Paradigm Concepts

[Mongolia Jones]

Browsing the bestiary and in particular, the Creating your own Foe section I couldn't help but notice some irregularities between Foes and PCs of equal tiers. Examining the charts and tables it seems that foes enjoy some significant mathematical advantages over the PCs.

1. Foe defenses are all front loaded. [Table 2-1] Example: A tier 1.0 foe gets all his/her bonuses (+3's or+4's) upfront at 1.0. On the other hand, a 1.0 PC has just started with his upgrades. It wont be until 1.8 or later that the PC defenses are on par with the 1.0 Foe. Same goes for all the higher tiers 2.0 through 5.0.

2. Foe defenses are far superior to PC defenses over the long term. With +3/tier and +4/tier, there is no way a PC can ever keep up with that rate of advancement. Assuming 6 of 10 of the PC's advancement slots are taken for skills/talents to keep up with the Foes' skill/talent gains, that leaves 4 advancement slots for stats and defenses (see calculations below).

Comparing total defense adjustments through tier 5: Foe vs PC [Table 2-1]
-Foe defenses @tier 5 = +51 added defense points total
-PCs defenses @tier 5 = +41 (+/-2) added defense points total

That's an average of 3 points higher per defense Foe over the PC which is HUGE. Not to mention the front loading issue where a tier 5.0 Foe will have a 6 point per defense advantage over his 5.0 PC counterpart!

Adding the variations (brute, etc.) it even gets worse for the PC.

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Looking over the monsters in the bestiary it is the case that 90% of the tier 1.0 creatures have defenses higher than any of the 1.0 PCs I generated. My starting PCs (heroic) typically had defenses in the 16-17 range where as most of the 1.0 Foe defenses are in the 16-21 range.

PC defenses (at least the ones of the heroic or better variety) should be, at the minimum, around the middle to upper defense ranges of foes they typically meet.

I am under the assumption that most foes/monsters are not of the heroic type themselves. Hence the reason for "exceptional specimen" template (as well as others) to boost monsters into the heroic or better territory.

[PCIHenry]

Hello,

While I'm not going to confirm not deny you mathematical analysis (As everyone knows, I'm the story guy) I can say that point by point parity between Heroes and Monsters was not something we wanted.

First, Heroes and Monsters are created in a completely different manner. We purposely designed making a monster fast and easy given that their life expectancy was a bout 20 minutes. Why spend so much time in building something that is going to be a speed bump at best.

Secondly, there are usually 6 Heroes to One Big Bad. Obviously, said Big Bad needs to be beefed up to give the Heroes a ruin for their money.

Lastly, (and this is my personal opinion and mantra to rpg-ing), the games about the story, not the stats.

If an adversary needs to be tougher, have more stamina, or quite frankly anything else I decide is required to give my players a good time, then that's what goes into the creature.

I understand that there are other systems which take meticulous glee in creating monsters through the use of equations that would make Einstein smile - but this is simply not the type of game that I or my fellow designers enjoy.

Best,
_________________
Henry Lopez
President
Paradigm Concepts, Inc.

[Mongolia Jones]

Henry,

Thanks for the quick response.

I understand that monsters and PCs are built differently and I'm not saying that that should be changed. Only that the formulas that are now used need to be tweaked a bit, while keeping everything else the same.

You mentioned 6 heroes to One Big Bad... well I was comparing heroes to their equals (i.e. 6 heroes to 6 commoners of equal tier). Those 6 commoners, as you climb tiers, get increasingly higher defense score deltas over PCs of equal tiers.

It is true that the best games are about the story, but you can't remove the stats out of the story. A number of bad (or good) rolls can change a story. Rolling dice are modified by stats. Hence stats affect a story.

If a thug's/monster's/creature's of the common type (not heroic) chance of hitting a (heroic?) PC of same tier is 50% and the PC only connects 25% of the time then how does that feed into the story. I know it would make me "feel" un-heroic regardless of how good the story is.

Lastly, I don't want an Einstein level equation rpg type game. The "simple" equations in the Bestiary are preferable to me.

Someone sat down and came up with a formula in your Bestiary, and it is in the realm of possibility that those equations can be off by just a little bit, yes?

Again, I am not attacking the system, I love it, I ordered all the PDFs as well as the hard copies. But if improvements/refinements can be made, then they should, shouldn't it?

