Alright, so, for a RotRL campaign that's just starting up, our GM is using a house rule called Virtue and Sin. Basically, what is amounts to is that having a lot of Virtue points gives you a small mechanical bonus, and a lot of Sin means having a penalty with a larger mechanical bonus than the Virtue version. Each of us must specialize in a Sin and a Virtue, gaining double points when we commit those in roleplay. So, I chose to specialize in Gluttony and Kindness. Since having my character gain weight is intregal to my concept, can you guys present me with one? I'm working on something a bit rough right now, and this is assuming that a standard person spends about a silver per meal.
1 cp=100 calories.
1 sp=1000 calories
That's a baseline. 4000 calories is a pound.
Now, this is the tricky part: how many calories does a day of adventuring burn? A day of farming? A day of desk work?
Now, for mechanical bonuses and penalties. Can you guys help me out here?
Alright, so, for a RotRL campaign that's just starting up, our GM is using a house rule called Virtue and Sin. Basically, what is amounts to is that having a lot of Virtue points gives you a small mechanical bonus, and a lot of Sin means having a penalty with a larger mechanical bonus than the Virtue version. Each of us must specialize in a Sin and a Virtue, gaining double points when we commit those in roleplay. So, I chose to specialize in Gluttony and Kindness. Since having my character gain weight is intregal to my concept, can you guys present me with one? I'm working on something a bit rough right now, and this is assuming that a standard person spends about a silver per meal.
1 cp=100 calories.
1 sp=1000 caloriesThat's a baseline. 4000 calories is a pound.
Now, this is the tricky part: how many calories does a day of adventuring burn? A day of farming? A day of desk work?
Now, for mechanical bonuses and penalties. Can you guys help me out here?
I can undestand the appeal of making sub systems like this. But i think, for this you are better of just saying that he is becoming fat. How heavy you are, is not very important in the game. And is more or less left to the player any way.
Edit: ipad helped with the spelling.
1 cp=100 calories.
1 sp=1000 caloriesThat's a baseline. 4000 calories is a pound.
Now, this is the tricky part: how many calories does a day of adventuring burn? A day of farming? A day of desk work?
Now, for mechanical bonuses and penalties. Can you guys help me out here?
Generally speaking a male adult burns about 2500 calories a day and a woman about 2000 calories.
Assuming one does a phusical job (like farming, miller, carpenter, lumberjack, adventurer when travelling while walking or riding) one might burn up 500 to a 1000 extra calories per day.
Athletes may burn up 4000 to even 7500 calories a day if they do the tour the France, Vuelta or another multi day race covering 150 miles a day for several days/weeks (yes, cyclists burn the most calories).
But realise that adventurers are not Olympian class athletes, so it's unlikely they will burn more then 3000 to 4000 calories a day.
Also realise that athletes eat at least 8 times a day!! And they will take small portions at a time, taking in 250 to 500 calories a meal/snack of very well proportioned food.
Considering that a commoners meal is usually 3 sp and is most likely about 2500 calories, that seems reasonable. Although a poor man's meal of 1 sp is most likely still 2000 calories. And a good meal of 5 sp is most likely 3000 calories. You should realise that the poor man's meal tastes very bland, while the other meals will have more variety.
Eating more then you need usually is only possible if you eat things you like and not things that do not stand out at all. One of the reasons elderly persons are malnourished is because the food they get does not tastes delicious, but bland or even bad.
I would add overweight to the encumbrance of a character, effectively lowering his/her total weight allowed by the extra pounds over his/her starting weight. And when above 110% of starting weight I would let a character make weekly fortitude saves (DC 10) of contracting some mundane disease. Every extra 10% of weight over the starting weight will add 2 to the DC of the save.
It shouldn't be too hard to do kind deeds. Simply find out what an area lacks and provide the area with that. Be polite and help people out, not expecting huge amounts of reward. Or trade some needed help for a service, instead of hard cash. Simply hunting for some predator/dangerous animal in the surrouninds of a village will most likely be well received. And if the predator/dangerous animal happens to be edible simply organise a BBQ afterwards. It shows everyone what you did and makes you popular for providing a meal.
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You are never going to get that level of simulation in this game. If you are a caster take the feat Bloatmage Initiate and to gain more weight take the prestige class Bloatmage (only works for arcane casters.) There is no other way I know of to represent a character gaining weight other than just saying it and it being a roleplay only concern.
But realise that adventurers are not Olympian class athletes, so it's unlikely they will burn more then 3000 to 4000 calories a day.I have an issue with this statement... If you are not playing a primary caster, you will have one or two physical attribute way higher than any olympian class athlete, at least after a certain level (around Level 6-8).
The world record for a high jump is around 2,5 m for males, which is around 8 feet. That is an acrobatics DC of 32, assuming skill focus, level 8 and Dex 20 you would need a measly 13 to get that world record...
