Gravity Variants

Heridfel · February 6, 2008

I'd want another referee to look over the other possible Areas. I would definitely reduce the distance of the Line from 50 ft./rank to 25 ft./rank. Even if the Explosive Line Trip were allowed, anyone within the line would be able to make a Reflex save to only be hit with half the usual effect, which offsets some of the benefits of no to-hit roll being required.

With Immovable, i'm looking as much as your descriptors as I am the power description itself. If you don't have something to brace yourself against, how will attracting the ground keep you in one place? You would need to pin yourself between several things in that case, and they'd all need to be in the same inertial frame. That wouldn't allow for the moon or some other celestial body to keep you Immovable while swinging.

Heridfel · February 6, 2008

I'd want another referee to look over the other possible Areas. I would definitely reduce the distance of the Line from 50 ft./rank to 25 ft./rank. Even if the Explosive Line Trip were allowed, anyone within the line would be able to make a Reflex save to only be hit with half the usual effect, which offsets some of the benefits of no to-hit roll being required.

With Immovable, i'm looking as much as your descriptors as I am the power description itself. If you don't have something to brace yourself against, how will attracting the ground keep you in one place? You would need to pin yourself between several things in that case, and they'd all need to be in the same inertial frame. That wouldn't allow for the moon or some other celestial body to keep you Immovable while swinging.

JDRook · February 6, 2008

I'd want another referee to look over the other possible Areas. I would definitely reduce the distance of the Line from 50 ft./rank to 25 ft./rank. Even if the Explosive Line Trip were allowed, anyone within the line would be able to make a Reflex save to only be hit with half the usual effect, which offsets some of the benefits of no to-hit roll being required.

I was basing the Explosion range variants on the base explosion, which just doubles the radius of a burst but has the damage reduction over distance to balance it out. Mathematically, they'd do the same amount of damage/area, but I do agree it feels unbalanced. 25ft/rank is the basic line area, though. Maybe creating a Reduced Damage over Distance Power Drawback would be more workable. Probably 3 points since it would always be in effect but isn't that limiting. Would only work on ranged or area affect powers though, since I don't see an easy way to make it work for persistent.

With Immovable, i'm looking as much as your descriptors as I am the power description itself. If you don't have something to brace yourself against, how will attracting the ground keep you in one place? You would need to pin yourself between several things in that case, and they'd all need to be in the same inertial frame. That wouldn't allow for the moon or some other celestial body to keep you Immovable while swinging.

I'd have to agree with that. I was imagining a web of gravitation holding him in the air, but that doesn't feel right. No Immovable with swinging makes sense.

On the other hand, wouldn't that also make it a viable flaw? And would "Only useable when sufficiently braced" be appropriate for the ranged trip and TK?

Wow, sorry this got so complicated. Hope you like it crunchy!

PS - Changed the array so using Immovability while swinging isn't possible and therefore a moot point, but now tempted to flaw Immovable to maximum 5ft per round on a solid surface.

JDRook · February 6, 2008

I'd want another referee to look over the other possible Areas. I would definitely reduce the distance of the Line from 50 ft./rank to 25 ft./rank. Even if the Explosive Line Trip were allowed, anyone within the line would be able to make a Reflex save to only be hit with half the usual effect, which offsets some of the benefits of no to-hit roll being required.

I was basing the Explosion range variants on the base explosion, which just doubles the radius of a burst but has the damage reduction over distance to balance it out. Mathematically, they'd do the same amount of damage/area, but I do agree it feels unbalanced. 25ft/rank is the basic line area, though. Maybe creating a Reduced Damage over Distance Power Drawback would be more workable. Probably 3 points since it would always be in effect but isn't that limiting. Would only work on ranged or area affect powers though, since I don't see an easy way to make it work for persistent.

With Immovable, i'm looking as much as your descriptors as I am the power description itself. If you don't have something to brace yourself against, how will attracting the ground keep you in one place? You would need to pin yourself between several things in that case, and they'd all need to be in the same inertial frame. That wouldn't allow for the moon or some other celestial body to keep you Immovable while swinging.

I'd have to agree with that. I was imagining a web of gravitation holding him in the air, but that doesn't feel right. No Immovable with swinging makes sense.

On the other hand, wouldn't that also make it a viable flaw? And would "Only useable when sufficiently braced" be appropriate for the ranged trip and TK?

Wow, sorry this got so complicated. Hope you like it crunchy!

PS - Changed the array so using Immovability while swinging isn't possible and therefore a moot point, but now tempted to flaw Immovable to maximum 5ft per round on a solid surface.

