Inherent and Learned

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I have been dipping into some Call of Cthulhu and Warhammer FRP texts recently, and this has gotten me thinking about skill-based (as opposed to class-based) systems. Back forever ago, I participated in a game called Blackwater Falls that started as D&D but was converted partway through to a fantasy White Wolf hack (which, at the time, seemed like the cutting edge of RPG design).

The basic idea of the old White Wolf system was that the chance of succeeding at a given action was derived from the combination of an inherent quality (an attribute, such as dexterity or appearance) and a learned quality (an ability, such as archery or medicine). Each of those stats were rated from 1 to 5, and contributed to a dice pool. So, shooting an arrow would be a dexterity + archery action. Assume a character had a dexterity of 2 and an archery of 3. In this case, 5d10 would be rolled, and the number of successes (dice results above some value, based on the situation) would determine the outcome. Too many dice and too much counting, but I still think the direct combination of inherent and learned qualities is an interesting and intuitively appealing approach. Some versions of D&D have something similar in the division between ability score modifiers and THAC0 or attack bonus increases, but the system is not generalized or particularly elegant.

The Blackwater Falls system used that basic paradigm, but combined it with the simplicity of roll-under ability checks. Inherent + learned was a number from 1 to 10, and then the roll-under check was done with a single d10. Quick and elegant; I still like it. I don’t remember exactly how we did advancement anymore, but I think it was close to unmodified White Wolf. Each kind of stat had an advancement cost (inherent stats cost more to advance than learned stats) and XP was spent directly on improvement. This is okay, but seems less impressive in retrospect.

To refine this system, consider combining the core of the above paradigm with a roll to advance system (this is inspired by BRP or Call of Cthulhu). Inherent and learned stats would each be rated from 0 to 50, thus resulting in a combined range of 0 to 100. Don’t worry about how starting inherent stats are determined for now; it could be by rolling, arrangement of an array, or something else. Also don’t worry about how skills are selected. Just assume that starting characters have their collection of inherent stats like strength and a small number of skills. The exact list of stats is also not important right now.

Here is how action resolution works. Let’s look at dexterity and archery again. Say our character has a 25 dexterity and a 21 archery. The archery check number is 46. You could use percentile roll under for this, but simplifying by rounding down and using a single d10 decreases the number of required operations during play. So the target number becomes 4. Roll 1d10, 4 or less is a success.

Now for advancement. At the end of any session, each player picks one inherent stat (such as dexterity) and one learned stat (such as archery) that they used during the session, and rolls for advancement. However, the roll in this case is above instead of below (so that it becomes progressively harder to improve stats as expertise is gained). Following the example, the target number is 47 or higher. Percentile dice are rolled twice, once for the inherent stat involved and once for the learned stat. Any success increments the stat by 1. Pre-calculating the threshold number (inherent + learned) for each learned stat would make the action resolution process extra streamlined, and would be low cost since the numbers change infrequently.

Increases to inherent stats are limited by starting point. Not everyone can be Einstein or Arnold just by experience or trying really hard (though everyone can improve and it is the rare person that gets within spitting distance of their true potential). To reflect this, I would say that inherent abilities can be increased up to 10 points beyond the starting score. Thus, a character that begins with 21 strength can increase it to 31 through play. This is also important to prevent acquired blandness, as all PCs converge towards being good at everything (a common downside of overly general systems). Learned stats are also limited by their associated inherent stat. So archery can never be higher than dexterity (or whatever). Since all action checks are a combination of inherent and learned, going from 36 all the way to 46 through advancement is still useful, despite the rounding down for the 1d10 check, because when combined with different learned stats the percentile part might still make a difference.

Since the action check is done with 1d10 and the advancement check is done with percentile dice, not all advances will lead to a direct effect on play. That’s okay; they still bring you closer to a real improvement, and since the advancement checks happen every session, I think that is okay. The percentile number ends up being somewhat like the Hackmaster idea of fractional ability scores, but much more elegant. I’m not sure how long it would take characters to top out using this system. Given a large set of skills (and the increasingly slow chance of advancement), I could see this being functionally unbounded. If not, some more thought would need to be given to other forms of advancement.

I see learned stats for this system being significantly different than most of the skill-based systems I have encountered, which tend to be concerned primarily with modelling all of the things that define a complete individual. 4 points in drive, 3 points in literary analysis, 3 points in dancing, etc. That’s not the model for learned stats here. Instead, they would represent only adventuring skills (as appropriate to the genre in question). So a fighter-type might have pole-arms 20 and crossbows 17. The level of specificity is still somewhat up in the air. A specific stat for derringers is probably overkill, but an all in one melee weapon skill is probably too general. The traditional thief abilities are at about the right level of granularity (pick locks, hide in shadows, etc). For magic-user types, an individual spell or ritual is a separate stat, and could be used at will assuming all the requirements are met (along with some danger of mishap or chance of corruption). Learned stats will require some more explicit guidelines and examples, but I think the basic intent is clear.

