Shadowrun
Shadowrun General => General Discussion => Topic started by: Mirikon on <03-13-19/2324:03>
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So, I was watching some youtube videos talking about some of the problems facing games like World of Warcraft and Anthem, and it reminded me of the main gripe I've always had with Shadowrun: the Reward Loop. Now, I love the lore of Shadowrun. The setting, the characters, the 'not a hero' approach that is so different from most games out there, all of it speaks to me. But ever since I started playing, I've come up against the same issue, time and again: there is no meaningful progression.
In other games, you do a thing, you get shinies (money or gear) and XP, which translates simply and easily to progression for your character. In D&D, this is whenever you get a new level, and you can usually count on leveling at least once or twice in a standard module. In M&M or Champions/HERO System, you get PP or CP, which you can use to improve your character. The costs are flat x amount of points equals y amount of improvement, depending on what you're doing. You get a couple fights under your belt, you probably already have enough points to improve something, maybe even one of your core abilities. Regardless, you know what the score is, and there is always a sense that your character is progressing.
In Shadowrun, that just isn't there. Unless you're looking for new shiny guns or need nuyen for something, your progression is essentially flatter than a coke that has been left open for three months. If you're a mage, or a technomancer, or someone wanting to improve your skills, you're looking at sometimes 10+ runs worth of XP to bump up a single die. There is a reason why people talking on the character creation section mention that what your skills and attributes are after chargen are pretty much what they will always be for the duration of a campaign, unless you're one of the really lucky ones who gets into a campaign that is going to last a decade or two. Standard run gives, say, 4-6 karma. That means a blade-focused street sammy needs to save up 10-14 runs worth of karma to go from a 6 to 7 in Blades. They actually have it easy, since they can also improve with nuyen, by getting ware, or new gear, and so on. Other archetypes, especially the ones that improve solely on karma (see: Awakened or Emerged), or their improvement relies on MASSIVELY expensive items (see: deckers and riggers) are looking at just as steep costs, and no progression in that time. The reward loop is broken for those archetypes, and advancement and progression feel stagnant. That is why so many people look at minmaxing their characters in chargen, because they know that they'll never be better than they are then.
Fixing the problem is easy enough. You just have to kill off a white elephant that has been haunting the game for multiple editions: the increasing karma costs for advancement. Reduce it to a fixed point per rank, and advancement becomes possible for people who haven't been playing the same character for forever. Make it a fixed cost per rank, and the minmaxing loses some of its steam, allowing people to try more varied character types because they can actually grow into their role, and be effective at it. With a fixed point per rank, the reward loop doesn't become an unholy grind that makes me start looking over my shoulder to see if EA has suddenly shown up and shoved a cash shop in the game to do RMT to buy your next skill rank.
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That’s why rewarding karma per run needs to go and be replaced by per session with actual karma rewards increased.
The amount of karma needed by mage/techno’s is through the roof even with the Missions’ concert karma/yen trick.
I reward on average 8 karma a session with more for when they complete the missions.
I’ve been thinking to use a little bit from Anarchy and just payout in Karma and have the players themselves convert to nuyen as needed.
But yes, the grind is horrid though not as bad as Crossfire
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I think flat would get boring too fast, and devaluates the high attribute and high skill characters since they're nothing special. Some kind of slow growth might be better. (As in, slower increase than simply x2). I like Witch's system, but that only works due to the low values. A change could be something like '4 to learn new skill, 2+Current/2 to increase'. But yeah, plenty of options to houserule. Definitely not right for all tables though.
There's also this one downtime thing I know, which I think belongs to an RP forum? Dunno exactly, but it hands out various kinds of karma during downtime activities. Can be found here (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Z2hUFxu_45hO9Xcd-XyfhWDxwEHYCAqYuKVEOJabFxY/edit?usp=sharing)
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We don't play very often so I jacked up the rewards similar to what Pixel was saying.
And I agree with Michael also. You can't have flat or high levels mean nothing.
Am actually having a little nuyen problem now, but that's because one of the players received massive rewards from another GM and now has most everything (Cyberware) he could possibly get.
"Standard run gives, say, 4-6 karma. That means a blade-focused street sammy needs to save up 10-14 runs worth of karma to go from a 6 to 7 in Blades"
Math?
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The last season of my campaign ended up having a bunch of runs with 7~9 karma (on top of the max 3 karma in downtime), since they involved some nasty enemies which also immediately triggered the 'holy shit you're facing THAT big thing?!' karma bonus. One player ended up with 10 Magic, but skills weren't improved much, only the Decker got some boosts there.
The upside of the Downtime thing I linked is that it gives out different kinds of karma. Because that's one big problem here: Yes, it's nice to boost Longarms from 6 to 8, and get that shiny new Quality, and raise a Knowledge Skill but something has to give. You won't take up knowledge skills if that means you lose out on that desired extra skill level. So handing out Quality-only and Knowledge-only karma is a nice way of rounding characters.
(By the way, don't forget training times. The karma can still take longer to use than to gain.)
To come back to WITCH: Fated Souls, by the way, there your attributes and skills go from 1 to 5, and you start with attribute points that don't allow for heavy stuff (even my 4 Intelligence was pushing it, and while my odds would have been better had I gone 5, it'd have hurt to have 2 1s). To take a new skill there costs 3 exp, while it's Currentx2 to level. Since the highest you can get is 4, that's rather significant. If you want to adapt to Shadowrun, you'd have to do a /2 or /3. That way, the amounts don't rise as much, making it easier to get higher ranks while making new skills actually hurt a bit.
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I personally prefer scaled costs. I find that flat costs promote more min-maxing rather than more diversification.
My personal experience is that the Awakened advance quickly: 5 karma for a new spell or 13 karma for an initiation has the mages and adepts off and running after a run or two. Mundanes are stuck in first gear, although Jack of All Trades can alleviate some of the short-term pain. Still, that's not a long-term solution.
Instead of trying to slow down the Awakened, I try to speed up everything else to avoid the flat progression curve that Mikiron describes. I have a few approaches to both benefit mundanes and also to incentivize the Awakened to do something other than advance their Magic:
1) I use Anarchy's prices for advancing skills and attributes (but not special attributes):
- Skill = 1 karma * new rating
- Skill Group = 3 karma * new rating
- Attributes = 3 karma * new rating
2) I use the Chummer rule "Treat Metatype Attribute Minimum as 1 for the purpose of determining Karma costs". If you are a troll with a Body of 5, which is the metatype minimum, improving to Body 6 only costs 6 karma (2 * 3 karma), not 18 (6 * 3 karma).
3) I award a separate karma award specifically for developing knowledge skills and contacts. Knowledge karma is generally be 1/2 the amount of the normal karma award. This lets players develop who and what their character knows without feeling like it's inhibiting the growth of the rest of the skills and attributes.
These are all popular with my players and I haven't found them unbalancing. If anything, I find that they can help right the scales between the mundanes and the Awakened.
I'll be interested to hear what other approaches people use in their games.
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@Tecumseh: That downtime document has 1 big exception by the way: Small Unit Tactics is banned from their bonus karma for knowledge skills. Which makes sense, because it's practically a cheap practical skill instead.
