I have a query about imbuements. Of the Defensive kind.

[Jaware]

All right. My question is about the energizing defense imbuement.

My first question, is at what point do you pay the FP cost for the ability? Do you pay it the first time you use it to absorb, or when you decide to use the stored points?

My second question. Can you use this on a weapon if you were to buy the skill as a melee weapon skill. And then use it of a parry, much the same as a shield? I think pyramid 3-36 Dungeon fantasy, page 24 says something about it on the bottom right. But I don't know if I'm interpreting it right. I'd like a concrete yes or no. And explination from someone whose played longer than I have.

My third question. How does the buying abilities work? Say for instance you had the skill at lvl 20. And you absorbed 20 points form some form of damage. And you wanted to buy your ST up a level. You would roll at 18, and spend 10 pts. They fall off at a rate of a point a second. At what point do you lose the +1 ST? Is it after the full 10 points fade away, eg 10 seconds from activating it? Or is it when it ticks down from 10 to 9? Just under the 10 required?

If some kind souls would like to give me some examples I'd greatly appreciate it.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by Jaware

All right. My question is about the energizing defense imbuement.

I should be able to answer these. :)

Originally Posted by Jaware

My first question, is at what point do you pay the FP cost for the ability? Do you pay it the first time you use it to absorb, or when you decide to use the stored points?

You pay FP every time you absorb damage, not just the first time. Using the points does not cost FP.

Originally Posted by Jaware

My second question. Can you use this on a weapon if you were to buy the skill as a melee weapon skill. And then use it of a parry, much the same as a shield? I think pyramid 3-36 Dungeon fantasy, page 24 says something about it on the bottom right.

I assume you're referring to the line "Defensive Imbuements that apply to Active Defenses can be learned for melee skills, and used with a Parry." here? If yes, then, while I didn't include it in the original article, it's still a good idea, and I definitely endorse it as a rule. I'd treat using a Defensive Imbuement with a Parry the same as using it with a Block (that is, for effects that depend on damage, you'd roll the damage for an attack to see how much it would have done, and use that).

Originally Posted by Jaware

My third question. How does the buying abilities work? Say for instance you had the skill at lvl 20. And you absorbed 20 points form some form of damage. And you wanted to buy your ST up a level. You would roll at 18, and spend 10 pts. They fall off at a rate of a point a second. At what point do you lose the +1 ST? Is it after the full 10 points fade away, eg 10 seconds from activating it? Or is it when it ticks down from 10 to 9? Just under the 10 required?

Ok, taking this in order. First, your roll to add the ST would be 16, not 18, since the modifier to add to attributes and secondary characteristics is at -4. Second, the point fall off - note that unused points disappear first. So if you had 20 points, spend 10 on +1 ST, you'd have a 10-second "buffer" before the points spent on ST started getting touched. And if you kept getting attacked and making your Energizing Defense rolls, you could keep topping that up, too. But, if you let all those buffer points run out, and the points started being drained from ST, the ST would be gone as soon as the first point went away. What I would do, however, to allow for a bit of leniency, is let you make a new Energizing Defense roll to reallocate the remaining points into a new trait that they could afford. So when you lost that first point that you put into ST, you could roll Energizing Defense to give yourself, say, three levels of Arm ST for just one arm, since that would cost 9 points, which is what you have left. The normal -6 to improve other traits would apply.

[Jaware]

Alright. I appreciate it very much. That pretty much answers my questions.

I only have one question now. Why does it cost every time you absorbe damage?

Don't the others work until ones next turn after activating them?

Because that makes the ability extremely resource intensive. Especially if you are being attacked from lots of little things like a group of weak goblins or something.

That seems almost like it's not worth the effort to go through.

Am I missing something obvious?

[Jaware]

Looking at the "refill ability" of energizing defense. In order to come out to a net plus, you would have to absorbe 4 damage per attack. Along with multiple skill rolls that bog down gameplay. I am confused.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by Jaware

Alright. I appreciate it very much. That pretty much answers my questions.

I only have one question now. Why does it cost every time you absorbe damage?

Don't the others work until ones next turn after activating them?

Sorry, yes, you're correct. Once you've activated it once, you get the benefit for the rest of the turn. I was thinking you meant activating it once, and then getting the benefit for the rest of the combat or something.

Originally Posted by Jaware

Looking at the "refill ability" of energizing defense. In order to come out to a net plus, you would have to absorbe 4 damage per attack. Along with multiple skill rolls that bog down gameplay. I am confused.

I'm not quite sure how you're figuring the math here? Every point of damage is converted into one point for the pool. You lose 1 point from the pool per second. Therefore, to keep even with the pool, you only need to stop 1 point of damage per second. As discussed above, you only need to roll Energizing Defense once per turn to keep it active, just like other Imbuement skills.

Or were you calculating the cost of recharging the FP that you spend every turn on Energizing Defense into the cost above? In that case, yes, you would need to absorb 4 points of damage per turn to keep the whole thing going, but I think that's not unreasonable. This is a rather potent ability, given that it lets you boost almost any attribute or trait. Resource management is the big balancing factor of all imbuements, so requiring you to absorb a number of damage every turn in order to keep it going indefinitely seems fair to me.

[Jaware]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

Sorry, yes, you're correct. Once you've activated it once, you get the benefit for the rest of the turn. I was thinking you meant activating it once, and then getting the benefit for the rest of the combat or something.

