So, I'm honestly not sure if this should go here or on the Theory forum, so I'm erring on the side of indie game design. Anywho.

I've been tinkering with a variant of Feng Shui for a Knights of the Old Republic Jedi-heavy Star Wars game (deeply inspired/stolen from Jeph at Rpg.net). And, as I was doing so, I simply made a note of 'doing bad things gets you Dark Side points. Too many Dark Side points = become NPC of Evil doom.'

I then started to work on how you get Dark side points. It boils down to accept bonus power from the GM, in exchange for using that power to accomplish some goal that the GM sets for you. This power can be just some bonus dice all the way to additional full on Jedi Powers. The more potent the gift, however, the deeper the entanglement and more heafty the requirement.

I went to bed, woke up, and blinked. Then wondered aloud- are Dark Side points even a useful idea anymore?

I mean, they give players a metagame means of seeing 'Hokay, I'm pushing that evil button a little bit too far'. But they get stuck in your teeth- players don't ever risk the Dark Side, because the consequences of failure are uberpermanent death and destruction (effectively).

Whereas just making Dark Side offers- well, that's /much/ easier to lead people astray on. I mean, the ends justify the means, right? I need this power to defeat this Sithlord. I need this ability to overcome the Governor's guards. And I need it /now/- the consequences of failure are too great to rely on training.

And the ante could be raised, just a little, on every vow. Until, with no clear defining line, the Dark Side has come to forever dominate their destiny.

Breaking these vows would gain the character some penelty (which probally becomes the new Dark Side points, or something)- a punishment and encouragement not to stray from their new path.

However, redemption should still be possible- and it is. It's real easy, actually. All the character has to do is walk away. Give up their Dark Side power.

Cause we all know how often people who've tasted power will give it up... especially when it would be ever so useful, and the price is oh so small...

:)

I just got Paladin recently, and I'm munching through it now- but is anyone aware of a similiar idea I could steal? Or at least look at, to see how else it's been done before.

Hi Drew,

Just a quick question to clarify -- and before you answer, you should read the forum policy posted on the sticky here. You're not really talking about a Star Wars game here, but rather, a space fantasy game with mystical elements inspired by Star Wars, right?

- Walt

Actually, I think he's just modifying Feng Shui. Which would be a sticky question. Is that a new game, and thus something to talk about here, or is tinkering just slight modifications, which might be better served over in Theory.

IOW, Drew, you were right to be confused about what forum to put this in.

Mike

Er. Right. A space fantasy game with mystical element a la Star Wars, with a good side and a bad side to the mystical power, as a modification of the Feng Shui system (and, to a lesser extent, setting).

In retrospect, it probally should have been Theory. But maybe an addendum to the Sticky could make clear where 'modifications to existing systems for alternate settings' could go- since it's not that uncommon an idea or topic (See: Riddle of the Dark Sun on the tRoS board, etc).

Hi there,

Actually, I'm not seeing an actual game in design here at all. Or if there is, it's in such a beginning stage that this is a theory question, 'far as I can tell. So ... and given Drew's last point ...

Here we are in Theory!

Drew, I'm very interested in seeing what you think of Paladin. It strikes me that Clinton entered the same area of concern that you're grappling with, and emerged with a functional solution.

That's not to say that you "shouldn't bother, 'cause Clinton did it already." I'm saying that reading Paladin will give you some useful material that you can turn over to see how it does or doesn't meet your goals.

Best,
Ron

I have to say that I think that the idea of the GM offering bits of bait to the players sounds like just too much fun.

Me [jiggling several bonus dice in my hand]: "Y'know, with a few more dice you might be able to put down these soldiers quickly enough to get to the transport ship before it lifts off with your sister."

Hehe.

But I also think that there has to be some arbitrary game mechanic that serves to throw the player over to the dark side at some point. The GM cannot just decide.

OTOH, perhaps the dice can be offered in return for bad deeds. That is, the GM says the above, but then says,

"If you want these bonus dice, you'll have to embrace the dark side, and kill your friend Bob who's fighting with the soldiers."

That sounds even more fun. You become the devil offering rewards for selling your soul. Still, the problem with this is that there's no "slippery slope" that's thematically so important to the Dark Side. It isn't the gradual descent into a pit from which there's no return.

