Viewpoint About Powers

[rainywrites]

i'm sure you've heard this... but perhaps you'd have better luck with 1X1 rps that suit your intrests? in 1X1 there aren't really any hard and fast rules. whatever you and your partner are cool with is game. and while i personally like to set up the world a bit with my partners in 1X1 rps, i totally would be down for a space superhero or whatever as long as we discussed it first and i know what's going on.

 

[Cosmo]

I don't blame the RPs for that, I blame the players. Hate to say it, but unless you know them or have a dedicated group, you almost always have that guy that wants to meta the shit out of the RP for their advantage as if an RP is a game to win rather then a story to write. By limiting it to one, its easier to police, less wiggle room for them to try to sneak crap by cause the last thing you want to do is pull the brake near the start to tell someone they are getting out of hand and need to reel it back in [It breaks the flow of the story, can create hurt feelings and bruised egos and can even lead to a mass exodus from the RP].

You can have multiple powers, of course, you can have a more open magic/power system that allows people to kinda make their own thing that suits the character/idea, but it requires more vigilance from the GM, its more of a risk, and more of a die roll on what kind of person may jump into their RP, and a lot of the time, a GM just wants to have fun, not act as the story police.

 

[Crenando]

I don't blame the RPs for that, I blame the players. Hate to say it, but unless you know them or have a dedicated group, you almost always have that guy that wants to meta the shit out of the RP for their advantage as if an RP is a game to win rather then a story to write. By limiting it to one, its easier to police, less wiggle room for them to try to sneak crap by cause the last thing you want to do is pull the brake near the start to tell someone they are getting out of hand and need to reel it back in [It breaks the flow of the story, can create hurt feelings and bruised egos and can even lead to a mass exodus from the RP].

You can have multiple powers, of course, you can have a more open magic/power system that allows people to kinda make their own thing that suits the character/idea, but it requires more vigilance from the GM, its more of a risk, and more of a die roll on what kind of person may jump into their RP, and a lot of the time, a GM just wants to have fun, not act as the story police.

I think it's kind of easy to pick out the guys that'll be harder to police, in my own experience. They've got a certain way about them, and they tend to be less clever than they think they are.

 

[Cosmo]

I think it's kind of easy to pick out the guys that'll be harder to police, in my own experience. They've got a certain way about them, and they tend to be less clever than they think they are.

If you're an RP veteran, you're pretty good at picking up those kinds of people quickly, sure. But not all GMs are veteran RPers, not all are very confrontational and so do their best to avoid such confrontations [and sadly, some even let themselves be run over by such people], making it so that it less likely to appear is a way to help mitigate the issues. Again, some people don't want to police. Some GMs just want to create a world with people, not spend the majority of their time acting like RP police telling people what they can and can't do, watching that one player you know is going to try and game the system and just waiting for the shoe to drop. There are many kinds of people out there, and in my experience, the reason so many 'one power' rules exist is because of the people that like to take advantage.

 

[Crow]

Limiting things in such a way always draws a good 90% of the fun out of any genre that it crops up in. Why is it so much to ask to play a superhero that's from outer space? Or one that uses magic? Or anything other than a normal human with a really cool gene?

Yeah, I myself prefer Superhero settings with ever-so-mallaeble stuff like that. That's the true fun in a superhero setting. I'd understand if it's a fraction of the universe like those X-Men. Not to say I don't participate in one-power things sometimes.

But yeah, I've actually seen people say that they're shifting from advertising their RPs as a regular superhero setting to turning them into Macademia RPs, all to top it off with the 'one power' stuff. I'm also not too big on RPing the setting and much prefer a standard superhero setting where the world is much more like others but the rise of superheroes change it. Additionally, some of RPs seem to have a fair priority over backstories, something that multiple options for origins would serve to benefit.

THAT is why I prefer standard superhero RPs and hardly ever touch Green Naruto RPs.

At the end of the day, it's all a preference kinda thing. There are still RPs out there that let you have a good bit of versatility, still keep things within reason and all.

 

[Ace Cream]

I prefer limited 'super'power, maybe one, or two 'super'power per character. The rest of the character's arsenal should come from their more mundane skill and creative mind.

 

[Crow]

I'm not so sure. I've seen plenty of cases where GM's fine with a character having a set of unrelated powers as long as you give the powerset a catchy name.

