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Talakeal
2013-06-20, 03:34 PM
So I am designing my own gaming system. The premise is that it is a gothic setting which is a melding on Arthurian mythology and Conan style sword and sorcery. It is not "low magic" per se, but magic is rare and mysterious, and the party is not expected to be covered in magic items and the capacity to cast spells.

Recently I have been having some problems balancing buffs / magic items, as anyone who has read my last two threads asking for help has probably noticed.

I would like some conceptual advice.

First a general question. How vital do you think "buffs" are to a game? I have noticed a trend in recent RPGS, both MMOs and table top, to minimize or even remove buffs entirely, or to group them into easy to access categories and assume they are "always on" in a balanced party.


No for the setting specific question. This is a bit long, so feel free to just answer the first part:

I want magic to be powerful but limiting. NPC wizards should be frightening and mysterious, a definite challenge, but not an insurmountable one for mundane characters to overcome. If a mage can prepare or go "nova" they should almost always win against a mundane character, but spell points are not recovered until the full moon so a mage who does go "nova" will be out of the action, and thus unable to accomplish anything further, and a better goal is to use magic subtly and escape from direct confrontation.

PC wizards are an option, but due to the limits of the magic system they should keep their magic low key, only casting when necessary. It is a building point system rather than a class / level system, so a mage can still do something while not casting spells.

I more or less have offensive magic and utility magic balanced so that it is stronger than mundane action but not unfairly so, and balanced by the cost. What I don't have balanced is buffing and transmutation.


Mages are powerful and can provide almost any ability they desire. A master transmuter can actually remake a person or animal, changing them into almost anyone or anything.

The party wizard (note that a party wizard is NOT an expected feature of every group like in D&D, but I have one for play testing) would spend a good portion of their magic buffing the group. This gave the party a significant bonus to all dice rolls as attributes, as well as several very potent abilities. However, the wizard would end up bored as they had spent most of their magic so everyone else could have fun, and they were bored with few spell points left for combat or utility spells. So sometimes she wouldn't buff, which meant the rest of the party went without.

I found it impossible to balance encounters. If the party was buffed they blew through everything without taking a scratch. If the wizard decided not to buff the party got rolled and most fights risked a TPK.

So I had the following problems.

One; difficulty of balancing.

Two; it is boring for the party wizard to spend all their resources making sure everyone else had fun.

Three; It makes it so that a party without a mage is up the creek, which means my rare magic world is anything but. It also gives rise to the 2E cleric problem, where one player isn't allowed to play the character they want and is forced into a support role for the benefit of the group as a whole.

Four; If you want an exotic ability such as flight it is actually cheaper to make your character into a wizard and just cast the fly spell on yourself than to make a winged character or a character with an item that allows flight.


So my solution was the Chakra system. Translated into d20 terms, no character can ever have more spell levels worth of beneficial magical effects active at any given time than their Charisma* score. This includes magic items which provide a continuous magical effect.**

Characters can spend a feat to get more chakras, and purchase a relic trait at character creation to receive a special item which does not use chakras. In addition mages can spend extra spell points on a spell to make the spell require no chakras, although it is a fairly significant cost.


In play the party filled up most of their chakras with passive magic item. Most, but all (actually the only one who is more than half full is the wizard in question, who dumped charisma).

The wizard is now complaining that buffing is useless, and might as well be removed from the game. That the chakra system has stripped the game of "all fun" and that no one who actually likes playing a mage will ever play the game. That the only role a mage can now play is a boring nuker / debuffer, as buffs are unusable and utility spells are a pointless waste of magic.



So, does anyone have any advice, suggestions, or feedback on how to limit buffs without ruining the game?



*: Charisma was a weak attribute and this was a needed buff. One of the goals of the system is to make a larger range of builds viable, and every attribute does something for every archetype.

**: Tying it into magic items solved some other problems:

One, it allowed a party without a mage to fill the power gap.
Two, limitless magic items means the PCs spend all their time money whoring which leads to a Christmas tree effect.
Three, there is no reason why powerful NPCs don't simply hunt down and destroy upstart adventurers and hoard their wealth.
Four, a limit of bonuses at a given time means players will be more likely to hold on to flavor or utility items rather than selling / disenchanting them for power bonus items.

