Level concerns

[quozl]

Adults are fully accomplished in their abilities. (They may or may not have yet begun applying those abilities in any dramatic way -- that is, they may or may not yet have reputations or have already done heroic deeds.)

Are these characters fun to play? Wouldn't it be similar to playing a level 20 character in AD&D fighting goblins or something? Also, so me a significant part of the enjoyment is actually improving skills and see the character explore its potential. Of course I could do an "adolescent" character if I like that. But are there people who would want to play "adults"? Really?

Just to answer your question, yes.  I hate the improving skills thing.  I like to play characers who are competent and develop emotion during a campaign, not skill bonuses.

[Ben Morgan]

Just to answer your question, yes. I hate the improving skills thing. I like to play characers who are competent and develop emotion during a campaign, not skill bonuses.

I agree. Back when I played Cyberpunk, the group I was in was always complaining to the GM that skill advancement went far too slow. I was the minority, in that I said that I would be happy never earning any experience at all, because all of the character development that I was interested in didn't happen on the sheet.

[Jeremy Cole]

Hi,

I've just had the good fortune to find this site and have spent a good few minutes reading through this thread. Is it worth mentioning the GNS question here?

A gamist design would base improvement on superior performance in contrast to the other players (which ironically imbalances the system). This would mean kills, successful dice rolls, and all that.

A simulationist system may focus on training, a rookie becoming a veteran, an adolescent developing his natural and supernatural abilities, etc.

A narrative system would tie advancement to dramatically suitable points, a character who takes a challenge far greater than he was previously capable ofd, may find his abilities improve at said climactic moment. Alternatively, a narrative system may find it most appropriate to have no advancement or minimal advancement, unless you have the classic adolescent or rookie or unpolished prodigy character stories.

Perhaps the best way to decide on a system is to look at where you sit on good old GNS.

[Lee Short]

The whole question of beginning character proficiency is one that, as GM, I generally vary from campaign to campaign, from player to player.  F'rex, my current campaign is only a few months old -- and I plan on moving some 2000 miles in a few months.  So I wanted to start the PCs as relatively experienced, and still keep advancement at the "normal rate" (which, in my game, is not all that fast).  

This post has no real point, other than to point out that few/no game systems have a mechanical way of supporting this.  For most game systems, it's just a matter of "everyone starts at 3rd level/with 200 points" -- but if you adopted the "start young with growth potential or mature with less growth potential", the GM would have a much harder time customizing the system to his needs.  

Lee

[Walt Freitag]

It could be argued (as I'm doing now I guess) that many fantasy stories only represent a few rpg adventure session and so their advancement even within a rpg supportive of such things might be limited.

Perhaps. But when "competent/adult" characters coexist with "incompletent/adolescent" characters in the same story, there's a distinct difference in how much and how rapdily they advance. Whether the competents don't advance at all, or advance slowly, or advance in a different way (e.g. through connections, possessions, knowledge, etc.), can be interpreted as you will without changing the key point that there is a strong distinction between the competents and the incompetents. There are clearly two different "advancement systems" being used. More to the point, the two are being protagonized in different ways. The incompetents express their protagonism largely through advancement; the competents generally do not.

Couldn't you just do this in D&D? Well, yes and no. You could certainly do what you describe. But it wouldn't work very well. For one thing, beacuse advancement in D&D is exponential, it's difficult for characters of widely different levels to participate in the same events. In a movie even the least competent character can jump up out from behind concealment and hit a powerful bad guy over the head with a vase at a crucial moment. In D&D a low-level character attempting to do that would have to pass several checks (for successful concealment, then successful surprise against the enemy's perception, then to-hit with the vase) against steep odds, if successful would not have any noticeable effect, and would probably get killed in the process, as likely as not by friendly fire.

Even more important, D&D is focused on advancement. Why use that system if you're going to change its core assumptions? You'd be giving yourself an  uphill battle against player expectations. Better to use a different system not already freighted with those expectations.

The "Pick Pockets Problem" is an important issue, the crux of your advancement system problem. Damion's answer pretty much laid out the possibilities. You can do what you can to prevent skills from going unused (make sure they're appropriate to the setting, make sure they have high enough success rate to be useful, and so forth) but you can't force them to be used. (Or can you? See below.) So it comes down to really a single two way choice. Allow an unused skill to become less important to the character, or allow an unused skill to advance anyway.

