Starhammer wrote:

I've been tinkering with a variety of survival/crafting games lately.

The Flame in the Flood?

I agree with PH, it would be too restricting for a superhero/villain game since way too many people have fully inherent powers or devices that are way too flexible (like Lantern Corps rings) to be under this system.

As its own game in its own setting that fully support that style of "powers" and "power progression" then I would support it.

Starhammer wrote:

I seem to have given the impression that this concept is entirely about technological "crafting." That's really not what I meant, or at least not more than a portion of it. Think about components in broader terms than tech. Like a martial artist might develop a maneuver out of a few different techniques, or a combination out of multiple maneuvers. For instance, he builds a "soft" block based on Judo, then enhances it with a knockdown component, so when he makes his defense roll, the attacker might fall down. At higher levels maybe he even adds a damage component and a snare component, so the attacker falls down and hurts their ankle.

I'm not sure how you would represent these components and the crafting process to properly represent most of the different forms one can develop powers through, like training ones own body to making a tech piece to learning new magic and so on. Either you would have to make the whole system so generic that it wouldn't really fit anything or you would have to have many different "crafting stations" (and most likely component gathering forms) that represent the majority of aesthetics (but still have the same mechanics) to give the illusion of properly representing most forms.

Quote:

If you're familiar with it, compare the idea to the spell crafting subsystem in Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind. But again, it could be magic, tech, skills, mutations, or maybe even combinations... not a requirement that super powers have to be externally acquired, but merely a method of developing them. Yeah, Superman has a bunch of powers built in just for being Superman, but in the format of a game, he probably doesn't start at max level like he does in the movies.

Not sure a freeform "craft your own power" system is such a good idea here since it will lead to "mage tanks" in the end. There has to be reasonable limits to it so the game presents a reasonable balance and some challenge. Having such a system would most likely require more resources to develop than what it's worth, especially this late in this game's development.

[url=https://ryzom.com/]Ryzom[/url] kinda had such a system when I last tried it (haven't played it in over a decade) though it was based on "blocks" that had a cost that needed to be offset. It was workable but not really balanced, though I suspect that had much more to do with their specific implementation rather than the concept overall.

On a much more personal note though, I don't really want to have to grind for "materials" in such a way to be able to get new powers and progress my character.

The CE system is similar to one of the ways I explored a different way of earning powers. It was rather inspired by the old Marvel PnP RPG advanced system.

You still chose an archetype and a primary and secondary set. Each set would differ slightly based on the AT chosen. Instead of say Atrophic Blast you would have Atrophic Offense.

If you chose an Enforcer, it would be easier to improve melee attacks of this set over ranged attacks.
You would select which offense branch to take - Damage, Control, Offensivr Support, Drfensive Support.

You could include them all but the power could only improve to a certain extent. The more focused the power was, say if you chose Damage only, it could be improved extensively.

You could chose to keep it single target, or make it an AoE. Each aspect of a power was a possible branch.

Protection sets worked similarly, in that you could choose to focus on a damage type, or evasion type, or broaden what the power could do. You could choose to make the power less protective by selecting an AoE branch with on offense component, and then follow the offense branches.

The deeper I got into designing however, the more I realized how much longer it would take our small team to implement the idea. Power Set design would become exponentially longer m, require more time for designing each set, more time to internally test all permutations.

In he end I had to scrap the idea in favor of our more simplified system we have now. Which is still plenty complex, just a lot less so comparatively.

That being said, we do plan on having Planned Powers in the game, but they’ll be temporary in nature.

My goal is to make a crafted version of every Tertiary Power as a basis .Add in aesthetic decoupling, and those basic powers Dan be made to fit any concept. Add in multiple aesthetics for crafting itself, and you have your martial artist practicing.techniqies coming up with a “new move”. A magic user creating an item, and so on.