Reputation: Events and PC/NPC Actions. A List

[TarionzCousin]

What are some things that should count for or against a party's reputation?

I've started listing them out, below. Please comment on and add to the list.

Positive Reputation

• Winning a public duel.
• Recovering something stolen, bonus if publicly known.
• Stopping a monster incursion.
• Freeing a monastery from being overrun by orcs and haunted.
• Slaying an evil dragon.
• Overthrowing an evil tyrant.
• Rescuing a worthy hostage: noble, royal, high level adventurer.
• Stopping a Force of Nature, such as an earthquake or tornado.
• Turning the Tarrasque away.
• Breaking a siege.
• Rooting out and destroying a cult.
• Slaying bandits, especially enough to make a road safe.
• Killing a master thief, anti-paladin, evil wizard, etc.
• Rescuing a large group of commoners.
• Finding and returning a famous item.
• Undoing a major curse, such as a blight upon the land.
• Finding a huge treasure and donating it to a worthy cause.
• Locating a mythical place, long believed merely a fable.
• Marrying someone worthy: noble, famous, high level adventurer, royal.
• Solving a local mystery.
• Purifying the town well water.
• Helping merchants and trade, especially on a large scale.
• Having a bard sing your praises.
• Writing a song about your heroics and paying a bard to sing it.
• Freeing an innocent from wrongful imprisonment.
• Giving to the poor.

Bonus points when children are involved.


Negative Reputation:
Nothing specific yet (other than the opposite of the above, such as losing a public duel)!

 

[Celebrim]

I'm going to come out front and say that I don't think reputation is something you can really implement in a PnP game well, as the amount of book keeping in the long run just gets to be too much.

Because the thing is, "Reputation with who?" and "Reputation for what?" Also, "How did they get it?" and "What does it do?"

If you assume a roughly homogenous culture then you could probably approximate the idea that the esteem or at least recognition of the PC's goes up when they do things to the general benefit of that one small community. But it's not necessarily the case that "giving to the poor" raises your esteem or recognition with everyone that raises an eyebrow when you "turn the tarrasque away". Not everyone impressed with your power is equally impressed by your generosity, and sometimes perhaps visa versa.

Most of your examples are thinks which could be broadly classified as "Did something heroic".

My suggestion would be instead to make renown more or less equal to level, on the assumption that most characters will get renowned doing things like the above. And you are more or less better off in a PnP environment winging it based on your assessment of whether an NPC will recognize the PC and if so what he'd think of him based on the specific acts he's done.

Is torturing a foe to death something that gives you negative reputation (fewer people like you) and positive renown (more people have heard of you)? And how does that work with groups that may admire a certain amount of ruthlessness - say a thieves guild. But if you torture a kid to death, now even the thieves guild may decide you are beyond the pale, but the cult of demon worshipers might think you have a certain unsubtle panache.

 

[pemerton]

What are some things that should count for or against a party's reputation?

I've started listing them out, below. Please comment on and add to the list.

The AD&D Oriental Adventures book had a list of actions that cause a gain or loss of honour - that is somewhat similar to what you're doing, and covers a lot of the same ground, but also gives different actions numerical weighting. It also has class-specific awards/penalties (eg temple warriors can lose honour if they lose the temple standard).

The OGL Conan game from Moongoose also has a reputation mechanic, but I can't remember the details.

 

[Celebrim]

What are some things that should count for or against a party's reputation?

I've started listing them out, below. Please comment on and add to the list.

Positive Reputation

• Winning a public duel.

• 
  
  Ok, this gives you 'positive' reputation only if dueling is socially accepted in the society and you obeyed the rules and code of conduct that regulate it. If it is, winning gives you positive renown (how well people know you) and 'lawful' reputation (and contrary loss of 'chaotic' reputation). If it isn't or you didn't follow the code of conduct, you still get renown, but the reputation effects are reversed. Note that I'm assuming D&D factions here for simplicity, but you could have as many different factions as you like, each with their own rules for what impressed them. Presumably showing mercy on a foe might get you positive 'good' reputation but negative 'evil' reputation, and being merciless the reverse.
  
  

  [*]Recovering something stolen, bonus if publicly known.