Suppose there had been some rule in place that caused the Pick Locks skill rating to keep pace with the others, so that at the end of the period of play in question, the thief looked like this:

Fight With Dagger 13
Pick Locks 19
Pick Pockets 12

Would that have solved the problem? It depends on where you think the problem lies. It solves the problem that a skill that is a defining quality of the character was 'lost' by the character. But it doesn't at all solve what I think of as the real problem: that a defining quality of the character was going unused in play. THAT problem can only be solved by either guaranteeing that the skills are used, or by not considering skills to be defining qualities of characters (or at least, not the most important ones).

Both approaches are known. On the one hand, Donjon, and many other systems that give "gamemasterful" powers to players, give players a voice in creating setting and situational details that play to their characters' skills. On the other hand, the Riddle of Steel and other systems emphasize SAs instead of skills (which in TRoS are limited in variety, thus shared by many PCs) as the defining qualities of player-characters. In another category entirely, there are gamemastering techniques applicable within traditional systems, for building custom settings and situations designed to engage the player-characters' specific skills and abilities.

It could be interesting (feel free to PM me if that is more appropriate) of what you think Ygg is. I feel that recently I've done so much rethinking in terms of the system. It would surprise me if I haven't had any progress. However, most of those things are not solidly written down yet as I feel I have to work out some important things (like the levels we are discussing right now!) before I can assemble all of the new tools I've aquired into a new draft.

Well, my failure to grasp the "how" part of your vision for Ygg probably has more than a little to do with the progress you've made not being written down yet. That being the case, it would be counterproductive for me to air the incomplete and probably erroneous picture I've picked up from the sometimes tumultuous discussion so far.

The phrase "D&D on the outside" does clarify things, even with your justified caution about not reading too much into the phrase. I'm definitely building up a sense of what lines you're willing to cross relative to "traditional" system design, and what ones you're not. I also understand, and am a big fan of, functional illusionism. I know from experience that functional illusionism applied to a mostly traditional system can do what you want Ygg to do. But my concept of functional illusionism is entirely dependent on GM techniques -- rather difficult techniques, at that -- that traditional game system elements neither hinder nor aid very much. I'm very interested in (and have advocated, on past theory threads) the idea of system elements that are designed from the ground up as new tools for effective illusionism. Is that part of what you're seeking with Ygg?

I believe it is possible for a mostly traditional system with a few well-designed unusual rules to have a very different and unique feel in play. But I believe "unusual" here has to mean breaking the underlying assumptions of D&D at some level, however subtle. And I mean assumptions that relate to the heart of play, like how it's decided whether a character survives or dies, or how characters gain advancement, or what the failure of an attempted action means, or what kind of qualities define a character, or how the GM decides what's around that next corner.

What I don't understand is where and how the Ygg design prevents D&D on the outside from leading to D&D on the inside. What standard assumptions does it break, or am I wrong about the need to break standard assumptions? No critical judgment is intended here. I have insufficient grounds to make any critical judgment. It's clear you have original ideas for how to establish Ygg's special qualities inside the context of mostly-conventional system elements. I just haven't grasped them yet.

- Walt

[Christoffer Lernö]

1)If pick-pockets is a defining charitaristic of the characther, they should complain to the GM that they havn't gotten to use it. Some like 'At least let me go to a town or something!'.

I woul disagree. What if your character is very honorable? Do you complain to the GM that you haven't gotten a chance to play out his honor?

My probles is with skills that are only intended as colour (although they may be useful) by the player. Many games punish this kind of customization of characters by forcing the player to trade that for in-game effectiveness.

The problem both arise in character creation and in character advancement.

2)Not require a skill to be used to be improved, player can
improve it if they want. Then when it's needed, it's there. Also, the GM can wait till there is a good chance of success. This seems to lose versimilitude.

Many games use this, but it's not a solution. The player will be trading this skill with effectiveness. You pay for having made a detailed character and get rewarded if you optimize and make faceless killers - not a good thing.

3)More general skills-I.e. a skill does many things, so doing one improves everything-again, you lose detail.

This might not always be possible. Plus, the skills stop being colour, which is removing their most important use.

[contracycle]

I woul disagree. What if your character is very honorable? Do you complain to the GM that you haven't gotten a chance to play out his honor?

