An RPG without leveling

[TheGreatGodPan]

Here's a dumb idea, what if you role-play a character that is progressively decaying until he reaches point zero. Usually you role-play games where you become a god like character and savior of the world striving to become better and more powerful. In this game you start as a genius and influential person and will slowly decaying striving to learn and live as much as you can to stop this process. Would this be an rpg?

The need for characters to become always better imposes some restraints on role-playing and we get always the same cliche plots and endings. For the writer it becomes a chalenge to defeat the narrative monotony imposed by this scheme and create truly unique quests and plots.

Call of Cthulhu has Mythos Points. It is like a permanent HP that can never be recovered, and after a certain limit your character can no longer be played.

 

[neuromantik]

It might work... depending on implementation of course. It seems like the formula that survival horror games use.

 

[LCJr.]

The problem ain't levels or character systems, the problem is the design that stems beyond that in CRPGs these days. Early on in a CRPG, before a player customizes his character much, obstacles should be somewhat open for how the player wants to deal with them. A beginning player probably should be able to kill the guards or sneak around them or talk them in to leaving their posts or whatever to get in to the tower. It's later on that a character that made strict warrior choices shouldn't be able to thief his way in or smooth talk his way in as a rule of thumb. The converse is also true, a friggin' thief shouldn't be forced to kill the guards to get in. In fact, the thief probably shouldn't even be able to kill the guards, since they're most likely strict warriors.

The character system should enforce the role choices of the player and so should the area design as well. There's no real good reason why a 15th level thief should be able to toe-to-toe fight a 15th level warrior. He should slip passed the guard, jimmy the lock on the window, and slip in that way. Problem is not to many designers think that way, so you have thieves running around chopping up guards instead of being thieves.

Same thing goes for wizards. How many CRPGs offer spells other than ones that make things dead? A wizard should be able to invis himself, transmute a stone wall to mud to make a hole in the wall, and make his way in like that. Use illusions to trick the guards in to thinking he's a dragon so they run away would be another way. The problem is, wizards just get attack spells so they just blast the guards and do things the same way warriors do.

Anyone that's thinking character systems have no part in a CRPG has his head up his ass.

You seem to be hung up on classes. Didn't you like the classless system in Fallout? Anyone could take a character and tag Small Arms, Speech and Sneak. Then regardless of level he'd be able to shoot someones eyes out as well as any fighter type. Talk his way out of almost anything like any diplomat type. Or sneak past the guards like any thief type. Would you say being able to do this means Fallout has a bad character system?

And I personally don't see where having a CRPG without levels means no character system. What I was suggesting is that the abilities of the character would be determined at generation and stay relatively static after that ala Traveller. Instead of going from a nobody to somebody you'd be starting as an experienced character. With grinding for levels out of the way you'd be free to play your character the way you wanted. Haven't you ever played a game where you had the opportunity to bypass a group of enemies but instead went ahead and killed them for the XP?

@Pan Are you talking the PC game or the PnP? Did insanity points get replaced with mythos points?

 

[Dementia Praecox]

As for flaying your arms pointlessly for reward, people kill kids in fallout for the pointless pleasure.

To be clear, my above game design isn't for a computer game - it's a game you play with a book and a knife.

It's a Role Flaying Game!

Oh, I really can't tell you all how much pain and agony I had to suffer through during this family dinner. All I could think about was this marvelous pun. No less than a thousand reliefs I felt when I realized I still could pull it.

Well, the pun is made, now I can move on. However, I find it very hard to argue with anyone, as galsiah steals all the good points and calls everyone on their bullshit. So, I guess I'll just diverge the entire discussion until SkeleTony reappears.

Same thing goes for wizards. How many CRPGs offer spells other than ones that make things dead? A wizard should be able to invis himself, transmute a stone wall to mud to make a hole in the wall, and make his way in like that. Use illusions to trick the guards in to thinking he's a dragon so they run away would be another way. The problem is, wizards just get attack spells so they just blast the guards and do things the same way warriors do.

