Eclipse RPG

[Ben O'Neal]

It's the "directed" bonuses for the natural 20 that are requiring ths, however. That is, if you didn't have that, then you could just check the chart for cost to increase a mod when leveling up (going from +12 to +13 costs two, for instance). And while we're at it, this is really going to benefit lucky players. I mean, some player will roll a bunch of 20's before another rolls one - given the range on your abilities, won't this tend to throw off your balance for levels? I mean, lets say I typically make 100 rolls between levels. That averages 5 attribute increases between levels. Some player is going to get 8, however, and another only 2. The difference is more than a level's worth of ability points.

However, the real danger behind "learning by rolling" (I can't remember the technical term right now) is that it rewards rolling lots of dice. Despite its intuitive appeal, both in terms of "realism" and ease of use, in practice it has been found, that the reward mechanism tends to dominate player's behaviour (yes, we're all just rats, pressing buttons for food ;). At least that's the common experience reported from all system which use such a method. If – as you seem to be planning – the "learning by rolling" mechanism has the potential to outweigh normal levelling that effect is going to be even more pronounced.
(Apart from that, certain activities which are either (a) rarely performed or (b) rarely rolled on (e.g. social stuff) and consequently the PCs skilled in them tend to get screwed by the system.)

hmmmm, both good points. i'm not particularly concerned about 'level balance', because i'm not particularly concerned about 'class balance' either. but... i definately see how this might be 'abused' by 'powergamers'. like players deciding to bash everything with their swords just so they can roll enough 20's to increase their power. this in itself is problematic in terms of destroying the immersion in the game, but worse, i think that such activity detracts from the enjoyment of other non-powergamer players.

originally, i intended to use both 'learning by rolling' and level-based attribute gain, to gain the benefits of both and offset the negatives. it seems though that 'learning by rolling' is more problematic than i thought... but i really don't want to rely on level based gain alone. ok, here's an idea... what if i limited how much an attribute could be raised by rolling to 1 per week (in-game time of course). not only would that help to replicate the limits of human growth (if i exercise for a day, i don't turn into arnold schawarzeneggar), but it might also help to encourage players to use all of their attributes in some way to increase the overall number of attribute points they gain.

also, with regards to social stats not be used alot, i'm not sure that really applies to Eclipse. Influence not only helps with skills like Persuasion and Insult and whatever, but also builds Luck, which is quite powerful as i've mentioned earlier. and Beauty (my other social stat) can be used for so-called "social combat", and allows characters to make other characters infatuated or even to fall in love. it uses a skill called Charm, which can be opposed by Discipline or Skepticism. if you win, you take the amount you won by and add it to their Ego (10 +Crystal mod +Influence mod). when a characters Ego score is double its initial value, they are in love with you (conversely, when it is 0 they loath you). my only problem with what i have for this so far is the fact that it requires a fair amount of book-keeping, either for the players or the GM, in keeping track of how some particular NPC feels towards a particular party. i'm hesitant to add one more detail simply because of this fact, and that is that if an NPC loaths you, they probably hate your friends as well, and if an NPC loves you, they probably won't hate your friends. this last part i am content to leave out simply because of the hassle of keeping track of it.

so yeah, social attributes get used a bit too. the trick is deciding how to develop your character, and the trick for me is not putting too many barriers in place to prevent you from doing what you want, yet still making any rewards "worth it".

It's [AC] only more familiar to players who haven't played anything but D&D. And that's a substantial group, no doubt, but represents probably less than a quarter of all RPG gamers. Even though the plurality of RPG players play D&D, most have played other games at least once. In any case, if you name it well, the name will convey what it means, and will better set the feel for what the stat does. I mean, if you called it Toughness or something, people would get the idea.

sure, that's a good point. i couldn't think of any other name that really conveys what it measures well, so sticking with a familiar term seemed a good idea. toughness is ok, but i feel that it conveys too much "human" aspect. a quick look at dictionary.com gave me the following terms that might be acceptable: tensile strength (too technical i think), resistance (ok i guess, but too general. perhaps Physical Resistance?), impenetrability (too absolute, too hard to say), and solidity (implies liquidity is possible). i dunno, i guess that you have a point, that the names i choose will reflect on the view of my system whether i like it or not, so i can see how simply using the acronym "AC" will be seen as a downfall.

ok, so i want all terms that i use to be intuitive and easy to use. so how about instead of "AC", i use one of the following: Tensile Strength (TS), Physical Resistance (PR), Toughness (T), or Armor Toughness/Bodily Toughness (AT/BT)? i'm open to any opinions about which to use, or any other suggestions i haven't thought of.

Again, not to be insulting, but your response above is what every heartbreaker designer posts. "No d20-like game is as simple as mine". Well, I haven't seen the totality of your game, but let me assure you that there are literally dozens of games with mechanics so similar to yours that it's frightening.

Here's a list of a couple hundred (no, I'm not exaggerating) free rpgs that focus on fantasy, many of them in precisely the way that you do.

*snip*

Add these to the list in the Heartbreaker essay, many of which sound very much like what you're proposing. If you just peruse a few, I think that you'll see that there are some which are just as simple as your system, if not simpler. Again, I've yet to see your system in it's entirity, but if it bears any resemblance to the D20 system (d20 + attribute + skill vs TN), then it's already been done by someone. Lots of someones.  

of course, but i wasn't implying that my system is in any way the simplest around. that really wasn't my goal. to achieve that sort of simplicity, i would have to settle for more abstraction than i am willing to use. instead, i meant that *to my knowledge* (i make no claims that my knowledge is in any way vast), i've not seen "realistic" (i understand the problems with that term) damage based duelling systems as intuitive (to me at least) as mine.

i also understand that TROS is on another plane entirely to Eclipse, but at the very least, i can see similarities in the underlying goals. both TROS and Eclipse use "simultaneous" combat, where every action is met with an opposing action, which are both played at the same time. however, i have done away with initiative, as i don't believe it to be necessary. also, both TROS and Eclipse impose penalties to rolls for being wounded. finally, combat in both systems is very deadly and very fast. i might mention right now that when i came up with my system, i had never known it to be done before. in fact (i'm not kidding), i thought that independantly designed systems were incredibly rare (you can laugh if you want, even i think it's funny now).

Well, that's the thing, I don't think it needs to be a heartbreaker, you can alter the design enough at this point to avoid that monicker. More importantly, I think you can better achieve your design goals by looking beyond d20 for inspiration.

OTOH, it's been said that sometimes the best way to get into design is to make a heartbreaker. The reason there are so many is because it's the way that half of designers start designing - myself for example. All I'm trying to do here is give you the option to skip that step if you like. If you feel the design is too far complete, or that you just want to finish it as is, I understand.

well, obviously i would love for Eclipse to avoid being a heartbreaker, but at the same time, i'm not creating the world's greatest rpg before breakfast. i'm not a fan of multiple die systems, mainly because counting up 15 die for powerful characters slows things down and increases the chances for mistakes. some dice +attribute mod +skill seems to be the only way i can avoid multiple die, and still factor for weak but skilled characters and strong but clumsy characters. that dice might as well be a d20 (as opposed to a d10 or d%).

but i promise i will look over those systems you listed (thanks!).

I completely agree. So in that case, I'd put in mechanics to represent this effect. If you want a game to make a statement of some sort regarding these sorts of themes, then you have to make it part of the rules somehow. See the essay in the articles section called "System Does Matter."

ok, this is an interesting idea. at first i thought "how the hell could you implement non-exponentially complex mechanics that factor for qualitative social themes on a large scale? what kind of mechanic would control "being outside the law", or "fear and respect"". i certainly am already including such themes as part of the cultural rules of the setting, but you clearly mentioned "mechanic". i guess i could certainly implement some mechanic similar to the "social combat" Ego, that represents either your reputation in your organisation, or your personal commitment to them (or an interaction between both), but i think it is a lot of book-keeping for the players. also, i feel that such a thing is more comprehensively and easily controlled with qualitative setting-based rules. ie: "you are above the law, but this power comes from the fact you work for the betterment of our nation". or "you are feared and respected, but only because you are mysterious and powerful, and use your power to help society. lose your mystery, lose fear, attack society, lose respect".

however, i am not closed to ideas on this. just because i can't think up a neat mechanic for imposing such awe-inspiration, doesn't mean no-one else can. if you have any ideas on how such a thing might be implemented concisely, i would be happy to consider it.

Neat set up. I'm dissapointed that I can't play the sorcerer, his enemies, the royalty, etc. Why aren't they available as characters? They seem to be what the plot is all about.

glad you like it :D technically, you COULD play the sorcerer or whoever, but then you have the whole "i know what i'm going to do thing" because it's already explained in the setting. also, even if you were to play such a powerful protagonist, there would always be someone/thing that came before you and did something else important. these characters are just some of those people.

but this isn't to say that my characters won't become powerful protagonists. far from it. whilst they don't know it yet, eventually (somehow) they will discover a "tomb" (totally unique in the world) full of inert "strange steel mechanical humanoids" (terminator-esque robots) and a device that let's them travel back in time 50,000 years each jump. whilst they don't yet know it (they aren't even close to this yet), they will be largely responsible for the destruction of all humanity 200,000 years ago. their jumps back in time will paint the picture of how the current civilisation and all the current life and gods came to be, and how the previous humanity's destruction was the catalyst. in effect, my party will be responsible for the current world's existence. but before that, they will (depending on how they play and where they go) most likely put a large dent in the pirate "organisation" (i use the term loosely) and play a large role in helping the kingdom activate its portal to enlist the help of the Engels (unfortunately for them, by that time the eternal night will have engulfed the area where this portal is, not only making access incredibly difficult, but also corrupting the portal, making it a gateway to chaos demons: the minions of The Nameless, thus sparking a quest to elist the Engels via some other means, made more urgent by the chaos demons). so yeah, certainly not short on protagonistic potential, and in the end, the party definately takes centre stage as to "what the plot is all about" (even if they don't go anywhere near where i hope they'll go).

Hmmm. OK, I get it, the PCs do whatever they're told to do by somebody that the GM creates in order to have the plot move along smoothly. Is that it?

not really, that's just how i started the first session. from then on the thief is on his own, and the cleric really has free range to pursue her goal (discover the ones behind the attempt at the princes life), whilst the mage is really only confined to by the same thing all mages in The Academy are confined by: working for the good of the nation. if she stops doing that, she becomes a threat to the status of the Academy and the people. but there's no reason any character MUST do what their organisations tell them to, just like in real life there's no reason i MUST submit my essays in on time, or stick to the word limit, or write about what i'm supposed to. but one day, i'll be telling people to write things for me, and one day the players will be the ones giving the orders.

All sounds pretty interesting, but there are two problems. First, where does all this setting and plot come from? That is, are you going to provide your setting that you've enumerated in your post to the GM, or does he have to make his own?

yeah, i'm including the setting with the game. most concepts within the game (other than how to swing a sword) depend on the setting, like gods and clerical orders, how magic and psionic powers work, the organisations that help to define characters, and all that junk. the particular campaign i am running though, with the time travel and stuff, will only be included as far as a brief mention of the existence of the device and where it might be. i don't want to write the story for the GM, just give them what's needed to streamline plots.

What does your system do to cause the players to behave like heroes that D20 does not do?

if, by d20, you refer to the entire range of d20 systems and settings, then i can't really be qualified to answer that question because i haven't read even half of them. but i guess i could ask how does d20 cause players to behave like heroes? IMHO, the only thing it does is offer options, and give a setting that is conducive to exploring those options. Eclipse does this. so does every system to my knowledge. but perhaps i am misunderstanding your question.

Because, secondly, your setting sounds a lot like every other setting ever made for a fantasy game. You've got a Dark Lord (TM), you have the powers who want to see him destroyed, you have the desperate monarchs who will do whatever desperate act it takes to prevent the dark lord or the war around him from destroying their kingdoms. You have the mages bargaining from their vantage, you have secret orders of priests in service to their own orders and to secular powers, you have a section of Thieve's World in the game... Have you seen Midnight? The D20 game that intentionally emulates LOTR?

