KORE rpg

I’ve seen numerous opinions regarding party dynamics. Many of them essentially mandating party members are friendly with each other and supportive. A symbiotic relationship is best in the minds of many. Introductory rule systems espouse the same logic: A party comprised of X, Y, and Z are necessary to undertake this adventure.

The hive mindset is unnatural to me. I think it is often limiting. I see no need to be friends with party members if they have differing goals than I do. A character can easily coexist with others for a short amount of time because it is beneficial. My enemy’s enemy is my friend….right now..

So many examples come to mind. I’ll start with party balance based on classes within D&D. Basically, all the published material espouses the need for class balance within a party. You need a thief, mage, cleric and a fighter at a minimum to achieve parity. Why? Running games based on the recommendations is easier initially from the balance. It’s also rather dull after a few years.

From the player perspective, the balance approached has been indoctrinated. Most games we play require it to achieve success. GM’s reinforce the balanced approach because they start by requiring it from lack of experience and then are obligated to keep all the characters involved so balance the adventures. The feedback cycle continues until it is ingrained.

More egregious, most DM’s force goal alignment down the throat of the characters. Doing so can snuff the life out of developing a character based only upon your planned campaign. Plans are only good up until implementation. If the players sit down and create 6 dwarves with intertwined backgrounds, can you honestly send them into battle against dwarves that are rising up against humans? Unlikely to happen if you constrained the choices available before character generation but plausible if you put them in an open sandbox.

Many systems, and GM’s also suggest or mandate that the characters all be white hats. The characters are going to undertake the campaign because they are the good guys and some bad guy needs thumped. Let me get out the scissors and carve some cardboard. Alignments in D&D propagate the idea.

Well, I’m lawful good, so I always have to play that way. Nope. If I’m playing a lawful good character and the DM has bad guys kidnap my daughter, I’m going to respond based on raw emotion, not ideals. I’ll hope my chosen god supports me along the way or forgives me in the end. There is no fixed bucket to what a player should be allowed to do or negative impact if she exceeds a certain limitation. You can judge based on overall interaction but the instantaneous, emotional response defies bucketizing.

Party conflicts are often quashed by many GM’s. Why? Is it really necessary to mandate? I played in essentially a 2-player campaign where my cohort was so paranoid of my character killing him, the other party put a massive amount of effort toward thwarting any intrusion into his home. Granted my character used whoever he could to achieve the goals he desired…not the party goals. I’d never considered turning against my party member but in the back of his mind, it was likely.

The same player later played a guy in a campaign who was wretched toward other player’s characters. “What have you done for me lately?” was the question always in the back of his character’s mind. So many PC’s died at his hand, I cannot count them. Yet, those same players kept making new characters and playing. Or trying to play again and again.

The best party dynamics I have experienced come not from planning but from differences. Kevin’s Top Secret campaign is an example. We generated characters based on a blank slate. In the end, the players within the party were very intertwined but also very self reliant. Rarely did we call each other for support. Instead, we called in the others to maximize impact.

Take the opportunity to thumb your nose to the expected and play purely off the players. You will be rewarded.

I’ve been slacking on KORE. Life gets busy in so many different ways including oddball hobbies and interests. I have so many I tend to devote time in sporadic, unplanned blocks to them. Lately, I’ve been focused on building up a robot in addition to planning for the Spring Convergence.

A great small company in Boulder, Colorado is holding an Autonomous Vehicle Competition in April. If you like tinkering with low-level electronics, you’ve probably heard of SparkFun. They are the coolest company in the electronics hobby market. Just this year, they held Free Day and gave out $100,000 worth of free stuff. How cool is that?

Last year, SparkFun held its first Autonomous Vehicle Competition. I took the day off from work and went to watch. For a small company, they are the most welcoming, cool bunch of people I’ve experienced. Game companies could learn a lot from their PR approach.

I attended last year’s AVC as a spectator. It was much like an all day gaming marathon except people were trying to get robots to do what they wanted. Hackers all, they were making furious last minute changes to software, hardware, or the vehicle. Each and everyone of them would take the time to talk, laugh, and discuss the pitfalls they’d encountered. Very similar to a bunch of DM’s or a group of players talking about games current and past.

