Why I don't like Affliction and Malediction

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Bruno

The thing I want to playtest is to to make the "special enhancements" for Affliction (such as Condition and Disadvantage) be setting up the base price of the advantage (including subsequent levels), and then apply all the other enhancements and limitations to THAT net value.

That, and remove the special-pleading case of Affliction and Malediction - Malediction removes the to-hit roll, not the damage roll, on Innate Attacks; the equivalent of the damage roll on Affliction is the subjects Resistance roll (modified by the level of the Affliction) but Malediction gets to remove it anyways for the same price.

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

I'm not sure it's a proper comparison. Malediction-IAs ignore DR, yes. But they pit the Will against enemy Will/HT; Malediction-Afflictions ignore DR, and pit Will against enemy HT.

It's not the ignore DR part[1] - that's consistent across both uses. The part that gets my goat is that the way Affliction has it's special interaction with Malediction, it's a Economically-inefficient idea to take Affliction: Heart Attack and Cosmic: Irresistable (or some other large collection of enhancements) and then multiple levels of Affliction to penalize the subsequent HT roll.

Instead, for a flat 10-20 points you should take Malediction, and then have fun buying up your Will (which is good for many things) and possibly slapping Reliable on there (extra cheap, +2 on the contest for 1 point).[2] Once you've got Malediction, it's even more wrong to buy Affliction 2+ outside of some corner cases. You'd usually be better off buying as much Extra Attack (Affliction only, -60%) as the GM will let you buy, assuming you've already maxed out Will and any Reliable the GM might let you buy.

But, I'm totally side-tracking this.

[1] My complaint about Maledictions bundling "ignore DR" in with the "turn attack/defense roll into quick contest is a side issue. I want those separable. I also think it's making Cosmic: Irresistable too expensive, which is obnoxious.

[2] AND you bypass DR for free, see footnote #1 as to why that annoys me.