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Old 02-18-2021, 11:20 AM   #1
johndallman
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Default [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

Insubstantiality [80] is an exotic advantage that can be mental or physical. You can become intangible, able to move through solid objects, a very potent ability. This advantage appeared during the GURPS 3e period, probably in Supers.

While you are insubstantial, you are not affected by gravity, and can move in any direction at your full Move, which avoids the classic problem of falling through floors. You don’t make any noise by moving, but you can still speak to and hear material creatures, and perceive the material world without any penalties. You also still need to breathe, so moving through solid objects is like swimming underwater: ordinary walls are trivial, but searching for an open space underground requires you to come up to the surface for air frequently.

While insubstantial, you are not affected by physical or energy attacks, nor can your physical or energy attacks affect material creatures. Mental and non-material magical attacks still affect you, and your mental and non-material magical attacks can affect material creatures, although your success rolls for then are at ‑3 (see below). By default, you cannot pick up or otherwise affect material objects while insubstantial, but there are enhancements to allow that.

By default, you can become substantial at will, provided you aren’t inside anything solid. Creatures that are normally insubstantial, but can materialise, have this advantage, at the same price. If you are always insubstantial and cannot materialise, that’s a -50% limitation, and you don’t have the ‑3 penalty to use mental or magical abilities.

Since there are quite a few fictional and mythological precedents for this advantage, it needs details to be agreed between the GM and player. The “fluff” of how it operates might be a switch of planes, a mystical vibration, a switch to spirit form, and so on. This rationale might imply limitations, such as things or barriers that you can’t pass through. It also determines what you look like while insubstantial (misty, normal, strangely coloured, transparent, etc.), but you can’t be invisible unless you also buy that advantage. Your physical and energy attacks work on beings using the same form of Insubstantiality, and theirs work on you.

This advantage has quite a few special modifiers: Always On is ‑50%, as noted above, and Usually On, which allows you to materialise at the cost of 1FP per second is ‑40%. The ability to affect the substantial world is +100%, and may require the relevant abilities to be bought at +40%. The ability to carry objects is +10% to +100% depending on how much you can carry, and the ability to change just a part of your body is +20% or +100%, depending on exactly what you can do. Powers adds some more limitations: No Vertical Move, ‑10%, Noisy, ‑5% and Projection, ‑50%, where you leave your body behind, unconscious and vulnerable.

Insubstantiality is widely used for spirits and similar beings in GURPS supplements. DF 9 Summoners nails down the rules for using mental and magical abilities at ‑3, and has advice on using and resolving insubstantial monsters. Fantasy adds more modifiers, for materialisation at 1FP per minute, and having an illusionary form, rather than being completely insubstantial; these are used for shaman and spirit templates. Horror has modifiers for chilly touches, ectoplasm, and forced reversions to a “native” form, used for ghosts and other spirits. Infinite Worlds allows Insubstantiality to be used with Jumper (Projection), and MH6 Holy Hunters provides “Ghost Air” and “Substantial Communications” enhancements within an Astral Projection power. PU5 Impulse Buys lets you turn objects permanently insubstantial (or otherwise) if you have this advantage, and PU8 Limitations provides “[Affects] Insubstantial Only.” Template Toolkit 2: Races provides the most recent spirit templates, and Thaumatology provides selective versions of “Affects Substantial” and “Affects Insubstantial.”

A point that doesn’t seem to be settled in any GURPS rules: does Insubstantiality let you pass through, or reach inside, living creatures? The Phasing power, on p. 40 of Supers allows this if you’ve bought a power for it, but doesn’t address the potential for leaving things, such as poisons, inside people, for which you only seem to need Can Carry Objects. Personally, I prefer not to allow insubstantial beings to interpenetrate living ones, since that greatly reduces this advantage’s potential for body horror, and I can do without that in my gaming.

What has Insubstantiality done in your games?
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Old 02-18-2021, 11:54 AM   #2
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Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

One thing worth noting is that, while GURPS claims that immunity to damage is not a valid trait because it would deserve an infinite cost, a suitably modified Insubstantial is sometimes unofficially put forward as an effective substitute.
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Old 02-18-2021, 12:02 PM   #3
ericthered
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Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

The justification behind insubstantial isn't just fluff: you can't interact with insubstantial beings that don't have the same insubstantial as you do.

