Disclaimer:
The following material consists of rulings
on GURPS originally posted to electronic discussion forums, newsgroups,
and
mailing lists by Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch.
Some
of these statements have been taken out of context, or have been
altered for
clarity or brevity; therefore, these are not "official" rulings, and
neither Sean Punch nor Steve Jackson Games is responsible for the
accuracy of
the modified content.
Comments: If you have comments or suggestions about this file, please
contact Travis
Foster.
Magic
Explosive
Fireball
Re: I think I must be Making a Mistake W/Explosions?
As for Explosive Fireball, the way it worked in 3e was that it only did full damage to the target struck. It did 1d less to everyone in the same hex as the target or in an adjacent hex -- or 2d less to those two hexes distant. It magically stopped doing damage past that range, no matter what. See p. M38. So a 3d blast worked like this:
Target:
3d (10.5)
Target Hex: 2d (7)
1 Hex Out: 2d (7)
2 Hexes Out: 1d (3.5)
3+ Hexes Out: 0d (0)
In 4e, damage is full in the target hex, whether you're struck or not, and divided by three times distance in yards past that, out to yards equal to twice the dice of damage. So a 3d blast would work like this:
Target:
3d (10.5)
Target Hex: 3d (10.5)
1 Hex Out: 3d/3 (3.50)
2 Hexes Out: 3d/6 (1.75)
3 Hexes Out: 3d/9 (1.17)
4 Hexes Out: 3d/12 (0.875)
5 Hexes Out: 3d/15 (0.700)
6 Hexes Out: 3d/18 (0.583)
7+ Hexes Out: 0d (0)
The effect is that you can blow up everyone in a single hex much more effectively (10.5 vs. 7), do only half as much damage at 1-2 hexes away, but have a chance of wounding people at 3-6 hexes distance who could ignore the blast in 3e.
Force Dome and
Create Fire
Re: Mages even more overpowered
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Pagan Can't argue with official rulings :-) |
Bah, sure you can!
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Pagan But this does beg the question, has force
dome been re-worded so it only affects the mage and any willing
participants or can it still affect enemies. (Just not allow one to bbq them) |
If you manage to throw a big Force Dome around your enemies, they are trapped. If you then cast Create Fire in there, they will take damage each turn. My official ruling was only that you cannot suck the air out, really. And IMO, the GM should allow potential prisoners use the diving-for-cover rules to bail out of a Force Dome before it forms.
Re: Mages even more overpowered
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Kaell Well, if in fact the air is always warm,
fresh, and clean inside of it. To me, 'warm' means about 65-80 degrees
F, fresh means free of smoke as well. Fire is hotter than that, ergo no
fire inside force dome. |
The air right above the fire is comfortable, breathable, and smoke-free. The fire itself, being magical and fuelless, burns just fine. So if you could levitate just above it, you'd avoid the barbecue. Otherwise, everything in the fire would be a little crispy.
Mages, Cost of
Re: Mages even more overpowered
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Kuroshima That means, unless you allow for magery to go over 3, you've greatly increased
the number of points it takes to have a decent mage, while reduced the
number of points it takes to build a decent warrior... |
Yep. And that was the goal. Wizards at N points were about as potent as warriors built on 2N to 3N points in 3e. I think we're closer to parity in 4e. A warrior who buys up ST and focuses on 2-3 weapon skills will be far tougher in a fight than a mage. But note that wizards can become healers, sages, spies, thieves, etc. by spending 1 point on each of a few extra spells. Warriors are mostly just good at fighting. It's the fact that wizards are fundamentally generalists that makes them more expensive. Don't just look at combat effectiveness. That's not a useful or fair comparison.
Missile Spells
and Magery
Re: Working with magic, rules ?
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Ellie the Technomancer The only real drawback is that it
severely limits Magery 1 and 2 Mages,
restricting them to 1d damage every 2 seconds and 4d damage every 3
seconds respectively, instead of 3d and 6d damage every 4 seconds. |
I don't know about that . . . you can put up to Magery energy points into your Missile spell per
second,
for up to three seconds, no matter what your Magery
level is. So we get:
Magery 1: 1 second = 1d, 2 seconds = 2d, 3
seconds = 3d
Magery 2: 1 second = 2d, 2 seconds = 4d, 3
seconds = 6d
Magery 3: 1 second = 3d, 2 seconds = 6d, 3
seconds = 9d
So Magery 1 wizards are no worse off than
in 3e.
Yeah, you could argue that the "free" attack ability in 3e made it
possible to deal more damage . . . but 3e wizards had to deal with Snap
Shot
and missing unless they aimed. In 4e, the time the 3e wizard needed for
Aim is
used for Attack.