Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

[Bloodstone]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Ok, this is a bit of a long setup, but the fact you mentioned Dr Manhattan makes me think this might be worth it for you...

 

I have a pair of "twin" energy projectors. One is a Cryokinetic, the other is a Pyrokinetic. They have some other minor psychic abilities as well, which they used to rather good effect. In my opinion, what sets them apart the most is their synergy and teamwork.

 

Somewhat inspired by Aurora and Northstar, they can buff other thermal based energy powers while in physical contact. Obviously, they tend to buff each other most of the time, which means they usually fight while holding hands, while carrying each other or standing back to back. However, they can't self buff, so they really are MUCH stronger together than they are apart.

 

In addition, they can share their Endurance Reserves, fueling each others powers through their psychic connection. It's a neat trick when you have been going all out and you're still fresh because your partner has been playing defensive... or isn't even there.

 

They have a mind link and can share their senses over great distances (Clairisentience), though when they use those powers they risk feeling each others pain as well (Stun Only Feedback). However, when they use this ability in close proximity, it effectively gives them 360 degree perception, making them pretty much impossible to blindside.

 

They have some very specialized close protection/martial arts training that focuses on team work. They have Defense Maneuver, but it only works when they are working together and they have extra CSL's that require a Teamwork roll. They've good good at paired acrobatics, allowing them to fling and fly each other into spectacular Surprise Maneuvers. They even use a variant of the Fast Ball Special

 

It goes without saying, but they have a really high Teamwork roll, so they can do scary things to even the toughest opponents with Coordinated Attacks and they frequently have a Multiple Attacker bonus. If that's not working, they can delay actions so that one of them can Haymaker after a successful Flash, Entangle or Martial Throw has reduced an opponents ability to defend himself.

 

Finally, since they have opposite power FX, they bring a rather wide spectrum of powers to any fight. And since they are essentially immune to each others powers, they can use tactics that would otherwise be considered suicidal.

 

So why do I mention all this for your character?

 

Because someone with a Dr Manhattan level powers should be able to justify some Duplication

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

My favorite EP thus far is my teen character Vixen, who has 13 different types of powers, done via Multiform; she only has access to one at a time, and has 'Requires a Skill Roll' on the Multiform to represent changing into the right form; otherwise, it's random (aside from not getting the one she wanted, obviously).

 

So far, she's never failed to screw up that roll when she really needed it.

[Cardinal]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Ok, this is a bit of a long setup, but the fact you mentioned Dr Manhattan makes me think this might be worth it for you...

 

I have a pair of "twin" energy projectors. One is a Cryokinetic, the other is a Pyrokinetic. They have some other minor psychic abilities as well, which they used to rather good effect. In my opinion, what sets them apart the most is their synergy and teamwork.

 

Somewhat inspired by Aurora and Northstar, they can buff other thermal based energy powers while in physical contact. Obviously, they tend to buff each other most of the time, which means they usually fight while holding hands, while carrying each other or standing back to back. However, they can't self buff, so they really are MUCH stronger together than they are apart.

 

In addition, they can share their Endurance Reserves, fueling each others powers through their psychic connection. It's a neat trick when you have been going all out and you're still fresh because your partner has been playing defensive... or isn't even there.

 

They have a mind link and can share their senses over great distances (Clairisentience), though when they use those powers they risk feeling each others pain as well (Stun Only Feedback). However, when they use this ability in close proximity, it effectively gives them 360 degree perception, making them pretty much impossible to blindside.

 

They have some very specialized close protection/martial arts training that focuses on team work. They have Defense Maneuver, but it only works when they are working together and they have extra CSL's that require a Teamwork roll. They've good good at paired acrobatics, allowing them to fling and fly each other into spectacular Surprise Maneuvers. They even use a variant of the Fast Ball Special

 

It goes without saying, but they have a really high Teamwork roll, so they can do scary things to even the toughest opponents with Coordinated Attacks and they frequently have a Multiple Attacker bonus. If that's not working, they can delay actions so that one of them can Haymaker after a successful Flash, Entangle or Martial Throw has reduced an opponents ability to defend himself.

 

Finally, since they have opposite power FX, they bring a rather wide spectrum of powers to any fight. And since they are essentially immune to each others powers, they can use tactics that would otherwise be considered suicidal.

 

So why do I mention all this for your character?

 

Because someone with a Dr Manhattan level powers should be able to justify some Duplication

 

Very cool pair. must spread rep before yadda yadda yadda...

 

any chance you would be willing to share the builds for these two. i would love to see how you put it together.

