From: magnus@bark-fddi.ii.uib.no (Magnus Alvestad)
Subject: net.rpg faq
Reply-To: magnus@ii.uib.no
Organization: UVBS -> SFK/T-DSA / SOPS - HOS / RNoN
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 92 18:49:07 GMT

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Frequently Asked Questions

net.rpg

Last Update: Nov 17 1992

Magnus Alvestad

magnus@ii.uib.no

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	net.rpg will be a traditional paper-and-pen based roleplaying
game developed on rec.games.design. These are some points that we have
views on and our decisions (if we ever make any).


Q1.	What will the system be called?

A1.	The working title is net.rpg


Q2.	Should the system be skill-based or class-based?

A2.	A career / life-path controlled skill-based system with a
large degree of configurability depending on the genre and campaign. A
C program to make a life-path generation system based on asking the GM
questions has been suggested. There will also have to be a
point-allocation version. 

ketil suggested that the skill-system should be hierarchic, with
expensive root skills and cheap leaf skill. Martial arts would be a
root skill and langsword could be a leaf skill.

Ysgarth had a skill system where each skill had components. Talent,
Practice and Essential Knowledge. This is generally (bell) considered
to be a Good Thing, but perhaps a littly heavy for daily use?


Q3.	Should net.rpg be multi-genre?

A3.	Yes. Spike reminds us that we have to plan for 'difficult'
genres like superheroes up ahead.


Q4.	Should there be one game mechanic?

A4.	Not decided. There has been some opposition to using just one
kind of dice because it has been suggested that it makes for boredom.
Then again it is a lot more elegant, and will probably be.

torbenm suggests that we should use a small number of game mechanics,
so we don't have to force everything into one.


Q5.	What will the one game mechanic be?

A5.	There have been some proposals:

1.	Roll two d20 and subtract one from the other. Add any modifications
due to skill.

2.	Roll just one d20, and your opponent rolls one as well. Each
side adds in mods for skills, advantages etc. Subtract as in 1.

3.	Ressult Point-based system. Open-ended d20 converts into nil,
one or two results point. Higher skills make for higher chance of
rerolling -> more result points.

Each of these systems works on the attribute (dexterity f.ex) plus
skill (melee weapons f.ex) equals your modification to the dice roll.

4.	You roll d100, if you roll 5 or less, you roll again and
subtract the second result. If you roll 95 or more on the first roll,
you roll again and add. Then you add modifiers.

jbridson proposed using a deck of cards. This did not seem to meet
with a lot of enthusiasm, though.


Q6.	What does the result of the game mechanic tell us?

A6.	The degree of success or failure. Suggestions:

1.	Each skill it's own result table. Unpractical.

2.	Detailed descriptions of all the general levels of
success/failure, including examples + links to actual results in most
skill descriptions, including numerous examples.


Q7.	Combat; detailed or streamlined?

A7.	Detailed and Streamlined. We don't want to make another Prince
Valiant - we are aiming for considerable realism, or at least
believeability. On the net experts in all fields are available, we
will use them. 

mathers suggested that we use a map-based combat system. magnus does
not think should be required, but it might be nice for an optional
rule - especially in those mother-of-wars battles.


Q8.	How do you roll for damage?

A8.	You already did that when you rolled to hit. Factors are how
well you hit, strength, weapon type, quality, armor, toughness. Some
people (ralph) think that damage does not increase with skill. He
seems to be a minority, though.

There are also weapon considerations that must be observed here.


Q9.	Hit points or wounds?

A9.	Hit points distributed onto body parts, but also with a
'central HP bank' that you draw from each time you draw from a body
part. When you get low, you are wounded and cannot perform some tasks.


Q10.	Hit locations?

A10.	When you roll a d100 to hit, you just switch the digit to find
the hit location. If you want to hit a spesific location, you can
subtract from your to hit roll (before making it), and add (or
subtract), to your hit location roll. 

