Is Independent on Mind Control worth it?

[Not another shrubbery]

Originally Posted by Michael Thayne

Even without limiting Reliable, Reliable +10 is only +50% and is as good or better as Independent as long as you have no more than ten victims at once. Also, I have Psionic Powers, but I don't remember where PK ruled out that use of Reliable—or did he mention it in "designers notes" type comments somewhere?

P10, under Specific Enhancements, rules it out as part of a technique [noting the similarity to not allowing Reduced Fatigue Cost apply to the 2FP cost for using a technique]. P20, in the Modifiers section, recommends only allowing Reliable to remove inherent penalties [such as the -8 penalty for active use of Precognition, or the -4 IQ penalty for passive use of Psychometry].

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Not another shrubbery

P10, under Specific Enhancements, rules it out as part of a technique

PP10... I was helplessly scanning Powers for minute until I figured out you meant Psionic Powers :)

Reliable, like a Talent, may offset penalties, but buying enhancements like this directly isn't the same as paying points to offset the penalty for using a Psi Technique.

Originally Posted by Not another shrubbery

[noting the similarity to not allowing Reduced Fatigue Cost apply to the 2FP cost for using a technique].

PP10 doesn't actually appear to specify why you can't take RFC as a technique, citing instead a kinda-vague "for similar reasons". We know of course it can be built into a psi power, as the aforementioned Pregnostication has also done, and which high levels of cure (PP46) does for Healing (PP47)

This embargo may be specific to psionic powers because of the unique way that psi techniques work compared to the Temporary Enhancements system they're built on.

There is a precedent for being able to apply Reduced Fatigue Cost to the 1/2/3 FP cost for Extra Effort / Temporary Enhancements / Using Abilities at Default

http://www.sjgames.com/pyramid/sample.html?id=5782

Originally Posted by Sean Punch

Another common option is a reduction to the FP cost to use the power's abilities under the right conditions. This lowers all FP expenditures for any reason: regular use, extra effort, stunts, and anything else the GM comes up with.

As for getting RFC or Reliable as a Temporary Enhancement, P172-P173 doesn't seem to suggest or forbid either, so it's edgy.

It doesn't seem like a bad idea to me because it's a gamble: you pay FP and roll to see if you get the enhancement, and if you don't you wasted the FP. If you pass then eventually the FP you save in the next minute of use might make it worth it.

Applying it retroactively shouldn't work though: you've already paid the FP before you got Reduced Fatigue Cost, you've already made the skill roll before you got Reliable.

Applying that retroactively (if GM allows) should probably require the "Time-Spanning" enhancement too, making it even harder to pull off. Not exactly legal though because Time-Spanning is meant to apply to the base effects of the ability, not the requirements of activating it.

If you want to send FP a second back in time to compensate yourself you'd probably need TimeSpanning on Affliction (Regeneration FP) or that variant of Healing in designer notes that gives FP instead of HP.

Psi-Techniques forbidding RFC/Reliable is I think because of how they get folded into a single activation/roll, instead of being two separate rolls.

Given that Temporary Enhancements are -1 per +10% that's -1 per 2 levels of Reliable (+2), which is why it would be broken to allow that even at default. It would really only make sense if you could only apply it to followup rolls AFTER the psi-technique, but not for the psi-technique roll itself.

Like for example if you had a psi-technique to make Mind Control more reliable, you take a huge penalty to initiate mind control (more likely to fail) but if you succeed in spite of that, you then get Reliable on any followup contests for people to break free of established control. That would seem okay to me.