This alone isn't a problem, really. That is, with the right system, you could have people playing your setting against your dark lord...but there's another problem which is making this sort of play fun. You've heard the term "railroading?" What are your feelings on it?

hahahaha @ Dark Lord (TM). no i haven't seen Midnight, and whilst i enjoyed the movies for what they are (forms of entertainment), i can't say i'm a fan of Tolkeins world or his stories. but now that you've mentioned it, i do think it's interesting that all fantasy i have ever read really boils down to those same premises, even though they do have different takes on each of the premises. it probably fits in with religious concepts and basic human nature. but i still enjoy them for what they are.

as for railroading, i believe you are referring to in some way forcing players to follow a given story, either by limiting options or making it clear what they are meant to do? i'll assume that is the meaning you intended. my feelings on it are mixed. on one hand i think a great GM can plan a rich story, and make the players believe that not only are they a part of this story, but that they are truly driving it, almost like some uber-author (or God...). on the other hand, what tends to happen with my sessions is that i plan for about the first hour or so of play, and then wing it as the players do what they want, and i develop the story ad lib, drawing on my broad concepts of what's going on in the world. i actually find it more interesting to simply "follow along" as the players burn down ships or bargain with powerful mages for rewards or purchase flying mounts and use them to decimate a local goblin tribe. at the end of a session, i go away and have a think about how the world would have reacted to their actions, and this usually sparks what will happen in the next session. if that is not what you meant by "railroading", feel free to let me know what you meant so i can better answer your question.

The question is, what of your system promotes the repercussions that you talk about? More to the point, why won't players just take an elyrial for their Kewlness factor, and just ignore the culture? What about the system promotes the idea of race as somthing more than just a different set of effectiveness modifiers?

do you mean: "what about my system limits the options open to players to ensure that they don't ignore culture?" or do you mean "what mechanics are in place that keep track of 'bad' things characters do to help bring about repurcussions?". besides culture, history, physical characteristics, social norms, generalized personalities, and effectiveness values: what else CAN define a race? and perhaps more importantly, why would i need it?

The extreme of this "perversion-of-play-through-system" is the magic user, who wastes enough spells in the evening to learn something (or, in your case, at least have a chance to roll a natural 20) and still be at his full power in the morning. *shudder*

to do that in eclipse would require casting of weak spells, or the mage would knock themselves unconscious real quick. but spellcasters are at their full power most of the time. the only limits are fatigue and their flow pool, which regenerates at 2 points per round. they use flow to cast, and fatigue comes from how much flow they use. more powerful spell=more flow=more fatigue. there is no "wasting" of spells, more just gratuitous use. in Eclipse, some cultures frown on this, others encourage this.

What is it that you'd like to see from us?

exactly the sorts of things i've seen so far! questions, comments, suggestions... they all help me get a better understanding of what is expected, what i am "up against", and how i might make my system better.

but in summary from this post alone, i would very much appreciate ideas on the following things:
what i should call "AC" instead?
if limiting attribute growth to 1 point per attribute per week would perhaps help the situation?
any suggestions for solid non-level based progression that also doesn't rely on rolling? (i will read through those 6 games, so i may find an answer in one of them...)
any concepts for how a mechanic might capture the social status of a mage in an effective and satisfying way?

[Mike Holmes]

hmmmm, both good points. i'm not particularly concerned about 'level balance', because i'm not particularly concerned about 'class balance' either. but... i definately see how this might be 'abused' by 'powergamers'. like players deciding to bash everything with their swords just so they can roll enough 20's to increase their power. this in itself is problematic in terms of destroying the immersion in the game, but worse, i think that such activity detracts from the enjoyment of other non-powergamer players.

To address this generally, have you read that essay yet (System Does Matter)? Because there's a general principle that's important here. Basically, there are no "powergamers" just players who are playing games that promote powergaming. That is, sans incentive to play this way, there are no powergamers. Designing your game to eliminate abuse is going at things backwards. If you're game is subject to "abuse", that means it promotes a sort of play that you don't want it to promote - the system causes the behavior. So, don't worry about combating "abuse" just make a game that will promote what you want in the first place.

Now, that said, this leaves two general issues. First what is it that you want to support? What are your design goals. This is a part of design that some people miss. They have an idea in their head about what they want to accomplish, but it's mostly thought of in terms of "I don't like X, I'll replace it with Y, because that's better." Well, why is Y better? What is it that you're trying to do? If you take a step back and look at what you're trying to produce, if you write these things down explicitly, then you'll better be able to apply these goals across all of the game, instead of to one small facet of the game.

Second, once you know what you want to support, once you have your goals listed, then you may find that the assumptions of previous games upon which you're basing your designs, don't work well for what you're trying to promote.

For instance, you say that you're not concerned with balance. And, assuming that means what I think it does, that may be a step in the right direction. On the other hand, it's hard to know, because we really don't know what you're trying to do with this game. Moreover, there are some things that you've done that seem at odds with the typical sorts of goals that discarding balance might achieve.

So, if you can backtrack on some of these things and tell us why you're not concerned with balance, rather, what you're trying to support that balance would get in the way of, then we can more cogently respond to your questions.

ok, here's an idea... what if i limited how much an attribute could be raised by rolling to 1 per week (in-game time of course). not only would that help to replicate the limits of human growth (if i exercise for a day, i don't turn into arnold schawarzeneggar), but it might also help to encourage players to use all of their attributes in some way to increase the overall number of attribute points they gain.

That seems just as stilted, doesn't it? "I'm going to do some research today, to ensure that I get my intelligence roll." Worse, it means that to get the best output, that I need to do as many tasks as it takes to get that 20. So I'll read, and read, and read, etc, until I get the 20, and then I'll work on the next thing.

System creates behavior. If you tell players, via the system, that it's about improving by making die rolls, then that's what the action will be. See what I mean about goals? What do you want the players to do? Once you know that, and state the goal, it's very easy to fix the system you have to produce that behavior. All we know right now is that the proposed design will cause some unwanted behavior - what we need to know is what the wanted behavior is.  

also, with regards to social stats not be used alot, i'm not sure that really applies to Eclipse.

As a side note, why do you not capitalize the start of sentences, but then capitalize things like ability names? It's hard to read. Who are you, ee cumings? ;-)

It's not so much that there won't be social play, but the number of rolls made for each sort. You're game improves on some models, but still has a combat system - meaning that there will tend to be more combat in play unless something in the system prevents this. Time for Mike's Standard Rant #3: Combat Systems.

I'm not saying you shouldn't have a combat system - just to realize that if you do have a combat system that you'll have lots of combat. And depending on how complex it is, it may require more rolls to accomplish. For example, if social rolls are all resolved in one roll, and combats take many "rounds" each with a roll, then one combat represents many times more rolls than social situations.

when a characters Ego score is double its initial value, they are in love with you (conversely, when it is 0 they loath you). my only problem with what i have for this so far is the fact that it requires a fair amount of book-keeping, either for the players or the GM, in keeping track of how some particular NPC feels towards a particular party. i'm hesitant to add one more detail simply because of this fact, and that is that if an NPC loaths you, they probably hate your friends as well, and if an NPC loves you, they probably won't hate your friends. this last part i am content to leave out simply because of the hassle of keeping track of it.

I like the system in general. How does it require any more record keeping than combat? I mean, do you have modifiers in combat? If the character is on ice, would you subtract something from their roll? If so, then why can't this just be applied to social conflicts? The GM notes that NPC A is an enemy of PC B, who is friend of PC C such that when C tries to get A to do somthing, he has a negative modifier.

BTW, rolling social contests like this is a fairly new thing, and puts you pretty damn close to innovative. Not quite, but, like I said, it's hard to be innovative when you don't know what's out there. My point is that, in combination with other good techniques, your game in total can be innovative, even if no particular single element is. The combination just needs to be new. So it's things like adding social conflict that make your game a heartbreaker, and potentially innovative if you just get past certain traditional methods.

so yeah, social attributes get used a bit too. the trick is deciding how to develop your character, and the trick for me is not putting too many barriers in place to prevent you from doing what you want, yet still making any rewards "worth it".

I'm not getting what you're saying here, but I sense that it's important. Can you clarify?

toughness is ok, but i feel that it conveys too much "human" aspect. a quick look at dictionary.com gave me the following terms that might be acceptable: tensile strength (too technical i think), resistance (ok i guess, but too general. perhaps Physical Resistance?), impenetrability (too absolute, too hard to say), and solidity (implies liquidity is possible). i dunno, i guess that you have a point, that the names i choose will reflect on the view of my system whether i like it or not, so i can see how simply using the acronym "AC" will be seen as a downfall.

ok, so i want all terms that i use to be intuitive and easy to use. so how about instead of "AC", i use one of the following: Tensile Strength (TS), Physical Resistance (PR), Toughness (T), or Armor Toughness/Bodily Toughness (AT/BT)? i'm open to any opinions about which to use, or any other suggestions i haven't thought of.

It's been called many, many things. In Hero System, it's Physical Defense (as opposed to Energy Defense). In WOD games, the totality of all the elements added together - armor, toughness, etc - results in what's called a Soak Roll. That is, once you're hit, you roll to see how much damage these things "soak up." Quite often that's the solution, adding the elements se. In TROS, you subtract both "Toughness" and "Armor Value" from damage. You can't just add the two together, because lots of blows will avoid the armor entirely and just be affected by toughness. I take it that you want to abstract armor more?

How is this used in play? What elements can add to the number? What stylistic feel do you want it to represent?

of course, but i wasn't implying that my system is in any way the simplest around. that really wasn't my goal. to achieve that sort of simplicity, i would have to settle for more abstraction than i am willing to use. instead, i meant that *to my knowledge* (i make no claims that my knowledge is in any way vast), i've not seen "realistic" (i understand the problems with that term) damage based duelling systems as intuitive (to me at least) as mine.

Simple, intuitive, fast, dramatic, fun, inspiring, realistic, gritty, adventurous...these are all adjectives that these designers use, and many more. I'm sure your system is the most intuitive system that you've seen. That's probably mostly because you haven't seen many systems. Again, you're claiming that your Taurus is the fastest car out there without having even seen the Ferrari.

both TROS and Eclipse use "simultaneous" combat, where every action is met with an opposing action, which are both played at the same time.

This is fairly new to RPGs. Less seatbelts, more like airbags. Still there are a lot of other games that have "simultaneous" combat. I often point to the free game Zenobia as a good example. In fact, I point to it because I'm a big fan of simultaneous combat. Other games that do "simultaneous" are Story Engine, The Window, and HeroQuest to name a few.

however, i have done away with initiative, as i don't believe it to be necessary.

Seatbelts. Games have "done away" with initiative since about the third published RPG.

also, both TROS and Eclipse impose penalties to rolls for being wounded.

Headlights.

finally, combat in both systems is very deadly and very fast.

Bucket seats. Runequest had a system in 1978 that made it possible, and indeed often likely that a character would be killed in one blow.

i might mention right now that when i came up with my system, i had never known it to be done before. in fact (i'm not kidding), i thought that independantly designed systems were incredibly rare (you can laugh if you want, even i think it's funny now).

The point is that most of your "innovations" here are things that were incorporated into the very first RPGs that came out after D&D. So, none of this compares your game specifically so much to TROS, as about fifty or so games out there that are "like" yours and TROS, but cling to D20 mechanics.

well, obviously i would love for Eclipse to avoid being a heartbreaker, but at the same time, i'm not creating the world's greatest rpg before breakfast.

That's good, because doing so on the first try would be extremely unlikely. But what you can do is make a game that will attract some players, and learn something in the making of it that will help with your next design.

i'm not a fan of multiple die systems, mainly because counting up 15 die for powerful characters slows things down and increases the chances for mistakes. some dice +attribute mod +skill seems to be the only way i can avoid multiple die, and still factor for weak but skilled characters and strong but clumsy characters. that dice might as well be a d20 (as opposed to a d10 or d%).

Again, this is what I'd call a "specification." It implies a goal - play should be fast. If that's a goal, then say so. Further, say what it should be faster than, because all things are relative.

Want to see the world's "fastest" combat system? Here it is: The GM just decides what happens and states the result in one word.

Now that's pretty extreme, and probably not much fun. We employ more rules than this in the games we play around here because most of us feel that the above system has too little structure. But a whole community of players who we sometimes refer to as "freeformers" play just that way.

So, given that RPG play comes in a bewildering variety of forms it's always best to state goals in relative terms. Faster than TROS, or faster than D&D would be something that we could get a hold on.

