Tales by the Fire: The Lorekeeping Skill and Tales

[YourMajesty]

Right now, I'm going to try and elaborate an idea, as simply as possible.

We begin with new items: Tales. These are objects that have a chance of dropping after performing various feats. Slay a Troll? You have a chance to earn a Tale of Valor. Find your ancestor's corpse? A slim chance to earn a Tale of Demise. Commune with your ancestors? Earn a Tale of the Ancestors. Combine 20 [A Beautiful Dream!]? Earn a Tale of Whimsy (not as valuable as any of the others, of course). Finish studying a high-end curiosity? A very slight chance to earn a Tale of Reflection. The quality of the Tales are derived from:

(Note: These are only examples. I couldn't come up with any satisfying formulas. These will be terrible.)
Valor: Level of creature
Ancestors: Ancestor's stats, your Tradition/Change slider, amount of numen you have
Whimsy: Average quality of dreams (Obviously, the cap is 10, for now)
Reflection: sqrt(qcurio*mentalweight)

Each of these Tales could be used as a curio, albeit one that cannot be transferred among Hearthlings. They also serve another purpose: Fireside storytelling. When a group of Hearthlings gather around a bonfire, one Hearthling can use their Tale. The little hourglass pops up, and when it is depleted, all of the Hearthlings around the bonfire will have heard the tale. After a Tale is told, a bonus is imparted upon each Hearthling, the magnitude of which is based on the storyteller's Charisma, the quality of the Tale, and the listener's Psyche and Intelligence:

For Valor, a temporary buff to the combat skills (unarmed, melee, and ranged), as well as a buff to Strength and Agility.
For Ancestors, a small amount of Numen.
For Whimsy, a temporary (and small) boost to Learning Ability.
For Reflection, a temporary boost to Intelligence and Psyche.

(A de-buff is also imparted on the listeners: Consumed by the Tale, which doesn't allow a Hearthling to collect their own Tales, or listen to another, for a period of time. The storyteller also gets a de-buff: Told his Tale, which doesn't allow the Hearthling to tell another tale for a period of time.)

Each time a Tale is told, it loses quality (equal to 1+number of Hearthlings story was told to), and when it reaches 0 quality, it is lost.

However, there is a way to immortalize these Tales: Through the Lorekeeping skill.

A Hearthling with the Lorekeeping skill allows them to listen to a Tale, and produce one of their own, albeit at a massively diminished quality (perhaps half of the original tale's quality, and softcapped by the average of the Lorekeeper's Intelligence, Perception, and Psyche?), that they themselves might tell. The same penalties apply, however, and a Tale can only be collected once per type per storyteller.

But, they can also take their Tales, and create a Tome.

The creation of a Tome starts at a desk, created with some unremarkable materials (30 boards, 40 blocks of wood, 8 nuggets of common metal). The creation of a Tome is a lengthy process, requiring large amounts of ink and parchment; the desk is necessary in that it is a repository for these two materials. You'll need a 100 liters of ink, and 100 pieces of parchment to create a Tome, as well as three of the same kind of Tale; ten pieces of hardened leather and ten spools of silk thread are required for the binding, and will come at the end of the process. When all of the ink and parchment are deposited at the desk, the Lorekeeper may begin, at which point, the three Tales will be consumed. The Lorekeeper does not have to finish creating the tome all in one sitting, but only he may create it, once he begins; progress is kept by the desk, and displayed via a bar on its interface. Progress is made, page by page; it is a slow process, but hopefully, it will be a rewarding process. At the end, you'll have created an Unbound Tome of (Tale-type). To finalize the process, you take the Unbound Tome, and combine it with the ten hardened leather and ten spools of silk thread to finish the Tome, the quality of which is dependent on the materials, desk, Tales, and softcapped by the Lorekeeper's Intelligence and Psyche.

A Tome has the same use as a tale, but can only be used by a Lorekeeper and it's quality does not decrease with use. However, Lorekeeper incurs a heavy toll on himself when he reads from a tome: A de-buff, Loretelling Fatigue, which temporarily decreases each of the Loremaster's primary stats, except Constitution, by the quality of the Tome. The duration of this de-buff would probably be as long as the other de-buffs; possibly longer. Once the Lorekeeper has read from the Tome, he'll be nigh-useless for a while if his stats aren't sufficiently high.

