Quote from: Zenoguy3 on February 09, 2025, 06:21:45 PM

Quote from: Fheredin on February 09, 2025, 04:48:55 PMThe problem is not that you dislike card mechanics, but that when you state an explanation as to why you want to choose against the card mechanics, your explanations are incorrect.

Funny, because before you starting whinging, the only reason Soc-DM gave for why he didn't want to use card mechanics was:

Quote from: Socratic-DM on February 07, 2025, 08:02:20 PMI find them a bit annoying personally

Was he incorrect about that? Does he not actually find them personally annoying?

How nice of you to leave things out.

Quotewhere I could maybe see a card mechanic working is some sort of luck based magic or voodoo magic, but that'd a lot effort for a stylistic choice.

I get that this is trying to be an off-the-cuff dismissal, but this off-the-cuff assessment is almost categorically wrong. Cards are partially antithetical to luck relative to dice, and provide features like hidden information or limited repeats until shuffles. The conversation had to pivot because suddenly there's something more important to the project to discuss.

Quote from: Chris24601 on February 10, 2025, 09:06:28 AMYou might consider it an insult, but he's not wrong. There is a large skill component to most card games that isn't there in rolling dice to see what happens. You're acting as if cards are random as dice which speaks to not really understanding card mechanics at all.

He was talking about skill in a game design sense, I don't fully understand card design therefore TTRPG dice design I'd struggle with. That is what he's implying, clearly a low blow insult I'm not going to be gaslighted  into thinking otherwise.

And besides he got his math wrong regarding depletion dice, so a hypocrite at that.

QuoteThere's a reason cards are used far more often in gambling (and the main dice game of gambling; craps; is based on bets on the results of multiple throws of the dice). Its because its skill in judging when and how much to bet (and when to stand or fold) that determines outcomes in a more gripping way than a flat rng result.

Take blackjack, the goal is to get as high as possible without going over 21 with faces counting as 10s and aces as your choice of 1 or 11. Knowing the relative odds of each value coming up (ex. there are four times as many cards with a value of 10 in the deck and only 38% have a value of 5 or less) makes the outcome much more skill than luck based.

Say, for example, what if a spell system were this... when you cast, you draw one or more cards. Add the card value to the spell's effect, and subtract the difference between the sum and 21 from your Mana pool. So the closer you get to 21 the more powerful the effect and the less it costs, but if you go over 21 catastrophe occurs. Depending on the system it could be a simple failure that costs full price anyway, or it might be a backlash that explodes in their face.

Now onto that imagine adding effects that force a minimum number of draws; an inherently risky spell might require at least 3 draws for example. You could have forced holds akin to the dealers... once you reach 10 or 16 you must stop drawing... limiting risk (one could still go from 12 to 22 with one draw, but it's less likely) and reward.

All of those require considerations a skilled player can leverage that are more than just "will my die roll more than X?"

Something like that would work well for some sort of unstable magic... you can use it safely though the effect is weak and cost high, or you can risk letting it loose, but the closer to the edge you get the more you court potential disaster.

And that's just blackjack card rules. You could have a different system where every time you perform some action you gain one or more cards that you hold onto say, until your next rest. When you get two with the same suit you can spend them to get a bonus to your next spell. Two of the same number grants a bigger bonus, three or more of a suit or face bigger still, runs of numbers, etc.I

Maybe doing something else lets the DM take one of your cards from you.

I could see something like that working for say a karma-based magic system... good deeds earn you cards, selfish deeds take them away. The more karma you build the more card configurations you can use.

Yeah see at least you actually mechanically explained a couple concepts, I'll probably back pocket one of those for something later down the road.

I don't think a card mechanic personally fits psionics though.

Quote from: Fheredin on February 10, 2025, 09:44:31 AMI don't see how this is an insult. Modern game design is a large enough field that no one can possibly know all of the material to it, so skill issues are inevitable. And being frank, with the internet, skill issues are really easy to fix. If you can figure out exactly what you need to learn it takes like 20 minutes. Anyone who says differently on either count is peddling OneTrueWayism and likely huffing their own farts, too.

No you can't weasel word your way out of that, you effectively said I don't understand that I won't understand the most basic game design, which is an utterly ridiculous claim, I don't think card game design is self evident and you're making it an issue about me the designer rather than articulating how a mechanic works and breaking that down.

QuoteNow, I would say this is an oddball one. Most designer skill issues I encounter tend to be something between abstract and esoteric because most RPG designers forget to study fundamental game design. Things like gameplay loops, feedback loops, complexity budgets, or techniques to streamline material tend to be sparingly discussed in RPG communities. Which is baffling because this stuff is game design 101 in the video game community, often coming well before someone tries to learn coding or using middleware.

The question is not whether or not you or I have skill issues; it's whether or not you recognize it when it spits on your shoes and try to correct them, or if you choose to ignore them until something breaks.

You have some audacity to talk about fundamentals in game design when you can't even get the basic mathematics down right, such as how you clearly don't understand the depletion rate of usage die...

