Post by narrativium on Feb 26, 2005 17:15:35 GMT -5
Greetings all, nice forum you have here (my first post ).
I'm GMing for the first time (ever in any system) tomorrow. My group are building 40 stone characters and I've got plot, challenges, puzzles and enemies to throw at them... but one of the players came up with a character who presents an interesting challenge to probably any GM.
The Copy-copy-copy-copy-cat:
Int 3, Str 1, Agi 1, Spd 1, Dur 1.
General Knowledge 3, No Bonus
Social Skills 1
Copy Ability/Action/Modifier
Duplicate Self
Wealth 0
That's 64 stones, so he's picked out 24 stones worth of challenges, including Mutant, Psychological: Teen Angst, Relatives who don't know he has superpowers, Afraid of the opposite sex, a hefty dose of Stick up for the Underdog...
Even so, with Copy and Duplicate, two 30-stone modifiers, a number of members of the group have deemed this a broken character. Any power or statistic one of the group has, he and his dupes can have too. Since he's only taken two actions, he has seven boxes available for new actions per dupe, which makes ganging up on him impossible. Since Duplicate isn't an Action, he can create any number of new dupes and still use two actions against an enemy, and at Dur 1 (assuming he doesn't copy an enemy Durability) he can't lose stones when a dupe gets killed.
It's also not clear from the Copy rules how you specify powers to copy - can you pick a GM character and copy all their powers, including the ones you don't know about? Our example was this - in close combat with Daredevil, could you also copy his legal skills to solve some other problem you were having?
For that matter, can you steal Actions acquired through experience - Vehicle Ops, General Knowledge, Social Skills (particularly contacts, rather than charm/bluff type specialities), Ninja? So far we're ruling yes.
The limit we've picked out is this: he can't steal the Intelligence-Energy rule, and he can't steal equipment or technology. An enemy with a sword or powered armour still has the advantage.
Our more detailed ruling went like this. They're still 30 stone powers, worth giving the player some latitude, and it's not like the character can't die...
Example One: Two dupes of our CopyCat A1 and A2, and a Companion B, stand in a line, no closer than 8ft to the next guy. So, A2 can copy B's powers, but A1 can't. We rule that A1 can also not steal A2's copy of B's powers. On the other hand A2 could legitimately create another dupe, who, being within 10ft of B, could also become empowered. So, A and B can give B an effective radius of a mile, but they can't cover the world.
Example Two: B has Vehicle Ops 5, enough to fly a plane, but is wounded. Copycat A creates several dupes, all of whom come close enough to B to copy the power, then take places in the cockpit. Let's say for the original A, Vehicle Ops now occupies the ninth Action box, but A doesn't have the Speciality General Knowledge in Geography to know where to fly to. B has this knowledge. A cannot absorb this knowledge and augment his existing General Knowledge; instead he must drop a power and take on a second General Knowledge Action in order to navigate.
Example Three: A bad guy, Villain, appears. The copycat chooses to copy his opponent's powers, not knowing their full extent. We rule that, so long as the copycat has empty Action Boxes, rather than the GM revealing his character's powers the GM can determine which Villain powers are also transferred. The Copycat may accidentally become invisible or set fire to his clothes or something.
Creating Challenges.
Steal Superpower won't restrict this character, unless you get the last and original one. Copycat copies Steal Superpower and as soon as they touch they're both unconscious for a minute. If they fall on each other for long enough they're both comatose... less than ideal.
Suppress Mutant Power will restrict the dupes in range to their original profile, and they can't make new dupes or be re-absorbed until they're out of range.
For one villain, who I wanted to keep superior, I came up with a new Invulnerability. Like Suppress Mutant Power, only personal - no range.
Invulnerability to Power-Stealing, 10 white stones.
Immune to Steal Superpower and Copy Ability/Action/Modifier. Immune to Drain Energy, too, unless it's used at range. It's not a case of you suppress the powers of an individual you touch, so much as they just don't affect you - a character you touch is perfectly capable of making a Power Fist or Stealing Powers, so it'll work against anyone else they're in contact with.
Just to try and equal some odds... though I don't know if it's too cheap or too expensive or about right.
Anyway... what do you think? We'll be letting the character play for at least one session, and we've got some back-up characters in case it gets really stupidly silly, but I like to throw out ideas and get feedback.