I like your numbers and think I'll consider them if I ever start another campaign, perhaps combine them with the downtime spending stuff document. (So replace their karma system with yours, keep the rest for easy tracking.)
Do you use the same numbers in chargen, btw? And Qualities remain double after chargen?
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bah the answer is obvious increase your rewards. Karma, cash, whatever the player will enjoy.
The main book is always been just a guidelines.
You don't need change progression just do the math and figure out how much karma you need to make advancing meaningful.
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Shadowrun is a bit different from other games in that the default character is pretty competent. Rating 4 in a skill is "professional level for most jobs", and rating 6 is "you could easily sell your skills on the open market". To compare to something like D&D, you're looking at 5th level characters instead of 1st level characters coming out of character generation. Because you're not going from zero to hero, the leveling is a bit slower.
The big issue is that skills are expensive to buy up compared to many other things. For the cost of going from 6 to 7 in a skill and getting 1 extra die, a character can initiate for the first time, or buy up to a 7 point positive quality. Both of these things are going to have more impact than that extra die. I've never seen a character have more than a skill 8 in anything, even in game with 400+ Karma...the points are better spent elsewhere.
Also, the original poster is just flat out wrong about time to raise skills. Going from 6 to 7 in a skill is 14 Karma, and you should be getting 6 to 8 Karma per run if you don't flub the mission. That's 2 to 3 runs, not 10. The only way it will take that long is if the GM isn't giving you sufficient downtime to train.
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We've been playing our campaign for about 4+ years twice a month/ 24 times a year.
Karma payouts are based on mission objectives achieved and handed out at the end of the campaign leg or "run".
They tend to work out to be @3-6 karma per session depending upon what the PCs do.
I also hand out bonus knowledge skills based on what the characters did during that leg of the campaign (so they might pickup "Ghost Cartels 1" or "Street Drugs 2" etc.).
It's worked out fine for us.
PCs are now around 200-350 karma depending upon when they joined the campaign.
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Look it's not a problem the concept of high reward isn't new and there is nothing wrong with it. Start at 10 karma as a base and go up from there. Not enough cash? Double that too. There isn't any wrong with changing rewards to fit your game. It's your game, do what is right for your table.
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Add other reward mechanics, let the characters make money of the stock market as a resulting from the characters missions. Or give them a chance to drop karma into a service trip that rewards them with a pile if karma. Do favors. Accept services in barter.
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I for one enjoy the system Shadowrun, for the very reason that it is NOT a leveled system. Leveled systems as used by many games and CRPGs have always had an artificial feel to them. "Kill X number of bad guys, and suddenly you are stronger, you hit better, you fear the enemy less, and your survival increased by a factor of n/l...
But built into such a system is a progression of never ending stronger bad guys, that in the end breaks the very world everything happens in it. Take any mid level DnD game... "Stop the WHATSISFACE from doing bad things"... well that "whatsitsface" is usually the same level as you (if not higher to its a challenge to the party).. which means, and I really have to ask: How is there anyone left to even ask for help?!!?? That mid level monster is powerful enough to ROFLstomp an entire army.. and the only reason it as not left its lair is.... plot device.
And then there is the other side to the leveled system, which is the perpetually decreasing awards for the perpetually decreasing threats. Going back the the classic DnD example: the lowly Orc. At first level, armed with his greataxe, he makes even Barbarians wet themselves. ("attack that orc?!? Are you nuts?!?! He could one shot me with that thing!). And by level 10, you have fighters placing bets with each other over who is going to have the highest kill count, the fighter with two weapons, or the fighter with Great Cleave feats, while charging entire TRIBES of orcs...
Which leads to a second problem with leveled systems in general: Everything in an Experience Pinata. To many players, floating in the back of their heads is the thought "If I kill this thing - not matter what it is- how much closer does that get me to my next level?"
And lets not even talk about the meta of the leveled game (adventure-loot-level-adventure-loot-level)... At least SR tries to break that mold. But sadly this is just re-enforced by the current trend of CRPGs and MMOs which use that exact same formula (I have a feeling I know which youtube video you watched, but there have been tons recently), and heck has been the standard for almost 20 years of CRPGs and MMOs (warcraft anyone?)
In Shadowrun, a Ganger with a pistol is just as much a threat at 0 karma as he is with 1000 karma. The only difference generally is in the options you have to remove that ganger. SR has tried to fix the issue that you are talking about when they brought in limits. I think the theory was that if only "X" number of successes counted, then why improve the dice pool exceptionally past that point? (if your limit is 4, why improve your dice pool to 30 for that test?). But that kinda of fell apart when they started including fifteen different options to increase your limits.
Improving an attribute is the new rating x5... which means increasing a weak attribute is easy, but increasing an strong attribute is very hard... just like in real life. Took me a long, LONG time of training to get my reflexes to the point that I could compete in a professional fast draw tournament (like 5 years of practice everyday, for 3 hours a day, 50+ thigh slaps from quick fires, hundreds of split thumbs and jammed wrists.... and I still didn't break the top 50 competitors)
Improving an active Skill is new rating x2.. which makes improving a weaker skill easy, but an established skill harder, again just like real life. I came out of trade school knowing how to do a High Voltage Slice (HVS), it took me THOUSANDS of HVS's to get that down to a 10 minute job that is perfect every time.
Shadowrun tries to mimic the challenges of increasing exceptional attributes and skills, as it is in the real world. And it IS difficult to increase exceptional performance in a human being; Look at the hours a day an Olympic Athlete spends on diet, exercise, training, and technique... They Spend YEARS training for a single event.. and generally only maintain their performance levels, not increase them. (if you loo at athletes that compete Olympic after Olympic, there is generally no increase from the previous year. In fact they usually drop a bit as age takes its toll..) And make no mistake; when you are talking bout increasing an attribute from 5 to 6 or a skill from 7 to 10 range, you're talking Olympic level skill and attribute...
What I find as a bigger problem is how some GMs seem to approach SR world. They seem to have a leveled system mindset when they GM Shadowrun which leads to some..."Strange" constituencies which has several problems.
What I mean by this is that man GMs get into a head space that says to them "If the players can roll 20 dice on an attack, I need to have enemies that can roll 15 to 25 dice to challenge them!" which leads down the road to the gutter punk ganger whose in the top 0.0000000000000000000000001 percentile of the World's elite shooters with his dice pool of 30, "just because"...
And this in turn has the effect of making the character feel cheap, and ineffective... and leads to fustration as they feel their characters are not "good enough" and can't improve fast enough to be "effective and cool"..
(And really go look in the GM section, you'll see what I mean)
IF the GM stick to constant and "real" level of expectation in their NPCs, the players don't feel as "weak". (and NO, a dice pool of 20 for a ganger NOT is realistic!) Take a gander at the NPCs in the NPC section of the book, and compare that to the dice pools being used in your games....
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...granted for the last few years I have only been involved in Missions play (for some reason where I live Home Brew campaigns tend to be somewhat sparse or fizzle out in a couple months). With Missions I have at least been able to satisfy my weekly SR "fix" even if I have to deal with the limitations imposed.
