Whoops; you forgot to buy your stats up to 10 first from 8, so they'd be quite a bit lower (it should be equivalent of 30 point buy, suitable for groups accustomed to using 25.)finally sat down and knocked out a few turns. did them all under the heroic set, or whatever the higher point array way is called.
** spoiler omitted **...
Oops. I normally just roll stats, and start everything from a base 10 anyways.
Draco18s, interesting. Thanks for the explanation. Can the player decide to put off a quest to go search for the best equipment to tackle it?
There's a expiration timer on it, but it's several hours. So essentially yes. (You can also say "skip this one" and it'll shorten the timer on when the next new quest pops in).
In terms of the attribute checks, though, what kinds of checks get used for each stat? Does Intelligence serve as Knowledges? Perception? Analytical thinking? Curiosity? Mental discipline? Ability to build things? We'll see what Gulthor has to say, but I'd think it would help to know what "Int" means for your game when applying Harrowing suits.
- Strength is the catch-all for combat, lifting, pushing, brute force. (Combat is resolved like any other encounter, but repeats as long as the monster still has hit points).
- Agility (Dex) is the catch-all for balance, swiftness, and small fiddly work.
- Intelligence is any sort of "think it over and puzzle it out." Knowing stuff, solving riddles, decyphering maps, finding directions.
- Charisma is any sort of "talk to other people."
More or less the same as Pathfinder, I just dispensed with Wisdom and Constitution, as I could easily use Int or Strength in its place and there wasn't any obstacle I could think of that would really need Wisdom to overcome (seemed too passive).
Also, I see you have in essence a "Good," "Neutral," and "Evil" outcome built into the game, but no apparent equivalence to the Law/Chaos axis. Don't know if it matters...
I don't even really have any good/evil stuff, honestly. My intent is for quests to just be quests, whether it being assassinating a king (whiiiich might be a good or evil act...) or killing a dragon. But I haven't written any explicitly evil quests/obstacles yet (e.g. killing angels).
Nature – The Publican
Spirit – The Empty Throne
Body – The Carnival
Mind – The Wanderer
Nurture – The Fiend
Strength – The Bear (4 tokens) 14
Dexterity – The Locksmith (5 tokens) 14
Constitution – The Owl (2 tokens) 12
Intelligence – The Vision (1 token) 11
Wisdom – The Teamster (2 tokens) 12
Charisma – The Keep (6 tokens) 14
Build/background later.
Got my Harrow deck tonight, updated the document to include Lakesidefantasy's variant, and will be doing some readings and interpretations tomorrow.
Bitter Lily, thank you for your kind words, and I'm glad you appreciate it; however, I couldn't possibly try to publish this list and lay claim to it. As I mentioned in my initial post, I lifted large amounts of writing directly from other authors, and I'm no plagiarist. That's not to undersell the work I did put into it: it took several hours coupled with multiple campaigns-worth of experience using the old system.
I'll say again, though, that Paizo is free to use this if they desire - the original article *is* a Paizo article.
I'm going to follow your suggestion of adding a point buy table to the Totals section. I agree that would be a good quality of life addition. Look for it to be added tomorrow.
Draco, I have some initial thoughts which I'll try to nail down for you. I suspect it'll be easy enough to convert, though there are some wonky things to work out.
For tonight, though, I'm off to bed.
Thanks for keeping this alive, everyone :) I was pretty humbled to see a large number of people on the document as I was uploading the changes. I'm really glad to know that my little idea has spawned numerous Harrow deck purchases and dusted off some more decks besides.
Having finally received mine and handled one for the first time, I have to add that the quality of the Harrow deck is outstanding. It's easily one of the best gaming props I've ever owned, and I'd encourage any group interested in this method to pick one up. I can only imagine how much it is going to add to these readings.
Draco, I have some initial thoughts which I'll try to nail down for you. I suspect it'll be easy enough to convert, though there are some wonky things to work out.
Yep. There are.
I've gone and converted stuff to code, but I've mushed some things around so that I had symmetry (e.g. all the "unique" Ability rules (steal 1 from all, give 1 to all, steal from/give to suit, etc) are on the same alignment across suits) but that was for the sake of easy programming rather than having to look up every card. Instead I can go "is this the 6th one in the suit? Yes? Ok, do one of these weird things. Otherwise just push a token around."
I also noticed that the Body and Mind pools aren't balanced (only one card in Hammer affects two mental, but four in Crown affect two physical), but I don't know if that's intentional (bias towards STR?), and I went through and just made them symmetrical. Again, for ease of programming.
Making changes is easy, though. So I look forward to your thoughts.
Draco, I have some initial thoughts which I'll try to nail down for you. I suspect it'll be easy enough to convert, though there are some wonky things to work out.Yep. There are.
I've gone and converted stuff to code, but I've mushed some things around so that I had symmetry (e.g. all the "unique" Ability rules (steal 1 from all, give 1 to all, steal from/give to suit, etc) are on the same alignment across suits) but that was for the sake of easy programming rather than having to look up every card. Instead I can go "is this the 6th one in the suit? Yes? Ok, do one of these weird things. Otherwise just push a token around."
I also noticed that the Body and Mind pools aren't balanced (only one card in Hammer affects two mental, but four in Crown affect two physical), but I don't know if that's intentional (bias towards STR?), and I went through and just made them symmetrical. Again, for ease of programming.
Making changes is easy, though. So I look forward to your thoughts.
Yep, the Harrow as an entire deck is balanced (see my under the hood spoiler in post #1), but the effects aren't symmetrical by suit.
The adjustment from 6 stats to 4 definitely introduces some odd changes, as you've mentioned.
Yep, the Harrow as an entire deck is balanced (see my under the hood spoiler in post #1), but the effects aren't symmetrical by suit.
I'll take a deeper look. I haven't managed to peruse the whole deck yet.
Wah! Gulthor, please, I beg of you: What would you do to start a character with a base of 8 but only 32 tokens, not 37? Which ones do I pull off of the start you give, in other words? Alternatively, looking at the 20-pt buy you give, where would you add the 12 tokens freed up by starting at 8?
Wah! Gulthor, please, I beg of you: What would you do to start a character with a base of 8 but only 32 tokens, not 37? Which ones do I pull off of the start you give, in other words? Alternatively, looking at the 20-pt buy you give, where would you add the 12 tokens freed up by starting at 8?
Should be answered in the newest "update", but it's pretty simple (sorry about missing it before.)
I'm going to give you the answer at the end, but I also want to just take a few and explain the process, because you may want to personalize this more/differently at some point :)
Okay, so baseline, you have a few goals.
You have whatever point buy you want to use, and you know that some tokens representing points must go on Nature, Spirit, and Nurture.
Nature needs to have a number that can be divided into thirds, and those thirds must also be able to be divided into thirds. So 9 is pretty much always your most realistic number, here.
