Gadgetry
Gadgetry is the ability to build, identify, and use technological devices. The Gadgetry Skill consists of two separate Subskills: Build Gadget* and Identify Gadget. Gadgetry as a means of using a Gadget or the Subskill "Identify Gadget" can be attempted by the unskilled, but to Build Gadget requires that the character have APs in that Subskill! No Ikea-style directions are going to be simple enough for assembling a Gadget worth any Hero Points.
At the time of the White Book's publication back in 1993, computer usage was nowhere near so prevalent as it is today. Acquiring the parts for a computer, building it, programming it, and using the programs on it all would have come under Gadgetry. For a long while, we sort of used it that way in our campaign, with a lot of handwaving and a little use of the Scholar Advantage.
That is no longer necessary for our campaign. We have made a Computer Science skill, complete with subskills of its own, that Dr. Adel Urda-Na discovered herself playtesting for everyone's future heroism.
Gadgetry can be done out in the rough-and-tumble conditions of the adventuring world, but it benefits from the better resources and controlled environmental conditions of a Workshop.
A collaborative Scientist may not be as insightful as a Gadgeteer at puzzling out the function and design of a recently acquired Gadget, but Scientists do usually have a respectable Analysis Subskill that can help determine weaknesses. And once the inner workings of the Gadget has been fully studied, a Scientist also has a Subskill for Drawing Plans. This is where blueprints are drafted for the Gadgeteer's own, superior version of the Gadget. If the Scientist's Laboratory and the Gadgeteer's Workshop happen to be in the same room, why, the new Gadget prototype can benefit from team gadget-building to become more effective than the copied original.
Want to build a Gadget? Have a tutorial!
Want to have a slot in your inventory for a fill-in-the-blank some-sort-of-Gadget like what Batman always has on his utility belt? You have a problem, because one of the two GMs does a whole lot of grumbling when Omni-Gadgets come up in conversation. You can wind up with an Omni-Gadget of certain types, but be prepared to persuade the GM that it will help everyone at the table have a fun story!
On the other hand, a lot of things that could be picked up for $50 or less at WalMart or Target are not treated as Gadgets which cost any Hero Points in our campaign.
Originally from "the White book", a.k.a.
DC Heroes Roleplaying Game Second Edition
DC Heroes Roleplaying Game Second Edition
page 76
published by Mayfair Games
Game Mechanics
Link: Int
Base Cost: 25
Factor Cost: 8
Number of subskills: 2
Type
Technology
Famous in the Field
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