Even with so many possible combinations of Home Worlds, Backgrounds and Roles available, 2nd edition's aptitude system leans towards certain stereotypical character facets within the respective range of choice. This is perfectly alright for novice players who need to be shepherded along the path of character creation. However, experienced players might feel restricted that way, being confined to the aforementioned stereotypical modules they can choose from.

I'm wondering whether it would be a feasible option from a gamist, that is, a purely mechanical point of view, to let a player choose his or her character's aptitudes freely at character creation. The reason why I emphasize mechanics, and thus game balancing, is that my only premise for any given combination of aptitudes would be an appropriate narrative reasoning. Quite clearly, narrative material cannot be formalized or correlated from character to character, which is why narrativism and gamism rarely get along with one another.

For example, with narrative being the cause, and mechanics being the effect, a player picks Strength, Toughness and Weapon Skill, describing

»My character comes from a Feral World where physical prowess and bravery (S, T) is valued higher than anything else. He was the champion of the clan, chosen by skill and dedication (WS) rather than birthright.«

He then chooses Offense, Leadership and Fieldcraft, declaring

»I now proudly serve the Emperor with the mighty blade given to me, crushing his enemies (Offense) without hesitation. I inspire those who serve beside me, but who lack my courage and dedication (Leadership). My previous knowledge of turning the battlefield against the enemy (Fieldcraft) serves me well when I lay siege to the heretics' foul nests.«

While this protagonist clearly visualizes the stereotypical Feral World Warrior, Feral Worlders are certainly not restricted to mindless brutes. Bards, skalds and swamp hags might favor Fellowship, Intelligence and Willpower, respectively, without counting as Voidborns or Hive Worlders. On the other hand, not all Highborns shine in mannerism and con games, but might be sloppy, unkempt or brute. If the origin of a character could serve as a narrative plot device to describe his or her abilities, Home Worlds, Backgrounds and Roles would flavor the career path of characters rather than serving as modular components that are chosen to acquire certain abilities.

When I suggest freedom of choice at character creation, I'm usually frowned upon and told that players might exploit and abuse that freedom. If this is true, would that kind of exploitation be acceptable for all participants, if only players ended up with the characters they wanted to play? Would I be overlooking something regarding game mechanics or balancing? Would that style of play, that possibility of choice ruin the vision of blinkered protagonists in an universe without hope for lasting progress?

Absolutely. Not every [Feral Worlder] is Strong and Tough, not every [Hive Worlder] Agile and Perceptive. If a player strays too far in one direction, such as making a character who can only do combat, then the GM can come in to say that a particular Aptitude distribution is not going to work. The RAW character creation rules are guidelines for quick-starting games, but are somewhat suffocating as you mentioned. I know if I was a GM, I would make sure to ask my players if they are satisfied with their character concept. The point of any game is to have fun, and if that means bending the rules a little bit or making new ones, I'm all for it. I strongly encourage players to make up stuff if they are going to have more fun that way; I know I do.

I let my player chooses their aptitudes freely (4 char, 3 prof, they are not allowed to pick both offence and finesse). Their choice has to fit with the story of their character, a bit like you describe how the narrative drives the choices.

I think it works quite fine.

As a hater of the Aptitude system I fully support letting people straight up choose their aptitudes.

Alox - since it's possible to get both Offense and Finesse RAW, why forbid it?

As a hater of the Aptitude system I fully support letting people straight up choose their aptitudes.

Alox - since it's possible to get both Offense and Finesse RAW, why forbid it?

Because they both give 2 characteristics cheaper, so you can cover 4 characteristics by taking these two aptitudes - for most gamey people this will be a nobrainer and thus uninteresting.

The RAW does allow it and I think that if a player make some choices along those required by RAW I would be open for it, just not on a totally free basis.

As a hater of the Aptitude system I fully support letting people straight up choose their aptitudes.

Alox - since it's possible to get both Offense and Finesse RAW, why forbid it?