  
  Here we get to one of the biggest difficulties running such a system. If something isn't publically known, it doesn't effect your reputation at all. Your reputation is only effected by what is known about you by the person in question. So recovering the young widow's stolen jewels might give you a large boost to your reputation and standing with the young widow, but if she decided not to tell anyone about it, you get benefit of that act with no one else. If you go into a hole somewhere and kill the triple headed red-dragon consort of Tiamat, in no one knows you did it or that such a beast was down in the hole, your renown doesn't change an iota except perhaps with Tiamat and her followers. That's going to be true of all of this. If you close the gate in the hidden wizard's tower that was allowing demons in, if no one knows it was you or no one believes it was you, your renown or reputation doesn't change a bit.
  
  

  [*]Slaying an evil dragon.

  
  On that note, unless you slay the dragon in the skies over the town, it's actually the act of taking a trophy - bringing in the dragon's head and hide, for example - that wins you the reputation change and not the act of slaying the dragon at all. Bringing in a trophy that proves you slew a terrible monster is impressive. Slaying the monster itself is something that usually doesn't happen publically.
  
  

  [*]Overthrowing an evil tyrant.

  
  Whether he's evil or a tyrant doesn't really matter here. What matters is whether he is unpopular. Slaying a ruler doesn't make people admire you unless they really really hated the ruler. It might well be that an evil tyrant has a huge number of admirers and fanatical followers who even believe that the tyrant is a living god. You'll certainly earn reknown slaying a group's leader, but you won't gain positive reputation with that group. And here comes another huge complication. Hitherto, we've acted like we could easily divide factions into 'lawful' or 'good' or 'chaotic' or somewhat, and that works to some extent, but it doesn't help us exactly work out the numbers by which numbers should change and it doesn't help us deal with conflicts between members of the community with the same culture. For example, in feudal Fooland, the Count of Overhill and the Count of Yonderwood might hold the exact same chivalric values and the exact same ambitions, and because of this also be hated rivals. If you advance the cause of Count Overhill by defeating the troops of Count Yonderwood, that doesn't mean that Count Yonderwood will treat it as equally positive. And you might win admiration from some likeminded third party, but not to the same degree you did with the Overhill family.
  
  It's easy to see that things would quickly get out of hand if we wanted to make this actually work in any logical manner. Consider for example the problem of a PC acting in a completely mercenary manner, changing his loyalties all the time and working for the highest bidder. The whole time he might be doing 'deeds of reknown', but why should his reputation keep becoming more an more positive when objectively, the trust you should have for this person ought to be going down and down even if no one act committed was dishonorable. Imagine for example changing sides in the middle of a battle. What do you end up getting a reputation for? If your table just says, "Helping to win a battle" or "Breaking a siege" is positive, you better have a big huge all caps disclaimer at the head of the table saying "DM IS ALWAYS THE FINAL SAY". If you get bribed to open the gates, you definitely 'broke a siege' but not in a way that normally wins admiration and trust from either side.
  
  

  [*]Killing a master thief, anti-paladin, evil wizard, etc.

  
  Again, what if the guy is popular? What if the master thief is a folk hero who robs from a hated government? Even if he's personally a bandit and rogue and self-interested, his reputation with the common folk is likely going up if they hate the ruler more, and likewise your reputation with them goes down even if he's not actually a nice guy. That anti-paladin could be a national hero because he defeat the hated rival King of Foobar when he invaded in the dry summer. That he is personally repulsive and likes to torture children in his basement might not be well known. And the evil-wizard might be beloved for what he does for the community, enough to excuse all his personal failings and lust for power. What's a few humans sacrifices compared to slaying the giants when they invaded or driving off the plague of werewolves?
  
  In short, what actually matters here is the reputation of the person you kill. If you kill someone with a highly negative reputation with a given faction, when people in that faction find out about it your reputation goes up. But if your kill someone with a positive reputation, your reputation goes down as well. And just as your reputation might vary from group to group, so two the reputation of the NPC might vary from group to group. In a really nasty guy might enjoy the mutual love and admiration say his spouse and offspring.
  
  

  [*]Finding a huge treasure and donating it to a worthy cause.

  
  Gains you a huge boost to reputation with the faction supporting that cause, but doesn't necessarily boost your reputation. Indeed, I'd say on the whole using a treasure in this way drops your reputation with the majority of society. Most will think you a fool, because they themselves wouldn't have done the same thing in your shoes. Keeping a huge treasure and being publicly fabulously wealthy will gain you far more reputation with everyone who is 'Neutral' aligned than giving all of it away would. The majority of people won't admire someone who is overly stingy, but they'll equally despise someone who is overly generous (unless it is to them personally).
  
