Points vs. Vocations

With this quarter's theme being the new system I thought I would cover the major changes we can expect to see for the lighter side of fighting and the darker side of humanity. So, sit back thief wannabees and I will try to catch all of the major highlights. Point vs. Vocation

Unlike other people, thieves have the major change with moving from a free point-based system to a vocation-style system. Point-based systems really give a great deal of freedom to those like thieves of all stripes that are more skill-based rather than combat or magic. Sure, this includes many people that are not thieves directly, but it just seems that thieves gain a great deal of benefits.

In a point-based system like HERO it was easy for a thief to have nearly twice the number of skills as most warriors and still be competitive with them in combat. Sure, most thieves were kicking out major damage but at least we could still hit and do enough to penetrate the foe's armor. Now that Miranda has moved to C&S, we will have to live under a more strict set of rules.

The Good

The good is that no longer will warriors be able to so easily step on our toes. Under HERO just about anyone with fighting potential took enough stealth to move around. What used to be a staple of thieves was turned into a commidity. Now that these skills are knocked to the more expensive back-burner for other vocations, thieves rule the alleys. Figure that if it costs 500 exp per level for thieves it will be costing 800 exp per level for the others. With the gain from the lower DF and the cost we can easily be looking at a 25-35% difference in skill between a true thief an a warrior thief-wannabee.

I know from many conversations with my players that their number one concern (after my many seemingly weekly changes) was that everyone had something they did well that the others didn't. Nobody likes to find themselves constantly on the outside while one uberhuman character is constantly at the fore. In the supers world this is like the difference between the martial artists and the brick — in fantasy it is the thieves against the warriors, or the casters against everyone else. A good vocation system brings this singular usefulness to everyone while leaving nobody so far behind that they cannot catch up.

The Bad

The bad is that we no longer have access to as many skills as we would desire for a very well-rounded thief. Instead, there are 4 sub-categories of thieves that demand our attention. There is the con-artist type, the assassin, the burglar, and the cut-purse. Each has their strengths and they overlap in several areas — but there is no all-around thief that we can latch unto to satisify all of our needs. Instead, each can be in a party and be assured that they have a speciality that the others cannot touch.

Normally I would say this is good, but from the perspective of moving from an open flat-cost system to a variable cost and restricted purchases system I would count this as a bad. I know that many players that have run the sneaky types enjoyed the fact that their skill list was often three times the size of the other characters. This gave them increased flexibility at the expense of being beyond human in a few select categories.

The Ugly

I guess the only ugly is the difficulty in the skill system. With mins and maxes tied into a base+3/rank system of rolling combat APs it can become a nightmare to run properly. Well some of that will smooth out as I learn the system, since it is not nearly as difficult as HARN. The rest is up to each player to understand their character and the way their skills really function. Until I become very proficient with the system, I will probably need a great deal of help remembering the hundreds of skills and spells.