Building Immunity: Fire

[Donny Brook]

Originally Posted by Bruno

I would not allow the build with just that limitation; you get rid of the biggest problem of Insubstantial (being unable to do much to the real world while being invulnerable) while retaining a big benefit out of it. I also strongly question the value of the limitation.

The "Invulnerability" build from powers requires
Affect Substantial, +100%; Can Carry Objects, Heavy, +100%; Partial Change, +100%; Reflexive, +40%; Unconscious Only, -20%; Uncontrollable, -10%

That gives a cost of 328. I don't like "Invulnerability" of any sort, but if I were allowing it I'd say "Invulnerable" is a new advantage worth 330 points, and you can apply the Limited Defense limitation from DR to it.

Is there a reason to take Reflexive rather than Always On?

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Donny Brook

Permeation (B77) says:

"... You also remain vulnerable to attacks with
the material you can pass through,
unless you purchase Damage
Resistance to such attacks."

It seems to me that a Cosmic rule exception ("you do no remain vulnerable to the material you can pass through") could cover this build.

I think the ridiculous levels of debate both these advantages generate is mostly because people are trying to derive logical consequences from something that actually makes no physical sense.

We'd be better off with definitions based on game mechanical effects - i.e. one advantage for you can't be bound and can walk through things if you want, and one for physical things can't injure you. Omit any wording about why - it really doesn't matter to the game effect if things pass through you or not, and it's trying to decide what is or is not consistent with that which generates half the problems.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Donny Brook

Is there a reason to take Reflexive rather than Always On?

Always On isn't a Limitation once the ability has Affect Substantial, Can Carry Objects, and Partial Change. That said, a Limitation that gets rid of the ability to fly and walk through walls would probably be more appropriate than the Reflexive and Uncontrollable+Unconscious Only setup. If you drop those, you probably don't need Partial Change either, as I think that's only to prevent sudden changes from somehow messing you up. So that works out to Insubstantiality (Affect Substantial +100%; Can Carry Objects, Heavy +100%; Cannot Fly or Walk Through Walls -??). That's only [240], minus whatever that last Limitation would be worth. You'll have to turn the invulnerability off if you're stumbling around at extra heavy encumbrance, or find an Enhancement for Extra Heavy.

Total cost probably isn't going to exceed [250]. Note this is also the cost for Unkillable 2 [100] + Regeneration, Ridiculous (10 HP/second) [150], which has a rather comparable effect, so [250] sounds about right for a base Immunity to Damage trait. It would be kind of funny to make a DF template off of this - the character would be built entirely off of the [50] or so points from Disadvantages. Note Cosmic effects will ignore your Immunity, and the GM might allow for certain other methods of bypassing it (for Insubstantiality, Maledictions, Affect Substantial, and the like ignore it, while for the regen build simply continuously doing more than the character's HP in injury each second will keep him from reviving).

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Varyon

If you drop those, you probably don't need Partial Change either, as I think that's only to prevent sudden changes from somehow messing you up.

You still need Partial Change, or (frex) allies you were holding onto suddenly aren't.

[Anders]

Seems we're landing someplace around 250-300 points?

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Bruno

You still need Partial Change, or (frex) allies you were holding onto suddenly aren't.

You can Affect Substantial and Carry Objects. I don't see why these don't extend to holding onto other characters. In fact, the "not actually insubstantial" Limitation (which should leave you vulnerable to being grappled and pinned, unlike the version from Powers) should probably handle this case as well, if for some reason the above two don't.

Originally Posted by Anders

Seems we're landing someplace around 250-300 points?

Yep. Well, maybe [200]-[300], as I'm not certain what "Not Actually Insubstantial" would be worth as a Limitation. But, yeah, I think [250] is a good middle ground price. Note that if it's available without needing a Limited Defenses Limitation of some sort, there should probably be "Bypasses Invulnerability" Powers or gear available. For a Power, this is going to be somewhere between +20% (Affects Insubstantial) and +300% (Cosmic Irresistible Attack); I'd probably go with +50%. For gear, it's probably going to be reliant on some sort of weird science and be rare/expensive, like the Hex2O (which I assume is some sort of magical water) that ignores Invulnerability in the Magellan Academy webcomic.

[Anders]

Originally Posted by Bruno

You still need Partial Change, or (frex) allies you were holding onto suddenly aren't.

So you can carry them, if they weigh less than Heavy encumbrance, but you can't hold on to them.

...

I have trouble visualizing this.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Anders

So you can carry them, if they weigh less than Heavy encumbrance, but you can't hold on to them.

...

I have trouble visualizing this.

I have a full writeup explaining how the jillions of modifiers work together for Insubstantial.

http://ottgaming.grimoire.ca/Insubstantial


EDIT: I'm having major problems with cut/paste right now, stupid tablet. Just go to the link :P

[Ottriman]

Wouldn't a personal nigh immunity or complete immunity to fire be better modeled like this?

Injury Tolerance: Damage Reduction 100 (Cosmic: Can reduce injury to less then 1 +50%, Limited: Fire -60%) [270]

Then buy like 10-20 levels of temperature tolerance to be impervious to the ambient effects.

for +135 pts the Damage reduction could go up to 1000.

Edit: This build has the advantage of protecting you fully against fire with the Affects Insubstantial enhancement.

[Wavefunction]

Originally Posted by Ottriman

Wouldn't a personal nigh immunity or complete immunity to fire be better modeled like this?

Injury Tolerance: Damage Reduction 100 (Cosmic: Can reduce injury to less then 1 +50%, Limited: Fire -60%) [270]

Then buy like 10-20 levels of temperature tolerance to be impervious to the ambient effects.

for +135 pts the Damage reduction could go up to 1000.

Edit: This build has the advantage of protecting you fully against fire with the Affects Insubstantial enhancement.

No, that'd be the best way to model the ability to divide all damage from fire by 100 and round down. What everyone else it trying to model here is complete immunity.

Affects Insubstantial can be avoided by adding Cosmic, +50% to Insubstantial.

I personally feel there should be a better way of modelling invulnerability in GURPS, beyond the standard infinite DR. Invulnerability to one thing simply isn't worth infinite points. Total Invulnerability arguably isn't worth infinite points depending on the rest of the character. I've played an individual who was essentially invulnerable but had no other powers, not even super strength, he certainly wasn't OP. Such things just need to be controlled by the GM.

The Insubstantiallity build is horrifically clunky, it's a shame that's the best we've got at the moment.