Spirit needs to have a number that can be divided into thirds - the original article only used 3, but I really like 6. 9 feels like overkill, but that's just me.
At this point, you want to look at how many points are left. Let's just say you went 9 and 6. That would mean on a 20 point buy, you'd have 5 tokens left over. At that point, you can't put any tokens on ability scores, so that leaves you putting them all into Nurture. If you'd gone with 3 in Spirit, then you could put 1 on each ability card (9+3+6), leaving 2 for Nurture.
So, that brings us to how to handle starting ability scores at values lower than 10, which is pretty simple.
Simply add extra tokens to your total to account for the value of the lower starting score (multiplied by 6 for the 6 scores.)
So, if you wanted to start each score at a 9, then you'd add 6 tokens. Starting at 8 adds 12, and starting at 7 adds 24.
Now, personally, I find that the easiest thing to do is to just put those tokens right onto the ability cards. (This is the direct answer you were looking for, which is why I bolded it.)
However, there's no reason you would *have to* put them there.
You could decide to put them into some combination of Nature, Nurture, and/or Spirit.
So, a 20-point buy (direct answer again) that started ability scores at 8 could look as simple as:
* Nature - 9, Spirit - 6, Nurture - 5, Each Ability Card - 2
or as wild as:
* Nature - 18, Spirit - 9, Nurture - 5
* Nature - 18, Spirit - 6, Nurture - 2, Each Ability Card - 1
* Nature - 9, Spirit - 3, Nurture - 2, Each Ability Card - 3
And so on.
This is what I was talking about with Dwayne Germaine on page 2 about customizing your token spreads to fit your campaign needs/goals.
I think it's just whatever works best for you and your group.
Personally, I like adding the extra tokens in and starting at 8. It allows for bigger swings, bigger steals or giveaways. I'm also going to muck around with starting at 7 to see how that goes, too (though that is a ludicrous amount of tokens, lol.)
finally sat down and knocked out a few turns. did them all under the heroic set, or whatever the higher point array way is called.
** spoiler omitted **...
Whoops; you forgot to buy your stats up to 10 first from 8, so they'd be quite a bit lower (it should be equivalent of 30 point buy, suitable for groups accustomed to using 25.)
Hey Bishop; sorry about that - I work in the steel industry, and it's always bonkers right at the beginning of the year. I really need to get on it, though.
In other news, though, I should actually be getting my deck sometime this week, so I've been looking forward to sharing some readings and results with everyone (at which point I'll *make* time to getting around to adding in lakeside's version if I haven't already.)
No worries man. While I did not know what you did, I can totally understand having a completely insane January. I'm not trying to pressure you or anything. I was mostly just making a "Did Gulthor die/abandon the forums?" check, is all. Deal with real life; we'll all still be here when you're done.
On a related note, my group recently did a 5-man harrow generation using the "only shuffle once at the end to pull that fifth person's 11th card" method. It turned out very interestingly. Draco18s is in the group, and he was the only person not really satisfied with his grid. On the other hand, he was the only person whose previous character had actually survived the otherwise total party wipe, and he was trying to back-in to his high-charisma character, which is why he was not happy with the end result. We also determined that it was one card in his grid that screwed the whole thing up, as almost literally any other card from the remaining 43 in that slot would have given him the charisma he was looking for. Once we have met up for our new session 1 this week, I will encourage everyone to post their grids, their final stats (we used the shift 3 before buying stats option), and how they tied the cards into their backstory.
We also tested out the lot system against the normal system before we generated. What we realized is that, unless you unlock at least three of the lots under that system, the grids you end up with seem to be painfully average all around. In other words, unless you are going to unlock 4 or more lots, you may have been better off going with the default grid and then move 3 points before buying up. I am not trying to knock the lots system since I have only been able to run it 4 times so far, but three of those attempts came out average, while one came out with a focused enough array to suggest potential options. I would want to see a full 30-run sample set before I was willing to make a judgement on the lots versus the normal method, but I am slightly less enthusiastic about it then I was before.
On the other hand, he was the only person whose previous character had actually survived the otherwise total party wipe, and he was trying to back-in to his high-charisma character, which is why he was not happy with the end result.
I also ended up with The Survivor card (admittedly in Dex) and Tyrant (Wis; character's a kobold), both of which were very appropriate for the character.
The card that messed up my grid was Rabbit Prince (steal 2 from highest) in INT. It yoinked two points from Charisma, which if it hadn't, I'd have been able to squeak a 16 out of it, I think (best I was able to do was 15: I was 1 token shy of a 16, and dropping from an 18 to a 15 would have really hurt the character, and he didn't need a 15 Int either).
It's not quite "any other card" would have worked better, but it would have been a very strong portion of the deck (several cards would have pushed two points, several would have given 1, and about half the deck would have had no effect).
Would a reasonable solution to "this card in particular screwed everything up" be to allow a player an opportunity to replace a card and draw another one? I wonder at what point in the reading that would be workable.
Would a reasonable solution to "this card in particular screwed everything up" be to allow a player an opportunity to replace a card and draw another one? I wonder at what point in the reading that would be workable.
In general I think most results generate a workable character spread, just that there are several effects that try to make the spreads more average (point buy being one, admittedly).
The problem for me was that none of our readings last week generated a stat higher than 15 (except one, a 16 in Wis) and I was trying to play the same character. I didn't mind redoing the stat spread, but having been playing a lowish-int high-charisma kobold, ending with a spread that had more tokens in Int than Cha really messed things up.
As for re-drawing, it would slow things down. You'd have to do one person at a time, resolve the cards, and if one turns sour, redraw. And how would you handle the "it stole 2 points from Cha!" being replaced with "it stole two points from Cha (but differently)!" effect?
If I hadn't been gunning for my sorcerer I would have ended up with an amazing spread for something. 13, 13, 11, 15, 15, 14 (as stats and before resolving the choice to move 3 tokens)
My personal thought is that if you're going to play with this kind of array, the best thing to do is to go into it blank, without a character already in mind.
Certainly there are all sorts of different variants and workarounds that you can apply to allow you to customize it, which is definitely an overall strength.
Of course, it's hard if there's a character that you really want to play. One thing that we did in the past was to do all of our readings as a group and then allow each player to claim the reading that they liked for their character.
Still, I love hearing the stories and personal experiences; I'd also be interested in gathering a ton if data on different readings; like I said, one of the things I want to do is to take a single spread, and see what the results are like using different point buy methods with the same cards.
One thing that we did in the past was to do all of our readings as a group and then allow each player to claim the reading that they liked for their character.
That's what we did, actually. We all generated spreads, let people pick which spread they wanted, then they got the choice of which 3 tokens to move around.
There was only one swap, iirc.
And yeah, I was pretty sure that I'd be going in and not get a spread that would work, I thought the one I got would, but it just wouldn't. GM doesn't mind my carrying through my character (as Bishop mentioned, my character was the sole survivor of an encounter before GM tweaked the outcome, due to a missing player). As the group hadn't been able to play for a while (GM's work schedule has been hell) and one player leaving the group entirely, we decided to re-roll and regroup.
