Effects

=POWER EFFECTS= Players spend character points on various powers for their heroes, like acquiring skills or other traits. A power is made up of one or more effects, possibly with different modifiers, which increase or decrease the cost of the effects. Effects can be used to create any number of different powers. A hero with the Concealment effect could use it to create a power called Blending, Blur, Cloak, Invisibility, Shadowmeld, or anything else appropriate to the character you wish to play. It’s all a matter of how powerful the effect is and what modifiers have been placed on it to increase or decrease its performance. Another way to think of it is that this book is filled with effects, but your character sheet is filled with powers.

POWER COSTS
Power effects are acquired in ranks, like ranks for other traits. The more ranks an effect has, the greater its effect. Each effect of a power has a standard cost per rank.

EFFECT TYPES
Power effects fall into certain categories or effect types. Effects of the same type follow similar rules and provide descriptors for certain other effects. This section discusses the different effect types and the rules governing them.

ATTACK
Attack effects are used offensively in combat. They require an attack check and damage, hinder, or otherwise harm their target in some way. Attack effects require a standard action to use. Their duration is usually instant although their results—whether damage or some other hindrance—may linger until the target recovers. Attack effects always allow for a resistance check.

CONTROL
Control effects grant the user influence over something, from the environment to the ability to move objects or even create them out of thin air. Control effects require a standard action to initiate, but can then usually be sustained. Control effects used against unwilling targets usually require an attack check and allow a resistance check, the same for the hazards they are capable of causing, such as creating intense cold or dropping a heavy object on someone.

DEFENSE
Defense effects protect in various ways, typically offering a bonus to resistance checks, or granting outright immunity to particular effects or conditions. Most defense effects work only on the user and are subtle and permanent, functioning at all times. Some are activated and sustained as a free action, meaning they can switch on or off, but can potentially leave the user unprotected.

GENERAL
General effects don’t fit into any other particular category. They’re not governed by any special rules other than those given in the effect’s description.

MOVEMENT
Movement effects allow characters to get around in various ways. Some provide a speed rank with a particular form of movement—such as ground, air, or water—while others offer different modes of movement, like walking on walls or slithering along the ground like a snake.

Although activating a movement effect is typically a free action, the character must still take a move action in order to actually move using the effect. So, for example, the action of the Flight effect is “free” and activating it grants the character a Flightspeed rank equal to the effect rank. Moving that speed rank still requires a move action, however.

SENSORY
Sensory effects enhance or alter the senses. Some sensory effects improve the user’s senses while others grant entirely new senses or fool the senses in some way. Sensory effects are typically a free action to activate and sustain, or are permanent and always in effect.

SENSE TYPES
Senses are grouped into sense types, descriptors for how different sensory effects work. The sense types, and some of the senses included in them, are:
 * Visual: normal sight, darkvision, infravision, low-light vision, microscopic vision, ultravision, X-Ray vision
 * Auditory: normal hearing, sonar (accurate ultrasonic), ultrasonic hearing
 * Olfactory: normal smell and taste, scent Tactile: normal touch, tremorsense
 * Radio: radio, radar (accurate radio)
 * Mental: mental awareness, Mind Reading, Precognition, Postcognition
 * Special: This is the catchall for other sensory descriptors not given above, including unusual senses or exotic descriptors like cosmic, gravitic, magical, and so forth.

HOW POWERS WORK
Using powers is a fairly simple matter. Some power effects work automatically. Others—particularly those affecting other people—require some effort to use, like an attack check or a effect check. Powers affecting others allow resistance checks against their effects.

EFFECT CHECKS
In some cases, you may be required to make an effect check to determine how well an effect works. A power check is just like any other check: d20, plus the power’s rank, plus any applicable modifiers, against a difficulty class set by the Gamemaster. The results of various power checks are described below. Effect Check = d20 + rank + modifiers vs. difficulty class

ROUTINE EFFECT CHECKS
Many power effects allow for routine checks involving their use, generally specified in the effect’s description (see Routine Checks in The Basics).

OPPOSED EFFECT CHECKS
In some cases, usually when one effect is used directly against another, or against a particular trait like an ability or skill, an opposed check is called for (see Opposed Checks in The Basics). If a contest is entirely a matter of whose power is greater, a comparison check is called for; the character with the higher power rank wins automatically.

EFFECT PARAMETERS
Each effect has certain parameters that describe the time needed to use the effect, the subject or target, the distance it works at, and so forth. The basic effect parameters are Action, Range, and Duration.

ACTION
Using or activating an effect requires a particular amount of time. See Actions, for details about the different types of actions. Modifiers may change the action needed to use an effect.
 * Standard: Using the effect requires a standard action.
 * Move: Using the effect requires a move action.
 * Free: It requires a free action to use or activate the effect. Once an effect is activated or deactivated, it remains so until your next turn. As with all free actions, the GM may limit the total number of effects a hero can turn on or off in a turn.
 * Reaction: It requires no action to use the effect. It operates automatically in response to something else, such as an attack.
 * None: It requires no action to use the effect. It is always active.

RANGE
Each effect has a default range, which may be changed by modifiers.
 * Personal: The effect works only on you, the user.
 * Close: The effect can target anyone or anything you touch. Touching an unwilling subject requires an unarmed attack check against the subject’s Parry.
 * Ranged: The effect works at a distance, limited by perception and path and requiring a ranged attack check against the subject’s Dodge defense. A ranged effect has a short range of (rank x 25 feet), a medium range of (rank x 50 feet) and a long range of (rank x 100 feet). Ranged attack checks at medium range suffer a –2 circumstance penalty, while ranged attacks at long range suffer a –5 circumstance penalty. See Action & Adventure for details.
 * Perception: The effect works on any target you can perceive with an accurate sense, without any need for an attack check. If you cannot accurately perceive the target, you cannot affect it. Rank: The effect’s range or area of effect is determined by its rank, as given in its description.

DURATION
Each effect lasts for a particular amount of time, which may be changed by modifiers.
 * Instant: When used, the effect occurs and ends in the same turn, although its results may linger.
 * Concentration: You can keep a concentration effect going by taking a standard action each round to do so. If you are incapable of taking the necessary action, or simply choose not to, the effect ends.
 * Sustained: You can keep a sustained effect going by taking a free action each round to do so. If you are incapable of taking the necessary action, or simply choose not to, the effect ends.
 * Continuous: The effect lasts as long as you wish, without any action required on your part. Once active, it stays that way until you choose to deactivate it (a free action).
 * Permanent: The effect is always active and cannot be deactivated, even if you want to. A permanent effect cannot be improved using extra effort.

RESISTANCE CHECK
Effects targeting other characters allow a resistance check. The defense used and the difficulty class depend on the effect and its modifiers.

Willing characters can forgo their resistance check against an effect, if they wish. This includes characters who think they’re receiving a beneficial effect, even if they’re not! You can’t forgo Toughness checks, but you may choose to discontinue the use of effects with a duration of Continuous or Sustained that grant a Toughness bonus in order to lower your resistance.

The Immunity effect allows characters to ignore certain effects altogether, removing the need for a resistance check.

COUNTERING EFFECTS
In some circumstances the effects of one power may counter another, negating it. Generally for two effects to counter each other they must have opposed descriptors. For example, light and darkness powers can counter each other as can heat and cold, water and fire, and so forth. In some cases, such as magical or mental effects, powers of the same descriptor can also counter each other. The GM is the final arbiter as to whether or not an effect with a particular descriptor can counter another. The Nullify effect can counter any effect of a particular descriptor!

HOW COUNTERING WORKS
To counter an effect, you must take the ready action. In doing so, you wait to complete your action until your opponent tries to use a power. You may still move, since ready is a standard action.

You must be able to use the readied effect as a standard action or less. Effects usable as a reaction do not require a ready action; you can use them to counter at any time. Effects requiring longer than a standard action cannot counter during action rounds (although they may be able to counter ongoing effects, see the following section).

If an opponent attempts to use a power you are able to counter, use your countering effect as your readied action. You and the opposing character make effect checks (d20 + rank). If you win, your two powers cancel each other out and there is no effect from either. If the opposing character wins, your attempt to counter is unsuccessful. The opposing effect works normally.
 * Example: Thetis, goddess of the seas, is fighting the Silver Knight. The hate-mongering villain hurls a blast of white-hot fire (a Ranged Damage effect). Having prepared an action, Thetis’s player says she wants to counter Silver Knight’s fire blast with her water powers. The GM agrees the two powers should be able to counter each other, so he asks Thetis’s player to make a Water Control effect check, while he makes a Fire Control effect check for Silver Knight. Thetis’s player rolls a result of 26 while the GM rolls a result of 19 for Silver Knight. Thetis successfully counters the flame blast, which fizzles out in a gout of steam.

COUNTERING ONGOING EFFECTS
You can also use one power to counter the ongoing effect of another, or other lingering results of an instant effect (like flames ignited by a fiery Damage effect). This requires a normal use of the countering effect and an opposed check, as above. If you are successful, you negate the effect (although the opposing character can attempt to reestablish it normally).
 * Example: Mindmaster has placed Johnny Comet under his mental control (an Affliction effect). Lady Justice has the power to break such bonds (the Nullify effect). She shines the light of liberty on her teammate and makes an effect check (d20 + her Nullify rank). The GM makes a check of d20 + Mindmaster’s Affliction rank. If Lady Justice wins, Johnny is free of Mindmaster’s control. If she fails, the Victory League will have to come up with another plan to neutralize their super-fast teammate without hurting him.

INSTANT COUNTERING
You can spend a victory point to attempt to counter another power as a reaction, without the need to ready an action to do so. See victory points for details.

EFFECT NAME (TYPE)
Action • Range • Duration • Cost
 * Name: What the effect is called.
 * Type: The type of effect.
 * Action: The action required to use the effect: standard, move, free, reaction, or none.
 * Range: The range at which the effect operates: personal, close, ranged, perception, or rank.
 * Duration: The effect’s duration: instant, concentration, sustained, continuous, or permanent.
 * Cost: How many character points the base effect costs per rank.
 * Description: A description of the effect and what it does in game terms follows.

Affliction
Action: Standard • Range: Close • Duration: Instant • Cost: 1 point per rank

You can impose some debilitating condition or conditions on a target by making a close attack. You set the conditions your Affliction causes at each degree when you acquire it and they may not be changed. Higher degree conditions replace lower degree conditions and do not stack with them. See the possible conditions for each degree under the Affliction Resistance Check table. The target resists with Fortitude or Will defense (chosen when you take the effect):

AFFLICTION RESISTANCE CHECK

Fortitude or Will vs. DC [Affliction rank + 10]
 * Success: No effect.
 * Failure (one degree): The target is dazed, entranced, fatigued, hindered, impaired, or vulnerable (choose one). Potential descriptors include coughing or sneezing, creeping mental influence, drowsiness, euphoria, fear, itchiness, lethargy, nausea, pain, or tipsiness.
 * Failure (two degrees): The target is compelled, defenseless, disabled, exhausted, immobile, prone, or stunned (choose one). Potential descriptors include agonizing pain, confusion, ecstasy, momentary emotional or mental influence, paralysis, seizure, terror, or vomiting.
 * Failure (three degrees): The target is asleep, controlled, incapacitated, paralyzed, transformed or unaware (choose one).

The target of an Affliction makes a resistance check at the end of each of his turns to remove first and second degree conditions. Third degree conditions require a minute of recovery time or outside aid, such as the Treatment skill or Healing effect (DC 10 + rank).

The exact nature and descriptors of the Affliction are up to you, chosen when you acquire the effect, with the GM’s approval; some examples are provided, but feel free to make up your own.

EXTRAS
 * Alternate Resistance: Some Afflictions may be initially resisted by Dodge, representing the need for quick reaction time or reflexes to avoid the effect. In this case, the later resistance checks to remove the Affliction’s conditions are typically still based on Fortitude or Will. For example, a target might make a Dodge check to avoid a blinding light or spray of liquid, but a Fortitude check to eliminate the effect if the initial Dodge fails. +0 cost per rank.
 * Concentration: Once you have hit with a Concentration Affliction, so long as you continue to take a standard action each turn to maintain the effect, the target must make a new resistance check against it, with no attack check required. +1 cost per rank.
 * Cumulative: Normally, an Affliction does not have a cumulative effect on the same target, so getting two results of one degree, one after the other, has no more or less effect than a single one degree result; you have to get a higher degree with a later attack, which replaces the initial result. A Cumulative Affliction adds any further degrees to the existing degrees on the target. For example, if you hit a target and impose a vulnerable condition (one degree), then attack again and get one degree on the effect, you impose the Affliction’s second degree condition. +1 cost per rank.
 * Extra Condition: Your Affliction imposes an additional condition per degree of success. So with one application of this extra, your Affliction imposes two conditions—such as dazed and hindered, or impaired and vulnerable—rather than just one. With two applications, it imposes three conditions, and so forth. Since mutually incompatible conditions are largely wasted, Afflictions with this extra often have the Limited Degree flaw as well. +1 cost per rank.
 * Progressive: This modifier causes an Affliction to increase incrementally without any effort from you. If the target fails a resistance check to end the Affliction, it not only persists, but increases in effect by one degree! So a target affected by the first degree of a Progressive Affliction who fails to resist progresses to the second degree of the effect at the start of his next round. A successful resistance check still ends the Affliction, as usual. +2 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Instant Recovery: Similar to the Reversible extra, the target of an Affliction effect with this modifier recovers automatically, no check required, at the end of the round in which the duration ends. So, for example, an instant duration Affliction only lasts one round, while a sustained duration Affliction lasts until no longer sustained. –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited Degree: Your Affliction is limited to no more than two degrees of effect. With two applications of this modifier, it is limited to no more than one degree of effect. –1 cost per rank.

Alternate Form
Effect: Varies, Activation effects total –1 or 2 points

You can transform into something other than mere flesh and blood, from a body of organic steel to a cloud of gas, a mass of liquid, a swarm of tiny insect-sized robots, or anything else you want to develop. Choose a set of effects that reflect the capabilities of your Alternate Form, based on the examples following. Then choose the action required to assume your Alternate Form: if it requires a move action, subtract 1 character point from the total cost of the effects. If it requires a standard action, subtract 2 points. See the Activation flaw for details.

Some potential Alternate Forms (and their possible effects) include:
 * Energy: You are made up of energy, such as fire or electricity: Damage (close or ranged), Flight, Immunity, Insubstantial 3, and Teleport (Energy Medium).
 * Gaseous: You are a cloud of gas, like fog or mist: Affliction (Suffocate), Concealment (Visual, Attack), Flight, Immunity, and Insubstantial 2.
 * Ghost: You are incorporeal and invisible, largely unaffected by the physical world: Concealment (Visual), Flight, Immunity, and Insubstantial 4.
 * Heroic: You have a distinct “hero” form, in addition to your “normal” form. Essentially, all your powers have the Activation modifier! The inability to assume your heroic form might also constitute a complication for you from time to time.
 * Liquid: You are made up of liquid (such as water): Affliction (Suffocate), Concealment (Visual, Limited to Underwater), Elongation, Immunity, Insubstantial 1, and Swimming.
 * Particulate: Your body is composed of a granular or particulate substance like sand, dust, salt, and so forth: Damage, Elongation, Immunity, Insubstantial 1, and Movement (Slithering).
 * Shadow: You transform into a living shadow: Concealment (Visual, Limited to Darkness and Shadows), Immunity, Insubstantial 4, and Movement (Slithering, Wall-crawling).
 * Solid: You are made up of a hard solid substance like stone or metal: Enhanced Stamina, Enhanced Strength, Immunity, and Protection.
 * Swarm: Your “body” is actually thousands of other tiny creatures: insects, worms, even little robots: Flight, Immunity, Insubstantial 2, and Movement (Slithering, Wall-crawling).
 * Two-Dimensional: You can flatten yourself to become almost infinitely thin: Concealment (Visual, Limited to One Side), Damage (Penetrating – sharp edges), Insubstantial 1 (for slipping through narrow spaces), and Movement (Slithering).

Blast
Effect: Ranged Damage • 2 points per rank

You can make a damaging ranged attack. It might be a blast of energy, a projectile (arrow, bullet, throwing blade, etc.), or some similar effect. You make a ranged attack check against the target’s Dodge defense. The attack’s damage equals your power rank and the target makes a Toughness resistance check against it.

Burrowing
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 1 point per rank

You can burrow through the ground, leaving a tunnel behind if you choose. You move through soil and sand at a speed rank equal to your Burrowing rank, minus 5. So Burrowing 8, for example, lets you move through the ground at speed rank 3 (around 16 MPH). Burrowing through hard clay and packed earth reduces speed one additional rank. Burrowing through solid rock reduces it by two additional ranks. The tunnel you leave behind is either permanent or collapses behind you immediately (your choice when you begin burrowing each new tunnel).

Note that Burrowing differs from the Permeate effect of Movement, which allows you to pass through an obstacle like the ground at your normal speed without disturbing it at all (see Movement).

EXTRAS
 * Penetrating: Normally, the hardness of the ground affects only the speed at which you burrow. At the GM’s discretion, some super-hard materials may be considered Impervious to Burrowing, in which case this extra allows you to dig through them. • 1 point per rank.
 * Ranged: This extra either allows you to create tunnels at a greater distance (without having to be at the end-point of the tunnel as it forms) or, in conjunction with Affects others, allows you to grant the Burrowing effect to someone else at a distance. Doing both requires two applications of the extra. +1 or 2 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Limited: Burrowing may be limited to certain circumstances or materials, such as only loose sand and soil (leaving the character unable to burrow through dense clay or solid rock), or only snow and ice (being unable to burrow through earth and soil at all). –1 cost per rank.

