Classes and archetypes

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Cyberpunk has classes. They may call them something else but there are abilities locked to the archetype. Might as well call it a class.
 
Im trying to think of one but can't, is there are game that uses classes that doesn't have levels, or do the two concepts always go together?
A decent amount of PbtA games might qualify? Playbooks in PbtA games feel closer to "class" than they do to "template" to me, as the abilities/"moves" are chosen and improved mostly from a list of things specific to the playbooks, rather than from a general list of abilities. Maybe playbooks are their own kind of thing.
 
Also Mutant Year Zero and possibly other Fria Logan games.

(If you have exclusvie abilities then I would call it a class)
 
I like them.

They let the other players in the party know what our character is good at, and what he is not so good at. There is niche protection and it plays to the tactical or game side of the game.

That said, stats and skills are only half of a character - the other half is personality, which is something the player has free rein over.

Too often class is used by some players to justify "that's what my would do because he is a [insert class]".
 
Why is that bad? Isn't that what they should be doing?

It depends, I guess.

If a cleric or paladin wants to heal a wounded and helpless enemy, that's good.

But if it's a barbarian just behaving rudely to people. a rogue stealing from or backstabbing a random NPC, or a bard seducing everything in sight...
 
It depends, I guess.

If a cleric or paladin wants to heal a wounded and helpless enemy, that's good.

But if it's a barbarian just behaving rudely to people. a rogue stealing from or backstabbing a random NPC, or a bard seducing everything in sight...
Only a problem if it's defined as a problem? No real people were hurt by those exploits...
 
I really disliked classes for a good 20 years but now I am more mellow towards them.
My current feeling is not so much that they constrain the players as there are always more classes than PCs so everyone can do their own thing. But their weakness is that they limit what the NPCs feel like and you can end up with dozens of interchangeable NPCs in terms of their abilities if the GM is not careful.
 
It depends, I guess.

If a cleric or paladin wants to heal a wounded and helpless enemy, that's good.

But if it's a barbarian just behaving rudely to people. a rogue stealing from or backstabbing a random NPC, or a bard seducing everything in sight...
I fail to see the issue with either.
Now, doing it "because of class" might be a problem if they use it as an argument why the Barbarian would never learn manners. But that's why I don't play class systems...:devil:
As an aside, both RL "barbarians" and Cimmerians in REH's works are amazingly polite, so I'd mock that player mercilessly... and the bard's would learn why seduce is a dangerous skill in pre-industrial societies:evil:.
 
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I really disliked classes for a good 20 years but now I am more mellow towards them.
My current feeling is not so much that they constrain the players as there are always more classes than PCs so everyone can do their own thing. But their weakness is that they limit what the NPCs feel like and you can end up with dozens of interchangeable NPCs in terms of their abilities if the GM is not careful.
Players only see what they are exposed to - so unless you as GM are bored with what your NPCs can do , classes don't especially limit this. 13th Age, for example, has a load of varieties of opponent for the PC's, including abilities that the PCs don't have. Most NPCs IME don't have powers that impact on the players (unless they are enemies). What impacts on the players is the NPC's personality, role in the game society and what they can do for or to the players.
 
Im trying to think of one but can't, is there are game that uses classes that doesn't have levels, or do the two concepts always go together?

Depends on how you define it, but I'd define just about every modern system that uses playbooks (PbtA, FitD, etc) as using "classes but not levels". More than templates, playbooks typically mildly or strongly restrain future character development to choices from the playbook.
 
It depends on the game. I'm not a massive fan of classes, believing myself to be a more mature roleplayer and above such 'juvenile attempts to game the imaginary world' but I'm now of an age where I recognise you say Fighter, I say Brujah. You say Ranger, I say Gangrel.

Whatever floats your boat, man!
 
Depends on how you define it, but I'd define just about every modern system that uses playbooks (PbtA, FitD, etc) as using "classes but not levels". More than templates, playbooks typically mildly or strongly restrain future character development to choices from the playbook.
I think playbooks are great for a system where the players are only going to play one campaign. However for repeat campaigns in the same system, I find the playbook starts to recreate the same feeling characters, given the size and scope of most playbook RPGs, this isn't a big issue.
 
Only a problem if it's defined as a problem? No real people were hurt by those exploits...

It is a problem if players use their characters' classes to justify their antisocial and disruptive behaviours, at the detriment of the other players around the table.

Class does not always imply a certain alignment, or an outlook on life or character goals.

The more "religious" classes like clerics, paladins, and monks may come with certain alignment limitations and obligations, but that is because those classes are also in-world "backgrounds".

Likewise, "barbarity" and "rangerhood" may imply certain outlook on life, but to interprete these as "rude, lacking social awareness, and screwing up the party's attempts at diplomacy every time" and "loner, always scouting apart from the party" respectively get old quickly.

