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atgxtg
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 Posted: Fri Apr 24, 2009 3:31 pm Post subject: Keeping Up Varaint |
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I was thinking.
What if instead of the usual MAP penalty for keeping Force Powers up, Jedi had to decide how many of their Force skill dice to allocate towards a task, and those dice were "locked up" and were not available for other things until the Jedi dropped the power?
For instance a Jedi who Controls pain after being incapacitated would assign 3D from his Control skill towards keeping the power up. Those dice would not be avaialbe for other Control powers.
Or a Jedi who is getting +2D to STR from Enhance attribute would likewise lower his Control Dice by 2D until the power is dropped.
How does that look? |
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MA-3PO
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| Posted: Fri Apr 24, 2009 3:36 pm Post subject: Re: Keeping Up Varaint |
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| atgxtg wrote: | I was thinking.
What if instead of the usual MAP penalty for keeping Force Powers up, Jedi had to decide how many of their Force skill dice to allocate towards a task, and those dice were "locked up" and were not available for other things until the Jedi dropped the power?
For instance a Jedi who Controls pain after being incapacitated would assign 3D from his Control skill towards keeping the power up. Those dice would not be avaialbe for other Control powers.
Or a Jedi who is getting +2D to STR from Enhance attribute would likewise lower his Control Dice by 2D until the power is dropped.
How does that look? |
Does the difficulty of the power determine how many dice are locked up? |
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garhkal
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| Posted: Fri Apr 24, 2009 4:07 pm Post subject: |
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What is the difference? With maps, you have -1d to all checks for each action/power being kept up. Your way does the same.
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Lostboy
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| Posted: Fri Apr 24, 2009 8:29 pm Post subject: |
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| Actualy his way would cost more and be a bigger bookkeeping problem. |
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cunning_kindred
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Location: Southampton, England
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| Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2009 3:09 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | What if instead of the usual MAP penalty for keeping Force Powers up, Jedi had to decide how many of their Force skill dice to allocate towards a task, and those dice were "locked up" and were not available for other things until the Jedi dropped the power? |
I've generally seen a trend in your suggested variants for greater simplicity. This however, would appear to increase the complexity. I can't believe I'm about to say this but: I think this would be too harsh for the Jedi. You just would not be able to keep up very much.
Although I have not tried out this variant I'm assuming your logic is somewhat similar to a route of thought we did follow. MAPs seem a very important part of what keeps the Force balanced RAW. We made the MAPs much harsher at one point in order to keep the more potent abilities balanced. We did this by introducing more force skills and demanding more than three rolls to activate some of the more powerful abilities. The result was a complete nightmare.
The new Force skills worked brilliantly (we kept those) but higher MAPs were just a nightmare to track and the Jedi character were crippled by their powers. Its was more balanced but the Jedi stopped feeling like Jedi.
I know you've read my rules atgxtg but for those that haven't: We eventually went in completely the opposite direction. We scaled down the powers until they were far less potent (at least for less powerful Jedi) and then we could do away with MAPs all together. Instead we demanded simple concentration.
You could concentrate on one power for free. There were no dice penalties. If you suffer an injury you have to reactively roll to keep the concentrated powers operating. If you attempted to put up more than one concentration power you need to roll to keep them all operating. The difficulty is always very easy, +5 per skill involved in each power you want to maintain.
This way, trying to maintain a lot of abilities or trying to maintain them when you are injured require rolls but for most characters at most times concentrating on powers (regardless of the number they have successfully put 'up') is not a consideration. They just get on with making rolls without having to worry about it. |
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atgxtg
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Joined: 22 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2009 2:33 pm Post subject: Re: Keeping Up Varaint |
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| MA-3PO wrote: | | Does the difficulty of the power determine how many dice are locked up? |
Indirectly. The number of dice locked up would be based on the number of dice rolled to to use the power. So, for example, if a character wanted to use Telekenisis to move something he would assign Alter dice to the TK action, and those dice would be "locked" until he stopped doing TK.
