Utility Talent/Racial Trait overhaul/revamp - New "Abilities" system

Another thing to think about is that it also counts for "theory" rolls... You know... If an NPC is doing something that if a PC were to do they'd need a skill check, that event can be effected too.

ZamuelNow wrote:I gotta ask...what GM does this?  It comes off like pretty blatantly breaking the fourth wall and a massive abuse of player trust.  It's something that exists in a "GM vs Player" mindset but is mostly impossible in a "NPC vs PC" aspect since the characters don't know rolls and other mechanics exist.  I'm really curious since I just realized this is the logic behind most arguments against Pinkie Promise.  

It's also potentially (ab)usable as a "PC vs PC" thing (AKA the "troll" problem Jinx has, or when conflicts rise up), or by a DM against PCs (traitors or villains in disguise - who says they don't try to "discourage" the PCs from something by an evil eye? It certainly makes opposed checks simpler, and NPCs are almost always at a assist/Magic Point/numbers disadvantage). In such a case, it would certainly be possible (or pretty much guaranteed) to be "avoided" in spammy manner.

Fury of the Tempest wrote:You know... I've been thinking...

Who here would ever actually use a true-shifter changeling, old or new?

That's...hmm. Actually a valid question. While some things have to change when a shapeshifter assumes a new form, they're still themselves. Might even be a power level/balance concern since I've seen the problem elsewhere with unchecked morphing ability.

Zarhon wrote:The reason I made it work by having things grow "by a single stage" is purely for balance reasons - it's pretty damn powerful to be able to turn an apple seed into a full grown tree with blooming apples, for example - there had to be some kind of limiter to it.

I wasn't sure what "method" to make such a limit though, other than a "stage" of plant life. I made an exception on this for dead plants, as those are rather situational in themselves (how often do you need to revive a tree from a rotten/dead/withering state?).

As an example of what I mean on stages, here's an example, going with a seed, of what "green hooves" could do:

Seed -> Freshly bloomed seed (basically a small leaf or sprout coming out of it) -> Sapling sized -> Adult size/blooming/pollinating -> Fruit bearing/seed releasing. Afterwards, it simply continues growing in size/bearing more fruit/reproducing for each application.

I suppose an alternate way of seeing it would be to simply assign static stages a plant can be in:
- Seed
- Bloom
- Sapling
- Adult/blossoming/pollinating
- Fruit-bearing

Could also make it so that the ability uses rolls/time prep investment to determine how much "growth" you get out of the skill - low rolls giving you a minor improvement, whilst high rolls essentially make you into a nature druid.

Indeed. I definitely understand the balance aspect of it. I think with a little elucidation such as you've proposed it could work fairly well and argument-free. I wonder if it would be worth it to make the ability to grow trees with this be an additional upgrade? So you could have a pony who's just really good at growing common food plants (vegetables, grains, etc.), then have one who's more of a druid that can actually affect trees.

I definitely think some sort of plant-growth ability should be available, as it makes sense for earth ponies to have (it could maybe even be a Core ability for the earth pony racial template). I mostly just need to come up with a way to phrase it using the definitions of various stages you provided.

...you know, here's an off-the-wall idea. What if we had an upgrade tree of a base, cheap ability that let you grow plants (except trees) At-Will in exchange for a longer prep time (like 10 minutes), then the current Green Hooves that lets you do it much quicker a limited number of times per day (maybe drop the prep time to 30 seconds or less), and then a third upgrade requiring Green Hooves that let you use the previous two to affect trees? Costs could maybe be something like 2 –> 3 –> 1 and the first one could be an earth pony Core ability. What do you guys think?

ZamuelNow wrote:I was pointing out the existence of other languages on the show, since Zecora speaks Pony/English/Common and Zebra/Swahili, but wound up being a little wordy.  I actually forgot about that bit in Cutie Pox.

Ohh, yeah, you're talking about that bit in Bridle Gossip. I actually forgot about that bit myself.

Changeling stuff:

So, I'll admit that I was never very interested in changeling talents, so I'm not entirely clear what you both are saying here. True Shifter I understand is the racial that lets you access another race's abilities while you're in that form, correct? So are you advocating that changing should be purely cosmetic, and that you retain all your abilities, without (potentially) gaining access to any Core abilities you might not have?

