Topic: [WARNING: Long] "Drive" rules aka a Narrativist twist to Rolemaster action

[ToM]

Hi people.

Just finished taking a look at The Riddle of Steel, indie roleplaying game from Driftwood Publishing (more here and here). You can download the Quickstart Rules and take a look at them.

The game has a solid Simulationist core system (for more on Simulationist vs Gamist vs Narrativist theory on gaming, take a look here) like Rolemaster, but not worth itself changing system from my old-time favorite one (Rolemaster, indeed).
One thing however it has that I would like to reuse adapting it to RM or maybe to any other system: a Narrativist approach to combat/resolution that enhance dramatic take on the action motivating characters more than mere "rewards" in EPs and money/items.
To make a long story short, such a game took into play "drive" mechanics based on three "Spiritual Attributes" (Conscience - representing personal moral beliefs, Faith - representing loyalty to a higher ideal being it mundane or philosophical/religious and Passion - representing ones Love or Hate towards someone/something). These three attributes are freely distributed during character creation to represent what we can call his motivations to adventure, combat, and perhaps confront possibly mortal dangers. Such attributes does not only come into play during character generation, but also during gameplay, boosting characters actions in dramatic situations or turning towards them in other.
Also, these attributes, or traits, may change their value or completely be reallocated during play. For example, winning a fight in which you've been driven by your Faith may cause your Faith trait to increase, as well as decrease in case of defeat or humiliation. Similarly, being driven against ones lifetime enemy by Hate and killing him can cause that trait to become "vacant": so the player may want, at a given time, reallocate those points to other Spiritual Traits.

Now: TRoS uses a dice pool system similar to White Wolf's WoD games. And so is very simple to add those bonuses/penalties to the dice pool: they simply add or subtract from the pool in any situation the GM deems appropriate. Altough the authors does not completely elaborate on this, leaving many of the decision to GMs (they only put down some brief guidelines), the system works pretty straight, for what it's worth.
But, as we know, Rolemaster doesn't use dice pools but a single open ended roll to determine success or failure in combat resolution.
So, if the problem of thinking about what Spiritual Traits to implement is marginal and very  (Honor or Wealth? Glory or Personal Betterment? You just have to name some...), the problem of how to have this traits influence gameplay is the focus.

I've thought up some ideas, but definitely need feedback and maybe new input.
Please remember I want this system to be usable with RM, but I will not complain if it will sort out to be easily adaptable to other game systems, such as d20 or whatever.

Let's assume I want to use the system plain as it is written down in TRoS, adapting it to RM. So, we must have bonuses from drive (from 1 to 5, such is the value a single trait may have) apply to RM rolls. How? As a trait comes into play, I first thought about letting add a fixed bonus, such as - say - a +/-10 to the die roll. That's however too much stiff and potentially too arbitrary at the same time. So maybe instead of a fixed bonus a variable one, such as +2d10? This can be modulated to add/subtract importance to the Drive mechanics in the game. But, again, this isn't much more than a temporary boost; Drive points won't be usable to offset penalties, or remove fumbles, or similar very dramatic (and useful) game events. And would this affect non-open-ended rolls such as Initiative or Crits?

Another option would be rolling additional dice, and selecting the best result. This will make fumbling practically impossible under Drive effects, and open-ending more probable. But also adds LOTS of chance into the game. And,it doesn't' work very well as a penalty, such as when you're adversely affect by your Drive (for example: the Knight, loyal to his Lord, being arrested by his guards, fights to escape and prove his innocence - but his Faith Trait goes against him, subtracting from his chance of success).

Now for the questions...
How to have Traits increase or decrease during game? Such as success temporary or permanently increase a Trait, or defeat decreasing it...
How to rule opposite Traits driving a character? Such as Faith in the Religion vs Love to the woman you have to sacrifice to the Dark God?
And, again, how to have this mechanic be as simple as possible, and not overwhelm normal roleplaying, just adding flavor to the game. No bookkeeping needed, and I don't really want to have a new Fate Points or whatever-you-call-them rule to bother about...

Thoughts? Ideas?

[markc]

 I do not really see how you can do it with out a fate point type rule. Other wise it is always on or provides a mechanism for the player to argue with the GM.
MDC

[ToM]

it is always

That's the point and what I would like to obtain...

