SYMBIOTE ABILITY WORKSHOP

[onemind]

SYMBIOTE ABILITY WORKSHOP

     THIS PART IS TOUGH and we get that. So if you're stalled out on thinking of a symbiote ability for your character, this is where you can throw out your ideas and get feedback and suggestions from other people in the game. There's no idea too weird, too incidental or too ridiculous.

As mods, we wanted to make a few quick note about what we've found useful to think about when devising and balancing symbiote abilities and what seems to have worked for other people. Most of these aren't requirements, but there's a good thing to keep in mind when designing your character's new abilities.

Is this something my character will want to use? Why? How? Abilities tend to work best when they're something the characters might find useful in a variety of situations, as opposed to just one or two. They're also more useful to the character/present more of a dilemma if they're something the character's can't already more or less do with one of their current canon abilities.

Does this ability balance the character's canon abilities? A character with lots of offensive canon abilities might benefit from a support-type symbiote ability; a squishy human character without many offensive capabilities might benefit from an armor upgrade.

Will this ability be useful only against NPCs and is it important to you to have something you can use with over player characters? Most offensive/destructive abilities won't be able to be used against fellow Hosts, so if you want your character to be able to use your ability in conjunction with other player characters even if they're not in a brawl or on a mission, it might be a good idea to go for a more "support class" type ability.

Are the drawbacks interesting? Will they generate cool CR? All symbiote abilities must have some kind of mental or physical drawback to their prolonged use, no matter how well trained they are. Think about what kinds of CR you might want to generate off those negative affects - is it as simple as giving your character debilitating headaches (look, we all love Hurt/Comfort right?), or do you want to go more metaphysical with it and have a lowered sense of self, paranoia, etc?

Does the ability challenge the character's personality or exploit their flaws? We find the symbiote ability is a good way of pushing characters out of their comfort zones and a good CR tool. A character who's worried about being useful to their loved ones might be more likely to use their ability if they can heal their teammates; a character with control issues being able to duplicate themselves might use that even if it weakens them physically; a character paralyzed by fear might find use in channeling that fear into other people.

Will this symbiote ability lead the character to want to integrate with the Nest or repel them from it? It can be fun to pick an ability which a character who would otherwise embrace their powers might shy away from, or an ability which
would be very tempting to a character which otherwise would not want to use it.

What's the 'tone' of this ability and does it fit with what you want or like to play? If you want to play action adventure, something bombastic might be a good way to go. If you'd rather focus on interpersonal CR, mentally heavy abilities or support type abilities might be a good route.

Does the ability work with the physicality of the symbiote? The symbiote is very much a physical creature. Shapeshifters can't go smaller than a house cat without suffering some serious, potentially unwated side effects. The symbiote can adapt to the host's body temperatures etc, but it won't have a good time if your ability is turning into a puddle.

Iota or Rho? The fast and loose rule for determining if your ability is an Iota or Rho type is Rho = psychic-type abilities, Iota = physical manipulation. If it's not obvious which your ability falls into that's okay. Pick which one makes the most sense to you.

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