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Sailboat
Novice
Joined: 06 Dec 2011
Posts: 6
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 Posted: Fri Dec 16, 2011 2:04 pm Post subject: [Necessary Evil] What Power for a Cloud of Inky Darkness? |
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I am a novice player in a Necessary Evil campaign. I am wondering how to best represent a blinding cloud of ink from a squid-based supervillain using Necessary Evil rules.
The Stun power might work, but I'm not trying to Shake enemies so much as blind them.
Energy Control with the "Darkness" elemental trick looks promising, but I don't really want or need to do 2d6 Heavy Weapon damage with this power, and the mechanics of "-2 for 10 minutes if they fail a Spirit Roll" don't match the idea of a power that blocks normal sight.
My GM let us capture some "Octo-Bombs" described as "Octo-Bombs. Range: 5/10/20. Grenade-like glass spheres that shatter on impact to create a large sphere of inky darkness. This imposes a -6 obscurement penalty in a Large burst template that lasts for 3 rounds."
That sounds like a better match for what I want, and I'm glad to have them, but it would be neat to have as an actual power for the villain. But there's no power listed that seems to work the same way.
Suggestions? |
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GranFalloon
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Joined: 21 Mar 2007
Posts: 647
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| Posted: Fri Dec 16, 2011 2:11 pm Post subject: |
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| I'm not especially familiar with NE, but that sounds like the Obscure power from any of the core books. If it's not in NE, it would be pretty easy to yank.[/i] |
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Lord Lance
Heroic
Joined: 23 Jul 2008
Posts: 1406
Location: Vicenza, Italy
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Timon
Heroic
Joined: 21 Feb 2011
Posts: 1076
Location: Haarlem in the Netherlands
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| Posted: Fri Dec 16, 2011 6:53 pm Post subject: |
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Just look at this Search-Fu from the great Lord Lance
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Biting! It's like kissing but there's a winner!
The Doctor's Wife |
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Sailboat
Novice
Joined: 06 Dec 2011
Posts: 6
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| Posted: Fri Dec 16, 2011 7:41 pm Post subject: |
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Thanks, that's useful.
Not quite sure about the "Just apply a half cost Modifier (Only to create darkness)" part, though. Elsewhere (and I couldn't find it in a brief search just now) someone made an assumption about a 1/2 cost as if applying the fractional advantages and limitations from the Hero System, and Clint noted that those are not used in SW and in that particular case the cost was just -1.
In this case, does he mean just pay half, so that, for example, 16" cubed of illusion would be 2 points instead of 4? That's pretty inexpensive.
And would the illusory darkness thus created affect actions with a penalty, and if so, which one? -4 for pitch dark? |
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Zadmar
Heroic
Joined: 10 Nov 2010
Posts: 1380
Location: Munich
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| Posted: Sat Dec 17, 2011 6:09 am Post subject: |
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| Sailboat wrote: | | In this case, does he mean just pay half, so that, for example, 16" cubed of illusion would be 2 points instead of 4? That's pretty inexpensive. |
It'd be 1/level, so a 16" cube (level 4) would be 4 points instead of 8. It's far less flexible than an illusion though.
Another option would be Energy Control (darkness), which I'd guess would allow you to fill a MBT with pure darkness, giving the same penalty for 2 points.
Note that a device (goggles) with Awareness (activated) costs 1 point, and would completely negate the penalty.
| Sailboat wrote: | | And would the illusory darkness thus created affect actions with a penalty, and if so, which one? -4 for pitch dark? |
Absolute blindness would be –6, as described in the Obscure power (which was referenced in the thread linked above). This is also the limit of the Darkness Elemental Trick. |
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Sailboat
Novice
Joined: 06 Dec 2011
Posts: 6
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| Posted: Mon Dec 19, 2011 11:03 am Post subject: |
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Well, regarding the Energy Control solution, the Elemental Trick says:
| Quote: | Darkness: This energy form can be used
to dim the vision of your foes. Anyone hit
by this power must make a Spirit roll. Failure
means victims are at –2 to actions related to
sight (including Fighting and Shooting) for
the next 10 minutes. This effect is cumulative
up to a –6 penalty. |
That doesn't sound like the same thing I thought we were talking about (a -6 penalty regardless of Spirit roll, but not persisting outside the darkness cloud).
