Author Topic: Split personality pc  (Read 3542 times)

Stallion12

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Split personality pc
« on: 19 June 2017, 21:45:59 »
I have a player that wants to have his character be a different personality each day of the week. Can the system handle this? I don't want him to be to strong, but I don't want to kill his creativity either.

monbvol

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #1 on: 20 June 2017, 01:51:34 »
Game mechanics wise I don't really see an issue.  So as long as both you and the player in question are prepared to do some reading on this particular psychological condition and discuss what you want to hold to and break from for the sake of the game it should be fine.

That said there are a couple ways I can see to do this.  It'll also somewhat depend on how aware of each other the personalities are.

1. Each personality is high functioning but not really aware of the others and thus it might not be unreasonable for him to generate 7 different characters as the split personalities.  Since they can have a wide variety of skills from each other and believe so strongly that they have different attributes than another personality they can actually functionally have different stats even.  The power of the mind is so significant each personality could take damage differently.  Compulsion 4 or 5 for this level of insanity should also be a common trait.  Would also recommend Pain Resistance as well.

2. Just one character with only a few minor adjustments for each personality to keep things simple.  Maybe mark certain skills as available to certain personalities or something.  This is probably a bit more representative of the different personalities being aware of each other and the severity of the condition not actually being that hindering for each personality.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #2 on: 20 June 2017, 02:38:53 »
Thank you, he was leaning towards option one, but I wasn't sure if that would be broken. Sounds like it won't be, I'll have him keep the same gear for each.

monbvol

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #3 on: 20 June 2017, 10:55:54 »
*nod*

Game mechanics wise it is not really any different than any other character or campaign except for that now you have a bunch of other "characters" to adjudicate as a GM to see if they work for your campaign or not.

The biggest issue with option 1 is when they eventually start taking damage.  This is where my not much better than layman's knowledge of psychology and general medicine/biology does start getting rather limited because while I know the mind has an incredible amount of power over the body and can actually make one personality frailer than the others or even have a full spectrum of durability for the personalities I am not too sure what the upper limits really should be, what actually happens when another personality takes over that isn't aware of the injury, how well they can function in spite of it, or how much additional damage they can do to themselves by ignoring it.

Option 2 simplifies a lot of that.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #4 on: 20 June 2017, 11:05:25 »
I'll mention both, but if he goes with one, I'm having damage carry over, that way it's not like he gets alot of health bars.

I'll keep you updated.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #5 on: 21 June 2017, 20:56:32 »
He ended up going 5 personalities that share identify traits, a few skills, and attributes but are otherwise different, my question is, how should I give him xp? I want to keep it fair compared to the other players.

monbvol

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #6 on: 21 June 2017, 21:20:29 »
I don't know if I'd give him any extra XP versus the other characters really.  Especially going the route of them being somewhat aware of each other and sharing certain skills and traits.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #7 on: 22 June 2017, 00:13:11 »
That's the issue, technically he has alot more xp, since he basicly will have 5 characters in one, at the same time, only different triggers will cause the switch.

How he's set up is

If he's around nonmilitary computers, he's a nerdy computer hacker, if he's in a combat situation he's a soldier, if he sees someone hurt he switches to a religious doctor, if he gets hurt he becomes a berserker, and his 5th personalty is a drug addicted salesmen. He'll take a compulsion check each time to see if he switches.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #8 on: 22 June 2017, 00:41:39 »
When I told him, he offered only getting xp for the shared attributes, would that be a good compromise?

I mentioned to him making 4 of the personalities npcs, and he can only put xp on the fifth (his choice on which that is). How does either sound?
« Last Edit: 22 June 2017, 01:17:47 by Stallion12 »

monbvol

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #9 on: 22 June 2017, 01:37:50 »
Hmmm...

Well what I'd probably do is give a fairly small boost in XP then but not a whole lot, say maybe another 10% of base, but be fairly creative about setting things up so he might change to a personality completely tailored to the situation.

Like the Religious Doctor could spring out a lot during fire fights and I'd say given the nature of Battletech the difference between a military computer and a non-military one could have him switching to his hacker personality when he really should be a soldier or vice versa he can't get out of the soldier personality when a hacker is needed because the computer isn't distinctive enough to trigger the hacker.

Because that is the thing about the real psychological condition, even if you try to stack the deck you don't always get the personality you want in a given situation.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #10 on: 22 June 2017, 09:09:24 »
So your saying give him an extra 10 percent to spread around?

And yea, I was planning to have him switch at inopportune times, unless he rolls double 6.

monbvol

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #11 on: 22 June 2017, 10:12:22 »
That is the absolute most extra I'd give him, yes.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #12 on: 22 June 2017, 10:55:34 »
Ah, I'll tell him.

