Personal Sacrifice

[Steve Long]

I ran across an intriguing power build issue today. If we were still publishing DH this would definitely become a HEROglyphs column, but since we're not, I thought it would make for an interesting Discussion topic.

 

The challenge: design a power that lets a character sacrifice some of his own life-force for the energy needed to fuel his powers. The power can only be used once every five minutes, and cannot remain active for longer than 60 seconds per use.

 

So, I know how I built it. How would you build it?

[Doug Limmer]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Transfer: BODY to END, self only? (Powered by an appropriate END Reserve)

[Qelan]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Build a Power or Power Framework that is only usable every 5 mins. Once active it can be accessed for 60 seconds without penalty.

 

The Penalty; Lose a percentage of STUN or BODY or both each time power is activated.

 

Maybe lose END also or all 3 stats.

[Jim]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

The challenge: design a power that lets a character sacrifice some of his own life-force for the energy needed to fuel his powers. The power can only be used once every five minutes, and cannot remain active for longer than 60 seconds per use.

 

It depends what you mean by "life-force".... Do you mean a reduction in life-span? Do you mean a temporary injury (i.e. Body and/or Stun)? Do you mean a permanent injury (e.g. a perm. loss of Body or Con -- now that would be interesting...). The key question is whether the loss is permanent or recoverable.

 

While I think about the "how", could you answer the "what", Steve? If possible, that is. You may leave it up to us to define the "life-force" in question, of course....

 

Thanks for the challenge!

 

Jim

aka The Fighting Banana Slug

[ghost-angel]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Aye, what is Life Force for the purposes of this discussion.

 

If it's just BODY, that can be healed back, I'd just use Major Side Effect, Always Occurs.

[Eosin]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

End Reserve (cover the cost of powers for 5 turns). Recovery once per 5 Minutes (Recovers the full END reserve) which triggers 1/2d6 Drain with a "characteristics return at a rate of 5 points per century."

 

Basically, his END reserve is always full but if he taps it at all it will Recover in 5 Minutes and trigger the drain.

[pinecone]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Aye, what is Life Force for the purposes of this discussion.

 

If it's just BODY, that can be healed back, I'd just use Major Side Effect, Always Occurs.

 

Yeah, I'm leaning that ways as well SE:NND, Does BODY 2D6 for minor, 4D6 for Major....or is this too Much life force?

[ghost-angel]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Yeah' date=' I'm leaning that ways as well SE:NND, Does BODY 2D6 for minor, 4D6 for Major....or is this too Much life force?[/quote']

 

I'd actually lean in towards a set ratio; 1 BODY / 10 AP used or something similar.

[pinecone]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

I'd actually lean in towards a set ratio; 1 BODY / 10 AP used or something similar.

 

Reasonable...but the lim as written is minor=30 pts, major=60 pts (or more if the power exceeds 60 pts) so I was going with that...your way is less bloody, and so is more likely to see regular use...

[Egyptoid]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

my gut reaction was side effects...

[revxopher]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Well, I'd say buy a power framework that once activated can only be active for 5 combat turns or 1 minute outside of combat, and buy a limitation (not sure of the cost, possibly just a -1/4) that makes all the powers drain STUN instead of END. Then just throw an extra limitation on the framework that gives it a 5 minute cooldown.

 

I have a pretty laid back gm, so maybe I'm under thinking this, but I don't really see any problem with it.

 

-revxopher

[Comic]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Continuing Charge, lasts one minute.

Trigger, takes five minutes to reset.

Susceptibility to deciding to trigger charge. Special effect could be a small dagger to cut self with, for example.

[Beast]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

here is my version

this is based loosely on 1 of swords form the series the book of swords

I think this 1 was called Townsaver(been a long time since I read it)

once the power is started it cannot be stopped

even the death of the wielder does not stop this sword

 

 

Townsaver: HKA 1 1/2d6, 1 Recoverable Continuing Charge lasting 1 Minute (Recovers Under Limited Circumstances; Recovers under limited circumstances 5min= -1; +1/2), Damage Shield (Offensive; +3/4), Continuous (+1), Area Of Effect (8" Radius; +1), Conforming (+1/2) (119 Active Points); Independent (-2), Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (3d6 normal heroic level; -1/2), Limited Power Power loses about a third of its effectiveness (wielder may not leave the hex in which this power was started of his own will; -1/2), OIF (-1/2)

[Steve Long]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Since it's a how-to, technically you can define "life-force" however you like. But I would certainly use BODY, since "lifespan" and the like have so little impact on the game as to be virtually meaningless.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Reasonable...but the lim as written is minor=30 pts' date=' major=60 pts (or more if the power exceeds 60 pts) so I was going with that...your way is less bloody, and so is more likely to see regular use...[/quote']

 

The trick being you don't have to use a Power at full force every time. It would make more sense you lose life force commensurate with the power used.

