Trap Options and Chargen Feel-Good

[Laertes]

So here's something that's been in my head for a little while now, thanks to this board; specifically thanks to the Ars Magica campaign that's kicking off and also thanks to Ogrebattle's thread on 40k heartbreakers.

We all love chargen. Building powerful characters is tremendous fun, even (or especially) if we don't intend to play them. There are entire boards where they do nothing but that; and even in games which don't encourage it, it's a thing. Games with no chargen (which use prebuilt archetypes or lifepaths) don't seem to attract anything like as much attention. What we especially love about chargen is the discovery, either serendipitously or analytically, of synergy: things that work well together and create a character that is more than the sum of their parts.

However, we all also curse the existence of trap options: things that are lower powered than the rest so that it becomes possible to build a far weaker character inadvertently. Such things make it necessary to study the system in order to avoid falling into the trap.

However, I'm coming to be of the opinion that they are different sides of the same coin: that if you have a hypothetical system which is perfectly balanced then players will not enjoy it, because just as there are no trap options there are also no powerful things to discover and no synergies to build upon. The two can therefore be said to go hand in hand.

A very simple example should illustrate. In Dungeons and Dragons, Fighters base their attacks on Strength. A Fighter's player can choose their character's Strength within limits, meaning that it is possible for them to intentionally or unintentionally choose a low Strength. You can eliminate this trap option by stating in the rules that "all Fighters start with a Strength of 16," but then we also eliminate the possibility for the player to be creative in chargen and to come up with something interesting.

Games like Feng Shui use a template-based build scheme; and while I would be hesitant to accuse Feng Shui of having balanced archetypes, I find that the normal power gamers of my acquaintance don't like Feng Shui because it's too easy to build a broken character; there's no challenge in it. On the other hand they adore games like GURPS and Exalted because of the intricacy of the build scheme and the extent to which creative combinations are possible. Sadly these games also tend to be riddled with less than optimal options which are perilous to new players.

In the extreme you have games like Go which have no options at all and are regarded as perfectly balanced - all the creativity happens in play. I love Go and play whenever I can but wouldn't dream of discussing it online because there isn't much to discuss there. The whole solitaire aspect of chargen, of you trying to outwit the system designer, is missing.

My question is therefore: what is your view? Can you think of examples of games which allow creative chargen while not having options to be avoided? Do you even see this as an issue?

[Covent]

Honestly, this is kind of my "Holy Grail" of game design. A system that allows enough flex to have defined power bands and is complex enough to cover most cases.

I have never seen a system that did this perfectly.

I would like to think that the way to do this would be a combination of something like 3.5/pathfinder and white wolf's NWOD mechanics.

I know both of these systems have major inherent flaws however I think if we could take the complexity and granularity from 3.5/pathfinder and the modularity from WOD it could possibly be done.

Now I have been poking at this for awhile, and have yet to find a solution that satisfies me.

I think it will take a lot of math and time to create a rock solid base and vet each modular option against that base, and then each combination of modules.

In short I believe it is possible if you had a team of excellent math based game designers to create the mechanical system and then you would have to find a set of fantastic writers to lock in a room with the designers and ensure that fluff matched crunch.

Would probably take several years and quite a bit of higher level math + BS&T.

After that noone would buy it. Don't ask me why but I feel like people like complaining too much to play even a smooth intuitive and fun system with strong crunch and fluff that supports each other, unless their is an obvious whipping boy such as 3.5 martial caster disparity.

Just my 0.02 cents.

[momothefiddler]

I'd put it more generally. I go into chargen (most of the time) wanting to map mechanics onto an idea I already have. Sure, quirks of the system or ideas presented might cause me to modify that idea, but in the end I really do come in looking to play my special snowflake Drizzt-clone. The more detail offered in chargen, the more closely I can map mechanics onto the character concept, and I like that.

The issue with trap options comes from that. I don't want the system to say "Fuck off with your swashbuckler concept", but I understand when that happens. But when the system says "Sure! You can play a swashbuckler! Here's how!" and then turns around and says "Oh and you're pathetic and useless and fuck you", I feel, well, trapped. That's why they're called trap options - because they are presented as though they're playable. The Expert class isn't a trap option. The Monk class is.