I've played a solo game where one character was a monster hunters ghost. It uses the default manifestation mechanic, which is frankly kind of weird. The Ghost's bread and butter was sneaking into places through walls with insubstantial and invisible. That character was a lot of fun.

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One thing worth noting is that, while GURPS claims that immunity to damage is not a valid trait because it would deserve an infinite cost, a suitably modified Insubstantial is sometimes unofficially put forward as an effective substitute.
My God slayers game had this as a standardized option. I think it came out to something like 240 point for the whole invulnerable advantage. I was central to the game, and the opening scene involved a villain with it intentionally getting hit by a nuclear bomb at the north pole. If I were to run it again, I might call the advantage injury tolerance.
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Old 02-18-2021, 12:04 PM   #4
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Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

Also note that Psionic Powers adds Substantial Communication, +40% and Ghost Air, +10% both page 14. Ghost Air also appeared prior.
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Old 02-18-2021, 01:40 PM   #5
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Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

A good invincibility build is Insubstantiality (Affects Substantial, +100%; Can Carry Objects, Heavy, +100%; Ghost Air, +10%; Selective Effect, +20%) [264]. You (and your gear) can become selectively insubstantial to certain attacks. Add Cosmic (+50%) if you want immunity to all non-Cosmic attacks and Reflexive (and possibly Reliable) if you greater power dodging, which together can push the cost to 376 CP, which is still pretty cheap.
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Old 02-18-2021, 02:05 PM   #6
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Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

GURPS Powers: The Weird uses Insubstantiality to represent being a four-dimensional being that has repeated onto a hyperplane adjacent to other people's three-dimensional space.
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Old 02-18-2021, 02:24 PM   #7
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Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

Malediction +100% having +60% worth of enhancements (both Affects Insubstantial +20% and Affects Substantial +40%) built into it is something which seems to introduce unnecessary complications.

This is something which doesn't really seem obvious at all when reading B106 except perhaps hinted at by "works like a regular spell", even though B239 doesn't appear to mention insubstantial foes.

I only really become aware of it via PU8's
Substantial Only (pg 18) "normally works on both substantial and insubstantial opponents, such as a Malediction"
Or maybe that only refers to having the +40% folded in (Malediction function assumes you're substantial?) and Insubstantial creatures need to buy "Affects Substantial" as normal?

If that's not the case (+60% is folded into +100%) then to get "insubstantial malediction only affecting other insubstantial creatures" you'd need a "Not Substantial" estimated at -50% since the -30% "Insubstantial Only" on PU8p15 seems to have the +20% "Affects Insubstantial" folded into it, and 20 minus 50 is -30

Quote:
Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
your mental and non-material magical attacks can affect material creatures, although your success rolls for then are at ‑3 (see below)
..
The ability to affect the substantial world is +100%, and may require the relevant abilities to be bought at +40%
It feels like B63's "Your psi abilities and magic spells can affect" (the only mention of -3 penalty in Basic Set AFAIK) is a 3e remnant back when psionics were a distinct thing aside from advantages.

Also that phrasing never specifies mental/non-material, just says they can affect, but at -3, so reading that literally it sounds like you could cast a -3 fireball which you could throw at substantial foes, or if you had Crushing Attack 1d (Telekinesis -10%) you could roll at Innate Attack - 3 to hit (only success roll necessary) and hurt them without needing a +40%.

Horror 108 (published 2011) similarly makes me wonder if it's a 3e carryover in describing the Etheric Plane:
Psi and magic are at -3 to affect the material realm from here; other abilities need the Affects Substantial enhancement
When you design a psi advantage (a power) you might or might not take the +40% on it, and this presumably affects the trait the same as it would a non-psi one, so it seems like psi shouldn't be singled out like this anymore.

Spells are still their own thing (unless you convert to Sorcery/Powers) so I understand why that should remain in 4e.

The +100% charge also seems like an unusual presentation. "If you have any" sounds like it's describing something like an Unusual Background, as opposed to an actual modification of how the ability works.

Maybe this should be something like "normally your abilities don't work on substantials, but if you have +100% enhance some/all work at -3/-0"

B102's lower-lefter similarly seems like a 3e remnant. We're explicitly told not to add this to magic/psi abilities, but does that mean +40% is part of the -10% power modifier for Psionic-Source and -10% power modifier for Mana-Sensitive?

