My rules question topic

[themaster408]

Figure I'll just reply on here if I have another random question.
Got two right now.
1. Knock-back - Does this happen every single time someone gets hit? Is it only physical attacks? Only when someone has Brawn of 3 (super strength).
So if I hit an enemy with my fist and deal 34 damage and he has Brawn of 2, he gets knocked back 14 feet, which is 2.8 squares (round down I assume). If he hits a wall, he takes 1DM since it's 10 feet. 1DM would be 2d6 X 1 right?
It seems like Knock-Back happens crazy often. Is this correct? What if it's an energy blast?

2. There's a few rules that seem to be hidden under something entirely different. On page 30 under the example "Go for Broke" it talks about the Hero spending 1 Hero point to make his attack roll to also be his damage roll. I can't find that under Hero Points or Hero Dice. Is this example wrong or is this rule somewhere in the book?

[BASHMAN]

KB doesn't happen when it doesn't make sense (such as from a rapier, pistol, or Aunt May's lucky hit with an umbrella). Energy blasts could do KB if the Narrator finds it appropriate (I certainly do).

Knock Back does happen often, but most of the time does not result in damage.

2. That example under "Go for Broke" is him using an ability of the Attack Weak Point power.

[themaster408]

Thank you, I was so confused on spending a Hero Die that way.
So, I'm going to give an example battle and please point out what I'm getting wrong. I just want to be clear on how it works.

3 characters, Mr. Good (player), Dr. Evil (villain), and Mrs. Great (player) in a Mystery Men campaign.
Mr. Good Agility 3, Brawn 2, Mind 1
Special Attack 3 (1 for hit, 2 for damage), armed with Baseball Bat, has 5 Hero Points. His special attack is having Super Strength and Speed in his swings of melee weapons or whatever.

Dr. Evil Agility 2, Brawn 2, Mind 2
Nullify 4, Mind Blast 4

Mrs. Great Agility 1, Brawn 1, Mind 3
Invisibility 3, Force Field 4 (variable), Mind Blast 2 (1 is Range)

Going by highest Agility goes first, Mr. Good moves 3 squares and is now adjacent to Dr. Evil. He swings his bat to hit him. Mr. Good rolls 2d6 and gets 6. 5 X 3 (2 from Agility and 1 from Special Attack) = 15 to hit.
Dr. Evil rolls 2d6 for evading the attack and gets 8. 8 X 2 = 16.
Mr. Good uses 1 Hero Point to make his 15 into a 16 for a hit.

Now for damage Mr. Good rolls 2d6 and gets 3. 3 X 6 (2 from Brawn, 2 from Baseball Bat, 2 from Special Attack) = 18 damage
Dr. Evil rolls 2d6 for soaking and gets 5. 5 X 2 (Brawn) = 10. So Dr. Evil takes a total of 8 hits.

Dr. Evil's turn. He will attempt to Nullify Mr. Good's Special Attack power. It says when you hit someone and want to nullify the power you roll the contest. So I'm assuming you have to hit melee / ranged using Agility.
Dr. Evil rolls 2d6 X Agility, Mr. Good rolls low on his 2d6 X Agility. Dr. Evil hits and instead of doing damage, wants to nullify the power. Dr. Evil rolls 2d6 and gets 5. 5 X 6 (2 from Mind, 4 from Nullify) = 30. Mr. Good rolls 2d6 and gets 3. 3 X 1 (Mind) = 3. His special attack is gone for the rest of this scene (battle).

Mrs. Great's turn. She turns invisible and concentrates on making a force field Range of 3 squares around Dr. Evil to make him unable to attack for a while (Mrs. Great is 3 squares away). Could she also use Mind Blast now on Dr. Evil, or is Force Field "an attack"?

Let's say she can't do anything else. So next turn some more battling and finally Mrs. Great's Force Field is ready.
She rolls Agility vs his Agility to hit and THEN rolls 2d6 Mind vs his Mind? Or would it only be Min vs Mind? From then on Dr. Evil has to try to destroy the Force Field that has 120 Hits and 10 Soak (30 Hits from Mind 3, 90 Hits from power 3 of Force Field. It's power 3 due to 1 used up for Range)?