The wizard is a RPG archetype with extremely unfulfilled potential. I've just played the hell out of the Penumbra tech demo, and I couldn't help but being struck by the possibilities a fully utilized physics-system could have for a wizard. The laughable attempt on telekinesis in Oblivion is a fucking disgrace to these possibilities. Combine a good physics engine with breakable scenery, and wham, the wizard is suddenly most interesting character in the game. Spells like melting walls, using telekinesis to distract people, smash people, or even lift people up and use it as a way to intimidate them would open up some real interesting possibilities. I remember seeing the first demo videos of Half-Life 2 and thinking on how what I saw could be utilized in Oblivion (early in the hype., when I still wasn't deprived of all hope). Further, things that have nothing do do with physics, like spells of the type of Jedi mind trick is too seldom to be seen. Spells that make you change appearance, not to a wolf, so you can kill people in a cool way, but to another person, so you could sneak in somewhere, infiltrate a faction, make people trust you, then proceed to fuck them in the ass. I'd like to see this type of a cunning mage, rather than the ranged attack with funny colours-fighter, as is the current standard in CRPGs.

Proper use of physics would be a great help for innovative gameplay for other archetypes as well. Look at Thief the Dark project. They had rope arrows ten bloody years ago. Now combine the gameplay of Thief, the combat of Dark Messiah (without the blatantly stupid placement of obviously usable objects like the omnipresent spikes), and the wizard described above. Then add this to a quest system like Gothic III, with the same open world, with opposing factions, some real consequences for your actions, consequences that would show.

Ah, it'd be like a wet dream come true. Worst thing is, by looking at Penumbra, an independently developed, beautifully looking 3d-game, and what seems to becoming of AoD. I can't help but think this actually could happen. If AoD don't turn out to be shit, and rather be the second coming of Christ that I hope it'll be, then just imagine, imagine what those four people combined with those crazy dudes in Frictional Games could do. I think I just came in my pants.

Here's a dumb idea, what if you role-play a character that is progressively decaying until he reaches point zero. Usually you role-play games where you become a god like character and savior of the world striving to become better and more powerful. In this game you start as a genius and influential person and will slowly decaying striving to learn and live as much as you can to stop this process. Would this be an rpg?

Reading this just made me remember one of my first experiences with PnP. I participated in a session of Shadow Run, with some heavy house rules to boot. We all started out as very skilled characters, the only info about the upcoming campaign was that we would be very experienced. As the munchkins we were, we all made some heavy combat focused trolls and minotaurs, except one who made a human focusing on intuition and logic (or what it's called). It turned out that the concept of the campaign was that we had been abducted, and infected with some sort of virus or nanobots of sorts. This virus-thing made us weaker by the day, it attacked muscle mass and bodily functions first, so obviously the guy who played human made the better choice. We could expose our self to radiation to slow the degeneration, with the consequence of suffering some other negative effects, but there was only one way to actually stop it (We had to eat some shit some guy had, far far away from our current location, don't remember the details).

We started out imprisoned, and at the best our characters were ever to be during the entire campaign. The first fights were the most difficult (enemy strength-wise), but as we escaped and made our way around through the world, fights and challenges became progressively harder, but the enemies we fought and the challenges we were put up to were, per normal rules an progression, easier. The story reflected this, as we had to seek out some hermit in the wilderness, where there were less and less bad guys. Sounds silly when I write this now, but it made sense back then. Best GM I've ever had, but he moved away soon after that, and all PnPs I've played since have been utter shit in comparison. We played for four days straight, and we all ended up dead. Pure awesomeness. So my answer is: Your suggestion could most definitely make a RPG. Might even turn out to be a great one too.

 

[Ismaul]

This is, of course, an improvement - the tedious/painful aspect is compensated by a reward. The reward is really something for the player to look forward to: he's higher level, so the tedious/painful aspect is over more quickly in future. In fact, after 300 pages, the player doesn't need to flay his left forearm at all!!

