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Akumakaji Cadet
Joined: 28 Nov 2019 Posts: 14
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Posted: Wed Dec 04, 2019 8:55 am Post subject: Defense against the Force - Willpower skill? |
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Hello everyone,
I want to talk about defensiv rolls against force powers and wether you should allow Willpower to be used. In the core rules, a lot of the more mental force powers roll either against the Control skill or the Perception attribute of the victim. Some powers also give the option of a Willpower roll (Inflict Pain, Waves of Darkness) while others only have Willpower as the defensive means against it (Merge Senses).
So, from a story perspective, I think that Willpower makes a lot of sense, maybe even more so then Perception, but Willpower is a Knowledge skill, which is a bit unfortunate in this regard.
Mechanically speaking, most non-force users have litte defenses against force powers, which is in most cases just their Perception total and thus will most likely max out at 4D, while force users can increase their force skills as much as they like to invest in them, so they will be much stronger on the offense and defense.
Then there is, of course, the force power Force of Will (FoW), which essentially adds Willpower to a force users resistance roll, with the possibility that the Willpower might be battered and reduced. I really like that concept, so why not use the same mechanic for everyone?
So everyone could use their control skills or perception attribute to resist force powers being used against them OR use their Willpower skill, but with the possibility that their Willpower might be battered and reduced. To differenciate it from the power FoW (and give a Jedi an incentive to use that power at all) maybe let every resistance roll with the Willpowerskill let your WP be battered and reduced.
At least with this you got an option to learn a skill to defend vs force powers being used against you. Willpower is a usefull skill, but it isn't on the A-List of skills, so to speak. But I could see that military special units or the various anti-jedi units (purge troopers, inquisitors stormtroopers, clone troopers) being trained in Willpower, to evene the odds somewhat. |
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MrNexx Rear Admiral
Joined: 25 Mar 2016 Posts: 2248 Location: San Antonio
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Posted: Wed Dec 04, 2019 4:45 pm Post subject: |
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I think Willpower makes a lot of sense for resisting things... especially, say, Affect Mind. _________________ "I've Seen Your Daily Routine. You Are Not Busy!"
“We're going to win this war, not by fighting what we hate, but saving what we love.”
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Random_Axe Lieutenant Commander
Joined: 11 Sep 2013 Posts: 102 Location: Toronto
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Posted: Wed Dec 04, 2019 11:03 pm Post subject: |
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IMC, I don't use the "Willpower" skill at all -- it doesn't make sense to me that one would "know" how to exercise willpower. I do agree that will-power should not be a Knowledge-based skill, but more Perception-based. I also further agree with you that someone with a high in-born power of will, ought to be able to use that self-certainty to resist Force Powers being used against them.
For that reason, I allow the Command skill to be used by non-Force-users to resist mind-affecting Force powers. The Command skill, to me, is also a measure of an individual's SELF-Command, not just the ability to command others. A high-ranking military official seems to me to have a higher level of self control and innate willpower, than a lower level conscript. Thus, the Command skill speaks to both aspects of the individual's power of personality.
So, wherever a Force power allows a Control or Perception roll to resist the effect, I change it to say a Control or Command skill roll to resist it. |
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Whill Dark Lord of the Jedi (Owner/Admin)
Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Posts: 10397 Location: Columbus, Ohio, USA, Earth, The Solar System, The Milky Way Galaxy
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Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 12:19 am Post subject: |
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This has come up several times over the years here.
The Force has a strong influence on the weak-minded, so it stands to reason that the converse would also be true, that the Force has a weak influence on the strong-minded. Weak and strong here seem to be measures of willpower.
In 1e, there was no Willpower skill, but base Perception was used to resist the Force. Therefore, willpower seemed to be an aspect of the Perception. I used base Perception for non-Force willpower type of things too.
2e came out and Willpower was now a skill. Willpower can resist Intimidation and interrogation. But Willpower was placed in Knowledge, and base Perception is still used to resist the Force, not Willpower. Huh?
