Limiting racial language proficiency

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by acrosome

I considered taboo traits, but it just logically seems more like a skill incompetence to me. Remember that this is for any language, not just a low proficiency in one! )

But "Accented" isn't really a disadvantage. Your speech is still intelligible. You just can't pass for a native. Or in this case, a human. But you probably couldn't pass for a human anyway. I mean you get the points for buying down your native language and that works for a slight speech impediment. Now if you are limited to "broken"...that's an Incompetence.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by acrosome

Are there rules for "leveled quirks" somewhere? That might be quite helpful.

None that I'm aware of - Quirks are usually one-and-done, but for something like this, where you could be restricted to Accented or Broken, that seems like the way to go. If you're restricting characters to 5 total Quirks, however, I'd treat the [-2] version (limited to Broken) as though it were a single Quirk. However, I think Racial Quirks don't really count against the Quirk limit... but I could easily be mistaken on that!

[acrosome]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

But "Accented" isn't really a disadvantage. Your speech is still intelligible. You just can't pass for a native. Or in this case, a human. But you probably couldn't pass for a human anyway. I mean you get the points for buying down your native language and that works for a slight speech impediment. Now if you are limited to "broken"...that's an Incompetence.

No, Accented is a disadvantage, I think. If nothing else it affects reading and study time, and gives penalties to many skills per Basic Set p.24. There are probably other things- I think a certain proficiency might be a prerequisite somewhere? And what I want is a limit for any language, and you cannot improve it above that level.

Damn. Opinions vary so widely that it might indeed take Word Of Kromm to answer this one. Anywhere from [0] to [-10] is, well... uh... more than an order of magnitude difference? (Divide by 0?)

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by acrosome

Damn. Opinions vary so widely that it might indeed take Word Of Kromm to answer this one. Anywhere from [0] to [-10] is, well... uh... more than an order of magnitude difference? (Divide by 0?)

The high ends of that though depend on analogy to Cannot Speak or lack of languages entirely. That's not at all what you have here.

Cannot Speak is worth a lot of points because it cuts you off from easy communication with the rest of the party, not because of its effects on language. If you were able to converse telepathically with anyone you can see for example, I'd never let you claim the points for Cannot Speak.

Lacking languages entirely is maybe worth a lot of points because [thinking] uses language, and if you don't have one you can't do all sorts of advanced symbol manipulation. As I understand it that isn't what you have here, though I could be wrong.

Ask yourself can these things learn a language at Native, as long as it isn't a spoken one, or understand one even if they can't speak it. If so, they have a zero point feature.

If the intent here actually is an intellectual disability, then lacking languages at Native is probably the wrong model in the first place. You probably want something more like an Anti-Talent that prevents them from learning any of the skills languages help with, or at least imposes a penalty on them relative to their IQ. Something more like Ham Fisted or Shyness. That it happens to extend to languages as well as language related skills, and makes your "Native" proficiency seem like that of someone with a lower IQ than you actually have is then just a side effect of whatever that disadvantage is, not the core of it, and doesn't actually restrict you from having Native proficiency, just makes it less good than is should be.

[Donny Brook]

It seems like it should be priced as an anti-Talent applying to anything that would be penalized for being attempted in a broken or accented language.

[acrosome]

Originally Posted by malloyd

You probably want something more like an Anti-Talent that prevents them from learning any of the skills languages help with, or at least imposes a penalty on them relative to their IQ.

Originally Posted by Donny Brook

It seems like it should be priced as an anti-Talent applying to anything that would be penalized for being attempted in a broken or accented language.

That seems likely to be far too expensive. Just among the examples of skills affected by literacy on Basic Set p.24 there are eight, and it's a -3 penalty for Broken or -1 for Accented, with each doubled for "artistic" uses such as poetry or singing.

And there must be many, many more skills that are affected. I could name three more off the top of my head.

Does anyone know the source for improving on low racial IQ? I swear that I read somewhere that it is limited somehow.

[Stormcrow]

Originally Posted by acrosome

Damn. Opinions vary so widely that it might indeed take Word Of Kromm to answer this one.

You don't need official sanction to deal with this. Just handle it however you want.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

But "Accented" isn't really a disadvantage. Your speech is still intelligible. You just can't pass for a native. Or in this case, a human. But you probably couldn't pass for a human anyway. I mean you get the points for buying down your native language and that works for a slight speech impediment. Now if you are limited to "broken"...that's an Incompetence.

Personally, I view Accented as more than just "Your voice sounds kinda funny." A character with Accented comprehension is going to misunderstand idioms ("Why is fish in barrel?"), occasionally use the wrong syntax, be a bit delayed in their responses (they don't "think in the language," so when you ask them a question they'll first have to translate what you said into their own language, answer it in their own head, and then translate it back into your language to respond), sometimes become nearly unintelligible or even switch back to their native language when in highly stressful situations, forget words ("How do you say..."), etc. The end result is the -1/-2 penalty suggested in Basic.

[Balor Patch]

Originally Posted by acrosome

Does anyone know the source for improving on low racial IQ? I swear that I read somewhere that it is limited somehow.

The table on DF11 pg.5 just used additive values. So human max is 20 and a race with -3 in that attribute would have max 17.

I personally prefer multiplicative values: if average is x then max = 2x.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by acrosome

While we are on the subject, I seem to recall some rules about low racial IQ. Isn't there a limit to how much you can raise IQ in such situations?

Bio-tech limits you to +1/2/3/4 IQs at TLs 9/10/11/12 for germline genetic engineering regardless of starting IQ. There are ways around this with bio-mods and cyberware but those of course are not hereditary.