"What do you do?" Resource Management

Welcome back! Last time we discussed some of the core mechanics and unique ideas driving Crossroads: The Yzyrra Chronicles. This time we take a look at a character's turn based resources.

When a new player sits at the table for their first game, and combat breaks out, the question, "What do you do?" may give some stage-fright. This post however is intended to help those players new to this game understand all of the resources that are at their disposal when the GM finally asks that question of them.

ACTION POINTS (AP)
When combat breaks out, the initiative order is determined. When a player's turn comes up, they have 5 AP at their disposal. Every action that the player takes has a varying AP cost. Some actions may cost 0AP while others may cost 5 AP, but they all have some sort of cost. If a question of AP Cost arises and is not already covered, the AP Cost is determined by the GM. 

While this list is not all-inclusive, all actions fall under one of the following categories...

0 AP "Free Action"

These are actions that are instantaneous, require no coordination, and are uncontested. This would include actions like dropping an item, talking to someone without it being contested, or spending TP (Tactic Points) to power/sustain certain ability effects.

1 AP "Side-Action"

Side-Actions are trivial actions that still require the character to still be cognizant of what is going around them. This includes move actions, the activation of certain Path ability's, minor skill strains that are contested, aiming (not firing) a ranged weapon, and "sustaining" certain buff/debuff effects.

2 AP "Complex Side-Action"

Complex Side-Actions are exactly what they sound like. These require more focus, coordination, investment of effort to pull off. Examples of this will be aiming through a scope with a high-powered magnification, performing contested major skill strains, making a move action over difficult terrain, attacking with a Fast speed weapon, and other similar actions.

3 AP "Single-Action"

The Single-Action is the standard difficulty action, which is contested by an unwilling party. This includes attacking with a Normal speed weapon, activating any Single-Action Path ability, or comparable action.

4 AP "Slow-Action"

The only action that truly costs 4 AP is attacks made with Slow speed weapons.

5 AP "Full-Action"

A Full-Action is one that requires so much concentration, or physical investment that it requires the entirety of their turn. These actions are unique in that they are the only actions that can carry over into the character's next turn, however the character starts their next turn with reduced AP and the action is considered "reckless". This concept of being "reckless" will be covered in a later post.

"Sustains"

Sometimes an character may use a Path ability that has some sort of benefit that persists as long as the character continues to invest some sort of effort into maintaining it. This method of maintenance is referred to as "sustains". Sustains are usually found on Path abilities that deal with some sort of buff/debuff/status/condition being imparted. The act of sustaining the effect costs less AP than starting a new one each turn. There will come a time where it is better to start a new effect than to maintain the old, but it is up to the character to make that call.

TACTIC POINTS (TP)

Tactic Points are a renewable resource that represents the capacity that everything possesses to perform beyond their normal capacity. These are acquired by reaching certain character levels. They are also acquired by taking the "Chosen" Path for a character's given race. TP can be spent for a variety of of benefits. While not a complete list: 

• TP can be spent to predetermine an attack is a minimum critical attack that deals double weapon damage.
• TP can be spent in reaction to a successful attack so that it deals a maximum tier critical hit.
• A TP can be spent at no cost to gain an extra AP for the current turn.
• TP can power certain weapon's Doubles effects.

A player may only spend TP for one effect on any given turn. While a player has a finite pool of TP, they can be replenished by either performing an activity determined by one's Paths, or by resting. There are a couple other ways to replenish these, but those won't happen as frequently. TP are also the currency used to fund a "Revisit" or re-spec of Path abilities.

WEAPON SPEED
A character has a base of 5 AP to make use of on their turn. Attacking is going to be a very common action, which will cost AP to perform. How much AP is required to attack is determined by the speed of the weapon being wielded. There are three speeds: Fast, Normal, and Slow. Fast weapons cost 2 AP to use. They tend to do lower damage, but critical more frequently and have the capacity to critical the hardest. Normal speed weapons cost 3 AP and tend to be all-around effective. Slow weapons cost 4 AP per attack, but tend to be higher in base damage and make area of effect attacks, but they don't critical as frequently.

HEAT
Heat will gone over a little more in depth in a later post, but Heat is a floating numerical representation of how stressed or prone to mishaps your character is. Being adventurers that were trained in the academies, it will stay at a low value. However, when you start pushing your character's performance beyond their normal limits, all bets are off. Taking actions like attacking someone who makes a reckless action when it isn't your turn, altering properties of a spell that you are casting on the fly, performing certain special combat maneuvers, or even taking a breather can all impact how this Heat value behaves. As a character takes more and more advantageous and/or opportunistic actions to perform better than normal, the Heat value will rise making it easier to succumb to the effects of the stresses they are enduring. Becoming overly stressed in a combat situation can leave a character in a sudden and bad situation. Performing actions that "slow down" the action for your character will help to bring this value back to a manageable level.

For those curious as to why the term "Heat" was chosen to represent the stress system, it all started with ranged combat. I originally had a mechanic that was going to be used to track ammo. While I liked the concept for the mechanic, I ultimately realized that it disproportionately slowed down combat for the little piece of information that it was offering. I still wanted a way to slow down range attackers who used the Burst Attack on firearms and M.A.W.S. (Magically Augmented Weapons Systems a.k.a. Mana-Guns). I was trying to prevent scenarios where the Burst Attack was the default attack for ranged attackers.

What I realized that if one continues to Burst Attack non-stop, they're essentially torturing the weapon and eventually this torture will cause a malfunction before long. This "heating up" originally was going to represent the weapon needing to be reloaded, un-jammed, cooled off or otherwise remedied before it could become functional again. This lead to the idea of a "Heat" system that slows one's DPT (damage per turn) down for abusing their gear. The more one abuses it, the easier it becomes to create a problem. There was a risk versus reward choice the player had to remain conscious of should they partake in it.

On the magical combat front, I originally had an MP system & initiative delay system on spells that one could manipulate. I intended for casters to be able to alter the properties and dimensions of their spells on the fly in a Dynamic Casting System (henceforth referred to as "DCS"). The caster could naturally spend more MP to adjust all of this. I sat the initiative delay system aside because it created some awkward situations. Anyone who ever played Final Fantasy Tactics will know what I'm talking about. While I still wanted the DCS, I thought about broadening the Heat system to apply to the DCS since it would facilitate the removal of the MP. This created a situation where casters could focus on casting basic spells without stress but as they cast stronger and mutated spells their stress levels will rise, making it easier to fail from overexerting themselves.

Having covered ranged and magical combat, I now had to turn my focus onto melee combat. How was I going to apply this same principle to melee fighters? I came up with an array of melee actions called "Maneuvers" which are special variants of common attacks that provide different situational advantages. Some caused an increase in their Heat value while others lowered it. Some did neither but made the character reckless. This was good because there wasn't anything that needed to be stripped out for this to be implemented. It also brought a uniformity to to all forms of combat. At this point, I created an array of ranged combat maneuvers as well so they didn't get left behind by not having options at their disposal. Finally, I decided that Heat was an overall measure of stress to explain why a melee caster could still have issues fighting if they pushed themselves too hard early in the battle casting advanced magic. This uniformity of stress makes it simpler to slow down someone who's going gonzo.

Hopefully this gives some insight to the design concepts and process I used and may help others experiment with design ideas of their own. In the next post, we will be looking at the Path Ability tree, and pointing out key details of advancing their character along their Paths, or "recording their Journey".

Again, if you have any questions or comments, find anything here of interest, or want to learn more about Crossroads: The Yzyrra Chronicles, please feel free to Comment, Subscribe, and/or Share. Until next time, this is Darrick signing off!

May good fortunes be with you!