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ZzaphodD
Rear Admiral
Joined: 28 Nov 2009
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 Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2011 8:32 pm Post subject: |
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| vanir wrote: | Agree Gharkal and ZD, that's exactly how we roll. We got so used to playing epic levels in AD&D we learned how to write up Artifacts that were as much a liability as they were a boon, so they were never game breakers.
Same deal, anything amazing can also be terrifying. Roses have thorns.
Mental and physical fatigue, yes (the Force is intrinsic to lifeforce, ergo has biological component). Attracting the Dark Side by heavy reliance on the Force for mundane tasks, that's a big one in our games. Sensing no danger as your companions are blown to pieces, another.
My favourite one is convincing Players that they are becoming more skilled in use of the Force as I teach them a more Sith perspective.
I don't tell them the Force Points I hand out are actually Dark Side Points until they start to question the morality of the opportunities for advancement I'm placing before them, or they've fallen to the Dark.
That's when I tell them their 6 FP and 2 DSP are in fact 2 FP and 6 DSP and I make them change them around on their sheet, then discuss whether we'll retire the Character as an NPC or try to atone.
See Darksiders don't think they're gaining DSP, they think they're justified. They think they're gaining FP (either don't care or don't know about the DSP, either is perfectly likely from my experience).
RAW says give them both and tempt them, if they use the FP they keep the DSP. I think that's too immature. I hide it from them and let them take responsibility for actions without direct warnings. I'll put warnings in the game, like Vima De Boda might come up and warn a Character who's been gaining a lot of FP lately about his path.
If he/she doesn't listen, they will later when it's too late. Makes things much more interesting and why not, these are fictional people, nobody's going to hell or anything.
We're an adult gaming group, so we cut the censorship about dark themes and harsh realities, and bring it in full force. |
I have a mechanic (discussed at lentgh elsewhere here) that slowly wrests the control of the character out of the players hands into the claws of the dark side... Its great fun..
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garhkal
Sovereign Protector
Joined: 17 Jul 2005
Posts: 14215
Location: Reynoldsburg, Columbus, Ohio.
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| Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 12:26 am Post subject: |
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| MacRauri wrote: | | garhkal wrote: | | Had a pc of mine done that (Danger sense up all the time), he would have eventally mentally fatigued himself as well as gave himself a case of paranoia.. |
No. You don't understand. They were trying to kill us. ALL of them! |
LOL... Its not really paranoia if they are out to get you!
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vanir
Jedi
Joined: 11 May 2011
Posts: 793
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| Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 12:26 pm Post subject: |
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| ZzaphodD wrote: |
I have a mechanic (discussed at lentgh elsewhere here) that slowly wrests the control of the character out of the players hands into the claws of the dark side... Its great fun.. |
Got a link? I'd like to have a read, always looking for stuff like this for our game. |
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ZzaphodD
Rear Admiral
Joined: 28 Nov 2009
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| Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 2:03 pm Post subject: |
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| vanir wrote: | | ZzaphodD wrote: |
I have a mechanic (discussed at lentgh elsewhere here) that slowly wrests the control of the character out of the players hands into the claws of the dark side... Its great fun.. |
Got a link? I'd like to have a read, always looking for stuff like this for our game. |
Couldnt find the thread, and Im not sure it was the latest version. These are 'my' (Tainted by the Dark Side and Resisting the Fall are borrowed/influenced from/by a forum members rather complicated force rules (for my taste) rules for turning to the Dark Side.
This will in general allow you to have more DSPs, this 'bonus' is balanced by the fact that you will not have complete control of you character during this voyage towards the abyss..
Turning to the Dark Side
Will of the Dark Side (WDS)
-From the point the character has at least 1 DSP the Dark Side will try to influence the characters behaviour. This will at first small things, like making the character use unneccesary force and cause pain. As the DSPs increase the urges will be stronger and will change to real atrocities or calling on the Dark Side. The actions a character might be forced to take when succumbing to the Will of the Dark Side may gain the character a DSP.
The mechanic works like an opposed test against the resisting characters Willpower or Control. The WDS is normally equal to the current number of DSPs a character have plus a number of situational dice, usually from 1D to 3D. These situational dice depends on the circumstances of the temptation and is determined by the GM. A character with DSPs who act in anger might have a 1D situational die. A character facing certain death which might be avoided by calling on the dark side might face 2D in situational dice. These dice might combine for a larger number of total dice. A character being goaded by a Dark Side character which at the same time threatens to kill the characters family/friends might face 3D in situational dice.
Tainted by the Dark Side
If a character has equal or more DSP:s than the number or Dice in either his Knowledge or his Perception, whichever is lower, he is ’tainted by the Dark Side’ and is dangerously close to falling to the Dark Side. After that, each time the character gets a DSP he must Resist the Fall or turn. If the Character ever gets an equal or higher number of DSPs than the number of dice in his Knowledge and Perception added together he turns automatically.