Communication
Action: Free • Range: Rank • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 4 points per rank

You can communicate over a distance using a medium other than your normal voice. Choose a sense type as your Communication medium (see the list of examples). You may also use a special sense type (like neutrinos, gravitons, magical sendings, and so forth) noticeable only to an appropriate form of the Detect effect (see Senses), at the GM’s discretion.
 * Visual: laser or fiber optic link
 * Auditory: ultrasonic or infrasonic beam, “ventriloquism”
 * Olfactory: pheromones or chemical markers
 * Tactile: vibratory carrier wave
 * Radio: AM, FM, and short-wave radio bands, micro-waves
 * Mental: telepathic transmission, psychic link, mystical sending

Your rank determines you maximum Communication range:

RANGE
The range of communication is equal to distance as shown on the Rank Chart equal to (Communication Rank+1).

Communication is instantaneous with any subject within your range.

The recipient of your communication must be within range and have a means of receiving your transmission (super-sense, or a receiver of some sort; conscious awareness is all that’s needed to “receive” Mental Communication). You can receive Communication of the same medium as your own. Receivers can choose to ignore your Communication, if they wish. Communication is language-dependent; you and the subject must share a common language (see Comprehend to communicate across language barriers). Your Communication is point-to-point (sent to a single receiver within your range).

Activating your Communication effect is a free action. Communicating, however, takes the normal amount of time. You can apply the Rapid modifier to speed things up, provided your recipient is capable of receiving communication at that speed.

Others with an acute sense able to detect your Communication medium can “tap into” your transmissions with a Perception check (DC 10 + your Communication rank). The eavesdropper must be within normal sensory range of you or the receiver. With two degrees of success on the check, the eavesdropped can also understand your transmissions. Effects like Concealment and Dazzle that target your Communication medium can “jam” or block your transmissions.

EXTRAS
 * Area: You can broadcast omni-directionally to every receiver within your maximum Communication range at once. Note this extra is only strictly necessary to communicate with everyone over a wide area all at once; since using and maintaining Communication are free actions, the GM may allow a communicator to establish and maintain contact with multiple discrete receivers—such as the members of the same team—all in the same round. +1 cost per rank.
 * Dimensional: Communication with this modifier can bridge dimensional barriers, reaching into other dimensions and planes of existence. The Communication effect still has its proximate range, and the GM may rule certain subjects “out of range” of the effect, depending on their relative positions in the other dimension. Flat +1 point.
 * Rapid: Your communication occurs 10 times faster than normal speech. Each additional rank increases communication speed by a factor of 10. This is useful for high-speed computer links, “deep sharing” psychic rapports, and so forth. Flat +1 point.
 * Selective: If you have the Area extra, you can choose which receiver(s) within range get your Communication, excluding everyone else. This allows you to go from a single receiver (point-to-point) to all potential receivers in range (omni-directional) or anywhere in between. +1 cost per rank.
 * Subtle: Your Communication cannot be “overheard” (it is encrypted, scrambled, or otherwise protected). With 2 ranks, your Communication cannot even be detected (that is, no one can even tell you are transmitting, much less what you’re saying). Flat +1 or 2 points.

FLAWS
 * Limited: Communication may be limited to only members of a particular group, such as a species, family, members of an organization, and so forth. This is in addition to limitations imposed by medium (that is, requiring subjects to have a means of picking up on the Communication). –1 cost per rank.
 * Sense-Dependent: Communication itself is already sense-dependent (in that the subject(s) must be able to sense your communication medium to pick up your transmissions) and so cannot have this flaw. However, other perception range effects can be Communication-Dependent, meaning you must be in communication with your subject for them to work (using your Communication medium as a “carrier” for the other effect). If your Communication is blocked in any way, the other effect doesn’t work. -1 cost per rank.

Comprehend
Action: None • Range: Personal • Duration: Permanent • Cost: 2 points per rank

You can comprehend different sorts of communication. Each rank in this effect allows you to choose one of the following options:
 * ANIMALS: You can either speak to or comprehend animals. You can ask questions and receive answers, although animals are not any more friendly or cooperative than normal. furthermore, wary and cunning animals are likely to be terse and evasive, while especially stupid ones make inane comments. If an animal is friendly toward you, it may do some favor or service for you. For 2 ranks you can both speak to and understand the “speech” of animals.
 * LANGUAGES: You can either speak or understand the language of any intelligent creature. You can speak only one language at a time, although you can comprehend multiple languages at once. This effect does not enable you to speak with creatures that don’t possess a language. For 2 ranks you can both speak and understand all languages. For 3 ranks anyone able to hear you can understand what you’re saying, regardless of language. Being able to also read any language you comprehend requires 1 additional rank.
 * MACHINES: You can communicate with electronic devices, making inquiries and understanding their replies. This requires two Comprehend ranks. Most are limited by their programming and peripherals in terms of what they “know,” and may not be able to answer some inquiries with anything other than an “unknown” or “not found.” At the GM’s discretion, you can use the Technology skill as an interaction skill when communicating with machines.
 * OBJECTS: You can communicate with inanimate objects, granting them the ability to speak to you or simply “reading” impressions from them. This requires two Comprehend ranks. Objects only “know” about events directly affecting them or occurring in their immediate area. Gamemasters can apply the guidelines for Postcognition to this effect.
 * PLANTS: You can communicate with plants, both normal plants and plant creatures. This requires two Comprehend ranks. A plant’s sense of its surroundings is limited, so it won’t be able to give (or recognize) detailed descriptions or answer questions about events outside its immediate vicinity.
 * SPIRITS: You can communicate with incorporeal and normally invisible and inaudible spirit beings, such as ghosts or certain extradimensional entities, depending on the context of the setting. Rank 1 essentially allows you to function as a “medium” of sorts, able to perceive spirits and relay what you see and hear. Rank 2 allows you to be clearly under-stood by denizens of the spirit world, as well. At the GM’s discretion, this effect may extend to undead creatures, demons, or other supernatural entities, depending on the setting.

FLAWS
 * Type: You can only comprehend a broad type of subject (only elves, canines, avians, or sea creatures, for example). For an additional flaw, you can only comprehend a narrow type of subject (dogs, falcons, or dolphins, for example). Broad –1 cost per rank. Narrow –2 cost per rank.

Concealment
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 2 points per rank

You gain total concealment from a particular sense while this effect is active, although you are still detectable to other senses (even other senses of the same sense type; so you could have full concealment against normal sight, but not infravision or any other sense in the sight sense type). Each additional rank gives you concealment from another sense; two ranks give you concealment for an entire sense type. See Concealment for full effects.

Concealment from visual senses costs double (2 ranks for one visual sense, 4 ranks for all visual senses). You cannot have concealment from tactile senses, since that requires being incorporeal (see Insubstantial effect). So with Concealment 5, you can have total concealment from all visual senses (4 ranks) and normal hearing (1 rank), for example. With Concealment 10 you have total concealment from all sense types other than tactile.

EXTRAS
 * Affects Others: This modifier allows you to grant Concealment to others while you are touching them, or at range, if you also apply the Range modifier. +1 cost per rank.
 * Area: Concealment with Affects Others (previously) or attack (immediately following) may have this extra, affecting everything in the area. To only affect some targets in the area, apply the Selective modifier as well. +1 cost per rank.
 * Attack: Use this extra for a Concealment effect you can impose on others (whether they want to be concealed or not). An invisibility ray, for example, is a Visual Concealment Attack, while a field of darkness is a Burst Area Visual Concealment Attack. +0 cost per rank.
 * Precise: You can vary your Concealment at will as a free action: going from total to partial to no concealment, concealing some parts and not others, or anywhere in-between. If your Concealment affects multiple senses, you can also choose to affect some of those senses and not others. Concealment is normally all-or-nothing: either you are concealed to the full amount of your effect, or you’re not. Flat +1 point.

FLAWS


 * Blending: You “blend” into the background. Your Concealment only functions as long as you move no faster than your (ground speed rank –1), since your blending can’t adapt faster than that. -1 cost per rank.
 * Limited: Your Concealment only works under certain conditions, such as in fog, shadows, or in urban locales. One example is Limited to Machines, where your Concealment only fools senses with a technological descriptor. -1 cost per rank.
 * Partial: Your effect provides partial rather than total concealment (see Concealment). -1 cost per rank.
 * Passive: Your Concealment only lasts until you do something requiring an attack or effect check on your part, at which point it stops working until you reactivate it, which you may do on the following round. -1 cost per rank.
 * Resistible: Your Concealment offers a resistance check (chose a defense when the flaw is applied) for anyone aware of your presence and actively looking for you. Concealment Resistible by Will may represent some sort of mental illusion effect. -1 cost per rank.

CONCEALMENT AND PERCEPTION RANGE
Perception range effects must accurately perceive a target in order to affect it. This generally means you cannot target subjects with total concealment from your accurate senses with perception range effects. Thus, foes with Visual Concealment '(the most common accurate sense) can be quite effective against characters relying on perception range attacks, unless the attacker has an unusual accurate sense to circumvent the Concealment. This is one reason Visual Concealment costs extra.

At the Gamemaster’s discretion, a successful Perception check to accurately locate a target with an acute sense may allow you to use perception range effects on that target; however, the target still benefits from concealment, granting a +5 circumstance bonus to resistance against the effect.

Create
Action: Standard • Range: Ranged • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 2 points per rank

You can form solid objects essentially out of nowhere. They may be made of solidified energy, “hardened” water or air, transmuted bulk matter, ice, stone, or some other medium, depending on the effect’s descriptors.

You can form any simple geometric shape or common object (such as a cube, sphere, dome, hammer, lens, disk, etc.). The GM has final say on whether or not a particular object is too complex for this effect. Generally, your objects can’t have any moving parts more complex than a hinge. They can be solid or hollow, opaque or transparent, as you choose when you use the effect, limited by your descriptors and the Gamemaster’s judgment.

You can create an object with a maximum volume rank equal to your effect rank and Toughness equal to your effect rank. Created objects can be damaged or broken like ordinary objects. They also vanish if you stop maintaining them. You can repair any damage to a created object at will by using your effect again (essentially “re-creating” the object). Your created objects are stationary once you have created them, although other effects can move them. Assume a created object has a mass rank equal to its volume rank.

CREATED OBJECTS, COVER, AND CONCEALMENT

A created object can provide cover or concealment (if the object is opaque) just like a normal object. Cover provided by a created object can block incoming attacks, but blocks outgoing attacks as well. Attacks hitting the covering object damage it normally (see Damaging Objects). Indirect effects can bypass the cover a created object provides just like any other cover (see Indirect modifier). The Selective modifier allows you to vary the cover and concealment your objects provide.

TRAPPING WITH OBJECTS

You can trap a target inside a large enough hollow object (a cage or bubble, for example). This requires both an attack check against the target’s Dodge and a Dodge resistance check against the effect’s rank. A trapped character can break out of the object normally. Imposing conditions on the target other than just trapping them requires a separate effect, such as Affliction (see Affliction), which you may wish to acquire as an Alternate Effect of Create (see Alternate Effect).

DROPPING OBJECTS

Simply dropping a created object on a target is treated like an Area Effect attack based on the object’s size (see Area extra). The object inflicts damage equal to its Toughness, and targets get a Dodge check to evade the falling object. A successful check results in no damage (rather than the usual half damage).

While a created object can potentially be wielded as an improvised weapon, the effect cannot otherwise create attacks or other effects; you must acquire these effects separately (perhaps as Alternate Effects).

SUPPORTING WEIGHT

If a created object needs to support weight—created as a bridge or to support a weakened structure, for example—it has an effective Strength equal to its rank. You can “shore up” a created object by taking a standard action and concentrating, increasing its Strength by 1 until the start of your next round. You can also use extra effort to increase a created object’s Strength for one round, and these modifiers are cumulative.

EXTRAS
 * Continuous: Continuous Create makes objects that remain until they are destroyed, nullified, or you choose to dismiss them. +1 cost per rank.
 * Impervious: Applied to Create, this extra makes the objects’ Toughness Impervious. +1 cost per rank.
 * Innate: Continuous or Permanent Create with this modifier makes objects that cannot be nullified, they’re essentially “real” objects for all intents and purposes (although the user can “unmake” them at will unless the effect is also permanent). Flat +1 point.
 * Movable: You can move your created objects around with a Move Object effect at your Create rank (see Move Object). +1 cost per rank.
 * Precise: You can create more precise and detailed objects. The exact parameters of Precise Create are up to the GM, but generally, you can create objects with moving parts, and considerable detail. Flat +1 point.
 *  Selective:  You can make your created objects selectively “transparent” to attacks, blocking some while allowing others (yours and your allies’, for example) to pass through them. You can also selectively make your objects solid to some creatures and incorporeal to others, such as allowing one person to walk through a created wall, while blocking another. It takes a free action to change the selective nature of an object; permanent created objects cannot have their selectivity changed once they are created. +1 cost per rank.
 * Stationary: Your created objects can hang immobile in the air. They resist being moved with a Strength rank equal to the modifier rank. Unless you have the Tether extra or the Movable extra, you cannot move a stationary created object once it’s placed any more than anyone else can. +0 cost per rank.
 * Subtle: This modifier either makes created objects not noticeable as constructs for 1 rank (they look just like real objects) or not noticeable at all for 2 ranks (such as objects composed of invisible force). Flat +1or 2 points.
 * Tether: You have a connection to your created objects, allowing you to exert your own Strength to move them (provided you are strong enough to do so). Flat 1 point.

FLAWS
 * Feedback: You may suffer damage when your created objects are damaged (see Feedback flaw for details). -1 cost per rank.
 * Permanent: Permanent created objects last until destroyed or nullified. Unlike Continuous Create, you cannot choose to dismiss such objects; they are truly permanent. You cannot repair permanent created objects or otherwise alter them once they’re created. +0 cost per rank (for a Sustained effect).
 * Proportional: Your created objects have a total volume rank plus Toughness rank equal to your Create rank, rather than both volume and Toughness up to your rank. So you can create an object with volume rank 0 and Toughness equal to your Create rank, vice versa, or anywhere in between, so long as the sum of the two ranks does not exceed your Create rank. –1 cost per rank.

Under the Hood: Create vs. Summon

Create and Summon are similar effects: both “create” things out of nowhere. So when should a character have one and not the other?

Generally, Create makes inanimate objects, while Summon conjures creatures of some sort, capable of independent action (albeit limited in the case of mindless creatures like robots or zombies). So a character able to create “sculptures” of ice, for example: walls, slides, columns, and so forth, should have Create. A character able to call up animated snowmen, on the other hand, should have Summon, while a powerful “ice elemental” may very well have both effects!

Damage
Action: Standard • Range: Close • Duration: Instant • Cost: 1 point per rank

You can inflict damage on a target by making a close attack. The exact nature of your Damage is up to you, with the GM’s approval; it can be anything from a powerful impact to razor claws, energy fields, or some other damaging medium. The target resists with Toughness:

DAMAGE RESISTANCE CHECK Toughness vs. [Damage rank + 15]
 * Success: The damage has no effect.
 * Failure (one degree): The target has a –1 circumstance penalty to further resistance checks against damage.
 * Failure (two degrees): The target is dazed until the end of their next turn and has a –1 circumstance penalty to further checks against damage.
 * Failure (three degrees): The target is staggered and has a -1 circumstance penalty to further checks against damage. If the target is staggered again (three degrees of failure on a Damage resistance check), apply the fourth degree of effect. The staggered condition remains until the target recovers (see Recovery, following).
 * Failure (four degrees): The target is incapacitated.

The circumstance penalties to Toughness checks are cumulative, so a target who fails three resistance checks against Damage, each with one degree of failure, has a total –3 penalty.

If an incapacitated target fails a resistance check against Damage, the target’s condition shifts to dying. A dying target who fails a resistance check against Damage is dead.

STRENGTH AND DAMAGE

Strength provides a “built-in” Damage effect: the ability to hit things! You can apply effect modifiers to the damage your Strength inflicts, making it Penetrating or even an Area effect! You can also have Alternate Effects for your Strength Damage; see the Alternate Effect modifier for details. Like other Damage effects, a character’s Strength Damage is close range and instant duration by default.

If you choose, a Damage effect can be Strength-based—something like a melee weapon—allowing your Strength Damage to add to it. You add your Strength and Damage ranks together when determining the rank of the attack. Any modifiers applied to your Damage must also apply to your Strength rank if its bonus damage is to benefit from them. However, any decrease in your Strength reduces the amount you can add to your damage, and negative Strength subtracts from your Damage! Likewise, anything that prevents you from exerting your Strength also stops you from using a Strength-based Damage effect. If you can’t swing your fist, you can’t swing a sword, either. On the other hand, a laser blade or thuderbolt staff does the same damage whether you can exert your Strength with it or not.

DAMAGING OBJECTS

Objects (targets lacking a Stamina rank) take damage similar to other targets. Dazed and staggered results have no real effect on inanimate targets, since they do not take actions. Constructs, capable of action, are dazed and staggered normally (see Constructs).

Inanimate objects are defenseless by definition and therefore subject to finishing attacks (see Finishing Attack in Action & Adventure): essentially, you can choose between making your attack on the object as a routine check or, if you make the attack check normally, gaining an automatic critical hit if your attack hits, for a +5 bonus to effect. Attacking an object held or worn by another character is a smash action (see Smash in Action & Adventure for more details).

If an attacker’s intention is to bend, break or destroy an object, then two degrees of failure on the Toughness check results in a bend or break (such as a hole punched through the object) while three or more degrees of failure means the object is destroyed (shattered, smashed to pieces, etc.).
 * Example: Lady Justice, rescuing people from a tenement fire, is hemmed-in by collapsed debris. Her player decides to simply punch a path through. Since she’s going for maximum damage, she decides to make the attack check normally (rather than a routine check). Given her attack bonus, she’ll only miss on a natural 1 anyway. She succeeds and does her Strength in Damage, +5 for the automatic critical. The GM decides the brick, mortar, and heavy beams have Toughness 9 and makes a Toughness check, rolling a 7, against DC 30 (Lady Justice’s Damage + 15). A 15 result is three degrees of failure, so she easily smashes through the debris and clears the building, carrying people to safety!

