Favoured Attribute scores and Skills: a House Rule

[Michebugio]

I am - in general - not a big fan off the rewards, to be honest.
Items as character advancements is something I don't like, since what happens if they are lost or destroyed?

I would rather see Valour & Wisdom both grant Virtues, either from different lists (e.g. Combat & Travel/Encounter) or from one combined list,
and see Rewards as something linked to Renown/Standing & Treasures.

We're on the same page here, and I agree with you on a conceptual basis. But the result is the same, if you think about it: Rewards are practically all combat-oriented, while Virtues are more generic. It's just a matter of definitions.

On the other hand, I've never liked how hugely more important is Wisdom respect to Valour in the gameplay. You make Corruption checks very often (journeys, tainted treasures, anguish and dark spellcasters) while Fear checks are required only once in a long while. So if it wasn't for the Virtues/Rewards mechanism, things would be too much unbalanced towards Wisdom. I even suspect that they already are.

But this is definitely a matter for another topic.

[DracoDruid]

Just opened another thread for it.

And I agree, that Valour could use another nice in-game use...

But what about "Expertise = 2 Favoured skills"?

[Rocmistro]

On the other hand, I've never liked how hugely more important is Wisdom respect to Valour in the gameplay. You make Corruption checks very often (journeys, tainted treasures, anguish and dark spellcasters) while Fear checks are required only once in a long while. So if it wasn't for the Virtues/Rewards mechanism, things would be too much unbalanced towards Wisdom. I even suspect that they already are.

But this is definitely a matter for another topic.

I'm not sure i agree with you on this. Is it the frequency of Corruption checks to Valour checks you are talking about? I can sort of agree with you on that, although I would say that Valour tests are something that the Loremaster has more license in throwing out (and without a lot of precedent set in the rulebook). But as far as importance of them goes...low Valour will get you (or your party members) killed pretty quickly if you become daunted and can't spend hope to add attribute bonuses. Corruption tests will get you "killed" (ie, lose your character) over the long run. Being daunted is far more immediately threatening than being shadowed. Corruption is actually pretty easy to keep in check. Hell, upto the 2nd permanent shadow point, I would actually say a hero need not even be concerned with healing his shadow

[Rocmistro]

Cheers.

I don't have all the rules at hand or know them by heart, so forgive when I suggest something that might be utterly stupid.
I simply brainstorm here.

Draco, welcome to the forum. I think this post by you says a lot. In the other thread you started, you asked people not to respond by calling your rules proposals stupid. And well they should not, as it is uncalled for and downright mean.

At the same time, when you openly admit that you don't have all the rules at hand or know them by heart (read: inexperienced), but desire to tinker with the rules and change things you don't like, the simple fact is that you can risk making mistakes and invoking the law of unforseen consequences in your game. Now, certainly you're not going to burn your house down or poison your dog by house-ruling TOR, but I think the classical wisdom is to learn a system first before you start tinkering with it.

All that being said, a virtue with +1 to a basic stat is too good (ie, OP), as is a virtue with +2 to a favored stat, as Michebugio indicated.

[DracoDruid]

I am not a native speaker, so with "by heart" I meant "every single rule or rather virtue/reward from memory".
And yes, I am rather inexperienced considering TOR, but not inexperienced in RPG.
Sadly, I have no group to play ATM, but am always been a rules-tinker.
So, yes. I might post some stupid ideas, that are completly broken, but that's where I would love to build on your experiences.
If you don't want that, then I am sorry to have bothered you and please just ignore my posts in the future.

[Rocmistro]

Draco:

Don't misunderstand me, you are not "bothering" me. My goal, believe it or not, is to maximize enjoyment of the game for as many people as possible. That includes cautioning them of the same mistakes I made, which includes my (very poor) first attempt at gutting the game when I first got it and implement all my own house rules. At the end of that long process, I had a game that looked more like D&D and less like TOR.

And I was unhappy with it.

I play in 4 TOR games now, and almost all of them are RAW with very little or few houserules. Most of the houserules we do have are only to help govern the slightly different pace established by PbP games (Play by Post) vs. live session games.

In any case, please don't take any of this personally. I spent much time in a 50 page thread (see Deadly Archery) arguing with Glorelendil and Zed and Rich and Michebugio and Falenthal and other guys (for whom I have great respect), and in fact play with in some PbP games.

[DracoDruid]

No hard feelings here.
I know all to well, how written words can be (mis-)interpreted just by the mood of the reader.
(I actually had a friendship broken apart for a while because of this)

And: Thanks.