[Night and Day] Some thoughts about alignment and changing the world.

[opsneakie]

So, I've been working on Night and Day on and off when I get the chance, and I think I have most of the mechanics ironed out. Things are resolved in 'clashes' - whether they be physical hand-to-hand collisions or simply someone trying to force open a door, things happen in bursts of effort. Right now, a clash is resolved on a d10 roll + skill level, against a set difficulty. This part isn't bothering me so much. Here's where I'm stuck at the moment.

The intention here is to portray a world at war, where the players have to choose sides or find a way to survive, but also a world where they can make a very tangible difference. There needs to be a constant sense of the war going on, but I need a mechanic that allows the player to exert some influence over the world. As they grow in power, the characters will gain increased health, more skills, higher stats, and so on, but I'm stalling out on a way to give them the sense that their human effort makes a difference on a war between the Night and Day realms. The idea is that humans have the most power over this world, and this world is the one where the most magical energy and such is gathered. Whichever side wins the alliance of the material world wins the war.

I've been toying with a mechanic that would rate a character's balance between dark and light (which should not be confused with good and evil, for those of you who weren't following the old thread) This would somehow... I don't know... effect creatures from the various realms in different ways? Maybe a human who was primarily Night-aligned would strengthen Midnight creatures that were close to him, giving them more of a physical form and such, and correspondingly weaken nearby Sunlight beings. That's as far as my thinking goes, I want to make it a very central feature that the players are important as humans, and are in their own element vastly more powerful than the outsiders. A human who is courageous can take on a twenty-foot tall glowing lion that breaths fire, because in this world they are less substantial, wispier, and are no match for a skilled fighter.

Any thoughts on making the player's influence powerful?

[whiteknife]

Well, the way I see it you can do it from an in-game perspective or from a story perspective.

On the one hand, you can make the players "scions of balance" or something and have even their minor actions reshape the world somewhat to fit their preferences. On the other hand, you can make the players impact story based- the GM could create lots of opportunities where the outcome of a mission the players embark on effects the world at large (for example, the success of the players in raiding an important night base might tip the war in one sides favor). While story impact is great, it's hard to achieve solely using mechanics. I for one am a fan of the idea that the players are affecting change merely by their presence, although if there are a lot of humans running around then the idea that all of them are effecting the world might be a bit out there.

Just some food for thought there, hope it helps!

[opsneakie]

Thanks for the response. Certainly they will be having a story-based effect, in the sense that as a GM part of your job is to give the players a lot of opportunities to make an impact. At the same time, I want their presence and beliefs to have a tangible effect that the mechanics show.

This game isn't intended to be a super-realistic thing, it's going to be clear from moment one that the players are controlling heroes, not just some average person in an adventuring scenario. The power of belief and conviction is really what gives the characters their power over the outsiders. I don't want to make the players 'scions of balance' so much, but instead as people with the power to change things in a position to change things.

As far as the idea that all humans effect things, I like that thought, and even though there are a lot of people out there making an effect, humanity as a whole tends to be fairly balanced, and most people lack the conviction to make a serious, tangible effect. This line of thought is making me wonder if I want to have a Conviction stat, as a spendable, refreshable pool that would allow players to make a more serious effect on things. I'll give it some thought here.

But, in answer to your... statement, I guess, I'm going for players creating change from both an in-game perspective and a story perspective. I'll give Conviction some thought and figure things out with that.

[Vulpinoid]

Since you're working off a d10 system I'll present an option that could prove worthwhile to you...something I worked on a few years back, but never got around to completing.

Trinary Alignment
Instead of running off a single line axis of light to dark, why not run a three way axis of light-dark-destiny (or whatever other term you're using for the power of humanity). In this way, a player allocates a series of points between the three (let's say 10 points).

This allows scope for the following...

