OK, I am just going to fight through the weird feeling of these being preachy or coming across as egotistical and instead just talk about something weird that I have sort of stumbled into as I have been designing this ttrpg.
I am writing rules. I am writing what you can and can't do in the game. I have found that letting players do stuff is only interesting if they normally can't do that thing. Most of the time I try to work in the realm of making the player do something that everyone can do but do it really well. This usually is something useful and consistent that has power through its consistency. Stuff like static bonuses, re-rolls, or rewards from a success on a skill check are pretty standard fair. On the flip side of this, there are times where I provide the player something intentionally game breaking. Like Prometheus providing flame to the humans... ok, maybe I should cool it on that if I started this post by talking about egotistical/preachy stuff.
There is something that I try to tell the few people that I interact with that want to get into fighting games to find a character or strategy that feels like cheating. This is kind of what I have seen ttrpg players do time and time again. They find ways to cheat within the rules. Powerful builds using the mechanics of the game. When it comes to D&D and Pathfinder a lot of time these seem like oversights or unintended interactions between mechanics. These are the things that bad DM's cry about and power gamers use to prove their worth at a table of roleplayers when they nuke the campaign nemesis before they could finish their monologue to the player about knowing the true history of their long lost parents.
The strange thing I have noticed is in indie ttrpgs these abilities or builds don't seem like oversights. They seem intentional or at the very least left there with a willing ignorance and trust in the people playing the game. This is kind of exactly what I want the Sources (your character archetype that dictates your BIG powers) to be about. They break the game because the Fated need to stand out in a world of titanic monsters and powerful magic. Let me break down two sources that I think shows this off the best
The Oath
Be it to a former hero, principled leader, newly ascended god, or even to the people of your hometown it is your oath to them for a better tomorrow that pushes you forward. The simple act of binding one to something greater than themselves holds a great power. This oath is both a promise and a guide to your life. Straying from the path you set yourself can have consequences.
Hold true Oath Sworn, humility is your power and hope is your blade
Bear the Burden: You may spend 2 influence to have the outcome of an enemy attack or ability on an ally be redirect to you. The outcome is halved on you.
Light in the Dark: every time your allies fail a roll you gain 1 temporary influence that must be spent on your next turn. These cannot exceed your maximum influence total.
Willing Martyr: When you are below half vitality you can choose to allow all attacks and effects upon you to succeed but you cannot be reduced below 1 vitality for the round. At the end of your next turn you die unless you spend 2 influence. You are able to be revived if brought to the place where you swore your oath or an appropriate location dictated by the fated and storyteller.
Ok, so this is the source of The Oath with a Fated that uses this source being called "Oath Sworn". This is meant to be the knight in shining armor/paladin archetype but in reality can be any character that is attempting to be an example for those around them.
This source is meant for you to be a pillar for your group that is able to hold things together until the group can turn the tide of things. If your team keeps failing rolls you can keep feeding Willing Martyr and remain unkillable. Not only can you not die but you can also redirect damage or debuffs on to yourself while not dying from them. It is a careful balance, you need some influence to maintain Willing Martyr so you can't use too much to bail your buddies out. To those of you who might be saying "Richard, this sounds suspiciously like FFXIV Dark Knight..." I would say to you "Shut your damn mouth and Dark Knight is self-love".
Now, on to the complete other side of the spectrum...
Blood
The blood in your veins holds a power that has coursed through your lineage. It’s source, from the monsters you fight. Your enemy is courses through you, you are at war with yourself. More importantly, you are at war with them. The power that they used to claim this world is now in your hands. Take it back.