[Arioch]

I tried to inject some narrativist element into RM (I never played TRoS, but I've taken inspiration from others story systems, like The Burning Wheel and Solar System).
Here: http://www.ironcrown.com/ICEforums/index.php?topic=8149.0

Unfortunately I never had a chance of playtesting it very much (I'm not playing very often lately), but it might serve as inspiration for you.
Anyway, I'm interested in the subject if you want to discuss it  

[markc]

it is always

That's the point and what I would like to obtain...

 Can you expand more on this so I might be able to help provide some input?
MDC

[ToM]

@ Arioch: I remember reading your post some time ago, albeit maybe too quick. Maybe it was inspirational to me in some way, who knows.
If you're interested we may also continue via MSN or whatever.

[ToM]

@ markc

The whole thing aims to build up a light yet consistent system to have said traits impact gameplay adding to its roleplaying aspect without making it more rule-heavy.

Players will assign these values freely according to the characters they have in mind (talents and flaws might also give some hints on how to spend this trait points). Once you've assigned the points, they will come into play each time the situation may suggest. Temporary or permanent increase of these traits may be a reward other than items, gold and experience for characters who succeeded in reaching minor or major goals respectively and roleplayed their characters according to those traits, even at a price.

Example: Aerendir the Half Elven mage has acquired the Black Rod of Vorgudil from Eelface the Mewlip-Mage. He knows by Attunement and spells the rod is inherently evil but he would gain a great amount of power wielding it against his arch-nemesis, Ghaurir the Sorcerer. Aerendir has a Passion (Hate) trait against the werewolf sorcerer who slain his father at level 3. He also has a Conscience (Good) trait at level 1. Should he use the artifact against his enemy gaining +3 (whatevers) for the combat or destroy it permanently, so having the chance to shift a point from his Passion (Hate) trait to his Conscence (Good) trait?

[Nejira]

I been toying with adding Aspects from Spirit of the Century RPG into RM (and other RPGs) because IMO its such a cool idea. In short Aspects is sort of a freeform set of words and concepts to describe a character -- with game impact written in" (personality traits), which are based on the player´s ideas and defined together with the GM. You get X Aspects (in SotC you get 8-10 but that will become toomuch as in a campaign type game) and they can be anything you like really as long as it somehow ties into a Aspect of your character´s personality.

In play, the player can activate an Aspect to get a bonus and the GM can activate the Aspect to drive roleplaying. What kind of bonus? I say it depends on your game, if you want them to have a strong effect give em +50. I planned to have them counter Fumbles and Crits as well. But I never wrote the rules for use with RM, so these are just ideas.

Aspects can be "Strong as a Bull" but for balance purposes they should be dual natured with both a positive and a negative meaning. EG: "Built as an Ox" which can give the bonus to things like OB or ST based manuevers, but also be activated by the GM in situations where such a thing may hinder the character. But it can also be whatever you like. One of my characters had a Aspect "He aint Heavy" in referrence to Neil Diamond´s "He Ain't Heavy He's My Brother". I defined it as a loyality trait to those my character cared for.

IMO Aspects are one of the best roleplaying gimmics/rules ever. The Spirit of the Century RPG are a pickup game, and really more geared towards one session games, and not campaigns as it falls apart rather quick. But the aspects are really really good.

Ps: Did I mention I really like aspects?? 

[markc]

 I guess depending on the power I would have each point be +5 or +10. I do not know about going to much higher than that unless the game you play in is really high magic. But that is just me. I also think I might have a standard list of opposing traits that players could decide where to put there point and maybe when they activate.
MDC
 

[Arioch]

@ Arioch: I remember reading your post some time ago, albeit maybe too quick. Maybe it was inspirational to me in some way, who knows.
If you're interested we may also continue via MSN or whatever.

I'll be glad to talk about this with you next time on msn.

@ Nejira: yes, aspects are cool, if you liked SoTC aspects (IIRC is based on the FATE system, right?), try to give a loogìk at House of the Blooded, it's inspired by FATE, but takes the aspects' concept further, making each aspect benefical and disadvantageous at the same time...