So yeah, most non-casting adventurers are probably more fit than the average athlete.
High jumping is a very specialized motion, and is not analogous to making a "High Jump" in PF (since, among other things, you're not going to land on your feet). The DC for that jump should be lower.
Generally speaking a male adult burns about 2500 calories a day and a woman about 2000 calories.
Assuming one does a phusical job (like farming, miller, carpenter, lumberjack, adventurer when travelling while walking or riding) one might burn up 500 to a 1000 extra calories per day.
Athletes may burn up 4000 to even 7500 calories a day if they do the tour the France, Vuelta or another multi day race covering 150 miles a day for several days/weeks (yes, cyclists burn the most calories).
But realise that adventurers are not Olympian class athletes, so it's unlikely they will burn more then 3000 to 4000 calories a day.
Also realise that athletes eat at least 8 times a day!! And they will take small portions at a time, taking in 250 to 500 calories a meal/snack of very well proportioned food.
Ask any soldier, physical combat is literally the most physically taxing thing a person can do. Martial adventurers who are actively adventuring almost certainly burn more calories then olympic athletes.
Not only do they actively engage in combat several times a day, but they also probably went on miles long hikes through wilderness, caverns, or dungeons, carrying packs as heavy of heavier then the biggest military packs.
We are actually in micheal phelps calories territory, maybe more, not less then a typical athlete.
Mind you on days of rest this is completely different, though they might have a training regiment which would put them up around the calorie usage of olypic athletes in training.
Keep in mind, no only are they engaging in taxing physical activity, they are doing it carrying weapons, gear, and wearing armor. Even a chainshirt is 25lbs. Go ahead and buy a chain shirt, put it on, and try to go through your normal day. Its exhausting even if you are in good shape. Adventurers actually go through superhuman physical toil every day.
Mind you, if you are a frail wizard sorceror or something that might well change, but then you can potentially include the calorie requirements for manipulating the powers of creation (most literature and such make using magic as physically taxing as physical combat). So again, adventurers are probably in micheal phelps territory of buring 10,000ish calories a day as opposed to 2-3000
Ask any olympian athlete to train with the special forces and their (honest) answer: 'Yes I can use a recovery training (light training for recovery)'. And you will see that a specialised athlete runs circles around the special forces.
I agree that fighting is one of the most physically taxing activities in existence, but soldiers do not fight 24/7 because noone is able to do that.
And checking the Pathfinder analogy will show that those 3 fights a day seldom last longer then 6 rounds each and trust me 5 hours of training or more that the athletes clock on average, cost more energy then the combat the adventurers are clocking in.
And no Michael phelps doesn't burn 10K calories, it's more like 5K to 6K, which is considerable as swimming is a high energy sport.
In short my estimate stands and is not unreasonable. In fact the game mechanics are very mild because they let us get away with eating one meal a day.
Ask any olympian athlete to train with the special forces and their (honest) answer: 'Yes I can use a recovery training (light training for recovery)'. And you will see that a specialised athlete runs circles around the special forces.
I agree that fighting is one of the most physically taxing activities in existence, but soldiers do not fight 24/7 because noone is able to do that.
And checking the Pathfinder analogy will show that those 3 fights a day seldom last longer then 6 rounds each and trust me 5 hours of training or more that the athletes clock on average, cost more energy then the combat the adventurers are clocking in.
And no Michael phelps doesn't burn 10K calories, it's more like 5K to 6K, which is considerable as swimming is a high energy sport.In short my estimate stands and is not unreasonable. In fact the game mechanics are very mild because they let us get away with eating one meal a day.
Strap an 80lb pack to the athletes back and give him a 13 lb rifle to carry and put 30lbs of body armor on him, and put him in harsh terrain, and I disagree about him running anywhere.
And while adventurers dont fight 24/7, they probably 'fight' (time leading up to and after as well as during combat) 10-15 minutes a day. The rest of that time, they are merely hiking through the woods carring 100+lbs of gear. Thats not exactly a leasurely stroll.
This should be a roleplaying issue only.
1 cp=100 calories.
1 sp=1000 caloriesThat's a baseline. 4000 calories is a pound.
Now, this is the tricky part: how many calories does a day of adventuring burn? A day of farming? A day of desk work?
Now, for mechanical bonuses and penalties. Can you guys help me out here?
Generally speaking a male adult burns about 2500 calories a day and a woman about 2000 calories.
Assuming one does a phusical job (like farming, miller, carpenter, lumberjack, adventurer when travelling while walking or riding) one might burn up 500 to a 1000 extra calories per day.
Athletes may burn up 4000 to even 7500 calories a day if they do the tour the France, Vuelta or another multi day race covering 150 miles a day for several days/weeks (yes, cyclists burn the most calories).