So when the 2010 AVC was announced, I signed up as an entrant. Today, I finally was notified we had been moved from the backorder list into the official participants list. My team mate and co-worker have been gradually working on a vehicle over the last few months but now the big push is on to get it done. We actually work on autonomous robotic vehicles for a living but the competition is just for fun — win, lose, or destroying the vehicle in the process. No management, no oddball requirements, just for the pure pleasure of doing it. Its a nice change of pace from the corporate grind.

To document the process, I launched a temporary blog for Team HellHound. I also called Kevin and put him through the hard sell of being a sponsor. Eventually after much arm twisting and explaining my sponsor requirements of being a good guy with a logo, I got him to agree. Next on my list is to arm twist, is Chris from 6d6fireball. The hard sell is really difficult when you tell them it costs nothing but you have to send a logo in.

Sadly, given my lack of a secretary and being completely devoid of scheduling skills, I managed to double book myself for the contest and Spring Convergence. My teammate is aware and planning on handling the competition by himself but depending on how the weekend is going I may slip down to Boulder for a few hours to lend a hand, gaming party in tow.

Many thanks to everyone who has contributed to the KORE blog. To each and everyone out there, may your hobbies be fun and fulfilling.

I had a random thought the other night about system knowledge and the ramifications it has. The origin of the idea is completely decoupled from role playing games. Instead, it based on the knowledge and insight provided by an online game. The game in question provides a pretty significant level of information to allow the players to mathematically defeat every foe. Randomness provides a bit of risk within the system but its marginal. It is possible to not only mitigate the risk directly but to also to mitigate it via secondary and tertiary actions.

Within RPGs, players tend to do the same. Odds are everything flows to specific attributes, skills, and advantages that can minimize risk for a particular system. Certainly, I’ve used ill conceived system design to my advantage. Is that bad? Hardly. The rule designers give us choices. Many of the choices can be idiotic and completely useless. So a trend to using the useful is natural.

Online games only have 1 discriminator: the random number generator. RPGs have at least two: dice and the DM. I’d add other players in there as well because they introduce a crazy factor but statistically, I’d wager that impact is marginal. The randomness of dice efficiently eliminates the random number generator.

Many of the choices we make are driven by experience and to exploit the system. Each and every time I’ve been introduced to a new system, the knowledgeable players point out a subset of choices to utilize — maximizing benefit but often ignoring the lesser choices.

More often than not, the core selection is chosen to maximize effectiveness in combat. The alternatives are discarded because they do not appear to have as much impact. Everyone I’ve played with are apt to select the high effectiveness options rather than the lower powered alternatives.

Why? The GM has to amp up the game to counteract the unbalanced options. Doing so makes the other choices even less desirable. At least in a sheer numbers sense.

Strange as it sounds, this occurs because everyone knows the rules and can mathematically maximize the benefit. Rules achieve an imbalance by their very nature. Players can also maximize benefit by knowing their GM. How he plays and rules he utilities most often.

Basically, we power game as players even if we don’t consciously attempt to do so. Evolution wired us to survive so it makes complete sense.

Are there solutions? Absolutely. First and foremost, eliminate the system power skills. If its combat, make combat less common. House rule them out if you find everyone has the same skill or advantage. Ignore the whining. In the end, it will be better.

The many options are for role play, and as game masters, we eliminate many of them by our own actions. Nix the benefit, eliminate the imbalance.

Its Valentine’s Day on Sunday, so I thought a post about Love would be appropriate. Most fantasy RPGs offer some means to charm or beguile the object of one’s affection in some form or fashion – be it a magic spell or potion. But who can deny the power identified in Fantasy Settings of True Love’s First Kiss.

All images © Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved.

