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

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

Yeah, that's what I meant. Sorry for the confusion, I was a bit rushed last night. I'll basically just port it directly over from the utility talents.

I'll focus on the illusion stuff later but you make good points about the weather crafting stuff, especially since I'm big on clarifying things.  I think weather is one of the things that would most benefit from using more time to lower the DC.  Sorta first draft attempt to update it, may try to clean it up some more later:

Weather-Crafter:

Seems like a good start. More clarifications could be added as far as how it can interact with forces such as wind, moisture, humidity, or air pressure in calm conditions, as well as how far one can go with a single "simple" cloud (do you need a "charged" cloud for lightning? Or a dark cloud for rain? Or summon either variant?).

Also noticed that the ability curiously lacks any mention of being able to walk on clouds - would weather-crafter clouds allow walking by default, or after they're "processed"? It's a minor issue between the PT and LL versions of it, since LL doesn't have "pegasi science" to apply.

One thing I've noticed, with the Ability system the Self-discovery Destiny cannot grant two utility talents.
In this case if the character in question is using the ability system and takes the self-discovery destiny should they gain an amount of ability points equivalent to two utilities?
Edit: A few Destinies actually.
Archmage offers 4 utilities and the ability to, twice per day, pick one to use for a time and Evolution grants racial points at levels 4 and potentially 7.
Again I assume these desinities give an equivalent amount of ability points if taken instead of the utilities/racials?

Doc pseudopolis wrote:One thing I've noticed, with the Ability system the Self-discovery Destiny cannot grant two utility talents.
In this case if the character in question is using the ability system and takes the self-discovery destiny should they gain an amount of ability points equivalent to two utilities?
Edit: A few Destinies actually.
Archmage offers 4 utilities and the ability to, twice per day, pick one to use for a time and Evolution grants racial points at levels 4 and potentially 7.
Again I assume these desinities give an equivalent amount of ability points if taken instead of the utilities/racials?

Self-Discovery could be easily added in, but actually, I think the bigger problem would be the overlap with Evolution.

Archmage, on the other hand, could limit itself to Magic abilities, x/day and similar abilities, and wouldn't be particularly nasty to deal with.

Other than that, no particular problems in destinies come to mind, except that a couple of them might need to be rebalanced too good or not good enough.

Judging from the new Element of Magic, I'm guessing the new version of "choose X utility talents" is "gain X traits that cost 3 or less points." This should work for Self-Discovery and Archmage, and it would make them both look different from Evolution if Evolution was just a flat "you gain 6 points to immediately spend on new abilities." However, I think I heard talk of just cutting evolution, because it clutters character sheets and a handful of other things, which would remove some of the problem.

I still think there's room for, if not Evolution itself, an Evolution-flavored destiny. It would have to probably focus itself more on the borrowing/trading of existing traits, saying starting with the ability to borrow one or two traits from party members and growing to be some of the second level features that let you give ponies temporary abilities, and then continuously upgrading from there.

It's one of the Level 7 abilities that you can gain, but I see your point. Basically, what I meant to say is that's there definitely room in the design for something Evolution-themed.

There's a Destiny re-write happening to refer to the new abilities system and take care of these cases, though I'm not doing it so I don't know how it's getting on. In the meantime you can do what sunbeam suggested and just replace "choose X utility talents" with "choose X abilities worth 3 points or less each."

I believe the Evolution destiny is getting cut because it wasn't much more than "Gain more points. Gain a bunch more points. Gain a whole bunch more points," neat level 7 options not withstanding. As with everything, though, just because it's getting cut doesn't mean we can't add it back in in the future if someone comes up with a cool new idea for it.

Also, @Fury: I don't believe any changes have been made to the old utility talent document. I don't have the ability to edit it, and I haven't heard of anyone making changes to it. I don't know if it will be maintained moving forward, but you could try asking in the Errata: Suggestions thread if you have some specific changes you'd like to see made.

It's a few pages back but I was wondering what your opinion was of the proposed changes to Found It!

