Perk or power that make people not remember you

[Tryskhell]

How much would you rate a perk or power that makes people have a hard time remembering you ? Maybe with an INT or EGO roll ?

[Doc Democracy]

Hmm.  There are a couple of ways round this.  If you were looking for something that made people not notice you were there, then you could take a limited form of invisibility.

 

If you want to have conversations with people they do not remember then you could have a very limited form of Telepathy.

 

The SFX of each are that people don't remember seeing, or talking with you.

 

All the details of the limitations would come with how it performed with in-game play.

 

Doc

[Doc Democracy]

I just noticed you did not ask to build it.  I think this is more of a talent than a perk. 

 

Work out the power, see how much that costs and then make a GM call.  You can write it down as Talent: forgettable.  X points.

 

Doc

[Greywind]

Or a form of mind control/psionic surgery.

[dsatow]

It would depend on how effective the amnesia was.  If its just you're so much of a wallflower people would not take notice of you but not so powerful that you'd totally be forgotten (thus in the realm of believability), it would probably be a perk about 5 points.  If it forced people to forget you were there, ala The Silence from Dr. Who, then you'd need to make that a power which would be quite costly either in the form of Transform or Mind Control (or possibly Telepathy).

 

[Doc Democracy]

I guess Tryskhell that we are asking you to tell us how you see it playing in-game.  An idea of the genre might help too.

 

🙂

 

Doc

[Duke Bushido]

13 hours ago, Doc Democracy said:

Hmm.  There are a couple of ways round this.  If you were looking for something that made people not notice you were there, then you could take a limited form of invisibility.

 

The SFX of each are that people don't remember seeing, or talking with you.

 

All the details of the limitations would come with how it performed with in-game play.

 

Doc

 

 

This is precisely how I do it with a villain called "Fade."  He and UltraViolent both received their powers at the same time during the same "radiation accident." Both of them are invisible.  Fade's "invisible," however, is that people just flat don't remember him.  He's there.  They'll bump into him, talk to him, interact with him-- the minute they're not looking directly at him, they totally forget he exists:  they think that _maybe_ they saw / talked to someone, but couldn't begin to describe him.  They couldn't pick him out of a lineup of two.

 

Been using him off-and-on as an assassin and / or bodyguard type since....   I don't remember.  Before 1990, I remember that, because we had a New Year's game going into 90 where they finally managed to catch him.  They hung a sign on his neck so they'd remember who he was.  

 

Turns out that his powers make him extremely hard to keep imprisoned, though.  All he needs is access to an open door without his shackles on.

 

 

You don't really need the Telepathy:

 

If you were "regular invisible," you'd have no features to remember or to describe.  You are just using that part of the Invisible power structure.  You can call the fact that you are actually looking right at a guy that you don't know the "fringe effect" if it makes you feel better.   Honestly, it's one of the most elegant builds I've ever done, and have been repeatedly surprised at how disturbingly effective it can be.  

 

 

[Tryskhell]

So the way I was seeing this, this guy, who's moniker is Da Vinci (because he really likes art) basically slips from the mind of other people. I bought him a complete invisibility to everything, no fringe, always on, inherent.

 

Unless the guy concentrates to become visible, he could just as well not be there at all, there's basically no way to crack into his cloak. However, it doesn't work on machines and very simple minds : the simpler the mind, the lesser the effect. A fully-functional human will simply never register him besides a weird impression when reminding the events, a baby or a comatose human might perceive a shadow or a silhouette, a dog will feel his presence and might see a blurry picture etc etc

 

This also means, while people might see his face when he concentrates to speak to them, it'll just vanish and they'll only remember bribes of the image (like how people imagine things or remember dreams, just patchwork of blurry elements, not even shapes or colors, memories of memories). They will remember what he said, the gestures he made, the way he was dressed, etc. 

 

At first I was thinking something along the lines of a distinctive feature "No Face", disadvantage... But now that I'm thinking about it, it really sounds more like just flavor? 

[Gnome BODY (important!)]

@Duke Bushido@Tryskhell

How do you deal with the issue of Unusual Group senses penetrating any Invisibility that doesn't explicitly cover them in particular? 

[Tryskhell]

I'd say, I'm okay with specific working over general, but this quite specific character would maybe get a "shut up I'm the DM" pass, since basically his invisibility is his only power (and ability, he's a very intelligent and agile normal Joe besides that, more of a skill monkey than a fighter) 

[Duke Bushido]

5 minutes ago, Gnome BODY (important!) said:

@Duke Bushido@Tryskhell

How do you deal with the issue of Unusual Group senses penetrating any Invisibility that doesn't explicitly cover them in particular? 

 

In all honesty, all these years, it hasn't really come up.

 

Well, it _sort_ of has come up: we've had a couple of heroes with Danger Sense who became aware of "something" just as he was about to strike.  But other than that-- well, a lot of my players take enhanced this or that, and HRR, but unusual senses?  Not really. Even on the rare occasion that someone does it, he invariably ties it to a "regular" sense, so it becomes "Gold Vision" instead of "detect Gold" or Atomic Hearing or -- well, you get the idea.  Unusual sense just haven't come up much in any supers group I've run since the 80s.   We get more of that in Fantasy than we do in supers.  All that being said, I really can't give you an honest answer; I'll have to make a note if it ever comes to pass.

 

I guess there's a reason they call them "unusual," hunh?    

