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11-29-2020, 04:42 PM | #1 |
Join Date: Apr 2015
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[Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
I'm looking to build an advantage for a half-orc, half-troll, half-other, bad-at-fractions character and I've run into a grey area concerning Unkillable and Limited Use.
The character already has regeneration (Regular) and is looking to purchase Unkillable as part of their troll heritage, representing the ability of most trolls to resist and regenerate injuries that would incapacitate or kill most creatures (missing lungs, giant holes through them). The plan was take Unkillable 1 (Limited Uses, 2) to let them fight through normally-fatal injuries a couple of times a day. Limited Use gives non-attack advantages a duration of 1 minute, during which they get to auto-pass HT checks to not die and, importantly, not die automatically at -5xHP and beyond. The thing I'm not sure of is what is suppose to happen at the end of that one minute when Unkillable 1 ends. Do I: A) Make HT checks for each death threshold I would have passed, and auto die if I'm at -5xHP or beyond. Effectively I re-take all of the damage and suffer the normal effects. B) Continue living as normal, making death checks at the normal thresholds if I'm damaged further. If at -5xHP any further injury would automatically kill me. Effectively Unkillable allowed me to dodge the critical effects of the injury when I suffered it. This same question would also come up if Unkillable was negated temporarily or was switchable, which others may find useful in the future. My searches didn't turn up any official or generally accepted answers yet, so I thought it would be worth asking.
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11-29-2020, 05:21 PM | #2 |
Join Date: Mar 2013
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Re: [Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
If you're thinking about the DnD troll, then I'd like to suggest that you read Three Hearts and Three Lions, by Poul Anderson. Somewhere in the middle the characters fight a single troll and have problems.
This troll was, I think, used as the prototype for the rpg troll. The only way to kill it was to cut pieces off and burn them immediately. If you left the pieces alone, they crawled back to the troll and reattached. I would use Injury Tolerance and fast regeneration w/regrowth to model the troll, with some limitation for the pieces.
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11-29-2020, 06:23 PM | #3 |
Join Date: Apr 2015
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Re: [Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
Our game is using the DF Monsters 1 Troll, which has (among other things) Regeneration (Very Fast), Injury Tolerance (No brain, vitals), and Unkillable 3 (Not vs. Burn, Cor) as standard. A full blooded troll can be reduced to red mush and regenerate over a few minutes.
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11-29-2020, 09:02 PM | #4 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Wellington, NZ
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Re: [Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
I think I'd go with if your UK1 turns off and you still have more than -5xHP then you just continue as normal. If you're under -5xHP, well you die.
My reasoning is that it's like having a force field giving you DR and being on fire. If the field dies after the fire is out, you don't retroactively get burned. If it turns off and you're still on fire, you get burned. That said, Berserk works they other way - when it wears off you have to redo all the death checks, so there's a case for that to be the case here, too.
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11-29-2020, 11:52 PM | #5 | |||
Join Date: Aug 2018
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Re: [Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
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11-30-2020, 01:09 AM | #6 | |
Join Date: Dec 2013
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Re: [Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
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Effectively, having Unkillable 1 means you do not suffer the death effects of having -HP, except the auto-death at -10xHP. You didn't auto-succeed at those death checks, because they don't actually exist. However, once unkillable wears off, and you are still at -HP, then you start doing death checks. But you don't need to retro-actively roll the death checks that never existed. ;) (hopefully that's clear)
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11-30-2020, 07:04 AM | #7 |
Join Date: Feb 2016
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Re: [Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
If you are at -5×HP or worse, you would automatically die when Unkillable wore off, which is why Limited Use is not the best option for a character. Unkillable with Achilles Heel is probably a better option that Unkillable with Limited Use, especially since the damage source for Achilles Heel should only show up as often as indicated by the rarity.
For example, if I have a character with Achilles Heel (Cheese, Rare), it is rare because cheese-based damage should be quite rare in the vast majority of campaigns. Of course, the GM can have the occasional meeting occurring in a fondue restaurant, just to remind the player that they remember to Achilles Heel, but there should not be enemies regularly running around with cheese-based weaponry. In the case of Unkillable (Limited Use) though, the character will always die one minute after taking -5×HP damage unless they have Regeneration (Very Fast), so it just ends up being a very expensive death delaying move. Unkillable 2 (Limited Use, 2 uses/day, -30%; Super, -10%) [60] is the same cost as Unkillable 2 (Achilles Heel, Impaling Wood, -30%; Super, -10%) [60], but a character with the latter build is going to get a lot more utility than a character with the former build. Even if you also toss in Regeneration (Very Fast; Bane, Impaling Wood, -30%; Super, -10%) [60] to both designs, the latter character is still better off, they are just nervous around wooden stakes. |
11-30-2020, 07:59 AM | #8 | |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Wellington, NZ
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Re: [Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
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11-30-2020, 08:38 AM | #9 |
Join Date: Feb 2016
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Re: [Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
The proposed troll character would be better off with the latter build than the former build. With Regeneration (Regular), a character cannot recover quickly enough from a fatal attack to reach viability in one minute. Anyway, you would need to turn on the advantage (Limited Use makes it switchable) for Unkillable to apply.
For example, let us say that the proposed troll character takes an attack to their heart that reduces them to -7×HT. Unless the player announced that they had activated the power before they suffered the attack, the troll character drops dead because Unkillable with Limited Use will not reflexively activate. Even if they do activate it though, the troll character will only live an extra minute before dropping dead. A better option for a troll character may be Unkillable 1 (Achilles Heel, Fire, -50%; Magical, -10%; Takes Recharge, 5 minutes, -20%) [10], as it would avoid the previously mentioned issues with activation, but there would still be issues of duration. The troll character would need to upgrade their Regeneration to Very Fast to really gain any repeated utility from the Unkillable 1, so Regeneration (Very Fast; Bane, Fire, -50%; Magical, -10%) [40] may be appropriate. In addition, Regrowth (Bane, Fire, -50%; Magical, -10%) [16] might also be a good idea. |
11-30-2020, 08:51 AM | #10 |
Join Date: Jun 2013
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Re: [Basic] Unkillable and Limited Uses - What happens when Unkillable expires
It feels like the most appropriate way to handle such a situation would be, as others have noted, to treat it similarly to the way Berserk works. That said, I wouldn't be opposed to having each use serve as a 1-minute, unlimited use "get out of jail free" card. That is, once it's active, it doesn't matter how much injury you suffer, so long as you stay above -10xHP, when the duration expires, you're still kicking (although any further injury will auto-kill you if you're at or below -5xHP).
As for the build itself, a potential alternative to Limited Use would be Maximum Duration. In that form, once it's active it lasts for some set amount of time (as set by the Disadvantage value), then you have a "cooldown" period during which it cannot be used. One issue you'll run into with just about any similar build is that such abilities need to be activated on your turn, while Unkillable seems like something you'd want to be reflexive - yet Reflexive is often worth more than the discount you're getting. I'm not certain what the best way to address this would be.
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basic, supernatural durability, unkillable, unkillable 1 |
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