Quick Question: RPM Damage and Area? Why does a cone cost so much?

[Raekai]

Well, the title is self-explanatory. I can add Area Of Effect: 3 yds radius for 2 energy versus the damage modifier Area Effect (2yds) for 10 energy. Everywhere, I see that you can buy the RPM area rather than buy it as a modifier. Cool beans. That makes it a little cheaper. Wait... But what about cones? Do they get left out? Most may not think it's a big deal, but I see it as a major problem. My conical air blast becomes way more expensive than my area whirlwind.

I would be happy with some kind of house rule for this if there isn't a rule already. I'm not sure as to why a cone should be that much more expensive compared to an area. What about making Area Of Effect: 3 yds cone for 2 energy? The number would define how large it is at the end.

Thanks.

[Nosforontu]

I am not sure how RPM modifies it but the reason that a Cone cost so much is that it does its affect across the entire length and width of its attack. Even a 1 yard cone on a standard 1d6 innate attack does full damage to every target in a 10 yard line and half damage to every target in a 100 yard line.

[PK]

RPM goes into a little more detail on Area of Effect, but in general, the expected way to achieve a cone-shaped area of effect -- or any weird shape -- with a spell is to buy enough Area of Effect to cover the entire area, then use the "+1 per two excluded targets" rule to limit it to only those in the area you want. (If there are no sentient targets in a given area, or everyone in said area has already been excluded, you may also pay +1 per two excluded areas if you're worried about your firecone spell singing the wrong room.)

For damaging spells only, you could use the "damage enhancement" rule to add Cone instead, sure. That produces slightly different results, but in effect, it's basically the same thing. It produces different energy costs because, well, the "powers/modified advantages" system is different from the RPM system. The "damage enhancement" rule is an attempt to bridge those two systems somewhat, but they're still so significantly different that enhancements ported over in this manner will not always be consistent with similar spell modifiers. That's why, IMO, if you can do something using the standard RPM spell modifiers, you always should -- the "damage enhancements" rule is a last-ditch emergency go-to for when nothing will work except adding an enhancement directly to the damage being done.

In other words, think of RPM as a system for affixing nuts and bolts. The spell effects and modifiers are all various types of wrenches -- socket, closed, adjustable, etc. And sitting at the bottom of the toobox, the "damage enhancement" rule is a big pair of pliers. Is it a tool designed for nuts-and-bolts work? Nope. But sometimes you need to break it out because all the wrenches in the world won't help and you need a pair of pliers. It's rather like working with a wrench, but definitely isn't quite the same thing. :)