hey guys and gals and various werebeasts,

I'm starting to think about Crux conflict, and have discovered a wall I'm bouncing on. I'm hoping some of you could help me out.

The basic idea is that classic, I-hit-him-with-my-+2broadsword combat is red (physical) conflict. Slam poetry, insults, having your dark secret exposed - this is amber (social) conflict. There won't be a separate chapter for Combat in the Crux book, because combat isn't a central premise of the game. Conflict, on the other hand...

So I want there to be 7 kinds of conflict, one for each color. The problem is trying to figure out what some of that conflict is like. Here's where I could use your help - what kind of conflicty events go with the following colors and associations?

Red - strength and athletic skills
Amber - charisma and social skills

(Those two are basically figured out - what about:)

Green - intelligence and knowledge skills
Cyan - Dexterity and precision skills
Blue - will and spiritual skills (counseling, meditation, prayer, etc.)
Magenta - perception and artistic skills
Clear - empathy and magical skills

Note that empathy is a character's ability to understand the universe at large, to know what Quiddity/Chi is doing in a particular place and how to avoid the not-so-nice effects that can cause. This is why it's magic.

So, yeah, what does artistic combat look like? Is cyan conflict just a gunfight, or can it be more than that? I think that the color of the conflict defines the damaged color - red conflict removes red motes from the caern - so cyan conflict wouldn't be a gunfight, as that would still remove red motes.

An additional thing that's bugging me - ranged vs. melee. For combat, the distinction is red skills vs. cyan skills, so I can see that being a useful distinction, for damage. That is, in a red conflict, ranged weapons use cyan skills and cause greater damage. Cyan is opposite red on the spectrum. In amber conflict, ranged damage comes from blue skills (hypnotism, for example). In a cyan conflict, ranged damage comes from red skills. And so on. Ranged isn;t about how far away you are, it's about how easy it is to dodge (usually impossible or VERY difficult) and how much damage it does - guns and bows are more dangerous and deadly than knives and sticks.

This is not to say that swords and axes aren't deadly too. Damage, at the moment, works like this:

Normal damage (WoD's Bashing) causes bruises and scrapes, and Deadly damage (WoD's Lethal) causes punctures, sucking chest wounds, and general whup-ass.

Melee weapons do normal damage as default. The amount depends on the draw - Power + weapon bonus + appropriate Trait. So, using my +4 sword of ouchiness, and drawing 5 power, if my strength is 3, I've done 4+5+3 or 12 normal damage (ND).

Ranged weapons use a multiplier, with the average handgun's multiplier being 6. I shoot with my Gun of Hurtiness, and get 3 power. That's 18 ND.

Deadly damage (DD) is determined by how strong the victim's trait is. For the melee, on an average victim (strength of 3), that's 4 DD - he's not doing well (it IS a Sword of Ouchiness!). Same guy, unhurt, shot with the gun - that's 6 DD, which will put him in a coma at the least.

Every caern starts with 3 of each color, so to kill someone, you have to do more damage than the victim's trait + 3. DD removes a mote from the victim's caern (among other things), and ND provides a penalty to draws, for every Trait # of ND taken. If I collect 6 ND, and have a Trait of 3, then I'm at -2 to all draws. If I take 4, that only -1, because I only have the one set of 3 in there. If my Trait is 10 (I'm a god, yeah, I'm bad, you know it), and have 8 ND, I have no penalty at all yet.

Now, a weak little guy with a strength of 2. The melee - 6 DD, which kills him outright, as it's more than the 5 motes he has. The gunshot - 9 DD - "meet my friend, Fine Mist". Str of 5, melee does 2 DD and 2 ND. Gunshot - 3 DD and 3 ND.

I like grainy and deadly, but this is TOO grainy I think.

Anyone offer some help?

Aidan

Here's where the problem starts, IMO:

I think that the color of the conflict defines the damaged color - red conflict removes red motes from the caern - so cyan conflict wouldn't be a gunfight, as that would still remove red motes.

Normal damage (WoD's Bashing) causes bruises and scrapes, and Deadly damage (WoD's Lethal) causes punctures, sucking chest wounds, and general whup-ass.

Ranged weapons use a multiplier, with the average handgun's multiplier being 6. I shoot with my Gun of Hurtiness, and get 3 power. That's 18 ND.

I like grainy and deadly, but this is TOO grainy I think.

Green - intelligence and knowledge skills

Cyan - Dexterity and precision skills

Blue - will and spiritual skills (counseling, meditation, prayer, etc.)

Magenta - perception and artistic skills

Clear - empathy and magical skills

Hey Mike,

I like the color of the act plus the color of the outcome solution.

When you open a system up like this, you tend to get players always using their best stat to try to do everything. What I'd do is figure out a way so that each stat had natural susceptibilities and resistances to other stats. Thus, Red might be the most effective way to damage Red, but Blue would be hard to affect Red with.

The alternative is to reduce stats as they're used, cycling points through them as if they're colored buckets, ala The Valedictorian's Death (and Jared's Red, White, Blue, from which it takes inspiration). The consequence to this method is that you can no longer use stats for character differentiation...you'd need to come up with another means of achieving that.

Paul

So, what you're saying is that swords and choppy bits are red-red combat - red actions for red damage, while guns and shooty bits are cyan-red combat, with cyan actions for red damage. That's doable. There are lots of associations with the colors, so a green-cyan conflict might be information leaked to the authorities to get you put in jail. Kind of like a green grenade.

Keep in mind that I'm making a distinction between task resolution and conflict. Task reolution may result in damage, but it's always impersonal - falling, big nasty fires, and so on. Conflict is always personal.

What I'm not seeing, though, is how being put in jail (cyan because it's about movement and freedom) is deadly. Being insulted (amber) to the point of suicide - I can see that, and being hacked to death, that's really easy to see. This is what I'm having trouble with. You've allowed me to refine the question, though, so here goes:

What do the other colors represent, in terms of personal and potentially deadly damage? Clear is easy, yeah, so skip that, but what is artistic damage? That's really what I'm describing here.

I like the color action-color damage system, but I'm not convinced it would work yet. Have to see what some possibles for color damage are.

On damage - if everything's normal damage, fine, but where does the removal of motes come from? Are my ranges simpler smaller (witha knife doing 1 or 2 damage only, and a gun potentially 7), and if so, how does that follow from the draw's power? Or do I convert to motes removed as before, just don't call it deadly? At which point, it seems silly not to - it IS so much more deadly than the other stuff, which only causes penalties.

