Custom Investigators

By Morgaln, in Fan Creations

Cimmerz: Thanks for the invite!

Anybody have a good suggestion for pictures? I am afraid of stepping on somebody's copyright by accident.

Speaking of which, here is another "hunter" type I've been playing with:

James_Garret_Bounty_Hunter_by_Feonorx.pn

In the 1920's there were still some holdovers from the Old West. Wyatt Earp in Hollywood with Tom Mix, for example. That was the insperation for this character. Thoughts and feedback?

james garret is a good character but why not bounties for him? $1?? no way for him to get money? hmmmm.....?

Honestly, I was worried about him being overpowered as it was. Additionally, IIRC, you can sell the monster trophies for money as a site-specific location, and I didn't want to devalue that benefit.

Two new Investigators for your consideration.

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I tried to reflect the alien nature of the character in the choice of special abilities and tried to reflect the randomness of the body he entered with all the random items.

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This one is a tribute to the character from the Terry Brooks "Word and Void" series. Secondly he was created in response to a challenge to play a single investigator ONLY in the game. Is he a bit mighty? Yes. Was he designed that way on purpose? Yes. Who else but a powerhouse has a change to beat the game singlehandedly? I would not recommend using him in a standard AH game, though...

Cimmerz said:

thecorinthian[ - Glad you like them! I sometimes wonder if I overthink things, which is why I decided to go simple for Xavier. Still, a less simple character can be fun too, as they require some thought. I like your rabbi character.

avi_dreader - Yeah, I agree, but after what thecorinthian said, it made me realize that Nina doesn't need the Find Gate spell with her ability to ignore red OW encounters. Having an ability that helps protect her in Other Worlds doesn't really go well with having an item that just takes her out of them anyway. So, instead, I dumped the Find Gate spell, and just gave her another random spell. I updated her image to show this.

Feonor] - I created just a simple Coppermine photo gallery. You're more than welcome to use it to upload your creations to. In fact, anyone is welcome to it, as long as its just used for custom AK stuff, and not a dumping ground for random images/videos. So yeah, go ahead and use that if you'd like for now.

www.jauston.com/gallery/index.php << That's the link to the Coppermine gallery. Use it if you need it.

If you're taking away her find gate, you should give her cash instead of another spell. Impoverished investigators tend to have problems otherwise.

For John Ross and Doe: I don't like that all the abilities come from already made investigators. Nothing new and I don't see how any of them fit Doe anyway. Plus if the original investigator only had one, it seems broken to give several to one character (pointing at Ross here).

I would rather have something convoluted and innovative than the same abilities. But that may just be me.

Lord of Squirrels said:

For John Ross and Doe: I don't like that all the abilities come from already made investigators. Nothing new and I don't see how any of them fit Doe anyway. Plus if the original investigator only had one, it seems broken to give several to one character (pointing at Ross here).

I would rather have something convoluted and innovative than the same abilities. But that may just be me.

I agree completely; if you want to use those abilities, why not just use the Investigators that came with them originally? I can see giving one of the less powerful abilities to someone who has a new ability but still needs something, but just taking Daisy's abilities and adding another one seems pointless.

what do you think about this guy? is he too powerful? should i make the cost to regain, 2 for 1?

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ivory_tower said:

what do you think about this guy? is he too powerful? should i make the cost to regain, 2 for 1?

Professor-Moriarty-Front-Side.png

Hmmm, I'm not sure. At first I didn't think you'd need to change anything, but he's pretty much guaranteed to NEVER go insane or Unconscious unless both are reduced to 0 at the same time (which would devour you) or he's at 1 Stamina and 1 Sanity at the same time. Which leads to one possible problem. At 1-1, instead of going insane, pay 1 stamina, thus restoring 1 Sanity, but losing 1 Stamina, causing you to go Unconscious. Then pay 1 Sanity, to restore 1 Stamina (you see where I'm going?). That could go on forever just to avoid it.

Though truthfully, I don't think a player would go through that trouble, it might be better to restrict it a little. Like say, "Whenever Professor goes insane, if his Stamina is at 2 or more, he may pay 1 Stamina to regain 1 Sanity instead. This prevents him from going Insane and moving to Arkham Asylum.", and vice versa. If you're afraid it's too powerful, upping the cost would work, or upping the minimum of the opposing stat. But I do like the character.

Cimmerz said:

Hmmm, I'm not sure. At first I didn't think you'd need to change anything, but he's pretty much guaranteed to NEVER go insane or Unconscious unless both are reduced to 0 at the same time (which would devour you) or he's at 1 Stamina and 1 Sanity at the same time. Which leads to one possible problem. At 1-1, instead of going insane, pay 1 stamina, thus restoring 1 Sanity, but losing 1 Stamina, causing you to go Unconscious. Then pay 1 Sanity, to restore 1 Stamina (you see where I'm going?). That could go on forever just to avoid it.

