Torchbearer: A Mythic Fantasy RPG (1st post, too)

[Jonathan Walton]

Nice example.

Here's another thought that I had last night, right before I went to bed:

Suppose it was possible for players to create custom-built, instantaneous Flame/Smoke combos that would last until you used them up.  This is kinda vauge, so I'll give some examples, but the idea was to let characters pay over the long term for short term gain.  I think this kind of thing could easily be intergrated into the "dormant" Flame/Smoke magic that you already have.

EXAMPLE:

Varashi is staring down Neranja.  She wants to create an avalanche to bury the demon, but has no such Flame, either among her active or dormant Traits.

For X amount of Fuel, she creates the Flame "Carries Winter with Her," which will last for the duration of a single scene.  However, to counter this she has to accept the Smoke "Ice Queen," which makes her always seem cold and aloof to those who interact with her.  Unlike the Flame, which will die out soon, the after affects will continue to smolder (I love using these fire-related words!) and continue giving off Smoke.

Basically, "Ice Queen" will stick around as a mild curse, interfering in her social life until it does a certain amount of damage, such as destroying several important relationships.  I'm not sre how you'd measure that, but you might be able to stay it sticks around long enough to have an effect equal to that of Varashi's avalanche earlier.  So it's a trade off.

/EXAMPLE.

I don't know that I'd have this be unlimited (that you could create ANY Flame you wanted), but you could have categories that people could buy during character creation or advancement.  You could buy Flame/Smoke categories in pairs, and call them "Embers" or something like that.

EXAMPLE:

Before her conflict with Neranja, Varashi's player decides to buy an Ember.  For the Ember's Flame aspect, she picks "Mistress of the Elements," which will allow Varashi to create elemental-based Flames on the fly by burning Fuel.  For the Ember's Smoke aspect, she picks "7 Years of Solitude," which means her elemental Flames will always leave her with Smokes that harm her social interactions and ensure that she lives the life of a loner.

/EXAMPLE.

Now, in the rules themselves, you could have a list of Flame/Smoke aspects that players could use to build Embers, but then allow them to create their own.  Aspects would be broader and more powerful than the kinds of things normally allowed as Traits: Elemental, Social, Military, Secrecy, Knowledge, Movement, Emotional, Biological, Physical, etc.  They'd be more like Spheres in Mage, but would always have a negative Smoke aspect to smack you when you used them.

I'm not sure if this fits within your vision, but I think it'd be cool, even in limited ways.  If you don't think it works as an overarching rule system, you could limit it to certain spirits or magical styles or the gods.

Later.
Jonathan

[Shreyas Sampat]

I had wanted to set something up like this earlier, when I proposed the dormant traits mechanic, but hadn't thought of a way to limit it.  This categories idea seems really appropriate.  I'll have to figure out the precise costs of that and so on...

On the availability of various cool tricks like this, dormant traits, etc:
I thought of this as a way to differentiate the different types of gods.
The skinchangers are so inconstant that they don't have access to dormant traits, and if they want temporary abilities they have to buy them as Embers.
The Hollow Gods, spirits of creature and place, are their opposite.  They don't hold surprises, and thus have access to dormant traits but not to Embers.  (dormant traits - Sparks? That seems off... Cinders? Those are ashes...Brands? Torches?)
The Walking Gods, humans without a touch of divine blood, who captured a spark of immortality by involving themselves in legend, are severely limited by either not having Contrast manipulation or having neither Brands nor Embers.
The leihesjun, being the eyes and hands of the Hidden Gods themselves, are at the top of the power ladder.  They can do all this.  Prosaic humans, without a trace of Spark, are the least privileged.  They have no native access to Fuel. (This looks a lot like the Exalted heirarchy of access to magic, for some reason.)

So, why isn't the world run by leihesjun?  They're powerful, flexible, and have the favor of the Faceless behind them.

