Post by dorkknight23 on May 30, 2009 0:59:34 GMT -5
I’ve started coming up with a few tweaks to the system to help make it run a little smoother. It’s more or less codifying a lot of things we’ve been doing on the boards already. A lot of this stuff has been floating around the boards for a while now, but this is just a serious attempt on my part to codify some stuff that I would keep for a second edition of MURPG. Note that a lot of the stuff here isn’t so much changed as elaborated upon.
These are my notes, and are thus kind of obtuse and all over the place. A lot of it is scattershot and kind of poorly organized, but were I to actually rework the whole system, I would try to present it in a more coherent manner. I apologize in advance for my feeble attempts at dry wit.
Semantics: I might try to separate the red/white stone distinction, going for Points. Character Creation Points would thus be different from Character Energy. Naming the two the same thing (like “character levels” and “levels of a dungeon”) only leads to confusion (c.f. Order of the Stick.)
Cost Levels: As is. For whatever reason I like this system.
Make sure to instill a Rule 0, if it isn’t as blatantly spelled out: “GM has an important job. He has to make sure everyone is having fun. And he has to make sure characters are built fairly and not to take advantage of the system purely for the sake of exploiting rules to try and create a more powerful character than the others. The GM is allowed final approval on character creation and what seems logical or justifiable. The GM is also encouraged to not be a jerk about this.”
Like Marxist theory does, a few of my edits presuppose a much more positive human nature than I’ve encountered in the past, so there will be numerous warnings to this effect (for both players and GMs) where they seem essentially necessary. Luckily, this is not a system for an improved socioeconomic structure.
Rule 0.5: “If you aren’t having fun, you need to stop playing and have a brief and immediate discussion as to why and how. Everyone should then apologize and shake hands like grown-ups.”
Action Resolution: As normal. Difficulty and Resistance, the core of the system, works just fine.
However, make this explicit: “The second to last sentence at the body of the D&R chart, ‘to be able to attempt the action, the total of your action number, ability bonus, and modifier must be = to the Difficulty’ should be excised. Instead, to be able to succeed at an action, your Action Number must be equal to the Difficulty Number.”
Weapons/Actions/Modifiers: Left almost entirely untouched.
The Abilities:
“Characteristic Abilities”/”Innate Abilities”/Something Like That:
Intelligence: As before except for Intelligence-based characters.
Strength: As before.
Agility: As before.
Speed: As before.
* All of these can have Efficient added onto them (but not the ones below, although there’s hardly a point to them being efficient.)
Energy Related Abilities:
Health: renamed Durability
Energy Reserve: Identical to Energy Battery in all but name. Can be 0.
Stamina: Identical to Deep Reserve in all but name. Can be 0.
SIDE-NOTE ON 0’s: 0’s in other abilities should be noted as possible for NPCs (confined to a bed, non-sentient, etc. But 0’s aren’t heroes, and make very, very, poor PCs. They are not inherently banned but should be highly discouraged to the point of being practically banned, and in any case, no character should have an Intelligence of 0 or more than 2 non-Intelligence Characteristic/Whatever Abilities of 0. Professor Xavier might have a 0 in Speed, but then again, he should be almost always be confined to an NPC role.)
This will allow a built in method (along with Efficient) to counteract the slow energy spiral that occurs in MURPG.
Some examples:
Hulk: High Health, no Energy Reserve or Stamina.
Thor: Lower Health, but some Energy Reserve and Stamina
Cyclops: Human-level Health, High Energy Reserve, low or non-existent Stamina.
Quicksilver: Slightly above Human Level Health, low level Energy Reserve, low-level Stamina
Intelligence-Based Characters: Just give them Stamina = Intelligence-Health and enough Energy Reserve to approximately double their pools, if they need it at all.
New Options:
Add “Substitute for ‘Characteristic Abilities’/’Innate Abilities’/Whatever” as a +1 option for all Actions, not just Mastery of Elements. Substituting an Action for Intelligence costs +2 instead of +1 (because it’s a lot more useful. This can be mitigated by a -1 to cost for “for sake of Mental Defense only” or “can substitute for Intelligence for beating Resistance of actions relating to pure mental power.”)
+2 for an action to combine with a Characteristic/Innate/Whatever Ability. [Both of these should be looked at very critically and subject to GM fiat.]
+2 for “can combine with ACTION”
+3 for “can combine with ACTION A and ACTION B” [Close and Ranged Combat, Social Skills and Leadership, etc.]