Alright, that makes waaaay more sense. That pretty much makes that second half my question null and void.

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

I'm not quite sure how you're figuring the math here? Every point of damage is converted into one point for the pool. You lose 1 point from the pool per second. Therefore, to keep even with the pool, you only need to stop 1 point of damage per second. As discussed above, you only need to roll Energizing Defense once per turn to keep it active, just like other Imbuement skills.

Or were you calculating the cost of recharging the FP that you spend every turn on Energizing Defense into the cost above? In that case, yes, you would need to absorb 4 points of damage per turn to keep the whole thing going, but I think that's not unreasonable. This is a rather potent ability, given that it lets you boost almost any attribute or trait. Resource management is the big balancing factor of all imbuements, so requiring you to absorb a number of damage every turn in order to keep it going indefinitely seems fair to me.

I was thinking aloud under the impression that one needed to trigger the ability every time you wanted to absorb an attack. So in order to absorbe at a net gain, one would need to take 4 points of damage a turn minimum, along with all of the skill rolls in order to just have that one point for it to bleed away.

Basically, I was trying to think of how much you would have to absorb just to break even, much less to gain something.

For example, I just took 15 points of damage, so I buy DR2. That gives me 5 turns before I need to worry about needing to absorbe any more.

In comparison to, I need to spend 1Fp every time something hits me that way I can absorbe the damage.and I have to hope that attack does at least 4 points of damage, else I'm just going to black out from exhaustion.




Though I did just have another question.

How would one determine the limit for the parry? Would it be 1/2 skill, or would it be the DR of your weapon? I didn't think of it till just now.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by Jaware

How would one determine the limit for the parry? Would it be 1/2 skill, or would it be the DR of your weapon? I didn't think of it till just now.

I'd do it the same way as a block, roll damage and assume it was all absorbed (but parrying a heavy attack could still potentially break your weapon, so watch out!). I could see an argument that a defensive imbuement parry should only use half the damage stopped, though, both for "realism" grounds, because parries are more about redirecting the force of a blow as opposed to blocks' simply stopping them outright, and for balance reasons, because if parries are just as good as blocks here, why would someone buy Shield skill instead of just pumping their best weapon skill up more?

[Jaware]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

I'd do it the same way as a block, roll damage and assume it was all absorbed (but parrying a heavy attack could still potentially break your weapon, so watch out!). I could see an argument that a defensive imbuement parry should only use half the damage stopped, though, both for "realism" grounds, because parries are more about redirecting the force of a blow as opposed to blocks' simply stopping them outright, and for balance reasons, because if parries are just as good as blocks here, why would someone buy Shield skill instead of just pumping their best weapon skill up more?

Fair enough. Seems decently enough balanced to me

[Jaware]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

I should be able to answer these. :)

I apologize for dragging back a dinosaur.

but one of my players decided to use imbuements and this one was one more.

And I'd like to be 125% transparent on the rules.

From the get go. It's a general skill. does one need to have the skill for both their shield and armor?

if so, how does that work? Maximum number of absorbed cp allowed mostly and how to use them. Are they in different pools like pool for shield and a pool for armor. And they drain seperately, 1 per pool, etc? How does this work?

Next, is there a way to take a minus to your skill to negotiate the ft cost like in the other skills?

Next, is that a "parry" use (1/2 skill+3)? Or is it just a normal skillroll?

and last that I know of, when can you use said points. On your turn only? Or after any use of it?

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by Jaware

From the get go. It's a general skill. does one need to have the skill for both their shield and armor?

If you want to use it with both easily, you need to buy both Shield and Armor specialities, yes. Note that they default to each other at -4, so if you have Energizing Defense (Shield) at 15, you effectively have Energizing Defense (Armor) at 11.

Originally Posted by Jaware

if so, how does that work? Maximum number of absorbed cp allowed mostly and how to use them. Are they in different pools like pool for shield and a pool for armor. And they drain seperately, 1 per pool, etc? How does this work?

Separate pools, yes, and with caps that depend on how much skill you have in the relevant speciality. You should be able to use Energizing Defense (Shield) to block an attack and then, if it still does enough damage to completely destroy the shield, use Energizing Defense (Armor) to try to block however many more damage remains.

Originally Posted by Jaware

Next, is there a way to take a minus to your skill to negotiate the ft cost like in the other skills?

Yes, Defensive Imbuements follow the general rules for Imbuements, which let you roll at -5 to ignore the FP cost.

Originally Posted by Jaware

Next, is that a "parry" use (1/2 skill+3)? Or is it just a normal skillroll?

If you're activating a Defensive Imbuement in response to an attack, then the roll is against the standard number for defenses, 1/2 skill +3 +1 for Combat Reflexes (and I'd allow Enhanced Defense (Single Imbuement Skill) for 5 points per level, or (All Imbuement Skills) for 10 points/level). If you anticipate being attacked, you can activate a Defensive Imbuement on your own turn, with a straight skill roll.

Originally Posted by Jaware

and last that I know of, when can you use said points. On your turn only? Or after any use of it?

Energizing Defense is based on the Absorption enhancement for Damage Resistance. Of course, Absorption also doesn't specify when the points can be used, but I'm inclined to say that using them is a free action that can be done even on someone else's turn. On the other hand, that's a lot of potential rolls against Energizing Defense, so I'd suggest limiting the player to only rolling to assign the points immediately after they've been hit, or on their own turn.