House Alacapa

This is more Psi-Wars content, about the Maradonian House that rules Highlun. Its based on material by Mailanka on his blog and the Psi-Wars Wiki.

House Alacapa is a Maradonian house ruling over a a collection of backwater worlds. While lacking in any title beyond "Baron", the house controls several of those. Alacapans are famous for finding new planets and space routes. Many of their worlds were discoverd this way and transformed from backwater nowheres into moderately valuable holdings. Other houses often find these holdings petty, and members of the house to be rough and occasionally a little eccentric. The most controversial title of all is Baron of the Iron Fleet. The Iron Fleet is not a planet, but a mercenary outfit staffed and controlled by House Alacapa, but funded by its outside contracts.

Touchy Feely TK

Sometimes a Psychokenesis user wants to be able to use their sense of touch as part of their TK. As part of my current Psi-wars stuff, I certainly want that. Here are two abilities that let them do this. 

 Thanks to Calmquist, who basically built these for me by himself!

Highlun: The Rest of the Planet

I've talked about the Vital Core of Highlun, as well as its Southern Continent. This last post is a little less focused, but it breaks down into three parts: The small wet tropical eastern continent, the settled parts of the northern continent not part of the core settlement, and some noteworthy wildernesses.

Highlun: The Southern Continent

As I've worked out the various areas of Highlun, the southern continent quickly became the most interesting. The Northern Continent has the capital and the biggest settlement, but the Winding is probably the most adventure-friendly area on the planet, and the southern mountains are the real home of the vitkin, famed for their fabulously luxurious and expensive wool, as well as some of the most extreme terrain on Highlun. The Cauldron explores some of the tension and possible lack of purpose the Fogglanders will experience when they finally run out of planet and don't have to wear their iconic respirators anymore.

Highlun: The Vital Core

 I've decided my atlas of Highlun is just too big for a single post, and I'm going to publish it in thematic chunks. Today we cover the Capital, Lowmon,  and the largest area of settlement: The Banks.

Highlun: A Psi-wars Planet

Highlun is a worked planet for Psi-Wars, a minor fief of a minor Maradonian House, to see just how far a small and measly planet will take you, economically and militarily. The project also might involve space-scotsmen herding space-alpacas. 

If you don't know what psi-wars is, the best place to start is probably The Psi Wars Primer. The project is great, and if you haven't read enough of it to get its basics, you should, because its really cool!

Magical Talent and Magical Power

Recently I've been getting into Gurps's "Standard" Magic system, for a couple of different reasons. As part of this, I've been looking hard at Magery prerequisites for spells. They're surprisingly good! The idea that some wizards can cast more powerful spells than others is just sort of natural.

But that's not how things usually end up playing: There is a strong incentive in Gurps for every Player Character wizard to have magery 3, which is the maximum. Why? because in the standard magic system skill 15 is everything, and magery is the cheapest way to boost skill. There is no choice between the ability to cast spells more reliably, cast spells more efficiently, or cast more impressive spells: the most effective way to do all three is to buy magery as high as the campaign allows, and then any specialization comes after that. 

But what if we associate magical power with the amount of energy available to a mage, rather than with magical talent?

Energy-Based Magery

When using this rule, skill-boosting Magery is renamed "Magical Talent", and doesn't get used for prerequisites. "Magery" refers to a composite advantage consisting of 3 levels of Energy reserve and a perk letting you cast spells with a prerequisite of that level of  magery (kind of like in RPM). Level 0 Magery doesn't change.

Analysis

This rule has some pretty big effects:

• Mages have permission to buy more Energy Reserve, as well as an increased incentive
• Bigger Spells are going to be cast more often
  
• Reaching Skill 15 will happen less often
• Mages will have to choose between reliability and efficiency vs. access to the best spells
• Mages will be just a little weaker
  

I think this is a good change in most cases, but it won't be in all cases. Ask yourself if the change fits your campaign. I'll probably be pairing this with my recovery energy tweak, to allow mages who go for power rather than skill to not miss out on that critical ability. I hope this makes your games more interesting!