Insanity or Corruption?

[samwise7]

So... if Novus had Insanity or Corruption mechanics, what do you think they would look like?

[imported_Witchking20k]

Like a many tenticled elder slumbering restlessly beneath the sea in his ancient city.....or a fun'o'meter with skulls and cotton candy!

[imported_Rasyr]

Off the cuff -- I don't know the answer to this question because I have not given it any thought previously..

Spur of the moment --

Create a Sanity or Corruption score - 0 is the worst possibility, 10 or 20 is the starting point (and also the maximum possible)...

Every time the character encounters a source of insanity or corruption - the character makes a Save vs. Will against it (and yes, these CAN have different TNs based on how bad they are). Failure means they lose one point from the score. Success means that they don't lose a point. Success + 10 means they gain a point (up to the max).

[imported_Witchking20k]

Booya!  Take that feeble minded mortals!

[Fidoric]

Rather than creating a sanity score, I would use the willpower stat directly. When confronted with corruption, you roll a save vs Will and if you fail, you lose points in Willpower, making you possibly more susceptible to next "attack". It would also reflect the character becoming less and less "focused" as madness grows.
It should be possible to use the same system with rolls vs Con if you are subject to physical corruption (Chaos, elemental poisoning...)

[samwise7]

Wow, I like the idea of your Willpower stat getting eaten away as you loose your sanity.  Nice. 

[imported_Rasyr]

Or perhaps Combine Willpower and Wisdom to get your Sanity score...

Many possibilities..

[imported_Witchking20k]

Then sanity would have to affect the rest of the game somehow.  IE.  Sanity is a requesite to Faith, or affects interaction rolls etc...otherwise it is a meaningless mechanic.

[Fidoric]

Maybe if you loose charisma points instead of (besides ?) willpower, it would make your character less and less sociable.

[imported_Witchking20k]

Or maybe insanity points trigger semi permanent snags?  Like a 1 point snag could be a twitch, or tick...

[gamewizard]

I like the Sanity relation to Faith, but maybe even include that if you decide to have an evil campaign you have to have a minimum number of Insanity points to have particular classes. ie you have to start the game with a significant amount of Insanity.

Perhaps allow your characters that are "Good" aligned to be able to burn XP to lower their Insanity to acceptable levels for your particular Faith.

Just some ideas

[Meerling]

Running ink and blurry text.

Too literal?  Ok.

I'd think it would be a series of situational Snags and/or penalties instead of 'mental hit points'.
For example, someone on the rowboat got messed up and nailed by an insanity attack, failed save, and now suffers. (Maybe it's only temp) Until it's removed (time, healing, drugs, etc) he refuses to go on boats, needs a will save to do so when necessary, and suffers a -2 to all actions when on a boat. Maybe it gets worse after another bad incident on a sailboat. Now he's at -4 on boats and to his will save to temporarily overcome his fear, and it's so bad, he even gets a -1 if near bodies of water. (Something large and deep enough to swim in, not the bathtub.)

Just an idea.  I remember trying to keep track of sanity points in many games (including Call of Cthulhu), and it never seemed to go as easily as HP did. Besides, the only part that really mattered to the players was when you actually went nuts, not the point based decent into madness.

Hope my opinion helps rather than confuses. If it causes insanity, I'm not responsible, it must have driven me insane when I thought of it. 

[gamewizard]

Sanity (or lack thereof) always went rather quickly in the games I have GM'd for Call of Cthulu. The same thing happens for Dark Heresy's Corruption points. They add up all too easily sometimes.

In Call of Cthulu it is simply thus: the more you know of the Mythos, the less Sanity you have. For each Mythos Point you gained, you had one point less of Maximum Sanity. I am sure you used that rule. If you didn't that may have been your problem.

[Right Wing Wacko]

IMHO and coming from someone who rarely played games with corruption/insanity systems, if there is a way to accumulate those points to negative effect, there should be a way to get relief/remove the points.

[gamewizard]

There should be; in a fantasy based game.

Not in a horror based fantasy game, maybe. The horror factor becomes not so horrible when the effects of the horror are lessened too easily.