Game Design Sins

[xanther]

....
After a couple of hours of him valiantly defending his design choices and hard work, I still had no idea what sort of adventures he imagined characters would go on in the setting or what those mundane skills and their related system added to the fun of any of it.

To be fair to your buddy, those systems could be more for referee and NPC use, and perhaps a bit of background and options for players. I like that from a referee point of view. So great for world building and internal game mechanic consistency, maybe of no use to player but so what they can just ignore those parts.

Organizationally would have the skills that matter for the genre and most players in a focused section and all that other stuff in a referee focused section.

 

[ffilz]

Psychotic? I mean most of mine had codes vs killing and defender of the helpless etc. Basically they tended to explain why they didn't run and hide when the times got tough.

It was something I think especially well suited to superheroes

In my Fantasy Hero gaming I kept seeing things that ran counter to the idea of adventuring or would clash with another PC’s disads. Also the rules encouraged one or two big disads of each category. So you had a psychotic blind character who had thus major enemy. It just started to feel ridiculous to me.

 

[Simlasa]

Hackmaster took one of AD&D's strengths, shortish chargen, and turned it around completely while keeping the same lethal play style. I'd say that was fine if they also had a random chargen tool to expedite that but they don't as far as I know.

That's one of the things that keeps me from being a bigger fan of GURPS. For all of it's options I wish it had a way randomly generate PCs on the quick... or better yet, some path generation like Traveller.
Maybe it does... somewhere. I dunno. But as it is it appears obssessed with 'balance' and nitpicking point buy.
The advantage/disadvantage thing puts me off as well, for reasons people have already mentioned... if you want to play a double-amputee that's fine, but doing it just to get enough points to buy some other widget is silly.

 

[xanther]

...Personally I hate .... the thousand and one versions of what's essentially a fireball spell—but this one shoots flaming arrows from your finger tips, and that one is single target, and this other one falls from the sky and it's really a blessing from your god that does fire damage, etc. T

Same. Personally think it should be one spell, then can be notes on various variations to provide flavor if you need that.
I tend to take the romance out of it and divide such spells based on range, direct vs indirect vs guided, and single vs area effect. For example, a magic missile is a ranged, direct, single target attack ...now if one can arch it like an arrow to go over a wall then it would have an indirect attack as well. A fireball would be ranged, direct, area of effect type attack. A fireball that could chase you around a corner would be guided, etc.
So in short build spells mechanically based on objective parameters...than add on the flavor and fluff to your hearts content.

And you don't even need separate attack spells for every element. You just need the basic stats for how attack spells work and to have different damage types defined in the game, then use what you need to fit the character or situation.

Agreed. Sadly when I tried this years ago players liked it being broken out. Really just extra ink because had already mechanically aligned the elemental spells. For example, each element had a direct, ranged, single target attack spell. That operated the same except for the damage and effect portion which had separately defined and distinguished.

....General skills with extra bonuses for specializations are better if you want to cover specific stuff. That way the potential for specific stuff is there, but you don't need endless lists of skills, and can always fall back on a general skill if you lack the specialization, rather than split your limited number of points across a dozen vehicles or specific weapons just so that you're not left on foot or unable to defend yourself effectively.

Amen. The only way to do it in my view. I generally believe that a dozen general skills is enough, and then you can specialize under them with specific skills. As to terminology, have one might call general skills Skills, and specialization Focus. Make general skills hard to improve as they are global, and cheaper PC improvement comes through specialization and ease of improvement via the more global general skill provides a means of "class" differentiation.

An example, I use 9 general skills, but you can specialize under each. For example, one general skill I call Combat. It is the skill you use to attach with weapons among other things. On can specialize in Swords for example under it. You don't need the Swords focus to use a sword, you can use your general Combat skill. To differentiate between "classes" do it based on general skill, e.g. warriors can more readily improve the general Combat skill in addition to a specialization like Swords, where a spell user could readily improve the general Magic skill but improving the general Combat skill would be cost prohibitive...better for the spell user to focus on specialization in a specific weapon class.

 

[TristramEvans]

...So Immortal wasn't a hit with you two?

