Another Stab at simple Sanity Rules - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 spindlethin Feb 15, 2012 23:55:35	So I asked my group what they thought about some sanity rules to combat the "I am always totally calm and in control regardless of the tentecled monstrosoty that is gnawing on my pancreas" problem that sometimes pops up. This is what I came up with for a system that: - Encourages some downtime and makes continuious adventuring more risky. - has a minimum of bookkeeping - doesn't feel like a huge departure from the current ruleset - never leaves a player with nothing to do The rules: - Each character has sanity equal to their Wisdom score - Sanity is an attack rolled when the PC encounters something the DM says is hard on the psyche of the character - Like HP, the two things that matter are half sanity and zero sanity Half sanity: -1 to all defences (-2 in paragon, -3 in epic), and the character can only make skill checks in which they are trained. 0 Sanity: The character is Dazed and cannot make skill checks, with the exception of those tied to roleplaying the insanity (eg. endurance, athletics, and hide will probably come up. Maybe knowledge to babble facts off or something similar.) If the last sanity damage happens in combat, the character is stunned for one round. Losing Sanity: A character can lose sanity for anything that would be hard to handle. Most events that cause a character to lose sanity only do so the first time. Ex.: - Seeing a loved one risen as an undead - Seeing a close friend ripped apart by monsters - Coming in direct contact with a God - Going below 0 HP - Being dominated - Being imprisioned for a long period of time (Cabin Fever) Interesting, but highly optional examples include: - Critical hits from Psychic attacks - Doing something that goes against alignment or established character personality Gaining Sanity: - A character gains one sanity point back for each day of Complete Rest: that is, rest in a safe area without doing anything that the character considers stressful. Note: don't let your PC's try and convince you that combat calms them down. I have a feat for that. - A ritual is availble that allows one character to go into a very deep sleep when the party rests and regain one sanity point. However, that character cannot keep watch and if there is an encounter while resting, that character starts asleep wakes up when they save or take damage from an attack. Furthermore, the casting time is 8 hours, meaning that while the casting character can still rest, it can only be used on one PC each rest. Powers and Feats: - Gaining Temporary sanity - Temporary sanity lasts until the next extended rest. It is not 'lost first' like temp HP, so resting after being kept sane with temp sanity may drive a person mad. Caiphons Tender Gift [Warlock, starpact] (Daily, Standard): lose any number of sanity points. and ally gains that many temporary sanity. Caiphons Glorious awakening [Epic]: You reverse the defence penalties for being below half sanity. Instinctive Defence: You do not take the penalty to AC for being below half sanity. You still take a -1 to all other defences. Fueled by madness (Pre: Instinctive Defence) : You get a +2 to damage when below half sanity. Stroke of madness:Once per encounter, lose one sanity to add 1d6 to any die roll after you have rolled. Roleplaying insanity: D&D adventurers are, by in large, already pretty crazy; going out into the wilderness to face almost certain death, confident that you can evolve and grow to face any danger you may find exposes a dangerous misunderstanding of statistics. Roleplaying insanity is about taking the prime negative aspect of your character and really letting it shine. The arrogant dragonborn becomes convinced of the inferiority of all other races; the warforged retreates into emotionless, mechanical safety; the good cleric turns into a evangelical zealot. Some classes may handle it well and even like it (Barbarians or Starpact Warlocks come to mind); feats that allow them to really shine at dangerously low levels of sanity should make for some excellent roleplay. Possible Weaknesses: - DM's will need to be careful with this system; constant abuse of sanity scores will make for some sad players. On the other hand, if the PC's only rarely encounter sanity draining effects, then the effects won't be scary or compelling enough to bother with. - Be careful of situations where a pc can be too effective at keeping their sanity stable. If a PC can choose where they are going to be on the track, the provided feats may end up being very overpowered. If you have a PC that consistantly wants to be below half for the bonuses, make sure that they get pushed at just the wrong time once in awhile; destroying one's own mind for power shouldn't be safe. So, given all of the above, what do you think? any glaring holes in the logic?