[PCIHenry]

Hello again,

I suppose we'll have to agree to disagree.

Frankly, I never look at the 'I hit 25% of the time or I have a X% chance to do Y. '. All these variables are at the command of the Chronicler. As a person who has run for decades and fiddled with the TNs of things (both up and down) I see that as being critical to telling a good story. As a Chronicler, I know my table. I know their strengths and weaknesses. So if an adventure were to say that the TN of X is Y and I know that there's no way they can do that and keep the story moving then it gets moved down (or inversely it would be ridiculously easy so I either don't have them roll at all or bump up the TN).

That, IMO, is how to craft a story that engages my players and keeps them on the edge of their seat. All these numbers and such are merely guidelines, IMO. I change them as needed.

To let a fun night rise or fall on some arcane equation just doesn't seem fun to me.

Now, I understand that there are people who love to crunch numbers and try to get that equation just right and to them I say God Bless. That's what Pete and Eric enjoy doing. I'm sure they may chime in on this thread.

I was responding to the over all nature of the design philosophy that we set as a foundation for the game.

Please understand that I'm not attacking your position. You apparently enjoy crunching numbers and there's nothing wrong with that. It just isn't my philosophy when I game.

Best,
_________________
Henry Lopez
President
Paradigm Concepts, Inc.

[Mongolia Jones]

Long story short.

Typical PCs gain about +2.5/tier per defense.
Foes from the bestiary gain +3/tier & +4/tier per defense [table2-1].

Tier 1.0 -> okay for PC's but could be better
Tier 3.0 -> not looking so good for PC's
Tier 5.0 -> time to retire your PC cuz da competition is too fierce

Simply change the per defense gains and do something about the front loading and problem solved.

[PCIHenry]

OK - thank you. I'm sure Peter or Eric will consider your proposal and give it due consideration.
_________________
Henry Lopez
President
Paradigm Concepts, Inc.

[Deviknyte]

Off topic. 666 post for Henry.

On Topic. I've thought about the future of my character's sheet as well. Wondering if I'll be able to survive a T5 BI. And if I should sacrifice a talent each tier to raise my avoidance.

I'm not sure where you got such high defense numbers from but the average PC is going to end up with a 29 in each defense if they don't use the +1 to defense option (which most players won't). If you do use the +1 def option and spread it out you'd end up with 32's in each def.

Base +12
Attribute A +3.5
Attribute B +3.5
+2 All Def Each Tier +10

The average PC will end up with 29 ranks in a combat skill before modifiers.

Creation +3 (+1 for a certain races)
Ranking Up +15
Paths +2 (low balling)
d12 Prowess +6 (average)
Talent +1

And I'm not saying that Big Bads aren't going to have an edge either. In a boss fight the should be hitting more often and me hitting less.

Now I don't own the bestiary yet, so I'm not sure about your math reaching the 50's. But if you're right, I won't be hitting it NPC's with my average roll of 38, but I auto land on another PC.

To be honest I was just taking faith that Pedro knows math and things would work out. The system has proven itself to be very balanced so far, so I assumed Tier 5 would be no different.
_________________
-Devin Redd, Detroit Harvester
"The Elorii shall rise again!"
Current- Vaerdos kyr'Taliis, Ardakene Elorii Chanter of the Rebirth and the Bright People
Retired- Elysian, Ardakene Elorii Hierophant of Belisarda

[Auroris]

Dun dun duh!

But for the OP, I think you might be making a mountain out of a molehill. Yes, if you just look at defenses monsters seem to outclass PCs but keep in mind that PCs have a lot more options than monsters. Most PCs are going to have a much wider array of talents, spells, weapon tricks, and martial techniques than the monsters. Also, most encounters are structured to have one or two monsters that roughly equal or even exceed the PCs and a bunch of little guys as roadblocks. Its very rare that 6 PCs will go up against 6 top-tier adversaries.
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Kailandos, Elorii Chanter of the Rebirth and the Bright People
Prince Arcahvir of the Tir Betoq
Harvester for Iowa
James Vacca

[Milandir]

Foe defenses advance relative to the progression of the heroes' attack bonuses, not the heroes' defenses. The inverse is also true.