Yes

[Ben Morgan]

I woul disagree. What if your character is very honorable? Do you complain to the GM that you haven't gotten a chance to play out his honor?

Yes

Most assuredly. I've always had the belief (though not always consiously) that what you plug numbers into on a sheet should be one of the strongest indicators to the GM of "what you want to play". That's why I'm really starting to dig the whole idea behind The Pool, where Traits can be pretty much anything, and their ratings reflect merely their immediate relevance to the story at hand.

If you create a character with some sort of Honor score (whether attribute or trait or whatever), that is something that begs and screams to be tested/challenged/questioned in-game, and any GM who ignores it is missing out on a prime opportunity for some seriously cool roleplaying.

-- Ben

[Christoffer Lernö]

I woul disagree. What if your character is very honorable? Do you complain to the GM that you haven't gotten a chance to play out his honor?

Yes

Contra, are you trolling me? Think about the subject at hand. A sim game with focus on setting or situation.

Let's say the GM says the game is set in a place where there are no riding animals. I insist on playing a knight with great riding skills. I know I probably won't get a chance of using it, but it is consistent with my character. That's the situation I'm talking about. I don't want characters to pay for advantages that aren't advantages, not even a little.

Your solution to this scenario is that the GM inserts something rideable into his adventure? I see where you're coming from but you have to understand the givens.

Besides it's just a dirty fix anyway.

[Christoffer Lernö]

If you create a character with some sort of Honor score (whether attribute or trait or whatever), that is something that begs and screams to be tested/challenged/questioned in-game, and any GM who ignores it is missing out on a prime opportunity for some seriously cool roleplaying.

Ben, did you read the context here? It's about "how do we fix the problem that underused skills don't get enough exposure to warrant increasing them"

James wrote to effect that "force the GM make sure there are no underused skills".

What that means are that what previously was defined as secondary, unimportant, flavour-conveying skills become primary forcus in the game.

As such, they are no longer secondary skills. However, as much of the focus of the game is defined through what skills are important and which are secondary, the effect is changing the game.

So saying that is basically saying: "write a different game". Interestingly, that game has to give equal focus to every skill available as a natural consequence of our "remedy" to the situation.

Unless we change the prerequisites, mold the game into a say a game with director's stance or something, this won't work as there is no way to maintain a game where EVERY skill is equally in focus.

Using director stance or something we might be able to put the character's skills in focus. But again, now we're about 1000 miles away from the original situation and the original problem.

So, it's not that what you're saying doesn't work, it's just that it isn't relevant for the case in question.

[Jasper]

I can't really conceive of a simulationist solution to the problem of the "I want the play a knight even though I know full well knights don't fit in here" choice.  If you're simulating a land where knights are comparitively useless, and you simulate a knight going in there, I think you have to simulate his lack of effectiveness.  Either that, or you stop simulating altogether, and focus on story and "character protaganization" instead.

Sometimes, in real life, people find themselves in situations where they're ineffective.  If you want to simulate everything that leads up to that ineffectiveness, you'll probably have to model it as well.  No "solution" to that -- just a design decision.

[Christoffer Lernö]

Now you're catching on Jasper.

Extend this to a more general situation, where it's not "can't use", but "have very little use of it in adventure scenarios".

However, these skills ARE fleshing or helping to define the character. Even in the knight case they might catch a dragon they ride.. in one adventure. The problem is that if the knight gives up a lot of efficiency for such poor payback, won't he get stomped over by more efficient characters?

Yes.

Is that a good sim game to let that happen? I don't think so. So the problem restated: how do we let the knight develop his riding so that he keeps his flavour skill? And how do we prevent that flavour skill from costing the knight too much in character efficiency?

What if all characters have these meaningless skills? Well the problem arises in when some keep develop them and some care little for a consistent character but put priority in efficiency.

There seems to be little choice but to enforce increasing these skills or make them free to increase in some way.

That is why I'm pointing at D&D, because it is a good example of the former. The latter I haven't seen anywhere really. There are other examples than D&D for the former, like Palladium, but not as clear. Most sim games, however, simply ignores this problem.

[Mike Holmes]

You want to only make skills cost if they are useful? Only charge for them when they are used. Every time a player uses a skill, he must pay Points equal to the level of the skill or something like that.