A side note: All spells last until the end of the next encounter and all spells can target anyone. Metamagics can modify this.

TuggyNE
2013-06-20, 11:12 PM
Other than the quirks of spell duration, this seems fairly reasonable, and I'm not quite sure what the problem was. Unless the buffs were far more useful in combination, it seems like cutting down the maximum number would preserve the effectiveness of the remainder, and even require careful thought to best use the limited resources of chakras. Your player appears to be overreacting from here.

Slipperychicken
2013-06-20, 11:48 PM
If a mage can prepare or go "nova" they should almost always win against a mundane character, but spell points are not recovered until the full moon

That's your problem right there. You took most of the issues with D&D magic and turned them up to 11.

Rhynn
2013-06-21, 01:17 AM
Buffs aren't necessary or vital, especially in the kind of setting you're saying you want to create. Spells that improve people were sort of rare in Howard's Conan, for instance. I can think of two, and both were on items: the sword in The Phoenix on the Sword (for slaying a demon) and the belt in The People of the Black Circle (for protection against magic).

IMO you should never assume them, and magic should have a cost.

Are you familiar with Pendragon and Conan d20? Both make PC magicians possible but not easy or assumed, and magic works in tricky ways. They'd make great research for your game, and I recommend them most of all. HârnMaster's magic system might be a good reference, too. Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2E also has an approach that makes magic a powerful ace up your sleeve, but not the standard approach. I think getting away from D&D magic and seeing different ways of doing it, then re-thinking the base assumptions, would be a huge help to your game.

It sounds like your problem is magnitude and breadth. Make magical bonuses more specific: you can't just get a bonus to everything (or at most a very small bonus). Maybe you can't get bonuses at all. Maybe, instead of giving you a bonus to fighting demons, an ensorcelled sword can hurt them at all.

In part, your wizard is causing his own problem: he's novaing (unnecessarily, I take it) on improving the party and then has no resources left to use. (Why can't he swing a sword, anyway?) Why not instead use magic to solve an encounter now and then (not by buffing, but by clever application of charms, illusions, etc.), and use a weapon the rest of the time? (Also, can you make combat less important and time-consuming?)

I actually had a similar problem with Artesia: Adventures in the Known World. In every other respect, it is an awesome system, but magic effectively lets you apply twice your main magic skill to all attack tests (tripling or more your combat skill) and thrice your main magic skill against attack tests against you. This means that PCs who ever have a little time to prepare (a week at most) will be nearly invincible and can carve through enemies in plate armor like cheese. (It gets much, much worse if they can also Tap a place of power.)

I came up with a few alternative solutions:
1. Hard: No test/roll can be affected by more that one magic.
2. Soft: PC magicians won't get access to unshaped true forms of magic (most professional magicians know exactly one true form and only teach it after a ~10 year apprenticeship), reducing their flexibility drastically and allowing the GM to control what spells are available to them.

Your approach sounds good, actually: I thought of "limit the amount of sustained magical effects" before I even got to that part of your post. (Incidentally, Artesia: Adventures in the Known World limits you to a number of magic items equal to your Presence, which is the Charisma-equivalent attribute; it's just that that limit is way too small, because PCs can easily maintain wards as spells or through prayers.)

Another part of your problem is that you've got such a small playtest group: for all you know, only 1% of people would actually complain about the limitation mechanic.

Basically, your player makes his own problems. Ignore him. Concentrate on the problems you actually see. You haven't necessarily solved them yet, as Slipperychicken suggests.

Rhynn
2013-06-21, 01:52 AM
Other magic systems!

In Pendragon, magicians function on somewhat different (but similar) rules from the rest of game, which is about playing knights. Instead of Glory ("experience points," although the game has no mechanical levels), they have Insight, which is acquired from different sources (mostly magical and religious works). They belong to traditions: Pagan Druids, Pagan Bards, Pagan Enchantresses, Pagan Witches, Christian Priests, Christian Nuns/Monks, and Christian Friars/Hermits.

