What is the function of Kewl Powerz

[Eero Tuovinen]

What ever gave you the notion evidenced in the last couple of pages that kewl powerz are an in-setting thing? Because it's not.

Well, to some extent it is, although your criteria seems to be more powerful.
The thing you're talking about in Vampire whose name I also forget is setting based. It's a discipline and as such is linked to your clan. It's powered with blood points, which you get by drinking blood. A pretty in-setting thing to me.
Kewl Powerz need this link to in-setting, or they're not that cool. Or else you'll have to show me how they definetly don't need to be, because it's not a straightforward thing to see.
I do agree that the opposite is not always true.

The Vampire thing is a fine example, let's use that: imagine that you were playing Vampire in Heroquest rules, and vampire super strength was just defined as a really high strength ability. Suddenly, although the in-setting thing is nearly unchanged, the strength is no longer a kewl power. It is no longer mechanically special, it's just the same as the strength of another character. Interestingly, this wouldn't be a big problem exactly because vampires have a strong character identity anyway. This is why kewl powerz in Vampire are ultimately a redundant mistake of reality modeling.

It's true that kewl powerz need to have an in-setting component, because their meaning in the setting is ultimately what makes them kewl powerz instead of just special powers. It's equally true that the in-setting specialness is not enough, you also need the mechanical component. So, to put it shortly:
(qualitative, discrete mechanics)+(in-setting specialness) = kewl powerz, which bestow a character with identity. He's special and protagonism-worthy by the virtue of being able to do this.
(qualitative, discrete mechanics) = special powers, which do not define character identity. The ability to disarm others in D&D is an example of this, as everybody can do it, even if it has it's own mechanics.
(in-setting specialness) = color, which doesn't define character identity. HQ abilities are all like this. There is nothing kewl in having "Ultimate Hellfire Sword" when it's a part of the resource economy of the game just as other things are. You could as well just have a "Sword" with the same rating, and it'd work the same.

You have to remember the context wherein I first answered the question: Tony was asking how he could not have kewl powerz in his bubblegum game. In other words, what's the reason for having kewl powerz. My answer shoots for that question, so it's not necessarily an useful definition for some other priorities. I don't know why you people are discussing the kewl power thing, so for all I know it might be useful for you to try to find an in-setting, literature phenomenon that could be called by that name.

You see, in Tony's context, the question is about roleplaying. And in roleplaying both the in-setting and mechanics become part of character identity. If you were to play a boardgame, the kewl powerz would work quite fine without an in-setting component. Similarly, in literature you don't need the mechanical component. In rpgs, however, the most efficient design has both, and that's what I'd like to call an actual kewl power, instead of just a bit of rules or setting.

Notably, Sorcerer has them [kewl powerz]. And this has nothing to do with power level or whether those powers can be taken away or whatever, and everything to do with whether character identity is defined in terms of having powers or not.

And how has that nothing to do with power level? Isn't Sorcerer all about "how far will you go for power?" and giving you the opportunity to get that power?
I agree that reliability on a power is perhaps not so good an argument though.

No, although Sorcerer the game is about power and it's use, the kewl power factor is not dependant on it. Each player character is a sorcerer, who can control demons, and this is the only kewl power characters have in the game. It's the same for everybody, and, interestingly enough, it's importance is not diminished even if the setting is defined such that the demons are wimpy little things compared with normal powers. You're still a special person, a Sorcerer, who risks his humanity for your goals. That has nothing to do with power level, and cannot be taken away even if your demons can be killed with machine guns.

I think it was Mike Holmes who gave an useful comparison about this a couple of years ago: imagine waking up one morning and realizing that you can cast the Light spell from D&D. Now, you're suddenly an incredibly special person, with a huge mystery howering over you. This, despite the light spell being the most meassly spell in the game, and despite there being electrical light in abundance for everybody. What has happened is that you gained a kewl power, and your identity was suddenly redefined by it. You are no more Bob the counter clerk, you're Bob the Mage. This is what I mean by the kewl powerz being used to define character identity. That's their only useful function as far as I can see, though; if you give the players tools of character identity in some other form, you don't need kewl powerz either. Like Heroquest does.