In fact, I'm willing to bet actual money that if you'd just name your character's powerset something like "gobellygook" most GM's would accept it without thinking twice.

I'm curious to see some examples. Did some at least try to justify the connection, like how Ben 10 Alien Force does via names? Merge superintelligence with electricity and call it 'Brainstorm'? Merge flight with sonic abilities with super vision and call it 'songbird'?

... I'm far off the mark, aren't I.

 

[Delinquent]

I'm curious to see some examples

Sure, there's one example where naming the powerset "Psychic" where enough justification for having telekinesis, being able to read minds and stopping time.

Another example was the character who could manipulate electricity, was a cyborg, merg with technology and could also upgrade/downgrade technology (i.e turning an old homephone into an cellphone and vice versa).

Also, just in case the creators of those characters ends up seeing this I want to stress that there's nothing really inherently wrong with those characters. It's just a bit weird too see them get away with such a varying powerset in a setting that's supposed to limit you to one power.

 

[Crow]

These two examples are very light ones that make sense to connect (except for the timestop. Then again even cryokinesis has been shown to freeze time so eeehhh. It's ridiculous but fun to laugh at.)

 

[Crenando]

Yeah, I myself prefer Superhero settings with ever-so-mallaeble stuff like that. That's the true fun in a superhero setting. I'd understand if it's a fraction of the universe like those X-Men.

Even X-Men gets into magic and aliens and stuff. It's only stuff like the movies and X-Men Evolution that try to make this big world smaller for the sake of believability.
You got the Brood, the Shi'ar empire, the muramasa blade Warlock the Technarch, that time Jubilee became a vampire, and ya girl Illiyana. Even franchise mainstay Juggernaut is magical and not a mutant.
I get the movie approach but I've rarely seen anything done the other way.

 

[SP3CT3R]

i'm sure you've heard this... but perhaps you'd have better luck with 1X1 rps that suit your intrests? in 1X1 there aren't really any hard and fast rules. whatever you and your partner are cool with is game. and while i personally like to set up the world a bit with my partners in 1X1 rps, i totally would be down for a space superhero or whatever as long as we discussed it first and i know what's going on.

I've thought about that, but what I want out of the kind of RP that I'm looking for isn't really something I can get out of a 1x1. A roleplay between two people doesn't really conduct the right group dynamic. Thanks for the suggestion, though.

If you're an RP veteran, you're pretty good at picking up those kinds of people quickly, sure. But not all GMs are veteran RPers, not all are very confrontational and so do their best to avoid such confrontations [and sadly, some even let themselves be run over by such people], making it so that it less likely to appear is a way to help mitigate the issues. Again, some people don't want to police. Some GMs just want to create a world with people, not spend the majority of their time acting like RP police telling people what they can and can't do, watching that one player you know is going to try and game the system and just waiting for the shoe to drop. There are many kinds of people out there, and in my experience, the reason so many 'one power' rules exist is because of the people that like to take advantage.

The thing is, if we keep building RP settings to enforce competitive balance, all of the troublemakers will just keep doing their thing and they're never going to learn. As Delinquent pointed out, people just started applying basic mental gymnastics to get around the rule, and it might as well not be there at this point because it's so easy to exploit.

I picked up roleplaying on a smaller server where people would let just about anyone join an RP, even "advanced" ones, and then only drop the hammer on them if they caused problems. I can tell you that calling people out is nowhere near as disruptive as you think it is, and having my edgelord OCs get violently shot down by the GMs probably helped me improve as a writer.

Obviously, tearing into newbies is a good way to turn them away from the hobby, and it's better to be lassiez-faire with beginner-friendly RPs, but there needs to be some amount of trust and communication between the players. Otherwise, you end up with the current RP scene, where every GM either lets everyone do as they please as long as they don't break the narrow confines of the setting, or micromanages everything to the point where they want actors to play the characters they already made.

 

[Crow]

Even X-Men gets into magic and aliens and stuff. It's only stuff like the movies and X-Men Evolution that try to make this big world smaller for the sake of believability.
You got the Brood, the Shi'ar empire, the muramasa blade Warlock the Technarch, that time Jubilee became a vampire, and ya girl Illiyana. Even franchise mainstay Juggernaut is magical and not a mutant.
I get the movie approach but I've rarely seen anything done the other way.

