UATTA And You

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etherial
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UATTA And You

Post by etherial » Wed Aug 29, 2018 7:18 pm

Hey everyone. I wanted to take a moment to talk about the "Using All Talents To Advance" Optional Rule, why we are implementing it, why we're allowing people to respec their characters, and how to go about it.

It's something we've been talking about in the background since the game began, but finding the right way to implement it has been challenging. For example, the Advancement Table in the book is just plain wrong. The cost to Circle goes up each Circle except when the table inexplicably fails to raise the minimum Talent Rank at 12th and 14th Circles. It costs over 300,000 Legend to go from 10th to 11th Circle, and then costs exactly 98,200 Legend to go from 11th to 12th. We will be keeping the expected Talent requirements (N+3 at Rank N to go to Circle N, one of which must be from your Current Circle), but allowing you to choose any Talent, rather than just Discipline Talents.

This is the way that people who have been playing since First Edition are used to, back then every Talent was what a "Talent Option" is now. That, frankly, isn't reason enough to implement this change, however. The main reason is that several Disciplines - Beastmasters, Cavalrymen, Scouts, Thieves, and Troubadours - are reliant on their Talent Options to make functional builds. It's right there in the design notes. By allowing Thieves to use Melee Weapons or Thrown Weapons to advance, we are ensuring that these characters will progress at the same rate as some of the more straightforward Disciplines. These same Disciplines also have Talents (like Animal Bond and Speak Language) that have very specific Rank requirements. More Melee Weapons is always better. More Climbing, eh, not so much. By UATTA, we are giving players greater control over which Talents (and at which Ranks) their characters have. This also makes it easier for a Thread Item Czar to read which Talents the player thinks are important to their Build.

9/1 Respec
Toward that end, we are allowing a one-time modification of a character's Talent Ranks. We aren't allowing changes to Downtime or Silver expenditures, so Attributes, Skills, and Circles must remain the same, as should timing when acquiring Secondary Disciplines. For most Novice characters, a Respec is completely unnecessary. Even if you now choose to raise a TO over a DT, the small investment you made in the existing DT is rapidly going to disappear to a tiny fraction of your lifetime Legend. Still, there are good and bad ways to go about it. You can't just post a new version of your character and expect the Character Head to do all of the work verifying that it is still a functional build.

Here's a template you can use:

Code: Select all

[size=150]9/1 Respec:[/size]

[size=150]Discipline A Novice Talent Changes:[/size]
[i]Remove[/i]

[i]Add:[/i]

[i]Net Legend Cost:[/i]
+X Spent

[i]Notes[/i]

[size=150]New Discipline Progression:[/size]

[size=150]Overall Legend Change[/size]
+X Spent
So if you're just switching the ranks of two Talents, you can list them in the Remove and Add sections like this:
Remove
Discipline Talent Heartening Laugh (4)
Talent Option Laughening Heart (2)

Add:
Discipline Talent Heartening Laugh (2)
Talent Option Laughening Heart (4)

Net Legend Cost:
+0 Spent
More complicated math may be necessary for players making more complicated changes, and I recommend separating Talents by Tier and Discipline so that Talents with equal Rank costs can be compared more readily to create subtotals.

New Discipline Progression
You must also demonstrate that your character will have been legal at all intermediate Circles. So your Cavalryman Discipline Progression might look like this:
To Second Circle: Five different First Circle Talents (including Animal Bond)
To Third Circle: Add Speak Language (a Talent Option taken at Second Circle)
To Fourth Circle: Add both Talents taken at Third Circle, Remove Speak Language
To Fifth Circle: Add both Talents taken at Fourth Circle, Remove Animal Bond
So this character decided that 3 Ranks of Speak Language were enough and would rather raise both of their Third Circle Talents. They also decided that their newfangled Riding Rhinoceros was all the Animal Companion they needed, so they stopped raising Animal Bond at Fourth Circle and raised both of their Fourth Circle Talents.

On their sheet, Speak Language should be at least Rank 3, Animal Bond should be at least Rank 4, and all other Talents listed for Progression should be at least Rank 5.

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