It is possible to have a strong personal force of will without being adept at leading others.
The solution to the all of this is to move Willpower to Perception, and allow Willpower (or base attribute Perception) to resist the Force. This would help explain in game terms how a character like Leia could resist Vader reading her mind on the Death Star when Luke couldn't even resist after some Jedi training (and Vader would have the same relationship modifier for either one). Leia has a very high Willpower skill.
Willpower was obviously only put in Knowledge because Knowledge was a common "dump stat" and they wanted to make Knowledge more valuable, despite Perception being a more natural home for it. I really despise game design like that. It is the GM's job to make Knowledge important in the game - We don't need skills put in the wrong attributes to force the issue.
But this is why we house rule. _________________ *
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garhkal Sovereign Protector
Joined: 17 Jul 2005 Posts: 14152 Location: Reynoldsburg, Columbus, Ohio.
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Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 1:42 am Post subject: |
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Yup. Sparks, even has an advanced skill, called Force Deterence for that reason.. It works against- receptive telepathy, sense force potential, farseeing, projective telepathy, dim other’s senses, affect mind, control mind, illusion, memory wipe, and mind rape _________________ Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk! |
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CRMcNeill Director of Engineering
Joined: 05 Apr 2010 Posts: 16272 Location: Redding System, California Sector, on the I-5 Hyperspace Route.
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Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 1:51 am Post subject: |
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I've never thought Perception worked as a catch-all defense against Force powers. Sure, it's perfect for some of them, but why would Perception matter against, for example, Telekinetic Kill? My thinking is that which Skill / Attribute is used to resist a Force power is hugely dependent on exactly what the Force power does. A physical attack like Force Lightning or TK Kill should be resisted by Strength; something like Receptive Telepathy where the character is trying to conceal their thoughts should be Willpower; something like Affect Mind, where the power user is trying to deceive the character should be resisted by whichever Perception skill is appropriate (Search, Discernment, etc). _________________ "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.
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Akumakaji Cadet
Joined: 28 Nov 2019 Posts: 14
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Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 9:34 am Post subject: |
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CRMcNeill wrote: | I've never thought Perception worked as a catch-all defense against Force powers. Sure, it's perfect for some of them, but why would Perception matter against, for example, Telekinetic Kill? |
I think the idea here is force of personality. Star Wars has no traditional charisma stat, but all the social skills are bundled together under perception. having a strong and robust personality and selfworth is required to boss others around, to exert command over them etc ... and it should also protect you vs manipulative attempts, be them a con, an intimidation or reading your thoughts. |
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CRMcNeill Director of Engineering
Joined: 05 Apr 2010 Posts: 16272 Location: Redding System, California Sector, on the I-5 Hyperspace Route.
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Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 10:29 am Post subject: |
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That's not what Perception really is, though. The Perception attribute, by definition, is "the character's ability to notice things about his surroundings and other characters." Force of will doesn't really enter into it, and is actually officially classified under the Knowledge attribute (both Willpower and Intimidation are officially classified here). _________________ "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.
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Akumakaji Cadet
Joined: 28 Nov 2019 Posts: 14
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Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 10:47 am Post subject: |
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CRMcNeill wrote: | That's not what Perception really is, though. The Perception attribute, by definition, is "the character's ability to notice things about his surroundings and other characters." Force of will doesn't really enter into it, and is actually officially classified under the Knowledge attribute. |
That is true per RAW ... but per RAW knowledge also is a "measure of your characters common sense and academic knowledge", so Willpower is actually quite the oddball skill and could also have ended up under strength, for all its worth, to represent mental thoughness.
But even though perception is "the character's ability to notice things about his surroundings and other characters" its also the home of bargain, command, con and persuation, so it IS the best representation in the game we have for a charisma and/or social measure of the character, thats why I got the feeling that its a better home for willpower. But in the end this doesn't amounting to much of a difference, the real question is if you should be able to resist force powers with a skill that is much more easy to increase then an attribute. |
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CRMcNeill Director of Engineering
Joined: 05 Apr 2010 Posts: 16272 Location: Redding System, California Sector, on the I-5 Hyperspace Route.
