[Basic] Advantage of the Week (#35): Detect

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Jasonft

I always did wonder about how to make that work. Detect at basic level probably would only get you the nearest source, but I never could quite figure out how to get a 'radar screen' type effect.

I think that the Sense modifier ought to work. I used it for that in GURPS Powers: Enhanced Senses.

[dcarson]

Had a PC in my GURPS Space 1889 campaign that had Detect (metal oar) with Per (taste). Went along with his mining skill. Forget the exact build but told him what and how rich. So everyone else is looking around and he is licking rocks.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by dcarson

Had a PC in my GURPS Space 1889 campaign that had Detect (metal oar) with Per (taste). Went along with his mining skill. Forget the exact build but told him what and how rich. So everyone else is looking around and he is licking rocks.

Why would anyone bury one in rocks?

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Why would anyone bury one in rocks?

I presume they meant "metal ore" and were a victim of spellcheck/homonyms.

[Anders]

Originally Posted by Jasonft

I always did wonder about how to make that work. Detect at basic level probably would only get you the nearest source, but I never could quite figure out how to get a 'radar screen' type effect.

Cosmic: No Die Roll Required gives you a radar screen effect with a range equal to the distance where your Perception drops below 3.

[Jasonft]

Expensive but doable. If I ever need to rebuild that concept in game I'll try that.

[Daigoro]

When trying to make a "view aura" type power, I was interested to find that the build in Psionic Powers used Detect (People) as the base, taking away the search-functions of Detect and keeping only the Analysis- then allowing it to analyse HP, FP, diseases and emotional state. It seemed like a long way round to achieve the desired ability, but works technically.

[ericthered]

If you can see using "detect", the proper advantage to use is probably scanning sense, instead of modifying detect to do something it wasn't meant to.

In powers page 72, it states the GM may invent new scanning senses, and suggests a cost of 20 to 25 for most of them.

[kirbwarrior]

Nearly every build of Detect I've used has Reflexive to make it into a sense, and most of those have an enhancement to get rid of the -4 for Reflexive. Some don't because it makes more sense with some abilities that active use makes it better (or not worse, however you look at it).

I really do wonder what the differences between Scanning Sense and Detect are. I've almost never used Scanning because it never seems to do what I want it to.

One great thing I like about Detect is how much it can do, from a build perspective. It's one of the few traits that canonically has the limitation 'You dont have this trait'.

[NineDaysDead]

Originally Posted by kirbwarrior

Nearly every build of Detect I've used has Reflexive to make it into a sense, and most of those have an enhancement to get rid of the -4 for Reflexive.

The -4 only applies to activation rolls, not sense rolls.