I think that's the real challenge, finding some mechanic that allows the player to dig a hole for themselves slowly which becomes progressively harder and harder to climb out of. Paladin sorta does this, but I can see other ways, potentially.

Mike

Mm, Paladin digesting...

Ahem.

The problem here is that, again, Evilness is a quantified number. Now, I'll grant, it's a far more /tempting/ number than it is in traditional Star Wars, but it's still directly quantified.

What I'm pondering is somewhat on the lines of the Shadowguide from Wraith. Someone (the GM or a player devoted to Shadowguiding) that offers the characters / players power- but at an indirect cost, a promise they will /have/ to keep and act on, with a definite penelty associated with it. A clever player could take the low ends of the bargins, hold out for only the choicest and least restrictive of bargins, and corrupt themselves only a little to become vastly more effective...

...but it's always going to be easier to say yes again after the first time.

The Knights of the Void are neat, but not quite what I'm thinking. More like, Restrictions and Limitations from Nobilis, or the opposite of a Malakim's vows from In Nomine. The Dark Offers are restrictions that specifically encourage a... certain anti-social bend to a character, while increasing their power.

Imagine if, in Paladin, some voice whispered in the back of your character's head- 'I'll give you the power you need to strike down your foe- if you will do something in exchange.' It starts quiet, and what it asks isn't even a violation of your code. And then it is, but only minor violations, and the results are so good, so pure...

And so on. Er. Is this coming across as clearer?

Drew Stevens wrote:
What I'm pondering is somewhat on the lines of the Shadowguide from Wraith. Someone (the GM or a player devoted to Shadowguiding) that offers the characters / players power- but at an indirect cost, a promise they will /have/ to keep and act on, with a definite penelty associated with it. A clever player could take the low ends of the bargins, hold out for only the choicest and least restrictive of bargins, and corrupt themselves only a little to become vastly more effective...

Hey Drew,

"A roleplaying restriction is no restriction."

Another option is to skip the whole karma issue and go straight to rolling dice. "Sure, with your level of Dark Side, you might fall, but really, just don't roll a one..."

Hehe, Gambling: the Addiction.

Later,
Grant

Mm.

I'd actually disagree with the idea of a roleplaying restriction being no restriction at all.

I'd say instead that a roleplaying restriction should only provide a bonus when the restriction is putting the character in an adverse situation they would have otherwise avoided.

That was a bit long thing to emphasis, so lemee explain a bit more, because I would have agreed with you without a second thought (and not had my blinky moment this morning) a year ago.

The problem with most games implementation of a roleplaying restriction is they are treated in the same fashion as a mechanical restriction- that is, as something which is /always/ hindering your character. In practice, that's simply not the case. Roleplaying restrictions /do/ but the character in a bad situtation, sometimes with great frequency and heavy cost- but they still aren't always in effect.

Thus, a proper roleplaying restriction should, IMO
A) Be something you can still violate, just at a mechanical cost
B) Be something which provides strength only when it is an active hinderance.

Also, yeah. Wraith is good :) Gonna have to re-read my olde Wraithe stuffe to remember quite how the Shadow worked and what it could do- the idea of the Dark Side offering additional powers comes directly from one of the Shadow's Thorns, however. Can't think of it's name...

I have some reservations about the tempting bargains idea. It seems to me that players (and characters) bargaining with known quantities will fairly easily be able to draw a line they just won't cross. In bargaining-with-the-devil stories, the twist is usually that something a character bargains to do is, for some reason the character doesn't know at the time of the bargain, much more harmful or evil than expected. But playing it that way would make the Dark Side seem like a sentient satanic being playing tricks -- not the way I percieve the Dark Side in Star Wars.

Also, if a character always kept his bargains, he'd never really go over to the Dark Side, right? Although he'd eventually be acting like he had anyway, which is interesting but again not the way I see the mythology working. I still see it as a sudden and catastrophic (in the mathematical sense) change rather than a slow accumulation of badness. Episode III will, I suppose, shed more light on this.

I'd be seriously tempted to use a Jenga stack for each character, if it weren't for the logistical awkwardness of preserving the stacks between sessions. For each unit of Dark Side assistance you accept, you have to move one block. It's reliably safe at the start (unless you really screw up), and gets insanely tense and dangerous after a certain point.

