Character Creation
-Select Tarot Arcana: sets access/BP cost of skills, initial stat spread, progression costs, and unique Tarot ability
-also sets a guide for character personality - Social Link Points (SLP - essentially xp) awarded for playing "in-Tarot"
-Players then pick an applicable Persona for the Tarot - encouraged to use "real-world" religions and folklore for inspiration - then builds the Persona's skill set/abilities using a set number of BP (should be adjustable depending on power level of campaign)
Optional Skills rules
-players get a preset number of Character Points to spend on the following four abilities: Persistence, Charm, Empathy, Knowledge

(Post 2 of 6)

I think it'd be better to have .jpgs of the rules in a nice format to go along with text for copu/pasto

wat do

Advancement
-Social Link Points (SLP) awarded by GM for good roleplay in-line with Tarot arcana
-SLPs also awarded for completing goals as a group
-SLPs can be used to raise Persona stats, purchase abilities, or kept as a reserve of "action points" for special combat actions (defying death, making additional actions, etc.)

(Post 3 of 6)

>>12671915

No .jpgs of the rules, cooked this up a couple days ago pretty much on the back of a napkin. This isn't an official system by any means.

Suits(subject of course to some shuffling):
-Swords/Spades = Fire element, Persistence
-Wands/Clubs(Staves, in some Tarots) = Wind element, Knowledge
-Coins/Diamonds = Lightning Element, Charm
-Cups/Hearts = Ice Element, Empathy

(Post 5 of 6)

I picked a really cool Tarot card for my Persona!

Hero Protagonist
(Character name)

Persistence: 4
Charm: 2
Empathy: 2
Knowledge: 1
(The player decides to spend his points in such a way that Hero is eager and persistent, but a little on the dense side.)

Chariot Arcana
+Impulsivity
+Energy
+Bravery
(As a Persona wielder of the Chariot Arcana, Hero tends to be brash and impulsive, but also confident and courageous - the GM should look for and reward the player with Social Link Points accordingly)

Persona:
Mars - Chariot Arcana
ST: 5 +1
MAG: 2
DEF: 4
LU: 3
Resistance/Weakness: Fire/Ice
Abilities: Power Hit, Dia
Tarot Ability: Focus (can spend an action to double damage of next physical attack)
(Hero's player decides after some research into mythology to go with the Roman god Mars as his Persona. The Chariot Arcana gives him an initial stat spread of 5,2,4,3. At this point, the player can spend BP on abilities, increasing statistics, or buying resistances/weaknesses. Since Mars is associated with fire, the player decides to buy Fire resistance. He takes a penalty to ice resistance to give him a few more points, buys Power Hit and Dia, then spends the rest on a +1 boost to strength)

(Post 6 of 6)

In general, trying to keep the whole thing rules-light. Not sure if i should add additional detail for skill checks. Maybe a time-management system?

Also, while the Tarot trappings and such are specific to Persona I imagine you could adapt the rules for similar settings; JoJo's Bizarre Adventure comes to mind.

Looking in hindsight though the rules are actually somewhat ill-adapted for emulating a Shin Megami Tensei game (although maybe you could get away with Devil Survivor).

>>12671890 Players play the suits and/or combinations dictated by the rules, the total sum of the cards (with any relevant bonuses) being compared against a given threshold to achieve damage, effects, or pass challenges.

Detailed description needed.

>>12671915

few quick seconds in Paint.

>>12672035

Still working on how exactly it will go, but it should in practice look something like this:

Mitsuru Kirijo, an ice-focused Persona user, gets caught in a battle with a bunch of mooks. At the start of the day (or whatever block of time the GM uses since the last rest), Mitsuru's player drew a hand equivalent to her Persona's "Hand Size" statistic - lets say the player has seven cards.

The player notices that he has the Four of Cups and the Six of Cups in his hand, and decides to use "Bufu" - an ice skill that requires one card of the Cups suit. The player decides to play the Six of Cups in order to use Bufu. He adds the face value of the card - six - to the Magic stat of Mitsuru's Persona, and compares it against the Defence of the enemy - that's how much damage he does. If the enemy is weak against ice, the player gets another action.