Dark - 10 pts, Light - 0 pts, Destiny - 0 pts: A person who's goals are focused toward the agenda of the dark realm.
Dark - 0 pts, Light - 10 pts, Destiny - 0 pts: A person who's goals are focused toward the agenda of the light realm.
Dark - 0 pts, Light - 0 pts, Destiny - 10 pts. A person who's goals are focused toward the mortal realm, and who care about neither light nor darkness.
Dark - 5 pts, Light - 0 pts, Destiny - 5 pts. A person balanced between darkness and destiny, who's goals are opposed to the ways of light.
Dark - 0 pts, Light - 5 pts, Destiny - 5 pts. A person balanced between light and destiny, who's goals are opposed to the ways of darkness.
Dark - 5 pts, Light - 5 pts, Destiny - 0 pts. A person balanced between light and darkness, who's goals are to prevent the humans from gaining more power.

Points could be distributed in any way (eg. 6 dark, 1 light, 3 destiny), showing the balance of where this person stands according to the mystic energies of the universe. As they do more light related things, they might shift toward that end of the trinary axis (gaining more light pts, and losing equally from the others); if they act against agents of darkness, they might lose darkness points (but gain the points in the others). Every action the character does has a chance to modify where they stand on the trinary scale. But every choice should have consequences of two options.

Kill the girl [darkness], Save the girl [light].
Hand the girl over the light [light], Help the girl pursue her own destiny [destiny].

Do one (and gain the accompanying point), sacrifice the other (and lose the accompanying point).

This can then be tied into mechanics which really ground the alignment system into the world (unlike most D&D games I've played).

Thresholds
Threshold effects could be gained at certain points.

eg. 1. Once an alignment reaches 5, a character gains -1 to their resistance against hostile magical effects derived from the other alignments (but gains +1 to their own beneficial effects derived from their alignment in question.

Uriel, the warrior of light has 1 dark, 7 light, 2 destiny. He suffers -1 to his resistance against "unholy" weapons of night and artifacts of destiny, but gains +1 to his healing magic.

Balthazar, the crusader of darkness has 6 dark, 3 light, 1 destiny. He suffers -1 to his resistance against "holy" weapons of light and artifacts of destiny, but gains +1 to his shadow magic.

Additional thresholds could provide extra bonuses and penalties at levels 8 and 10, or could provide similar effects if an alignment factor gets too low. (You've got 0 light...sorry...healing effects don't work on you any more).

Modifiers
A completely different way to handle the effects could be to allow players to use their alignment scores once per turn to modify a die roll. Equivalent alinments apply bonuses, opposing alignments provide penalties.

Balthazar sees a darkness effect going off and he wants it to occur, so his action for the round is to focus on it and the user's roll is increased by +6. Uriel sees the same effect happening and wants to oppose it with his light, so the effect is then reduced by -7 (for a cumultive total of -1).

The benefit to this is that humans can use their destiny to decrease either light or dark effects. While beings allied to one side or the other can only push their own side's agenda.

Alignment Locks
The other advantage to humans is the fact that they can change their alignments more easily. Their points are fully changeable, while supernatural beings aligned to either side start to see their alignment values become more restricted. A half blooded being of darkness might always have three of their points locked in the darkness category, while a full blooded being might have six points locked to that alignment. In this way, the half blood could end up pursuing the light, but they'll never be as strong as if they fully embraced their dark side. A full blood being of darkness would always have the balance of their attributes tipped in the favour of night.

When you face a being of darkness, you know which effects are going to do the most damage to them. When you face a regular mortal, you don't know what's going to be most effective at all.


I had a few other ideas along these lines, but that's the basic gist.

V

[opsneakie]

Wow. I think you just broke my head. This is it exactly- this is the spot where I was stuck a bit. I might have to re-work the terminology a bit, but the idea is pure genius. I think I want the points to be a little less mutable than you've put out in this post, but still definitely set in jell-o.

Here's my new thought, along these lines. You've got Light-Shadow-Destiny as your three axes. While your example had the light being strictly good, and the dark evil, in my way of thinking it's more a conflict of animal instinct, represented in the animal-like creatures of Midnight, and logic and reason, represented by the ordered, gleaming ranks of Daylight. Either is a legitimate way to come to a decision, but they are nevertheless locked in combat for the power the mortal world holds. I especially want to play with the idea that while at first glance Daylight might appear to be purely good and Midnight purely evil, both sides have a stake in the world.

