Permanent - 100

Notes:
Net Value = (100 x Super Powers) + (10 x Powers) + Abilities - Marks - (10 x Weaknesses) - (100 x Super Weaknesses)
Gross Value = (100 x Super Powers) + (10 x Powers) + Abilities

Caveat
  You cannot earn ANY Effect Points without having a conflict that involves both a PC and an NPC.

Example:
  Uber Man faces Rex Ruthless. He uses Super Strength, X-Ray Vision and Observant. And Rex uses Green Rocks against him. Rex is trying to control Urbopolis with a mind control ray, so the scope is 1d10 (the city). Uber Man's player gets to roll 1d10 and add 100+10+1-10 (101) and gets 105. Rex rolls and adds up his Traits for a total of 43. So Uber Man gets 62 effect points. He decides that about 1 million people in Urbopolis (the ones that know he saved them) will gain the Standard Traits "Seeks Truth" and "Seeks Fairness" for a year (50 for 1 million people, 2 for traits and 10 for the year).

  What do you guys think?

[ChadDubya]

Lots of math always makes me cry. In your example, what would be the game effect of converting 1 million civilians into "good people." Is that any different then converting 100,000 people? I mean, I can visualize the difference, but how does your game reconcile the difference?

[dindenver]

Chad,
  Well, again, Standard Traits have no mechanical impact. So the point of this Effect would be to represent how Uber Man inspired these people to look deeper at the world around them, right?
  Of course, he could have added an actual Ability (maybe Detective) to a smaller number of people, but I was going for a big effect here. In that case, it would represent the chances that someone with that Ability to help Uber Man in a future conflict...
  Does that answer your question?

[Will]

The idea is intriguing but I am having a hard time envisioning how it would work in practice.
I would be very interested in reading an example of play for this.

[Arturo G.]

3) The Scope of the conflict. This determines what dice is rolled. For instance, a Personal conflict might be no die or 1d4, a conflict that effects a nation might be 1d20 and a global conflict might be 1d100.

The way of distinguish different levels of conflict may be easy if you define them accordingly to the kind of community you are affecting. It sounds good (if fact it somehow reminds me the levels of Trollbabe).

But...

So, each side adds up the following:
100 for each Super Power used
10 for each Power used
1 for each Ability used
-1 for each Mark in play
-10 for each Weakness in play
-100 for each Super Weakness in play
  and adds their die roll (Players always troll the same size die).

  The winner gets a number of effect points equal to the amount that they won by (Their total-the other total). They spend those points to affect the game world:
Target:
One person - 0
Self - 10 (Add 10 to the other cost if you are not the only person affected)
2-100 people - 10
101-1,000 people - 20
1,001-1,000,000 people - 50
1,000,001+ people - 100

I would say I cannot see such differences in scale working. In conflicts where one character wants to destroy the district using superpowers, while another wants to save her old-uncle in a traditional way (driving the van) at the same time, you will be getting and incredible different level of points. Am I right?
Would a few points be enough to save the uncle before the player with so many points determines the city completely destroys everything?
I can not see why such big differences on the scale are going to be operative. Am I missing something?

[dindenver]

Arturo,
  Thanks for the quick response!
  In fact, that is the plan, set the dice based on the size of the community threatened. I was thinking, something like this:
Battle of wills/No one directly threatened: No dice
One on one combat: 1d4
One person threatened: 1d6
One town/village threatened: 1d8
One city threatened: 1d10
Province/State area threatened: 1d12
Nation threatened: 1d20
World threatened: 1d100

I am not sure if I understood your example. Was that one scenario or two. If its one scenario, then that is a case where there are probably two conflicts, Save the Uncle, Save the district. They would each be rolled separately and effects generated accordingly, I think. Because you are right, driving the van should be enough to save your uncle (assuming you have enough time/gas). But it would not be enough to save the district, would it?

Well, there are two goals here:
1) That the effect should be in line with the effort expended (no global effects if you don't make a Super Effort)
2) That people with Super Powers aren't thwarted by luck when the problems are small. I mean, how likely is it that Super man is going to fail saving one person from danger, even if he rolls a 1? Its only possible if a Super villain uses a super power against him, right?

  I just came up with this idea last week, so you are right, I do need to run the numbers in various scenarios and make sure the results aren't too wonky. But I feel like I am close, just need to tweak it a bit, do you get the same feel?

[Arturo G.]

The example was assuming that the uncle lives in the threaten district. Thus, the idea is saving the uncle BEFORE the district is destroyed. The other player wants to destroy the district BEFORE the hero saves the uncle.
I was trying to fix an example with incompatible goals.