“…from this slumber you shall wake, when true love’s kiss the spell shall break.” – Sleeping Beauty

“The Victim of the Sleeping Death can be revived only by Love’s First Kiss. Love’s First Kiss. Bah! No fear of that. The dwarves will think she’s dead. She’ll be buried alive!” – Snow White

“To spend a life of endless bliss, just find who you love through true love’s kiss.” – Enchanted

“Once upon a time, there was a lovely princess. But she had an enchantment upon her of a fearful sort which could only be broken by love’s first kiss… She waited… for her true love, and true love’s first kiss.” -Shrek

True Love’s First Kiss

True Love’s First Kiss is a powerful, ancient magic that can dispel any enchantment. So potent is the power of the kiss that it cannot be prevented. No magic can withstand the kiss and its dispelling capabilities. One must simply kiss one’s true love for the spell to take effect. Anyone who is truly in love with the target, and is truly loved by the target, and is the True Love of the target can perform the spell.

This spell cannot be learned, it is innate in all who are in love.

Dear Representatives,

What are you thinking? What ignorant individual authored these bills? Who thought this was a good idea anyway?

http://legis.state.sd.us/sessions/2010/Bill.aspx?Bill=1277
http://legis.state.sd.us/sessions/2010/Bill.aspx?Bill=1278

Seriously?

HB1277 requires that any online content provider shall be required to:

provide, within thirty days of service of the summons, at the expense of the person bringing the slander or libel action, any information, reasonably available and kept in the normal course of business, that assists in the identification and location of the unknown, anonymous, or pseudonymous person who left or uploaded the defamatory content.

Which sounds nice and safe if you don’t keep such records, combine it with HB1278 however and you get a whole different view since that bill will require that:

Any person who allows internet posts shall keep a record of the internet-protocol logs adequate to provide identification and location of otherwise unknown, anonymous, or pseudonymous persons who leave or upload content.

Why? So someone can’t post something libelous in anonymity? Please. Aren’t there laws against such things already?

If your real intent is to cool free speech on the internet, then BRAVO! you may have found a loophole! But I think you’ll have a difficult time when you try to enforce these new proposed rules. Perhaps you can shed some light on what you were thinking here.

Let’s start with the simple question of just what are the constraints of these bills? I’ve looked them over but don’t see any provisions identifying the scope of the bills. So perhaps you’ll be so kind as to answer me a few simple questions:

• Since the scope identified is any internet site that allows for posting you’re not just targeting blogs but forums too… are you targeting any forum or blog I might be a member of and post something under a pseudonym? Care to shed some light on the scope of the proposed legislation?
• What about sites such as mine that aren’t even hosted in South Dakota but are maintained by someone living within the bounds of the State?
• Since the bill doesn’t explain if it’s aimed at sites hosted here, maintained by residents of the State, on domain names currently registered to residents of the State or what, I can’t for the life of me discern how you intend to see to it that these bills are enforceable. Care to shed some light on how you intend to do that?
• How long must I keep this identifying information? 2 years is the statute of limitations for libel. Do you expect me to keep these logs back 2 years? If so, then I might as well shut down the blog and the forums I run since my free service can’t possibly keep track of logs that far into the past and I won’t be paying for such a service just to comply with this new law.
• So I’ll ask, if sufficient logs cannot be maintained with a free service, then how can you justify requiring anyone who runs a blog linked in some form or fashion to South Dakota the undue burden of forcing said individual to purchase fee-based services for the sole purpose of meeting with this flawed Legislation?
• In HB1278 you limit the use of this provision to “That the information sufficient to establish or to disprove that claim or defense is unavailable from any other source.” Which I’m sure sounds all well and good to you as a limiting factor, but consider for a moment that since this bill only applies to situations of online postings, there IS by definition no other source! So that’s a moot point.
• Do any of you understand what you’re proposing us simple bloggers do to comply with your new legislation?

You have a few options since these bills were so poorly constructed and tossed in as some moronic ad-hoc attempt to exert unconstitutional power of the blogosphere; go back and either kill these bills off, let them die in committee, or re-work them to fix the holes within them.

You want my advice? Stop overreaching your mandate, scrap this big brother plan and get to work doing what the constitution directs you to do.