So, if you've got, say, Light 6-Shadow 1-Destiny 3, you're governed primarily by reason, with some leaning towards pursing the destiny of humanity (be that in a personal or impersonal sense). If you're Light 2-Shadow 2-Destiny 6, you're governed by your head and your heart equally, but your primary concern is following your own path (be it that you are destined to be king, destined to forge a great weapon, destined to protect people from injustice, whatever).

Anyhows, here's my thought on bonuses and penalties. You are by default not in perfect balance, since it's 10 points split 3 ways. Whatever you're strongest in is where you get the bonuses, one point for every point you are imbalanced. So your Light 6-Shadow 1-Destiny 3 character has a 3-point Light imbalance. He gives Daylight creatures a +3 bonus of some kind (be it to health, physical power, I'm not quite sure about that bit yet). In order to grant this bonus, the character has to be focused and aware of the creatures, purposefully letting his conviction strengthen his allies and weaken his enemies. I'm thinking these bonus overlap and overwrite where they can, so if a Light 6-Shadow 1-Destiny 3 character and a bunch of Daylight creatures are fighting a Light 0-Shadow 8-Destiny 2 character and a bunch of Midnight creatures, the Daylight get a +3 (from the first character), but a -6 (from the other character), while Midnight gets a -3 and a +6 from the same characters. This means that downing the human portion of the enemy force could be critical in winning a fight, since if the second character goes down, his bonus vanishes. The Midnight creatures are suddenly weakened, while the Daylight beings get a burst of power and toughness.

This mechanic still needs some work, clearly. If every human contributes, it could mean a lot of calculation involved in combat, and I'm looking for quick-and-ugly fighting. Also, Destiny needs some bonus to provide. Maybe Destiny imbalance can buff all mortals nearby, and harm all immortals equally? That seems about right, and could lead to some fun times if you were to play, say, a Light 1-Shadow 1-Destiny 8 character. The 7-point imbalance could banish lesser creatures completely, while your heroic figure inspires humans around you to greater heights.

Hmmm... should the imbalance be measured relative to what you're trying to effect? That would mean more number-crunching, but could lead to some interesting effects. Although then a Light imbalance would have to effect mortals negatively, so everything effects the other two. I'm not sure if that's quite where I want to go, or if it should just be the difference between your highest and second-highest. More thinking time!

Vulpinoid, your whole 3-axis thing is cool, but man does it make the mechanical bits funky.

-sneakie.

[Vulpinoid]

I've been following your concepts for a while, so I know that in your setting the light isn't necessarily good, and the darkness isn't necessarily evil....I just used that as examples of the conceptual ideas because it's the easiest for outsiders/newcomers to grasp.

A few aspects to consider with what I presented...

With 10 points to distribute across the three axes, you can never have a perfectly balanced character (where perfect balance would be equal across the three). The best you'd get is a 3-3-4 split where one of the three concepts is favoured. Everyone has a little bit of propensity toward darkness, light or controlling their own fate. But you've already picked that up, which is good.

The average person on the street would probably have this 3-3-4 split. Only those who go out of their way to follow a specific mentality would start to deviate beyond this.

It doesn't really take much for a mortal character to push beyond this 3-3-4 split to generate a 5. If a half blood started with a fixed value of 3 in one of their alignment values, they would find it really easy to generate a 5 in their races favoured alignment (darkness or light). On the other hand they'd find it very hard to push one of the other alignments to 5 because they only have variable 7 points to play with.

If a full blood has six of their attribute points fixed, they'd never be able to reach that 5 value except in their racially attuned alignment, and this would always be fixed above the minimum threshold point. As a result of this, "anti-dark" effects will always work against a pure-blooded dark being, and they've got a damned good chance of working against a half-blooded dark being.

I definitely think the idea of gaining bonuses or penalties based on the highest alignment value. But also consider the flip-side of gaining bonuses or penalties from the lowest alignment value.

