House Rules for Story Points…?

[Marnal]

Some thoughts on House Rules for Story Points...

While I really like the Story Points used in AITAS I made some changes for philosophical reasons.

Story Points seem to be about enriching the story – not enriching the characters. There character is never ‘deciding’ when to use a story point [not even on a subconscious level like with the Force Points in Star Wars]. And a lot of the things you do with story points aren’t things that the character has any control over what-so-ever.

So I decided that CHARACTERS don’t have story points. PLAYERS have story points. After all it’s the players who want a rich storytelling experience. The characters just want to stop the Daleks as quickly and painlessly as possible.

If there’s a way to do stop the Daleks by pushing one button the character will do it. But their PLAYER might ask the GM how many story points he’d get for having the button be broken.

Once I made that decision I realized that a lot of other things changed. The GM essentially has unlimited story points. You could even argue that every event the GM introduces costs him story points. But since they are unlimited why both keeping track?

If this is true, why bother with story points for NON-player characters? They are run by the GM and the GM has unlimited story points. If its dramatically important for the NPC to have a spare pistol hidden in his jacket then he will. If its not, then he wont. If a particular battle needs to be as challenging as possible then the GM can roll 4d6 instead of 2d6 for the villain’s attacks as often as he feel it will help the story.

This makes running NPCs a LOT simpler for the GM. The idea that the GM would have to play both the npc AND an imaginary player who is spending the npc’s story points is way more headache then I want to deal with.

Following on from this Gadgets can’t carry story points either. If you want the Sonic Screwdriver to be able to blow up a Special Weapon Dalek at 300 meters then the Player pays for that out of his own fund of SP. If the player is out of SP then another Player Character can give a rousing speech to donate points to the Player with the screwdriver.

Again, this ruling on gadgets easier. They do what they say on paper. If you want them to do something more the player pays the story points just like all the other times the player thinks an advantage for his character would make the story better.

Gadgets still COST SP to build. And they cost SP to make a regular part of your PCs equipment. I still use Story Points to balance the player characters. But the idea is, that the more powerful your Character is the less powerful you Player is. And vice-versa.

So, despite the idea that story points belong to the Player, you still get a different amount of story points if you swap Characters. Cuz one of the things they do is balance Player-Character equality.

If a player has earned a ridiculous amount of story points at the end of an adventure I will let them have a small bonus (usually less then 1/2) of them for use in the next adventure. Just cause it seems like unfair to toss them all after the player tried to hard to make the game more interesting for everyone.

Also I made any system of magic or pseudo-magic (like the Faction Paradox rituals) follow the basic structure of the gadget construction rules. Though I had them cost a lot less because you have to pay them every time you perform the ritual. (Most gadgets can be used several times.)

So far the above modifications have streamlined things quite a bit and seem very workable. YMMV of course.

Thoughts?

- Marnal Gate

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[olegrand]

;D After running one full season of my campaign, I've come to a very similar conclusion:

dwaitas.blogspot.com/

It's great to see that I'm not the only DWAITAS GM to think along these lines...

[knasser]

Sept 22, 2010 14:46:37 GMT Marnal said:

Thoughts?

If it works well in your game, then that's reason enough. You give some good justifications for the house rules. But I am going to make the case for keeping things by the book though as that's working well for me so far.

Firstly, giving Story Points to NPCs. I do find this useful for a few reasons. First is your comment about the GM having infinite Story Points. I consider that notion a bad thing because it diminishes the players' ability to direct the plot how they want. In fact, this was explicitly raised by a player in our last session when a Weeping Angel spent Story Points to counter what they'd hoped to achieve. One used the exact words you did when they said dejectedly that they supposed the GM had "infinite story points". I was quick to assure them that this was not the case. I have previously described Story Points as "buying GMness". My players like to feel that their enemies do not have an infinite resource in the GM backing them up. They like knowing that an NPC or a monster has a finite plot significance.

And that phrase "plot significance" brings us on to another quality that I've found Story Points add which I'm really growing to like. Story Points indicate how central an NPC or monster is to the plot. How much the power of Story will back them up. The amount of Story Points qualifies that "plot significance". Example: some routine Sontaran warrior will have one or two Story Points. That's sufficient if necessary, to pull off some minor plot imact - maybe he gets free when the PCs tie him up, maybe he lives just long enough to crawl to the detonation button that will start the countdown to the ships destruction. He'll never be a major character, we may never even learn his name. The measure of his Story Points lets us know to what extent the Story will bend to his will. At the other end, maybe the Weeping Angel, prowling the catacombs beneath Paris, sole monster of the plot, has a whopping 8 Story Points. Now we - and the players - know that this is a significant foe. The GM knows that this isn't going to fall to a random lucky shot. The players know that strange things might be done by the Weeping Angel. And whilst they know that in a confrontation with Joe Sontaran, they can win if they absolutely have to, simply by being more Plot Significant than he is (they can outbid him on Story Points). And they know that if they can't do the same against the Weeping Angel, it's not because the GM is suddenly saying "no, I like this monster too much, you can't", but because the Weeping Angel has a lot of Story Points and can twist the plot itself.

