Help me actually understand Winds of Fate.

[hogarth]

Anyway, adding more columns to a chart makes the game more complicated, but it also makes the character more powerful.

Adding a column full of "niche" powers only makes you more powerful if you compare it to adding nothing at all (which is a dumb comparison); if you compare it to adding a column of frequently useful powers, it makes you weaker.

Similarly, I could argue that adding an awesome card to a deck of shitty Magic cards makes it more powerful than adding nothing at all, but so what? It's a contrived example.

[Ice9]

You still average 1/3 of an optimal maneuver per turn, but sometimes you get 2 optimal maneuvers in one hand, but that's a waste so your chances of getting such an option at all are worse.

Ok, I think we're talking past each-other here, because in a card-based system you do not draw a whole new hand every turn. Because that would be stupid, and you may as well use a chart at that point. You know MtG right? More like that, although I would allow discarding cards voluntarily to free up hand space.

So:
1) Draw cards until you have six.
2) Play zero or more cards.
3) Discard zero or more cards.

Drawing multiple optimal maneuvers is not a waste, because you use the "extras" on your next turn. Nonetheless, I'm not even saying that there are no advantages to a chart - being able to guarantee that you always get both a single-target and crowd control power is a good thing. But it's a trade-off, because the greater tactical control cards give you is a good thing too. Hence, my support for having both options available.

[Username17]

Adding a column full of "niche" powers only makes you more powerful if you compare it to adding nothing at all (which is a dumb comparison)

That is actually exactly the comparison, and it's the way charts are different from decks. In a chart based system adding a column of niche maneuvers makes you more powerful. In a deck system adding a pile of niche maneuver cards makes you less powerful. It makes you less powerful even if you increase hand size to compensate.

Ok, I think we're talking past each-other here, because in a card-based system you do not draw a whole new hand every turn. Because that would be stupid, and you may as well use a chart at that point. You know MtG right? More like that, although I would allow discarding cards voluntarily to free up hand space.

No, that would be an example of a very slow and shitty WoF. Since the optimal solution in almost all cases would be to discard everything you didn't use anyway - after all it was something other than the maneuver you actually used, making it statistically likely to be worse than a random card out of your deck in your present encounter.

But even then that doesn't change the math that your chances of drawing a maneuver out of a specific list are lower if you increase deck and hand size proportionately. That's just how deck size math works. There is a reason why in Magic tournaments, almost every viable deck is also the minimum possible size.

-Username17

[Ice9]

No, that would be an example of a very slow and shitty WoF. Since the optimal solution in almost all cases would be to discard everything you didn't use anyway - after all it was something other than the maneuver you actually used, making it statistically likely to be worse than a random card out of your deck in your present encounter.

Man what? Does planning ahead sound familiar?

Ok, so this turn you drew Hell Swamp (crowd control) and Ride The Lightning (charge attack at single target). There are a bunch of mooks between you and Baron Jerkface. If you use RTL right now, you'd take lots of AoOs and then get ganged up on. But, if you use Hell Swamp first and eliminate the mooks, you can RTL next turn for massive damage. And in fact, you don't even need Hell Swamp - as long as anyone on your team is likely to deal with the minions, it's worth keeping RTL in your hand.

Ditto with - for example - drawing Vampiric Touch when you're not injured yet but are likely to be soon. Or Mass Snake's Swiftness when your allies won't be in position until next round. Or a fucking ton of things.

The only time you want to cycle your entire hand is when the cards are inapplicable not just to the current situation, but to the entire battle. And honestly, you shouldn't have very many of those, either in a deck or a chart-based WoF. "Thing that is only usable occasionally" is not a good combination with "You only have a 1/6 chance to get it even when it is usable".

There is a reason why in Magic tournaments, almost every viable deck is also the minimum possible size.

And why would this be different? When you mentioned it about one page ago, it was in the context of characters like Wizards or Gadgeteers that could swap out which powers they had prepared. So levelling up = bigger collection of cards, not necessarily a bigger deck.

And yes, that means "level 1 should be insultingly simple, level 20 should be crazy complex" can go die in a fire. Experienced players end up in campaigns that start at 1st level, and newbies join games that are already at 10th+. Make your "introductory characters for newbies" thing orthogonal to level. Not to mention that even experienced players vary in how much complexity they enjoy.

[Ice9]

Incidentally, the talk of swapping out powers made me think about what types of swapping different WoFs would support.
* Card based WoF is better for swapping out individual powers. For instance - "I'll replace these Ghost Walls with Conjure Giant Frog and Stealth Regeneration."
* Chart based WoF is better for swapping entire columns. For instance - When a Berserker goes into rage, remove the Tricky Fighting column and replace it with the Primal Fury column.
* Pretty much any system is equally good for swapping the entire chart/deck/whatever.

[Draco_Argentum]

No, that would be an example of a very slow and shitty WoF. Since the optimal solution in almost all cases would be to discard everything you didn't use anyway - after all it was something other than the maneuver you actually used, making it statistically likely to be worse than a random card out of your deck in your present encounter.

That makes no sense at all. The deck and my hand are both knowns. Assume there are five cards that are awesome for the current fight in my twenty card deck. If I draw five cards and two of them are awesome then I know there are three left in the remaining fifteen.

Why would I discard a card I know to be awesome for a chance at getting some other awesome cards? Its clearly better to keep whichever awesome card you didn't play this round and draw four more.