But realise that adventurers are not Olympian class athletes, so it's unlikely they will burn more then 3000 to 4000 calories a day.
Also realise that athletes eat at least 8 times a day!! And they will take small portions at a time, taking in 250 to 500 calories a meal/snack of very well proportioned food.Considering that a commoners meal is usually 3 sp and is most likely about 2500 calories, that seems reasonable. Although a poor man's meal of 1 sp is most likely still 2000 calories. And a good meal of 5 sp is most likely 3000 calories. You should realise that the poor man's meal tastes very bland, while the other meals will have more variety.
Eating more then you need usually is only possible if you eat things you like and not things that do not stand out at all. One of the reasons elderly persons are malnourished is because the food they get does not tastes delicious, but bland or even bad.I would add overweight to the encumbrance of a character, effectively lowering his/her total weight allowed by the extra pounds over his/her starting weight. And when above 110% of starting weight I would let a character make weekly fortitude saves (DC 10) of contracting some mundane disease. Every extra 10%...
Being fat makes you contract diseases? Of all the people I know the ones who are heavy seem to get sick less often than everyone. And the light weights get sick way more frequently.
Unless you are talking about chronic conditions associated with obesity, in which case every week seems rather harsh. Even with a 5% failure chance. Gain 25 pounds? Well, in 5 months you have arterial sclerosis! 5 more months it's diabetes! After a year and three months of being 25 pounds over "max" weight you get heart disease and die. Those numbers are for someone who would only fail on a 1. That would be a 7th level character (who got good fort saves) with an 18 con. Not exactly the kind of person I would expect to fall dead of complications from being obese in just over a year.
I never mentioned that we should kill an overweight character like that, but some minor mundane disease that saves relatively easy and does minor con damage is a major pain in the backside although not exactly lethal.
Actual overweight is a constant hindrance, detroying joints, clogging arteries, shortness of breath, crushing organs if really obese untill someone heart cannot cut it anymore or they litterally die because they are crushed under their own weight (asfixation / organ failure).
Besides underweight is quite lethal as wel and leads to problems a lot faster.
con damage is not exactly lethal? Isnt it like the definition of lethal?
I never mentioned that we should kill an overweight character like that, but some minor mundane disease that saves relatively easy and does minor con damage is a major pain in the backside although not exactly lethal.
Actual overweight is a constant hindrance, detroying joints, clogging arteries, shortness of breath, crushing organs if really obese untill someone heart cannot cut it anymore or they litterally die because they are crushed under their own weight (asfixation / organ failure).
Besides underweight is quite lethal as wel and leads to problems a lot faster.
If that is your intent then I stand by my statement that once a week is FAR too often. Once a year would be a more appropriate timeframe for those checks.
con damage is not exactly lethal? Isnt it like the definition of lethal?
If the save for the disease is really low a character will simply save it off fast, but will get some minor con damage temporarily. And that will hamper the player. And the disease doesn't have to affect Constitution only, it might affect str or dex instead. Just enough to really annoy, but nothing really lethal (yet).
Oh noes! My diabetes is flaring up!
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Pathfinder has absolutely no method (no should it in my opinion) of simulating with long term health risks. Even if it did, it would be hard to imagine that being overweight would present a greater risk than the routine physical abuse and environmental dangers that an adventurer faces.
As for calories in vs. activity of weight gain, I would ignore it completely, and just spend extra money on food, roleplay out how much he relishes consuming it, and have him slowly become heavier etc. However, if you feel you must have 'rules' for this, remember that weight gain doesn't really conform simply to thermodynamics. Weight gain is at least as much associated with a person's basic metabolism, the type of food (not just how many calories) and a host of other factors, as it is with a simple calories vs physical activity.
One doesn't need a simulationist mechanic to roleplay being a glutton and getting fat, and I would argue that having one would actually impede, rather than enhance, the experience.
I wonder how many calories are burned in the life-or-death moments where the body switches off all its "limiters" for a temporary burst of strength and speed. Adventurers have such moments multiple times per day, so it can be assumed that they can eat hearty without getting fat.
If you're a Strength-based melee class, or possibly a high Dex character who didn't dump Strength, you can simply say those calories go toward building and maintaining muscle. Some big lug with high Strength and low Dex might have a beer gut, but wouldn't suffer any mechanical penalty for it.
Casters can go that route too, with the explanation that casting spells is physically taxing. A Sorcerer or Wizard who fires off a bunch of spells in rapid succession, for example, might be sweating and out of breath by the time combat is done. An Oracle or Cleric may eat lustily, and yet still be left gaunt as his crude physical body is used as a conduit for the power of God.
Admittedly, this works better thematically for the Sorcerer and Oracle than the Wizard or Cleric.