Personal Shadows

[ed]

I don't like 'em.

If a player spends their hard to get points on a shadow and puts a lot of points into it, it becomes imperative that the GM include the shadow in the campaign but if the place has guards, control of contents, access control, etc then how is the GM supposed to generate anything of interest with the place? There are a couple of places like that in the game I am running now and it seems counter-intuitively that the more points spent on a shadow the less value the PC gets from it.

I view invulnerable armor and deadly damage weapons the same; word will quickly get out that X can't be harmed by weapons so no one important will attack them, Y has a deadly damage sword so no one will fight them. So buy 4 points armor, 4 point sword then Amber rank warfare. Put the rest of the points into end and psyche and be a tank-mentalist. Boring. Why don't all the elders have items like that if they are so cheap and easy to own? Invulnerable item with transference and Eric, Brand, and Caine would never have died.

Just as there is a reason Julian was in the books for only a dozen or so pages is because super armor is boring. Benedict's super warfare is boring so he only shows up to be tricked, mind controlled, wear magic arm. He is the Worf of the story.

[blinky55]

As to your first part of the post. I view Personal Shadows as a place a player become so accustomed/attuned to they have the homefield advantage in them. The places dont have to be important to the story, they are just safe havens to the PCs, their own personal armory/bunkers. Generating anything of interest is not their point, venturing out of them is when the real fun begins.

As to the other points, maybe the Elders had such items in the past but have over time gotten rid of them using pattern to reinforce their own importance/power level, after all they could always get more easily and they have decided the artifacts are not really that good compared to personal development. Maybe there are too many factors ingrained in the Shadows themselves, GM are supposed to throw obstacle after obstacle to artifact use each time PCs venture into them? A well versed used of warfare can easily disarm the user with better gear, the super armor still leave Julians head exposed, just right for the right chop. Invulnerable items with transference are simply not permitted in my game, too much of a gamebreaker.

Boring Elders are boring yes, if you bring up their one invincible aspect then yes. I see Benedict as the Sleeping Giant, unlike Worf he could just kill Pickard and be a hundreds time better Captain. He just decides it would be too much of a dishonorable thing to do.

[ed]

I agree with not permitting things from the rulebook but why should we? Why can't the game be designed so that such modifications are necessary? ere such things not playtested? Are the rules worded poorly? Would more mechanical rules be needed to balance things ut so this kind of discussion isn't needed?

The only solution I have now, by the book, is public in-character shaming by the elders and others when a player buys super invulnerable or killer items. Just a point, a laugh, and called a coward.

[blinky55]

My advice is dont be a by the book cop/GM thou:) The book was written in the start of the rpg era so im sure Erick Wujcik would write it diffrently today, using hindsight we could even get a 2.0 version of it if he were with us. I dont think we will get more mechanical rules, my solution would be to use narrative ones.

You may simply state that using a power with higher level means the lesser artifact with less points can be annuled over time. So yes, the PCs may die, just not instantly. Logrus tendrils will rip them apart, Pattern Hell riding friction will shear them apart, Trump teleportation will displace them layer by layer and Shapeshifting will enact grusome biodamage. It comes down to who has the bigger and better ''stick''.

I read a post on a forum that i cant recall now about a man having auto-reanimation powers with regeneration. That was bad because his enemy was capable of murdering him in multiple very painfull ways. His regeneration only meant it would take his hunderds of years to finally die. PCs may fear fates worse than death.

Let me give u a link to tv tropes page on immortality(i think this is permitted):

tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WhoWantsToLiveForever

[thondor]

Every designer would write their book differently 5 years later. I playtested my system for 5 years, and would still make a few albeit mostly minor changes if I were to rewrite it now. GM rulings are key, only you can really know if something is breaking your game.

On the first topic - I've mostly used personal shadows as useful short-hands and hooks as the GM. "Are you in your personal shadow or somewhere else?"
"Hey Patrick, a strange army is marching through the edge of your personal shadow, they seem to be bypassing your fortifications, would you like to investigate?"