Class specific "Special Abilities"

[Suhiira]

Class specific "Special Abilities"

Not that this is really the thread, but I don't know if I'd go that far. An undercover cop has Authority - arguably an organized crime enforcer would. The Lone Ranger would.

From my perspective, it's mostly your self-confidence that you speak for something greater than yourself. If you are a Solo/Cop, the second part would be dormant until you had an employer/cause bigger than yourself to represent Authority on behalf of.

Sort of like Resources for a Corp.

This brings up a good point.

Class specific "Special Abilities":
Cop - Authority
Corporate - Resources
Fixer - Streetdeal
Med Tech - Mecical Tech
Media - Credibility
Netrunner - Interface
Nomad - Family
Rockerboy - Charasmatic Leadership
Solo - Combat Sense
Techie - Jury Rig

Just what do they represent?
Is it reasonable to restrict them by class?
How can they be represented in a console/PC game?

 

[Doomblade403xxx]

From the core book special abilities were unbalanced. It really was....here are solos...and here's everyone else. Solos shit is set in stone and in a fight they are the masters of going first, and literally seeing all there is to see. All other classes had some nebulous concept as a special ability, but no real hard and fast rules on how to navigate them. it was patently awful to be honest.

 

[eraser7278]

to make no mention of 3 classes getting completely hosed should they ever get fired/expelled: cops, corps and nomads

if a doctor got fired, he could still be a ripperdoc. if a techie got laid off from pep boys, they could still work a chop shop. if a solo got fired, well they could continue being awesome as always. but those 3 were 100% tied to who you worked for and not what you could do... sucks to be them, which is why IU fixed what was broken by divorcing abilities from employers.

 

[Doomblade403xxx]

There was never in my games any reason someone coulnt go freelance with their skills...because frankly those are their skills.

 

[Suhiira]

Look at your classic private detective. In book/movies (and often real life) they're often former cops who maintain a (usually) good relationship with the police. They get, and do favors. While they're technically no longer part of the law enforcement community thus don't wield "Authority" as defined by Cyberpunk they do have "Family" and "Resources" ("Hey Bill old buddy, could you run some fingerprints for me?"). I agree that totally cutting them off is extreme, maybe reduce their skill a level or two.

BUT

Basically you think the entire concept is flawed and should be scrapped?

 

[Doomblade403xxx]

Look Suhirra I think half the issue here is you have a different concept of what the special ability is and does than Eraser. He made his toon for the game. It's for him and the gm to suss out how it works. It seems your not liking it and your trying to make it hard on him because of that, and it's not cool. Why dont you just let a man play the game and quit playing rules lawyer.

 

[eraser7278]

it was deeply flawed and it did get scrapped by IU. the connections aspect you're referencing was removed from the SA and moved under the new skill of networking.

 

[Sardukhar]

Wait...you're having a -discussion- on game rules and suggesting someone else not be a "rules lawyer"?

Okay, first, you can pretty much never suggest someone around here quit talking. That is actually a bannable offense. This is a Forum - if you don't like what someone else has to say, either put them on ignore or simply ignore what they type in. Don't try to tell them not to talk. You may think taking control of someone else's "character" is bad? It's not. Telling someone else to shutup, that's bad. Unless you're a Mod. That's our job.

Second, I like the "Special" aspect of Special Abilities. One of the things I think IU made too generic, which is why although we are using the twin skills approach of IU, we're sticking to Corebook Roles.

I also prefer perceived realism over game mechanics. You can't get Combat Sense unless your character has seen combat, and more than a little. You can't be a Nomad unless you have some kind of Family, a Rockerboy unless you perform somehow, a Tech unless you have the supporting tech skills, etc. etc. etc.

These are Careers. I like the idea of multiple careers/Roles, but you must sustain them in your character in a believable way. A Corp without corporate resources isn't a Corp, no. Find a way to replace them.

I didn't even mind the somewhat nebulous approach to the SA in Cyberpunk - wasn't hard to work out how to apply it in game, we've played with those for years. The issue was that having only one Role was too limiting.

 

[Doomblade403xxx]

I didnt say shut up...i said leave him be and let him play his toon. If there is a problem it's for you and eraser to work out. The idea that someone has to be employed by a law enforcement entity to have a skill is ludicrous. He could have a private security license. He could be a reserve or auxilliary officer. Hell the whole concept of blackwater style mercs is that they are the law when it comes to corp assets. So then you roll into a million different what ifs. What if your an NCPD officer on Arasaka territory. Do you have any sway? What about you flip that? This is a SKILL. It's ludicrous to think you can just say 'well hes not wearing a badge so nananana' and its worthless.

