can Jumper (Tunnel) cause harm?

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by naloth

It's absolute only because it was described that way. Conversely if you described it as doing a few dice of damage while it pushed someone through, chopping them up if the damage was high enough, it's not that absolute any more.

I'm not aware of any representations of such portals where they can sever things that are in transit but that this effect isn't absolute. There may be instances where a particularly resilient target prevents the portal from closing completely, but not anything like how it would work in GURPS - harming the resilient character and pushing them through the portal. Of course, I did say you could do just that, if you're willing to do away with the "absolute" nature of the attack.

Originally Posted by naloth

There's nothing more absolute about a teleportation attack than invulnerability or the one touch kill.

Those are also things that GURPS struggles with. Invulnerability is impossible, the best you can do is have enough protection nothing in the setting can harm you (but something from another setting - or something similarly from outside the scope for which you designed the character, like taking a nuclear warhead to the face - could overwhelm your "invulnerability"). A 100% reliable One Touch Kill (like Aidan's "Seal of Death" from Mixed Myth) is similarly impossible - the best you can manage is either enough damage to kill anything or an Affliction with enough of an HT penalty that the most resilient foe can only survive on a Critical Success (and again, it may not work against something from outside your scope of design).

Originally Posted by naloth

Besides if it's better than any of the campaigns attack abilities it's likely worth whatever cost is being charged.

That depends on how the GM requires it to be designed, but in many campaigns, ruling the Tunnel Enhancement as having this ability would basically amount to said Enhancement being unavailable, as the required Innate Attack would be outside of most characters' budgets.

Originally Posted by naloth

Of course if the GM wants to provide it, I wouldn't worry about trying to build it as a power. The portal weapon just becomes equipment.

Indeed.

[JulianLW]

I think you could buy an attack as an Alternative Ability to your Warp advantage, but I also think several other possibilities could apply, especially when the Warp tunnel in other cases might simply suck a passenger harmlessly through to the other side.

I'm thinking of a couple of somewhat obvious examples from fictional sources.

First, Rick Sanchez uses portals for all kinds of purposes, from power dodges to bisecting a Gromflomite. I think this (bisecting a mook) could be an example of

1. rolling a critical success (it seems a bit like an accident when he suddenly appears and conveniently kills a guard with a blaster pointed at Morty),

2. dooming a mook (Rick definitely has a lot of Wildcard Points to spend), or

3. a power stunt (which I suspect applies best to most of Rick's portal gun tricks, though maybe not this one) using either a Gadget power or a Metatronic Generator.

Second, when Wong chops off the hand of Black Dwarf in Avengers: Infinity War. This looks very much like a case of Using Abilities at Default - or simply a hardcore improvisation with Sorcery - to use a portal as a Warp-strength cutting attack. Wong even seems to take a second to prepare it, as per the rules in Powers.

[naloth]

Originally Posted by Varyon

I'm not aware of any representations of such portals where they can sever things that are in transit but that this effect isn't absolute. There may be instances where a particularly resilient target prevents the portal from closing completely, but not anything like how it would work in GURPS - harming the resilient character and pushing them through the portal. Of course, I did say you could do just that, if you're willing to do away with the "absolute" nature of the attack.

Representations usually don't say they are absolute and there have been plenty of examples where portals were kept from closing even when they would otherwise chop things in half.

There's also nothing preventing a variant Gate enhancement that allows the gate to constrict whomever is halfway through.

Those are also things that GURPS struggles with. Invulnerability is impossible, the best you can do is have enough protection nothing in the setting can harm you (but something from another setting - or something similarly from outside the scope for which you

More correctly Invulnerability does not have a fixed cross genre cost. A few options were created in Powers and any GM can assign a cost for it like there was in Supers under 3rd.

[johndallman]

In Infinite Cabal, tunnels were normally a step or so long, and they closed from the start towards the end. The characters became quite disciplined about forming up and going through quickly. They occasionally tried to corelate the time tunnels lasted with conditions at their ends, but never got any reliable results.

There was at least one case when a tunnel was very long and winding, and took several minutes to traverse. The start closed after a normal length of time, but the tunnel closed up at about 5 yards/sec, so the party were able to keep ahead of it.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Plane

This is more along the lines of "I accidentally risk harming myself and my allies" than "I intentionally use this to harm enemies" though.

It's far more likely to harm pursuing foes than your allies. For one thing you could in fact keep the tunnel open by just doing it again if, say, you wanted to march an army from Earth to Narnia.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

It's far more likely to harm pursuing foes than your allies. For one thing you could in fact keep the tunnel open by just doing it again if, say, you wanted to march an army from Earth to Narnia.