Something like "you're obligated to add this to magic and psi" might've worked better, because otherwise the -5%/-5% breakdown of these power modifiers in GURPS Powers gets flip-turned upside down. Am I missing some kind of drawback which balances out getting +40% for free on these -10% powers?

Maybe it's not a full +40% because +40% represents "minus zero" so "minus 3" is like adding Hard to Use 1 -5% to form a limited enhancement, but chopping 1/20 the price off +40% only reduces it to +38% so it's not significant.

I wonder if this is due to the intent in 4e of designing many psionic powers via Malediction but not all of them are.

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
If you are always insubstantial and cannot materialise, that’s a -50% limitation, and you don’t have the ‑3 penalty to use mental or magical abilities.
Always found this a bit weird...

Again the B63 middle column "no -3 to use magic or psionics" seems like a 3e remnant of when psi was distinct and not a power, unless that's somehow folded into the -10% source modifier unaccounted for in Powers' -5/-5 breakdown.

This seems like it's not even a benefit at all unless you get the +100/+40 so why build an only sometimes-helpful benefit into a limitation's cost?

Instead, at least in terms of using psionic powers, wouldn't it just make sense to take the "Only While Insubstantial -10%" discount on your abilities to partially offset the +40% cost of ignoring the -3?

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
DF 9 Summoners nails down the rules for using mental and magical abilities at ‑3
Pg 20's "Spirits in the Material World" actually seems to overlook the Always-On exception to the -3 penalty...

Despite noting "often with the Always On limitation" the "mentions that insubstantial
beings can use “psi abilities and magic spells” to affect the material world, albeit at -3" makes no mention of it not applying in the Always-On modified trait.

The first bullet seems like a pretty significant change. Afflictions resisted by HT for example would (just purely by Basic Set standards) need both B102's "Based on (Different Attribute)" to shift it to Will and B102's "Affects Substantial" to target substantial guys, but not it's like for the cost of +20% you're getting +38% for free.


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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
By default, you cannot pick up or otherwise affect material objects while insubstantial, but there are enhancements to allow that.
..
The ability to carry objects is +10% to +100% depending on how much you can carry
This could probably use some rephrasing too, like calling it "Affects Equipment" (similar to Affects Others) since the idea is more "I'm turning stuff I carry insubstantial so I can continue to carry it" whereas the present name could give some an impression like "my substantial sword stays substantial when I carry it in insubstantial form" which I don't think is actually possible unless you do a Partial Change (hand remains substantial) or use Telekinesis.

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
MH6 Holy Hunters provides “Ghost Air” and “Substantial Communications” enhancements within an Astral Projection power.
These are also on Psionic Powers 14, to provide an extra option.

I think the "take the standard -3 to skill unless they have" note for communication abilities (I assume this is for advantages like Telesend/Mind Control and similar?) seems significant here.
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Old 02-18-2021, 02:25 PM   #8
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Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
A point that doesn’t seem to be settled in any GURPS rules: does Insubstantiality let you pass through, or reach inside, living creatures?
It would seem strange if you couldn't do that, since the implication seems to be that living creatures pass through you.

Powers 119 for example when designing the "Reflexive Insubstantiality" approach to Invulnerability is "become insubstantial for just an instant when exposed to damage" and there's no "unless a fleshy punches you" exception to how this counteracts "physical attacks".

P119 neglects to mention you need to roll a Power Dodge every time you do this though, as per taking Reduced Time +20% to make it a free action (instead of Ready) to switch the ability on and off. P167 specifically references Reflexive for Power Dodge...

P109 mentions "If this normally requires a success roll, activation requires a roll at -4" but since that's perhaps intended for full-attribute rolls (like Detect) I'm wondering if maybe it halves to merely a -2 penalty for active defense rolls like Power Dodge?

I also don't really understand the "falling through the floor" note as to why there's Affect Substantial and Partial Change... I get why there's "Can Carry Objects +100%" for "keep the user from dropping things" but is falling through floors unintentionally something that normally happens when one turns insubstantial? If so that could probably use some emphasis because it's not an impression I got from Basic Set.

I'm also skeptical about "can’t shield others with their body" .. I realize "Uncontrollable" makes that difficult but shouldn't that actually be possible by using a Will roll to prevent that from activating, or does Reflexive in combination with Uncontrollable somehow negate the ability to prevent an ability from activating via a will roll?

