Hidden 5 yrs ago Post by DocRock
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DocRock Techno-Gilgamesh

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Just a question to the masses.

But you ever sit down to transcribe a character sheet, and want to simplify a character you've developed a long time so others can enjoy them without having to know every last weapon or item they've gathered in their years of existence? But then when you do it, you stop and realize there's sections you just can't simplify? Or are unsure how to?

I ask this because I'm working on the CS for a character who I consider my "main muse" and whose series verse(as she draws powers primarily from the Rune Factory series, as she was born to a Rune Factory OC as part of the RF Expanded Universe me and friends had going for a time and still do, though I stopped expanding the universe overall, and focused on more characters) has a lot of powers. I mean, it can be all summed up in just "Runic Energy" or "Rune" as its directly called in verse, and its countless applications. But yeah, its a lot of shit. Ranging from mundane stuff like getting stronger from everything you do, to having PCs punch gods in the face and even battle beings that should erase them with a touch(RF has a thing where if your character ODs on the energy, you get turned into a Runemon, and the final RF4 boss is implied to be someone who you watched OD in the second story arc finale, fun times), and come out fine. And to a point, that's all fine and good(and if you spend enough time around me, you'll find out I adore RF, especially Ventuswill, oh my god she's so adorable, sorry), but then you actually go to reduce the character sheet's powers so its less of a text wall for people, and you're like "How do I do this."

tl;dr: Over in the Character Sheet Sub-Board of this Board, I'm trying to set up a CS for a character I've put through hell and back, and who has a lot of powers due to how her verse works(its worse for Runemons to an extent, since they have some species centric powers that are just weird), but I have no idea how to properly condense, due to an inherent fear people will not want to read to the end due to the mountain of text that is my research into the Rune Factory series. Everything else can be slimmed or is fine(like her treasury, not showing that off just yet).
tl;dr of tl;dr: Help
Hidden 5 yrs ago Post by BrokenPromise
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BrokenPromise With Rightious Hands

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Something I've found with a lot of my older characters is they have a LOT of powers. But when I look at them now, I realize that there's some overlap. I have power X and Y, so power Z isn't really necessary. An example of this is that I had an all elemental character who could use fire, water, air, etc at will. But when I looked really closely at what they were doing, there were ways to work around a lot of the elements by restricting them to fire, and they would still be able to do a lot of the stuff they always could. Instead of skating across a puddle of ice that was always under their feet, they encased their feet in stone and slid across pools of lava. The restriction in powers made her much more interesting thematically.

If that's not possible, just write down their powers in a vauge sense, being sure to write in their limitations. Instead of mentioning the 10-15 different fire spells they can cast by name, simply say they can manipulate fire and to the extent. For my character, I noticed they only really needed to melt things that were relatively close to them, and most of their other effects were explosions. So they are able to heat up and cool things near their body, and they can enchant items and throw them to get those distant explosions. I gave them a coin pouch to accomplish this. The coins have a hole in them, and some are kept on a string. So it's possible to do the kunai knife thing, only with exploding coins.

And some powers simply aren't necessary. I once gave a character a pendant that made him appear more attractive, but nobody really knew how to RP with it. Said character was plenty charismatic without the pendant, so it didn't really serve a function. I ended up removing it from his sheet in the reboot.

As far as weapons go, people realistically carry two, maybe three weapons on their person. A primary weapon (bow, assault rifle, spear) secondary (pistol, sword, club) and usually a back up knife for really close encounters, and possibly some utility items like grenades, scrolls, or an anti-tank launcher. If your character is carting around more than one primary or secondary weapon, you might want to lighten their load.

There is no easy way to simplify a character, especially if they have 2346257457 auxiliary powers. But through careful observation of powers, you can parse things quite a bit by getting rid of stuff you don't really need.
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Hidden 5 yrs ago Post by DocRock
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DocRock Techno-Gilgamesh

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Appreciate the advice, as tbh, I was looking at how all the powers(Rune related at least) all basically stem from the same source, or are actually just done via magic. My character usually just pulls her stuff out of her treasury, as its a separate realm. Pocket dimension stuff, not quite the same as the RF inventory though. That thing was always fun, you could pull a dozen weapons out and still have more inside.

But I don't intend to go into detail on the treasury at present, even if I sat down and spent a few hours typing stuff out from the notes I have, I'd still have a bit to go. So I'll probably make like my title and not display what she's gathered publicly. But still have the sheet around, in the off chance I ever use her for anything other than just "hey, here's my main who I spent years on from off the site." Plus her other major powers are just straightforward or barely need mentioning. Massive crossovers get weird.

I mean, for her treasury, I might mention the stuff she always has to have on her, but that's her skinsuit and power suit. Since well, they're bonded to her. Love her to death, put her through hell, both on purpose and not(like the time a friend stabbed me in the back and broke the characters heart in the process), and she's come out mostly fine. Dragons who don't act like normal dragons due to their society are fun. Especially when they collect stuff to preserve a memory of someone, so they never "die".

At the end of the day, I think I just have stage fright, that's the core issue. And indecisiveness. When it all boils down, its just being a Rune Factory character from the Expanded Universe. With chaos involved. And evil grandfathers. And a dad who crashed a doomsday station on purpose to avoid the station hitting a populated area and killing millions. Sorry, I'm rambling, I tend to do that a lot when not focused.
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