Besides the general rules I have for PCs in Felltower, I have added a few others.
For starting PCs the following rules apply.
No Power-Ups.
If it's not on your main template, you can't have it.
I do make small exceptions. The Ferocious Beard perk, for example, makes perfect sense as a starting perk. I'm fine with people taking Reach Mastery if they have a two-handed weapon and don't feel like waiting exactly one session to get it. I'd possibly consider other ones, as well.
Spellcaster perks, though? Little chance of them.
I do make a big exception for the Thief. I think it's a much richer, fuller, and more immediately effective template with the Power-Ups, so I allow them, per this discussion and the ones linked here. A thief that starts with Sensitive Touch or Backstabber is a much more viable character in my experience.
Not a thief? Stick to what's listed on your template to start with.
The general idea here is that you can make a character with just Dungeon Fantasy 1: Adventurers (Or Barbarians, or Ninja for Assassins.) You don't need any other books. You don't have to be fully conversant in the options to make a viable character. The rare exceptions are perks like the ones above, and I'm able to just suggest them as the GM if I think they'll in-concept and the player doesn't realize they are out there. One book is all you need to keep up.
No Lenses.
That is, no cross-training lenses. Template-specific lenses (like those in Barbarians) are allowed.
I do this for a few reasons.
One is that, at full cost, basically Knights and Swashbucklers can afford lenses. So it becomes a narrow set of templates that can afford to lens out right away, and it encourages people to do so because you can stack Swashbuckler onto Knight, say, just so you could get more sword skill off the bat.
Another is that, while I like the concept of cutting down duplication to allow easier purchase, it feeds into the first part and feed heavily into the next one. So not allowing it reinforces point one, and if I allow it . . . keep reading.
The third and probably most important reason is because that allowing lenses rewards the players with the most time to investigate cross-template synergies and long-range Power-Up synergy goals. Since I'm gearing the game to casual play, I want the folks who just say, "Give me a Knight with a mace and shield!" or "I'll run a Druid" just to be able to do so without worrying that they've already given up ground to the more rule-expert guys. That the rules-expert guys have come up with some totally amazing synergistic combination between this Knight Power-Up here and that Swashbuckler Power-Up there and this here Martial Artist Chi Power is fine - they're more than 100 points away from that. They're just as Knight as you are, to start, no matter where they plan to go.
No Special Customizations
If it's on your template and we're using it, it's on your template and you are using it. I don't allow customization. No extra disads above the count. No ditching skills just because you can't think why Mimicry (Bird Calls) or Writing or Physiology (Undead) can help you. Find a use for them.
I will allow thematically appropriate changes - this is why, for example, we had a Martial Artist with Gigantism. I've allowed different disads for some templates to swap in ones that seemed to fit the concept of the character and the template. But I haven't allowed new advantages, extra powers, or dumping required disads to open up more options for a template.
I have had a little fun allowing for non standard disads, and sticking it to munchkins who thought their personality problem would never show up in play. The knight with wierdness magnet for obe, the pyromaniac mage with coitaphobia who had to travel through rooms the trolls had profanely carved..,
ReplyDeleteI have had a little fun allowing for non standard disads, and sticking it to munchkins who thought their personality problem would never show up in play. The knight with wierdness magnet for obe, the pyromaniac mage with coitaphobia who had to travel through rooms the trolls had profanely carved..,
ReplyDeleteI can see the fun in it, but it's more of a pain than a positive. If someone really has a cool character concept that demands it, I'll allow it - but generally people aren't coming up with cool concepts built around disads that are more restrictive than the ones they want to trade out.
DeleteDo you allow moving points around between skills that are already on the template? Your Elf Knight wants his primary weapon to be Bow vs the melee options, so 4 points in a melee option and 24 points in Bow?
ReplyDeleteDo you allow adding skills with quirk points that arent on the template? For example, strictly by template, Martial Artists _cant swim_! Using a quirk point to plug that hole allowed? Or is it "try not to drown your first time in the water, buy it after"?
I do get what your driving at for this though, and I think its a good way to keep GURPS novices in the game and having fun in DF. Probably borrow these rules for a DF game I want to run, if I can get my novices to agree to play :)
The only one I allowed was the Dwarf Knight moving some points from Axe/Mace to Shield so his shield would be useful. I wouldn't do it again, though. I regret doing it once - it would have been better if he'd had to make different choices and not have his race bump up his skills evenly.
DeleteSwimming is on everyone's Background skills in my game, after this session. But that's a generic campaign switch - like how we deleted some skills and merged them, or just don't use them (Hiking is always zeroed out and an extra point is added to the skill set it in included in.)
Heh, yeah, that was the session I was thinking of :).
DeleteSo basically "no" to both of those, but you've done some campaign stuff to cover some glaring holes. Gotcha.
Right. Those holes are holes because my game makes them so - so I'm responsible for giving them patches.
Delete