Note that when motes are removed from your caern, the opponent gets to define a new flaw of the appropriate strength and color, and to heal back those motes, you have to spend XP (Boons or motes from passions) to heal the flaw. If I got shot in the leg for 1 DD (1 red mote from my caern), then the Guide (for the NPC who shot me) might give me the flaw "Limpy R1" - no effect but color, except for the effect on the caern).

Aidan

Mike Holmes wrote:

Normal damage (WoD's Bashing) causes bruises and scrapes, and Deadly damage (WoD's Lethal) causes punctures, sucking chest wounds, and general whup-ass.

I'd ignore "damage types", and just stick with bonuses for weapons. This is actually realistic. There is no such thing as "non-lethal" damage. As a Physicians Assistant I know once told me, "any harm to a person that renders them unconscious is a potentially life-threatening situation". For a more cinematic sort of game, there are other ways to keep characters from dying than the "normal" damage fallacy (in this case in the stat comparison/draw).

I would rather contend that it actually reduces complexity, because "any color and conflict with any other color" is a lot easier to process than "there are three kinds of conflicts..."; the fact that it creates more different situations in a play is an outgrowth of its simplicity.

Okay, Shreyas, good point. And complexity from simplicity is great.

So, if conflict is determined by what you're doing and what is damages, the question remains - what the heck does magenta damage look like! ;)You have to think laterally - cyan is about dexterity and motion, including freedom or the lack thereof, so imprisonment can be cyan. But what does cyan damage look like? Is imprisonment a sufficient reason for cyan motes to be lost from the caern - measuring a change in one's ability to move in the world, on a different logical level?

As to minimizing min/max - I think I'll just make non-axis colors do a little less damage, or be a little more difficult (same difference, really). As to what axis - doesn't matter - I think. I'm starting to imagine counterexamples - in which case - screw the players another way! (I've been playtesting - I should post the results to the actualplay forum... all kinds of great ways to screw over my players, without it being painful or nasty!)

Aidan

So, if conflict is determined by what you're doing and what is damages, the question remains - what the heck does magenta damage look like! ;)You have to think laterally - cyan is about dexterity and motion, including freedom or the lack thereof, so imprisonment can be cyan. But what does cyan damage look like? Is imprisonment a sufficient reason for cyan motes to be lost from the caern - measuring a change in one's ability to move in the world, on a different logical level?

Heya Jack! (I have to start that way - it doesn't feel right otherwise!)

That last bit was me playing devil's advocate, while at the same time having my head up something dark and smelly. I warned you about the number jags! ;)

Okay, so I see what you're saying - and it's intuitive. One of the playtesters suggested creative block for magenta conflict too. the idea of "incapacitation" really clarified for me, and I now totally agree on that count, as well as on the single type of damage.

Motes can still be removed (a sign of incapacitation), and replaced temporarily with Flaws, to be bought off later to gain the return of the motes.

Now - Death! I can see the collapse of the spectrum if one whole color is missing. Imprisonment doesn't kill you, but it can lead you there if it's severe enough. Creative block can be the same. In most of these cases, it's probably self induced, but that really doesn't matter when you're a corpse.

The thing is - for characters anyway - Death is hard to come by, unless they want it. Boons can prevent Death in every case - and Death thus only happens when the character is down to 0 in a color and has no Passion left. A player can choose to have a character die, and that's fine, at any time.

The other question left is how do damage mechanics work? I think there should be a difference between how ranged (difficult to avoid actions) and melee (easy to avoid) "attacks" calculate damage, even though there's only the one kind. Ranged should do more, in my mind, or at least have the capacity for it. So it seems like there would have to be some way of converting lots of damage into motes removed.

I like the simplicity of using the Trait (I have Perception 5, so 5 magenta motes of damage causes me to lose 1 magenta mote from the caern), but this sucks for low Traits. On one hand, that's as it should be, on the other - too grainy?

While we discuss it here (because having all the extra comments is helping me a lot - I hope you don't mind, Jack), some basic stuff to contemplate and be aware of.

Average Trait is 3, Average Aspect (aka skill) is 3, so the average Hand is 6 (we've gone Trait + Aspect). Average Power (aka number of successes) for that hand is 3. Average Obstacle (aka difficulty) is 2.

Caern is built with Trait+3. If my perception is 5, I'll add 8 magenta motes to my caern.

I know we need some sort of initiative too - is using the dex score too simple, or just right? Other ideas? I had this complicated thing sort of like Stances in TRoS, but I'm not sure that works either.

I think that's enough...

Thanks to everyone so far, BTW, this is helping a lot. I knew it was screwed up, but couldn't move my head somewhere else...

Aidan

Heya Aidan!

taalyn wrote:

I know we need some sort of initiative too - is using the dex score too simple, or just right? Other ideas? I had this complicated thing sort of like Stances in TRoS, but I'm not sure that works either.

taalyn wrote:

Boons can prevent Death in every case - and Death thus only happens when the character is down to 0 in a color and has no Passion left. A player can choose to have a character die, and that's fine, at any time.

The other question left is how do damage mechanics work? I think there should be a difference between how ranged (difficult to avoid actions) and melee (easy to avoid) "attacks" calculate damage, even though there's only the one kind. Ranged should do more, in my mind, or at least have the capacity for it. So it seems like there would have to be some way of converting lots of damage into motes removed.

I like the simplicity of using the Trait (I have Perception 5, so 5 magenta motes of damage causes me to lose 1 magenta mote from the caern), but this sucks for low Traits. On one hand, that's as it should be, on the other - too grainy?

Lot's of stuff to clear up here.

First, Jack got right exactly what I was talking about in terms of what the effects of Zero would be, but then you guys retreated from it, which I don't understand. There seems to be an opinion that causing someone to die is always preferable to causing them to become incapacitated somehow, and that as such, Zero in a Trait should cause death or something. I'm not getting that at all.

What I'm saying is that going to zero in any stat should have the game mechanical effect of preventing the character from doing anything. Incapacitation for some reason, whatever it is. That does not mean that the character should die, except in the case of Red and only in the case of Red going to zero. If your Green goes to Zero, then you are too mentally messed up to do anything. If your Blue is zero you have no will to do anything. Etc. You don't die, but the mechanical effect is the same, the character can't do anything until such point as he somehow gets a mote back in that color.