I wonder - what if the player characters had to follow the limited powerset rule rooted in X-genes or Quirks or something, but every other NPC and whatnot later on gets freeform pass as a means to show that at first, they're part of a hidden world, then later on, this hidden world is broader and more diverse than initially thought.

 

[PauciloquentPumpkin]

The people who frequent all of the complaint threads have probably seen me bring it up a few times, how I can't stand when roleplays restrict characters to having a single unique ability. It just drains the fun out of everything. I'm so sick of it that I'm also sick of posting about it in those threads, but it just keeps happening. It's everywhere. I'm now making an entire thread about it because posting comments is no longer good enough to hold me back from going absolutely feral over this.

I love to mess with tropes and clichés when I write. I like subverting expectations, thinking outside the box, and seeing how much I can do with a given setting. But opening up an interest check and finding that all I have to work with is one superpower for my character makes it so much more difficult to be creative. Limiting things in such a way always draws a good 90% of the fun out of any genre that it crops up in. Why is it so much to ask to play a superhero that's from outer space? Or one that uses magic? Or anything other than a normal human with a really cool gene? There are so many character archetypes that I'm missing out on because they don't fit into the "one superpower" box. I can't make a character that has an arsenal of built-in weaponry in a roleplay about escaped test subjects, for example. And fantasy has it so much worse. If the setting is devoid of magic other than one unique ability that each of the characters possesses, it hardly deserves to be called fantasy.

And then, there's the part about being limited to one superpower, which in itself is only moderately irritating after all of the above, because it just means that I can't make a flying brick or add secondary abilities that back up my character's specialty. The thing is, I enjoy making unique powers for my characters, and I'd probably find these roleplays to be a fun challenge if I weren't totally sick of them. That, and the fact that I don't get to have fun with character creation because they usually go one of two ways:

• In realistic roleplays, there's this unwritten expectation that people use classic superpowers; they usually favor the clean, hands-off kind such as telekinesis or elemental control, but more physical ones such as enhanced strength or speed show up occasionally. Regardless, I can't make a character who can do some ridiculous body horror shit without sticking out like a sore thumb.
• In the more anime-inspired roleplays, on the other hand, you'll see characters whose powers are extremely loosely interpreted and have a broad range of functions that basically let them pull off the effects of multiple common abilities, like a telekinetic who can use their telekinesis on themselves to fly, enhance their strength, and become invulnerable, as well as control the very movement of atoms in order to control energy as well. And since it's anime, I can't afford to make a character that's weaker than theirs unless I want to get trampled on.

Anyways, thanks for coming to my vent thread. I acknowledge that this is most likely a me problem, so please don't make a post just to point that out because it's a huge pet peeve of mine, but feel free to comment otherwise.

While you have some good points, I can't say I have similar experiences. Maybe I just haven't been in as many powers based RPs, but some of my characters and ideas can get strange.

I'll address your second paragraph where you talk about super heroes from outer space, or one that uses magic. In my experience, this is probably due to the fact that an RP has a theme or origin of their powers, like a mutated gene. So including a character from another dimension, or a time traveler from another time might just not fit into the theme of their RP. I don't think you can blame someone for limiting powers in that kind of way.

As for the others, I'm guessing we just have different experiences. I have characters that might have multitudes of powers, like one that has different powers based on their emotional state. Including physical ability increases, increased senses, elemental abilities in a variety of forms, and healing capabilities. I've also created mutated beings that have a plethora of abilities, like skin that's resistant to a variety of things, while also having increased strength from size, trapping psychics in their own mind, flight and a body that absorbs light.

I create powersets just for fun. I have many that aren't used. I tend to like giving a specific ability that has a multitude of uses, or is used in a strange way. I've made someone that generates electricity and can only discharge it through two points of contact, and rather than following a path, like one of least resistance, it just goes in a straight line between the contact points, so it can be used even against materials that normally insulate against electricity. They can still only really do one thing, but it's in a unique way that electricity isn't normally used in.

I've also never had someone tell me I flat out can't use a power, like some body horror stuff. I've had characters that have tar-like bodies that can create a multitude of tendrils from their body, or morph their body in any way they wish. I've had a character that has a large eye in their stomach that can shoot lasers and creates barriers from air within its line of sight. I suppose what I'm saying is that I simply can't relate. And I'm sorry if this was entirely unhelpful.

