Cosmetic Question

[transmetahuman]

Originally Posted by Ze'Manel Cunha

I think I missed that one, where does it reference needing mimicry to change your voice with morph?

(I can see needing mimicry to imitate the speech patterns of someone, but morph should take care of pitch and tone.)

I called up more search-fu - and found out that this time, I was hallucinating. Kromm talks about Morph and voice here; limited mimicry (and the potential for the Voice advantage) would seem to be included in Morph. Since I'd consider them part of "appearance", I don't see any reason they couldn't be included in Cosmetic Morph (with an appropriate pool, in the case of the Voice advantage - I agree with vitruvian). I'm relieved; I would've house-ruled it to be so anyway.

[vitruvian]

I just find it a little silly that you need to have extra points in a Morph point pool in order to change into Halle Berry, but not if you just want to turn into Lyle Lovett.

It's only silly if it's also silly for Halle to pay more points for her Appearance than Lyle. Otherwise, a popular point crock would be to get Average or lower base Appearance for every Morph, and just bump it up to Handsome/Beautiful or Very Handsome/Beautiful on a constant basis.

[Not another shrubbery]

Originally Posted by Ze'Manel Cunha

I just find it a little silly that you need to have extra points in a Morph point pool in order to change into Halle Berry, but not if you just want to turn into Lyle Lovett.

I'd say 'frustrating' rather than 'silly', but there you go. For a power that changes appearance, I would expect the ability to shift Appearance Levels would be included in the default. As it stands: To remain in the camp of Officiality, it looks like you may have to add the pool for increasing AL. Without clear evidence that it is egregiously unfair, I would just assume that for the base cost of Cosmetic, the shapeshifter can copy the appearance of someone better-looking than they are *shrug*

[Kromm]

Elastic Skin [20] = Morph (Cosmetic, -50%; No Mimicry, -10%; Retains Shape, -20%) [20]

• Cosmetic, at -50%, is a standard modifier for Morph.
• No Mimicry means exactly what it says: you can't fake other peoples' voices. You can do this with Morph . . . it's meant to be the all-in-one change. Since Mimicry is 10 points against Morph's 100 points, this is -10%.
• Retains Shape, at -20%, is a standard modifier for Morph.
• The limited "slots" of Morph vs. the need for Disguise rolls with Elastic Skin trade off. That's a +0% special effect.

And that's that. Morph with Cosmetic alone does allow voice mimicry and does allow changes in morphology. For game-balance purposes, it's assumed that these effects never grant or remove actual attribute levels, advantages, disadvantages, etc. Those who think this latter point is silly or troublesome shouldn't allow Cosmetic. That's in the very nature of Cosmetic. Anything more is really closer to full-blown Morph.

[Not another shrubbery]

Originally Posted by Kromm

For game-balance purposes, it's assumed that these effects never grant or remove actual attribute levels, advantages, disadvantages, etc.

I take it that this means that tmh's point, about 'see or touch' being an actual requirement for Morph, was correct? That a morpher cannot mimic someone unless he: can see Or can touch Or has memorized the target?
Does this mean that you can't even negate advantages or add disadvantages to perfect a disguise?

Those who think this latter point is silly or troublesome shouldn't allow Cosmetic. That's in the very nature of Cosmetic. Anything more is really closer to full-blown Morph.

Well, rather than just sit back and complain needlessly (my first impulse, heh)... once it's all sorted out, I'll have notes to refer to for future questions, then I'll just keep doin' what I think is right ;)

[transmetahuman]

Originally Posted by Kromm

The limited "slots" of Morph vs. the need for Disguise rolls with Elastic Skin trade off. That's a +0% special effect.

Does that "limited slots" reference mean that a Morph needs a model he can see or touch (or the memory of such, of course) in order to change his appearance, unless he has Improvised Forms?

Edit: 'Shrub beat me to it. (You don't mind if I call you 'Shrub, do you? ;))

But I'm more concerned with appearance changes that aren't intended to impersonate. If you have Morph, Cosmetic or not, can you give yourself a quick nose job, paunch, and hairstyle/color change to throw off pursuit in a crowd, or do you need to mimic a model unless you have Improvised Forms?

I'm betting on/hoping you need Imp. Form, since otherwise you'd be able to use Disguise skill anyway, and there'd be no trade-off.