Was that the one that hired the chick from Babylon 5 to do fashion photography to advertise the game?

 

[DeadBob]

To be fair to your buddy, those systems could be more for referee and NPC use, and perhaps a bit of background and options for players. I like that from a referee point of view. So great for world building and internal game mechanic consistency, maybe of no use to player but so what they can just ignore those parts.

Organizationally would have the skills that matter for the genre and most players in a focused section and all that other stuff in a referee focused section.

I appreciate you standing up for my buddy, as he is a wonderful guy.

But no, you're entirely incorrect in your interpretation of that.
He entirely made that whole subsystem of mundane, non-adventuring skills to be part of PCGEN.

 

[Baulderstone]

I see the logic of what you are saying, but I'd offer a counter argument. It is not a universal rule, but generally games with lighter tone favour lighter systems. Comedy games in particular often have rules-light system and, Paranoia aside, rarely leathal. You don't want to sweat the details, you just want to keep things moving and allow the players to do crazy things.

Where crunchy rules often tend to come into their own is when you want a degree realism. And with more realistic combat comes more realistic consequences, including death or permanent disability.

You make an interesting point, but I'll add that there are games with systems that are crunchy in play but have quick character generation, and relatively light systems that require some work for character generation. Dungeon Crawl Classics can be crunchy, but random character generation makes it very fast. On the other hand, I've always liked Call of Cthulhu as a simple system for playing with new people, but placing all those skill points can be rough.

The problem I ended up feeling with disads was the implication that most PCs approached being psychotic. I think that was OK for Champions where a certain style of superhero comic was being followed but it didn’t work for me for fantasy games.

A lot of games with disadvantages allow you to take too many. I've never had an issue with Flaws in Savage Worlds because you can only take a few, and the points they give are a nice little bonus, but it's not enough to imbalance you with someone that doesn't take any.

That's one of the things that keeps me from being a bigger fan of GURPS. For all of it's options I wish it had a way randomly generate PCs on the quick... or better yet, some path generation like Traveller.
Maybe it does... somewhere. I dunno. But as it is it appears obssessed with 'balance' and nitpicking point buy.
The advantage/disadvantage thing puts me off as well, for reasons people have already mentioned... if you want to play a double-amputee that's fine, but doing it just to get enough points to buy some other widget is silly.

I remember that they began including templates near the end of GURPS 3rd Edition. They were bundles of skills, advantages and disadvantages that you buy in one lump system. That was after I stopped running the game, so I can't say how good they were.

The character generation was one of the main reasons I stopped running it. As long as you didn't go crazy with optional rules, it was a reasonably easy system to run.

 

[Doctor Wombat]

Oh yeah, and to piggyback on this theme:

If you are making an RPG about an established IP, don't present the writeups for the main characters as impossible to create using your own character creation rules

Whatever else you might think of the system, that's one thing Star Trek Adventures got right. Based on the game's official published stats, it is possible to create every single canon cast member as a starting PC.

In D6 Star Wars, you have no chance of being Luke Skywalker or Han Solo. If you play for a year of weekly sessions, maybe you can be Dak Ralter or Jek Porkins and hold Luke's jockstrap.

 

[David Johansen]

In D6 Star Wars, hold Luke's jockstrap.

AT LAST! The Star Wars game the fans been waiting for!

 

[chuckdee]

Was that the one that hired the chick from Babylon 5 to do fashion photography to advertise the game?

I'm not sure if that's the answer, but looking at the book that should be the answer.

 

[opaopajr]

Stats, Abilities, keywords, etc. that exist (especially on Character Sheets !) without explanation or known function. Way more common than you'd think, especially in the non-dead-tree age of e-publishing. Just because functioning editors are an endagered species now doesn't mean you have freedom to be a lazy shitbag.

Proofread your shit!
Playtest your shit!

... blew a gaming fuse

 

[E-Rocker]

In response to the original question, there are a number of game design decisions I don't care for, but the only ones I would consider sins are things like referencing a table that isn't actually in the book.

