The Inventor Skill

[Ulmageist]

I'm a little confused on the process of making new "items" with the inventor skill. One of my players swears that its only used when you make non-existing items instead of any item. Can someone please clarify if it should be used to make everything ala a crafting skill of sorts, or only items that don't already exist.

 

Thank you!!

[Steve Long]

Re: The Inventor Skill

 

Given the way you've phrased your question, I'm assuming you want input from lots of people, so I've moved this to the "Discussion" board.

 

My opinion, for what it's worth, is that:

 

--the description of the Skill clearly specifies "new devices"

--the very name of the Skill implies that it's used for inventing, which is a different thing from "crafting" in general

--there are other Skills (including Professional Skills) that relate to creating/building/maintaining/altering existing devices of specific types

 

Thus, Inventor is not a general crafting Skill. It's a Skill that, in conjunction with another Skill closely related to the subject at hand (e.g., Weaponsmith for weapons), allows a character to invent new devices. How a GM defines "new" is up to him; some may limit the Skill to entirely new creations, while others might allow a character to use it to create something he knows exists (or can exist) but has simply never seen or owned. As always, I think common sense and dramatic sense are the best touchstones.

[AnotherSkip]

Re: The Inventor Skill

 

theoretically you can "reinvent the wheel" its just that it is generally easier to have someone else do the work, then stand on the shoulders of "giants that came before".

 

Probably the way it is written Inventing isn't nealy as universal as the character seems to think. Realistically Inventor is an add on skill to possibly a whole slew of skills (probably Mechanic, Ps: Flight technician, Ks: Flight Technology for "inventing" an improvement on a plane) Inventing should probably double the time and resources a project calls for at a minimum, though with programs at least "it will be done when it is done" is bog standard.

Inventor also means you have to make the base roll then the inventing roll so on a reasonable character that means twice the chances of failure.

[Ockham's Spoon]

Re: The Inventor Skill

 

In games I've played, Inventor has been used more like a Perk than a skill really, the only exception being a gadgeteer that used his Inventor skill for manipulating his VPP on the fly.

 

For Tony Stark types it is kind of a background skill that explains how he made the Iron Man suit, and justifies later upgrades, but I don't know of a GM that has said "Well, you blew your Inventor roll, so you can't spend your XP to buy that armor piercing blaster you wanted. Sorry."

 

For wizards we have used Inventor as an excuse for creating new spells that the character has not seen in some other spellbook. But again, I don't think the roll was ever actually made; the GM gave his blessing to the new spell and the character spent the XP to learn it.

 

For cyberpunk hackers, Inventor could be used to create novel programs; I could see it being used as the basis for a Requires Skill Roll limitation on an Advantage (say AP for a cyberspace Blast or Hardened for a cyberspace wall) to represent the fact it works in a way never seen before and so could be extra effective. But if Inventor was just used to justify a new suite of cyberspace programs, I don't think I would require the player to roll it.

[Steve]

Re: The Inventor Skill

 

I would suggest using the roll to determine success if no character points are being spent. If Armored Hero wants to upgrade his suit or Gadget Girl wants a new toy for her Multipower of Foci, just spend the points.

 

But if Armored Hero wants to provide mass market armored suits or Gadget Girl wants to create a handheld energy cell that never runs out of power for the world, that would require a roll.