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Hellbent
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Joined: 12 Feb 2022
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 Posted: Thu Mar 17, 2022 9:56 pm Post subject: Advantages and Disadvantages as Human Special Abilities? |
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Hey everybody. Just looking for some feedback on an idea I’ve had to give Humans and other species without Special Abilities a bit of a bump, to avoid a “best build” kind of scenario. My kids have started to fall into the min/max trap! 😁
Basically pull Advantages and Disadvantages from REUP and/or D6 Space and allow any characters whose species have no Special Abilities to use them, if they are balanced in value.
This means that if a character has an Advantage at -2D, there must be a comparable value in Disadvantages, for a net zero value/cost.
I’m unsure about allowing Attribute Dice to pay the cost…
The Advantages and Disadvantages must have a mechanical impact; they cannot be story factors or anything similar.
Any feedback welcome! |
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CRMcNeill
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Location: Redding System, California Sector, on the I-5 Hyperspace Route.
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| Posted: Thu Mar 17, 2022 10:57 pm Post subject: |
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I thought that was how Advantages & Disadvantages worked, though; as in, each one has a set value that has to be offset, either in part or whole, so that the cost and benefit balance out to zero. Per the D6 Space system, each rank in an Advantage / Disadvantage or Special Ability is equal to 1D of starting Skill Dice (see D6 Space, pg. 16, under Costs at Character Creation), so you could theoretically not take any Advantages at all, and instead use Disadvantages to boost your starting Skill Dice count.
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garhkal
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Joined: 17 Jul 2005
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| Posted: Thu Mar 17, 2022 11:11 pm Post subject: |
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If you play games during the empire era, the humans already HAVE a major advantage built in. THE EMPIRE HATES ALIENS!
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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 Mar 17, 2022 11:18 pm Post subject: |
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In my general gamer experience, it seems that taking disadvantages to gain more skill dice tends to be a calculated munchkin move (hoping disadvantages will have minimal impact), so that has left me with a sour taste and I don't allow that in my game. If a player's character concept includes a disadvantage they choose to role play then great, but they don't get anything extra for it.
In my game, I have a small list of advantages that can be bought with the equivalent of one skill die. A couple that are more advantageous come with built-in disadvantages. All of them are things that cannot be accomplished with skill dice/pip allocation alone (because otherwise just allocate accordingly).
I think it is much easier to equate advantages to skill dice than attribute dice, so I wouldn't recommend messing with attribute dice.
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Hellbent
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Joined: 12 Feb 2022
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2022 12:01 am Post subject: |
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| CRMcNeill wrote: | | I thought that was how Advantages & Disadvantages worked, though; as in, each one has a set value that has to be offset, either in part or whole, so that the cost and benefit balance out to zero. Per the D6 Space system, each rank in an Advantage / Disadvantage or Special Ability is equal to 1D of starting Skill Dice (see D6 Space, pg. 16, under Costs at Character Creation), so you could theoretically not take any Advantages at all, and instead use Disadvantages to boost your starting Skill Dice count. |
True, and I think I misread them originally, my bad. Overall though, the idea is that this would be for species that have no mechanical benefit inbuilt. My kids are falling into maximizing mechanical as opposed to story based effects: currently two Wookies and an Esoomian. 🤷♂️
Don’t get me wrong; it’s all good fun, but I’m hoping to give them a few more options as they’re not quite at the level of playing a Wook as more than “strong human”, but they have great ideas of a more underdog nature (getting captured after being stunned, which high STR races rarely are, in my experience). It’s what they know, I guess…😁
Last edited by Hellbent on Fri Mar 18, 2022 12:22 am; edited 1 time in total |
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CRMcNeill
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2022 12:05 am Post subject: |
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| garhkal wrote: | | If you play games during the empire era, the humans already HAVE a major advantage built in. THE EMPIRE HATES ALIENS! |
That's one of the nice things about the ADSA System in D6 Space; it actually lays out bonuses and penalties for things like that (see pg. 25 of D6 Space for the Prejudice Disadvantage).