Also, for the racial templates, what I put up was just a first draft off the top of my head, where I was being very conservative when it came to Core abilities. Now that I've thought about it more I could see giving every race at least one Core ability, although trying to get them all balanced point-wise might be a bit harder.

Jinx stuff:
I actually kind of like Zarhon's suggestion to change Jinx to simply be a -10 penalty rather than than a critical failure, and Zamuel's suggestion for decreasing its duration could be good too. What if it become something like this:

Jinx! (?) – Magic
Preparation time: Instantaneous
You summon misfortune to all those around you. For the next 13 seconds, all creatures within 70 feet of you (including you) suffer from horribly bad luck, causing all skill checks to suffer a -10 penalty.

What do you think, Dan? Still too much of a game-breaker for GMs?

Also, Cloud Sculptor was brought to my attention as an ability that really isn't especially useful. It's very situational – I'm curious, has anyone ever used it in-game? I think we could probably cut it without much loss.

Philadelphus wrote:Indeed. I definitely understand the balance aspect of it. I think with a little elucidation such as you've proposed it could work fairly well and argument-free. I wonder if it would be worth it to make the ability to grow trees with this be an additional upgrade? So you could have a pony who's just really good at growing common food plants (vegetables, grains, etc.), then have one who's more of a druid that can actually affect trees.

I definitely think some sort of plant-growth ability should be available, as it makes sense for earth ponies to have (it could maybe even be a Core ability for the earth pony racial template). I mostly just need to come up with a way to phrase it using the definitions of various stages you provided.

...you know, here's an off-the-wall idea. What if we had an upgrade tree of a base, cheap ability that let you grow plants (except trees) At-Will in exchange for a longer prep time (like 10 minutes), then the current Green Hooves that lets you do it much quicker a limited number of times per day (maybe drop the prep time to 30 seconds or less), and then a third upgrade requiring Green Hooves that let you use the previous two to affect trees? Costs could maybe be something like 2 –> 3 –> 1 and the first one could be an earth pony Core ability. What do you guys think?

Personally, I don't think the split should be grass -> tree.  Rather, I think upgrades should be based on prep time speed and that trees are considered to have an extra step. That would be a better split of good farmer vs super druid magic.

Also, Cloud Sculptor was brought to my attention as an ability that really isn't especially useful. It's very situational – I'm curious, has anyone ever used it in-game? I think we could probably cut it without much loss.

I believe Ramsus stated he took it on one character...and even then it was purely flavor.  I think the move is built wrong in its current form.  What it should be is a sort of Frankenstein mix of Fabricate and Strengthen Substance that's limited to clouds.  Wonderbolt Academy showed that clouds can be packed densely enough for non-pegasi though it's temporary.  Would still be situational but would be more useful as a way to stop a fall or act like an aerial bridge.

Philadelphus wrote:Jinx! (?) – Magic
Preparation time: Instantaneous
You summon misfortune to all those around you. For the next 13 seconds, all creatures within 70 feet of you (including you) suffer from horribly bad luck, causing all skill checks to suffer a -10 penalty.

This seems too weak for its cost of a MP, if you ask me. The -10 penalty to yourself and allies means you can't do anything reliably during its duration. The 13 seconds make it too short to benefit from more than one or two rolls by NPCs, as well as making timing of it crucial (too early, and you're screwed, too late, and an opportunity is wasted), and it's not guaranteed to help you against a powerful (or simply lucky) adversary - opposing rolls, for instance, are practically identical, since both you and the NPCs suffer the same penalty.

It's powerful, yes, but it requires the exact right kind of situation (impending, predicable assault that won't last for more than 13 seconds) to be useful to the PCs (as opposed to outright hindering them).

I'd say, for that version, remove its MP cost (make it a 1/day instead), and have it allow usage as an interrupt (so if you get caught by a surprise roll, you can still use this as a counter). Potential upgrades could include making yourself/allies immune to the penalty.