I'm GMing for the first time (ever in any system) tomorrow. My group are building 40 stone characters and I've got plot, challenges, puzzles and enemies to throw at them... but one of the players came up with a character who presents an interesting challenge to probably any GM.
The Copy-copy-copy-copy-cat:
Int 3, Str 1, Agi 1, Spd 1, Dur 1.
General Knowledge 3, No Bonus
Social Skills 1
Copy Ability/Action/Modifier
Duplicate Self
Wealth 0
That's 64 stones, so he's picked out 24 stones worth of challenges, including Mutant, Psychological: Teen Angst, Relatives who don't know he has superpowers, Afraid of the opposite sex, a hefty dose of Stick up for the Underdog...
Even so, with Copy and Duplicate, two 30-stone modifiers, a number of members of the group have deemed this a broken character. Any power or statistic one of the group has, he and his dupes can have too. Since he's only taken two actions, he has seven boxes available for new actions per dupe, which makes ganging up on him impossible. Since Duplicate isn't an Action, he can create any number of new dupes and still use two actions against an enemy, and at Dur 1 (assuming he doesn't copy an enemy Durability) he can't lose stones when a dupe gets killed.
It's also not clear from the Copy rules how you specify powers to copy - can you pick a GM character and copy all their powers, including the ones you don't know about? Our example was this - in close combat with Daredevil, could you also copy his legal skills to solve some other problem you were having?
For that matter, can you steal Actions acquired through experience - Vehicle Ops, General Knowledge, Social Skills (particularly contacts, rather than charm/bluff type specialities), Ninja? So far we're ruling yes.
The limit we've picked out is this: he can't steal the Intelligence-Energy rule, and he can't steal equipment or technology. An enemy with a sword or powered armour still has the advantage.
Our more detailed ruling went like this. They're still 30 stone powers, worth giving the player some latitude, and it's not like the character can't die...
Example One: Two dupes of our CopyCat A1 and A2, and a Companion B, stand in a line, no closer than 8ft to the next guy. So, A2 can copy B's powers, but A1 can't. We rule that A1 can also not steal A2's copy of B's powers. On the other hand A2 could legitimately create another dupe, who, being within 10ft of B, could also become empowered. So, A and B can give B an effective radius of a mile, but they can't cover the world.
Example Two: B has Vehicle Ops 5, enough to fly a plane, but is wounded. Copycat A creates several dupes, all of whom come close enough to B to copy the power, then take places in the cockpit. Let's say for the original A, Vehicle Ops now occupies the ninth Action box, but A doesn't have the Speciality General Knowledge in Geography to know where to fly to. B has this knowledge. A cannot absorb this knowledge and augment his existing General Knowledge; instead he must drop a power and take on a second General Knowledge Action in order to navigate.
Example Three: A bad guy, Villain, appears. The copycat chooses to copy his opponent's powers, not knowing their full extent. We rule that, so long as the copycat has empty Action Boxes, rather than the GM revealing his character's powers the GM can determine which Villain powers are also transferred. The Copycat may accidentally become invisible or set fire to his clothes or something.
Creating Challenges.
Steal Superpower won't restrict this character, unless you get the last and original one. Copycat copies Steal Superpower and as soon as they touch they're both unconscious for a minute. If they fall on each other for long enough they're both comatose... less than ideal.
Suppress Mutant Power will restrict the dupes in range to their original profile, and they can't make new dupes or be re-absorbed until they're out of range.
For one villain, who I wanted to keep superior, I came up with a new Invulnerability. Like Suppress Mutant Power, only personal - no range.
Invulnerability to Power-Stealing, 10 white stones.
Immune to Steal Superpower and Copy Ability/Action/Modifier. Immune to Drain Energy, too, unless it's used at range. It's not a case of you suppress the powers of an individual you touch, so much as they just don't affect you - a character you touch is perfectly capable of making a Power Fist or Stealing Powers, so it'll work against anyone else they're in contact with.
Just to try and equal some odds... though I don't know if it's too cheap or too expensive or about right.
Anyway... what do you think? We'll be letting the character play for at least one session, and we've got some back-up characters in case it gets really stupidly silly, but I like to throw out ideas and get feedback.