Low-powered campaigns

AlexanderHowl · 05-24-2019, 07:08 AM

So, I am curious why people like playing low-powered campaigns (anything where the heroes start below 150 CP). I have never seen the allure of them myself, as I want to play games where people are more capable than me, but they seem to be popular. If you regularly participate in low-powered campaigns, could you please share why you like them?

ericthered · 05-24-2019, 07:47 AM

To be honest, I see the 100-150 range as mid-powered campaigns, not low powered. I usually play in that range, so I can't speak to why people play at 75 or 50.

I find the 100 point range to be remarkably tolerant of min-maxing. At that level it focuses players into finding a niche and doing it well, rather than generally excelling at everything. I still have to watch disadvantages, but that is much simpler than stringently policing the whole build.

I find that 100 point characters have skills in the "Fat" portion of the 3d6 curve. 50% of the probability in 3d6 is between 8 and 12. 80% of it is between 6 and 14. 100 point characters tend to have skills between 10 and 14, which is a fun set of probabilities to work with, and doesn't require me to be constantly slapping modifiers on everything.

I find that 100 point characters have enough room for two or three different skill sets, but not enough to dominate an entire attribute. This makes niche protection easier, and encourages talents, which I believe flesh out characters. 100 points is enough to start having a few 17-20 skill levels among a group of PC's, plus 12-14 at most things they need to roll.

100 point characters will always have a number of weaknesses that keep them coming back to other team members for assistance.

If you're a stat normalizer, 100 point characters feel exceptional but not world class. Not all games have to be about world-shaking heroes, and I've even found 100 points a good place to start individuals who shake the world through leadership (not counting their social advantages like wealth and rank).

Most of this focus is on the skill and attribute part of character building. I play a very skill-centric game, often with low levels of combat.

Brandy · 05-24-2019, 07:55 AM

I agree with everything that Eric said.

In addition, characters that start in this range and grow to the 250 point range look and feel quite different from those that are built as 250 pointers.

I'm also a "stat normalizer". A 13 in a stat (other than ST) is very high and will stand out in the crowd; skills of 16+ are exceptional.

whswhs · 05-24-2019, 08:20 AM

It depends what kind of roleplaying you want to do.

My lowest-powered campaign for GURPS 4/e was Worminghall, set in the medieval university town I described in that supplement. All the PCs were newly matriculated students at a university with a Faculty of Magic. They were 14 years old, or thereabouts. I worked through what was needed to create a plausible new student, and gave them just enough character points to customize a bit and be slightly above average students. That came to 75 points, allowing up to 112 points with disadvantages.

I had five players who seemed to have a good time. Their characters were the youngest son of a landed knight; two Welsh cousins from a prosperous but non-noble landowning family; the bastard son of a servant by the nobleman she worked for; and an orphan raised by dragons, who had given him gold and sent him to learn human magic. We roleplayed the whole Harry Potter thing of boys from disparate backgrounds getting to know each other and becoming friends.

This campaign did not have an overarching plot. It did have a number of adventurous subplots, including encounters with the Fair Folk, exploration of the abandoned dragon lair under the town (the dragon had been slain centuries ago, but still haunted the lair), and town/gown riots. But it also had character interaction subplots, such as one of the Welsh students discovering that another student in his class was actually a disguised magically gifted girl, or the emergence of a friendship between the knight's son and the servant's bastard son. In a lot of ways it was what the Germans call a Bildungsroman, a novel about growing up and forming one's adult identity.

My campaigns vary in their focus a lot. But they always have a significant element of character interaction, conflict, and development; and such things are not dependent at all on a high point value.

Gumby Bush · 05-24-2019, 08:29 AM

Some of it has to do with what I find interesting. When I started with GURPS, I enjoyed making high-powered characters focused on combat, powers, and deception who I could imagine succeeding at anything their genre might throw at them. Over time, my interest has shifted towards the social and technical arenas: still built for deception and maybe some powers, but much more subtle, much less combat-oriented, more focused, and much more prone to failure.

"Failing" in interesting ways is fun. More fun than succeeding, a lot of the time, since a success just means my plan went as intended, but a failure means I need to rethink things.

Brandy · 05-24-2019, 08:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gumby Bush

"Failing" in interesting ways is fun. More fun than succeeding, a lot of the time, since a success just means my plan went as intended, but a failure means I need to rethink things.

