dugfromthearth

The rules do not say to penalize for a failed complementary skill roll, but it seems odd that it can provide a bonus but not a penalty. The general question is I guess - do you consider skills to be "safe". Meaning if they succeed you get accurate information, if they fail you get no information. Or do you allow skills to fail and provide incorrect information? I know stealth, climbing and other skills can fail.

I understand the problem with selling a product which includes something other people have written. Most of my stuff comes from research, so I will be sure to try and include a bibliography (web sites) at the bottom.

are you accepting contributions for that book or are you looking to write it all yourself?

I am doing a bunch of stuff which I am putting on geocities right now. Right now I am just fooling around with it (I don't really know html) but when I get something really done I will take you up on it. thanks

I am working on navigation, fishing, and climbing as well. I really would like good rules for sailing, I want to work on that at some point. I like simplicity when you are just moving the story along, but I don't like playing a character and just saying you do a skill without any idea what it actually involves.

I thought I could quote a bit to give you a sense of the document without you having to dl it. Leaves: Leaves bounce back when compressed but the ground underneath them does not. The leaves do get scuffed and may be somewhat disturbed. Imprint at -4, imprint is gone after one hour of aging. Wet, fresh leaves have a tendency to bruise. It takes over an hour for the bruise to appear and then it disappears in about 24 hours. Imprint is normal but disappears after 24 hours. The ground underneath leaves is usually wet and takes an imprint well +2. The leaves prevent the ground from weathering (they will disappear over the course of months). The leaves must be moved for the imprint in the ground to be seen. Pine Needles: Pine needles do compress, but poorly - imprint at -2. They weather normally. Fresh pine needles bruise like leaves. Pine needles absorb the impact and the ground beneath it does not compress. Stones: This refers to stones and boulders, not a large expanse of rock. Usually there is little dirt on stones. Dislodged stones are common but may be hard to recognize. Dry patches after rain or wet patches on a sunny day may indicate a stone has been moved. The imprint is at -5, being erased entirely after one hour of aging or 5 minutes of rain.

the old justice inc genre for hero had more complicated charts I think. if you can find it/them.

3d6 pre [15], cumulative X4 max [+1], aoe cone [+1], Continuous (+1) , Persistent (+1/2) Always On (-1/2), Focus OIF reflecting Mask (-1/2), Only versus people who have killed somebody or let somebody die they could have saved and are not at peace with those dead/deaths (-1/2), Only to cause fear (-1) AP: 67.5 RC: 19 Cone: 52.5pts (10" cone?) It is expensive, because PRE normally gets aoe for free. If the power affected the wearer, increasing their presence it would be cheaper, but the cumulative wouldn't make any sense. So if you want cumulative this seems to be the way to go. Now looked at in terms of effectiveness, a 12d6 pre attack is a 60pt power. So it would/could be very powerful. The point cost is too low if anything for the potential power. can you use cumulative with PRE attacks? I have the feeling you can only use cumulative if there is a defense against the power, and there isn't against PRE attacks. But I could be wrong about that.

yes but the first 1" or 2" you fall does no damage and then you take 1d6 I believe. so say it is 1" is 0d6 and 2" is 2d6. Falling 2" (12 feet) could do at most 4 stun and 0 body to you. That lets you fall safely from a roof. add in that you can jump down 1", and you can jump down 3" and take at most 4 stun and 0 body - an ordinary person.

but the effect is defined - it causes fear. So there can be no concious control. the question isn't whether killers applies to half the people in the world, but half the people you want to effect. like buying an attack "only works on criminals" may not work on 75% of the population, but those aren't the people you want it to work against. I can't comment on the cumulative, not sure how that would work in practice.

I would allow stealth to be used against it if the character had mental awareness and could thus sense their mind and tell if they were being mentally stealthy. I think ultimately what this thread shows is that mind scan is bad. It should be bought as some form of sense using the sense building rules. Rather then having a sense building framework and then a crucially important sense that is legacy rules.

okay, I can go with persistent. the mask has to work even when he is unconcious, so it would require persistent.

jumping is different then falling. They jumped down with no trouble, fell down with some trouble. Look at the falling damage chart. It is not that dangerous - unless you are a normal human with a PD of 2. A character with a PD of 20, which seems reasonable for vampires and werewolves can probably fall a half dozen stories with little fear. When you jump down you can subtract the distance you can jump vertically from the distance fallen. So if a werewolf is strength 40, it can standing jump 4 hexes high. So if it were 8 hexes up it could jump, subtract 4 hexes from the distance and count as only falling 4 hexes. Given the werewolf's high PD they would probably not get hurt.

