What is the Seventh Enigma?  Well, that's a riddle, isn't it?  (Yeah, cheep joke, I know)

The 7th Enigma Universe (sometimes abbreviated 7E) is the label I'm applying to a new fiction project I'm working on.  The core concept is to, like Heroes on NBC, Astro City, Rising Stars, or similar works, take a slightly different look at the tropes of comic book superheroes and the worlds they inhabit.  It's nothing that hasn't been done before, but I hope I've found a worthwhile angle.  And if I haven't, you can't really stop me anyway. :P

That still begs the question "what is the 7th enigma?" but I really don't have an answer.  I don't even know what the other six enigmas are.  It's just that 7th Enigma can be made into a really cool logo.

 

The 7th Enigma Universe takes its inspiration from the question of "what would happen if people had superpowers in the real world?"  It's an old question, debated countless times.  There have even been some "realistic" takes on superpowers in the past.  The NBC show Heroes, which probably kicked this matter to the front of my brain again, is a recent example.  Going into the wayback machine a little, there's the Wild Cards universe.  Both of those are similar in that they limit the field a little before grappling with the question.  I decided to avoid those limitations myself.  In the 7E universe, anything goes.  All the classic "origins" will be available, and not limited by world-builder's fiat.

That means I want room for aliens, magic users, mutants, and guys in power armor, and even alien mutant magic users in power armor.  It also means I'm not going to dodge around the supertech issue by saying mad inventors and superscientists are using some highly refined form of psi power to make their machines work.

I am, however, taking a completely different dodge.  A world where superpowers had been around all along wouldn't really be recognizable to us.  It'd be so drastically changed that what I was writing would be more like science fiction than superheroes.  So taking a page from Marvel's New Universe (one taken many times before) and saying superpowers and related phenomena didn't exist until recently.  I'm going to tell the story of a normal world that one day wakes up and realizes it has superpowers.  Then, in manageable chunks, I can examine the ramifications of different superpowers.

But what does this mean to you, my legions of adoring readers?

Well, for one thing, it means a new label over on the side.  I'm adding a 7th Enigma category.  7th Enigma content might also get other labels, like Artistic Widgets and Fiction Widgets.  But mostly, 7th Enigma Widgets will be for gaming.  Specifically, they'll be for the 4-Color system, for which I am deeply indebted to Phil Reed of Ronin Arts.  (Everybody say "Thanks, Phil")

And yes, I could have used M&M instead, but I can write 4C characters off the top of my head, with no references at all.  For M&M characters, I'd have to have my book, and my character creator spreadsheet, and it'd take time.  And, honestly, I'm too lazy for that.  So this way, you get stats you can use if you were a fan of the most Marvelous supers game from the 1980s, and I get to hash out ideas in a solid form.

I'm simultaneously developing the setting and plotting the first book (tentatively called Seven Wonders).  As I go along, I'll put up stats for various characters, and maybe some gear and so-forth.  Of course, don't quote me on any of this.  What ends up in the book may be different than what I post on the blog.  For one thing, I have to keep some surprises, and for another, I change my mind a lot.

Before we get going, I'll give you a brief rundown of 4C.  For more info, try the Ronin Arts forums, here.

There are 7 Primary traits and 4 Secondary traits.

Primary

Melee: This Primary Trait is the measure of a character’s expertise in melee combat. When kicking, punching, stabbing, or otherwise fighting in close quarters, this Trait determines the success or failure of the attack.

Coordination: This Primary Trait is the measure of a character’s physical proficiency. When shooting, throwing, dodging, balancing, or otherwise employing physical nimbleness, this Trait determines the success or failure of the action.

Brawn: This Primary Trait is the measure of a character’s physical power. When lifting heavy objects, determining damage with melee or thrown attacks, throwing an object a certain distance, or otherwise engaged in activities relying on physical power, this Trait determines the success or failure of the action.

Fortitude: This Primary Trait is the measure of a character’s physical stamina and robustness. When attempting to hold breath, resist sickness, overcome toxins, ignore fatigue, keep from dying, or otherwise engaged in physically strenuous tasks, this Trait determines the success or failure of the action.

