Players Creating New Maneuvers

This is always a sticky point.  A player will generally attempt to concoct a new maneuver for one of the following reasons:

• He wants to sneak by a godly maneuver that will make him dominant in the ring.
• He wants to make up for some perceived shortfall in his character or style.

The first consideration, qualification of the character to make up new maneuvers, should be enough to quash many players right off the bat.  New maneuvers are generally created by masters.  This is especially true of the more powerful maneuvers:  Blanka is identified as the originator of the Beast Roll, Guile is associated with the Flash Kick, and of course the Psycho Crusher is M. Bison's pet technique.  No player character who is not already a recognized master should be normally able to concoct something hyper-advanced, as he just doesn't have the ability to do so.  It's like a 2nd-year Hung Gar student suddenly breaking off to form his own school, declaring himself a master, and inventing new techniques.  Such occurrances are sadly common in today's world of martial arts, but such neophyte "innovators" are typically proven inadequate in practice.

A character who wishes to create a simpler maneuver must still have some degree of mastery over their system, even for something as simple as a 2 point maneuver with low prerequisites.  One must have a firm grasp of the fundamental concepts of movement, direction of force, breathing, etc. particular to one's style before presuming to find new ways to apply them.

The second consideration can save a lot of time and trouble, and is applicable to most "new maneuvers."  Let's say for example a player wants to create the "Double Ox-Horn Punch," a bizarre kung fu maneuver in which both fists come in at the enemy at about shoulder level from a ridiculous position.  It's supposed to be slow, not very mobile, and hard hitting.  Of course in real life practice the double ox-horn punch is generally an invitation to get your ass kicked, but then again so are lots of Street Fighter maneuvers.  A little thought should reveal that the double ox-horn punch can be considered a different way of executing the Buffalo Punch.  The player can simply train the Buffalo Punch as an "any" maneuver for 2 power points, and define its special effect any way he wishes.  Many maneuvers can be modified in this way to give flavor to a style's interpretations of the maneuver, as well as players who wish to stand out from the crowd.

The third consideration is the most troublesome.  Street Fighter as a system is already riddled with stupid and unbalancing maneuvers like the original Cartwheel Kick (way too strong), the Ear Pop (way too weak), etc.  More often than not, a new maneuver proposed by a player will probably be unbalanced in some way to the player's advantage.  Take a careful look at the character who is supposed to be designing the maneuver.  If the technique is, for example, a high damage kick with a Move of +7, and the character in question has Athletics 1 and Kick 5, this is an obvious cheapo way out of that character's deficiencies in mobility and should be disallowed.  "Your Sensei tells you, 'Just work on your footwork, you idiot.'"

The imbalance can be very subtle, too.  One player in Steve Karstensen's campaign came up with a "Deflecting Punch Versus Kicks," which worked exactly like a Deflecting Punch, but (you guessed it) versus kicks.  Why is this bad?  The character who would be using it was a very punch-heavy character who could not kick at all.  How can you concoct a defense like this without knowing some fundamental kicking concepts?  The definition of Deflecting Punch reveals that the simultaneous block and counter are both executed with the same arm.  Versus a kick it makes no sense, like "Elbow Smash Versus the Arch of the Foot."  Physically impossible.  It was just a way for a character to get an abortable counterstriking Block versus all kick techniques that allowed him to continue to dump all his points into Punch.  "Deflecting Kick" makes a little bit more sense, based on kick technique.

Also, look for imbalances in terms of special effects.  Special effects like the Dim Mak's reduction in attributes to the target are counterbalanced by high prerequisites, high power point costs, and lackluster Speed/Damage/Move values.  Watch out for move effects like, "Renders the target unable to Block or move next turn."  If you allow this in, you can bet the player will be comboing it into some insanely high damage strike or sustained hold as soon as possible.  This cheapo shot is usually motivated by the considerations outlines in the previous paragraph.  A master of grappling may try to slip something by you that says, "Decreases Soak vs. Sustained Holds by 2 for 3 turns."  If a special effect is suspicious, simply say it's a master-level technique, come back in 4000 experience points or so.

The fourth consideration is a little easier to deal with.  A new technique should be an outgrowth of the character's experience as a practicioner of a certain style.  No multiple aerial kicking techniques for Sanbo.  It should also be a reflection on the character's fighting style in the chronicle.  If a character is a passive/reactive fighter who relies on Blocks and complex setups, why would he suddenly come out with something like a Widowmaker?

