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The Dresden Files => DFRPG => Topic started by: BumblingBear on March 31, 2011, 09:06:02 AM
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In the game I am working on starting, I asked my gf what character she would want to play if she could make it to games.
After much discussion, she decided she may want to play a girl who through mystic-scientific testing that she volunteered for in order to make money, wakes up 3 months later with no memory of the prior 3 months, and the ability to turn into an 8 foot tall ... housecat.
At first I thought it sounded cute and a little goofy... but omfg... wow.
Her character will have no weaknesses (since she plans on taking high alertness and investigation in her human form). If she plays this character, I plan on compelling the hell out of her lack of control over her powers, and the size of the animal she turns into...
But wow. We've discussed on the boards how min/maxed a shapeshifter can be, but when you add the monstrous size power into the mix...
She could easily have a +10 or +12 to strength from powers. She could just maneuver a bad guy to have him pinned to the ground (rolling strength) and then just absorb all the damage while her team mates kill him with ease.
::shakes head::
What is kind of cool, though - is that with at least a few PCs that powerful, I will be able to throw really nasty stuff at the group and not see them drop like flies. Hopefully. ::evil grin::
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Would you mind posting the build for this character?
Another thing, does 8 foot tall meet the requirements for hulking size? I always assumed you have to be in excess of 10 foot at least for that.
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Would you mind posting the build for this character?
Another thing, does 8 foot tall meet the requirements for hulking size? I always assumed you have to be in excess of 10 foot at least for that.
This is an 8ft tall cat we are talking about here I would say that is one huking big cat who probably is that tall without standing on her hind legs which means she will also probably be about 3-4 (9-12ft) meters in length. I didn't think that hulking size gave a bonus to grapple though or does she have strength powers.
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This is an 8ft tall cat we are talking about here I would say that is one huking big cat who probably is that tall without standing on her hind legs which means she will also probably be about 3-4 (9-12ft) meters in length. I didn't think that hulking size gave a bonus to grapple though or does she have strength powers.
Oh yes, hadn't thought of it that way.
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[-1] Beast Change
[-2] Hulking Size and Claws modified by Human Form
[-4] Supernatural Strength
[-1] Nimble (no defense penalty by Hulking Size)
[-1] Supernatural Toughness (catch is poison)
Probably attacks and defends at superb (+5) skill with weapon 6, effective Might +13 for breaking/lifting, +9 for grappling. Armor 2 and ten stress boxes. That's what she could have for max shapeshifting effectiveness - this build allows her to be human-sized human, cat-sized cat, giant-sized human and giant-sized cat, depending on what combination of forms she uses. Not weak, but not really broken either.
Possible weaknesses for the character include the following;
1) Poison (or whatever her catch is). Duh.
2) Social encounters demanding Presence, Rapport and Empathy.
3) Encounters with, say, a White Court vampire. She can go ahead and grapple with him if she wants - that only means autosuccess in his touch attack. :P
4) Encounters in places where she cannot change (too small room, corridor) or does not want to change (i.e. in the middle of crowded street)
5) Wizards. Wizards can counter anything with enough preparation.
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How are you getting +9 to grapple? If we assume a starting base might of superb, you get +2 for supernatural strength, but I don't see any other bonuses.
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Hmm. I thought Hulking Size gave a +2 bonus to some Might rolls but I am away from my books at the moment.
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Hmm. I thought Hulking Size gave a +2 bonus to some Might rolls but I am away from my books at the moment.
It does, to lift and break, not to grapple.
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This may not be the right place for it but I do have a more min-maxed build than giant cat for grappling.
Slade Kemp (submerged)
-1 Shape Change (Cthulhu Form)
+1 Human Form
-6 Mythic Strength
-1 Made of Tentacles (might): +2 to grapple see OW p77
-2 Inhuman Toughness
+0 Catch (Swords of the Cross)
-1 Body Eater (reskinned blood drinker)
+1 Feeding Dependancy
This character build has a +10 grapple mod which is the max you can get it and is ever so slightly silly.
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She could easily have a +10 or +12 to strength from powers. She could just maneuver a bad guy to have him pinned to the ground (rolling strength) and then just absorb all the damage while her team mates kill him with ease.
