alright, so for starters I've never really been good when a player picks any kind of addiction. its always been "so did you do it today? good" I've never really worked it into the game.
but most times the players picked something that was sometimes hard to get a hold of or difficult to do.
now most recently a player of mine has chosen smoking tobacco as an addiction, nothing hard about that really, sure. then went ahead and bought a bunch of tobacco to last them awhile.
how can i better work this disadvantage out? how can i do more than just take it away every now and again when someone in town won't sell him a brick load of tobacco to smoke?
Make his character get gradually worse at running.
Justin Clark
Addiction isn't fun when you actually play with it. If it starts having an affect on rolls because your player is ignoring it they'll get hissy, and if you keep reminding them, nagging them, like the addiction it is, it'll get old fast.
Players don't want to play with an addiction, they want to occasionally say "I have a smoke/take a drink/inject rat piss into my veins" and use the buy point refunds or what have you to take something mechanically helpful.
On the off chance you do have a player who appreciates that an addiction is an actual addiction, you can just keep reminding them to smoke/drink/rat piss, when they don't get the opportunity to their rolls should reflect their inability to concentrate on anything other than their vice, and they should have to actually go buy their vice. If they've got an endlessly refillable bottle/cigarette packet/jar of rat piss and no one finds it distasteful when they swig/smoke/piss up then the addiction isn't actually in play.
Jacob Howard
Fate Aspects are still the best way to handle addictions because they actively incentivize the player to have their character pursue their vice even when it would be detrimental to their own wellbeing.
Anthony Watson
Don't forget that withdrawal is not the only penalty, and shortage isn't the only reason for them to be forced to go without.
Have them get dirty looks sometimes if they're smoking in public.
Many places don't allow smoking. Use this. Maybe the player needs to meet a contact at a restaurant. He's waiting at the table when a craving comes on. Does he step out to smoke and risk making a poor first impression (or perhaps missing his target, if it's not exactly a voluntary meeting on their part) or does he just tank the penalty?
Smoking has detrimental health effects. Have them slowly accumulate. Might not work well if the game's over a short time period, though, unless he's doing two packs a day or something.
Smoking's obvious. The smell clings. The smoker gets used to it, but non-smokers can tell immediately. Penalize stealth checks in close quarters for a couple of hours after he smokes to represent the oder giving him away.
Smoking's expensive. Seriously, have you been watching the tax hikes the last couple years? I know a guy who pays $11 a pack and still can't quit.
Christopher Hernandez
Serious addiction: tobacco
How much smoking constitutes an addiction? Does he have to over time smoke more each day to qualify?
And mostly, If the person has let's say 6 pounds on their person, do they have to just keep smoking? It's an addiction They can't help bust satisfy as much as they can
Elijah Hughes
Didn't mean to tag
Nathaniel Smith
My character smokes tobacco. Usually it's just an RP element like "As i sit down at the table I light up a cigarette *insert conversation*"
It's really no big deal at all.
Bentley Gray
If it's not a big deal it shouldn't be represented mechanically as a drawback, because it's not. By definition, an addiction is a problem. Somebody who smokes once or twice now and then isn't addicted any more than a social drinker is an alcoholic. If it's bad enough to affect mechanics, that means can't get through a shift without smoke breaks or haven't been sober in weeks.
Anthony Myers
cigarettes are fucking expensive and will eat away at his money. My mother spends over 200$ a month on them
Cooper Lewis
this also this minus all in-game penalties it's retarded and no one likes it
Leo Cox
If he doesn't smoke, he gets penalties to pretty much everything, because withdrawal fucks you up when you are a serious smoker. If he keeps smoking, just remember that it does drain ressources.
You don't really need more granularity than that. Just remember that the stuff takes up space and weight and wet tobacco isn't worth shit. Unless you keep it dry it gets ruined pretty quickly, so lugging around a lot of it won't really be feasible for most adventurers.
Robert Wilson
There are levels of addiction, dude. There's a huge difference between the functional alcoholic who's both psychologically and physically addicted but more or less sane, and the guys waiting for the liquor store to open every day because they're DTing cause they haven't drunk since midnight.
And that's just alcohol. Once you start talking about meth or heroin, that's a whole different ballgame.
Xavier Foster
Yeah, but a light addiction doesn't need rules.
Mason Gray
This probably won't help you with your problem, but there's a fanmade school of magic in Unknown Armies centered around cigarettes and addiction that's oozing with style: ua.johntynes.com/content_comments.php?id=P2058_0_3_0
Noah Perez
Why not? Loads of adult Westerners have caffeine addictions that give them debilitating headaches or depressed mental function if they don't get their coffee fix. Caffeine is very addictive but its withdrawal effects are VERY mild, all things considered.
