Morale Overhaul

Its fairly simply system. Make almost every morale bonus or penalty randomized, to a number between to set integers, on character creation.

For example:

I create a character named Maxamillian Morticae Milkherds
Just a basic character, no traits, and all that goodness.
He ended up being generated with a Distinct contempt for milk.
He might not be lactose intolerant, but he just doesn’t like the taste of the stuff.
He also dislikes cranberry juice, but only mildly.
Though he dislikes Cran-juice, he absolutely adores Apple juice.

This would allow us to have a level of variance between characters.
We could also apply this system to books and similar things, to represent the personal taste of the character that we generate. For example, I create Roberta Rubber Rail, who adores swash-buckling, books on mechanics and adventure books, but hates erotic books and construction books.

Of course, traits can be added to ensure that certain preference. For example, a player could take a -1 trait for “Hates Reading”. This will guarantee that any book that the character reads will have at least a minor morale penalty during character gen, and likewise could be done for the opposing trait of “Loves Reading”. These traits would allow for some control over the character’s preferences by the player, allowing them form them as the player sees fit and keeping them happy, without forcing everyone to be locked into a preference form.

This would smash the generic slate that every single character becomes.
You have to hunt down the things that your character actually fucking wants, as apposed to just “reading” ALL OF THE PORN until happy.

Of course, there is the chance that the player gets an obscenely good or bad roll, and just loves or hates everything, potentially being crippling or over-powered. That is why I also suggest and average range and ratio cap for the preferences. For example, I generate a character that just hates everything, in a world with a bottom average cap of -30 and a top average cap of 20 along with a bottom ratio cap of 3 penalties: 1 bonus and top ratio cap of 1 penalty : 3 bonuses, getting the an average of -50 across all of the possible morale penalties and has a ratio of 5 penalties to 2 Bonuses. Because the average is so low, the preferences have to be rerolled and this time he gets an average of 20 across all of the possible morale affects, just barely keeping it within the acceptable average range, but this time around has a Pentalty:Bonus ratio of 1:5, resulting in a roll for the morale. This time he gets an average of 10 and ratio of 1:2, and he is good to go. The ranges for the acceptable average and ratio should be adjustable from the options.

So, what do you all think?

I would be fine with this if I only invested 5 hours of time per character.
That is not the case though.

[quote=“Cherry, post:2, topic:6737”]I would be fine with this if I only invested 5 hours of time per character.
That is not the case though.[/quote]

Why’s that?

I only play this game about once a month, and when I do, I go as long as possible.
If my character developed a dislike for things like sausage and scrambled eggs, I would re-roll my character.

This is something I’ve wanted to do for a REALLY long time, so obviously I think it’s a good idea.
Just to cross-link the discussions, here are the discussions from the other times it has come up:
http://smf.cataclysmdda.com/index.php?topic=1498.0
http://smf.cataclysmdda.com/index.php?topic=3831.0
http://smf.cataclysmdda.com/index.php?topic=4368.0
http://smf.cataclysmdda.com/index.php?topic=3841.0

tl;dr For choosing the like/dislike numbers, it either needs to be random, or have a small or nonexistent bonus for setting things to dislike, because disliking particular foods would be a very low-impact way of padding out character points.

Also we’d like to have over-exposure to a particular morale-boosting item (mp3 player, books, food, drugs, whatever) make enjoyment decay.

I’m gonna object to enforced-random likes/dislikes, as that sort of decision can be an important part of character design. That said, if someone doesn’t care about 'em, random is fine, so no problem with it for Play Now!, etc.

Like I said, there would be traits one could take towards liking or disliking certain things.
If i took “Hates Reading” then books will always have a morale setting equal to or lower than zero

If i took “Likes Meat” then foods that contain meat would give a morale bonus equal to or greater than zero.

I intended this as a place holder function for the devs, as it seems easier to program than an entire screen where-in one can fine tune every last like or dislike. Honestly, a screen like that seems like it might be a bit overwhelming for new players, or might show people items that they might not be aware exist yet, giving them spoilers.

I don’t think blanket like/dislikes of huge categories like that does much for differentiating characters.
@KA101: not sure if I mentioned it previously, but considering the options for preferences are ‘random’ or ‘whatever it’s set to in json’, I’m not sure how random loses out.
It might however be reasonable to just have a toggle at character creation to decide on randomizing preferences or not.

[quote=“Kevin Granade, post:8, topic:6737”]I don’t think blanket like/dislikes of huge categories like that does much for differentiating characters.
@KA101: not sure if I mentioned it previously, but considering the options for preferences are ‘random’ or ‘whatever it’s set to in json’, I’m not sure how random loses out.
It might however be reasonable to just have a toggle at character creation to decide on randomizing preferences or not.[/quote]

Silly me liking to know what stuff is good/not for morale without having to manually inspect everything, I guess.