A Question of Lore

Grey

Grey

Dialectical Hermeticist
Afternoon, all.


I thought I'd solicit a little feedback about this design decision - I value the opinion of people who've read Crucible and those who have not yet alike.


The game has a Lore skill, which measures a character's knowledge of the secret world, of monsters, magic, and secret histories. Now, this is normally used in the way most knowledge skills get used - a player asks for information, or encounters a text or symbol, and they roll. Based on the roll, the GM tells them something (I say something because I routinely lie to players who don't roll well).


Which is fine, I suppose. But I'm considering adding something like this to the rulebook:


Lore (General) Rank 0


Your character is blissfully unaware of the magic and horror of the world. They may have heard that Vampires exist, or know some worthless habitual platitudes against Fae, but generally they'd be lucky to identify a supernatural encounter, let alone survive it.


Lore (General) Rank 1


Monsters are real. Vampires are real. Fair Folk are probably real. If you carry a holy icon, you're safer. Vampires hate holy water and sunlight, and drink blood. Never accept food from a Fairy. Salt can ward off ghosts. Magi are dangerous and not to be trusted.


Lore (General) Rank 2


Certain magical substances exist which hurt some monsters more than mundane steel. Wizards used to rule the world. There might be different kinds of Vampire. Fair Folk are dangerous, but can be bargained with. Magi have powers revolving around the elements, of different kinds.


Lore: Magic Rank 1


Magic suffuses the world and is immanent in all things. It is drawn to certain places and substances.


Would this be a bit much? I think it would be nice for players to know what their characters should know for the relative skill level, that way they can act on that info and put 2+2 together in game more organically without being spoonfed plot relevant info.
 
I think it's a good idea, since having the requisite dots would mean that you automatically know a certain amount of setting information, i.e. At Lore Rank 2, you automatically know to steer well clear of the unbroken ring of broad-capped white mushrooms you found in a forest clearing, because it's a Fairie Ring and a sure way to get your soul nommed on by alluring androgynous pointy-eared leeches. A purely 'crunch' way of letting players know how much their characters know and understand would be writing the setting descriptions for the various 'magical beings' in paragraphs with later paragraphs having more in-depth information and saying, 'Your Lore Rank 3 means you know everything upto paragraph four of that subject'.


Captain Hesperus
 
Yeah, I'm actually assembling the Bestiary that way, tiered by Lore rating.


Although anything from Lore 4 up is only in the GM section, to preserve the mystery/sanity rolls.
 
That sounds good to me. I've not read Crucible, but the crunch you've written above would satisfy me as a player in the game. I don't mind having a paragraph that tells me as a player what my character knows about the setting. And it also gives me an idea of when to boost his Lore rating based on what he's encountered in game. If he's run into all kinds of sanity-shaking stuff right out of the gate I'm going to be spending on Lore as fast as I can, whereas if he's run into one or two fae or vampires his Lore probably isn't going up unless he's had a lot of study time on his hands.
 
Cool, thanks for the feedback. This is looking more like a good investment.
 
WlfSamurai said:
I like it a lot. Especially since I may be able to use it in your TES game. :)
Click to expand...
That would be a looooooot of Lore to transcribe and sort. I don't think I could do it for TES. I'm mostly going to link people to the Wiki where necessary.
 
That could still work, you could simply say: 'Read the first to third paragraph, that's what you know off the top of your head. The rest you'll need to roll for.'


Captain Hesperus
 
Yeah, that was my thinking.


I was also going to link to in-game texts, and essentially say 'Your character has read this. I can't tell you how to interpret it, of course.'
 
I like the way it's laid out like that; lore needed a bunch of clarification, as it's extremely important if the party are going to reach any significant power level. This more in-depth treatment will make it much easier for GMs to know what information to feed players.


Also, I think a list of suggested specialties could work well, and perhaps for other skills too. I've often found keywords like that can make a character concept leap out of nowhere.
 
I do have some suggested specialties for all skills, usually three each. But for Lore each specialty will need a huge chunk written. Which I'm fine with.
 
Are there free starting specialties for certain character archetypes?


It could be an interesting approach for some of them, as a bunch of characters have training implied in their backstory.
 
Yes, that is usually a given, but not for every type. The best, simple example is that H'kaeri characters will always have a Purifier specialty. If someone's concept is for a squire or freshly anointed knight, they'll often get an armingsword specialty. If you character grew up near The Strack, it's not unreasonable for them to have a Lore specialty in Mutation or Mutants.
 
I like this idea, you could even push the limits by adding bias based on the characters background. Character A with 2 dots in Lore knows paragraph 1-3 however it's flavored with some misinformation or down right falsehoods taken as fact.
 
[QUOTE="Ian Hanrahan]I like this idea, you could even push the limits by adding bias based on the characters background. Character A with 2 dots in Lore knows paragraph 1-3 however it's flavored with some misinformation or down right falsehoods taken as fact.

[/QUOTE]
Yeah, that does sound like a good idea and very fitting. A good example is an Inquisitor - their bias tells them everything is Demons. For Monks, everything is secretly a Vampiric plot, and so on. Means a lot of extra wordcount, though, so I'd likely leave that to GM discretion with some helpful tips in the appropriate section.
 
Exactly what I was thinking, it's a really clean device for advancing plots but at the GMs' discretion as not everyone wants/needs this.
 
Especially in tabletop. PbP it's easier to PM people with what their character knows, but unless you have notes I've found I need to take people into another room a bit too frequently for just that.
 
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