5th Ed. Transformation: Consecrating objects

[eepjr24]

Yep. The only solid info on exact make up I knew of was in Superman III. I am not old enough to have read the original comics (Well, at least not before the late 70's) and I didn't think they had ever gotten real specific.

 

- E

[Christopher R Taylor]

I can have susceptibility to objects a certain shade of blue. Would necessitate a minor transform?

 

No, because of the definition of the power and how it works.  Changing the color of an item is cosmetic, by definition, according to the rules:

Cosmetic Transforms have no impact on how the target functions, but merely change its appearance.  Cosmetic Transforms cannot alter a character’s combat effectiveness (except where that relates directly to appearance somehow).

Changing the function of the item is minor or greater, according to the rules.

 

Its pretty straightforward here.  This isn't about the complication, its about the degree of change to the target.  That's how transform works.  Its like how Teleport moves objects and Change Environment doesn't build Barriers.

[Wardsman]

I'm going to agree with Hyper-Man on this.  Characters who took vulnerabilities/susceptibilities did so knowing that these things can come up in the course of gameplay.  They got points for a vulnerability to blessed weapons.  Unless your game universe has a very different definition of "blessed weapon" than a normal setting does, it should not require a power to bless something.  But it really depends on how they work in your campaign.

 

Vampires are held at bay by crosses.  How many points did they get for that?  Are "crosses" very common, common, uncommon?  Does holding two sticks together in a cross shape count?  Because if so, crosses are probably "very common" and it doesn't take any points to use a cross.  If its got to be an actual cross, manufactured into that shape, maybe its just common (somewhat rare depending on where you are, but easy enough to get one if you know there's a vampire around).  You don't have to pay for the ability to use a cross.

 

Normally the definition of what counts as holy (or whatever) comes in the disadvantage.  You don't have to pay points for it because somebody else already got points for it.  They got extra points because it's relatively easy to hit them in the disadvantage.  If you have to have a power to hit his disad, then it's gotta be uncommon at best.

Apples and oranges in your example. You are talking about a physical shape. I'm talking about a metaphysical quality.

And this goes beyond blessed or holy. Several mystic tradition have consecrated items where shape has nothing to do with it.

[Armitage]

Yeah I thought about change environment for Holy or consecrated ground.

 

 

There's actually a spell in the Divine Magic chapter of the 6e Hero System Grimoire  and the 5e Fantasy Hero Grimoire that temporarily makes a weapon sacred to take advantage of Susceptibilities and Vulnerabilities.

 

Sanctify Weapon (6e)

Change Environment (make a weapon sacred), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +½), Time Limit (duration of 1 Turn, +1 Turn per point by which the caster succeeds with his Magic roll; +¼) (9 Active Points); OAF (holy symbol or the like; -1), Extra Time (Full Phase; -½), Gestures (-¼), Incantations (-¼), No Range (-½), Only When Serving The God’s Purposes (-½), Requires A Magic Roll (-½), Spell (-½).

 

Sanctify Weapon (5e)

Change Environment 1" radius (make a weapon sacred), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +½), Uncontrolled (duration of 1 Turn, +1 Turn per point by which the caster succeeds with his Magic roll; +¼), Usable As Attack (+1) (15 Active Points); OAF (holy symbol or the like; -1), Gestures (-¼), Incantations (-¼), Only Affects One Weapon (-½), Only When Serving The God’s Purposes (-½), Requires A Faith Roll (-½), Spell (-½).

[Christopher R Taylor]

Yeah I thought about change environment for Holy or consecrated ground.

That's how I did it: areas that are holy or unholy are change environment.  I slipped in a few minor effects like +1 to magic skill roll for necromancy in unholy areas, but that's not necessary.

[Wardsman]

There's actually a spell in the Divine Magic chapter of the 6e Hero System Grimoire  and the 5e Fantasy Hero Grimoire that temporarily makes a weapon sacred to take advantage of Susceptibilities and Vulnerabilities.

