Icon v2.0: What would you change?

[Talon Kane]

I completely agree regarding XP costs. It is way to easy to raise them with the current skill listing. I become very stingy in my games because of how easy it is to raise skills. But, I also will not allow a character to buy or raise a skill they have not used or attempted to use during play or downtime. For example, if one of my characters tell me during downtime they start training on the holodeck for armed combat, I'll allow them to buy the skill the next game.

Another thing about ICON that drives me nuts is the Renown system. For example, we have a character who has an Aggression of 10. He does something very unaggressive that gives him a Renown "reward" of -3. Now, he has a Aggression of 7, but his Renown has gone up by 3. Anyone come up with a good way of keeping track of this? Or am I just a goober? (don't answer that :-) )

In regards to my system and ICON, either way the systems were built to focus on attributes because that is where you get the dice to roll. I feel the way I use my skill totals are better because it makes a significant difference from someone who has a speciality in Phaser Rifle as oppossed to someone who does not.

[SIR SIG]

'You want to put up what skill? Okay now start your 10 week intensive training!'



Not an ultimate solution, but make them do the time for the skill. ala 1 mth/lvl training fo DnD; which we all do right

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SIR SIG a Aussie TREK Narrator

[Calcoran]

Funny that, I ave never had the problem with skills going up too fast ... it must be me . Actually my players are always complaining because their characters develop too slowly in their opinion ... and because they feel they don't get enough XPs. But again, they always do ... however for once I'm inclined to agree with them ... maybe .

Just for the sake of curiosity, approximately how much would you give for a long session (one week-end: between 12 and 16 hours)?

[Dan Gurden]

Originally posted by Calcoran:
Just for the sake of curiosity, approximately how much would you give for a long session (one week-end: between 12 and 16 hours)?

Well in the ICON PBEM I run, I recently awarded XP, now considering the pace of a PBEM tends to be far slower but with greater characterisation detail, I have had to take this into account.

The format does allow me to reward excellent
characterisation when it occurs. But for the current plot which has been going on since November I recently gave awards for the 16 players of between 10-25 xp with 2-5 renown depending of the character and the plot interaction...

Its a far higher reward than the recommended rewards but I feel its fair due to both the length of time the game takes and the far greater detail for roleplaying...

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Dan.

"A couple of thoughts from a random mind!"

[Calcoran]

10-25 xps for a game that runs since november? I wonder how long the game would have taken if played "live" instead of by email ... I usually give between 5 and 8 xps for 12-16 hours games ... maybe I should give more.

[Talon Kane]

We play our Deep Space 9 game every Saturday night for about 4 to 6 hours. Usually I have a major storyline running in the game and give the characters shorter plots that eventually lead up to the big one. When they finish a smaller plot, I give them either 3 to 4 XP (4 if they really played well) and about 2 to 3 Renown (if they really earned it). When they complete a major storyline, I give them between 4 to 7 and sometimes a major Renown award (around 4 to 6 via a medal of some sort).

[Damian Harn]

Two things I would change, Hand-to-hand, true not many fist fights break out on my ship but some times they do. I had a hard time doing and amount of damage to anyone. I am not a weak character, I have been playing the same character ever sence the game came out. I got it the day the store did.
Number two, starship combat. Untill the stardock rules were posted I felt combat between starships was to fast and to deadly. If a powerful starship entered into combat with two smaller ships, yes it will win but the damage it would suffer made it almost imposible to do anything else.
Other than ablative armor I have no other problems with the system. I love it. Star Trek is my second favorate game, behind WEG Star Wars.

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Cpt. Damian Harn, U.S.S. Brittania N.C.C. 31379

[Talon Kane]

Here is how we handle hand to hand combat:

* I still use my rules with the Star Wars (West End Games version) target numbers allowing people to add up all dice rolled and then double the amount of the specialization used if one is used.

* I fiddled a bit with the damage rules to truly make the Strength edge worth buying as well as specializations in Martial Arts. This is very confusing, so follow closely folks! Every point the character has in the Strength edge gives them an extra die to roll for damage. Also, for every 2 points a character has in a specialization of hand to hand, they get another die. This means 2-3 +1, 3-4 +2, 5-6 +3. Otherwise, I left the damage per the LUG rules.

So, let's say a character has Unarmed Combat (Starfleet Martial Arts) of 2(3) and a Strength edge of +1. If I remember the rules correctly, if the character throws a punch and hits, LUG only gives him 3+1d6. In my game the character would get 3+3d6 (1d6 for the punch, 1d6 for the specialization at level 3, 1d6 for the Strength edge).

Yes, this means characters can do knock out blows in one shot. But, you do sometimes see that on Star Trek a lot. Otherwise, to me, combats take forever.

* If a character decides to Dodge a blow, they roll Coordination + Dexterity and add it to double their Dodge skill (my version adds up all dice to get the total).

* Resistance stays as normal and if a character takes more than one action, the penalty is +5 to the target number per action (1 action +5, 2 actions +10, etc...)

Any questions? :-)

[Imagus]

Personally I love the Icon approach to char gen - template + overlay + packages.

The only problem is that if you put a character together with the packages, then go back and rebuild it to the same skill levels with just individual skills, spending the points directly, it is very easy to have up to ten points left over.

Tends to encourage min/maxing IMHO.

So a revision to the costings would be my vote...

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Slartibart-Jon