[12:57:44 PM] Pentharis: Awesome. I had a thought for alignment: I’m not a fan of controlling players based on the alignment they chose, and I’m also not a fan of restricting players’ class effectiveness by the alignment that can change overtime. I’d rather reward players for certain play styles and not restrict to morality, you know?
[1:00:26 PM] Pentharis: I think morality points (of a sort) should be awarded to players not for being super special nice or extra extra evil, but for playing smart and playing noble. If you stop the thief from stealing, that’s neutral. If you slit up the thief, that’s forward-thinking, if you stop the thief and give him enough money to pay to feed his family, that’s noble. There’s not so much ‘good’ and ‘evil’ as there is methods of thinking. I figure at the end of the quest, one should reward the sneakiest player with something that will aid sneakiness, award the noblest player with something that will aid their noble causes, etc. What do you think?
[1:02:46 PM] Mike Overby: It's certainly original. I've heard of similar things (like a video game's alignment points), but not really as its own experience-like system. I'm kind of an old-fashioned person when it comes to alignments, but I do like this.
[1:03:29 PM] Mike Overby: It would be pretty umch entirely GM discretion, but that's OK.
[1:04:15 PM] Pentharis:
that’s good. I just don’t like the old argument of “Your character wouldn’t do that!” Vs “It’s my character, they can be however they like.” This seemed like the best way to solve it: The players who act cleverly or nobly or whatever else get rewards, those who are just kinda there don’t get rewarded as much, prompting people to want to stick to a side, but also think ahead as they play. c:
[1:04:48 PM] Pentharis: The question now is what are the alignments? I like nobility and sneakiness, but surely there must be more dimensions?
[1:06:36 PM] Mike Overby: Well there's "Your character would never do that" and then "Your Monastic Order would never teach someone they sensed was evil." Different things. /That/'s where certain alignment /restrictions/ come in. Otherwise, they're guidelines.
[1:08:59 PM] Mike Overby: But as for what these traits should be...vain, libidinous, charitable, pious, savagery
[1:09:11 PM] Mike Overby: Off the top of my head.
[1:09:24 PM] Pentharis: Aren’t charitable, pious, and noble all kind of the same thing?
[1:10:37 PM] Mike Overby: "Religious" can encompass being charitable or noble, but then you're not doing it just to be noble or charitable. You're doing it to not go to Hell. Hopefully it makes you feel good too, but it's different.
[1:10:55 PM] Mike Overby: And being charitable is completely different than being nobe. Wat.
[1:10:57 PM] Pentharis: Hm, fair enough, but I can’t see there being a gameplay benefit to it.
[1:11:16 PM] Mike Overby: We have priests. Buffs for them.
[1:11:57 PM] Pentharis: But if you’re only doing it to be religious, it seems to fit into the ‘sneaky’ play style to me: just being religious to not go to hell. I’d think the gods would take that into account.
[1:12:05 PM] Mike Overby: Or bonuses when dealing with/bartering with/requesting aid from churches
[1:12:25 PM] Pentharis: Isn’t that just a charisma buff?
[1:12:36 PM] Pentharis: A very specific charisma buff, admittedly.
[1:12:47 PM] Pentharis: Why not have a bonus for each stat?
[1:12:48 PM] Mike Overby: What kind off buffs are you talking about for rewards?
[1:13:07 PM] Pentharis: Talking more about monetary things. Gold, items, armor, weapons, etc.
[1:13:08 PM] Mike Overby: Being nice does not get you the Infinity Plus One Sword.
[1:14:33 PM] Pentharis: How about Strength, Int, Stealth, Charisma, etc. Or just a few of those. Say, Strength and Charisma could be nobility, while Stealth and Charisma could be sneakiness. That sort of thing.
[1:14:51 PM] Mike Overby: That's what I'm talking about.
[1:15:01 PM] Pentharis: Playing with Int and Charisma could be the Pious bonus you were talking about.
[1:15:48 PM] Pentharis: But then that does sort of boil things down to statistics, doesn’t it...
[1:16:44 PM] Pentharis: The GM could keep a tally of moral markers in the game (like outsmarting a monster rather than fighting it) and mark down which traits they used during the game at various points, then give out two or three rewards (whatever is specific to the journey at the time) to whoever has the most of specific stats?
