ED4 Preview #3

[Roth]

[Flowswithdrek]

[Mataxes]

[Kcinlive]

I'm not sure what to think about this personally. I like the idea of not having to spend precious legend on Karma/Durability. However, I really like the idea of being able to raise my durability independent of Circle. It's one of the things I really like Earthdawn. My characters almost always have a durability higher then their current circle.

Similar thing with karma. I mean I think that having a character who "specializes" in karma is a good concept. Rather I think that if a character wants to spend the time and legend to have a lot of karma on hand, should be allowed to do that. I mean it's another way to build the character and be successful. I think the new rules might close of an avenue of character growth. You could say the same thing about durability too. Specifically we had one player who was trying to raise his durability as much as possible. He was famous for taking a point blank shot from a fire cannon and surviving.

Having said that I'm not convinced these are bad ideas. I'm just not quite sure how they will work out. And like other people have said, it's still easy enough to go back to karma ritual/durability if need be. Now a talent or something that could raise your karma step could be interesting. Though maybe that's something best left to spells/items.

-Kcinlive

[Gorro]

[Roth]

[zayven]

There's a difference between the thematic element of everything having a price and needlessly dinging players experience points to refresh what mechanically amounts to action dice. I just don't see how that's a meaningful decision in terms of character development. I can see how spending points to improve your karma ritual rank amounts to a meaningful choice, but having to spend legend to refresh to pool is just tedious.

I'd be curious to know if that design decision was originally made as a means of limiting the potentially overpowering effectiveness of characters with high Karma Ritual ranks.

Personally, I hate it when any game system forces you to pay experience points for anything other than level and core stat progression (such as improving magic items and so forth). Earthdawn isn't the only game that does this, either. It always feels like an attempt to implement a mechanic for something that should be handled purely with roleplaying.

[Slimcreeper]

We are currently experimenting with letting characters use karma as the mechanic to push yourself with blood magic. The our current rule is that you roll the karma die, even if you are out and even if you wouldn't normally be able to do so. The cost is that you take number of strain points equal to your karma roll. The damage happens after the action takes succeeds or fails, so you could use it as a last ditch effort even if you are nearly unconscious.

Furthermore - and this runs counter to the mood of the message thread - non-adepts acquire karma too - once every year and a day, up to their racial karma multiplier. Of course, most people have no idea and can't use it. Only people with the karma ritual talent or knowledge: blood magic skill can access it. I imagine village leaders that preside over blood magic rituals such as marriage and treaties know how to do it, or certain scholars, or questers.

[Roth]

Legend Points drives everything a PC does. It costs and costs and costs, driving the PC to do more and more pushing their legend further and further.

Take that away and it's D&D without the d20 system.

It's not needlessly dinging a player's legend points. The game is built around gaining and spending legend points.
Don't see how it was a limiting factor at high karma ranks, ranks that cost tens of thousands of legend points to gain compared to 150 or less legend points.

But it doesn't matter it's already done. Karma and Durability no longer are talents, makes one wonder though about all of those Talents that require karma... what happened to those...

[zayven]