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Let's Chat About The PT System

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Post  Paper Shadow Sun Apr 29, 2018 2:10 am

Hey everyone. I wanted to hear what everyone's current thoughts and feelings about the current state of the Pony Tales system, so this is the thread to say anything you want to about it. I'll be able to post my opinions in a small while, but if you want to say something first, I'm eager to hear. I will quickly say that I think the system is currently in a good place, with a handful of flaws, kinks, and oddities tied to it, some intrinsically baked into the design of the system and acts as both a positive and a negative (most well known examples being the high level of power of Lvl 1 and the mechanical seperation of combat and non-combat), and some able to be polished out with a solution that's elegant enough not to create additional problems down the line...
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Post  ZamuelNow Sun Apr 29, 2018 4:36 pm

Multiple thoughts here:

  • I'm not sure the separation of combat and non-combat needs fixing.  To do so would probably require a ton of work to fix and the system itself was setup based on old school JRPGs so it's mimicking a certain style.  That said, it would likely be a good idea to add some info on how to handle a few out of combat scenarios where a single action, like throwing a net over an enemy, would quickly resolve the combat without full "combat".
  • Something I championed a while back and think it might be time to push again is an official change to starting points.  I propose that the starting Ability points be lowered from 30 to 21, those 9 points be broken to 3 point increments that are given out on the levels where boons are given out, and then boons are officially converted to something GMs give out on their own whims.  This does a lot to adjust power and gameplay.  The boons change gives the GM more flexibility in rewards while negating those squabbles over which boon is best.  The points change helps adjust progression while still allowing strong starting characters, considering MLP characters seem to have a bit more than a generic fantasy character.  When I originally proposed this, I attempted to build Season 1 versions of the Mane Six and it works pretty well.  A nine point shift also alters the opportunity cost of what people actually take at level one.
  • There may need to be some points adjustments to some abilities and some would be good to pull from Wanderlust.  I'm not sold on the idea of PT needing the full chain for Flight.  Enchanting kinda feels like a minor problem but splitting it up is likely unpopular.  WL's Smash the Spell basically does what most people were wanting out of Sunderblade when it didn't get moved to PT's Ability system.  I'd need to sit down and make a separate list for this since there's some minor and some major shifts, including possibly pulling something from WL that might make a full Destiny (or edit one that already exists).
  • I think WL has a better stat system than PT but PT does alter some capacity for min-maxing.  That said, I think Sense -> Streetwise should be replaced by Sense -> Insight.  One thing that came up in older discussion was that "streetwise" was too variable of a concept for GMs to pick just how to apply it.  Separately, officially adding Insight lowers Perception's status as a super stat and also allows character variance between a people person and someone who sees things but is poor at reading people.
  • Suggesting that Honesty gain one final small adjustment to its wording: "Target helpless or willing creature must answer 3 questions that you ask truthfully without distortion.  All those in witness know that this creature is speaking the truth. This effect ends after the three questions are asked, or after thirty minutes (whichever comes first)." Arguably shouldn't be needed but it's to clear up something that popped up in discussion a while back.  Essentially, Honesty shouldn't be "wasted" by the people around the user not knowing.  Arguably, it's possible that this could just be a new footer than editing the ability directly.
  • Re-rolls just might need a rule about overwriting instead of stacking but I don't know how much of an issue that is.  Granted, some re-rolls may or may not need removing if points do get adjusted.
  • Character sheets might need adjusting for unneeded whitespace but I haven't figured out how to do that without font size changes.  I wouldn't mind it but I do remember there being an outcry against the suggestion a while back.  Alternately, there's some Player's Handbook stuff that might be better to move to the GM guide.


