Respecs.
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Some of this depends on the system, like many things.
Like, somebody stuck with a permanent leg wrack tilt in CoD might want to drop that Expression.BallroomDancing spec after a while. Yeah, they still know how, and how they became unable to use it is IC, but it's still now a waste of points that's additional OOC suckage for the player on top of the IC suckage of the tilt.
Oh fucking well.
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@ganymede I largely agree with this but would add an exception or two.. Goblin markets and perhaps occasional cases of 'My character was a total nerd but has since abandoned that life to become a dance painter (imagine ballet with brushes on your toes) and not using my smarts these days I am rusty, please let me refund a single point of academics for the xp back so i may spend it elsewhere.
I dont really like full respecs at all.
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Like many others, I'm in favor of allowing respecs--with restrictions.
First of all, I would allow significant respecs within the first couple of weeks a character has been in existence, because we've all had that moment where we realized that we totally forgot Gunnery on our Viper pilot and somehow it slipped past Staff too (or more realistically, when we later see that someone has a Tactics background skill and our character has been described as tactically-inclined). So long as the skill(s) being lowered haven't been the focus of a scene on-grid or aren't the "core" of the character (definitions may vary, Staff's definition wins), I don't have any problems with them changing.
Secondly, I agree that if the system ever changes dramatically, respects in the areas that changed should be allowed (again, so long as they don't wildly change the character's core).
Thirdly, if it's a minor side-note on the character that's never come up (my character happens to be able to play the violin a little, but it's never been mentioned before) and the player wants to change that minor side-note to a different minor side-note (I'd like my character to be able to dance a little rather than play the violin), I've got no problem.
I don't think that major changes to character capabilities should be allowed (the character was a swordsman before, now they're a bowman? What? Or even worse, now they're a politician who can't fight at all?) unless they're triggered by something IC (possession, massive head trauma, I don't know... a creative player can usually find an excuse, but there should be one).
If one of these tweaks causes them to become slightly more mechanically powerful? Meh, don't care. If it changes them from a pushover in the system (which they were by choice rather than my lack of system knowledge) into a badass? Naw, I'd say that significantly changes their character... put in the time and spend XP to get there.
I also think that there should either be a limit to the number of times someone can respec, or a "cooldown" before they can do it again, and that cooldown should be relatively long (I like @Sunny's 6 months).
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@surreality said in Respecs.:
Like, somebody stuck with a permanent leg wrack tilt in CoD might want to drop that Expression.BallroomDancing spec after a while.
No dice. That bitch should've had my money.
I don't think it's fair to let someone dodge IC consequences with a re-spec, and that seems to be what you're suggesting.
I'm with Wretched in that minor tweaks based on circumstances should be permissible, but when I think "re-spec," I think of major stat shifts and changes.
“It is better to live doing the things that you like. It is foolish to live within this dream of a world seeing unpleasantness and doing only things that you do not like.” -- Yamamoto Tsunetomo.
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@surreality said in Respecs.:
Like, somebody stuck with a permanent leg wrack tilt in CoD might want to drop that Expression.BallroomDancing spec after a while. Yeah, they still know how, and how they became unable to use it is IC, but it's still now a waste of points that's additional OOC suckage for the player on top of the IC suckage of the tilt.
I think that is different though, and would classify it more under a sanctity-of-merits clause - where you never spend XP on something that can be simply taken from you and waste those XP - than a respec.
It makes sense from a wider perspective of not punishing characters for accepting in-game setbacks, too; sure, I might be upset my SL4 model had a glass full of acid thrown in his face, but I could get excited about the possibilities for growth and RP from that, and it sweetens the pot if I had the XP back to invest in something else.
A common case for respecs was the nWoD 1.0 CGen freebie points. Someone who knows how to use them could save obscene amounts of XP by using them to max stats compared to another who'd try to make the exact same PC but 'misuse' those points then have to buy up the traits with XP in game.
Another, using that same system, was people who didn't realize how powerful fighting styles were - if you and I both made gunslingers but you bought CM5 and I didn't, your character would be waaay more effective than mine. That's easily something a newbie wouldn't realize until much later, and 30 XP aren't easy to just come by.
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@ganymede What Arkandel said.
Someone playing out the consequences of it means they're no longer a star ballroom dancer, and isn't ballroom dancing any more, and has all the other persistent mechanical penalties of leg wrack.
Losing the XP spent on it is punishing the player by forcing them to keep something that is no longer valid on their sheet, not inflicting consequences on a character.
Bear in mind, I think WoD/CoD has a lot of cognitive dissonance on this front; they have sanctity of merits, but in most of their setups, things like integrity/etc. can be bought up but lost IC (and the XP wasted) as well. (Edit: WtF2's Harmony is the exception here, and is more sensible a mechanic from my perspective.) I favor actual common sense on this front: if there's IC means of losing it, there should be IC means of gaining it back; throwing XP into the mix in any way muddies the waters and is internally inconsistent.