So let's say that I want to kill some guy with lots and lots of Red motes. Do I attack his Red? Well, I can do that. But if he's also low in, say, Blue, I'd attack him there instead. If I get him down to Zero Blue, then he'll have no will to defend himself, and I can then take all his Red motes if I so desire.

But this all assumes that killing is somehow a good idea. Why not reduce someone to Zero Blue, and instead get all the information I can from them? And then throw them in prison. Why is it so necessary that the game be all about killing folks? I don't get that at all. Isn't it a bigger coup, a more impressive feat, to capture something than to kill it?

I sense a strong "Traditional Gamer" bias in this determination. But I sense that the game won't be about tradtional things, and has non-traditional rules, so as long as you make the balance of the Conflict mechanics about things other than killing, I think it'll work. And for those who want to be killing machines, well, there's always the option to take a big Red score (or Cyan).


Ranged weapons do more damage than melee weapons? When? Where? Why? Let's take a quick look at Newton's Third Law in effect. When you fire a gun there's that "kick" that the firer feels? That kick is the "opposite and equal reaction". Which means that the person getting hit with the bullet is hit by exactly the same amount of force. The only reason that bullets go into people at all is that they are very small and fairly hard. If you get hit by a beanbag with similar force behind it, it hurts a bit, and might bruise you, but can't possibly kill you. People aren't knocked down by being hit by gunfire. Ever. If they do fall down, it's because they think they're supposed to do so.

With a sword, OTOH, you can put your full strength behind a blow, and really impart some force to a target. Causing much much larger wounds.

Guns are dangerous simply because they're easy to use, and can be used at range. Meaning that you can accost somebody potentiall without being accosted back. This makes aiming much easier, for instance. But given an opportunity to poke you with a rapier without you trying to stop me, or shooting you with a .45 at short range, the rapier is about 10 times more likely to kill you. Despite being common, and easy to use, only about 10% of GSW are fatal. Knifings are worse than that.

And with bows...think about it for a minute.

Now, as I always say when I point these things out, I'm being hyper-realistic here. This is based on data from the FBI and ARMA that only silly grognards like myself would ever bother to look up. So, if you want a game that matches the portrayal of guns in other media, particularly movies (I blame the movie Shane above all others for pushing the trend), then I suppose you might want to bump up gun damage.

But I don't see the point, particularly. Is this game about delivering a cinematic combat feel? I wouldn't say not to do it because it's not realistic, I'd say not to do it because it's just not important. You're adding rules to simulate something that just doesn't seem to be an important part of the game.


As for damage, and Combat in general, here's what I'd suggest. Both sides draw trying to achieve what they want to achieve. Count successes. Subtract the lower from the higher. The remaining amount is what the lower drawer takes in terms of Motes lost. Simple and fast. I think there may be some confusion here over the idea of Conflict v Task resolution.

Mike

I agree with everything Mike said just there except about zero red motes being death.

I don't see any need for there to be an exception for red (assuming zero motes in anything is out of action) - with zero red you're knackered and just lying around wheezing (in my humble opinion)

But other than that, pay attention to Mike Holmes, he's spouting wisdom.

I guess I wasn't too clear in my last point, because I was attempting to make the same points that Mike did in his last post. Zero traits should be about incapcitation, not death - which makes more exciting stories anyhows. This confusion is what I get after not sleeping for over 24 hours...

Just remember: what Mike said!

Jack goes to hit the Sack

When I read this and visualize it I see a color wheel with six pie slices. The center of this pie is a smaller circle that is in your description 'clear' however it is in my visualization actually white. Like the white of Saruman's(sp?) cloak in the Lord of the Rings. That is a white made up of all the colors. Each color has an opposite that it is espescially effective against. While it is less effective against bordering colors. Am I visualizing this correctly?

I think white works better than clear, as clear isn't really a color.

Hey Mike,

excelelnt ideas, and thanks for providing them. You and Shreyas will certainly be in the credits when we get there - you've been a great help.

Understand that I'm gun clueless (it's a long story, but lets simply say that I have the odd magical power to make guns jam on touch), so you're ultra-realism notes helps a lot. It all makes sense, plus you have Jack, my co-writer, on your side, so even if I wanted there'd be little I could do to counter. ;) You win!

Anyway, this works as you describe. I still have a couple of thought/issues, though.

You're right to say that Crux isn't about killing people - if anything, it's aboput all the problems that come with doing so. Which is why some way to determine death (even if rare or impossible for characters) is important. I want a way to account for accidental death in a gunfight, so that I can then add the police, guilt, revenging relatives in to the mix. That, and there is a certain degree of tension introduced, even if Crux let's the character escape death almost always.

Deadly weapons like guns and swords and letters (bombs) simply have a bonus to the loss/incapacitiation. My Sword of Ouchiness adds 2 to the damage. This is sleek, and I like.

How about initiative? This can be significant in conflicts - being able to whip off the first stinging insult can be quite an advantage, since any loss you cause means the other guy is less effective. Initiative is very important, I think. Have any of the ideas I mentioned sparked anyone's interest?

Thanks again, guys. This has been messed up for a long time (since I was discussing the whole thing here as Aisling), and it looks like it's finally reaching a good place. Now maybe we'll have to do magic here too...Jack? Good idea?

Aidan

Hi Ross!

Yeah, you've got it right. There are several reasons for going with clear -

White light isn't really white, is it? That's what that center represents, as I'm using the light spectrum instead of the paint spectrum (geekily, additive vs. subtractive spectra). Also, each caern, a collection of tokens representing motes of various colors, also includes one white, one black, and one iridescent (or stiped, or mauve, or polka dotted - distinctive somehow, anyway) token. The white mote is called a Boon, which has all sorts of good stuff come with it. If I call clear "white" there's confusion there, and the Boon as white is intuitive.

Also, technically, white isn't a color either - it's either all or none of them (depending on the spectrum used).

Does that make sense now?

Aidan

ross_winn wrote: When I read this and visualize it I see a color wheel with six pie slices. The center of this pie is a smaller circle that is in your description 'clear' however it is in my visualization actually white. Like the white of Saruman's(sp?) cloak in the Lord of the Rings. That is a white made up of all the colors. Each color has an opposite that it is espescially effective against. While it is less effective against bordering colors. Am I visualizing this correctly?

