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

Zarhon Tue Jan 14, 2014 8:07 pm

On the topic of 'genetic' things being off-limited to the abilities - doesn't that stymy character creativity somewhat? Unless it's in the form of an ability that can be re-flavored as such, you can't have any 'exotic' detail about your character, or anything unique, genetics-wise. An example would be minotaurs (who are large, bipedal, and horned), batponies (long tongue, vampiric / fang-sucking), Ahuizotls (their tail), Griffons (beak - something which pathfinder avians actually use as a natural weapon), etc... All of them have genetic details which has no impact on the game / the player can't benefit from, unless the DM makes an exception, or the player re-flavors it as something else (which might not fully fit the talent - for example, a character with stretchy arms flavoring it as 'telekinesis', and then trying to grab a burning coal with their bare hands... Do they get burned or not?).

What would the opinion be on adding abilities that cost 0 points, acting purely as flavorful 'genetic' additions, pseudo-flaws, or similar traits/low-gameplay impact abilities that the player might wants to play under, for RP reasons?

For instance, a set of talents that add "monster" features to your characters, either at no penalty (due to their rather low-value properties), or at an informal/indirect, "RP" penalty - NPCs finding you monstrous / untrustworthy / scary (a reverse "Sweet & Elite"):

Monstrous Miscreant:

In fact, perhaps it would be a idea if a "RP trait repository" was made? A list/supplement of 'genetic traits', or similar RP-worthy minor abilities, both for the purpose of character creation (for both PCs AND NPCs), creativity in character concepts, and 'rule-suggestions/houserules' for handling such details as a DM. Such a doc could also include "PC-unavailable" abilities - stuff that only NPCs can do (e.g. making a player's rolls weakened by using an ability, or dealing them combat damage via skill checks, for the dungeoneer-type DMs).

**Philadelphus** Wed Jan 15, 2014 3:36 am

ZamuelNow wrote:It was? I always thought it was based off of Gilda stealing the apple in Griffon the Brush Off.

I believe the idea was first proposed in this thread, then codified into racial trait form when Genetic Engineering came out.

Crystalite wrote:D'aaaw! I really like the Shapeshifter talents!

Reason for the decision:

If it's any consolation, they aren't going away entirely, they're just becoming exclusive to a single destiny. And I've heard that the destiny re-write for the new system is very nearly done... Smile

Zarhon wrote:On the topic of 'genetic' things being off-limited to the abilities - doesn't that stymy character creativity somewhat? Unless it's in the form of an ability that can be re-flavored as such, you can't have any 'exotic' detail about your character, or anything unique, genetics-wise. An example would be minotaurs (who are large, bipedal, and horned), batponies (long tongue, vampiric / fang-sucking), Ahuizotls (their tail), Griffons (beak - something which pathfinder avians actually use as a natural weapon), etc...

Quite the opposite, really, it's very liberating. Not every detail of a character's physical form needs to be associated with an ability – there's no "walking" ability because it's assumed that a normal creature would be able to do that. Similarly, an ahuitzotl should be able to use the hand on its tail to do whatever it can do with its other two hands, without needing to have taken an ability to do so.

Basically, that's what skill checks are for – they're for all those innumerable actions that players want to do that aren't covered by an ability because they should be something you can do. If you want to kick down a door, you don't need a "Years of Apple Bucking" ability to do it, you just roll Athletics. You DO need an ability to teleport, because it's not something that you would just be able to do.

Zarhon wrote:All of them have genetic details which has no impact on the game

Right. Otherwise we're basically back at the original state of affairs where racials were actually exclusive to each race. And the new system encourages creativity in builds; I no longer am forced to play a pegasus or griffon if I want to be able to fly. I can play a pegasus who is unable to fly if I want to, or play a genius minotaur inventor with a jetpack who can. Taking away those barriers encourages creativity.

Zarhon wrote:What would the opinion be on adding abilities that cost 0 points, acting purely as flavorful 'genetic' additions, pseudo-flaws, or similar traits/low-gameplay impact abilities that the player might wants to play under, for RP reasons?