For a while I was thinking that either getting rid of the flaying, or replacing it with something fun or interesting might be a good idea. It's ok now though, since I've got the above reward system. Personally I think it's great.
Thoughts?

Some nice satire there. I really agree that a reward system does not make a good game. Although it does make a selling one. The masses want instant (or nearly instant) gratification at the cost of anything. And here come the legions rats of different shapes that give loot and xp at the click of the mouse, while story, choice and consequence weep in their lonely corner. Diablo is teh bestest RPG evar!!!!

... kill the guards... sneak around... warrior choices...thief his way... smooth talk his way... thief... kill the guards to get in... thief... kill the guards... warriors.

... 15th level thief... toe-to-toe fight... 15th level warrior... thieves running around chopping up guards instead of being thieves...

... wizards... spells... should be able to invis himself... transmute a stone wall to mud to make a hole in the wall... Use illusions to trick the guards... wizards...

Emphasis mine, obviously. You're talking about a game that revolves around combat. The roles you talk about, warrior, thief, wizard, are all combat related. Sure, a game that's all about combat can benefit from a stat system, one that even allows to do more than fight, but that's not what we are talking about.

What we are talking about is roleplaying. Since when combat was mandatory? Sure, cRPGs have a history of it, but that doesn't limit roleplaying, it means the developers/publishers limited themselves (dumb money obsessed industry). Roleplaying can take other forms. You can have roles that are not defined by the main way you kill foozles.

Example: What about a mad scientist, or a good natured one? Not the best example, and uninteresting until you put them in front of a choice with consequences: Participate in a great discovery that would make you known and powerful at the cost of lives/environment/morality, or try to stop it no matter what it takes for your own integrity and conscience.

What about political struggle? social relations? uncovering knowledge?
Where is the combat in that? The fighter, thief, and warrior?

Anyone thinking that fantasy archetypes are the only roles to roleplay has his head up his ass.

 

[Xi]

What we are talking about is roleplaying. Since when combat was mandatory? Sure, cRPGs have a history of it, but that doesn't limit roleplaying, it means the developers/publishers limited themselves (dumb money obsessed industry). Roleplaying can take other forms. You can have roles that are not defined by the main way you kill foozles.

No, we are talking about Role playing "games". When I argued that a progressive reward system was important, I did not do so because I thought it was something that was all encompassing to have good roleplaying. I was merely stating that it is an important factor for gaming in general and has simply been a staple of RPGs since the beginning.

Roleplaying and gameplay are seperate facets of the "Game", they are almost mutually exclusive these days - which is a shame. Blame it on the instant gratification of progressive rewards, lack of Developer insight, the easy road or whatever, but in the end it's just really hard to offer a lot of meaningful choices and consequences outside of the PnP experience where you are only limited by the imagination of your DM.

I prefer a delicate balance of gameplay with roleplaying intricately interwoven into the "game". It seems like someone needs to define the difference between gameplay mechanics, roleplaying, and how they both influence one another. They truely are separate entities where a Leveling/Stats system is more or less exclusive to the gameplay portion though it might influence how you roleplay your character through strengths/weaknesses.

 

[Koby]

Roleplaying and gameplay are seperate facets of the "Game", they are almost mutually exclusive these days - which is a shame. Blame it on the instant gratification of progressive rewards, lack of Developer insight, the easy road or whatever, but in the end it's just really hard to offer a lot of meaningful choices and consequences outside of the PnP experience where you are only limited by the imagination of your DM.

I prefer a delicate balance of gameplay with roleplaying intricately interwoven into the "game". It seems like someone needs to define the difference between gameplay mechanics, roleplaying, and how they both influence one another. They truely are separate entities where a Leveling/Stats system is more or less exclusive to the gameplay portion though it might influence how you roleplay your character through strengths/weaknesses.