Could Dr. Evil use Mind Blast on the good guys while still in the Force Field?

Also, if you have Special Attack and range, can you use a gun and add it to it like you do with melee Special Attack and melee weapons?

[themaster408]

Oh and when does that force field happen? Page 1 she concentrates, does the field happen at the end of Page 2? And does this mean she is free to do whatever attacks (let's say she has a gun) she wants in Page 2?

[BASHMAN]

Force Field turns on as soon as she takes her turn: but Concentration means she goes last. It also means she is not free to make attacks, or even move much before the Force Field turns on (she is spending her time and energy concentrating on getting the force field going).

So the Force Field turns on at the END of page 1.

I'll get to the other question tomorrow (bedtime for me here) but I hope I helped a bit.

[themaster408]

I meant to have Knock Back in the example. Dr. Evil would be knocked back for 18 feet (3 squares), but his Brawn is 2, which prevents 20 feet (aka 4 squares), so no Knock Back.

[BASHMAN]

Going by highest Agility goes first, Mr. Good moves 3 squares and is now adjacent to Dr. Evil. He swings his bat to hit him. Mr. Good rolls 2d6 and gets 6. 5 X 3 (2 from Agility and 1 from Special Attack) = 15 to hit.
Dr. Evil rolls 2d6 for evading the attack and gets 8. 8 X 2 = 16.
Mr. Good uses 1 Hero Point to make his 15 into a 16 for a hit.

I don't know how this is working. If you rolled a 6 on the 2d6, and had a to-hit multiplier of x4 to hit (3 Agility +1 from Special Attack) his roll to hit would be 24. 6x4 = 24.

So he'd definitely hit Dr. Evil, no Hero Points needed. But let's say Dr. Evil with his x2 Defense rolled really well and got 13 total on his roll (exploding dice) for a total Defense of 26. This would mean Mr. Good is 2 shy of hitting him. He can spend 2 Hero Points to turn the miss into a Hit.

Now for damage Mr. Good rolls 2d6 and gets 3. 3 X 6 (2 from Brawn, 2 from Baseball Bat, 2 from Special Attack) = 18 damage
Dr. Evil rolls 2d6 for soaking and gets 5. 5 X 2 (Brawn) = 10. So Dr. Evil takes a total of 8 hits.

Actually no. I was thinking initially that the bat was your Special Attack. It is not something in addition to it.

You can have either Special Attack or use a regular weapon (like a bat) on an attack, but you cannot have both. What you can do is take a power called Weapon Techique which improves your to hit / damage with bats (or you could make it be all hand-to-hand for 1 extra Character Point, or all weapons for 2 extra Character Points).

Another issue is the way ordinary weapons work. They do a set Multiplier for damage, and your Brawn adds a Result Bonus of +5 per point of Brawn to a max of +15 to the Result. This way, Aunt May can still knock out a robber with a baseball bat (x3 Dmg) but Superman is probably better off punching people (x3+15 dmg instead of x5, exploding dice favor the latter).

Now if you want, your character can have Special Attack bought with a Gadget Limitation that is his special "Power Bat" or something. Using your Special Attack as you wrote it up, that would do x4 Dmg, so 3x4 = 12. Or you can have him just use an ordinary bat, doing x3+10 dmg. So on a roll of 3, that would still be 19 Dmg (3x3+10). If you bought Weapon Technique 2 (Bats, +2 DM) he'd be able to do x5+10 Dmg with that bat, though, so that would be 25 Dmg (5x3+10).

You are right about Dr. Evil's Soak; 5 x 2 = 10. Depending on how you were using the bat (as Special Attack or just ordinary equipment) the damage he takes would vary.

Dr. Evil's turn. He will attempt to Nullify Mr. Good's Special Attack power. It says when you hit someone and want to nullify the power you roll the contest. So I'm assuming you have to hit melee / ranged using Agility.