One real problem with the standard "lose a Force point and roll under your remaining Force point total to avoid going over to the dark side" approach is that the probabilities are deceptive. It's actually much riskier than it looks, which is just the opposite of what you want, which is for players to be afraid of the possible catastrophe but not have it happen very often.

For example, starting with 20 force points, suppose a player uses a total of 10 dark side points, reducing her force score to half (10). After each use, a d20 must be rolled equal or below the remaining total to avoid going over to the dark side. What's the probability that the character will have gone over to the dark side by the time 10 points have been used? Answer: over 96%.

Instead, you could just require the same roll (don't roll a 20) for every point used. Over 10 rolls, the cumulative odds of failure are only 40%. But then there's no sense of increasing danger. If you get away with the first 10 rolls, it's no less likely that you'll get away with the next 10 too.

The Jenga stacks being too inconvenient, I'd substitute pulling tokens out of a bag. Start with 1 black token and 19 light ones. Pull a token for each Dark Side point used. Pull the black token and go over to the dark side. If you pull 10 tokens, your overall chance to go over to the dark side is 50%. (More generally, the overall chance is N * 5% for N tokens drawn.) Each successive draw is a little more dangerous, but not so much so that the overall chance of failure gets deceptively high.

- Walt

See, I really see the Dark Side as being /exactly/ that kind of tempting, taunting thing. It's seductive, and plays that seduction off of fear, anger and hate. And so on.

'Hey. You. I'll give you the power you need to avenge your mother's death- but you'll have to kill. Not just the warriors, either. The women and children.'

(Or, next movie)

'Hey. Anakin. You want revenge on the Jedi? That can be arranged...'

Or, to quote the Yoda, 'Quick the Dark Side is to come in a battle, easily does it flow. But once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny.'

A fight is, normally speaking, the most desperate circumstance in the Space Fantasy genre. Especially a fight against an equal or superior foe. It's when the character is at their weakest, the most likely to give in- to accept some geas in exchange for the power to strike down their foe. But the geas lasts longer than the fight. One or two minor requirements- that's nothing. But slowly, it becomes a habit- get into a fight, take on more strictures for additional power (or even the same power, over and over) -until the character is so entrapped by their Dark restrictions they can no longer even try to walk down any other road. Hell, the Dark Side would even stop making such offers (or, at the least, make progressivly worse ones) at some point- after all, the character is already so enmeshed in their 'duties' that they can never break free, so there's no point in giving them further additional power.

Um, Walt, good points, in general. But the bag thing? Same odds as the d20 idea. The solution is to use more tolkens (or a larger die) and have them reduce more slowly).

OTOH, this is still known odds. I theorized that the GM could pull an unknown number of stones, but that really puts the character's fate in the subjective hands of the GM. Which isn't horrible, but...

How about if after a potential infraction, the GM asks for secret ballots which indicate from zero to three points each depending on how egregious they thought the infraction or use was (the point limit would be adjusted up or down depending on the number of players; I'd include the GM). Start with, say, 100 Light Side Force Rating and reduce it by the numbers on the ballots handed in. Then the player must roll percentile below the current rating to not go Dark Side. Players aren't allowed to tell the suffering player how many they selected, so they will have to guess just how in the hole the character is based on how bad they were, and guage chances from that. Redemptive situations would just be the reverse.

How's that sound? Keeps the drama high for everyone, and also supports the group view of the relevance of actions.

Mike

ER...


I dunno.

That seems like it could turn into a 'Player A versus Player B' OR a 'Party cohesion above all logic and reason' (or, ironically, both at once) real easy. Which would be Bad.

wfreitag wrote:
I'd be seriously tempted to use a Jenga stack for each character, if it weren't for the logistical awkwardness of preserving the stacks between sessions. For each unit of Dark Side assistance you accept, you have to move one block. It's reliably safe at the start (unless you really screw up), and gets insanely tense and dangerous after a certain point.

Drew Stevens wrote: That seems like it could turn into a 'Player A versus Player B' OR a 'Party cohesion above all logic and reason' (or, ironically, both at once) real easy. Which would be Bad.

wfreitag wrote:
I'd be seriously tempted to use a Jenga stack for each character, if it weren't for the logistical awkwardness of preserving the stacks between sessions. For each unit of Dark Side assistance you accept, you have to move one block. It's reliably safe at the start (unless you really screw up), and gets insanely tense and dangerous after a certain point.