Resist the Fall
Willpower/Control Difficulty: Easy or opposed by the Will of the Dark Side (the GM rolls those characteristics to oppose you) whichever is higher. If the character uses Control to Resist the Fall he cannot use any DSP bonus but must also lower his Control by a number of dice equal to the number or DSPs the character has. This is due to the efforts of not using the Dark Side, similar to the rule that raises the difficulty number one level when not using the Dark Side bonus when using Force Skills.
Capsule: this is used whenever a Tainted character gains a dark side point to avoid falling to the dark side
If you successfully use this technique you do not become a Dark Side character. If you ever have a Dark Side score equal to or higher than the total of your Perception and Knowledge attributes added together you automatically fail to use this technique and become a dark side character.
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vanir
Jedi
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| Posted: Thu Dec 22, 2011 11:46 pm Post subject: |
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I like it, especially the DSP ratio vs Kno/Per factor, something I never thought of although certainly I considered Willpower an obvious factor in resisting temptations of the Dark Side.
In one short campaign we wanted to play a Dark Side campaign, especially considering some of the extra material now published for dark sider PCs now, like the sith and fallen jedi templates.
So the system we implemented there was the ratio of DSP to FP signified your actual freedom of action as a Player.
What I mean is you know how RAW says basically the 1d6<DSP rule for Player controlled actions, we made it 1d6+FP<DSP
so that someone like Darth Vader can run around doing "heroically evil things" so to speak and so long as he kept his FP rewards in proportion to his DSP accumulation he remained largely in control of his own tactical actions. He just couldn't break the Palpatine/the Dark Side dominance over his lifestyle, but we played that out more RP style for our Dark PCs (two Sovereign Protectors which became Dark Jedi/Sith and continually vied for power as a breakaway Imperial faction in the New Republic era), for example by simply playing out overpowered enforcers like Palpatine II or various high powered dark siders who physically enforced the PC lifestyles by the simplest means, threat and fear, rather than arbitrarily ruling GM dictated actions by use of some disembodied evil force.
Of course the only problem there was ultimately they started accumulating FP/DSP to the degree of people like Palpatine so if we kept playing them out eventually they were going to be game breaking characters. They just about were when we retired them. That was a long time ago though and back then, when there was far less material dealing with dark siders we thought you got bonus Force Skill die for each DSP all the time, normally, so Palps is running around with about 60d6 in skills for example (was manifesting dopplegangers halfway across the galaxy if he didn't like you, very scary).
Might work better now with the developed rules in the Dark Side sourcebook on those elements. |
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ZzaphodD
Rear Admiral
Joined: 28 Nov 2009
Posts: 2426
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| Posted: Fri Dec 23, 2011 3:54 am Post subject: |
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| vanir wrote: | | I like it, especially the DSP ratio vs Kno/Per factor, something I never thought of although certainly I considered Willpower an obvious factor in resisting temptations of the Dark Side. |
That idea is borrowed from someone on the forum who has developed quite extensive force rules. My version is simpler though, for ease of play.
| Quote: |
In one short campaign we wanted to play a Dark Side campaign, especially considering some of the extra material now published for dark sider PCs now, like the sith and fallen jedi templates.
So the system we implemented there was the ratio of DSP to FP signified your actual freedom of action as a Player.
What I mean is you know how RAW says basically the 1d6<DSP rule for Player controlled actions, we made it 1d6+FP<DSP
so that someone like Darth Vader can run around doing "heroically evil things" so to speak and so long as he kept his FP rewards in proportion to his DSP accumulation he remained largely in control of his own tactical actions. He just couldn't break the Palpatine/the Dark Side dominance over his lifestyle, but we played that out more RP style for our Dark PCs (two Sovereign Protectors which became Dark Jedi/Sith and continually vied for power as a breakaway Imperial faction in the New Republic era), for example by simply playing out overpowered enforcers like Palpatine II or various high powered dark siders who physically enforced the PC lifestyles by the simplest means, threat and fear, rather than arbitrarily ruling GM dictated actions by use of some disembodied evil force.
Of course the only problem there was ultimately they started accumulating FP/DSP to the degree of people like Palpatine so if we kept playing them out eventually they were going to be game breaking characters. They just about were when we retired them. That was a long time ago though and back then, when there was far less material dealing with dark siders we thought you got bonus Force Skill die for each DSP all the time, normally, so Palps is running around with about 60d6 in skills for example (was manifesting dopplegangers halfway across the galaxy if he didn't like you, very scary).
Might work better now with the developed rules in the Dark Side sourcebook on those elements. |
I once had a Light Side Points / Dark Side Points a la KOTOR in mind, but dropped it due to lack of time to develop it.
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