just a little, imo. any "microcopy" that says "roll 3d6" or whatever will be completely ignored by the time you're making a 2nd or 3rd character. however, common calcs you would look up a lot might be handy (e.g. a 5e skill check, or dccrpg spell check). typically i'd say zero to very little, since a blank piece of paper should always suffice.
I think it should walk you thru (or have 2 version, one easy for char creation, one streamlined version) - not everyone grew up playing RPGs. I certainly didn't (well, not Pen & Paper). I didn't play any until after college. If your character sheet is acting as a gatekeeper and preventing someone NEW to not just YOUR system, but perhaps all RPGs from being able to play because it's too difficult for them to figure out, you're potentially keeping someone out.
Is it for a convention game, or a one-shot where the players won't have read the rules? Hell yes. Anything the player needs to play the game should be on the sheet.
Is it for a long running game where you can assume that (eventually) all players will have a good handle on the rules? Not at all. Space on those sheets is precious.
Basically, what's the proportion of time the player will spend creating the character vs playing the character? Make the sheet useful for what they're going to be doing.
I think it depends very strongly on the requirements the game creates. The right answer for D&D 5e is very different from the right answer for Urban Shadows. There isn't a universally applicable answer.
Wow, this is a varied set of people to show up for this one!
Robert Bohl I'm not sure I love making players rewrite stuff. Does Burning Wheel get around that?
Todd Sprang I think there's some unexamined assumptions there. Why should a blank piece of paper always work?
Celestine Cookson Thank yo for speaking up for the drounded out voices. You are right, I think; character sheets should be more obvious if we want people outside to be able to play them.
Jonathan Beverley I think agreed. I do a lot of one-shots it turns out, and never expect my players to know the rules. Whether that's dungeon world or AW, my expectations is folks don't have a good handle on the detailed rules.
John W. Sheldon Do the Us sheets walk us through creation? I feel like they do, and I always feel like they are pretty dang big.
fair enough... maybe not always, but for the games i'm imagining you're talking about (rules-light), i'd hope so. i've actually been playing hackmaster 4th ed lately (long, crunchy story), and that char-gen for that shit needs a tool, not just paper prompts. so clearly i know better than "always".
to some of the other points, i think that's right - really depends on the audience. experienced gamers may not need any extra info and would rather have attractive graphics. newbies might like more hand-holding. main thing i'm thinking is if it's on the sheet, it's always there, so it should always be useful. if it's just there for newbies, maybe a special newbie-sheet, but i think it'd be better to have a companion document that walks you through.
i would use "the biggest frpg's" character sheet as a guide. rules-moderate and definite mass appeal. whatever they did is probably about right.
I guess it depends on how you view 'should' (yes, this is a very Bill Clinton thing to say). I'd probably say that with current development and theory on the matter I'd call it best practice to make a self directed character sheet. This is harder to do with clunker character creation, but I'd also say current trends are suggesting that easier character creation is perferred
I prefer sheets that don't, unless you're making character build choices during play -- or there are clear play books with different sets of character creation rules (like the Hx in Apocalypse World) that happen together with the other players.
I want my sheet to only have what I need to play. Preferably, I'd also like it to fit on two index cards.
I'm not sure if it should guide you, exactly, but it's nice if a character sheet doesn't fight you. Like, so long as the flow of the sheet is more or less the flow of generation in the RAW
William Nichols the US sheets, like most PbtA game sheets, do walk players through character creation pretty explicitly. I probably should have used a different example, since I think there are a lot of problems with the Urban Shadows sheets, but the fact that they walk you through character generation isn't one of them (how they do it might be).
I don't think it is absolutely necessary for the character sheet to have all the information needed for chargen but I think it is nice if the layout follows the order of filling things in - D&D has been a staple example of how not to organise a character sheet for chargen. However, use-oriented layout is more important than chargen-oriented one.
Chargen on the charsheet is very useful for pick-up play, which makes it useful for small-audience games that are trying to insert themselves into play groups. The less a player needs to tangle with to get going, the better.
For the record, I also think this is true for 'how to play' instructions: I think Mouse Guard is a great example of that, even though it has no chargen instructions.
I think it makes less sense for crunchy long-form games, where chargen instructions are going to take up real estate that's probably needed for other stuff.
There's a lot of agreement here. From my perspective, I want the system to be as minimal as possible and as directed towards what I care about as possible, and for the character sheets to be play aides.
Fiasco does this pretty well, since all your information is spread out on index cards that you write down from a book. The book can be passed around, and you don't need it during play.
pbta games typically do this pretty well. A lot of these work you throw it, with AW even explicitly saying to go around the table for introductions and then to do Hx.
Dnd has, from my memory and recollection, not done this well at all. Sheets with a bunch of blanks where I put numbers, but what are those numbers? I also remember looking up grappling rules and spell misfire chance and blah blah blah. Simplify!
But then, what I value isn't so much what dnd typically values.
To no extent should it. Is it a good, convenient, smart way to do it? Definitely.
ReplyDeleteBurning Wheel has an interesting intermediary step: character creation worksheet, transferring to character sheet.
just a little, imo. any "microcopy" that says "roll 3d6" or whatever will be completely ignored by the time you're making a 2nd or 3rd character. however, common calcs you would look up a lot might be handy (e.g. a 5e skill check, or dccrpg spell check). typically i'd say zero to very little, since a blank piece of paper should always suffice.