Worse still are players who interprete class as repetitive, near-compulsive, and stereotyped behaviours, like the horny bard and the kleptomaniac rouge.

Sure, no real world persons are hurt by these actions, but unless your GM and fellow players also enjoy this way of playing, then it may harm everyone's fun around the table; not a heinous crime, but surely that is opposite of what we are trying to achieve?
 
I always thought Shadowrun's* combination of priority and point-buy was interesting. For those not familiar, you have 5 overall categories of character aspects: Race, Magic, Attributes, Skills, and Resources, and you categorize them from A to E, each priority giving you more points to spend (or money), or in the case of race and magic, I think to play anything besides a human, Race had to be priority A, and certain types of magic users required a certain priority assigned to Magical Ability.

It worked well, haven't seen any other games use that approach ( I guess White Wolf was close)


*1st edition and 2nd, I haven't read the newer editions so don't know if they are the same
I kind of reverse it in one. One can buys skills to qualify for certain pre-made setting customized classes, and qualification provides benefits. So you have a bunch of ingredients, but here are some recipes for dishes well suited to the genre, make them and be rewarded...don't worry if you don't want to cook we have pre-mades...with a little flexibility (you can add salt or pepper as you wish)..in the frozen isles.

Or one can make ones own unique recipe. Each class is defined by 8 parameters (Talents), and your progress along those parameters by spending experience points (to buy/raise a certain number of associated focus skills to certain levels), which allows you to qualify for character improvements (with specific improvement choices associated with each Talent and better improvements the further along you progress). The way it is done, by predicating your character improvements (HP increase, improved saves, more spell points, etc.) to a certain constellation of skills at a certain level, addresses both what I call the one trick pony (pouring all your experience points into one skill) and what I call the jack-of-every-trade where if a skill level of 3 say cost 9 pt, and skill level of 1 cost 1 pt, you get characters with a skill of 1 in each and every skill.

I add in slow automatic character improvement system on the side, a slow pre-determined, no-choice trickle of this and that just to have a bit of a staggered reward system, and to aid the contrary.

The pre-made classes are just a life path, or playbook, done for you using the free form system, with a tiny bit extra as I made them for my setting :smile:, and with 4-6 improvement options at each "level" pretty easy to customize over time It actually doesn't break if you change mid-stream, go from free-form to the pre-made or vice versa as it is all of a piece.

So I am not certain what I have, certainly a hybrid, maybe it is more a system to make a class system or to channel a free form skill system into coherent quasi-class...core skill bundles around the 8 Talents, with potentially 256 starting configurations and 8 branching choices (but not limiting to future choices) at each "level." Things are designed up to level 20 (so is that 160 branches?)....but before play stopped we had only got up to level 14-16 between the 6 PCs.

For me it provides the skill coherence, synergy and association characteristic of class systems, with both flexibility in choosing what you are good at and more importantly what aspects of character improvement are important to you.

So warrior-types would focus (but not locked into) on Combat Talent focus skills, spending their experience to buy constellations of combat skills. They would have the ability to improve HP, but no ability to increase spell points, really poor ability to improve magic saves, etc. and poor ability to increase the amount of stun damage they can withstand, or resist poison, or improve dodge, etc. those increases being the province of Athletic and Nature Talents.

Or another way to analogize it, imagine you have an 8 pointed star, at one point is pure Fighter at another at another pure Magic User (both viable options), you decide where along the F-MU axis you want to be by how you spend you experience points and which Talent you wish to take your improvements under Combat or Magic. Of course there are 8 points, and you can be along any ray of the star, it is just the sum of the length of all your rays is constrained by your total experience points.
 
It is a problem if players use their characters' classes to justify their antisocial and disruptive behaviours, at the detriment of the other players around the table.

....
I always though that was the role of the CA alignment (chaotic a**hat) :smile:

Know too well your other examples. I consider it a people problem though it certainly got enabled and baked into the culture by AD&D, I won't blame OD&D as Law, Neutral and Chaos, were more Moorcock stuff IIRC, and so loose as to be near meaningless and rarely used but for flavor in my experience. No, it was the old CN description that seemed to really allow someone to release their inner a**hat with plausible deniability.

Haven't played with an "my alignment made me do it" group in neigh on 40 years and glad of it.

As one may gather form my post above, I am not one for hard-wired behavior into classes (guess I should call my stuff templates). Any hard-wired behavior does not derive from or is required of the class. Rather it may be required of an organization to stay in their good graces and get benefits like information, political power, gear, access to magic and such (good benefits indeed), but one's abilities...no. As you might imagine, in my games there is no organization that will provide extra aid and comfort to the murder-hobo, certain their are organizations that are all for it, but they are murder-hobos themselves...do you really think they are going to give you a free non-poisonous lunch?
 
