Advantages and Disadvantages have narrative and mechanical effects. The narrative effects are independent of Rings (e.g. Painfully Honest says you can't lie or let lies go unanswered). But the mechanical penalties of disadvantages seem to be tied to specific Rings (e.g. Painfully honesty give strife when making certain Air checks).

Players have the freedom to choose approaches that avoid Rings associated with their disadvantages. I could, for example, be painfully honest in a reasonable, Earthy way. Or use Fire to incite with my honesty. Outside of hoping I will be an honest role player, what can the GM do to trigger the mechanical aspects of these disadvantages?

Note that the rules is that disadvantages list the rings MOST COMMONLY associated with them. As long as they perform the act, feel free to hit them with the disadvantage effects regardless of used ring.

11 minutes ago, TheSapient said:

Advantages and Disadvantages have narrative and mechanical effects. The narrative effects are independent of Rings (e.g. Painfully Honest says you can't lie or let lies go unanswered). But the mechanical penalties of disadvantages seem to be tied to specific Rings (e.g. Painfully honesty give strife when making certain Air checks).

Players have the freedom to choose approaches that avoid Rings associated with their disadvantages. I could, for example, be painfully honest in a reasonable, Earthy way. Or use Fire to incite with my honesty. Outside of hoping I will be an honest role player, what can the GM do to trigger the mechanical aspects of these disadvantages?

The associated ring is the most usual to trigger it, but it does not mean exclusivity, and this also applies to advantages. But remember that triggering disadvantages and failing recovers Void Points (which is rare) and usually has interesting narrative consequences. In my table it was usual for players to ask me for a disadvantage to apply to them rather than the contrary both in the beta an now.

14 hours ago, TheSapient said:

Players have the freedom to choose approaches that avoid Rings associated with their disadvantages. I could, for example, be painfully honest in a reasonable, Earthy way. Or use Fire to incite with my honesty. Outside of hoping I will be an honest role player, what can the GM do to trigger the mechanical aspects of these disadvantages?

Taking that specific example - yes, you can, but you don't get strife for being painfully honest.

Painful Honesty is air because you find it uncomfortable not being honest; lying your backside off (also known as the Trick or Con approach), which you hate, is air, hence generally using said approach lands you strife, but any approach which basically revolves around you deceiving someone would also apply.

being "painfully honest in a reasonable, Earthy way" would be pretty much your 'default state' and have no mechanical effect. 'use Fire to incite with my honesty' would be a case of being prepared to say the things no-one else will but everyone agrees with, and would be a case of 'inverting your disadvantage' - spending a void point to get a bonus on a Sentiment (Fire) check to rile up the audience.

4 hours ago, Magnus Grendel said:

Taking that specific example - yes, you can, but you don't get strife for being painfully honest.

Painful Honesty is air because you find it uncomfortable not being honest; lying your backside off (also known as the Trick or Con approach), which you hate, is air, hence generally using said approach lands you strife, but any approach which basically revolves around you deceiving someone would also apply.

being "painfully honest in a reasonable, Earthy way" would be pretty much your 'default state' and have no mechanical effect. 'use Fire to incite with my honesty' would be a case of being prepared to say the things no-one else will but everyone agrees with, and would be a case of 'inverting your disadvantage' - spending a void point to get a bonus on a Sentiment (Fire) check to rile up the audience.

I tend to agree with this interpretation. I don't think the strife penalty applies when the check involves a different Ring. This would mean it is largely up to the player to decide to take strife for either RP purposes, or to go after a Void Point. It is the sort of thing I think will be fine at some tables, while other tables will be quite calculating with the application of the mechanic. Maybe it doesn't matter, as the narrative effects are broad and clear. If you are Painfully Honest, you are going to be calling out even your companions when they try to pull a fast one. That is a significant disadvantage.

1 hour ago, TheSapient said:

It is the sort of thing I think will be fine at some tables, while other tables will be quite calculating with the application of the mechanic. Maybe it doesn't matter, as the narrative effects are broad and clear. If you are Painfully Honest, you are going to be calling out even your companions when they try to pull a fast one. That is a significant disadvantage.

