Stopping time

[Brutal]

How do you create a power that stops time?

[Zaratustra]

A good way to start is not to use Hero to do it.

[Tom McCarthy]

I believe the latest Digital Hero has an incredibly over the top, too expensive to use, version of this. The next Digital Hero may have a more usable version, as might the UNTIL Superpowers Database.

Also, look at Dave Mattingly's Power Points articles on the web for Time powers. Nice stuff there.

[Monolith]

Originally posted by Zaratustra
A good way to start is not to use Hero to do it.

I always love when people give these really constructive and helpful answers. I am sure he feels much better now that you have answered his question.

[Zaratustra]

Well, it's true. Hero has no well-built power construct that'll slow down or stop time. Unless you want to use a XDM (future), Time Travel, Usable As Attack, Area Of Effect.
...
By jove, that works.

[Monolith]

Originally posted by Brutal
How do you create a power that stops time?

First you have to define what you mean by stopping time. Do you mean stopping time for one person you are attacking, stopping time for an area you are attacking, or stopping time for everything?

Here are a few attack options:
#1: Time Decrease: Speed Drain. You train your target's Speed. Each successive hit makes him slower and slower. When he gets to 0 Speed he can do nothing at all (this is a balanced way of doing it, thus not making the character too powerful).

#2: Time Jump: Extra-Dimensional Movement, Usable As Attack. You move the character out of the time stream and have it reappear one minute in the future, hopefully after you have beaten all the other villains (this is an unbalanced version because for only a few points you can make every villain useless quickly).

#3: Temporal Entangle: Buy an Entangle with the Takes No Damage Advantage. The character is frozen in place and can be damaged by outside attacks (this can be powerful and weak at that same time).

All these options can be used Area of Effect if you want a Time Stop over an area. You can also add Mega-Scale to the AE if you want something to cover 1km or more.

Keep in mind that while Time Stop works well in comic books (where the writer controls the story), players can get excessive with such a power and entirely forget about genre and continuity when using it. My simple rule is, if a player buys a power and expects to use it all the time he should think how he would feel if a villain had the power and used it against him all the time. If your only purpose in the game is to win, then do whatever you want. But if your purpose of playing is to emulate comics and the genre then you should always use "absolute" powers sparingly. That way it is fun for all.

[Brutal]

Originally posted by Monolith
First you have to define what you mean by stopping time. Do you mean stopping time for one person you are attacking, stopping time for an area you are attacking, or stopping time for everything?

Here are a few attack options:
#1: Time Decrease: Speed Drain. You train your target's Speed. Each successive hit makes him slower and slower. When he gets to 0 Speed he can do nothing at all (this is a balanced way of doing it, thus not making the character too powerful).

#2: Time Jump: Extra-Dimensional Movement, Usable As Attack. You move the character out of the time stream and have it reappear one minute in the future, hopefully after you have beaten all the other villains (this is an unbalanced version because for only a few points you can make every villain useless quickly).

#3: Temporal Entangle: Buy an Entangle with the Takes No Damage Advantage. The character is frozen in place and can be damaged by outside attacks (this can be powerful and weak at that same time).

All these options can be used Area of Effect if you want a Time Stop over an area. You can also add Mega-Scale to the AE if you want something to cover 1km or more.

Keep in mind that while Time Stop works well in comic books (where the writer controls the story), players can get excessive with such a power and entirely forget about genre and continuity when using it. My simple rule is, if a player buys a power and expects to use it all the time he should think how he would feel if a villain had the power and used it against him all the time. If your only purpose in the game is to win, then do whatever you want. But if your purpose of playing is to emulate comics and the genre then you should always use "absolute" powers sparingly. That way it is fun for all.

Good stuff there, I'll look into it

[zen_hydra]

Thanks, I was wondering how I could recreate Dio's "The World" stand ability from Jo Jo's Bizarre Adventure.

[ProfessorM@ss]

Originally posted by Brutal
How do you create a power that stops time?

