Super Speed + Movement?

[AslanC]

If you have Super Running (or flight, or Swimming) and you have Super Speed limited to it only, what is the benefit?

Thanks in advance.

[Lindharin]

You get to move on two or three panels (for 3 or 5 pts of Super Speed), but can only do other actions like activating powers or attacking on one panel. So if you have Flight 3 for 15 squares, you could move 45 squares per panel if you want to. But not every panel, since Super Speed is Tiring, etc.

Technically, I suppose your non-movement action would have to be on the first panel since the Super Speed panels come after it and the limitation says those panels can't be used for other things. In my game, I don't know if I'd worry about that or not.

[AslanC]

Sorry I am not following you, can you show me with an example;

Bronco has Super Running 5 and Super Speed 2 (limit: only with Super Running) and he Body Slams someone, what benefit if any would the Super Speed give him in this case?

[Lindharin]

Sure. Let's see, I haven't looked at that with regards to Body Slam. I don't know Bronco's Agility, which is part of his Super Running movement formula. Let's say he has a 2 Agility, so he can move 16 squares per move action. Here's my understanding:

Let's say he has a priority roll of 20. At his turn, he gets his normal panel, during which all the normal rules apply. So per the rules on what he can do in a panel (pg 17), he can move up to 16 squares and attack, and activate other powers like Deflect or whatever. Let's say he attacks someone who is 15 squares away. His attack action could then be Body Slam, a special maneuver, and if he hits he can do +1 DM from him momentum since he moved more than 10 squares before attacking.

Body Slam has some special rules for how you resolve to hit and damage, but they aren't really relevant to this. The amount he moved doesn't affect his attack chances, and it's only affect on damage is from the momentum discussed above. The only other thing that might be relevant is if the target chooses to dodge and succeeds, in which case Bronco would keep running for another 15 squares. He "missed" the body slam, so his panel effectively becomes a double move instead of a move and attack.

Now, after he finishes that panel, he has the option to use his Super Speed to take a second panel. But his Super Speed power is limited to only allow movement. So referring back to page 17 again, during the extra panel the only actions he can take are movement ones. He can make a single move of up to 16 squares, or a double move of 32 squares, or reach his top (out of combat) speed. He cannot make another Body Slam, because that is an attack action which is not allowed in his extra panel. He also cannot turn on any other powers like Deflect (although if it was already on, it stays on of course).

In my game, I would also allow him to use the Hold Off option for his extra panel, but he could still only do movement when he chooses to take that panel.

The reason I think he has to use his "normal" panel first, and his Super Speed extra panel second, is because of the rule in the left sidebar on page 42 that the panels must occur in sequence. As a matter of Narrator interpretation (or an explicit house rule), you could allow him to take his Super Speed panel first, then his normal panel, so he could attack someone who was further away at the start of his turn. Note that his momentum bonus wouldn't change even if he did a double move followed by his move-and-attack and covered 45 squares to get to the target, because momentum is calculated based on how far he moved in the panel during which he attacks (not the entire page).

Does that help?

[AslanC]

Yes it does

Sadly it doesn't help him at all

The idea was to find a way to give him a larger momentum bonus than just a +1 and to my mind, having Super Speed should allow him to move faster, but after seeing how you laid it out for me, it would be a waste of points for him in this case.

Thanks

[Lindharin]

You could house rule it to allow more than one panel's worth of movement. I don't think that is necessarily unbalanced, since it has several limitations:

* He needs that much space to move before attacking.
* If the target doesn't dodge and wins, then the attacker takes damage INCLUDING the momentum bonus (the book says "excluding" but Bashman's clarified that is a typo). So extra momentum can work against you.
* Super Speed is Tiring so he can't do it all the time.

An alternate approach would be Special Attack with a limitation of only if he also has at least +1 DM from momentum.

[AslanC]

I think the Special Attack idea is the winner, since it requires the least amount of monkeying with the system