Game System with Realistc NPCs

[Adarchi]

I'm trying to create a system that allows PC generation to be done the same way as NPC generation. The goal being that a baker or wood cutter somehow fit into the system as neatly as a gladiator or adventurer would. A lot of systems concentrate tremendously on combat at the expense of everything else. Does anyone have any ideas on a system like this (or know one that already exists)?

A few vague ideas:
Levels are out since a 20th level baker doesn't make any sense to me.
Classes don't seem to work unless they become very specific. At this point you might as well go with skills anyway.
A sort of tiered system seems to be fill the above goals but becomes super complicated quickly.
   Farming
      Planting
      Animal Husbandry
   Labor
      Blacksmithing
      Carpentry
   Combat
      Weapons
         Swords
      Armor

And so on.... However when using this, how would the subcategories relate to the parent? Increasing Combat increases weapons, and swords, and armor?

Hope the question and examples are reasonably clear. Thanks!

[Abkajud]

Aw, I've been trying to sneak Farming into an RPG for years! Who says cows aren't interesting?

Classes that are binding in some absolute way are lame, I think, but social roles that affect how people treat you still make plenty of sense; in fact, I daresay choosing a social role adds to the character's chances of being part of a cool conflict or story in-game. I used roles in my design for Mask of the Emperor because of the inherent assumptions about what kind of society it is; they establish your initial focus in skills and what people expect of you in society, but from there you can grow in whatever direction you please.
I dunno if what you've presented here for skills is all that complicated - you just need to establish the relationship between really broad areas of ability and more specific, "traditional-skill" areas of expertise.
If I have Labor but no other skills, what does that mean? Is it kind of like a hauling-and-hefting stat? When I tack on some Blacksmithing, I know exactly what I'm doing. Does the stat+skill model feel okay for you, or is it overdone? Stats that represent broad ranges of ability, ones that you can leave at zero without being hobbled, could be pretty neat.
Alternately, you could have those broad skills still serve as, um, skills (as opposed to stats), and then just grant perks when people take points in a specialty.
Thoughts?
- Abby

[Adarchi]

Great point Abkajud. I'm glad this isn't too complicated so far. I haven't thought how stats would work with skills. Again, most stats are focused on combat (str, dex, and con all factor into combat) whereas the other stats seem to be afterthoughts. What do you mean by perks? Something like Fallout's SPECIAL system?

I made the below table as a general mock up of the skills I've imagined (using a typical medieval setting but ignoring magic for now). Items highlighted in yellow would immediately be given a novice starting rank when the higher level item is first chosen. So if I create a new character and pick Social, I immediately get a bit in Civil and Persuasion. If I then pick Financial then the character gets a bump in Bargaining right away.



Wow, 33 skills before I even get to combat.... I realize most players aren't going to get excited about making a character concentrating in masonry but whipping up a few NPCs would be very easy with this framework.

[Vulpinoid]

All of these non-combat skills are great, in a non-combat situation.

As long as you tailor a game around something other than combat, these skills can become really important.

Let's say that there is a creature near the village which cannot be killed...warriors have all gone to slay it and have ended up as a pile of bones. If the local villagers prevent warriors from going to slay the beast, then it dpesn't have a fresh supply of meat and it comes into town, annihilating the local farms. What can they do?

It sets up a premise for a game where combat just isn't going to solve the problem. The characters discuss new options.

1. The local apothecary speaks to members of his guild from far off lands, he discovers that the creature is slowed down and falls asleep in the presence of a particular herb.
2. A hunter knows that the herb grows on the frozen tops of a nearby mountain range.
3. A local farmer has a green thumb and is renowned for growing anything even in the most inhospitable circumstances.
4. Since the herb puts the creature to sleep, the town's bonesetter offers a suggestion about getting the herb into the creature.
(a visiting heroic warrior offers the suggestion of coating a weapon in an extract made of the juices of the herb, but he is slain because the creature cannot be overcome through combat)
5. The local lord's chef decides that he will get the creature to eat the herb, the villagers make sure no-one goes near the creature for a month to ensure it is hungry. The chef then cooks a marvellous feast of pork and lamb, he seasons the meat with the herb.
6. The creature eats the herb and ends up in a state of perpetual slumber, never to harass the village again.

This is just a hypothetical example where typical townsfolk from a regular medieval village could unite their skills to eliminate a menace. The steps focus on a single villager and their contribution to the solution. Each step could be a scene from a single story, or each step could be expanded out into a story in it's own right.

