Femme Fu

[Randyman]

Originally Posted by Icelander

NineDaysDead, that very quote implies that to perform the same feats in high heels as without them requires higher skill.

Plus, she did it by following his lead...

[NineDaysDead]

Originally Posted by Icelander

NineDaysDead, that very quote implies that to perform the same feats in high heels as without them requires higher skill.

What "higher skill" in reality means when translated into GURPS can be interpreted in different ways; one way would be by adding perks to an already high skill, such as High-Heeled Heroine.

[Mailanka]

Originally Posted by NineDaysDead

This message is too short

Okay, as a dancer: Dancing is very different from combat or chase-scenes. Dancing takes place on specialized surfaces using specialized footware, while combat and chase-scenes take place on surfaces that you have no control over. It's like arguing that racing cars are just as good as off-road vehicles for military purposes because of how well a formula one car driver drives.

Heels are great for certain dances. They bring you closer to your lead's height, and at least in tango, push you forward which is the ideal sort of posture because it creates an imbalance that is fixed by leaning on your partner. Dance shoes, specifically, have smooth (or even suede) soles, which facilitate turning.

Dancing in sneakers or combat boots would hard, bordering on impossible, for a variety of reasons, and I certainly wouldn't try it. Watching first-time students try it on sneakers is hilarious. But that doesn't mean that heels are perfectly good footwear for combat. Rather, the take-away is: Wear the shoe for the job. Dancing is best in a certain kind of heel, and combat is best done in a certain kind of boot.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Mailanka

Dancing in sneakers or combat boots would hard, bordering on impossible...

Depends on the style of dance.

[Sam Baughn]

I'd add Acrobatic Stand to the techniques list. You could make an argument for Eye Rake, Ground Fighting (Karate), Stamp Kick and Sweep too.

[Wavefunction]

Originally Posted by Perfect Organism

I'd add Acrobatic Stand to the techniques list.

Probably right.

Originally Posted by Perfect Organism

You could make an argument for Eye Rake, Ground Fighting (Karate), Stamp Kick and Sweep too.

I considered Stamp Kick and Sweep, didn't think of Eye Rake or Ground Fighting. I'll probably add all of those suggestions, this is intended as a bit of an 'Ultimate Style'.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Wavefunction

Let me know if I've missed anything. Also let me know if this is horribly sexist, it wasn't intended to be, it's meant to simply be a representation of the style found in most action flicks.

It's obviously sexist and silly. I was under the impression that that's what you wanted, until I came to this last part of your post.

I think to improve your Style, you should broaden it a bit. Not much, just a bit. I'm thinking less "femme fatale" and more "chick-ninja". Kunoichi, Sydney Bristow from "Alias", etc.

How about Perks or Techniques to represent being able to change clothes quickly? I'd suggest a levelled Perk with 2 levels to undress quickly, and another levelled Perk with 2 levels to put clothed on quickly. It goes even faster if the clothes the character wants to put on have been folded just right (the ability to do this comes with the Perks), and of cours you can use Tailor skill to modify clothing to be super fast to remove although then it gets destroyed in doing so. (Undressing in a sensual and/or distracting manner isn't covered by those Perks. That's Sex Appeal or Dancing.)

I'd like to see some way of turning the Appearance bonus into a combat-relevant bonus. It's dangerous to go overboard with that, game balance might suffer, but just a little nice plus at some point, e.g. +4 for Beautiful, +6 for Very Attractive, to something relevant.

I'm sure that somewhere in the published material, there's some talk about substituting skills for other skills. Maybe a Perk or something. What I more specifically have in mind is something that allows traditionally feminine non-combat skills to be used instead of combat skills, but of course in a controlled manner (no using Sex Appeal to injure people, etc, since that'd throw game balance out the window). Maybe Dancing. I think there was something about a Skill Substitution Perk, so you could use Dancing instead of Acrobatics for Acrobatic Dodge. Try to look for such opportunities, and offer a few Perks along those lines.

I've spent some time working on a near-future setting, not really well suited for RPGs but for written stories, about an all-female European police force. Part of their schtick is that they rely on the usually quite macho criminals or terrorists to underestimate them (although, granted, those females are selected more for genius than for looks). But one heavy element of their 2-year intensive training programme (yeah, it's like that - imagine a cross-breed between GURPS Cops and GURPS Special Ops, except of course I wouldn't use GURPS for it, if I were to GM it, I'd use Sagatafl) is unarmed combat, specifically tae-kwon-do, since a kick-emphasizing style reduces the tendency towards low upper-body strength.