Don't play with fucking wankers solves a lot of these problems. My gaming time is too precious to spend it rolling my eyes at somebody's attention-seeking edgelord shenanigans.

To quote myself from the thread on scheduling:

I think the common theme here is: Life is short, time is precious - don't play any game you don't enjoy, and don't game with anyone you don't enjoy gaming with.
 
It is a problem if players use their characters' classes to justify their antisocial and disruptive behaviours, at the detriment of the other players around the table.

Class does not always imply a certain alignment, or an outlook on life or character goals.

The more "religious" classes like clerics, paladins, and monks may come with certain alignment limitations and obligations, but that is because those classes are also in-world "backgrounds".

Likewise, "barbarity" and "rangerhood" may imply certain outlook on life, but to interprete these as "rude, lacking social awareness, and screwing up the party's attempts at diplomacy every time" and "loner, always scouting apart from the party" respectively get old quickly.

Worse still are players who interprete class as repetitive, near-compulsive, and stereotyped behaviours, like the horny bard and the kleptomaniac rouge.

Sure, no real world persons are hurt by these actions, but unless your GM and fellow players also enjoy this way of playing, then it may harm everyone's fun around the table; not a heinous crime, but surely that is opposite of what we are trying to achieve?
If their play is spoiling the fun of others at the table, sure that's a problem. But I don't think classes are the reason, they are a justification. It's perfectly easy to create sociopaths, lechers and boorish characters in any system.

But equally unless the ethos of your game is high toned, someone being uncouth as a barbarian is perfectly fair play, and thats why the Greeks named them barbarians. Stealing as a thief - whats the issue? Non parity of resources? That they fail and that disrupts the play? Or that you don't like the idea of people stealing things. Someone being avidly promiscous - I certainly would not want to roleplay anything more than mild flirtation with them, but otherwise it's just an expression of a character. If they are being sexist or making other people uncomfortable with overly sexual description, sure thats a problem.

People often have tics to denote a characters behaviour. If a player wants to be anti social then thats the issue. Not classes.
 
It is a problem if players use their characters' classes to justify their antisocial and disruptive behaviours, at the detriment of the other players around the table.

I'm not a fan of using RPG game systems to try and fix psychological issues.

An asshole is an asshole, regardless of the game.
 
I'm not a fan of using RPG game systems to try and fix psychological issues.

An asshole is an asshole, regardless of the game.
I'm not a fan of using RPGs as therapy, either. Despite roleplay having uses as a therapeutic technique.

But the fact is, everyone is an asshole to someone. What is unacceptable to one table is regular fun to another.
 
I don't believe I suggested that they should.

It just seemed like your criticism was based upon the idea that an abusive player might abuse classes, as if that was something inherently wrong with classes, as you said:

"It [ referrring to the statement "Too often class is used by some players to justify "that's what my would do because he is a [insert class]".] is a problem if players use their characters' classes to justify their antisocial and disruptive behaviours, at the detriment of the other players around the table."

I simply don't think that is a problem with classes (or any specific system element), it's a behavioural problem with some players.
 
My original post on this thread reads:

I like them.

They let the other players in the party know what our character is good at, and what he is not so good at. There is niche protection and it plays to the tactical or game side of the game.

That said, stats and skills are only half of a character - the other half is personality, which is something the player has free rein over.

Too often class is used by some players to justify "that's what my would do because he is a [insert class]".

=

That is not a criticism of Class-based rules, but a criticism of the behaviour of some players. To put my original words another way: Class is good from the rules point of view, but rules for Classes do not control how players roleplay their characters.

As for what I was referring to as a problem, it was in response to zanshin's question of why "a barbarian just behaving rudely to people. a rogue stealing from or backstabbing a random NPC, or a bard seducing everything in sight..." was a problem to me.

Again, the criticism was not the existence of Classes, but how players played their characters.

Finally, I still don't believe I suggested RPGs to be used to fix psychological issues.
 
My original post on this thread reads:

I like them.

They let the other players in the party know what our character is good at, and what he is not so good at. There is niche protection and it plays to the tactical or game side of the game.

That said, stats and skills are only half of a character - the other half is personality, which is something the player has free rein over.

Too often class is used by some players to justify "that's what my would do because he is a [insert class]".

=

That is not a criticism of Class-based rules, but a criticism of the behaviour of some players. To put my original words another way: Class is good from the rules point of view, but rules for Classes do not control how players roleplay their characters.

As for what I was referring to as a problem, it was in response to zanshin's question of why "a barbarian just behaving rudely to people. a rogue stealing from or backstabbing a random NPC, or a bard seducing everything in sight..." was a problem to me.

Again, the criticism was not the existence of Classes, but how players played their characters.

