A discussion of metagame concepts in game design

pemerton said:

On Attributes: the attributes in In a Wicked Age are interesting:

* Covertly
* Direclty
* For myself
* For others
* With love
* With violence

These are rated with dice, and every action uses two of them for its resolution.

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I find myself liking this kind of "mode"-style attributes more and more as time goes on. Fate Accelerated calls its batch "Approaches" (Forceful, Sneaky, Quick, Careful, Flashy, and Clever). I was skeptical at first, but have run FAE a few times and see the value in the method.

Aldarc said:

If you were forced to create attributes that were not the Big Six (or the Big Six renamed), what attributes would you create or use? (So no "they are perfect as they" are non-answers.)

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Assuming we're restricting ourselves to D&D-like games here.

I would lean towards what Fate Accelerated (and maybe Marvel Heroic?) call "Approaches" rather than traditional attributes. By default, FAE uses Forceful, Clever, Quick, Flashy, Sneaky, and Careful. (They are often re-named to be more evocative for specific implementations) By stepping away from a quasi-physical descriptor of the character and into a mode of describing the action, they could free the game up a lot. You could almost instantly have Fighters with statistical and stylistic individuality. I would wrap the stuff in traditional attributes into a system of quirks/bennies, some of which might be class-based, or class-accessed.

Lanefan said:

Yes, and I just realized one more - see below.
I'm not quite sure how you're arriving at this conclusion, but...OK.

One other very signficant difference between my system (or normal 1e, for all that) and 3e is this: in my system you're putting xp into a class before you level up in that class - the end result clearly matches the process that got it there in that xp put into class A as I go along result in a bump in class A once I get enough. In-game, the character is consciously trying to improve a specific set of abilities (class) and the xp total meta-measures that improvement.

In 3e it's not until you bump that you're forced to retroactively (!) decide where that last level's worth of xp was actually going. I'm a Ranger 8 and just got my 9th - and only now must I decide whether to go R-9 or R-8/Cleric-1. I've been earning xp, sure, but not in any particular class: the process and the end result don't quite match in that those xp could, when I bump, retroactively go into class A or B or C or wherever. In-game there's no process required of the character (though some DMs did houserule that you had to declare at the start of each level where that level's xp were going), just a meta-choice on bumping as to what class to put that level's worth of xp into.

Just on this, 3e = way more meta.

Lan-"and the above is true for single-class characters too"-efan

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Wait are you trying to say that earning XP is meta? Because I would definitely agree with that.

If you are trying to argue that using XP to go up a level is meta then I would say that yes it could be if you did not roleplay how you were specifically working to go up a level Ranger or Cleric or some such.

Ratskinner said:

I haven't played in your games, but in every other D&D game I've played in, DMs will casually describe a hit...and then that description is quickly abandoned in the face of the HP total. I think the dissonance that it causes is why so many DMs abandon describing the hits with any detail beyond...you guessed it, a HP total.

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Why does that cause dissonance for you? Why do you see the HP total as being at odds with the narrative description, rather than reinforcing it? They're supposed to be two different languages for conveying the exact same information.

If you have 40hp, and the giant drives its maul into your chest and you can hear ribs cracking, then why does it hurt for the DM to tell you that it was 36 damage? Or to the next point, if you know that you have 40hp, why can't you infer how badly you are hurt in the narrative, based on the damage number?

Emerikol said:

They are tastes no doubt but they don't necessarily overlap. I've used 4d6 drop the lowest arrange as you like since 1e. Nowadays though I've realized there ought to be a better way that still gets you a decent score in your prime attribute but not always a top score. I also hate dump stats. I half wish those could be rolled separately.

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That's why I allow the players if they want to choose two stats to roll at 5d6 drop 2, two stats at 4d6 drop 1, and two stats at 3d6. They have to choose which rolls go into which stats before they start rolling. The 3d6 are the "dump" stats, but I've seen rolls there that are higher than the 5d6 rolls. Now, I also allow the swapping of one pair of stats, because I want them to be able to play the PC they want, but you don't have to if you don't want to. That method will still allow you to get decent scores in prime stats, while rolling "dump" stats separately.

Lanefan said:

in my system you're putting xp into a class before you level up in that class - the end result clearly matches the process that got it there in that xp put into class A as I go along result in a bump in class A once I get enough. In-game, the character is consciously trying to improve a specific set of abilities (class) and the xp total meta-measures that improvement.

In 3e it's not until you bump that you're forced to retroactively (!) decide where that last level's worth of xp was actually going.

