Making Talents

[drewkitty ~..~]

To lower the activation cost of a talent in the talent creation process, at what ratio would you think is reasonable of a ratio to spend a perm PPE point?

Spending 1 Perm PPE low lower the activations cost by 2, 3, 4 or 5 temp PPE points?
Note that this is just talking about the lowering the cost for one talent.
(A 1:1 ratio is just plane stupid, and 1:6 is just plane M, so didn't include them as an answer.)

As to say raising the perm PPE cost to buy the talent to lower the activation cost while crafting the talent.

[Glistam]

I would not allow it at all.

[13eowulf]

This poll presumes that everyone is in agreement that a permanent PPE cost would reduce the activation cost.
I find that not to be the case, and as such the poll is missing a 'none' option at the very least.

[drewkitty ~..~]

I would not allow it at all.

would you care to explain why?

[13eowulf]

I would not allow it at all.

would you care to explain why?

-----------------------------
13eowulf
Your whole post reads to me as just a complaint that I'm taking the poll at all, disuigsed as complaining about the formate of the poll. Furthermore, you did not even answering the poll question or saying you wouldn't allow it in your games. At this time I have more respect for Glistam.

I addressed the thread, if you don't want outside opinions don't post in public forums.
If you don't want your attacks on posters public, don't post them publicly then edit them out and send them as PMs and hope that you edited fast enough to not get quoted.

I addressed the posed question by stating that I find the presumption of the posed question to be making incorrect assumptions.
That isnt a complaint, it is an opinion and a critique.

Why you feel the need to add in a comment about your respect baffles me as it is entirely irrelevant.

[eliakon]

If I allowed it at all, I would run things like so.
1) This would be restricted to fairly high power games
2) Generic price is 5 Base PPE to reduce activation cost by 1 PPE
3) I would not allow this reduction to be bought more times that the 'bane has levels. So a level 1 Nightbane can reduce their talents costs by 1, a level 2 by 2 etc.

This is because
1)Nightbane tend to have large PPE pools so the loss of 1 or 2 points is going to be so trivial as to not even be noticed.
2)This is a long term investment, i.e. the player is banking on their investment here in the short term in base will pay off in the long run in activation discounts. As such I would expect it to be worth while. At 5:1 the power has 'paid for itself' in only five uses which is, frankly an insanely good bargain.

Just my opinion on the matter.
(I am assuming that since this was put up in a public forum that comments were desired. If not, my bad)

[drewkitty ~..~]

Pardon me, as want with my writing skills I did mis type out my thoughts and the OP had been edited to reflect what I meant.

If you would, reread the OP and update anything you want to change.

[drewkitty ~..~]

13eowulf
Your whole post reads to me as just a complaint that I'm taking the poll at all, disuigsed as complaining about the formate of the poll. Furthermore, you did not even answering the poll question or saying you wouldn't allow it in your games. At this time I have more respect for Glistam.

I addressed the thread, if you don't want outside opinions don't post in public forums.

I did move it to PMs before you posted this. And you still have not posted anything on the topic of the OP.

[13eowulf]

13eowulf
Your whole post reads to me as just a complaint that I'm taking the poll at all, disuigsed as complaining about the formate of the poll. Furthermore, you did not even answering the poll question or saying you wouldn't allow it in your games. At this time I have more respect for Glistam.

I addressed the thread, if you don't want outside opinions don't post in public forums.

I did move it to PMs before you posted this. And you still have not posted anything on the topic of the OP.

Before I finished posting, but not before I started, otherwise I wouldnt have caught the quote.
And I did address the topic. You may not like how I addressed it, but I did. Simply saying "no you didnt" in various different ways wont change that I in fact did.

[drewkitty ~..~]

If I allowed it at all, I would run things like so.
1) This would be restricted to fairly high power games
2) Generic price is 5 Base PPE to reduce activation cost by 1 PPE
3) I would not allow this reduction to be bought more times that the 'bane has levels. So a level 1 Nightbane can reduce their talents costs by 1, a level 2 by 2 etc.

...snip

5:1 exchange rate Between perm and activation costs..... so you would be in favor of lowering the perm PPE cost by 5 points for every +1 point of activation cost? That is how your math works out.

