I'm currently building my final 2 races for a setting I'm homebrewing. The setting draws analogy to a mythology which has 2 races with the ability to magically shape change themselves into another creature or object. In previous homebrews (using SWD or SFC rules) when I allowed a single innate racial power like this, I typically allowed it to be evoked once every 6 hours. That worked well enough, because with the recharge rate of 1 power point/hour in SWD, that translated into roughly 6-10 pp's for the innate power - with the idea that the PC would sleep for at least a quarter of a day. I usually costed such an ability as +2 points; +3 in some case. With the new Power racial ability in SWADE though, it gives a heckuva big boost to an innate power like this by its use of the new Gifted AB. That +2 racial ability now grants the AB and it's 15 PP, which with the new recharge rate of 5pp/hour seem way too OP to me; that's a lot of potential activations per day!
One of my problems with this being handled with the Gifted AB, is the need for the Focus skill. In my previous homebrews, I always allowed an attribute like Smarts or Spirit to activate an innate racial power, which meant a PC based on that race wasn't required to buy a skill; I allowed them to associate an AB skill if they wanted to. I'd like to do something similar, but it seems that the SWADE requirement for the PC to acquire the activating Focus skill might be a balancing factor for this new & powerful racial ability. Another problem I have, is that even though one of the 2 races is small, they both have the ability to shape change into a Size 0 creature. So allowing that for a Novice rank PC might skew game balance. TBH though, were I still building these races for SWD, I'd probably use the Disguise power instead, due to the very restrictive nature of the old Shape Shift. Then there's the problem that in my setting there really isn't a Focus skill - powers are clearly magical and activated with a Spellcasting skill, or arcanely technical and arcane device based like Weird Science. Based on the ancient history of the setting there really isn't a Gifted ability, but if push came to shove it's an area where I could compromise.
Anyhow...SWADE allowing the Gifted AB for a racial ability like this iis nice and generous, but it seems like it's made allowing an innate racial power too OP. This is my 1st time building with SWADE though, so maybe I'm missing something obvious. If anyone could provide some feedback or make some suggestions, I'd appreciate it.
One of my problems with this being handled with the Gifted AB, is the need for the Focus skill. In my previous homebrews, I always allowed an attribute like Smarts or Spirit to activate an innate racial power, which meant a PC based on that race wasn't required to buy a skill; I allowed them to associate an AB skill if they wanted to. I'd like to do something similar, but it seems that the SWADE requirement for the PC to acquire the activating Focus skill might be a balancing factor for this new & powerful racial ability. Another problem I have, is that even though one of the 2 races is small, they both have the ability to shape change into a Size 0 creature. So allowing that for a Novice rank PC might skew game balance. TBH though, were I still building these races for SWD, I'd probably use the Disguise power instead, due to the very restrictive nature of the old Shape Shift. Then there's the problem that in my setting there really isn't a Focus skill - powers are clearly magical and activated with a Spellcasting skill, or arcanely technical and arcane device based like Weird Science. Based on the ancient history of the setting there really isn't a Gifted ability, but if push came to shove it's an area where I could compromise.
Anyhow...SWADE allowing the Gifted AB for a racial ability like this iis nice and generous, but it seems like it's made allowing an innate racial power too OP. This is my 1st time building with SWADE though, so maybe I'm missing something obvious. If anyone could provide some feedback or make some suggestions, I'd appreciate it.
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