Changing Morality rules a little?

[Space Monkey 124]

Just thought I'd run this by you all to see if I'm missing something you may pick up on.

I'm not too keen on the "Roll 1d10 and minus Conflict points" as I find it too swingy. I was thinking of some kind of check using the game dice, and deducting Conflict from that instead. I'm just wondering what check to use.

I don't want to go with a Discipline roll as it could end up being the Jedi uber-skill (also being used for some Force activation checks, and resisting Force powers). I was thinking of either a Cool (Presence) check, or maybe even a flat Stat check such as Willpower or Presence. What do you think?

Another option could be rolling 1d6 instead of 1d10. Any ideas?

[emsquared 779]

Unclear as to what exactly the problem is.

When you say it's too swingy, it makes it sound like you have PCs going up one session and down the next, and vice versa, and so on and so forth... Which is an ideal result in my opinion (i.e. reflects what one would expect to see in untrained Force Sensitives).

Making it a Skill check is gonna make it even more gameable than it already is - which is less desirable IMO.

And making it a d6 is gonna make them more likely to tend toward Darkside. So if you want to make that (adhering to the Light) more of a struggle, then making it a d6 is fine. It's gonna be just as swingy from a statistics perspective tho because it's still a uniform distribution (1 die).

Are you sure your problem can't be solved by just using the Morality/Conflict system more effectively (changing how much and when you give out Conflict) towards your goals?

[DaverWattra 535]

I favor making it a smaller die and granting them extra morality bonuses for light side actions. Make them have to actively do good things to become paragons.

[Space Monkey 124]

3 hours ago, emsquared said:

Unclear as to what exactly the problem is.

When you say it's too swingy, it makes it sound like you have PCs going up one session and down the next, and vice versa, and so on and so forth... Which is an ideal result in my opinion (i.e. reflects what one would expect to see in untrained Force Sensitives).

Making it a Skill check is gonna make it even more gameable than it already is - which is less desirable IMO.

And making it a d6 is gonna make them more likely to tend toward Darkside. So if you want to make that (adhering to the Light) more of a struggle, then making it a d6 is fine. It's gonna be just as swingy from a statistics perspective tho because it's still a uniform distribution (1 die).

Are you sure your problem can't be solved by just using the Morality/Conflict system more effectively (changing how much and when you give out Conflict) towards your goals?

We've played 2 games so far and they've done nothing to earn conflict yet (we played the adventure in the core so they now have their hilts, and next we'll be playing the one in the GM screen so they can get crystals). One of them rolled high on both sessions and if he rolls well next session will sit firmly on or very close to Paragon, yet he's done nothing in my mind to earn it. He hasn't done good, he's just not done bad. This feels wrong to me.

38 minutes ago, DaverWattra said:

I favor making it a smaller die and granting them extra morality bonuses for light side actions. Make them have to actively do good things to become paragons.

Exactly! Just acting "average" shouldn't let you become a Paragon, whether it takes 3 sessions of high rolls or 21 sessions of rolling 1's. You're deeds should make you a Paragon. Doing good things, selfless things, making sacrifices for others, etc. Just raiding a ship to find a holocron, fighting a droid and a few storm troopers, and poking around in a cave...   so what? Maybe I'm missing the point but if others are happy with this then good for them, but it doesn't sit right with me. Luke saved billions of lives when he destroyed the Deathstar and helped remove Palps from power and I wouldn't consider him a Lightside Paragon, just a Jedi hero.

With the system as is, I could get on with my life as a moisture farmer, never do anything remotely nasty, always be polite to people and stay out of trouble, and I'd be a Light Side Paragon by the end of the week. Weird.

[Tramp Graphics 2,328]

Just now, Space Monkey said:

We've played 2 games so far and they've done nothing to earn conflict yet (we played the adventure in the core so they now have their hilts, and next we'll be playing the one in the GM screen so they can get crystals). One of them rolled high on both sessions and if he rolls well next session will sit firmly on or very close to Paragon, yet he's done nothing in my mind to earn it. He hasn't done good, he's just not done bad. This feels wrong to me.

Exactly! Just acting "average" shouldn't let you become a Paragon, whether it takes 3 sessions of high rolls or 21 sessions of rolling 1's. You're deeds should make you a Paragon. Doing good things, selfless things, making sacrifices for others, etc. Just raiding a ship to find a holocron, fighting a droid and a few storm troopers, and poking around in a cave...   so what? Maybe I'm missing the point but if others are happy with this then good for them, but it doesn't sit right with me. Luke saved billions of lives when he destroyed the Deathstar and helped remove Palps from power and I wouldn't consider him a Lightside Paragon, just a Jedi hero.

