Character Flaws: Crunch vs. Fluff

[Mastikator]

Let's say that I give my character traits and flaws around "the human form is perfect; other stuff is just weird". So "-2 to hit anything with 6+ legs, +1 to hit anything with 2 legs", "-2 to hit anything with tentacles, +1 to hit anything with 2 arms", "won't accept grafts / piercings / tattoos / other body modifications", "hatred: Mutants".

If the party learns that Mirkwood is infested with spiders, and I convince the party not to go there, should we encounter fewer humanoid opponents as a result, to balance how much my trait disadvantaged me?

If the module had called for us allying with a group of Mutants, and, instead, we slaughter them all, and add their corpses to the Necromancer's army of Undead, is the group going to be any less unhappy if that kills the campaign?

In my experience "is a racist jerk" is a bad flaw to allow a PC to have. And also a good motivation for a villain to have. Unless it was an evil campaign where the GM is taking into account evil actions from the party I would probably just not allow this flaw to begin with.

[Vahnavoi]

Trying, I really am, I have read your posts multiple times at this point, but I am having difficulty finding a single argument against flaws where I can't make a 1 to 1 comparison in complaining about a character being able to drop their strength score and buying up another attribute as a result.

The comparison does no work for you if you don't get the logic behind the original argument. So focus on your own subject: flaws, and leave others for another day.

Well, I can tell you that I have been enjoying games which do allow that level of customization far more than one's which don't since the mid 90s, and I have never played with anyone who made it known that they thought they were a waste of time.

Which is more important again? Fairness or customization? Fairness or making a game you'd enjoy?

See, one of your overarching flaws as a game designer seems to be that your true guiding principle is "make a game I'd enjoy", but instead of straightforwardly following that principle and just copying game elements you enjoy, you feel compelled to ask feedback from players who've been empirically proven to not enjoy the types of games you'd enjoy. And random folks on the internet whose preferences you have few real ideas about.

[icefractal]

The comparison does no work for you if you don't get the logic behind the original argument. So focus on your own subject: flaws, and leave others for another day.

This seems like a total non-answer. "If you can't see how my argument is correct, you must not understand it."

You prefer not to have any mechanical representation of flaws. Fine, valid preference. You have not so far demonstrated a reason they're objectively bad.

[Vahnavoi]

This seems like a total non-answer. "If you can't see how my argument is correct, you must not understand it."

That's not what I said.

You prefer not to have any mechanical representation of flaws. Fine, valid preference. You have not so far demonstrated a reason they're objectively bad.

I'm not trying to demonstrate they're objectively bad - I'm questioning having them as a separate subsystem based on design principles. Those are not the same thing. If you go back to my first post, you'll outright see me give two reasons why you'd have flaws.

Saying I have not succesfully argued for something I was never arguing for is not a counter argument.

[MoiMagnus]

Also, if your remove "flaws as a way to get more character creation points at no cost", you might want to take a look at character creation in general and increase the base number of points.

Some systems might leads to character that are pretty uninteresting to build and/or play if you don't have the additional points from the flaws. In which case the correct homebrew would be "Take the points from the maximum number of allowed 'flaws' by the rules, but don't take the associated flaws. Now here is a new subsystem if you want your character to truly be flawed, but don't expect to be able to min-max those."

[Talakeal]

Which is more important again? Fairness or customization? Fairness or making a game you'd enjoy?.

All of them at once.

While perfect balance is impossible, it is not unreasonable to allow a great deal of customization options which have costs approximate to their power. Likewise, I prefer for crunch and fluff to work together, and things that have a noticeable impact on one should be modeled in the other.

Flaws don't need to mean a worse character overall. The players being roughly balanced doesn’t make perfect sense in fiction, but it doesn’t agregiously hurt verisimilitude the way a one armed man dual wielding would. And it is possible for a flawed character to be roughly as good as anyone else, for example a young healthy recruit right out of boot camp and an old veteran who knows everything about war and a lifetime of experience with the blade, but whose body is broken by said lifetime or war and may have physical or mental handicaps as a result could both be equally contributing members of a mercenary corps.