[15 PRE Cumulative *4 Max (+1), Damage Shield (+1/4, only versus people who can see their reflection in the front side of the mask), Continous (+1) , Persistent (+1/2) Active Cost: 56 Always On (-1/2), Focus OIF reflecting Mask (-1/2), Only versus people who have killed somebody or let somebody die they could have saved and are not at peace with those dead/deaths (-2), Only to cause fear (-1) No Conscious Control (-1)] This seems strangely complicated for a simple effect. And several of the limits are off-base imho. Just buy it as a bonus to presence - drop the damage shield, continuous, and persistent. then drop always on, and no concious control (which can't apply in any case to an always on damage shield) the only vs peope who have killed somebody - at most is worth a -1 lim in some pacifistic game. In most games it should be -1/2, villains kill people. In any sort of fantasy setting or game where killing is common it would be -1/4. only to cause fear is -1/2 I thought, since it is the most common use of pre attacks (I could be wrong though) My take on it: +30 Pre [30], Focus OIF reflecting Mask (-1/2), Only versus people who have killed somebody or let somebody die they could have saved and are not at peace with those dead/deaths (-1/2), Only to cause fear (-1/2) Active Points: 30, Real Cost: 12 the +6d6 adds to the character's normal presence attacks. It is usually good for +21 to the result, which bumps up the results by two levels, making for a very powerful attack. You could buy it with the always on (-1/2) limitation. In which case anyone who met the criteria would suffer a 6d6 PRE attack on every one of the phases of the character with the mask. Real Cost would be 10pts.

my understanding is that negative stun makes you unconcious. negative body means you are dying - it does not make you unconcious. my characters end up fighting a lot with negative body.

it is simple and not a bad system. but you forgot negative body. I would go with -1 for under 1/2 body, and -2 if you are at negative body.

Awhile back I researched tracking and wrote up this document. It can be used purely for flavor so that players can GM's can describe tracks, or how they track, or how they conceal tracks. It does have some mechanics in it - so you can figure out penalties for the age of tracks, terrain type, etc.

it is really very simple when you are at 0 stun you are at 0 END. Normally you only get as much END back as stun, so if you are at 1 stun you will be at 1 end. You can do a 12d6 punch if you want. But that costs 6 END, and since you only hav 1 END, the extra 5 END are paid by taking stun dmg - 1d6 per 2 END (Fred 286). So you would do 12d6 to them and take 3d6 yourself, knocking yourself back unconcious. Now if you had an attack that took no END to use - say a gun, you could recover to 1 stun and fire off a bullet without knocking yourself out. This all seems perfectly reasonable. Now it might seem strange when you can get to 1 stun and 1 end and shoot off a 12d6 firebolt from your eyes at 0 end cost, but the strange part is being able to shoot firebolts from your eyes - the ) END and being able to do it just after recovering conciousness is just window dressing.

OIF if you can't take it away in combat it is not OAF.

okay mental sense group. what are the rules for a mental sense group?

if someone has Fred handy can they look up mental powers. I believe that mental powers are restricted to LoS, and require actually seeing the target to be used - unless you have a mind scan link to the target. Since this detect is defined as a mental power it would function in the same way - the mentalist would have to see the target in order to detect the mind. So this would let the mentalist note that the guy in front of him is actually an automaton, or that the statue in front of him actually has a human mind, but it would not let them detect an invisible person. I could be wrong. I don't have Fred with me. But I am fairly confident mental powers require LoS unless you have a mind scan link.

I still don't know what you intend the effect to be, just what you want the special effect to be. The power to use depends on the effect you want.

I agree, that is clever in a twisted way. I would make by con instead of str be a major advantage though, not +1/4.

Detect Minds (Mental Group), 0 Phase Sense, Ranged, Discriminatory, Analyze, 360 Degree Sense, Targetting I would probably allow it with the following caveats: it is LoS only - mental powers are LoS unless used through mind scan. So it is blocked by walls, other people etc. LoS means he has to see it, so although he bought it as 360 degree sense, unless his sight is 360 degree sense that won't do him much good. So this would be a power that let him look at someone and analyze their mind - which is not reading thoughts, it would be something like "human, strong willed". And if he had encountered their mind before and remembered them he could ID them by their mind (so he could ID batman and Bruce Wayne as being the same person by their mind). This power would not duplicate mind scan since it would not give the range or indirect (non LoS) capabilities that mind scan give.

I don't like the concept desol would prevent aoe's from affecting the character - even megascale AOE's that the character can't outrun. and it wouldn't stop ego attacks from working - which shouldn't work if the character is running so fast they can't be seen. I would buy it as dcv levels and perhaps ego dcv levels linked to run.