Meta-Mechanics Worth Stealing

[Aus_Snow]

* Virtue & Vice (True20).
* Nature & Demeanour (oWoD).
* Lifepath (CP2020 and others).
* Attack/Defence, Magical Attack/Magical Defence, Stealth/Perception, Speed/Evasion (Dragon Warriors).
* Noun/Verb magic [and kindred subsystems] (Ars Magica, Changeling and various others).

 

[LostSoul]

My nomination: The d20 Diplomacy skill and attitude rules. They're clean, applicable to multiple games and serve as a way for the DM to submit NPC reactions to player intervention without just making a snap ruling. Attitude stages can also be scaled up to large groups pretty easily.

Ugh. I can't stand the d20 Diplomacy rules. In practice, the roll rarely does anything - the vague nature of the attitudes means that the DM just has his NPC do whatever he was going to do anyway.

 

[Henrix]

I'm surprised that nobody has nominated any form of scene framing rules - like in My Life With Master, Burning Empires, Primetime Adventures (although I haven't seen those), etc.

Rules for how scenes are built, who can have one, etc.

I have managed to use really good MLWM style scenes in D&D when the characters were in a big city (Greyhawk). Basically they all got to have a scene, involving just them and, if they wanted, other characters, in the order they sat around the table.

By cutting aggressively, and keeping scenes short, all got to have their scenes without being bored. All got to do what they wanted, no need to keep the party together.

I'm not sure how to implement scenes as a limited resource (as in Burning Empires) in D&D without leaving standard D&D adventures altogether, yet.

 

[Greg K]

Ugh. I can't stand Let it Ride. It was designed with good intentions (rolls should be meaningful, GMs shouldn't call for rerolls when they don't get what they want), but in execution it's actually kind of brutal to players.

Wow . In my years of experience it is the players calling rerolls when they don't get what they want

 

[mmadsen]

• Virtue & Vice (True20).
• Nature & Demeanour (oWoD).
• Lifepath (CP2020 and others).
• Attack/Defence, Magical Attack/Magical Defence, Stealth/Perception, Speed/Evasion (Dragon Warriors).
• Noun/Verb magic [and kindred subsystems] (Ars Magica, Changeling and various others).

Would anyone like to explain any of these?

 

[Herse]

Would anyone like to explain any of these?

Noun/Verb magic system

Briefly, in Ars Magica the magic system is comprised of 15 Arts divided into 5 Techniques and 10 Forms. The Techniques are what one does (verb) and the Forms are the objects one does it to or with (noun). By combining one Technique with one Form you generate spell effects. Characters have skill levels in these Arts. The Arts are named in Latin.

The Techniques are named after the corresponding first-person singular present tense indicative mood Latin verb.

Creo: "I create"
Intellego: "I understand"
Muto: "I change"
Perdo: "I destroy"
Rego: "I rule or control"

The Forms are named after the corresponding singular accusative Latin noun.

Animal: "animal"
Auram: "air"
Aquam: "water"
Corpus: "the (human) body"
Herbam: "plant"
Ignem: "fire"
Imaginem: "image" i.e., senses and perception
Mentem: "mind"
Terram: "earth"
Vim: "pure magic"

Technique + Form makes for a spell. E.g., Creo Ignem creates fire.

Also, you can cast stronger formulaic spells with set effects or weaker spontaneous spells whose effects are invoked on the fly. Awesome stuff.

 

[painandgreed]

Would anyone like to explain any of these?

Nature & Demeanour (oWoD)

Every character had a Nature and a Demeanour. Nature was how you really were and Demeanour was how you appeared to others (or was it the other way around?). Choices were listed in the books and could both be the same thing. They were part of the Willpower system for the game. Most mind control abilities worked against the targets Willpower, some magic worked via the users willpower. You could use willpower to get an automatic success if you stated you wanted to do so before the role (you can get multiple success in the WoD systems and it was sometimes required in oWoD). Some powers also used up Willpower to use. Thus, the more you used your willpower, the easier you were to mind control to other creatures. When you fullfilled the conditions of your nature or Demeanour during role play, you got back a willpower point (up to your max).

Examples of Nature and Demeanour (not actual examples from book)

Martyr - get back a willpower point anytime the character puts herself at a disadvantage to benefit somebody else

Bon Vivant - get back a willpower point anytime the character is enjoying themselves, such as at a party

Builder - get back a willpower point anytime the character creates something that will outlast his current efforts

Leader - get back a willpower point anytime the character gives orders and others follow them

Sadistic - ...anytime the character causes another person pain

caregiver - ...anytime the character aids another person without benefit to himself

Neat idea, but in actual play, I've seen very few Storytellers or players remember to get back willpower even if they fullfilled the requirements except for the occational player who was always doing so

 

[Aus_Snow]

Yep. Of course, oWoD is by far not the only place that kind of thing has cropped up.

Dark Metropolis, for example, gave cyberpunk in-modes and ex-modes (i.e., natures and demeanours). . . plus some other quite interesting stuff, actually.

But anyway, no opportunities for scoring some Willpower there, just flavour.

 

[painandgreed]

Would anyone like to explain any of these?

Lifepath (CP2020 and others)

Basically, a system as part of character creation that allowed you to come up with your character's history up to that point. A flowchart with lots of rolling to come up with lots of complex histories. What was your parents social standing? Were you an only child? Are they still living? If not, how were they killed? How good is your education? How have you been living up till then? Do you have nay enemies? if so, why are they your enemies? Who is your best friend? Are they still alive? If not, what horrible life scarring tradgedy happened that caused their death? Do you have nay friends? Why do they like you? Do you have any lovers? Etc. Etc. Usually including character appearance.

really neat, especially if you don't have a clear idea of what you want for your character. With just a few minutes of rolling you can have a very detailed background.

The first time I saw this, it was in an anime RPG (Mekton?). I loved it so much I bought a copy just so I could use it for my D&D characters.

 

[Raloc]

I didn't read the thread to see if anyone has posted it yet, but Fate Points from Spirit of the Century would be cool. I don't know if the Harping Monkey podcast guys were using them correctly, but IMO linking the characters to certain nemeses and giving them points to directly narrate part of the game is very cool.

Okay, just read through and it looks like SotC was mentioned but not this particular part (or at least, how the HM guys used it ). Essentially in some situations where the character's nemesis is encountered, the player gets a fate point. They can use these to essentially influence part of the narrative scene directly (within reason, pretty much depedent on GM judgement the way they're using it): The nemesis' henchmen run because of the fearsome sight of <character> and his allies charging down on <nemesis> in righteous fury. I really see it being good for climactic times in battles when the players want to do something beyond the scope of their characters' abilities.