[BNW] Improving Powers Part 2

[MKirk2112@aol.com]

Thanks to all of your who responded to my first post about whether or not you 
allow improving powers in your game.  It appears that the vast majority of 
you do not allow this to happen.

I totally see why this is the case.  First, there are no rules for it.  
Second, we all know that Alpha powers rules will be coming, hopefully, very 
shortly and you don't want to do anything that potentially would not match 
those new rules.  Third, it really is a great idea to get the players to buy 
new tricks from their power package or even create their own power package 
tricks to make their hero's powers "different" from another hero's who has 
the same power package.  Finally, I don't think that having a "power 
improving" game is what Matt had in mind when he created BNW.

However, as I have been running my game more and more, I have noticed a 
potential problem with not allowing powers to be improved.  It may not be a 
big deal, but it is an interesting development.

If powers cannot be improved, then certain power packages are more adversely 
affected than others.  Any power package that has "trait-based" powers, such 
as the Goliath's and Scrapper's Strength bonus, the Bouncer's Speed bonuses, 
or the Interrogator's Detect Lie power, can indirectly increase the strength 
of their powers by increasing the trait associated with the power.  The 
rulebook says that deltas often go beyond the 5d6 human maximum for traits, 
so a very experienced Goliath hero could be running around with a 8d6+5 
Strength Trait.  Granted, this would cost a fortune in experience points, but 
it is possible.  This is also true for "skill-based" power packages, such as 
the Healer's healing roll bonus and the Gunner's shooting roll bonus.  When 
those heroes improve their skills, their powers in effect become more 
powerful.  This is also a much cheaper option than the trait-based 
improvements as skills are relatively cheap to improve.  However, powers that 
are not trait or skill-based, such as the Blaster's energy blast, or any 
hero's armor power, are stuck at one level.  The Blaster is a good example of 
this difficulty as all of the package's powers are not based on traits or 
skills for determining the intensity of their effect.  To use a very simple 
example, this sets up a situation where the Goliath's strength of attack can 
go up (5d6+5 Strength, to 6d6+5 Strength, to 7d6+5 Strength, etc.) while the 
armor of characters trying to protect themselves from the Goliath's attacks 
stays constant.  I guess you could make the argument that if you improve a 
hero's Strength, their armor does get "better."  But it's still not exactly 
like the Goliath example I gave.  Also, there is still no way to improve an 
energy blast or similar power that does not rely at all on a trait or skill 
for determining intensity of effect.

Maybe in the actual play of the game over the long hall, this is not a big 
deal and I am making a mountain out of a mole hill.  But it is a burr under 
my saddle a bit at the moment.  I'm hesitant to allow powers to be improved 
in my game (I really do think it goes against the "flavor" of the kind of 
game that Matt was creating and that I want to put into practice in my 
group).  I'm going to disallow improvement of powers at least until I see how 
Matt is going to handle the alpha powers.  But, as my heroes get more and 
more experienced, I wonder if this is going to cause more of a problem.  Any 
thoughts?  Are their folks out there who have been running a BNW game for a 
while and have any insights into how this panned out in their game?

Thanks, and Ever Defiant!

Guide Matt