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Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 10:57 am Post subject: |
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You're trying to shove a square peg into a round hole here. The WEG rules effectively divide the "traditional" Charisma attribute between Perception and Knowledge; it does not fit cleanly into one or the other. _________________ "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.
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Whill Dark Lord of the Jedi (Owner/Admin)
Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Posts: 10397 Location: Columbus, Ohio, USA, Earth, The Solar System, The Milky Way Galaxy
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Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 5:56 pm Post subject: |
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Quote: | I think the idea here is force of personality. Star Wars has no traditional charisma stat, but all the social skills are bundled together under perception. having a strong and robust personality and selfworth is required to boss others around, to exert command over them etc ... and it should also protect you vs manipulative attempts, be them a con, an intimidation or reading your thoughts. |
Yep.
Quote: | That's not what Perception really is, though. The Perception attribute, by definition, is "the character's ability to notice things about his surroundings and other characters." Force of will doesn't really enter into it, and is actually officially classified under the Knowledge attribute (both Willpower and Intimidation are officially classified here). |
So GMs are debating if RAW placed the new skills in the proper attribute in the first place, and your argument here is RAW is correct because it is official? Remember, there are forum guidelines against arguing RAW supremacy just because RAW is official. And the official placement is suspect since knowledge is the most common "dump stat" in this game, and an aspect of willpower was already inherent in Perception before the skill existed.
In Star Wars, Intimidation more clearly belongs in Perception than Willpower. It is a personal influence skill. Using it is trying to force someone to bend to your will, give secret information, make someone afraid of you, etc. Intimidation belongs with Command, Persuasion, etc.
Quote: | That is true per RAW ... but per RAW knowledge also is a "measure of your characters common sense and academic knowledge", so Willpower is actually quite the oddball skill and could also have ended up under strength, for all its worth, to represent mental thoughness. |
Willpower is the odd man out. In some games, Willpower is its own attribute. So unless you are going to add another attribute to your game, the question for every GM is, where is the best place for Willpower.
Quote: | But even though perception is "the character's ability to notice things about his surroundings and other characters" its also the home of bargain, command, con and persuation, so it IS the best representation in the game we have for a charisma and/or social measure of the character, thats why I got the feeling that its a better home for willpower. |
I'm right here with you, Red Three.
Quote: | You're trying to shove a square peg into a round hole here. The WEG rules effectively divide the "traditional" Charisma attribute between Perception and Knowledge; it does not fit cleanly into one or the other. |
You can put skills under whatever attribute you see fit in your game, but that's a rather square peg comment to make about someone else's choice. Charisma is social awareness/interaction/influence. In R&E, Perception has 10 skills. Bargain, Command, Con, and Persuasion are social awareness/interaction/influence. Gambling has a huge social/interpersonal aspect to it, while Investigation includes a minor element of it too. The rest of the skills are more physical awareness, the other thing WEG includes with Perception. Knowledge doesn't have any skills with a significant Charisma aspect to it, so I am not seeing this "divide" at all. "Charisma" fits very close to completely within Perception. All the official and unofficial D6/D20 conversions have Charisma only correlate with Perception and no other Star Wars attributes. But we really don't have to look to D&D and other games for guidance on house ruling our game.
Perception is clearly social and physical awareness. It always has been. However one aspect of "willpower" in general has always also been a part of the Perception attribute, resisting the Force. 2e gave us more willpower with the new Knowledge skill, but willpower in general is now divided between two attributes in RAW. (Force willpower is inherent in one and non-Force willpower is a skill in the other.) If any GM is ok with that, then great. More power to you. If a GM wants to keep the Willpower skill in Knowledge, and take Force resistance away from Perception and add it to the Knowledge skill Willpower, then great. More power to you. But it is not a square peg to put the Willpower skill (and Intimidation) with other force of 'personality' type of skills in Perception.
