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DougRed4
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 Posted: Wed Oct 02, 2013 6:07 pm Post subject: |
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Agreed. It's important to be firm on stuff like that, to make sure one character isn't so far out of balance with the others that it becomes a nuisance for everyone.
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atgxtg
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| Posted: Wed Oct 02, 2013 7:40 pm Post subject: |
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| DougRed4 wrote: | | Agreed. It's important to be firm on stuff like that, to make sure one character isn't so far out of balance with the others that it becomes a nuisance for everyone. |
Thar kinda depends on how the GM runs though. Depending on what skills and abilities the GM stresses during adventures quite a few "balance" issues can be resolved. I've seen somebody write up a combat monster only to have the rug pulled out from beneath his feet when the GM sent the group on a diplomatic mission. Suddenly the guy with 7D in blaster was stuck in a situation where he didn't want to fire it (and cause an incident). |
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Whill
Dark Lord of the Jedi (Owner/Admin)
Joined: 14 Apr 2008
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Location: Columbus, Ohio, USA, Earth, The Solar System, The Milky Way Galaxy
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 12:07 am Post subject: |
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There are many different ways to balance things like this. Some GMs depend completely on role-playing/story factors, some may tweak the rules and others will do both. With so many cool alien species to choose from in the Star Wars universe, I've had the experience of players by and large wanting to play aliens more than humans (which I find annoying since I am a big fan of the whole 'pose as Imperials to infiltrate' bit.) I definitely play alien discrimination and warn players of the added difficulty and reduction of story possibilities they will have by playing an alien.
However I also try to balance things mechanically as much as possible while trying to better interpret the fluff text and still honor the original spirit of the RAW stats. I have a rather large list of PC races. No I do not try to balance the species as a whole and their average members with each other - Not all species evolved equally. I only try to balance the starting PC rules for each playable species with each other. (And if a player really wants to plan another species, I only ask them to seriously consider the playable ones first, and if they still have their heart set on another then I let them try to sell their character concept to me and if I approve we work out the specific abilities together.) Regardless of the species average skill dice stats, ALL starting PCs have 18D in attributes. Period. No more, no less. I've tweaked the average and min/max ranges for attribute dice as I see appropriate.
I dispensed with any "2 for 1" starting skill dice bonuses like the Duros have in RAW. That's just utterly ridiculous from a balance perspective. I may have finite bonus allocation skill dice available for specific skills instead. And in cases like those where the rules allowed for certain starting skills to start out more than 2D above its base attribute, the PC species may allow the player to choose only one of the skills to start out 3D above its base attribute (at a cost of 3D in skills), and all the other skills follow the 2D skill allocation limit.
For Sluissi, I give them some bonus allocation skill dice for Technical skills as above. I like the +1D to all Technical attribute and skill checks with it taking twice as long, so I've kept that as an essential part of the species. If they take triple the normal time, I let them have the +1D that everyone else gets for only double the normal time. Applying the rush rules, if they rush something to half their normal time (which equals everyone else's full normal time), then they suffer the rush penalty of their result roll being divided by 2. I've made Sluissi cold-blooded which is mostly a disadvantage. Also, they have a slower than human Move and a penalty at jumping checks.
My toned-down Verpine PCs get one bonus skill die that can be allocated to any Technical skill and their +1D bonus is only for all modification or jury-rig rolls. They get the organic telecommunication, and similar vision-related and natural body armor bonuses. I also give them a charm/persuasion bonus and a poor swimmer penalty. But I have a PC race that is the base species the Verpine are offshoot from - real insects with 6 limbs and some other differences who are much cooler than the Verpine.
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shootingwomprats
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 1:21 am Post subject: |
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That is quite interesting. Will you post these changes? Or could you attach to an e-mail so I may look at them? rpgman999@gmail.com
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DougRed4
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Joined: 18 Jan 2013
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 3:50 pm Post subject: |
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| atgxtg wrote: | | DougRed4 wrote: | | Agreed. It's important to be firm on stuff like that, to make sure one character isn't so far out of balance with the others that it becomes a nuisance for everyone. |
Thar kinda depends on how the GM runs though. Depending on what skills and abilities the GM stresses during adventures quite a few "balance" issues can be resolved. I've seen somebody write up a combat monster only to have the rug pulled out from beneath his feet when the GM sent the group on a diplomatic mission. Suddenly the guy with 7D in blaster was stuck in a situation where he didn't want to fire it (and cause an incident). |
Quite true. And I'd also add that there are some players (in my experience, anyway) that I'd trust to play a character considerably more powerful or skilled than the others. Some players can use restraint, limit themselves, and not use an "overpowerered" character in such a way that the other players feel overshadowed. This can especially be true of Jedi, who (IMHO) should be played with a lot of story-driven restrictions anyway.
