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Arduin Eternal (AE) Experience System

Arduin Eternal took a different path in defining how to gain experience from the systems before. 

From its pages:

Role-players believe a character's advancement should be based on how well that character is role-played as well as actual game-play experience. Contrasting this type of thinking is the adventurer player type that believes a character's advancement should be based solely on actions taken by that character during the game. In short, the role-players believe any form of advancement should be awarded for playing totally in character (among other things) while the adventurers believe that a character should only advance from game system methods of reward. Truly the difference in opinion comes from the fact that role-players think that they contribute more to a game than just rolling dice and so should be rewarded for any acting ability, no matter how bad. The adventurers, on the other hand, think that it is unrealistic for a character to gain any advancement based on the actions (or lack thereof) of that character's player; they don't believe that any acting ability should be rewarded, no matter how good.

The real truth lies in a balance between the two spectrum by taking the best attributes of each approach. Arduin Eternal makes this leap by looking at experience using dual method of improvement. The first method of improvement is via a Skill Advancement and Development activity that occurs following each game session. Skill Advancement and Development is not a reflection of training but intuitive jumps, application of previous knowledge, tasks, and maneuvers and just putting together a concept you mentally understood but did not practically comprehend until circumstances thrust you into the right mold to figure it out. Nightly Skill Advancement and Development checks provide immediate and necessary feedback to the player and give a sense of improvement with your character. The second method is through Experience or EPS. EPS is a slice of time, resources, knowledge, experience and dedication. EPS are also a measure of how much your character has learned, practiced, grown knowledgeable or just progressed personally. EPS are given along a point defined by the GM, usually at the end of a specific story arc, expedition or time frame.

Arduin Eternal, as you read above split experience into two activities, one that happened as an active byproduct of game play and another that was more strategically driven by the player as an after game play activity. Its more complex than the previous systems but it fit the more complex system that had evolved, being as granular as the system had become.

This method of experience allows for strong non-holistic improvement, since you mark skills, saves, defenses and other improvement possible items and they have a chance to get better based off their use. At the same time, each session gives you an amount of experience you can invest: either in the same items or to get new capabilities, what AE called secrets. About 20% of secrets are packages of bonuses the rest are new abilities, like to strike at the beginning of a melee, attack a person's ability to move power, talk to spirits, castigate your enemies, inveigle people socially and so on.

In the pursuit of an average game, a person would see 1-18 points of advancement in improvement items (higher at lower skill levels) and earn 1 or more EPS to either turn into the same or to get a secret, i.e. a new ability.

David Hargrave's Experience System (CA)

I originally meant for this to follow the AA post on experience a little quicker so I hope it still makes sense.  Anyway:

The CA had a very similar take on experience as well. It explains it like below:

“Experience measures the character's increasing skill with the abilities he already has, both inside and outside of his class.”

It also goes on to say the following:

“First of all, a character does not necessarily start out at EL 1. Nope! If the character is totally green, as most are, he has no EL at all. This is not to say he is not trained. He is presumed to have beginning skills for the use of his craft. He is just without experience.

Advancement is measured in the terms of time passed or in expeditions run. The latter is a flexible concept; the GM may well consider a quest taking weeks or months of game time to qualify as multiple expeditions. On the other hand, a milk run may not equal even one expedition. Difficulty and novelty to the characters are the key elements the GM must consider.”

The CA continued on the thinking exposed in the Arduin Adventure. It just refined it slightly, defined it a bit more. A meme of thinking pervaded that one game session equaled one adventure or expedition. The Compleat Arduin ruffled that idea; it was explicit that the GM could rule that one game night had multiple expeditions or none – it might require a stretch of 2, 3, or more to meet the requirement. Key elements expressed here are novelty and difficulty.

In the background remained the beginning chart laid out in AG I. It was refined, of course, but it mapped out that actions, especially those in the novelty, inventive, and role-playing categories were the actions worth rewarding. Gone was all mention of acquisition, at least in the sense of material items and personal power that grew from them.

If the Compleat Arduin did something different, it was that it re-introduced the idea that each class progressed at a different pace. DH did away with that in the Arduin Adventure but it was reintroduced in the CA. Warriors & Barbarians earned their EL 1 by going on 2 expeditions or 6 months elapsing. It took 4 expeditions per EL after that and then 10 expeditions for EL 5 – 8. It got much harder then, going to 15 expeditions for EL 9 & 10 and 25 expeditions for EL 11 and beyond. The other professions had it much worse: priests, wizards, illusions, druids, etc. requiring 6 expeditions just to get to EL 1 and 10 per EL afterward through EL 4 and 20 afterward to EL 12 and then 40 each for EL 13 and beyond.

