Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
White Dwarf Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Nest
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
EN Publishing
Twitter
BlueSky
Facebook
Instagram
EN World
BlueSky
YouTube
Facebook
Twitter
Twitch
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Roleplaying Mechanics - The Value Test [Mechanics for Roleplaying instead of no mechanics]
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 9464427" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>[USER=7046040]@PerfectPathways[/USER] </p><p></p><p>I read your doc. The system lenses that influence how I look at it are Burning Wheel, Torchbearer and Marvel Heroic RP (plenty of play experience): The Dying Earth (Pelgrane version) and Wuthering Heights (a bit of play experience); and The Riddle of Steel and Pendragon (no play experience, but conceptual familiarity).</p><p></p><p>The presentation could be clearer. There is repetition (esp on pp 2 and 3), and I would suggest replacing the narrative paragraph structure with a dot point structure - even if you ultimately don't like this as a way of presenting your rule, going through this structure in your drafting will help you cut repetition and establish clarity in respect of your procedures.</p><p></p><p>The mechanic itself lost me in a few places. I gather there is a "roll under" component to tests, as well as the comparison of success levels in an opposed test. How are ties resolved? (Sorry if I missed this, but maybe you can take that as an indicator of how the presentation could be clearer.)</p><p></p><p>More importantly, when are value tests called for? I saw two statements of this:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Page 2: During gameplay, Characters will face moments of internal, and external conflict that challenge their Values. These moments trigger a special type of Test called a Value Test. Value Tests occur when a Character must choose between conflicting approaches to a problem, an internal conflict arises, the GM deems it appropriate, or if the player recognizes a moment of significant moral or ethical weight. The GM will most often call for these, but a Player can ask for one as well.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Page 3: During gameplay, Characters with Values will face moments of internal conflict - these may be prompted from external events, upon reflection of past events, or any number of situations. These moments trigger a special type of Test, called a Value Test. Value Tests occur when a Character must choose between conflicting approaches to a problem, an internal conflict arises, the GM deems it appropriate, or if the player recognizes a moment of significant moral or ethical weight. The GM will most often call for these, but a Player can ask for one as well. A Value Test can also be triggered without any conflict, to spur the Character forward - this is resolved like a Value Test, but it has a few key differences.</p><p></p><p>I think it would be useful to have greater clarity in respect of <em>who gets to decide there's a conflict</em>, and also in respect of <em>what happens if the player disagrees with the GM's reading of their PC</em>.</p><p></p><p>I also think that the <em>statement of actions</em> probably needs to be thought of in relation to the broader context of the game's approach to action resolution. For instance, is <em>I turn around and return home</em> a permissible statement of an action? In BW probably yes; in D&D probably no (except perhaps in 4e, to be resolved as a skill challenge).</p><p></p><p>It wasn't clear to me what the point of the Weak, Moderate, Strong and Defining descriptors is. Do these just correlate to percentage ratings? Do they have some other meaning? Can I have a Weak value rated at 90%? EDIT: I just found the chart that explains this. I think the chart and descriptors are redundant - just write the XP rule by reference to the percentage thresholds. (You might also want to look at how Wuthering Heights handles sudden changes in personality ratings.)</p><p></p><p>It also wasn't clear to me how values <em>drop</em> in ratings - the growth rules imply that acting against a value nevertheless increases it (via the "dot" system). It seems that to drop a value requires challenging it, which seems a slightly complex additional subsystem. Whether the growth system will work in play I couldn't say, as it seemed to depend on a lot of factors - how often dots are filled in, how downtime works, how ingame time passes, etc - that I can't really assess in the abstract.</p><p></p><p>You asked about the general categories of value. Why are Love and Loyalty separate? And why do I have to start with one from each category? What if I want two loyalties (say, I'm loyal to the bishop and loyal to my mother) as well as my love? What if I want to start out not hating anyone or anything? What if I want two hates (I hate Orcs, and my rival Golin - and now I can get at Golin by going along with the Orcs' plan . . .)? I didn't really get this.</p><p></p><p>Finally, examples: your example said that the bonus is +10, but the chart says +15 for 5 SL, so I got confused by that.</p><p></p><p>Sorry that the above is mostly critical: I'm taking it as a given that you want the system to work more or less as you've set it out and described it in your posts, and I'm reading it taking all that as a given.</p><p></p><p>If you don't know Wuthering Heights, I strongly recommend looking at it, given how close it is to what you're trying to achieve. Here is an English version (<a href="https://unseelie.org/rpg/wh/" target="_blank">wuthering heights</a>), and another English version (<a href="https://www.geocities.ws/soner_du/files/wuther.pdf,);" target="_blank">https://www.geocities.ws/soner_du/files/wuther.pdf,);</a> unfortunately the French version, which is a bit more complete, seems to have gone offline. I think <a href="http://www.indie-rpgs.com/reviews/23/" target="_blank">Ron Edwards' review of it</a> will also be helpful for you. And <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/played-some-wuthering-heights-today.672161/" target="_blank">here's an actual play report</a> from my own Wuthering Heights play.