I think you will have more luck here if you tie luck to the setting directly. For example if you want it as something the player spends, tie it to the fantasy version of saying the lords prayer or making a gesture signifying a desire to be lucky (kissing a medallion or something). You might even cloud the amount of luck characters have, having the GM keep track of how many points they have left (perhaps even starting them with random  amounts of luck).

Quote from: nDervish;1077687You're just playing semantic games with this argument.  If I say "there are crates there" and the GM says "ok", then I have, for all intents and purposes, created the crates, GM veto power or no GM veto power.  To say otherwise is like claiming that, if I have a gun to your head, I don't have the power to shoot you because someone might grab the gun out of my hand - while it's certainly true that someone could grab the gun and stop me from shooting you, I still have the power to shoot you right up until the point that they actually do take the gun.

This quote gets to the center of things, I think. I don't think it is playing semantic games at all. I mean it in this way:

In any game I've GMed, I don't know the details of the world in 100% photographic detail. Let's take a scenario.

A group is playing DC Heroes, where "Hero Points" are Experience Points, but also function a bit like Marvel Super Heroes' "Karma" and can be used also like Alexander Kalinowski is proposing. Players are in an office building. Player asks "Are there any power outlets nearby?" GM thinks it is extremely plausible that there are, so he says "Yes". Players then move out of the office and into a warehouse. Player asks "Is there a crate I can duck behind?" GM thinks it is extremely plausible that there is, so he says "Yes". Another player asks "Is there a power outlet nearby?" Hmm, well, warehouses have some power outlets, but not like an office. How do we determine if there is a power outlet nearby? Some things a GM clearly knows, "No" and others, "Yes, definitely", then there is this middle ground. Unless described as part of the scene, none of these things exist before someone asks about them, metacurrency spend or not. It's only a player's wish to pretend the GM has a perfect picture in their head that would make 'em think otherwise.

1. GM makes sure he has detailed blueprints of all locations, including where the outlets are. It's maximally realistic. No funny business at all. Super not realistic to do in any real game.
2. GM makes a call based on his gut feeling of how plausible he finds the question (which... honestly is also kind of a request) and the asked about item then pops into the fictional reality or not based on that feeling.
3. GM takes the input of the player asking and makes a call based on something like how interesting a game it would make, or based on how lucky or unlucky he feels the players have been so far and cuts 'em a break or gives 'em the business based on that, or if he's feeling kind towards or annoyed with a particular player.
4. GM ad hoc comes up with a probability that the asked for scene feature is present, then a random roll is made.
5. GM determines how likely it is, and if pretty likely he says something like "Yeah, for 5 Hero Points it's there" or if less likely but possible, "Sure... for 20 Hero Points"

Clearly, some people here don't like option 5 for various "immersion" related reasons. If those kinds of mechanics mess up immersion for you, definitely don't use 'em. Others think the idea is necessarily storygame-y or somehow undermines GM control of the situation. There are metacurrency based luck mechanics I agree can do that, but in the DC Heroes situation I don't see how that could be thought to be the case. If there is anything to be said for option 5 in my experience, it's that it creates a sense of pressure & desperation when I'm put into those situations where the GM offers the feature for a price. 20 Hero points!?!? I could maybe push my Martial Arts next round into AV, and have enough to boost my Body so I'm not knocked out if my desperation attack against Gorilla Grodd doesn't score enough push back to knock him off this platform. Or... my desperate desire that there is a construction crane on this platform turns out to be the case.

I can see how that wouldn't work for some people, but the agonizing costly options vibe just tends to pull me more into the game.

There's a couple of things to be said in this thread. But I'll start with this:

If the luck of heroes in genre fiction is based on writer's fiat and you don't like any amount of writer's fiat in games, then you're probably not in the target audience for genre sim. At least not mainstream genre sim. The mainstream of the fantasy genre is Conan, Aragorn, Jon Snow - characters like that. We experience fantasy worlds through their stories. The thrill to this type of gaming is finding out if you're really Conan, Aragorn or Jon Snow and not: Valeria, Boromir or Robb Stark, if you catch my drift. Now, you can of course play some random guy in a fantasy world and he may or may not tumble to a meaningless death in act 2 when trying to scale some cliffs. That's okay; it's alright. But it's not what the big stories of the genre are about. Same with Luke Skywalker in Science-Fantasy. Or Peter Parker for Supers.

