[Torg] Reality Storms

[Steve Crow]

Trying to combine a response to all relevant posts.
>>Until you
invoke one against the wrong enemy. There's an awful lot at stake when you
invoke a reality storm. Often you will only gain a small number of Possibilities,
but if you lose, you can easily lose 20 or 30 (in the form of what is needed to
buy your Reality skill back up to where it was).

 >


Obviously, a GM can build a "reality-strong"
opponent. Just as a PC can. The problem is, the PCs often have no idea whether
to judge if an opponent is the "wrong enemy" or not prior to invoking a reality storm.

 

I find that odd because once you invoke a Maelstrom, there
is no limit on the number of Possibilities you gain. Why would someone only
gain a small number?

 

Also, stealing possibilities is the best defense against a
"wrong enemy." The more possibilities you get, the more you can
increase your reality to deal with any future wrong enemies.

 

>My
experiences were quite different. PCs who invoked storms lost as often as they
won, and even when they won it was rare for them to come out more than a
handful of P-Points ahead of where they were when they went into it. I can
recall maybe one case where they got a maelstrom result and milked it for
points, every other time it's either been a rush to finish off the bad guy or a
struggle not to lose.

>


Why the rush? Once a Maelstrom locks the radius, and if
the initial radius was relatively small, there seems no in-game reason for a PC
to break off a IRS.




>Vast
majority? The boss villain should be P-Rated, maybe his major sidekick, but the
majority of the bad guys that the heroes encounter should be Ords.

>
I misspoke slightly. I meant that the majority of
encounters, and certainly dramatic encounters, feature at least one P-rated
opponent. For the sake of argument, I'm only concerned about the dramatic
encounters.


 

(Although two interesting questions: approved actions
don't matter in a reality storm, but do the action modifiers, the Ups and
Flurries and so on, kick in? Also, by definition should any IRS be
"dramatic," so you should always use the dramatic line resolution?)

 

>I've often
used the collateral damage to make them less desireable by PCs.  The
deaths of hundreds or thousands of Ords tend to cause guilty feelings. 
They can cancel Connection cards, they can cancel or make more difficult Glory
cards, and they can cause P-rated antagonists to arise and attempt to stop the
PCs simply for no other reasons than to prevent further mayhem. 
"Antagonist" simply means someone attempting to stop the
"protagonists," with no implied villainy or evilness involved.

>
That is
unfortunately somewhat variable, based on the strength of the storm, the
location of the PCs, and the radius multipliers rolled or not rolled. All of
these factors combined seemed to make it difficult to bring balance and/or
create an effective deterrence. You can't stage every dramatic encounter around
hundreds or thousands of Ords.


 

>And don't
forget the ultimate P-rated antagonists: the High Lords (scary) and their
Darkness Devices (scarier).  A DD can sense reality storms in its cosm or
realm; it can dimthread an agent into the mix quite quickly.  DDs tend to
frown on those who have been taking "their" possibilities from the
realm/cosm.  High Lords aren't too pleased with that, either.

>
And do...
what? Persons in a reality storm can't be affected by anyone outside of it.
Also, that doesn't account for reality storms conducted in Core Earth, which
still accounts for a majority of CE's reality.


 

That approach also presents another problem: while one or
two PCs might consistently invoke reality storms, all the PCs have to deal with
the consequences of a ticked off High Lord. :)


>Additionally,
going with KJ, I've seen half the storms result in losses to the invoking PCs,
and half result in gains.  Only a few I have seen have resulted in
maelstroms with lots of possibilities. 


>
All I can say
is that it seems to happen with some regularity. Keep in mind that a PC can go
into an IRS armed with the cards they need by trading beforehand. You'd be
surprised what a well-placed Presence card will do to get to to a Maelstrom
result.



>Should you
find a PC in your game who walked away from a maelstrom with a total of 30-40+
possibilities, I'd suggest bringing that character to the attention of the
higher powers of the area, those who will be less than pleased with the PCs.


>
Well, they've
already done that even without IRSs. :) That simply seems like a justification
to throw tougher opponents at them, which I would do anyway. To wildly paraphrase
Dr. Manhattan: there's no difference in the toughness of an opponent you've
designed for the adventure, and an opponent you throw in because the PCs
snatched a bunch of possibilities in an IRS.

Also, I'll admit a seeming flaw of the above is that you're letting a game mechanic drive your campaign. If the rules lead to such an abuse that you have to start creating what are essentially Nemesis subplots to deal with use of the rule... that suggests a flaw in the rule. not the players' use of it.

 

-----

 

It seems like the "limit" should be the # of
possibilities a PC (or NPC) can grab. The idea of grabbing dozens or hundreds
from a maelstrom, and draining them all from the surrounding area, would have
serious repercussions. Or that there should be some limit. Being able to drain
potentially hundreds of possibilities out of an area seems much more effective
and dangerous than a Darkness Device doing the same thing to a stelae-bounded
triangle zone.
Taking a larger look, it seems that having a skill that in some part lets you gain experience would inevitably cause problems. It didn't seem to be addressed in the R&E, which I found a little odd.





---

Steve Crow

"Logic merely enables one to be wrong with authority."

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


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