I actually go so far as to forewarn the players (we're still in our first few adventures), that an upcoming adventure features a high Story Point character. Thus they are ready for something to equal them in terms of plot significance. E.g. the Doctor knows that this episode isn't going to be running around a hospital chasing Judoon, but that it's going to the Master, or General Stahl or something else that has the power to re-shape the plot.

As to Gadgets, we haven't used them much in the game so far, so I have little real play experience to relate, but I like that they have their own Story Points. It adds that little bonus when they get their hands on one. And it encourages innovative use of the Gadget. When the PCs have got themselves in a hole and they pull out the Sonic Screwdriver and realise, hey - it's got two Story Points in it, then it's a stimulus for them to say "could it spend them to signal the spaceship to descend and collect us?" And it's the only way that I know of for characters to "steal" Story Points from each other. Nick the Master's laser screwdriver? Sweet - get Story Points with it. Some Victorian Street Urchin nicks your twirly doohickey (it goes ding when there's stuff), it's loaded with a couple of Story Points so that they can accidentallly unleash some trouble with it back at the workhouse.

Those are my feelings on the subject, anyway.

It's good to discuss these matters because it unearths all the different ways people play the game.

K.

[Curufea]

Hmm, I've come across a different problem with story points - mainly how to implement them in non-face-to-face games.

If the player posts a roll for something - especially a player triggered event such as searching, or trying to hide - if the GM then goes on to say "do you want to spend story points on it" you are basically telegraphing to the player that there is something to find, or that someone is looking for them. However if the GM doesn't ask - they don't spend the point and fail.

[zarohk]

I agree with knasser on this issue. Yes, it is important that there are Story Points available for the players to be able to use, but they are also a balancing factor. If you take Experienced, Time Lord, or any other trait that costs Story Points, you make your character more powerful in one way, in exchange for decreasing that character's ability to do the near-impossible as much. Also, linking Story Points to specific characters means that characters can only do so much: this way you can't have another Rory, dying and coming back two or three times in a single episode/adventure.

In addition, linking Story Points to particular characters is part of the reward system in DWAITAS. If you role-play well, especially having a character do something that you, the player know better than to do but the character doesn't, you should be rewarded with the chance for the character to do better at something later. On the flip side, if a player is not role-playing well, and going out of character (breaking Code of Conduct: Does Not Kill without a good reason), you may penalized story points, making it harder for those characters to survive. I have had players lose characters because they didn't role-play well and so didn't have enough story points to get their characters out of sticky situations. This is helpful in keeping players in character and making them think carefully about making characters that they couldn't easily role-play. Not to say that you can't experiment, but if you're not good a role-playing a certain type of character and you don't improve or try and switch characters, it will not get any easier.

As for Story Points in villains: that is vital in keeping them balanced as well. For example, I was running a game where a PC was supposed to die, killed by the arc villain, his death revealing certain information to the other characters . However, the NPC villain, who had gained two levels of Experienced (and the corresponding 4 Character Points and 4 Skill Points) by using a special ability to consume the minds and knowledge of other NPC characters, did not have as many Story Points as the PC, and so the PC won the fight, causing me to change the plot. The villain's insufficient story points showed that in this case, the PC was just luckier.

Story Points are one of the most vital mechanics in the game. Change how you get them and what you can spend them on maybe, but don't change their relation to characters.

[Marnal]

Sorry to take so long to reply to this.

Knasser said:
“GM having infinite Story Points. I consider that notion a bad thing because it diminishes the players' ability to direct the plot how they want.”

That would certainly be an issue for some groups. Depending on how much the players trust the GM they might want to limit the GM’s power. That said my players enjoy tightly plotted stories with lots of structure and rising action. To orchestrate that I need most of the power traditionally afforded to a GM in most game systems (ie Infinite Story Points). My players trust that they are competing against is the Bag Guy NPCs, not the GM. But I do enjoy the fact that (In the Vortex System) the PCs now have the ability to throw ideas in and change things up when they want things to go a bit differently. I a little of that is refreshing and (after 20 years of GMing) keeps me on my toes.

