Concept for a personality system

[garrowolf]

Personality System (optional)
Some sort of personality system that looks similar to the attribute system. It would be zero sum to start with or close to it. Traits are positive or negative. You can take lower some to raise others. Every other level would give you a personality point. Each level you could move a point around as your character is altered by his experiences.
Connect this to the sanity system - Sanity damage causes you to lose personality points.



Focus
Positive – Reduce error range with equipment, bonus to perception checks
Negative (Distracted/Scatterbrained) – increase error range with equipment, penalty to perception checks
Sanity damage – disconnection with reality



Compassion
Positive – Bonus to social
Negative (racist) – Penalty to social
Sanity damage - xenophobic



Belief in Supernatural
Positive – penalty to science/engineering
Negative – increase horror checks
Sanity damage – Belief that everything is supernatural



Outgoing
Positive – bonus to social
Negative (solitary) – penalty to social
Sanity damage – Hides in house



Trusting
Positive – Bonus to social
Negative – Penalty to social
Sanity damage – Paranoid



Self-Control
Positive – resist taunting
Negative – angry a lot, subject to taunting
Sanity damage – Violent attention deficit

Any suggestions or comments?

 

[dwayne]

this could be very over balanced as most of these would pertain to social skills and the skills already do this and ads another level of complexity not needed

 

[Nagol]

Some of the choices should have potential negative effects even with positive points -- take Focus as an example. A high-focus character should get perception/range bonuses against a declared target, but penalties on noticing anything new on the battlefield. Think of the selective attention test (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJG698U2Mvo). A focused character will get the ball pass count correct, but never see the anomaly.

Take a look at Pendragon. It uses a system of defined traits and their opposites as part of a very nice personality system.

 

[dwayne]

then play with that system as it is adding this in my opinion is just over doing it and there is no need for it as skills and feats if you want bonuses (if you are so set using this then do away with feats and use this system in place of it)

 

[garrowolf]

Well I was thinking about limiting the value to +3. The other thing I was thinking about was only allowing one of these to apply to any specific roll.
However the key is less about the bonuses and more about giving certain players something to grab on to to help them with their character's personality development and evolution. Characters would be less static as they change their traits around based on things that occur in game. Plus they would be losing points from sanity damage in some settings (or from losing a close friend, etc.). They would either become really messed up in one way or take a point to compensate and become messed up in another way as their character's minds try and deal with the mental damage.

 

[Ahnehnois]

Not clear what rpg this system is for, but if we're talking D&D or any number of other ones, "belief in supernatural" is kind of assumed. It's hard to say what schizotypy would look like in a world with tangibly real deities, monsters, alternate realities, and magic.

 

[dwayne]

sounds to me you're trying to put a game mechanic to replace role play, that should be up to player and if you want horror checks and such the cthulhu D20 has rules for that. But you're the GM if you want to add more rules then its up to you but the more complexity you add the slower things move.

 

[garrowolf]

It is for a sort of D20 modern/universal type game system.
It could not replace role play. The idea is in the same vein as Nature and Demeanor from World of Darkness. However I think this one has the potential to work better since it encourages the player to have their character evolve.
As for the specific traits, I am looking for suggestions on better versions. I've got a few ideas that would make it so that several don't modify the same thing but I wanted to see what ideas other people came up with.

 

[dwayne]

You could make the bonus like this situational in that say a scientist sees something what he can not explain with modern science a werewolf or something and depending on the closeness of the encounter +1/-1 from a distance or +2/-2 saw and attack or +3/-3 was attacked. this would affect his outlook and cause issues with his skill checks pertaining to this scientific endeavors. In this way the bonus is controlled by the GM and is given by him alone. And this could be done along the lines you were wanting and the characters would evolve and change with every encounter, depending on their out look. In the same vein A very confident person can be rejected by some one and given the conditions could affect him in social encounters there after until he overcomes it (by making a skill check even with the penalty could do this or put a timeframe on how long the penalty or bonus lasts). 24 hours or until you regroup, compose your self, talk to a friend, your mom, or what ever gets you over the issue.

 

[Dethklok]

Personality System (optional)
Some sort of personality system that looks similar to the attribute system. It would be zero sum to start with or close to it. Traits are positive or negative. You can take lower some to raise others. Every other level would give you a personality point. Each level you could move a point around as your character is altered by his experiences.
Connect this to the sanity system - Sanity damage causes you to lose personality points.



Focus
Positive – Reduce error range with equipment, bonus to perception checks
Negative (Distracted/Scatterbrained) – increase error range with equipment, penalty to perception checks
Sanity damage – disconnection with reality



Compassion
Positive – Bonus to social
Negative (racist) – Penalty to social
Sanity damage - xenophobic



Belief in Supernatural
Positive – penalty to science/engineering
Negative – increase horror checks
Sanity damage – Belief that everything is supernatural



Outgoing
Positive – bonus to social
Negative (solitary) – penalty to social
Sanity damage – Hides in house



Trusting
Positive – Bonus to social
Negative – Penalty to social
Sanity damage – Paranoid



Self-Control
Positive – resist taunting
Negative – angry a lot, subject to taunting
Sanity damage – Violent attention deficit

Any suggestions or comments?

It's interesting. It doesn't look like it would work well with a generic game, and I have a bit of trouble figuring out exactly what the game world is like from looking at it. (Modern horror?) But you could also come up with a set for fantasy or science fiction or what have you.

I'd also like to see your take on:

* Imaginative

* Rugged / Brave

* Machiavellian / Manipulative