This is similar to my take. At these low power levels, how the characters approach their challenges is just as important as the traits they have. At some power levels and in some genres, the approach is often "I have a plan. Attack." and the decisions are more about resource management than tactics. With lower-powered games, it's easier (for me at least) to craft scenarios that the characters cannot just brute force their way through.

martinl · 05-24-2019, 08:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

So, I am curious why people like playing low-powered campaigns (anything where the heroes start below 150 CP). I have never seen the allure of them myself, as I want to play games where people are more capable than me, but they seem to be popular. If you regularly participate in low-powered campaigns, could you please share why you like them?

1. A 100 pt character can be wildly more capable than me at their specialty if built right. I built a 115 pt street urchin for Paraj's latest game that could break real me like a rotten stick.
2. "Zero to hero" is a fun trope.
3. "We won because we're awesome" is a fun game, but "We won because our plan was awesome" is also fun.

AlexanderHowl · 05-24-2019, 09:02 AM

100 CP is capable of producing a social monster if you want (combat monsters are much more expensive). Appearance (Handsome), Charisma 5, Status 1, Voice, and Wealth (Wealthy) costs 67 CP and creates a character that gets +10/+12 on most reaction rolls. The addition of Independent Income 5, Status 3, and Filthy Rich (+45 CP), creates a member of idle wealthy. With -50 CP in negative traits, that leaves 38 CP for skills, which is sufficient for a spoiled 19 year old adult.

In a TL8 campaign, the character earns $100,000 a month and, while they are average in their attributes, everyone looks to them for leadership (their trust fund is around $100 million, assuming a monthly return of 0.1% after fees and taxes, since they are too untalented to manage their own money). They will attract legions of potential lovers and more than a few members of the upper class will attempt to marry them for their money if nothing else. Such a character would adventure out of boredom or due to eccentricity.

Stormcrow · 05-24-2019, 11:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

So, I am curious why people like playing low-powered campaigns (anything where the heroes start below 150 CP). I have never seen the allure of them myself, as I want to play games where people are more capable than me, but they seem to be popular.

Unless you walk around being heroic all the time, you are probably worth far less than 150 character points in GURPS terms. I don't say that to insult you; it's true of all of us here. 25–50 points is called "average," and I'll bet that's what most people here fall into, though I would expect most people would think, "Yeah, but 'competent' is above 'average,' and that's what I really think I am."

I prefer lower-powered games because I'm more interested in the challenge of overcoming the obstacles of a game, not in fantasizing about being someone more capable than myself. Actually it's not that the power level determines challenge, since you can always just find something even more powerful than yourself. Fiddling with powers and outrageous abilities doesn't appeal to me all that much. The individual swings of a battle-axe are more interesting to me than the details of your Power Blast.

Mark Skarr · 05-24-2019, 12:44 PM

It depends on what the goal of the game is. If you’re not playing an over-the-top cinematic action game, or super-heroes, you’re probably playing “low-powered.” Not everyone likes to play games where the fate of the world hangs on every session. Sometimes, a very big story about very small people can be just as interesting.

My GURPS BattleTech games have characters start at about 125 points. They’re soldiers, not super-soldiers. And each and every one of them is doing something that none of my players will ever get to do—pilot a giant, stompy robot! And, your “social monsters” fit perfectly in the setting—there’s even a term for them: Steiner Officers. (BattleTech players will get the reference. They’re not Locust pilots—those are the results of Weirdness Magnet.)

“Low-Powered” games tend to revolve less around giant action set-pieces and more around character interaction and development. Think of a “low-powered” game as a comedy, rom-com, thriller or horror movie, and High-Powered games (like you enjoy) as summer blockbusters.

Also, a lot of people enjoy historical role-playing games. It’s never been my cuppa, but to each their own. Others like hard sci-fi games. Again, not for me, but, it’s popular. Many like Wainscot settings, where everything starts out normal. Most of those tend toward the low-powered level.

A lot of times, it’s less about the game being “low-powered” as a device, and more about the setting of the game being one less supportive of over-the-top point-bloated characters. But, sometimes the point is low-powered. A low-powered crime game could have the players start out as simple thugs and grow to control a crime family (ala Scarface).

Some people like low-powered, gritty games, others like high-powered, over-the-top spectacle games. (Yes, you can do low-powered spectacle-games, and high-powered, over-the-top gritty games, they’re just rare. My ARK: Comedy Devolved game was a low-powered spectacle-game with 75 point characters.)