The Toughness ranks of some common materials are shown on the Material Toughness table. The listed ranks are for about an inch (distance rank –7) thickness of the material: apply a +1 per doubling of thickness or a –1 per halving of it. So a foot of stone is Toughness 8. Equipment has Toughness based on its material. Devices have a base Toughness equal to the total points in the device divided by 5 (rounded down, minimum of 1).

TABLE: MATERIAL TOUGHNESS

RECOVERY

Living targets remove one damage condition per minute of rest, starting from their worst condition and working back. So a damaged character recovers from being incapacitated, then staggered, dazed, and finally removes a –1 Toughness check penalty per minute until fully recovered. The Healing and Regeneration effects can speed this process. Lasting or more serious injuries are handled as complications (see Lasting Injuries in Recovery section of Action & Adventure).

Objects, having no Stamina, do not recover from damage unless they have an effect like Regeneration. Instead, they must be repaired. See the guidelines under the Technology skill when repairing damaged objects.

Dazzle
Effect: Ranged, Cumulative Affliction, Limited to One Sense • 2 points per rank

You can overwhelm one of the target’s senses, chosen when you take this effect. The target makes a Fortitude or Will resistance check against your effect DC (choose one when you acquire the effect). One degree of failure leaves the sense impaired (–2 penalty). Two degrees leave it disabled (–5 penalty) while three degrees leave the sense unaware: The target automatically fails Perception checks involving the sense, and everything effectively has total concealment from that sense.

The target makes a new resistance check at the end of each turn to recover. Success removes the condition imposed by the Dazzle power. Failure means it persists.

Multiple Dazzle effects against the same sense are cumulative. If a target is already visually disabled, for example, another Visual Dazzle with one degree of success leaves the target blind, as if subjected to a Dazzle with two degrees of effect. Your Dazzle effect can work on more than one sense at once; apply the Extra Condition modifier for each additional sense affected.

Deflect
Action: Standard • Range: Ranged • Duration: Instant • Cost: 1 point per rank

You can actively defend for characters other than yourself, deflecting or diverting attacks against them at a distance, and may be able to more effectively defend yourself, depending on your rank. See the Defend action in Action & Adventure for details. You use your Deflect rank in place of an active defense. You still add 10 to a Deflect die roll of 10 or less, for a minimum roll of 11. Deflect modifiers are limited by power level. Like a ranged attack, if you Deflect at medium range, you have a –2 circumstance modifier on your check. At long range, you have a –5 circumstance modifier. Range is Measured from you to the target of the attack you are deflecting.

Like the defend action, Deflect does not work against area effects or perception ranged attacks, nor versus attacks targeting defenses other than Dodge or Parry.

EXTRAS
 * Action: Because it requires the defend action, Deflect cannot take less than a standard action. To create a kind of “deflection field” or similar effect that automatically deflects attacks over a wide area, use an Enhanced Dodge and/or Enhanced Parry effect with modifiers like Area and Selective.
 * Reflect: You can reflect attacks back at the attacker as a free action. First, you must successfully deflect the attack, then make a normal attack check using your own attack modifier to hit with the reflected attack. It has its normal effect if it hits. +1 cost per rank.
 * Redirect: You can redirect attacks you successfully deflect at any target within the attack’s normal range, as Reflect, above. You must have the Reflect extra to take this one. +1 cost per rank.

Duplication
Effect: Summon Duplicate, Active • 3 points per rank

You can create a duplicate of yourself. Your duplicate is a minion with the same traits as you, except for this power and any victory points. You can spend your own victory points for your duplicate’s actions.

You must have this power at a rank equal to your own character point total (not counting Duplication), divided by 15, and rounded up for your duplicate to possess your full abilities. If you have it at a lower rank, create your duplicate as a scaled-down version of yourself, with a power level equal to your rank in this power and starting character points determined accordingly (power rank x 15). So a power level 11 hero who has Duplication 8 creates a power level 8 “duplicate” with (08 x 15) 120 character points and proportionately lower-ranked traits.

Your duplicate thinks and acts just like you, so it is automatically helpful toward you. Gamemasters should generally allow the hero’s player to determine the duplicate’s actions. Your duplicate disappears if your power is countered for any reason. You can also make your duplicate disappear at will by turning off your power.

You can apply Summon modifiers to this power (see Summon). Use the Multiple Minions extra to be able to create multiple duplicates.

Element Control
Effect: Perception Ranged Move Object, Limited to Element • 2 points per rank

You can control and move a mass of an element like air, earth, or water. Your power’s effective Strength equals its rank, which is also the mass rank of the element you can move at once. So Earth Control 11 lets you move up to 50 tons of earth and stone, for example.

Element Control is further refined with various Alternate Effects (see Alternate Effects), expanding what you can do with your control. So Earth Control might let you kick up clouds of dust (Area Visual Concealment Attack), build walls and other structures of rock (Continuous or Permanent Create), tunnel through the ground (Burrowing), or fly standing on a chunk of rock (Platform Flight), to name a few. Alternate Effects you do not add to your power as full-fledged modifiers are still available to you as power stunts using extra effort (see Powers Stunts).

Elongation
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 1 point per rank

You can elongate your body and/or limbs to extend your reach. Add your effect rank to your normal size rank to determine how far you can elongate; for a normalsized human (size rank –2) this is 15 feet at rank 1, 30 feet at rank 2, and so forth. Rank 20 Elongation can stretch 1,000 miles! “Snapping back” to your normal shape is a free action.

You can use Elongation to make “close” attacks at a greater distance by elongating your limbs. Once elongated, you can make melee attacks within your new reach as a standard action. If you can’t accurately sense your target (you’re elongating around a corner, for example), apply the rules for concealment (see Concealment in Action & Adventure). In addition, Elongation allows you to wrap up and entangle an opponent so it grants a +1 bonus to grab checks per rank (limited by PL).

Energy Absorption
Effect: Enhanced Trait, Fades, Reaction • as base trait

You take the energy from a particular type of attack, chosen when you take this power, and use it to enhance one of your traits. Typically this is either Strength or a Ranged Damage effect of the same energy type as the initial attack, but other traits are possible, including Quickness, Regeneration, Speed, or the like. The enhancement to your trait is equal to your power rank or the attack’s rank, whichever is less.

The enhancement of the affected trait occurs automatically when you are subjected to the attack. Thereafter, the enhanced trait fades at a rate of 1 point per turn until it is gone. Further attacks can “top off” your Enhanced Trait, restoring it to its full rank again, before it is completely faded. Your rank is the limit of how much it can increase, however.

Effects
 * Reduces Damage by (02 x Rank Level)
 * May absorb up to (40 x Rank Level) Hit Points.
 * Stored Hit Points may be bled off at a rate of 04 Hit Points per round (six seconds).
 * May power (Stored Hit Points x 04) Ranks Of A Power.

Energy Aura
Effect: Damage, Reaction • 4 points per rank

You can surround your body with an aura of damaging energy or some similar effect. Anyone you touch or that touches you must make a Toughness resistance check against your aura’s Damage rank. You can turn your aura on and off at will as a free action. If your Aura damages some targets but not others, apply the Selective or Limited modifiers (depending on whether or not the selectivity is under your control).

Energy Control
Effect: Ranged Damage • 2 points per rank

You can generate and project a type of energy, such as cold, electricity, fire, kinetic force, magnetism, radiation, or even cosmic energy, in a damaging blast (see the Blast power).

Energy Control is further defined by the addition of Alternate Effects (see Alternate Effects), expanding what you can do with your control. For example, Cold Control might let you lower the surrounding temperature (Environment – Cold) or trap targets in ice (Affliction, see the Snare version). Magnetic Control could let you manipulate metallic objects (Limited Move Object) while Electrical Control lets you generate an electrical pulse to overload electronics (Burst Area Nullify Electronics). Add as many Alternate Effects to your Energy Control as you can afford, and consider some additional ones as options for power stunts (see Powers Stunts).

Enhanced Trait
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: As base Trait

You can temporarily improve one of your existing traits, chosen when you take this effect. While this effect is active, you increase the affected trait by its rank. So, for example, Enhanced Strength 5 increases your Strength by +5 while it is active. Your enhanced trait is still subject to power level limits, so your unenhanced rank must be below the limit by at least the amount of the enhancement to accommodate it.

The cost of Enhanced Trait is the same per rank as acquiring a rank in the affected trait. The key differences are that Enhanced Trait is a power effect, rather than a natural trait, and as an effect it can be combined with extra effort and other effects. See Extra Effort in The Basics and Enhanced Abilities in Abilities for more.

FLAWS
 * Limited: Enhanced Traits are often Limited in some fashion, such as Nighttime (or Daytime) Only, While Angry (or in another emotional state), Underwater (or in some other environment), and so forth. A limit that rarely comes into play—like losing your Enhanced Trait during a new moon—can be handled as a power loss complication. See Complications in The Basics for details. –1 cost per rank.
 * Permanent: At no change in cost, your Enhanced Trait may be a permanent improvement, rather than a sustained effect. The primary difference is that your permanent enhancement cannot be turned on and off and cannot be improved by extra effort, including using it to perform power stunts (see Extra Effort). There is no action to use a Permanent Enhanced Trait, as it is always active. +0 cost per rank.
 * Reduced Trait: One or more of your traits is lowered while others are enhanced. This flaw is worth as many points as the reduction in the affected trait(s). So, for example, if you lose Intellect while you gain in Strength, treat the value of the lost Intellect ranks as the value of the flaw. As with all flaws, the effect must still cost at least 1 character point. Flat –points equal to the lowered trait.

Environment Control
Action: Standard • Range: Rank • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 1–2 points per rank

You can change the environment in an area: raising or lowering the temperature, creating light, causing rain, and so forth (see The Environment in Action & Adventure for details).

Your Environment affects a 30 foot radius around you at rank 1. Each additional rank moves the radius up one distance rank, for a reach of approximately 2,000 miles at rank 20, sufficient to alter the environment of an entire continent!

Each of the following is a separate Environment effect. If you have one you can acquire others as Alternate Effects, but you can then only use and maintain one at a time. To use or maintain multiple Environment effects simultaneously, add their costs together for the effect’s total cost per rank or apply the Selective modifier, allowing you to mix-and-match effects.
 * COLD: You can lower the temperature in the area. For 1 point per rank, you create intense cold; for 2 points per rank, you create extreme cold.
 * HEAT: You can raise the temperature in the area. For 1 point per rank, you create intense heat, for 2 points per rank; you create extreme heat.
 * IMPEDE MOVEMENT: You can impede movement through the area with high winds, icy or wet surfaces, or similar effects. For 1 point per rank, you reduce movement speed through the area by 1 rank; for 2 points per rank, you reduce it by 2 ranks. Depending on your descriptors, you may also apply circumstance modifiers to Acrobatics and Athletics checks for surface conditions.
 * LIGHT: You can raise the light level in the area, countering the concealment of darkness, but not other forms of concealment. For 1 point per rank, you can create enough light to reduce total concealment to partial and partial concealment to none. For 2 points per rank, you can shed light as bright as a sunlit day, eliminating all concealment provided by natural darkness. Power effects with the darkness descriptor may be countered with a successful power check (see Countering Effects).
 * VISIBILITY: You impose a -2 modifier to Perception checks for 1 point per rank, and a -5 for 2 points per rank. For more significant obscuring of senses (via darkness, fog, etc.) use an Area Concealment Attack effect (see Concealment).
 * EXTRAS: Selective: With this extra you can vary the environment within your affected area, affecting some while not affecting others, or even mixing and matching different environments (making part of the area cold and another hot, for example). +1 cost per rank.

Extra Limbs
Action: None • Range: Personal • Duration: Permanent • Cost: 1 point per rank

You have extra manipulative limbs, such as arms, tentacles, or even prehensile hair or a tail. Each rank in this effect grants you an extra limb.

Extra Limbs do not allow you to take additional actions in a round, although they do provide the benefits of the Improved Grab advantage—grabbing with some of your limbs and leaving others free. All additional limbs except your dominant limb are considered your “off-hand.” If you have the Benefit (Ambidexterity) advantage, you have no off-hand penalties with any of your limbs.

If you apply all of your limbs to a grab attempt (rather than taking the option to leave some of them free), you gain a +1 circumstance bonus per rank in Extra Limbs to a maximum of +5, much like a team check.

EXTRAS In general, modifiers affecting attack effects (e.g. Affects Corporeal, Area, Penetrating, etc.) should apply to the Strength of a character with Extra Limbs rather than to the Extra Limbs effect itself. Such modifiers applied to Strength affect all of the character’s limbs.
 * Continuous: Continuous Extra Limbs are a power effect you can turn on and off at will, but that remain until you choose to deactivate them, even if you are stunned or incapacitated . +1 cost per rank.
 * Projection: Your Extra Limbs are merely a projection of your power rather than an extension of your body. therefore, any harm directed specifically against your Extra Limb(s) has no effect. So, for example, one of your additional limbs could reach into a container of acid or a blast furnace to pull out an object without any harm to you. The GM may require Extra Limbs with this extra to modify their duration to continuous or sustained, but this is not essential. It’s likely Extra Limbs with this extra are not eligible for the Innate modifier. +1 cost per rank.
 * Sustained: Sustained Extra Limbs can be turned on or off (growing or forming the additional limbs and then making them disappear just as easily), but the limbs disappear or stop working if you are unable to continue the effect. +0 cost per rank.

'FLAWS
 * Distracting: Coordinating the actions of your multiple limbs is difficult, so you are vulnerable while applying any extra limbs to an action. This flaw should generally not apply to any creature with Innate Extra Limbs, especially if they are part of its natural physiology. -1 cost per rank.

Under the Hood: Extra Limbs Not Extra Actions

As a default, Extra Limbs do not grant characters the ability to take extra actions in a round, simply because multiple actions—especially extra standard actions usable for attacks—tend to slow down and unbalance play.

As an option for including some combat benefits with Extra Limbs, consider allowing the application of the Multiattack extra to the Strength of a character with Extra Limbs, reflecting the ability to launch a flurry of attacks at a single opponent, or to “spread” those attacks among a number of nearby opponents. See Multiattack description under Extras for details.

Feature General
Action: None • Range: Personal • Duration: Permanent • Cost: 1 point per rank

You have one or more minor features, effects granting you an occasionally useful ability, one per rank. This effect is essentially a version of the Benefit advantage but a power rather than a virtue of skill, talent, or social background. For example, diplomatic immunity or wealth are Benefits; fur, the ability to mimic sounds, or a hidden compartment in your hollow leg are Features.

It’s up to the GM what capabilities qualify as Features; generally, if something has no real game effect, it’s just a descriptor. If it has an actual game system benefit, it may be a Feature. There’s no need to define every possible Feature a character may have down to the last detail.

Some Features may be sustained duration rather than permanent with no change in cost. This suits active Features a character has to use and maintain rather than having them as passive traits requiring no effort whatsoever.

SAMPLE FEATURES
 * Insulating Fur: You have a layer of fur that protects you from intense heat and cold, giving you immunity to those environments.
 * Internal Compartment: You can carry a portion of your carrying capacity inside your body! You have a pouch or compartment of some sort, able to hold objects with a size rank no greater than 3 less than your own (size -5 for a normal size rank -2 human).
 * Iron Stomach: You can eat anything that’s not toxic without ill effects, no matter how unpleasant it may be: spoiled or particularly gross or spicy food, for example.
 * Mimicry: You can imitate almost any sound you’ve heard, giving you a +10 bonus to Deception checks to convince others your mimicked sounds are real.
 * Quick Change: You can change clothes—such as into or out of your costume—as a free action. With 2 ranks, you can change into any outfit at will.
 * Special Effect: You have some special effect, like a gust of wind at the right dramatic moment, or ideal spotlighting, or personal theme music. The GM may give you a +2 bonus for favorable circumstances when your special effect is likely to impress people or otherwise aid you.
 * Temporal Inertia: You are somehow uniquely “anchored” in the space-time continuum, making you immune to changes in history. You recall the “true” version of historical events, even if no one else does.

Under the Hood: Feature

The Feature effect is intended to round out various minor traits and abilities characters might have, but it is entirely optional and not meant to burden character design with needless amounts of detail. It’s for traits with an actual game effect, not merely descriptors or background color (neither of which should cost any points). Ultimately, the Gamemaster decides what traits merit a rank (or more) of Feature and what Features are permitted for any given game or setting, using the examples given here.

If a “feature” is something likely to come up only occasionally, or even just once, then you are better off allowing it as an aspect of the inspiration and power stunt rules (see Characteristics), charging the player a victory point for the feature when it comes into play. The player can then choose whether or not to use earned character points to acquire the Feature as a regular part of the character’s traits later on.

Flight
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 2 points per rank

You can fly through the air, including hovering in place. You have a flight speed rank equal to your effect rank.

EXTRAS
 * Aquatic: You can move underwater as easily as in the air. You have a water speed equal to your Flight rank, minus 2, subject to the usual rules for swimming (see Athletics for details). You can make Athletics checks to swim as routine checks. This power does not allow you to breathe underwater (for that see Immunity). This is the Swimming power as an Alternate Effect. Flat +1 point.
 * Continuous: Continuous Flight operates even when the user is incapacitated or otherwise unable to sustain it. The user remains hanging in the air, maintaining relative position to the ground, if necessary. Alternately, the user might float safely down to the ground when unable to maintain Flight as a kind of “safety net,” your choice when you apply the modifier. +1 cost per rank.
 * Subtle: The default Flight effect is noticeable, whether from the rush of air, the roar of jets, or a glowing contrail or aurora, for example. This modifier reduces, and then eliminates, these traces. If your Flight is completely Subtle, you do not need to make Stealth checks to move silently while flying (you do so automatically), although you may still need to do so to avoid being seen or otherwise detected. Flat +1 or 2 points.