We'd like to keep away from 0-point abilities because they just add more clutter to the character sheet. This system already makes for really long character sheets; Snowflake's character sheet was a whopping five and a half pages, and that was after I shrunk the font into near unreadability and cut out every single white space I could. Someone taking another five–ten 0-point abilities would simply be cluttering up their sheet making it even harder to find things on it.

These type of low-gameplay impact things are perfect additions to a character's backstory (subject to GM approval, of course. No one like power creep). If someone wants to put stuff like that into their backstory/character description, that's fine, it's up to them, but we don't want to encourage even longer character sheets filled with even more abilities that take even more time to read through in order to react to situations.

Zarhon wrote:For instance, a set of talents that add "monster" features to your characters, either at no penalty (due to their rather low-value properties), or at an informal/indirect, "RP" penalty - NPCs finding you monstrous / untrustworthy / scary (a reverse "Sweet & Elite"):
Monstrous Miscreant:

We definitely want to steer clear of vague abilities as much as possible because they inevitably lead to dissension between players and GMs. One player interprets something one way, the GM interprets it another, and everybody is unhappy. I (and the other devs) often spend a lot of time wording abilities (and adding comments) to make them as clear and precise as possible. I've made several proposals for new abilities only for Stairc to come back with "What about this scenario? What does this exactly mean? Could someone use it to do X?" Which is great because it helps tighten things up and make them more clear. There is a point where common sense has to come in, but the more clear we can make something and less open to interpretation it is, the better.

Zarhon wrote:In fact, perhaps it would be a idea if a "RP trait repository" was made? A list/supplement of 'genetic traits', or similar RP-worthy minor abilities, both for the purpose of character creation (for both PCs AND NPCs), creativity in character concepts, and 'rule-suggestions/houserules' for handling such details as a DM. Such a doc could also include "PC-unavailable" abilities - stuff that only NPCs can do (e.g. making a player's rolls weakened by using an ability, or dealing them combat damage via skill checks, for the dungeoneer-type DMs).

Feel free. As I said in the other thread, I'm all for additional third-party supplements. As the guy in charge of the official documents I have to be very cautious and conservative when it comes to adding things, but when writing a supplement you can do whatever you like with it. It gives you a great chance to learn exactly what works and what doesn't about the ideas you use for it. Some sort of "Monster Pony" supplement could be quite interesting for certain games. I look forward to seeing what you come up with. Smile

Fury of the Tempest Wed Jan 15, 2014 3:40 am

Philadelphus wrote:If it's any consolation, they aren't going away entirely, they're just becoming exclusive to a single destiny. And I've heard that the destiny re-write for the new system is very nearly done...

Awesome! Because when they are out... I think we can consider this version officially released.

Zarhon Thu Jan 23, 2014 11:20 am

What happened with "Audiomancy"? It's missing from the abilities. Was it cut, or...?

**Paper Shadow** Thu Jan 23, 2014 11:39 am

Zarhon wrote:What happened with "Audiomancy"? It's missing from the abilities. Was it cut, or...?

A number of talents and racials were not carried over for some reason. I'll see if there is an actual reason (I forgot if there was), but if you still wish to old the old stuff, you can convert them yourself: a racial point is worth 2 ability points, and a utility talent is worth 3 ability points, so in this case Audiomancy would cost 3 ability points...

That said, if something has been converted and now cost more or less than what I've put above (such as Derp costing 4 points now, or Recycle Crazy Contraption costing 1 point), that's intentional...

Zarhon Thu Jan 23, 2014 12:24 pm

Way I see it, the docs being made official didn't actually change anything with the abilities, from when its was unofficial (still seems same from when elemental affinity/resistance/book forte was added) - just the destinies that granted utilities are now using "ability points" instead.

Were there any actual changes to the abilities with it being made official? Errata is very unspecific, and combing/comparing through it is annoying at best.