Also, while I like your initial premise of flaws as a self imposed hard mode, and indeed do it in almost every game, in my experience most players see it as selfishly sabotaging the group’s success and I have literally been kicked out of a half dozen groups for it.

See, one of your overarching flaws as a game designer seems to be that your true guiding principle is "make a game I'd enjoy", but instead of straightforwardly following that principle and just copying game elements you enjoy, you feel compelled to ask feedback from players who've been empirically proven to not enjoy the types of games you'd enjoy. And random folks on the internet whose preferences you have few real ideas about.

Its not one or the other.

While yes, I agree that one of my flaws as a person, not just a game designer, is I want to talk everything to death and will never agree to disagree, its not always a bad thing.

I have received tons of good feedback from play-testers and forums, and have made hundreds of changes to my game as a result. And even though most feedback I don't agree with and don’t use, discussing it still helps me better understand where other people are coming from as well as my own position.

And, its not always about me. While the ultimate decision is mine, sometimes I do bow to the masses. For example, I much prefer games with acquisition rolls to coin counting, but every time I have tried to introduce such a thing to Heart of Darkness, it is universally hated by both play-testers and forums, and so I have never gone through with it.

And yeah, copying systems works for a baseline, but nothing is ever perfect. Merits and Flaws straight out of World of Darkness is a good system, but it has its flaws, no pun intended, and so while my initial implementation was more or less a direct copy, I have iterated on it over time, as has White Wolf / Onyx Path.

This seems like a total non-answer. "If you can't see how my argument is correct, you must not understand it."

You prefer not to have any mechanical representation of flaws. Fine, valid preference. You have not so far demonstrated a reason they're objectively bad.

What he said.

[Anonymouswizard]

Are we back to giving out stat and skill points based on age categories? I mean it's not a terrible system, I do like Burning Wheel's character creation, but it's always more complicated than strictly required.

Honestly, the problem with granular crunch and CP for flaws is the same, it in practice increases the gap between the power gamer (who has taken flaws which apply to things they just don't care about) and the average player (who selected flaws for concept, if at all). That's not that other forms of handling flaws don't have their issues, but I've personally seen them less often.

I once tried to convince my GM that I shouldn't have been allowed to take the 'weak melee strikes' flaw, because I already had so low strength that even after we patched the healing punches loophole I was still getting free points for something that didn't actually limit me. Weirdly he refused because his system was basically balanced around my character taking it, but he did ban my attempt to minmax my way down to one hit point (I had two, and only survived due to exploring the lack of rules in just what you can react to a charge with...).

Oh yeah, it's not talked about as much but over-minning is also an issue. Most commonly thought of in the 'Grog the Barbarian took 3 Charisma, Odious Personal Habits, Body Odour, Short Temper, and Bloodlust' style, but some of us will min other areas for the challenge.


Anybody else think that Talakeal's perspective might be skewed via his known history of bad groups? He does seem to have an unusual tendency to get them.

[Vahnavoi]

All of them at once.

While perfect balance is impossible, it is not unreasonable to allow a great deal of customization options which have costs approximate to their power. Likewise, I prefer for crunch and fluff to work together, and things that have a noticeable impact on one should be modeled in the other.

*groan*

You might have heard some version of optimizer's triad in your life: fast, cheap, good. Pick two. Can't have the third. The reason we say that is because in real life, multiple design goals can interfere with each other and often do. When that happens, you don't say "all at once", you pick which are more important and compromise the one that doesn't make the cut. On some level you must've realized it, otherwise you wouldn't have gotten this much work done. If you don't start to embrace it, you'll never finish.

The amount of customization in particular directly interferes with fairness in a mathematically simple and objective way: the amount of interacting customization widgets increases the amount of work required to balance them factorially. Arbitrary "+X to one check at the cost of -X to another" is a great example of a mechanic that is near impossible to make fair - like everyone and their mother in this thread has been able to tell you, these are rarely prompted equally. They say the bonus is prompted (or should be prompted) more often, but it could be as well the opposite; either way, it ends up unbalanced compared to those not using the mechanic. It also ends up unbalanced compared to other instances of the same mechanic without constant fine-tuning on the GM's side, which you can't ensure outside games you personally hold, since you do not control game scenarios.

