Considering the book is covered under CC 4.0 the only reason I could think of was if the authors had either had a split on who owned it or there were freelancers who didn't sign over rights to work used in the production of the book. But it's immaterial for this.
Okay, introduction, p. 1. Key takeaways here are second paragraph, particular phrase "high powered, fantastic settings" is what we're looking for. That gives us some tone.
p. 5; "Spirit characters are inherently magical beings for whom supernatural effects are as natural as drawing breath." So anything remotely mundane needs to be chucked; this is a basic stat, most people are going to possess some amount of magical power.
p. 9; attack and defense methods are explained here and the suggestions as to what they are run a pretty wide gamut: "sword, axes, hand-to-hand combat, or, in some cases, large thrown weapons;" "bows, guns, thrown weapons, or, in some cases, light melee weapons;"
"magical spells that use incantations, formula, and other such mystical traditions, in addition to attacks that assault the mind directly or employ highly advanced technology;" "attacks that draw upon the character's inherent power or spiritual energy, such as ki-based shockwaves."
So, by raw, we've got the usual wide gamut of JRPG standards here - melee weapons, martial arts (mundane and supernatural), psychic powers, magic, guns, archaic ranged, super technology, and magic.
Okay, got literally a moment to myself, here. p. 14 - Incapacitated status; this needs to be a setting where it makes thematic sense for there to be the assumption that damage in combat isn't immediately lethal.
summary so far: - High-powered fantastic settings - Due to magic (or ki, etc) being represented by a core attribute, settings are going to naturally tend towards said matters being common. - Magic and technology are functionally interchangable - Combat styles run the whole gamut you'd see in JRPGs - Combat not immediately or necessarily lethal
While pretty cool, I don't see anything especially evocative of a setting in the examples, beyond that even mundane concerns are going to be big scene-long affairs involving everyone. I guess we can say "no, seriously, the world trends toward the dramatic."
p. 23 - Seasons. Key takeaways: "Season 1 is centered around the basic core of the character's identity;" "[Season 2] more powerful utility skills that grant them a number of useful options;" "Season 3 is when characters have really begun to make their mark on the world;"
"obstacles that the characters may have once struggled to overcome are now easily defeated. Flight becomes prevalent;" "[Season 4] Characters are now amongst the greatest in the world, and they are able to accomplish things that others can only dream of."
This curve in power and narrative weight suggests that our setting needs to be capable of letting heroes start off as absolute nobodies and expand out to world-shaking importance by about halfway through the story arc. They can't start out major players, but they do need to grow into such a destiny, and the world needs to be built for that.
p. 36, Malevolent Entity. This is a big one because it's a base flaw but unlike most of the others, it declares there's something specific to the setting, that PCs can be possessed or I guess have very anime-esque split personalities, though the write-up seems to lean more into the former.
p. 41, Teleport. This is the first of many end-game options that need to be accounted for; most games treat teleporting as a rarity where this is pretty much at-will for end-game.
pp. 44, additional mobility options in Improved Swimming, and Phasing. Movement is a huge part of this; this needs to be a setting where small-scale, high mobile, highly destructive fights are the norm.
Essentially by Season 2 we're moving out of standard arenas and by Season 4 we appear to be flying through the sky, fighting underwater, nearly anywhere and everywhere.
Attack Node (p. 48), Clone (p. 48), Duel (p. 49), Flunky Domination (p. 50), Portal (p. 52), Refraction Point (p. 53), Shadow Meld (p. 53) all seem like definite things that would need some kind of setting support.
Basically there's a lot here that doesn't seem specifically generic or instinctual that a setting would need to explain in some way or perhaps multiple ways.
Selective Barrier and Terrain Disruption and Terrain Restore (pp. 87-88) do suggest some interesting conceits given earlier notions about environments and setpieces.
Ammunition Limit (p. 88) and Cooldown Limit (p. 89) both are pretty fascinating implications for more tech-focused uh, techs. They suggest a sort of gear setup for some stuff?
Most settings we only have one character, typically, who transforms, unless the whole genre is about that. Here we can have up to four of them per character, they can be built to be given to other people, it's really fascinating and unique and if we're making a setting, the idea that you'll probably have an upgrade form or two needs to be baked in.
Okay, so! pp. 99-100 give us a hard limit as to what shouldn't be available to PCs, with Revival and Invisibility flagged as NPC-only skills. This does suggest some degree of arbitrary, but, well, that can be massaged in a setting.