I've also learned (the hard way, with other games) not to just blindly trust a new player who seems to be the type who could be restrained. I once had a player (in a supers game) who talked me into allowing his super-powered chest laser (it did something like 30D6 damage). He explained that it was only used during emergencies, and would almost never see use. He seemed very reasonable and logical about it. So what happened on their first combat? You bet, that laser was used at full potential!!! (and he tried to justify it with "My PC HATES when the bad guys take hostages!")
The "type" of game really does matter, too. I don't know about the rest of you guys, but the way I run this game almost always has combat/conflict. The word "Wars" is right there in the title! So I try to have lots of action and excitement, with plenty of thrilling fights, chases, battles, etc. So if somebody (especially the typical "munchkin" or "power gamer" type) makes a "combat monster", in my game I would be much more wary of allowing them to have a character that outclasses all the others (being as combat is such a frequent occurrence).
OTOH, if their character is "overpowered" or outclasses the others in some other area, like as a mechanic or diplomat or something along those lines, I'd probably be more inclined to let that slide, being as it's only going to come up every so often in play.
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atgxtg
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 4:24 pm Post subject: |
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| DougRed4 wrote: | | Quite true. And I'd also add that there are some players (in my experience, anyway) that I'd trust to play a character considerably more powerful or skilled than the others. |
Yup. One reason why the Gen'Dai character was allowed was because of the concept I had and that the GM knew I wouldn't abuse it. Taking such a long lived species and going with a kid made for a very offbeat concept. A lot of the fun came about because other characters would be protective of the kid, but the kid would end up being protective of them, since they can die so easily. Rather than turning right into a combat machine (even after all this time, I'm still haven got blaster up past 4D) he's been getting worried about the fact that all the other PCs will be dead long before he grows up. That must be vary frightening for a kid. He's getting very attached to his droid, since he figures it will be around for awhile. |
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garhkal
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Joined: 17 Jul 2005
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 4:44 pm Post subject: |
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| shootingwomprats wrote: | | That is quite interesting. Will you post these changes? Or could you attach to an e-mail so I may look at them? rpgman999@gmail.com |
I would also love to see what he has come up with. But by the basics of it, it sounds much like how sparks handles aliens.. No 2d for 1d stuff.. but basic +1 to XYZ still counts.
| Quote: | | I've also learned (the hard way, with other games) not to just blindly trust a new player who seems to be the type who could be restrained. I once had a player (in a supers game) who talked me into allowing his super-powered chest laser (it did something like 30D6 damage). He explained that it was only used during emergencies, and would almost never see use. He seemed very reasonable and logical about it. So what happened on their first combat? You bet, that laser was used at full potential!!! (and he tried to justify it with "My PC HATES when the bad guys take hostages!") |
Acting on anger - auto dsp. Overkill - DSP!
Two ways to reign him in there!!
| Quote: | | Yup. One reason why the Gen'Dai character was allowed was because of the concept I had and that the GM knew I wouldn't abuse it. Taking such a long lived species and going with a kid made for a very offbeat concept. A lot of the fun came about because other characters would be protective of the kid, but the kid would end up being protective of them, since they can die so easily. Rather than turning right into a combat machine (even after all this time, I'm still haven got blaster up past 4D) he's been getting worried about the fact that all the other PCs will be dead long before he grows up. That must be vary frightening for a kid. He's getting very attached to his droid, since he figures it will be around for awhile. |
My only issue is playing a kid in any system other than ADND which did have modifiers for your attributes based on age does not really make any distinction to your skill levels/attributes. So your "Kid" is just as skilled/attribute stacked as my 50 yr old veteran of 2 great wars..
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Esoomian
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 8:43 pm Post subject: |
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| garhkal wrote: | | Quote: | | All it really means is they won't be failing repair rolls, which has less of an effect on gameplay than it sounds. |
Jury riging weapons, ships etc all falls under tech, which can get outlandish if you let it. Same with upgrading stuff. YES it takes time and credits, but its not "less of an effect" as you make it out to be.
Imagine someone getting to have his fellow PC from the start Jury rig his light repeater (bounty hunter template) for 2d extra damage (normally a moderate-difficult difficulty, not that problematic for someone with 8-9d in blaster repair. SO now you got someone walking around with effectively an E-web damage out put.