If you desire fairness - if what you intent is truly for +X and -X to equal 0 - then you should not have these kinds of rules via direct application of Occam's Razor. Do not multiply entities needlessly. Between two rules models that create same effect, choose the simpler one. Turns out, you get 0 by not having those kind of rules in the first place. Plus it eliminates all designer and GM fine-tuning needs.

If you still don't want to get rid of such rules, then you have implicitly decided customizability is more important than fairness. You want yourself and your players have those widgets. Fairness takes a hit as a direct result. If you want any amount of fairness, you pay for it with extra work.

Flaws don't need to mean a worse character overall.

Nobody claiming it needs to mean that - completely the opposite, everyone and their mother has pointed out flaws, as a mechanic, can make your character better overall, or have no result whatsoever. I'm questioning why you'd choose those options. Why call flaws "flaws", if they're boons in disguise? Or why waste effort adding extra rules if you don't want those rules to matter? These aren't rhetorical questions - I gave one valid answer in my first post. Clearly, your answer is that yes, having customization trade-offs is more important than flaws changing the way a game is played by being actual flaws.

The players being roughly balanced doesn’t make perfect sense in fiction, but it doesn’t agregiously hurt verisimilitude the way a one armed man dual wielding would. And it is possible for a flawed character to be roughly as good as anyone else, for example a young healthy recruit right out of boot camp and an old veteran who knows everything about war and a lifetime of experience with the blade, but whose body is broken by said lifetime or war and may have physical or mental handicaps as a result could both be equally contributing members of a mercenary corps.

If you cherry-pick the entire space of possible characters, you can find examples of "fair" pairs of flawed and flawless characters. This doesn't mean you should try to stretch your mechanical system to cover such examples. The more accurately you model the factors that differentiate the recruit from the veteran, the harder it actually becomes to ensure they are and remain equally contributing, and the easier it becomes to create unfair pairs of characters. This is what happens with all old versions of D&D that use random generation, by the way: they can generate a pair such as your recruit and veteran, but not because they even try to ensure parity among characters. Instead, it's just possible to roll so well that the veteran, even after penalties from old age, has the same stats as the younger character.

As for your one-armed dual wielder, have you playtested this to see if it ever happens? Because it strikes me as another mirage conjured by your own way of thinking. Players have their sense of verisimilitude too, you know - which in practice means that if they lose an arm, they won't even try to dual wield. The fact that they technically could is not relevant to their decision. Of someone pushed it, you could always say they wield the additional weapon with their teeth or feet - perfectly acceptable in a fantastic, abstract system.

Also, while I like your initial premise of flaws as a self imposed hard mode, and indeed do it in almost every game, in my experience most players see it as selfishly sabotaging the group’s success and I have literally been kicked out of a half dozen groups for it.

That's where we get back to your tragedy as a game designer. Those people are victims of old game design and their existing metagame of it. You are making a new game. Instead of disabusing old players of their stubborn habits, find new players and have them build their own metagame. One that doesn't, for example, include obsession over group success.

Its not one or the other.

While yes, I agree that one of my flaws as a person, not just a game designer, is I want to talk everything to death and will never agree to disagree, its not always a bad thing.

I have received tons of good feedback from play-testers and forums, and have made hundreds of changes to my game as a result. And even though most feedback I don't agree with and don’t use, discussing it still helps me better understand where other people are coming from as well as my own position.

If you say so.

I don't have access to full version history of your game and the feedback you've required, so I can't conclusively tell if it was genuinely good or if your design has been pointlessly drifting as a result of unvetted crap.

[GloatingSwine]

In my homebrew system (link in sig), I used to have numerous flaws which provided bonus points with which to build your character. Some of these had mechanical effects, others were RP aids like the character has a phobia, or lives by a code of honor, or is on the run from the authorities, or is an alcoholic.

Recently though, I changed how it works is that only flaws which provide a numerical penalty give extra character points, typically enough to buy an equivalent bonus in some other area, thus allowing for more customizable characters.