 

Sanctify Weapon (6e)

Change Environment (make a weapon sacred), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +½), Time Limit (duration of 1 Turn, +1 Turn per point by which the caster succeeds with his Magic roll; +¼) (9 Active Points); OAF (holy symbol or the like; -1), Extra Time (Full Phase; -½), Gestures (-¼), Incantations (-¼), No Range (-½), Only When Serving The God’s Purposes (-½), Requires A Magic Roll (-½), Spell (-½).

 

Sanctify Weapon (5e)

Change Environment 1" radius (make a weapon sacred), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +½), Uncontrolled (duration of 1 Turn, +1 Turn per point by which the caster succeeds with his Magic roll; +¼), Usable As Attack (+1) (15 Active Points); OAF (holy symbol or the like; -1), Gestures (-¼), Incantations (-¼), Only Affects One Weapon (-½), Only When Serving The God’s Purposes (-½), Requires A Faith Roll (-½), Spell (-½).

One 4 edition spell did some something similar but using CE and cosmetic change. So I think change was 5 edition. Need to dig out both rules.

[Ninja-Bear]

I would say its not cosmetic because it is changing the item beyond its normal range of simple appearance and sensory alterations. Turning your sword blue: cosmetic. Making your sword do extra damage to creatures vulnerable to a kind of attack: minor.

I disagree. Your making a character pay more points because it affects someone elses's disavantage. No cosemtic is the choice because it doesn't fundamentally change the item in question. Only the disavantage on the character makes it so.

[Ninja-Bear]

Armitage why usuable as an attack?

[Ninja-Bear]

Change enviroment allows you to exploit a characters susceptibilites or power limitation. 5th r pg 136 and look at Lodestones example.

[Ninja-Bear]

Ok after re-reading the original post, a question dors come to mind. Wardsman hoe do you see the consecrated weapon doing extra damge? If iy solely comes from monsters disadvantages then cosmetic is fine however if a little extra damge is also added then minor would be appropriate as Christopher Taylor pointed out.

[Christopher R Taylor]

No cosmetic is the choice because it doesn't fundamentally change the item in question.

 

In this universe, consecrated is a fundamental change.  In a universe like ours, where consecration has no discernible combat effect, its cosmetic.

[Outsider]

I dunno.  Seems to me that adding 'holy' special effect to an attack via consecration is just that, adding a special effect.

 

Look at something like Fire vs Ice special effect...

 

Lets say I have a Frost Brand (sword) that does 2D6 killing.

 

Now lets say I am an Elementalist, and I have a spell that changes special effect from one element to another element, but doesn't change anything else.  Damage stays the same, just a new Special Effect.

 

One day, I am facing mummies, who I know have a 2x  Body Vulnerability to fire based attacks.

 

So I cast my 'alter element' spell on my Frost Brand, changing it to a Fire Brand.   Still 2D6K, but the mummies have that vulnerability, and the 2D6 they take will be doubled.

 

In 6th Edition, this is clearly a minor (5pts per D6) Transform.  The rules use the specific example of changing an ice/fire special effect.

 

Transform in 5th Edition has one less level of granularity, so it isn't entirely clear if this would be cosmetic (5pts per D6) or Minor (10pts per D6)

[Armitage]

Armitage why usuable as an attack?

 

 

in 5E, Change Environment was area effect by default.  Usable As Attack was used to make the power "stick" to the weapon and move with it.

(I was just copying directly from the 5e Grimoire.)

[eepjr24]

From 6e, I would say this falls into one of two categories of Minor transform from the examples in the book. You already mentioned the SFX argument. The other one that seems to apply to me is "create minor combat related effects". If consecration had no effect on damage generally (IE, a world where undead do not exist, are not affected by consecrated items or are so rare as to be moot) it would be cosmetic. Like making the sword blue or adding glowing letters that say "Mzayque" down the blade. But since it does have combat effect, it is minor.