A character with 6 darkness, 3 light and 1 destiny is going to have a different outlook to a character with 6 darkness, 1 light and 3 destiny. The first might be bent toward darkness but have an innate sense of duty (or might manifest other subtle traits of light); the second would be bent toward darkness, but have more of a self-righteous and selfish attitude.

In this way, having alignment values too high might impose certain effects, while having values too low might impose other effects.

Maybe high scores allow you to more easily control certain effects, while having low scores makes you more easily subjected to certain effects.

Finally, the system could easily work with a slower slide of the scales. A GM could tally the players actions and add a point to the alignment that closest matches the actions they performed over the course of a game/session. They could then remove a point from the alignment value that is most opposed to the actions they performed. This is actually the way I first envisioned the rules.

A complication on this could be to apply a die roll at the end of the session before making the modification. When determining if a player increases one of their alignment values, roll a d10. If the roll is higher than the current alignment value then it increases (and another value decreases), otherwise it remains stagnant.

Balthazar, the crusader of darkness has 6 dark, 3 light, 1 destiny. He does some nasty darkness things during the game and everyone decides that he's got a chance of increasing his darkness alignment (and he didn't really follow the orders of his superiors, so his light has a chance of decreasing). His player rolls a 5...no change this game.

Next game, he pursues his own interests above darkness and light. He was still pretty nasty though, so if he was going to lose a point, it'd be his point of light. His player rolls a 4, which is above the current destiny score, so his destiny increases by 1 and his light decreases by 1. With nothing left in light this leaves him really susceptible to certain effects and he really needs to consider the consequences of his actions.

(Perhaps having 0 in an alignment value has a tangible effect in the game world, such as a shadow aura or an aura of light that can now be seen by mortals).

Again...just some more ideas, take them or leave them.

V   

[opsneakie]

Good stuff, good stuff. So far I've spend my first day back at school frantically writing up more ideas. My thought is that getting to zero would be much more difficult than any of the other changes, because there is a vast difference between something and nothing. Anyways, here's my thought about how the whole thing will shake out. I'd been stalling on a mechanic for activating supernatural powers, and for making the Human Spark, their ability to let their power spill over, work well but not be unlimited use. Also, I've been looking for a way to work Conviction into the game. So, here we go.

Conviction is going to serve as a character's experience and the source of their power activation. If anyone is familiar with the West End Games Star Wars, it's going to work in a similar manner to Character Points, only considerably more powerful. Conviction can be spent in a number of ways. Firstly, a point of Conviction wins you the clash you're in, so if you roll terribly you can save yourself. Conviction is also required to activate any of your supernatural powers, which will break up into the categories of Light, Shadow, and Destiny. Lastly, a Conviction point activates the Human Spark for a scene, applying all bonuses/penalties that go with it.

Anyhows, here's how the Human Spark is going to work (I think). This would be ideal if the GM had a bunch of tokens in three colors, like, say, white, black, and red. Have white represent Light, black as Shadow, and red as Destiny. Now, If Alec, a Light 3 Destiny 4 Shadow 3 character (I know I re-ordered them, this ordering makes more sense to me now) activates his Human Spark, he applies a -1 to creatures of Daylight and Midnight, and a +1 to mortals. I'm envisioning the Spark as being really a powerful thing, so on supernatural creatures, the modifier applies to their health and all combat rolls. Against mortals, only their combat rolls are effected. This even makes sense if you give it some thought. The Nazgul are so terrifying that men are reduced to near-helplessness against them, angels, while 'light', are scary enough and can negatively effect the willpower of humans around them. This means if you wanted to be a perfect Light-aligned 'buffer', you would be Light 5 Destiny 5 Shadow 0, so Midnight gets a -5 and Daylight gets a +5. In a scenario where your top two are balanced, I think they both get the benefit, so in this sense mortals are inspired as well and also get the +5. On a d10 system, this would mean a devastating boost in power. Anyhows, that's the basics of the mechanic behind it. More and more work to go.

I like the rolling to change balance, means that it's hard to reach a 10 in something. Also, I think getting to zero needs to have very tangible effects. It will shut out those powers for sure, and maybe a couple more things. I'll give it a think.

