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Champion
 
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| We're developing a set of rules for "Twilight", the new modern horror game that we're launching next month. One of the ideas that we came up with is that the supernatural powers develop without the players having a full understanding of it We've basically written "Skill Trees" for each of the races. So they might be a "Hypnotic Gaze" or "Charm" as a basic power. Once they get Hypnotic Gaze Level 3 they might get a Mind-wipe power. If they get Hypnotic Gaze 2 and Charm 2 they'll get a Command power. If they get a Hypnotic gaze 6, Charm 4 and Command 3 then they'll get a Possession power. So its all "logical" in that the characters develop new powers as they gain mastery of the lower ones. The idea however is that we only give the players the basic powers. We don't tell them what higher level powers are available to that race, nor the "pre-requisites" to actually gain each power. We let them work it out as they go along. We are planning to have NPC "teachers" who can educate the players on the power that "other Elders" have acquired and what powers they focussed on. Players can also assist others of their race by telling each other about the powers they've developed We just think that its a different way of doing it, and that it'll stop people munchkinning by just going for the snacky powers without any genuine reason for going for it. Basically (in a Vampire:tM sense) stops people going for Majesty when they never use any of the lower powers Having said that, we know that there are always people who want to know what sort of powers characters get at higher levels before they make their decision on what race to play. Does it work if you with-hold that information? Is this a system that would feasibly work, or are we likely to have rioting from players? Any other systems tried this or anything similar?
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- Brighton Below : Organiser
- Serenity: Capt Tom Crowson
- RL: Simon / Trez
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Champion
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Maelstrom works this way.
Advancement relies on working out a new skill for yourself (slow) or getting teaching from another character (faster). To be able to learn or be taught certain skills, you need to have one or more other skills already.
The only way to find out what high-level skills/abilities are available is through roleplaying asking other characters, or by learning some lower-level ones and then seeing what options you get for researching new things.
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Prodigal
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Trez (8/2/2007)
We've basically written "Skill Trees" for each of the races. So they might be a "Hypnotic Gaze" or "Charm" as a basic power. Once they get Hypnotic Gaze Level 3 they might get a Mind-wipe power. If they get Hypnotic Gaze 2 and Charm 2 they'll get a Command power. If they get a Hypnotic gaze 6, Charm 4 and Command 3 then they'll get a Possession power. So its all "logical" in that the characters develop new powers as they gain mastery of the lower ones. Bear in mind that the more logical the skill progression is, the easier it will be for PCs to predict what's higher up the skill tree. Trez (8/2/2007)
We are planning to have NPC "teachers" who can educate the players on the power that "other Elders" have acquired and what powers they focussed on. Players can also assist others of their race by telling each other about the powers they've developed It seems to me that if the NPCs are genuinely trying to be helpful IC, the secret combinations won't stay secret very long. Similarly, if it's a small system and some PCs progress relatively quickly, then the secret combinations are likely to become common knowledge soon after someone unlocks them- especially if PCs have no IC incentive to keep the secret path to power secret. Trez (8/2/2007)
We just think that its a different way of doing it, and that it'll stop people munchkinning by just going for the snacky powers without any genuine reason for going for it. Basically (in a Vampire:tM sense) stops people going for Majesty when they never use any of the lower powers I don't play Vampire, so I may misunderstand what you're saying. Why do you think it is a bad thing for PCs to want to become very powerful? Trez (8/2/2007)
Does it work if you with-hold that information? Is this a system that would feasibly work, or are we likely to have rioting from players? Have you asked your potential players whether they're ok with the basic concept of secret powers? It's not something I'd expect to cause rioting, per se, but some people are likely to find the idea interesting in and of itself, while others may just see it as an extra hoop they need to jump through. Without knowing your playerbase, it's hard to say which sort of attitude seems likely to dominate.
WARNING: the information above may have been subjected to dangerously high levels of ignorance.
OOC (and on Pagga): Carrie
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Wag
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Yep I like the hidden skills progression way of doing things. I can’t immediately think of a game I’ve played in with it, most of them being one-offs without skill progression. I wouldn’t worry about players feeling uncomfortable without knowing how their PC will progress skills wise, I assume you wouldn’t want a player that fixates on skill progression to the extent that they don’t want to attend on one of your games. I would take the NPC trainer thing one step further by having different NPCs training PCs differently and getting different results. Different NPC’s training resulting in completely different skills obtained.