Magicians are limited by several things. Magic needs Life Force to work, and usually you need to find ambient Life Force sufficient to work your magic; not an easy task. A magician has a Magic Limit that limits the life force that can be channeled. Magic requires 1-3 hours to work, as a base. (It can be worked in 1-6 minutes instead, but at a penalty to the success roll.) And magicians have different Talents (magical skills), like Glamour, Healing, and Shapeshift, which determine the kinds of mgic they can work.

Duration and number of targets increase the Life Force required for magic.

For instance, to change a man into a toad for the rest of his life, you'd need to use High Shapeshift (only available if Shapeshift is part of your tradition, rather than a Natural Talent), which costs 90 Life Force, +150 Life Force for a lifetime duration. That's 240 Life Force. Sacred or holy places have 6d20 (or more; Avalon has 8d20, Carbonek and Stonehenge 10d20) Life Force available, or an average of 66. If you're a particularly devout Magician, your own Life Force (always available) is 4d20 (5d20 is pretty much the maximum), so that's 22. Not enough! You need to perform this magic at a Sacred Time: Imbolc or Lugnasadh would add 5d20 (55). If you sacrificed a particularly virtuous human, you'd get another 4d20 (22).

That's only up to 143 Life Force, short by 100! If you cut the duration down to one season, you'd only need 140. So, by using a sacred place and a sacred time, you could turn a man into a toad for a whole season, which is pretty powerful magic. You could even perform this spell on your own if you were an extremely virtuous Pagan.

You probably spent 14 weeks in preparation of the spell, in order to avoid 14 weeks of magical slumber afterwards! Magic has a cost, indeed. (It's worth noting that Pendragon only assumes one "adventure" per year, but life goes on all year, and wars and other events can happen.)

Rhynn
2013-06-21, 02:33 AM
In Conan d20, there is one spellcasting class - the Scholar - and spellcasting is the default-but-optional mechanic for it. Every time you'd get a new Sorcery Style, you can choose a bonus feat instead; every time you'd get a new Advanced Spell, you can take bonus skill points instead. A scholar with all Sorcery is going to be more powerful than a Scholar with less or no Sorcery, but it's not really a game of builds and power and balance the way D&D 3.X is. (Of course, a bookish scholar isn't exactly a very Conan-style character at all!) Non-Scholars can get very limited access to Sorcery with the Dabbler feat, but multiclassing is assumed and encouraged, too.

Sorcery usually requires preparation, and runs on Power Points. A 1st-level Scholar sorcerer has 4 + Wis mod base PP, and can temporarily increase to double this. A 20th-level Scholar sorcerer can have 9 + Wis mod base PP, and can temporarily increase to five times this. PP costs of 2-3 are common, but powerful spells can require 8+, and some impressive spells require as many as 20 (+10 per hour in one case). PPs are recovered up to the base limit by resting 2 hours per point.

To exceed the normal limit, a sorcerer may sacrifice creatures, gaining 1 PP per 16 HP of non-sacred animal, 1 PP per 8 HP of ordinary person, up to 1 PP per 3 HP of a ritually prepared (bathed, anointed, purified, conscious, and aware) virgin sacrifice, and 1 PP per 3 HP for one who is also particularly pleasing to the entities (demons or gods) the sorcerer worships or has a pact with. But given that most such virgins will probably be 1st-level commoners...

Sorcerers can also perform power rituals, gaining PPs based on the average Perform check result of the worshippers (they're generally assumed to take 10). An average result of 10-14 by 100+ celebrants (the highest category) only gets you 4 PP, though.

And then, once you've boosted your PPs, they fade away by 1 per hour until you are at your base limit.

So, performing powerful magic requires rituals with celebrants in the dozens, and difficult human sacrifices.

There's a bunch of other specifics: all magic ceases to function when its caster dies; sorcerers can cast defensive blasts (with different effects) that expend all remaining Power Points; sorcerers become obsessed and insane and corrupted; sorcerers are often beholden to masters (mortal or from the Outer Dark).

