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Aberrant RPG - Problems with Mastery


Horizon

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Well, that's all well and good that "canon" says it's unsoakable, but weren't you the one that said "eventually it takes novas to hurt novas?"

: )

With a single dot in M. Sta and Adaptability, a nova can survive in space. Novas also laugh off diseases that kill baselines in days or hours. They are capable of unmaking and making PLANETS. So, with all due respect to "canon," no. At the end of the day, a nuke is a really big bomb. There are blast shockwaves, EMP's, radiation during and after, and a whole host of badness. That doesn't make it auto-death to a being who can chill at the core of the sun and not even get tan.

At its heart, Aberrant is a game about redefining the world and breaking limits.

Why is it Dave that you always assume the worst possible implications of anything I post? I give you the benefit of the doubt, could you extend me the same?

Do our games have nukes dropping often? No, hardly ever. However, if you consider the lead-up to the Aberrant War, someone eventually is going to use WMD on novas. Also, powers like ESP, teleportation, and DC:D make the possibility of novas trying (and maybe succeeding) in stealing nukes very real. Hell, in "canon" Proteus uses a "primitive" fusion bomb on a major city.

So, yeah we have a general idea what sort of damage nukes put out. It varies depending on time frame and tech level. Brainy novas can make just about anything better, including bombs. Does it actually see use? As a result of major story events, yes. That doesn't make it common, and it doesn't make us "tards" for actually considering the geopolitical implications of nova powers. It's the subject of a great body of literature, movies (good and bad), and a host of non-fiction works. It has also happened in the real world. That makes it fair game for telling stories.

Since you are so fond of "canon," hopefully you have also read the stuff in EVERY WW book about roleplaying being a game. It's a game about sitting around telling a story. It's not competitive, it's cooperative. Do they not say (exhaustingly) over and over that Rule O is the only unbreakable rule? I also seem to recall the people who write this "canon" you are so fond of making the point that it is the "intolerant ranter" who ruins the fun, not people who know what they like and enjoy it with friends.

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Originally Posted By: Horizon
So, with all due respect to "canon," no. At the end of the day, a nuke is a really big bomb. There are blast shockwaves, EMP's, radiation during and after, and a whole host of badness. That doesn't make it auto-death to a being who can chill at the core of the sun and not even get tan.


Yeah, that's usually how it goes. Canon is a good idea as long the PCs are able to stay on top, but the moment it looks like a PC might get a scratch on their delicate skin it quickly becomes time to bash it.

Adaptability doesn't work against offensive capabilities that duplicate the environments it protects against. So while your PC may be able to walk through a nuclear reactor melting down, or chill in the core of the sun, they are not protected against another novas offensive powers that would duplicate heat or radiation, even if the output of the character is one hundred times less than that of the reactor or the sun.

Funny how that works. Adaptability would grant no protection against a nuclear strike.

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At its heart, Aberrant is a game about redefining the world and breaking limits.

Actually it's a game about political intrigue.

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Why is it Dave that you always assume the worst possible implications of anything I post? I give you the benefit of the doubt, could you extend me the same?

I'm an opinionated bastard that assumes the worst. You'll get used to it. Nothing personal against you, but people either love me or hate me.

And relax, I'm not trying to kick you in the balls here, they're just my opinions with a smidgen of fact mixed in. At the end of the day if you and your pals like how you play, then really that's all that matters.

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Since you are so fond of "canon," hopefully you have also read the stuff in EVERY WW book about roleplaying being a game. It's a game about sitting around telling a story. It's not competitive, it's cooperative. Do they not say (exhaustingly) over and over that Rule O is the only unbreakable rule? I also seem to recall the people who write this "canon" you are so fond of making the point that it is the "intolerant ranter" who ruins the fun, not people who know what they like and enjoy it with friends.


Snippy lil asswipe, aren't ya?

Personally I hate canon, especially Aberrant's canon. The books poorly written, the NPCs are bullshit, the metaplot is about us paying more money to buy more books to read about how our PCs will never better than the pole smokin' Magneto reject they thought up while they were all circle jerkin to Celine Dion.

You guys seemed lost on the stats for a nuke, I offered you the stats. That's it.