FLAWS
 * Concentration: Flight requiring concentration means you can fly, but can’t do much else at the same time. –1 cost per rank.
 * Distracting: You are not very maneuverable and therefore vulnerable while flying (see Vulnerable condition). –1 cost per rank.
 * Gliding: You fly by gliding on wind currents. Your maximum gliding distance is limited to the vertical distance rank of your starting height, plus your flight speed rank. You may be able to gain altitude occasionally by catching thermal updrafts and winds at the GM’s discretion. Other-wise you must land at the end of your maximum distance. –1 cost per rank.
 * Levitation: You can only move vertically, straight up and down, and not side to side, although you can allow yourself to be carried along in the direction of the wind horizontally. –1 cost per rank.
 * Platform: Your Flight is reliant on some sort of platform on which you stand or sit. If you fail a resistance check while flying, or you are grabbed by someone standing on the ground, you’re knocked or pulled off your platform and cannot fly. You can regain the use of your flying platform by reactivating your Flight effect on your next turn. –1 cost per rank.
 * Wings: You have wings that allow you to fly, but they run the risk of being fouled or restrained, which prevents you from flying. If you are immobilized, restrained, or bound, you cannot fly. You can regain the use of your wings by reactivating your Flight effect once you are no longer affected by the aforementioned conditions. –1 cost per rank.

Force Field
Effect: Protection, Sustained • 1 point per rank You can surround your body with a protective field of energy or force, providing you with a Toughness increase equal to your rank. As a sustained effect, your Force Field is noticeable, unless you apply the Subtle modifier. Force Fields are often Impervious as well, immune to certain lower thresholds of Damage.

Growth
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 2 points per rank

You can temporarily increase your size, gaining Strength and Stamina at the cost of becoming a bigger, heavier, less agile target, unable to maneuver through small spaces. Growth modifiers are restricted by power level limits.

Each rank of Growth adds 1 rank to your Strength and Stamina (constructs add 1 rank to Strength and Toughness if they lack Stamina) and adds 1 rank to your mass. Every two ranks adds a +1 bonus to Intimidation. Every 8 ranks adds 1 to your Speed. Every rank of Growth subtracts 1 from your Stealth checks. Every 2 ranks (rounded up) subtracts 1 from your Dodge and Parry defenses. Every 4 ranks of Growth increases your size rank by 1 (ordinary humans start out at size rank –2, between 3 and 6 feet tall). So at Growth 8, you have +8 Strength and Stamina, +4 to Intimidation, +1 Speed, but -8 to Stealth, –4 Dodge and Parry, and you are size rank 0 (around 30 feet tall). Increases to your Strength and Stamina also improve related traits like your Strength Damage, Fortitude, and Toughness.

EXTRAS
 * Permanent: Permanent Growth, typically with innate, suits giant-sized characters and creatures that are a fixed larger size. +0 cost per rank.

Healing
Action: Standard • Range: Close • Duration: Instant • Cost: 2 points per rank

You can heal Damage by touching a subject and taking a standard action. You may heal  (Rank Level) Hit Points per round (six seconds).

You can use Healing on yourself, provided you are still capable of taking the standard action needed. Healing does not work on subjects unable to recover on their own, such as creatures with no Stamina rank or inanimate objects.

EXTRAS
 * Action: This extra reduces the action required for you to use Healing. You cannot use Healing more than once per turn regardless. To heal multiple subjects at once, apply the Area modifier. +1 cost per rank.
 * Affects Objects: Your Healing can also “heal” damage to non-living subjects. +1 cost per rank.
 * Area: Healing with this extra grants the same benefit to all subjects in the affected area. Area Empathic Healing (see this power’s Flaws) is an unwise combination, as the healer takes on all of the damage of the affected subjects at once! +1 cost per rank.
 * Energizing: You can heal the fatigued and exhausted conditions as well as damage conditions: DC 10, one degree of success for fatigued, two degrees of success for exhausted. However, you take on the removed conditions and cannot use Healing to eliminate your own fatigue (although you can still use victory points to recover from them). If the Healing check fails, you must wait the normal recovery time or use extra effort to try again. +1 cost per rank.
 * Perception: Applied to Ranged Healing (following), perception Ranged Healing does not require an attack check to “touch” the subject. +1 cost per rank.
 * Persistent: Your Healing can remove even Incurable effects (see the Incurable modifier). Flat +1 point.
 * Ranged: Ranged Healing requires an attack check to “touch” the subject with the Healing effect. The GM may waive the check for a willing subject holding completely still, but the subject is defenseless that round, making it an unwise decision in the midst of combat. +1 cost per rank.
 * Restorative: Your Healing effect can restore character points removed by Weaken effects with the appropriate descriptors, such as injury, disease, or poison. You restore points equal to your rank to the affected trait(s). +1 cost per rank.
 * Resurrection: You can restore life to the dead! If the subject has been dead for fewer minutes than your Healing rank, makes a DC 20 Healing check. If successful, the patient’s condition becomes incapacitated, as if just stabilized. +1 cost per rank.
 * Selective: Area Healing may have this extra, allowing you to choose who in the area does and does not gain the benefits. +1 cost per rank.
 * Stabilize: You don’t need to make a Healing check to stabilize a dying character, your Healing effect does so automatically, although it still requires the normal standard action. Flat +1 point.

FLAWS
 * Empathic: When you successfully cure someone else of a condition, you acquire the condition yourself and must recover from it normally. You can use Healing and Regeneration to cure your own conditions. You can have the Resurrection modifier for Healing, but if you successfully use it, you die! This may not be as bad as it seems if you have Immortality, allowing you to return to life (see the Immortality effect for details). –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited: Examples of ways in which Healing may be Limited include: One Type of Damage (such as energy or bludgeoning damage), Objects (in conjunction with Affects Objects), Others (you can’t use Healing on yourself), or Self (you can only use Healing on yourself). –1 cost per rank.
 * Temporary: The benefits of your Healing are temporary, lasting for one hour. The subject then regains any damage conditions you healed. These conditions stack with others the subject acquired since the initial healing, which may result in more severe damage or even death. –1 cost per rank.

Illusion
Action: Standard • Range: Perception • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 1–5 points per rank

You can control others’ senses to create false impressions, illusions. This can range from visual images to phantom sounds, smells, or even radar or mental images. For 1 point per rank, you can create an illusion affecting a single sense type. For 2 points per rank, you can affect two sense types. For 3 points per rank, you can affect three sense types. For 4 points per rank, you can affect four sense types, and for 5 points per rank, you can affect all sense types. Visual senses count as two sense types. Your rank determines how convincing your illusion is, including the DC for the Insight resistance check (10 + rank).

ILLUSION SIZE

Your illusion occupies an area with a maximum volume rank equal to your effect rank. To increase the size of the illusion you can create, apply the Area extra; each application increases the area your illusion covers by 1 rank.

ILLUSIONARY EFFECTS

Illusions have no substance and cannot have any real-world effect. So they cannot provide illumination, nutrition, warmth, or the like (although they can provide the sensations of these things). Likewise, an illusory wall only prevents people from moving through an area so long as they believe it’s real, and an illusory bridge or floor is revealed as false as soon as someone tries to walk across it, and falls through it!

OVERCOMING ILLUSIONS

Characters encountering an illusion do not receive checks to recognize it as illusory until they interact with it in some fashion. A successful Insight check against an illusion (DC 10 + Illusion rank) reveals it as false. A failed check means the character does not notice anything amiss. A character faced with clear proof an illusion isn’t real needs no Insight check. Senses with the Counters Illusion effect (see Senses) automatically detect illusions. If any viewer successfully uncovers an illusion and communicates this fact to others, they gain another Insight check with a +5 circumstance bonus. Circumstances may grant additional modifiers to the Insight check to uncover an illusion, depending on how convincing it is.

MAINTAINING ILLUSIONS

Maintaining an active illusion (such as a fighting creature) requires a standard action each round, but maintaining a static illusion (one that doesn’t move or interact) is only a free action.

Under the Hood: Illusion

Illusion is a broad-ranging effect, usable for a number of different things. A few common considerations for Illusion include the following.

DAMAGING ILLUSIONS

For illusions so realistic they are capable of inflicting damage, add a Linked Perception Range Damage effect. At the GM’s discretion, this effect can even be made into a Linked Array with a variety of alternate attack effects, allowing your illusionist to inflict conditions other than damage on targets. Keep in mind the attack effects all need to be perception range to match the range of Illusion.

ILLUSORY APPEARANCE

Illusion can alter a subject’s appearance, providing an essentially impenetrable disguise—at least until someone makes a successful check to see through the illusion. However, for just the ability to alter appearance, use the Morph effect, which is generally more effective than Illusion Limited to Appearance.

MENTAL ILLUSIONS

The default Illusion effect is perceptible to anyone or anything (including machines) as if it were real. Some illusions exist solely in the mind, like projected psychic hallucinations. This type of Illusion has the Resistible by Will flaw and the Selective extra, since the illusionist can choose whether or not to project the illusion into a particular subject’s mind, and therefore decides who can or cannot perceive the illusion. This is a net +0 modifier, for the same base cost.

MY ALLY, MY ENEMY

A common Illusion trick is to switch the appearances of an enemy and an ally, causing a foe’s teammate to attack that enemy by mistake. You can generally handle this with an opposed check of Illusion and Insight; if you win, the target is unaware of the switch and attacks the wrong target.

I DISBELIEVE!

Keep in mind characters don’t get to make a resistance check to overcome an illusion unless they have reason to believe the illusion is not real. Given the rather fantastic things that can happen in different settings, an illusion generally has to provide some evidence of its true nature. Smart illusionists keep the true nature of their powers secret, and smart Gamemasters require players to come up with something a bit more comprehensive than “I disbelieve!” to figure out when there are illusions at hand.

EXTRAS
 * Independent: Your active illusions only require a free action to maintain, rather than a standard action. +1 cost per rank.
 * Selective: You choose who perceives your Illusion and who doesn’t. +1 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Feedback: Although Illusion does not have a physical “manifestation” per se, it can apply this flaw, in which case a successful damaging attack on one of your illusions causes you to suffer damage, using the guidelines given in the description of the Feedback flaw. –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited to One Subject: Only a single subject at a time can perceive your Illusion. –1 cost per rank.
 * Ranged: It is left to the GM’s discretion whether or not Illusion’s range can be reduced at all, since being able to perceive the affected area is important in creating and directing the illusion. In order to solely alter your own appearance, see the Morph effect, possibly with the Resistible modifier. –1 cost per rank.
 * Resistible: Illusions Resistible by Will are typically hallucinatory effects projected into the target’s mind. This flaw is commonly combined with Selective, so only the targets you choose perceive your illusions. Illusions Resistible by Fortitude may represent a hallucinatory drug or similar biochemical effect. As usual, targets immune to effects targeting the resistance are unaffected by the illusion as well. So Illusions Resistible by Fortitude or Will have no effect on non-living targets, for example. This resistance check is in addition to the usual Insight check; the first determines if the target can resist the effect creating the illusion, the Insight check determine if the target notices something wrong about the illusion, revealing it as false. –1 cost per rank.

Immortality
Action: None • Range: Personal • Duration: Permanent • Cost: 2 points per rank

You can recover from death! If your condition becomes dead, you return to life after a time. Subtract your Immortality rank from a time rank of 19 (one month) to determine how long it takes. So Immortality 11, for example, restores you to life in just 30 minutes (19 – 11 = time rank 8). At rank 20, you recover from death at the start of each action round! When you recover, all your damage conditions are removed, but you also lose all accumulated extra power points, starting over with none.

FLAWS
 * Limited: You must specify a reasonably common effect (or set of uncommon effects) that keeps you from recovering from death, such as beheading, cremation, a stake through the heart, and so forth. Even then, if the effect is somehow removed or reversed (e.g. the stake is removed from your corpse) you may still be able to come back. -1 cost per rank.

Immunity
Action: None • Range: Personal • Duration: Permanent • Cost: 1 point per rank

You are immune to certain effects, automatically succeeding on any resistance check against them. You assign ranks of Immunity to various effects to gain immunity to them (with more extensive effects requiring more ranks). These assignments are permanent. Examples include the following:
 * 01 Rank: Aging, disease, poison, one environmental condition (cold, heat, high pressure, radiation, or vacuum), one type of suffocation (breathe normally underwater or in an alien atmosphere, for example), starvation and thirst, need for sleep, or a rare power descriptor (such as your own powers, a close sibling’s powers, etc.).
 * 02 Ranks: Critical hits, suffocation effects (no need to breathe at all), or an uncommon power descriptor (such as chemical, gravitic, necromantic, etc.).
 * 05 ranks: Alteration effects, sensory Affliction effects, emotion effects, entrapment (grabbing, snares, or bonds), fatigue effects, interaction skills, or a particular Damage effect, descriptor (such as bullets, cold, electricity, falling, fire, magic, radiation, sonic, etc.)
 * 10 Ranks: A common power descriptor (such as all effects with cold, electricity, fire, radiation, or weather descriptors, for example), life support (includes immunity to disease, poison, all environmental conditions, suffocation, and starvation and thirst).
 * 20 Ranks: A very common power descriptor (bludgeoning or energy, for example).
 * 30 Ranks: All effects resisted by Fortitude, All effects resisted by Will.
 * 80 Ranks: All effects resisted by Toughness (the equivalent of 40 ranks of Impervious Toughness).

DEGREES OF IMMUNITY

Some Immunity effects are a matter of degree. For example, “immunity to cold” can range from the environmental effects of cold (described under The Environment) to cold damage, to complete immunity to all effects with the “cold” descriptor. The first requires only 01 rank, and provides no resistance to other sorts of cold effects. The second requires 05 ranks and only provides immunity to cold Damage effects. The third requires 10 ranks and provides complete immunity to all effects with the “cold” descriptor whatever they may be.

EXTRAS
 * Affects Others: This extra allows you to grant the benefits of your Immunity to others by touch. It’s most commonly used with life support, such as the power to maintain a life support “bubble” around you. +1 cost per rank.
 * Sustained: Sustained duration Immunity may be suitable for certain types of powers, particularly force fields or similar protective abilities requiring a modicum of concentration. It is a net +0 modifier from Immunity’s base permanent duration. +0 cost per rank.
 * Ranged: Affects Others Immunity may have this extra, allowing it to grant its benefits at range. +1 cost per rank.
 * 'Reflect: You can reflect attacks to which you are immune back at the attacker as a free action. Make a normal attack check using your own attack modifier to hit with the reflected attack. It has its normal effect if it hits. +1 cost per rank.
 * Redirect: You can redirect attacks to which are you are immune at any other target within the attack’s normal range, as Reflect, above. You must have the Reflect extra to take this one. +1 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Limited to Half Effect: You suffer half the normal effect rather than being entirely immune to it. For environmental effects, you only make checks half as often. For other effects, halve the effect’s rank (round down) before determining its resistance, including for things like Impervious. -1 cost per rank.

Insubstantial
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 5 points per rank

You can assume a less solid form, with each Insubstantial rank becoming progressively less solid. You do not gain the ability to assume lower-ranked Insubstantial forms at higher ranks, but you can acquire a lower-ranked form as an Alternate Effect of a higher-ranked one. You can switch between normal and Insubstantial form at will as a free action once per round. The default is that substantial is your “normal” form, but the GM may permit you to make Insubstantial your “normal” form, in which case remaining solid is a sustained duration for you! Insubstantial offers four ranks of effect:

RANK 1 - FLUID

You become a fluid mass. You can flow through any sort of opening, under (or around) doors, through keyholes and pipes, and so forth. You cannot pass through watertight seals. You can automatically flow out of any restraint—such as a snare or grab—that is not watertight. So you cannot flow out of a bubble completely enclosing you, for example, but anything less cannot hold you. You can exert your normal Strength and can still push or carry objects, although your manual dexterity may be limited (at the GM’s discretion).

A fluid character may attempt to catch a falling person or object, cushioning the fall with the character’s flexible form. This requires a move action, and reduces the falling damage by the cushioning character’s Toughness bonus (representing flexibility in this case). Both characters must make resistance checks against the remaining damage. Higher rank insubstantial forms—lacking physical Strength—cannot attempt this.

RANK 2 - GASEOUS

You become a cloud of gas or fine particles. You have no effective Strength in gaseous form, but have Immunity to Physical Damage. Energy and area attacks still affect you normally. You can flow through any opening that is not airtight. You can use your various other effects normally.

RANK 3 - ENERGY

You become coherent energy. You have no effective Strength, but have Immunity to Physical Damage. Energy attacks (other than the energy making up your form, to which you have Immunity) damage you normally. You can pass through solid objects permeable to your type of energy, but energy resistant barriers, like heavy shielding or force fields, block your movement.

RANK 4 - INCORPOREAL

You become an incorporeal phantom. You can pass through solid matter at your normal speed and you have Immunity to Physical and Energy Damage. Sensory effects (other than tactile) and those targeting Will still work on you, as do effects with the Affects Insubstantial modifier. Choose one other reasonably common effect or descriptor that works on you while you are incorporeal. You have no effective Strength and cannot affect the physical world, except with effects with the Affects Corporeal modifier. Your sensory effects work normally.

Unless you have Immunity to Suffocation, you must hold your breath while passing through a solid object, and you can suffocate. If you revert to solid form while inside a solid object for any reason, you suffer damage equal to the object’s Toughness, resisted by your Fortitude. If not incapacitated by the damage, you’re immediately ejected from the object into the nearest open space. If you are incapacitated, you’re trapped inside the object and your condition worsens to dying on the following round (making it very difficult for aid to reach you).

INSUBSTANTIAL DESCRIPTORS

Note that the fluid, gaseous, etc., rank names are themselves essentially descriptors for the different Insubstantial effects. A character with Insubstantial 1 might instead be a stretchable, rubbery form rather than a liquid, for example, while one with Insubstantial 2 could transform into a swarm of insects rather than a gas.

