Power: Copy Book

[mhd]

A player who wants to portray a priest of a deity of knowledge asked me for a spell to copy books at hand. He's okay with bringing empty books with him and then touching the works to be copied.

My guess would've been Snatcher, but with Permanent (+300%) and Creation (+100%), no amount of limitations and accesibility modifiers would bring it down to something sensible (50 pt range).

Affiliction, Duplication does sound a bit wonky at first glance.

[Nereidalbel]

You don't really need Creation, though. That a copy of that book is lost in one of the infinite alternate timelines is just an inevitability anyway.

Affliction with +150% Permanent and giving 1-Use Only Duplication works from a mechanical standpoint.

[ericthered]

As a GM, I'd personally borrow the wealth mechanic from the create advantage, and not charge for permanent. I wouldn't charge for creation in any case. Creation allows you to build things from memory or imagination and ignore penalties for rare objects. This really doesn't do either of those. The fluff behind those limitations or lack there of is irrelevant to actual cost.

Between 'Only books', 'materials required', and 'only copies objects at hand', you get get -80%, no problem. that gives you a cost of [16]. This really isn't a game breaking ability -- as long as you keep the wealth under control.

You must buy wealth/independent income to represent how many books you can create. The 16 points can be an alternate ability -- in fact I expect them to be. The wealth points shouldn't be allowed as an alternate ability -- which means they are likely to be the most expensive part of the advantage.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by Nereidalbel

That a copy of that book is lost in one of the infinite alternate timelines is just an inevitability anyway.

Last time I saw it, it was floating next to the Infinite Sea of Typewriters in the Plane of Monkeys.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

Last time I saw it, it was floating next to the Infinite Sea of Typewriters in the Plane of Monkeys.

Yes, but that one is in all lower case except for where all the a's are replaced with 4's. And the punctuation is pretty bad.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by mhd

A player who wants to portray a priest of a deity of knowledge asked me for a spell to copy books at hand. He's okay with bringing empty books with him and then touching the works to be copied.

Personally I'd just charge him 10 points for it and call it done. Consider it the cost for a technique buying off the Reduced Time penalty (for -100%) for whatever skill he would normally use to copy a book (Professional Skill Scribe maybe). Charge a few more points if he doesn't want to make skill rolls either.

[SRoach]

Isn't there a spell for copying text? Can't you cook one up for copying larger volumes of text at once?

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Nereidalbel

You don't really need Creation, though. That a copy of that book is lost in one of the infinite alternate timelines is just an inevitability anyway.

Affliction with +150% Permanent and giving 1-Use Only Duplication works from a mechanical standpoint.

This is exactly what I'd do - but I'd use "Truly Permanent" (+300%) for Extended Duration and with 1-use only you'd probably only get one chance to dupe the book.

[Nereidalbel]

Originally Posted by Ghostdancer

This is exactly what I'd do - but I'd use "Truly Permanent" (+300%) for Extended Duration and with 1-use only you'd probably only get one chance to dupe the book.

+150% is fine, as the dupe is still subject to fire, water damage, being ripped up, or otherwise destroyed. Being subject to mundane means of destruction more than satisfies the requirements for +150%.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Nereidalbel

+150% is fine, as the dupe is still subject to fire, water damage, being ripped up, or otherwise destroyed. Being subject to mundane means of destruction more than satisfies the requirements for +150%.

I don't know. The fact that it's just a book means it's subject to those things. With Extended Duration at +150% you need to specify a condition that dispels what the ability did (in this case, the Affliction. So I don't think you can double dip like that.