Aberrant RPG - Force Field

[Ammonites]

Is it possible to buy 2 instances of the same power with different extras?

Ex.

Force Field 2 extra/Wall

Force Field 1 extra/Projection

[Jager]

Yes, but don't let them stack. They get to use the best protection rolled, but not the benefit of both FF's.

,,

You could get more than one Q-bolt with either differing special effects (say fire and ice) and/or different extras.

You could get different Elemental Anima/Masteries and even different suite powers (say Gravity Manip and Weather Manip.).

[Inti]

I'd only allow it for powers that truly represent different fields of expertise. I. e. you should be able to buy Elemental Mastery (fire) and later buy Elemental Mastery (air). I wouldn't allow it just for the purpose of attaching more extras to something that is basically the same power, as is the case with Force Field or Invulnerability. That's what the "more extras per power at higher Quantum"-rules in the PG and the weakness-strength construction kit are there for.

[Ouchfest]

I would allow it. If someone wanted Disorient with the option (not requirement) of affecting everyone around him, he could get Disorient (lvl 2 power) and Disorient (lvl 3, Area extra) separately. He is familiar with the mechanisms of his power, but developing different uses of it takes a lot of time and effort (xp).

[The Ranger]

Hey, if someone wants to spend xp on buying the same power twice let 'em. Might make sense too considering that anything above one dot is essentially a waste anyhow.

[Ouchfest]

Quote:

Originally posted by The Ranger:
Hey, if someone wants to spend xp on buying the same power twice let 'em. Might make sense too considering that anything above one dot is essentially a waste anyhow.

Okay, sometimes the extra .4 successes isn't worth the xp, but a lot of the time it is, especially for the powers with tricks (Bodymorph, Elemental whatever, Weather Manip, etc...) and for success-independent powers like Armor, Flight, and Psychic Shield. The Player's Guide even has a version of Force Field in which each dot in the power lets you spend one quantum for two additional soak.

There is also a suggestion in the main book that STs let powers become more powerful and flexible with more dots, ignoring the letter of the law in favor of better game play. But your point is valid that there should be a better incentive to get that 5th dot of Flight instead of a single dot of Hypermovement, or more dots of some powers than just beefing up attributes.

[Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre]

Why wouldn't three separate instances of force field count separately? This character has three different fields, each with a separate extra. Why wouldn't each count?

[Singularity]

Quote:

Originally posted by Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre:
Why wouldn't three separate instances of force field count separately? This character has three different fields, each with a separate extra. Why wouldn't each count?

When you put an extra on a power then that extra will always apply, unless specified in the power (IE - Supercharge). So if someone wants an Area Quantum Blast, an Aggravated Quantum Blast, and a normal Quantum Blast then they'll need to buy the power three separate times. If they just added those on as extras, then that Quantum Blast would always be an aggravated, area attack.

Edited: whoops, this is what I get for reading too quickly... nothing to see here, don't look at the man behind the curtain...

[Alex Craft]

I think the question is more about this situation:

I have Force Field and Force Field (Projection). Why should I not be able to use them both simultaneously and still have the soak bonuses stack?

Pro: You spent the xp for both powers and you're spending the quantum for both powers - they should stack.

Con: Buying four dots of Force Field once gives you a dice pool of Stamina + Force Field ••••. Buying two dots of Force Field twice gives you an effective dice pool of [stamina x 2] + Force Field ••••. Also, if you buy them with xp, the latter situation costs you less.

Honestly, I like the first argument better, but the second one is hard to argue with. Probably a problem with the rules, in a way.

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

There are two issues here:

Issue #1: Can people buy the same power several times?

It depends. Keep in mind the 5 dot max rule is still in effect, thus letting people buy and benefit from multiple versions of the same power is illegal.

Example:

1) 5 Dots of Armor

2) 5 Dots of Armor + Impervious

3) 5 Dots of Armor + Superheavy

In your example the PC could in theory buy 10 dots of Forcefield up, and that’s plainly illegal.

However, this is almost off topic since the real issue is #2 below. I don’t have problems with the ST letting people buy the same power several times. For example, Telepathy + It’s various Extras; or Q-Bolt + it’s various extras.

Issue #2: Soak isn’t Linear.

Let’s ignore someone having the purchased the forcefield power several times.

In theory, two characters could both have Forcefield + Attune 5 and attune each other, thus covering each other with their Forcefield.

For a more mundane example, someone could buy multiple eufibers or multiple bullet proof jackets.