EDIT: and yes, sometimes that concept is about power, but even then that's not the same as straight theorycrafting where I go "How much healing per day can I scrounge for a 1st-level 3.5 Cleric?" (answer: a whole hell of a lot, and it still doesn't matter) because if the various options presented as playable were in the same basic range power-wise, I'd be fine with that. I wouldn't use that system for that type of puzzle, but I sure as hell would advocate playing it.

[kzt]

Trap options are bad and should be eliminated or fixed so they are not traps.

But complex char gen systems (like HERO) often have 2 or more ways to accomplish something, and often one is simply objectively better. For example, characters that buy extra dice in HtH damage and extra PD should be buying points of strength instead, as it does all that and more for less or the same points. Or combat skill levels vs DEX - there are some cases where you should buy skill levels instead of DEX, but you should almost always be increasing your DEX instead. The usual way you find this is to have the GM or another more experienced player look at the characters and suggest where you can optimize.

[Lago PARANOIA]

For what it's worth, there are always going to be trap options. Let's look at the character of Starfire from Teen Titans for example. Before she gets her badass upgrade, she has three primary schticks: flying, hand blasts, and super-strength. Any two of those powers would be useful and balanced, but the third one will always cause her to trip over her own dick. If for example her power set was illusions, hand blasts, and super strength they'd synergize together very well.

What's more, her two other noteworthy powers -- being able to fly FTL outside of a gravity well and shooting lasers from her eyes -- further erode the relative usefulness of her character. One of them is because of a CharGen decision a friend (Cyborg, with his ability to make FTL vehicles for the whole team) made, one is because of a previous decision that she made.

It's easy to make characters who are weaker than the sum of their parts even if the individual components are balanced against each other. A wizard with stinking cloud and fireball is about the same power level as a wizard with suggestion and lightning bolt, suggestion and fireball, or stinking cloud and lightning bolt but is generically better than one with fireball and lightning bolt.

[deaddmwalking]

I'd agree that 'meaningful options' and 'trap options' are opposite sides of the same coin. If it's possible to choose two synergistic options, it would also be possible to choose options that don't synergize well. While this is unavoidable, it isn't always a problem.

Momothefiddler is right - if you are presented the option as if it is a reasonable thing to do, but it doesn't work in practice, what appears to be a reasonable option turns out to be a trap.

It's also important to keep in mind that there is going to be a range of power, and it's okay if people have different areas of comparative strength. If you choose non-optimal selections, but you're in the same power-range as everyone else in your party, that's not really an issue.

It should be possible to make sure that someone that makes 'bad choices' is still playing the same game as someone who makes 'good choices'. This can be done by off-loading most of the 'functional' selections to a structure like 'class'. Under the normal rules, a Rogue can't, for instance, trade Sneak Attack (useful) for a higher max-rank in their Rogue skills (probably not useful). On the other hand, they can select between a greatsword and a shortsword. Ideally, those types of choices are meaningful for FLAVOR, but matter little to the overall survivability of the character.

[ishy]

I feel that this is relevant, Monte Cook on Ivory Tower Design: http://web.archive.org/web/200802211744 ... mc_los_142

A very simple example should illustrate. In Dungeons and Dragons, Fighters base their attacks on Strength. A Fighter's player can choose their character's Strength within limits, meaning that it is possible for them to intentionally or unintentionally choose a low Strength. You can eliminate this trap option by stating in the rules that "all Fighters start with a Strength of 16," but then we also eliminate the possibility for the player to be creative in chargen and to come up with something interesting.

Having 14, 16 or 18 strength is not interesting though. Don't waste time on letting people make uninteresting choices nobody cares about.

[Laertes]

I feel that this is relevant, Monte Cook on Ivory Tower Design: http://web.archive.org/web/200802211744 ... mc_los_142

That's very interesting, thank you.

[Cyberzombie]

Well there's always going to be synergies. That sort of thing is unavoidable, at most you keep the synergies from breaking the game. The point of avoiding trap options isn't that you're trying to get some game where nothing stacks or works together and everyone is totally equal. The idea is that you don't want to have crap classes, spells or feats that are so bad that nobody wants to take them. So the only people that ever choose them are newbies that don't know any better and then end up suffering under it. After they learn those options suck, it's as if those options didn't even exist anymore, and become nothing but bloat that people flip through looking for good stuff. That's the kind of trap option you want to get rid of.

There's a whole other argument about how strong you would want optimized characters to be over non-optimized ones, but that's not really about trap options.

