[Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Quadriplegic

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by ericthered

or they simply don't have a ST score and so get no points back

There's not really such a thing. Characters with 'no ST' actually have ST0 (e.g. some air elementals); [spiritual or infomorph] possessors have unmodified ST and take on the ST of the host body [including the ST0 computer]; etc.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

There's not really such a thing. Characters with 'no ST' actually have ST0 (e.g. some air elementals); possessors have unmodified ST and take on the ST of the host body; etc.

Gurps is funny about that. Most of the time, I'm using the possessor option. Brains in jars are fond of that, even if its just possessing robot vehicles.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

possessors have unmodified ST and take on the ST of the host body
[including the ST0 computer]; etc.

Wouldn't the reason for not buying down your ST because you want to be able to return to your original body?

That or being a ghost with the 'spiritual' modifier on Possession, meaning you actually have a body within a body with its own separate HP and abilities which can be targeted in some special ways.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Plane

Wouldn't the reason for not buying down your ST because you want to be able to return to your original body?

Not always, not even usually, and its the least of reasons not to allow buying down ST for serial possessors.

In the case of software that can use different shells to walk, roll, or fly around in, they don't have an original body. In other cases, the brain's "Jar" is as much of a body as they've ever had, but its almost always seen in a vehicle or piloting something remotely. They don't want their original body, because its awful.

They don't get points for buying down their strength because the GM rolls their eyes and tells them that 95% of the time they'll be in a big strong robot shell and the other 5% of the time its because its actually better to be something that fits in air vents, and that's not a disadvantage.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by ericthered

They don't get points for buying down their strength because the GM rolls their eyes and tells them that 95% of the time they'll be in a big strong robot shell and the other 5% of the time its because its actually better to be something that fits in air vents, and that's not a disadvantage.

Or they just pilot a Roomba for one session and they're still happy with it!


Hey, that Roomba was a brave little vacuum.

(why yes I am ignoring the other cleaning bots and the combat bots I was also piloting)

[Pursuivant]

I've never used Quadriplegic for PCs or NPCs.

I consider it to be one of the most useless and problematic disadvantages in the game.

First, it's redundant with No Manipulators + Lame (Paraplegic) or No Legs (Sessile) and its description says as much.

Second, it completely fails to model the real world limitations of an actual quadriplegic. Realistically, a neck-down quadriplegic is going to have Lame (Paraplegic), Maintenance (7+ man-hours a week, Professional Skill (Nursing or Physical Therapist) and/or Physician), No Manipulators (Enhancement: Two useless arms, +10%); Numb (Limitation: No on head, -20%), Odious Personal Habit (Incontinent), Susceptibility (Skin and Respiratory Infections), Unfit or Very Unfit, reduced ST and HT due to muscular atrophy, and possibly Dependency (Supplemental Oxygen) and/or Restricted Vision (No Peripheral Vision).

From a gaming point of view, there's every incentive for a quadriplegic character to buy down ST, DX, and/or Basic Speed since they're largely useless for them and pile everything into mental advantages and IQ- and Will-based skills. That's good for your stereotypical Brain In A Jar or Great Mind In a Weak Body character but it essentially gives you double the point value for the same problem.

Buying Quadriplegic [-80], ST: 6 [-40]; DX: 6 [-120] gives you 240 character points to play with. Buy HP back up to 10 [20] and an Ally Group (25% of character points, 10 people, 15-) [18] to carry or push you around and you've got an effective character. Boost IQ to 15 [100] and you've still got 102 character points to spend.

In a SF or Fantasy game, get rid of the Ally Group [-18], and buy Flight (Limitation: Power Limitation, -10%) [36], and Telekinesis 12 (Enhancement: Cosmic (Can IQ for DX rolls), +50%. Limitation: Power Limitation, -10%) [84] and you're back at net 0 character points, but with advantages that nullify most of the game effects of Quadriplegic and a super-genius IQ.

Alternately, keep the Ally Group, drop Flight, and buy levels of DR with the Force Field enhancement and/or drop Telekinesis and add Possession.

The fix for this disad is to call it something other than Quadriplegic and for it to specify that your ST, DX, and Basic Speed are fixed attributes which you can't fiddle with.

[RogerBW]

I don't think there's any benefit to having package disadvantages like this. If they're used often enough to make it useful to pre-calculate them, they can be made templates or lenses, and not clog up the disadvantage listing.

[Michael Cule]

Only ever once.

It was back in the days of third edition when I was running a GURPS TEKUMEL game.

The magic system in EPT/SWORDS AND GLORY was proving hard to hack but I found I could port Psionics in and as 'Psychic Magic' was and is a thing in Tekumel I could use it pretty much as was and give the PCs (who were a clan of refugees newly landed and stuck in the foreigners' quarter as per the WELCOME TO JAKALLA scenario that got published in The Eye of All Seeing Wonder) psychic magic as their advantage over the locals.

One player who was (and is) a bit of a mini-maxer chose to be the junior shaman of the clan and to acquire a large level of psychic power by taking this one huge disadvantage.

It lasted until he ended up propped against a wall in the Underworld while he went and possesed the body of a nearby Tsolyani thug. His clansmen and comrades (being PCs) didn't leave anyone to guard his body and...

Well, we wound up the campaign with him being about two hundred and fifty points in Character Point Debt as he tried to pay off having both immense Psychic Gifts and a healthy body.

Didn't ever allow that sort of thing again. You live and learn.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Or they just pilot a Roomba for one session and they're still happy with it!

Yeah, I remember that character. In descriptive terms, she was quadriplegic, with her body stuck on life support somewhere. You probably could have made a case for the quadriplegic limitation with a -80% mitigator on it, given that I stuck bad guys in your building. But that would have been a mere [-16] points.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by ericthered

Not always, not even usually, and its the least of reasons not to allow buying down ST for serial possessors.

In the case of software that can use different shells to walk, roll, or fly around in, they don't have an original body. In other cases, the brain's "Jar" is as much of a body as they've ever had, but its almost always seen in a vehicle or piloting something remotely. They don't want their original body, because its awful.

They don't get points for buying down their strength because the GM rolls their eyes and tells them that 95% of the time they'll be in a big strong robot shell

If you have regular access to that shell then wouldn't you need to buy it as an Ally/Minion?

So you would be paying for the ST, but just in the cheap way that you can buy a ST30 truck ally that's sometimes available for much cheaper than it would be to buy ST30 for yourself that's always available.

Originally Posted by ericthered

and the other 5% of the time its because its actually better to be something that fits in air vents, and that's not a disadvantage.

You can have any amount of HP at any size though, so being a 10 HP brain in a vent is better than being a 1 HP brain in a vent :)

Well except for falling damage... but the upside to being less likely to take 0 damage from a fall is being more likely to cause more than 0 damage to someone you fall on.