Oh fucking well.
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@surreality said in Respecs.:
Losing the XP spent on it is punishing the player by forcing them to keep something that is no longer valid on their sheet, not inflicting consequences on a character.
I don't see it as a punishment though. This ties into my general view of viewing XP as a part of the character not an OOC reward. YMMV. For me it's no different than taking points in "Demolitions" but never actually getting into a scene where you get to blow stuff up. Your character still knows the thing, and who knows - your ballroom dancing knowledge may come up in some way even though you can't shake it like you used to.
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@faraday I'd personally toss a character under those circumstances. If I designed a thing that could no longer do what they specialized in again, and they could not be reshaped into something else -- even if it's over some reasonable period of time -- there would be no worthwhile story to be had on that character any longer entirely aside from it being the doubled blow of 'not what I intended to play'; their story would be 'is miserable their life was wasted' barring the most exceptional circumstances, and I think we all get more than enough of that RL much of the time.
I'd make something else, probably after hoofing it off that game faster than the roadrunner.
Oh fucking well.
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@surreality Ok? I never said they couldn’t be reshaped.. that’s what new XP is for. Just that you shouldn’t get an XP refund just because something bad happened to your char.
Like... if you were a top notch fighter pilot and lost your wings, that sounds like a really interesting story to me about adaptation and growth. But I can also see how somebody might be really really keen on playing that particular concept and just want to reroll. To each their own.
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@faraday Thing is, all the pilot needs in various systems is somebody else to fly for. (Depends on the setting, obviously.)
WoD also really forces a lot of hyper-specialization, which is factor, too. To be very good at your special thing, you pretty much suck at everything, or nearly everything, else. You really are pretty much stuck with 'pick ONE'.
There are a number of things that can, system-wise, completely change or invalidate a character. There's a bunch of social fu or superpowers that can, according to the system, completely remake someone else's character with a dice roll (or sometimes a few). I find this equally crappy. Every player makes the character they want to play, and if it's not a character they're interested in playing any more, and it can't be remade into something interesting?
Not getting the chance to do one's specialization is different from 'you no longer get to play the character you were excited about playing because the dice say it will now never happen and cannot ever happen'.
Attrition is a realistic thing, too. Most systems don't do much with it, but I can assure you that, having not drawn in 20 years, I would certainly not draw as well today as I did 20 years ago by miles because I, like the hypothetical dancer concept character, am not doing that regularly any more. My skill is not frozen forever as it was at its highest point. If I was still investing the same amount of time in drawing as I once did, I wouldn't know many of the things I know today, but I would probably be a little better at drawing than I was then. If someone's not maintaining their skill level because it's impossible for them to do it, yes, it will realistically atrophy, but that means there's now time for other things, many of which, since someone's learning them at an entry level -- sometimes out of urgent necessity -- they would learn more rapidly than most XP gain setups are designed to represent.
Oh fucking well.
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@surreality said in Respecs.:
WoD also really forces a lot of hyper-specialization, which is factor, too. To be very good at your special thing, you pretty much suck at everything, or nearly everything, else. You really are pretty much stuck with 'pick ONE'.
I don't really agree with this, i think gamer min max culture has more to do with it seeming like it's like that than it is.
A single success is a success. A skill at 3 is 'you are a professional in this skill' an attribute at 3 is you are /good/ in that area. Dex 3 int 3 medicine 3 is a damned good doctor, add bonuses for tools and operating rooms and whatever, you are almost guaranteed a success MOST of the time.
The way it tends to work on MUs however is 'Damnit i don't have 5's in every trait and 45 dice in this area and i wont get an average of 7 successes every time.. GOD I SUCK.
Sorry tangential peeve, carry on.
Edit:My point being is there is plenty of room to have many skills if you dont insist on being 'the very best surgeon on the planet here in this podunk towns hospital' Not being Stephen hawking doesn't make you a terrible scientist, etc./
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I'm also in the boat of 'respec with limitations.'
I think you should be allowed a full respec if it's within the first couple months. Especially for little-played characters. Now by full-respec, I'd expect certain things to not change (sphere, major things like clan or auspice or kith...). But it can be hard to fully grok a character or to realize 'I was aiming towards being a ranged fighter, but being a crafting specialist really makes more sense for where I'm feeling this character.'
After that point, I think minor respects are okay within reason. Like @surreality's example. Or someone going through a major life-changing event might adjust someone's Vice/Virtue, or cause a spec to drop...
But the other point to consider is staff workload. I'd only allow things like that once every 4, 6 months. Some people will send requests in to alter shit on a nigh-weekly basis, even when it's not allowed. 'Oh I changed my mind about specializing in X, can I move all of those points?' 'I know I just altered X, but I would really prefer Y'
Everyone is stuck with dots they're not quite keen on. It's just the name of the game.
Min-maxing in a roleplay-focused environment is lame.