Rephrasing: How do you plan to resolve conflicts where opposite sides are using different scaling levels? Does the low-scale side need to escalate to be able to get any chances?

The rest sounds right to me. The main idea seems to follow your objectives.

[dindenver]

Arturo,
  ok, I thought you might be asking that but I wanted to approach it from a less complicated angle first.
  Basically, the players always roll the same scale dice. So, in your example, that either breaks into two challenges, or the hero rolls the district-level die and settles for saving the Uncle if he only wins by a low margin.
  The rules will encourage the players to negotiate whic die to use. But the tie breaker will be to use the largest die suggested.

  Does that answer your question?

[Filip Luszczyk]

Basically, these resolution rules govern and quantify character's interaction with the environment. The main question is: what exactly makes this important in your game? How do you envision the progress of an ideal session and how these rules figure in it?

One thing that I think might be problematic is the focus on scale and quantification of effects. Playing the game I'd know how many people I could affect with my powers depending on the scope of the conflict, but it wouldn't necessarily map to my interests in the conflict. For example, saving a single person could be much more important for me than saving the whole world.

What if there were no pre-set costs for affecting stuff, but instead the cost of a given effect was entirely negotiated?

For example, maybe I say what I want to achieve in the conflict, and whoever opposes me decides how much it's going to cost me, and I asses the opponent's goal as well. However, the more difficult I make it for the other player to succeed at his or her goals, the more difficult it's going to be for me as well. So, maybe my goal is to save the uncle, and the GM decides it's worth 10 points. The NPC's goal is to destroy the disctrict, and I decide it's worth 5 points. We both roll the dice depending on the conflict's scale, and we both need to get 15 points to achieve our goals. If I get less than 15, I fail to save the uncle; if the GM gets less than 15, the NPC fails to destroy the district; if we both roll 15 or more, the uncle is saved, but the district is destroyed as well. If I'm not able to roll high enough due to the current scale, maybe I could move the conflict to a higher scale or push myself harder, taking some additional risk (i.e. maybe I say that I want to roll a higher die to save my uncle and the GM tells me that if I do it any even result means the identity of my character gets revealed, or I lose my power, or whatever). The players would evaluate their own and their opponent's goals depending on the importance of certain outcomes in a given story context (i.e. do you prefer to make the destruction of the district more difficult, or have a better chance to save the uncle?). Then, they'd have a choice to push harder, accepting some risk or cost.

Also, durations might prove problematic in play. You have durations measured both by story units (a scene) and in-fiction passage of time. However, notice that story units can have varying length both in real time and in-fiction time, and sometimes lots of in-fiction time can pass between two scenes. So, despite there being fixed costs for durations, depending on the decisions of whoever frames scenes 10 points might not always equal 10 points.

[dindenver]

Filip,
  I like this, it has a very intimate feel.
  But, I do want the powers to be defined by their ability to effect their environment. Also, I want to devalue the NEED to use a super power to save one person and amp up the need to resort to super powers in order to change the world.

  There is also the design goal that I want the Challenges to really be about player effort. Basically, Players can create characters that can meet most challenges. Then arrange the circumstances so that Challenges are compatible with the character's Powers and finally, reap the rewards through the points awarded by their strategy and narration. And this is where your idea doesn't work I think. the idea that the points your character can generate can be inflated or devalued through player negotiation seems like it wold lead to incoherent results at times. Also, bear in mind that each Challenge would will not just automatically default to every trait being called into play (like some times happens in ditv), because the Powers and Super Powers can only be called into play during Challenges that are in the same arena as their tags. So if you have Telepathy as a Super Mental Power, it will not help in a Physical conflict, right?

  Does that make sense? Do you think those design goals match up with the fantasy super power genre that you know?

[Arturo G.]

Arturo,
  ok, I thought you might be asking that but I wanted to approach it from a less complicated angle first.
  Basically, the players always roll the same scale dice. So, in your example, that either breaks into two challenges, or the hero rolls the district-level die and settles for saving the Uncle if he only wins by a low margin.
  The rules will encourage the players to negotiate whic die to use. But the tie breaker will be to use the largest die suggested.

  Does that answer your question?

Yes, it does.

But then, I'm not sure I can see how somethings are going to work when players are trying very different things at different scales at the same time in a complex situation where you cannot really split the challenges. I think there could be problems trying to negotiate the level because it affects the kind of imagined-actions and means to solve the problems which a player may want to use.

Perhaps it is just a matter of justifying it properly with in-game stuff. If you want to save your uncle driving the van, and the other player is using a big scale dice to destroy the area, surely your points are not enough to win. The whole district is being destroyed and you see how it comes to you... if you do not scale-up using your powers you are going to fail. Something like that. Doing the negotiation not before, but during the resolution.

