The Main Man Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 I never extensively used it in 5e, but I cannot help but wonder why it was excised for 6e in the first place. It strikes me as odd because I can't see why it necessarily should be. Anyone care to "dispuzzle" me? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Goodwin Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? Gone baby gone. I thought I'd remembered some discussion on why but can't find it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Markdoc Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? Steve didn't like it, in the final analysis. It's one of those things that can be abused, and which is often inappropriate - but occasionally very useful. Fortunately, it's easy to add back in as a custom limitation and it's already clear that many GM's do. I use it rarely, so it doesn't really bother me that it's gone, since I can easily add it back on those occasions when I want it. cheers, Mark Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greywind Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? The Independents were beaten by the Alliance. Refer to the Battle of Serenity Valley. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hugh Neilson Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? Independent was always a meta-limitation. You get a very powerful character until the item is taken away, then you become a weakling compared to your peers. So you may as well make a new character with a bunch of Independent items. Really, Independent items were a step between "pay full points for everything" and "get free gear". Do we still have "charges never recover"? That's pretty much the same thing in a lot of respects. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fearghus Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? It is my understanding that it was too easily abused. you take a weapon with the independent "limitation" on it and you can trade it between characters in the group, or give it to other characters... Some sort of Usable by others seems more appropriate. If I were to add this back in I would likely reduce it's value (maybe down to 1) and force the character to take usable by others. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ternaugh Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? It is my understanding that it was too easily abused. you take a weapon with the independent "limitation" on it and you can trade it between characters in the group' date=' or give it to other characters... Some sort of Usable by others seems more appropriate. If I were to add this back in I would likely reduce it's value (maybe down to 1) and force the character to take usable by others.[/quote'] In most cases, passing around a weapon would be covered under the Universal Focus rule. I'm pretty sure that Independent originated in FH (and was clearly designed as a Heroic level limitation), and migrated into the main Hero rules with 4th Ed. But it's something that my group pretty much stopped using, as it didn't really fit most character conceptions, and caused a great deal of player anguish when the item would be lost/stolen/damaged*. JoeG *And if there was no threat of that, why give it such a high limitation value? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Main Man Posted January 5, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? Interesting points. I think I'll bring it into my Rifts campaign as a -1 1/2 limitation to account for the UBO element. It'll be a campaign by campaign basis. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Markdoc Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? Interesting points. I think I'll bring it into my Rifts campaign as a -1 1/2 limitation to account for the UBO element. It'll be a campaign by campaign basis. In general, Independent isn't a good solution to building an instrument of some sort that can be used by different party members - universal focus does that fine. Independent comes into its own when a character is (for example) infusing something with his life force, or transferring - permanently - something worth points to another character. A good example of the former is Sauron and his ring. He buys down all his stat.s and buys them and his powers through a focus, making himself über-powerful. Of course, when the ring is destroyed he loses all those points: he can't build or acquire a new focus. He's hosed. Another, less tongue-in-cheek example is operating in my current FH game. People can obtain "magical gifts" by making a deal with a godling. They can transfer those magical gifts to other people - but then, of course they lose them themselves. UBO has quite specific restrictions, which make this sort of unlimited-and-forever transfer a bit difficult to play: (that's a euphemism for impossible by RAW). Independent provides a simple and elegant approach to cover these eventualities. One possibility to address the latter, if you are playing 6E where UOO has been greatly expanded, you could simply treat it as an extended form of UOO, with the +1⁄2 Advantage, Lasts Through Unconsciousness (listed as an optional) and a new -1 less advantage "power cannot be used unless it is returned". That'd give you a fully transferrable power, and would likely end up costing you +1/4, but it seems unnecessarily cumbersome. It's probably easier to just retain Independent. cheers, Mark Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Main Man Posted January 5, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? But you do bring up an interesting point - what if Independent was a UBO modifier? It'd be like how cerain modifers like Charges, Time Limit, or Damage Over Time can be Advantages or Limitations in different circumstances. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ghost-angel Posted January 5, 2011 Report Share Posted January 5, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? I only found it useful in campaigns where Equipment was free, and Equipment Pools were used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ternaugh Posted January 6, 2011 Report Share Posted January 6, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? I only found it useful in campaigns where Equipment was free' date=' and Equipment Pools were used.[/quote'] Doesn't that defeat the reason for the Limitation in the first place? If an item were lost/stolen/damaged, would it freeze the points in the Equipment Pool permanently? And if it didn't, did you still use the same Limitation bonus? JoeG Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ragitsu Posted January 6, 2011 Report Share Posted January 6, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? He moved back in with his parents. The recession spared no one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kraven Kor Posted January 6, 2011 Report Share Posted January 6, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? I remember building powers - mostly super-guns or magic items - as "Independent (-2), OAF (-1), Real Weapon (-1/4)" and then never really being in a situation where said power was lost. It was definitely more of a discount than it should have been. I would still use it in rare instances - mostly with magic items in Fantasy settings, where the point discount doesn't matter since it is an item the party found or whatever rather than something the character bought with points (and I sometimes would, in the past, require a character to spend the points to be able to use the item - signifying the time spent unlocking the item's secrets or learning the command word or "attuning" to the item.