My comments don't focus on PT combat directly since I think 90% of fixing the Skype/play-by-post version comes down to "just use Wanderlust combat".
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Post  Paper Shadow Mon Apr 30, 2018 12:50 am

Commenting on some of these while I have a little time...
ZamuelNow wrote:I'm not sure the separation of combat and non-combat needs fixing.  To do so would probably require a ton of work to fix and the system itself was setup based on old school JRPGs so it's mimicking a certain style.  That said, it would likely be a good idea to add some info on how to handle a few out of combat scenarios where a single action, like throwing a net over an enemy, would quickly resolve the combat without full "combat".
Yeah, as I said, it's both a positive and a negative, and not something that needs fixing. It's just a bit odd when your big endurance powerhouse has the same combat HP as the character with three endurance, you know? I list it more as an oddity...
ZamuelNow wrote:Something I championed a while back and think it might be time to push again is an official change to starting points.  I propose that the starting Ability points be lowered from 30 to 21, those 9 points be broken to 3 point increments that are given out on the levels where boons are given out, and then boons are officially converted to something GMs give out on their own whims.  This does a lot to adjust power and gameplay.  The boons change gives the GM more flexibility in rewards while negating those squabbles over which boon is best.  The points change helps adjust progression while still allowing strong starting characters, considering MLP characters seem to have a bit more than a generic fantasy character.  When I originally proposed this, I attempted to build Season 1 versions of the Mane Six and it works pretty well.  A nine point shift also alters the opportunity cost of what people actually take at level one.
I agree boons haven't worked out for us, at least from my perspective as a pbp player. I'll have to think more about how I feel about your proposed change of initial point total. Have you ran or played a game that used that ruling? I know I struggle as it is when it comes to spending my first thirty points, haha...
ZamuelNow wrote:There may need to be some points adjustments to some abilities and some would be good to pull from Wanderlust.  I'm not sold on the idea of PT needing the full chain for Flight.  Enchanting kinda feels like a minor problem but splitting it up is likely unpopular.  WL's Smash the Spell basically does what most people were wanting out of Sunderblade when it didn't get moved to PT's Ability system.  I'd need to sit down and make a separate list for this since there's some minor and some major shifts, including possibly pulling something from WL that might make a full Destiny (or edit one that already exists).
I have been racking my brain on Flight on and off for two years now, and I don't have time to full explain my thoughts, but I feel like the current Flight abilities have two issues; player perception and clutter. I need to talk more about it when I get the chance to, because I have thought a lot about flight and verticality options in PT, but I never got any ideas elegant enough to push them to Dan to make official...
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Post  AleneShazam Mon Apr 30, 2018 9:24 pm

ZamuelNow wrote:I propose that the starting Ability points be lowered from 30 to 21, those 9 points be broken to 3 point increments that are given out on the levels where boons are given out, and then boons are officially converted to something GMs give out on their own whims.

I... really like that idea???? One issue I've always had is the power curve feeling very low as you level up and stunting level 1 to add more increments throughout the leveling chart seems like a good solution to that. Although with a lower starting power level it probably means some abilities do need to be adjusted.... such as....

ZamuelNow wrote: I'm not sold on the idea of PT needing the full chain for Flight.

I agree wholeheartedly. While there's no doubt that flying is a significant advantage, in a setting where 1/3 of the (pony) population (not to mention other races) can fly with apparently no difficulty the ability point investment PT requires seems... excessive. I don't know about directly porting over Wanderlust, but definitely removing a few of the steps in the ability tree and starting the player off at a less harsh penalty seems necessary.

ZamuelNow wrote:That said, I think Sense -> Streetwise should be replaced by Sense -> Insight.  

I agree with this as well. Me (and other friends of mine i.e. Espresso) have grappled with Streetwise, some of our interpretations being "Streetwise -> knowledge of the contemporary as opposed to History -> knowledge of the past" due to the lack of a 'contemporary knowledge' stat aside from base knowledge, "Streetwise -> Streetsmarts INCLUDING Insight-type checks" and the most basic "Streetwise -> 'local' knowledge such as rumors (as well as stuff like shortcuts, where shops are etc)".

None of them have quite worked out, with the most basic kind of rendering Streetwise a weak stat at best (though situationally useful), and the Contemporary Knowledge interpretation making it grotesquely overpowered.

I'd either want a clarification on exactly what Streetwise can do, or has ZamuelNow suggests, simply replacing it with another stat.




One thing that I want to bring up is the ridiculous power level some characters can get to, such as getting +25 to say athletics just by virtue of stacking various abilities without even needing to break out a magic point. A character in a game I play in routinely gets 30+, even 40s, with flying due to creative application of abilities.

