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Old 12-19-2023, 10:16 PM   #1
Bicorn
 
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Default Critique - Battle Aura advantage

I've been fiddling an advantage meant to simulate battle auras: those visible manifestations of risen power that are a mainstay of old-school battle anime and things inspired by them. Think Dragon Ball, Hunter×Hunter, RWBY, etc.

The rules I came up with are rather convoluted right now, so I'd appreciate any suggestions how to streamline them. Keep in mind though that this is meant for a setting where most characters who qualify as "heroic" have a battle aura, so making them kind of a big deal mechanically is only appropriate.

I considered various ways to represent the effect of the aura, but eventually settled on using it essentially as a "fuel source" since I feel that best represents how they tend to behave in such works - as long as the aura lasts you're in the fight, once it depletes you're out unless you can get the aura to "flare" again, usually by drawing strength from something important to you. Note that the rule for how this energy can be used assumes the campaign uses the Extra Effort in Combat optional rule from p. B357.

Important note - I use the term "aura" because it's the usual anime fandom term for these things. It should not be confused with the usual GURPS usage (the Aura enhancement) or the Aura of Power advantages from Pyramid.


Battle Aura
5 points/level

When sufficiently excited, your ki manifests itself as a perceptible aura of power around you. You may roll Will at the start of a fight or other crisis situation to summon the aura, and again every time you deliver or receive a hit. On a success the aura turns on immediately. You will also involuntarily project the aura if you have Bad Temper, Berserk, Overconfidence etc. and fail the self-control roll, or if a Dependent is threatened; for involuntary activations, a Will roll at a penalty equal to the level of your Battle Aura advantage is allowed to suppress the aura should you want to not activate it.

You can also take a Concentrate maneuver and make an Autohypnosis or Meditation roll to attempt to activate the aura; this is the only way to activate the aura without a crisis situation or failing a self-control roll.

Levels of active aura can be spent in place of fatigue points for Extra Effort and any abilities that involve projecting one's ki (e.g. Power Blow, ki-based Imbuements, etc.) Other energy expenditures (fatigue from fighting or running, magic, psychic powers, etc.) cannot use aura, except with appropriate enhancements (see below).
If left idle, each minute the user spends not engaged in strenuous activity reduces the aura by one. A weakened aura can be brought back to full effect by reactivating it (see below).

The aura turns off once its active level drops to 0; it also turns off prematurely if you fall unconscious or fail a fright check. If you are stunned you must succeed in a Will-3 roll to keep the aura active. You can also attempt a Will roll at a penalty equal to the aura's current active level to intentionally turn it off as a free action, up to once per turn.
Any new rolls to reactivate the aura without an hour of rest in between are at cumulative -1 per time it has already been successfully activated; if the roll fails because of the penalty (i.e. you failed by an amount equal to the penalty or less), you may choose to have the aura activate to a level equal to your normal maximum level minus the amount the roll failed by. Failed self-control rolls can only summon the aura once (per disadvantage, if multiple ones apply) without the rest period, but always activate the aura to its full level; however, involuntary activations still count for the penalty on voluntary activation.

While the aura is active you have +2 to using and resisting Intimidation, with an additional +1 per five levels of active aura. However, you also have a penalty to Stealth equal to the aura's active level, as your agitated ki draws attention to your presence. Against observers who can sense aura energy, this penalty is doubled.
You suffer a point of fatigue after any encounter in which you invoked the aura, in addition to fatigue suffered from engaging in combat and the like; number of activations during the same encounter does not matter for this.

Enhancement: Armoured. While active, the aura acts as flexible semi-ablative DR equal to its current level. For every 5 damage the aura absorbs, its active level drops by one. +20%.
Enhancement: Versatile Use (purpose). You can spend levels of aura as energy for another purpose besides Extra Effort or ki-powers. +20% for a broad category (e.g. Magic, Psi); +10% for a narrow category. This enhancement can be taken multiple times for different categories.
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Old 12-20-2023, 02:02 AM   #2
Varyon
 
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Default Re: Critique - Battle Aura advantage

I like it. I could also see it being used as the basis for an Alternate Ability set - maybe you can solidify your aura into something akin to a sword (Innate Attack or Natural Weapon), focus it to propel yourself through the air or walk on nothing (Flight, Super Jump, Walk on Air, Walk on Liquid, Clinging, etc), etc. These would be cases where you aren't consuming it for power, but rather sequestering it for something else - and I'd have the AA only sequester an amount of equal value (so if you have 5 levels of a baseline Battle Aura, for [25], and you have an Alternate Ability nominally worth [15] - which you buy for [3] as an AA - it only locks up 3 levels of Battle Aura, leaving you with 2 to make use of).

