As I said yesterday, I've only got a couple more games left from the Pakistan bundle of 2010, so I think I'll finish them up this week.
The Game: Wild Talents 2nd Ed
The Publisher: Arc Dream Publishing
Degree of Familiarity: Not a lot; I'm pretty sure it uses the One-Roll Engine and so it'll look a little like Godlike and Better Angels, which I have a little more familiarity with
Books Required: Just the one
Characters in Wild Talents are built using points, and in fact the first thing I need to figure out is how many points I get. There's a discussion of the different genres of superheroics that the game can fit into; there aren't specific point totals attached, but it just notes that a gritty game tends to have fewer points than, say, a four-color.
Oh, wait, the book says that it recommends starting GMs give out 250 points. Sounds good to me. The GM is also supposed to brief the players on what kind of world we're in. I don't have a GM, of course, so I shall use the example "gritty world where mutants are hunted by the government". I don't think I've actually made a superhero character in such a world, so that's exciting.
This is frustrating; I get 250 points, sure, I have to buy Stats and Skills and so on, but I don't see a point cost for jut normal Stats & Skills. I see point cost for Hyperstats (basically superhuman attributes), but is it just one-for-one for the normal stuff? Ah, no, not in the slightest. Good grief, the only place the book seems to list those costs is on the reference sheet at the back of the freaking book, and there's no example of character creation (guys), so I'm just gonna screenshot the costs here so I have them for reference.
Well, since we're in a gritty, X-Men-esque universe, I assume I want my character to be fairly young 20s or so. Since the government is hunting us, we'll assume that my character (and the other heroes in our hypothetical group) are living off the grid; whether we have some sort of Professor X figure with a dope mansion is undecided, but kinda unlikely given the setting. I want my character to have powers that are kind of scary, and what's more frightening than bugs?
My character was raised in a very strict, almost cult-like Christian household. He's still a believer, but obviously the particulars of his faith are shaken by the whole manifesting powers thing. I want his powers to be of the "commanding animals" variety, and maybe right now he can just do bugs and lower forms. He calls himself Dominion, after Genesis 1:26 ("Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.").
With all of that in mind, let's do some stats. I figure that he's mostly average, but I'll put Body and Sense a little higher (3d) and I'll put Charm a little lower (1d; he's a wallflower and he's pretty cowed because, y'know, cult). That's a total of 13d into Stats, 65 of my 250 spent.
Skills, then! These work more or less the same way as Stats, they're just cheaper. Let's see what my devout little mutie would have.
Well, Athletics at 2d is always good. Dodge at 2d, Drive (car) at 1d, Stealth 2d. Empathy and Perception can go to 3d, I think. I'll take Knowledge (Religion) at 4d, and I'll take Intimidation at 2d (highly devout people are scary, especially when they have spiders coming out of their ears). That's 16 Skill points, or 32 points spent, which puts me 97 in the hole in total (doin' fine! I think).
Next step is Archetype, and I have to check this chapter out to see if I want one. It doesn't look like there's a Mutant Archetype (which kinda surprises me), so let's build one.
I start out with a Source; first one's free, but I can take multiple Sources. I think "Mutant" is fine.
Hmm. Now this is interesting. Next thing is Permissions, which limit the kinds of powers I can buy. If I wanted to create a highly skilled sort of character, f'rex, I could take a Permission that just allows me to take Hyperstats or Hyperskills or both. If I want unfettered access to powers, I can take the Super Permission, but that's expensive. I don't know that I need that much wiggle room, honestly. I could take Power Theme, which allows me to buy whatever I want if it's in-theme (the theme for Dominion because animal command and control; the religious stuff is purely psychological). I think I'll do that, that's only 5 points.
Oh, wait, actually "Mutant" is an Archetype, and it's pretty much what I did, except it lists Genetic as the Source (which, like, fine, it said "genetic tampering" or something so I figured that was more an altered human/Spider-Man kind of thing). So that's easy; I don't get any Intrinsics and that's all I need to do for Archetype.
Powers, then. Hoo-doggies. The book lists "gourmet" powers (how to build your own) or "cafeteria" powers (pick 'em from a list), so I'm gonna see if the power(s) I want are listed first before I go trying to suss out how to build one. OK, nope, not really. Although, really, what I think I need to do is figure out what I want the creepy-crawlies to be able to do for Dominion in play, and structure the power(s) accordingly. This may take a minute.
Good grief. I like this system (it reminds me a little of Tri-Stat's Silver Age Sentinels in just how versatile it is, but wow, it's involved. I mean, sure, you can pick from the cafeteria, but as is typical with me, I gotta do it the hard way.
Well, let's jump in both feet. My power is "Animal Control." I need to choose its Qualities; Attack, Defend, or Useful. I don't think Defend makes a lot of sense, here, so I can Attack and Useful with this power.
I need to define, though, what I can do with the Useful bit. I'm gonna say that I can summon up whatever animals are in the area and I can send them to do my bidding, which allows me to short out machinery, freak people out, and I can see through their eyes (ooooh). I think, though, that although Dominion can control any kind of animal, he's got a mental block that prevents him from controlling anything but vermin (bugs, rats, bats, maybe snakes). It's a mental block because "vermin" is just how he thinks of these animals; rats are a lot more intelligent and complex than bugs, but to him they're all lower creatures.
