r_b_bergstrom said:

We'll just disagree on that issue then. Hopeless and mcv have already replied saying most what I would have said, so no need to repeat.

But just to be clear, I don't care that some of my actions are not used that often, they fit with my career concept and when I use them they fit the situation at hand.

Improved guarded position is a good card when you have a high damage dealing but perhaps not so tough party members. Like Troll slayers or Bright wizards. It also depend on the opposition. When being attacked by a Ungor 3 man henchmen group (4 blue dice+2 white), the chance of being missed increases by about 20% when you add one purple die to the pool. It's less efficient with more powerful monsters, but it helps keeping the other party members up.

I also agree wholeheartedly with dvang and mac40k.

dvang said:

dvang said:

qft

I would go even farther and say that a slew of Advanced careers for each career "type" would be a bad thing. I find that they tend to lock people into a more linear path of advancement. It's a feature (not a bug) of the career system that there is no obvious "stage 2, 3, 4, etc" for everyone. Otherwise, you may as well have traditional, level-based classes.

Guys & gals:

Just to clarify what I mean by vertical advancement is what was seemingly /forgotten/ to have been brought forwards from WFRP2e and the reason why I left D&D:

I'm not interested in +1 to hit bumps and high level action cards.

I'm interested in the following:

Troll slayer > Giant slayer > demon slayer

Soldier > veteran > sargent > captain

Seaman > mate > captain

thief > cat burglar > master thief

etc.

It's the THEME of advancement that WFRP3 has seemed to have forgotten. That's what lost my players. Players like to advance vertically and feel like their character is growing into something important in the campaign. Advancing horizontally (thief --> soldier --> commoner) is like starting a new character when you rank "up" or should I say "rank 'over' ". That's why I really look forwards to seeing what FFG will have to offer in that regards. Jay did a great job on the career compendium, but I wonder how he managed to forget how important that book really was!

Now, I estimate that within a year, there will be a whole bunch of advanced careers, at which I hope to try the game again. Afterall, I enjoyed most of it and still actually detest D&D (Pathfinder included), but will suck it up to be able to play..rather than sit alone in the dark with my shiny WFRP3 boxed set..myyyyy ...precious.....gollum...gollum...

jh

mcv said:

Actually, he did say he wanted 8 attacks. Quote:

I have 2 ranged actions now, I'll want at least one more (and 1-2 more once I get a blackpowder weapon), that's two more. I have one support card now, I'm planning for at least two more. I have one melee action now, I want at least 3 more.

Has 2 ranged, wants 1 more, plus 1-2 more when he gets blackpowder.

Has 1 melee, wants 3 more.

2+1+2+1+3 = 8 all attacks. Then he wanted support cards, defenses, social actions, etc, on top of his 8 attacks he said he wanted. He indicated he wanted 14 action cards, 8 of which were attacks. That sounds a bit much to me.

I must be losing my connection with RPGs. I never even heard terms horizontal, linear or vertical advancement until this thread.

I mean I instictively understand all three of them from the first time I heard them, I just never heard those terms before.

Overall, I dont see why anyone would be upset at the OPs statement that he is playing another game until this game catches up to where he and his players want to be at. Its a very rational thought and purpose. The same support goes to anyone who says "I like the game enough to play it over and over again and dont feel its incomplete." These are all personal views and none of them are right or wrong.

As for advancement, if I was playing in a game and there was no advancement allowed or it was extremely rare, I would probably find another group to play with. Most fiction (especially sci-fi and fantasy) has characters who learn new skills, abilities and powers fairly quickly, but these powers reach a peak and rarely advance after a certain point, but they still spend XP in other ways. Luke learns to use the force pretty quickly in Star Wars and Empire, but developes very little during Jedi.

I would say a combined XP/Fate system would work well here, such as how it operates in DC Heroes or D6 or Marvel Super Heroes. XP can be spent on advances or used to gain bonus dice on a immediate action, soak damage, do recovery checks for damage and so forth. This would reduce advancement for those who dont like it too fast but also allow players the sense that they are getting advances and experience, but alternate ways to use it. Just a thought, perhaps one that needs more thought out.

