Attainments

Graf · Aug 30, 2008

An attainment is a something a character receives for in character success that identifies a remarkable acheivement or unusual relationship. Sample attainments might be
Trusted by the Mayor: You've proved yourself in the eyes of the mayor of Daunton; he trusts you with important or sensitive assignements. This attainment can be lost by betraying that trust, having it revealed that you've acted against the interests of the town.
Explorer of the Shadowrift: You've visited the Shadowrift on Kithria and lived to tell the tale
Caught the Skingraft Slasher: Your were part of the group that revealed the slashers identity and help capture her

Attainments would be approved in advance by judges (usually as part of an adventure submission) and awarded by DMs on an individual basis.
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... some attainments could have trivial mechanical benefits

these should be granted as the result of success in a significant adventure or series of adventures
so if you're "known to be a friend of the Peg-legged Don" you get +2 to intimidate and diplomacy when dealing with the merchants of Bacarte; +4 when dealing with members of the Don's family

... rare attainments could have non-trivial mechanical benefts

these should be capstones at the end of a truly epic and difficult adventure
so if you've "Helped seal off the Caverns of Madness" you get +2 to saves vs effects with the psychic keyword; once a day as an immediate action when effected by a condition caused by a power with the psychic keyword that a save ends you may make a saving throw

... affliation attainments would connote a particularly close relationship with a group

similar to affiliations, which were sort of halfheartedly implimented in varous 3.x suppliments. You might get a discount on certain items or services, access to unusual equipment (alchemy?), or even the "lend" of a certain kind of magical item.
So the "Defenders of Allaria" might give senior members the lend of a "battle standard*" magic item of level equal to the characters

(*=WotC just put it out on the web; it's not approved content for L4W but it's an easy to understand example)

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Advantages may include

An easy way for DMs and other players to find out what you've accomplished
Could spark ideas for cross linked adventures
A way to reward roleplaying
With the advent of a pretty remarkably potent reward system for DMing we'll see a lot of higher level characters in play who didn't get there by playing; attainments are only available through actual play. A 4th level character who advanced normally will potentially have a lot of attainments (relationships, etc) that a character who "got to 4th on points" won't be able to match

Disadvantages include

Bookkeeping
Judge workload
Possible balance issues if we have mechanical effects

garyh · Aug 31, 2008

I voted "No." Seems like a lot of work to try and balance, if that's even possible. Also feels a bit like grinding faction in an MMO.

Graf · Aug 31, 2008

it is a multiple choice poll and there are non mechanical options.
just saying...

covaithe · Aug 31, 2008

Mmm... I haven't voted yet, but I'm leaning toward yes, with trivial mechanical benefits, and with individual achievements looked at by judges on a case-by-case basis. I'm thinking of a couple of things in one-off things in LEW that seem to have worked out pretty nicely, such as several characters who were awarded knighthoods in the Kingdom of Monemvassia after a series of linked adventures there. The knighthood, along with having plenty of fluffy benefits (e.g. people in Monemvassia knew them and were generally favorable to them), came with a small estate that generated a flat 50g per real-time month of income. One of the characters was a bard, who chose to have his "estate" take the form of a theater on the outskirts of the city that he owned. 50g/month was a pittance by the time they achieved it, but I always thought that was pretty cool nonetheless.

The reason I haven't just voted yes is that I'm not sure how it helps to have a policy in place for this sort of thing. As long as we have a policy that any adventure rewards that are out of line with the normal treasure packets outlined in the DMG have to be authorized (by email) with the judges beforehand, then the judges can just look at any proposed rewards one at a time. I assume these things are intended to be pretty rare?

Graf · Aug 31, 2008

I am personally thinking about living settings and games I want to run and I keep getting stuck on how difficult it might be to get info spread around that would let dms build a richer world.

Like what if a dm starts and adventure involving mayor bunt or the merchants or whatever and there is one member of the group who worked closely with him and another who betrayed them...
how would you know? Wouldn't it be nice to have that recorded somehow?
or to know that one of the party members has already been to the island upon which you're setting your adventure?

My thought is that mechanical stuff would be rare one every two levels... But someone who's really into roleplaying and building relationships might wind up picking up a couple of rp attainments (stuff that has no mechankcal benefit) a level.

If people get into it it could be the tip of the iceberg... If a bunch of characters have the attainment "defeated agents of the dark one" then a dm could propose an adventure (or just a vingette) about "the dark one's high priest tries to take revenge".

covaithe · Aug 31, 2008

If I were running a game involving an NPC and a player had had dealings with that NPC before, I would expect the player to point it out to me, and roleplay their new interactions appropriately. Then I could apply circumstance bonuses or penalties as I saw fit.

One every other level is a lot more common than I was thinking. I was thinking that maybe one in ten characters would get one during their adventuring career. If it's every other level... well, that sounds an awful lot like a feat. Surely these things are less common than feats?

D&D involves a ton of bookkeeping already. I don't think we need to add more for this.

Graf · Sep 1, 2008

So Mayor Bront comes in and says "OK. I don't know any of you... but I'm desperate for some help" and THEN the player says "Uh... I saved your daugther last winter, and you wept when you thanked us...."
It just seems inefficent to me.

Its actually less bookkeeping, to my mind.
But it depends, really, on what you mean by "living".

I'd like for that to mean that the environment has a persistent feel, that characters build up relationships and so forth as they advance through the game, they change things and those changes and contributions are recorded.
But I suppose living could just supposed to be a sort of WotC style "you get to play the same character in multiple games, but there's no story or connection, and your player never affects the world or changes anything".
If that's what it means to the community at large then so be it.

I'll probably do something informally, but, you know, effectively that means that characters in my games may wind up feeling like they've gotten something special or extra for an OOC reason (they wound up with me instead of with some other DM).

But like I said, if that's not what living means to most people I'm happy to do some gurillia roleplaying. I just thought it was worthy of consideration.

garyh · Sep 1, 2008

Graf said:
So Mayor Bront comes in and says "OK. I don't know any of you... but I'm desperate for some help" and THEN the player says "Uh... I saved your daugther last winter, and you wept when you thanked us...."

Burns: "Who is that firebrand, Smithers?"
Smithers: "That's Homer Simpson."
Burns: "Simpson, eh? New man?"
Smithers: "Actually, sir, he thwarted your campaign for governor, you ran over his son, he saved the plant from meltdown, his wife painted you in the nude..."
Burns: "Doesn't ring a bell."

Graf · Sep 1, 2008

I think that may be the best response this year. Were we arguing about something before?
I can't remember...

CaBaNa · Feb 27, 2009

I like this idea.

If it is overworking judge and/or DM, we can strike it.

I like smooth, consistent, and rewarding game play. Attainments seem like they may be able to achieve that. If they are counterproductive to those goals i.e. taking judges away from their play/character approval/DM time we can simply remove the system.

Worse comes to worst, remove all benefits that are static and let DM's make calls as the game goes based on the attainment. If the DM chooses to ignore the attainment so be it.

It'll be like the Montgomery Burns argument. Or the Mayor may be denying his affiliation with you do to a political reason. Or whatever people feel like making up.

The base idea is great and I say implement it for testing.

[sblock=EDIT]I'm feeling useful, just pulling up old issues and helping to find some closure on them... YAY! reiterating, I am really enjoying this community.[/sblock]