NND vs Desolid

[Edsel]

The character I run in our champions campaign is a mage. My character is built with a VPP. One of the situations our group has encountered is a villian who will go desolid to avoid attacks. Of course to counter this in the past I have bought attacks that affect desolid. The problem is that the power level of such attacks are, necessarily, lower since the advantage must be paid for. However, the villians defenses are no lower when he is desoild so such attacks are usually woefully ineffective. One solution I have come up with is to buy an NND attack whose defense is Not Being Desolid. Do you think this is an overly cheezy thing to try and get away with?

For that matter the whole NND issue is full of opertunities for cheeziness. Take for instance the Fast Nutreno Rifle from the Old Star Hero book, an NND attack whose defense is having less than 5 points of resistant PD. Where should you draw the line?

[Chris Goodwin]

Why not just try to figure out what his Desolidification doesn't protect against, then load up on that?

[Edsel]

Originally posted by archer
Why not just try to figure out what his Desolidification doesn't protect against, then load up on that?

Actually I guess I should have made that plural "villians", there are several mystical-NPC bad guys who use this sort of ability. But your reply has led me to think of something. My character has the Analyze Magic skill, KS- Magic, KS- Magical Para-normals, etc. Perhaps I should see if the GM will allow me to Analyze the Desoild spell being used to discover its weakness.

[bjbrown]

I don't think it would be cheesy to have an NND attack, with the defesnse being solid, depending on the special effect. If your villians become desolid by going to the ethereal plane, for example, then it would seem to make sense that your mage could develop an attack that would work against things on the ethereal plane only.

You might also consider AP to lower defenses, or the power Find Weakness, if your GM will allow it.

Of course, with all your character's knowledge skills, I would think that your GM would give you some sort of hint on how to deal with your villains. (In fact, it's possible that your GM is thinking that he gave you a situation in which those skills are useful, and he's waiting for you to tell him that you'll use them ...)

[kirakane]

Well an alternate plan is if you have fixed active point attacks is instead to match the special effect of the desolid character and become desol yourself since people with the same desolid special effect can effect each other just fine.

Desolid with varriable special effect only to match desolid effect of villians (-1/4), cannont go through walls (-1/2), cannot be used as a defense (-1). Would probably be pretty cheap and would fit in power structures well.

Also, an often overlooked part of the desolid power is that you have to choose something that can still effect you while desolid. So as a role playing point go find that out.

[bjbrown]

Re-reading the rules, you can't do the schtick of an NND attack with being solid as a defense. A Desolid character is immune to even NND attacks, unless also bought with the Affects Desolid advantage.

[Edsel]

Originally posted by kirakane
Well an alternate plan is if you have fixed active point attacks is instead to match the special effect of the desolid character and become desol yourself since people with the same desolid special effect can effect each other just fine.

Desolid with varriable special effect only to match desolid effect of villians (-1/4), cannont go through walls (-1/2), cannot be used as a defense (-1). Would probably be pretty cheap and would fit in power structures well.

Also, an often overlooked part of the desolid power is that you have to choose something that can still effect you while desolid. So as a role playing point go find that out.

I like this. It's comming at the problem from a direction I had not thought of before. I think I'll write up a spell like this and run it past my GM for approval.

[Chaosliege]

Originally posted by bjbrown
Re-reading the rules, you can't do the schtick of an NND attack with being solid as a defense. A Desolid character is immune to even NND attacks, unless also bought with the Affects Desolid advantage.

That's still not bad. A 4d6 NND is better than an 8d6 regular blast.

This is using 60 active points.

8d6 Affects desolid, 40*1.5=60

4d6 NND Affects desolid, 20*2.5=50

I'd rather get an average of 14 pure stun than nothing..

<edit>

8d6 gives average of 28.. subtract even a modest 20 defense and you're left with 8.. I he has 25, you only do 3..

Also, you have a better chance of getting a good roll on 4 dice than on 8..

[Oruncrest]

Might I suggest an Ego Attack instead of piling on NND on top of Affects Desolid. This, of course, assumes that your enemies haven't added Immune to mental attacks to their Desolid as well. If they haven't, you've got good odds to stun them (21 STUN average for a 60 AP campaign as opposed to 11 STUN for an NND attack that Affects Desolid).
And you don't have to be an ESPer to use it. for magicians (is that what your character is?), you can call it 'The Scary Strike of Spooky' which summons a ghost to attack an opponent (add visible to the Ego Attack to save points). A gadgeteer can build a 'Psychic Disruptor' that works on the psychic wavelengths of the EM spectrum. Heck, even Martial Artists can get into the act (Chi Blasts anyone?).
Hope I've helped.

[Chaosliege]

Originally posted by Oruncrest

And you don't have to be an ESPer to use it. for magicians (is that what your character is?), you can call it 'The Scary Strike of Spooky' which summons a ghost to attack an opponent (add visible to the Ego Attack to save points). A gadgeteer can build a 'Psychic Disruptor' that works on the psychic wavelengths of the EM spectrum. Heck, even Martial Artists can get into the act (Chi Blasts anyone?).
Hope I've helped.

I like some of those Ideas, I'm going to have to incorperate that Psychic Disruptor into my guys power armor..

[Syberdwarf2]

Personally, I think the fact that (If I understood you correctly), most of the villains go desolid, is Cheez enough. I wouldn't worry too much about the cheez factor.