Not really so difficult to do the Jenga thing. At the end of a session record the number of blocks pulled (a tally can be kept as you go). When you do a new session, just build the tower like starting from scratch. Then when the next infraction occurs, pull out all the ones from the last game, plus the one for this infraction. This makes that first pull more risky, but that's probably not a big deal.

If that seems to be too long or weird, then the player can pull all the ones that he did before at the start of play and as it goes on. If the tower collapses, then he can just start over until he get's it right.

Still, if unknown odds is what you want, there are easier ways. In fact any sufficiently complicated die rolling mechanic should suffice. Just as with Jenga, the player will have some idea the danger, but not exact. If you want really unknown odds, you can use some blind method of dertermining odds. Player rolls a d6 for each level of infraction, and the GM consults some chart that has the deductions from the total assigned randomly.

roll
1___ -4
2___ -2
3___ -5
4___ -6
5___ -1
6___ -3

I'm sure there are even easier ways that I'm not thinking of.

Mike

I quite like the idea of having some power you can use, but you have to roll to avoid its affecting what Side you are on. It seems to me that every point of Dark Side you acquire, you should have LOTS of cool powers you can start acquiring (but you have to roll again when you use them, of course), and that returning to the Light Side would take similar rolls but at minuses for each Dark point you've acquired. Remember, the players know perfectly well that the Dark Side is dangerous and evil --- they've seen movies. But if you keep putting them in difficult situations, the question is whether they'll start going for an immediate solution (impatient you are!), or just trusting in the Force that everything will turn out okay in the end. Since the whole mechanic deals with an explicit problematic, for both players and characters, I don't see the difficulty in having it be very simplistic. The complexity comes when the character is faced with disaster in terms of events, but which could be averted by the use of the Dark Side; the character now agonizes about what to do, which is presumably the goal of the mechanic.

Okay, pimp mode. :D I've just completed a ~16-page Feng Shui --> Starwars conversion, and am writing up the playtest adventure. It includes new and adapted archetypes (Jedi Pilot, Ace Pilot, Jedi Warrior, Jedi Philosopher, Fringer, Noble, Droid, a few others), a new skill list, Force and Flow schticks, vehicle combat rules, and vehicle and character record sheets. End game pimp.

The way I did Dark Side, was a two stats (Light and Dark), the sum of which was equal to double the character's Force attribute (which replaced Chi). Dark Side assists in the Force Lightning schtick, and can be used for better results with your Destiny (replacing Fortune) dice, but if too much is aquired (i.e., more Dark then Light), the character becomes an NPC. However, I'm looking for alternatives. This thread is . . . useful . . . to me. :D

Others before us have done SW stuff with FS. Check out this site, as well as this one. I don't really like what they've done, but it's inspirational material. :-)

Hi, I'm DS! :) I'd wondered if you were the same Jeff/Jeph fellow.

But anywho. Yeah, you already sent me the 16 page PDF. Which has mostly been burning in the inspiration fires of my belly- the result is a MASSIVELY expanded list of Flow Schticks for Cool Lightsaber Tricks. And had me thinking about the whole Light Side / Dark Side disjunct- which is how I got to here.

I dunno. I just don't see going to the Dark Side as a single, smooth and complete thing, even within Star Wars. It shouldn't be that clear, IMO.

Yeah, it's me. I migrated hear thanks to a link in one of Andrew Martin's posts on RPG.net. :-)

Anyway. Perhaps call for Willpower rolls with the character's current Dark Side as the TN, at certain times? If they fail, then the GM gets to narrate their character's actions for a spell. That can help introduce new conflicts, and give characters a good reason not to let their Dark Side rating get out of hand.

Maybe characters could, whenever they like, gain extra Destiny dice. When they roll the die, they add the result to a running talley on their character sheet. At the end of the session, they make a Willpower roll, against that talley. If they fail, they gain the Outcome in Dark Side. If they succeed, then the Outcome is subtracted from the current talley. The talley does not reset at the beginning of each session. At high tension moments, characters would have to make a Willpower roll against their Dark Side; failure indicating that the GM, or maybe the players communually, determine the characters actions. Kinda like Lapses in Unsung?

Mm. Not being familiar with Unsung, I can't really comment.

As to the rest, I dunno. The idea of the Dark Side not being an utterly binary state has somewhat enchanted me. And removing narrative control from the player over how their character acts seems... not so good, to me.

