Orbius hurts my head

[The Mighty Buzzard]

To be purely technical the RAW doesn't allow you to extend offensive blocks zone wide.

Actually, it does allow zone-wide offensive blocks.  Unfortunately:

Generally speaking, if the block can affect more than one person, it can only prevent one type of action.

Pew, pew, pew, no zone-wide grapples.  Ever.

Speaking of... Orbius = pwned.

When you create a block, the block has to be specific and clear in two ways: who it's intended to affect, and what types of action (attack, block, maneuver, move) it's trying to prevent.

Orbius is specific in the description on preventing breathing, therefore that is all it prevents.

[Sanctaphrax]

A few disordered points:

1. You can't take someone out with a normal block. If Elaine's air shell took Harry out, it was an attack inflicting stress. A 100000 shift block with 10000000 exchanges of duration won't take out a pixie.

2. If you can immobilize an opponent for 8 exchanges, you've either won or had no hope in the first place. The stress inflicted by Orbius is just not that significant compared to its ability to block everything.

3. There was no typo in my earlier example. 8 shifts base, take mild mental and tick off 4th mental stress box to get +5 power. Eat 5 points of backlash, taking a mild physical and filling in 3rd physical stress box. 13 shifts.

4. Wish I had my books on hand to check out this zone block stuff. I was under the impression that evocations of all kinds could be made zonewide for 2 shifts of power.

5. I have no idea what the "resisted by Endurance" thing in Orbius's stats means. As far as I know, blocks are never resisted with anything.

[Tedronai]

Orbius is specific in the description on preventing breathing, therefore that is all it prevents.

Orbius is specific in being adjudicated as a grapple.
Grapples are blocks against (almost) all actions.
Orbius is, thereby, specific in being a block against (almost) all actions.


But then, we've been over this before.  You have your interpretation; I have mine.

[Haru]

A few disordered points:

1. You can't take someone out with a normal block. If Elaine's air shell took Harry out, it was an attack inflicting stress. A 100000 shift block with 10000000 exchanges of duration won't take out a pixie.

I know that, of course. What I meant was, if you are not willing to spent a fate point or a consequence on a conflict, and you get blocked like that, you might as well concede the conflict and get it over with, I don't see a reason to keep pushing stress on the target just to go for a taken out result.

2. If you can immobilize an opponent for 8 exchanges, you've either won or had no hope in the first place. The stress inflicted by Orbius is just not that significant compared to its ability to block everything.

Maybe a better way to go would be "block everything of one type". There might still be some overlap, but it would still dial down the power. In the case of my Elaine example, it would make sense to say it was a block against physical actions. Harry proceeds to do a declaration (remembering the spell from their shared past) and probably a mental maneuver (concentrating on the weak spot of the spell) before he attempts to break out.

I a lot of cases, this might boil down to forcing the opponent to deal with you in another way. If you lock him down physically, he might go for a social conflict instead.

[sinker]

Actually, it does allow zone-wide offensive blocks.  Unfortunately:

I should have been more specific. The evocation rules do not allow zone-wide offensive evocation blocks. Technically the normal block rules do allow for zone-wide offensive blocks provided that they are to a specific action, however I've always believed that the evocation rules supersede those, since evocation changes several things over the normal rules (like an attack being zone-wide, or a maneuver requiring shifts of duration).

I would actually agree with you though. I'd rather have the non-evocation rules prioritized over the evocation rules on this one.

4. Wish I had my books on hand to check out this zone block stuff. I was under the impression that evocations of all kinds could be made zonewide for 2 shifts of power.

That rule is mentioned individually in each action you can make with evocation. Under the attack action it says this:

2 shifts of power let you affect every target
in one particular zone you can see (filling the
zone with fire, for example, instead of shooting
fire at one monster). You can go after more than
one zone at a time by buying this effect multiple
times, so four shifts of power allows you to affect
all targets in two zones.

The quote above is from the block action. The maneuver action does not mention being able to extend the action to a whole zone, but does mention creating environmental aspects to effect more than one target. This does not cost any shifts.

[sinker]

Orbius is specific in the description on preventing breathing, therefore that is all it prevents.

To be completely technical, that argument has holes punched into it from a previous argument. If a defense roll is not an action (and therefore cannot be blocked) then neither is breathing.

[The Mighty Buzzard]

Orbius is specific in being adjudicated as a grapple.
Grapples are blocks against (almost) all actions.
Orbius is, thereby, specific in being a block against (almost) all actions.
But then, we've been over this before.  You have your interpretation; I have mine.

Dandy, so you have to recast it every exchange the same as a physical grapple.  Adjudicated as a grapple...  Oh, and you'll be using Might rather than Discipline.  Adjudicated as a grapple...  You won't be taking any other standard actions while maintaining it either.  Adjudicated as a grapple...

See how nifty it is when you can directly contradict something you don't like about a spell with that phrase?

You must be specific + being specific is not likely meant to be directly contradicted by a later vague statement.

If you want to write a different spell that blocks all actions and grapples, by all means.  You'll need to rewrite the description though.  Hell, you could even call it Orbius.  Orbius as written is not what you want though and I've got extremely solid ground to say it was not intended to be interpreted to as such from both canon and RAW.