Ability wise - anything planned with elemental affinity's prerequisite requirement? As was said (and acknowledged) on Skype, elemental resistance, on its own, often doesn't "match up" or "make sense" for most characters, leading to it being veto'd/banned, which in turn bans the elemental affinity (easily justified for most characters, compared to flat out immunities) due to prerequisite requirement. Two bans for one ability.

There's also a lack of options for having "mis-matched" elemental resistance and affinity (e.g. being immune to drowning due to not breathing, and being able to shoot acid, rather than water, with a device/invention - makes sense in flavor/RP, but the rules prevent it).

Xel Unknown Thu Jan 23, 2014 1:43 pm

Personal Project and Sunderblade... Were dropped... All my rage... Sure you can say we can "houserule" stuff all you want, but hey, I don't get why they were weren't updated outside of you guys forgetting about them, or just not wanting to do them for unknown reasons.

And yeah... Not really sure you guys have a good idea what you are trying to do with the Elemental Resistance/Affinity, because as you've written the thing, you can only take ONE element and you're equally forced to pick the elemental blast for the character. Which is kinda lame when compaired to how you could in theory pick out all of the elements you wanted.

Also not sure what the deal with the Companion getting limits on how many points they can have. I mean the old version doesn't have any limits allowing a companion focused character who is spending most if not all of their racial/talents on the companion... I can understand that you dislike how now there is little cost to do so if you allow that. But I don't see why you can't figure out your own extra cost to balance it. Cause really you heavy unfairly nerfed Companion in my eyes. I mean you can only give it at max 10 ability points. IE: 5 racial points... Which the old version could get a lot more than that.

**Paper Shadow** Thu Jan 23, 2014 3:23 pm

Zarhon wrote:Were there any actual changes to the abilities with it being made official? Errata is very unspecific, and combing/comparing through it is annoying at best.

Well, I went through it all, and gathered a list of changes. Note: this is just face value of things, since I didn't make it I can't know for sure if certain things I've mentioned are true or not, since renaming stuff and merging stuff and reworking stuff can leave one's head in a spin. Also, some things I've labelled as MIA and some as Removed. The MIA are stuff I don't know why are missing, and the Removed are things I believe I can take a pretty good guess on. Some things are also awkwardly written due to stuff (for example, new Changeling's Trickery is more like A Thousand Faces, but I said A Thousand Faces was removed and Changeling's Trickery changed). Finally, from the numbers I posted above (and devs posted before), I converted everything into its relevant point cost, so that things which are now cheaper/costlier can be seen, comparing them to what their cost should be. So take this list as if it was from a fellow player, not someone on the dev team (which I am not)...

That said, enjoy...

LONG LIST IS LONG!:

ZamuelNow Thu Jan 23, 2014 11:29 pm

I feel Echolocation, Deceive The Senses, Inkbound Object, Speak With The Dead, Audiomancy, Spectral Batting Ram/Tsunami, and Sunderblade are both worth keeping and worth arguing their behalf. These are generally non-numeric skills without direct equals in the system.

I feel Words of Wisdom, Crystalline, and Many Tongues are worth keeping but don't feel like arguing the point in comparison to the other things. Many Tongues has gotten discussion on it's issues.

**Stairc -Dan Felder** Thu Jan 23, 2014 11:54 pm

I can't comment on most of those right now (busy as a rarity before a fashion show) but I believe Speak with the Dead will still exist - but it'll be unique to the lich destiny. This will make the destiny feel more special.

**Philadelphus** Sun Jan 26, 2014 2:48 am

Zarhon wrote:Way I see it, the docs being made official didn't actually change anything with the abilities, from when its was unofficial (still seems same from when elemental affinity/resistance/book forte was added) - just the destinies that granted utilities are now using "ability points" instead.

Yup, that's what we were waiting for to make it official, since they interact enough that you couldn't use the old version of the destinies with the abilities system.

I'm still thinking about the Elemental stuff, so no promises – but it does seem likely that it will get changed somewhat.