Here is my humble opinion: in a CRPG (emphasis on the C), there is NO difference between game-play mechanics and role-playing, CRPG is a simulator, and as such, role-playing completely depends on the mechanics, including dialogs (charisma and intelligence as a trait, etiquette and bluff as a skill, empathy as a perk [as in fallout] and so on). If you really want to be technical then I think that best way to put this is: game-play mechanics determine the scope in which you can role-play, or, game-play mechanics encompass role-playing, if the game mechanics don’t offer a certain option/ability/action, you can not role-play it.

Another important aspect (or a different point of view) is looking at the detail level, as in what kind of distinction the game-play mechanics allows me, in creating and role-playing a character. Do I have the option within the game side quest option, skill mechanics, reputation and faction system and not only dialog options, to distinguish between role-playing en experienced, pessimistic and bitter soldier who been there, done that and has seen a quite few things in his relative short life, to role-playing a youthful, naïve, bighearted but intelligent, skilled and extremely talented warrior, who don’t know shit about the world outside the village where he was brought up in?

Or maybe comparing (*) a romantic thief who in not really such a bad guy with a women problem and gambling problem (and a debt problem), that think that the good life is just one good "breaking and entering" away from him, and he always promising himself that once he'll get it, he will live a strait life from that moment on, but meanwhile he always end up at the wrong side of the law, to (*) a cold-heart, business first approach to life kind of thief, that doesn’t really give a damn just about anything but himself but for some reason do take pride in his professionalism.

Outside of dialog options, how do you distinguish between the two warriors and the two thieves in the beginning of the game if I told you that in many simpler mechanics the two warriors and the two thieves have the exactly same traits, skills, and perks?

If you can come up with some kind of mechanics that can encompass these distinction, you CAN *role-play* these characters, in a game with that mechanics.

I have only some crude unpolished ideas about how to accomplish this without start slapping on the character a shitload amount of statistics.

The simplest (and very unoriginal) but a very limited idea is use the D&D system of alignment, but with a twist, the character can have to two new traits: moral and consistentness (?), both with a score of 1 to 100, moral score of 90-100 means you are a goodytwoshoes and a score of 1-10 means you are the spawn of Satan, consistentness (it the best I could come up with :/) score of 1-10 means you act in a randomly... yadyayadayada, you get the idea.

The point is however that you (1) not only have a more meaningful way to distinguish two characters, but have a powerful tool to (2) define characters action consequences not only the world around him but on himself too, (3) cross-referenced to reputation/faction score can give better, more refined picture on the characters that can be used by the game mechanics to decide things like which quests will be obtainable, which dialog option are presented, and so on.

The D&D alignment is however not the most appropriate system to accomplish this, better idea is to sit down and think how to distil the wide range of human personalities traits into two/three/four personality traits in a way that can best serve/support RPGs game mechanics, and i'm sure the hivemind is the most appropriate for this job.

 

[JarlFrank]

That idea is nice, but I guess it would need another kind of personality system.

Maybe add something like personality traits to your character, like egoistic, benevolent, lazy, brave, cowardly, nymphomanic, alcohol addict, whatever you like, you get the point I guess.

This would give each character you play an individual personality. Would be quite complicated to pull off I would say, but it would surly be neat.

 

[Solomon Doone]

I think this has been discussed once or twice, but there hasn't been any topic on the subject yet.
So, how about an RPG without (or with a very small amount of) leveling. Where you define your character at the beggining, and play the exact same character for the entire game.
Sure, character advancement is a good concept, but it's used in every single RPG, and it has several flaws.
Mainly, it doesn't make sense that the player can advance in one year more than important characters have in their entire lifetimes. In party games, it's even worse - it would make sense that one person is especially talented and can advance fast, but 6 of them? Developers also feel that they have some sort of duty to give low level characters boring quests, and keep the interesting ones high-level.
It also creates problems for certain characters, such as diplomats. If a monster is one level above you, the combat will be a little harder, but you'll still succeed. But if a dialogue check is one level above, the enemies will attack your non-combat character, giving him no chance to succeed.
Thus, I don't understand why it has to be used in every RPG. Why can't there be a game where you create your character at the beggining, and play him that way for the entire game? The game could also allow the player to make an overpowered avatar or an underpowered one, both being interesting in their own ways. Would such a game be that unfun to play, that nobody has ever even attempted making one?

