Quote:
Originally Posted by whswhs
Actually, GURPS has game mechanics for much of that; I wrote a lot of it for GURPS Social Engineering. The key point of difference is that it doesn't have a formal concept of "loyalty missions." I'm not sure if this is something W&WS came up with, or if it comes from some other sort of gaming, but in either case I find it odd as a designated category.
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"Loyalty Missions" are from videogame RPGs - the Fallout and Mass Effect series are most famous (infamous?) for this. In
Fallout 4, for instance, you can take one Companion with you at a time, gathered from a number of places (Codsworth was your household robot back before the War, you meet Dogmeat on the way to Concord, you rescue Garvey from the museum in Concord, etc). With the exception of Dogmeat and his literal doglike loyalty, each companion has an Affinity stat that says how much they like and trust you. It starts off at or near zero; you can increase it by doing things they like, and decrease it by doing things they dislike. If you get their Affinity low enough, they'll leave you. On the other hand, get it high enough, and many of them will give you a Loyalty Mission. Once that's completed, you get a special perk.
For instance, Nick Valentine was a pre-War detective, whose mind was recorded as part of an experiment. Two hundred years later, the Institute tried to use the recording to animate their latest attempt at a human-like synth; it failed to meet their expectations, and the new Nick was literally discarded. When he trusts you enough, he'll tell you about Eddie Winter, the pre-War crime lord who managed to turn himself in an immortal irradiated Ghoul on purpose; Nick needs your help to track down the recordings scattered around the Commonwealth with a code to Eddie's location, so Nick can track Eddie down and get revenge for the gang's killing of his fiance, Jennifer Lands, just before the War. Completion gets you the Close to Metal perk, which means you never get locked out of computer terminals while trying to guess passwords.
Cait is a drug-addled pit fighter, who expects everyone to eventually betray and mistreat her. Gain her trust, and she'll ask for your help kicking all of her various addictions; there's a machine in a Vault that can clean her up, but she's going to need your help to get in there and then to operate the machine. (I don't remember the perk reward, but you can then pursue a Romance storyline with her if you like, and she's pretty easy on the eyes...)
Other companions (Codsworth, Garvey, Strong the supermutant, others) will gain Affinity simply by traveling with you and seeing you do things they approve of. (Codsworth likes helping people, wants to see you in charge, and approves of the Brotherhood of Steel. Garvey wants to make the Commonwealth safe. Strong values displays of strength, and disapproves of helping the "weak".) Like the questing companions, though, they do give you a perk when their Affinity hits the peak. Fortunately, once you've gotten the perk, you don't lose it, even if the Affinity drops again.