[RandalThor]

If I am understanding you correctly, the way I would go with this is another-type of Fate Point, or a FP modifier system. Example: Jord the Cleric of WRTHSERSRjTHRHSdhgser'y (the god of fruit-bearing trees) who has a very high Piety Rating (or Faith Score, whatever) so he has either extra FP to use only when furthering his god's ideals, or his FPs are more affective when furthering his god's ideals, especially more so than when using them to do something he has a particularly low "motivation" score in. Like he has taken a vow of poverty (low Wealth Score), so when doing something that will earn him monetary (for whatever reason) he has to use 2 FPs to gain the benefit of one, or the FPs give a lesser bonus (say +10 or +15 instead of normal).

Also, in character gen I would say you have more of a sliding scale, so that if you peak a couple of these attributes, you will have low scores in others - that way you will suffer a negative in some fashion for getting the bonuses.

The various White Wolf games have their Virtues which can help give more ideas on what types of Motivational Attributes you could have

Hope this helps.

[Nejira]

@ Nejira: yes, aspects are cool, if you liked SoTC aspects (IIRC is based on the FATE system, right?), try to give a loogìk at House of the Blooded, it's inspired by FATE, but takes the aspects' concept further, making each aspect benefical and disadvantageous at the same time...

Yep its based on the FATE system. I like some of the ideas from HotB, especially the wages, but I am more a simutationist (I play RM) when it comes to rules than a narratist. Although I enjoy the roleplaying mechanics which I feel RM is missing. I found that I really liked that there was no Characteristics (St, Co, and all their cousins) and I thought aspects were told more about your character than a number in a characteristic.

[ToM]

Finally after a long time tinkering with ideas and rules I came up with something in the way of this topic.
I wrote down the rules and I'm about to playtest them on my upcoming new campaign. Unfortunately, for know, they're written as guidelines, and in Italian only. As far as I tested 'em a little, I'll be posting them here.

Just to make a little preview...
Each character selects three Traits. Those can be personal creeds, mental or ethical aspects, long or short-time goals, likes and dislikes, behaviors, whatever. The three traits are arranged in order from 1 (the most important) to 3 (the least important).
When, during game, the opportunity to "trigger" one of these traits arises (GM discretion), the player may chose to activate it. Once activated, the Trait gives the character a "dice pool" bonus to each and every roll made to obtain a certain goal linked to the trait, for the "scene" the character is playing. The bonus is proportional to the importance of the trait itself: a priority 1 trait gives 3 bonus dice to each roll, a priority 2 one 2 bonus dice, a priority 3 trait 1 bonus die.
If the character succeeds in his goals for the scene while the trait which was activated for that scene is active, then he may also get (GM's dicretion here, too) a Fate Point (see after). If the character fails to reach the goal, or is taken out, during a scene in which the trait has been activated, he gets a penalty to every action proportional to the priority of the trait (1=-30, 2=-20, 3=-10) until one of these conditions is matched: 30 days are passed, the character advances a level, the GM deems appropriate to end the penalty. Furthermore, while suffering for a penalty for a failed activation of the trait, the character can not activate that trait again (but can activate other traits).
Trait bonuses and penalty can not "overlap": only the highest bonus or penalty are given to a character at a single time. BUT, the character can still suffer from a penalty for a failed activation of a trait while at the same time gaining advantages of another activated trait.

Then, we have the Fate Points.
No character can have more then 3 at a time. They are not recovered when character level up, but only when GM deems appropriate (giving them for party or character based goals achieved, such as - see above - traits successfully activated).
A player can choose to spend a FP at any time to obtain one of the following:

Left for Dead: if the character has taken a deadly (instant death or mortally wounded) critical, then he can spend a FP to have him being "Left for Dead". GM will lessen the effect of the critical as he deems appropriate, while the character is surely taken unconscious. Foes (and often allies) will believe the character dead or dying, and might - or might not - choose to take care of him. Foes will probably ignore him or take him prisoner or the like.

Wheel of Fortune: if the character becomes stuck in a "no win condition", or is low on clues, or is turning round, or has been deranged from the main storyline and can't get back on track, or whatever, he can spend a FP to call the GM making him "spin the Wheel of Fortune". The GM will help the character with a narrative element, may it be a NPC (maybe from the PC past), an item, clue, or any other expedient he feels appropriate and will make the "story move". This can also be not only of aid to the PC. There might be "drawbacks". The GM is called to use his fantasy to its best to provide entertainment and good story/plot hooks.

