Re: [BNW] Glory Days Questions

[MKirk2112@aol.com]

In a message dated 9/3/2000 6:28:52 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
crow_steve@hotmail.com writes:

<< >I just got "Glory Days" a few days ago, but I think the Translator power
 >package is one of the most useful there is in that book.
 >
 >One reason for that, however, is that the first thing I do is make up new
 >Tricks ... I do this for every package, actually.  I have one for the
 >Translater package called "Babble" that allows the Translator to alter the
 >language that another character speaks and thinks in (requires touch).  If
 >the target, for example, cannot understand French and the Translater alters
 >the target's language to French with this trick, the target can no longer
 >understand her teammates, nor can she even understand herself.  The target
 >cannot coordinate actions with her teammates, and she cannot perform any
 >action that requires any kind of conscious thought (she can still do
 >reflexive or automatic things like dodge blows, keep from running into 
 >walls,
 >etc.).  Obviously, this trick has tremendous combat implications, a 
 >criticism
 >given for the package before.
 >
 
 It wasn't a criticism I leveled, I don't think. But a Trick like you suggest 
 seems to go outside the range of the power.  The Translator is no longer 
 just learning something in his head, or passing said knowledge on to a 
 comrade (as my Trick allows), but is scrambling another person's language 
 centers.
 
 Plus, if the Translator can get close enough to touch someone in combat, 
 shouldn't he have better things to do...?  Either that, or it's hard to 
 believe his contribution is going to be anywhere close to a key factor in 
 bringing down, say, a Goliath or a Charger.
 
 And again, I'm not saying that a Translator has to have combat capabilities 
 ot be useful. I rated the Communicator, Genius, Charmer, and Changeling 
 fairly high at my site, well above some combat types.  When I rated, I did 
 so on general versatility and usefulness in a campaign. having a Translator 
 who can speak languages when no one else can just limits the participation 
 those other players can have (if language is important) or means the 
 Translator package isn't very useful (if language isn't important).  There 
 are exceptions, sure, but  it really comes down to, "We sit around and watch 
 while Character X does something we can't participate in." Which isn't a 
 unique complaint about just Translators - Hackers come to mind.  But their 
 non-group activities don't take long.  A Translator's activities are going 
 to take as long as the player takes for all the conversations he makes in a 
 language no one else can contribute to.
 
 >Information is power, and I think if a Guide is fairly loose in her
 >interpretation of the way this package's powers are defined, the package
 >becomes quite useful in combat and noncombat situations.
 >
 
 Sure.  But...BNW as a rule of thumb doesn't include a lot of looseness in 
 power packages. See my comments above about how the Trick proposed tends to 
 step outside the bounds of what is generally established for Tricks and how 
 they expand upon powers - they don't change them.  Your mileage, of course 
 may vary.  :)
 
 >Also, if the character is a leader type, it allows her to command a very
 >diverse group of deltas.  In a contemporary campaign, especially one in 
 >which
 >the players are playing Delta Primers, this would make the character very
 >valuable on international missions.
 >
 
 IMO, no, because the other PCs having to channel all their conversations 
 through one person is going to get real tedious, real quick.  Either you're 
 going to just let the PCs talk to each other directly (in which case why 
 need a Translator PC to serve that function?), or a session is going to 
 grind to a near-halt while the Translator PC relays everything to everyone, 
 meaning each PC line of dialogue gets repeated twice (once to the 
 Translator, and then from the Translator to the rest of the group).
 
 Watch any movie with such an "international" taskforce to see what I mean. 
 Either everyone conveniently speaks English, or the movie simply assumes 
 everyone can understand everyone else's language, allows that the audience 
 knows that as well, and doesn't bother providing a translation mechanism.  
 Or watch Star Trek, where Klingons, Romulans, and Fed types sit around a 
 conference table and just talk, without subtitles or a translator sitting 
 nearby repeating each conversation twice.
 
 Drawing attention to the mechanism of translation is awkward at best, and 
 can substantially slow down adventuring at worst.
 
 >BTW, nice tricks you made up for the Translator package on your website,
 >Steve.
 >
 
 I only made one Trick for the Translator, but thanks.  :)
 
 >Guide Matt
 
 
 ---
 
 Steve Crow
  >>

I'm going to start with this disclaimer ... this is an opinion response based 
on the large number of other responses about the Translator package, so read 
at your own risk or boredom if you don't give two hoots about this discussion 
line on the listserve.