Enter godsblood.
Everyone knows that the sacrifice of blood is a potent thing.  Well, the gods bleed too, and if you slay a god and drink the blood of his heart, you gain a portion of his power.  In game terms, this boils down to gaining access to the next cool Fuel ability you don't have, that your victim did.  (This means that a human has to kill a great deal of powerful creatures to get leihesju access to powers: anything for Fuel usage, something for Contrast, something for Reversal, something for Ignition of Brands, something for Embers.)  Granted, there isn't much that can slay a ccareful leihesju, but there are things out there that can.
Besides the simple Fear of Blood, there is the issue of preoccupation.  Who really wants to rule the world?  The immortals certainly aren't interested in that.  They all have their own goals, and ruling the world is likely to be low on the list unless it makes some later goal that much easier to obtain.  Thirdly, Dhei Yaarnje is BIG.  The Sea of Years is so named because it takes Years to cross it.  Not even the dawnseekers can maintain lines of communication across those distances.  (In Torchd20, dawnseekers were a sect of priests that had powers of mindlinking and perfect navigation; they came about as a result of the obsidian exodus from their homeland and their continuing attempt to find their home.  In D&D style, the mindlink could not be permanent, so there's this constantly shifting web of dawnseekers meeting and linking to keep their supernally quick communications alive.)

[Jonathan Walton]

I had wanted to set something up like this earlier, when I proposed the dormant traits mechanic, but hadn't thought of a way to limit it.  This categories idea seems really appropriate.  I'll have to figure out the precise costs of that and so on...

Deciding the Fuel requirements of various effects would be important, but I think you could almost take a page out of Nobilis and have a ranking of effects:

Minor, One Target:  1 Fuel
Minor, Local: 2 Fuel
Major, One Target:  3 Fuel
Minor, Non-Local:  4 Fuel
Major, Local:  4 Fuel
Major, Non-Local:  6 Fuel

Or something like that, based on whatever you think the effects should cost and how you want to rank them.

As far as costs for buying a particular Ember (or "Matchbook"?  or "Furnace"?  or something that implies multiple uses?), I'd probably go with something simple and have them all have the same cost.  You just pick two categories, designate one Flame and one Smoke, and that's that.

If you were creative, you could have the same category designated as both Flame and Smoke.  Take Varashi's "calling the river" trick, which could easily have been the use of an Ember.  "And the Waves Hear Her Cries" could have been an Elemental Flame produced by an Ember and "The Unpredictable Waters" could have easily been an Elemental Smoke.  But Varashi better be careful around large bodies of water for a while, since the rivers have yet to extract the full price of coming to her aid...

On the availability of various cool tricks like this, dormant traits, etc: I thought of this as a way to differentiate the different types of gods.

Cool idea, and definitely helps to solidify your cosmology.  Makes different types of characters have different abilities and use slightly different mechanics, but it keeps them from being Splats.  Rock out.

The skinchangers are so inconstant that they don't have access to dormant traits, and if they want temporary abilities they have to buy them as Embers.

This would also mean that the skinchangers have fairly easy access to Fuel, since they have to purchase all their powers on the spot, right?  How do you gain Fuel anyway?  If you can get it by killing people and drinking their Heart's Blood (even if they are lower on the celestial totem pole), that might explain why the skinchangers are so violent...

The Hollow Gods, spirits of creature and place, are their opposite.  They don't hold surprises, and thus have access to dormant traits but not to Embers.  (dormant traits - Sparks? That seems off... Cinders? Those are ashes...Brands? Torches?)

Couldn't you just call them "Doused Flames" or "Smoldering Flames"?  Since they work just like normal Traits, except that they are surpressed.  You could have a little check box next to your Flames to mark whether they were Active or Smoldering, and a place to write the accompanying Smoke.

The Walking Gods, humans without a touch of divine blood, who captured a spark of immortality by involving themselves in legend, are severely limited by either not having Contrast manipulation or having neither Brands nor Embers.

Is this the player's choice, or have you just not decided which ones they don't have?  Maybe there are various castes of Walking Gods (since we're pulling a bunch of stuff from Indian mythology) who are limited either either one way or another, depending on just HOW they have involved themselves in legends.

The leihesjun, being the eyes and hands of the Hidden Gods themselves, are at the top of the power ladder.  They can do all this.

