APP characteristic

[Lloyd Dupont]

APP (Aka Appearance) is the least useful of all characteristics.

Anyone thought of some way to make it more useful?

Initially I thought of getting rid of persuade and the like, but obviously skill matters, so might not do it....

An idea just struck me, might use fast talk as an influence roll, followed by a save that would be APP vs Int/POW/SomeSkill or something...

[g33k]

This is an area where BRP's generally solid simulationism cred breaks down (to be fair, most RPGs do no better, and many do worse).  Multiple studies have proven that APP has broad & pervasive impact, albeit sometimes subtle.

[Ian Absentia]

Maybe it's APPeal and not APPearance?  That skews back in the direction of the widely mis-understood CHA, but doesn't have to be nailed down to an objective scale of physical beauty.

On 8/11/2019 at 6:25 PM, Lloyd Dupont said:

An idea just struck me, might use fast talk as an influence roll, followed by a save that would be APP vs Int/POW/SomeSkill or something...

I like this.  Fast Talk has always struck me as a little too negative for some of it's potential uses.  I'm thinking of the skills from classic Traveller like Liaison and Carousing, which are the stuff and subtle nuance of interpersonal communication, and have cropped up in BRP as things like Persuade and Charm skills.

!i!

Edited August 13, 2019 by Ian Absentia

[Zit]

On 8/12/2019 at 3:25 AM, Lloyd Dupont said:

APP (Aka Appearance) is the least useful of all characteristics.

Anyone thought of some way to make it more useful?

You could import the Conflict rules from Revolution D100 for "social" challenges, which would drastically increase the importance of APP/CHA.

 

It is also an important characteristic for shamans, but if you don't use shamans in your game, of course it won't help you.

[el_octogono]

On 8/11/2019 at 10:25 PM, Lloyd Dupont said:

APP (Aka Appearance) is the least useful of all characteristics.

Anyone thought of some way to make it more useful?

 

You can use it as an Initial Reaction guide. Even with a succesful Fast Talk or Persuade roll, the NPC attitude and willingess may vary.

APP

3-5           Distrusted, fearful.
6-8           Doubtful, suspicious.
9-12        Neutral
13-15      Agreeable, nice
16-18     Attractive, trustful

 

[soltakss]

On 8/13/2019 at 6:13 PM, el_octogono said:

You can use it as an Initial Reaction guide. Even with a succesful Fast Talk or Persuade roll, the NPC attitude and willingess may vary.

APP

3-5           Distrusted, fearful.
6-8           Doubtful, suspicious.
9-12        Neutral
13-15      Agreeable, nice
16-18     Attractive, trustful

 

I had a table for APP, showing what it meant in the real world, but it was quickly deleted by the Admins. 

You could use APP as a modifier to the Reaction Roll, if the Reaction roll is still a thing, so anything below 10 makes things worse and anything above 10 makes it better. This uses the assumption that people react better to attractive people than ugly people.

[Ian Absentia]

54 minutes ago, soltakss said:

I had a table for APP, showing what it meant in the real world, but it was quickly deleted by the Admins. 

😐 🤔 🤨

54 minutes ago, soltakss said:

This uses the assumption that people react better to attractive people than ugly people.

Granted, but not consistent cross-culturally, regionally, sub-culturally, etc.  I've always found APPearance problematic in play as a result, and have leaned into APPeal/CHArisma.  While it's more vague, that vagueness has allowed more flexibility.  And I still generally don't use it.

!i!

 

 

[Prinz Slasar]

Modern D100-games like MYTHRAS abandoned the concept of CHA as APP and uncoupled charisma and beauty.
This approach is more realistic, because there are so many people who are not very attractive but highly charismatic. And we all know very attractive people which are bland and dull (or just extremely shy).
 

[el_octogono]

Other, older BRP games did that as well. Never knew why they kept Appearance instead of Charisma...

[Prinz Slasar]

4 minutes ago, el_octogono said:

Other, older BRP games did that as well. Never knew why they kept Appearance instead of Charisma...

The reason is the Charisma Roll.

[Lloyd Dupont]

I used D20 under for the same result

And D20+characteristics vs characteristic+10 for resistance, no need for a table!