Don't take the narrative description as completely inflexible.

The guidance that you can't be deceptive must have some flexibility in it, otherwise you can't really find yourself in a situation where you're making a test to mislead someone (which is when a person with the Painfully Honest disadvantage suffers strife) in the first place.

It's much like Playfulness - whilst the narrative description talks about people "writing it off as your playful nature instead of being significantly angered or saddened by it", it's a grey area - in order to trigger the mechanical effect you must be "gently mocking or chiding someone" with clever puns or jokes with sufficient effort that it requires a check to succeed (probably composition or courtesy), which in turn requires you to convince the GM the action needs a check - meaning there are meaningful consequences for success & failure (as a minimum honour staked on a failure of courtesy is always a good fallback), but it's not blanket permission to be as insulting as you like without comeback.

anxieties trigger when you're doing something that is made harder by the anxiety - so a Battle Trauma is triggered when you strike to kill, Paranoia when looking for or imagining potential threats, Materialism to give something up, Perfectionism to ignore a flaw instead of fixing it, and Painful Honesty to lie or mislead.

7 minutes ago, Magnus Grendel said:

Don't take the narrative description as completely inflexible.

The guidance that you can't be deceptive must have some flexibility in it, otherwise you can't really find yourself in a situation where you're making a test to mislead someone (which is when a person with the Painfully Honest disadvantage suffers strife) in the first place.

It's much like Playfulness - whilst the narrative description talks about people "writing it off as your playful nature instead of being significantly angered or saddened by it", it's a grey area - in order to trigger the mechanical effect you must be "gently mocking or chiding someone" with clever puns or jokes with sufficient effort that it requires a check to succeed (probably composition or courtesy), which in turn requires you to convince the GM the action needs a check - meaning there are meaningful consequences for success & failure (as a minimum honour staked on a failure of courtesy is always a good fallback), but it's not blanket permission to be as insulting as you like without comeback.

anxieties trigger when you're doing something that is made harder by the anxiety - so a Battle Trauma is triggered when you strike to kill, Paranoia when looking for or imagining potential threats, Materialism to give something up, Perfectionism to ignore a flaw instead of fixing it, and Painful Honesty to lie or mislead.

I don't disagree, but I feel this is where the mechanics break down a little (and just a little). Because the structure of Anxieties is what it is, the 3 strife is tied to specific skill checks. You are right that a Painfully Honest person can sometimes let a lie slip, but I feel that when the character acts against his/her nature in that way, the 3 strife should be applied. Otherwise, a rules lawyer type of player is simply going to ignore their Anxieties altogether until the GM brings down the hammer.

I personally like playing the disadvantages in my RPG characters more than I like playing my advantages, but not every player does it. When push comes to shove, they take the "best" approach.

3 minutes ago, TheSapient said:

You are right that a Painfully Honest person can sometimes let a lie slip, but I feel that when the character acts against his/her nature in that way, the 3 strife should be applied. Otherwise, a rules lawyer type of player is simply going to ignore their Anxieties altogether until the GM brings down the hammer.

Agreed totally. It's not that your character can't lie - it's that they don't like it; and the 3 strife is the manifestation of "I'm doing something I don't like".

It's human nature not to voluntarily make life harder - which I guess is why you get the 'sweetener' of an otherwise-relatively-hard-to-get void point as payback for accepting having your disadvantages used.

3 minutes ago, TheSapient said:

I don't disagree, but I feel this is where the mechanics break down a little (and just a little). Because the structure of Anxieties is what it is, the 3 strife is tied to specific skill checks. You are right that a Painfully Honest person can sometimes let a lie slip, but I feel that when the character acts against his/her nature in that way, the 3 strife should be applied. Otherwise, a rules lawyer type of player is simply going to ignore their Anxieties altogether until the GM brings down the hammer.

