EGO in Initiative Order

[Blue]

This has likely been discussed here in the past.

I have a player character who is an Egoist. The player wanted to use his EGO for initiative (an optional rule). I said no, feeling that allowing him to rely on a 2-for-1 cost characteristic when everyone else is using a 3-for-1 cost stat would be unfair to everyone else.

Has anyone else had experience in allowing EGO as the intiative stat for mentally based characters, and has it worked out well for you?

[Pattern Ghost]

If his EGO is somewhere in line with average DEXs, I don't see it as being too unbalancing. DEX is still a better buy than EGO, even letting the mentalist use EGO for initiative. If he's bought his EGO up into the absurd range, then make him lower it if he wants to use it to go first too, or charge him 3 pts.

Also, the DEX guys can buy Lightning Reflexes for dirt cheap anyway, and you can disallow this to be based on EGO, which would balance things a bit.

Plus, going first isn't always a benefit. Sometimes it's better to hold an action, and a high-DEX (or high-initiative) character can be brought into line quickly by forcing him to abort phases in combat. Let the AE attacks fly liberally, and you've got a guy who's going to start holding his actions, or being forced to abort them pretty quickly. (Assuming he's not also a tank who can take the hits.)

[Talon]

Just have him buy Lightning Reflexes equal to the difference between his DEX and EGO. Less than buying up DEX.

[Lord Liaden]

FWIW, according to the description of Mental Combat on FREd p. 246, the default rule is that characters using a Mental Power use Ego instead of Dexterity to determine their initiative in a Phase. The same rule description also points out that if the character using the Mental Power also wants to perform a physical action in his Phase like making a Half Move, he'd have to wait until his DEX rank comes up and then act before he uses his MP. That helps keep things balanced.

I've run it pretty much this way since the BBB; as Pattern Ghost pointed out, unless the mentalist has an Ego score significantly higher than the average Dexterity of the campaign, it really has little effect on the flow of combat.

[Dust Raven]

I do it just as Lord Liaden does and always have. If a characters really want to do everything, including physical, based off their EGO, then I have them buy Lightning Reflexes as Talon suggests.

[Lord Liaden]

Also keep in mind that a mentalist who wants a DCV competitive with that of other characters in the campaign, or uses a physical power in addition to Mental Powers, will still want to buy up his Dexterity in addition to his Ego score. So in practice, mentalists don't usually get much of a cost break - their players may actually end up investing more Character Points to make their characters viable in both CV and ECV.

[Bartman]

Originally posted by Blue
I said no, feeling that allowing him to rely on a 2-for-1 cost characteristic when everyone else is using a 3-for-1 cost stat would be unfair to everyone else.

Except everyone else is using a 2-for-1 cost characteristic. Remember that every 3 points of Dex gives you 1 point of speed for free. Thus the net cost is only 2 points. And Ego is generally far less useful than Dex. I would let the player act on Ego.

[prestidigitator]

I tend to agree. Use Ego to determine when in a Segment a mentalist goes if (s)he is using mental powers, or the worse of Ego and Dex if doing both mental and physical actions. If this is a problem for the character (or for you), have them use Lightning Reflexes to make up the difference (for either Dex or Ego--it should cost the same, even though it is based on the more expensive cost of Dex).

However, if this was somehow, "...wanted to use his EGO for initiative [including Speed]..." just say no. Make them buy extra Speed straight.

[Dust Raven]

Originally posted by Lord Liaden
Also keep in mind that a mentalist who wants a DCV competitive with that of other characters in the campaign, or uses a physical power in addition to Mental Powers, will still want to buy up his Dexterity in addition to his Ego score. So in practice, mentalists don't usually get much of a cost break - their players may actually end up investing more Character Points to make their characters viable in both CV and ECV.

My mentallists usually just buy Precognative Intuition: DCV +X. They also buy either Defense Maneuver 1V or just buy Persistant on the DCV to it applies out of combat too.

[Tasha]

This is why I ALWAYS have my Egoists have a Dex and Ego that are the same value. That way there is no wierdness on the speed chart. Besides DCV is always useful. And ECV's on most characters usually hover around 4 anyways.

Tasha :P

[CrosshairCollie]

I let them go off of EGO ... but I have always been annoyed by the 'having to wait 'til DEX' part if I want to move. Traditionally, I have always created Mentalists with identical EGO and DEX (usually 20/20 under 4th) ... in 5th, I'll probably go for the Lightning Reflexes route (mostly for simplicity's sake ... just do everything at once already).