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View Full Version : Help determining the mechanics of a Renown/Recognisability Stat



Albions_Angel
2021-04-02, 04:42 AM
Hi all,

I am currently creating a custom system for some friends. The dice, type of system, etc isnt actually important for this question though, as it focuses on a single mechanic.

The system is based on a fantasy world we all enjoy, and that world has a large basis on character renown. Servants are largely ignored, the ruling classes can literally get away with murder.

Because of this, I came up with the concept of a Renown attribute/score/tracker thing. Basically, your choices at character creation are very free, but generally fall into 3 categories - common, uncommon and rare. Your base renown is 0, the rarer your options, the more renown you accrue.

I want the renown score to be useful at both high and low values. My general idea is something along the lines of:

Low Renown should allow you to blend in with servants, gather information from commoners, and generally pass unnoticed. But if you are caught/questioned, there is not a lot you can do to get you out of a situation.

High Renown means you are easily recognised/spotted in a crowd (you are not necessarily well known, but something about you stands out). It should make it harder to buddy up to the lower classes, but far easier to talk your way out of trouble if caught by the authorities ("do you know who I am?").

I am trying to keep the system extremely simple. My group dislikes complexity in any form. Therefore:


The Renown counter can never be lower than 0
It will run to a maximum of likely 10 or 15 throughout the course of the game
Skill checks currently work in the "default" way - roll a die, add the appropriate attribtue score - Renown need not work that way, but its better if it does
It should be one score/tracker, not 2


The thing is, I am struggling to come up with how to actually use the score I have created. I dont have a list of skills yet, so thats free to tinker with. And while currently this system is, as far as I can tell, unique, I dont mind borrowing a mechanic here or there. The system wont be published so I am free to do whatever.

About the only thing I have in my head right now is when designing, say, a ball that the players have to sneak into, I predetermine a minimum (usually 0) and a maximum Suspicion level for various entry points. As long as their Renown is between those bounds, they are fine, and can act how they want. Should they fail either condition, they will be approached and questioned, at which point, they can try to use a skill (perhaps substituting their Renown for the skill attribute) to lie their way out, distract the questioner, or otherwise circumvent the situation.

Low renown players are less likely to face questioning at all, but if they do, they only have their base stats to go on (which are likely higher than their renown score, so substituting is pointless). High renown players will get questioned a lot (at the gates to the party, for example) but can usually blag their way in, either using their stats, or substituting their raw Renown score and using their influence.

But I dont know. I feel there are too many failure points in this, and that its clunky. I absolutely want to keep Renown as a mechanic, and I am very happy with how its determined, but I just dont know how to USE it.

Thoughts would be appreciated.

Batcathat
2021-04-02, 04:55 AM
I'm not sure if it would do everything you want it to, but one pretty simple way of doing it be to match the renown scale to a die (so 1-20 for a d20 or 1-100 for a d100 or something), call one direction of the scale Anonymity and the other Fame (so having 20 renown would both count as 20 Fame and 80 Anonymity, if we're using a 1-100 scale). Then the players try to roll under one of the values, depending on whether they want to be recognized or not, so blending in with the crowd would require rolling under Anonymity and pulling a "Do you know who I am?" would require rolling under Fame.

Disclaimer: This is something I thought of in one minute and wrote down in two, so I'm not sure it'll work well and even less sure I explained it well.

Albions_Angel
2021-04-02, 05:57 AM
I'm not sure if it would do everything you want it to, but one pretty simple way of doing it be to match the renown scale to a die (so 1-20 for a d20 or 1-100 for a d100 or something), call one direction of the scale Anonymity and the other Fame (so having 20 renown would both count as 20 Fame and 80 Anonymity, if we're using a 1-100 scale). Then the players try to roll under one of the values, depending on whether they want to be recognized or not, so blending in with the crowd would require rolling under Anonymity and pulling a "Do you know who I am?" would require rolling under Fame.

Disclaimer: This is something I thought of in one minute and wrote down in two, so I'm not sure it'll work well and even less sure I explained it well.

No, I totally get that. Its also one of my thoughts for how to make it work, but I run into issues if a low renown character gets stopped, they really should fail. So rather than them picking, I would have to decided whether it calls for a Fame or Anonymity roll. Which I can do, but I am just wondering if there is a more elegant solution I am not seeing.

Also, the system I am creating is d12 and I am worried thats too granular for such a scale.

