This is a game of mine which I'm thinking of revising again to make it more of an RPG again, and less of an Adventure game (the direction I was taking it on it's last revision).  Rather than bodge up my terms, I'd rather simply put in front of everyone here, and ask:

I'm completely open to pretty much whatever advice you're in the mood to toss my way; got any thoughts?

http://members.shaw.ca/LeviK/8bitDungeon.pdf

I'll take it with me to work and give it a good, thourough analizing. I like the premise so far, and I would suggest you keep it simple. (I am baised though, as I see simpler games being more flexible, fast, and accomadating to more people. I will give you a more detailed viewpoint sometime tommorow. ( I work third shift)

Hi!
  Well, the version you have now, is a pretty good representation of the genre. The question is, what do you mean by more of an RPG?
  You have a working mechanic here and it seems sufficient to play, players who love this kind of computer game will love this system.
  Mechanically, I feel like there is a LOT of luck involved in this system. You roll to see how many times you can use your power and when you use it, you roll to see how well it works. I can totally see some poor player rolling a one to determine how many powers they get and then getting a one the only time they get to use it, lol
  I guess to make it more of a role playing game you need to find a way to encourage character interaction. Maybe a background system to develop the characters' motivations, allies and enemies. Or social system that recreates the fierce rivalries, unshakable romances and unbridled hostility that these games always feature.
  That's my two cents, no change please...

dindenver wrote: I guess to make it more of a role playing game you need to find a way to encourage character interaction. Maybe a background system to develop the characters' motivations, allies and enemies. Or social system that recreates the fierce rivalries, unshakable romances and unbridled hostility that these games always feature.

Hi!
  Well, if you want to stay in genre, you could have characters pick from a list like this:
:-)
Friendly - Uses Run ability to get in a character's good graces. The player says their piece, spends the point and the GM determines how well they pull it off

...
Uncertain - Uses Think Ability to understand the other charater's motives. The character spends the Think point and listens intently as the other character spills his guts.

???
Quizical - The player asks there question and depending on their standing with the other character, they might even get an answer.

!!!
Hostile - Uses Fight Ability to intimidate or coerce other characters. Players say what they will do that is threatening and rolls fight die. Depending on the roll, the other character may squeal, surrender, freeze in fear or run like a chicken.

  Just an idea...

Granted, I didn't read the entire PDF, but enough to know the gist of it.

What about allowing characters to "multi-class" a la FF2 and 3, where they could select new "Jobs" as they went up in levels? These additional Job choices could allow them a little more diversity, and to some degree minimize the whining that might arise from the bad luck of getting 1's on rolls?

Not sure you want it to go in this direction of course, given the already comic feel of the game. a 1 would be quite a humorous outcome of a roll especially if every other party member rolls a 6. This would also, I suppose, mimic the feel of the platform RPG to a degree, where certain characters are just never as useful as others or are prone to bad events happening to them in-game.

sayter wrote: What about allowing characters to "multi-class" a la FF2 and 3, where they could select new "Jobs" as they went up in levels?

dindenver wrote: Well, if you want to stay in genre, you could have characters pick from a list like this:

Oh, I hoped and hoped when I saw the title (while the PDF was loading) that this would be about the web-comic.  So thank you!

Are you trying to support the same sort of humorous interactions that define the comic?  Because you've got an awful lot of rules about monsters, given how seldom fighting the monsters actually ... y'know ... matters in the comic.  Whereas you're a bit shy on social combat rules (in fact, the comic they're showing today (though maybe not by the time people read this post) is all about social combat).  I totally agree that you want to encourage people to think up their own humorous dialogue, but a good system can support and encourage that activity rather than replace it ... if, y'know, that's what you're aiming for.

Anyway, I'm excited about this, but I want to hold off on dumping too many ideas on you until I know what your design goals are for the game.

TonyLB wrote:
Oh, I hoped and hoped when I saw the title (while the PDF was loading) that this would be about the web-comic.  So thank you!

One thing that might add some interpersonal juice while still keeping the flavor... a shared resource or two. Are you familiar with The Mountain Witch? 8-bit seems like it might do with a Trust-like thing that can be used to either help or hurt your fellow party members. Maybe an Alignment stat could figure in here?

Mark wrote:
One thing that might add some interpersonal juice while still keeping the flavor... a shared resource or two. Are you familiar with The Mountain Witch? 8-bit seems like it might do with a Trust-like thing that can be used to either help or hurt your fellow party members. Maybe an Alignment stat could figure in here?

In TMW, between chapters, players assign a numeric value for how much Trust they have for each other character. Starting Trust levels are determined by characters' Zodiac signs, so the D&D 9-alignment system is a good analog.

Trust can either be used to Aid the character who Trusts you (add a bonus to their conflict rolls) or to Betray them (penalize their conflict roll) - there are some tricks with narration rights, too, but they're probably not relevant.

Between chapters (for 8-bit, probably between adventures), you can either add 1 to your Trust for another character, keep it the same, or drop it by any amount.

It sounds incredibly simple, but it really drives a neat dynamic that feels a lot like the "band of psychopathic outlaws" model of the classic D&D party.