EXTRAS
 * Affects Corporeal: This extra is required for any effect that works on corporeal targets while you are incorporeal. See the description of this extra for details and cost.
 * Affects Others: This modifier allows you to extend your Insubstantial effect to another character by touch, taking them Insubstantial with you. If you ever withdraw the effect while someone is inside a solid object, see the effect’s description for the unpleasant results. +0 or +1 cost per rank.
 * Attack: Applied to Insubstantial, this extra makes it into a close range effect able to turn targets Insubstantial. You must be able to physically touch the target to make an Insubstantial Attack, meaning it must have the Affects Corporeal modifier to use it while you are incorporeal. This modifier is most effective for ranks 2 through 4, since the victim loses some or all ability to interact with the physical world. The default resistance for an Insubstantial Attack is Dodge, although it can be Fortitude or Will, as best suits the effect’s descriptors. You need to grab a target in order to drag them inside a solid object unless the target is already defenseless. You and the target are not insubstantial to each other. The cost is +0 per rank if it is an Insubstantial Attack only, +1 cost per rank if you can both be Insubstantial and make an attack to make others Insubstantial. +0 or +1 cost per rank.
 * Continuous: Extending the effect’s duration to continuous allows you to remain Insubstantial until you choose to return to your corporeal form. +1 cost per rank.
 * Innate: Use this modifier if your character’s form is naturally or innately Insubstantial, particularly if the effect is permanent in duration. Flat +1 point.
 * Precise: This modifier allows you to selectively make some portions of your body insubstantial while keeping others substantial (or vice versa). This allows you to do things like reach through a wall, solidify your hand to pick up an object or tap someone on the shoulder (or punch them in the face), and become incorporeal again to withdraw it on the following round. Flat +1 point.
 * Progressive: You can assume lower ranked forms of Insubstantial, but you must progress through them in order to reach the higher-ranked ones. For example if you have Progressive Insubstantial 3, you can assume fluid, gaseous, or energy forms, but to assume energy form, you must first progress through fluid and gaseous, becoming less and less substantial. Since you can only activate the effect once per turn, it takes you three turns to get there. +0 cost per rank.
 * Reaction: Becoming Insubstantial is normally a free action, meaning you can’t switch to an Insubstantial form when surprised or otherwise unable to take action. At the GM’s option, applying the Action extra to use Insubstantial as a reaction allows you to switch forms “reflexively” in response to such hazards, even if it is not your turn. +1 cost per rank.
 * Subtle: This extra makes your Insubstantial nature less noticeable to observers. Rank 1 requires a Perception check (DC 20) to detect that you are Insubstantial, while 2 ranks mean you look entirely normal in Insubstantial form (which may cause opponents to waste effort on you, not knowing you are immune to their attacks, for example). Flat +1 or 2 points.

FLAWS
 * Absent Strength: This flaw applies only to rank 1 Insubstantial and removes your effective Strength while in that form, leaving you with limited ability to affect the physical world like the higher ranks of the effect. Flat –1 point.
 * Permanent: You are always Insubstantial; you cannot assume solid form, although your Insubstantial effect can still be Nullified unless it is also Innate. +0 cost per rank.

Invisibility
Effect: Visual Concealment • Cost: 4 or 8 points

You can vanish from sight at will, gaining total visual concealment, although other senses can still detect you. This power costs 4 points if you are only invisible to normal vision, 8 points if you cannot be detected by any visual sense (including infrared and ultraviolet).

Leaping
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Instant • Cost: 1 point per rank

You can make prodigious leaps, far more than even a skilled athlete. Your Leaping rank, minus 2, is the distance rank you cover in a single standing jump: so 15 feet at rank 1, 30 feet at rank 2, up to 1,000 miles at rank 20! You do not suffer any damage from landing after a jump, so long as it is within your maximum distance.

The speed rank of your leap maxes out at 7 (around 250 miles per hour), so leaps of greater than distance rank 7 take time equal to the distance rank minus 7. For example, a massive leap of 500 miles (distance rank 17) takes time rank 10 (17 – 7, or two hours) of time in the air! Because of this, leapers may choose to make shorter “hops” of just a couple miles, leaving them airborne for only a minute or so, to better control their direction.

EXTRAS
 * Affects Others: You can give someone you are touching the ability to leap like you do while the effect lasts. You do not need this extra to simply carry someone while you leap; you can carry what your Strength normally allows. +0 or +1 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Acrobatics Check Required: In order to use Leaping, you must make an Acrobatics skill check (DC 10). Each point your check total exceeds the DC allows you to use 1 rank of Leaping, up to your total rank. –1 cost per rank.
 * Full Power: With this flaw, you can only leap your maximum distance; you can make shorter leaps only by not using your Leaping effect at all, just the normal jumping distance for your Strength. This may suit uncontrollable “leaping” effects like rocket boosters and the like. Flat –1 point.

Luck
Action: Reaction • Range: Perception • Duration: Instant • Cost: 3 points per rank You can use victory points or ranks of Luck to affect others in various ways (see victory points). For each rank you have in this effect, choose one of the following capabilities:
 * You can spend a victory point or use Luck on another character’s behalf, with the normal benefits.
 * You can bestow your victory point or use of Luck on others. You can use this only once on any given character in a round, but the recipient may use the bestowed point(s) normally.
 * You can spend one of your victory point or uses of the Luck advantage to negate someone else’s use of a victory point, use of their Luck advantage, or a Gamemaster-imposed complication (at the GM’s discretion). The latter also eliminates the complication, however, so no victory points are awarded for it.
 * You can spend a victory point or use Luck to force someone else to reroll a die roll and take the worse of the two rolls. The target of this last effect may spend a victory point or use Luck to avoid having to reroll.

EXTRAS
 * Area: Your Luck Control effect works equally on all targets in the affected area. You spend only one victory point, but the subjects are each affected individually. You must apply the same effect to all subjects at once. +1 cost per rank.
 * Luck: Each rank in this extra gives you the benefit of a rank in the Luck advantage (see Luck in Advantages). It is subject to the same limits as the Luck advantage set by the GM. Flat +1 point per rank of Luck.
 * Selective: This extra, applied to Area Luck Control, allows you to choose who in the area is or is not affected by it. +1 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Action: If the action required for Luck Control is increased beyond a reaction, it is only usable during your turn each round, which limits its usefulness in responding to the actions of others. –1 cost per rank.
 * Ranged: Luck Control normally requires no attack check; if Ranged, it does. –1 cost per rank.
 * Resistible: Targets of your Luck Control get a resistance check—usually Dodge or Will—to avoid its effects. –1 cost per rank.
 * Side Effect: As a particular side effect of Luck Control, if your effort to alter luck fails, you suffer a setback without earning a victory point. Effectively the GM gains a “free” complication against you. –1 or –2 cost per rank.

Magic
Effect: Ranged Damage • Cost: 2 points per rank

You are a sorcerer, witch, or wizard, able to cast a variety of magical spells. Your basic default effect is a Blast of eldritch force, able to inflict Ranged Damage (see the Blast power, previously).

However, like the Energy Control power, Magic can have a wide range of Alternate Effects, each a separate spell you have mastered. The possibilities are virtually limitless, within the bounds of your hero’s descriptors and the Gamemaster’s approval. Examples include mystic bindings (Affliction, see the Snare version), dispelling magical effects (Nullify Magic), conjuring clouds of mist or fog (an Area Visual Concealment Attack), scrying distant places (Remote Sensing), or slipping between the dimensions to appear elsewhere (Teleport), to name just a few.

All Magic effects have the “magic” descriptor regardless of their other descriptors, so a Blast of flames conjured with magic has both the “magic” and “fire” descriptors, for example.

Magicians often have a Power Loss complication (see Complications in The Basics): if they are unable to freely speak and gesture to cast their spells, they cannot use Magic (or any related magical powers reliant on spellcasting). Certain styles of Magic may impose other complications or limits as well.

Mental Blast
Effect: Perception Ranged Damage, Resisted by Will • Cost: 04 points per rank

You can strike targets’ minds with “mental force,” inflicting Damage resisted by the target’s Will rather than Toughness, but having no effect on targets immune to effects resisted by Will, such as inanimate objects. Mental Blasts are often, but not always, Subtle as well, which costs a flat 1 point.

Mimic
Effect: Variable, Move Action • Cost: 08 points per rank

You can duplicate the traits of another character you can perceive, requiring a move action to scan them. You gain (Mimic rank x 5) character points worth of traits the target has, up to a maximum of the target’s rank, and limited by the total character points you can Mimic. If you can only mimic some traits, apply the Limited flaw to this power.

Some Mimics are Limited to only copying subjects they can touch, requiring a successful close attack check to touch an unwilling subject. Others do not mimic other people but instead mimic the traits of animals (substituting the “animal” descriptor for “another character”).

Mind Control
Effect: Perception Ranged, Cumulative Affliction, Resisted by Will • Cost: 04 points per rank

You can impose your will on others, forcing them to obey your commands. Targets failing a Will resistance check against your effect DC first become dazed, then compelled, as they try to fight off your influence. Finally, with three or more degrees of effect, the target becomes controlled and obeys any commands you give.

Degrees of failure on resistance checks against Mind Control are cumulative. You can also apply the Progressive modifier (see Affliction effect) so your mental hold increases each time the target fails a resistance check against it!

Mind Reading
Action: Standard • Range: Perception • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 2 point per rank

You can read another character’s mind. To use Mind Reading, make an opposed effect check against the result of the target’s Will check. The degree of success determines the degree of contact:

TABLE: MIND READING RESISTANCE CHECK

If you lose the opposed check, you cannot read the target’s mind. With two or more degrees of failure, any renewed attempt in that scene requires extra effort (see Extra Effort). If you desire a greater degree of contact, you must take another standard action and make a new opposed check.

The target gets a new Will check (DC 10 + Mind Reading rank) at the end of each turn to shut you out; success ends the effect.

MIND READING AND DECEPTION

If you can interact with your subject, a successful Deception check against the target’s Insight check causes the subject to consciously think about a particular piece of information you’re looking for, such as a password or name, allowing you to pluck it from the subject’s mind with surface thoughts contact.

EXTRAS
 * Cumulative: Your Mind Reading adds any further degrees of success to the existing degree on the target, rather than using just the result of the new opposed check. For example, if you have one degree of contact and make another Mind Reading check, getting one degree, you now have two degrees of contact. +1 cost per rank.
 * Effortless: Trying again after two or more degrees of failure does not require extra effort for you. You can retry a Mind Reading attempt an unlimited number of times. +1 cost per rank.
 * Sensory Link: You can “tap into” the senses of your subjects, perceiving what they perceive like a Remote Sensing effect (see Remote Sensing) so long as you have at least one degree of contact. Your own senses are inactive while you are using your sensory link and you can only perceive through the senses of one subject at a time. +1 cost per rank.
 * Subtle: As a mental sensory effect, Mind Reading has a degree of subtlety, only noticeable to the subject or to characters with an appropriate mental sense, such as Mental Awareness (see Senses effect). Subtle Mind Reading is less detectable, requiring a DC 20 Perception check for either type of character to sense it, while two ranks of the Subtle modifier makes your Mind Reading completely undetectable. Flat +1 or 2 points.

FLAWS
 * Close: Applied to Ranged Mind Reading, Close Mind Reading requires a close attack check to touch an unwilling target and physical contact throughout the effect’s duration; breaking contact ends the effect. –1 cost per rank.
 * Feedback: You suffer Feedback if a subject you are reading is harmed, using your Mind Reading rank as the resistance check bonus against the damage. Additionally, you may suffer Feedback at the GM’s discretion from reading or experiencing particularly traumatic or emotionally-charged thoughts of memories from the subject. –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited by Language: You can only understand the subject’s thoughts or memories if you share a common language. –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited to Emotions: You can only read or probe for emotions and emotional associations, not coherent thoughts or memories. –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited to Sensory Link: If you have the Sensory Link extra and this flaw, you can only tap into a subject’s senses, you cannot read their thoughts or memories. –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited to Surface Thoughts: You can only read surface thoughts and cannot achieve higher degrees of contact. –1 cost per rank.
 * Ranged: Ranged Mind Reading requires a ranged attack check in addition to the effect’s normal resistance check. –1 cost per rank.
 * Sense-Dependent: Your Mind Reading is dependent on a sense other than just having to accurately sense the target, such as needing to see his expressions (Sight-Dependent), hear him speak (Hearing-Dependent), smell his changes in biochemistry (Scent-Dependent), and so forth. Alternately, it may be dependent on first being in Mental Communication with the target. –1 cost per rank.

Morph
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 05 points per rank

You can alter your appearance. Your traits do not change; your new form is merely a cosmetic change. You gain a +20 bonus to Deception checks to disguise yourself as the form you assume (see Disguise guidelines for Deception).

Your Morph rank determines what form(s) you can assume: At rank 1 you can assume a single other appearance. At rank 2 you can assume any of a narrow group of forms, such as people of roughly your size and gender, a type of animal like birds or reptiles, and so forth. At rank 3 you can assume any of a broad group of forms like humanoids, animals, machines, and so forth. At rank 4 you can assume any form of the same mass as your own.

For the ability to change size as well as appearance see the Growth and Shrinking effects. To take on the other traits of forms you assume, see the Metamorph extra, following, or the Variable effect.

EXTRAS
 * Attack: A Morph Attack imposes a different appearance on the target creature. Unlike an Affliction that imposes the transformed condition, a Morph Attack is entirely cosmetic: you can’t change the target’s traits other than appearance. +0 cost per rank.
 * Metamorph: Morph only changes your appearance; you still have all the traits of your normal form. This modifier allows you to have an alternate set of traits, essentially a complete alternate character you change into, one set of traits per rank in Metamorph. You can switch between sets of traits at will, once per round, as a free action. Your other form(s) must have the same point total as you and are subject to the same power level limits. They must also have traits suitable to your Morph effect. For example, if you can only Morph into humanoid forms, then your alternate forms all have to be humanoid. All of your forms must have your full Morph effect as well; those character points cannot be reallocated. The GM may require certain additional common traits for all of your forms, particularly mental abilities and skills, if you retain them. Metamorph is best suited to characters with defined sets of alternate traits. For a character able to transform into a virtually unlimited number of forms with various traits, see the Variable effect. Flat +1 point per rank of Metamorph.

FLAWS
 * Resistible: A Morph effect Resistible by Will is most likely a mental illusion of some sort. Observers who succeed on the Will resistance check see you as you truly are rather than in your Morph guise. This is in addition to the usual Perception check to penetrate your disguise. If you have the Metamorph extra, then targets that resist your effect treat you as if you had your normal traits, and not those granted by your Metamorph form. –1 cost per rank.

Move Object
Action: Standard • Range: Ranged • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 02 points per rank

You can move objects at a distance without touching them. Move Object has no action/reaction; a moving object cannot drag the character “holding on” to it, for example. This effect is also not considered “physical contact” or “touch” for effects requiring it.

Your effective Strength for lifting and moving objects with this effect is equal to your rank. By taking a move action to concentrate you can increase this by +1 Str, changing the effect’s duration to Concentration (see Duration). This is in addition to using extra effort to further increase your rank (see Extra Effort).

This effect can move objects, but cannot perform tasks of fine manipulation (like untying knots, typing, or manipulating controls) without the Precise modifier. Objects thrown into targets as attacks base their damage off your power rank as if it were your Strength rank.

Move Object cannot inflict damage directly; you can’t “punch” or “crush” objects with it. You can use it to make disarm, grab, and trip attacks. See Action & Adventure for details.

EXTRAS
 * Continuous: Move Object generally cannot have a continuous duration, since it is an active effect and requires at least a modicum of attention to maintain. The GM may allow Continuous Move Object as a variation that is not disrupted when you are unable to maintain it, but that still requires your conscious attention to do anything other than have the affected object hang in midair. There’s no change in the cost of the extra, this is just a limitation of the Move Object effect. You must make Move Object’s duration Sustained (+1 cost per rank) before you can make it Continuous. +1 cost per rank.
 * Damaging: Your effect can inflict damage, like an application of normal Strength with damage equal to its rank. This includes damaging targets in grabs and making ranged “strike” attacks. +1 cost per rank.
 * Improvised Weapon or Throwing Mastery: You are particularly adept at using objects as weapons with your power. Each rank of either advantage increases the damage of objects wielded or thrown using Move Object by 1. Flat +1 point per rank of Improvised Weapon or Throwing Mastery.
 * Perception: Perception Ranged Move Object can affect any object you can accurately perceive, with no need for an attack check. +1 cost per rank.
 * Precise: Move Object with this modifier can be used for tasks involving fine manipulation. Flat +1 point.
 * Subtle: The default version of Move Object involves some noticeable manifestation like a “tractor beam,” a glow around your head or hands (along with a corresponding glow around the affected object), big glowing hands, blazing “energy talons,” a lasso, whip, or the like. Apply the Subtle modifier for a less noticeable Move Object effect, such as invisible “psychokinesis” (which is generally also Perception Range). +1 point per rank.

FLAWS
 * Close: Since Move Object works on things at a distance by definition, it cannot generally be reduced to close ranged. At the GM’s discretion, a Close Ranged Move Object effect may represent “tactile telekinesis” or a supernatural influence over objects you are able to touch, but such things are usually better represented by the Enhanced Strength effect. –1 cost per rank.
 * Concentration: Concentration Move Object requires more attention to maintain. You cannot concentrate to increase your lifting capacity or to grab or move another object while you are still “holding” your first. –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited Direction: You can only move objects in a particular direction or path, such as only up and down '(towards and away from the ground), only directly towards or away from you (attraction and repulsion), and so forth. This is useful for “gravitic” or “magnetic” versions of the effect. –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited Material: You can only move a particular type of object or material, such as only metals, plants, rock, water, and so forth. –1 cost per rank (The GM may allow a –2 cost per rank flaw for a particularly limited type of material, such as only precious metals, leaves, sand, or petroleum).

Movement
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 2 points per rank

You have a special form of movement. For each rank in this effect, choose one of the following options:

DIMENSION TRAVEL

You can move instantly from one dimension to another as a move action. For 1 rank, you can move between your home dimension and one other. For 2 ranks you can move between any of a related group of dimensions (mystical dimensions, alien dimensions, etc). For 3 ranks you can travel to any dimension. You can carry up to 50 lbs. (mass rank 0) of additional material with you when you move. If you apply the Increased Mass modifier, you can carry additional mass up to your modifier rank.

