Geting rid of spending Character Points on rolls

[Leon The Lion]

I'm aware I'm commiting what many, no doubt, will see as a great heresy against the game. Well, won't be the first time. But my mind is made up and not going to change. I want to remove the option for spending Character Points to increase Skill/Attribute rolls. I've never liked it, in any game, not only SW, and it has to go, in my game at least.

To be clear: I have nothing against the characters having a pool of some game currency they can spend to boost their rolls, in and of itself. In fact I'm all for it. I think it's a great option for cheroic, cinematic play.

No, what I find myself strongly objecting to, is those points coming out of the character's Character Points - experience, to put it simply. It just doesn't feel right to me. Often, it feels basically like a tax on bad luck: "Oh, you rolled poorly on your dodge roll. You're screwed. You may save yourself by spending some CP, but if you do, they won't be available to actually rise your dodge skill so that you can have better chances in the future." It forces the character to exchange long-term improvement for short-term survival, and this, frankly, sucks. Especially if the character is unlucky enough to fall into a vicious cycle of bad rolls and CP spending. Especially if the rest of the group has more luck on their rolls.

And even when it's not about naked survival, the character still has to sacrifice possible future success for short-term accomplishment. At least in this case, it feels somewhat justified, as a "hard choice". "Do you want to be awsome now, in this single instance, or do you want to wait and possibly be consistently awsome later, with higher skills?" Trouble, for me at least, is, I'm not interested in having this kind of "hard choice", a choice of a very meta-game nature to boot, in my game. At the lest, I prefer my SW game to be rather cinematic/heroic, and this choice doesn't fit into my perception of how such a game should be.

So, that's why all this. Does anyone have any ideas (or even better, experience) on how to remove the spending of character experience on roll improvement, without depraving the characters of some kind of safety net / critical performance boosting resource?

The most obvious way would be to create a kind of "Fate/Destiny/Mojo/Luck/Insert own name" resource, separate from CP, that could be used on rolls the way CPs are now. I had this thought on making it an actual Skill, under a Force Attribute which is sometimes proposed, or in some other way tied to it. Thoughts?
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[CRMcNeill]

WEG is hardly unique in offering this option. In D&D, certain magic spells require the expenditure of experience points.
_________________
"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

[Naaman]

Just give them back at the end of the adventure: the more they save, the more they'll have available to boost rolls, so they can just keep a few on hand for each adventure.

Heck, you could even make them work like Force points in that if they are particularly heroic or successful (or whatever), they get back an extra one (not double the expenditure, just one more than they spent).

[Nico_Davout]

[CRMcNeill]

You could also apply rules similar to Force Points, where Characters earn CP back depending on how it is used. Using CP in a heroic situation regains that CP later, but just using them to save yourself from a bad roll loses them permanently.
_________________
"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

[Leon The Lion]

[Quetzacotl]

In the Sava World System (or what it's called) you actually have an additional die to roll. You can then choose which roll you want to use.

Instead of getting more dice, the die changes. You start with a d4, increasing it to a d6, then to a d8, then to a d10 etc. pp.
You always roll your skill die (being d4, d6, d8 or whatever) and additionally, you also roll a d6. You can then choose what result you want to take (if you roll a 3 on the d4 but a 5 on the d6 you can take the 5 as the result).

What makes that more usefull is the fact, that if you roll the maximum value, the die "explodes", like with the wild die. Your roll a 4 on the d4? You get to roll again with it and add the result to the previous result.
So, in the end, you increase the chances a lot to not roll extremely low with that. But that won't prevent the "you rolled very badly, you character is dead"-Situation when you roll two 1s for example.

The simplest thing would be something like "luck". Per Session or Adventure or whatever, you have X points of luck. If you roll badly, you can spend one point of luck to reroll a single die or, if you prever, reroll all the die.

So, instead of using your "experience", you use something entirely different that is not tied to the character advencement, can't be hoarded (each session or adventure the luck points are reset to the initial value, you can't save them) and can potentially save the asses of the players if they have bad luck.

[garhkal]

Hows about for every 2CP they earn, they gain 1 fate/destiny/luck point they can spend. That pool only replenishes when they earn new CP.
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[atgxtg]

[Ankhanu]

[vanir]

I think you're bound by playing the stats of the game and not role playing the game, which is what RPG is really about. A plot course is not something players can win, it is an adventure the players partake in.
These are the first rules of RPG, how do so many forget and just lose it?

Character points are not experience points. They may (at player choice) represent experience gained which maybe used to enhance skills with training or familiarity, but they also represent the intellectual construct of belief in your skills and abilities or just hope. You can spend them frivolously this way but your actual skill levels may not increase and eventually your belief in your skills will be shaken. Analogues the pitfalls of youth rather well I think.

Similarly, Force Points (and even Dark Side Points) are not entirely some magical deity which supports you on call with increasing devotion. It is in part your reputation among others for your actions.

One of the reasons my gaming group came from AD&D d20 across to WEG SWRPG was for the d6 system which we felt had the potential to represent more mature gaming within the system it uses. If we thought in terms of XP and squeezing rulesets for advantage we would've gone to WotC d20 SWRPG.



each to their own I guess.

[Leon The Lion]

Yes, I can kind of see how points hoarding coud become an issue if I just gave the spent CPs back at the end of the adventure, tempting as it is as the simplest solution.

But, points hoarded are points unspent on advancement, and you're only allowed to spend 2 CPs on any single roll, except the ones directly keeping the character from dying.

Still, something to think about. My first idea was to only allowed each CP to be spent on rolls once. Once you spend it, you get it back later, but it's "burnt", and can no longer be re-used on improving rolls, only spent on advancement. This wouldn't completely eliminate the possbility of hoarding, but would make it more difficult.


atgxtg:
I'm afraid I can't really relate, having never had such a problem with players. My current players have a very realistic outlook on their characters' capabilities and a healthy "if you don't have to, then don't" approach to risk taking. Certainly the number of CP they have available to save their skin never really enters into their risk calculation. If a course of action looks suicidal, then, unless absolutely necessary, they will not attempt it, even if their CP totals could make them actually survive it. They're pretty good with getting into character, and characters just don't think in such meta-game terms.


Ankhanu:
Having Luck be a skill you'd actually roll and base the effect it has on other rolls on the result of that roll... It would be a little wierd: you would first need to get lucky on your luck roll to get really lucky on the other skill roll. Luck-ception! Certainly doable, but a little too unpredictable for my taste.

What I was thinking is, each die in the Luck skill gives a character one Luck Point which can be spent on boosting rolls exactly like CPs are now (and maybe on other things, should we come up with any, like Nico_Davout's proposition of a bonus action). Those points reset to skill value at the end of each adventure, when CPs are awarded.

The starting skill level would be 6D, just like, and instead of, the number of CPs beginning characters get now. Luck has to be advanced like any other skill, one pip at a time, however only a full die provides an actual Luck Point - just like with CPs, you cannot divide the die they provide into pips. The CP cost of increasing the skill would be double the number of dice per pip, like with Advanced Skills.


vanir:
...Seriously?
_________________
Plagiarize! Let no one else's work evade your eyes,
Remember why the good Lord made your eyes! So don't shade your eyes,
But plagiarize, plagiarize, plagiarize... Only be sure to call it, please, "research".
- Tom Lehrer

[CRMcNeill]

[atgxtg]

[Naaman]

Another simple option is to hand out more CPs, but limit the number that can be spent between adventures. For example... say, no more than 10 or 15 cps between adventures (this will account for CPs "saved" and would eventually allow for very skilled characters to still raise a skill here and there).