Questions about Innate Attack (Wall)

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by naloth

Piercing is defined by its wounding effects. If you're taking "no wounding" on the ability such that the wound multiplier will never make a difference, then it's not really a piercing attack. The justification you've used has nothing to do with why this would make sense as a base for an ability.

I think there are RAW examples of attacks that do Small Piercing damage but have No Wounding, for the purpose of creating a carrier attack for a Follow-Up. Personally, I don't like that, as it feels like a cop-out - attacks with No Wounding should generally use a base cost of [5], with their damage type as a special effect. It may be appropriate to make an exception for Innate Attacks with Side Effects and Symptoms, however, at least if the former is using Injury instead of Damage to determine the penalty (and you allow the latter at all).

Originally Posted by naloth

Describe the ability you're trying to create, not the game mechanics you're trying to ramrod together. I really don't see a Wall/Side Effect IA that makes since. As a linked ability, ok, but not on the same IA.

I could potentially see a rigid Wall with a Side Effect - say, a wall of icy spears that can (cinematically/supernaturally) freeze the target (so Side Effect: Fragile (Brittle) and maybe some more effects), or (for a No Wounding example) a "soft" force field that can shock a target (Side Effect: Stunning). Even using pi- to represent something like tiny needles, I don't see it working with No Wounding for a rigid Wall, however.

Originally Posted by Plane

Ah okay I think I get it now, wasn't processing the sentence before. Per B408 it seems like the wall HP is being treated as "flesh" though, since it's not 1/2 HP like unliving or 1/4 HP like homogenous has for cover DR.

Yes, this is why I've opted to quadruple the HP of rigid Walls - it lets them function like Homogenous structures, and also creates a DR vs HP exchange that makes some sense to engage in.

Originally Posted by Plane

Ought to be, but since it is a major component of the base Innate Attack ability, there isn't any way to avoid that for walls.

"No way to avoid" doesn't mean you have to exploit it by getting your Wall at nearly half price by making it pi-.

Originally Posted by Plane

Or to cause collision damage if they can't avoid them.

That is a use, yes, but as I mentioned later, it's a rather niche application. Part of why I'm kind of OK with the high price for cutting and impaling Walls is that I expect a player who opts for one to intend to frequently use it for its collision damage (by throwing it in the path of fast-moving foes).

Originally Posted by Plane

I guess the question is: what is the cap on the collision damage that rigid walls can actually cause compared to their permeable form?

See B431 -"If the obstacle is breakable, the moving object cannot inflict or take more damage than the obstacle’s HP + DR." Homogenous objects really should use 1/4th HP, however, to be consistent with its Cover DR, and so a pillow doesn't deal more damage than a locomotive of the same mass (the example used on B430, although they got the relationship backwards there - sure, they note a pillow should indeed do less damage than a locomotive, but seeing as a Pillow is Homogenous and a locomotive is Unliving, the pillow would actually deal more damage).

Regardless, this works out to mean the maximum damage a Wall can deal in a collision is equal to the average damage of the Innate Attack it was built off of.

Originally Posted by Plane

It's a good all-around approach, stuff like 2d-6 would still cause a problem.

2d-6 is less than 1d. Honestly, if you're subtracting more points than you have dice, that's going to throw the average off. Personally, I don't think I'd allow going beyond -1 (with the exception of 1d) for the modifier - generally speaking, the pattern should go nd, nd+1, nd+2, (n+1)d-1, (n+1)d, etc.