Upgrade form or two; ...really, i'm now just imagining the game being done in the style of either shounen anime or a merchandise-driven show. And it makes me grin like a doof. XD
621st Raven
Per RAW by max level you can have 4 transformations on a single character and if built right they can work off eachother if you want to spend most of that final set of fights screaming and getting more impressively glowy.
and then when those four transformations all fall off you better hope you've been getting healing through that fight because there goes literally your whole HP bar
So yeah, another note for the setting is just the conceit of every 5 levels, roughly by the end of every major story arc, you should be getting either an ultimate super move or a transformation.
p. 103; battlefield hazard reinforces points made above about hazardous terrain. Basically a setting made specifically for Valor has to have a lot of really unsafe parts of the world, it feels like, to get maximum bang for buck.
p. 104: If something can be done repeatedly, it shouldn't be constantly given Valor bonuses. However, repetition of the same action and a general style of play that involves it should warrant progressive Valor bonuses every few combat round. Hey, can I get a clarification on what this exactly means?
p. 104: settings need to encourage heroic behavior as well as shonen tropes of calling attack names, posing, etc. Dramatic monologues need to not just be a thing villains indulge in as well. I think this is the second ruling mimimum about dramatic monologues.
p.105: a chance encounter with an old man who doles out cryptic advice to a dramatic confrontation with the character's evil twin atop a tower in the middle of a storm well there's some evocative imagery.
p. 106: cliffs and ledges rules are interesting mechanically but the most salient bit is Characters should never be killed from falling off a cliff, the fall should always be to necessitate a solo scenario with the player. Which again, evokes how impossible it is to actually die in this game, it feels like.
While not noteworthy for setting thematics (beyond dangerous terrain being very fucking dangerous), I am a little surprised how much of this parallels the trap/dangerous terrain rules from the old Returners SeeD RPG.
re: 104, it isn't written clearly, but I think the intent is... if someone is just describing swinging a sword and striking the enemy each combat round, don't award valor for every single description, but if the attack descriptions are ramping up to something or there's some stylistic thing they're going for, you can award valor for the buildup
That makes sense, yeah. Basically don't accept a dialed in stunt but if they're being a bit repetitive because it's meant to evoke a particular thematic or be building up to something, reward that.
p. 110: Elaborate actions in general are interesting because they suggest that most non-standard combat actions are usually pretty big Hail Mary type plays instead of accepted as part of the narrative.
p. 111: The whole section on Capturing the Valor Feel is very interesting and key to understanding that this should be a setting that encourages some stupid behavior out of players to keep things rolling from time to time; high action means high danger and high risk, and that players should give the GM a heart attack.
Because, let's be real, Dark Valor, Pillars, and Vices make too much sense if you assume at least one of your players (or for a setting, a certain sort of player) is going to run immediately for Malevolent Entity the second they get the chance to. No names named, y'all know who you are.
Pillars and Vices also encourages more interacting with the mechanics of the setting and more heavy moralistic debate and such within characters; it makes characters have incentive to not always be great people.
Hunger and Fatigue can be included with "by the way your characters need to eat" which.... okay I get to write a foodporn section of the setting, cool.
I am a little confused why Illusions are optional mechanically but yeah, we'll include them, it just means some setting faction needs "oh and by the way there's a bunch of illusionists with these guys"
Elemental Affinities and Weaknesses I get why it's optional but I like it, we'll write it into the setting with the additional kicker of a free Elemental Resistance and mandatory Elemental Weakness.
Equipment rules, again, I get why these are optional, but I absolutely love them and they are incredibly evocative of a setting. They give options to people who want gearbunny stuff for their mechanical descriptions and also a solid edge for people who want to be Ryu from Streets.
Our lit review is done, we'll be going into the actual setting making shortly. I should probably compile a list of what we're looking at, mechanically and thematically.
p. 14 - Incapacitated status; this needs to be a setting where it makes thematic sense for there to be the assumption that damage in combat isn't immediately lethal.
- High-powered fantastic settings
- Due to magic (or ki, etc) being represented by a core attribute, settings are going to naturally tend towards said matters being common.
- Magic and technology are functionally interchangable
- Combat styles run the whole gamut you'd see in JRPGs
- Combat not immediately or necessarily lethal
- Destructible environments suggest a tendency towards high action
"Season 1 is centered around the basic core of the character's identity;"
"[Season 2] more powerful utility skills that grant them a number of useful options;"
"Season 3 is when characters have really begun to make their mark on the world;"
"[Season 4] Characters are now amongst the greatest in the world, and they are able to accomplish things that others can only dream of."
we dragons nowIf something can be done repeatedly, it shouldn't be constantly given Valor bonuses. However, repetition of the same action and a general style of play that involves it should warrant progressive Valor bonuses every few combat round.Hey, can I get a clarification on what this exactly means?
a chance encounter with an old man who doles out cryptic advice to a dramatic confrontation with the character's evil twin atop a tower in the middle of a stormwell there's some evocative imagery.Characters should never be killed from falling off a cliff, the fall should always be to necessitate a solo scenario with the player.Which again, evokes how impossible it is to actually die in this game, it feels like.SWORDIANSEGO WEAPONS are some cool shit.