Stone Fist

[SpydirShellX]

I have a character I'm designing that starts to turn to stone when he is in moonlight. This is a bad thing for him, for if he ever turns completely to stone, it'll be perminant. Signs of the process are that his skin begins to look and feel rocky and he begins to stiffen up.

The character thus spends a lot of time indoors away from windows at nighttime unless it is cloudy or it's a new moon.

How do I represent a disadvantage like that?

Secondly, the character's left arm from below his elbow has been completely turned to stone. Since the upper part of the arm is unaffected, he can move it around, block swords with it, and punch with it), but can't use the hand for much of anything. How much of a limitation should he take for it?

[Sean Waters]

The stone body thing sounds like an uncontrolled transform with partial effect, limited to work under certain circumstances.

You could build that as a physical limtiation OR build the power the character is subject to, and then take the real cost as a limitation value.

The 'permanent if transformation complete' is probably not worth anything. I mean, it is all or nothing and it is never meant to happen.

Unless your GM is a bit psychotic, I'd just have it there as a bit of flavour, or define the 'heal' for the transform as something very uncommon (magic, a conjunction of stars, whatever - it will FEEL permanent, but technically isn't.

As for the stone arm, well, it depends how much of a problem you want it to be - buy it as a physical lim (not worth a lot) and a distinctive feature.

Possibly a psych and/or lim too, depending on how the character and others feel about it...

[Insaniac99]

I have a character I'm designing that starts to turn to stone when he is in moonlight. This is a bad thing for him, for if he ever turns completely to stone, it'll be perminant. Signs of the process are that his skin begins to look and feel rocky and he begins to stiffen up.

The character thus spends a lot of time indoors away from windows at nighttime unless it is cloudy or it's a new moon.

How do I represent a disadvantage like that?

Secondly, the character's left arm from below his elbow has been completely turned to stone. Since the upper part of the arm is unaffected, he can move it around, block swords with it, and punch with it), but can't use the hand for much of anything. How much of a limitation should he take for it?

just a warning but depending on your group this may not be a fun character to role-play, it would be particualarly bad if your GM plans most of his adventures at night. it does sound like an interesting character though.

the hand, take a physical limitation, sounds like an all the time, slightly at 15 points. a psychological limitation of "afraid of moonlight", and a susceptability to moonlight (if he takes enough damage to pass out or die then parts of him turn to stone), possible a DF depending on the campaign too. then buy a bunch of dice of HA for the stone fist.

[Nevenall]

Susceptibility to Moonlight that does Transform damage rather then normal damage.

Since it's a major transform, I would say 3d6 Normal damage becomes 1d6 Transform, with no defense of course.

You define the condition for recovering from the transform to be some very difficult ritual, or godly intervention.

[Robyn]

Sounds like a NCC Shapeshift to me, with Inherent so it can't be dispelled or drained. Effect is gradual/partial, and may be irreversible; only changes when exposed to moonlight.

But this still doesn't solve the cost problem (for new body parts being stone). You could take powers with the Limitation "not yet" (and let them come into play only permanently, for going under moonlight), but buying powers latent that way strikes me as a waste of points, still.

Even if you could (assuming GM permission) use a custom Advantage on Multiform to let you stay "in between" forms, this would still be costly unless you wanted to start out with a "weak" character by using part of the points of the stone form to buy your weaker character as a Multiform.

There may be something helpful in the Shapeshift variation proposed by Christopher Mullins(?), it seemed more granular.

[Bloodstone]

If you are goign to use the hand to block swords and such, you should probably buy some Armor or Damage Resistance, with limitations that it only covers the one hand.

You could also probably buys a bonus to OCV with Block.

Hand Attack Dice are also probably a given, though you might want to buy some limted STR if the "Left Hand of Doom" also has a praticulalrly strong grip.

[PhilFleischmann]

Susceptibility to Moonlight that does Transform damage rather then normal damage.
Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner. The recovery condition could also be simply healing back the BODY normally. REC/month as long as you stay out of the moonlight.

You have paid for the benefits the stone arm gives you (+HA, extre DEF or DCV like a shield, etc.), right? Good. Then we can move on to the disadvantage. It seems like only a 5-pointer to me - no manipulation with one hand. So you can't play most musical instruments, shoot a bow, drive a stick shift, you type slower, etc. You can still do most things with your normal hand. IIRC, there's a published character somewhere with one-rigid-bashing-weapon-for-a-hand. See what he's got.

[TaxiMan]

Whatever, but I know it's not as good as having fists ....

like unto a thing of iron!

[Robyn]

You have paid for the benefits the stone arm gives you (+HA, extre DEF or DCV like a shield, etc.), right? Good. Then we can move on to the disadvantage.

I would be tempted to (as GM) give him the powers for additional body parts turning to stone, but balance them out with additional Disadvantages (increase his Phobia of moonlight, for instance).

If he ever turned all 4 limbs to stone in the pursuit of power, I would have him acquire a Psych Disad that effectively turned him into a villain ;)

[SpydirShellX]

Yes, I have paid for the few tricks that are achieve with this. (Doubling END for them... the arm is heavy and the guy is not a brick.... well except that his arm literally is....). He actually carries the arm in a sling most of the time, so the weight of the arm doesn't weigh him down as much. He's primarily a technology-based blaster.

Per some of the comments, I'd like to say that he can't move any parts of the stone arm, only the unstoned parts. Grabs would be impossible... and walking on frozen legs or trying to get on with two stone arms would be just as impossible as it would be for a normal person.

Was also, now that I think of it, wondering how to represent his ability to reload his blaster one-handed.

[Insaniac99]

Was also, now that I think of it, wondering how to represent his ability to reload his blaster one-handed.

special effects. if he reloads it faster than normal people, ten he has fast draw, but reloading it a special way is just sfx

[Wolfgar]

Was also, now that I think of it, wondering how to represent his ability to reload his blaster one-handed.

Probably just as a special effect. It should be easy enough to form a cradle for the weapon using his stone arm and his neck, and then using his free hand to load clips/bullets/cartidges/batteries. Doesn't really seem like that advanced a trick as to require something special.