Intellect: This Primary Trait is a measure of the character’s intelligence. When attempting to invent, solve a problem, learn, or otherwise use smarts, this Trait determines the success or failure of the action.

Awareness: This Primary Trait is a measure of the character’s intuition.  When attempting to sense danger, spot something, recognize a hunch, or otherwise work on instinct rather than analyzing a situation, this Trait determines the success or failure of the action.

Willpower: This Primary Trait is a measure of the character’s mental strength. When dealing with psychic abilities, magic powers, issues of willpower, or otherwise using powers of the mind, this Trait determines the success or failure of the action.

Secondary

Damage: This Secondary Trait is a measure of the physical punishment a character can suffer before dying. This Secondary Trait uses a numerical score (not Rank Value) that is decreased as the character takes damage. This Secondary Trait, as well as damage and healing

This Secondary Trait’s starting value is calculated by adding up the Rank Values of the character’s first four Primary Traits (Melee, Coordination, Brawn, and Fortitude).

Fortune: This Secondary Trait is a measure of the character’s ability to use luck, training, and/or experience to influence the present. This Secondary Trait uses a numerical score (not Rank Value) and points may be spent from it to affect die rolls and improve the Rank Values of Primary Traits.

This Secondary Trait’s starting value is calculated by adding together the Rank Values of the character’s last three Primary Traits (Intellect, Awareness, and Willpower).

Lifestyle: This Trait is a measure of the character’s wealth and ability to procure needed items and services.

To calculate the Rank Value for this Secondary Trait roll once on Table 1.

Repute: This Secondary Trait is a measure of how well the character is known; the greater the score the more popular the character. This Secondary Trait uses a numerical score (not Rank Value).

To calculate this Secondary Trait’s value roll d% and divide the result by 3 (round up).

(Not that I'm going to do that)

Rank Values: Primary traits have a percentile value and a descriptive adjective.  The number is all that really matters to the system, but the descriptors are much more flavorful.  You can add your own when you play.  For simplicity's sake, I'm just going to use the rank numbers, and generally the first one from any given range within a rank, such that someone with a 30-39 has a 30 for my calculation purposes.

Rank 
1-2    
3-5    
6-9    
10-19
20-29
30-39
40-49
50-74
75-99
100-149        
150-999        
1000  

Besides Traits, you've got Powers, Skills, and Contacts. 

I'm using freeform powers, which is a fancy way to say I just make up whatever I want.  It's easy: just describe what you want the power to do and assign a rank number to it.  These characters won't be "balanced" like, say, the Unisystem ones, but the source material isn't particularly balanced, either, and in this case my task is to represent the source material accurately rather than to produce completely playable content.

Skills are the stuff a character is particularly good at.  Both in the pulp-inspired writing that I like and in superhero comics, there's a lot of latitude in a character's skills.  Captain Striker can use any gun he damn well picks up, and fly any kind of plane, because that's the way the writer wants it.  So Skills are fairly broad, although I'll suggest specialties.  A skill gives a character one extra rank when he's using it.  For instance, a Scientist with an Exceptional Intellect would have a Super Intellect in the area of Science.

Contacts are the people a character knows and can call on for help or information.  I'll be pretty descriptive with these, since that's more fun to me than totally broad categories.

By next week, I should have a pretty good idea of what characters will be running around.  To the (negligible) extent that I'll focus on anything, I'll try to focus on villains, since they're really the fun people anyway.

I promised a picture of Diana in skimpy attire, so here you go.

First of all, I'm sorry about the image quality.  I did this one at work on scratch paper with a pencil, then bumped up the contrast in Photoshop so it would be visible.

The idea behind this sketch was to draw a figure in perspective.  You'll notice that most of my art is from a straight-on point of view.  That's because I suck at foreshortening.  I didn't quite get the effect right here, either.  I think what went wrong was the placement of the window.  It should be a little lower, and not quite so distorted by persepctive.  I couldn't really set up a drawing board at my desk, so the perspective is all just eyeballed.