[DSMatticus]

A card-based WoF is an iterative selection of individual cards at random. Whether you redraw the entire hand (bad) or you keep the cards you want and redraw the ones you don't (better), there is no relationship between any of the cards in your hand. None. Whatsoever. In statistical terms, the probability of drawing any single card is independent of the probability of drawing any other single card.

A chart-based WoF is a single selection of an entire group of cards at random. There is a relationship between all of the 'cards' you have, in that if you have power X from row 2, you must also have power Y from row 2, by definition. The groups are predefined, and players can build them in an intelligent way that has meaningful choices, which drawing your hand at random does not do.

This is the beauty of the chart-based system over the card-based system. In the card-based variant, you add cards you like to the deck, in the hopes you will draw them when you need them. If half your deck is 'niche-cards', there is a very real chance (slightly less than 50%) you will draw a hand full of niche cards and you will be a very, very unhappy camper most of the time that happens. But in a matrix you can fill half of your columns with niche cards without concern, because the other half of the columns for that row can contain generically useful abilities.

As a matter of fact, this is the beauty of the chart-based WoF entirely. As long as you have one power that is at least always useful for every row in the chart, you are guaranteed to never have a 'bad' result on the table. Every other column in the table can have some random niche power, as long as column 1 has something useful. For a 3x5 matrix, that is 3 powers that must be useful in nearly all situations, and 12 that can be situational/unique/interesting powers. 80% of your matrix can be random situational crap, and you'll still always have something useful to do. If your deck is 80% situational crap, slightly less than 80% of the time you'll have nothing useful to do.

And this comes back to what I said at the start - in a deck-based WoF, there is no relationship between cards. Drawing one niche card does not guarantee you won't draw another four and fill your entire hand with niche cards (hand size of 5 in this case). That is bad, because nobody wants that.

In a chart-based WoF, there is a strong relationship between 'cards'. Really strong. Like, drawing a single card literally determines the rest of your hand, because that card is paired with four other specific cards. You can never draw an all-niche hand if you put one non-niche ability in every row.

To put it very succintly, let's pretend we're playing Magic the Gathering/Yugioh/Poker/whatever. You have two options.
1) You may take one random card after another from the deck until you have a hand of the right size.
2) You may take the deck and arrange it into individual hands, and then pick one of those hands at random.

Imagine that for poker, for example. It's obviously better to build a bunch of hands and randomly pick one of those because when you're building those hands you won't make any that suck. When you pick a bunch of individual cards at random, you can't guarantee they won't suck.

(Also, side question: how long is it before it's thread necromancy? If this is a raise dead casting I owe somebody a lot of diamonds.)

[Ice9]

That is an advantage of chart-based WoF. However, it is not quite as overwhelming as you make it out to be. The "90% niche" chart is still bad, because you the majority of your niche powers will be wasted. A power that is only useful 1/10 of the time and only has a 1/6 chance to be rolled might get used once in the adventure, or even campaign. Or maybe never, if you're unlucky. Bottom-line - extremely niche powers are not really desirable in WoF.

And while the card-based WoF doesn't help you with cards that are niche to a particular enemy, it does help you with cards that are niche to a particular tactical situation.
* Let's say you have "Crashing Wave Throw" that sends someone flying back when you hit them. It doesn't do great damage, so it's main use is throwing people into hazards or getting them away from your back line. * Now, let's say you're fighting in field of acid geysers, so there definitely are things to toss people into. However, the geysers aren't "on" every round and people aren't always in position to be tossed into them. So it might be 2-3 rounds before you get a good opportunity.
In Chart-Based WoF: If you roll "Crashing Wave Throw", but the foes aren't in position - too bad. Doesn't matter if they'll be in position next round, you lost your chance.
In Card-Based WoF: If you draw "Crashing Wave Throw", then you can hold it for the next opportunity. And knowing that you have the card, you can move into position to use it next round.

That last point is a big one - in Chart-WoF, any manuever that takes two or more rounds to set up is a total gamble. Whether we're talking a team-combo or solo, it has to happen within one round or not at all.

[DSMatticus]

The 90% niche chart is vastly more playable than a 90% niche deck, though, which is what I set out to establish. The difference is: is "Crashing Wave Throw" in your matrix, but you have only a medium chance of getting it when you need it, or did you have to cut "Crashing Wave Throw" out of your deck to make room for "face stab #6" because your proportion of facestabs just needs to be higher in the deck than in the matrix? Having it and not getting it sucks. Not having it at all is boring.

But you do bring up an issue, and it shows us that any good WoF system probably has a reserve.

Imagine a WoF where every player begins combat with two powers (perhaps they are forced to roll for them, perhaps they may take X and select them with a few minutes of preparation). At the end of each turn, they refill their reserve of two, replacing the power they used (or both, if they did somehow), and maybe we give them the option to replace the other as well if they don't like it.

In this case, the character can 'search' the matrix twice as fast, getting them powers they want quicker. And when they do get a power they want, they can hold onto it for the next few rounds in combat incase it's what they want for the fight, but it doesn't work in this specific round (Crashing Wave Throw), and they still have something useful to do other than standard attack - the other power in reserve.

Also, the take X variant models characters with signature moves (they always get to use their signature move once per fight, if they prepped with it), and it models ambushers - the first two rounds of an ambush, the ambushers use the exact powers they had prepared to best ambush the enemy. And then after that, the tactical advantage of the ambush slowly diminishes towards randomness.

[Lago PARANOIA]

So, Josh, any more experience/reports on WoF?

[DragonChild]

So, Josh, any more experience/reports on WoF?

That was from a single session of my game, which ended at the end of the semester.