@ Cloudsculptor: The ability is sort of iffy - on one hand, it's "benefit" should technically already be possible to do, simply by having weather-crafting. On the other, the ability is situational (both in its use as a decoy, and potentially where it can be created). It should/could have, among other things:

Cloud Sculptor suggestions:

I'm somewhat in favor of having a form of True Shifter, but that's only because in Living Legends I have a race which can do that, and without that ability it'd be silly to be able to transform into something with wings and yet not be able to fly... in the current system I can't say how it'd work without reserving some ability points for racial abilities. It might have to be something done with DM discretion.

Personally I'd love for Cloudsculptor to have an upgrade to make cloud-golems... (I know that mook can allow such things, but I figure we can always use more minion maker options)

I 100% agree with Xel, minion makers are the best things ever

I have a major suggestion. Downgrade all the X-Borns to 1 abality point and their bace form be just basic immunity to said element and have upgrade options for each of them at one point that would allow the power to use the element in question. This change would allow both the power to create characters that are immune to elements without needing them to also have the power to expel said elements and allow One with the Waves and Waterborn to be merged into one by the Roll Twice while swimming & power to swim with allies without penaity powers be added as an upgrade to Waterborn's base immunity.

Fury of the Tempest wrote:

So are you advocating that changing should be purely cosmetic, and that you retain all your abilities, without (potentially) gaining access to any Core abilities you might not have?

Yeah, basically. We don't even know if true-shifter changelings actually exist, and without any racial/utility divide, it'll simply gives players the opportunity to change their abilities mid-game, which is a bit of a game breaker, especially at early levels.

So yeah... changelings should simply be a cosmetic change, able to quickly change appearance between one creature to another, but not changing what they can actually do.

Hmm, interesting. That would be the simplest way to handle it from a mechanics point of view. I could see having Alter Ego basically unchanged from GE, then an upgrade to it ("Changeling's Trickery" or "Thousand Faces" or whatever name people like) that lets you change into any medium-sized creature you've seen.

My only concern with it is the potential for arguments if you're playing, say, a changeling, and morph into, say a minotaur:
Player: Ok, so I morph into a minotaur, then fly up to the roof with the boulder–
GM: Hey, wait a minute. You're a minotaur. How are you flying?
Player: I dunno. The wording just says that I keep all my abilities.
GM: I mean, if you were using a jetpack or something to fly I could see you doing that as a minotaur, but you were flying with your wings...
Player: *shrugs*

It's kind of a problem of story-and-mechanics separation. I'm starting to like the idea more and more for being elegant mechanics-wise, it's just potentially prone to causing arguments. Although, there's often a bit of suspension of disbelief when it comes to how various abilities actually happen...maybe there could be a comment talking about the rationale behind the mechanics and a suggestion that you voluntarily avoid using any abilities that it doesn't make sense for your current form to be using (it would kind of blow your cover, after all).

ZamuelNow wrote:Personally, I don't think the split should be grass -> tree.  Rather, I think upgrades should be based on prep time speed and that trees are considered to have an extra step.  That would be a better split of good farmer vs super druid magic.

That's an idea. What do you guys think of something like this?

Nature's Touch (2) – At Will
Preparation Time: 15 Minutes
You drastically speed up the growth of one plant that you can touch, causing it to advance one stage in growth. The stages of growth are:
(Trees) Seed→Seedling→Sapling→Young Adult→Mature Tree
(All other plants) Seed→Seedling→Young Adult→Mature Plant
Using Nature's Touch on a mature plant will cause it produce whatever fruit or seeds it would normally produce, and may be repeated indefinitely.

Green Hooves (3) [Created by Zarhon]
Prerequisite: Nature's Touch
The time it takes to advance a plant one stage decreases to 1 minute. In addition, you may use Nature's Touch to revive a withering, wounded, or diseased plant to full health.

ZamuelNow wrote:I think the move is built wrong in its current form.  What it should be is a sort of Frankenstein mix of Fabricate and Strengthen Substance that's limited to clouds.  Wonderbolt Academy showed that clouds can be packed densely enough for non-pegasi though it's temporary.  Would still be situational but would be more useful as a way to stop a fall or act like an aerial bridge.

I'm thinking we can pretty much just drop Cloud Sculptor at this point. I do think some of the text about shaping clouds into shapes could get moved to Weather-Crafter. Maybe something along the lines of "You may also sculpt clouds into various shapes. They will remain the way you shape them for an hour before dissipating."

