Actual play experience of Hope/Shadow

[Dunkelbrink]

It would be interesting to know how the Hope/shadow mechanic works in actual play in different groups. There have been a lot of discussions on this forum about when to give shadow points for different deeds, the refreshing of the Fellowship pool etc, but I am interested in how numbers accumulate during prolonged play.

My own experiences after 20+ sessions (sessions lasting approximately 3-4 hours, 3 years have passed in game with about two-three adventures a year) with the same live play group in the same campaign are:

- Hope does not decrease as fast as I expected it too. I'd say my players are fairly generous with spending Hope, but only on important rolls (so far mostly in Encounters, in combat for Protection rolls or if a Hope would change a missed attack into a Great or Extraordinary result). Most sessions they end up on a +-0; they use the Hope in the Fellowship pool and often get one back for the Fellowship focus not harmed in any serious way.
- After 20+ sessions players are at maximum Hope or at most 3-4 under their maximum.
- Shadow points differ from 2 (the Hobbit) to 7 (the Beorning) points after 20+ sessions. I am fairly liberal with Corruption tests for blighted places, gruesome scenes and confronting the Shadow. So far no issues with misdeeds, expect when the Beorning wanted to cut the throats of the fallen bandits after the battle in Kinstrife. Have until now missed the rule that you get 1 SP when your fellowship focus is wounded.
- No player hero has suffered from being Miserable so far. Thus no permanent shadow points.
- I've house ruled the "Healing corruption" undertaking. Only one roll is allowed, even when at a Sanctuary. Two rolls with a decent skill score and the threat of Shadow points is almost removed completely, if you ask me.

Does this compare to your experiences? Personally I want the diminishing Hope and rising Shadow to be a real threat and solid mechanic in the game. Maybe the effect in the long run will make the heroes want to retire after 10 years and a few permanent points, but right now that seems far fetched. Right now I think that the balance is somewhat off, with no bouts of madness or permanent shadow after 20+ sessions. The PC:s skills have improved, and soon the will need Hope less and less, making the possibility of Miserable and Bouts of Madness even more uncommon. Would be really interesting to hear your numbers and experiences!

/Magnus

[zedturtle]

As I mentioned in the other thread, I'm a softie and my players tend to be pretty well behaved. So their Shadow is not too high. I am trying to be a bit harder on them with Hope points... finding the balance where they do spend the points but don't get them all back is tricky. Monsters with Foul Reek and other non-bonus needs to spend Hope help with that a little bit.

[Corvo]

Interesting question: I got the hunch that the RAW are relatively lenient.

In my houseruled campaign the Parry is a roll, not a fixed value, so a lot of Hope points are spent here. And Heal Corruption undertaking is severely limited.
The King's Men fellowship, all Bardings in the sixty-seventy xp range, is pretty much impervious to corruption rolls. Shadow was never higher than 5, but in 2950 (DoM) one of them got to defend the king's honor in duel and he was down to 1 hope.
The Fellowship of the Hunters, composed of Beornings and Woodmen in the 10 xp range, is really low on Hope and fail a lot of Corruption rolls. Both fellowships are really good at avoiding misdeeds.

[Dunkelbrink]

Interesting question: I got the hunch that the RAW are relatively lenient.

I agree that the RAW feels pretty lenient, at least the aspect of removing Shadow points.

The King's Men fellowship, all Bardings in the sixty-seventy xp range, is pretty much impervious to corruption rolls. Shadow was never higher than 5, but in 2950 (DoM) one of them got to defend the king's honor in duel and he was down to 1 hope.
The Fellowship of the Hunters, composed of Beornings and Woodmen in the 10 xp range, is really low on Hope and fail a lot of Corruption rolls. Both fellowships are really good at avoiding misdeeds.

Interesting, then I Presume you've hade Bouts of madness and permanent shadow in both campaigns? Or did the Barding recover before that happened?

[Corvo]

Interesting question: I got the hunch that the RAW are relatively lenient.

I agree that the RAW feels pretty lenient, at least the aspect of removing Shadow points.

The King's Men fellowship, all Bardings in the sixty-seventy xp range, is pretty much impervious to corruption rolls. Shadow was never higher than 5, but in 2950 (DoM) one of them got to defend the king's honor in duel and he was down to 1 hope.
The Fellowship of the Hunters, composed of Beornings and Woodmen in the 10 xp range, is really low on Hope and fail a lot of Corruption rolls. Both fellowships are really good at avoiding misdeeds.