My hope is to have the character able to make clouds of darkness that he himself can see inside/through (he has Darkvision) that will give him as much benefit as possible when fighting (-6 would be great, but if that blocks Darkvision then -4 might be smarter).
I'd like it to be effective but I want the power point cost to be fair, I don't want anyone to feel like I'm trying to get away with something. |
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Zadmar
Heroic
Joined: 10 Nov 2010
Posts: 1380
Location: Munich
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| Posted: Mon Dec 19, 2011 11:52 am Post subject: |
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| Sailboat wrote: | Well, regarding the Energy Control solution, the Elemental Trick says:
| Quote: | | Darkness: This energy form can be usedto dim the vision of your foes. Anyone hitby this power must make a Spirit roll. Failuremeans victims are at –2 to actions related tosight (including Fighting and Shooting) forthe next 10 minutes. This effect is cumulativeup to a –6 penalty. |
That doesn't sound like the same thing I thought we were talking about (a -6 penalty regardless of Spirit roll, but not persisting outside the darkness cloud). |
Right, you've got two separate things here. The first is Energy Control, which requires the controller to "choose a particular type of energy when taking this power, such as fire, kinetic energy, cold, darkness..." and which allows them to "manipulate enough energy to fill a Medium Burst Template. Within the template, fires may be nullified, air evacuated (or filled), electricity drawn or drained, etc."
And then you've also got Elemental Trick, which can be taken for a number of different powers, including Energy Control.
So the way I would personally rule it is that Energy Control (darkness) would allow you to fill a MBT with pure darkness, giving everyone inside the standard –6 penalty for absolute blindness (unless they have Awareness, Darkvision, or something similar).
I would probably make it require a standard Smarts roll to create the darkness, the same as the Nullify option - arguably you should really have Energy Control (light) to nullify light (creating darkness) and Energy Control (darkness) to nullify darkness (creating light), but personally I think it makes more sense to switch them around.
Then you've got the Elemental Trick, which would be applied to the Damage option. If you chose to take the Elemental Trick as well, you could inflict a lasting blindness on your enemies, even after they left the cloud of darkness. You might decide that it doesn't make sense for the darkness to literally cause damage, in which case I would allow it to be a touch attack - it never causes damage, but the attack gets +2 to the Shooting roll.
Of course this is all just my personal interpretation, other GMs might rule differently. Clint's suggestion is probably an easier way of handling it.
| Quote: | | My hope is to have the character able to make clouds of darkness that he himself can see inside/through (he has Darkvision) that will give him as much benefit as possible when fighting (-6 would be great, but if that blocks Darkvision then -4 might be smarter). |
If the trapping is 'darkness' then darkvision would see through it, and infravision would half the penalty.
| Quote: | | I'd like it to be effective but I want the power point cost to be fair, I don't want anyone to feel like I'm trying to get away with something. |
There are creatures with infravision (and others that don't require vision at all), not to mention Nightvision Goggles and IR scopes, all of which would half the penalty. A MBT (or 4" cube) of darkness won't help much against grenades, either, so I don't think it would be overpowered.
Energy Control is 2 PP, and a 4" cube of Illusion (Obscure only) would be the same. Add on Darkvision and that's a total of 3-4 PP. Compare that with Invisibility for 5 PP (or 4 PP in a device), which would render you immune to Darkvision, infravision, Nightvision Goggles and IR scopes, and make it very difficult for people to target you with grenades...
EDIT: It's also worth noting that both making and maintaining an illusion is an action, and I presume the same would apply to Energy Control. So if you wanted to be able to create and move the cloud of darkness without a multi-action penalty you'd also need to take a level of Extra Actions for 3 PP.
However I don't think it would be unreasonable to reduce that to 2 PP if the Extra Action only applied to one specific action (effectively the same as the Phaser modifier for Intangibility). Thus for +2 PP you could activate or maintain your cloud of darkness as a free action. |
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