This picture spawned a conversation between Lisa and me about what kind of underwear Phoebe would wear.  If any.

:)

Today's Found Writing comes courtesy of avid reader Blue Canary.  (doesn't "Avid Reader Blue Canary" sound like a good title for a manga?)

I can't even read most of that.  I'm not quite sure what language it's in.

If you'd like to win eternal fame by sending me a Found Writing, well... you probably won't, but feel free to send it anyway.  I'm not too picky about the file format, but once I compress it it's going to come out as a jpg.  Use the email link on the blog, and it'd probably be smart if you prefaced the subject line with [electric widgets] so I can easily sort them out from my tons of regular mail.  (Well, not tons, but at least pounds)

Okay, now it's time for those long-awaited Supernatural Packages

 

The Gargoyles universe is home to several unusual creatures and to humans who have traded (willingly or not) their humanity for something else.  Gargoyles are relatively easy, but some of the others are a lot more fluid.

 

Gargoyles - the Gargoyle package will appear below.  Basically, Gargoyles are strong, can fly, can regenerate when they turn to stone, and have nasty claws.

 

Cyborgs - Cyborgs can have just about anything that can be mechanically grafted onto them.  Gargoyles-verse prosthetics can run the gamut from being indistinguishable from human parts without close examination to being large and obvious.  It is not at all uncommon for cyborgs to be able to pass for human so long as they don't use their more obvious powers and avoid metal detectors.

 

Cyborgs have the disadvantage that some portion of their Life Points are tied to their cybernetic parts.  For every 5 points of Cybernetic Qualities a character has, 25% of his LP no longer heal normally.  Instead, he either needs a specific Regeneration power, or requires the services of someone with a cybernetics lab and the Mr. Fix-it skill.  Additionally, Directors can rule that some powers can be temporarily lost due to damage.  The Target Limb maneuver is particularly good for this.

 

Demifey - Human (or possibly Gargoyle or something)/ Faerie hybrids are viable life forms.  The Third Race's genetics are remarkably adaptable.  Faerie blood carries faerie magic.  Demifey characters often have Sorcery, Supernatural Senses, and the like.  These powers take practice to develop, so demifey who are unaware of their heritage or reject it might have very little power.  Demifey generally look like normal members of their other race, with modest if any unusual features.  They are generally quite attractive and fit specimens, so adding modest stat boosts to a demifey package is completely appropriate.

 

Mutates - Techniques pioneered by Dr. Anton Sevarious allow human/animal DNA grafts that produce viable life-forms.  Mutates generally have powers that can be traced to real animals.  A little Natural Armor is fine.  Being bullet-proof would be kind of odd.  Distance attacks are somewhat rare (but then again, electric eels.)

 

Hybrids - All of the above are at least somewhat compatible.  Coldstone was a cyborg/gargoyle.  There's nothing but the fact that you'll run out of points to stop you from making a cybernetic demifey gargoyle with a suit of battle armor.

 

Packages

To get you started, here are a few more obvious packages

 

Cyborg (20-point Quality)

Cyborgs have a lot of variation.  This one is designed for straight-up combat with gargoyles.

+2 Str, Dex, Con (6)
Night Vision (1)
Natural Armor 10 (10)
Natural Weapons (wrist blades) Str x3 (2)
Supernatural Attack (Optical Laser) 20 (8)
Flight (Shoulder & boot Jets.  Boot jets can also be used for Supernatural Attack) (5)
Combat Computer (Situational Awareness, Fast Reaction Time) (7)
Beholden (secret masters) (5)
Cruel 2 (disassociative disorder)
Appearance -2

 

 

Demifey (18-pont Quality)

Keep in mind that the Demifey are as varied as their Faerie parents, but here's a fairly typical one.