The problem that many people face after playing only D&D, is that they think all roleplaying has to be about combat. This conclusion is reached because combat is the reward path for that particular game system.

Most people in the real world don't take combat as a first course of action, because they might get hurt! People don't like getting hurt.

On the reverse side, most warriors in combat oriented games don't like diplomacy, because they just can't do it as well as they swing a sword.

The kinds of things that your game rewards will reflect the kinds of skills that become important. There are plenty of discussions around here that have described this concept.

If you can get a look at the Shadow of Yesterday, it shows a great way to reward people for NOT being combat oriented.

Similarly, I'm developing concepts in my current game where you can use diplomacy or seduction as a valid method of defence in a potential combat situation. (In this case, you avoid damage because the opponent just thinks you're too pretty to hit, or because they agree with what you're trying to say to them in the middle of the conflict...you can do damage similarly by targeting their intentions and getting them to do what you want, rather than preventing them from doig what they want).

It's all about perspective.

Just some ideas...

V

[JoyWriter]

I reckon a 20th level Barber or Baker is just as sensible as a 20th level priest for example, or for that matter a 20th level "rogue", in fact it makes more sense as the above groups actually had guilds sometimes that would consider your "level" in terms of general skill.

Skill values and levels can be pretty equivalent, depending on how you work them out, as a multi-class sailor/farmer might be exactly the same as someone who has split his skill points equally between the two.

[scarik]

I dont have much to add, but I like how the framework looks.

I think the key to ensuring the need for noncombat skills is simply o make combat as poor an option as it often is in the real world. It takes a great deal of technology for a single man to ever be dangerous to many, and its easy to close that gap on the scale that matters most, the personal one.

In a medieval world a trained knight is deadly when supported by other warriors, but 5 farmers with crossbows will kill him everytime he tries to fight them.

One way is to make sure that combat skills are possessed at a basic proficiency by a large section of people. Certainly hunters, trappers and even basic laborers should be dangerous men when they outnumber you. Its not simple by any means since 2-1 odds are not the same as 8-4.

Another way would be to simply not reward combat by making the XP or cash rewards always greater when a non-violent (or at least non-direct) solution is used.

[Bert]

Hi Adarchi,

Why not take a look Chaosium's BRP or the original Rune Quest? It's not without flaws - but then again what game is? Anyway, all characters and creatures in BRP/RQ (PC or NPC) are created in pretty much the same way. They all have attributes and skills. You can use a template to create a farmer or craftsman, so it doesn't take forever. There are no levels, XPs or anything similar - just individual skills and attributes improving independently through training and general use. Loads of games take this approach now, but RQ was the first one to do it.

Each occupation has a list of skills related to it, with many skills common to multiple occupations. There are no hierarchical tiers – no parent or daughter skills – so if you get better at tracking it doesn't make you better at any other skills related to being a hunter/scout/herder/tracker/ranger/whatever. Skills are categorised as Agility, Communication, Knowledge, Manipulation, Stealth, Perception and Magic. You can get better at a whole group of skills (or several) by training your attributes instead of your skills.

The first character I ever played in a RQ game was a simple herdsman, which horrified me at the time - but it was great! I didn't get into a fight until the third session, and even then it was only fisticuffs with a farmer.

Anyway, good luck with the system.

Bert

[Abkajud]

Wow, between V's plot suggestion (awesome! Really, really awesome. Go you!) and Adarchi's bevy of non-combat skills (like I said, I'm a sucker for farming skills), this discussion reminds me of a game idea someone posted a while back, one in which the simplest of village jobs required going out and slaying rock-beasts, or river-monsters, or grain-goblins. The Forge's search feature is being a bit of a layabout at the moment, so Adarchi, I'll try to PM you with the link when I find it.

Anyway, it also reminds me of the section in Unknown Armies that talks about all the things you could do instead of fighting someone: talking it out, surrendering, running away, etc. Adarchi, your game sounds like it has potential to provide all sorts of alternatives! Have the brewer and the apothecary join up to put a sleeping draught in the drink of the merciless tyrant; I'm sure his food-taster wouldn't mind a little narcolepsy if it meant freedom for his people. It makes me think of something that has seemed a little odd to me about D&D and such games - especially in video games, foes fight to the death, 99% of the time. Humans, as a rule, do not do so unless they're fanatics or they have death/worse than death waiting for them back where they came from.

