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Design Alternatives Analysis Archive

Started by Bloody Stupid Johnson, December 19, 2011, 01:12:23 AM

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Scott Anderson

What you say about the granularity and specificity of the rules with respect to tone and setting interests me. Do you ever just go by your "gut" and pick a certain mechanic because it solves the in-game situation in a way that supports the setting?  

I don't have the deep background on rules and systems as well-enumerated as you do (perhaps nobody does); when I home brewed my game, I just went by what felt right.  It worked out.
With no fanfare, the stone giant turned to his son and said, "That\'s why you never build a castle in a swamp."

Bloody Stupid Johnson

Quote from: Scott Anderson;753925What you say about the granularity and specificity of the rules with respect to tone and setting interests me. Do you ever just go by your "gut" and pick a certain mechanic because it solves the in-game situation in a way that supports the setting?  

I don't have the deep background on rules and systems as well-enumerated as you do (perhaps nobody does); when I home brewed my game, I just went by what felt right.  It worked out.

Well if you were talking to me anyone who's read the entire thread now knows everything I do, mostly :)

On gut instincts...I think there's something to be said for just picking an option and going with it sometimes. Its easy to get stuck on trying to analyze which option is the best, when most of them will have some pros and some cons. Also, I think gamers fairly often have instincts about game design matters which are logical, even if they would have a great deal of trouble explaining intellectually why they like or dislike a particular thing - e.g. I had a dislike of un-immersive or metagame rules long before I'd read any of the discussions around about immersion and dissociated mechanics.

Picking a certain mechanic because it solves an in-game situation in a way that supports the setting, doesn't sound like its really a matter of gut instinct, though? If you had an idea for a specific rule you could add that would support the setting, I don't know why you wouldn't add it, it sounds like that'd be good design. Unless you meant stuff at more of a basic level, like picking what core mechanic to use, or what attributes/attribute scale would work best with the sort of characters your game should have.

LordVreeg

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;753958Well if you were talking to me anyone who's read the entire thread now knows everything I do, mostly :)

On gut instincts...I think there's something to be said for just picking an option and going with it sometimes. Its easy to get stuck on trying to analyze which option is the best, when most of them will have some pros and some cons. Also, I think gamers fairly often have instincts about game design matters which are logical, even if they would have a great deal of trouble explaining intellectually why they like or dislike a particular thing - e.g. I had a dislike of un-immersive or metagame rules long before I'd read any of the discussions around about immersion and dissociated mechanics.

Picking a certain mechanic because it solves an in-game situation in a way that supports the setting, doesn't sound like its really a matter of gut instinct, though? If you had an idea for a specific rule you could add that would support the setting, I don't know why you wouldn't add it, it sounds like that'd be good design. Unless you meant stuff at more of a basic level, like picking what core mechanic to use, or what attributes/attribute scale would work best with the sort of characters your game should have.
I've also refined and sometimes changed my main, setting-specific ruleset for decades.  And for certain groups and certain feels, it changes again.  I'm adding a secondary damage track (physical HP and subdual HP) for my online collegium game, since they are students and I want to have the effects of exhaustion and fear without always having a cut or sprain, and I want to have the two come back at different rates.
Making magic work to be non-generic and setting-specific is also so, so important to avoiding the 'just another system x setting' that most GMs don't know they fall into.
Currently running 1 live groups and two online group in my 30+ year old campaign setting.  
http://celtricia.pbworks.com/
Setting of the Year, 08 Campaign Builders Guild awards.
\'Orbis non sufficit\'

My current Collegium Arcana online game, a test for any ruleset.

flyingmice

#213
"Gut feel" is is a two edged sword. "Gut feel" is an internalization of logic - a shortcut to the proper answer without conscious thought. It is also, by the same token, an internalization of 'what has been done before', and thus also a shortcut to the *safe* answer. The shortcut only works on what you have internalized, which means you totally comprehend it, which means it is utterly and completely known territory. What we don't know is always vastly larger than what we do know, and what we know - that is, that which we have a fairly vague but useful understanding of - is always vastly larger than what we comprehend - that is, what is known so well we have internalized it. "Gut feel" therefore can only lead us to what we already know. It cannot lead out of that territory, which can only be understood by exploring, learning, and studying that which lies outside our internal oikumene*.  