Dex +3, Per, Will +2 (7)
Appearance +5 (5)
Immortal (0)
Hypnosis (What do you See) (10)
Supernatural Senses (Basic, the Sight) (4)
Vulnerability (Can be bound by magic, iron does x3 damage) (5)
Honorable 3 (bound by Faerie Law)

The demifey probably also has Sorcery, but it's not part of this Quality.  It might be fun to play him or her without it instead, perhaps replacing some of Hypnosis with Emotion Control to represent a less developed ability.  The poor character might not know why iron is uncomfortable or why he can't seem to lie or break a deal.

Gargoyle (19-point Quality)

Gargoyles are stronger, faster, and tougher than humans, with sharp senses  They get +4 Strength, +2 to Dexterity, +2 Constitution, and +2 Perception, and Natural Toughness.  They get 3 levels of Hard to Kill, and can buy up to 5 more  They also have razor-sharp claws (Strx3 armor-piercing), gliding wings, and prehensile tails.  When in stone sleep, they regenerate Con/Minute, which also removes any poisons, but doesn't cure diseases.  They also have very sharp hearing, sense of smell, and night-vision.

On the other hand they are ugly to human eyes, with Appearance -3.  Gargoyles don't have human psychology, either.  They feel a deep need to protect.  This translates to the Driving Goal flaw at -2.  A gargoyle's worst weakness, however, is their vulnerability to sunlight.  Being exposed to sunlight turns a gargoyle to stone.  On the up-side, stone is fairly tough, but modern man has plenty of ways to damage it.  Staying indoors is no defense, either.  Once the sun is fully in the sky (say, an ten minutes or so after sunrise) the transformation occurs regardless of whether the gargoyle can see the sun or not - and gargoyles need exposure to the sun.  Without it, they gradually become sickly and infertile.

Gargoyles are currently 2-point Minorities with no legal rights, but that's not figured in to the cost of the Quality.

Gargoyles frequently have the Honorable Drawback, but this is not a requirement.  Those who don't have Honorable often replace it with Cruel, but this, too, is a matter of choice.

Neo-gargoyle (27-point Quality)

Neo-gargoyles are Mutates built to have traits similar to gargoyles.  They were created for David Xanatos by Dr. Sevarious, but he ultimately lost control of them.  Sevarious may have created more than the initial group.

Neo-gargoyles combine the traits of big cats and bats or raptors, along with those of electric eels.  They get +3 Strength, +2 Dexterity and Constitution, and +2 Perception.  They also get +3 levels of Hard to Kill and can by up to five more.  They have Str x3 claws, but theirs are not armor-piercing as a gargoyle's are.  Most impressively, they can throw blasts of electricity doing 20 points of damage.  These have limited use.  After a number of blasts equal to the Neo-Gargoyle's CON score, he needs an hour or so to recharge.  They have gliding wings, but not prehensile tails.  They have no stone sleep, but regenerate at con/hr.  Like Gargoyles, they have acute hearing and smell, and night-vision.

Neo-gargoyles have hair-trigger tempers, giving them one level of Antisocial Impulses: Violence.  They also look frightening to human eyes, with appearance -3.

(Note: I really wish I could make htis one come in for 20 points or less, but supernatural attacks are VERY expensive)

Neo-Werewolf (14-point Quality)

One of Sevarious' most popular conversions is to simply graft some predator's DNA to a human's.  The result is a  stronger, faster, meaner creature.

A new-werewolf is a mutate with (generally) wolf DNA.  This conveys Str + 2, Dex +2, Con +2, Per +2 (with a minimum of 5), Acute Hearing and Acute Smell, as well as Enhanced Smell, meaning the neo-werewolf can track by scent.  Neo-werewolves are tough with 3 levels of Hard to Kill and an option on 5 more.  They also have Strength x2 claws and fangs.  The wolf's hardy constitution provides Con/hr regeneration.

Wolf DNA produces severe problems in humans.  The neo-werewolf has -2 appearance and Antisocial Impulses: Violence at 2, as well as one level of Cruelty (and individuals can take more separately).  Neo-werewolves have no vulnerability to silver beyond what one would expect.

And, with that, you should have enough to play a Gargoyles game, or add Gargoyles and their associated hangers-on to your Angel and Buffy games.  Enjoy.