+4 for “can combine with ANY ACTION”
A New Modifier:
Based off of Psychocentric Power Template and Personal Luck (pretending the latter has +3 for it’s usefulness to any action and a -1 for a highly specified circumstance [to only help when succeeding by one stone,]) “Innate Talent” is a MN+4 Modifier that can be applied to a set range of actions determined by the player and the GM. Sage, for example, might have her renamed Innate Talent apply to Telepathy and Computers and added a +1 to allow her free stones to interface with computers (although it’s kind of stupid, since she has Biocomputing already, but like Gambit’s Agility Bonus to Charge Objects...sometimes a GM just raises up his hands and goes “whatever.”) Either on its own or combined with some Stamina, Efficient, or a combination thereof, this can allow a character with low Health to be able to really perform in specific situations. If it applies only to a less effective action (one specific skill,) should be worth -1 disadvantage, whereas applying to any and every action is a +3 advantage.
Other Stuff:
Improving Abilities Beyond 4, Modifiers, etc.:
I’ve been using the following in my games and have found it works pretty swimmingly.
Actions:
I need to go and look action by action, but I generally don’t consider any action to be particularly imbalanced if you know how to handle it.
One note is an idea of Speciation: “Skills” and “Powers” being kept in the same action box area, but segregated. “Skills” being things that you can learn and theoretically really train at (like Close Combat, Social Skills, General Knowledge, etc.) and “Powers” being things like Flight, Force Blast, Mastery of Elements, Power Packages, etc.
Nine Action Box Limit: KEPT. I try to resolve the whole business through Power Packages, and combined actions. If you really can’t make it work with nine actions with all that, I can guarantee there’s some superfluous low AN actions floating around, or actions that should/could be combined.
+1/-1: For no cost, and at a player’s option, a character can gain a +1 to any skill-type action in a certain specific situation (talking to the opposite sex, for example,) and a -1 at all other times. Powers may receive it at GM discretion. If there’s a free +1 stone at all times, indicating great general skill, this should be worth +1. For a -1 stone at all times, that would be -1.
Specialties vs. Emphasis:
I originally called Emphasis “Specialization,” but, despite how much I love alliteration (seriously, read the early Vol. 1 Guardians. 9/10ths of the reason I love that game is how much I love alliteration,) I wanted to avoid confusion and “Specialization” could create confusion.
This is a more broadly applied version of the fix to Close Combat that Wildknight and Dionon were discussing. For each AN of many “skills” (see above,) you can receive one Specialty or Emphasis at your option. Specialties are, as before, a +2 sit mod in situations where they occur, but may only be applied once, but can be applied broadly. Emphases are a stacking +1 sit mod. For example, a hard-hitting Heavyweight Boxer might have Close Combat 4 (Strength bonus or Weapon Modifier; Boxing Specialty, Boxing Emphasis, Boxing Emphasis, Boxing Emphasis.) He’s not going to be as good kicking somebody or hitting them with a bat, but when he punches somebody they stay down. This will allow specialists (unarmed combat specialists in particular) to thrive the same way a broad generalist can now (who might have +2 in many situations, but not thrive in a certain field the way others might.) For an example in a non-combat situation, Reed Richard’s General Knowledge might contain multiple “Scientific Emphasis” as well as Specialties with a few specific fields, while Hank Pym might have one “Scientific Emphasis” and a wider range of specialties, and Beast might have no Emphases and a lot of specialties (since he’s so intellectually well-rounded.)
Three Methods to Purchase Powers:
Normal Action Boxes and Mastery of Elements, as normal, and...
Power Packages: With Energy Weapons and Mastery of Elements as inspiration, Power Packages are exceptionally a broader version of those two actions. Power Packages are for characters who need multiple powers but require limited boxes (consolidating multiple powers into one box.) Each option to the power costs either +1 or 1 less than its normal cost level (whichever is more.) The option is to either have a sort of “Swiss Army Power” with many minor powers at a low AN, or, ideally, to fit in a few thematically linked powers of similar strength into one action box.
Dependent Actions:
Inventing and Technology are a good example.
Making an action Dependent on another action requires GM approval and should be somehow plausible or justifiable. It reduces the cost level of the dependent action by 1, but means that this action can never exceed the AN of a second (Dominant) action. This cost is automatically built into Inventing (although some characters [Dr. Samson] have changed the dominant action into Medical Healing.)
Extreme dependence reduces the cost level by 2, but means the action can never exceed half the other action.
