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Old 08-13-2020, 03:13 PM   #11
Otaku
 
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

I used to frequently take it for my Third Edition characters. I think it was a somewhat common pick for many others in our group as well. Then the issues mentioned above started making it clear we shouldn't take it so often.

It is very hard finding a good balance between being sufficiently weird, sufficiently interesting, sufficiently disadvantageous, and sufficiently non-lethal. The wording also lead to some questions, like is the idea that it can eventually become overtly lethal as time goes on, even before factoring in player actions (players can always make something non-lethal end up lethal... to themselves).

I tend to think of it now as volunteering for "weird" duty, a bit like how Unluckiness means - when something unlucky happens - it happens to your player by default. It can have the potential to be harmful or even lethal, but that should be because the player in question approached the situation in a very stupid manner.
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Old 08-13-2020, 03:46 PM   #12
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

As a GM, I like Weirdness Magnet, mainly because it means that I can let my creativity run wild, and things don’t have to make sense from the rational viewpoint.

As a general procedure, when planning for a session I roll 3d6 for each character and item that has the trait, and take a note of the result rolled and also any sixes or ones rolled. The more extreme the number, the more trouble the trait will cause. Sixes and ones are special, I keep tally of those, and when I have enough sixes and/or ones, something drastic will happen in the game world / setting.

If it’s more sixes, it will not be too bad, and there might be a silver lining or chance for great treasure or something, but if it’s ones, well. Oh dear. The excrement will hit the fun, and fan will ensue.

So, imagine how I felt when planning for a session, I rolled three, three times in a row. That ended up changing the fundamentals of magic and summoning the grendels into Yrth.
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Old 08-13-2020, 04:31 PM   #13
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

This is one that always benefits from consultation with the GM. In many campaigns, it can be great if one PC has it. Or, in certain campaigns, if all the PCs have it. But otherwise I'd limit it to one. It is challenging, as others have pointed out, for the GM to manage it every session. When I'm GMing, I don't succeed at that, but I try to include something every few sessions, and I definitely enforce the reaction penalty.



In my current Nordlond campaign, the sea druid has it. Most other druids, clerics, and wizards are nervous around him. Some of the weirdness that he has encountered:
  • Multiple times: observing strange signs and portents that are difficult (i.e., impossible) to interpret.
  • Multiple times: odd variations on his spells (different colors, unexpected sounds or smells, etc.)
  • While escaping downriver on a boat at night, a colony of phosphorescent water creatures flowed up onto the boat and coalesced into a mirror image of the druid. It wasn't dangerous, but made the boat more visible and freaked the crew out.
  • While traveling through a primeval forest, a small pond suddenly burbled and contained a large (and aggressive) aquatic dinosaur. (This was not especially dangerous since the druid specializes in aquatic animals, but it was weird because the pond was way too small for the creature.)
In the last game that I wasn't GMing, my animist cleric (Zafir Abrashi), was a Weirdness Magnet. It was part of a set of advantages, disadvantages, and quirks that related to his perception that the world was crowded with spirits who could often speak and interact with him. These included Divine Omens, Spirit Empathy, Phantom Voices, and Unnatural Features (spirit wind blows hair in unusual ways). He was a really fun character to play, and I'd like to think that the whole package made it quite easy on the GM since Zafir was already weird and had a lot of quirky religious experiences.
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Old 08-13-2020, 05:08 PM   #14
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

I've all but banned Weirdness Magnet from my games because it seems more of a setting feature than a personal trait. That there's one player who gives it to every single one of his characters even when I say "no exotic/paranormal traits" doesn't help. (He also tends to use Lifebane and Frightens Animals the same way.)

That said, I've used a variation from Supers - Origins Magnet - to good effect. Haven't gone with Monster Magnet from MH yet, but like Enemy (Monster of the Week), it might be a personal trait or a setting feature.
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Old 08-13-2020, 05:37 PM   #15
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

Weirdness Magnet is great!... in a single PC game. When playing with a party, I usually just suggest Serendipity and players eat it up.

It's definitely warping. If my way of gming a campaign won't allow it (not just genre or smaller assumptions) then I won't allow it. That's true of a lot of meta traits, but it's important to bring up here. Cursed falls under the same boat (especially since Cursed is basically a far worse version of it).

