The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

[prestidigitator]

Damage Negation (6E). Not only is it already effectively Resistant and Hardened (Armor Piercing attacks are fully effected by it, and it takes a Limitation if it doesn't work against the Body of Killing Attacks), but it works against physical attacks, energy attacks, AVLD attacks, etc. A DC of an attack does at most 6 Stun and 2 Body (less if the attack has damage-affecting Advantages). So one level of Damage Negation (5 points) is even better than +6 defense (normally at least 6 points). Way better because it effectively has Advantages that normal defenses must purchase, and works against all those forms of attack....

 

I know Damage Negation is a warning Power, but damn! It's so incredibly point-efficient there's almost no point in buying anything else. What gives? Can anyone see any drawbacks in it that make it a little more balanced with other Defense Powers?

[Bodkins Odds]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Well, for starters it only works against any one of "physical attacks, energy attacks, AVLD attacks, etc." Not against all of them. You would have to buy Negation twice to protect against both energy and physical for instance. Also, I think, but I'm not entirely sure, that it's subject to the DCs of advantaged powers rule, so it would take about four levels of Negation to negate a single die of a killing attack with Armour Piercing +1/2.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Well' date=' for starters it only works against [i']any one of[/i] "physical attacks, energy attacks, AVLD attacks, etc." Not against all of them. You would have to buy Negation twice to protect against both energy and physical for instance. Also, I think, but I'm not entirely sure, that it's subject to the DCs of advantaged powers rule, so it would take about four levels of Negation to negate a single die of a killing attack with Armour Piercing +1/2.

 

I think you are correct that Negation offsets DC's, and that DC's are enhanced by certain advantages, including AP.

[prestidigitator]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Ah. Oops. Okay. This was a bit of a slip-up. I read through, "Using Damage Negation," this time around but not, "Buying Damage Negation."

 

But still, one level of Damage Negation is the equivalent of either:

 

• +6 PD, Hardened, Resistant (well, 2 points of it Resistant, at least), Works against all forms of AVLD Physical Attacks (+???)
  
• +6 ED, Hardened, Resistant (well, 2 points of it Resistant, at least), Works against all forms of AVLD Energy Attacks (+???)
  
• +6 Mental Defense, Hardened, Resistant (well, 2 points of it Resistant, at least), Works against all forms of AVLD Mental Attacks (+???)

 

Right? Still seems incredibly more effective for the points than any of those Defense Powers.

[Nevenall]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Is this all a ploy to make me read 6E1 again.

 

Damage Negation seems very comparable to Damage Reduction to me.

 

Also, attack powers can counteract Damage Negation with a +2pt/level adder.

[megaplayboy]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Ah. Oops. Okay. This was a bit of a slip-up. I read through, "Using Damage Negation," this time around but not, "Buying Damage Negation."

 

But still, one level of Damage Negation is the equivalent of either:

 

• +6 PD, Hardened, Resistant (well, 2 points of it Resistant, at least), Works against all forms of AVLD Physical Attacks (+???)
  
• +6 ED, Hardened, Resistant (well, 2 points of it Resistant, at least), Works against all forms of AVLD Energy Attacks (+???)
  
• +6 Mental Defense, Hardened, Resistant (well, 2 points of it Resistant, at least), Works against all forms of AVLD Mental Attacks (+???)

 

Right? Still seems incredibly more effective for the points than any of those Defense Powers.

 

Well, not exactly, because if you roll 6 points of damage on 2 dice rather than one, then it only negates one of those dice.

[prestidigitator]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Well' date=' not exactly, because if you roll 6 points of damage on 2 dice rather than one, then it only negates one of those dice.[/quote']

 

True. I guess I was looking at it as a sort of total defense. If you bought a DC (that does a maximum of 6 damage), I could buy 1 level of DN and negate it completely. To do the same thing with, say, PD, I'd have to buy +6 PD. Maybe that's a limited viewpoint.

[ajackson]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

But still' date=' one level of Damage Negation is the equivalent of [i']either[/i]:

 

• +6 PD, Hardened, Resistant (well, 2 points of it Resistant, at least), Works against all forms of AVLD Physical Attacks (+???)
  
• +6 ED, Hardened, Resistant (well, 2 points of it Resistant, at least), Works against all forms of AVLD Energy Attacks (+???)
  
