Indeed an interesting debate.
Let's quote the rules as a starting point:
Step One - Start with a normal item and
The basic artifact or creature is free, no matter how weird or exotic. I would use these guidelines, as as start point for a discussion (feel free absolutely to criticize, I am proposing this exactly for this purpose):
- obtaining an item or a creature it is not as going to the shop and buy what you need. It's a great role-playing opportunity, possibly with danger and difficulties if the item is really important.
- a PC can reach only what he knows or can imagine.
- the more a PC has to imagine, the more the GM will use this vagueness against the PC because, you know, things aren't exactly as you imagine...
- an item or a creature that belong to a known class, costs zero points: it's a normal item and it's free.
- An item or a creature that are a special variation of their class may cost points as in the C&I table. These points represent the time needed to find them.
- A zero point item or creature will take only the minimum time requested for the type of approach used to find them (pattern, logrus, ecc.)
So if I were the GM, I would do this way:
1) so you want a bulldozer?
For me a bulldozer costs zero points. It will costs points only if it has some special feature, like "a bulldozer able to speak" so you can command it to start or stop the engine vocally.
If your PC knows what a bulldozer is, this means he knows where to find a shadow where there are bulldozers. So the time to find one is the time to reach that shadow and locate a bulldozer somewhere. The key is that you can have what you can imagine, or what you know already. So if you don't know what a bulldozer is, but someone told you about it or you have seen it in a picture, you will find only what you have imagined and it's probable that it is the wrong thing in some aspect...
2) so you want to find an army of angels?
Angels are a class of beings. Again, does your PC knows angels? Has he seen an angel before? What powers have these angels? What are their limits? Who they serve and why? For the bulldozer we didn't need these information, because we all know (approximately!) how it works. Once you find them, why these powerful beings should come with you to fight? The PC must present arguments because this has to happen, possibly via role-playing.
If we have defined what a normal angel is, it costs zero point for me. Only if you take a
normal angel and make him special you have to spend the points.
3) so you want to find Superman?
He is not a class, he is a person. Does your PC knows him? Does he only imagine him, perhaps reading some comic? So, define his powers and points. If I remember well, only under a yellow sun superman has his powers, but under a red sun... Maybe he's not that great resource in the end... And may be that he will kill you under his sun because he is stronger than you. This suggest me that the stronger the creature, the harder is to control it, and the more powerful the item, the more probable someone else is trying to get it.
And of course you have to spend the point only to make that special item as
your somehow.