Images (light only) and Explosion

[unclevlad]

So to set the specifics:

 

Images, +4 to PER (to counteract darkness as per 6E1's sidebar).  AoE radius 16m, Explosion.  Only to produce light.

 

So how would you interpret the light level?  Simplest would seen +4 to 4 meters, +3 from 4+ to 8, +2 and +1 moving out to the boundary.  

[Gnome BODY (important!)]

The writeup for Explosion states it removes 5 AP per 2M.  But 6e1 p323 also states that at the GM's option an area other than that required to perfectly match the explosion dropoff can work how you describe. 

So basically, it's up to your GM. 

[Surrealone]

Your interpretation (dropping off one bonus to PER roll every 4m, commencing with +4) is in keeping with Occam's Razor, where the simplest solution tends to be the correct/best one.

 

i.e. I believe your interpretation is spot on and that's how I'd have done it, too.  That said, others might be prone to doing it differently, but if that's how you'd interpret it, by all means … go for it!

 

 

 

[unclevlad]

Those were my takes, too.  It's not RAW in relation to Explosion, but it fits both the general interpretation of Explosion as a limitation, and does behave reasonably similar to a real-world light.  NOT taking Explosion becomes a D&D Light spell, where you hand wave and say "don't worry about it, it's magic."  And it's not like the power is made 'cheap' by doing this.  Base cost for a Sight Images, plus 12 points for the PER...ouch.  22 point baseline before advantages...nothing crazy, of course, but for the equivalent of an LED lantern.  That's the annoying part.

[Christopher]

Ah Light is one of those powers that is tricky to build - especially in heroics when it needs to fit into a point budget - but maybe that is good so?

 

D&D puts making Light somewhere around Level 1/cantrip level. But then it's mechanics for fighting without light are annoying. I ran 1 fight with it, and a 50% "attack roll does not count" chance is just not a good resolution. So it was intentionally made a non-issue by making lightsources and lightspells plentifull and non-issues (the light spell makes your sword the source).

Hero has a better solution, that is tied into OCV/DCV system proper. Light is a very important thing. A core tool. And if the GM does not want to track it, he just ignores it (and the need that technically 1 hand is tied up holding a lantern/the lantern has limited range). I just had a fight in a Mausoleum. We only had 1 lantern. And for most things, teh GM just ignored the limitations of the light rules.

 

In Superheroics creating light is easy. Indeed your powers can create this as a "disinctive feature". And since you got 60 AP to work with, making a proper power is also not that hard.

Meanwhile most lightsoures (the Sun, artificial lighting) are just non-superheroic gear. More importantly, few villains and heroes are set up to exploit lack of light. They do not have a alternate targetting sense and thus need a lightsource as desperately as the other guy. And even if they do, it is a tactic too easily countered - just punch through the wall to let some outside light in or put the fight anyplace but underground/at night.