[csyphrett]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

I don't know about interesting but if your character is speed based at first, then it seems to me that attacks that deal in kinetic energy and vibrations might boost this from a strict speedster to a blaster. Suddenly adding speed to a victim is a great way to cause collisions, throwing objects at high speed, vibrations to cause quakes, speeding up molecules so things catch fire, slowing things down so they are frozen, if your character is stuck in the speed zone, then transdimensional attacks might be the way to go.

CES

[Hagadorn]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

I love energy projectors, you get to roll lots of dice, play around with any and all of the power-frameworks and mess with many of the movement powers.

 

And they can be rather interesting. Radon was proof of that. and he was my FIRST hero character.

[caris]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Why not take something like figuring out how to make a metamorph or a brick into a ranged fighter, rather than a hand to hand?

 

Here is an idea I had for a character in an X-Menesque game. The character generates tons of excess psychic energy, but can not produce the kind of fine manipulation necessary for Mental Powers. All that they can do is generate static (Mental Defense for themself, MD AoE UAA, Darkness vs. the Mental Sense Group, Suppress Mental Powers AoE) and project a beam of it (EB AVLD vs. MD).

[Vulcan]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Absolutely! Aside from the old saying of judging a man by his enemies, its those points where a character isn't perfect that make him interesting. After all, who wants to hear a story about a hero who has no weaknesses and can't even possibly lose?

 

I haven't been able to create many characters starting from disadvantages, but I have found that the more you flesh out a character's disads the more you feel like you "know" him.

 

People have been reading Superman comics for what, eighty years now?

[Greywind]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Every time Superman came close to perfect and undefeatable, a crisis or a reboot happened.

[Checkmate]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

...

So why do I mention all this for your character?

 

Because someone with a Dr Manhattan level powers should be able to justify some Duplication

Awesome character concepts, but remember, he's just got the personality of Dr. M. not the powers (and I may even ditch the personality).

 

I did have a character called Equinox that had heat and cold powers, and could duplicate where one half got the heat the other got the cold.

 

I guess I should tell the whole story so you'll see that he really can go anywhere:

 

He was trying to rescue a girl in a hospital when a Crab Man activated a device that threw him into the "Slow Zone", I could still see everyone but it appeared they were moving at superspeed and I appeared to be frozen. A teammate got frozen with me. My teammate blasted the device while I turned on my megascale running overloading the device. At the same time, an interdimensional hole opened up in the floor and I couldn't stop and ran right into it. My body dispersered. The team telepath (sort of a Psychic Caveman) stuck his head in the hole. The Telepath came out with my mind in his and I was able to re-form my body through force of will.

 

So if you take an element of any of that, it really could be anything.

[Vestnik]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Any other ideas besides your Necromancer?

 

Give me some ideas, what kind of options and tricks? My well has dried up.

 

How about (just brainstorming here):

 

The character is an avatar of the Wendigo, the harsh spirit of the Arctic. Personally in this case I would avoid cheesy Icemanic powers, and get, off the top of my head

 

Arctic wind blasts and of course Flight and Force Field

Freezing NND

Snowstorm (Change Environment)

Aurora Borealis powers (not sure what)

Maybe a Multiform to change shape into various animals of the Far North a la Snowbird

Summoning of snow and ice elementals (I like Summoning)

LS: Extreme Cold (of course)

Ultraviolet Vision (6-month nights)

A Freezing Cold NND Damage Shield

[Doc Samson]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

I've been playing in quite a few online games, and something I've noticed, is no one ever really wants to be the Energy Projector.

 

Being one who likes to do things no one else does, I figured I'd go with the EP'er. What I found out though, is man are they boring. I mean think about it, when you say Energy Projector, you pretty much are going to know the powersets: Energy Blast, Flash, Entangle, Flight, Force Field. Regardless of the SFX, that's pretty much it. Sure depending on SFX you might add a few flavor powers like you could make a Green Lantern clone and add Telekinesis and Force Wall, or an Iceman clone would have Change Enviornment, but really, ho-hum.

 

So what I'm looking for, is how do you make your Energy Projectors interesting? To give you an idea, one of my favorite EP'ers I've ever played was a Captain Mar-Vell / Quasar type (enhanced Stats OIHID and Energy Constructs through wrist bands). What I liked about his, was that he was just given his bands and didn't know how they worked really. He had an END Reserve that only recovered when he WASN'T in hero ID, and he'd switch out of Hero ID if the END Reserve ran out. So in the middle of a battle he'd become a normal again, and have to try not to get killed (hope he wasn't flying too high), and maintain his secret ID while trying to figure out why his powers kept failing. So some times it's limitations that make the character interesting.

