[X] My Assistant

[GreyBrother]

That street goes both ways.

Yes it does. But, i think i go with Cain from now on. Changed my mind. Less Traditions with those that are there more wordcount but with the option to expand the scope in future books like Digital Grimoire would have been a better way. Or some smaller write ups about the traditions like MitS did. Or expanding local traditions in the Location books where they are important.
I acknowledge that the way it was done is okay, not ideal for everyone, but okay. I can live with it and i can work good with it. In the aftermath, everyone can whine about something and it's hard work to please everyone.

[GreyBrother]

Doublepost!

[GreyBrother]

Ultrapost!

[GreyBrother]

M-M-M-Monsterpost!

[Heath Robinson]

M-M-MULTIPOST!

[Heath Robinson]

M-M-MULTIPOST!

[Demonseed Elite]

Yeah, the topic of few traditions versus more has basically reached its end. Cain has his preference, I have mine, Zurai has his, etc. Any way you cut it, a player who wants to detail his magical tradition in depth will have to do some work, whether he's using a tradition from the book or a custom-created one. But it was never the design intention to eliminate player research. Hell, I love player research.

[Demonseed Elite]

Yeah, the topic of few traditions versus more has basically reached its end. Cain has his preference, I have mine, Zurai has his, etc. Any way you cut it, a player who wants to detail his magical tradition in depth will have to do some work, whether he's using a tradition from the book or a custom-created one. But it was never the design intention to eliminate player research. Hell, I love player resea♦rch.

[darthmord]

That street goes both ways.

I think what he is driving at is the core book should provide concrete examples with detail while the source books give additional options / rules to add to what the core book offers.

If that is in fact his point, I would agree with it. The BBB should contain everything needed to play and be sufficiently detailed to answer questions. The source books would provide additional resources and options.

[darthmord]

That street goes both ways.

I think what he is driving at is the core book should provide concrete examples with detail while the source books give additional options / rules to add to what the core book offers.

If that is in fact his point, I would agree with it. The BBB should contain everything needed to play and be sufficiently detailed to answer questions. The source books would provide additional resources and options.

[Heath Robinson]

Then you use the rules to invent your own. If you have guidance in creating traditions (by putting more detail into the ones you get) then it should be a breeze.

And how are you meant to know that the tradition even exists? You've been avoiding this question. The tradition writeups in Street Magic are the first introduction a lot of players have to many of the traditions. You can't search for information you don't even know exists. There is no big list of knowledge you don't possess, and people don't look for things until they have a pressing need.

Their pressing need is created by the fact that they read the short writeup and say "this tradition is cool beyond belief, I need to learn more to make my character truly awesome". Two sentences cannot do that (or else, you've failed to prove that it can, still waiting on your 2 sentence Ryobu-Shinto writeup that'll drop my jaw), and you lose out if that awesome tradition isn't covered by your smaller selection. Birdshot is more likely to hit the bullseye than buckshot, and we only care about hitting the bullseye (which is only painted on after we finish shooting).

[Cain]

And how are you meant to know that the tradition even exists?

You invent them. That's the strength of the SR4 system, it's designed to invent traditions. The ones presented should show the building process, instead of just a two-paragraph overview.

[Heath Robinson]

You invent them. That's the strength of the SR4 system, it's designed to invent traditions. The ones presented should show the building process, instead of just a two-paragraph overview.

Let me rephrase.

"How do you know the source material you use to create a tradition exists?" Surprisingly, not everyone knows about Buddhism, Sikhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism, etc, etc. If you don't know these things exist, you've got nothing to search for.

[Moon-Hawk]

Let me rephrase.

"How do you know the source material you use to create a tradition exists?" Surprisingly, not everyone knows about Buddhism, Sikhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism, etc, etc. If you don't know these things exist, you've got nothing to search for.

What, you just want a list of all the religions?
Here's a start.

Although I wonder why one would have a need for religions in their game that they'd never even heard of.
Maybe i don't understand the question.

[Heath Robinson]

We're not talking about knowledge-obsessives like myself. We're talking about normal people - who won't ever look these things up for themselves because they seriously don't want to learn things that have no bearing on their normal life. Yes, you are an oddity, a rarity, for learning things beyond the bare minimum you can get away with. Don't make the assumption that other people are like you.

They don't look up lists of religions that they don't follow, because they're not in the market for a new religion. They don't want to know. Unless you expose them to religions they can use as a tradition, they will never discover them. Same goes for hedge magic and chaos magic. Without a wide variety of tradition writeups they will just trump for playing a Hermetic or Shaman again. They might be happier playing a Shinto kanmushi, but under Cain's proposition there's a fence between them and Shinto they don't care to hop.

