(no subject)

[technoir]

I had an interesting game design question.

Is earned advancement really needed?

Whats to say we have to have experience points in a game?

I was wondering if would hurt a system is if all the character advancement was based on how long the characters played or age. It seems to me that concept of an earned advancement through points is not inherently even. And if you are doing it in such a manner to keep everyone even then there is not point in having an earned point advancement.

Just a thought. I would be interested to see what other people thought.

Comments

[hapersmion.livejournal.com]

Heh, at some point on the way home from the event, I was thinking, "What if everyone at a LARP got starting character points based on how old they were?" So, I would get a certain amount, hoshiadam would get a little bit more... and technoir would get ALL of them. *eg* And then everyone would get the same build as time went by. It would make it really difficult to attract new 18-year-olds, though. :)

But for a more workable idea, I was pondering a game where you can buy one skill or skill level after each event. Doesn't matter if it's Dagger, Dodge, or Lore level 5. It would be nice to be guaranteed to improve the character each event, instead of sitting still while you saved up for the big expensive stuff, but mana would probably require some tweaking. Perhaps it would come in mana sets.

Anyway, none of that really applies to tabletop so well, but I found it amusing that I was just thinking about this.