[RPM] Misc Questions

[Ejidoth]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

Its entirely possible that thinking RPM is cool may be the only facet our styles share

Since I've now slept since last night and such, I've also gone through and reread your post on UB on your blog and also reread how it is used in Characters, and this has gotten me even more confused

For instance, gaining access to Psi Powers or Unkillable are both given as 'things which might have a UB'

These potentially not usually possessed by people type traits seem like they should (intuitively to me) be things which are Greater, not Lesser . . . . but UB indicates things should be lesser

Or gaining Ninja skills from your blog. I don't even know how to add say Power Blow or Throwing Art in RPM (if someone already had Power Blow or Throwing Art) it would thus seem it would be lesser, like buffing other skills

I'm afraid even rereading your post I don't understand how you are relating traditions and Unusual Backgrounds to figure out lesser/greater . . . . the only two places Unusual Background appears in RPM is strengthen body / strengthen mind, so the example mentioning path of Chance among other things doesn't follow to me

A good rule of thumb is that you take Unusual Background for things your enemies would not reasonably expect you to have, or would be unlikely to have countermeasures prepared for - you're paying extra for the surprise value, in effect.

So if you're not using UBs, you can still apply the reasoning for determining whether an effect is Lesser or Greater: if it's an ability someone might have without magic, it's Lesser; if it clearly requires magic for a human to do this thing, it's Greater.

To apply this to your example of pigs and djinn, an enemy building a trap for djinn will take into account that djinn can fly, and not have a trap that they can fly out of. An opponent building a trap for a pig will not expect pigs to fly, so a pig trap might be a simple pit that your Unusual Background flying pig can fly right out of. That's why the pig pays more than the djinn.

[Kalzazz]

How does visualizing weapon damage work for determining greater or lesser effects? For instance in many cases it notes 'up to about what a handheld weapon in the setting could inflict with a single blow or shot'

In Godogma's setting we are trying to figure that out. For instance, the largest 'normally encountered' weapon is probably the 4d+2 pi++ musket (since pi++ is x2 damage often, this would in many cases be roughly the same as the 9d burning of say a magery 3 mages fully charged fireball)

[Ejidoth]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

How does visualizing weapon damage work for determining greater or lesser effects? For instance in many cases it notes 'up to about what a handheld weapon in the setting could inflict with a single blow or shot'

In Godogma's setting we are trying to figure that out. For instance, the largest 'normally encountered' weapon is probably the 4d+2 pi++ musket (since pi++ is x2 damage often, this would in many cases be roughly the same as the 9d burning of say a magery 3 mages fully charged fireball)

It probably won't lead you far wrong to base it on the injury from an unarmored torso hit against a foe without special injury tolerance, rather than basing it on direct damage. That lets you compare various damage types more readily.

[Kalzazz]

Alright, so, the Flying Pig needs a UB because he can fly

I cant really think how to properly continue this example in RPM, since, the two UB areas are strengthen body and strengthen mind

And pigs flying seems to not fall under either (maybe its a control body effect to move the pig around in the air?)

So, hmm, we normally think pig tails are fairly useless, so it would surprise us if our pig could manipulate things with its tail right? So we might charge the Pig UB Tail of Awesome to buy off NFM, and instead get 1 arm to represent a tail manipulator? So that would be a lesser effect?

What sort of thing would be a greater effect then? Since 'things that surprise us so much we cost them with a UB are lesser'

[Ejidoth]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

Alright, so, the Flying Pig needs a UB because he can fly

I cant really think how to properly continue this example in RPM, since, the two UB areas are strengthen body and strengthen mind

And pigs flying seems to not fall under either (maybe its a control body effect to move the pig around in the air?)

So, hmm, we normally think pig tails are fairly useless, so it would surprise us if our pig could manipulate things with its tail right? So we might charge the Pig UB Tail of Awesome to buy off NFM, and instead get 1 arm to represent a tail manipulator? So that would be a lesser effect?

What sort of thing would be a greater effect then? Since 'things that surprise us so much we cost them with a UB are lesser'

Ah, right, sorry for answering in haste without thinking too hard about how it applies to RPM. The examples in Ritual Path Magic are closer to the cheap UBs like you get from martial arts training.

