G33X Nexus Entertainment > Precursors

Player Creation

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Noonien:
So, ya want to create a new player/character for the game. Groovy, but how? There are many ideas out there, so lets here them! My personal idea (as discussed with Morgul over a pizza) would be to have a number of slots you can put different traits/parts of the character into (life-style, wealth, intelligence, health, whatever). Say you have slots A - D, with the A slot being the most important and the D slot being the least important. For each slot there's a numerical range attached to it, say 0 - 20 for D, 21 - 40 for C and so on. For those sections you have a total pool of points to pull from and distribute among those slots to help define your character. Following the trend, a pool of 200 points would be cool. Well too bad, I was thinking having a max pool of about ~130 points to distribute would be acceptable (nobody's perfect  :wink: ). And then, though some method that pool would be created. Say someone might have a pool of 100 points to distribute, they could be all intelligence but almost nothing else. Not everybody starts out with the same value for their respective pool. Balances out dosn't it?

There are probably better ideas out there for character stat creation out there, hell we could directly rip-off WoC and use the D&D D20 system. So lets here something!  :)

Morgul:
Ok, let me explain mcrobotic's idea (as I understand it) and then give me thoughts, and finally, suggest my idea.

The Container Method:[/u]

Basically, imagine containers A,B,C,D. (A > B > C > D) You assign traits in the order of importance... say the traits were Intelligence, Widsom, Charisma, Skills. So we have:

Container:
A -> Wisdom
B -> Skills
C -> Charisma
D -> Intelligence

Ok, now for argument, let's say the contains have max values of:

A: 100
B: 50
C: 35
D: 15

Which means total they all hold 200 points. Instead of giving the players 200 points at character creation, we only give them 100. This means that you would have to assign the number of points you wanted to start depending on how important it is to you, knowing full well that you won't be able to max everything. Let's say you do it this way:

A: 20
B: 50
C: 25
D: 5

This would mean that starting off, you have more skills and more Charisma then you have Wisdom, but your character has the capacity to gain more wisdom as you play... but will never inprove his Skills since it's already maxxed out at character creation.

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Ok, this system is interesting, because it already assigns max values to your stats when you create the character... However I don't know if I like *ALWAYS* having to be really weak in one area. Some people are all around good at everything.. and I can't make a character like that with this system. It bugs me.

Morgul:
Ok, here's my idea:

The 'All Men are Nerfed Equally' Method:[/u]

Genereral Idea: Basically, Take Shadow Run's Priority System, mix it up with a random number generator, and add a little nerfing in for spice.

Ok, let's say you have Prority Slots A through D, which all have point ranges assinged to them like so:

A: (100 - 200)
B: (50 - 110)
C: (30 - 60)
D: (10 - 40)

Notice, we have 10 points overlap between each one, and the one above, or below it. Now, let's take the following Attributes (Wealth, Skills, Knowledge, Personality), and assign them to the following slots:

A: Wealth
B: Skills
C: Personality
D: Knowledge

Now, once we assign them, we let the computer pick values in the range of each one, and that's the number of points we have to work with in each Attribute. Let's say it assigns the following:

A: 120
B: 50
C: 60
D: 25

Now, notice that we actually start out with more points in Personality then we do in Skills, even though we assigned Skills to a slot above Personality.   Just because it's assigned to a slot below something else, doesn't nessicarily mean that it's going to have more, just that on average it will. This means that you don't always know how many points you'll have given a slot, but you do know the least you're going to have. It makes it dynamic, and still allows for you to create characters that start off good at something.

Now, wait, there's more. Let's say you were really pissed off at the fact that you have more Personality points than Skill points. You can 'purchase' more points by lowering your max in any catagory, at -2 in a catagory gets you 1 point in any other catagory you want. Let's say the max (in all catagories) is 255. You want to put 20 more points in Skills. That means you need to take a total of -40 in max points. Let's say you do it this way:

A (max): 255
B (max): 255
C (max): 235
D (max): 235

So, now you have a 70 in skills, but once you've been playing for a while, you're not going to be able to be as Knowledgable, or have as many Personality traits as another character who didn't nerf themselves.

Now, keep in mind, all number in this can be changed.. and most likely will. This was all just to illustrate the idea. So, what do you think?

(Oh, as a side note... You can't nerf wealth, since it's only at character creation that it matters... IE: it determines how much starting cash you have. having a 'max' for it is retarded... there's no reason why you can't have a million dollars, just because you don't have a max high enough.)

--Chris

fehknt:
I like it.  It allows people to change thier characters around from what they're given, but only if they really want to, because of the high cost.  I'd propose that increasing your highest stat costs even more, say it's a 3-1 trade there.

Maybe allow people to choose if thier character has "even" stats (almost all equal), or "normal" (fair range) or "extreme" (crazy highs and lows), and then put them to prioritizing them.  Even stats won't matter too much how you prioritize, but the others it would.  It would allow you to make a character that was a jack-of-all-trades, non-specialist, or a normal specialized person that can do ok but not good outside thier specialization, and they can make a person that's freakishly good at some things, but pretty terrible at anything that they dont specialize in.

Duffy:
Except for the random generation part it sounds good. By having the points randomized you could potentially run into two problems. One of them being that  someone could get a really good random draw or a really horrible random draw.  Both obviously cause some unfair factor on either the creator or other players. The easy solution to a bad draw is to simply remake your character. This brings up problem number two, remaking characters till you get the best "stats". This will obviously create a problem, the system will cause player customization to become just the priority you give each "stat". So why bother with the random numbers at all? Now of course anyone who knows anything about randomization knows that the chances of getting the perfect stats aren't very good. But it is possible, and players will use this to gain an advantage.. (I've spent a lot of time with D&D Character Creation programs, it can be done)

Best solution I think would be to stick with the point distribution and the priorities, but make three changes.

1.) Depending on priority the point cost from your starting point pool changes. Sorta sticks to what morgul said. (Somthing like: A slot 1-1 exchange, B slot 2-1 exchange, etc...)

2.) Put a cap on each priority, doesn't have to be very low, but it insures no one is "perfect" in something and has nothing else at all. (while this could be argued as nerfing yourself I guarantee someone will think of a way to exploit it, its just one of those things you know can cause problems, just don't know exactly what yet.)

3.) Since you want this to be close to realistic, you should probably account for natural talent. This is a possible use for a quick random number to be added to your "stat" scores. Range for each possible increase would be determined by the priority slot. This would be a hidden number anyways so players would not be able to exploit it, also it should only be enough to help but not enough to horribly overpower a character.

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