I personally like playing the disadvantages in my RPG characters more than I like playing my advantages, but not every player does it. When push comes to shove, they take the "best" approach.

the whole game is definitely in a weird spot. it is heavily mechanical but then also have a lot of cracks and "up in the air" type of stuff.

let compare

D&D (heavily mechanical) rules are "tight".

to

Star Wars (barely mechanical, everything is basically narrative or gm's decision) rules are loose.

and L5R is Heavily Mechanical, but with loose rules.

which is a weird combo. definitely a Niche rpg that will probably be more enjoyable to long time L5R fans.

1 minute ago, Avatar111 said:

the whole game is definitely in a weird spot. it is heavily mechanical but then also have a lot of cracks and "up in the air" type of stuff.

let compare

D&D (heavily mechanical) rules are "tight".

to

Star Wars (barely mechanical, everything is basically narrative or gm's decision) rules are loose.

and L5R is Heavily Mechanical, but with loose rules.

which is a weird combo. definitely a Niche rpg that will probably be more enjoyable to long time L5R fans.

I've only played in one 7 hour session. My feeling is that the mechanics are designed to encourage the narrative. In the right head-space it works really well.

Because it is in the character's best interest to always apply their highest ring to every problem, it can feel like you are always trying to game the system with your decisions. Or, it can feel like your character is being true to their nature by sticking with certain Ring-based philosophies.

When a Monk is intuitively feeling out a crowd for trouble spots, is it because Void is his highest Ring? Or is it because this is how he interacts with the universe? I think that the former is true when you first start, but it drifts into the latter the longer you play.

2 minutes ago, TheSapient said:

I've only played in one 7 hour session. My feeling is that the mechanics are designed to encourage the narrative. In the right head-space it works really well.

Because it is in the character's best interest to always apply their highest ring to every problem, it can feel like you are always trying to game the system with your decisions. Or, it can feel like your character is being true to their nature by sticking with certain Ring-based philosophies.

When a Monk is intuitively feeling out a crowd for trouble spots, is it because Void is his highest Ring? Or is it because this is how he interacts with the universe? I think that the former is true when you first start, but it drifts into the latter the longer you play.

skill mechanics yeah,

but some other stuff really falls into the "gamey and/or shaenigan" category which star wars kind of avoid by being so narrative base with barely any rules (sure a few things are gamey in SW too, like disarms all the time and the stimpacks, but not nearly as much as L5R)

6 minutes ago, TheSapient said:

I've only played in one 7 hour session. My feeling is that the mechanics are designed to encourage the narrative. In the right head-space it works really well.

Because it is in the character's best interest to always apply their highest ring to every problem, it can feel like you are always trying to game the system with your decisions. Or, it can feel like your character is being true to their nature by sticking with certain Ring-based philosophies.

When a Monk is intuitively feeling out a crowd for trouble spots, is it because Void is his highest Ring? Or is it because this is how he interacts with the universe? I think that the former is true when you first start, but it drifts into the latter the longer you play.

In that case it is likely important to keep demeanors in mind. A TN 4 (Air 2, Earth 5) Command or Courtesy check will make even a Painfully Honest character with an Earth of 5 and an Air of 3 consider rolling Air.

2 hours ago, Avatar111 said:

and L5R is Heavily Mechanical, but with loose rules.

This is not that weird, lots of ST systems and Exalted, specially, are exactly like that. Heavily mechanical games but with a lot of abstraction, arbitration (RAI vs RAW) and encouraging collaborative storytelling. I don't have problems with it, mostly because my table really likes this type of game, but I definitely wouldn't recommend this style of RPG to D&D powergamers, for example.

3 minutes ago, omnicrone said:

This is not that weird, lots of ST systems and Exalted, specially, are exactly like that. Heavily mechanical games but with a lot of abstraction, arbitration (RAI vs RAW) and encouraging collaborative storytelling. I don't have problems with it, mostly because my table really likes this type of game, but I definitely wouldn't recommend this style of RPG to D&D powergamers, for example.

yeah Exalted didn't survive our group... but we were big fan of old white wolf vampire and werewolf.

we broke exalted though ?

