Power fuild help needed: Transform+AOE

[Play4Keeps]

I posted this to the Fantasy forum. I'm taking advice and reposting here.

 

 

 

I'm building a spell lets a wizard change the state of bulk stuff: solidify a lava field, melt a frozen lake, turn an avalanch into steam, like that.

 

Its Transform with Limited Target, and other stuff. To make it useful its got to have AOE. Begs the question: what BOD is the Tform acting against? The BOD of the whole thing he's trying to Tform, or each hex of the target?

 

My friend says each hex, like each target in an EB AOE. I'm not convinced. Is that right?

 

Another question: if the Tform is acting on the BOD of each hex, what about if the AOE is Megascaled? What BOD is the Tform acting on then?

[Robyn]

Re: Power fuild help needed: Transform+AOE

 

Its Transform with Limited Target, and other stuff. To make it useful its got to have AOE. Begs the question: what BOD is the Tform acting against? The BOD of the whole thing he's trying to Tform, or each hex of the target?

 

My friend says each hex, like each target in an EB AOE. I'm not convinced. Is that right?

 

One of the options for an Area of Effect power is "Nonselective Target", meaning you must roll to hit against each individual target. This seemed close, but doesn't directly bear on what you're trying to do here.

 

However, my belief is this: like any AOE attack that affects an area in which several characters are standing, you affect all of those targets equally (you don't split damage between them). So, you would roll once for damage, and apply that individually to each Hex in your Area of Effect.

 

Your friend may be thinking of trying to "spread" an Energy Blast, which does reduce the damage for each target, whether you hit them all or not.

[HeroGM]

Re: Power fuild help needed: Transform+AOE

 

Megascale it.

[Robyn]

Re: Power fuild help needed: Transform+AOE

 

I would say, to prevent the "transformation into lava" that was pointed out in the other thread, that the power should be forced to take the limitation "must also affect the Body of all other substances on top of it". So, if the player wants to turn a bay into steam, he has to get a high enough result to Transform all the ships too, and their inhabitants (this will probably be just impossible, if you let the highest Body of each substance stack).

[Play4Keeps]

Re: Power fuild help needed: Transform+AOE

 

One of the options for an Area of Effect power is "Nonselective Target", meaning you must roll to hit against each individual target. This seemed close, but doesn't directly bear on what you're trying to do here.

 

However, my belief is this: like any AOE attack that affects an area in which several characters are standing, you affect all of those targets equally (you don't split damage between them). So, you would roll once for damage, and apply that individually to each Hex in your Area of Effect.

 

Your friend may be thinking of trying to "spread" an Energy Blast, which does reduce the damage for each target, whether you hit them all or not.

 

:confused:What reduce? OK analogy:

 

EB 16d6, AoE any (covers 8 hexes). There's a dude in each hex, each dude takes 16d6 (roll once, each dude takes the same). BUT!! dudes don't "run into each other" like a puddle of water does.

 

Transform, Major, 5d6, AoE any (covers 8 hexes, the GM's nice). There's 800kg of water in each hex, 6.4t total. Does the Transform to ice (or steam, or any f****** thing) happen when you hit double 10 BOD or double 13? I understand you don't have to hit double 10 eight times; that's what the AOE is for.

 

What if it's MegaScaled AoE, 1" is 250 meters? It's now 12.5kt of water per hex, so do you have to hit double 24 BOD? Double 27 BOD for the whole mass? Or 10 (13?) BOD for an ordinary hex?

 

That make the question easy enough to understand?

[Robyn]

Re: Power fuild help needed: Transform+AOE

 

What if it's MegaScaled AoE, 1" is 250 meters? It's now 12.5kt of water per hex, so do you have to hit double 24 BOD? Double 27 BOD for the whole mass? Or 10 (13?) BOD for an ordinary hex?

 

That make the question easy enough to understand?

 

I don't have the Megascale advantage in 4E, so I don't know.

 

I also don't have access to the 5E or 5ER rules, so all that technical stuff just went right over my head

[Threnody]

Re: Power fuild help needed: Transform+AOE

 

:confused:What reduce? OK analogy:

 

EB 16d6, AoE any (covers 8 hexes). There's a dude in each hex, each dude takes 16d6 (roll once, each dude takes the same). BUT!! dudes don't "run into each other" like a puddle of water does.

 

Transform, Major, 5d6, AoE any (covers 8 hexes, the GM's nice). There's 800kg of water in each hex, 6.4t total. Does the Transform to ice (or steam, or any f****** thing) happen when you hit double 10 BOD or double 13? I understand you don't have to hit double 10 eight times; that's what the AOE is for.

 

Double 10 BODY to change it. It works just like the EB; every "target" takes the same damage. The fact you're "attackin" a "continuous substance" don't change that.

 

Here's an idea:

Fifth Ed, page153: "A character can use Trasnform to create objects,...a spell which creates water would be...(air/nothingness into water), with the amount of water created based on the BODY rolled on the Transfrom dice..."

 

Now you all are changing stuff to a different "state" so that ain't like making water outen air, but you are working with a continuous substance so it's kinda alike. I'd say your spell don't have to change all of the BODY before anything happens. Figure it by halving what you roll, and change stuff that's got that much BODY. Fer instance: you roll a 4, you change 3.2kg of whatever into whatever (page 304, "Object Body Table," "Unliving" column). I think it'd work better. Course, that's 3.2 kg per hex, without caring what size your hex is at.

 

What if it's MegaScaled AoE, 1" is 250 meters? It's now 12.5kt of water per hex, so do you have to hit double 24 BOD? Double 27 BOD for the whole mass? Or 10 (13?) BOD for an ordinary hex?

 

That make the question easy enough to understand?

See what I said above. If'n you're changing (half the roll) BODY per hex, the MegaScale don't matter none. Except for the question of how long to get it all changed.

[Frenchman]

Re: Power fuild help needed: Transform+AOE

 

I don't remember where I saw/found this or if I just dreamed it, but I thought part of the exponential argument for BODY was that +1 BODY represented a doubling of mass of an object (1 hex of rock has x body, two hexes has x+1, 4 hexes has x+2, etc...) and that this specifically applied to transforms when you needed to figure out how much of something you changed. soo...

 

If one hex of lava has, say, 10 body (this is being nice, since 1 hex of granite has 19 body, but lava is less dense...anyways) then you need to roll 20 body on a minor transform to change 1 hex of lava into solidified and cool lava rock. If you roll 22 body, you change 2 hexes, 24 body gets you 4 hexes, and so on. This gives you an effect which varies by the amount you rolled on your transform, and it isn't limited to the number of hexes your AOE transform has, only the amount you can roll.

So (math done in head, don't shoot)

For 140 points you can buy 7d6 Minor transform with AOE 7" Radius - letting you reliably turn a 7" radius of lava solid. This is ~1077 hexes in a sphere

For the same 140 points you could buy a 14d6 Minor Transform (no advantages) letting you transform a whopping 2^11 hexes - 2048 hexes in whatever shape your GM allows.

 

Of course, this is all assuming I wasn't hallucinating about that +1 body=x2 mass thing

[Robyn]

Re: Power fuild help needed: Transform+AOE

 

I'm partially of the opinion that "must affect Body of adjacent substances" should be an inherent part of the rules: I mean, I don't need to fry your entire body when I can just fry your heart. That's got to be significantly less mass than our calculations get when taking the rest of your body into account, and I could probably have a good chance at murder just by giving your heart a bit of a jolt.