Advancement

Advancement is the gain of action points and their use to improve your character or their storyline. 

Action points are the currency of the game mechanics and are awarded in multiple ways:

1. By the GM or other players in return for good play
1. From the storyteller AP pool
2. When you resolve a dramatic or physical conflict in a memorable way
1. From the storyteller pool, other players AP, or both
3. Upon the completion of quests/goals that you have defined for your character
1. As defined by the quest when it was created
4. Through trade/distribution as a result of bidding for story/NPC/rule control
1. Drama mechanics resolution from the pool created

How many Action Points?

The number of action points in play is a result of two sets of pools.  We recommend having little glass beads as a currency, because they are pretty and encourage trading around and visual estimation.

1. The Storyteller pool - this is what the GM or group storyteller action can pay out of as rewards, or to enact plot twists.  It can never go below 0. If, at the end of a scene this pool is at zero, refill to 6 AP.  A scene constitutes a series of actions or places with a shared goal. e.g. a dungeon.
2. The Players' pools - these are the available action points of each of the characters. They are either left over from unspent points of character creation or gained during play. When spent they are redistributed:
1. In dice fudging or adjusting the rank before rolls - the AP spent go into the storyteller pool
2. When given as kudos to another player for being awesome - that player gets that AP and the donating player marks a number of generosity points equal to that amount
3. For bidding on scene changes, the amount is spent from the side which wins the bid & roll, and that goes into the storyteller pool. The remaining is given back to the players who bid it.

How often should points be awarded? If you have reached the end of a scene and no one has exchanged any action points but there was some memorable things happening, give out some APs from the storyteller pool. If nothing of note happens then don't feel obligated to give out points.

Types of Rewards

Rewarding good play

Good role-playing is a moment that makes other players say wow or get sufficiently impressed.  It can be a cunning plan, a dramatic flourish, a daring risk, a profound speech, etc.  The GM can award any number of points.  Players can give each other points for this as well, and receive a number of Generosity points equal to their contribution.

Plot or complication resolution

Resolution of a major situation, something key to the storyline.  Success will give more, proportional to the hardness of the situation.  Failure can give some points still, if it makes for a good story.

Quest resolution

Goals or quests are specific tasks that characters want to achieve.  They can be of the players construction, something key to the personal development of their character.  They can also be provided by the GM, as a goal/quest within the campaign.  They consist of a set of conditions, and the difficulties of these conditions.  The highest difficulty is the overall difficulty of the quest.  Upon it’s completion, the level of success in the quest is assessed and points are rewarded as a function of the overall difficulty and the margin of success (+/-).  It can be a negative success, for example if the quest is to destroy a greater demon and you just barely escape with your life and have betrayed all your friends in the process, you may have succeeded, but at a Terrible price, and would gain much fewer points than the Superb difficulty the quest had.

            Action points must be converted into creation points in order to train up skills, abilities, spells or attributes.  Recommended rate is 6:1, but this can vary dependent upon the speed of gain of action points.  In games where a lot of player GMing and plot bidding is occurring, more action points need to be out in play, so the number of action points to creation point should increase.  The goal is to balance the fun of advancement with how many rolls are being fudged, or plot points modified.  Start with 6:1 and negotiate amongst yourselves if it needs to change.

            Use point costs presented in character creation, but they now cost for each level in two ways:  you must pay the level cost multiplied by the raw cost of advancement for that statistic (e.g. 1pt/level of specialization, 6pt/level of primary attributes, etc)

IE you cannot buy yourself up to Superb from scratch with a single 4pt expenditure.  You must first buy into Mediocre, then Fair, then Good, then Great, then Superb.  Paying for each level of specialization would therefore cost you 1+1+2+3+4 = 11 points.  With this level of jump in your character, it’s recommended that you play through some scenario that represents your sudden gain of skill, training or raw talent.  Discuss how you see your character making this progression with the GM or other players.  You may have to make a bunch of success rolls along the way to get to this advancement.  If deemed a particularly challenging advancement, some of these rolls might only be overcome by the additional use of action points to fudge rolls or situations. 