Since all actions are based on inherent + learned, there would no suggestion that, for example, only thieves could sneak. Everyone could roll dexterity (or whatever) +0, even if they don’t have any appropriate learned stats, such as hide in shadows or stealth. The same is true for any relatively mundane action, like climbing.

Rather than an make an advancement roll, a player may choose to acquire a new learned stat, assuming that they have performed some action that allows getting a new skill to make sense in the fiction. For example, rescuing a martial arts master might allow a character to learn some kind of combat skill. Finding a tome of forbidden lore might allow the learning of a spell. The way I am thinking about this now, getting a new learned stat should not require a roll; it happens with no chance of failure. A newly acquired learned stat would begin with 1d10 points. Another option would be to require the player to roll under twice the associated inherent stat to start off the learned stat, but I think that might needlessly slow down advancement (the fictional justification, along with giving up an advancement roll, seems like it would be cost enough).

Rationalized hit dice

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Hit dice in the original little brown books only used six sided dice. Plusses were applied to modulate the values by class. So (ignoring constitution for simplicity), a fourth level fighter would have 4d6 HP, whereas a fourth level magic-user would have 2d6+1 HP. Coming to OD&D from one of the later editions, the absence of different hit dice is one of the most striking differences (along with flat d6 weapon damage, to which the size of hit dice is related). This approach was dropped almost immediately, in Supplement I: Greyhawk, and forever after different classes have used different sized dice for their hit points.

I have come to appreciate the hit dice being only from six siders. It keeps the totals grounded. It works particularly well with rerolling per session (the scalar bonuses feel less strange, as they just modify the per-session expected value slightly). However, the actual progression seems somewhat arbitrary and unmotivated. For example, the original fighter “dice for accumulative hits” progression was, by level:

Level	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
HD	1+1	2	3	4	5+1	6	7+1	8+2	9+3	10+1

What’s up with that?

It’s relatively easy to fix, though. Here is my proposal, broken down into progressions for high (fighter), medium (cleric), and low (magic-user) hit dice.

Level	High	Medium	Low
1	1d6+1	1d6	1d6
2	2d6+1	2d6	1d6+1
3	3d6+1	2d6+1	2d6
4	4d6+1	3d6	2d6+1
5	5d6+1	4d6	3d6
6	6d6+1	4d6+1	3d6+1
7	7d6+1	5d6	4d6
8	8d6+1	6d6	4d6+1
9	9d6+1	6d6+1	5d6
10	10d6+1	7d6	5d6+1

The patterns should be easily intelligible. The expected values are relatively close to the originals, though in Men & Magic the magic-user gets all the way up to 9+2 (by 16th level). Gary sure did love the wizards.

What about after tenth level? My inclination would be to halt HD growth entirely past tenth level. A sort of soft E10. It would also be reasonable to keep adding some bonus HP though, in the manner of AD&D. I would probably just make it a flat +1 per level for every level above ten, irrespective of class. Going much above +1 would start to overwhelm the d6 values, unlike the larger hit dice sized used by AD&D, so probably best not to adopt the AD&D numbers (given characters of equal level, the relationship of fighter > cleric > magic-user will still obtain, which I think is the most important thing).

Necropraxis

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Welcome to my new domain!

For a while now, I have been less than enamored of Blogger, for a number of reasons. The most continuously irritating aspect has actually been the URL rewriting by visitor location. But there are other more substantive issues as well, such as Google’s project of unifying their products (which I understand but do not like) and the poor Blogger backup functionality (it does not export images, for example).

Further, I have never really liked the name of my old blog. The meaning of “untimately” is only that it is one of the ways that I most commonly misspell a word (don’t ask me why I thought that was a good idea for a name). Really, at the time when I started my old blog, I knew that if I waited for a name that I was really satisfied with I would never actually begin. So I just picked something that was somewhat arbitrary and got on with it.

But now I think I have a name that I like, that makes sense, that is easy to remember, and that is rather unique. The meaning of the name Necropraxis is twofold. Necro and praxis, of course, refer to death and practice (as in contrast to theory). Necromancy, despite recent linguistic corruption, is more properly predicting the future by communication with the dead. So necropraxis, being the practice of manipulating death and unlife, more closely captures the idea of undead than necromancy.