[opsneakie]

Interesting new problem has come up. In an unbalanced scenario, do you provide a bonus to the two highest, or a penalty to the two lowest?

i.e. Bob is Light 5 Destiny 3 Shadow 2

Now, if I compare everything to the lowest score, he gives a +3 to Daylight creatures, a +1 to mortals, and either a -1 or -3 to Midnight creatures (I'd probably say the -3, comparing it to the furthest away. If everything is maximized, it's +3, + or - 2,  -3. I need a way to compare everything. I'm thinking you provide two bonuses, just so that Bob wouldn't harm his party. I'm also leaning towards maximizing everything, so the benefit of activating this power is big. That only leaves the problem of ties to deal with.

If you're Light 4 Destiny 4 Shadow 2, it seems clear you should get +2 Daylight +2 Mortals -2 Midnight, but what about Light 8 Destiny 1 Shadow 1? Is it +7 Daylight -7 Mortals -7 Midnight? This kind of scenario could devastate the user's party if they were unbalanced, and I want the Human Spark to be a powerful, helpful effect. A friend has advanced the idea that in the even of a lowest tie, the player could choose one of them to gain a bonus, but it frankly doesn't make sense to me that way.

My current thinking: Maximize modifiers, the highest two are bonuses. In the event of two tied for highest, both gain an equal bonus. In the even of two tied for lowest, they both gain an equal penalty. Does this sound sensible?

[Vulpinoid]

This kind of scenario could devastate the user's party if they were unbalanced, and I want the Human Spark to be a powerful, helpful effect.

There could be a metagaming effect at play here.

In an unbalanced party, where various members were wildly different in alignment there would be arguments arising all the time as different people viewed their agendas as correct and other agendas as flawed. The easiest way for a party to solve their quarrels would be for them to adapt to one another's views, gradually bringing their alignments into phase with one another. On the other hand, many cases where this happens would push the individual back to the standard average default pattern of 3-3-4.

Which leaves everyone getting along pretty well, but unable to give big benefits to one another. Lack of conflict, lack of drama, lack of change in the world.

High differences mean more conflict, more drama and bigger potential changes (for good or for ill).

But that's why I was looking at alignment thresholds as the source of bonuses rather than differences in alignment providing the tangible effects.

Where I said previously that full-blood and half-blood beings from the other realms might have a fixed number in their respective alignments, it might be worthwhile to have beings who transcend the mortal. These count as half-blood and full-blood beings of destiny, who have 3 and 6 points respectively locked into their destiny value.

You average human doesn't have the spark in them (at least not in meaningful levels), but those who count as half-sparked mortals can start to impose these effects on the world around them, and those who count as full-sparked mortals can really dramatically impact the world with their potential.

In this way, each of the alignment values favours certain types of actions, but it might cost some kind of character/player resource to achieve this effect. Spend a hit point, willpower, mana, or whatever else you decide (a follow on to this is that players may be able to purchase more of these points with experience, or they may go up with levels). Points like this may replenish as the character fulfils goals or achieves objectives.

With our example of Bob (L 5, D 3, S 2), I wouldn't bother aboutthe types of creatures he gives bonuses to, but focus on the types of action he can contribute toward. If people are performing actions that favour his agenda, he can try to give them bonuses; if they are performing actions that he doesn't like, he can instead try to apply penalties to them. This means that Bob has to actually decided whether or not to use his power, his will manifests in the game world through the benefits or penalties he applies to the actions of those around him.

This way you don't have to worry about what value subtracts from what other value, you just apply the straight alignment value as a modifier (when you couple this with the point resource system indicated above, then it stops the effect being too powerful).

Bob can give 5 points to someone performing an Light aligned action, 3 points to someone performing a Destiny aligned action, or 2 points to someone performing a Dark aligned action. Naturally he likes it best when people perform light aligned actions, because he provides the highest bonus in these situations.

The problem I'm facing in my suggestion is how it works when you try to prevent someone else action from occurring.

Option 1:
Whenever a player doesn't want something to occur, they may use the sum of the opposing alignment scores (don't want a light action to occur, then add your destiny and shadow..). Other rules apply as normal. The problem with this is that the veto effect becomes more powerful than the bonus effect.