#2 bone_naga Feb 16, 2012 10:06:34	One thing that might just be easier overall is to create some disease tracks for different types of insanities. Horrible monstrosities that are supposed to shatter your mind can have a power that inflicts the disease on a hit. Also, anyone reduced to 0 HP by a psychic attack (or at DM discretion, like it the guy lost 90% of his HP from psychic attacks and then actually went down from an arrow) contracts the disease. Simpler overall, but maintains the general idea. Your ideas isn't bad. Depending on the tone of your game you may want to have lasting implications for sanity loss that go beyond the next extended rest (I recommend the disease track), but that also might not work for some campaigns. I really love the bit you mentioned about feats that let some characters do better at low sanity, letting them straddle that thin line between just crazy enough for your job and going completely over the edge.
#3 dieffenbachj Feb 16, 2012 20:56:46	Here are the rules I set up for my Lovecraftian Eberron campaign: [Link] They work pretty well, though if I were ever tempted to revamp them, I would probably have it so that each character picks their permanent insanity type at chargen, so that they can roleplay slowly sliding toward it rather than have the DM be like "Okay you're psychotic now".
#4 mhbjarkistef Feb 17, 2012 17:44:28	Everyone within the community who's ever played World of Darkness will be drawn to this thread. I like it. It's perfect for DMs that don't already have enough stuff hampering their adventurers. I have a whole group with a curse (one at stage 5) and one with a disease, one player is missing his class (will regain next session), and I'll be putting more pressure on their healing surge pool next adventure. The only penalty they have left is the death penalties xD. I also recommend it for those who have groups that they can do anything, and aren't that of roleplayers. Changes I'd recommend Use "Defense" instead of "Defence" ...wait, nevermind, "Defence" is the british version. lol Have the sanity points be "Equal to your Will defense at level 1". This accounts for classes that have managed to protect their sanity, or races that are naturally more mentally recilent.. Have more exiting ways of gaining sanity, and hand them out at the end of sessions: "Hm, let's see... You've traversed the castle and its traps, and lost sanity while doing so. You finally defeated the giant turtle and your feeling of accomplishment allows you to regain 3 sanity points each. However you learn that your princess is in another castle and lose 1 sanity point" Have different ways for each player to lose/regain sanity points. Okay, when you are done writing your bios I want you to find 1-3 things that are important to you character, and would give him a boost. For example a ranger would feel accomplished after tracking down a group of orcs, and a wizard would feel like he's progressing when he learns a new ritual. These things will be your special ways of gaining sanity points. However, for each of these triggers you make, I will make one "counter-trigger". For example, when the ranger does NOT find something, he'll lose sanity, and when the wizard rolls a natural 1 on an encounter or daily power he'll feel less accomplished and start doubting himself. This means that at mid-campaign you have a player roleplaying a wizard, but even if he's really bad at roleplaying he'll still want to find rituals and gather arcane knowledge to take that -1 is poor fortitude defense. This is why the sanity point system needs not be about losing the points, but getting the players to roleplay through the act of gaining them back. As long as you are creative with the penalties. Don't say "you gain -1 to everything". Read World of Darkness and say something like: "Whenever you see a creature with the beast and fey keywords you get scared and hide behind your friend. If this happens in combat you cannot attack that creature (Save ends), and cannot end your turn in a square not adjacent to an ally of your" etc. This should make even the worst/lasiest of roleplayers have some fun-to-watch action. I tried it with my group the other day: I mind-controller one of them and said to the player: "Your primary mission now is to get your group to split up". And he just did it, he took my "persona" and went with it. If you give your players a way to act, he will gladely do so as long as it does not go against his will (for example "You want to kiss the fighter" or "You hump every tree you see". These only work in "silly-campaigns" or in a group full of guys" I'm now running out of battery, and forgot my charger, so I will have to leave this post ugly and un-edited :S Sorry for all misspelcomputer dies