The prior stat-gen used the Snowflake Cards idea from...someone else's thread...which was also neat.
(huff, the site ate my edit. attempt to rewrite)
Now, for the record, I don't dislike this method of stat generation, it's really quite ingenious. I just went in with a particular desire and didn't get a workable result. Which I think is due to several "try and make the stats more average" mechanics, one of which is how Point Buy works. It results in spreads that work for several classes, but might not shine.
I don't think it's the fault of this stat gen method, necessarily, but more with Pathfinder. But it does mean that there are very few 16s possible, with higher being unheard of: 3 tokens is a 13, where as 10 (three times as many) is only a 15, which is only a net +1 on the attribute modifier.
Now, for my little programming project it works great. I removed the scalar on point buy, which lets the adventurer's stats range ~7-17 (with attribute checks being "roll 1d20 vs. stat, roll low").
My personal thought is that if you're going to play with this kind of array, the best thing to do is to go into it blank, without a character already in mind.
Certainly there are all sorts of different variants and workarounds that you can apply to allow you to customize it, which is definitely an overall strength.
Of course, it's hard if there's a character that you really want to play. One thing that we did in the past was to do all of our readings as a group and then allow each player to claim the reading that they liked for their character.
Still, I love hearing the stories and personal experiences; I'd also be interested in gathering a ton if data on different readings; like I said, one of the things I want to do is to take a single spread, and see what the results are like using different point buy methods with the same cards.
Yes, I usually come up with the concept first, and then go out and advertise for a good PC -- meaning I design a character to fill the concept well. This method is... not so good for that.
I think you should put an idea like allowing each member of a group to claim the reading that they want -- and then switch three tokens, if you're doing that -- in the article. I'd think you could even allow different players to pick the same reading. At least, it would be fun to see if they would flesh it out differently!
And thank you so much for the advice on customizing the token start. That definitely ought to be in the article, IMO. I mean, you can shorten what you told me by saying: "For a conservative approach, Nature needs 9 tokens, and Spirit either 3 or 6. Figure out how many tokens you want for all the ability cards, dividing them evenly among them. The remainder (with a minimum of 1) go on Nurture."
Although I'm going to try putting an extra few on the stat I really want high to see what happens... after I do one for a character using
>> Nature - 9, Spirit - 6, Nurture - 5, Each Ability Card - 2 <<
I'll be back!
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I'm back. It's been... interesting. I don't know if I have a viable character or not. I used a 20-pt build, 32 tokens, 8-pt base, w/ the tokens distributed Nature - 9, Spirit - 6, Nurture - 5, Ability Cards - 2 each.
Even more significantly perhaps, her mind cleared and her adoptive parents were able to teach Sasha to read! Books were her salvation. The family had a true library, and she was able to lose herself in books of all sorts (with historical and fictional books at the top of the list), while her illness waxed and waned and waxed again. And as she read, she could see herself taking part in the stories she loved. And so, she began to force herself to exercise. She honed her reflexes first with archery, but building her strength came soon after. And after her physical endeavors exhausted her past bearing, her beloved books helped her develop her mind. These exercises are what truly helped her to best the plague. But her academic tilt has admittedly kept her from paying that much attention to the world around her, be it physical, spiritual, or social.
When her parents apprenticed her to an alchemist in town, she readily learned part of the alchemist's craft -- the extracts and alchemical items that the woman prepared. The mutagens and what-not never made sense to Sasha. On the other hand, she absorbed so much information from her adoptive parents' library that she began to make a living as a bit of a sage. Someone who could remember odd bits of trivia just when they were needed. At the same time, she practiced archery compulsively, just as she had in her youth. As she put it all together, she began to call herself... an Investigator. It's a fragile mix, and she's prone to go off wandering in fits of day-dreaming. Some day, she's sure, she will figure out the key to saving thousands of lives. The child her first people abandoned as useless will make the history books, she's vowed.
~~~~~
So how did I get to this?
Sasha's reading started well, real well. Yeah, right. I dealt the cards upside down, so I'd be revealing them as the reading progressed. I flipped over the Nature card, and found:
The Lost This is the chaotic evil card of wisdom. The bodak represents the permanently insane, lost among lunatics and psychopaths in insane asylums. It is a card of emptiness.
~~~
Sasha's Spirit echoes the theme of loss, but this time from the opposite alignment.The Empty Throne This is the lawful good card of charisma. It represents those who are gone, or a ghost of the past that has taught important lessons.
~~~
Her Body focused on honing Dexterity over Strength or Constitution.The Juggler This is the chaotic good card of dexterity. It represents destiny, deities, and those who play with the fates of others.
.
And Sasha's Mind is disturbing, as befits someone whose Nature is or at least was psychotic, I suppose.The Fiend This is the lawful evil card of strength. It is a devil who devours the masses of the innocent, and can represent the deaths of many in a disaster.
I haven't worked these in yet; they're still hanging as a gift to the GM -- and an ambition.
~~~
Ah, but for her Nurture, I got The Forge, which reflected rigorous Dex-based training and a hint of salvation.
The Forge This is the lawful neutral card of strength. It represents strength through diversity, or strength from many sources united against a single trial.
~~~
Now, I'm not as sure what to do with the ability score cards. They're flavorful, but it's hard to relate them to a specific ability score.~~~
Dexterity 16 (12 tokens, plus one that gets moved to Wis or Cha)
The Snakebite This is the chaotic evil card of intelligence. It represents poison, venom, assassination, and discord.
~~~
Strength 14 (7 tokens)The Mountain Man This is the chaotic neutral card of constitution. This giant represents an encounter with a physical power outside of the subject's control.
~~~
Intelligence 14 (7 tokens)The Tyrant This is the lawful evil card of charisma. It represents a ruler who harms those he rules.
~~~
Wisdom 12 (1 token, plus 3)The Dance This is the lawful good card of dexterity. It represents a complicated framework that requires the cooperation of all to avoid collapse.
~~~
Charisma 10 (4 tokens, minus 2 moved to Wis)The Hidden Truth This is the lawful good card of intelligence. It represents the discovery of the greater truth within.
~~~
Constitution 8 (0 tokens, and a debt of 3 I couldn't move off)The Cricket This is the neutral good card of dexterity. It represents the grig, quick travel, and the reward at the end of a journey.
Lonely, neglected Con, with no tokens at all, yet I was to give a token to Dex, Int, and Cha. The rules said I didn't have to, but I don't see how I can rescue her with a racial bonus -- her Con is simply fated to be bankrupt. If I'd been able to make her an Oracle, she might have suffered polio, and ended up Lame. But no...
