[DF] AD&D Levels and GURPS Will

[b-dog]

I have been looking over some older modules and there are many cases where lower level characters are frightened off while higher level ones are more resistant to the effects. In GURPS this is reflected by Will and Will is only one set attribute. There is in my mind something to the fact that a higher level character would be more resistant to fear and the like due to the fact that they have more of the heroic essence than just a normal person with a strong will. I think that the stronger resistance to fear in high level characters in AD&D is backed up by the fact that the high level characters are more powerful and embody more heroism than lower level characters. Now I know that GURPS uses no level and characters can pick and choose the traits that they want but I still sort of feel that in fantasy higher powerful characters seem more appropriate to having resistance to fear because they have been through this experience before and also because they have the power to back it up.

So I don't know how to play this but I just think that there should maybe be some unwritten rule that the purchase of high Will needs to have a certain power level to be abe to do it. Yes I know that GURPS does not do things this way but I still feel that as a DF character advances then his/her Will should increase as well to reflect the growth of heroism in the character. Maybe I am thinking that heroism is more important than just having a strong mind or maybe a character should not be able to have such a strong mind unless they have been through enough combat scenarios. Who knows? So I am asking how do you hand out Will in you DF games? Do you just let characters buy as much as they want to? Or do you start them at a lower level and then have them gain a stronger will through dungeon exploration?

I just have this concept that a 14th level paladin would just naturally have a stronger resolve and will than a lower level one just because he/she has adventured long enough to gain a strong mind. This is a old school AD&D concept but it is one that I tend to like because it makes gaining resolve through actual adventure experience rather than just buying it with points at the start of the game. What do you think? Thanks

[Juca]

You don't need to only buy will at the start of the game. Actually, experience and having facing many challenges during his lifetime (the motto: been there, seen that) IS a good reason to buy extra will power. In the same line of though, one person that is worned out by the hard life, loss of friends and family over a life of combat can justify the loss of willpower with the same experience.

[zoncxs]

allow the players to acquire any number of levels of fearlessness anytime they "level up" in your mind(completing a arc, or fighting ghosts and living).

[Kromm]

You're comparing apples to rocks, unfortunately. A level-based game and a point-build one have different end goals. You use levels when you want all abilities to advance in lockstep, because the end goal is to be able to carefully power-balance encounters, which works best when you have guaranteed minima and maxima for just about everything a hero can do. You use points when you want it to be possible to make tradeoffs, because the end goals are characterization, which works best when each player can customize his heroes strengths and weaknesses, and teamwork, which works best when each strength bought out of a limited budget opens up a weakness for somebody else to cover.

While you can hammer one into the other, it isn't such a great idea. It's like buying a hammer and using it as a chisel, or vice versa. Why do that? It's a poor use of funds, however much you might like the company or designer behind one tool relative to the other.

[CousinX]

Per the Rule of 14 (p. B360), Fright Checks fail on any roll of 14 or more, regardless of the character's actual Will. The only way around this is the Unfazeable advantage (which basically exempts the character from Fright Checks), or the Brave perk (DF11, p. 11, aka "Rule of 15") in combination with Will (or Will + Fearlessness) of 14 or better. Simply disallow starting PCs from buying either of those traits until they've passed whatever threshold you think they need to become suitably heroic.

[David Johnston2]

Have 'em fail a few Terror checks and they'll be putting experience points into Will, you betcha.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Kromm

You're comparing apples to rocks, unfortunately. A level-based game and a point-build one have different end goals. You use levels when you want all abilities to advance in lockstep, because the end goal is to be able to carefully power-balance encounters, which works best when you have guaranteed minima and maxima for just about everything a hero can do. You use points when you want it to be possible to make tradeoffs, because the end goals are characterization, which works best when each player can customize his heroes strengths and weaknesses, and teamwork, which works best when each strength bought out of a limited budget opens up a weakness for somebody else to cover.

While you can hammer one into the other, it isn't such a great idea. It's like buying a hammer and using it as a chisel, or vice versa. Why do that? It's a poor use of funds, however much you might like the company or designer behind one tool relative to the other.

One of the rare occasions where I agree with Sean. so the above is QFT.