Make sure you pay attention to which bonuses are for Might in general versus Might only for lift/bend/break versus Might only for grapple. It makes a big difference.
Secondly, yes, a grappling strategy is pretty strong, but you can still have issues with lack of range. A gunman two or three zones away gets an extra round at least before you can close with him. A flying creature with a breath weapon might never come into range at all. And as someone mentioned above, there's certain creatures, like the White Court, that you *really* don't want to be grappling in the first place.
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I allways treat the +1,2,3 with the might powers for grapple as a general bonus to the might score like the speed powers for athletics because it makes sense that would be the case. Though interestingly once you have someone in a grapple you could argue that a perfectly valid attack would be breaking someone in two which could mean that the +12 to the roll would count.
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a perfectly valid attack would be breaking someone in two which could mean that the +12 to the roll would count.
(bolding added)
No.
Supreme Lifting. Whenever lifting or breaking
inanimate things, you gain a +12 to your
Might score.
(again, bolding added)
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Ah. I stand corrected.
I have not actually put the concept down on paper yet.
However, consider this. That might score to lift or break things could be used by my ruling to smash vehicles or destroy weapons.
As it is, I believe that with hulking size, claws, and the -4 strength power, she will have a weapon: 8 attack for fists.
I don't have the book in front of me so I'm not sure about the numbers, but I know it's a nasty, nasty attack.
The funny thing? She wants to have an aspect that makes her cowardly so she can be compelled to run away from conflict... lol
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There are some nice "human cats" in the GURPS Technomancer book. They have a nice take on human non-humans (a bit like Shadowrun's) in that book that could be incorporated into a Dresden Files game.
Richard
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As it is, I believe that with hulking size, claws, and the -4 strength power, she will have a weapon: 8 attack for fists.
I'm not sure, but I don't think Hulking Size increases your damage output. I could be mistaken, though.
Also, there's a good reason why I rarely, if ever, let a player take Supernatural or Mythic level anything, and if I do, that should be their ONLY strength/speed/tough/recover power. Having multiple Supernatural level boosts is *extremely* powerful.
If she was running Inhuman Toughness and Inhuman strength instead of Supernatural, she'd be less directly powerful, but have more fatepoints to throw around on stunts or shoring up bad rolls.
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I'm not sure, but I don't think Hulking Size increases your damage output. I could be mistaken, though.
This is correct. So her fists attack is likely +5, weapon: 6. Assuming she took Claw Focus and Claw Specialization as stunts she could up that to +6, Weapon: 8. She can throw that around all day, which is nice.
Does not compare to optimized evocation, and falls a little behind optimized Weapons builds. I would say don't worry too much about "compelling the hell" out of her. She'll be quite effective, but not overpowering.
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What is her Troubled Aspect? You say she has no flaws. I really trying to understand how this character is so untouchable without flaws? Everyone has a Troubled Aspect in Dresden.
The no memory thing is a great way to screw with her. Missing 3 months I would easily turn that into something interesting and a great flaw.
How and why she turns into a Giant House Cat? If she left that up to you. Well I would research about Feline Shapeshifter Mythology and if I had time I would read some Feline Shapeshifter Novels.
My wife is in my Star Wars D20 Revised game and her character has no memory. I have had a lot of time to really have fun with her with it and she has grown to a level 9 Character. She loves all the ins and outs I come up with and my gaming group here.
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I consider it OP because she will be decent in social conflict, she will never miss any clues, she is really hard to surprise or ambush, and then she can shapeshift and toss cars around or cleave people in have with her cat claws.
Sure, there are more optimized builds for social, mental, or physical conflict, but she'll be able to do anything... without preparation.
That is pretty nasty. :)
No, I am not too worried about any of my characters being OP in combat. A creative GM can always figure out a way to work around that.
I don't believe in nerfing PCs. I like buffing NPCs.
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I consider it OP because she will be decent in social conflict, she will never miss any clues, she is really hard to surprise or ambush, and then she can shapeshift and toss cars around or cleave people in have with her cat claws.
Sure, there are more optimized builds for social, mental, or physical conflict, but she'll be able to do anything... without preparation.
So she is competent in Social conflicts, skilled in one kind of Mental conflict, and skilled in Physical conflicts that don't contain elements (spellcasters, flying monsters) designed to rob her of her advantages. This is actually closer to a good baseline for what a PC should be capable of, in my humble opinion.
