Open WesWedding opened 1 week ago
Submitted by mistake, still writing up...
Okay, I think I'm done re-writing that.
So you're thinking on going with a Hud element to display scene traits? I know it's possible to do something like that in foundry, and the hud element will be able to display the traits are assigned to it in the scene using the flag system and objects. Though it might come at a cost of performance, depending how much information want the trait object to hold.
Some kind of HUD element, yeah. But not a passive display element which is somehow searching the scene and active players for traits to display. Rather, an actual Thing I'm adding traits to that are relevant to the current situation. They can be the advantage a player just generated, or the complication I just created via Threat, the traits for a given scene or location, etc. If necessary, I can move them to a more appropriate spot later.
Examples of the styles of traits I routinely lose track of....
Do you still use injuries, or are injuries traits?
If you mean currently: I've never used the Injuries feature in this system, I've used the built-in Foundry VTT statuses as a proxy.
If you mean in this theoretical HUD element, I think Injuries would still be handled the way they are. Injuries aren't a trait, but they can be the source of a trait (Complication).
I mean that, at least in 2e, injuries are treated as traits, so could we swap out the injuries section for traits perhaps?
Reviewing page 290 (2E) and I see that now. Yeah, I guess that's how I tend to handle injuries in my 1E games, too (if someone takes a hit from a disruptor they're at least a little singed, even if it's nonlethal). So even in 1E that would be applicable.
This is an issue brought up by https://github.com/mikira7 in another Issue thread, seems worth breaking out into its own issue.
Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe. Trait management is only loosely supported by the System; as a text field on character and ship sheets. Traits that apply to a scene/situation, an item, a location, or have potency, etc are left to the players and GM to figure out how to manage. Traits come and go frequently, as well.
Traits are the Star Trek Adventures version of the common Modiphius d20 system of "facts" that can be applied to characters, scenes, areas of a room, etc. that describe a fact about the thing that is pertinent to gameplay. When an action is taken, traits are taken into account to determine how or what actions can happen. A classic rulebook example is "If a Human wants to arm wrestle a Vulcan, and they both have the same Fitness level, the Vulcan will still have twice the strength of the Human because of the immense physical strength provided by the Vulcan species trait."
Traits can come and go frequently during any given session, and be generated at-will by both the player and GM via game mechanics in the form of Advantage and Disadvantage traits. Traits in 1E and 2E both can have potency, as well. "Dense Smoke 2" could suggest an increase in difficulty to certain actions by 2, or an increased complication range by 2, or require 2 uses of Create Advantage, etc. Social Conflict, in particular, is a game of applying and removing traits a lot. At least as written in the Command Division book.
The System lacks a convenient way to track and update traits in general, but even on a Character/Ship the trait field is a simple text field. If a character has accumulated traits it can be hard to read and modify the entire list due to the space available.
Describe the solution you'd like
An Item of the type "Trait" would be a good starting point. See @mikira7's original comment in the other issue, specifically about traits on players:
Originally posted by @mikira7 in https://github.com/mkscho63/sta/issues/162#issuecomment-2409824747
The more general issue of "How to I keep track of traits, in general" is a little murky, though. A visually persistent list the GM can modify at will would be pretty useful.
Describe alternatives you've considered In the real world, this would be a pile of notes or a sheet of paper on the table everyone could look see. In a VTT context this is less clear. A journal, perhaps? I have tried the Journal approach and it's hard for me to keep the list updated. Writing text on the screen is another alternative but if you switch scenes it can be easy to forget (example: those "Gravimetric Eddies 2" I added two scenes ago still matter but I forgot them when they would have been important in the current situation).
Additional context 1E CRB: pg. 76, 94, 270-280 Klingon CRB: pg. 73, 74, 77-79, 90, 96 1E Digest: 54-55, 75, 246-248 2E CRB: 87, 250, 321