The GM can also decide two different actions can be, for lack of a better term, co-dependent on one another. This means one action cannot exceed double the other. This is essentially a +0 option (or, more accurately, a -0 disadvantage.) This is automatically applied to Mastery of Magic and Sorcery/Summoning/Witchcraft. A GM can also do this to other powers, although s/he is encouraged to do this sparingly if at all, and only if the powers can be plausibly/justifiably linked (a -1 “linked to power” disadvantage essentially is begging for this.)
EXAMPLE: A Telepath character requires concentration (and thus use of the Concentration action) to use his Telepathy action (which he purchased as a -1 disadvantage,) so the GM ruled that his Telepathy must therefore be codependent to his Concentration.
These actions must occupy different action boxes and never combined or .
A Power Package could, theoretically, be dependent on another action, or another action dependent on it. But it would require GM approval.
Transform Self:
I briefly considered scrapping this entirely giving The Hulk out of control Metamorphosis (and Colossus “one form only.”) But instead I came up with this…
The character with Transform Self uses their full stone count to built the “more powerful form.” They then get to spend half that amount to build a “weaker”/baseline form.
For a +1 to cost level of any ability, action, or modifier on the more expensive form it can be “linked” and thus be acquired at no cost for the weaker form. Any LOE used to improve a linked action is thus improved for both (or more, see the alternates) forms.
The Wolfsbane Rule: For a cost of 2 stones, a character can purchase two alternate forms, and divide the stones however you like (evenly, or more towards a powerful form and less to an intermediate one.)
The Snowbird Rule: (In different sorts of fandoms the “Beast Boy” Rule or the “Ben 10” rule, or whatever) For a cost of 5 stones, a character can acquire “Transform Self: Any form of X stones,” where X is equal to the number of extra stones put into it. For example, Transform Self: …35 stones would cost 40 stones. Your only limit is the number of CADs and your imagination.
The character is then built as normal.
Disadvantages to Transform Self typically instill a decrease in costs for all the Stronger form’s abilities/actions/modifiers (like The Hulk having “Power out of Control” would put a -2 into all abilities actions and modifiers,) and 5 stones per -1 for “The Snowbird Rule” (Snowbird, for example, has a -2 for being limited to “white female animals native to Canada.” [-1 for white female animals and -1 for limiting it to Canadian animals] and thus gets 10 free stones for her Transform Self)
Powered Armor:
Yes, it’s confusing. Yes it’s non-intuitive (which is my way of saying it’s evil.) But it’s not unbalanced, like Inventing or Manipulate Body Density, in the hands of an attentive GM. It might have to become optional (for many games it already is.)
An Optional Rule (for those who want a little randomness): At a GM’s discretion, he can roll 2d6 (preferably of different colors, or one then after the other.) If the result of the first 1d6 is even, he subtracts the second d6 roll from the action. If odd, he adds it. These results would be kept secret from players, of course, and only used in extremely dramatic “will they or won’t they succeed” types of moments.
These are my notes, and are thus kind of obtuse and all over the place. A lot of it is scattershot and kind of poorly organized, but were I to actually rework the whole system, I would try to present it in a more coherent manner. I apologize in advance for my feeble attempts at dry wit.
Semantics: I might try to separate the red/white stone distinction, going for Points. Character Creation Points would thus be different from Character Energy. Naming the two the same thing (like “character levels” and “levels of a dungeon”) only leads to confusion (c.f. Order of the Stick.)
Cost Levels: As is. For whatever reason I like this system.
Make sure to instill a Rule 0, if it isn’t as blatantly spelled out: “GM has an important job. He has to make sure everyone is having fun. And he has to make sure characters are built fairly and not to take advantage of the system purely for the sake of exploiting rules to try and create a more powerful character than the others. The GM is allowed final approval on character creation and what seems logical or justifiable. The GM is also encouraged to not be a jerk about this.”
Like Marxist theory does, a few of my edits presuppose a much more positive human nature than I’ve encountered in the past, so there will be numerous warnings to this effect (for both players and GMs) where they seem essentially necessary. Luckily, this is not a system for an improved socioeconomic structure.
Rule 0.5: “If you aren’t having fun, you need to stop playing and have a brief and immediate discussion as to why and how. Everyone should then apologize and shake hands like grown-ups.”
Action Resolution: As normal. Difficulty and Resistance, the core of the system, works just fine.
However, make this explicit: “The second to last sentence at the body of the D&R chart, ‘to be able to attempt the action, the total of your action number, ability bonus, and modifier must be = to the Difficulty’ should be excised. Instead, to be able to succeed at an action, your Action Number must be equal to the Difficulty Number.”