RP traits instead provide circumstantial bonuses when acting in accordance with it, and circumstantial penalties when acting against it; so like if you have a code of honor to never see harm come to children, you might get a -2 penalty when attacking children but also a +2 bonus when defending a child. These neither provide nor cost character points.

I personally thought it was a massive improvement.

So, when I showed this to one of my players, he was extremely disappointed. Basically, he said that the only people who take flaws in an RPG are min-maxxers who are trying to game the system and get something for nothing, and that balanced flaws like this are completely uninteresting and unappealing, and that by making this change I have effectively removed all flaws from the game as no player would ever actually select one.

Is he right? Thought?

I'm sure that there are players that play like he describes, but a system probably shouldn't be designed to cater to them.

I think you're on the right track with only permanent flaws giving permanent bonuses, and roleplay traits being circumstantial, but circumstantial flaws that give penalties when you act in against them are in danger of being an incentive to inaction if they only have negatives (eg. a phobia, there's no real way to act in accordance with that that still allows you to interact with the encounter). Ideally you want these sort of circumstantial flaws with no direct upside to drive players to act against them, doing something they're worse at now in order to earn some sort of transient resource they can spend again later on doing something else. (fate points, hero points, whatever, something they earn by taking a disadvantage now in order to gain a commensurate advantage somewhere else).

Since AFAICT your system doesn't have a transient resource like that, it's best to leave those sort of things in the realm of roleplay and not systematise them.

[Talakeal]

I'm sure that there are players that play like he describes, but a system probably shouldn't be designed to cater to them.

I think you're on the right track with only permanent flaws giving permanent bonuses, and roleplay traits being circumstantial, but circumstantial flaws that give penalties when you act in against them are in danger of being an incentive to inaction if they only have negatives (eg. a phobia, there's no real way to act in accordance with that that still allows you to interact with the encounter). Ideally you want these sort of circumstantial flaws with no direct upside to drive players to act against them, doing something they're worse at now in order to earn some sort of transient resource they can spend again later on doing something else. (fate points, hero points, whatever, something they earn by taking a disadvantage now in order to gain a commensurate advantage somewhere else).

Since AFAICT your system doesn't have a transient resource like that, it's best to leave those sort of things in the realm of roleplay and not systematise them.

Most quirks reward destiny points which can be used to reroll dice.

For phobia specifically, it gives you destiny when you disadvantage yourself to avoid a phobia, for example a character with a fear of water refusing to get on a boat and instead taking a much longer overland journey, or a character with a fear of spiders staying in the back when they would be more effective fighting giant spiders in melee. As a drawback, it inflicts psychic damage (in essence reducing your ability to pull of amazing feats through willpower) each time you come into direct contact with the object of your fear.

[King of Nowhere]

He was undoubtedly upset that he was no longer able to game the system for free points. But he also said that most players would feel the same way, so I was effectively removing flaws from the game as they are now just wasted space that will never get used.

you should know, by now, to not confuse the average gamer (in all their shades) with your players.

Min/maxers will use flaws to increase their optimization, but that doesn't mean they will ignore the flaws. It's the munchkins who ignore flaws or choose that which will have as little impact as possible. That Guy players will also exploit flaws to use them as an excuse to be disruptive to the game. For example, using "greedy" as an excuse to steal from the party and/or keep found party treasure for themselves. Your friend is likely used to playing with munchkins and That Guys.

see also: talakeal's players

[Psyren]

So, when I showed this to one of my players, he was extremely disappointed. Basically, he said that the only people who take flaws in an RPG are min-maxxers who are trying to game the system and get something for nothing, and that balanced flaws like this are completely uninteresting and unappealing, and that by making this change I have effectively removed all flaws from the game as no player would ever actually select one.

Obligatory:



Less facetiously - obviously your friend is wrong, mechanical flaws are a tool in the game designer's toolbelt, and like any tool they can be used well or poorly.

[False God]

For every group ever, sure.

For an individual group, maybe.

