Polyglot, a cinematic take on languages.

[Gef]

I like the original idea, in campaigns to which it's suited, but think the cost should be double: 5 gets you Gadgeteer, and +100% gets you Cosmic (Lingering Effect). That's because you've established you know that language, so you can use it if it comes up again.

[cosmicfish]

I too dislike having to choose between the cinematic and expensive Omnilingual and the realistic but pricey Language Advantage. One thing I toyed with was an Advantage I just called Language Pool (6/lvl). Your first level of LP gives you 6 points worth of Languages, doubling with each additional level. For the first two levels this is exactly the same as just buying Languages, but it grows quickly up to the point where you would just buy Omnilingual:

Language Pool (1) [6]: 6 pts in Languages (from 3 Broken to 1 Native)
Language Pool (2) [12]: 12 pts in Languages (from 6 Broken to 2 Native)
Language Pool (3) [18]: 24 pts in Languages (from 12 Broken to 4 Native)
Language Pool (4) [24]: 48 pts in Languages (from 24 Broken to 8 Native)
Language Pool (5) [30]: 96 pts in Languages (from 48 Broken to 16 Native)
Language Pool (6) [36]: 192 pts in Languages (from 96 Broken to 32 Native)
Language Pool (7) [42]: 384 pts in Languages (from 192 Broken to 64 Native)
Language Pool (8) [48]: 768 pts in Languages (from 384 Broken to 128 Native)

My rule was that the player did not need to decide every language beforehand, but upon encountering a language the player would need to immediately and irrevocably place it on a "known" or "unknown" list. No backsies. And, of course, the GM could decide that a given language could not reasonably be none. It required a bit of record keeping but stayed realistic-ish and allowed serious linguistics without the expense and cinematic nature of Omnilingual.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by ArchonShiva

Mine too - but I just don't see her automatically pulling out Navajo.

The kind of stories she appears in would never confront her with speakers of an indigenous American language. Now a character with that trait in a Western might speak any tribal tongue they happened to encounter, but not know, say, Chinese or Arabic or even German.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by ArchonShiva

A 5-point advantage with a 10% enhancement also creates a half point - the rules are clear about rounding up point costs, I don't see any issue. I would allow all languages to stack before rounding, if the player wants to sprinkle it a bit.

Obviously I was unclear. The problem with "only charge half cost" is this:

You get both Italian (Broken, Spoken Only) [1], Italian (Accented, Spoken Only) [1], and Italian (Broken) [1].

This means no one will ever take Italian (Broken, Spoken Only) unless it was purely for flavor and they had plans to 'upgrade it' (for free) at some point in the campaign.

This is ... limiting.

Also, it's only even a problem if you think half points in GURPS are a problem.

Since 4e went to so many pains to eliminate half points... I tend to stick to that.

I'm not saying your plan is a failure, just pointing out it's flaw.

[Culture20]

Perfect for Star Wars where every character seems to understand at least 10 languages. Protocol droids should still use Modular Abilities (Languages Only).

Star Trek and Stargate SG1 just ignore languages for the most part with notable occasional exceptions in series and movies.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by whswhs

That doesn't seem very different in purpose from the Omnilingual unusual background in GURPS Supers. Were you aware of that treatment?

That said, I remember that by paying four times the price of an advantage you got a SuperAdvantage. Thus Super Language Talent for fourty points would allow a person to speak any language at Native. It would also let you descipher unknow scripts as well. The price could be brought down with simple limits like Only laguages that the character could have possibly studied at a univerisity or Only Earth Human Languages.