Option 2:
Whenever a player doesn't want something to occur, they may use either of the opposing alignment scores, but they have to explain why they think this choice is suitable for countering the effect. Other rules apply as normal. The problem with this is that it could take a while for players to come up with these explanations for manifesting their spark and this might slow down the game too much.

Option 3:
Since the characters are agents of change in the world, their presence only makes things more likely to occur. They can't counter the effects of others, only magnify them. This might fundamentally change the background of the game in ways that you don't want.

I got to this point when I was exploring this type of mechanic before and kept going round in circles, hence abandoning it.

V

[opsneakie]

Okay, using the values as strait modifiers sounds good and gets rid of a lot of problems. I really want to make this mechanic work well and be interesting to use without it bogging down the game. I'm still thinking about giving the bonus to actions instead of to creatures. It's a sensible move, but I worry that it will lead to a lot of time spent puzzling out some NPC's motivation. Since the game is about a world at war (at its heart at least), I don't know if it's a problem if they can only provide combat bonuses, since combat is going to be the primary method of making huge changes to the world. And as far as benefiting their agenda, anyone with any points in Destiny will be able to empower their party and any other mortals that are with them, and anyone with any points in Light or Shadow will be able to grant a bonus or penalty to the creatures they support.

So, Bob , our L5 D3 S2 character, can give a +5 to all the friendly Daylight creatures (which should probably include characters with a high enough Light Score), a + or - 3 to mortals in the conflict, or a + or - 2 to any Midnight creatures (again, probably including sufficiently aligned mortals). Then we run into this interesting bit. If you want to provide the biggest bonus to Daylight things, you want a high Light score, obviously. But if you would rather provide a large penalty to Midnight things, you want a high Shadow score, which seems a little nonsensical. Unless you can provide a bonus equal to the relevant rating or a penalty equal to the sum of the the other two (so a low score means a small bonus or a large penalty), which makes more sense I think.

So that leaves me at bonuses are equal to your rating, penalty equal to 10 - your rating (= the sum of the other two). To really incorporate the spark, we can even say that you can apply it to any scene, not just a combat scene. Does that sound like a mechanic that is better? I think if I can get this sticky spot dealt with, I'll be about ready to actually playtest the thing and see how it goes.

Thanks for all the help Vulpinoid,

-sneakie

[Abkajud]

I think it could be helpful to have a "community" stat triad for Light, Shadow, and Destiny in any given locale. Whenever the PCs begin a conflict in the midst of a temple, on holy ground, or in a crowd of people, maybe the "local forces" or the alignment of the immediate vicinity could influence conflicts at hand.

Sneakie, I noticed that you've started hinting at a sort of difference between Light and Shadow, a sort of reason v. passion conflict, perhaps? I can dig it, and it certainly leaves the good v. evil conflict aside. In light of the Destiny stat, in particular, it's important to set up Light and Shadow as alternatives to one another in some meaningful way, but without making the choice "obvious". Light, if aligned with reason, could be about cold intellect, technology, philosophy, and complicated ritual protocols; Dark, then, could be about wants and needs, an Id-driven existence, personal honor and hospitality, and such.

Is there enough sophistication in what's left of humanity to make characters who could have a larger agenda behind their choices, as opposed to it coming down to a temperament thing? A stuffy professor might prefer Light because they respect literacy more, but what's at stake for Prof. Stuffy in the larger war? How do Light-dominated regions differ from Dark-dominated ones? What sorts of value systems do they have? In "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe, the protagonist's frail-bodied son leaves his home culture's ways because the white Christians are less focused on physical strength as a virtue. It's not just a matter of aesthetic or religious preference, either: the boy sees a life in which he's not a total failure, and seizes upon it.

Using Rome, mid- or pre-Gallic Wars, as a "human world" example, I could see your average Roman siding with Destiny or Light more, with the Senate and the aristocracy siding with Light most heavily (we'll set aside questions of self-determination and self-rule here). The Gauls, Franks, and Norsemen, on the other hand, might well side more heavily with Shadow, with plenty of Destiny enthusiasts in there, as well. I dunno if this is too pat an example, but I think it makes at least some sense.

