quote:If you''re a Level 1 Thief, there is no way your character would be even close to experienced enough to be able to accurately judge a situation well enough to make that kind of determination.
In general, I would consider that a false statement. Having a strong D&D background, level 1 classes were a considerable step up from the average commoner, with an assortment of useful skills and abilities already at their disposal. Level 1 characters weren''t considered to be newbies, inexperienced whelps. Your level 1 thief, fighter, mage, or cleric have all gone through years of apprenticeship and learned a great deal about their profession as a result. In this particular instance, a level 1 thief indeed has a good deal of experience sizing up people, spotting the subtle gestures and postures that are the teltale signs of an experienced adventurer. A level 1 fighter would be able to interact with Jet Li for a mere minute and gain an appreciation of his skill, without ever even hinting at a blow. This fighter has gone through a significant amount of training. He understands how stance and posture affect balance, the advantages of flanking opponents, obtaining higher ground, etc. The level 1 adventurer in general sees the entire world in a way us common gamers just don''t perceive.
Maybe, maybe not; that''s a roleplay distinction, not an actual rule. I''ve had L1 D&D warriors fall to a net trap and a runt orc with a broken sword before, and if that is what constitutes superior training and "years of apprenticeship", it''s pretty sad. A level 1 might be a step or two above an ordinary commoner, but as far as real situations go they are inexperienced. That''s the whole point of the experience levels. They start out as basically a farmer with a sword and a few picked-up tricks, and only as they progress do they gain the necessary combat and tactical experience to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of an opponent or situation to an accurate degree. I reckon you can look at it either way and still be right. I guess it all depends on the game. Few of the campaigns I ever participated in as a kid took place in lands civilized enough to offer "formal" apprenticeship and training in many arts; the setting was such that most of the adventurers were village toughs and non-conformers who picked up a sword or a spellbook and set about learning what they needed to know.
Regardless, my main point was that I objected to the straight across statistical comparison implied in the original post. Being a L1 thief and knowing right off the bat if a particular victim can thwart your theft or not by doing a statistical computation isn''t roleplaying. A comparison of character sheets can give you precise mathematical probabilities of success, and a run-down of all strengths and weaknesses, but the L1 thief would not and should not have access to this information. Since the character should not be able to make an evaluation of the situation with that level of detail, the player should not be able to either.
In order to have a game without lvls you would have to make a game similar to mario or donkey kong. That way it would only take one hit to kill the enemy or like 3 hits depending on if it is a boss or not. Those are really the only types of games that you can have levelless characters.
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Or you could base the stats on equipment. Zelda had a pretty good feeling of gradual progression, and all it had was two rings and three swords to adjust your stats. I liked that it was a binary improvement, though. Well, you got through the second dungeon, you are now twice as awesome as you were before. Now, as you get ready for the very end of the game, you are twice as awesome as you were after the second dungeon! Go you!
The gradual increase of health was nice, too. Heck, OoT was sweet, because you had the gradual increase in health, the opportunity to double that faculty, a fireproof suit, an aqualung, and the Biggoron Sword, which was freaking sweet. Throw in the different shields and the various other "augmentations", and you've got a good sense of betterment without having to hoard XP or buy skills.
Edit: But I think the best way to do it is to make it hard to see people's stats. After all, if Aldo Nadi comes into a bar, pinches the waitress, orders a glass of wine and starts reading the newspaper at the favorite table of "Rapier Jim", how is RJ to know what kind of trouble he's getting into when he challenges Nadi to a duel? Aldo Nadi didn't wear his various medals and titles on his shirt, and there wasn't a big sign over his head that said, "Best Italian Fencer Ever".
Maybe if you have some kind of "intuition" skill that lets you think, "Say, that guy walks like a wrestler," or "Anyone packing a Kimber probably knows how to use it." Or perhaps if you use some kind of competition system, and you read the papers, you can see that the man in front of you is in fact Doug Koenig, 1996 winner of whater combat shooting competition he won that year.
But for most RPGers, the stat screen is the trophy the win for spending five hundred hours playing the damn game. If you can't show that off, then what's the point?
[edited by - Iron Chef Carnage on May 7, 2004 1:16:43 PM]
Maybe if you have some kind of "intuition" skill that lets you think, "Say, that guy walks like a wrestler," or "Anyone packing a Kimber probably knows how to use it." Or perhaps if you use some kind of competition system, and you read the papers, you can see that the man in front of you is in fact Doug Koenig, 1996 winner of whater combat shooting competition he won that year.
