So I need to increase the teamwork

[Tema69]

...of my PCs. I'm GM'ing a campaign that right now is pretty much one big Reality Quake, with very varied PCs.

We're updating the characters (after some initial screw-ups due to GURPS-noobness), and one of them is apparently severely behind the others points-wise, but not so much in-game/in-combat -wise. He's kinda of an individualistic player, so I thought I'd find a teamwork related ability to give him, so that he'll work more with his mates.
Alternatively, a teamwork related gadget might work too (bought as wealth/signature item). Right now, I'm leaning towards a force field of some sort?

Don't worry too much about how the campaign works or what's going on, except that there's no magic (but mutation and psionics exist), and pretty much anything is available (TL-wise).

Thanks!

[tg_ambro]

The way I would go about fixing this is not doling out a new ability that is "team" oriented, if this guy is a total lone wolf, without any motivation to work with the other PCs then his being able to generate a force field won't give him much of an in-game to work with his mates. It's also possible that this kind of character doesn't have a place in the campaign.

I think the best thing to use the story to make it clear that working together is the best thing to do, I assume you have some kind of Big Bad, so while Johnny Lone Wolf is doing his thing, have the Big Bad's Henchmen lean on him, ,making it clear that teamwork is essential to survival.

As for answering your question about powers and abilities that are teamwork oriented, I'd say giving him the Healing advantage, seems plenty teamwork focused, and may have the other PCs seeking him out.

[TheSkywise]

One way to do this is to make all the characters related to each other (brother, sister, cousin, etc). I once ran a Oriental fantasy campaign where the players were all of the royal house, only the royal lineage was taken out (except the players, of course) and the players had to work together to bring back the family rule.

Another way is to make them all on the same team. For example, in my current online GURPs campaign (MapTools & TeamSpeak), the players are all members of Team Chicago, a Bureau 13 team tasked with investigating the night fantastic during the 1920s.

Of course, there is always the "you wake up with no memory and several other people who you know to be your friends for some reason..."

Or, you could simply explain to the players that unless they work together, there is no campaign.

[By the way, don't complain if my examples are not the same genre as your campaign. You never mentioned anything about your campaign, TL, or anything else that would allow us to help you...]

[Tema69]

Originally Posted by tg_ambro

The way I would go about fixing this is not doling out a new ability that is "team" oriented, if this guy is a total lone wolf, without any motivation to work with the other PCs then his being able to generate a force field won't give him much of an in-game to work with his mates. It's also possible that this kind of character doesn't have a place in the campaign.

I think the best thing to use the story to make it clear that working together is the best thing to do, I assume you have some kind of Big Bad, so while Johnny Lone Wolf is doing his thing, have the Big Bad's Henchmen lean on him, ,making it clear that teamwork is essential to survival.

As for answering your question about powers and abilities that are teamwork oriented, I'd say giving him the Healing advantage, seems plenty teamwork focused, and may have the other PCs seeking him out.

We're all trying to increase the teamwork-factor of the group. The other PCs are pretty good at having support roles on top of their primary roles - stuff like suppression fire, tactics, leadership, healing, etc... This guy, however, dons his power armour and brings the pain, which is great. He's definitely "the tank" (in the non-WoW sense, he can take a beating and deals damage). I just thought that if he had something else to do except kicking bad-guy-butt, he might do it more. He's a great guy, he just started out (6 months ago) with a very loner-type character that gradually became more social.

Originally Posted by TheSkywise

One way to do this is to make all the characters related to each other (brother, sister, cousin, etc). I once ran a Oriental fantasy campaign where the players were all of the royal house, only the royal lineage was taken out (except the players, of course) and the players had to work together to bring back the family rule.

Another way is to make them all on the same team. For example, in my current online GURPs campaign (MapTools & TeamSpeak), the players are all members of Team Chicago, a Bureau 13 team tasked with investigating the night fantastic during the 1920s.

Of course, there is always the "you wake up with no memory and several other people who you know to be your friends for some reason..."

Or, you could simply explain to the players that unless they work together, there is no campaign.

[By the way, don't complain if my examples are not the same genre as your campaign. You never mentioned anything about your campaign, TL, or anything else that would allow us to help you...]