15 minutes ago, Avatar111 said:

we broke exalted though ?

Exalted was made to be broken. If you aren't breaking Exalted you are quite simply playing it wrong ?.

3 hours ago, Avatar111 said:

the whole game is definitely in a weird spot. it is heavily mechanical but then also have a lot of cracks and "up in the air" type of stuff.

let compare

D&D (heavily mechanical) rules are "tight".

to

Star Wars (barely mechanical, everything is basically narrative or gm's decision) rules are loose.

and L5R is Heavily Mechanical, but with loose rules.

which is a weird combo. definitely a Niche rpg that will probably be more enjoyable to long time L5R fans.

Your scale is a very narrow slice of the range out there. Further, I think you're conflating "mechanical complexity" with "Tactical precision"

FFG Star Wars (SW) is heavily mechanical - in 12 point arial, I filled a page with just the corebook's opportunity and triumph spends, not counting ones unique to various talents. Mechanical limits on what talents one can take, and when they can be taken, with prerequisites so complex than only the graphical flowcharts make them playable.

SW can be played in a very mechanically light, GM driven narrative mode... but that literally means ignoring more than half the actual rules. It's actually pretty damned crunchy, despite not using a grid. Its tactical precision is low; it utterly lacks support for use of tactical minis and relies heavily upon "Theater of the Mind" . In terms of rules interactions per unit playtime, it's a dead heat with AD&D 2E and/or D&D 5E.

L5R is mechanically less complex - fewer constraints upon current action choices due to rules-covered situational states, fewer mechanical outcomes from given states, fewer variant/divergent mechanics, fewer action types calling for mechanical use, and fewer variations on those resolutions than D&D 5E or FFG Star Wars.. We have one unified dice mechanic (same as SW){same as D&D 5), two types of dice (less than SW's 7 kinds){vs D&Ds 20), 4 symbols (vs SW's 8){numerical results for D&D}, 4 total advantage/disadvantage mechanics (vs SW none){D&D 5 has no such mechanic, and the same term is used for a different kind of mechanic), two mechanical types of talent (vs SW's roughly 10){vs D&D's roughly 6-7); 7 types of non-dead damage state (vs SW's 20 or so){vs D&D 5e's 4, one of which s purely descriptive), and of those 7, 3 are already using the disadvantage mechanics (SW's are about 10 mechanics, and, since no disadvantages exist, they're essentially new mechanics). Psychological states number 4 in L5R5 (conflated with stun damage in SW), Conditions and Qualities number about 30 in both L5R5 and SW, and about 20 in D&D5.

L5R 5 has more defined than D&D 5e in mechanical terms, but those are less complex individually than D&D ones, use fewer overall mechanical types, and are defined in such a way that they can be used in a "purely silent manner"... that is, RAW, you, the player, can see clearly when they apply if the GM isn't allowing outside uses.

FFG SW is mechanically far more complex - more rules and more interactions between those rules, and more rules per roll involved.

None of the mentioned games are notably different on expected and average number of mechanical interactions per game-play-hour. Where they differ is in how many different rules are touched on for a single check, and how many mechanical decisiosn need to be made once the roll is committed.

D&D 5E, once the roll is made, it's made. Further mechanical interaction by that player is solely the constraint/deconstraint of the target, and or the damage or conditions affected. THe target may get to make a roll to avoid effects in many cases.
FFG SW, once the roll is made, there usually is opportunity to spend or threat to spend, plus the possibility of triumph or despair, and for a significant subset of rolls, force symbols to spend.
L5R 5 has several post roll decisions: rerolls, keeps, explosive keeps, opportunity spends, additional targets and/or special effects

L5R 5 is more complex only on the rolls' meaningful decisions; the rest of the game is simpler than either D&D5E or FFG Star Wars.