With the system as is, I could get on with my life as a moisture farmer, never do anything remotely nasty, always be polite to people and stay out of trouble, and I'd be a Light Side Paragon by the end of the week. Weird.

The very fact that he hasn't done any wrong is why it is perfectly fine for him  to be near Paragon level. If he's not doing evil, he is doing good. You don't need to be going out of your way to be an "uber boy scout" to be a Light Side Paragon.

[Daeglan 5,950]

The Bigger problem is that you are not giving him HARD choices.  Do you stop the murder or save the slave? You can only do one. Which do you do? 

[Space Monkey 124]

23 minutes ago, Tramp Graphics said:

The very fact that he hasn't done any wrong is why it is perfectly fine for him  to be near Paragon level. If he's not doing evil, he is doing good. You don't need to be going out of your way to be an "uber boy scout" to be a Light Side Paragon.

Not strictly true though, is it? If I spend the day going to the supermarket and later grabbing a coffee, I'm not doing evil so I must be doing good? No offence TG, but that isn't right. If I spend my day rescuing a child from a burning building and helping an old woman across the street then fine, but groceries?

[Space Monkey 124]

4 minutes ago, Daeglan said:

The Bigger problem is that you are not giving him HARD choices.  Do you stop the murder or save the slave? You can only do one. Which do you do? 

The adventure didn't give us many opportunities to make hard choices. He saved the guy in the university from the thugs through negotiation, and that's about it. 

Edited March 9, 2017 by Space Monkey

[Daeglan 5,950]

Per the Devs if there are no conflict worthy choices then no roll is made. You can't sleep your way to paragon. 

[Daeglan 5,950]

1 minute ago, Space Monkey said:

he adventure didn't give us many opportunities to make hard choices. He saved the guy in the university from the thugs through negotiation, and that's about it. 

And there is your problem. 

[GroggyGolem 2,848]

1 minute ago, Space Monkey said:

Not strictly true though, is it? If I spend the day going to the supermarket and later grabbing a coffee, I'm not doing evil so I must be doing good? No offence TG, but that isn't right. If I spend my day rescuing a child from a burning building and helping an old woman across the street then fine, but groceries?

You had the chance to steal the groceries and coffee. You didn't. The chance was there, the choice was made.

I do agree that the GM should be presenting tough situations as well, since that's what the system is designed for.

[Space Monkey 124]

Ok, so I present a tough situation and they get 5 Conflict, then he rolls a 9 and GAINS 4 morality...  The system may work for many of you but I can't understand how no one see's this as a problem.

[Daeglan 5,950]

The reason this is in the system is it prevents gaming the system which was so common in previous Star Wars games. You could earn 2 conflict and roll a 1 and still go down. You can't predict what you are going to roll so your choices will always matter if your goal is to become a paragon. The bigger problem is far too often players are not given hard choices. 

[Space Monkey 124]

Now THAT was helpful, thank you Daeglan. It's good to understand why the rules are the way they are. It's not enough for someone to just say "it's meant to be swingy, get on with it", I'd like to know why.

Also, I wasn't aware that you don't roll if nothing much happened, so that will go a long way to resolving the issue too. I'll stick with it for now and reduce his Morality by his last roll as he didn't really earn it.

Thanks again.

[emsquared 779]

5 minutes ago, Space Monkey said:

Ok, so I present a tough situation and they get 5 Conflict, then he rolls a 9 and GAINS 4 morality...  The system may work for many of you but I can't understand how no one see's this as a problem.

People gaining Morality for "doing nothing" is a very common complaint. Lots of people see this as a problem.

What I think many, if not most, ppl do is just don't go quite "by the books" as much.

Give Conflict when your PCs rp fear and anger, give Conflict any time they use he Force to do damage or in a way that would cause fear - regardless of whether or not the target is trying to kill them. Give them more Conflict when they are dealing with issues related to their Moral Strength/Weakness.

The only problem with the Morality system is that the Vanilla instructions on when to award Conflict were too permissive, if you want to evoke the feel of the lore/media that we know a Jedi to be.

[DaverWattra 535]

The current system can be pretty easy to game too. Just make sure to use one single dark side pip per session, no more no less, and your morality can only go up and up.

[AnomalousAuthor 506]

53 minutes ago, DaverWattra said:

The current system can be pretty easy to game too. Just make sure to use one single dark side pip per session, no more no less, and your morality can only go up and up.

If you have players that are meta gaming like that then don't allow a roll unless they've done something 'good' to earn it. Still give them their one conflict for the force pip, but don't allow a morality roll. If they want to play a light side paragon, that's great, but make them earn it through their gameplay, not through a loophole.