Entangle with: NND +1, transparent to attacks +½, cannot be escaped with teleportation +¼, affects desolidified +½, cannot form barriers –¼, entangle has 1 Body –½.

Just add Area of Effect and Personal Immunity for stopping more than one opponent. Freeze time, and walk through the area...note that this version would also stop anything coming into the Entangle's radius. And, of course, with the Personal Immunity, the attacker can walk right through the affected area.

A way to limit this obviously powerful ability is to make it reliant on Endurance for its duration.

--->M@ss

PS: Below are sample time powers I made for a villain in my campaign. And, yes, he's supposed to be ungodly tough.

Multipower: Time Mastery (side FX: random time portal opens if powers are dispelled -1) Active: 180, Real: 90
1) Decay Field (force field, 45 PD/ED, protects carried items) Active: 110, Real: 11 - any attack that reaches him is slowed in time to have no effect.
2) Decay Damage Field (damage shield +½, 4d6 energy blast, NND +1, does Body +1, linked to Decay Field –½) Active: 60, Real: 6 - anything that touches the decay field ages rapidly
3) Decay Blast (12d6 energy blast, NND +1, does Body +1) Active: 180, Real: 18 - aging blast
4) Freeze Time (5d6 entangle, NND +1, transparent to attacks +½, cannot be escaped with teleportation +¼, affects desolidified +½, cannot form barriers –¼, entangle has 1 Body –½) Active: 50, Real: 5
5) Freeze Time In Area (4d6 entangle, area of effect radius selective +1¼, NND +1, transparent to attacks +½, cannot be escaped with teleportation +¼, affects desolidified +½, cannot form barriers –¼, entangle has 1 Body –½) Active: 150, Real: 15
6) De-Age Target (6d6 major transform, usable on self +¼, improved target group (any younger age) +¼, targets heal back at Body rate unless he doesn’t want to +¼) Active: 157.5, Real: 16
7) Age Target (6d6 major transform, usable on self +¼, improved target group (any older age) +¼, targets heal back at Body rate unless he doesn’t want to +¼) Active: 157.5, Real: 16
8) Accelerate Healing (18d6 healing, injuries must be healable without medical intervention or with some first aid done –¼) Active: 140, Real:14
9) Cleanse the Body (life support, full) Active: 45, Real: 4.5
10) Speed Time, Personal (+6 Speed, +40 Dexterity, costs END +½) Real: 120, Active: 12
11) Speed Time, Other (+3 Speed, +14 Dexterity, usable by 4 others simultaneously +1½, ranged +½) Active: 180, Real: 18
12) Slow Time Field (drain 6d6 [split between Speed and Dexterity], area of effect radius selective +1¼)
13) Decay Missiles (missile deflection, at range +1, all ranged attacks) Active: 40, Real: 4
14) Suppress (12d6, all time powers +2) Active: 180, Real: 18
15) Dispel (46d6, any time power one at a time +¼) Active: 175, Real: 17.5
16) Time Jump (extradimensional travel through time, only twelve seconds forward or backward in time for up to twelve seconds, 226x weight [67,000,000 lbs]) Active: 50, Real: 5
17) Time Scan (mind scan, cannot attack through link –1, 36d6) Active: 90, Real: 9
18) Chronocognition (clairsentience: sight, hearing, smell, past, future, vague and unclear –½, 222 x range, range: 330,000 miles) Active: 120, Real: 12
19) Superchronocognition (clairsentience: sight, hearing, smell, past, future, vague and unclear –½, megascale +1½ [350,000,000 miles]) Active: 140, Real: 14
20) Superranged Chronocognition (clairsentience: sight, hearing, smell, past, future, vague and unclear – ½, megascale +2½ [35 billion kms], x4 END –1) Active: 140, Real: 14

Other powers include:

Invisible to Time (invisibility to clairsentience and any time-based sense +¼, no fringe, 0 END +½, persistent +½, Multipower must be active –½) 45