I suppose I should actually just finish writing up my version... ;)

Mike's mention of the secret ballots got me thinking this direction; it might help.

Whenever the player chooses to accept help from the dark side, the amount of help he takes is connected to a die type. That is, a really major boost would connect to a d12, and a simple push to a d4. The player would know what die he's taking, but he wouldn't know what was rolled. These rolls would be tallied by the referee, and kept secret.

Also, a roll would be made for each character that would be his personal break point. I suspect something like 5d20 would do the job well, as most people would find a break point in the middle somewhere, but the range is pretty wide. This would also be hidden from the player.

Redemptive acts might also be included, and these, too, would be connected to a hidden die, reducing dark side points by an unknown amount.

Now what you have is that the player doesn't know how many dark side points he actually has or how many he can absorb before he goes over the edge. He only knows that he's taking a significant risk which grows greater with each use of the dark side.

Keeping all the information secret from him tempts him to believe that he's not so bad off as all that and can afford to take the chance--at least for the risk-accepting player. The risk-adverse player will probably avoid the dark side even when he's got plenty of room to play it.

Well, it might work.

--M. J. Young

Hi there,

Maybe I'm just a Fortune-y Narrativist kind of guy, but ...

1. Sorcerer's Humanity rules are Fortune-driven. Do a Good Thing, get a Humanity gain roll; do a Bad Thing or a Sorcery Thing and get a Humanity check. Neither is guaranteed. We've recently discussed the thematic content of this rules-device on the Adept Press forum. Please note that the roll for Humanity checks for Doing Bad Things is always 50%, regardless of current Humanity score.

Hence, there you are, at Humanity 1 ... do the thing? The Bad Thing? Will it take you to 0? 50%, pal - same as the drop from (e.g.) 6 to 5.

2. I'm reading a hell of a lot of Tunnels & Trolls stuff lately (and hoo-boy is that gonna be a series of posts one day), and here's a scene from one of their solo modules. You meet this smirking elf, right, and he offers a game (you can refuse). Pay 100 g.p. to play. Reach into a bag full of jewels and cobras, and take a jewel. Roll 1d6. Repeat as many times as you like; stop when you like. Keep adding the die total to the last roll/total. When that value hits 20, a snake strikes you, very awfully poisonously.

If I were setting up a Dark Side kinda situation, these two examples would be playing the primary prompting role.

Best,
Ron

Mike Holmes wrote: Um, Walt, good points, in general. But the bag thing? Same odds as the d20 idea. The solution is to use more tolkens (or a larger die) and have them reduce more slowly).

Mike Holmes wrote: I have to say that I think that the idea of the GM offering bits of bait to the players sounds like just too much fun.
...
But I also think that there has to be some arbitrary game mechanic that serves to throw the player over to the dark side at some point. The GM cannot just decide.

It seems to me, in line with the films, any mechanic that maps a character's decline should come from his motivations, if he chooses his primal or base instincts. Further, a mechanic to map a character's decline should also be able to map any possible redemption, and I don't think this should involve the player ever losing absolute control of his character.


Motivation
I think the important thing about any fall to the darkside is its motivation, needing to come from a character's choice towards greed, envy, rage or whatever. I would suggest players may accept dark side force bonuses (extra dice, or rerolls or something) for any sequence of actions, if they can attach a strong primal drive to the act, such as rage against Vader. This bonus should be large or small, depending on how strongly the character feels about this act. I think taking the bonus should also require the character to act primitively, or barbaric, for the duration of the bonus, hacking apart the guild droids without any regard for civilians around them, or whatever.


Decline
I'd go with the points model of the dark side, represented on a scale of 20 (none) to 1 (complete), where you lose 1 point for accepting the above bonus. If the player doesn't take the bonus, I'd require him to test against his dark side level, rolling a number of d20 according to how tempting the dark side is for this course of action. If one of the d20 is over the player's level, the character should be required to act according to the dark side anyway, but without receiving the bonus. I think this should be left to the player to narrate, however.


Redemption
The player would, however, receive a light side point each time they are forced to act 'evil', when they didn't take the dark side bonus originally. However, not accepting the bonus of the dark side when the player would be forced to act in such a way anyway would be dangerous, and take some bravery from the player.