Be wary Blood Sworn, lest the power of monsters makes you one
Channeled Fury: You can spend 2 influence to make an attack at any range. By adding more humanity you can empower it further with every 2 points granting you +1 to damage and additional effects, these are additive:
2 points: you can move the target one range bracket
4 points: the opponent is made vulnerable
6 points: the attack cannot be avoided
8 points: the target dies, your turn ends. Succeed on a stability check or take 4 points of damage
Scion’s Boon: Every time you use humanity you heal 1 vitality at the start of your next turn
Bloodletting: At the start of your turn you may choose to gain 2 influence but you take 1 vitality damage. Humanity tokens gained this way can exceed your maximum. You may do this multiple times
Ah yes, blood. This is meant to sort of be sorcerers. I also gotta say that sorcerers have some of the coolest thematic magic out of D&D/Pathfinder. Inheriting magic through a lineage or because of essentially area specific magical radiation is wild. I really wanted to capture this idea that you are wielding magic that is WAAAAAAY beyond the scope of a mortal to wield and it does not play nice with your biology. I can see there being two ways to play this source:
you can focus on the healing aspect of it and using influence sparingly to be able keep yourself healthy through out a combat.
choose the biggest enemy, drop everything into channeled fury, smile as you are entirely consumed in the back blast of annihilation you have unleashed knowing that you are not going alone (hopefully)
Of course there is a cost to this, but I have also never met a ttrpg player that doesn't crave that moment where they can do the cool thing (especially when the cool thing is self-destructive). I am going to blame some of this on my s/o who in every game I have been in with them as jumped at the chance to have their character killed to test something with only dubious ways of getting info out of it or bringing them back in one piece. Either way, this source lets you just kill something. Not with damage. Not with some failed save. You put in the points and the target dies.
After writing this I feel like I need to go back and re-tool the other sources to give them this sort of power. Just some defining feature that requires you to play around it. Willing Martyr and Channeled Fury offer wild power but there are costs associated with both of them. I still am not fully locked in on the Sources of Nature and Progress, in fact Progress is barely worked on. What I am considering right now is having Nature have some form of reincarnation. Actually, let's break down that a bit...
Just a heads up, this is straight design brain vomit. Things might get technical...
So, the design concept for the Source of Nature is about bonuses for staying at maximum influence. So, if the maximum provides bonuses then there are two questions that are needed to be asked.
Is there going to be a mechanic for regaining influence?
What should be the benefit for not being at maximum?
So, we can't have Nature be an influence battery because that is what Mortality does. I also really do not like options that make you roll more dice to gain benefits, like avoiding damage or regaining some resource. So, why not have a buffer pool of influence? Well, that would mean that Green Sworn fated would be a lot more reliant on their directions to do things. It is kind of an enabling source in that sense. Like, a Green Sworn can just do more than other sources. It is sort of a boring cheat which is making me not be 100% sold on it. It just doesn't feel active enough.
I was considering something using terrain features, because I love wood elves from Warhammer fantasy. The idea that when the fated is in a terrain feature, like a forest or ruins, then they would be be able to ignore the influence cost for something once per turn... or something like that. The problem then is every Green Sworn will just play generally the same. They would all just be hanging out in shrubs shooting magic or attacks out of it. I think that Green Sworn interacting with terrain is a cool idea space but being static in it doesn't feel quite right. Now teleporting between terrain features or even creating them sounds bigger nifty.
Here is also something that is colouring the creation of the Source of Nature with my own perspective. I think that wild shaping, however cool it is to become a bear and wreck some shit, is more exciting as a numeric concept than a narrative concept. For me, combat wild shape feels underwhelming because your character is no longer the one that is doing something and it is whatever creature is doing that. Basically, it is an ability that replaces your character with something better which feels weird. I will not pretend to not be aware that has become part of the drudic archetype but I think there is a better way...
WEREWOLVES! Well, sort of. More the idea of taking on key traits of a creature than fully changing into it. You don't need to replace your character with a wolf if you can have the claws, fangs, fur, and ability to run for miles. The real key to this is the wiggle room because if someone wants to be a whole ass wolf they can still fluff it like that. Still, I think it is really cool to pick and choose what parts of nature to manifest on your character. Eh, maybe it is just me but still adapting to a situation feels like a more natural thing than just becoming something entirely different.
Ok, well... now I have direction on that... hope that wasn't too difficult to follow or dry.