[Christoph Boeckle]

Ok, I buy your two arguments. Thanks for explaining!

[Callan S.]

Noon Wrote:

At that point the other players could be focused on surviving in the wilderness and coping without skills there. But are they really going to focus on that stuff, when everyone could watch the melodrama of how you finally cope with your dead dad?

Are you talking simultaniously? Then no.  But if all the characters were walking through the Dread Swamp, then the guy with Wilderness Survival would be of keen interest to them.  Wouldn't you agree?

Well, as noted the power only activates when your dealing with your dead dad. So it's either....

A. Going through the dread swamp has nothing to do with the PC's dad and the power wont activate. Since effectively no one has wilderness powers, they all push for the game not to include going through the dread swamp to begin with.

or

B. Going through the dread swamp does have something to do with the dead PC's dad and coping with that, so it will activate. Everyone will go through the dread swamp, but they are distracted by the PC coping with this issue.


But I might not be getting what you mean by "But if all the characters were walking through the Dread Swamp, then the guy with Wilderness Survival would be of keen interest to them.". I guess if the GM uses force techniques to get the players into the dread swamp this PC will gain more interest. But sans force techniques, the players will avoid the dread swamp like the plague to begin with (situation A). And if the GM is using force to get them into the swamp, then the players shouldn't be interested in the PC but instead interested in the GM, as to whether he'll decide at some point that the swamp activates the kewl power and saves all their butts. But that looks like illusionism/participationism to me and I think my idea about kewl powers breaks down when it comes to that.

[Troy_Costisick]

Heya,

Eero Wrote:

So, understand that powers defining identity are a function of a certain kind of game, not a general dictum. A game can handle powers in ways that do not make them a character identity thing. And games can handle character identity in ways that do not depend on powerz. Only when you support the kewl powerz with system you really get the phenomenon.

Okay, I think I'm following you.  Could you list a few games that handle character identity without anything you would label as a Kewl Power?  I think this will be very helpful in aiding me with using this concept in both discussion and in design.

Noon Wrote:

A. Going through the dread swamp has nothing to do with the PC's dad and the power wont activate. Since effectively no one has wilderness powers, they all push for the game not to include going through the dread swamp to begin with.

or

B. Going through the dread swamp does have something to do with the dead PC's dad and coping with that, so it will activate. Everyone will go through the dread swamp, but they are distracted by the PC coping with this issue.

I think we might have had a tad of miscomunication.  I probably did not state things clearly, and I appologize.  I wasn't talking about GM force or anything like that.  I meant to say that if one of the PC's had Kewl Wilderness Ability then when the PCs went thru the Dread Swamp his power would be well appreciated by the players and they *would* take interest in it.  Then, later, when another of the PCs met his arch-nemisis and his "You killed my father..." power came into play, it would be well appreciated and the others would take interest in it.  Make sense?  I wasn't treating the Dread Swamp as an obsticle to "You killed my father...", altho I do concede one could look at it that way.

My point, however, was to demonstrait that a Wilderness ability and a Revenge ability might not be all that different mechanically speaking.  Did I get that accross or am I still rambling? :)  

I appreciate your thoughts and insight.

Peace,

-Troy

[Itse]

Some of these things have been pointed out, some have not. I think the aspect of how giving the characters power can help streamline (= "forget the uninteresting bits") and focus the game is possibly the most important, and I'm a bit surprised that it hasn't been discussed to death already. (Or maybe it has, and I just didn't notice, I admit I didn't read all the messages that carefully.)

So, giving the characters kewl powerz:

a) helps to free the game from the trivialities of mundane life (escapism)

With powerful characters it becomes a lot easier to just ignore things that are irrelevant to the story, but would otherwise realistically need to be noted. I haven't played Amber myself, but I understand that in that game this is quite often the case.

For example, having a lot of money means having a lot of power in a modern society. With money you can have the characters travel anywhere they want, dress any way they like, eat and drink what ever they like and have what ever reasonably mundane equipment you want them to have, and still keep realism intact.

b) helps to free the game from matters that are irrelevant to the story

If Superman wants to go to North Korea, he can just fly there. No need to talk about border patrols or the price and availibility of plane tickets.