Okay, I do have one article I can post: http://ptgptb.org/0019/classconflictD20.html discusses the social and societal implications of various D&D classes, which brings us back to the archetypal fantasy warrior - someone who's just a heartless mercenary, and far from his homeland at that, would have little to no social connections to rely on for help where he's been stationed on his latest gig. He might be intimidating as all get-out, and a fearsome swordsman, but if he angers the locals, he won't even be able to buy a drink without wondering if someone's laced it. But rather than punishing combat-monsters in your design, why not reward them for taking on a few points in getting some friends, or at least some other skills as well, so they have options beyond, "Um, I kill him?" every time they're faced with adversity. Most action movies have at least some situation in them in which the hero can't just haul off and shoot or stab the main villain, even when he's given a chance to do so - something stops him, like, say, diplomatic immunity, and he has to do a bunch of legwork to get to a place where he's allowed to pull the trigger.

But yeah - V, that suggestion is awesome sauce!

-- Abby

[Luke]

V's suggestion is colorful, but I think it's still stuck on the same saw. It's a problem solving event that is acting as a surrogate for combat. That's only going to work a couple of times before it becomes boring or frustrating. Though I suppose you could make a game about clever problem solving and just have fighting not be an option.

However, I say go one step further. If you want to have depth in your mundane, non-fighty activities, give them all equal weight. I'm not saying that Fighting can be beat with Farming. I'm saying that there should be conflicts about Farming. Bringing the crops should have the same mechanical weight as fighting off raiders. The actual practice of two arts isn't necessarily equivalent, but the consequences of the outcomes can be equal.

Seemingly mundane activities can be used as excellent dramatic devices. Fighting is not the only activity in a fantasy RPG. Making, growing, trading all can be used in various incarnations to great effect.

[DWeird]

I don't get the point of this.

Don't mean to make the above sound offensive - I want to understand what's so fun in assigning a peon PCs may never see again a whole character sheet of 'is own, but I just can't. The fact that a number of people do find the idea naturally alluring puzzles me to no end! Could someone explain the reasons of this allure to me?

Here's where I'm coming from:

NPCs created the same way PCs are). If NPCs are not created according to the same rules as the PCs, it's because they're quite usually boring, one-dimensional, and never to be seen again after you fix whatever problem they had. Will John Cropgrow the Farmer who's barn has been infested with wolves or whatever stop being one-dimensional because he actually has the "Farmer" group of skills? Neither does the possibility of him also being a terrific dancer, an OK accountant and cook thrill me.

Non-combat skills are largerly "invisible" in most games, since their respective areas of effect are not modelled at all in most games. If the PCs will wandering combatants of some sort or the other (Adarchi seems to think that will be the case), how is providing what's essentially useless detail better? The PCs are not going to see it, and I imagine it's a lot more work for the GM. If a skill is likely to never be used by a PC, you might as well fib it.

"I want to see the effects of these mundane skills on the world!" Some of you seem to be saying. Fine, okay - say the PCs kill John Cropgrow instead of getting rid of his wolf problem, so his fields go untended and a nearby village is near starvation and will have to try and trade for its food. Simulating stuff like that *would* be pretty cool. S'only that it's not the *use* of a skill that's interesting, it's the lack of a skill that gave that effect. Still say it's easier for the GM to play it by the ear.

However, if John Cropgrow wasn't part of a small village, but of a bigger town or city, someone would have just giggled with glee and settled on his lands, meanin' there wouldn't even be any food problem. Most of the simple skills are rather easily replicable, meaning that the NPCs in question is boring not because it has no effect on the world, but because that NPC is very, very expendable.

And if the NPC isn't expendable in that she has skills that allow her to accomplish super-awesome feats - the deceased John Cropgrow's cousin Jill Plantseed can grow a beanstalk to the moon! - you can get by by just saying, as is the custom: that NPC is super-awesome, for she can do this and that, guard her from dangers lurking and obvious!

So yeah.

1) Don't see the point in giving skills PCs will never use.
2) Don't see the point of giving skills the PCs will use without them having some sort of effect on the world.
2a) Having these skills have an recognisable, system-induced effect on the world is both difficult and somewhat meaningless to simulate if you're planning to model any society that's bigger than a breadbasket.

Maybe this would be a fun way to play in a game with a small community in crisis, where lack of relevant skills is really an issue (we have no blacksmith nor carpenter, so our farmer has to work the lands with a large treebranch) and any crisis has to be solved by creative application of common skills.

Which is what most people seem to be proposing, implicitly at least.

Whereas the starter of the thread wants to design a broad-use mundane NPC creation tool.