But, given that it could be faster, what does the part of the system that's slowing you down do for the player. What are the rules intended to do in your game?

i guess i could certainly implement some mechanic similar to the "social combat" Ego, that represents either your reputation in your organisation, or your personal commitment to them (or an interaction between both), but i think it is a lot of book-keeping for the players. also, i feel that such a thing is more comprehensively and easily controlled with qualitative setting-based rules. ie: "you are above the law, but this power comes from the fact you work for the betterment of our nation". or "you are feared and respected, but only because you are mysterious and powerful, and use your power to help society. lose your mystery, lose fear, attack society, lose respect".

This is exactly what happens in the game Heroquest. You have an ability rating that represents the character being, perhaps, "Member of Tribe" and he might have a "Good Reputation" at some level.

Too much book-keeping, means that you're keeping track of something that you don't use. In practice, it means that play becomes about somthing that you don't want it to be about. What this means is that, if you want play to be about social themes, then recording things about it can't be "too much book-keeping."

Other games have done this as well. In the newest edition of Gamma World, each community has stats to represent it in conflicts, and PCs can react to communities as entities, for instance.

glad you like it :D technically, you COULD play the sorcerer or whoever, but then you have the whole "i know what i'm going to do thing" because it's already explained in the setting.

So, what the sorcerer is going to do is set in stone? And play revolves largely around that agenda? This is what's refered to as "metaplot" hereabouts. You may want to do a search on the term. It should suffice to say that there are many people here who have grave doubts as to the effectiveness of a metaplot, and some even think that they're detrimental to play. I personally would suggest the "steady state" start. That is, you present history up to a certain date where the game begins, and then just have the NPCs do what makes sense given their motives after that point.

What this means is that if a player wants to be a "player" (a big fish), he doesn't have to worry about his ideas being over-run by the fact that the GM is determined to force a pre-planned plot through. For example, if I'm the King, and the Sorcerer is coming to get me, I'd like it if my strategic planning could prevail potentially. If the metaplot says that the sorcerer takes over at thus and such a point, then I can't really have an effect.

This general principle applies somewhat to characters at all levels.

also, even if you were to play such a powerful protagonist, there would always be someone/thing that came before you and did something else important. these characters are just some of those people.

That's my point - power is moot, really. These are all characters, and characters are characters. The players should be allowed to play the characters for whom the setting is going to have a lot of meaning.  

but this isn't to say that my characters won't become powerful protagonists. far from it. whilst they don't know it yet, eventually (somehow) they will discover a "tomb"

See, this is all metaplot that forces the characters to have a certain destiny.

so yeah, certainly not short on protagonistic potential, and in the end, the party definately takes centre stage as to "what the plot is all about" (even if they don't go anywhere near where i hope they'll go).

How is that? I mean, it sounds like the party is free to go off of the metaplot. If that's so, then what are the chances that they'll stay on it? At which point, what's the use of it?

Basically, theory here says that you basically have two choices. Either the plot can be decided by the GM, and enforced, or the players all (including the GM) work together to create the plot. Meaning that it'll tend to go in a lot of unpredictable directions. To say that the GM can control the plot to make certain things happen, and that the players can also control the plot at the same time is a contradiction, and a problem that many RPGs have. We even have a name for this, it's "The Impossible Thing To Believe Before Breakfast" or TITBBB. There's some debate about this, but what seems pretty clear is that some players playing some games, don't get a clear view of who's in control of what, and this leads to all sorts of problems in play (especially if different participants are expecting different things).

The point is that this needs some thought on your part, and some well written direction in the text. Or better a system that makes this all obvious.

but there's no reason any character MUST do what their organisations tell them to, just like in real life there's no reason i MUST submit my essays in on time, or stick to the word limit, or write about what i'm supposed to. but one day, i'll be telling people to write things for me, and one day the players will be the ones giving the orders.

While there's no reason you MUST, there are reasons that you do. Are these encoded in the system? Such that when the character breaks the rules, it makes a statment? Or is breaking the rules without consequence?

yeah, i'm including the setting with the game. most concepts within the game (other than how to swing a sword) depend on the setting, like gods and clerical orders, how magic and psionic powers work, the organisations that help to define characters, and all that junk. the particular campaign i am running though, with the time travel and stuff, will only be included as far as a brief mention of the existence of the device and where it might be. i don't want to write the story for the GM, just give them what's needed to streamline plots.

So, the GM is supposed to write up his own metaplot? Again, it's not clear here where the story comes from.

What does your system do to cause the players to behave like heroes that D20 does not do?

if, by d20, you refer to the entire range of d20 systems and settings, then i can't really be qualified to answer that question because i haven't read even half of them. but i guess i could ask how does d20 cause players to behave like heroes? IMHO, the only thing it does is offer options, and give a setting that is conducive to exploring those options. Eclipse does this. so does every system to my knowledge. but perhaps i am misunderstanding your question.

I hope it's clearer now, but in case it isn't, D20 doesn't particularly promote players doing adventurous things. In fact, quite the opposite. What I'm saying is that your system is no better than D20 here, and given that D20 fails to meet this goal of heroic play, that's a problem (to the extent that you're game is actually like D&D).

Here's an eye opener. The biggest problem with D&D and getting players to act heroically is that the characters can die. Since characters can die, players always have an incentive to play it safe. Have you considered having a rule system that only allows for death when dramatically appropriate, instead of as a result of poor tactical play? Because that's what promote heroic play.

The next objection is that this eliminates the challenge from play, but believe me, it doesn't.

but now that you've mentioned it, i do think it's interesting that all fantasy i have ever read really boils down to those same premises, even though they do have different takes on each of the premises. it probably fits in with religious concepts and basic human nature. but i still enjoy them for what they are.

And I too enjoy them. But they're not universal, there are other fantasy games to play. Still, I'm not even advocating that you change your setting. What I'm advocating is that you find a way in your system to bring out the parts of your setting that you think are fun to experience. Another problem with D20 is that it's somewhat "generic" and as such doesn't really enhance any setting. Your game links up in terms of magic, and such, but, as we noted, your magic system doesn't really say much about the universe (magic makes me tired is not much of a theme).

So, how can you make the most of your social conflict, and other system techniques to link into the setting that you have? What sort of statements do you want to see from play?

on one hand i think a great GM can plan a rich story, and make the players believe that not only are they a part of this story, but that they are truly driving it, almost like some uber-author (or God...).

This is what we refer to around here as "illusionism". You might want to read up - it's pretty controversial in some ways, and almost certainly a very hard way to GM. Hence why....

on the other hand, what tends to happen with my sessions is that i plan for about the first hour or so of play, and then wing it as the players do what they want, and i develop the story ad lib, drawing on my broad concepts of what's going on in the world.

Many people have that experience. Is this the style that you want to promote? If so, there are things that you can put into your system that do this well, and things to avoid.

This isn't railroading at all. The problem is that metaplot makes the style that you're talking about difficult. How can I just "go with the flow" and still have the sorcerer do what he's going to do? There are ways to do this, actually, but there are other potentially serious problems.

do you mean: "what about my system limits the options open to players to ensure that they don't ignore culture?" or do you mean "what mechanics are in place that keep track of 'bad' things characters do to help bring about repurcussions?". besides culture, history, physical characteristics, social norms, generalized personalities, and effectiveness values: what else CAN define a race? and perhaps more importantly, why would i need it?

The question is how the social norms and such are represented. A really bad way, I'll bet you agree, is the "Alignment" method. That methods penalizes the player for not playing to the stereotype. But what if you make the personality traits of the race potentially empowering? Then the player can choose to be typical, or atypical, still has the same mechanical effect, but a statement is made about the character. I'm thinking about the game Heroquest again, in which, for instance, your belief system (which often provides magic) is often related to your culture. So you can play a character who is typical in having that belief system, or atypical in having one from another culture or subculture. In any case, the player is incentivized to make that issue important through the use of the effectiveness that it provides.

Maybe more importantly, those "relationship" abilities tell you just how the character's culture feels about the character.

What is it that you'd like to see from us?

exactly the sorts of things i've seen so far! questions, comments, suggestions... they all help me get a better understanding of what is expected, what i am "up against", and how i might make my system better.

any suggestions for solid non-level based progression that also doesn't rely on rolling? (i will read through those 6 games, so i may find an answer in one of them...)

You will. The one that you'll see commonly, is the "point-based" progression. The player gets points at intervals like every session, and these are spent in specific ways to produce specific advancements. Again, this is the FM Car radio of designs, having appeared in most every game as a "solution" to the level problem.

Right now, the current theory is that too much freedom is a bad thing, as we'd discussed (there's a thread on the subject in "theory", right now). In that way things like "classes" are positive. OTOH, there are about a jillion other ways to do this, and some of them are demonstrably better. For example, everyone knows that people pick up more than one job over a lifetime, so long ago (ADD1E), the "mulit-classed" character was introduced. The problem with this is that it's too blocky. You want constraint, but not in such huge blocks of effectiveness that the character seems stilted. In ADD3E, you get the ability to pick up new classes every level. This is almost worse because nobody learns that way, going back and forth between large blocks of instruction.

A current trend is towards having character enumeration be very simple. But what I like to see are large scale selections at character generation that are simple to make, like classes, but which represent actual background options. These are like "classes" in a way, but tend to provide nothing but "skills" or other effectivenesses. And then after chargen, the player typically then buys things by the point system to represent whatever the specific in-game action is all about.

This makes chargen as simple or simpler than class systems, but leaves actual development to be as specific as it needs to be in play.

Oh, another quick note. What do you see as the Reward Systems for the game. How are players rewarded - what behaviors? What can the rewards be used for?


I want to make a quick statment about my agenda here - I'm not being completely altrusistic. About once a year, I find a game like this, and provide the same critiques. My hope is that other potential designers like yourself can be helped by the messages here. They might recognize that they're in the same place as you are, and get almost as much from the threads as you do. In that way, we prevent the forum from being flooded with people like yourself.

I just wanted to be clear on that, and get my agenda in the open. I'm having fun working with you (and you've been a superlative model - maybe the best I've ever had), and want to continue. And I do like some of your ideas. But my participation here is mostly educational, and not intended to constitute some big endorsement. We've yet to really see what you can produce, I believe.

Mike

[Ben O'Neal]

To address this generally, have you read that essay yet (System Does Matter)? Because there's a general principle that's important here. Basically, there are no "powergamers" just players who are playing games that promote powergaming. That is, sans incentive to play this way, there are no powergamers. Designing your game to eliminate abuse is going at things backwards. If you're game is subject to "abuse", that means it promotes a sort of play that you don't want it to promote - the system causes the behavior. So, don't worry about combating "abuse" just make a game that will promote what you want in the first place.

Yeah i read that essay. I found it hard to determine whether Eclipse had a GNS focus, whether it needed one, or whether I wanted one (I'm trying really hard to use proper punctuation, I'm used to typing in MSWord :). I think it would probably closely approximate being a simulationist design, but I know I have included Gamist and Narrativist elements as well. I think time will tell how that works. But I see your point about "powergamers". Unfortunately, I really did like the idea of progressing attributes through use. No matter how hard I try, I can't concoct a mechanic that increases attributes through use and doesn't incentivise behvaiour that I don't want. So I've scrapped that idea. I'll get to my ideas for a reward mechanic later on...

For instance, you say that you're not concerned with balance. And, assuming that means what I think it does, that may be a step in the right direction. On the other hand, it's hard to know, because we really don't know what you're trying to do with this game. Moreover, there are some things that you've done that seem at odds with the typical sorts of goals that discarding balance might achieve.

So, if you can backtrack on some of these things and tell us why you're not concerned with balance, rather, what you're trying to support that balance would get in the way of, then we can more cogently respond to your questions.

