[freeroleplay] Re: Advantages
- From: "Samuel Penn" <sam@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <freeroleplay@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 27 Sep 2003 18:57:05 +0100 (BST)
Ricardo Gladwell said:
> Hi Sam,
>
> On Sun, 2003-09-21 at 15:03, Samuel Penn wrote:
>> I've actually removed all the
>> personality based ones, since I've never been particularly happy with
>> them.
>
> I'd be interested to know how the personality traits worked before?
It was actually a hold over from my previous system. A trait ranged from
-5 to +5, and acted as a modifier to a will roll. The modifier was the
square of the trait, or something with approximated the square of the
trait, depending on the version.
Traits from 0 to 3 were pretty 'normal', whereas +4/+5 were pretty
fundamental to the character. Only one +5 trait was allowed, since
this level represented something which totally dominated the character.
All traits were listed as positive, but some were just negatives of
others, e.g. coward +3 was equivalent to brave -3.
Cost was based on the level of the trait, and how important it was in game
terms. Something like hatred of a particular person wasn't that costly,
lustful might be a bit more costly since it would come into play more often,
and something like death wish (especially at +5 - character just wants to
get killed doing something) was most costly of all.
Most costs were as disadvantages, though a few (Brave, Unfazeable) were
advantages. +1/+2 traits were always free, allowing players to customise
their characters without having to pay a point cost for it.
It was all originally based on the Ars Magica personality trait system.
It's been through several iterations, gradually getting simpler, until the
current system.
>> It also prevents the issue of players creating characters which
>> have too many social problems to work well with the rest of the
>> group.
>
> This sounds like a sound idea rather than allowing players to load up on
> psychological disadvantages.
It was all heavily influenced by GURPS, which is very bad at allowing
characters to load up in this way. However, I've recently come across
a GURPS optional rule which really makes sense, though I'm not going
to use it in Yags.
Basically, all players always take the maximum number of disadvantages,
and often end up with broken characters because of it. So, just give players
the maximum number of disadvantage points for free, and tell them to
take whatever disads they want, though they won't get extra points for them.
People who have tried it say that players often do take disads, sometimes
quite a few, but they fit their character concept much better because they're
not working against the points.
>> http://www.bifrost.demon.co.uk/games/yags/core/advantages.html
>
> Good work on the advantages and disadvantages section: the rules are
> simple yet flexible enough. Instead of having complex levels of
> advantages, you only give +/- 1 modifiers, making the system that much
> more simpler. The rest of the miscellaneous ads/dis are equally good.
> The only thing I would say is that seperating advantages into different
> sections for bonus-type and misc-type might make finding specific
> advantages/disadvantages difficult.
Splitting them has the advantage (sorry!) that players know that ads in
this section always work this way, and ads in that section work a different
way. It possibly makes things easier.
What I am trying to avoid, is saying to players "you can take 10 points of
disads", and then they go and always take 10 points. I'd prefer them to
just take the ones that suit their character, and which are needed to get
maybe a few extra points.
I don't see it as the fault of the players, but as the fault of the systems
which encourage this sort of character design. I'm currently working on
this problem.
--
Be seeing you,
Sam.
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