Weapons/Actions/Modifiers: Left almost entirely untouched.
The Abilities:
“Characteristic Abilities”/”Innate Abilities”/Something Like That:
Intelligence: As before except for Intelligence-based characters.
Strength: As before.
Agility: As before.
Speed: As before.
* All of these can have Efficient added onto them (but not the ones below, although there’s hardly a point to them being efficient.)
Energy Related Abilities:
Health: renamed Durability
Energy Reserve: Identical to Energy Battery in all but name. Can be 0.
Stamina: Identical to Deep Reserve in all but name. Can be 0.
SIDE-NOTE ON 0’s: 0’s in other abilities should be noted as possible for NPCs (confined to a bed, non-sentient, etc. But 0’s aren’t heroes, and make very, very, poor PCs. They are not inherently banned but should be highly discouraged to the point of being practically banned, and in any case, no character should have an Intelligence of 0 or more than 2 non-Intelligence Characteristic/Whatever Abilities of 0. Professor Xavier might have a 0 in Speed, but then again, he should be almost always be confined to an NPC role.)
This will allow a built in method (along with Efficient) to counteract the slow energy spiral that occurs in MURPG.
Some examples:
Hulk: High Health, no Energy Reserve or Stamina.
Thor: Lower Health, but some Energy Reserve and Stamina
Cyclops: Human-level Health, High Energy Reserve, low or non-existent Stamina.
Quicksilver: Slightly above Human Level Health, low level Energy Reserve, low-level Stamina
Intelligence-Based Characters: Just give them Stamina = Intelligence-Health and enough Energy Reserve to approximately double their pools, if they need it at all.
New Options:
Add “Substitute for ‘Characteristic Abilities’/’Innate Abilities’/Whatever” as a +1 option for all Actions, not just Mastery of Elements. Substituting an Action for Intelligence costs +2 instead of +1 (because it’s a lot more useful. This can be mitigated by a -1 to cost for “for sake of Mental Defense only” or “can substitute for Intelligence for beating Resistance of actions relating to pure mental power.”)
+2 for an action to combine with a Characteristic/Innate/Whatever Ability. [Both of these should be looked at very critically and subject to GM fiat.]
+2 for “can combine with ACTION”
+3 for “can combine with ACTION A and ACTION B” [Close and Ranged Combat, Social Skills and Leadership, etc.]
+4 for “can combine with ANY ACTION”
A New Modifier:
Based off of Psychocentric Power Template and Personal Luck (pretending the latter has +3 for it’s usefulness to any action and a -1 for a highly specified circumstance [to only help when succeeding by one stone,]) “Innate Talent” is a MN+4 Modifier that can be applied to a set range of actions determined by the player and the GM. Sage, for example, might have her renamed Innate Talent apply to Telepathy and Computers and added a +1 to allow her free stones to interface with computers (although it’s kind of stupid, since she has Biocomputing already, but like Gambit’s Agility Bonus to Charge Objects...sometimes a GM just raises up his hands and goes “whatever.”) Either on its own or combined with some Stamina, Efficient, or a combination thereof, this can allow a character with low Health to be able to really perform in specific situations. If it applies only to a less effective action (one specific skill,) should be worth -1 disadvantage, whereas applying to any and every action is a +3 advantage.
Other Stuff:
Improving Abilities Beyond 4, Modifiers, etc.:
I’ve been using the following in my games and have found it works pretty swimmingly.
BUYING NEW SKILLS:
1 line to buy at AN 1, +10(X) [where X is equal to any addition to the cost level, like the +1 for Black Ops, 0 for something like Computers or Social Skills], 9 lines to improve to AN 2, 10 lines/AN afterwards as normal
IMPROVING ACTIONS
10 lines/+1 AN as normal.
IMPROVING “CHARACTERISTIC”[WHATEVER] ABILITIES TO 3
10 lines/+1 AN as normal.
IMPROVING “CHARACTERISTIC”[WHATEVER] ABILITIES BEYOND 3
20(X-Y) [where X is the higher cost level and Y is the lower one. The result of X-Y should be 1, 2, 3, or 5]
IMPROVING ENERGY_RELATED ABILITIES TO 3
10 lines/+1 AN as normal.
IMPROVING ENERGY-RELATED ABILITIES BEYOND 3
60(X-Y) [where X is the higher cost level and Y is the lower one. The result of X-Y should be 1, 2, 3, or 5]
IMPROVING MODIFIERS
Flat rate of 30 lines per increase in MN.