[transmetahuman]

Originally Posted by Not another shrubbery

Does this mean that you can't even negate advantages or add disadvantages to perfect a disguise?Well, rather than just sit back and complain needlessly (my first impulse, heh)... once it's all sorted out, I'll have notes to refer to for future questions, then I'll just keep doin' what I think is right ;)

Yeah, for game balance purposes, I'll certainly allow a Morph, physically impersonating a one-armed man, to voluntarily accept a temporary One Arm disad that has no point-consequences. Or a satyr to lose his horns. Same as you can get a "temporary One Arm disad" by tying an arm behind your back. If he can justify keeping his arm or his horns in a form where they don't appear, he can keep 'em. I don't see any problem with doing it this way.

[Ze'Manel Cunha]

Originally Posted by Kromm

For game-balance purposes, it's assumed that these effects never grant or remove actual attribute levels, advantages, disadvantages, etc. Those who think this latter point is silly or troublesome shouldn't allow Cosmetic. That's in the very nature of Cosmetic. Anything more is really closer to full-blown Morph.

I understand the need for game balance, I do, it just seems that the way things are written now, following my previous example, someone with Morph, (Cosmetic or not), would be able to become any average person, and turn into any ugly person, like Lyle Lovett, but they would be unable to turn into Halle Berry unless they pay for an additional appearance Morph pool to cover that occasional appearance boost.

I'm running into a brick wall when I try to logically justify* that power concept to myself without resorting to simply calling it an anti-munchkin game mechanic.

Regardless, for both game balance and consistency of the advantage itself, shouldn't that occasional appearance boost morph pool cost just be included in the base package for the power we're trying to model?
(Whether it be called Elastic Skin or Cosmetic Morph?)


*(It's one thing to say that Cosmetic Morph only grants form without function, but when the form is the function, as in appearance, it gets much harder to justify).*muttering*

[vitruvian]

Regardless, for both game balance and consistency of the advantage itself, shouldn't that occasional appearance boost morph pool cost just be included in the base package for the power we're trying to model?

Well, I suppose that Cosmetic Morph *without* the pool (and with an Average Appearance of your own) would represent imperfect mimicry. You can copy the raw facial features of a Beautiful person, but there's something slightly off about the alignment of the cheek bones, or your gracelessness in movement doesn't support the slim form, or in some other way you're just 'off' enough that you don't get the benefits of the target's level of Appearance. You can still be mistaken for them or impersonate them for a brief period of time, but you don't get the reaction bonus and people who saw you masquerading will just figure that the target isn't at their best that day, or doesn't look as good in person, or must wear a lot of makeup the rest of the time, or something along those lines.

(Whether it be called Elastic Skin or Cosmetic Morph?)

Then you have the problem that Elastic Skin evidently *does* let you mimic higher Appearance levels with a Disguise roll, without a Morph pool. Huh. Does Disguise with no special Advantage, just using makeup and such, allow you to effectively increase your Appearance with a successful roll? If so, I guess I'd let it work in tandem with either Elastic Skin or Morph, although Morph doesn't need it for impersonating specific people...

[transmetahuman]

Originally Posted by vitruvian

Then you have the problem that Elastic Skin evidently *does* let you mimic higher Appearance levels with a Disguise roll, without a Morph pool. Huh. Does Disguise with no special Advantage, just using makeup and such, allow you to effectively increase your Appearance with a successful roll? If so, I guess I'd let it work in tandem with either Elastic Skin or Morph, although Morph doesn't need it for impersonating specific people...

Ugh. Can of worms. Logically, you get your Appearance modifiers most of the time; certainly it doesn't represent you only as you look after you've spent hours with a top beauty team. And few people would deny that there can be a notable difference in "knockout level" if you have the time, energy and skill to pretty yourself up - if you do, there's an enormous industry that says otherwise. Which would imply that skill, time and money can temporarily increase your Appearance (or, more accurately, give a bonus). Whether that skill is a Disguise specialization, or Disguise defaults to that skill at some penalty, or it's a skill that Disguise doesn't default to, but which could be used with ES - and what the limitations are - I think GMs are going to have to make up to suit themselves. I doubt it'll ever be addressed in GURPS.

That does leave the weirdness of Morph needing a pool while ES doesn't, though. I guess our choices are:

1. Morph doesn't need a pool for Appearance (which can be worth the 30 points alone, if the base form is fugly enough - bad idea)
2. ES + Disguise can't alter your Appearance (as opposed to appearance) upwards,
3. ES + Disguise can give a bonus to Appearance, up to a point, and maybe with a penalty to skill, or
4. Characters with ES must also buy Very Handsome/Beautiful, however much time they spend as hotties.

I'm leaning towards 3 or 4, depending on character concept. I mean, if you had ES in real life, wouldn't you go around as handsome as you could make yourself? But if a player insisted his character didn't, I'd make up some rules for #3.