Still reading through the core book rules, and am loving what I am seeing so far. And while I'm not usually a fan of Class/Level systems I am seeing a lot of good methods laid out in Anima for that style of rules. However, I'm thinking of changing one aspect:

Instead of spending all your DP at once when you gain a level, players spend the points in a more organic manner where advancement can happen only in certain increments over time. I'm still getting a feel for the scale of things and how often levels advance based on the XP structure of the game, so I'm wondering if anyone has suggestions.

The array there is too low, IMO. Especially since the other methods practically ban 3s.

A 'low supernatural' game gives a spread of 45 points to divide between the attributes, with everything costing 1:1 except for a 10, where the final point costs extra. (11 for 10).

A moderate supernatural game is '55'. (Thanks to Ysalaine for this info!)

Swordwraith, I think you posted this in the wrong thread, my friend.

Uhuhuh, bizarre bizarre....

Anyway, do you mean giving 10 DPs each 1/10 of the remaining XP before next level ? Something like that ? Cause it would be hard for people to understand they get 10, so, 6 allowable to their main field... when thinks like PP, AMR or Ki Acc multiples costs much more....

I've thought about it (but in fact a level system doesn't bother too much).

You can give DP instead of XP if you want, you just need to beware of balance. And, each time you've given 100 DP, give them the bonus of an extra level (attribute point, turn bonus, class bonus to skills, extra zeon or PPP, etc.). You'll need to watch out how much DP you gave.

And, don't forget that it harder to gain levels when level increases. It costs more to get level 5 from 4 than to get level 2 from 1. So don't give too much DP...

Of course, players should be allowed to keep their points to spend them later...

And your players need to be nice, because you can't use limitations (60% or 50% in a field, etc.), so they could spend their DP without control...

Malckuss said:

Indeed I did. I was a bit surprised when I read the other thread first, and didn't see my post there... o_O

Whoops.

I'm not a fan of these new forums. Too much flash, too much glitz, only middling functionality.

Then again, I'm nitpicky about these things, and like standardized forums. Go figure.

I used to feel the same way about level systems, but as a player I think it is more gratifying when you level up as opposed to"here are 3 skill points to use", To me you can feel you character's growth better in a level system even though it is not very realistic.

Janus said:

Well, to be fair, Anima's class system is more like a 'pricing plan' for the various abilities. You're free to spend how you wish, its just that some ways are more efficient than others.

Accruing DP in an incremental manner can pose several problems, though. Like Ysalaine said, if you remove the caps on categories (60% combat for Fighters, etc.), you can load down one area with the majority of your points. Also, you'd need sizable increments of DP to see improvements, since most things will cost 2 DP per point. Some people might get frustrated with a 'trickle' compared to a flood.

I wouldn't do it that way personally, but if you're set on the idea, I recommend you break it into chunks of 10-20 DP, for rounding/management purposes. I'd probably go with 5 'increments' of 20 DP each. (Meaning you'd get 20 DP every 20 XP from Level 1 to 2).

Good talk all around so far, and I think I might need to better clarify my concept. Instead of doing away with the concept of the levels acheived, I was more thinking of something like the following (and I will likely adjust time frame ranges once I get a better appreciation for the system and it's scales):

(Calculate time increments based on the value after spending DP)

Life Points

• 0 - 25 (1 day)
• 26 - 50 (3 days)
• 51 - 150 (7 days)
• 151 - 300 (14 days)
• 301+ (1 month)

What happens is that the player gets their 100 DP each level, but each increment they spend represents a period of time they must wait before spending in that category again. You spend DP for Life Points, Primary, and Secondary Abilities, able to spend in each category whenever the next time increment is reached. You must remain within your class's percentile limits for spending, and you only advance to the next level whenever you both gain enough XP and have spent all of your DP.

Seeing as things like Ki Accumulation, Magic Accumulation, and Psy Points work on different scales than Secondary Abilities and many other Primary Abilities, seperate lists need to be made for their point spreads. I just haven't done that yet, as I'm still reading. Still, any new thoughts with this idea information put forth?

It's not an altogether bad idea, but it's definitely more book-keeping than I'd want to do as GM. Unless someone drops all 60 DP into a single ability, you won't see an overly dramatic increase in anything from one level to the next. Of course, in a level system, you want to at least feel the difference.

Instead of a strictly numerical restriction, you could enforce a sort of "training" restriction, where they're only able to buy a certain amount per session. Maybe they can buy only +5 to an ability per game, one multiple per game, or one spell or power every-other game, for instance. Players will have to keep track of unspent DPs.

Interesting concepts.

I'm curious though, is this 'time' deal in terms of play time? What I mean to say, is that are these DP's accumilated after playing the game a month (ie: 30 days over a few months at one gaming day a week for instance?), or in a 30 day period breaks and all, real time. And if so how does it account for say more involved game play, or the hours spent in each session. Was the four hours you may have had an adventure in itself, or was the two day long weekend session nothing but you all taking the piss, and not getting much done? If so the day(s) week and month of DP's may actually vary. Just like xp.

True it can still be organic though eh. Looks like the list can be more of a guideline. Would that one day session really be worth up to 25 only? That's always up tp the GM. As you all know, each session can vary and sometimes it can be far less or more then you expected. Then again it's a great compliment to the basic XP give away, which is why I picked up this game. If someone experiments with this give-away system and finds it player-friendly, let me know. I'm always keen on seeing how something beyond the hard-wired 100 per level works,

I don't really think Anima needs a system like that, seeing as it's kind of high-powered in the first place, i imagine having to wait with buying things after getting chunks of DP seems like you're better off just handing out DP in small increments instead of exp.

Mixing a level based system with a time-based system for buying up stats doesn't really seem... As a player i think i'd be kind of annoyed when i reach second level and can't get the benefits of it for another 4 sessions, because we're stuck in a one session=half a day of game-time part in the story.

The idea behind level based systems is that you get your improvement after your character has gotten the experience needed.

I'd rather have players decide how to spend their DP for their next level whenever they go up a level. But if you count whatever they're gonna spend their DP on as "off-screen training" then it doesn't really matter anyway.

Bottom line, if you're gonna have both leves and incremential increase... It'd be clunky, and the players wouldn't feel the increase enough. And if its based on in-game time, then they'd most likely get a lot of exp in too short a time to get any effect from whatever they bought with their DP. So you'd risk sitting there with 3rd lvl characters with 1.3 level stats since most of the stuff they bought didn't kick in yet.

It still depends on your playing style though, sometimes more realistic progression is what you want, but then again i wouldn't be playing a level based system in the first place... *shrug*
Note that i'm still new to the system and haven't actually played any of it... yet.

I'd also like to point out that the level and DP system is the same for NPCs and PCs. As such, the levels are there to make it easier for the GM to compare the actual power level of whatever fight is coming along, and scale it accordingly.