ENVIRONMENTAL ADAPTATION

You’re adapted to a particular environment, such as underwater, zero gravity, and so forth (see Environmental Hazards for details). You suffer none of the normal unfavorable circumstance or movement penalties associated with that environment, moving and acting normally. You are still affected by environmental hazards like suffocation, exposure, and so forth. You need the Immunity effect to ignore such things.

PERMEATE

You can pass through solid objects as if they weren’t there. For 1 rank, you can move at speed rank –2 through any physical object. For 2 ranks, you can move at speed rank –1 and for 3 ranks, you move at your normal speed through any obstacles. You cannot breathe while completely inside a solid object, so you either need Immunity to Suffocation or have to hold your breath. You may also need Penetrates Concealment Senses to know where you’re going, since you cannot see inside solid objects, either.

Permeate is often Limited to a particular substance like earth, ice, or metal, for example. Permeate provides no protection against attacks, although you do gain cover while inside an object (see Cover). For the ability to allow things (including attacks) to pass through you, see Insubstantial effect.

SAFE FALL

So long as you are capable of action, you can fall any distance without harm. You can also stop your fall at any point along a distance so long as there is a handhold or projection for you to grab (such as a ledge, flagpole, branch, etc.). If you have the Wall-crawling power (later in Movement), any surface you can climb provides you with a handhold. Safe Fall may be Limited to only when you are near a surface (such as the side of a building); you’re assumed to be using the surface to help slow your fall.

SLITHERING

You can move while prone at your normal ground speed. You suffer no circumstance penalty for making attacks while prone.

SPACE TRAVEL

You can travel faster than the speed of light through the vacuum of space (but not in a planetary atmosphere). At rank 1 you can travel to other planets in a solar system. At rank 2, you can travel to other star systems, while at rank 3, you can visit distant star systems, perhaps even other galaxies! This effect does not provide protection from the rigors of outer space (for that, see Immunity effect).

SURE-FOOTED

You’re better able to deal with obstacles and obstructions to movement. Reduce the speed penalty for moving through or around such obstacles by 1 for each rank of this effect. If you reduce the speed penalty to 0 or less, you are unaffected by that obstacle and move at full normal speed.

SWINGING

You can swing through the air at your normal ground speed rank, using a swing-line you provide or available lines and projections (tree limbs, flagpoles, vines, telephone- and powerlines, etc.).

TIME TRAVEL

You can move through time! For 1 rank, you can move between the present and another fixed point in time (such as 100 years into the past, or 1,000 years into the future). For 2 ranks you can move to any point in the past or any point in the future (but not both). For 3 ranks, you can travel to any point in time. Reaching alternate timelines or parallel worlds requires at least 2 ranks of Dimension-Travel. You can carry up to 50 lbs. (mass rank 0) of additional material with you when you time-travel. If you apply the Increased Mass modifier, you can carry additional mass up to your modifier rank.

TRACKLESS

You leave no trail and cannot be tracked using visual senses (although you can still be tracked using scent or other means). You can walk across the surface of soft sand or snow without leaving tracks and you have total concealment from tremorsense (see Concealment). Each additional rank renders you trackless to another sense type.

WALL-CRAWLING

You can climb walls and ceilings at your ground speed rank –1 with no chance of falling and no need for an Athletics check. You are still vulnerable while climbing, however. An additional rank of this effect means you climb at your full speed rank and are not vulnerable while climbing.

WATER-WALKING

You can stand or move at your normal ground speed on the surface of water, quicksand, and other liquids without sinking. If you fall prone for any reason, you sink into the liquid normally. With 2 ranks of this effect, you can also lie prone on a liquid surface without sinking; you only sink if you choose to.

Under the Hood: Time, Space, And Dimension Travel

The Time, Space, and Dimension Travel effects of Movement are comparatively cheap considering what they do, primarily because such special movement capabilities are highly dependent on the plot and nature of the setting, and subject to a lot of Gamemaster oversight. Thus, they largely amount to supped-up Features, mainly allowing heroes to visit exotic locales. Temporal mechanics and the effects of time travel are left entirely up to the GM, who may choose to make Time Travel Limited, Uncontrolled, or Unreliable for player characters, or disallow it altogether, treating it solely as a plot-device in the setting.

Space travel in the comic books rarely involves the laws of physics and tends to occur “at the speed of plot”. Characters and vehicles (such as alien starships) able to traverse the void of space do so primarily to facilitate adventures out among the stars. Exactly how fast characters travel through the void of space does not really matter; it is how long it takes them to get where they’re going that matters. So Space Travel is largely defined in terms of “how far can you go between scenes?” The same is true of the mechanism of travel, whether hyperspace, jump drive, faster-than-light “warp speed,” or what have you.

The Gamemaster likewise decides on the existence and nature of other dimensions in the setting, what they are like, and who can reach them. Like Time Travel, the GM may require Dimension Travel be Limited, Uncontrolled, or Unreliable for player characters, or treat it solely as a plot-device rather than a defined effect.

Nullify
Action: Standard • Range: Ranged • Duration: Instant • Cost: 1 point per rank

Nullify can counter particular effects of a particular descriptor, such as fire effects, magical effects, mental effects, and so forth (see Countering Effects). You can counter one effect of your chosen descriptor per use of Nullify. You can’t nullify innate effects (see the Innate modifier description).

Make a ranged attack check to hit the target. Then make an opposed check of your Nullify rank and the targeted effect’s rank or the target’s Will defense, whichever is higher. If you are targeting the subject of an effect rather than the effect’s user, make an opposed check of Nullify rank vs. effect rank. If you win, the targeted effect turns off, although the user can reactivate it normally. If you lose the opposed check, you do not Nullify the effect. With two or more degrees of failure, trying again against the same subject in the same scene requires extra effort.

EXTRAS
 * Affects Insubstantial: Nullify does not require this modifier to affect insubstantial targets, or the Insubstantial effect itself. You can attempt to nullify the effects of insubstantial targets normally.
 * Alternate Resistance: Nullify may require a Fortitude rather than a Will check to represent an effect resisted by health and stamina rather than strength of will. +0 cost per rank.
 * Area: An Area Nullify effect works on all targets in the area. Make a single power check and compare the result against the opposed checks of the targets. Targets lacking effects you can nullify are, naturally, unaffected. If your Area Nullify has a duration longer than instant, choose whether or not the effect remains in the chosen area (affecting anyone entering or leaving it) or moves with the targets hit with the initial effect. There is no difference in cost, but to be able to do both, take one Area Nullify as an Alternate Effect of the other. +1 cost per rank.
 * Broad: Broad Nullify can counter effects of a particularly broad descriptor like magical, mutant, or technological effects. This modifier is available only with the GameMaster’s permission and may depend on the effects available in the series. +1 cost per rank.
 * Concentration: Any countered effect is suppressed and cannot be reactivated while you concentrate. The user of the countered effect may use extra effort to gain another opposed Nullify check. If successful, the effect can be reactivated. +1 cost per rank.
 * Simultaneous: Simultaneous Nullify can counter all effects of a particular descriptor (such as fire or magic) at once. +1 cost per rank.
 * Effortless: Trying again after two or more degrees of failure does not require extra effort for you. You can retry a Nullify attempt an unlimited number of times. +1 cost per rank.
 * Precise: If you can Nullify multiple effects, this modifier allows you to choose which are nullified and which are not. Flat +1 point.
 * Randomize: Rather than being countered, the effect(s) targeted by your Nullify acquire the Uncontrolled flaw and go out of control (as dictated by the GM). +0 cost per rank.
 * Selective: If you have an Area Nullify effect, this extra allows you to choose who in the area is affected, nullifying some targets and not others. +1 cost per rank.
 * Sustained: If this modifier is applied to Concentration Nullify, keeping the countered effect(s) suppressed is only a free action for you each turn. +1 cost per rank.

Power-Lifting
Effect: Enhanced Strength, Limited to Lifting • Cost: 1 point per rank

Your lifting and carrying capacity is out of proportion with the rest of your Strength. Each rank in this power gives you +1 to your Strength rank for determining how much weight you can lift and carry, but does not increase your Strength damage or other effects of your Strength rank.

Protection
Action: None • Range: Personal • Duration: Permanent • Cost: 1 point per rank

Protection shields you against damage, giving you +1 to your Toughness defense per rank. So Protection 4 gives you +4 Toughness.

Reduces Damage by (02 x Rank Level)

EXTRAS
 * Impervious:  Impervious makes protection immune to (non Penetrating) damage equal to impervious levels.

FLAWS
 * Sustained: Your Protection is a sustained effect, rather than permanent. The effect can be turned on and off and can be improved using extra effort, including using it to perform stunts (see Extra Effort). Sustained Protection might be a power like a personal force field, or the ability to consciously harden your skin and turn it into armor. +0 cost per rank.

Quickness
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 1 point per rank

You can perform routine tasks—anything that can be done as a routine check (see Routine Checks in The Basics)—fast, perhaps very fast. Subtract your effect rank from the normal time rank to perform a task to determine how long it takes you. So, for example, if you have Quickness 07, a routine task normally taking an hour (time rank 09) takes you (09 – 07 = time rank 02) 30 seconds. Non-routine checks are not affected by Quickness, nor is movement speed.

If you can perform a task in less than a second (time rank –02), the GM may choose to treat that task as a free action for you (although the GM can still limit the number of free actions you can accomplish in a turn as usual).

Under the Hood: Quickness

Quickness, like many power effects, is not especially realistic; it allows you to do things like disassemble an entire car as a free action at a high enough rank (around rank 13-14), but doesn’t have any effect on how many attacks you can make on your turn. Why? Two reasons: first because allowing any character potentially thousands of attacks per turn would slow down the game and be hugely unbalancing (to say the least). Second, and perhaps more important, it’s how superhuman quickness works in the comics: speedsters do routine things in the blink of an eye, but in fights they don’t really act more often than anyone else. See Super-Speed for some examples of the super-fast attacks speedsters might have, in addition to their Quickness.

FLAWS
 * Limited to One Type: Your Quickness applies to only physical or mental tasks, not both. –1 cost per rank.
 * Limited to One Task: Your Quickness applies to only one particular task, such as reading, mathematical calculations, and so forth. –2 cost per rank.

Regeneration
Action: None • Range: Personal • Duration: Permanent • Cost: 1 point per rank

You recover quickly from damage. Remove penalties to your Toughness checks due to damage equal to your Regeneration rank each minute. You then recover other damage conditions equal to:
 * May regenerate up to (05+Regenerate Ranks) Subdual Hit Points per minutes.
 * May regenerate up to (05+Regenerate Ranks) Lethal Hit Points per minutes.

REGENERATION ABSENT STAMINA

Characters with no Stamina do not heal (see Absent Abilities in Abilities). One or more ranks of Regeneration overcome this. An absent Stamina character with Regeneration 1 recovers at a normal rate; additional Regeneration ranks speed up that rate.

EXTRAS
 * Persistent: You can regenerate even Incurable damage conditions (see the Incurable modifier). +1 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Source: Your Regeneration only works when you have access to a particular source to replenish yourself, such as blood, electricity, sand, scrap metal, sunlight, and so forth. –1 cost per rank.

Remote Sensing
Action: Free • Range: Rank • Duration: Sustained • Cost:' 1–5 points per rank

You can displace one or more of your senses over a distance, perceiving as if you were at that location, up to 60 feet away. Each additional rank increases your range one distance rank, so rank 2 is 120 feet, rank 3 is 250 feet, and so on. Remote Sensing overrides your normal sense(s) while you are using it. Subjects observed via Remote Sensing can “feel” it with an Insight check (DC 10 + rank).

You can make Perception checks normally using your displaced senses, taking the normal action to do so. To search a large area for someone or something, use the search guidelines given in the description of the Investigation skill. Remote Sensing costs 1 point per rank for one sense type, 2 points per rank for two sense types, 3 points per rank for three, and 4 points per rank for four, and 5 points per rank for all of your senses. Visual senses count as two sense types (so visual Remote Sensing is 2 points per rank). You can use perception range sensory effects via Remote Sensing if your effect applies to their sense type and an accurate sense (usually sight). Sensory effects targeted on the spot where you have displaced your senses affect you normally.

Because Remote Sensing overrides your normal senses, you are vulnerable (at half your normal active defenses) while using it, since you are less aware of your immediate surroundings.

EXTRAS
 * Dimensional: This modifier allows you to extend your Remote Sensing into other dimensions with range proximate to your location in that dimension. One rank of Dimensional allows you to sense into a single other dimension, two for a group of related dimensions, and three for any dimension in the setting suitable to your Remote Sensing descriptors. Dimensional Remote Sensing for an accurate sense is especially useful for targeting other Dimension effects. Flat +1 point per rank of Dimensional.
 * No Conduit: Sensory effects targeted where you have displaced your senses do not affect you, but neither can you use perception ranged effects via your Remote Sensing. Despite the built-in limitation, this is an extra, since it allows you to use your Remote Sensing to observe subjects in relative safety. +1 cost per rank.
 * Simultaneous: You can use both Remote Sensing and your normal senses at the same time, perceiving two locales like “translucent” overlays of each other. This means you’re more capable of taking physical action while also using your Remote Sensing, although the effect still requires its normal duration to maintain. You are not vulnerable while using your Remote Sensing. +1 cost per rank.
 * Subtle: Remote Sensing already has a degree of subtlety. applying 1 rank of Subtle to Remote Sensing increases the DC to notice the effect to 20 + rank or makes it noticeable only to a particular unusual sense (with the usual DC 10 + rank perception check). Subtle 2 makes Remote Sensing completely unnoticeable, as usual. Flat +1 point per rank of Subtle.

FLAWS
 * Feedback: With this flaw, damaging attacks directed at where you displaced your senses can affect you. Your sensory-point is considered to have partial cover from attacks and you use your Remote Sensing rank as your Toughness defense against any successful attack. The feedback may be psychosomatic in nature or due to some sort of disruption caused by an assault on the point where you have redirected your senses. Note that sensory effects already work on you via Remote Sensing and this flaw doesn’t apply to them. –1 cost per rank.
 * Medium: You require a medium for your Remote Sensing, such as shadows, flames, mirrors, open water, television screens, and so forth. You can only perceive locations where your chosen medium exists. –1 cost per rank.
 * Noticeable: Remote Sensing with this flaw has an easily noticeable display, like a glowing set of eyes or a phantom image of your face, head, or body at the location you are observing. This manifestation cannot be used for communication, however (for that, take the Communication effect). Flat –1 point.
 * Sense-Dependent: Remote Sensing is already Sense-Dependent and cannot apply this flaw. Another effect might potentially have the flaw Remote-Sensing Dependent, such as an Affliction that targets only remote viewers observing a target or an area as a means of blocking or deterring them.

Senses
Action: None • Range: Personal • Duration: Permanent • Cost: 1 point per rank

One or more of your senses are improved, or you have additional sensory abilities beyond the normal five senses. Allocate ranks in Senses to the following effects. Some options require more than one rank, noted in their descriptions. So if you have Senses 5, for example, you can have darkvision (2 ranks), direction sense (1 rank), distance sense (1 rank), and ultra-hearing (1 rank), or any other combination adding up to 5 ranks.

Like all sensory effects, Senses uses the sense types as descriptors.

ACCURATE • 2 OR 4 RANKS

An accurate sense can pinpoint something’s exact location. You can use an accurate sense to target something in combat. Visual and tactile senses are normally accurate for humans. Cost is 2 ranks for one sense, 4 for an entire sense type.

ACUTE • 1-2 RANKS

You can sense fine details about anything you can detect with a particular sense, allowing you to distinguish between and identify different subjects. Visual and auditory senses are normally acute for humans. Cost is 1 rank for one sense, 2 for an entire sense type.

ANALYTICAL • 1-2 RANKS

Beyond even acute, you can perceive specific details about anything you can detect with an analytical sense, such as chemical composition, exact dimensions or mass, frequency of sounds and energy wavelengths, and so forth. You can only apply this effect to an acute sense. normal senses are not analytical. Cost is 1 rank for one sense, 2 for an entire sense type.

AWARENESS • 1 RANK

You can sense the use of effects of a particular descriptor with a successful Perception check (DC 10, with –1 to your check per 10 feet range). Examples include Cosmic Awareness, Divine Awareness, Magical Awareness, Mental Awareness, and so forth. You can apply other Sense effects to your Awareness to modify it. Choose the sense type for your Awareness; it is often a mental sense, but doesn’t have to be. Awareness counts as an “exotic sense” for noticing effects with the first rank of the Subtle modifier (see Subtle under Extras for details).

COMMUNICATION LINK • 1 RANK

You have a link with a particular individual, chosen when you acquire this option, who must also have this ability. The two of you can communicate over any distance like a use of the Communication effect. Choose a sense type as a communication medium when you select this option; mental is common for psychic or empathic links. If you apply the Dimensional modifier to your Communication Link, it extends to other dimensions as well (see Dimensional under Power Modifiers for details).

COUNTERS CONCEALMENT • 2 RANKS

A sense type with this trait ignores the Concealment effect of a particular descriptor; you sense the subject of the effect normally, as if the Concealment wasn’t even there. So if you have vision that Counters Invisibility, for example, then invisible beings are visible to you. For 5 ranks, the sense type ignores all Concealment effects, regardless of descriptor. Concealed subjects seem slightly “off” to you, enough to know they are concealed to others. This trait does not affect concealment provided by opaque objects, for that, see Penetrates Concealment.

COUNTERS ILLUSION • 2 RANKS

A sense type with this trait ignores the Illusion effect; you automatically succeed on your resistance check against the illusion if it affects your sense type, realizing that it isn’t real.

DANGER SENSE • 1 RANK

When you would normally be surprised in combat, make a Perception check (DC 10): One degree of success means you’re not surprised, but can’t act during the surprise round (so you don’t suffer any conditions of being surprised), while two or more degrees of success means you are not surprised and may act during the surprise round (if any). Failure means you are surprised (although, if you have Uncanny Dodge, you are not vulnerable). The GM may raise the DC of the Danger Sense check in some circumstances. Choose a sense type for your Danger Sense. Sensory effects targeting that sense also affect your Danger Sense ability and may “blind” it.

