Seasonal adventures vs pseudo real time

[Bill the barbarian]

25 minutes ago, Joerg said:

Basically there comes the point when training your relevant raisable characteristics to the thresholds gives quicker results than training the skills directly. But then, unless he has fallen victim to the Shakes, a Rune Lord with 90% weapon skill is quite unlikely to have reached that with an abysmal DEX - at some point, skill training becomes undistinguishable from characteristic training.

That's true.

[PhilHibbs]

26 minutes ago, Joerg said:

Basically there comes the point when training your relevant raisable characteristics to the thresholds gives quicker results than training the skills directly.

Not really, and anyway not for long - if you have a category modifier of 20, then you always have a 21% chance to raise your skill. Even at 15%, that 16% chance of skill-up is probably better than characteristic training. Raising a characteristic from 17 to 18 has a 20% chance, and gives you nothing. Likewise to 19 (15%), and to 20 (10%), and then when you get it to 21 (5% chance) you get a +5. Hardly cost-effective. Sure, if you have a 16 then raising it to 17 (25%) is very worthwhile. And 12 to 13 is a no-brainer. 13 to 17? Not sure if that works out more cost-effective than training the skill.

32 minutes ago, Joerg said:

at some point, skill training becomes undistinguishable from characteristic training.

Not even vaguely similar to my eyes!

[Bill the barbarian]

24 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

Not really, and anyway not for long - if you have a category modifier of 20, then you always have a 21% chance to raise your skill. Even at 15%, that 16% chance of skill-up is probably better than characteristic training. Raising a characteristic from 17 to 18 has a 20% chance, and gives you nothing. Likewise to 19 (15%), and to 20 (10%), and then when you get it to 21 (5% chance) you get a +5. Hardly cost-effective. Sure, if you have a 16 then raising it to 17 (25%) is very worthwhile. And 12 to 13 is a no-brainer. 13 to 17? Not sure if that works out more cost-effective than training the skill.

57 minutes ago, Joerg said:

This does cause Joerg's argument a problem.

and is a slight problem I have with RQ G: the re-introductin of break points. I did not even know the expression (at least as relates to RQ ) until RQ G. When GMing RQ 2 pre-internet this was not something I thought of often and with RQ 3 ameliorating the situation I rarely thought about it at all other than as another great RQ feature. 

[styopa]

3 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

Once you are within your category modifier of 100, it is linear with the frequency of checks. The returns stop diminishing.

Fair point, I was talking about the bulk of increase, but you're absolutely correct.

We've toyed with HR that skill over 100 requires a special to EVEN get a check, and skill over 150 requires a crit.  It makes those breakpoints much more significant, but then when adapting adventures, you have to keep in mind that those % iles above 100 should be deprecated....if the adventure says the boss has a 140% attack, that should really be scaled down to about 120 at most.  I could probably work out the function (something like everything over 100 divide by 5, and over 150 divide by 20) but winging it is honestly likely good enough.  Players don't honestly care whether the enemy has precisely 120% or 122%.

Edited July 1, 2019 by styopa

[styopa]

3 hours ago, Joerg said:

at some point, skill training becomes undistinguishable from characteristic training.

For us it was a sort of light bulb moment when we realized we could merge the two.  In RQ3 at least, skill training was pretty reasonable, but characteristic training had a 'winging it' feel with a totally different approach/calculation.

One day I realized ...what if we just take the stat, multiply by 5, and THEN TREAT IT JUST LIKE TRAINING A SKILL?  (and then of course you actually a stat point increase when your 'training' crosses the next multiple of 5) 

Voila!  It's not the Grand Unified Theory, but it works great, is internally consistent and IMO feels right.

[galafrone]

19 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

@galafrone so they can get 2 skill increases on the same skill? Or only 1 successful check?

Basically yes, they can. If that skill they checked with the regular experience rules ends or not in an skill up doesnt matter.

If an adventurer stays 1 season, 56 days (during dark season for example) outdoor looking to reach the safety of dikene after a long trek into the nothingness i rule they can use one of they 4 "freebies rolls" on survival, or any other skill appropriate to this situation (stealth, listen, scan, first aid, climb etc)

[Shiningbrow]

8 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

Not really, and anyway not for long - if you have a category modifier of 20, then you always have a 21% chance to raise your skill. Even at 15%, that 16% chance of skill-up is probably better than characteristic training. Raising a characteristic from 17 to 18 has a 20% chance, and gives you nothing. Likewise to 19 (15%), and to 20 (10%), and then when you get it to 21 (5% chance) you get a +5. Hardly cost-effective. Sure, if you have a 16 then raising it to 17 (25%) is very worthwhile. And 12 to 13 is a no-brainer. 13 to 17? Not sure if that works out more cost-effective than training the skill.