Necropraxis, in addition to gesturing toward my fascination with legends of the undead, also makes sense when considering OSR gaming. By playing (or learning from) the older editions of games, we are reviving them. Animating them to serve our current needs. Not allowing them to rest or vanish into the past as nothing but curiosities.

I’m still learning how to use WordPress, so the visual style and layout will likely change, but I wanted to go ahead and make the move, because once I made the decision to change and registered the domain, I found myself reluctant to publish new content to Untimately. Like my original blog launch using Blogger, I figured that it would be better to just get this off the ground even if the presentation was not perfect. I have learned enough about WordPress that I don’t think anything like static URLs should change going forward. However, I still need to find a good blogroll plugin and play around with how comments are handled. So, if anyone can recommend a good blogroll plugin (something that sorts by recent post and shows image previews would be best), I would be appreciative.

Raise dead

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In OD&D, clerics gain access to the raise dead spell upon reaching seventh level. One of the cleric characters in my current campaign is at fifth level right now, and has a pile of unspent treasure. The ability to restore life is right around the corner. This spell is potentially game-changing, and thus requires careful consideration. First, let’s look at the text (Men & Magic, page 33):

Raise Dead: The Cleric simply points his finger, utters the incantation, and the dead person is raised. This spell works with men, elves, and dwarves only. For each level the Cleric has progressed beyond the 8th, the time limit for resurrection extends another four days. Thus, an 8th level Cleric can raise a body dead up to four days, a 9th level Cleric can raise a body dead up to eight days, and so on. Naturally, if the character’s Constitution was weak, the spell will not bring him back to life. In any event raised characters must spend two game weeks time recuperating from the ordeal.

This description is characteristically ambiguous and demands interpretation. The way I read the timing rules, a seventh level cleric can only raise those freshly slain (one turn? one day?), since the example given has an 8th level cleric able to raise those that have been dead for four days, and that deadline increases by four days every further level gained.

The most obvious need for a ruling relates to constitution. What defines a “weak” constitution? Does this refer to the “withstand adversity” or survival chances given on page 11 of Men & Magic? (You can see the chances in my OD&D ability scores post.) That seems like a reasonable interpretation. I think a constitution check would be a more elegant resolution system, but I want to stay close to the original rules where possible.

The “two game weeks” recuperation fits nicely into how I have been handing time passage already. I assume that one week passes between sessions, representing downtime and recovery, unless there is some urgent reason compelling continuous adventuring (this happened once that I can remember, when the PCs were in pursuit of a sorcerer). So a raised PC would be unable to participate in the following session (the player could temporarily run a retainer). In game terms, this seems like a small XP progression speed bump (if a PC dies and is raised, they miss out on one session worth of XP).

The spell description says nothing about side effects, and of course there should be some. What marks are left on a character’s body or mind from a layover in the land of the dead? Are there cosmic consequences to calling someone back from eternal rest? Perhaps the land of the dead is forever drawn closer to the land of the living at the site of a raising. Perhaps there is a chance that something else comes back along with the soul of raised character. I have some half-baked thoughts on raise dead consequences here.

Here is a preliminary ruling. A raised character must make a survival check (using the percentage as determined by constitution score). Failure means the character is not raised, and can never be raised. If the check is successful, the character is restored to life but also loses a point of constitution permanently. Further, life and death are not to be trifled with, and there will almost certainly be some other consequence to tampering with the order of things.

Alternate cleric magic

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Giotto – The Miracle of the Spring

Here is an idea for another way to do cleric magic, based on a d6 roll and my idea of competency (which is character level divided by 2, round up).

All cleric magic is ritualistic, and requires a turn (10 minutes) to attempt. This time represents the cleric petitioning for aid, reciting prayers or sutras, and so forth. Roll 1d6, add competency, subtract disfavor (see below), ritual succeeds on a 6. If the magic works, the cleric gains a point of disfavor. Disfavor is reset to zero when the cleric returns to civilization (generally, between sessions). Rituals available would be the standard spell list and max level of spell known would be equal to competency, just like for magic-users. Or maybe competency minus one to make it so that clerics don’t get any spells at first level.

Clerics are thus differentiated from magic-users, as cleric spells do not require preparation, are not useful during combat (unless they have been performed beforehand), and consume exploration time. This does slightly change the number of spells that can be cast per session. For example, a second level cleric would be able to get off two cures (or other spells) rather than one, but this is offset by the uncertain amount of time required to petition for aid.

Banishing demons or turning undead might also decrease effective competency, though I’m not sure if turning undead should require a roll or not.