I am working on a similar Idea for Dark Heresy.

Emirikol said:

Then I agree! I loved that sort of thing in 1st edition (except Giant Slayer was an end career there, so I'm not terribly interested in demon slayers). I can understand FFG didn't want to swamp us with hundreds of career cards right away, but I disagree with many of the careers they chose to include so far. The few intermediate careers we have so far, are awfully specific. Fanatic doesn't sound like anything I'll ever use. Witchhunters are cool, but also quite specific.

I would have liked a generic Veteran, Sergeant, Mate, some roguish types (Charlatan, Spy), maybe some sort of Travelling Scholar for Students and Scribes to advance into?

I'm seriously thinking about creating my own career sheet template, and then producing a ton of suitable adventuring careers ranging from basic to advanced (because there are also some basic careers that are missing, IMO).

Peacekeeper_b said:

I think seeing as I was the one to say about slowing advancement, I should answer this point. I was answering the OP about having reached the limits of the mechanics for character advances .. as in advances they can buy in the game's mechanics. My point was that my players tended to focus on what game mechanic advances they could take, rather than the character development in-game which is a far more important part of RPGs (imo), until I slowed the rate suggested in modern RPGs. Then they stopped thinking all the time about what talent they were going to buy at the end of tonights session, and instead thought about how they were going to get into that NPC farmers daughters knickers. Much more interesting character development.

I felt it was a viable addition to any conversation about the limits to game mechanic advances, but peoples milage will vary depending if they have seen the issue that I did .

Fabs said:

No I do understand. In many of my games in the past, it was a requirement that a character use a certain skill or ability or strive to learn it in game before he or she could increase it or purchase it new. It made for interesting moments as not only did the players have their characters looking for people to teach them or to shadow but were also looking for reasons to use skills in game.

In your above example, they would have to try, reasonably well, to get into the NPC farmers daughters knickers if they wanted to increase any ability that had to do with charisma or seduction (whatever skill for whatever game) and not just go "OK I hid in the basement the whole fight, avoided the troll, did not make eye contact with the knight and only ate my own food at the Vampire Count's banquet this adventure. So now I am going to spend my XP on +1 WS and +1 S and put the rest toward buying super-man-fu-judo-chop-with-axe!"

Yup, but just to take it a little further ... I felt my players were trying to get into the farmers daughters knickers (I wish I'd chosen another example now), so that they could improve thier Seduction skill rather than trying to get into her knickers because .. er .. there character wanted to get into her knickers.

I know for certain, then when I'm trying to seduce a woman, my prime concern isn't 'Hmm, if I do this well, then I'll be better at it in future", but something far ... er .... simpler . Of course, over the years my skills have certainly improved, due to this very practice (now I really wish I'd chosen a different example), but that wasn't the objective of the excercise.

Actually, this whole conversation is really about when different groups require different things out of game mechanics in terms of what helps, and what hinders, the players imagination and involvement in the game. And for my group, a regular focus on character improvements through game mechanics, was a hinderance rather than a help.

The whole knickers thing was interesting.

But as a result of a succesfull seduction "getting into the farm daughters knickers" , your self-esteem and confidence would probably soar, or at least increase. And that part is something you will build on for future seduction attempts, like you get the hang of it (seduction specialization).

Other than I think with social skills self-insight are important, knowing yourself and your limitations.

Here is a thought: don`t you learn more from your failures than your successes? meaning that if you use a sort of system that you guys where talking about that you can only increase in stats and such if they where used in previous sessions. Like no combat stats can increase if all you did was attending a ball. In that context successes are as important as failures when determine what stat increase is available.

You behaved clumsily and steped on the toes of the duchess, failed at all attempts at etiquette. Now this is a good reason to pick up that skill.

good gaming

Btw Emirikol: you seemed to have opened the flood gates. LOL

It's the difference between focusing on story and focusing on stats.

