A recent poster (thanks Pinky!) made a few good points I think need discussing so its clear where this is going.
What kind of point buy will this be?
Well the simple answer is "as simple a kind as I can make it" which, if explained in a little more detail means...
I like point buy but I also dislike too much work or detail in creation time.. I don't want to get bogged down with a Champions or GURPS-style character that has 200 points to spend. I want to achieve a couple of things with this system, and perhaps it is very ambitious. I'm just too stupid to know I shouldn't even attempt it. Ok, the idea is that I think that high level "classic" d20 games are a beast. Right now a friend is putting together a one-shot, single weekend death-fest for 15th level PC's in Pathfinder. The amount of work creating the characters for the players and creating NPC's and monsters for the GM is insane. Add to that the fact that at least one of the PC's will have dozens and dozens of special abilities and tricks, yet the player doesn't have an exceptional grasp on the mechanics of 90% of them. Then, consider that the vast majority of the NPC's and monsters the GM is whipping up will have MANY, MANY abilities, only a few of which will ever be played. Of course 4E resolved a lot of this by simplifying the NPC and monster creation process... BUT, I don't want to go quite as far as the 4E model. I want PC's and monsters to be manageable, yet still interesting and not purely combat statistics. So, what does this have to do with Point Buy character creation you ask? Well I am trying to balance out the notion of VERY MANY abilities vs. a few key abilities that define a character or monster, and how best to achieve that. I am heavily in favor of "theme-based" characters where a player comes up with a theme and then continues building on that theme over time. However, if the classic character advancement model is used its simply layer upon layer of more, more, more. Ideally, the number of abilities a character possesses doesn't grow to the nth degree but instead the character possesses a few key abilities it develops tricks for over time. So... that's probably a long-winded way of not saying very much after all lol
So, back to the questions from Pinky's post... "Will it be a GURPS type game which allows most character design freedom but at the cost of more DM intervention? Or will it be a slightly more guided affair with rules which enforce at least a semblance of balance."
Well, the goal is the player is free to choose what he likes, because hopefully the system enforces balance and doesn't depend on a GM to do that. Really, I feel that's ultimately the job of the system, not the GM. The GM shouldn't have to worry about balancing the system he is running. If he is, there's something wrong with the system. The GM should not HAVE to "fix" things. Can he change things he doesn't like? Certainly! However, he shouldn't HAVE to. So, my response there is that the goal is that the system enforces balance and leaves the player free to build to match his concept.
Pinky then made a few suggestions...
- Level based caps on augmentation of talents.
Yep. already planning on that. Basically, any bonus granted by a Talent can not exceed the level of the PC. The next question becomes, "well how will you manage stacking of bonuses?" Well, I haven't quite gotten that far yet, but the immediate notion that comes to mind is something completely arbitrary like "Total bonuses can not exceed level +2" or something... but I'll get more into that as I get more into the PC building phase. Lately I've been focusing much more so on fixing the foundation of the system, ie, action points, movement points, etc.
- Use a separate point pool for skills talents, or allow X number of points per level to count double for skills or something similar.
This is something I've been considering anyway for another reason. Right now everything is called Talents. So I've been trying to visualize what a character sheet will look like when all is said and done and right now I can't get past the vision of one big block that just says "Talents" and it has a million things under it. I really think that's not going to be ideal and that there needs to be some separation. Right now there are Minor Talents, Standard Talents, Major Talents, and Epic Talents. I'm considering giving the Minor Talents an "aka" of "Traits" which would indicate that they are just that, traits, which I define as "an inherent part of someone that doesn't improve over time." So right now I'm debating how best to segregate these items. Also, I want clear rules that delineate what qualifies as a Minor Talent, Standard Talent, etc. so that if a GM goes back later and wants to add new stuff he can get some idea what it should be. Something like "if this talent grants a bonus that increases automatically as a pc levels, then it should be at least a standard talent" or, "if this talent grants a flat bonus not greater than 1/4 character level, then it can be a minor talent" etc. I don't want vague guidelines that leave GM's scratching their heads misjudging things into one category when they should be in another.
- Give people who take an archetype a greater number of points, but restrict what a number of those points can be spent on. Or alternatively use something like the GURPS lens system and restrict lenses by archetype.
Yeah, I was already considering giving some level of incentive for choosing Archetypes. For now though there wouldn't really be much "point spending" if someone chooses an Archetype because the theory is that all the points are already spent because all choices have already been made. The incentive for choosing an Archetype might be that the PC gets a few more points OVERALL than if the character was custom built, which is a reward for choosing something the game designer(s) already feel is balanced. Also, certain players DO NOT want to make too many choices. They want to sit down and play and the leveling process is not their cup of tea.
Ok, back to the grindstone. Oh, by the way, anyone want to help? :)
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