Author Topic: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?  (Read 11818 times)

Offline KOFFEYKID

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Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« on: April 28, 2010, 06:24:22 PM »
Do you actually think lawbreakers (the stunts) are actually needed? Ive been thinking that they are a crutch of the system, and shouldn't be modeled the way that they are. I think a social impact, and a aspect impact should be enough for most lawbreakers (the people, not the stunt).

What do you guys think? Can you punish a player adequately enough without having to also force a power on them?
« Last Edit: April 28, 2010, 06:30:02 PM by KOFFEYKID »

Offline SaintAndSinner

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #1 on: April 28, 2010, 06:27:13 PM »
If trying to run game in the Dresden Files universe I find them very helpful.  If you're off doing your own take on urban fantasy and wizards I suppose you could pretty easily drop them.
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Offline Korwin

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #2 on: April 28, 2010, 06:27:56 PM »
Was posting this in the other thread

Quote
I'm thinking about scratching the Lawbreaker stunt and keeping the political ramifications (ie Warden will want to kill you).

Need to ponder it more...

Deleted it there and copied it here, after seeing the new thread...


Offline KOFFEYKID

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #3 on: April 28, 2010, 06:28:33 PM »
One of the major issues I have with them is that from a purely role playing standpoint, a player who wants to have a shady past (maybe a 3rd lawbreaker like Molly), has to start off with this penalty to their character's mechanical power. This can cause difficulty within the party balance, Players A, B and C are going to have more points to put towards their goals than Player D who has the lawbreaker. That means if Player C and D are both spell casters player C will invariably be stronger than Player D. Also, I hate that you get a "bonus" that you are discouraged from using.

Offline Deadmanwalking

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #4 on: April 28, 2010, 06:30:15 PM »
Sure, if you like.

The Lawbreaker stunts have te great and sigular advantage of actually portraying how breaking the Laws more than once or twice directly leads to inevitable Warlockdom.

But if you want to reflect that with mandatory Aspect changes instead, that should work out fine, though for most games you'll need something in the way of guidelines to decide when a character has gone so far they need to be made an NPC, but those aren't especially hard to come up with.

One of the major issues I have with them is that from a purely role playing standpoint, a player who wants to have a shady past (maybe a 3rd lawbreaker like Molly), has to start off with this penalty to their character's mechanical power. This can cause difficulty within the party balance, Players A, B and C are going to have more points to put towards their goals than Player D who has the lawbreaker. That means if Player C and D are both spell casters player C will invariably be stronger than Player D. Also, I hate that you get a "bonus" that you are discouraged from using.

Ah! I actually have an alternate way to handle this issue: I allow the Lawbreaker bonus to apply to two things other than breaking the Law (and in both cases the character in no way suffers for it):

1. I apply it to doing things that would break the Law but don't due to a technicality. I'd give Harry his Lawbreaker bonus to killing Ghouls and vampires with magic, for instance, or a reformed necromancer his bonus to raising an animal zombie.

2. I also apply the bonus to figuring out what other people with the same Lawbreaker stunt are likely to do. There's an incident in Turn Coat that sums this up best...

In both cases, you're that kind of person, and that means something.
« Last Edit: April 28, 2010, 06:35:40 PM by Deadmanwalking »

Offline Falar

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #5 on: April 28, 2010, 06:33:34 PM »
I'm going to go with Dead here. You can do away with them if you want to and use other means, but it's really a mechanic that is indicative of how the world works. If you break the Laws, you, more likely than not, will end up being a warlock. The slide from being a more-or-less self-controlled character to becoming basically a monster is represented by the refresh. If you do away with that, then there's little reason not to go full bore warlock route trying to redeem himself. However, if you play the game as written, he'll basically be compelled more and more to act along his nature which will end up with him sliding.

Basically, it takes a lot of punch out the Free Will vs. Nature slider that is, to me, one of the greatest things about how the system imitates the world of Dresden.
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Offline KOFFEYKID

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #6 on: April 28, 2010, 06:39:01 PM »
What if we have a morality score, sort of like World of Darkness's humanity. If it drops to 0 you become an NPC. Its equal to Half your refresh level, and every time you do something undeniably good, a purely Good act, you can remove one point of Morality Damage.

Offline Deadmanwalking

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #7 on: April 28, 2010, 06:41:31 PM »
What if we have a morality score, sort of like World of Darkness's humanity. If it drops to 0 you become an NPC. Its equal to Half your refresh level, and every time you do something undeniably good, a purely Good act, you can remove one point of Morality Damage.

Seems overly mechanistic and kinda tacked on. I'd just go with you becoming an NPC when more than half your Aspects reflect Lawbreaking. You can avoid this almost indefinitely by changing those Aspects back to more normal ones at every Milestone...but it'll need to be justified.

Offline Korwin

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #8 on: April 28, 2010, 06:44:23 PM »
Power corrupts, but as it is you are discouraged to misuse your power...