• +6 Mental Defense, Hardened, Resistant (well, 2 points of it Resistant, at least), Works against all forms of AVLD Mental Attacks (+???)

 

Right?

Wrong. -1 DC vs normal is -1 Bod, -3.5 Stun, not -6 Bod/Stun. -1 DC vs killing is -1.17 Bod, -2.33 Stun, not -6 Bod/Stun. As far as hardening, it's effectively 1/3 hardened. Also, it's reduced effect against area attacks and other advantaged attacks. Overall, it's worth 3-4 points of defense if you ignore the AVLD effects, which will generally be somewhat marginal since most AVLDs require 2 DCs to reduce damage by 1d.

[megaplayboy]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

It is a rather direct way to stat up invulnerability though. Just take the campaign DC level (let's say 12, for example), factor in a pushed haymaker (18 DCs), and now in order to be "functionally invulnerable" to attack, just buy 18 DCs of DN for physical and 18 DCs for energy (and 18 for mental, if you want completeness). Short of a kamikaze diving movethrough, nobody can do a thing to that character.

Heck, you could buy levels of DN, take it on a focus and require a skill roll and voila, you have an indestructibubble shield.

[prestidigitator]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Wrong. -1 DC vs normal is -1 Bod' date=' -3.5 Stun, not -6 Bod/Stun. -1 DC vs killing is -1.17 Bod, -2.33 Stun, not -6 Bod/Stun. As far as hardening, it's effectively 1/3 hardened. Also, it's reduced effect against area attacks and other advantaged attacks. Overall, it's worth 3-4 points of defense if you ignore the AVLD effects, which will generally be somewhat marginal since most AVLDs require 2 DCs to reduce damage by 1d.[/quote']

 

Perhaps. That's what it stops on average. But really it effectively stops all damage from that DC, which potentially means 6. I suppose if there is fewer DN than there are DCs in the attack, a more statistical treatment might be worthwhile though. Hmm. I may need to ponder for a while. I might have opened my yap before I had time to digest. Heh.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Perhaps. That's what it stops on average. But really it effectively stops all damage from that DC' date=' which potentially means 6. I suppose if there is fewer DN than there are DCs in the attack, a more statistical treatment might be worthwhile though. Hmm. I may need to ponder for a while. I might have opened my yap before I had time to digest. Heh.[/quote']

 

It's hard to quantify because it works differently. If I spent 60 points on Damage Negation, I'm invulnerable to a 12 DC attack of that type. But if I spent 60 points on the relevant defense, my 62 defense will stop an average attack of almost 18d6 (I'll take 1 Stun from an average roll of 63), and an above average 15d6 attack (average of 4 per die is pretty good).

 

If my 12 DC Negation, 2 defense character is hit with that 15d6 attack, he will take, on average, 8.5 STUN and 1 BOD, The 18d6 attack will average 19 STUN and 4 BOD. That seems a significant difference.

 

Comparing damage negation to straight defenses (let's say PD), I get:

 

+1 rPD, does not act against BOD 1 time in 6

+1 rPD, acts against BOD 1 time in 6, acts against STUN 5 times in 6

+1 PD, does not act against BOD, acts against STUN 4 times in 6

+1 PD, does not act against BOD, acts against STUN 3 times in 6

+1 PD, does not act against BOD, acts against STUN 2 times in 6

+1 PD, does not act against BOD, acts against STUN 1 times in 6

 

That's a lot of activation rolls...and they would vary if the attack were a killing attack.

 

3 levels buys 1d6 KA removed, so that's 6 rPD if it's a 6 on the die - not all of the defenses would need to be resistant.

 

The benefit is that it also offsets a number of other advantages, and some attacks that PD would have no impact on.

[The Main Man]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Sounds like a great way to stat up "boss" characters...

[Lairian]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Actually, I've done a significant amount of math and spreadsheetery on this topic, and the conclusion is that you're better off (points-wise) buying resistant defenses in the lion's share of cases.

 

Per 5 points, 1 DC of damage negation stops .17 stun more than resistant defense (remember, since dam. neg. picks physical or energy, we get to dump all the resistant defense into PD or ED). Damage Negation stops 1.83 more stun from a AP Normal attack per 5 points, and the same for AP Penetrating (step graphs, so similarity is not overly surprising). Against a straight Penetrating Normal attack, Damage Negation stops on average 3 stun LESS than resistant defense.