 

So how about it fellas (using the term 'fellas' gender neutrally of course) any ideas for an interesting Energy Projector?

I have played very few Energy Projectors pretty much for the reasons you cite. Here is a few things I did to make them more exciting.

 

- Build a "Nova Flame" type ability. Work with the GM to build an extremely limited but very scary attack. I ususally use limitations like 1 Charge and x10 END or a Side Effect that END and STUN are reduced to 0. In AP capped campaigns you may have to get creative in making this attack scary. If your group uses a strict AP cap, work with GM. See if the GM will allow you stack Linked attacks like EB, Flash, and Entangle for your "Nova Flame". Megascale on attack elements like Radius and Knockback are a great way to make the attack seem "extreme" without having game breaking damage.

 

- Don't just settle on one type of attack. If an EB is your only offensive power, you will get bored quick (even tactics like spread and bounce can get old fast). Use a Framework to build a diverse array of attacks that work against multiple defense types. Even a vanilla flavored Fire Projector could have an EB, a RKA, a Flash, a STUN Drain (dehydration), an Entangle (melt the ground), Darkness (smoke)...you get the idea. Multipowers are great for keeping costs cheap on attacks. Also, mix up SFX. A Tunneler who throws rocks can be just as much of an "Energy" projector as a Flying fire blaster.

 

- If all the above isn't enough, have a gimmick. The only two Energy Projectors I can remember playing used a similar mechanic. They both had all of their powers bought through END Reserves that could only be refueled (Limited REC) when they had access to the material they projected. One had oil powers and had to get to an oil source to recharge his powers. The other used sludge and had to refuel his powers in the city sewers (ick). In games where they were "away from home" they had to be very cautious about how they spent their END. It was tough but fun.

[tesuji]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

my latest tendency for chargen is to do the following...

build the pc on 50 pts less... say 350 cp i build him on 300.

thats the meaty stuff, the basic skills and the big three offense defense and movement.

 

then i sit back for a bit and think "whats a unique trait he can have that hardly anyone else has?"

 

this might be offensive but it may not but it should be something that makes him special.

 

they also dont have to tie in directly with his other powers.

 

a brick might be a gadgeteer and thus have some bonus int and skills and a vpp for gadgets.

 

a brick might have a magical amulet with some precongitive abilities - bought as luck and danger sense and even some very limited precog

 

an ep might be able to turn into puure energy, with effort,gaining a desolid form and some really swift travel options

 

an ep might wear a mental protection helment providing mental defense out the wazoo as well as possibly a mental damage shield as it feeds back on the mentalists attacking

 

a battlesuit guy might be a mentalist underneath with either weak psychic powers or very taxing psychic powers.

 

an ep might have "healing", really good healing, that he can use to do things like cure diseases and the like, which while not necessarily useful in terms of combat (make it gradual effect) should have a really big impact in terms of character stuff. "can you heal my sick mom"

 

if i spend all my points on "basic character stuff" i find too much is bland in terms of uniqueness. so i set aside some points for a potent impacting but restrictive use power set to help make me unique.

 

think of it this way

"is this a power some master villain would go to the trouble to kidnap your mother to get you to use it for him?" if the answer is "nah he can just get it elsewhere?" then try again.

[csyphrett]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Awesome character concepts, but remember, he's just got the personality of Dr. M. not the powers (and I may even ditch the personality).

 

I did have a character called Equinox that had heat and cold powers, and could duplicate where one half got the heat the other got the cold.

 

I guess I should tell the whole story so you'll see that he really can go anywhere:

 

He was trying to rescue a girl in a hospital when a Crab Man activated a device that threw him into the "Slow Zone", I could still see everyone but it appeared they were moving at superspeed and I appeared to be frozen. A teammate got frozen with me. My teammate blasted the device while I turned on my megascale running overloading the device. At the same time, an interdimensional hole opened up in the floor and I couldn't stop and ran right into it. My body dispersered. The team telepath (sort of a Psychic Caveman) stuck his head in the hole. The Telepath came out with my mind in his and I was able to re-form my body through force of will.

 

So if you take an element of any of that, it really could be anything.

 

Just based on having rebuilt your body through force of will, I would go with Teleportation and transforms as the basis for the character to be a blaster. maybe add analyze molecular structure to help with the transforms. I don't know if that fits what you want, but it seems to fit the best.

 

The only other thing I can see is using dimensional gates as the source of energy blasts. I did that once witht he character's eyes opening portals so he could buy eb with variable sfx and advantage.

CES

[Checkmate]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Tesuji-

Thanks, but I don't need help making a character, my well has completely run dry on interesting powers. If you have some examples of what you used those last 50 points on, I would be VERY interested in that.