[K]

A lot of chargen problems stem from the baked-in preconceptions of RPGs like:

1. We must have Attributes. Ok, the instant that you attached a Strength-type score to the mechanics of stabbing fools well, you have created the problem where a well-intentioned gamer could pick a substandard Strength score. Maybe they min-maxed the wrong stat for some reason like RP or some other skill, or maybe they just thought that a different set of stats would be more important, but the fundamental problem is that the designer created this problem.

Of course, people want mechanical ways to define their character. The "everyone has the same stats" feels very samey both mechanically and RP-wise. Player 1 wants a fighter whose stats make him feel powerful and strong, and he is not going to get that if his Str score is the same as the wizard's score.

The answer, of course, is to make a game where there is a different way to determine combat power and make people feel strong. For example, if you really wanted to open up DnD to physically weak fighters, you'd tie all swording damage to just character level and make great strength a feat that allows for feats of exceptional strength and starts a chain of strength-style feats like tossing boulders and enemies and jumping Hulk-style over things (remember, to make this work, you need to eliminate all the swording feats that just add damage to swording because you've now changed the value and use of feats).

2. We must put RP abilities in the same resource pool as combat powers and in the same pool as plot advancement powers. At the end of the day, you never should have to choose between Fly, Fireball, and Firetrap. One is mostly a plot advancement power, the other is mostly a combat power, and the last is mostly a RP power.

Even a veteran player can easily pick too many of one type and build a substandard character who is not fit to face level-appropriate challenges, mostly because most powers can be used to a greater or lesser degree in several kinds of situations. The guy who Fireballs bridges is going to argue that Fireball is a plot advancement power and a combat power and that he's a smarty for picking it.

The solution to this is to either go the 4e route of strictly limiting powers to roles (the shit solution) or to expand each power to all spheres (the hard and correct solution). You really can expand the write up of Firetrap as a combat power easily and as a plot power easily, in addition to the slight expansion it'd need to be a proper plot power.

3. Games must have synergies. While it is fun to design decks and char-op on the Internet, as a player who is trying to start a game with friends it's a giant chore. The very idea that there should be designed synergies is pretty dumb if you care even a little about making a fun game because Three Moves of Doom is no fun for anyone.

Of course, not adding any designed synergies is not the whole solution. There are always going to be powers that work well together, but I find that most of the actually powerful synergies come about because the designers never stopped to even look at the existing synergies as a way of figuring out if single powers are too good.

For example, DnD has a problem with ranged attacks combined with flight being too good. The big sin here is that no one ever sat down and said, "Is this too good because flight is too good, or is it because ranged is too good, or maybe both?" (Spoiler: the answer is "both.")

So this issue is correctable with a little extra design work and the expectation that people will find broken shit that needs to be corrected in errata.

4. My druid gets a power-up. Lots of designers simply fall into the trap of making some things better than others "for story reasons" or some other nonsense. DnD fighters suck because designers can't imagine a fantasy RPG where fighters don't suck. The pervasive fantasy archetype where magic can do anything means that a lot of games suffer from the fact that powers can't be balanced because the designer needs his druid to be more powerful than someone else's sorcerer or fighter or else the game does not feel right.

The solution to this problem is depressing because it boils down to "be a fucking grown-up."

There are other minor issues, but I think these cover the basics.

[Lago PARANOIA]

For example, DnD has a problem with ranged attacks combined with flight being too good. The big sin here is that no one ever sat down and said, "Is this too good because flight is too good, or is it because ranged is too good, or maybe both?" (Spoiler: the answer is "both.")

You're on a fool's errand here. For one, there are going to be anti-synergies. Tanking + Combat Stealth has a lower cost/effectiveness ratio than just tanking or combat stealth. Hell, there are going to be anti-synergies which start synergizing with one key component. Improved Two-Weapon Fighting and Spring Attack go together like peanut butter and ass... but when you throw in 3.0E Whirlwind into the mix it starts working again.

For two, a lot of synergies and anti-synergies will be determined by what your friends pick. If everyone else in your team are ranged blasters then rolling a melee interdictor will only get you turned into chunky salsa. If healing needs are covered by two party members then a third healer is going to end up making some of the three redundant. Even if you made it so that everyone had only one broad tactic like ranged spiked damage or healing, you still can't avoid the issue of synergies.

But for three, and probably the most important one, only the shallowest game imaginable won't have some kind of internal synergy. This is such an overwhelmingly potent and obvious aspect that it doesn't even need to be discussed.