So without being wildly unrealistic, you could allow one level of Striking ST Limits to Kicking Only (if you want to "curb" it a bit, require a Special Training Perk UB too, like I think the Strongbow Trait requires). I think the RAW says that that's -60% since it's a single attack only, but honestly I think -60% in this case is a bad idea (just one reason: You almost always have both your legs with you, so it's not the same as Striking ST Limited to Dagger Only). -40% strikes me as much more reasonable, and I wouldn't object if a GM told me -30%.

I had one more thing in mind, but I've forgotten what it was. I'll probably return, in a few hours or in a few days, with the last bit...

Oh, one thing which I don't think was the "one major thing" I had in mind, and this gets a bit silly, but you could try to build a usable-once-per-day (except 3 times per day if the character has TbaM) Reverse Strength ability where the character's Striking ST is treated as being "mirrored around 10" for unarmed purposes only (and Striking ST only). Thus if the character is ST 7, she functions as ST 13 for one turn, one action, only, and can do this only once per day.

I don't know how to build that in GURPS. I suppose you could always just buy it as the appropriate amount of Striking ST for the given character (e.g. 8 levels for a ST 6 character, 4 for a ST 8 character) and then apply a truckload of Limitations to it to try to get the cost down to something that's reasonable.

Or given that most female characters aren't going to be absudly low ST anyway, you could make it a Perk, and useable once per week only. Max 1 level for normal characters (if trained in this Style), but cap raised to 3 if they have TbaM. I don't think that'd cause any serious problems. Simple and gets the job done, and it's same cost for all characters (except ST 10+ characters who will never buy it, and ST 9 and 8 characters will be increasingly reluctant to take it).

[Wavefunction]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

It's obviously sexist and silly. I was under the impression that that's what you wanted, until I came to this last part of your post.

Obviously sexist yes, but I wanted to make sure it wasn't horribly sexist, I don't want to cause offence.

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

How about Perks or Techniques to represent being able to change clothes quickly? I'd suggest a levelled Perk with 2 levels to undress quickly, and another levelled Perk with 2 levels to put clothed on quickly. It goes even faster if the clothes the character wants to put on have been folded just right (the ability to do this comes with the Perks), and of cours you can use Tailor skill to modify clothing to be super fast to remove although then it gets destroyed in doing so. (Undressing in a sensual and/or distracting manner isn't covered by those Perks. That's Sex Appeal or Dancing.)

That's not really the sort of thing covered by a combat style, but I could see an argument for it's inclusion.

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

I'd like to see some way of turning the Appearance bonus into a combat-relevant bonus. It's dangerous to go overboard with that, game balance might suffer, but just a little nice plus at some point, e.g. +4 for Beautiful, +6 for Very Attractive, to something relevant.

Already done, Attractiveness gives a bonus to Sex Appeal, and Sex Appeal-based Feints are an intrinsic part of the style.

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

I'm sure that somewhere in the published material, there's some talk about substituting skills for other skills. Maybe a Perk or something. What I more specifically have in mind is something that allows traditionally feminine non-combat skills to be used instead of combat skills, but of course in a controlled manner (no using Sex Appeal to injure people, etc, since that'd throw game balance out the window). Maybe Dancing. I think there was something about a Skill Substitution Perk, so you could use Dancing instead of Acrobatics for Acrobatic Dodge. Try to look for such opportunities, and offer a few Perks along those lines.

As previously noted, Sex Appeal-based Feints are an intrinsic part of the style. I do like the idea of using Dancing for Acrobatic Dodge.

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

I've spent some time working on a near-future setting, not really well suited for RPGs but for written stories, about an all-female European police force. Part of their schtick is that they rely on the usually quite macho criminals or terrorists to underestimate them (although, granted, those females are selected more for genius than for looks). But one heavy element of their 2-year intensive training programme (yeah, it's like that - imagine a cross-breed between GURPS Cops and GURPS Special Ops, except of course I wouldn't use GURPS for it, if I were to GM it, I'd use Sagatafl) is unarmed combat, specifically tae-kwon-do, since a kick-emphasizing style reduces the tendency towards low upper-body strength.

So without being wildly unrealistic, you could allow one level of Striking ST Limits to Kicking Only (if you want to "curb" it a bit, require a Special Training Perk UB too, like I think the Strongbow Trait requires). I think the RAW says that that's -60% since it's a single attack only, but honestly I think -60% in this case is a bad idea (just one reason: You almost always have both your legs with you, so it's not the same as Striking ST Limited to Dagger Only). -40% strikes me as much more reasonable, and I wouldn't object if a GM told me -30%.