Sure! I know it sounds cliche, but I am not concerned with balance because I believe that a mighty sorcerer who can command the elements can have just as much impact on the world as a simple thief or heroic fighter. My opinion on this matter stems from epic novels. I think balance should not be enforced on players, but instead should stem from their place in the world and their protagonistic potential. "Balance" would shatter the social status of a sorcerer if they were equally powerful as a fighter. I hate coming back to these examples all the time but I do think they are apt: in The Wheel Of Time, Rand is the world's most powerful channeler, so he obviously has protagonistic potential and appeal, but so does Mat, who is a mere trickster and war general, and Perrin too, who simply has a big heart and is willing to do anything for the one he loves. In Magician, Pug (Milamber) is also the most powerful sorcerer ever, but Tomas becomes almost as powerful in a different way, whilst Jimmy the hand plays a large role, and really there are too many characters to mention that all make for great characters and protagonsists, regardless of the fact that in terms of raw power to influence any given outcome, they are all dwarfed by Pug. This is the sort of variety and freedom that I want. Perhaps in essence, players make their own balance, by choosing to take risks and doing their best to succeed. No risk = no gain. I'll get back to this with my reward mechanic ideas. I hope this helps some, if not, then either I've misunderstood your question or I'm not sure how to answer it.

I like the system in general. How does it require any more record keeping than combat? I mean, do you have modifiers in combat? If the character is on ice, would you subtract something from their roll? If so, then why can't this just be applied to social conflicts? The GM notes that NPC A is an enemy of PC B, who is friend of PC C such that when C tries to get A to do somthing, he has a negative modifier.

BTW, rolling social contests like this is a fairly new thing, and puts you pretty damn close to innovative. Not quite, but, like I said, it's hard to be innovative when you don't know what's out there. My point is that, in combination with other good techniques, your game in total can be innovative, even if no particular single element is. The combination just needs to be new. So it's things like adding social conflict that make your game a heartbreaker, and potentially innovative if you just get past certain traditional methods.

Actually, I was envisioning social combat to usually require more than one roll. For instance, I roll to insult someone; I succeed and damage their Ego, but in doing so, I increase my own Ego. In retaliation, they can roll to insult me, and if they succeed, then they gain back Ego points equal to how much Ego damage they do to me. This repartee could go on for hours I guess, but you get the idea. Similarly, if someone tries to charm another person, that person can in turn attempt to charm back, and in doing so, both people modify their rolls according to how high the other person has raised their Ego, thus allowing two people to "flirt", feeding off each others' flirtations, and drastically accelerating the process of infatuation to love. Conversely, one could counter charms with insults, and if successful, the insult does double Ego damage to the charmer, and negates the charmer's effect on the insulters Ego. I hope that made some semblance of sense, but I'm sure you can see how it will often come down to many rolls. But now that I've scrapped improvement via rolling, the number of rolls becomes moot. And your point about book-keeping is well taken, I'll try to implement it as simply and intuitively as I can.

In regards to the heartbreaker factor, I must admit that your posts have given me incentive to avoid that monicker if I can. That said, I am certainly interested in any suggestions of changes I should think about. Clearly you can't just tell me what I want and what to do, but I'm sure that you can identify "heartbreaker symptoms" easier than I can.

I'm not getting what you're saying here, but I sense that it's important. Can you clarify?

Yeah, I guess it does sound important. If only I knew what it meant!

I think I meant that in Eclipse, your character may have to fight for their life, respond with witticisms to protect your Ego and reputation, and perform tasks within your organizations to advance in power and reputation, and it's up to players to choose how to divide their efforts and advancement. In terms of my job, I think I meant that I need to do everything I can to make that choice a hard one, not by making it difficult to achieve what you want, but by making it difficult to choose what you want most, and making the rewards for any choice satisfactory. Perhaps your character devotes all their efforts into developing a scathing wit, but really can't handle themself in a fight: not to worry! you can just use your wit to damage your opponents Ego, thus imposing penalties on their rolls, and perhaps even enlisting the help of others to defend you as you are clearly superior to the goat-loving nancy-boy thug you just outwitted.

Maybe that's what I meant, but who can know such things?

How is this used in play? What elements can add to the number? What stylistic feel do you want it to represent?

"AC" is used to directly resist physical attacks. AC is the number that is subtracted from an opponents AP (Attack Power) to determine the difference, which in turn determines damage. Beat armor by a large margin, and you deal more deadly damage; beat it by a small margin, and you barely manage to scratch them. Every creature has a base AC, because it isn't terribly easy to just push a blade through someone, and armor adds to this. Certain creatures are naturally "tougher", and so have higher base AC's, despite the fact that they don't wear armor. Pushing a sword through someone wearing full-plate is noticeably harder than pushing it through an unarmored person, regardless of if they are moving or not. The stylistic feel I want it to represent is exactly what I think it already does represent: making you harder to push a sword through, and thus harder to damage. I just need a name to match the style.

That's good, because doing so on the first try would be extremely unlikely. But what you can do is make a game that will attract some players, and learn something in the making of it that will help with your next design.

This is exactly what I hope to achieve. And if I can make a game that is half decent and that other people find fun to play, all the better.

So, given that RPG play comes in a bewildering variety of forms it's always best to state goals in relative terms. Faster than TROS, or faster than D&D would be something that we could get a hold on.

But, given that it could be faster, what does the part of the system that's slowing you down do for the player. What are the rules intended to do in your game?

Faster than TROS by a large margin. Faster than D&D by a smaller margin. Not as fast as freeform. Eclipse sits somewhere in there, and if I had more experience with more games, I could be more specific with regards to speed.

What are the rules intended to do? Give the players something to do. I'm not a fan of free-form concepts. They are too free-form! Clearly my perceptions on this matter are biased, but I include the rules that I do because I feel they 'add' to the game, rather than subtract from it. To me, free-form may have more potential, but it feels like less of a game. But that's just my opinion. As for specific rules, they are intended to help conceptualise what is actually happening in the shared imaginative space, and then embelished on with specific details from the GM. They are also their to take control away from the players, to the effect that they now have something to work towards in the form of advancement, and also to create verisimilitude in that the characters are not gods (only the GM can be God ;)

I personally would suggest the "steady state" start. That is, you present history up to a certain date where the game begins, and then just have the NPCs do what makes sense given their motives after that point.

Sorry for not making it clearer, but that is pretty much exactly how I have created it. The campaign begins after the first 3 years of war, and all that sorcerer/vampire stuff was simply what sparked the war, by driving the invaders to invade. Eventually the ramifications will reach the Kingdom, but by that stage nothing is set in stone, and if they surprise me, the party may even be able to discover and prevent the vampire army from ever coming close, and in doing so remove the motivations for the invaders to invade. But whilst I won't prevent this in any way, I won't encourage it, because I am a firm believer that things happen in the world which the players cannot be aware of but which may still affect them. Similarly, they may affect the world in ways that they are not aware of too (this happens alot). But this is reaching more into GMing styles and less concerned with my setting or system. I certainly won't be doing anything to encourage or discourage such plot machinations if I can help it, mainly because I know that there is no "One Right Way" to GM, and if I try to encourage a particalr way, I will inevitably discourage certain GMs from my system.

Here's an eye opener. The biggest problem with D&D and getting players to act heroically is that the characters can die. Since characters can die, players always have an incentive to play it safe. Have you considered having a rule system that only allows for death when dramatically appropriate, instead of as a result of poor tactical play? Because that's what promote heroic play.

Hmmmm. Personally, I think that such a thing simply promotes one kind of heroic play. I think I can still maintain a system where death is always a danger, but still have characters do heroic deeds. In fact, I feel that the risk of death plays a large role in determining whether or not an action is heroic. The other part being whether it is done for the good of other people, and not for the good of oneself. Perhaps there are other aspects to heroism, but I feel these are the major ones. I mean, all you need to do is look at real life: we have heroes, and no-one is immortal or protected by divine writ that they will not die unless it is "dramatic enough" for them to do so, but we still have heroes (NOT sport-stars!).

Now is as good a time as any to talk about my ideas for my rewards mechanic...

So, how can you make the most of your social conflict, and other system techniques to link into the setting that you have? What sort of statements do you want to see from play?

...which I think, also might answer this question.

Ok, my idea is both a way to eliminate levels and advancement by rolling, and provide a focus for heroic play. Unfortunately I still can't decide how to implement the "progression through use" concept (which already is working in skills) without incentivising play that I don't want.

Anyway, my idea is basically that characters are awarded attribute points and reputation points, not via level, experience, or rolling, but through being heroic. In other words, doing things which the general population might see as being heroic, such as saving someone's life (or many peoples'), risking your life for a just cause, or doing something that few people would willingly do in order to help someone.

As well as being a hero, characters can also progress through completing tasks for organisations they are a member of, or organisations such as a monarchy or whatever. These sorts of tasks would award more reputation points, and also have the advantage of allowing the character to progress through the organisation.

Attribute points are awarded according to the risks involved, as judged on-the-fly by the entire gaming group (players and GM). Concensus must be reached or no points are awarded at all. The risks are categorised as follows:

Slight = 2 Attribute points
Fair = 4 Attribute points
Considerable = 6 Attribute points
Heavy = 10 Attribute points
Severe = 14 Attribute points
Deadly = 20 Attribute points

In the text I will of course provide examples of how these might be evaluated, according to the objective risks and the capabilities of the heroes involved.

Reputation points will be awarded according to how many people witness the event, and the risk involved. In the case of completing tasks set for you by your organisation, you receive an extra flat rate of reputation points for each task (after all, you are simply doing what they ask you to do), being equal to your Influence modifier. Reputation points are given as the number of attribute points awarded plus:

0 witnesses = 0 reputation points
1 witness = 2 reputation points
2-6 witnesses = 4 reputation points
7-10 witnesses = 6 reputation points
11+ = 10 reputation points

alternatively, if character wishes to be a bit less benevolent and a bit more malevolent, then the risk/reputation thing still applies, but reputation points are doubled, and "heroic deeds" become "evil deeds", such as killing the innocent, rape and pillage, etc.

I just came up with this today while I was walking home from the bus stop, so I'm sure it needs work. Again, comments/questions/suggestions are very helpful.

And to pre-empt the question: "what does reputation do?", the answer is: "enables progression through the ranks of organisations, brings monetary bonuses such as cheaper purchases, makes it easier to win in social combat through bonuses to rolls and Ego, makes it easier to obtain information (not really a mechanic for this, but certainly something a GM can consider), and probably other stuff I haven't yet thought of."

But what I like to see are large scale selections at character generation that are simple to make, like classes, but which represent actual background options. These are like "classes" in a way, but tend to provide nothing but "skills" or other effectivenesses. And then after chargen, the player typically then buys things by the point system to represent whatever the specific in-game action is all about.

In Eclipse, class opens up two things: a derived attribute or path of progression, and class-based abilities, which are usually devoted to making the most of your derived attribute.

Examples: Spellcasters get a Flow Pool, which is their capacity to handle the Flows of magic, or in other words, how much Flow they can handle at any given time. Using this Flow to cast spells threatens fatigue (depending on your roll, you may take no fatigue or alot more than you can handle).
Fighters get a path of progression in the forms of 3 combat schools, each focusing on enhancing a certain aspect of combat (defense, offense, or general enhancement of effectiveness).
Clerics get Faith and a spell-stone, which is essentially their tools to channel the will of the gods, shaping it with their own will.
Thieves get access to poisons and exposives and learning skills is easier.
and Psionics get a Psi capacity, which is their potential to influence the world around them. Like spellcasters, psionics must deal with threatened fatigue for the use of their powers.

Changing class simply opens up a new derived attribute. everything important (like all the base attributes) can be improved however a player desires. But now that I've done away with levels, I can't think of any coherent and plausible way to implement "multi-classing", without either letting players be every class at once or imposing arbitrary penalties.  

I want to make a quick statment about my agenda here - I'm not being completely altrusistic. About once a year, I find a game like this, and provide the same critiques. My hope is that other potential designers like yourself can be helped by the messages here. They might recognize that they're in the same place as you are, and get almost as much from the threads as you do. In that way, we prevent the forum from being flooded with people like yourself.

I would expect no more. Really, your help thus far has been terrific, and you've certainly given me plenty of things to think about, which is a good thing. Though I'm not sure how to take that last part, about preventing the forum from having people like me in it... ;)

I just wanted to be clear on that, and get my agenda in the open. I'm having fun working with you (and you've been a superlative model - maybe the best I've ever had), and want to continue. And I do like some of your ideas. But my participation here is mostly educational, and not intended to constitute some big endorsement. We've yet to really see what you can produce, I believe.

Trust me, your educational input is, I think, far more valuable than any sort of endorsement might be.