The thing would be that players wouldn't fail once and remain evil, a player who had given in to his urges many times, like Vader, would constistantly act 'evil', even when the player desired otherwise, but there would always be chance of a redeeming act. It can be thought of as the scenes in RotJ with Luke, Vader and the Emperor as Vader failing a series of dark side checks, acting without the power of the dark side, but building enough power that he eventually makes a check, and saves Luke.

A few posits

First, there wouldn't be an absolute 'Dark Side' with the GM temptation thing. Just increasing levels of metaphysical debt/requirements owed to the Dark Side.

I actually think that it's the 'Whoops! You're character's just become an NPC!' mechanic that underlies any Fortune Dark Side system that drives me up the wall. It should never happen arbitrarily or as a fluke- which is the potential for every other system given. Under mine, the player would never suddenly lose control of their character- that control would be shaved away, sliver by sliver, until the player decides they have become too corrupted to continue trying. At which point they voluntarily give the character up. It becomes a matter of player choice at every step along the path, rather than a fortune mechanic dictating. And while I realize that dice are really easy to ignore, it also removes the drama from the situation to do so, in the exact same fashion as too overtly ignoring combat results that would be fatal to the PCs removes the tension from a fight.

A compromise might be the Raveloft Dark Powers check- but that seems to weaken the narrativist potential of the whole drama by taking what should be a choice and making it a die roll to see if the character is strong enough to resist. Which makes perfect sense from a simulationist sense ('The character's rise or fall has nothing to do with my knowledge and abilities as a player, but rather their own as a character') but seems lousy from a narrativist PoV.

Although I do like *ip's system- that seems to be on the same goal as not instantly reducing a character to Dark Side NPC status. At the same time, I don't know about that 'Every time you perform evil while resisting, you get a light side point back'... while it makes sense mechanically, it doesn't really seem to fit genre...

John Kim wrote: OK, maybe this is going off topic, but personally I feel quite differently about this. I think the main thing is that I prefer that morality remain ambiguous -- i.e. a quality which may be judged by differently by various characters as well as players.

wfreitag wrote: Buzz.

Hi there,

Following up on Mike Holmes and John Kim ...

I don't see the options limited to free-form vs. mechanical; in fact, I venture to say that this dichotomy is largely not an issue in role-playing in general. Both my Tunnels & Trolls example (which was not about morality but could be adapted into a Dark Side mechanic) and my Sorcerer example are based on my preferred approach that choice leads to Fortune outcome leads to new basis for choice.

Best,
Ron

Mike, you're right about the 100-point mechanism, but I see the deceptiveness of the odds as a big potential problem. I think many if not most players would see going down to 90 from a starting point of 100 as being still very much in a "safe" part of the range, unaware that even to get that far is taking a cumulative risk almost tantamount to a coin flip. Many would probably also see 80 points as "still pretty good" and not realize that using the next 10 points from 90 to 80 would be far riskier still (about a 4 in 5 chance of going over, in those ten checks alone). This seems almost like entrapment.

Ron, I agree on the power of the mechanisms you cite in representing incremental change. The split between free-form vs. mechanical arises when what's being modeled is a catastrophic (discontinuous) change, like Banner turning into the Hulk: he doesn't get more and more Hulk-like as anger builds up; he hits a threshold and that's it, all or nothing. Ultimately, in such a case, the final deciding factor at the moment the change-over occurs has to be either a mechanical result or a player choice. (Even if the mechanism involves both, in the end one or the other must have had the final say in any given instance.)

Now, Drew and others disagree with me on whether or not "going over to the Dark Side" in Star Wars should be modeled as a catastrophic event. I certainly have no problem with that.

In the T&T example, it appears to make a big difference whether or not the threshold is known by the player in advance. Is it? If it is, you know in advance that you have a number of safe draws, and you know when your next draw will no longer be safe. If it's not, what would that imply for extrapolating the mechanism to a standard system element for which the threshold would be difficult to keep secret from players?

- Walt

Hello, :)

wfreitag wrote: This seems almost like entrapment.

Given the subject matter, entrapment is not much of a stretch of the imagination. At least subconscious entrapment. Also note that if you put those odds reservations in the rules themselves, then the entrapment, if still present at all, does become subconscious. I think that'd be ok, no?

Y'know, you're both absolutely right. So okay, change that sentence to "This is, therefore, an ingenious mechanism for representing the insidious allure of the Dark Side."

