Mailanka's Musings -- GURPS Content Post

[A Ladder]

Hey Mailanka,

I thought I would let you know that your posts on Communion (and all this Psi Wars setting stuff as well) are probably my favorite things to read on the blogosphere right now.

In fact, I took a modified version of Communion (not owning as many books as you do) and used it as the basis of "Space Magic" in my Space Opera campaign, which kicked off last night.

So far my players have super enjoyed using Communion and the implications it has on play. Right now I have a Ego Communion user (which I call True Communion) who has a split personality that taps into Broken Communion (think Dr. Jekyll / Mr. Hyde). It was a blast seeing hows those two interacted. That player now has a ton of negative reactions to his True Communion reactions due to some terrible things his Mr Hyde self did ;).

Just wanted to let you know that your setting stuff has given me and my players a whole new version of fun to play in. Keep up the good work!

[Mailanka]

Originally Posted by A Ladder

Hey Mailanka,

I thought I would let you know that your posts on Communion (and all this Psi Wars setting stuff as well) are probably my favorite things to read on the blogosphere right now.

In fact, I took a modified version of Communion (not owning as many books as you do) and used it as the basis of "Space Magic" in my Space Opera campaign, which kicked off last night.

So far my players have super enjoyed using Communion and the implications it has on play. Right now I have a Ego Communion user (which I call True Communion) who has a split personality that taps into Broken Communion (think Dr. Jekyll / Mr. Hyde). It was a blast seeing hows those two interacted. That player now has a ton of negative reactions to his True Communion reactions due to some terrible things his Mr Hyde self did ;).

Just wanted to let you know that your setting stuff has given me and my players a whole new version of fun to play in. Keep up the good work!

Few things make a writer happier than knowing his work is being put to use. What did you have to modify due to a lack of books?

[Mailanka]

Today, Cybernetics as Powerset, including a catalog of updated bionics and appropriate cybernetic implants.

[A Ladder]

Originally Posted by Mailanka

Few things make a writer happier than knowing his work is being put to use. What did you have to modify due to a lack of books?

I don't own Horror, so Broken Communion's corruption mechanic got changed to Costs 2 HP to keep costs similar. I can also "fluff" the Costs 2 HP as a creepy bloodletting ritual to keep Broken viewed as insane/bad for your health.

[Mailanka]

Originally Posted by A Ladder

I don't own Horror, so Broken Communion's corruption mechanic got changed to Costs 2 HP to keep costs similar. I can also "fluff" the Costs 2 HP as a creepy bloodletting ritual to keep Broken viewed as insane/bad for your health.

Oh, well, I can tell you that every 25 points of corruption translates to -1 character point. There can be a little more to it than that (and Horror goes into more), but that's the crux of it.

In essence, all three have some variation of "get 25 energy points for 1 character point." True Communion (good call!) lets you "train" for 8 hours to get one energy point, Dark Communion has a funny system that essentially amounts to "You might go into debt with a rough ratio of -1 point for every 25 energy points" and Broken Communion is "You got into debt, 1 character point for every 25 character points" with an added "This is non-option for using powers, but hey, they cost less!"

(EDIT: Not that you have to change your system, I'm just giving you more information so you can do with it what you wish :) )

[Mailanka]

Right, so, that's enough Cybernetics, but if we're going to revise DR costs, that means revised Robot costs. Here's a quick reference to Robots Revised.

Update: I wrote that post long before I revisited everything again after playtesting and a few more elements popped up in that revision, which I've added to the post, which mostly consists of an edit of the modular abilities.

[Mailanka]

To round out the week, I have not one, but two power-sets: Heroism and Experience.

That "finishes" iteration 4. Next week, I start winding down the iteration with documentation and playtesting. There's a lot of ground to cover!

[Kalzazz]

Experienced often seems to mean 'better at what you currently do'

So I would think there should be an Option for Spies like 'Spend 25 pts on template skills and advantages you already possess'

I don't think that there should be much a problem with a Spy keeping up with a Space Knight (or vice versa) as long as the DM remembers they do different things! Obviously Leylana isn't going to be happy if the DM keeps throwing her into all combat all the time slugging matches, but if the DM makes sure to give her stuff where she can use her laundry list of IQ tricks she will do cool (and the DM also needs to remember to give Dun something to use his force sword on)

[Mailanka]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

So I would think there should be an Option for Spies like 'Spend 25 pts on template skills and advantages you already possess'

The Experience lens is this:

Advantages: Choose 50 points from your template Advantages, or from your template Power-Ups.

So that's already there, though clarifying skills would be useful.

The idea of upgrades is that they do something new.

I don't think that there should be much a problem with a Spy keeping up with a Space Knight (or vice versa) as long as the DM remembers they do different things! Obviously Leylana isn't going to be happy if the DM keeps throwing her into all combat all the time slugging matches, but if the DM makes sure to give her stuff where she can use her laundry list of IQ tricks she will do cool (and the DM also needs to remember to give Dun something to use his force sword on)

Well, if he did, she could get some martial arts templates, but Leylana's purpose in this game is to test non-combat competency, and how useful such a character is. So far, she's proven pretty solid in that regard.

I will say that in the playtest, I ramped up one space knight to 400 points, and it was pretty easy to do and I had a sense I could go a lot farther. I'm not entirely convinced that the non-psi/martial artists could do as well, but that's the sort of thing I'd need to see in the long term to be sure. I'm reasonably confident I'm safe, though.

EDIT: Oh, but it's nice to see you like the idea. This was the only idea left I was somewhat worried about.

[Kalzazz]

You know, I somehow just missed that and thought it was just 'pick two of these power ups'