Psychological Effects

[garhkal]

I'll accept Esoomian's clarification for Visible target.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[CRMcNeill]

So edited. Now that that is settled, what would be some good Willpower Difficulty guidelines for characters to roll against to avoid giving in to these effects?
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[garhkal]

The editing seems to only indicate he "However, the character must still make an Easy Willpower check or remain in Frenzy and attack the first visible target. "

Nothing about the base part of frenzy i mentioned that when they intially go into it, they attack the nearest target, not just nearest Enemy.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[CRMcNeill]

[garhkal]

some of the sources in adnd (which is my most common game besides this i play) that have frenzies/beserker rages, have i where the one enraged can't tell friend from foe and just attacks everything standing. Others DO allow them to tell friend from foe but have it where if a friend does something that might be hinky, he gets a wisdom check to avoid labling him a foe.

And since this frenzy is supposed to be a BAD thing, i was taking the harsher view for it. Otherwise as you have it, its one heck of a great BENEFIT for characters (+2d to all combat skills, -2d from reactions, and ignores all wound penalties.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[Esoomian]

Is it supposed to be a bad thing? I don't see people trying to inflict frenzy on their enemies to make them easier to defeat. I see it as more like a group of individuals psyching each other up before they have to run the gauntlet of the enemy forces in order to close with their foes.

In my mind frenzy would be difficult to invoke without drugs or something similar but it would be a largely beneficial state to be in provided the person frenzied could be pointed at enemy forces and they weren't just having high tea with the royal family.
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[CRMcNeill]

Exactly. I could see a Frenzied character attacking the nearest target (friend or foe) in the event of a major Willpower fail, but not automatically.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[CRMcNeill]

Thread bump.

One of the objections raised in criticism of this idea (which I can no longer find) was that it mandated actions on PCs, by forcing them to act in ways which the players do not want. Personally, I don't have a problem with this (nobody wants their character to get shot, either, but the Rules allow it to happen, and the player must roleplay the consequences).

A simple solution would be to still use psychological effects to mandate certain actions and behaviors, but allow PCs or major NPCs to spend Force Points to override the effect. Expending a FP would still be subject to heroic vs. non-heroic usage.

Thoughts?
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[griff]

Willpower would seem to fit nicely with trying resist these effecrs.
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"EXECUTE ORDER 67. Wait a minute, that doesn't sound like order 67..... No, wait. Yes, yes it does. EXECUTE ORDER 68" Palpatine's last moments - robot chicken.

[CRMcNeill]

[Naaman]

I like the general idea. In particular, I would probably require a significantly powerful effect in order to force a PC to do something. For more mundane effects, I would try the following:

Impose penalties on actions that are not in line with the character's current psychological state. Also, you could add bonuses to actions that are appropriate to the psychological state.

For example, a character who is frightened might get a penalty on attacks, but a bonus on dodge rolls provided that he is seeking/using available cover (fighting out in the open is contrary to a frightened psychological state).

A character who is frenzied might get a bonus on attack or damage rolls, but a penalty on dodge and parry rolls.

This way, the PC isn't forced into any particular action, but will tend to act in ways that are appropriate for his mental state.

[Whill]

Fine work you're doing in this thread for GMs that like this kind of thing. Not to distract from that, but just to briefly chime in with an on-topic opposing view...

In the spirit of the interaction skill descriptions with respect to PCs starting with 1e, I've always shied away from anything forcing PCs to behave in certain ways. I'm a little more on board with with the penalties on PCs in certain mental states, but I still try avoid those too in general. I have a small list of low-powered advantages available at a cost of 1D in skill dice, but I don't even have general disadvantages.

There are a couple PC species in my game that have behavioral disadvantages, like the Herglics making Willpower rolls to resist gambling. I have a homebrew feline species who hates being wet and despises water, making Willpower rolls to go in water or get wet, and suffering various levels of penalties to all actions when in different situations involving water. But they are a fairly high powered species so need an offsetting disadvantage for game balance.

But for those species and others, I expect players to roleplay their character's psychological state realistically for the character. It's called roleplaying, not roll-playing. Per RAW, GMs discourage poor roleplaying and encourage good roleplaying with CP penalties and bonuses. I did both at first but I have long done away with the sticks and just have carrots now (a base CP award for each adventure with bonus CPs available for good roleplaying). When warranted, I've even on rare occasions met privately with a player to discuss our understandings of the character concept and write-up in relation to the PC's behavior. But I've also had players that self-impose penalties in certain situations. And cases like where the PCs split up to hit the street for information, and a player self chooses to make a Willpower roll at a self-determined difficulty to resist stopping off at the house of ill repute down the street, just because that is a struggle the PC would have based on his background and personality. 8)

Not forcing behavior on PC is why I always thought the outcome of crossing over to the dark side is the PC becomes a NPC. While the player couldn't resist making his character carry out dark actions at times, you can't force a PC to fully turn to the dark side so the GM handles the character from then on. DSPs and the threat of losing your PC forever are the sticks for extreme bad behavior that are still in my game. I have never played the redemption thing where a PC comes back to the good side because I'm not interested in running redemption stories (of the dark side nature anyway). The point is to not cross over to the Dark Side in the first place. If a PC starts getting DSPs, they can atone to remove them before it is too late.

Anyway, just throwing this perspective in here for the record. Carry on.
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[garhkal]

Whill.. Do you not have enemy Dark jedi use force powers such as affect mind, control mind etc on pcs?
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[Naaman]

Garhkal raises a good question.

We could go to the movies for some insight on how to handle these scenarios.

In particular, when Padme asks Anakin "are you going to use your Jedi mind trick on me?" He responds "that only works on the weak minded."

Some have inferred that Jabba was "immune" by virtue of his species, but Obi-Wan also told Luke right off the bat that "the Force can be a powerful influence on the weak minded." I would estimate Jabba to be at PC level of power (major villain). Also, if I'm not mistaken, didn't someone manage to mind trick Jabba in the EU? Proof that he's not immune, if we want to use EU as a canonical reference.

Watto makes the remark that being a toydarian makes him immune (or at least resistant) to the mind trick. This might be enough to give his species a bonus to resist (or out right immunity) or it might be inferred that a mind trick is not effective when money is on the line, but might work at other times.

I also like Whill's method of giving CP rewards for good role playing. That might be incentive enough, if the bonus is large enough.

[Naaman]