My "Savage" Experience

[dbm]

In the specific case from last night's battle, I'm unsure of how it's calculated. Vigor is d8 (which accounts for 6 Toughness) and Armor is +3 (which should get us to 9). The armor is just for the torso, so I guess a called shot could avoid 3 points.

They are size +1 and you add size into Toughness.

 

[Retreater]

They are size +1 and you add size into Toughness.

That explains the missing +1. Thanks!

To be fair, I don't remember seeing that explicitly stated in the rules when it's explaining how to compute Toughness.
There are these little things about SW that I'm having a hard time figuring out.

 

[Retreater]

Sure. I think one thing that happens with folks discovering Savage Worlds from other games, especially D&D likes, is that they might not like "metacurrency" and consider it optional. It really isn't in SWADE. It is built into the system, as much as hit points are in D&D. So playing without them or with them greatly reduced gives an inaccurate (and probably negative) experience of the game.

Here's my issue with bennies.
My group isn't the most proactive. They tend to argue, plan, and discuss actions a lot. I want to give bennies when they do something in character, fun, action-oriented, risky, etc. Not just argue about plans out of character.
I give them bennies when they earn bennies. If I just give bennies all the time for no reason, then it's basically - just leave a bag of bennies on the table and let them take them whenever they want.
Do you get what I'm saying?
If it's mechanically necessary for the game to function properly, I feel like I need some sort of guidance on how many I should hand out.

 

[dbm]

To be fair, I don't remember seeing that explicitly stated in the rules when it's explaining how to compute Toughness.
There are these little things about SW that I'm having a hard time figuring out.

It’s not the clearest, but it’s covered on p178 (Size) and p179 (the Size table).

 

[Retreater]

It’s not the clearest, but it’s covered on p178 (Size) and p179 (the Size table).

Okay, I vaguely remembered seeing that. And did I remember seeing that size impacts chances of hitting? Like if we have a Size 1 creature fighting a Size 0 creature, it's -1 to hit the Size 0 creature while the Size 0 creature is +1 to hit it? Or is that only if we go to the next size category (e.g. Normal to Large?)

[Just saying this is the sort of fiddly gameplay that got me to quit 3.x D&D and Pathfinder.]

 

[dbm]

It’s by category rather than size.

 

[Autumnal]

In all seriousness, you should be giving Bennie’s out a lot. If they aren’t doing many things that seem worthy, give them out automatically at scene changes, after a fight, every real-world hour like torchlight in Shadowdark. It’s also possible that looser standards of worthiness would help.

And if this all seems stressful and wearing, remember that not GMing for a while is often a very good idea. Your whole situation seems rigged against fun.

 

[Reynard]

Here's my issue with bennies.
My group isn't the most proactive. They tend to argue, plan, and discuss actions a lot. I want to give bennies when they do something in character, fun, action-oriented, risky, etc. Not just argue about plans out of character.
I give them bennies when they earn bennies. If I just give bennies all the time for no reason, then it's basically - just leave a bag of bennies on the table and let them take them whenever they want.
Do you get what I'm saying?
If it's mechanically necessary for the game to function properly, I feel like I need some sort of guidance on how many I should hand out.

One trick I use while running SW at conventions is to use Bennies like a Momentum/Threat pool that oscillates between the players and the GM. I do this at cons explicitly because I don't want the mental load of "rewarding roleplaying" at a convention game, especially since at a con game you never know just what sort of player you are going to get at your table.

It works like this: each player starts out with a personal Bennie (or two or none depending if they bought the appropriate edges). Then, the 2 Bennies per player that would normally make up the GM pool go into the player pool. When a player uses one of those,instead of being discarded, it goes into the GM pool. When I use one,it goes back into the player pool, and so on.

When a Joker comes up,it adds a Bennie to either the Player pool (red) or GM pool (black) plus any usual effects otherwise.

It works really well in that convention context. I also use it in regular campaign play if I am running something especially high octane like Star Wars.

 

[thullgrim]

Here's my issue with bennies.
My group isn't the most proactive. They tend to argue, plan, and discuss actions a lot. I want to give bennies when they do something in character, fun, action-oriented, risky, etc. Not just argue about plans out of character.
I give them bennies when they earn bennies. If I just give bennies all the time for no reason, then it's basically - just leave a bag of bennies on the table and let them take them whenever they want.
Do you get what I'm saying?
If it's mechanically necessary for the game to function properly, I feel like I need some sort of guidance on how many I should hand out.

I'm pretty poor at giving out bennies for RP, so I handle it mechanistically, and give them all a bennie after every scene.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Sure. I think one thing that happens with folks discovering Savage Worlds from other games, especially D&D likes, is that they might not like "metacurrency" and consider it optional. It really isn't in SWADE. It is built into the system, as much as hit points are in D&D. So playing without them or with them greatly reduced gives an inaccurate (and probably negative) experience of the game.

Oh, yeah. The only game I know of with metacurrency where skipping it altogether would be a worse idea is Mutants and Masterminds.

That said, there's a great degree of disagreement among SW fans about how many bennies you want to give out IME. Some people want to hand them out like water, some want to make them more rare to keep a serious tone.