I personally don't really mind it (I'd put it down as a quirk of the system) but I do think a deeper look into how GMs should interpret these high rolls is warranted.

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Post  ZamuelNow Mon Apr 30, 2018 11:28 pm

Paper Shadow wrote:I agree boons haven't worked out for us, at least from my perspective as a pbp player. I'll have to think more about how I feel about your proposed change of initial point total. Have you ran or played a game that used that ruling? I know I struggle as it is when it comes to spending my first thirty points, haha...
I started a 21 point campaign that seemed to have formed well enough but ended early as some pbp do.  Arguably, my main experience is actually from two longrunning campaigns I'm GMing--one WL and one PT (with WL combat). While the WL campaign started at lvl 1.5, no one was left wanting for more with their characters.  The PT campaign started with 30 and in many ways, the players tend to struggle with leveling up since concepts left them pretty complete at level 1 (they are currently level 4ish).  Now there is the argument that the points change probably affects lateral building players more than vertically built builds.  There's also the argument that pegasi get punished more due to flight but, well...

I really feel the simplification to Flight given to WL should mostly be back ported to PT and the chain shrunk:  It’s Almost Like Flying -> Flight (maybe adjusted to 3 points and acting as the non-penalty version) -> Flying Ace.  Even if Flight moves up to 3, the new chain would be 7 points as opposed to 12 for the current chain and still allows the variance between Scootaloo, generic normal Pegasus, and a Wonderbolt.  While there's other things like Teleport and Telekinesis that might need decluttering, Flight adjustments would be a massive QoL adjustment to the system, especially considering the logic AleneShazam has pointed out of it being 1/3 of the population that can fly. Actually...non ponies might benefit far more. What comes to mind was an older discussion where someone argued that it's easier to make a tiger companion than any sort of basic bird companion due to point costs.

AleneShazam wrote:One thing that I want to bring up is the ridiculous power level some characters can get to, such as getting +25 to say athletics just by virtue of stacking various abilities without even needing to break out a magic point. A character in a game I play in routinely gets 30+, even 40s, with flying due to creative application of abilities.

I personally don't really mind it (I'd put it down as a quirk of the system) but I do think a deeper look into how GMs should interpret these high rolls is warranted.
Cheerilee Derp Oh that's easy to deal with: Rocks fall.

Okay, in all seriousness, I think there may be some basics of non stacking rules and varied applications that may need looking at.  Out of curiosity, do you have some examples?  I tend not to mind too much with dailies pushing things far but passives may be an issue, pending on what's used.

History...is an interesting separate discussion in itself.

Wait, before I forget again...Assists!  I figured out a solution for my campaigns but the official system really needs something more concrete.
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Post  Stairc -Dan Felder Tue May 01, 2018 12:57 am

It's interesting to see the old system analyzed this deeply. Frankly, it'd probably be best to replace the skill system wholesale with the background system of 13th age.

If anyone's interested in how I'd do things differently these days, this is the most recent system I've made. It's loot-based instead of character based, but the core mechanics might give y'all some ideas.
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Post  Paper Shadow Tue May 01, 2018 2:22 pm

It's funny that people have mentioned their own issues with some of the skills and they are different to my own biggest issues, being the Brawn attribute and Persuasion. The Brawn attribute's only two skills create a bunch of oddities, such as how it is better to take extra training in Brawn than Best of Breed (four ability points for +3 vs five ability points for +2, compared to 6 for +3 vs 5 for +2), allowing for cheap 8/10/8/5 sort of things, or maybe 11/10/5/5 as long as you weren't planning to otherwise take training in Brawn. And my issue with Persuasion is tied to the whole high modifiers issue Shazam brought up. I think it's a universal thing for PT GMs that the first time you play with a PC that has Freaky Knowledge in "Lying" or the like, and watch them get away with anything in a conversation 'cus they are getting an additional +5 to any persausion or perception check (maybe even +10 if both FKs are relevant) 'cus they are lying or trying to spot a lie, you make a mental note never to allow it again...
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Post  ZamuelNow Tue May 01, 2018 4:10 pm

Stairc -Dan Felder wrote:It's interesting to see the old system analyzed this deeply. Frankly, it'd probably be best to replace the skill system wholesale with the background system of 13th age.

