[MH] A couple of questions
 

1. When a Lycanthrope takes on his animal form, how big is it? One of my players has a Were-eagle character, and I don't see anything that refers to any change in size for the shapechange leading me to guess he turns into a six-foot tall eagle! This can't be right, or is it?

2. Psionics. How does this even work? On of my players made a Psi and has mind wipe, mind reading, and telekinesis. I don't see anything that a player needs to roll to activate his ability (beside mind reading), so where do the talents come into play? Also, is there a way for a characters ability to reduce the resistance of a target in a way like you can take hits to your melee skill to reduce active defense?

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

Mechanically, it clearly is. None of the templates list an SM change. Which means very big eagles (considering how high their ST is, that kind of figures), and also rather small bears and tigers!

I'd guess the big weres not getting bigger is for simplicity, since the were-form would get then get its ST discounted. The eagle and wolf may have been left a bit on the big side because those are some crazy strong eagles and wolves and probably should be about man-sized.
Mindwipe requires a quick contest of will to use. That's a roll. You say mind reading requires a roll. Telekinesis doesn't require a roll to activate, but I think you'd be able to claim your psychokinesis talent to rolls to do things using the telekinesis.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

They can be whatever size you want, just set it at character creation. I assume from the information given that there is no change in SM for the examples.

Note, an SM 1 eagle has a 6 foot wingspan (which is not really that big for a fully grown eagle), it is not 6 feet from tail to beak!

Any ability who's basic set entry requires an attribute or skill roll, it still does and is aided by talent unless is is listed as enhanced with (Cosmic: No Die Roll Required).


If the ability requires a "to hit" roll, you might be able to make a deceptive attack...it depends.

If you have multiple attackers, you can coordinate your attacks. Each attacker after the first who hits gives the victim -2 to active defenses or -1 to resistance rolls against all of the attacks. (See Powers page 165)

And if it's a contested roll, the attacker can trade fatigue for skill to improve his odds (See Powers Page 161).

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

This was a design decision that the author made to keep things as simple as possible. Basically you keep your mass when you shift over, thus the SM stays whatever your SM is (e.g., SM 0).

Usually, you make attribute rolls or take maneuvers and then it does whatever the ability is supposed too. Talents add to attribute or skill rolls. Not usually no.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

But would still need to eat as much as a full grown tiger unless given reduced consumption. As well as needing equivalently heavy gear. SMs include a whole host of features that aren't necessarily obvious.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

And of course, if you want the shapechangers to take on different sizes, put the SM modifier in the template for those Alternate Forms.

As for talent/skill rolls, see the "Skills for Everyone" section in Powers. It's a fairly common requirement for settings to specify that all abilities have an associated skill. Other settings have abilities that are innate and "just work" -- often needing rolls against basic stats. (See the individual descriptions.) Talent helps with those.

If the character doesn't have a lot of abilities that require rolls, Talent may not be a great investment.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

These were characters made using the templates in Monster Hunters 1.

1. Regarding the size of the eagle... I'm pretty sure I saw birds in a GURPS books somewhere that were the size of an eagle and had a negative SM. I thought DF:Allies had an eagle in there, but it only has a Giant Eagle, described as having a 12' wingspan and is SM:0. If my players' character becomes an eagle with a 6' wingspan, then it should probably be SM:-1 or -2. I just want to know if the intent of the authors is for them to be large birds or if this was an accidental ommission (or something else).

2. Regarding Psionics:In this instance, there's no need for my player to have Psychokinesis Talent since his only power in that category is Telekinesis.
I see the Quick Contest of Will under Mindwipe now - I was an idiot for missing it before.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

I meant SM 0 not 1, oops, but you are correct that the SM 0 Giant Eagle has a 12 foot wingspan. Seems a little weird to me...

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

This was a hard decision, but in the end I made all lycanthropes SM 0 (large birds and small tigers) solely for the sake of simplicity. We get many FAQs about the SM rules; they throw a lot of new gamers. And since the GURPS Monster Hunters series is designed as a ready-to-play setup for people who find GURPS a little bit too complex and intimidating, I didn't want to force the GM to deal with PCs with changing SMs.

So yes, the were-eagle is large, as hinted at by its impressive ST! But not 6' tall -- its SM comes from its wingspan, not height as with a human. If it's flying high, this shouldn't be an issue. If it's just hanging out on the ground, most people will think, "Wow, I've never seen a wild eagle up close. I didn't realize how huge they were!" Experts (e.g., anyone with Animal Handling for birds or Veterinary) should get a roll to realize something is weird, as with any lycanthrope.

That's not true! PK Talent is awesome for TK, because it adds to every roll you make using the TK. If you want to grab someone using TK and Judo skill, your PK Talent adds to Judo for that roll!

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

Thanks for the detailed response!
So a bonus to all skills that could concievably be used via TK? So, a couple questions come to mind: when using TK, is it as if he only had one hand or two (TK) hands? Do range modifiers come into play if you're TK-wielding a sword from 15' away?
My player also discovered that he has sufficient TK lifting strength to lift himself though at X-heavy encumberance (TK level 10; he weighs 140) resulting in move 2. Is this fatiguing (TK does not cost fatigue in MH)? How high can he lift himself? Could he levitate across the grand canyon? I'm currently thinking about having a 20' maximum altitude since that's the range of his TK and I explain it as pushing against the ground. Sounds reasonable?

As for the large eagle, your explanation makes perfect sense - there would be confusion or at least a fact that would be easily forgotten, so I like the way it was done. As an aside, my player decided he'd rather be a Weretiger (is it supposed to hyphenated? Were-tiger?) thus making a large part of the conversation moot. Is there any type of clothing he can wear so that he won't be naked when he turns back into a human? Maybe signature gear or a schtick?

