New Maneuver, please offer opinions

[Roy_The_Ruthles]

So, one of my players wanted to do something super-heroic (rescue an innocent bystander) but felt like he wanted to do a grab-by to do it, rather than a DFC (he needed something to abort to). We talked it over, and I came up with this maneuver. What do you guys think?

 

The "Protect Civilian" maneuver is specifically designed for the super-hero genre, to allow Player Characters to more easily protect and rescue innocent bystanders. Any player character (or NPC super-hero) may abort to his maneuver. This maneuver is a full phase action that targets one or more civilians who are currently under attack. The hero makes a DEX check with the attacker.

 

If the hero succeeds the DEX check by more than the attacker (or fails it by less), the hero can abort to a Grab-By maneuver and grab the civilians, then move them out of harms way. Each civilian requires an attack roll vs. DCV 0 to grab, and failing one fails all subsequent grabs fail as well. Any who is resisting automatically causes the maneuver to fail (due to the fact that you cannot abort to an attack). While doing a grab-by you the hero may make multiple grab-bys as normal, with each imposing a cumulative -2 OCV/ -2DCV penalty on top of the -3OCV, -4 DCV penalty from Grab-By. With appropriate Power Skill Rolls, the hero can do things like pick up a bus of people and fly them to safety, or telekinetically grab every car on a bridge as the bridge collapses (i.e. use their powers in innovative ways to rescue larger amounts of people.

 

If the hero loses the DEX check, then he instead Dived for Cover in front of attack in order to take the brunt of it for them. The hero automatically succeeds in their Dive for Cover, but are also automatically hit by the attack they were trying to save the civilian from. They are also prone at the end, just like a normal Dive for Cover maneuver.

 

The purpose of this maneuver is to allow characters to super heroically save innocent bystanders, while still risking their lives. There is an element of risk to the character involved, but never for the Civilian (unless the character does not move them far enough out of an Area of Effect). This represents how sometimes Superman will grab Lois and fly off with her, and sometimes just get hit in the back with a laser, while grunting dramatically.

[ghost-angel]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

You can abort to Dive For Cover.

 

5ER page 394 goes over using Dive For Cover to protect other characters.

[Roy_The_Ruthles]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

right, we thought about that. But the PC wanted a way to not only Dive for Cover, but to also move civilians out of the way. Basically a maneuver for rescuing people as they fall off buildings as well as from attacks. That's why the Grab-By element was added.

[ghost-angel]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

Ah, first I'd remove the "super-hero" stipulation.

 

Second, I'd just say Make A DEX Roll and if successful allow an Abort to Grab By. No need to compare it to anything.

[Hyper-Man]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

It really sounds like the player just wants the character to be able to react quickly to save innocent lives.

 

Danger Sense (and/or Precog) could be used to give the character advance warning of a situation like the one you described and allow him to take full rather than abort actions.

[ghost-angel]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

It really sounds like the player just wants the character to be able to react quickly to save innocent lives.

 

Danger Sense (and/or Precog) could be used to give the character advance warning of a situation like the one you described and allow him to take full rather than abort actions.

 

I think the idea is to allow Anyone (regardless of capability/Power Types) to try and rescue or save civillians.

 

Thus, a Combat Maneuver (vs Martial Maneuver or Power) specifically geared to let any Hero jump to save civilians.

 

Suggesting a specific Power Build is counter to the intent.

[Roy_The_Ruthles]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

I think the idea is to allow Anyone (regardless of capability/Power Types) to try and rescue or save civillians.

 

Thus, a Combat Maneuver (vs Martial Maneuver or Power) specifically geared to let any Hero jump to save civilians.

 

Suggesting a specific Power Build is counter to the intent.

 

Yes, that is the intent. The only reason I limited it to hero's only was because I didn't want lazy PCs to say "why doesn't one civilian abort to save the other".

[Hyper-Man]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

I think the idea is to allow Anyone (regardless of capability/Power Types) to try and rescue or save civillians.

 

Thus, a Combat Maneuver (vs Martial Maneuver or Power) specifically geared to let any Hero jump to save civilians.

 

Suggesting a specific Power Build is counter to the intent.

 

Maybe...

 

However, Grab By is an Attack Action.

By default it is not Abortable.

 

The rule for DFC just puts the character between the attack and whomever they want to save.

 

Moving to an innocent bystander and grabbing them can certainly be done via Grab By if the character had a Held Action available. Making the maneuver abortable just devalues DFC imho.

[ghost-angel]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

Depends on how you view it.

 

Let's expand then to prevent any perceived overlap with Dive For Cover.

 

Aborted Grab By:

Movement stops in the Hex, or no more than One Hex away.

You cannot intervene to take Damage (use Dive For Cover).

You cannot perform any standard "Grab" Options (Squeeze, Throw, etc).

Requires an Attack Roll to "Grab" the target.

Requires a DEX Roll to do in the first place.

 

With any luck this is easy to implement, doesn't take on so many penalties as to make it difficult (I like to encourage Heroic and Daring Actions).

 

As for why Civilians don't do this... well, they're civilians. And if they do perform the Maneuver, they're Heroes In The Making. I see no reason to try and prevent a civilian from acting this way should they manage to keep their cool. Heroes tend to have higher DEX Rolls and OCV and are inherently more likely to succeed in the first place.

[Roy_The_Ruthles]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

I think you are right that it doesn't need to be hero only, but I'm deadest on the fact that you can't use it to grab-by a hero. While it does devaluate DFC, DFC's greatest strength is the ability to avoid most every attack for self protection. Allow hero's to protect civilians even on a failed roll is what I wanted so that as long as hero commits to saving a civilian, they know that they will at least succeed in that.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

You can Abort to any defensive action. What constitutes "defensive" is left to the GM's discretion.

 

So, if you as the GM determines that attempting to save someone from harm is a defensive action then Aborting to a "grab by" for that purpose or any thing else that is appropriate and has the result of saving or shielding another for harm is totally feasible with no extra rules necessary. Don't get overly hung up by the "attack roll" aspect of grab by in such a case; consider the INTENT of the action, not the MECHANIC.

[Sean Waters]

Re: New Maneuver, please offer opinions

 

You can Abort to any defensive action. What constitutes "defensive" is left to the GM's discretion.

 

So, if you as the GM determines that attempting to save someone from harm is a defensive action then Aborting to a "grab by" for that purpose or any thing else that is appropriate and has the result of saving or shielding another for harm is totally feasible with no extra rules necessary. Don't get overly hung up by the "attack roll" aspect of grab by in such a case; consider the INTENT of the action, not the MECHANIC.

 

I agree with this absolutely. The important thing is to give effect to what matters in gaming - that is having a fun game. 'You can only abort to a defensive action' is there so that we don't get silly 'trumping' each other with attacks - and this clearly does not fall in the that category - the PC is giving up an action to save another, and may well be disadvantaging themselves (if only by losing the next phase to attack), so I'd have no problem at all allowing it.

 

Of course if someone decided to 'save' a piece of rubble to get out of the way of a AoE, I'd spend some time explaining that is not appropriate in this particular game*.

 

 

 

 

 

 

*And, obviously, slamming their fingers in a drawer to emphasise the point.