Chain Effect Modifier

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Blackguard

Diving for Cover pg 377. The implication is pretty clear that depending on the nature of the attack, solid obstructions will protect you. It is a reasonable assumption for any physical effect in any case.

That's probably intended for Explosions.

[Kuroshima]

Originally Posted by Blackguard

There are several good suggestions for dealing with the specific case of the classic AD&D style chain lightening based on innate attack. But that isn't what I am after. There is no fundamental reason why a chain ability must do less damage with each hop. There is also no reason why chains should be limited to standard ranged attacks. Chain Leech would require the ability to be a Malediction. Chain Healing is also interesting, etc. It should be possible to define a modifier that applies with the same degree of genericness as the existing modifiers.

The suggestion of basing the cost of Chain Effect on the distance it can jump to the next target rather than the number of targets is an interesting one. That would neatly solve the problem of allowing another modifier to scale the effectiveness of Chain Effect indirectly. It has also been suggested that the shear number of attack or Quick Contest rolls necessary in my proposal can be a problem, and that is also a good point. I will work on an alternate definition that combines both these ideas.

For good or ill, it's the behavior most often seen outside of D&D (Videogames, etc etc). True, they're influenced by D&D. If you remove the decreasing power each jump, then a 50% modifier, per 2y of jump distance is probably fair. I would also somewhat limit the number of extra targets, to the square of the level of the enhancement, for example. Of course, another option is to simply say that the total distance of the jumps is the limit (Treat jumping between beings in close combat as 0.5y)

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by munin

Chain Lightning: Burning Attack 1d (Nuisance Effect, No more than 3 shots per target, -5%; Rapid Fire, RoF 30, Chained Attack*, +150%; Selective Effect, +20%; Surge, Arcing, +100%) [19]. Selective Effect isn't required but it ensures that "shots" wasted traversing distances between targets don't hit friends. Other possible nuisance effects might be "Shots at successive targets can't exceed half of previous target's shots" and/or "A failed attack roll wastes all further shots". We can argue about how much the nuisance effects are worth, but I think it all works.

* Chained Attack (a Rapid Fire option): When you use Spraying Fire (p. B409), your targets don't need to be in the same general direction, but you must target them in order of proximity to each other rather than from one direction to another. The path taken from you to each successive target is used for determining the effects of 1/2D and Max range. +0%.

I think this might be what the OP is looking for, looks good to me on a cursory, might even snag it for use in my games in the author doesnt mind.

Ghostdancer

[zorg]

Originally Posted by Molokh

That's probably intended for Explosions.

I agree. AE could just as well be some sort of field effect which doesn't radiate outwards, but simply affects its, well, area of effect. In which case onstacles won't do a thing.
iirc, you can dodge an AE if your Dodge can take you outside the AoE.

[Blackguard]

Originally Posted by Ghostdancer

I think this might be what the OP is looking for, looks good to me on a cursory, might even snag it for use in my games in the author doesnt mind.

Ghostdancer

It is close. But Rapid Fire options can't be applied to Maledictions, so it needs some adjustment.

[Blackguard]

Originally Posted by Kuroshima

If you remove the decreasing power each jump, then a 50% modifier, per 2y of jump distance is probably fair. I would also somewhat limit the number of extra targets, to the square of the level of the enhancement, for example. Of course, another option is to simply say that the total distance of the jumps is the limit (Treat jumping between beings in close combat as 0.5y)

I do like the doubling jump distance as per Area Effect method of determining available targets. The issue I'm trying to deal with now is if there is any reasonable way to reduce the number of attacking dice rolls needed in such a way that the number of hops is also capped. Maybe something like you get one hop per point in the margin of success, and the margin of success decreases by 1 with each hop. I'm not entirely comfortable with the all or nothing nature of that, however.

[Phoenix_Dragon]

I suppose you could make the main bolt as a standard Innate Attack, with the other hits being seperate Innate Attacks with Link, Accessibility (Only on closest target within X yards of previous hit), and a +50% Cosmic (Use range penalties from previous attack's hit location). Or possibly the "No Dice-Roll Required" Cosmic, if that's appropriate to how the attack should work (Especially fun if you have no control over where it arcs!). Maybe reduce the Accessibility to "Only on targets within X yards of previous hit" if the caster can decide exactly where it arcs. And quite likely a small Accessibility (Can not hit a target hit by a previous hit in this "salvo"), seeing as chain-lightning effects most often seem to follow the whole "lightning never strikes the same place twice" saying.

This does have the side-effect of making the subsequent bolt-hits more expensive per-die than the original, but that's appropriate as they are slightly better. At the very least, they have reduced range penalties, potentially quite a bit if the caster just lobs it at a group of foes a hundred yards away, knowing the first bolt will probably miss, but counting on the massive reduction in range penalties to arc subsequent hits into them anyway.