[edited by - Iron Chef Carnage on May 7, 2004 1:16:43 PM]
Intutition seems like a pretty good idea to me. Something I thought of that might be particularly relevant in the kind of dangerous fantasy world most RPGs take place in: for somebody who makes their living in the arts of warfare, it might be important to strike a certain balance in your appearance, demeanor and manner of moving/speaking. You''d want to cultivate a sense of being dangerous, without giving away the full extent of your abilities. You would want to appear dangerous enough that you wouldn''t have to fight a brawl or a duel every six steps down the street, but you also would want potential enemies to misjudge you and underestimate your skill.
This would create a pretty tricky environment. On the one hand, you have the posers--people who act tough, and talk tough and might be just skilled enough to appear tough even to the skilled eye, but in reality are not all that dangerous. On the other hand, you''d have the truly dangerous ones. In my experience with martial arts and tournament competition, it has usually been the quiet, unassuming ones that posed the most danger to my health. Folks that do not talk tough, nor do they look particularly tough, but will hand you your ass if you underestimate them.
Intuition would be critical in an environment like this, where any asshat can cultivate a mean, lithe grace without any true depth to back it up; or where any lethal killer can look like the kid next door, fresh-faced and maybe even slightly awkward. Intuition perhaps based on very low level subliminal processing of non-obvious data, or even true magical or psychic abilities as permitted by the gameworld.
Iron Chef Carnage, VertexNormal: I agree, intuition is a good idea for a skill.
Self-intuition would also be an interesting attribute. Suppose the game lets you choose where to put points, and self-knowledge (knowledge, intuition, whatever) is one of them. You could buff your character up... and the character might seem rough and tough, but without the self-knowledge, the character could easily end up on the floor in a brawl.
It parallels reality to a certain extent. Quite a few people have a different sense of how important they are in a company to how they are viewed as coworkers (and I''m not exempting myself) -- or how good they are at certain tasks. Imbalances are more often on the intellect/wisdom scale than strength (due to the ease of proof in the latter), but they still exist everywhere.
Other-intuition, of judgment, is definitely a separate thing, but also important. And it makes for a good choice for the player. Would you rather be stronger... or better able to judge your foe''s strength, to know when to run away? In time, both might be attainable, but...
I''d prefer it if your intuition was more effective at ascertaining skills that you and the other guy share. A sort of "it takes one to know one" type of system would be ideal. If I''m a skilled thief, and I see a skilled thief across the room, I''ll think, "Ah, crap, she''s already working here. I''ll have to either get rid of her or go someplace else." Same deal with warriors. If I''m looking for a bunch of fighters to help me keep the peace in town, I''ll be able to find the ones that can actually fight, and spot the posers right off.
I think a system that combines your skill level and perception to judge what you perceive the other person’s skill level to be, would be good. So if you have a low firearms skills and you look over at the guy at sitting at the bar you might think hmm, he doesn't look so tough. While, if you had high firearms skill you look at the same guy and notice the little details, the way he holds his glass and the way his muscles move, and you know immediately that this person is a highly skilled sniper and not some you should take lightly.
Perhaps you could even include an obscuration skill that allows characters to hide how skilled they actually are.
You could also have another skill assessment that is used instead of perception to determine how well you can judge people, places, and things.
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[edited by - TechnoGoth on May 10, 2004 5:22:14 PM]
This is a really neat idea. Being able to interact with people''s demeanor and appearance instead of just reading their stst sheet would make for a far more organic gaming experience.
I think, however, that detailed technical data on a character should be available to that character''s player, to facilitate more effective training and micromanagement of skills, etc. I don''t like the idea that you need to gain a skill for "introspection". That should be a priori.
I really like the idea of using intuition to "consider" the enimies, and combining that with perception and your own skills. It also fits in quite perfectly with my game as I already have Intuition as a base stat. I also have a base stat called Temperament which basically represents the character''s self-control and could help determine their ability to hide their true skill. Perhaps actually have a disguise category of skills.
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quote:Original post by NecroMage In my game designs, I always attempt not to include experience levels. They tend to seem arbitrary and meaningless and are totally unrealistic.
I don''t see anything unrealistic about it. A young adventurer starts smashing monsters, he''s not as efficient as he could be. As he smashes the monsters, he learns better techniques, and in the case of physical attackers build muscle mass, in the case of mages they learn better use of the spells through practice.
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