[DF] Lich PCs in DF - Oswald the Violet

[Tymathee]

Celjabba, and Christopher Rice (on Discord) have stated previously that allowing Disguise (not always convenient, as a good GM would make sure it's not always a effective or even available solution) to work around a lot of his negative reaction modifiers is inappropriate. The obvious and frankly easy solution is to treat this, for the duration of the time that his disguise remains effective, as a different form of Disadvantage, a very extreme Secret, for +0%.

I know the easy thing to do is to have very reactionary responses without looking at the bigger picture (as evident with previous replies), but you have to be rational about these things. I know Evil/Anti-Hero characters have a long history of being seen as "too problematic to ever play as or even run a campaign with", but a insightful, creative outside the box thinker can easily turn these impossibilities into possibilities. I think the people who play TTRPGs need to be open to unconventional wisdom, otherwise the ideas for campaign premises will dry up real quick.

[Anders]

I would treat Disguise as a Mitigator on appearance issues. Has to be applied once per day, requires skill roll... probably -70%.

[Tymathee]

Originally Posted by Anders

I would treat Disguise as a Mitigator on appearance issues. Has to be applied once per day, requires skill roll... probably -70%.

Wouldn't this actually imply the RAW negative Appearance traits need to actually be repriced to accommodate such work arounds? This appears to be the very apparent case, rather than what you suggest.

[Tymathee]

Disguise isn't a skill he has, I keep bringing it up because I want to help facilitate a game where the Thief is a effectual character archetype. Oswald can anticipate and deal with magical traps, but the Thief will be more valuable with mundane traps. The Thief's repertoire of uncouth skills will positively synergize with Oswald, providing plenty of hooks for meaningful roleplay opportunities that will allow them to perpetually play off of each other.

The Thief is well known as being pretty poo-poo choice to play in DF, but I want to help someone who's disappointed by this by supplying them more meaningful roleplay opportunities. Plenty of people recognize that a good player bakes roleplaying hooks for other characters to work off of.

[Inky]

I think Tymathee's in the right about the cost of Appearance. You could attempt to improve any character's Appearance with Disguise (or the similar Makeup skill, which defaults to Disguise-2 and even says in so many words that one use of it is to improve appearance). Oswald the Violet's skull-face is probably not particularly harder to conceal than any other kind of Monstrous Appearance (i.e., "give up and put a really big hat over it" :-D). So I'd have assumed this is included in the listed price of Appearance and you don't have to buy it as a Mitigator.

[Celjabba]

Originally Posted by Tymathee

Celjabba ... have stated previously that allowing Disguise (not always convenient, as a good GM would make sure it's not always a effective or even available solution) to work around a lot of his negative reaction modifiers is inappropriate.

For the record, I don't think I said so, suggested a mitigator or spoke against disguise, and I am fine with Oswald attempting to sneak in disguised !
If I accidentally implied otherwise, it wasn't intended.
As you said, make-up and disguise cannot be an easy, foolproof, permanent solution, but that certainly doesn't mean it cannot ever work.

I did question the wisdom of a character with -5 from monstrous(universal) added to a -4 social stigma and further circumstantial -7 reaction penalties on top of that base -9 but I am fine with attempting to disguise some of it away.

When wrapping the character mummy like, putting a mask on his face and calling him a leper actually improve his reaction rolls by +4 or +5 (+6 with fine robes and an ornate silver mask), it may suggest the disadvantages are a bit excessive, however. And possibly redundant.

I would personally forbid the combination on a player character, but if allowed, I am perfectly ok with any attempted disguising or other sneaking around.

Do note that with Weirdness Magnet, a successful disguise attempt may still lead to 'interesting' situations from time to time :)

[Tymathee]

Originally Posted by Celjabba

For the record, I don't think I said so, suggested a mitigator or spoke against disguise, and I am fine with Oswald attempting to sneak in disguised !
If I accidentally implied otherwise, it wasn't intended.
As you said, make-up and disguise cannot be an easy, foolproof, permanent solution, but that certainly doesn't mean it cannot ever work.

I did question the wisdom of a character with -5 from monstrous(universal) added to a -4 social stigma and further circumstantial -7 reaction penalties on top of that base -9 but I am fine with attempting to disguise some of it away.

