Telekinesis clarification

[Overdog]

My group is debating how TK works. In the book it says:

The damage that can be done by this (by slamming
an object into an opponent or vice-versa) is as if it were a
special attack, treating Telekinesis as Brawn for damage,
lifting, or wrestling and Mind as Agility to hit.

Does this mean that with a TK level of 4 a hero would do x4 damage or would your mind adjust that damage also since this is a special attack? So someone with TK level 4 and a Mind of 3 would be doing x7 damage?

In addition, in order to slam someone into something to damage them this way I am assuming they would need to make a successful wrestling check using their TK level as brawn and then on their next turn, assuming you dont beat their wrestling check by 10, throw them into something or someone?

[BASHMAN]

Mind has nothing to do with damage. It is "used as (instead of) Agility to hit".

So if you have TK 4 and Mind 3, you roll x3 to Hit, and do x4 Damage.

It depends on how you want to slam them. If they are helpless and being held in place while being hit, then you'd need to wrestle them. If you just want to hit them once, then you don't need to grapple them first; it's like punching them.

[Overdog]

Thanks...the Special Attack reference was what was throwing us.

I suppose if you wanted to increase the damage from TK without breaking the level 5 restriction you could simply buy Boost to Brawn for TK damage only.

[BASHMAN]

I suppose if you wanted to increase the damage from TK without breaking the level 5 restriction you could simply buy Boost to Brawn for TK damage only.

No. Boost affects your *actual* Brawn. TK acts *in place of* Brawn for damage with it.

Instead, you would need to just have higher than 5 Levels in TK. By RAW, that is not normally allowed (it is there for a reason of game balance), but Cosmic characters certainly could have it.

[BASHMAN]

Although you might also be able to "Push Yourself" above level 5 with Narrator Approval from time to time.

[Overdog]

So there isnt a mechanic that would allow you to buy increased level for TK damage only ?

In my games I use Boost as a way to increase a power's level without increasing the stat. So I might say Boost level 1 for Brawn for HtH attacks only. This would only increase the damage for HtH attacks and not give them any extra soak or basic Brawn.

I guess what I should be doing in the example above is buying a Special Attack that is no range and calling it a HtH damage bonus.

[BASHMAN]

You CAN use Boost to Brawn for Hand to Hand Attacks only. The key difference here is TK does not use any stat at all for damage. Damage is entirely based on its level. Boost does not affect a power; it affects a stat, even if it is withn the framework of being used with a power.

If a power like TK or Continual Damage or Damage Field only let you use the power's level and not Level + Stat, there is a game balance reason for it. The power in question is already very powerful as is. Raising the power above level 5 would be "game breaking" yes, but so would adding some other modification to effectively do so.

By RAW, you can add the "Extra Effect" Enhancement to it to do extra damage in certain situations. So you could do TK 5 with Extra Effect vs. Magic. It would do x5 Damage or x7 Damage against a magical creature. That is balanced by the fact it only does that extra damage some of the time; against specific opponents.

Remember you can also use TK like it was brawn. This means you can use it to pick up an improvised weapon, like a Car, and hit someone with it. That itself can increase teh DM by 1, if the object lifted is sufficiently heavy.

[Overdog]

Thanks for the clarification and explanation.

[BASHMAN]

No problem.

Also another thought. If you want a very high-damaging TK based attack, why not just use Special Attack to build it?

Telekinetic Bullet
This power sends a bullet of pure force at an enemy.
Special Attack 5 (+5DM) [Multi-Power: Telekinesis]
Other Enhancement Possibilities: [Bypass Force Field]

Note also that Cosmic characters can take TK with both levels above 5 and also the "Space" Enhancement, allowing them to TK entire planets.

[Overdog]

I like it and that is what I love about this system...so many different ways to get what you want.

As as aside...are all powers assumed to have a visible effect or would you say just attack powers?

What do you think?

We were thinking of having people buy a "no visible effect" enhancement for 1 point if they wanted to conceal the source of any power that had an attack component and this wouldn't provide any modifiers in combat.

[BASHMAN]

Actually, this Enhancement exists in Awesome Powers #1:

There are also a lot of other good ones in there, as well as dozens and dozens of powers, and tools to make random characters.

Unseen (+2 Pts): This Enhancement may be used only with powers that are normally visible. This Enhancement makes the power in question completely invisible to normal vision. Thus, a Force Field or Damage Field created by the affected power would not be noticed… until somebody ran into it. For +1 pt, you can make the power undetectable to another means of detection, such as infrared, sound, etc. Note that if this Enhancement is added to an attack, it does not necessarily become more difficult to defend against (you can’t see a bullet coming at you, but you still get a defense roll when you see somebody pointing a gun). The Narrator will decide if and when any hindrance is incurred, likely because the attacker is also invisible.