Who knows, maybe one day Eclipse (or some other system of mine) may be worthy of your endorsement, but I'm sure that by then, it wouldn't need it.

But I'm having fun trying to answer the (sometimes damn hard) questions that you raise, and in the end I feel that it will benefit me greatly, regardless of how "altruistic" you feel you're not being. ;)

[greyorm]

Ravien,

Just a couple comments about statements you've made about the combat system. Basically, you keep saying it is very intutive and very fast.

Regarding the former, intuitiveness of the system...well, perhaps it is for you. My experience with it so far, given your examples, is that it is not all that intutive -- I certainly don't quite get how it works, even with the help via examples you've provided.

On the other hand, I do get TROS combat, just by reading through the examples in the free basic rules (also note that I have not played either your game or TROS, so I'm not defending one or attacking the other).

My point isn't that you're wrong, but that you might be. I don't know how many other groups have played your game, but my experience regarding this aspect differs from "what's expressed on the package."

Now, the reason I mention other groups -- specifically other groups who have had no coaching from you or someone you trained in, who did it "cold" from the rules -- is because you can declare the rules are intuitive all you want, and they will be to you or your group...because you designed the system. Your experience, however, is not a good indicator of how clear or graspable the rules are.

The problem with your group grasping them is that you are there to explain it to them, so they benefit from your knowledge of the system. Intuitiveness can just be from the fact that you know the rules well, they make sense to you, so they seem intuitive to you.

Now, I will wait for the full rules to be available before I make any sort of permanent judgement about how intuitive the combat mechanics are.

Faster than TROS by a large margin. Faster than D&D by a smaller margin.

My problem with this statement is that TROS resolves notably faster than D&D (based on the comments of numerous posters).

And since you keep using it as a benchmark against which you are measuring your game, I'm wondering how much experience you've had playing TROS, or if you're simply going by what you feel it would play like given your reading of it?

[Ben O'Neal]

Regarding the former, intuitiveness of the system...well, perhaps it is for you. My experience with it so far, given your examples, is that it is not all that intutive -- I certainly don't quite get how it works, even with the help via examples you've provided.

Hmmm, I'm not sure if this comes down to, as you've stated, the simple fact that I designed it, thus I understand it, or if it's a matter of my inability to explain things properly, or if it's simply the fact that the concepts involved are too different to what is normally used. I'd say it was a combination of all three.'

One the bright side, however, if it's non-intuitive for you, then that means it is significantly different to d20! Or at least different to what you are used to, which is just as good.

Ok, I'll try to explain in as simple terms as I can, for both combat and magic (magic is naturally more complex):

In combat, opponents must try to hit each other without being hit. To do so, they roll opposed Attack Speed rolls. The faster of the combatants wins, because he is faster. If he wins by just a little bit, then his opponent was not fast enough to win outright, but still fast enough to block the incoming attack. Does this make sense so far? So the first resolution of the Attack roll determines the action, to the extent of who was faster in their attack and by how much, and whether or not this allowed the opponent to defend themselves.

The second resolution does not require a new roll, it simply uses the same roll and adds a different number: Attack Power (instead of Attack Speed). This new number (Attack Power) is compared directly to the AC of the opponent. The opponents AC is a combination of their armor and their own inherent bodily AC. But just like how there are two attack numbers (Attack Speed and Attack Power), there are also two AC's: Total AC and Block AC. Total AC is what I just mentioned, but Block AC is Total AC PLUS Attack Power. The logic behind the Block AC is that the opponent is adding their strength and the weight of their sword to their defence.

Damage is determined by how much an attacker's Attack Power beats the defenders AC (Total AC or Block AC depending on if they were at least fast enough to block or too slow to do that much).

I feel that this is intuitive because it is less abstract than "did I hit?" and more reflective of the nature of swinging a sword in a duel. i.e: the important things to consider when fighting are how fast you can swing and how much oomph you can put into that swing. You can really only "miss" if the opponent dodges, and that resolves in a similar fashion.

If this still is difficult to understand, then I apologise. But I still maintain that this mechanic is intuitive, because it is to me. I can't speak on behalf of everyone, but I'm sure that at least someone out there might find this concept as intuitive as I do.

As for magic, it may be helpful if you understood the concepts behind how magic works. In Eclipse, "magic" is the stuff of creation. The Gods emanate what is known as The Flow. The Flow is existence. Spellcasters are a precious few who can manipulate the Flow of the gods, in essence harnessing the God's power. Spellcasters have a derived attribute known as their Flow Pool. "Pool" is really not the right word to describe how it works, but it sounds better than "pipe". But it really functions like a pipe, in that the larger the pipe, the more Flow one can use through it. Casting a spell uses up a certain amount of Flow from the pool, which then slowly regenerates (at a rate of 2 points per round), just like if you suck some water out of a pipe, and then stop sucking, the pipes pressure slowly rebuilds. If a caster "maintains" a spell, that is, uses up that spell's portion of Flow from their pool for a length of time, only the remaining portion of their Flow Pool is available to them. For example, if I have a Flow pool of 20, and I cast an instantaneous spell that costs 10 Flow, then next round I will have 12 Flow points left (20 -10 for the spell, +2 for regeneration). If I want to then cast a spell that costs 20 Flow, I must recover from the effort of my first spell by waiting 4 rounds until my Flow Pool had completely regenerated.

If I instead wanted to maintain a spell that cost 10 Flow, then so long as I maintained it, I would only have 10 Flow points available for use in my Flow Pool, because the other 10 are being used to "feed" the maintained spell. I could drop the spell at any time, and my Flow Pool would continue to regenerate.

Now, using any amount of Flow requires effort. The casting of any spell threatens fatigue equal to 3 times the Flow cost. This fatigue is prevented with a constitution save, which subtracts directly from the threatened fatigue, and any remaining fatigue gets dealt to the caster. This constitution save is the only roll a spellcaster makes to cast a spell provided they are not facing an opponent spellcaster who intends to counter their spell. In other words, all spells automatically succeed unless purposely countered. Using the same examples as above, if I cast a spell with a Flow cost of 10, then it would threaten 30 points of fatigue (3 times 10). I would make my constitution save, and if I rolled, say 24, then I would take 6 points of fatigue (30-24). If I rolled 30 or more, I would not take any fatigue at all.

As for a maintained spell, fatigue is threatened whenever the spell ends, either because the caster drops it or because an opponent counters it or if the caster takes damage etc. They don't need to make a constitution save to cast the spell, only when it ends.

As for two casters duelling, then because all a spellcaster is doing when they cast is manipulating the Flow, other spellcasters can manipulate the same Flow. In essence, to cast a spell, a spellcaster manipulates Flow to create a desired effect (known as "weaving", and a spell is known as a "weave"). To counter a spell, a spellcaster manipulates the weave of the other spellcaster, essentially stuffing it up, ruining the spell.

Does this concept make sense?  In practise, to cast a spell a player subtracts the Flow cost from their Flow pool, rolls their constitution save to avoid as much fatigue as they can, and the spell happens regardless of whether they knock themselves out from the effort or are completely unphased. In duelling with another spellcaster, both opponents must make tactical decisions as to whether to cast or counter, or attack in some other way. If both decide to counter, nothing happens; if both cast, both spells happen (you can imagine the consequences of that); and there are all sorts of other combinations with obvious effects.

I hope that has at least helped clarify something for someone.

My problem with this statement is that TROS resolves notably faster than D&D (based on the comments of numerous posters).

And since you keep using it as a benchmark against which you are measuring your game, I'm wondering how much experience you've had playing TROS, or if you're simply going by what you feel it would play like given your reading of it?

In terms of the number of rounds required to resolve conflict, and the fact that conflict is resolved simultaneously for both opponents, then yes, TROS resolves faster than D&D significantly (this may also be helped by the fact that to my knowledge, D&D usually involves more combatants in a single fight). But in terms of how-much-real-time-is-required-to-resolve-a-single-round, then D&D wins out, and Eclipse beats them both.

I admit though that my knowledge of this is based not on extensive hours of play, but from a simple demo run I conducted alone, reading the Quickstart guide (which, it should be noted, is more simplistic than the full rules), and reading some essay here on the forums about why TROS wasn't a heartbreaker, where the author (sorry I can't remember who) clearly described an action that took 15 minutes to resolve due to needing to look up many complex tables in the rulebook. Surely this was an exageration (I hope), or at least an exception to the norm, but the fact is no single action will ever take anywhere near that long to resolve in Eclipse. In terms of complexity, options, realism, and simulation, TROS beats Eclipse (and everything else too I bet) hands down. In terms of innovation, again the crown goes to TROS. But until I see an action take more than 1 minute to resolve in Eclipse, I'll maintain that Eclipse is faster. But I think I should make it clear that I am not nearly stupid enough to compete with TROS. I merely use it as a basis of comparison for aspects that are similar, just as I also use certain novels and movies and computer games.

But I'd really like for people to tear apart my reward mechanic :D

I think that it is pointing in the right direction for me and what I want players to be doing, but I'm sure that it needs work (most likely a total overhaul, but whatever it takes...).

Thanks though for all comments so far, at the very least they have made me think how to explain things better, and at best they have made me think how to make things better. I hope I can continue to get a similar quality of feedback to help me make Eclipse at least something that won't be dismissed on sight, even if it isn't to anyones tastes :D

[montag]

In combat, opponents must try to hit each other without being hit. To do so, they roll opposed Attack Speed rolls. The faster of the combatants wins, because he is faster. If he wins by just a little bit, then his opponent was not fast enough to win outright, but still fast enough to block the incoming attack. Does this make sense so far? So the first resolution of the Attack roll determines the action, to the extent of who was faster in their attack and by how much, and whether or not this allowed the opponent to defend themselves.
The second resolution does not require a new roll, it simply uses the same roll and adds a different number: Attack Power (instead of Attack Speed). This new number (Attack Power) is compared directly to the AC of the opponent. The opponents AC is a combination of their armor and their own inherent bodily AC. But just like how there are two attack numbers (Attack Speed and Attack Power), there are also two AC's: Total AC and Block AC. Total AC is what I just mentioned, but Block AC is Total AC PLUS Attack Power. The logic behind the Block AC is that the opponent is adding their strength and the weight of their sword to their defence.
Damage is determined by how much an attacker's Attack Power beats the defenders AC (Total AC or Block AC depending on if they were at least fast enough to block or too slow to do that much).
I feel that this is intuitive because it is less abstract than "did I hit?" and more reflective of the nature of swinging a sword in a duel. i.e: the important things to consider when fighting are how fast you can swing and how much oomph you can put into that swing. You can really only "miss" if the opponent dodges, and that resolves in a similar fashion.
If this still is difficult to understand, then I apologise. But I still maintain that this mechanic is intuitive, because it is to me. I can't speak on behalf of everyone, but I'm sure that at least someone out there might find this concept as intuitive as I do.

It's very intuitive, at least the way you explained it now. IMHO the confusion stems from the fact that you changed your system from two rolls to one in the course of this thread and that you keep referencing tables and options ("if the opponent dodges") we don't have access to.

[Ben O'Neal]

It's very intuitive, at least the way you explained it now. IMHO the confusion stems from the fact that you changed your system from two rolls to one in the course of this thread and that you keep referencing tables and options ("if the opponent dodges") we don't have access to.

Yeah, sorry about that. Actually, my system has taken some major evolutions in the course of this thread, mostly inspired by Mike's helpful questions and criticisms.

I'm glad the combat is intuitive to someone now! Would it help if I posted a link to the page with the combat tables on it (it'd probably be a word.doc)? If no-one would glance at it, then I won't bother, but if it might help someone see exactly what's happening then I can easily stick one up.

On another note, I was riding the bus the other day not particularly paying attention to my thoughts when I realised my mind was devising a way of totally revamping my class system in a way that appealed to me. Here's the basic rundown:

Classes become 'Social Class'. I'm thinking maybe three or four should be playable: Noble, Merchant, Peasant. Maybe I might include Royalty, but at the moment I reckon that could go under Noble. I really don't have an in-depth understanding of the layers of medieval/renaissance social classes so if anyone can suggest some I am missing or ways I should subdivide it would be greatly appreciated.