(Then again, WEG d6 SW was simpler still than all three, but even more mechanical interactions per hour... Faster resolution means more resolutions per hour. Savage Worlds, likewise, is quick. All 4 mentioned games are heavy on mechanical interactions. Compare this to Fiasco - where mechanical interactions are about 4-6 per player for an entire session... and are short to boot. FFG's End of the World likewise is mechanically lighter even than d6 SW or Savage Worlds.)

A nice assessment.

11 hours ago, AK_Aramis said:

Your scale is a very narrow slice of the range out there. Further, I think you're conflating "mechanical complexity" with "Tactical precision"

I definitely agree with this. At the risk of picking up a classic strawman; Go is one of the most tactical games going despite having a total of 8 rules - it took some 20 years of computer development to move from Deep Blue beating Gary Kasparov to DeepMind beating Kie Jie.

13 hours ago, omnicrone said:

I don't have problems with it, mostly because my table really likes this type of game, but I definitely wouldn't recommend this style of RPG to D&D powergamers, for example.

I'd seriously consider recommending Imperial Assault to players like that; it may not be billed as an RPG per se but it's not far off. The issue of 'wanting to game the system and/or beat the GM' is much more meaningful in a very structured game with what you might call an 'adversarial GM' - who has stricter limits of their own on what they can and cannot do.

I can't actually comment on D&D - as a not-particularly-dark-shame-and-secret, for a long term RPG player, I've never played D&D or any of it's derivatives.

I can add a few more to the pile, though:

• Dark Heresy (including Rogue Trader, Deathwatch, Only War, Black Crusade, and I guess 2nd edition WHFRP)
  • Very mechanical, at least in combat scenes; ranges in metres and fixed moves and action options means you could use it as a second-generation substitute for Inquisitor as a narrative RPG/Wargame if you were so inclined.
  • Success or Failure with no 'opportunity/threat/advantage' mechanic - 'degrees of success' matter but normally to trigger fixed effects; you've no real choices once the dice are picked up beyond throwing in fate points to reroll or add degrees of success.
  • The system - designed as it was in WHFRP days where a ratcatcher with a 'small but vicious dog' was a realistic PC choice - scales badly and even starting space marine characters can fall off the top of the carry/lift/push strength table.
  • It's not massively great at allowing multiple approaches to the same thing. Whilst it makes mention in passing in the rulebook about using characteristics with other skills, or occasionally a published adventure lists two or three different skills that might get you the same information (a -20 logic test or a -10 common lore) at different difficulties, there's no real advice or mechanical structure behind it. This is especially annoying if you've got a more driven-to-win player base given things like 'nested' lore skills or peer talents; Common Lore (Imperium), Forbidden Lore (Adeptus Astartes) and Forbidden Lore (Specific Chapter), for example.
  • One thing I love in FFG star wars and L5R that irks me in DH - damage rolls. Yes, there are ways of changing degrees of success into damage modification but they're a Band-Aid to a rather odd concept; a bullet causing D10+3 damage, where the variable chunk of damage is so much bigger than the fixed one, and which (aside from the rather loosely coupled Band-Aid mentioned above) is unconnected to how good the shot was (i.e. the 'to hit' roll).
• Traveller (Mongoose first edition & playtest)
  • Also very mechanical. The playtest for 1st edition with 'the tick' had some issues but it was really, really good and one of the best games I know for 'near future' gunfights over a few seconds (it needed a tweak of swapping high roll/success, low roll/failure to the other way around as a house rule - which I think I recall @AK_Aramis may have originally suggested - but otherwise I really like it).
  • Actively encourages using the same skill for different functions with different stats but again rarely offers two different skills to achieve the same effect in different ways.
  • Does connect 'effect' - how well you hit someone - much more directly to the damage of the shot (in the playtest it was literally the effect with a weapon-specific multiplier, in the 'printed version' effect was added to the damage roll as bonus damage)
  • Didn't have 'wounds', or 'hit locations' - instead, damage comes straight off one or more of your stats; so a 'shot to the leg' is a hit taking away a load of your dexterity, for example.
  • Again, no 'a random good/bad thing has happened!'
  • No concept of 'minion/adversary' enemies - everyone gets a full statline, and is just as dangerous, and there's nothing akin to 'extra life' fate points, void points, or any other 'look at me, I'm a Player Character!' special rules. Which is part of the reason combat is so freaking dangerous.
• Advanced Fighting Fantasy (bugger, I'm showing my age)
  • Very simple. There really wasn't much to this one; if in a fight, roll 2D6 and add your SKILL, opponent does the same, lower loses and gets smacked with the weapon of the winner.
  • A million tables of modifers for specific skills (are you sneaking 'in darkness'? 'with cover?' 'in heavy armour'?) but the whole thing was very loose. There wasn't much guidance beyond 'everyone make a swim test'. Everyone has a 'basic' SKILL score od D6+6 outside their specialist skills, and woe betide you if it was just a '7'....
  • Again, no 'opportunity' and no performance-linked damage boost aside from the 'double-six-critical/double-one-fumble'.
  • It's very much a story-driven one because there aren't enough mechanics to really let you pull any especially nasty tricks without convincing the Storyteller (GM) that you should be allowed to.
• Paranoia (Mongoose first & second edition & high programmers)
  • Probably the simplest rules-sets imaginable.
  • Not one for exacting tactical combat so much as co-operative storytelling and learning to dissemble, rationalise and lie your backside off on short notice... A lot of combats encountered tend to be forgone 'you win' or 'you lose' with the meat of the adventure being dealing with the consequences, not the fight itself.
  • There is a degree of 'gaming the system' allowed - and encouraged - but it's generally to screw over other players..... the 'perversity points' in first edition are essentially fate points you may or may not choose to spend on making a fellow troubleshooter's check easier (or harder).
  • Second edition did include a mechanical opportunity system with the computer die - when Friend Computer will turn up to 'help'. Ish.