QuoteThe problem with depletion dice is that because the odds of rolling below the threshold rise with each failure. The odds of depleting 1d12 is 25%, but the odds of depleting a d10 is 30%, and a d8's odds are almost 40%. This means a little bad luck snowballs really easily and this is a problem you might have to get (un)lucky to properly playtest. It's also a bit of an odd flavor for psychic abilities especially.

Here is a graph showing the average amount of rolls you can get before a die depletion on a d10 with a threshold of 1-2, at the bottom of this post I'll provide the anydice formula if you want to mess around with it and educate yourself...

So the broader point, before you have the audacity to make this personal, check your math before you make yourself a hypocrite, you want to lecture me about a mechanic or concept I don't understand and judge me for it, while criticizing a mechanic you simply don't understand! and using it as an excuse to ram rod me with something I am not interested in while derailing this whole thread for your own ends.

Quoteset "explode depth" to 50
set "maximum function depth" to 10

function: usagedie D:d keep on TN:n {
 SIZE: [maximum of D]
 if SIZE <= 4 {
  result: 1 + [explode D>=TN]
 } else {
  result: 1 + [explode D>=TN] + [usagedie d(SIZE-2) keep on TN]
 }
}

output [lowest of [usagedie d4 keep on 3] and 50] named "d4"
output [lowest of [usagedie d6 keep on 3] and 50] named "d6"
output [lowest of [usagedie d8 keep on 3] and 50] named "d8"
output [lowest of [usagedie d10 keep on 3] and 50] named "d10"
output [lowest of [usagedie d12 keep on 3] and 50] named "d12"

Here is the anydice formula

Quote from: Socratic-DM on February 10, 2025, 11:56:31 AM

QuoteThe problem with depletion dice is that because the odds of rolling below the threshold rise with each failure. The odds of depleting 1d12 is 25%, but the odds of depleting a d10 is 30%, and a d8's odds are almost 40%. This means a little bad luck snowballs really easily and this is a problem you might have to get (un)lucky to properly playtest. It's also a bit of an odd flavor for psychic abilities especially.

Here is a graph showing the average amount of rolls you can get before a die depletion on a d10 with a threshold of 1-2, at the bottom of this post I'll provide the anydice formula if you want to mess around with it and educate yourself...

So the broader point, before you have the audacity to make this personal, check your math before you make yourself a hypocrite, you want to lecture me about a mechanic or concept I don't understand and judge me for it, while criticizing a mechanic you simply don't understand! and using it as an excuse to ram rod me with something I am not interested in while derailing this whole thread for your own ends.

Quoteset "explode depth" to 50
set "maximum function depth" to 10

function: usagedie D:d keep on TN:n {
 SIZE: [maximum of D]
 if SIZE <= 4 {
  result: 1 + [explode D>=TN]
 } else {
  result: 1 + [explode D>=TN] + [usagedie d(SIZE-2) keep on TN]
 }
}

output [lowest of [usagedie d4 keep on 3] and 50] named "d4"
output [lowest of [usagedie d6 keep on 3] and 50] named "d6"
output [lowest of [usagedie d8 keep on 3] and 50] named "d8"
output [lowest of [usagedie d10 keep on 3] and 50] named "d10"
output [lowest of [usagedie d12 keep on 3] and 50] named "d12"

Here is the anydice formula

Yeah, this is straight bad-faith arguing for two very important reasons.

• You wrote the blog post I took Threshold 3 from, and
• You wrote the blog post I took Threshold 3 from.

Now, I realize that's technically only one reason, but it's such an important one that I thought it was worth mentioning twice.

Quote from: Your Linked BlogIf the result is equal to or below the power's depletion threshold, your psi-die shrinks to the next smaller size (e.g., d8 → d6).

    Example: A character with a d8 die uses a power with a threshold of 3. They roll an 4, which is above the threshold—no depletion occurs. If they rolled a 2 or lower, the die would shrink to d6.

I took the threshold of 3 example straight out of your own blog post's example.

Oh, and this is not just about the example. Of the seven psi abilities you provide, three are Threshold 2, and four are Threshold 3. My choice of Threshold 3 was not arbitrary; I chose Threshold 3 because the majority of your own examples were Threshold 3.

And you wrote the bloody thing.

Quote from: Fheredin on February 10, 2025, 05:58:29 PM

Quote from: Socratic-DM on February 10, 2025, 11:56:31 AM

QuoteThe problem with depletion dice is that because the odds of rolling below the threshold rise with each failure. The odds of depleting 1d12 is 25%, but the odds of depleting a d10 is 30%, and a d8's odds are almost 40%. This means a little bad luck snowballs really easily and this is a problem you might have to get (un)lucky to properly playtest. It's also a bit of an odd flavor for psychic abilities especially.

Here is a graph showing the average amount of rolls you can get before a die depletion on a d10 with a threshold of 1-2, at the bottom of this post I'll provide the anydice formula if you want to mess around with it and educate yourself...