The Bride can just walk into a yakuza club to have her revenge, no need to make a plan.

If a player wants his millionaire character to enter through a window on a Harley Davidson, you don't need to ask "where are you going to get the Hog?" There is no point (or need) to get into the details.

c) creates new narrative possibilities

Things that were previously impossible now enter the realm of possibilities. What if you could live for a thousand years? What if you could possess anyone you like?

d) can help in focusing on certain themes

For example empaths and telepaths easily end in heated discussions about privacy and things like "my right to feel miserable" or "your friends right to know". Necromancy can bring focus on death, the dead and for example the meaning and existance of a soul. Immortality puts life and history in a new perspective. If you could just kill the people you think are bad, would you really?


So my contribution to why most RPG's give the characters kewl powerz is that it's a really easy and obvious way of giving powerful tools for storytelling. (Or in other words, stories with powerful characters tend to be more entertaining, which is the end result of the previous idea.)

Unfortunately this tool is usually poorly used (and thought out), both in the games we buy and the games we play. I think White Wolf was propably among the first to really understand that the powers the characters have a big effect on the themes, and the easiest way of creating games with certain themes was focusing on a certain type of supernatural characters with appropriate powers. They too could've done much better in this I think, but still. It was a good idea, and it did/does work to some extent.

This also pretty nicely helps explain why indie games tend to have less of cool powers. They have, use and give other means to focus and streamline the stories/games.

(Btw: after a second reading I do notice that what I'm talking about here is not best described with "kewl powerz". Replace with "unusual amount of power" or "superpowers", if that helps.)

[Eero Tuovinen]

So, understand that powers defining identity are a function of a certain kind of game, not a general dictum. A game can handle powers in ways that do not make them a character identity thing. And games can handle character identity in ways that do not depend on powerz. Only when you support the kewl powerz with system you really get the phenomenon.

Okay, I think I'm following you.  Could you list a few games that handle character identity without anything you would label as a Kewl Power?  I think this will be very helpful in aiding me with using this concept in both discussion and in design.

Sure.

I'll start with Heroquest, because it's been mentioned several times in the thread. In it, the players are assumed to derive character identity from the setting: either you support or oppose the cultural paradigm of each of your keywords, and that is you. The keyword in this manner becomes the defining framework for the details of who your character is.

Another example is Vampire. It has kewl powers, but they are largely reduntant for the game, because character identity is tied to the clans. Being a camarilla nosferatu or whatever is exactly the same as being an Orlanthi convert to Lunarism in HQ.

An opposite example by the way is Hunter, in which kewl powers are indeed the definition of character identity. You are a hunter because you can do this stuff nobody else can. Really backwards thematically, but there you have it. A more sensible example of the same is Mage, in which character identity is also all about having these powers. It's less invested in the kewlness thing, though, because the mages do not need to prove their specialness constantly.

Still another example is Call of Cthulhu, which deals with character identity much more weakly than any of the above examples. The main idea is that your character is somebody who's interested in the occult. Apart from this, however, the game doesn't proffer tools for character identity. This can be a good or a bad thing, but the fact is that you pretty much have to build your character yourself, perhaps utilizing period cliches.

A list of other games that do not use kewl powerz for character identity follows. Note how each of these games has some precepts and tools concerning character identity, and generally they are stronger than corresponding tools in kewl powerz games.
- Dogs in the Vineyard: characters are all soldiers of the faith, by situation fiat.
- Fastlane: the only explicit tool of character identity is the aesthetic guideline of living fast, dying young. However, the rules encourage building a web of nihilistic social debt, too.
- Universalis: no tools, except lots of genre expectation and cliche.
- Vespertine: your identity is your clique. A prime example of how a social group can function in replacing kewl powerz.
- Dust Devils: the Devil functions to replace kewl powerz as character identity.
- The Questing Beast: character identity comes from the antropomorphic animal and the setting cliches. Strong stuff.

A list of games in which kewl powerz as identity are especially strong:
- kill puppies for satan: a mockery of the phenomenon, and thus very clear example of the same.
- superhero games: very much so. Especially the Aberrant cycle of games. The whole point is to explore the implications of your superhumanity.
- Exalted: it's a superhero game, of course.