The problem is that in Aberrant, Damage and Soak are not linear, they are exponential. A knife is 2d, a Nuke is 100d. 50 knifes isn’t equal to a nuke. Similarly, having two 20 soak defenses should NOT be anywhere near as affective as a single 40 soak defense. A bullet proof jacket gives you +4 (or so) soak; but wearing 25 jackets doesn’t let you soak a nuke.

So with Forcefield, yes, you may put several of them up, but you only gain the benefits of the best of them. This is because the weaker forcefields simply aren’t adding enough to actually help you.

[Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre]

Yeah, well I think you're wrong.

I have three force fields. One is with Wall. The other is standard. The third is with Reflexive.

They are considered 3 separate powers for the purposes of XP raising and quantum spending. Just like if I had Armor and Invulnerability. Those bonuses stack.

So let's say someone is shooting quantum death bolt at me. I've already got my standard field up, and I make my awareness check so I know this thing is about to toast me. It's coming at me for 60 or so point of damage. (I'm making up numbers, so don't try adding this)

I know it's coming, and I have time to put up my Wall field in front of me for extra protection.

The Wall takes 20 points of the damage, but 40 of it is still coming. 20 More points are taken by my standard field. 20 more are still coming. My reflexive forcefield kicks in right then, taking the last 20.

Effectively, I don't have a TOTAL soak of 60, but I have 60 levels of soak that can be put in the way of it.

Otherwise, I think the other stacking defenses don't hold up. If I have 36 points of soak from Invulnerability and another 20 from Armor, are you saying that ONLY the 36 from the Invulnerability matter because it's the highest? Isn't that the same as wearing multiple vests, just vests made out of different strengths of kevlar? Because that's not a 56 soak from a single source either, it's two different quantum powers adding up to 56. I don't see why Armor+Invulnerability stacks but 3 different forcefields do not.

I mean, in THAT instance, you have 56 soak that you don't even have to pay to activate - it's always on. In my instance, I had a net 60 soak that I had to pay *eight* quantum total to have and that's only for a few minutes worth of protection before I have to respend for them.

If the free soak stacks but the expensive soak does not, that's just plain broken.

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

Reflexive Forcefield is something I wouldn’t allow for two reasons (yes, I know the book does use this as an example)

1) If you want Soak that is always on you should buy Armor.

2) I don’t think it’s possible for most novas to define conditions where the reflexive would work.

The book says something about ‘if you are going to take damage that is higher than your soak’… but that is nonsense. How, EXACTLY, do you know (much less know reflexively) that the attack is going to exceed your soak? The only way most novas can do this is by taking the attack and seeing if there is damage, but by that point it’s too late (you’ve already taken the damage). So with that reflex the Forcefield goes up after the damage is taken.

Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre: I have three force fields. One is with Wall. The other is standard. The third is with Reflexive.

They are considered 3 separate powers for the purposes of XP raising and quantum spending.

So if I put on 17 sets of SWAT style bullet proof armor I can take a ground zero nuke or multiple hits with the Directive Mass Driver (AB:WWII)?

You could turn on that reflexive FF separately (it only costs you a die or perhaps a succ to use non-reflexively). You could also buy Forcefield + Reduced Q-Cost, and Forcefield + Impervious with 18 more experience.

Let’s say you get 20 points of soak from all 5 of those Forcefields. According to you, depending on your ping dice, you can take more than a dozen ground zero Nukes.

5 20-die attacks doesn’t add up to a single 100 die attack (5 novas can’t stack their Q-Bolts and make a nuke).

Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre: Just like if I had Armor and Invulnerability. Those bonuses stack.

So because Armor stacks with Invulnerability, we are supposed to let you use the same Forcefield power five times to shrug off nukes?

Apples and Oranges.

Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre: If the free soak stacks but the expensive soak does not, that's just plain broken.

Not as broken as letting you slap down 18 experience and be tougher than Pax.

[Noir]

I remember in Cyberpunk there was apage discussing armour and stacking it. Because the basic ideas of soak and damage are the same as Aberrant. They explained that (like Dr. Troll is saying) 20 + 20 is NOT 40.

When you staked armour, it did not all add equally. You take the higest rating as a base and then additional layers of armour would give a bonus based on how close they were to the base armour. The bigger that gap, the less the bonus (down to done, possibly).

Now this is for the CP2020 mechanics, but it will illustrate.

Difference in

Armour Rating____Bonus armour

0-4.....................+5

5-8.....................+4

9-17....................+3

15-20..................+2

21-26..................+1

27+.....................+0

So the worse each additional layer is, the less benefit you recieve. The closer each additional layer is the base, the more benefit you recieve.