If anyone's interested in how I'd do things differently these days, this is the most recent system I've made. It's loot-based instead of character based, but the core mechanics might give y'all some ideas.
From a cursory glance, it looks somewhat interesting.  However, while it probably better words the health/fatal HP split, I don't think it actually fixes any of the Freaky Knowledge-esque problems.  Granted, that's only from a brief glance.  As far as people analyzing the old system, some of us are still using it.  If anything, the discussion feels more like a return to form from how things used to be.  But like, with fewer people being jerks and shouting down the dev team, thankfully.

Paper Shadow wrote:-Freaky Knowledge-
While I feel like FK is one of the best things in the system I wonder what the best way for fixing that kind of problem is.  While it's never been a problem in my current campaigns, the problem has sort of always been there with players who try to misuse it.  I wonder if the official MLP RPG has the right solution.  They have a FK style ability but it comes in three versions that are each mildly specialized to a way of using it (Creative Flair, Keen Knowledge, Special Skill).  Alternately, there might be some sort of tactful rewording that would fix it.

Paper Shadow wrote:It's funny that people have mentioned their own issues with some of the skills and they are different to my own biggest issues
I think it has a lot to do with different thought processes and campaigns.  My players aren't perfect but I'm thankful that most aren't heavy min-maxers.  As far ass issues, I think I noticed a number of things that got adjusted when WL came out and quietly waited to see if anything would get back ported.  Flight is a major standout since that's been a longstanding discussion and Smash the Spell caught attention since it was close to the right revisal of something people wanted brought over from the utility talents era.  I mean, WL sorta fixed Mirage, too (by blowing it up to multiple pieces, intriguingly enough).

Separately, I found the threads for my revised leveling and GM issued boons proposals:
https://ponytales.forumotion.com/t890-revised-level-up-table
https://ponytales.forumotion.com/t862-alternate-boon-structure-document
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Post  ZamuelNow Sun May 06, 2018 11:19 pm

Paper Shadow wrote:It's funny that people have mentioned their own issues with some of the skills and they are different to my own biggest issues, being the Brawn attribute and Persuasion. The Brawn attribute's only two skills create a bunch of oddities, such as how it is better to take extra training in Brawn than Best of Breed (four ability points for +3 vs five ability points for +2, compared to 6 for +3 vs 5 for +2), allowing for cheap 8/10/8/5 sort of things, or maybe 11/10/5/5 as long as you weren't planning to otherwise take training in Brawn.
What I find myself wondering is if it's less of an issue of Brawn being an issue and more of Best of Breed being the concern. It's a "more stats" boost in a system that probably has a few too many numeric boosts. It might not be an issue (one of my players in my WL campaign uses the WL equivalent) but it's a different thought on that situation.
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Post  Paper Shadow Sat May 12, 2018 2:17 am

Okay, finally got some time to talk about my view on Flight...

So, first, I need to explain my concepts of Soft Flight and True Flight. Soft Flight is when the player has the ability of flight, essentially the ability to ignore gravity, in an non-stressful situation. The player wishes to fly to an open window on the top floor of a building. There are no archers firing on him, no intense weather conditions, nothing weighing him down. This is such a simple action that the DM does not ask for a check, the player is able to get to where they want to go. Soft Flight is all you need to casually fly over something, or fly up to something, or just hover around in place. However, Soft Flight doesn't help you in situations where you need to make checks, such as flying fast, flying sneakily, dodging mid-flight, that sort of things. That's what True Flight is, the ability of flight, to ignore gravity, with no penalty. The ability to make checks as reliably in the air as you would on the ground. In the current state, I consider It's Almost Like Flying as Soft Flight (despite what the ability's name implies) and Cloud Chaser as True Flight...

