[Solar System] Quick Questions Thread
Eero Tuovinen:
That equipment asymmetry is one reason for why I dropped the distinction between weapons and armor, myself. With armor being a potential weapon (eg. coupled with a Passive Ability check) there is no inherent weakness to an armor-type equipment, other than the system bias for being active - which is fine with me, defending should not be rewarded over-much.
That said, I think that Effects work fine to emulate equipment, if you even need to emulate it. I think there's a certain kind of charm to a fantasy game where each character has Abilities such as "Warrior equipment care" (or a squire with such), which they roll before battle to garner some mojo for their equipment. It also rewards bashing your shields and whatnot to bits (= reduce the Effect to zero), which is cool. And if you weapons with a more permanent feel, I think I gave some examples of how to make equipment Secrets out of Effects.
Then again, I'm pretty sure that equipment ratings will make a brave reappearance in my TSoY rewrite - coupled with some discussion about where and when, exactly, one might expect to encounter rated equipment. Clinton's take is very formalistic in that equipment ratings just reflect local importance of stuff and players can just assing them nilly-willy. I'll be looking into perhaps including some definite in-setting meaning to the ratings. We'll see.
Paul T:
Eero,
I'm not 100% clear on using Effects for equipment. For instance, you mention in the rules, as an example, someone with the Effect: "Plate mail, 5/V". How might someone get such an effect, and what Ability roll would determine its level?
Finally, what would have the plate mail in combat look like? Would you be adding bonus dice to defensive actions, or would the Effect "soak up" levels of harm, instead of them going directly to the character?
Thanks!
Paul
Eero Tuovinen:
To get that plate mail, ask a friend with "Blacksmithing (V)" to make the check for you. Or use your own "Haggling (I)" at a large market to compare and buy the best one. Or have your father bequeth it to you with "Heritage (I)". Or just have the Story Guide agree that somebody else has made available the Effect at a given level.
In combat, you could use the plate mail in two ways:
- Spend it as bonus dice, one point for one die, and describe how it takes hits for you. After the battle, get the value back up with a good roll of "Equipment Maintenance (I)" or something like that.
- Let it take a blow for you, while you yourself do something unrelated, such as attack relentlessly. Note that this is not possible if the opposition does not act in a manner that goes against the plate mail; if the opposition is tying to lasso you and tie you up, for instance, then you could maybe spend the armor as bonus dice with clever narration, but not as a conflict participant. This is discussed separately in the extended conflict chapter.
Let me know if you'd like elaboration on the above points - it's pretty simple and context-dependent, but perhaps I'm not explaining it well.
Paul T:
Eero,
I think I get it.
So, for instance, if I have a "plate mail 4" effect, I can spend dice from to as a bonus to opposed Fighting checks.
If I'm taking some parallel action, then any opponents who are trying to hurt me (with methods the armour can block) would have to take a parallel action to wear down my armour before they could inflict Harm on me. Is that right?
In that case, what happens if I have "plate mail 4" and someone Competent:
--Takes a parallel action to stick a sword into me and rolls a +1 (total of 2)?
--Takes a parallel action to stick a sword into me and rolls a +3 (total of 5)?
Who or what takes Harm, and how much?
Thanks again!
Paul T:
A side thought:
It's kind of a neat side effect to handling equipment as Effects: equipment like weapons and armor can require you to spend a point of Vigor to carry around, which functions as a bit of an "encumbrance system".
However, does handling it as an Effect mean that:
In simple Ability check contests, you can potentially draw on a huge bonus ("I'm using my master quality sword, and I'm going to use all four bonus dice!")?
In extended conflicts, on the other hand, you could pretty quickly run out of bonus dice, so such equipment is only giving you an opening advantage?
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