 

[VisionStorm]

Oh yeah, and to piggyback on this theme:

If you are making an RPG about an established IP, don't present the writeups for the main characters as impossible to create using your own character creation rules

Whatever else you might think of the system, that's one thing Star Trek Adventures got right. Based on the game's official published stats, it is possible to create every single canon cast member as a starting PC.

In D6 Star Wars, you have no chance of being Luke Skywalker or Han Solo. If you play for a year of weekly sessions, maybe you can be Dak Ralter or Jek Porkins and hold Luke's jockstrap.

In fairness...I don't expect to get god-tier characters right out of the gate. Protagonists and main cast characters in most IPs tend to be pretty uber competent well established characters within their respective universes since early on, or the equivalent of "high level" characters in D&D and other level-based systems. I don't expect to play Luke right out of the gate, specially not Empire or later versions of him. Early New Hope? Maybe, cuz he was a pretty weak farm kid back then, and outside of blowing up the Death Star through sheer luck, he didn't do much till then. But normally I'd expect to work my way to higher-tier stuff, cuz otherwise there's no room for growth.

That being said, I do believe that in a lot of games characters start out really weak. And they make you split your limited budget of points between actual adventuring skills and anything you'd need to fill out background details and basic education. IMO, characters should always get a couple of background skills and abilities for free, to cover basic occupational stuff that adds flavor, rather than making you chose between basic combat and survival skills, or basic education everyone should have.

 

[TristramEvans]

In fairness...I don't expect to get god-tier characters right out of the gate. Protagonists and main cast characters in most IPs tend to be pretty uber competent well established characters within their respective universes

well, I don't look at an IP that I like and think to myself "I'd love to play in that world, but only if I could be an incompetant loser"

 

[Simlasa]

well, I don't look at an IP that I like and think to myself "I'd love to play in that world, but only if I could be an incompetant loser"

Hah! I often want to do just that... because the original source material is usually so focused on the top dogs of the setting that I'm left wondering what all the little dogs do all day.
So the first time I played Star Wars D6 I made a Twilek (sp?) space pimp with a cadre of enhanced 'escorts' (they had hallucinogenic fungi in their secret regions).
In the 40K setting I want to play as ordinary-ish citizens in the interesting corners of the Empire... not giant space drones.

 

[Silverlion]

I'm reading these, and finding so many interesting takes. (For the record, yes I've played my own games, and wish I could play more!)

 

[A Fiery Flying Roll]

well, I don't look at an IP that I like and think to myself "I'd love to play in that world, but only if I could be an incompetant loser"

You are never playing in my Red Dwarf game.

 

[Skywalker]

My number one is assuming rules for GM controlled characters should be identical to player controlled characters despite the substantial differences in their gameplay experiences. This is more commonly just ignoring the realities of GMing when designing rules.

 

[Gabriel]

Yeah, related to the statements above, I hate when a game is either based on or has its own fiction which are impossible given the rules of the game.

Maximillian Sterling fires quick bursts from the Valkyrie's gun pod and blows up Battle Pods effortlessly. The ONLY way this could happen in the Palladium RPG RAW would be if he were rolling natural 20s exclusively and then rolling higher than average damage on top of that.

Then there's Rifts fiction where a single shot from a Wilk's Laser pistol is capable of instantly killing a target in heavy CS armor. In the game you wouldn't even manage to do that if you burned through the entire e-clip, and by Ultimate Edition, even then, once you had finally got through the armor you'd still have an untouched target standing there in his underoos.

 

[TristramEvans]

You are never playing in my Red Dwarf game.

If your Red Dwarf main cast write-ups present them as hyper-competant supermen that lowly player characters could never aspire to be as awesome as, I'm guessing I wouldn't want to play in your Red Dwarf game

 

[A Fiery Flying Roll]

If your Red Dwarf main cast write-ups present them as hyper-competant supermen that lowly player characters could never aspire to be as awesome as, I'm guessing I wouldn't want to play in your Red Dwarf game

Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast.

 

[TristramEvans]

Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast.

That's a fair cop

 

[Silverlion]

You are never playing in my Red Dwarf game.

I played an absolutely lethal warbot, who was a pacifist, and enjoyed golf.