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In 3E the "process" is defeating monsters. They might have been defeated via swordplay, or a mighty spell, or by being tricked into running off a cliff. The XP system is indifferent to these nuances.

So what would it even mean to be "consciously trying to improve a specific set of abilities"?

In your system, does a player have to use a ranger weapon to put XP into the ranger class? Cast spells to put XP into magic-user?

Nytmare said:

I like that a lot, and it brought to mind the old Everway attributes of Earth, Air, Fire and Water. If I remember correctly earth was basically constitution, air was intelligence, fire was strength, and water was perception, but then you'd combine them. So if you were arguing angrily, you'd use a combination of fire and air, but if you were trying to calmly persuade someone to see your point, you'd use air and water.

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Interesting!
I've been working on a board game that also associates elements with D&D-style stats (and a few other aspects that are important for the game: general spell effects & monster roles, inspired by D&D 4e).
Here's what I did:
STR - Fire - Attack - Brute
CON - Earth -Defense - Guard
DEX - Water - Movement - Skirmisher
INT - Air - Vision - Artillery
WIS - Light - Healing - Leader
CHA - Darkness - Enchantment - Controller

Emerikol said:

No. Vancian casting is not metagame. It's magic. My characters really do prepare their spells. In 1e they memorized their spell book. This was an in game activity. When they cast the spells they were no longer available. You might not like the system but everything you don't like doesn't just become metagame.

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Have you even been paying attention to our conversation?

So planning out which spells you will prepare is very much an in game activity that the character does. Since the DM doesn't provide any info outside what the character knows, the player is acting on character info alone when they choose spells.

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IMHO, this is the metagame that the player does as part of the "strategic play" of the game. If you want to say that Vancian casting is 'magic,' then we may as well call Fate points 'fate.'

Shasarak said:

Wait are you trying to say that earning XP is meta? Because I would definitely agree with that.

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I wasn't really trying to say that, but yeah - xp are a necessary-evil form of meta.

If you are trying to argue that using XP to go up a level is meta then I would say that yes it could be if you did not roleplay how you were specifically working to go up a level Ranger or Cleric or some such.

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I'm more trying to argue that it's a higher degree of meta to assign the xp to a specific class after gaining a level (a la 3e) than it is to be assigning them to said class while working toward said level (a la 1e-2e).

pemerton said:

In 3E the "process" is defeating monsters. They might have been defeated via swordplay, or a mighty spell, or by being tricked into running off a cliff. The XP system is indifferent to these nuances.

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The 'process' I'm referring to is the game-mechanical process of awarding and assigning xp after said monsters have been defeated, or missions accomplished, or diplomacy spoken, or whatever else earns xp in a given game.

So what would it even mean to be "consciously trying to improve a specific set of abilities"?

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The character (via its player) has for the time being decided to focus it's activities on, say, thieving and sneaking (Rogue) more than on martial action (Fighter).

A real-world equivalent might be that I could decide that for the next half-year or so I'm going to focus my writing efforts (analagous here to adventuring exploits) on creating D&D modules, as opposed to the song lyrics I've been focusing on for the past while. End result: for the next while I gain more module-writing practice than lyric-writing practice, thus in theory over that time - for these purposes assuming practice leads closer to perfect at a constant rate - I become a marginally better lyric writer through limited practice and a more noticeably better module writer through greater practice.

What I can't do is just write whatever I feel like and then six months from now decide I'm suddenly a better module writer, which is analagous to how 3e does it.

In your system, does a player have to use a ranger weapon to put XP into the ranger class? Cast spells to put XP into magic-user?

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We don't break it down to that degree, but there's the occasional time when a batch of xp will be forced into one class - our usual example is a 25% fighter/75% MU who defeats a foe solely by use of physical combat might get the xp for that combat forced to her Fighter side only.

Most of the time, what I find is that some double-class characters will often tend to use mostly one class in one combat and mostly the other in the next, such that it vaguely evens out in the end. And I don't even think this is intentional on the player's part - it just works out that way.

That, and many double-class characters in effect mostly use one class just to support and augment the other, as in a Thief/MU who mostly uses her spells to help with her sneaking and thieving. (or my favourite, which unfortunately I've never really been able to get off the ground yet despite having got a couple into play over time: a Necromancer/Assassin who uses the Necromancer side to augment the Assassin side to better and more neatly kill things which in turn provides corpses for the Necromancer side to play with)

Lanefan