Soft Flight should be cheap, if only because of the system's pony roots. It's unfair on Pegasus players to spend a lot of ability points for something their characters need. It's the equivalent of Unicorns needing Telekinesis. True Flight should be expensive. If True Flight is cheap, or relatively cheap, it invalidates other options of verticality. That's why I say "to ignore gravity", because that is what successful flying is, the ability to ignore the normal constraints of gravity at will without needing to achieve some other conditioning, such as climbing or whatnot. Soft Flight is cheap but constrained by its limitations, it is weak in situations where you need to make checks. This gives room for alternatives to prosper. Spider Climb, Climber's Grip, Webspinner, stuff like that. Conversely, things that provide True Flight are expensive. Create Crazy Contraption is the cheapest but still requires a magic point and only lasts 10 minutes (obviously its more versatile than just True Flight but you get the gist). Cloud Chaser is the strongest option as it has no duration, no restrictions, no limitations, and as such it is the most expensive by a mile. If True Flight is cheap, it weakens and invalidates other vertical options, which also limits design space. Why take anything else when unrestricted vertical movement is only a point or two more? If Soft Flight to Pegasi is what Telekinesis is to Unicorns, then True Flight should be seen the equivalent to a Telekinesis Build. If Soft Flight is the ability to walk, True Flight is the ability to run and dance at an professional level...

So, on to my issues with the currently Flight Tree. First, Player Perception. It's Almost Like Flying feels bad. It is suppose to represent Soft Flight, the ability of non-stressed flight, but it doesn't feel like it from looking at it. The ability lists it as "terrible maneuverabilty". Even the name undermines it for this purpose. It's Almost Like Flying. The name conjures up the image of a novice engineer at the start of a film about to show off his flying machine, only to have it malfunction and crash into the mud. This is only worsened by the penalty, which carries on though the entire Flight Tree. The negative penalty feels terrible to players, it's like "Hey, here's the power of flight, but don't expect to use it". Seeing the -15 penalty is like what's the point, you know? It needs a penalty of some sort, something to make it Soft Flight, something to make other options appealing, but such a demotivating modifier is not the way to go...

Second, Clutter. To get Cloud Chaser (True Flight), you need to take a total of four abilities. That's a lot, more than is really needed, especially since each ability is basically "Reduce the penalty by five". I understand the advantage of a sliding scale, it means that characters whose flying skill is their main skill can afford to take a penalty if they don't wish to go the full mile (as well as the terrible to good manoeuvrability scale I suppose, which seems to be a 3.5e thing), but any other ability would have one extra ability and a "you may take this ability up to x times" and sheets with multiple abilities dedicated to this one thing just look unnecessarily messy. When I take a character with Cloud Chaser, I just put Cloud Chaser down and state its costs as (9), the total of the tree up to that point...

So, with all that in mind, here's my current thought of how Flight should be implemented in the system. Again, I have been thinking about this on and off for the last two years, from changing the numbers of the penalty and costs to changing the nature of it to that duration, trying both duration of a single instance of flying and how much time you can spend flying per day. And even now I'm still changing it, and even if I'm happy with the idea of it, I'll still need to change it to have it worded more elegantly, more clearly, maybe with a bit of tasty flavour. But nevertheless, here it is:

Flight (2) - At Will
You gain the ability to fly. When making a check to fly or while flying, treat your Attribute bonus as 0. You can also hover in one place, and may walk on and interact with clouds as if they were soft, yet solid, objects.

Wonderbolt (6)
Prerequisite: Flight
You treat your Attribute bonus as normal when making checks to fly or while flying.

(In regards to Flying Ace, I don't feel strongly one way or the other in terms of keeping it or removing it, it's sorta like Archmage’s Eye where it's a really powerful ability for its cost (any check a player will make to run, for example, will suddenly be replaced with one made to fly) but the real cost is spending the points needed to get there...)

So with my current idea you can see how I have addressed my two issues while maintaining my concepts of Soft and True Flight. The new Soft Flight penalty is less punishing to players who don't want to invest in either the relevant skill or in Wonderbolt and are just mostly taking Flight because they are a Pegasus (which also makes scenarios like that of Hurricane Fluttershy a lot more mechanically plusable) while still being great enough to warrant looking at other vertical options, and between Training, Expert Skill, and Wonderbolt, players have a natural sliding scale of how good they want their character to be at flight, all with only two abilities (or three with Flying Ace)...

