Defiant Explorer
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Expansion of Ability descriptions.
🕑 Added 2024-04-28 15:29:22 +0000 UTCWhen I made the Ability descriptions, I tried to keep them short and concise so as not to distract too much of the player's attention during character creation. Well, the descriptions seem to be concise. But probably not quite comprehensive enough. Right now I'm thinking about expanding the Ability descriptions a little bit on the not-so-obvious aspects.
It should look something like this:
Vigor
[Old description, hereafter they will remain unchanged]
Vigor is a combination of strength, toughness, endurance, and health. The physical capabilities of vigorous people are far superior to those of the same sex and age. When it comes to pure physical challenges, they are like fish in water - it's their native element.
[Additional points we're talking about]
Also:
Overall physical condition and fitness, not muscle mass.
Health and immunity. Resistance to disease, environmental substances, drugs, and alcohol.
As you can see, there's a clarification here that Vigor doesn't count for muscle mass, so the players don't have to worry about creating a bodybuilder-chick if they put a lot of points into Vigor.
Here's a preliminary list of expansions for the rest of the Abilities:
Agility
Agility is coordination, plasticity, and flexibility, a general measure of body control and fluidity of movement. An agile person is like a cat that always lands on four paws. Can easily perform an outstanding acrobatic feat or bend with such flexibility that even looking at it would be painful.
Also:
Act physically fast and impetuous in dangerous or stressful situations.
Overall possibility to act and react quickly in all situations, like catching an object on the fly, keeping balance, and the like.
Perception
Perception is a general observation, a keen eye, and accuracy. Perceptive people have unusually keen senses, often noticing things that escape others, such as quiet movement behind them or fleeting changes in facial expression during a conversation. They are difficult to deceive or take by surprise.
Also:
Noticing hidden things, both in surroundings and people, but only what can be noticed with the senses.
Mind
Mind is a combination of intelligence, logic, memory, and erudition. Smart people tend to think things through and often find clues where others will just pass by. Besides, they are particularly good at speaking abilities based on reasoning, such as persuasion, negotiation, and bargaining.
Also:
Analyze situations, people, and experiences. Notice the hidden, but only what can be deduced with the help of logic, erudition, or common sense.
Willpower
Willpower is self-control and discipline, resistance to fear, pain, disgust, carnal desires, or other people's influence. Another side of willpower is the capability to project own personality onto people around: motivating, inspiring, suppressing, or intimidating them. Willpower gives control over both oneself and others, and few will be able to resist.
Also:
Strength of personality and resistance to other people's influence, like seduction, intimidation, or imposition of one's opinion.
Act fearlessly in fearful situations.
Possibility, but not necessarily an inclination, for dominant behavior.
Intrigue
Intrigue is the general capability to manipulate others with cunning, deception, or charm. Intriguers are natural actors with excellent control over their facial expressions and tone of voice. They can charm or fool someone without much effort.
Also:
Possibility for stealth and mental tricks in stressful or dangerous situations.
Why?
So that players choose character abilities more deliberately. The purpose of the expansions is to shed light on non-obvious points, without over-extending the descriptions themselves. Only the most important (and not the most obvious).
For example, the description expansion to Willpower has a direct reference to seduction resistance. Considering how many complaints I've read about Cadonis and his (possible) seduction of Selene... I think this is a reasonable addition.
What'd I miss?
Did you have a feeling during the game, like, “Oh, this Ability is responsible for that too?!” Please remember where exactly and why you had that feeling of... non-obviousness. I'll try to put it into a new paragraph for the target Ability.
Is it even needed?
The vote will last two weeks. If you cancel these changes, so be it, all descriptions will remain as before. After all, I'm doing this for you and also for new players.
Once patron voting is complete (13.05.2024), this post will be open to all.
Comments
Defiant Explorer
I don't know, Intrigue sounds prettier. More harmonious? Besides, changing the Ability's name is not quite the same as, for instance, changing a regular line of text. It's possible, but it's better not to. Could accidentally and easily make bugs in a lot of things that now work just fine.
