Anti-Rad Field - Change Environment?

[Fedifensor]

I'm working on a post-apocalyptic Hero game (Gamma HERO) where there are mutant powers and pre-apocalypse high-tech artifacts.  I'd like to make either a mutant power or a device that acts as an "anti-rad" field, decontaminating the immediate area so that radiation is reduced or removed, sort of like a decontamination chamber.  It wouldn't heal radiation damage, but it would remove existing radiation so that irradiated objects or people would be cleansed.  I realize that this could be done with a Transform, but that seems a bit much (especially considering how much Transform you would need to change a 20 BODY human).

 

I was thinking of doing this with Change Environment, using the Long-Lasting adder at the +20 point level to make it permanent.  Is this within the bounds of what Change Environment can do?

[Tjack]

Mis-keyed....sorry.

[Derek Hiemforth]

8 minutes ago, Fedifensor said:

I was thinking of doing this with Change Environment, using the Long-Lasting adder at the +20 point level to make it permanent.  Is this within the bounds of what Change Environment can do?

 

I would lean toward "No," mainly because the damage that radiation can cause (per CC pg. 141) in terms of NND Normal or Killing damage is beyond what Change Environment could be used to cause. Therefore it would seem slightly off to me to use Change Environment to cancel it out.

 

I agree with Tjack, and I think a build around Life Support with Area Effect and Usable On Others is probably a better way to go.

[Fedifensor]

My thought is that Change Environment wouldn't be able to cancel out a direct radiation source (plutonium, reactor core, strong fallout), but would cancel out radiation on irradiated objects below a set rad count.  This is mainly to keep PCs and their items from being radioactive long-term after going through a radiation zone.  My game is straddling the line between realistic radiation (it can be lethal) and unrealistic radiation (it can cause fictional mutations both beneficial and horrific).  This is  per the 5E Post-Apocalyptic Hero book, page 74.  I'm not a fan of tracking specific rad counts, but it is a guideline the book gives.

 

I didn't get to see Tjack's post, but I'm not sure how Life Support works for this, unless getting LS: High Radiation even briefly is considered to permanently remove the radiation.

[Grailknight]

Depending on time factors, this can be done with a relatively inexpensive Transform with Damage over Time.

 

Severe Transform 1d6 (Irradiated People and equipment to normal, Permanent by GM Fiat), Area Of Effect (2m Radius; +1/4), Damage Over Time, Target's defenses only apply once (13-16 damage increments, damage occurs every 20 Minutes, +3) (64 Active Points); OAF Bulky Fragile (-1 3/4); (23 Real Points)

 

That gives you a vehicle portable chamber that can be set up fairly quickly that will require a little over 5 hours to decontaminate everything in a 2 meter radius dome. Damage over Time can be abused but is a wonderful tool for making long lasting effects  outside of combat.

[Christopher R Taylor]

In my opinion, yes, its Change Environment.

CE should be a short term channeled transform: it can make things different in an area, as long as you keep it going.  Want it colder? Change environment.  Want a radiation field?  Change environment.  Want NO radiation field?  CE.

 

I mean you can buy it as area effect usable by others in the area life support vs radiation too, but CE is the really obvious, no kludge, concept-friendly choice.

[Duke Bushido]

I know this puts me in disagreement with at least one person who rates as a rules guru-- a guy I have great appreciation for, actually, as he is the one who pointed me toward the original Red October way back when.

 

But I'm kinda with Christopher: I would allow Change Environment to do the job.

 

There are several reasons, the absolute least of which is "what is Change Environment for, anyway?"  Seriously: with the advent of Transformation Attack, and the general mindset of "everything requires super-specific points counting," Change Environment has no reason to exist, period: everything could be done with T-Form.  T-Form radioactive wasteland into non-radioactive wasteland.  Done.  T-Form: Environment.

 

Which, I suspect, means you're changing the environment, which steps on the toes of a power that preceeds T-form and is intended to specifically Change the Environment.

 

We never used to wonder about "Change Environment: Create intense winds" or "create intense magnetic fields" or any of that, until someone decided "Hey!  You need an AoE Telekineses versus X to 'properly model' that!"  Realistically, we still don't worry about it unless someone wants to use it as a controlled attack.

 

We used to use "Change Environment: intense radiation fields" for characters who both manipulated radiation and wanted to take advantage of an enemy's Power Limitations ("Doesn't work in intense radiation fields" and the like).