DARKVISION • 2 RANKS

You can see in complete darkness as if it were normal daylight; darkness provides no concealment to your vision. This is essentially the same as Counters Concealment (Darkness).

DETECT • 1-2 RANKS

You can sense a particular item or effect by touch with a Perception check. Detect has no range and only indicates the presence or absence of something (being neither acute nor accurate). Choose what sense type your Detect falls under (often mental). For 2 ranks you can detect things at range (with the normal –1 per 10 feet modifier to your Perception check).

DIRECTION SENSE • 1 RANK

You always know what direction north lies in and can retrace your steps through any place you’ve been.

DISTANCE SENSE • 1 RANK

You can accurately and automatically judge distances.

EXTENDED • 1 RANK

You have a sense that operates at greater than normal range. Your range with the sense—the distance used to determine penalties to your Perception check—is increased by a factor of 10. Each additional time you apply this option, your range increases by an additional factor of 10, so 1 rank means you have a –1 to Perception checks per 100 feet, 2 ranks makes it –1 per 1,000 feet, and so on. An extended sense may be limited by conditions like the horizon and physical barriers between you and the subject, unless it also Penetrates Concealment.

INFRAVISION • 1 RANK

You can see in the infrared portion of the spectrum, allowing you to see heat patterns. Darkness does not provide concealment for objects differing in temperature from their surroundings. If you have the Track effect, you can track warm creatures by the faint heat trails they leave behind. The Gamemaster is the final judge on how long the trail remains visible.

LOW-LIGHT VISION • 1 RANK

You ignore circumstance penalties to visual Perception checks for poor lighting, so long as it is not completely dark.

MICROSCOPIC VISION • 1-4 RANKS

You can view extremely small things. You can make perception checks to see tiny things nearby. Cost is 1 rank for dust-sized objects, 2 ranks for cellular-sized, 3 ranks for DNA and complex molecules, 4 ranks for atomic-sized. The GM may require an Expertise skill check to understand and interpret what you see.

PENETRATES CONCEALMENT • 4 RANKS

A sense with this trait is unaffected by concealment from obstacles (rather than Concealment effects). So vision that Penetrates Concealment sees right through opaque objects, for example, and hearing that Penetrates Concealment is unaffected by sound-proofing or intervening materials, and so forth.

POSTCOGNITION • 4 RANKS

Your senses extend into the past, allowing you to perceive events that took place previously. You can make Perception checks to pick up on past information in an area or from a subject. The Gamemaster sets the DC for these checks based on how obscure and distant in the past the information is, from DC 15 (for a vague vision that may or may not be accurate) to DC 30 (for near complete knowledge of a particular past event as if you were actually present). Your normal (present-day) senses don’t work while you’re using Postcognition; your awareness is focused on the past. Your postcognitive visions last for as long as you concentrate. Postcognition does not apply to sensory effects like Mind Reading or any other ability requiring interaction. Postcognition may be Limited to past events connected to your own “past lives” or ancestors, reducing cost to 2 ranks.

PRECOGNITION • 4 RANKS

Your senses extend into the future, allowing you to perceive events that may happen. Your precognitive visions represent possible futures. If circumstances change, then the vision may not come to pass. When you use this ability, the Gamemaster chooses what information to impart. Your visions may be obscure and cryptic, open to interpretation. The Gamemaster may require appropriate Perception skill checks for you to pick up on particularly detailed information, with a DC ranging from 15 to 30 or more. The GM can also activate your Precognition to impart specific information to you as an adventure hook or plot device. Your normal (present-day) senses don’t work while you’re using Precognition; your awareness is focused on the future. Your precognitive visions last as long as you concentrate. Precognition does not apply to sensory effects like Mind Reading or any other ability requiring interaction.

RADIO • 1 RANK

You can “hear” radio frequencies including AM, FM, television, cellular, police bands, and so forth. This allows you to pick up on Radio Communication (see the Communication effect). This is the base sense of the radio sense type. It’s ranged, radius, and acute by default.

RADIUS • 1-2 RANKS

You can make Perception checks with a radius sense for any point around you. Subjects behind you cannot use Stealth to hide from you without some other concealment. Auditory, olfactory, and tactile senses are normally radius for humans. Cost is 1 rank for use with one sense, 2 ranks for one sense type.

RANGED • 1 RANK

You can use a sense that normally has no range (taste or touch in humans) to make Perception checks at range, with the normal –1 per 10 feet modifier. This can be enhanced with the Extended Sense effect.

RAPID • 1 RANK

You can read or take in information from a sense faster than normal: each rank increases your perception speed by a factor of 10 (x10, x100, etc.) with a single sense, double cost for an entire sense type. You can use rapid vision to speed-read, pick up on rapid flickering between frames of a film, watch video replays in fast-forward speeds, and such, rapid hearing to listen to time-compressed audio “blips,” and so forth.

TIME SENSE • 1 RANK

You always know what time it is and can time events as if you had an accurate stopwatch.

TRACKING • 1 RANK

You can follow trails and track using a particular sense. Basic DC to follow a trail is 10, modified by circumstances, as the GM sees fit. You move at your speed rank –1 while tracking. For 2 ranks, you can move at full normal speed while tracking

ULTRA-HEARING • 1 RANK

You can hear very high and low frequency sounds, like dog whistles or ultrasonic signals, including those used by some remote controls.

ULTRAVISION • 1 RANK

You can see ultraviolet light, allowing you to see normally at night by the light of the stars or other UV light sources.

Under the Hood: Normal Senses

Senses are broken down into sense types, used as descriptors for sensory effects. Here are the traits of normal human senses, for use when modifying them with the options from Senses:

VISUAL

Normal vision is ranged (with a –1/10 feet modifier), acute (able to distinguish fine details) and accurate (able to pinpoint the locations of things).

AUDITORY

Normal hearing is ranged (with a –1/10 feet modifier), acute (able to pick up details like differences in tone), and radius (able to pick up on sounds coming from any direction). Normal hearing is not accurate.

OLFACTORY

Normal human olfactory senses, which lump together smell and taste for descriptor purposes, are fairly limited. Ordinary human olfactory senses are neither acute nor accurate. The sense of smell is a radius sense, however, able to pick up on scents coming from any direction. Its “range” is quite limited, however, effectively only close, except for especially strong scents.

TACTILE

The normal sense of touch is, by definition, close range. It is accurate (in that you know the location of anything you can touch) and radius (in that you can feel things from any surface of your body).

MENTAL

The “sixth sense” or mental sense type is fairly crude in normal humans, limited essentially to interactions with the Insight skill and awareness of mental effects used directly on you. Thus it is close range and has none of the Sense qualities.

Under the Hood: Precognition & Postcognition

Precognition and Postcognition can be problematic abilities, since they provide players with considerable information. Keep in mind precognitive and postcognitive information is often cryptic or unclear, and changes in circumstances may lead to changes in visions of the future. If players use either too often, feel free to have their visions become less and less clear as the timelines become tangled by so much constant surveillance and intervention.

Generally, Precognition is best treated as a plot device for the GM to provide information to the player as suits the adventure, similar to a free use of the inspiration ability of victory points. In fact, GMs looking to limit Precognition and Postcognition may wish to require extra effort or victory points to use them, or require the Uncontrolled modifier.

EXTRAS
 * Affects Others: You can grant the benefits of one or more Senses to another character. Apply Affects Others only to the ranks of the chosen sense(s). +0 or +1 cost per rank.
 * Area: The Area modifier only applies to Senses that affect Others, and only to extend their benefits to everyone in an area. Apply the Selective modifier for the ability to choose who in the area does and does not benefit from the Senses. To affect the area of a sense itself, use the Extended and Radius traits of the Senses effect. +1 cost per rank.
 * Dimensional: This modifier allows you to extend your senses into other dimensions. It’s assumed to apply to all your senses, allowing you to sense your proximate location in the other dimension(s). For a more extended range, use Remote Sensing with this modifier. +1 point per rank.
 * Innate: Senses, particularly those of aliens or constructs like robots, may be Innate, although this does not prevent sensory effects like Concealment or Dazzle from disabling them. Flat +1 point.
 * Ranged: Likewise, the Ranged extra only applies to Senses that Affect Others, extending the distance at which you can grant their benefits. To extend the range of a sense itself, use the Extended, Radius, and Ranged options of the Senses effect. +1 or +2 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Limited: Some Senses may be Limited to only sensing certain things or only under certain circumstances. As usual, the sense must lose about half its utility to qualify for this flaw, less than that is more likely a particular descriptor associated with the sense and may constitute a complication at the GM’s discretion when it comes up in play. –1 cost per rank.
 * Noticeable: Senses with this flaw are particularly noticeable in some way: your eyes may glow, for example, or you may emit a noticeable sound, vibration, energy, or the like for use as a sensor. Flat –1 point.
 * Unreliable: Some Senses may be unreliable; the GM makes checks for reliability when the sense is used. Two variations of this flaw may apply: in the first, the Senses effect is unreliable, when it doesn’t work, the character perceives nothing with that sense. In the second, the character’s perceptions are unreliable, the sense appears to work, but the character gets the wrong information. For this reason, the GM should make all reliability checks for Senses in secret, just informing the player of what the character does (or does not) notice. –1 cost per rank.

Shapeshift
Effect: Variable (assumed forms), Move Action • Cost: 8 points per rank

You can transform into different forms, gaining the physical traits (abilities, skills, advantages, and powers) of the assumed form. You gain (Shapeshift rank x 5) character points worth of traits. You can also redistribute points spent on your own physical traits (lowering your Strength to apply those points elsewhere, for example). You are limited to the inherent traits of the forms you assume and do not gain new mental traits, even if that form possesses them.

Shapeshift is often further Limited by the specific types of forms the character can assume, such as Limited to Animals or Limited to Machines.

Shrinking
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 2 points per rank

You can temporarily decrease your size, becoming smaller, harder to see — and hit — at the cost of losing Strength and speed. Every 04 ranks of Shrinking reduces your size rank by 01 (normal humans are size rank –2 by default) and each reduction in size rank subtracts 01 from your Strength and every two reductions in size rank subtract 01 from your ground speed rank. Add half your Shrinking rank (rounded down) to your active defenses. Add your Shrinking rank as a bonus to Stealth checks, since you are harder to spot, but apply half your rank (rounded down) as a penalty to intimidation checks (hard to be imposing when you’re tiny). Shrinking modifiers are restricted by power level limits. So at Shrinking 12, you are size rank –05 (about 06 inches tall), and have a +06 bonus to active defenses and +12 Stealth bonus, but –03 Strength, –01 speed, and –06 Intimidation penalties.

EXTRAS
 * Atomic: At Shrinking 20 (and size rank –07), you can shrink down to the molecular or even atomic level, allowing you to pass through solid objects by slipping between their atoms. It takes at least a full turn to do so, possibly longer for larger objects. You’re effectively immune to damage and many effects at this scale, since you are essentially shifted out of the ordinary universe. The GM decides if a particular effect can reach you at the atomic level. If you have this extra, you might also acquire a Dimensional Travel effect allowing you to shift into a sub-atomic “universe” or similar realm. Flat +01 point.
 * Normal Strength: You retain your full Strength, Speed, and Intimidation while shrunk. +01 cost per rank.

Sleep
Effect: Ranged Affliction, Resisted by Fortitude • Cost: 2 points per rank

You cause a the target to feel tremendous weariness. Targets failing the Fortitude resistance check against your effect DC become fatigued, then exhausted, and finally asleep as they succumb.

Sleep is not normally cumulative, but you can apply the Cumulative or Progressive modifiers, making the fatigue that much harder for victims to fight off.

Snare
Effect: Ranged, Cumulative Affliction, Extra Condition, Resisted by Dodge, Limited Degree • Cost: 03 points per rank

You can restrain a target with bonds of ice, glue, webbing, bands of energy, and so forth (whatever suits your descriptors). The target makes a Dodge resistance check against your effect DC. One degree of failure leaves the target hindered and vulnerable, while two results in the target becoming defenseless and immobilized. There is no additional effect for three or more degrees of failure.

The resistance check to break out of a Snare is based on Damage (including Strength Damage) or Sleight of Hand, either breaking the effect or slipping out of it. This is part of the power’s Alternate Resistance, with no change in cost.

Speed
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 01 point per rank

You can move faster than normal. You have a ground speed rank equal to your effect rank. This also improves all forms of movement based on ground speed.

Strike
Effect: Damage • Cost: 1 point per rank

You inflict additional damage in close combat. Your Strike either substitutes for your Strength damage or adds to it, if it is Strength-based, see the Damage effect for details. It might be claws, energy fields, focused striking strength, or something similar, depending on your descriptors. Close combat weapons are either equipment or this power with the Removable flaw. See the Gadgets & Gear (following) for more information.

Suffocation
Effect: Ranged, Progressive Affliction, Resisted by Fortitude • Cost: 04 points per rank

You render the target unable to breathe. Targets failing the Fortitude resistance check against your effect DC become dazed, stunned, and finally incapacitated, passing out from the lack of oxygen. A failed attempt to resist the ongoing effect of Suffocation causes the target’s condition to worsen by one degree.

Summon
Action: Standard • Range: Close • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 02 points per rank

You can call upon another creature—a minion—to aid you. This creature is created as an independent character with (effect rank x 15) character points. A summoned minion is limited to a Power Level equal to the rank of the Summon effect used to create it, is subject to the normal power level limits, and cannot have minions of its own, either from this effect or the Minions advantage.

You can summon your minion automatically as a standard action; it appears in the nearest open space beside you. Minions have their own initiative (see Initiative in the Action & Adventure) and act starting on the round after you summon them. Summoned minions are dazed, taking only a standard action each round. Directing a minion to do something is a move action for you, but minions generally do as they are told until a task is completed.

You always have the same minion unless you apply the Variable Type modifier, allowing you to summon different minions. Your minion automatically has a helpful attitude and does its best to aid you and obey your commands.

Incapacitated minions disappear. They recover normally and you cannot summon an incapacitated minion until it has completely recovered. Your summoned minions also vanish if your effect is not maintained, or is countered or nullified. For more information and rules regarding Minions.

Under the Hood: Summon

Summon is a useful effect; it doesn’t cost much to summon up a gang of minions, giving you a lot of effective actions per round! Gamemasters may wish to limit large numbers of minions (summoned or otherwise) to villains and non-player characters. Player character minions are subject to the series power level limits. There are also practical matters limiting just how much your minions can do at any one time.

First, directing your minions to do something is a move action. If you want to issue different commands to different minions, then it’s one move action per command. So it’s easier to tell all of your minions “attack!” than it is to issue complex commands to each one in the midst of combat.

Second, Gamemasters may wish to have groups of minions use team checks (see Team Checks in The Basics) rather than rolling their actions separately. For example, instead of making eight attacks for eight different minions, the GM has seven minions aid the eighth, giving that minion a +5 bonus. This makes groups of minions more effective and efficient overall, but keeps the number of die rolls to a minimum. GMs should keep in mind the limits on the number of opponents that can team up on a character at once.

Gamemasters may wish to limit the use of the Heroic extra for Summon. Treating minions the same as heroes can greatly slow down combat, especially if there are more than a couple of them, since it becomes that much harder to take them out of a fight.

EXTRAS
 * Active: Your minions are particularly independent and do not have the dazed condition, having a full set of actions each round. +1 cost per rank.
 * Controlled: Your minions all have the controlled condition (see Controlled in The Basics). They have no free will of their own and are completely under your direction. +1 cost per rank.
 * Heroic: The creatures you summon are not subject to the minion rules, but treated like normal non-player characters. A dditionally, they do not have the dazed condition and take a full set of actions each round. Do not apply the Active modifier to Heroic minions, as this modifier already includes it. Gamemasters should be particularly cautious about allowing this extra for Summon effects used by player characters, especially ones summoning more than one minion. +2 cost per rank.
 * Horde: If you have Multiple Minions (see following) you may take a standard action to summon any number of minions up to your maximum amount. You are vulnerable (see the Distracting flaw) until the start of your next turn when summoning a horde. +1 cost per rank.
 * Mental Link: You have a mental link with your minions, allowing you to communicate with them and issue orders telepathically like the Communication Link effect (see Senses effects). Flat +1 point.
 * Multiple Minions: You can summon more than one minion. Each application of this extra doubles your total number of minions. So, for example, with Summon 6, you summon a single 90-point minion. With Multiple Minions 1, you can summon two 90-point minions, with Multiple Minions 2, four minions, and so forth. It requires a standard action to summon each minion unless you also have the Horde extra (see previous). +2 cost per rank.
 * Sacrifice: When you are hit with an effect requiring a resistance check, you can spend a victory point to shift it to one of your minions instead. The minion must be within range of the effect and a viable target. Needless to say, this is not a particularly heroic ability. In fact, the GM may wish to restrict it to villains or non-player characters (in which case a hero earns a victory point when a villain uses this extra to avoid an effect by sacrificing a minion). Flat +1 point.
 * Variable Type: Minions are normally identical in terms of traits, although they may differ cosmetically. With this modifier you can summon different minions of a general type (like elementals, birds, fish, etc.), or even a broad type (like animals, demons, humanoids, etc.). General Type: +1 cost per rank. Broad Type: +2 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Attitude: Your summoned minions are less than cooperative: indifferent or even unfriendly. You can use interaction skills and other effects to get your summoned minions to cooperate, but success is by no means assured!
 * Indifferent: –1 cost per rank.
 * Unfriendly: –2 cost per rank.
 * Resistible: Your minions get an appropriate resistance check (typically Will) against (DC 10 + Summon rank) to avoid being summoned. If they successfully resist, you cannot attempt to summon them again in that scene without using extra effort. –1 cost per rank.