Not even vaguely similar to my eyes!

You've overlooked two significant aspects of characteristic increases - firstly, when it hits threshold, it applies to ALL skills affected by the characteristic (if INT was raisable this way, everyone would go for it); and secondly said extra 5% is an extra 5% chance to increase each of those affected skills.

Well and truly worth the time and effort of grinding through 3 wasted points...

 

At RL level, it sort of becomes irrelevant,.since you can DI your way up.

But then, what's to stop an RL from upskilling the same way? What do we think a DI is worth in skill %?? (At best, a characteristic increase can give 5%... But that  stat raises multiple skills , so it's going to be hard to place a value on an individual skill!!) 

[Joerg]

8 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

Not really, and anyway not for long - if you have a category modifier of 20, then you always have a 21% chance to raise your skill. Even at 15%, that 16% chance of skill-up is probably better than characteristic training. Raising a characteristic from 17 to 18 has a 20% chance, and gives you nothing. Likewise to 19 (15%), and to 20 (10%), and then when you get it to 21 (5% chance) you get a +5. Hardly cost-effective. Sure, if you have a 16 then raising it to 17 (25%) is very worthwhile. And 12 to 13 is a no-brainer. 13 to 17? Not sure if that works out more cost-effective than training the skill.

That's the rule for research. If you do training (paying for supervision), you don't roll whether you increase, only how much (which may still be zero). RQG p.418. And since the additional 5% apply to a wide range of skills you roll checks for,  it should be cost-effective.

 

 

[Kloster]

10 hours ago, styopa said:

One day I realized ...what if we just take the stat, multiply by 5, and THEN TREAT IT JUST LIKE TRAINING A SKILL?  (and then of course you actually a stat point increase when your 'training' crosses the next multiple of 5) 

IIRC, this was the official RQIII rule.

[styopa]

12 hours ago, Kloster said:

IIRC, this was the official RQIII rule.

Nope, for characteristic increases (where allowed) RQ3 was multiply stat x25 and after that number of hours of training, you get d3-1 to the stat.

[Kloster]

11 hours ago, styopa said:

Nope, for characteristic increases (where allowed) RQ3 was multiply stat x25 and after that number of hours of training, you get d3-1 to the stat.

Yep, you're right.

[Lordabdul]

I'm resurrecting this topic to mention that, as it turns out, Jeff is mostly running a pseudo real-time campaign with the White Bull Campaign that's on Twitch and YouTube. As far as I can tell, he doesn't have to work to much, although maybe there's some preparation behind the scenes I'm not aware of... but at first glance, it just looks like the players generally keep an eye out for upcoming holy days (with Jeff reminding them on occasion), work around those by postponing or hurrying-up some part of the campaign, and noting how depleted they are in Rune Points. I also notice that they make good use of associated cults to regain Rune Points here and there. Also, as expected, they sometimes fast forward a day or two or even a couple weeks.

Edited October 26, 2020 by lordabdul

[Brootse]

On 6/23/2019 at 9:50 PM, lordabdul said:

Thoughts? Feedback from experience? All will be appreciated!

At least the first two years of the -25 Sartar campaign will be quite tightly packed, and there will be more than one scenario per season, if the characters have personal feuds or take part in the field battles of the Hero Wars. I just finished the first year. The way I handled it was to give experience and POW increase rolls after each major scenario (eg. the published ones), or after few shorter ones. Orlanth and some other cults have more than one holy day per season, so at least some of the characters of the group had Rune points in each scenario. Some cults eg. Humakt get only one holy day per season, so their worshippers just have to be more careful about their Rune point spending.

 

e: haha, didn't see how old the op was

Edited October 26, 2020 by Brootse

[Brootse]

39 minutes ago, lordabdul said:

I'm resurrecting this topic to mention that, as it turns out, Jeff is mostly running a pseudo real-time campaign with the White Bull Campaign that's on Twitch and YouTube. As far as I can tell, he doesn't have to work to much, although maybe there's some preparation behind the scenes I'm not aware of... but at first glance, it just looks like the players generally keep an eye out for upcoming holy days (with Jeff reminding them on occasion), work around those by postponing or hurrying-up some part of the campaign, and noting how depleted they are in Rune Points. I also notice that they make good use of associated cults to regain Rune Points here and there. Also, as expected, they sometimes fast forward a day or two or even a couple weeks.

Wait, you can regain your Rune points by worshipping in associated cults' temples?