 

So now we have this weird waffle:

 

Character 1 has "Change Environment: powerful cross winds" and Character 2 has "Telekinesis, no fine manipulation, Area of Effect, Uncontrolled, only to simulate winds," yet they both have the exact same special effects.  Character 2 has an exact amount of STR he applies against flying opponents and people walking around and small cars and what-have-you.  (I'd like to take just a moment to thank players who concoct this build then require me to apply it against every single piece of set dressing because they want to revel in the effects of their power   ) while Character 1 has to trust the GM to take into account the effects of his power and what it does to the people and things within the area.

 

Character 3 has an anti-wind power.  Woo-hoo!  The day is saved!  Or is it?  He's got Change Environment: calm winds.  Too bad he's fighting Character 2, against whom he will need Suppress.

 

 

So what's the difference, other than the build?

 

I don't remember it being spelled out particularly specifically anywhere (though, in all fairness, there are a Hell of a lot of books now, and I'm not LL; I can't remember all of them    ), so I have built a kind of quick-and-dirty rule that keeps the peace at my table:

 

If the "environment" is the result of a character-created attack-based power-- for example, Killing Attack: NND, AoE, Gamma Zone Burst or some such thing, I will allow Change Environment to clean-up the after-effects that may remain, but the attack will have to be dealt with through other means.

 

If the environment does KA: NND, AoE _because it is radioactive_-- say a nuke hit here fifty years ago or whatever, then no problem: Change Environment will work quite handily.

 

 

It's really far too far beyond my bedtime to phrase that any better, but I hope it helps someone.

 

 

I'm going to crash now; you folks have fun.

 

 

[Beast]

transform area

LS safe vs radiation area sticky

[Derek Hiemforth]

3 hours ago, Fedifensor said:

I didn't get to see Tjack's post, but I'm not sure how Life Support works for this, unless getting LS: High Radiation even briefly is considered to permanently remove the radiation.

 

Maybe I'm making invalid assumptions. I figured that background radiation was a general constant in this post-apocalyptic world.  I was envisioning that the area "cleansed" by this power/device would only be radiation-free while the power/device was in effect, and that after the power/device was gone, the usual environmental condition of general irradiation would return.  In that scenario, I do still think Life Support is better than CE.  I know the SFX you're building are technically applying to the location rather than the people, but if the end result is that the location is going to go back to being irradiated, then the game effect of it seems to be that people and things within the area of effect are immune to radiation while it's there. 

 

I guess my main objection to CE is this line from the power description (CC, pg. 53):  "Change Environment cannot provide “positive” effects or bonuses for any character. However, a character can have a Change Environment power that creates a pleasant effect, provided the power has no beneficial effect in game terms."

 

I feel like clearing an area of radiation (or providing those within it with immunity to radiation, however you look it), would be a positive effect that is beneficial in game terms.   

[Ninja-Bear]

20 minutes ago, Derek Hiemforth said:

 

I guess my main objection to CE is this line from the power description (CC, pg. 53):  "Change Environment cannot provide “positive” effects or bonuses for any character. However, a character can have a Change Environment power that creates a pleasant effect, provided the power has no beneficial effect in game terms."

This is the crux of the issue I believe with CE. As RAW you’re of course correct. However this rule seems counter intuitive to most people’s concept of what CE should do.  Yes we shouldn’t be locked into name of Power equals SFX, yet it still feels wrong.

[Ninja-Bear]

@Fedifensorif you went with Transform, you could use the concept that there is a absolute effect that the decontamination needs to make to work. Iow you could declare 15 Body is enough to decontaminate anyone.  So if the Body is 20, 15 is enough if it is the absolute needed.

[Fedifensor]

24 minutes ago, Derek Hiemforth said:

 

Maybe I'm making invalid assumptions. I figured that background radiation was a general constant in this post-apocalyptic world.  I was envisioning that the area "cleansed" by this power/device would only be radiation-free while the power/device was in effect, and that after the power/device was gone, the usual environmental condition of general irradiation would return.  In that scenario, I do still think Life Support is better than CE.  I know the SFX you're building are technically applying to the location rather than the people, but if the end result is that the location is going to go back to being irradiated, then the game effect of it seems to be that people and things within the area of effect are immune to radiation while it's there. 