 

Sounds good so far, right?

 

Against a nonadvantaged normal attack, Resistant Defense stops 2.33 more bod than Damage Negation per 5 points. It stops .67 more against AP attacks than Damage Neg, and "significantly" more against penetrating attacks (2.33 and up...way up). Against AP Penetrating, resistant defense stops .67 more than damage negation in the worst case, and "significantly" more against lesser attacks.

 

So for normal attacks, Damage Negation is notably better only against the stun of AP attacks. What about Killing Attacks, then?

 

Against the stun of a killing attack, resistant defense will stop .996 more per 5 points than damage neg. when the attack is nonadvantaged, and in the worst case against penetrative you'll again hit .996. I'm unclear if you then trend toward "significant" gains for small attacks, as I'm unsure if penetrating BOD guarantees minimum stun as well. Against the stun of an AP killing attack, Damage Negation wins out by .996 stun per 5 points spent, and breaks even with resistant defense against AP Penetrating (it can be more, or less, or equivalent based on the step in the step graph).

 

For the BOD of a killing attack, you will always be better off with resistant defense, to the tune of 2.16 per 5 points spend against unadvantaged, .503 against AP, "significantly" for penetrative (meaning unstable but climbing noticeably), and at least .503 for AP penetrating (minima cited because of step graph tomfoolery).

 

In essence, against non-penetrative normal attack stun, and AP killing attack stun, Damage Negation is better. Against all other cases, pick Resistant Defense. I chose to use AP and Penetrating as advantages to explore because while 6E lists a number of advantages that "apply directly to dealing damage", these are the only ones that effect numbers. For all other advantages on that list, Damage Negation is punished, while Resistant Defense doesn't care (e.g. Area of Effect reduces Damage Negation's protection, unlike its effects on Resistant Defense).

 

Wish I could upload the spreadsheet so you didn't have to "take word for it", since I know none of you will (or should!). It's all mathematically provable for non step graph functions, though, so for example...

 

Normal Stun comparison:

(stun reduction of D.N.) - (stun reduction of R.D.) = (extra from D.N.)

3.5 - (5/3)*2 =

3.5 - 3.33 ~= 0.167

 

AP Normal Stun:

3.5 - (5/3) =

3.5 - 1.67 = 1.83

 

Normal BOD:

1 - (5/3)*2 =

1 - 3.33 = -2.33 (e.g. D.N. comes out lacking by 2.33 points)

 

Killing Stun: (evaluated at 15 points, rather than 5 as above)

(3.5)*2 - (15/3)*2 =

7 - 10 = -3

 

(note that -3/3 = -1, but the number cited above in generalities section is not from this simplification, but a trend line set to a proper pip/half die/full die step function).

 

Anyway, long story short, Damage Negation is really only stellar at Stun from Normal Attacks.

[megaplayboy]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Yeah, but stun from normal attacks is the bread and butter of most superheroic settings, likely comprising half or more of the attacks made and received in combat.

 

What about splitting the two (resistant defense and damage negation)?

[Lairian]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Yeah' date=' but stun from normal attacks is the bread and butter of most superheroic settings, likely comprising half or more of the attacks made and received in combat.[/quote']

 

Inarguable. But, you're going to have to remember that the extra stun gains (if any, remember) are offset but increasing losses to your body defense.

 

What about splitting the two (resistant defense and damage negation)?

 

It's the approach my damage sponges certainly will be taking (to the extent I worry about point crunching as GM). The "invisible" gain of Damage Negation to keep in mind is predictability. Resistant Defense does nothing to stop a glorious roll on the part of the attacker. Damage Negation, by dropping their dice, does by reducing their possible maximum.

[SCUBA Hero]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

The first thing I thought of when seeing this Power was, "Perfect for Vehicles! Now I can take 9 DCs of Negation and have my APC or Starship hull invulnerable to the .50 cal machine gun without having to buy 18 DEF."

 

 

Also useful for Brick characters in Champions.

 

Although, with the Stun Lotto gone in 6e, not as much need for it for bricks...

 

All in all, a nice addition to the system.

[Hierax]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

I love Damage Negation!