All of this, of course, informs what sorts of choices would be considered Light, and which would be considered Shadow. What about Destiny choices? Is there some inherent value they profess? It could be more contextual and less tied to certain virtues, like "Drive out the immortals!" or "Keep the war away from our lands!" Tying Destiny to self-determination could be tricky, especially if personal impulse and selfish desire are the province of Shadow.

[opsneakie]

You've certainly unearthed the meat behind the system. Light and Shadow are not good or evil, but both have good and evil parts. Light is good in the sense that it is fair and impartial in its judgment, but can be cruel in the cold, calculating sense. If you're bleeding to death, and two people are in danger somewhere else, a Daylight being would probably leave you behind to save the two. It might be the logical choice, but it is emotionless. Greatest good for the greatest number and so on.

Meanwhile, while Midnight creatures can be fierce and vicious, have the emotional sense that Daylight beings lack. While they might not judge everything the same way, they let emotion sway them and can in some senses be more 'just'. Shadow creatures are good in the sense that they wish the world well and want to help others, but can be unfair, violent, selfish, and irrational.

Prof. Stuffy, who appreciates the Light and their literary leanings, wants them to win because of how they would rule the mortal world. Beings of Daylight would create a highly ordered society, focused on their literature and all that kind of thing. A Midnight-dominated realm would be a little more chaotic and fluid, ruled more day-to-day, but not necessarily less sophisticated. The Rome analogy actually works out pretty well. Shadow societies tend to be more tribal and spiritual, while Light societies tend to be more orderly.

As far as Destiny, players will hash out some destiny stuff at character creation. So I might make Bob, our test dummy of a character, and he is Light 5 Destiny 3 Shadow 2 right now, and up top on his sheet, next to his name, it will say "my destiny is..." and I'll write in, say "to rule the Kingdom of Taratal". Whenever I pursue that destiny, that's a destiny choice. Hopefully that clears that all up.

-sneakie

[Abkajud]

Now you're talking!
That is an *excellent* take on Destiny, comparable to Fate from Sorcerer and Sword. It really fits the heroism, the Clashes, and the grandeur of the cosmic battle unfolding before them all. It really gives players a vested reason to choose their humanity over the War, and yet is still a choice - there are real consequences for snubbing your divine counterparts.
Speaking of which - can players create PCs that are, as Vulpinoid suggested, half-blood and full-blood divinities? I think it'd be best to refuse full-bloods as a PC option, on the basis that they would have no Destiny, and thus lack the same tri-split moral quandary that humans have. (And on that note, maybe only certain, gifted humans, those who possess Destiny, are eligible to be PCs?) Half-bloods, on the other hand, have an interesting problem: if they must always possess a certain minimum of dice (points?) in either Light or Shadow, then there are going to be situations in which they have no choice but to side with their "element".
That'd be kind of cool: after a certain threshold, your half-Light standard bearer simply cannot choose Destiny or Shadow, at least whenever Light is an option. Would it be fun to do that, though? I could see it being a lot of fun to be "compelled" in a particular manner, and ultimately giving up Destiny or Shadow entirely through play, but there would need to be plenty of player input in constructing these choices, lest the half-bloods who've hit their threshold be railroaded along by the GM.
It'd be amusing to take a Half-Shadow character and try your best to give him choices only between Light and Destiny, though. After a few sessions of that, you might end up painting the character into a corner: when Halfie's Destiny is so far along that it bumps into the Shadow threshold "from behind" (say, Light is totally depleted and you can't take any more dice away from Shadow), you might find the character's options reach a screeching halt. He would have to betray his mortal aims, at least for a time, to bring himself back into Shadow's good graces once more, and be able to get some "wiggle room", mechanically.
P.S. I'm assuming the actual choice-mechanic would only apply to point gains/losses in a significant dilemma on the part of the character. Dilemma, or simply an important choice in the storyline? Otherwise, players might run out of dice in a particular category fairly quickly, and why not draw out the whole business as much as we want?

