Modifying AB "Invalid Powers" lists?

[zarlor]

I've been looking at getting 50 Fathoms up next (Tour of Darkness and Pirates of the Spanish Main are in Review now, so if anyone want's a "beta" version before they go live just let me know). One of the things implemented in 50 Fathoms, though, is a single AB (Magic) but with 4 different subcategories, Earth, Fire, Water and Air. Each of these categories simply limits which Powers are available to you. I would normally consider this just 4 different ABs, but here's the catch... you can add a category to any one you've chosen as an Edge. It's not like adding a second AB (which presumably you can't really do anyway) but rather just adding Powers that were previously set as Limited by the Sphere chosen.

Anyone have some ideas on how to implement that? I figure I could set up 4 different ABs for each sphere for that initial choice, then create Edges for each of the 4 spheres, but I'm not sure how to make the Edge modify the Power Limitation list. Although is someone has a better idea or different way that might work I'd love to hear it.

[jbearwillis]

Hey I will send you my NightFall file - it not done but the psionics I have done and you can see what I did to get that style to work it you want it zarlor.

[SeeleyOne]

One thing that might work is to have a group. It is like the Factions, which you would use for the first choice. Have the second choice (in Groups) require the edge that provides it. So you would choose "Fire" in Factions, then get an edge for "Water" and select that as a group. The printout would list both Fire and Water by your race, so at a glance you would see that your character is a Fire and Water mage.

[zarlor]

@jbearwillis: Sure! I'd love to see what you've got. If I forgot to send it to you before just send it to zarlor at acm dot org.

@SeeleyOne: The problem with that method is that there are 4 potential types you can take. Having all 4 makes you an "Archmage". So I'm not sure the Group/Faction method would really work, plus I'm not sure how to use that to remove some of the spell limitations from that list.

[zarlor]

OK, I see what you did. Mainly just setting up powers to have PickReqs for the appropriate Edges. So I don't really need to do the preclude powers list so much as just set PickReqs for them. Duh.

[jbearwillis]

LoL simple yet it works. I told you that it wasn't much but it works and seems like your getting extra Arcane backgrounds.

[zarlor]

Yeah, but you could have just told me you did that. I was looking at that file for like an hour before I realized what you did!

[jbearwillis]

LoL Sorry, I told you I'm bad about how I do things, I just try things until they work. Bad about explaining things and I thought it was easy what I did and didn't think about sometimes the easy way is more confusing then the more in depth way. LOL and again sorry about that.

I tried to do a lot of more advanced ways of doing it, by hiding them and such but I couldn't get them to work right so I just went the easy route.

The bad thing is - when someone tells me what they did doesn't work for me as much as seeing what someone did. I have the problem of learning by example then explanation.

[zarlor]

I mostly work well by example, too, but since this one has several places to look it took me a while to realize that I needed to just look at the Powers themselves (rather than the ABs and Edges) and that you just set Pre-Reqs on them. It does work great... well, in the sense that you have to leave all appropriate powers valid so they do show up on the list, but at least they are grayed out and you can set an explanation of why the character can't have it. Worked perfect as the last thing I needed to finish up the 50 Fathoms file. Speaking of which, 50 Fathoms has been sent in for review if anyone wants a Beta copy.

[jbearwillis]

Well I guess as long as you figured it out and it worked - That's all that counts.