Hope this didn't come off as hostile - and maybe was even of some use. I just don't get it, is all.

[opsneakie]

Hey, I just thought I'd throw in my 2 cp on the subject of making a game non-combat oriented. I'm doing something about it in Night and Day, which is, incidentally, about war, but I wanted to reward players for success in non-combat encounters too. I took some inspiration from Shadow of Yesterday, and made everything deal damage the same way. A cutting remark is as dangerous as a cutting blade. This means you can have conflict and deal damage and all that without it being a knock-down, drag-out fight. Have the players in conflict against a problem, dealing damage against the difficulty of solving it, maybe.

Give whatever task the normal people have to overcome a Difficulty pool instead of a Health pool, and let them make Farming or Blacksmithing 'attacks' against it.

Just a thought

[Vulpinoid]

Again, most stats are focused on combat (str, dex, and con all factor into combat) whereas the other stats seem to be afterthoughts.

Really?

You don't think strength would be a primary concern for a farmer when moving his plow, or when trying to pull a horse from a boggy ditch?

How about a craftsman with high dexterity versus one with low dexterity? The first might be able to execute his work with brilliant detail, while the second has great ideas and designs for his work, but can't put them into practice.

Needless to say, constitution would be important for a range of skills. How long can I keep [plowing my field/baking bread/carving stone] before I get tired and eventually have to rest?

These are just initial thoughts that come to mind.

Just like my previous comment was an gut reaction idea of a story that could still focus around mysterious beasts without using combat as an element.

If you think of things in a black-and-white/combat-and-noncombat perspective, then your game will reflect this (as we've seen in numerous game designs).



Going back to the original thread title, and the opening lines of the thread...

I'm trying to create a system that allows PC generation to be done the same way as NPC generation. The goal being that a baker or wood cutter somehow fit into the system as neatly as a gladiator or adventurer would.

When it is said that PC generation should be done the same way as NPC generation, does this mean that the PCs are expected to be expendable characters just like most NPCs? Regarding the second line, I find this to actually be contrary to most of my experience. In most cases, the NPCs fit into the setting and integrate into the system far better than most PCs who are typically outsiders and who possess numerous exceptions in comparison to the mundane world.

A few posts have skirted around the issue, but I think the easiest way to resolve this is by simply having all of the players begin with a regular mundane societal role (baker, butcher, farmer, craftsman, milliner, innkeeper, etc.). You can decide for yourself whether the skill set associated with these roles comes from a class, a basic template of starter skills, or whatever other system takes your fancy. As an addendum to the character creation process, you could add a second template to the character (whether PC or NPC) to indicate membership in the town guard, service in the local lords militia, membership of a guild, a seat on the town council, etc.

Following this simple pattern, all the characters present have some kind influence within the local area, or some kind of skill that serves the community at large...and they also have some kind of trade to fall back on.

In many of the roleplaying games being alluded to in this thread, it's often the PCs who are one-dimensional in this regard. They fight, they plunder, they go adventuring...but what do they do when there are no more monsters to face, or ruins to explore??

Just some ideas...

V

[Adarchi]

I don't get the point of this.

[snip]

1) Don't see the point in giving skills PCs will never use.
2) Don't see the point of giving skills the PCs will use without them having some sort of effect on the world.
2a) Having these skills have an recognisable, system-induced effect on the world is both difficult and somewhat meaningless to simulate if you're planning to model any society that's bigger than a breadbasket.

Not at all hostile and I welcome the feedback. I know this isn't most people's idea of fun. Here is the larger though process that led me to this idea:

1) A large part of creating a game is creating a setting.
2) The larger the setting, the more time intensive to fill in the details that are required for various reasons
3) A computer program would be great at generating those details
4) In order to make this computer program, a more general character system needs to be created.

So I'm not advocating that every one actually play as a non-combatant (or even use those skills at all) but more that the majority of systems I've seen focus on the combat side of things.


As an example, suppose you're going to DM a game of DnD and want to whip up a generic town purely for the sake of having a place for your characters to get some gossip, buy supplies, and other common activities. The town is utterly pointless in the larger scheme of things besides these basic vending activities. To save yourself the work of coming up with the various NPCs your PCs will interact with, you head over to a random town generator only to find that it's filled with combatants.

There's nothing wrong with this but a typical Medieval town (even a fantasy one) is not 100% wizards, warriors, and a couple of bards. I would find it much easier to take a town that had a list of farmers and shop owners to weave into my story and the current rules for character generating are not easily used for this purpose.