MINIONS AS DESCRIPTORS

Some effects might seem to be Summon, calling up minions to do things for the character, but are actually better treated as descriptors of other effects. Take for example a shaman able to “summon” various spirits to perform magical tasks. By calling on particular spirits of the winds, he can attack a foe with an Affliction that “steals” their breath. Is the “wind spirit” a minion? Technically, no, it’s just a personified effect, since it cannot be attacked, interacted with, or do anything other than create the Affliction effect. It can be Nullified, but so can any effect. The same is true of a character summoning a “minion” that acts as a shield, providing the Deflect or Protection effect, but doing nothing else. Consider carefully whether or not the particular effect a player wants really needs Summon, or if the “minion” in question is just a descriptor for another effect, no different than “heat ray” is a descriptor for a Damage effect or “sticky webbing” is a descriptor for a hindering Affliction; in neither case does the character need Summon Heat Ray or Summon Webbing to create the desired powers!

SUMMON AND DESCRIPTORS

Some effects might seem to be Summon, calling up minions to do things for the character, but are actually better treated as descriptors of other effects. Take for example a shaman able to “summon” various spirits to perform magical tasks. By calling on particular spirits of the winds, he can attack a foe with an Affliction that “steals” their breath. Is the “wind spirit” a minion? Technically, no, it’s just a personified effect, since it cannot be attacked, interacted with, or do anything other than create the Affliction effect. It can be Nullified, but so can any effect. The same is true of a character summoning a “minion” that acts as a shield, providing the Deflect or Protection effect, but doing nothing else. Consider carefully whether or not the particular effect a player wants really needs Summon, or if the “minion” in question is just a descriptor for another effect, no different than “heat ray” is a descriptor for a Damage effect or “sticky webbing” is a descriptor for a hindering Affliction; in neither case does the character need Summon Heat Ray or Summon Webbing to create the desired powers!

Super-Constitution
Effect: Enhanced Constitution • Cost: 03 points per rank

Increases Hit Points by (05 x Rank Level).

Super-Speed
Effect: Enhanced Initiative, Quickness, Speed • Cost: 03 points per rank

You are fast! Each rank of Super-Speed gives you the effects of Improved Initiative as an Enhanced Trait, Quickness, and Speed, with a ground speed rank equal to your power rank. So with Super-Speed 10, for example, you have +40 to initiative checks, can perform routine actions normally requiring two hours in just 6 seconds, and have a ground speed of 2,000 miles per hour!

Heroes with Super-Speed often have additional powers based on their speed, particularly things like Air Control (whipping up powerful winds, see Element Control, previously) or modifiers to their Strength Damage like Area or Multiattack to represent the ability to make a rapid series of attacks in a single turn. High (possibly Enhanced) active defenses are also common for characters with Super-Speed.

Swimming
Action: Free • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 1 point per rank

You can swim fast. You have a water speed equal to your Swimming rank –2, subject to the usual rules for swimming (see the Athletics skill description for details). You can make Athletics checks to swim as routine checks. This power does not allow you to breathe underwater (for that see Immunity).

Teleport
Action: Move • Range: Rank • Duration: Instant • Cost: 2 points per rank You can move instantly from place to place without crossing the distance in between. You can teleport yourself and up to 50 lbs. (mass rank 0) of additional mass a distance rank equal to your effect rank as a move action. Unwilling passengers get a Dodge resistance check to avoid being taken along.

You can only teleport to places you can accurately sense or know especially well (in the GM’s judgment). You retain your position and relative velocity when you teleport. So if you are falling when you teleport, you are still falling at the same speed when you arrive at your destination.

Teleport is meant for use on or around a planet. For things like traveling to distant planets or stars, apply the Space Travel effect of Movement as a “hyperjump” or similar power.

EXTRAS
 * Accurate: You don’t need to know or accurately sense your destination to teleport there, just be able to generally describe it, such as “inside the capitol building lobby” or “atop the Emerald Tower’s roof.” If the destination isn’t in your Teleport range, nothing happens. +1 cost per rank.
 * Change Direction: You can change your direction or orientation after a teleport..Flat +1 point.
 * Change Velocity: You can teleport “at rest” to your destination. Among other things, this means you can teleport out of a fall and suffer no damage. Flat +1 point.
 * Easy: You are not dazed or vulnerable when making extended teleports (following). +1 cost per rank.
 * Extended: You can take two move actions to make an extended teleport with a distance rank equal to your effect rank +8. You are dazed and vulnerable for one round after an extended teleport. +1 cost per rank.
 * Increased Mass: You can carry additional mass when you teleport equal to your rank in this extra. Flat +1 point per rank in Increased Mass.
 * Portal: You open a portal or gateway between two points as a free action. The portal is five feet across. Anyone stepping through the portal (a move action) is transported. The portal remains open as long as you concentrate, taking a standard action each turn to maintain it. +2 cost per rank.
 * Turnabout: You can teleport, take a standard action, and teleport back to your starting point in a single round, so long as the total distance moved doesn’t exceed your Teleport range. Flat +1 point.

FLAWS
 * Limited to Extended: You can only make extended teleports. You must have the Extended extra, and this flaw effectively makes it a +0 modifier. –1 cost per rank.
 * Medium: You require a medium for your teleportation, such as electrical or telephone wires, root structures, waterways, shadows, flames, mirrors, and so forth. You can only teleport from and to locations where your medium exists. –1 cost per rank.

Transform
Action: Standard • Range: Close • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 02-05 points per rank

You can change objects into other objects, altering their shape or material composition in the process. You must touch the chosen object, which requires a close attack check if the object is held or worn by another character. What you can transform affects cost per rank:
 * 02 Points: Transform one thing or substance into one other thing or substance, such as metal into wood, iron into glass, or broken objects into repaired ones.
 * 03 Points: Transform a broad group of things into a single result (any metal into gold, for example) or a single target into any of a broad group (one type of metal, such as lead, into any other metal, water into other liquids, and so forth).
 * 04 Points: Transform a broad group of targets into one of a broad group of results (solids into other solids, for example).
 * 05 Points: Transform any material into anything else.

Inanimate objects do not make resistance checks and transform automatically, so long as you can affect their total mass. You can transform (Transform rank –6) rank mass, so Transform 1 can affect up to 1.5 lbs (mass rank –5), then 3 lbs. at rank 2, and so forth, on up to rank 20, which affects 400 tons at once.

The transformation lasts as a sustained effect. When you stop maintaining it, the target reverts to normal. Continuous Transform is irreversible except by using another Transform effect to turn the target back into its previous form.

Transforming someone’s devices or equipment requires targeting them first: characters can make Dodge resistance checks for their held or worn items, with a +5 circumstance bonus for hand-held and similar sized objects. So transforming a hand-held weapon like a gun requires an attack check and permits the wielder a Dodge resistance check with a +5 bonus (for a hand-held item). Targeting a worn suit of armor requires an attack check and allows the wearer a Dodge resistance check (with no modifier for a large item).

Transform is generally just another way of “removing” a device or equipment, considered a part of their discount in cost, although transformed items should eventually be restored or replaced.

Under the Hood: Transform

Transform is a powerful effect, particularly in the hands of a cunning player. To a degree, Transform can duplicate certain other effects, such as trapping a target by transforming air into a solid material or turning oxygen into a suffocating gas (both Afflictions). This is perfectly allowable; use the rules for other effects as guidelines on how to handle these situations, using Transform rank to determine resistance DCs. Keep in mind, however, that Transform has a sustained duration, which may affect how such “tricks” work (e.g., the trap disappears if the character is stunned, the suffocating gas dissipates unless the character concentrates each round to continue transforming it, etc.). As always, the GM should use common sense and good judgment. You may wish to require characters using Transform to acquire money (gold, precious gems, etc.) or other permanent material goods to spend character points on ranks of the Benefit advantage to reflect this newfound wealth; otherwise, the goods fade or remain impermanent in some way. (Assuming things like wealth matter in your series in some way.)

DESTRUCTIVE TRANSFORMATIONS

It is possible for Transform to effectively destroy objects: turning a steel door into water, air, or even rust certainly removes it as a barrier. However, keep in mind that Transform is normally sustained; the target isn’t truly destroyed unless the effect is continuous, and therefore irreversible. Even then, the destruction of targets tends to be all-or-nothing. For an effect capable of wearingdown and eventually destroying objects, use WeakenToughness instead.

TRANSFORMING BEINGS

Transforming living or otherwise animate beings as opposed to inanimate matter requires an effect other than Transform. To alter a target’s outward appearance only, go with a Morph Attack. For a harmful effect that does something like turn the target to stone or into a mind-controlled zombie, see Affliction. When dealing with non-living creatures (those absent Stamina) capable of resistance checks (possessing Will) the GM may permit Transform to function like an Affliction against them.

Variable
Action: Standard • Range: Personal • Duration: Sustained • Cost: 7 points per rank

You can gain or use potentially any effect of the appropriate type and descriptor! A Variable effect provides you with a set of (rank x 5) character points you can allocate to different effects. Take an action on your turn and choose where to allocate your Variable character points. It is a good idea to have a “menu” of commonly used options written down in advance to help speed up this process during play.

The effects you gain from your Variable effect are subject to the normal power level and series limits. So you cannot, for example, acquire Enhanced Trait as a Variable effect to improve a trait beyond its power level limit, or acquire effects or descriptors the Gamemaster has specifically banned from the series. The GM has final say as to whether or not a particular use of a Variable effect is appropriate and may veto your allocations, if necessary.

You must also place descriptors on your Variable effect limiting its scope. For example, a Variable effect that mimics other’s traits is limited to the traits its subject(s) possess; a Variable effect providing you with traits suitable to different shapes is limited by the form(s) you assume; a Variable effect providing adaptations is limited to the stimulus to which it adapts, and so forth. This descriptor does not reduce the effect’s cost unless it’s especially narrow or limiting, and the GM is the final arbiter of what constitutes a suitable descriptor and which descriptors are narrow enough to qualify for a Limited flaw.

The allocation of your Variable points is sustained, so if you stop maintaining your Variable effect for any reason, your allocated points “reset” to a “null” state: you lose any temporary traits and must take the action necessary to reallocate your Variable points again on your turn to regain them. Points in a Continuous Variable effect remain where you set them without maintenance, unless the Variable effect itself is countered or nullified. Variable effects cannot be permanent in duration by definition.

Under the Hood: Variable Effects

Powers based off the Variable effect are obviously very flexible, capable of duplicating a wide range of other effects. Responsibility for controlling Variable effects in the game is placed largely in the hands of both the Gamemaster and responsible players. To do otherwise would require weighing the effect down with numerous game-system limitations that would keep it from doing what it is supposed to do: create a wide range of effects.

Keep in mind a Variable effect is not supposed to be “any effect I want.” That kind of unlimited power doesn’t belong in the hands of player characters, and is better reserved as a plot device for NPCs. A Variable effect can be “any effect within a given set of parameters,” but it’s up to you and the GM to define those parameters. The limits of power flexibility are deliberately set by Variable effects, the use of extra effort, and victory points.

Many comic book heroes who appear to have the power to “do anything” are actually using one of these options in game terms. For example, a super-wizard can do practically anything with magic. However, generally speaking, these characters have certain abilities they use all the time (powers they have acquired with character points) and “stunts” they only do from time to time, essentially power stunts performed with extra effort (and possibly victory points). This is why the Magic power, for example, is not a Variable effect: most powers in the game have the potential to do “stunts” via extra effort, so the “variability” of Magic seen in the comics is already built-in to the system, with some costs to control it, without having to give players carte blanche to duplicate any effect in the game at will (which is just likely to slow things down and cause game balance issues).

Variable effects are better reserved for things where it is difficult to cost-out and define everything about a given power in advance. For example, the ability to shapechange into any animal could be an application of the Morph effect with a long list of Metamorph options, but listing out every single possible animal form, one at a time, would be tedious to say the least, especially when a good number of those forms would be superfluous. A Variable effect, with the descriptor “animal forms” is easier to manage. The player can prebuild certain commonly used animal forms for use during play, but also has the option to new configurations that fit into the power’s descriptors. See the Sample Powers section for some examples of Variable effects in practice.

In short, Variable effect is a “last resort” in power design, and the GM should treat it as such.

EXTRAS
 * Action: You can change the configuration of your effect faster, although only a Reaction Variable can change more often than once per turn, and then only in response to its triggering circumstances. Gamemasters should exercise caution with Variable effects that can be reconfigured as a free action or reaction: they not only grant tremendous flexibility, they can also slow down game play as the player considers virtually infinite possibilities for each action using the Variable effect. Move Action: +1 cost per rank . Free Action: +2 cost per rank. Reaction: +3 cost per rank.
 * Affects Others: You can grant effects to someone else. The subject granted the use of the effect controls its configuration, if appropriate for its descriptors (although you retain the ability to withdraw use of the effect altogether whenever you wish). Affects Others Only: +0 cost per rank. Affects Others or yourself: +1 cost per rank.
 * Perception: Applied to a Ranged Affects Others Variable, this extra allows you to grant the benefits of the effect to any target you can accurately perceive. +1 cost per rank.
 * Ranged: A Variable effect with Affects Others may have the Ranged extra to improve the range at which you can grant the effect to another. This does not alter the ranges of the effect’s various configurations. To do so, apply the Range modifier to the effect(s) within a particular configuration. +1 cost per rank.

FLAWS
 * Limited: As noted in the description, a Variable effect must be limited by certain descriptors by default. To qualify for this flaw, the effect must be even more limited. This is highly situational and left to the Gamemaster’s judgment. An example is a Variable effect only able to provide Enhanced Skills; in most settings, this is Limited. However, in settings where powers are rare and most characters rely on skills, it might not be. Conversely, a Variable effect prohibited from providing Enhanced Skills, but able to provide a wide range of other effects, isn’t particularly Limited, just defined by its descriptors. –1 (or more) cost per rank.
 * Slow: You can only reconfigure your Variable effect outside of action time. You might need access to a lab, arsenal, spell-book, or other special equipment, or need to perform certain procedures or rituals. It takes at least a minute, possibly as long as an hour or more. The GM sets the specific time in cases where it matters, but it should be short enough that you can reconfigure between scenes in a game, but long enough that you effectively cannot do it during action time. The GM may allow you to spend a victory point to reconfigure your Variable effect during action time as a power stunt, if circumstances warrant it. –1 cost per rank.

Weaken
Action: Standard • Range: Close • Duration: Instant • Cost: 01 point per rank

You can temporarily lower one of a target’s traits, chosen when this effect is acquired. You must touch the target, making a normal close attack check.

WEAKEN RESISTANCE CHECK

Fortitude or Will vs. DC [10 + Weaken rank]
 * Success: No effect.
 * Failure: The target loses character points from the affected trait equal to the difference between the check result and the DC, up to a maximum of the Weaken rank.

Multiple failed resistance checks against a Weaken effect are cumulative, up to a maximum of the Weaken rank, at which point the effect cannot weaken the trait further. Lost points return at a rate of 1 per round at the end of each of the target’s turns. Inanimate objects do not recover weakened Toughness; they must be repaired. Objects may or may not recover other weakened traits, at the GM’s discretion and depending on the effect’s descriptors.

WEAKENING ABILITIES

Abilities weakened below a rank of –5 become debilitated. See Debilitated Abilities for details of specific abilities at this point. It is not possible to weaken an ability past the point of debilitation. Any further uses of Weaken on the subject have no effect until the ability recovers to a rank of at least –5.

WEAKENING DEVICES

Weaken with Affects Objects and the right descriptor(s) can lower the traits provided by a device (see the Removable flaw in Gadgets & Gear). For example, Weaken Magic could potentially drain the powers of a magical device as well as a target’s own magical powers. Likewise Weaken Electricity could affect an electrical device, and so on. This also applies to equipment, although it tends to have fewer traits to weaken, and the GM should feel free to disallow any Weaken effects that don’t make reasonable sense. For example, just because a Weaken Damage effect is possible doesn’t mean a character should be able to cause guns to do less damage; this sort of thing is better handled by an all-or-nothing effect like Nullify.

EXTRAS
 * Affects Objects: Weaken with this modifier works on inanimate objects, although the effect can still only affect traits the objects possess. This is most often applied to Weaken Toughness for an effect that can weaken both creatures and objects. +1 cost per rank, +0 for Affects Only Objects.
 * Broad: You can Weaken any of a broad set of traits, one at a time suited to your effects descriptors. So you might be able to Weaken Abilities, for example, or Weaken Mental Effects. You choose which trait from the set is weakened when you use the effect. +1 cost per rank.
 * Concentration: Once you have hit with a Concentration Weaken, so long as you continue to take a standard action each turn to maintain the effect, the target must make a new resistance check against it, with no attack check required. +1 cost per rank.
 * Incurable: Weaken with this modifier cannot have its effects countered by another power (such as Restorative Healing) without the Persistent modifier; the target must recover from the Weaken normally. Flat +1 point.
 * Precise: A Weaken effect capable of reducing more than one trait at once can have this modifier, allowing you to choose which traits are affected, while not affecting others. Note this differs from the Selective extra (following). Flat +1 point.
 * Progressive: A Progressive Weaken effect reduces the affected traits each round until the target successfully resists. Make a new resistance check for the target at the end of each turn; failure weakens the affected trait(s) further, while success stops the Progressive Weaken, but the target must still recover ranks already lost (at the rate of 1 point per turn). +2 cost per rank.
 * Selective: This extra is applied to an Area Weaken so it only affects some targets and not others. Combined with Precise (previously), you can use an Area Weaken to selectively affect only certain traits of certain targets. +1 cost per rank.
 * Simultaneous: If applied to a Broad Weaken, this extra allows it to affect all of the traits in its set at the same time. Each trait loses the difference between the resistance check result and the DC in character points on a failed check. So a Simultaneous Weaken Fire Effects subtracts points from every fire effect the target possesses with a single attack. The effect must be Broad to apply this modifier. +1 cost per rank.

FLAWS
A listing of flaws relevant or unique to the effect. If any of these entries do not apply, they are omitted. So if an effect does not have any particular extras associated with it, the extras entry is omitted.

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