partial effect?

[Foxx!]

Heroes!

 

Normally, Mental Powers like Mind Control, Mental Illusions, Telepathy, and Mind Scan are All Or Nothing: you get the desired effect or nothing happens. How do you make a Mental Power that has some effect, even if you do not get the desired effect?

 

Example

Hinata secretly admires Naruto but is too shy. Ino uses Mind Control to make Hinata kiss Naruto.

If the effect roll is:

EGO, Hinata admires Naruto from afar and imagines kissing with him.

EGO+10, Hinata nervously approaches Naruto, says hello, fidgets, etc.

EGO+20, Hinata daringly talks with Naruto, trying to create an excuse to friendly kiss on the cheek or at least grab his hand.

EGO+30, Naruto is Surprised Out Of Combat and will not act for 1 Full Phase.

 

Cheers!

[Vanguard00]

Re: partial effect?

 

How do you make a Mental Power that has some effect, even if you do not get the desired effect?

More or less how you surmised. I allow for degrees of success. It never occured to me that this might not be how you were supposed to do it.

[Sean Waters]

Re: partial effect?

 

Technically this is not how it works: you should be aiming for a level of effect and if you don't get it then you do not get a partial effect.

 

However, this seems like a very reasonable way to do it BUT if you use it, realise that it makes mental powers far ore effective: they will almost always have SOME effect.

 

You could cost balance this with a custom advantage (partial effect) at +1/4 or +1/2.

[ghost-angel]

Re: partial effect?

 

Why not use Gradual Effect, or a variant thereof, for this?

[Foxx!]

Re: partial effect?

 

Ghost Angel!

 

Partial Transformation (+1/2) (see Transform) is closer to the effect I want, but without the ability for effect to cumulate.

 

 

Sean Waters!

 

For an Advantage Value, I was thinking +1/2 to +1, so unless someone else replies, I’ll use +1/2.

 

Thank you both.

 

Cheers!

[ghost-angel]

Re: partial effect?

 

Foxx!

 

No problemo

[austenandrews]

Re: partial effect?

 

Very nice idea.

[Dust Raven]

Re: partial effect?

 

A "partial" effect with a Mental Power is one thing discussed in the original 4th edition Ultimate Mentalist, and the rules there were somewhat lacking. I'm hoping there are rules for this in the new one (whenever they decide to write it) and clear up the confusion of the original.

 

Oh, and the rules are pretty much as you described in your example Foxx.

[Susano]

Re: partial effect?

 

Interestingly we've always played with Mental powers working like this. You'd declare you're effect, roll the dice, and the result would be based on your total. It made Mental powers useful in the game.

[Sean Waters]

Re: partial effect?

 

I don't use this variant as it means there is no disincentive to simply going for Ego+30 effect every time - if you get a lower total it still has some effect.

 

The way we play it in-game is to describe a desire building in the target (assuming the target is a PC), but if the target level is not reached they don't have to give in to it, so...

 

...in the example given getting Hinara to kiss Naruto would probably only be a 'greater than EGO' task anyway, unless Hinara has psych lims along the lines of 'painfully shy', as it is something that Hinara WANTS to do anyway but is clearly worried about rejection etc: mind control can be quite liberating...

 

Assuming Hinara did have psych lims that made the mind control require (say) Ego+20 to succeed, but the roll only comes up Ego +10 then the player gets this:

 

Your feelings for Naruto seem to surge in your breast, your heart beats faster and you feel your self flush. You really want to just go over there and kiss him...but you are held back still by your fear that he will reject you...What do you do?

 

The player gets a free choice, and no 'combat penalties' - if they want to try and overcome their psych lim they can (and I'd give them a bonus on the ego roll because of the mind control (say EGO=+2, EGO+10=+4 etc) but if they don't want to, then no problem.

 

It gets the role playing bit in without making mind control more powerful by adding partial effect for free.

 

BTW the examples you give at the first post seem very appropriate for PRE attack - a friend trying to persuade Hinara to overcome shyness...

[Dust Raven]

Re: partial effect?

 

One possible "disincentive", Sean, is perception of the attack. If your result falls short of what the GM deems the level required, the attack still has a result, but the target is aware of it's affect on him and can possibly take actions against it.

