Steve Jackson Games Forums - View Single Post - [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#31): Cultural Familiarity, Cultural/Xeno-Adaptability

johndallman · 02-05-2017, 05:34 AM

It's quite routine in games I play for characters to have one or two extra Cultural Familiarities, learned if the character has spent a while in a relevant area, or has studied the language intensively with a native speaker. It's one of the things you need to pass as a native.

For example, the WWII game I play in did successive scenarios in Egypt, Libya and Mandatory Palestine, and taking Cultural Familiarity (Muslim) seemed reasonable as a "Got used to the area, can be polite to the inhabitants" marker. That game uses very broad CFs: Western, Muslim, East Asian, African and South Asian are the main ones.

I have taken Xeno-Adaptability once, in the TORG campaign we played. Thorfin Fairhair was a dwarf from the Norse/Fantasy realm that had overlaid the British Isles and Scandinavia, so almost everyone he met was a different species. He was a bard and our face-man, which people thought was weird for about half a minute each. I'm not sure it was actually cost-effective, but it was fun.

Infinite Worlds (p173) has rules for CFs changing over time: -1 of CF penalties for each two TLs of difference. I think this is actually a bit friendly, but it matches adventure fiction. In my Infinite Cabal campaign, several of the PCs have learned CF: Ancient Rome, and since the peace between Infinity and Centrum, CF: Centran.

02-05-2017, 05:34 AM	#10
johndallman Night Watchman Join Date: Oct 2010 Location: Cambridge, UK	Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#31): Cultural Familiarity, Cultural/Xeno-Adaptabi It's quite routine in games I play for characters to have one or two extra Cultural Familiarities, learned if the character has spent a while in a relevant area, or has studied the language intensively with a native speaker. It's one of the things you need to pass as a native. For example, the WWII game I play in did successive scenarios in Egypt, Libya and Mandatory Palestine, and taking Cultural Familiarity (Muslim) seemed reasonable as a "Got used to the area, can be polite to the inhabitants" marker. That game uses very broad CFs: Western, Muslim, East Asian, African and South Asian are the main ones. I have taken Xeno-Adaptability once, in the TORG campaign we played. Thorfin Fairhair was a dwarf from the Norse/Fantasy realm that had overlaid the British Isles and Scandinavia, so almost everyone he met was a different species. He was a bard and our face-man, which people thought was weird for about half a minute each. I'm not sure it was actually cost-effective, but it was fun. *Infinite Worlds* (p173) has rules for CFs changing over time: -1 of CF penalties for each two TLs of difference. I think this is actually a bit friendly, but it matches adventure fiction. In my Infinite Cabal campaign, several of the PCs have learned CF: Ancient Rome, and since the peace between Infinity and Centrum, CF: Centran. __________________ The Path of Cunning. Indexes: DFRPG Characters, Advantage of the Week, Disadvantage of the Week, Skill of the Week, Techniques.