[PhoneLobster]

I think if anything you should actively design to create as many synergies as possible and try and design them for some assumed synergistic balance point.

There will be combinations you do not put sufficient hooks in for, you will make some mistakes and allow for a few synergies that exceed the balance point.

But on the whole "You have power X, so here are 5 other powers that syngerise with that in different ways that you could advance your character with" is a lot better than alternatives where there aren't relevant options interesting to a character with existing abilities.

[Grek]

Tanking + Combat Stealth has a lower cost/effectiveness ratio than just tanking or combat stealth.

This is only true if your tanking ability (the one that makes monsters try to attack you despite that action being unlikely to succeed) requires that the enemy know where you are. Designate Opponent, the Tome Knight ability, requires that the opponent be able to hear the knight. But if that knight is invisible and on the other side of the battlefield with a longbow, they're still being an effective tank regardless of if the enemy wastes actions trying to find and attack the invisible archer or if they take a bunch of 1d6/level damage arrows to the face instead.

Unless, by "tanking" you mean "powers that make you really hard to kill" in which case yes, taking multiple redundant defenses is a bad idea. Don't let players go all in on either offense or defense.

[K]

For example, DnD has a problem with ranged attacks combined with flight being too good. The big sin here is that no one ever sat down and said, "Is this too good because flight is too good, or is it because ranged is too good, or maybe both?" (Spoiler: the answer is "both.")

You're on a fool's errand here. For one, there are going to be anti-synergies. Tanking + Combat Stealth has a lower cost/effectiveness ratio than just tanking or combat stealth. Hell, there are going to be anti-synergies which start synergizing with one key component. Improved Two-Weapon Fighting and Spring Attack go together like peanut butter and ass... but when you throw in 3.0E Whirlwind into the mix it starts working again.

For two, a lot of synergies and anti-synergies will be determined by what your friends pick. If everyone else in your team are ranged blasters then rolling a melee interdictor will only get you turned into chunky salsa. If healing needs are covered by two party members then a third healer is going to end up making some of the three redundant. Even if you made it so that everyone had only one broad tactic like ranged spiked damage or healing, you still can't avoid the issue of synergies.

But for three, and probably the most important one, only the shallowest game imaginable won't have some kind of internal synergy. This is such an overwhelmingly potent and obvious aspect that it doesn't even need to be discussed.

Don't make the perfect the enemy of the good. Just because 100% synergy elimination can't be done doesn't mean that discovering that a party of three ranged blasters and a melee guy equals melee PK isn't a clear sign that your overall system needs a new draft.

That is literally how you design things that work: you try out a bunch of combinations and redesign when you find flaws. If your game can't handle three blasters and a melee as a party, then redesign until it does. If four bards can't win encounters, redesign until they can. If Two-weapon Fighting and Spring Attack don't work well on the same character, redesign until they do,

The goal is to remove egregious synergies, not remove all synergies in some kind of purist synergy jihad. Getting some fire resistance and Fireball is a small synergy because you can drop fireballs on yourself, and things like that can remain. It's the big synergies like "if I have a ranged weapon and flight, there is no way that a melee guy can escape or attack me" kind of synergy that means your game needs a redesign. You have a built-in fun-killer and it needs some work.

Often this means fundamental redesigns that question core assumptions like whether Spring Attack and TWF should even exist as abilities in the first place or whether PC fighting guy design should depend on ability and stat synergy when spellcasters can get by with an almost random selection of spells. Answering those questions is actually hard work compared to the gold standard of game design where they simply write up some stuff that seems cool and then release it.

[ishy]

The problem is not with ranged + flight. The problem is with melee only, final destination.
The melee only will get destroyed by simple obstacles + ranged too (like say rivers, rocks, cliffs and towers)

[MGuy]

The problem is not with ranged + flight. The problem is with melee only, final destination.
The melee only will get destroyed by simple obstacles + ranged too (like say rivers, rocks, cliffs and towers)

Pretty much this. It's also why, in Lago's example I don't see Starfire tripping on her own dick because she has flight + short range attack + ranged attack. Just give melee people a ranged option and even if their target is flying they are still in each other's range.

[hogarth]

However, I'm coming to be of the opinion that they are different sides of the same coin: that if you have a hypothetical system which is perfectly balanced then players will not enjoy it, because just as there are no trap options there are also no powerful things to discover and no synergies to build upon.