Here's another grocery list.  The smudged bits were people's names.  I gather that one person was shopping for some other people.  She wrote on both sides.

Besides burning with curiosity over whether or not the bingo sampler paid off, I wonder what blue sugar is.  Is it some kind of confectioner's thing?

At least at the moment, I'm not going to bother to write a lot of setting exposition, so we'll start roughly in what would be Chapter 2 of a normal Eden RPG book.  Here, we'll take a brief run-through of attributes, skills, and existing Qualities and Drawbacks.  New Qualities and Drawbacks will be in part 3.  (Yes, Virginia, there is a Gargoyles Quality.  There's probably a Santa Claus, too, but we'll talk about him under the Fey later on.)
 
Attributes - nothing much needs to change about Attributes.
 
Skills - the standard Cinematic Unisystem skill list works just fine for the Gargoyles world.  Occultism clues you in on the secret history of the world, and lets you know about magic and the faeries.
 
Qualities - ah yes, here's the meat of the thing.
 
Attractiveness - The current system, elegant in its simplicity, lumps all matters of personal appearance into the Attractiveness Quality.  So a Gargoyle might start off with -3 Attractiveness to represent his inhuman appearance, but could then buy it up as far as he wanted.  Goliath, who's got a way with the ladies, might have spent 5 points or so to get an effective Attractiveness of 2.
 
I don't really like that.  It's okay in Buffy or Angel, where most of the characters are human, but in a Gargoyles game, it's very possible that all the PCs will be Gargoyles, so it's a little wonky.  I'm seriously considering splitting Attractiveness into two Qualities/Drawbacks.  One would measure your aesthetic Attractiveness, and the other would measure your deviation from human norms.  "Fearsomeness" would be a Drawback that makes your basic form scary/ugly to humans.  It'd give you a negative modifier to Influence tests not based on fear, no matter how high your Attractiveness is - except for dealing with people who are used to your unusual form in some way.  For them, your Attractiveness kicks in.  Possibly rather than all or nothing, the two add/subtract from one another, so a Gargoyle with -3 Fearsomeness and +1 Attractiveness is only two points scary on first impressions.
 
When I get to the point of writing up characters, I'll decide whether to adopt this or not, but I think it makes a neat alternate rule.
 
Enchanted/Superscience item - The relatively high tech level of the Gargoyles setting means that 1-2 point items are frequently not worth paying for with Quality points.  They can just be purchased with sufficient wealth or obtained through Organizations.  Higher-level items should still be bought for 2 points per PL.
 
Optionally, something that would be incredibly expensive like a battlesuit (Which is really several PL 4-ish items all mushed together) can be purchased as a Supernatural package Quality.  The Dual Form Drawback is appropriate to represent the fact that you can't walk around in your battlesuit all the time.

As I've mentioned, I think there's an Eden-approved method for this in All Tomorrow's Zombies.  It involves buying the Robot Quality and whatever add-ons you'd like.  That seems workable to me.  
 
Enchanting/Superscience - Enchanting is completely gone.  Mortal magicians can create potions and charms through a variety of spells, through the Sorcery quality.  More powerful items are purely the purview of the Third Race.
 
Superscience is easier than it is in Buffy.  Superscience devices no longer require special ingredients.  Money works.  This will be discussed more completely later on.  Your Superscience Quality can never be a higher level than your Science skill, and you should probably really have Science of at least 4 before you pick up Superscience.  6 would be better.  We're probably going to talk about new uses of Superscience to cover metagenetics and cybernetics.
 
Occult Library - I think Occult Library works just fine as-is.
 
Rank - Rank now explicitly buys up your standing in an Organization, granting you more autonomy (but also more responsibility).  We'll talk more about Organizations when I get into new Qualities/Drawbacks.  You can have Rank in several groups.  For instance, an undercover police investigator might have rank in the Police and in an organized crime ring.  Almost all Illuminati members also have Rank in some other group.  In fact, that's frequently why they were recruited into the Illuminati.
 
