Looking for some feed back on world and system

[Trollkin]

I've been writing my own game for a while now, but besides some friends, and a little test played with my weekly DnD group I've keep this pretty under wraps. So I'll start with the universe, and then work down to the basic of character creation, then finally a really basic idea on how the system works. Note this is the first RPG I've written so I'm swimming through uncharted waters right now so any pointers will be helpful thanks .

200 hundred year after the fall of the Nightgrift (similar to elf's) empire are left in three pockets that are cut off from each other. The Nightgrifts being the first race created be the gods that hold domain over the land created to protect there frosts, and the great secrets hidden within them. They became all powerful mastering all forms of magic, war, art, etc, but they became lost in their study and work and their numbers began to drop tell their empire crumbled. Failing to protect the god's gifts, and losing many to time the gods created Man to become their new protectors. Now the Nightgrifts fight to reclaim their lost empire and the gift that they forget with time before the humans crush what little they have left. In the resent years the Nightsgrifts have started to remase produce their mighty knights the Blood Kissed giant warriors dressed in steel amour from when their empire was at its height. In the northern part of the continent the (blank name still pending) giant blond haired warriors from the north lead attacks on the remaining Nightgrift navy, and Northern capital from the exNightgrift eastern capital which they captured during the fall of the Nightgrift Empire. The lands are covered with huge expanses of forests that home great breast gods that travel from their home in the great forest. To the east is the largest pocket of the Nightgrifts untouched by the outside world sounded by large mountain chains to the east of that are the lands of the Giants, and to the North of that is the beast land.

This is the run down of the character creation

First pick race
Right now there are 9 races to pick from the Nightgrifts as Manichean above the blood kissed which is a ritually created super strong tough Nightgrift that can't use magic. The 3 human's big Norse guys, Irish Celts, and premedical Romanians.
and one last one that I didn't Manichean above are half man half animals that are create thought being born near Beast gods or places of half magic energy.

Then you roll stats there's 6 stats

Then you do background like social class, birthplaces, where you grew up, etc

You get our skills

Your money buys your gear and you're off.

I made my own system for this monster so I will be keeping some details to my self. I increased the bell curve over 20 not over 100, and made it so that all combat actions cost x amount of fatigue when it all gone to pass out. So that characters at higher levels can out last lower level characters in battle.

This is just a quick run down on the game I've asked friends about what they think, but I think I what to not what people really think about think thing.

[Mike Sugarbaker]

So, suppose I'm a player, coming up with a character. What am I supposed to want? What can I expect that I'll end up doing?

Also, I understand your reluctance to spill the beans on system, but you'll get a lot more help if you do, odds are there's nothing actually new in it, and as someone once said, "if your ideas are actually any good, no one will steal them - you'll have to ram them down people's throats."

[Trollkin]

Well that depends on the race and type of character you are playing like lets say a Blood Kissed knight you would most likely end up fighting to protect the Nightgrift boards, or the more powerful knight and up getting sent out to recover lost artefacts, lost books, item, etc be for the humans or some other race can get their hands on them and use them. If you were a human ranger you would most likely attack Nightgrift trade cravens, and gathering items for your portion, etc.

The system I have running on this thing is geared for real world like combat; and magic is used to tap into the power the elements.

I think you were asking mainly about this things character creation.

Well it goes as fallowing you pike your race then roll for your states adding the racial bonus. After doing that everyone in the group adds up there stats from that you find what the average of the group is the compare it to the average for a normal character from that you can find who in the group gets bonus or negatives. This are manly stat increase or decrease with some special traits that allows the GM to even out the stats of the plays to get rid off that poor guy that has to set behind the party so he wont died will one guy kills 70 present of the monsters in the advecher. Now that?s been done the players roll for their blood lines to see if like a giant breed into their family three generations about this will change characters height, weight, stats, appearance, and add special traits. Now they roll to see were they were born this sometime changes stats, and adds special traits to characters. Now they roll to see were they grew up which changes their stats. After that they roll for events for where they grow up the change stats, etc. Now they roll for their social class which can make the filthy rich or a slave that the party can buy. Lastly you go through the lists of careers are find one that you meet all the criteria for now roll your age, roll for cash, and the type of magic that you can use, and put the pie in the oven its done.

This does change a little from race to race but generally this is what happens.

[Mike Sugarbaker]

Why all the factions? What is it, specifically, that you want out of giving that choice to players? (If you do in fact give it to players - in fact, it'd probably be wiser to give GMs tools to put real limits in place to keep the party from dissolving into infighting.)

Why 6 stats? You're interested in combat, OK, I get that, but if you want anything other than combat to happen in the game, it's gonna matter how you represent people mechanically. Do these characters want anything besides what their factions want?