[Rodney Dangerduck]

26 minutes ago, Brootse said:

Wait, you can regain your Rune points by worshipping in associated cults' temples?

Page 315:  (some italics added for emphasis)

"Associated Cults: With a successful Worship roll during an associated cult’s high or seasonal holy day, initiates get 1D6 Rune points restored, and God-talkers, Rune Priests, and Rune Lords get 1D6+1 Rune points replenished. With a failure, no Rune points are restored."

You only get a D6, not 2D6 like from your own cult's seasonal holy day, and 0 instead of a D3 if somehow you fail.  (Which is almost impossible unless you are insanely stuuupid.)

[Brootse]

23 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Page 315:  (some italics added for emphasis)

"Associated Cults: With a successful Worship roll during an associated cult’s high or seasonal holy day, initiates get 1D6 Rune points restored, and God-talkers, Rune Priests, and Rune Lords get 1D6+1 Rune points replenished. With a failure, no Rune points are restored."

You only get a D6, not 2D6 like from your own cult's seasonal holy day, and 0 instead of a D3 if somehow you fail.  (Which is almost impossible unless you are insanely stuuupid.)

Thanks!

[Scorus]

The biggest issue that 1 adventure (not session) per season has caused for me is that time passes very fast. If you start a campaign in 1625 and you want your players to be involved in the high level stuff going on as far as the Lunars, Kallyr, Argrath, etc. then you don't end up with time to develop much in the way of other storylines. I've gotten around that by having the whole Lunar to Argrath transition occur over a much longer period, but having more adventures per season might also be in our future.

[jajagappa]

1 hour ago, Scorus said:

The biggest issue that 1 adventure (not session) per season has caused for me is that time passes very fast.

It's just an example case.  I think plenty of us have games that have multiple events per season - and when on the road, it's often fairly continuous over X number of weeks.

[Dissolv]

I am running a bit of a mix.  When the players are in clan lands, taking on odd tasks or self directed adventures, they follow the seasonal rules, with the extra exp checks, Pow gain rolls from the handy local temples, etc.   Montage training for several seasons while adventuring on the side has been a heavy focus, especially for the Lhankhor Mhy player, who needs his lores skilled up via training.

When the players venture out of these safe zones, then it all starts to go real time on them, with multiple encounters before holy days, extensive travel time between any type of civilization, and so on.  Right now the players have had a couple of sessions where there were limited or even no ability to get back rune points or refill the Pow crystals, so are aware of the temporal limits of their abilities.  They have consciously chosen to stick to being big fish in a smaller pond and are working with clan politics and local adventures currently.  They are aware of a bigger wider world.

Actually, as an aside, a great example of limited resources happened tonight. a character is a member of the Two Pine clan and has been rallying the clan to get the seven tributes gathered before Storm Season sets in, or the Lunars interfere.  To do this, he wound up challenging a clan to a duel for it, when negotiations broke down.   He burned 3 out of 5 Rune points but managed to win.  Then he wound up in a serious clan raid (150 vs. 230) just a few days later, still low on Rune points.  In this even he had his leg chopped off clean by a critical and was hors de combat.   Accelerating the pace of the encounters is a thing, especially as the hero wars draw near!  🙂  (His leg was fully healed before the battle was totally over, and he was fine.)

[tnli]

Mostly seasonal, (one season, so far), but will depend on where the chaps go. 

[French Desperate WindChild]

 

there is no rule forbidding full season (or year) adventures

 

from an RP perspective :

your characters can have a social and "daily" activity so they cannot go in adventure each day of a season. They must take care their land, workshop, temple, etc... that what rules describes

or

your characters can "break" their way of lifes, they can decide to become adventurers, no more field to farm, no more sheep to guard, etc... Of course that means they cannot take any official position, of course they have to manage any previous commitments they make with clan / temple / boss etc..

 

from a GP perspective

if you stay at home for your "professionnal" occupation, you get the advantages of "between adventures experience check" of you profession

if you have no more "home" (or at least no more profession in your home), there is nothing about "between adventures experience check" but

1) there is no time between adventures

2) or you can decide to create a kind of "adventurer profession" to define a list of skills that can be checked each season of full adventure (of course only if daily activities are not played on session.)

 

for example : for 20 weeks the pc have been pursue some bandits who kidnaped the clan children. as gm you don't play how the players manage to find food because you prefer focus on other activities . You can decide to put in you list of "betrween adventures experience check " : local lore, survive, etc.. or decide that players, for these season can choose between hunter and bandit occupation (depending on how they manage to find food)