I hope this can illustrate or help in some way.

~Noir

[Noir]

Here is an example.

Lets look at this isn CP202 terms for a moment...

In CP2020, a flack vest is 20 armour.

So say you have 3 force fields that each have the equivalnt armour of a flack vest. (20 each)

Your NET armour would be 30, not 60.

~Noir

[kestrel404]

Let's take a look at this from another perspective.

Say you bought ForceField 5 times.

Once vanilla. (2 q to activate)

Once RQC (1 q to activate)

Once Wall (3 q to activate)

Once Impervious (3 q to activate)

Once Reflexive (3 q to activate)

For the sake of argument, we'll say you buy each at one dot, and have 5 stamina (no mega-stamina, for now).

That's one level 2 power, and four level 3 powers, which is 47 XP, or 14 Nova points

On activation, that's 12 quantum.

On average, you will get .4 (4/10 chance) times 30 dice (5 powers at 6 dice) times two (two soak dice per success in FF, unless I'm remembering wrong). That's roughly 24 dice of soak, with a standard deviation of 6 (on a guess). Plus, you're probably not going to be able to activate all those abilities as once, and some of them (like wall) may not apply.

For 15 nova points (and fewer XP), you can also get:

Invulnerability: Physical **

Invulnerability: Energy **

Psychic Shield ***

This ALWAYS gives you 12 soak, costs no Quantum, doesn't require an action, and stacks with everything.

Going towards the other end - lets say that you've got the original five different forcefields, with mega-stam 5

Now you've got the basic 24 dice on average, with another ~50 dice (again on average) from your mega dice (in this case, using them to reduce difficulty is a diminishing returns problem, unless you've got all the FFs at 3 or more levels). Now, you're still spending 12 quantum every dozen or less rounds, and you've about 70 dice of soak, on average.

Go to the same power scale with the other soak abilities, and you'll find that, again, you can get about half the protection, for free (quantum wise), without concentration.

If this seems particularly unfair to you, (and it doesn't to me) then I'd suggest the following:

Every sustained nova power beyond the first increases the difficulty of the next nova power to by activated by 1. Thus, activating the first ForceField is normal diff. The next is as plus one. When you get to the last, you'd better be using your mega-stamina to lower diffs, or else it's not going to get you any protection.

[Noir]

Oops.

[Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre]

Quote:

Originally posted by David 'Dr. Troll' Smith:
So if I put on 17 sets of SWAT style bullet proof armor I can take a ground zero nuke or multiple hits with the Directive Mass Driver (AB:WWII)?

You could turn on that reflexive FF separately (it only costs you a die or perhaps a succ to use non-reflexively). You could also buy Forcefield + Reduced Q-Cost, and Forcefield + Impervious with 18 more experience.

Let’s say you get 20 points of soak from all 5 of those Forcefields. According to you, depending on your ping dice, you can take more than a dozen ground zero Nukes.

5 20-die attacks doesn’t add up to a single 100 die attack (5 novas can’t stack their Q-Bolts and make a nuke).


Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre: Just like if I had Armor and Invulnerability. Those bonuses stack.

So because Armor stacks with Invulnerability, we are supposed to let you use the same Forcefield power five times to shrug off nukes?

Apples and Oranges.


Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre: If the free soak stacks but the expensive soak does not, that's just plain broken.

Not as broken as letting you slap down 18 experience and be tougher than Pax. [/QB]

You're comparing swat armor with quantum power? Tell me, in your 17 swat armor example, why I'm supposed to accept that the quantum powered Armor and Invulnerability stack, but 3 different quantum-powered Forcefields do not. They each have different soak levels, and you're not saying you have to take the higher rating there.

[Singularity]

I think Troll is pointing out that Invulnerability stacks with everything. Or another observation is that you can stack Invulnerability, Armor, and Force Field together, but you can't stack two Armors or two Force Fields. More simply: you can only stack different powers.

But I do believe Troll did give a rather compelling mechanical reason for this:

Quote:

Not as broken as letting you slap down 18 experience and be tougher than Pax.

Talk about logic all you want, in the long run game balance tends to be more important.

[Noir]

If it were mechanically allowed, you would have seen an NPC with it by now. Fully stacking the same power is just trying to reap the system.

"Ha ha! I can have a better soak than some of the most powerful novas on the planet for a handful of experience."

But that becons the question, "Why didn't anybody else think of this?"