Well, right now, their reason to be a group is this Reality Quake. They met in their plane/world/dimension, working together for a little while, but had no reason to keep doing so. Now they do.
Anyway, it's not as much about the overall who's-best-mates-with-who, it's more that I'd like to increase the teamwork-abilities of this one PC. As noted above, the others have both their primary roles and their secondary supportive roles... Problem is, this one doesn't. I introduced a Force Screen kinda deal earlier on (that they lost during the Reality Quake), and they kinda liked the idea, so I thought that "giving" a Force Screen kinda deal to this one would make him more prone to deploying it wisely to protect his friends while he does his stuff (he has enough DR as it is already) and attracts attention...

And it's not that I'm just handing out overpowered abilities to random PCs, it's just that we've been looking through all the characters, and we've made a mistake with him, so he has like 50points less than the others.

[tg_ambro]

Originally Posted by Tema69

*Major Snips*
And it's not that I'm just handing out overpowered abilities to random PCs, it's just that we've been looking through all the characters, and we've made a mistake with him, so he has like 50points less than the others.

This, along with the rest of your post clarifiies some things.
The best thing to do is to look at the secondary niches the other PCs fall into and find a gap, for example, you might already have someone who can heal, someone who sneaks, but not have anyone who can social engineer, add 50pts of social skills and levels of Smooth Operator and bam, niche filled.

Shielding would seem like a pretty logical choice for a Tank to have, and I'd give it to his character if he and the other players dig it,

[RobKamm]

Originally Posted by Tema69

He's definitely "the tank" (in the non-WoW sense, he can take a beating and deals damage). I just thought that if he had something else to do except kicking bad-guy-butt, he might do it more.

Having played my fair share of bricks, I find that any campaign that has a reasonable amount of combat will give that character plenty of "spotlight" time. That said, it is more fun to play a character that is more than a blunt instrument.

You mentioned that he can take a beating, so give him the opportunity to take some extra hits to help other characters accomplish group goals. His contribution can be very signficant. That will build his sense of contribution to the team, otherwise saddling him with situations where he has to rely on his teammates for everything gets old.

Check his character sheet, did the player throw in a strange skill or two (I try to include one WTF skill on every character I make). If so try to include an opportunity for that skill to come into play. {It's a shame none of you are familiar with 10th century Saxon literature... Oh, you are? Well, then you realize that the bad guy is a fan -- and likely goes to that Medievalist Conference that is coming up next week...}

Ditto his Disadvantage and Advantage lists, and the backstory (you let him write a backstory, right?). If he made the mistake<<<<<< had the good sense to take contacts, patrons, allies, or (you lucky GM) dependents -- then you've got a source for a session or five that thrust the tank into a more central role. And, if he took the cliched "orphan raised by a now-extinct troop of gorillas on an island that has subsequently sank" well, then you know something more about this player: he doesn't want you to mess with him. So, introduce the two surviving Island Gorillas that were imported to the Exotic City Zoo hours before the typhoon set off the volcano or whatever.

If you're still hunting for other activities for the character there is always the inevitable fall back of talking to the player. If he's content smashing kicking down heads and bashing doors you're golden. If not, find out what he'd like to see -- there is absolutely no reason that you, the GM, have to do all the heavy lifting.

[Tema69]

Originally Posted by tg_ambro

This, along with the rest of your post clarifiies some things.
The best thing to do is to look at the secondary niches the other PCs fall into and find a gap, for example, you might already have someone who can heal, someone who sneaks, but not have anyone who can social engineer, add 50pts of social skills and levels of Smooth Operator and bam, niche filled.

Shielding would seem like a pretty logical choice for a Tank to have, and I'd give it to his character if he and the other players dig it,

Thanks for the post. :)

Well, we've got healers (actually quite a few), a pilot, a faceman, a camouflage-guy and a sneakiness guy, all of whom are capable fighters (often both armed and unarmed - the latter after a zombie encounter). This character however is "Hideous" and Low Empathy, so he'll probably just stand still somewhere behind the people doing the talking. :)
So far, I've settled on a DR200, 5m radius TL11^ Light Force Screen (external power supplied by his power armour, with a 1min battery in case of external-power-failure/the PC moves away). And I've upped the weight to 40 lb., made it Kinetic & Velocity, as well as having it be Directional (Front) all the time. That should make for some interesting situations I think. Hopefully, with a bit of ingame persuasion, he'll start using it to shield his friends (as it isn't really very useful to him, having high DR already).

