OOC Discussion

[ffilz]

In deciding how long to train, I need to understand all the costs...

I'm not sure Taisho would necessarily pay for training for Hiroshi, though maybe it depends on the Gakusho training. Hiroshi could train in some non-combat stuff on Taishi's coin. I think you can learn new skills right?

[Marullus]

I would actually like nine weeks. (My post on that was written before I saw this.) Except for Hiroshi, I think that Kentaro runs out of money first given his bribe and 20% premium costs, and his lesser share for paying the postman, so nobody should need shorter than he.

For Haruto, that teacher is +1 school +1 bonus skill +1 superior teacher... no bonus for 99 skill, what about Level 6 teacher? Is it for all three schools or so you want to determine instructional quality separately for Wood, Metal, and Soil?

[Marullus]

Kofu Shrines, Temples and Schools
Here's a link to information on Kofu's places for study, from the Honor Bound module. https://www.dropbox.com/s/fhqvxnp3ockqj ... s.pdf?dl=0

The descriptions of the facilities assign each NPC teacher a letter. Then after each skill available for learning are the letters of who teaches it. (In the example below, I haven't figured out what the "(11)" means as yet.

Senior Staff: Sato Tetsuya (B) and Kudo Hideo (C (Level 6 Gakusho); Takahashi Yutaka (Level 5; D); Sasaki Satoru (E) and Ito Masashi (F) (Level 4); Watanabe Yoshi (Level 3; G); Kimura Zoki (Level 2; H).
Divination A, B, C, D, E, F (11).

I think the (11) is the BCS at which they train. The ones that are 19 are mastered skills, the others show whether they are higher than the student or not. (Multiply x5+4 to get the skill, so a 19 becomes 99). That's my guess.

Of course, that means some interesting things. The only skill the Snob School offers the +1 bonus for a 99 teacher is in Heraldry, and they can't train someone in Kenjitsu once they reach a 79. Kentaro will realize (with much disappointment and disillusionment) that he has learned all they have to teach of the sword by the time his nine weeks in town are up. (He drops to +3 per week from +4, then six weeks is at 78. In week 7 of sword training he passes their skill of 79 and reaches 81, and they no longer can teach him swordsmanship. The good news is that it should also cost 1 silver less per week, too. )

In deciding how long to train, I need to understand all the costs...

I'm not sure Taisho would necessarily pay for training for Hiroshi, though maybe it depends on the Gakusho training. Hiroshi could train in some non-combat stuff on Taishi's coin. I think you can learn new skills right?

So... costs are:
7 silver per week for Hiroshi (1/day as his share of the group)
7 copper per week for Taisho (30cp per 1 sp, so that's .23 silver per week)

Then you go to the document linked above, which has a ton of Shrines in it teaching different things. You pick the shrine you want and figure how many +1 bonuses it gives you. You pay 1 silver per week per +1 bonus.

[jemmus]

Just in case anyone isn't subscribed to it, the Campaign Setting thread has information on all of Kofu's study facilities from the Honor Bound module.

The teacher isn't level 6. The die roll was level 6, but we have to add 10 to the roll for magic school. She's not 99 skill by either a natural roll or by adding 10-60 to Haruto's skill scores. She can teach all of the Schools. I'll post more in the IC thread.

Name Noriko
School Her home
Location Kofu
Caste Heimin (artisan)
Level 5
Skills All Schools
Master 99 No

Hiroshi can study on his own, with no school or teacher. He won't have the bonuses to Learning Rate, but he won't have the additional expenses either.

[Marullus]

Hiroshi can study on his own, with no school or teacher. He won't have the bonuses to Learning Rate, but he won't have the additional expenses either.

No teacher is a hinderance, so /2. Hinderance is brutal. So he can pay 1sp a qeek for a shoddy teacher and get 3 points per week or work alone for free for 1 point a week.

[ffilz]

Hiroshi can study on his own, with no school or teacher. He won't have the bonuses to Learning Rate, but he won't have the additional expenses either.

No teacher is a hinderance, so /2. Hinderance is brutal. So he can pay 1sp a qeek for a shoddy teacher and get 3 points per week or work alone for free for 1 point a week.