But basically, there would be a tradeoff between the classes (you know, like incentive to choose Peasant over Noble). Noble's will have much higher initial Reputation and Ego, higher starting wealth, and 10 Ability points (I'll come back to these). Merchant's will have less Reputation and Ego, slightly less starting wealth, and 11 ability points. Peasants will start with almost no Reputation, dead average Ego, and meager wealth, but will start with 13 ability points and will have bonuses to their Reputation gain and Social Combat rolls. The idea behind this "balance" (for lack of a better term) is that news of a peasant achieving a great deed has more wonder attached to it than if a noble did the same deed. Also, I want to bias peasants as being the stuff heroes are made of more than other social classes (Nobles and Merchants can still be heroes of course, but peasants are more admired when they become heroes).

As per the ability points, well since I got rid of levels, I had to find another way to hand out abilities. My solution was that at the beginning of the game, players recieved nearly all the abilities they would recieve during the entire game, and it is up to them to spend them all on abilities they can access immediately or save them for when they meet the requirements for better abilities. For example, you start with 10 Ability points, and it's up to you to decide how you are going to spend them, either on the weaker/less impressive abilities early on, giving you an early-game advantage, or save them for the best abilities that have higher requirements, giving you a great late-game advantage.

Some abilities (the really good ones), cost 2 ability points instead of just one. What used to be class (spellcaster, thief, ranger, fighter, psionic, and cleric) are now abilities called Professions. This is way easy to do with the tiny amount of things that seperated one class from another (usually a single derived attribute and list of abilities which can now all simply require the "class" ability as a pre-requisite). This also makes multi-professioning incredibly simple, as well as costly (to take 2 professions allows many new abilities and benefits, but costs 4 ability points out of your total).

One thing I really wanted to implement into Eclipse was the gender-based proficiencies in magic ala The One Power in The Wheel of Time, but I couldn't figure out an elegant way to do it. But if I use this system that I'm just now describing, then I can! All I need to do is make Talented Realms (there are five realms of the Flow: Spirit, Air, Earth, Fire and Water) into abilities that must be chosen (and also cost 2 points). Then I just make the ability cost 3 for a male and 2 for a female or vice versa, depending on the ability (Spirit will cost 2 for both genders).

So my time on the bus allowed me to invent a new and powerful currency (Ability Points), make multi-classing a total breeze, make character customisation/creation even more flexible, allow a flexible gender-bias in the Talents of spellcasters, and deal with the initial social status of player characters and how they relate to the world in their efforts to become heroes. It's amazing what your brain can do when you aren't even paying attention, isn't it?

The only problem I now have, is how to allow characters to learn spells. It used to be easy with levels, but it's much harder without them.

Anyways, I haven't yet been able to read those 6 games, but I promise I will!!! I've just had a shitload of stuff to do lately, with finding a new house and organising to move, researching and writing uni assignments, and modelling a corvette c5 for a short B-grade movie. With luck, I'll find out if my proposed idea for classes and professions has any flaws and maybe I'll find a way to make learning spells elegant and easily integrated.


So in closing, I'd be interested in hearing anyones ideas on social classes, regarding how many levels and what they should be called; whether there are any blatantly glaring flaws in my proposed Class & Profession system, and the currency of ability points and the "balance" of the classes; and if posting a link to the page of combat tables would be of any interest to anyone at all (and whether a word.doc or a .pdf would be best).

Thanks!

[greyorm]

Ravien,

Thanks for the explanations! I have to "ditto" what Markus said. It very much makes sense now, with this newest explanation, and that a large part of the problem was certainly the lack of the tables you've been referencing for results which we don't have.

That said, yes, I would be interested in seeing the tables. Go ahead and post them and let us know (either .doc or .pdf is fine with me, but .pdf is probably the better choice for a wide audience). I'll definitely download them. Why?

Well, because your combat system really interests me. I've been looking for a way to make my 3E game's fights run more quickly, because we play on-line and that stretches out the already ridiculous amount of time necessary for combat.

I am worried about the sheer lethality of it, however, as I would like to keep the heroic flavor D&D provides via hit points. Any suggestions? Does your game have any rules for making combat less lethal? Or is it not really as lethal as I'm seeing?

(I'm sorry I'm focusing on the combat mechanic to the exclusion of the other material you've put up for discussion; much of it is quite interesting, but I don't have the time right now to look at it all, and the combat system is what I find most interesting right now. I hope it is helping you at least somewhat with your game to discuss it).

[Ben O'Neal]

Thanks for the explanations! I have to "ditto" what Markus said. It very much makes sense now, with this newest explanation, and that a large part of the problem was certainly the lack of the tables you've been referencing for results which we don't have.

That said, yes, I would be interested in seeing the tables. Go ahead and post them and let us know (either .doc or .pdf is fine with me, but .pdf is probably the better choice for a wide audience). I'll definitely download them.

I'm glad I could finally make some sense! Unfortunately I am at uni right now and don't have the tables with me, but I will stick a link up to the one-page .pdf tonight. I'll send you a private message letting you know when they are up if you don't mind. Once you have them, and my explanation given earlier, I'll gladly do my best to answer any further questions you have regarding any aspect of the combat resolution mechanic.

Well, because your combat system really interests me. I've been looking for a way to make my 3E game's fights run more quickly, because we play on-line and that stretches out the already ridiculous amount of time necessary for combat.

I am worried about the sheer lethality of it, however, as I would like to keep the heroic flavor D&D provides via hit points. Any suggestions? Does your game have any rules for making combat less lethal? Or is it not really as lethal as I'm seeing?

Actually, I have considered how my mechanic would work with hit points, and I discarded that idea only because it didn't fit with my goals for the game, but it can work. But in order to make it work for the scale of 3E, it will need a few tweaks. For starters though, I'll do my best to explain how it can be used to deal hit point damage (if something I say is not clear, or it looks like I've missed something important, feel free to let me know and I'll fix it):

As I hope I've explained properly by now, actions happen simultaneously. So let's use an example where I am attacking you for the sake of simplicity. I attack, and roll my d20 and get 15. I add my attack speed of +9, which is the modifier for my attribute plus the modifier for my weapon. At the same time, you roll your attack speed in exactly the same way. For arguments sake, let's say I roll 24 and you roll 13. According to my combat resolution table, this means that I am fast enough to hit you before you can block. So I add my attack power of +12 to my roll for a total of 27. I compare this to your Total AC (not your Block AC, because you were too slow), which is, say, 14. So my attack power is 13 higher than your Total AC. In my system, you then look at a table to see that 13 higher equals a fatal wound (if I were aiming for your head or torso) or a mortal wound (if I were aiming for one of your limbs), but for hit points you can ignore that last step and deal the 13 points as damage (you can also ignore the first step which I didn't mention which is to declare where you are attacking). I hope that made some sense.

However, to port this over to D&D, you would need to take into consideration the exponential scaling of damage able to be dealt and damage able to be sustained (hit points), and the overall much lower modifiers. Attack speed could be a combination of your Dex mod plus the Dex mod of your weapon (I could provide you with my weapon list, but you'd probably need to tweak it alot) plus maybe your base reflex save. Attack power could be based on your Str mod, your weapon's Str mod and your base attack bonuses. I predict that the most work you would need to do to adapt this to D&D would be to modify the weapons list to Dex and Str mods instead of damage rolls, and adjust the base attack bonuses to reflect the amount of damage you can do at higher levels. I hope that makes sense too, and is at least partially helpful :)

One issue that you may need to address that doesn't really crop up too much in Eclipse, is the issue of multiple opponents attacking you. There are two ways you can handle it, and both are deadly. One, you could divide your actions that round between the opponents (providing you have as many actions in a round as opponents), or Two, you could handle them all simultaneously, meaning that you can only defend against one attack unless you are fighting with two weapons, in which case you can defend against two. Eclipse uses the first method by default, under the reasoning that your opponents probably won't be trained in making their attacks at the same time for maximum efficiency, but their is an ability called Concert Fighting, which allows an attacker to attack a foe at the same time as that foe is being attacked by another, or IOW, method Two. In practise, dodging becomes a very handy thing in manouvering the battlefield against many foes, but I'll leave it up to you to decide how to incorporate such a thing into D&D.

As for the lethality, I think that would become a non-issue when converting it to hit points and the D&D scale, but overall I'm not too sure how much faster it would run. In terms of rolls, sure, one action is one roll for both combatants at once, so you're halving the time at worst, dividing by 4 at best (attack roll, damage roll; player 1, THEN attack roll, damage roll; player 2). But part of what makes Eclipse so fast is the lethality.

Does your game have any rules for making combat less lethal?

Yes. It's called advancement and picking your fights :)

But seriously, in the test runs I've made it isn't overly lethal for players, but I guess that depends on what you classify as lethal. If you mean "can be killed in 3 actions and still have a tense fight", then yeah, it's lethal. But if you mean "I'm probably going to die if I pick up that sword", then no, not really. I find that so far, it provides a nice balance between tension and potential, and is strong enough to dis-incentivise killing everything that moves, but leanient enough to make choosing to stay and fight a realistic choice rather than running from every threat. No doubt, if anyone else ever play-tests this thing they will beg to differ, and then I'll be more than happy to accomodate and adjust.

(I'm sorry I'm focusing on the combat mechanic to the exclusion of the other material you've put up for discussion; much of it is quite interesting, but I don't have the time right now to look at it all, and the combat system is what I find most interesting right now. I hope it is helping you at least somewhat with your game to discuss it).

I don't mind at all! Really I need to develop my communication skills for conveying complex mechanics in a clear and concise manner, so every bit of practise helps.

But yeah, I'll post the link to the .pdf page when I get home and I'll do my best to answer any questions that pop up.

[Mike Holmes]

Yeah i read that essay. I found it hard to determine whether Eclipse had a GNS focus, whether it needed one, or whether I wanted one.

Well, if you want to get into GNS the other essays on that are much more enlighening - System Does Matter is mostly about how important system is in general. Something that I think you find non controversial?

In any case, the theory would state that all RPGs support some mode of play whether designed to or not. The question of your game's GNS support can probably be tabled until later. The real question is whether or not you have a good vision overall of where you want to go with the game. Which I think you do from later comments.

No matter how hard I try, I can't concoct a mechanic that increases attributes through use and doesn't incentivise behvaiour that I don't want. So I've scrapped that idea. I'll get to my ideas for a reward mechanic later on...

Note that it's not impossible to make attribute increases do other things (to some extent the selection of attributes makes a difference). But we can talk about that if it comes back up.

Sure! I know it sounds cliche, but I am not concerned with balance because I believe that a mighty sorcerer who can command the elements can have just as much impact on the world as a simple thief or heroic fighter. My opinion on this matter stems from epic novels. I think balance should not be enforced on players, but instead should stem from their place in the world and their protagonistic potential. "Balance" would shatter the social status of a sorcerer if they were equally powerful as a fighter.

You're saying a lot of different things here, but let me paraphrase. Characters don't need to be equal in power because any character can be made as much of a protagonist as another. Is that correct? If so, then you're stating that the game isn't about power and using the character as a pawn to do well, but instead about addressing the issues of the character?

Perhaps in essence, players make their own balance, by choosing to take risks and doing their best to succeed. No risk = no gain. I'll get back to this with my reward mechanic ideas. I hope this helps some, if not, then either I've misunderstood your question or I'm not sure how to answer it.

Actually, this has been an excellent answer to the question.

Actually, I was envisioning social combat to usually require more than one roll. For instance, I roll to insult someone; I succeed and damage their Ego, but in doing so, I increase my own Ego. In retaliation, they can roll to insult me, and if they succeed, then they gain back Ego points equal to how much Ego damage they do to me. This repartee could go on for hours I guess, but you get the idea.

There's a thread in the TROS forum here that might interest you: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=5276

Lots of ideas about how to take a tactical system and apply it to social combat.

In regards to the heartbreaker factor, I must admit that your posts have given me incentive to avoid that monicker if I can.

I think you're well on your way already. Actually, the more we hear about the system's differences the less it seems like a heartbreaker to start with. Heading in the right direction, I think you'll have no problems.

I think I meant that in Eclipse, your character may have to fight for their life, respond with witticisms to protect your Ego and reputation, and perform tasks within your organizations to advance in power and reputation, and it's up to players to choose how to divide their efforts and advancement. In terms of my job, I think I meant that I need to do everything I can to make that choice a hard one, not by making it difficult to achieve what you want, but by making it difficult to choose what you want most, and making the rewards for any choice satisfactory.

