Skill Levels on Familiarity?

[Ndreare]

I have a player who thinks it would be cool to have a sort of "Zen" power. 
Basically he can just do things with Zen. I am thinking this is like Familiarity with most of the skills. But he can also focus his Chi and make himself better able to perform task. 

For this I am thinking the following.

Skill Levels (all skills) +5, concentration throughout -1/2, costs endurance -1/2. 25-points

But this brings up the question. By RAW can skill levels be applied to Familiarity, or would this require GM fiat? I am introducing these guys to Hero System and want to be as close to RAW on everything as possible.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Skill levels cannot add to skills bought with familiarity, so you're probably better off with something like a power pool: skills which would allow the character to select any given skill or group of skills at a high level of proficiency.

[Ndreare]

Hum,
I thought there was some restriction like that. But looking through the book, I could not find it.

I am generally not a fan of Special Powers (like skills) in Frameworks. I know as a GM I can allow it. But I am inclined not to. Perhaps another was would be just to have him spend the 60 points for the 3 point level in all those skills and just retrap it.

Adding the "Concentration and Costs Endurance" to those skills could reduce their cost.

[SCUBA Hero]

18 minutes ago, Ndreare said:

Hum,
I thought there was some restriction like that. But looking through the book, I could not find it.

 

6e1p56:  "No Skill Levels (not even Overall Skill Levels) add to the 8- chance to perform a Skill with which a character is Familiar, since the character doesn’t understand the Skill well enough to use his expertise."

[unclevlad]

Skills can be bought as Powers, but they're Special Powers, and therefore can't be added into a framework, and I wouldn't allow it either.  There are special powers that I would allow, but not skills.  I'd also almost never allow Costs END on a skill, for multiple reasons...doesn't fit, doesn't have any negative impact, will rarely if ever cost meaningful amount, most skills are executed off phases.  It just doesn't work for me.  More broadly, I'm not a big fan of limitations on skills, with some exceptions...+2 to Contortionist linked to some Shrinking, would be an example.  

 

Familiarity with, say Gambling (card games)...you know the rules of common poker games, differences between limit, pot limit, and no limit...doesn't mean you understand the strategy differences between them  You know hold em and Omaha...but not necessarily Badugi or 2-7 Triple Draw or Razz.  (I think I have just a Familiarity with poker...and I do know all of them.  But then I watched WSOP far too often.)  

 

Also, +5 to All Skills is huge;  in addition, "I focus my Chi" is just SFX, really.  Make it 2 All Skills levels, then buy a bunch of skills to base characteristic level...it's only 1 point per skill more.  Note that given a 13 characteristic, the base roll is 12-.  2 levels gives a 14-...succeeds 90% of the time.  5 levels is 17-...succeeds 99.5% of the time.  Those 3 levels are only buying you +10%...that's not much.  And that's starting from a mediocre-level characteristic, for supers.

 

I'd tell your player to focus.  Work up some backstory...what does he like to do?  Spycraft?  Any/all of Acting, Charm, Conversation, Concealment, Disguise, Lipreading, Persuasion, Security Systems, Shadowing, and Stealth.  And some others probably as well. (Many might be a bit too specialized, like Forgery, for the general-purpose type.)  Investigator?  Criminology, Deduction, Concealment again.  Appropriate KS/SS skills.  Medical examiner's branch tosses in Paramedic probably, and Forensic Medicine.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

[LoneWolf]

Another way to do this would be through luck.  If you use the variant that allows you to reroll that would give him a better chance to succeed with things, he only has familiarity with.    Rerolling an 8 or less roll increases the chance of success from roughly 25% to 45%. Anything higher than an 8 or less scales up rather quickly.