Slaves, and some foibleslp;dr: tinkering with it
The current released version place som fellow mine slaves as extras. Currently, they only work as meat shields. I've been thinking they should have a will of their own, and some might even join you in the revolt. In future releases, chain gangs may actually be chained to each other (use a pick on the chains to break them). If facing battle, some may want to run and hide, others fight against the masters, and some even backstab their fellow slaves, whether in the hopes of gaining the masters' favor, or because they've succumbed to the madness that accompanies lead poisoning.
If you can get fellow slaves to act as independant allies, it seems reasonable to add a skill to try and convince NPCs to join your cause. At first tier, it may only work on non-hostiles (ie. just your fellow slaves). Try once, 1/6 of success; if no success, the person gains a slight dislike (not much, but prohibit trying to recruit again). This skill fits quacks, agitators, officers, lynching artists, preachers, salesfolk, etc. Higher up a skilltree ("or something", however that might end up looking) you can have feats to appease hostiles and so forth.
I was also thinking about adding "foibles" to the character generation. They would entail weaknesses, from "animal phobia" (minus to rolls in presence of animals) to "epilepsy", various reductions in fighting stats etc. I might try a system where the player collects "points" by choosing a foible, and then buys abilities with the points afterwards. The game would keep three lists of foibles, ranked by worth. For each character, the player gets to choose between three random foibles, but we always make sure there is one foible of each worth (1, 2, 3 points). Then the player gets to choose one of three affinities/abilities, all three of which are worth the same amount of points as the chosen foible. So you might get to choose between the foibles "late sleeper (1 p)", "doppleganger (2 p)", and "one-eyed (3 p)", and choose "doppelganger". Then, you would choose from three virtues, all worth 2 points.
Before adding foibles to the mix, I have to rebalance encounters, since the game is much too hard at the moment.
Thinking more long-term, I'm envisioning one category of foibles as a "code of conduct". This might come together with a system for reputation, quests, conduct. The basic 1 point foible is that you receive a penalty to all rolls (lasting for a certain amount of game time) if you break your personal rules (indulge in alcohol, harm a member of the other sex, break the law, assume too much wealth, etc). It is worth an extra point if the restriction is very broad (never kill, vow of silence). For yet an extra point, call it "taboo" and make the punishment more severe: If you break your oath, you simply lose all/most skills and abilities, including the "taboo" foible. So a taboo against eating meat would be worth 2 points.
Some vaporware for y'all: Characters who start with the "taboo" foible might bump into an NPC called The Button Moulder, who resides either at Boot Hill (the cemetary where I plan to keep an in-game hiscore) – or at some crossroads, of course. The Button Moulder will use speech bubbles, inciting the character to break the taboo. If @ does so, losing all assumed experience (but not loot, physical conditions, etc), and returns to The Button Moulder, he/she will start the character off with a new career. Solving this quest once would work as an achievement (oh rly?), that unlocks The Button Moulder to the pool of NPC templates that any character may encounter. Meeting a PC without the "taboo" foible, Button Moulder offers to re-career the hero – free of charge – as if @ had broken a taboo and returned: stripping career-related foibles and abilities, and restocking with some skills fitting a ("level 0") random career. Towards characters with the "taboo" foible, Button Moulder acts as usual: suggests to break the taboo, and only then offers to assign a fresh career. I can see this NPC becoming an important player later in the plot.
The point of including Button Moulder as an achievement wouldn't so much be to appease min/maxers as to portion out the setting a little bit for the player. I hope for a rich setting in the long run, with details about species, culture, different factions (secretive societies, from revolutionary clubs to sororities of lynchers favoring the breaking wheel, as well as various circles of officials, trading companies, etc). The careers a player can choose from must obviously tie in with the setting. There are already careers like lynching artist and avenger, which could do with some backstory, plot relevance, and polish. Even the raillayers should be a recognizable social group, maybe renowned for their endurance or anarchistic inclinations. I could take a career like travelling salesperson and turn it into some kind of cowboy/bard (salesboy, salesgirl, salesfolk), who travels the land, peddling goods and picking up rumors, delivering messages and undertaking secret missions. Not to mention tropes such as cattle runs (maybe not necessarily with cows – how'bouts schools of blubber-yielding brutes of the deep that must be transported underground, or something like giant goats who graze in the mountainous outskirts of the desert) … My only hope is to slowly grow the setting from what I have, adding yet a few interfaces to put in the first few pieces of lore, maybe kickstart the overworld with a pseudorandom quest, like a bounty announced at the train station office. When/if I add something like, say, riding later on, it would be neat with mounted starting careers: cavalerist, circus rider, horse charmer. But to ensure the player learns the basic stuff first, I could implement these careers to be unlockable, only accessible after the player has tried to ride a horse with a character of a less specialized career.
In conclusion, well, thanks for reading my entire rant (if you even did (note to self, DDAP)). In light of all these vague plans, I'm quite happy about the stripped-down backstory I'm working with for the mine slave release: I can keep it simple (since the character, a slave, is dressed in rags and deprived of all juridical freedom), just hint at the setting by fleshing out a few details, such as the importance of lead in this society: it's rare, used both as ammunition and as a currency, and there is also a motif like lead poisoning, which may open up to stuff like mad miners retreating into natural cave systems and cohabiting with the underground bestiary, as well as representatives of this nadirian order of life making their way into the companies' mine shafts, rumors of
certain things in the deep, which shamans or philosophers may begin to try to comprehend, etc.
Here's a screenshot of current character generation:
As always,
Minotauros