The main thing to understand is that kewl powerz, although prevalent in rpgs, are a matter of inability to think outside the box. There's only one theme evidenced by kewl powerz, and that by itself is kind of sad. All the WW games, for example, are ostensibly about this or that lofty theme, but they all come down to identity-through-power. Pretty limited.

[Christoph Boeckle]

The main thing to understand is that kewl powerz, although prevalent in rpgs, are a matter of inability to think outside the box. There's only one theme evidenced by kewl powerz, and that by itself is kind of sad. All the WW games, for example, are ostensibly about this or that lofty theme, but they all come down to identity-through-power. Pretty limited.

Would you please care to develop this point?
Do you think kewl powerz could serve other themes? How could one avoid the trap of focusing exclusively on "identity-through-power"?
What's your take on using kewl powerz for matters of scale (the way Itse described it just a few posts up for example)?

[John Kim]

The main thing to understand is that kewl powerz, although prevalent in rpgs, are a matter of inability to think outside the box. There's only one theme evidenced by kewl powerz, and that by itself is kind of sad. All the WW games, for example, are ostensibly about this or that lofty theme, but they all come down to identity-through-power. Pretty limited.

I don't agree with this.  Identity-through-power is a device, not a theme.  As a non-roleplaying example, the film X2 made great use of powers as identifiers, but the thematic subject of the film wasn't identity through power.  Thematically, it was about different sorts of human identity, especially gender identity.  I see the same thing in superpowered RPGs.  Players create their characters with powers, and those powers inevitably symbolize human things which the players are interested in the real world.  

It's not limited at all.  I've played at least a half-dozen extended Champions campaigns, and each one had different themes.

[Eero Tuovinen]

The main thing to understand is that kewl powerz, although prevalent in rpgs, are a matter of inability to think outside the box. There's only one theme evidenced by kewl powerz, and that by itself is kind of sad. All the WW games, for example, are ostensibly about this or that lofty theme, but they all come down to identity-through-power. Pretty limited.

Would you please care to develop this point?
Do you think kewl powerz could serve other themes? How could one avoid the trap of focusing exclusively on "identity-through-power"?
What's your take on using kewl powerz for matters of scale (the way Itse described it just a few posts up for example)?

Well, to my mind the term "kewl powerz" indicates a particular kind of mindset: character-focused play with competence-based identity being a high priority. Many games have superpowers or heroism, but only some have kewl powerz. Risto (Itse) himself noted how his points are more about superpowers in general than kewl powerz in particular.

So, as I understand the phenomenon, kewl powerz really are their own theme, and thus cannot serve or support other themes. To wit, you could remake any of the WW games without the kewl powerz, and the actual themes the games ostensibly shoot for would have that much better chances to actually appear. Imagine Vampire without the Disciplines and generations, if you will. Especially, imagine Vampire without some über-rare exclusive assamite off-shoot bloodline Disciplines. A completely different, and perhaps more focused, game.

Superpowers and heroic feats, on the other hand, are a much wider category of concept. They're just a literary meme, and thus can be applied for many, many things. Risto gave some examples of their use.

Thus, my take is that we're talking about two separate things. The question is not so much how to use kewl powerz for other things, but how to perhaps have a variety of super powers and neat stuff without falling into the kewl powerz syndrome. The answer to this is to simply remove the super powers as goals of character development and crux of character identity. Simple, but efficient. Many games do this, but most achieve it by removing the crunch from the super powers. An example of a game with power crunch but no kewl powerz syndrome... can't really think of one. Perhaps the sim-friendly setting heavy-games like Burning Wheel or Riddle of Steel are such? I haven't played either, but I imagine that kewl powerz can't be a particular focus of either game.

[Eero Tuovinen]

I don't agree with this.  Identity-through-power is a device, not a theme.  As a non-roleplaying example, the film X2 made great use of powers as identifiers, but the thematic subject of the film wasn't identity through power.  Thematically, it was about different sorts of human identity, especially gender identity.  I see the same thing in superpowered RPGs.  Players create their characters with powers, and those powers inevitably symbolize human things which the players are interested in the real world.  

