DF4: Power-Ups?

[dataweaver]

I just acquired most of the DF series; I got DF1 and DF3 in order to get full context for DF4 - nice bit of marketing there, BTW.

Anyway, reading through it, I noticed that DF4 appears to be lacking in Power-Ups for its classes. Was this an oversight, or was it intentional? If it was an oversight, what would be your suggestions for Artificer and Scholar Power-Ups?

[sjmdw45]

Hmmm. [scratches chin] Higher TL for Artificer? Some suitably-modified variant of Snatcher to instantly create ANYTHING from the materials at hand (i.e. not limited by weight like Gizmos are)?

I'm not really sure about Scholars.

-Max

[demonsbane]

I just came with the same doubts today.

I thought one of the real powerups (beyond more levels of Book Learned Wisdom) of the Scholar is "acquiring other delver templates" for combining Scholarship with Smiting Power and such. But I'm not extremely sure about this.

[Kromm]

The main power-ups for artificers and scholars are open-ended amounts of their core abilities (Gizmos for artificers, Book-Learned Wisdom and Wild Talent for scholars). I did think about other things, but most of it seemed a lot like goofy ". . . with a cherry on top" stuff, really. I guess "stupidly high IQ" is fair, if obvious. Although I personally find steampunk silly in fantasy, I could also see letting the artificer buy High TL to raise his TL from 3 to 3+1 or 3+2, and then learn TL(3+1) and TL(3+2) skills that give access to a world of new stuff.

[Kromm]

Yeah, thinking about it more, I could see divergent tech being a good area for artificer power-ups. I think the divergence needs to come from alchemy, magical materials, spells, etc., rather than from mad science per se, but it does seem workable. Of course, that would fill 32 pages all by itself, really.

[dataweaver]

:nod: I'd wager that the rule of thumb for remaining in-genre would be whether or not the gadget in question would require a whole new skill to operate: crossbows that draw their own bolts are one thing, but fire-powder guns are quite another. The former is operated using the Crossbow skill, while the latter would require the introduction of the Guns skill. (Likewise with bows that cast a limited Might on their wielder.)

Keeping it "in-genre" in this respect would have the added benefit that you wouldn't need to tweak other templates in order for them to use advanced gadgets: if they can use a mundane crossbow, they can use a self-loading one as well.

[El Guapo]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Yeah, thinking about it more, I could see divergent tech being a good area for artificer power-ups. I think the divergence needs to come from alchemy, magical materials, spells, etc., rather than from mad science per se, but it does seem workable. Of course, that would fill 32 pages all by itself, really.

The next 32 pages, perhaps? I'd buy it. Then again, you could probably publish something called "Kromm gets drunk and scribbles on a napkin" and I'd probably end up buying that, too. So do we get any teasers on what to expect from DF: 5?

[Captain-Captain]

TL 3+2 Gravitas powder. When sprinkled on a stone and shoved, the stone flies at very high speed in the direction provided. Aftificers have learned to load the stones (stoneshaped to a uniform diameter) into straight tubes (usually made of stout would that can easilyt be taken apart an reassebled where desired.

Sholars believ giving the front end of the stone a bit of a point will make them do a better job of penetrating a ship's hull.