If you hit someone wiht a special body structure, you just roll for
what part of him you damage, for example agility. A one hit point
damage to agaility would be a minor leg wound for a biped.

tdunn said this: If you have a higher skill, you get to roll more dice
at the hit-location table, and then you choose one of them.


Q11.	Character Generation?

A11.	We don't know yet - but see A2. There will be a career
creation framwork built based on your genre and campaign. There is a
lot of choice on the side of the player (and of the GM). When you
generate a character, you roll up (or calculate) a lot of stats. When
you copy these to the Player Sheet, you just copy the ones you will
need in that campaign / genre.

I you should some day need another stat, you can just find it on your
Character Generation Sheet. 

The bad guys have the same stats as the characters do. Just better :-)

cffitzge said something important: If we can create characters just
the way we want them to be, why should we look for advancement,
adventure and all that? magnus thinks the fun should mainly be in the
role-playing itself, not so much in advancement.

Classes, if we do decide to have something like them, should only
represent a talent in a certain direction, says fts5729.

magnus has sketched a character generationa alternative where you
first find (roll for or select) a lifepath, including parents,
education etc. - and then calculate stats based on this and an
(maybe optional) roll.

jbridson (robert) is only one of several proposing weaknesses. If you
play with a 'restricted' character generation, a weakness would give
you extra points to distribute among positive attributes / abilities.

Nick_Janow thinks it is important that it's possible to create a
completely random persona, with everything decided by the dice. This
will bring an extra dimension of challenge into the roleplaying.

leet suggested that at each point in your lifetrack where there was a
choice, you could spend a point to get a skill, or get a point for
getting a weakness. When you are out of points, you start the game.
magnus thinks there is a problem with this; you don't know before you
start when you are born - this could be important for starting values,
possibilites, parents etc.


Q12.	How do I improve?

A12.	All characters in a party get the same amount of experience
from each adventure/part - then they can distribute them to any skills
used during that adventure. There seems to be a strong majority for
skill advancement vs. levels.

bell wants to give experience points for time played. He does not
quite fancy the entire idea of experience, because it tends to give
players the wrong motivations.

magnus says a few words about advancement not only in strength, skills
and so on - but also in maturity, values, principles and maybe in some
genres mental illnesses.. :-)


Q13.	Human touch.

A13.	There has been some discussion as to where the 'human touch'
should be focused. magnus suggests that the human touch is essential
in details as well as in the grand picture, while mav wants this to be
saved for the campaign and the "role-playing". He wants the rules to
take care of all the small-scale effects. 

OBS: The human touch is when the GM determines effects and such
himself, instead of them being stated in the rules/tables.


Q14.	What should be in net.rpg?

A14.	At least this (according to RDT111 and others):

System for creating characters
Mechanics for learning skills
Mechanics for using skills
Combat System
Advancement system
Campaign Advices
Customization Guidelines

Genre spesifics:

Magic system
Equipment lists
World outlines
Races (including monsters)

Q15.	Are there any attributes yet?

A15.	jliukkon proposed these:

Build
Fitness
Consciousness
Subconsciousness / Instinct


Q16.	What is this modularity that people talk about?

A16.	It is 'hiding methods behind information' - for example, the
stats on your character sheets are independent of the method used for
creating them. So, they could be generated through a life-path system,
rolled up, just written down, or some combination. The rest of the
rules will then be able to use these stats, without 'knowing' how they
were generated. Generalize this, and some interesting thoughts will
pop up in your head.

Each method will be a way to generate/process/use information from
other methods (or the core rules?). There will be several methods that
exclude some other methods. For example, you can only use one method
for one skill. (This was proposed by dalamb and processed by method
magnus. :-)


Q17.	What will the stats be?

A17.	We don't know yet - but probably:

Form, Fitness, Intellect and Instinct.

Then there will a lot of substats below each of these. Each substat
will be the mother-stat plus/minus something. They will have to be
balanced, so the average of all the substats = the stat.

