Problems with the Protégé’s Powers
Alliteration aside, I’ll be the first to admit that v2’s Protégé’s abilities were far too broad and unfocused. In a game designed around guiding archetypes and letting people enjoy narrative niches, “Common Power” and “General Power” didn’t do much to inspire. However, I feel that v3 went too far in the opposite direction and closed off a lot of the Protégé’s narrative potential.
First, several of the available abilities are either too narrow or uninspiring. Hacking is a power more suited for the Beacon and can easily be covered by weapons and gadgets (ie, a hacking minitool). Detective skills is a nice subset, but not very versatile as a main power. Powerful armor is just dull sounding, even if it was meant to invoke the idea of Power Armor. A counter example is power mimicry, which is very cool and versatile and adds to the narrative potential (especially in the case of the Protégé mimicking their mentor’s power as part of training exercises). The current list mostly nudges Protégé’s towards one specific role and in the words of my own Protégé player, “Not every Protégé is Robin.”
Second, and this is admittedly a problem from v2 as well as v3, it’s unclear how to select the Protégé’s abilities. Everyone else is given a list with available checkboxes and told to check off a certain number. Even the Legacy is told to pick two to cross out. But there is no guideline for the protégé. Even now, I’m confused as to how you are supposed to pick them. My natural assumption is to pick one from each list, with the first two being yours, but I’m not entirely sure. I feel this should be made more explicit, at least on par with the other playbooks.
Thirdly, assuming my interpretation of how to pick character powers from above is correct, this new version cuts off one of the best narrative angles for the Protégé: the story of a mentor with an unusual ability finding a young person with the same and tutoring them on how to control it. The current shared abilities are all things you are trained in, not inherit gifts. With this ability set, you can’t play Jean Grey learning telepathy from Xavier or Sticks showing Daredevil how to use his super senses. You are only left with learned skills, like Robin or Speedy. Cutting off that narrative angle is rather disappointing.
My thought would be to have a list of narratively open powers, like Power Mimicry or Weapons and Gadgets, and have the player choose one of them to be Shared, one for Themselves, and one for the Mentor. That would make it easy to pick, remove the ambiguity, and allow the player to decide if they are being taught a skill or learning to master a shared gift. More clarity and more narrative freedom can only make the Protégé a more interesting playbook.
I didn’t even notice that the powers here had changed until you pointed it out.
I like the idea of having a list like you said. The Protege in my game is the protege of the setting’s Deathstroke/Casey Jones mash-up, the Guardian of Steel Canyon, and while the Guardian is a criminal mastermind turned protector of the people, the Protege is a private school kid turned amateur detective. He has none of the “your own ability” powers, but he has Superhuman Physique, Weapons and Gadgets, Stealth AND Detective Skills.
And what’s with the choices here? “Hacking, power mimicry, body elasticity, powerful armor” as your abilities seems like a grab bag of 3rd string superpowers. “Our shared ability is stealth” doesn’t exactly bring to mind any kind of character.
I’m going to add and say that this selection:
Shared ability: common power, general power, teachable power, useful skillset
Your own ability: strange power, distinctive power, niche power, specific skillset
Mentor ability: dangerous power, intense power, impressive power, masterful skillset
was better and allowed for a broader range of character types including sorcerer’s apprentices.
If I were to take Deimosu from my Divine Blood stories it would be this to describe him and his mother:
Shared Ability: Sorcery (which includes martial arts…otherwise I’d say just Shaping)
Your Ability: Electrokinesis
Mentor Ability: Life-Force Sight
And that would cover it.
His sisters could be similar replacing Electrokinesis with Earthquake Generation or Death-Seer.
Luke Green I understand why they drifted away from this though. For one, some of the character classes let you gain an ability from another playbook. Having the chance to just gain any “strange power” would be a little too narrative strong.
Plus, a lot of Masks design is about helping inspire people with limited choices. That’s why picking your outfit style from a set number of options is a thing. A player might look at the Protege, want to play it, and then run into analysis paralysis trying to decide what “general power” they want.
But I agree. Some form of magic should definitely be included to allow sorcerer’s apprentices, etc. Or at least something that could be flavored as magic, like elemental control or creature summoning.
adding “Occult Power” or “Mutant Power” to the list would help a lot.
I second this post, especially the idea at the end about combining the lists to make one big list that you then choose powers from for yourself and your mentor.
I’m starting a game tonight playing Iron Maiden, protege of the Iron Knight, a silver age hero. I really want their Powerful Armor to be their shared power, but that isn’t how the list works. It feels too restrictive.
In general, while I totally understand the idea that some powers fit some playbooks better than others thematically, i’d like to see a more open power selection mechanic. Or at least advice to GMs to be flexible about interpretations. In a game with no detailed power descriptions, it seems like a missed opportunity to let people create the hero they want.
For example, the Legacy is the only one who can fly? Seriously?
Love the game. Just picking nits.
This is the reason I make my teenaged gorgon the Nova. Though Doomed might also work now that the doom can be easier defined as a massive number of enemies.
Sorcery is such a broad power that it can cover both the Pre-Greco-Demonization aspects of Medusa the Goddess and the more well known abilities of Medusa the Gorgon.