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ghost-angel Posted January 6, 2011 Report Share Posted January 6, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? Doesn't that defeat the reason for the Limitation in the first place? If an item were lost/stolen/damaged, would it freeze the points in the Equipment Pool permanently? And if it didn't, did you still use the same Limitation bonus? JoeG In games where I use it Equipment is mostly given out to begin with - not bought. It's more a form of divisor that allows for large® amounts of equipment without inflating Equipment Pool sizes (to prevent the "And I can fit the Uber Cannon in" syndrome completely). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tasha Posted January 7, 2011 Report Share Posted January 7, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? I'm pretty sure that Independent originated in FH (and was clearly designed as a Heroic level limitation), and migrated into the main Hero rules with 4th Ed. But it's something that my group pretty much stopped using, as it didn't really fit most character conceptions, and caused a great deal of player anguish when the item would be lost/stolen/damaged*. JoeG *And if there was no threat of that, why give it such a high limitation value? Independent was created to allow for the Creation of Magic Items in FH that were actually affordable. It helped to answer the question "if a Magic item is so many points and those points come from the Mage, why do they bother building something that weakens them so". in 4e Independent was a Magnifying Glass Limit (which was a mild way of saying that this limit was unbalanced), it seemed that in 4e people understood that Independent was for Heroic Level games and not really intended for Champions. By 5e we lost the Magnifying Glass/Stop Sign indicators and many players abused Independent and their GM's let them get away with it. My guess is that the abuse was so bad that Steve decided to remove the limit so he didn't have to deal with it anymore. The limit really doesn't have any place outside of FH, and can be replaced by a quick house rule (ie Mages making magic items pay Character points at Real cost / 3 or whatever makes the GM happy). The GM could just handwave the whole thing and just worry about making the creation of Magic items time intensive, and not cost character points. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ghost-angel Posted January 7, 2011 Report Share Posted January 7, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? in 4e Independent was a Magnifying Glass Limit (which was a mild way of saying that this limit was unbalanced)' date=' it seemed that in 4e people understood that Independent was for Heroic Level games and not really intended for Champions. By 5e we lost the Magnifying Glass/Stop Sign indicators and many players abused Independent and their GM's let them get away with it. My guess is that the abuse was so bad that Steve decided to remove the limit so he didn't have to deal with it anymore.[/quote'] 5E most certainly did not lose the indicators. They are the Yield and Stop signs. Independent did not have the Yield sign, but 5E overall still had them in spades. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greywind Posted January 7, 2011 Report Share Posted January 7, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? In games where I use it Equipment is mostly given out to begin with - not bought. It's more a form of divisor that allows for large® amounts of equipment without inflating Equipment Pool sizes (to prevent the "And I can fit the Uber Cannon in" syndrome completely). The Terminator: [picking up guns] The 12-gauge auto-loader. Pawn Shop Clerk: That's Italian. You can go pump or auto. [Hands the Terminator the pump action shotgun] The Terminator: The .45 long slide, with laser sighting. Pawn Shop Clerk: [Hands the Terminator a .45 gun] These are brand new; we just got them in. That's a good gun. Just touch the trigger, the beam comes on and you put the red dot where you want the bullet to go. You can't miss. Anything else? The Terminator: Phased plasma rifle in the 40-watt range. Pawn Shop Clerk: Hey, just what you see, pal! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ternaugh Posted January 7, 2011 Report Share Posted January 7, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? Independent was created to allow for the Creation of Magic Items in FH that were actually affordable. It helped to answer the question "if a Magic item is so many points and those points come from the Mage, why do they bother building something that weakens them so". in 4e Independent was a Magnifying Glass Limit (which was a mild way of saying that this limit was unbalanced), it seemed that in 4e people understood that Independent was for Heroic Level games and not really intended for Champions. By 5e we lost the Magnifying Glass/Stop Sign indicators and many players abused Independent and their GM's let them get away with it. My guess is that the abuse was so bad that Steve decided to remove the limit so he didn't have to deal with it anymore. The limit really doesn't have any place outside of FH, and can be replaced by a quick house rule (ie Mages making magic items pay Character points at Real cost / 3 or whatever makes the GM happy). The GM could just handwave the whole thing and just worry about making the creation of Magic items time intensive, and not cost character points. In my last campaign, we finally ended up using a modification of the old FH creation rules. The mage would purchase a spell with the active points based on the real points of the item, and then modifiers related to the creation ritual applied to that. It took a base time of about a week per 10 Active in the item to build/modify/repair, which could be modified in some cases with penalties/bonuses from the Time Chart. I didn't charge Character Points for the end product. JoeG Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Goodwin Posted January 7, 2011 Report Share Posted January 7, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? In my last campaign' date=' we finally ended up using a modification of the old FH creation rules. The mage would purchase a spell with the active points based on the real points of the item, and then modifiers related to the creation ritual applied to that. It took a base time of about a week per 10 Active in the item to build/modify/repair, which could be modified in some cases with penalties/bonuses from the Time Chart.[/quote'] If I'm not mistaken, this is specified as an optional rule in 6E FH. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ternaugh Posted January 8, 2011 Report Share Posted January 8, 2011 Re: What Happened to Independent? If I'm not mistaken' date=' this is specified as an optional rule in 6E FH.[/quote'] Yup. I actually massaged the finer points from the 5E FH suggestion, after looking up the old creation rules in the original FH. It worked really well, as one of the players wanted a wizard with an item that gave him some armor equivalent. He designed a woven ribbon bracer that created an air barrier around him when activated. It could be easily damaged under certain common circumstances, and he wanted a way to be able to rebuild the item, and using these creation rules worked wonderfully. There were a couple of sessions where he just didn't have time to spend rebuilding, and another time that he took a huge penalty to rebuild it in an accelerated pace. JoeG Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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