I don't disagree, although I've yet to see the movie. I think that that kind of game isn't a kewl powerz game, though. Let me give an example of what I think as the core of the kewl powerz fetish:

We're playing Vampire. I get this idea for a Caribbean character, say, who's a vampire voodoo priest. Now, it's a really cool character concept, I think. However, I have this problem: to fulfill my character concept, I need my character to have this power to, say, contact the loa of the dead or something. This is because my character won't be cool without that power. My concept won't be supported if my character doesn't have this thing others can't do. He needs the special power that says that he's a voodoo priest. If he were a voodoo priest with just Celerity and that strength thing with the name I still can't remember, then he'd just be another run-of-the-mill vampire. He wouldn't be cool or special at all. Which is of course weird, when you remember that he's a vampire.

This is what I understand by kewl powerz. A game with them needs to have a wide variety of different, flashy and setting-embedded powerz, because character identity is constructed from mastering these special powerz. Not having a particular kind of power is the same as not supporting a particular character.

This is completely different from merely having a game include super powers or other cool stuff. It's a matter of setting and mechanics supporting power-identity, and can be considered pretty much a theme, when you see how players act to define their characters through their powerz.

[John Kim]

I see the same thing in superpowered RPGs.  Players create their characters with powers, and those powers inevitably symbolize human things which the players are interested in the real world.

This is what I understand by kewl powerz. A game with them needs to have a wide variety of different, flashy and setting-embedded powerz, because character identity is constructed from mastering these special powerz. Not having a particular kind of power is the same as not supporting a particular character.

This is completely different from merely having a game include super powers or other cool stuff. It's a matter of setting and mechanics supporting power-identity, and can be considered pretty much a theme, when you see how players act to define their characters through their powerz.

Well, from your description, I think that what I'm talking about is definitely what you call "kewl powerz".  The players are acting to define their characters through their powers.  That's how it worked in the Champions games I played in.  The advantage of Champions was that it had an extremely flexible powers-creation system, so it supported a wide variety of different character types.  

I doubt I'd be interested in a game which "merely include superpowers" as part of the background without them being used for identity.  What's the point of the superpowers in such a game?  

We're playing Vampire. I get this idea for a Caribbean character, say, who's a vampire voodoo priest. Now, it's a really cool character concept, I think. However, I have this problem: to fulfill my character concept, I need my character to have this power to, say, contact the loa of the dead or something. This is because my character won't be cool without that power. My concept won't be supported if my character doesn't have this thing others can't do. He needs the special power that says that he's a voodoo priest. If he were a voodoo priest with just Celerity and that strength thing with the name I still can't remember, then he'd just be another run-of-the-mill vampire. He wouldn't be cool or special at all. Which is of course weird, when you remember that he's a vampire.

Right.  As I generally play, I'd be trying to get those special voodoo powers as a player, and as a GM trying to support the request for voodoo powers.  Celerity and/or Potence for such a character is pointless -- they don't represent the stuff which the player wants to externalize.  It would be like handing out costumes in a theater performance without any thought as to character.

[Brand_Robins]

I'll start with Heroquest, because it's been mentioned several times in the thread. In it, the players are assumed to derive character identity from the setting: either you support or oppose the cultural paradigm of each of your keywords, and that is you. The keyword in this manner becomes the defining framework for the details of who your character is.

Unless you're playing the Heroquest where your identity comes from discovering surfing, doing origami, or being a duck. Or the one where your identity comes from having the secret of Six Cuts Silk, or being able to jump over the sun. What you're talking about is certainly present in HQ, but only focuses upon it that tightly and exclusively in ForgeQuest.

However, this is using "unusual abilities" to make identity -- which is, as I understand your argument -- different than "kewl powerz" because all of the unusual abilities still use the same basic system as the rest of the abilities. Your Six Cuts Silk may sound cool, and be narrated cool, but isn't a powerz because it isn't any different (mechanically) than Sword Fighting.

