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CheeseDogX Since: May, 2010
Apr 9th 2011 at 12:57:49 AM •••

>Game Breaker. As to this, I've found that a lot of it depends on the players, and even more so on the GM. An inexperienced/pushover GM can easily get overwhelmed by the player characters. A lot of G Ms I know (myself included) cope with it by having the players tell him what they want to play before they start making characters, so he can veto the idea if he wants to. Even so, I'm pretty open minded.

Another thing to keep in mind is that a lot of the real powerful stuff is limited, and a good GM will play within those limits to ensure the player(s) isn't running roughshod over his campaign. Case in point: the Glitter Boy. This guy gets brought up more than anyone else when the term "broken" comes up. I had a campaign where a guy wanted to play a Glitter Boy pilot, and I told him that was fine, as long as he was Ok with the fact that I was going to be rather strict in how he handled himself in combat. For starters, I made it clear to the party as a whole that if he fired the Boom Gun within 150' feet of them, they would get deafened by it and suffer penalties (as outlined in the book). So most fights, he spent the first couple actions running to a safe distance. And, once he started firing, he couldn't move. So if the situation changed, he'd had to use up a couple actions repositioning himself before he could start fighting again. And, since the Glitter Boy is (in)famous, as well as a big fat glittery target, he was generally the guy getting hit the most in battles. "Big deal," some may say, since the suit has a Main Body of 770 MDC. But unlike the other players, he couldn't get repairs done just anywhere, and when he could find a place to repair his suit, they charged a lot for said repairs. I think he was down to about 100 MDC (starting the campaign at full) before he was able to get repairs done in Free Quebec.

He bore all this without complaint. The one time he did get upset was when the party got ambushed during a meal break. He wasn't in his suit at the time, and I told him that by the time he got suited up and ready for battle, the fight would probably be over. So he fought the battle with a sidearm and his jumpsuit. I pointed out to him at the end of the battle that I did that so that he'd realize he wouldn't always have his Glitter Boy when a fight broke out.

All this was enough to put him, if not quite on even footing with the rest of the party, it at least kept him from being a Game Breaker. And it was all done without modifying any rules, and letting the rest of the party play what they wanted to without worrying about game balance.

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