OK, so, Power Qualities are 2 points per die. That means I need to buy dice for the Attack and the Usefuls, so I'd better define how many. Shorting out machinery is one, seeing through their eyes is another, but freaking people out I could take as a Hyperskill off Intimidation, I think. Unless there's a way to inflict mental damage or something. Ooh, there is, I can take Traumatizing. OK, that'll be a little easier, then. And actually I can take On Sight as a way to affect things with my bugs without actually seeing them, so that's nice.
Do I wish to make this really complex and take Variable Power so I can basically change up my effect whenever I use the power? Ooh, actually it's not all that complex, because I have a model I can work from - Cosmic Power. Except I don't need to be even that persnickety with it, because I don't need Attack or Defend there, it's just Useful with some wiggle room.
Good lord, are there example characters here? Oh, there are, thank goodness. OK, so now at least I have a little perspective.
So, I definitely want to make this a single power with all the effects I need. It has an Attack form, and then I think the Useful can have Variable so I can just have the bugs do what I need them to do. Let's do the Attack first.
Attack Quality is 2 per die. I'll add 1 for a Quality Level so it does an extra point of damage (3 per die). I get the Range Capacity for free, so that's fine. I kinda want Area to reflect that a horde of bugs or rats can swarm in and bite everyone. That's an extra 1 per area die, or 2 if I want hard dice. I think I'll skip that for right now, but it'll be easy enough to add in later. I'll add in Daze, though (it reduces my target's dice pool by my width for the next round, which I think makes sense). I'm up to 4 points per die. Oh, shit, I want Engulf (letting me hit all hit locations at once), which puts me to 6 points per die. Oh, wait, I like radius better than area, so I'll add that in and also Traumatizing, for a total of 9 points per die. Oy.
Ah, but Flaws. There are a bunch I like. I want Delayed Effect (takes a minute for the bugs to arrive), which takes me down to 7 per die. Horrifying makes perfect sense (6 per die), as does Obvious (5 per die). Reduced Capacities is good (which lowers my Range), so that's 4 per die. That's good.
And now, Useful. Rather, the Variable portion, since strictly speaking I can use it for any kind of Quality, unless I take If/Then to restrict myself. Oof. OK, so we start with 2 per die. I want Variable, obviously, so that's 6 per die right off the bat. I'll take On Sight to account for the "can see through the animals' eyes" bit, so that's 7 per die. I don't think I want any other Extras, but I do want Delayed Effect, Horrifying, and Obvious, which drops me to 3 per die for this part of the power.
Altogether, that's 7 points per die for my Vermin Control power. I've spent 97 points, so I have 153 remaining. Say I want 7d in this power plus one Wiggle die. 7d by itself is 49, and a single wiggle die is 28. That puts me down to 76 points. Doin' fine.
Well, shit, I have the points. I may as well buy up some Hyper-Intimidation. Hyperskills are just one per die, so I'll throw, what, 5d in there? That's 5 more points, still got 71, ffs.
Let's do Hyper-Stat in Command. I can add 5d in that for 20 points. Ooh, I kinda want to add Hard Dice to my Command stat, so that I can represent my mutant power of command, but have it be more or less not something he can control. Let's see. Hard Dice cost double, so if I want to take two Hard Dice in my Hyper-Command, it'd be 16 points right there. Add in 3d normally (so I can use my Hard Dice, but I don't necessarily have to), and that's 12 points, or 28 points altogether. Still got 43 points. Good lord.
Well, any other power-like things I should have for Dominion? I could take Hyper-Sense to represent his ability to see through animals' eyes, how about. That's 4 per die, and it feels like Wiggle Dice would be good here. So if I take, say, 4d (16 points) and 2wd (32), that's 48 points - crap, that 5 higher than I have. I'll drop my normal Sense to 2d, which gives me back 5, and that puts me even!
Oh, a couple of things I forgot. I have to do Base Will and Willpower. Base Will is Charm + Command, but does Hyper-Command count? Without the Hyper it's 3, with it'd be 9, depending on what Hard Dice do. Looking at the example characters, it does seem to count, so let's assume I have 9 Base Will. Willpower starts equal to that.
Now I do Motivations. I get 2, a Passion and a Loyalty, and they tend to conflict. I have to split points between them equal to my Base Will. Groovy. I'll say that Dominion is Loyal to God (7 points), and Passionate about Family (2 points). His Passion has been shaken pretty hard by his biological family disowning him, so the "family" in question is whoever lives at the X-mansion or whatever.
Dominion's real name is Noah Beacham. He's 19, I think - just out of high school, and his power manifested at a graduation party. Noah went to a public high school, but of course he was heavily involved in his parents' cult (like they were members, they didn't run it). He snuck away and went to a graduation party and his parents came and got him and started screaming about sin. Noah lost it and spiders, bugs, and all the other awful animals in the area swarmed in. They didn't really hurt anyone (too much), but it was terrifying for everyone, Noah included. Surrounding by a cloud of flies and with spiders crawling on his hands, he recited Genesis 1:26 (also manifesting that whole Hyper-Command thing) and everyone fucking fled.
Noah retrieved the robe that he wore for services; it used to be white, but it's pretty dingy now. He pulls up the hood when he needs to keep his face hidden, but he's not really concerned with concealing his identity, just his whereabouts. He's very confused as to how what he can do - and what other mutants can do - fits in with God's law, but it must, right?