JDRook · February 6, 2008

I'd want another referee to look over the other possible Areas. I would definitely reduce the distance of the Line from 50 ft./rank to 25 ft./rank. Even if the Explosive Line Trip were allowed, anyone within the line would be able to make a Reflex save to only be hit with half the usual effect, which offsets some of the benefits of no to-hit roll being required.

I was basing the Explosion range variants on the base explosion, which just doubles the radius of a burst but has the damage reduction over distance to balance it out. Mathematically, they'd do the same amount of damage/area, but I do agree it feels unbalanced. 25ft/rank is the basic line area, though. Maybe creating a Reduced Damage over Distance Power Drawback would be more workable. Probably 3 points since it would always be in effect but isn't that limiting. Would only work on ranged or area affect powers though, since I don't see an easy way to make it work for persistent.

With Immovable, i'm looking as much as your descriptors as I am the power description itself. If you don't have something to brace yourself against, how will attracting the ground keep you in one place? You would need to pin yourself between several things in that case, and they'd all need to be in the same inertial frame. That wouldn't allow for the moon or some other celestial body to keep you Immovable while swinging.

I'd have to agree with that. I was imagining a web of gravitation holding him in the air, but that doesn't feel right. No Immovable with swinging makes sense.

On the other hand, wouldn't that also make it a viable flaw? And would "Only useable when sufficiently braced" be appropriate for the ranged trip and TK?

Wow, sorry this got so complicated. Hope you like it crunchy!

PS - Changed the array so using Immovability while swinging isn't possible and therefore a moot point, but now tempted to flaw Immovable to maximum 5ft per round on a solid surface.

Heridfel · February 7, 2008

I hadn't realized it before, but the Line's size was reduced in UP to 10 feet per rank. I was assuming that you went up one step on the Time/Value Progression Table, which would go back to the 25 ft./rank.

The flaw you suggest for Immovable seems sufficiently limiting to me.

Heridfel · February 7, 2008

I hadn't realized it before, but the Line's size was reduced in UP to 10 feet per rank. I was assuming that you went up one step on the Time/Value Progression Table, which would go back to the 25 ft./rank.

The flaw you suggest for Immovable seems sufficiently limiting to me.

Heridfel · February 7, 2008

I hadn't realized it before, but the Line's size was reduced in UP to 10 feet per rank. I was assuming that you went up one step on the Time/Value Progression Table, which would go back to the 25 ft./rank.

The flaw you suggest for Immovable seems sufficiently limiting to me.

JDRook · February 8, 2008

Ok, I did it again. More complexity, but I'll do it in stages so as not too overload you.

Stage 1: The Encumbering Flaw

I know you said the Immovable flaw was fine, but I got started thinking about the why of the flaw and blew it up. The Encumbering flaw inflicts the equivalent rank of Gravity Control on Stickler, which is the heavy load of rank * 5 in STR. I'll break down the numbers more later, but basically that would mean he could only use a couple ranks without effect, but start being weighed down in the 3-5 range, depending on whether he's using his enhanced Str. With the way I have him configured so far, he could only use up to rank 6 without falling prone or requiring some kind of bracing, not to mention all the penalties. It's a pretty heavy flaw (no pun intended), but I really like it, and it fits the concept really well. It should probably be worth more than -1, but with the array set up I'm not saving any points and I don't know if I'd give it any feats or extras.

The new array would look like this:

Movement Array: 11pp total

dP: Super-Movement wall-crawling 3 [6] + PF: Subtle 1 + PF: Dynamic 1 = 8pp

dAP: Immovable 1, Encumbering -1: 10 Ranks [5] + PF: Dynamic 1 = [6]

plus Concealment (Scent Class) 2, Distracting -1: 2 ranks [2] = [8] 2pp

AP: Super-Movement Swinging 1 [2] + PF: Subtle 1 = [3]

plus Speed 1, Swinging only -1: 4 ranks [2] = [5] 1pp

JDRook · February 8, 2008

Ok, I did it again. More complexity, but I'll do it in stages so as not too overload you.

Stage 1: The Encumbering Flaw

I know you said the Immovable flaw was fine, but I got started thinking about the why of the flaw and blew it up. The Encumbering flaw inflicts the equivalent rank of Gravity Control on Stickler, which is the heavy load of rank * 5 in STR. I'll break down the numbers more later, but basically that would mean he could only use a couple ranks without effect, but start being weighed down in the 3-5 range, depending on whether he's using his enhanced Str. With the way I have him configured so far, he could only use up to rank 6 without falling prone or requiring some kind of bracing, not to mention all the penalties. It's a pretty heavy flaw (no pun intended), but I really like it, and it fits the concept really well. It should probably be worth more than -1, but with the array set up I'm not saving any points and I don't know if I'd give it any feats or extras.