Though truthfully, I don't think a player would go through that trouble, it might be better to restrict it a little. Like say, "Whenever Professor goes insane, if his Stamina is at 2 or more, he may pay 1 Stamina to regain 1 Sanity instead. This prevents him from going Insane and moving to Arkham Asylum.", and vice versa. If you're afraid it's too powerful, upping the cost would work, or upping the minimum of the opposing stat. But I do like the character.

I think if I make him pay 2 sanity to regain 1 stamina and vice versa, it would be a bit more balanced. And add a stipulation, he can only use the ability if paying the sanity or stamina would not reduce him to zero.

How about this? By upping the cost to save himself, I think he will only be able to save himself part of the time.

Professor-Moriarty-Front-Side1.png

And we can't have Moriarty without his Arch-nemesis, Mr. Holmes.

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Does that chain?

Seemingly, if Holmes gets a success, he gets another clue, which gives him a die. That works out on average to half an extra clue per clue found on average, but it's really swingy. 2 times out of 3 you get nothing, and then like once a game you'll have a huge breakthrough where clues just fall on you.

-Frank

I didn't think of that. Maybe he should only be able to do it for clues he gets from the game and not from his ability?

One last Holmes character....

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The picture was the inspiration for this character, I think his ability is simple yet elegant.

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Is three 1s two hits or zero hits? Is four 1s two hits, zero hits, three hits, or six hits?

-Frank

Frank said:

Is three 1s two hits or zero hits? Is four 1s two hits, zero hits, three hits, or six hits?

-Frank

1 set of doubles = 1 hit

2 set of doubles = 2 hit

ivory_tower said:

Frank said:

Is three 1s two hits or zero hits? Is four 1s two hits, zero hits, three hits, or six hits?

-Frank

1 set of doubles = 1 hit

2 set of doubles = 2 hit

But I think he's more asking if three 1's are rolled for example:

{doubles}

/ l

ONE ONE ONE

l / / l

{doubles} {doubles}

So in that example, three dice could equal 3 hits as there ARE three sets of doubles there. So could the same die be counted more than once basically?

Does anyone think that would be too powerful or have it go like this.

Any Double 1,2,3 = 1 success.

Any Triple 1,2,3 = 3 success

Any Quadruple 1,2,3 = 6 success

I'm not sure about 'too powerful', but I think all this pretty clearly demonstrates that the Baron's ability is too complicated.

If all you want to do is add a few extra successes, either just make him 'blessed for Fight' (i.e. his ability does roughly the same thing as the skill Grapple), or make any Physical weapons he uses have the shotgun effect (6s = 2 successes).

Fixed .18 derringers are all very well, but aren't there only two copies? The Baron is stopping anyone else getting one. It'd be more interesting if he started with one weapon and to use him to his full potential you had to find another gun.

this is an investigator based on me and things i really have thats goona be part of an expansion based on me and my friends and where we live

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here are the iteams and skill that goes with my investigator

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Morgaln said:

Lord of Squirrels said:

For John Ross and Doe: I don't like that all the abilities come from already made investigators. Nothing new and I don't see how any of them fit Doe anyway. Plus if the original investigator only had one, it seems broken to give several to one character (pointing at Ross here).

I would rather have something convoluted and innovative than the same abilities. But that may just be me.

I agree completely; if you want to use those abilities, why not just use the Investigators that came with them originally? I can see giving one of the less powerful abilities to someone who has a new ability but still needs something, but just taking Daisy's abilities and adding another one seems pointless.

Thanks Lord of Squirrels and Morgaln. I've been reluctant to create new Special Abilities, instead recycling existing ones, as it is much harder to make sure they are balanced. I'll give it a go and re-post these guys.

thecorinthian said:

I'm not sure about 'too powerful', but I think all this pretty clearly demonstrates that the Baron's ability is too complicated.

If all you want to do is add a few extra successes, either just make him 'blessed for Fight' (i.e. his ability does roughly the same thing as the skill Grapple), or make any Physical weapons he uses have the shotgun effect (6s = 2 successes).

Fixed .18 derringers are all very well, but aren't there only two copies? The Baron is stopping anyone else getting one. It'd be more interesting if he started with one weapon and to use him to his full potential you had to find another gun.

I disagree. He wasn't too complicated someone inferred that you could use more than one double. So, I am fixing it back to my original thoughts when coming up with him.

A double 1,2,3 also counts as a success. Each die can only be used once. So

1 double = 1 success

1 triple = 1 success

1 quadruple = 2 successes.

This is simple to follow and I just playtested it. Worked out nicely. Helped a few times in the game but wasn't abused. I did however limit his starting weapon to one and changed it to the .38.

Dethasarus Rex said:

this is an investigator based on me and things i really have thats goona be part of an expansion based on me and my friends and where we live

I didn't know Mary Sue was a Great Old One...

i dont know about anyone else, but I get kind of annoyed when I get an item I will probably never use. So I devised this character.

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