 

[rumble]

Meta-currency... for GMs.

I actually don't mind this, but perhaps you could clarify with a negative example?

I'm thinking favorably of things like the Marvel SAGA system, where players flip over cards that end up as powerful bonuses in the GMs deck at a later time. This effectively builds up to a more dangerous climatic scene.

Or my own Dead of Night game that disburses Tension points that are both a currency and a guide to establishing the tenor of the game at any given moment. A lower tension increases the perception of normalcy, and higher tension increases general paranoia and sharpens disturbing detail.

I think I prefer meta-currency as directive prompt rather than as game mechanism.
There's also the application of meta-currency to make all players equal in a "no-GM" game (which, really, everyone is a GM). These have some potential.

 

[Dyrnwyn]

well, I don't look at an IP that I like and think to myself "I'd love to play in that world, but only if I could be an incompetant loser"

I remember some print ads for the D20 Star Wars RPG that showed scenes from the films with a bunch of stormtroopers or gungans in the background, and a random one being highlighted with text that was "What's their story" or something like that. The idea being that you could play any of these unnamed characters and have your own adventures with them.

But my reaction was just "I don't know; who the hell cares."

 

[Necrozius]

I actually don't mind this, but perhaps you could clarify with a negative example?

So in most traditional “one GM” games, the GM can make things happen outside of dice rolls or player decisions.

By that I mean, outside of a critical failure, or a player rolling a 6- or 7-9 in Apocalypse World.

In most games, the GM can just declare “as you run around the corridor you come face to face with a whole platoon of Stormtroopers!”. In these new “GM has meta currency too” games, the GM could have only made that kind of declaration if he/she had some “Doom points” to spend (which are gained when the players generate certain results with the dice).

This is different than games like Cypher System or Fate where the GM can offer bad things in exchange for bonus luck or something if the player accepts it. But close. I’ve started to dislike that mechanic too.

The point is that the only reason why I THINK that these rules were invented was because some game designers had one too many bad experiences with GMs and felt that they had to impose restrictions on them in general.

I find that tragically sad.

 

[CRKrueger]

I hate "One Spell with a Hundred Different Skins" with fury of a thousand thousand suns.

Mein Gott in Himmel, is there a better way to suck all soul out of a game than generic magic? No, no there really isn't.

Magic is is one of, if not the primary defining element of Fantasy, and you're going to have every single magician from a High Thaumaturgist to The Speaker in Dreams to the Arch-Clerist of Ghyala cast Magic Missile? Why even have a setting at that point?

 

[TristramEvans]

I hate "One Spell with a Hundred Different Skins" with fury of a thousand thousand suns.

Mein Gott in Himmel, is there a better way to suck all soul out of a game than generic magic? No, no there really isn't.

Magic is is one of, if not the primary defining element of Fantasy, and you're going to have every single magician from a High Thaumaturgist to The Speaker in Dreams to the Arch-Clerist of Ghyala cast Magic Missile? Why even have a setting at that point?

Oh yeah, piggybacking on that, I hate when magic in superhero RPGs is just - "take a superpower but it's a spell"

 

[CRKrueger]

Oh yeah, and to piggyback on this theme:

If you are making an RPG about an established IP, don't present the writeups for the main characters as impossible to create using your own character creation rules

That's why when Goodman made DCC Lankhmar, they had to add all kinds of character options, because otherwise you couldn't have even come close to The Twain in DCC.

Alter the system to the setting...it's an Axiom.

 

[PolarBlues]

So in most traditional “one GM” games, the GM can make things happen outside of dice rolls or player decisions.

By that I mean, outside of a critical failure, or a player rolling a 6- or 7-9 in Apocalypse World.

In most games, the GM can just declare “as you run around the corridor you come face to face with a whole platoon of Stormtroopers!”. In these new “GM has meta currency too” games, the GM could have only made that kind of declaration if he/she had some “Doom points” to spend (which are gained when the players generate certain results with the dice).

This is different than games like Cypher System or Fate where the GM can offer bad things in exchange for bonus luck or something if the player accepts it. But close. I’ve started to dislike that mechanic too.

