Regulating Power Skill

[Sean Waters]

Hello. I've seen a lot of posts where Power Skill is mentioned, and there isn't much about it in the book, so until TUS comes along...

 

Here's some suggested house rules for Power Skill designed to make it useful and interesting without it being a free VPP.

 

1. You can not buy power skill beyond 14- when using the power at full strength (i.e. including the penalties for active points but no other penalties).

 

2. You can't buy PSLs for Power skill.

 

3. If you fail a PS roll then all subsequent rolls this scene/session/day are at a cumulative -2 penalty.

 

4. If you want to add an advantage or remove a limitation temporarily with the PS then you can do so but you add 10 to the effective active points (a -1 on the roll) for each one.

 

5. You can increase the active points of a power but points added over your normal active points count double for penalties (and always at least -1). You can increase about campaign AP limits but doing so costs 4x for penalty calculations.

 

6. If you change the base power then you have to take -1 penalty if the new power is in the same group (attack powers/defence powers/adjustment powers etc) or -2 if it is in a different group.

 

7. All penalties are cumulative and all uses of the PS are at the GM's discretion, as always.

 

Obviously it is 'safest' and easiest to use the PS to build small powers rather than big ones - your roll will be far less penalised. This seems in keeping with the comics/books; small manifestations of power easy, big ones hard.

 

Thoughts and comments?

[Black Rose]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

Do you have USPD? There are a couple of explained uses for the Power Skill. Essentially, and I truly hope this does not violate IP (I'm gonna keep it imprecise anyway), while you can use it to "pull new powers out of your butt", they are only a small fraction of your Active Points; if you want or need more points to pull off the effect, you take some serious penalties.

 

Personally, I wouldn't let your players raise Power above some arbitrary point - say stat roll - without having serious experience in using the powers in question. This is easy when the PCs are "beginning heroes", but if they are playing canny veterans, I'd let them have a bit more play.

[Chris Goodwin]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

What sorts of problems are you seeing that your suggested fixes are solutions for?

[Sean Waters]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

What sorts of problems are you seeing that your suggested fixes are solutions for?

 

Not seeing many at all: I tend to keep a weather eye out for potential abuse way ahead of time, but I've seems posts where PS has been suggested to do all kinds of things. My biggest motivator, however, is laziness: I can't really be bothered to record how often The Flaming Lash has used her energy blast to weld steel doors together: this way I don't have to, as the mechanic tends to be reasonably self-regulating.

[Black Rose]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

Not seeing many at all: I tend to keep a weather eye out for potential abuse way ahead of time' date=' but I've seems posts where PS has been suggested to do all kinds of things. My biggest motivator, however, is laziness: I can't really be bothered to record how often The Flaming Lash has used her energy blast to weld steel doors together: this way I don't have to, as the mechanic tends to be reasonably self-regulating.[/quote']

 

You don't really have to "keep track" exactly: if you can remember her doing it once before, she really ought to buy it. If it's been so long you can't, don't worry about it.

 

My recommendation for such things is to keep a small pool of points to add to your multipower (yes, I'm assuming everyone has one) for a new slot. Alternately, you get the power, but it costs you 1 point per session till it's paid off.

[Mike W]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

I think that a lot of the limits you use depends on what the skill is used for. It's one thing if it is primarily for "pulling new power out" but if you're using it to govern a VPP(such as a Magic Pool), then the roll will have to be a lot higher than 14 for the pool to mean much.

[tesuji]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

Actually, i would be fairly free with its use and not worry overmuch about how many times he has pulled so-n-so. HERo, imo needs to use this skill as an option for much of the versatility you see supers in comics.

 

if anything, its being under-used looking at USPD where its mostly very small ap tweaks.

 

IMO, lets be clear...

 

you got 40 str tk and you wanna power skill to turn it into a 12d6 eb for a round... go for it.

 

you got 12 d6 firebolt and you wanna use it for a +60" jump for one round? sure, go for it. make that roll to-hit the hex now.

 

you want to "extend your force field" to cover the innocent you are holding when the explosion goes off? sure, go for it.

 

you say this will cost x5 end, hey get a bonus to your roll.

you say "gm, pick some side effects"? hey take a bonus.