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

Lifting yourself with TK is a well-known possibility. I wouldn't impose a flight ceiling on it...TK does not play by Newton's Third Law. You can have a mouse standing on a sheet of paper lift a car with TK, so there's not a really compelling reason you can't just lift yourself without needing to reference anything else.

Fatigue should be whatever you'd normally impose for long-term exercise of the ability. I think Powers has some discussion of that? No charge for short-term use.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

If you require Psychology rolls to do tricky things with telepathic powers, then the Talent bonus should apply to those.

There may be IQ rolls in difficult-communication situations, i.e. if language is involved and one of the participants has less than Fluent. Again, the Telepathy/Psi Talent should add to the IQ roll for such purposes.

It's the same as with the Shapechanging advantage. There's no roll to use it, so in order to make Talent still be useful, the RAW says to apply it to rolls such as Acting, during the use of the advantage.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

No, a bonus to skills that you are using via your TK. If the skill roll is being made to see how well you can control your TK (e.g., to swing a sword or throw something), you should add your PK Talent.

Read the Telekinesis advantage; it explicitly gives you a "pair of hands."

They should, yes. It's only reasonable that it'd be harder to see what you're doing when fighting a foe 5 yards away than when you're fighting one at arm's reach.

Inherently, no. But if he's doing it for hours, it'd be only reasonable to charge him FP as if he were hiking.

There is normally no limit, as the TK's range is defined as range from you. But if you want to make that call as the GM, it's a perfectly reasonable one.

A perk would make sense for that, sure. Though personally, I'd charge one perk just for retaining some ragged clothing, and a second perk if you want the clothing to actually stay in perfect shape. :)

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

Adding "Absorptive Change (No Encumbrance), +5%" to the Alternate Form base advantage costs [0.75] and so a perk would be perfectly reasonable to retrofit AF with the enhancement. This'd allow them to absorb up to their basic lift in gear whenever they shift and then have it reappear unharmed when they shift back.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

Don't Talents specifically state that they don't effect combat skills?

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

Both Talents and Power Talents work with combat skills. Where are you seeing that which says they don't?

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

Not at all. It's just that most pre-made Talents don't, and the GM is recommended to keep a close eye on those that do. But this is a Power Talent, not a regular one. Power Talents add to all skills rolls associated with their Power, including opposed rolls for Maledictions and to-hit rolls for Innate attacks.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

I was thinking of the last sentence under Talents. It says GMs "ought to forbid Ninja Talent or Weapon Talent." Rereading it, I guess it doesn't say Talents can't effect combat skills. I just got that impression.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

That sentence is saying that the GM shouldn't allow unrealistically broad Talents, not Talents with skills useful in combat. In other words, the GM shouldn't let players build a 15/level Talent that encompasses 25 different useful Ninja skills -- that's too good of a deal and makes no sense as an inherent talent.

Several existing Talents include combat skills; see GURPS Power-Ups 3: Talents for a complete list.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

THe thing to remember with TK is it's utterly Non Newtonian. If you're thinking of TK "pushing against the ground" to lift you, you're "doing it wrong" - that's Newtons third law "When one body exerts a force on a second body, the second body simultaneously exerts a force equal in magnitude and opposite in direction to that of the first body."

The Third Law doesn't apply to TK at all - there is no first body to exert force upon you (the second body), or upon anything else. Your TK is a disembodied force in the most literal sense and requires no mass to act with.

If you dislike that (and it's a little brain-hurty-impossible so I can understand that) it might be easier to visualize the TK itself as the first body - it has some unstated invisible unmeasurable mass that is probably proportional to it's ST rating, and it exerts force through the "normal" methods but cannot be detected or interacted with by any means other than using anti-powers to "unhappen" it entirely.

That's also pretty impossible, so it comes down to which makes your brain hurt less.

I strongly recommend against the "TK applies force between two perfectly normal objects" model to get its effects, because creative players can use that to affect twice as many targets with the effect.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

SM0 is 6ft. Wingspan is (at least) twice your height. If the eagle has a 6ft spread, it would be SM-2.

Talent helps with any rolls; cripple checks, power blocks, etc.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

I didn't say it had a 6' wingspan. I said that its SM was not derived as a human's would be, and thus the statement about the eagle "being 6' tall" was incorrect. A SM 0 bird will have a wingspan between 10' and 12' across, but its actual body will vary -- it doesn't use the same proportions as a winged human would.

If we assume wingspan is about 3x the length of the bird (appropriate for some eagle species), we can envision a SM 0 were-eagle with a 10' wingspan and a body length of about 3.5'. Such an eagle would be extremely large, but not so large as to necessarily cause a panic. It would provoke the kind of responses I mentioned above.

Finally, I'd like to note that going to SM -1 and SM +1 were-animals will not break anything in a MH game; it will just add complication. In a world where some of the foes have nonzero SMs, having to also keep track of PCs shifting between different SMs was simply something I wished to avoid. If you and your players are experienced and like the extra crunch, go ahead and mix up the SMs for your lycanthropes.

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

Bumping that to 12' and 4' still gives us a relatively small being for SM 0, considering that 4.5' is the max of SM -1. Or would this eagle only be able to fit in spaces an SM 0 creature could? Makes me think this bird is pretty fat (considering the SM rule on p19).

(not that I require the bird to be of any size, I would just rather that, if the bird is supposed to be SM 0, that it follows the rules of being SM 0. If I wanted the bird to be smaller, I'd deal with the rules of SM -1)

Re: [MH] A couple of questions
 

Skill Talents as supernatural powers, e.g. as per the suggestions in GURPS Fantasy, ought to be able to range more widely.