I have a better idea; why not instead have a system where there is no levelling per se, but the character merely slides between certain points on a scale, dictated by actions alone - magic ability and firearms is one example: The more a character uses spells, the less his ability to safely wield firearms and other goodies becomes.

Old concept, employed in many games to some extent - but what you say is like calling Half Life 2 an RPG, ostensibly you are playing a role, but with no development; even though levelling does not necessarily have to be essential for an RPG, or even a core tenet.

 

[Koby]

That idea is nice, but I guess it would need another kind of personality system.

Maybe add something like personality traits to your character, like egoistic, benevolent, lazy, brave, cowardly, nymphomanic, alcohol addict, whatever you like, you get the point I guess.

This would give each character you play an individual personality. Would be quite complicated to pull off I would say, but it would surly be neat.

Not necessarily, modern psychology already did most of the work.

*wiki warning*
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_p ... ity_traits
And for further reading:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personality_psychology

 

[Lumpy]

Oh - here's another possible system: allow the player to choose his maximum total skill value, and distribute a certain amount of those at the beggining. So progression would be optional, and make more sense.
Thus, you could make a talented but unskilled character, one who is already a master at everything but can still learn more, or one who doesn't know much but has reached his maximum potential.

 

[Ismaul]

What we are talking about is roleplaying. Since when combat was mandatory? Sure, cRPGs have a history of it, but that doesn't limit roleplaying, it means the developers/publishers limited themselves (dumb money obsessed industry). Roleplaying can take other forms. You can have roles that are not defined by the main way you kill foozles.

No, we are talking about Role playing "games". When I argued that a progressive reward system was important, I did not do so because I thought it was something that was all encompassing to have good roleplaying. I was merely stating that it is an important factor for gaming in general and has simply been a staple of RPGs since the beginning.

Well, roleplaying is a game in itself. Notice the word playing in roleplaying. A game's main purpose is to be played, and anything that can be played is a game. Different kinds of games, some more gamey, some less, for example music.

Now about gameplay. Roleplaying is also a gameplay element in a game where there is other gameplays than roleplaying. Other gameplay elements, like combat, puzzles, strategy, ..., can enhance the choices, the roles you can play. But still, in a roleplaying game, roleplaying should be the major gameplay element. Sadly, this is not the case in almost all RPGs. We get to kill things and collect stuff most of the time.

Combining roleplaying with other gameplay elements is not bad, far from it. Roleplaying all the time, aka chosing and facing the consequences, can get heavy with time. Just like in real life, you're not always dealing with moral dilemmas every second, you sometimes relax, play games and stuff.

 

[TheGreatGodPan]

@Pan Are you talking the PC game or the PnP? Did insanity points get replaced with mythos points?

The PnP, which should have been the basis for a crpg rather than a shooter. Mythos Points put a cap on your Sanity Points. SP can be recovered, MP cannot.

 

[cutterjohn]

OK, I'll admit it I didn't bother to read all 10 pages of posts as I just know that there'll be a huge POS in it forcing me to filter out the dross and off-topic crap from the on-topic posts.

Anyways, my take:
An RPG WITHOUT levelling IS an action adventure game, and unless it was actually designed to be an adventure game, possibly with a few RPGlike elements, it'll be a shitty adventure game. If you remove/reduce/or otherwise simplify the combat a great deal it could even qualify as a plain old adventure game.

