Question about Divination School and Old Marvel RPG Karma

[CrusadeDave]

First time poster, I searched for something similar to this topic but couldn't find anything. So here goes:

I am an old time Marvel RPG DM. I ran multiple campaigns for many years using the system, and feel very comfortable with it.

16 months ago I joined a start-up 3EDD group, as a player, to have fun and familiarize myself with the rules, so that in the future I could run a campaign.

I'm a pretty organized DM, and I used the concepts I worked on for the Campaign Setting Search/Contest to begin building my own campaign setting, and have been building that world privately since I sent in the submission.

As a first time Fantasy DM, I'm very nervous/apprehensive about the Diviniation School of magic. I tend to reward quality roleplaying, and in the Marvel world, figuring things out on your own, being resourceful, etc, works itself out so well with the Karma system.

I had one PC, who had awful stats (Was a Batman/Captain America type crimefighter) but was such a quality roleplayer, and resourceful crimefighter/investigator, that I constantly had to reward with extra Karma, and while everyone else kept raising their stats, he built a giant Karma pool that he used to make Called shots whenever he needed them against the Big Bad.

So I really have 2 questions:

1) Let's assume I built a Quality campaign, (I.E. doesn't suck) where for some good RP reason, the party gained/was cursed with a total immunity/Prohibilition to all Divinations. I would literally build a Divine geas or wish utilized on the party into the foundations of the campaign and then let the PC's both feel the effects of the prohibition, and gain the effects of the immunity. As a player, how would you feel about this? Would this limitation to the campaign, where other people have access to Divinations, but you don't, make it impossible, or more difficult, to enjoy?

Also, how should I communicate this with the players? Should I "ruin" the RP surprise of the first session and thell them how it is going to happen? Would I tell them upfront before they created characters, so they could make informed diecisions on character classes? Tell only spellcasters OOCly before the first session, since it affects them most anyway? Or just Spring it on them, (Except for players who want to play Diviners because that's just not fair.)

2) From a good deal of reading here, I understand that XP is awarded for completing EL's, and that an EL is not necessarily a creature kill, it could be a series of traps, riddles, or diplomacy puzzles to solve a specific challenge. I also know most GM's give bonus XP for good roleplaying.

I wanted to know if any of you give other things for good roleplaying? Again, I'm used to the Marvel system, where Karma (What they call XP) can be spent on increasing dice roles as well as improving your character.

Have any of you ever given or recieved Bonus Feats, Extra Skill points, hit points, dice roll mulligans (Reroll a Die of your choice), dice bucks (+5 to a d20 roll of your choice), or other things to reward good roleplaying?

For each of the ideas I listed here, what would be the consequences of doing these. Obviously I wouldn't be handing out Whirlwind Attack, but if say a PC had, numerous times in row, done a superlative job of roleplaying an intimidation, would awarding him say Skill Focus: Intimidation, or giving him an extra Skill Point, or saying Next Intimidation attempt you fail, you get to roll again, be that unbalanced?

Thanks for all the great ideas that you helped cultivate while I lurked, and I look forward to reading your responses to these specific questions.

 

[Umbran]

Hmm. I was also a fan of the old Marvel game...

Well, on Divinations - I think you're a bit overly scared of them. In practice, while they are useful, they don't bring the game to the point where players must stop thinking and figuring things out withtheir own heads. Divinations may give the players extra data, but they still must interpret that data on their own.

Plus, every divination cast is a spell they might need for something else - like protection, or offense. In practice (and IME) they don't get used often enough that such a prohibition is necessary.

That being said... I'm not sure how I'd feel about it if I was shoved into that situation. Probably would depend on what class and personality I were playing. If I were a Wizard who'd specialized in the school of Divination, you'd bet I'd be ticked off if you sprang that on me.

On Role-playing awards - the DMG has some suggestions on giving XP for role-playing. I, in general, would not give Feats, Hit Points, or skill points for role-playing. While any one or two might not be a big deal, over the course of the campaign they'd build up, and the potential for serious balance issues would crop up. You might also throw off the CR/EL/XP system. This last is something you'd want to avoid if you're not too familiar with runing D&D yet.

In Marvel, character advancement was achingly slow. In our games, characters were far more likely to use a given karma point to alter die rolls than advance, because that was more fun to play, and because you'd get more "bang for the buck" out of karma spent that way.

I think giving dice mulligans, or one-use die bonuses would be a far better award. They are transient, encourage more heroic style, and don't chew into the balance between PCs nearly as much.