 

I guess my main objection to CE is this line from the power description (CC, pg. 53):  "Change Environment cannot provide “positive” effects or bonuses for any character. However, a character can have a Change Environment power that creates a pleasant effect, provided the power has no beneficial effect in game terms."

 

I feel like clearing an area of radiation (or providing those within it with immunity to radiation, however you look it), would be a positive effect that is beneficial in game terms.   

 

I probably should have stated up front that my game is using 5E, though I have the books for 6E as well.  5ER states the following about the difference between Change Environment and Transform:

 

Quote

Although Change Environment and Transform have some similarities, there are important differences between them.  Change Environment creates relatively subtle effects over a large area, and its changes are rarely permanent or long-lasting.  Transform creates a drastic change in a very limited area (just one target, usually), and its effects often last for a long time.

 

This is a case where the effects ARE subtle, though it may not seem like it.  Low-level radiation won't kill you in an hour or a day, but it will slowly kill you over time - just ask Madame Curie!  This effect, as written, removes the long-term complications of radiation.  While the changes from Change Environment aren't usually long-lasting...that's specifically why I was going to use the +20 adder to make it permanent.

 

A ballpark figure is that the field would remove 1 rad per second.  That's nothing in a radiation field doing damage in combat time, but it will clear up radiation sufficient to hit a lethal threshold (300 rads for a 10 CON character) in about 5 minutes.  In the presence of 1 gram of Plutonium, the characters would be getting rads as fast as the field dissipates them, while an unshielded Reactor Core would result in a net gain of 6999 rads/second instead of 7000/second.  A character with this mutant power could slowly reclaim pockets of irradiated land for use...but it would take lifetimes to purge the area hit by one bomb.

[Derek Hiemforth]

27 minutes ago, Fedifensor said:

I probably should have stated up front that my game is using 5E

 

The same applies in 5E (5ER, pg. 137).  But my take is clearly the minority take, which is fine.  Ultimately, if you think the effect and the cost and everything are appropriate, that's all that counts.   

[Fedifensor]

9 minutes ago, Derek Hiemforth said:

 

The same applies in 5E (5ER, pg. 137).  But my take is clearly the minority take, which is fine.  Ultimately, if you think the effect and the cost and everything are appropriate, that's all that counts.   

 

Technically, this Change Environment isn't providing a positive effect to the character in terms of game mechanics.  They are not receiving any OCV, skill rolls, or anything else that will directly help them.  What the power is doing is countering an environmental effect that would give the character a negative effect over time (which results in damage only when it hits a threshold).  Plus, if you defined the radiation as a Change Environment effect doing low-level damage, the GM can allow one Change Environment effect to cancel or negate a similar Change Environment power.

[Tech]

10 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

In my opinion, yes, its Change Environment.

CE should be a short term channeled transform: it can make things different in an area, as long as you keep it going.  Want it colder? Change environment.  Want a radiation field?  Change environment.  Want NO radiation field?  CE.

 

I mean you can buy it as area effect usable by others in the area life support vs radiation too, but CE is the really obvious, no kludge, concept-friendly choice.

I'm going with Fedi and Christopher here. The rules for CE specifically say you can increase temperature or lower it. If the temperature is too high, you take damage; if it's too cold, you take damage. CE allows you to make it nice so you don't take damage. The same goes for the radiation.

Since Fedi is creating the game, he has every right as GM to say what goes.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

However this rule seems counter intuitive to most people’s concept of what CE should do.  Yes we shouldn’t be locked into name of Power equals SFX, yet it still feels wrong.

 

That is the issue yeah.  I get why the rules say that, but I think it should have a stop sign and work the way people feel it ought.  In 6th edition, CE went from "makes an area different" to "makes people do a roll or have an effect".  Sure you can build it the old way, but the rules heavily lean toward the roll thing now.\

 

Quote

The rules for CE specifically say you can increase temperature or lower it. If the temperature is too high, you take damage; if it's too cold, you take damage. CE allows you to make it nice so you don't take damage

 

And yes, despite the rule saying "no positive effects" you actually can use them to make positive effects already.  This needs to be made more consistent and reasonable.

[Chris Goodwin]

If radiation is an environmental effect, then Change Environment ought to be able to fix it.  

