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Old 04-02-2021, 03:32 PM   #3
Prince Charon
 
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Join Date: Dec 2012
Default Re: [Supers] A More Scientific Golden Age

Secondary and Unavailable Power Sources:

Secondary powers are special cases of the available powers above, and Unavailable is self-explanatory. Still, enough of them could arguably fit into either category that I've lumped them together. If you decide to use a Secondary power modifier that can fall under more than one of the above sources (as opposed to using the Secondary to describe a theme and just using one of the PMs above), remember to note which it is on your character sheet. Secondary powers that are described as special cases of Superscience are consistently power modifiers.
  • Chemical: A special case of Superscience; fairly common. Also called Biochemical, Pharmaceutical, Alchemical, or Herbal.
  • Cosmic: Does not appear to exist. (You can add Cosmic enhancements to other powers, but Cosmic as a power source seems to not apply to this setting.)
  • Divine: This worldline has no active deities, but does have powerful spirits that have been worshiped as or taken the form of traditional divine beings (so have powerful ancient aliens, and a very few modern humans or aliens who gained or have enough power for it to go their heads). Such spirits can (but very few do) grant powers similar to Divine Favor, generally with additional limitations (see for example 'Totem Spirits as Patrons' in this article), and the power modifier switched to 'Spirit, -10%.' More often, they grant a few less versatile abilities, with specifics depending on the spirit, and the recipients believing that their powers are divine. Some such powers may cause spiritual distortion, but others will not.
  • Electronic: A special case of Superscience, often accompanied by the Electrical disadvantage; rare, but more common among robots than other derivatives of Superscience.
  • Elemental: These abilities (which also include powers like Death, Illusion, Order, et cetra) mostly fall under Spirit, though some abilities may be Chi or Psionic instead; often written as a specific Element, e.g. 'Fire Elemental, -10%' or 'Chaos Elemental, -10%,' and frequently has the trappings of magic (see below). Uncommon.
  • Magical: This is a largely No Mana worldline (and thus 'Magic' or 'Magical' should never be used as power modifiers), but things that appear to be magic from the outside do exist. For example, it is quite difficult for mundane observers to distinguish between a Superscience Gadgeteer who is an adventuring stage magician, a Chi Adept who is a part-time stage magician, and an adventuring magic-user with 'stage magic'-themed powers. There are enough relatively common 'magic' emulations that I'm listing them separately. Less common than the main power source of any specific 'magic' imitation.
  • Mechanical: A special case of Superscience; rare, most often found among automatons of the Victorian era or older (most of which also have powers from other sources helping them to function or think - mostly Psionic, Spirit, or even Chi), like Boilerplate.
  • Moral: Does not exist. Absolute morality is not part of this setting. Some spirits will act like Moral power sources, representing the morals of a specific society or faith (which should be noted on the character sheet), but this should still just be written as 'Spirit, -10%' (and may also have 'Corrupting, -20%,' even if Spirits of 'Good' cause a different sort of spiritual distortion than Spirits of 'Evil'); rare.
  • Mutant: A special case of Biological (individuals born with genetic abnormalities that neither parent possessed genes for, and were not intentionally created); cause of some Psionic abilities (though they should still have a psi-related limitation, rather than Mutant); rare.
  • Nanotech: A special case of Superscience (almost always alien in this era); very rare.
  • Nature: This is mostly a special case of Spirit or Chi; some Nature spirits are alien enough to humanity that powers gained from them may make the user's mind (or even body) less human-like over time; uncommon.
  • Physiological: A special case of Biological worth +0% (abilities granted by anatomical changes that normally cannot be affected by Biological Neutralize abilities); uncommon. Sometimes called Mutated Biology or Passive Biological.
  • Sex: If you want to run that sort of game in basically this setting, the Sex power would most likely be a special case of either Biological, Chi, Pulp, or Savant, or possibly Spirit; how common or rare it is depends on the kind of game you're running, more so than the others on this list.
  • Super: Does not exist as a separate Power; most abilities that would be listed as Super should instead fall under Biological, Psionic, or Superscience.

Common 'magic' emulations:
  • Spells from GURPS Magic and such, in the form of Cinematic Skills; these skills would have a Chi Talent, if any, substituting for Magery levels, and would generally have few prerequisites (or none at all) beyond Trained by a Master, Weapon Master, or the equivalent. Depending on the GM, these 'spells' might be powered by Energy Reserve (Chi), instead of FP; alternatively, energy cost might be replaced by Margin of Success. They are often not based on IQ, but as this is just 'how you were trained' and 'how these skills work,' there's no need for perks to adjust the skill's Attribute. (Chi)
  • Path/Book Psi Powers, generally as Energy Accumulating styles. (Psionic)
  • Spirit-based forms of Path/Book Magic or Symbol Drawing - in both cases, replace the Magery Talent with Spirit Control Talent (or something similar), and Magery 0 with some variant of Channeling, Medium, or Spirit Empathy, or with a spirit as a Patron, Ally, or possibly Contact, or several spirit Allies or Contacts. (Spirit)
  • Spirit-based Modular Abilities limited to Summonable Allies (similar to the Modular Allies in 'Spirit Magic' as a psi ability, but based on 'Spirit, -10%,' rather than 'Astral Progection, -10%') or Contacts. (Spirit)
  • Spells from GURPS Magic and such as Spirit-Assisted Magic. This has the highest risk of spiritual distortion of any 'magic' imitation. (Spirit)
  • Magic-themed Gadgets (e.g an Invisibility Field Generator in the shape of a cloak, or a Lightning Manipulator in the shape of a wood-veneer staff), and/or Gadgeteer with odd limitations (e.g. 'One Skill Only: Pharmacy (Herbal),' or 'Focused: Stage Magic'). (Superscience)
  • Sets of Alternative Abilities with a 'magic' theme (including non-magical variants of Sorcery) or related limitations (e.g. Nuisance Effects like 'Must speak and gesture' or 'Must display runes,' or a required skill roll in something like Occultism or Symbol Drawing). (Can fit nearly any power source, depending on how you design the abilities - though Pulp would be rather odd, and Biological only slightly less so.)


Thoughts?
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Five Earths, All in a Row. Updated 12/17/2022: Apocrypha: Bridges out of Time, Part I has been posted.

Last edited by Prince Charon; 07-30-2021 at 05:39 PM.
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