I think white works better than clear, as clear isn't really a color.

White light isn't really white, is it? That's what that center represents, as I'm using the light spectrum instead of the paint spectrum (geekily, additive vs. subtractive spectra). Also, each caern, a collection of tokens representing motes of various colors, also includes one white, one black, and one iridescent (or stiped, or mauve, or polka dotted - distinctive somehow, anyway) token. The white mote is called a Boon, which has all sorts of good stuff come with it. If I call clear "white" there's confusion there, and the Boon as white is intuitive.

Also, technically, white isn't a color either - it's either all or none of them (depending on the spectrum used).


thanks for the clarification. I like the idea of a boon mechanic as well. Thanks.

No "initiative". Again, what I propose is a contest between abilities. Higher drawer wins, and does something to the opponent.

So, if I'm drawing Cyan to escape, and you're drawing Red to do Red to me, and I draw higher, I get away. If you draw higher, you do damage, and I don't get away.

If I'm insulting you with Magenta, and you're trying to kill me with Red, and I roll higher, then I have insulted you, and you haven't hurt me because of the sting of the jibe. If we do the same Conflict again, and you win, you injure me before I can insult you, thus shutting me up.

It's a very simple method, but also very realistic. Conflicts are rarely "IGO UGO" in real life. Everybody sorta goes at the same time, and through some combination of events dictated by skill and random chance, somebody scores on somebody else. For example, in a sword fight, you might have a situation where one attacker attacks repeatedly forcing his opponent to defend like mad, and then the defender gets hit anyhow. Followed by the same thing. Sometimes one side just doesn't get an opening. IGO UGO systems just don't represent that well.

The system that I'm describing does represent this sort of situation. Using high levels of Green? Represents a fast mind. Lot's of Magenta? Quick wit. High Blue? Constant levels of spiritual support. In any case, they all represent some ability to do well in conflicts and find an opening to score on. After all, you wouldn't want to rate a character's speed of ability to insult on their Cyan, would you? So no need to have a secondary system to determine who "goes" before whom.

Mike

If you decide to go with the color for action/color for damage you get some unique advantages if you also decide to go with the simultaneously resolution system Mike is throwing at you. This relates to a system I've been experimenting in my head with, you can resolve all conflicts as damage.

Mike Holmes wrote: So, if I'm drawing Cyan to escape, and you're drawing Red to do Red to me, and I draw higher, I get away. If you draw higher, you do damage, and I don't get away.

Mike wrote: The system that I'm describing does represent this sort of situation. Using high levels of Green? Represents a fast mind. Lot's of Magenta? Quick wit. High Blue? Constant levels of spiritual support. In any case, they all represent some ability to do well in conflicts and find an opening to score on. After all, you wouldn't want to rate a character's speed of ability to insult on their Cyan, would you? So no need to have a secondary system to determine who "goes" before whom.

On intiative:

The issue isn't simultaneous IGO UGO for me. Rather, it's an issue of "I see what you're going to do, so I'm going to do this." I LIKE the simultaneity, and whatever else happens that will be included - every "action" in conflict includes attack AND defend.

There are metagame reasons for initiative. When I have 6 players all acting at once, I need both a way to fairly get actions in some sort of order and a way to reflect the fact that a player can preempt a NPCs actions (as well as other players). I suppose the simultaneity and the power of the draw addresses that last issue.

My thoughts on the metagame aspect - simply use DEX, in order from highest to lowest, and use draws to differentiate if necessary. If player's have DEX as: player a - 4, b 3, c, 5, and d5. Then c and d draw, then a then b. On the other hand, you guys may have a better way to handle this. I thought about simply going around the table to the left, but that seems to penalize players who sit to my right.

The more I think (and apologies for rambling, I just woke up and there is no caffeine) the more I think this metagame thing might not be an issue at all. Everyone simpoly says what they want to do, and the succeeding draws get to do what they want.

If Joe is running and shooting at the giant snake, and the Snake is moving and striking at Wanda: if Joe succeeds - he simply gets a shot and hits the snake, interrupting his action, thus preventing the snake from moving AND/OR striking Wanda. Perhaps power indicates whether both "sides" of the action are stopped, or whether he moves but striked, or strikes but doesn't move. If the Snake succeeds, Jow doesn't hit/run, depending. Actually, I like this. Simply require, say 2 power, to stop the secondary side of the action, the primary being the offensive side.

Another concern about simultaneous actions: only one side draws (PC), except for particularly significant NPCs or dramatically tense situations). That makes the "who got higher power" a difficult measure - it's represented already in simpoly one draw. Oh wait - íf it's included in the one draw, then it isn't an issue. If they don't get enough power, the other guy suceeds, with a power derived from how much the draw failed by.

Now, on damage - had inspiration/help last night from one of my playtesters. A caern, the pile of motes you draw from, contains a base 3 motes of each color plus traits. Incapacitation happens when you lose your Trait number of motes. If the remaining base 3 motes of a color are lost, death happens. If I have CHA 5 (amber), I can take 5 motes of "damage" before I'm flummoxed, and 3 more before I become suicidal.

The point of having death rules is to reflect the interrelatedness of the caern. Without any particular color, the spectrum starts to unravel. Since I'm concerned about damage being too severe, perhaps it takes twice your trait +6 to kill. If I have CHa 5, at 5 amber damage I'm temporarily incapacitated (I can regain those motes fairly easily), but once I've taken 8 (5+3), I'm doing badly, and those motes are hard to get back (a la previous rules ideas with flaws). And at 16 amber damage, I'm dead, from my spectrum unravelling.

With all this rambling, if people make a good case for why I'm just stuck on old ways of doing things, I'll believe you and drop it. Sorry for rambling on - you got the "thinking out loud" process - a good thing I think since you get a little bit into my head that way. It may reveal presuppositions I'm not conscious of.

Aidan

I would go ahead and present what we have on Magic so far as a separate thread, and see what people think. They might help with the three Schools of Sorcery, Magery, and Wizardry, since we seem to be going around in circles on that one. Also I'm curious to see what they think of our 7 Threads, and the minor, medor, and major levels of 7 actions (do we have a term for them?).

The ever-allusive Jack

I think I like the idea of incapcitation rather than death. Incapcitation emphasizes each color equally rather than just one. Death on the other hand creates a preference on red and other colors that make sense for death, and creates a wierd tension for the colors that don't.