Magic is powerful but limited. Many of the spells are flavorful and cool above all; there's a spell to stuff a thousand demons into a bag (to be released upon everything in the vicinity when it is opened), a curse to turn a human into a were-beast, a dying curse (a free spell if you know the prerequisites; basically, killing certain sorcerers always gets you cursed), a spell that involves smashing jars to release cobras to force a victim into a hypnotic dance, etc. Most are straight from Conan stories (not only Howard's, of course, but also de Camp's, etc.). Many spells obviously exist only to justify an adventure ors story around them - they'd be close to worthless to PCs.

Talakeal
2013-06-21, 03:30 AM
That's your problem right there. You took most of the issues with D&D magic and turned them up to 11.

I'm not sure if I follow. Care to elaborate?

I was under the impression that the strength of D&D magic was not power, but versatility, and how incredibly easy it is to bypass its downsides. That and flat out broken spells like the polymorph line.




In part, your wizard is causing his own problem: he's novaing (unnecessarily, I take it) on improving the party and then has no resources left to use. (Why can't he swing a sword, anyway?) Why not instead use magic to solve an encounter now and then (not by buffing, but by clever application of charms, illusions, etc.), and use a weapon the rest of the time? (Also, can you make combat less important and time-consuming?)



First off, thanks for the detailed response. Its nice to now someone actually took the time to read my wall of text and write out a detailed response. Thanks for the info on the other games, I haven't actually read either of those systems before and it offers some cool new insight. I will have to check them out more in the future.


Actually, if he was consistently doing that it wouldn't be such a problem. Sometimes he nova buffs the party, sometimes he is stingy and wont toss out any buffs. It was REALLY hard for me to balance encounters with a variable of such magnitude, which was one of the reasons why I put in limits, to minimize the power gap between a buffed and unbuffed party.

He refuses to take any skills besides magic because "he is a mage". Any turn in which he is not casting a spell he is "not a mage" and not having fun because "he came to the game to play a mage".

His big problem with the new system is that as the players get to higher and higher power level their magic item access outstrips their buff slots, and most players will simply "cap out" their buff allotment with items that grant passive bonuses.

This provides the mage with two problems. One, he seems less useful. Two, there is no room for "fun" buffs which provide options but not numerical increases in power such as flight, invisibility, or incorporeality.

These buffs are useful, and too powerful to let people just have free access to, but won't usually keep pace with flat power increases, at least in the minds of the players. To some extent I agree with him, and am uncertain exactly which buffs I should make count against the chakra limit.




Another part of your problem is that you've got such a small play test group: for all you know, only 1% of people would actually complain about the limitation mechanic.

Basically, your player makes his own problems. Ignore him. Concentrate on the problems you actually see. You haven't necessarily solved them yet, as Slipperychicken suggests.

Well, that was actually the real crux of the issue. As one last "twist of the knife" the player explained that my game sucked and would never have any appeal because I "designed it for myself" rather than designing it for the average gamer. The average gamer, he said, likes an unbalanced and crazy high magic game, while only a very small minority would ever play a "boringly over balanced low magic game".

I could just dismiss it as the ravings of an angry munchkin, but I have to admit that he might be right, "low magic settings" does seem to be one of the top pet peeves of the players on this and other forums as it seems like most are just an excuse for a DM power trip.

Rhynn
2013-06-21, 05:19 AM
I'm not sure if I follow. Care to elaborate?

I was under the impression that the strength of D&D magic was not power, but versatility, and how incredibly easy it is to bypass its downsides. That and flat out broken spells like the polymorph line.

I think the was referring to going nova. It's pretty much acknowledged that if spellcasters only need to deal with one encounter per day, they will blow through them like nothing to it. Psions are even worse: I've seen that one in action, with every power augmented to the maximum; even with just blasting, the powers were one-shotting enemies left and right.

So building a system where that's not just possible but apparently becomes de rigueur is a bad idea. Although, again, I think that's the player's problem. A player has to be a bit dumb, honestly, to feel like what he is choosing to do is a huge problem but doing it anyway.