 

[SP3CT3R]

While you have some good points, I can't say I have similar experiences. Maybe I just haven't been in as many powers based RPs, but some of my characters and ideas can get strange.

I'll address your second paragraph where you talk about super heroes from outer space, or one that uses magic. In my experience, this is probably due to the fact that an RP has a theme or origin of their powers, like a mutated gene. So including a character from another dimension, or a time traveler from another time might just not fit into the theme of their RP. I don't think you can blame someone for limiting powers in that kind of way.

The problem is that everyone is doing superhero RPs that way, and there aren't any roleplays that will accept an extraterrestrial or magic-using hero. I'm blaming the zeitgeist going around (whih My Hero Academia is probably responsible for) that's causing people to make these settings nigh-exclusively.

I've also never had someone tell me I flat out can't use a power, like some body horror stuff. I've had characters that have tar-like bodies that can create a multitude of tendrils from their body, or morph their body in any way they wish. I've had a character that has a large eye in their stomach that can shoot lasers and creates barriers from air within its line of sight. I suppose what I'm saying is that I simply can't relate. And I'm s

Nowhere did I say that my power ideas were getting outright rejected. It's just that they usually either run counter to the themes of the setting, or they're drastically underpowered compared to those of other characters, who are usually bending the rules. And that makes it difficult to enjoy the roleplays that do this.

 

[PauciloquentPumpkin]

The problem is that everyone is doing superhero RPs that way, and there aren't any roleplays that will accept an extraterrestrial or magic-using hero. I'm blaming the zeitgeist going around (whih My Hero Academia is probably responsible for) that's causing people to make these settings nigh-exclusively.


Nowhere did I say that my power ideas were getting outright rejected. It's just that they usually either run counter to the themes of the setting, or they're drastically underpowered compared to those of other characters, who are usually bending the rules. And that makes it difficult to enjoy the roleplays that do this.

I dunno. To me, that's like getting upset at a slice-of-life RP for not letting you play as a Wendigo or a time traveling cyborg. Magic generally needs an entire system to be built for it in an RP. Without a system that's developed for it, it can be nearly impossible to determine the capabilities of someone. If someone has a setting or theme for their RP, there's nothing wrong with that. And if you can't find any RPs that fit your specifications, you can always make your own and post it in the interest check area.

You can also create a power that mimics magic or dimensional travel. A character that uses their hands in a way that makes them look like they're casting spells. And various hand motions can manipulate different elements and such. Or a wormhole character that can open wormholes to travel around the planet. Looking through the wormholes could look like looking into another dimension.

Either way, there's options. Though, generally, if you have a really specific idea in mind, which it sounds like you do, you may be better off creating your own RP.

 

[SP3CT3R]

I dunno. To me, that's like getting upset at a slice-of-life RP for not letting you play as a Wendigo or a time traveling cyborg. Magic generally needs an entire system to be built for it in an RP. Without a system that's developed for it, it can be nearly impossible to determine the capabilities of someone. If someone has a setting or theme for their RP, there's nothing wrong with that. And if you can't find any RPs that fit your specifications, you can always make your own and post it in the interest check area.

You can also create a power that mimics magic or dimensional travel. A character that uses their hands in a way that makes them look like they're casting spells. And various hand motions can manipulate different elements and such. Or a wormhole character that can open wormholes to travel around the planet. Looking through the wormholes could look like looking into another dimension.

Either way, there's options. Though, generally, if you have a really specific idea in mind, which it sounds like you do, you may be better off creating your own RP.

First of all, I can't run RPs. If I could, I wouldn't be subject to the whims of the people who are making them, and I wouldn't have made this thread. And this is an extremely personal subject, so you're not allowed to ask about it.

Second, anyone can make a power to copy an aesthetic. What I'm after is the experience. A character from another planet or dimension is going to have a completely different outlook and life experience from the rest of the characters, and I can't get anywhere near that same effect by making a superhero with a martian gimmick. Similarly, a character using magic raises the questions of how they learned it, how it works, and where else in the setting magic exists. But I don't get the chance to answer those questions, because the current RP trends never have any room for me to put my ideas to use.

 

[Crenando]

I dunno. To me, that's like getting upset at a slice-of-life RP for not letting you play as a Wendigo or a time traveling cyborg.

It's more like if slice-of-life RPs were all centered around high school and nothing else. Nothing based around a neighborhood or a workplace.