Just to be clear, when you use "I" above, do you mean your job as designer or as GM? Or both?

Perhaps your character devotes all their efforts into developing a scathing wit, but really can't handle themself in a fight: not to worry! you can just use your wit to damage your opponents Ego, thus imposing penalties on their rolls, and perhaps even enlisting the help of others to defend you as you are clearly superior to the goat-loving nancy-boy thug you just outwitted.

Check out: http://www.glorantha.com/support/GameAids.pdf

This is an example of a system (there are quite a few) which do not distinguish between different sorts of conflict, really. Would that be good for your game, or would you prefer to create a focus on the three areas you point out?

"AC" is used to directly resist physical attacks. AC is the number that is subtracted from an opponents AP (Attack Power) to determine the difference, which in turn determines damage. Beat armor by a large margin, and you deal more deadly damage; beat it by a small margin, and you barely manage to scratch them. Every creature has a base AC, because it isn't terribly easy to just push a blade through someone, and armor adds to this. Certain creatures are naturally "tougher", and so have higher base AC's, despite the fact that they don't wear armor. Pushing a sword through someone wearing full-plate is noticeably harder than pushing it through an unarmored person, regardless of if they are moving or not. The stylistic feel I want it to represent is exactly what I think it already does represent: making you harder to push a sword through, and thus harder to damage. I just need a name to match the style.

The problem is that you have two somewhat different things adding together here. That is, you have what's called toughness, and armor value in other games added together. The problem, then, is that neither term really applies, and you're kinda forced to resort to something more generic like Damage Resistance. As a synthetic number, this works just fine, but lacks a little flavor. OTOH, as a reistance for something as generially lableled as Attack Power, it probably works just fine.

Faster than TROS by a large margin. Faster than D&D by a smaller margin. Not as fast as freeform. Eclipse sits somewhere in there, and if I had more experience with more games, I could be more specific with regards to speed.

That gives us an idea, at least. At some point we'll apply some calculus to the system to determine just how fast it is in comparison to other mechanics.

Clearly my perceptions on this matter are biased, but I include the rules that I do because I feel they 'add' to the game, rather than subtract from it.

Don't worry about that, you're amongst folks here who pretty much feel the same - you really can't publish a freeform game.

To me, free-form may have more potential, but it feels like less of a game.

Watch out for that term - game. It's loaded. Consider that some RPGs probably don't fall under any commonly accepted definition of game. In any case, I think what you're saying is that you want an activity that has structure. Again, we're all about that here.

As for specific rules, they are intended to help conceptualise what is actually happening in the shared imaginative space, and then embelished on with specific details from the GM.

Have you been doing more reading? The above statement is called the Lumpley Principle herabouts.

They are also their to take control away from the players, to the effect that they now have something to work towards in the form of advancement, and also to create verisimilitude in that the characters are not gods (only the GM can be God ;)

Interesting perspective. The rules limit the characters in what they can do in-game? Do I have that right?

I personally would suggest the "steady state" start. That is, you present history up to a certain date where the game begins, and then just have the NPCs do what makes sense given their motives after that point.

Sorry for not making it clearer, but that is pretty much exactly how I have created it.

Cool. That prevents a whole lot of potential anguish.

But whilst I won't prevent this in any way, I won't encourage it, because I am a firm believer that things happen in the world which the players cannot be aware of but which may still affect them. Similarly, they may affect the world in ways that they are not aware of too (this happens alot). But this is reaching more into GMing styles and less concerned with my setting or system. I certainly won't be doing anything to encourage or discourage such plot machinations if I can help it, mainly because I know that there is no "One Right Way" to GM, and if I try to encourage a particalr way, I will inevitably discourage certain GMs from my system.

I sort of agree, and sort of disagree. There is no "one right way" true. But your game should probably deliver "one good way." You'll note that RPG players being the tinkerers that they are will alter the game if they don't like it anyhow. So presenting the game in such a way as to make clear where the plot comes from, and how, can be important. Most important is to avoid sending mixed messages, however. Note well that these messages can be encoded in your system more than you may be aware. In fact, text doesn't tend to matter much in play at all, and your system will determine more than any thing where the plot comes from, in actuality.

Hmmmm. Personally, I think that such a thing simply promotes one kind of heroic play. I think I can still maintain a system where death is always a danger, but still have characters do heroic deeds. In fact, I feel that the risk of death plays a large role in determining whether or not an action is heroic.

I agree. The question is whether or not the system has to represent this or not. That is, is it still unheroic to go into a battle if the character doesn't know that he can't die? If only the player knows?

Basically, is it the player winning the fight, or the character?

The other part being whether it is done for the good of other people, and not for the good of oneself. Perhaps there are other aspects to heroism, but I feel these are the major ones. I mean, all you need to do is look at real life: we have heroes, and no-one is immortal or protected by divine writ that they will not die unless it is "dramatic enough" for them to do so, but we still have heroes (NOT sport-stars!).

The characters in question are fictional, and cannot actually die. Does the system have to allow for a chance of character death to emulate movies? How many times has Indiana Jones died? How many times "should" he have died? Drama often allows for plot immunity in different media - but this doesn't detract from our enjoyment or the feeling that the character is unheroic.  

Still, I'm not saying that you need to get rid of death - that was more for shock factor. I'm saying that the system needs to do what it needs to do to promote the sort of action you're looking for.

Anyway, my idea is basically that characters are awarded attribute points and reputation points, not via level, experience, or rolling, but through being heroic.

Looks like a good start, conceptually. A lot depends on what the attributes are used for. There are two parts to every reward  - what's rewarded, and what the reward is. You've covered the most important, you're now rewarding heroism. The addition to attributes is fine, if that incentivizes players to do heroic things. That is, it can't just make them more powerful, but make them think about doing more heroic things.

Attribute points are awarded according to the risks involved, as judged on-the-fly by the entire gaming group (players and GM). Concensus must be reached or no points are awarded at all.

That sounds pretty cool, but it may need some playtesting and additions in terms of structure. For example, can anyone nominate someone for a reward? Even the player who's character did the act? Who decides when things are deadlocked and no points are given? If it's the GM, then really, it's his way or the highway, no?

In the text I will of course provide examples of how these might be evaluated, according to the objective risks and the capabilities of the heroes involved.

Cool. These would be given out as often as people felt it was warranted? When it happens? Or does this happen after play?

Reputation points will be awarded according to how many people witness the event, and the risk involved. In the case of completing tasks set for you by your organisation, you receive an extra flat rate of reputation points for each task (after all, you are simply doing what they ask you to do), being equal to your Influence modifier.

Hmmm. You don't get bigger muscles by performing heroic tasks, but your system allows this. Which is, fine. It's just in this case, you require something in-game to substantiate the claim to the points. You're sending two different messages here, which can be confusing. One says the rewards are for the player for having the character do heroic stuff. The other says the reward is for the character doing in-game stuff. That can work, potentially, it's just that you have to make sure that the players understand how it works. For example, what would be an allowable in-game description for how an increase in, say, strength, occurs.

alternatively, if character wishes to be a bit less benevolent and a bit more malevolent, then the risk/reputation thing still applies, but reputation points are doubled, and "heroic deeds" become "evil deeds", such as killing the innocent, rape and pillage, etc.

So, does the player track these separately - Reputation, and Evil Deeds? Do they cancel each other? Is there any incentive to stick to the good side, or is it entirely the player's option?

And to pre-empt the question: "what does reputation do?", the answer is: "enables progression through the ranks of organisations, brings monetary bonuses such as cheaper purchases,

Cool - does this mean that you're considering an abstract wealth system? That is, does the player keep track of electrum pieces, or does he just have a rating that represents his purchasing power? There are some strong arguments for the abstraction, even in the name of realism.

makes it easier to win in social combat through bonuses to rolls and Ego, makes it easier to obtain information (not really a mechanic for this, but certainly something a GM can consider),

Why not a mechanic for this? I mean, what's the difference between social combat to make someone look bad, and a conflict intended for you to browbeat someone into giving out info or somesuch? I see all these, money, social conflict, and info as all part of the same pool of contests, potentially.

In Eclipse, class opens up two things: a derived attribute or path of progression, and class-based abilities, which are usually devoted to making the most of your derived attribute.

Cool.

Changing class simply opens up a new derived attribute. everything important (like all the base attributes) can be improved however a player desires. But now that I've done away with levels, I can't think of any coherent and plausible way to implement "multi-classing", without either letting players be every class at once or imposing arbitrary penalties.

Loads of ways to do this. One off the top is just to charge to open up a derived attribute. For cheap the player gets it at one quarter of normal. For a little more, one half, etc. After full, maybe they can push it further than the figured value for a cost, too. In any case, if you want to limit this, then just charge more for advancing all of them as soon as a second one or more is opened up.

Lots of other ways to go.

Looking forward to seeing the charts and such that Raven asked for.

Mike

[Bracken]

Hello there all,

Ravien:
I've been following this thread for a few days, and I had a question as to how your mechanic handles outnumbered opponents (where one character is facing 2 or more opponents), and how do you determine when missile fire occurs during the round? Is there a separate phase for missile combat (blah), or is it weaved into the combat round in some way?


Bracken
PS: My vote is for a pdf file, everyone has the free reader by now. If you don't have a pdf maker I'd suggest downloading openoffice, it's free, and it can export files as pdfs.

[Ben O'Neal]

Mike:
I'd love to respond to your questions and points, but I don't have enough time at the moment, but I'll get on it as soon as I can.

Here is the link to the .pdf for the combat table page. I've only given the tables, so you'll need knowledge from this thread to understand all of it. But as I've said before, I'll answer any questions that anyone has as best as I can.
http://home.ripway.com/2004-2/66933/EclipseCombatTables.pdf

Bracken:
Multiple opponents are handled deadly-like. I've given a brief, though probably insufficient, explanation in my earlier reply to greyorm. When I have time for a more comprehensive reply, I'll address multiple opponents for you.

As for "missile fire", or Ranged Combat, it happens at the same time. I'll try to be brief (cos I have little time). Basically, if I want to fire my bow at somone, then there is no "phase" that I have to fire in, but instead, I fire when others do their own thing. For example, two combatants are duelling over there, and one of them is my friend. So I decide to shoot the other dude to help out my friend. In the first action, they make their attack/defense, and I draw and nock my arrow, in the second action, they again make their attack/defense, and I aim and fire. The arrow hits at the same time as their attacks are made, thus, not interferring with the attacks, but certainly preventing any more attacks assuming I get a good shot off. But in the end, you don't want to be trying to shoot someone while engaged in melee with them, unless you are a fantastic dodger. I know this is kinda a lacking explanation, but I'm typing as fast as I can.

I'll give more satisfactory answers when I can.

Bye for now!

[Bracken]

Bracken:
Multiple opponents are handled deadly-like. I've given a brief, though probably insufficient, explanation in my earlier reply to greyorm. When I have time for a more comprehensive reply, I'll address multiple opponents for you.

As for "missile fire", or Ranged Combat, it happens at the same time. I'll try to be brief (cos I have little time). Basically, if I want to fire my bow at somone, then there is no "phase" that I have to fire in, but instead, I fire when others do their own thing. For example, two combatants are duelling over there, and one of them is my friend. So I decide to shoot the other dude to help out my friend. In the first action, they make their attack/defense, and I draw and nock my arrow, in the second action, they again make their attack/defense, and I aim and fire. The arrow hits at the same time as their attacks are made, thus, not interferring with the attacks, but certainly preventing any more attacks assuming I get a good shot off. But in the end, you don't want to be trying to shoot someone while engaged in melee with them, unless you are a fantastic dodger. I know this is kinda a lacking explanation, but I'm typing as fast as I can.

I'll give more satisfactory answers when I can.

Bye for now!

Sorry I missed the multiple attackers comment, it kind of got lost with the rest of the posts :-) After reading it I'm still unclear what you mean by "splitting attacks", there are sereral ways to interperete this. When you get more time I'd like to hear more about it.

More comments:

Just to clarify, there are 2 exchanges per combat round? The winner of the intitiative/attack roll determines who gets the second action?

When does movement occur?

How is manuevering done in combat?