[Atgxtg]

On 8/11/2019 at 9:25 PM, Lloyd Dupont said:

Anyone thought of some way to make it more useful?

Yes, use RQ3 Category modifiers. 

In RQ3 APP not only affected the starting skill scores, but it also applied to improvement rolls. This meant that someone with a high APP not only started with a better fast talk/orate/etc. but also that they would tend to improve faster. 

[Lloyd Dupont]

I just switched from Mythras to BRP but I was wondering whether to go tick mark on skill or XP for improvement rolls... I was edging toward xp and I guess it's one more reason to do it!

[Prinz Slasar]

44 minutes ago, Lloyd Dupont said:

I just switched from Mythras to BRP but I was wondering whether to go tick mark on skill or XP for improvement rolls... I was edging toward xp and I guess it's one more reason to do it!

The XP in MYTHRAS have a bunch of effects and aren't only for improvement rolls. Therefore they can't be just replaced by tick marks.
It's very easy to integrate tick marks in MYTHRAS, though. Just let your players mark their used skills with ticks.

The XP-subsystem of MYTHRAS is more flexible as the ol' tick boxes and delegate decisions to common sense.

[Lloyd Dupont]

mm... if you read carefully I switched in the opposite direction. using BRP now.

But wondering whether to keep XP.. particularly as BRP has more skills (1 per weapon and 1 per magic spells)

 

I like the definitely less powerful (and more enchantment friendly) default magic of BRP. Though not quite happy with Fireball...

And for combat it's a toss up.. but I am happy I got rid of action point, happy about random armour (i.e. less armour, really), and while general HP might seem a step back, I am not losing that much, really, but now area attack (spell, grenades, breath weapons) and scifi weapon are less oppressives ...

Edited August 18, 2019 by Lloyd Dupont

[soltakss]

I've used XP for years, it avoids the Tick-Chase and allows PCs to specialise.

[Aycorn]

On 8/16/2019 at 1:14 PM, el_octogono said:

Other, older BRP games did that as well. Never knew why they kept Appearance instead of Charisma...

I never did.  In my games it's still CHA.  Any adult ought to be able to understand that one can be highly charismatic while physically plain, unusual, or even unattractive.

[colinabrett]

I wrote a set of Lord of the Rings rules (which I think are around here somewhere) where CHA (or APP) reflected the character's personality as well as looks. I reasoned that magic is an intensely "personal" business, so CHA/APP affected things like range, area of effect and duration of spells.

Colin

[Mugen]

On 8/17/2019 at 7:16 PM, Atgxtg said:

Yes, use RQ3 Category modifiers. 

In RQ3 APP not only affected the starting skill scores, but it also applied to improvement rolls. This meant that someone with a high APP not only started with a better fast talk/orate/etc. but also that they would tend to improve faster. 

It only applied to Communication skills, though. Not like in Mythras, where having a high CHA grants you extra Xp after each session.

[Mugen]

On 8/16/2019 at 10:14 PM, el_octogono said:

Other, older BRP games did that as well. Never knew why they kept Appearance instead of Charisma...

It seems to me the reasoning was that there was some overlap between POW and CHA as the "personality characteristic". In a time where characteristics were typically rolled and not chosen, it did not matter much that APP was such a garbage stat and POW so good.

[Atgxtg]

1 minute ago, Mugen said:

It only applied to Communication skills, though. Not like in Mythras, where having a high CHA grants you extra Xp after each session.

Yeah, but RQ didn't have xp. There were some other APP base effects in the game, but it was the weakest stat. 

One RPG that made Appearance important was the old James Bond RPG. In that game Appearance greatly modified the chance of seduction, which in turn could improve an NPC viewed a player character. 

[Kloster]

2 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

One RPG that made Appearance important was the old James Bond RPG. In that game Appearance greatly modified the chance of seduction, which in turn could improve an NPC viewed a player character. 

Yep. It had also the effect of increasing Fame with higher looks (but the cost was decreasing).

[Atgxtg]

3 hours ago, Kloster said:

Yep. It had also the effect of increasing Fame with higher looks (but the cost was decreasing).

LOL! Yeah appearancce and height and weight were set up so that it cost more to be average, as that kept the Fame score down, so that a PC wouldn't be recognized.