AnotherSkip
Jun 21st, '03, 11:22 AM
Inspired by the Article: Designer Desmenes by Mark A. Hart appearing in Dragon magazine #259 this post/thread seeks just what sort of things we would do in order to take the Hero System and Modify it to build not bases(too small) or planets (might be too large), but nations with advantages and disadvantages, something along the lines of "The Ultimate Nation" (TUN?).
If you dont have the article the posts won't do you much good ( or more appropriately shouldn't) for building kingdoms with the Skills and Powers Book. That was the purpose of the article mentioned above. this has a different concept of taking the HERO system and making it work for Nations.
Okies so here goes:
Determining National Values:
though every nation/kingdom is very different. The Hero System assumes that each character begins with "x" amount of base points depending upon which level of beggining power level the Gm wants.
SO the first step would be to choose how powerful at the three choice points the Gm wants the nations to be.
Just like with Hero's a high base point (say 75 or more) means that each individual nation can be relatively powerful without taking disadvantages. a high capacity for disadvantages (like 50 points per category or 75 or more points availible in disadvantages)
One of the things I'm considering doing is because I'm not intending these to be bought by a person. I might in effect megascale the countries size and making the Megascaling free for the smallest size of country.
After all to be a country you at a minimum have to be what a City (Vatican City, though no wuss is the smallest Country I can think of) ? Well, landed at least, there are other possibilites in Sci fi.
To link up the countries with Character Types Guidelines I'll think ill use the Standard, Skilled and Competant normals with Standard hero Classification being at the upper range. This will give people the opportunity to work with something from Satellite countries and 3rd (even fourth) world countries to an impressive 1st world nation.
At this point going through FRED Im going to ignore Everyman Skills for an actual nation, these might be appropriate for each World Subset, but at this point im going to look father before I decide on default.
Skills: now then Skills have interesting intersections looking at bases , buying a nationwide skill to in essence get a complimentary roll to everyone in the nations borders could have an interesting correlation.
Another would be this is where Everyman Skills come from.
The real question is Is The Nation a really big base(Lataveria, Wakandia, malachites country, Citystates, Empires, Sci Fi Corporations like Ares, ), or is the Nation in question an independant entity (USA, PGC[Pan Galactic Corporation], Rome, T$R legal staff etc...)
part of the answer is whether or not the Country will be stable in mostly the same condition as it was left after the current ruler leaves.
As a subset of Skills, Skill enhancers could be argued for as well, if the nations policies encourage a strong pursuit of interest (Such as Science and Japan, Linguistics in Europe, Traveller in a country that encourages globetrotting and international interests.
Perks : this is where i have really formed ideas:
Access repersents a governments ability to have info-sharing (typically through spy techniques) it can repersent a level of data gathering on the allies of the nation in question as well as those considered enemies,
Anonyminity: though not typically found in modern real world campaigns (after all how easy is it to hide from the current level of spy networks?) this might be applicable to many Sci-Fi, and possibly some fantasy nations. For example a mysterious fantasy nation suddenly appears out of the mists of time, Latervia being overlooked by the nearby Soviet Union via super sorcery and other cases, or France being under appreciated as the evil global power it is.
Contacts: Unlike Access this perk has to deal with either friendly data sharing or under the table informal deals. Computer "file sharing", whether willed or no is probably better handled through Computer link.
On the converse side since often a nation develops such communication at multible levels when a form of contact does form then the nation does not need to buy the "upgrade" for Organization Contacts since this is an Organization to Organization contact. The obvious exception is Favor. typiaclly finding the contact is not difficult either, but the roll should be used for getting the contact to do what you want them to do.
Followers though on some scales this could be used to repersent millitaries, gov't officals and other such things probably it is best not simulate the buying of millitaries by using followers as is. In almost any era a millitary consists of 100's of men and most likely 1,000's to 100,000 or more, a significant expenditure if the standard follower rules were used!!!!
Perhaps the best way would be to establish a base size for the minimum level of competant fielding of troops (based upon numbers)
after building the desired level of competancy (via character points/5 in the standard manner) then essentially "megascaling" to repersent sufficient troop levels. if a Gm uses the FH Mass Combat rules to determine what the typical size of units that are to be fielded in the reigions then use that as the base size (or perhaps a size down or some fraction therof) The Gm may choose to not allow the typical doubling for 5 ponts either as this may repersent a potentially unbalancing way for a country to quickly overrun it's neighbors and then use the resources it just accquired to counteract its disadvantages.
Fringe benefits don't really seem to apply at this level though possibly a country could be particularly resourceful at getting treaties signed and thus accquire the equivalent to the Right to Marry something along the lines of Prefered Treaty Signator. Historical similarities would be the role of Catherine the Great in the relationship of Europe in her time.
Money certainly does not work like listed in the main book, if so then most countries would have to pay 10 to 15 points right off!
Rather the better solution is viewing money as a relatavistic value then most countries would have Money as a 0 point value for the nation, they are neither in debt nor are they flush with value either. There are several ecnomic values that the money advantage or disadvantage can repersent. It could repersent the purchasing power of its people, the actual international investments of the Government or even the result of whether or not a nation sucessfully balances its budget. Though typically this would for simplicity's sake repersent the end economic results of the nations interests.
Reputations: For good or evil most nations have one form or another of reputation. Like many other advantages and disadvantages in this area the scale has to change with the scale of the area. also some of this may be redundant with the redefinition of the character scale.
I'll add more later.
PS I would suggest Steve make a book Called Questions, Riddles and Secrets for publication as part of the Hero System in the fantasy section then we could have QRS to go right before TUV ;)
If you dont have the article the posts won't do you much good ( or more appropriately shouldn't) for building kingdoms with the Skills and Powers Book. That was the purpose of the article mentioned above. this has a different concept of taking the HERO system and making it work for Nations.
Okies so here goes:
Determining National Values:
though every nation/kingdom is very different. The Hero System assumes that each character begins with "x" amount of base points depending upon which level of beggining power level the Gm wants.
SO the first step would be to choose how powerful at the three choice points the Gm wants the nations to be.
Just like with Hero's a high base point (say 75 or more) means that each individual nation can be relatively powerful without taking disadvantages. a high capacity for disadvantages (like 50 points per category or 75 or more points availible in disadvantages)
One of the things I'm considering doing is because I'm not intending these to be bought by a person. I might in effect megascale the countries size and making the Megascaling free for the smallest size of country.
After all to be a country you at a minimum have to be what a City (Vatican City, though no wuss is the smallest Country I can think of) ? Well, landed at least, there are other possibilites in Sci fi.
To link up the countries with Character Types Guidelines I'll think ill use the Standard, Skilled and Competant normals with Standard hero Classification being at the upper range. This will give people the opportunity to work with something from Satellite countries and 3rd (even fourth) world countries to an impressive 1st world nation.
At this point going through FRED Im going to ignore Everyman Skills for an actual nation, these might be appropriate for each World Subset, but at this point im going to look father before I decide on default.
Skills: now then Skills have interesting intersections looking at bases , buying a nationwide skill to in essence get a complimentary roll to everyone in the nations borders could have an interesting correlation.
Another would be this is where Everyman Skills come from.
The real question is Is The Nation a really big base(Lataveria, Wakandia, malachites country, Citystates, Empires, Sci Fi Corporations like Ares, ), or is the Nation in question an independant entity (USA, PGC[Pan Galactic Corporation], Rome, T$R legal staff etc...)
part of the answer is whether or not the Country will be stable in mostly the same condition as it was left after the current ruler leaves.
As a subset of Skills, Skill enhancers could be argued for as well, if the nations policies encourage a strong pursuit of interest (Such as Science and Japan, Linguistics in Europe, Traveller in a country that encourages globetrotting and international interests.
Perks : this is where i have really formed ideas:
Access repersents a governments ability to have info-sharing (typically through spy techniques) it can repersent a level of data gathering on the allies of the nation in question as well as those considered enemies,
Anonyminity: though not typically found in modern real world campaigns (after all how easy is it to hide from the current level of spy networks?) this might be applicable to many Sci-Fi, and possibly some fantasy nations. For example a mysterious fantasy nation suddenly appears out of the mists of time, Latervia being overlooked by the nearby Soviet Union via super sorcery and other cases, or France being under appreciated as the evil global power it is.
Contacts: Unlike Access this perk has to deal with either friendly data sharing or under the table informal deals. Computer "file sharing", whether willed or no is probably better handled through Computer link.
On the converse side since often a nation develops such communication at multible levels when a form of contact does form then the nation does not need to buy the "upgrade" for Organization Contacts since this is an Organization to Organization contact. The obvious exception is Favor. typiaclly finding the contact is not difficult either, but the roll should be used for getting the contact to do what you want them to do.
Followers though on some scales this could be used to repersent millitaries, gov't officals and other such things probably it is best not simulate the buying of millitaries by using followers as is. In almost any era a millitary consists of 100's of men and most likely 1,000's to 100,000 or more, a significant expenditure if the standard follower rules were used!!!!
Perhaps the best way would be to establish a base size for the minimum level of competant fielding of troops (based upon numbers)
after building the desired level of competancy (via character points/5 in the standard manner) then essentially "megascaling" to repersent sufficient troop levels. if a Gm uses the FH Mass Combat rules to determine what the typical size of units that are to be fielded in the reigions then use that as the base size (or perhaps a size down or some fraction therof) The Gm may choose to not allow the typical doubling for 5 ponts either as this may repersent a potentially unbalancing way for a country to quickly overrun it's neighbors and then use the resources it just accquired to counteract its disadvantages.
Fringe benefits don't really seem to apply at this level though possibly a country could be particularly resourceful at getting treaties signed and thus accquire the equivalent to the Right to Marry something along the lines of Prefered Treaty Signator. Historical similarities would be the role of Catherine the Great in the relationship of Europe in her time.
Money certainly does not work like listed in the main book, if so then most countries would have to pay 10 to 15 points right off!
Rather the better solution is viewing money as a relatavistic value then most countries would have Money as a 0 point value for the nation, they are neither in debt nor are they flush with value either. There are several ecnomic values that the money advantage or disadvantage can repersent. It could repersent the purchasing power of its people, the actual international investments of the Government or even the result of whether or not a nation sucessfully balances its budget. Though typically this would for simplicity's sake repersent the end economic results of the nations interests.
Reputations: For good or evil most nations have one form or another of reputation. Like many other advantages and disadvantages in this area the scale has to change with the scale of the area. also some of this may be redundant with the redefinition of the character scale.
I'll add more later.
PS I would suggest Steve make a book Called Questions, Riddles and Secrets for publication as part of the Hero System in the fantasy section then we could have QRS to go right before TUV ;)