What are the main mechanical problems of Werewolf the Apoc.?

[Prak]

I feel like I've done this before...

But, first of all, STAY AWAY FROM FLUFF POINTS, PLEASE. We do not need yet another discussion on the sexual habits of werewolves. Lets assume that for the purposes of this thread, and the specific game that drives it (Werewolf the Sailor Moon-Planeteering), werewolves are relatively stable individuals born from humans or other werewolves, and just have a platonic to parental fondness for regular wolves with which they have some vague empathic ability. No breeding with wolves, no designated protagonist rape vans, no "well we need to bolster our numbers, so lets round up some brood mares, I mean bar skanks."

I'm literally just asking what specific mechanical points would need to be addressed so I can just pull out published books and a notepad with house rules, and run with it, not print out a binder full of homebrew system.

Point one is double negative 1s and exploding 10s, I would assume.
Point two, I imagine, would be rebalancing the furry types.

Is that right? anything else?

[sabs]

What's wrong with exploding 10's and negative 1's? per say?

The problem is of course that it's a 1-5+1-5 roll that many d10 against a TN.

You have two options for fixing it:
1) go the Ars Magica Route. You have exploding 1's and 0 is actually 0, not 10. This means that Yahtzee is less likely to Yahtzee.
2) Go the Shadowrun 4 route. You succeed on a 78910, 10's reroll only on special occasions.

The Furry types aren't that badly out of balance, as long as you stick with the 5 werewolves. If you're going to have werecockroaches, then things get more complicated.

Ahroun have high rage, low gnosis
Ragabash have low rage, high gnosis
Everyone else is a different combo.
It's not terrible, rage is your straight up ass kicking, and Gnosis is your Spiritual/magic ass kicking.

The problem is of course one of Balance. A Rage 10 werewolf should be a walking berserker who has a hard time being in the same room as a human without attacking. Patricia Brigg's Mercy books have an interesting dynamic that the 'human' half is usually in control, but the wolf half reacts and tries to usurp control when it can. If a human acts like a rabbit, the wolf has a hard time not attacking.

You want to stress willpower vs rage rolls. And if your willpower is lower than your rage, that should be a problem.

You need to figure out a good way to have an Alpha. It should probably be a combination of Rage+willpower total compared to others.

[Prak]

Well, the problem with the dice mechanic, as I understand it is "1s are automatically a failure, and they subtract successes. If there are no successes to counter act, then they just straight up fuck you, no lube."

So if you roll 1, 3, 4, and 6 on a difficulty 6 roll, you actually didn't succeed at all. If that roll is difficulty 7, you not only fail, you botch, and something bad happens, like you hurt yourself. More 1s on a failed roll mean you hurt yourself more. Then 10s explode when you're using your specialty, which you try to do as often as possible, and most STs try to prevent as much as possible. So if your specialty is "rifles" and you're shooting someone at close range (difficulty 4), and roll 3, 4, 6 and 10, you get to roll another die because you rolled a 10 on your specialty, and continue doing so until you roll no more 10s. But what if you roll 1, 3, 4, and 10? You get to roll again because you got a 10, right?
Nope. The 1 takes away the 10 before anything else happens.

I would have ones just be failures, not success nullifiers, I think. And sure, if you get no successes and roll a 1, you sucked pretty bad, but not "welp, your character is now dead, make a new one" bad.

And auspices only determined rage, gnosis was determined by breed. Though having auspice determine both is a fix I was considering, so it's all good.

I did want to allow the full zoo of shifters, though, so spiders, cats, crows, bears, wolves, foxes, snakes, sharks and lizards-descended-from-dinosaurs. But they need to be balanced, which I would basically tackle by figuring everything as spending from freebie points, correcting costs as seems necessary, and trying to get everything costing roughly the same (within say five points), and giving or subtracting the point difference from the resulting freebie points.

the rest after that makes a lot of sense.

[CCarter]

IIRC this was the game where they basically did away with opposed rolls by having one side roll Stat+Skill vs. a difficulty target number of opponent stat+skill, instead of having a set target number and comparing numbers of successes. That desperately needs to be killed (wildly asymmetric depending on relative stats).

