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  1. #31
    Site Moderator AndrewTall's Avatar
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    Bloodline should not be directly related to realm strength - superficially this seems to be a long term equilibrium point perhaps, but it is an unstable equilibrium due to other dominating factors - a dullard will fall likely from the crown regardless of bloodline, bloodline is one advantage, but not an overwhelming one.


    In general the power of a NPC is far more related to their intelligence, skills and resources in BR than in 'standard D&D - of any kind, simply because the L1 chappie may be a cocky 14 year old but in BR they may have an 80 year old mage advisor and a plate-clad killing machine as royal champion - bloodline as a result has less effect than its adventure-level effects indicates since meeting a regent in battle should be very rare and likely anti-climatic anyway (awnshegh and elves aside).


    As such there should be a lot of minor bloodlines out there - and having one or two 'colour points' helpfully puts them above the herd in a magic-rare setting - if they have no such attribute how are they recognised as blooded? One minor power should not impact game balance to any significant degree, and will certainly do so to a far lesser extent than a 2,000 gp a month stipend and 100 bodyguards...


    Ideally the re-balancing from 2e to 3e would not change the bloodline score itself, or the number of powers, instead it would make sure that powers were equally effective across the campaign (instead of what one friend described as tumpty-tumpty-tumpty-tum-WOW! style based on random chance which was the 2e standard for balancing out stuff)


    BRCS fails to a degree in the number of powers point as Ken has noted, although possibly deliberately (was there an aim to restrict powers to bloodlines above the normal 3d6 range?) but is very good (imho) in evening out the powers - I dislike the way it 'breaks' at high bloodline score - above standard 'mortal' ranges it goes from being an edge to an epic accessory (not necessarily a bad thing, but not right for my stuff), it is however certainly less broken than the 2e stuff and so preferable to me, particularly if scion levels can be amortised.


    BRCS provides a very useful benchmark generally, I like it despite having had no part in it and happily considering amendments to it, the use of scion classes (one of the biu changes) fits into several 3e interpretations I know, although is a pain for spellcasters in particular using standard multiclass rules.


    Would I have wanted to be allowed to have an input if I'd been aware of the site when the brcs was being built? Of course. Do I think that it has left bitterness by being exclusive? Of course - some of the 4e threads are very enlightening for newbies such as myself in that fashion. I for one am very grateful to you et al for the work you put in, but equally I'm grateful to those posting on the wiki regardless of the system they use as they are also contributing to the setting.


    Would I like it if more people posted on the wiki so that more viewpoints were available rather than simply that of a small group? Of course - the 'small exclusive group' issue was - rightly or wrongly, in actuality or mere perception - what caused issues over BRCS, and continue to do so as is clear from the arguments between you and Ken. The whole point of a wiki is to avoid a 'top down linear style' of world building and make a 'infinite diversity in infinite combinations pick 'n' mix' that will offer everyone something and value every contribution. Do I think that the 'old' brcs team could add a lot - definitely, do I think that they should dominate the wiki, or current boards, when so many have left? No. To fixate on the past may be how some see BR, but to me as long as we use and contribute to the setting it is still alive and so must still grow and develop.


    Ken's characters - and others - use OGL + 2e bloodline as far as I am aware so are not too hard to understand although it would be easier if 2e was uploaded (albeit in breach of copyright), would it be handy to have a banner? Maybe, but then brcs characters could equally use a banner too, an alternative given the wide variety of ways to build NPC's and monsters would be to put a 'sources' footer to show the specifics as the options are numerous. Personally I only briefly skim the stat-block, being far more interested in the character so have little interest either way.


    I was the guy that Rich Baker described 'talking your way past the monster instead of just killing it' as 'High brow' to by the way, a somewhat soul-destroying moment that basically could be summarised to me as 'don't buy 4e Andy, you won't like it'. His comments on new proficiencies, etc were thus somewhat of a confirmation point. 4e has no interest in role-playing, only in roll-playing, they have deliberately turned the game I love into a poor quality knock-off of a computer game - building an online board on which to fight with the idea of using it at the table to keep track of various powers to reduce the book-keeping seems to somehow miss the point...
    Last edited by AndrewTall; 10-27-2008 at 10:02 PM.

  2. #32
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by irdeggman View Post
    Except for the character posting side obviously or else this sbuject would never have arisen would it>
    No. The issue with the character posting side is that all character information is 3.5, except for bloodline data which does not conform to your houserules, the BRCS, but continues to follow follow the original system, since there was never a good reason to make a change.

    Let's see of the group dedidcated to writing the BRCS at the time of the votes I was the only one left. So it is impossible for me to be voting by myself.
    I didn't claim you were personally alone, I claimed that only the people already committed to the BRCS project were involved. People who rejected the project left. I know because I hosted one of the alternative mail groups. I have seen the posts on this board that make note of the fact that some players who already had their own conversions were much less interested in the BRCS project.

    IIRC the total in the sancitioning votes were between 30-40 people. Which is as large or larger than any poll posted on this site.
    It is true that many votes had 30-40 people, although many had 20-30 people as well. The poll that ran about who would switch to 4th edition had 98 voters. The post asking whether blood abilities should be domain powers or adventure powers in a 4e conversion got 62 voters. So I quibble with the claim that the BRCS polls were as large or larger than any poll posted on this site.

    I think the real reason that more did not vote is (just like in past US elections) they don't want to be bothered with voting. Or they were people like you who stated up front that they were going to use their own house rules for the the game they were running.
    People like me who didn't vote because we preferred our own or some other conversion might count for nothing in terms of deciding what the BRCS looked like, but they count as
    "no" votes on the question of is the BRCS official. That is why, as Ryan Caveney put it, the BRCS is just another set of house rules.

    The existing 2nd ed bloodline system was a total reflection of the 2nd ed concept of letting the DM do what he wanted to with no structure as a basis.
    Which would be a fine riposte had you simply regularized the blood abilities, so that they were balanced between one another and had a predictable impact on the game. But you didn't just do that, concerned with the ECL impact of blood abilities, you restricted them mostly to already powerful bloodlines. So that a common character from the books, a minor noble with a tainted bloodline who had character reading, or detect lie became a practical impossibility. An interesting role play challenge was eliminated. Why? On the presumption that it was too powerful? That a +1, +2, or +4 bonus to Sense Motive was too little?

    Interactions with lesser nobles, knights, guild officials, or mid-level prelates might all involve characters with low bloodlines and their family's one little blood ability. But if this is a common occurrence, in the BRCS they are identical to commoners. In the BRCS, and in your reply above, the distinction is between he who has a domain and he who does not. As if these are the only people who matter. Its all Kennedy - Kruschev, never Alexey Kosygin, Andrei Gromyko, Mikhail Smirnovsky, Dean Rusk, Llewellyn Thompson, or anyone else. I think these minor players matter, not just the big boys.

    So politics determines how poerful and influential a regent is? Hmmm it seems that I mentioned that in the fact that the number of blood abilities should be irrelevent.
    It appears that I have to actually make explicit that there are many kinds of power, not one unified power score (like the General Intelligence Factor). A character can get power from their family connections, from their innate abilities, from their experience, from their possessions (gear), from their wealth, from their domain, from their friends and allies, and from their blood abilities (this list is an example and not to be taken as the sum total of all sources of power).

    Why do you have to either insist that blood abilities should be irrelevant (as they mostly are in the BRCS, at least for half of all characters) or claim that I defined power based solely on blood abilities? Is it not possible that they are a factor, worthy of consideration, without being all or nothing?

    In my earlier post (#19) I wrote:
    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck
    Birthright characters have vast fortunes compared to standard D&D characters. They may command armies, or have entire domains at their disposal. But a few minor blood abilities is a crisis worth re-inventing the setting?
    Here I intended to compare the command of armies, domains, and vast wealth against what I hoped would be understood as a much lesser source of power. That is why it strikes me as odd that given the totally open ended domain end of things, there was such a concern with balance when it came to blood abilities.

    How much of that material is OGL?
    OGL is material we can put up on the wiki. So the page Cerilian horse has OGL material from Noble Steeds, and includes a page with the Noble Steeds OGL license. Likewise an alternative magic system Elton likes on a page called Advanced d20 Magic, including the OGL license there too. Classes from OGL sources, all of it can be posted, because we don't have the space requirements of a pdf.

    For non OGL material, only the descriptions of mechanics, not the mechanics themselves are protected, so as long as we write our own descriptions, we can include anything. The taint rules from Heroes of Horror are included, albeit with all new text. Again, no space limit.

    That is all I've said but have quickly been the brunt of attacks of to paraphrase "what you helped write is total garbage" and yet there are numerous posts by players new to BR who came due to the BRCS-playtest. Can the wiki or you claim otherwise on that one?
    There have been 63,494 views of the main page of the wiki, 11,409 views of Anuire, and then we settle into a long list of pages (the usual suspects - realms in Anuire) with three to four thousand views. That's on par with the Birthright 3ed revision pdf with its 3,999 downloads. And in a much shorter period of time.

    Even if one ranks page views much lower than total downloads (and the downloads include me on three computers) I don't think anyone can just dismiss the impact of the wiki on new or current players.

  3. #33
    Site Moderator AndrewTall's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    Here I intended to compare the command of armies, domains, and vast wealth against what I hoped would be understood as a much lesser source of power. That is why it strikes me as odd that given the totally open ended domain end of things, there was such a concern with balance when it came to blood abilities.
    Ken, to me the reason is that all of these things can be lost. Bloodline by contrast, like ability scores and class skills, is something inherent to the character - it can change (investiture, vassalage, etc) but generally does so far less easily than a characters money, influence, etc. Certainly until one gets to sort of level as Avan, etc a regent's domain is unlikely to have significant surpluses for them to use in adventure level play, so the domain is less unbalancing than might be thought.

    Plus from a 'flavour' point wealth evens out - does your regent adventure with PC B (his trusted knight) and wear full plate while his impoverished knight makes do with cracking leather? The other PC's either have pretty good stuff or the regent should be subsidising them (see how he mistreats his loyal knight! What a miser! To consort with that shabby harlot and the wizard who smells of mould! What kind of noble he?

    So yes, a regent PC will have masses of extra's from their domain, but these are more flavour than reality and mostly background if BR adventures are less about 'we need cash' than 'lets make this domain action go well by taking a heroic role in it' sort of play.

    The problem reduces if all PC's are scions - or at least all regent's. Under 2e two regents with similar bloodlines could have wildly differing powers, I take your point that the best way to change would to have been simply converting the old random growth to fixed number of power accrual, with the main change being to the powers underlying the system, but see the concept of bloodline more important than the exact execution in converting the system. As a 'start from scratch' system BRCS probably beats 2e in bloodline in my view, of course that ignores your point that we aren't starting from scratch, but anyway...

  4. #34
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by irdeggman View Post
    From post #19. There is a direct (infered) tie between the number of blood powers and the strength of rulership here - the reference to characters vying with dukes.
    The problem arises, if you are converting a canon character like one of those I named. Fhylie the Sword had a minor, Anduiras 18 bloodline, but has Battlewise and Courage as blood abilities. So you rather have a choice in the conversion, if you want someone who collects 18 RP maximum, she has a 9 blood score in the BRCS and has no abilities. That's a big change for both Fhylie and for the MOC.

    If you are willing to raise her bloodline to give her Battlewise and Courage (minor), you need to bump her up to a 14 in the new system. (a 28 in the old system, based on RP collection)

    So as I said in post #19, "Are they to be made great characters vying with dukes, or humbled, forced to give up their blood abilities because of the BRCS?"

    But its not to suggest that blood powers are the definition of power, or the only meaningful power, but rather that Fhylie 9 no powers and Fhylie 14 two powers is a significant difference. Significant, not definitional.

  5. #35
    Birthright Developer irdeggman's Avatar
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    Kenneth,

    Again all I'm saying is that when posting characters on the wiki to state which source they are from - not doing so is the source of the confusion plain and simple. If you want to ignore that solution and delve into assassination of a specific system or not then you are not being part of the solution but only continuing to add to the problem.

    You seem to emphasize that since the BRCS is so bad we should never be using it and because you choose to think of it as bad you consider it house-rules.

    We (at the time the Official fan site for Birthright, subseqently all such authority and recogition ahs been stripped - thank Electonic Initiative of WotC) were giving the authority and basically encouragement to develop a 3.0 (then 3.5) update of the setting that would be considered "official".

    I am sorry if you didn't read all of those posts from WotC that Arjan put up a long time ago pertaining to that, but it is a fact.

    It is also a fact that if someone doesn't vote then that does not mean "no" or "yes" it basically an abstain (which counts in neither side) - so insisting that because you chose not to participate your non-existant vote should be counted as a "no" is plain illogical in any sense of legal measure.
    Duane Eggert

  6. #36
    Birthright Developer irdeggman's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    The problem arises, if you are converting a canon character like one of those I named. Fhylie the Sword had a minor, Anduiras 18 bloodline, but has Battlewise and Courage as blood abilities. So you rather have a choice in the conversion, if you want someone who collects 18 RP maximum, she has a 9 blood score in the BRCS and has no abilities. That's a big change for both Fhylie and for the MOC.
    If you are willing to raise her bloodline to give her Battlewise and Courage (minor), you need to bump her up to a 14 in the new system. (a 28 in the old system, based on RP collection) [/quote]

    Will you please use the correct version of chapter two for making any arguments - you know the one that was voted on. You do have a tendency to go to the playtest version and ignore any of the sanctioned parts (chap 1 and 2).

    A regent's bloodline score determines the maximum number of regency points a character can absorb from their domain per season. This number is equal to the regent's bloodline score.



    So as I said in post #19, "Are they to be made great characters vying with dukes, or humbled, forced to give up their blood abilities because of the BRCS?"

    But its not to suggest that blood powers are the definition of power, or the only meaningful power, but rather that Fhylie 9 no powers and Fhylie 14 two powers is a significant difference. Significant, not definitional.

    And so PCs will not have the same number of abilities as do the NPCs on any "logical" basis. Since it is extremely unlikely that a PC with a 18 blood score would get the 10% shot of having the first blood ability (up to 10 score) but they would have a roughly 85% chance to have one.

    As I have said repeatedly 3.5 is all about balancing NPCs and PCs and building all characters using the same baseline.

    Using NPCs "chosen" as they were in the original material clearly goes against that main design basis.

    Also in 3.5 (other than ability score generation) nothing in the character design system is random. The characters are all free to make choices as to what they want to become and how they want to be it. That is another main design basis.

    The BRCS tried to use these when being developed.
    Duane Eggert

  7. #37
    Senior Member Elton Robb's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by irdeggman View Post
    Also in 3.5 (other than ability score generation) nothing in the character design system is random. The characters are all free to make choices as to what they want to become and how they want to be it. That is another main design basis.
    I wish this particular point on 3.x were true. Most characters are genengineered by their players right up to level 20. There is no true organic growth on the part of a character. A 3.x characters life is completely planned out for him.
    Regent of Medoere

  8. #38
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    I have no objection to identifying whether a character is BRCS, 3.5, or 2e.

    My objection was (and is) to being told that I had a choice between BRCS and 2e, that combining 3.5 and non-BRCS bloodline was a problem. Labeling it doesn't bother me, prohibition bothers me.

    I know the story of Wizards acknowledging fan made material at the official site to be official. That means Wizards acknowledge it as official and wouldn't sponsor competing efforts. It has nothing to do with people looking for good gaming rules. My comments were directed at how the official status doesn't effect me, pointing out Wizard's acknowledgment doesn't change that.

    Regarding voting. The mere procedure of a vote means nothing. This is why legitimate bodies often establish a quorum based on the total number of members, so that the mere fact of a plurality isn't misinterpreted as some kind of majority. Sometimes, as at the Second Party Congress of the Russian Social Democrats (ie Communists) one side walks out, as Julius Martov's supporters did, leaving Lenin's faction to vote to organize the party as a group of professional revolutionaries, rather than a group composed of like minded individuals throughout the population. Lenin's group then claimed to be the majority faction and adopted the name Bolshevik (from bol'shinstvo "majority"). At other times, such as the Rump Parliament, political rivals were purged from a body so that the remainder of the assembly can now get majority votes.

    The reason that I and others have used the term rump to describe those who participated in the BRCS project is to highlight that it had only the approval of those participating and had no claims to represent the whole community. Attempts to parlay official status as being Wizard's promise not to sponsor a competing version into some kind of obligation to acknowledge this particular document likewise are rejected.

    People who walk out on the whole project are effectively voting no to the whole project. That fact that some people will continue with the project doesn't mean that it reflects the participation of the whole community.

  9. #39
    Senior Member Elton Robb's Avatar
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    I don't like the BRCS. I left development over the PRCs linked to a Great bloodline. Aeric is my favorite NPC in the BR canon. *The Magian is my favorite Awnie since I can play him as a good guy. *Aeric, I can play differently. Making him [Aeric] conform to the BRCS makes me think that I'd unman him.

    Both Aeric and Darien would be Impotent under the BRCS. That would be a tragedy to the setting as a whole.
    Regent of Medoere

  10. #40
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by irdeggman View Post
    Will you please use the correct version of chapter two for making any arguments - you know the one that was voted on. You do have a tendency to go to the playtest version and ignore any of the sanctioned parts (chap 1 and 2).
    And you say the wiki is confusing!

    I guess now I should point out that the 3999 downloads is for this pesky playtest document and that the chapter downloads got several hundred downloads, and order of magnitude smaller.

    And so PCs will not have the same number of abilities as do the NPCs on any "logical" basis.
    PC's are meaningless to me. I don't make PC's, I only make NPC's. Its the rules for NPC's that matter to me. At stake for me is a lot of canon characters, including Arlando el-Adaba, Fhylie, and others. Changing them is a very big step and needs a very good reason. The bigger the change the bigger the necessary justification. This bloodline change is a very big change for a very large number of characters.

    The fact that a PC could get Fhylie's result only once in 200 tries is of little significance. Even if they broke the rules and gave her two major blood abilities, I would not favor overturning the whole bloodline system because of it

    As I have said repeatedly 3.5 is all about balancing NPCs and PCs and building all characters using the same baseline.
    I certainly think that's true of the BRCS, in fact its my primary objection to the BRCS. I think 3.5 does a bit more.

    I have always taken the position that I don't need to abandon D&D to abandon the hack 'n slash mentality. Cool new game systems with narrative and a great emphasis on story and setting can all be done with D&D. A game about blooded houses and noble families doesn't require John Wick's new game.

    But, I think the biggest problem with taking my position is that because D&D doesn't explicitly reject the gamist perspective, in which the game revolves around issues of balance, I am stuck in a perpetual conversation against gamist dominance. The kind of gamist dominance that was too influential in BRCS and now dominates 4e.

    I think 3.5 was really a simulationist approach, not really about balance. The system remains too brittle. Too much of an encounter is deadly, too little is a cakewalk. Later variant rules addressed this problem and made characters more robust without making them more powerful. What CR obsession exists in 3.5 is there to patch a weakness, its a not a strength in the system or a selling point to be leveraged.

    It makes me appreciate why some people would just switch to Ars Magica or Houses of the Blooded and effectively go somewhere where the ECL obsessed don't follow them. In a setting so political as BR, carefully balancing encounters should be something of an afterthought. PC regents should be making decisions based on the facts of the powers they confront, not on the basis that an encounter will be matched to their own power level. Its nice to have a system that allows you to estimate power levels so you can assign experience, but I don't want to make those concerns central.

    Using NPCs "chosen" as they were in the original material clearly goes against that main design basis.
    NPC regents shouldn't be typical, they should be paragons. As Elton says above, characters like Darien Avan And Aeric Boeruine are so fundamental to the feel of the setting. This applies to a lot of the named characters we have blood abilities stated out for in the original materials. They aren't representative averages.

    Also in 3.5 (other than ability score generation) nothing in the character design system is random. The characters are all free to make choices as to what they want to become and how they want to be it. That is another main design basis.

    The BRCS tried to use these when being developed.
    Even ability score generation should not be random. Standard Array all the way! In a prefect world blood score and abilities are determined by knowing who your parents and ancestors are. You know, your birthright. It already determines what domain you'll succeed to.

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