~~~
The spread showed a mishmash of alignments split almost evenly between Chaotic and Lawful, Evil & Good; looking at all the cards, there were 3 LG's, 2 LE's, 2 CE's, and a scattering of singletons. I don't know WHAT alignment she should have!
The total suit distribution made a lot of sense, though, for the way that the stats came out: 2 Hammers (Str), 3 Keys (Dex), 1 Shield (Con), 2 Tomes (Int), 1 Star (Wis), 2 Crowns (Cha).
TL;DR:
1. Nature: The Lost, CE Stars or Wisdom
2. Spirit: The Empty Throne, LG Crowns or Charisma
3. Body: The Juggler, CG Keys or Dexterity
4. Mind: The Fiend, LE Hammers or Strength
5. Nurture: The Forge, LN Hammers or Strength
Strength 14: The Mountain Man, CN Shields or Constitution
Dexterity 16: The Snakebite, CE Tomes or Intelligence
Constitution 8: The Cricket, NG Keys or Dexterity
Intelligence 14: The Tyrant, LE Crowns or Charisma
Wisdom 12: The Dance, LG Keys or Dexterity
Charisma 10: The Hidden Truth, LG Tomes or Intelligence
Proposed Class: Investigator, with compound shortbow focus in combat, plus knowledges & extracts. If anyone can propose a different class from the PRD, other than occult, I'd be grateful.
Cavalier? The low con hurts, but it might work.
One of these days I'm gonna sit down and do spreads until I get an 18.
I don't think it's possible. Not without some serious shenanigans on part of the six stat cards. You'd need the stat that becomes the 18 to have the "steal 1 from all" card and every other card to have a "give 2 to X away" where X is the distance to the 18.
That'd get you 15 of the 17 required tokens.
I got an 18 in strength the very first time I tried this method. Never saw an 18 again after that. Saw a 17 once and a few 16s.
I'm also going to muck around with starting at 7 to see how that goes, too (though that is a ludicrous amount of tokens, lol.)
I tried that, it's an extra 24 tokens added to the point-buy you want. In my case it's 44 tokens I'm pushing around the spread, which is a lot--maybe not too much, but still a lot.
I tried starting all scores at 3, using extrapolated point-buy values for scores below 7, but that would require over a hundred tokens. (However, I tackled that problem with the tea leaf reading system for character generation which at the moment is half-baked.)
I love monkeying with the Harrow card method. It's a big bonus in my opinion. I've come up with half a dozen variations for myself so far. I like the gamble of creating a character, so when I use the Lot system any Lots not freed up during the reading are removed altogether rather than placed on their respective ability cards. This gives a range of 14-20 points.
I also use negative tokens and extrapolate scores below 7 for added range in variation.
I definitely think you should approach a reading with a clean slate. I love watching a character being born and figuring out who he is. It's a game within itself--and a good one.
My thoughts on this is that if you want to go "grid shopping" to get an array that can fit a concept, you'll need to do readings with the rest of your gaming group and find someone to swap with.
I swapped with someone that had a near perfect build for a barbarian. In fact, since I talked about it earlier, let me provide the grid and what I have so far on the character.
Nature: The Demon's Lantern
Spirit: The Rakshasa
Body: The Hidden Truth
Mind: The Waxworks
Nurture: The Cyclone
And the abilities. The first value is what the grid started at, followed by the pluses and minuses I applied. The value in parentheses is what I had before purchasing, and is followed by the minuses and pluses from the shifts caused by stat purchasing. Finally, the bolded value is what I ended up with.
Str: The Theater 12 (12) 16
Dex: The Big Sky 0 +1+2 (3 +2=5) 13
Con: The Avalanche 12 -1 (11 -2=9) 15
Int: The Inquisitor 9 (9) 15
Wis: The Brass Dwarf 4 -2 (2) 10
Cha: The Marriage 0 (0) 8
I'm still working through this one and working on a connection with someone else in the party, but meet our party's barbarian. And our party's smartest character. And the party's trap monkey. Hurray for a mummy's mask trait that gives you disable device as a class skill AND the ability to disable magical traps!
This entire grid tells the story of someone that was enslaved in one form or another for most of his adult life. He has clearly been under physical, mental, and magical enslavement at various points, usually under more than one, and he was probably forced to do terrible things in that time. He was trapped that way for years, until some special truth was revealed that helped snap him out of it.
I dare anyone to read the full descriptions of the 5 core cards and tell me that does not SCREAM "I am the Winder Soldier". That was the first reaction for myself and my gf. And now I am trying REALLY hard not to call him Bucky.
You know, I'd love it if more people did what I did, and quoted the initial sentence from the doc for each of their cards. Of course, LOL, maybe a lot of people were irritated by what I did! But I don't know the deck well enough for a lot of the names to strike home by themselves. It would also help if people at least incorporated the alignment & suit of the cards, to help us look through the Harrow doc to find the descriptions!
bishop, you saw this character, and said it was "near perfect" for a barbarian? Really? I thought barbarian rage abilities functioned off Charisma, while Intelligence... um, okay, you don't want to be "Big and Stupid," and that's fine, but I don't think it helps the core class, does it?
~~~~
A question for Gulthor:
Are we supposed to relate specific cards to the slot they turn up in? For my character, at least, it's quite hard to do. I'm tempted to add the following after Totals.
Or if you prefer, you may lay them back out as you choose, arranged to make a satisfying story. You must then include the Role Card in any spot of the grid. Pay attention to which cards you place in the past, present, and future columns -- and which Good/Evil cards are misaligned (in the opposite row, indicating a meaning reversal). Powerful influences must be either True Matches (in the spot matching the alignment on the card) or Opposite Matches (in the spot diametrically opposed to its alignment). Cards that will be weak influences must be Partial Matches; the remaining cards (including the two that did not get dealt out) will not be interpreted.
Now do your Harrowing for your character. Refer to the instructions that came with your deck for the full meaning of each card, especially for those that are misaligned.
My Harrowings will follow. Gulthor, I do want to point out that if you were to go back to the drawing board (ouch!) and redo your spread to a 3x3 card grid, it would be a lot simpler to relate the cards to a Harrowing. Sadly, also a lot of work for you! (Especially since in theory you'd want different instructions for the Good/Evil cards based on whether they were normal or misaligned.)
~~~~
(added): Upon reflection, it's obvious that I'll want to add Sasha's racial +2 to Int, making that a 16.
So I can't move 2 from Cha to Wis, and I don't like Wis 10, Cha 12 as much. But Int 16 (18 after racial +2) ends up looking sweet. The other stats don't change.
Strength 14 -- now 8 tokens
~ less 1 to Int by choice still makes 7
Dexterity 16 -- still 13 tokens
~ Nurture dump had 1 less, offsetting the extra 1 base
~ less 1 to Int by rule still makes 12
Constitution 8 -- still 0 tokens
~ except that I'm able to put 1 on Int now, so Con's "debt" is only -2
Intelligence 16 (18 w/ racial) -- now 9 tokens
~ counting 1 from Con due to The Cricket;
~ plus 1 from Dex (rule), Str (choice), & Cha (choice) makes 12
Wisdom 10 -- now 2 tokens
Charisma 12 -- now 5 tokens
~ less 1 to Int by choice now makes 4
~ unfortunately, I can transfer at most 1 to Wis by choice, so none.