Robot - The Robot Quality from Buffy is a decent starting point for any robotic characters, but there's no reason to limit yourself so.  Instead, build Robots like Demons and Supernatural characters from Angel.  Robots can have Drawbacks like Beholden from Armageddon (which I might list down in the next part, for simplicity sake).  They could also have variations of Antisocial Tendencies, Mental Problems, Emotional Problems and the like to represent programming imperatives.
 
Cyborgs work pretty much the same way, except they can recover (depending on how many cybernetic parts they have) 75%, 50%, or 25% of their Life Points without a Mr. Fix-it test.  Cyborgs who are nothing but a brain in a robot body work just like normal robots.  Drawbacks like Cruel are appropriate to represent the dehumanizing effect of losing so much of your essential humanity.  (Then again, Jackal and Hyena were already pretty twisted)
 
Sorcery - Sorcery works as-is, except that I'd drop it to 3-points per level and remove the TK.  Pretty much only Faeries have Sorcery, and some of them might instead have 2-point per level Magic Domains, which are pretty much Invocations as per the conversion rules in the Magic Box.
 
Vampire - no Vampires have shown up in Gargoyles, thus far.  If they do, the existing Vampire Quality probably won't really work for them, but do whatever you want with your own game.
 
Wealth - Wealth, at high levels, gives you free levels of the Organization Quality.  At level 4, you get 5 Organization points.  At level 5, you get 10.  Beyond level 5, Wealth would start to describe the resources of nations.  Characters might actually be that rich (like David Xanatos), but level 5 represents the limit of their liquid assets, so this Quality is capped at 5.  (To keep the Director sane, really)
 
Supernatural Qualities - Note that many Supernatural Qualities are appropriate for Demifey, Mutates, and Cyborgs.
 
Natural Attack - New to this Quality is an Armor-Piercing kicker for 2 points.  It'll probably work with Supernatural Attack, too, but I'd be more hesitant to apply it.
 
Supernatural Senses - New to this Quality is night-vision, costing 1 point.
 
Okay, so I think that does it for existing Qualities.  Next up are the new ones.
 
Magical Conduit (2-point per level Quality)
A Magical Conduit is a mystical artifact that allows a human to freely work magic.  Each level of Focus allows a non-Sorcerer to Quick-Cast spells of a power level up to the level of the Quality.  A would-be magician can only control a Conduit of a strength equal to or less than his Occultism level.  Otherwise, his spells have the chance to go seriously awry - using the miscast rules in Buffy.  A Magical Conduit is essentially an enchanted item, and can be lost.  
 
Magery (1-point per level Quality)
Magery provides bonus points on Sorcery checks.  The maximum rating of this Quality is 5 levels.
 
Organization (Variable Quality)
The Organization Quality provides a character (or characters, it is possible to pool levels) additional Organization points.
 
Supernatural Qualities - Supernatural Qualities are possessed by such creatures as Gargoyles, Demifey, Mutates, and Cyborgs.  To create such a character, you build a package Quality by picking the positive and negative traits you want to be intrinsic to your character's "race."  (In the case of a cyborg or mutate, it might be a race consisting of a single creature, of course.  Each demifey might be unique, as well)
 
Extra Limb - Variable Quality
You have one or more extra prehensile limbs.  Extra feet don't really cost you anything.  This Quality doesn't grant you any additional actions, but it can allow your actions to affect more people.  If you had, say, ten tentacles, you might be able to grab ten people a few at a time and hold/crush them all.
 
One limb costs you 1 point.  2 to 4 additional limbs cost 2 points.  5 or more cost 5 points.  In practical terms, 10 limbs is probably a good limit to this Quality.  Extensible limbs that significantly increase your reach add a 1-point kicker if you can reach about 10 feet (3 meters or so), and 2 points if you want to be able to reach even further.  And at some point you're just getting silly.  Particularly at the higher levels, your limbs don't have to be static limbs.  An amorphous mass that can extend multiple tendrils might vary from no limbs up to ten, depending on his mood.
 