 

[TalesfromtheCrypt]

OK, I'll admit it I didn't bother to read all 10 pages of posts as I just know that there'll be a huge POS in it forcing me to filter out the dross and off-topic crap from the on-topic posts.

Anyways, my take:
An RPG WITHOUT levelling IS an action adventure game, and unless it was actually designed to be an adventure game, possibly with a few RPGlike elements, it'll be a shitty adventure game. If you remove/reduce/or otherwise simplify the combat a great deal it could even qualify as a plain old adventure game.

Well, maybe if you had bothered, you would have noticed that your point has been brought up fairly early, discussed controversialy and was more or less smacked down.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

You seem to be hung up on classes. Didn't you like the classless system in Fallout?

The same thing applies to skills. Most people tend to build characters around tradiational archetypes.

Emphasis mine, obviously. You're talking about a game that revolves around combat. The roles you talk about, warrior, thief, wizard, are all combat related. Sure, a game that's all about combat can benefit from a stat system, one that even allows to do more than fight, but that's not what we are talking about.

No, you idiot, the thief and wizard don't have to be combat related. Did you even fucking read my post? SNEAKING AROUND PEOPLE WHO WOULD HURT YOU IS NOT COMBAT. IT'S AVOIDING COMBAT. The big problem with those classes is that GAMES FORCE THEM TO BE COMBAT CLASSES.

What we are talking about is roleplaying. Since when combat was mandatory? Sure, cRPGs have a history of it, but that doesn't limit roleplaying, it means the developers/publishers limited themselves (dumb money obsessed industry). Roleplaying can take other forms. You can have roles that are not defined by the main way you kill foozles.

If you're trying to stop a bad guy, chances are at some point there will be some kind of interaction between you and it's forces. My point was that in CRPGs, all conflict is resolved with combat which should not be the sole way it's done. In fact, in what YOU quoted, I even talked about avoiding combat. YOU FUCKING QUOTED IT, YOU DUMB SHIT!

What about political struggle? social relations? uncovering knowledge?
Where is the combat in that? The fighter, thief, and warrior?

Uncovering knowledge from what? In a political struggle, even in the modern world and certain countries, there is an element of people willing to kill you or make life very, very hard for you. You can either kill them, or side step them and get the knowledge. Do you think Woodward and Bernstein just walked up to Nixon and asked him if his people taped the Democrats at the Watergate Hotel to which he answered, "Sure did! Here's the proof! Take some copies!"?

 

[Solohk]

I'll admit I haven't read the 10 pages of this thread, but the idea of an RPG without leveling really got me thinking.

Sure, character advancement is a good concept, but it's used in every single RPG, and it has several flaws.
Mainly, it doesn't make sense that the player can advance in one year more than important characters have in their entire lifetimes.

What if instead of making your character more powerful directly (stats go up, level goes up, etc.) you make the character more powerful indirectly? Think about a soldier that has gone through basic training and fights in a war. If you compare that soldier to himself before and after the war, it is clear that war makes him more skilled as a soldier, but more indirectly. Sure he might be able to shoot a little better (dexterity), endure harsh conditions a little better (constitution), but that is a small part of it. I think the main reason he is more skilled is because of the knowledge he's gained. He knows when to take cover, when to shoot, etc. Basically he knows when and when not do to things so he doesn't get himself or others killed. In addition, maybe he has been promoted, giving him more options.

How could you translate this knowledge gain into a game? By giving the character more options. As you proceed through the game perhaps you learn a new way to configure your equipment in a para-drop so you are combat effective right when you land. Perhaps you learn a faster way to reload, carry more or more of the right equipment. Options such as these don't make your rifle do more damage, but they certainly make you better able to survive in a realistic and believable manner.

Maybe you get promoted. This is an excellent way to make the PC more powerful by giving them many more options. When you are a private, you have no influence and do what you're told. But as a squad leader, you begin to be able to have an effect on decisions made on where to go, how to accomplish the mission, etc. In addition, you now have a team, again making you indirectly more powerful.