Joe Steel
I'm wondering if "misdirection" might not be a better term for what you call intrigue. Intrigue does imply covertness in one sense of the word, but also attracting interest in another. Misdirection implies making someone believe something other than the truth, whether by words or actions.
Lonely Wolf
No worries D.E. thanks. And in any cases: good fortitude to you, of course. [^-😉-^]
Defiant Explorer
Work is progressing. Still can't say anything about the dates, though. Sorry.
Lonely Wolf
Concerning the end of the vote, I still have the strong impression that the < yes > will prevail over the < no >... But in these uncertain conditions, it is true that it is better that you be ready for all eventualities. Otherwise (please forgive my curiosity, D.E.) I was wondering if your work was progressing well (or not?) for the finalization of the version 1.7?&?
Defiant Explorer
It's a rough draft. Excluding time to write the post itself and drafts for abilities, I'm busy working on 1.7. In any case, I need to wait until the voting is over before making any changes. As for Agility and its description, it will likely remain unchanged. Well, with Joe Steel's correction about the cat's feet instead of paws, of course. And the physical stealth aspect needs to be put in there as well. And yes, with each passing day, I'm leaning more and more toward replacing the descriptions with slightly more detailed descriptions, in a couple of paragraphs, rather than the old paragraph + additional points. It's supposed to feel more organic that way.
Lonely Wolf
Otherwise for your choice of the adjective (impetuous), I am like Zapp169, that is to say that I do not find it terrible in relation to agility (the difficult choice of words, isn't it?). But you might tell me that my adverbe (methodically) is also rather inappropriate! It's possible yep; in fact, I just simply don't see what you meant by < impetuous >. No doubt that < briskly > or < nimbly/racily > would be... Hhmm... I don't really know?-🤔-? More appropriate here, if I interpret your initial idea correctly? Okay, I'll stop bothering you with that D.E. yes, yes, I promise!+!
Defiant Explorer
Okey dokey, thankie! What was yours is now ours... ♪ whistling ♪
Lonely Wolf
No problems, the friend!&! It's just that I'm still a fan of parentheses and other happy emojis!!! Do what you want, you're the boss after all;-😌).
Defiant Explorer
This one looks good: "To act insidiously (without resorting to physical means) with the aim of inciting/persuading others, to react in the way that suits you best in complex/stressful situations." I'd like to redo it a bit, if you don't mind, of course. You know, without the parentheses and slashes...
Lonely Wolf
Hi to you, D.E. [^✌️^] I hope everything goes well for you! I'm a former RPG player myself, (yeah the old fashioned way: on table of course, with the dice and everything else that goes well!+!) and so I didn't have any problems with the concise descriptions of the abilities. However, I can understand that for RPG neophytes, a few additions on the abilities may prove useful. For the question of stealth which can be exercised in two capacities, well; you're right, I thought about it but it actually seems complicated to put into words... Regarding the Intrigue in particular: perhaps the best thing would be to say the thing as simply as possible, right? I had thought of something like: To act insidiously (without resorting to physical means) with the aim of inciting/persuading others, to react in the way that suits you best in complex/stressful situations. {like for the crawler example, I guess?} Also for agility: I would maybe have replaced impetuously by methodically (I find that it is more balanced with quickly.) So what do you say? Am I totally wrong about your vision of abilities, or do these seem like good ideas to you?&?
Defiant Explorer
It's been bugging me for a long time. The role system in IE is abstract, it has no formal criteria like Strength +1 = +1% damage or Luck +1 = +1% crit, etc. Therefore, the wording must be clear, without ambiguity, and concise, otherwise half of the players won't even read it. Not such an easy task. Thanks for the corrections. I'll take them into consideration. Although, the above points are still nothing more than a preliminary draft. Yesterday I was leaning towards those additional points. Today I'm already thinking about a complete replacement and expansion of the wording for all abilities. Well, there won't be one paragraph for each one, but the whole two :)
Zapp169
More information is always good. I was a little confused the first time I made a character, and didn't put any points into Willpower since it didn't seem useful. Fortunately Selene listened to Iolanta's advice to steer clear of Cadonis, and I was saving Insight, but it was a close one. Two minor things with the new descriptions. With Agility, "impetuous" is a weird word to use, since when you use it to describe people it usually connotes "reckless haste". I'm not sure that is really what you meant to say. With Willpower, you have a misplaced comma in the new description. It should be "Possibility, but not necessarily, an inclination for dominant behavior". Don't mean to be annoying, those just stood out to me.