 

By analogy, Change Environment can reduce or increase the local temperature, but that does nothing at all against attacks with heat or cold as special effects (unless they are specifically using increasing or decreasing the environmental temperature as SFX).  So I'd say that even if the environmental radiation causes damage (analogously to extreme environmental cold or heat) Change Environment could change it.

[unclevlad]

An unprotected person without the proper life support would take damage very quickly on the Antarctic ice shelf, due to the extreme cold.  One defense is Change Environment.

 

What is the difference between this, and what Fed is suggesting?  NOTE:  I'm talking here about cleaning up a radioactive AREA.

 

So Derek's interpretation that the CE is applying a benefit isn't correct, IMO, and Fed's is:  it's not granting a positive, it's protecting from a negative.

 

I also agree with the others that the LS constructions are tortured at best, and more than likely incorrect.  For example:  LS Usable on Others.  How many others?  That has to be specified.  OK, you can define a Limitation saying it's only applying within the area, but that right there says the approach is backwards.  LS is a creature power, not an area power.  

 

Some of the push to use LS, I think, is also because it's cheap.  LS: Rad starts at 2 points...so +9 advantages means it's only 20.  

 

Another option would be Dispel.  OP specifically notes, it doesn't heal the existing damage, so what it's doing is stopping a Damage Over Time NND or a continuous Transform, however you define the radiation damage.  So the decontamination chamber works great as a Dispel.  The environmental cleanup does too...better than a Transform.  The radiation damage is a power, not an object.  The effort required to end it is based on the strength of the radiation...which goes into the active points of the attack power.  Hey....that's Dispel.

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

OK cleaning up a radioactive area you probably want dispel or transform because its  permanent change.

[unclevlad]

You could do it with a Transform, but Transform targets a characteristic...typically BODY, sometimes EGO...for purposes of defining when the Transform is achieved.  What, in fact, are you Transforming?  The ground?  Not really;  at most, a tiny fraction of it.  A high grade uranium mine has about 0.2% uranium.  Radioactive fallout is, I suspect, even lower;  it's just nastier stuff.  

 

If anything, Drain fits better, as Drain targets powers, and that's what you want to target here.  The transformational aspect is part of the SFX;  mechanically, the radiation is a power running independently.  And note:  Transform is *not* implicitly permanent either.  It's one of the bugaboos in the rules...basically GM call.  If some Transforms can be permanent, then similar Drains should be permanent too.  And again, Drain gives you a scaling mechanic based on the intensity of the problem...the points involved in the Nasty Stuff.  Transform relates to something that's completely disconnected from the threat level.

 

EDIT:  also note that decontaminating an area is really just a plot device.  A decontamination chamber may well be a plot device.  A mutant power that a PC wants to have...that's something that needs a concrete definition.

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

If some Transforms can be permanent, then similar Drains should be permanent too.

 

I want to say that drains on inanimate objects are typically permanent; they have no capability of recovery because I recall this rule but digging through I cannot find it specifically right now.  I'm reasonably sure that is true, but I might be misremembering.

 

As for the transform, I'd say you have to transform the surface (and air around the surface) of everything in the area, which won't be a gigantic amount of body, but it will add up over a few square meters.  Transforms do not necessarily have to have a way to heal, by GM permission they can be permanent.  This is usually the way healing/cleaning/fixing transforms are handled: the way to reverse it is to get it dirty or break it again.

[Fedifensor]

Given the discussion points made, and that Change Environment does have the option to be made permanent, I'm going with Change Environment, with the general stipulation that the power removes 1 rad per second (segment).  Here's a few examples:

 

10  Anti-Radiation Decon Wand:  Change Environment 1" radius (Long-Lasting Permanent) (25 Active Points); OAF (-1), No Range (-1/2), 1 Continuing Fuel Charge lasting 1 Hour (-0)

 

20  Renew The Land (Mutant Power):  Change Environment 2" radius (Long-Lasting Permanent) (30 Active Points); No Range (-1/2)

[Ninja-Bear]

26 minutes ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

 

I want to say that drains on inanimate objects are typically permanent; they have no capability of recovery because I recall this rule but digging through I cannot find it specifically right now.  I'm reasonably sure that is true, but I might be misremembering.

 

Nah, you got it right. The rule for things like equipment if drained are broken until fixed. Now I’ve been in a few arguments about this rule on the boards because people can’t seem to read all the rules pertaining to Drain and insist that things like equipment heal back as normal characteristics.