BUYING NEW SUPER POWERED ACTIONS:
You'll need challenge stones for these, or GM approval (such powers would likely have to be thematically linked to your current ones. The Punisher shouldn’t suddenly grow wings and fly, unless there’s a good in-story reason for it [which would likely be more linked to challenge stones.])
BUYING MODIFIERS: Case-by-case basis
The cost of the modifier on purchase (treat red stones as a third) x 30. Improved at a flat rate of 30 LOE after that. Some modifiers might not be allowed for you to learn by training (GM caveat.)
For example, if you want Mental Defense (+1) or Fast Draw (+1), that would cost 10 LOE. To improve them to (+2), (+3), and so on, would cost 30 LOE. If you wanted Reflexive Dodge (+1), you could wait for 2 challenge stones, or you could spend 60 LOE to buy it.
1 line to buy at AN 1, +10(X) [where X is equal to any addition to the cost level, like the +1 for Black Ops, 0 for something like Computers or Social Skills], 9 lines to improve to AN 2, 10 lines/AN afterwards as normal
IMPROVING ACTIONS
10 lines/+1 AN as normal.
IMPROVING “CHARACTERISTIC”[WHATEVER] ABILITIES TO 3
10 lines/+1 AN as normal.
IMPROVING “CHARACTERISTIC”[WHATEVER] ABILITIES BEYOND 3
20(X-Y) [where X is the higher cost level and Y is the lower one. The result of X-Y should be 1, 2, 3, or 5]
IMPROVING ENERGY_RELATED ABILITIES TO 3
10 lines/+1 AN as normal.
IMPROVING ENERGY-RELATED ABILITIES BEYOND 3
60(X-Y) [where X is the higher cost level and Y is the lower one. The result of X-Y should be 1, 2, 3, or 5]
IMPROVING MODIFIERS
Flat rate of 30 lines per increase in MN.
BUYING NEW SUPER POWERED ACTIONS:
You'll need challenge stones for these, or GM approval (such powers would likely have to be thematically linked to your current ones. The Punisher shouldn’t suddenly grow wings and fly, unless there’s a good in-story reason for it [which would likely be more linked to challenge stones.])
BUYING MODIFIERS: Case-by-case basis
The cost of the modifier on purchase (treat red stones as a third) x 30. Improved at a flat rate of 30 LOE after that. Some modifiers might not be allowed for you to learn by training (GM caveat.)
For example, if you want Mental Defense (+1) or Fast Draw (+1), that would cost 10 LOE. To improve them to (+2), (+3), and so on, would cost 30 LOE. If you wanted Reflexive Dodge (+1), you could wait for 2 challenge stones, or you could spend 60 LOE to buy it.
Actions:
I need to go and look action by action, but I generally don’t consider any action to be particularly imbalanced if you know how to handle it.
One note is an idea of Speciation: “Skills” and “Powers” being kept in the same action box area, but segregated. “Skills” being things that you can learn and theoretically really train at (like Close Combat, Social Skills, General Knowledge, etc.) and “Powers” being things like Flight, Force Blast, Mastery of Elements, Power Packages, etc.
Nine Action Box Limit: KEPT. I try to resolve the whole business through Power Packages, and combined actions. If you really can’t make it work with nine actions with all that, I can guarantee there’s some superfluous low AN actions floating around, or actions that should/could be combined.
+1/-1: For no cost, and at a player’s option, a character can gain a +1 to any skill-type action in a certain specific situation (talking to the opposite sex, for example,) and a -1 at all other times. Powers may receive it at GM discretion. If there’s a free +1 stone at all times, indicating great general skill, this should be worth +1. For a -1 stone at all times, that would be -1.
Specialties vs. Emphasis:
I originally called Emphasis “Specialization,” but, despite how much I love alliteration (seriously, read the early Vol. 1 Guardians. 9/10ths of the reason I love that game is how much I love alliteration,) I wanted to avoid confusion and “Specialization” could create confusion.
This is a more broadly applied version of the fix to Close Combat that Wildknight and Dionon were discussing. For each AN of many “skills” (see above,) you can receive one Specialty or Emphasis at your option. Specialties are, as before, a +2 sit mod in situations where they occur, but may only be applied once, but can be applied broadly. Emphases are a stacking +1 sit mod. For example, a hard-hitting Heavyweight Boxer might have Close Combat 4 (Strength bonus or Weapon Modifier; Boxing Specialty, Boxing Emphasis, Boxing Emphasis, Boxing Emphasis.) He’s not going to be as good kicking somebody or hitting them with a bat, but when he punches somebody they stay down. This will allow specialists (unarmed combat specialists in particular) to thrive the same way a broad generalist can now (who might have +2 in many situations, but not thrive in a certain field the way others might.) For an example in a non-combat situation, Reed Richard’s General Knowledge might contain multiple “Scientific Emphasis” as well as Specialties with a few specific fields, while Hank Pym might have one “Scientific Emphasis” and a wider range of specialties, and Beast might have no Emphases and a lot of specialties (since he’s so intellectually well-rounded.)
