Character Creation

Saint Jiub wrote:Bonuses for tagged skills:

Advance up to 1 additional time per adventure
Synergize at higher level (maybe 25% instead of 20?)
Any more suggestions to differentiate tagged skills?

Well, this is obvious, but major skills would get a 25 or 30 point boost at start, while minor would get a 20 point boost. Not too much, but worth listing if a list is being put together.

Levels up faster and are more powerful. I'd say the above system is what we're looking for for major and minor skills.

How do you mean they synergize at a higher level? That if they are the high skill the other's are synergizing off of, the max they can be boosted to is higher?

I figure tagged skills will grant larger bonuses to their companion skills. So if I tag long blade, my short blade and block skills will get a 25% boost from long blade instead of 20%

Ah... I thought so. Wouldn't make much sense for major skills to be low enough to get bonuses to them from synergy.
This isn't really the right thread, but I'm still a little confused about how synergy would work. Would it just take the highest of the three skills, take 20%(or 25%) and use that as the other skills if the other skill or skills were lower than the resulting number? That's how I understood it to work, but I could be mistaken.

Rainbay wrote:Ah... I thought so. Wouldn't make much sense for major skills to be low enough to get bonuses to them from synergy.
This isn't really the right thread, but I'm still a little confused about how synergy would work. Would it just take the highest of the three skills, take 20%(or 25%) and use that as the other skills if the other skill or skills were lower than the resulting number? That's how I understood it to work, but I could be mistaken.

That's about the size of it. And you can't make a skill higher than the skill granting the bonus. So if your long blades is at 50, and your short blades is at 47, you can still only boost short blades to 50.

Wait, what? I thought synergy only worked if the skill was lower than 1/4 the highest of the three. So if you had 100 long blade, and 5 short blade, it would be boosted to 25. I didn't mean it would be boosted by an actual number amount. If shortblade surpassed 25, hey, that's great, but that just means it's on its own. I came up with this system so incredibly low skills can acutally have a chance to work, because at 5 failure is all but assured. Although with attribute bonuses, this might not be an issue.
Your way sounds interesting too however.

As I intended it when I suggested the system, the plan was to add part of your highest skill (25% if that skill is tagged) to the entire synergy group. That way, as your main skill grows, the subordinate skills grow at a reduced rate. The original numbers I proposed were 10% for untagged, 15% for minor, and 25% for major, but I think it would be easier to just say 20% for most skills and boost that to 25% for tagged skills.

Ah, that works well. I must have just misunderstood. Sorry, it's late.

I don't think there should be a synergy boost for tagged skills. It seems like that's already what having Synergy there in the first place is for. You're not likely to get a non-tagged skill to the point where it's granting other skills a synergy bonus anyway.

Outlander wrote:I don't think there should be a synergy boost for tagged skills. It seems like that's already what having Synergy there in the first place is for. You're not likely to get a non-tagged skill to the point where it's granting other skills a synergy bonus anyway.

Or aren't we? (Dun dun dun!) Synergy is just there to do away with situations where the grandmaster of long blades stabs himself in the face with a knife because he is in some inexplicable way as inept with them as any commoner who's never wielded a weapon. And, if you are pressed into frequently using a non-major (or an untagged) skill they will give you a kick start toward effective leveling. I think they should stay. They're not exactly a big influence, but they're logical, useful, and if we keep things simple to the end, there won't be a way to break them.

I think what he means by the boost to synergy with tagged skills (I could be mistaken again) is that if one of your tagged skills is your highest, the other skills get larger boosts than otherwise. Sp if you have 100 long blade and 5 short blade, and long blade is tagged, you'd get 30 short blade instead of 25 short blade.

Perhaps we should place a cap on how much synergy can do? Maybe make it so no skill can be synergized past level 50? So if you have 25 short blade and 100 tagged long blade, you'd operate at 50 short blade. But if you raised short blade to 26, you'd still only operate at 50 short blade.
This keeps synergy from being overpowering, I think.

Let's keep it simple. Synergy equal across the board and granted as long as the modified skill is less than or equal to the skill granting synergy. There's really no point in making a difference between tagged and untagged skills here as well, just for a difference of 5.

As for balance, let's not cap synergy but limit it like this: 1 point of bonus for X points in synergy giving skill, X being whatever we find appropriate. This way there's no abstract limit to how much synergy you can get out of your skill mastery, rather a practical one of your skill taking months of game time to get to 100 and requiring magic to go over.