Xel Unknown wrote:Personal Project and Sunderblade... Were dropped... All my rage... Sure you can say we can "houserule" stuff all you want, but hey, I don't get why they were weren't updated outside of you guys forgetting about them, or just not wanting to do them for unknown reasons.

Personal Project was dropped because it doesn't really work with the new system. Before, it was a way to spend racial points to get extra utility talents. Now, it would be a way to spend to ability points to get...the same abilities you could just buy anyway. And Personal Project had a chance to explode horribly dangerously 20% of the time.

Xel Unknown wrote:And yeah... Not really sure you guys have a good idea what you are trying to do with the Elemental Resistance/Affinity, because as you've written the thing, you can only take ONE element and you're equally forced to pick the elemental blast for the character. Which is kinda lame when compaired to how you could in theory pick out all of the elements you wanted.

Yeah, that's one reason I was convinced to change the Elemental stuff to the way it is now. I've seen too many characters with all of the X-Borns, and it's just silly. Immunity to even one thing can be a real headache for DMs as it removes a possibility of danger (read: excitement, fun) in a campaign. Having someone be able to be resistant to drowning, falling, fire, ice, acid, and lightning for a measly 6 points? That'd be crazy.

Xel Unknown wrote:Also not sure what the deal with the Companion getting limits on how many points they can have. I mean the old version doesn't have any limits allowing a companion focused character who is spending most if not all of their racial/talents on the companion... I can understand that you dislike how now there is little cost to do so if you allow that. But I don't see why you can't figure out your own extra cost to balance it. Cause really you heavy unfairly nerfed Companion in my eyes. I mean you can only give it at max 10 ability points. IE: 5 racial points... Which the old version could get a lot more than that.

I don't remember why I put that limit there in the first place, and I don't see a logical reason it needs to stay there, so I've changed it to let you give your companion as many points as you have available.

Paper Shadow and ZamuelNow, thanks for doing the hard lifting and bringing that stuff to my attention. I've added Many Tongues and Audiomancy into the Abilities system with some slight modifications. As Dan said, Speak with the Dead will be a destiny-exclusive for the Lich destiny – helps make it more unique. The rest I'm either undecided about or have some reason for leaving out that I'd be happy to go over if you like.

ZamuelNow Sun Jan 26, 2014 3:07 am

Curious about the reasoning for the ones that are more definitively dropped. May help in figuring out what to do about them. I understand that some of the others may take thinking over.

Xel Unknown Sun Jan 26, 2014 2:27 pm

From where I see it... This system is built to make headache's for unskilled GMs... Cuase it goes players first and wants to give them as much freedom as it can to do anything and everything. So this one point where you can't get more then one x-born seems really random in my opinion. Sure being able to do so for 6 points is crazy I wont disagree with you there. Just say that we should try to figure out some "balanced" way to allow such builds. Everything this system changes seems to do was done with the mindset of giving the Player more build options so just removing a big and powerful one like that seems kinda backwards to me.

**Philadelphus** Sat Feb 01, 2014 11:24 pm

ZamuelNow wrote:I feel Echolocation, Deceive The Senses, Inkbound Object, Speak With The Dead, Audiomancy, Spectral Batting Ram/Tsunami, and Sunderblade are both worth keeping and worth arguing their behalf. These are generally non-numeric skills without direct equals in the system.

I feel Words of Wisdom, Crystalline, and Many Tongues are worth keeping but don't feel like arguing the point in comparison to the other things. Many Tongues has gotten discussion on it's issues.

