"Factions as Characters" article

[chalimacos]

Just wanted to tip my hat in the direction of the superb article "Factions as Characters" by Paul Elliott in the (free) zine Cepheus Journal #3:

Cepheus Journal – Issue #003

Visit the post for more.

cepheusjournal.com

What he does is assign the classic six characteristics to factions, slightly reinterpreting them (END becomes the resources of the faction, INT the quality of its advisors, etc).

The way I applied it is this: every month I roll a d10 for each faction (political, corporation, religious) active in the subsector. On a roll of 1, the faction relationship with another faction deteriorates, on a 10 it improves and on a roll of 7 I reroll one of its characteristics and read the result narratively. For instance:

A faction whose INT goes from A to 5 has been betrayed by one key advisor who has sold its secrets. If END goes down, the have suffered sabotage... a nifty system to enliven the subsector.

 

[Spinward Flow]

That's ... clever.

 

[whartung]

Yea, that's very interesting.

Once a month may be "too fast", or you might consider rolling an adjustment to a characteristic rather than re-rolling it completely. My use case is the STR stat going from 12 to 2 in a month, or vice-a-versa. I assume STR represents some kind of Power, though not sure how that manifests.

 

[Spinward Flow]

I assume STR represents some kind of Power, though not sure how that manifests.

Military, Economic, Political, Cultural ... take your pick of the mix. All get blended into the pot o' STR.
Another way to think of it would be as Influence in the hegemony sense.
Note that high population (and especially Industrial) worlds ought to have an outsized amount of influence attributed to them (assuming their economies aren't basket cases).

Once a month may be "too fast"

Agree, the tempo of changes might perhaps be too ... tumultuous ... for a peacetime setting. Perhaps once per 4 months would be better.
If the subsector is on a war footing however, once a month sounds about right.

 

[willtron3030]

Military, Economic, Political, Cultural ... take your pick of the mix. All get blended into the pot o' STR.
Another way to think of it would be as Influence in the hegemony sense.
Note that high population (and especially Industrial) worlds ought to have an outsized amount of influence attributed to them (assuming their economies aren't basket cases).

Agree, the tempo of changes might perhaps be too ... tumultuous ... for a peacetime setting. Perhaps once per 4 months would be better.
If the subsector is on a war footing however, once a month sounds about right.

Maybe if there is a change, decrease the interval between checks (annually, quarterly, monthly, maybe even weekly at the system level and daily on the planet) until you get no change twice in a row, at which point you revert to the next longer interval.

 

[chalimacos]

I check for change once a month for each faction, but only change the characteristic if the roll of a d10 is 7. That's about one major change/event per year per faction (I use 6 factions in a subsector: 2 or 3 noble families, a couple of corporations and some weirdos).

 

[mike wightman]

Some thought on a rather nifty idea.
Why is the resolution mechanic d10 based - this is Sparta Traveller - I would use a modified version of the reaction table roll to get a change.
Also how does communication lag work? Considering it takes weeks for information to cross back and forth across a subsector then changes to a factions scores should probably be on a longer timescale.
How to model conflict or cooperation between factions, or resource development, or disasters...
lots of potential here.

 

[chalimacos]

Some thought on a rather nifty idea.
Why is the resolution mechanic d10 based - this is Sparta Traveller - I would use a modified version of the reaction table roll to get a change.
Also how does communication lag work? Considering it takes weeks for information to cross back and forth across a subsector then changes to a factions scores should probably be on a longer timescale.
How to model conflict or cooperation between factions, or resource development, or disasters...
lots of potential here.

Sorry I if I didn't make this clearer. The d10 thing is in my application of the system, not in the original article (which I wholeheartedly recommend because it's very suggestive).

 

[david.wendelken]

What a cool idea! Needs some thought about the exact mechanics and rate of change, but it's a really good idea!