 

Damage Negation is the fairest Defensive Power of all. It is actually costed right 1 DC of Attack = 1 DC of Defence; heck, more of the Hero System should be like this, nicely balanced. I've never liked the Defensive powers being much cheaper than the attack powers but this fixes it.

 

If you wanted more variation it would be easy to House Rule it so that you could roll dice for Damage Negation just like you do for Damage.

 

Heck, you could even change it so that there is Normal Damage Negation and Killing Damage Negation.

 

Keep in mind that for Attack Powers there is the option for Reduced Damage Negation which acts sort of like Piercing vs. Damage Negation. With this in mind you could build Armor and Forcefields, etc. with Damage Negation and use the Reduced Damage Negation to replace Armor Piercing and Piercing.

 

If the parts of it vs. Penetrating, AP, NND, etc. are a problem, then you could require the Damage Negation to have to take the same Advantages as the attack to be able to defend against them; effectively having it work just like an anti-attack anti-DC base points.

 

A lot of potential for Damage Negation, even if you don't like it as is think about how with a few tweaks it opens up more possibilites and a better balance between attack and defence powers (at least at the base point level).

[ghost-angel]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

I like things like this:

 

-6 DCs vs Guns/Firearms.

 

Now actually bulletproof vs a Called Head Shot.

(6 DCs is just a number, use the actual intended maximum DCs of guns in your campaign)

[ajackson]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Now for a comparison that's more meaningful:

 

30 points damage reduction: halves damage after defenses.

30 points damage negation: subtracts 6 DCs. In a 12 DC game, that halves damage before defenses.

 

This may say something about damage reduction, though. 50% damage reduction is effectively 2x CON, Bod, Stun, and getting it vs all major categories is 90 points, so if you're below something like 30con/30bod/60stun damage reduction is a poor choice (or maybe 30con/20bod/80stun).

[mmshah]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

Lairian while your compairsion is valid for Resistant Defenses vs Damage Negation, you should really compare Damage Negation vs a combination of Resistant Defenses and Normal ED or PD, since on average 1 level of DN stops 3.5 stun and 1 body of a normal attack or 3.5/3 Body and (3.5*2)/3 = 2.33 Stun of a Killing Attack, since the Body and Stun Damages inflicted by a die roll are not equal buying only Resistant Defenses as a comparison is not the right evalutaion. Instead use something like the following since 1 level of DN costs 5 Points, buy 1 Point of RD (1.5 Points) and 3.5 Points of normal ED/PD and compare with that. If you do that comparison you get the same conclusion you reached but the RD and PD/ED combination is better even for the Stun of a Non-Advantaged Non-Killing Attack as well.

 

If your wondering how I came up with the numbers for Killing Attack Damage its like this, 3.5 Body Damage is obvious the /3 is because 3 DCs = 1 die of Killing Attack Damage. Now while in a particular case this may not be what happens (ie if we reduce 1 DC from 1 die of Killing Attack Damage we make it into 1/2d6) it is still the right number to use because we do not know how many DCs of Killing Attack may be used against us or how many levels of DN we wish to buy, all combinations are equally valid, thus we are using the average. The 2 factor in the Stun Damage comes from the average Stun Multiplier.

 

A Clever person may have figured out that the average given above is not 100% correct due to what I will call rounding error. For example since all combinations of Attack Damage and levels of DN are possible we have the following: If we are attacked by a 3d6 Killing Attack with say 5 Levels of DN, then 3 Levels of the DN go exactly as the average stated above but the last 2 levels reduce 1 die of Killing Attack to 1 pip, which means a loss of the following:

 

1d6 Killing Attack = 3.5 Body, 7 Stun

1 pip Killing Attack = 1 Body, 2 Stun

 

So we lose 2.5 Body, and 5 Stun for 2 levels of DN which has to average in with the average of the previous 3 levels of DN, so now I think you see what I mean by rounding error, every 3 Levels of DN counts as above, but any odd remainder will change the average slightly. Having no knowledge of the Strength of the Attack used and the levels of DN we wish to buy there is no way to compute the average of the remainder term with the levels of DN divisible by 3. But it will only change the average slightly. We can however do a best case analysis for DN. That would be the following:

 

3 level of DN stops: 3.5 Body and (3.5*2) Stun of a Killing Attack from the very beginning