A PI with his bonus refresh spent on Gun Stunts is likely to operate functionally close to this. Her powers will make her tankier and allow to her to, as you say, toss cars around when necessary, while his Stunts could be spent making him VERY decent in social conflicts and a spectrum of mental conflicts.
Your game, your balancing points, but just make sure you've accurately appraised her potential before locking her in a closet with Tessa.
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So she is competent in Social conflicts, skilled in one kind of Mental conflict, and skilled in Physical conflicts that don't contain elements (spellcasters, flying monsters) designed to rob her of her advantages. This is actually closer to a good baseline for what a PC should be capable of, in my humble opinion.
A PI with his bonus refresh spent on Gun Stunts is likely to operate functionally close to this. Her powers will make her tankier and allow to her to, as you say, toss cars around when necessary, while his Stunts could be spent making him VERY decent in social conflicts and a spectrum of mental conflicts.
Your game, your balancing points, but just make sure you've accurately appraised her potential before locking her in a closet with Tessa.
Lol! All good points.
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The skill rearranging part of beast change is potentially the best bang for the buck you can get, power wise.
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The skill rearranging part of beast change is potentially the best bang for the buck you can get, power wise.
Definitely. Even just using "standard" were-forms (e.g. real-life animials, Inhuman level but no Supernatural level powers), I consider Were-form to be one the most powerful and versatile builds, and suitable to run right along side a full wizard in a high-power game.
At lower refresh levels, a were-form might outshine pure mortals or other weak templates to a degree, but they'll be limited to weaker animal forms anyway, and probably have less left-over refresh than most players at the table.
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[-1] Beast Change
[-2] Hulking Size and Claws modified by Human Form
[-4] Supernatural Strength
[-1] Nimble (no defense penalty by Hulking Size)
[-1] Supernatural Toughness (catch is poison)
Man, I got to ask, but what the hell is "poison"? Like, I know the definition of the word, but what the hell does it mean in the context of a catch. So what, substances that harm the character will harm the character? Does a catch of "weaknesses" work the same way?
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the venomous upgrade to the claws power would satisfy a 'poison' catch
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Man, I got to ask, but what the hell is "poison"? Like, I know the definition of the word, but what the hell does it mean in the context of a catch. So what, substances that harm the character will harm the character? Does a catch of "weaknesses" work the same way?
Cyanide, venom, hemlock would all be catch fufilling for a character, a catch of weaknesses would mean that people who are weak will bypass your toughness usually whilst they shoot at you.
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Everyone can poison most weapons and a number of creatures already have the "venomous" upgrade to their claws. That's what bypasses that catch.
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Everyone can poison most weapons and a number of creatures already have the "venomous" upgrade to their claws. That's what bypasses that catch.
How would it work though? In relation to toughness would the poison act as like a corrosive? I can see poison hindering recovery but toughness is a little harder to explain.
Another point, what do you define as poisonous? Chocolate is technically toxic, does that count?
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Stress that would normally be inflicted by exposure to a poison if the character didn't have a toughness power is not reduced by that toughness power, nor are consequences originating from such stress subject to the accelerated healing of a recovery power. That's how it works.
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Toughness is a supernatural power. How things work does not have to deal with physics at all. In this case, think of Balder being killed by mistletoe; his magical invulnerability simply did not exist against it. Ditto for some types of werewolves and silver.
As for what works, the catch makes poison ignore extra toughness, it does not make it deal more damage than normal or ignore the normal defense rolls against it and the poison has to be poison. Use common sense; being whacked with a chocolate is not poisonous. Eating a chocolate is not nearly poisonous enough to deal even 1 stress of damage (equal to a short knife). But the sting of a wasp (weapon 0, attack 3 vs endurance) would deal stress normally if she failed the defense and not be absorbed by her toughness/armor. So would the toxic fumes from a building on fire (environmental hazard 4 vs endurance) but the fire itself (another hazard 4 vs endurance) would have to deal with armor and extra stress boxes from her toughness.
Gas grenades, poisoned darts, strong contact poison on a blade, snake bites, magical water attacks that create poisons, the venomous claws of red vampires; all of these would ignore her toughness.