Now of course death in rpg, just in life, is unavoidable. Why not have the idea that bringing one trait to zero creates incapcitation, doesn't matter what color. Once an opponent is incapcitated, then bring in the death mechanic, like lowering Red to zero. But first the target needs to be incapcitated first.

If it is Red that is brought to zero for incapcitation, then yes, the trait has to be brought down to zero again for death.

But lets say Blue is brought down to zero. The target has Flaws assigned appropiately by the attacking player. But lets say that the player wants the target to commit suicide. Then the player would assign Flaws that would cause the target to go commit suicide, lowering his or her own Red trait down to zero themselves. Or with Boons, the target removes the Flaws before suicide is successful.

What say you to this idea? I think it combines the incapcitation aspect plus the need for death aspect into one package.

As far as initiative goes, once again I think I like the simplicity of the one-step by Mike. He said the highest draw goes first. I think I actually would see it as end-result deciding who goes first. So everyone makes their draws, and based on power achieved, that declares who went first. This lets that lucky shot from the low trait go first at those miracle times.

Heya Jack,

I think what we're getting stuck on is that death is a physical (red) thing, and that's not necessarily the case. The mind(green) can shut down and you get brain death simply from (lack of) will - people who think themselves to death. Or the soul(blue) can be destroyed, which leads to death too.

What I'm saying is that red, green or blue can cause death, but the others don't. Perhaps clear/magic can bring death too, by simply sundering the threads that hold everything else together, though this might be a strange death that would be easier to resurrect from. You'd just need to reweave everything together. Of course, the body is easy to find, but where do you find the floating-free mind or soul?

So, if R,G, or B (and maybe X) are reduced to 0, death. Otherwise, it's incapacitation. Or perhaps you need to have two Traits incapacitated to die, with appropriate flaws helping. Red at 0? Create flaws that make the pain so severe they give up(B or G). Blue at 0? Flaws that induce the character to putting themselves in danger, like schizophrenia. Green at 0? Flaws that reflect a general lack of faithin the world, or the character believing that death is coming for them.

If one of the other colors reaches 0, incap, then flaws tend to aid in reducing another trait to 0 as well.

I like this. Now we have a simple way to reflect an incapacitating blow, with the evil serial killer who then scars the face (actually Green damage - damaging a person's understanding of themselves) or frightens the person (Blue damage) to death.

I'm still worried that this is too deadly - playtest will tell. I think perhaps the first Trait motes are easy to get back, and it's the last 3 (caern=trait +3, remember) that are difficult to regain. If I get incapped in conflict on amber, and I have CHA 5. I can regain those 5 motes fairly easily (within a day or two), but the last 3 remain for months or longer - those are the motes that have to be bought off with experience. This way, my draw isn't penalized forever, but there is still a game effect - I'm easily cowed by a certain person, for example, until my confidence is rebuilt (through XP). This also works for red, reflecting wounds that take months to heal. It's slightly unrealistic there, but not egregiously so.

Initiative - simple draw it is.

I'm starting a new thread with magic stuff.

Aidan

I'm always sufficiently dense in the mornings that I sometimes need things repeated for me. Let me see if I understand what you said last, Aidan.

So, if R,G, or B (and maybe X) are reduced to 0, death. Otherwise, it's incapacitation. Or perhaps you need to have two Traits incapacitated to die, with appropriate flaws helping. Red at 0? Create flaws that make the pain so severe they give up(B or G). Blue at 0? Flaws that induce the character to putting themselves in danger, like schizophrenia. Green at 0? Flaws that reflect a general lack of faithin the world, or the character believing that death is coming for them.

If one of the other colors reaches 0, incap, then flaws tend to aid in reducing another trait to 0 as well.

I like this. Now we have a simple way to reflect an incapacitating blow, with the evil serial killer who then scars the face (actually Green damage - damaging a person's understanding of themselves) or frightens the person (Blue damage) to death.

I'm still worried that this is too deadly - playtest will tell. I think perhaps the first Trait motes are easy to get back, and it's the last 3 (caern=trait +3, remember) that are difficult to regain. If I get incapped in conflict on amber, and I have CHA 5. I can regain those 5 motes fairly easily (within a day or two), but the last 3 remain for months or longer - those are the motes that have to be bought off with experience. This way, my draw isn't penalized forever, but there is still a game effect - I'm easily cowed by a certain person, for example, until my confidence is rebuilt (through XP). This also works for red, reflecting wounds that take months to heal. It's slightly unrealistic there, but not egregiously so.

Initiative - simple draw it is.

Heya Jack,
Your paraphrase is right. After the character is incapacitated (whatever color), Red, Green or Blue incapacitation then equals death.

Damage causes motes to be lost in the caern, where there are trait + 3 motes of each color. A Trait number of motes can ge regained fairly quickly, minutes to days, depending. The last 3 take months to years to heal without help (medical, psychiatric, magical, etc.) - in game mechanics, the flaw is bought off (and thus flaws are only applied when the damage is greater than the trait, and always range from 1 to 3).

Initiative is based on the highest power of the appropriate draw.

Let me do an example af a complex conflict (multiple attackes and defenders):

Our characters:
Amy: STR 3 CHA 4 DEX 2 INT 3, guns 2, bitch 4
Bob: STR 5 CHA 3 DEX 4 INT 3, guns 4, sword 2

The badguys:
Xon (Marahh henchman): STR 3 CHA 3 DEX 3, guns 3
York (Marahh agent): STR 4 CHA 4 DEX 3, sword 3, cutting remark 5
Zuul (summoned Caesura spirit): STR 4 CHA 8 DEX 7 INT 2 mindeating 4

Amy and Bob stumble across York and his henchman Xon in the middle of a ritual to summon a mindeater. In order to prevent the menace, Amy and Bob attack, hoping to stop the ritual. York and Xon saw them enter the warehouse.

Round 1:

Initiative:
Amy - RAA (Dex 3 - cyan) - 0 power
Bob - AGBM - 2 power
Xon - RMX - 0 power
York - RCG - 3 power
Order is York, Bob, Amy, and Xon (effectively, Bob then Amy).

York is going to finish his part of the ritual, and then move to engage Amy with his sword. Bob is going to fire at York (C on R) and avoid any attack on himself. Amy is going to fire at Xon (C on R), and avoid York. And Xon uses both sides of his action to finish the ritual.