One of the places it may cross over, however, is in secrets of religions and in the magic rules in several places. While the magic rules all come out of your culture (or a culture, at least) they also have the only HQ examples of special rule systems (augments that work differently, some abilities that force the way you spend AP, etc). So despite the fact that they may come from culture, they are powerz because they change the normal rule systems and work differently than all the other abilitys of the game.

So in HQ you can have unusual abilities that have little to do with your culture, either for or against, that make up a good part of your identity. You can also have abilities that do not follow the rules for abilities from the rest of the game. Which means there may well be the potential for kewl powerz -- all you need is the kind of player who would use the rules for spirit-based augments, kill a god and wear its skin to use those special rules to build his personal identity, then make up the kind of background where his culture is created in order to support his role rather than the reverse. (Cough)

All in all I think HQ is a very iffy example in this, as it floats back and forth along the line. Of course, that could aslo make it a perfect example as one of its strengths is that it does different things and can be conformed to different visions of the game without having to drift the system proper. You can have characters that get their identity from their special abilities, or their culture, or both. You can also have characters that have abilities that use slightly different rules than the rest of the abilities in the game, which may be tied to their culture or may not.

Which ties in with what John Kim is saying, I'm thinking. It may well be that your character starts out as a character in HQ with the "kewl powerz" of "I'm a duck and can talk to the dead" and end up creating the rest of the theme based around those powers, rather than the reverse.

[Troy_Costisick]

Heya,

Here's what I've come to conclude so far.  Feel free to lambast, counter, and/or agree with as you see fit.  I am very interested in all feedback :)  I think I can break down all that we've talked about so far when it comes to Kewl Powers and mechanics of that ilk.  Here's what I've got:

Function: This is anything a character can do.  It's rather broad, but that's the point.  Everything below pretty much falls into that catagory.

Ability: This is a generally static special function of a character.  Some have said it is a unique feature, but I would prefer rare.  IE, it would be "rare" for a character to have laser eyes.  However several characters may actually have laser eyes.  Unique would me only one character potentially could.  Abilities tend to only be upgraded by other abilities, not by various currencies (like exp).  Examples of abilities include feats, super-powers, or Background Options.

Skill: This is a function of a character that is common (as opposed to rare) and can be upgraded by currency (eg. Exp, Character Points, etc.).  Usually, these are tied to a Stat or Atribute.  Examples include Pick-pocket, encryption, navigation, sword swinging and so on.

Attribute: This is a static value for a character, and may not be a function at all.  Things that fall under attribute are Stats, Saves, Personality Mechanics, age, and so on.  Having a high stat is not a Kewl Power.  Examples are Strength, Dexterity, Resistance to Poison, Brooding personality, and so on.

Equipment: These are objects the character can use.  Whether magic or non-magical, they are not in and of themselves a Kewl Power.  However, one may have to have a certain Ability, Skill, or Attribute in order to use them.  And, they may grant a Kewl Power to a character.  However it seems to be general concensus, the object itself is not a kewl power.  Examples might be rayguns, magic wands, lock pick kit, computer, etc.

Kewl Power: This is a near synonym with Ability, however it must also meet a few other criteria.  First, it must help give the character identity, ie make the character have idividual significance separate from all other PCs and NPCs.  Second, it must be a vehicle for the player's creativity.  In other words, it must help the player use the character and engage the player's imagination.  Third, it must directly aid in engaging the CA of the group.  Otherwise it is useless.  Kewl Powers are often unique, but can be rare.  They are never common.

So, what do you guys think.  Am I close to nailing what we've talked about?

Peace,

-Troy

[Jason Lee]

Just a little note...

Typical heroic fantasy (Conan/Star Wars) seems to be about man versus idea.  For example, the hero battles evil directly as personified by a wizard.  Thus, the wizard can transform into a snake not because the wizard is snake like, but because snakes are evil.  The magic used by the wizard is simply an extension of what the wizard symbolizes in the story.

That's just looking at it from one rather specific genre.  The purpose of powers can be considered a genre convention, because their role would vary with genre.  Metaphor, externalization of character motivation, and character identity I think are all nice ways of looking at it, but I don't think you'll get any deeper without first identifying the genre you're talking about.