Because they both give 2 characteristics cheaper, so you can cover 4 characteristics by taking these two aptitudes - for most gamey people this will be a nobrainer and thus uninteresting.

The RAW does allow it and I think that if a player make some choices along those required by RAW I would be open for it, just not on a totally free basis.

Wow, I never noticed this. What a dumb way to lay out the characteristic advances...

Still, if you stick to the 3 characteristic aptitudes, 4 professional, that only covers 3. That character would be a combat god, though.

As a hater of the Aptitude system I fully support letting people straight up choose their aptitudes.

Alox - since it's possible to get both Offense and Finesse RAW, why forbid it?

Because they both give 2 characteristics cheaper, so you can cover 4 characteristics by taking these two aptitudes - for most gamey people this will be a nobrainer and thus uninteresting.

The RAW does allow it and I think that if a player make some choices along those required by RAW I would be open for it, just not on a totally free basis.

Wow, I never noticed this. What a dumb way to lay out the characteristic advances...

Still, if you stick to the 3 characteristic aptitudes, 4 professional, that only covers 3. That character would be a combat god, though.

Not a combat god, just either:

a.) versatile cc/ranged combat character - if he doesn't take the characteristic aptitudes for Offense and Finesse, thus ends up with 4 med-costed characteristics, but nothing overtly special.

b.) an extremely focused offensive combat character who can do combat and nothing else - if he takes all the characteristic aptitudes too, but then, he has 1 aptitude option for everything else, including important defensive aptitudes like Willpower, Defense, Toughness, and Fieldcraft.

A combat god takes Offence, Finesse, Defence as professional aptitudes and WS, BS, Toughness and Willpower as characteristic aptitudes. Strength and Agility will be medium cost, but they don't scale as well as those four stats anyway (agi gets capped by armor and str is only +1 damage beyond prereqs for talents). WS scale extremely well if you have the talent (and use the weapon) where you can reroll a missed attack.

So by restricting the players from taking both Offence and Finesse it leads to a more natural choice of being good at either melee or ranged combat which enables players to have diverse specialisations in the group.

This is just my opinion as an inexperienced player/GM, but is wanting to be a combat god wrong? Aptitudes are the players' way of saying "this is what I want to do in our game". They have a fantasy in mind and want to grasp it, so the system rewards them by making that fantasy more accessible. I find RAW chargen not fully accommodating in that sense. I don't think Aptitude diversity is as important as player/character diversity. As long as they're not all playing the exact same concept, say, Pyrokinetic Psyker, I would just build my game around my players' fantasies.

The aptitudes are not balanced in a game mechanical sense. Some of the aptitudes are far stronger than the others, check for example the Leadership aptitude and compare it with either Finesse or Offence.

So if you set the choice of aptitudes to be completely free you need to at least have considered if it is a problem with game mechanical imbalances between the players. The importance of this will vary from group to group. The rule with not both finesse and offence works for us.

The aptitudes are not balanced in a game mechanical sense. Some of the aptitudes are far stronger than the others, check for example the Leadership aptitude and compare it with either Finesse or Offence.

Totally agree with you there. Leadership applies, what, literally once for both Characteristics and Skills combined? There aren't even all that many Talents that use Leadership either. I'm one for adding a third Aptitude for almost everything, like what was touched upon somewhere in these forums. Buying stuff is pretty expensive as written when a player has less than 2 appropriate Aptitudes. Adding a third aptitude has the benefits of making characters more flexible and aptitudes more useful. A Characteristic/Skill/Talent could have three Aptitudes but would only benefit from a maximum of two, in case in needs to be said. Also, not everything would get a third aptitude if the player-obtainable is particularly powerful.

So if you set the choice of aptitudes to be completely free you need to at least have considered if it is a problem with game mechanical imbalances between the players. The importance of this will vary from group to group. The rule with not both finesse and offence works for us.