Sense Chronal Currents (detect eddies in the time stream, as a sense, n-ray, 360 degree perception, discriminatory, analyze, +20 Perception, +10 vs. range, Multipower must be active –½) 40

[JohnTaber]

Hi Guys,

A REALLY simple way to build a power that allows the character to step out of the flow of time is teleport with a limitiation that the character must be able to climb or walk to the target location. This version means that when the character is out of the flow of time they can't interact with the real world BUT if you link in some overall levels you can get a but of cool effects.
+ I go out of the flow of time and study the lock really closely. I then go back into the flow of time and pick it. (Combat TP with levels put toward a lock picking roll. The levels would offset penalties for taking little time.)
+ I go out of the flow of time and move behind Green Dragon. I study his position then start moving again and let him have it. (Combat TP with levels put in OCV.)

Depends on what effect you want...you don't have to get complicated. If you want more complication you could add Change Environment only objects the time traveller is holding. This way watches stop and such. Again...only if you want that level of complexity.

[JmOz]

Depends on the effect you want, a good "Functional" form I have developed follows, note this is still insanly expensive:

Time Stop, all slots: 1 Recoverable Continuing Charges lasting 1 Minute each (-1/2)
100 1) Frozen in Time: Suppress 20d6, Personal Immunity (+1/4), Area Of Effect (13" Radius; +1) (225 Active Points); No Range (-1/2), Linked to Frozen in time (-1/4)
21 2) Frozen in time: Flight 4", Usable As Attack (+1), Area Of Effect (13" Radius; +1 3/4), Perosnal Immunity (+1/4) (32 Active Points)
24 3) Temporal Invisibility: Invisibility to Sight Group (Additional Sense Group: Hearing Group, Additional Sense Group: Mental Group, Additional Sense Group: Radio Group, Additional Sense Group: Smell/Taste Group, Additional Sense Group: Touch Group, No Fringe) (55 Active Points); Linked to Frozen in Time (-1/2), Only for people with Speed 6 or less, speed 6 can see fringe (-1/4)
Powers Cost: 145

If you want something more robust (but still in the local area) increase Suppress, make sure you keep the radiuses together, anyone in the area will not see you moving (Invisibility), be unable to act (the suppress) and not fall (Flight)...Just realised that it would also need Usable underwater on flight, so the costs may be off a touch

There you go, that shoudl do it...

NOte this is not a time stop, but more a time slow power, and some speedsters will still be able to act, but slowley (most speedsters in my experience will be reduced to a 1-2 speed...just not as fast as they use to be are they...

[Arkham]

As someone else said, it depends upon how you are meaning 'Stop time'.

To take a target out of time, I would use a version of Entangle covering all senses, including the sense of time and BOECV.

If you want to step out of time yourself, then my favorite way to do that is to just timetravel to
the beginning of the moment until a total of a minute has passed.

Time stop:
Extradimensional movement 20 Any other time +20
Time travel only -1/2, Only travel to a moment ago -1,
Continuous +1, 1 Continuing Charge -1 ( 1 minute ),
OAF ( pocketwatch ) -1, Triggered +1/2 ( Push the button )
( 100 Active, 22 Real )
PLUS Desolid linked -1/2, 1 Continuing charge -1
( 40 active, 16 real )
Total cost 38 real points.

But just like the EDM it is based on, it is definately a {STOP} power.
( But then, so is nearly any time manipulation power )

But this is the only way you get the effect of stepping out of time so you can see bullets in mid-air, falling objects stopped, airplanes stopped dead in flight, etc.

[mattingly]

1) Frozen in Time: Suppress 20d6

What are you suppressing here, SPD?

[Zaratustra]

Remember a rock has SPD 0 and still can move around if you throw it.

[Monolith]

Originally posted by Zaratustra
Remember a rock has SPD 0 and still can move around if you throw it.

Yes... And if you Transform someone into a statue, and then throw the statue it moves too, but that has nothing to do with the fact that the person who is a statue cannot move or act under its own power.