Actually, if he was consistently doing that it wouldn't be such a problem. Sometimes he nova buffs the party, sometimes he is stingy and wont toss out any buffs. It was REALLY hard for me to balance encounters with a variable of such magnitude, which was one of the reasons why I put in limits, to minimize the power gap between a buffed and unbuffed party.

This brings up a question: are you looking to balance encounters because you want that sort of game, or because you mostly have experience with D&D 3.X/4E? Because the whole concept of "encounter balance" is one that developed in late AD&D 2E, came into its own in 3.X, and was crystallized into mathematical perfection in 4E. Pretty much no other game I know (excepting d20 derivatives) does that, and I own and have read probably close to 100 by now. As in, I can't think of a single one that worries about encounter balance that's not AD&D 2E and later D&D.

Most games cheerfully don't worry about encounter balance. They usually also don't assume combat is a big part of the game, which has been the assumption in D&D since AD&D 2E removed XP-for-gold rules. (The slower advancement was half-heartedly addressed with weak story awards, specifically limited in guidelines to be smaller in comparison to monster XP than treasure XP was in 1E.)

Instead of presenting "combat encounters," these games tend to present broader challenges. Instead of "you fight a dragon on a mountainside," it's "a dragon is stealing sheep from farmers, how do you approach this problem?" Instead of "you have to fight through 6 rooms in an evil cult's secret temple" it's "an evil cult with a secret temple is doing evil cult stuff, how do you approach this problem?"

Combat still happens in those games, but it's not forced on the players by assumptions or mechanical necessity (defeating monsters for XP). Often, there's more expectation on the players to play smart. Enemies don't divide into convenient, easily handled amounts, and players often need to be clever, sneaky, and tactical if they want to fight them.

This creates a sort of balance-by-imbalance, in my experience. The players don't throw themselves carelessly into everything, but sometimes find themselves in over their head - in which case, they usually try to extract themselves rather than forge on stubbornly. (Unless, of course, a bold last stand is appropriate.)

Making a game where combat encounters and balance are important is just fine, and obviously such games have a big audience (though I really doubt it's because of that approach). What I'm getting at is a general principle of designing any game: your most important asset is knowing the rules, style, and principles of many, many other RPGs. As many as possible. Dozens, preferrably. There's no magic prerequisite number, but more is better.

The problem with the balance-by-imbalance is that it's not something created by rules; in fact, it's something created by the absence of guidelines, which doesn't work so well if your players come from D&D 3.X/d20/4E, because they have all the wrong assumptions. (I feel a few party wipes ought to teach them to approach things differently, unless they're particularly lazy or entitled...)


He refuses to take any skills besides magic because "he is a mage". Any turn in which he is not casting a spell he is "not a mage" and not having fun because "he came to the game to play a mage".

:smallfurious:

... yeah, the player is the problem, not the system.


Well, that was actually the real crux of the issue. As one last "twist of the knife" the player explained that my game sucked and would never have any appeal because I "designed it for myself" rather than designing it for the average gamer. The average gamer, he said, likes an unbalanced and crazy high magic game, while only a very small minority would ever play a "boringly over balanced low magic game".

People who claim they know what the "silent majority" thinks are BSing, by definition. :smallbiggrin: Ignore him. You need more people to test the system.

D&D's popularity is based mostly on inertia and brand recognition.


I could just dismiss it as the ravings of an angry munchkin, but I have to admit that he might be right, "low magic settings" does seem to be one of the top pet peeves of the players on this and other forums as it seems like most are just an excuse for a DM power trip.

That is, IMO, not true at all. D&D 3.X is a an outlier as far as magic goes. Hardly any RPGs have magic with the same combination of convenience, low cost, and power.

One player whining is not data, and your general impression from one (D&D 3.X focused) roleplaying forum is not data. If you actually hope to publish a system (even on an amateur level), you'll need to playtest it with dozens of people at the very least. At first, you can do it in person; maybe you can run it at cons or game stores as an event (pre-made characters and a quick-start rules summary sheet, but using all the real rules), with a feedback form and an opportunity for in-person feedback afterwards. Then, find groups (through forums, for instance) willing to try the game out and send you feedback. Keep in close contact with them if possible - if they're online friends, all the better.