If that type of sim is NOT what you want, we have to ask what remains of genre sim. I suppose it's the setting without the genre conventions. Or maybe just traces of them (high hitpoint PCs for an inaccurate representation of heroes luck). Like I said, that's alright. I'm not sure I would refer to that as genre sim - we'd have to check case-by-case what else remains of a given genre. To me, that sounds at least closer to the other broad category of simulationism: real sim - simulation of the real or a realistic world. The difference to genre sim is the difference between playing to find out what would it really be like to be an elven archer in a world like Middle-Earth as opposed to playing to find out what it's to be someone like Legloas (not necessarily Legolas himself).

To me, both can be interesting and fun - but they have different requirements.

Quote from: S'mon;1077694Those are not dissociated mechanics in the way luck points are - they connect to in-world features. Luck Points are dissociated unless characters have luck in-universe (like WEG d6 Force Points), and know they have it. For that to be true, I think they can't allow for the creation of in-world elements like boxes - they are not box-summoning magic. So you need to restrict them to a more general lucky break/not die yet function, like WHRFP Fate Points or OGL Conan Fate Points, to name a couple. Or the Fighting Fantasy Luck attribute.

I dunno. Consider something like the superhero Domino (as featured in Deadpool 2), who has in-universe luck. I feel like it would be impossible to represent her luck by just modifying skill rolls. A huge part of her luck is having favorable circumstances, like a truck passing at the right time, or a box being in the right place. She doesn't summon a mattress truck into place to break her fall - it was always there and acting normally, but it happened to be in the right place at the right time because of her luck.

Also, I'm not sure that Force Points are really associated. The Force in Star Wars doesn't seem like a resource that characters bank and use up. It's supposed to be an omnipresent field that characters can tap into under the right circumstances. i.e. A character wouldn't say "I'm out of Force now".

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1077723There's a couple of things to be said in this thread. But I'll start with this:

If the luck of heroes in genre fiction is based on writer's fiat and you don't like any amount of writer's fiat in games, then you're probably not in the target audience for genre sim. At least not mainstream genre sim. The mainstream of the fantasy genre is Conan, Aragorn, Jon Snow - characters like that. We experience fantasy worlds through their stories. The thrill to this type of gaming is finding out if you're really Conan, Aragorn or Jon Snow and not: Valeria, Boromir or Robb Stark, if you catch my drift. Now, you can of course play some random guy in a fantasy world and he may or may not tumble to a meaningless death in act 2 when trying to scale some cliffs. That's okay; it's alright. But it's not what the big stories of the genre are about. Same with Luke Skywalker in Science-Fantasy. Or Peter Parker for Supers.

If that type of sim is NOT what you want, we have to ask what remains of genre sim. I suppose it's the setting without the genre conventions. Or maybe just traces of them (high hitpoint PCs for an inaccurate representation of heroes luck). Like I said, that's alright. I'm not sure I would refer to that as genre sim - we'd have to check case-by-case what else remains of a given genre. To me, that sounds at least closer to the other broad category of simulationism: real sim - simulation of the real or a realistic world. The difference to genre sim is the difference between playing to find out what would it really be like to be an elven archer in a world like Middle-Earth as opposed to playing to find out what it's to be someone like Legloas (not necessarily Legolas himself).

To me, both can be interesting and fun - but they have different requirements.

I think you will find there are people here who are fans of genre emulation (I know I am, I know Pundit has written about it quite a bit). However, some ideas are pretty prevalent here that you are going to be battling uphill against. One of them is dissociated mechanics and the idea of interacting through the setting with your character. I am not saying this is the best way to do things. But on this forum, at least in my view of it, you'll find this is a pretty strong point of view (though by no means does everyone adhere to it). All I am trying to say is, there is a path to genre emulation that doesn't put you at odds with that viewpoint (perhaps that isn't your aim, and if so, by all means, I suggest doing what you are doing). As long as the luck resource is either part of the cosmology and can be handled by the character (if you want players to spend it themselves) or operates in the background of the setting and is mainly handled by the GM, I think you'll find it will go over. Where people tend not to be happy is stuff like bennies, or luck points, that the characters don't really have any awareness of in the setting, but the player spends out of character (again there are Savage Worlds fans here, and I am among them, but just pointing out the fault line you are rubbing against here).