OK in Missions, rewards generally are between 6 - 8 Karma and and 9,000¥ - 12,000¥ per run. Because most missions groups meet on a Weekly basis, these rewards can add up quickly if you run a single character consistently. There are also some special rewards for completing certain goals as well like being able to get a high availability item with no markup, higher grade augmentation at basic grade price, or a favour from one of the Missions NPCs/Contacts. Also there was a rule adopted which allowed a character to apply one tenth of his/her total Street Cred (rounded up) to reducing availability on a 1 for 1 basis (which came in really handy in the Season 8 missions). The downside, individual characters are only allowed to keep up to 5.000¥ in swag or money from sale of loot found, so yeah you can keep that Yamaha Raiden you found after a firefight as part of your swag "payment", but not the Ares Citymaster the oppos left behind.
Throughout the entire Chicago arc (seasons 5 - 8 + CMPs) I have primarily run two characters My namesake KK and Leela. Leela (who I have played the most) is a JoAT character, and currently sits at 449 career Karma. For her, the most time spent is improving skills, or an attribute. At most, it is 5 - 6 weeks of downtime (skill above 4 or an attribute. In spite of her TKE, she is not all that powerful with respect to dice pools, her highest being Urban Sneaking at 17. Most others are, at best, around 12 dice. For her, financial rewards are more important as she likes "new toys". Being a JoAT, she not only saved Karma on skills but has an impressive array of both Active and Knowledge skills which pretty much take up a full page on a Chummer character record. Her one fault, she has Neoteny and PTSD (which I express through Distinctive Style as Neoteny is a prohibited quality in Missions) so people don't always take her seriously as she has the appearance, personality, and outlook of a young teenager (even though she's a genius who is in her 20s - long backstory). Being a mundane, in a Home campaign she would be just about as diverse as she is in Missions, particularly as skills take rating x days up to rating 4 (so, for only three days downtime and 4 karma, she could have a base pool of 12 in a new combat or Agility based skill).
On the other hand, my Gunbunnny Adept, KK who is around 370 karma, is much more focused. The character is currently a grade 7 adept with a 7 Magic (she began with a Magic of 4). A good portion of the TKE she has came through the "Working for the People" option (money for Karma) which she used after just about every mission, while the total number of missions she's been is less than what Leela has gone through. Even so, she pretty much spent a lot of time on her calendar, and funds for lifestyle on initiating (along with training to increase her Magic) as the process to achieve a new initiate grade is the new rating x 28 days (effectively one month intervals). Her last initiation took five and a half months to complete as in missions all downtime functions must be done through buying hits. Prior to that it took her 7 weeks to increase her Magic so a total of around 7 months between the two.
Now the one benefit of how Missions works is that outside of the actual sessions, downtime is considered "fluid", so matter how much downtime a character uses between sessions he/she can be played the very next week just as long as the time is marked off on the Missions Calendar and lifestyle costs are deducted from his/her available resources. Not so in a home campaign. Unlike training to learn a new skill or "increase an attribute, Initiation has one more restriction, it cannot be put on "pause" while you go out on a job as once the character interrupts the process, she has to start all over again beginning (and the karma is still spent = eg. wasted).
So the issue is how to handle this so players of both mundane and awakened characters o the latter don't feel "held back" because of the longer amount of time it takes to make the improvements that are important to their "profession"?
This is where not only Missions, but other game systems tend to be treat all character types more evenly so players of any Class/Archetype can see their characters grow at a reasonable rate. Were KK in a Home Brew campaign, she would be lucky to have made it to initiate grade of 3 maybe 4, and possibly might have improved her magic to 5. I would also have needed to develop a secondary character to play while she was out of action to remain involved for the other characters.
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I think flat would get boring too fast, and devaluates the high attribute and high skill characters since they're nothing special.
As it stands, they're already nothing special, because they are almost always NPCs, unless you either start at 200 karma after chargen, or you have been hauling the same character to every Missions event you can get to for a couple years. Might as well say that people having money devalues billionaires. It doesn't really matter if you're on the streets.
"Standard run gives, say, 4-6 karma. That means a blade-focused street sammy needs to save up 10-14 runs worth of karma to go from a 6 to 7 in Blades"
Math?
Going from 6 to 7 in an active skill is 56 karma. 6 x 9 is 54. 6 x 10 = 60. So 10 at the shortest. 4 x 14 = 56. So 14 at the highest.
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In Shadowrun, a Ganger with a pistol is just as much a threat at 0 karma as he is with 1000 karma. The only difference generally is in the options you have to remove that ganger. SR has tried to fix the issue that you are talking about when they brought in limits. I think the theory was that if only "X" number of successes counted, then why improve the dice pool exceptionally past that point? (if your limit is 4, why improve your dice pool to 30 for that test?). But that kinda of fell apart when they started including fifteen different options to increase your limits.
And the irony is that increases to dicepools would usually be more appreciated.
Improving an attribute is the new rating x5... which means increasing a weak attribute is easy, but increasing an strong attribute is very hard... just like in real life. Took me a long, LONG time of training to get my reflexes to the point that I could compete in a professional fast draw tournament (like 5 years of practice everyday, for 3 hours a day, 50+ thigh slaps from quick fires, hundreds of split thumbs and jammed wrists.... and I still didn't break the top 50 competitors)
Improving an active Skill is new rating x2.. which makes improving a weaker skill easy, but an established skill harder, again just like real life. I came out of trade school knowing how to do a High Voltage Slice (HVS), it took me THOUSANDS of HVS's to get that down to a 10 minute job that is perfect every time.
Shadowrun tries to mimic the challenges of increasing exceptional attributes and skills, as it is in the real world. And it IS difficult to increase exceptional performance in a human being; Look at the hours a day an Olympic Athlete spends on diet, exercise, training, and technique... They Spend YEARS training for a single event.. and generally only maintain their performance levels, not increase them. (if you loo at athletes that compete Olympic after Olympic, there is generally no increase from the previous year. In fact they usually drop a bit as age takes its toll..) And make no mistake; when you are talking bout increasing an attribute from 5 to 6 or a skill from 7 to 10 range, you're talking Olympic level skill and attribute...
Isn't the rising cost of improvement also supposed to encourage you to diversify your skillset and pick up new qualities? Because after 5 runs, that's certainly what I've observed in my group.
What I find as a bigger problem is how some GMs seem to approach SR world. They seem to have a leveled system mindset when they GM Shadowrun which leads to some..."Strange" constituencies which has several problems.
What I mean by this is that man GMs get into a head space that says to them "If the players can roll 20 dice on an attack, I need to have enemies that can roll 15 to 25 dice to challenge them!" which leads down the road to the gutter punk ganger whose in the top 0.0000000000000000000000001 percentile of the World's elite shooters with his dice pool of 30, "just because"...
I mean, they're right, but they're doing it wrong. If you want your players to face a dicepool of 30, you don't give the ganger a dicepool of 30, you pit your players against a cyberzombie assassin with a dicepool of 30.