The other classes were just as bad and back in was the unevenness of progression. I'm doubtful this was the idea: everything up to this point was a progression toward a simplified, singular advancement train per class. The leap backwards here was likely an introduction from the core group that was putting together CA from the notes David Hargrave left behind.

David Hargrave's Experience System (AA)

The Arduin Adventure. Often overlooked, it defined its time.   Let's fast forward to 1980 from the earlier 1970s release of AG I - III.

I know I previously said I was going to talk about experience and how it was handled under the Compleat Arduin (CA) but let's make a quick stop by the Arduin Adventure (AA). Often overlooked, it was the first cohesion of Arduin into a fuller game system. David Hargrave's look into experience was much simpler in explanation though he maintained the previous chart as a guide for newbies to his game. Here, it was explained like this:

“Experience is what all people accrue as they proceed through life. This is what we learn while doing “our jobs” and “coping” with different situations. In the game, this is shown by a character’s ability to better himself, fight, evade, etc. as he gains experience levels (EL).

Each character will gain one experience level (EL) for each five adventures completed (through fourth level). Thereafter it takes 20 adventures to gain each additional EL. Later on you can use more precise “point value experience systems”, such as the Arduin Trilogy has, for a more detailed awarding of experience.”

In the intervening years between the release of AG I and the publication of the Arduin Adventure we see a change in accounting. Gone is the idea of placing point values to action, items and experience and in is a focus on the experience of playing, the making of each game session important to the advancement of a character. You can still employ it, as mentioned above. By and far not revelational now but then it was a vast departure from the norm. It also made sense. It was a path David Hargrave started on but was one that was carried forward when some of his fans and personal core group took up his banner and completed the CA in his name.

David Hargrave's Experience System (AG)

I meant to get this out earlier but life, as usual, put forth a different set of options. I'm also doing this backwards, since I posted it out the Google+ community first and then gave it a home here too.  I suffer in the organization department, what can I say.

Anyway, this is a part II of a look into David Hargrave's (DH) design of Arduin Grimoire. For those familiar with his work, he built on the release of the DnD Basic Set, even though he maintained he had developed along a very similar theme independently. He cited his experience with chainmail as a mainstay to back up this idea as well as his exposure to gaming theory and tactical practice while in the army. I'm not sure I'm very convinced of that, given the path his original grimoires took but it was his stance. Some of it I'm sure was sourced from his legal disputes with TSR at the time. In the end, it really doesn't matter though it makes for an interesting historical point.

My look today is at DH's look at experience. He discarded the experience for gold concept immediately; so much so that he made it a point to put it right up front in AG I. In fact, his opening paragraph goes like this: “In the Arduin Universe, the ability to advance to higher levels is based on earned merit and not on the acquisition of treasure. Therefore, points are given for many reasons but NOT for gold or other treasures. After all, it is the act of robbery, not the amount stolen, that gives the thief his experience.” He then goes on to give a chart as a guideline for situations that would provide experience. For anyone not familiar with the old charts, it was...interesting at times. Each profession had a different experience requirement to advance. One would need 1750 (Thief) to make EL 2 while another night need 6500, like the Assassin. His approach is commonsense to our current sensibilities but back then he was straying from the canon – worse, publishing it for others to follow!

If you glance at the chart, you'll see he strongly enforced the experience behind the experience, if you catch my meaning. Death and dying were, to his eyes, a powerful experience. An important fact, given the high lethality of Arduin. In turn, it provided the greatest rewards, as evinced by the experience chart. So, in turn, did like dilemmas and character changing events: reincarnation, lycanthropy, curses that morph you into something else, sex changes, etc. In fact, if you follow along you'll see that being a sole survivor of an expedition came close to the top, being considered of equal to acquiring the mightiest of artifacts (Satan's own pitchfork!) and beating out defeating in single combat demi-gods and greater demons. Followed by defeating in single combat any creature four times your size, performing spells of tremendous import, and like things. Seeing the trend? This page was probably one of the most overlooked ones in AG I by newcomers. DH laid out a different schema for advancement, one that rewarded actions and experience. It wasn't unique nor was that its purpose. It was, however, a part of his game and endorsed heavily. It opened the door for role play and inventiveness, since being creative and involved was rewarded. The chart provides a guide as to how DH saw that occurring. He wanted to move things from the “I go kill or loot that thing” and into the realm of “I do <insert awesome stuff>”, which is probably contrary to anything the casual spectator of the game would think. Most people saw the fluff and craziness and missed the genuine deep seated thoughts underpinning it. Like remapping experience into something more commonsense. Ponder on the chart again. Normal activity is rewarded: figuring out traps, conundrums, and riddles, even if you blow them (oops, poisoned again!) or miss an opportunity because you thought the rainbow peaks was a reference to the Courtesan of the same name instead of the Prismatic Mountains. In fact, just being involved and getting hurt reaped a rewarded or doing the dangerous and uncalled for acts. This was extended to a reward for doing tasks not everyone cared to do, like being in charge (party leader anyone?) or to fighting a rearguard action, being Horatio at the bridge, or being the one to takes down the BEM at the right moment.