I’m a father now, have been for a few years so this isn’t an immediate adjustment, but something has definitely changed in me over the course of having kids of my own. Namely, there are things that now break my immersion almost immediately when presented in various formats.

Call it an annoyance, call it a prejudice… whatever. Consider me a dull blade that’s lost its edge for all I care. I’m giving you fair warning here that some things aren’t going to hook me like you might expect. And since RPGs are the point here, here’s a list of 5 things you can’t do in RPGs anymore if I’m at the table… at least not if you expect me to retain my uninterrupted focus.

1. Kids dying needlessly – It breaks my immersion and makes me think of my own children.
2. In a corollary category, kids dying horrific deaths – Even if the death is totally in line with the story, believable and helps to propel the plot, I’ll warn you now that if, as a parent, you’re hoping to draw me into a story by getting me to internalize the pain and anguish of a parent, you’ve done just the opposite.
3. Torture of any sort – Seriously, try to find another way to elude to the wickedness and evil of your villain. Torture by its very nature exploits the weaknesses of those in positions of lesser power.
4. And in like reference, Rape – Personally I have never seen the need for this type of violence in any game so this one isn’t a change brought on my fatherhood.
5. Basically anything that tears a family apart – even a pretend family is going to briefly make me think of my own family.

Have I gone soft? Maybe.
Do I care if you call me squeamish? Not really.

And to be fair here, I’m not saying that any of these should be stripped from RPGs. In some cases these techniques/plot hooks/etc. are probably as good for you and your group as they would be for mine. I’m not judging here.

Does this mean that you can’t have a pretend family meet with some horrid and grisly terror in a game? Of course not. Astute readers of this blog will note that I’ve even recently posted a short story about a man who comes into contact with a strange device that literally erases his family out from under him. So I’m not averse to the concept, but the story itself should be a small indication of my own personal fears and concerns. And that’s what breaks my immersion; because it shifts reference to me, not the character I’m playing. For the reasons why, you might want to ponder this gem of a concept.

In fact, once I re-immerse myself into the game I might even be more involved than before. But if I’m at the table, don’t expect me to be drawn-in to your story more just because you think I’ll empathize with the characters… expect the exact opposite for at least a brief moment as I break out of character to wonder if I should call and see how my wife and kids are doing while I’m playing a game… And I’m guessing I’m not alone.

Shade Eyes

Since the 1 Spell N Systems entries have been falling off the radar lately, I’m including a  special bonus: today’s spell identifies a new wondrous item for your D&D party to discover while delving into the depths of the lands… or perhaps for some dark elf or goblin-kin to bring to their attention.

The townspeople spoke of the horrors they had endured from the nightly goblin raids. While the darkness brought them fear, at lest they knew safety came with the dawn. But then their tales turned even more horrific when they began to recount how the goblins, normally averse to daylight, began to attack the settlement in the bright sun. How could this be they wondered… did it have something to do with the cloth strips the evil fiends wore about their eyes?

Dungeons and Dragons (D&D d20 SRD Format)

Enchantment
Level: Clr 0
Components: V, M, S
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Special
Target:  Cloth Touched
Duration: Permanent* /1 hour per level
Saving Throw: N/A
Spell Resistance: N/A

This spell enchants a small strip of cloth to be worn over the eyes. When the command word is spoken, the wearer of the cloth is granted a +1 bonus to all sight based saving throws and granted a +1 bonus to identifying visual illusions. Additionally, if the wearer is negatively affected by bright lights, it can disregard that specific drawback for the duration of the spell.

The material components for the spell are a small strip of cloth (negligable cost), a blind eye (original creature non-specific), and a small (less than 10 gp) ground gemstone of violet, purple or black hue.

*The enchantment is considered permanent until used, then the effects lasts for only 1 hour/level of caster. Once the duration is exceeded, the cloth becomes worthless and unravels, finally crumbling to dust as the magic consumes it.

Note that the weaer of the cloth must be able to see by visual means. Blinded creatures, Puddings, and bats for example are not affected by the spell.