All that said, I don't particularly mind having a luck resource that players spend to emulate genre. If you are going for the idea of some kind of plot immunity, I think there are easier ways to do it. One would be, when you reach 0 HP, or would otherwise be killed, by some miracle you are not. You emerge from the rubble unharmed due to (insert after the fact explanation). That would model the fiction you are looking to emulate, and would only really come up when it matters. However, I would expect there to be plenty of people here who really wouldn't be into that approach.

Savage Worlds bennies and wild die. Heroes and Villains are always luckier with the wild die and can further do unlikely things with bennies.

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1077723There's a couple of things to be said in this thread. But I'll start with this:

If the luck of heroes in genre fiction is based on writer's fiat and you don't like any amount of writer's fiat in games, then you're probably not in the target audience for genre sim. At least not mainstream genre sim. The mainstream of the fantasy genre is Conan, Aragorn, Jon Snow - characters like that. We experience fantasy worlds through their stories. The thrill to this type of gaming is finding out if you're really Conan, Aragorn or Jon Snow and not: Valeria, Boromir or Robb Stark, if you catch my drift. Now, you can of course play some random guy in a fantasy world and he may or may not tumble to a meaningless death in act 2 when trying to scale some cliffs. That's okay; it's alright. But it's not what the big stories of the genre are about. Same with Luke Skywalker in Science-Fantasy. Or Peter Parker for Supers.

If that type of sim is NOT what you want, we have to ask what remains of genre sim. I suppose it's the setting without the genre conventions. Or maybe just traces of them (high hitpoint PCs for an inaccurate representation of heroes luck). Like I said, that's alright. I'm not sure I would refer to that as genre sim - we'd have to check case-by-case what else remains of a given genre. To me, that sounds at least closer to the other broad category of simulationism: real sim - simulation of the real or a realistic world. The difference to genre sim is the difference between playing to find out what would it really be like to be an elven archer in a world like Middle-Earth as opposed to playing to find out what it's to be someone like Legloas (not necessarily Legolas himself).

To me, both can be interesting and fun - but they have different requirements.

True, and my point wasn't to dismiss the idea of luck metacurrency. But I think it did help clarify what that metacurrency should be simulating. If character luck is writer's fiat, then putting that metacurrency in the hands of the player will not simulate that accurately. Frodo didn't spend a resource to influence events in LOTR, Tolkien decided what happened. So this currency should be a GM resource to spend on the characters actions and events to drive a specific narrative.

Quote from: NeonAce;1077700This quote gets to the center of things, I think. I don't think it is playing semantic games at all. I mean it in this way:

It's also a false analogy. A correct analogy would be if he held a loaded gun to my head and I had a 100% foolproof way to prevent him from shooting - something like magical mind domination. Because that would be the equivalent of GM veto. Under these conditions, yes, he may place that gun to my head.

Quote from: NeonAce;10777001. GM makes sure he has detailed blueprints of all locations, including where the outlets are. It's maximally realistic. No funny business at all. Super not realistic to do in any real game.
2. GM makes a call based on his gut feeling of how plausible he finds the question (which... honestly is also kind of a request) and the asked about item then pops into the fictional reality or not based on that feeling.
3. GM takes the input of the player asking and makes a call based on something like how interesting a game it would make, or based on how lucky or unlucky he feels the players have been so far and cuts 'em a break or gives 'em the business based on that, or if he's feeling kind towards or annoyed with a particular player.
4. GM ad hoc comes up with a probability that the asked for scene feature is present, then a random roll is made.
5. GM determines how likely it is, and if pretty likely he says something like "Yeah, for 5 Hero Points it's there" or if less likely but possible, "Sure... for 20 Hero Points"