 

[PauciloquentPumpkin]

It's more like if slice-of-life RPs were all centered around high school and nothing else. Nothing based around a neighborhood or a workplace.

That's normally where creating your own RP comes into play. Popular settings are popular for a reason. And niche settings will be harder to find, which makes it great that you can create your own. But SP3CT3R won't create their own RP, so I don't know what else to offer. Options are there to remedy situations like that though.

 

[Crenando]

That's normally where creating your own RP comes into play. Popular settings are popular for a reason. And niche settings will be harder to find, which makes it great that you can create your own. But SP3CT3R won't create their own RP, so I don't know what else to offer. Options are there to remedy situations like that though.

The weird thing is, these pieces of media really aren't niche, right? All major superhero teams have magic users, aliens and cyborgs/robots as allies if not as members.

 

[SP3CT3R]

That's normally where creating your own RP comes into play. Popular settings are popular for a reason. And niche settings will be harder to find, which makes it great that you can create your own. But SP3CT3R won't create their own RP, so I don't know what else to offer. Options are there to remedy situations like that though.

What I want isn't "niche". The popular settings are the niche, and I'm trying to advocate for everything that exists outside of that niche, because there's lots of potential to be found there that people just up and forgot about.

 

[PauciloquentPumpkin]

The weird thing is, these pieces of media really aren't niche, right? All major superhero teams have magic users, aliens and cyborgs/robots as allies if not as members.

True, but when you're talking about settings in which multiple strangers have to work together, having a variety of things that characters can use can make things difficult, such as including magic in a superhero world that isn't based on a fandom. And if fandoms are included, it becomes much easier. I have seen several Marvel and DC based fandom RPs where you could easily include a magic based or inter-dimensional hero rather easily.

These media franchises are also highly coordinated and written together, rather than individual "players" writing out for different characters in a plot they aren't 100% aware of at all times. They are writing their story where they know the ending at the beginning. Role playing in a setting like on RPN is nothing like writing a story that is meant to be enjoyed by others, rather than actively played by people where you can never know how and what each person is going to post. So I don't think it's right to compare anything on here to what an individual company can produce, or a book or comic author. It's nothing alike.

And as I've said before, it's 100% fixable by making your own RP.

What I want isn't "niche". The popular settings are the niche, and I'm trying to advocate for everything that exists outside of that niche, because there's lots of potential to be found there that people just up and forgot about.

If you can't find an RP that fits your specifications, that's sorta exactly what makes it niche. If most people are playing one way, and you can't find things done another way, it's pretty much a niche. If they weren't niche, they'd be easier to find. Saying the popular setting is niche sounds contradictory. What you're looking for is a niche because it's specifically tailored to you.

I also don't think it's just something that people up and forget about, but rather, it's done to make things simpler. GMing multiple people has its difficulties, and keeping a unified format makes it easier to plan things around a plot.

You also don't want to talk about it, so there's no way for me to know. But there are still options available to solve all of these problems by creating your own RP. But it seems like you're just ranting about things that don't exist that anyone could make. And if no one's making RPs that fit your specifications, that's not a fault on anyone else. They are making the RPs they are interested in.

 

[Cosmo]

The thing is, if we keep building RP settings to enforce competitive balance, all of the troublemakers will just keep doing their thing and they're never going to learn. As @Blackguard pointed out, people just started applying basic mental gymnastics to get around the rule, and it might as well not be there at this point because it's so easy to exploit.

I picked up roleplaying on a smaller server where people would let just about anyone join an RP, even "advanced" ones, and then only drop the hammer on them if they caused problems. I can tell you that calling people out is nowhere near as disruptive as you think it is, and having my edgelord OCs get violently shot down by the GMs probably helped me improve as a writer.

Obviously, tearing into newbies is a good way to turn them away from the hobby, and it's better to be lassiez-faire with beginner-friendly RPs, but there needs to be some amount of trust and communication between the players. Otherwise, you end up with the current RP scene, where every GM either lets everyone do as they please as long as they don't break the narrow confines of the setting, or micromanages everything to the point where they want actors to play the characters they already made.

