They are, in a sense. The 0 point skills, which are effectively variant rules for Accelerant, and the death, departed, turning undead rules are somewhat of a pain, but the general system is Accelerant which means that *character generation* is a convoluted impossible mess, but actual gameplay isn't.
I think some of my difficulty just lies in the presentation. Practical examples would have done wonders for me.
In any case, I think I have a fair enough grasp of things for now, though the re-usability of skills still seems *way* too obtuse to me. I *thought* Madrigal's Attribute system was part of the core rules...
No, most Accellerant games do use the attribute system (or some variation thereof), but there are a couple Accellerant games out there (Aralis, Isles, I don't know if there are more) that don't use it.
And again, character creation is a pain, but actually remembering your stats isn't. Every 2 hours you have these skills, and every 8 you have these, plus per-events. It's actually less complicated to remember IG than the attribute system (or NERO, for that matter), since you don't have to worry about using up an attribute (or slot) for one skill/spell that you'd use for another one.
I have a spell that does 3 damage by fire every 2 hours. In an attribute-based game, that spell is powered by an attribute (say, Fire). However, Fire may also power my cure-root spell, and the ability to call a parry. So if you need to cure root or parry a lot, you may never use your 3 damage by fire spell.
In Aralis, you have your 3 damage by fire spell. You won't ever not have it because you had to parry 5 times. It leads to other issues, like not getting to use your spells because it's been more than two hours since you've needed (or wanted) to fight things. But you always know what you do have, so in terms of complexity, it's not bad.
The real difficulty is knowing at any time what someone else can do. There are a lot of very odd skills in the game, from obscure spell lists to special abilities you get for picking a class, to hidden skills that no one has access to. There are PCs in game who have gesture attacks. And some who are immune to death spells. And those who take damage if they touch a particular
( ... )
I reread a few bits and I think I understand things much better, now. It turns out I had mis-read something that was pretty critical - it was on the same level as trying to read a book up-side down. :P
Have you played around with the character generator? Without it I imagine that most PCs would be lost in a sea of numbers when trying to plan out their characters, but with it I think I find things easier to keep track of than the Captain Planet system that Madrigal, Endgame and other use.
You can always use the sample account to see what your combinations of abilities would look like in the end, so that might get rid of some of your worries.
I've messed around with it some and it has helped, but I'm not going to be happy until I can do back-of-an-envelope builds pretty confidently. That'll come in time, though, and especially so once I'm able to hang out with people who actually play the game. :P
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I think some of my difficulty just lies in the presentation. Practical examples would have done wonders for me.
In any case, I think I have a fair enough grasp of things for now, though the re-usability of skills still seems *way* too obtuse to me. I *thought* Madrigal's Attribute system was part of the core rules...
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And again, character creation is a pain, but actually remembering your stats isn't. Every 2 hours you have these skills, and every 8 you have these, plus per-events. It's actually less complicated to remember IG than the attribute system (or NERO, for that matter), since you don't have to worry about using up an attribute (or slot) for one skill/spell that you'd use for another one.
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I have a spell that does 3 damage by fire every 2 hours. In an attribute-based game, that spell is powered by an attribute (say, Fire). However, Fire may also power my cure-root spell, and the ability to call a parry. So if you need to cure root or parry a lot, you may never use your 3 damage by fire spell.
In Aralis, you have your 3 damage by fire spell. You won't ever not have it because you had to parry 5 times. It leads to other issues, like not getting to use your spells because it's been more than two hours since you've needed (or wanted) to fight things. But you always know what you do have, so in terms of complexity, it's not bad.
The real difficulty is knowing at any time what someone else can do. There are a lot of very odd skills in the game, from obscure spell lists to special abilities you get for picking a class, to hidden skills that no one has access to. There are PCs in game who have gesture attacks. And some who are immune to death spells. And those who take damage if they touch a particular ( ... )
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You can always use the sample account to see what your combinations of abilities would look like in the end, so that might get rid of some of your worries.
Reply
I've messed around with it some and it has helped, but I'm not going to be happy until I can do back-of-an-envelope builds pretty confidently. That'll come in time, though, and especially so once I'm able to hang out with people who actually play the game. :P
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