This is a splendid summary. We'd have to know analyze each option for how well suited they are for genre sim involving those famous heroes... Conan, Han Solo, any big Schwartzenegger action role. Let's have a look:

#1 is not possible to pull off all the way. The player might require some minute detail and you can't guarantee that you've thought of it. What if you're Sean Connery and the GM forgot to consider if there were any seagulls on that beach? And that's just where it begins. What if a player plan requires empty syringes from that trashcan over there? Are you going to prepare the contents of every trashcan?
#4 works for genre sim if you don't base the probability of the roll on real world probabilities but genre conventions/likelihoods. And these are hard to determine. Even worse: if your player has really this great idea about driving seagulls into the enemy plane, are you going to potentially ruin it by giving him only a 30% of a flock of seagulls being nearby? You can do that - but will that make your game still feel like you're playing inside an Indiana Jones story? Which approach is really the immersion-breaking one here?
#2 suffers from the same problem, except when the GM strictly determines it on plausibility for the genre: "Surviving the nuclear bomb in a refridgerator? Sorry, that won't work." "Jumping with your cart from your part of the rails and landing straight on the opposing rails, continuing your ride? Well, that's borderline okay." The problem with that approach is that it, as described above, is blind to how much luck each side has drawn on before.
#3 is complicated. If the GM bases it on genre plausibility AND at least relies on gut feeling regarding how much luck has been "consumed" already, that can work. But it probably should be net luck consumption because luck for the opposing side makes it more okay for your side to have luck AGAIN. You're missing out on the fun of #5 and turning luck into a metric for player performance though. It will feel more capricious.
#5 is basically case #2 with keeping track of luck consumed but without considering net luck - so it could be improved. Here's a neat little idea: suppose the master villain is going to end up becoming recurring or not, depending on if you manage to reach the boss battle with 70 or more Hero Points. NOW you can suddenly build challenges around that.

As a final thought: metacurrency implementing heroes' luck is limited because there is only so much luck someone can have before it becomes too much for the reader/viewer, depending on circumstances. So, does it even make sense to model it individually? Or will the readers/viewers groan if EVERY member of a party has moderate amount of times luck per story? Doesn't it make much more sense to have "group luck"? And if there is group luck and the enemy having some luck themselves makes it more plausible for you to have luck again - shouldn't luck then best be modeled by two opposing pools with luck being traded back and forth?

Quote from: NeonAce;1077700How do we determine if there is a power outlet nearby? Some things a GM clearly knows, "No" and others, "Yes, definitely", then there is this middle ground. Unless described as part of the scene, none of these things exist before someone asks about them, metacurrency spend or not. It's only a player's wish to pretend the GM has a perfect picture in their head that would make 'em think otherwise.

You make an interesting point.

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1077723...that sounds at least closer to the other broad category of simulationism: real sim - simulation of the real or a realistic world. The difference to genre sim is the difference between playing to find out what would it really be like to be an elven archer in a world like Middle-Earth as opposed to playing to find out what it's to be someone like Legloas (not necessarily Legolas himself).

That's a nice way of characterizing the difference you see. Originally RPGs like OD&D and Runequest were designed to do the former and not the latter.

Quote from: jhkim;1077725Also, I'm not sure that Force Points are really associated. The Force in Star Wars doesn't seem like a resource that characters bank and use up. It's supposed to be an omnipresent field that characters can tap into under the right circumstances. i.e. A character wouldn't say "I'm out of Force now".

I'd say weakly associated.

Number of Force Points corresponds to how strong a character is with the Force which is something that exists in the game world. Knowing how many times they can "use the Force" isn't something that characters in the movies/novels/comics seem to know.

In that sense Force Points are kind of like D&D hit points. Players know things that characters, strictly speaking, don't know. Of course one could address this by having the GM track Force Point totals and not letting the players know what those totals are. Just like one could have the GM track hit point totals. Few people do those things because doing them adds more GM book keeping for an additional benefit that most players don't strongly care about and it takes away the knowledge of character improvement that most players enjoy as part of the RPG experience.