[1:18:29 PM] Pentharis: Like for example, if you have a group of three warriors, a thief, a mage, and a warrior, and you go off to fight an evil wizazrd. If the thief does things sneakily, the mage does things intelligently, and the warrior goes by his noble actions, then the thief could infiltrate and be rewarded sooner with a sneak-based item from the evil wizard, then team up with the rest of the group to take down the wizard, and the warrior -who acted nobly- gets the reward for nobility?
[1:18:43 PM] Pentharis: from the questgiver, of course.
[1:19:04 PM] Pentharis: It does create a bit of in-team competition, though. Is that a big problem in TRPGs?
[1:19:49 PM] Mike Overby: Well, quests are handled like they would be in real life. Their terms are decided beforehand, so getting reward items from questgivers doesn't make sense.
[1:20:07 PM] Mike Overby: In-team competition is one of the main things that drives TRPG.
[1:20:33 PM] Mike Overby: It's the whole point of Paranoia, which you should defiintely take a second to Google.
[1:21:30 PM] Pentharis: looks like a neat game. c: But why wouldn’t getting reward items from questgivers make sense? Isn’t that kind of how most RPG games work?
[1:22:54 PM] Mike Overby: Because if a questgiver says they'll give you 500 gold for killing the goblin, they're not about to give you a free sword because you were sneaky about it. Unless doing it without drawing attention to it was part of the deal, but that's different.
[1:24:03 PM] Pentharis: It’s not like it’d be every little quest, necessarily. And it doesn’t have to be a spectacular reward every time.
[1:25:49 PM] Mike Overby: A sword isn't spectacular. How would they know? A little birdy told them that the Knight was charitable along the way to slay the dragon. He gave money to a little boy that wanted to buy a puppy?
[1:26:27 PM] Pentharis: Fair point.
[1:27:49 PM] Mike Overby: The rewards could be doled out by the GM at his discretion. He lallies up earned points and then decides when to spend them on physical rewards. If he tallies up 15 points, he can includes a chest in the next adventure that has a nice item in it.
[1:28:16 PM] Mike Overby: The player could call out that he wants to spend a point on a temporary stat buff.
[1:29:03 PM] Pentharis: Hmm... That last idea seems like a quick way to break the game, though.
[1:29:31 PM] Mike Overby: Not allowing them to spend a whole lot of points at once, of course.
[1:29:34 PM] Pentharis: I do like the GM’s discretion idea, but then the chests would have to be designed to specifically open for one specific player character, unless the points go toward the team as a whole.
[1:31:01 PM] Pentharis: It wouldn’t be a bad idea to have the chests specifically open for one player character, though: just make sure the characters have a symbol. It could be a stat all its own, a completely customizable thing. Some special symbol that the player comes up with and becomes their coat-of-arms as it were. Specifying one on a chest might seem strange, but not if it’s “Because the gods say so”.
[1:31:15 PM] Mike Overby: Nope, they just have to exist. If the intended person finds it, cheers. If someone in the group with an ulterior motive finds it, cheers for them. If they don't find the chest, sucks.
[1:31:31 PM] Pentharis: Well then it’s hardly a reward.
[1:31:53 PM] Mike Overby: Player characters /could/ be marked yb the Gods though, perhaps.
[1:32:32 PM] Mike Overby: Good weapons are so rarely loot, the /chance/ of getting it free is a spectacular reward.
[1:33:06 PM] Pentharis: I rather like the idea of letting people make their own special marks, that would make them a little more unique in their own worlds, and if they decide to make other characters, they could have similar marks to make a sense of brotherhood, or even have similar marks within a party.
[1:33:09 PM] Pentharis: True ‘nuff.
[1:33:58 PM] Mike Overby: I like that idea too.
[1:35:37 PM] Pentharis: So reward players with tallied points, when a certain number is reached, a chest is placed somewhere in a dungeon at some point in the future. Maybe they could be found by anyone in the party, allowing for weapons trading or within-party bartering (or just charitability, which could maybe yield more points), and as a side note: Players can make their own individual marks, which may lead to more interesting storytelling in future missions and dungeons and such?
[1:36:00 PM] Mike Overby: Pretty much.
[1:36:04 PM] Pentharis: Spectacular.
[1:36:41 PM] Mike Overby: Though I like the reward system working like cash instead of a "level-up"-style thing.
[1:37:06 PM] Pentharis: You mean like using the points to buy buffs?
[1:38:03 PM] Mike Overby: Yeah. Though players don't buy the physical rewards. They choose to either allow the points to build up to the GM buying them a nice gift, or they spend it on perks.