Heroes, without any equipment, talent, or other non-skill benefits, will typically increase their primary attack bonus by +3 (or more) per tier. Common foes increase defenses by +1 per tier through tier 3, and +4 in tiers 4&5 - Heroes come "front-loaded" with a full tier worth of hit bonuses and thus have 6 tiers worth of skill bonuses.
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Eric Wiener
Paradigm Concepts, Inc.

[Archangel]

I'm one of those math guys as Henry put it. I love to crunch the numbers and compare things to see what is the optimal progressions and such. The trick is that the only time you need to absolutely worry about the numbers is when the person running the game doesn't adjust on the fly. The only times I've seen the numbers grow out of control and be an issue is when they were running a module and refused to adjust anything or grant circumstance bonuses or when they made their own adventure and had no real understanding of what the numbers really did.

So for the Arcanis system specifically keep in mind those base numbers aren't taking into account talents, spells, and circumstances the players could use to give themselves bonuses and/or the enemy penalties.
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Brian Trahan

[Mongolia Jones]

To Deviknyte:

According to the Bestiary a tier V "common monster" will have 14 (+3/tier 1st-3rd & +4/tier 4th-5th) = 35 per defense.

And that's about the lowest of the low. Elites, Brutes, Exceptionals, all get bonus to defenses as well as a higher starting base defenses as a starting point.


To Auroris:

Tier V monsters with 8 or more points per defense over Tier V PCs is a mountain not a mole hill.

Forget the big baddy, just pray your Tier 5 PC doesn't EVER go up 1 on 1 against that tier 5 sidekick opponent.

As far as monsters not having much in the way of talents, etc., just browsing the tier 3 monsters in the Bestiary, these critters are stacked with special castings, special maneuvers, specials (general), talents and traits. I think I counted on a TIII minion with about 13 specials alone.

[Mongolia Jones]

[StatMonkey]

Let me break it down this way…. these are basic numbers, not taking buffing spells or even magical runes into account.

+3 Starting Skill Ranks
+15 Ranks Per Tier (Normal Advancement)
+2 Ranks from Paths (Its assumed players will pick up +2)
+6 Average from d10 Stat Die (+1 from rounding up exploding die %)
+1 Talent (Weapon Mastery Melee/Prodigy for Casters)
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+27 to hit

Average +10 from your Action Die...

Now your hitting a 37 50% of the time.

An Adversary will have (worse case)

16 +17 = 33
18 +17 = 35
18 +17 = 35

Now what comes into play: Tactics!

+2 from Tactical Edge

+3 from Spells (Benediction of the Gods)

-2 to targets Defenses (Bestow Curse, Righteous Strike)

+2 granted to allies from talents (Distract Opponent)

+1 from talents (Wolf Pack Tactics, Exploit Weakness)

+1 to hit (Study Appoint Skill Use)

-2 to targets avoidance (Martial Techniques like Force the Opening)

+3 to hit with offhand (Trap & Cut comes to mind)

Without any specific talents and simply using teamwork (Tactical Edge) you can start hitting 39 @ 50%, With Assist Ally to help the big hitter and you are looking at 42 @ 50%, have that heavy hitter use Force the Opening and now you are looking at 46 @ 50.

I did not include once per scene bonuses to hit like Smite Infidel, Leadership Tier IV, Inspirational Performance, Inspirational Presence, or even the use of Assist Ally (which stacks with Distract Opponent!) I also did not include magical items or weapon abilities (Hatred at Tier 5 can grant a constant +2 to hit)
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Pedro C Barrenechea
Paradigm Concepts, Miami
And all you need to know about Arcanis
New player: "You know, I'm not really sure we *should* win. I'm not sure we made the right choice."
Veteran player: "Welcome to Arcanis!"

[StatMonkey]

[hustonj]

One thing I've learned about Pedro through the years: He's going to keep things challenging, but he knows the PCs are supposed to be the heroes doing what nobody else either would or could do.

There will be some big baddies that are as tough (or worse) than you are thinking these normal opponents will be. They will be very rare, and will appear only when Henry thinks they fit the story.

Pedro LOVES having people excitedly talking about what they managed to pull off, and how they did it. Far too much for him to have set things up to be weighted the other way.
_________________
Valeriano Innocenzo Camillo de Larissa la Galletti
San Antonio, Tx-based Harvester
Jeff Huston
huston.harvester@cox.net