[sabs]

I think the solution for the dice system is to get rid of the 1's erase successes.
You fail if you have 0 successes
You 'glitch' if you have more 1's than successes
You crit glitch if you have 0 successes and some 1's. What you could do, is you pick up the 1's and roll them again. The number of 1's your roll = how badly screwed you are.

That gets rid of the double negative from 1's.

Wow, I had forgotten that Gnosis was determined by Breed, that doesn't even make any sense, since Theurge and Ragabash are supposed to be the gnosis users. I think having Auspices determine both, and breed perhaps determine starting willpower?

Humans are more able to control their wolf?

weresharks are pretty damn silly.
The dinosaurs is kinda weird, but I guess they can be cool.. who wouldn't want to play a character with a dragon war form.

[TheFlatline]

I think the solution for the dice system is to get rid of the 1's erase successes.
You fail if you have 0 successes
You 'glitch' if you have more 1's than successes
You crit glitch if you have 0 successes and some 1's. What you could do, is you pick up the 1's and roll them again. The number of 1's your roll = how badly screwed you are.

That gets rid of the double negative from 1's.

Wow, I had forgotten that Gnosis was determined by Breed, that doesn't even make any sense, since Theurge and Ragabash are supposed to be the gnosis users. I think having Auspices determine both, and breed perhaps determine starting willpower?

Humans are more able to control their wolf?

weresharks are pretty damn silly.
The dinosaurs is kinda weird, but I guess they can be cool.. who wouldn't want to play a character with a dragon war form.

The botch rules were revamped in revised werewolf. If you roll 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 9 on a difficulty 6 roll, it's still a simple failure. Botches *only* happen if you roll at least one 1 and no successes. Which makes botches happen a *lot* less often in revised.

The big mechanics rule screw-job is the variable target numbers combined with the variable successes needed mechanic. It's so goddamn nebulous that it's insane. And I'm not talking grades of success. I'm talking "difficulty 8, 3 successes required to even go off" stuff. Static target numbers in nWOD was a big improvement.

Other than that, I'm fine with gnosis being birth determined. Wolves are closer to nature than metis, and humans aren't as close to nature. Seems simple. Saying wolves or humans have varying amounts of willpower/stubbornness seems not applicable here.

Let's see... other considerations. You're going to shred vampires. You are a walking blender after all. Even elder vampires are going to get their asses handed to them (ahrouns for example get initiative with a rank 1 gift. As in, they add 10 to their init, so maybe a 3rd gen vampire who burned celerity before combat gets init). High ranking werewolves do crazy shit like light on fire and exude pure sunlight from their bodies. So just accept that vampires are going to get ashed. Other high end talents include thieving talon of the magpie (Hi! I want your celerity. Thank you it's mine and you can't use it for X turns. Plus I can spend rage on top of that.), Renew the Cycle (rank 5 silent strider. Roll... something I can't rmember and a permanent point of gnosis. You're dead. Period. Do not pass go, do not save, you're done.)

Werewolves are not built for long, drawn out fights. Rage depletes quickly, and gnosis takes forever to reclaim. Sure they can soak anything except silver, but they regen slow enough that protracted fights aren't worthwhile (and you have to make a concentration check to regen in combat).

There's other shit but I can't remember it. I actually enjoyed playing an eco-terrorist furry more than I enjoyed playing any vampire game, and since each game was it's own interpretation of the WOD ruleset, Werewolf usually had improved mechanics over Vampire (and mage was generally the most mechanically refined, since there was a year of feedback in Vampire and Werewolf going into Mage).

[Prak]

Well, due to the game idea, villains were going to pretty much just be non-crossover Pentex execs and fomori. Wasn't going to worry about vampires, though leeches may pop up as mooks on occasion.

I figured since I'm saying "there are no werewolves born of wolves" that I'd limit things to "human or crinos birth form," and saying your birth form can't regenerate, but also doesn't have to worry about silver.

Auspices would pretty much have six points split between rage and gnosis, so Ahroun have Rage 5, Gnosis 1, Ragabash have Rage 1, Gnosis 5, Philodoxes are an even split, etc.

If nothing else, opposed rolls will use a standard difficulty and successes will be compared.

[sabs]

I think going static TN is a key to sanity. Just do threshholds, and levels of success.