*Koine Greek for "Known World"
clash bowley * Flying Mice Games - an Imprint of Better Mousetrap Games
Flying Mice home page: http://jalan.flyingmice.com/flyingmice.html
Currently Designing: StarCluster 4 - Wavefront Empire
Last Releases: SC4 - Dark Orbital, SC4 - Out of the Ruins,  SC4 - Sabre & World
Blog: I FLY BY NIGHT

Bloody Stupid Johnson

Well. Its been almost six months since this was last active, so, refloating it for any continued discussion or anything (topics I've missed? Points of contention? Extra notes from anyone on obscure RPGs that did things a way that I haven't mentioned, maybe in new RPGs that are recent? There are extra 5E notes here and there where I felt it was pertinent, and maybe new people will find it useful.)
Nothing else to add at this end myself, however, worth mentioning that there is a topic index on the first page now, and I've been continuing to edit existing topics throughout the thing.

Cheers,
BSJ.

Majus

I've just spent much too long reading through this whole thread. Absolutely awesome, Mr Johnson*, thanks for all the hard work compiling this.  :)

(*Love the username, Pratchett is great!)

flyingmice

My last couple of games - Volant and Lowell Was Right - used a chargen process I called "Template Trees". You pick a Background Template and an Education Template, then choose a starting template of a template tree. From there, you can take a derivative template on that same tree, or switch to another base template for another tree if you meet the prerequisites. The character earns all skill ranks and edges on the template. Each template has a point cost, with the points available varying by age.

In effect, it is a condensed version of a non-random lifepath chargen, but much faster. At young ages, characters from similar backgrounds and professions tend to look a lot alike. As the character ages, different paths lead to very different characters. Time-wise and result wise, it is a compromise between a life path character and a point buy character. You have a logical progression of professions and skills, like in a lifepath, but with a lower granularity.

-clash
clash bowley * Flying Mice Games - an Imprint of Better Mousetrap Games
Flying Mice home page: http://jalan.flyingmice.com/flyingmice.html
Currently Designing: StarCluster 4 - Wavefront Empire
Last Releases: SC4 - Dark Orbital, SC4 - Out of the Ruins,  SC4 - Sabre & World
Blog: I FLY BY NIGHT

LordVreeg

Quote from: flyingmice;801880My last couple of games - Volant and Lowell Was Right - used a chargen process I called "Template Trees". You pick a Background Template and an Education Template, then choose a starting template of a template tree. From there, you can take a derivative template on that same tree, or switch to another base template for another tree if you meet the prerequisites. The character earns all skill ranks and edges on the template. Each template has a point cost, with the points available varying by age.

In effect, it is a condensed version of a non-random lifepath chargen, but much faster. At young ages, characters from similar backgrounds and professions tend to look a lot alike. As the character ages, different paths lead to very different characters. Time-wise and result wise, it is a compromise between a life path character and a point buy character. You have a logical progression of professions and skills, like in a lifepath, but with a lower granularity.

-clash
My lifepath stuff is much more random.  But I don't have archetypes in most of my games, though I do use skill trees.

http://celtricia.pbworks.com/w/page/66960599/Collegium%20Arcana%20Base%20Character%20Creation
Currently running 1 live groups and two online group in my 30+ year old campaign setting.  
http://celtricia.pbworks.com/
Setting of the Year, 08 Campaign Builders Guild awards.
\'Orbis non sufficit\'

My current Collegium Arcana online game, a test for any ruleset.

Bloody Stupid Johnson

Quote from: Majus;801854I've just spent much too long reading through this whole thread. Absolutely awesome, Mr Johnson*, thanks for all the hard work compiling this.  :)

(*Love the username, Pratchett is great!)
You're welcome. Glad it was of service.
( :) I think I get some odd looks, metaphorically speaking, from people who aren't familiar with Pratchett, but its all good. Anyway.)

Quote from: flyingmice;801880My last couple of games - Volant and Lowell Was Right - used a chargen process I called "Template Trees". You pick a Background Template and an Education Template, then choose a starting template of a template tree. From there, you can take a derivative template on that same tree, or switch to another base template for another tree if you meet the prerequisites. The character earns all skill ranks and edges on the template. Each template has a point cost, with the points available varying by age.

In effect, it is a condensed version of a non-random lifepath chargen, but much faster. At young ages, characters from similar backgrounds and professions tend to look a lot alike. As the character ages, different paths lead to very different characters. Time-wise and result wise, it is a compromise between a life path character and a point buy character. You have a logical progression of professions and skills, like in a lifepath, but with a lower granularity.

