Is anyone else annoyed by Physical Immunity?

[Taer]

Does anyone other than me find this power largely inappropriate in the game?

For example, let's say I'm designing some kind of a BBEG. I want for him to be extremely badass, tougher than even Mythic Toughness. Because of God-mode, there just isn't any place for designing any other super-Toughness powers. Why even bother? God-mode is available. I can't ever have a Toughness power cost more than -7 Refresh because -8 is invulnerable.

It's also placed in some highly unsatisfying places in the book. For example, Ogres have Physical Immunity to magic. I mean, does that seriously mean that an Ogre could basically walk into a meeting of the entire White Council and the thousand or so wizards could unload enough magic to level a city and he'd just shrug it off? GM Fiat here is not really a satisfying solution.

Sure - I can get that Ogres are very tough against magic. But they're also nowhere near heavyweights, they shouldn't get to laugh in the face of the entire Council if they unleash their full power.

Similarly, some other creatures I don't think deserve Physical Immunity. Sure, the Loup-Garou is badass. Sure, it could rip apart an entire police department. So, can it survive a nuke? Ten? Fifty? The full might of Queen Mab if she doesn't use some sort of a Catch-satisfying ability?

Again, GM Fiat is not a good solution. As a GM, I can already do anything. The rules in the book are there to tell me what I should and should not do.

So, opinions on this? If you share my opinion, did anyone come up with some sort of a custom power for other high-end Toughness abilities?

[tetrasodium]

Does anyone other than me find this power largely inappropriate in the game?

For example, let's say I'm designing some kind of a BBEG. I want for him to be extremely badass, tougher than even Mythic Toughness. Because of God-mode, there just isn't any place for designing any other super-Toughness powers. Why even bother? God-mode is available. I can't ever have a Toughness power cost more than -7 Refresh because -8 is invulnerable.

It's also placed in some highly unsatisfying places in the book. For example, Ogres have Physical Immunity to magic. I mean, does that seriously mean that an Ogre could basically walk into a meeting of the entire White Council and the thousand or so wizards could unload enough magic to level a city and he'd just shrug it off? GM Fiat here is not really a satisfying solution.

Sure - I can get that Ogres are very tough against magic. But they're also nowhere near heavyweights, they shouldn't get to laugh in the face of the entire Council if they unleash their full power.

Similarly, some other creatures I don't think deserve Physical Immunity. Sure, the Loup-Garou is badass. Sure, it could rip apart an entire police department. So, can it survive a nuke? Ten? Fifty? The full might of Queen Mab if she doesn't use some sort of a Catch-satisfying ability?

Again, GM Fiat is not a good solution. As a GM, I can already do anything. The rules in the book are there to tell me what I should and should not do.

So, opinions on this? If you share my opinion, did anyone come up with some sort of a custom power for other high-end Toughness abilities?

Remember what morgan tells harry about his actions back in the 50's while talking about....

(click to show/hide)

Shagnasty and how he thinks he killed one bu walking through into the nevernever just before a nuke went off

in ummm changes?  Plus magic is isanely versatile and can easily trigger nonmagical "attacks"... collapse the roof/building supports or throw a car at them and you have magically done something to attack wiin a nonmagical manner, if it's an old enough car, maybe it's mase of steel and hits  the ogre's cold iron vulnerability  Mely the floor into frictionless dust like  Ramirez can do and poof... that ogre is trapped for a bit while you find something useful t throw at him. With any kind of immunity, sometimes as the GM you have to step in and make a judgement call and say "yea ok sure, that's a reasonably powerful/creative enough attack to be partially exempt as long as your players are ware that it can work both ways if they minmax enough to warrant it.

[EdgeOfDreams]

My main response is that Physical Immunity may prevent damage, but it doesn't make you unbeatable or protect you from being disabled.  For example, I would expect the Senior Council's response to an Ogre attack to be a bunch of earth evocations, opening up a 50-foot pit in the ground right under the ogre's feet, then filling it in with dirt and walking away.  The ogre was never directly attacked by magic, so his physical immunity doesn't matter.

[BumblingBear]

My main response is that Physical Immunity may prevent damage, but it doesn't make you unbeatable or protect you from being disabled.  For example, I would expect the Senior Council's response to an Ogre attack to be a bunch of earth evocations, opening up a 50-foot pit in the ground right under the ogre's feet, then filling it in with dirt and walking away.  The ogre was never directly attacked by magic, so his physical immunity doesn't matter.

A wizard could just use a wind or spirit evocation to propel a rock or chair at said ogre at extremely high speeds too.

All that would cost is a declaration or character equipment and an evocation.

Without trying to be too snarky here, I think the OP ha not grasped the creative aspect of the DFRPG yet.

OP - you could just use spirit to explode or wipe the mind of a character with physical immunity.

[ways and means]

There is allways mental and social stress.

[Sanctaphrax]

I also find Physical Immunity extremely aggravating. Mostly for the first reason provided.

There are a few cases where I don't especially mind it. Like for intangible beings. But even then, it's undercosted.

Physical Immunity with a +0 catch is just plain better than almost anything else that you can spend 8 refresh on. From an optimization point of view, anyone with 8 points of normal toughness is a dumbass. And that's a problem.

[sinker]

The way I see it Taer, you're the one putting efficacy over story. You totally could make a toughness power that is greater than mythic and make it cost 8 refresh. There is no reason not to. But you aren't willing to, because you feel that you must get the better value out of those 8 refresh. Where is that coming from? Why do you feel that way?

As far as the ogre, again there's no reason why your ogre can't simply have toughness up the wazoo. Seems to me that the physical immunity fits the canon, but if you feel differently then do differently.

If you're worried as a GM that physical immunity is too tough, then the best thing to do is to make the catch very broad. Physical immunity to magic means that there is a whole lot of other things that can hurt them, some of which can be brought about by magic (as mentioned above).