[Black Rose]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

Actually, i would be fairly free with its use and not worry overmuch about how many times he has pulled so-n-so. HERo, imo needs to use this skill as an option for much of the versatility you see supers in comics.

 

if anything, its being under-used looking at USPD where its mostly very small ap tweaks.

 

I think that's to discourage excessive mucking about with the Power skill. Considering we (the HERO-using public) can simply loosen things up as we wish, making it a bit restrictive doesn't really hurt anything.

 

Though I must say that IMO, the ability of the Power skill is pretty weak at the moment. I completely recommend that players put a small pool of points aside - 5 or so - to add any nifty new abilities to their main trick's Multipower.

 

Oh, I also recommend Multipowers, but I think you figured that out already.

 

IMO, lets be clear...

 

you got 40 str tk and you wanna power skill to turn it into a 12d6 eb for a round... go for it.

 

you got 12 d6 firebolt and you wanna use it for a +60" jump for one round? sure, go for it. make that roll to-hit the hex now.

 

you want to "extend your force field" to cover the innocent you are holding when the explosion goes off? sure, go for it.

 

you say this will cost x5 end, hey get a bonus to your roll.

you say "gm, pick some side effects"? hey take a bonus.

 

I think you'd wanna throw some kind of penalties on these rolls. Forex....

 

40 STR TK into a 12D6 EB? Same basic SFX and stuff? -4 perhaps?

 

12d6 EB (firebolt) into a +60" Leap? -6 or so, since you're doing something that's pretty different from the originating power; though some kind of fiery damage SE would make a lot of sense, and reduce the penality.

 

Force Field into a Force Field UBO? -1 or 2, this is the kind of tweak that makes the most sense, in terms of using the Power skill; minor shifts that don't alter the concept of the power in any real fashion.

 

Now saying "this will cost x5 END" and getting a bonus makes a lot of sense. You might even have a list of limitations that could be used, and how much they would be worth in terms of bonuses; maybe something about the difference between the Active Points and the Real Points, I dunno. Then again, most GMs I know would wing it pretty much all the way.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

You don't really have to "keep track" exactly: if you can remember her doing it once before, she really ought to buy it. If it's been so long you can't, don't worry about it.

 

My recommendation for such things is to keep a small pool of points to add to your multipower (yes, I'm assuming everyone has one) for a new slot. Alternately, you get the power, but it costs you 1 point per session till it's paid off.

 

I wouldn't recommend this. A lot of times you just need to do something weird now, have a Power that the SFX say should allow you to do it, but you haven't paid for the mechanics. You don't necessarily need to accomplish it again, ever. Just right now. Say my character is making muffins when the danger alert is sounded. Not wanting my muffins to be spoiled when the team gets back, I just use my heat ray to instantly bake them then rush off the save the city. I'm probably never gonna do that again, so I shouldn't pay points to cook food. For a more "useful" example, the villain tosses a cryobomb into the public swimming pool. I don't want the swimmers to freeze, but I'm vulnerable to water, so I can't dive in after the bomb. So I just use my heat ray to keep the water from freezing as the bomb goes off.

 

Now, if such a trick was being used again and again, then certianly, pay for it. Otherwise it's just one of those tricks you see in the comics once, just to show off a particular ability and then it's done.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

Hello. I've seen a lot of posts where Power Skill is mentioned, and there isn't much about it in the book, so until TUS comes along...

 

Here's some suggested house rules for Power Skill designed to make it useful and interesting without it being a free VPP.

 

Some interesting restrictions, Sean.

 

I'm not sure I'd ever go so far as to globably restrict the use of the Power Skill, or even for one specific character have it restricted that much. I will impose penalties for doing certain things, but all of those penalties are variable and subject circumstances and SFX. If a character has a Force Blast (EB) and a Force Beam (TK), but no Force Field (wears armor), I might say making a x2 KB Force Blast is somewhat easy (just convert the active points in the current blast), and using the Force Blast as a launching abilitity (Leaping) would even be easier (depending on the launching surface). Maintaining actual Flight is probably impossible though, so I wouldn't even allow a roll. Trying to keep the TK up as a FF might be tricky but possible, so I might allow a week FF with DEF equal to twice the amount the roll was made by, up to half the TK STR (max) (which is a pretty steep penalty actually).