The point is that the only reason why I THINK that these rules were invented was because some game designers had one too many bad experiences with GMs and felt that they had to impose restrictions on them in general.

I find that tragically sad.

I think mechanics that require a GM to spend points to throw in "Stormtroopers at the end of the corridor" type encounter or obstacle aren't miles away from the having keyed encounters on a map that or rolling on a random encounter table every x moves. They are all methods to regulate how much adversity the players are going to face and when, as opposed to the more freeform, imporvisational approach in which the GM simply decides, moment to moment, how much adversity to throw at the players (based what makes sense, what might be more fun or other criteria).

I guess each of these methods has its pros and cons, and will suit different styles of GMing. I personally don't the Doom Point approach. I am by nature a soft GM. I don't have that instict that tells me when to push hard and spend my points. But I also don't tend to use maps much or prepare at that level of detail. I fare better with random encounter tables so that when things get tough for the players I can just cowardly blame the dice.

 

[lategamer]

And you don't even need separate attack spells for every element. You just need the basic stats for how attack spells work and to have different damage types defined in the game, then use what you need to fit the character or situation.

Is this where you sneak GURPS into the conversation.

Long lists of skills are also problematic as well, because they're too specific and tend to cover tiny variations of similar tasks that rarely come up in actual play and don't grant you any aptitude when attempting similar stuff. General skills with extra bonuses for specializations are better if you want to cover specific stuff. That way the potential for specific stuff is there, but you don't need endless lists of skills, and can always fall back on a general skill if you lack the specialization, rather than split your limited number of points across a dozen vehicles or specific weapons just so that you're not left on foot or unable to defend yourself effectively.

One of the things I quite like about DESTINED (Mythras) is the condensed skill list. It's BRP, but with fewer skills at "nahim"

 

[lategamer]

I actually don't mind this, but perhaps you could clarify with a negative example?

It's one thing I really don't like about the Dune 2d20 game. The accumulation of threat and very vague rules about what to do with it means I'm giving them Momentum and taking this Threat and I feel like I have to spend it to ...hamstring them with more powerful enemies which puts me in adversarial role against the players.

I don't like that. I play the adversaries but I also play the allies. So, garnering Threat seems really off for a modern RPG (and for the record, I love story game twaddle)

 

[lategamer]

Oh yeah, piggybacking on that, I hate when magic in superhero RPGs is just - "take a superpower but it's a spell"

Hmmm, I just wrote some rules like that today for Silver Haired Sentinels. But it's not "take a superpower", it's take ANY superpower at RUNTIME.

 

[Ladybird]

Stats, Abilities, keywords, etc. that exist (especially on Character Sheets !) without explanation or known function. Way more common than you'd think, especially in the non-dead-tree age of e-publishing. Just because functioning editors are an endagered species now doesn't mean you have freedom to be a lazy shitbag.

Proofread your shit!
Playtest your shit!

... blew a gaming fuse

Or as an alternative, systems whose default character sheet doesn't include a place to write down derived stats which are important but don't change much - for example, initiative modifiers. Heck, I've played games where the character sheets didn't even include somewhere to track a character's HP.

 

[TJS]

I think mechanics that require a GM to spend points to throw in "Stormtroopers at the end of the corridor" type encounter or obstacle aren't miles away from the having keyed encounters on a map that or rolling on a random encounter table every x moves. They are all methods to regulate how much adversity the players are going to face and when, as opposed to the more freeform, imporvisational approach in which the GM simply decides, moment to moment, how much adversity to throw at the players (based what makes sense, what might be more fun or other criteria).

I guess each of these methods has its pros and cons, and will suit different styles of GMing. I personally don't the Doom Point approach. I am by nature a soft GM. I don't have that instict that tells me when to push hard and spend my points. But I also don't tend to use maps much or prepare at that level of detail. I fare better with random encounter tables so that when things get tough for the players I can just cowardly blame the dice.

Yeah. I don't really see it that differently to the old school rules that require a wandering monster check after so many turns.

