How to Make and Think About a Trait

Working on characters for the main rule book, hoping that examples will help illustrate one approach to Trait creation, and one character had a power-set that waned and waxed with the moon.

What to do?

Having seen powers/ abilities/ items/ etc... with stipulations like this in games before, usually, the burden fell to the GM to determine at what phase the moon was in, what time of day it was, where the red moon was in relation to the black moon, if it was an even numbered day, etc.

Ugh....

I hate saying no to a player, but I also hate seeing yes all the time, and i also like abilities like this, maybe due to being a Nighthawk fan.

I considered having situational bonuses and setbacks assigned to the affected Traits, but that still left the burden on the GM to make a call...

I stepped back and tried to look at it a different way, and I came up with this:

LUNAR CYCLE DEPENDENT POWERS (9) 1/1/1
Link (+5)
Fickle
Disadvantage- this trait can only be used to link with other powers
Disadvantage- if the fickle roll fails in an action scene, this trait cannot be used for that scene

This Trait can be used each scene if the fickle roll succeeds, if the player chooses. If the roll fails, which won't happen too often, the moon must be in the wrong phase.

Looking at the Trait this way, gives the player a fun way to have the power description they want, by having there be some good Linking opportunities, and unless the GM really wants to keep a lunar calendar handy, lets the story be told with a minimum of complication.