Or, I would be awfully tempted to just do the ars magica system.

you roll a d10+stat+skill+modifiers.
a 0 is a 0, roll some more dice to see if you botch.
a 1 open ends up, roll again 2x the next number, if it's a 1 again 3x, 1 again 4x, etc.
Then you just set a TN, and what ever you overshoot it by is your level of auccess.

6 for easy, 9 for normal, 12 for hard, 16 for exceptional, 20+ for legendary.

[Psychic Robot]

the main problem with werewolf is that there's no mechanics for impregnating dogs

[Prak]

Sabs: it's an interesting idea, I'll give it some thought. You're only rolling one die, right?

[TheFlatline]

your birth form can't regenerate, but also doesn't have to worry about silver.

That's pretty much how revised works. Though soaking lethal in your birth form isn't possible. However, it is regenerative if you later shift into another form.

[Prak]

Yeah, except metis are always vulnerable to silver (damn autocorrect).

[sabs]

Yes Prak, you're only rolling 1d10, everything else is a modifier.
You can then do things like have powers, etc that give other people extra botch dice. Or curses. You can make certain activities balanced by the idea that trying to do it is extra dangerous by giving extra botch dice.

roll a 0, and you pick up the die again, and add any botch dice.
Roll again, if you get 1 0, then you fail, if you get more than 1 0, then the number of 0's you get determine how badly you botch.
If you get no 0's then you just zero out your die, so you still get stat+skill+modifier.

So if you're really skilled, you can do easy things even if you roll badly.
You don't fail unless you roll a 0, twice. Which is a 1% chance of failure. That's not bad.

[sabs]

If you're climbing a 5 foot wall, then the penalty for failing/botching isn't so bad. If you're climbing a 100 foot wall, then you still have the same chance of success, but failure gives you 5 botch dice, because failing can be spectacularly bad.

It's not perfect, it's got issues, like all open end up systems do. But it's certainly interesting.

[Username17]

The birth forms were nothing like balanced. Having more gnosis was good, because everzone needed to buy gnosis. Having a restriction on which skills you were allowed to purchase at chargen was meaningless. Vulnerability to silver is almost completely meaningless, so not regenerating in a stupid form like wolf form is obviously the way to go.

The different starting rage values for different auspices is more salvageable. Not everyone wanted a high rage. In fact, I usually went with minimum rage because I liked being able to live in an apartment.

The list of gifts and spirits is batshit fucking insane, and you have to burn it down and start over.

-Username17

[Prak]

Well, a byproduct of "no one's born as wolves" that I forgot to mention is that I decided I kinda liked the idea that wolf wasn't a basic form, it's a special trick you have to learn, and the basic forms are human, furry man, hybrid, and dire wolf, and if you make a more difficult roll, you can shift a bit more mass and look like a closer to normal size wolf.

I was thinking that you choose from Human born (don't worry about silver, but can't regen in human form) and Werewolf born (don't worry about silver, but can't regenerate in hybrid form). There's a tribe of throwbacks that think wolves are the shit, and humans are bad, but they're almost all metis, and hang out in dire wolf mode all the time and have kind of forgotten what the human world is like, and no one really takes them seriously.

But I don't know how much that trade off means.

[sabs]

I never did like the Metis stunted crappy thing. It seems horrible. And not regenerating in combat form seems like the worlds most horrendous disadd.

[Username17]

I never did like the Metis stunted crappy thing. It seems horrible. And not regenerating in combat form seems like the worlds most horrendous disadd.

Also completely fucking pointless, since you apparently aren't giving them anything to compensate. There's just no reason for "incest baby" to be a character class.

-Username17

[sabs]

I think the balance was, "immune to silver in Crinos form, isn't that freaky awesome!!!"

Which given that by about week 3 of playing, you stopped running into people who did aggravated damage via silver, and instead did it with claws, or magical poisons, or corruption, or straight up magic.

Make all werewolves born as humans, who go through the first change at puberty. Let werewolves breed true.

[sabs]

I think the balance was, "immune to silver in Crinos form, isn't that freaky awesome!!!"

Which given that by about week 3 of playing, you stopped running into people who did aggravated damage via silver, and instead did it with claws, or magical poisons, or corruption, or straight up magic.