On 11/1/2018 at 1:02 AM, Magnus Grendel said:

I can't actually comment on D&D - as a not-particularly-dark-shame-and-secret, for a long term RPG player, I've never played D&D or any of it's derivatives.

I can add a few more to the pile, though:

[snip]

• Traveller (Mongoose first edition & playtest)
• • Also very mechanical. The playtest for 1st edition with 'the tick' had some issues but it was really, really good and one of the best games I know for 'near future' gunfights over a few seconds (it needed a tweak of swapping high roll/success, low roll/failure to the other way around as a house rule - which I think I recall @AK_Aramis may have originally suggested - but otherwise I really like it).

Yeah, I'm likely the one you heard mention flipping the direction of the rolls... but I can't take credit for the idea itself. Someone else in the MGT playtest came up with it. And yes, I agree with your assessment of it.

As for D&D... Congratulations on missing D&D. (5E is amusing enough in short runs.)

On 11/1/2018 at 1:02 AM, Magnus Grendel said:

Advanced Fighting Fantasy (bugger, I'm showing my age)

It was recently rereleased in PDF. I picked it up as a bundle within the last year or so.

On 10/31/2018 at 3:26 PM, Avatar111 said:

the whole game is definitely in a weird spot. it is heavily mechanical but then also have a lot of cracks and "up in the air" type of stuff.

Sound like not thoroughly tested, or tested by people only interested in narrative and drama. Having a lot of trouble adapting it for my group since they are mechanic focused ppl (they like tactical combat (grid), clear "not in the air" mechanics etc).

7 minutes ago, Shosur0 said:

Sound like not thoroughly tested, or tested by people only interested in narrative and drama. Having a lot of trouble adapting it for my group since they are mechanic focused ppl (they like tactical combat (grid), clear "not in the air" mechanics etc).

yeah, us too. there are a lot of "weird" stuff in the rules. sure you can always just chill and play however you think it make sense on the spot. but for a game this heavily focused on techniques/stances/opp spendings.. there are a lot of redundant, unbalanced, or simply unexplained stuff.

it have the potential to be a great RPG, but It would probably need a "revised edition" or a "edition 1.5" like D&D 3.5 back in the days lol.