Three Methods to Purchase Powers:
Normal Action Boxes and Mastery of Elements, as normal, and...
Power Packages: With Energy Weapons and Mastery of Elements as inspiration, Power Packages are exceptionally a broader version of those two actions. Power Packages are for characters who need multiple powers but require limited boxes (consolidating multiple powers into one box.) Each option to the power costs either +1 or 1 less than its normal cost level (whichever is more.) The option is to either have a sort of “Swiss Army Power” with many minor powers at a low AN, or, ideally, to fit in a few thematically linked powers of similar strength into one action box.
Dependent Actions:
Inventing and Technology are a good example.
Making an action Dependent on another action requires GM approval and should be somehow plausible or justifiable. It reduces the cost level of the dependent action by 1, but means that this action can never exceed the AN of a second (Dominant) action. This cost is automatically built into Inventing (although some characters [Dr. Samson] have changed the dominant action into Medical Healing.)
Extreme dependence reduces the cost level by 2, but means the action can never exceed half the other action.
The GM can also decide two different actions can be, for lack of a better term, co-dependent on one another. This means one action cannot exceed double the other. This is essentially a +0 option (or, more accurately, a -0 disadvantage.) This is automatically applied to Mastery of Magic and Sorcery/Summoning/Witchcraft. A GM can also do this to other powers, although s/he is encouraged to do this sparingly if at all, and only if the powers can be plausibly/justifiably linked (a -1 “linked to power” disadvantage essentially is begging for this.)
EXAMPLE: A Telepath character requires concentration (and thus use of the Concentration action) to use his Telepathy action (which he purchased as a -1 disadvantage,) so the GM ruled that his Telepathy must therefore be codependent to his Concentration.
These actions must occupy different action boxes and never combined or .
A Power Package could, theoretically, be dependent on another action, or another action dependent on it. But it would require GM approval.
Transform Self:
I briefly considered scrapping this entirely giving The Hulk out of control Metamorphosis (and Colossus “one form only.”) But instead I came up with this…
The character with Transform Self uses their full stone count to built the “more powerful form.” They then get to spend half that amount to build a “weaker”/baseline form.
For a +1 to cost level of any ability, action, or modifier on the more expensive form it can be “linked” and thus be acquired at no cost for the weaker form. Any LOE used to improve a linked action is thus improved for both (or more, see the alternates) forms.
The Wolfsbane Rule: For a cost of 2 stones, a character can purchase two alternate forms, and divide the stones however you like (evenly, or more towards a powerful form and less to an intermediate one.)
The Snowbird Rule: (In different sorts of fandoms the “Beast Boy” Rule or the “Ben 10” rule, or whatever) For a cost of 5 stones, a character can acquire “Transform Self: Any form of X stones,” where X is equal to the number of extra stones put into it. For example, Transform Self: …35 stones would cost 40 stones. Your only limit is the number of CADs and your imagination.
The character is then built as normal.
Disadvantages to Transform Self typically instill a decrease in costs for all the Stronger form’s abilities/actions/modifiers (like The Hulk having “Power out of Control” would put a -2 into all abilities actions and modifiers,) and 5 stones per -1 for “The Snowbird Rule” (Snowbird, for example, has a -2 for being limited to “white female animals native to Canada.” [-1 for white female animals and -1 for limiting it to Canadian animals] and thus gets 10 free stones for her Transform Self)
Powered Armor:
Yes, it’s confusing. Yes it’s non-intuitive (which is my way of saying it’s evil.) But it’s not unbalanced, like Inventing or Manipulate Body Density, in the hands of an attentive GM. It might have to become optional (for many games it already is.)
An Optional Rule (for those who want a little randomness): At a GM’s discretion, he can roll 2d6 (preferably of different colors, or one then after the other.) If the result of the first 1d6 is even, he subtracts the second d6 roll from the action. If odd, he adds it. These results would be kept secret from players, of course, and only used in extremely dramatic “will they or won’t they succeed” types of moments.