Regarding Jinx!:

I think at this point it really just has enough difficulties that it should simply be cut altogether. It's extremely out of line in terms of benefit-to-cost ratio with the other two or three similar abilities, and as Stairc has brought up it can be a real game-breaker for GMs. I think I'll go ahead and cut it for now, keeping in mind that we can always re-add it if we come up with a way to make it work in the future. Remember, it's fine to remove abilities if they aren't really fitting into the overall scheme or are too problematic for GMs. We have no shortage of ideas for new ones, after all.

Xel Unknown wrote:Personally I'd love for Cloudsculptor to have an upgrade to make cloud-golems... (I know that mook can allow such things, but I figure we can always use more minion maker options)

See, this brings up the strength of a flavor-neutral system: we could have five different minion-making talents, flavored cloud golem, stone golem, zombie, robot, and ninja. Or, we could have a single flavor-neutral ability and you could have any of those...or anything else you like, too!

...speaking of which, I've added Mook back in as an ability in the Companion section. I've been meaning to do that, thanks for reminding me.

Xel Unknown wrote:I have a major suggestion. Downgrade all the X-Borns to 1 abality point and their bace form be just basic immunity to said element and have upgrade options for each of them at one point that would allow the power to use the element in question. This change would allow both the power to create characters that are immune to elements without needing them to also have the power to expel said elements and allow One with the Waves and Waterborn to be merged into one by the Roll Twice while swimming & power to swim with allies without penaity powers be added as an upgrade to Waterborn's base immunity.

Now, this, I rather like the idea of. I like the idea of Waterborn having multiple upgrades like you suggested and removing the redundancies. Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

Philadelphus wrote:

Xel Unknown wrote:Personally I'd love for Cloudsculptor to have an upgrade to make cloud-golems... (I know that mook can allow such things, but I figure we can always use more minion maker options)

See, this brings up the strength of a flavor-neutral system: we could have five different minion-making talents, flavored cloud golem, stone golem, zombie, robot, and ninja. Or, we could have a single flavor-neutral ability and you could have any of those...or anything else you like, too!

...speaking of which, I've added Mook back in as an ability in the Companion section. I've been meaning to do that, thanks for reminding me.

then I suggest we turn Cloudsculptor into a basic "sculpt stuture out of anything" type of talent?

Philadelphus wrote:That's an idea. What do you guys think of something like this?

Nature's Touch (2) – At Will
Preparation Time: 15 Minutes
You drastically speed up the growth of one plant that you can touch, causing it to advance one stage in growth. The stages of growth are:
(Trees) Seed→Seedling→Sapling→Young Adult→Mature Tree
(All other plants) Seed→Seedling→Young Adult→Mature Plant
Using Nature's Touch on a mature plant will cause it produce whatever fruit or seeds it would normally produce, and may be repeated indefinitely.

Green Hooves (3) [Created by Zarhon]
Prerequisite: Nature's Touch
The time it takes to advance a plant one stage decreases to 1 minute. In addition, you may use Nature's Touch to revive a withering, wounded, or diseased plant to full health.

I think that works pretty well.

By the way the Immunity to Fall Damage isn't in the system anymore... I'd suggest it returns even if it get's nerfed in some minor way.

And what of the "talk with plants" utility? It would certainly have interactions / benefits - should it be made into an upgrade or cheap side-option?

I'm against the removal of Cloudsculpting, at least not without upping the functionality of Weather-crafting to match what has been proposed for Cloudsculpting, as far a cloud manipulation/availability goes - it's an entirely outdoor skill reliant on situation with very vague functionality/limits, rather than the "use whenever you want", clearly defined functionality of Cloudsculpting utility.

I'm curious, though - what is everyone's opinion of the current "helpless/willing non-ally" requiring utilities (Howling Chains, Pinkie Promise, Honesty, etc...)? Do people find decent (or rather, meaningful) use of such in practice? Should they be 'freed up' in its functionality, or perhaps be given passive benefits to counter their situational natures?