Cope.
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Originally Posted By: Revenant

Personally I hate canon, especially Aberrant's canon. The books poorly written, the NPCs are bullshit, the metaplot is about us paying more money to buy more books to read about how our PCs will never better than the pole smokin' Magneto reject they thought up while they were all circle jerkin to Celine Dion.


omfg lmao

Or to put it less 'weird-texty'; that's the funniest thing I've read in months, heh. *wipes tears from his eyes*
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Originally Posted By: Dave ST
Actually I've seen the WW Canon stats on a nuke, and while I'm not sure on the actual damage dice (50-100 d10, I can't remember)...
One of the developers claimed 100 on the WW boards.
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all of the damage from a nuke is unsoakable aggravated damage.

Meaning that it bypasses all defenses. ALL defenses, that includes the most potent nova you can think up. There are no powers in the Aberrant Universe that allow you to soak 'unsoakable' damage.
Now this is news... but it also seems a bit much considering the other powers floating around, especially at Q6+.
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Originally Posted By: Revenant
Every fucking post so far.


Your ideas intrigue me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.

Seriously folks, it's not like we're just now figuring out how broke Abbie is. Personally if I was running a game I'd just say fuck the rules and apply ST fiat to everything. Not a perfect solution either cos players will bitch about inconsistency or whatever, but it's a solution that gives me less headaches. smile

But, Horizon does have a point. Offense>defense in Aberrant. Increasing the effectiveness of defensive powers is a valid solution if you don't like the "gritty" style of gameplay the system forces on you. Believe it or not, buried under the grit and world-spanning conspiracies and funky mechanics, Aberrant is also a game about superheroes.
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The paragraph about Adaptability (which also talked a lot about other powers) was intended to illustrate that novas can in theory survive damn near ANYTHING. They can do damn near ANYTHING. That is the point of Aberrant. Politics and intrigue are definitely the order of the day, but eventually you get down to the fact that by 2008 6,000 people from all walks of life matter in ways nobody accounted for.

Who said anything about bashing canon just because PC's could get hurt? It's the uber NPC's you hate so much that stand a chance of surviving most of the time. I just modify things to account for the setting. If anything, you are the one ragging on canon for making novas bigger than starting PC's. I'm perfectly happy with that arrangement.

The politics and intrigue occur because these seemingly random people can grow into beings capable of asking the question "Could I survive a nuke?" There are humans and novas who are scared out of their wits by that possibility, which is why you get Proteus. In fact, most of the cloak and dagger stuff comes from one really super being literally knowing the future and trying to prevent it.

Politics and intrigue exists along side breaking limits, or did you miss the snazzy superman clone baldy-locks on the cover?

Don't call me snippy just because I finally decided to call you out on calling me stupid every other paragraph. I never said I was lost on stats for a nuke. To paraphrase you, canon blows.

Every single game WW puts out has the obligatory uber-badasses of doom. Something or somethings that can absolutely eat everything for breakfast. Aberrant is no different in that category. The only differences are 1: The uber-badasses actually show up and play and 2: You can get as badass as they are. You might have a rough time. They have a big lead on you, and plenty of people want you dead just because you have a node, but that sounds like intrigue to me.

Once again, you are pigeon-holing the game. Intrigue and politics (damn Aeon) are rife in the world of Aberrant (didn't I just get done talking about trying to steal nukes?). There are also a group of novas who consider themselves beyond human, and some are actually more interested in exploring that condition with "peers" than simply being monsters for Pax to pound on. More intrigue and politicking. It's also a great way to actually explore the ramifications of the powers novas wield.

If you want to be super heros, Abberant covers that. If you want intrigue and social change, where powers mean less than media perception, it has that, too. It has a ton of different ways to enjoy the setting, and none are more valid than the other. They are also not mutually exclusive. In fact, the one thing the writers did well was weave a world where they are interdependent.

And for the record, personally I think Mal is far more complex than good ol' human hating Mags. But then, I actually read the Teragen book for more than Node Spark.

Edit: Oh, and how did me making nukes do more damage get turned into removing grit? I just think it's silly for people that can project blasts that shred planetary bodies to be auto-killed by 1940's technology.

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Atoms didn't exists until 1940? I didn't know that.

It's not the technology level that's the problem, it's the effect. The heat and radiation are the problem and Adaptability does not defend against offensive attacks by baselines, their technology, or from other novas.

A baseline with a flamethrower would still bypass adaptability and move on to the nova's soak. Yes the weapon is heat and napalm and Adaptability covers that, but a flame thrower is an attack and goes through the normal attack resolution.

By using your rationale than as long as I possess adaptability I am 100% invulnerable to any attack that produces heat, radiation, severe cold, etc... which is exactly what Divis Mal uses. So I buy Adaptability and the heat of his plasma attacks no longer affects me because I can chill in the middle of the sun.

