Quote from: Ryan L.;393515I would purchase a clone if you paid me. They are a waste of time and paper. The people that have written them would be better off doing something original.

But let's not focus on that because my real problem with your post is that somehow your derivative work is somehow keeping Amber alive. When in reality you aren't using the cosmos of Amber, because its illegal and the best you can do is something that is sort of kind of like Amber.

It is keeping the area of the fandom that likes the style of Diceless RPG epitomized by Erick Wujcik's game alive, over the style epitomized by R. Sean Borgstrom (or whatever she calls herself these days).

Of the two, the fans of the latter monstrosity, during its very brief heyday of popularity, were declaring that it was the new definition of how to do Diceless, and that they would bury us.  Now, we're burying them.  We were around a decade and a half before they were, and we'll be around a decade and a half from now, thanks to these new games; and it has been clearly defined which type of game is the better Diceless RPG.

RPGPundit

Quote from: GrimGent;393522I like to describe it as a roll-over system that just happens to replace the dice with resource management: by way of comparison, 2e is roughly as crunchy as early Tri-Stat.

And about a million times more convoluted.

QuoteChapter 5 ("The Essence of Nobilis") summarizes the most central rules, Chapter 9 ("Attributes") elaborates on the basic resolution mechanics, and Chapter 13 ("Resolving Conflict") deals with confrontations between characters, including combat.

One major difference from Amber is that attributes are never compared directly. Simply put, each of the attributes (which in 2e are Aspect, Domain, Realm, and Spirit) has a rating which represents what the characters can accomplish effortlessly and a pool which measures how much further they can push themselves if necessary. Every action has a difficulty level, and as long as that doesn't exceed the relevant attribute rating, the character succeeds without any additional effort. If it does, however, then an increasing number of points must be expended from the pool associated with that particular attribute. When characters clash, it's those varying power levels of their individual actions that are compared in order to determine which one triumphs. In this way, the system doesn't actually reveal anyone's stats to others: you have no direct way of knowing, say, how high the Aspect of a swordsman you're duelling with is, only what kind of feats and stunts he's managed to pull off so far and what that may tell about his abilities.

It's worth noting that any action based on those attributes is considered miraculous. A character is allowed to perform one miracle per turn, as well as one mundane action, which by default are of the sort that any ordinary human being is capable of. Mundane actions are essentially equivalent to the (lowest) levels of Aspect, but they can fail arbitrarily and cannot be boosted with miracle points from the attribute pools. A mortal swordsman who ranks among the finest in the world could effectively fight at level 2 with swords, for example, but might fumble at the GM's whim. Miracles on the other hand absolutely never fail unless opposed by at least an equal force.

Quite right. You've here described the entire boring mediocre utterly unremarkable not-in-any-way-revolutionary beancounter system. In two paragraphs.
Borgstrom, meanwhile, needs to expand that into thousands and thousands of paragraphs to say the exact same thing, filling her spaces with useless words, made up words, byzantine sentence structure, REALLY awful prose, twee pretentiousness, and a desperate desperate effort to pretend that Nobilis is so much more graceful and artistic and clever than it actually is.

RPGPundit

Quote from: GrimGent;393522I like to describe it as a roll-over system that just happens to replace the dice with resource management: by way of comparison, 2e is roughly as crunchy as early Tri-Stat. Chapter 5 ("The Essence of Nobilis") summarizes the most central rules, Chapter 9 ("Attributes") elaborates on the basic resolution mechanics, and Chapter 13 ("Resolving Conflict") deals with confrontations between characters, including combat.

One major difference from Amber is that attributes are never compared directly. Simply put, each of the attributes (which in 2e are Aspect, Domain, Realm, and Spirit) has a rating which represents what the characters can accomplish effortlessly and a pool which measures how much further they can push themselves if necessary. Every action has a difficulty level, and as long as that doesn't exceed the relevant attribute rating, the character succeeds without any additional effort. If it does, however, then an increasing number of points must be expended from the pool associated with that particular attribute. When characters clash, it's those varying power levels of their individual actions that are compared in order to determine which one triumphs. In this way, the system doesn't actually reveal anyone's stats to others: you have no direct way of knowing, say, how high the Aspect of a swordsman you're duelling with is, only what kind of feats and stunts he's managed to pull off so far and what that may tell about his abilities.

