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Tunneling Question.


incrdbil

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Just to see what other GM's take on this is.

 

 

Ok, lets say you have ranged tunneling. Make a hole in a wall at range? Sure, no problem. Inside a giant Vehicle, a starship--make a whole in the wall and escape, again, no problem.

 

A smaller vehicle drives by--a motorcycle. What would tunneling do to it?

 

Lets say you come up to where their should be a door--but somethign etal is blocking it. You use Tunneling. does it make a difference if its a large vehicle blocking it? The leg of some Pc's giant robot vehcle? Now, let's use the tunnel on the giant robots head where the control computer is. You have enough tunneling to get through the DEf, and can go far enought o go completely through the head. Let's say as GM you had said the control computer was in the head. What happens?

 

Body damage? Effect on operation?

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

Tunneling is a Movement Power, and may not be used as an attack. I think that's what your example is basicly doing. I'm pretty sure this is addressed in the FAQs.

 

You want to blow big holes in things to cause them damage, you buy a suitably large AP or Killing attack.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

I agree with Treb. The question of whether the Tunneling is Ranged or not is pretty much a red herring. It doesn't matter if it's Ranged nor non-Ranged. What matters is that it isn't an Attack Power. This sounds to me like a case of a character having multiple Powers (in game mechanics terms) to simulate a single ability (in the game world). Specifically, simulating this ability requires the character to have both Tunneling and some kind of Ranged Attack (most likely RKA).

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

Well, tunneling doesn't do any damage. It just moves material out of your way. So if you "used" it on a moving motorcyle, since it's already moving out of your way, nothing happens. If you "tunnel" through a large vehicle there will be a you-sized hole in it, but none of the systems will be damaged and the hole won't reveal any vulnerable systems either.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

Tunnelling cannot be ranged because it's a movement power. Can you imagine Flight, Ranged? Or Running? What would they do? Absolutely nothing. If you want to put a hole in something at range, buy a ranged Attack Power that does damage.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

All true, but the issue does raise the interesting question of where you draw the line. Should Tunneling get you into a Base? What if the owner has paid character points for real defenses (e.g. Armor), which is bought just like it would be bought for a character? Now what if it is a vehicle (which is sometimes hard to distinguish from a Base)? Now what if it is a Focus that looks like a vehicle? An Automaton? Where exactly does Tunneling lose its effectiveness? I'm not sure myself right now. :think:

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

Well, the rules say specifically that you can't Tunnel though characters or Vehicles, but nothing that I know of concerning Bases. I think it's because you can tunnel through walls but not engines. In some cases, I think a character should be able to Tunnel through engines/Vehicles/characters, but in those cases, the attacking/tunneling character should have bought an attack of some kind that's usable with a Move Through.

 

As for a vehicle that's large enough to be a base, I don't see any problem with allowing a character to Tunnel through it's walls.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

Tunnelling cannot be ranged because it's a movement power. Can you imagine Flight' date=' Ranged? Or Running? What would they do? Absolutely nothing. If you want to put a hole in something at range, buy a ranged Attack Power that does damage.[/quote']

 

Tunneling Usable as an Attck can be ranged. I've used that as a "dig a hole at range" power in the past.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

However' date=' I think the effect would be to make the target go through something, not put a hole in the target. Right? ;)[/quote']

 

I would agree 100% on that, just like Flight UAA would allow you to "fly" another character.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

However' date=' I think the effect would be to make the target go through something, not put a hole in the target. Right? ;)[/quote']

 

If also bought AE: Hex, I'd allow it to puch a hex of "nothing" through a tunnel, effectively just creating a neat hole in the ground. Then again, if someone wanted a hole in the ground, I'd probably make them buy a standard attack power like EB or RKA, or perhaps even a Ranged BODY Drain, and use the rules for breaking walls. DEF+BODY (or just BODY if using the Drain) will destroy a hex of material, and each additional +1 BODY over this (assuming an undamaged target) destroyes an extra hex of material.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

If you use Tunnelling UAA, and don't buy the option of closing the hole behind you, practically it needs to leave the hole in the ground, doesn't it? Tunnelling, UAA, only down, defense is Flight would seem a reasonable construct for blasting a hole beneath someone, which they promptly fall down.

 

[This was a Protectors trick from the Serve & protect module, if I recall correctly - one character used their Ranged Tunnelling, a second threw in an Uncontrolled attack with a few phases of END and a third Entangled the top of the hole.]

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

If you use Tunnelling UAA, and don't buy the option of closing the hole behind you, practically it needs to leave the hole in the ground, doesn't it? Tunnelling, UAA, only down, defense is Flight would seem a reasonable construct for blasting a hole beneath someone, which they promptly fall down.

 

[This was a Protectors trick from the Serve & protect module, if I recall correctly - one character used their Ranged Tunnelling, a second threw in an Uncontrolled attack with a few phases of END and a third Entangled the top of the hole.]

Yes. I was being a little facetious, hence the wink. If you can make anything man-sized or smaller your target, and use it to leave a hole in something by Tunneling it, you might as well just be able to create the hole without a substantial target to use the Tunneling on. Eh.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

If the Tunneling power had never been invented, we would be simply using attack powers to make holes in things, including the ground. With appropriate modifiers (like Invisible Power Effects) to "fill in the hole" as needed.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Have you seen a flying palindromedary?