 

[Umbran]

Hmm, having tought, I'll be a little more specific on the skill/feat/hitpoint award thing...

3E has done a pretty good job of balancing classes aginst each other. While I don't mean to say it cannot be fiddled with, things that might alter this balance should be done with careful deliberation.

Some classes specialize in Feats (like fighters), or in skills (like rogues). Even if you give out such awards evenly, you will tend to lessen the relative lead such characters have on their compatirots, making playing such classes less special.

Similarly with hit points - if you hand them out evently, you actually lessen the relative lead the warrior-type classes have over clerics, rogues, and wizards.

Plus, you'll find your PCs start to have far more feats, skills, and HP than NPCs of the same level who haven't won awards. That throws off your estimation of how tough the party is with respect to their opponents. This is manageable, but annoying.

 

[CrusadeDave]

Hmm. I was also a fan of the old Marvel game...

Ever try running the Sentinel Future Campaign? That was amazing setting material.

Well, on Divinations - I think you're a bit overly scared of them. In practice, while they are useful, they don't bring the game to the point where players must stop thinking and figuring things out withtheir own heads. Divinations may give the players extra data, but they still must interpret that data on their own.

When I first started converting the Setting Search to a campaign, I think I was overly fearful, but I came up with this great idea for a "divination purge" on the party, and why they'd want to keep it, once they had the ability to get rid of it after the Bait and Switch with the Big Bad, and.......

That being said... I'm not sure how I'd feel about it if I was shoved into that situation. Probably would depend on what class and personality I were playing. If I were a Wizard who'd specialized in the school of Divination, you'd bet I'd be ticked off if you sprang that on me.

I would never do that. That's similar to never letting a Ranger's favored enemy show up. I think I mentioned that I would never do this to a Diviner. But do you think I should maybe give a warning saying that, I have a low level of Divination in the world before character creation? Or if anyone starts talking about playing a Wizard and working towards Loremaster, or playing a Diviner, pull him aside and explain to her that isn't a good idea.

In Marvel, character advancement was achingly slow. In our games, characters were far more likely to use a given karma point to alter die rolls than advance, because that was more fun to play, and because you'd get more "bang for the buck" out of karma spent that way.

I think giving dice mulligans, or one-use die bonuses would be a far better award. They are transient, encourage more heroic style, and don't chew into the balance between PCs nearly as much.

That's what I was leaning towards, but didn't know if this was just my Marvel bias coming out. Getting Reds when you needed them really inspired agressive, heroic play knowing you could be really creative and risky, when you really needed it.

Knowing how you played with Karma and I were very similar, how do you think rerolls, would play out, and how rare should the award be? Should I limit them to specific types of rolls or let them use a generic +3 on any Attack, damage, initiative, hit dice, or save rolls? I mean, if you had this little, +3 card, that you could whip at the DM, where would you use it? And would you allow it before or after the rolll?

Thanks.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

If you don't want to screw the balance, I recommend that you give everything the players can get also to NPCs.

If you give out reroll abilities (I think that is one of the best benefits you can get.), than allow the same for NPCs.

A very intelligent or charismatic player can often compensate for bad character abilities and skills, so he won`t probably really need extra skill. Just let him roleplay the situation, and than give him a little bonus to his roll (if you really want to base it on the role, which would be fair to other players, who may be not so eleqount, but bought the skills)

(In our group, the general concensus is, that you can use a skill for something - Taunt, Feint or anything like that and just roll the die, or you say what you're doing, and if it's good, you gain a bonus - NEVER a penalty)

For Divinatin Magic:
There are several Divination powers and spells that DMs don`t like:
Detect Evil is very famous. Just rule, that in your world, being evil does not mean that everybody may kill you. There must be proof for evil (or, most the time, unlawful, because the authorities must be convinced) deeds, making it very difficult to openly fight with lawful evil enemies. (That will make great plan to get to their power).
Many monsters in the DMG are of evil alignment. Change this, and explain that, so many of them might be evil, that this isn`t always the way, and confront the players with good kobolds, goblins and orcs, so that they are careful about these things.

Against most spells, there are countermeasures (Nondetection, Mind Blank, and so on), so directly using spell on persons might fail.

Than, there are situations in which divination spells should prove very useful and might be the only way to solve an adventure - Look at montecook.com for advises on how to use the player powers, instead of screwing them.

Mustrum Ridcully