Elennsar wrote:
Would it make any difference to have an outline of a map now, or not?
Not really. Until we've worked out how far apart battles are, how much travelling is going to take place, how large battlefields are, how much choice the players have over the place of battlefield, how much the DM can change the map and so on, then drawing a map is silly because in all likelihood it would need to be completely changed several times over.
Which makes me think. Based on this and various other things you've said (unfortunately none of which I can recall offhand) this project seems more like a single campaign than a RPG that can be applied to other situations.
After all, you've got a specific NPC, obviously specific cultures, geography and so on, with a narrow field of what the PCs are going to do, and most of the story planned out. That does seem more like a single campaign than a system to me.
Oh, and an island sounds good. Or at least a peninsula.
So, are you going for the idea that heroic characters and bastardy characters are equal but different?
That bastardy characters will use ambushes, dirty tactics and so on, will have less chance of death but won't be able to trust their underlings and will have a harder time in straight up battle because their side is less likely to fight to the death? And players will be discouraged from playing this sort of character by the players agreeing not to beforehand?
That heroic characters will take risks to help others and keep their troops alive, will have battles to try to save villages surrounded by ravagers, will be supported when they need it most but will have a much higher risk of death? And players will be encouraged to play this sort of character by the players agreeing to beforehand?
If so, then I see two main problems. Firstly since you don't want backstory to have too much effect on the game, the heroic players are a lot more likely to die or be captured. If so, then the player will need a new character, even if it is just while their normal one is being rescued. During this time, they gain no benefits from the heroic deeds, and indeed the army might be demoralised whilst the hero is missing. Since you want the player to care about the new PC, this could end up with the player having two PCs to play. This would punish the player for performing heroic acts, which is adverse conditioning teaching the player not to be heroic.
Secondly, since there will be multiple people playing, some of them could play heroic characters and some could play bastardy characters, and the group as a whole is better off. This is like when a player really wants to play a Paladin in D&D, but one or two of the rest of the party want to do something naughty so for the good of the game the Paladin PC acts like a retard for a while.
It can be viewed that the only reason people do good for rewards. Whether it is for rewards that they think they will get after they die, for karmic rewards, for other peoples praise, for thinking more of themselves than otherwise, because doing the right thing also has side benefits, or what.
There are fewer reasons for players to make PCs do the right thing.
One of the main reasons for players to play heroic characters is to feel good about themselves. This could be because they admire themselves for doing so, because the rest of the players congratulate and encourage doing so, because they get endorphins from winning or doing something cool.
The only one of these three you have any control over is the third. And to do that you need to make being heroic different in the game, better in some way and capable of giving that winning rush of endorphins. At the moment it doesn't, and actively trains the player not to do good. So, to counteract the teaching the player not to do good, you only really have the rest of the group who will all also be trained not to do good.
This is going to lead the whole group to feel worse about doing good. In effect, you are training players to not do good. You could even say that you are training evil-doers and as such must be stopped.
Oh shit, I started babbling and I don't know how much to delete. Oh well, I'll just shove the whole thing on the board.