Although, a competent GM would be able to prevent this from becoming an issue through the scenarios and interactions they present to the characters.

Edited March 9, 2017 by ghatt

[Jedi Ronin 1,588]

1 hour ago, Space Monkey said:

With the system as is, I could get on with my life as a moisture farmer, never do anything remotely nasty, always be polite to people and stay out of trouble, and I'd be a Light Side Paragon by the end of the week. Weird.

The general and GM sections of the F&D core encourage the GM (and players) to actually push meaningful, interesting, and even tough choices and situations on the PCs.  The PCs should be morally conflicted in the game or have an option of taking the quick and easy (Conflict laden) path to solve a problem.  The PC should also expect to confront situations playing in to their Moral Strenghts/Weaknesses.  In other words, the game is not the story of being stuck on a moisture farm and staying out of trouble but rather getting out there and doing things and making decisions.  Also, the force powers mechanics themselves tempt the player (especially early on) to gain Conflict in order to do things with the Force.

[Tramp Graphics 2,328]

1 hour ago, Space Monkey said:

Not strictly true though, is it? If I spend the day going to the supermarket and later grabbing a coffee, I'm not doing evil so I must be doing good? No offence TG, but that isn't right. If I spend my day rescuing a child from a burning building and helping an old woman across the street then fine, but groceries?

 

1 hour ago, Daeglan said:

Per the Devs if there are no conflict worthy choices then no roll is made. You can't sleep your way to paragon. 

 

1 hour ago, Space Monkey said:

Ok, so I present a tough situation and they get 5 Conflict, then he rolls a 9 and GAINS 4 morality...  The system may work for many of you but I can't understand how no one see's this as a problem.

The thing is that the character must have the opportunity to make a choice and if he chooses not to do evil, this is a good thing. IF a character doesn't participate at all, then he doesn't roll for morality at the end of the adventure. However, if he is an active participant in the adventure, and manages to avoid Conflict, then he deserves his Morality going up. And yes, this includes managing to avoid combat by negotiating an peaceful outcome to an encounter. So, if he avoided gaining Conflict through Negotiation, that's a good thing. He did very well and should be rewarded. 

Edited March 9, 2017 by Tramp Graphics

[Aetrion 441]

I don't like the current system much because people always inevitably end up at 100 or 0 with it, there is no spectrum of morality, how good or evil you are only affects how long it takes for you to top or bottom out.

[Daeglan 5,950]

39 minutes ago, Aetrion said:

I don't like the current system much because people always inevitably end up at 100 or 0 with it, there is no spectrum of morality, how good or evil you are only affects how long it takes for you to top or bottom out.

That kind of mirrors real life. Unless you make a conscious change in your behavior you do tend to end up one way or the other eventually. 

[Aetrion 441]

26 minutes ago, Daeglan said:

That kind of mirrors real life. Unless you make a conscious change in your behavior you do tend to end up one way or the other eventually. 

I completely disagree with you there. Morality isn't a slippery slope where if you insult someone and don't feel sorry you're on a highway to genocide. That's simply nonsense. In fact, all the worst things humans have ever done were done by people who thought they had moral authority to do it, and viewed their victims as the evil ones. 

[Daeglan 5,950]

And way to take what I said and misunderstand and ignore the part where someone makes a conscious change. Which the majority of people do. 

[Tramp Graphics 2,328]

1 minute ago, Aetrion said:

I completely disagree with you there. Morality isn't a slippery slope where if you insult someone and don't feel sorry you're on a highway to genocide. That's simply nonsense. In fact, all the worst things humans have ever done were done by people who thought they had moral authority to do it, and viewed their victims as the evil ones. 

I think you missed his point. It's a matter of a person's overall pattern of behavior. IF a person naturally does good, and only occasionally "screws up" and does something bad only once in a whiile, then naturally, they'll eventually tend towards the "saint" or Light Side paragon. whereas, someone who is always a trouble-maker, always mean to others, and only occasionally does something nice only to people he likes, the  he will tend to become worse as time goes by, not better. They don't stagnate somewhere in the middle. 

[Aetrion 441]

I simply don't agree. There is a spectrum of morality that people fall into depending on how they live their life.  Most people will stand up to injustice when it happens right in front of their eyes and it poses no danger to them to speak out against it. Much fewer people will stand up to it even if it costs them the respect of their peers, and even fewer people will stand up to it when it presents a real danger to their body or livelihood to do so. Even fewer people than that actually go out to look for injustices in the world, and leave forego living a peaceful life themselves to fight against them. None of the people in this example are evil, but that doesn't mean they are all equally good either. Being a saint requires sacrifice. Most saints are martyrs.