Post/Author/DateTime

Post

spindlethin

Feb 15, 2012 23:55:35

So I asked my group what they thought about some sanity rules to combat the "I am always totally calm and in control regardless of the tentecled monstrosoty that is gnawing on my pancreas" problem that sometimes pops up. This is what I came up with for a system that:

- Encourages some downtime and makes continuious adventuring more risky.
- has a minimum of bookkeeping
- doesn't feel like a huge departure from the current ruleset
- never leaves a player with nothing to do

The rules:

- Each character has sanity equal to their Wisdom score
- Sanity is an attack rolled when the PC encounters something the DM says is hard on the psyche of the character
- Like HP, the two things that matter are half sanity and zero sanity

Half sanity: -1 to all defences (-2 in paragon, -3 in epic), and the character can only make skill checks in which they are trained.

0 Sanity: The character is Dazed and cannot make skill checks, with the exception of those tied to roleplaying the insanity (eg. endurance, athletics, and hide will probably come up. Maybe knowledge to babble facts off or something similar.) If the last sanity damage happens in combat, the character is stunned for one round.

Losing Sanity:

A character can lose sanity for anything that would be hard to handle. Most events that cause a character to lose sanity only do so the first time.
Ex.:
- Seeing a loved one risen as an undead
- Seeing a close friend ripped apart by monsters
- Coming in direct contact with a God
- Going below 0 HP
- Being dominated
- Being imprisioned for a long period of time (Cabin Fever)

Interesting, but highly optional examples include:
- Critical hits from Psychic attacks
- Doing something that goes against alignment or established character personality

Gaining Sanity:
- A character gains one sanity point back for each day of Complete Rest: that is, rest in a safe area without doing anything that the character considers stressful. Note: don't let your PC's try and convince you that combat calms them down. I have a feat for that.

- A ritual is availble that allows one character to go into a very deep sleep when the party rests and regain one sanity point. However, that character cannot keep watch and if there is an encounter while resting, that character starts asleep wakes up when they save or take damage from an attack. Furthermore, the casting time is 8 hours, meaning that while the casting character can still rest, it can only be used on one PC each rest.

Powers and Feats:
- Gaining Temporary sanity
- Temporary sanity lasts until the next extended rest. It is not 'lost first' like temp HP, so resting after being kept sane with temp sanity may drive a person mad.

Caiphons Tender Gift [Warlock, starpact] (Daily, Standard): lose any number of sanity points. and ally gains that many temporary sanity.

Caiphons Glorious awakening [Epic]: You reverse the defence penalties for being below half sanity.

Instinctive Defence: You do not take the penalty to AC for being below half sanity. You still take a -1 to all other defences.

Fueled by madness (Pre: Instinctive Defence) : You get a +2 to damage when below half sanity.

Stroke of madness:Once per encounter, lose one sanity to add 1d6 to any die roll after you have rolled.

Roleplaying insanity:
D&D adventurers are, by in large, already pretty crazy; going out into the wilderness to face almost certain death, confident that you can evolve and grow to face any danger you may find exposes a dangerous misunderstanding of statistics.

Roleplaying insanity is about taking the prime negative aspect of your character and really letting it shine. The arrogant dragonborn becomes convinced of the inferiority of all other races; the warforged retreates into emotionless, mechanical safety; the good cleric turns into a evangelical zealot. Some classes may handle it well and even like it (Barbarians or Starpact Warlocks come to mind); feats that allow them to really shine at dangerously low levels of sanity should make for some excellent roleplay.

Possible Weaknesses:
- DM's will need to be careful with this system; constant abuse of sanity scores will make for some sad players. On the other hand, if the PC's only rarely encounter sanity draining effects, then the effects won't be scary or compelling enough to bother with.

- Be careful of situations where a pc can be too effective at keeping their sanity stable. If a PC can choose where they are going to be on the track, the provided feats may end up being very overpowered. If you have a PC that consistantly wants to be below half for the bonuses, make sure that they get pushed at just the wrong time once in awhile; destroying one's own mind for power shouldn't be safe.