On a side note, I wanted to talk briefly about other vertical options I had came up while thinking about Flight. First is a new job for It's Almost Like Flying, where it is a X/Day ability that grants you or a target ally Flight for 10 seconds, which is more fitting for someone with a rickety jetpack or limited magic skills. Second is the Reverse Gravity spell Twilight uses in the Crystal Empire episode, which opens a new realm of options, but I struggled with giving it an elegantly written failsafe, to stop players from sending something, or someone, into space (my current idea revolved around the spell ending if the target undergoes 30 feet of free fall). Finally, a low costing Glide ability, ideal for characters with wings but can't fly, or for like a ninja kite or wingsuit or the like, but my issue with that was if it bit too much into the territory of Airborne Resistance, as they both making falling a lot safer...
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Post  ZamuelNow Sat May 12, 2018 6:39 pm

This...is actually kind of brilliant. It does a great job of cleaning up the actual language used and decluttering the ability chain. I think on its own it even manages to succeed at some of your other goals. Granting an ally flight is fully viable on the low end with the Element of Magic (if the new Flight gets implemented) and on the high end with the already existing Dazzling Wings. I do feel Flying Ace can stay since it's an upgrade to be great instead of a base requirement to be competent.

Separately, Resistance: Airborne always felt like a weird change when the old version fit perfectly fine. Especially with the prior rules of resistances being non-stacking (which they probably should be but that's a different discussion).
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Post  Paper Shadow Fri May 18, 2018 12:53 pm

ZamuelNow wrote:Separately, Resistance: Airborne always felt like a weird change when the old version fit perfectly fine.  Especially with the prior rules of resistances being non-stacking (which they probably should be but that's a different discussion).
Could you expand on the Resistance: Airborne thing? I forgot what the old version was like...
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Post  ZamuelNow Sat May 19, 2018 2:52 pm

Old version was:

Feline Grace (1)
You take no damage from falls.

It's basically the same thing.  It just the weirdness of the flavoring change plus, making it a resistance meant it was subject to the prior exclusion (and I still think resistances shouldn't stack).  This isn't even remotely in my top 5 of things I feel need changing, just something in the back of my head about a change.  Flight revisions are way more important along with Teleportation and Telekinesis decluttering.
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Post  Paper Shadow Sun May 20, 2018 6:59 pm

ZamuelNow wrote:Old version was:

Feline Grace (1)
You take no damage from falls.

It's basically the same thing.  It just the weirdness of the flavoring change plus, making it a resistance meant it was subject to the prior exclusion (and I still think resistances shouldn't stack).  This isn't even remotely in my top 5 of things I feel need changing, just something in the back of my head about a change.  Flight revisions are way more important along with Teleportation and Telekinesis decluttering.
Ah right, I remember now, it was a racial trait...

Well, what are your thoughts regarding Teleportation and Telekinesis?
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Post  ZamuelNow Sun May 27, 2018 9:58 pm

Thought I had gotten back to this, oops.

Both concepts essentially have the same problem but to different extremes.  For Advanced Telekinesis vs the Telekinesis chain, the former more or less feels like a vestigal limb of the older system.  It feels the later part of an ability chain that's been pulled out as opposed to something that should be truly standalone.  This is compounded by the footer text noting that Telekinesis upgrades apply to Advanced Telekinesis.  Finally, TK and Adv TK are separated from each other in the listings.  If no other genuine changes were made, it can be argued that Telekinesis should be the last 2 point ability in the Psionics category and Advanced Telekinesis should be the first.

Flash Teleport and Teleportation have similar problems but Flash Teleport feels more like something that would be a bigger problem for a new GM and has an entirely separate chain instead of just one single ability like Advanced Telekinesis.  I think adjusting it may open up a gameplay option.  If the Flash Teleport chain was removed but an adjusted version of the upgrade Flash Escape was added to base Teleportation, it would create the option to spend Magic Points different ways since you could go longer distances or you could disappear instantly.



Admittedly, neither of the above is as big of a concernt as fixing the Flight chain or clarifing Streetwise.  However, there is something that may be on that level: Assists.  There's always been this problem where we know the results of an assist but not how to actually do one.  I remember small discussions popping up about it in the forums and this is what I currently use in my campaigns:


  • For a player who would like to assist an ally, your target DC will be 20% lower than their target DC with whatever skill is most appropriate.


