New Ad: Contact Network

[Daigoro]

Is there any point in making a new advantage, Contact Network?

At first blush it would seem the same as Contact Group, but there would be some differences. A Contact Group reads to me as a single group in a single location, such as a city's police department, or the local mob.

A Contact Network would be available in many locations the PCs travel to, and would be like "having eyes in every port". It wouldn't be necessary to specify beforehand exactly the nature of each contact, and indeed the individual contacts might more follow the single Contacts rules rather than the Contact Group rules (ie one skill instead of a skill set, etc). Also, the reliability or skill level for each contact in the network might vary somewhat.

Doing the trait this way avoids having the PC write up and spend points on a large number of Contacts that might only enter play once or twice in a travelling campaign.

Of course, instead of making a new advantage, it could be written up as a form of Modular Ability or Claim to Hospitality, but it might be simpler to just make it a new advantage if it's useful enough.

Thoughtlings?

Oh, and I don't have Action 2, but from reading various comments about it, it strikes me that there might be something along these lines in there (along with uses of Rank, etc).

[SuedodeuS]

Actually, it sounds somewhat like you might expect for Contact Groups with a +50% Cosmic modifier tossed on. I think that undersells the effectiveness of the Advantage, however - maybe the +100% modifier would be more appropriate?

[Kelly Pedersen]

Generally speaking, I prefer to just put an enhancement on Contact/Contact Group for this. I eyeballed it at +50% (basing it on the +50% Cosmic enhancement for non-attack, non-defense powers) to have a "world-spanning" Contact.

Edit: Argh, ninjaed!

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by SuedodeuS

I think that undersells the effectiveness of the Advantage, however - maybe the +100% modifier would be more appropriate?

Maybe leveled for the breadth of the area covered? Perhaps +25% for a small nation or large region (e.g. Switzerland or the Pacific Northwest), +50% for a large nation or group of smaller nations (e.g. the USA or Western Europe), +75% for a whole continent, +100% for the whole world, and +150% for any area bigger than a world?

[SuedodeuS]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

Maybe leveled for the breadth of the area covered? Perhaps +25% for a small nation or large region (e.g. Switzerland or the Pacific Northwest), +50% for a large nation or group of smaller nations (e.g. the USA or Western Europe), +75% for a whole continent, +100% for the whole world, and +150% for any area bigger than a world?

Those levels look really good to me. You could divide things up slightly more, so that the Galactic Federation (+150%) is worth more than an organization that only has members on Earth and Mars (+125%).

[vicky_molokh]

IMO Contacts are overpriced anyway (see some other threads for reasons why), and especially so if the campaign is globe-trotting, or even galaxy-switching, and if the GM assumes that they're very location-limited.

[trooper6]

In the Traveller game I was GM'ing, someone wanted what you describe. In his case, the ability to know people on Terran free traders (he grew up on a free trading, spent his life in the trade routes and was very chummy with people)--so, an acquaintance on many ships (rather than eyes in every port).

I just used Contact Group. Worked fine for me and didn't need a new Disad.

[Daigoro]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

Maybe leveled for the breadth of the area covered? Perhaps +25% for a small nation or large region (e.g. Switzerland or the Pacific Northwest), +50% for a large nation or group of smaller nations (e.g. the USA or Western Europe), +75% for a whole continent, +100% for the whole world, and +150% for any area bigger than a world?

I'm not sure this geographical scale is fair. For example, a horse-bound party travelling from town to town should get as much utility from their point investment as space-faring PCs going from planet to planet, ie about one use every other session, say.

I think the Availability roll should cover this aspect fairly well, it gives the probability per day that the contact would be useful. You might apply some Accessibilty modifiers: only in space-ports, only in towns above a certain population (the pricing dependent on the campaign and TL), only in areas with significant organised crime levels, or only in settlements with significant Klingon populations, for instance.

I guess you do need to put a geographic limit on it if the PCs are likely to leave their sphere of influence- but still the limits would be campaign/world specific, you couldn't declare absolute levels.

As far as applying Cosmic at all, I might argue the other way- it's just as fair to say that a generic contact in any city I visit is worth the same as a specific contact in one city. The amount of use I get out of the contact depends on the style of campaign- if it's a travelling-location campaign as opposed to a set-location campaign, my points in a specific location Contact would almost be worthless, as I would rarely be able to use him.

Thus, the possible need for a specific advantage- it could be done by enhancing/limiting the existing Contact/Contact Group advantage, but some particular issues come up if you want to make it a generic contact or network. Actually, it could be better done by making a new enhancement instead- Generic/Network Contact.

I started thinking about this reading David Eddings' Seeress of Kell- Silk and his colleague had set up their own network of trading agents that they could call on for information in any major trading centre they passed through. Arguably though, that particular case might be an application of Merchant Rank.

[Veton]

Originally Posted by Daigoro

Of course, instead of making a new advantage, it could be written up as a form of Modular Ability or Claim to Hospitality, but it might be simpler to just make it a new advantage if it's useful enough.

Thoughtlings?

I don't see why you couldn't use Modular Abilities with Social (+0%) and Only for Contacts (whatever limitation that would be.) That seems to be the simplest solution to me.