Bry Hitchcock
Legacy can fly, Outsider can fly, and the Doomed can fly through telekinesis. The Nova can fly through telekinesis, elemental control: earth like Terra from Teen Titans or elemental control: air to fly by wind, and gravity manipulation to fly by antigrav. The Janus can take “Impossible mobility” but who knows what that means.
Lots of flying
John Leibee I’d agree as an MC, but I guarantee there are MCs who won’t read the powers as broadly as they are intended. Only two playbooks (Good catch on the Outsider. I searched for flight and flying, but not fly. :P) mention flight specifically as a power. If it can be covered in other powers, then just having “flight” seems like a downgrade, except for all the other cool stuff the Legacy gets.
Sorcery also allows flight.
I also think “Captain” is a much weaker ability*. Before, it gave you a + to a roll that determined. It was the constant club you could use on teammates to say “If you want this team to work, I’m gonna lead it.” When I played with it, that was an exciting narrative space.
As it is, it says “sometime this session, maybe twice, if you lead the team, someone on the team can exchange their action to give someone +1 forward.”
Compared to the delinquent’s Team-building activities you’re not really an exciting narrative space; the team is just slightly better when you’re the leader.
*It’s also very very Robin, but there’s definitely room for Robining.
I wanted to be an Ant-Man protege. Looks like that isn’t fully supported anymore.
I liked v2 much better. It allowed for more concepts.
Why not bring back the open selection and just give a partial list as an example?
(Shared or common power such as martial arts, detective skills, hacking, etc)
That would still leave it open to imagination but give other players a guideline.
Also I’d like it if you picked two shared powers. Even Robin is hard to build with just one shared power and one unique power
Morgan Robertson While I do think a solid list of powers is better for the genre and the system, I agree that having the option for more shared powers would be nice. Come to think of it, very few Proteges from the genre start off with their own unique power.
possibly this:
Start with two apprentice skills/powers and one personal skill/power.
The mentor gets one mentor power
As a possible advance take a power from the mentor list.
I’m still against having a “mentor” list and an “apprentice” list. I think the difference between “Unleash Your Powers” and “Wield Your Powers” is strong enough to draw the difference between the power scales. I’d say have the Protege draw two powers from the list, either shared or unique to them at their choice.
Based on my own (admittedly limited) exposure to PbtA games, I’m pretty sure the power lists are suggestions, not limits. Just make sure you understand how your particular power set mechanically meshes with the Moves for your archetype, and you’re good to go.
I’m with Theo Brinkman here. For first time players I would stick to the list but once you got a bit of experience you can easily choose something different and stay in the parameters of the proposed powers.
Theo Brinkman and Tim Franzke I’m in agreement there. My own solution to this in my game was to say, “Take whatever powers you want” to my Protege. But, you both brought up the major detraction yourselves. They are suggestions for new players. When I bring this list of playbooks to a new group of players, I want them excited to play the Protege, not go “seriously, Powerful Armor? That’s lame. And all of the shared powers are learned skills only? I can’t play Jean Grey? Not cool.” Even if they are suggestions or guidelines, they are suggesting and guiding towards a very limited narrative niche that I think the Protege could expand beyond.
Tim Franzke Why couldn’t you be an Ant-Man protege?
Option 1: Shared Ability Weapons and Gadgets (shrinker), Own ability Hacking, Mentor ability impossible fighting (training to do the gravity fighting)
Option 2: Shared Ability Stealth, Own Ability powerful armor (surely the ant-suit or a variation of it qualifies), Mentor Ability impossible fighting skills
Am I reading the ability descriptions too broadly here?
To some extent, I think I like having limitations on the character sheets. I may be in a minority here, but it forces you in character creation to consider options that aren’t part of your first initial plan, and it gives the different classes a distinct feel. If it’s too broadly defined, I wonder if it’s necessary to have the Protege and the Legacy, or the Transformed and the Bull, The Doomed and The Nova.
Joel Pearce I like the limitations! And your interpretation of how to handle Antman is quite cool and I approve. However, there is still no room in the current rules for playing a Protege and a Mentor with the same innate power, like telepathy or super strength. And there is still a lot of ambiguity on how you are supposed to select your abilities.
As for being broadly defined, the differences you mentioned are about theme and tone, not power sets. The Protege is learning from a single master while the Legacy is dealing with the weight of generations of heroes. The Transformed is afflicted with their monstrous form while the Bull could be normal appearing while still incredibly dangerous. The Doomed is cursed with a dangerous fate while Nova is struggling with all of the power and none of the control. You could theoretically give ALL of them telekinesis and they’d still all be different characters, because of their themes rather than their abilities (though, you’d never want to do that, because you’d have way, way too much stepping on each other’s toes, telekinesis wise).
Camden Jenkins I like the distinction you are making between the mechanics of powers and how they function and the narrative mechanics. I think narrative mechanics is the weirdest part of Apocalypse engine games, and still something I`m having a hard time adjusting to (while simultaneously being my favourite aspects of the system).
Joel Pearce that’s true but that is different then the original idea I had.
Shared power: shrinking
Power the mentor has: controlling rodents
Power only I have: growing in size
I think the reason there is a different mentor list is because you’re supposed to be differrent in a pretty dramatic way from the big time hero.
And in this narrative, yes they’re always going to be more grandious as this story ends just as you become an adult hero