Retrainings!

[Anastasia]

As I said when this game started, we're aaaaaaalll learning the system as we go along. So when I request or you can talk me into it I'm allowing some retoolings. Hal just went through one since none of us wanted to deal with Projection after all and also corrected a minor skill/clarified.

Next up is Karuma. Having seen you in action? That build worked insanely well, to the point where something needs to get toned down. The 15 DCV was O_O worthy, the lack of baddie DCVs on certain attacks was worrisome, and so on. I'm debating a few things here, do you have any opinions/preferences, Karuma?

As for Chisato/Chizuru, I haven't seen anything too big there yet. Partly because Chizuru hasn't had a big chance to shine quite yet and because Chisato's kinda been outta it. I'll get back to you when and if.

[Ebiris]

Well, bear in mind the 15 DCV is for a block defence - an attack powerful enough to bypass my forcefield means I take damage even on a success. Conversely if I choose to dodge/deflect rather than block my DCV is reduced by 2 (and more than that, a multiple of 2 for every special attack level vs those kinds of attacks - so if I tried to deflect a level 3 special attack my DCV would only be 9 - or 8 if it was a melee special attack). Also I did make a mistake with some of those attacks, since 13 is my DCV vs ranged attacks - it's 12 vs melee when using a shield, before adding in the block defence +2. I think all DCV checks were passed by a decent margin anyway, so it doesn't make any difference to how things played out.

edit: As an example to the above, say Karuma was up against Chisato and attacked with the Hyper Accelerator. She could block the attack with a DCV 15 check, and still take 40 damage. Next round she could block it and take 60 damage (assuming Chisato rolls max each time), since her force field blocks less damage after being overpowered in a single attack. So she'd swiftly die anyway. Conversely she could try to deflect (or even reflect) the attack, but her DCV check on such an attempt would be against 5 - so difficult she'd be better off simply trying to dodge it outright.

Honestly, yesterday's session went exactly how I'd planned for Karuma to play out -  I designed her to be more or less invulnerable to mooks unless ganged up on. Put her up against a decently powered posthuman and she falters unless she has particularly optimal terrain to take advantage of - if not for being able to drown Momoro, his forcefield basically neutered all of her offensive potential, while his mind attacks bypassed the vast majority of her defenses.

I don't deny that Karuma is exceptionally powerful in her element, but looking at the overall picture she's not an insane combat monster - she fills the niche of vastly overpowering normal humans, but has pretty big shortcomings against foes with comparable power levels.

As far as changing things? I'm loathe to make drastic alterations, since Karuma is exactly what I set out to create. However, as a balancing issue, I could stick another attribute onto her forcefield, lowering the damage blocked to 60 rather than 80. This forces her to make more difficult DCV checks to deflect more attacks rather than simply blocking them, given the higher risk of damage getting through the field.

[Anastasia]

Heh.

First off, Momoro was a fucked up case in a lot of ways. His skillset matched up very, very well to yours, it was only by a stroke of good thinking on background details that you had a chance with him. Really, I figured you would've tried an escape after taking that damage. The entire thing went awry, but anyway.

The problem with the forcefield in your setup is that for anything to be strong enough to get through 60-80 points of damage either has to be set up to(Unreliable at best, and I'm not keen on giving most enemies forcefield piercing means just to counter one thing) or have enough damage on the table to splatter a non protected PC in one shot. This applies doubly when you consider most attacks won't be doing optimal damage.

To me, that's a problem right then and there. To your example in your post, a baddie with 120 points of damage is going to -splatter- anyone else in a single full shot. They're going to do horrific things if they critical, beyond spatter and into vaporize. I'm really not comfortable with having to bring that sort of artillery to bear against you to have a hope of doing threatening damage.

Sure, I'll cook up ways to wiggle around that, but it's too powerful as it stands. I don't mind being creative as a GM, but when I have to be just to remotely threaten the PC? Not good.

[Anastasia]

Okay. After a bit more looking, go ahead and drop your forcefield down to 20(Axe the three levels of shield only.) How does that make you on points, Karuma, theoretically?

[Ebiris]

I'm not willing to take off shield only, since that obviates a few of the Combat Techniques related to deflecting/reflecting with a shield. Also it means I have to put another 2 points into the Area PMV for forcefield, since a non-shield one requires a minimum of 3 points there.

*However* If I take 2 attributes on it - Say Offensive and Field Penetrating, that also reduces the damage blocked down to 20.

Offensive is pretty nice, since it means I can do 10 damage to anyone that touches the shield.

Field Penetrating is debatable - as written it only lets you penetrate shields that your one blocks more damage than. Since I'm at the minimum there, I'd suggest a ruling to say it penetrates other shields if yours blocks more than or equal to.

The other traits are either useless for a shield or useless for a force field that only blocks 20 damage, so no point looking at them.

[Anastasia]

What would be the actual application of penetrates field, though?

[Ebiris]

If you penetrate a field it means that the other character's force field provides no protection against your attacks.

Given Karuma's lack of range on her force field it would require physical contact, but say Momoro also had a 20 point all around force field, she could touch it with her own field and then be able to attack him with no damage reduction, although his field would still function to full effect if someone else hit him at the same time.

[Anastasia]

Okay, that's fine. We'll give that a shot for now, since I don't think either should come up that much. I think.