Acidic Blood Weaponized

[kirerellim]

Okay, so here is the situation. A player of mine wants to create a race with corrosive blood (which they did take immunity to) and weaponize that in the form of drawing and keeping pressurized grenades of it and a syringe. Unfortunately we are finding it incredibly pricey by conventional methods. Mostly that each appears to have to be purchased separately. The blood in the body we stated at:

Innate Attack (Corrosion) 3
Aura, +80; Always On -20; Melee Attack(C); Blood Agent(reversed) -40, Cyclic 4 (1 sec; Resistible)

That alone is 145 points. The game is only 500 points max, and adding a grenade and syringe version of this would obviously use up most if not all of it. This seems unfair as he is going to be self harming regularly to draw this substance in the first place. Does anyone have any suggestions?

[Bruno]

A 3d corrosive attack that cycles 4 times is expensive because it's brutal, and as you noted this is only a 500 point game. A 1d attack might be more appropriate. And cheaper!

You probably should also limit it to not work on glass and at least some metal alloys and plastics, or your grenades and syringes won't work; this will also make it cheaper.

My recommendation is to look at Alternate Abilities and Alternate Attacks; this seems like a prime candidate for them. Don't forget the Gadget limitations, which will make them cheaper.

Another approach is to consider the grenades, syringes, and etc. (I'm certain that there will be more ideas later) equipment that the character can create, and give them a highly limited Gadgeteer (Only For Making Delivery Systems For My Acid Blood, -80% seems really quite fair). They will have to sit down and create them, and spend money on them or at least build them out of stuff they have to find. If they go with Quick Gadgeteer, then the "stuff they have to find" can be a lot simpler. I recommend the Scrounging skill along with the appropriate armory skill.
Don't forget that drawing your own blood and filling up stuff is not something you can do lightly.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Bruno

A 3d corrosive attack that cycles 4 times is expensive because it's brutal, and as you noted this is only a 500 point game. A 1d attack might be more appropriate. And cheaper!

Yes, 15d corrosion tends to be very expensive. And you're going to get the full 15d every single time. In fact, corrosion is one of those things that might be better spread out, because of the whole reducing of the DR thing.

That said, this is one of those builds where multiplicative multipliers helps out a lot: you've got a lot of limitations and an enhancement that is closer to raising the level of the ability than actually enhancing it. That gives 33 points. Which is still high, but much lower.

of course, unless you're playing in an ultra-tech or supers setting, 15d is so overkill I'd strike it down as a GM just on that. If you are in an ultra-tech setting, I'd look into buying it as an accessory perk or unusual background. Though that will depend on your GM's character building philosophy.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by ericthered

Yes, 15d corrosion tends to be very expensive. And you're going to get the full 15d every single time.

Not necessarily, because it still has to get through DR, and the Cyclic is Resistable. Although I notice Resistable is missing from the main advantage and it should be there too if it's on Cyclic.

I'm not sure why acid is Resistable though, that doesn't make a lot of sense to me. It just suddenly stops eating your armor?

[whswhs]

GURPS Powers: The Weird has a writeup of hyperacid based abilities: spit, sweat, and digestive fluids. It sets them at 1d for exposure and 2d for immersion. This is based on roughly doubling the expected damage from standard acid to get something like Aliens-style "molecular acid." I think that 3d may be a bit high.

You might also want to look at the Cosmic: Intensified corrosion enhancement in that volume. For +200% you get damage to armor on a 1 for 1 basis.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Bruno

Not necessarily, because it still has to get through DR, and the Cyclic is Resistable. Although I notice Resistable is missing from the main advantage and it should be there too if it's on Cyclic.

I'm not sure why acid is Resistable though, that doesn't make a lot of sense to me. It just suddenly stops eating your armor?

I'm pretty sure that's a typo: the math he's using certainly implies that its not resistible. The modifiers other than cyclic come to -10%, and if you use +200% as the value for cyclic, that gives you [84], not [144].

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Bruno

A 3d corrosive attack that cycles 4 times is expensive because it's brutal, and as you noted this is only a 500 point game. A 1d attack might be more appropriate. And cheaper!.

This thing has blood so corrosive that if you splash it on an ordinary human they usually outright [die] - average damage takes them 0 HP on the first turn, leaving them at such huge penalties from shock they can't do much even if they don't fall unconscious. First cycle usually takes them to making death checks 1 second later.

That's more than I'd expect from being dropped in a tank of the worst corrosives in the real world (though that wouldn't have a limited number of cycles) never mind the kind of exposure you could get from something bleeding on you.

That aside, you may be approaching this the wrong way. The syringe and grenades are not actually innate attacks - anybody could theoretically buy and use corrosive filled weapons. Mostly nobody manufactures and uses them because they are not very effective in reality, but if the blood effect is this good and this race is at all common, there *will* be a market for their blood and that will change. If the local TL is 5 or more, the existence of this stuff proves the local laws of nature allow corrosives to be this lethal, and there are probably commercially available chemical options equal to it as well. Basically the advantage you get for being able to use your own blood is you don't need to pay for your ammunition supply. Possibly coupled with an Enemy disadvantage if adventurers routinely hunt you for your blood.

[kirerellim]

Oh yay lots of responses! :D

Okay as the most common point in this is the stronkness, I should probably mention the setting. This is going to be a race on Rifts Earth gurpified as I hate Palladium Rifts rules but love their setting. This race is megadamage itself and should be doing a decent amount of damage, and an average of around 40 damage over 4 seconds is actually not that crazy high. Also, I don't mind the cost of the corrupting blood itself, that's understandably powerful, its mostly the having to buy it multiple times at that cost to use it for more than one thing that I was having the issue with.

I like the idea of gadgeteering/gadget limitations! Also making the substance not able to affect certain things is a good one, he already is taking a bane for his healing. Perhaps a point in signature gear as it will be very hard to replace otherwise >< Its not such a huge deal, the self bleeding to this race as they heal very quickly and have a high pain tolerance naturally, but it certainly is freaky for other people to see the needle scars.

As noted above, in Rifts, this isn't really worth unusual background. Really on rifts not sure what would be considered unusual background lol.

It is supposed to be resistible, though you're right that doesn't make much sense :/ Mostly went with that because otherwise cost was /really/ crazy high. Might have to go with Cyclic 2 without resistance, probably gonna be better average damage anyways.

[sir_pudding]

Rifts damage isn't sensibly convertable directly. Weapons and armor just don't work the way they do in real life, and the numbers are entirely arbitrary. Otherwise you have to figure out how you have an energy supply for a pistol that gets dozens of shots with more energy than a shoulder launched rocket (why don't they use the pistol battery as a warhead instead?) and even sillier stuff.

[kirerellim]

Very true we're not converting directly lol just everyone has much more ablative dr, hp, and damage than in a 'normal' game. So, 44 damage over 4 seconds is not going to be upsetting to the balance