Some rule questions after play

[kevperrine]

My game gang just played our 2nd issue of BASH! Saturday and we all loved it! I have a few questions that I noted as we played, we went with rulings on things easily - but I'd like to get ideas about the rules we had questions for.

BASHMAN, if you read this and have answer ideas, I'll share them "officially" with my group when we play again next week!

We're playing a short set of story arcs for the next 2-3 weekends since our entire group can't make it to our normal game (a long running D&D3.5 game). We're playing in a "MysteryMen, Tick style" campaign where the heroes are all average or less. But it's been great fun all around!

Here are our questions and rule snags. If you have suggestions, I'd love to hear them. If you can point me to any rules in the book - just let me know. THANKS!


KNOCKBACK: when knocked back if you hit something before you fly back the entire knockback distance, do you take damage (when you hit something) for the distance you traveled before you hit or do you take the full damage for the full distance that you would have travelled?
Example: The Disposal gets punched and knockbacked 70' but he flies back 40' and slams into a building. Does he take the damage (as falling damage) for the 70' or just the 40'?
Also... If The Disposal gets knockedback for a total of 70' but happens to be right up against the building (only 5' behind him) does he take damage for hitting the wall?


MOVING
When moving in combat, can you move "through" enemies (or friends) square to go past them? Would you need to make any sort of check? Would it reduce your move (by half like getting up)? Can the person in your way try to stop you moving past as you go?


DROPPING THINGS
What action would it be to just drop an item? Can you just drop something on another character's turn? Example: Gus the Dimensional has Comrade Poke's voodoo doll, the Disposal wants to grab and eat it (destroying it utterly). Can Gus just drop the doll if it's NOT his turn?


SAVING SOMEONE
If you are holding a person (or big object) or you want to pick someone up does it take any sort of action? Or does drawing a weapons take an action?


GET OUT OF WAY
When it is not your turn and something comes at you (like a falling tree or traffic) is there any sort of "reactive" check you need to make to avoid getting hit? Another example... In an earthquake, when it's not your turn and the earth is ripping open near/under your feet, do you get a reactive chance to NOT fall in or to grab the side as you fall in?


PUSH
Can you use the Push power to "pull" someone toward you? Essentially pushing them toward you. Or would you need to use Telekinesis or another power to pull them?


HERO DICE
Can you spend more than one Hero Dice on the same page? On or when it's not your panel? Example: Can I spend a HD to get another dice to roll to my check, see that I still don't make it, then spend another to add another HD? If so, is there a limit that you can spend in a page or panel? Another Example: Can you spend a HD to react when it's NOT your turn, then spend a second HD to Power Stunt a power - interrupting to act?


CAPTAIN SAFETY
How would you make Captain Safety's powers?
Cap Safe has the ability to "change reality" in a panel to be able to make the person/action more "safe". Example: Mr. Dagger runs to slash at a poor innocent bystander, Captain Safety yells "You shouldn't run with scissors!" and all of a sudden Mr. Daggers' hands are covered in big foam blocks that will stop/slow his danger. Another Example: Cap Safe is watching traffic, he sees a child jumping in the backseat while the mother is putting on makeup and talking on the phone - "NOW I feel what ROAD-RAGE IS!!" as he reaches out and reality shifts to do "xxx" changing the situation to make it safe (whatever the player comes up with!).
He cannot use his powers in any other way than to "make things up to safety codes!" How would you do that?




Okay...
lots of questions.
thanks for ideas!

-kev-

[BASHMAN]

KNOCKBACK: when knocked back if you hit something before you fly back the entire knockback distance, do you take damage (when you hit something) for the distance you traveled before you hit or do you take the full damage for the full distance that you would have travelled?
Example: The Disposal gets punched and knockbacked 70' but he flies back 40' and slams into a building. Does he take the damage (as falling damage) for the 70' or just the 40'?
Also... If The Disposal gets knockedback for a total of 70' but happens to be right up against the building (only 5' behind him) does he take damage for hitting the wall?

It's the full distance damage. Yes, if you are knocked back 5 feet into a building, you'd take the 70 feet (minus 10*Brawn). So if the disposal had a brawn of 4, he'd take 30 feet = x3 Dmg. This is applied seperately from the damage of the attack (and for a character like the disposal, likely wouldn't hurt.

MOVING
When moving in combat, can you move "through" enemies (or friends) square to go past them? Would you need to make any sort of check? Would it reduce your move (by half like getting up)? Can the person in your way try to stop you moving past as you go?

You can move through a friends square. I wouldn't let you move through an enemies (maybe if you made an Athletics/Acrobatics check) There is no Attacks of Opportunity or anything though. To stop you from moving by, they can: Hold their action or spend a Die to interupt to grab you or use immobilize, etc.