(And as far as "real world" combat, well, I usually recommend for people to read this: http://www.rpg.net/oracle/essays/itoolkit1.html
It might seem very relevant to what you're after at first, but read the whole thing - its picture of "realistic combat" is real food for thought.)

You have lots and lots of random inputs into your character stats here, and most of them come after the point where you have the GM compare everyone to the party baseline. You're going to have to be very thorough when you test this process, and I would advise introducing a lot more player choice. I've never met a player that didn't have a clear idea of the character in their head, and a fairly fixed one about things like whether they're young or old, and where they grew up. If it's very important to you that players have to cope with being someone they might not want to be, you're really going to have to orient all your design decisions for the whole game around that, and probably retool the setting assumptions as well.

...and I should belatedly offer you a welcome! There's lots for you to learn from here. (Is there a real-world name we can call you?)

[Trollkin]

What my goal from the beginning was to create a game that has a in-depth character creative without, become one of those games that at the end of the night very one says " Hey that would have been fun if only the character creative didn't take use 6 hours", but at the same time I've ran into allot of people how just don't know what or who they want to play the first time they set down with a new game. So I'm thinking about making the character creation were the player decide how important each part of the creative is to their character for example " The player wants to have a character with high stats but really does not care about their skills so they world make Stats a rank A will making Skills rank D" meaning that every character will end up roughly with the same power level at the end of the creation, but I'm looking for a way to have the one I just listed, and have a random one that I would have to clean up so players can't make this over powered monster?s. At this point I don't know if I should keep one both, or think of another way of doing it. About that party dissolving into infighting in my weekly test player's group that all that?s happened every week the hole group moves one more step into killing each other.

Well it's really its seven, but 1 is a bonus stat, only 3 stats are geared for combat, 2 are purely there for magic and a little skills, 1 is just there for metal stuff, and the bonus one I put in because I hate "Fate points" that players can just wipe out at any point, but I need something for a game were the combat can kill you really fast if you get stupid, and just run in so it hole point is to give the player to come back to life from wounds.

Ok maybe I miss labelled the combat system I've been building it?s more like cinematic combat for those epic sword fights, or a stare down between to enemy archers in the middle of a raging battle. And thanks for the link.

Yes I've been thinking I need to fixes the hole baseline thing when I was thinking about I thought it would work, but my first set of characters I had fiends make It seemed to work 4 people had very even powered characters, 1 needed to add a blessing that brought them up to the baseline power level, but 1 player got a curse because his stats were too high. To say the least he somehow made a giant with stats that were almost max starting off. I'm not sure what you mean by "introducing a lot more player choice" did you mean I should add more parts to character creation it's self, or did you mean I should make it so the players have more control over the results of character creation? What do you mean when you say ?probably retool the setting assumptions as well."?

Thanks you I'm glad to find such a great site. My real world name is Eric.

[Mike Sugarbaker]

I meant more control over the results. More steps would just be more hassle if the player doesn't have any control over the results. Also, I don't want to steer you in the wrong direction - it seems like the players you're really designing for are thinking much more in terms of characters as game pawns than as characters who take a fleshed-out role in a story. (Which is fine - letting the game rules handle the gamey stuff and leaving the story stuff to people's imaginations is a very reasonable choice. I just don't want to encourage you to make design decisions for a game of a totally different sort than the one you're after.)

My thought of retooling the setting assumptions was in reference to my wild-hair idea of a game that was totally about random characters who weren't necessarily built effectively for adventuring, but suddenly got thrown into it. A big gameplay-focus change like that would require you to do some violence to your setting ideas in order to support it. But your game isn't that, so nevermind - my problem, not yours.

Here's a question to think about: what does "combat can kill you really fast if you get stupid, and just run in" have to do with the themes implied in your setting and its backstory? (I'm not implying that any given answer is right, I want to hear your thoughts about it.)

Are you already playtesting the game? (Strictly we like to keep discussions of games that have made it that far in the Playtesting forum instead of First Thoughts, but whatev, I'm not the moderator.) It sounds as if this is a group you've been playing with for a while. Can you talk a bit more about your play history and the sort of stuff that's inspired you to design?

[Trollkin]

That is what I'm now trying to do, but I agree with that the all random system will never sell in a rpg the players always want as much control over their characters as possible, so I don?t now why I've been doing it this way for so long? That the feel I've been going for I was afraid I lost it some were down the line.