In Shadowrun, for example, there are 4 separate degrees of addiction representing how often you need a fix and how debilitating the withdrawal is. It's not a perfect approximation, but it's a fairly decent system.
Andrew Baker
>In Shadowrun, for example, there are 4 separate degrees of addiction representing how often you need a fix and how debilitating the withdrawal is Playing Devil's Advocate for a moment, doesn't Shadowrun also say that things like caffeine doesn't qualify for the Addiction quality?
Kevin Young
Give a bonus on certain rolls while their smoking, give a minus for when they're not.
Dylan Moore
Honestly, alcohol is on par with meth, coke and heroin when it comes to severe addiction This shit is a hard drug for real
Christopher Brown
Meth and coke, sure, but you clearly don't know enough about heroine if you think alcohol is on that level of bad
Alexander Brooks
Depends on the edition. I know that 3e specifically forbids it for being "too gamey," but 5e allows it and has rules for it.
In 3e, though, every drug has identical rules, and there isn't a lot of variation. So it makes sense that you'd want to keep players from picking something innocuous and easy to acquire with no negative social connotations when they could be snorting heroin.
The 5e system is significantly more fleshed out than the 3e system, though, with various substances having their own ratings for both addictive strength and addictive speed. There's also mechanics for becoming addicted involuntarily, though, so it makes sense that you'd have a broader range of substances.
Camden Nguyen
Because if an addiction isn't severe enough to produce inarguable consequences, it's just free points at best and an annoyance at worst.
Flaws should ALWAYS have a mechanical consequence attached, otherwise you just run into the situation where the players get free points for promising to act a certain way and the DM has to constantly ask them to roleplay out their flaws. And mechanics should only be attached to significant things, so a light addiction doesn't warrant one.
Josiah King
>Ciggies +10 cool if you look like a punk or a hardass -10 cool otherwise
>Cigars +10 cool if you look like a gangster or are rich as fuck -10 cool otherwise
>Pipes +15 cool if you are a literal wizard or could me mistaken for one -15 cool otherwise
>Snuff +20 cool if you have some kind of legit title of nobility (duke, baron, count, etc.) -5 cool otherwise
>Chew only -10 cool if you play baseball in the 50's or are a cowboy the full -100 cool otherwise an additional -100 cool if you spit everywhere or leave spit bottles everywhere
Nathan Wright
Meth has nastier health side effects than alcohol does, and they manifest faster. There's probably an evolutionary aspect to this, because as a species we've been drinking alcohol for quite a long time.
Heroin, on the other hand, often requires step-down medications like methadone or suboxone so that addicts don't outright die from withdrawal. It's kind of in a class by itself.
Fun fact: in the late 18th century, heroin was considered to be a better alternative for pain relief than aspirin because it didn't cause nausea or have any dangerous side effects. Medicine ho!
Hunter Jenkins
You also forgot:
>E-Cigarettes -100 cool no exceptions
>Vapes Player is beaten immediately.
Jackson Fisher
Pretty sure that was opium, not heroine.
Daniel Flores
This, except you need your fix to perform at normal levels. No bonuses.
Josiah Hughes
Nope, it was heroin, and it was marketed by Bayer, even.
Ryder Richardson
How about detectives and men who wear waistcoats for pipes as well?
How about embedded war reporters for chew?
For cigars I just think of someone rotund or someone like David Sarif.
Landon Morgan
Why does that name sound familiar
Aiden Fisher
Unless he takes 10 minutes to smoke every 6 hours he receives and penalty to whatever represents concentration in your game. The penalty gets worse every additional 2 hours he goes without smoking.
Ryan Perez
Two tins of tobacco and a pipe will keep you in smoking for ages. I can make a small pipe, packed properly, last nearly two hours with no relights.
Charles Watson
loss of concantration when you have not been smoking a while, smoke more with alkochol, runs easier out of breth, hands shake when out of tabaco, has problems with prolonged concentration when not smoking.
Mason Reyes
Deus Ex Human Revolution, he's the guy in charge of the company Jensen works for.
Nicholas Anderson
Yes, but OP made it sound like the guy was carrying a huge brick of tobacco. Also, if your addiction warrants a Flaw, then you are probably going to have a significant consumption.
Isaac Campbell
Force the actual player to become a compulsive chain smoker and make it so they can only smoke during the game if they smoke in the game.