Defiant Explorer
Well, yeah, that's what I'm thinking. Especially since right now, judging by the description, Intrigue looks more like a social-oriented ability. And it is, but my idea is that it's also responsible for tricky actions that don't depend on the physical aspect. Just need to make that clear somehow... Plus, there will be a moment in the coming updates where a lot will depend on Intrigue's check (and one Iolanta's gift). It even could be said that cunning will be Selene's last resort to avoid... an unpleasant turn of events. So now is a perfect time for me to think about it :)
Chien_perdu
I think you could add these but I don't think it's necessary. If a player reads "agility " they will guess that it's good for sneaking if they have played a single RPG before. And the word "intrigue" also brings the notion of secrecy to the mind so it sounds much more like stealth than if you had just called it charisma or bluff or something like that. But adding a short line won't hurt and if it may help someone why not
Defiant Explorer
One other point I'm mulling over, but haven't gotten around to adding to the main post. Namely - stealth, hidden infiltration, and the like. Take, for example, I don't know, Fallout or any game where stealth mechanics work separately. That is, a situation where a squatting character is sneaking somewhere, that's when stealth mechanics work in the usual sense of the word. But there are also situations where stealth is used without, well, stealth. For example, when you are shuttling around the raiders' base so that you stay out of sight of the mobs, to choose a convenient point to attack before they notice you, and so on. In my, text-based game, there's no need for stealth as a separate mechanic. That is, if it's a matter of “squatting” or sneaking in quickly and stealthily (like to the poor farm in the first chapter before the hostess notices), then checks will be based on Agility (the usual stuff). But when it comes to the second case, i.e. using subterfuge/cunning rather than a physical attempt to hide, then Intrigue will be involved. This situation, for example, is in one of the three (they are chosen randomly) crawler spawn locations at the lake bottom in the last update. There you have the option to trick the creature by circling it in an arc and trying to block its escape route. And that's an Intrigue check. I think this should be worded somehow to the additional paragraphs of the Agility and Intrigue descriptions, too.
Defiant Explorer
Copy that. Will be replaced by the next update. Thank you.
Joe Steel
Minor nitpicks: 1. the expression in English is "a cat [that] always lands on its feet" not "a cat that always lands on four paws." 2. The phrase "the capability to project own personality onto people around" should probably read "the ability to project one's own personality onto nearby people."
Defiant Explorer
I'll think about what I can do with that... The problem there is that if you just advise on the starting Ability selection screen to not leave them at 0, otherwise they can't be boosted with Insight, without any explanation, then new players may get confused. Like, what the hell is Insight while I choosing that Abilities thingie now? The Insight itself is under the portrait and the hyperlink to it appears just after selecting the starting Abilities (on the Ethnos selection screen). I mean, there are only 2 pages of rules (basic mechanics) with the explanation and it's not much at all. But if you drop them on new players at once... they might confused.
DamnedFrog
Perhaps because I'm an old RPG player, I found the old descriptions enough to understand what each ability does. But I vote for the descriptions extension, because it could help new players. However I think that if something is lacking in the description of the abilities, it's the huge impact to having 0 vs 1 or more in an ability. This as a major impact in the gameplay, as you can't use insight point during a check if you have 0 in the ability. Hence the complaints about Cadonis from players who have put 0 point in willpower, and then can't avoid succumbing to his advances. I know this mechanism is explained, but I think it's still hard for a new player to really understand the effect of having 0 in an ability.