DROPPING THINGS
What action would it be to just drop an item? Can you just drop something on another character's turn? Example: Gus the Dimensional has Comrade Poke's voodoo doll, the Disposal wants to grab and eat it (destroying it utterly). Can Gus just drop the doll if it's NOT his turn?

To drop an item, I'd say is no action at all, even on someone else's turn. Unless dropping the item would constitute an attack- dropping a smoke bomb for instance, would have to be on your own panel.

SAVING SOMEONE
If you are holding a person (or big object) or you want to pick someone up does it take any sort of action? Or does drawing a weapons take an action?

Grabbing someone counts as an attack, whether they are friend or foe. Note, you can grab someone and then move.

GET OUT OF WAY
When it is not your turn and something comes at you (like a falling tree or traffic) is there any sort of "reactive" check you need to make to avoid getting hit? Another example... In an earthquake, when it's not your turn and the earth is ripping open near/under your feet, do you get a reactive chance to NOT fall in or to grab the side as you fall in?

To avoid being hit, you roll a Defense roll, usually based on Agility. Danger sense would be added to this, and sometimes so could Deflect (a shield won't be much good vs. a falling tree or car though). Yes, you would get to make a check not to fall into the chasm. Athletics/Acrobatics or Athletics/Climbing would both work for this, I think.

PUSH
Can you use the Push power to "pull" someone toward you? Essentially pushing them toward you. Or would you need to use Telekinesis or another power to pull them?

Push is specifically for pushing someone away from you. You'd need TK or Stretching to pull them towards you.

HERO DICE
Can you spend more than one Hero Dice on the same page? On or when it's not your panel? Example: Can I spend a HD to get another dice to roll to my check, see that I still don't make it, then spend another to add another HD? If so, is there a limit that you can spend in a page or panel? Another Example: Can you spend a HD to react when it's NOT your turn, then spend a second HD to Power Stunt a power - interrupting to act?

You can spend multiple Hero Dice in a page, but no more than 1 may be added to any given ROLL. So you could spend a Hero Die to power stunt Attack Weak Point, then add one to your Attack Roll, and add another one to your Damage roll, all in the same panel.

What you absolutely CANNOT do is roll more than 1 Hero Dice on a single roll. In playtesting we found this could lead to result in infinity, which breaks the game.

CAPTAIN SAFETY
How would you make Captain Safety's powers?
Cap Safe has the ability to "change reality" in a panel to be able to make the person/action more "safe". Example: Mr. Dagger runs to slash at a poor innocent bystander, Captain Safety yells "You shouldn't run with scissors!" and all of a sudden Mr. Daggers' hands are covered in big foam blocks that will stop/slow his danger. Another Example: Cap Safe is watching traffic, he sees a child jumping in the backseat while the mother is putting on makeup and talking on the phone - "NOW I feel what ROAD-RAGE IS!!" as he reaches out and reality shifts to do "xxx" changing the situation to make it safe (whatever the player comes up with!).
He cannot use his powers in any other way than to "make things up to safety codes!" How would you do that?

Captain Safety:

A lot of his powers would be a limited form of Mind Control + Telepath or even Suggestion. I'd give him "Quick Thinking" advantage to help represent his ability to seemingly "stop the clock" on this kind of thing. This could work to make the mother pay attention to her driving.

Shouldn't Run w/ Scissors: Sound like he is Nullifying "Dangerous" powers to me. Nullify is the way I'd build this, with limitation that it only works on "dangerous powers that could hurt oneself or others". So he cannot turn off the bad guy's force field. Likewise, he could only nullify flight if someone were ALREADY safely on the ground (now now, we cannot risk you running into any errant airplanes, now can we).

[kevperrine]

Wow.
Thank you BASHMAN. Your quick courteous replies NEVER cease to make me very happy. Thank you sir!

Few follow-ups below...

KNOCKBACK

It's the full distance damage.

WOW! OUCH!
That, I was not expecting. We rule this one incorrectly in-game.

MOVING

You can move through a friends square. I wouldn't let you move through an enemies (maybe if you made an Athletics/Acrobatics check) There is no Attacks of Opportunity or anything though. To stop you from moving by, they can: Hold their action or spend a Die to interupt to grab you or use immobilize, etc.

Great! We weren't sure about moving-through. We assumed no Opportunity Attacks (this isn't D&D afterall, it's BASH!!), but that's good to note about moving through.

DROPPING THINGS

To drop an item, I'd say is no action at all, even on someone else's turn.

Awesome!

SAVING SOMEONE
If you are holding a person (or big object) or you want to pick someone up does it take any sort of action? Or does drawing a weapons take an action?

