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Next Week: Discriminatory Hearing, Disciminatory Smell, Discriminatory Taste, Sensitive Touch
Preface
The intent of this thread is to discuss the selected Advantages in their entirety. This begins with how the traits were written in [Basic], and while I won't go into depth about what is mentioned in other supplements, I will at least try to touch upon them. I would also like to include links to other useful sources (threads, blogs, etc.), and if it seems worth it, the rules for the traits from past editions. It will also include open discussion of it all, and that means sharing thoughts and experiences on the matter, be they praise, criticism, questions, or just remembrances. I'll avoid sharing my own thoughts, except where it is necessary, such as when I don't really understand the trait all that well myself.
Thanks to the
index of topics johndallman created as is maintaining, it is much easier to keep track of what we've covered and where also lessening the need for me to try to cram every remotely related trait together
or keep them all separate (whichever might make them easier to find). It also means I can get one more trait we skipped, Daredevil, reviewed alongside what I believe to be a better known and more widely employed trait, Luck, without worrying about future readers looking for it in the threads that will focus on "L" traits.
Basic
Daredevil (p. B47) is a Mundane, Mental Advantage worth 15 points. It has a slightly less detailed entry on page 9 of GURPS Lite which is handy for quoting:
Quote:
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Fortune seems to smile on you when you take risks! Any time you take an unnecessary risk (in the GM’s opinion), you get a +1 to all skill rolls. Furthermore, you may reroll any critical failure that occurs during such high-risk behavior.
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[Basic] adds an example to help clarify what constitutes an unnecessary risk; the text suggests leaping from cover to charge into battle (instead of firing from that position) as something that would trigger Daredevil. This trait may not make taking an unnecessary risk the best approach, but the combination of a Skill bonus and being able to re-roll critical failures should at least make it more palatable.
Luck (p. B66) is a Mundane, Mental trait that comes in three tiers, each with a different cost. This trait also appears on page 9 of GURPS Lite, where the entry reads
Quote:
You were born lucky! There are three progressively more “cinematic” levels of Luck:
Luck: Once per hour of play, you may reroll a single bad die roll twice and take the best of the three rolls! You must declare that you are using your Luck immediately after you roll the dice. 15 points.
Extraordinary Luck: As above, but usable every 30 minutes. 30 points.
Ridiculous Luck: As above, but usable every 10 minutes! 60 points.
Your Luck only applies to your own success, damage, or reaction rolls, or on outside events that affect you or your whole party, or when you are being attacked (in which case you may make the attacker roll three times and take the worst roll!).
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[Basic] adds additional text to clarify; though it can factor into an event that affects the entire party, the only times it will work on a roll for someone else is when that roll directly affects the character with Luck. If your character's life depends upon a door being broken down and you want to use its Luck to improve the odds, your character has to be the one actually making the attempt (as opposed to a fellow party member who would otherwise be more suited to the task). Completely unambiguous is the explanation that how the added text in [Basic] states that the minutes between uses acts like a cooldown timer; you don't get one use per X minutes of game time, but after you use a form of Luck, you must wait that amount of time before you can use it again; no saving it up for later to use several times in a row, or using it back-to-back claiming one was for the previous 60/30/15 minutes and the other is for the next.
Luck includes some Special Limitations you may take for it in [Basic], still on p. B66. "Active" requires you specify you are using your Luck ahead of time, denoting it as a conscious, supernatural ability. You must state you are using it
before rolling; no opting to use it to offset a bad roll after-the-fact. This is worth -40%. "Aspected" restricts your Luck to working with a specific class of related tasks; if it falls outside of that scope, it is like you don't have any Luck at all. The text lists some examples as athletics, combat, social interactions, and stuff you could use at your job, detailing the restrictions for combat. This is worth -20%. "Defensive" is basically another instance of Aspected; as your Luck can only re-roll failed Active Defenses, Resistance rolls, HT rolls to resist the effects of injury, or for an opponent to re-roll a critical hit against you. It is also worth -20%.
Super Luck (p. B89) is an Exotic, Mental trait that costs 100 CP. Despite the name, it is
not a higher form of Luck; though it still affects the outcome of a roll, it doesn't involve re-rolling the dice. Instead, once per hour of play, Super Luck allows the player to dictate the result of any one die roll you or the GM make for your character. Since you are specifying a result, that means you cannot accomplish the impossible with Super Luck, just the improbable; the circumstances have to permit a roll in the first place, and you just get to state the number rolled. You
may take Super Luck alongside one of Luck, Extra Ordinary Luck, or Ridiculous Luck, but Super Luck itself can only be taken once.
Other Supplements
Besides the usual advice for how to use Luck and Super Luck to represent... erm... powers, GURPS Powers includes the new "Wishing" Enhancement for Luck on page 59. On page 80 mentions in a high power campaign, the GM
might consider allowing some characters to purchase Super Luck as a leveled trait, and includes the rules for that. It also features the "Alter Reality" Enhancement to allow Super Luck to work retroactively, or the Wishing Enhancement, which does work just a bit differently than it does with Luck/Extraordinary Luck/Rediculous Luck. It also contains some non-trait specific Modifiers that could apply to the various versions of Luck and Super Luck.
GURPS Power-Ups 3: Talents contains optional rules for traits that act as prerequisites or enablers for a particular talent, with Daredevil and Luck showing up among the possible traits. Page 26 of GURPS Supers has rules for treating Daredevil as a leveled trait.
Previous Editions
Daredevil, Luck, and Super Luck
all work the same in Third Edition as they do in Fourth. As a reminder, I don't have information for earlier editions.
Useful Links
Thank you for the links. We have not only some threads discussing the use of these traits, but those oh-so-valuable Kromm & PK Quotes:
Discussion Starters
This is a generic list of questions
if you need them; if you already know what you want to say, feel free to just chime in.
- Have you ever taken any of these traits for one of your PCs or NPCs? How'd it go?
- Is there anything these trait do really well?
- Is there anything you think these traits should do different, whether it means adding, subtracting, or just changing aspects of it?
- Any thoughts on how the 4e version of these traits compares to them in earlier editions?
- Feedback about BAotW threads in general, such as how I structure them?