Moderately simple, scales up well enough for higher skill checks, calculations could be easily made as a reference chart, and it makes an assist useful without overtaking the original roll and thus avoiding the "why doesn't the other player do it themselves" problem.  I also have more rules for crit success/failure on an assist but that's less important than making sure the base assist mechanics are finally defined.
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Post  Dusk Raven Thu Jun 28, 2018 9:39 pm

Ah, I'm sorry I didn't see this thread sooner, particularly since I'm currently deciding between Pony Tales and Wanderlust for my next game...

One thing I will say is that while I really like Pony Tales, I feel Wanderlust has a much better sense of progression. Characters really do get more powerful in and out of combat as they level, significantly so. In Pony Tales, out of combat you get a few new abilities, and in-combat you get traits that augment your current build, refining it, but rarely adding to it in a significant way. At first level, it's possible to start as an ace flyer or a master magician, but if you do so your abilities never really get better because there's nowhere else to go at that point - you just get a few new tricks, possibly in unrelated fields (which I hardly consider a bad thing as someone who favors generalists over specialists, but still).

While I sometimes roll my eyes at the idea of leveling up only to have enemies level up with you, there is a certain joy in watching your build expand and grow more powerful... and it makes sense that a character would grow stronger as their own story arc develops. With Wanderlust the greater power gap between 1st and 10th levels means there's a wider range of power levels to play.

If I want PT to have anything, it's that, through the different tiers of Abilities and Traits. Of course, I also liked the Features, which I felt were a nifty way to make characters more distinctive outside of their talents. Having combat features for Destinies was also super awesome. In general though, I think Pony Tales combat let you do more things on a fundamental level than Wanderlust did, although there were a few cool things you could do in Wanderlust combat.

Just my thoughts.
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Post  ZamuelNow Wed Nov 21, 2018 5:13 pm

I'm wondering whatever became of the new Flight proposal? As far as testing, I personally am planning on having my regular group running a 21 Ability point mini campaign that uses the new Flight and some clarifications I plan for assists. I'm also testing out some build defaults that, while I assume most here won't use them, should probably officially exist. I will say that I sorta feel like the Fight change would be a big thing to officially add for 2019 (or Christmas 2018 if you're generous).
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Post  Paper Shadow Thu Dec 13, 2018 7:24 pm

ZamuelNow wrote:I'm wondering whatever became of the new Flight proposal?  As far as testing, I personally am planning on having my regular group running a 21 Ability point mini campaign that uses the new Flight and some clarifications I plan for assists.  I'm also testing out some build defaults that, while I assume most here won't use them, should probably officially exist.  I will say that I sorta feel like the Fight change would be a big thing to officially add for 2019 (or Christmas 2018 if you're generous).
Honestly, and I'm a little embarrassed to admit (thus the delayed response), I would sorta feel bad bothering Dan to approve changes and only really present the Flight changes, especially after he has stated he considers the system open source. Not to mention that my own attempts to test the changes have all fallen through, so I'm still working only on theorycrafting here. I've spent most of my PT-thinking time conceptualising some alternative rules of my own, but I only have the framework of changes to make sorted out, not any of the nitty-gritty of it, which is most of the work really...
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Post  ZamuelNow Tue Dec 18, 2018 12:02 am

For as much as I should love the idea of the system being open source, one of the biggest problems I have with that is that in practice it doesn't legitimize any new changes. In my time using the system, I still see the various anonymous blips at the top of the Google Docs page so the people who could benefit might not see anything added to a different document and/or the forum alone. Case in point, a (Wanderlust) Divine Light proposal I made in the forum got no feedback. While the change has gone over very well in my own campaigns...that sorta doesn't mean anything for the wider use of the system.

I do get and understand not getting a chance to test things since I've been getting swamped by work and that my current pegasus players are using Wanderlust flight so only one of them can benefit (they're a poor flyer in their backstory). However, I am gearing up to run a mini campaign to test some stuff during a hiatus so I hope to have results/feedback soon. Main things I'll be looking at are new Flight, 21 Ability point characters, and some assist revamp concepts though I'll be eyeing other things as we go. I guess I should actually make a new thread about things I've noticed in the system in my time running it but I'm incredibly discouraged by how inactive things are here.
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