Re: A Couple of character Creation Questions

From: Chris Lemens <chrislemens_at_...>
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2010 07:32:28 -0700 (PDT)


Ryan:

I'm not sure that I'm the best person to answer, but here goes --

I think your 20 points can only be used to raise abilities that you have. So, you can't use one of those 20 points to create a breakout ability under an umbrella keyword. To do that, you must use one of your 9 abilities.

Yes, as a narrator, I would allow a player to put 10 points into a keyword, then another 10 points into its breakout ability. But I would first discourage it and give the player examples of why it is a bad idea. If the character takes some sort of combat ability, I would ask what he will do when he needs to persuade the chief to lend him aid. Swinging a sword around won't work. If he persisted, he would probably find himself in many situations where his sword was pretty useless.

One way to rein in a munchkin is to use one of the other methods of character creation. Instead of the list method, you might require everyone to use the 100 words method. I think it's less susceptible to munckinitis.

Finally, if you worry about munchkins, you might reserve the right to designate each character's flaws. So, the guy who takes "Two-handed axe of super-instant-death 18w" also gets "Coward 18w" (because he's obviously compensating for his weakness). Or you might limit that right to any flaw with a value of more than 5w or so.

I think that the flaws are intentionally tied to the highest abilities to make the characters more interesting. When creating sample characters, I noticed that my more balanced characters usually had several keywords tied at the top ability level for that character. That is, I chose some areas to develop, developed them to pretty much the same level, and left the other abilities at their base levels. That meant that all of the flaws were also at that top ability level. Since these main abilities, and the flaws, are what defines the character, it worked for me. I can't explain the apparent difference between that and the HQ book itself.

Chris Lemens

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