Custom Attacks that Limit Enemy Defenses

[Goldeneale]

Hey guys. I've posted on here once before, and was very pleased with the quick and comprehensive response to my questions. I'm back for round two.

My players have been discussing the potential for a superhero campaign in the future, and one of them has been watching a lot of Jojo lately.

He wants to make a character whose attacks are all based on band names and songs. Most of them I think I know how to work, but he's got one he wants where he would summon an Iron Maiden around the target. They would then only be able to dodge forwards or up. I don't know if parrying or blocking would be an option.

But the question is: is there any enhancement or advantage that creates an attack that can only be defended against in certain ways?

EDIT: One more thing. Does anybody have any solution to the potential issue created with characters that have high weapon skills going up against unarmed characters? Even with the malus to hit when rolling to damage an unarmed attack you parry, when you've got characters with 15 and more skill, anything without a weapon pretty much just kills itself on them without them even having to act. It also somewhat limits options. I had a villain with a naginata that I designed to push kick people who closed in with him, but the instant he tried to kick he just got his leg chopped off. Are there any ways to make unarmed attacks more viable against weapons?

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by Goldeneale

But the question is: is there any enhancement or advantage that creates an attack that can only be defended against in certain ways?

Well, Cosmic, No Active Defense Allowed, is +300%. So that sets an upper bound on this kind of thing. Note that an Innate Attack, by default, can't be blocked or parried anyway - allowing those defenses are actually limitations. So, you really only need to worry about dodging here. I'd use the rules for limiting enhancements here. So, start with Cosmic, No Active Defense Allowed, +300%. I'd say that there's a big difference between absolutely eliminating the active defense, and allowing one, but only in limited circumstances. So let's call the base value -50%. Then, let's look at Accessibility for further values. I'd say "Only on Dodges that require backward or sideways movement, or staying in place, sounds like -20% (I assume a Dodge that involved, say, teleporting a yard away would also work on this?). So, that's -70% total. Apply that to the +300%, and you end up with a +90% final enhancement. That sounds about right.

Originally Posted by Goldeneale

EDIT: One more thing. Does anybody have any solution to the potential issue created with characters that have high weapon skills going up against unarmed characters? [snip] Are there any ways to make unarmed attacks more viable against weapons?

For starters, make sure you're using Karate or Judo skill, as those lack the -3 to parry weapons. Also, make sure you're remembering that damage only applies on a failed parry. If you succeed, you're unharmed! Once you've got those issues settled, it's basically a matter of making sure you can reliably parry. Trained by a Master is, of course, very good here, since it halves penalties to parry repeatedly with the same limb. Also, consider burning FP on the Feverish Defense extra effort option, since that gives you +2. Once you've done that, buying Enhanced Parry seems like the best way forward. Accessibility, "Only against armed attacks", -20%, seems like a good limitation to take on it, which takes the cost of Enhanced Parry (Bare Hands) down to only 3/level. 3 points for +1 to your parry against armed attacks seems pretty reasonable to me.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Goldeneale

EDIT: One more thing. Does anybody have any solution to the potential issue created with characters that have high weapon skills going up against unarmed characters? Even with the malus to hit when rolling to damage an unarmed attack you parry, when you've got characters with 15 and more skill, anything without a weapon pretty much just kills itself on them without them even having to act. It also somewhat limits options. I had a villain with a naginata that I designed to push kick people who closed in with him, but the instant he tried to kick he just got his leg chopped off. Are there any ways to make unarmed attacks more viable against weapons?

The only ways I can see are ones that reduce the armed opponent's defences - things like Deceptive Attacks, Feints, and so on. Otherwise, it's really "don't bring a fist to a sword fight". Also, use Karate or Judo so they have a -4 to hit.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by Goldeneale

EDIT: One more thing. Does anybody have any solution to the potential issue created with characters that have high weapon skills going up against unarmed characters? Are there any ways to make unarmed attacks more viable against weapons?

Sorry, on my first readthrough, I obviously completely missed that you were talking about using unarmed attacks against weapon-based parries, rather than people with weapons parrying you.

As Rupert says, anything that lowers your opponent's defenses is probably your best bet here. Actually, I'd allow a special cinematic technique for this, along these lines:

Weapon Evasion

Hard

Default: Prerequisite skill, cannot exceed prerequisite skill +8.
Prerequisites: Boxing or Karate.

You can attack in ways that avoid your opponent's weapons, giving them a penalty to parry your unarmed attacks. Choose a penalty, from -2 to -8, to your attack, and roll against your level in this technique minus this penalty. If successful, your opponent makes any armed parry against this attack at a penalty equal to -1 plus half the penalty you took. For example, if you chose a -4 penalty, they would parry your attack at -3.
However, if you fail to hit with the attack, the opponent can still choose to parry, at only half (round down) the penalty they would have taken to parry you originally. If they succeed in this parry roll, treat it as if they had successfully parried your unarmed attack.


I built this with the technique design system in Martial Arts. Basically, it's the usual -2 to skill for each -1 to the target's defense, with +2 to the default for two special drawbacks: first, it only applies to armed parries, not all parries, and second, the chance for the opponent to parry you and thus damage you even if you miss completely.

[AlexanderHowl]

I think that it would be a great reason for using a DWA (Karate) with a Feint followed by a Deceptive Attack. With a skill of 25, you can do DWA (Karate) at 21. Against an enemy with a skill of 15, the Feint succeeds by an average of 6, meaning that the opponent will receive a -9 to defend against the skill 17 Deceptive Attack (-6 for a successful Feint, -1 for defending against DWA, and -2 forna Deceptive Attack). Since a character with skill 15 is unlikely to have a Parry higher than 11 without a retreat, the target probably cannot parry against the attack since his effective parry would be '2'.