Detect Death's Aura - Occasional, Common, or Very Common?

[Phantasm]

I'm building an ability for a character who happens to have been chosen for training as a Valkyrie. Part of the Valkyrie package is the ability to "see" a "death aura" around someone who is dying or will die soon. "Soon" in this case is relative; "in a few minutes" for someone who will be hit by a car, "within the hour" for someone mortally wounded, "within the day" for most poison, or "within the week" for an incurable disease, I think. Of course, it'd be relegated to human and other sapient life, and does not extend to animals or plants.

This is for a superhero setting with a neo-Silver Age feel, in which human life is not cheap and the PCs don't cause a ton of deaths themselves.

What I have so far is this:

Detect Death's Aura (Increased Range: Line-of-Sight, +70%; Reflexive, +40%; Sense-Based (Vision), -20%; Vague, -50%).

I just don't know whether, given the circumstances and world, if this would be an Occasional, Common, or Very Common aura to be detected.

[Railstar]

One issue I see is it assumes all fights are predestined: whose aura do you see during combat? It sounds like a headache to me.

Anyway, I would generally say Occasional, because I pass by hundreds of people when I walk through the street to do my shopping. How many of them do you think die that week? When I go to work or university, most of my classmates and tutors or colleagues survive are still alive the next week. On that basis, I would call it Occasional.

Valkyries just happen to seek out the places where all these 'occasionals' gather.

[Phantasm]

Originally Posted by Railstar

One issue I see is it assumes all fights are predestined: whose aura do you see during combat? It sounds like a headache to me.

During a fight in which the PCs are involved, I see it kicking in the moment a character - PC or NPC - takes a wound that knocks him to below 0 HP. In the source material I'm working from, a character who was granted this ability was able to reverse the conditions which led to the removal of the death aura.

[Christopher R. Rice]

I think I'd call this Occasional (but only barely and because Life is a 30-point Detect, so Detect Death would be a 20-pointer). That said, for something like this - let's call it "Esoteric Detect" (kind of like Godlike Control) - I'd start off with saying that you you'd read miles as hours when you make your Detect roll. Adding Long-Distance would let you use the Long-Distance Modifiers (p. B241) and read miles as days. Adding Short Range would make you read yards as minutes for the standard range modifiers (p. B550). Make IQ rolls to figure out how they'll die. I know that's a bit of a stretch and it's off the top of my head - but would let you better emulate the flavor you're going for. Yeah, I like that. Hmmm.

[Lia Valenth]

This is interesting because, I agree, from what has been suggested this is an Occasional Detect [20] with the modifiers you suggest that's [28] (or [12] if using Multiplicative Multipliers).

However, I would only price it as that if it is actually useful to the character. As it is described, I would not call it useful to the character. It is necessary for the back story and useful to the GM, I would call it a Perk [1] if that is the only case. However, if it can be used in ways that will help the character it should be full price.

For example, if he can know who his actions would endanger before he performs any heroism then it would be very useful. This would depend on his other powers, but for example if he has AoE or Explosive abilities and can know what civilians might be put in danger if he used the ability it would be more than a Perk.

[Phantasm]

Originally Posted by Lia Valenth

This is interesting because, I agree, from what has been suggested this is an Occasional Detect [20] with the modifiers you suggest that's [28] (or [12] if using Multiplicative Multipliers).

Are you sure about that math? I plug my build into GCA with a -10% power modifier, and I get [13] for Occasional or [26] for Common, without using Multiplicative Modifiers.

Ah, just checked p. B48. Occasional is a base [10], Common a base [20]. Your math is right, just using the wrong base.