Mano a Mano:Character Development

Character Development

Developing Abilities through Training and Experience

An experience point (XP) is one percent (1% or 1/100) of a character point (CP). Experience points are used to improve abilities by small increments. Characters can gain experience points from training, as a reward for completing an adventure, or from other experiences that improve their abilities. An experience point can represent an hour of intense training with experts, or three hours of relaxed training on your own.

Experience points can be given to improve a specific ability, or characters can receive flexible experience points which their players decide how to use. Experience points are added to an ability's CP. Then the ability's modifier is updated. For example if a character has an ability with +3 modifier and 6 CP and then adds 400 XP to it, the ability will have 10 CP (6 plus 400/100.) The ability's modifier will become +4 because of the increased XP. (See Ability CP.)

Experience points can be added in four steps:

1. Convert the ability's CP into XP and add the new XP. The ability's XP is 100 times the abilities CP. If the ability's CP is 6, it's XP is 600. If the ability's CP is 8.5, it's XP is 850. If the ability's CP is 3.14, it's XP is 314. After finding the ability's XP, add the new XP to it.

2. Find the new ability level. A character's ability level is the difference between their personal ability modifier and their template's ability modifier. The following table shows the CP required for each ability level. If fractions of ability levels are allowed the table also shows how much CP is required for each additional fraction of an ability level.

 Whole          Add       Add      Add
Ability  XP     1/2      1/10     1/100
 Level       for each  for each  for each

   1    100   100 XP     20 XP     2 XP
   2    300   150 XP     30 XP     3 XP
   3    600   200 XP     40 XP     4 XP
   4   1000   250 XP     50 XP     5 XP
   5   1500   300 XP     60 XP     6 XP
   6   2100   350 XP     70 XP     7 XP
   7   2800   400 XP     80 XP     8 XP
   8   3600   550 XP     90 XP     9 XP
   9   4500   500 XP    100 XP    10 XP

3. Find the new ability modifier. The new ability modifier is the character's new ability level plus their template's ability modifier.

4. Convert the ability's new XP into CP. The ability's new CP is the XP divided by 100. For example, if the new XP is 314, the new CP will be 3.14.

Examples:

• A character has an ability with 3 levels and 6.00 CP. They add 400 experience points (4.00 CP) for a total of 10.00 CP. Their ability level is now 4.

• A character has 2.00 CP in some ability. The whole number part of the ability is 1. The game allows the character to have half ability levels, so the player finds the difference between the Ability's CP and the CP of the whole number part (2.00 CP - 1.00 CP = 1.00 CP.) The next whole ability level is 2, so increasing the ability level by a fraction requires 2 experience points for every percent of fractional ability level. Increasing the ability by one half (50%) requires 2 experience points times 50 percentage points which equals 100 experience points or 1.00 CP. So the character has just enough points for ability level 1.5.

• A character uses 550 experience points to develop a new ability. The new ability's CP is 5.50. The whole number part of the new ability's level is 2 (which requires 3.00 CP while the next whole number level requires 6.00 CP.) The game allows tenths of ability levels. The difference between the ability's CP and the CP of the whole number part is 5.50 - 3.00 = 2.50 CP, or 250 experience points. The next whole ability level is 3, so the ability can be increased ten percent for every 30 (3 times 10) experience points in the difference. 8 times 30 experience points is 240, which is less than 250, so the characters new ability level is 2 and eight tenths (2.8).

• A character has an ability with 3.55 CP and is allowed to have hundredths of an ability level. The whole number part of the ability's level is 2, and the difference between the CP of that whole number part and the ability's total CP is 0.55, or 55 experience points. The character can have an extra percent of an ability level for every 3 experience points (3 is the next whole ability level.) 19 percent of an ability level would require 57 experience points, which is more than the 55 experience points available. 18 percent of an ability level would only require 54 experience points, so the character's ability level is 2.18.

Changing Occupations

While a Template has to do with the origin of the character and is a static part of the character, the character's Occupation is not permanent. As a character matures, he could easily end up with in more important Occupations related to the Occupations he has had in the past. If the character is used in a multiple campaigns or adventures, he could easily end up pursuing a wide variety of occupations throughout his lifetime.

Occupations are often unintentionally gained by a character. For example if a character is captured by enemies, his Occupation could become "prisoner" in contrast to his player's intentions.

Occupations are often development goals for a character. For example a character may want to join a "town guard" to have better access to weapons for defeating a public enemy, and successfully changing his occupation to "town guard" could be a significant accomplishment for that character.

Inventory Management or Acquiring and Losing Equipment

(See also Character Equipment)

Making Equipment

Equipment CP

(See Armor and Weapon CP in the Template CP rules)

Make an Item - Equipment Generation Example

We will use our Steven character from the character creation example to make a new weapon. (See Character Creation/Make a Character.) Steven has craftsmanship ability with a modifier of 2.

1. Design the weapon

We decide Steven is making a "machete". The mass of the machete is 0.5 kilograms, worth 1 CP. The machete's 5 power is worth 50 CP. The machete's 3 heft is worth -30 CP. The total CP is 21 so far. (-30 + 60 + 1 = 31.) Having no shots feature (not requiring ammunition or reloading) is worth 20 CP. We add 20 CP for the sharp feature for a final total of 61 CP. In other words, Steven wants to make this machete:

machete (81 CP, 0.5 kg, 3 heft, 5 power, sharp)

2. Find the Maximum CP We start with Steven's craftsmanship modifier (2). We subtract 1 from this because Steven is only taking a few days make the machete. We add a circumstance modifier of 1 because his culture specializes in making machetes. We multiply the result by 50 CP because Steven is in a culture that has "ancient" technology. The maximum CP is 100 CP: (2 craftsmanship ability - 1 time modifier + 1 circumstance modifier) × 50 technology CP.

3. Compare Maximum CP to the CP of the Designed Weapon

Since the maximum CP (100) is equal to or greater than the Machete's CP (61), Steven is able to make it.