A few disordered points:

1. You can't take someone out with a normal block. If Elaine's air shell took Harry out, it was an attack inflicting stress. A 100000 shift block with 10000000 exchanges of duration won't take out a pixie.

2. If you can immobilize an opponent for 8 exchanges, you've either won or had no hope in the first place. The stress inflicted by Orbius is just not that significant compared to its ability to block everything.

3. There was no typo in my earlier example. 8 shifts base, take mild mental and tick off 4th mental stress box to get +5 power. Eat 5 points of backlash, taking a mild physical and filling in 3rd physical stress box. 13 shifts.

4. Wish I had my books on hand to check out this zone block stuff. I was under the impression that evocations of all kinds could be made zonewide for 2 shifts of power.

5. I have no idea what the "resisted by Endurance" thing in Orbius's stats means. As far as I know, blocks are never resisted with anything.

Ahh, didn't see where you were getting it from.  And yeah, its primary usefulness is in the all-actions block that directly contradicts the spell description.

As for resisting? I think that was a bone thrown in to mitigate the vileness a bit.

The zonewide for two shifts thing is a general rule for spells.  Blocks have their own specific way of dealing with zone-wide-ness though.  This is why I store my pdfs in my Dropbox Private folder.  Always have them wherever I go and there's case law giving me the OK copyright-wise.

Heh, 10000000 exchanges of duration on a pixie will likely result in you being taken out by old age while the pixie twiddles its thumbs.  Pixie: 1  You: 0

[The Mighty Buzzard]

To be completely technical, that argument has holes punched into it from a previous argument. If a defense roll is not an action (and therefore cannot be blocked) then neither is breathing.

Neither is perception but it can be blocked all day long by veils, darkness, excessive light, wacky cartoon illusions, etc...

[sinker]

Ah, but veils are a specific case that the rules mention specifically as an exception. Otherwise you have to pick an action.

[The Mighty Buzzard]

I specifically checked up on that a day or so ago.  Granted I've slept since then but I remember it being worded such that I moved on uncertain whether they were using action to mean an Action or an action with examples.  I'm inclined to think the latter or you couldn't do things like drown someone by holding their head underwater.

This is a spot where I'd let fluff win out since it isn't really doing anything that couldn't be done for exactly the same result with a slightly different description and isn't contradicted by canon, common sense, physics, or clear refutation in the RAW.

[Silverblaze]

I liken orbius to Spider-Man webbing a foes face (with an evil bent).  Maybe you can't see, maybe you can't breathe...but you should still be able to move or swing at sounds etc.  It certainly shouldn't serve as a block against zombies or Blampires....they don't breathe.  Therefore my reasoning says it can't possibly block all actions.  In some cases it truly blocks nothing. 

I know we don't like absolutes around here...but... not needing to breathe...because you are dead...is pretty absolute.

I assume it is treated as a grapple since it is a gooey substance that clings to people's faces.  Not that it stops all actions.  I also have an issue with grapples stopping all actions.  I've been grappled a fair bit in my day.  I can still do a lot of stuff...fairly offensive painful stuff.

That said, even if orbius is OP....

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I like it.

It still simulates spidey's web to face manuever...sort of.  Also i like to hear Sanctaphrax rant about it.

I personally will never run it that way in a game and would not play in someones game who used such a thing on me in a game.

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I'd also likely crap in their bed or car, but you know that just goes without saying.

[Sanctaphrax]

@Haru:

Not sure what you mean. Your post reads like a rebuttal, but it looks as though you actually agree with me.

@sinker:

Thanks. This is one case where I'm quite glad to be wrong.

@The Mighty Buzzard:

I really don't think that this is so clear-cut. As far as I know, Tedronai is neither illiterate nor evil. So if he genuinely thinks that it blocks everything, then maybe there's some merit to that.

The main cause of the disagreement is probably the fact that "a block against breathing" doesn't actually mean anything according to the game rules.

@Silverblaze:

Glad to hear that I'm entertaining, at least.

[Watson]

(...quote from YS251...)
The quote above is from the block action.

No, it is not - it is from the attack action on YS251. The block action, YS252, is more vague in regards to how it can be used.

2 shifts of power allow the effect to cover
multiple allies within the same zone (typically
the same zone the wizard occupies). Covering
multiple zones requires 2 additional shifts
per zone.

I interpret that as:
a) One can't use a block against attacks for all allies in one zone - they have to be added at 2 shifts of power per ally (assuming they are in the same zone, otherwise it costs 2 more shifts of power to add another zone.
b) You can't cast a "block all actions" on all enemies in one zone (as the text does only refer to adding more allies as part of the block).
c) Perhaps it is not even possible to add 2 shifts of power to add a "block all actions" on more than oneenemies in one zone (if the fact that the word "ally" is being used instead of the word "target" was something deliberate, from the author).

[sinker]

No, it is not - it is from the attack action on YS251. The block action, YS252, is more vague in regards to how it can be used.

By above I meant my previous post. It's one of the last ones on the previous page. Sorry for the confusion.

It occurs to me that a lot of The Mighty Buzzard's argument is that it says "Offensive Block, adjudicated as a grapple." How would you respond then if we just made a magic grapple? There's other RAW supporting that.

[Silverblaze]

Has anyone contemplated some of the wording for Orbius as I have?  Typographical error?