And for the record I just want to play...and its been nuts ever since we started. This whole debate is just a debate for the sake of debate. Is whether or not he's a contracted security agent even an issue here? It's a skill. He bought it. If you dont want him to have it or think its overbalanced you talk to him and come to an understanding. This has nothing to do with me and suhirra and our input not only shouldnt be a factor, we shouldnt be an influence either. Your game.

Eraser has had the skills for his toon up a while and all of a sudden today this debate crops up. I'm fairly certain he feels ganged up on and my input is that you and he work it out in a classy way that makes it cool for you guys.

 

[Suhiira]

Look Suhirra I think half the issue here is you have a different concept of what the special ability is and does than Eraser. He made his toon for the game. It's for him and the gm to suss out how it works. It seems your not liking it and your trying to make it hard on him because of that, and it's not cool. Why dont you just let a man play the game and quit playing rules lawyer.

Not at all.
Asking questions is what I've done for a living most of my life to learn things and to clarify information. You strongly imply doing so is an attack on the character and integrity of the person asked a question. So we should never question anyone or anything because it's offensive?
========================================

Back on topic.

Second, I like the "Special" aspect of Special Abilities. One of the things I think IU made too generic, which is why although we are using the twin skills approach of IU, we're sticking to Corebook Roles.

I also prefer perceived realism over game mechanics. You can't get Combat Sense unless your character has seen combat, and more than a little. You can't be a Nomad unless you have some kind of Family, a Rockerboy unless you perform somehow, a Tech unless you have the supporting tech skills, etc. etc. etc.

These are Careers. I like the idea of multiple careers/Roles, but you must sustain them in your character in a believable way. A Corp without corporate resources isn't a Corp, no. Find a way to replace them.

I didn't even mind the somewhat nebulous approach to the SA in Cyberpunk - wasn't hard to work out how to apply it in game, we've played with those for years. The issue was that having only one Role was too limiting.

So I guess the question is ... what should the "Special Ability" be for each class, assuming you don't want a classless game system? What would be truly unique to each?

 

[Sardukhar]

So I guess the question is ... what should the "Special Ability" be for each class, assuming you don't want a classless game system? What would be truly unique to each?

The skill combination - two skills boosted per class SA - although bland, is good enough. The SA bonus lets you do pretty crazy things with those skills that people without couldn't. Streetdeal makes for super-streetwise, like where to go and who to talk to buy railguns, etc. Authority makes for super-Intimidate, enough to chill out angry crowds, Jury-Rig lets you do crazy fixes with Tech. It's still a little vague, (what rolls are needed to build a Punknaught?) but workable.

A whole Special Ability list with neato tricks per SA, like more formal uses for Charismatic Leadership or what you need to do with Resources to call in Airstrikes, would also be cool. But not necessary.

 

[Suhiira]

The skill combination - two skills boosted per class SA - although bland, is good enough. The SA bonus lets you do pretty crazy things with those skills that people without couldn't. Streetdeal makes for super-streetwise, like where to go and who to talk to buy railguns, etc. Authority makes for super-Intimidate, enough to chill out angry crowds, Jury-Rig lets you do crazy fixes with Tech. It's still a little vague, (what rolls are needed to build a Punknaught?) but workable.

A whole Special Ability list with neato tricks per SA, like more formal uses for Charismatic Leadership or what you need to do with Resources to call in Airstrikes, would also be cool. But not necessary.

So if I understand you correctly you'd prefer to eliminate the actual class specific skills and allow the player to designate a couple "favored" skills which they'd obtain at a discount?

 

[Sardukhar]

So if I understand you correctly you'd prefer to eliminate the actual class specific skills and allow the player to designate a couple "favored" skills which they'd obtain at a discount?

Nope. We're currently using IU, which gives two specific skills that are boosted by the Special ability level. Costs are the same, although IU has the Ref controlling how your SA goes up, which I may or may not bother with.

It's bland, but workable. The SA boosts let players do things at the Very Difficult and Nearly Impossible targets they couldn't really stand much chance or reaching normally.

The Corebook, which not everyone can get or share (legally) uses a different approach and, most importantly, locks people into one Role. Even if we were going Corebook, I'd still immediately adopt multi-Roles.

 

[Suhiira]

Hold on a moment.
I'm am not, and never was, referring to the current play-by-post game.
I started a new topic because I'm talking about the Cyberpunk core rules as currently written.

So your proposal is to keep those core rules, and the class specific "Special Abilities", but permit multi-role characters?

 

[Sardukhar]

Hold on a moment.
I'm am not, and never was, referring to the current play-by-post game.
I started a new topic because I'm talking about the Cyberpunk core rules as currently written.