-clash

That's nice actually - personally I can appreciate lifepath while also tending toward liking less random chargen, myself. (Easy enough to balance different templates since randomization is an either/or roll, rather than rolling how much, but I usually have a fairly predetermined idea of what sort of character I want).  
Sounds like it'd be easy enough to go the other way and add some tables of random rolls for those options, if a player did want to randomize.
 
I'll edit in a link to this from earlier.

Bloody Stupid Johnson

*bump*

Resurrecting since it has been awhile. I've done some more work throughout. Added further references to a number of systems including Cortex, Red Box Hack, the Irregulars game that was recently posted for review in the D&D subforum (e.g. movement, autofire), Invulnerable, Mutant Chronicles 3 (based on hearsay) and the pretty weird Four Colours Al Fresco. Not to mention 5E, of course.

Specific posts that have been notably adjusted include: Effect, Contested Actions, Dice Pools (success counting), Skills, Adventuring situations (luck rolls).

Daddy Warpig

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;858446*bump*

Resurrecting since it has been awhile. I've done some more work throughout. Added further references to a number of systems including Cortex, Red Box Hack, the Irregulars game that was recently posted for review in the D&D subforum (e.g. movement, autofire), Invulnerable, Mutant Chronicles 3 (based on hearsay) and the pretty weird Four Colours Al Fresco. Not to mention 5E, of course.

Specific posts that have been notably adjusted include: Effect, Contested Actions, Dice Pools (success counting), Skills, Adventuring situations (luck rolls).
Once again, it's awesome and well done and, once again, it should be stickied.
"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."
"Ulysses" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Geek Gab:
Geek Gab

Skarg

#221
This is awesome, if enormous and spawling. It's got so much stuff, though it seems (I haven't read the whole thing and am following links from the first post assuming those go to the most updated version of each section) missing a few things from my perspective as a fan of detailed tactical combat in GURPS and The Fantasy Trip.



* Seems to me The Fantasy Trip wants mention as a pioneer as an early point-buy, classless, attribute-based system with a very good hex-based tactical combat system that aims to be fairly realistic (and lethal) yet simple to play. In The Labyrinth and Tollenkar's Lair are designed with a mindset that GM's will design their own worlds and run them in a fairly sandbox-like fashion. There are detailed rules for non-combat concerns such as encumbrance and where you carry things on your body, how far noise carries for various activities through various obstacles, and tunnelling. It's an example of a system where spells and "talents" (which are sort of between skills and talents in your naming system) are available based on the IQ attribute and prerequisites, and can provide modifiers to the effects of using skills and various combat effects and rolls. Armor reduces damage from each hit as well as DX and movement.

* Your Movement section seems to lack how great mapped tactical combat can be when done well. I would say that combat with a map in TFT or GURPS are distinctly different interesting experiences, and offer something completely different from abstract mapless combat systems (where fighter players sometimes complain that all they have to do in combat is pick someone to attack and roll dice) due to the tactical significance (also because of the high lethality) of choices and the details of the situation including who is where facing what situation, with what equipment, doing what each turn. Players control how their characters fight, and have to make life-or-death tactical situations in a rule system which gives appropriate cause and effect. Surviving combat is more about avoiding getting hurt and hurting the enemy by making appropriate choices, rather than by having a high Level and piles of hitpoints which supposedly represent experience and the things that result in not dying - with detailed tactical rules, the player needs to come up with tactical decisions which result in not dying, and a vital part of that is maneuvering for advantage and avoiding doing things that get you killed, in terms of explicit details of position, situation, equipment, skills, attributes and action.

* Some specific mechanics GURPS has which I don't see mentioned include picking various maneuvers each turn which give different effects on what you can do when (attacks, defenses, modifiers, movement options, delayed action), and different movement costs for turning, sidestepping, going backwards, jumping, etc, detailed close-combat rules and body position rules, lines of fire and rolling to miss friends, facing effects, and the importance of having some people Wait so they can respond to enemies and unpredictable events during a turn.

* Of mapped flying you write "More than 3 objects get tricky. Aerial combat also tends to involve continuing motion at varying speeds, which miniatures do badly." However there are some fairly good aerial combat wargames / miniatures rules out there in which maps are a crucial element of play. What will be a problem is if you (have inadequate rules or) try to use the same map for fast-moving figures as you usually use for foot melee, since the scale is too small. If both types of action are happening at once, you probably want two or more maps, with fliers who pass through the melee at high speed zooming through the melee map when/if that happens.