Enchanted Cloth of Shading

This small strip of cloth is obviously used to tie about one’s eyes for protection against ambient lighting effects. When worn and the command word is spoken, the cloth grants the wearer a +1 bonus to all sight based saving throws and granted a +1 bonus to identifying visual illusions. Additionally, if the wearer is negatively affected by bright lights, it can disregard that specific drawback for the duration of the spell.

Cloths of Shading are commonly used by intelligent dwellers in the darker regions of the world in daytime excursions to the sunlit realms.

Moderate Enchantment; CL 1; Craft Wonderous Item, Shade Eyes; Price 125 gp.

KORE

Shade Eyes (X) – This power grants a modicum of protection against all sight-based effects, negating 1 point of Mdb from any such sight-based attack. Shade eyes allows the recipient to ignore bright lights and light-source distractions in actions as well as increasing the ability to discern visual illusions as false.

Next spell in the grimoire: True Love’s First Kiss

Lurking the highways and byways of the rural regions of the land, The Devil Bunny is a strange manifestation of sheer suicidal energy. Bent with a focus to race directly at the headlights of vehicles as they travel along the deserted thoroughfares late at night. Many a late-night driving tragedy can be attributed to these odd creatures and their habits of appearing, then aiming their non-corporeal essences directly at the vehicle.

Are these manifestations mere coincedence? Or is there a nefarious intelligence behind their actions?

How will our interpid heroes deal with such a bizarre foe? And what mystery surrounds the presence of these manifestations? By what manner do they choose their prey? Where and when will they strike next?

And should our fair city’s rural roadways be swept clean of The Devil Bunny, stay tuned fair readers, for next week the ick factor is turned up for our beloved gang of do-gooders when they come face to face with Rowena Pots the Queen of Snots!

Wizard101 has a nifty feature that allows a wizard to enchant certain standard spells they have learned and create Treasure cards via this process.

Treasure cards are special, one-time use cards, that sit in a wizard’s sideboard and can be used in a duel. In order to access a treasure card, a wizard discards a standard spell from their hand and randomly draws a treasure card.

Treasure cards are acquired in various ways in the game including drops from creatures, treasure chest rewards, a player can craft them from various reagents and a card crafting station, they can be traded between players as well as being purchased in either the bazaar or any library in any world on the spiral. But the most cost effective means of building a good sideboard is to create treasure cards yourself from other treasure cards.

Creating treasure cards is a simple procedure, you combine enchantment (like keen and tough treasure cards and their other cousins) or mutate cards (which are treasure cards themselves) with standard spells. The end result is a new treasure card in your sideboard.

I’m not going to go into much further detail on this because I assume you already know how treasure cards are made. If that’s not the case, I’ll be happy to give you a rundown offline or int he game itself. – KO

The end result of this process is a treasure card that has been enchanted to:

• Do more damage by combining with Tough, Strong, Giant or Monstrous Treasure Cards
• Fizzle less by combining with Keen, Accurate or Sniper Treasure Cards
• Change the type of damage such as from fire to ice, fire to lightning, ice to lightning, etc. by combining them with various mutate Treasure Cards

And while there is an interesting amount of depth that is generated by the simple inclusion of these enchant treasure cards, I propose the following be added as well:

An enchantement set of cards that increase the duration of multi-round spells.

So, here’s the cards:

• Stretch: Enchantment: Fire: Adds 1 round to any multi-round spell
• Extend: Enchantment: Fire: Adds 2 rounds to any multi-round spell
• Prolong: Enchantment: Fire: Adds 3 rounds to any multi-round spell

These enchantments would not increase the total damage done (or total healing provided) by multi-round spells, merely increasing the rounds the spells stay active. But with the use of traps and charms, these enchantments could add a new depth to any multi-round spell.

Here’s what I mean by the total damage done/healing provided would be the same, just spread over more rounds.

For example: As you can see by the card description:

A standard elf does 50 + 210 damage over 3 rounds or 70 damage per round after the initial 50 damage.