 

And personally, I've almost always ignore those "AP guidelines" in favor of just how 'unkind' that Side Effect is. Losing Body? Major. Must Take a Quick Nap afterwards? Minor.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

I like the idea of using a BOD drain side effect, and setting the BOD drain recovery rate based on how long-term you want the loss of life force to be. Permanent? 5 points per 5 centuries should do it. After all, lifespan has little impact on the game because few games span centuries.

[BobGreenwade]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

I'm in favor of Drain BODY as a Side Effect, though I'd make it a Minor Side Effect (15 AP worth) unless plenty of Delayed Return Rate was tacked on per Hugh's suggestion.

 

For the main power, I'd use Succor Endurance Reserve END, 1 Continuing Charge lasting 1 Minute, and reverse the Increased Recovery Time element for Charges so it recovers after 5 minutes. If I'm doing my math right, altering the value of the Limitation by +1/4 for every step up the Time Chart from 1 Day, that becomes a -0 Limitation. But Self Only and any other Limitations would still reduce the cost.

 

An alternate way of doing it would be Aid Endurance Reserve END 10d6, omitting the Continuing aspect of the Charge so that it's simply 1 Charge every 5 Minutes (-1). With the Standard Effect Rule, Aid 10d6 gives 30 points worth, which at the rate of 5 points per Turn would run out in exactly one minute. That would be modified by usage, of course, but that's the basics.

 

Which of the two (Succor vs Aid) would be better depends on the dynamic desired for the ability.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

I ran across an intriguing power build issue today. If we were still publishing DH this would definitely become a HEROglyphs column, but since we're not, I thought it would make for an interesting Discussion topic.

 

The challenge: design a power that lets a character sacrifice some of his own life-force for the energy needed to fuel his powers. The power can only be used once every five minutes, and cannot remain active for longer than 60 seconds per use.

 

So, I know how I built it. How would you build it?

 

There are several possible ways to do it, but here is my suggestion (I've used FW as it is a constant defensive power, but you can substitute any other appropriate power, subject to some minor build changes):

 

Force Wall (10 PD/10 ED) (50 Active Points); Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (Side Effect does a predefined amount of damage; -1 1/2), 1 Recoverable Continuing Charge lasting 1 Minute (-1/2) 17 Real points

 

The side effect is a Body drain that recovers per hour, so you can recover the Body lost (the life energy) much faster than if you had taken a wound or injury (but you can't get around the restriction with, for instance, regeneration - at least I've always assumed you can't regenerate drained Body), but much slower than if you use the power at every opportunity i.e. every 5 minutes. The 5 minute gap is done here with a recoverable charge, although it could easily have been done with extra time (5 minutes extra time, only to activate -1), but this seemed cleaner: you would need to buy 0 END otherwise, which increases the active points (and therefore makes the side effect more deadly) and I figured that, if you'd already 'burned' all that Body, you'd fuelled the power. If the 'base power' did notcost END then Extra Time would probably be favourite (for instance if you wanted the ability to be 'full life support').

 

The side effect is built like this:

 

Drain BODY 2d6 (standard effect: 6 points), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2), Delayed Return Rate (points return at the rate of 5 per Hour; +1) (50 Active Points)

 

Each use of the power therefore 'costs' you 3 Body. If that is too steep you can reduce the level of the side effects and therefore the level of the Body Drain.

[incrdbil]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Life force is pretty tricky. Is the life force something more than just body? Is it a permanent loss of lifespan?

 

If so, it could be a side effect of a partial transformation to the next higher age category. (defining the age categories as infant, child, teenage, young adult, adult, middle aged, senior citizen, elderly, and dead.).