My university group had a case of the GM loving crunchy games that try to stimulate characters, his wife far preferring simpler games, me being somewhere in the middle but preferring narrative simulation. While we never found a perfect system we did manage to compromise like adults, and after our game of Mutants & Masterminds I think Ubiquity might have gone down really well.

I've occasionally been the only person in a group who's perfect system isn't D&D . Which is annoying but understandable.

Well but that's the rub. A more generic systems by itself is never going to result in always happy groups where no players ever get kicked. BUT a specific group of people can agree to a certain system, perhaps with some(or a lot of) houserules, and create an ultra-niche system custom tailored to that specific group and their specific needs.

The OP seems to waffle back and forth between wanting to make a "generic system" (and thus, not being able to please his group), and wanting to please his group in specific. The latter will never please everyone, but it never intended to so that doesn't matter.

It just can't be both.

As Vahnavoi mentions above, it's another idiom the OP seems to be missing: "You can please all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you can't please all the people all the time."

[Talakeal]

Well but that's the rub. A more generic systems by itself is never going to result in always happy groups where no players ever get kicked. BUT a specific group of people can agree to a certain system, perhaps with some(or a lot of) houserules, and create an ultra-niche system custom tailored to that specific group and their specific needs.

The OP seems to waffle back and forth between wanting to make a "generic system" (and thus, not being able to please his group), and wanting to please his group in specific. The latter will never please everyone, but it never intended to so that doesn't matter.

It just can't be both.

As Vahnavoi mentions above, it's another idiom the OP seems to be missing: "You can please all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you can't please all the people all the time."

I don’t think anything could ever please my current group.

Doesn’t mean that their observations are never applicable to the wider community, or that my observations for problem areas in multiple groups don’t have any basis.

[Anonymouswizard]

Well but that's the rub. A more generic systems by itself is never going to result in always happy groups where no players ever get kicked. BUT a specific group of people can agree to a certain system, perhaps with some(or a lot of) houserules, and create an ultra-niche system custom tailored to that specific group and their specific needs.

The OP seems to waffle back and forth between wanting to make a "generic system" (and thus, not being able to please his group), and wanting to please his group in specific. The latter will never please everyone, but it never intended to so that doesn't matter.

It just can't be both.

As Vahnavoi mentions above, it's another idiom the OP seems to be missing: "You can please all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you can't please all the people all the time."

Yeah, and honestly if we'd had a few more years I think my uni group would have found a perfect compromise system where nobody was dissatisfied. Which is I think another thing we're missing.

You don't actually need the perfect system, just one that everybody can find enjoyable. Notably my university group played four systems over the years with a wide variety of crunch levels and everybody had fun in all of them, even if it was never a perfect system.

GURPS, which our GM loves and used for over the campaigns, is one of the best ways to see how a generic system isn't always going to work. GURPS can do anything, but making it so that can take a lot of work. It's the one system were we managed to have a character dedicated towards crafting consumables, but even relatively simple concepts went through three or four iterations.

And then when I played a game with a group in my hometown none of those systems would have been truly viable, even Unknown Armies. Because different groups are different people, and they had massively different priorities.

I don’t think anything could ever please my current group.

Doesn’t mean that their observations are never applicable to the wider community, or that my observations for problem areas in multiple groups don’t have any basis.

No, but it's still significant and should be taken into account. I've personally never seen must of the issues you've brought up, the one I've probably seen must often is disad munchkinery, and even that was fairly range.

I have a feeling that you might be assuming that such opinions are more common than they are. It's like how the 5e board here has very different views to most players of 5e.

[False God]

I don’t think anything could ever please my current group.

Then why do you keep trying? Cut your losses.

Doesn’t mean that their observations are never applicable to the wider community, or that my observations for problem areas in multiple groups don’t have any basis.

I never said that.

Yeah, and honestly if we'd had a few more years I think my uni group would have found a perfect compromise system where nobody was dissatisfied. Which is I think another thing we're missing.

You don't actually need the perfect system, just one that everybody can find enjoyable. Notably my university group played four systems over the years with a wide variety of crunch levels and everybody had fun in all of them, even if it was never a perfect system.

