I'm going to derail this for a moment, sorry. Before I converted to Christianity I had some abilities that could best be described as magical. I asked God to cleanse me of what I knew to be a taint in His Eyes, and I believe He has. I asked Him to allow His Will and not mine to be done in all things; therefore, I would not willingly make a prayer to a spirit power I knew to not be God.
I am asking for access to the river and for some fish, and meaning it, but I am not anticipating my asking to have any effect on the outcome of the hunt.
You can't do magic without meaning to, and I would specifically mean not to.
bump
gotcha, so you are asking, but not waiting for a reply, basically. Right?
Okay, next skill, spear fishing. Your tech bias is 11@1, the spear fishing should be way less, something like 1@4 or something? (not sure at all) BRA here I would guess to be hand/eye, strength and ? I actually don't know what flexibility is, otherwise maybe agility? Let's have the tech bias low or something odd. They do not know the wheel but where able to construct a building which has an inside garden that looks like it's outside.
There are some explanations I am thinking about to explain that but I do not want to spoil things for you.
ooc: If by any chance you have the time to start up a game for me, partially for fun, partially for the purpose of teaching me to GM, I would be much obliged.
Also, I'm positively impressed by hearing about how you converted. If you would like 'to share your testimony' by e-mail or something, I would like to read it and be encouraged.
Off the top of my head, spears are more complex than the wheel.
Here it is, create axled wheel, 2@2 bias level@instensity. And 3@1 simple wedges would be a spear. Tech level five is for water wheels and hard metals; also glass working and plumbing. Level four is pulleys, gears, and soft metals.
(Level one is control of fire, leatherwork, pottery.)
I'm trying to go for something like what I've heard about the native Americans from central America, that they didn't know the wheel, yet they had step pyramids amid the jungle etc. Mirrors are hard metal bended and polished, right. So I'll go for 5@something. Let's say 5@8. Still not sure about the BRA, I guessed at the attributes, but I'm not sure.
BRA for tech is ed lev, intellect, intuition.
(looks it up)
Woot. Win.
5@8 is uh... well, actually, there's no skill associated with a 5@8, so it suggests a falling bias, from one that was once higher. 5@4 are water turbines, 5@3 for tempering and alloying hard metals.
A word about bias curves!
With a 5@8 bias, you have a curve of 13. People not indigenous to the world could broadcast television or radio waves (that's a curve of 13), build a rocket engine (curve of 12) as long as they already had the designs for it, design and build a combustion engine (that's a curve of 12 and 11, respectively), design and build an air lock (also 13), use plastic explosives (that's 13 as well); not that indigs have access to these things, but that anything above the curve of 13 is completely impossible *no matter how good the person is at doing it*.
Designing and building explosive-driven slug throwers, aka guns, is a 6@4 skill, curve of 10, just fyi.
The curve is adding the values before and after the @ then? Falling Bias suits me well, very well. How slowly does it fall, generally speaking?
Learning Spear Fishing:
21+58+111-31= instant succes, not even counting the example. But that is if it's tech. Is it Tech? If so, why is spear fishing tech and are all fighting skills body, even if weapon dependent?
You made a mistake is why ;)
If I pick up a spear, and view it as a simple wedge, and along with all the technical ramifications this presents, and attack with it, you are using the spear as a tech weapon.
If you pick up the same spear, but instead view it as an extension of your body, and along with all the physical ramifications this presents, and attack with it, you are using it as a bod weapon.
You could also use it as a material component for a magic spell or wield it telekinetically with psionics. Or possibly do many other things with it if you chose.
Biases generally change over hundreds of years, but sometimes rise much more quickly than that; certainly not overnight, but over decades, certainly.
So, is spear fishing tech or bod? I would think bod, right? Then I need to know how bod biases work to set them for the world.
Actually, I would personally approach it as a tech skill; I'm not using the spear as an extension of my body, I'm using it as a tool with which to catch fish; to compare it to a fishing rod with a mechanical reel or a harpoon gun, both of which are clearly tools used to catch fish.
On bod biases, most Earth-type worlds have a 12@ bias level (I believe) to account for abilities indigenous creatures but not humans have (metamorphosis in caterpillars, tadpoles, etc).
does this need a bump? I can't see your reply.
BUMP
Bu-hump!
Aha! It needed a bump (or two)!
There is no objection coming from the pond to whether you can fish. The pond must have approved it seems because it doesn't take long before you have a fish on your spear.
You two keep fishing until the basket is filled. In the mean time your host tries to teach you the names for spear, fish or the name of that specific fish, and what could be water or pond. (29% rolled, oh, so close!) You repeat the sounds but once the next word comes you have forgotten the previous word.
How do I decide how good you are at the new skill you learned? I've seen people learn skills from 1@1 up until 1@3 if I recall correctly.
successful rolls of 1 - 50 are 1@1 SAL, successful rolls 81 and higher are 1@3.
21+58+111-31+10= 169% chance to learn. The roll is 54, which means I can note you down for 1@3 Spear Fishing T3@1, if I am correct.
1@2. 51 - 80 = 1@2 SAL.
At any rate, I caught some fish. Wee.
Yeah, so he pointed his hand to you with five fingers outstretched. As he sees you got one he does the same but with four fingers outstretched.
Ah, I guess he wants me to catch five. Well, at least I know math. Keep fishing.
I'm going to crunch numbers tomorrow (fuzzy mind right now, rainy day, kids without being able to run in an acoustically horrible gym after sitting still in school all day tends to make me fuzzy in the head.), though I suspect you will succeed automatically. This is your chance to come up with up until 4 different ways to catch a fish with a spear for new uses. Of course, your character is probably not thinking about that, but he might. Maybe he likes this spear fishing thing and wants to try out some stuff.
No, I would just try to catch fish.
It's not much crunching, really. It's my decimalized BRA, doubled level of the world's ABL (since it's lower than mine), decimalized SAL for the skill (11 in this case), my martial strike value, all against the target value of the fish.
How do I determine the value target of the fish?
Target value is Agility + Density + Intuition/3.
As a fish is small, it may also have a sitmod penalty to hit it for size, and as it's underwater, you may also choose to penalize me slightly for its cover value.
I've got no clue as to the agility of the fish, or it's density or intuition.
Density is probably human normal, agility is probably high 1@ or maybe 2@, and intuition is likely 0@.
OK: 19+11+(6/3)=32 and sit mods of 10 and 5 for size and cover. Does that sound OK?
That brings the target value for the fish to 47.
For you it's 21+(58*2)+11+17=21+116+11+17=165
So if I get it correctly, your chance to catch it equals 165-47=118% Right?
You catch five other fish. You get back and fall in the routine of attempted learning, eating, watering plants ... The panther-man plays music every night. Sometimes short, sometimes for extended periods of time.
By what chunks of time do you want to progress? Weeks, months? If say weeks, do I roll a learning skill only for that week or for every day? Or should I take the 19% and apply it so that by the fifth day's end you finally get it?
Agility+Density+Intuition=X
X/3=target value.
(A+D+I)/3=TV
Sorry, I see the confusion.
One skill learning roll for every day until it's learned, then one training skill check for him every two weeks, if he fails I gain a skill point two weeks after the check, at which time the clock begins again, if he succeeds I gain a skill point at the time of the check.
We can go as quickly or as slowly as you like.