Inspired partly by the patron disfavor system in DCC.

Thoughts?

The plague city

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Poussin – The Plague at Ashod (WikiPaintings)

I’ve been reading a book called Necropolis: London and Its Dead (a souvenir I picked up in Cambridge), and it gave me an idea for a campaign. Just jotting it down here so that I don’t forget.

The seat of the empire, the City, has served as the seat of power and the source of culture for ages untold. The hegemonic family’s rule has been unchallenged. But now, plague stalks the city, and the Heavenly Family was one of the first to succumb. In the power vacuum that followed, lords stood dumbfounded, but only for a moment before they were at each other’s throats.

Quickly, the disease raged unchecked, and the city descended into chaos, law fleeing to the hills with the nobles outside the now cursed city walls. The one accord the warring nobles made was to seal the city from the outside, hoping to save the surrounding lands by a great quarantine.

The PCs have been sealed within. Food dwindles, and many of those with arcane knowledge have turned to necromancy, either to preserve themselves from slow and painful death through un-death, or to make use of city’s now greatest resource: corpses uncountable. This is D&D as survival horror, with “treasure” often being another meal. Like insanity in Call of Cthulhu, death, while not fated, would be to some degree expected at some point.

In addition to some human classes, several types of B/X-style race as class undead would be playable, and would probably have some sort of humanity stat (perhaps shoehorned into wisdom) which would be the undead analogue of constitution/hunger for the still living. Negotiating the factions, building new power structures within the anarchic confines of the City, and maintaining enough resources to survive would be the primary objectives of gameplay. Perhaps playing an undead would need to be unlocked first, by finding and performing the appropriate necromancy.

OSR Dogma Recency

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It has long been thought that many old school gaming principles are fundamentally reinventions and reinterpretations rather than rediscoveries. Here is more evidence for that, from N1 Against the Cult of the Reptile God, page 20:

The DM must remember that it is important that the party get to the dungeon. Encounters that are obviously too strong for the group (especially if they have been weakened by previous encounters) should be reduced or bypassed—for example, the party might come across a predator’s kill or war party’s trail instead of the the actual monsters; or they might be able to sneak past a monster that is otherwise engaged. On the other hand, a very strong party might encounter up to double the number of creatures or more. In all cases the DM should match the challenge to party strength and to the general flow of the adventure.

Basic D&D has some similar advice, but the text from N1 is notable in that A) it is even more explicit and B) it occurs in the first “beginner” module, ostensibly designed to teach new referees and players how the game works. N stands for “novice-level” and N1 was published in 1982. If this passage was found in a recently written module by someone like James Raggi or Matt Finch, it would be considered the rankest of heresies.

Personally, I prefer OSR distrust of predetermination and balance over the TSR advice. Why bother even putting numbers to challenges beforehand if you are just going to scale them to party strength? Why roll dice if you are not willing to live with the result?

Spell competency and other competencies

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Spell competency is the highest level of spell that the magic-user can prepare. This is usually equivalent to experience level divided by 2 (round up). For example, a fifth level magic-user has a spell competency of 3. The original magic-user spell progression followed this pattern up until 6th level spells are considered, which are not gained until 12th level (rather than 11th, as the pattern would require).

I find treating this number as a separate stat is useful. For example, in the spell-casting roll. I imagine it could also be rather useful for some sort of magic duel as well. Relatedly, I read something by Jack on Google Plus about how he has spiced up the fighter class and simplified the thief for his Labyrinth Lord game. One of the abilities he added was a bonus to weapon damage every few levels (not exactly level divided by two in his system, but it easily could be with similar effect).

Does this risk the numerical inflation and illusionism of 4E? Regarding combat, as long as it’s not applied to the accuracy part of the equation, I don’t think so. I probably wouldn’t use this in OD&D, which has a very low numerical baseline (especially if you avoid +1 style magic items, like I do). But I could see it working well in a game that used B/X power assumptions perhaps.

As discussed by Talysman, this kind of “level divided by 2” number also fits well into the reaction roll when opposed by a similarly scoped difficulty number. He uses this as the basis for his X without spells class design paradigm:

The “without spells” approach is based on the reaction roll, and the interpretation of Turn Undead as a reaction roll: subtract the HD of the creature being commanded from the level of the character making the command, double the result, and use it to modify a 2d6 roll. On 9+, the command works.

