Re: Magic and Mundane

From: Michael Hitchens <m.hitchens_at_...>
Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2000 11:13:56 +1100 (EST)

On Tue, 21 Nov 2000, James Turner wrote:

> Michael:
> >Remember a devotee isn't a rune lord, so Orloff isn't a sword of Humakt.
> >The Humakti's got more combat related feats than a (say) Orlanth
> >Adventurous, so a couple of seasons more HP may not save the Orlanthi.
> >But even if it does, think in terms of RQ - a Humakti initiate with lower
> >skills never had any guarantees vs. an Orlanthi initiate.
>
> The problem I was trying to show was that this guy who has devoted himself
> to Humakt and learnt his combat magic and is no better at fighting than
> someone who spent that time just getting cc experience. In fact strictly by
> the rules he is worse off because it costs more to learn all that magic.
>
> That devotion and magical knowledge should account for something. Not just
> interesting character development. Which is why I wouldn't treat magic the
> same as any old mundane ability.

I think what you're saying here (and please excuse me if I'm wrong) is that if I plow all my HP experience into my combat abilities, I'll be just as good, if not better, as someone who split the HP's between combat ability and affinity. I'll answer on that basis, if I'm wrong let me know and I'll try again.

I'd say you might be right, and ignoring the affinities could leave you better off (not culturally though- "Oh that Tarank, he's no closer to Orlanth than a newly initiated brat"). The point is the interesting part of the HP table that allows you to put up an ability by more than one per session.

Let's take an example. You mentioned two seasons, let's interpret that as two sessions. So let's take 6 sessions for our Humakti and 8 for the Orlanthi Adventurous. Let's assume they both started with 5w in their main combat ability and 17 in their affinity. I'll assume an average of 4 HP per session to be spent on improving things (which I think is a good rough average).

1. Things going up by one per session If the Orlanthi has put his main comabt ability up by 1 each session,but ignored his affinites (He spends his other 3pts on something else), the Humakti his main combat and and one of his two combat affinities by 1 (which is everything). So the orlanthi will have combat ability 13w and affinity 17. The Humukati will be 11w in combat and 20 in his affinities. Given that the Humakti is going to be able to get (probably) an extra pt of augmentation and has more combat related feats, he'll probably win. Not bad for only 75% of the experience.
2. The Orlanthi pours everything into his combat ability The Orlanthi would have combat 2w2 (costs him 27 of his 32 HP) and affinity 17. The Humakti is as above (11w and 20). The Humukati is probably going to loose now. Even worse, if we give the Humukati the extra two seasons (8 HPs) he's now only 13w and 1w. Even if we ignore his second combat affinity (which only gives him Death Song Deserk for normal combat) and thorugh everything into the first combat one, he's 13w and 5w. The difference inthe affinity is not going to make up for the advanatge in raw combat ability..

The problem obvioulsy lies in the same cost for +2 ability and +1 affinity. Even when an affinity has two or three feats that are related to the same task they aren't going to give you asmuch as +2 ability. OK, the affinity gives you a more rounded set of things, but even so...

The problem becomes even more obvious if you compare two Humukati with the same experience. Let's take 8 sessions (32 HP again). They start on 5w combat and 17 affinites
Humakti 1 spends 27 on combat and 3 on affinity (who knows what he did with the other two), giving him 2w2, 18 and 17 Humakti 2 sends 8 on combat and 24 on combat affinity 1, giving him 13w, 5w and 17.

My money is on #1. Which does't sound right to me.

My stab at a solution is to restrict the use of the +2,3,4 upgrades to abilities that aren't commonly used (or to put it another way, you can't, overall, have increased any ability by more than the number of sessions you've played). How's that?

Michael