I'll probably be completely changing that into something else by the time I'm done, but that's a great place to start thinking from.

Thanks!

If anyone else has any other thoughts, feel free!

I think that Ron Edwards' Elfs and possibly Jack Aidley's Great Ork Gods might be helpful to you as well. Elfs in particular is all about making the dysfunctional party of adventurers in the fictional world be the product of a functional play experience among the players.

That said, I read your game the first time I saw it in your sig at rpg.net, and it made me smile, but I didn't know exactly what I'd do with it, you know what I mean?

Nonsensical...a good random encounter table might help with that. Like the one that has bacon, eggs, and toast attack you in one of the old Judges Guild products, maybe.

I'll be looking into Great Ork Gods and Elfs, then, over the weekend.

Sean wrote: That said, I read your game the first time I saw it in your sig at rpg.net, and it made me smile, but I didn't know exactly what I'd do with it, you know what I mean?

Sean wrote: Nonsensical...a good random encounter table might help with that. Like the one that has bacon, eggs, and toast attack you in one of the old Judges Guild products, maybe.

So, if a group went and fought monsters, and kicked butt, and never betrayed each other, never taunted each other, never did flat-out stupid things, would you think they'd missed the intended goal of your system?

How about if they betray each other, taun each other, do flat-out stupid things but never go and fight monsters, or kick butt?  Like, they never even make it out the door of the tavern where a hooded stranger gave them their assignment?  Have they missed it then?

I hope that didn't sound badgering.  I genuinely can't tell, looking at what you've written so far, whether those two elements have to exist in synergy, or whether one is essential, and the other is optional (but useful) support for the first.

My hope would be to most completely support a playstyle where the heroes do make it out of the tavern, do fight monsters, and also work together, argue, bicker, and occasionally steal from each other, betray each other, and so on, with all those elements operating in a sort-of-synergy.

But anywhere in that spectrum could theoretically be possible, depending on how the rules come out - it would just be 'not at the center of the fun'.

At least, that's what I'm thinking.

And no, I don't feel badgered at all; I'm mostly figuring this idea out as we go along though, so I won't be shocked if I haven't been entirely clear.

I know you said that you wanted to move away from the 8-Bit Theatre (I found your thread over there, a shame it didn't catch on as they would be a valuable resource for ideas), but I would recommend still looking there for how to create discord between characters. If handled delicately, this could be represented in a conflicting interest model.

Every character has the primary interest of surviving and (presumably) obtaining gold. You could then add a secondary interest that directly contradicts the first. Perhaps the thief in the group has the nasty habit of stealing other people's gold (yet not benefiting from it himself). To get away with this he must always out-talk his friends (preferably in-game). Or the Fighter might have the habit of buying the shiniest swords, as opposed to the most effective ones, using not only his own money but everyone else’s as well. Perhaps the White Mage must refuse payment for his/her attempts to save the world, thus reducing the reward from Questy McGuy. But these are, as you well know, ripped from 8-Bit Theatre itself.

However, by making such making such dysfunctional behavior part of the rules (i.e., the rules requires Thief to steal from his friends and Fighter to waste money) you may be able to con players into working around such limitations through RP itself, which seems to be your goal. Or it might just annoy everyone.

Regardless, I look forward to your next version of this game with great interest.

Hi!
  I have a thought:
  Include a "Luck" stat. That is consistant with 8-bit and could be used to solve the luck issues in the mechanics as well as encourage interactions.
  The way it could work is you could set a luck threshhold for each Job (e.g., 11 for the Black Belt or 17 for the Thief) at the begining of the session, the player rolls their Run, Think and Special die and add them up, subtract that number from their Luck Threshhold and that's how much Luck they get this session.
  Characters can use Luck after they win a fight to get gear from the monster. Characters can trade or give luck points to other players. But only one character can get an item after the fight is over, so characters can also bid against each other. The winner of the bid will get a single item valued in Gil equal to ten the amount of luck spent x their level x the monster level. And then include lower cost items like tents, potions and ether so it's worth something even if you get a small amount og Gil.
  Just an idea. I think this can be used to encourage cooperation with trading and gifting and encourage competition if there is competition already.

I agree with dindenver about luck. As for expanding the game, I might suggest setting a flat rate of points for abilities as you did hit points, as well as perhaps the damage they can do to monsters( maybe getting bigger/more dice?). In short, I would take what fine work you did and just expand it so players have more options the farther into the game they get. Simple is good, and I like simple, but you can still have more and still keep is sweetly simple. I also would personally like to see some of the other FF classes show up, like the Dark Knight, Paladin, Ninja, ect. Lol. Actually, you might go ahead and take that whole prestige class idea, and at level 10 ( cause you could easily double this aspect and still be flexible) perhaps they go on an uberquest and "power up" becoming Lv 0 Knights, Wizards, ect. Just a thought.