I thought barbarian rage abilities functioned off Charisma, while Intelligence... um, okay, you don't want to be "Big and Stupid," and that's fine, but I don't think it helps the core class, does it?Neither would Charisma, though. Rage powers aren't based on mental stats.
D'oh! It's Constitution. OK, cool barbarian. People will underestimate the character's smarts all the time.
One other note before I go off to perform Harrowings. For the record, what if I had had my "set the extras aside and place them as you want" rule in place instead of the "move 3 tokens of your choice" rule? Then my 20-pt buy would have gone:
Strength 14 (7 tokens)
Dexterity 16 (13 tokens, leaving 1 left-over)
Constitution 8 (0 tokens, and a debt of -3)
Intelligence 14 (7 tokens) [Int 16 w/ racial +2]
Wisdom 10 (1 token, plus 1 left-over assigned)
Charisma 12 (4 tokens)
Less freedom of choice, certainly. But being stuck with Wis 10, Cha 12 in fact better reflects the actual token placement.
This is a bit more interesting with this variant...
Strength 14 -- now 8 tokens, leaving 1 left-over
Dexterity 16 -- still 13 tokens, leaving 1 left-over
~ Nurture dump had 1 less, offsetting the extra 1 base
Constitution 8 -- still 0 tokens
~ except that I'm able to put 1 on Int now, so Con's "debt" is only -2
Intelligence 15 -- now 9 tokens [Int 17 w/ racial +2]
~ counting 1 from Con due to The Cricket
Wisdom 12 -- now 2 tokens, plus 2 left-overs assigned
Charisma 13 -- now 5 tokens
With 2 left-overs, I have more choices: Str or Cha by 1, or Wis by 2. I don't like odd stats, so +1 to Cha is tempting. But I really want this character to have some sort of boost to Perception & Sense Motive, so into Wis they go. Again, less freedom of choice, and arguably better fidelity to the token placement. Dex is still better than Int, up until the racial bonus kicks in. I get my Wis 12, but am forced to accept a quite sociable Cha 13.
I hereby formally tender as an optional rule my variant, to be placed at the end of the Totals section:
For greater player flexibility, set the remaining tokens aside. After purchasing all 6 ability scores, place all of the “left-over” tokens on ability cards of your choice and buy up those ability scores as much as possible. All tokens must be used in the end to buy ability scores; you may not place any “left-overs” on cards such that you cannot spend them.
Cavalier? The low con hurts, but it might work.
Can cavaliers go ranged? Given the low Con & high Dex, I really want compound bow for her.
Cavalier? The low con hurts, but it might work.Can cavaliers go ranged? Given the low Con & high Dex, I really want compound bow for her.
You want the Luring Cavalier archetype from Ultimate Combat. It lets you use your challenge against anybody you can see (i.e. anybody you can shoot arrows at) and trades the charge class features for ranged-combat specific ones.
You want the Luring Cavalier archetype from Ultimate Combat. It lets you use your challenge against anybody you can see (i.e. anybody you can shoot arrows at) and trades the charge class features for ranged-combat specific ones.Cavalier? The low con hurts, but it might work.Can cavaliers go ranged? Given the low Con & high Dex, I really want compound bow for her.
There's also the Samurai. It trades out the teamwork stuff for focus on a subset of weapons, including compound longbows.
A question for Gulthor:
Are we supposed to relate specific cards to the slot they turn up in? For my character, at least, it's quite hard to do. I'm tempted to add the following after Totals.** spoiler omitted **...
Gulthor, I do want to point out that if you were to go back to the drawing board (ouch!) and redo your spread to a 3x3 card grid, it would be a lot simpler to relate the cards to a Harrowing. Sadly, also a lot of work for you! (Especially since in theory you'd want different instructions for the Good/Evil cards based on whether they were normal or misaligned.)
Yep, the idea is that you relate the card to the position that it lands in. So if your character's Nature is The Paladin, or The Twins, or the Tyrant, as examples, that should hopefully already be giving you ideas (and of course remember that people fight against their natures all the time. ) If your character's Intelligence is The Sickness, it might mean that your character suffered a long illness as a child and was bedridden, leaving her to escape into books. Just examples, of course. Nurture is something - a person or event - that was a major influence in your character's life. The Empty Throne could mean the loss of a loved one, The Marriage could be a literal marriage in your character's family (or even your character) or it could be a more figurative interpretation, like your character joining an adventuring party.
Sure, I could have tried to alter the method to "The Tapestry" method, but you must remember that my goal was simply to adapt the old 3DA system that our group loved and update it for use with the Harrow. And keep in mind with regards to The Tapestry that:
Alternative Harrow Spreads
The classic harrow spread is called 'The Tapestry' but there are many more ways of laying down the harrow cards.
So this is simply one of those alternative spreads. Hypothetically, were I to consider a Tapestry version, I'd cut out the Body and Mind cards, and have Nature put tokens directly on abilities, but that's actually substantially more work than it sounds like.
I'm very glad to hear that you're feeling a lot more confident developing a variant that feels better for you and your group.
Personally, our group doesn't use any token manipulation method; we accept the scores as they land (at least that's how we did it in the past.)
We might go the route of doing a batch of readings and allowing the group to pick which one they like for their character, though. I'm not sure. Part of what we liked was that it forced us into less comfortable builds and roles. And since we're talking about using it for Strange Aeons, we're already talking about using it as a way to embrace the loss of player agency.
The BIG point about using the Tapestry is that cards can be "misaligned" -- good cards have an unfortunate influence and evil cards a fortunate one. And the reading makes a distinction between True Matches & Opposite Matches, which have a major influence; Partial Matches, which have a minor influence; and then everything else, with no influence. I crammed the cards I'd dealt Sasha into a Tapestry layout, and oh, did it ever make a difference to the reading! I strongly recommend it.
The way I could figure it out, the first column, representing the Past or lawful, is Nature-Spirit-Nurture. (Body & Mind got discarded.) The second column, representing the Present or neutral, is Strength-Dexterity-Constitution. The third column, representing the Future or chaotic, is Intelligence-Wisdom-Charisma.
Note that the top row (Nature, Strength, & Intelligence) is aligned with good, so any evil cards that appear here will be misaligned and given an opposite interpretation. The same is true for any good cards appearing in the bottom or evil-aligned row (Nurture, Constitution, & Charisma). (The middle row is aligned with the neutral.)
It's a powerful, complex system, that has already produced an incredible effect on one of the games I'm running (Jade Regent). What I'd love to see is a system of moving tokens around that reflected this understanding of the Tapestry spread.