When a substat is needed for a skill, if you don't have that substat 
(because you have opted not to use it or because the genre doesn't
think you'll need it), you use the motherstat. If you have multiple
substats that are related to the skill, you're in trouble.

Maybe a roll below the lowest would be a failure, one between the
stats would be a marginal success (or partial success), while one
higher than the highest would be a real success. This is kind of ugly,
though - any better solutions for this?

ketil suggested that it might be wise to divide stats into attributes
and talents, where attributes are f.ex dex, rolled against to avoid
falling into a pit. Talents are not rolled against and are what your
skill scores will depend upon.

ketil doesn't want stats to be very important, except for learning
skills. There seems to be some disagreement over this.

Spike proposed another set of stats. Well he proposed a set of
intelligence stats. They are:

Kinesthetic, Linguistic, Logical, Spatial, Aesthetic, Intuition and
Social. These would be used as what ketil called 'Talents' - the stats
used to calculate how good you are at skills. Spike has a few examples
of stat application:

	Shooting = Kinesthetic + Spatial
	Architect = Spatial + Logical
	Fast Talk = Linguistic + Social

This is supposedly Aftermath-similar. Well, they can sue me.


Q18.	Skills, how do they work?

A18.	Well, there are a lot of ideas here. ketil suggested that
there should be a lot of skills, organized into a hieriarchy. For
example, below a skill 'Computers', there would be at least
'Technical', 'Programming' and 'Use'. Different leaf skills would
depend on different stats.

The border between skills and stats is getting a bit misty, maybe we
could just put them all in a conglomeratical hieriarchy?


Q99. 	How do I discuss aspects of net.rpg?

A99.	Post on 'rec.games.design', but remember to put NET.RPG in the
Subject, with the sub-subject, for example "NET.RPG: Exp Points",


Q100.	What's next?

A100.	You tell me what you think about the ideas I have presented
and the assumptions I have made. If there is too much discussion on
one issue, I will cut the cream and decide. 

It might be better at a later stage to distribute that responsiblity,
so different people decide about different parts of the system.

jbridson suggested this time plan:

	Decide what skills represent. 
	How do stats work with skills?
	Extrapolation at both ends of scale.
	'Shells': char-generation, damage, hit-location etc.
	Genre-spesific rules
	Source material

In other words; mechanics first and then things like the character
generation. The toughest part first.. :-)

We must also decide *What is a characteristic?*. (Spike)


Q101.	What people are working on net.rpg?

A101.	Here are some of them, in no particular order:

Those that are listed as committee members may be so if there is a
committee. I'm not sure at the moment. sos has a cynical attitude
about committees.

magnus@ii.uib.no		Maintainer of FAQ, committee member
mav@cs.uq.oz.au			Lore creator, see 13.
tdunn@ecst.csuchico.edu		<no to tables - 1 net.rpg no way!>
RDT111@psuvm.psu.edu		Committee member
mathers@sibelius.trl.oz.au	<combat on hexmaps>
ketil@ii.uib.no			<hierarchic skill system>
bell@beethoven.cs.unc.edu	<skills,mechanics>
cffitzge@IASTATE.EDU		<mostly single-genre>
fts5792@cs.tamu.edu		<classes=talent>
jbridson@kean.ucs.mun.ca	(robert) <weaknesses>
Nick_Janow@mindlink.bc.ca	<random char-gen>
sos@oz.plymouth.edu		<multiple net.rpg's>
cleggp@aix.rpi.edu		<integrate, don't compromise, system1>
(Spike)				<planning, d6>
morrow@thorogood.rutgers.edu	<1 style, 1 game>
torbenm@diku.dk			<committee = ouch!>
jliukkon@cc.helsinki.fi		<stats>
leet@acsu.buffalo.edu		<life-path>
dalamb@qucis.queensu.ca		<hiding methods behind information>
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-Magnus