How do you handle actions where a character is trying to do something another character is trying to prevent? For example, let's say I'm trying to close a door before the enemy closes and can attack me. Is this just a straight Speed roll?

Overall I think your mechanic is interesting and I would encourage you to continue to develop it. Try to get  general rules pdf out asap as the mechanics are spread out all over the thread and I for one and having problems figuring out everything, but what I see I like.

Bracken

[Ben O'Neal]

After reading it I'm still unclear what you mean by "splitting attacks", there are sereral ways to interperete this. When you get more time I'd like to hear more about it.

Ok, I'll try to explain as clearly as I can (so be nice ;). One of the statistics that every character has is a number of actions per round, or simply: Actions. Basically, it represents overall how fast you can swing your weapon by measuring how many times you can swing it within a given time frame. It is given by 1 action per round for every 10 attribute points you have in Speed, and every 10 attribute points you have in Power. So if my character has a Power score of 24, and a Speed score of 32, then he will have 5 actions per round. If my character is fighting an opponent with less actions per round, then my opponent will run out before I do, and I will have 'overwhelmed' them, and will be able to use my remaining actions to basically hack at my helpless opponent. Actions are a major measure of character power.

So if I then come up against say, 2 opponents, and both have 3 actions per round, then when I have ran out of my 5, then together they will have overwhelmed me, and one will gain a "free" attack against me ("free" in that I have no more actions left to defend myself). During a given round, I will "split" my actions between my two opponents, using them to attack or defend or whatever. So the more opponents you face, the more severely you will be overwhelmed. As a side note, it is possible to have the upper hand over one opponent (ie: I'm attacking, he's defending), and have the lower hand against the other (I'm defending against his attacks).

This is the default method of handling multiple opponents, but there is an ability called Concert Fighting, which allows you to attack during the same action as your ally against the same foe. It's kinda hard to explain, but if one (or both) of my opponents in the previous example had this ability, then every time I was attacked by one, I would be attacked by the other, and only able to defend against one. This is a bad position to be in.

I hope that made something that resembled sense, and I hope you can see how getting into a duel against multiple opponents is not particularly desirable.

Just to clarify, there are 2 exchanges per combat round? The winner of the intitiative/attack roll determines who gets the second action?

No, there can be as many exchanges per round as a character has actions per round, as I hope I have explained clearly earlier in this post. There is no initiative. The person who attacks first does so as a tactical decision. If both opponents choose to attack at the same time, then they are fighting "Heedless" (the bottome table on that pdf page). If both choose to defend, nothing happens (well, not nothing, but the action is not used for an attack).

When does movement occur?

Whenever a player wants to move, so long as it is during an action. If they choose to move whilst engaged in melee, then they must make a dodge check to get away from the opponents weapon.

How is manuevering done in combat?

You can move 5ft in any action and still do something else (attack, defend). But both opponents can do this, and somewhere in my mechanics I've got a technique where you can "lead" an opponent by moving backwards and forcing them to follow and extend their reach or quit the offensive (there are a bunch of defensive benefits from doing this).

How do you handle actions where a character is trying to do something another character is trying to prevent? For example, let's say I'm trying to close a door before the enemy closes and can attack me. Is this just a straight Speed roll?

If you try to close a door before an enemy attacks you, and the enemy had the potential to attack you in that action, then you make a dodge check. Just so you know, a dodge check is d20 +your agility mod + your skill in Acrobatics -any penalties your armor imposes to agility-based skill checks.

There's a thread in the TROS forum here that might interest you: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=5276

Lots of ideas about how to take a tactical system and apply it to social combat.

Thanks for the link, I've be reading alot of the essays and threads here, and I've noticed that many of the topics are way over my head. But I think overall I've gained some things here and there when I understood them.

Just to be clear, when you use "I" above, do you mean your job as designer or as GM? Or both?

As designer, but I guess it applies to GMing as well.

Would that be good for your game, or would you prefer to create a focus on the three areas you point out?

I prefer to focus on the different areas. I'm not a fan of homogeneity.

Have you been doing more reading? The above statement is called the Lumpley Principle herabouts.

Actually, I've not heard of the Lumprey Principle. But I'm glad to know that my idea for what rules are for has been given a name!

Interesting perspective. The rules limit the characters in what they can do in-game? Do I have that right?

To a degree, yes. They limit them so that they can't say "I kill everyone", or "I bust out of jail with a piece of string". But I'm trying to create rules that make as much possible as I can. I understand the same goal can be achieved without rules, like in free-form games, but I dunno. I guess it's kinda like life. Our universe operates under a given set of rules, and we are bound by them. But we can push them in inventive ways. I'm guess that's what I mean by limiting what characters can do.

Basically, is it the player winning the fight, or the character?

Ok, that's a good way of looking at it. Thanks for the new perspective, but I don't think I'll take away the ability for characters to die yet. However, I have been juggling an idea in my head for allowing players to sacrifice permanently 1 attribute point to lower the type of damage dealt to them by one degree. For example, say their character takes a fatal wound, killing them instantly. The player could choose to sacrifice one of their attribute points permanently and lower that damage to just a mortal wound, enough to kill, but not immediately. I dunno, just an idea for now.

That is, it can't just make them more powerful, but make them think about doing more heroic things.

Well, I guess I was thinking that reputation gain would incentivise more heroic play, as I reckon that may be a factor in why a real-life hero might do more heroic stuff.

For example, can anyone nominate someone for a reward? Even the player who's character did the act? Who decides when things are deadlocked and no points are given? If it's the GM, then really, it's his way or the highway, no?

Yeah, any person can nominate someone for advancement. I was thinking of making it clear that every person at the table had to agree, and that gives every person equal power. If one person disagrees, then no award is given until concensus is reached. Consensus must also be reached to conclude that no award is given. Kinda like a jury. I don't know how that would work yet.

Cool. These would be given out as often as people felt it was warranted? When it happens? Or does this happen after play?

I was leaning towards during play, but I'm not sure how much that might become annoying, having to re-calculate all your stuff because of a single change. Maybe after each session might work smoother.

It's just in this case, you require something in-game to substantiate the claim to the points. You're sending two different messages here, which can be confusing. One says the rewards are for the player for having the character do heroic stuff. The other says the reward is for the character doing in-game stuff. That can work, potentially, it's just that you have to make sure that the players understand how it works. For example, what would be an allowable in-game description for how an increase in, say, strength, occurs.

I'll have to think on that some more. At first I thought it might be easy: "my character became stronger because the heroic act required me to fight strong opponents", but then considering that you could advance without any fighting at all, I guess it might have to come down to "natural increase in strength", or something.

I have to go now, so I'll address the rest of your post later. Thanks so far though! I hope my answers are satisfactory.

Seeya

[Mike Holmes]

Thanks for the link, I've be reading alot of the essays and threads here, and I've noticed that many of the topics are way over my head. But I think overall I've gained some things here and there when I understood them.

There is a steep learning curve here. All I can say is that it's worth the effort it takes, IMO.

As designer, but I guess it applies to GMing as well.

So, to reiterate, your goal in design is to have the rules provide difficult challenges for the characters to overcome. That's a cool goal, and an unusual one. Usually, it's the GM job solely to prepare appropriate challenges, and, at best, the system only informs them of what level of challenge is appropriate. But what I'm hearing is that you want the system to produce appropriate challenges. That would be a very interesting addition to your game.

Would that be good for your game, or would you prefer to create a focus on the three areas you point out?

I prefer to focus on the different areas. I'm not a fan of homogeneity.

Cool. I think that you've made it very clear that there you want several "areas" of action going on at once, and I think that you're splits in the system are probably appropriate.

Interesting perspective. The rules limit the characters in what they can do in-game? Do I have that right?

To a degree, yes. They limit them so that they can't say "I kill everyone", or "I bust out of jail with a piece of string". But I'm trying to create rules that make as much possible as I can. I understand the same goal can be achieved without rules, like in free-form games, but I dunno. I guess it's kinda like life. Our universe operates under a given set of rules, and we are bound by them. But we can push them in inventive ways. I'm guess that's what I mean by limiting what characters can do.

OK, you're setting out some potentially conflicting goals here. Should the rules limit the characters as though they were akin to the laws of physics in the game world, or, alternately, will they promote drama appropriate to the genre expectations of your setting?

For example, putatively the physics in Indiana Jones are those of our world, but he manages to take punishment that would kill anyone, and generally do impossible things. If you modeled the physics of the world, Indy would die. If you modeled the dramatic expectations, then he manages to survive because it's appropriate for him to do so, despite the risks taken.

This is an important and complex issue. Note that D20 provides "plot immunity" to characters in the form of Hit Points. In most editions there's little chance of a character with a lot of HP going down in the current conflict. In fact, in a well designed scenario, you'll find only the last fight as the one in which there's any significant chance of character death.

The point is that most RPGs seem to have at least a little support for genre expectations as opposed to just addressing the in-game physics.

Ok, that's a good way of looking at it. Thanks for the new perspective, but I don't think I'll take away the ability for characters to die yet.

Good, I haven't said you should. I'm not making suggestions here, just trying to get you thinking about the issues in a productive way. There are probably dozens of ways to implement genre expectations and plot immunity, etc. You just have to decide to what extent you want to empower these things and how.

However, I have been juggling an idea in my head for allowing players to sacrifice permanently 1 attribute point to lower the type of damage dealt to them by one degree. For example, say their character takes a fatal wound, killing them instantly. The player could choose to sacrifice one of their attribute points permanently and lower that damage to just a mortal wound, enough to kill, but not immediately. I dunno, just an idea for now.

Interesting. The problem is that this mechanic, like many others, makes the character less interesting for having "lost" the fight. So you're penalizing the player. This indicates to the player that they're goal is to win each fight, as a personal player goal - not just as a character goal. Again, this can be detrimental to heroism, depending on whether or not its tactically sound in the game to play it "safe".

That is, it can't just make them more powerful, but make them think about doing more heroic things.

Well, I guess I was thinking that reputation gain would incentivise more heroic play, as I reckon that may be a factor in why a real-life hero might do more heroic stuff.

I think there are no such things as "real-life heroes" that go out again and again and risk their lives. Real heroes do what they do because they are thrust into a situation to which they must react, and do so bravely at that time. Even the heroes of literature don't do it for the glory in most cases, but based on their moral convictions.

In any case, none of this addresses the fact that if the rewards make the characters, say, more able to kill things, that it will inform the players that they're supposed to be about killing things. If you want play to be about character values, then perhaps the rewards should add to those?

Yeah, any person can nominate someone for advancement. I was thinking of making it clear that every person at the table had to agree, and that gives every person equal power. If one person disagrees, then no award is given until concensus is reached. Consensus must also be reached to conclude that no award is given. Kinda like a jury. I don't know how that would work yet.

The problem with using the open Jury debate method is that it can take a long time to determine that a Jury is hung (can't decide). So what I'd think might work well is something where the proposing player states the level that they think is appropriate, and perhaps a short reason why. Then the player to their left either agrees or proposes another level. When it gets back to the starting player, they propose a level again, based on what they think the consensus is likely to be. Then each other player goes thumbs up or thumbs down. If there are any thumbs down, no reward is given. If all are thumbs up, then the player recieves the modified reward.

That, or something like it, could be done in short order. This kind of organization is good to keep it clear how to conduct these things, and prevents them from going forever.

I was leaning towards during play, but I'm not sure how much that might become annoying, having to re-calculate all your stuff because of a single change. Maybe after each session might work smoother.

During play gets the best results. It means that players are reminded again and again about this important part of play. The problem, as you mentioned is it bogging things down. What might work is to have the rewards come at the end of each scene or at some reqular interval like that. The GM just asks, "rewards?" and the players make their suggestions at that time.

Then I'd have the rewards only get spent between sessions or something. That way recalculation only happens dong that down time as opposed to during play.

I'll have to think on that some more. At first I thought it might be easy: "my character became stronger because the heroic act required me to fight strong opponents", but then considering that you could advance without any fighting at all, I guess it might have to come down to "natural increase in strength", or something.

Right. One can always retroactively declare a reason for why something has happened. If a character gets stronger, then it's because they've been working out. In fact, you really don't have to have an in-game reason. Maybe he was that strong all along, and it just wasn't showing. Whatever. The question is how "in-game" you want the results to be. And how this compares to the in-game nature of the other reward mechanism.

Mike