Immunity to Siblings mutant power

[Amorkca]

We are starting up a new Champions game and two of the players are running a brother/sister team. I think they should be immune to each others powers (like Banshee and Black Tom - can't think of other examples). Would this be an advantage they should pay extra for or just flavor text to add to the characters?

 

Opinions??

[Escafarc]

Check out the Personal Immunity Advantage.

[Amorkca]

That was the first place I looked, and it would fit if such was needed. But is their immunity just a show? Not being enemies it wouldn't give either an advantage over the other in a fight...

[ayinde]

I see it as a 0 limitation/advantage now if there also immune to there own attacks buy personal immunity. the way I see it this wont come up that often

[Amorkca]

I certainly agree that it wouldn't come up too often, but siblings do tend to fight!!!

 

One character is sound based (flight, EB, Flash vs hearing) and the other is mentalist (Telepathy, Mind control, mind scan, danger sense). Perhaps a splash effect of the EB hitting the sibling (no damage) but a minor sound distortion going off from there...

 

[ayinde]

no its true lord knows me and my sibs fought all through childhood but I have never used full force on them. but remember even if a power wont work directly on a opponent you can still use the indirect aspects those child hood scraps would grant them new insight on there powers function the telepath is still a step ahead in his actions that means maybe extra dcv sfx using surface thoughts to his advantage and then there is the sound generator he can still trip and throw with the passive aspects of his abilities. unless you see there powers as fully canceled out on each other out some how if that is the case there power has a real bad hindrance a smart enemy can use on them think use one sibling as a human shield kind of bad.............

[ayinde]

or you can just have them both take a psychological flaw ; code of conduct never use power on brother. cost 0 (if gm feels giving 5pts) now they just cant knowingly use there powers on each other

[Greywind]

I'd rather support something closer to the Summers brothers immunity, which RAW would require "Personal Immunity".

[Amorkca]

I should probably know what RAW is an an acronym for but for the life of me... I don't...

 

Does anyone know whether Megalith who could steal Alex Summers powers was immune to Scott's eyebeams?

[Lucius]

RAW : Rules as Written.

 

As opposed to any house rules you may have cooked up.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary looks for house rules in the building codes

[ayinde]

Greywind really its as much a hinder effect as an advantage so should that not be a 0 cost and both summers brothers have had there power reflected at them and took damage from it so no personal immunity

[Greywind]

Not to my knowledge. They have suffered knockback from having their attacks reflected. They have suffered knockback from their respective sib, but the only time they've actually hurt each other was when it came to physical blows.

[psyber624]

As with most things of this nature you have to look at how it will affect your games in YOUR universe. If you have or plan to have a villain with powers like Reflection, Mind Control, Mimic VPP's, etc then being immune to each others powers is definitely an advantage (for most of the same reasons that Personal Immunity is an advantage in the first place). Also if either player takes an AOE advantage on one of their powers then without question that Immunity is an advantage for both them and their sibling. If neither of these is true then honestly it will likely almost never come up so while it might be the case it can easily fall under the "What not to spend points on" rule and you can just make a note about it on their character sheets and leave it at that. And unless you intend for the two to willingly actually get into fights with each other then there is really no limitation to be had.

 

Now how to simulate this is up to you. The best two suggestions I can come up with are:

 

1. Handwave Personal Immunity to be Sibling Immunity. This is the easiest way to do it. If using AP caps I wouldn't use this as part of the Cap calculation.

 

2. Purchase extra defenses to the other power with the -2 Limitation "Only to defend against siblings Power". This is the RAW way to do it and you purchase them high enough so that with your innate defenses you cannot be affected by the power in question. Of course this way is probably going to be MUCH more expensive to the players involved and if you add things like Drains and Aids into the mix things can get wonky (unless you apply the absolute effect rule to these defenses even if Drained/vs Aided power). I would personally only use this option if I planned to have plenty of "Price of Power" or "Reflection of Power" themed adventures in my campaign. If that is the case being immune to the effects of those themes might be worth the cost in points.