Or are you saying you're making the ratio so cost prohibitive that any sane player would realized he'd be if he chose to do it, with the result you would not have to deal with any modifications to the costs you think the talent should have?

The core thing is that to any magic/PPE user is that the size of their PPE is more dear to them then what can be refilled. Thus the Perm PPE is more dear then the temp cost. Which is why I put the proper ratios in my poll.


So update your post with numbers that don't the players over or say you would not allow it

[Glistam]

I would not allow it at all.

would you care to explain why?

Partly because I appreciate the current balance of the existing talents, and partly because of the criteria your poll limited me to choose from. I also have questions and this raises flags to me for too much potential for abuse.

I appreciate the current balance of the existing talents. Not really more I can add there - ultimately I don't feel such adjustments are necessary for my enjoyment of the game.

The criteria the poll limited me to choose from was too limiting. IF I were to even entertain such an idea, the ratio of Permanent P.P.E. cost to acquire the power versus the reduction in P.P.E. required to activate the power would be reversed. To even start considering it I would examine the situation with a +5 P.P.E. burnoff per -1 P.P.E. activation reduction. Some Talents could justify lowering that while other Talents may justify raising it, and I would need to take all those into careful consideration before applying a blanket rule like this. With the Talents I could remember and think about, there was no situation I could envision where I'd consider a single P.P.E. burnoff to be balanced for a one P.P.E. (or greater) reduction in activation cost.

Questions this change in rules raises for me:

1. Can a Talent be reduced to 0 P.P.E. activation cost? Is a 0 P.P.E. cost Talent "always on"?
2. Would Talents with tiered activation costs see each tier reduced or just the initial tier?
3. When the effect of a Talent is based on the P.P.E. spent to activate it, does the reduced cost factor into that effect?

Potential for abuse. An aspect of the game design I really like is that all Nightbane must find the right balance for themselves of Permanent P.P.E. expenditure versus maintaining a P.P.E. pool sufficient to use those Talents. I think that choice keeps the number of Talents a Nightbane can get to be manageable, makes the Talents a Nightbane chooses to be significant, and also supports a wide variety of Talents among Nightbane themselves. With this ability, and especially at the ratios you suggested, it seems like it becomes too easy to collect a large number and variety of Talents and still be able to use them - something I feel lends itself to abuse easily and also goes against what I believe is the spirit of the game's design.

I guess that's my explanation. Ultimately I'm not against the core idea, but as currently presented I would not support it.

[eliakon]

If I allowed it at all, I would run things like so.
1) This would be restricted to fairly high power games
2) Generic price is 5 Base PPE to reduce activation cost by 1 PPE
3) I would not allow this reduction to be bought more times that the 'bane has levels. So a level 1 Nightbane can reduce their talents costs by 1, a level 2 by 2 etc.

...snip

5:1 exchange rate Between perm and activation costs..... so you would be in favor of lowering the perm PPE cost by 5 points for every +1 point of activation cost? That is how your math works out.

Or are you saying you're making the ratio so cost prohibitive that any sane player would realized he'd be if he chose to do it, with the result you would not have to deal with any modifications to the costs you think the talent should have?

The core thing is that to any magic/PPE user is that the size of their PPE is more dear to them then what can be refilled. Thus the Perm PPE is more dear then the temp cost. Which is why I put the proper ratios in my poll.


So update your post with numbers that don't the players over or say you would not allow it

It is up to the player to decide if that is worth it.
My stance is that this is not HU. I don't think that people should be running around with a half dozen abilities all of which only cost 1PPE (or many 0) to activate.
So I don't see a bad deal here at all.
If a player really wants to get a bit a head of the curve on a talent that they use a lot so that they can use it more often... then they can pay, and pay a reasonable price for that privilege. Just like a mage that wants a better familiar has to pay for that familiar and doesn't just get to pick a feature for each PPE point they spend, or how you can't make 1d6 charms per PPE point I see no reason why this should be inverted either.