Well in my mind what I've wanted to do is create a system that gives you the feel that I'm one wrong step from getting an arrow in the side of the head, or maybe I shouldn't get involved in that bar room brawl, because one good stab from a knife one of those guys might have on him could kill me. I mostly did this to show that live in this world can be end in a second giving the game that every battle could be my last feel. I did this; because the setting is suppose to give the players this feeling of wonder so most of the game works around strange magic weird creatures, but at the same time should give them this felling that damager is around every corner.

Not really I've just had them going though character creation, and some combat, and I throw a little story with it. While I've only been Gming this group for about 6 months. I started with DnD 3.5 with my first group, when me and a friend start baying rpgs in mass he stated buying  allot of the older games DnD 1st edition, anything by tsr, etc. I started to buy allot of the newer stuff War hammer Fantasy, shodowrun, legend of the five rings, etc. So I've about played everything of the market, but I always found that when I played a game there way one maybe two thinks in the game itself that I liked, and whenever I Gmed I found the setting boring at best in allot of cases, and the mechanics didn't have the rules for the setting that I wanted to run. So I started making this game based around the kind of game I've been looking for.

[Mike Sugarbaker]

The point isn't what'll sell (the answer to "what will sell": not really anything) but what players will enjoy. Don't put the cart before the horse.

I'm not sure how compatible a feeling of wonder is with a feeling of constant dread, but that isn't the real issue: the issue is, you're going to have to think of each mechanic in the game and each element in the setting in terms of whether, and how, they create the feelings in the player that you're after.

...and I regret to inform you that you have not quite played everything on the market. :-) I'm sure you've taken notice of a few games since being here, but if you haven't you should definitely check out some awesome stuff that happens to be available free as well as at awesome game stores:

The Shadow of Yesterday
Spirit of the Century

[Trollkin]

First to correct myself what I to say is that mechanic wouldn't work because the players always want as much control over their characters as possible. Sorry my miss worked.

Now that I think about I'm not sure how much wonder of the world the players would really get to enjoy if they?ve lock themselves in a stone building fearing for their lives. Right now I'm working on mechanics to create the feels I want the players to have, but I'll have to see if those work if not I'm going to start reworking key parts of the system to achieve that feeling. Do you have any pointers that would help me keep the feel that I've been looking for?

Again me not reading what I've type before I hit Post. I don't think anyone could play let alone find all the games on the market that would take life time, and thanks for the links.

[dindenver]

TK,
  I think there are a couple of barriers to making a fun, lethal game. It doesn't seem like they have been addressed here, so I want to bring them up. It feels like that lethality is a goal you may go for, so I want to help you in case you do:
1) Player consequences of character death. Basically, if a character dies (deserved or not), two things happen: a) they don't get to play until they finish making another character, b) they don't get to play until the GM can integrate that character into the existing story. Waiting for these two requirements to be met, can take a long time. if the character generation is complicated and the characters are in the middle of a long, dangerous mission, inserting a friendly character, can be near impossible if you want to maintain any kind of continuity (sure the party is imperiled in a deadly dungeon crawling with vampires, but they can still meet Sam Sneaky the Rogue in the next room and instantly add him to the group and trust him and what not, I mean, what would you do in that situation, attack him?).
2) If the goal is to make the players solve problems without resorting to violence, then the system has to give the characters other tools, and make those tools just as fun and reliable as combat. One time I made a total diplomat in 1e Exalted. He had awesome stats, and charms to back them up. But, every time a fight broke out, the ST refused to allow me to intimidate, charm or otherwise influence my enemies on the battlefield. Needless to say, I learned my lessons and spent my XPs on combat stuff.
  Also, if you only have one stat for influencing people, it is too easy to max it out and make unreasonably influential characters. If there are only 1-3 skills out of 50 that have to do with charming people, then that is trivial to min/max as well. Which means that you have to nerf those abilities, because players can max it out too easy. Then the players that try and specialize in it out get hand-slapped for trying to "game" the system and no one does it again. You have to make those kinds of options viable and just as predictable as combat, right?
3) Design intent, what I mean is, when you say, "I want a game that is realistic, PCs should not die, unless they do something stupid" Then, a PC dies, was he stupid? Most Roleplayers have this idea that there is no winning in RPGs, But, statements like this means that even though you can't win, somehow, you can still lose... I think good designs avoid sending this message to the GM and players.

  So, if you can avoid these three main pitfalls, then you should be able to make a fairly lethal game and have lots of fun.

  As to sense of wonder, I think its important that a game has at least one of two things:
1) Something to discover. D&D has this in the form of wild un-trekked wilderness and dungeons.
2) The ability to combine character aspects in unexpected ways. Champions and SotC has this. The idea where you can't predict what a character is about or what they can do by knowing one or two things is a cornerstone of these games.
  I could be wrong, I have always had a hard time zeroing in on on wonder and fancy in my games, but I feel like I am close...