Slotha Sil wrote:Let's keep it simple. Synergy equal across the board and granted as long as the modified skill is less than or equal to the skill granting synergy. There's really no point in making a difference between tagged and untagged skills here as well, just for a difference of 5.

As for balance, let's not cap synergy but limit it like this: 1 point of bonus for X points in synergy giving skill, X being whatever we find appropriate. This way there's no abstract limit to how much synergy you can get out of your skill mastery, rather a practical one of your skill taking months of game time to get to 100 and requiring magic to go over.

The issue I take is that late in the game, you would reach a point where you wouldn't even need to raise a skill because of synergy. For instance, 100 long blade and 80 short blade. without limits, short blade would synergize up to 100, so you wouldn't need to train it anymore. So for each of the skill groups, only one of the 3 skills would need to be 100, the others could just be 80 and you'd get the same effect. I think this should be avoided if at all possible.

But isn't getting one skill up to 100 and the two related skills up to 80 a pretty big accomplishment in itself? Considering most of the syngergizing skills we have are things that you just can't do at the same time (you can't swing a long sword and a short sword at the same time, it's one or the other), and considering how we're slowing skill advances as you get progressively better, getting skills up to 80/80/100 is something that would require literally dozens of adventures. At that point, I'm not opposed to letting people fudge it. And remember, there's always the Mastery perk (which you'll need to get 100 i a skill to benefit from - no lazy shortcuts there!)

Slotha Sil wrote:

Outlander wrote:I don't think there should be a synergy boost for tagged skills. It seems like that's already what having Synergy there in the first place is for. You're not likely to get a non-tagged skill to the point where it's granting other skills a synergy bonus anyway.

Or aren't we? (Dun dun dun!) Synergy is just there to do away with situations where the grandmaster of long blades stabs himself in the face with a knife because he is in some inexplicable way as inept with them as any commoner who's never wielded a weapon. And, if you are pressed into frequently using a non-major (or an untagged) skill they will give you a kick start toward effective leveling. I think they should stay. They're not exactly a big influence, but they're logical, useful, and if we keep things simple to the end, there won't be a way to break them.

I'm not arguing against the Skill Synergy rule, in fact I rather like it. I'm just saying that tagged skills shouldn't have more synergistic influence than skills that aren't tagged.

Yes, tagged skills have enough bonuses already I'd say. PLus, it's easier to get 20%. Just take 10% and multiply by 2. Really easy with a system based around 100.

MENTLEGEN
I have created a test character, a Redguard warrior-type.

Name: Inkwesa Ocha
Race: Redguard
Sex: M
+10 Str, End. -10 Int, WP, Per
+10 Block, Heavy Armor, Long Blade
+5 Athletics, Mercantile, Medicine
Sign: The Lover

HP: 55 (Str+End/2)
MP: 30 (WP+Int/2)
FT: 40 (WP+End/2)
Magicka/Turn: 3 (10% of current magicka, rounded down)
Actions: 3 (Speed/25, rounded down, plus one)
Move Speed: 5 (Speed bonus)
Max Encumbrance: 300 (Str*5)
Current Encumbrance: 137

STR: 60
END: 50
AGI: 40
SPD: 50
PER: 30
INT: 30
WP: 30

Skills (Group: synergy)

Subtle magicka: 7
Mysticism - 5
Illusion - 5
Apprentice Restoration - 35 (Major)

Gross Magicka: 1
Conjuration - 5
Alteration - 5
Destruction - 5

Magic-crafting: 4
Enchant - 5
Alchemy - 20 (Minor)
Armorer - 5

Crime: 4
Stealth - 5
Security - 5
Backstab - 20 (Minor)

Marksmanship: 7
Archery - 5
Apprentice Crossbow - 35 (Major)
Thrown - 5

Martial arts: 4
Hand-to-Hand - 5
Unarmored - 5
Acrobatics - 20 (Minor)

Brute weapons: 1
Axe - 5
Blunt - 5
Polearm - 5

Finesse weapons: 9
Apprentice Long Blade - 45 (Major)
Short Blade - 5
Apprentice Block - 45 (Major)

Speechcraft: 4
Etiquette - 5
Streetwise - 20 (Minor)
Mercantile - 10

Armor: 9
Apprentice Heavy Armor - 45 (Major)
Medium Armor - 5
Light Armor - 5

Adventuring: 5
Apprentice Athletics - 25 (Minor)
Medicine - 10
Survival - 5

Spells Known:

Restoration:
Novice +10
Soothing Balm - Heal Self 1d10 HP (3 MP)
Lesser Remedy - Remove Poison Self 1d5 (2 MP)
Apprentice +0
Remedy - Remove Poison touch 2d10 (8 MP)
Cast Chance: 24

Recipes known:
Lesser Fatigue Restorer - Heal 2d5 Fatigue Level (1 Grain, 1 Fruit)
Minor Haste Potion - Fortify Speed 1d5 for 5 rounds (1 Sugar, 1 Meat, 1 Animal Hide)

Effects:
Resist Common Disease 75%
Resist Poison 75%

Gear:
Weapons
Iron Saber - Attack: 49; Damage: 1d10+10; Weight 15
Iron Crossbow - Attack 39; Damage 1d10+7; Weight 10
50 Iron Bolts - Attack -5; Damage +0; Weight 5
Weapon Encumbrance - 30

Armor
Iron Cuirass - Dice Reduction: 3; Max Dice: 4; Armor modifier -5; Weight 30
Iron Helmet - Dice Reduction: 3; Max Dice: 4; Armor Modifier -0; Weight 5
Iron Greaves - Dice Reduction: 3; Max Dice: 4; Armor Modifier -2; Weight 18
Iron Pauldrons - Dice Reduction: 3; Max Dice: 4; Armor Modifier -2; Weight 20
Iron Boots - Dice Reduction: 3; Max Dice: 4; Armor Modifier -2; Weight 19
Iron Gauntlets - Dice Reduction: 3; Max Dice: 4; Armor Modifier -0; Weight 14
Iron Shield - Damage Reduction: 5; Block Modifier -5; Weight 15
Armor Encumbrance - 60.5
Total Defense: 23
Block Chance: 40

Clothing:
Buckskin pants - Weight 2
Linen tunic - Weight 1
Wool socks - Weight .25
Leather gloves - Weight .25
Leather quiver - Weight 1
Clothing encumbrance - 2.25

Other Items:
3 Lesser Fatigue Restorers - Weight: 3.75 (total)/ 1.25 (each)
1 Minor Haste Potion - Weight 1.5
Assorted adventuring gear - +20 to Survival skill used to forage and rest in the wild; Weight: 20
Hemp Rope - 20 feet; Weight 5
Iron Grapnel - Weight 3
Trail rations - 5 days; Weight 1
Iron Canteen (full) - capacity 1 gallon; Weight 10 (full)/2 (empty)
Backpack Encumbrance - 44.25

Pack Horse
When present, carries backpack. Encumbrance value becomes 92.75. Base defense becomes 31.

Encumbrance:
137
Penalty: -13

Some notes:
Defense is Armor Skill (Heavy armor) - total Armor penalty - Encumbrance penalty
Cast Chance is Spell skill - total Armor penalty. Cast chance is increased by 10 for each level below your current level and reduced by 10 for each level above your current. So an Apprentice gets +10 to cast Novice-level spells and -20 to cast Expert-level spells.
The non-combat gear he has is just there to look pretty and give an estimate of how much kit a character might be hauling on any given trek
I gave him one recipe per 10 points of Alchemy, and one Resto spell per 10 points of Resto skill
For Alchemy ingredients, I'm thinking it will be easier to have ingredient classifications than a specific list of ingredients. So guar hide and netch leather would both count as Animal Hide for ingredients.
For Fatigue, I'm thinking we can do a hybrid of the Up To 100 scale and the Fatigue Level scale by having tiresome actions, such as combat and endurance marching, do fatigue damage, and fatigue levels be at every 20% of total Fatigue. So say you've got 60 Fatigue; your first Fatigue Level is at 48 Fatigue, then 36, then 24, then 12. 0 Fatigue would mean you're completely exhausted. In Daggerfall that meant you would immediately pass out until you had regained some fatigue, but in Morrowind it just mean you couldn't do diddly.

That looks very promising! I'm going to go through the process and see if I can't create a character quickly myself based on the rules you've come up with here. I'm actually back for a few days in between exams and I'm feeling relatively healthy today, so I'll probably continue posting through this weekend. Next week is dead to me, but I should resume posting in full force come May 28 or so.

If you wanna give him light armor, I took the weight right out of the book and assigned random defense penalties. I'm thinking it might be more prudent to assign defense penalties based directly off weight, like, -1 per 5 pounds or something. What d'you think?

The only reason I'm hesitant to do that is that we're already counting off for encumbrance. Do we want to penalize armor based on weight twice?