11-04-2014, 01:44 AM | #1 |
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Alternate Ratio for Game Time Modifier
The game time modifier for traits such as Luck has a lot to recommend it. If nothing else it's pretty much required for a pbp game. There is a disadvantage though since this means losing the tie between amount of rerolls and implicit interest in the events being played out. Thus the inclusion of the rather obvious "The GM may adjust these ratios."
Personally given the sort of campaigns I've been involved in historically only a small minority of characters wouldn't be seriously disadvantaged by the switch from real time to game time so I'd like to adjust the ratio. Has anyone experimented with this? |
11-04-2014, 10:41 AM | #2 |
Join Date: Feb 2011
Location: Cambridge, MA
|
Re: Alternate Ratio for Game Time Modifier
One thought is to measure time narratively rather than game time vs. real time. For example, you could give Luck x uses per encounter.
|
11-04-2014, 11:05 AM | #3 | |
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Alternate Ratio for Game Time Modifier
Quote:
What I had in mind was something in much the same vein as the normal game time modifier but. say. 24 times as fast in recharging. This is the sort of thing that can really use practical reports though. |
|
11-04-2014, 11:16 AM | #4 |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
|
Re: Alternate Ratio for Game Time Modifier
The difficulty is the enormous variation in the rate of passage of game time. Significant amount of time passing between scenarios should not be a problem, but it's very easy for "You travel for two nights and hide during the day" to happen during one session, while another session only lasts ten minutes of game time. So it's going to depend a lot on campaign style, and still more on the individual events of a session. If they're similar enough to generalise across, you may have a cliché problem.
|
11-04-2014, 11:47 AM | #5 | |
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Alternate Ratio for Game Time Modifier
Quote:
You can always generalize a rate no matter the campaign although, of course, some will function better having done this. I also feel that regularity of time passage is far too abstract a feature to be a cliché. |
|
11-04-2014, 12:03 PM | #6 | ||
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
|
Re: Alternate Ratio for Game Time Modifier
Quote:
Quote:
|
||
11-04-2014, 12:21 PM | #7 | |
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Alternate Ratio for Game Time Modifier
Quote:
Oh I see what you mean. Yes that would get old eventually. Last edited by Sindri; 11-04-2014 at 12:25 PM. |
|
11-04-2014, 12:52 PM | #8 | |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
|
Re: Alternate Ratio for Game Time Modifier
Quote:
However, you have to consider your attitude to the recharge system being gamed by your players. One of the advantages of player-time luck is that timewasting is generally not entertaining for the player doing it, still less the other players. Those two examples above, which I just invented (or conceivably re-invented), have their own gameability. If Luck recharges in terms of rounds of combat, you can expect more all-out defences and Evaluates, and less pressure to win fights ASAP. If it recharges off critical successes, players will avoid reduce their use of penalties for things like Deceptive Attacks, so that they get more rolls at 15 or 16, and more critical successes. |
|
11-04-2014, 01:22 PM | #9 | |
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Alternate Ratio for Game Time Modifier
Quote:
One of the disadvantages of real time Luck is that it incentivizes stalling for time which is unfun. Replacing that gameability with something like drawing out in game combats seems to be a generally good trade. One thing I've contemplated to reduce this sort of gameability is to make Luck only have a chance of recharging when it would be triggered instead of being automatic. I tend to think it's very rarely worth voluntarily going below skill 16 anyway, so that wouldn't bother me. It's less than ideal for Luck to be stronger with greater skill levels but that's not a terrible flaw. |
|
Tags |
brainstorm, game time, house rules, powers, real time |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|