So your proposal is to keep those core rules, and the class specific "Special Abilities", but permit multi-role characters?

I know what the topic is.

We're using the IU rules - modified - because it's bland but workable. Perfectly fine and useable, albeit lacking in flavour. Works out easier for newbies and includes a handy Multi-Role ruleset.

 

[Suhiira]

We're using the IU rules - modified - because it's bland but workable. Perfectly fine and useable, albeit lacking in flavour. Works out easier for newbies and includes a handy Multi-Role ruleset.

For those that don't have access to the UI rules could you clarify how they handle the concept of "Special Abilities" differently then the core rules?

The core rules give each class a unique "Special Ability" only that class has access to. In some cases this skill adds to generic skills allowing a class to become inhumanly good at something. For instance the Solo ability "Combat Sense" makes them so skilled at combat related tasks no other class stands a chance vs a Solo in combat (barring (un)lucky die rolls). In other cases, Techie - Jury Rig, gives the class the ability to do something no other class even can; temporary repairs or making an item perform a function it was not originally designed for. Or Nomad - Family gives them access to cash, items, and people to support whatever they're trying to accomplish.

 

[Doomblade403xxx]

This was already addressed.

Core rules: Combat sense is drawn out in stone while the other special abilities are very nebulous. So much so it's pretty much a GM call to interpret what the player can do with them. So players when faced with a choice look at the classes and say... "Well this one gives me a boost in awareness and initiative, and the rest is just a gm call with the most basic of guidelines". An experienced gamer looks at that and sees the unbalance and either exploits it, or chooses not to be exploited by it. When your solo can legit start the game with 30 bases or higher in initiative and awareness, you can see game balance crumble pretty quickly. Especially when the highest possible SA score for anyone else is 20.

IU: Took or changed those core classes and made the skills more additive. Every special ability got two or sometimes three skills to base a special ability off of and evened the playing field special ability wise. It democratized the special abilities alot to make them more appealing. There was also a few more special abilities added that exploded the game in a few more directions, or simply added flavor. Adding that BASE SKILLSET in those Special abilities put those other special abilities on par with solo in a different way. For instance a Runner in IU is your basic driving fool. 2 fast 2 furious and all that stuff. What a solo can do in combat he can do behind the wheel. Fixer would have his ear to the street and know alot of people who tell him alot of stuff.

So in the simplest of terms the special abilities finally became even.

P.S.

I have played in and run games without Special Abilities. It does tend to put everyone on equal footing and make it a little more fast and dirty,

 

[Suhiira]

A fair amount of this is dependent on the GM.
If most tasks are rated as "Very Difficult" (25+) or "Nearly Impossible" (30+) then using Stat+Skill+1d10 means at best 50/50 or 1-in-10 even at maximized stats and skills chance of success (barring luck/crits). So the extra skill added to the equation makes a huge difference.
If most tasks are rated as "Difficult" (20+) or "Very Difficult" (25+) and "Nearly Impossible" (30+) was saved for truly unique situations the situation alters dramatically.
But we all know characters regularly try the impossible and far to many GMs seem to assume everything should be as difficult as possible.

So the core game concept of "Special Abilities" seems to be accepted as reasonable. But the implementation in terms of what they're used for and the game mechanics of their use needs work.

A separate but closely related can-of-worms is the entire concept of classes (thus class specific abilities). Would it make sense in classless game to have "Special Abilities" allowing the player to select as many as they wish? Or is the entire concept intrinsically tied to a class based game?

 

[blank_redge]

Hm.

I think there's a basic philosophical difference between the camp that believes Special Abilities should be character specific, and the camp that believes that a person can excel in two (or more) fields.

The example wisdom gave that's stuck with me: the War Correspondent, broadcasting from hotzones all over the world. wis argues that a Media in that kind of environment would develop Combat Sense by necessity, or get dead real quick.

I would argue that the correspondent in question would develop Awareness / Notice, but I don't think a career journalist would out-draw a professional Solo.

For me, it's the same difference as the kid that grew up in the 'hood (Streetwise) and the hustler that's doing business (Streetdeal).

Could a Rocker or a Med-Tech have come from the streets, and know what gangs control what blocks? Sure. But, I wouldn't expect them to be exceptionally proficient at setting up grey- and black-market deals.

 

[Tramp-Graphics]

This issue is one of the reasons I like the Fuzion rules so much. It is a a classless system and they turned all of the special abilities into either skills, talents, or perks any character could buy. Thus, you could have a Solo who had "Resources/Family" (Membership/Family), a Netrunner with Combat Sense, etc. In other words, more versatile and well rounded characters.