This is the only equitable way to ensure that a character is balanced in play.

Mike

[Jasper]

As has been pointed out in the other thread, this is a very broad and common problem, and really needs to be tackled for a specific set of mechanics -- there is no single solution.

Mike's suggestion is a pretty good one.  Another solution is to go the route GURPS took with its Allies (as have many other games): you pay points not just based on the effectiveness of a particular ability, but also on the likelihood that it will come into play.

So in the knight example, if it's already been defined that we're not in a dragon-infested place, but that there's still some chance of a dragon attack, why don't I just pay, oh...maybe 1/5th the normal cost.  You could keep a permanent record of this too, so that if the characters moved into a more dragon-filled region, the knight would need to pay some points (either that, or have the ability limited in some other fashion).


Oh, and one thing that may be confusing t he issue:

The problem is that if the knight gives up a lot of efficiency for such poor payback, won't he get stomped over by more efficient characters?

Yes.

Is that a good sim game to let that happen? I don't think so.

It's really an issue of balance, not GNS.  If anything, a very sim-ey game
would say the opposite: if a character goes somewhere he's ineffective, so be it -- let it play out.

[Walt Freitag]

Does the GM (or the system itself) reliably know in advance, and in perpetuity, how useful a skill is going to be?

If the answer is no, then obviously no one knows how useful a skill will be. That means that there's no reliable way to distinguish a "useful" skill from a "color" skill, or pinpoint where along a continuum between the two a skill falls. In this situation only ex post facto solutions like Mike's (in which you pay for the skill only after you learn how useful it is in a unit of play) can guarantee that no skill will ever be too expensive or too cheap for its usefulness.

If the answer is yes, then the system or the GM can price skills accordingly. Skills that are not useful at all should be free, and can be assumed to be at as high an advancement level as the player desires. This covers e.g. the farming skills of the expert lifelong farmer who then goes to sea to seek adventure. Skills that are less useful should be cheaper in proportion. For example, it's been repeatedly pointed out that picking pockets is really very limited in usefulness in most fantasy settings. The picking pockets skill should therefore either be very cheap to acquire and advance, or start at a very high effectiveness, or both. The former portrays picking pockets as a sort of hobby skill not requiring a great deal of the character's effort to pursue; the latter, as a likely part of a character's background reflecting a childhood on the streets.

The other general point I want to make is that there can be a workable balance between generalization and specialization in skills. But the balance has to be realistically reflective of the actual play. If combat is 90% of play, then non-combat skills should be at least 90% cheaper than combat skills. (And that would be for a hypothetical skill that's always useful outside of combat. Most skills should be far cheaper than that!)

AD&D was deliberately designed to strongly encourage specialization over generalization. Characters who tried to generalize (either by multi-classing or by choosing a more generalized class) were hosed. The choice was you could be 100% effective in one major area, or maybe 25% effective in each of two major areas, and so forth. Much of the cause of this was in subtle cumulative mathematical effects. Effectiveness in combat comes down to how often you attack, times how frequently you hit, times how much damage you do, times how long you can remain in combat before running out of hit points. Do the math. If a non combat-specialist (say, a thief) is 60% as effective as a specialist of the same experience level in each of these individual areas, he's really only 13% as effective in combat overall! (Factor in his back-stab advantage, and he's still thoroughly hosed.) If you decide that the usefulness of a thief's special skills are a fair trade for being, say, 80% as effective in general combat as an equally experienced combat specialist, then the thief still has to have about 95% as many attacks, 95% as high a chance to hit, do 95% as much damage, and resist 95% as much punishment as the specialist in order to reach that 80% overall. AD&D is chock full of these kind of double- triple- and quadruple-whammies.

This effect, I believe, has exaggerated the apparent intractability of the problem of min-maxing because in many systems the effectiveness penalty for not min-maxing is actually considerably higher than is generally appreciated. It's not a matter of (most) players being willing to trade off everything else for a tiny effectiveness edge. The advantage from min-maxing is often enormous. Give players more reasonable trade-offs that are truly worth the cost and you'll see more reasonable behavior.

And yes, this is plunging deep into "currency issues" which you set out trying to avoid. You can't, if you want to take the general approach you've started out on. Currency issues are fundamental in this type of design. You can avoid looking at them but that won't make them go away.

- Walt