Board Thread:Midian Ideas/@comment-24302820-20170129224532

One of the many projects in the works is revising the relationship rules. As you should already be aware, there are a tremendous number of options for customising a relationship. However, many players would rather not devote too much time and effort into this. I should point out that the bonus contacts gained from having a high Personality score can already be held back, and fleshed out during play.

What should be the minimum amount of detail for a contact? You can already gain 'shifts' to improve the usefulness of a contact just by adding details (such as with the stable address or details options) but what should be the bare minimum to get things up and running in order to play your character? Currently, the guideline is that you should answer the Five Ws of journalism: who, what, where, when, why, and how. Is this too much? Should there be a reduced bare minimum, like just picking one or two of these? For example, you have a buddy in Argent named Tim, or you know a master carpenter who's good friends with your cousin. Would this level of detail suffice? Would just a single reference point be good enough, like having an associate in the Darkmouth Emirate, or just that you have an enchanter companion? Should the strength of the relationship affect this required level of detail at all?

I'm mostly asking about what should be the requirement for starting characters. Relationships developing during play is a whole separate issue. 