Simple. Because it would be broken.

Having 3 q-bolts with different extras is one thing, because you can only use one at a time. But having 3 FFs or Armours or Invulnerabilities or whatever that stack (especially completely stack) is just broken.

~Noir

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

I don't think we've ever seen a NPC with multiple version of a power, including Q-Bolt (etc).

This makes me suspect strongly that we just can't do it... I think I know why.

Let's say you have

5 dots of Q-Bolt (generic) and,

5 dots of Q-Bolt + Area.

Now lets powermax that Generic Q-Bolt and put the extra "Area" on it. Whoops, we've now got 10 dots in a power, or the exact same power twice, or something else equally illegal.

Mind you, I'm not opposed to the ST over ruling this for specific instances, and even with one Forcefield you could still buy "Elemental Mastery: Force Fields" and do most of what you want and have it stack.

[Kirby1024]

Perhaps looking at D&D logic might help the situation.

D&D has a similar issue with Armor Class - there are a lot of spells that can improve it, so why not use the same spells more than once? D&D solves the problem by having "named" bonuses. Any two spells that create the same named bonus don't stack - rather, you take the best of the two. So, if one spell gives a +2 deflection bonus, and another gives +4, you don't get +6, you pick the best of the two, ie +4.

This may be a useful way of thinking about it. Each part of the Soak score is a named bonus, with each name being a quantum power. So, you can easily stack Armor and Force Field, because they're different names, but stacking Force Field and Force Field forces you to pick the best of the two. You can pick multiple Invulnerabilities, but if a certain attack crosses the boundaries of two Invulnerabilities, you have to pick one to protect you - both Invulnerabilities don't apply.

This seems reasonably fair and adequate.

[Singularity]

Kirb, you're stealing my idea.

[Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre]

Attacks don't stack because there is no way to combine their effectiveness.

Defenses DO stack for that reason.

Nobody is giving me a good rationale for Armor+Invulnerability stacking. The different power explanation doesn't hold water - 3 different Force Fields are three different powers - they should stack as well.

Think about it this way :

in my previous example, you can have 3 different Q-Bolts that all do 20 points. They don't get through the force field because none of them can exceed the 20 points. But a single 60-point q-bolt doesn't IGNORE the 20 point forcefield. the first field soaks 20 of it. The remainder is soaked by the following 2.

The same applies when you add Armor+Invulnerability. It's not a total soak of 54. It's that the armor soaks 20 levels of it, and whatever gets passed the armor gets absorbed by 36 levels of Invulnerability. Anything after that goes to Stamina/MegaStamina. It's considered a "total soak" for the sake of brevity, but it's not combining into a single energy defense. It's three layers of protection, all at different ratings, that prevent levels of damage respectively as the hits the target.

There's nothing so far that indicates that 3 different Force Fields can't do the same thing.

Is there anything in the rule book anywhere that says this can't happen, cause all I'm hearing so far is a "cause we don't want this to happen."

When dealing with Q-power-defenses, we're not talking about a total heartiness rating like physical armor. I could just as easily describe these fields as "dampners" which don't eliminate the energy so much as diffuse it, so that 20 points are diffused at each barrier until it is ineffective.

Honestly, I'm lost as to why everyone says this can't happen. it DOES happen with Armor+Invulnerability, and if there's something in the books that says you can't do it, I haven't found it.

[Noir]

The game is already geard to favour the defender (i.e. you get full soak potential, but the attack is only going to get a small portion of his damage potentital because he must roll).

Armour, Invulnerability, Force Field and so on are different powers. To make a huge soak you have to get lots of powers and there is a limit to how many you can get and stack (1 of each), thereby limiting how much soak one can have, otherwise allowing mutiple versions of the same defense to stack meas you can make yourself impossible to injur because you can have your 6 FFs, your 4 Armours, your 3 Invulnerabilites (or whatever combination) that have to be pierced by a SINGLE attack. It's not going to happen.

And then you can even add Impervious, making the Armour Percing and Aggrivated extras on an attack essentially pointless.

Letting multiple versions of the same power fully stack would be TOTALLY broken.

~Noir

[Kirby1024]

Quote:

Originally posted by Singularity:
Kirb, you're stealing my idea.

More explaining it slightly differently

Pulse, let me put this in a slightly different way, which is probably copying off a few others.

Let us compare the pair. Nova A has Force Field 5, Stamina 4, Quantum 3. Nova B has Five copies of Force Field 1, Stamina 4, and Quantum 3.

