Isnt Ally too overpowered?

[GM.Casper]

My player wants a golem minion. So, a 250 point ally for a 250 PC is 5cp, multiplied by x4 for constant Frequency of Appearance, is 20cp, for what is basically a whole extra party character, optimized for combat. 100 points gets 5 golems and the PC could conceivably defeat the entire rest of the party..

Am I missing something because this sounds way too overpowered?

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by GM.Casper

Am I missing something because this sounds way too overpowered?

Allies are built by the GM (so not necessarily optimized for what you want, and you don't get to see its character sheet) and played by the GM with their own goals and personalities (so they don't necessarily do what you want them to either). Though there are official workarounds for that later issue like Minion or Puppet or using the trait for reprogrammable IQ 0 things which IMO *are* overpowered.

If you play them like they're originally intended, essentially as NPC henchmen you don't have to worry about the loyalty of and who won't necessarily desert you if you can't make payroll some week, then no, they aren't particularly overpowered. Anybody can after all hire retainers for cash. If you let the players treat them as second PCs, then sure, there's a potential problem there.

[Ashtagon]

Well, first, the constant level of frequency is reserved for NPCs "that are implanted, worn like clothing, or super*naturally attached". So that requires a supernatural link at the very least for your golem. GMs would be well in their rights to ask for an Unusual Background (and a paragraph or three of text) to explain this link.

Next, unless you are adding Minion to him (+50%), he's going to resent being used as your combat monster.

You'll probably want Summonable (+100%), unless you want him literally present everywhere and everywhen, including when you go to teh toilet, on a romantic date, trying to impress a local noble, trying to be stealthy, etc.

Putting that all together, I make it 70 points.

Finally, GM veto is a thing.

[AlexanderHowl]

I agree. And there are times in which you will not be allowed to bring a golem around. In most settings, golem servants will be required to remain within a private residence or within a suitable storage area while in an urban area.

[Stormcrow]

Most of the caveats you guys are suggesting don't apply here. The player wants a "golem minion" worth 250 character points and available all the time. Since it's not supernaturally attached, the best you can get is "almost all the time," 15 or less, which is pretty darned often. A golem will have Slave Mentality, which means you don't have to spend anything extra for the Minion enhancement.

250-point Ally for 250-point character: 5 points
Frequency 15 or less: ×3
Total: 15 points.

If you've got four of these, that's 60 points. But note: that's 60 points out of YOUR 250-point character, so ignoring Allies you're only a 190-point character.

Overpowered? Maybe, depending on the type of game you're playing. It comes down to whether the GM allows "golem minions" in the game. If he does, then this breakdown is pretty much inevitable, as the player chooses the point cost and frequency of the Ally. The GM only chooses what to do with those points—I suppose he could be a jerk and sink all those points into astronomical levels of Cross Stitching skill.

[mlangsdorf]

Originally Posted by GM.Casper

My player wants a golem minion. So, a 250 point ally for a 250 PC is 5cp, multiplied by x4 for constant Frequency of Appearance, is 20cp, for what is basically a whole extra party character, optimized for combat. 100 points gets 5 golems and the PC could conceivably defeat the entire rest of the party..

Am I missing something because this sounds way too overpowered?

Alternately, you can just recruit another player that you're really good friends with, and you get an Ally worth 20 CP for free.

The usual tools for tamping down the power of Allies is to remember that the GM, not the player, creates and controls the Ally, and that if a PC wants to abuse their allies, they either need to be stupid minions +0% or true minions +50%. Spending 25 points to get an optimized combat minion is still a pretty good deal.

You can also just say no. I find my games get unwieldy with 6 PCs and intolerably slow with 7, so I wouldn't let a player recruit a 7th player as a free ally. Similarly, I don't generally allow people to take allies other than animal companions or mounts because I find adding more people on the PCs' side just slows the game down. If I had less PCs, I'd be more open to allies.