I've been saying the same thing for years. E.g.:

"Any game that allows meaningful choices in character creation will also allow bad choices."

"I'm saying that, in my experience, a game that has enough options so that I enjoy making characters as a minigame in itself will have bad combinations of options. And I hardly think I'm alone in finding the problem solving part of character generation entertaining."

[hogarth]

For example, DnD has a problem with ranged attacks combined with flight being too good. The big sin here is that no one ever sat down and said, "Is this too good because flight is too good, or is it because ranged is too good, or maybe both?" (Spoiler: the answer is "both.")

You're on a fool's errand here. For one, there are going to be anti-synergies.

We already had a zillion page discussion on K's idea of making everything equal, if you recall.

http://tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=53173

[Lago PARANOIA]

The problem is not with ranged + flight. The problem is with melee only, final destination.
The melee only will get destroyed by simple obstacles + ranged too (like say rivers, rocks, cliffs and towers)

Pretty much this. It's also why, in Lago's example I don't see Starfire tripping on her own dick because she has flight + short range attack + ranged attack. Just give melee people a ranged option and even if their target is flying they are still in each other's range.

Think of it in terms of marginal utility. Option paralysis and list recall aside, getting new abilities with no inherent drawbacks to them is always going to provide some additional utility. However, Starfire's problem is that if she already has two of Melee Attack, Ranged Attack, or Flight then the third one is always going to have less marginal utility than the previous two. However, if instead of selecting a third option from that list she picked Mobile Wall or Illusions the marginal utility would go up about as much as it did when she selected her second option.

What makes the problem even worse is that sometimes the marginal utility array will go pear-shaped. Two-Weapon Fighting and Spring Attack is one of the most notorious anti-synergies in core 3.0E D&D, but if you throw 3.0E Whirlwind into the mix then suddenly it becomes awesome again.

[PhoneLobster]

Think of it in terms of marginal utility.

Yeah, I think you are wringing your hands over what is pretty much a non-issue again.

But even aside from that. There is one, and only one way to stop people from picking options that have been rendered partially redundant by options they already have. And that is to not let them pick those options.

Either you have a strict class system where the options are picked for you or some sort of "no more than 1 option from each list" exclusion rule.

And you know what? If that is what you want here? Fuck you. Because you are saying "Customizable characters, but fuck you if your build includes any redundancy, I won't let you have THAT much customizability! Guy who learns 2 different ranged attacks FORBIDDEN!!!!"

It's just going too far. Even within a class based system unless you cast it in fucking stone and remove all further options you are going to hit issues with partially redundant power selections being possible. You just have to fucking learn to let it fucking go and stop wringing your hands over the potential non-disaster for once Lago.

[TiaC]

No, you just make the second ranged attack cheaper.

[PhoneLobster]

No, you just make the second ranged attack cheaper.

How?

[Foxwarrior]

There are a lot of ways to do that, with varying levels of precision.

You could make people buy up their Ranged Attack Bonus, which is a cost you only have to pay once independent of how many ranged attacks you get.

You could make all ranged attacks come from the Ranged Attack Skill Tree.

You could make each ranged attack have its own tactical relevance, and get synergistic advantages to "staying at a distance" from other things, like flight.

You could say at the end of every ranged attack ability: "Further ranged attacks you purchase cost 1 less"

There are a lot of ways, and surely you already knew a bunch of them.

[Username17]

No, you just make the second ranged attack cheaper.

How?

If white wolf can manage to solve that design problem, I am sure that people who can do math can as well. In Vampire, getting a level of thaumaturgy is expensive but getting a new spell at your level is cheap. Most skill based systems work this way. In Shadowrun it is expensive to have a good spellcasting dice pool for your mana bolt, but it's cheap to be allowed to apply that same dice pool to stun ball as well.

-Username17

[K]

However, I'm coming to be of the opinion that they are different sides of the same coin: that if you have a hypothetical system which is perfectly balanced then players will not enjoy it, because just as there are no trap options there are also no powerful things to discover and no synergies to build upon.

I've been saying the same thing for years. E.g.:

"Any game that allows meaningful choices in character creation will also allow bad choices."

"I'm saying that, in my experience, a game that has enough options so that I enjoy making characters as a minigame in itself will have bad combinations of options. And I hardly think I'm alone in finding the problem solving part of character generation entertaining."

Here is the solution to your problems. Pay attention to the bit after the 4:00 mark especially.