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 9464427, member: 42582"] [USER=7046040]@PerfectPathways[/USER] I read your doc. The system lenses that influence how I look at it are Burning Wheel, Torchbearer and Marvel Heroic RP (plenty of play experience): The Dying Earth (Pelgrane version) and Wuthering Heights (a bit of play experience); and The Riddle of Steel and Pendragon (no play experience, but conceptual familiarity). The presentation could be clearer. There is repetition (esp on pp 2 and 3), and I would suggest replacing the narrative paragraph structure with a dot point structure - even if you ultimately don't like this as a way of presenting your rule, going through this structure in your drafting will help you cut repetition and establish clarity in respect of your procedures. The mechanic itself lost me in a few places. I gather there is a "roll under" component to tests, as well as the comparison of success levels in an opposed test. How are ties resolved? (Sorry if I missed this, but maybe you can take that as an indicator of how the presentation could be clearer.) More importantly, when are value tests called for? I saw two statements of this: [indent]Page 2: During gameplay, Characters will face moments of internal, and external conflict that challenge their Values. These moments trigger a special type of Test called a Value Test. Value Tests occur when a Character must choose between conflicting approaches to a problem, an internal conflict arises, the GM deems it appropriate, or if the player recognizes a moment of significant moral or ethical weight. The GM will most often call for these, but a Player can ask for one as well. Page 3: During gameplay, Characters with Values will face moments of internal conflict - these may be prompted from external events, upon reflection of past events, or any number of situations. These moments trigger a special type of Test, called a Value Test. Value Tests occur when a Character must choose between conflicting approaches to a problem, an internal conflict arises, the GM deems it appropriate, or if the player recognizes a moment of significant moral or ethical weight. The GM will most often call for these, but a Player can ask for one as well. A Value Test can also be triggered without any conflict, to spur the Character forward - this is resolved like a Value Test, but it has a few key differences.[/indent] I think it would be useful to have greater clarity in respect of [I]who gets to decide there's a conflict[/I], and also in respect of [I]what happens if the player disagrees with the GM's reading of their PC[/I]. I also think that the [I]statement of actions[/I] probably needs to be thought of in relation to the broader context of the game's approach to action resolution. For instance, is [I]I turn around and return home[/I] a permissible statement of an action? In BW probably yes; in D&D probably no (except perhaps in 4e, to be resolved as a skill challenge). It wasn't clear to me what the point of the Weak, Moderate, Strong and Defining descriptors is. Do these just correlate to percentage ratings? Do they have some other meaning? Can I have a Weak value rated at 90%? EDIT: I just found the chart that explains this. I think the chart and descriptors are redundant - just write the XP rule by reference to the percentage thresholds. (You might also want to look at how Wuthering Heights handles sudden changes in personality ratings.) It also wasn't clear to me how values [I]drop[/I] in ratings - the growth rules imply that acting against a value nevertheless increases it (via the "dot" system). It seems that to drop a value requires challenging it, which seems a slightly complex additional subsystem. Whether the growth system will work in play I couldn't say, as it seemed to depend on a lot of factors - how often dots are filled in, how downtime works, how ingame time passes, etc - that I can't really assess in the abstract. You asked about the general categories of value. Why are Love and Loyalty separate? And why do I have to start with one from each category? What if I want two loyalties (say, I'm loyal to the bishop and loyal to my mother) as well as my love? What if I want to start out not hating anyone or anything? What if I want two hates (I hate Orcs, and my rival Golin - and now I can get at Golin by going along with the Orcs' plan . . .)? I didn't really get this. Finally, examples: your example said that the bonus is +10, but the chart says +15 for 5 SL, so I got confused by that. Sorry that the above is mostly critical: I'm taking it as a given that you want the system to work more or less as you've set it out and described it in your posts, and I'm reading it taking all that as a given. If you don't know Wuthering Heights, I strongly recommend looking at it, given how close it is to what you're trying to achieve. Here is an English version ([URL="https://unseelie.org/rpg/wh/"]wuthering heights[/URL]), and another English version ([URL]https://www.geocities.ws/soner_du/files/wuther.pdf,);[/URL] unfortunately the French version, which is a bit more complete, seems to have gone offline. I think [url=http://www.indie-rpgs.com/reviews/23/]Ron Edwards' review of it[/url] will also be helpful for you. And [url=https://www.enworld.org/threads/played-some-wuthering-heights-today.672161/]here's an actual play report[/url] from my own Wuthering Heights play. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Roleplaying Mechanics - The Value Test [Mechanics for Roleplaying instead of no mechanics]
Top