[1:38:28 PM] Pentharis: Fair enough, I rather like that. Maybe have each individual player choose how their points are to be used?
[1:38:49 PM] Mike Overby: Sure, input would be welcome.
[1:40:11 PM] Pentharis: How about it works a bit like an XP/level-up system? Keep points, which can be used to buy temporary buffs for a small cost, or wait until you hit a certain number and say you’d like a chance at a physical reward. The first time it’s a small number of points for a smaller reward, and the more you use it, the more points it takes and the better your reward is?
[1:41:02 PM] Pentharis: or alternatively, keep stocking up points and at different levels, the cost is different, but you can keep hoarding points. So you can either buy small buffs, or wait for a long time and ‘buy’ a really great weapon when you’ve hoarded a whole bunch. That sort of thing. If that makes any sense.
[1:41:14 PM] Pentharis: Should I find a different way to explain that?
[1:42:31 PM] Mike Overby: The more points you get, the higheryour "point" level is and the less the reward item would cost?
[1:42:31 PM | Edited 1:42:47 PM] Pentharis: Kind of like food: Small amounts of money for a candybar now, or wait until you save up a bit for a bag of chips, or keep saving up until you can afford better and better food, with the max being a whole bloody thanksgiving dinner, but you have to save up for a great deal of time. That sort of thing.
[1:43:08 PM] Pentharis: Gotta love the edit feature.
[1:43:33 PM] Mike Overby: ...Didn't notice
[1:43:59 PM] Pentharis: I accidentally said “small amounts of food for a candybar” when I meant “small amounts of money”. Small thing, but I felt it was a big difference. *English major problems*
[1:46:17 PM] Pentharis: Anyway, does that mode of thought make sense? Does it sound like a good plan?
[1:48:31 PM] Mike Overby: I don't really see how it's different from just having a straight "I have five bucks, so I'll spend five bucks on a burrito." Unless what determines the level isn't the amount you've saved, but instead the time you've spent playing.
[1:48:57 PM] Pentharis: I would think they’d correlate.
[1:49:26 PM] Mike Overby: Like an inverted "You spent five simoleons on a burrito?! In my day, they cost a dime."
[1:49:39 PM] Pentharis: They cost less the more you play?
[1:49:45 PM] Mike Overby: Inverted.
[1:49:55 PM] Mike Overby: Future Grandpa problems.
[1:50:05 PM] Pentharis: I’m perplexed.
[1:50:10 PM] Mike Overby: Cost less the more you play.
[1:50:20 PM] Pentharis: So what I just said.
[1:50:49 PM] Mike Overby: I thought you said "more." x)
[1:51:02 PM] Pentharis: “They cost LESS the MORE you play”.
[1:51:11 PM] Pentharis: But I digress.
[1:51:21 PM] Pentharis: Maybe the ‘buying buffs’ plan was actually a better idea.
[1:51:25 PM] Mike Overby: I know! Big picture Engineering major problems!
[1:51:35 PM] Pentharis: Fair ‘nuff.
[1:52:33 PM] Pentharis: So it costs an obscene amount of points to get a good thing at the beginning, but if you start saving your points to buy possibilities for treasure, then it’l cost less and less as you go, or you can use points to buy buffs?
[1:52:48 PM] Pentharis: This seems like a good plan to me.
[1:53:42 PM] Mike Overby: Decaying equations!
[1:54:32 PM] Pentharis: But we should mind that certain types of points should go to those rewards: Stealth points to stealth buffs/rewards, that sort of thing.
[1:55:02 PM] Pentharis: ...I just realized we’ve essentially just re-invented the EXP bar.
[1:55:29 PM] Mike Overby: There will be different rewards for each. This will probably be a whole section of the final book.
[1:55:39 PM] Mike Overby: SQUARE WHEELS FOR THE WIN.
[1:55:46 PM] Pentharis: YEP.
[1:56:17 PM] Pentharis: So perhaps we should focus on the play-styles being alignment-based, not stat-based: Mage types can play sneakily without using sneak stats after all, right?
[1:56:30 PM] Pentharis: That would explain why they would need the buffs.
that’s good. I just don’t like the old argument of “Your character wouldn’t do that!” Vs “It’s my character, they can be however they like.” This seemed like the best way to solve it: The players who act cleverly or nobly or whatever else get rewards, those who are just kinda there don’t get rewarded as much, prompting people to want to stick to a side, but also think ahead as they play. c: