So I am developing a skill focused, levelless, classless roleplaying system.

Skills are currently purchased via a point based system and these increase to show the development of the character. So far all the guys and girls that I have game-tested with really like this method. The main reason that they site for this is that it has given them unprecedented versatility to create a character precisely as they like.

Now, I lurk mostly on a few game boards and blogs and one of the things that a lot of people mention as a good feature of a game is "speedy character creation". So I have been tossing around ideas to possibly cater for this.

The best method I have come up with so far is creating packages that provides a group of skills that can be purchased at three levels of the expertise: Beginner, Intermediate, and Expert. This should allow a player to then pick a career with a point cost, effectively chewing up a large portion of the points they have available to spend, cutting down the time (and thought) involved in making a character.

So far, this suits the system I have created and my own personal tastes but here I run into my indecision. Would you prefer to see:
   
a) Add equipment and starting money commensurate with the package level
b) Give a slight points break to encourage buying a package
c) Add in slightly intangible benefits (ie: Reliable Fence for the thief/etc)
d) Charge exactly the point costs for skills and add extra for any extra goodies?
e) Make purchasing the skills in the package slightly cheaper for the rest of the players existence (effectively creating classes)
f) Me sentenced to death by many papercuts for creating the sort of system you don't like

Of course, feel free to give suggestions other to the above or even suggest complete alternatives to what I have come up with. I like new ideas that I haven't even thought of yet as well

Going on what you've given us so far, I'd go with option B,

"Give a slight points break to encourage buying a package."

Given your design philosophy as far as I can tell, (d). This is pretty much what GURPS does (also AFAICT, from what I've read on the net and skimmed at stores).

Also I think you meant to write "commensurate" in (a).

I did mean commensurate, ah well.

Not entirely sure what the difference between a class and a package here. By not restricting which skills are bought later, is this removing the class-ness of it? Does a class always have to have to have certain skills associated with it? Surely, a class is a starting point, after which the player decides where to go with skills? If so, how is that different from a package?

Sorry for the ignorance, I'm not au fait with D&D terminology.

Some may disagree with me here, but the quiddity of "class" is that it basically maps out certain elements of future development. While the possibilities in a non-class system are purely a result of the "current state" of the character's abilities and future opportunities, in a class system the character has a "history" which affects future development regardless of the "current state".

E.g. with a class system it might be possible for a mercenary and a thief to have the same "sleight of hand" rating at a given point in time, but the thief is going to be able to advance faster in that rating purely because he's a "thief".

This is why (e) recreates classes somewhat.

There are in-between options, for sure. Any game where ability scores affect skills has at least a slight class-like effect going on. Something more in that direction is the old Swordbearer, where you got to pick one or two groups of skills that you'd get a discount on as you advanced.

Quote from: Elliot WilenSome may disagree with me here, but the quiddity of "class" is that it basically maps out certain elements of future development. While the possibilities in a non-class system are purely a result of the "current state" of the character's abilities and future opportunities, in a class system the character has a "history" which affects future development regardless of the "current state".

I agree with this statement.

Basically unless the system constrains future choices in some way, it's not a class system. The coverage and strength of those constraints may vary, but they must be present and present enough to be significant.

Quote from: telliusSo I am developing a skill focused, levelless, classless roleplaying system.

Skills are currently purchased via a point based system and these increase to show the development of the character. So far all the guys and girls that I have game-tested with really like this method. The main reason that they site for this is that it has given them unprecedented versatility to create a character precisely as they like.

Much the same as I have gotten using a similar system.

Quote from: telliusNow, I lurk mostly on a few game boards and blogs and one of the things that a lot of people mention as a good feature of a game is "speedy character creation". So I have been tossing around ideas to possibly cater for this.

The best method I have come up with so far is creating packages that provides a group of skills that can be purchased at three levels of the expertise: Beginner, Intermediate, and Expert. This should allow a player to then pick a career with a point cost, effectively chewing up a large portion of the points they have available to spend, cutting down the time (and thought) involved in making a character.

I use a variation o fthis a bit more disparate. I find it works well.

Quote from: telliusSo far, this suits the system I have created and my own personal tastes but here I run into my indecision. Would you prefer to see:
   
a) Add equipment and starting money commensurate with the package level

I have seen this used in some games as part of a template. I use supply equipment up front for characters in SA! Still, the problem with this is that you would need to supply a kit then allow the player to buy additional equipment. Further, you need to ask yourself if there would be a big difference in equipment between a beginner forensics expert and an expert one,

Quote from: telliusb) Give a slight points break to encourage buying a package

I am always in favor of incentives. The important thing here is that the break is not so much that it violates your goals of the system. If you want to encourage packages, making a generalist impractical, then make the break formidable. Adjust to your taste. I am pretty flexible on this point. I prefer packages that are just convenient packaging of skills. So, I would be happy with paying one-to-one in development points.

Quote from: telliusc) Add in slightly intangible benefits (ie: Reliable Fence for the thief/etc)

I find these to be the least satisfying. They are not universally played by all players. One's vital "Reliable Fence" is another's "note a the sheet I never look at".

Quote from: telliusd) Charge exactly the point costs for skills and add extra for any extra goodies?

I am not sure I am following you on this. I think I suggested this above. I am in favor of charging the same for skills in a package then allowing for the purchase of additional skills. This is how I do it in Iridium.

Quote from: telliuse) Make purchasing the skills in the package slightly cheaper for the rest of the players existence (effectively creating classes)

Actually, I should say this is closer to what I do in Iridium. For ease of use, I have classes that are essentially free then the player gets additional development points for customization. However, when I came up with the amount of dev points a char would have, I always kept in mind those class skills. It has worked out well and kept book keeping in char gen down.