I'm amazed reading sessions when others are able to instantly create a town full of interesting people with minor plot items and red herrings. Unfortunately I often fail at that step when the PCs decide to charge in an unanticipated direction. If nothing else, I'd say adding this kind of flavor to the world really improves the creative process, there are some wonderful ideas people have come up with just with my meager list of skills.

[Adarchi]

Again, most stats are focused on combat (str, dex, and con all factor into combat) whereas the other stats seem to be afterthoughts.

Really?

You don't think strength would be a primary concern for a farmer when moving his plow, or when trying to pull a horse from a boggy ditch?

How about a craftsman with high dexterity versus one with low dexterity? The first might be able to execute his work with brilliant detail, while the second has great ideas and designs for his work, but can't put them into practice.

I see and completely agree with your point, but let me rephrase your question slightly. Would an extremely dexterous craftsman have the same advantage over a lower skilled one that a dexterous swordsman would have over a poor one? A friend and I were debating about how "gamey" skills would work with something like playing an instrument. The worlds most dexterous, intelligent, and creative individual is still going to play the violin worse than a 10 year old with a year of practice.

Combat seems to magnify small differences - and rightly so, otherwise the struggle wouldn't be any fun.

If you think of things in a black-and-white/combat-and-noncombat perspective, then your game will reflect this (as we've seen in numerous game designs).



Going back to the original thread title, and the opening lines of the thread...

I'm trying to create a system that allows PC generation to be done the same way as NPC generation. The goal being that a baker or wood cutter somehow fit into the system as neatly as a gladiator or adventurer would.

When it is said that PC generation should be done the same way as NPC generation, does this mean that the PCs are expected to be expendable characters just like most NPCs? Regarding the second line, I find this to actually be contrary to most of my experience. In most cases, the NPCs fit into the setting and integrate into the system far better than most PCs who are typically outsiders and who possess numerous exceptions in comparison to the mundane world.

A few posts have skirted around the issue, but I think the easiest way to resolve this is by simply having all of the players begin with a regular mundane societal role (baker, butcher, farmer, craftsman, milliner, innkeeper, etc.). You can decide for yourself whether the skill set associated with these roles comes from a class, a basic template of starter skills, or whatever other system takes your fancy. As an addendum to the character creation process, you could add a second template to the character (whether PC or NPC) to indicate membership in the town guard, service in the local lords militia, membership of a guild, a seat on the town council, etc.

One slight modification - I want NPCs generated using the same system, not necessarily the exact same way. In fact I would argue that as heroes, PCs should have generous bonuses that are already put into most systems to make at least a few of their attributes above average. NPCs on the other hand should be stuck with a more "realistic" and average scores. I think PCs would generally enjoy a world that was built for them to be above average.

I do agree that I need a better system that integrates combat / non-combat type items. This really has me stumped on how to integrate them better. The only way I can think to combine the two (which I don't like) is to give every skill both a combat and non-combat side:
Wood cutting - able to destroy wooden items with an axe easily (+1 dmg), can earn a small income during any down time in game (+5 coins per day in a forested area).

Right now I'm leaning towards letting NPCs have 1 skill point per year old whereas PCs get 2 (1 combat and one non). Of course this only makes the sepation worse Thanks for all of your great ideas V, keep them coming!

[Vulpinoid]

Would an extremely dexterous craftsman have the same advantage over a lower skilled one that a dexterous swordsman would have over a poor one?

It all depends how you measure those skills. A hypothetical dexterous swordsman has twice the skill of a less dexterous swordsman, he might hit more often, he might do more damage than the less skilful swordsman....doesn't matter what specifically causes it, but let's just say that he wins twice as many fights, and therefore earns twice as much money from his fighting.

Same applies to the dexterous and less dexterous craftsman. Maybe the dexterous craftsman can produce his work more quickly, maybe his work is of a much better quality...once again the more dexterous craftsman earns twice as much money from his craft.

This is assuming all other factors are the same, and probably assuming that the skill levels aren't playing a huge role...which basically leads to the next part of your comment...

A friend and I were debating about how "gamey" skills would work with something like playing an instrument. The worlds most dexterous, intelligent, and creative individual is still going to play the violin worse than a 10 year old with a year of practice.

How much do you think raw potential plays in the grand scheme of things? How much does trained skill play?

You're probably right that a kid with a year of practice will play far better than a creative, brilliant adult who has never touched a violin. But at what point will the adult surpass the kid? There are numerous ways that a game system can handle this type of question...

...but that's another topic entirely.

V