GURPS, which our GM loves and used for over the campaigns, is one of the best ways to see how a generic system isn't always going to work. GURPS can do anything, but making it so that can take a lot of work. It's the one system were we managed to have a character dedicated towards crafting consumables, but even relatively simple concepts went through three or four iterations.

And then when I played a game with a group in my hometown none of those systems would have been truly viable, even Unknown Armies. Because different groups are different people, and they had massively different priorities.

Yep, it's as important to find compatible players as it is a compatible system. Having half the group want hardcore crunch and the other want fluff and flavor can be reconciled, but sometimes it's just easier to make 2 groups that are into two different things.

[Beleriphon]

I like flaws that work on the basis of the GM giving you something for introducing the character flaw in game. FATE for example might have a scene at a bar and the Character has an aspect about being a recovering alcoholic. Do, they partake or not? GM will hand out a FATE point if the character does, and the player can say no they resist this time by not accepting the point. In essence by making this an aspect, the player says "I want this to come up and get points for playing this in game." They can also use it as a positive, maybe their AA sponsor is a cop, or they can leverage their experience in being a recovering alcoholic in someway to turn a situation around.

M&M has a similar setup. You don't get build points back for having Complications, but you do get Hero Points to spend in game for fun stuff, like free alternate powers, over coming fatigue, all kinds of stuff. As a superhero game the expectation is that Aunt May is doing her monthly banking at the same time Doc Ock is robbing the Mid-Town Bank! What is Spidey going to do if Ock threatens May? First the player will get a Hero Point to help either immediately, or in the future.

[Glorthindel]

Also, if your remove "flaws as a way to get more character creation points at no cost", you might want to take a look at character creation in general and increase the base number of points.

Some systems might leads to character that are pretty uninteresting to build and/or play if you don't have the additional points from the flaws. In which case the correct homebrew would be "Take the points from the maximum number of allowed 'flaws' by the rules, but don't take the associated flaws. Now here is a new subsystem if you want your character to truly be flawed, but don't expect to be able to min-max those."

It is very definitely the case that a lot of systems with "trade flaws for Building Points" systems expect you to do so, as a lot of characters just aren't buildable without those extra Build Points.

I am currently looking at character ideas for a new Hackmaster campaign. Hackmaster has this exact system (with the variation that flaws are worth a flat rate if you cherry-pick them, considerably more if you roll on the random charts). A standard Human Fighter gets 20 BP's (10 for race, 10 for class). However, those BP's just don't stretch far enough (a Class kit costs between 10 and 15, Talents about 5-10 each, Skills range from 1 to 10 (and you are expected to need to buy them multiple times to get decent levels in them), Weapon Proficiencies are 1 each). A standard human fighter will find himself with probably 1 talent, no class kit, his base weapon proficiencies, and 3-4 skills at a very low level. A 'decent' build (which is far from a powerful one) needs somewhere in the region of 28-35 BP's, so it needs those extra flaw points. But the game lets you get these easily - one flaw worth 2BP's if you cherry pick it is "male pattern baldness" which has no negative whatsoever.

Ultimately, whether the game should or should not have such "min-max friendly flaw choices" depends on if the games balance point expects you to have them.

[kyoryu]

I like flaws that work on the basis of the GM giving you something for introducing the character flaw in game. FATE for example might have a scene at a bar and the Character has an aspect about being a recovering alcoholic. Do, they partake or not? GM will hand out a FATE point if the character does, and the player can say no they resist this time by not accepting the point. In essence by making this an aspect, the player says "I want this to come up and get points for playing this in game." They can also use it as a positive, maybe their AA sponsor is a cop, or they can leverage their experience in being a recovering alcoholic in someway to turn a situation around.

M&M has a similar setup. You don't get build points back for having Complications, but you do get Hero Points to spend in game for fun stuff, like free alternate powers, over coming fatigue, all kinds of stuff. As a superhero game the expectation is that Aunt May is doing her monthly banking at the same time Doc Ock is robbing the Mid-Town Bank! What is Spidey going to do if Ock threatens May? First the player will get a Hero Point to help either immediately, or in the future.

