Wise Turtle Publishing

Hello again. My current game that I have made makes alot of use out of the Transformation ability. Reading the description it says that the bonuses from Transformation add to your characters abilities if they are the same such as Quick +3 and another Quick +2 from transformation while in your other form would give you a total of Quick +5.

The part that Im looking at is where it says the total of the your abilites can be increased to greater then +5 in this way. I have decided to allow this (at my discretion of course).

The trouble Im having with this ability is the progression certain abilities take when they are increased past 5. Things like quick, perceptive and the like simply give you more dice. What about abilities in which have a chart that they follow. Looking through the book Armor, Tough and Vitality atleast have these.

So I ask, what would your progression be for these skills? If Clay see this I would appreciate an answer from him very much. Thanks again for responses fellow OVA players!

Technically, there is no rank beyond 5. Rank 5 is extraordinarily rare, a rank reserved for completely awing, supernatural abilities.

A little advice... Unless you're running a very powerful game, I wouldn't allow abilities to creep up into rank 5 from Transformation. It's too easy and subject to abuse. Typically, this is what I allow for beginning heroes at character creation:

Gritty Game: 1 rank 3 ability; any number of rank 2s and 1s.

Normal Game: 2 rank 3 abilities; any number of 2s and 1s.

Powerful Game: 1 rank 4, 2 rank 3s; any number of 2s and 1s.

Rank 5 is only attainable through role-playing and experience points.

Again, thanks for the replay Calibur1. As for ranks, I am aware that they dont go above 5 and moniter my players abilities to make sure they dont get out of hand. And for my game I plan for thier to be the potential for very powerful beings. I planned on making a thread about my campaign but alittle background:

The players and various NPCs are descended from different types of Dragons. Most of them have or can learn Transformation, allowing them to assume Dragon form. These forms are suppose to be extemely powerful if mastered and most will never have any rating over 5 save few. While Im not allowing players to begin with abilities total over 5 or even close, I will allow them to eventually at my discretion (Being along time Tabletop player and DM, Im well aware of the abuse that could result, but thats a long story )

So going by the note under Transformation my question was more of what would those progressions look like if they continued above 5?

One option might be to scale Down the 'average traits' for average people. Like never letting 'average normal characters' add double sixes. Or even instead of getting the 'base 2d6' only let them roll ONE d6! They can still add dice by spending Eundurance for those difficult actions (perhaps letting them 'take 2' or something when not stressed). That will make your PCs and major NPCs WAY more powerful.
It also goes without saying that you can lower the standard average Health and Endurance of 'average' people too.

Hmmm. Let me say I know there are plenty of options to 'scale' down average people, or limiting them so the stronger people feel just that. The option you propose Gavinwulf I believe would just confuse people or complicate things to much. Since this game is based on added doubles I dont think that would be a good idea.

I also realise that I could just say 'Well no normal person can have above 4 in any abiltity.' This would mean rank 5 would be reserved for just the Dragons. Im sure there are more things I could do but Id rather not. To quote the book:

If you take an Ability you have normally, add the levels you gain from the transformation to your normal level. Likewise if you have two of the same Weakness. If you have an Ability and Weakness that contradict one another (Like Quick or Slow) subtract the Weakness from the Ability to get your final level. If it is 0, you have neither an Ability or Weakness. Through this, it is possible to get higher then a +5 Bonus or less than -3 Penalty You may want to consider lowering your gained Abilities or Weaknesses, or atleast discuss the affects of the with your Game Master.

So Im aware, just as it says that as GM I may want to consider lowering the abilities so that none go over the +5 bonus. Again, Ive already considered that and am curious over what everyone would think certain abilities would look like if they continued thier progression. In which I mean those with the charts such as Armor, Vitality, Tough and the like.

Scaling Down average folks was one thing I think was done in a group using OVA to play Exalted (It might be in the forums somewhere).
If that doesn't work for you well, good luck. My advice would be to play the game as it is before you decide to make changes.
With Unnatural Resistance (Physical Damage), stacked with Armor, stacked with Tough, -that is already Uber-Powerful.

Gavinwulf, Im not sure how to explain that I understand and have used scaling down in the past. Its easy to do and works in most cases, I agree. Also, Im not looking to change things, as I shown earlier Im looking for clarification on what these abilities would look like as stated in the book under the quote I gave. This is my fourth OVA game so I know how the game is play as it is presented and have done so for the last couple years now.

For me, when I look at game systems I like to understand all aspects of them which tends to make me want to know the thought process behind it.
This incluces things like Nazo's Illusions. An ability thats not listed but would be very interesting to hear more about. The same goes for these abilities in relation to transformation.

Now as to the topic, if anyone has any opinions on what these abilities would look like progression wise I would appreciate the insight, thanks.

My apologies for assuming you were unfamiliar with the system. Sorry if I sounded belittling towards your game plan.
To specifically answer your question, and I hope I am understanding it correctly, it looks like the bonus for Tough & Vitality is consistently doubled with each rank:
10
20
40
80
160
320 at level 6
640 at level 7

With Armor, well, it isn't so consistent. If I were trying to scale it up a couple ranks more, I might just Double the bonus anyway. That is, unless Clay game me a more 'official' ruling. If you were to continue the pattern the scale as written it would look like this:

2
4 (2x2)
6 (2x4-2)
10 (2x6-2)
20 (2x10)
38 (2x20-2)
76 (2x38-2)

Thanks again for the reply Gavinwulf. No worries its not uncommon for people to post questions about rules because they are unfamiliar with the game.

And yeah looking over Tough and Vitality I came to the same conculsion. I seriously doubt Id let a player or NPC have ratings like those

And as far as Armor I saw that they werent consistant either. My first thought was if someone got armor 6 somehow it would perhaps be something like:

2
4
6
10
20
30
?? (Not sure on this one)

Thanks again for your input and will most likely be posting more things to mull over in the future.

Sorry about the delayed response, gent. Down here in the south we had a fellow named Gustav causing a ruckus and pulling out the plugs on good people's houses and whatnot. Yessir.

</Southern>

In any case, there will be official rulings on how to handle this sort of thing the revised game, but for now, let me give my general thoughts on it.

While, as suggested elsewhere, you CAN simply continue with the book's implied scale, you'll notice the numbers get incredibly big, incredibly fast. You may be better off simply taking the last increase and use that for every additional Level. For example, Level 6 in Vitality would be 240 (160+80). Level 7 would be 320, and so on. This also makes problematic scales, like Armor, a bit easier to handle.

Hope that helps!

Thanks for the reply Clay. I am very glad to hear about a revised edition and am looking forward to it very much!

As for the ability progression I can agree with that. Would allow things to scale if needed without getting to out of hand, so if I were to use it I will do just that, thanks.

Clay wrote:Sorry about the delayed response, gent. Down here in the south we had a fellow named Gustav causing a ruckus and pulling out the plugs on good people's houses and whatnot. Yessir.

That...is the worst Southern accent I have ever read.

JuddG wrote:That...is the worst Southern accent I have ever read.

And this... is quite possibly the most delayed response I've ever seen.