Move Through Interception

[Dust Raven]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

So: sweep move throughs* - can't do them unless the targets are in adjacent hexes: good rule or rubbish rule?

 

 

 

* Which is the only sort of multiple move through the rules allow for, as far as I can see

Rubbish. It either needs more detail, or it needs to be removed. Reading it as it is, if there is a line of targets, all standing shoulder to shoulder and I come at them at a full 90 degree angle, I can Sweep Move Through each of them, even though that makes entirely no sense whatsoever. I'm pretty sure that's not what the rule indented.

 

The way a Move Through works, there is no allowance for striking at multiple targets unless you leave a hole in the target (such as when going through walls). If we can do it, there should be some reasonable description of how to do it, otherwise any adjudication on the part of the GM is purely based on personal opinion and should be considered a house rule, even though it says in the rules you can do it.

 

In my opinion, this is not good.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

The official rules, as Rapier (and others) illustrates them, are internally consistant, and work. However, there's still something illogical about them.

 

Greased Lightning and Speed Demon are having a race. Both have 30" of running, the same speed, and in fact have all the exact same characteristics, powers, etc. But what GL doesn't know is that SD's buddy, the Mad Glasier, has set up a series of Invisible Force Walls along GL's race lane. And he's also replaced, GL's regular coffee with Folger's Crystals. Each Force Wall has 10 PD, so it's not difficult for GL to break through them, even though he doesn't see them in advance, and must do an uncontrolled move-thru each time. GL has a very high CON and STUN, so he won't be stunned or knocked unconscious before the race is over.

 

And they're off! They have the same SPD and the same Running, GL repeatedly bashes his way through force walls, while SD runs freely along the open ground. The race is a tie.

 

Does this bother anyone?

[Dust Raven]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

The official rules, as Rapier (and others) illustrates them, are internally consistant, and work. However, there's still something illogical about them.

 

Greased Lightning and Speed Demon are having a race. Both have 30" of running, the same speed, and in fact have all the exact same characteristics, powers, etc. But what GL doesn't know is that SD's buddy, the Mad Glasier, has set up a series of Invisible Force Walls along GL's race lane. And he's also replaced, GL's regular coffee with Folger's Crystals. Each Force Wall has 10 PD, so it's not difficult for GL to break through them, even though he doesn't see them in advance, and must do an uncontrolled move-thru each time. GL has a very high CON and STUN, so he won't be stunned or knocked unconscious before the race is over.

 

And they're off! They have the same SPD and the same Running, GL repeatedly bashes his way through force walls, while SD runs freely along the open ground. The race is a tie.

 

Does this bother anyone?

 

Realistically, it doesn't bother me. You can even attempt the same race in real life, kinda... Imagine two runners, one with an open path, and the other with periodic barriers made of plastic wrap. The plastic wrap is easily broken through and the runner has enough PD and CON and STUN to avoid being Stunned and KOed by the end of the race.

 

Of course, also realistically, the runner who keeps running into invisible things should probably give pause and wonder why all this crap is in his way... after all, the next one might not be easily busted through. Unless he's reckless or stupid, he should slow down out of caution.

[Hyper-Man]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

There is a disconnect.

 

Move Through vs. a character has 2 possible outcomes.

• If the attacker does Knockback to the target he gets to choose to continue or stop (as long as the attacker doesn't STUN or Knockout himself in the process).
  
• If the attacker does no Knockback he stops in his tracks and takes full damage from his own attack.

Note that at no point does the target's PD make any difference in the results in this equation.

 

Force Wall and Entangles used to form barriers are different in that their PD (and BODY) is also their defacto Knockback Resistance.

 

Does anyone think that we should start tracking Knockback against partially-anchored barriers? By partially-Anchored I mean Force Walls and Entangles anchored to the ground or even real doors where breaking the lock or hinge might be more likely than breaking through the surface of the door itself. I think consistent optional rules could be developed for this but do they need to be?

[Dust Raven]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

There is a disconnect.

 

Move Through vs. a character has 2 possible outcomes.

• If the attacker does Knockback to the target he gets to choose to continue or stop (as long as the attacker doesn't STUN or Knockout himself in the process).
  
• If the attacker does no Knockback he stops in his tracks and takes full damage from his own attack.

Note that at no point does the target's PD make any difference in the results in this equation.

 

Force Wall and Entangles used to form barriers are different in that their PD (and BODY) is also their defacto Knockback Resistance.

 

Does anyone think that we should start tracking Knockback against partially-anchored barriers? By partially-Anchored I mean Force Walls and Entangles anchored to the ground or even real doors where breaking the lock or hinge might be more likely than breaking through the surface of the door itself. I think consistent optional rules could be developed for this but do they need to be?

 

Well, there is a huge difference between a controlled Move Through, and an uncontrolled move through. There are also different rules for when impacting a wall than you have when impacting a character/other object. What confuses me is all of these rules are spread out over the book. Maybe they're all in the same place in the Combat Handbook?

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

Realistically' date=' it doesn't bother me. You can even attempt the same race in real life, kinda... Imagine two runners, one with an open path, and the other with periodic barriers made of plastic wrap. The plastic wrap is easily broken through and the runner has enough PD and CON and STUN to avoid being Stunned and KOed by the end of the race.[/quote']

Well, we're not exactly talking about plastic wrap here. We're talking about a significant barrier - breakable, but not with casual STR, and strong enough so that Greased Lightning doesn't exceed the DEF (or BODY) in the case of Entangles) buy double.

