RE: Skill Levels at Character Generation from Mike Holmes on 2004-03-24 (HeroQuest-Rules)

From: Mike Holmes <homeydont_at_...>
Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2004 14:18:32 -0600

>From: "maddyeuk" <eid_at_...>
>
>Hi All,
>
>Basically, I've created a Darjiini Boatman character with the Darjiini
>homeland keyword and the Boatman keyword as developed by Viktor Haag
>on the HeroQuest-RPG list.

Heh, Darjiini are becoming popular lately.

As it happens, I'm writing an article that will cover this in passing (spurred on by a thread over at The Forge on the same subject), but I thought I'd comment here on this particular issue. There are several approaches that people have made:

You only get one, and lose the other. This is what the rules say, but the rules also say something else which I'll get to.
You get to add four. Per the supplemental rules. This makes sense, because consider the entertainer occupation - one would think that someone specialized in singing would have an advantage with it over the less specialized character. Still, it's sort of a hack, and doesn't really do the job, IMO, because the character still ends up with one less ability overall. Yeah, in theory stacking makes the character cooler, but if they want more experience, I'd just give that to them. In any case, what does this say about how much starting characters can add? Do these points count against the 10 point limit? If not then you might create an artificial thrust towards players stacking this way in order to get maxed out characters.
You get to add the automatic augment of the one to the other. This makes sense for the same reason as two, and seems mechanically sound being a representation of what the character would have if he had both abilites and one always augmented the other. Still, sorta odd, and you don't really get much bonus.

So, how do we make the character just as interesting, but in a balanced way? Fortunately the rules give you the perfect suggestion, one that doesn't require changing any rules at all to accommodate. Keywords aren't written in stone, they can be altered to suit. Instead of Sing, boatmen from Darjiin, who already know how to sing, would have a slightly different keyword, one that included something besides Sing. I'll leave it to the individual Narrators and players to determine a suitable replacement for the ability.

Now, what if I'm an entertainer, or I determine that Darjiini boatmen really are supposed to be better than the average Darjiini at singing? Then I'd give them "Strong Voice" for the entertainer, or "Sing Songs of the River" for the boatman or somesuch. This tends to work much like option number two above, in that these will tend to augment each other a lot. OTOH, they're not precisely the same, so the character gains a broader base from which to use these as primary abilites or augments. So you have the balance of the normal character maintained. Further, the abilities can be strengthened individually, meaning that the character has more depth - some Darjiini Boatmen will be better at singing overall, some will know the songs of the river better.

So, when you have the situation where there are two keywords that have the same ability, think about what the sensible solution is in terms of altering one of the keywords, and the problem becomes an opportunity to make a more interesting character.

Mike

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