Hi!
  If you want something that encourages roleplay (in the form of giving the players something to talk about), try this:
Backgrounds
You could include 3 simple background systems that are what makes these CRPG characters unique:
Destinies
  Destiny is a far away event that WILL happen to your character. Have the table include good destinies and dark destinies
Example - Black Mage
Roll - Destiny
1 - Become Dark ArchMage, leader and teacher of all Black Mages
2 - Marry a White Mage
3 - Own a castle in a swamp
4 - Thrown into a volcano (Dark)
5 - Devoured by a dark creature you summoned (Dark)
6 - Incinerated by backfire from your own spell (Dark)

Twists
  Every destiny will have a twist that pushes it in the other direction.
Example - Black Mage Twists (Use for Dark Destinies)
Roll - Twist
1 - Natually trusted
2 - Will live to be at least 79
3 - Mother is a White Mage
4 - Natural born leader
5 - Mentor and teacher is alive and still likes you
6 - Member of a secret society of Mages (all kinds)

Example - Black Mage Dark Twists (Use for Good Destinies)
Roll - Dark Twist
1 - Bitter Rival
2 - Disowned by your father
3 - Betrayed by your best friend
4 - Mistrusted by all townspeople
5 - Horribly disfigured
6 - Has a crippling illness

Quirks
  Quirks are little thing that add flavor to your character
Roll - Quirk
1 - Hits on all women (or men, but not both), regardless of age, looks or marital sttus
2 - Says "..." alot (switch this out if you use ... as a game mechanic
3 - Shouts everything they say
4 - Can't use curse words
5 - Starts drooling if it has been more than 5 minutes since the last fight
6 - Gets a migraine if they hear a word that is more than two syllables

Example - Bob the Black Mage
Bob makes his character and decides he want to be a Black Mage, he rolls for Destiny and gets a 4. Bob discovers he has the Dark Destiny of some day being thrown into a volcano (ouch!). He then rolls for a Twist and rolls a 5. His Mentor and Teacher is still alive! Great, he can always count on his buddy and more experienced Black Mage to get his fat out of the fire, well, until that whole Volcano business... Finally, he rolls a 2 for Quirk and discovers he says "..." slot. So Bob has an easily confused, but likeable character who will someday be thrown into a volcano, nice...

  Of course you can make your own and might want to encourage players to make their own. Anyways, this starts to make the characters have flavor text like in all the manuals to these games and gives them something to talk about with each other and NPCs.

Okay, I've been thinking over this quite a bit, trying to figure things out for where I want to go, and I think I have pinned down just what I want to add:

1) A mechanical system vaguely like the trust and luck mechanics already brought up, which encourages competition and bickering within the character group.

2) A 'color' or 'origin' mechanism - a single descriptor added to a character, chosen by the player, that encapsulates their backstory in a way that brings flavor to the game.  I think I have such a list already, and I'll put it up here once I've cleaned it up a bit.

3) A reason for in-character discussions between characters, specifically set up as individual exchanges of character diaogue, or as seperate scenes. 

Now, it would be nice to tie those all together, but I don't think it's required.

Hi Levi!

Ok first thing first - I found a typo :P Unde Black Magic on the Special Skills page it says "hut" instead of "but". Just thought i'd that (sorry if it was already pointed out, I didn't read the whole thread).

I'm not familiar with 8-Bit Theater so my opinion comes from a purely "game" perspective. First thing is that I think you shouldn't buy levels or skills - you should have seperate experience points. I'm assuming that it is some in-joke though, and if that is the case then ignore this. It just seems weird "buying" levels to me, especially since I've played quite abit of the FF series.

I think including trust, luck and a descriptor mechanic would really help this game foster the style of play it is based on. You need to create discontent without making the players attack each other in real life. I like the idea of "quirks" mentioned also - giving each proffesion such foibles would help drive party conflict. Having 6 per job seems good (where you'd roll to get one in the start).

Allowing multiclassing would be good also. If you were to make this change it'd need to have each job have a seperate section and table ala D&D. Having 5 levels in the base jobs and then 5 levels in specialist jobs sounds good (I'd make it like FFV, I really liked the system in that). That would be a major change though and I don't know if you even like the idea of multiclassing. But having ninja, samurai, beast tamer classes... it'd be really cool.

Saxon wrote: I'm not familiar with 8-Bit Theater so my opinion comes from a purely "game" perspective. First thing is that I think you shouldn't buy levels or skills - you should have seperate experience points. I'm assuming that it is some in-joke though, and if that is the case then ignore this. It just seems weird "buying" levels to me, especially since I've played quite abit of the FF series.

Saxon wrote: I think including trust, luck and a descriptor mechanic would really help this game foster the style of play it is based on. You need to create discontent without making the players attack each other in real life. I like the idea of "quirks" mentioned also - giving each proffesion such foibles would help drive party conflict. Having 6 per job seems good (where you'd roll to get one in the start).

Saxon wrote: Allowing multiclassing would be good also. If you were to make this change it'd need to have each job have a seperate section and table ala D&D. Having 5 levels in the base jobs and then 5 levels in specialist jobs sounds good (I'd make it like FFV, I really liked the system in that). That would be a major change though and I don't know if you even like the idea of multiclassing. But having ninja, samurai, beast tamer classes... it'd be really cool.