And people who play mental gymnastic to get around that rule are found out and kicked out easier. Its much easier to see someone trying to abuse something if their options are limited compared to if they are given all the options. The entire idea of, 'Meh, its not worth policing cause they will try to get by it anyways, so whatever' is not a counter-argument in any shape or form. Nor does it change what I said in that the trend of doing that appeared because of these people, ergo, its not the fault of GMs but those players. You can even take this beyond, why do pen and paper roleplays have so many rules? Because it makes it easier to enforce. You still have 'That Guy' who tries to break or meta it, but it doesn't mean you throw out the rules because of a handful of 'That Guys'.

I started roleplaying, pen and paper as well as online in forums, when I was around 12 which was about 15 years ago. I am not new to this nor am I new to human beings. I've been in many RPs, and yes, I've seen entire RPs grind to a halt because of bruised egos. There is a difference between telling someone before the RP starts and as characters are being accepted that something isn't up to par or is sketchy and another to tell a RPer to knock something off in the middle of posting. The former is expected, the latter causes a pause in writing, it disrupts the flow, people aren't sure if they should post or not until it gets settled, things may even need to be retconned, that is how bad it can get. I've seen this happen multiple times, I've had this happen to me as a GM. The point of limiting what a player can do with powers is to help sort it out during the CS creation and not have to deal with it during the RP and I am saying this as someone who is currently working on making a very open magic system RP.

Cept you are trying to do this: 'Its either A or B, lads'. It isn't. It also isn't only newbies who do it. I've seen people who have RPed for years and years try to power game and metagame RPs. This isn't something only new players do before they've seen the holy light of the RP and learned 'dis is da way' and knock it off.

Simple lesson anyone can learn, regardless of experience, is to never make a character around powers. You make powers around the character. If, at any moment, you view writing your character. especially their abilities, as a competition, you've failed already and need to restart.

 

[SP3CT3R]

And people who play mental gymnastic to get around that rule are found out and kicked out easier. Its much easier to see someone trying to abuse something if their options are limited compared to if they are given all the options. The entire idea of, 'Meh, its not worth policing cause they will try to get by it anyways, so whatever' is not a counter-argument in any shape or form. Nor does it change what I said in that the trend of doing that appeared because of these people, ergo, its not the fault of GMs but those players. You can even take this beyond, why do pen and paper roleplays have so many rules? Because it makes it easier to enforce. You still have 'That Guy' who tries to break or meta it, but it doesn't mean you throw out the rules because of a handful of 'That Guys'.

I started roleplaying, pen and paper as well as online in forums, when I was around 12 which was about 15 years ago. I am not new to this nor am I new to human beings. I've been in many RPs, and yes, I've seen entire RPs grind to a halt because of bruised egos. There is a difference between telling someone before the RP starts and as characters are being accepted that something isn't up to par or is sketchy and another to tell a RPer to knock something off in the middle of posting. The former is expected, the latter causes a pause in writing, it disrupts the flow, people aren't sure if they should post or not until it gets settled, things may even need to be retconned, that is how bad it can get. I've seen this happen multiple times, I've had this happen to me as a GM. The point of limiting what a player can do with powers is to help sort it out during the CS creation and not have to deal with it during the RP and I am saying this as someone who is currently working on making a very open magic system RP.

Cept you are trying to do this: 'Its either A or B, lads'. It isn't. It also isn't only newbies who do it. I've seen people who have RPed for years and years try to power game and metagame RPs. This isn't something only new players do before they've seen the holy light of the RP and learned 'dis is da way' and knock it off.

Simple lesson anyone can learn, regardless of experience, is to never make a character around powers. You make powers around the character. If, at any moment, you view writing your character. especially their abilities, as a competition, you've failed already and need to restart.

Okay, maybe I was a little unclear. I can get theatric when I have a hard time making a point and I lose track of what I'm saying.

What I meant to say was that, to me, using the superpower gene approach to prevent people from powergaming seems like a fairly nuclear solution to the problem. It gives problem players less opportunity, yes, but it also denies a lot of options to people who can put them to good use. Sacrificing that much creative potential to prevent powergaming seems like overkill, especially when, in my experience, people generally tried to cause problems less often in the few roleplays that allowed for lots of creative freedom. And, in regards to RPGs, most of them (at least the ones that I like) have rulesets that limit the functionality of a character's abilities, while allowing players to justify the abilities however they wish.

