Automatemplate

[Sean Waters]

I'd quite like to see 'formal' automata rules for characters; let's face it quite a lot of people ignore the injunction anyway, so perhaps officially introducing them for characters, a sort of seperate template, given that the rules are a little different, might be a cool and cunning plan.

Of course if we are going there that opens the door a crack to other template ideas. Something we've talked about before is a race that doesn't breathe. It's some sort of sentient computer, perhaps, it doesn't NEED to breathe, so how do we do that?

Well there's buying life support WITH the 'inherent' advantage. I mean, that would do me, but I know a lot of people have issues with the 'inherent' advantage.

There are different ways we could do this, but the 'problem' arises because we are assuming a basically human template i.e that the character needs to eat, drink, breathe, has two manipulatory limbs, five senses, and only one targeting.

Hmm. Anyway. Something to think about.

[GamePhil]

Well, I'd be perfectly happy to start characters out with nothing at all, but that's unlikely to be forthcoming or popular. However, a lot of what you're talking about can be worked toward by:

Having all Powers accessible to all characters, whether PC or NPC.

Having some level of Characteristic where you simply don't have it anymore (possibly 0), or otherwise rules for getting rid of one or more of them.

Greater acceptance of Inherent.

Possibly some tweaking of Disadvantages, but in any event developing Disads that cover "characters" of different types. Is a car blind, or does it just have a 0 INT and that covers it? Does a Computer take Physical Limitations to remove its Senses?

That's part of why I like the idea of starting from zero, since it is in some ways less complex to build up than to take things away. However, if necessary the things can be taken away, and it will probably ruffle fewer feathers.

[Steve Long]

Issues regarding Automata should be posted in the "Equipment" thread, please.