 

I can't believe that he should realistically be able to keep up with Speed Demon, who's on the onobstructed path. If GL's path was strewn with debris, it would slow him down a little.

 

And even in a "real" case of running through plastic wrap (or even paper), I can't see how a runner wouldn't be slowed down at all.

 

If a person is falling from a building and rips through an awning, it will slow him down a little bit.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

Well, we're not exactly talking about plastic wrap here. We're talking about a significant barrier - breakable, but not with casual STR, and strong enough so that Greased Lightning doesn't exceed the DEF (or BODY) in the case of Entangles) buy double.

 

I can't believe that he should realistically be able to keep up with Speed Demon, who's on the onobstructed path. If GL's path was strewn with debris, it would slow him down a little.

 

And even in a "real" case of running through plastic wrap (or even paper), I can't see how a runner wouldn't be slowed down at all.

 

If a person is falling from a building and rips through an awning, it will slow him down a little bit.

If he's not knocking down the barriers with Casual STR (or breaking the Entangle by doing 2x the remaining BODY), then the one runner will come to a stop at each such barrier. Granted, there is no middle ground, but honestly, how often is it important to measure the average speed of someone running through a bunch of walls?

[Rapier]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

This is one of those cases where I could easily see reversing myself on an earlier decision. It's one of those judgement calls that gets a little hairy.

 

The devil's advocate in me posits this:

 

Up above, I after busting through the FW, the running character could then accelerate back to his full move (if he had the distance to do so). Continue with his attack with a [possible] penalty on his OCV.

 

The rules state that you can not Accel and Decel in the same phase. Which is obviously a VERY silly rule. If you only want to move 1" forward, you must accelerate to 1" and then decelerate to 0" (eg stop). I believe that the intent of this rule was to state that you can, in a single phase, achieve two things with movement:

 

1) You can make a full move and at the end of your phase still be in motion.

2) You can make a move (either full or half) and come to a complete stop at the end of your turn.

 

You cannot within this rule: Accelerate to a full move, decelerate to a lower velocity. This would stop characters from using NCM to close the distance (say, if their opponent were just beyond half move range), decelerating to combat velocity and then striking their opponent.

 

That makes much more sense to me. So, lets explore how that rule effects this situation.

 

Waller is 20" away from Runner. Runner has 28" of Running. As he is Running towards Waller in what appears to be a full body tackle, Waller pops up a FW (10 DEF) 5" away from her (after 15" of movement Runner will hit the FW). If Runner doesn't break the FW, we all know what happens (eg full damage, etc). If Runner does break the FW what happens? Well, if we extrapolate from the KB rules, 10" of velocity have just been eaten up by breaking through the wall. It is conceivable to rule that Runner, since he can't alter his movement rate once declared as the above rules clarification, has just used up 10" of velocity. This means that his full move has gone from 28" to 18". His full move will place his 2" away from Waller. If he had 30" of movement, he would still actually be able to strike Waller! Take that FW-Boy!

 

I'm torn between which method I prefer, the one in the post above or this one here. Convince me.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

If he's not knocking down the barriers with Casual STR (or breaking the Entangle by doing 2x the remaining BODY)' date=' then the one runner will come to a stop at each such barrier. Granted, there is no middle ground, but honestly, how often is it [i']important[/i] to measure the average speed of someone running through a bunch of walls?

Hmmm... I missed that part, but it still leads to wierd results. If GL has 30" of running and the FW/Entangle is at the 29" mark (assuming he breaks it with less than 2x BODY), he comes to a stop and loses the last 1" of running. But if the barrier is at the 20" mark, he loses 10" of running. And if it's at the 8" mark, he loses 22" of running, etc.

 

So if GL is running along a 100" path with three barriers, his time will vary depending on where those barriers are placed. If they're at 29", 58", and 87", he'll finish in about 3.5 phases, having lost a total of 3" of movement. But if they're placed at 10", 20", and 30", it will take him about 5.5 phases, having lost a total of 60" of movement. Same number of barriers, same strength of barriers, same force needed to break them, he's able to accelerate to full velocity before hitting each one.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Move Through Interception

 

Hmmm... I missed that part, but it still leads to wierd results. If GL has 30" of running and the FW/Entangle is at the 29" mark (assuming he breaks it with less than 2x BODY), he comes to a stop and loses the last 1" of running. But if the barrier is at the 20" mark, he loses 10" of running. And if it's at the 8" mark, he loses 22" of running, etc.

 

So if GL is running along a 100" path with three barriers, his time will vary depending on where those barriers are placed. If they're at 29", 58", and 87", he'll finish in about 3.5 phases, having lost a total of 3" of movement. But if they're placed at 10", 20", and 30", it will take him about 5.5 phases, having lost a total of 60" of movement. Same number of barriers, same strength of barriers, same force needed to break them, he's able to accelerate to full velocity before hitting each one.

That makes sense. If the barriers are closer together he'll have less time to compensate for ramming into them. As you say though, mechanically it causes a mental double-take. If anything every happened in game that forced a character to run though multiple barriers, visible or otherwise, I might rule something on the spot to cover that specific situation, but otherwise I just don't care enough to worry about it.