Alright, let's see here...so with the new combined system Dan's been trying to streamline the system a bit, removing some of the talents that aren't as unique or exciting. The things we're looking for are if something is (mostly) unique, doesn't make life overly-hard for DMs, is exciting and interesting, and (generally) is less about boosting rolls and more about giving a new ability. Now, I'll be the first to say that this hasn't necessarily been consistently applied all the time in the past, but now that it's official there'll be a bit more scrutiny applied. So going over the ones you listed, here's what I'm thinking at the moment:

Echolocation: This one has, I feel, an odd wording. It's originally a racial trait, so since it's in the more flavor-neutral Genetic Engineering document, it stipulates that you can see as well as "a normal human could in broad daylight" which strikes me as odd for a My Little Pony campaign. I've been thinking lately that perhaps this could be incorporated into Nightwatch so that upon taking it you would pick either the ability to see in the dark, or echolocation; I just need a good way to word it in a more pony-flavored fashion.
Deceive the Senses: I'm looking at using this one as a replacement for the current level 7 ability of the Mindsculptor destiny, but I need to flesh out the idea a little bit. I'll probably put a post over there when I have something.
Inkbound Object: This one is rather cool (I played a character who had it), but it always seemed to me to be similar to You Don't Know Where It's Been. I never really ended up using it much on my character either, despite it being the sort of campaign you'd think it would come in handy (a spy campaign). I wonder if you could merge the two to make one super-ability...I'll have a think on it.
Speak With The Dead: As Dan mentioned, that's going to remain part of the Archlich destiny (level 4). I'm not a fan of destinies giving abilities that anyone can take at level 1 (and neither was Lapis-Lazily who did most of the rework), as it kinda cheapens the effect of your cool destiny if two other people in the party have had that ability for the last three months or whatever. This actually touches on a lot of what I'm doing – seeing if certain abilities that might not come back otherwise can be moved into destinies.
Audiomancy: Already added.
Spectral Battering Ram/Tsunami: Honestly, I feek these really aren't that unique. It's basically an Athletics check with an automatic boost that can't be boosted further. You could achieve roughly the same effect by making an Athletics check and using Yee-Haw! on it, except that other people could also assist it for an every higher check.
Sunderblade: Has some cool flavor, but ultimately much the same thing: +40 to Athletics checks to cut things. Using it to break magic with Athletics is fairly unique, admittedly.
Words of Wisdom: We actually had a pretty long discussion about this one. The consensus was that, although it can work well in play-by-post campaigns it can be harder to work (and slow the game down) in live campaigns. It was also not commonly taken, and the amount of explanatory text for it was over twice as long as the main text for the ability itself.
To get a historical perspective, there are quite a few abilities out there that exist because they were originally racial exclusives (as was Words of Wisdom) and were needed to make the races properly balanced with each other. With the passage of time and the erasing of racial barriers some of these abilities really weren't necessary any more. We don't need Words of Wisdom to make zebras unique, because every zebra can choose a completely unique combination of abilities now, as can any individual of any race or species. Since it wasn't a particularly strong or popular talent on its own and didn't do anything more interesting than "roll three times instead of once" we decided not to bring it back.
Crystalline: I could perhaps see an ability with this name getting re-added, but I've always found the current form of it very odd. I've got a brilliant crystal body, and my ability is...to disguise myself as a boring everyday rock? I think the other part about being uninteresting to predators is cool, though, hence why I could see it perhaps coming back in with a bit of tweaking.
Many Tongues: Already added.

**Stairc -Dan Felder** Sat Feb 01, 2014 11:37 pm

It's also worth noting that Spectral Tsunami had a confusing issue in that, while it might not hurt creatures specifically - the buildings it toppled with creatures IN them should hurt a lot. And that's a very combat-like application for a utility talent. Also makes life harder for DMs.

Zarhon Sun Feb 02, 2014 12:15 am

@ Echolocation: What about the Living Legends version? That has humans. Also, a good word to use could be "non-nocturnal" or "daytime dwelling".

@ Inkbound: In honesty, I found it to be a bit inferior to the "you don't know where it's been" ability. It's much more obvious to those who know what to look for, can be dispelled, only really serves a function for certain tools, and a somewhat bigger limitations on objects it can hide. It's certainly got a cool factor, but in functionality it's alternative is almost always chosen instead. It could indeed use a buff of sorts. Turning it into an upgrade/addition for YDKWIB could work, as could making it more functional.