Good idea, though I think I'll keep it at -60%, you can do a lot more with a knife than with a kick.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by Wavefunction

Fiddling with this for a female character who would love to learn it.

Femme Fu

5 points

This is the martial art learnt exclusively by femme fatales in action flicks. I has both striking and grappling components, with the striking component focusing on kicks to high hit locations (preferably executed whilst wearing a skirt), but also including slaps to the cheek, and knees to the groin.
Whilst the grappling component focuses primarily on head locks, chokes, or neck snaps executed with the lower body (bonus points for doing them from a handstand), it also teaches Power Grappling to allow waif like women to chuck around 200+ lbs. marines.

Stylists make extensive use of Acrobatics, usually performing multiple (surprisingly slow) flick flacks across a room to reach their opponent.

Then there's the sexy component, revolving around sex appeal-based feints. These feints still take up an attack manoeuvre, but count as hands-free for anything that cares (i.e. Extra Attack).

It also teaches stylists how to fight in high heels, and even use them to ones advantage.

Stylists must be at least Attractive in order to be accepted into a school teaching this style, however appearance can degrade after it's been learnt, and there may be rogue teachers who are willing to teach anyone it's components (perhaps even men!).

Cinematic stylists, sorry, more cinematic stylists, might make use of Pressure Points (for a variety of purposes), Hypnotic Hands (don't ask), and Body Control.

Note that this is the unarmed style of femme fatales, the armed style is considerably more risqué.

Skills: Acrobatics; Karate; Sex Appeal; Wrestling.
Techniques: Acrobatic Attack (Karate or Wrestling); Acrobatic Stand; Eye Rake (Karate); Feint (Sex Appeal); Ground Fighting (Karate or Wrestling); Hammer Fist; Kicking; Knee Strike; Lower-Body Head Lock; Lower-Body Neck Snap; Stamp Kick (Karate); Sweep (Karate or Wrestling); Targeted Attack (Karate Hammer Fist/Face); Targeted Attack (Karate Kick/Face); Targeted Attack (Karate Kick/Neck); Targeted Attack (Karate Kick/Skull); Targeted Attack (Karate Knee Strike/Groin); Triangle Choke.
Cinematic Skills: Body Control; Hypnotic Hands; Pressure Points.
Cinematic Techniques: Lethal Strike; Pressure-Point Strike.
Perks: Acrobatic Kicks; Ground Guard; High-Heeled Heroine; High-Heeled Hurt; Improvised Weapons (Feminine); Iron Nails*; Power Grappling; Sexy Feints; Technique Mastery (Feint); Technique Mastery (Kicking); Trademark Move.

*Prevents nail breakage. Allows appropriate unarmed attacks to do Cutting damage at -2 or -1 per die, whichever is worse, with a (0.5) Armour Divisor. Permits humans to purchase the Long Thumbs Perk.

Optional Traits
Attributes: Improved HT.
Advantages: Allure; Flexible; Improved Appearance; Voice;
Disadvantages: Callous; Lecherousness; Unlucky (Abduction);
Skills: Acting; Erotic Art; Intimidation.
Perks: Extra Option (Bulletproof Nudity); Improvised Weapons (Any); Sexy Pose; Shtick (Immaculate); Teamwork.

Let me know if I've missed anything. Also let me know if this is horribly sexist, it wasn't intended to be, it's meant to simply be a representation of the style found in most action flicks.

EDIT: Would particularly appreciate input from women (or men) on how realistic the High-Heeled Heroine Perk is.

There's only so much one can be concerned about how "ist" one is; paranoia about that in modern authors is worse then paranoia about lewdness was in Victorians. In any case you seem to be making a character that is obviously an affectionate parody. Now from appearance it looks like a rather silly character to be honest, but I gather you are trying to make a rather silly character so there is not much wrong with a little silliness. In any case I would be expecting in this context to see equally silly male characters.

[Wavefunction]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

There's only so much one can be concerned about how "ist" one is; paranoia about that in modern authors is worse then paranoia about lewdness was in Victorians. In any case you seem to be making a character that is obviously an affectionate parody. Now that from appearance it looks like a rather silly character to be honest, but I gather you are trying to make a rather silly character so there is not much wrong with a little silliness. In any case I would be expecting in this context to see equally silly male characters.

Hence why I simply wrote it up, then added a footnote in an attempt to avoid any offence, paranoia did not affect the actual write up in any way.

I should note that the final query was somewhat unrelated to the rest of the post, the general post was inspired by a character for a more realistic game, and I wondered if High-Heeled Heroine was a viable option for her. The style in general is clearly intended for a really rather silly game.