Aid vs. Characteristics Usable by Other

[ScottishFox]

Working on a Bless substitute for one of my former D&D players.

 

Initial costing seemed really low as we went with +2 OCV, AoE, Usable by Others, Anyone within 10m Radius.

 

After I considered how strong +2 OCV actually is and how it was basically an At Will ability with no END cost I began to reconsider the construction.

 

Would this be better reflected with Aid 3d6+1 (taking default values so... 10pts for +2 OCV)?  This way there's an END cost and it takes an Attack action so there's an action economy cost as well.

 

Is there any difference in legality of the two approaches?

 

 

[TranquiloUno]

I was noticing this too. It *seems* to me like Aid would be the way do it. But only because doing it as Char UBO is so cheap!

[ScottishFox]

Hmm, seems like I needed to give myself the old RTFM advice.

 

It's actually under the Usable by Others advantage writeup in 6E1.

 

"Characteristics: Characters cannot buy Characteristics
as Usable By Others without GM’s
permission; they should use Aid to achieve that
effect."

 

/facepalm

[Christopher R Taylor]

A wise GM has some kind of stacking rules; that is, there is a limit to how many spells and abilities ("buffs") you can have active one time.  Aid tends to get around that by being instant, so the mage doesn't have to maintain them or pay any kind of cost such as continued mana.  Of course a wise GM also has a max on buffs that someone can have on them at once as well.

[ScottishFox]

3 minutes ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

A wise GM has some kind of stacking rules; that is, there is a limit to how many spells and abilities ("buffs") you can have active one time.  Aid tends to get around that by being instant, so the mage doesn't have to maintain them or pay any kind of cost such as continued mana.  Of course a wise GM also has a max on buffs that someone can have on them at once as well.

 

I've been using a combat effectiveness cap for each player.  Aid - Area Effect has thrown a bit of a spanner into that.

 

My inclination is to make AoE buffs a factor on my spreadsheet so that a character that buffs has to be slightly weaker than a combat purist, but provides a net benefit to the team.  Tricky part here is if everyone on the team takes buffs and the cumulative effect of 6 people buffing each other is something like (+2 OCV, +1 DCV, +7 rPD, +7 rED, etc., etc.).  Combined it is a major shift in a mid-power Fantasy HERO campaign.

 

One goal of the Combat Effectiveness sheet is to force roles to a limited degree.  If you want crowd controls and buffs you can't also be the highest OCV/DCV/Damage character.

 

One player, in a moment that made me proud, saw how disruptive his at-will Tunneling ability was and volunteered to swap it out for something else.  Dungeon crawl experiences are annihilated by someone who tunnels alongside each room instead of trying to work through puzzles, traps, etc.

 

I do have rules in place for stacking Armor and a couple of other things based on a modification of the armor weight chart (Armor X can only stack with Armor Y if it is within 2 points and it contributes +1 point to the higher value of the two). 

Otherwise 8 cloaks = plate armor at a fraction of the weight.  Thy metal armor is no match for my velvet puffball suit.  Have at thee!