 

Use a power, gets some transformation effect that doesnt heal when you cross that threshhold, you take on the age ramifications of your campaign of the next age category. (characteristic loss, possible physical limitations, lower charactersitic maxima, maybe even lowered active point limits on powers)--just depending how age impacts such things in the specific campaign.

[mallet]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

What if the loss of "Life Force" was the loss of Character Points?

 

Every time the power was used the character would have to remove a certain number of CP worth of abilities/powers/stats from his/her sheet. It would represent him getting weaker, forgetting things, withering away, etc... Eventually he would have to remove the last of his BODY and die.

 

Very evil, but kind of cool.

[Jim]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

What if the loss of "Life Force" was the loss of Character Points?

 

Every time the power was used the character would have to remove a certain number of CP worth of abilities/powers/stats from his/her sheet. It would represent him getting weaker, forgetting things, withering away, etc... Eventually he would have to remove the last of his BODY and die.

 

Very evil, but kind of cool.

 

Ooh, I like that! Have a side-effect of losing one character point per use. That would make people think twice before using it.

 

In addition, if the life-force is defined as body, why not just use the Susceptibility disadvantage (and buy it twice so that it does BODY and STUN damage per CCH, p398). That would make it worth 30 pts (Uncommon, 3d6, Instant, bought twice) or 40pts if Common. The only problem is that it is fully in the PC's control.

 

Jim

[Sean Waters]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

What if the loss of "Life Force" was the loss of Character Points?

 

Every time the power was used the character would have to remove a certain number of CP worth of abilities/powers/stats from his/her sheet. It would represent him getting weaker, forgetting things, withering away, etc... Eventually he would have to remove the last of his BODY and die.

 

Very evil, but kind of cool.

 

Although Character Points are a meta-concept and therefore not susceptible to loss as such, you could do something like that with a Drain that had variable effects and a long fade rate.

 

Actually I quite like the idea of a skill drain (this is a complete aside) - as you use a power you forget how to do things, or maybe just lose limted INT: that is the INT that is drained is only for remembering stuff, not for processing information, so, for instance, a 10 INT character has his (memory) INT drained. He is still 10 INT for the purpose of PER, and 'reasoning' based skills, but for memory based skills and memory tasks he (once the INT is below 0) has to make rolls to recall how to do things, or what has happened.

 

Limited characteristic drains might be useful in other situations; a limited CON drain might make you susceptible to disease whilst leaving your stun resistance intact.

 

A limited charcateristic drain might be quite a nice idea, if we can beat it into shape.

[Utech]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

Here are two more takes on using Side Effects on a set of powers:

 

1) EGO Drain

While I appreciate the idea of a BODY Drain (since losing BODY can lead to death), I'm not sure that it best represents the "life force". An EGO Drain better fits the bill for me. As you use your powers, you lose your ability to exercise free will. Overuse of your powers would leave you a zombie. Alive, perhaps, in a medical sense, but lacking the "life force" that makes life worthwhile.

If the Drain has a normal return rate, this Side Effect would have little impact on most games.

If the Drain has a longer than normal return rate, this Side Effect might really give the player reason to pause.

If the Drain has a return rate of, say, a million years, the player will have to spend XP to replace lost EGO.

 

2) Cumulative Transform

OK, so this might feel a bit of a cheat. But it fits the bill nicely. Each Player could define precisely what it means to lose "life force". As the Transform takes greater hold, the player suffers more and more changes. These might include changes to Characteristics. They also might be less tangible changes -- made clear through role play but not on the character sheet. The character might become lethargic, listless, depressed, morbid, uncreative, etc.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

You could represent 'life force' in a number of ways. Steve seemed to suggest that was how he was going to do it in an earlier post in the thread but you could do it, of instance, with an END drain. You would rapidly become listless and unable to exert yourself.

 

However, a Body drain is scary. An END drain much less so.

[Utech]

Re: Personal Sacrifice

 

However' date=' a Body drain is scary. An END drain much less so.[/quote']

 

Given the extreme reluctance of people to accept Social Combat results that would force a character to change his/her mind, I disagree. This is particularly clear when you consider that no one seems to mind that characters can die.

 

It seems many people fear losing the ability to control their character's will than having their character die.