Affliction: Negated Advantage with Variable Enhancement

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Anthony

While it makes sense for some abilities, it doesn't make sense for other abilities -- for example, it's hard to see what negating a level of Unkillable 3 actually does, because unkillable 2 is really a different but related power.

...Kind of, yeah.

Originally Posted by Not another shrubbery

Yeah, I've read through the bit in Power-Ups 4 a few times while posting in this thread. It does look like that might be the intention, but it's far too flexible for a trait like Affliction, where so many effects are special enhancements. I'm looking at the base proposal of negating a specific 50 point advantage, and seeing a cost of 15, while your adjustment to the VE build would cost 55 and allow the negation of any advantage costing 50 or less, and the unlimited build would cost 60 and allow the adding of any of the special enhancements worth up to +50%. That just don't look right to me *shrug*

Meh. Cosmic Modular Abilities are two flexible for some folks - po-tay-toe, po-ta-toe.

Originally Posted by Not another shrubbery

I guess the Pyramid articles are vetted as far as officialdom is concerned. I don't have a big problem with it, as it increases the utility of the Negated Advantage mod a bit. That doesn't help it when applied to non-levelled traits, unfortunately. So the trouble is with levelled traits that have irregular pricing, then?

Pyramid is edited, laid out, etc. exactly as if it were a GURPS book - because it is in fact a [I]GURPS /I] book, just with lots of moving parts. This comes from the Line Editor himself.

Originally Posted by the_matrix_walker

Allot of folks seem to have a problem with flexible Advantages... you can't use a Modular Ability or Variable Enhancement without being branded a Munchkin by some. I find it a bit perplexing, and that the expense usually balances the ability.

Affliction is just one example of flexibility with modifiers. Side Effects and Symptoms can just as easily add most Affliction effects.

But really, if you can't use your 10x cost Variable Enhancement with flexible Advantages, there's no point in having them in the game system. Having six potential Enhancement options is only double normal cost (using Alternative Enhancements). You have to go past the cost of the original Enhancement and it's 45 Alternative Enhancements before you've spent as many points.

QFT!

[GodBeastX]

Originally Posted by Nereidalbel

First hit is going to wake you up. Also, Doesn't Sleep makes you nice and immune to sleep-inducing Afflictions.

Besides, the sleeping guy is the LAST one that's going to be attacked, instead of the awake guys with pointy sticks. And if none of those guys try to wake you up, shame on them.

True you can wake them up. What about the other afflictions you can't?

And yes you can put immunity on an enemy or buff their stats to make resistance a certainty but then you are just taking a toy away from the player.

Afflictions tend to be too cheap or too expensive. I don't have a good solution to the problem, but this has been my feeling on them in play and scenarios they come up, and the balance seems awkward.

I'm going to give you an example of what irks me a bit.

Let's say you want the ability buff people in your party. To give people in the party 1.0 additional speed, you're looking at 30 point affliction in general (10 points + 300%). Let's say I want to make it cost fatigue to do, like, let's say 4 fatigue for a nice round -20%. The afflication becomes 28 points.

However, if someone wanted to buff themselves the same way, they don't have a 18 point buff, they have a 16 point buff. Somehow it's cheaper in the pool of balance for people to buff themselves than for someone else to do it? You're already paying 10 points, still have a resist roll, still have to hit the guy (Or get malediction) and somehow you are paying more for worse problems? And you could say "But you can give it to multiple people" but I've a limited pool of fatigue, so it's not like I could spam it! The costs just don't add up.

I can give a bigger example, what if you add something that would make it impossible to keep someone constantly buffed, like "Takes Preparation" or something, you still end up with ridiculously priced buffs.

And on the debuff side, I showed sleep, but someone could wake them up as pointed out. What about afflictions people can't just wake up out of? So to not trivialize a player who bought said afflictions, I can't simply make people immune left and right, and if I end up with high resist chances, I get to watch a player wait for their turn in a fight to see this as a GM:

"I use my affliction."

"They resist."

"Ugh... 4th time in a row. Okay, I'll wait about 15 minutes for my turn to come up."

And if I had to guess the problem, it's because of the hard line between success and failure. It'd be more interesting if it didn't last so long or had a lesser effect from things if resists happen.

"You failed by 1, guess they'll be incapacitated by half the time..."

or

"You failed by 3, guess hey'll be incapacitated 1/10th the time"

and success by could strengthen it.



It's why I tend to hate save or die systems. There's no middle ground or variance in effect.

[Not another shrubbery]

Originally Posted by Ghostdancer

Meh. Cosmic Modular Abilities are two flexible for some folks - po-tay-toe, po-ta-toe.

Cosmic ModAbs are flexible, but you pay more for that. It might be a better guideline for what this sort of ability should be worth.

[Nereidalbel]

You can always require Reduced Time 1/60 on any Afflictions that have combat use. This turns minutes into seconds, which is much less Save Or Die.

When it comes to Afflicting advantages, it's effectively a 10 point surcharge for the ability to boost multiple people. Limitations are meant to be bad at reducing the cost of Affliction, while all the Affliction-specific enhancements make it get really expensive.

[Not another shrubbery]

Originally Posted by GodBeastX

I'm going to give you an example of what irks me a bit.

Let's say you want the ability buff people in your party. To give people in the party 1.0 additional speed, you're looking at 30 point affliction in general (10 points + 300%). Let's say I want to make it cost fatigue to do, like, let's say 4 fatigue for a nice round -20%. The afflication becomes 28 points.

However, if someone wanted to buff themselves the same way, they don't have a 18 point buff, they have a 16 point buff. Somehow it's cheaper in the pool of balance for people to buff themselves than for someone else to do it? You're already paying 10 points, still have a resist roll, still have to hit the guy (Or get malediction) and somehow you are paying more for worse problems? And you could say "But you can give it to multiple people" but I've a limited pool of fatigue, so it's not like I could spam it! The costs just don't add up.

While I agree that Affliction can be troublesome at times, this is more of a problem with Costs FP. If you take that away from both builds, it looks much fairer: 20 points to have +1 Speed for yourself, or 30 points to be able to temporarily grant +1 Speed to yourself and all your friends, assuming it works, but you can keep trying until it does.