Also, you're never going to publish a D&D-killer anyway, so finding a niche that will like your game is much more useful than trying to cater to people who just freaking love D&D 3.X/4E/5E. Heck, even WotC can't seem to that right anymore.

The Glyphstone
2013-06-21, 12:50 PM
:smallfurious:

... yeah, the player is the problem, not the system.


.

This must be your first Talakeal thread. Any problem he has, you can generally assume Root Cause #1 is the players (his game group) being irrational and unpleasable crazy people.

Rhynn
2013-06-21, 12:55 PM
This must be your first Talakeal thread. Any problem he has, you can generally assume Root Cause #1 is the players (his game group) being irrational and unpleasable crazy people.

Oh, I have avowed my hatred of his group over and over. And over and over...

Apparently it's just the one guy, though, according to the last thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=288091).

... wait, it is the same guy in that thread and this thread, right? :smalleek:

Talakeal
2013-06-21, 01:35 PM
The idea is that an npc mage is free to nova, while a pc mage wil want to ration out their magic. Balance exists between pcs, but npc mages can still be dangerous and unpredictable opponents and not something dismissed lightly.

As for balanced encounters, i dont mean something like d&d cr, a laughably broken system anyway. I simply mean as a dm i cant tell if an enemy is beatable by the party or not. If i put a monster in their path and they attack with no bufs it could be a tpk, but with unlimited buffs they can just rush headlong in with no tactics because it cant realisticly hurt the flying, incorporeal, plus five armor, plus five vitality, plus five dodge, regenerating, energy resistant pcs.to say nothing of their offensive power...

My group is mostly made up of hack and slash players. Two players hate to rp and get bored very quickly outside of combat. I have had many players in the past who were even worse. I like rp myself, but i still enjoy a good sword fight now and then. The system does not, however, force combat on the players and killing bad guys is not a means of character progression.

The Glyphstone
2013-06-21, 02:07 PM
Sounds like you're making buffs too powerful. If the variance between Buffed and Unbuffed is smaller, then the chances of that happening are lower.

Make up for this by having magic be more useful outside of combat.

Barsoom
2013-06-21, 04:44 PM
It pains me to say that, but per-day abilities make for lousy game balance. You either have them, in which case you're golden, or don't, in which case you're a commoner. Per-month abilities are even worse, since presumably they need to be made stronger to compensate for their rarity.

Which is why you can't achieve the goal of:
I simply mean as a dm i cant tell if an enemy is beatable by the party or not.

The only truly balanced way to create a caster is to make all their abilities either at-will or per-encounter. That at least makes them predictable - you know exactly which level of power they wield coming into an encounter.

Talakeal
2013-06-21, 05:39 PM
It pains me to say that, but per-day abilities make for lousy game balance. You either have them, in which case you're golden, or don't, in which case you're a commoner. Per-month abilities are even worse, since presumably they need to be made stronger to compensate for their rarity.




That's never really been much of an issue, or if it is it is because the player has made it an issue by blowing their load immediately and then bitching about not having any power left for the rest of the game.


In theory it works out kind of like the fighter doing 5 damage every round, and the wizard doing 10 damage every other round. In my play test experience it generally works out that way in practice as well.


Magic lends itself to a much more strategic level of game play. It isn't for everyone, but then again the default assumption is that magic is rare and most characters won't be wizards to begin with is.


There is also low key subtle magic which affects probability rather than directly altering reality. This sort of magic can be done virtually all day long, and while not as powerful as regular magic, or even mundane skill in the proper area, it is still a noticeable contribution and something for the "pure" mage to do.


The problem was the wizard using buffs (and with the proper setup it is possible to get buffs which last all month and affect the whole party) to cast a spell once, then just sitting back and letting the rest of the party demolish everything they came up against with no risk or resource expenditure.




The only truly balanced way to create a caster is to make all their abilities either at-will or per-encounter. That at least makes them predictable - you know exactly which level of power they wield coming into an encounter.