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

If the Tunneling power had never been invented' date=' we would be simply using attack powers to make holes in things, including the ground. With appropriate modifiers (like Invisible Power Effects) to "fill in the hole" as needed.[/quote']

 

And Flying would be handled with Swimming, Usable In Gasses (+1). :rolleyes:

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

And Flying would be handled with Swimming' date=' Usable In Gasses (+1). :rolleyes:[/quote']

:rofl:

 

He has a point, though, DR. We do talk about blasting holes in things with Attack Powers. I think Area of Effect or somesuch might be appropriate (and/or possibly some Efficient at Making Usable Holes Advantage or something). I'm not sure if it would be all that efficient for moving through a material continuously (and I'm not convinced of the filling in part being done with IPE), but the precedent is there.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

And Flying would be handled with Swimming' date=' Usable In Gasses (+1). :rolleyes:[/quote']

 

The two cases are not comparable.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary has four eyes, and rolls all of them, just for the heck of it.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

How many characters (vehicles, etc) with Tunneling have you seen, who did NOT have an associated attack power that represented the same power if turned on a living thing/vehicle/etc? It's often in a multipower.

 

 

Of those without some associated attack power, how many would have made a lot more sense if they had?

 

 

The cases are not comparable because Tunneling is unique among movement powers.

 

Flight, Running, and Gliding are through a gas environment; the gas is basically pushed out of your way as you move, and "closes" behind you. You may make a noticable wind if you move fast, but that's it. Swimming is the same thing in a liquid. In all these cases, you're not really effecting the medium through which you move. In the case of Teleport and Extradimensional Move, of course, you are not really moving "through" anything at all, in terms of the game environment.

 

In Tunneling, however, you ARE having a serious impact on solid objects, i.e. things with a DEF and BODy score. You're making holes in things; normally, the prerogative of attack powers. Tunneling also has to penetrate the DEF of something, again, normally what an attack power does. But it's NOT an attack power, and therefore it can't HURT anything. It is this bizarre combination of concepts - putting holes in stuff but not hurting anything - that leads to bizzarre situations, like saying you can put a hole through a tank or spaceship and go in to / out of / through it, but not damage it, or that you put a hole through a building wall and have no effect on structural integrity, wiring, plumbing, etc.

 

This is also why it may seem to someone to make sense to put Range on Tunneling. I'm not claiming it DOES make sense, but I'm saying there is a reason it would seem to. It obviously doesn't make sense on Running or Flight, unless it's also Usable on or by Others. But if, instead of thinking of Tunneling as "moving me through stuff" you concieve of it as "making holes in stuff" it makes sense to want to put "Range" on it to "make holes in that stuff way over there."

 

And I think it's a very telling fact that when the question arises "How do I make holes in the ground / wall / whatever over there?" some people quickly answer "Buy a ranged attack power, like Ranged Killing Attack." Nor am I saying that's not the right answer.

 

But if that is the case, when the question is "How do I make holes in the ground under me / the wall next to me / whatever is big enough and close enough for me to go through this phase if I put a hole in it?" why is the answer not "Buy a non-ranged attack power, like Hand to Hand Killing Attack?"

 

 

The only reason I can see is that normally an attack ends your phase; Tunelling defined as such an attack would seem to be limited to 1 hex per phase, or to a kind of "blast a big hole, then move through it next phase." To which I counter that you could possibly do it as a multiple Move Through; but I will have to think further on the problem.

 

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary notes that, oddly enough, the problem of Tunneling is connected to the problem of “the property of being ‘immune to most physical and energy attacks, including ones such as Drains and No Normal Defense attacks’ (whatever word we end up applying to it, and whatever SFX justify it)â€

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

How many characters (vehicles' date=' etc) with Tunneling have you seen, who did NOT have an associated attack power that represented the same power if turned on a living thing/vehicle/etc? It's often in a multipower.[/quote']

 

Moles, rabbits and earthworms, among others, are associated with the ability to tunnel, but not the ability to cause vast damage to living creatures. Of course, their tunnelling DEF is pretty low.

 

The cases are not comparable because Tunneling is unique among movement powers.

 

Flight, Running, and Gliding are through a gas environment; the gas is basically pushed out of your way as you move, and "closes" behind you. You may make a noticable wind if you move fast, but that's it. Swimming is the same thing in a liquid. In all these cases, you're not really effecting the medium through which you move. In the case of Teleport and Extradimensional Move, of course, you are not really moving "through" anything at all, in terms of the game environment.

 

All this must be leading up to the conclusion that we can ditch most forms of movement in favour of limited Tunnelling, right? [Only through air; only through water; etc.]

 

The only reason I can see is that normally an attack ends your phase; Tunelling defined as such an attack would seem to be limited to 1 hex per phase' date=' or to a kind of "blast a big hole, then move through it next phase." To which I counter that you could possibly do it as a multiple Move Through; but I will have to think further on the problem.[/quote']

 

In all seriousness, tunnelling becomes difficult because it requires a hole be dug in some fashion, having some attack and some movement characteristics. However, I don't see removing Tunnelling as being any real answer. Some characters can Tunnel very effectively without hurting people. Others (Wolverine) inflict a lot of damage but aren't especially effective at digging holes. Tunnelling represents the former, KA the latter, and a multipower represents those who can do both.

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Re: Tunneling Question.

 

The concept works better on a hand to hand weapon--example, the Ginsu blade that can cut through almost anything.

 

The Tunneling setting will get through higher defense walls more often than the HKA ever will.

 

40 The Sword of Ginsu: Multipower, 60-point reserve, all slots OIF (-1/2)

4u 1) HKA 2 1/2d6 (4d6 w/STR), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2)

3u 2) Tunneling 1" through 19 DEF material; no Noncombat movement (-1/4)

 

 

Using at range, in addition to the rules problems, just isn't that impressive.

 

51 The Destructo-Ray Gun: Multipower, 61-point reserve, all slots Reduced Endurance (1/2 END; +1/4); OIF (-1/2)

6u 1) Destructo Beam: RKA 4d6

5u 2) Tunneling 1" through 13 DEF material; no Noncombat movement (-1/4)

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