I’ve known people who couldn’t get their heads inside the concept or allure of playing super heroes (we play a lot of supers games). Those people insisted that the only games that were any fun were low-powered, hard-reality, modern-day military games. A couple were genuinely at a loss to find that the other players were having way more fun in my (slightly silly) Supers game than their stern and stoic military game.

But, at the end of the day, it depends on what you’re looking for. If you don’t enjoy playing low-powered games, then, by all means, play what you enjoy and don’t let anyone tell you you’re doing it wrong (unless someone’s being hurt, and even then, if it’s consensual, you do you). If you don’t understand how people could be having fun, then join one of those games and find out. But, be sure to go in with an open mind and be ready to be surprised.

05-24-2019, 07:08 AM	#1
AlexanderHowl Join Date: Feb 2016	Low-powered campaigns So, I am curious why people like playing low-powered campaigns (anything where the heroes start below 150 CP). I have never seen the allure of them myself, as I want to play games where people are more capable than me, but they seem to be popular. If you regularly participate in low-powered campaigns, could you please share why you like them?

05-24-2019, 07:47 AM	#2
ericthered Hero of Democracy Join Date: Mar 2012 Location: far from the ocean	Re: Low-powered campaigns To be honest, I see the 100-150 range as mid-powered campaigns, not low powered. I usually play in that range, so I can't speak to why people play at 75 or 50. I find the 100 point range to be remarkably tolerant of min-maxing. At that level it focuses players into finding a niche and doing it well, rather than generally excelling at everything. I still have to watch disadvantages, but that is much simpler than stringently policing the whole build. I find that 100 point characters have skills in the "Fat" portion of the 3d6 curve. 50% of the probability in 3d6 is between 8 and 12. 80% of it is between 6 and 14. 100 point characters tend to have skills between 10 and 14, which is a fun set of probabilities to work with, and doesn't require me to be constantly slapping modifiers on everything. I find that 100 point characters have enough room for two or three different skill sets, but not enough to dominate an entire attribute. This makes niche protection easier, and encourages talents, which I believe flesh out characters. 100 points is enough to start having a few 17-20 skill levels among a group of PC's, plus 12-14 at most things they need to roll. 100 point characters will always have a number of weaknesses that keep them coming back to other team members for assistance. If you're a stat normalizer, 100 point characters feel exceptional but not world class. Not all games have to be about world-shaking heroes, and I've even found 100 points a good place to start individuals who shake the world through leadership (not counting their social advantages like wealth and rank). Most of this focus is on the skill and attribute part of character building. I play a very skill-centric game, often with low levels of combat. __________________ Be helpful, not pedantic Worlds Beyond Earth -- my blog Check out the PbP forum! If you don't see a game you'd like, ask me about making one! Last edited by ericthered; 05-24-2019 at 07:53 AM.

05-24-2019, 07:55 AM	#3
Brandy Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Nashville, TN	Re: Low-powered campaigns I agree with everything that Eric said. In addition, characters that start in this range and grow to the 250 point range look and feel quite different from those that are built as 250 pointers. I'm also a "stat normalizer". A 13 in a stat (other than ST) is very high and will stand out in the crowd; skills of 16+ are exceptional. __________________ I didn't realize who I was until I stopped being who I wasn't. Formerly known as Bookman- forum name changed 1/3/2018.

05-24-2019, 08:20 AM	#4
whswhs Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Lawrence, KS	Re: Low-powered campaigns It depends what kind of roleplaying you want to do. My lowest-powered campaign for GURPS 4/e was Worminghall, set in the medieval university town I described in that supplement. All the PCs were newly matriculated students at a university with a Faculty of Magic. They were 14 years old, or thereabouts. I worked through what was needed to create a plausible new student, and gave them just enough character points to customize a bit and be slightly above average students. That came to 75 points, allowing up to 112 points with disadvantages. I had five players who seemed to have a good time. Their characters were the youngest son of a landed knight; two Welsh cousins from a prosperous but non-noble landowning family; the bastard son of a servant by the nobleman she worked for; and an orphan raised by dragons, who had given him gold and sent him to learn human magic. We roleplayed the whole Harry Potter thing of boys from disparate backgrounds getting to know each other and becoming friends. This campaign did not have an overarching plot. It did have a number of adventurous subplots, including encounters with the Fair Folk, exploration of the abandoned dragon lair under the town (the dragon had been slain centuries ago, but still haunted the lair), and town/gown riots. But it also had character interaction subplots, such as one of the Welsh students discovering that another student in his class was actually a disguised magically gifted girl, or the emergence of a friendship between the knight's son and the servant's bastard son. In a lot of ways it was what the Germans call a Bildungsroman, a novel about growing up and forming one's adult identity. My campaigns vary in their focus a lot. But they always have a significant element of character interaction, conflict, and development; and such things are not dependent at all on a high point value. __________________ Bill Stoddard I don't think we're in Oz any more.