 

For example: Mind Man, having just been caught by the guard, attempts to Mind Control him into letting him go. Since the guard knows Dr. Nasty will do evil things to him if he lets Mind Man go, the GM says this is an EGO+30 effect. The dice are rolled, and Mind Man only gets EGO+23. The Mind Control has some effect, the guard isn't shooting him or taking him straight to Dr. Nasty or a dank dungeon cell, but neither is he letting him go. However, the guard knows he's under the invluence of Mind Man's power and calls for backup.

 

Alternatively, Mind Man could attempt to Mind Control the guard to check to make sure the security camera is working so Dr. Nasty will have proof he's captured him, and might even get him to put down his gun for a second, and the guard would simply follow orders (assuming Mind Man doesn't crap out on the roll).

 

Okay, it's not much, but it's something.

[Foxx!]

Re: partial effect?

 

The goal of this idea is to make the 4 Mental Powers more suspense and variety, other than all-or-nothing. I want a chance for a struggle that takes some Phases to resolve. Maybe Hinata cannot stop from grabbing Naruto, but she is able to keep her face away, she is aware that she is being Controlled, and she asks Naruto to help. Maybe every Phase Hinata makes an EGO roll to stop herself from moving one step closer to completing the command.

 

Dust Raven!

Thank you for the information. It’s good to know that there is an official version.

 

Cheers!

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: partial effect?

 

This is almost the exact same effect as my "Lock-on Feedback" advantage that I described in the "Unofficial WDYWTS Ultimate Mentalist" thread. It was also a +1/2 advantage. The result is essentially the same, even if the method is different. In my version, you declare the general effect you're going for, then roll the dice, then narrow down the "general effect" to the specific effect based on what level you got. If you didn't get a high enough level to do what you really wanted, you can at least to something approaching it.

[austenandrews]

Re: partial effect?

 

This absolutely matches most source material better than the default mechanic.

[Sean Waters]

Re: partial effect?

 

One possible "disincentive", Sean, is perception of the attack. If your result falls short of what the GM deems the level required, the attack still has a result, but the target is aware of it's affect on him and can possibly take actions against it.

 

For example: Mind Man, having just been caught by the guard, attempts to Mind Control him into letting him go. Since the guard knows Dr. Nasty will do evil things to him if he lets Mind Man go, the GM says this is an EGO+30 effect. The dice are rolled, and Mind Man only gets EGO+23. The Mind Control has some effect, the guard isn't shooting him or taking him straight to Dr. Nasty or a dank dungeon cell, but neither is he letting him go. However, the guard knows he's under the invluence of Mind Man's power and calls for backup.

 

Alternatively, Mind Man could attempt to Mind Control the guard to check to make sure the security camera is working so Dr. Nasty will have proof he's captured him, and might even get him to put down his gun for a second, and the guard would simply follow orders (assuming Mind Man doesn't crap out on the roll).

 

Okay, it's not much, but it's something.

 

 

This is good. It crystalises somehting I was thinking about today when I should have been working.

 

Partial effect can be emulated by making small steps in the ind control process (1)

 

Mind control is obvious to the target, but a 'current' mind control can't take that fact into account in deciding the 'difficulty' (2)

 

SO: (3) why not rule that consecutive mind controls don't allow the target to 'realise' the influence until there is a break in proceedings?

 

This would allow ind controllers to 'work up' to a particularly unpalatable idea, it would ake them hugely powerful out of combat (but most heroes won't be taking advantage of that anyway) BUT does not make them any more powerful IN combat. It allows role play in an appropriate situation, but does not vastly increase the effectiveness of the power for most situations.

 

Anyway it is risky: each mind control gets a seperate breakout roll, and if one crumbles. all the ones after would get a breakout bonus...

 

Hmm....

[prestidigitator]

Re: partial effect?

 

I usually play with some variant of this. Otherwise it is just too dang difficult to make an effective Mental Attack (and when you do have an effective power, it will often be effective most of the time, as the huge number of dice you have to roll results in a pretty narrow probability distribution). I don't like making mentalists discover and take advantage of Psychological Limitations every time they need to affect a new target; that just makes the character concept tedious and unfair.