* Under movement system failures, you could include the problems of movement systems that fail to provide limits to combat based on available space and time. For instance, "The thirty-seven goblins all attack Ralph this turn, who gets to do nothing till his turn" (though that's partly a sequence / reaction problem). Or not being able to well describe what happens in confined spaces, either not limiting enough, or limiting too much. Or not handling close combat or grappling well. Or not having a system for limiting who can see or identify or target whom with different types of weapons - in an abstract game, an archer may be able to just say they shoot at the enemy leader, while with a map, you'd trace a line of sight and if people or objects were between them, they might not even see the leader, or have limited target locations and/or steep modifiers to hit and chances to hit intervening people or objects, or for a guard to step up and block the attack, and the archer would need to decide if he wanted to try to move to get a better line of fire, which might put himself at more risk, etc., which is not possible to do in the same way without an actual map and rules for how all that works (unless the GM provides all of that somehow out of his imagination and discretion, which the players then need to learn to trust and interact with, but that's collaborative imagination rather than a rule-based game system, which can be fine or preferable but is a different thing).

Bloody Stupid Johnson

Quote from: Daddy Warpig;858948Once again, it's awesome and well done and, once again, it should be stickied.
Thanks again Daddy Warpig :)
I'd considered even requesting a move to the Articles subforum maybe? Anyway.

Quote from: Skarg;858973This is awesome, if enormous and spawling. It's got so much stuff, though it seems (I haven't read the whole thing and am following links from the first post assuming those go to the most updated version of each section) missing a few things from my perspective as a fan of detailed tactical combat in GURPS and The Fantasy Trip.
Thanks Skarg!
It started as a spur-of-the-moment idea and then got carried away, plus I'm limited by the thread format so some ideas are just stuck where they're stuck. I've been progressively adding internal links and anything leading to a specific post will be up to date as they just lead to the post in question. (Links to specific pages can possibly end up a page off from a post being deleted, but I think I've gotten all those).
I'm inevitably going to be limited by my own experience and biases as well of course - with the minis games I've played the most being 3.x /Savage Worlds (I've run GURPS - supers - about twice..). All you say here makes sense though. I'll expand/correct relevant sections with some insights from your post with credit.
(I don't necessarily mention things just for being first but I think I have overlooked much of where TFT evidently shines).

Skarg

A great thing about TFT is that is can show players what's so fun and interesting about map-based tactical combat with comprehensive rules, in a game whose basic rules are very short, concise, and easy to learn quickly. Which is quite the opposite of later editions of GURPS, where getting to the point where tactical combat is easy can take a long time (and many players choose to play a basic combat before getting to that point).

In reading the section here on combat actions, I can see that there would be a lot of contrast between D&D-style games and GURPS, and it might be pretty difficult to express in a clear way that combined with what you've written, because the context is different (map-based 1-second turns are a lot different that more abstract, mapless and longer turns). Just listing all the options available in GURPS, to include things in GURPS Martial Arts, GURPS Technical Grappling, GURPS High Tech, and GURPS Tactical Shooting, would be a major work that I'd even have to study up to write.

And then there is Phoenix Command with its impulse-based movement/action system and rules for how quickly on a fine time scale it takes for a chainsaw to cut through someone... ;-)

It's amazing how much content is jammed in this thread.

Bloody Stupid Johnson

#224
Thanks Skarg :)
You may be right as far as smoothly integrating it. If no one person can write it, I think a good solution may be to start a discussion - and I will add a link from earlier in the thread to there (if suitable) or otherwise summarize later (if that ends up being better).  I don't know how lengthy its likely to be, but in case I'll start a new thread for this where everyone can feel free to contribute.
Started here: [URL="Thanks Skarg :)
You may be right as far as smoothly integrating it. If no one person can write it, I think a good solution may be to start a discussion - and I will add a link from earlier in the thread to there (if suitable) or otherwise summarize later (if that ends up being better).  I don't know how lengthy its likely to be, but in case I'll start a new thread for this (link) where everyone can feel free to contribute.

https://www.therpgsite.com/showthread.php?33288-TFT-GURPS-etc-Tactical-and-Miniatures-based-movement
Edit: link not working after recent site changes - search function can find.