 

- E

[Christopher R Taylor]

I dunno.  Seems to me that adding 'holy' special effect to an attack via consecration is just that, adding a special effect.

Sure you could do that: naked special effect addition, maybe a +1/4 naked advantage

[dmjalund]

From 6e, I would say this falls into one of two categories of Minor transform from the examples in the book. You already mentioned the SFX argument. The other one that seems to apply to me is "create minor combat related effects". If consecration had no effect on damage generally (IE, a world where undead do not exist, are not affected by consecrated items or are so rare as to be moot) it would be cosmetic. Like making the sword blue or adding glowing letters that say "Mzayque" down the blade. But since it does have combat effect, it is minor.

 

- E

does this mean in a world where Green Lantern exists, turning something yellow would be a minor transformation?

[Ninja-Bear]

in 5E, Change Environment was area effect by default. Usable As Attack was used to make the power "stick" to the weapon and move with it.

(I was just copying directly from the 5e Grimoire.)

Makes sense, wasn't sure. Thanks

[Ninja-Bear]

Sure you could do that: naked special effect addition, maybe a +1/4 naked advantage

Ezactly or cosmetic effect as the op asked if it might be.

[eepjr24]

does this mean in a world where Green Lantern exists, turning something yellow would be a minor transformation?

If there was no other easy way to make things yellow? Yes. But as I covered in the "blue" argument earlier, if a trivial outside method exists to do the same thing it is probably cosmetic as well. I mentioned it in the terms of consecration as well, if you can get an item consecrated on any street corner or buy them in the general store, it's probably cosmetic. But in the end, it's all still GM's call since this type of transform is by it's nature very tied to setting and other campaign factors.

 

- E

[bigdamnhero]

First off, I love the general idea and am totally stealing it for my upcoming FH campaign!

 

It depends on the campaign. If Consecrated weapons are available in a general goods store, they would be a cosmetic transform to me. And the Susceptibility would be at the Very Common level.

I was thinking along similar lines, but coming at it from the opposite direction. If it's a cosmetic transform, then consecrated weapons are going to be available in the general store; if it's a minor transform, they're going to be a little harder to come by. So it depends on how often you want them to come into play. Similarly, the value of Vulnerable to Blue relative to Vulnerable to Blessed/Holy depends largely on how common each attack is...which will depend partly on how easy each is to make...

 

It also depends on how often the PCs are likely to encounter characters/monsters with that Vulnerability? If it's something that's only going to come up once in awhile, then odds are they won't bother to carry those sorts of weapons, making them effectively Uncommon. But if they're the principal Bad Guys of the campaign, then you can bet they'll stock up. (I acknowledge that varying the value of a Vuln/Susc based on whether or not the PCs have that particular attack borders on GM Munchkinism. But from a narrative standpoint, what matters primarily is how vulnerable they are to the PCs.)

 

Based on the above, here's what feels about right to me:

• Turn Weapon Blue is Cosmetic, and can in fact be done non-magically.
• Consecrate Weapon is a Minor Transform that can only be done by certain priests (or whatever)
• Vulnerable: Blue is therefore at least Common, and could become Very Common if it's widely known that blue weapons are more effective against certain monsters (the same way everyone carries silver weapons in most typical urban fantasy games).
• Vulnerable: Consecrated is probably Common-to-Uncommon, again depending on how widely-known the vulnerability is.

Also: does Consecrating a weapon have any other in-game effects beyond triggering someone's Vulnerability?

[eepjr24]

Also: does Consecrating a weapon have any other in-game effects beyond triggering someone's Vulnerability?

I think this is not a huge thing whether it does or does not, unless again it is something that people are aware of. If having consecrated armor provides a DC of damage negation versus certain types of attacks (mind control by a vampire or disease effects of a ghoul bite) it is really moot unless it is known by either the players or some other group who utilizes it. It could even be something like undead having a sense for consecrated items and having one makes you either more or less likely to be picked as the primary target.