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@surreality said in Respecs.:
A single success is a success. A skill at 3 is 'you are a professional in this skill' an attribute at 3 is you are /good/ in that area. Dex 3 int 3 medicine 3 is a damned good doctor, add bonuses for tools and operating rooms and whatever, you are almost guaranteed a success MOST of the time.
Agreed, here. My longest running character had about 5-7 dice in a bunch of different things, and with the occasional willpower spend or equipment bonus he always got along fine except with STs who forget how the system works and start calling for you to hit a certain number of successes to actually succeed at anything.
Outside combat and contested rolls against similarly overbuilt characters there's not much need for 60 dice in anything.
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@flitcraft said in Respecs.:
@surreality said in Respecs.:
A single success is a success. A skill at 3 is 'you are a professional in this skill' an attribute at 3 is you are /good/ in that area. Dex 3 int 3 medicine 3 is a damned good doctor, add bonuses for tools and operating rooms and whatever, you are almost guaranteed a success MOST of the time.
Agreed, here. My longest running character had about 5-7 dice in a bunch of different things, and with the occasional willpower spend or equipment bonus he always got along fine except with STs who forget how the system works and start calling for you to hit a certain number of successes to actually succeed at anything.
Outside combat and contested rolls against similarly overbuilt characters there's not much need for 60 dice in anything.
I admit, I do sometimes scale things in investigations based on roll results.
If Bob and Jim both roll a perception check and Bob gets just 1 success while Jim gets 5, I'm gonna give Jim more details than Bob gets.
However, this is also for RP purposes. It's less fun if everyone sees the same thing. It just becomes 'whoever poses quickest gets the clue!'.
Saying the quiet parts out loud since 1996.
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@auspice Pedant Face: Well yes, because 1 is a success and 5 is an exceptional, just 1-4 successes by the rules of the game are equal.
dont hit me. -
The way it tends to work on MUs however is 'Damnit i don't have 5's in every trait and 45 dice in this area and i wont get an average of 7 successes every time.. GOD I SUCK.
While you are correct in theme and how the games are designed to work, if you are the 3 in each 6 pool competent doctor it gets old quick when you are regularly outperformed to the point where your competent doctor really only outperforms nameless NPCs.
Not that I have done the doctor thing but I have played the 8 dice pool for thing and RPed being on the upper end of ability for thing as the book says I was, at least until thing was used in plot and pretty much everyone else had 12+ dice for it so to still claim to be good at thing it was pretty much min max or rewrite my character to be average. Regardless of how skilled you might be compared to the general world if 90 % of your interaction is with other PCs that becomes the real frame of reference.
Note in this case I had XP sitting around so I just spent that rather than respecced but it is the same basic conundrum. -
@auspice Pedant Face: Well yes, because 1 is a success and 5 is an exceptional, just 1-4 successes by the rules of the game are equal.
dont hit me.Except in combat, or anything extended, or in activateing quite a few powers in each splat etc. I would be quite happy with 1-4 successes being the same if only the authors of the books actually stuck with it instead of having a lot of exceptions especially when some of those exceptions (combat and power activation) tend to be some of the more commonly rolled things.
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@thatguythere Yup! That is my experience as well, but that's more a problem with mu culture than the system. I totally fall into the same habits. 'hey i'm pretty alright' interacts with other people 'never mind I am mediocre' Which kinda makes me miss justifications. Keeping up with the Immortal joneses is a thing.
Also a 'too much xp' problem. With less xp, the guy with all 5's in combat is still amazing at combat, but he cant tie his shoes without help, and I support this. Where the person who spreads it out is still competent, but more rounded.
Or maybe some boldly written guidelines would be a good idea. 'Were not gonna police you or make you justify all your stats but if you have a 5 in underwater basket weaving, then that is something you dedicate your life to and people notice it'
On FH actually if you pick a high tier, you must also either buy fame or inconspicuous merits to reflect these things.
Sorry for tangenting. Respecs!
I also think that old skills you don't use anymore are still part of your character and should be on your sheet. Sure I'm a Stage Manager on Broadway now, and all my xp is into this but i have high survival because at one point in my life i used to be a park ranger' That shit should be kept, not washed away to minmax better.
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I don't really agree with this, i think gamer min max culture has more to do with it seeming like it's like that than it is.
And yet underestimating the culture is a bad idea, and on top of it PrPs will be balanced around that, which means you would end up walking into plots you're poorly matched for.
A single success is a success. A skill at 3 is 'you are a professional in this skill' an attribute at 3 is you are /good/ in that area. Dex 3 int 3 medicine 3 is a damned good doctor, add bonuses for tools and operating rooms and whatever, you are almost guaranteed a success MOST of the time.
Again that's true, only power in the nWoD doesn't merely come from skills rolls; your strength+melee roll is only a portion of your roll compared to your modifiers added by powers like Potence, and on top of that there's a dearth of supernatural abilities to do things your attributes can.
In other words who cares if I can get a couple of successes from my Wits+Medicine roll on average when @surreality has Life 4?
