Re: [HoE] Answers to my "Something About A Sword" post...

["Steve Crow" <crow_steve@hotmail.com>]

>>Perhaps.  But a few things come to mind for me...
>>
>>1) Again, there is _never_ any reason to aim a Nuke directly at someone,
>>as far as I can tell.  Is there...?
>
>Human tendency.  if you look in on games, most people say I shoot X with
>the Nuke.  In at least one case, a Doombringer is instructed to, in an
>adventure, hit a PC with a Nuke.  So it is not all that alien.  Generally,
>people do not aim for the ground or feet with such things.  Why? well, the
>way people think does not always make sense.
>

*shrug* That's a kind of mentality thing (relating to experience, which 
other games you've played, etc.) so it's hard to discuss one way or another. 
  My group, which are hardened D&D players, think of it in terms of the 
Fireball spell, which doesn't require that you "roll to hit" per se but 
instead the target tries to get out of the way.

Which adventure?  I'd be leery of anyone  advising anyone to hit someone 
with a Nuke.  Have folks been using the new Iron Oasis rules for massive 
damage vis a vis Nuke?  Yukkk...

>>2) Malias is a Doombringer.  A slight difference, but presumably DBs have
>>a little better chance of surviving an encounter with a powerful Templar
>>than a Doomsayer.  At best, a DB may have survived an Atomic Blast or ICBM
>>or something being Deflected back at them.
>
>True, although in the case of Deflection, they stand a very real chance of
>eating their own Blast which is a fatal to them as anyone.  Oh, their Syker
>buddy may have been deflected but would they notice that much?
>
>

Do Syker have a deflection ability?  I recall them having Negator, but 
that's not the same thing...

Actually, that raises a question I've had come up several times.  Can 
Doombringers be destroyed by _any_ Doomsayer miracles (including their 
own?!?)?  Granted, we don't really need a lot of Doombringers running around 
using Ground Zero.  Still, it seems mildly odd...

>>3) According to the Templars book, Templars now on (to put it bluntly ;) )
>>Silas' shit list .  Presumably they got there by being a formidable 
>>threat.
>>Part of why they're a formidable threat is...well, Deflection.
>
>Ok, Mr. Crow.  This is a valid argument to me.  I can deal with it. (note:
>as it is impossible to adequately convey over email, I *AM NOT* trying to
>be biting or sarcastic here{or anywhere else})
>
>

Other than the use of "Mr. Crow" (?!?) I didn't feel it was sarcastic.

Again part of it boils down to the whole hunter-nature of Doombringers.  As 
I noted later, I would tend to agree with your assessment if we were talking 
your average run-of-the-mill green-robe Doomsayer.  Of course, they're more 
the conversion-type anyway, depending on which viewpoint you take anyway...

>>4) The Greater Power lets the Templar deflect a Nuke directed against
>>anyone (in which case #1 above is a moot point, true).  And it's true
>>probably not too many folks have seen a Templar with that Greater Power
>>(and survived).
>>But a Templar only needs one level of Deflection to try and thwart a Nuke
>>directed at him.  So I don't think this is as big a rarely seen tactic as
>>made it out.
>The Greater Reward can leave you hatin' life if yer playing a Doomsayer.
>I guess how likely you are to survive seeing that greater reward is
>inversely proportional to how arcane your attacks are.  Letmetellya, the
>next Anti-Templar I fought I used an Auto-Shotgun on.
>

The Greater Reward is no great shakes for Syker opponents either.  :)  Of 
course, the next Anti-Templar you fight with your shotgun will probably have 
Guardian Angel, which is another pain-in-the-ass Reward and Greater Reward.  
;)

Really, it boils down to this for me.  Discussing Nuke is pointless.  Under 
the new Massive Damage rules, it becomes at least 50% more effective.  The 
area of effect now becomes controllable, and the damage goes up 
significantly (full damage on each of 1d6 locations?!?).  It's also now a 
pain in the ass to roll the damage against multiple spread-out targets.  
It's quite, frankly, a Radmiracle I'm not going to toss at PCs, whether 
they've got noticeable Templars in the group or not.

The PC in my group that has it seems to have gotten the message, and is 
holding back on it (although 'tis true that since we got Iron Oasis, he 
hasn't had much strategic opportunities to cast it).  If he does use it, 
this may be our starting point to ignore the Iron Oasis "errata."


>>Well keep in mind that "everyone firing at the ground" is not an option
>>for most HoE-magical abilities.  It won't work for ICBM, or MIRV, or
>>Atomic Blast, or Brain Blast, or...well, you get the idea.  So your
>>Templar in the case above probably isn't going to be too sore, and the
>>Marshall probably isn't going to do this tactic very often.
>
>My book is not here, but would it not work for ICBM?  I thought that had a
>Burst Radius.  I could be wrong here.
>
>

Don't have mine either, but I don't think it does.  Its advantage is that 
you can throw it in an arc over an obstacle and hit a target beyond.  
Alternately, you can just throw it as a single-shot more-powerful Atomic 
Blast.  The rules don't seem to _require_ that you toss it in an arc...

>>We are _only_ talking about Nuke here (and a relatively small subset of
>>other "area of effect" attacks like, say, Arson).  And the fact that it is
>>pretty easy to bypass Deflection is indeed a problem...but overall it
>>still means that Deflection gives the Templar an ability that lets him
>>bypass and reverse a wide range of attacks that other folks don't
>>have.  His inability to generally use Deflection 1-5 (w/o the Greater
>>Power) against Nuke just means in this one specific instance, he is on the
>>same level as everyone else.
>
>I dunno If I would call it a problem for people with Deflection. (like you
>went on to say).  I am talking more about practical foreknowledge (how much
>do the bad guys know) and less about game balance.
>
>

But the "bad guys" are you and me, the Marshals.  Above you were saying how 
"people" tend to think in terms of targeting a single person with Nuke.  
Fair enough.  I'm not going to try convince any player to have his Doomsayer 
think that way.  ;)

But for a NPC Doomsayer/bringer...I guess I'll have them think the way they 
think.  Which will probably reflect the way I think.  If I don't think 
there's any reason they'd target an individual over a ground-spot, they're 
not going to do it.

>granted.
>But Mindset is my whole point, and Deflection is 1 out of 22 Rewards.
>We disagree on human nature here, evidently.  That seems to be the key.
>
>

Well, I'm not sure we're disagreeing.  But to use Nuke requires a fair 
amount of strategic planning (How many are there?  How far are they spread 
out?)  Heck in some cases you may _have_ to deliberately aim for a 
ground-spot rather than a specific target to get the maximum # of targets 
within the area of effect.

And that last sentence is kinda my point.  It doesn't seem unreasonable to 
me that a NPC, who has already mastered the various art to casting a 
successful Nuke, is almost always going to think in terms of hitting for 
maximum area of effect, _not_ for hitting a specific target.  Such thinking 
would almost seem to be an inherent part of Nuke...kinda like how it is for 
casting a Fireball in D&D.

Again, if a player cares to think of Fireball in terms of Lightning Bolt 
casting (to use the D&D analogy) when it comes to using Nuke, more power to 
him.  But my impression is that folks tend to treat Fireball-type effects 
like Fireball-type effects, and Lightning Bolt-type effects like LB-type 
effects.  Nuke is definitely the former rather than the latter.

---

Steve Crow

"Worm Can Opener Extraordinare"

Check out my website at:  http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/4991/

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