OR worse, have him fully mod it up the 1d+2 all items can get, THEN jury rig 2d ontop of that.. |
I can see how some species could be problematic and indeed I have my own slant on dealing with Verpine but high tech skills have never been a problem.
As mentioned earlier modifying a device is something that is completely controlled by the GM. Unlike species that can have a high strength or dexterity and then you have a player just roll buckets of dice in combat situations (though this too is not insurmountable but it takes more effort) having a high technical skill still requires parts and the like.
If someone wanted to improve their light repeater to have the full 1d+2 damage bonus then as a GM I’d be saying sure you can do that but the parts you’ll need for a stable, safe and permanent upgrade are restricted. You’ll have to either visit some very shady people and get parts that you don’t know the history of or you can go the official way and you’ll have a lot of people very interested in why you need those parts. You can get a +1 perhaps even a +2 without anyone batting an eyelid as the parts you need for that are freely available or perhaps there are other non-military parts that will do the job just as well (like perhaps an engine component will boost the power output just as well) but to get the whole 1D+2 you’ll need grade A military hardware and getting that would be an adventure (or two) in itself.
As for jury rigging the rules state that not having the parts for jury rigging should be the exception not the rule so you can’t control supply to any real degree but jury rigging has its own (not insignificant) problems. On a lethal device (like the light repeating blaster) every bonus dice is a complication dice and on a roll of a 1 the device explodes, a 2 the device is ruined forever and a 3 the device doesn’t fire that turn but just needs a whack to get going again. That means a blaster that has been jury rigged has a 50% chance of not firing for every bonus dice it has and a 33% chance of being forever ruined. With odds like that I’m happy to let my players jury rig away. I can’t imagine any player wanting to take the blaster he has lovingly and expensively modified to have +1D+2 damage and then modify it so that it has a 33% chance of being forever ruined every time it is fired, more if it has more than a +1D bonus.
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Darth_Hilarious
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Joined: 17 Apr 2013
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 10:14 pm Post subject: |
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The bane of all ship owners...........
An OCD mechanic that takes forever to fix things because all the fasteners have to tightened to the same angle...................
"Hey Bub!, Why did it take ya 9 standard weeks to calibrate the alluvial dampers on my ship?"
" Well. there are 14 thousand fasteners on it and i had to triple check my work fourteen times!" |
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garhkal
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Joined: 17 Jul 2005
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| Posted: Fri Oct 04, 2013 2:58 pm Post subject: |
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| Esoomian wrote: | | garhkal wrote: | | Quote: | | All it really means is they won't be failing repair rolls, which has less of an effect on gameplay than it sounds. |
Jury riging weapons, ships etc all falls under tech, which can get outlandish if you let it. Same with upgrading stuff. YES it takes time and credits, but its not "less of an effect" as you make it out to be.
Imagine someone getting to have his fellow PC from the start Jury rig his light repeater (bounty hunter template) for 2d extra damage (normally a moderate-difficult difficulty, not that problematic for someone with 8-9d in blaster repair. SO now you got someone walking around with effectively an E-web damage out put.
OR worse, have him fully mod it up the 1d+2 all items can get, THEN jury rig 2d ontop of that.. |
I can see how some species could be problematic and indeed I have my own slant on dealing with Verpine but high tech skills have never been a problem.
As mentioned earlier modifying a device is something that is completely controlled by the GM. Unlike species that can have a high strength or dexterity and then you have a player just roll buckets of dice in combat situations (though this too is not insurmountable but it takes more effort) having a high technical skill still requires parts and the like.
If someone wanted to improve their light repeater to have the full 1d+2 damage bonus then as a GM I’d be saying sure you can do that but the parts you’ll need for a stable, safe and permanent upgrade are restricted. You’ll have to either visit some very shady people and get parts that you don’t know the history of or you can go the official way and you’ll have a lot of people very interested in why you need those parts. You can get a +1 perhaps even a +2 without anyone batting an eyelid as the parts you need for that are freely available or perhaps there are other non-military parts that will do the job just as well (like perhaps an engine component will boost the power output just as well) but to get the whole 1D+2 you’ll need grade A military hardware and getting that would be an adventure (or two) in itself.
As for jury rigging the rules state that not having the parts for jury rigging should be the exception not the rule so you can’t control supply to any real degree but jury rigging has its own (not insignificant) problems. On a lethal device (like the light repeating blaster) every bonus dice is a complication dice and on a roll of a 1 the device explodes, a 2 the device is ruined forever and a 3 the device doesn’t fire that turn but just needs a whack to get going again. That means a blaster that has been jury rigged has a 50% chance of not firing for every bonus dice it has and a 33% chance of being forever ruined. With odds like that I’m happy to let my players jury rig away. I can’t imagine any player wanting to take the blaster he has lovingly and expensively modified to have +1D+2 damage and then modify it so that it has a 33% chance of being forever ruined every time it is fired, more if it has more than a +1D bonus. |
Some good counter arguments there.. Well done.