Going from 6 to 7 in an active skill is 56 karma.
It's 14 karma. Go read the rulebook again.
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Going from 6 to 7 in an active skill is 56 karma.
It's 14 karma. Go read the rulebook again.
To be fair, the chart is completely unintuitive. I mean you have to subtract the value of the skill rating you are at from the rating of the skill you want to go to.
Good thing we can expect a timely errata to make that clear, huh? :p
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Errata? What's that? I've never heard of such a thing. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go shopping for my 12F Ares Thunderstruck.
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I think flat would get boring too fast, and devaluates the high attribute and high skill characters since they're nothing special.
As it stands, they're already nothing special, because they are almost always NPCs, unless you either start at 200 karma after chargen, or you have been hauling the same character to every Missions event you can get to for a couple years. Might as well say that people having money devalues billionaires. It doesn't really matter if you're on the streets.
"Standard run gives, say, 4-6 karma. That means a blade-focused street sammy needs to save up 10-14 runs worth of karma to go from a 6 to 7 in Blades"
Math?
Going from 6 to 7 in an active skill is 56 karma. 6 x 9 is 54. 6 x 10 = 60. So 10 at the shortest. 4 x 14 = 56. So 14 at the highest.
Methinks you have been cheating your players very severely.
SR5 pg. 104-105
The skill table works on a similar principle, though Active Skill ratings costs are computed at new Rating x 2. If you are purchasing a brand new skill, find the desired rating on the table and pay that cumulative amount. For example, if you are purchasing the running skill for the first time, and are buying it up to Rating 3, you will pay 12 Karma. To go from 7 to 8 in a skill, you will pay 16 Karma (rating 8 x 2 Karma).
It only costs 14 Karma to go from Rating 6 to 7
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Going from 6 to 7 in an active skill is 56 karma. 6 x 9 is 54. 6 x 10 = 60. So 10 at the shortest. 4 x 14 = 56. So 14 at the highest.
Mirikon has over 8000 posts on these boards. That rule failure is so bad I have to wonder if the account has been hacked...
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Mirikon has over 8000 posts on these boards. That rule failure is so bad I have to wonder if the account has been hacked...
I wondered about this also.
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I only have a few issues with the karma system.
1. I think its bad design to have skill groups costing the same as attributes which are skill groups+++
2. Related to 1 I think skills are a smidgen too expensive I think x5 for attributes is pretty good but maybe x1.5 for single skills x3 for groups.
3. I think training times need to die in a fire. It adds nothing to the game and is better represented by role playing use during a game or games.
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I agree with this so much. After so many years of playing I've never had a Fairlight Excalibur, never has a skill at rating 12, never owned an aircraft, never had more than one piece of deltawave, never had a piece of betaware, and so on. It feels boring to have to play 5 sessions to raise body a single point. My group decided to award about 15 karma per run, we actually had progression, but it feels bad to not follow the book. I strongly dislike scaling costs in all rpgs, it's a huge turnoff.
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I think the scaling costs make the game feel more organic. In reality, it takes a long time to master skills to a serious degree, so it makes sense that it isn't easy to do in the game too. I think it is unfortunate that the character creation system encourages min-maxing, but the advancement rules aren't the core issue.
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I think the scaling costs make the game feel more organic. In reality, it takes a long time to master skills to a serious degree, so it makes sense that it isn't easy to do in the game too. I think it is unfortunate that the character creation system encourages min-maxing, but the advancement rules aren't the core issue.
To Mirikon they are a core issue. I've already seen him complain about it during 4e, iirc. I know for sure I've seen complaints in the early days of 5e.
I do think boosting mundanes a bit by decreasing their costs would be nice, because the Mages get bonus dice and bigger oomph from their magic-increases, while the mundane Decker/Rigger tends to lag behind. A Force 10 instead of a Force 6 Spirit and enough quickened spells to have 30 defense dice, while being able to cast powerful magic without care thanks to Centering and increased attributes, is a huge impact (even with downsides) compared to 'I just spend 400 karma on getting +4 dice on all my primary skills with increased skill ranks and increased attributes'. Background Count helped though.
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"Standard run gives, say, 4-6 karma. That means a blade-focused street sammy needs to save up 10-14 runs worth of karma to go from a 6 to 7 in Blades"
Math?
Going from 6 to 7 in an active skill is 56 karma. 6 x 9 is 54. 6 x 10 = 60. So 10 at the shortest. 4 x 14 = 56. So 14 at the highest.
Oh dear, there is a reeeeaaaaaally bad table in the CRB that I think threw you off. To buy a skill up by one point costs 2x the new level. So if you are at 6 and going to 7, it costs you 2x7=14 karma.
I don't have the book in front of me, but I think what it shows is the total cost of going from 0 to n, where n is the new skill level. And indeed 2x(1+2+3+4+5+6+7)=56, so if you have no skill in blades and wish to get to skill 7, it will cost you 56 karma.
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3. I think training times need to die in a fire. It adds nothing to the game and is better represented by role playing use during a game or games.
I'm ok with the balance between suggested karma awards and karma costs for improvements... but I also dislike how training times are executed.
In practice I like the idea of codifying how long it takes, and the meta challenge of aligning a regular group's calendars. Sammy wants to take 8 weeks off to improve unarmed combat, Rigger wants to take a month off to buy a new piloting specialization, but the face rocking a high lifestyle literally can't afford to make rent without taking more paying jobs before the first week of the next month, so the players have to work out some sort of compromise about when they start looking for their next run...
What I really don't like is the implementation on instruction reducing training time. It should reduce the interval, whatever that is, instead of a flat reduction in days. Who the hell cares if you cut 1 day off your training time measured in weeks. If training cut the same interval (days for days, weeks for weeks, etc) per hit it'd be much more attractive. And higher skills/attributes would be more achievable via karma expenditure.
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In practice I like the idea of codifying how long it takes, and the meta challenge of aligning a regular group's calendars. Sammy wants to take 8 weeks off to improve unarmed combat, Rigger wants to take a month off to buy a new piloting specialization, but the face rocking a high lifestyle literally can't afford to make rent without taking more paying jobs before the first week of the next month, so the players have to work out some sort of compromise about when they start looking for their next run...
Me too. There are only two players in my home game, but I made a calender for the past year of game time and its really great for working out when things happen, how much time has elapsed, etc.
What I really don't like is the implementation on instruction reducing training time. It should reduce the interval, whatever that is, instead of a flat reduction in days. Who the hell cares if you cut 1 day off your training time measured in weeks. If training cut the same interval (days for days, weeks for weeks, etc) per hit it'd be much more attractive. And higher skills/attributes would be more achievable via karma expenditure.
Yes. The instruction rules are terrible so I made the following new rules:
Training time for new skills are:
1 Rating * Rating * Days
2 Rating * Rating * Days
3 Rating * Rating * Days
4 Rating * Weeks
5 Rating * Weeks
6 Rating * 2 Weeks
7 Rating * 2 Weeks
8 Rating * 3 Weeks
9 Rating * 3 Weeks
10 Rating * 3 Weeks
11 Rating * 4 Weeks
12 Rating * 4 Weeks
13 Rating * 4 Weeks
Instruction Rules:
1) Instructors can teach up to Rating equal to (Instruction + 3) or their (Skill) whichever is higher.
