The Point of Being Impulsive
We played last Tuesday as usual. No summary has been submitted by a player yet. I give out one Impulse Point to any player who writes an in-character summary of a session. There might not be one this week, and thinking about why I think that is, lead me to re-evaluating my reasoning behind Impulse Points in the first place, and whether or not that is working.
I originally considered giving 1 XP (in GURPS terms, a Character Point) for each session report, however I decided against it because (unlike XP in a game using a more traditional level-advancement system) each individual Character Point is worth something in and of itself; a new skill or Perk, or a not-insignificant fraction towards a larger Advantage. In this game, where the normal rate of advancement is usually between 2-4 XP per session, an extra 1 XP could amount to a bonus of 25%-50% for those who write summaries over those who don't. I decided to try Impulse Points instead.
For context, the idea for Impulse Points is taken from GURPS Power-Ups 5: Impulse Buys. That books takes the idea of treating character points not just as currency for advancement, but also as a means of getting immediate metagame benefits during the game session. These are based on the optional rules of "Buying Success" from p.B347 of the Basic Set, and expanded it out with new options and alternatives.
For reasons I will go into below, I chose to have Impulse Points as their own separate pool, completely divorced from character points/XP.
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How are Impulse Points earned?
There are 2 main ways to get IPs currently:
1. As indicated above, I give out an Impulse Point to a player each time they write an in-character session summary which I can post on this blog.
2. At the end of every session, the players nominate an MVP from among their number. Players can nominate themselves. I don't usually vote as GM, except in order to break ties. Whomever is nominated as MVP gets one Impulse Point.
3. I also sometimes award an Impulse Point arbitrarily. For example, after the group survived a very tough "boss" fight, I gave out an IP to each player by way of metagame reward, on top of their XP.
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What can be bought for Impulse Points?
Below are the options I listed for my players:
For context, the idea for Impulse Points is taken from GURPS Power-Ups 5: Impulse Buys. That books takes the idea of treating character points not just as currency for advancement, but also as a means of getting immediate metagame benefits during the game session. These are based on the optional rules of "Buying Success" from p.B347 of the Basic Set, and expanded it out with new options and alternatives.
For reasons I will go into below, I chose to have Impulse Points as their own separate pool, completely divorced from character points/XP.
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How are Impulse Points earned?
There are 2 main ways to get IPs currently:
1. As indicated above, I give out an Impulse Point to a player each time they write an in-character session summary which I can post on this blog.
2. At the end of every session, the players nominate an MVP from among their number. Players can nominate themselves. I don't usually vote as GM, except in order to break ties. Whomever is nominated as MVP gets one Impulse Point.
3. I also sometimes award an Impulse Point arbitrarily. For example, after the group survived a very tough "boss" fight, I gave out an IP to each player by way of metagame reward, on top of their XP.
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What can be bought for Impulse Points?
Below are the options I listed for my players:
Converting a normal failure to a success: Costs 1 Impulse Point
Converting a critical fail to a regular failure: Costs 2 Impulse Points
Converting a success to a critical success (I think this one in particular could be unbalancing so requires GM approval): Costs 2 Impulse Points
Specifying a maximum or minimum effect (e.g. damage or healing roll) before the dice are rolled: Costs 1 Impulse Point for every 2 dice affected
Flesh Wound (reducing wounding damage from a single hit to 1 HP lost): Costs 1 Impulse Point
Second Wind (restore all FP, and ER if you have it): Costs 1 Impulse Point
Energy Surge (Gain 25 bonus FP/ER for one single task - any unused energy is lost): Costs 1 Impulse Point
Other options may be possible: (Ask the GM)
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Why a separate type of points with their own pool?
My logic was a follows:
1. Spending character points on immediate benefit at expense of future potential would be treated differently by different players. Some would avoid it like the Plague, never wanting to sacrifice advancement for a transient benefit. Other players might instead happily spend all their character points with abandon, not caring about future advancement in order to guarantee success and survival in the now. This probably doesn't matter in the short term, but as a consistent behaviour either way (or more acutely, with a player of either kind in the same group), could develop into an imbalance in the longer term campaign. Therefore, having a separate pool allows for the earning/awarding of Impulse Points to be unrelated to XP and character advancement.
2. A separate pool also allows me to set an arbitrary cap to the number of Impulse Points that can be saved at any one time. This was a consideration for me to prevent a situation in which a PC might buy multiple successes in a short space of time (e.g. a "boss fight") to an extent that could be unbalancing, and potentially less fun for everyone as a result. The cap I decided was 3 IPs maximum at any one time. This allows for a max of one critical success (plus any 1 other benefit), or a total of 3 separate benefits, within a single play session. The normal refresh rate of one IP in exchange for a session summary, and possibly one more for MVP, also means that critical successes cannot reliably be stacked up for consecutive play sessions as they don't refresh fast enough.
3. The above restrictions allow for some bursts of cinematic action, and/or with the possibility for metagame @rse-saving or bad-luck mitigation, in what is an otherwise fairly gritty low power level fantasy campaign (i.e. the game as I run it), without feeling too unbalancing or rendering risk meaningless. I also think that such a cap adds another level of meaningful player choice (albeit a metagame rather than in-character one) as Impulse Points as a limited resource encourages tactical rather than wasteful use.
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So what's the problem?
