I realize I am chiming in a bit late but as I said I have been gone for a while. The more bookkeeping problem does not frightened me as much as the fact that mod writers would start making that a consideration when making TN's after a while it would no longer be an option because you don't get a fair roll if you don't take a lifestyle.

Mith....read what I posted...

[quote="mighty28"]

Low Lifestyle: No Cost. You are sleeping in a tent or the gutter. You hunt, forage, or dumpster dive for food. You take X penalty to social rolls unless interacting in the slums/dregs of society. You may make a "earn a living roll". May not be voluntarily taken by anyone with the "Expensive Taste" Flaw.
quote]

The only one I suggested could not would be average lifestyle, as it would offset living costs. if people are against bookkeeping, they will take this option. The only people who would complain are those who want the positives (Earning a Living) without any negatives (Lifestyle Costs). If that is their argument, they are not against bookkeeping, just consequences. But, to keep the train of logic going, other things that could be considered "exercises in bookkeeping": keeping track of XP and earned coin. Why not just let people be the level they want with whatever runes/stuff they want? That eliminates bookkeeping, also.

As to the point about Expensive Taste not being able to "opt out"....you are talking 1 FLAW out of nearly 50 that would(and in this case should) be effected. Otherwise, someone is playing a character with Expensive Tastes who prefers "slumming it". and that makes sense how? This gets back to decisions having consequences...in this case, it is flaw choice. If anything, I would add that a Miserly character would have to make the roll to take High or Exalted Lifestyle.

I understand that we do not want to do anything to chase players away, but I, personally, have never heard of a story where anyone said "yeah, Arcanis has great mods and stories with a fun group of people, but they have lifestyle costs, so screw that!"

AJ.....I understand your concern, but I think fear of the potential of a currently non-existent problem is a poor reason to avoid making this decision. It is something that the campaign staff and editors can easily watch for.

I do know people that refused to play Living Greyhawk because it was too much "Living Bookkeeping". I also know a lot of people that complained, in general, about how much bookkeeping there was in the original 3/3.5 arc. By the end I had a 2" binder FULL of character sheets, log sheets, item creation sheets, magic item log sheets, full page certs, half page certs, hundreds of third page certs, mod notes, etc...etc...etc...


I already suggested that at Origins '13. Instead of XP, which people can get hosed on at times, if you play X modules, you get a rank - LARPs do not count, BIs count double (since they are 2 slots).

As I recall, it gave Tony pause because he thought it could actually work. Though, in all honesty, it was less about bookkeeping and more about being a way to regulate players' levels without setting an artificial level cap for the arcs.


That's just reductio ad absurdum, and you know it.


Expensive Taste already has a consequence when purchasing anything at all. Don't think it's much of one? Try buying Tier 2 runes with it. But to your specific argument, over half the time I forget to earn a living on any of my characters (so no positives) and I'm still complaining about lifestyle costs.

Specifically to Lifestyle costs: I challenge anyone to show me anywhere within the Core book a reference to Lifestyle costs as an actual mechanic. 'Expensive Taste' specifically says 'purchases', but there's no reference to room, board, etc. It's creating a mechanic that wasn't included in the books and has not been play tested (unlike 'Earn a Living').
In general, I think it's a stupid mechanic to force upon people. If it's purely optional, I'm fine with it. By the way, earning a living is also purely optional, too. What makes lifestyle costs even more ridiculous are those modules where you're out in the wilderness 100% of the time and somehow still magically have to pay those costs. Even when your party has enough tents or wilderness lore to find shelter and food, if you don't pay the X coin, you get negatives across the board.

I don't speak from fear I speak from experience with every other campaign I have played. Once meta game bonuses start piling up then so do the mods start making more difficult challenges. Either you have two choices participate in the meta game thing or accept not being any good at social challenges (in this case). Following your idea limits build options. Say I want to role play a scrooge patrician. I am patrician so I have to take High Lifestyle but I am Miserly so I can't.
I know that is a stretch but it could happen.
Hmmm. . . Scrooge Patrician. That gives me an idea but this is not the thread for that.

I've also heard about this