Re: [dq-rules] Advantages and disadvantages

[William Hough <houghpt@yahoo.com>]

"Obi-Wan once thought as you do..."

I have been playing RPGs since 1976, and if I had to
choose one solitary observation among the many I've
garnered, I would say it's that it's not the system
you choose so much as it is the group you game with.

Changing game systems has to be neither a temptation
nor permanent. I say that as long as you enjoy
spending time with the folks you game with, you'll
have fun in any system. 

Take AD&D for example. Take away the camaraderie and
most folks start pointing out the gaping holes in that
system. Yet I still play AD&D if the group is my cup
of tea...standards thereof of course to the taste of
the individual gamer. Some like rowdy and boisterous,
others prefer quiet and order.

If you are "intrigued" by a certain game system, I
would definitely suggest that you go ahead, get some
familiar faces together, and give it a try. The worst
that can happen is that the game will end up as a
dusty bookend on the shelf or on eBay someday, and the
experience itself will still contribute to your
overall exposure as a developing and wordly-wise gamer
as well as to your stock of gaming stories: "Hey,
remember that one Saturday when we played Papers and
Paychecks?" My group still remembers over ten years
ago when we tried Arduin Grimoire -- a ghastly system
at best but a great night of laughs.

I have played GURPS and a similar system, called HERO
System, better known as Champions (or Fantasy Hero for
the fantasy genre) before. They share many of the same
traits, such as point-based and detailed character
generation, character advantages and disadvantages,
character quirks and habits, and formulae based off
character statistics. These are excellent systems for
not only generating the exact character you want to
play (or 99% facsimile), but they offer a level of
detail not found in DQ. I will not offer a discourse
about which is the better system, suffice to say that
I prefer HERO because that is what I started with.

On the contrary, I have discovered that more character
detail does not force a player into a tighter mold in
regards to playing his character, but rather simply
gives the GM and other players greater information
about the character and provides more game-generating
ideas for the campaign. Besides there is NO game
system that I know of that utterly and completely
details every facet of a player's character.

Ultimately, whether or not a character is roleplayed
in a manner consistent with its writeup should remain
the privelege and the responsibility of the player,
not the game system. Judgement as to whether or not
this was actually accomplished naturally lies with the
GM.

I'm also not sure I agree with the concept that the
Advantage/Disadvantage element can be likened to a
reward/penalty situation. The idea of Advantages and
Disadvantages, at least in the HERO System, is
twofold: 1) to establish that the character is not
without fault and 2) to give the character that extra
bit of points needed for a vital skill or power in
exchange for an occasional headache or two. It may be
just a matter of semantics, but I prefer to limit the
use of the word "penalty" to a player screw-up when it
comes to the realm of RPGs.

Because the tendency of players is to abuse the
Disadvantage system in order to give their characters
more points (to Hell with what happens in subsequent
roleplaying sessions), both systems have limits on the
point total of Disadvantages allowed for characters.

I have never tried to add an Advantage/Disadvantage
system to DragonQuest, since the points generated are
limited strictly to statistics. I suppose you could
apply such a system to generated experience. Perhaps
in the nature of "For an extra 100 starting xps, your
character always has an unfortunate tendency to wet
his pants when faced with arrest by any authority,
unless he makes a 2 * WP roll." If it is some trait or
idiosyncrasy that can easily be concealed, perhaps
only 50 or even 25 xps; ex: unusually-colored hair.

Having read Bruce Galloway's "Fantasy Wargaming"
(1982), I did come up with a "Bogie Table" for
DragonQuest; this is 100 traits and quirks (50 good
and 50 bad) generated with percentage dice that a
player can request to roll on but I don't require as
part of their character generation. But once a player
opted to roll for their character, there was no going
back; D10: 1-6: 1 roll on the table, 7-8: 2 rolls on
the table, 9-10: 3 rolls on the table. If you want a
copy of this table in MS-Word format, I can get it to
you.

Hope this helps.

- Pat Hough

--- jcorey30 <jcorey30@yahoo.com> wrote:
> DragonQuest is my game of choice.  But that is not
> to say I have not 
> been tempted to stray.  and I would play multiple
> games if I had the 
> time.  One of the games that intrigues me the most
> is GURPS.  and I 
> will tell you why...
> It has a built in "role-playing" system.  When you
> create your 
> character, you have can give them advantages,
> disadvantages, quirks, 
> and habits.  This helps to define someone's
> character.  and they 
> force players to behave in a certain 
> fashoin consistantly.  Now, I have never played
> GURPS (but i did play 
> Fantasy Trip), so I don't know how this works in
> practice.
> So I am asking two questions...
> 1) what do you think of these kind of reward/penalty
> systems?
> 2) has anyone tried to add one to a DQ campaign.
> 
> John
> 
> 
> 


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