Hey everyone it's been a little while, been really busy.

I've recently started Gming an anima campaign, which I'm having fun with, although one of my PC's are unrepently horrible but that's a story for another thread. I was wondering about the appearance roll and what other Gm's do with it the first game I've played it didn't make any difference at all (besides my female NPC who was appearance 9 getting hit on by a stranger or two) I put it into mechanics to make appearance more useful making it give a bonus to persuade, leadership and style depending on stat (eg: appearence 10 will give a +15 to all three) leading to the lower rolls having minus effects to theses skills. I though it made the roll a bit more useful besides the roleplaying parts. Does anyone else do this? If someone has, it didn't break the game at all? Is it a good idea? Also any other ways appearance can add to the game?

Just wondering and thanks!

I personally wouldn't use it to give bonuses to skills, seeing as other abilities already do that. I might give players a bonus in situations to some skill (in certain cases) if appearance could effect the outcome. I wouldn't give a bonus if, say, a character was trying to get a king to go to war.

Adrassil said:

Here's my thoughts, scattered as they may be… Hope they are helpful.

I only allow it's use against NPCs. But otherwise, I think that was a good use of it. Generally, my players don't like to let a die or a state dictate how they react to each other (except by faction). The only time stats or rolls sway players amongst themselves is when something impressive happens as a result of it in general (as in, not against another PC).

If you can find an OLD copy of AD&D titled "Unearthed Arcana", that had rules for the 7th trait called Appearance and not only did it cite Fascinate spell-like abilities for extrodinarily high scores (obviously Elves and Dryads get high bonuses) but even reactions for ugly and even hideous appearances for low scores (usually the half-orcs). If you really like to spice things up, there is an OpenGL d20 title "The Book of Erotic Fantasy" with more uses of the Appearance traits and even feats, skills and classes that can make use of it. I recommmend players 18+ for that title, however.

Anima core-book has a conversion table for 3-18 based ability score systems.