QQ: Are DF perks balanced for 'normal' games?

[vicky_molokh]

Greetings, all!

A quick question for either those in the know, or people who learned the truth through trial and error:

Are Dungeon Fantasy Perks okay to be used in normal campaigns? I'm specifically thinking about stuff like Charms, Better Power Items, and Gear Discounts.

Thanks in advance!

[Kromm]

Charms are fine, although they might seem generous to some. They're a lot like the Unusual Training perk in Martial Arts, which lets you learn special skills without buying a 20- to 45-point advantage first. In this case, you do need a special advantage -- Magery -- to get the full benefits, and spell prerequisites are what's waived. In point of fact, I've let PCs learn spells sans all prereqs without requiring a perk, and there were no problems. The meaningful limits on spells are FP cost and casting time.

Better Power Items only matters if you're using power items, which in turn sort of implies a DF campaign. It might be unbalanced if you toss power items into a game with Manastones, Powerstones, uncapped extra FP, ER, etc. I don't really think so -- it rarely adds more than a few extra energy points -- but there might be creative abuses I didn't think through.

Most of the gear discounts are pretty minor . . . they amount to letting people haggle prices down without needing Merchant skill, but only on a very narrow category of things. It's probably a better deal to put the point into Signature Gear in campaigns that lack big-ticket ($5,000+) items of the right type.

[KlausPrinceOfTheUndeads]

BTW, what about Brotherhood of the Ghouls? It's my favourite, Dustmen-like perk. :-) Would it be fine in an "ordinary" game?

[Kromm]

"You won't be eaten by mindless corpse-eaters as long as you just watch them eat your friends' brains and don't help at all." I think that's balanced just about anywhere.

[vicky_molokh]

I've been thinking of Better Power Items as applicable to Powerstones, FP storage devices etc.