Now, Force Field has a roll of Stamina + Force Field. So, let's compare:

A: Stamina (4) + Force Field (5) = 9 dice, 2QP
B: (Stamina (4) + Force Field (1)) x 5 = 25 Dice, 10QP.

Force Field notes upon successful activation, you get [Quantum] soak plus an additional two soak per success. Compare:

A: (Quantum (3)) x 1 = 3 base soak + successes
B: (Quantum (3)) x 5 = 15 base soak, + successes.

So, with this note, let's compare average soaks from activation, shall we?

A: 3 base, + (9 x .4) = 3 + 3.6 = 6.6 soak, 2QP
B: 15 base, + (25 x .4) = 15 + 10 = 25 soak, 10QP

So, in short, for identical NP cost, one can choose either an average of 6.6 soak, or an average of 25 soak. Since combat in Aberrant is typically quite short, I'm not sure that the expanded QP cost is significant in the decision making. This means that for effectively no additional cost, we have about 4 times the power for 5 times the cost. For those who live on the edge, not that bad a deal. The only issue, perhaps, is that one would need to spend multiple actions bringing the FF up. So why, precisely, should anyone choose to boost up their Force Field score past the requisite 1? The benefits clearly outweigh the penalties.

As such, I find it difficult to accept that the designer's reading of the rules expected players to be able to stack powers. If one cannot stack Offensive powers in a similar fashion, I see no reason why you should stack Defensive powers in the same way. I find it unlikely that, for instance, two Nova's opposing shrouds can combine successes - it doesn't seem particularly, well, logical. I find it unlikely that two Telepaths can combine successes in rifling through a mortal's mind. I find it unlikely that two Immolaters touching one person can combine attacks. So I honestly don't see how Stacking Force Field, Armor or Invulnerability would be a developer's reading of the rules.

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre: Is there anything in the rule book anywhere that says this can't happen, cause all I'm hearing so far is a "cause we don't want this to happen.”

A fair comment.

OK, I’ve re-read the relevant sections of the book. My conclusions are that we have two different issues here that need to be addressed separately.

RE: “Can Separate Forcefields Stack?”

I see nothing in the book that prevents this. Further, this would seem to be an advantage to Forcefield + Wall. It’s a little broken, but livable considering the below issue since it's supposed to be rare.

RE: “Can a single nova buy Forcefield several times?”

No. Go back and re-read the section on General Power use (I think it starts at 177). It’s clear that Power + Extra still counts as Power. There is no single sentence in there that stands out, but the entire section as a whole pounds that down. They talk about making your power unique by giving it a special name or an extra. For that matter the power chart listing all the powers doesn’t break them down by extra either. Then you have the 5 dot rule.

So let’s say you buy Forcefield + Wall. If the ST asks you, ”Do you have the Forcefield Power?”; you have to answer in the affirmative. You can’t have 15 dots of armor spread over three powers, because that’s what you’d have, 15 dots of Armor.

Exception:

I would make an exception for the powers those names need expanding before you can tell what they do. If I have 5 dots in Forcefield + Wall, then the ST knows what I can do, regardless of what my special effects are. If I have 5 dots in Elemental Mastery: X, then the ST can’t tell what I can do until I tell him what “X” is.

So I would say that Elemental Mastery: X is a different power than Elemental Mastery: Y.

But that’s a spot ruling, if the ST wants to be a real hard ass he could say that you can only have one EM power (and the only character I can think of who might have multiple EM powers is Scripture… who could have Elemental Mastery: Light and Elemental Anima: Air).

[Neil Preston]

Doc, by that reasoning, I could have one dot in FF+Wall, one in FF+RQC, one dot in FF+Impervious, one dot in FF+(strengthed to touch)Range, and one dot of straight FF. Would that give me a max FF soak of [Q]+2x success from the Sta+MSta+5 roll, or would it be [Qx5] plus 2x successes from FIVE different Sta+MSta+1 rolls?

I think this is one of those many situations were the ST has to come up with their own interpretations.

I prefer allowing versitility while maintaining a game balance. The same power, bought with different extras, doesn't stack in defense.

[Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre]

Quote:

Originally posted by David 'Dr. Troll' Smith:

1: RE: “Can a single nova buy Forcefield several times?”

No. Go back and re-read the section on General Power use (I think it starts at 177). It’s clear that Power + Extra still counts as Power. There is no single sentence in there that stands out, but the entire section as a whole pounds that down. They talk about making your power unique by giving it a special name or an extra. For that matter the power chart listing all the powers doesn’t break them down by extra either. Then you have the 5 dot rule.