So the broader point, before you have the audacity to make this personal, check your math before you make yourself a hypocrite, you want to lecture me about a mechanic or concept I don't understand and judge me for it, while criticizing a mechanic you simply don't understand! and using it as an excuse to ram rod me with something I am not interested in while derailing this whole thread for your own ends.

Quoteset "explode depth" to 50
set "maximum function depth" to 10

function: usagedie D:d keep on TN:n {
 SIZE: [maximum of D]
 if SIZE <= 4 {
  result: 1 + [explode D>=TN]
 } else {
  result: 1 + [explode D>=TN] + [usagedie d(SIZE-2) keep on TN]
 }
}

output [lowest of [usagedie d4 keep on 3] and 50] named "d4"
output [lowest of [usagedie d6 keep on 3] and 50] named "d6"
output [lowest of [usagedie d8 keep on 3] and 50] named "d8"
output [lowest of [usagedie d10 keep on 3] and 50] named "d10"
output [lowest of [usagedie d12 keep on 3] and 50] named "d12"

Here is the anydice formula

Yeah, this is straight bad-faith arguing for two very important reasons.

• You wrote the blog post I took Threshold 3 from, and
• You wrote the blog post I took Threshold 3 from.

Now, I realize that's technically only one reason, but it's such an important one that I thought it was worth mentioning twice.

Quote from: Your Linked BlogIf the result is equal to or below the power's depletion threshold, your psi-die shrinks to the next smaller size (e.g., d8 → d6).

    Example: A character with a d8 die uses a power with a threshold of 3. They roll an 4, which is above the threshold—no depletion occurs. If they rolled a 2 or lower, the die would shrink to d6.

I took the threshold of 3 example straight out of your own blog post's example.

Oh, and this is not just about the example. Of the seven psi abilities you provide, three are Threshold 2, and four are Threshold 3. My choice of Threshold 3 was not arbitrary; I chose Threshold 3 because the majority of your own examples were Threshold 3.

And you wrote the bloody thing.

A notable sidewinder for sure, but it doesn't distract from your central thesis being a joke.

But honestly I don't care anymore, Regardless I make my concession, you win, you outplayed me, you got your witticisms and zingers in, you outsmarted  my rash arguments and got a funny gif puunch-line to boot. you beat me handily at the word games and argumentation itself.

This thread is yours and I concede it.

This argument passed the point of no longer being worth having long ago.

To that end,

I think the usage die for psionic is a great idea. It definitely sets it apart from more traditional OSR magic systems. I like that having higher thresholds takes the place of higher spell levels, gating who can cast them and "costing" more to cast, while at the same time the difference between a threshold 2 and threshold 3 psionic seems a lot smaller than the difference between a level 1 spell and a level 2 one.

I would reword "Whenever you use a psionic power, roll your psi-die" to "After you use a psionic power, roll your psi-die" just to clarify that the usage roll isn't checking whether the current power goes off, but rather determines how much is left in the tank afterwards.

Something else you might be able to do, use the psi die for more than just the usage, you could also roll it for things like damage or duration. This would allow some psi powers to scale with level pretty smoothly, and allow for as a psonic is exhausting their resources that's reflected in the power of their abilities.

Quote from: Zenoguy3 on Today at 03:53:35 AMThis argument passed the point of no longer being worth having long ago.

Can't agree more.

QuoteTo that end,

I think the usage die for psionic is a great idea. It definitely sets it apart from more traditional OSR magic systems. I like that having higher thresholds takes the place of higher spell levels, gating who can cast them and "costing" more to cast, while at the same time the difference between a threshold 2 and threshold 3 psionic seems a lot smaller than the difference between a level 1 spell and a level 2 one.

I would reword "Whenever you use a psionic power, roll your psi-die" to "After you use a psionic power, roll your psi-die" just to clarify that the usage roll isn't checking whether the current power goes off, but rather determines how much is left in the tank afterwards.

Something else you might be able to do, use the psi die for more than just the usage, you could also roll it for things like damage or duration. This would allow some psi powers to scale with level pretty smoothly, and allow for as a psonic is exhausting their resources that's reflected in the power of their abilities.

Okay those are some solid suggestions, but especially duration and damage being tied to psi-die level, it seems obvious now that you bring it up, I don't know if I'd give every power this scaling property but quite a lot of them would.

It also gives an interesting incentive to use certain powers when your fresh to maximize their potency, and a good way of representing your mental energy reserves draining, each blow you land being a bit less powerful than the last one.

Yeah I like that a lot.

Quote from: Socratic-DM on Today at 12:13:20 PMI don't know if I'd give every power this scaling property but quite a lot of them would.

Oh yea, definetly not all of them, but things like the basic bolt power would benifit greatly from it. Maybe other powers could use the die differently as well to model exhaustion, like the manifest flame power being able to manifest a 2dP sq. ft. area of flame that'll be less impactful, but will have some interesting flavor, and when a high level psion manages to manifest double the usual it would feel awesome, although you're also opening up the possibilty of getting a tiny flame out of it.