  On that subject, "Building yourself an ostentatious palace" is more likely to improve your reknown and reputation than large charitable donations. That's why people who care about fame do more to live wealthy and show they are wealthy than they do to be charitable.
  
  

  [*]Locating a mythical place, long believed merely a fable.

  
  Hell, for example? Did the place want to be found? Did people want to believe in it? Did finding it bring a curse with it? Did you just effectively open a Pandora's Box by finding the place?
  
  

  [*]Having a bard sing your praises.
  [*]Writing a song about your heroics and paying a bard to sing it.

  
  The effect of this is really complicated. Having a bard sing your praises might work if the bard is good and the basic problem is people haven't heard of you. In effect, what this does is spread your reputation - not change it. It's the equivalent of bringing the dragon's head into town to let people know you killed the dragon. Because of the bard, now people in Underhill know about you as well. And assuming the Bard is really good, it might help change the way people who hear about your deeds think about your deeds. But there is probably a limit to that if the actual deeds are well known through other sources. Ironically this sort of thing works best when you are dead, few people remember you, and thus you can't complicate the conversation by being real and messy in the way real things are.
  
  

  Negative Reputation:
  Nothing specific yet (other than the opposite of the above, such as losing a public duel)!

  
  I think I've shown how doing any of the above can also result in negative reputation, at least with someone or perhaps almost everyone.

 

[TarionzCousin]

I'm going to come out front and say that I don't think reputation is something you can really implement in a PnP game well, as the amount of book keeping in the long run just gets to be too much.

I agree, but in my campaign, one player is advocating for it and the others want it, too--mostly due to one factor.

The PC's have been shown up twice by an NPC adventuring party, the Glorious Eagles. So they want to know how popular the Eagles are compared to themselves, the Silver Pact.

 

[TarionzCousin]

The AD&D Oriental Adventures book had a list of actions that cause a gain or loss of honour - that is somewhat similar to what you're doing, and covers a lot of the same ground, but also gives different actions numerical weighting.

Thanks. I'll dig that book out of storage and take a look.

 

[Celebrim]

The PC's have been shown up twice by an NPC adventuring party, the Glorious Eagles. So they want to know how popular the Eagles are compared to themselves, the Silver Pact.

If your concerns are that narrow, you might just be able to do it. If all you care about is the opinion of a single faction and you've got a hub/haven style campaign revolving around a single locality, then the book keeping won't be overwhelming. There will in practice be all sorts of other factions and reputations that the PC's out there, but you can hand wave those and run the interaction on fiat and common sense.

I'd still want to track renown (how well you are known) with reputation (how well you are liked) separately. And if this is D&D, I'd track reputation on an alignment grid like Gygax suggests in the 1e DMG and make your reputation relative to the assumed overall cultural values or high ideas of society (which in your case sounds like you are assuming LG). In this way, if you need to add additional factions you'll have a starting reference point.

Have renown work like the absolute value of reputation (positive and negative both increase it) and have renown decay at a steady rate (say 1 per week or whatever suits your pace of play). You might want to have a cap on both just to keep things from getting too crazy, either absolute or relative to character level.

To get to a functional system, you're going to need to simplify from concrete examples to abstract concepts at some point - categories of things that earn renown. One category you've left off is doing things that entertain people - performing in an opera, fighting as a gladiator, winning an athletic contest, winning a chariot race, showing off you illusions in a public festival, and otherwise 'proving your worth' and giving people something to talk about.

 

[amerigoV]

So they want to know how popular the Eagles are compared to themselves, the Silver Pact.

Just play Eagles music at the next session. They will get the hint, unless you folks are young-whipper-snappers.

 

[Hand of Evil]

If know one knows about what you do, there is no need for reputation.

High Charisma - you got to appeal to public, have that winning smile.
Bard Connections - now the news of all your hero deeds need to be put out there, how bards and the press presents you are most important.

 

[TarionzCousin]

Just play Eagles music at the next session. They will get the hint, unless you folks are young-whipper-snappers.

The players might not get it as they refer to their competitors as the "Glory Holes."

If know one knows about what you do, there is no need for reputation.

High Charisma - you got to appeal to public, have that winning smile.
Bard Connections - now the news of all your hero deeds need to be put out there, how bards and the press presents you are most important.

Yeah, the NPC group has an active bard. The PC bard is unable to attend 2/3 of the sessions. If he were to write an actual song and spend his time performing it around the area, that would certainly help the group improve their reputation.