Retraining Levels

Torchbearer Hacks and Expansions
1

Looking back at my character build, there are a few class abilities I wish I had chosen differently. I was thinking there might be a way to retrain those levels, but I’m having a tough time coming up with something. My first thought is that, when you are going to town and would normally level up, you can instead (or also) retrain by “spending” Fate and Persona points equal to those needed to gain the level you are wanting to change.

For example: You are L6. You need 41 Fate and 20 Persona to gain L7. You have 44 Fate and 23 Persona. Going into town, you look back at your build and wish you had chosed differently at L2. You can spend 3 Fate and 3 Persona (the number of points needed to reach L2) and change that L2 choice. That would still leave you with 41 Fate and 20 Persona, so you would still level up going into town along with changing your L2 ability. However, if you had wanted to change your L3 ability, you would have needed to spend 7 Fate and 6 Persona, which would have reduced them to 34 and 14, meaning you would not level up going into town. (It take major commitment to attempt to change higher level abilities.)

A few of notes on this:

You cannot spend so many points that it would reduce your totals below that needed to gain your current level. (In the above example, you couldn’t reduce your Fate to less than 31 or your Persona to less than 16, the levels needed to reach your current L6.)

You can only do this once per Town Phase so you cannot retrain more than one ability at a time. (In the above example, if you had sufficient points, you could not retrain both your L2 and your L3 abilities. You could only do one now and one later.)

You can only do this once per ability. You really need to be committed to the idea of changing your ability. Once you change it, you can’t change it back later. (This prevents players from choosing abilities that might be advantageous for an adventure, then changing them back later.)

Do you think this is workable? Does it need tweaks? Are there better ideas out there? Or do you think this should not be allowed at all?

2

My first instinct is to treat it as non-diagetic (i.e., outside the story). Talk to the other players and GM, explain why you’re dissatisfied with the choices you made and, with their approval, just change it. I hesitate to make it a game-mechanical thing because that makes retraining part of strategic character building.

If you do want it to be diagetic, your approach could certainly work, but I’d be careful about adding EVEN MORE bookkeeping to a game that is already very demanding in that regard. You could just require a successful Mentor test during the Winter Phase.

3

Just erase it and PRETEND IT NEVER HAPPENED. Also: I got a dog.

4

I’m good with the idea of a Mentor test for retraining. (You guys just reinforced my son’s opinion that I overcomplicate these kind of things too much). And congrats on the dog, Jared. A family doesn’t feel complete without one.

5

It’s not a real dog.

6

To be more precise, Jared’s halfling character got a dog. He’s very excited.

I know the urge to over complicate things very well. I’m trying to do better!

7

As am I. Its still an issue, though. I think we’re going to do the changes over the winter session so that it happens over time. (Assuming the WS is coming soon. I think its not too far.)

And you got me on the dog. Pretty funny.