Also my favorite. It has players picking things that will actually come up and be part of the game, and gets rid of the minigame of "how can I get the most points for things that either won't come up, or I wouldn't want to do anyway?"

[Anonymouswizard]

Also my favorite. It has players picking things that will actually come up and be part of the game, and gets rid of the minigame of "how can I get the most points for things that either won't come up, or I wouldn't want to do anyway?"

On the other hand, the argument that it leads to Fate Point Fishing does have some legitimacy. I'd personally argue that that's the point, and you can also effectively play the game without Compels (but why would you), but some people might not like the shifted screen time from 'what are we good at' to 'what are we bad at'.

Honestly, I think at the end of the day Fate does character traits best just by getting rid of the Boon/Flaw separation.

[kyoryu]

On the other hand, the argument that it leads to Fate Point Fishing does have some legitimacy. I'd personally argue that that's the point, and you can also effectively play the game without Compels (but why would you), but some people might not like the shifted screen time from 'what are we good at' to 'what are we bad at'.

Honestly, I think at the end of the day Fate does character traits best just by getting rid of the Boon/Flaw separation.

Practically, that's usually handled by ensuring that the Compel does give an actual complication, combined with the GM just kinda going "dude, seriously?" in those fishing attempts. Fate is definitely a game where GM/table oversight is as important as anything in the rules directly. As such, it can definitely fail in the category of games that don't work with people that tend towards intractable.

I'd personally say that aspects aren't boons/flaws. Boons would be stunts, in most cases. Aspects are more like Chekov's Guns.

[Max_Killjoy]

Also my favorite. It has players picking things that will actually come up and be part of the game, and gets rid of the minigame of "how can I get the most points for things that either won't come up, or I wouldn't want to do anyway?"

On the other hand, the argument that it leads to Fate Point Fishing does have some legitimacy. I'd personally argue that that's the point, and you can also effectively play the game without Compels (but why would you), but some people might not like the shifted screen time from 'what are we good at' to 'what are we bad at'.

Honestly, I think at the end of the day Fate does character traits best just by getting rid of the Boon/Flaw separation.

Whether they award CP or whatever at build, or award mechanics or narrative-affecting tokens during play... what none of the systems in question handle well is the player who doesn't want side-drama at all, and just wants to get on with solving the mystery or completing the job or doing the whatever thing. Either one actively punishes that player by making them choose between something they don't want, or deeply disadvantaging their character.

[kyoryu]

Whether they award CP or whatever at build, or award mechanics or narrative-affecting tokens during play... what none of the systems in question handle well is the player who doesn't want side-drama at all, and just wants to get on with solving the mystery or completing the job or doing the whatever thing. Either one actively punishes that player by making them choose between something they don't want, or deeply disadvantaging their character.

I'd say that you're making assumptions that don't necessarily hold.

Namely, that the adventure is a separate thing that exists apart from the characters. In a system like Fate, it's not, it's designed around the characters and built on their actions. So in this case, it's more like "the GM is going to screw with your lives in some ways. Why not have it be something you're interested in, and get points for it?"

That, of course, is not how a lot of games work. And in those situations, you'd have more of a point.

[NichG]

Rather than having flaws that are just bad things or difficult personality traits, I tend to like sidegrades that make it so that a character is playing a different game. So no 'anger management problems, make Will saves to avoid getting into or starting fights when provoked'; instead something more like "Eternal Rage: instead of hitpoints you have an anger meter. Every time you hurt someone or are hurt by someone this increases by a but. Every round neither happens, your anger drops by half to a minimum of your Con score. An attack dealing more damage than your anger KOs you/kills you if exceeds by 10, but otherwise you sustain no damage."

[Anymage]

If someone is able to play a different game, expect players to math out which one is more optimal and all play that. Plus you get into all the messes subsystem bloat brings.

Fate points do seem like the ideal flaw template. Even assuming a 5e base without giving players too many narrative powers*, being rewarded for sticking to a character's personality traits/flaws (either by getting a point for following up a trait when it raises a complication, or being able to spend a point for a benefit only when a relevant trait can be invoked) is a good way to encourage characterization. Encouraging players to ask means it's one less thing on the GM's mental load. And having a separate currency instead of xp rewards means you don't have to worry about different long term growth rates.