Magical Affinity (2-point per level Quality)
Each level of Magical Affinity gives you a +1 bonus on Sorcery tests, up to a maximum of 5.  Unlike Buffy Sorcery, there is no progressive spell-casting penalty, so there is no point in taking this Quality beyond 5 levels.  The prerequisite for this Quality is Sorcery.
 
Special Movement (Variable Quality)
This Quality imparts more freedom of movement.  Characters can have more than one type.  For instance, Gargoyles have the first level of Climbing, and Gliding, for 3 total points and pretty much as much freedom of movement as someone who can just fly.
Climbing: 1 point for climbing with claws/special gear.  2 points for spider-like wall-crawling that lets you hang from the ceilings as well as scaling the walls and climb smooth surfaces easily.
Flight 3: points for flight that can be easily disrupted (like with wings), 5 points for freeier flight.
Gliding/swinging: 2 points.  It's pretty much just the lower level of Flight.
Leaping: the ability to make prodigious vertical or horizontal leaps.  2 points.
 
Superspeed (2-point per level Quality)
Superspeed lets a character move really quickly.  It's generally tied to a single type of movement, like running, swimming, or flying, depending on the character.  Each level of Superspeed more or less doubles the character's maximum speed.  At level 3, the character can move as fast as a car in the city.  At 4, he's approaching race-car speeds, and at 5, he's... well, really fast.  Superspeed doesn't allow any extra attacks.  For that, you're going to want obnoxiously high Dexterity.

I think that covers new Qualities.  I was planning to do Packages as part of this post, but it's getting late tonight and I still have some work to do on them.  I'll do them next.  Really, you don't HAVE to have package qualities to start using this stuff, so I don't feel too bad about leaving you waiting.

Hey everybody,

I just did a really cool panel for Domino Girls, which you will get to see in several weeks.  But I liked one particular part of it enough that I also did a sketch I've decided to share.

I should sketch more.  I should do a lot of things more, for that matter.  But since that's not very likely, you'll just have to enjoy Phoebe: schoolgirl from Hell.

An error with the blog yesterday seems to have been resolved - probably through the tireless efforts of Tim Rayburn.  Or maybe it was just one of those things.

Either way, I don't know if my hordes of subscribers (okay 6) got their RSS feeds, so I figured I'd throw out an announcement.

I figured I'd start with the hardest part first.  Well, that's not strictly true.  I have most of the other parts worked out already, but magic is a toughie, and some of the other stuff hinges on how it works.

Buffy magic is a very robust system, but it doesn't fit the Gargoyles flavor.  Buffy Sorcerers have an entirely diferent set of problems than Gargoyles ones.  The high probability of spells going awry doesn't really fit, and the progressive -2 per turn seems a little off, too.

All we know about magic comes from Demona, the Magus, the Archmage, and various faeries.  And really, there's not a lot.  Normal humans hardly ever cast spells (compared to the amount of time they spend doing other stuff).  Faeries, on the other hand, sling magic around all the time, although it does seem to wear them out after a while.

For humans and gargoyles, the rule seems to be that it's very hard to cast spells spontaneously.  The Magus only ever does it once, and he dies from it.  I think the Archemage throws around some nasty spells, but it's been a while since I've watched it.  I'm going to go with the assumption that for the most part, magic in Gargoyles is through rituals, or through using magical devices.  For instance, it was likely a property of Titania's Mirror that Demona could use a simple ritual to summon Puck - rather than a "spell" of Demona's.

EDIT:  Something else I've thought of

One thing I might change, although I'd do so with some trepidation, is to make spell formulas a little more flexible.  Spell R&D is pretty hard.  If your books don't have a spell for turning people into statues, you're probably never going to be able to turn people into statues.  But if your books DO have a spell for turning people into statues, you can probably turn one person into a statue, or a dozen, or a million if you're good enough to marshal the magical energies.  And you can do so under different circumstances, like "the next person I touch" or "everyone in the sound of my voice."

