🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Dec11.233642@IASTATE.EDU>, cffitzge@IASTATE.EDU (Charles F Fitzgerald) writes:
>
>I do not believe, however, that this problem is insurmountable, in
>fact, I believe the mechanism for combatting the problem has already
>been discussed by the group, _ie._ the ability tree.  In my view of
>this mechanic, the final form of net.rpg will come with a well
>fleshed-out ability tree of the general form
>                        A1
>                    /       \
>        B1                              B2
>   /    |     \                     /   |    \
>C1      C2      C3              D1      D2       D3
>etc.    etc.    etc.            etc.    etc.    etc.
>
>This tree would include _all_ possible abilities usable in the role
>playing game.  (Note:  by this I mean all the abilities usable in
>net.rpg, not necessarily all the abilities usable in _any_ rpg.)
>
  Well, it's nice to see that there are people who agree with me on this 
aspect of system design.

>I also think that there is generally a tendency among game designers
>to add, and sometimes necessitate the use of, symmetry in role playing
>design.  This means that if B1 has three subcategories, B2 must have
>three subcategories.  I would like to state again that this practice
>is probably unneccessary and may be unrealistic and needlessly
>cumbersome.  I think that if a few stats are used (say, between four
>and seven) symmetry is nice and can be handled easily.  If one uses
>more abilities, generally in an attempt to increase realism, pedantic
>use of symmetry tends to erode the realism and does not serve any
>worthwhile purpose.
>
  I must agree with the other poster on this topic that symmetry is not 
an entirely pointless effort. In any point allocation system that
aspires to some form of game balance, you need to try to make the
various stats balanced in usefulness, unless you are willing to
make differnt scales for different stats.  
  Maybe a certian amount of variation could be allowed (3 or 4? 2 or 3?)
but we should try to have symmetry.  
                                         
[ability tree deleted]

>Note that this system is not very symmetric.  Some Level three
>abilities have three substats, others have none.  (I am not too happy
>having no substats to a Level three ability, but I could not come up
>with two things to go under Luck and Willpower, and it made no sense
>to have only one substat.  It is possible that these should actually
>be moved under some other stat because of this lack, but I am not sure
>at this time.)
>
>What do you all think? 

This is fairly well done, but i think that the binary system that was proposed
is better. It makes calculation of point values very easy (who can't divide by
two?)  Still, this is a big step in the right direction, in my opinion.

Any more ideas?
>
>-- 
Tony Pace
apace@mta.ca