Need to rephrase that.
If in the RPG you (the PC) misuses your power (break one of the 7 laws) you get an penalty/get from an power standpoint weaker.
Basically there is an counterweight against the corruption of power.

So the players arent as much lured to the dark side.
If you want that, you should keep the Lawbreaker stunt (if I keep the stunts, that would be the reason).

What are the consequences of scratching the stunts?
You will probably get more law violations.
The Wardens will still kill the lawbreaker if they catch them (but the PC can try to argue with them [self defense])
The law violations will still show in Soulgazes. (Aspect changes)


Offline SaintAndSinner

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #9 on: April 28, 2010, 07:08:16 PM »
What if we have a morality score, sort of like World of Darkness's humanity. If it drops to 0 you become an NPC. Its equal to Half your refresh level, and every time you do something undeniably good, a purely Good act, you can remove one point of Morality Damage.

Sounds like something you could try out and let us know how it goes. 
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Offline Nudge

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #10 on: April 28, 2010, 07:23:29 PM »
Do you actually think lawbreakers (the stunts) are actually needed?

I've had the same concern you did: punishing someone for a choice that otherwise creates good RP.  I had two solutions in my head:

1) Extend the bonus to related actions to "tempt" the player. (Just as others have come up with)
OR
2) For characters coming into play with it, Skip the Refresh cost and have them take an Aspect.  They get punished in game, but get Fate points as their reward, the equal of other characters.  They can exercise a bonus by invoking it (representing the temptation and slippery slope).  Break the Law again and they get the Stunt. 

Offline TheMouse

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #11 on: April 28, 2010, 07:46:18 PM »
I like the idea of extending them to things that would otherwise be breaches of the Laws.

Honestly, I mostly see them as something for NPCs. That sorcerer who doesn't have the ability to keep growing in skill can still be dangerous by getting a +1 or +2 to all acts of magic to blow you up or control your mind.

If a player wants to take the things, that player is choosing to play with fire. That fire has a lot of power, but it can definitely burn the hands of someone using it.

Gaining such a thing after char-gen seems to me not to be a punishment so much as the result of a choice the player made knowingly. I mean, to break the Law against killing, the player must choose to kill someone as part of taking them out.

Offline Korwin

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #12 on: April 28, 2010, 07:47:33 PM »
Some points why I don't like the stunts:
1. If I use Char Building resourses I expect to use those abillities in the game, but if I do that I get harrased/killed by wardens.
2. If I build the PC with lawbreaking in mind, I don't have a problem with free will (buy the Stunt for -2).

But if I use an Aspect for Lawbreaking...
Let's use the juvenile Warlock from Proven Guilty as an example:
He brocke the Law many times so he has the aspect: My wish is your Order.
So he wakes up --> compel: get someone to bring you breakfast to the bed.
Afterwards he wents to school --> compel: borrow the new car from the neighbor, even if you have no driving licence.
In the school: compel the chearleader to go with you...
etc.

So if the warlock does those things he get many fatepoints, but if he wants to change? How long can he get by without running dry?

Offline Deadmanwalking

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #13 on: April 28, 2010, 07:54:52 PM »
Some points why I don't like the stunts:
1. If I use Char Building resourses I expect to use those abillities in the game, but if I do that I get harrased/killed by wardens.
2. If I build the PC with lawbreaking in mind, I don't have a problem with free will (buy the Stunt for -2).

Uh, not to disagree with the possibility of using Aspects, but, well, I really think my solution helps:

Ah! I actually have an alternate way to handle this issue: I allow the Lawbreaker bonus to apply to two things other than breaking the Law (and in both cases the character in no way suffers for it):

1. I apply it to doing things that would break the Law but don't due to a technicality. I'd give Harry his Lawbreaker bonus to killing Ghouls and vampires with magic, for instance, or a reformed necromancer his bonus to raising an animal zombie.

2. I also apply the bonus to figuring out what other people with the same Lawbreaker stunt are likely to do. There's an incident in Turn Coat that sums this up best...

In both cases, you're that kind of person, and that means something.

As for the Free Will thing, bear in mind that by the official rules every three times you break a Law you need to change an Aspect to reflect that Broken Law.

Offline Korwin

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Re: Lawbreakers: Do We Need Them?
« Reply #14 on: April 28, 2010, 07:57:20 PM »
Honestly, I mostly see them as something for NPCs. That sorcerer who doesn't have the ability to keep growing in skill can still be dangerous by getting a +1 or +2 to all acts of magic to blow you up or control your mind.
An aspect would do the same. First the aspect get compelled, then the aspect invoked to better kill.
Quote
Gaining such a thing after char-gen seems to me not to be a punishment so much as the result of a choice the player made knowingly. I mean, to break the Law against killing, the player must choose to kill someone as part of taking them out.
Or the GM concedes...


[/quote]