It goes on. Yes, he provided some incentive for acquiring magik items, not to mention spells and other things of note. It was the experience of attaining them that gave the XP, not the actually grasping. If it just fell in your lap, it didn't work. You had to overcome conflict to get there.

As a point, if you relook at the experience system and then consider that the lethality of Arduin was balanced by a couple of considerations. David Hargrave loved to be out thought. He outright challenged everyone to do so. His mantra, as spoken earlier was, “I can be out thought but I can't be out fought!”. He knew that the players, no matter their power or EL, could out fight the amount of danger, conflict and challenge he could muster as the GM. The only and in fact, proper out, in his eyes was to out maneuver and out think him. It was this thought that underpinned his encounters. On paper they were ugly and deadly. In reality, with a good GM (and he was) no encounter is an immediate auto death. That Ibathene you just ran into isn't really after you – its the wiggling BEM that crashed through the brush right before you sauntered along. Give it no grief and it will sail by. Or, it may just take a bite and keep on the trial of its original prey. Just because an encounter came along doesn't mean its always aggressive or right to a fight to the death. DH had a wonderful capacity to scare the pants off his players but he always gave them an out. If the players weren't being idiots he would even give it to them in bite sized increments if necessary.

thoughts on David Hargrave Pt. 1

I originally posted this on Google+.  However, I wanted to make sure it got a wider distribution.  Someone had made a post about why David Hargrave employed so many secret doors on his maps.   Naturally it lead to some discussion.  See below.

**********

Since this fits in one of the areas I was going to talk about, I'll start here. DH had a good eye for things. It went back to his time as a combat photographer in Vietnam. He also had an appreciation for the realistic side as well, though he didn't let it get in the way of having fun or for making something colorful and cinematic happen.

How does this apply to the question? Well, if you take a look at his design toolbox, DH employed secret doors like they are meant to be. Some are blinds; traps to draw the enemy in and delay, destroy or denude them. Others were fast routes to different parts of the dungeon, facilitating a hidden highway for the denizens (and sometimes intruders). What helps the person that lives there is easy to turn around on them – if you have the knowledge. Some were just whimsical; a play toward the fun side of gaming.

While DH was locked down to a certain mentality in some ways (all encounter rooms pretty much were cookie cutter in the regard of having a monster + treasure in a box, at least in his published works) he was flexible in others. He employed what he learned as a soldier in combat to situations and his eye as a photographer to add some realism to his games. If you look at the times, maps produced back then lacked rhyme and reason for their construction as a general theme – no architect would have made them in life! But they make great gaming tools and draw in the player, pulling them into a world where adventure perches like a gleaming jewel to be found.

What he added was the flavor of some realism, something a few might find odd to apply but its true nonetheless. If you study his maps, you'll see secret doors, sliding walls, and traps everywhere. When defending a perimeter, you design with the three D's in mind: 1) Delay. Slow them down, break up their momentum (they being the invader, of course!) and separate them if you can. 2) Destroy. Kill them, eliminate them for acting or neutralize their movement or ability to harm. This could be done in a lot of ways, not the least of which is using up their ammo (resources, in this case. Use all the mage's spells, all the party's healing, etc.). 3) Denude. Strip the enemy of their capacity for harm. This is where you target their equipment or capability. Inflict a wound on one so others have to carry or leave him behind, that kind of thinking. Add in destruction of weapons, armors, and resources and you get the thought. Its also the whimsical: change their gender, turn their armor to lead, and so on.

DH employed all these ideas if you give his dungeons a once over. On the surface they look chaotic. Its the point. Of course, they also didn't always fit the idea that sat behind but that's a different discussion. Caliban is my favorite to point out on that topic. I'll save it for tomorrow.

RPG Community on Google+

As a companion to the blog we have a growing community over on google+ as well!