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DougRed4
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| Posted: Fri Oct 04, 2013 5:39 pm Post subject: |
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| garhkal wrote: | | shootingwomprats wrote: | | That is quite interesting. Will you post these changes? Or could you attach to an e-mail so I may look at them? rpgman999@gmail.com |
I would also love to see what he has come up with. But by the basics of it, it sounds much like how sparks handles aliens.. No 2d for 1d stuff.. but basic +1 to XYZ still counts.
| Quote: | | I've also learned (the hard way, with other games) not to just blindly trust a new player who seems to be the type who could be restrained. I once had a player (in a supers game) who talked me into allowing his super-powered chest laser (it did something like 30D6 damage). He explained that it was only used during emergencies, and would almost never see use. He seemed very reasonable and logical about it. So what happened on their first combat? You bet, that laser was used at full potential!!! (and he tried to justify it with "My PC HATES when the bad guys take hostages!") |
Acting on anger - auto dsp. Overkill - DSP!
Two ways to reign him in there!!.. |
Ah, but this was a supers game, so no Dark Side points in the system (or the equivalent).
| garhkal wrote: | | My only issue is playing a kid in any system other than ADND which did have modifiers for your attributes based on age does not really make any distinction to your skill levels/attributes. So your "Kid" is just as skilled/attribute stacked as my 50 yr old veteran of 2 great wars.. |
Some other games have this as well. I'm pretty sure the CODA system does this, too.
Personally, I think at's concept of playing a kid - especially the way it's being done - is quite cool and a fun role-playing challenge/experience. Reminds me of how one might play an immortal (like from Highlander) or a character that's been around for millennia (like in The Man from Earth.
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garhkal
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| Posted: Fri Oct 04, 2013 6:34 pm Post subject: |
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Thing is i like there to be some diversity in relation to what you get for what your age is.. Giving everyone the same 18d/7d whether they are 12 or 72 is imo DUMB of Sw to have done.
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Kytross
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| Posted: Fri Oct 04, 2013 11:01 pm Post subject: |
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| garhkal wrote: | | Thing is i like there to be some diversity in relation to what you get for what your age is.. Giving everyone the same 18d/7d whether they are 12 or 72 is imo DUMB of Sw to have done. |
Ooh! I'm making a new thread! |
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atgxtg
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| Posted: Sat Oct 05, 2013 1:38 pm Post subject: |
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| garhkal wrote: |
My only issue is playing a kid in any system other than ADND which did have modifiers for your attributes based on age does not really make any distinction to your skill levels/attributes. So your "Kid" is just as skilled/attribute stacked as my 50 yr old veteran of 2 great wars.. |
First off the "any system other than AD&D" line is way off. Quite a few RPG have rules for age and aging. But your complaint certainly applies to D6.
The only game mechanic that is changed for kids is that they loose a little movement (8 instead of 19 for a human), and I actually did that with my Gen"Dai.
While the kid vs 50 year old veteran thing has some truth to it, it is more of a problem with the generic starting character thing with D6 rather than a problem with the kid concept.
You see the same problem when comparing he farm kid brash pilot to the veteran exTIE pilot. |
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atgxtg
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| Posted: Sat Oct 05, 2013 1:49 pm Post subject: |
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| garhkal wrote: | | Thing is i like there to be some diversity in relation to what you get for what your age is.. Giving everyone the same 18d/7d whether they are 12 or 72 is imo DUMB of Sw to have done. |
Well it was easy, and did avoid the problem of someone bringing in a character long lived species and getting lots of extra dice.
There are a few ways to address this, though, if you have a problem with it. Some options:
-Allow older characters to trade off attribute pips for extra skill pips (say 1D of attributes is worth 4D in skills, and raise their cap from +2D into a skill to +3D).
Kids
-Built on 15D instead of 18D, and only 5D for skills.
- Their max stats values are 1D lower (i.e. 3D instead of 4D)
- Can put more than 1D into any one skill
-Can sacrifice a second D for more specialties
-Lose 2 Move (or 20%)
- 3 extra CPs.
-Adjust difficulties up or down a level for task where their small size might play a factor (sneak, climbing/jumping).
-Kids can improve attributes without actually bothering with the training, after the appropriate time passes they can just spend the points and make the rolls (called growing up). |
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