 

Now in game, he registers on camera, etc.  Heroes can walk around with a photo of the guy they think "might be him."  But when they talk to him, they don't get that "this is the guy!" signal from their brain; it just won't make the connection-- it's as if the guy in front of them is completely invisible....    So cameras, security robots, little tags that say "Hi; my name is Fade"-- these are all things he tries to avoid.

 

16 minutes ago, Tryskhell said:

At first I was thinking something along the lines of a distinctive feature "No Face", disadvantage... But now that I'm thinking about it, it really sounds more like just flavor? 

 

 

Pretty much everything you've listed I cover in Fade with straight-up invisibility.  

 

Though let's think about "No Face" as a disadvantage:  People are likely to remember the guy with no face!  That's the kind of soul-shaking freakiness you just don't forget   "He had on oxblood leather shoes, black trousers, a plaid salesman's coat, and OH MY GOD HE HAD NO FACE!!!!!"  

 

I won't tell you that what I am doing is perfect, but I _will_ tell you that I have been quite pleased chalking the specific use up to-- well, "flavor," as you say.  

 

[Doc Democracy]

7 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

You don't really need the Telepathy:

 

I had the telepathy for the circumstance where people did not even remember the details of conversations, perhaps not even that a conversation ever happened.

 

Recently read a book with a character just like this "The sudden appearance of hope" by Claire North.  Decent book.

 

Doc

 

[Doc Democracy]

6 hours ago, Tryskhell said:

I bought him a complete invisibility to everything, no fringe, always on, inherent.

 

Unless the guy concentrates to become visible, he could just as well not be there at all, there's basically no way to crack into his cloak

 

Here is a problem for me as GM.  If it is indeed inherent, how does he shut it off?

 

I think you need some mechanic that allows him to spend END to push it into the background or have images that allow him to project himself for others to see (and remember).

 

Needn't cost a lot of points but it would square the circle.

 

Doc

[Tryskhell]

37 minutes ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

Here is a problem for me as GM.  If it is indeed inherent, how does he shut it off?

 

I think you need some mechanic that allows him to spend END to push it into the background or have images that allow him to project himself for others to see (and remember).

 

Needn't cost a lot of points but it would square the circle.

 

Doc

Using concentration to shut down an always on power is a proposed alternative to paying the full END cost

[Doc Democracy]

1 hour ago, Tryskhell said:

Using concentration to shut down an always on power is a proposed alternative to paying the full END cost

 

Yup, but you have also gone that step further and made it inherent. 

It is a personal thing (meaning I like it!) that I want such things to be time limited and so only allow such things when the END costs will be a real feature and their ability to switch off the feature limiting enough to warrant their cost savings in the always on.  🙂

 

Doc

[mallet]

Characters and NPC's use INT Rolls to make memory checks. So first I'd ask the GM to make a chart with the modifiers of things that would effect that roll. For example, a one on one conversation gives +3 to check, no communication and in a crowd gives -3 to check, making a "scene" gives +2, every two steps down the time chart is a -1, etc... And NPC's will remember major and minor events they are part of (that they went to that party) but they might forget details about who was there, who they saw, etc... In real life this can happen a lot, especially under stressful events, witness to crimes often have very different descriptions of the perpetrator of the crime, even if it happened just a few minutes ago. 

 

After the chart is made and base rules agreed on, then a build like this might work:

 

 Forgettable:  Change Environment (-5 to INT Roll, Long-Lasting Permanent), Area Of Effect (10m Radius; +3/4) (54 Active Points); Only vs A NPC's check to remember details of the Player (-2), No Range (-1/2)) RC:15

 

Players has to activate the ability, for 5 END, but after that the effect is permanent. Everyone within 10m of him for the duration he is using the ability, will after that and forever have a -5 to INT rolls to remember details of the character. Again, NPC's will remember events happened. If the Player stands on a table and shoots a someone the NPC will obviously remember that event forever, but this ability means he/she will have a hard time remembering any important details of the character or identifying him later. If the Player has a distinctive feature disadvantage, the NPC will always remember that feature, but might not remember any other specific details. 

 

Note: this is built saying an NPC's check, meaning it only effects sentient characters, and does not work against cameras and the like. 

[dsatow]

Personally, I'd probably build this as an invisible area of effect transform.  This is very much like the Silence from Doctor Who.

 

Side note: Prosopagnosia is actually a real disease wherein the afflicted can not tell people by their faces.

 

[Shoug]

I would just make you buy the inverse of Distinctive Features as a talent. "Sell it back," so to speak.

[dsatow]

17 hours ago, Shoug said:

I would just make you buy the inverse of Distinctive Features as a talent. "Sell it back," so to speak.

 

I don't know.  It could be a major problem if it only affected people. 

 

Say you went out to eat and paid for a meal.  As soon as they deposit the money you get no change and you get the bill again.  They've forgotten you got the check and paid for it.  In fact, if you ate alone, they are wondering why you are eating obviously someone else's food since they forgot you ordered anything.  If you are with a group of people, they will constantly asking what you want to order.  Doing anything in person will be problematic if you are on the side of the law.  Are you a witness?  Even if the lawyer has enough mental defense to not forget, what about the 12 jurors?

 

How about villains?  Have agents?  Why should they follow you?  They don't even remember you.  Colleagues?  You're obviously a law enforcement spy since no one remembers you.  Any job you do for a "client" has to be written down as evidence otherwise they won't pay for a contract they never made.  Any evidence eventually finds it way to the heroes.