- Walt

Hmmm. Odds Opaqueness as a tool to guide player action. Neat. Ethics anyone? :-)

Also keep in mind the horseracing problem. That is, the odds must change in the middle of the race to keep up with the frontrunners if betting is allowed to continue after the bell (which is why it's not). In our case, a character who has already dropped 5 points and gotten away with it has, in fact, a substantially larger chance of making it to 10 down than when he started. As such, an even more insidious effect occurs, the "push your luck" effect. From a player POV, he's not looking at a target. He's just looking at that next roll. If the odds are 95% that he'll be fine for this roll, the player will often consider that alone in the current decision.

Oh yes, this will draw them in like flies, I think. Make it uncertain, and the effect increases I think. Say on each violation the GM rolls a d3-2 in secret. Perhaps the character has not been affected at all after 5 rolls. The player can assume 95% for his next roll. But since it's uncertain, he'll have even more incentive to consider the current situation over the ramifications.

This all assumes that compelling in game reasons can be made to use Dark Side powers.

Mike

Hi,

Walt, the T&T example was taken from a solo adventure module, so the threshold is known to the player. I think that makes sense; it's exactly the same as the difference between any Humanity value above 1 in Sorcerer and the value of 1 (which is known to the player).

The point in both cases is that there are three phases: (a) no result of the dice can "damn me," (2) the dice may or may not "damn me," and (3) damned.

So it's a lot like Blackjack. In the T&T example, the first gem gets you, maximum, 6. The problem is when you hit 14 or higher, and ... hit me? Um ...

I think this works better than an unknown threshold, as the "safe" score values act, essentially, as theme music throughout the history of the character.

Best,
Ron

It seems the majority of posts now are on the merits of different rising risk* mechanics, where multiple rolls affect the chance of a certain test being made, or failing, in future. While this mechanic might be part of a "dark side" element to a game, there are several other elements that need to be considered, if I have missed any, or if any could be better phrased, please give suggestions.

A good act/evil act mechanic, here specifically in relation to Star Wars, seems to consist of the following options;

Temptation - there must be some reason for choosing to take the risk of the dark side. This can be bonusses to your actions, or new powers, but does it have to be?

Threat - the likelihood of suffering any repercussions from the dark side. Should this increase as you take more dark options, and increase if you take increasingly dark options? Should this be an either/or thing, or should it be a scaled threat, where you may suffer one of several penalties of increasing severity? Are there any benefits to a guaranteed penalty, rather than a fortune based system?

Consequences - the negative result of taking the dark side option. I personally hate the consequence, 'lose your character to the GM', that seems very non-enjoyable to me, I think there must be other options, such as the imposition of codes of behaviour proposed in the initial post.

Increasing decline - should choosing the dark side increase the likelihood of choosing it again, and increase the danger of the actions taken? It seems that most mechanics discourage choosing the dark side with increasing regularity, which seems to me at odds with the films.

Redemption - most systems model decline, but not the chance of redemption, which again seems at odds with the films. If a chance for redemption is desirable, how is this best done?

It seems to me the mechanics of rising risk being suggested are not the best way of representing the above, especially when coupled with the penalty of losing your character. Going through that list of requirements, I'm increasingly thinking that a model of the temptation of the dark side, or anything similar, shouldn't be done with a pass/fail test.




*This was the best name I could come up with, sorry :)

Jeremy Cole wrote: Increasing decline - should choosing the dark side increase the likelihood of choosing it again, and increase the danger of the actions taken? It seems that most mechanics discourage choosing the dark side with increasing regularity, which seems to me at odds with the films.

I was thinking about this earlier this morning, and had a rather bizarre notion - rather than Jenga, how about Connect Four?

Every time you perform a 'Dark Side' action Red gets a piece to play, and every time you perform some noble or selfless act Yellow gets a piece.

Now, bringing in a different game for resolving this sort of thing does seem a little squiffy, but I like the fact that there's a temptation to push it so far, and try and 'block' the Dark Side for a little longer.

I'm not entirely sure how this would work over a campaign - either keeping a record of where the pieces were played or starting afresh each time a new piece was added, nor am I sure how you'd need to adjust the rules of Connect 4 to cope with dissimilar numbers of pieces that those involved were free to play. I'm verging on ultimate digression now, so I'll stop.

