There is something to be said for a progression in power based on
qualitative shifts rather than gradual quantitative change of skill
levels.
Luke goes from being a promising candidate to an awsome Jedi rather
rapidly.
Paul gets whapped on the road to Damascus, and his life goes in
another direction.
Sparrowhawk jumps from being a hedge magician to one of Earthsea's
most powerful wizards rather rapidly (and injecting some serious bad
mojo into the universe in the process)
I like the way masteries/HeroQuests/the switch from mere initiate to
feat-wielding devotee all model the "transformation through
challenge/crisis" pattern of narrative.
> Toksickburn_at_a... wrote:
> ...
> > i
> > really liked the RQ experience system with its ticks better.You
have the
> > possibility to improve your skill,when you have used and succeeded
it in a
> > stressful situation.The better you are the more difficult it is,to
improve
> > further.
> ...
>
> Now, why is that better? Why must a 'stressful situation' be
> involved? I suppose it might be argued that this was 'realistic'.
> Several objections come to mind.
>
> * In RQ, your skill rating was also (normally) your probability of
> success. That rating must therefore be normalized to the range 0% to
> 100%, which therefore requires asymptotic increase to 100%. In HW,
> this is not the case, skills are rated on an arbitrary scale which
> can be made conveniently linear.
>
> * It is not, actually, a realistic simulation of how the real world
> works. IIRC from the little cognitive psychology I've studied,
> ability CAN be rated by the number of times a skill has been used. I
> expect Thom could put us straight here.
>
> * How many stressful situations occur between episodes? RQ tried to
> be a simulation, so ALL the stressful episodes were played as
> adventures. That need not be the case for HW.
>
> * Glorantha is not the real world. Producing 'realistic' rules for
> how Harrek improves his abilities is impossible.
>
> * In HW, abilities not relevant to the session are more expensive to
> increase. This is analogous to the presence or absence of ticks in
> RQ.