Quote: | But in the end this doesn't amounting to much of a difference, the real question is if you should be able to resist force powers with a skill that is much more easy to increase then an attribute. |
I'm sorry. There are a few topics here that some of us never agree on, and the new skills in 2e is one of them. I thought it was relevant to the question. I think the "Willpower" skill should be allowed to resist the Force because I think Obi-Wan (ANH), Jabba (RotJ), and Anakin (AotC) were all telling the truth about the Force working more easily against the weak-minded. I feel 1e putting that ability in Perception was the best choice of the attributes available, and I don't feel that the two aspects of Willpower should be separate. And I like the skill option better than base attribute because it can allow for non-Force characters to have a good resistance to the Force.
No matter which attribute the Willpower skill is on, I feel the skill should be allowed to resist the Force. _________________ *
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Bren Vice Admiral
Joined: 19 Aug 2010 Posts: 3868 Location: Maryland, USA
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Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2019 12:41 am Post subject: |
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Personally, I prefer to have Intimidation and Willpower unlinked rather than placing both under the same attribute. Just because one is good at scaring other people that doesn't make one good at resisting being scared. Bullies who are really afraid on the inside is both a common trope and often true.
While psychological intimidation certainly is a thing, in action movies it's more often physical intimidation that we see and its questionable that Perception is at all important, much less more important, that STR - for example.
And being perceptive has nothing to do with the ability to keep going when physically exhausted (Stamina roll failed), to stay home and study rather than being tempted to do something that, in the short term, is more fun, to choose to turn the other cheek when struck, or not give up secrets under threat of torture. A case could be made that being perceptive is likely to make one more, rather than less, susceptible to intimidation. As a perceptive individual you are better at hearing the scary Interrogation droid and of feeling the pin prick injection of the hypo.
In real life willpower seems connected to the ability to plan ahead and to delay gratification. Things that are orthogonal to being perceptive of current events around you. (See various studies on children who, when given 1 piece of candy, either choose to eat 1 candy now or to wait some amount of time to get 2 or 3 candies later.)
None of this says that the RAW got things right, but that the arguments for chucking two more useful skills under perception really aren't all that persuasive. |
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Bren Vice Admiral
Joined: 19 Aug 2010 Posts: 3868 Location: Maryland, USA
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Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2019 12:58 am Post subject: |
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Whill wrote: | Gambling has a huge social/interpersonal aspect to it, while Investigation includes a minor element of it too. | Perceptin being a minor element of investigation is an interesting point. Consider Sherlock Holmes. What is he renowned for?
1. His ability to notice minor details. He’s perceptive.
2. His ability to remember facts. He knows things.
3. His ability take 1 and 2, think hard (often in a monomaniacal manner) and arrive at correct conclusions about what has previously occurred or what may logically occur next. He investigates and he’s good at it.
But is Holmes particularly persuasive, charming, or likable? Not really. Most of the time he’s a bit of a misogynistic @$$.
I’ve never been completely happy with being attuned to one’s environment and having keen senses necessarily being linked to being likeable, persuasive, or charming. James Fennimore Cooper’s character Hawkeye (that guy in Last of the Mohicans) is very attuned to the environment around him and can track a deer or a party of Huron Warriors across the wild. But he too isn’t all that persuasive.
I’ve also known more than a few research scientists. These are folks whose bread and butter is investigation. They don’t seem any more perceptive than anyone else and quite often they are less perceptive of many things outside their field of expertise.
All that said, I’m wondering whether putting Investigation under Knowledge is better than leaving it under Perception, as does the RAW. |
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CRMcNeill Director of Engineering
Joined: 05 Apr 2010 Posts: 16272 Location: Redding System, California Sector, on the I-5 Hyperspace Route.
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Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2019 1:07 am Post subject: |
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Bren wrote: | {snip}
None of this says that the RAW got things right, but that the arguments for chucking two more useful skills under perception really aren't all that persuasive. |
^This^
Thank you, Bren. I've had a long, stressful day at work, and don't really have the energy to form a cogent response, so I will add a hearty "what he said."
