GURPSよろず

Character templates, especially those describing high-powered roles, can be complex mazes of interdependent lists and choices. Wildcard skills offer a way to turn them back into the “quick-start” tools they were meant to be. The path is relatively straightforward ―― a template already has a high concept that’s easily adapted to a wildcard!

　To simplify an existing template, begin by bundling its primary and secondary skill lists into a wildcard skill. If the template makes a Talent mandatory ―― say, Green Thumb for a druid or Business Acumen for a merchant ―― then add in all of the skills that covers, too. These steps will usually do the job, but if the included skills are too few in number (less than a dozen) or overlap excessively (e.g., a lengthy collection of Guns skills for a commando), then add background skills to flesh out the wildcard.

　Occasionally, a template covers a group of related professions or requires numerous choices from lists. If its divisions seem needlessly tedious, just assume that the wildcard is for cinematic polymaths and includes everything. If the distinctions are meaningful, or if lumping all the skills together would result in excessive breadth, it’s better to come up with several wildcards ―― one per strong subtype ―― and reduce the necessary decisions to one: “Which wildcard do I pick?”

　After that, remove the incorporated skills and associated Talents from the template. Replace them with the wildcard or choice of wildcards just worked out. Spend the points assigned to the deleted traits on as much of the wildcard(s) as they’ll buy. Add leftovers to discretionary pools for advantages, background skills, and special abilities.

　Template-specific wildcards don’t replace the relevant templates’ standard skills in the campaign in general. They’re for people for whom all of the constituent skills are vital ―― that is, for heroes built using the associated templates. Characters designed freeform or based on unrelated templates buy individual skills normally. A simple-but-effective way to make this clear is to name template wildcards after the matching templates (or vice versa).

　Not every template needs a wildcard! Some templates may involve too few skills for this to be worthwhile. Templates meant for ordinary NPCs instead of or as well as PCs ―― or for people who aren’t supposed to wield special abilities in campaigns where wildcards represent such (see Special Ability, p. 7) ―― may omit cinematic components by design. It might even be that the only templates with wildcards are those without other exceptional abilities such as powers and magic spells.

　For a more radical simplification of templates with wildcards, see Ultimate Template Wildcards (above).

　Another alternative is for the campaign to feature a broad wildcard skill set spanning all the tasks the GM believes are likely to really matter, and to define character templates through combinations of these.
If templates already exist, a practical method is to dump all of their skills together and then divvy up the combined list among a modest number of wildcards (about twice the number of templates works) whose high concepts match key activities.
Then for each template, identify one to three standard skill sets that most overlap wildcards, and reassign their point allotment to the associated wildcards.
Make sure that a few points remain to buy important standard skills that fall between the cracks.

　For instance, a high-fantasy campaign might specify just three key combat wildcards (Archery!, Light Weapons!, and Heavy Weapons!), plus several noncombat wildcards (Outdoorsman!, Rogue!, Social!, etc.). The charismatic bard then receives Social! and a little Rogue!, leaving combat to standard weapon skills; the cunning thief gets Rogue! and a touch of Light Weapons!; the pure fighter pours everything into Heavy Weapons!; the hardy barbarian splits points between Heavy Weapons! and Outdoorsman!; and the equally wilderness-loving ranger enjoys Archery! and Outdoorsman!, relying on standard skills in a melee.

　As this simple example illustrates, the wildcards go with tasks rather than specific templates. For a complete worked example, see GURPS Monster Hunters 1: Champions.

For the first class of wildcard skills ―― those corresponding to templates ―― anything in Additional Benefits (pp. 10-15) might fit, but the starring role goes to Hyper-Competency (pp. 12-13).
This gives players a potent tool for playing their characters’ roles with style.
The GM may want to consider invoking this rule for all wildcards in the campaign, but using the “accelerated” schedule for Wildcard Points for template-specific skills and/or allowing heroes to spend their WP on a wider range of options when performing their templates’ core functions.

For the second category of wildcards ―― building blocks ―― extra benefits are especially important.
Heroes will often have more than one wildcard, and this costly collection will seem inefficient if it brings nothing special to the table.
Here, too, anything works but Hyper-Competency works best.
A particularly effective tool is to allow all the wildcards that define a template to use the “common pool” option (p. 13) and thus empower each other in play.

In either case, don’t skimp on Other Bonuses (pp. 13-15).
The best options focus less on the wildcards’ constituent skills than on beefing up the templates the wildcards serve to define.
Bonuses to rolls to use template-specific advantages are especially effective.
The same goes for bonuses that replace the most attractive benefits of expensive advantages; e.g., spending points on a wildcard that gives bonus Accuracy, instead of on Gunslinger or Heroic Archer ―― or on one that grants a ST bonus, instead of on Weapon Master ―― can yield impressive results.
Tricks like restricting bonus poison and trap damage to assassins and thieves, bonus healing to medics, and initiative bonuses to fighters can also bolster each template’s niche.
And bonuses to allies’ rolls can help to explain why a team boasts adventurers built on a wide range of templates.

If the GM wants, template wildcards (p. 17-20) needn’t name any standard skills. Instead, each wildcard enables a character built using the associated template to perform every skilled task definitive of whatever the template represents: culture, dramatic niche, occupation, etc. The wildcard includes all skills conceivably tied to the template, subject to an overarching condition: “Only when playing my role.” Thus, such a wildcard covers a role’s tasks more than its skills.

When a character is playing his part in the campaign, every skilled activity involves a roll against the most suitable attribute modified by his relative skill level with his template wildcard. When he isn’t, he’s stuck using standard skills. In borderline cases, the GM’s word is final ―― though it’s more fun to put it to a vote!

For this to work out, the gaming group has to agree on a set of roles, and then every player must buy a wildcard associated with such a role. Everybody needs to be a good sport, too. If the group contains power-gamers who strive to stake a claim to every possible task ―― or players who can’t agree to an equitable division of labor between characters with similar skills ―― this approach is doomed.

　Most rules for wildcard skills tacitly assume that it’s PCs who use them. This needn’t be so.
An NPC might have a wildcard that amounts to “The skill of everything the plot calls for me to know or be good at.”
This is an extension of ultimate template wildcards to characters for whom brief stats blocks or scrawled notes take the place of templates.

This device makes it straightforward to grade NPCs as anything from “fodder” with attribute-3 level to “experts” with impressive competence. When the GM isn’t tracking NPC point value, it simplifies many impromptu encounters to “Pick a level and get on with the adventure!”

　Friendly/Neutral NPCs: Experts have Sage!, servants know Flunky!, kindly strangers use Samaritan!, and so on. The GM might spend the points of Allies, Dependents, and Patrons on such skills.

　Contacts (pp. B44-45): These are trickier than Allies because they’re defined by a skill level, not a point total. Wildcards are so broad that Contacts who have them cost triple ―― just as wildcards do relative to Very Hard skills. A “Contact!” can provide any sort of help that has a plausible relationship to his area of expertise.

Hostile NPCs: Foes boast wildcards like Guard!, Mugger!, Orc!, and Thug! ―― and Enemies might spend points on skills like this. These mostly cover standard skills for violence and deception.

Monsters: Even nonsapient enemies can play. Rather than worry about all the skills a tigress might have, give her Tiger! at, say, attribute+2 so she can climb, fight, and stalk at DX+2, swim at HT+2, track at Per+2, and so on.