First, Bob fires at York - that's a draw of 8 with an Obstacle of 4 (for distance). he draws - RAGCMMX and the Bane. That would be 3 power, but the bane subtracts 2 more motes (the Guide decides), for a final 1 power - he misses widely.

Now Amy fires at York - Draw 4 Obstacle 4. RRGX - only 1 power. She misses too.

Because they both missed, York was able to finish his part and has now moved to engage Amy. Xon completed the other parts of the ritual.

Round 2:
Init:
Amy - RCC - 4 power
Bob - RGB and the Boon, Bob opts for 2 motes to draw (gets RR) - 2 power
Xon - ACM - 2 power
York - AAM - 0 power

Amy then Bob, basically. Amy is going to shoot York(C on R), and avoid his sword. Bob is going to shoot at Xon(C on R), and avoid any attack against him. Xon will finish the ritual with one side, and with the other side will flee the warehouse. York is going to attack Amy(R on R), and will flee with his other side.

Amy shoots: Draw 4 Obstacle 2. RBBM - 2 power, not quite enough. Bob shoots at Xon, Draw 8 Obstacle 4 (Xon didn't move closer, nor did Bob) - RAACMXXX - only 2 power. Missed again. Xon finishes the ritual then flees.

Finally, York attacks Amy. She will dodge with a draw of 3 (her DEX) against an obstacle of 3 (York's DEX + sword aspect, halved). MBX - only 1 power, so she takes 2 damage to Red.

Round 3:
Init:
Amy - RBM - 1 power
Bob - RCX and Bane (Guide says it will go as badly as possible) - 2 power
Xon: fled, no longer in conflict
York: G boon and bane (2 motes for boon RC, goes badly) - 3 power
Zuul: CCGGGMX = 7 power

Zuul will try to eat Amy's mind (she's closest - B on G) with both sides, gaining a +1 to the attempt. York will try to attack Amy again (R on R), and insult Bob with the other (A on A), getting a -1 to each attamept (2 different targets). Bob will shoot at the mindeater, and dodge York's insults. Amy will try to disengage York, and avoid Zuul (-1, two targets).

Zuul jumps at Amy. She'll draw 3 (DEX), obstacle 4 (INT 2 + mideating 4 +1 bonus, halved). CGX - 3 power. Not enough, and Zuul does 2 damage (1 for power shortfall, 1 for bonus) to Green. Amy is now down 2 red and 2 green.

York tries to attack Amy. She'll draw 3 vs. 3 (STR 3, sword 3, -1 = 5 halved rounds up to 3). GGX, 2 power, takes no damage even though she failed to block. She would have taken 1 red, but with the minus for additional targets, there's nothing left. York thought he hit, but actually only sliced her shirt.

Now York insults Bob (A on A). Bob dodges with CHA, so he'll draw 3 vs. Obstacle 4 (CHA 4, cutting remarks 5, -1 = 8, halved). CMM, no power, so Bob takes 3 amber damage (4 - 1 for multiple targets).

Neither Bob nor Amy get to act now, as their acts were disrupted.

The conflict can continue, but this is enough. I'm wondering if Mike would post a complex conflict too, so I can see what he means? I think he's not going for this, but maybe...

Note that depending on the situations, I'm also open to single draw conflicts, depending on the significance of the fight. The above is obviously an important one, to do it round by round.

Aidan

Holy cats. It's times like these that I remember just how flakey most people must think our ideas here are. The Matrix is hard to shake.

taalyn wrote: After the character is incapacitated (whatever color), Red, Green or Blue incapacitation then equals death.

Why does Mike elegant use of simplicity always make me feel like my thinking is the equivalent of Jack Tripper from 3's Company trying to walk across the living room?

I don't know about you, Aidan, but I kinda like Mike's example better...
Sorry ;)

Jack

Well, yeah. I knew there was something wrong, I just couldn't figure out what the Matrix was. His example is better.

Aidan

The Matrix says, all contests must be "I go, then you go" (IGO UGO). Your system screams to me UGO UGO UGO. Which is very cool. The GM just states what obnoxious things are going on, and sets the targtets. The players roll to overcome. They either win and do damage if that's what they were intending, or they lose and take damage if what they were trying to do was defeat an opponent trying to do damage against them. All the focus is on character success or failure, and NPCs success or failure only in relation to competition with PCs. Neato.

Still some bugs to work out, however. What if I'm being attacked by a bunch of stuff? I would simply add one to the target for each extra opponent (or more if you want less "cinematic"). For really realistic, allow the player to divide up his draw as much as he wants and confront as many problems as he wants simultaneously. That's really harsh, but like TROS, fair. Players will find that in cases of facing multiple opponents that their conflicts all become about trying to get to a situation where they can only face one, again ala TROS terrrain rolls. That or running away.

Lot's of potential options.

Mike

Mike - I could recognize I was stuck (and hence why I asked for an example from you), but couldn't get my way out. Thanks for the Red Pill!

I prefer the split up their Hand idea for multiple combatants. My Charisma is 3 and my repartee is 4, so I can split my 7 motes among the 3 people harassing me.

Aidan

Here are some other issues that came up when talking to my playtesters. I think I have a solution, but Morphe...Mike, would you say yeah I've escaped the Matrix or not here?

Initiative - still need some sort of battle order - some way to gauge who says what they're doing first, so that all the characters don't end up attacking the same guy - actually, that's not a problem. I just can't process everyone saying what they're doing at once, and having everyone write down their action(s) before hand is awful - slows down everything. A battle order (not quite the same as initiative, as actions all happen at once even though they're drawn for in _some_ order) would be useful here. I'm thinking a simple left to right around the table, with each successive "turn" skipping a person - the person who went first in declaring this turn goes last next turn. Once actions are declared, people make draws, and it all goes down at once. The Guide will have lots to do in putting it all together - oh well.

Some of my players have hyperspeed (they're vampires), so they get (so they argue, and so far I'm buying the arguments) extra actions. This is simple - when they declare actions, they simply get to declare more actions: Bob can shoot York, and Amy can shoot Xon, but Vlad gets to shoot at York _and_ Xon, if he wants.

The only complication is how to measure how fast feits are cast while in conflict. Turns work, but somehow that seems vaguely Matrixal. Might work anyway, but just in case...

