[freeroleplay] Re: [FRINGE] Unique Traits
- From: Jerry Stratton <jerry@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: freeroleplay@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 22:52:34 -0800
At 12:50 PM +0000 on 10/28/03, Samuel Penn wrote:
>> actions will be successful. Generally, a beneficial roll modifier will
>> give the player the ability to re-roll certain rolls in certain
>> cicurmstances, usually in exchange for a temporary point of a secondary
>> trait or an experience point.
>
>I've generally found that spending xp like this doesn't work.
>I'm not saying it can't be made to work, but I've never seen it
>work. Maybe it should come off some fatigue-like trait.
I agree; the problem I see in systems which allow or encourage players to use
their characters' experience points to either affect immediate rolls (usually
under a stressed situation) or to create things the characters couldn't
otherwise create, is that the mechanic is counterintuitive both in the
literature and in real life; in fantasy and sci fi, characters who push their
abilities to the limit often end up resetting their limit up; they generally do
*not* suffer a loss of experience because of it. And even in real life, pushing
yourself to the limit on an occasional basis is beneficial to learning.
I have to admit to using a very similar mechanism myself; in Men & Supermen,
players can use their "editing points" to either increase any skill or to edit
any roll. If they edit a roll, they don't lose the editing points completely;
they retain half of the editing points used, but those editing points *must* be
used for the skill whose roll was edited. That is, if the player decides to
edit a Dance skill roll by four editing points, the character now has two
editing points that must be used to increase the Dance skill.
I'm occasionally tempted to simply let them use the full editing points for
editing rolls, with the only limitation being that once points are used to edit
a roll, those points can only be used for training in the skill that was edited.
If the goal is to provide the players with a growing number of re-roll points
as their characters grow, you might simply provide them with a certain number
of "edit points" proportional to their experience.
Changing the subject, if anyone is looking for a way to provide potential
players with the ability to order printed copies without increasing your own
work, http://www.lulu.com/ seems to be a useful service. I uploaded Gods &
Monsters in PDF format and the books I received back were very nice. The only
issue I had was that it takes longer than their FAQ indicates for the first
book to print (they said 4 days, it took a little over 3 weeks; the book
arrived exactly four weeks from when I ordered it).
It doesn't cost anything to use their service, only to order books, and the
prices (if ordered direct from the store) seem reasonable. Since it doesn't
cost anything to use enter a book into their system, this works nicely for
projects like ours where the books change on a regular basis. The upload
process (at least for PDF files) is extremely easy.
Jerry
--
jerry@xxxxxxxxxx It Isn't Murder If They're Yankees
http://www.ItIsntMurder.com/
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