>>12672035

A skill challenge would work similarly. Let's say Mitsuru faces a pop quiz in class after the fight. The GM has a set threshold in mind - let's say 8. Mitsuru hasn't had a chance to rest or catch her breath yet, so she still has the same hand, minus whatever cards she used in the fight earlier.

Mitsuru's player would have to play a Wands (or Clubs, in a regular deck) card (going by the Suits=Elements comparison chart below, Wands are required for Knowledge checks) of any number. That number is then added on to Mitsuru's Knowledge statistic and compared against the GM's threshold.

Again, still working on exact numbers and other balancing factors, but that's the essentially idea behind the system. It's meant to be light and fast but also require some elements of choice tradeoffs.

>>12672142
Sounds plausible, although it has waaaay too much room for abuse on both parts.

A player with a hand full of tens and figures can rape everything, while a player with nothing but twos or so is basically fucked.

Also, what if you only have 1 skill "suit" and you don't draw any card of the suit you need? Do regular physical attacks count as wildcards (any card can be used to pay for them)? What happens if you run out of cards?

And somehow i missed segment #4... well, it's all there in the .jpeg.

Resolution mechanics
-Ideally, use deck of Tarot cards (minus the Arcana; a regular set of 52 playing cards can substitute for those without)
-Players draw a hand at the start of each session to be used for skill checks/combat, GM plays from deck for mooks; draws his own hand for bosses
-Hands are replenished only through special abilities, exploiting weaknesses, or if the party has a chance to catch a breather (in which case players replenish their hand to their maximum)
-Using abilities requires playing a number of cards from a specific suit based on element, or a combination of cards for stronger moves (ex. Cups/Hearts for Ice moves - possible example - 1 Cups/Hearts card for Bufu (low level ice attack), 2 Cups/Hearts for Bufula(mid level ice attack))
-Damage dealt based on value of card played + relevant stat vs. defence of target (maybe allow target to play cards in defence?)
-exploiting weaknesses grants extra turns and/or drawing more cards to the hand
-Players who null an attack (via resistance, etc.) draw a card for each attack nulled
Skill Challenges
-If using the optional character attributes (Persistence, etc.); challenges work similarly to combat - players play a card of a suit related to the attribute
-In pure form should be playable without any regard to positioning, although could include optional rules for tactical movement, flanking, outnumbering, etc.

(Post 4 of 6)

>>12672142
It seems to me that the hand is kinda meant as a resource to be managed, which can be depleted. However, if it's your only method of resolving challenges, then I suspect you might need to replenish it more or less all the time (diminishing the resource management aspect by making it rather trivial), or else have player characters turn into "vegetables" for extended periods of time on a regular basis (which doesn't seem like much fun).

Or is it perhaps meant to be close enough to Persona 3 and 4 (and whatever else works the same) in that you mostly have dedicated "dungeon runs" where the resource management will matter, and where you won't really do anything requiring challenge resolution except fight, and for the rest you chop it up to the point where you're not supposed to be able to do enough stuff per scene (to borrow WW-terminology) to bottom out?

>>12672201

Physical attacks would be wild-cards. Normal, non-ability attacks would not use a card at all - just the base stat, so a player who has exhausted their hand still has options.

I'll admit it is very draw-dependent right now, trying to work on some mechanics to try and even things out. For example, allowing players to spend SLPs to trade cards in, or allow them to pass a turn to do so. Another possible option is allowing players a Full Defence option to protect themselves if they have no good options left.

The difficulty too is partly dependent on how hard the GM pushes the players too - players replenish their hands by default every time they have a chance to take an extended rest. A GM can slacken or tighten the pace to make things more challenging.

>>12672229

Yeah - still trying to smoothen out the resource management aspects of it. It's to try and capture a sort of time-management feel that's similar to the games - players can only do so much in a day before having to rest.

But good point there - controlling hand size is going to be really important. I think it might be better to tie hand size to overall "level" (total S.LP, in a similar way to how Dark Heresy handles levels). Thus as players level up, they can do more in a day.

Finally, there are some smaller ways to replenish your hand - nulling attacks via resistance was one of the initial ways I was thinking - rather than giving another turn, you draw a card. I was also thinking maybe of having particular persona abilities that allow players to draw, trade, or give cards.

