Are Powers Overpriced?

[dataweaver]

There's this thing called a “concealed weapon permit”.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by dataweaver

There's this thing called a “concealed weapon permit”.

A super who has LEP doesn't need that. He might not have a secret I.D. either. It'd be on file with the Police and the secret's not worth any more than their information security then.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by dataweaver

There's this thing called a “concealed weapon permit”.

That makes it legal for you to carry a gun. It doesn't mean people won't look at you and say "Hey, that guys wearing a gun."

[dataweaver]

Fair enough. The point is that the “effectively armed while in your secret identity” thing isn't unique to having the Innate Attack, and isn't really that big of a deal anyway: the aforementioned cop could easily have a concealed weapon permit and carry around a gun in his civilian identity, and it doesn't strike me that such a benefit would be worth more than a one-point Perk, if even that: it may well be folded into his Legal Enforcement Powers or his Patron (the police force), etc. It certainly doesn't explain the cost differential between the cop's gun and the super's Innate Attack.

[AlexanderHowl]

The GM can take away the gun under a number of circumstances (and, if it is not protected by Signature Gear, destroy or steal it without compensating the character). The majority of abilities can only be countered under specific circumstances and/or with other abilities.

What becomes really interesting is if you have abilities in a TL9+ setting. In that type of setting, most supers will probably use mundane equipment because it would really make no sense to ignore it. So you would get supers wearing flying powered combat armor or using sniper rifles.

[dataweaver]

The circumstances under which an Innate Attack can be taken away aren't necessarily all that uncommon; it's just a matter of whether the GM wants to do it. Same with the gun.

On your second point: it's relative. For example: why doesn't Superman wear a bulletproof vest? Because anything that could hurt him would rip through the best like it was bath tissue. As well, there's the genre convention: in such a setting, I'd probably introduce a Quirk along the lines of “relies on his own powers instead of gear”. But even that would only work if the point cost of the abilities was low enough to make it worthwhile (or, as with my sig, you don't worry about point values; but that's not what this thread is about).

So that gets back to repricing abilities with the point cost of comparable Signature Gear in mind.

[AlexanderHowl]

But repricing abilities by Signature Gear runs into the problem of violating the universality of the GURPS system. Abilities cost what they do regardless of the TL of the setting because the TL of the setting can change quite dramatically, which is why it is better for supers to purchase gear that complements their abilities rather than just taking gear or just taking abilities (though that does depend on character concept). Even the gods of legend use gear that, while created from strange and unusual components, tends to use recognizable methods for its production.

[dataweaver]

And that's what happens when you insist that the point accounting is more important than the character concept.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

Originally Posted by dataweaver

And that's what happens when you insist that the point accounting is more important than the character concept.

Though sometimes the point-accounting is so that one can achieve character concept. Within a given point-budget.

[dataweaver]

Sometimes. Other times it flat-out kills concepts.