I apologize for the wall of text, and thank you for having read all of this. I will state right now that none of the numbers are set in stone, and if you have a better number in mind, suggest it; I cannot claim to be as attuned to the game as others, and probably have overestimated the difficulty of any of these steps. I had tried to make this process difficult and costly, so as to offset its potential and try to keep it from being overpowered; I apologize if I have failed in doing so, and far upset the balance.

Tl;dr:
The introduction of Tales to the H&H; objects acquired through performance of various feats. The Tale can be "told" around a bonfire, where other Hearthlings listen; after doing so, the quality of the Tale depletes (when quality hits 0, the Tale is lost). Depending on the type of Tale told, buffs are imparted on the listeners, as well as a debuff that prevents them from listening to another Tale immediately afterwards, with the added penalty of not being able to collect their own Tales. The "teller" of the Tale is given a debuff preventing him from telling another Tale immediately after.
The Lorekeeping skill is also introduced, which allows a Hearthling to "copy" a teller's Tale, but with a much-depleted quality. The Lorekeeper also has the ability to preserve these Tales in Tomes, which require three of the same Tale, as well as numerous other ingredients and a desk; a Tome has the benefit of not losing quality after use. After the Tome is complete, it is used like a Tale, but can only be used by Lorekeepers; penalties for listeners are the same, but the Lorekeeper gains a debuff that decreases their stats (except Con) by an amount proportionate to the Tome's quality.

That's the best I can do for a Tl;dr, TeckXKnight. Sorry.

Thoughts? Comments? Adjustments? Flames?

[TeckXKnight]

Think you could tl;dr it maybe? Can't bring myself to read the wall =(

[Stinkfoot]

The first half of your idea sounds awesome to me, though I don't know about the lorekeeping/tomes bit. Sounds overly complicated.

+1/2

[YourMajesty]

Think you could tl;dr it maybe? Can't bring myself to read the wall =(

Awwwwwwww...

I'll try; but a lot of the stuff I typed is essential to the idea.

Edit: It is done. Try that, if you please.

The first half of your idea sounds awesome to me, though I don't know about the lorekeeping/tomes bit. Sounds overly complicated.

+1/2

Half is better than nothing, I suppose. I tried to keep it fairly simple, but I guess I... Didn't. Is it the Tome creation part that is troubling you?

[Stinkfoot]

The tome creation bit is a little unusual for item creation, but doesn't bother me too much. I think the idea of long lasting combat debuffs is lame though, and the whole listen to tale to record in book to retell is a weird mechanic (IMO). The idea of "tales" is a cool one though, for sure.

[YourMajesty]

The tome creation bit is a little unusual for item creation, but doesn't bother me too much. I think the idea of long lasting combat debuffs is lame though, and the whole listen to tale to record in book to retell is a weird mechanic (IMO). The idea of "tales" is a cool one though, for sure.

I suppose it is a bit odd.

When I developed the idea, I was dead-set against allowing Tales to be transferred among players directly, but figured that it didn't make sense for nobody to be able to record/memorize a Tale; hence, the Lorekeeper: My best attempt to make the transfer possible, but difficult and costly, so as to keep it from being overpowered.

And it didn't make sense to record a Tale if you didn't gain any extra benefit from having done so; hence, Tomes and preservation of quality.

And then, I didn't want to make that overpowered, so I added huge material costs and staggering debuff to keep it from being spammed.

I was pretty sure this would be some "end-game" stuff, so to speak.

Overall, I tried to make the thing too difficult, rather than too easy, as a common complaint among forumgoers is that suggested mechanics make the game too easy:
"This isn't the game for you! Get out! If you want easy, play WoW!"

More-or-less, trying to avoid that. Plus, in my mind, it seemed better to let the veterans deem what was too difficult, and suggest ways to tone it down.

[dra6o0n]

My version of this is a curiosity item based on storytelling.
Requires: 8 Parchments, 2 Bone Glue, 0.5L inkroot extract

Enables you to create a High end curiosity that is a book, and it should be a valued "tale" for those who study it.
As a bonus, maybe give the studying hearthlings a temporary buff called "enlightenment" until the study is over?

Enlightenment gives you +25% LP bonuses to each curiosity you studied in the time span (doesn't stack with Learning Ability).

The book should take several real time days to complete, and it gives a modest amount of LP (not a super high end LP gained item, but acts as a buffer to other curiosity items).