But another thing to remember is that all PCs already have a minor version of this; The plot is happening to them. Weird stuff is already coming. It's even more true with how I generally GM.

However, there is a version I'm totally okay with people taking and that's Lesser Whimsy which is just Controllable Disadvantage: Weirdness Magnet (I'm far more lenient in what people can take with CD). When the player wants something bizarre to happen, they are using a power that costs points and a roll to make it happen. Now I don't have to think about it constantly.

Probably the most fun time with Weirdness Magnet was when I was gming a pokemon campaign and the player took it. She eventually ended up in a pokeball a Tangela threw back at her, thinking they were playing a game.

Origins Magnet is absurdly fun, though. I've taken that a few times. Even though it is a disadvantage, it's one I've never had any issue with so it's basically free points for me (Charitable is another, I often play it even with characters who don't have it).
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Old 08-13-2020, 05:53 PM   #16
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

Weirdness Magnet is a disadvantage that has my low-key admiration/approval as a cool idea, and I wish I saw it in play more. I've never used it on any of my PCs though (I have put on an NPC), and I haven't had a player take it in one of my games. I understand the issues that have been brought up here (and in the other threads that I can remember it being discussed in), but it has always seemed to me that it shouldn't be that hard to play up the negative aspects of it. Kick the owner with the reaction malus when appropriate, and make sure that the weird stuff is never *just* funny, nor *just* odd but beneficial. If you treat it like a minor curse that always ends up causing them grief eventually, then you'll be pretty close to what was intended (IMO).

I've had the idea just recently that a variant that might be worth exploring is removing Reaction from the concept, and just play the weirdness exactly like the 'minor curse'.
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Old 08-13-2020, 06:58 PM   #17
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

Quote:
Originally Posted by Phantasm View Post
That there's one player who gives it to every single one of his characters even when I say "no exotic/paranormal traits" doesn't help.
Is there a "mundane" counterpart to Weirdness Magnet? Oh, and I'm asking in general; Phantasm's comment is just what got me thinking about it. Well, that the sheep incident from the opening post. I guess that would just be Bad Luck with a theme of... uh... pardon the paradoxical terminology, but "Mundane Weirdness"?
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Old 08-13-2020, 07:26 PM   #18
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

It is a quirk (Realistic Weirdness Magnet).
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Old 08-13-2020, 07:32 PM   #19
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

Officially? Not that I'm aware of.

Unofficially, sure. Maybe Weirdness Magnet (Mundane) [-10] as WM, but people just think you've had an interesting life. They don't react poorly to you. Essentially, this is Unluckiness (Weirdly +0%) meaning that you get unlucky, but only in weird ways. The fact that this makes it harder to plan for and often works out to Unluckiness (because a problem happened that no one thought to plan for) balances out the fact that you can sometimes get a bonus to Public Speaking rolls when telling stories of your life and can sometimes get out of it because no one expects you to be great at handling such black swan events.

ETA: if we could see character sheets of elected officials, I'd vote against the several people who seem to have this lately. Or does 2020 itself have Weirdness Magnet?
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Old 08-14-2020, 11:25 AM   #20
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Weirdness Magnet

Weirdness Magnet - totally fun way of detracting.

Players had perform a series of tests on soft cheese:
Code:
 The Philadelphia Experiment
Meetings at construction sites:
Code:
The Allan Parson's Project
Security Guard work at the Exhibition 'From Da Da to Bau Haus:
Code:
They were Avante Guards
TV show quiz on spotting the ubiquitous Alien:
Code:
50 Shades of Grey
Never let them cross Arnhem Bridge:
Code:
It's a bridge too far
Highlight to check the horrid answers

Sometimes you can use it to get the PC into trouble (not life threatening) or out of trouble albeit through a massive plot deviation.

It could be that Taxi who drives extremely fast and charges the PC a fortune.

You can't get out of a house because there is a SWAT raid going on across the street again.

Construction site, there is a road detour and the PCs end up driving a scenic route but it is very nice and relaxing full of wonders, maybe a nice Coffee shop to stop at.
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