Gulthor, can you at least talk about the principles you used to modify your source doc, as best you understand them?
Btw, the first reading I did, which was just a scattershot attempt to pull cards together, gave me a half-orc Investigator. (Investigator really fit because of things like poison-use from The Snakebite, for instance.) The second one I did, using the Tapestry spread, gave me a human Luring Cavalier. (Thank you, PossibleCabbage, so much for telling me about the archetype! The new background just cries out for Cavalier.) I had no True Matches, you see, but four Opposite Matches -- cards whose usual meanings were reversed for my character. Starting with her nature; she hadn't had her sanity crushed by circs, no, she had retained clarity of mind under duress. Wow!
I'm still typing up the new reading; it will follow. But I can at least urge those of you who have the instructions for the Tapestry spread to try using it on the characters you dealt.
Gulthor, can you at least talk about the principles you used to modify your source doc, as best you understand them?
Yep, click the spoiler at the bottom of the first post.
Gulthor, can you at least talk about the principles you used to modify your source doc, as best you understand them?Yep, click the spoiler at the bottom of the first post.
OOOPS! Was that there before?
Then I placed the cards in their proper spots in my converted spread, according to the spots I had dealt in Gulthor's. The Juggler (Body) and The Fiend (Mind) got discarded.
A card with an alignment that has nothing in common with the spot in the grid where it got dealt has very little influence, and usually is only interpreted if it fits the more powerful cards, or if there is literally nothing better in that column. Sasha has three:
> The Mountain Man (Strength) represents "an encounter with a physical power outside of the subject's control." I had worked that image into my previous backstory; now it is in Sasha's present, in a minor way. Her Strength is 14.
> The Snakebite (Dexterity) was extremely interesting the first time around -- representing "poison, venom, assassination, and discord." I ended up picking the class of Investigator partly based on this card the first time around; now it also is in Sasha's present, in a minor way. I'm frustrated that her Dex ended up being so high (16), when this card is minor and not something I can relate to Dex. Anyone who can help, in the context of her present story, please do so!
> The Dance (Wisdom) represents a complicated framework that requires the cooperation of all to avoid collapse; now it lurks in Sasha's future, in a minor way. Her Wisdom is minor, too -- 10.
We'll come back to all three of these as I tell Sasha's story, since they do in fact work in with the powerful cards of the spread. However, I had been unable to seriously relate the cards to their abilities the first time around, and I have to say, that hasn't changed. I'm less troubled by it now, however, since their influence is so weak.
Sasha also had two cards that had only one alignment in common with its spot in the spread. These are Partial Matches, or weak influences.
> The Empty Throne (Spirit) whispers of ghosts from the past, which is an interesting card. First of all, I took the image of an Empty Throne and ran with it -- far more this time than the first. Secondly, this is her Spirit card, and there is, unbeknownst to her, a spiritual connection in her past which will inform her future.
> The Forge (Nurture), representing strength through great diversity, OTOH doesn't seem to play a role in her past or her nurture. By the rules of the Tapestry readings, I can disregard it.
A card with an alignment that completely matches the spot where it was dealt is a True Match, and a powerful influence -- well, Sasha didn't have any of those. But she had four Opposite Matches -- cards in the spot opposite to their alignment. A very strong reading! These are also powerful influences, and must be interpreted, but the card signifies the opposite of what it normally would.
> The Lost (Nature) tells me, as I've said, that her defining nature & role is to maintain her cool under fire, her clarity of mind under great duress. First, she's become a military officer... a Luring Cavalier. But the more obvious association, especially since this is her role card, is that she was tortured for information... and didn't break.
> The Cricket (Constitution) The Cricket had been good news before, of treasure to be found at the end of the journey. Now, it relates much more readily to her broken Con (8, with a debt of -3 I couldn't pay). Because misaligned, it represents a journey going poorly, and treasure that is lost rather than found. Again, she had been on track for something, only she lost it -- and her health, besides. Well, the second part is easy to interpret; she's been tortured over a prolonged period of time!
> The Tyrant (Intelligence) was a card I had a hard time understanding before, despite the fact that Intelligence is one of Sasha's key abilities. It indicates "a ruler who harms those he rules." This was her mind, ruler of her body? Let's not go there! But now, it means that the tyrant is to be revealed -- in her future. Well, what if she is to find a way in the future, through her strong intelligence of 14, to reveal and depose a literal tyrant? A... tyrant who seized an empty throne. From Sasha, the rightful heir. A Mountain Man of a tyrant, in fact. Who has used poison and venom to wreck discord in his own family, slaying his brother to take the throne with a Snakebite. Certainly, in revealing his usurpation, she will be abandoning the spot in the Dance that he assigned her, and bringing his house of cards to ruin!
> The Hidden Truth (Charisma) But discovering that cards were misaligned cuts both ways for Sasha; this comforting card will turn into a secret that is revealed to her detriment. Those ghosts from the empty throne will not bring her comfort. And the secret has to do with relationships, Charisma (12). Her detriment. And I felt certain that the misaligned Cricket would play a role, not just in her ruined present, but in that detrimental secret.
It must be a secret that steals from her the right to rule that she (currently) believes she has. The reign that she is currently on a journey to regain. Her uncle has told the nation that she died when her father did, when instead he whisked her off to his dungeon. (No doubt a faithful retainer finally helped her escape.) He tortured her because he wanted the password to the family vault, with its significant treasure, but which is sealed with an artifact-level lock. Only the password will open that vault. And she retained her clarity of mind; she did not give it to him, despite the fact that she does know it. But inside that vault, if she ever gains entry through the course of play, is more than the treasure she hopes will fund a revolt. There is a letter she does not know about. Signed and sealed by her father, the king, as well as a neighboring king. A letter that betroths her to that king's (child) heir, written when she was but an infant. And upon her father's death merges her kingdom into the neighboring one.
When she finds that letter, she'll know she has all the allies she needs to bring her uncle the usurper to justice. And regain her throne -- for as long as it takes to wed a man who will take title to it. What a plot hook to hand a GM!
OOOPS! Was that there before?Gulthor, can you at least talk about the principles you used to modify your source doc, as best you understand them?Yep, click the spoiler at the bottom of the first post.
Yeah, but I realized long after the edit window passed that I should have called better attention to it. What can I say? It was an extremely long post; I didn't edit it nearly as well as I should have (I typed it up on my lunch break on mobile, which again, probably shouldn't have.)
I'm definitely not shooting down what you're saying; you should definitely go for it if you'd like to put it together.
My goals, however, are/were very different: I wanted to remake the Three Dragon Ante system and update/fix/convert it for use with the Harrow deck while having it remain functionally identical to the method my group and I loved - sharing it was honestly a massive afterthought. Even when I did share it, I didn't think it was going to receive any attention (I have been humbled to have been proven wrong.)