>>12672229

Oh, and to address the second point - in the original formulation of this - generally yes, the players shouldn't be taking a skill check on something unless they're under incredible pressure or stress.

If players or the GM want to add an element of randomness to "everday life", I'd say to just draw from the deck and disregard the suits - just use the face value of whatever card is flipped up. It's only for moments of critical pressure (let's say, bashing a door in while trying to escape) should player play cards from their hand.

>>12672249
I'd make the hand size a fixed number rather than a stat, or at least a stat which is fixed for starting chars. It simply looks rather to central to be easily balanced (in cost or whatever) with anything else, and the less it varies, the easier it will be to set the pacing.

>>12672329
Probably just mes tuck in a "normal" RPG mindset where there isn't quite so much everyday life going on then.

>>12672334

Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. Maybe have it advance along with total character level, or at whatever rate the GM feels is appropriate.

Also, I'm curious if a Persona homebrew has been attempted before? Considering /tg/ has done an Evangelion homebrew, I imagine Persona isn't that far off.

>>12672357
The only thing I've seen is a Persona-based M&M setting. Not a full-blown homebrew yet.

I really really like this. Keep us updated

Finally, some campaign hooks ripped straight out of the various SMT games and spinoffs - most of them are pretty chock-full of campaign ideas:

-crazy rumours start flying around the school, and the PCs discover that after the rumours have circulated they actually come true (Persona 2)
-the PCs meeting up on the weekend at a park get caught in a battle between two cults of opposing ideologies, both battling it out with Personae. Later, the event is covered-up by the government as a riot. (SMT:Nocturne)
-a mystery murderer is on the loose - going after particular students and teachers from the PC's school. The crimes seem almost supernatural. (Persona 4)
-PCs are recruited into a secret organization of Persona users that are battling horrors that emerge at night (Persona 3)
-PCs are caught and nearly killed by a secret organization of Persona users (Persona Trinity Soul)
-PCs are caught in a lockdown of an entire sub-municipality, which the government explains initially as a gas leak. However, this is soon revealed as a cover up when eldritch horrors emerge from below... (SMT: Devil Survivor)

>>12672481
Another note too - the rules assume a sort of default "urbanized first-world country in the 21st century", but you could easily change up the location or even the time period for a unique game.

>>12672446
Will keep working on it - the core of the rules is there, so if you've got some people interested I imagine you could run it immediately if you're willing to make up your own skills on the fly. The elements that will probably take the longest time is the comprehensive skill and ability list - that's next in line.

this is really cool. Make sure you put it up on 1d4chan/suptg

Here's some persona creation feedback/tips, for when you think up rules for them:

- currently, physical attacks are virtually mandatory on any card as they are way more versatile than elemental attacks. I suggest changing this, so that instead each persona gets to nominate a single element for which it is dominant (fire/wind/elec/ice/physical/mental/light/dark). It can use that type of attack with any type of card (so it's dominant element becomes the 'wild card' element). Other attack types require the right type of cards.


- you still need a job for luck. You could potentially tie luck to maximum number of cards in hand or similar.

- what is the role of the major arcana when drawn? do they have special abilities?

-what about the other elements? there's light and dark, but also mental attacks such as charm.

- weaknesses are pretty major things in this game, and should be encouraged whenever possible IMO. Instead of picking them in a 'flaw' type of system, I would instead suggest making it mandatory to select one weakness and one 'resist' on character creation. The resist can be upgraded to null/drain/repel and more resists can be added (optionally with additional weaknesses to offset cost), but it is quite expensive to remove the initial weakness. Otherwise you'll end up in a situation where no players choose weaknesses ever because they are crippling (and should be so) in this combat system.

>>12672357
Not really, though we've talked about doing a Geist game with Persona as the basis. It works surprisingly well, with only a few problems (and that's mostly issues with on-site healing).

bamp for more feedback

>>12672699

Debating about how to handle the major arcana. Leaving them in means that the game is tough to run if you don't have a Tarot deck - and a good set of playing Tarot cards is pretty tough to find in North America - it's almost exclusively fortune-telling style cards.

