Unpredictable/Predictable

[David Johnston2]

Clearly you want to represent the Joker's advantage over Batman. However, it shouldn't be that inexpensive and probably shouldn't be a leveled advantage at all.

[khorboth]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Clearly you want to represent the Joker's advantage over Batman. However, it shouldn't be that inexpensive and probably shouldn't be a leveled advantage at all.

If I were going to try to represent this kind of general combat advantage, I'd probably just use luck. With "armor of faith" there's precedent for Luck representing lots of stuff.

I'd also give Joker an Batman an absurd number of gizmos.

[Donny Brook]

Another useful comparator for Predictable might be Easy to Read (B134). As far as I know, though, there is no inverse i.e. 'Hard to Read'.

Originally Posted by aesir23

Essentially, since this affects other people's rolls, you should base the price on Affliction: ... presumably it affects more than one person at a time so take Area Effect, +200% will get you a 16 yard radius.

Maybe Line of Sight (or would it be Reverse LoS?) would work better.

[aesir23]

I actually built the opposite of this in my DCU thread.

Cassandra Cain (Batgirl) and Lady Shiva both have the ability to "read their opponent's intention in their body language" at a high level.

Basically, everyone else is predictable to them in combat.

I represented it with three different traits:

Danger Sense (Accessibility (Only Human Threats) (+1); Requires Body Language Roll ((Replaces Per Roll)); Sight-Based (One sense)) [11]

Modular Abilities: Any Style Familarity Perk. (Cosmic Power) (Per point of abilities (+1); Trait Limited: One specific trait) [5]

And High Skill Level in Sensitivity.

I could actually see Unpredictable as a couple of Style Perks.

Unpredictable Fighting (Defensive) (1)
You've learned to move in unpredictable, unpatterned ways. Whenever you would recieve a bonus to your defenses because of your own actions (e.g. All-out Defense, Defensive Attack, Retreating, Acrobatic Dodge, etc...NOT DB from a shield or cover), you gain an additional +1 to your defense roll, only for the purposes of offsetting penalties from Feint, Spinning Attacks, or Deceptive Attacks. [Place holder for some bonus against opponents trying to track or lead you with ranged weapons.]

Unpreditable Fighting (Offensive) (1)
Buy separately for each skill you will be attacking with. You've learned to attack at odd angles, with dramatic shifts in tempo, or otherwise in unconventional and hard to predict ways.
Opponents who share your Style Familiarity do not get their usual bonus to resist your Feints and Deceptive Attacks.
Additionally, against opponents who've never faced you before, you gain a +1 to any quick contests in combat that could result in a defense penalty for your opponent. This includes Beats, Feints, Ruses, and Spinning Attacks.

[Christopher R. Rice]

I wrote up variations of Obscure for Emotions and Mundane Prediction that is basically what the OP is trying to do. It's on p. 9 of Pyramid #3/99: Death and Beyond.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Anders

Martial Arts has something similar to this on p. MA53. It's a Reputation for always using the same tactics. I would look to that for pricing and mechanism.

MA54, apply reputation as a penalty to combat contests, nice.

MA49 has Style Familiarity penalties too...

This comes down to reducing penalties from Feint or Deceptive Attack (which Evaluate can also do)

MoS rerolls for Tactics v. Tactics could also emulate predictability.

MA130's "If this drives the loser to attack, he has the winner’s margin of victory as a penalty to his attack rolls!" could also be useful here. This is for the Battle of Wills rules.

I thought somewhere I saw a rule if a PC fails a save against intimidation but attack anyway they suffer MoF penalty to attack rolls. Can't remember where it was.

That seems very similar to MA130 so using both could be overkill.

[The Benj]

Originally Posted by aesir23

Danger Sense (Accessibility (Only Human Threats) (+1); Requires Body Language Roll ((Replaces Per Roll)); Sight-Based (One sense)) [11]

That just sounds like ... Body Language...

[aesir23]

Originally Posted by The Benj

That just sounds like ... Body Language...

Hmmm.
I'm fairly sure my reasoning was that Body Language by itself doesn't give access to Precognitive Parry...but I wonder why I didn't just take a rules-exemption perk to allow that...
I'll have to take a look at the mechanics and see if this is necessary.