So let’s say you buy Forcefield + Wall. If the ST asks you, ”Do you have the Forcefield Power?”; you have to answer in the affirmative. You can’t have 15 dots of armor spread over three powers, because that’s what you’d have, 15 dots of Armor.

2:Exception:
I would make an exception for the powers those names need expanding before you can tell what they do. If I have 5 dots in Forcefield + Wall, then the ST knows what I can do, regardless of what my special effects are. If I have 5 dots in Elemental Mastery: X, then the ST can’t tell what I can do until I tell him what “X” is.

So I would say that Elemental Mastery: X is a different power than Elemental Mastery: Y.

But that’s a spot ruling, if the ST wants to be a real hard ass he could say that you can only have one EM power (and the only character I can think of who might have multiple EM powers is Scripture… who could have Elemental Mastery: Light and Elemental Anima: Air). [/QB]

1) It never says you cannot. You're inferring intent. As I am from the extras section on 230, where it says that "a power with an extra is a separate, distinct power." Which essentially means that you cannot have a Q-Bolt with explosive and then us it non-explosively. I thinks this pounds home pretty clearly that if you want to be able to have a non-explosive Q-Bolt AND an explosive one, you have buy them separately. They are "separate and distinct" powers.

My character's whole power scheme is based off the idea of wielding different forcefields. Why couldn't a character have the ability to make a field around themselves and a wall to protect their teammates?

2: I see no reason that you can't purchase different versions of Boost and Absorption based on what the power is set to do. You can buy multiple invulnerabilities as well. Different variations on poisons. Different Quantum Vampires.

I've never thought that you were stuck to only purchasing "one" type of a power and then never having an option to do so again.

[Ammonites]

So could I have Elemental Mastery Force Fields? With one technique creating a wall and another protecting me?

For example I choose the EM technique Shield, and then the EA technique Wall.

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

Neil Preston: Doc, by that reasoning, I could have one dot in FF+Wall, one in FF+RQC…

No, you can’t. After you buy the first one, YOU HAVE A FORCEFIELD. Period. You can’t then buy a forcefield because at that point you already own one. That’s why Q-Bolt has the extra that allows multiple types, because you can’t just buy multiple Q-Bolts.

Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre:

1) It never says you cannot. You're inferring intent. As I am from the extras section on 230, where it says that "a power with an extra is a separate, distinct power." Which essentially means that you cannot have a Q-Bolt with explosive and then us it non-explosively. I thinks this pounds home pretty clearly that if you want to be able to have a non-explosive Q-Bolt AND an explosive one, you have buy them separately. They are "separate and distinct" powers.

You’ve got one sentence which means what you just said (i.e. that Q-Bolt + Explosive must be used that way).

I’ve got several pages, every power chart that’s ever been published, the 5 dot rule, and every sample character that ever been published. If my book were handy I could probably give you several paragraphs of quotes.

Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre:

1) My character's whole power scheme is based off the idea of wielding different forcefields. Why couldn't a character have the ability to make a field around themselves and a wall to protect their teammates?

You can. But “Wielding different Forcefields” is a special effect. You have to use different mechanics to build it, rather than the same set of mechanics over and over. Your personal Forcefield could be built with Armor (the Reflexive one is especially appropriate for this), and if you feel the need to get more you could also go with Elemental Mastery: Forcefield which would also have a defensive forcefield.

In many ways this would even work better. You could have +22 soak from Armor + Superheavy. Forcefield + Wall (for +20 soak). Elemental Mastery for +10 soak. On top of that you’d get -5 to be hit so most attacks would miss.

Perhaps more importantly, with all that you’d have paid an appropriate amount of experience and/or nova points for what you were using, and NOT just slapping down 18 experience points.

Sarah 'Pulse' McIntyre:

2: I see no reason that you can't purchase different versions of Boost and Absorption based on what the power is set to do. You can buy multiple invulnerabilities as well. Different variations on poisons. Different Quantum Vampires.

There is no such power as “Invulnerability”. There is INV: Bullets, INV: Fire, INV: Mental Powers, etc, but INV by itself isn’t a power any more than “Elemental Anima” is a power. Ditto Boost, Ditto Absorption, Ditto Q-Vampire.

Joe: My character has 5 dots in Invulnerability.

ST: Great, so what does it do?

As I said earlier, I think you can have multiple versions simply because none of those powers are complete. That’s not the case for Armor or Forcefield or most of the other powers.

