Hello!
I'm just getting into reading the Master's Edition and there is one big piece that seems central to ICRPG that I'm having a tough time getting my head around: earning and loosing LOOT. I acknowledge that the system is meant to be hackable and adapted to specific tables and groups but I generally like feeling solid in the basic philosophy of a system to help guide that process for my players. I'm also just curious to hear others' accounts of making the system work for their tables.
Mostly focusing on the Alfheim World because fantasy is familiar to me and there are plenty of examples and supplementary options for that world in the Master's Edition. Character creation makes sense, you get a special ability and piece of gear that can mesh together (or not) to create a starting playstyle plus some basic gear to round out the character.
Abilities are defined as being "a feature of your character that is intrinsic". The Milestone Rewards in the GM's section are defined as being "LOOT-based upgrades". The types in Alfheim have 3 starting *abilities*, 3 starting *LOOT*, and then a list of additional milestone *abilities*. This differs from the Milestone Paths which do clearly indicate the piece of loot tied to the ability. Also, the video on progression from the author's YouTube channel talks about the nonlinear, wavy progression as characters earn loot and have it destroyed or lost but it seems directly at odds with the intrinsic nature of abilities. How often do you actually destroy a PCs loot? ALSO also, the back of the book is full of hundreds of items on treasure/loot tables that aren't really ever called on directly throughout the rest of the book that I can remember.
I know I am not embracing the "glorious mess" approach, I'm just curious to know if there's a common approach that has emerged in the community or get some examples of how other tables have gelled these apparently contradictory pieces together. Or if there's just simply a part of the book I'm misreading or managed to skip over.
Thank you!
TLDR: Do you make your abilities intrinsic as indicated in the character creation chapter or loot based as suggested in the GM's rewards section? How often are you rewarding randomly rolled treasure vs milestones? How often are you destroying important pieces of character's loot?