Knasser said:
“Story Points indicate how central an NPC or monster is to the plot.”

That’s just it, I’d rather be decide myself how important a particular Sontaran is to the plot then have it dictated by some stat book that was published before I even conceived of my story. Yes I can alter how many SP the Sontaran has, but if I’m going to do that then I might was well just ignore the listed SPs and were back to the GM having (effectively) unlimited SP.

Curufea said:
“if the GM then goes on to say "do you want to spend story points on it" you are basically telegraphing to the player that there is something to find,”

That is a sticking point for me. I’ve basically resigned myself to telling the PCs the difficulty numbers for everything and trusting they won’t meta-game too much. Sometimes (to build tension) I don’t tell them for search rolls and just let them decide if a 17 was high enough to beat a monsters sneak roll.

Zarohk said:
“Story Points available for the players to be able to use, but they are also a balancing factor.”

Oh yes, I’m religious about making sure the point values between all the PCs are balanced. Some of my players have characters that have huge super powers. Others are much more of off the street humans. Because there is a lot of in-game conflict and back-stabbing that goes on the Players have to feel that everything was fair when one PC tries to screw another. So, between different Player Characters, Story Points are an essential balancing tool.

And yes it is awkward when one Player changes which character they are playing in Game. I basically have to figure out how far the Player’s character is from its default starting point, then add or subtract that difference to their new character’s starting point. Fortunately, in 3 years of running AiTaS I’ve only had one player swap Characters in mid game [on their own initiative they had their PC get enslaved by the Tharils and grabbed a UNIT NPC to play for the rest of the game].

So there is a link between a Character and the number of Story Points the Player gets. But it is always the Player (and not the Character) who decides when to spend them and why. Many times my Players have decided NOT to spend SP on a roll that their Character would have considered to be the most important thing in their lives. They do this because they realize failure often offers more role-playing challenges and then success.


Zarohk said:
“villains: that is vital in keeping them balanced as well.”

True, but its easier to do on the fly when you get to the confrontation and can see how many SP the Players have left, then it is to use some pre-written stats that have no clue how many SP the PCs might have spent to get to the final boss.

Zarohk said:
“…NPC characters, did not have as many Story Points as the PC, and so the PC won the fight, causing me to change the plot.”

I still allow my Players to change a major plot point – but I charge them a lot for it.
For something that will totally re-shape the rest of the scenario [or the next scenario] I might put a price of 9 SP on the idea. But I’ll still let them buy it if they are really in love with their idea.

Zarohk said:
“but don't change [story points] relation to characters.”

Again, Players tend to make very different decision about how to spend the points then their Characters would. I find the choices made by the Players to be much more interesting and enriching to the story then the choices their Characters would have made. YMMV.

[zarohk]

Aug 9, 2013 19:24:49 GMT Marnal said:

Sorry to take so long to reply to this.

Sept 22, 2010 22:50:48 GMT Curufea said:

If the player posts a roll for something - especially a player triggered event such as searching, or trying to hide - if the GM then goes on to say "do you want to spend story points on it" you are basically telegraphing to the player that there is something to find, or that someone is looking for them. However if the GM doesn't ask - they don't spend the point and fail.

That is a sticking point for me. I’ve basically resigned myself to telling the PCs the difficulty numbers for everything and trusting they won’t meta-game too much. Sometimes (to build tension) I don’t tell them for search rolls and just let them decide if a 17 was high enough to beat a monsters sneak roll.

I've solved that by almost never telling players the difficulty of roles, only their results. I remind players that they can spend story points on any roll to increase their success rates, and leave it up to them if they do. I have set up a system with my players for non-combat rolls, that if they really want a success on a particular roll, they declare that they will spend up to so many story points on it before rolling, and after they roll I tell them how many they will be spending for a success.

Example:
1. "Elizabeth" says that she wants to succeed on this particular awareness roll, up to 3 Story Points worth.
2. "Elizabeth" rolls a 9 on the dice, plus her character's Ingenuity+Awareness bonus of 7, for a total of 16.
3. The awareness had a difficulty of 21, so I make her pay 2 Story Points to raise the outcome sufficiently high enough.

If the amount they gave was not enough for a success, (for example, if "Elizabeth" said she wanted to spend only 1 Story Point), then I would take the Story Point and tell her the "Unsuccessful" result, making spending Story Points a gamble.