There is only one Poison power, so no, you can’t buy it more than once. If you can’t hit him with Poison + Ranged then you don’t get to try Poison + Area.

[Neil Preston]

Doc, the Q-Bolt extra would allow you to have multiple special effects with that one bolt, so you wouldn't have to pay fot two different bolts. It doesn't imply to me you can't have two kinds of bolt.

Having two Q-Bolts at level three would cost you 21 + 21, or 42 xp. Having the Q-Bolt with the Extra Energy Type extra would cost you 30 xp. To me, it is a matter of cost effectiveness, not a matter of not being allowed to have multiple Q-Bolts.

While it is pretty clear that the Q-Limit on how many dots you can have in a power exists, it isn't clear to me that getting the same power, multiple times is prohibited.

In my opinion, we should strive for game balance, not control. If someone wants to dump out the points for multiple different versions of the same power, erring on the side of creative freedom dictates we let them. Game balance demands that we don't allow same effects to be stacked together were they would upset the game.

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

Hey, I'm in favor of the ST over riding the default rules where appropriate. Multiple Q-Bolts doesn't seem game altering, multiple sets of non-stacking claws doesn't seem game altering. When we come to Forcefield, I don't think that 3 sets of Forcefields is broken... if they don't stack.

But these rules do interlock. As soon as you override the rules to let someone buy two sets of forcefield, then you need to override the rules again to make them not stack.

[Preston]

Got it Doc.

pg. 230, second column, 3rd paragraph.

"A power with an extra is considered a seperate, distinct power."

So, Force Field, and Force Field with the Wall extra are seperate, distinct powers. In fact, it says next,

"A character may not buy one power and several extras and then 'trade off' the Extras from turn to turn to get the most effectie attack."

To me, that means if I want a Q-Bolt with the Area effect extra, but don't always want to use Area Effect, I have to get a seperate Q-bolt. The would be seperate, distinct powers.

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

That's one statement. Now go re-read the general power section, starting on page 177? or so.

[Noir]

The game is already geared to favour the defender (i.e. defender gets full soak potential, but the attacker is only going to get a small portion of his damage potentital, usually about 40%, because he must roll). And this is not even mentioning the Impervious extra which negates TWO extras that can be placed on an attack.

Letting multiple versions of the same defensive power fully stack would be TOTALLY broken.

Allowing multiple version of the same defense power (such as FF) to stack would allow you make your soak so totally outstrip incoming attacks as to make physcial attacks utterly pointles.

Also, IF it is legal, then it is really amazing NONE of the dozens NPCs (alot of which are near the top on power level),even Ironskin Andy Vance, "the most indestructible nova", have stacking Armours, FFs and so on.

My take on it?

Having multiple Force Fields? Sure, go ahead, and you can have one active at a time.

You can though buy Armour and define it as your personal Force Field, then buy Force Field and put the Wall extra and so on.

~Noir

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

Noir: Also, IF it is legal, then it is really amazing NONE of the dozens NPCs (alot of which are near the top on power level),even Ironskin Andy Vance, "the most indestructible nova", have stacking Armours, FFs and so on.

Divis too. More than 20 well developed powers, including the ability to give himself more powers, and he doesn't appear to have it.

[Inti]

It appears that the Aberrant authors themselves are divided on the issue. I thought they generally wouldn't allow several instances of the same power, but then I looked at Andy Vance having 4 different Invulnerability powers, one with an extra (broad category). However, I also noted that noen of them stacked against the same type of attack.

So there are basically several solutions to the problem:

1. Characters can purchase any quantum power exactly once. If you want more extras than you can stack on it, wait until you are Quantum 6 or higher. This preserves the superiority of high-Quantum novas. However, with this solution, I recommend houseruling that extras do not always have to be activated with a power, as it would narrow down the applicability of many powers quite a bit ("I want to hit the guy holding the hostage with my Q-Bolt" "Well, you better aim that real good, because you have the Area extra and its a 30 meter blast radius..."). This restriction to extras makes them less useful than Maxing Out anyway.

2. Allow multiple instances of one power if they apply to different fields. Characters may have Elemental Mastery (Air) and Elemental Mastery (Stone) or Invulnerability (mental powers) and Invulnerability (Broad category: Physical), but they may not have Force Field and Force Field (Wall) and then activate the first and create wall around themselves with the second for double soak.

3. Characters may buy and simultaneously apply any power they want. Assume that other chars will spend their XP somewhere else and power level equals out under the line.