Character Advancement

Characters can get permanently better by investing Action Points into Character Creation Points.  Each Creation Point costs 6 AP.  This conversion does not return them to the storyteller pool, and must be done as a function of Training.

Training - creation points when they are spent (see character design for costs) need to be in a story context befitting of the gain you are after. So, if you want to improve your Strength or Physique, spend some story time working on a farm. Your Agility, tend to sails or ropes on cloud ships.  Intuition, help guide crystal generators and astronomical-tide machines in the deep power producing temples of an arcology.  This means that adventures will often be broken up with some time spent "levelling-up".  At this time characters can also work towards their citizenship requirements, such as generosity points per season.  Some abilities can be learned on the road, or while travelling. e.g. Merchantry, or Botanical knowledge, etc.

Life Path Advancement Packages

Two examples for each path. 

Temptation

1. start flame spell, useful, and causes a bit of damage.  A couple of flaws and the fact it is forbidden. 

2.  Advatanges and flaws

Nobility

1. Small advantage, nobility points cost. 

2.  Spend 4 nobility point and get back more on investment in total points of advantages (5).  Nobility points are bought into along this path, and then paid back through later deals/packages to give more output points than effectively paid in.  1.5^nobility spent, round off.  Therefore 5 points paid in, gets 8 (7.59) points out.

Adept

1. Package one; skills

2.Package two; attributes

Design of these should be based upon a simple set of ratios, then have them scale for higher levels.  Linear is simpler, a chart, cost in, vs effective points out.  Three lines, y=mx for adept, y=mx – mNobility, y=mx + mFlawss

Tertiary Attributes that Accumulate with play

Unluck (optional rule)

            Unluck points accrued against a character is a problem waiting to happen. Every time you spend a point to Fudge a dice you accumulate one point of Unluck, kept track of on your character sheet or by the storyteller if there is one.

They can be activated by the GM or a spell ability.  If triggered by the will of a GM (or player through shared drama rules) they must roll a successful activation or be lost.  If triggered by a spell, effect or item all points are used.  Points available are used to buy dice or rolls against the character in question at the same rates as action points.

            Jonah is chasing a goblin that has stolen from the farm.  It’s laughing and running away from him, brandishing the pots of honey with leers, and yells back a curse.  Jonah didn’t know enough to be careful of goblins and the unlucky spell hits him and uses it’s points immediately, bringing about a Great roll opposing his Running.  Jonah fails his running defense and tumbles down the hill, which is covered in hay this time of year.  With sticks in his hair and bruises about, he wanders home cursing the inopportune trip.

Luck is the amount events tend to work out in a player’s favour.  This happens in gameplay when players are spending Action points, effectively making their lives easier/lucky.

Generosity (optional rule)

            Is the measure of how much your character contributes back to others.  Functionally, it is used to fulfill Citizenship requirements and is spent monthly.  See Society (Politics; Citizenship) for a summary table of costs by hometown region and time of year.

Tips for players

            Try not to block if you can help it!  Block is an improv term that means you are resisting a new element in the story and it prevents progression.  This is not the same as conflict, which is dramatically desirable.  A block would not be refusing to jump off a cliff, but it would be information you as a player know (but your character doesn’t) to attack a bad character that has not yet been revealed.

            Figuratively, roll with the punches, look for a way to alter the situation using a skill or attribute, not refuse to do it.  Think of ways out.  If it’s clever but super risky, would make sense for your character and give you a great tale to tell, take the risk!!  Spend some action points and fudge the roll.  If it’s awesome you might win points back.

Note GMs are also players, they can have a different role to play, but still cooperate.  Being stuck on a railroad storyline can be frustrating for everyone who wants to break free and do unexpected things.