If a new maneuver seems okay to develop, don't let the player dictate the maneuver's system to you.  Let him describe how the maneuver works; you determine the mechanics, modifiers, prerequisites, and costs.  Don't even tell him what they are... let him go off and sequester himself for a while, and let him be surprised with what he comes out with.

Use of Insight Before the Fight

On page 52, there is a little paragraph under Insight, there is a rule about observing another fighter for 3 rounds and then making a Perception + Insight roll to determine style and possibly maneuvers.  This is the defined system I go by:

A character can make a Perception + Insight roll after three rounds of observation, or by watching the target warm up.  One success determines the enemy's style (if the style is unfamiliar to the player, a basic description of it can be fudged).  Each additional success will determine either a Special Maneuver or a Combo.  Because players can quickly learn what maneuvers a fighter has just through mundane observation, an Insight maneuver result will give him the Speed, Damage, and Move modifiers, representing a thorough assessment of that fighter's abilities with that maneuver.  A Combo can only be learned if the player also knows about all of the special maneuvers that go into it, so if a player gets a result that would tell him the enemy has Flying Thrust Kick to Backflip Kick, but is unaware that the enemy has either of these maneuvers, the GM rerolls.

For example, a fighter watches her enemy warm up before a match, and get 3 successes on her Perception + Insight roll.  The Gm tells the player that the enemy studies Wu Shu, and consults the enemy's maneuvers and combos list.  The enemy has the special maneuvers (1) Backflip Kick, (2) Double-Hit Kick, (3) Drunken Monkey Roll, (4) Jump, and (5) Wall Spring, and the combos (6) Block to Short to Roundhouse (Dizzy) and (7) Wall Spring to Double-Hit Kick to Backflip Kick... a total of 7 possible maneuvers or combos that can be gleaned by the attentive player.  The GM generates a random number between 1 and 7 and gets a 5, so the player learns that the enemy has Wall Spring, with its Speed, Damage and Move ratings.  He then gets a 7, but the player isn't sure the enemy has Double-Hit Kick or Backflip Kick, so he rerolls, getting a 6.  Since the combo Block to Short to Roundhouse (Dizzy) doesn't contain any special maneuvers the player hasn't learned about, he tells the player about the combo.

Warming up before the fight is usually mandated to avoid injury, and unless the fighters are all sequestered until the very start of the match, they will have an opportunity to observe and make Insight rolls on one opponent.  Not warming up or doing something dumb like trying to warm up in a deceptive manner will not allow any Insight rolls on the character, but will also incur a penalty... I suggest the critical failure range being increased from a roll of 1 to 1-2.  Enemies will also be making Insight rolls, and will plan accordingly (for example, planning to use a lot of Grabs versus a slow character, and keeping speed and mobility high if everyone on the players' team has Dex 5 and a lot of Block combos).

An insight roll can only be made against a single target once in a while, say 6 months... enough time in the GM's opinion for the target's personal fighting style to change significantly.

Ring Doctors and Aggravated Damage

If the Players' Guide description was adhered to, Ring Doctors could only heal aggravated damage between rounds of a fight.  This is not only completely inaccurate as far as the role of a Ring Doctor goes, it makes Ring Doctors useless for anyone but a duelist.  If you've taken aggravated damage in a standard fight, you've probably lost already.

Here is an alternate system:  Between rounds, a Ring Doctor can temporarily heal non-aggravated damage using ice and compresses, etc., as standard (Wits+Medicine roll, successes = temporary healing).  Keep track of the amount of temporary healing that takes place.  After the fight is over, if the character would normally be unconscious without the Ring Doctor's ministrations, damage below Health 1 is considered aggravated, as if the character had actually taken that much damage during the fight.

Example:  A fighter has 12 Health.  In round one, he takes 4 damage, and the Ring Doctor restores 2 temporarily, placing him at 10.  In round two, he takes 7 damage, and the Ring Doctor heals 3, placing him at 6.  In round 3 he barely wins, taking 4 more damage in the process, placing him at 2 health.  Now that the fight is over, we see that without the Ring Doctor he would be at -3 health; the fighter has 3 points of aggravated damage which must be healed by resting and/or medical attention.

If a Ring Doctor botches a healing roll, one of the character's damage points becomes aggravated.

Ring Doctors are also useful for things like popping dislocated limbs back into place and such, but should not be allowed to remedy the effects of Dim Mak (only Chi Kung Healing or Honor rolls should do this).