What this means is that the spells you know are listed with their minimal effect and starting PL, and you can pick and choose modifiers.  Make the spell work longer or faster or bigger, and the PL goes up.  Make it take rare ingredients or year-long rituals, and it goes down.

That's a scary level of freedom, though.  I've already learned that WitchCraft style Invocations are frighteningly poweful, and those just let a magician do one kind of effect.  So I'll have to think about it.  Sometimes play balance has to win over simulation of the source material.

So anyway, the Sorcery quality is really, really rare.  Human magicians learn rote spells and need either elaborate rituals or a magical conduit to work their mojo.  A magical conduit is an Enchanted Item that - just to keep things simple - provides the holder with the ability to Quick Cast spells up to its Power Level.  It doesn't provide the bonus points.  Instead, that's going to be a Quality called - because I like GURPS - Magery.  Levels of Magery up to 5 add to your Occultism skill to cast spells.  Since I'm already dinging you at roughly 2 points per level for Quick Casting, I'll just make that Quality a 1-point per level Quality.  And if you want Telekinesis, you have to pay for it the old-fashioned way.

I think I'll leave Sorcery in, but make the prerequisite for learning it be something like Occultism greater than 10.  And I might turn it into a sort of "Wild Card Skill" so it advances a lot more slowly.

On the other hand, Gargoyles magicians don't seem to have too much trouble with spells going awry.  A spell can fail if you're not talented enough to cast it, and what it's supposed to do might not actually be what you think it does, but it's not going to do something radically different.  Magic seems very legalistic.  A spell to make you as enduring as the mountain stones may just turn you to stone.

(Although I have a private theory that if Xanatos had immersed himself in the cauldron, it would have made him immortal - he would have shed his stone skin like a Gargoyle.  I think Puck didn't want Xanatos to be immortal because then  he'd be stuck as Owen for all eternity, so he did something to scare Xanatos off.  Greg Wiesman doesn't actually agree with me, but what does he know?)

Faeries have it different.  They seem to be able to just whip out with spells that do just about anything at the drop of a hat.  They also DO seem to suffer from some degradation of their powers.  Puck says he'll need a long nap after The Mirror.

Ergo, Faeries DO have Sorcery, which costs 5 points per level and lets them Quick Cast spells.  I'll keep the Quality at 5 points per level even though it doesn't include telekinesis because it will include the ability to improvise spells.  Faeries just whip out with the magic whenever they want.

I'm also making one other major change - Magic can kill you.  If you throw a Quick Cast spell of a higher PL than your Sorcery or available conduit, you take physical damage from it.  I think I'll make it five times the PL of the spell.  That'll REALLY limit what magicians can do without their tools.

Faeries can also have other powers.  In fact, not all faeries or demifey need to have Sorcery.  They might rely on innate powers that are more reliable, if less versatile.  For those, the Angel supernatural Qualities will do most of the job.

So then there's Enchanting and Superscience.

Magic items are really rare in the Gargoyles-verse, and most of the ones I can think of are actually Faerie creations: the Eye of Odin, Titania's Mirror, the Phoenix Gate, and probably Excalibur.  The Grimorium is something of an unknown, as is the Gae Bolga.  I think I might limit Enchanting either to just level 1 for humans, or entirely to Faeries.  Or maybe not.  There's a dearth of evidence on the subject.

Superscience, on the other hand, should be easier than it is in the Buffyverse.  Robots, blasters, floating factories, and whatnot are all common enough not to raise eyebrows, even if they're not ubiquitous.  So Superscience works as written - you have to have a high Science skill to have it, and it costs 5 points per level.  The only difference is that Superscience gadgets no longer require a special ingredient.  Instead, rare ingredients can lower the effective Power Level like they do for Sorcery spells.

And I think that covers everything magic-related.  We're going to discuss a slightly different way to approach the Enchanted Item Quality a little later on.  It works okay for some devices, but is really bad for things like exo-armor.

If I get my hands on All Tomorrow's Zombies before I write the next segment, I'll see what Eden did for battle suits there.  I think they went with a variation of the Robot Quality, which probably works pretty well.