Post by Ljcyan on Jul 14, 2016 22:08:37 GMT
First thread, let's see how this goes!
Introduction and Backstory
I play in a playgroup with very varied knowledge in Digimon, and one thing that comes up often from all players is a preference to have their Digimon partners decided by GM. Whether that's because of a lack of knowledge of the setting, or a wish to enact scenarios closer to the TV show and games, I've had a bit of experience and a lot of thought about how such a system would work. To clarify, this is similar to how the Digi-Destined rarely know the identity/species of their partner and almost never know which species they will Digivolve to. To make things clear early on, most of these ideas and concepts are flavour oriented, not mechanics oriented, and aside from a bit more work from the GM, will in no way impact game balance.
In my first play-test game a looooong way back, during about Version 0.8 or so, the players randomized a Rookie/Child Digimon partner. When it came time for their partners to Digivolve, I gave the players the option to Digivolve to any species listed on their partner's wikimon.net page OR they could randomize a species from that list and in return gain a few bonus DP. It was a short game, mainly to test mechanics, so didn't suffer much imbalance from the bonus DP. There is certainly a little merit in exploring that option, or similar options further, but I lack the in-game experience to say how unbalancing or disruptive bonus DP would be (probably quite a bit), and instead choose to leave this here for interests sake.
With my most recent session and newest playgroup, we played another one-off to gauge interest in the setting and mechanics of the game, this time using the Version 1.0 rules. Players chose their partner Digimon's Rookie/Child stage. At the end of the game, I asked the players, should the game continue, if they would like to choose their Champion/Adult forms or would prefer to be surprised. All of them chose to have their partners chosen for them.
After that play-test/one-off, I've spent a lot of time thinking about a system to determine Digivolution paths for players that prefer their partner's forms to be a surprise. What follows is what I came up with.
The Digivolution Path
For the purposes of this system, we will be assuming the players are starting with Rookie/Child Digimon. However, this will work fine with all stages, if perhaps needing a little more creativity during Fresh/Baby, In-Training/Baby II stages.
To explain and illustrate the system, I will have an example under each step. For tradition's sake, we'll use Agumon.
Step One: Planning the Path
So your player has picked (or randomed) Agumon as their starter. To begin, gather a short list of possible Champion/Adult forms. These will be potential Digivolutions for this player's partner.
For this example we pick:
• Greymon
• Tyrannomon
• Meramon
• Monochromon
• Birdramon
Your short list can be as long or as short as you like; longer lists give more options but are more effort on the GM's part, both to create and track.
Step Two: Adding the Affinity
Once you have your list, it's time to work on your Affinities. These are preferences that lean the player's partner towards a certain Digivolution. Essentially, these act similar to the prerequisites Digimon required to Digivolve in most videogames, including the original V-Pets. Affinities are little, hidden "rules" that each species prefers or favors and will help guide the GM into deciding what Digivolution makes sense for each player and their Digimon. Every time a player or their partner acts in a way appropriate to a species' Affinity, the Digimon gets a check next to that Affinity. Each potential Digimon can have as many Affinities as you prefer. Personally, I would recommend two each, one Role-Play Affinity and one Combat Affinity.
Role-Play Affinities are actions that are entirely covered by Role-Play, and tend to be broader than Combat Affinities. Decisions the players make both for themselves or their Digimon, regardless of success or failure can influence Role-Play Affinities. These can include putting themselves in danger for the sake of others, to preferring diplomacy over direct combat.
Combat Affinities are actions that are mostly covered by combat, although can come up during skill checks and other situations. Combat Affinities are less under the player's control and refer more to actions that affect their partner directly. These can include being reduced to 0 Wound boxes, to succeeding on a specific skill check.
Any easy way to differentiate the two Affinities is to think of it thusly: Role-Play Affinities define actions taken by both player and Digimon, portraying their personality, beliefs and goals. Combat Affinities are actions that affect the Digimon directly and are not always under their or their Tamer's control.