The issue of possible imbalance raises the question (for me) as to whether character concepts in general, and the choice of one's aptitudes in particular, are discussed openly among players.

Assuming that role-playing was about an arms race between the GM and his or her players , or even among the players themselves, then these players would be well advised to reveal as little as possible about their actual potential to their respective counterpart, thus gaining what could be called the advantage of surprise. If, on the other hand, players discussed their preferences openly, probing whether their intended character concept and character's strenghts would fit in with the ideas of the rest of the group, any objections and discordances that might occur later could be ruled out right from the start.

In essence, can mechanical imbalance be tolerated so long as everyone around the table is happy?

This question may sound provocative at first glance. Then again, there are psykers around, as well as sages.

The issue of possible imbalance raises the question (for me) as to whether character concepts in general, and the choice of one's aptitudes in particular, are discussed openly among players.

Assuming that role-playing was about an arms race between the GM and his or her players , or even among the players themselves...

In essence, can mechanical imbalance be tolerated so long as everyone around the table is happy?

I believe in all players being in the loop about each other's abilities. As a GM, I would want to make sure there is as little overlap between characters as possible. Or at least making sure no one steps on another player's niche. Two Pyrokinetic Psykers can still happily co-exist if one specializes in melee and the other in ranged weaponry. Being different is part of the satisfaction of creating a character in a system that has so many variables and permutations. The written chargen system is a good springboard, but should not be the only way to build a character.

A game should never devolve into "us vs. them" unless it's in a mutually accepted way. It should not be about what mechanics a player get sneak under the GM's nose, or how much better Character A is than Character B is at doing Task C. Everyone around the table should be able to exercise their creativity and individuality without having to worry about being overshadowed by their peers or what other people are hiding. Unless that's an aspect of the game, keeping secrets seems pretty anti-fun to me.

Yes, I would say mechanical imbalance is tolerable in the name of happiness. As long as the imbalance isn't too skewed in one direction, I invite all characters to railroad their character concept one way or another.

The aptitudes are not balanced in a game mechanical sense. Some of the aptitudes are far stronger than the others, check for example the Leadership aptitude and compare it with either Finesse or Offence.

So if you set the choice of aptitudes to be completely free you need to at least have considered if it is a problem with game mechanical imbalances between the players. The importance of this will vary from group to group. The rule with not both finesse and offence works for us.

The aptitudes are not balanced in a game mechanical sense. Some of the aptitudes are far stronger than the others, check for example the Leadership aptitude and compare it with either Finesse or Offence.

Totally agree with you there. Leadership applies, what, literally once for both Characteristics and Skills combined? There aren't even all that many Talents that use Leadership either. I'm one for adding a third Aptitude for almost everything, like what was touched upon somewhere in these forums. Buying stuff is pretty expensive as written when a player has less than 2 appropriate Aptitudes. Adding a third aptitude has the benefits of making characters more flexible and aptitudes more useful. A Characteristic/Skill/Talent could have three Aptitudes but would only benefit from a maximum of two, in case in needs to be said. Also, not everything would get a third aptitude if the player-obtainable is particularly powerful.

Sorry for resurrecting the thread but I was reading it and it's something I agree completely.

Aptitudes are a bit weird (for me transitioning from 1ed to 2ed) and unbalanced to say the least.

I made table below with my Aptitude Spreadsheet (WIP Which I'm using to create full DH2 Character Sheet).

It represents how many times an Aptitude occurs as a requirement.

Leadership applies to 1 skill Command and 2 talents Contact Network T2(Which makes 0 sense as from description it seems like Social) and Halo of Command T3 (Makes sense).

As I'm a GM I will remove Leadership Aptitude and replace it with Social as currently it's waste of space.

I did not group them by wherever it's aptitude 1 or 2 but Finesse and Intelligence open a lot of doors.

EDIT: I checked and they both occur in 2 talents so grabbing Finesse and Intelligence gets you lower cost of 3 characteristics, 11 skills and 31 talents.