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Also, note that adverse reactions to a catch that doesn't normally deal stress are a compel, usually of the characters high concept. For example, a fae being burned by the touch of iron is a compel of their high concept, while using a hammer made out of iron to crack open their skull is a catch being used to negate their toughness powers.
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With the catch of poison there is the question would the catch only be satisfied by the poison damage ie venom rules or would just coating something in poison fufill the catch or is a weakness to one or the other a different catch.
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Unless specified otherwise, it is the stress/consequences caused by the catch itself that bypasses the toughness/recovery, not merely stress/consequences caused in its presence. It's one of the reasons WCV catches are valued so low. You'll have a heck of a time finding a weapon that serves as a symbol of True Love, and a wedding ring isn't particularly suited to causing harm.
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Ammorachius is a pretty big symbol of true love. ;D
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Amoracchius, The Sword of Love, countering Lust.
Esperacchius, The Sword of Hope, countering Despair.
Fidelacchius, The Sword of Faith, countering Fear.
Are the Swords of the Cross so neatly aligned against the White Court?
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The White Court, in a world were humanity knows of the supernatural, is going to be the greatest danger from the more humanoid supernaturals. Someone knew what they were doing when they arranged the swords' meaning in their Great Plan. :P
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Ammorachius is a pretty big symbol of true love. ;D
Yeah, and there's ONE in the entire world. Oh, and it has the capacity (at the cost of a FP, if it wouldn't already qualify) to satisfy ANY catch, from 'not fire' through 'only the Barrabus Noose', not just that of House Raith.
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The White Court, in a world were humanity knows of the supernatural, is going to be the greatest danger from the more humanoid supernaturals. Someone knew what they were doing when they arranged the swords' meaning in their Great Plan. :P
Perhaps so, but if this is the case, then the possibility of there being any other WCV Courts (besides the core three we already know of) becomes very low, unless new Holy Weapons begin springing up to counter the predations of new WCV breeds.
Yeah, and there's ONE in the entire world. Oh, and it has the capacity (at the cost of a FP, if it wouldn't already qualify) to satisfy ANY catch, from 'not fire' through 'only the Barrabus Noose', not just that of House Raith.
Indeed! I think what is being proposed is that Amoracchius would be able to serve as the Catch simply by use - not requiring a Fate Point.
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Would a mercy killing count as satisfying the true love catch say a lover saw the person they knew and love become an absolute monster and decided to save them from them self.
Perhaps so, but if this is the case, then the possibility of there being any other WCV Courts (besides the core three we already know of) becomes very low, unless new Holy Weapons begin springing up to counter the predations of new WCV breeds.
Indeed! I think what is being proposed is that Amoracchius would be able to serve as the Catch simply by use - not requiring a Fate Point.
There is reasonable reason to believe there is at least one more sword of the cross floating about somewhere.
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Would a mercy killing count as satisfying the true love catch say a lover saw the person they knew and love become an absolute monster and decided to save them from them self.
Do both the killer and the victim (currently, at the time of the killing) possess an aspect to reflect their mutual unconditional love?
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Would a mercy killing count as satisfying the true love catch say a lover saw the person they knew and love become an absolute monster and decided to save them from them self.
"Twas love killed the beast," I believe the saying goes? That was also an element in that terrible "Wolf Man" movie.
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I dunno about the true love thing....
There are an awful lot of happy married people. Most of them wear a wedding ring.
These wedding rings would lend rather nicely to a punch or a grapple....
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Being happily married doesn't mean you have True Love. And even if you do, it doesn't guarantee that any given item linked to your relationship will gain the metaphysical association with that Love.
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Being happily married doesn't mean you have True Love. And even if you do, it doesn't guarantee that any given item linked to your relationship will gain the metaphysical association with that Love.
What's your point?
A HUMMWV could fall from the sky too.
If Harry banging some silly reporter with little to no survival instinct and a nose for trouble, I'd say quite a few of the married couples are "true love".
This stuff is all highly subjective.
Also, if two people in "true love" have a ring that symbolizes their relationship, I would think logically that it is more of a leap to assume the thing /doesn't/ have a metaphysical connection than that it does.
My point stands.
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What's your point?
A HUMMWV could fall from the sky too.
If Harry banging some silly reporter with little to no survival instinct and a nose for trouble, I'd say quite a few of the married couples are "true love".