Ideas that springs to mind:
1) Having the option to 'shoot' the object like a bullet or swift projectile, rather than just summoning it into your hooves.
2) Allowing you to enchant an object to act like a "keyblade" does: Letting you 'summon' the object into your hands/hooves at will, even when it's away from you, or when it's safely 'stored' inside your ink tattoo.
3) Object is repaired/refurbished when stored and unstored.

@ Speak with dead: That sort of limits options of any necromancer players to "wait till level three/seven/ten", and ONLY of a specific route (necromancer detective vs necromancer summoner, specific zombie summon types...).

@ Battering ram: The ability didn't cost Magic points, though (which is a HUGE advantage in functionality), and was the closest to a "Hulk smash!" ability one could get, outside of min-maxing athletics and hoping for epic roll values, or the once-per-MP Yee-Haw. Magic users get lots of cool and flashy stuff, but the buff, athletic, and strong ponies have to rely on numbers and their own creativity in describing actions to do anything "cool", or go the "Rainbow Dash flyer" route instead (who also get Weathercrafting coolness to use).

Additionally, the spectral X's were fairly simple methods of avoiding OOC vs IC issues (a rule that is understandable, though has some issues of its own, as Dan pointed out), if creatures are involved. I found the fact it makes a roll (rather than you) rather odd though - what happens if the ram rolls a natural 1? You end up wasting it, that's what.

Those abilities shouldn't be removed, so much as reworked into something that makes a "impact" in the literal sense of the word, and/or is focused for those that want to play the "Applejack" method of problem solving.

@ Crystalline: The rock aspect was a bit strange, but does provide a practical usage in many settings. Maybe instead of turning into a rock for disguise, one could turn into a literal "petrified statue" for durability (endurance bonuses for impending bad things), or for blending in (as seen here)?

Ooh, there's an idea: Activating Crystalline gives you a limited time during which you are granted all of the "elemental resistance" passive abilities, and/or an immovable status that affects only your body (as appropriately priced upgrades, of course, so that players can choose to just get the crystals trait for flavor rather than functionality).

Alternately, their "shiny crystal" aspects are turned into a blinding method, a source of light (or light reflection/amplification), or a social bonus ("So pretty!").

ZamuelNow Sun Feb 02, 2014 1:21 am

Echolocation: This one has, I feel, an odd wording. It's originally a racial trait, so since it's in the more flavor-neutral Genetic Engineering document, it stipulates that you can see as well as "a normal human could in broad daylight" which strikes me as odd for a My Little Pony campaign. I've been thinking lately that perhaps this could be incorporated into Nightwatch so that upon taking it you would pick either the ability to see in the dark, or echolocation; I just need a good way to word it in a more pony-flavored fashion.

An either or choice might be good but there's the issue of noting that it's two validly different concepts. I don't think the problem is of making it more pony and rather that it needs to be more neutral in both directions. Consider:

Echolocation Rewording:

Inkbound Object: This one is rather cool (I played a character who had it), but it always seemed to me to be similar to You Don't Know Where It's Been. I never really ended up using it much on my character either, despite it being the sort of campaign you'd think it would come in handy (a spy campaign). I wonder if you could merge the two to make one super-ability...I'll have a think on it.

You could make it a prerequisite. This is the one that's easy to notice and slightly limited while the other is better at hiding things.

Speak With The Dead: Zarhon makes a valid point that moving this to the destiny limits level 1 options considering Mind of It's Own is gone. Intriguingly, a buffed MoIO could theoretically be added to the destiny. If power is a concern, you could make the Ability version of SWtD use a magic point or be once a session with the destiny version being more readily available. I mean, that's where the ability to make multiple destiny options comes into play.

Spectral Battering Ram/Tsunami: I'm surprised you don't view it as unique since it passes through creatures and the flat base makes it useful for multiple builds. It's the non-combat version of an energy beam/hadoken. The players haven't gotten far enough to use them yet but in one of my campaigns it's what I use for the lasers on their mechs. It's one of more well defined things in the system and we already have the ability for players to breathe fire or shoot force lightning out of combat. Also, it being magic/lasers instead of the player or a creature means it avoids nat 1 problems (or it should). I will agree with removing the Tsunami upgrade since it's a crazy amount of power and has too many problems with the out of combat split.