I have another suggestion the new Element of Magic should have a note on it to tell GMs that they maybe should allow quickswaps with the five utilties in this set of talents mid-sessions or something... To help allow those who liked the old version a lot to have their fun still be game-legal, kinda.

Mid-session seems a bit much. Pre/post session? Maybe. Each level up? Definitely.

Looking at the abilities for raising skill checks, their purchasing costs seem pretty unbalanced.

Compare:

1. Applejack of All Trades (3) [Created by LoganAura]
    Gain a +1 bonus to all untrained skills.

       Tricks of the Trades (3)
       Prerequisite: Applejack of All Trades
       The bonus from Applejack of All Trades increase to +2 for all untrained skills.

2. I’ve Read A Lot About it (2) [Created by Philadelphus]
    Choose a skill. You gain training in that skill. You may take this trait multiple times, choosing a different skill each time.

3. Best of the Breed (6)
   You gain two additional Attribute points. This ability may be taken up to 3 times, however, the normal limits for Attributes still apply (no
   Attribute may be improved above 10 normally, 12 if you have the Overachiever ability).

The net results are:

1. Applejack of all Trades + Tricks of the Trade (6 points total): +2 to up to 9 skills.
2. I've Read A Lot About It (Taken 3 times to give a cost of 6 points total for comparison): +3 to 3 skills.
3. Best of the Breed (6 points): +1 to 6 skills or +2 to 3 skills. Also raises the base attributes, but they don't seem to have many uses outside of the skils they affect.

Best of the Breed seems to objectively do less to raise skill checks than either of the others can for the same cost, and also can't raise skills above 10 by itself, which both of the others are capable of. Is it overpriced at 6 points? Or am I missing some advantage that it has?

I would assume it's a meta thing. Best of the Breed can be used for Min-Maxing while the other two can't as much (since getting as high as possible in as many skills as possible is not considered Mix-Maxing compared to always hitting DCs on your set attribute with bonuses alone). The trade skills actually counters min-maxing somewhat since it weakens training...

Although more likely it was due to their old system costs and the way things have converted, as well as Tricks being a new thing to this system...

Ah, this helps quantify what was bugging me about Tricks of the Trade. It really is under cost for what it does.

Not really. +1 is very useful for a generalist but limited. It's the type of buff where it gets to be a bigger concern the more times it's applied. The cost probably shouldn't be straight additive. Not saying it should be changed right now but it at least needs to be looked over.

Ok, I've made a few changes, let's see...

• No one has brought up any issues with ZamuelNow's revamped proposal for Found It! and I like the idea so I've replaced the old version in the document with it. It now works similarly to Freaky Knowledge, requiring you to pick an object type to look for when you take it. Given this more restricted version compared the original, I've modified it to let you pick two objects or categories of objects when you take it, just like Freaky Knowledge.
  
• Given the problems brought up with it and the trouble it can cause GMs, I've removed Jinx! for now. We can always see about adding a replacement in in the future if someone comes up with one everyone likes.
  
• Nature's Touch and Green Hooves have been added in, since no one raised any problems with them. I went to add Speak with Nature, but it was already in.
  
• Regarding the various skill increase abilities, there was actually a lot of discussion about whether or not to raise the cost of Applejack of All Trades. Because yes, if you look at the pure cost-to-benefit ratio of AoAT it's three times higher than Best of the Breed and twice as high as I've Read a Lot About It. However, its power is spread out over all your skills, which just isn't as useful, mechanically, as getting trainings in specific skills, since there are undeniably certain skills that are more often used and more important than others. Getting training in Persuasion, Perception, and Athletics/Acrobatics is almost certainly more useful than getting +1 to your Streetwise, Heal, History, Mechanics, Edurance, etc. Thus, the decision was made to keep the cost of AoAT low to encourage people who wanted to run jack-of-all-trades characters without feeling like they were having to pay the same price for less effect. It may not be perfectly balanced as-is (and if people find ways to abuse it or whatnot it's always open to change), but that's the reasoning behind it. I could perhaps see an argument for bumping Tricks of the Trade's cost up a point, but I want to wait and see if it's actually a problem or not. One problem with this system is that's fairly easy to see someone with high stats in a few keys skills leaving jack-of-all-trades characters feeling left out, so hopefully making their options a little cheaper should help them be (and feel like) contributing members of the team.
  