This stuff is all highly subjective.
Also, if two people in "true love" have a ring that symbolizes their relationship, I would think logically that it is more of a leap to assume the thing /doesn't/ have a metaphysical connection than that it does.
My point stands.
This has been addressed several times on this board in recent memory. I don't feel the need to rehash the arguments here.
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This has been addressed several times on this board in recent memory. I don't feel the need to rehash the arguments here.
Ummm... ok.
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If you interpt true love as not being the perfected form of abosolute Love (which is a mix of fate, chivalry,genetics and others random factors) then it makes true love a far to common catch for a +0 which implies that only several people know about the catch and that there are own several people in the entire world posessing the catch.
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If you interpt true love as not being the perfected form of abosolute Love (which is a mix of fate, chivalry,genetics and others random factors) then it makes true love a far to common catch for a +0 which implies that only several people know about the catch and that there are own several people in the entire world posessing the catch.
1. I don't believe all WCV catches should be a +0.
2. We have it from Fred himself that Our World is more of a guide, not law.
I think true love should be a +1 at least.
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1. I don't believe all WCV catches should be a +0.
2. We have it from Fred himself that Our World is more of a guide, not law.
I think true love should be a +1 at least.
And I would agree. There are two sides to this argument you should be aware of.
One seems to be arguing backwards from +0 to "True Love is insanely rare". The other takes the stance that True Love is NOT insanely rare, and therefore the Catch should have higher value.
It is worth noting that love is a really touchy subject for a lot of people, even when the biology and psychology of it hasn't been much of a mystery for decades; add in metaphysical connotations to muddy the issue and you have a recipe for strong opinions. I would advise against getting into an in-depth discussion here, and instead recommend that you pick which ruling you prefer and apply it to your own games, and then try not to bring it up online when you're not looking for a fight - consider it DFRPG fighting words, the way "roll vs roleplaying" or "GNS theory" cause ugly flareups wherever they're uttered.
If True Love were the province of the average happily married couple, it'd be up to a +1 rebate for frequency.
As for knowledge of the Catch, this is in an odd place where the game utterly defies canon. There is an entire species almost unilaterally aware of their own Catch and that of rival Houses, and would be unlikely to balk at sharing the Catch of their rivals for personal gain. Given how obvious it is and how likely it is that wizards have some reason to care enough to investigate this kind of thing, it's absurd to imagine the White Council is blind to any knowledge of the bane of an entire Court of active vampires. From there it stops being reasonable to call it a +0 knowledge. I mean, come on.
So I would personally call it a +2 rebate.
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My gf's character ended up being as nasty powerful as I was expecting it to be.
She ended up tying all of her beast change abilities to an item of power, which ended up giving her an extra point of refresh as well... at the cost of potentially losing /all/ of her supernatural abilities in the future. :evil:
But yeah, she was throwing out an average of 6 shift attacks with a 6 shift weapon. Every time. I think she killed 4 out of the 5 enemies the group encountered.
Granted, I had the first session be kind of an old school dungeon crawl so everyone could get used to the system. I think some of the most fun I had as GM was compelling my white court vampire PC who doesn't know that he is a vampire to activate whatever powers I told him to for each scene. :)
Everyone at the table got a good number of compels. I think that everyone at the table has learned how to do maneuvers and such now and everyone is aware of how powerful they are now. I ended up letting the techno savant PC use his lightning power for maneuvers and it was cool when he blinded a couple of goblins with it.
I think it's cool that the group was able to pick up the system so fast. Now I can start with the /real/ story and start bringing in more interesting enemies.
Goblins and malks are not all that great of a challenge to a submerged group.
But yeah... my gf's character could soak up massive amounts of damage and put out massive amounts of damage, but still have decent social skills as a human. I think the only fate points she spent was denying my compels that would have not let her change into a were giant cat since she is new to her powers.
So for all you new players out there, or gms who have a new player that does not know what they want to play, a were animal is really quite nasty for a relatively low amount of refresh.
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Have you considered adding compels for the standard Cat stuff? The aloof indiference the species shares? The catnip addiction? The drive to hunt, (IE:chase small moving objects, including laser pointers and string) How would these effect the character in transformed mode, and in human mode? You can give them the good, but remember the bad as well.