Hmm, what does it take to teach? Could Taisho teach Hiroshi something?

[jemmus]

He could teach Hiroshi a non-magic skill that he knows. But then he would pass on doing his own studying. Or he could study part time and teach part time. But then both he and Hiroshi would improve skills at 1/2 their learning rate.

Haruto won't get the +1 to Learning Rate bonus for studying at a school. Instead, he gets the better bonus for studying with a private tutor.

Name - Noriko
School - Her home
Location - Kofu
Caste - Heimin (artisan)
Level - 5
Skills All Schools
Master 99 No
Fire - 72
Water - 64
Wood - 64
Metal - 45
Soil - 55
I'm still not very good with the rules for spellcasters. Do those figures for skill scores look reasonable? Not sure if I'm even doing it right, really.

Private lnstruction
Contracting a Teacher to spend all his time with a single pupil will
increase the student‘ Learning Rate by a significant Bonus. The
pupil receives a Learning Bonus equal to (Teacher’s score-
Student’s score)/lO. The Gamesmaster may choose to allow small
groups Player-Characters to receive this bonus together, if studying
the same Skill under the same Teacher. This will depend on how
generous he wishes to be with such training.

[Marullus]

Those values look fine. Which individual spells she knows is also important - look at the lists on page 68 and pick those you want her to know/teach that are below her school knowledge level. (Or she knows the ones I hope for... but letting her determine is proving more fun already. )

Wow, Private instruction is the best. I will write up Haruto's post tomorrow.

[jemmus]

I'll us the Bushido GM rulebook's guidance on NPC shugenja encounters to determine the spell Noriko knows. The guidance is pretty good.

[jemmus]

Completely off-topic, but this new RPG by Modiphius looks interesting. Legends of Avallen. The theme is Celtic Britain during the Roman invasion. It uses a deck of regular playing cards for randomness generation.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/38 ... ebook--PDF

[ffilz]

OK, I'm just getting stuck on all this training stuff and it's feeling like it's stalling out the game...

Downtime training is clearly important to the game, in fact it's really the only way your skills improve, but it seems like it's awfully finicky for play by post.

And I have yet to complete even a single new PC for the other campaign...

Challenges with finicky rule systems are why I bailed on my RuneQuest play by post as soon as we hit our first combat. Some mechanics that are finicky just seem to be totally stalled out in play by post where in live play the might take an hour or two but then you finish and move on...

Not sure how to move forward.

I suppose the simple thing would be for Taisho to just spend the time teaching Hiroshi Rhetoric and Herbalism (Hiroshi has no skills worth teaching Taisho) and then just deduct the living expenses from Taisho's account.

[jemmus]

Marullus spoilered text in this post might help you get an idea how it works. viewtopic.php?p=591278#p591278 It's not as complicated as it seems. If Taisho wants to pick one of the shrines or temples to study at, I can walk you through the costs and how much skill you gain each week. The link to the list of schools is here: viewtopic.php?p=591279#p591279

If we can get everyone's input on how they want to spend the next 9 weeks, we can fast forward, update char sheets with new figures, and move on.

[ffilz]

Actually what I may just to is drop Hiroshi and just focus on running a single PC. His not really being able to afford this downtime is just stalling me out trying to figure out what to do with him,

In that case, some options for Taisho to train would be good. He would want to train Karma Yoga and Meditation.

And how do we improve attributes? That's the only way his magic score is going to improve at much pace...

[jemmus]

Hiroshi can study on his own for free if you'd like. His Learning Rate is 2, divide that by 1 Hindrance (no teacher) * 2, = 1 skill point per week. So over 9 weeks he'd gain 9 points.

[ffilz]

Hiroshi can study on his own for free if you'd like. His Learning Rate is 2, divide that by 1 Hindrance (no teacher) * 2, = 1 skill point per week. So over 9 weeks he'd gain 9 points.

I'm just worried about trying to juggle two PCs when the action starts, though granted, in combat Taisho doesn't have much to do...

Let me see how much Taisho is going to spend, maybe if he doesn't spend too much he can spend a bit on training for Hiroshi.

Hmm, can we encode the training costs into a spreadsheet?