Not sure if I'll include the Luck statistic in the final draft of it. I was thinking these might be used instead as "action points". Originally i was thinking that players could spend SLP to accomplish certain things (extra turns, etc.), or I might remove it completely.

Good thoughts on forcing weaknesses and resistances. The temptation is pretty strong not to take any, so that's a good suggestion. I was thinking of offsetting the wild card property of phys attacks by providing some sort of penalty, but having players select a "Wild Card" bonus to an element actually makes a lot of sense and is a lot more elegant.

Light and Dark spells - I'm probably going to lump status inflicting spells under Dark, and healing abilities under Light, just for simplicity. Since these two are somewhat less common and tend to encompass 'all-or-nothing' effects, I was thinking of making them require maybe pairs of some sort (either two of the same suit, or two of the same number, or possibly allow both for the lower level abilities, and more specific combinations for higher power abilities).

Last bump for anyone else - gonna go to sleep. Thanks for all the feedback and interest; helped do a lot of refinement.

I'm sure OP is gone now, but I'd love to see more of this- even though I know none of my friends would play it with me, the concept still seems really fun.

>>12674658
I share that opinion. I really do wanna see more.

Back in for a little while, no real substantative updates, but have been mulling over the main issues of having a cruddy hand and/or having cards they otherwise wouldn't use. One idea is to allow players to use a mechanic I've termed a "Shuffle":

Once per day/encounter/rest, a player can spend a Social Link Point to perform a Shuffle. The player draws a number of cards from the deck equivalent to his Persona's Luck statistic, and can trade any number of cards in his hand for the cards he has drawn. The remaining cards are reshuffled into the deck.

Also on the drawing board are general ideas about abilities for each Tarot "player class" - each Tarot card should have some sort of unique ability along with the starting stat spread that helps players specialize but is also faithful to the whole theme of the specific Tarot card. One idea would be the wild card ability someone suggested being exclusive to a player with the Fool Arcana. Fortune Arcana characters might have a unique skill that improves shuffles, or hand manipulation, and so on and so forth.

The other issue is, like an above poster noted, physical attacks are in some sense a must have, because they're so versatile. Ideas include:

1. Giving physical attacks their own specific cards or combinations (maybe even numbers only, or odd numbers only, if not a specific suit)
2. Reducing lethality of physical damage (ala WoD, have physical damage be less "lethal" than magic)
3. Reducing damage output (You could, say, halve the face value of cards used for physical attacks)
4. Tracking physical and magical defences seperately - enemies might be more resistant to physical and less resistant to magic on average - which has a similar if more modest effect to #3.
5. Some combination of the above

I'm somewhat in favour of reducing the damage output or giving some sort of disadvantage to physical attacks in general... i feel their versatility is more a feature of how physical attacks generally work in the SMT series of games - they're supposed to be your most reliable option. Still, there's something to be said for increasing diversity...

Also, one variation of #4 might be allowing characters struck by a physical attack to augment their defence score with a card drawn from the deck or played from the hand, to represent the greater ease in defending against physical strikes versus magic. That would also provide a use for "unwanted" cards in a player's hand.

Seeing as interest seems to be down, I'll be stepping out for a couple hours.

>>12681139
Looking forward to hearing more when you get back!

The Magician
+Creativity, craftsmanship, determination
-The smart guy of the group
-Stats geared towards magic. 1 Elemental weakness, 1 elemental resistance. Access to wider range of elemental skills, low access to physical and support.
-Tarot Ability: Sleight of Hand - at character creation, pick a suit. You may spend one SLP to treat a single card as of that suit for any check or skill.

The High Priestess
+Wisdom, serenity, relationships
-Tends towards a motherly archetype
-Stats geared towards Magic Def. 1 Ele. Weakness, 1 Ele. Resistance. Healing/support-focused.
-Tarot Ability - Serenity: Spend 1 SLP to shrug off a single negative status effect.