So now instead of not being able to go to location X because the enemy is too powerful and you need to gain levels to defeat them, at first you don't even have the choice to go to location X. But after promotion you can convince the division leader that mission Y can be accomplished by proceeding to location X, and you now have a team to support you in this encounter with a powerful enemy. Your power as a soldier hasn't gotten better in a significant way between the start of the game and now, but you now have the resources and influence to proceed to the difficult area.

Even though the outcome is the same, you get to defeat the enemy at location X, the way there is completely different. For one, you don't start off the game as a loser killing thousands of rats for experience. You get to start as a trained soldier, able to shoot about as well as anyone else. In addition, you get to advance indirectly and become more powerful in a realistic and believable manner. You aren't a god at the end of the game, you are still have a comparable skill level to when you started, but you have much more resources and choices available to you.

 

[kingcomrade]

How could you translate this knowledge gain into a game? By giving the character more options. As you proceed through the game perhaps you learn a new way to configure your equipment in a para-drop so you are combat effective right when you land. Perhaps you learn a faster way to reload, carry more or more of the right equipment. Options such as these don't make your rifle do more damage, but they certainly make you better able to survive in a realistic and believable manner.

The last time we had a no-leveling thread I suggested something like an expanded trait/perk system, or a "tech" tree of sorts like in Silent Storm.

 

[mister lamat]

No, you idiot, the thief and wizard don't have to be combat related. Did you even fucking read my post? SNEAKING AROUND PEOPLE WHO WOULD HURT YOU IS NOT COMBAT. IT'S AVOIDING COMBAT. The big problem with those classes is that GAMES FORCE THEM TO BE COMBAT CLASSES.

on a level, they do remain as combat though. they play out the same way, rolls, checks, luck et al. how you move away from that, i'm not sure but it is 'combat' albeit by a different name.

same goes for dialog as well really when you think about it.

 

[Ismaul]

First, Saint, no need for attacks ad hominem. We're having a civilized discussion with differing opinions, and your point doesn't get better if you insult me.

No, you idiot, the thief and wizard don't have to be combat related. Did you even fucking read my post? SNEAKING AROUND PEOPLE WHO WOULD HURT YOU IS NOT COMBAT. IT'S AVOIDING COMBAT. The big problem with those classes is that GAMES FORCE THEM TO BE COMBAT CLASSES.

Well, avoiding combat still makes the game revolve around combat. But you've got a point, thief and wizard are not necessarly combat related roles. I can see roleplaying a wizard where, instead that the role focuses on using magic to overcome enemies by force, maybe the role could be directed around a struggle to find magical knowledge, or else. But, in all games having classes that I know of, even PnP, they are combat related.

The main problem I see with classes is that they reduce the role to a profession, usually related in some way to combat, and end up being the major element that is defined and developped in a character. There is other things in a role than profession. I'm repeating myself, but personnality, influence, social/political standing, knowledge are things that are encompassed in a role that are also interesting to define and develop. Some are also more fundamental to a role than profession.

If you're trying to stop a bad guy, chances are at some point there will be some kind of interaction between you and it's forces. My point was that in CRPGs, all conflict is resolved with combat which should not be the sole way it's done. In fact, in what YOU quoted, I even talked about avoiding combat. YOU FUCKING QUOTED IT, YOU DUMB SHIT!

Sure, conflict is a major part in RPGs. Without conflict, there is no choice or consequence. The quote was on purpose. It was there to show that even with some alternative solutions to combat, what you where describing was still revolving around it. The argument is that the conflit necessary for roleplaying does not have to be of the type where someone has to die. There can be roleplaying without ever needing to resort to means like this. But if there is, which is extremely interesting, the roleplaying would be so much better if you'd have to worry about why you're killing, who, what consequences (prison?), what point you're trying to make, who backs you up... instead of how hard the enemy is to beat, how many clones of him is there, are you skills high enough, what loot will you get and what foozles comes next.

