Mental Encumbrance

I like encumbrance systems. Deciding whether to bring this or that equipment, or debating whether or not to drop your sword so you can carry an extra bit of treasure on your way out of the dungeon is a very interesting decision and makes the game all the richer for it. Without an encumbrance system, there's no penalty for carrying loads of useless items, so these decisions never have to be made, and there's no reward for a clever player. It is also realistic- you just can't carry everything, realistically.

A penalty for excessive physical burdens is good. Why don't we have one for mental burdens? Just as there's a limit to how much you can carry on your back, realistically, there should be a limit to how much you can keep in your head. It's very rare you see an RPG give characters any penalty for knowing lots of lore, for speaking many tongues, or for knowing a whole library worth of spells in their head. 

Typically, this penalty for being physically encumbered is that your character moves more slowly, which might make one limit how much they carry in order to keep a quick pace. The penalty for carrying many memories could be that that mental saves are more difficult, as your mind already is very busy. A mind that knows much about the world might be more likely to go insane, if you're using a sanity system. Your thoughts straying on other subjects might make performing an incantation correctly more difficult, causing your spells to misfire.  

Art by Kit Curry O'Connell

 

Physical and Mental encumbrance

  • You have a number of item slots equal to your Strength score. 
  • You have a number of memory slots equal to your Intelligence score. 
  • You don't need to note down trivial things which have no effect on gameplay, or are in no way cumbersome 
    • e.g. your character wearing pants, or your character knowing how to tie their shoes. 
  • Some items and memories are particularly cumbersome, and take up two slots. Their names are written in Bold.
     

Some of these slots will be filled at character creation, and the rest will be filled up as you play the game. Rolling for memories at character creation could look something like this:

  • Language (D20)
    • 1. Goblin
    • 2. Dwarvish
    • ...
    • 19. Abyssal
    • 20. Ancient Thanian
  • Obscure Lore (D20)
    • 1. Ancient History
    • 2. Pantheon genealogy
    • ...
    • 19. Where a prophesied sword lays dormant
    • 20. The true name of a Major Demon
  • Skills (D20)
    • 1. Lockpicking
    • 2. Medical skills
    • ...
    • 19. Alchemy
    • 20. Astrology
  •  Spells (D20)
    • 1. Read Magic
    • 2. Charm Person
    • ...
    • 19. Fireball
    • 20. Raise dead

 

During play, you might also:

  • Spend a week training and learn Sir David's special swordfighting technique (+1 To sword attacks)
  • Learn the thieves' guild 50-word long passphrase.
    • Running out of memory slots, you write it down on a piece of paper.
      • This frees up memory slots, but risks an NPC stealing the paper.
  • Spend an evening at a pirate tavern and devote a memory slot to learning All the sea shanties.
  • A thought-stealing Wizard robs you of the Lycanthropy Lore you worked so hard to learn.
  • After a particularly rough night at the bar, a particularly cruel DM might erase one of your memories.

 

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