- drew

Problems with that method, MJ.

The odds from 70 to 100 are over half a percent, and from 75% are almost 3%. The problem is that you've only got a 50 $ chance to make it past two rolls. If you do make several rolls, somehow, then the horserace problem begins, and, since the player's odds are dramatically increased, he will keep rolling. Until he gets to, say, 90% where he has better than a 50% change of rolling out.

Then what?

Thematically it's all messed up, too. You're being rewarded for successfully avoiding the Dark Side with more resitance to the Dark Side.

Mike

You're twice right, Mike; and I don't seriously think I've got the perfect answer here.

However, what I like about the system is that it is seductive.

Typically, the average role player looks at odds in a rather straightforward way: what are my chances of making this roll? If you've got a system in which the odds of failure keep going up (as with rolling against a percentage that increases with increasing darkside points) the system discourages you from taking the chance again. You eventually decide you've pushed your luck as far as you can push it, and you get out of the game.

But the dark side is supposed to work opposite to this. It's supposed to be that the more you yield to the forces of the dark side, the more tempted you are to do so again. By having the chance of failure decline with each success, you create the incentive for the player to act in a manner which reflects the expected feelings of the character. That is, each time I successfully use the dark side without suffering for it, as a character, I more and more believe myself invincible, that I can get away with it; and in the mechanics, the perceived odds reflect this, because as a player I'm being told that I have a lower and lower chance of failure, a better and better chance to avoid the dark side entirely.

I think there are a couple of tweaks necessary; I'm just not sure how to do them at this point. One is that, as you observe, the chance of failure is far too high on the first rolls. There has to be a level set at which the chance of failure is not so high on the first rolls, but is still high enough to make the player nervous about making those first rolls. Maybe a ten to fifteen percent chance of failure would do the job.

The other is that the system can't ever confer immunity on the character. Probably you'd have to stop at one percent; or maybe you could shift to a decimal (that is, if you roll 99 you have to roll another die for the tenths).

At some point you'd have a system in which the perception to the player would be that each time he gets away with using the dark side he's more likely to get away with it again; but because of the cumulative odds of repeated rolls, he's actually increasing his chance overall such that ultimately, if he allows himself to yield to the temptation, he will be caught.

--M. J. Young

M. J. Young wrote: However, what I like about the system is that it is seductive.

Typically, the average role player looks at odds in a rather straightforward way: what are my chances of making this roll? If you've got a system in which the odds of failure keep going up (as with rolling against a percentage that increases with increasing darkside points) the system discourages you from taking the chance again. You eventually decide you've pushed your luck as far as you can push it, and you get out of the game.

erithromycin wrote: I was thinking about this earlier this morning, and had a rather bizarre notion - rather than Jenga, how about Connect Four?

Hullo, :)

Hmm... It occurs to me that L5R's taint mechanics are somewhat related to this. For the unfamiliar, here's how it goes:

a) You don't have any taint until some external factor makes you gain it. External factors include long incursions through the shadowlands, wounds inflicted by shadowlands beasts, etc... You get taint in tenths of points. Until you get to a full point, it pretty much doesn't exist.

b) Once you get to a full point of taint, you can now use it. The effects of its use vary but are generally proportional in power to the number of full points you have. Each usage of taint gets you as many tenths of point as full points you already have.

c) Also, once you get to a full point, taint increases on its own. Very, very slowly. Like, every month, you make an easy roll to see if it goes up or not. If it doesn't, the roll for next month gets a bit harder. If it does, it goes up by as many tenths as full points you already have, and the difficulty of the roll resets.

d) Once the number of full points of taint exceeds the highest of your attributes, that's it, game over. Give your character to the GM. You have become a shadowlands beast.

e) One other effect is that successive full points of taint start giving you interesting physical characteristics (like, say, an extra arm).

f) Oh, I almost forgot. There is no way to bring taint down. Ever. Well, that's not really true. There is a spell that can remove all taint, but you have to be a voluntary target. Also, it involves your death.

And that's that. It seems to me that, if not for step e), this could be used interestingly. For instance, as long as the character can 'keep ahead' by increasing his stats as he gains taint, he will get more and more powerful in a very alluring way. But all of a sudden, he fails to keep up and it's bye-bye-bryan time. ;)

Cheers,

J.