I don´t use edges and flaws. I think they´re to much trouble. Of course you want an explanation. Hm. Well, I think they bring the rules into areas that are best handled without rules. And they tend to make characters silly, because it´s so easy to go over the top. However, there are things I like about them. The drug thread made me think of that. It would be nice to compencate a player who decided to throw in an addiction in his character´s concept. I guess I could introduce a heavily rationalized edges and flaws system. Take away anything that could be even moderately problematic...

How do you use edges and flaws in your games?

I do individual chargen with each player, and discuss each aspect of the character in depth. As such, I allow Edges and Flaws on a case-by-case basis (adjusting them according to need), but don't automatically ban anything.

Good idea

We use them, and fairly extensively. It's true that they can be abused, but so can anything else in the game -- it's up to the individual player and GM to work things out, and make sure any given flaw/edge will fit into the game. Used properly, they can add depth and fairness to a game. Some people are willing to complicate their character's lives, some people aren't. The ones who are willing to give the GM more to work with -- more history, more background, more stuff that'll blow up in his face down the line -- should, I think, get a point or two for their effort/trouble.

I like Edges and Flaws if they fit the character concept, as long as its not cheesy like Allergy to Dairy Products or Hunted by a small Street Gang in Miami for games in Seattle.

I think it's a good start to a campaign when no PC takes any edge and flaws.

I could just ban them outright, but being passive agressive about them is much more gratifying.

It's a bad campaign when no one takes any edges and flaws. That's what gives the character life, makes pile o' numbers A different from pile o' numbers B.

~J

No, I am not thinking about roleplaying. I have Character A, who is a child electronics prodigy grown to maturity. Character A is roleplayed as having a natural talent, just flat-out being better than everyone.

Now I have Character B, who just picked it up a few years ago and has reached specialist level, but is nothing special.

Now we roleplay. Then it comes time to do some real work.

Character A throws six dice.

Character B throws… six dice.

Oh my, where'd that roleplaying go?

~J

If a guy has electronics 6, he didn't just pick it up. He's damn good, I say. The roleplay should reflect that : Whenever a PC is talking about a 6+ skill, he is talking about something he is an expert at.

Perhaps character A is a wunderkid while B is more mature and acquired his skill over a longer period of time. But they're both equally great at it. Roleplay would distinguish between the maverick and the carefully schooled, but that's it. 6 dice is 6 dice.

Seriously, what player puts a 6 in any given skill and then insist it's something he just picked up along the way? 6 is pretty good. If someone when to 'pick up something along the way', he keeps it at a lower level.

I've never seen that kind of thing in my campaigns. The expert are easy to spot by the fact that no one else has 6+ in that skill and that's all there is to it.

Either way, we're talking two experts, one with innate talent and one without. Without edges and flaws, when the dice come down it's just so much empty roleplaying.

~J

Why would the guy with innate talent be better than the guy without but who trained harder and for longer? Both have 6 at this point.

If wunderkid really has more talent, he has a higher linked attribut and will increase at cheaper cost in the future.

If 2 player put 6 in a given skill, they both intend to be great at it. Edge in that case only open an arms race. Once both PCs take the edge to decrease TN, where are we at now?

We're at a point where we've declared both to have an innate talent. We're assuming that one character does not have an innate talent.

Why should someone need a high linked attribute to be great at something? It helps, certainly, but can you think of a reason why it should be necessary to play a character with an innate talent?

~J

I think they have their place in the game. If it fits the character's background, that's fine. I just get tired of seeing the same Edges and Flaws every time. If the character is a Spellcaster he's likely got Focused Concentration for instance.

I've been in games where almost every PC was trying to max out their flaws just to get more build points. Its amazing how many characters you can run into in one group who all have Dark Secrets, and have Phobias about their Unusual Allergies. Its hard to believe they have any time to run at all, what with their Day Jobs and Multiple Dependents.

I do like unusual uses of flaws. I played in a game where a player had a Troll Adept with the Vindictive and True Believer Flaws, where he believed everything that was published in Weekly World News and would get very upset and get revenge on anyone that laughed at his beliefs. He had a lot fun with that.

My players make characters with a lot of life without edges and flaws. I help them with that by providing suggestions and giving them books to read that might help with their background. Making a character in my group usually takes about two 2-4 hour sessions per character (one for the essentials and one for fleshing out). The numbers have taken up a minority of those hours. In games were edges and flaws are used, my experience is that, especially players new to the game, look at the edges and flaws for inspiration instead of looking at the background material in the books. This actually makes characters MORE streamlined, because every character is built around a few predifined character quirks.

But having some way of paying something back to those players who want something in their characters background that will be a problem for them. That would be nice. I think I could do that though.. None of my players has looked very hard at the SR companion. I could use it as a guid line and give out a few extra points for stuff they make up themselves...

My games is like Fortunes. A character has to explain why such a flaw works for them, but since we've been gaming together for years, most of the people in my group are more concerned with well developed characters instead of number crunching. To be honest we have more fun with the flaws than the edges.