Yes, that is correct.

Dr. Evil rolls 2d6 X Agility, Mr. Good rolls low on his 2d6 X Agility. Dr. Evil hits and instead of doing damage, wants to nullify the power. Dr. Evil rolls 2d6 and gets 5. 5 X 6 (2 from Mind, 4 from Nullify) = 30. Mr. Good rolls 2d6 and gets 3. 3 X 1 (Mind) = 3. His special attack is gone for the rest of this scene (battle).

Not quite how it works. The rules say:

. When you hit a target and want to nullify
a power, roll a contest between your Nullification Factor and
their level the power you wish to nullify. If you succeed, the
power turns off, and cannot be used for the rest of the scene.

So when you hit, it is not a Mind Contest. It is Dr. Evil's Nullification Factor (4) x2d6 vs. Mr. Good's level in Special Attack (3) x2d6. So with Dr. Evil's roll of 5, his result is 5x4 = 20. Mr. Good's result is 3x3 = 9. But his power is still Nullified.

But here is the important question: How is Mr. Good's Special Attack defined? Is it a super-power, or is it a special piece of equipment? Because Nullify usually only affects inherent powers, not equipment (unless it is bought with an Enhancement to affect machines / magic items, etc).

Mrs. Great's turn. She turns invisible and concentrates on making a force field Range of 3 squares around Dr. Evil to make him unable to attack for a while (Mrs. Great is 3 squares away). Could she also use Mind Blast now on Dr. Evil, or is Force Field "an attack"?

She can't do that. Force Field uses her whole turn; she cannot turn Invisible this page unless she already was. She also cannot Mind Blast this page, but she is free to Next Page if the Force Field is still up (you use Concentration to generate it, not to maintain it).

To clarify:

According to the Rules, under Force Field it says:

Remember,
you need to spend a full panel of concentration to generate the
force field, and your panel is delayed till the end of the page.

Under the description of the Concentration Limitation it says:

When you use a power with this
limitation, you cannot attack (unless the power in question is an
attack) or activate any other powers that panel. You may move, but
only at half your normal speed. In addition, your panel is delayed
until the end of the page

Let's say she can't do anything else. So next turn some more battling and finally Mrs. Great's Force Field is ready.
She rolls Agility vs his Agility to hit and THEN rolls 2d6 Mind vs his Mind? Or would it only be Min vs Mind? From then on Dr. Evil has to try to destroy the Force Field that has 120 Hits and 10 Soak (30 Hits from Mind 3, 90 Hits from power 3 of Force Field. It's power 3 due to 1 used up for Range)?

Actually Mrs. Great's Force Field goes off on this turn, assuming she didn't turn Invisible or more more than half her movement; it just goes off at the END of the page.

There is no need for the secondary Mind contest. If the Force Field hits, the only roll that needs to be made is for Dr. Evil to pound his way out of it. Remember the Force Field soaks 10 points of damage per hit before any is applied to the Field itself, so he cannot just dig his way out of it with a plastic spoon. He has to hit it hard, repeatedly. It may take him several pages to break free.

Could Dr. Evil use Mind Blast on the good guys while still in the Force Field?

Yep. This is why it's not good to put a Psionic badguy in one (you can always dismiss your own Force Field though). This is also why Psionic Bad Guys like to have Force Fields, too.

Also, if you have Special Attack and range, can you use a gun and add it to it like you do with melee Special Attack and melee weapons?

Just to re-iterate, Special Attack does not add to or affect your hit or damage with regular equipment. That power is called Weapon Technique. Special Attack is things like fire-balls, claws, laser beams that shoot out of your eyes, etc. Special attack can be a piece of equipment, like a magic sword, or a special laser rifle, but when that is the case, the power has the Gadget Limitation, and is a truly unique, special piece of equipment most of the time.

[themaster408]

Thank you so much for replying to all of that. I have a much better handle on a bunch of the things I would have been doing wrong or been not sure on how to run it.