Innate Ranged Attack -- Opinions wanted

[imported_Rasyr]

One of the problems with an Innate Ranged Attack is that unless it is limited in some fashion, it can quickly become overly used and/or abused in some fashion.


For normal spell users, they are limited by Spell Points. Archers are limited by their number of arrrows.

We need some such limitation on this talent as well

The question is....

Should I make it a flat number (i.e. 10 or 15 shots before needing rest) or should I base it on a Stat or should I do something like have it cost the character a number of hit points equal to half the Base Damage it deals (i.e. an innate ranged attack that has 6 points of Base Damage would cost 3 hit points per shot).

I want opinions on this please.... Or even alternative options that might work

[Fidoric]

For those attack which are not magical by nature, I would suggest using constitution as it reflects the ability to endure stress and  producing such an attack is likely a stress for the body.
I think you can either use constitution stat or constitution bonus*level or size (tiny=1, small=2..., huge=5) as a daily base. According to creatures, some attacks may be usable only on bonus times per day ?
A possible option would be to consider that different attack size have different costs. For example, a focused dragon breath (bolt) could cost 1 attack whereas a large cone attack with 15' radius effect could cost 3.

[imported_Rasyr]

The talent gives a single attack that does 6 points of Base Damage (there is a Feature that allows for increasing it up to 10 points Base Damage maximum). I wasn't planning on allowing the talent to be used for area attacks (too powerful, IMO).

Hmmmm...... I could leave the choice up to the player, to a certain degree (i.e. physical manifestation be based on Con, energy manifestations be based on Will, and Magical manifestations be based on Magic Stat - have a set of Power Points equal to given stat, and have it cost 2 points per shot - recover Power Points at same rate/speed as Spell Points.

[Fidoric]

I did not understood you were speaking about a talent for PCs. I was thinking about dragon breath and such attacks.
For PCs, I think 10 times a day is close to "at will". So your formula, maxing around that number, seems good to me. Maybe it could be a good thing to increase the cost of the 10 Base damage attack so that it costs 3 or 4 points.

[imported_Rasyr]

Well, I was originally thinking of making the cost be equal to half of the Base Damage done by the attack (so for the base talent, which has a Base Damage of 6, that would be 3 Power Points, while an attack that does does 10 points of Base Damage would cost 5 Power Points). That may actually be a better costing solution overall.

Thus, if a person has a Con of 20, instead of being able to fire 10 ranged attacks, they would only be able to do 6 (7 with a stat of 21) without resting for a bit (and again the point recovery would be identical to Spell Points)

[Fidoric]

I think it would be best that way.
Those talents are better appreciated IMO if they are scarce. Being able to cast it 4 or 5 times a day seems well-balanced to me.

[imported_Viktyr Korimir]

I understand the need to balance Innate Ranged Attack against people using conventional ranged weaponry, but is the ability to make a simple ranged attack something that needs to be use-limited?

[imported_Rasyr]

I understand the need to balance Innate Ranged Attack against people using conventional ranged weaponry, but is the ability to make a simple ranged attack something that needs to be use-limited?

I think so, yes. It does need to be limited, at least in a manner that prevents it from being overly abused. Perhaps one method, beyond the usage of power points as described above, would be to allow it to continue to be used AFTER the character runs out of power points, and having it cost the character a number of hit points equal to the Base Damage of the ability.

for example, using a basic Innate Ranged Attack - this shoots a bolt of chi energy at the foe and does 6 points of Base Damage. Character has a Willpower stat of 19. This allows him 6 bolts normally before he needs to rest. Once he has used the 6th bolt, he has 1 PP left, but that cannot be used since there aren't enough. So, any further attempts to use the Chi Bolt will incur a -2 penalty on that usage (i.e. attack roll) and it does 6 points of damage to the character.

This would allow him to continue using it, but it would have its costs as well, and the player would have to balance that cost against the usefulness of the ability...

[Fidoric]

That's a great ideau Rasyr. Maybe you could consider extending it to spell casting ?

[imported_Rasyr]

That's a great ideau Rasyr. Maybe you could consider extending it to spell casting ?

I will think about that. There would be some problems/issues involved that are not involved in Talents (such as how to set the hit point costs). I will however, take a look at the possibilities involved.

[Fidoric]

It would be simple to use the SP cost as a Hit cost.

[imported_Rasyr]

It would be simple to use the SP cost as a Hit cost.

Yes, it would be simplest, but it would also be very unbalanced, since SP costs are only loosely related to the amount of Base Damage done by a spell, and it also doesn't take into account how to handle the costs of non-attack spells either.

Also, I am not even sure that I want to include the HP bit as part of the talent itself. I may just make it an option that a GM can decide to add later on. And if I do that, I can then make it an option that is viable for all of the different types of spell/power points

[Fidoric]

I understand that. Another possible option (one I used in an old campaign) would be to substract the cost of the spell (SP or whatever cost you chose) to be substracted from the magic stat. This way, the more spell you cast, the lesser your ability become with maybe a character with his stat reduced to 12 (+0 bonus) unable to cast further spells until some recovery.
That's a simple idea, though certainly not so easily put into rules.
But that's why it's great to have you there Rasyr ! 

[imported_Rasyr]

ooooo.... I like that stat reduction idea as well. That also makes for a good option - especially for spells/spell points...

[imported_Viktyr Korimir]

I really like that.