How to price/buy abilities within Powers?

[DarthDude]

I try to wrap my head around the concept of creating and buying powers in the Powers book.

First, here is what I believe I understand so far. Please correct me, if I'm wrong.
- I understand the idea of source and focus, I think this part is a nobrainer.
- I also understand that a power contains a collection of thematically related abilities, which are in fact advantages but named "abilities" of a power.
- Every power also has a talent you can purchase up to four levels which provides the ability roll or skill roll (depending on the advantage) with an +1/level bonus.

Now here's what I struggle with and this is mainly about the pricing of the abilities within a power.
Talents cost from 5 to 15 pts per level, I get that. But I guess purchasing only the talent won't grant me automatically all abilities of that power and I have to buy each talent separately? The only modifier decreasing the cost would be the Power Modifier which is mostly -10% based on the source (source magic equal power modifier magic)?
If that is the case, why wouldn't I buy the advantages separately instead of as a collection under the umbrella of a power?

[whswhs]

Purchasing only the Talent gives you none of the abilities at all. You have to buy each ability separately.

There is a trick for making this cheaper: If you can't use two or more abilities simultaneously, but only one at a time, you pay full price for the most expensive, and one-fifth price for the alternative abilities.

There are two basic strategies for building up a power. One is to start with only the Talent, and accumulate points until you can afford the first ability, which lets you discover what the Talent was FOR. The other is to start with only an ability or two, and then acquire the Talent, and then acquire more abilities.

Of course you're perfectly free to build a super who has already gotten to the stage of having both the Talent and one or more abilities . . .

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by DarthDude

I try to wrap my head around the concept of creating and buying powers in the Powers book.

Now here's what I struggle with and this is mainly about the pricing of the abilities within a power.
Talents cost from 5 to 15 pts per level, I get that. But I guess purchasing only the talent won't grant me automatically all abilities of that power and I have to buy each talent separately? The only modifier decreasing the cost would be the Power Modifier which is mostly -10% based on the source (source magic equal power modifier magic)?
If that is the case, why wouldn't I buy the advantages separately instead of as a collection under the umbrella of a power?

A "Power" is really a set of abilities with the same "special effect", focus, or theme.
You buy each ability within the power that you desire, some maybe as alternate abilities of each other. The Talent applies to ALL abilities within the appropriate power though. It is also always 5 points unless it does somethings outside the power and normally does not apply to skills.
The Talent also counts as sort of a UB that lets you later buy abilities in the power rather than having to start with them.

[ericthered]

I can think of three reasons to buy abilities as powers:

• Because the power talent is a great deal if you need high skills on multiple abilities. For example, if you have mind control, mind reading, and mind probe.
• Because -10% is a pretty nice discount and in most cases it doesn't matter. In cases where it does, its usually some nice flavor. Sometimes, it even makes the ability stronger.
• Because you can't buy the ability without the power. In most Gurps games, you have to justify buying exotic abilities. Most of the time, you don't get to buy healing without a power. You buy it because you have divinely powered healing, or psionic healing, or magical healing.

Those are the three main reasons I see my players put their abilities in powers.

[Anaraxes]

The main point of all the text about "power" and "focus" is just to give a theme to your abilities. Most high-powered characters have such a theme; think supers, or magic colleges. But in Powers, that's more fluff than mechanic.

The Power Modifier is a way to help define common traits that all abilities of a given power should have to make it seem like that power. Maybe magic costs mana, so you need the Costs ER trait on all spells. Rather than put that trait on each and every spell you ever create, you put that common requirement into the PM. Note that while all the PMs in Powers have the same PM value of -10%, that's just for convenience for the authors in building that large catalog of pre-defined abilities. If all powers are PM -10%, then the cost of those abilities in the book don't have to be recalculated when you pick them up for different abilities. If you're building everything yourself, then the PMs can be whatever you want.

The PM also serves as the definition of what abilities are what sort of power. If you have a setting that's got more than one kind of juju -- "magic" and "psionics", say, or "mutant power" vs "advanced tech" -- then when someone casts Dispel Magic or Detect Mutant, the question immediately arises "does that ability affect me/my ability?" The PM is an easy way to answer that question immediately; Dispel Magic affects all abilities with the Magic PM. Detect Mutant pings on any one with any ability with the Mutant PM. If all abilities of all characters are one-off wild traits, then it becomes harder to answer those sorts of questions.

A Talent is just a skill bonus, in this case for all abilities of a certain power. Here again, "is this ability benefitted by this Talent" is easily defined by looking at PMs. But mechanically, Power Talents are just like other GURPS Talents. They give you skill bonuses if you happen to have the skills that are covered by the Talent definition. Talents don't directly give you any skills themselves.

The value of a Power Talent depends on how many of your abilities actually need skill rolls. Some Advantages call for rolls in their descriptions, but it's also common for a setting to have a rule that all abilities must have a skill roll. See the "Skills for Everyone" section in Powers, or look at the Psi Powers supplement for a worked example of an entire system of abilities, all of which have skills. Mechanically, you can just add Requires (Attr) Roll to all abilities. Depending on the setting, those may be unique skills for each ability, or there may be some groups of abilities that share a skill.