Grabbing someone counts as an attack, whether they are friend or foe. Note, you can grab someone and then move.

Excellent. In our example it was picking up a bystander to use as a weapon! So the "attack" check was simple for the villain. But what THIS tells me is that the villain:
Can Move, activate any powers, then "pick up the bystander" AS the Attack, and end his turn.
Not aloud to grab the bystander AND attack (unless they have more Panels to act) in the same turn. As per the Options for what you can do in a Panel.

GET OUT OF WAY

To avoid being hit, you roll a Defense roll, usually based on Agility. Danger sense would be added to this, and sometimes so could Deflect (a shield won't be much good vs. a falling tree or car though). Yes, you would get to make a check not to fall into the chasm. Athletics/Acrobatics or Athletics/Climbing would both work for this, I think.

Excellent!

PUSH

Push is specifically for pushing someone away from you. You'd need TK or Stretching to pull them towards you.

That was 100% my gut feeling. But one of the players thought differently - I allowed it until asking here. Now I know my gut was right.

HERO DICE

You can spend multiple Hero Dice in a page, but no more than 1 may be added to any given ROLL.

So.... hypothetical...
Would I be correct that you CAN then, spend Hero Dice like this, ON ANOTHER character's Panel:

1 Hero Die: “You weren’t gonna start his party without me were you?” Use a Hero Die to enter a scene you were previously not in.
2 Hero Dice: “Whew! That was close!” Re-actively use a power even when it is not your panel or have already gone.
3 Hero Dice: “Power Stunt!” Temporarily gain a new power by using an existing power creatively.
4 Hero Dice: “Never underestimate me!” Roll another die and add it to your regular 2d6 roll.

One PC spending 4 Hero Dice, when it's not even their turn?
If so that's wicked COOL as a hero! But I wanna double check to see if you feel that's beyond the flavor of the rules...

What you absolutely CANNOT do is roll more than 1 Hero Dice on a single roll. In playtesting we found this could lead to result in infinity, which breaks the game.

Yup. I aloud that once. I thought it was a little much.

CAPTAIN SAFETY
How would you make Captain Safety's powers?

- limited forms of Mind Control + Telepath or even Suggestion.
- Quick Thinking Advantage
- Nullify, with limitation that it only works on "dangerous powers that could hurt oneself or others".

That's GREAT!! Brilliant!

Likewise, he could only nullify flight if someone were ALREADY safely on the ground (now now, we cannot risk you running into any errant airplanes, now can we).

LOL.... Love that!! Good thinking!


Again - thanks a TON!
-kev-
-kev-

[BASHMAN]

Excellent. In our example it was picking up a bystander to use as a weapon! So the "attack" check was simple for the villain. But what THIS tells me is that the villain:
Can Move, activate any powers, then "pick up the bystander" AS the Attack, and end his turn.
Not aloud to grab the bystander AND attack (unless they have more Panels to act) in the same turn. As per the Options for what you can do in a Panel.

Note: as a wrestling move, you can Grab a minion and still do something to them in one panel. If the person is a Hero/Villain, grabbing them takes your turn unless you beat them by 10.

[BASHMAN]

1 Hero Die: “You weren’t gonna start his party without me were you?” Use a Hero Die to enter a scene you were previously not in.
2 Hero Dice: “Whew! That was close!” Re-actively use a power even when it is not your panel or have already gone.
3 Hero Dice: “Power Stunt!” Temporarily gain a new power by using an existing power creatively.
4 Hero Dice: “Never underestimate me!” Roll another die and add it to your regular 2d6 roll.

One PC spending 4 Hero Dice, when it's not even their turn?
If so that's wicked COOL as a hero! But I wanna double check to see if you feel that's beyond the flavor of the rules...

You absolutely can do that, and in fact, on Friday Night, one of my players used 3 to basically do this (except he was already there, so didn't need the first Hero Die you mentioned there).

[oni5115]

Well reading the response actually makes me curious here. Couldn't you technically take an Area and a Range on Push and push them from behind. Regardless, it would still be pushing outward from its epicenter, not pulling, but the outcome would be similar.

Then again, it might be cheaper to simply use Multi-Power for 1 or 2 points. Regardless, interesting questions.

[BASHMAN]

Well reading the response actually makes me curious here. Couldn't you technically take an Area and a Range on Push and push them from behind. Regardless, it would still be pushing outward from its epicenter, not pulling, but the outcome would be similar.

Then again, it might be cheaper to simply use Multi-Power for 1 or 2 points. Regardless, interesting questions.

Yeah, you are right on that. You could also take Push with Range and Arc to push someone a direction other than away from you.