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Old 08-24-2022, 06:31 PM   #11
SydneyFreedberg
 
Join Date: May 2019
Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

[1] D'oh! Basic math mistake on my part.... Turning a 150% increase into a multiplier of 1.5 instead of 2.5. Good catch. And I like your build without Cyclic better -- it's easier to understand and should be easier to play.

[2] This was my first take on a Torture skill:

Torture (IQ/A): Defaults to First Aid-4, Physician-4, or Pressure Points-2. This is definitely a villainous skill! A successful Torture roll inflicts pain without inflicting permanent injury (unless the torturer wants to, which is even more evil). This skill does not include the art of asking questions: Interrogation defaults to Torture -4, but only if you torture the interrogation subject.

But perhaps I should customize it for Fomori? Or add a special Feature to Fomori, or an addition to the Code of Honor, something like:

If a Fomorian's master tortures them, and the Fomorian then tries to act against their master's orders or interests, the Fomorian must first roll a Quick Contest of their Will against their master's Torture skill. The Fomorian rolls at +3 if they have High Pain Threshold, at +1 if it has been a full day since they were last tortured, at +2 if it had been two days, at +3 if it has been 4 days, etc. If the Fomorian fails the roll, they must remain loyal to their master for at least another day, when they may roll again. Note that a sane Fomori will not normally even try to resist a master they see as "honorable"!
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Old 08-25-2022, 06:50 PM   #12
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Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

Quote:
Originally Posted by SydneyFreedberg View Post
Torture (IQ/A): Defaults to First Aid-4, Physician-4, or Pressure Points-2. This is definitely a villainous skill! A successful Torture roll inflicts pain without inflicting permanent injury (unless the torturer wants to, which is even more evil). This skill does not include the art of asking questions: Interrogation defaults to Torture -4, but only if you torture the interrogation subject.
Previous versions I've seen of the Torture skill have defaulted to Interrogation, on the mistaken assumption that torture gets accurate information from victims. For Fomori, torture might default to Intimidation, Leadership, or Psychology.

Possibly clarify things by calling the skill "Fomori Torture" to explain lack of default to Interrogation.

But perhaps I should customize it for Fomori? Or add a special Feature to Fomori, or an addition to the Code of Honor, something like:

Quote:
Originally Posted by SydneyFreedberg View Post
If a Fomorian's master tortures them, and the Fomorian then tries to act against their master's orders or interests, the Fomorian must first roll a Quick Contest of their Will against their master's Torture skill. The Fomorian rolls at +3 if they have High Pain Threshold, at +1 if it has been a full day since they were last tortured, at +2 if it had been two days, at +3 if it has been 4 days, etc. If the Fomorian fails the roll, they must remain loyal to their master for at least another day, when they may roll again. Note that a sane Fomori will not normally even try to resist a master they see as "honorable"!
I'd call this a Quirk on its own, "Can be Conditioned by Fomori Torture."

Adding it to Code of Honor is a bit weird, since CoH is canonically a "self-imposed" mental disadvantage. It's more likely to be part of a Duty (Involuntary) disadvantage or the Subjugated Social Stigma.
either a built-in part of the Fomori
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Old 08-26-2022, 10:07 AM   #13
ericthered
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Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

I don't think the Fomori code of honor is worth -15 points, I'd put it at -10. Probably because it doesn't really change how or who they can attack, just what they do after they win. Serving someone who defeated you for as long as they inflict pain is a big deal... but I'm also unsure that its worth the full -15. I suppose its equivalent to a weirdly limited form of programmable.


The cost of hand-to-hand weapons of armor the Fomori have in an Ultra-tech environment make me cringe. They're spending 46 points on having 3 DR and spears on their hands. I suppose they're also extra good with spears... but won't most people just be using a gun?



The HT penalty for the Teciti is weird. What's the reasoning behind it?


I actually expected the Teciti to be smaller: 3' at most. They work find at SM-1, but they feel pretty large for being compared to squirrels and pack-rats.



Nearsighted cripples the Teciti in combat. Can they use glasses as a mitigator? if not you should make a note of that.



Putting low signature on the spitslug attack doesn't feel neccessary. Yes, is quieter than a gunshot, but it also takes a bit more motion from the slug than pulling a trigger, and the acid itself should make it very obvious something happened, and what direction the attack came from.



Of course, I think most of your attributes are too extreme, but I think that's a template-building philosophy difference.
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Old 08-26-2022, 07:08 PM   #14
SydneyFreedberg
 
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Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

I wholeheartedly agree with your argument that the best racial templates are reasonably close to 0 points. (Everyone interested in building aliens for GURPS should read Eric the Red's blog post on the subject). But in practice I can't always get a concept to work: e.g.Striders, who are elephant-inspired herd beasts, and Fomori, who are literal combat monsters.

Yes, it's pretty superfluous, even counterproductive, for a spacefaring race to have massive bodies (Striders) or glaive-like weapons built into their arms (Fomori). But, well, those are the concepts that have been rattling around in my head since the 1990s, and those physical traits have informed their racial psychologies....You gave me some good tips for making the Striders more point-efficient, and maybe we can figure out something for the Fomori too.

Or maybe by "most of your attributes are too extreme," you're referring to the high basic stats of some of these aliens. I'm less bothered about that, because these are meant to be unusually successful spacefaring species, in a setting where humanity is an unexceptional species from an insignificant little blue planet. But it does rack up the point costs.

As for your other suggestions:

- I see your point about the Fomori "Code of Honor." Codes are hard to cost out in the first place, and this one is not a traditional code because it's at least partially hardwired by instinct. I'll ponder how many points to rate it.

