Stunt idea: Redirect Attack

[Mr. Death]

So, after playing a bunch of Sentinels of the Multiverse, I had an idea. There's a handful of ways in that game to redirect an attack away from a friendly target and into someone else, so how about:

Redirect Attack: After a successful defense against a melee attack, you can skip your next turn to attack another target using the Weapon rating of your attacker.

I'm stuck on whether this should act like Step Into The Blow, where you get to roll another attack immediately, or like Riposte, where you'd just use your defense roll as your attack roll. Wording may also need some work.

Thoughts?

[sdfds68]

Wouldn't making a "I stole ur knife!" maneuver be an easier, non-refresh way of using your opponents weapon scores?

[Mr. Death]

If you're no good with a knife, it's useless, and you can't steal the +2/4/6 from your opponent's strength powers. You also can't do so in reaction without a stunt.

[Taran]

The challenge of doing it like ripost is that ripost allows you to take the difference in your defense vs the attack as the number of shifts for your ripost attack.  When you involve another target, I feel like they should also get a separate defense.  That's an extra roll, so it seems less smooth.

Step into the blow doesn't really make as much sense to me.  You've been hit  AND you redirected their attack?  I think it's balanced but the fluff doesn't make sense to me.

Why don't you make it more like Redirected Force?  You get to place a maneuver as part of your dodge as long as you lose your next turn.  It just lets  you place that maneuver on another target (limited to the zone you're in, I'd think).

[dragoonbuster]

I would just go with a hybrid solution....On a successful defense, you can redirect the attack. The first opponent's weapon damage becomes "your" weapon damage. Your "to defend" becomes your "to strike" against a second opponent. That opponent gets a defense. If it's equal to or lower than your "to strike" roll, the blow lands.

That or, maybe a bit more simply, use the original attacker's strike roll and have the second opponent defend against it. Effectively, the stunt would allow you to sacrifice your next action on a successful defense to force an attack from one opponent against another.

[sdfds68]

Maybe instead of rolling against your opponent, sacrifice a fate point to redirect to a new target. Redirecting attacks sounds like a 'only once in a while, when it's important' kind of thing anyways.

I mean, when are you going to want to do it? Every day, all day or when it's most dramatic?

[dragoonbuster]

I mean, when are you going to want to do it? Every day, all day or when it's most dramatic?

That depends. There are some characters where this might be central to their fighting style. Think of Jackie Chan's movies. He spends 99% of his "attacks" as redirects, sending on of his opponents' attacks at another. This stunt is trying to do exactly that. It requires input from the attacker (their roll), defense and a redirection from the original defender (defense roll and stunt to convert into attack roll) and defense from the new defender (a second opponent rolling defense).

[sdfds68]

That depends. There are some characters where this might be central to their fighting style. Think of Jackie Chan's movies. He spends 99% of his "attacks" as redirects, sending on of his opponents' attacks at another. This stunt is trying to do exactly that. It requires input from the attacker (their roll), defense and a redirection from the original defender (defense roll and stunt to convert into attack roll) and defense from the new defender (a second opponent rolling defense).

I honestly think the ordinary rules cover that behavior much better than attack redirection, because those guys almost certainly have worse stats than Jackie, so it would take a ridiculously long time for that combat to end if all of those individual punches and kicks counted as redirected attacks. Much better to just describe Jackie redirecting those attacks and actually have him be making Fists attacks against the nameless goons.

[Taran]

I think Jackie is doing maneuvers and following up with attacks.  Which is why I think redirected Force would work nicely.

That said, how about a stunt that lets you use your enemy's weapon rating for your fist/weapon strikes?

So you could just attack normally, but use the weapon value of your enemy to narrate how you redirected an attack.  It would only apply on attacks where you were attacked by the weapon in question.

It's not so great if you're wielding a Great sword, but if you're wielding fists/daggers or a light weapon, it'd be cool.

So, opponent A attacks you.
On your turn, you attack opponent B with your attack chance but with opponent A's weapon value.

Edit: and/or you could make it like step into the blow, except it only applies when you dodge.  You give up an attack to get an immediate attack against another opponent in the zone, using the first opponents weapon value.

I might allow you to use opponents strength value on top of that...I dunno.

[sdfds68]

That could actually work pretty well. But does it let you redirect their equipment only or equipment and power bonuses?

[Taran]

I edited. see above.

I'm not actually sure.  If you redirect someone coming at you with Mythic force, wouldn't that force be redirected to the new target?

Or, would the act of redirecting it, slow it down too much?

Maybe it could be a second stunt with the first as a pre-requisite?
-1 refresh gets you weapon value only
-2 refresh gets you strength bonus too?

There's an advantage, then, to not taking out the mythically strong person and, instead, using them as a weapon against others...but if you don't attack them and take them out, you're risking being hit by them...

And, if you make it take up your next turn, then you can only do it every second exchange

[sdfds68]

Also, wrinkle. If there's a precedent for redirecting attacks of some kind, does that mean its ok to redirect attacks of all kinds?

See: wizard rocket tennis.

[Taran]

Also, wrinkle. If there's a precedent for redirecting attacks of some kind, does that mean its ok to redirect attacks of all kinds?

See: wizard rocket tennis.

Rocket tennis could be a cool extended test between two wizards during a combat!

at the same time, I'd love to see the surprise on a players face when you redirect their weapon 12 evocation back at their ally!

Honestly, redirecting missile weapons should be close to impossible.  Probably the realm of powers and not stunts.  That said, I could see that, if you're in melee with someone and someone else shoots into that melee, you could move out of the way, or use your opponent as a shield against the incoming attack.

This is stuff I'd allow with maneuvers.  A player uses might to create a maneuver of "human shield" (maybe while grappling).  Then tags for effect when another opponent attacks in order to have that attack hit the shield instead.

Overall, I'd limit it to melee and limit it to other characters in the same zone.  But you have a good point.

[sdfds68]

Not to mention social and mental attacks. I think before working on redirection I should probably go familiarize myself with all the ways to cause stress in the game.

I do kinda feel like redirection should be limited somehow besides rolls. It sounds cool, but 4 or 5 rolls into a tennis match with one increasingly powerful attack I think the other players will be getting bored with declaring and maneuvering to help one person not get blown into tiny pieces.

[Mr. Death]

I would just go with a hybrid solution....On a successful defense, you can redirect the attack. The first opponent's weapon damage becomes "your" weapon damage. Your "to defend" becomes your "to strike" against a second opponent. That opponent gets a defense. If it's equal to or lower than your "to strike" roll, the blow lands.

That or, maybe a bit more simply, use the original attacker's strike roll and have the second opponent defend against it. Effectively, the stunt would allow you to sacrifice your next action on a successful defense to force an attack from one opponent against another.

That's more or less how I initially thought of it -- seems to make the most sense.

That depends. There are some characters where this might be central to their fighting style. Think of Jackie Chan's movies. He spends 99% of his "attacks" as redirects, sending on of his opponents' attacks at another. This stunt is trying to do exactly that. It requires input from the attacker (their roll), defense and a redirection from the original defender (defense roll and stunt to convert into attack roll) and defense from the new defender (a second opponent rolling defense).

Murphy's Aikido comes to mind, too -- there's one bit in Proven Guilty where she does exactly this, redirects one of the Hammerhands dude's attacks into his own foot.

Rocket tennis could be a cool extended test between two wizards during a combat!

Isn't that kind of how Harry and Ortega's duel worked out?

But yeah, redirecting projectiles would be a lot trickier -- the only way I could see it working mundanely is something like if you're standing directly between your attacker and one of his goons, and you duck at just the right moment. Like the Deadly Dodging trope.