At least, that seems like the best way to do it without inventing new modifiers. It also seems like the one most open to use for other "chain" abilities, like the mentioned Healing and Leech. Albeit, very expensively, of course. That said, I really like Munin's "Chained Attack" feature for Rapid Fire, and would be very tempted to do that instead, at least for Innate Attacks. I could also see it being very nasty without the Selective Effect enhancement! It does have the side-effect of making absolutely huge chains rather affordable. A 300-yard chain would only be +300%, so that burning attack would only be ~26 or so points for an ability that could injure an entire company of soldiers. Though seeing as a similarly-priced Area Effect would cover a 64 yard radius, that's not really out-of-line of some of the other high-end enhancements...

Hmm... Now I want a Dispersal Dream... (Eeeevil!)

[Blackguard]

The Chained Attack idea is a good one for Innate Attacks. For a more generic solution, what about breaking Chain Effect into two modifiers? I don't have good names for them yet, but one would control distance and the other number of hops. Price them at 25% each, so if you scale both it is the same cost as Area Effect. Like Area Effect, you only need one attack roll for a normal ranged ability. If the first one hits, everyone else in the chain is hit, though they can defend normally. For any power requiring a Quick Contest, you still have to roll for each target, though if the first target resists the chain doesn't fire. Any range penalty, 1/2D, etc is calculated from the initial target. Similar to the Area Effect notes on Powers p100, if you have modified an advantage with a native FP cost into a ranged ability, each hop costs 1 extra FP.

I like the net effect of that, though the double modifier is a little clunky. You keep all the normal options, so there is no loss of flexibility in designing an ability. You can choose to increase just range or number of hops to fit what you want. You get fewer targets than a well placed AoE and they have a better chance to defend, but you can potentially get incredible range in exchange.

[munin]

Here's yet another approach to the problem that can be combined with Malediction (not completely RAW, but definitely in the spirit):

A Cone continues past its first victim on to other targets (like we want a chained attack to do). Overhead is the enhancement used to "bend" an attack (it isn't just for literally overhead attacks). Combined, they make an attack which can hit one target and then bend to hit additional targets.

To be fair I think Overhead would only allow the cone to bend once, so we allow Overhead to be leveled (+30%/level) allowing multiple bends. This allows your cone to strike multiple targets not in a straight line (you might be able to line up more than one target without a bend so it's not exactly "targets = 1 + Overhead level"). 1/2D and Max will follow the cone's path. Add Accessibility or Nuisance if you want the cone to automatically target the next closest target (or do some of the other things that have been discussed here), or Selective Effect if you don't want it to hit friendlies in the path between two targets.

For example, Chain Lightning: Burning Attack 3d (Cone, 1 yard, +60%; Overhead 3, +90%; Selective Effect, +20%; Surge, Arcing, +100%) [56]. Notes: You can emit a 1-yard-wide bolt of lightning which hits everyone in the area it crosses unless they dodge out of the way. You can bend the bolt up to three times along its path, and you can veer around friendlies. Treat conductive metal armor as no more than DR 1.

Blackguard, this is pretty close to modeling the concept you just posted except it defines bends instead of hops (and the attack's usual ranges are adjusted normally).

There usually isn't a need to combine Overhead with Malediction (since Malediction ignores barriers anyway), but if we want to bend a Malediction Cone, Overhead is the way to do it (and I can't find anything that explicitly forbids it). Malediction definitely can be combined with Cone (see p. P101) so I'd assume Malediction-like effects could be as well, but Cone is a little weird with Malediction in that it can only be a 53-degree cone (width = length, which isn't how I imagine a chained attack looking). I think to shape the effect of a Malediction Cone, it would be reasonable to apply Increased Range (you usually can't apply Increased Range to a Malediction, but that's because Malediction usually has no range to adjust -- but with Cone, it does). So we say "Malediction 1 + Cone, 1 yard" to get a cone that spreads to 1 yard wide at a range of 1 yard, then use (for example) Increased Range, 100× to shape it into a 100-yard-long by 1-yard-wide cone. Finally we add some Overhead levels to allow it to bend. When Malediction is combined with Cone you treat each target separately to determine range penalties for resistances or contests.

[Daigoro]

As Blackguard said, I would look at each level of a Chain Effect enhancement giving one hop- that's more intuitive to play with than levels giving distance (not that that can't be a further enhancement though).

But instead of halving damage with each hop, which would make it useless for higher numbers of hops due to the tyranny of exponentiation, divide the initial rolled damage by the total number of targets, and have it reduce by that amount for each subsequent target.

e.g.- Rolling 30 damage, and having 1 hop: 1st target takes 30, 2nd target 15
-having 2 hops: 30, 20, 10 against 3 targets respectively
-4 hops: 30, 24, 18, 12, 6 against 5 respective targets

If damage doesn't reduce with each hop, that's an additional enhancement, but reducing damage would be the "generic" form of the attack.

As for the hit roll mechanism, I'm not sure "automatically hits all subsequent targets if the first is hit" is a fair mechanic, unless it's priced similarly to Cosmic: No Hit Roll Required. Using MoS would be okay though- you hit a number of targets equal to your MoS or your number of levels of the Chain Effect enhancement, whichever is lower (just like Rapid Fire with Rcl 1).