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ShelfordFX
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Champion
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I think this will work best if it is complicated, with large numbers of skills.
If you and your players don't want that, there's not much point in keeping things secret as soon it will all be known. Fine while it lasts, but then what?
Also, it suits a game-world undergoing a time of discovery and invention.
As a counterexample, in one system I play, each skill has three levels of expertise that must be learned in order, and to advance in some skills you need relevant support skills; all of this is in the rule book for any player to read. (Also, once your character has mastered a skill, it can learn any relevant extra abilities based on that skill subject to your own inventiveness and GM approval, so there is still scope for new stuff.)
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Overlord
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| Eos uses this method as well. The only difficulty is to ensure you stay well connected to the basic rules in your core rule book. Otehrwise you will end up with rules creep that happens too fast and destroys your game. You will also have many players not knowing how to react to particular effects. You also do not want to be in a sisutation where these advancements do other players out of being able to participate and interact fully. The so called "sweet spot" approach.
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Knight
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TheThomas (8/2/2007)
Maelstrom works this way.
It's probably also worth mentioning that Maelstrom doesn't really have skill "trees". It's more like a skill "tangled mess of brambles". There are some fairly simple routes you can follow but there are also a lot of cross-overs. For example, if you know "Bake Pie" and then get taught "Build Bazooka" you may find that you can then research "Build Splurge-Gun".
TheThomas (in a different post)
I think this will work best if it is complicated, with large numbers of skills.
I'm guessing that only Matt knows the actual number of skills in the system, but I did hear 1500 mentioned as a ball-park figure.
On the scale that Maelstrom runs at, this this means there are lots of rumours of higher-level skills that nobody actually knows but which a few people could research if they didn't have a dozen more exciting sounding skills to invent. Or skills that people have just theorised about.
For a smaller scale system, I'm not sure that it will be worth the effort to have a skill forest that big, so you might lose some of the rumour/speculation goodness. But it's still worth doing.
Allen Stroud
The only difficulty is to ensure you stay well connected to the basic rules in your core rule book. Otherwise you will end up with rules creep that happens too fast and destroys your game. You will also have many players not knowing how to react to particular effects.
I'm quoting this purely to stress how important this is. Hidden advancement paths should not equal hidden rules. The rules should include every call the players need to be able to react to. Even if there is no way in the basic rules for players to be able to make that call.
Plus, the mere existence of a call might get your player busy theorising/researching ways to get to it.
I may be at the same event as you, but that does not mean I am playing the same game.
LT: Aries (Vipers)
PD: Dorian Bowchard (Sacuza)
I am hereby placing all original, unquoted text in the above post in the public domain.
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Champion
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| Cheers guys. I've spoken to the players that we've got and there seems to be a mixed opinion on it. Some people are happy not knowing. Others want to be able to have an idea of the basic capabilities of each race before they choose what they want to play We've got about 50 or so "powers" which are spread over the 7 races that we're using, so its nowhere near the 1500 that Maelstrom use. However we do have a MUCH smaller player base so theres less need We've written the main player rules so that all the calls that are used in the game are listed. We didnt want to have to start calling time-freezes every time someone uses somehting different so that we can explain the rulings to people Most of the progression is fairly logical but there is some "Splurge Gun" type powers in there where you might find you develop something new with skills which don't initially seem logical. We know that some players will just want to find out everything that there is for them to do, and thats fine with us. They'll need to spend the XP to find out whats at the top levels, so thats up to them Think I might need to expand the variety a little bit. We've tried to keep the races all fairly balanced and ensure that each race has a couple of things that are unique to them. Also tried to give each one a "speciality" (i.e. the shapechangers are more combat orientated) but still allowing them to play the character the way they want. We're having a talkthrough / playtest tomorrow night so we'll see how it goes
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- Brighton Below : Organiser
- Serenity: Capt Tom Crowson
- RL: Simon / Trez
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