Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

I am running an Ultra tech game. Once again.

I have a pc that wants to be a cyborg robot. But, as ultratech robot bodies are ridiculously expensive point wise, his character wound up being next to useless when stated out thanks to the massive point sink that was the robot body, (some 150 almost) out of the 200/-75 allowed.

None of that is really the problem though.

But we had an idea.

Build the body as an ally. And the character as a brain in a jar.

The body want that bad to make. 14s in all basic attributes, 0 for iq. The standard robot advantages etc.

Came out to an even 100 points. Which is only an ally built on 50%. X4 for constantly there, and of course special abilities would apply since it gices said brain in a jar abilities he wouldnt normally have eg. Walking and talking etc.

Now. My question. Is with the character, being a St 0, Dx 0 thats -300cp.

Now how does one stat the unusual background. As was stated. -300cp is a metric crapload of points.

How should one price it?

I was thinkin of pricing it at the 300 at least. But i dont know.

I seek advice from the collective, whose experience is greater than mine.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

I assume he is planning to have Possession (Digital) and Puppet. One question should be: Why is he expecting a discount for having a ST 0, DX 0 corpse he can occupy if he, for some reason, wants to? As is, what you've got is a robot PC that can survive the death of his primary body. That he emotionally identifies with the backup server is irrelevant, even if the backup server is made of meat.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

Which is the easiest way to build it. The robot has awesome stats and other Advantages? (Built-in DR, Immunity to Metabolic Hazards, Doesn't Sleep, Doesn't Eat, etc...) Why should the player not pay for all of those? It costs what it costs. If the cost is too high, that perhaps is an indication that the player has his sights set too high for the campaign point budget, and needs a less awesome and powerful robot body to fit in with the other characters.

Yes, expensive meta-traits mean that the PC comes up short in personalized Advantages and skills compared to players that didn't sink all their points into a powerful base package. In fantasy, this shows up as the supposedly awesome immortal elves (like Tolkien Noldor) having no actual skills once they pay for all their baseline Unaging, +IQ, +DX, +Magery, etc -- so the supposed superior race actually shows as relatively incompetent in game. Or, for that matter, the similarly incompetent trolls/ogres that have to cough up points for their ST 30 and HP 30 and DR, etc. But at least no one expects them to do more than Hulk smash.

At 150 points, note the similarity with Unkillable 3, also 150 points. If the "PC" robot body is destroyed, the PC becomes incorporal and unattackable, and reappears in a location of the GM's choosing. In this case, the fluff is that the brain goes back to the brain in a jar and waits until there's a new robot body built -- or, of course, the wily player will already have some backups ready to go. In this case, the "healing" time gets called the "download and imprinting" time.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

Note that the brain in a jar is itself a weak point. It has to be within a couple hundred light-miliseconds with a reliable connection or else suffer from what's effectively a serious DX penalty, Klutz, and any number of other disadvantages to represent lag. Do you have a geostationary-capable spaceship to put your brain in?

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

Is it just a basic brain running the robot with brain impulses or like Krang from the TMNT cartoon?

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

[QUOHe's not an RyanW;2170654]I assume he is planning to have Possession (Digital) and Puppet. One question should be: Why is he expecting a discount for having a ST 0, DX 0 corpse he can occupy if he, for some reason, wants to? As is, what you've got is a robot PC that can survive the death of his primary body. That he emotionally identifies with the backup server is irrelevant, even if the backup server is made of meat.[/QUOTE]

No. He has no reason to have possession. He is not an artificial intelegence. He is a brain in a jar with no ability to interact with the outside world in anyway without help.

why a discount should be given? Because he has st0 and dx0?

As for a backup server? It's not. It's a brain. In a jar. That can be targeted and attacked etc. If it dies. So does the robot since it's just an empty shell.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

[QUOTE=Jaware;2170669]If the robot is an empty shell, controlled by the brain in a jar, how does the brain control the robot? The usual advantage for that is Possession (Digital). If the robot were self-aware and self-directed, it might be an Ally. (Though I'd be dubious about a build that relies on the "main" character being immobile and ineffective just to throw more points into an Ally thanks to the divider.) But then the brain might as well be ignored; the robot isn't an empty shell, but the active character.

So I don't understand what you're really going for.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

If he doesn't have Possession, how is he controlling the robot body? If he's just giving it orders, the body should not have IQ 0, as that will make it incapable of following them. If he's controlling the body via controls, it will use his DX for things like attacks, which means he shouldn't have DX 0 himself. Only Possession will allow him to use the robot body's physical stats as though they were his own. And Possession suggests that you should buy the most expensive body you can regularly possess as if it were the character's "real" body anyway.