Quote from: telliusf) Me sentenced to death by many papercuts for creating the sort of system you don't like

No such issue! I may not like it but you are free to make what ever system makes you happy.

Quote from: telliusOf course, feel free to give suggestions other to the above or even suggest complete alternatives to what I have come up with. I like new ideas that I haven't even thought of yet as well

Well, a lot depends on the feel you want for your system and what your goals are. If you want flexibility I think you are on the right path. Implementing classes could be a route. In Iridium I have classes and it allows me to award a different progression to in class skills than out of class skills. I do not make different costs since I believe that you should be able to learn anything and it is more dependent on your ability to learn not what profession you have chosen. So, a lot depends on how far you want to take it.

Bill

*forehead slap* Gleich, Elliot many thanks.

I don't like class systems. Give them a break for getting a package at the start, thus quickening the process but after that let the game and scenarios decide on their progress.

I ran a homebrew Bladerunner game for years and tackled the issue of speed of character generation but having 3 options, rapid. moderate and painstaking.
The eventual differences in terms of points etc were zero but the backgrounds got far richer with each level of complexity.
I used careers and careers have a list of skills.
In the rapid system you picked a career you had a set number of points (120) which you could spend on skills. Skils on your list were 1 point skills not on your list were 3 (per rank). The you got some random backgrounds stuff +ve and -ve. Then y you got starting funds based on your career and age.
In the moderate system you could spend some of those points (10) to have a secondary career. This would allow you to max out your points a little by buying stuff at lower costs. You had more detailled background for each career. You could use the moderate system with just one career and basically you got more background stuff and it was tied more to your career.
The painstaking system ran a travelleresque year by year career with checks for events at each stage and income. You rolled for promotions and tried to track how well you did in each career, actors got to be tv stars and then went into movies etc ... you could change careers and careers like law-enforcement had elite subsets like Homicide, Bladerunner or Narcotics that you could drop into by sacrificing sucessful promotions. Each year you got points to spend on skills. the number of points depended on your ages so in early years you got more points and it levelled off at 35 to 1 point a year. The effect being a 32 year old would get 120 points ...

Now the long and the short of this was that a character from the first method had the same number of skills and ranks as one from the complex system but their backgound was up to the player to create whilst the backgorund of the complex character was full of known associates, ex-wives, etc. There was a degree of superiority to the complex characters as they had more career options and so had a tendancy to have a wider range of skills.
In this sytem I could have added a template to make even faster character generation but it really wasn't necessary. 120 skills points took about 10 minutes for most players to handle. The full character system would take 2 hours ... + but was like a game in its own right to be fair.
After character gen all were equal so increasing a skill you had or buying a new one cost the same no matter as careers weren't used beyond character gen.

So basically ... I guess I am saying that making character generation fast at the expense of flexibility doesn't give you much. It sounds like you have a good system and it shouldn't strain the player to spend 15 minutes investing in their characters should it.

Quote from: HinterWeltWell, a lot depends on the feel you want for your system and what your goals are. If you want flexibility I think you are on the right path. Implementing classes could be a route. In Iridium I have classes and it allows me to award a different progression to in class skills than out of class skills. I do not make different costs since I believe that you should be able to learn anything and it is more dependent on your ability to learn not what profession you have chosen. So, a lot depends on how far you want to take it.

For myself, flexibility is the ultimate goal, but I understand that many folks out there don't have the similar goals. So I was wondering what others around here thought of the concept. By and large I would like to create a versatile system that me and my friends enjoy to use in the majority of games that we play.

Elliot and Gliech are correct though, option (e) does introduce a class element. I don't particularly think that I would use this option, but I included it in a genuine interest to find out what people like.

I think ideally I would like to have a package/career cost precisely the same as purchasing the skills themselves individually, making them more of a guide than a powergaming break. After that I would probably add equipment and/or starting cash to the mix so that the creator would be able to tick some boxes on a list and have a starting character in relatively short order.

Having said that, the kinda hardcore element for creating a character in a painstaking way that jibbajibba has pointed out certainly has an appeal to me at the very least.

Coupled with that, the different progression idea from HinterWelt may not be directly applicable to my system but certainly gives me some cool ideas .. so thanks

Quote from: Elliot WilenSome may disagree with me here, but the quiddity of "class" is that it basically maps out certain elements of future development. While the possibilities in a non-class system are purely a result of the "current state" of the character's abilities and future opportunities, in a class system the character has a "history" which affects future development regardless of the "current state".

E.g. with a class system it might be possible for a mercenary and a thief to have the same "sleight of hand" rating at a given point in time, but the thief is going to be able to advance faster in that rating purely because he's a "thief".

This is why (e) recreates classes somewhat.

There are in-between options, for sure. Any game where ability scores affect skills has at least a slight class-like effect going on. Something more in that direction is the old Swordbearer, where you got to pick one or two groups of skills that you'd get a discount on as you advanced.

What he said. For me, a game system uses classes when there are benefits to be had that can only be accessed to by belonging to a certain group (the character class).

Quote from: telliusa) Add equipment and starting money commensurate with the package level

Yes.

Quoteb) Give a slight points break to encourage buying a package

Yes.

Quotec) Add in slightly intangible benefits (ie: Reliable Fence for the thief/etc)

It depends. If those benefits can only be had if you buy the pack, then it's a class

Quoted) Charge exactly the point costs for skills and add extra for any extra goodies?

It's possible, but it feels boring to me. Maybe that's the reason why I don't like templates in GURPS.

Quotee) Make purchasing the skills in the package slightly cheaper for the rest of the players existence (effectively creating classes)

It can be done, but remember that you wanted a classless game. Stick to that, unless you want to change your mind.