This allows people with instruction skill to teach anything, while those with skill in something can teach others that skill
2) Instructors roll Instruction once per month (or just once if time is <= 4 weeks) and reduce the time for that period by 5% per success.
Simplifies things greatly and provides a percentage decrease instead of flat number of days.
3a) Tutorsofts have Rating 1-6 and act as Instruction with Rating (NOT x2) in dice and reduce time by 5% per success.
3b) Tutorsofts can only teach up to Rating in skill
Tutorsofts should be a poor substitute for a real teacher. Otherwise why bother getting a live Instructor?
4) Self-teaching is not possible until after Rating 6
Practicing the wrong thing because you don't know what you are doing is not helpful.
5) Ratings 12 and 13 can not be taught by an Instructor
If you want to be legendary you must develop your own way..
NOTE: These training times aren't really "realistic" to learn skills in the real world, but setting the time to learn Skill 12 at 50 years is not going to work for an RPG.
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For my table, my view of training times is a little special:
If its a skill that you use a fair bit, I don't require training times as I see it as a natural evolution of your use of the skill (and if I am requiring a roll, its more then a causal usage).
Knowledge skills can be "Trained" a head of time through general off time interest. ("My character stays on top on economic developments by reading the Business and Finance media")
However, for new active skills, I do require training. A smart player will decide on a skill and let me know they are planning to pick it up, then they MAY be able to work in some "on the job practice" that could reduce the training time :P
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3. I think training times need to die in a fire. It adds nothing to the game and is better represented by role playing use during a game or games.
I'm ok with the balance between suggested karma awards and karma costs for improvements... but I also dislike how training times are executed.
In practice I like the idea of codifying how long it takes, and the meta challenge of aligning a regular group's calendars. Sammy wants to take 8 weeks off to improve unarmed combat, Rigger wants to take a month off to buy a new piloting specialization, but the face rocking a high lifestyle literally can't afford to make rent without taking more paying jobs before the first week of the next month, so the players have to work out some sort of compromise about when they start looking for their next run...
What I really don't like is the implementation on instruction reducing training time. It should reduce the interval, whatever that is, instead of a flat reduction in days. Who the hell cares if you cut 1 day off your training time measured in weeks. If training cut the same interval (days for days, weeks for weeks, etc) per hit it'd be much more attractive. And higher skills/attributes would be more achievable via karma expenditure.
I don't see the value add to a I guess i wont being playing next week rules. Yeah, maybe the team works out some deal but there comes a point where i need 4 months off or some other ridiculous amount and there isn't a great way to wiggle around it.
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Well the training time doesn't need to be uninterrupted completely, just "reasonably" uninterrupted. If your karma expenditure requires 2 months of training, you CAN still go on a certain number of training-interrupting escapades, such as Shadowruns. You just don't get benefit of the expenditure until the total time elapses.
Making it challenging to align everyone's (in-universe) calendars makes for Fun imo. Making it too difficult however is an unfun exercise in book-keeping... I suppose where the line lies between the two is in the eye of the beholder.
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Sure for short runs its just a small interruption and you are back to training, but I've done plenty of runs where I'm sending the team to other cities for weeks on end. Which I'd generally say falls under the longer interruptions where you have to start over time frame.Maybe the player can work out some way they are training while n the job or something, but maybe not. Even if its a small run and its only a speed bump and doesn't slow things down, who wants to earn 20 karma spend it but not see the benefit of spending it for 5 or 6 more runs where they earned another 30 karma.
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F-training time. Montage it, play some sweet 80's montage music and move on. lol
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F-training time. Montage it, play some sweet 80's montage music and move on. lol
There's also that. The way SRM does training, you just keep your own calendar that only synchs up with other peoples' if your character is doing downtime stuff for/with them. Unlimited time just ends up being unlimited lifestyle payments.
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F-training time. Montage it, play some sweet 80's montage music and move on. lol
I can understand that sentiment, but for me.. I run a fairly non-traditional game with only 2 players (currently).
Most of the time, training and "Working for the People" are turned into small adventures in themselves.
For my table, my view of training times is a little special:
If its a skill that you use a fair bit, I don't require training times as I see it as a natural evolution of your use of the skill (and if I am requiring a roll, its more then a causal usage).
Knowledge skills can be "Trained" a head of time through general off time interest. ("My character stays on top on economic developments by reading the Business and Finance media")
However, for new active skills, I do require training. A smart player will decide on a skill and let me know they are planning to pick it up, then they MAY be able to work in some "on the job practice" that could reduce the training time :P
I agree with this as well... sometimes advance in skill is just organic (and its an easy way to play it).
Something like Perception I don't make anyone train.
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If there is something to be gained narratively or players have fun with it, then by all means. But if its just holding up the fun then forget it.
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High reward and rapid progression is important for zero-to-hero games like D&D, where you start with a fairly incompetent character, and really need to get a bit better if you want to survive. In Shadowrun and many other skill-based systems, you already start out very competent, and you don't really need advancement. At least in my experience. When character creation is done, I've got a character that I want to play, not a character that I first need to get to level 5 before I can get access to my signature abilities.
In fact, even in D&D many players feel like advancement is not so important anymore after a certain level. For D&D 3.5, a lot of people felt level 6 was roughly the sweet spot, and some introduced the Epic6 house rule: once you reach level 6, you're Epic and don't advance in levels anymore. You can still get feats I believe, but no levels beyond 6.
In Shadowrun, you already start at level 6. Level 5 maybe. GURPS is the same thing. I once played a GURPS campaign that had no character advancement at all. It was fine. Fantastic campaign, all focused on the story, rather than grabbing XP for extra power.
Going from 6 to 7 in an active skill is 56 karma. 6 x 9 is 54. 6 x 10 = 60. So 10 at the shortest. 4 x 14 = 56. So 14 at the highest.
Mirikon has over 8000 posts on these boards. That rule failure is so bad I have to wonder if the account has been hacked...
You don't want to know how badly my group interpreted some advancement rules when we were playing Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay as teenagers. Sometimes people don't read a rule correctly, latch on to a wrong interpretation, and never bother to check it for years.
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High reward and rapid progression is important for zero-to-hero games like D&D, where you start with a fairly incompetent character, and really need to get a bit better if you want to survive. In Shadowrun and many other skill-based systems, you already start out very competent, and you don't really need advancement. At least in my experience. When character creation is done, I've got a character that I want to play, not a character that I first need to get to level 5 before I can get access to my signature abilities.
You're entitled to your opinion and all, but I've found my post-gen improvements to be key to completing the runs I've gone on. Mind you, I haven't actually improved any of my major dicepools yet. It's just that picking up a few more skills, qualities, pieces of gear and improving the gear you already have goes a long way in giving you more options and better options to deal with whatever you encounter.
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I only have a few issues with the karma system.