 

- E

[massey]

From 6e, I would say this falls into one of two categories of Minor transform from the examples in the book. You already mentioned the SFX argument. The other one that seems to apply to me is "create minor combat related effects". If consecration had no effect on damage generally (IE, a world where undead do not exist, are not affected by consecrated items or are so rare as to be moot) it would be cosmetic. Like making the sword blue or adding glowing letters that say "Mzayque" down the blade. But since it does have combat effect, it is minor.

 

- E

 

But it only has a combat effect because of the disadvantage a character possesses.  Making a weapon "holy" or "unholy" doesn't affect most characters at all.  The fact that someone got extra points for taking a disadvantage should not require his opponent to spend points for something he could otherwise do for free.

 

I think a lot of people are looking at this from the wrong angle.  This is really a question of how the disadvantage/complication/limitation was purchased.  And that might be determined by the assumptions of the setting itself.  If an item can be made "holy" by a normal, non-power requiring process, then the disadvantage is more common than it would be otherwise.  For example:

 

Vinnie the Vampire takes a Susceptibility to holy objects, which include pieces of paper with Bible verses printed on them.  Joe the vampire hunter doesn't have a Bible nearby, so he grabs a post-it note and jots down the first verse he can think of, and presses the paper against Vinnie's forehead.  How it affects Vinnie is NOT determined by whether Joe purchased "transform paper to paper with Bible writing on it", because he didn't buy that.  How it affects Vinnie is determined by how Vinnie bought his Susceptibility in the first place.  Just like taking two pieces of wood and holding them together to make a cross, the GM rules that Vinnie got enough points with his "very common" disadvantage that the scrawled verses count.  Remember that not everything a character can do has to be paid for with points.  Oftentimes you can roleplay to get the exact same effect.

 

Now, forget about Vinnie for a moment.  Switch genres.  Someone is attempting to revive Great Cthulhu.  Fortunately they messed up, and only brought forth some Ancient Elder Thing That Lurks in the Outer Darkness.  And to kill it, you need a very special kind of weapon.  Because the Elder Thing has a "very rare" vulnerability (so rare that he might not even get points for it), this is not something that you can create on the fly.  It is not something that a normal person can make.  It requires lengthy rituals when the stars are aligned and all that good stuff.  Now you might theoretically need a major transform, because within the context of the campaign, you're changing the very essence of what the weapon is.

[Wardsman]

I think this is not a huge thing whether it does or does not, unless again it is something that people are aware of. If having consecrated armor provides a DC of damage negation versus certain types of attacks (mind control by a vampire or disease effects of a ghoul bite) it is really moot unless it is known by either the players or some other group who utilizes it. It could even be something like undead having a sense for consecrated items and having one makes you either more or less likely to be picked as the primary target.

 

- E

Point of order this is for 5th. Don't feel bad. I just look at 5th and found I was using 4 ed. costs.

5th seems lean more your way. The example of a cosmetic doing this that I remember is from 4th Edition Fantasy hero Grimoire.

 

This for must have disad for all spell users in an low power urban fantasy.

In this case this is the witch vs witch defense. Consecrated dust acts as a force wall against all paths PD/ED/EGO/ Power Defense. Draw a circle  or seal all doors and windows and you get a globe effect.

 

I plan to have a similar one that can be used by normals but it only affects a specific path or witch group. So you must know what witch patch your defending against if you are a normal.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Part of the reason people are recoiling from using Minor Transforms might be that they are thinking in terms of 5th (10 points per d6) rather than 6th (5 points per d6).  At that cost, I agree Minor is too much.  Its also why you should at least drop the 6th edition cost structure (Cosmetic 3/d6, Major 10/d6, Total 15/d6) into your 5th edition game, if not move to 6th.

[Ninja-Bear]

I think another problem is that minor transform seems to be a little murky as what it entails. After looking at the example, I know think that from dagger to sword would enhance the daggers base DC, maybe +1 and give it +1 OCV.

 

So maybe a minor transformed dagger consecrated gives a +1 DC, on anything it can affect?