Be sure and join us there if you have an account. 

You'll find good company.

Happy End Year everyone!

In keeping with Arduin traditions, happy End Year!

Random Map Resource

For the GM who needs a random map off the cuff, this resource cannot be beat: http://www.velvet-edge.com/RisusMonkeyMap.html.

An interesting look at mixing Arduin Demons with more OSG products

An interesting look at how someone mixed Arduin Demons into their own games along with a lot of other OSG products.  It's hosted at the In The Cities blog.

I'm looking for more examples on this idea so if you know of them or have done them yourself, be sure to share.

Inns, Arduin, and "The Pearl"

An extensive listing of the inns and road houses of Arduin were provided to us in the famous treatise Welcome to Skull Tower. Also covered, was their place in the fabric of society. While the Inns have come and gone as the years have drifted by us, the original listing has changed some (and not a few owners to say the least) the overview is still a fairly accurate one.

Inns are the center point of Arduinian life. Whether you live in a small outlying farming community near Foxton or in the largest mansion of Talismonde, Inns are where its at!!! Inns provide every form of entertainment a citizen or traveler to Arduin could want. Whether it’s a small roadside tavern with an occasional bard stopping by and a simple dart board and nightly game of swords and dragons or a large Inn in the center of Melkalund featuring nightly shows, gambling tables and dancing. It always comes down to the Inn. Need a drink—drop by the pub. Desire to gamble? Stake your fortune at spin of the dice in the backroom. Need a bit of “loving” companionship ? Drop by the next street to the left and see Bruno at the door; he can take care of that for you, for just a few SP of course.

But you know all of this!  You have ventured in and out of pubs and taverns all your life. Have you ever considered what life is like from the other side of the railing? Dealing with your nightly regulars as they cry on your counter, drowning their sorrows not only in ale, but in your bar keep’s endless supply of wit wisdom and yes, my friend, sometimes love. Have you contemplated what life is like for Efwryn the Curvaceous, the tavern wench, constantly sashaying her hips for tips while avoiding over-reaching lushes with lovin’ on their minds? How about Mousewhisker? Who is Mousewhisker you ask? Why he is the little guy who always wipes the table before you sit down and brings you your bangers and mash without a word..

On Fast Fall Hill, ‘round the Circle Way with its sodden, wilted trees and dilapidated buildings lies the ramshackle inn, Pearly Gates. It’s in the older part of Khurahaen, where the taint of the vulgar waters of the Misty Sea have worn haggard aging timber and the stone is pitted and crumbling from the pass of time. Winding up the lopsided hill, the leaning buildings sag against one another and are little broken by change: giving more meaning to the sudden appearance of the haggard but still off-white pearl like curving arch that leads to the Inn of the same name.

“Once a dive, always a dive”, they say and it ranked among the seediest of the city. It was quite a trove for the beggars and thieves that infest the roads as more than one corpse or almost corpse found out quickly how the hill got its name (usually face first down the sheer side. Splat!) Its looking up a little these days. It was during the Spice Ale Riots some six years, that the Royal troops took time out from smacking rioters to round up some of the City’s less reputable citizens and make them involuntary guests of the throne.

The interior is comfortable and aged, like a worn boot or veteran courtesan. It is thick with rafters and heavy ceiling beams, not to mention dozens of niches and nooks. Its to the “Pearl” that everyone comes here to do their dealings, you know the kind I am talking about, the ones that you really don’t want your neighbors aware of. Whether you need a little trysting, a secret meeting with a guy you shouldn’t know, or perhaps you just want to pick up a little something for missus at bargain basement prices (considering it just came out of the Twuahn the Goldsmith’s basement, it really is a bargain tonight). Or perhaps you really do just wish to tip a flagon of Rumble Tummy Ale (yeah right).

Of course, no one comes in through the front door; that’s for the young in life and tourists (also referred to as fresh meat) who don’t know any better. Anyone with the least sense of the place comes in the other ways, the most common through Prat’s Bean Emporium at the “mouth” of Circle Way or Jongle’s Rent a Wreck near the Slash. A couple of the more daring nobles have taken to running the rooftops and wandering in via Shank’s Wares on the Shingle or across the span from Vrenduor’s Hot Spot. (Better take care going that way, since the women get real peckish if you don’t give them their piece, no not a silver piece; for the other type you pay ALOT more—and don’t think about shorting them! They tossed the young and stuck up lord Zig Malr-Tyvo headfirst off the side when he jilted them.)