The math is not exactly the same, but the similarity should be clear, I think. What if we generalized this kind of “reaction roll power” to every class? For example:

Cleric: turn undead (opposed by undead hit dice)
Fighter: intimidate or rally (opposed by enemy hit dice)
Magic-user: casting roll (opposed by spell level)
Thief: misdirect or dissemble (opposed by interlocutor hit dice)

And, if almost all capabilities are based on level divided by two, why not cut out the middle man and collapse level into that competency number? Attack progression does not happen every level in OD&D or Basic D&D. Saving throws do not increase every level. The only thing that increases every level is hit dice, and I think most of us can agree than D&D characters end up with too many hit dice anyways. An added benefit of this approach would be to do away with some of the ambiguity around the level numbers (as, for example, third level spells would be useable by third level magic-users).

Dungeon World bag of holding

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Image from Wikipedia

Dungeon World has some excellent, interesting magic items. There are very few simple +1 style items, and most of them have clever drawbacks. My only (minor) complaint is that I think the collection would benefit from more consumable or impermanent items, which lead to interesting resource management and also militate against accumulating lots of permanent enchanted items as a campaign progresses.

As an example, consider the DW version of an old classic, the bag of holding. This item is a huge boon, because it allows one to worry less about encumbrance and thus be more likely to have the tools needed for a given situation. This version has a nice twist: you can’t always find exactly what you want, or at least not quickly.

Bag of Holding – 0 weight

A bag of holding is larger on the inside than the outside, it can contain an infinite number of items, and its weight never increases. When you try to retrieve an item from a bag of holding, roll+WIS. ✴On a 10+, it’s right there. ✴On a 7-9, choose one:

• You get the exact item, but it takes a while
• You get a similar item of the GM’s choice, but it only takes a moment

No matter how many items it contains, a bag of holding is always 0 weight.

Yes, this includes some player narrative control, but that’s easy enough to fix if you don’t like it. Here’s a version I might use with OD&D.

When you try to retrieve an item from a bag of holding, roll 1d6. You find:

1-2: junk from the inter-dimensional nexus (ask referee)
3: something similar that you have never seen before
4: something similar that put in previously
5: what you were looking for, but it takes a full turn
6: what you were looking for immediately

That could probably be tightened up a bit, but you get the idea.

The quoted item description above is from DW page 333 and is creative commons licensed. Dungeon World can be found at RPGNow.

Favorable and unfavorable saves

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Swords & Wizardry collapsed all the saving throws into a single number, with some class-based modifiers. For example, clerics get +2 when saving against paralysis or poison, and magic-users get +2 when saving against spells. The traditional saving throw categories do provide atmosphere (death ray, dragon breath), but are somewhat cumbersome and nonintuitive.

One thing I’ve been doing recently is using “most favorable” or “least favorable” save numbers for cases where the choice of what save category to use is not immediately clear. If it seems like something the class in question would have some competence with, the character gets to use the most favorable. Where this has come up most is for the saving throw involved in carousing-like activities.

I have previously discussed simplifying saving throws by deriving them directly from character level. Here is another approach. Rather than have one column of saves per class, as S&W does, or use the more complicated multi-save system as did the original TSR editions, why not have two progressions by level: favorable and unfavorable. All classes would reference the same values, but would differ as to which number was used by situation. This method would require two numbers, but would avoid needing any class-based or situational modifiers.

Putting this idea into Third Edition terms, combat oriented classes would use the favorable numbers for direct physical situations, whereas magic-users would use the favorable numbers for resisting sorcery or mental effects.

Saving Throw Competency by Class
Class	Favorable	Unfavorable
fighter	fortitude	reflex, will
magic-user	will	fortitude, reflex
thief	reflex	fortitude, will

The cleric does not fit quite so neatly into the 3E classification. A cleric should probably have favorable saves when dealing with demonic or undead threats, for example, but not necessarily for situations that require general toughness. Classes like the cleric would be easily handled by this proposed dual number system, without needing to spell out the types of threats beforehand.

Bifurcated Saving Throws
Level	Favorable	Unfavorable
1 – 3	12	16
4 – 6	10	14
7 – 9	8	12
10 – 12	6	10
13+	4	8

These numbers are derived from the OD&D fighter best and worst saves. I chose the fighter because A) the fighter is the most fundamental class and B) fighter saves improve every third level rather than the less frequent schedules of the other classes. The resulting pattern is also quite nice and easy to remember, as the two numbers always differ by 4 (20%) and always improve by 2 every tier (once a player has written down 12/16 they never even have to every consult the table again as long as that basic rule is remembered).

All classes would use the favorable number for the 0 HP death save.

I am aware that some people think that saving throws should be collapsed into ability checks, but I do not think that is the best approach for a level-based game, as improving saving throws should be a reward for longterm successful play, not a trick of the dice at first level. See here for more on my philosophy of saving throws.