I'm very comfortable calling and accepting that it's my personal preference for it to be set up mechanically the way that it is, since that was my goal. And I unapologetically like reading the cards as described in the original text, unconnected from the Tapestry method - all 11 cards occur in the character's past, after all.
But just because I enjoy reading it that way doesn't make it the right way or the only way. Far be it from me to get in the way of someone wanting to adapt something I myself adapted (which is why I won't take credit for it.) You should be encouraged to adapt and interpret in the way that makes sense for you and your group. You should run with it if you feel like tinkering around with all the pieces and parts.
The BIG point about using the Tapestry is that cards can be "misaligned" -- good cards have an unfortunate influence and evil cards a fortunate one. And the reading makes a distinction between True Matches & Opposite Matches, which have a major influence; Partial Matches, which have a minor influence; and then everything else, with no influence. I crammed the cards I'd dealt Sasha into a Tapestry layout, and oh, did it ever make a difference to the reading! I strongly recommend it.
It's a powerful, complex system, that has already produced an incredible effect on one of the games I'm running (Jade Regent). What I'd love to see is a system of moving tokens around that reflected this understanding of the Tapestry spread.
I'm definitely not shooting down what you're saying; you should definitely go for it if you'd like to put it together.
My goals, however, are/were very different: I wanted to remake the Three Dragon Ante system and update/fix/convert it for use with the Harrow deck while having it remain functionally identical to the method my group and I loved - sharing it was honestly a massive afterthought. Even when I did share it, I didn't think it was going to receive any attention (I have been humbled to have been proven wrong.)
I'm very comfortable calling and accepting that it's my personal preference for it to be set up mechanically the way that it is, since that was my goal. And I unapologetically like reading the cards as described in the original text, unconnected from the Tapestry method - all 11 cards occur in the character's past, after all.
But just because I enjoy reading it that way doesn't make it the right way or the only way. Far be it from me to get in the way of someone wanting to adapt something I myself adapted (which is why I won't take credit for it.) You should be encouraged to adapt and interpret in the way that makes sense for you and your group. You should run with it if you feel like tinkering around with all the pieces and parts.
Let's hope I do. It does, honestly, sound like a lot of work. And I appreciate more than I can say what you've done on this.
If anyone wants to join in, please, I'd love a collaborator!
(20-point buy)
Nature – The Publican
Spirit – The Empty Throne
Body – The Carnival
Mind – The Wanderer
Nurture – The Fiend
Strength – The Bear (4 tokens) 14
Dexterity – The Locksmith (5 tokens) 14
Constitution – The Owl (2 tokens) 12
Intelligence – The Vision (1 token) 11
Wisdom – The Teamster (2 tokens) 12
Charisma – The Keep (6 tokens) 14Build/background later.
Okay, it's pretty clear at this point that I'm not getting anywhere on this. Therefore, I'm giving her to anyone that can make something of her.
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Okay, it's pretty clear at this point that I'm not getting anywhere on this. Therefore, I'm giving her to anyone that can make something of her.(20-point buy)
Nature – The Publican
Spirit – The Empty Throne
Body – The Carnival
Mind – The Wanderer
Nurture – The Fiend
Strength – The Bear (4 tokens) 14
Dexterity – The Locksmith (5 tokens) 14
Constitution – The Owl (2 tokens) 12
Intelligence – The Vision (1 token) 11
Wisdom – The Teamster (2 tokens) 12
Charisma – The Keep (6 tokens) 14Build/background later.
You know... I'm thinking the circus.
You have the Carnival, Wanderer, Bear, Owl, Locksmith, Teamster... the Publican in Nature could easily mean that she's a natural performer - gregarious and outgoing - it speaks to the need to belong to a group. The Fiend in nurture could mean that her parents were cruel and abusive, leading her to run away. The Empty Throne in Spirit - perhaps a death in the family which was cause for the cruelty she experienced at home? You could go Cinderella-style; biological parent died, and step-parent became abusive. Or perhaps the character blames herself for the death of a sibling. Or perhaps the character grew up in an orphanage, never knowing what it was to have parents, filling her with a deep longing.
The Carnival in the Body and Wanderer in Mind tell similar tales; the Carnival represents illusions and false dreams - the Circus turned out to be much harder work than the character dreamed, building up her physical stamina and resilience. The Wanderer in Mind, well... that's pretty obvious :) Daydreamer, full of wanderlust.
The Bear in Strength; well, the Bear represents Strength that cannot be tamed - as suggested, the Circus is hard physical work. It's natural that it would result in a character with greater physical strength.
The Locksmith in Dex; well, let's just say that the Circus can - on occasion - engage in some shady practices.
The Owl in Con; the Owl represents the harshness of the natural order. The character hasn't had an easy life. Living on the road is tough; she's probably gone through periods where food was scarce on long journeys - perhaps the circus has been robbed now and again or driven out of some villages.
The Vision in Int; the Vision represents esoteric knowledge or even madness. Life on the road doesn't exactly lend itself to academic study, and the character was driven to that life by an extremely stressful childhood.
The Teamster in Wisdom; the Teamster represents a force that drives the character on. This is a recurring theme with this character. The bear is irrepressable. This character is stubborn and driven, not easily discouraged. This is further driven home by:
The Keep in Cha; Charisma has been said to be the Stat that measures a character's "soul". The Keep "represents quiet, unshakeable strength that withstands any hardship." This character is resilient, and despite a rough and tumble life, her zeal and love of life is indestructible.
This array features:
Law/Chaos axis:
Lawful: 3
Neutral: 5
Chaotic: 3
Good/Evil Axis:
Good: 4
Neutral: 6
Evil: 1
Notably, 3 True Neutral cards appear in her spread, and neutrality overall has a very strong representation.
Given her good Str, Dex, and Cha, I'd think she'd be best suited to something a little more physical; given the Bear and the Owl, I'd be extremely tempted to take her into a class that offers an animal companion or familiar (of which there are many.)
She's certainly not evil, but I don't see her as the type to put her neck out for others, either. She's had to fight for her freedom, and she's filled with determination. I see her as probably being a bit mercenary, and - as a bit of a show-off (Publican/Circus/Performance) - attracted to the glory and fame adventuring has to offer.
I could easily see her as a bard, hunter, ranger, rogue, or swashbuckler, to name a few, with both the background and ability scores to back those up. I'd probably be tempted to go human and lose the bonus feat to nab to racial alternative extra stat boost to get a pair of 16's.
Anyway, just my interpretation. Hope it helps!
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Hey everyone,
Just wanted to give a quick update:
Under the "What You Need" section, a couple links have been added - one to the Paizo store's Harrow Deck page, and another to a printable version of the rules.
One of our players came up with the linked document since I have our group's deck, and he wanted to play with it on his own to run some test arrays.
I know quite some time ago, we made the ambitious claim that we were working on making a program/spreadsheet to allow you to click a button and generate an array. Progress on that unfortunately stalled, but it is still being worked on.