I think flaws and edges should not be used when people are learning the system, they just add more complications to the system, more things to try and keep track of.

I allow Edges and Flaws. I have no problem with them, I make clear that anything that is labeled GM-recommended-not-to-allow will not be allowed, but otherwise anything goes. I see them as game mechanics that allow PCs certain abilities or drawbacks that simply have certain names.

One thing I like about edges and flaws is it gives you reason to better roleplay those drawbacks, which when they have no game mechanic effect tend to get forgotten when they're most inconvient (or maybe I've just played with good enough GMs that they don't let you conviently write off flaws the same way).

Allergies and phobias do tend to get cheesed the hardest, but they're also the ones that should be subjected to the strictest GM approval. When there are problems with Day Job and Dependants, it's usually because the GM is not enforcing them. (For Dayjob, especially the 40 hour version, I have the player tell me what his job is, where it's located, and what time his shifts are. If a run is going to conflict with his job, he can't go, because losing that job means he's going to have to pick more flaws to replace Day Job. In Dependants, the player must describe the family members, and how he relates to them, so I know how I can put them too use. I had a dwarf in a LS campaign with the dependant flaw, whose wife hated the long hours and late nights he worked, and the family drama became a big part of roleplaying him).

I like edges, because they fill out the character in interesting ways. I had a PI who greatly resembled Tony Shaloub's "Adrian Monk," (a couple years before the actual series came about). He had a column full of flaws, but edges such as Perceptive, Friendly Face, Photographic Memory, which gave actual substance to his supposed above average investigative skills.

Most of our GMs allow 'em. A lot of us in our group have the tendency to abuse them (I count myself among the guilty), but for the most part we're pretty good about roleplaying them out. Our old friend Wounded Ronin is especially adept at this, I'll add.

I love the use for edges and flaws, it gives me so much to work with as long as the player does not go twinky on me, i some times allow Aptitude depnds on what skill it's used with.

One or two edges or flaws seems to work just fine, but I would start to worry about a player with four or five - he's probably not taking them all for backstory and character development at that point.

The only time I've allowed the aptitude edge was when a character was playing a mundane blind swordsman.

I am alright with edges as long as the player can support the edge in their background, but when they start picking flaws that are obviously being used for the sole purpose of build points, I go ahead and allow it, and then punish the player for taking them. This is followed by an explaination of why it is happening, and usually prevents it in the future.

"Oh, I see you've got Sea Madness. That's perfect, because guess where the next run is taking us..."

After we got the the SRcomp, it seemed like everyone was playing a metavariant and loadng up on edges, but after a while it died down and most of the grop is based on the good ol' priority system at the moment.

I tend to allow just about everything. I tell everyone to clear edges or flaws with me first, and anyone munchking is giving me the right to screw them.

I really don't enjoy smacking around players over Edges and Flaws. It's passive agressive, and usually gets out of control. If they take something inappropriate, like Sea Madness in a game in Denver, I simply tell them 'no.'

Sea Legs on Denver, on the other hand…

~J

Has anyone ever had a real problem with skill apptitude?

I can see it with a skill that's always opposed like melee, and with firearm skills for called shots.

Is it really all that unbalancing with sorcery or decking though?

I think there was a thread on it a while back, but I love the hunted flaw.so much fun.

Melee/opposed ones are nasty, but not as bad I would think as sorcery.

Reason being, sorcery/spellcasting, well.. throw it on a manaball/powerball/stunball, and it's a lot easier to take someone out, since the TNs are different, and typically higher for the victim of the spell then the caster. You start getting even people with decent will (3-4) at TN 2-3...

That being said, haven't seen how it works with the other ones yet... nobody's pissed off the sam with aptitude-demolitions, skill at 6, 4kg CXII, and vindictive flaw..

The worst Aptitude in my opinion would be in any type of Melee skill. TN bonuses rule in melee.

I allow them. Since they were introduced, I liked them. I think they help push the roleplaying aspect into a character most of the time. It helps me as a GM too. I have all of my players' edges/flaws written down behind the screen. I don't have all of their back stories written down though (those I have to remember). When I sense that someone might be forgetting about their edge/flaw, I gently remind them about it and it can change how they react. Its a good thing most all of the time.

I have one power gamer (mage) in the group though and he always tries to min/max his edges and flaws. So, I have to explain why I'm not allowing him to have -2 Simsense Vertigo and -4 Sensitive Nueral Structure. Sure, the character could have those flaws, but I know why he picked them. Easy free points. Nuh-uh.

Isn't Simsense Vertigo only a 2 point flaw for awakened characters anyway? Essentially, I feel that Edges and Flaws are one of those things that need to be run by the GM for approval. I had one character who had a severe phobia over Bug Spirits, and a lesser phobia over insects in general (he'd spent a couple years trapped in Chicago), and I made sure that the GM was okay with that.