[opsneakie]

Well, I think half-bloods will be playable, but not full-blooded. I'll probably lock in 3-4 points, but we'll see how the mechanic plays out. I may end up locking more points to prevent the others from getting too high, but that's all playtesting detail. When a character bumps their minimum, they can't advance any further away from that area. Even if you're playing Halfie, and you really want to pursue your Destiny, at some point your heritage betrays you and certainly at least tries to force you down a different road. I think a half-blood could certainly stall out at their minimum in whatever, and there would be some compulsion, but it would be in the hands of the players to deal with their character's dilemma. Full-blooded characters will not be playable, at least not without some additional thinking put into it.

Changes in alignment, by the way, will only happen when a player makes a significant choice, so it won't be too wishy-washy. I want the transitions to be fairly prolonged, so a character might attain a high score in one element only very late in the game. I will be running with the mechanic of needing to roll 1d10 over your current score to increase it, for now at least, to see how that could prolong especially the higher points.

Lastly, I'm toying with the idea of Ascension. Upon reaching a 10 in something, the player would become almost a supernatural agent of that force. A human with 10 Light has gone so far down that path they are barely human at all any more, etc. etc. Just some food for thought.

Thank you all for your support and listening to my increasingly long and incoherent ranting,

-John

[Vulpinoid]

Here's another couple of ideas to consider.

Locking points in.

I'd just given some basic ideas of how half-blood and full-blood beings could have alignment values locked in, and you're right that these scores will need a bit of playtesting to get a good balance happening. But last night I thought of another way to tie these into the characters with better detail and in-game rationale.

I don't know how many supernatural powers you're going to be giving to characters, or how these powers might be determined...so you might need to resculpt these ideas to tie in with your current thoughts.

The thought is that a character only gets alignment values locked in when they embody more of the essence of that alignment. Embodying more of this essence is symbiotic with having more supernatural powers. The more powers you have, the more alignment values are locked in...the more alignment values become locked in, the more supernatural powers become available.

I'm just going to play with the assumption that a low-powered character has two or three minor abilities, a mid-powered character has a couple of minor abilities and a major ability or two, a high-powered character has numerous minor abilitities, a couple of majors and something really powerful.

Each power might then have a minimum lock value, a minimum alignment value and an XP cost. The power may only be purchased by a character meeting the minimum lock value, and they must spend XP to pick it up as well. Characters also have to keep following the virtues of their alignment otherwise the greater powers deny them access to the powers they might currently possess.

To earn more powerful abilities, character have to lock in more of their alignment to certain values, restricting their ability to act in other ways. They are basically sacrificing some of their soul in exchange for a little more power.

To keep using the powers a character might have to maintain a certain alignment value, or powers might get bonuses if higher alignment values are reached (eg. It only costs a single locked point of light to gain "Clarity of Thought", this reduces the penalty from any distractions by your current light alignment score, so it only costs a single point to get it, but it's in a players best interest to keep their score high to gain maximum benefit from this power).

This gives a smoother progression than simply the half-blood/full-blood transition that I mentioned previously. Characters can gradually transcend the ranks.

In a campaign game, locking in new alignment values would be great quests that take a couple of sessions to achieve, and a player would have to keep following the tenets of that alignment in order to prove their worthiness to the greater powers.

Similarly, a character might choose to undergo a great quest to unlock their alignment...gaining some freedom in exchange for sacrificing some of their power (this could make a great campaign idea in itself).

Using this type of concept, the unlocked alignment values can be more fluid, but the true importance to the characters lies in the locked values and what they represent to the individual.

Imagine the concept of a rogue agent of the light who has traded in their locked alignment of light for destiny, or even darkness.

Generic supernatural powers like regeneration or heightened strength, could be available to anyone as long as they have some type of alignment locked in place. Specific powers like a cloak of shadows might require a certain level of darkness locked in place. Other powers could require a pair of alignments locked (eg. destiny and darkness = freedom from certain light effects). Truly transcending the whole war might require having locks in all three alignments.

Again, just ideas.

V