Sunderblade: It's one of the few downright awesome options for a strong character as opposed to the options for mages and a few specific roles like weather crafting. While default flavor is a blade, in my head it's always 'punch magic with your fists'. I'm not in many campaigns as a player, otherwise I'd put it on tons of characters. It also seems to imply the ability to work against somewhat intangible magic so it's an interesting merger between a despell and chopping/smashing something.

Words of Wisdom:
Since it wasn't a particularly strong or popular talent on its own and didn't do anything more interesting than "roll three times instead of once" we decided not to bring it back.

I find that interesting since while uninteresting sometimes, a triple roll is intriguingly strong when paired with other things. Perspective also varies since I have a campaign elsewhere with a player who uses it, some of my NPCs have it, and I have a character with it in the ability system. I actually think the old structure was why it was unpopular since you had to use 6 of your 8 racial points on one racial and most players seemed to gravitate towards getting a large number of smaller traits. For this, I think removal is premature since not needing to take that many uses is a major change for the talent. However, I'm able to take a step back on arguing in its favor due to the easier stacking it now has with other stat buff and reroll options.

**Stairc -Dan Felder** Sun Feb 02, 2014 1:28 am

I actually think that Spectral Battering Ram (not Tsunami) and Sunderblade are pretty darn cool because of the implied flavor. My only hesitance with them, particularly the blade, is that it can be tough for new DMs to handle checks that high. But that's not exactly a huge issue.

I'd caution against the dual-desire to have all character concepts perfectly available at level 1 and the desire to have unique destiny features. Sometimes it's okay to say players need to wait a bit to fulfill their character concept. A little reflavoring can go a long way for character concepts in any case. If nothing else, flavoring combat abilities as necromantic powers is a thing. There's no foundational rule that says people studying necromancy should immediately be able to speak with dead people at level 1.

Xel Unknown Sun Feb 02, 2014 1:49 am

I'd argue having a worry now about a former official talent beucase of GM reasons... Only means more that you gotta get to updating the GM guidebook for the newer GMs. But that's an issue for another topic.

Well when it comes to Sunderblade (and Spectral Battering Ram too a little only seen the Ram used once, but this random idea of using it to be flavored as a non-combat ROCKET LAUNCHER type of item makes it dang cool enough to keep just for that possible usage) I've got a soft spot for seeing an ally of mine from a campaign end up using that one talent for a lot of cool things. The big starting point I'd say was when it was used to cut a mountain in half... There had also been some other outcomes like having used it's magic powers for soul-reaping to help get fully rid of enemies that were likely to somehow return if we didn't have that power. I highly wish to put all my support into it's return. And equally hope to not see it getting nerfed.

**Stairc -Dan Felder** Sun Feb 02, 2014 2:37 am

Xel Unknown wrote:I'd argue having a worry now about a former official talent beucase of GM reasons... Only means more that you gotta get to updating the GM guidebook for the newer GMs. But that's an issue for another topic.

You're absolutely correct (and we're hard at work on a DM's Guide for Wanderlust that will be expanded for PT). Of course, the current lack of a great GM's guide just makes it even more important that the current abilities don't cause confusion or problems.

ZamuelNow Fri Feb 07, 2014 8:45 am

Philadelphus wrote:
ZamuelNow wrote:Not sure everything needs to be shoutout and I tend to prefer the more subtle ones. Book Forte is a reference to a book fort which some people have either drawn filly Twilight playing in or built one for their Twilight Sparkle toys. Despite Applejack being my favorite, Yee-Haw sounds slightly generic. That said, Frozen Time is incredibly dull and have no complaints about changing it unless it turns into something obnoxiously memey. My biggest problem is that I can't think of a good replacement.
Of the two Frozen Time is the one I'd most prefer to come up with a replacement for. I'll have a think and see if I can come up with anything.