There is already a strong case to be made that Knowledge is the dump stat of the game; very little of Knowledge gets used in the course of "roll" playing, and Willpower is one of the only exceptions. Moving Willpower to Perception as the skill of Force resistance even further neuters an already weak Attribute. We should be looking at ways to expand what characters can do with Knowledge, not pare it down.
Personally, I've always thought that Intimidation needed to be under the Perception stat, as it is, in its own way, just as much of an interpersonal relations skill as many of the other Perception skills. However, being placed where it is in Knowledge makes a strong case for Knowledge being the seat of a strong, forceful personality, as opposed to merely a persuasive, manipulative one (makes one wonder if Command could be moved to Knowledge, with a Leadership skill of some kind taking its place in Perception).
EDIT: Okay, that ended up being a bit more cogent than I expected... _________________ "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.
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Whill Dark Lord of the Jedi (Owner/Admin)
Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Posts: 10397 Location: Columbus, Ohio, USA, Earth, The Solar System, The Milky Way Galaxy
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Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2019 4:26 am Post subject: |
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Bren wrote: | Personally, I prefer to have Intimidation and Willpower unlinked rather than placing both under the same attribute. Just because one is good at scaring other people that doesn't make one good at resisting being scared. Bullies who are really afraid on the inside is both a common trope and often true. |
I feel this is better argument for Willpower being its own attribute than not putting both of those skills under the same existing attribute.
Quote: | None of this says that the RAW got things right, but that the arguments for chucking two more useful skills under perception really aren't all that persuasive. |
The discussion was about Willpower and then Intimidation was brought into it. First, your comment isn't that "persuasive" either because it evokes the idea of an overall balanced attribute skillset but assumes no other changes but these too skills. If you are concerned with me making Perception too powerful, well I moved Forgery out of Perception to Technical, and I moved First Aid to Knowledge. First Aid is an extremely important skill in game. It involves using medpac technology, yes, but it involves biological knowledge too and has uses without tech, so I felt Knowledge was the overall best fit. I have also combined some Knowledge skills that strengthen skill dice allocated to Knowledge. Bureaucracy and Law Enforcement are combined into Bureaucracy/Law. Business and Value are combined into Business/Value.
Secondly, this discussion should not be attempts to persuade each other. Sometimes a GM may end up changing his mind, but I do not like the idea of persuasion because it links an attachment of the persuader to the outcome of others's decisions. We share our ideas, and it may end up helping each other. There is a distinct difference between someone saying, "I do it this way in my game because X" or "This rule works for me because X", and saying "You are doing it wrong in your game." See the difference? Up in the thread, the OP was told he was putting a square peg into a round hole because their choice. There is a difference in saying, "That doesn't work for me because X" and saying "Your way and explanation for it is trying to put a square peg into a round hole." No one's goal here should be to get others to do things their way.
Thirdly, again, despite moving skills around, I do not depend on the skillset for attribute balance. Over the course of my campaigns, virtually ALL skills will come up for my PCs to use at some point or another. I put all skills where I think they should go and Knowledge will always be important in my game because I make it important in planning my adventures. I despise munchkin players and powergaming. I make that very clear to all new players up front. Players should allocate their attributes according to their character concept, but I do not have "dump stats" in my game. All attributes should have at least one PC in the party who is good at it so the group as a whole has got the full spectrum covered. Players aren't just in it for themselves. In session zero, the player group and I as a whole hash out who's character is going to cover what before we start to fine tune character concepts. I personally find the term "dump stat" to be offensive, as if GMs are powerless to do anything about min-maxing except have more skills there. I don't need heavy handed, artificial game design methods of 'beefing up' Knowledge to prevent it from being a dump stat.
I have experienced a good degree of success with my methods, but I'm not trying to persuade anyone else to do it my way. If a GM needs more skills in Knowledge, then more power to them for doing it whatever way works for them... _________________ *
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