I'm creating a setting inspired by Palladium's After the Bomb RPG, which was a spinoff of their game Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Other Strangeness . The premise is that the world's gone through nuclear war, and everyone still alive is a humanoid mutant animal in the tradition of the Ninja Turtles.

Part of the fun of the setting is that no two mutants are the same, even if they share the same animal type. For instance, you can have one mutant cat with sharp claws to attack with, while another can fall from great heights without damage. To emulate this, I'm planning to go with archetypes similar to the human ones in the Genesys CRB (Aristrocrat, Laborer, etc.) and then adapt the Heroic Abilities system from Realms of Terrinoth to represent your animalistic mutant abilities. I'm thinking these mutant abilities will work more like standard archetype/species abilities, so they won't require DP spends, and they'll be less powerful than RoT's Heroic Abilities. Nevertheless, I like the idea that they can be upgraded a certain XP milestones, either by making them more potent (like your cat claws now do more damage), or by allowing you to pick another appropriate mutant ability (like your cat decides to take the cat-fall ability they skipped at character generation).

The question is how to organize and limit these abilities (if at all). Maybe you're limited to a set of abilities (and their upgrades) appropriate to your species type? Like, a mutant reptile might eventually decide to take chameleon skin, but a mutant bird couldn't. Or the abilities and upgrades are linked to certain anatomical features, maybe? Like you can take claws for damage, and later upgrade them to allow you to climb better. But if you want to take chameleon skin, you'll have to spend more of your upgrade points. Or maybe I just leave it all open-ended and let players and GMs decide what abilities would be appropriate for a specific animal type?

Thoughts?

Adapting Heroic Abilities seems like a good route.

Some you may want to turn in to "magic skills" and work with the players on what things they can use (adding fire damage, etc).

Wolverine obviously has a ton of upgraded talents. Storm obviously has "Weather Magic skill" because it's very common for mutants to get too exhausted (used up all their strain).

6 hours ago, Teslacrashed said:

Adapting Heroic Abilities seems like a good route.

Some you may want to turn in to "magic skills" and work with the players on what things they can use (adding fire damage, etc).

Wolverine obviously has a ton of upgraded talents. Storm obviously has "Weather Magic skill" because it's very common for mutants to get too exhausted (used up all their strain).

Hmm. That's an interesting idea. Something that's a hybrid between Heroic Abilities and Magic Skills. To clarify, What I'm referring to as "Mutant Abilities" are more like things the Ninja Turtles might have than the X-Men (so, a hard shell rather than metal control). But maybe there could be some way to access additional effects of your ability for a cost of some sort (Strain, DP, roll against some difficulty).

I've been playing around with this idea a bit. My current plan is to allow players to pick one natural ability at character creation to represent some special aspect of being a mutant animal of that type. These base abilities will be roughly equivalent to a species ability or archetype ability in Genesys or Star Wars. However, every 30 XP or so (not sure exactly how much right now), you can choose from a list of improvements on that ability. The result is that we end up with abilities that are lower-powered than Heroic Abilities, so they are always on and always available. That said, they can be improved over time to meet the player's desires. There's also the issue of Flaws, which players can choose to offset the cost of an improvement if they want to access one early. Despairs while using a mutant ability may also result in temporary Flaws chosen by the GM.

Acute Senses

Base: You have heightened acuity with one of your senses. Decide which sense this ability affects and how the effect manifests; for instance, you may have large ears that give you keen hearing, or sensitive whiskers that allow you to detect vibrations in the air. You remove [Setback][Setback] from Perception and Vigilance checks you make using that sense.

Improvement Options: Add +1 [Boost] to affected checks made using your enhanced sense or senses, extend the benefits of your acute senses to an additional skill (e.g., Ranged (Light), Survival, or another skill at the GM’s discretion; may be selected multiple times), gain the same benefits for one additional sense (may be selected multiple times).

Flaw Options: Add +1 [Setback] to Perception and Vigilance checks involving a different sense, suffer +1 strain when using your acute senses.

Environmental Adaptation

Base: You have adapted to living in a particular climate. When making skill checks, you may remove [Setback] imposed due to conditions matching your native climate.

Improvements: Add [Boost] to all checks made in your native climate (may be purchased multiple times), remove additional [Setback] from all checks made in your native climate (may be purchased multiple times).

Flaws: Add an additional [Setback] to checks made in a specific climate different from your native climate (may be selected multiple times for a different climate each time or for an additional [Setback] each time).

Natural Melee Attack

Base: Some aspect of your anatomy makes your Brawl attacks more dangerous. Choose the source of this attack; possibilities may include antlers, claws, fangs, horns, powerful legs, or a whip-like tail. When making an unarmed combat check, you add +1 to your base damage and have a Critical Rating of 3.

Improvement Options: Accurate +1 improvement, add an additional natural melee attack improvement (this does not give you a second attack but ensures you can still gain the benefits of your attack if something happens to your original natural weapon), Concussive +1 improvement, reduce Critical Rating by 1 to a minimum of 1 improvement, Damage +1 improvement, Defensive +1 improvement, Deflection +1 improvement, Disorient +1 improvement, add Knockdown quality improvement, Pierce +1 improvement, add Sunder quality improvement, Vicious +1 improvement.

Flaws: Cumbersome +1 flaw, Inaccurate +1 flaw, Inferior +1 flaw, Unwieldy +1 flaw.

Natural Ranged Attack

Base: Your anatomy gives you a natural attack that you can use with a Ranged (Light) check. Choose the source of this attack; possibilities may include a chemical spray, toxic saliva, webbing, venom, an electric discharge, or projectible quills. Treat this natural feature as a ranged weapon that has the following profile: Ranged (Light); Damage 4; Critical 3; Range (Short). Each time you use your natural ranged attack, you suffer 2 strain.

Improvement Options: Accurate +1 improvement, add an additional natural ranged attack improvement (this does not give you a second attack but ensures you can still gain the benefits of your attack if something happens to your original natural weapon), Blast +1 improvement, Burn +1 improvement, reduce Critical Rating by 1 to a minimum of 1 improvement, Concussive +1 improvement, change skill improvement (choices may include Resilience or Ranged [Heavy]), Damage +1 improvement, Disorient +1 improvement, Ensnare +1 improvement, add Knockdown quality improvement, Pierce +1 improvement, increase range by one range band to a maximum of long improvement, reduce strain cost by 1 improvement, Vicious +1 improvement.

Flaws: Cumbersome +1 flaw, Inaccurate +1 flaw, Inferior +1 flaw, Slow-Firing +1 flaw, Unwieldy +1 flaw.

Specialized Movement

Base: Your species is adapted to moving quickly through certain environments. For instance, you may have long limbs that allow you to swing through dense forest, blunt claws that let you dig through dirt, or webbed feet that permit you move deftly through shallow water.Choose a specific type of difficult terrain. Examples may include dense brush, ice, loose rubble, shifting sand, snow, or shallow water. You never suffer movement penalties when moving into or through that terrain.

Improvement Options: Add an additional type of difficult terrain to gain these same benefits, add +1 [Boost] to checks made while moving through your preferred terrain or terrains, allow one engaged ally to follow behind and enjoy the same movement benefits as you (may be selected multiple times).

Flaw Options: Add +1 [Setback] to checks made while moving through your preferred terrain or terrains (may be selected multiple times for additional terrain types or further setbacks),suffer +1 strain when using this ability,treat a different type of terrain as difficult that would not normally cause movement penalties (may be selected multiple times).