Martial Arts 'N' Stuff

[chaosnet]

How do you all handle Martial Arts? Do you use it as a POWER SET and have things like "Savate Mastery" with STR, STA, SPD, REF, etc as traits, or do you use it as a POWER TRAIT where you have "Savate Mastery" with Savate D8 along with STR, STA, SPD, REF, etc.

Looking at some of the 'melee fighter type' datafiles from OM, it seems like the former is the general way it goes. Cap, Daredevil and Iron Fist are all awesome combatants, but none of them have Mixed Martial Arts D8/D10 (Cap), Street Fighting D8 (DD) or Kun L'un Kung Fu D10(Iron Fist).

Comments?

[Mouse]

Normal martial arts, like the sort that actual people practice in the real world? Combat Specialty and maybe a Distinction if it's fairly central to the character.

Mystical martial arts, where you learn transcendent techniques like in a kung fu action flick? Sounds like a power set to me. Well, a power set on top of the stuff I mentioned above.

[MidnightBlue]

Yeah, unless it is the only thing going for the character, I'd try to keep Martial Arts limited to the Combat Expert/Mastery specialty. Otherwise you let a character double dip into the dice pool. Power trait Martial Arts + Combat Expert/Master on every combat die roll is what you'd be looking at.

It would be the equivalent of having a character with a Super Strength power trait and a Super Strength Expert/Master specialty.

Now if his advanced training is all that the hero has going for him, I probably wouldn't have a problem with giving him both the Power Set and Specialty (and possibly any Distinctions).

It just depends on how "good" you want to make the character at what he does.

[chaosnet]

I guess I just don't see the difference between having "Enhanced Reflexes D8", or "Enhanced Strength D8" and "Combat Expert D8". This would give me 2D8 in my die pool everytime I'm in combat, the same as I would have if I had "Ninjitsu D8" and "Combat Expert D8".

Maybe I'm just overthinking it.

[MidnightBlue]

I guess I just don't see the difference between having "Enhanced Reflexes D8", or "Enhanced Strength D8" and "Combat Expert D8". This would give me 2D8 in my die pool everytime I'm in combat, the same as I would have if I had "Ninjitsu D8" and "Combat Expert D8".

Maybe I'm just overthinking it.

Mechanically, it isn't any different, but flavor-wise it might be.

To me it is just a question of how important is it to the character.

Iron Fist for example is all about the martial arts and he has power sets and distinctions that help out his Combat Master specialty.

Most of the X-Men have also been trained in martial arts, but that is only represented by their Combat specialty for most of them...because their main focus (power sets) is in their mutant abilities.

[EldritchFire]

As others have said, your basic martial arts is covered by the combat specialty. Power sets is where you showcase the awesome things you can do because of said training. Ca you punch through a brick wall? Take a strength power. Ability to run up walls and ignore gravity? Wall crawling. Patented Hadouken-lookalike? That's the blast power.

If all they know is katas, basic blocks, throws, strikes, etc that's just the combat specialty.

-EF

[MidnightBlue]

As others have said, your basic martial arts is covered by the combat specialty. Power sets is where you showcase the awesome things you can do because of said training. Ca you punch through a brick wall? Take a strength power. Ability to run up walls and ignore gravity? Wall crawling. Patented Hadouken-lookalike? That's the blast power.

If all they know is katas, basic blocks, throws, strikes, etc that's just the combat specialty.

-EF

What I tried to say...but with less success.

[chaosnet]

So, my character The Fencing Fool has Combat Master signifying his incredible ablity to fight and his Magical Rapier power set which has Weapon D8 and Durability D10 (when he starts to Super Parry). He also has Enhanced Relexes in his second Trained by El Aguila power set.

He could have the distinctions of:
*Second Best Swordsman Alive
*Apt Pupil
*In El Aguila's Shadow

Which would further distinguish his abilities as a swordsman.

Ok...I think I get that....

[Mouse]

I guess I just don't see the difference between having "Enhanced Reflexes D8", or "Enhanced Strength D8" and "Combat Expert D8". This would give me 2D8 in my die pool everytime I'm in combat, the same as I would have if I had "Ninjitsu D8" and "Combat Expert D8".

Maybe I'm just overthinking it.

For me, it comes down to this: What does the Ninjitsu power do?

If the answer is, "It adds to combat rolls," then the system already has something that does that. It's a Combat Specialty. Perhaps this is my urge for minimalism speaking, but if something in the system already does exactly what you want, I don't see a reason to reinvent the wheel. Just take Combat Master, and you can either do the d10 or split it into 2d8. Done and done.

On the other hand, if your answer is more, "It represents my supernatural speed, strength, and toughness," there's other stuff you can do. Namely, you take Strength, Reflexes, and Durability. Maybe Stamina, too. Because that's how the system represents those things. Then if you want to use your great physical prowess to lift cars off of people and such, you don't cause the game to grind to a halt as you explain what you meant by Ninjitsu, and the other players don't have to roll their eyes every time it seems like you're trying to get your one power to do absolutely everything.

So at the end of the day, you take a Distinction that represents your training, you take some powers that represent your physical prowess, and you take the level of Specialty to represent the skill from your training. It does exactly what you want it to, and it's clear to the other people at the table exactly what you mean by your powers and stuff.

[chaosnet]

Makes perfect sense, thanks Mouse!