This is why there is no way that I can see allowing anyone to simply buy down a talent at any sort of lower ratio
Why don't we look at the numbers if we allowed the middle of your chart (1 PPE buys you 3 reduction)
Regular Nightbane will be first, then the "improved Nightbane" second
Anti Arcane becomes 15 to buy 20to activate vs 21 to buy /1 to activate
Darksong becomes 7 to buy 5 /8 to activate vs 10 to buy 0 to activate
Lightning Rider 15 to buy 10 per minute with 6 per 1d6 damage...or 22 to buy, can turn it on at will for up to 2d6 of damage...
The list goes on an on... again and again, for trivial costs (and yes, I do consider 5 or 6 PPE to be a trivial cost for this sort of thing) the powers go from "this is a power that the player will have to carefully think about the use of"
to
"This power now becomes a super power that they can use basically at will"
This in turn leads to the admonition of not buying to many talents lest you have a huge array of powers and nothing to fuel them with becoming instead "go wild and buy everything you can, just remember to spend the extra couple of points to make sure it costs nothing to use"

This is why I said that there was no way I would allow 1 Base Point to buy a reduction of multiple Activation PPE like your poll offers.
This is further more why I then went and said that I would only allow a significant investment of base points to get a small reduction of activation cost, and that I would only allow that to be done in limited amounts.
This is because I
1) Do not see having talents become 1 or less PPE to activate as being a desirable state of affairs.
2) Do not see that there should be a reason that a beginning level 1 character should be a master of a talent in ways that an ancient isn't.
3) Do think that allowing a person to specialize in one or two talents that they use a lot and wish to have as their signatures does help the game and therefor a way to allow that is worth while, but it must be done in a way that doesn't harm the rest of the game

[Shark_Force]

i would even be hesitant with low-cost talents on that 5 permanent PPE for 1 cost reduction. i'd be inclined to place a strict "no better than half the original cost" limitation or something like that (*maybe* as much as 1/4 being possible).

i definitely wouldn't consider allowing 1:1, let alone more favourable ratios. you'd be a fool to *not* pay the extra permanent cost on everything you take that way.

[eliakon]

i would even be hesitant with low-cost talents on that 5 permanent PPE for 1 cost reduction. i'd be inclined to place a strict "no better than half the original cost" limitation or something like that (*maybe* as much as 1/4 being possible).

That's why I put the "you can only buy one reduction per level".
I do like the idea of "no better than half".
I might let them burn a talent slot to reduce it to a quarter (my houserules let people use their 'talent slots' for various things. And yes, that means that I do use the rule where you get 2 'slots' per level that you can use to buy talents plus what ever freebies you get for your particular flavor of 'bane.)

I will think on this further (as of right now? Its not something that can be done at all. But my Nightbane rules are still 'fluid' due to the low number of people that play them online. My table top game was pretty easy. The rules there for that group were "okay this is what it is right now. We will adjust as we need. Sound good?" "yep sounds good to us, lets do this thing')

[drewkitty ~..~]

*Wonders if anyone paid attention to my notice that I have filled in some missing ideas in the OP question.*

G&E thank you for explaining you reasoning.

Yes, in polling questions there is a bias because it is only asking one question.

Limits: The canon talent making rules say that a Talent's activation cost can never reduced to less then One PPE. And this is talking about the canon rules about activation cost reduction Within The Talent Making Process.
Which the question I asked was intended to be presented as being in (The Talent Making Process), but I typoed.
Not as something that could be done with already completed Talents.(aka canon talents)

I do like Shark's idea that a talent could not be reduced; by this method; by no more then half the final cost.

The range of the ratios that I had in the guidelines reduced the activation cost by 2-4 points for each perm point used.

[eliakon]

*Wonders if anyone paid attention to my notice that I have filled in some missing ideas in the OP question.*

Nope, didn't see that you changed the original post as there was no

EDIT: <change>

so I didn't look for one. I will look now.

G&E thank you for explaining you reasoning.

Yes, in polling questions there is a bias because it is only asking one question.

Limits: The canon talent making rules say that a Talent's activation cost can never reduced to less then One PPE. And this is talking about the canon rules about activation cost reduction Within The Talent Making Process.
Which the question I asked was intended to be presented as being in (The Talent Making Process), but I typoed.
Not as something that could be done with already completed Talents.(aka canon talents)

I do like Shark's idea that a talent could not be reduced; by this method; by no more then half the final cost.

The range of the ratios that I had in the guidelines reduced the activation cost by 2-4 points for each perm point used.

