[Crepusculum] User Created & Free Form Powers

[MacLeod]

I like The Babel Watch the best out of your list. =)

[Sebastian K. Hickey]

I might take Snarl of the Shepherds back then.

[MacLeod]

Its agreed then!

[MacLeod]

I was thinking about how I can make this system a little better or perhaps more functional... Talislanta came to mind.

I know I haven't even playtested this game yet but I think too much. =)

What if Techniques were built around Action Words? This would limit the precise mechanics of each Technique.

For those who don't know... The 'Modes' of Talislanta 4e are; Alter, Attack, Conjure, Defend, Heal, Illusion, Influence, Move, Reveal, Summon, Transform and Ward.

So what do y'all think?

[Ken]

What if Techniques were built around Action Words? This would limit the precise mechanics of each Technique.

For those who don't know... The 'Modes' of Talislanta 4e are; Alter, Attack, Conjure, Defend, Heal, Illusion, Influence, Move, Reveal, Summon, Transform and Ward.

Your earlier rules for creating techniques suggested that the effect be narrowly defined. Using something like this would definitely help define the uses for a technique. Is there a good reason for adding rails to the sides of a character's techniques? Is there a concern that players may try to fit too many effects into a single technique?

Overall, adding these classes could be handled very neatly and briefly without dominating the rules. I could see these posted on a sidebar or something. You could probably just do it, and it would be done, and nobody but Sebastian and I would even notice. Its probably not a big deal. The most important question here may be: do adding these classes detract more from your free-form system than they add?

Also, is this a slippery slope? Will players soon have to choose other defining characteristics, like are their powers magic, mutant, or machine? Will they have to document what part of the body their power's effects emanate from? Probably not. Are these questions important? Maybe, but do you have to deal with them? Maybe again, but probably not.

Having tinkered with rules-lite ideas, it is easy to want to fill that rules void, but you don't always have to. The more form the rules demand, the less free it is.

My advise would be to test it without and see how it works.

Looking forward to hearing the results.

Ken

[MacLeod]

You are likely right. =)
I think what I'll do is include this idea... but as a mechanical suggestion instead of a required act of creating Techniques. See where it goes from there. =D