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The size of things? (possible spoilers for players)

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Fri, 2010-07-23 04:49

Ferretz

The size of things? (possible spoilers for players)

Hi, With all the different morphs characters can sleeve in, and with the numerous opponents the characters face, I would have loved to see more mention of how big different things really are. Eclipse Phase has no "size characteristic", and you might say that this is up to the GM to describe, but in some cases, the GM has no idea. For example, how big are the different types of TITAN machines? There's a fractal on the cover of the GM screen, and I can guess the size of the headhunters, as they're described in the fiction "Lack", but I'm at a loss when it comes to the warbots and hunter-killers. And when Gatecrashing comes out, I guess there will be descriptions of the mega-fauna of the planet Echo IV. Going the other way, the child sized neotenic morph has a bonus for being a little bit smaller than an average morph. The rules, as they stand now, seem to scale everything containing an Ego or mind, on the scale of human sized characters. Would a rules mechanical way of handling this be a good idea at some point? E.

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"I can’t talk to a man who bears an undeserved animosity towards ferrets."

-GRAHAM CHAPMAN (1941-89)

Fri, 2010-07-23 15:29

Eleazar

Re: The size of things? (possible spoilers for players)

I think the neotenic example of a -10 to hit it due to its size is pretty much a good example for how to include size modifiers in a game. If it's in between a child and an adult in size, you can either just say there's no penalty to hit, or give something in between 10-0. Going against larger targets, just say to your players that they get a +5, +10 to hit or whatever. The rules are based on percentages, so it is easy to just think about how much of a percent bonus you want to give for any situation, including size modifiers.

Fri, 2010-07-23 16:41

CodeBreaker CodeBreaker's picture

Re: The size of things? (possible spoilers for players)

Eleazar wrote:
I think the neotenic example of a -10 to hit it due to its size is pretty much a good example for how to include size modifiers in a game. If it's in between a child and an adult in size, you can either just say there's no penalty to hit, or give something in between 10-0. Going against larger targets, just say to your players that they get a +5, +10 to hit or whatever. The rules are based on percentages, so it is easy to just think about how much of a percent bonus you want to give for any situation, including size modifiers.

The To-Hit modifiers seem to be the only mechanical difference in size, so yeah. Page 193 lists the different modifiers, -10 for child sized, -30 for mouse/insect sized. +10 for car sized, +30 for side of a barn sized. Basically its just up to the GM to pick a modifier for anything between the two extremes.

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Sat, 2010-07-24 03:35

Decivre

Re: The size of things? (possible spoilers for players)

CodeBreaker wrote:
The To-Hit modifiers seem to be the only mechanical difference in size, so yeah. Page 193 lists the different modifiers, -10 for child sized, -30 for mouse/insect sized. +10 for car sized, +30 for side of a barn sized. Basically its just up to the GM to pick a modifier for anything between the two extremes.

Also note that the neotenic has a reduced somatics cap... that may also be linked to size, and may be another standard set for making bodies smaller than human-size.

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Sun, 2010-07-25 11:02

King Shere King Shere's picture

Re: The size of things? (possible spoilers for players)

Yes, the book has much ambiguity. I feel that many things have been written intentionally vague -to not rule things out. All to ease canon for future unwritten work visions & consumer GMs personal implementations. Sort of related. Remembering a earlier thread on how large a nanoswarm needs to be to contain a human ego. The swarm morph (not nanomachine) is said to be the size of a small child when gathered. Of course The size of a nanoswarm morph becomes a hand wave using TITANs. I have got the impression that the EP nano machines are actually not nanomachines. Since they doesn't seem to be nano-scale or even act at that level -rather they act on the micro-scale (bacteria) or on the millimetre scale (insects). Still capable of pretty impressive stuff. The TITAN nanomachines may be pico or nano-scale -though even they seems to to be on the micro scale. Contrast to "real" nanomachines since Nanotechnology, shortened to "nanotech", is the study of the controlling of matter on an atomic and molecular scale. EP public may still call all non-nanoscale & tiny machines for Nanomachines as it sounds better than pico or micromachines -and people like simplifying into general use labels.

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Sun, 2010-08-01 06:21

Ferretz

Re: The size of things? (possible spoilers for players)

I'm playing around with some rules that take into account the size of morphs when it is needed. There are some silly situations that might arise with Neo-Avians wrestling and subduing suryas and so on. The two rules that needs to take size into account it Subduing and Knockback/Knockdown. The way I see it, Durability can be used as a measure of physical size, strength and weight of a morph. So to achieve subdual or to knock down something, why not say that the MoS must be the base Durability of the morph in question? This would prevent some neotenic morph to wrestle a TITAN Warbot to the ground ("Grab its leg, Bob! Grab its leg!!") Any thoughts? Eirik

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"I can’t talk to a man who bears an undeserved animosity towards ferrets."

-GRAHAM CHAPMAN (1941-89)