Make all werewolves born as humans, who go through the first change at puberty. Let werewolves breed true.

[FatR]

I think the balance was, "immune to silver in Crinos form, isn't that freaky awesome!!!"

And extra 2 points of Gnosis. Frank is talking out of his ass once again. In actual play the latter alone was so important that people actually tried to sneak metises with visually non-obvious deformities into parties where metises wouldn't normally be welcome.

[FatR]

General points:

1)Just be aware, breeds are supposed to be balanced with roleplaying difficulties. Lupus is the king for basically every role that doesn't require close contact with human society (which might not happen for the whole game). Metis is in the second place, if deformity is picked carefully.
2)Sliding difficulty should be replaced with fixed one, not only to avoid extra pain in the ass, but to fix abuses like Diff 2 bite attacks. Unfortunatelyt this means rewriting a fuckton of Gifts and whatever.
3)Backgrounds are hilariously unbalanced. Ancestors or Totem or, looking at extra sources, Numen, give your amazing power, sometimes at chargen only. Shit like Allies gives you things that are entirely in GM's hands and which you'll gain through playing the game anyway.
4)You surely know, that Dexterity is boss, but Strength can be even better (particularly thanks to much easier access to Strength buffs), depending on how grapple is ruled. As its effects and interaction with extra actions are confusing.
5)Speaking of extra actions, some see them as the biggest problem in the actual play, because everyone of note throws them around easily. I personalyl believe that while rounds last longer due to that, opponents still go down in roughly the same number of actions, and the main problem with them is that one side can easily get serious action advantage.
6)Well, and Gifts are hilariously unbalanced too, probably the most unbalanced poweret in the the entire oWoD. Most of them are complete crap, but a lot are awesomely powerful.
7)With proper set-up for using rituals, characters can easily mass-produce potent one-use magic items, recruit numerous spirits as powerful than themselves, even summon invulnerable demigods. This is supposed to be limited by roleplaying difficulties, except that making things difficult for PCs here makes no fucking sense, because, depending on your reading, spirits either cannot disobey proper appeasement due to their very nature, or know you are their only hope.
8)For that matter, spirit stats in any edition are stupid. In pre-errata Revised they made enemy mooks practicually impossible to hurt, for example.

Maybe I'll remember something else later...

[sabs]

I still think Incest baby is a horrible setting option.
Yes, Having Gnosis is good, but that's why I like the idea of giving the moons a sliding scale.

Ahroun:
5 Rage
2 Gnosis
Galliard:
4 Rage
3 Gnosis
Philodox:
3 Rage
4 Gnosis
Theurge:
2 Rage 5 Gnosis
Ragabash:
1 Rage: 6 Gnosis

drop the Metis breed altogether, and make everyone Born a Human.

[Username17]

I think the balance was, "immune to silver in Crinos form, isn't that freaky awesome!!!"

And extra 2 points of Gnosis. Frank is talking out of his ass once again. In actual play the latter alone was so important that people actually tried to sneak metises with visually non-obvious deformities into parties where metises wouldn't normally be welcome.

We're talking about Prak's plan here, which involves Gnosis not being tied to parentage. So under his plan, the only difference for a Metis is that they don't regenerate in war form while a homid doesn't regenerate in stealth form. That is a shitty division.

I am well aware that in the original Apocalypse, Lupus got 5 gnosis and Metis 3. That is however not what is being talked about, so kindly don't accuse me of talking out of my ass until you catch up with the fucking conversation.

-Username17

[TheFlatline]

I'm gunshy of tying both rage and gnosis to one decision. Yeah sure the inverse scale *looks* neato, but the game itself doesn't place equal value on rage & gnosis. First, it's cheaper, way cheaper, to buy up rage than gnosis. Second, it's easier to recharge rage than gnosis.

Third though, and most importantly... Rage isn't used for all that much. It's used for some combat and that's it. And even in combat it's not *that* useful. You spend it 1-to-1 for extra actions, you spend it to shapeshift automatically, you spend it to force regeneration (and receive scars and shit in the process), and that's really it. Gnosis literally powers everything else. So Ahrouns are going to get kicked in the nuts and Ragabash are going to be gods.

I don't even need to play the game to tell you the balance will be off.