Simple Question, probably repetitive, on Alternate Form

[robkelk]

Originally Posted by Tuk the Weekah

What is the correct way to cost this out?

I'm seeing two distinctly different answers to this original question.

One group's answers includes "if you have IQ 10+X in human form, you'll have IQ 4+X is bear form." This is the way to go where you replace the default Human template with a default Bear template and what makes you different from average carries over.

The other group's answers includes "You have whatever stat you chose at character creation in bear form." This is the way to go where you replace your specific Human body with a specific Bear body and what makes you different from average doesn't necessarily carry over.

Which one of these are you wanting advice on?

[WaterAndWindSpirit]

Originally Posted by robkelk

I'm seeing two distinctly different answers to this original question.

One group's answers includes "if you have IQ 10+X in human form, you'll have IQ 4+X is bear form." This is the way to go where you replace the default Human template with a default Bear template and what makes you different from average carries over.

The other group's answers includes "You have whatever stat you chose at character creation in bear form." This is the way to go where you replace your specific Human body with a specific Bear body and what makes you different from average doesn't necessarily carry over.

Which one of these are you wanting advice on?

Basically, build the bear form as a character. Everything that the natural form has that carries over counts as a cost of the bear form. Advantages and disadvantages specific to the bear form count in the CP cost of bear form. Everything that doesn't carries over (say your character has Magery and the bear form does not) isn't counted in the price of the bear form. So in the end, when you have decided all the bear form's attributes, calculate the total cost of the bear form. If the bear form is less expensive than the regular form, before applying Alternate Form, AF costs 15 points.

Else, it costs (CP cost of bear form - CP cost of natural form)*0.9 +15 CP.

[ericbsmith]

Originally Posted by robkelk

I'm seeing two distinctly different answers to this original question.

Which one of these are you wanting advice on?

They're not really two different answers, they're really the same answer with two different goals.

By the rules, Alternate Form removes your characters default Racial Template and replaces it with another Racial Template. The rules specify Racial Template basically to keep things under control of the GM; for only the GM makes Racial Templates for his game world and only the GM approves what Racial Templates he didn't create can be used in his game world.

However, there's nothing saying that you can't create your own Racial Templates or modify existing Racial Templates and use them as an Alternate Form - you just need GM approval. And then you can change out your base Racial Template for the now modified Racial Template.

Why would you create your own Racial Template? Classic supers shapeshifters, where "The Hulk" isn't technically a race. However, by the rules you'd create him as a Racial Template, and when Bruce turns into the Hulk he loses his Human template and gains The Hulk template.
Why would you modify an existing Racial Template? To create the "Bear, but with Human IQ, the ability to talk, and usable hands" or the like; basically to customize the template of the creature you're going to turn into so that it conforms to the abilities and limitations you want it to have.

Either way, the goal is to keep the changes under strict GM approval. If the GM doesn't want Human IQ talking bears that can wield scythes running around in his games he can veto the changes you want to make to the Bear template and insist that you use the original animalistic Bear template.


Also worth noting in all of this is that most Racial Templates have inbuilt Taboo Traits (specified or not) that may cause you to not be able to use your personal traits if you shapeshift into one of those forms. For example, if you are shapeshifting into a Church Mouse it would naturally have Taboo ST above 1. It doesn't really matter how much extra ST you're purchased for the character, the mouse just isn't going to be above ST 1. Similar taboos likely apply to animal form IQs if they are bestial in nature; it doesn't matter if you have an IQ20 Human, when you change into a bestial snake your IQ isn't going to be more than maybe +1 above the racial average. Many skills will be unusable also; almost anything requiring hands will be unusable in a form that lacks hands; any skill requiring higher intelligence will be unusable in a bestial animal form; any skill requiring speech will be unusable in a form that cannot speak; etc. etc. etc.

[malloyd]

The closest I've come to a method that makes much sense is to produce a character sheet for each of your forms. Ignore that these are alternate forms and include everything the form has, just as if it were the only sheet that applied to your character.