When choosing Affinities, it is best to think of broad actions, rather than specific goals. These are guidelines to help you decide which path their partner will go down. Having the Affinities be too complex or too inconsistent will only make your work harder. For example it's much easier to have "Succeed on two successive Skill checks" as a Combat Affinity, compared to "Succeed on two successive Brain Skill checks with at least one Critical Success."
Continuing with our example, these are our Agumon’s potential Digivolutions and their respective Affinities:
Greymon
Role-Play Affinity: Co-operation. Actions that support or encourage co-operation increase this Affinity. Selfish actions reduce this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Intelligent Fighting. Winning a combat without any ally being reduced to 0 Wound boxes increase this Affinity.
Tyrannomon
Role-Play Affinity: Warrior. Actions that support or encourage combat and fighting increase this Affinity. Retreating or refusing a fight directly reduces this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Tyrant. When this Digimon reduces an opponent to 0 Wound Boxes, increase this Affinity.
Meramon
Role-Play Affinity: Hot-Headed. Actions that support or encourage haste, impatience and/or quick thinking increase this Affinity. Refusing to act quickly or choosing to wait reduces this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Haste. When this Digimon rolls highest initiative, increase this Affinity.
Monochromon
Role-Play Affinity: Defender. Actions that support or encourage protecting others increase this Affinity. Refusing to protect innocents in danger reduces this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Martyr. When this Digimon or its tamer successfully Intercedes, increase this Affinity.
Birdramon
Role-Play Affinity: Peacemaker. Actions that support or encourage avoiding combat increase this Affinity. Fighting without provocation reduces this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Counter. When this Digimon successfully wounds a Digimon that wounded it previously, increase this Affinity.
Step Three: Tallying the Ticks
Now that you have your Digivolution Path list and their Affinities, make sure to write them down and keep them with you as you run the game, making sure to keep the information hidden. During play, whenever a player and/or their Digimon partner act in according to an appropriate Role-Play Affinity, mark a check, tick or some other mark next to that Digimon. Likewise, when a Digimon (or rarely, Tamer) accomplishes or is subjected to an appropriate Combat Affinity, mark a slightly different check, tick or mark. Even better, have a separate section for the two Affinities, marking each accordingly. If for any reason a Digimon or their partner acts in a way that would reduce a potential Digivolution's Affinity, simply erase that affinity's tick.
For example: “Agumon and his party have discovered a pack of Goburimon/Goblimon resting in a camp. Agumon’s Tamer suggests that the party sneak around the camp, preferring to avoid a fight if possible. Unfortunately, Agumon failed the Stealth skill check and alerted the Goburimon, who then engaged in combat. During the fight, Agumon Intercedes to protect his ally Patamon, taking the hit that would have reduced Patamon’s Wound Boxes to 0. Shortly after, the party defeats the Goburimon.”
In this example, you would tick a Birdramon Role-Play Affinity (attempting to avoid a fight), a Monochromon Combat Affinity (successfully using the Intercede action) and a Greymon Combat Affinity (no party member was reduced to 0 Wound Boxes). Notice that even though Agumon failed the Skill Check to Stealth, he and his Tamer tried their best to avoid a fight, which is enough to qualify for the Role-Play Affinity. Likewise, they do not lose a Tyrannomon Affinity, because even though they avoided a fight, they did not specifically retreat or refuse the fight directly.
Step Four: Deciding the Digivolution.
Once the Tamer’s Digimon has reached the point of its Digivolution, simply tally up the ticks for each potential Digimon. In most cases, the choice will be clear cut, with Affinities favouring one Digimon above the rest. However, there may be some times where the choice is more difficult, either because the Affinities are equal or possibly because the Affinities are skewed too heavily in one direction. In this scenario, you can use your own discretion as GM to make the final decisions.
Example 1
“Agumon is ready to Digivolve. Counting up the Affinities, Greymon is in the lead with 6 Role-Playing Affinities and 3 Combat Affinities. The next closest is Meramon at 2 Role-Playing, 3 Combat. The decision is simple. You tell the player that their partner has Digivolved to Greymon.”