Malakai Peerse runs the bar and doesn’t bat an eye when his patrons wander in from seemingly everywhere; he’s used to the comings and goings after all these years. Newcomers are always a treat and he gets a smirk or two when the new ones “have a Vroat” ( isn’t that what the kids say now?) watching folks appearing and disappearing from everywhere, (“By the moons, you mean to tell me a roof’s out there!?”), all over the place, all the time and doors opening and closing almost out of thin air it seems. Mixed drinks are his specialty. Need a Spiga Slammer or perhaps, on a really bad day of three dancing dwarves and two spitting elves, you find the need for something truly potent, like a Windego Wangdango. The man is half artist and half Wizard when it comes to mixing mash, that much I will say. He talks about as fast as he mixes and is notorious for lecturing about the various potables, and the Inn. With the right amount of coin and a taste for trying his drinks, he’ll explain it all to you (yeah, but don’t drink the blue flaming one until he blows it out!).

It’s less a mystery or magik than just that the Inn is riddled with doors of all shapes and variety, leading off into one room or another. Its not the finding of a door hidden in the wall or floor that’s challenging, its the realization that there is a door within that door and another within that one, like some vast intricate puzzle that really boggles the mind. Where they go is another question, and while Malakai has maps, or so its said, he openly admits he doesn’t really know either. Then again, he doesn’t want to know, his concern is coin and where it comes from is “no business of mine”. That the whole block has doors that lead to / from his inn is a surety as well as to the sewers and deeper into the under cities. Ah my friend, don’t ask him about the undercity. If you need something, tell him with a coin in your palm, but don’t ask about his trade secrets or your life isn’t worth the silver ten ‘pence you slid him across the wooden bar.

If you need something Malakai is there for you. Need a loan? No problem, he knows where you live. Girl problems? “Fine, lets talk to Kyra Burning Eyes over at the Blue Light, she specializes in such things as make women fiery with desire”, he’ll say with a wink and palming of your sovereigns. Understand this though, before you take a gander inside that like most things in Arduin, both Malakai and the “Pearl” are as complex as a minotaur’s maze. Always claiming its about the “da coin”, Malakai helps all who ask, sometimes even helping for ‘nah cost’. Other times he’s recalcitrant when he could make a baron’s ransom, refusing to grant aid at all, though it would cost him nothing.

Many people think that Malakai works the Inn by himself. A minute of clear thought will dispel this illusion. Malakai actually has five full-time bar wenches along with a full cleaning crew and his own security staff. When asked why he allows the bar to look so dilapidated, he has been known to reply, “neighbor, remember a pearl that shines bright is coveted by all, one of dull luster fewer look at, despite the fact with, but a wipe of a rag, one would realize its true worth”. Many think he is just a small time owner of a shabby Inn. Follow him home one morning (DON”T GET CAUGHT!!!!), as he winds his way from the odorous mists of the harbor up to his mansion on Three Jewel Hill. Apparently he does “alright” by the “Pearl”.

The “Pearl” isn’t to be taken lightly. Its a nexus between the upper world of “the straights” and the dancers of the undercities. For those in the know or those who need to find it, the “Pearl” can lead to salvation or damnation. Many wish to walk its roads from the light to the dark side of the city and back. There are toughs and other strong types that rent their services out just to lead and guard the adventurous through the paths of the inn. Where those travels may lead is rarely made public. It is always an incredibly unpredictable trip, which is why people come, but be warned, you would not be the first to enter and be lost. That however, is a tale for another time.

Arduin Eternal Rocks!

Ynyzer’s Sign

Also called Janguir’s bite (in Falohyr, Khorsar and Bossalia) and vulgarly “big-lip, fat-eye” disease in the Undercities. It only arises mostly in those who use spoken magik (of any kind) but sometimes afflicts victims who see or gaze upon magic. Typical affliction starts with a swollen lip or lips and sometimes an or eyes (especially if they have gazed upon powerful magic [OP 15 or higher] when infected). The disease spreads through the body rapidly, peaking within 8 to 54 hours and declining thereafter over a 40 to 88 hours period. However, any exposure to magik worsens the condition and lengthens the affliction by 8 to 40 hours. The affliction is caused by small miniscule parasites (invisible to the eye) that infect creatures (living, undead, or dead) and subside off the arcane particles emitted by spoken magic [Runeweave or Runesong does not emit any particles and does not support these creatures]. Its mortality rate is a flat 5% during the first 8-hour period but rises by 5% for each additional 8 hours that passes. Exposure to sun light (natural only) reduces the mortality rate in half for that period. This disease is particularly prominent in the Undercities and the Great Wurm Road.