  Additionally, for Best of the Breed, you can pair it with Overachiever and use it raise three skills all the way up to 12 (and then stack training and an Expert Skill on top of it!), so it needs to be a little more expensive. (BotB is actually the exact same cost it had in Genetic Engineering, just translated to the ability system.)
  
• I've updated the description for Weather-Crafter slightly to make clear that it allows you to shape and create clouds (given that clouds are made in weather factories in Equestria it probably shouldn't, but gameplay over realism in this case).
  
• Changeling stuff: Ok, back to this. I've modified Alter Ego and Changeling's Trickery so they no longer have restrictions on your abilities when you transform (and Alter Ego has a 3/day limit to help differentiate it a bit more from the At Will Changeling's Trickery). Then while doing that, I had a thought: what if there were an upgrade available to CT that did something like the old Adaptable racial trait? Something like this:
  
  Adaptable (2) – 1/Day
  Prerequisite: Changeling's Trickery.
  When you transform into a different race, you may choose a passive, At Will, or Magic ability worth 2 points or less that you fulfill any prerequisites for. You gain access to that ability as long as you are in that race's form until your next extended rest. (Note that this allows you to revert to your normal form, then transform back into the same race and regain access to the form you chose, but only that specific race. If you transformed into a unicorn and took Telekinesis then you would have Telekinesis as long as you were in the form of a unicorn until you took an extended rest – even if you transformed back and forth between that and your normal form multiple times. However, you wouldn't have it if you then transformed into a pegasus).
  
  I'm not sure if it's a good solution, but it allows players to gain access to new abilities upon transforming without necessarily having to have them in their normal form (so you could transform into a pegasus and be able to fly, or a unicorn and use telekinesis, etc.). I'm definitely hesitant about as it's kind of an alternate form of the Element of Magic, but we'll see. It could potentially be changed in various ways to try to balance it such as by being more expensive, cost a Magic Point, or only allow 1-point abilities...I haven't added it to the document yet as I'd like to get people's thoughts first.
  
• Finally, on a more personal note: I'll be going on vacation this Saturday (the 14th) through the end of December. I will have Internet access where I'm going, but it'll be slow and I don't expect to have much time to actually get on the 'net. So don't be surprised if you don't hear a lot from me for next two weeks. I'll try to check the forums as I can, but don't expect a quick reply. I'll try to finish up some of these last remaining issues before I leave so I can leave the document in a good state over Christmas.   
  

Adaptable looks okay. Will there be a version of it for Alter Ego as well (upgrade)? Or will it require (as a prerequisite) Alter Ego?

If Alter Ego is getting limited uses, should its "transformation" time be reduced to compensate? It's pretty awkward to use, with 5 minutes of idleness to transform, and then a minute to reverse the process. You can't use it for most/any emergencies, and it leaves you pretty vulnerable to identity exposure if caught/seen during the preparation time.

For alter ego, this can be a disaster, due to the permanent nature of the disguise - if NPCs (or PCs   ) happen to connect the dots and identify the link between your form(s), you can forget about the ability being useful - potentially ever, if it becomes public knowledge (e.g. via 'wanted' posters, TV, newspapers...). It's pretty much every masked superhero's nightmare.

'Changeling's Trickery's' 30 seconds prep time also doesn't make much sense: the show-changelings pretty much do it instantly. Any reason why it can't be bumped down to 5-10 secs prep time?

Also you guys have seemed forget about my X-Born's suggestion... Or that's just still on the backburner for now?

Also on the Alter-Ego thing I don't see why it can't be like five seconds or even instant if it's going to be limited in use.