Wait, and THESE GUYS are the default PCs?  Wouldn't it be fun to play a campaign where you started out as mortals and had to kill the gods to gain power?  That's every Munchkin's dream game!  But it would be done in a style that supported that kind of play, without letting it get out of hand.  I at least think that kind of campagn should be a viable option.

(This looks a lot like the Exalted heirarchy of access to magic, for some reason.)

Hmm... I haven't really read Exalted all the way through yet, but there are some definite parallels that I see.  The Leihesjun look a lot like the Solars (chosen servants of the Higher Gods) and the skinchangers, just because of the name, are going to be associated with Lunars.  Then you have the lesser gods who could be Siderals or Terrestrials.  And the game is celestial high-powered multi-cultural mythic-fantasy on a strange continent.  You're going to definitely have to make an effort to distinguish the game from looking just like a Exalted/Nobilis hybrid (especially since R. Sean Borgstrom is writing for Exalted now, so there are already parallels).

Enter godsblood.

This will definitely help to make your game look different, moreso if you do a good job of emphasizing it.  I still think it'd be cool to start off mortal and try to kill the gods, because playing a Leihesjun and having to defend yourself from lesser gods sounds much less interesting.

I could see some really cool themes developing from humans commiting all these atrocities to gain godlike power, and then discovering that it's not really worth it (because you always have to watch your back).  You just have to be careful to keep it from becoming "god diablerie."

Still, it may be that I'm just unclear about why the Leihesjun are the default characters?  Is there something I'm missing?

In any case... Man, I'm really excited about this game!  Seriously, if you want any help with it, I'd be extremely willing to do whatever you wanted me to.  Design & layout, artwork, examples of play, blurbs of fiction, playtesting, or even some of the actual writing.  Just let me know.

Later.
Jonathan

[Walt Freitag]

The Hollow Gods, spirits of creature and place, are their opposite. They don't hold surprises, and thus have access to dormant traits but not to Embers. (dormant traits - Sparks? That seems off... Cinders? Those are ashes...Brands? Torches?)

Call them Flint, which holds fire dormant within.

(Oops, I forgot, I promised to do some calculations on the mechanism. I'll be back with that.)

- Walt

[Shreyas Sampat]

Leihesjun have been the default characters for the purposes of this discussion simply because it's less confusing to use examples that aren't incapable of some things.  I could see several chapters devoted to discussing how it's possible to play as anyone in the heirarchy; I also like your idea of playing the humans climbing the ladder, though that takes out the opportunity to use Marks, which I just love (but look like Exalted again... gah)

Fuel gain:
This could be different for the different castes as well.  Blood-drinking sounds right for skinchangers.  Leihesjun might have to do things that have some direct association with their gods (this is nebulous), or they could get it as a contsant trickle of power through their 'link'.  Hollow Gods could be fearsome creatures with Fuel associated with their territory; maybe they gain some amount of Fuel whenever the light of Dawn touches their lands,  and they have no cap to their reserves, so the most active gods are probably the least dangerous.  Humans could gather Fuel through dramatic actions that inspire fear and wonder; maybe each caste feeds on a different emotion.

I have to run; more thoughts later.  I'd be overjoyed to have you helping design, by the way, but, time flies, and i'm late

[Jonathan Walton]

Walt reminded me to go back and look at your dice mechanic...

Basically, it looks like "Fudge on Crack," and I mean that as the highest compliment ;)  Still, I was playing around with it a bit to see if I could come up with something similar that didn't use D12's (mostly because it's much harder to find blank D12's and pretty difficult to put little tiny marks on their sides).

Your standard die (+,+,+,+,+,+,-,-,_,_,_,_) could be reduced to a D6 (+,+,+,-,_,_).  Heck, you could even buy a Fudge die and cross one of the minus signs to be a "+."

However, your mod die (+,+,+,-,_,_,_,_,_,_,_,_) is REALLY hard to reduce.  The closest D6 would be (+,+,?,_,_,_) with a half-ring as the "?"; if you rolled two half-rings, you have to take away a "+".  Not very elegant, unfortunately.

