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Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Reputation

Since the World of Onn doesn't use alignments, I use a simple group reputation system to determine how NPCs that may have heard of the group's deeds and how their impression affects how positively or negatively they are recieved. Even though a group may have a high score for their overall reputation, some people will have a negative reaction, especially if the group has thwarted the plans of such groups in the past in order to build their reputation. Doing things that advance the character's goals while benefitting others will raise a group's reputation, while actively (and openly) performing bad deeds will impact the group's reputation score. If a Referee chooses, Reputation scores for each character can be kept track of. Reputations start at a base score of 8+1d4 and thereafter rise and fall over the group's career.
Reputation
ScoreEffect
19++3 to Reactions, 15% better prices when trading
17 - 18+2 to Reactions, 10% better prices when trading
13 - 16+1 to Reactions, 5% better prices when trading
9 - 12Average
5 - 8-1 to Reactions, 5% worse prices when trading
1 - 4-2 to Reactions, 10% worse prices when trading
0 or less-3 to Reactions, 15% worse prices when trading

4 comments:

Jensan said...

Nice idea with reputation. Wouldn't charisma affect the base score (instead of 1d4)? I mean, a character of exceptional high/low charisma would have people talking about him surely?

James Bobb said...

I try to keep the two seperate as far as one influencing the other. A character's Charisma is his charm and force of personality dealing with people one-to one, while a Reputation is something people across the land may hear about you without ever even meeting you.

When dealing with NPCs I use the Reputation modifiers along with the character's Charisma Reaction Adjustment. For example, a character with a 15 Reputation (+1 to Reactions) and a 13 Charisma (+1 to Reactions) would gain a +2 bonus to and dice rolls to influence the reactions of NPCs; A character with a 0 Reputation (-3) and 13 Charisma (+1) would suffer a -2 penalty to NPC reactions.

To use a real life example of how Charisma and Reputation are seperate, Hitler was a very bad man, but those that spoke of him characterized him as highly charismatic. Even towards his end, though many Germans knew and disapproved of him, when he spoke he had a way of captivating his audience and drawing them up into a frenzy.

Jensan said...

That makes sense, of course.

Another stupid question: is Reputation a global factor, same for lets say all cities? Can the party have great reputation in one city, while being infamous in another?

...or should I consult the Onn-rulebook before asking these questions? :)

James Bobb said...

I never considered making the Reputation system part of the rules since most groups have some sort of system of their own to determine alignments or reputations, so you won't find it in the rules. I've added a 'House Rules' tag to the post to avoid any confusion now.

Reputation is a global as the Referee wants it to be. If you want to simulate a realism, the reputation would only affect people in the same region (again this is subject to what individual Referees define as a 'region'.

My Sirac's Point group is based in the port city of Sirac's Point and their reputation will be mostly effective in Sirac's Point and the Elves of Wyrmwood. But, being based in a bustling port city, word of their deeds will spread to other port cities and if they decide to travel to them and have ways of proving who they are, their Reputation will have preceeded them, otherwise, they'll just be average again (for that area). Depending how detailed you as a Referee want to take it, you can track the Group's Reputation for several different places and they may have a high reputation in some places, and a low reputation in others, depending on what they've done.