| Whill wrote: | | In my general gamer experience, it seems that taking disadvantages to gain more skill dice tends to be a calculated munchkin move (hoping disadvantages will have minimal impact), so that has left me with a sour taste and I don't allow that in my game. If a player's character concept includes a disadvantage they choose to role play then great, but they don't get anything extra for it. |
I think that's why a system like D6 Space is better than some other ADSA systems. Each Disadvantage comes with rules for how the Disadvantage can affect skill rolls or Difficulties, which puts lots of tools in the GMs hands. If a character picks a Disadvantage that applies penalties to certain actions, the player doesn't have the option of ignoring when, for example, a roll fails because the GM applied a Difficulty modifier that caused the character's roll to fail.
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Hellbent
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2022 12:11 am Post subject: |
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| Whill wrote: | In my general gamer experience, it seems that taking disadvantages to gain more skill dice tends to be a calculated munchkin move (hoping disadvantages will have minimal impact), so that has left me with a sour taste and I don't allow that in my game. If a player's character concept includes a disadvantage they choose to role play then great, but they don't get anything extra for it.
In my game, I have a small list of advantages that can be bought with the equivalent of one skill die. A couple that are more advantageous come with built-in disadvantages. All of them are things that cannot be accomplished with skill dice/pip allocation alone (because otherwise just allocate accordingly).
I think it is much easier to equate advantages to skill dice than attribute dice, so I wouldn't recommend messing with attribute dice. |
I hadn’t thought of Skill dice instead; that’s cool. I like it. My only real “gripe” I guess (?) with RAW is that there are Species that are neat but have no mechanical perks, but others do…and sometimes big ones. It’s basically the only thing I like about Saga Edition; every Species has its own perks, so there is no “base”, you know? They’re still not really balanced in Saga, but they’re there.
….Unless I’m out to lunch, which is entirely possible. 😁 |
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Hellbent
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2022 12:14 am Post subject: |
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| garhkal wrote: | | If you play games during the empire era, the humans already HAVE a major advantage built in. THE EMPIRE HATES ALIENS! |
New Republic Era, because the Mandalorian exists and is their favourite show. I’ve either done them very right or very wrong…😂 |
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CRMcNeill
Director of Engineering
Joined: 05 Apr 2010
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Location: Redding System, California Sector, on the I-5 Hyperspace Route.
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2022 1:00 am Post subject: |
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| Hellbent wrote: | | True, and I think I misread them originally, my bad. Overall though, the idea is that this would be for species that have no mechanical benefit inbuilt. My kids are falling into maximizing mechanical as opposed to story based effects: currently two Wookies and an Esoomian. 🤷♂️ |
As an alternate take, I would suggest going using the background and template on the species that do have clearly defined benefits or disadvantages and balancing them appropriately by assigning matching ADSA's to the species.
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index
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DougRed4
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Joined: 18 Jan 2013
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2022 12:17 pm Post subject: |
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| CRMcNeill wrote: | | That's one of the nice things about the ADSA System in D6 Space; it actually lays out bonuses and penalties for things like that (see pg. 25 of D6 Space for the Prejudice Disadvantage). |
What does ADSA System stand for? From context I'd guess "Advantages and Special Abilities", but that's only a guess.
Google suggests "Agriculture Development Systems Activity", but that doesn't strike me as a good match. 
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CRMcNeill
Director of Engineering
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2022 12:21 pm Post subject: |
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| DougRed4 wrote: | | What does ADSA System stand for? From context I'd guess "Advantages and Special Abilities", but that's only a guess. |
It's an acronym for "Advantages, Disadvantages and Special Abilities." I'm not typing all that $h!t out every time I want to reference the system as a whole.