Interesting, then I Presume you've hade Bouts of madness and permanent shadow in both campaigns? Or did the Barding recover before that happened?

Both fellowships narrowly avoided any Bout of Madness.
The Barding champion was luckily at zero Shadow: in '49 they had a Heal Corruption roll for the birth of Bard's heir (I allow Heal Corruption just in extraordinary circumstances. Being a friend of the king and Warden, it was fitting), and the group had the luck to meet Farmann the Warden twice in previous years (they rolled a G on the feat dice to happen upon him).

About the Hunters, one Beorning "took it for the team": at the end of the adventure two of them were miserable, so he choose the Confidence virtue and gave "his" fellowship point to the friend.

Then again, both groups are dangerously near to being miserable: the players feel that it's only matter of time...

[Stormcrow]

I suspect the trouble people are having is not that the Hope and Shadow rules are too lenient, but that there aren't enough challenging things going on. An emphasis on combat over other activities would be one way to end up with this; each element in combat is generally too narrow to use Hope on it, though there are exceptions.

Loremasters with this problem will want to increase difficulty levels, or increase the number of times players make tests or want to perform tasks.

[Dunkelbrink]

I'm not really saying that there's trouble with the mechanic, mostly just interested in people's experience with the system, numbers of Hope/shadow after different numbers of sessions. What is an "optimal" Hope/shadow curve and how to avoid the mechanic gliding to far in either direction? etc After 20+ sessions I am a bit surprised that the Hope of my group is still high in general and no one has reached the Miserable state. I can truthfully say that my game is not combat oriented, with maybe one combat every other session. Yeah, maybe I need to raise difficulty levels but then I will move away from the TN 14 being the expressed default value. Fransesco has emphasized that 14 should be the standard value, and that deviations should be motivated. So the design of the game and the RAW promotes this, and he obviously tried to balance the Hope mechanic with TN 14 being the standard number to reach. I could propose more tests as you suggest, but that would take away some of the roleplaying and tilt towards dice rolling. How many dice rolls are "normal" during a 3 hour session? And how many of these will be supported by Hope spending? I'd say we have roughly about 20-30 rolls a session (combat excluded, travel included). I don't know if that is a lot or not.

I am interested in these "meta questions" and what numbers the designers have calculated with. Stormcrow, do you have a hunch of actual numbers/effects of the Hope/shadow mechanic in your game? Has it felt balanced to you?

[Corvo]

I suspect the trouble people are having is not that the Hope and Shadow rules are too lenient, but that there aren't enough challenging things going on. An emphasis on combat over other activities would be one way to end up with this; each element in combat is generally too narrow to use Hope on it, though there are exceptions.

Loremasters with this problem will want to increase difficulty levels, or increase the number of times players make tests or want to perform tasks.

Maybe you are right, I cannot confirm or deny your hypothesis since I play in a houseruled context, but in my context the houseruled Parry rolls are the ones where most Hope is spent.

[Stormcrow]

I haven't got a game at present, though while I was a player in one no one was ever far from maximum Hope points. But it was also true that I never felt especially challenged during the game.

The game isn't, I think, designed to drain Hope with TN 14; that target was chosen as giving someone with skill 3 a 50/50 chance of succeeding.

The Loremaster must examine his game and determine why his players aren't using more Hope. Do they succeed at most actions? Then they need greater challenges (higher TNs). Do they fail as often as they succeed? Then they don't care enough about what they're doing to spend Hope on it; they need to be more invested in what's going on. Does their Hope fluctuate a lot, but they never get much Shadow? Then they're not heading into serious danger; you should send them someplace darker.

All this assumes the players WANT a game where their very souls are in danger. If they just want to stomp some orc butt and never mind the burden of morality, then let them continue with high Hope and low Shadow. Forcing players into bouts of madness just because the rules exist may not be your best option, if that's not the kind of game they enjoy.

[Glorelendil]

The discussion shows that TOR, like most RPGs, gives the LM the flexibility to be as dangerous (or not) as they want, and as matches the playstyle of their players, which varies greatly. I'm a Hope Hoarder for sure...I've been known to take a Wound rather than spend Hope if I think we'll still win the fight and a FP is close...but in Roc's PbP game recently a player spent seven Hope in one fight. Yes, seven.