Example 2
“Agumon is ready to Digivolve. Counting up the Affinities, Birdramon is in the lead with 8 Role-Playing Affinities. However, Birdramon has 0 Combat Affinities. Looking further down, Monochromon is second with 3 Affinities apiece, 6 in total. You decide that Monochromon’s balanced Affinities better represent the tamer and their partner’s actions up to this point. You tell the player that their partner has Digivolved to Monochromon.”
In this second example, the GM chose to give more weight to balance rather than total Affinities when deciding on the Digimon's Digivolution. This is fine, and as GM you will always have final say. Likewise, it’s equally fine to accept the Digimon with the highest total Affinity, regardless of whether they have very few or no Role-Playing/Combat Affinities.
Finishing Up
Once Digivolution has been decided, the player creates their next form and adds it to their sheet just like normal. After that session, the cycle starts again from Step One, forming a new shortlist of Digimon and Affinities for their next form, in the example’s case, Ultimate/Perfect.
In Conclusion and Final Thoughts
In the end, this is a homebrew in name only. It doesn’t affect mechanics per se. In fact, if you boil it down to its base parts, this is literally just several pages about choosing Digimon for your players. After all, you could have just picked at random, chosen of your own accord or just told the players to do it themselves. It’s in the rules after all! However, what I hoped to achieve here is a method with which to role-play and portray the scenario of the Digi-Destined seen throughout the seasons of the show, the excitement of your first V-Pet toy and so on. Tai didn’t know his Agumon would Digivolve into Greymon and in your game world, neither would the players. Having the players go in blind can bring a little extra mystery and excitement to the game. More importantly, telling your players that their actions directly influence their partner’s form can get them thinking a little harder about their role-playing.
These rules or guidelines won’t be for everyone, but I certainly hope you’ll consider giving them a try.
If you have any questions then please don’t hesitate to ask. Also, if you have ideas for Affinities then please post them. They don’t need to be specific to a Digimon, in fact it’s best if they aren’t so GM’s can customise their Digivolution Paths to their liking.
Hope you enjoy!
Introduction and Backstory
I play in a playgroup with very varied knowledge in Digimon, and one thing that comes up often from all players is a preference to have their Digimon partners decided by GM. Whether that's because of a lack of knowledge of the setting, or a wish to enact scenarios closer to the TV show and games, I've had a bit of experience and a lot of thought about how such a system would work. To clarify, this is similar to how the Digi-Destined rarely know the identity/species of their partner and almost never know which species they will Digivolve to. To make things clear early on, most of these ideas and concepts are flavour oriented, not mechanics oriented, and aside from a bit more work from the GM, will in no way impact game balance.
In my first play-test game a looooong way back, during about Version 0.8 or so, the players randomized a Rookie/Child Digimon partner. When it came time for their partners to Digivolve, I gave the players the option to Digivolve to any species listed on their partner's wikimon.net page OR they could randomize a species from that list and in return gain a few bonus DP. It was a short game, mainly to test mechanics, so didn't suffer much imbalance from the bonus DP. There is certainly a little merit in exploring that option, or similar options further, but I lack the in-game experience to say how unbalancing or disruptive bonus DP would be (probably quite a bit), and instead choose to leave this here for interests sake.
With my most recent session and newest playgroup, we played another one-off to gauge interest in the setting and mechanics of the game, this time using the Version 1.0 rules. Players chose their partner Digimon's Rookie/Child stage. At the end of the game, I asked the players, should the game continue, if they would like to choose their Champion/Adult forms or would prefer to be surprised. All of them chose to have their partners chosen for them.
After that play-test/one-off, I've spent a lot of time thinking about a system to determine Digivolution paths for players that prefer their partner's forms to be a surprise. What follows is what I came up with.
The Digivolution Path
For the purposes of this system, we will be assuming the players are starting with Rookie/Child Digimon. However, this will work fine with all stages, if perhaps needing a little more creativity during Fresh/Baby, In-Training/Baby II stages.
To explain and illustrate the system, I will have an example under each step. For tradition's sake, we'll use Agumon.