Plus, you're talking about stopping a bad guy. That's not necessary for roleplaying. You can have a RPG with no bad guys, just partially conflicting perspectives, or even be the "bad guy" yourself. Obviously, when morality is so clear cut that there is immuable good and evil, killing the other "team" is the only option. I like the grey morality and the uncategorical options that come with it. Roleplaying benefits from it.

 

[SkeleTony]

No, you idiot, the thief and wizard don't have to be combat related. Did you even fucking read my post? SNEAKING AROUND PEOPLE WHO WOULD HURT YOU IS NOT COMBAT. IT'S AVOIDING COMBAT. The big problem with those classes is that GAMES FORCE THEM TO BE COMBAT CLASSES.

on a level, they do remain as combat though. they play out the same way, rolls, checks, luck et al. how you move away from that, i'm not sure but it is 'combat' albeit by a different name.

same goes for dialog as well really when you think about it.

A point I raised several pages back I think. Conflict, whether it be in the form of combat, debate/dialog, stealth vs. detection etc. is a necessary component of RPGs. Without it you simply have some other type of game.

 

[SkeleTony]

Rewards sure but this should not mostly be provided by brute character power. This is what 100% of RPGs do and why they suck.

Then you do not like the genre that is "role playing games" but you are ata forum dedicated to such for the sole purpose of stating this?! Why are you not at a forum for shoot-em-ups to complain that they need to do away with the tired old 'shooting' component?

Time to try something new. Write a good, interesting story (PST style or maybe Arcanum)

PS:T was hardly interesting. I think it gets overrated because of teh "finished book syndrome"(re: Most of the time people manage to finish a book, even a bad one, they tend to give the book more immediate praise than it deserves simply because finishing it grants a sense of accomplishment, like running a marathon). PS:T had a lot of text to read but it was boring beyond belief.
Also, having solid RPG mechanics/system does not preclude having good story or roleplaying(if you are into that). In fact it ENCOURAGES and empowers such. There were no pen adn paper RPG systems that did more for the "roleplayers" crowd than HERO system(Cahmpions etc.) and GURPS(a much poorer system but had similar versatility) adn this is precisely because the mechanics of the games enforced having personality quirks and such. Suddenly there was a reason beyond arbitrary whim for having a guy who was blind in one eye or whom hated military types or what have you.

and reward the player by plot progression and game experience.

In other words you want to play First Person Shooters and arcade games? Because that is precisely what you are describing above.

Some character power increase is necessary but it is retarded to think that is the only worthwhile reward.

Straw man.

If you don't care about the story go buy the D&D Monsters' Manual and you can roll up random battles and masturbate over level-up options all you want. It's cheaper and you don't need a computer.

Another straw man.

 

[TheGreatGodPan]

I definitely think characters should get promoted and gain more authority throughout the game, as that is the primary way in which people advance in the world around us. Not many people get tough enough to kill everybody in town, but gaining enough influence to get people to wipe others out for you is perfectly feasible.

 

[kingcomrade]

PS:T was hardly interesting. I think it gets overrated because of teh "finished book syndrome"(re: Most of the time people manage to finish a book, even a bad one, they tend to give the book more immediate praise than it deserves simply because finishing it grants a sense of accomplishment, like running a marathon). PS:T had a lot of text to read but it was boring beyond belief.

Stupid. That's your explanation of why people love PS:T? Psychosis?

 

[SkeleTony]

PS:T was hardly interesting. I think it gets overrated because of teh "finished book syndrome"(re: Most of the time people manage to finish a book, even a bad one, they tend to give the book more immediate praise than it deserves simply because finishing it grants a sense of accomplishment, like running a marathon). PS:T had a lot of text to read but it was boring beyond belief.

Stupid. That's your explanation of why people love PS:T? Psychosis?

No...read what I wrote and get back to me.