It wouldn't work out the same as MAPs, since the dice would be lost to alter, but not come off of other things.
It wouldn't necessarily be harsher, since it frees up MAPs from other things. BUt it would be a bigger bookkeeping problem through. Just how much bigger is another issue.
Thanks for the feedback everybody. |
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Ankhanu
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| Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2009 5:51 pm Post subject: |
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Hmm, I'm not sure this works with the spirit of the Jedi so well. To show what I mean, think about the example of Telekinesis you use. In most every account, using Telekinesis to move anything of any substantial weight or for any duration other than an instant fling requires a LOT of concentration on the Jedi's part. Think Yoda lifting the X-Wing from the swamp, Luke calling his lightsaber to his hand on Hoth, Dooku pulling the walkway down on Obi-Wan, Yoda and Dooku with the column that was to crush Obi-Wan and Anakin, etc... The Jedi stops doing EVERYTHING else and puts all their will into telekinesis. The only real spot that we don't see this is flinging small objects (Maul flicking debris to open a blastdoor on Naboo, some of the debris Vader flings at Luke on Cloud City, etc), which represents a pretty momentary use of the power; pick it up, get it moving, ignore it.
Allocating some of your Alter dice into the action leaving you free to do other things doesn't really fit the concept... mind you, neither does a -1D MAP.
I kind of like Cunning Kindred's suggestion concerning concentration... but I think that certain powers just need a rewrite as well 
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cunning_kindred
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| Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2009 6:17 pm Post subject: |
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In reference to Ankhanu: its interesting that you should make that example.
We have a power called Move Object: named after the d20 skill and designed to replace telekinesis power in RAW. We used telekinesis for the skill that covers all forms of moving things through the Force.
For this basic power we don't actually allow a concentration duration. While you can put up lightsaber combat and maintain it throughout the battle at no cost (it only add +2D to the attack and parry rolls BTW) move object lasts only one round. If you are still holding something at the beginning of the next round you must roll again and keep rolling every round - successfully - or you drop it. Hence, Jedi in our game tend to do nothing while trying to levitate heavy objects. We felt this best represented how it works in the films.
Our Concentration duration is for powers that don't require much active effort once they are running. |
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atgxtg
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| Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2009 11:34 pm Post subject: |
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| So Move Object as a sort of reaction TK? |
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Raven Redstar
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| Posted: Sun Apr 26, 2009 12:34 am Post subject: |
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| I personally don't really have a problem with MAP as is for jedi in general. The only thing that I've changed with regards to that, is controlling pain on wounds doesn't add to the MAP. However this is only for wound status. Incapacitated or Mortally wounded still have the -1D because they require far more concentration to maintain. Also, things like life detection and danger sense I let coupled together with a single -1D, since in my opinion, they can go together nicely without requiring too much added concentration. |
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cunning_kindred
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| Posted: Sun Apr 26, 2009 3:09 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | So Move Object as a sort of reaction TK? |
Exactly, but only if you were using the power in the previous round. |
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atgxtg
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| Posted: Wed Apr 29, 2009 1:26 pm Post subject: |
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| Ankhanu wrote: | | Hmm, I'm not sure this works with the spirit of the Jedi so well. To show what I mean, think about the example of Telekinesis you use. In most every account, using Telekinesis to move anything of any substantial weight or for any duration other than an instant fling requires a LOT of concentration on the Jedi's part. Think Yoda lifting the X-Wing from the swamp, Luke calling his lightsaber to his hand on Hoth, Dooku pulling the walkway down on Obi-Wan, Yoda and Dooku with the column that was to crush Obi-Wan and Anakin, etc... The Jedi stops doing EVERYTHING else and puts all their will into telekinesis. The only real spot that we don't see this is flinging small objects (Maul flicking debris to open a blastdoor on Naboo, some of the debris Vader flings at Luke on Cloud City, etc), which represents a pretty momentary use of the power; pick it up, get it moving, ignore it. |
It looks like in the films just how much effort you have to put into something depends on just what "scale" the use of the power is, and if the power is being uased momentarily, or as a long term action.