The new array would look like this:

Movement Array: 11pp total

dP: Super-Movement wall-crawling 3 [6] + PF: Subtle 1 + PF: Dynamic 1 = 8pp

dAP: Immovable 1, Encumbering -1: 10 Ranks [5] + PF: Dynamic 1 = [6]

plus Concealment (Scent Class) 2, Distracting -1: 2 ranks [2] = [8] 2pp

AP: Super-Movement Swinging 1 [2] + PF: Subtle 1 = [3]

plus Speed 1, Swinging only -1: 4 ranks [2] = [5] 1pp

JDRook · February 8, 2008

Ok, I did it again. More complexity, but I'll do it in stages so as not too overload you.

Stage 1: The Encumbering Flaw

I know you said the Immovable flaw was fine, but I got started thinking about the why of the flaw and blew it up. The Encumbering flaw inflicts the equivalent rank of Gravity Control on Stickler, which is the heavy load of rank * 5 in STR. I'll break down the numbers more later, but basically that would mean he could only use a couple ranks without effect, but start being weighed down in the 3-5 range, depending on whether he's using his enhanced Str. With the way I have him configured so far, he could only use up to rank 6 without falling prone or requiring some kind of bracing, not to mention all the penalties. It's a pretty heavy flaw (no pun intended), but I really like it, and it fits the concept really well. It should probably be worth more than -1, but with the array set up I'm not saving any points and I don't know if I'd give it any feats or extras.

The new array would look like this:

Movement Array: 11pp total

dP: Super-Movement wall-crawling 3 [6] + PF: Subtle 1 + PF: Dynamic 1 = 8pp

dAP: Immovable 1, Encumbering -1: 10 Ranks [5] + PF: Dynamic 1 = [6]

plus Concealment (Scent Class) 2, Distracting -1: 2 ranks [2] = [8] 2pp

AP: Super-Movement Swinging 1 [2] + PF: Subtle 1 = [3]

plus Speed 1, Swinging only -1: 4 ranks [2] = [5] 1pp

JDRook · February 10, 2008

Stage 2: Simulated Inverse Power Law Flaw

We'd discussed Explosive area effect and possible variations for that, which didn't really work out. This is roughly the same idea, but pretty customized.

As I suspect you know, gravity (and several other phenomena) drops in intensity inversely proportional to the square of the distance from the source. So gravity felt by a target 100ft from source is 1/4 as strong as gravity felt by a second target at 50ft. Essentially, strength drops quickly but has at least a slight effect over distance.

MnM doesn't really have that level of granularity (and I'm thankful for that) so I thought a simple way to simulate it would be to simply have rank drop to half rounded up every range increment. So for a rank 10 TK, the first 100ft range increment could do the full 10 ranks, the second would be 5, the third 3, then 2, then 1, and stay at 1 to the end of range.

10, 5, 3, 2, 1, 1, . . . 1.

I think this would give the right feel for the power. For more accuracy, I guess it should actually drop one quarter each rank (eg 10, 3, 1, ... 1.) but that seems less interesting to me.

The main qualities of the flaw to me are the close range strength and the "long tail" at the end. I wrote up the array that would have the effect, and even included an extra Perception Range rank 1 power to simulate the long tail effect.

Gravity Pull Array: 18pp total

Trip 1, Knockforward +1, Explosive Area +1, Touch Range -1: 6 ranks (12) + PF: Indirect 3 + PF: Subtle = 16pp

AP: Trip 1, Knockback +1, Simulated Inverse Power Law -1, Side Effect -1: 8 ranks (4) + PF: Indirect 3 + PF: Subtle 1 = [8]

plus Trip 1, Knockback +1, Perception +1: 1 rank (3) + PF: Indirect 3 + PF: Subtle 1 = [7] 1pp

AP: Telekinesis 2, Explosive Area +1, One Direction -2, Touch Range -1: 8 Ranks (4) + PF: Subtle = [5]

plus Telekinesis 2, One Direction -2, Simulated Inverse Power Law -1, Side Effect -1: 8 Ranks (2) + PF: Subtle 1 = [3]

plus Telekinesis 2, Perception +1, One Direction -2: 1 rank (1) + PF: Subtle 1 = [2] 1pp

The Side effect is the anchoring we discussed earlier. It should inflict a Trip of equal rank to Stickler's power use any time he uses the power on a target that

either outweighs him or is braced against movement. With the flaw on Immovable, this should make it worth being a Side Effect.

I've also included 3 points of Indirect for the Trip Knockbacks until it's decided by two refs whether I need them all. I do intend to give Stickler quite a few Grappling feats and a lot of Toughness, so Knockforwards could be useful to him, provided they don't knock him over.

JDRook · February 10, 2008