[Sorcerer] A 'new' demon ability

[Doyce]

Hey all,

While digging through the archives looking for something to put into the Wiki regarding Daze (Some Demon abilities just never seemed to raise that many questions.), I ran across this.

(Paraphrased)

General 'combat damage' applies to and affects all Attributes Scores. More specific penalties are usually handled through Demon Abilities like Daze, where penalties resulting from such rolls are focused on specific types of conflicts, not on scores.

Hmm.

So, if you wanted to create a Demon Ability that applied a penalty to the target's social interaction (for instance)... it would be appropriate to create a variant of Daze that would inflict penalties in any socially manipulative situation regardless of what score the victim is using (in the same way that Daze applies penalties to all Perception rolls, regardless of the base Score being used).

For instance:

Pariah
The user hits the target with a combat roll to subtract Power from all the target's social interaction rolls; the effect lasts for a few minutes (Demon's Power?), but that 'timer' does not generally go into play until the target enters a social situation.

Personally, I've always been impressed that very very few new Abilities have been introduced on the list over the years, and I don't even think this entirely qualifies, since it's just a riff off an existing Ability, but it seems kind of fun -- I can envision a pretty fun Passer Demon with this ability. :)

Thoughts?

[Nev the Deranged]

Sounds interesting.

 I was thinking about a "new" ability myself, but decided to try to build it out of existing ones. It's not really that new of an idea, but I thought it would be interesting:

Perception: Covers
Nonlethal Special Damage: Cover only.
Boost: Cover

Basically this demon "borrows" the knowledges and skills of other people for its master's temporary use. While the sorcerer is using them, the original owners find they are remarkable forgetful and clumsy, fumbling tasks that should be second nature to them.

Sort of like (although I hate to use this for any kind of reference) in Space Jam when the aliens stole the NBA stars' "game" (IE skillz) for their own use. Or when Dr. Evil stole Austin Powers' mojo.

I suppose you could adapt this for any stat, Stamina, Will, even Lore. Would be interesting.

Actually, that would make a really interesting superhero concept... a hero who has to borrow the strength of those around him for his powers... sort of a metaphysical vampiric thing. Like, he can lift the car off the little girl with no problem, but everyone within fifty yards goes all faint and weak while he's doing it.

Umm.. I'm babbling again, aren't I... >.<

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Doyce, I think that's probably within the range of "severely customizing Daze," but an even better way to put it is to open up Daze to affect any single class of actions. As long as it doesn't affect a score, but rather a category of action, then it works fine.

My only real concern is that such a concept opens up the rules to bullying, whether by GM or by anyone else. So perhaps altering Daze to a rules-set like Travel, in which I lay out the available categories that it may affect, would be a good idea.

Best,
Ron

[Doyce]

Ron,

Sounds like a good plan all around.  I'm certainly open to suggestions -- I was mainly just jazzed that I'd found a kind of fun use for a power that, right now is kind of ignored in my play group.