Even for the creation of a new talent I still wouldn't allow much of a reduction.
The issue remains the same only more so.
Specifically it allows for a person to 'pay to win' by paying a small price in advance to gain a large advantage over the longer term.
And if it is only available to custom talents it is even worse as now only those people who utilize custom talents would have that advantage, people who choose to use the regular talents wouldn't have that option, in effect punishing people who choose to play with canon material! Which in my mind should never ever be the case.

If I allowed it (again a huge if). I would, at a minimum do the following
Step One: Require the talent to be written up, in full before hand so as to calculate the 'normal price' of the talent to make sure that the costs are in line with the other talents in the game.
Step Two: I would then ask the player if they want the option of modifying the talent. If they do, then they have to make it 'non-proprietary'. I.e. they are explcitily stating that this talent is now open for general use and that anyone with the proper pre-requisites can buy it. (most talents are like this anyway but I allow a player to ask that their talents be kept 'propriatary' and will generally allow this.)
Step Three: If the talent is made open, then at the time the player goes to buy the talent I would allow the option, at that time, to make a limited set of modifications. This would be, for example, trading base PPE for reduction of the activation cost. I am still going to charge the 5:1 ratio for that privilege for most talents but I might be talked down to as low as 3:1 in extraordinary circumstances. I would then make a note of the ratio that was settled on and add it to the talent for future reference.

The reason I would not be willing to allow much of a discount on the reduction for custom talents is that it is too open to abuse.
-First off, when designing a custom talent there is already a trend by players to try and optimize them to make them as cost efficient as possible. Thus player created talents tend, as a whole, to be more efficient than book talents anyway.
-Second off is that 99% of the time a custom talent is being tailored to a specific person in a specific situation, thus the prices will already be aimed at being optimal for that person. Allowing for even more specialized tailoring seems to be an open invitation for abuse because it will be utilized almost exclusively by those that have the PPE to spend to get the PPE reduction and are in a situation where PPE on a usage basis will be of higher utility than base. Creating a feedback that makes the ability more valuable than simply allowing anyone to do so at will, or level up or what have you.

[drewkitty ~..~]

My POV is that the perm cost boost and the reduction of the activation cost is a part of the whole of making the talent. And every nb or ns that buys the talent gets the same costs.

What it appears to me, your view Eli is that your POV is that the talent is made and put on a list of available talents. And then a char pays extra after selecting the talent and limits about how much reduction is possible being based on the char's level.

Not saying ether PoV is wrong, just different.

[eliakon]

My POV is that the perm cost boost and the reduction of the activation cost is a part of the whole of making the talent. And every nb or ns that buys the talent gets the same costs.

What it appears to me, your view Eli is that your POV is that the talent is made and put on a list of available talents. And then a char pays extra after selecting the talent and limits about how much reduction is possible being based on the char's level.

Not saying ether PoV is wrong, just different.

Exactly. I think the reduction has to be separated from the creation otherwise you penalize all the people that play canon and give people that play custom talents double bonus. First a bonus for getting a talent that does exactly what they want instead of 'close enough' and then giving them a power boost that is only available to 'custom players'.
With out some way of offering that same power boost to everyone its simply not fair. Either everyone needs to have access to a power boost, or no one does, but in my opinion you can't allow special treatment of only certain classes of player. That way leads to elitism and hurt feelings.

I will agree that some people may not see it as special treatment. I am simply stating that I do see it as such, and that as I believe that GMs should be impartial that as a GM I believe that it is my duty to nip such in the bud. Thus my stance as I have explained it.

If a player came to me with a specific talent, and after we worked out the nominal costs of said talent could articulate a good, clear, and convincing reason why I should allow them to lower the activation costs...then I would be willing to talk about it on a 'exception to the rules' basis.

[drewkitty ~..~]

You and I will just have to disagree about the specific ratio to use.
Counter to your opinion, anything that uses up more perm PPE then the amount of reduction in the activation cost is unfair to the player. In my opinion.
Of course When I wrote up what I did, part of the initial concepts were to make talents that are in line with the costs of the other canon talents in the MB.
Now, that there are canon rules it a moot point. Even if the canon rules tend to make spell conversions 'cost prohibitive'.