We're knee-deep in our Jade Regent campaign at the moment, which is going well, and the next AP on our lineup is Strange Aeons, which we're going to be using this method for.
We ran a dozen or so readings a while ago that generated some interesting arrays (and we did see a couple elusive 17's, as well as a lot of 15's and 16's - definitely a very real bell curve in place.)
Unfortunately, I didn't think to record the readings, but will be doing so and transcribing the results for our Strange Aeons characters.
Thanks again for your support and interest in this method. It's been a really enjoyable experience knowing that others out there appreciate this strange and evocative dice rolling/point buy hybrid.
On a semi-related note, I had my mind blown the other day while I was watching an episode of QI about the math of playing cards (which obviously extends to the Harrow, as a 54 card deck.) So needless to say, every character generated by this method is going to be a pretty unique experience.
Hi, Gulthor! Rules like this are hard to come up with! I wanted to come up with something that fit a Tapestry layout, if you recall, but I've stalled. <sigh>
Good luck with this.
Hi, Gulthor! Rules like this are hard to come up with! I wanted to come up with something that fit a Tapestry layout, if you recall, but I've stalled. <sigh>
Good luck with this.
Thanks! I feel you. My current brainworm is coming up with houseruled Variant Multiclass rules for the classes not represented in Unchained (particularly the Occult classes, though also taking another pass at the Witch and Gunslinger, which are widely accepted as being egregiously bad as-written.)
I'll post that in the House Rule forums when it's finished up, but there's a surprising amount there to keep me busy, and the idea only bit me a couple days ago. No doubt by the time I'm done, I'll have tackled the hybrid classes and the Vigilante as well.
Yeah, I was working on a custom Tome with interesting effects to give my PCs; I can send you the final version if you're interested -- the thread is a fairly messy doc working it out. And now I'm working on a multiple-breed dogfolk race here. Feel free to come take a look! The post linked is actually the version before the current one, which takes into account comments I've gotten thus far, but I'm happy to incorporate more!
The current version is sadly a mystery still; I want to move to posting a complete doc on-line and linking it. I don't have a google account right now because I've wanted to avoid giving google my personal info. So I'm hoping to find something more secure against identity theft. Do you have ideas?
In exchange, I'd love to see your ideas for Witch, when you're ready. That's a class I've actually played -- and enjoyed as is, btw, although that's not to say that it can't be improved. What's egregiously bad about it?
The other brainworms you've got are not anything I'd have input about. But I hope you enjoy your infestations! :)
Just the Variant Multiclass for Witch is bad. Base Witch is perfectly fine - maybe a *little* weak, but only as weak as a 9th-level caster possibly can be.
<grin> with hexes that work all day long, yeah.
{To clarify, I've never tried VMC anything.}
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The other night, we got together and knocked out our Strange Aeons Harrow readings.
As promised, I'll share the link here. This leads to our Obsidian Portal page and the wiki page that has the six readings. Only mine (Gulthor's) has an interpretation as of yet, which is a link inside the wiki link.
We used a 25-point buy method with ability scores starting at 7 (so 49 tokens used in the spread). We allowed a single "re-read" where a player could scrap their first reading and take their second reading if they were unhappy with the first, which (as of yet) no one has done.
Surprisingly, the lowest stat in any spread was a single 9. The highest stat was a single 17 (and was amazingly only 2 tokens away from hitting an 18, which would have been very cool to see.)
Otherwise, the spreads were pretty "standard":
Set #1: S 13 D 15 C 13 I 14 W 14 Ch 12
Set #2: S 9 D 14 C 15 I 16 W 12 Ch 12
Set #3: S 10 D 11 C 15 I 16 W 15 Ch 10
Set #4: S 10 D 13 C 14 I 13 W 15 Ch 15
Set #5: S 15 D 13 C 13 I 15 W 13 Ch 12
Set #6: S 11 D 10 C 13 I 14 w 17 Ch 13
Interestingly, they're overall a pretty Intelligent and Wise bunch, and not terribly Strong.
Set #3's player (DarkArchon) really had his heart set on playing an Amnesiac Psychic, and amazingly got not only a great set of stats for it, but got The Rakshasa in the Mind stat (The rakshasa represents domination, mental control, and slavery), The Wanderer in Nature, which led to Intelligence (It represents a centaur collector who appreciates things others discard as junk), and amazingly, The Lost in Intelligence (The bodak represents the permanently insane, lost among lunatics and psychopaths in insane asylums. It is a card of emptiness). His set had a whopping FIVE Tome cards, and although he was disappointed he didn't get a good Charisma (he was hoping for the Rebirth discipline), it's hard to argue with getting what you want.
I, myself, had what I consider to be one of the most interesting readings, allowing me to play the character I posted on the Strange Aeons board almost a year ago, "The Misbegotten", and I was able to virtually copy/paste my original planned backstory for the character, with very little editing or additions to make the reading fit.
Gotta say, that's awesome
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I was driving today, from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia (no-stops, that's five hours). So I had some time for thinky thoughts.
I had the greatest revelation ever.
This plus Kingmaker or Kingdoms or really any time your adventurer is going to have offspring that take up the mantle at some point. Mind, this'll be rare, but I happened to have gotten involved in a game where it seems likely.
The spread can be expressed as a chromosome and you can do a crossover recombination.
In the event that you need the same card twice, just draw random (there's your mutation rate).
I've already mocked up this idea in Unity C# (ok, I've gotten to the point where I can specify a series of integers as a new spread, rather than pure random, but I can extract a series of integers from an existing spread easily, next is doing the recombination and providing a UI), albeit my deck is more rigidly constructed (see prior posts about compressing the deck to 4 stats: I had to handle the attribute resolution mechanics in a less arbitrary manner with respect to the unique cards*). And the results work:
Parent 1 . . . Parent 2 . . . Child-a . . . Child-b
STR: 10 . . . .STR: 11 . . . . STR: 9 . . . .STR: 10
DEX: 14 . . . .DEX: 14 . . . .DEX: 15 . . DEX: 16
CON: 14 . . . CON: 16 . . . CON: 15 . . CON: 15
INT: 14 . . . . INT: 13 . . . . INT: 16 . . .INT: 9
WIS: 11 . . . .WIS: 13 . . . WIS: 11 . . WIS: 14
CHA: 13 . . . .CHA: 13 . . . CHA: 11 . . CHA: 11
(Child-a / Child-b are the two possible results from a given crossover point)
That was just two random spreads (one after the other, no shuffling) and then a manual extraction and crossover, no camera tricks involved (ie I didn't run several spreads until something looked nice). I did a second crossover at a different point and got similar results (10 / 15 / 15 / 15 / 13 / 11 and 9 / 15 / 16 / 11 / 13 / 12).
*Still not done re-expanding the code to 6 suits. The unique cards are still only 4-suit. But it was good enough to test with.