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Message no. 1
From: William Monroe Ashe <wma6617@******.TAMU.EDU>
Subject: Toxic Shaman riposte #2
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 1997 12:50:14 -0600
First off let me begin by saying I appreciate everyone's comments.

Next, I wanted to make sure that these rules were balanced in the short
term. i.e. A character coul conceivably conjure a force 3 spirit in an
area that has a background count of 3 and have a manifest toxic spirit at
force 6, have it also be able to cross domain lines etc etc etc. I still
feel that the temporary insanity rules balance this out.

Perhaps I was a bit harsh in the permanent insanity part. I like the
concept of increasing a shaman's "Toxicity" to the point where he goes
mad permanently. But, I still think that the "Toxic Way" eventually
leads the character to a slippery slope, and once on the way down, there
is nothing that can be done to stop the fall.

I will have to think about altering the permanent part so that it is a
little more balanced.

I was going to say something but I forgot ... oh well It'll come to me.
oh yeah if anybody got weird mails from last night, I apologize. I
forgot to turn off my call waiting while I was on the modem, and I got a
call. My system freaked out... oops.


regards, Happy Easter, Pesach, holidays


Bill
Message no. 2
From: David Buehrer <dbuehrer@****.ORG>
Subject: Re: Toxic Shaman riposte #2
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 1997 15:19:11 -0700
William Monroe Ashe wrote:
|
| Perhaps I was a bit harsh in the permanent insanity part. I like the
| concept of increasing a shaman's "Toxicity" to the point where he goes
| mad permanently. But, I still think that the "Toxic Way" eventually
| leads the character to a slippery slope, and once on the way down, there
| is nothing that can be done to stop the fall.
|
| I will have to think about altering the permanent part so that it is a
| little more balanced.

My brain started working on this (it just does that, ask anyone on the
list :) and I came up with the following.

Give Toxic Shamans a Sanity stat, minimum 1, maximum 6. Treat it like
any other stat (Strength, Willpower, ect). Every time the shaman
summons a toxic spirit it drops a number of points equal to the
spirit's adjusted force times 0.1. If a shaman with a sanity of 5
summons a force 4 toxic spirit, and the background count raises it to
7, the shaman loses 0.7 points of sanity, droping his sanity to 4.3
(5).

For every full unit of time (a week, a month, 60 days, whatever you
decide) the shaman goes without summoning a toxic spirit, his sanity
increases by 0.1 (but does not go above the original level). So if you
decide that toxic shamans get back .1 point of sanity per 30 days, and
the shaman in the example goes 60 days without summoning a toxic
spirit, his sanity would be 4.5 (5).

Sanity can be increased like any stat. The shaman could spend 12 karma
to raise his sanity to 5.5 (6).

You might want to decide what a healthy sanity is. Say 6 is a
perfectly balanced mind. 4-5 is average and functional. At 3 a person
starts to become somewhat impaired and is viewed as eccentric or
weird. At 2 its pretty obvious that the person is "nuts", but he can
still take care of himself, barely. At 1 the person has serious problems
dealing with reality and needs help to get basic needs met. At 0 the
person has gone over the edge and is no longer connected with reality
in any way.

BTW, you could also use this system for a Cthulu game, where the force
or rating of the monster affects the character's sanity. If you're a
nice GM you might allow a willpower test against the monster's rating
to decrease the ammoung of sanity lost.

| regards, Happy Easter, Pesach, holidays

Ditto :)

-David
--
/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\ dbuehrer@****.org /^\/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\
"His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking
alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free."
~~~http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/1068/homepage.htm~~~~

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Thwap!