Toast: Kewl Powerz

[ethan_greer]

So, as some may be aware, the magic system for my pet game Toast (the greatest role-playing game of all time) is "pending."  I have some ideas, and I'm wanting to expand the scope and have something that can be applied to any supernormal ability.

Here's what I have so far:

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The player decides on a "supernormal" ability they want their character to have.  Examples include the following:

- The ability to confer "magical" healing
- The ability to create a permanent heatless flame centered on an object
- The ability to kill someone by concentrating
- A mechanical arm that gives a bonus to strength
- The ability to see the future
- Telekinesis
- The obligatory fireball
- An innate sense of direction
- Photographic memory

Players may select any number of supernormal abilities, and are required to detail the use of the abilities in concrete, regulatable game terms, insofar as that is possible.  The player must also outline the in-game rationalization for the ability, i.e. is it magical?  Divine in origin?  The result of being bitten by a radioactive spider?  Hereditary?  And so on.

The GM then confers with the player, and assigns each ability a number of points.  This number is the number of extra points the ability costs to purchase at character creation.  This cost is paid out of the character's allotment of skill points.  Determining the cost of a supernormal ability should take into account the following factors:

- The commonality of similar supernormal abilities in the setting
- The number of points it would cost to get a comparable benefit using regular skills
- The number of skill points allotted to a starting character

Once the cost is paid, the supernormal ability is listed on the character sheet.  If it makes sense that the supernormal ability be treated like a skill, then it follows all of the normal rules for skill use and advancement, and further points may be spent during character creation to increase the skill level (which starts at 1).  If the supernormal ability confers some sort of bonus such as an attribute increase, that increase is taken into account and the supernormal ability is noted on the character sheet but does not advance.

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This is of course a very rough outline, and has not been tested at all.  At this stage I just have a few questions.

Does this sort of system work?  Fudge has something similar (if a little more structured) but I've never seen it put to use.

Are there any other games out there that use this sort of model for special powers that I could mine for ideas?

Should I bag it and go back to my "no kewl powerz for you" style games?

Should I find some other game to run where someone else has done all this work?  Kewl powerz systems bug me.  Arcane/Divine spell-casting, cyberware, psionics - it's all annoying.  So why am I designing a system for them in Toast?  I don't know.  Just seems like a hill I should be climbing, I guess.

Anyway, thoughts/suggestions (both on the proposed system outline, or on the angsty paragraph above) are always appreciated.

[Mike Holmes]

I'm pretty leery of "educated guess" methods of determining value in a point based system. Either the points are important, and the costs should be rigorous, or the points aren't important, and the player should just be allowed to select whatever he likes.

The problem that people run into is that they find that there are just too many Kewl Powerz to enumerate. So don't even try. Instead, have a system that determines the cost by game effect, and then fit the description of any power to the underlying mechanics to determine the cost of that power.

By which I mean to say, use Hero System. Or make your system work that way. Assuming you want points.

Mike

[ADGBoss]

Mike is definitely correct here, there are far to many powers possible (ie imagination) to be able to wing it for a game system. Especially when an opinion can come into effect. ie Jack thinks Flying is worth 3 points but Jane might think 5 is appropriate.

You may want to limit the physics of the universe, even if they are far more then we can do in real life.  Also, lay out a sort of table, possibly Forece and effect.... an Elemental Example

Force
E
F
F
E
C
T

                      Fire            Water             Air            Earth
Heal-2              x2               x1                 x2              x3
Harm-2            x1              x3                   x3              x2
Survive-2
Armor-3
Charm-4

Where force has a multiplyer and effect is the base cost

To give some parameters of what people expect to do with their powers


Sean
ADGBoss

[ethan_greer]

Mike, Sean, thanks very much for the responses.  I've done a bit of research and a LOT of thinking about this, over the past couple of days, and I've decided in the end to leave kewl powerz out of Toast.
-e.

P.S. Sean, please don't be annoyed with me when looking at the post times; I only just reached this conclusion, and when I got here to post it I saw your response.  it's not like your post reminded me to say "never mind."  Just a coincidence of timing.  :)

[ADGBoss]

Hey no problem...

:)

Sean
ADGBoss