I'm not certain [5] is the right price for Battle Aura. Energy Reserve is [3]/level, so let's compare to that. BA is better than ER in that you can continuously renew it, albeit at a mounting iteration penalty, and it gives a bonus to use and resist Intimidation. BA is worse than ER in that it requires a roll to activate (and this calls for specialist skills outside of combat or similar*), individual activations can be "wasted" by failing SC rolls, it risks deactivation if Stunned (and automatically is deactivated if knocked out or if failing a Fright Check), penalizes stealth (it also makes battles cost an additional FP, but that's pretty minor in the grand scheme of things), and requires a full hour of rest to get rid of the iteration penalty.

That ability to continuously remanifest the Aura is indeed powerful, but is that enough to not just negate all the drawbacks but leave the Advantage being worth an additional +67%? It honestly feels more like a wash to me, making BA the same [3]/level as ER (note this would change the Armoured Enhancement to around +30%, so it's still around [1] per DR).

Well, except for that Intimidation bonus that's a bit of a fly in the ointment. Sure, that looks like a relatively minor benefit, but it would be built as something like Racial Skill Bonus: Intimidation +2 [4] + Fearlessness 2 (Intimidation Only -50%) [2]. I could see that getting reduced to [2] or so from the plethora of Limitations involved, which would match the [5]... but you only get that full +2 for the first level, and after that it's only +1 per 5 levels. I'd be inclined to have Battle Aura be [5] for the first level, and [3] per level after that (much like how Sorcery costs more for the first level). In that case, rather than having the Armoured Enhancement for Battle Aura, you might opt to allow characters to buy Damage Resistance with Battle Aura -80% as a Limitation, with all the effects you list for that (Flexible; Extra Semi-Ablative, losing 1 point per 5 damage instead of the typical 1 per 10; loss of DR also results in loss of Aura; current DR cannot exceed Aura level).
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Old 12-20-2023, 02:33 AM   #3
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Default Re: Critique - Battle Aura advantage

Quote:
Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
I like it. I could also see it being used as the basis for an Alternate Ability set - maybe you can solidify your aura into something akin to a sword (Innate Attack or Natural Weapon), focus it to propel yourself through the air or walk on nothing (Flight, Super Jump, Walk on Air, Walk on Liquid, Clinging, etc), etc. These would be cases where you aren't consuming it for power, but rather sequestering it for something else - and I'd have the AA only sequester an amount of equal value (so if you have 5 levels of a baseline Battle Aura, for [25], and you have an Alternate Ability nominally worth [15] - which you buy for [3] as an AA - it only locks up 3 levels of Battle Aura, leaving you with 2 to make use of).
I've been pondering ways to have "aura-powered" abilities (as it's a very common feature in the settings I'm using for inspiration, e.g. Semblances in RWBY); that sounds like one possible way to implement that.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
That ability to continuously remanifest the Aura is indeed powerful, but is that enough to not just negate all the drawbacks but leave the Advantage being worth an additional +67%? It honestly feels more like a wash to me, making BA the same [3]/level as ER (note this would change the Armoured Enhancement to around +30%, so it's still around [1] per DR).
I prefer to have abilities have base costs divisible by 5 for easier calculation; what might be a good way to increase the usefulness to justify 5/level?

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
I could see that getting reduced to [2] or so from the plethora of Limitations involved, which would match the [5]... but you only get that full +2 for the first level, and after that it's only +1 per 5 levels. I'd be inclined to have Battle Aura be [5] for the first level, and [3] per level after that (much like how Sorcery costs more for the first level).
Hmm. I prefer to avoid having a variable cost per level because it feels clunky; the bonus mainly exists for flavour reasons, anyway. Would a flat +1 per level, with a minimum of +1 even at lower levels, work?
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Old 12-20-2023, 03:27 AM   #4
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Default Re: Critique - Battle Aura advantage

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Originally Posted by Bicorn View Post
I prefer to have abilities have base costs divisible by 5 for easier calculation; what might be a good way to increase the usefulness to justify 5/level?