First time readers "COULD" potentially and randomly learn new curiosity recipes (optional idea) since the book contains tales and knowledge of other stuff the "author" had experienced and written down.

5000 LP on completion (yeah its kind of meh), but the LP bonuses from curiosities learned beforehand makes it more worth it if you have some decent curiosities to spend and have high enough Int to fill them up on...

Don't know if this idea fully works because there's certain aspects that needs to be considered.

Possible ideas:
- When engaging combat and other activities (hourglass related), studying on the curiosities can halt (you don't fight and read a book at the same time... UNLESS YOUR GODLIKE?!).
- This book would be considered a special type of curiosity... You don't read a book by sleeping for several days (means you must play the game to tick down the book's timer).
- Reading a tale and then sleeping might "enable" your character to dream (or nightmares), and dreams comes in various forms and each has it's buffs and debuffs maybe... Horror stories may frighten your character, Heroic stories of battle may make your character brave or valient. Etc.

[TeckXKnight]

Overall, I tried to make the thing too difficult, rather than too easy, as a common complaint among forumgoers is that suggested mechanics make the game too easy:
"This isn't the game for you! Get out! If you want easy, play WoW!"

The issue is usually that new players want to make easy things easier and tedious things more tedious. But that's neither here nor there.

So the premise is to take events that occur and attach value and meaning to them, allowing us to share this value with others via buffs. It makes sense and having a storytelling tradition could be a fun mechanic. I think it is safe to assess that your first idea is much less tedious while still being potentially fun and useful. Tomes seem to be a major drag on the entire concept though.
If I may suggest, perhaps tales does not so much need a lore keeper and book. The impermanence of them seems to give them their meaning and value in the first place.

[YourMajesty]

Overall, I tried to make the thing too difficult, rather than too easy, as a common complaint among forumgoers is that suggested mechanics make the game too easy:
"This isn't the game for you! Get out! If you want easy, play WoW!"

The issue is usually that new players want to make easy things easier and tedious things more tedious. But that's neither here nor there.

So the premise is to take events that occur and attach value and meaning to them, allowing us to share this value with others via buffs. It makes sense and having a storytelling tradition could be a fun mechanic. I think it is safe to assess that your first idea is much less tedious while still being potentially fun and useful. Tomes seem to be a major drag on the entire concept though.
If I may suggest, perhaps tales does not so much need a lore keeper and book. The impermanence of them seems to give them their meaning and value in the first place.

Ah, thank you for the feedback.

That does make sense; I guess the Tomes should go, then? I was a bit attached to 'em, but it seems nobody likes them so far. And I can't think of anything else to do with them.

[OvShit]

Overall, I tried to make the thing too difficult, rather than too easy, as a common complaint among forumgoers is that suggested mechanics make the game too easy:
"This isn't the game for you! Get out! If you want easy, play WoW!"

The issue is usually that new players want to make easy things easier and tedious things more tedious. But that's neither here nor there.

So the premise is to take events that occur and attach value and meaning to them, allowing us to share this value with others via buffs. It makes sense and having a storytelling tradition could be a fun mechanic. I think it is safe to assess that your first idea is much less tedious while still being potentially fun and useful. Tomes seem to be a major drag on the entire concept though.
If I may suggest, perhaps tales does not so much need a lore keeper and book. The impermanence of them seems to give them their meaning and value in the first place.

Ah, thank you for the feedback.

That does make sense; I guess the Tomes should go, then? I was a bit attached to 'em, but it seems nobody likes them so far. And I can't think of anything else to do with them.

Well, if you`d redesign Tomes for them being somewhat less impossible to do(for example, yarn instead of silk and general leather instead of hardened), as well as giving them some learning ability...no, I don`t mean LP or skills. For example, you`re gifted herbalist, you`ve seen every single herb on the world, and you got some parchment and ink. So, why not to make a book which tells reader about appearance and uses of herbs? In short, while book is at someone`s inventory he gets those objects from book at memory(and recipes involved with them aswell) - but upon taking book out of inventory all the objects are forgotten. You can, though, learn the book as curiosity - let`s say it has 23 herbs, so you`ll get 23*50(base LP)LP after 23 hours(hour for each object). Some people seem to be unhappy with new learn-to-craft system(cooks being unable to make sausages, smiths knowing nothing about steel, silver and gold, etc.), so that`d help them a lot.