[Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

[AlexanderHowl]

True, but that is not actually Flight either, as you can quite easily fall with Flight.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

It does if they're smart about it. Insubstantiality lets them pass through barriers and fly, so they can approach from angles that would normally be impossible and thus are less likely to be checked. It makes them completely silent, I think, and at a minimum makes them move silently. And if they want to push it they can keep most of their body hidden in the walls - while by default they need to breathe in open air and of course need to expose their eyes to see anything, that doesn't preclude keeping everything but their face 'submerged'.

Mostly not automatic benefits to Stealth there, but a lot that can be leveraged into going undetected.

One of the Epics in The Reckoners had Insubstantiality as his primary defensive power, and he was very difficult to engage, even once the characters figured out how to get around his Insubstantiality, due to his habit of only sticking part of his face out of walls (to allow him to see). He arguably wouldn't have been as much of a threat if he wasn't also able to attack with solidified shadows, of course, but in such a case he probably would have just stuck to spying on them and reporting their location to his forces, which honestly would have likely been ultimately more effective (instead, he obsessively went after and tried to kill the guy who was using his weakness against him; it didn't work out well for the Epic).

[Otaku]

Again, heavy spoilers incoming!

IIRC, Rimmer actually has a few decent stealth/spy moments and... well... Rimmer being Rimmer, if he wasn't mostly or wholly insubstantial, then they wouldn't he wouldn't have had a hope of succeeding. ;)

I'll add that the show is comedy driven, and wasn't the kind to sweat inconsistencies. So they sometimes ignored that Rimmer - an AI replicating a deceased member of the crew, represented with a holographic "body" - was always dependent on something "running" him. Whatever ran him also supplied his senses, and in some cases, let him do odd things like "drink". It wasn't that he physically ingested liquids, but that the program could simulate him being "drunk".

1. In early seasons, on the actual Red Dwarf ship, the ship's computer and holo-emmiters are how Rimmer existed.
2. If Rimmer wanted to go down to a planet, one time he employed a "holo cage", which just let him be there, not walk around.
3. The Light Bee was introduced later, when they were no longer regularly on their main ship, but stuck on a scout ship chasing Red Dwarf.
4. It also gets confusing because of certain, story-specific situations, where Rimmer was - for "reasons" - not insubstantial.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

True, but that is not actually Flight either, as you can quite easily fall with Flight.

Not so much really. That is, you can fall, but unless you have Cannot Hover it only will happen voluntarily or if your flight is somehow turned off. (Which may be most likely to happen due to unconsciousness, though that really shouldn't switch off many forms of flight.)

To make Flight emulate ignoring gravity, the only thing you need to add under the Basic rules is that you cannot benefit from diving as described on B398. Probably a -5% limitation.

(Logically, it might also have odd consequences if used in orbital reference frames, but that probably isn't intended for Insubstantiality. In most settings. Ghosts being unable to cling onto orbiting objects and instead being flung off on escape trajectories seems like something a setting in the style of Dr. McNinja might do. Though Dr. McNinja in particular quite firmly did not.)


That leads me to a point of curiosity about Insubstantiality: what skills do you use for endurance and agility during insubstantial pseudoflight? (Analogous to Flight and Aerobatics or Running and Acrobatics.)