Over 4 rounds that would be 210/4 or 52 damage per round (assuming KI rounds down in their math for these types of calculations)
Over 5: 42/round
Over 6: 35/round

I’m sure a fair number of you might be reading this and thinking, “What’s the point of dilluting the damage or healing a spell does just to get it to happen over a longer period of rounds? Well, I contend that having that spell active over 6 rounds as opposed to 3 would make it more beneficial at times. A good example would be when you need to spend multiple rounds to build up the right set of charms and shields while needing to keep your opponent from shielding itslef.

The nature of extending the duration without increasing the actual full effect of the spell shouldn’t cause any issues with play balance, but I believe it could add some additional depth to enchanting cards.

Finally, I chose to put the enchantments in the school fire since it’s my understanding that the nature of fire, as paraphrased by Professor Falmea, is “Damage over time.”

The genre is enjoyable in various forms including film, print, etc. I even enjoy an occasional RPG session. Yet my interest is always fleeting. I cannot continually suspend my disbelief.

Super Hero movies are cool but not for the characters. I watch them with the attitude of seeing an action flick. The special effects, the crazy plots and the magic of computer generated imagery are what I’m there to see. I’m one of the poor extras in the movie — the normal folk who are just watching in awe.

I see super hero characters as reprints of the same tired origins. Sure there are twists on the origins of the power — innate mutant power, alien power in an Earth setting, or advanced technology of unbelievable power. Call it a mental block. All the powers have seemingly been used and reused. I have never come up with any concept that isn’t some variation of something already completely overused. When I do, they are always things which would be of little use in a game.

Super Hero games also always seem to use the good versus evil plot. A super villain plots some madness and the characters must go forth and defeat them to keep the world safe. I can taste the bile at the back of my throat. Even the guy who says “Screw this, I’m staying at home, powering down a bag of Cheetos and watching I Love Lucy.” ends up being forced into being a hero. All of them lack self motivation, goals, and desires. I’ve racked my brain trying to come up with any portrayal of anything other than a superficial personality. Even the internal conflicts some characters have are hard to believe because they are the singular element identified of a personality.

As I stated previously, the characters always seem stuck in time at the point of creation. What precisely do I mean? Often characters have a great history or back story. The problem is the history has no application to the future. They are stuck waiting for the next evil genius plot to take over the world until they are compelled to act yet again. Or they go seek revenge on someone due to a factoid in the background. Once that is over, what’s next? Managing a Burger King? Running a Fortune 500 company? Working as security for someone kicking the spleens out of mere mortals? I prefer games where I’m capable of building my character’s future not being held hostage by who he is.

Mortality is also an issue. Traditionally super heroes and villains rarely die. So even if you are outmatched, outclassed and outwitted, and get your ass kicked what happens? You go home, heal up (while flipping burgers) and come up with a new plan or a better group. If there is no risk of dying, the game is just dull to me. Self preservation is a fundamental element in all other RPGs. If it is missing, I get bored quickly and lose interest in the game. I’m guessing most game systems in the genre have mechanics for death so I am not bashing systems. I’m bashing the way the games I’ve played in have been run.

On the topic of game system mechanics, I will come back to the “stuck in time” comment. Character improvement seems impossible after a point. If a power comes because an alien ability like Superman, its capped at conception. Innate powers based on mutation also have an immediate cap. A mutation can only provide so much benefit before it is fully realized. Certainly discovery and learning can allow you to utilize a power better but at some point you hit the capacity of that ability based on the origin. Technology based powers are the one area I can fathom continued improvement. Sadly, my own background makes me nitpick the technology. I impose self-limitations on the capabilities because I find them absurd at the extremities. And if it isn’t human technology? Well, that’ll take years to understand to begin with yet alone improve. I don’t know how any system handles improvement because I’ve never been engaged enough to actually purchase or read the systems fully.

I’ll be the first to admit that my comments on the Super Hero genre could be applied to nearly any other genre. The genre just doesn’t spark my imagination. It has yet to immerse me so I’m standing in the shoes of my character and looking through his eyes. Instead, I always seem like a puppeteer pulling the strings to move my character around. Many others love the concept and enjoy it immensely. Good for you, go play and have a great time. I’ll wait for the movie.