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
The Phasing power, on p. 40 of Supers allows this if you’ve bought a power for it
Are you referring to Affliction representing "squeeze internal organs" ?

I think that's because normally even if you had something like B63's "Partial Change" (instead of "read through a wall and tap someone on the shoulder" you "reach through a ribcage and tap someone on the lung") you could experience problems like "there's no room inside bodies for hands to materialize" for that kind of fine control.

The "can't materialized inside occupied space" dilemma provokes thought about what happens to air/water molecules though. Like do you create a "wake" in gas/liquid mediums while insubstantial so that there is no such dilemma (you've already moved the molecules aside creating a vacuum that you occupy) or does the process of turning substantial move those molecules out of the way like Warping in?

A "swap" approach for Insubstantiality or Warp could solve some of those issues, like maybe there "no wake" formed by either thing because when you turn substantial the gas/liquid which you were overlapping turns insubstantial (or in the case of Warp, teleports where you used to be, or to some smokey interdimensional halfway realm like Nightcrawler?)

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doesn’t address the potential for leaving things, such as poisons, inside people, for which you only seem to need Can Carry Objects.
B63 explicitly says under CCO directly after "become physical if dropped" that you "cannot materialize these objects inside other objects or characters".

It just doesn't go into detail as to WHY, and it raises a lot of questions about character/object parameters vs other barriers.

Like maybe we could explain this away as humans having something like this for free?
Crushing Attack (Aura, Always On, Insubstantial Only, Accessibility: only objects) ?
This would make it harder to exploit: to drop grenades inside people they'd need to be extremely dense grenades (enough HP they can't be knocked back) which probably weigh a lot that only highly-enhanced CCOs (+100%) of very high-ST insubstantials could actually convey such grenades past the "free aura" that living beings have to prevent this exploit?

Then you could define people who lack this free advantage as having the "insubstantial guys can drop grenades inside my stomach" disadvantage where there is no such aura, and maybe give this advantage to "objects as characters" like houses who don't enjoy it (grenades can be dropped past their "skin" walls)

Like for example if you view a house/building as collective object (or even a character) does that mean I can't phase a grenade through a house's wall and drop it inside?

B63's shift from +20 to +100 is for turning them substantial WITHOUT dropping it... even though that actually might be less useful, since needing to keep a substantial hand for this is a vulnerability in many cases.

I'm actually wondering if we could somehow replace CCO with some equivalent to "Exoteleport" afflictions.

"Carry" enhancements seem to work like afflictions/symptoms that bypass the need for damage or a resistance roll.

The closest to that might be "Affects Others" enhancements, but they require consent of the governed (just like Beneficial Afflictions, and even then you still need a kinda reverse-resistance success roll on their end)

Equipment being subsentient (IQ0/Will0) could be easily affected via abilities which resist via IQ/Will since at their best (roll a 3) they have MoF of 3, so any successful hit works so long as you don't take "Easy to Resist" limitations beyond 1 or 2 to give them a bonus.

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Personally, I prefer not to allow insubstantial beings to interpenetrate living ones, since that greatly reduces this advantage’s potential for body horror, and I can do without that in my gaming.
This makes a big problem for Possession (Spiritual -30%) though since that's pretty much by-definition what's required: the insubstantial body overlaps the possessed victim.

Even without that, there's mechanical concerns "what happens if I'm jogging directly at a ghost and ghost doesn't dodge me" because if the ghost doesn't overlap/interpenetrate then clearly something is going to cause the movement of one or the other (perhaps both) to prevent that overlap from occuring.

If you don't want interpenetration to be possible it seems like the natural solve is to give abilities which prevent it from happening, like maybe ghosts have Crushing Attack (Aura, No Wounding, Double Knockback, Affects Substantial) so that if anyone is en-route to overlap/interpenetrate, they're pushed away and it doesn't happen.

If you don't want ghosts to abuse that to easily affect the material world, you could give it the Reflexive/Unconscious-Only/Uncontrollable trio from P119 so that ghosts only react this way when "something interesting happens" (ie "someone is going to jog through me and that would be gross!") but can't consciously activate their Crushing Attack Aura to just go attack joggers.

You might also need some icing there for this to make sense like:
"Delusion: joggers heading in my direction falling down is just a convenient turn of chance and has nothing to do with some ability I'm not aware of"
"Phobia: people jogging through my body"
The latter is to trigger Uncontrollable ability to activate (because normally it wouldn't: joggers aren't a threat to you, a reasonable person won't be upset by this) since B116 triggers UC stuff whenever you would make a self control roll.