I'll see if I can come up with anything else.  Maybe an optional diceless mechanic?

Later.
Jonathan

[Shreyas Sampat]

The mod die is problematic because it's an expansion of Walt's d6 mod die with only one point and no ring.  I linked to his discussion of his mechanic way back in my first post.  The thinking behind my mechanic was to expand Walt's (I linked to the discussion on it in my first post) in such a way as to define degrees of success and failure.

The base die is a d12 only because the mod dice are d12s as well.  The Alyria forum discussed making moon dice with stickers, and I figured that I could use stickers to make Torchbearer dice (to continue the fire motif, I might use little gold starbursts or flame designs for the point and a black or blue circle for the ring, I dunno) as well.

I'm not sure if there is a way to not only have a less odd die type but also to arrange the faces attractively; the second ring of a base die forces me into ugly arrangements on a d12.

Rg... going for dinner.  Still more later.

[Shreyas Sampat]

As for playing leihesjun and defending yourself from the lesser gods:
I don't want that to be going on a lot; the power of godsblood should be at least partly obscure.  Mortal magicians know that drinking godsblood makes them mighty, but they don't understand the capabilities it grants them well enough to recognize its true value.
Leihesjun should be in fairly close communication with their gods; they aren't simply infused with power, but also consciousness, drive.  If gods were in the habit of having thousands of leihesjun, then this analogy would apply: an anthill related to a single ant as a god does to the sum of the part of him in the Upper World and the leihesjun who serve him.  The ant doesn't really know what's going on, and the hill doesn't know what's happening at that level of detail, but each knows its purpose and works to the same goals.  The fact that the Hidden Gods are vanishingly rare and the leihesjun require a lot of power to maintain makes the analogy less graceful but no less true.
I can see an outgrowth of this, a story where commands from on high manipulate the characters like pawns. It wouldn't be wildly interesting without some personal conflict, perhaps the characters' relationships with each other or the environment running counter to their orders...

I don't see a way that a mortal, without a stroke of incredible luck or the assistance of some kind of more powerful being (a magical object, a spirit ally) could have a chance of taking down someone of worthy blood, but once the first killing is over with (that first killing would be a spectacular story, if it panned out) the rest of the line is a lot less difficult.  Mortals don't even have a Fuel buffer to keep them alive.
On the other hand, right now I really want to run a game of skinchangers hunting down some mortal magician, for fear that the magician will do something undesirable to a particular demon lord whose Name he has learned.  (Name is tied deeply to Blood and power; I think I'll associate these somehow mechanically.  Maybe with a combination of a person's Name and Blood you could be him, or draw on his Fuel or Traits?  The preciousness of given Name is why my example characters carry noms de guerre.)

I'm starting to think that Human characters would be eminently playable, and the player can choose what power his character has no access to - activated traits, Contrast, or Reversal.  I seriously doubt that anyone would sacrifice the use of Contrast, it being so wildly useful, but perhaps a character who carries a magical object that can use Contrast on itself would be playable.

Now I'm actually going to dinner.

[Jonathan Walton]

I don't see a way that a mortal, without a stroke of incredible luck or the assistance of some kind of more powerful being (a magical object, a spirit ally) could have a chance of taking down someone of worthy blood, but once the first killing is over with (that first killing would be a spectacular story, if it panned out) the rest of the line is a lot less difficult.

Actually... ;)  I made an outline today for a story along those lines.  Give me a few days and I'll see if I can do anything with it.

(Name is tied deeply to Blood and power; I think I'll associate these somehow mechanically.  Maybe with a combination of a person's Name and Blood you could be him, or draw on his Fuel or Traits?)

Here's something that'd be cool:

If you know a being's true name, when you fire up Embers, you can make HIM take the lingering Smoke curse, instead of you.  In this way, SOMEBODY still has to pay for making the river kill Neranja, but it wouldn't necessarily be Varashi.  Of course, that someone (and his friends) will probably come looking for Varashi eventually...