[dindenver]

Arturo,
  I like the way you think, and I do intend to address this issue. But until we do some AP, I think that rolling a higher die for the other players' Scale can only benefit the Uncle saving player.
  Also, ideally a super HERO wouldn't choose to save just one person, right?
  That is the game I want to make. One that nudges the player's to think on a larger scale (save the town!), be more heroic and then sometimes have to make the ultimate compromise (save the uncle...).
  Does that make sense?

[dindenver]

Will,
  I am not ignoring you. I am trying to hash out the math. And am also, trying to hash out the turn order. After that I will pose  a "make believe" AP. Sort of an example of ideal play. Cool?

[Will]

Will,
  I am not ignoring you. I am trying to hash out the math. And am also, trying to hash out the turn order. After that I will pose  a "make believe" AP. Sort of an example of ideal play. Cool?

Very

As I envision it so far the idea has decided merit but I see it as very standoffish and academic in play. Admittedly there isn't a lot to go on yet so that may be personal prejudices and whatever I ate for dinner the night before coloring my first impression. I eagerly await a more on-the-ground look at it.

[dindenver]

All,
  OK, here is the revised mechanics.
  If no one sees any glaring holes, I'll put together a mock Actual Play Example and we can see what it looks like:

Turn Order:
Narration continues normally until one player (usually the GM) calls for a Challenge, then the following Turn Order applies
Initiating player sets the Scope of the Challenge (how many people are threatened)
Scopes are as follows:

• Battle of Wills: No die rolled
• Individual threatened: Roll 1d4
• Group Threatened: 1d6
• Village or Town threatened: 1d8
• City threatened: 1d10
• Region threatened: 1d12
• Nation threatened: 1d20
• World threatened: 1d100

Challenged Player sets the Arena (Physical, Mental or Social)

Players take turns narrating using Traits (Abilities, Powers, Super Powers, etc) to rise to the Challenge

Once all players involved have used all the Traits they want to bring to this Challenge, add up the following:
100 for each Super Power used
10 for each Power used
1 for each Ability used
-1 for each Mark used
-10 for each Weakness exploited
-100 for each Super Weakness exploited
Each side of the challenge (regardless of the number of characters involved) only rolls one die (not one die per player) equal to the Scope

The grand total is your Effect Points. This represents your characters ability to change the game world.

Whoever has the highest total Effect Points is known as the Winner of this Challenge. The other side is the Loser.

The Winner has one chance to spend points to cancel the Loser's Effect Points on a 1-for-1 basis (e.g., if I roll 160 and you roll 100, I can spend 60 of my 160 pts to lower your total to 40, leaving me with 100 left to spend). The only limit on this is it can only be done once and it cannot lower the Loser's total below zero.

If the Loser has points left, they have one chance to lower the Winner's total on a 1-for-1 basis following the same rules as the previous step.

If the Loser has any points left, they can buy whatever effects they like using the table below

The Winner can spend the remaining Effect Points any way they choose, with one exception. They cannot remove an effect created by the Loser. They can remove Effects created by any player (including the GM) in a previous Scene.

Effect Costs:
Effects
Add Standard Trait: 1
Add Ability: 10
Add Mark: 5
Add Power: 100
Add Weakness: 50
Add Super Power: 200
Add Super Weakness: 100
Remove Standard Trait: 2
Remove Ability: 5
Remove Mark: 10
Remove Power: 50
Remove Weakness: 100
Remove Super Power: 100
Remove Super Weakness: 200
Hospitalize: (100 x Super Power Arena Tags) + (10 x Power Arena Tags) + Abilities - Marks - (10 x Weakness Arena Tags) - (100 x Super Weakness Arena Tags) - Target is wounded and is laid up in the hospital and unable to act Physically for the Duration
Incapacitate: (100 x Super Power Arena Tags) + (10 x Power Arena Tags) + Abilities - Target is unable to act physically, mentally and socially for the Duration

Duration
One Scene: 0 (This is 3 days or one scene, whichever occurs first)
One Day: 1 (Any number of scenes)
One Week: 10 (Any number of scenes)
One Monh: 100 (Any number of scenes)
One Year: 300 (Any number of scenes)
Permanent: 200 (Another Effect can still negate this though)

Target
One person: 0 (Besides self)
Self: 5 (Add this to another Target if you are affected along with others)
2 to 20: 1 (Group)
21 to 1,000: 3 (Village/Town)
1,001 to 10,000: 5 (City)
10,001 to 1,000,000: 10 (Big city)
1,000,001 to 10,000,000: 20 (Region/Small Nation)
10,000,001+: 100 (Large Nation/World)

  So, what do you guys think?