[sinanju]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

One user, Tech, wanted to see my Hell's Angel character. So I've attached the Hero Designer file here. I'd email it to him, but there's no option for attachments in the email interface.

[Fedifensor]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Well, to share two of my past PC's:

 

Wavelength - A fairly standard energy projector with an "enhancement suit". The last 2 DCs of damage for his attacks (and all his resistant defenses) were provided by the suit, but it made people think he was a powersuit character. Never got the suit taken away in the brief time I played him, but it would have surprised the heck out of a villain the first time he was put in a deathtrap!

 

Backblast - A 4 SPD Energy Projector with Absorption (to STUN and END), with brick-level defenses. Basically acted as heavy artillery in a battle, able to take hits and give as good as he got. Spreading his EB was done a lot to make up for his lower SPD, allowing him to hit multiple foes (or for extra OCV to hit high-DCV foes).

[Hyper-Man]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Tesuji-

Thanks, but I don't need help making a character, my well has completely run dry on interesting powers. If you have some examples of what you used those last 50 points on, I would be VERY interested in that.

 

It might help us help you if you could tell us more about the kinds of Energy Projectors you have played (or just made) in the past.

[Pariah]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Here's another suggestion for Energy Projectors: Skill Levels. Lots and lots of Skill levels. Not just "+3 with Multipower" Skill Levels (although those are certainly useful), but Skill Levels with specific maneuvers. For example, Skill Levels with Bounced attacks. Cyclops got a lot of mileage out of those. Range Skill Levels are useful, too. To be able to hit someone way at the other edge of the map as easily as someone right next to you is part of the advantage of playing an Energy Projector over a Brick or a Martial Artist. Check out the Combat Maneuvers Table in FREd or 5ER. Many of those maneuvers are underutilized, and a couple of Skill Levels with such maneuvers will allow you to do really cool things in a fight.

[caris]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Here is another idea from the brick thread:

 

Here is an idea that might work for both you [Revanant] and for Checkmate. Make a brick into an energy projector. Build a brick on less than the required number of points and than fill in an energy blast based on a thrown missile weapon (just simple balls) and some skill levels with them. Adjust either the brickness or energy projectorness so as not to step on the toes of other players in the game.

[Checkmate]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

I think I have it. I think I'm going to do sound based. Actually a reverse Dazzler, instead of sound to light, he converts light to sound. I can picture him looking all black like Sunspot of the New Mutants (or whoever he's with now... Does he even turn all black now? Oh who cares).

 

So, now that that is decided, anyone have any cool ideas for sound based powers (or light absorbing powers for that matter). Here's what I came up with (besides the obvious Flash, Energy Blast etc.):

Equilibrium Distortion: DEX Drain

 

Harmonics: RKA vs Inanimate Objects Probably an All or Nothing attack. It either destroys the object or doesn't damage it at all (that makes sense for harmonics right?). Then I might link a RKA Explosion to it, when it gets destroyed it explodes outwards.

 

Any other ideas?

[ghost-angel]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Harmonics II - Tunneling

 

Counter Harmony - Suppress Sounds

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

I think I have it. I think I'm going to do sound based. Actually a reverse Dazzler, instead of sound to light, he converts light to sound. I can picture him looking all black like Sunspot of the New Mutants (or whoever he's with now... Does he even turn all black now? Oh who cares).

 

So, now that that is decided, anyone have any cool ideas for sound based powers (or light absorbing powers for that matter). Here's what I came up with (besides the obvious Flash, Energy Blast etc.):

Equilibrium Distortion: DEX Drain

 

Harmonics: RKA vs Inanimate Objects Probably an All or Nothing attack. It either destroys the object or doesn't damage it at all (that makes sense for harmonics right?). Then I might link a RKA Explosion to it, when it gets destroyed it explodes outwards.

 

Any other ideas?

 

Sonic Slam: Hearing Group Flash, AE Cone, Does Knockback, Double Knockback, No range.

 

Can You Hear Me Now?: Sound Group Images.

 

Wall of Sound: Force Wall

 

Disruptive Harmonics: Dispel vs any 1 Sonic power

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Darkness to all sight and sound, probably no range. SFX: absorbing all light makes it dark, of course, and the release of the energy as sound overrides all other sound in the area.

[Vestnik]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Harmonics again: Dispel Technological Device (shattering it)

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Help Make Energy Projectors Interesting

 

Harmonics again: Dispel Technological Device (shattering it)

 

I prefer a Penetrating Kill for that, myself. If I'm reading the rules right, if you don't beat the Active Points of the device, it does nothing, which makes the power pretty unreliable.