[jemmus]

The cost calculations are pretty simple. Every week it's 1 sp + another sp for every bonus you're getting. Saburo here gives three bonuses (higher level than Hiroshi, teaches a skill that a bonus for the profession (bushi), and 99 skill in kenjutsu). But if you study tantojutsu, he doesn't have 99 skill in that, so only one bonus. So either 1 + 2 or 3 sp per week.

Iwataki no Ryusuke gives only two bonuses (higher level than Hiroshi, teaching a skill that's a bonus for the profession). So 1 + 2 sp per week = 2 sp.

Or he can try to be admitted to the snobby academy. 3-4 sp per week, depending on whether the teacher is 6th level or not. The rates could be higher, depending on the skill or art he studies. Plus 10%-60% higher for not being samurai.

I gave you bad information about Hiroshi training on his own. If he studies a bushi BCS bonus skill (kenjutsu, etc.), he gets one bonus. So learning rate 2 + 1 = 3. Divided by one hindrance x 2 = 1.5/week.

Saburo
No name dojo
Kofu
Middle heimin (farmer)
Level 4
Kenjutsu, tantojutsu
99 skill in kenjutsu

Iwataki no Ryusuke
No name dojo
Kofu
Middle ronin
Level 3
Kyujutsu
No

[jemmus]

Attributes go up whenever a BCS goes up because of improving a skill. An attribute goes up by 0.1 points. The same happens if a PC achieves a 99 score in a skill.

The other way is to spend a full month (30 days) exercising (physically or mentally). The rules don't specifically say, but I assume 1 month also equals a 0.1 increase.

There's really no game mechanic involved in either study or exercise. You just say your PC is doing it, it happens, and you revise your char sheet.

[ffilz]

Is there any cost to exercise? That might be a cheap way for Hiroshi to improve during the down time... 9 Weeks is 3 months. I think actually the attribute training may be a full point, it sort of reads that way after the previous section on attribute increase via skill increase. If it is the .1, getting to higher attributes to get higher Zanshin and stuff is going to be very slow... The karma gain we got in the other campaign represents 4 years of attribute training at .1 per month...

[jemmus]

I thought the .1 might be a typo, but the rules give an example of a character with 21.9 Strength. So I think it has to be 0.1. Agreed that it a really long haul to improve attributes that way. Exercise is free, but the PC needs to do it in a dojo, temple or shrine. The inn isn't a good place for either physical or mental exercise. I'll say that a dojo would charge 3 silver per month and a temple or shrine would expect a comparable donation.

If Taisho wants to study Karma Yoga, teachers are available at the Takeda-Jingu and Kofu-Sengen-Jinja shrines and the Kaizenko-ji temple. The all teach Meditation too. All of them have 6th level teachers, and they'd all give five bonuses. The cost would be 6 sp per week, or 5 sp if you want a lower level teacher and only four bonuses. https://www.dropbox.com/s/6h25a1rjd15ty ... s.pdf?dl=0

[ffilz]

I thought the .1 might be a typo, but the rules give an example of a character with 21.9 Strength. So I think it has to be 0.1. Agreed that it a really long haul to improve attributes that way. Exercise is free, but the PC needs to do it in a dojo, temple or shrine. The inn isn't a good place for either physical or mental exercise. I'll say that a dojo would charge 3 silver per month and a temple or shrine would expect a comparable donation.

If Taisho wants to study Karma Yoga, teachers are available at the Takeda-Jingu and Kofu-Sengen-Jinja shrines and the Kaizenko-ji temple. The all teach Meditation too. All of them have 6th level teachers, and they'd all give five bonuses. The cost would be 6 sp per week, or 5 sp if you want a lower level teacher and only four bonuses. https://www.dropbox.com/s/6h25a1rjd15ty ... s.pdf?dl=0

The 21.9 is a result of skill improvement... And there the .1 (or .05) per +1 BCS is clear.

And here's a strong argument attribute training has to be faster than .1 per month...

In 3 weeks (1 month) of self-study, Hiroshi would get 4.5 points of skill which is almost enough for +1 BCS which would be .1 attribute increase. And that's almost the slowest skill training. With teaching, you rate to get more than .1 per month even with mental skills which are only .05 per +1 BCS...