Its a good solution though, and I will definitely put it on my mind map with the others!

lightningcat
2021-04-03, 08:58 PM
Only appropriate for a d20 game, but you could use Renown as a Ability that grows and shrinks based on the actions of the character/group. It replaces Charisma anytime the character was not directly interacting with them. It starts at 1 (or Charisma mod) and gains a +1 bonus each level. Complete an adventure +d6. Fail an adventure -d6. Give money to church +d4. Accused/Convicted of a crime -d6. Proven Innocent of a crime +1. ect
There was also the Renown stuff in the d20 Starwars game, but it was just bonuses/penalties to charisma based skills depending on Fame/Infamy

MoiMagnus
2021-04-04, 06:07 AM
I find it easier in practice to use an "Influence" stat rather than Renown, which instead of quantifying how famous you are, quantify who much you can extract from your fame and connections.
[Example: If you were the suspect in a trial that every bard is talking about, you're very famous but it will likely not help you at anything. On the other hand, if you have an official letter from the mage's academy, nobody really knows you but they will recognise the letter and possibly grant you some significant favours.]

The main downside with this approach is that Influence is usually positive, while you're seeking for a stat which is neither fully positive or fully negative.

Batcathat
2021-04-04, 06:34 AM
Only appropriate for a d20 game, but you could use Renown as a Ability that grows and shrinks based on the actions of the character/group. It replaces Charisma anytime the character was not directly interacting with them. It starts at 1 (or Charisma mod) and gains a +1 bonus each level. Complete an adventure +d6. Fail an adventure -d6. Give money to church +d4. Accused/Convicted of a crime -d6. Proven Innocent of a crime +1. ect

One issue with this seems to be that it basically only measures positive reputation, meaning you can't be known as a repeatedly failed adventurer or an infamous criminal. Though I suspect something like that would happen with any renown system that only uses a single score, rather than tracking level of fame and positive/negative reputation separately.

Anonymouswizard
2021-04-04, 10:22 AM
I find it easier in practice to use an "Influence" stat rather than Renown, which instead of quantifying how famous you are, quantify who much you can extract from your fame and connections.
[Example: If you were the suspect in a trial that every bard is talking about, you're very famous but it will likely not help you at anything. On the other hand, if you have an official letter from the mage's academy, nobody really knows you but they will recognise the letter and possibly grant you some significant favours.]

The main downside with this approach is that Influence is usually positive, while you're seeking for a stat which is neither fully positive or fully negative.

Yeah, my homebrew system doesn't track fame or infamy, but does track social resources representing influence with our favours owed by powerful people or groups. Although it doesn't fit the required system in any way, partially because it has no baring on fame and infamy, partially because characters begin with good multiple ones by default.


@OP' part of the problem is that the more sensible you want such a system the more complex it gets to track. So renown should, at a default, be a bonus on checks to identify the character, while also opening up some of the perks of hazing a high Standing in society of an organisation.

An important aspect of renown is that players should be able to mask it via disguises, with their renown and the renown of the person they're impersonating (so 0 or 1 for 'someone anonymous') being applied as a penalty to their roll, succeed and they treat their renown as being equal to their target's to anybody who doesn't see through the disguise.

Renown should also be rolled occasionally to see if somebody tries to, certainly in the scope of the adventure, waste the PC's time.

On the plus side if you're well known crowds might be more likely to listen to you, you might legitimately get invited to the party, and could even get discounts on goods or services. And if you have a positive reputation people might actually listen to what you say.

farothel
2021-04-04, 11:28 AM
Have a look at Shadowrun. They have a renown system build in that might serve as a basis for what you want.

Jay R
2021-04-05, 09:56 PM
I did this without a system -- just a unique situation and DM judgment. In my AD&D 2e world, there are no magical monsters native to the Earth, but occasionally, there are portals from other worlds that release them into the world for a few decades. These are highly chaotic times, and are known as Ages of Heroes.

The world has been quiet for 80 years, and there are essentially no high-level characters, except a few soldiers (mainly leaders of large units) at the 3rd-5th level), plus a very few really old adventurers. The portals opened again when the PCs were first level.

At 3rd level they were able to lift a siege on a small town, and became the local heroes.

At 4th level, they are higher than almost anybody in that part of the world, heroes in the larger city they've just aided, and their fame spreads as fast as bards can travel.

Telok
2021-04-06, 12:18 PM
Rereading the op it sounds more like a social class stat that's affected by fame.

A d12 system huh? I presume the usual "roll, add something, is it higher than a number" procedure.

One option, as a social/reputation stat, is to take the difference between the character stat and the situation rating as a penalty to the default roll. So a rep-0 beggar in a rep-10 'talk to the kings guard' situation does roll-10+stat, in a 'sell to scummy fence' rep-2 situation the rep-8 kings guard has a -6 on the roll.

Hmm. Can lean on or use reputation if it matches the situation, but have to use other skills/stats if it dosen't. Ok, beak it out into 4 point descriptions with overlap. One column for the rep, another for situations. This is a design thing at this point. So 1-4, 3-6, 5-8, 7-10, 9-12, 11-14, 13+. Then if the character rep number falls into the situation range numbers they can use the rep as a stat to roll and get some situation benefit. Otherwise they have to use something else. Could do it without the overlapping ranges but I find social stuff vague enough that I like fuzzy edges. Could have it so that if the character rep number is in an 'off by one' range from the situation you can still roll with rep, just with a penalty or at no bonus.