Basically, I'm in agreement with Anaraxes here - this seems to be trying to do an end-run around the cost of getting all the advantages of a robot body, and it's likely to end up broken. If someone wants to be a brain in a super-cool robot body, they'd better expect to pay the points for that. It's not fair to the other players that they have to pay full cost for all their cool abilities while the cyborg character gets to use a point crock to get a bunch of stuff and high mental attributes and skills and all that.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

So he's paying a bunch of points to have an NPC friend who hangs out with people he will never interact with.

Another theoretical way to do it is to give the ally Compartmentalized Mind (Controls) and both of them some form of Telecommunications, with at least the Video if not the Sensie enhancement. It would be no more reliable than the form of communication chosen. Having the "I can't hear you. I'm going through a tunnel," conversation with someone in the tunnel with you would be fun.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

[QUOTE=Anaraxes;2170677]Its a cyborg. So the "brain in a jar" is a "brain case" from ultratech.

It goes in the robot body (payload) and the robot has compartmentalized mind(controls). It makes the required computer one size smaller, eg a personal computer becomes a small computer, and a braincase is inserted.

The basic set states its up to the GM to determine what costs points and cash in his campain. This should cost points. As its essentially a character.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

I agree with thw others. Built him as a normal cyborg/robot character. That is what he is. That is what he should pay for.

However! You do not have to follow the robot templates from Ultra-tech. Maybe his robotic body is less sophisticated, more frail or simply weaker. (Less dx, dr and st). If he want to have a strong robot body, ofcourse he have to pay for it.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

If he'll never be rolling against that DX 0 or using his ST 0, they're not actually disadvantages and aren't worth any points.

For the Ally, it has come up before that an Ally with Controls who is really just an extension of the character is a point crock. For example, an Ally built on 50% of a PC's points [2], appearing all the time (x4) and with Special Abilities (+50%) costs just 12 pts for what is, effectively, a 50% point increase in the PC's abilities. To be fair, you should offer all the other players a 12-point "supersuit", or require the player to pay the points for the robot body he expects to inhabit 24/7, and which is his actual character.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

How about transhuman space's bio-shells?

These are more or less like cyborgs. The "algonaut" template has bladerunner-esque features and abilities; moreover, surely you can adjust them to your liking (for example, removing low pain threshold). The brain in a jar could be a 0 point feature if you are not planning to move to another body, and if you wish to do so... perhaps you could buy possession and so on.

The algonaut template is around 110-150 cp.

By the way, this template is in "Transhuman Space - Deep Beyond".

- Hide

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

Going back to the OP. if the problem was that the Ultra-tech robots had a lot of points spent on features that you weren't using, then simply remove those traits and/or add disadvantages such as Maintenence and you can spend some points on skills like you wanted.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

He has one reason to have Possession, namely that he possesses a robot body. It would have major limitations, such as Accessibility to represent being only able to possess certain kinds of body - Puppets, or Nuisance Effect to represent needing to be physically plugged in with help (presumably skilled help) from others.

Overall, I'd consider it Possession at -80%.

I was going to say he doesn't have ST 0 & DX 0. Or rather, either you have Possession to represent being able to pilot/direct a robot body, or you have ST & DX because the robot body is your body.

However, I think you've handled it fairly.

Unusual Background [300] removes the problem of all the free points from ST/DX 0.

Special Abilities is a valid way of handling the body, accounting for the "free points" from IQ 0. I would have given the body Unusual Background instead, but this works too.

Any other cost from Unusual Background is usually based on the idea that your character has a resource that other people don't have access to and can't prepare themselves against. For example, being a wizard and able to use spells in a world where other people can't use spells against you and are largely unable to develop countermeasures against you.

How far does that apply to Brain In A Jar? If robotics are integrated into the setting's technology, then just cancelling out the ST/DX free points is cost enough for Unusual Background. I wouldn't charge anything extra.

Another thing worth noting is the brain still requires nutrients and oxygen, so a brain-in-jar will probably still require everything an organic being does.

Re: Robot body built as an ally to a brain in a jar questions.
 

-10 ST (mitigator: Robot Body, easily replaceable, sturdy -80%): -20 pts
-10 DX (mitigator: Robot Body, easily replaceable, sturdy -80%): -40 pts
Don’t forget advantages like no vitals, no eyes, and disadvatages like no legs, no arms, mute, all with the same mitigator. And then buy the robot body as signature gear (points).

I’m not fond of this build; I’d suggest just making a robot character with points and saying it has an organic brain (remove reprogrammable, digital mind, et al).