And I've only been roleplaying for seven-ish years as of now, but I've seen plenty of post-character-creation conflicts get resolved peacefully and without causing problems for the RP as a whole. Maybe it was because of the circles that I frequented, but things never got that bad, and people were usually willing to work things out. Except for the Homestuck forum. That place was rancid.

 

[Cosmo]

Okay, maybe I was a little unclear. I can get theatric when I have a hard time making a point and I lose track of what I'm saying.

What I meant to say was that, to me, using the superpower gene approach to prevent people from powergaming seems like a fairly nuclear solution to the problem. It gives problem players less opportunity, yes, but it also denies a lot of options to people who can put them to good use. Sacrificing that much creative potential to prevent powergaming seems like overkill, especially when, in my experience, people generally tried to cause problems less often in the few roleplays that allowed for lots of creative freedom. And, in regards to RPGs, most of them (at least the ones that I like) have rulesets that limit the functionality of a character's abilities, while allowing players to justify the abilities however they wish.

And I've only been roleplaying for seven-ish years as of now, but I've seen plenty of post-character-creation conflicts get resolved peacefully and without causing problems for the RP as a whole. Maybe it was because of the circles that I frequented, but things never got that bad, and people were usually willing to work things out. Except for the Homestuck forum. That place was rancid.

Nuclear would be creating an approved list of powers they may take. Telling people they can only select one power isn't nuclear, its just quality control. Any pen and paper RPG can let you do anything, with the GM/DM's permission, however, the limit on functionality is the point. If someone can make whatever they want, as many as they want, that is more that a GM has to comb through to look for people deciding to tweak the system and, unlike those RPG systems you enjoy, they don't have a hundred pages of rules to help back them up [Even examples of ones that allowed total player freedom, like a superhero one I can't recall the name of, quickly released a supplement to streamline it and organize it]. Which, again, is what I said. The more options = the more ways someone can metagame = the more time and effort it takes to comb through to ensure someone isn't taking advantage = the more stress it puts. The less options you allow, the easier it is to control said outcome. That is just kinda how numbers work.

It is okay to not like that. It is okay to disagree with that, completely understandable even, but the reason it is done is solid and makes sense. Regardless of your stance on liking it or not liking it, the reason it is done is sound. Its not a rule that came out because people were feeling lazy or being jerks, it was a solution to a problem. Now, how large of an issue that problem is, well, that is down to personal preference.

I've seen such people causing RPs to grind to a halt on multiple sites, even when its done in a subtle way, it can cause a lot of tension between the writers. I'm glad you haven't had to deal with that, truly I am because it really sucks, but it happens and once burned, twice shy, as they say. However, on this note on talking to people, I've found that GMs are open to discussing powers with people and are open to working with you if the power is related and is non-intrusive.

 

[PauciloquentPumpkin]

Nuclear would be creating an approved list of powers they may take. Telling people they can only select one power isn't nuclear, its just quality control. Any pen and paper RPG can let you do anything, with the GM/DM's permission, however, the limit on functionality is the point. If someone can make whatever they want, as many as they want, that is more that a GM has to comb through to look for people deciding to tweak the system and, unlike those RPG systems you enjoy, they don't have a hundred pages of rules to help back them up [Even examples of ones that allowed total player freedom, like a superhero one I can't recall the name of, quickly released a supplement to streamline it and organize it]. Which, again, is what I said. The more options = the more ways someone can metagame = the more time and effort it takes to comb through to ensure someone isn't taking advantage = the more stress it puts. The less options you allow, the easier it is to control said outcome. That is just kinda how numbers work.

It is okay to not like that. It is okay to disagree with that, completely understandable even, but the reason it is done is solid and makes sense. Regardless of your stance on liking it or not liking it, the reason it is done is sound. Its not a rule that came out because people were feeling lazy or being jerks, it was a solution to a problem. Now, how large of an issue that problem is, well, that is down to personal preference.

I've seen such people causing RPs to grind to a halt on multiple sites, even when its done in a subtle way, it can cause a lot of tension between the writers. I'm glad you haven't had to deal with that, truly I am because it really sucks, but it happens and once burned, twice shy, as they say. However, on this note on talking to people, I've found that GMs are open to discussing powers with people and are open to working with you if the power is related and is non-intrusive.

I can attest to the fact that people bringing RPs to a halt happens. Even worse, they'll try to tell the GM what their character is capable of, when it's really up to the GM what kind of limits are allowed, and what all is allowed or not.