Aberrant RPG - Hardbody

[Rorschach]

Hello.

I think Hardbody is much too strong : no action to use, no dice to roll, automatic succes when 1QP is paid.

Aggravated attacks make few damage, generally between 5 and 10. Being unsoakable, this is quite enough, BUT, considering the fact that a 10 lethal soak is quite possible and easily reached, Hardbody is in fact a way to become almost IMMUNE to aggravated.

It doesnt fit to my vision of Disintegrate and Aggravated Claws : a simple enhancement can prevent damage from this so-called horrifying attacks.

Once again, the quantum cost is NOT a real handicap when your enemy must pay THREE points himself per attack.

I think about limitating Hardbody (making it work as Durability), or suppress it.

[Login]

Well, think of it this way: if you have an Aggravated attack, you can cut through anyone's armor like a hot knife through butter. Inanimate objects are fair game, too (and that can be useful, believe me). In fact, the only thing that CAN stop you is Hardbody. How many powers, even lvl 3 powers, can boast only having ONE way to be immune to them? It's not like every second nova is going to have the enhancement.

[Rorschach]

Hurmf.

You're right. Disintegrate is very useful, even is your target can soak your damage rating, you can still drop on him a biulding or two

The problem is : my players begin to know the system, and each of them wants this enhancement.

What a pity

[Noir]

Quote:

Originally posted by Login:
Well, think of it this way: if you have an Aggravated attack, you can cut through anyone's armor like a hot knife through butter. Inanimate objects are fair game, too (and that can be useful, believe me). In fact, the only thing that CAN stop you is Hardbody. How many powers, even lvl 3 powers, can boast only having ONE way to be immune to them? It's not like every second nova is going to have the enhancement.

Umm.. Agg powers cannot boast about having only way to Stop them.

Invulnerability works against Agg attacks as well as any defense with the Impervious extra slapped on it. Hardbody is not the only way to soak Agg.

[Hugin]

Quote:

Originally posted by Login:
Well, think of it this way: if you have an Aggravated attack, you can cut through anyone's armor like a hot knife through butter.

Yeah, right. Most places except here. Check out some character sheets. You know how many people have impenetrable and/or invuberabilities?


But, Hardbody seems pretty tough except that to be "immune" to Aggravated as mentioned by Rawshark you have to have Stamina 5, MegaStamina 5 and Resiliency X2 in additon to Hardbody, That's a pretty big investment.

Now, question, can you combine Hardbody (which should really be more specific and say that it allows you to soak Agg with the Lethal soak pool provided by Stam and MStam alone) with Durability? That would be a bit more icky.

[kestrel404]

What Hugin said. Hardbody doesn't let you soak Agg with your armor or anything else like that. That takes an extra on the armor, or whatever other power you're using.

As for Hardbody and durability stacking: Nope. Hardbody says that it lets you soak Agg with your Lethal dice pool. Durability says you soak Lethal with your Bashing dice pool. In both cases, you're just switching dice pools, not damage types. So any damage leftover after the soak is still the original kind of damage, and even if you had both powers active at the same time: You're taking agg, soak with lethal.

[Noir]

Quote:

Originally posted by Alchemist:
What Hugin said. Hardbody doesn't let you soak Agg with your armor or anything else like that. That takes an extra on the armor, or whatever other power you're using.

Where does it say that Hardbody doesn't let you soak Agg with your armour or anything? It says you may use your "lethal soak" and your Armour or what have you is part of that lethal soak. (The main reason I hate Hardbody).

[Hugin]

Quote:

Originally posted by Noir:

Quote:

Originally posted by Alchemist:
What Hugin said. Hardbody doesn't let you soak Agg with your armor or anything else like that. That takes an extra on the armor, or whatever other power you're using.

Where does it say that Hardbody doesn't let you soak Agg with your armour or anything? It says you may use your "lethal soak" and your Armour or what have you is part of that lethal soak. (The main reason I hate Hardbody).

Yep. In my humble opinion it should be written to say that Hardbody, being a MegaStamina enhancement, only affects your MegaStamina lethal soak.

[Harold 'Mythic' Anderson]

The rule has some ambiguity (surprise surprise), but to point out a contrast the Impervious extra does convert all aggravated damage to lethal damage, making all lethal soak applicable to the damage. So if I have an Impervious Force Field I can use my Force Field, Armor (if I have it), Invulnerability (if I have it), and my Stamina soak against aggravated damage.

Not that it really helps, but it's something to consider.

[Slattern]

An extra would only effect the power it is bought on. It makes no sense for it to affect other soaks.

[Harold 'Mythic' Anderson]

Sorry, that's the reading of the rule, it converts it from Agg to Lethal, allowing everything to soak.

[Evan]

You folks made me read the Hardbody rules again. I thought I had it covered, stamina lethal soak became agg soak and eveyone was happy, now I'm all confused again...

this game is so confusing sometimes I'm sure we could start a religion out of it.