I don't know that there is a problem, really; it could be nothing. Sometimes I over-think things.
As far as in-game usage, the above rules have worked pretty much as I expected, "at the table". If I have a concern (hint: I do), it's that we could be developing a two-tier system between the players, in terms of Impulse Point availability.
Some players are regularly writing a session summary whenever they spend an IP, and pretty much keeping themselves at the max of 3 Impulse Points in their pool as much as they possibly can. Therefore, they can always mitigate a serious hit with a Flesh Wound or gain a burst of Second Wind in a session should they need to do so. So far so good; that is the effect as intended. On the other hand, some players rarely (if ever) write a summary, and are largely relying on being voted as MVP in order to get an Impulse Point. The latter players might go several sessions without any IPs at all. Consequently the first set of players never get voted MVP no matter how big their contribution, as they already have a full IP pool, and that would be a waste. Players in the second set might be voted MVP even if they shouldn't, just in order so that don't have no Impulse Points at all in an emergency.
I considered scrapping the Impulse Point "experiment" as I don't want a two-tier system. I do like the benefit they give to the players though, and it means I don't have to worry to the same extent about playing tough with the PCs, when I know they can have a metagame escape in their back pocket.
No snap judgements just yet. Perhaps I can think of a way to tweak the rules. Perhaps my players will have a suggestion. The process of writing out my thoughts for this post has been a useful exercise. Ultimately I haven't decided, but for the moment nothing will change.
----
Why a separate type of points with their own pool?
My logic was a follows:
1. Spending character points on immediate benefit at expense of future potential would be treated differently by different players. Some would avoid it like the Plague, never wanting to sacrifice advancement for a transient benefit. Other players might instead happily spend all their character points with abandon, not caring about future advancement in order to guarantee success and survival in the now. This probably doesn't matter in the short term, but as a consistent behaviour either way (or more acutely, with a player of either kind in the same group), could develop into an imbalance in the longer term campaign. Therefore, having a separate pool allows for the earning/awarding of Impulse Points to be unrelated to XP and character advancement.
2. A separate pool also allows me to set an arbitrary cap to the number of Impulse Points that can be saved at any one time. This was a consideration for me to prevent a situation in which a PC might buy multiple successes in a short space of time (e.g. a "boss fight") to an extent that could be unbalancing, and potentially less fun for everyone as a result. The cap I decided was 3 IPs maximum at any one time. This allows for a max of one critical success (plus any 1 other benefit), or a total of 3 separate benefits, within a single play session. The normal refresh rate of one IP in exchange for a session summary, and possibly one more for MVP, also means that critical successes cannot reliably be stacked up for consecutive play sessions as they don't refresh fast enough.
3. The above restrictions allow for some bursts of cinematic action, and/or with the possibility for metagame @rse-saving or bad-luck mitigation, in what is an otherwise fairly gritty low power level fantasy campaign (i.e. the game as I run it), without feeling too unbalancing or rendering risk meaningless. I also think that such a cap adds another level of meaningful player choice (albeit a metagame rather than in-character one) as Impulse Points as a limited resource encourages tactical rather than wasteful use.
----
So what's the problem?
I don't know that there is a problem, really; it could be nothing. Sometimes I over-think things.
As far as in-game usage, the above rules have worked pretty much as I expected, "at the table". If I have a concern (hint: I do), it's that we could be developing a two-tier system between the players, in terms of Impulse Point availability.
Some players are regularly writing a session summary whenever they spend an IP, and pretty much keeping themselves at the max of 3 Impulse Points in their pool as much as they possibly can. Therefore, they can always mitigate a serious hit with a Flesh Wound or gain a burst of Second Wind in a session should they need to do so. So far so good; that is the effect as intended. On the other hand, some players rarely (if ever) write a summary, and are largely relying on being voted as MVP in order to get an Impulse Point. The latter players might go several sessions without any IPs at all. Consequently the first set of players never get voted MVP no matter how big their contribution, as they already have a full IP pool, and that would be a waste. Players in the second set might be voted MVP even if they shouldn't, just in order so that don't have no Impulse Points at all in an emergency.
I considered scrapping the Impulse Point "experiment" as I don't want a two-tier system. I do like the benefit they give to the players though, and it means I don't have to worry to the same extent about playing tough with the PCs, when I know they can have a metagame escape in their back pocket.
No snap judgements just yet. Perhaps I can think of a way to tweak the rules. Perhaps my players will have a suggestion. The process of writing out my thoughts for this post has been a useful exercise. Ultimately I haven't decided, but for the moment nothing will change.
What if Impulse Points were awarded to every player as long as one of them wrote a summary? That still provides an incentive for *someone* to write something up, but it levels the playing field in terms of who is getting points.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the suggestion. However, on the surface it would seem to disincentivise the desired behaviour rather than encourage it.
DeleteMy initial intent was to reward the player making the effort to write the summary. Multiple players regularly writing summaries, gives us different voices and IC points of view. Rewarding all evenly might level the playing field in terms of Impulse Points, but would seem to work against the intent. In fact, I suspect it would just put more obligation on those who are already making the effort to continue to do so, as they now have to do it for the team. Those who already don't would have even less incentive, as they can expect to be rewarded regardless. That feels less fair to me.
I will continue to ponder. There is no rush.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts about using impulse points.
ReplyDelete