Btw, I wasn't clear with my question, I ment lvling up wise.

Since he already built 2, should I tell him to go the seperate character route? He kinda did a hybrid. All the characters will have damage and exhaustion move over as he does stuff.




monbvol

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #13 on: 22 June 2017, 11:33:05 »
Okay that is a lot trickier.  Because each personality can progress individually I'd probably not award him any extra for progression.  Especially since so many of his personalities are tailored to filling particular group roles/are useful.

Just because he's already done up 2 of them I'd say why not have him finish off the rest.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #14 on: 22 June 2017, 11:38:25 »
So with his different characters, should I allow different gear totals and wealths? Or should that be universal? Gear won't change with what's on him when his personalty does.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #15 on: 22 June 2017, 11:44:40 »
Also, I was capping characters at 10 percent negative traits, instead of giving him an extra ten percent, should I use the errata so all his personalities negative trails give him more xp, but personality specific skills and traits are only active when he is that personality. Assuming he still wants to gain xp.

monbvol

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #16 on: 22 June 2017, 13:22:19 »
Wealth and Equipped should absolutely be shared/universal.

As you yourself state what he has with him won't change.  If he wants certain personalities to actually have different levels of access for buying new gear there is already a mechanic for such a situation in the Alternate ID trait.

As far as traits and extra XP I'd probably use the errata for point buy but still follow the rules for which traits are identity based and which ones are not and thus if he doesn't want them bleeding over have to pay for actual Alternate ID traits for the desired personalities.

After all if one of his personalities gets a bounty on them the rest are not safe and could still attract the attention of a Bounty Hunter.  Which becomes more likely if they only have one official government ID to book passage with.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #17 on: 22 June 2017, 15:46:13 »
Ok cool. So another question, since it's a mech campaign and only the soldier has mechwarrior ability, should vehicle count the same way?

abou

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #18 on: 22 June 2017, 16:08:42 »
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cowboy_Ninja_Viking

I'm not saying you have to do this, but I just might!

A great series with too short of a run. The idea is that people with split personalities have each one magnified and trained. They operate as special forces, but most of the time the personalities just argue with each other.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #19 on: 22 June 2017, 16:22:37 »
I might do something like that for his rivals.

bluedragon7

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #20 on: 22 June 2017, 17:16:55 »
Did this in the previous edition, a deep undercover agent that got lost in his alternate identities. I basically created multiple characters of roughly the same age, all having the appropriate negative traits and each time flashbacks triggered the schizophrenia I switched character sheets. Unfortunately did not play them much.

monbvol

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #21 on: 22 June 2017, 19:58:16 »
Yes to an extent.  It is an ID based trait but most security measures could permit the other personalities to still utilize it if they must.  Heck players can have multiple Vehicle traits and thus have multiple Vehicles.

Stallion12

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #22 on: 22 June 2017, 22:37:24 »
Off topic, but do you enforce the plus 2 tp for vehicle ownership?

monbvol

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #23 on: 22 June 2017, 22:47:59 »
Only if it is an era/setting where it actually has a real impact.

Like if I'm running a Solaris campaign pretty much no matter the era I'll enforce it because it does have such a dramatic impact on a character's negotiation position with a stable.

Or 3rd-4th Succession War where that extra prestige can net some other benefits.

There might be some others but it is a rarity that I will enforce it.

Kitsune413

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #24 on: 25 June 2017, 16:11:27 »
He sounds unplayable unless there are no other pc's.

If he is playing a character that hates the other pc's on wednesdays then it will cause problems. But it just depends on how disruptive the player is.

Not really how schizophrenia works though. Multiple personalities tend to take on roles. That doesn't really matter though. Nobody rp's antrograde amnesia. Always retrograde which people usually only get from psychological trauma and not injury.

Most people with amnesia just cannot store anything into long term memory so they forget you exist as soon as you leave the room.
Every man lives by exchanging - Adam Smith

Tslammer

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #25 on: 26 February 2018, 18:37:21 »
We had one player who wanted to have a split personality. So we decided how much he would spend on the character then hand me the sheet and as GM I would spend the rest.
He wanted to be FRR resistance fighter based and I decided it was part of a FRR project. I had some fun with this and having just watched the TV show My own worst enemy where this spy organization had a cybernetic way of switching the guy from normal guy to Spy. Of course the system has problems.
I then kept a copy of the full sheet and let him learn small details of what he could do at times. He knew he had the skills just not the levels.



Daryk

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Re: Split personality pc
« Reply #26 on: 26 February 2018, 19:12:38 »
Did you just say "I know kung-fu?"  :D