@Robkamm: Oh, it's not that the character is dull or not interesting, it's great, and provides a lot of roleplaying, it's just not very teamworkish or team-oriented. Nightmares, Phantom Voices, etc...
The only "odd" skill he has is Tracking, but he uses that once in a while. :) It's not at all that he doesn't get his spotlight, or that he's unhappy about bashing heads in and swinging Force Swords, he loves it, and to be honest, I think it's pretty fun too. It's just that he gets a lot of that combat spotlight, and I'd rather try to distribute that a bit more even (especially since I have another PC who is even more behind points-wise, who originally wanted to be the melee fighter but really just didn't care enough to make a coherent character, and now spends all session being quiet and doing as little as possible - but that's another problem). I don't need to mess with him (I'm messing with them all at once, actually) at all.

Oh, and I laughed at your gorilla-orphan-story. Thanks for that one. :D

[Witchking]

Originally Posted by Tema69

It's just that he gets a lot of that combat spotlight, and I'd rather try to distribute that a bit more even (especially since I have another PC who is even more behind points-wise, who originally wanted to be the melee fighter but really just didn't care enough to make a coherent character, and now spends all session being quiet and doing as little as possible - but that's another problem). I don't need to mess with him (I'm messing with them all at once, actually) at all.

Oh, and I laughed at your gorilla-orphan-story. Thanks for that one. :D

Well there are lots of ways to "contribute" in combat...Show the other PCs a couple of examples and if that fails hit them with a brick...or show them the ST TNG episode where Picard and an Alien captian who speaks only in Metaphor are "trapped" (in that the Alien strands them there) on a Planet with a "dangerous beast" and have to learn to fight it together. By a lot of old RPG counts Picard wins and Paul Winfield's character Alien Captain loses. After all Picard kills the monster and lives. All Winfield does is risk his life for what he believes in and dies, but sees his goal achieved.

In the last run I was in they had had a mage who was all about the damage She could do...Ice Sphere 25 or so with like Magery 6. Impressive (yawn).

I came in as a new mage at about 300 pts less and I think I was contributing as much or more as she had.

I could slap an extra 5 DR on one of the fighters, or I could Blur one for -5 worth, or I could Mental Stun someone elses opponent, or Daze the gate guards, or go Invisible and scout ahead.

More important that that I could was THAT I WOULD. She could do some of the above, she just never did. I had a couple of Direct Damage Spells but I pretty much used them...WHEN I couldn't think of anything better.

I would even STEP IN with my ST 9 Staff 12 parry 11 and engage an opponent...I might not put him down, but I could hold his attention until the others got to him.

My proudest moment was when the main Fighter went face down in front of the Big Bad and I took the calculated risk of steping in and buying him a second or two to get up. I did manage to parry once so I did get him 2 rounds..less then I thought I would because he one shotted me. We took him down tho, or so they told me when I came around later....

I would look hard at the other PCs sheets to see where their perephial skill will let them shine and then put in a few more of those Challenges in the mix.

But first they gotta want to try.
Sann Arkis ben Zai Journeyman Adept of the Blue Star

[dcarson]

Originally Posted by Tema69

@Robkamm: Oh, it's not that the character is dull or not interesting, it's great, and provides a lot of roleplaying, it's just not very teamworkish or team-oriented. Nightmares, Phantom Voices, etc...

How about giving him some psionics. Let him get hunches, visions of things happening far away, danger sense, etc. They fit in with the disads and let him be an early warning of upcoming plot points.

[Tema69]

Originally Posted by dcarson

How about giving him some psionics. Let him get hunches, visions of things happening far away, danger sense, etc. They fit in with the disads and let him be an early warning of upcoming plot points.

That's actually a pretty neat idea. I might incorporate that into the Nightmares and Voices (who are usually either about his deceased father, or his voice), so it'll actually be a bit more 'occult' than 'psionic', but the essence is the same, really.

@Witchking: I'm fully aware of the other PCs' skills and advantages and strong sides, what I need is increase this one PC's teamwork abilities. It's not about him taking up too much space. It's not about the others not getting enough time to shine.
It's about this one PC (named 'Goodman') who is just a bit too solo for my taste.