Although Yoda said "Size matters not", what we see on scree suggests that mass does matter.
What is seems like is that the MAP penalty "in the films" is dependent on the difficulty of the task. Very Easy tasks seem to be freebies for momentary actions, but as the difficulty goes up so does the amount of concentration required. |
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MA-3PO
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| Posted: Wed Apr 29, 2009 1:53 pm Post subject: |
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| atgxtg wrote: | | Ankhanu wrote: | | Hmm, I'm not sure this works with the spirit of the Jedi so well. To show what I mean, think about the example of Telekinesis you use. In most every account, using Telekinesis to move anything of any substantial weight or for any duration other than an instant fling requires a LOT of concentration on the Jedi's part. Think Yoda lifting the X-Wing from the swamp, Luke calling his lightsaber to his hand on Hoth, Dooku pulling the walkway down on Obi-Wan, Yoda and Dooku with the column that was to crush Obi-Wan and Anakin, etc... The Jedi stops doing EVERYTHING else and puts all their will into telekinesis. The only real spot that we don't see this is flinging small objects (Maul flicking debris to open a blastdoor on Naboo, some of the debris Vader flings at Luke on Cloud City, etc), which represents a pretty momentary use of the power; pick it up, get it moving, ignore it. |
It looks like in the films just how much effort you have to put into something depends on just what "scale" the use of the power is, and if the power is being uased momentarily, or as a long term action.
Although Yoda said "Size matters not", what we see on scree suggests that mass does matter.
What is seems like is that the MAP penalty "in the films" is dependent on the difficulty of the task. Very Easy tasks seem to be freebies for momentary actions, but as the difficulty goes up so does the amount of concentration required. |
In many of the mentioned situations I always assumed the character was taking a round to "prepare" in order to get a die bonus for the move object roll. |
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garhkal
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| Posted: Wed Apr 29, 2009 5:33 pm Post subject: |
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Or TK roll.
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Ankhanu
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| Posted: Wed Apr 29, 2009 5:36 pm Post subject: |
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| MA-3PO wrote: | | atgxtg wrote: | | Ankhanu wrote: | | Hmm, I'm not sure this works with the spirit of the Jedi so well. To show what I mean, think about the example of Telekinesis you use. In most every account, using Telekinesis to move anything of any substantial weight or for any duration other than an instant fling requires a LOT of concentration on the Jedi's part. Think Yoda lifting the X-Wing from the swamp, Luke calling his lightsaber to his hand on Hoth, Dooku pulling the walkway down on Obi-Wan, Yoda and Dooku with the column that was to crush Obi-Wan and Anakin, etc... The Jedi stops doing EVERYTHING else and puts all their will into telekinesis. The only real spot that we don't see this is flinging small objects (Maul flicking debris to open a blastdoor on Naboo, some of the debris Vader flings at Luke on Cloud City, etc), which represents a pretty momentary use of the power; pick it up, get it moving, ignore it. |
It looks like in the films just how much effort you have to put into something depends on just what "scale" the use of the power is, and if the power is being uased momentarily, or as a long term action.
Although Yoda said "Size matters not", what we see on scree suggests that mass does matter.
What is seems like is that the MAP penalty "in the films" is dependent on the difficulty of the task. Very Easy tasks seem to be freebies for momentary actions, but as the difficulty goes up so does the amount of concentration required. |
In many of the mentioned situations I always assumed the character was taking a round to "prepare" in order to get a die bonus for the move object roll. |
atgxgt, Ok, I think I see where you were working from now... it's less arbitrary seeming than it was when I first read it. I'll have to put more thought into the mechanic.
MA-3PO, that would work in scenes like Yoda and the X-Wing and Luke and his lightsaber... but doesn't really fit the action in the more intensive scenes, particularly the ones involving Dooku using it to move heavy objects during combat. Using concentration should, if anything, make it seem less difficult to move those heavy objects.
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