When wrapping the character mummy like, putting a mask on his face and calling him a leper actually improve his reaction rolls by +4 or +5 (+6 with fine robes and an ornate silver mask), it may suggest the disadvantages are a bit excessive, however. And possibly redundant.

I would personally forbid the combination on a player character, but if allowed, I am perfectly ok with any attempted disguising or other sneaking around.

Do note that with Weirdness Magnet, a successful disguise attempt may still lead to 'interesting' situations from time to time :)

My modified Lich template is pretty faithful to GURPS lich templates (From the Bottom Up, a Pyramid article for DF for playing as monsters) as well as templates for skeletal undead. The only major exception is no Dependency on Mana, which could be justified as a "Inner Darkness" trait, which is "Inner Light" with the serial numbers filed off that Faerie-Folk may acquire to buy off their own Dependency on Mana.

On those same undead templates will often have both a negative appearance (Monstrous or Horrific) and Social Stigma (Undead).

A Kromm quote confirms the validity of having a social stigma basically be a force multiplier for how people react to your appearance.

You could forbid it, but doing so isn't very RAW (nothing wrong with that, as I've taken logical liberties with some design aspects myself, but just saying).

[Tymathee]

We should take a lot of these assumptions being made and come to the natural conclusion that negative reaction modifiers are not meaningful disadvantages or limiting factors for traits or abilities because of circumstantial positive reaction modifiers.

However, that's veering towards the mentality of a rather adversarial-style GM'ing trying to invalidate the debilitating traits of PCs because of their own personal preferences.

I totally expect there to be the meaningful consequences that these traits would entail, HOWEVER I also expect that there be logical, rational workarounds to be employed but not forever exploited. That path yields a bad taste in the mouth of terrible munchkinry.

[Celjabba]

Originally Posted by Tymathee

My modified Lich template is pretty faithful to GURPS lich templates (From the Bottom Up, a Pyramid article for DF for playing as monsters) as well as templates for skeletal undead.
...
On those same undead templates will often have both a negative appearance (Monstrous or Horrific) and Social Stigma (Undead).

Your version have

Disadvantages:
Appearance (Monstrous; Universal, +25%) [-25]
Social Stigma (Dead) [-20]

which perfectly match the skeleton template in Zombies (p69)

but not the lich in Pyramid 72 which only have Social Stigma (Monster) [-15]; and refer to the necromancer template : Appearance (Unattractive, Ugly, or Hideous)

Originally Posted by Tymathee

You could forbid it, but doing so isn't very RAW (nothing wrong with that, as I've taken logical liberties with some design aspects myself, but just saying).

Zombies do mention that those templates are
"if the GM allows them for PCs" (emphasis mine)
and Characters p 21
suggest that
"Horrific: ... The GM may decide that this trait is supernatural and unavailable to normal characters.
Monstrous: ... Again, this trait might not be appropriate for normal characters. "

so a GM saying no is not only rule zero but RAW as well.

I am well aware of the Kromm quote, and agree with it, I just don't want those level of negative modifiers for player characters in my games. Obviously, every GM do as they want.

Originally Posted by Tymathee

However, that's veering towards the mentality of a rather adversarial-style GM'ing trying to invalidate the debilitating traits of PCs because of their own personal preferences.

I don't object because of possible workarounds, those are fine, I object because I don't wish for player characters with such penalties.
And yes, it is a personal preference.
My game, my rules.
Your game, your rules.

I will stop from commenting on this thread, we are obviously not going to agree, and that's fine !
I said it before, while I would not accept it in my games as written, I do like the character concept, and I truly hope you will have fun playing it !

[Tymathee]

The template was suited to fit the concept, as FP doesn't make sense for a skeletal undead unless you want comical-realism, and the social stigma only makes sense because realistically there are social ramifications for being undead.

Playing this character makes the assumption that the campaign is appropriately suited for such a character. I'm not making a wrongful point by stating this, it's just common sense.

A lot of these objections are highly subjective and soley based on the opinion of a single GM and likely not reflective of the experience that I'll have at any table that Oswald would be played at, so I'm not concerned by your clearly adversarial-style GM'ing. The arguably malicious bait'n'switch tactics (as you mentioned on Discord) you invoke are a huge red flag to a lot of people.