Problematic Afflictions [Powers/Supers]

[AlexanderHowl]

Let us say that I have a character in a supers game with Affliction 1 (Accessibility, Only during consensual intimacy, -25%; Accessibility, Only with members of desired sex, -20%; Advantage, Appearance (Very Handsome/Beautiful), Charisma 5, and Voice, +510%; Blood Agent, -40%; Extended Duration, Permanent, Reversed by consensual intimacy with anyone but the character, +150%; Melee, C, No parry, -35%; No Signature, +20%; Super, -10%) [65]. When the character has unprotected consensual intimacy with a member of the desired sex, they give their partner Appearance (Very Handsome/Beautiful), Charisma, and Voice until their partner shares intimacy with another.

Would such an affliction be a problem in your supers games? What would be the consequences? What other afflictions might be problematic in a supers game that have a similar cost?

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Would such an affliction be a problem in your supers games?

It would generally be out of scope for supers games, as they are rarely rated more than T+. Other than that, permanent duration on beneficial afflictions is sufficiently problematic that I don't permit players to have it.

[ericthered]

So there are three ways in which the above build could cause problems.

1) There is the really weird sexually aspect of the ability. That's really not a theme I personally would want to play with or see in my games. So that could cause problems with the social contract of the group. This is a fairly well understood, if perennial and difficult type of issue.

2) Permanent beneficial afflictions in general can be thorny. They change the way the game is played, and I'd look long an hard if a campaign concept supports it before I allow it in my game. Consider a super who can take one hour to give people the flight advantage until they are completely dunked in the water. How do you run the points on that? Do you allow it as an alternate "Attack"? It takes a certain campaign mode for advantage like that to be acceptable.

3) Some GM's struggle to keep social characters in check. Especially ones who go all in and have all of those factors maximized. Its one thing to see it on a player, but another to have a player spam maximized Reaction modifiers on random PC's. I'd probably tell the player he's got to add "Off the shelf looks", and look into deepening the social play in this game. deeper social games often weaken social advantages, rather than strengthening them.

As a bit of personal preference, I don't like to stack the highest levels of appearance with voice.

[Celjabba]

You may want to add aura, and merge the accessibility.

Otherwise, it would be out of scope in my games, for the same reasons as Anthony : adult thematic and being a permanent beneficial affliction.

Consequences would depend on the setting.

[Mark Skarr]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Would such an affliction be a problem in your supers games? What would be the consequences? What other afflictions might be problematic in a supers game that have a similar cost?

A permanent affliction, especially one like this, would be disallowed. While I'm not as averse to permanent afflictions, it does depend on what, precisely, it grants. This one . . . wouldn't be allowed for a PC. Or any PC that has it wouldn't remain a PC for long.

The sex-aspect, in some of my games, would be irrelevant. I don't have a problem with sex-abilities in my games.

[AlexanderHowl]

Would reducing the Extended Duration to 1000x make the ability more tolerable?

[Mark Skarr]

Not really. Explaining why it needs to exist, at all, would go further.

Sexual powers, really, need a reason to exist. They really need to be a metaphor for something inside the character. Unless you're just looking to do a sex-fantasy game, which is fine, but you're not going to find many people interested in that.

Think about what would make the super interesting to play, and how would this be interesting to the other players at the table. What would make a character with this power interesting to explore?

Suzie had an unconscious power to make sapiens sexually desire her. She couldn't control it, it was always on. Only after someone had consensual sex with her, the power no longer affected them. (Or, if they made their resistance roll by enough, or enough times.) She was an interesting character because it was an exploration in free will vs control, and who was at fault.

Was the person who sexually assaulted her at fault? The were being controlled by her to do it, but she couldn't control the ability, so it wasn't consensual. But, the other person also couldn't be at fault because they had been controlled into doing it.

What makes your character interesting?

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Mark Skarr

What makes your character interesting?

I think this really gets to the core of it. It's not too difficult to create an extremely powerful ability, but it ideally needs to be something that makes the character more interesting, rather than just a "I'm the greatest" ability.

And, honestly, an ability that makes people you have sex with significantly more attractive until they have sex with someone else just seems... odd. What's the dynamic you're trying to go for, here?

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Let us say that I have a character in a supers game with Affliction 1 (Accessibility, Only during consensual intimacy, -25%; Accessibility, Only with members of desired sex, -20%; Advantage, Appearance (Very Handsome/Beautiful), Charisma 5, and Voice, +510%; Blood Agent, -40%; Extended Duration, Permanent, Reversed by consensual intimacy with anyone but the character, +150%; Melee, C, No parry, -35%; No Signature, +20%; Super, -10%) [65]. When the character has unprotected consensual intimacy with a member of the desired sex, they give their partner Appearance (Very Handsome/Beautiful), Charisma, and Voice until their partner shares intimacy with another.

Would such an affliction be a problem in your supers games? What would be the consequences? What other afflictions might be problematic in a supers game that have a similar cost?

It would have no impact whatsoever. All it would mean is that somewhere out there there's a supervillain who naturally looks like an unpleasant troll but now it doesn't because it has your character locked up in a prison somewhere. It's Mother Gothel and Rapunzel with more sex and less singing.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

It would have no impact whatsoever. All it would mean is that somewhere out there there's a supervillain who naturally looks like an unpleasant troll but now it doesn't because it has your character locked up in a prison somewhere. It's Mother Gothel and Rapunzel with more sex and less singing.

The 'consentual' part would make that rather tricky, unless the villain is celibate.