My argument against Cain's two sentence writeup idea is that you can't get a full feel for a tradition in two sentences. He's yet to indicate that he finds the sentences I picked out of his previous posts about Ryobu-Shinto an unsatisfactory example of the worth of the style. I was completely unenthusiastic about the tradition on the basis of those sentences, since I knew basically nothing about the tradition. Meanwhile, a number of the writeups in SM piqued my interest and I can see myself doing research if, in future, I decided to play a magician or adept.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Yeah, the topic of few traditions versus more has basically reached its end. Cain has his preference, I have mine, Zurai has his, etc. Any way you cut it, a player who wants to detail his magical tradition in depth will have to do some work, whether he's using a tradition from the book or a custom-created one. But it was never the design intention to eliminate player research. Hell, I love player resea♦rch.

Research is what keeps it fresh... I too Love that particular aspect of creating custom traditions...

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

And how are you meant to know that the tradition even exists? You've been avoiding this question. The tradition writeups in Street Magic are the first introduction a lot of players have to many of the traditions. You can't search for information you don't even know exists. There is no big list of knowledge you don't possess, and people don't look for things until they have a pressing need.

You could always search the internet (Google is good, as is Yahoo) for "Religion" or "Magic", you will get a very large number of hits for each... Pick and choose from there...

Design as you see fit... Viola, New Traditions

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

We're not talking about knowledge-obsessives like myself. We're talking about normal people - who won't ever look these things up for themselves because they seriously don't want to learn things that have no bearing on their normal life. Yes, you are an oddity, a rarity, for learning things beyond the bare minimum you can get away with. Don't make the assumption that other people are like you.

They don't look up lists of religions that they don't follow, because they're not in the market for a new religion. They don't want to know. Unless you expose them to religions they can use as a tradition, they will never discover them. Same goes for hedge magic and chaos magic. Without a wide variety of tradition writeups they will just trump for playing a Hermetic or Shaman again. They might be happier playing a Shinto kanmushi, but under Cain's proposition there's a fence between them and Shinto they don't care to hop.

I would say that these individuals are not the ones that are interested in creating their own traditions in the long run anyway, so it does not really matter for them does it?

Of course, if they really WERE truly interested, they could do the research themselves, or ask someone else to do so...

[Heath Robinson]

I would say that these individuals are not the ones that are interested in creating their own traditions in the long run anyway, so it does not really matter for them does it?

Of course, if they really WERE truly interested, they could do the research themselves, or ask someone else to do so...

So providing them with more traditions maximises their utility from the product, since at least one is going to hit the nail nearly straight on for them. Unlike us, who are willing to do research and therefore don't need exceedingly long writeups.

[Cain]

So providing them with more traditions maximises their utility from the product, since at least one is going to hit the nail nearly straight on for them. Unlike us, who are willing to do research and therefore don't need exceedingly long writeups.

Actually, it's the opposite. The more you write on a tradition, the more likely you are to set someone's imagination on fire. Information junkies with a lot of imagination were probably developing their own traditions long before SM came out. The writeups are for those without; and in that case, the more detailed, the better.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

So providing them with more traditions maximises their utility from the product, since at least one is going to hit the nail nearly straight on for them. Unlike us, who are willing to do research and therefore don't need exceedingly long writeups.

Exactly...

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Actually, it's the opposite. The more you write on a tradition, the more likely you are to set someone's imagination on fire. Information junkies with a lot of imagination were probably developing their own traditions long before SM came out. The writeups are for those without; and in that case, the more detailed, the better.

Yes and No...

Some writeup is good to fire the imagination, too much information given as Cannon will tend to suppress the imagination, as you now have no room to maneuver if you disagree with what is written...

Excessive information is for those who do not want to go through the effort of creating their own information... and in this regard, yes, the more information the better...

However, for those who like to add their own flair, a smaller writeup is infinitely better as there will be less information that will need to be altered to fit the ideas that you may have discovered because of a single paragraph with minimal information.

Neither approaches is wrong, but with a limited word count, the developers decided that it would be better to provide many smaller writeups than a few detailed writeups...

Works for me...

[Heath Robinson]

Actually, it's the opposite. The more you write on a tradition, the more likely you are to set someone's imagination on fire. Information junkies with a lot of imagination were probably developing their own traditions long before SM came out. The writeups are for those without; and in that case, the more detailed, the better.

Rifle in the dark. A powerful shot, but if you don't hit then it's completely worthless. I'd rather take birdshot and be assured of hitting near the bullseye.

I also agree with the point that too much information becomes not a road, but a rail.

[Cain]

Rifle in the dark. A powerful shot, but if you don't hit then it's completely worthless. I'd rather take birdshot and be assured of hitting near the bullseye.

Imagination is a curious thing. Reading a detailed writeup on one thing might light your imagination on fire for another. And the rules do support tradition creation, so who knows what might result?

[Neraph]

Dogma, Rituals, Beliefs that have been formed over the last several thousand years...

...All two of them.