Bullseye: the character automatically hits with a  melee, missile or directed spell attack, causing maximum damage possible (but must still roll for the critical. If the attack was a melee attack, it also deliver 2x hits and +1o to the critical roll, but a breakage check for the weapon must immediately be rolled with a special -30 modifier.

Flip the Coin: the character may choose to re-roll any roll made by him or have the GM re-roll a roll made against him. He might then choose which roll he wants to keep.

There are also guidelines on how to change traits during game, shifting priorities, loose traits and replace them with new ones, and so on, but for now I will have to test them a little before posting...

Comments? Feedback? Suggestions?

[markc]

+ Dice? Does that mean make more than one roll and take the best one?


 IMHO the Bullseye is very powerful and might/should be scaled to the weapon or situation.
MDC

[ToM]

+ Dice? Does that mean make more than one roll and take the best one?

Yep, you roll +X dice and select the one you want to keep.

IMHO the Bullseye is very powerful and might/should be scaled to the weapon or situation.

I forgot: Bullseye option can only be used if the OB for the attack is no less than +0. But I admit, it is very powerful. What do you propose to scale it down?

[markc]

  I guess it depends on the game but the first thing I would drop is x2 damage and crit bonus. IMHO max damage and a roll for possible crit is huge if you have the right weapon or even a poisoned weapon.


MDC

[ToM]

Yes, seems logical. I added it to give a little edge to those characters who risk their own lives and limbs meleeing.

Now, I'm toying with this other idea: having Traits don't activate automatically for free. Characters must spend a Fate Point for this. They will eventually get it back if the goal is obtained. Otherwise, it's wasted.

What do you think?

[pastaav]

Have you considered letting the traits work by changing the difficulty level of the action? If the players feels it is something important they can lower the difficulty. The great benefit of this is that you avoid the hassle of deciding how large the bonus need to be to get the right difficulty. Especially for movement maneuvers the needed bonus to get a certain improvement of success very much differ by the difficulty of the action.

Another way to receive a more narrativist style of play is keeping the simultionist approach to handle the actual given tasks, but that the players can use them to get extra options about what to do. This typically work in matrix-style rewriting of reality. By example the players are on the run from an army and one of the players feel he would like to have momentary break from the just running and win a encounter for once. The players spend one of his fate-alteration points and requests the enemy to make some kind of mistake that the group can exploit to their advantage. Another example would be in a mystery story when the player feels the group is stuck, thus he spend one fate-alteration point on getting a true clue to the real bad guy. If we look outside combat the most reasonable way to get new fate-alteration points would be that the players make flaws matter to the scenes. I think their are great play benefits of adding the narrativist angle in this way.

[ToM]

Have you considered letting the traits work by changing the difficulty level of the action? If the players feels it is something important they can lower the difficulty. The great benefit of this is that you avoid the hassle of deciding how large the bonus need to be to get the right difficulty. Especially for movement maneuvers the needed bonus to get a certain improvement of success very much differ by the difficulty of the action.

That sounds very interesting. It would be great if you'd want to elaborate on it a little.

Another way to receive a more narrativist style of play is keeping the simultionist approach to handle the actual given tasks, but that the players can use them to get extra options about what to do. This typically work in matrix-style rewriting of reality. By example the players are on the run from an army and one of the players feel he would like to have momentary break from the just running and win a encounter for once. The players spend one of his fate-alteration points and requests the enemy to make some kind of mistake that the group can exploit to their advantage. Another example would be in a mystery story when the player feels the group is stuck, thus he spend one fate-alteration point on getting a true clue to the real bad guy. If we look outside combat the most reasonable way to get new fate-alteration points would be that the players make flaws matter to the scenes. I think their are great play benefits of adding the narrativist angle in this way.

Excellent input, and that's more or less the thing I thought about... Again, nice advices.

[Arioch]

Interesting changes, thought I wouldn't penalize PCs for failing their goals. After all, they've already failed in something they deemed very important, so adding a penalty to all their actions seems like rubbing salt on their wounds 
Also, the GM seems to have the final word on everything: is it really necessary? Especially in the Wheel of Fortune option: why should ever a player spend a fate point for that? If nothing fun happens in the game the GM will feed him something interesting anyway, or are they going to sit down and bore themselves to death all the evening?