1. I think its bad design to have skill groups costing the same as attributes which are skill groups+++
2. Related to 1 I think skills are a smidgen too expensive I think x5 for attributes is pretty good but maybe x1.5 for single skills x3 for groups.
RE 1:
Well, as it stands, most skill groups have 3 skills. So, you actually SAVE karma on improving the skill group as opposed to 3 separate skills.
Raising the Athletics Group from 5 to 6 costs 30 karma.. Raising the 3 skills separately would cost 36 karma... a savings of 6 karma! And if you happen to grab a 4 skill group, even more savings.
RE2: The issue with a 1.5 rating is that at points, you are losing out on karma... every time you raised a skill to an odd level, you are losing a .5 karma as you have to round up.
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RE 1:
Well, as it stands, most skill groups have 3 skills. So, you actually SAVE karma on improving the skill group as opposed to 3 separate skills.
Raising the Athletics Group from 5 to 6 costs 30 karma.. Raising the 3 skills separately would cost 36 karma... a savings of 6 karma! And if you happen to grab a 4 skill group, even more savings.
You're missing his point entirely. Yes, buying a skill group is cheaper than buying the 3 or 4 skills separately, but it's the same cost as boosting an attribute, which increases the dicepool for more than 4 skills (except for Strength, Body and Willpower) while also having a number of other benefits.
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RE 1:
Well, as it stands, most skill groups have 3 skills. So, you actually SAVE karma on improving the skill group as opposed to 3 separate skills.
Raising the Athletics Group from 5 to 6 costs 30 karma.. Raising the 3 skills separately would cost 36 karma... a savings of 6 karma! And if you happen to grab a 4 skill group, even more savings.
You're missing his point entirely. Yes, buying a skill group is cheaper than buying the 3 or 4 skills separately, but it's the same cost as boosting an attribute, which increases the dicepool for more than 4 skills (except for Strength, Body and Willpower) while also having a number of other benefits.
Speaking as a Devil's Advocate... OTOH karma spent on skills gives you skill ranks and karma spent on attributes doesn't give you skill ranks. It may work out to be the number of dice for the test, but there's a difference when Leadership/Teamwork comes into play.
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I've found my post-gen improvements to be key to completing the runs I've gone on. Mind you, I haven't actually improved any of my major dicepools yet. It's just that picking up a few more skills, qualities, pieces of gear and improving the gear you already have goes a long way in giving you more options and better options to deal with whatever you encounter.
Oh, absolutely. I do enjoy increasing stuff, and in particular branching out into skills I neglected at chargen but really kinda wanted to punt a few points in as well. But it doesn't need the steep power climb the way D&D does, and if I had to play with my starting character unchanged, that wouldn't be a big problem for me.
RE 1:
Well, as it stands, most skill groups have 3 skills. So, you actually SAVE karma on improving the skill group as opposed to 3 separate skills.
Raising the Athletics Group from 5 to 6 costs 30 karma.. Raising the 3 skills separately would cost 36 karma... a savings of 6 karma! And if you happen to grab a 4 skill group, even more savings.
You save some, but not a lot. An attribute is generally a better investment, and you wouldn't lose much if you had to buy the skills separately. A skill group only really makes sense if all three skills in it are equally important to you.
I think skill groups for 4 karma would make a lot of sense.
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Attributes cap faster though. So giving a discount on something because of another thing that caps faster, and with some skills going split on attributes (or because they're Magic-tied), seems bad.
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I wish they would do more with skill level to make it more important than just raw stat. It just seems you get punished for high skill + mediocre stat over high stat vs low skill. The high stat always gives you more utility, PLUS the total dice pool (especially since most high stats seem to be determined right at creation due to efficiency..), mostly its on the secondary skill tree monkey (for instance super high agility, then taking 1 skill rank in all groups and throwing 10+ dice). Maybe make skill help counter certain penalties (or negate certain opposed roll bonuses). That way under perfect conditions the 2 builds are equal, but under duress or difficulty the high skill guy compensates. I dunno...
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I wish they would do more with skill level to make it more important than just raw stat. It just seems you get punished for high skill + mediocre stat over high stat vs low skill. The high stat always gives you more utility, PLUS the total dice pool (especially since most high stats seem to be determined right at creation due to efficiency..), mostly its on the secondary skill tree monkey (for instance super high agility, then taking 1 skill rank in all groups and throwing 10+ dice). Maybe make skill help counter certain penalties (or negate certain opposed roll bonuses). That way under perfect conditions the 2 builds are equal, but under duress or difficulty the high skill guy compensates. I dunno...
That is certainly a good observation.
Off the top of my head it seems like one thing you could do is adjust limits base on skill (i.e. - higher skill = higher limit, but higher stat != higher limit)
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The couple of places where skill level matters (as opposed to dice pool) are:
- on team work, where the dice you can gain is limited to your skill. It doesn't matter much on some skills, but does quite a bit on others.
- block and parry actions in melee combat (granted that I've seen that come up once in my playing so far)
I like that sort of incentive to develop some skill over things that just say 'skills are better than stats'
Now, if we could lower the total number of skills, that would lower the incentive to just have one point in so many skills.
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The couple of places where skill level matters (as opposed to dice pool) are:
- on team work, where the dice you can gain is limited to your skill. It doesn't matter much on some skills, but does quite a bit on others.
- block and parry actions in melee combat (granted that I've seen that come up once in my playing so far)
I like that sort of incentive to develop some skill over things that just say 'skills are better than stats'
Now, if we could lower the total number of skills, that would lower the incentive to just have one point in so many skills.
Leadership is a second skill though (but yes you are correct, but that seems pretty small tradeoff, beides those with 6+ skill rarely need the leadership boost most of the time). And what do you mean block and parry? UNless I am missing something, they introduce your physical limit, not your skill (counterstrike has a weird synergy to skill level though, but it's not a good use of action economy, so there is that...)
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Now, if we could lower the total number of skills, that would lower the incentive to just have one point in so many skills.
Never understood that strategy... Why waist the karma or SP on a bunch of 1 point skills? Either the skill is worth having at a decent level that Glitching is not an issue (3+), or you can default if really have to do it..
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Eh... if you've got some high attribute(s), there's little reason to NOT put a point into every skill linked with that attribute. Especially if you're a mundane with Jack of All Trades. That one skill rank is a 2 dice advantage over defaulting, and 1 + an awesome stat is sometimes enough of a dice pool anyway to get a job done.
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The couple of places where skill level matters (as opposed to dice pool) are:
- on team work, where the dice you can gain is limited to your skill. It doesn't matter much on some skills, but does quite a bit on others.
- block and parry actions in melee combat (granted that I've seen that come up once in my playing so far)
I like that sort of incentive to develop some skill over things that just say 'skills are better than stats'
Now, if we could lower the total number of skills, that would lower the incentive to just have one point in so many skills.
Leadership is a second skill though (but yes you are correct, but that seems pretty small tradeoff, beides those with 6+ skill rarely need the leadership boost most of the time). And what do you mean block and parry? UNless I am missing something, they introduce your physical limit, not your skill (counterstrike has a weird synergy to skill level though, but it's not a good use of action economy, so there is that...)