So, given all of the above, what do you think? any glaring holes in the logic?

bone_naga

Feb 16, 2012 10:06:34

One thing that might just be easier overall is to create some disease tracks for different types of insanities. Horrible monstrosities that are supposed to shatter your mind can have a power that inflicts the disease on a hit. Also, anyone reduced to 0 HP by a psychic attack (or at DM discretion, like it the guy lost 90% of his HP from psychic attacks and then actually went down from an arrow) contracts the disease.

Simpler overall, but maintains the general idea.

Your ideas isn't bad. Depending on the tone of your game you may want to have lasting implications for sanity loss that go beyond the next extended rest (I recommend the disease track), but that also might not work for some campaigns. I really love the bit you mentioned about feats that let some characters do better at low sanity, letting them straddle that thin line between just crazy enough for your job and going completely over the edge.

dieffenbachj

Feb 16, 2012 20:56:46

Here are the rules I set up for my Lovecraftian Eberron campaign: [Link]
They work pretty well, though if I were ever tempted to revamp them, I would probably have it so that each character picks their permanent insanity type at chargen, so that they can roleplay slowly sliding toward it rather than have the DM be like "Okay you're psychotic now".

mhbjarkistef

Feb 17, 2012 17:44:28

Everyone within the community who's ever played World of Darkness will be drawn to this thread.

I like it. It's perfect for DMs that don't already have enough stuff hampering their adventurers. I have a whole group with a curse (one at stage 5) and one with a disease, one player is missing his class (will regain next session), and I'll be putting more pressure on their healing surge pool next adventure. The only penalty they have left is the death penalties xD.
I also recommend it for those who have groups that they can do anything, and aren't that of roleplayers.

Changes I'd recommend

Use "Defense" instead of "Defence"

...wait, nevermind, "Defence" is the british version. lol

Have the sanity points be "Equal to your Will defense at level 1". This accounts for classes that have managed to protect their sanity, or races that are naturally more mentally recilent..

Have more exiting ways of gaining sanity, and hand them out at the end of sessions:

"Hm, let's see... You've traversed the castle and its traps, and lost sanity while doing so. You finally defeated the giant turtle and your feeling of accomplishment allows you to regain 3 sanity points each. However you learn that your princess is in another castle and lose 1 sanity point"

Have different ways for each player to lose/regain sanity points.

Okay, when you are done writing your bios I want you to find 1-3 things that are important to you character, and would give him a boost. For example a ranger would feel accomplished after tracking down a group of orcs, and a wizard would feel like he's progressing when he learns a new ritual. These things will be your special ways of gaining sanity points. However, for each of these triggers you make, I will make one "counter-trigger". For example, when the ranger does NOT find something, he'll lose sanity, and when the wizard rolls a natural 1 on an encounter or daily power he'll feel less accomplished and start doubting himself.

This means that at mid-campaign you have a player roleplaying a wizard, but even if he's really bad at roleplaying he'll still want to find rituals and gather arcane knowledge to take that -1 is poor fortitude defense. This is why the sanity point system needs not be about losing the points, but getting the players to roleplay through the act of gaining them back.

As long as you are creative with the penalties. Don't say "you gain -1 to everything". Read World of Darkness and say something like: "Whenever you see a creature with the beast and fey keywords you get scared and hide behind your friend. If this happens in combat you cannot attack that creature (Save ends), and cannot end your turn in a square not adjacent to an ally of your" etc.

This should make even the worst/lasiest of roleplayers have some fun-to-watch action.

I tried it with my group the other day: I mind-controller one of them and said to the player: "Your primary mission now is to get your group to split up". And he just did it, he took my "persona" and went with it. If you give your players a way to act, he will gladely do so as long as it does not go against his will (for example "You want to kiss the fighter" or "You hump every tree you see". These only work in "silly-campaigns" or in a group full of guys"

I'm now running out of battery, and forgot my charger, so I will have to leave this post ugly and un-edited :S Sorry for all misspel*computer dies*