05-24-2019, 08:29 AM	#5
Gumby Bush Join Date: Oct 2010 Location: FL	Re: Low-powered campaigns Some of it has to do with what I find interesting. When I started with GURPS, I enjoyed making high-powered characters focused on combat, powers, and deception who I could imagine succeeding at anything their genre might throw at them. Over time, my interest has shifted towards the social and technical arenas: still built for deception and maybe some powers, but much more subtle, much less combat-oriented, more focused, and much more prone to failure. "Failing" in interesting ways is fun. More fun than succeeding, a lot of the time, since a success just means my plan went as intended, but a failure means I need to rethink things. __________________ Formerly known as fighting_gumby.

05-24-2019, 09:02 AM	#8
AlexanderHowl Join Date: Feb 2016	Re: Low-powered campaigns 100 CP is capable of producing a social monster if you want (combat monsters are much more expensive). Appearance (Handsome), Charisma 5, Status 1, Voice, and Wealth (Wealthy) costs 67 CP and creates a character that gets +10/+12 on most reaction rolls. The addition of Independent Income 5, Status 3, and Filthy Rich (+45 CP), creates a member of idle wealthy. With -50 CP in negative traits, that leaves 38 CP for skills, which is sufficient for a spoiled 19 year old adult. In a TL8 campaign, the character earns $100,000 a month and, while they are average in their attributes, everyone looks to them for leadership (their trust fund is around $100 million, assuming a monthly return of 0.1% after fees and taxes, since they are too untalented to manage their own money). They will attract legions of potential lovers and more than a few members of the upper class will attempt to marry them for their money if nothing else. Such a character would adventure out of boredom or due to eccentricity.

05-24-2019, 12:44 PM	#10
Mark Skarr Forum Pervert (If you have to ask . . .) Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Somewhere high up.	Re: Low-powered campaigns It depends on what the goal of the game is. If you’re not playing an over-the-top cinematic action game, or super-heroes, you’re probably playing “low-powered.” Not everyone likes to play games where the fate of the world hangs on every session. Sometimes, a very big story about very small people can be just as interesting. My GURPS BattleTech games have characters start at about 125 points. They’re soldiers, not super-soldiers. And each and every one of them is doing something that none of my players will ever get to do—pilot a giant, stompy robot! And, your “social monsters” fit perfectly in the setting—there’s even a term for them: Steiner Officers. (BattleTech players will get the reference. They’re not Locust pilots—those are the results of Weirdness Magnet.) “Low-Powered” games tend to revolve less around giant action set-pieces and more around character interaction and development. Think of a “low-powered” game as a comedy, rom-com, thriller or horror movie, and High-Powered games (like you enjoy) as summer blockbusters. Also, a lot of people enjoy historical role-playing games. It’s never been my cuppa, but to each their own. Others like hard sci-fi games. Again, not for me, but, it’s popular. Many like Wainscot settings, where everything starts out normal. Most of those tend toward the low-powered level. A lot of times, it’s less about the game being “low-powered” as a device, and more about the setting of the game being one less supportive of over-the-top point-bloated characters. But, sometimes the point is low-powered. A low-powered crime game could have the players start out as simple thugs and grow to control a crime family (ala Scarface). Some people like low-powered, gritty games, others like high-powered, over-the-top spectacle games. (Yes, you can do low-powered spectacle-games, and high-powered, over-the-top gritty games, they’re just rare. My ARK: Comedy Devolved game was a low-powered spectacle-game with 75 point characters.) I’ve known people who couldn’t get their heads inside the concept or allure of playing super heroes (we play a lot of supers games). Those people insisted that the only games that were any fun were low-powered, hard-reality, modern-day military games. A couple were genuinely at a loss to find that the other players were having way more fun in my (slightly silly) Supers game than their stern and stoic military game. But, at the end of the day, it depends on what you’re looking for. If you don’t enjoy playing low-powered games, then, by all means, play what you enjoy and don’t let anyone tell you you’re doing it wrong (unless someone’s being hurt, and even then, if it’s consensual, you do you). If you don’t understand how people could be having fun, then join one of those games and find out. But, be sure to go in with an open mind and be ready to be surprised.