I seriously doubt that anyone would sacrifice the use of Contrast, it being so wildly useful, but perhaps a character who carries a magical object that can use Contrast on itself would be playable.

I really think the Walking Gods should just have Contrast to seperate them from normal humans.  It would be the thing that would make them a part of legends, since they would be larger-than-life, having legendary abilities but heroic flaws too.  A good way to begin a campaign would be to have the characters be humans who take part in some mythic endeavour that makes them into Walking Gods (i.e. Heroes of Legend).

Just a few thoughts.  I'll go look at Walt's dice mechanic now.

Later.
Jonathan

[Walt Freitag]

Well, I programmed the die roll distributions and the result is a bit surprising, at least for me. The system is reasonably well-behaved, but I think you might be as surprised as I am by how slowly the chance of failure (for positive mod scores) and the chance of success (for negative mod scores) actually decays.

The table below is for positive modifiers. The symmetry is still intact, so for negative modifiers the numbers are the same and you just reverse the words "success" and "failure."

The key number I use to characterize Symmetry variants is the factor by which the chance of failure diminishes for each added point of positive modifier when the mod is positive (which is also the amount the chance of success decreases for each additional point of negative modifier, when the mod is negative). Because of the added complexity of the rings, this isn't quite constant in this case. It varies between a factor of .923 and .909 (and may rise higher again at higher modifier totals). The variation isn't a surprise and it isn't a noticeable problem. But the magnitude of the number is; it's a much slower decay rate than even basic fine-grained d6-based Symmetry, in which each point of positive modifier decreases the chance of failure by a factor of .841.

As a result, the overall chances of success increases by about the same amount as if the modifier dice had only a single point side (and no rings). It takes a +8 just to get to a 75% chance of success. Clearly, the rings are having a powerful effect.

I've found this difficult to understand intuitively (and I haven't totally ruled out the possibility of an error in my program). Shouldn't three points and one ring average out to about the same effect as two points? Apparently not. Here's one way to look at it:

A modifier die turns failure into success only if
   (a) the net result of the other dice is zero (what you treat as an ordinary failure) and
   (b) the modifier die rolls a point

At most two thirds of the failures are ordinary failures, so the chance of a modifier die turning failure into success is at most (failure chance for all the other dice) * (2/3) * (3/12). This decreases the overall failure chance by one-sixth at the most.

But the overall reduction in failure chance is reduced due to the cases in which the modifier die instead turns success into failure, which happens if the modifier die rolls a ring and the net result of the other dice was one net point. The chance of this occurring is (chance of one net point on all other dice, which equals the "unusual success" chance) * 1/12. If the unusual success chance is equal to the failure chance for all the other dice (which is only true for the first modifier die), then this effect undoes half of the benefit of the chance of the modifier die rolling a point.

As the modifier increases, the chance of the one-net-point unusual success chance decreases, which would tend to reduce the adverse effect of rolling a ring on the next modifier die. But at the same time, the fraction of failures that are normal failures (and can thus be turned into successes with a roll of a point on the next modifier die) also decreases, which reduces the benefit of the next modifier die. The two effects offset, keeping the decay rate of the overall failure chance relatively steady... but very slow.

Code:

Number of modifier dice = 0
  Any success 0.5000
    normal  0.0000*
    unusual 0.5000*
  Any failure  0.5000
    normal   0.3333*
    unusual  0.1667*
*if the rules used for nonzero modifier scores were to be applied
Number of modifier dice = 1
  Any success 0.5417
    normal   0.1250
    unusual  0.4167
  Any failure  0.4583
    normal   0.3056
    unusual  0.1528
Number of modifier dice = 2
  Any success 0.5833
    normal   0.2188
    unusual  0.3646
  Any failure  0.4167
    normal   0.2731
    unusual  0.1435
Number of modifier dice = 3
  Any success 0.6212
    normal   0.2943
    unusual  0.3270
  Any failure  0.3788
    normal   0.2429
    unusual  0.1359
Number of modifier dice = 4
  Any success 0.6547
    normal   0.3578
    unusual  0.2969
  Any failure  0.3453
    normal   0.2164
    unusual  0.1289
Number of modifier dice = 5
  Any success 0.6841
    normal   0.4126
    unusual  0.2715
  Any failure  0.3159
    normal   0.1938
    unusual  0.1222
Number of modifier dice = 6
  Any success 0.7099
    normal   0.4606
    unusual  0.2493
  Any failure  0.2901
    normal   0.1744
    unusual  0.1157
Number of modifier dice = 7
  Any success 0.7327
    normal   0.5032
    unusual  0.2295
  Any failure  0.2673
    normal   0.1578
    unusual  0.1095
Number of modifier dice = 8
  Any success 0.7530
    normal   0.5412
    unusual  0.2119
  Any failure  0.2470
    normal   0.1435
    unusual  0.1035
Number of modifier dice = 9
  Any success 0.7712
    normal   0.5753
    unusual  0.1960
  Any failure  0.2288
    normal   0.1310
    unusual  0.0978
Number of modifier dice = 10
  Any success 0.7877
    normal   0.6061
    unusual  0.1816
  Any failure  0.2123
    normal   0.1200
    unusual  0.0924

If you were to make the modifier dice the same as the Core die (2 rings, 6 points, 4 blank), the decay would be closer to basic Symmetry, with four modifier dice yielding a success chance of just over 76%. Would you like to see the numbers on that version?

- Walt

[Shreyas Sampat]

That math is amazing.  I would certainly like to see the numbers on that alternative (which is especially attractive because it requires only one die type).

I'm very excited about the implications of this.  The possibility of having dice that I can simply call 'Torchbearer Dice' is better than can be believed.

Thanks, Walt.  I don't know how I can effectively express my gratitude.

[Jonathan Walton]

The other good news is that, if you do go with your "standard" die type, you have a viable D6 alternative, which'll make it much easier for players who just want to try out the system without going to great ends to find dice.

Heck, you could just convert your own:



Later.
Jonathan

[Blake Hutchins]

Guys,

I have nothing to add about the game as yet.  Just wanted to say I really enjoy this thread and the discussion.  It's a model both of civil dialogue and focused creative synergy.  Fun to see the concept of the game unfold between the three of you.

Ah! I lied.  One comment.  I generally prefer options that permit me to easily modify existing die types over those that require extensive modification or stickering higher sided polyhedrons (which can prove an awkward task).  Thus, Jonathan's suggestion regarding use of ordinary six-siders or Fudge dice works best for me.

Best,

Blake

[Jonathan Walton]

Just wanted to say I really enjoy this thread and the discussion.  It's a model both of civil dialogue and focused creative synergy.  Fun to see the concept of the game unfold between the three of you.

No kidding.  Part of it is Willows' interesting ideas and willingness to respond to contructive criticism and suggestions, but I've been really enjoying the cooperative spirit here in general.

Now, if I could just get this kind of cooperative support of one of my concepts...

I generally prefer options that permit me to easily modify existing die types over those that require extensive modification or stickering higher sided polyhedrons (which can prove an awkward task).  Thus, Jonathan's suggestion regarding use of ordinary six-siders or Fudge dice works best for me.

Ooo, ooo!  One more cool conversion idea:

1) Get blank D6's of a non-white color.  Hopefully, this isn't a big deal.

2) Buy some hole protectors.  Y'know, those little stickers you put on 3-hole-punched papers to keep them from tearing along the holes.

3) Use the hole protectors to make rings.  Take the centers out of the hole protectors to make dots.

Whalla!  Instant TorchDice, using everyday supplies!

Later.
Jonathan

[Shreyas Sampat]

Ever read J. Gergory Keyes' novel The Waterborn?  That was the ideal that this game seeks to attain.  It's incredibly mythic: the story opens to a teenage boy falling in love with the goddess of a stream, who soon after tells him that the River downstream is eating her, always eating her, nibbling away at her feet every moment of her life.  He is outraged, and swears to kill the River for the Goddess that he loves.  (Moment a boy becomes a mythic hero.)  It just gets better from there, and I think that that opening would make a great way to start a Torchbearer game.