I think I've got it! I hereby propose Frozen Time be changed to A Stitch in Time, Saves Nine. It's a common phrase (that has been out of regular use long enough to be considered uncommon) meaning that you should take care of a problem immediately instead of waiting later when it's harder to deal with. It's thought have originated from sewing due to the mindset of fixing a hem before it unravels. Rarity uses the phrase during the song "Art of the Dress". It seems like a precision focused name/phrase to use, plus being a common term means it gets to be a MLP reference that still works fine in Living Legends.

Due to having the other three Attributes having a MP based stat buff move, The Stare should be moved from just Persuasion to cover all of Sense. While Perception doesn't particularly need the buff, Streetwise certainly good. Plus, it's an issue of parity since the other attributes are now covered.

Crystalite Sat Feb 08, 2014 2:49 pm

I can recall The Fun Has Been Doubled from the Legacy system, and I really think that idea - talents that improve your element - could really stand an extra look. Some of my suggestions? Well, let's see...

First off, just for easy reference:

The Elements OF Harmony:

Loyalty:

Laughter:

Generosity:

Honesty:

Kindness:

Magic:

Zarhon Sat Feb 08, 2014 4:01 pm

I think those upgrades are a bit overpriced at 5 points, considering the elements need a MP to use, and are thus less than practical. Tone it down to 2-3 points, tops?

And Honesty could probably use an "upgrade" that lets it bypass the "helpless" requirement if the target fails an opposing check per question asked, rather than extra questions you might not be able to achieve at all (three are probably more than enough for most).

For instance, an obviously untrustworthy individual in power is lying to you, but you obviously can't tackle them to make them helpless. You use honesty, and now the target rolls three opposing skill checks (per question - probably persuasion) to be able to lie to you - flavored as them making an accidental slip in frustration or something like that. They do the roll after the question is asked, so the players don't prioritize questions from knowing the results of the rolls.

To keep it balanced, it could have the option of having the target know that the ability was used on them afterwards.

**Philadelphus** Tue Feb 11, 2014 1:07 am

ZamuelNow wrote:I think I've got it! I hereby propose Frozen Time be changed to A Stitch in Time, Saves Nine. It's a common phrase (that has been out of regular use long enough to be considered uncommon) meaning that you should take care of a problem immediately instead of waiting later when it's harder to deal with. It's thought have originated from sewing due to the mindset of fixing a hem before it unravels. Rarity uses the phrase during the song "Art of the Dress". It seems like a precision focused name/phrase to use, plus being a common term means it gets to be a MLP reference that still works fine in Living Legends.

Due to having the other three Attributes having a MP based stat buff move, The Stare should be moved from just Persuasion to cover all of Sense. While Perception doesn't particularly need the buff, Streetwise certainly good. Plus, it's an issue of parity since the other attributes are now covered.

Ahh, a name that actually works (perhaps shortened to simply "A Stitch In Time", which for some reason sounds to me like something you might encounter in Star Trek: "Captain! We've got a stitch in time off the port bow! A real whopper!"). Excellent.

Then your second paragraph made me stop and think: if we made that change, we'd have four separate abilities that all, mechanically, do the exact same thing (+20 Magic Interrupt to the skills in a specific Attribute). What if, instead, we replaced them with a single ability that let you pick which Attribute it applied to when you took it? Something like this:

Super-Specialized [placeholder name] (3) – Magic Interrupt
When you take this ability, choose an attribute. You then gain the following ability:
Trigger – You or an ally you can see makes a skill check using a skill which falls under the attribute you selected when you took this ability.
Effect – After seeing the result of the roll, you can choose to add a +20 bonus to the check.

You may take this ability up to three times, choosing a different attribute each time.

Xel Unknown Tue Feb 11, 2014 1:29 am

I will admit, I do like the idea of having a limit for such +20 skills which is what this Super-Specialized talent would give us. But I'm unsure if we should do such a change...

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