I personally find them rather tricky from both player and DM perspective:

For players, they obviously want to use them, but have to be given a rather specific situation from the DM to do so. And even then, limitations can apply, be it from DM veto, chances of it causing unwanted campaign chaos, or simply the ability's specific wording not allowing it to function when it would be optimal to use (be it DM's intention or otherwise - sometimes DM's can sabotage themselves/their players by accident!). They're also pretty limited in what they can achieve - a general lack of "creative uses", or any "perceived impact", acting instead as fail-safes (which aren't actually foolproof or a guarantee - It's the reason why the "unreliable narrator" is extremely unpopular - players prefer not being paranoid by their own design).

And from a DM perspective, they become "burdened" to provide a meaningful situation for those utilities to be utilized - It can be very hard to give a player a situation where a Pinkie Promise becomes wanted, needed, and then actually utilized (rather than going for alternate methods). Utilities are a big deal (you get roughly three per level, which is a lot of RL time - they have to count), and if they're useless, that's a lot of wasted character potential, RP and mechanics wise.

The "helpless" requirement can also be a problem, if it causes setting/morality awkwardness.
("Okay, we'll just have to tie up and kidnap Mrs Cake. Then she'll have no choice but to tell us the secret ingredients to her MMM cake!")

@Fall immunity : Maybe it could be reworked to function as though you've got cat/ninja skills : Massive decreases in the relevant "land safely" DCs, reduced negative consequences (sprain an ankle rather than become a splatter), additional ninja/acrobatic options (grab onto a railing, spin on a flagpole, epic roll...), or simply a passive "decrease fall velocity" functionality (akin to a flying squirrel). These could be applied directly, or as an "extra upgrade" (similar to Xel's suggested X-born stuff). That way it's functional AND an attractive pick for anyone wanting to have Pinkie Pie levels of pronking or ninja skills.

I find Pinkie Promise to be really powerful to lock in an agreement with any party that might be questionable to wither the task will be done or something. Can even be used to lock in the PCs to do something cause if you brake the promise bad stuff happens to yea. Then again, maybe it should get a buff of some kind to help that some good karma is made by fulfilling the promise?

Howling Chains, I only saw it used once in Pony Team Bravo which wore off too soon to be worthwhile. (that was before it's buff to last hours)

Honesty, just plain sucks as is, without clear def on what "helpless" and "without distortion" mean it's basically useless to every really use and it's power can highly very between campaigns because of different viewpoints on it's power level.

But yeah, I'd agree that stuff like it could use a good deal of help to be improved outside of the very limited viewpoint they do have...

@Fall Damage suggestion: I like that idea.

Xel Unknown wrote:I find Pinkie Promise to be really powerful to lock in an agreement with any party that might be questionable to wither the task will be done or something. Can even be used to lock in the PCs to do something cause if you brake the promise bad stuff happens to yea. Then again, maybe it should get a buff of some kind to help that some good karma is made by fulfilling the promise?

The karma portion would require the promise to have an "active" part - something you can fulfill (rather than just "don't betray me"). It also can bring misery to the players if traitorous/tricky NPCs benefit from its "karma", whilst also abusing a promise technicality/loophole.

("I promised I wouldn't lay a hoof on you! That's what my henchmen are for! Thanks for the free karma!")

DM's have simpler/easier ways of forcing players to do something (threats, torture, blackmail...), and can give less vague consequences of such. Most DMs probably don't apply it as an ability the NPCs would have - it's the players that get it, and use it against other NPCs (or players, but that's a special case and not always a factor).

It's good for making agreements, but that's pretty much the only functionality of it - you can't benefit from it any significant way, or really manipulate NPCs with it - you can't really fool /force creatures into breaking the promise (they have to do it willingly), and the promise can backfire on you if the "cosmic retribution" is a slap on the wrist, or happens to an unintended target.

One way that could work around it - have it be usable on non-willing creatures, but in such situations, you have to provide three different, simple promises (unrelated to each other) , and they have to pick one of the three at their choice. That gives the creatures some leeway - you can't have them promise not to harm you AND not to betray you AND not to lie to you.

A similar mechanic could work for Honesty as well - give the NPC/creature more than one question thing to answer, and it chooses what it's most willing to answer.

Zarhon wrote:And what of the "talk with plants" utility? It would certainly have interactions / benefits - should it be made into an upgrade or cheap side-option?