 

Edit: One thing to note which may be difficult to get across to your players. The value of the two could actually VARY between the two players. For instance you stated you have one Mentalist Brother and one Sonic Brother. MANY Sonic archetypes include an AOE ability and having his brother be immune is a huge advantage as he never has to worry where he is screaming if his brother is around. On the other hand a Mentalist rarely has AOE's, is unlikely to have his powers "reflected", and generally has enough EGO/MD that he will likely never be subject to Mind Control so the fact that his brother is immune to his power really doesn't represent much of an advantage, and depending on the Mental powers might even be a -0 limitation as he cant, for instance, communicate telepathically with his brother, or read his brothers mind if he is unconscious or any of the other myriad beneficial uses of mental powers we have seen depicted in media over the years. Of course convincing your players that the same ability is an advantage for one of them but a limitation for the other could be a tough battle so I would personally probably just ignore this aspect and go with whichever side of the coin seemed most likely to affect my campaign, but I thought I would mention it.

[phoenix240]

That was the first place I looked, and it would fit if such was needed. But is their immunity just a show? Not being enemies it wouldn't give either an advantage over the other in a fight...

its a slight advantage because they're powers can't be turned on the other (missile reflection, one is somehow compelled or tricked into attacking the other, etc) But its very situational so could be seen as handwave +0 Advantage.

[phoenix240]

Maybe a small Physical Limitation::Powers do not affect sibling?

[Christopher]

I agree with what psyber624 said. This largely depends on how likely this will play a relevancy in your campaign. The rule about "what not to spend points on" could be the answer.

About how to realise it rules wise:

You could give the target better defenses, with a limitaiton.

 

You could give the attack a Limitation (-0; only more if they are hunted level enemies)

 

Giving the attack an advantage.

This only applies if it comes up rather regulary: If one or both have a mentalist nemesis and rather low relucatance about hitting one another*.

AoE's would almost certainly cost an advantage. Every form of "ally affection prevention" (hole in the middle, Selective) is an Advantage for AoE so this should not be an exception.

 

*there is a difference between siblings squabbling with fists and the two having an all out fight with superpowers till one is knocked out.

[Kaze9999]

Cyclops and Havok also are immune to each other's powers! Personally, I would do it as a zero point limitation on the power, "Not vs [name of sibling here]", and if it were going to really be a limitation (or advantage) I'd adjust the value accordingly.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Yeah I would treat that as a personal immunity variant.  Neither of them can hurt themselves with their power either, its a minor advantage, but worth paying for if your sibling shows up often engouh and you can't hurt yourself with your optic beams or what have you.

[esampson]

Overall I would say that you should buy it as personal immunity. The issue really is this; does the modifier work to the benefit or to the detriment of the player?

 

Yes, an argument can be made that it is preventing the power from working in certain circumstances (such as when they want to duke it out with one another) but all in all there is probably a great deal more benefit in the fact that they can sling around their powers when fighting badguys without the concern of hitting one another.

 

Now, this is somewhat situational. If one of the siblings was an NPC villain it would probably be a limitation, because whenever the PC has to fight the NPC they can't use their powers on them (and vice versa). However with two heroes the only time they would probably be using their powers against one another would be either in training room sessions or because of some squabble where no one is getting killed or arrested and as such neither of those incidents are 'important' (this isn't meant to denigrate the idea of a scene with siblings fighting. They can be an excellent component of a story. However there are no real ramifications from their inability to use their power on one another. The ramifications come from the fight in the first place and whether they were tossing around power beams or right hooks has very little effect on the final outcome).

[TheQuestionMan]

Does Not Work against Siblings (-0) 

[esampson]

Does Not Work against Siblings (-0) 

That would only be the case if the drawbacks were equal to the advantage. In this case it seems to me like there are clearly more advantages than drawbacks. Not overwhelming advantages but enough to justify a +1/4.

[Greywind]

Depends on whether or not the siblings get along.

[Lucius]

 

If I can hurt myself with my power but can't hurt my sibling, that strikes me as really really strange.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Palindromedary Immunity

[esampson]

Depends on whether or not the siblings get along.

Yes, I did mention in an earlier post that it could be a limitation if one of the siblings was a villain and the other a hero, but in the given example they are both heroes.

 

Personally I would say that if they are both heroes it doesn't really matter if they 'get along'. In any fight they had the significant event would be the fight itself, not which one wins, so an inability to use a power under those circumstances in not an effective limitation.

[Greywind]

Given the example, both Cyclops and Havok are heroes and they don't get along.