In effect, both allow and use Unusual Background, but Lesser effects are those that you'd allow as a GM with the Unusual Training perk -- things that are borderline-unrealistic but still believable -- while Greater are those that are blatantly unrealistic and would require a more expensive unusual background.

So, you have a pig. You're enhancing it so it can fly.

Lesser Strengthen Body might allow it to take a level of Super Jump -- doubling jump heights is impressive, but jumping twice as high as normal isn't impossible. Greater Strengthen Body uncaps that, allowing any number of levels of super jump. Flight requires Greater Control Body (to make the pig zoom through the air inexplicably) or Greater Transform Body (to give it wings).

A lesser effect lets you apply something plausible but possibly extremely rare/impressive, while a greater effect lets you do that but without an upper limit.

[Kalzazz]

We also calculated that that damage level seems consistent with that of a brawny weapon master swinging a cutting weapon into the torso (which is a pretty common choice on the part of PCs)

I noticed that those are actually the only areas where visualization damage applies if I understand correctly. So, creating a fireball is a greater effect whether or not it does more or less than a musket?

[Ejidoth]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

We also calculated that that damage level seems consistent with that of a brawny weapon master swinging a cutting weapon into the torso (which is a pretty common choice on the part of PCs)

I noticed that those are actually the only areas where visualization damage applies if I understand correctly. So, creating a fireball is a greater effect whether or not it does more or less than a musket?

I think you're meant to only use lesser effects for internal damage most of the time; it's notable that external damage generally provides triple the damage but requires a greater effect, tripling the cost.

RPM was developed for a 'secret magic' setting, as well, so it's built such that things that endanger that secret (like hurling lightning from your hands) are Greater effects even when they're not super potent.

[Kalzazz]

Alright, I may think Im seeing it

Pigs are tough, we make pigskin protective gloves and such. You want to have DR 4 tough skin as a pig, sure go for it!

You want to have DR 15 tough skin and Injury Tolerance (divide by 2)? Well, alright, thats a UB because you got trained in Pig Kung Fu to have skin like hardened heavy plate and to take a lickin and keep on tickin? (Pigs are smart animals, so I can accept that they took Pig Kung Fu lessons from the wise old pig atop the mountain)

You want to have DR 50 superior to the finest hardened essential steel plate and Injury Tolerance (divide by 5)? Uhm . . . yeah, thats not happening my piggy buddy and still having you be a pig, but Greater Strengthen Body is your friend


Is that roughly how it might work?

[Ejidoth]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

Alright, I may think Im seeing it

Pigs are tough, we make pigskin protective gloves and such. You want to have DR 4 tough skin as a pig, sure go for it!

You want to have DR 15 tough skin and Injury Tolerance (divide by 2)? Well, alright, thats a UB because you got trained in Pig Kung Fu to have skin like hardened heavy plate and to take a lickin and keep on tickin? (Pigs are smart animals, so I can accept that they took Pig Kung Fu lessons from the wise old pig atop the mountain)

You want to have DR 50 superior to the finest hardened essential steel plate and Injury Tolerance (divide by 5)? Uhm . . . yeah, thats not happening my piggy buddy and still having you be a pig, but Greater Strengthen Body is your friend


Is that roughly how it might work?

Roughly. You have the right idea, but I think most GMs would be a little more strict on where the break-point is. As GM you can adjust exactly where the breakpoints are for your game -- for a mostly realistic game, Greater Strengthen Body is going to kick in after just a few levels of DR, probably, while your example works fine for a campaign where training can get you pretty big bonuses like that (such as Dungeon Fantasy).

[Nereidalbel]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

We also calculated that that damage level seems consistent with that of a brawny weapon master swinging a cutting weapon into the torso (which is a pretty common choice on the part of PCs)

I noticed that those are actually the only areas where visualization damage applies if I understand correctly. So, creating a fireball is a greater effect whether or not it does more or less than a musket?

If you want to accomplish external damage with a Lesser effect, you need to be holding a ready weapon capable of dealing that damage. So, for the musket, you can be holding a ready musket, with the spell effectively being a nice way to say "Haha! It was loaded the entire time!"

A fireball, however, is entirely unrealistic and is always a Greater effect. Burning damage CAN be a Lesser effect if you're fighting in a storm and you just call a lightning bolt on somebody, though.