Now make modifications.
Copy any skills on any of the sheets to every other sheet with the same point values. The GM may choose to allow you not to copy skills that are utterly unable in a particular form though.
Find the lowest value each attribute has on any of your sheets and split the others, recording any higher values that that minimum as if it were an advantage.
For each advantage you don't have in every form, including all those attribute bonuses, apply a limitation for the possible countermeasure (can lose this when forced out of this form -10%).
For each disadvantage on any character sheet, add either that same disadvantage or the advantage Not [disadvantaged] (countermeasured -10%), your choice, to every other sheet.
Calculate the value of each character sheet. The point total for your character is the highest one, plus 15 points per additional form.

This still has some exploits, but closes some of the worst of them, and comes reasonably close to the official scheme for characters that aren't particularly munchkinized in the first place.

[Tuk the Weekah]

Originally Posted by robkelk

I'm seeing two distinctly different answers to this original question.

One group's answers includes "if you have IQ 10+X in human form, you'll have IQ 4+X is bear form." This is the way to go where you replace the default Human template with a default Bear template and what makes you different from average carries over.

The other group's answers includes "You have whatever stat you chose at character creation in bear form." This is the way to go where you replace your specific Human body with a specific Bear body and what makes you different from average doesn't necessarily carry over.

Which one of these are you wanting advice on?

Well, firstly, I'd like to know which is more accurate, RAW, for Alternate Form. To me, Group "10+X" seems like a closer reading of the advantage than "Group Norm" does. But I could be missing something.

Secondly, assuming that the first group is correct, or at least the group my GM agrees with, if my human has a ST 10+2, but I want my bear to have normal black bear ST 17+0, do I build the "my bear" template with ST-2 so that the final result is ST 17+0? If so, the alternate forms can be significantly less expensive than if not, which will affect the final build of the PC.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Tuk the Weekah

Well, firstly, I'd like to know which is more accurate, RAW, for Alternate Form.

I think why you're not getting the answer you want is because the answer is "yes". They're both accurate, neither is "more" accurate.

Originally Posted by Tuk the Weekah

Secondly, assuming that the first group is correct, or at least the group my GM agrees with, if my human has a ST 10+2, but I want my bear to have normal black bear ST 17+0, do I build the "my bear" template with ST-2 so that the final result is ST 17+0? If so, the alternate forms can be significantly less expensive than if not, which will affect the final build of the PC.

-2 would give you a final ST of 10 in bear form, not 17. You mean +5 (instead of +7).

[Tuk the Weekah]

Originally Posted by Bruno

I think why you're not getting the answer you want is because the answer is "yes". They're both accurate, neither is "more" accurate.

I'm trying to convince myself that my preference for Option 1 is because it is more elegant, and not because it is cheaper than Option 2.

-2 would give you a final ST of 10 in bear form, not 17. You mean +5 (instead of +7).

Yes. Originally I had written "a relative ST -2 from the bear template", but edited it down before posting. Object lesson: not all editorial decisions are wise.

[Celjabba]

Originally Posted by Tuk the Weekah

Secondly, assuming that the first group is correct, or at least the group my GM agrees with, if my human has a ST 10+2, but I want my bear to have normal black bear ST 17+0, do I build the "my bear" template with ST-2 so that the final result is ST 17+0? If so, the alternate forms can be significantly less expensive than if not, which will affect the final build of the PC.

If the human form have ST 10+2 and you want the bear form to have total ST 17, the bear template should have either ST 15 or ST 17 and feature:fixed strenght.
GM choice.

[Tuk the Weekah]

Originally Posted by Celjabba

If the human form have ST 10+2 and you want the bear form to have total ST 17, the bear template should have either ST 15 or ST 17 and feature:fixed strenght.
GM choice.

Yes, those are the two choices. The dilemma is that one is clearly advantageous, cost-wise, over the other. My personal dilemma is to not be a munchkin, yet not build a character who is a one-trick pony. Well, one-trick bear.

[Phantasm]

In a slightly related post (my build for Johnny Blaze/Ghost Rider), what I did was I determined the exact stats I wanted his final form to be, then for the Alternate Form trait I calculated what the "racial template" would be by comparing the normal form with the final alternate, adding in "No $trait" ads and disads as needed.

Of course, this method works best if you're going from this human to this bear, which I would assume is the case if you're keeping your human IQ as a bear, not to mention not adding the typical bear's Bestial trait. If you're going to have a single bear racial template but not adjusting your IQ (which may end up below sapience level) and adding in Bestial - which may be fun! - then you're looking at the other method of not adjusting the "racial" template.

This help?