ReplyDeleteI think it should walk you thru (or have 2 version, one easy for char creation, one streamlined version) - not everyone grew up playing RPGs. I certainly didn't (well, not Pen & Paper). I didn't play any until after college. If your character sheet is acting as a gatekeeper and preventing someone NEW to not just YOUR system, but perhaps all RPGs from being able to play because it's too difficult for them to figure out, you're potentially keeping someone out.
ReplyDeleteIs it for a convention game, or a one-shot where the players won't have read the rules? Hell yes. Anything the player needs to play the game should be on the sheet.
ReplyDeleteIs it for a long running game where you can assume that (eventually) all players will have a good handle on the rules? Not at all. Space on those sheets is precious.
Basically, what's the proportion of time the player will spend creating the character vs playing the character? Make the sheet useful for what they're going to be doing.
I think it depends very strongly on the requirements the game creates. The right answer for D&D 5e is very different from the right answer for Urban Shadows. There isn't a universally applicable answer.
ReplyDeleteWow, this is a varied set of people to show up for this one!
ReplyDeleteRobert Bohl I'm not sure I love making players rewrite stuff. Does Burning Wheel get around that?
Todd Sprang I think there's some unexamined assumptions there. Why should a blank piece of paper always work?
Celestine Cookson Thank yo for speaking up for the drounded out voices. You are right, I think; character sheets should be more obvious if we want people outside to be able to play them.
Jonathan Beverley I think agreed. I do a lot of one-shots it turns out, and never expect my players to know the rules. Whether that's dungeon world or AW, my expectations is folks don't have a good handle on the detailed rules.
John W. Sheldon Do the Us sheets walk us through creation? I feel like they do, and I always feel like they are pretty dang big.
BW doesn't get around that. It makes you rewrite some stuff.
ReplyDeletefair enough... maybe not always, but for the games i'm imagining you're talking about (rules-light), i'd hope so. i've actually been playing hackmaster 4th ed lately (long, crunchy story), and that char-gen for that shit needs a tool, not just paper prompts. so clearly i know better than "always".
ReplyDeleteto some of the other points, i think that's right - really depends on the audience. experienced gamers may not need any extra info and would rather have attractive graphics. newbies might like more hand-holding. main thing i'm thinking is if it's on the sheet, it's always there, so it should always be useful. if it's just there for newbies, maybe a special newbie-sheet, but i think it'd be better to have a companion document that walks you through.
i would use "the biggest frpg's" character sheet as a guide. rules-moderate and definite mass appeal. whatever they did is probably about right.
I guess it depends on how you view 'should' (yes, this is a very Bill Clinton thing to say). I'd probably say that with current development and theory on the matter I'd call it best practice to make a self directed character sheet. This is harder to do with clunker character creation, but I'd also say current trends are suggesting that easier character creation is perferred
ReplyDeleteI prefer sheets that don't, unless you're making character build choices during play -- or there are clear play books with different sets of character creation rules (like the Hx in Apocalypse World) that happen together with the other players.
ReplyDeleteI want my sheet to only have what I need to play. Preferably, I'd also like it to fit on two index cards.
Oh -- or if you need a quick-start, like for convention play.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if it should guide you, exactly, but it's nice if a character sheet doesn't fight you. Like, so long as the flow of the sheet is more or less the flow of generation in the RAW
ReplyDeleteTwo index cards, Jesse Cox? Have any examples?
ReplyDeleteRisus and Fate come to mind. One card that's ~half-sheet sized is actually best for those, imho.
ReplyDeleteI did D&D 5e for a bit where it was two cards, plus one for each power, and a whole pile of tokens.
I like information density and manipulatables.
This is sometimes at odds with ease-of-use learning curves.
It might help to say that my ideal character write up for PCs is about the same as my ideal write up for NPCs.
ReplyDeleteGurps and Hero don't really permit this.
William Nichols the US sheets, like most PbtA game sheets, do walk players through character creation pretty explicitly. I probably should have used a different example, since I think there are a lot of problems with the Urban Shadows sheets, but the fact that they walk you through character generation isn't one of them (how they do it might be).
ReplyDeleteI don't think it is absolutely necessary for the character sheet to have all the information needed for chargen but I think it is nice if the layout follows the order of filling things in - D&D has been a staple example of how not to organise a character sheet for chargen. However, use-oriented layout is more important than chargen-oriented one.
ReplyDeleteLots to say on this... chiming in so I remember to write a big post later.
ReplyDeleteChargen on the charsheet is very useful for pick-up play, which makes it useful for small-audience games that are trying to insert themselves into play groups. The less a player needs to tangle with to get going, the better.
ReplyDeleteFor the record, I also think this is true for 'how to play' instructions: I think Mouse Guard is a great example of that, even though it has no chargen instructions.
I think it makes less sense for crunchy long-form games, where chargen instructions are going to take up real estate that's probably needed for other stuff.
There's a lot of agreement here. From my perspective, I want the system to be as minimal as possible and as directed towards what I care about as possible, and for the character sheets to be play aides.
ReplyDeleteFiasco does this pretty well, since all your information is spread out on index cards that you write down from a book. The book can be passed around, and you don't need it during play.
pbta games typically do this pretty well. A lot of these work you throw it, with AW even explicitly saying to go around the table for introductions and then to do Hx.
Dnd has, from my memory and recollection, not done this well at all. Sheets with a bunch of blanks where I put numbers, but what are those numbers? I also remember looking up grappling rules and spell misfire chance and blah blah blah. Simplify!
But then, what I value isn't so much what dnd typically values.