Step One: Planning the Path
So your player has picked (or randomed) Agumon as their starter. To begin, gather a short list of possible Champion/Adult forms. These will be potential Digivolutions for this player's partner.
For this example we pick:
• Greymon
• Tyrannomon
• Meramon
• Monochromon
• Birdramon
Your short list can be as long or as short as you like; longer lists give more options but are more effort on the GM's part, both to create and track.
Step Two: Adding the Affinity
Once you have your list, it's time to work on your Affinities. These are preferences that lean the player's partner towards a certain Digivolution. Essentially, these act similar to the prerequisites Digimon required to Digivolve in most videogames, including the original V-Pets. Affinities are little, hidden "rules" that each species prefers or favors and will help guide the GM into deciding what Digivolution makes sense for each player and their Digimon. Every time a player or their partner acts in a way appropriate to a species' Affinity, the Digimon gets a check next to that Affinity. Each potential Digimon can have as many Affinities as you prefer. Personally, I would recommend two each, one Role-Play Affinity and one Combat Affinity.
Role-Play Affinities are actions that are entirely covered by Role-Play, and tend to be broader than Combat Affinities. Decisions the players make both for themselves or their Digimon, regardless of success or failure can influence Role-Play Affinities. These can include putting themselves in danger for the sake of others, to preferring diplomacy over direct combat.
Combat Affinities are actions that are mostly covered by combat, although can come up during skill checks and other situations. Combat Affinities are less under the player's control and refer more to actions that affect their partner directly. These can include being reduced to 0 Wound boxes, to succeeding on a specific skill check.
Any easy way to differentiate the two Affinities is to think of it thusly: Role-Play Affinities define actions taken by both player and Digimon, portraying their personality, beliefs and goals. Combat Affinities are actions that affect the Digimon directly and are not always under their or their Tamer's control.
When choosing Affinities, it is best to think of broad actions, rather than specific goals. These are guidelines to help you decide which path their partner will go down. Having the Affinities be too complex or too inconsistent will only make your work harder. For example it's much easier to have "Succeed on two successive Skill checks" as a Combat Affinity, compared to "Succeed on two successive Brain Skill checks with at least one Critical Success."
Continuing with our example, these are our Agumon’s potential Digivolutions and their respective Affinities:
Greymon
Role-Play Affinity: Co-operation. Actions that support or encourage co-operation increase this Affinity. Selfish actions reduce this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Intelligent Fighting. Winning a combat without any ally being reduced to 0 Wound boxes increase this Affinity.
Tyrannomon
Role-Play Affinity: Warrior. Actions that support or encourage combat and fighting increase this Affinity. Retreating or refusing a fight directly reduces this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Tyrant. When this Digimon reduces an opponent to 0 Wound Boxes, increase this Affinity.
Meramon
Role-Play Affinity: Hot-Headed. Actions that support or encourage haste, impatience and/or quick thinking increase this Affinity. Refusing to act quickly or choosing to wait reduces this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Haste. When this Digimon rolls highest initiative, increase this Affinity.
Monochromon
Role-Play Affinity: Defender. Actions that support or encourage protecting others increase this Affinity. Refusing to protect innocents in danger reduces this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Martyr. When this Digimon or its tamer successfully Intercedes, increase this Affinity.
Birdramon
Role-Play Affinity: Peacemaker. Actions that support or encourage avoiding combat increase this Affinity. Fighting without provocation reduces this Affinity.
Combat Affinity: Counter. When this Digimon successfully wounds a Digimon that wounded it previously, increase this Affinity.
Step Three: Tallying the Ticks
Now that you have your Digivolution Path list and their Affinities, make sure to write them down and keep them with you as you run the game, making sure to keep the information hidden. During play, whenever a player and/or their Digimon partner act in according to an appropriate Role-Play Affinity, mark a check, tick or some other mark next to that Digimon. Likewise, when a Digimon (or rarely, Tamer) accomplishes or is subjected to an appropriate Combat Affinity, mark a slightly different check, tick or mark. Even better, have a separate section for the two Affinities, marking each accordingly. If for any reason a Digimon or their partner acts in a way that would reduce a potential Digivolution's Affinity, simply erase that affinity's tick.