Though I can see a mental disadvantage like "I'm afraid of people phasing through my body" as maybe "assumed by default" on a human baseline (kind of like "Not One Hand") and not being worth points. In that case though, people who lack this fear (as you'd expect many Ghosts/Mutants to eventually overcome) should cost points.

The FORMER (the DELUSION) is so that even if you pass your pass your Phobia self control roll (your phobia does not force you to spend 1 FP on a +2 "Frantic Defense" to Acrobatic Dodge all incoming joggers) thinking "this jogger can't hurt me, I should just let him ride on through and confront how gross that would be" that you can't make a Will roll to prevent your Crushing Aura from turning on, because you don't even know you have a Crushing Aura that you're capable of willing away.

Joggers/cyclists heading in your direction that you want to ride right through you will just keep falling down... and if you actively overcome your Phobia (make your Self Control roll) and try to walk through a stationary person, they'll fall down too...

But it has nothing to do with you! It must be coincidence... so there's absolutely no reason to try walking through people to intentionally have them fall down, because you totally have no reason to think you could cause that!

If players start to metagame this (walk into joggers/cyclists when knocking them down advances the plot, even though you have no reason to expect them to fall down) the GM should probably force them to buy off the Delusion, because you're not RPing it right (B129 "must roleplay your belief at all times")

Quote:
Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
It also determines what you look like while insubstantial (misty, normal, strangely coloured, transparent, etc.), but you can’t be invisible unless you also buy that advantage.
That's another weird part to me. I get if they want to fold together the variant kinds as 0% features but I want to conceive them as sum 0 from bonuses/penalties, and we're essentially talking about something similar to "Supernatural Features" as a Temporary Disadvantage here, except that TD can't be taken on Reflexive abilities and Insubstantial can be reflexive.

You can take "Nuisance Effects" on reflexive abilities though, so it could probably fall under that.
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Old 02-19-2021, 12:54 PM   #9
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Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

Quote:
Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
A point that doesn’t seem to be settled in any GURPS rules: does Insubstantiality let you pass through, or reach inside, living creatures? The Phasing power, on p. 40 of Supers allows this if you’ve bought a power for it, but doesn’t address the potential for leaving things, such as poisons, inside people, for which you only seem to need Can Carry Objects. Personally, I prefer not to allow insubstantial beings to interpenetrate living ones, since that greatly reduces this advantage’s potential for body horror, and I can do without that in my gaming.
Passing through seems like a given - unarmed attacks go right through each other, as do attempted grapples and slams. This shouldn't let you manipulate things inside of people, however, because that should call for a separate ability, given how powerful it would be ("I grab his heart and crush it"). Indeed, trying to materialize anything inside of a character/object/whatever shouldn't work, instead shunting whatever you tried to materialize just outside of the target (IIRC, this is what happens if you turn Insubstantiality or similar off while inside a wall or similar). The metaphysics of some settings might allow for materializing things inside of body cavities, like the mouth, but that would either be a separate ability or an Enhancement on Insubstantiality.

If just the idea of a ghost and person phasing through each other is pretty squicky to you, you could interpret the insubstantial being as essentially parting around the person, like mist. This would allow Insubstantiality to maintain its mechanical effects without the squick. In theory, a large group of people could pile up and create an impenetrable barrier that couldn't be phased through, but I doubt they could actually form an airtight seal (plus, they'd have to be naked to do so, as otherwise the ghost or whatever could just flow through their clothing), and as GM it's pretty easy if players try that sort of ridiculousness to just say "It doesn't work," maybe saying the being is able to phase through the cracks (or even just let the ghost phase through their dead skin cells, treating that layer similarly to clothing, above). If the players have their characters go through an acid wash or whatever to remove any dead skin cells, or do something else similarly-ridiculous to turn your squick-aversion into a mechanical advantage, I suggest grabbing the largest book you have at hand and rolling for Targeted Attack (Brawling Book/Skull).
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Old 02-19-2021, 02:07 PM   #10
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Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: Insubstantiality

You can usually pass through anything with Insubstantiality, it is just that you cannot normally affect anything you pass through. You would normally need both Affects Substantial (+100%) on Insubstantiality and Affects Substantial (+40%) on any attack to target substantial targets.
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