Upward, upward, upward

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lumpley

  • 1293
Upward, upward, upward
« on: June 11, 2010, 09:12:55 AM »
I'm hoping we can keep the idea of Qualities that accumulate values over the course of the game...

Oh oh oh! I have an idea!

...But it's going to take a little more construction to express than I thought it would. Be back soon.

-Vincent

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lumpley

  • 1293
Re: Upward, upward, upward
« Reply #1 on: June 11, 2010, 11:11:31 AM »
My idea is: stat strata. At the start of play, in Newgate, all your stats are in the least stratum, stratum 0. You climb up the strata, stat by stat, over time. A stat stratum goes from -1 to +3.

At the start of play you might have:
Dangerous+2 (stratum 0)
Watchful-1 (stratum 0)
Persuasive+1 (stratum 0)
Shadowy+3 (stratum 0)

Then say you do the shadowy thing and earn +1Shadowy. Now you have:
Dangerous+2 (stratum 0)
Watchful-1 (stratum 0)
Persuasive+1 (stratum 0)
Shadowy-1 (stratum 1)

When you go up to the next stratum in a stat:

a. You get access to new moves. Going up to stratum 1 in Shadowy, for instance, gives you "to sneak out of Newgate Prison, roll+Shadowy..."

b. It represents a concrete change in your circumstances, demeanor, and reputation. People can tell your strata by looking at you. You can tell theirs by looking at them.

c. Acting below your current stratum becomes easy, but acting in your current stratum is more rewarding. Like, I haven't been scared of urchins for a long time, but when the opportunity arises for me to steal their silk scraps, I pass it by. I can buy all the silk I need, now, by beating up people who aren't beneath me.

Does acting below your stratum count as stat+4? That might be perfect.

Acting in the stratum immediately above yours can probably just count as stat-2, and acting further above that as stat-3.

There's my idea! Now that I've written it out, it seems awfully obvious.

-Vincent

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lumpley

  • 1293
Re: Upward, upward, upward
« Reply #2 on: June 11, 2010, 11:28:30 AM »
Another possibility is that when you act below your current stratum, your moves have a 12+ clause:

To beat someone up, roll+dangerous.
On a 10+, you beat them up. Congratulations.
On a 7-9, you beat them up, but they black your eye for you too.
On a miss, they beat you up.

On a 12+ and below your stratum, it's not so much that you beat them up, that was never the question, it's that you hold them down and make them cry. You get +1ongoing against them, forever and in any domain.

That's kind of neat. Maybe you still roll+3 below your stratum, maybe you roll+4, we'd have to think about that.

-Vincent
« Last Edit: June 11, 2010, 03:16:55 PM by John Harper »

Re: Upward, upward, upward
« Reply #3 on: June 11, 2010, 03:01:35 PM »
This is a very fine idea. I like the cut of its jib.

I think you roll +3 below your stratum, but maybe there's no miss result? So you have 12+, 10+, and 7-or-less results.

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lumpley

  • 1293
Re: Upward, upward, upward
« Reply #4 on: June 11, 2010, 03:05:05 PM »
Oh! Great. Yeah.

-Vincent

Re: Upward, upward, upward
« Reply #5 on: June 11, 2010, 04:10:01 PM »
Oh. That Knife & Candle! Oh dear.
♥ Julia