The Tunnel Enhancement has the Tunnel staying open for 3D6 seconds after the user passes through. The normal way to keep it open is the Extended Duration enhancement.

A Tunnel that closes when the user wants would be at least a +50% Cosmic.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by naloth

Representations usually don't say they are absolute and there have been plenty of examples where portals were kept from closing even when they would otherwise chop things in half.

I'm just saying I've never seen a case where both a) a portal is demonstrably capable of cutting things in half if turned off during transit and b) that same portal gets turned off during transit and fails to cut whatever was going through in half. If something is half in one location and half in another, and the link between the locations is severed, so is the something. I think I've seen cases where a character is able to keep such a portal open long enough to pass through, but more due to extreme skill, willpower, plot protection, etc than because said character is particularly resilient.

Originally Posted by naloth

There's also nothing preventing a variant Gate enhancement that allows the gate to constrict whomever is halfway through.

That seems more like it should be a Binding (just as cutting in half is an Innate Attack) than an Enhancement, but I could see that - it would basically bind the character in place and keep trying to cut through until either it made it through or the character escaped. That's very different from how such portals are usually portrayed, however.

Originally Posted by naloth

More correctly Invulnerability does not have a fixed cross genre cost. A few options were created in Powers and any GM can assign a cost for it like there was in Supers under 3rd.

Certainly, the GM can always design a new trait and charge whatever he/she thinks is appropriate. I always interpreted the advice in Powers as talking about how to make a trait that is largely indistinguishable from Invulnerability, but I could see it being meant instead as "this is a fair way to price Invulnerability," such that if actually encountering something outside of the design scope, you're still invulnerable.

Although I could certainly see cause for outright invulnerability to not exist - in Sanderson's Reckoners series, it's noted that even otherwise-invulnerable Epics could be taken out with a powerful enough attack, like a nuclear bomb.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

The Tunnel Enhancement has the Tunnel staying open for 3D6 seconds after the user passes through. The normal way to keep it open is the Extended Duration enhancement.

A Tunnel that closes when the user wants would be at least a +50% Cosmic.

I don't recall if this is addressed, but is the duration known to the maker when he opens the portal, or does the GM roll that in secret?

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Varyon

I don't recall if this is addressed, but is the duration known to the maker when he opens the portal, or does the GM roll that in secret?

The latter. Parties who travel this way regularly tend to avoid acquiring followers, and move smartly. Characters did very occasionally get left behind in Infinite Cabal, but the party was organised enough to put the people who could travel independently last in the queue.

[naloth]

Originally Posted by Varyon

I'm just saying I've never seen a case where both a) a portal is demonstrably capable of cutting things in half if turned off during transit and b) that same portal gets turned off during transit and fails to cut whatever was going through in half. If something is half in one location and half in another, and the link between the locations is severed, so is the something. I think I've seen cases where a character is able to keep such a portal open long enough to pass through, but more due to extreme skill, willpower, plot protection, etc than because said character is particularly resilient.

I could come up with examples (especially for comics), but the point was that it's rarely explained what the portal can and cannot cut through often until something blocks or holds it open. There might be definitive limits to most of the portals that have managed to slice relatively fragile people, clothing, and the odd bit of metal.

[qoute]
That seems more like it should be a Binding (just as cutting in half is an Innate Attack) than an Enhancement, but I could see that - it would basically bind the character in place and keep trying to cut through until either it made it through or the character escaped. That's very different from how such portals are usually portrayed, however.
[/quote]
That sounds like a reasonable outcome.

Certainly, the GM can always design a new trait and charge whatever he/she thinks is appropriate. I always interpreted the advice in Powers as talking about how to make a trait that is largely indistinguishable from Invulnerability, but I could see it being meant instead as "this is a fair way to price Invulnerability," such that if actually encountering something outside of the design scope, you're still invulnerable.

Functionally that works the same.

Although I could certainly see cause for outright invulnerability to not exist - in Sanderson's Reckoners series, it's noted that even otherwise-invulnerable Epics could be taken out with a powerful enough attack, like a nuclear bomb.

You need a way for humans to take down these city conquering epics, otherwise the basic plot premise fails.

I don't recall if this is addressed, but is the duration known to the maker when he opens the portal, or does the GM roll that in secret?

Generally the approximate duration is know by the user, so I would let the player roll for it. Even if the GM does roll for it, there should be clues as to how quickly it's closing.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Varyon

I'm just saying I've never seen a case where both a) a portal is demonstrably capable of cutting things in half if turned off during transit and b) that same portal gets turned off during transit and fails to cut whatever was going through in half.

The typical result is "the portal fails to close if it can't cut through whatever is sticking through". If this is interdimensional horror sending tentacles through, this means it's up to the PCs to kill all the tentacles so the portal can be closed.