- The Teceti are meant to be physically kinda fragile, hence low ST and HT. But arguably HT-2 makes them sickly, which would be an odd thing for an animal to evolve to be. Again, I'll ponder.

- The Teceti are also meant to have better hearing than humans but worse eyesight. Problem is GURPS has lots of options for fine-grained improvements to senses but only fairly gross options for decrements; there's no "slight astigmatism (-5)." Suggestions are welcome!

- The Spitslug attack may not warrant Low Signature. I was thinking that meant anyone in the vicinity would have a hard time noticing what was going on, since there's no loud noise or bright flash. But, yeah, the Spitslug is basically hawking up a giant loogie, which could be attention-getting in another way....
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Old 08-27-2022, 10:10 AM   #15
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Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

Quote:
Originally Posted by SydneyFreedberg View Post
Problem is GURPS has lots of options for fine-grained improvements to senses but only fairly gross options for decrements; there's no "slight astigmatism (-5)." Suggestions are welcome!
Take the basic GURPS sensory disadvantages as a starting point, then apply limitations to make them more "fine grained". A few GURPS supplements do this by modifying Bad Sight with "No for motion detection" to create species with poor ability to distinguish fine details at a distance, but decent ability to sense attackers in motion.

If you haven't yet discovered it, check out T.Bone's Games Diner. He went over the GURPS rules (originally GURPS 3E, but plenty of GURPS 4E content) with a microscope, tweaking the system to make it better suited non-humanoid species.

Luke Campbell's Panoptesv GURPS Miscellanea site also has some good house rules for creating non-humanoid characters.
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Old 08-28-2022, 08:35 PM   #16
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Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

I’ve taken your comments to heart and revised the Fomori. Major changes:
- I cut out “Long Arms” — after much thought, I decided their arms are long but not a full yard longer — saving 20 points off the template.
- I added further restrictions to the Code of Honor, including minimizing collateral damage, and refined the rules for torture imposing loyalty.
- I added new Common Optional disadvantages, including to reflect the three main Fomori subcultures (strategoi, ronin, and heretics).

[click here to read about Fomori biology, history, & society]

Fomorian (101 points)
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Last edited by SydneyFreedberg; 08-30-2022 at 02:24 PM. Reason: Added Unfazeable, Indomitable, Thalassaphobia, & Xenophilia; replaced Increased Life Support with Restricted Diet
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Old 08-29-2022, 10:20 AM   #17
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Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

Per RAW, being limited to just eating meat is Restricted Diet, not Increased Life Support.

While not quite RAW, it's not too much of a stretch to allow -5 point versions of Restricted Diet. Trivial Restricted Diet is a legitimate Quirk. E.g., being Vegan might be a -1 point RD, while being an obligate carnivore might be worth -5 points if you can eat preserved or cooked meat in addition to fresh meat.

Use Increased Life Support for creatures that either go through massive amounts of something other than food/fuel, have life support needs which passively threaten others, or require extensive or expensive equipment to stay alive outside of their native environment. In some campaigns, it's fair to combine Increased Life Support with Dependency. Not only are you dependent on whatever it is that's keeping you alive, recreating those conditions outside of your native environment causes extra trouble.
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Old 08-29-2022, 10:43 AM   #18
SydneyFreedberg
 
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Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

Good catch. Rather than repost the whole template, I’ll just edit the post above to replace “increased life support” with “restricted diet.” (Being a meat eater does increase your life-support requirements in an ecological sense, because you require more acres of agriculture per calorie than plant-eaters, but that’s not what the GURPS disadvantage means).
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Old 08-29-2022, 11:19 AM   #19
SydneyFreedberg
 
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Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

And here are the revised Teceti. (singular “Tecet,” by the way). Thanks to the good advice on this thread, I made a bunch of changes:
- Improved average HT to 9.
- Moved Discriminatory Hearing, Vibration Sense, & Eidetic Memory to Common Optional Traits, redefine them for Teceti with above-average abilitied (but keeping the racial Acute Hearing).
- Replaced Night Vision advantage with Night-Adapted Vision feature.
- Limited Bad Sight with increased range (penalties kick in after 6 yards, not 1) and mitigators. Regular glasses aren’t enough, but I imagine Teceti scouts and others that need good distance vision wearing high-tech goggles.
- Dialed down racial reputation to +2/-2.
- Added Temperature Tolerance to reflect their adaption to their homeworld’s severe seasons.
[Edit: I also just edited in an optional racial Talent to reflect their traditional wilderness skills.]

[Click here to read about Teceti biology, history, & society]

Tecet (12 points)
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Last edited by SydneyFreedberg; 08-29-2022 at 01:34 PM. Reason: Added custom Talent, link
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Old 08-29-2022, 11:34 AM   #20
SydneyFreedberg
 
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Default Re: [Space] [Templates] Really Alien Aliens II: Empire of Pain

Finally, the long-suffering Spitslugs, where I made fewer changes:
- Altered racial reputation to purely negative, dropping 10 points from cost. (I’d given them a bonus from their former & current masters, but that’s too optimistic a view of the Trinocs and Fomori).
- Revised acid-spitting attack & added customization options under Common Optional Traits.
- Added a perk to emphasize they’re not actually slimy, despite their resemblance to slugs.

Click here to read about Spitslug biology, history, & society]

Spitslug (16 points)
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Last edited by SydneyFreedberg; 08-30-2022 at 02:25 PM. Reason: upgraded "not slimy" Perk
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