2 levels of DN stops can reduce a 1d6+1 attack to 1/2d6 or 1d6 to 1 pip, which is the same reduction in damage of 2.5 Body and 2.5*(2) Stun

1 Level of DN reduces a 1d6 attack to 1/2d6, 1d6+1 to 1d6 or 1/2d6 to 1 pip, the first is the best case scenario for DN so we choose that getting:

1.5 Body and 1.5*(2) Stun

 

Per DC this works out to:

3.5/3 = 1.166 Body 2.33 Stun

1.25 Body 2.5 Stun

1.5 Body 3 Stun

 

Thus 1 level of rounding is the best case scenario for DN giving 1.5 Body and 3 Stun of a Killing Attack stopped per 5 points, but we can buy 1.5 RD for 2.25 Points and another 2.75 ED/PD for 5 Points also stopping 1.5 Body and 4 Stun which is slightly better. So even in the best case scenario for DN it stops less damage. By best case scenario I mean by rounding not luck of the die roll, clearly that will favor DN since RD/PD/ED are just flat numbers.

[Matt the Bruins]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

I don't so much like the idea of it for brick-type characters (a judicious mix of PD and rPD works just fine for them, IMHO), but I think it's an extremely well-suited power for the protection provided by vehicles, and for gods and other cosmic beings that can just ignore reasonable amounts of physical damage.

[Lairian]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

...You should really compare Damage Negation vs a combination of Resistant Defenses and Normal ED or PD...buy 1 Point of RD (1.5 Points) and 3.5 Points of normal ED/PD and compare with that.

 

This is a valid point and argument. My comparison to Resistant Defense was in the interest of keeping overall point expenditures going toward the same goals, namely that of stopping all incoming damage. Damage Negation is 100% applicable to incoming Killing Attacks (although demonstrably not efficiently), whereas a mix of Resistant and Nonresistant Defense is only somewhat applicable. In the lion's share of cases (namely not the BOD of killing attacks), you are correct in that a mix of rD and D will be more favorable than both straight Resistant Defense and Damage Negation.

 

The 8/3 factor in the Stun Damage comes from the average Stun Multiplier.

 

I'm...not following the Stun Damage you're providing, sadly. 2 chances at 1xBOD, 2 chances at 2xBOD, and 2 chances at 3xBOD, so (2x1 + 2x2 + 2x3)/6 = (2 + 4 + 6)/6 = 12/6 = 2. So average stun should be two times the bod dealt, or 3.5*2 per die, or 3.5*(2/3) per DC.

 

Your assessment of rounding error (what I termed loss due to step graph functions) seems correct, and as you assert, division by 3 approximates nicely enough to not worry about (and as you note, worst case modeling is available for the skeptics as well).

[prestidigitator]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

I don't so much like the idea of it for brick-type characters (a judicious mix of PD and rPD works just fine for them' date=' IMHO), but I think it's an extremely well-suited power for the protection provided by vehicles, and for gods and other cosmic beings that can just ignore reasonable amounts of physical damage.[/quote']

 

That might be a good use for it. Honestly, my biggest problem with this Power is that a defender's power changes what an attacker rolls. That both complicates the rolling (especially when some targets of an AoE have DN and others don't, or when you are used to simply rolling to-hit and damage and then letting the defender worry about the rest) and gives the attacker a pretty precise knowledge of the mechanics of (at least some of) the target's defenses. But for that kind of occasional application it might make sense.

 

But for the time being I was trying to ignore that and look at other aspects of the Power.

[Rapier]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

If you wanted more variation it would be easy to House Rule it so that you could roll dice for Damage Negation just like you do for Damage.

 

That is a very interesting mechanic. I almost like the way that sounds. It would probably slow down combat a bit as people count dice, but it sounds like it might be pretty neat.

[Lairian]

Re: The SUPER Defense Power (6E)

 

That is a very interesting mechanic. I almost like the way that sounds. It would probably slow down combat a bit as people count dice' date=' but it sounds like it might be pretty neat.[/quote']

 

Not only counting up dice, but also spending the time prorating your Damage Negation DCs against the only-damage-related-advantages-cost of DCs of the opponents attack.

 

That slowdown more than anything else makes me queasy about D.N. Also, as Prestidigitator pointed out, it gives the defender a lot of information about the incoming attack...