It's worth noting that any action based on those attributes is considered miraculous. A character is allowed to perform one miracle per turn, as well as one mundane action, which by default are of the sort that any ordinary human being is capable of. Mundane actions are essentially equivalent to the (lowest) levels of Aspect, but they can fail arbitrarily and cannot be boosted with miracle points from the attribute pools. A mortal swordsman who ranks among the finest in the world could effectively fight at level 2 with swords, for example, but might fumble at the GM's whim. Miracles on the other hand absolutely never fail unless opposed by at least an equal force.

Thanks for the great synopsis! I have seen other systems use a similar mechanic. I have toyed around with something in Amber that involves astrological aspects corresponding to narrative elements that result in a small pool of points that can influence ability scores etc...providing an edge or what have you. The idea of Astro. corres. effecting play came to me from 'The Highest Level of all Fantasy Roleplaying' which IMO has some awesome ideas.

Quote from: RPGPundit;393544And about a million times more convoluted.

How so? You can't really trim the mechanics down much more without going freeform. "I have Domain (Cats) 4 and a Lesser Change is a level 6 miracle, so I need to spend two points to make this litter of kittens grow wings" isn't exactly rocket science.

QuoteBorgstrom, meanwhile, needs to expand that into thousands and thousands of paragraphs to say the exact same thing, filling her spaces with useless words, made up words, byzantine sentence structure, REALLY awful prose, twee pretentiousness, and a desperate desperate effort to pretend that Nobilis is so much more graceful and artistic and clever than it actually is.

Actually, the reason why the chapter on the attributes takes up thirty pages is that the book not only includes listings of what the difficulty levels between zero and nine can achieve in each case, but it also meticulously describes every single attribute rank one after another, with examples of the kind of characters who might possess that level of ability, details on its importance in the society of the Nobles, and discussions on its metaphysical nature and significance. To put it in another way, it's a little like having an extended analysis on the difference between Strength 1 and Strength 2, only more pertinent since the attributes themselves are so setting-dependent that they require a bit of explanation.

Quote from: skofflox;393546I have seen other systems use a similar mechanic.

Well, next to straight-up stat comparison, variants on "spending effort" are probably the most commonplace diceless resolution mechanic out there these days. It wasn't quite as common back in the late '90s when Nobilis was originally written and published.

Incidentally, the examples of Nob 3e character stats over at Hitherby Dragons include this sheet for Corwin from Amber. Of course, you can't really combine the two games without a clash of cosmologies, but still...

(The position of mundane abilities in the system wasn't really formalized before the Society of Flowers web supplements which led to the Superior Qualities seen here. How they differ in practice from these Skills hasn't been mentioned so far, though, and from what I hear even the Bonds can be actively used to gain an advantage in the new edition. The Afflictions seem to replace the old Handicaps, and apparently can now be activated by the GM to impose penalties of some sort. All in all, the Worldwalker Gift is the only completely familiar trait on the sheet aside from two attributes.)

I'm looking forward to the 3rd Edition of Nobilis a lot. I think one of the main strengths of Nobilis is the guidance it gives you over what each of the levels of miracle can do. It's flexible enough to allow for almost anything, but precise enough that HG decisions can be justified. This is what makes me feel like I can HG it successfully.

Meanwhile, as cool-looking a game as Amber is, after reading it I don't feel like I know when circumstances should trump different levels of stat, or what it takes to switch a contest from being about Warfare to Psyche. This is compounded by it being inherently adversarial in its construction. Obviously, it's true to the books, but I feel it would take a GM with a will of steel to keep rulings fair and balanced between PCs.

The underlying system in Nobilis isn't earth-shatteringly revolutionary, but it is surprisingly finely balanced considering its high power level - 25 CPs is exactly the right place for starting characters, giving a wealth of difficult choices while still leaving room for them to grow during play.

The prose is unashamedly purple, but it captures a specific whimsical mood very well. It's like Marmite in that some love it and some hate it, though I don't quite understand why some people hate it quite so much. I sometimes wonder how well a cut-down version with the basic rules written in plainer English would do. Some of the sub-systems are a bit complicated, but not to an extreme extent once you get to know them.

