A veritile Absorb/Boost setup: seeking advice

[mellowgoth]

Hello, all: Long time listener, first time caller.

No, seriously, I have never played M&M Tabletop, and only made few cahracters for PbP on ther boards. The idea I have for my first character here at FCPbP goes a little something like this:

A younger, struggling adrenaline junkie. His major power set is a combination of Absorbtion powers. He can absorb physical damage to boost Leap, Srike, or Trip (a la the Earth Stomp Super Strength power feat). He can abosrb energy to boost Blast or Strike (like a Shocking Grasp or the biggest Rug-shuffle-static shock ever). ANd I would like to be able to absorb either with the option to Heal.

I've looked at the energy storage extra, and would like to be able to use any physical damage stored to power any of those powers (Leap, Strike,Trip) without needing to decide at the time of the incoming damage, and similar for energy. As I imagine the setup, he WOULD need to decide whether or not to apply incoming damage absorbed to Heal before putting points into storage.

Here is how I imagine the decison tree when the hero (working name: Aftershock) takes Energy or physical damage:

Do you want to use it to heal?

Yes - Good, you feel better

No ----- IS it Physical or energy?

Physical ----Put absorbed points into storage, use later to power Leap, Strike or Trip.

Energy------Put points into a seperate storage bank, use later to power Blast or Strike.

As I had it initially written, I (wihtout the benefit of UP) have it written as follows:

Absorb (Physical) (Boost Leap) (Extras: Energy Storage) (Power Feats: Energy COnversion, SLow fade(1pt/5rds))

ALT: Absorb (Physical) (Boost Strike) (Extras: Energy Storage) (Power Feats: Energy COnversion, SLow fade(1pt/5rds))

ALT: Absorb (Physical) (Boost Trip) (Extras: Energy Storage) (Power Feats: Energy COnversion, SLow fade(1pt/5rds))

Extras on Trip - ARea (centered Burst)

ALT: Absorb (Energy) (Boost Strike) (Extras: Energy Storage) (Power Feats: Energy COnversion, SLow fade(1pt/5rds))

Blast=electrical

ALT: Absorb (Energy) (Boost Blast) (Extras: Energy Storage) (Power Feats: Energy COnversion, SLow fade(1pt/5rds))

Strike-electrical

ALT: Absorb (both) (Boost Heal) (extras: Both types)

Note that, absent incoming damage, he does not possess any of the boosted powers - he must 'charge up' before doing anyhting fancy. Though I am considering giving him a couple of ranks of Super-Movement: Swinging, so , if need be, he can drop himself from about 30 feet before the start of a fight....I figure, it's a heck of a way to make an entrance...

So, all of you experienced types out there, can you give me advice on how to make this setup rulesworthy? Does any of the concentrated babble there make sense? I throw myself upon the mercy of the boards...

Thanks, all,

mellowgoth

[quotemyname]

I used to play This guy. He used absorption.

Absorption is a powerful power. One of my favorites, in fact.

It looks like you're going to want Absorption with the Both types extra that boosts healing as your base effect. essentially gives you:

Do you want to use it to heal?

Yes - Good, you feel better

If you want to be really nasty, make the absorption boost Healing (Extras: Total; Flaws: Personal) for no extra cost.

For the rest of it, things get complicated :/

You'll need energy storage. That much is clear. However, it's been a while since I sat down with the absorption power, so you may want to get a ref ruling, but as it sounds, you can put the points from energy storage into boosting your other powers.

You can use

your stored energy points to fuel your other absorption effects

(Boost or Healing) as desired on a 1 point per rank basis.

So that either means that when your turn rolls around, you can assign those points to anything, or anything you have an AP absorption of.

If it is the later (and it most likely is) just buy a bunch of 1pp alternate powers of all the things you may want to boost. Please note if you switch to those APs and you then get hit, you will not be able to activate the healing power (though you will be able to store the points).

Also, Absorption is tied to impervious toughness so you can't have any more ranks in it than your power level.

Yea, that's all I got for you right now. I hope it helps.

[mellowgoth]

Thank you, quotemyname. It looks like my basic idea is going to work well, then.

If there is a Ref out there that would care to comment, I'd welcome the input: Otherwise, I will whip up a build and post to the character bank.

Thanks,

mellowgoth

[angrydurf]

I'm fairly certain that the energy storage extra will only allow you to plug the points from it into a boost you have an AP of. Also you can't boost higher than the boost rank in the given AP but that shouldn't be much of an issue so long as your base absorption power isn't too low.

The one area that I don't think is going to click is physical only being converted to a subset of powers and Energy to another. Also energy storage can be used for healing later even if you don't immediately use it for that.

To make more sense of this what you're going to need to have is Absorption with Both types as Quote said and energy storage to use it later if you want.

So when hit by any damage you can use it immediately for whatever effect the AP is currently set to. Then as a free action once per round you can switch your AP and use whatever energy is stored on that effect. The most you can store will still be capped by your absorption level of course. But that means that you can absorb something and heal with it later or use a physical attack to power a "energy" power.

You are of course free to limit yourself further for RP purposes but the system doesn't really have the flexibility to do that as it stands. If it was really important you could get 2 absorption powers one for energy and one for physical with whatever boost APs you want linked but you would be paying alot more for that than just getting the both extra.

Also though its kinda obvious absorption counts towards PL caps for toughness saves.