Block/parry add your skill rank, right?
I prefer Agile Defender though. But with Agility capped at chargen, I need to invest in the skills instead.
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I've GM'd over 100 sessions for my players at this point and we kind of change the game as we go, making adjustments so that the game makes sense but stays fun as well.
One of the very first things we did away with was Training Times. Instead I give the players 2 weeks of downtime after every run. Each week they can increase a stat -or- a skill, but not both, and no limitations on Knowledge Skill increases.
That being said, I do agree that STAT costs are fine at x5, but all too often I found my players stuck with low skills or missing important ones altogether. To help alleviate that, I redesigned how TutorSofts work.
Now, Tutorsofts are a commlink module that must be chosen for a specific skill at purchase and only go to Rating 3. A commlink must be of the same rating of the soft to be compatible.
The player must then vocalize at the beginning of a session that they are using the Tutorsoft in their commlink, then attempt the relevant skill an unspecified number of times that session. If they do it right, they can purchase the next rank of that skill using a discounted karma value equal to the rating. Tutorsofts also stop being educational/beneficial at skill rank 6.
Example: StreetSamX wants to buy Sneak from 4 to 5 using this method. Normally the cost would be 10 (5 x 2) but using a R3 Tutorsoft he gets to drop the cost to 7.
Prior to this I'd NEVER seen anyone even consider buying a tutorsoft. At $1,200 a pop for a rank 3, its all the rage.
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The couple of places where skill level matters (as opposed to dice pool) are:
- on team work, where the dice you can gain is limited to your skill. It doesn't matter much on some skills, but does quite a bit on others.
- block and parry actions in melee combat (granted that I've seen that come up once in my playing so far)
I like that sort of incentive to develop some skill over things that just say 'skills are better than stats'
Now, if we could lower the total number of skills, that would lower the incentive to just have one point in so many skills.
Leadership is a second skill though (but yes you are correct, but that seems pretty small tradeoff, beides those with 6+ skill rarely need the leadership boost most of the time). And what do you mean block and parry? UNless I am missing something, they introduce your physical limit, not your skill (counterstrike has a weird synergy to skill level though, but it's not a good use of action economy, so there is that...)
Block/parry add your skill rank, right?
I prefer Agile Defender though. But with Agility capped at chargen, I need to invest in the skills instead.
True, limited use again. (and it still is physical limit, not skill limit that is introduced p188 melee defense rules), but introduces a limit, which can be sub-optimal vs All Out Defense (more on that in a sec). But that still leaves gun skill in the cold even more... And as you yourself stated - most would rather pick up agile defender (because if you have 6 skill ranks, you probably have 6+ agility since that was your focus) or just all out defense(willpower, cause its higher then a 1 I hope) if you had low skills and not introduce a limit at all... But that is artificially constraining what I meant over all, as my implications was refering to the side effect of secondary skills (high agi + low skill pick up to be jack of all trades, and be good at it, vs the dedicated average or lower agi + high skill). And I realize a lot comes down to munchkin/power-gaming... But it sucks that when your skill rank 6, rolls the same dice as 1 skill point wonder, who also has every other side skill in addition... unfortunately the game punishes you for sub-optimal choices due to this.
Too use weapon skill (it easily transfers to other skills, but this is easier to state for me), I believe that natural skill can take you far, under laboratory conditions, but skill should give you the edge under real world conditions (i.e. wind adjustment, leading target, bullet drop... ect). So yes in an indoor shooting range with good lighting/no wind, non-moving target, ect.., okay natural wonder is just as accurate. But outside, the high skill understands the variables that now come into play (lighting, foreseeing where the target may be going, adjust for wind/range... ect). But under the current system, both are equal. That's why I kind of would like a system where skill plays a more predominate role, especially for maybe being able to ignore some penalties, but not giving a bonus over the natural wonder when all things are equal... It discourages the single point in every skill build that slings ridiculous dice in everything related to that stat (read: too much bang for your buck, aka 1 stat wonder that can do it all with every skill).
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I've wanted to see changes to the SR advancement system since 1E as its always been a very very VERY slow system.
Not that it should be like D&D since as someone mentioned these are not 1st Level noobs at chargen.
But something a bit easier to see some progression to be sure.
Knowledge Skills = 5x INT+LOG to give you a broader knowledge base at Chargen.
Active Skills can substitute in for a Logic Skill covering the Active Skill (Not all editions did this but some did) So FireArms is both your active skill but also your knowledge of Firearms.
Remove Karma from Advancing Knowledge Skills - You get the Bigger Bonus to start & then you learn 1 new skill point after each completed Run.
Active Skills = New Rank * 1 Karma
Skill Groups = New Rank * 2 Karma
JoaTs new function to reduce Skill Group Cost by 1/2 for the first 3 ranks and it caps at 3 w/o ever going to a penalty at 4+ (It is a Positive Quality after all) It allows you to learn the "basics" across a broad range (group) but not go high or on specific skills.
Attributes = New Rank *3 Karma
Special Attributes = New Rank *4 Karma
Karma Rewards:
I'd like to see the "Participation/Survival/Roleplaying/Difficulty" rewards go out every single session, not per run.
I'd also like to see the "Achievement" rewards increased in size. (Most of them are +1 per "Goal" and it would be nice to see that doubled)
So a typical scenario that takes 2-3 sessions and would be 8 karma (5 goals + 3 participation) gets turned into 16-19 (Maxed) if all rewards were given out but probably an average of 12ish.
When I combine more karma w/ lower advancement costs I see a 12-15 Karma reward & think they can upgrade 1 low end attribute or 2 skills or 1 skill and a spell, etc etc after a 3 session long run.
They also get to pick 1 knowledge/language skill & increase it 1 rank.
Which seems a bit better than a 2 session run that gives you 5 karma, not enough for any upper end skill & barely qualifies for a spell.
As for Training times, I think its important to remember that while Missions has you taking entire weeks OFF, & everyone tracks separate calendars, that in a home campaign the downtime isn't AWAY time.... that your "downtime" is what your doing 8 hours a day that isn't Shadow Running Oriented Stuff or Sleeping. At least that is the way I read it. I'm practicing those firearms once a week at the range & I'm working out at the Gym 3-4 a week while I work on increasing STR & Pistols. And after several weeks then I can pay for that advancement after a few runs of Karma have built up. You don't STOP doing runs while your training. That would be like saying I stay at my job 15 hours a day & never have time to go to school at night or work out or read a book or ANYTHING that isn't running & sleep.
I'm torn on Limits & Skill Level issues.
I've tried to think of how to handle making skill checks be Skill*2 + Attribute but then you have to come up w/ a different "defense test"
I would like to see Limits utilize all the attributes & have the skill be modified in there too somehow as it makes no sense to me that Agility isn't somehow a limiter in a dancing skill check.
Hmm, Maybe change limits to use the actual skill as well as 4 attributes (1 double) and divide by 4?