The Emperor
+Authority, command, discipline
-Good candidate for party leader or at least strategist
-No ideas for stats, maybe slight bias towards defence
-Elec Resistance, 1 Elemental weakness. Lightning-focused with some physical
-Tarot Ability: No ideas

Chariot
+impulsiveness, bravery, pride
-Focus on strength
-one elemental resistance, and opposite weakness (fire and ice, lighting and wind)
-Tarot Ability: Focus - spend 1 SLP to double the face value of the card you play on your next physical attack.

>>12683352

Missed the Fool.

The Fool:
+crazy plans, risk-taking
-Arguably the hardest to pin down a roleplay archetype. Risky behaviour is the mark of the Fool, any suggestions?
-Balanced, but low stats. Player may pick one resistance (any except physical) and one weakness.
-Possible ability: Wild Card - player may spend an SLP to use any card for any ability or skill check at half it's face-value

One thing that's still niggling at me is how to implement Social Link Points. The idea is that players accrue a pool of SLPs in play, and can spend them to increase statistics, acquire abilities, and the like (ala Dark Heresy), but can also hold onto them to spend as "fate points" or "action points" - allowing them to accomplish heroic goals, activate Tarot abilities, and the like.
My gut tells me though that most players are more likely to immediately spend them all on stats and not leave any behind... any thoughts?

Also, suggestions for Tarot abilities, classes, the like, all are welcome.

>>12683414

Well, you could just say that they can "burn" SLP to do their crazy fate point shenanigans, but they can still buy stats from the total amount they have gathered from the start.

That way, they can both buy stats and have a reserve of "fuck you" magic that they basically use like action points.

Of course, if you're giving out a huge number of SLP to just get them through encounters, they might need a stat boost anyway, solving the problem.

Shitty Hand Problem Solution

Card Combos that you can chain in a Blackjack/Uno style.

Need a big Ice attack? Drop two of cups, play 2 of pentacles, play 3 of pentacles. Total of 7.

And/or suggest having a Partial Draw mechanic; you get some cards back (maybe 1 or 2 out of a Max Hand Size of 7.

Or spending a Partial Action to discard dome cards & redraw.

Can someone archive this, so we can cone back to it later?

>>12683539

The Serenity RPG does this, and it works fine. Given you can only level up in downtime, SLP will wind up being burned to survive.

Warn players: If you use all your SLP fir your stats, you're liable to get pwnt. Then it's up to each player to decide whether they buy the Stat Increase now, and have less spare SLP that they'd like.

>>12683791
That's a really good idea actually. Maybe have it available the bat, or perhaps you can buy certain abilities that increase the maximum combo count. The elemental Boost and Amp skills seem like good candidates. Increases in combo size might be a bonus Tarot card ability too.
Plus, if a higher campaign difficulty is desired, you can allow enemies to pull off chains - so even basic mooks can deal out ferocious damage even on a very high level PC.

>>12683909
Sounds like it will work out okay then. I'm just worried about stat caps - since the highest value on a random draw is 13; but if we work in the Card Combo idea above things could probably scale somewhat higher before stats get a little broken.

The Card Combo idea makes me think that it's possible to implement All-Out attacks in the same manner - if the players have enough extra actions, they can do a Card Combo, with each player playing a card uno-style to the pile for every extra action they have. The combined total is dealt as Almighty-type damage (basically, irresistable).

Keep the suggestions coming, they help a lot!

>>12680828
One way of keeping physical attacks from being all too overshadowing would be to simply not have physical weakness in the game, or at the least make it very rare amongst shadows.

Don't forget falling down when you miss. That is pretty discouraging to have happen when you do physical attacks.

Persona physicals are a different story.

>>12684752

As the system works now, there's no hit/miss system - you just do varying degrees of damage - or no damage at all. You could possibly have a penalty applied if you fail to do damage with a physical attack.

Last bump for the night, and I'm off to turn in. Thanks for the input - the Card combination suggestion seems to fit in perfectly and helps with a lot of problems. Maybe have more to add tomorrow... In any case, have some female Kanji.

Card Combo Anon here.

If you're worried about people going overboard with their attacks, you could limit Max Combo Size to the relevant stat (so your total power is limited no matter how many cards you have)

Another SLP Burn option might allow you to exceed your combo limit according to how many you spend.

/r/ Thread Archive before it dies

Not sure if want....

>>12688417
Archived on suptg.