In fact I think they tend to work well when you use them in similar ways. If the PCs are exploring the old tombs the GM gets a Doom point at understood periods of time. My experience is they also work best if there's an understood effect that doom points are being used for - ie random encouters are called for, or some kind of environmental effect is triggered, or the GM spends doom to roll on a table. They actually work less well I think if they are just permission for the GM to randomnly add complications because, of course, as is often said, the GM can do that anyway.

In fact I think the problem with them is that they can potentially cover so many different things that it can take some time to work out what they should cover - both in terms of system design and also in terms of how you as an individual GM could get the most use out of them depending on your style of GMing.

 

[David Johansen]

In response to the original question, there are a number of game design decisions I don't care for, but the only ones I would consider sins are things like referencing a table that isn't actually in the book.

Yeah, a lot of this thread is more about preference than abomination. Like generic spells, I keep using them in my games because I've seen too many lists of thousands of spells that amounted to difference without distinction.

But there's stuff like the misnamed table that's in the wrong part of the rulebook that's referred to repeatedly by a name that's not even on the table. Now that's a game design sin.

I think the distinction is that NOBODY wants it or likes it and it is just a straight up abomination.

 

[rumble]

I hate "One Spell with a Hundred Different Skins" with fury of a thousand thousand suns.

That probably eliminates HERO system as an option. How do you avoid this without needless complexity when hit points are an abstraction anyway.
In the end, the damage type is flavor text (with circumstantial impact), but you still take damage.

Or are you just talking about mindlessly repurposing the exact same spell with the exact same effect for multiple character types and backgrounds?

 

[TJS]

It's one thing I really don't like about the Dune 2d20 game. The accumulation of threat and very vague rules about what to do with it means I'm giving them Momentum and taking this Threat and I feel like I have to spend it to ...hamstring them with more powerful enemies which puts me in adversarial role against the players.

I don't like that. I play the adversaries but I also play the allies. So, garnering Threat seems really off for a modern RPG (and for the record, I love story game twaddle)

I think the thing about Threat or Doom or whatever they are calling it, is that for it to work, the GM has to know in advance what the effects of Doom are. Or in other words, I think it works best as a tool for designing your own little subsytems then as a generic floating tool - which of course implies work for the GM.

I could see myself designing things like a heist scenario, or a dungeon, or a car chase all of which I think Doom and threat could add something too, provided it was worked out in advance, - however, if nothing is worked out in advance then it sort of sits there oddly.

With Dune I felt the same way about zones. It makes so much use of zones in an abstract sense that I bounced off it hard, as I couldn't see myself actually able to run the game without doing a lot of prep work in advance to decide what zones were in play at any particular time (maybe if I ran it for long enough that might become intuitive, but I couldn't see myself starting a game without doing a lot of that prep.)

 

[opaopajr]

Along the lines of chargen and lethality, the depth of a sub system should be no more than proportional to how much you expect to see it used. No need for 7 charts on detailed wall crawling if the game is about dueling mages.

For this I have always returned a grateful word to AD&D 2e Punching/Wrestling Tables. They worked, quickly, cleanly, and with actual excitement (the KO% roll is da best! ) -- and then they got out of my way.

And whenever a martial artist junkie needed their fix I just asked them to scribble up their own [Favorite Martial Art Here] labeled Punching/Wrestling tables without blowing the originals out of the water. And then we could avoid the discussion at the table! And they could find the other martial art bunny at the table and work furiously, debating fine points, like studying for bar exams. And I didn't have to care about all that extraneous detail. ... and then and then and then

Oh, how I love you Punching/Wrestling table! I wish you came in Gun for my gun bunnies.

 

[TJS]

My number one is assuming rules for GM controlled characters should be identical to player controlled characters despite the substantial differences in their gameplay experiences. This is more commonly just ignoring the realities of GMing when designing rules.

I have mixed feelings on this, because I find the hate the opposite situation as well - games like 13th Age seem to assume anything that doesn't take place after initiative is rolled is pure GM fiat, yet some of the most satisfying games have been when PCs squared up in intrigue and mystery against npc enemies over a period of weeks or months and I played the NPCs to the hilt sticking strictly to the rules about what they could do to evade detection and capture.