[Movie Supers] Iron Man

[Snaps]

Originally Posted by smurf

I wouldn't allow it, no. That's basically what Morph is supposed to be.

And that's fine. The GM should have final say on any ability obviously. But it still might be okay with the RAW.

Someone else pointed out that Tony could also buy the Alternate Forms for the different suits he's used as one use abilities. This would only cost him 3 points per suit, and would let him do it on the fly.

It's one of the really cool things about some of the new rules for 4th Edition. A character might not have a Deep Sea suit, with torpedoes, etc listed, but with a one shot ability he could get one when he needed it.

Tony Stark is always working on new sets of armor, so the player says that he has one he's been working on, pays the 3 points, and BAM the player has what he needs. I don't know of any other system that allows for things like that, and if so none that work as well as the GURPS rules.

But back to using Modular Abilities to purchase Alternate Forms. I think this is okay. I can think of examples from fiction of things like this too. Ben 10 is probably the best example.

I don't think he has Morph. He has A Gadget with Modular Abilities that allow him to purchase Alternate Forms. (IMO anyway).

When I starting building this version of Iron Man, I was using Morph, but I stopped trying to do it that way because it doesn't allow you to use Non-Reciprocal Damage or Rest.

[Langy]

Originally Posted by Snaps

But back to using Modular Abilities to purchase Alternate Forms. I think this is okay. I can think of examples from fiction of things like this too. Ben 10 is probably the best example.

I don't think he has Morph. He has A Gadget with Modular Abilities that allow him to purchase Alternate Forms. (IMO anyway).

That isn't any different at all from having a gadget that gives him Morph. Morph is the 'Modular Abilities to purchase Alternate Forms' advantage. There is no difference, aside from pricing - thus, it's the correct advantage to use.

[naloth]

Originally Posted by ErhnamDJ

That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about purchasing alternative abilities with a modular ability. Not Alternate Form.

That doesn't make sense either. If it can be reconfigured in any way, it's a a Modular Ability. Alternate Abilities are an optional rule introduced in Powers to allow you to define multiple distinct mutually exclusive modes of the same ability. Having "modes" that can come and go in a reconfigurable fashion is both outside the scope of what AA do (i.e. you're no longer defining anything) and a point crock.

[naloth]

Originally Posted by Snaps

Tony Stark is always working on new sets of armor, so the player says that he has one he's been working on, pays the 3 points, and BAM the player has what he needs. I don't know of any other system that allows for things like that, and if so none that work as well as the GURPS rules.

I presume you're suggesting 3 points as 1/5 of the base cost of an Alternate Form which isn't legal since the pricing of Alternate Form is Base 15 x (Forms -1) + 90% of the highest template. Each form is already mutually exclusive.

[Langy]

Originally Posted by naloth

I presume you're suggesting 3 points as 1/5 of the base cost of an Alternate Form which isn't legal since the pricing of Alternate Form is Base 15 x (Forms -1) + 90% of the highest template. Each form is already mutually exclusive.

No, it's perfectly legal pricing. He isn't buying the Alternate Form as an Alternative Ability (which is illegal), but purchasing a one-use Alternate Form (which is also x1/5 price).

Personally, I wouldn't do it that way - I'd just purchase a new Alternate Form straight-up, no need to do it as one-use.

[Snaps]

Originally Posted by Langy

No, it's perfectly legal pricing. He isn't buying the Alternate Form as an Alternative Ability (which is illegal), but purchasing a one-use Alternate Form (which is also x1/5 price).

Personally, I wouldn't do it that way - I'd just purchase a new Alternate Form straight-up, no need to do it as one-use.

LOL, then again in the movies Iron Man's suits don't tend to last past one use anyway...

Also, if you didn't want to use Modular Points for the Alternate Forms then each Alternate Form would be Unique, so each One Use is probably going to be as cheap as 1 point.

[naloth]

Originally Posted by Langy

No, it's perfectly legal pricing. He isn't buying the Alternate Form as an Alternative Ability (which is illegal), but purchasing a one-use Alternate Form (which is also x1/5 price).

I wasn't under the impression he was permanently expending 3 character points every time he tried a new suit, nor would I really have an issue with that. You'll seldom have enough experience to justify that and the GM could easily say that a "use" is only one minute since that's the typical rule.

Originally Posted by Snaps

Also, if you didn't want to use Modular Points for the Alternate Forms then each Alternate Form would be Unique, so each One Use is probably going to be as cheap as 1 point.

Eh, what? First off, you wouldn't want to use your Modular Points for an expendable ability since once you spend the points they are permanently gone. As for Unique? As a gadget limitation that only knocks of -25% and I thought the goal was to avoid treating it as a gadget.

[Langy]

Hound

Originally Posted by naloth

I wasn't under the impression he was permanently expending 3 character points every time he tried a new suit, nor would I really have an issue with that. You'll seldom have enough experience to justify that and the GM easily say that a "use" is only one minute since that's the typical rule.

Naw, the Alternate Form has Once on, Stays On: for three points, he can use that ability once, but a 'use' for Alternate Form is only for changing forms - once he uses it, he is permanently in that form until he chooses to switch to a new form.

Eh, what? First off, you wouldn't want to use your Modular Points for an expendable ability since once you spend the points they are permanently gone. As for Unique? As a gadget limitation that only knocks of -25% and I thought the goal was to avoid treating it as a gadget.

I don't think he was going to use the Modular Points pool for an expendable ability - the expendable version was a different discussion from that.

As far as treating it like a gadget, I'd personally still do that, but the Alternate Form advantage wouldn't have any Gadget modifiers. Instead, the abilities inside the Alternate Forms would have the Gadget modifiers. Alternate Form would just be used to represent Tony switching to a different set of Gadgets.

[ErhnamDJ]

Originally Posted by Langy

As far as treating it like a gadget, I'd personally still do that, but the Alternate Form advantage wouldn't have any Gadget modifiers. Instead, the abilities inside the Alternate Forms would have the Gadget modifiers. Alternate Form would just be used to represent Tony switching to a different set of Gadgets.

That's what I suggested some pages back.

This way, you can do things like tie different gadgets to different parts of the AF.

Unfortunately, trying to do that with different DR will be a problem, since taking area-specific DR with different limitations presents problems due to the way it's priced.

[Langy]

Originally Posted by ErhnamDJ

That's what I suggested some pages back.

This way, you can do things like tie different gadgets to different parts of the AF.

Unfortunately, trying to do that with different DR will be a problem, since taking area-specific DR with different limitations presents problems due to the way it's priced.

I wouldn't handle it quite like that, since Starks armor isn't modular. A single Alternate Form gives him a suite of Gadgets at most (and I'd only do it that way to represent being able to damage specific aspects of the suit, rather than just the whole thing at once).