If you want to get into the farmer's daughter's knickers because that's the kind of person you are, you focus on story, not on stats.

If you want to get into the farmer's daughter's knickers because then you can improve your Seduction skill, then you make the story subservient to improving your stats.

If you want to get into the farmer's daughter's knickers but you're thinking more about what to spend your XP on, story and stat increase are mostly unrelated, but the stat increase still distracts a bit from the story.

If you forget to get into the farmer's daughter's knickers because you're only thinking about how to get XP and how to spend it, you don't really have much story left.

Whether that's a problem depends on your taste. Personally I think story trumps everything, but most of the rest of my group seem to disagree.

I always thought CoC had a neat advancement concept. At the end of an adventure/session you would test any skills you used to see if they improved. CoC is a percentile system, but to improve a skill you have to roll over your current score, which means that characters tend to advance rapidly in newly learned skills, but it becomes increasingly harder to improve them as time goes on no matter how often you use them. Now there are those people who will focus on the story and use whatever skills seem appropriate during the adventure, and there are others who will look for any excuse to use a skill they want an opportunity to make the advancement roll for at the end of the session.

WFRP doesn't really have this problem because advancement is based on career and done in between sessions, not during the game based on in-game events. This frees us to use whatever skills, talents, or actions are appropriate for the story without worrying about how that will impact advancement. Similarly, by not requiring in-game justification for the advancements taken, players don't have to look for those rationalizations to use skills inappropriate to the current adventure only becuase they plan to advance that skill at the end of the session. It's easy to assume that a character that wants to improve his WS is practicing his swordsmanship during story downtime and over a period of time. When the player takes the advancement then it doesn't matter if the entire activity of that session was social, the advancement isn't the result of specific in-game activities. Whether it is rationalized as the culmination of weeks of study/practice or an "ah-hah" moment, the character just gets better because he does. This also means that we don't waste time in game seeking out tutors/mentors to provide skill training or to teach a specific action.

Mechanically, WFRP was designed to reward players with some small improvement after each session. If you slow down XP awards you are going against the design philosophy. Now if you are doing it for fear of exhausting advancement potential until additional material is released, again, I only see that being a problem for certain careers and not a big one at that, but it shouldn't be because you are forcing players to tie in-game events to advancement.

Emirikol said:

I have a proposal. Do those have to be in the form of careers? Couldn't you get an "Advancement Card" of some sort that gives you a title and an ability? That way you can have your character grow in a linear fashion without abandoning the non-linear nature of the career system.

(runs back to the lab to experiment with idea)

Sounds interesting. hopefully this will not actually be done by the publishers.

Doc, the Weasel said:

We did some work with this in the house rules section..but I finally decided "WHY am I doing this?!?!" This really should be a priority for FFG.

jh

Doc, the Weasel said:

And with that advancement card, you just do the same basic career a second time? Interesting idea, as long as the advanced career really is just "more of the same". Do soldiers and mercenaries get the Leadership skill? Because I think that skill is rather vital to a mercenary captain.

Emirikol said:

Because we are gamers, and we tinker.

mcv said:

I think the strength of the career system is in moving from one to the next (i.e. "I used to be X, and now I am Y"). By moving along a linear progression (either Soldier > Captain > Knight, or repeating a career) you lose that, and may as well just have a level-based class system. That's why I was thinking of taking rank and making it something outside of career. That way, your character can still have the a > b > c career progression, but still move from a1 > a2 > a3.

Besides the Advancement Card, you need a better variety of careers in certain fields. You can't have just "thief", you need "cutpurse", "burgler", "fence" and "thug" (some of which we already have in this case). You can't have "soldier", you need "infantry", "heavy infantry", "bannerman" and "cavalry".