Whatever makes it fun for you, I guess.

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This is true, and I agree. The problem is, even if the nuke was not unsoakable, baselines can not soak lethal or agg damage anyways which ensures that their chances of survival are still pretty much nil.

A nova surviving a nuke (with the proper soak or power scheme, like Radioactive-Man or something) is not a far fetched idea. All I did was drop the stats, if it says unsoakable then even novas are screwed. If people don't like that idea, make it soakable, but baselines will never survive (statistically) unless the ST intervenes.

Most WMDs I use I apply a value to it that, if I think it should bypass soak, then that value is an automatic damage pool. So a nuke in this case, a very powerful weapon, I might assign 30 at ground zero to it. Basically no matter what your soak is, you've still got a 30 dice pool coming at you. Now if your catching just heat, radiation and shockwaves (and you PC equipped to deal with those sorts of thing, not just soak and certainly not adaptability) then you'll prolly only catch 5-15 dice depending on how far out you were.

Most high powered PCs would/could/should be able to survive that, and the ones that don't I have no sympathy for.

As an aside, I wouldn't drop automatic damage on PCs unless I was sure they'd at least survive a majority of it, or if they were being particularly ignorant and deserved hot death in a variety of flavors.

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Originally Posted By: Revenant
Originally Posted By: Horizon
Why is it Dave that you always assume the worst possible implications of anything I post? I give you the benefit of the doubt, could you extend me the same?

I'm an opinionated bastard that assumes the worst. You'll get used to it.

Yuppers I can attest to that, It took me a while (and Rev explaining his personality to me) before I could better understand him.

Just watch out for when his Avatar changes all jeckle and Hide like, and you and he will be fine.
For instance when i put up a lousy power consept, he Did critizise it quite hard, but he was still giving me a good and well thought out critizisum that, after looking at the power somemore, he was right... It needed more work... MUCH more work unfortunatly frown
It's just the kinda guy he is, and why he such a likable guy...

CuZ He'S got P-E-R-S-O-N-A-L-I-T-Y- :P



On another note, I'm glad you think that adding HL is a good start, but I really think that, as long as YOU remain incharge of the players abilitys to use Strengths & Weaknesses (IE: just fer soak), that this may finally clear up your lil problem without having to resort to redik-U-Lose amounts of Other sidepowers to even out soaks.

Just remember that to have the Masterys multiply the Strength Soak as well when you increase the base soaks of a power, this way you can show the True growth of power, But also realize that, just like in real life, Damage dealing weapons (powers) tend to out pace Armor...

That's why people no longer wear full plate armor, and given time people may start to again. Food fer thooooooght!
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Okay, I really, really do know that Adaptability doesn't protect against attacks. I was trying to show-case that novas can do ANYTHING. I wasn't arguing Adaptability protects against attacks, I was arguing that in a game where characters can make universes and move through time, that something like a nuke shouldn't be auto-death.

When it comes down to actually "statting" a nuke, I'd say you have to consider how much effort you want to go to. Nukes do bad, bad things in many ways, but I'd say for most game purposes a high amount of damage and good cinematics would cover it. The ST system, by definition, leaves things undefined in many areas so groups can decide how much realism and rules they want bogging down the story. Others will want to apply strobe damage, radiation poisoning, multiple kinds and amounts of damage for blast-wave, heat, and sundry other nasty things. It's really what works for the group and the ST.

Plenty of things "survive" nukes. Tests, computer models, and the two real-world examples show that some buildings are partially standing, and some people do indeed survive. I wouldn't use any of that as justification for a nova ignoring the damage, only to point out that they don't simply vaporize everything in their area of effect.

When I ST, I do my best to apply believable consequences to actions. That means if a player comes up with a brilliant idea, I usually let it work. I run the universe, I can let them have their clever victory and come back next week with something new. On the flip side, when PC's act stupid, they have to deal with the negative consequences, including character death. If they deserve being at the center of a nuclear detonation by some amazing string of stupid moves, on their head be it.

Course, I cut my teeth running Vampire, so I'm aware that for some players PC death isn't such a bad consequence. I don't have this problem with my current group, but I'm not above devising ways to keep the character alive so they get to play through the consequences of their mistake, rather than getting a fresh character sheet while the other players and my game world reel from the great glob of stupid.

You are right, Dave, that 30 dice of damage has the potential to be very survivable by some novas, even if you rule it ignores all soak. I've seen huge damage pools be rolled out as laughably small. I'm glad there are adds in most nova powers for that reason.

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