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

I'm a bit wary about 'power stunts' going amuck and keeping track of who's done what tricks, so I do it like so:

 

You can do two things with the Power Skill:

1. Things that just are NOT worth points, like using your laser powers to function as a TV remote, or

2. Spending XP in mid-game on a new power application.

2a. You must have the XP available

2b. You must make the Power Skill roll at -1 per 10 points in the power, after advantages and limitations, but before Frameworks (so buying a 60 active power with a -1 in Limitations requires a -3 check, even if it's only going to cost you 3pts in a Multipower slot).

 

Probably not the best system, but it's seemed to work so far. Some PCs keep 'reserve' XP sitting around, some don't.

[Black Rose]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

I wouldn't recommend this. A lot of times you just need to do something weird now, have a Power that the SFX say should allow you to do it, but you haven't paid for the mechanics. You don't necessarily need to accomplish it again, ever. Just right now. Say my character is making muffins when the danger alert is sounded. Not wanting my muffins to be spoiled when the team gets back, I just use my heat ray to instantly bake them then rush off the save the city. I'm probably never gonna do that again, so I shouldn't pay points to cook food. For a more "useful" example, the villain tosses a cryobomb into the public swimming pool. I don't want the swimmers to freeze, but I'm vulnerable to water, so I can't dive in after the bomb. So I just use my heat ray to keep the water from freezing as the bomb goes off.

 

Now, if such a trick was being used again and again, then certianly, pay for it. Otherwise it's just one of those tricks you see in the comics once, just to show off a particular ability and then it's done.

 

Sorry, I should have made myself more clear. What I was trying to say (and failing, apparently) is, if you use it once (super baking muffins or steady-heating the pool) use the Power skill to adjudicate it. OTOH, if it comes up more than once in casual memory:

 

"Hey, Jerry, didn't you steady-heat a swimming pool a few sessions ago? When you were fighting The Cryos King, I think."

 

"Yeah, you're right. I did do that."

 

"Well, even though it's a trivial use to be heating up the hottub for the party, I'm gonna have to say it's a reuse. You'll lose an XP this session and get a new slot. I'll figure it up at the break, 'kay?"

 

"Yeah, that's cool, I guess."

 

then you get a new power. Now you might say the example is trivial, and it is, but I couldn't think of anything better off the top of my head. I hope you see what I meant, though.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

I think I see your point. Personally, I would never make a player pay for a trivial stunt, even a trivial stunt that could be used effectively in combat. That's what SFX are for, and for the difficult to control ones, we've got the Power Skill. But for anything that really amazing and useful and not at all trivial, that the character seems to like to use at least semi-regularly, then it's time to spend point. Things like using his heat ray to melt/soften the ground around his target's feet so they get stuck would count for this.

 

With the heat ray example specifically, I would never charge the character points for heating up an object or substance. It's what the Power does, it just usually does damage when it does it. Now it's just heating something up without the damage. No big deal. For any effect that involves heating something up for a specific effect other than damage, points would need to be spent.

[Black Rose]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

Ah, but you see, players should also be rewarded for creative role-playing, and to me, coming up with nifty ways to play with your powers is reason enough to be rewarded with an XP. And if you can't, out of play, come up with a way to write up the power in such a way that it only costs 1 or 2 points when placed in a multipower (note that I like these), throw more Increased END Cost onto it.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

Ah' date=' but you see, players should also be rewarded for creative role-playing, and to me, coming up with nifty ways to play with your powers [i']is[/i] reason enough to be rewarded with an XP. And if you can't, out of play, come up with a way to write up the power in such a way that it only costs 1 or 2 points when placed in a multipower (note that I like these), throw more Increased END Cost onto it.

 

Rewarding a clever player is never an option, it's a requirement. I don't always reward with XP though. Usually just letting them "get away" with a certain stunt is reward enough. If they like it and plan to use it again, they'll spend the XP I do award on making it a standard use of their Power.

[tesuji]

Re: Regulating Power Skill

 

Actually, in my book, if someone comes up with a nifty way to do something, the "reward" is usually the gains such an idea got them.

 

Creative uses and good tactics reap their own rewards in game, IMX, whether this be stopping the bad guy quicker or even looking good doing so.

 

I certainly don't need to mandate bonus out-of-game bonuses like extra xp to further gild the lily.

 

YMMV