Sure, at will / encounter mechanics are nice, but it really limits the kind of powers you can have in the game. Something like the ability to heal wounds* or turn lead into gold is grossly unbalanced in an at will / per encounter system.

I could make a game like 4E which is super balanced and all classes play the same (in regards to power recovery time), but I want magic to have a very different feel than doing something the mundane way. The goal is to make magic simultaneously powerful and rare. Making it easy and reliable for PCs to use defeats both of those goals.

It's funny, the player who said he hates "boring and balanced" games and says that it is only fun when mages are overpowered gods, yet 4E, the only edition where this is not the case, is the only edition of D&D which he will play.

*: This is a "realistic and gritty" game, and it takes weeks to recover from a serious injury, rather than the full health after a few hours rest style. If mages can heal wounds at will or per encounter this means that it becomes vital for every party to include a magical healer, which is exactly the problem I am trying to avoid, having magic become so necessary it is ubiquitous.

Barsoom
2013-06-21, 07:02 PM
Seems you're going for "different", "powerful", "awe inspiring" and "balanced" all at the same time. Good luck, but seems like a lost cause, frankly.

Talakeal
2013-06-21, 07:36 PM
Seems you're going for "different", "powerful", "awe inspiring" and "balanced" all at the same time. Good luck, but seems like a lost cause, frankly.

Eh. Maybe. But the principles aren't unsound.

Currently I am playing Resident Evil on my Playstation. In that game the Magnum is roughly x10 as powerful as the Handgun, but ammo for the Handgun is roughly x10 as plentiful. Thus over the course of the game you will have reason to use both, and both will do roughly the same amount of damage over the course of the game, and thus the Magnum fulfills three of those criteria. Add a mechanic like the Shotgun where a well aimed shot does double damage but a poorly aimed shot does half or a funky graphic like the Flame Thrower and you fulfill "different" as well.

Obviously a tabletop RPG is much more complex than a shooter game, and various PC abilities are a lot more complex than a gun, but the principles are much the same. Perfect balance is of course impossible, but as long as one choice isn't always a no brainer it is good enough for me.

Slipperychicken
2013-06-21, 07:40 PM
That's never really been much of an issue, or if it is it is because the player has made it an issue by blowing their load immediately and then bitching about not having any power left for the rest of the game.


In response to the "nova", I'd consider dividing the spell points across a smaller time period, like a week or a day. Like if they would normally get 300 spell points a month, they'd get 70 per week, or 10 per day. Or doing something else so one bad decision doesn't cripple the character.

Mr Beer
2013-06-21, 08:12 PM
This must be your first Talakeal thread. Any problem he has, you can generally assume Root Cause #1 is the players (his game group) being irrational and unpleasable crazy people.

This.

Talakeal, this is not a system problem. You're spending time making an elaborate and delicious cake for the kind of people who will put a fist through it and yell "I wanted HAM you bastard!".

erikun
2013-06-22, 12:51 AM
I see buffs in a lot of systems, but a lot of them tend towards self-buffs. There are a lot of powers or charms or magics that will grant the user something in exchange for some small resource. Buffing others tends to be less common, though.

One thing I note is that you seem to be using buffs as numeric bonuses, rather than granting new abilities. One of my best buffing experiences was probably with a D&D4e Warlord, with abilities like flanking an opponent, then giving an ally at attack against them (Commander's Strike). Or taking a swing at an opponent, and allowing an ally to move (Wolf Pack Tactics). Or a group buff that allows PCs to move one ally any time they successfully hit an opponent (White Raven Onslaught). And as much as I like the D&D3e Cleric, rationing out my spell slots into +1 or +2 bonuses for the party, or large buffs for myself, was just rather boring in comparison.

Also, I am curious. Does your wizard have some sort of "manabolt" that they can toss around for a bit of magical damage each round?

Talakeal
2013-06-22, 02:14 AM
Also, I am curious. Does your wizard have some sort of "manabolt" that they can toss around for a bit of magical damage each round?

Yes, but not unlimited use. Guys running around shooting energy blasts at each other all day is just not the image I am going for.