*(I do think D&D could also use some system where a player could claim ownership over a region or npc. In large part because I recently saw a player retire their character in order to keep a favorite npc out of harm's way. That's kind of a separate topic, though.)

[NichG]

If someone is able to play a different game, expect players to math out which one is more optimal and all play that. Plus you get into all the messes subsystem bloat brings.

It's not really a different design challenge than designing interesting options in general, but embracing that design challenge is pretty important for my tastes. When its done well, things like that tend to break along players' preferences about playstyle, enable combos or interesting build ideas, or have a high degree of dependence on campaign specifics and events within the campaign. Something like Path of Exile would be my go-to example of this being done pretty well at scale in CRPGs - you do get meme builds and the handful of potent options every league, but overall people do play a lot of different things, even multiple things each league.

There's also the whole thing about designing around incomparables rather than comparables. Don't spend so much effort populating a tradeoff between to-hit and damage per hit, because they collapse into the same number. Instead focus on tradeoffs between e.g. movement speed vs perceptual abilities vs whether the character acts directly from their location or indirectly from summons/turrets/etc, which are very hard to boil down into a single win-rate evaluation. That has a much greater chance of hitting different player tastes in different ways as well - some players may like having a bunch of minions where they can pick the best one for a situation, and others may want the simplicity of having one unified schtick, etc.

[Anonymouswizard]

Whether they award CP or whatever at build, or award mechanics or narrative-affecting tokens during play... what none of the systems in question handle well is the player who doesn't want side-drama at all, and just wants to get on with solving the mystery or completing the job or doing the whatever thing. Either one actively punishes that player by making them choose between something they don't want, or deeply disadvantaging their character.

At this point I'd argue that the issue is with the player not the game. In the case of Fate at least such 'side drama' it's an intended part of the game, the lows so that the highs are higher. But there's nothing wrong with not including flaws in your game, and such a game is probably better for that player.

Working as intended is not an issue. Playing something built around a loop you don't want to engage in is.

[Tanarii]

Whether they award CP or whatever at build, or award mechanics or narrative-affecting tokens during play... what none of the systems in question handle well is the player who doesn't want side-drama at all, and just wants to get on with solving the mystery or completing the job or doing the whatever thing. Either one actively punishes that player by making them choose between something they don't want, or deeply disadvantaging their character.

I mean, the same can be said for getting in a fight. That's a form of side-drama between you and completing an adventure objective in many games. So having to invest in the ability to fight in those games could be seem in the same light.

I hear what you're saying though. I'm not a huge fan of games where narrative mechanics focusing on character personality or interplay are a critical component of play.

Although Paranoia does both pretty well.

[Anonymouswizard]

Although Paranoia does both pretty well.

I wish I could read that text, but it's above my security clearance.

[Beleriphon]

Whether they award CP or whatever at build, or award mechanics or narrative-affecting tokens during play... what none of the systems in question handle well is the player who doesn't want side-drama at all, and just wants to get on with solving the mystery or completing the job or doing the whatever thing. Either one actively punishes that player by making them choose between something they don't want, or deeply disadvantaging their character.

On side drama, I'd argue that if you're playing FATE you need FATE points. They're a critical part of the how the game is played. Also, if you're playing something like FATE you presumably like the game and the way it works, which includes what you're calling side-drama. Keep in mind that one of FATE's core mechanics is coming up with the characters as a group, so everybody knows what the game and characters are about. Dresden Files RPG takes this a point further and the group builds the setting almost like a group created character, although it's generally assumed the GM picks the specific city the game is set in. So, there's already an incentive to have side-drama, and the player that isn't interested in it can pick Aspects that don't lend themselves to that kind of thing.

I'd liken it to playing Star Wars and then somehow hating space ships, laser swords, magical space wizards, and Darth Vader. If you aren't into Star Wars what the heck are you doing playing a Star Wars game?