"Abilities" are the things that let you do things. They're traits that are built on an Advantage or Advantages, plus Enhancements and Limitations necessary to get the ability to behave the way it's envisioned. The concept is the important guide here, not the mechanics. Mechanically, you can slap any Advantages together with any modifiers you feel like. But that would be an incoherent mess if done at random. You probably have some specific goal for a character concept that describes (in plain English) what the character is supposed to be able to do, whether that's "talk with animals" or "run at the speed of sound" or "edit reality on a whim".

Recall the "GURPS is a toolkit" slogan. Powers isn't a system that's meant to give you a bunch of pre-cooked abilities that define some common setting presumed for all games, as are (say) D&D Feats. It's a framework for organizing the way you go about creating powers and abilities that flesh out and add mechanical support for the setting and powers you want for your games. So, the actual mechanics can seem a bit abstract, as they have to sidestep questions that are answered by those setting concepts, and cover a wide variety of possible answers.

I've already recommended Psi Powers just as a study guide, even if aren't interested in "psionics" per se. It has "Under the Hood" sections that tell you how everything was built to reach a desired effect, and so can be useful just to study. Sorcery is another such case. You may not want that kind of magic, but it can be instructive to see the choices that were made to pick and choose rules that results in the particular end goal that the author started with.

[DarthDude]

Thank you very much for your responses, they are very insightful!

As I want to use powers as a magic alternative, I found Skills for Everyone very appealing as those "spells" (in fact abilities) would need training or special combat moves for warriors also needing dedication and training.

Alternative Abilities is also another very intriguing aspect. Can I use Alternative Abilities and "normal" abilities within the same power as a mix or must it either be all Alternative Abilities or none?
Also would I have to take different characteristics of an advantage multiple times or can I combine it dynamically in one (or one Alternative Abilities)?
For instance I want to create a Raise Undead power and within this power I would want to be able to either rise one powerful undead with 150% or 10 medium powerful 75% undead or 50 low 25% undead? Maybe I also wanted to be able to raise a mix of those 3 options? How could I realize this within a power/ability?

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by DarthDude

Alternative Abilities is also another very intriguing aspect. Can I use Alternative Abilities and "normal" abilities within the same power as a mix or must it either be all Alternative Abilities or none?
Also would I have to take different characteristics of an advantage multiple times or can I combine it dynamically in one (or one Alternative Abilities)?
For instance I want to create a Raise Undead power and within this power I would want to be able to either rise one powerful undead with 150% or 10 medium powerful 75% undead or 50 low 25% undead? Maybe I also wanted to be able to raise a mix of those 3 options? How could I realize this within a power/ability?

Yes you can have some abilities as alternative abilities and others not.
Different ways to have multiple effects for an ability include...
Power Stunts (GURPS Powers). GURPS Psionics is a good worked example of this.
Selectivity and Variable Effect let you have a lot of play, something else is Alternative Enhancements (Power-ups Enhancements).
The Ally build though probably has to be built as alternative abilities if you want to be RAW. So Power Stunt for a mix if not going to do it often or you dont care about spending the FP when you do it. Build as alternative abilities if you want to do it reliably (no roll) and with no FP cost.

[DarthDude]

Thank you very much, Selectivity and Alternative Abilities really sound like what I'm looking for.
I was thinking of using powers as magic "schools" in a Conan game as it fits that sword & sorcery setting way better than the spell lists and to be honest I like the flexibility of magic as powers in general way more. And if you get used to create powers it works very fast as well. And very elegantly. The rumors of Gurps being overly complicated are not deserved. Show me another generic system where you can create every power you desire with such ease.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by DarthDude

Thank you very much, Selectivity and Alternative Abilities really sound like what I'm looking for.

As another note about Alternative Abilities (AA), you can mix things up a bit (or represent your character gaining control over their powers) such that you can use more than one ability in an AA set at a time by paying for the 2 (or 3, or 4, or whatever) most expensive abilities. Say you've got a telekinetic character with 5 abilities - Flight, a force field (DR with Force Field), a "Force Push" (ranged crushing innate attack, probably with double knockback and maybe cone and no wounding/no blunt trauma), a summonable "sword" made of thin force fields (a melee cutting innate attack), and general purpose Telekinesis - all as part of an AA set. If you pay full price for the most expensive, and 1/5th price for the others, you can only use one at a time. If you pay full price for the two most expensive and 1/5th price for the others, you can use any two at a time - so you can fly and have a force field, or fly and have a sword, or have a force field and be able to remotely manipulate objects using TK, or whatever. If you pay full price for the three most expensive and 1/5th price for the others, you can use any three at a time - typically this will mean constant access to flight and the force field while swapping out the Force Push, blade, and TK, but you might also have a case where you want to have a force field and have your blade out (for Parrying enemy attacks) while you're manipulating something distant with your TK.

As noted, starting with the ability to use just one at a time, then gaining the ability to boost this to two or three, can be an interesting way to show your character gaining more control over their powers.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by DarthDude

As I want to use powers as a magic alternative, I found Skills for Everyone very appealing as those "spells" (in fact abilities) would need training or special combat moves for warriors also needing dedication and training.

Take a look at GURPS Powers and the GURPS Sorcery books for worked examples of magic-based powers. The GURPS Psionics and some of the Dungeon Fantasy and Power-Up books also have "spell like" Powers which easily be adapted.

If you want lots of different powers which you can only use one at a time and where it takes a bit of time to switch between them, it might be cheaper to use Modular Abilities or Morph and work up a selection of different powers you can use with that advantage. Just remember to apply the Power limitation to Modular Abilities/Morph and not to the specific powers.