Quote from: GrimGent;393563How so?

Convoluted in its presentation.

RPGPundit

Quote from: thenorm42;393583I'm looking forward to the 3rd Edition of Nobilis a lot.

Me, too.

Seanchai

Quote from: thenorm42;393583Some of the sub-systems are a bit complicated, but not to an extreme extent once you get to know them.

Looking at the character sheets of some 3e playtesters, I'm noticing quite a bit more mechanical complexity in parts of the game that are handled in a much looser freeform fashion in 2e. For instance, in 2e the details on heraldic Designs which connect Nobles to their Estates are largely symbolic and without crunch in themselves. In 3e, though?

"Keys: Key 1, Lotus Flower + Key 15, Oak

More than anything else, you are: Something Cool (+both Keys)

Your Estate is from:
Courage: Either Light or Beautiful (+Shadow either way)
Blades: Painful Side (+Heart of Lotus)

Your Estate is:
Courage: Something you live (+Shadow)
Blades: Something you can point to (+Heart of Oak)

You lived: a Humble Life (+Heart of Oak)
Legacy: Freedom! (+Heart of Lotus)

Contacts: Mortal Family (+Oak), Organization (+Lotus)

Affiliation: Light/Wild (+Shadow)

Totals: Heart of Lotus-4, Heart of Oak-4, Shadow-3"

Quote from: RPGPundit;393661Convoluted in its presentation.

Not everyone appreciates a nothing-but-the-facts chemistry textbook approach to RPG writing. Again, tastes vary.

Intersting. Where did you get that?

And more important: What does it mean?

Quote from: 1of3;394047Where did you get that?

From the Chancel Amyra information on the RPGnet wiki. The testplayers are still under an NDA which prevents them from explicitly explaining the quirks of the new system, and so for now any conclusions about how exactly these Heart and Shadow scores work have to be speculative at best. However, it does appear that the heraldic symbols on the Nobles' coats of arms can now provide mechanical advantages of their own, and that they touch on the characters' lives far more extensively than in 2e (where their practical uses are pretty much limited to sympathetic magic and communication through prayer).

Apparently the new chargen also includes the questionnaire elements that some folks have suggested earlier, in the form of Life and Legacy: what kind of an existence the characters led before Nobility and how that still affects them. And not only Bonds but also Afflictions seem to be bought with the same pool of points that's at least partially based on the Treasure attribute.

As a playtester, I can't really say anything except in general terms, but I can say that it's going to be difficult to describe Nobilis 3e as "pretentious" (although I'm sure someone will try)  but that those who dislike whimsy will be unlikely to enjoy the product. At some point Jane seems to have jacked Ianthe in an alley and stolen her narrator-stick, metaphorically speaking.

Quote from: Rand Brittain;394867As a playtester, I can't really say anything except in general terms, but I can say that it's going to be difficult to describe Nobilis 3e as "pretentious" (although I'm sure someone will try)  but that those who dislike whimsy will be unlikely to enjoy the product. At some point Jane seems to have jacked Ianthe in an alley and stolen her narrator-stick, metaphorically speaking.

I am looking forward to 3rd edition, but I will always love my GWB.

And hey!  It's Rand Brittain!  I am sensing another mass migration from tBP in the works.

I don't really "migrate," I just don't post everywhere very often. Lately, of course, I've been playtesting more than posting, trying to see how far I could stretch the character creation system and such. (We play over IRC, so it's generally troublesome to try and do character creation during an actual session if you want to get anything else done.)

So far I'm fairly pleased with the changes to the mechanics. Persona, as Dr. Moran has mentioned, is a replacement for Spirit that actually does spirited things instead of just being a sort of passive numinous glory. Treasure isn't quite a replacement for Realm but it does a lot of things people tended to end up using Realm to accomplish. The basic mechanics haven't particularly changed, but there have been all kinds of tiny tweaks. I think they're mostly all improvements, although the new Bonds system is going to need some really good explication so that people can understand how far you can stretch it, or it might be in danger of being treated like 2e Bonds and languishing a bit.

Quote from: Rand Brittain;394872I don't really "migrate," I just don't post everywhere very often.

There appears to be an influx of new members around here, so I am guessing it is from tBP, as I don't really scan the member list over there for a comparison.