I know I keep saying this, but thanks so much for your help, Mike. I feel like we should include you as one of the main collaborators, a la Zak for Ron's Dunjon.

Aidan

Well, in real life, no one knows if everyone is going to gun for one enemy or not. Why is that any different in rpgs?

But I don't think that truly answers your question.

While the idea of each player righting down their action then drawing appropiately is intriguely, it is much too awkward and time consuming.

The clockwise or countercw turn system with skip works to prvide some type of orderliness for ooc flow, but disrupts the dynamic being achieved for ic.

And I guess I don't see how any of this creates more work for a Guide, Aidan... At least in the sloppy way I GM ;)

Jack You Up

Hmmm...as for additional actions. If you decide to go with the earlier suggestion of using split draws for additional actions, you've already got an additional action system. You could just let the speed characters buy the approriate trait higher.

Ack, that's totally right! I spaced on the split-the-draw thing. So, my speedy vampire Vlad draws for his speed feit, and gets 6 power. He gets to add 6 motes to all speed-related actions, including conflicts where speed is a relevant factor (being that fast and trying to inflict amber probbaly wouldn't work - no one could understand him speaking that fast). From there, he can split up his pool if he wants, otherwise he's just so fast he can avoid parries and dodges and still strike.

Aidan

Matriz, Matrix, Matrix...

Go around the table in any order. Each player says what they want their character to address. When you get to the end, keep going around and ask if anyone wants to change what they're doing. Let them talk about it. Negotiate. Plan. Whatever they need to do. Once everyone has clearly stated what one thing (more or less) they are attempting, the GM says, Draw, and everyone draws. If it drags on, point to people and say, "what is your character doing" and make them stick with it. That's the risk they run for hedging.

Basically this is what Ron calls "free and clear". Order doesn't matter. and people can keep changing their minds until they've decided what they're doing for sure, or you decide to punch them out for taking too long to decide.

Mike

Jack, yeah, you're right, it does disrupt the flow. But I don't know what to do otherwise. I think there will just have to be some sort of compromise here, as everyone yelling what they're going to do is impossible to follow. I just don't know what the best compromise would be, other than to get boffers and go at it in real time.

Aidan

The thing is, my games flow more like Mike's post than use. I guess I am all for chaos versus order ;)

I get it now... I may actually escape the damn Matrix this time.

Aidan

taalyn wrote: Jack, yeah, you're right, it does disrupt the flow. But I don't know what to do otherwise. I think there will just have to be some sort of compromise here, as everyone yelling what they're going to do is impossible to follow. I just don't know what the best compromise would be, other than to get boffers and go at it in real time.

I playtested last night - and I found something out. I think I have escaped the Matrix (finally!), but my players haven't and won't. I don't know what to do with this info - should we reintroduce initiative (their big complaint) as a standard, or be freeform and offer several options on how to run conflict, of even just avoid that issue alogether and let these sorts of things be devised/set up as social contract issues for any given playing group?

The conflict was a simple combat - with the PCs in a house, and 9 cultists and the big baddy attacking them. I simply gathered actions ("what are you doing, Vlad") and draws, and then wove them together in a different order at the end of the round, including who hit what and how, and such like.

The players really didn't like it - when I asked for comments later, they immediately stated this, without even the slightest pause. They felt it wasn't tense enough (which I don't buy, and this seemed to be the way they phrased that they didn't like it), and that it was hard for them to get into a rhythm. I thought it particularly interesting when they said good players wouldn't have a problem with it (and thus indicating that they weren't!), and basically talked their way around saying it was weird and hard for them, and they didn't like it. Everything else they were cool with - but not conflict sans initiative.

I'm baffled. I mean results are results. So I guess there must have been something not working right.

But I can't tell from your post what it is. What was the "hard" part? Not making that extra die roll? Trying to visualize everything going on at once (as opposed to the totally unrealistic idea of envisioning one character doing something, and stopping, and then another character starting up)? ;-)

Why would tension go down? I mean, you roll, you get results? Was it waiting for the results to be narrated?

You were there. What did you think? If your opinion is different than your players' why do you think that might be so?

Mike

Their big complaint was that there was no sequence to it, and that the speedy characters didn't get to act more than once. To me, these were invalid arguments - the speedy guys never opted to go more than once (I explained that speed simply added to their draw, and they could split it among multiple actions), and there was order to it, they just didn't know it ahead of time.

They thought that having order increased tension as they didn't all draw at once, and got to see the battle unfold in bits and pieces. But they didn't all draw at once, and they had a clue as to how the battle unfolded, in bits and pieces, as each person drew after I got their action. The only way this was at all applicable was in the fact that I combined everything together and narrated it all at the end of the round as one piece.

The only valid complaint was that initiative would allow the bad guys to go somewhen else, and to allow the players to react to them. I had a habit of putting the bad guy last every time. Still, that's not a reason for initiative, but for better use of the freeform nature of conflict. Plus, I still had players draw to be affected by the mooks - whenever it was appropriate, which wasn't always at the end of combat.

So, overall, yeah, I don't think they had valid arguments, and that the conflict was just as full of tension as any other. I think it's simply a matter of habit - they're used to initiative, and know what to do when there's initiative, and I'm willing to explore the other options now that I understand them. It feels like I'm doing something new and unusual, and getting the standard, expected static because it's different from what they're used to.

Aidan

Good job though. I mean, it's hard enough to break the Matrix, then to go ahead and give it an honest attempt - in the very face of those still plugged in.

I believe this essentially comes down to taste.

And I don't think what that "taste" should be personally decided. I believe it should be decided based on what is aesthically pleasing to the entire game itself. As Mike said, the multi-colored draw mechanic of this game seems to lean towards a UGO UGO theme - once more breaking down barriers and moving to a wide range, intuitive, universal design.

Just how brave do we want to be with this Crux?

Jack

PS - Interested in feedback on Magic as well. Said as much on the Magic Thread...

Well, I wouldn't mind going for brave and groundbreaking (as much as this can be said to be groundbreaking at all). Let's just go with the freeform, and if people don't like/get it, they can use houserules - they're probably going to anyway, so let that be. In the meantime, let's go where our vision is - wide open, freeform, and universal.

Aidan

Hmmm.