I'll go with 1. It preserves the power hierarchy of the game and stops 1-million-soak novas with Quantum 3 from running around, while the houserule makes extras more useful for the XP/nova points invested into them by keeping powers flexible while stilling adding something to them.

[Ouchfest]

Quote:

Originally posted by Kirby1024:

As such, I find it difficult to accept that the designer's reading of the rules expected players to be able to stack powers. If one cannot stack Offensive powers in a similar fashion, I see no reason why you should stack Defensive powers in the same way. I find it unlikely that, for instance, two Nova's opposing shrouds can combine successes - it doesn't seem particularly, well, logical. I find it unlikely that two Telepaths can combine successes in rifling through a mortal's mind. I find it unlikely that two Immolaters touching one person can combine attacks. So I honestly don't see how Stacking Force Field, Armor or Invulnerability would be a developer's reading of the rules.

Some offensive powers stack: Mega-STR + Claws get the autosuccesses + the extra Claws dice and turns bashing into lethal. Throw in Bodymorph: Stone and you get to add more dice of damage.

Also, people can work together for more successes, such as with extended actions (making gadgets, constructing a building, research) which can be facilitated with the Mega-WIT enhancement Synergy. Different people's quantum powers wouldn't stack, though, unless Quantum Imprint was used so the signatures would be the same.

As an ST, I would allow FF:Wall to stack with any one other FF since it's in a different location, but the other FFs would get in the way of each other. That would be my fiat, as is each ST's right. Multiple Armor would never work because there is only room on the Nova's body for one.

With the Andy Vance example, I can see the reasoning behind having multiple, non-stacking Imperviouses. This does go against Dr. Troll's insistance that no one can buy the same power twice, with his classification of power as the name in the book regardless of extras. I am in the other camp that says a QB with the area extra is a different power from a regular QB, and it's okay to buy both up to 5. Since the effects are instant, they wouldn't be stackable. Multiple Boosts or Bodymorphs or Elemental Animas are fine, too (though probably hard to justify to the ST). Just because WW NPCs don't have them doesn't mean it can't be done.

I might consider, however, stacking the damage dice of simultaneous attacks. If someone on fire is hit with a QB (unless it's ice or water), why not add the dice? Two people attacking at the same initiative working together?

[Ouchfest]

Quote:

Originally posted by Noir:
The game is already geared to favour the defender (i.e. defender gets full soak potential, but the attacker is only going to get a small portion of his damage potentital, usually about 40%, because he must roll). And this is not even mentioning the Impervious extra which negates TWO extras that can be placed on an attack.
~Noir

I disagree that the game favors defenders. Mega-STR provides a number of automatic successes that rivals the same number of dots of any one defensive power (except Invulnerability: Kinetic, which is only a tiny bit better and costs more). Defenders have to spend more xp and justify more powers to get a soak equivalent to attacks, and the attackers always get to roll a minimum of 1 die. Aggravated damage is very hard to defend against and recover from. Mental attacks bypass everything except psychic shield or Invulnerability: mental. And when it comes down to it, Super Indestructoman can be warped into the Sun or deep space, unlikely to return with his sanity. To protect yourself from everything costs a tremendously prohibitive amount of XP, leaving one vulnerable for many years and ultimately not very useful for accomplishing anything.

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

With the Andy Vance example, I can see the reasoning behind having multiple, non-stacking Imperviouses. This does go against Dr. Troll's insistance that no one can buy the same power twice, with his classification of power as the name in the book regardless of extras.

Vance has three non-stacking versions of INV, and (as stated earlier) Invulnerability isn’t a power by itself so it would be easy to allow multiple versions.

,,

…Some offensive powers stack…

This is extremely rare and specifically stated in the power. Someone buying and maxing them all would have a grand total of +7 dice on top of his Mega-Strength.

…Different people's quantum powers wouldn't stack, though, unless Quantum Imprint was used so the signatures would be the same.

Not even then. (See below example).

I might consider, however, stacking the damage dice of simultaneous attacks. If someone on fire is hit with a QB (unless it's ice or water), why not add the dice? Two people attacking at the same initiative working together?

Most of the damage from Mega-Strength comes from the nova’s Q-sig.

All Clones have the same Q-Sig.

Doctor Troll has M-Str 6 and Clone.

Someone getting hit by 3 Clones shouldn’t be taking 27[90] before soak (that’s well over a nuke). If Troll’s crew were doing that to Ironskin, none of them individually could scratch him so why would they be able to do it together?