The result would be something like the following:

I started out as a cutpurse, then moved to burglary (Career Burglar) when I joined the guild (Advancement Card "Guildsman"). Once I was established, I started getting into the fencing game (Career Fence) and started rising in the ranks. Once I became Master of the Guild I did less field work and focused more on running the business side of the guild (Career Burghermeister with Advancement Card "Guildmaster").

As far as the Leadership question, maybe that becomes a career skill when you get the card.

i am trying to understand what you mean. to me, it sounds like you want to offer structured/titled "perks" to players so that they can feel they are advancing without having to come up with rigid career paths for every general career type. perks were one of the things i really liked about HERO. you had to roleplay and spend points to get them and they usually increased the players integration into the game world. giving these perks titles like "guildmaster" is genius. you could also give out lesser perks for characters as they start to advance in organizations like "scrub: amongst the members of your guild you are the lowest of the low, every time you encounter a guild brother you have to perform any menial non-endangering task they require. guild-related purchases are one scarcity less in any location where your guild is present." just an idea.

Bindlespin said:

Pretty much. I love the career system, and the very non-linear progression that it encourages. I think that Advanced Classes stand to undermine it, but what they do provide are options that aren't available at character creation, such as being a knight, witch hunter, high level wizard, etc. I'm interested in finding a happy medium that allows for those kinds of progression options, while making sure that there isn't just a single path to get there.

I totally can understand what you all mean in regards to those types of 'vertical' career progression. However, where we disagree is that it needs to be a priority for FFG. I think there are plenty of fun advancement opportunities for a mercenary, without needing to go mercenary ->mercenary sergeant->mercenary captain->etc

While it would be nice to have this progression available, I don't see it as *needed* before other things; such as the rest of the wizard and priest basic careers, as well as other "basic" careers.

For example ... a mercenary could go to Thug when he wants to advance to "Sergeant". When he wants to become a "Captain" he advances into Dilletante or Noble (or somesuch). Or, maybe Thug->Mercenary->Noble career progression. And so on.

dvang said:

With this, I agree.

dvang said:

With this example I lose a little of focus. Why should I change from mercenary to thug for becoming a sergeant?
We are forcing the system, imho:

1) I disregard the notation "thug" on the card, considering it a "sergeant". This way I can use this card for fisherman, bartender or artillerist.
2) I change career only to gain some bonuses, gaining pluses but, perhaps, losing on the RPG side.

And if my player wants to became a Thug Lord?

As you have made the example I must simply select the most "attractive" career for the next step and saying "boys, this ironbreaker is my new cart washer".
Not much difference from having some classes (warrior, rogue, etc), and then calling them as someone likes.

WFRP has always been the other way around, I think.

DeathFromAbove said:

You are mangling what dvang suggested in order to make your point. He's suggesting thinking of the career titles as generalized areas that fit a theme rather than an ironclad job description. A thug is someone who gets what they can out of life by bullying others. If you look at the level of organization and discipline in most medieval armies, the parallel to being a sergeant should be immediately obvious. It's a far cry from just calling the advancement profile for a thug a fisherman.

The only real limitation on skill training in WH3E is your character's Rank, which is only very loosely related to the character's number of careers. You don't have to have "Veteran Soldier" to train your second rank of Weapon Skill... in fact you can do it in a single career if you plan appropriately.

Pretty much what Haggard says. Since we don't currently have a "Mercenary Sergeant" career for a Mercenary to advance into ... he can approximate by using a Thug as an approximate template for how a "Mercenary Sergeant" could typically feel. He could advance into the Thug career card, yet still remain a Mercenary "sergeant".

There is a big difference between using a Thug to represent a position in the chain of mercenaries, and using, say, a Scribe to represent a Dragon Slayer, or an Ironbreaker for a Cartwasher (if there was a cartwasher career). I'm suggesting that it isn't difficult to find a similar and compatible basic career to represent a more 'advanced' type career position with the current career cards. Will it be nice when more advanced career cards come out? Sure! Is it something urgently needed? No, because for the most part, the basic careers make fine alternatives until then.