[Singularity]

Well, it's quite simple, IMHO.

Hardbody: a nova spends a single quantum point they are allowed to use their lethal soak against aggravated damage for a single turn. The next turn requires another quantum point and any damage that is not soaked is aggravated damage.

[Noir]

Exactly.

And for some bloody reason, this enhancement affects your total soak, which means it even somehow alters your powers (Armour, FF) and so on.

Makes no bloody sense, but that's how it works.

[Hugin]

Maybe we should just acknowledge that it was badly written and perhaps suggest that it only affect MegaStamina soak?

[Noir]

Quote:

Originally posted by Hugin:
Maybe we should just acknowledge that it was badly written and perhaps suggest that it only affect MegaStamina soak?

That would be my suggestion and how I have seen it 'house ruled' in several games. it worked well and did not totally over power agg attacks, but it could certain save your life or take the edge off at least.

[Rorschach]

I think that at least powers as Force Field should never be included. About Armor and other permanent powers... Well, I don't know.

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

Quote:

Hugin: Maybe we should just acknowledge that it was badly written and perhaps suggest that it only affect MegaStamina soak?

Of the three ways to deal with AGG attacks, Hardbody is already, by far, the weakest. It doesn't need to be made any weaker.

Imperv and INV don't cost quantum. INV grants a min of 6 soak, Imperv removes AGG altogether. Note that both Imperv and INV also have other bonuses. Imperv prevents Armor Piercing, INV grants soak for bashing and lethal attacks.

If you have Hardbody then you still have the potential of taking AGG ping damage (assuming puny human doesn't apply). You even have the potential of your defense being shut down by simply running out of juice.

Further, in abby it generally costs three nova points to hose the Speciality attacks. Adaptability halts suffication attacks. Three dots of Psi-Shield come close to preventing any mental attack. Strobe is halted by three dots of its defense, etc.

Limiting Hardbody to cover only Stamina based soak would be both overly limiting, and it also ignores certain other rules issues. For example if you have HB then your Eufiber also has Hardbody so it's soak should also apply.

On the other hand, with the exception of Eufiber, Attune doesn't apply enhancements to clothes/armor. So while in theory your armored t-shirt could apply it's lethal soak to an Q-Bolt+AGG, that bit of soak wouldn't apply after the first attack since the shirt would be hosed by the first attack.

[Slattern]

One, Hardbody is an Enhancement, not a power.

Two, it works on ALL forms of Agg, whether they be physical or energy. Invunerability only affects a small section of agg, unless you buy it up and even then it's all Physical or all Energy. Yes, three dots of Psyshield, at 3 QP or 12 EXP is pretty cool, but Hardbody can be for free when you purchase MStam or costs 5 exp, period.

If you buy Impenetrable you get that bonus for one power and one power only. If you have 3 dots of armor or forcefield that extra costs you 9 exp. If you have more dots it costs you more and only counts against the soak provided by that power.

How is it balanced to purchase on Enhancement and expect it to alter your Stamina, MegaStamina, Armor, Forcefield, Euefibre, Elemental Mastery, Gravitokinesis, and so on?

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

2x Post.

[David 'Dr. Troll' Smith]

Hardbody can be for free when you purchase MStam or costs 5 exp...

True, but there is an opportunity cost there. Regen and Adapt are generally more useful as they come up far more often.

If you buy Impenetrable you get that bonus for one power and one power only... If you have more dots it costs you more and only counts against the soak provided by that power.

If we are talking about AGG, Impervious doesn't affect soak, it affects damage. And if that one power is Armor (which it usually is) then it affects all soakable damage you're likely to take. Nor do I seen many PCs running around with more than one dot of Forcefield.

If we are talking about Armor Piercing then AFAICT Imperv still removes any AP effect.

How is it balanced to purchase on Enhancement and expect it to alter your Stamina, MegaStamina, Armor, Forcefield, Euefibre, Elemental Mastery, Gravitokinesis, and so on?

It isn't balanced against those things, it's balanced against the rest of the system.

Imperv *also* affects all of those things, doesn't have to cost juice or require maintenance, and can cost only three points of experience to boot (you're already said this character has Armor).

Impervious also doesn't suffer from ping damage being AGG nor does it suffer from taking Damage overruns. For example, if you only have 6 lethal soak and you take 10 AGG (Disin is nasty), which would rather have? HB means you take 4 AGG, Imperv means you take 4 lethal.

And on a side note:

Invunerability only affects a small section of agg, unless you buy it up and even then it's all Physical or all Energy.

I see no reason why there couldn't be other board catagories. All HTH. All Ranged.

I also don't see a reason why someone couldn't buy INV: Aggravated Effects. AGG is rare enough and closely linked enough that it wouldn't even be a BC.

[Rorschach]

I'm pleased to see that at least everyone agree about ONE thing: dealing with Hardbody IS problematic