I suggest putting a critical eye to this before making a decision. I believe my principles are sound, but this is a case of principle in action, and there may be mitigating circumstances. We can't just assume that we're right in this case without analysis.

Now, it may just be a preference thing, and maybe this is too small a sample (I suggest a playtest on IndieNetgaming). But I found the objections to be interesting. I mean it wasn't just, "I don't like it," or "it's weird," but in addition there were some very specific complaints.

The suspense thing is a particularly interesting comment. I think that may have been in part your particular application of the rule, Aidan. That is, you took all the Draws, figured all the results, and then narrated them all at once when you had the big picture. I'm wondering if you were trying to avoid any feelings of "unfairness" by going this way? Because it's not neccessary.

How about this, instead? After declarations and Drawing, just go around the table one by one resolving each. Or just select them based on feel (players will probably try to cajole you into selecting a certain order at times). But resolve one and then the next, and the next. Nobody announces their results until their resolution comes up; in fact they can delay the Draw until it's their turn if they really want to keep the suspense up (though this will delay play unneccessarily). This does make things happen in an "order" in terms of descritption, but I'm not sure what that order matters. In fact the resolutions can be happening simultaneously, they're just described one by one.

In fact, that's how my example above was done. Anyhow, this would put the suspense back to where it normally is, and keep it all fairly simple in terms of keeping things straight (you don't have to worry about forgetting to incorporate some part).

OTOH, what I find so interesting is that often players make the claim that going in "rounds" is boring. That is, sure, there's suspense, and it's cool while it's your "turn", but while you wait for things to come around to you, it's a drag. But there's another couple of alternatives to this.

First, there's a method described in the game Run Out the Guns. Hawkins calls it Cascading. Instead of doing "Combat Rounds" where everyone gets their turn, instead, you focus on an entire conflict from beginning to end for one character before moving on to another. So, let's say that in our example that one character gets into a firefight with another. The GM focuses on the player until his character has completely resolved that firefight. Then he moves on to the next player.

There are a couple of important effects of this. Since there's no break in the description of the action except to draw, things are much more contiguous and intense. Not only is this good for the player, but it allows the rest of the group to fall into Audience mode while this occurs. Meaning that they are now not thinking in terms of their character (since their characters can do nothing), but in terms of the character acting as a protaginist. So everyone is more entertained. Also, things go more quickly as you can focus on less sets of stats, etc. So in fact things like combat take less time overall than they would otherwise.

This also goes to the real simplifier. And that would be to move completely to Conflict resolution per the Forge definition. What you have is still Task resolution. I shoot, you miss, I shoot again. Task. Conflict resolution is more like, I want to kill him, you fail, hmmm, now what do I do.

That is, in Conflict resolution, once the Draw has been made, there's no more drawing for that same Conflict. One draw decides the entire Conflict as described, and the narration lists all the tasks that are performed in the interrim. Combat? "You shoot back and forth each popping up over the crates to shoot. At one point you frantically reload, and as you pop back up, you note that your target has fled."

So, just some ideas there. Anything jog loose on any of that?

Mike

Heya Mike, Jack,

I've been thinking through your thoughts, Mike, and also referring to Nobilis' conflict system, as it's one of our inspirations. Here's back at ya:

- on resolution: you're right - I may have skewed my results by trying to be "fair" and incorporating it all at once. I'll give it another go. Since I keep forgetting to include the mooks' turn, I'll just pick a new person each round, and the mooks will go after that person goes.

- on the Cascading thing: I can't get my mind around how that would work in complex conflicts, where several characters are attacking a single (or many) other characters at the same time.

- on Coflict vs. Task resolution: yes, what I've been describing is Task resolution. But that doesn't mean conflict res (in Forge terms) isn't in there too. In my mind, conflict resolution is for less important or dramatic events - there are 5 guards to get through, but the guards themselves aren't terribly significant, nor is getting through them. It's Underworld-like, in this regard - broad or narrow scope as important or relevant.

All that said, I think maybe the best way to handle it in the rules is simply by implication, a la Nobilis. There is no direct reference to how to organize conflicts. Damage is explained, and the effects of various sorts of miracles, and that's it. The examples tend towards what you're describing, and what we seem to be aiming at, but there's no overt explanation. I like that. This seems to be the most freeform and open option.

Aidan

I've spent the evening discussing these conflict issues with some of the playetsters, and come to some realizations.

- it's one player who is violently opposed (at least, he seemed that way to all of us) to the freeform system. But he's a powergamer, and his actions must always be a) before yours and b) cooler than yours. No wonder it would bug him.

- I misremembered how it went down a bit. As it turns out, I did do resolution instantly a lot of the time (but not all of it), which together with the powergamer, really screwed up opportunities for the other players to do stuff.

So, they're all for the freeform, but suggest that I make sure to get draws, but not narrate results until everyone has declared, and that I apply the 5-second rule always ("what do you do? one thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three...").

Another thing that will help that they suggested - drop that story, because it's using characters made based on the complicated system - return to the "wide-open", they say. Since tonight was standard game night and 2 of the players canxed on us, we went through and made new characters (members of a band!) and started a new story, and the new stuff worked great. I think conflict will too...

Aidan

taalyn wrote: - it's one player who is violently opposed (at least, he seemed that way to all of us) to the freeform system. But he's a powergamer, and his actions must always be a) before yours and b) cooler than yours. No wonder it would bug him.

- I misremembered how it went down a bit. As it turns out, I did do resolution instantly a lot of the time (but not all of it), which together with the powergamer, really screwed up opportunities for the other players to do stuff.

So, they're all for the freeform, but suggest that I make sure to get draws, but not narrate results until everyone has declared, and that I apply the 5-second rule always ("what do you do? one thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three...").

Heya Mike,

I get you, and that's definitely some great advice. This thread has become more of "GM eductaion" than directly addressing conflict system issues, but that's all good as far as I'm concerned!

What I meant in that confusing paragraph is that I would give each player 5 seconds to declare what they're doing, then tell them to draw while I move on to the next player's actions. Once I've got everyone's actions, then I get draws all at once and combine them into story.

On Cascading - I get it, and that does work well. I think there will still be some sort of interruption, do some cascading for a bit with one character or gang, then to the next. In a sport event, cascading might not work so well.

To be honest, though, having you see my GM style when we playtest will be the real deal - you'll be able to see first hand what I'm doing wrong and/or right. I'm looking forward to it.

Aidan