I need some advice..

[leska]

Hello everyone, sorry to bother y'all but I need a little help with a side project of mine. So I have a character whom of which has a special weapon which goes with her but I haven't been able to really figure out how to price it all in a way that is cohesive and some parts I think I'm overcharging on. Any help would be greatly appreciated! This is what I have so far:

Ancestral Guardian; The Serpent
- [4] to Close Combat/Ranged Combat (2)
- Range = 3 (3)
- Magical Damage (1)
- 2x damage vs Magical Beings (0)
- Breaks Magical Effects/connections (*Soulsword don't know cost)
15ws without breaking effect
- Summonable (1ws)
- Can only be wielded by those of her bloodline (1ws)
- The Serpent is an entity of its own will but serves to protect its wielder. The Serpent has a Int of 5 (3), General Knowledge of 5 (4) Sense Magic of 5 (6) *as Sense Mutants (13ws)
- The Serpent augments the magical power of the weilder by allowing a bonus up to its MN to be used onto the owner's Witchcraft. (9ws)
- The Serpent protects its owner from mystic attacks by granting magical protections up to its MN (2ws)
I got 41ws total but not sure about the breaking effect and if this weapon is its own entity, do I build it like a character or are there certain rules I follow like treating it like a powered suit or something

[Gris]

It looks quite complicated and rules aren't my forte. What I tend to do in those cases is to grab the main action (I'd probably use psi weapon in this case since it's a summonable weapon) and then tie the rest of stuff into it with a "can only be used with [action]" modifier, sort of like my character Valerie in your game.

[RidiculousNinja]

If you do treat it as a psi weapon range is automatically range 3

[RidiculousNinja]

I would treat it as psi weapon Equipment that powers itself you reduce the need to increase range the summonable can go and the bloodline requirement can go (or I would say steal the pricing in the armor section for the limited assccess I think it's 1 white stone

Basic idea

[4] psi-weapon (Magical Serpent Staff)
+6 ws for stones coming from equipment

Then add
1 [1w] exclusive
Also magic number +3 for adds directly to action?
Plus whatever else

Idk hopefully the this helps a bit as far as idea wise

[Brainstem]

I'm a bit confused about how the serpent works. Is it summoned into combat or is it always present? Can it be attacked and killed?

Let's break it down a bit, maybe, going into how the fluff works out for the different aspects?

Aug 1, 2017 3:52:34 GMT -5 leska said:

Hello everyone, sorry to bother y'all but I need a little help with a side project of mine. So I have a character whom of which has a special weapon which goes with her but I haven't been able to really figure out how to price it all in a way that is cohesive and some parts I think I'm overcharging on. Any help would be greatly appreciated! This is what I have so far:

Ancestral Guardian; The Serpent
- [4] to Close Combat/Ranged Combat (2)

Is this a Modifier or does it grant the character CC 4 and RC 4? Thematically, does it reflect the serpent attacking or is the serpent imbuing the player?

- Magical Damage (1)

What does this mean? Does it mean the damage is "magical" as the element (like a magic blast) or something else? And which damage... all damage?

- 2x damage vs Magical Beings (0)

This should probably cost something. It's circumstantial, but "magical beings" could be a broad stroke and may grant a lot more leeway than it would otherwise seem.

- Breaks Magical Effects/connections (*Soulsword don't know cost)

Probably should be fairly pricey if it's an immediate thing. If it requires some kind of Action resolution, then it can be brought down a touch. How do you see this coming out in-game?

- The Serpent augments the magical power of the weilder by allowing a bonus up to its MN to be used onto the owner's Witchcraft. (9ws)

Where does MN come into it? This is the first mention of a MN for the ability, so this should probably be cleared up. And I'm guessing this is a Modifier, right?

The Serpent protects its owner from mystic attacks by granting magical protections up to its MN (2ws)

Same as above with MN. I'd just use the Magic Defense Modifier for this and call it a day.

Generally, my take is that you should just price everything out as different Actions on the CAD, especially if The Serpent can't be disarmed; this should get the same end result without nearly as much mental gymnastics to get it functioning. If this is the focus of all powers, then I would say you could just pop on a 3w Challenge to reflect The Serpent's autonomy and call it a day.

[leska]

The Serpent is a snake sword that's summonable in the same manner as the soul sword is for Magik. I put it as a close combat and ranged weapon because it can turn into a whip though perhaps adding the tendril action onto it would make sense? Or make it a telescopic weapon?

As for magical damage, I mean that it does magical damage as elemental damage. All of its damage is considered magical.

As for the 2x damage vs magical beings I don't know what to place the cost at. Perhaps as cl + 1?

For the magical breaking I can see it coming into play as striking someone with the Serpent, it would disrupt magical based effects such as mysticism mind affecting control, sorcery, witchcraft, etc. like I see when she would fight someone let's say a witch who uses their magic to create a protective shield, her attack would break through the magical effect of protection and hit the witch directly. This sword is working off the base of Soul sword

. The MN I refer to is the base Modifer Number of the weapon. In this case would be a 4 so basing all the stuff on that.

[Brainstem]

Okay, so I think you should:

1) Treat the weapon itself as just a weapon. Convert the Tendril Whip Action to Modifier by boosting the CL by +3. Magical damage is probably easy enough to just say is a fluff thing presuming it's not intended to go through Toughness and the like. If so, then also tack on whatever the cost is for Armor Penetrating.

2) 2x Damage vs. magical beings probably depends a lot on the setting. Is this meant to plop into a standard Marvel setting? Or is it different? If it's a standard Marvel setting (or something like that) where "magic" means a very specific kind of thing, then +1 is probably fine. If it's something more broad or a more traditional fantasy setting, boosting it up more might be appropriate; just make sure it never crosses over whatever 2x damage would normally cost.

3) The magic breaking seems pretty strong and should come with a hefty cost. As i understand, you want the sword to ignore all magic effects? That should probably net at least a +2 or +3, but I'll admit that I don't have my books handy at the moment and am only going off the cuff.

[lilithsboy]

Pg 94 of X-Men prices Magik's sword at 6 white

This actually takes care of

- 2x damage vs Magical Beings (0)

- Breaks Magical Effects/connections

- Summonable (1ws)

If I were you I would check out the rules for sidekick/familiar pg 4 house rules.

It seems fairly easy to price once you have all that:

Sould sword 6ws: 7an
-[4] to Close Combat/Ranged Combat (included because you can actually get a weapon that will do this for $ not stones) 
-Range=3 (see above)
- 2x damage vs Magical Beings (0)

- Breaks Magical Effects/connections

- Summonable (1ws)

-Magical energy dmg +1
-Magical energy defense +2
- The Serpent augments the magical power of the weilder by allowing a bonus up to its MN to be used onto the owner's Witchcraft. (power boost+4 only useable for certain action-3) +1

So far you are looking at a healthy 11 an for a weapon which means 20 white 

If you feel like going the other route you can do sidekick/familiar 3+2 so 3ws +the item qualities at 20 so you would then pay 23 ws 

[lilithsboy]

Might I suggest adding telepathy to the sidekick so it can communicate with its owner? and perhaps some extra toughness so that it is not easily shatterable? as it would stand you have 2ws unspent in the familiar portion of this.