I feel it's fairly different enough to warrant being separate despite sharing the same theme.

I'm against the removal of Cloudsculpting, at least not without upping the functionality of Weather-crafting to match what has been proposed for Cloudsculpting, as far a cloud manipulation/availability goes - it's an entirely outdoor skill reliant on situation with very vague functionality/limits, rather than the "use whenever you want", clearly defined functionality of Cloudsculpting utility.

...

I thought it had already been stated that it could be used indoors through the many discussions about it with limitations just being modifiers to the skill checks.

I'm curious, though - what is everyone's opinion of the current "helpless/willing non-ally" requiring utilities (Howling Chains, Pinkie Promise, Honesty, etc...)? Do people find decent (or rather, meaningful) use of such in practice? Should they be 'freed up' in its functionality, or perhaps be given passive benefits to counter their situational natures?

I personally find them rather tricky from both player and DM perspective:

For players, they obviously want to use them, but have to be given a rather specific situation from the DM to do so. And even then, limitations can apply, be it from DM veto, chances of it causing unwanted campaign chaos, or simply the ability's specific wording not allowing it to function when it would be optimal to use (be it DM's intention or otherwise - sometimes DM's can sabotage themselves/their players by accident!). They're also pretty limited in what they can achieve - a general lack of "creative uses", or any "perceived impact", acting instead as fail-safes (which aren't actually foolproof or a guarantee - It's the reason why the "unreliable narrator" is extremely unpopular - players prefer not being paranoid by their own design).

And from a DM perspective, they become "burdened" to provide a meaningful situation for those utilities to be utilized - It can be very hard to give a player a situation where a Pinkie Promise becomes wanted, needed, and then actually utilized (rather than going for alternate methods). Utilities are a big deal (you get roughly three per level, which is a lot of RL time - they have to count), and if they're useless, that's a lot of wasted character potential, RP and mechanics wise.

The "helpless" requirement can also be a problem, if it causes setting/morality awkwardness.
("Okay, we'll just have to tie up and kidnap Mrs Cake. Then she'll have no choice but to tell us the secret ingredients to her MMM cake!")

It really depends on the ability and the circumstance. Howling Chains is one of those powers I want to like but simply can't due to the helpless condition. "That guy we just beat senseless and tied up we can now...tie up." Pinkie Promise comes down to how nitpicky and pedantic both the player and GM are. Unfortunately, what seems to be an ability to help prevent you from getting screwed over seems to only get discussions about trying to weasel around it and screw people over. Disappointing since I think it's one of the most interesting utilities in the game.

Just a quick post to address two things:

Xel Unknown wrote:then I suggest we turn Cloudsculptor into a basic "sculpt stuture out of anything" type of talent?

I think you can do that already with Fabricate, can't you? It basically lets you take anything and sculpt it however you want...


And regarding Speak with Nature, I forgot to mention it, but I'm planning on just adding it in alongside Nature's Touch/Green Hooves under Woodsman as a regular ability.

"Regular ability"? What do you mean?

I think he means "same cost as a normal utility talent used to" (3 points).

ZamuelNow wrote:I thought it had already been stated that it could be used indoors through the many discussions about it with limitations just being modifiers to the skill checks.

Weather Stuff:

@Howling chains:

Howling Chains stuff:

To add another branch of discussion of talents: The 'create magical illusion' talents. Is it just me, or are these incredibly impractical to actually use effectively? Their limitations appear to put a roadblock on them when they would normally be optimal.

Illusionary Image & Mirage stuff:

There's potential for illusionists, but they there's simply a lot of drawbacks or alternate-ability investment requirements to make it work.
I think the illusion talents need to have a number of upgrade options, or outright direct buffs:

- Altering their drawbacks (not needing to focus or focusing discreetly, touch-vanishing only making the illusion easier to discern rather than vanishing, lack of sounds removed...).
- A few minor buffs (better duration, more uses...).
- Functionality upgrades (adding options to make multiple illusions simultaneously, as seen on Pokemon/Naruto, or getting ventriloquism ability via the illusion, and other fun illusion stuff...).
- Making it not rely solely on persuasion (for Mirage) to work effectively. Why does it have persuasion, anyway?