For example: “Agumon and his party have discovered a pack of Goburimon/Goblimon resting in a camp. Agumon’s Tamer suggests that the party sneak around the camp, preferring to avoid a fight if possible. Unfortunately, Agumon failed the Stealth skill check and alerted the Goburimon, who then engaged in combat. During the fight, Agumon Intercedes to protect his ally Patamon, taking the hit that would have reduced Patamon’s Wound Boxes to 0. Shortly after, the party defeats the Goburimon.”
In this example, you would tick a Birdramon Role-Play Affinity (attempting to avoid a fight), a Monochromon Combat Affinity (successfully using the Intercede action) and a Greymon Combat Affinity (no party member was reduced to 0 Wound Boxes). Notice that even though Agumon failed the Skill Check to Stealth, he and his Tamer tried their best to avoid a fight, which is enough to qualify for the Role-Play Affinity. Likewise, they do not lose a Tyrannomon Affinity, because even though they avoided a fight, they did not specifically retreat or refuse the fight directly.
Step Four: Deciding the Digivolution.
Once the Tamer’s Digimon has reached the point of its Digivolution, simply tally up the ticks for each potential Digimon. In most cases, the choice will be clear cut, with Affinities favouring one Digimon above the rest. However, there may be some times where the choice is more difficult, either because the Affinities are equal or possibly because the Affinities are skewed too heavily in one direction. In this scenario, you can use your own discretion as GM to make the final decisions.
Example 1
“Agumon is ready to Digivolve. Counting up the Affinities, Greymon is in the lead with 6 Role-Playing Affinities and 3 Combat Affinities. The next closest is Meramon at 2 Role-Playing, 3 Combat. The decision is simple. You tell the player that their partner has Digivolved to Greymon.”
Example 2
“Agumon is ready to Digivolve. Counting up the Affinities, Birdramon is in the lead with 8 Role-Playing Affinities. However, Birdramon has 0 Combat Affinities. Looking further down, Monochromon is second with 3 Affinities apiece, 6 in total. You decide that Monochromon’s balanced Affinities better represent the tamer and their partner’s actions up to this point. You tell the player that their partner has Digivolved to Monochromon.”
In this second example, the GM chose to give more weight to balance rather than total Affinities when deciding on the Digimon's Digivolution. This is fine, and as GM you will always have final say. Likewise, it’s equally fine to accept the Digimon with the highest total Affinity, regardless of whether they have very few or no Role-Playing/Combat Affinities.
Finishing Up
Once Digivolution has been decided, the player creates their next form and adds it to their sheet just like normal. After that session, the cycle starts again from Step One, forming a new shortlist of Digimon and Affinities for their next form, in the example’s case, Ultimate/Perfect.
In Conclusion and Final Thoughts
In the end, this is a homebrew in name only. It doesn’t affect mechanics per se. In fact, if you boil it down to its base parts, this is literally just several pages about choosing Digimon for your players. After all, you could have just picked at random, chosen of your own accord or just told the players to do it themselves. It’s in the rules after all! However, what I hoped to achieve here is a method with which to role-play and portray the scenario of the Digi-Destined seen throughout the seasons of the show, the excitement of your first V-Pet toy and so on. Tai didn’t know his Agumon would Digivolve into Greymon and in your game world, neither would the players. Having the players go in blind can bring a little extra mystery and excitement to the game. More importantly, telling your players that their actions directly influence their partner’s form can get them thinking a little harder about their role-playing.
These rules or guidelines won’t be for everyone, but I certainly hope you’ll consider giving them a try.
If you have any questions then please don’t hesitate to ask. Also, if you have ideas for Affinities then please post them. They don’t need to be specific to a Digimon, in fact it’s best if they aren’t so GM’s can customise their Digivolution Paths to their liking.
Hope you enjoy!