I do remember it coming up a time or two. The primary benefit of an X+Y setup is to flexibility in doing stuff. The more clunky the setup is the less the flexibility is useful.Korbel wrote:Encountering a new combination of Attributes would be rare, it's kinda hard for me think of any... Did you use any other combinations in your playtesting?
If this is really rare, it's not an issue.
We're doing more math for eight attributes as opposed to less math for the three that would otherwise be proposed.Korbel wrote:Come on, 2A+B is only slightly more complicated than A+B. At character creation there is already some math involved.
The rub here is two-fold. The 10+ rule works when 10+ is the exception, rather than the rule. It was originally invented to help deal with animals and monsters at the top of the scale so that we weren't rolling buckets of dice. Every die over 10 is worth 2 dice under it at base TN. As the TN goes up, this is even more so. If the average pool is 9 (before SAs!) then the probability is shot.Korbel wrote:Dice bloat? The "dice over 10 grant automatic successes" rule will be more used. It is fun.
Obs... I imagine I would use 8 steps of difficulty (1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15).
Right now, the obs are actually pretty intuitive. 1-5 is normal stuff people do, 6+ is heroic. When in doubt, I can almost always start at ob3 and +1/-1 if i want it to be harder or easier. Given that the average pool is 6 this works out. Even if they are slightly higher, it's still only +1 success per +2 dice to the pool.
If we went with your setup, people will have 9 dice average, which is going to be 4.5 successes. But if you add +2 dice that becomes 6 successes. +2 dice from there is 8, 3 of which are automatic, even if I'm severely wounded.
You'd have to drop the 10+ rule and then just consign yourself to rolling buckets of dice for skill checks.
I think I'd rather be more strict on when SAs fire and keep the current SA setup than any of the above. The fact that SAs build over time through following them has so many handy side-effects that I'd be loathe to change it to a flat bonus if we could fix the issue some other way.thirtyhr33 wrote:1. This is why you have to get more dice per SA. If you enter a conflict you get 1 SA, and if you win you get 2. That's 1.5 or more on average, per conflict. To turn a profit, you then need to spend ~1 SA on average to win a conflict you could have otherwise avoided to make it worth while to enter. 1 dice for 1 SA just isn't enough for that. If you are getting 4 dice per SA, you can reasonable expect to earn SAs and it isn't zero sum. It is a positive feedback loop, with the excess siphoning off to character advancement.
2. If you want to retain the "perform better for following motivations" you can just scrap the SA cost. Just simplify SAs to be so they fire for a constant 2 for skills and a constant 4 for combat, instead of the variable 1-5. It's simpler and has the same feeling. The only problem then is putting some tighter restrictions on when SAs can fire. SAs firing all the time becomes routine. Ideally, I would want SAs to fire 30-50% of the time. To quote myself from the other thread:
- Incentivizes picking long-term arcs instead of short-term goals
- Discourages them from being simply used as quest markers as they take a bit to pay off (above).
- Makes players balance their desire to advance the character against the immediate usefulness of the bonus dice.
- Serves as a visual feedback mechanism for progress -- when it's been a while since a given SA has advanced, it's obvious to both the player and GM that it's not working.
- Serves as an inherent cap against PC resource hoarding, forcing them into using said SAs instead of saving them all up "just in case." (Every Fate, BW, or Savage Worlds game I've ever played had someone who refused to spend their points unless absolutely forced).
- Creates an interesting kind of strategy in which SA you choose when. Two SAs might apply to the same conflict, but do you want to go with the one which is higher (more beneficial now), or go with the weaker in order to build it up for a later conflict?
It's a neat feature, but one I was clearly willing to barter away if need be.Marras wrote:I think I am in the minority when I don't shed many tears for X+Y.
I considered that as well. It might make things simpler and do away with the "Dead levels" argument in general. We'd just have to adjust the priority tables. If someone wants to use a skill they don't have, they can make an attribute roll instead on TN6 (on a d6. TN10 on a d10, I suppose).Marras wrote:Personally I would have ditched even the starting level for skills based on an attribute.
Of course, the natural argument might then be "but why isn't my high-intelligence character better at X?" which can be legitimate from a simulationist perspective.. but we do give you the chance to choose how important your skills are to you from the start, so that might not be an issue.
The real question would be whether attributes had enough value if we removed them entirely from skills. That's one to chew on.
My default opinion as well.Marras wrote:Having just a skill to worry about works wonderfully in general and I don't see why it wouldn't in BoB. In this case the skill represents the knowledge, actual performance but also possible financial trivia about it. I don't see the need to add an attribute to the roll. Besides even if the skill is based on a single attribute it is just a starting point and that's the end of the link. No reason to think about it during a gameplay only during character generation.
This sort of thing works wonderfully on a human scale, but tends to break on an animal scale. Remove attributes and we need a different way to deal with grizzly bears and such that are way stronger than humans and every animal needs its own damage modifiers, rather than being able to have "claws" and "Teeth" as their own categories with damage increases based on strength.Marras wrote:I would go even as far as remove attributes except for "derived attributes" that would be bought using points. Instead of attributes everyone is by definition average but edges/flaws (with ratings?) would tell how strong your character is, how smart he is etc. if that differs from average. The down side of this is how to do attribute checks but I think most often a skill check can be substituted with edge/flaw being a modifier.
Thats true, however. Though, so would ignoring the link between skills and attributes. Derived attributes are another issue, but not as big of one. There's no such thing as a "Dead level" when we're averaging two attributes, because different attributes are at different levels. Two evens and two odds will produce the same thing. The only "dead levels" you might see argued are in Brawn being divided for Body, but I'm of the notion that we can make Brawn do enough other stuff that you have reasons to raise it besides just "I want to increase my damage"Marras wrote:This would also remove the problem of "dead levels" that divisions can cause.
It does, but it also means those shifts have less impact. I've found the that dis/advantage feels a bit anemic on a d10 unless you're already so wounded that you're just desparately trying to avoid using TN10. If we don't go to a d6, I'll probably argue to make advantage +2/-2 TN instead of +1/-1.Marras wrote:I really don't have an opinion about the die type. I suppose I have enough of both type to not complain Still, d10 gives a bit smoother grade for TNs.
Ha. There's a thought.Marras wrote:As for using or not using dots on a character sheet. I created a character sheet for Cyberpunk 2020 quite a while ago. I just made two sets of 5 dots for skills and it is quite easy to read, even for skill rating of 8.