Finally, I still don't believe I suggested RPGs to be used to fix psychological issues.
Sorry for any misinterpretation on my part. What people are comfortable with at different tables varies, and we have different trigger points. I really dislike torture of NPCs (even of evil ones) by PCs. I will present the fact of torture having happened in games as I like to go quite dark - kind of heroic fantasy horror - but always as a horrible evil to be addressed.

As regards the kind of venality you will see in Fantasy fiction, I am pretty relaxed. Tyrion in Game of Thrones being promiscuous doesn't stop me liking his character, the Artful Dodger is a thief and a great creation, and I enjoy the threats and macho displays of the Vikings in the Last Kingdom.

I get that others don't enjoy that kind of behaviour. If it isn't right for your group it isn't.

But class is just an excuse. I have heard 'but that is what my character would do' far more often than I have heard 'I am doing this because my PC is an X'.
 
If their play is spoiling the fun of others at the table, sure that's a problem. But I don't think classes are the reason, they are a justification. It's perfectly easy to create sociopaths, lechers and boorish characters in any system.

But equally unless the ethos of your game is high toned, someone being uncouth as a barbarian is perfectly fair play, and thats why the Greeks named them barbarians. Stealing as a thief - whats the issue? Non parity of resources? That they fail and that disrupts the play? Or that you don't like the idea of people stealing things. Someone being avidly promiscous - I certainly would not want to roleplay anything more than mild flirtation with them, but otherwise it's just an expression of a character. If they are being sexist or making other people uncomfortable with overly sexual description, sure thats a problem.

People often have tics to denote a characters behaviour. If a player wants to be anti social then thats the issue. Not classes.
Yeah, this last part. OTOH, I've found, empirically, that people who plan on doing something like this often find a class system because they believe you can use your class as justification.
The advice to "roleplay your class" - yes, I remember having read such - certainly doesn't help, either...:grin:

Then again, barbarians (and rogues) should be quite polite, both in REH's works and IRL (and for much the same reason that Howard mentioned). They might just have different ideas of what is polite, and in their view, it might well be the "civilised" people who fail at basic etiquette* and decency...
But of course, it might also be hard to be polite if you lack basic command of the language** the other people are speaking (and that's the definition of "barbarian"). Involuntary insults are a thing.
The same applies to rogues as well, at least with other rogues, and usually law enforcers as well - like fighters, paladins, clerics of a militant deity, and the like. If you need proof, read about prison etiquette, though I suspect you wouldn't need to.

*Not avenging insults with blood is lack of decency, after all. How can you believe such a person:tongue:? OTOH, this also means that you don't insult anyone unless you are going to fight him...

**No, "I am Groot" doesn't count unless you have someone translating for you:shade:!
 
I don't see what Skinner Boxes have to do with classes.

Skinner boxes are all about reinforcement (preferably variable and with increasing intervals).

A lot of class-and-level systems do have that, but that's more tied to progression than the classes themselves... it'd be just as easy to make a class-based system that lowered the advancement curve to avoid Skinner Boxes entirely, and you could also add a Skinner Box mechanism fairly easily to a non-class-based system.
 
It just seemed like your criticism was based upon the idea that an abusive player might abuse classes, as if that was something inherently wrong with classes, as you said:

"It [ referrring to the statement "Too often class is used by some players to justify "that's what my would do because he is a [insert class]".] is a problem if players use their characters' classes to justify their antisocial and disruptive behaviours, at the detriment of the other players around the table."

I simply don't think that is a problem with classes (or any specific system element), it's a behavioural problem with some players.
Agreed, same with my knocking on alignment.

Never really saw a problem where the class was used as a justification of behavior.

I've seen alignment done well, very...it does seem though that problems associated alignment go back far...as working through a recent curse laid upon me inadvertently by a well meaning mage and rereading my old Dragon magazines....several articles (think as early as 1979) addressing it use and misuse in addition to those around various moral issues (recall at the time this was at the height of the satanic panic in the US with respect to D&D). My personal view is alignment is actually a pretty sophisticated concept, a bit beyond the typical age range of the new to D&D player in the 1980s....I get the feeling in the articles the authors know well they are in a minefield.

And back around to class, there was an excellent article in The Dragon about playing an assassin in AD&D. #64 by Elizabeth Cerritelli with Lynda Bisson. Just excellent stuff and far from a chaotic killing machine/murder hobo, actual organizational precepts that make the assassin anything but...and just pure genre goodness aligning with all the assassin guilds have read of in fantasy literature from Game of Thrones to Thorne of Glass :smile: and even history, and just right the kind of flavor for a criminal organization.
 
I don't see what Skinner Boxes have to do with classes.

Skinner boxes are all about reinforcement (preferably variable and with increasing intervals).
....
I personally prefer a nerve induction box and Gom Jabbar;... "It kills only chaotic a**hats. Let's say I am suggesting you are human." Found that to be a most effective session zero. :smile:
 
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