Need help creating a power.

[Herolover]

Hello all. I am needing your help. I need help creating a power.

 

The power is actually part of a specific type of character. This character has the ability to call upon "mystic energies," but it is very unreliable. Basically it goes like this:

 

a) The player decides to call upon the effects. He an activation roll to see if anything happens. If the activation roll fails nothing happens, no good or ill effects occur.

 

b)If the activation roll is successful the player must then make another activation roll to see if he can control the effects.

 

So far I know it should be a VPP and two activation rolls, but I have not idea how to write this up. What do you think?

[Diashan]

Re: Need help creating a power.

 

I belive it would only be one activation roll. Have the player buy the power skill and make that the second roll. Maybe give RSR limitation or pool can't be manipulated at all. Thats probably how I would handle it.

 

 

 

 

Diashan

[Chris Goodwin]

Re: Need help creating a power.

 

Make it a base Activation Roll (or Skill Roll, you decide which works better) and a lower value variant of No Conscious Control. In this case the value of the NCC Limitation would be roughly equal to the value of whatever the Activation Roll is for it.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Need help creating a power.

 

VPPs have a Skill Roll inherent to them, if the character takes enough time to adjust the VPP Power Poll no roll is required. The time required is under GM pervue, but is at least five minutes, possibly longer depending on the SFX involved and the campaign. The Skill Roll on the VPP Pool comes in when the player wants to change the configuration of the Pool:

 

VPP - Can Change Powers as 0-Phase Action (+1 Advantage)

 

That allows the character to attempt to change the Powers in the Pool whenever he wants, but still has the Skill Roll Required part still there so the character must make the appropriate SR (Power Skill defined as "Mystic Energies Control" works) to do so. If that fails the pool does not reconfigure and the previous powers used are still "active"

 

Next, require all Powers in the Pool to have either an Activation Roll or RSR - whichever you feel fits best. If you want pure chance use the AR, if you want it based off of a skill the magic user has make it an RSR.

 

That should get you what you're looking for.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Need help creating a power.

 

OK, as I see it, this guy has a VPP which is Cosmic (0 phase, change at will + +2 advantage on control cost) in that he can buy any power he wants, any time he wants.

 

Every power must have an Activiation or Requires a Skill Roll, which will also be a limitation on the control cost.

 

Each power also has a variant of No Conscious Control in that he may not be able to control the effects of the power. The usual limitation for NCC is -2 when the player has no real control over when the power activates or what it does. Not being able to control the effect is a -1 limitation. I would call "unable to control unless he makes an activation roll" some lesser limitation based on how common the roll is. Probably -1/4 if the required "control roll" is 14+, -1/2 if it's 10 - 13, and -3/4 if it's 8 or 9. I'd probably limit the choices to 14-, 11- and 8-. [These are just rough equivalents of "limiting" the -1 limitation based on the reciprocal of the activation rolls.]

[paigeoliver]

Re: Need help creating a power.

 

If I was GM, and these powers were going to be used on any regular basis I would just veto them. A variable power pool with 2 activation rolls and side effects, ye gads that would eat up so much game time. Other people attack with one roll, but you are taking 3 of them here.

 

I really try to minimize uber complicated concepts like that. A teeny shift in concept or idea could make that whole problem go away. Like how important REALLY is it that there be three possible effects?

 

Character can't call up power.

Character calls up and controls power

character calls up and cannot control power.

 

We need more input as to what happens when the character CAN'T control the effects. If there is no functional difference between "no power" and "uncontrolled power" (energy blast sizzles out, force wall fails to fully form, etc), then there is no need to have a separate activation roll here, as you can call it a special effect of a near miss on your activation roll.

 

Now if the energy blast takes on a life of its own, or the force wall comes up in the wrong spot, that makes things more complicated.

[Herolover]

Re: Need help creating a power.

 

I guess I made a mistake in explaining what I was going for. The character is called a Supernatural Focus. He has the ability to call upon the Supernatural, however it is a 50-50 question whether or not the Supernatural answers. Once called upon the player has NO control over what supernatural effect occurs, but he does have a 50-50 chance of controlling the "target" of the effect.

 

Example:

Joe is a "supernatural focus." Joe gets in a situation and decides he needs something to happen so he calls upon the supernatural to act. He makes a single roll and if he fails nothing happens.

If however he succedes it means the supernatural reacts. The GM randomly decides what effect there is. Lets say a lightning bolt cracks out. Joe again makes another roll. If he fails the GM chooses what the lightning bolt does, but if Joe succeeds he can choose where and what the lightning bolt does.

 

No matter who controls the effects (GM or Joe) the effect called up is random. I am going to have a random table to roll upon.

 

Thinking about it more and more this is what I have come up with. What do you think?

 

55 Supernatural Focus: Variable Power Pool, 50 base + 5 control cost, (75 Active Points); Character has no choice how or when powers change (-1), Activation Roll 11- (-1), Active points in power is dependent upon local mystic energy level (-1), Only mystical effects (-1/4); all slots Character must make an 11- roll to control the power (-1)

[Lightray]

Wouldn't it make Joe's life easier if he had only one roll to make? For example, if he rolls 14- the power activates, but he needs to roll 11- to have control over how the power activates? Maybe add an additional -1/4 limitation on top of the base (14-) activation limitation to indicate the additional (11-) roll requirement.

 

As an alternative, you could simply go with Activation Roll + Side Effect, where the Side Effect is your Maybe No Conscious Controll Roll.