As for the OP, b-dog (or B-Dog?), here are a few random suggestions:

Require that characters buy certain minimum levels of Fearless based on CPs, like any adventurer over 200 CPs must have 2 levels of Fearless, any adventurer over 400 CPs must have 4, any adventurer over 600 must have 6. Non-adventurers (presumably never PCs) use an interval of 350 or 400 CPs instead of 200 CPs (400 is neater, 350 less unrealistic).

Alternatively, allow the taking of Fearless with Limitations. For instance after extensive experience fighting or otherwise overcoming a particular brand of incorporeal undead, allow the purchase of a number of levels of Fearless Limited to only that creature type.

The RAW actually already allows this, having only the problem that multiple instances of such differently Limited Fearless can end up costing more than straight unLimited Fearless. That's a GM-solvable problem, however.

As an alternative to my first suggestion, give automatic free levels of Fearless based on CP total, so it's like above, except they cost zero CP. If you want the D&D-shaped feel of character levels, you can declare that in your world, Fearless cannot be bought, so the only way to gain it is to raise your CP value.

This opens up the question of Will. Will does more than give resistance to fear, and forbidding the buying up of Will would be absurd. The least bad thing you can do is to divorce Fearless from Will, so that you create a new sub-attribute called Fear Resistance. It can either be a sub-attribute of IQ, or a sub-attribute of 10, i.e. one that derives from nothing.

[tg_ambro]

Originally Posted by Kromm

You're comparing apples to rocks. . .

This made me laugh so hard!

The best thing to do for a DF game is to divorce the stupid genre notions (which come from DnD) from that ones the work and streamline the experience. Outside of a class system, what's wrong with a fresh-faced, 250pt Holy Warrior staring down a horde of Cosmic Lava Liches (yeah, I'm never forgetting that concept) while the more experienced, Thief turns tail?

A concept like "Heroic Essense" sounds cool, but what does it mean exactly? The world view I subscribe to, and the one GURPS seems to as well, states that a whenever anyone is better at something than someone else, it's because they have some trait or skill that gives them an edge. So they have High Will, Fearlessness, Unfazable, Et Cetera. This may not be as fantastic as being a force of "heroic" nature, but it requires less suspension of disbelief, which is good because people shouldn't have to accept a game's absurd reality ("I'm more of a hero then you because I've been playing this game longer than you") and a twenty foot tall, fire belching orge in a dungeon the heroes have had to crawl around in the get anywhere.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by tg_ambro

what's wrong with a fresh-faced, 250pt Holy Warrior staring down a horde of Cosmic Lava Liches (yeah, I'm never forgetting that concept) while the more experienced, Thief turns tail?

And I think that underlines what I'm getting at: "Never afraid" is a character concept, as valid for starting PCs as for experienced once; Unfazeable is the ultimate case, and at 15 is priced to be affordable even for 25- and 50-point ordinary folks. If somebody invests in this, they're sending the GM a message: "I don't freeze up. That's my shtick." It very much fits divinely guided heroes, especially the young, idealistic newbie kind . . . jaded veterans have often been damaged by seeing just how many things faith can't defeat, and might actually be less resistant to fear. Likewise, it doesn't fit sneak thieves, who tend to avoid conflict at all costs; there, I agree that a veteran might be tougher, because he's faced enough things that he can't avoid to put some steel in his soul.

The point is that resistance to fear is fairly independent of power level. It has more to do with personality, which GURPS leaves in the realm of player choice first and disadvantages second. I'm not sure I'd want to play in a campaign where the GM said, "Sorry, at 150 points you have to be craven. You can't stand up to the Cosmic Lava Liches until you're worth at least 300 points." That's making my choices depend on a meta-game number instead of on my convictions about my character. The good GM convinces PCs not to go after scary monsters by giving the monsters a bite to go with the bark. Making it clear to the players that they'll die on the first turn of combat is the right way to make monsters scary.

[PK]

Originally Posted by b-dog

I just have this concept that a 14th level paladin would just naturally have a stronger resolve and will than a lower level one just because he/she has adventured long enough to gain a strong mind.

Note that Fright Check modifiers do already take experience into account. A holy warrior who's dealt with a few dozen vampires gets a bonus relative to one who's never staked one in his life. This is touched on briefly in the Basic Set and in more depth in Horror -- but there's no reason you can't expand it even further! Set up a range of Fright Check modifiers based on how many encounters the character has had with the given beasties, maybe from -3 for "never encountered one" up through +5 for "has encountered over 200 or defeated over 100". That way, experience is a significant factor when dealing with scary monsters.