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index
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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: Fri Mar 18, 2022 5:00 pm Post subject: |
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It's a good acronym.
| CRMcNeill wrote: | | Whill wrote: | | In my general gamer experience, it seems that taking disadvantages to gain more skill dice tends to be a calculated munchkin move (hoping disadvantages will have minimal impact), so that has left me with a sour taste and I don't allow that in my game. If a player's character concept includes a disadvantage they choose to role play then great, but they don't get anything extra for it. |
I think that's why a system like D6 Space is better than some other ADSA systems. Each Disadvantage comes with rules for how the Disadvantage can affect skill rolls or Difficulties, which puts lots of tools in the GMs hands. If a character picks a Disadvantage that applies penalties to certain actions, the player doesn't have the option of ignoring when, for example, a roll fails because the GM applied a Difficulty modifier that caused the character's roll to fail. |
I'm familiar with how the ADSA system works in D6 Space (I have actually played D6 Space a few times), and I am sure it is better than a lot of games. I still don't see any need to have a formal system that institutes optional disadvantages in my SW D6 game, so I don't, except for my two general character advantages that have built in disadvantages to make a bigger gulf between physical and social awareness abilities, and one alien species that has a list of advantages and disadvantages to choose from to balance out the ADSA dice value to +4D...
| Hellbent wrote: | | Whill wrote: | In my game, I have a small list of advantages that can be bought with the equivalent of one skill die. A couple that are more advantageous come with built-in disadvantages. All of them are things that cannot be accomplished with skill dice/pip allocation alone (because otherwise just allocate accordingly).
I think it is much easier to equate advantages to skill dice than attribute dice, so I wouldn't recommend messing with attribute dice. |
I hadn’t thought of Skill dice instead; that’s cool. I like it. My only real “gripe” I guess (?) with RAW is that there are Species that are neat but have no mechanical perks, but others do…and sometimes big ones. It’s basically the only thing I like about Saga Edition; every Species has its own perks, so there is no “base”, you know? They’re still not really balanced in Saga, but they’re there. |
That's easy. In my game, every PC species (including humans) has a Species Abilities package that is "worth" +4D in skill dice. Granted, it is not an exact science because some abilities do not equate easily to skill dice, but an effort is made to balance it all out. For species that have more than "4D" in special abilities/advantages there are corresponding disadvantages built into the package to being it down to "4D." For species (like humans) that do not have 4D worth of special abilities/advantages (or any), they get an appropriate number of bonus skill dice in char gen.
So in my game, all PCs get 7D in starting skill dice, the 1D bonus die, and a species abilities package. Humans get the equivalent of 12D in starting skill dice. And all PCs have exactly 18D in attributes regardless of species, so PCs of different species in my system is far more game mechanically balanced than RAW.
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garhkal
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| Posted: Sat Mar 19, 2022 12:47 am Post subject: |
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That sounds like a nice balancer.. Do you have a rundown of what some of those 'racial packages' are?
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Whill
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| Posted: Sat Mar 19, 2022 3:21 pm Post subject: |
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| garhkal wrote: | | That sounds like a nice balancer.. Do you have a rundown of what some of those 'racial packages' are? |
It's one of my many ongoing projects. Most of my playable species stat blocks are still in draft form (and some I haven't done yet). I only have two in shareable form so far...
Humans
Zabrak
I'm going to share them all eventually, but for my convenience I am sharing them in my house system, so I've had to post details on my system first so there would be a reference for the different skill names, etc.
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Hellbent
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| Posted: Sat Mar 19, 2022 4:51 pm Post subject: |
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| Whill wrote: | | garhkal wrote: | | That sounds like a nice balancer.. Do you have a rundown of what some of those 'racial packages' are? |
It's one of my many ongoing projects. Most of my playable species stat blocks are still in draft form (and some I haven't done yet). I only have two in shareable form so far...
Humans
Zabrak
I'm going to share them all eventually, but for my convenience I am sharing them in my house system, so I've had to post details on my system first so there would be a reference for the different skill names, etc. |
I would be very interested in this, should you ever post it. Sounds great. |
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