So Sneaking-6 + Agility-5 + Reaction-4 + Strength-3 + Body-3 = 6+5+4+3*2+3 = 24 / 4 = 6 Limit? V/S the existing limit of 5
IDK, I'd have to toy with it for a bit but that seems better than STR being such a major factor in everything AGI based.
Social would include Intuition & Skill
Mental would add Double Skill maybe as raw knowledge trumps in Mental tests?
Anyway those are my thoughts.
I'd like to see advancement be faster w/o going to all Level 12 skills & 6 attributes & living a luxury lifestyle inside a campaign year.
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Karma Rewards:
I'd like to see the "Participation/Survival/Roleplaying/Difficulty" rewards go out every single session, not per run.
I'd also like to see the "Achievement" rewards increased in size. (Most of them are +1 per "Goal" and it would be nice to see that doubled)
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This is EXACTLY what we do at our table. I try to make every run fit within our allotted time, but we've streamlined the ever-living CRAP out of some of the rules. If we dont finish the run, I still give Karma for everyone playing well and doing what they do. This does not impact the final reward, and tends to keep everyone happy.
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I give rewards every session as well. But this is generally because there is something karma worthy happening in every session. (Remember, we don't play missions at my table).
And really if something karma worthy is happening, why not award it at the end of the session? Keeps the GM bookkeeping down, keeps the player gravy flowing, and makes them feel like they accompished something that seesion..
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I think I only had 2 runs ever that took 2 sessions each, and that was when I converted 4 OU Missions into a short campaign of 6 sessions where we had maybe 2.5h per session with all-newbies. The real 52-session campaign was 52 runs as well.
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our table typically takes 2-4 sessions to do a "run".
but then we're in a humungous campaign with multipart runs
very different from the simple fedex type 4 hour irl runs you get from missions.
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I'm definitely in favour of rewards per run and not per session. Don't feel like you're getting karma fast enough? Stop faffing about and do the job. It's an incentive not to spend eternity in the planning and legwork phase. For me and mine, that carrot has always worked well. Even with it in place it can be too easy for some groups to get into a slog of paranoid over-preparation that takes up multiple sessions of what is basically five characters sitting around a table talking. So I'll take what I can get.
The topic of training times is one that is often on my mind. I dislike the rules in principle. In practice I started running a campaign without them and in the space of around one month of game time, the characters had been on approximate ten runs, earned over 50k nuyen and were sitting around 70 karma or so total. I had made lifestyle costs pretty much meaningless. Even spacing out the runs further resulted in "No calls from a Fixer? Okay, guys, let's make our own run to steal something valuable and fence it."
I reinstated training times and now characters must decide whether or not to put time into getting work and earning money, or on eating through their savings and building up their skill set. Or maybe they'll go get some new cyberware installed and spend that time recovering from the surgery while the mage initiates. I told my players I expected them to be cooperative and courteous and plan to spend karma at the same time whenever possible so everyone is either running or training, and nobody complained because that's just good manners.
I'm still not happy with the rules. Mostly it irks me that you can spend as much time as you like shooting bronze dead with your pistol and somehow never learn anything until you take a week off to attend Pistol classes at the community centre. I'm working to find a house rule that strikes the right balance, but it's not there yet.
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Let us know when you got some ideas you want to toss around. I want to start a single-season campaign at some point, but if it turns into a double-season training times will become very important.
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Well let me think out loud and share where I am at. The rules must meet particular requirements:
1. Still require characters to have some downtime to spend karma, ensuring they have one more thing to juggle in their lives and keep their lifestyle clock counting down. Being a runner is not meant to be easy or cheap.
2. Must reflect the benefit of actual field practice for whatever trait is being trained. Teachers and teaching software also still benefit.
3. Shadowrun has plenty of rules already and any new rules or rules adjustments should be small for convenience.
4. Fit around the current karma spending rules so if something is added in later books it is easy to include in the modifications.
5. Should not get in the way of the wonderful roleplaying and story opportunities that downtime provides.
With that established, I am currently considering the following addenda:
1. All training times are measured in a number of days. A day is approx 10 hours of work.
2. Training times do not need to be consecutive. If characters find they are in a position where all the legwork for a job is done but they need to wait two days for a contact to deliver crucial gear for the mission, they can spend those two waiting days on training.
3. Whenever a player makes a skill check and fails, reduce the training time for that skill by X to a minmum of Y. Runners learn the most from their failures.
Further considerations:
Attributes. Do players choose if their failed roll contributes to training the skill or attribute rolled? Do they benefit from both? Are attributes only benefitted by atteibute only rolls? Or some other mechanic?
Should success count and not failure? One sees good runners get better and skills increase faster with time. The other has diminishing returns and higher skills take longer. That makes more sense to my gut. Does it encourage diversity?
Can characters pick up the basics just by doing or must the first skill point always be trained?
That is where I am at.
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Got to be careful not to introduce a scenario where players deliberately take penalties or get hit just to help boost their training times... I rather disliked that in Star Trek, you were encouraged to make up excuses to roll a lot so that you could claim training.
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Got to be careful not to introduce a scenario where players deliberately take penalties or get hit just to help boost their training times... I rather disliked that in Star Trek, you were encouraged to make up excuses to roll a lot so that you could claim training.
True! Another thing to consider! And while such an exploit might be handled table by table, I should include in the requirements that the rule be broadly applicable. I do not think that a rule that is only functional because of how I personally run a game is a well crafted rule.
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I'm not sure how Star Wars works but if it is at all like the Basic Role Playing system where characters make a roll at the end of every session to see if any skills they used are increased, and so the only way to increase skills is through rolling them, then I think the existence of Karma might create an inherent limitation on abusing the system. Because no matter how much you roll and reduce training time, you still have to spend Karma, so there's not a lot of utility in looking to roll all your low skills as often as possible.
But a possible solution to this potential abuse is to limit it to once per session. Not once per session per skill, but once per session at all. So the Street Samurai can't spend the whole session firing at the hardest to hit targets with his worst weapon and skill to claim it as training (and that's an obnoxious way to play a group game), he can only benefit from that once. And the Rigger can't keep speaking over the Face to make negotiation rolls to try and build that up, because if she does, she can't train her piloting rolls at all that session. Narratively, the once per session limit can be described as the character not just failing, but considering their failure and reflecting on it, which they can't do for every single misstep along the way. If the mage is thinking about why their spell didn't work, they're by exclusion not thinking about what they did wrong when they were sneaking.
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Depends which Star Wars RPG you mean - that's not how d6SW (the WEG product) works.
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Depends which Star Wars RPG you mean - that's not how d6SW (the WEG product) works.
The one I played a few times apparently had 'if you succeed at a roll, you get to do an improvement-chance roll at the end of the session'.
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Depends which Star Wars RPG you mean - that's not how d6SW (the WEG product) works.
My bad, I meant Star Trek.
The one I played a few times apparently had 'if you succeed at a roll, you get to do an improvement-chance roll at the end of the session'.
Yeah, that's more or less how Chaosium's BRP (the basis of Call of Cthulhu and Runequest) system works. As I say, I think the necessity of karma still makes looking for lots of opportunities to roll largely pointless and then restricting it to once a session furthers that.