And yes, the way I feel is that some things (like the loup-garou, and shagnasty) really should be that powerful. There are some creatures that are simply overwhelming, that are an unstoppable force that's going to get what it wants. Japanese horror is a great example of this (Juon is the last one I've seen, but it's been a long while) and it can be used to create a lot of tension and fear.

[Lanir]

Going to try to state this simply.


If it annoys you, you either haven't given it an appropriate catch for your game or you've misunderstood how to use the catch.

The OP has kind of hit on a point here, in a tangential sort of way. An ultimate, extreme power like this should either be severely limited or it should be crafted in such a way as to fit your story exceptionally well. It's never supposed to trigger evil GM laughter. It's a trick you use when you want your players to be creative and not use the same tricks to get through every situation or when you just think that something makes sense. Like possibly making a fiery apparition of some sort immune to normal fire.

When you use Physical Immunity you have to kind of make sure there's another option is all, and if you've taken the PC's main tricks offline, you may be required to provide a nudge to get them thinking along the right lines after the initial wake-up call (which should always be a scary but ultimately not very costly encounter... making players pay out the nose for not knowing something you haven't told them yet is pretty prickish).

[Taer]

OP - you could just use spirit to explode or wipe the mind of a character with physical immunity.

Psychomancy is Thaumaturgy. Without Kemmlerian Magic, how can you inflict Mental stress?

The way I see it Taer, you're the one putting efficacy over story. You totally could make a toughness power that is greater than mythic and make it cost 8 refresh. There is no reason not to. But you aren't willing to, because you feel that you must get the better value out of those 8 refresh. Where is that coming from? Why do you feel that way?

Let's say I have a Shapeshifter villain, who has Modular Abilities. Why would he ever assume any other Toughness-based power other than Physical Immunity for the same cost, unless explicitly forbidden? And - if I must explicitly forbid him from assuming it, doesn't it imply it's too good?

And I feel that way because it feels entirely pointless. I could create a version of Evocation that grants 2 elements and no Focus Item slots while costing -3 Refresh, but is there really any point in doing so?

And yes, the way I feel is that some things (like the loup-garou, and shagnasty) really should be that powerful. There are some creatures that are simply overwhelming, that are an unstoppable force that's going to get what it wants. Japanese horror is a great example of this (Juon is the last one I've seen, but it's been a long while) and it can be used to create a lot of tension and fear.

Shagnasty(well, another Shagnasty than the one we've seen) died to a nuclear bomb. This implies there is a level of force that can defeat him.

[ways and means]

Spirit Magic can do mental stress if you follow the official canon of the books otherwise how else did Molly make her attacks when she didn't have access to thamaturgy at all at that point. Also don't forget inctite emotion or conversation stress.

[Sanctaphrax]

Please do not try to invoke canon.

The issue is not clear.

The novels are not game rulebooks.

Also, the writeups in OW are sometimes unambigously wrong.

And for all we know, that character's mental shenaniganisms could have been maneuvers or the use of Psychomancy as a temporary power.

PS: Spoiler tags might be warranted there, I'm not sure.

[paul_Harkonen]

Ah power gamers.

Look, DFRPG is a story heavy, rules light system.  If you want to break it, you can do that.  You can do it really easily (at least if you do so directly).  However, it also encourages lots of lateral thinking in order to get around those types of problems.

Consider this example:  We have a normal human in every way except he\she\it has physical immunity with a +0 catch.  You aren't going to hurt this person, ever.  Fine, instead of trying to kill this person directly (impossible) I'm going to spend the next set of exchanges applying aspects such as "Pinned Down" "Wrapped in barbed wire" "trapped in dirt".  I could also use assessments and declarations to apply "Weak floorboards, "creepy house" or "Construction yard relics".  After applying 4-5 aspects as a team we then tag them for effect in rapid succession.  We use those tags to force the NPC to concede, to be trapped in wires, to be pinned to the ground or some other equally effective way to simply prevent this person from moving.

DFRPG is all about aspect manipulation, story and creativity, not numbers.  If you just play by the numbers you are going to have easily broken systems and miss out on half the fun of the game.

[Sanctaphrax]

I disagree.

I think that DFRPG is actually pretty hard to break.

Also, just because it isn't a crunchy system doesn't mean that mechanical problems aren't problems. Mythic Toughness + Mythic Recovery is inferior in (very nearly) every possible way to Physical Immunity. That's not a good thing.

PS: I'm pretty sure that forcing someone to concede is literally impossible. It's a player action, not a character one.

[BumblingBear]

Psychomancy is Thaumaturgy. Without Kemmlerian Magic, how can you inflict Mental stress?

Spirit evocations can attack.. well, spirit.  

There is some disagreement about this on the boards here, but the overwhelming majority agree with this.

You don't have to kill that way, either.  Taking out someone's mental track can knock them out.

After you knock out a guy with physical immunity, you could bury him in concrete or drop him to the bottom of the ocean.

Also, beings with physical immunity still need to breath.  A wind evocation could rob the creature of all the air around them, attempting to knock out or kill based on suffocation.

There are ways around everything.

[Taer]

As a note, could the people here cut back on the insults? I'm neither an idiot nor a munchkin. So, thanks in advance, would be nice.

Note, however, that I'm not asking here whether or not you can beat someone with PI. I'm focusing on whether it's an appropriate ability.

Would you allow for total immunities to other things? How about Social and Mental tracks? How about an immunity to Physical Blocks or Maneuvers(call it "Unstoppable Force" or whatever)? How about an immunity to assessments("Null Presence")? Or Declarations(Reality Warper)?

If any of those would be considered inappropriate, why do Attacks get a pass? What makes them special?