Hmm. I prefer to avoid having a variable cost per level because it feels clunky; the bonus mainly exists for flavour reasons, anyway. Would a flat +1 per level, with a minimum of +1 even at lower levels, work?
Combining these two, maybe something like +1 to each of using/resisting Intimidation, resisting Fright Checks, and resisting unconsciousness per level. That would be something like Racial Skill Bonus: Intimidation +1 [2] + Fearlessness 1 [2] + Hard to Subdue 1 [2], for the same [6] as for the first level above (again, reduced to [2] on account of the Limitations).
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Old 12-20-2023, 03:39 AM   #5
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Default Re: Critique - Battle Aura advantage

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
Combining these two, maybe something like +1 to each of using/resisting Intimidation, resisting Fright Checks, and resisting unconsciousness per level. That would be something like Racial Skill Bonus: Intimidation +1 [2] + Fearlessness 1 [2] + Hard to Subdue 1 [2], for the same [6] as for the first level above (again, reduced to [2] on account of the Limitations).
Fright Check and unconsciousness resistance bonus certainly makes thematic sense with the source materials. Thanks!
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Old 12-20-2023, 04:43 AM   #6
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Default Re: Critique - Battle Aura advantage

Quote:
Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
Combining these two, maybe something like +1 to each of using/resisting Intimidation, resisting Fright Checks, and resisting unconsciousness per level. That would be something like Racial Skill Bonus: Intimidation +1 [2] + Fearlessness 1 [2] + Hard to Subdue 1 [2], for the same [6] as for the first level above (again, reduced to [2] on account of the Limitations).
+1 to Intimidation and Fearlessness is only a.point less than +1 Will which does the same thing and more.
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Old 12-20-2023, 05:06 AM   #7
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Default Re: Critique - Battle Aura advantage

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Originally Posted by sir_pudding View Post
+1 to Intimidation and Fearlessness is only a.point less than +1 Will which does the same thing and more.
+1 Will [5] and Hard to Subdue 1 [2] also works well with the source material, and I think would fit within the ~[+2] above ER's base 3 when keeping in mind all the functional Limitations involved. That's good advice, yeah.
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Old 12-20-2023, 02:31 PM   #8
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Default Re: Critique - Battle Aura advantage

A straight-up Will bonus would reduce the risk of losing the aura after a stun, though, which I feel is a pretty important aspect of the sort of scenes the advantage is trying to emulate. ("Oh no! He was knocked out of Super Saiyan mode!")
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Old 12-20-2023, 02:47 PM   #9
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Default Re: Critique - Battle Aura advantage

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Originally Posted by Bicorn View Post
A straight-up Will bonus would reduce the risk of losing the aura after a stun, though, which I feel is a pretty important aspect of the sort of scenes the advantage is trying to emulate. ("Oh no! He was knocked out of Super Saiyan mode!")
Simply state the Will bonus doesn't apply to the roll to keep the battle aura up after a stun. We're largely eyeballing costs here anyway, so there's some wiggle room in how things apply (plus, that would be a fairly small Limitation on Will anyway). I'd probably take it a step further - the Will bonus also doesn't apply to rolls to renew the Battle Aura (if you opt to do so while it's still partially up). Goku would probably have a Perk or similar to ignore this restriction, however - while I've only watched Dragonball and some of Dragonball Z, Goku seems to be a habitual rule-breaker when it comes to stuff like this. "Kaiouken not quite cutting it? That's alright, I'll just stack 10 instances of it on top of each other."
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Last edited by Varyon; 12-20-2023 at 02:54 PM.
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Old 12-21-2023, 05:38 AM   #10
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Default Re: Critique - Battle Aura advantage

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Goku seems to be a habitual rule-breaker when it comes to stuff like this. "Kaiouken not quite cutting it? That's alright, I'll just stack 10 instances of it on top of each other."
After he was specifically warned that more than two would kill most users, if I remember right.
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