[Malfi]

What about allowing a summonable ally not for 100% advantage increase, but pay 1 of your cp's for every 5 the ally has. So for 20 cp's you could have a 100cp summonable ally. (The ally still shouldn't have more cp's than you have)
The player could build the ally as he wants within logical limitations of what the ally actually is.
You could go further and say that weaker allies cost less per cp. So if the ally's total point are less than 50% of yours you pay 1cp for every 10cp's he has. If he is within 75% of your cp's you pay 1 cp for every 7 cp's he has.

Non summonable, non minion allies are fine as they are though.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

A golem will have Slave Mentality, which means you don't have to spend anything extra for the Minion enhancement.

No, if anything slave mentality should REQUIRE you to add minion. but that will just bring you to 23 points per Golem. Slave mentality gives the owner more control and the minion more points, and that benefit should be balanced with minion.

Ally is overpowered. But its not priced like it otherwise would be because its a kind of "overpowered" that can play well with others. Allies can be very helpful for game play. In my current game one player has an ally who's function is to take care of boring things for the party. She would otherwise exist, but she's loyal and attached to one specific character, and yes, that's been important in the game.

You could also go out and hire folks for your job. Sometimes even for just "A share of the proceeds". The difference between that and an ally is that you can trust them. And yet most players don't, because of Genre convention.

There are games where a player who is mostly a stack of combat monster minions would be fun. But the other players have to be built around this, and the GM should tweak adventures to fit. For example, Golems are usually slow and struggle to overcome obstacles. And don't know much magic. So a viable party could be the golem master and repairman, a theif who scouts, unlocks doors, and gets to hard to reach places first, and a Mage who bridges gaps, levitates Golems, and counters spells. But this only works if the GM is throwing those obstacles at the Golems that the others are overcoming, and isn't spending too much time on the fights.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by mlangsdorf

just recruit another player... and you get an Ally worth 20 CP for free.

Worth repeating. Would you consider it it "overpowered" just to add another PC to the party?

The GM can just scale the difficulty of the challenges, right? And you know the character has the golem combat monster when you design those challenges. If you can design an encounter for five PCs, you can do it for four PCs plus an Ally. So really, they've paid 25 CP for the privilege of making all their combats harder and risking getting the squishies squished because they're not combat-monster-y. The all-PC party doesn't have to waste 25 CP on adding another 100 points of combat power. In that sense, Allies are actually less effective than they look because of that surcharge.

There is no rule or even expectation in GURPS that says all encounters are designed ahead of time on a fixed point budget relative to the PCs base characters (only) with no knowledge of the party composition, to be randomly attacked by any group built strictly according to the rules, without the GM's knowledge or revision. Even in D&D, the "Challenge Rating" didn't guarantee balanced combats (our group frequently saw it off by at least a factor of two in either direction, and had to fudge). And GURPS isn't even claiming to have that. Character points aren't about combat power balance, and are only mostly about story-influence balance. To paraphrase Kromm, they're about "all players had an equal opportunity to start off" balance -- and a lot of groups don't even care about that!

[Ashtagon]

Regarding Minion and Slave Mentality...

If your golem has Slave Mentality (-40), that's an IQ-8 roll to do anything -- even pick a new target to attack -- that isn't specifically ordered. You golem-master's action economy is down the pan. This does, however, grant the benefits of Minion for free. Slave Mentality also means your golem can be tricked by social influence rolls. That might be important if your golem can be separated from you and then convinced of stuff you might not want them convinced of.

Remember, Ally just means he's your friend, Minion just means he won't resent abuse. A Minion with Slave Mentality can still be influenced by others, and rather easily too if you aren't nearby. An Ally who has been convinced that you must be "protected" no matter what could become quite the inconvenience.

The other way to get Minion for "free" is to buy IQ down to zero. However, at that point, they are unable to learn skills. Without at least some combat skills, he won't be as useful as you might want.

I'd also note that Slave Mentality, with its susceptibility to social engineering, doesn't really fit with conventional ideas of what a golem actually is. You can build it with points, but it won' necessarily end up being what you expect it to be.