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1077741As a final thought: metacurrency implementing heroes' luck is limited because there is only so much luck someone can have before it becomes too much for the reader/viewer, depending on circumstances. So, does it even make sense to model it individually? Or will the readers/viewers groan if EVERY member of a party has moderate amount of times luck per story? Doesn't it make much more sense to have "group luck"? And if there is group luck and the enemy having some luck themselves makes it more plausible for you to have luck again - shouldn't luck then best be modeled by two opposing pools with luck being traded back and forth?

Managing luck pools is not something that I'm interested in doing as a GM, but I think there already are games systems that do that.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;1077735True, and my point wasn't to dismiss the idea of luck metacurrency. But I think it did help clarify what that metacurrency should be simulating. If character luck is writer's fiat, then putting that metacurrency in the hands of the player will not simulate that accurately. Frodo didn't spend a resource to influence events in LOTR, Tolkien decided what happened. So this currency should be a GM resource to spend on the characters actions and events to drive a specific narrative.

Even in a story game, though, as GM I am *not* the writer.  A writer creates all of the character background, dialog, and actions - that's a huge part of a writer's work. So the writer is the combination of all the players and the GM.

In practice, as GM, I find spending on behalf of the PCs is a pain in the ass. I think the player can handle player-specific tracking much better than I can. So i will often hand off character-specific things to them. A wargame parallel is having the player control the actions of their attack dog in combat - with the restriction that they should have the dog act like an obedient trained dog, not like a telepathic extension of the PC.

Now, some players would complain that controlling the dog drags them out of character - because really the character isn't telepathically controlling the dog. But a lot of players are fine with it, even though they enjoy getting into character.

Quote from: Bren;1077747That's a nice way of characterizing the difference you see. Originally RPGs like OD&D and Runequest were designed to do the former and not the latter.

Yes and nowadays you have mid-level D&D characters with, I don't know, 80 HPs and it puts them in a weird inbetween. They have the basic suvivability of real heroes and their saving throws but they don't have the crate to dive behind when they need it (which would reduce the need for bloated HPs and saving throws).

Quote from: Bren;1077748Managing luck pools is not something that I'm interested in doing as a GM, but I think there already are games systems that do that.

Sure, it's not for everyone. We didn't even look closely at alternatives to metacurrency so far. But I'd like to once more point out my response to item #5. This is something that other approaches, like Genesys, generally do not do: shaping the outcome of a story in part based on how well the characters mastered the challenges along the way, how little luck they required to help out.

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1077761But I'd like to once more point out my response to item #5. This is something that other approaches, like Genesys, generally do not do: shaping the outcome of a story in part based on how well the characters mastered the challenges along the way, how little luck they required to help out.

Yeah I noticed that. It is of even less interest to me as GM than is managing two metacurrency pools. It seems like something that would appeal to players who want at the same time a narrative style of play and a gamist/system mastery style of play. I'd think that would be a very narrow niche of players, but then there is FATE and its ilk.

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1077741Ishouldn't luck then best be modeled by two opposing pools with luck being traded back and forth?

I find the best way to model luck in a game with dice is using the dice.

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1077761Yes and nowadays you have mid-level D&D characters with, I don't know, 80 HPs and it puts them in a weird inbetween. They have the basic suvivability of real heroes and their saving throws but they don't have the crate to dive behind when they need it (which would reduce the need for bloated HPs and saving throws).

The bulk of my experience with D&D is with becmi and 2e, which at least at the tables I've been at were handled using method 2 and 3 above.  Barrels could be there for the asking if they were plausible and, again, without having to spend or track narrative karmic currency. Unless the pursuit is story over simulation, narrative karma currency is a solution looking for a problem that wasnt really there.  The 'narrative' of those older games was at least partially dealing with the consequences of living in a world ruled by swingy fickle dice.  That's my personal favorite narrative anyway.

Quote from: VincentTakeda;1077798Unless the pursuit is story over simulation, narrative karma currency is a solution looking for a problem that wasnt really there.  

That's my feeling. GM decides if there are barrels, based on what's plausible. Works fine and rewards creative play.