I'm a little surprised to hear you say that you think the power packages in 
BNW are not very loose in their definitions.  I think compared to other 
supers games, they are quite lose.  Look at the bean counting that goes on in 
Champions or GURPS Supers or even Marvel Superheroes for that matter with 
regards to the constraints put on power descriptions by the authors.  In 
contrast, in BNW Matt doesn't do that.  For example, in the description of 
the TK package Matt just basically says that the hero can move things with 
her mind.  Well, that's pretty darn general.  Does that mean "move" or 
"control" or "manipulate" or what?  Yes, he does say that fine motor control 
is limited, but it's still quite open to interpretation, and this is a 
package that we are all familiar with, and every time a TK hero gets 
creative, the Guide has to make a judgment call about whether or not it is 
within the description of the power.  Well, that all depends on how you 
interprete "move objects."  For example, I'm pretty much of a hard ass about 
it.  I don't let my TK hero twist doorknobs because that is not "moving" an 
object in my opinion.  The object (the doorknob) has not moved in space 
because I interpret telekinesis as involving the moving of an object from 
location 1 to location 2; it is not as if the hero has a mental "hand" that 
she uses to manipulate the object.  The hero mentally, rather than 
physically, moves the object.  I know I am in the minority on this, but 
that's how I see it, and because Matt doesn't provide a lot of detailed 
description about the power, I am free to interprete the description of the 
power that way (much to the distaste of my player! <laugh>).  And I like that 
freedom (thanks Matt).  I've seen some descriptions of TK in other games that 
say that the character cannot make themselves fly by moving themselves 
telekinetically because there is no focal point for movement ... they in 
essence cannot move themselves because telekinesis involves moving an object 
in relation to the telekinetic's current position.  Since they are not 
stationary (they are trying to move or fly) then there is no focal point for 
the telekinetic movement and therefore they cannot perform this action.  Now 
I don't know whether I agree with this or not and I swear that I didn't bring 
this up to get into a discussion about telekinesis!  I'm serious!  My point 
in bringing it up is that Matt doesn't go into that much detail for a good 
reason, I think, and that is that he wanted the power packages to be quite 
flexible in their desciption of how the powers work.  He gives us the 
"spirit" of the packages only, and I appreciate that a lot.  We are all free, 
then, to decide for ourselves what each involves.

In my opinion, the Translator package appears to be centered around 
languages, specifically "speaking, writing, and understanding" them.  
Typically one thinks of Tricks designed to facilitate this process, e.g. 
speaking, writing, and understanding languages better.  But why must the 
Translator go only in that direction.  Why not allow the Translator to 
inhibit that process, e.g. speaking, writing, and understanding languages 
worse?  It's still just dealing with languages, which is what their power is 
supposed to allow them to do.  It's not at all a stretch from the other 
Tricks already given for the package.  The Codebreaker Trick allows the 
Translator to sift through an unknown code and make sense of it.  Why not 
turn it around and develop a trick that allows the Translator to start with a 
language or "code" that she knows quite well, and then jumble it up instead 
of making it more understandable?  In my opinion, these two activities are 
expressions of the same power (dealing with the speaking, writing, and 
understanding of language); it's just that they have a different goal.  
Translators "do" languages ... I think it is that simple, and any variation 
on comprehension and communication with language is fair game to them and 
within their delta power; just like Defender controls her force field and any 
variation on that is fair game.   I disagree that my trick ("Babble") 
"changes the power" of the Translator; it just describes the flip side of the 
typical way the power is used.  She is still dealing with languages, she's 
just now dealing with mixing them up rather than making them more 
understandable.  I never said the Translator is altering the target's 
memories, or perceptions, or anything like that ... just their language 
which, as I said, is what Translators do according to the way I interpret the 
powers description ... but this is indeed open to interpretation. 

As far as my "mechanism" for how it works (requiring touch), that is just 
something I put in there to make it similar to other tricks and powers, not 
because I think that the hero "scrambles the language centers" of the 
target's brain by touching them.  I don't really know "how" it works per se 
... it's a delta power, that's enough for me.  I don't know how any of them 
"work" nor do I know how magic "works" but I play games with it in it as 
well.  As long as the action that the Trick describes is in line with the 
area of influence of the delta power as described by the power package and is 
in the "spirit" of the package (which is as I said a judgment call), then I 
think it's fair game and as a Guide I will at least entertain the idea of the 
Trick.

If the hero is a pacifist then no, they have few things better to do in 
combat than to use the Babble trick.  They are certainly not going to shoot 
anyone.  Also, if performed on the leader of a group, the Babble trick would 
have significant effect on the course of the battle.  This would be 
especially true in military types of conflicts.

As far as handling the necessity to have an NPC say something to the 
Translator and have the Translator translate it to the other PCs, I don't do 
this.  I treat it the same way as I do in a dungeon crawl in a D&D or other 
fantasy adventure.  If you are close enough to the character with the 
lantern, you can see what's going on.  If not, then you can't.  If the 
Translater is around, then everyone can understand each other and there is no 
reason to painstakingly role-play this translation process out.  Similarly, I 
don't make the character without the lantern say "hold the lantern a little 
to the left so I can see."  It's understood that in due time all characters 
who are around the individual with the lantern will be able to see.  It is 
indeed identical to the Star Trek example you provided about the universal 
translator ... the Translator character functions in my game the exact same 
way.  In the play of the game, we all speak English at the table even though 
the characters may not be speaking English, and we all speak to each other 
rather than go through another person.  It is assumed that the Translator is 
the cause of this without having to go step by step through it.  But, if the 
Translator is not around, then they must resort to nonverbal communication, 
just as I make them do if they are all English speaking characters sneaking 
around somewhere trying to be quiet.  They communicate with hand signals and 
gestures.  

The Translator has a real "game effect" but it is not one that has to be 
acted out in every detail.  So no, I don't make all the other characters 
transfer all of their conversations through the Translator PC because yes, it 
would get quite tedious to do so.  But because I don't do that AND because 
this ease of communication wouldn't be possible without the Translator hero 
there, it is very obvious how valuable the  Translater character is to the 
group and to the adventure.  Just like the other delta powers, having the 
Translator around allows the characters to do things that they wouldn't 
normally be able to do without her.

Just my 2-cents,

Guide Matt