(M&M2E/M&M3E) Statting Kerrigan? Alex Mercer? Panacea? Joshua Foley? SCP-040?

[Gavinfoxx]

Hi, I'm trying to come up with some reasonable ways of statting characters that use 'biological manipulation' as their core powerset (or one of the related powers with names like 'DNA manipulation' or 'wet nano/biotech' or 'biological essence manipulation' or any of the sciency variants), in M&M 2e (primarily, but I'll be willing to hear suggestions for 3e).

The problem I've been having is the sheer variety of effects that could happen under the aegis of 'biological manipulation', from ways of permanently enhancing the base character itself, to attacks of acid, hot chemical spray, spider-silk based attacks, to various sorts of shapeshifting into animal-like forms, to ways of manipulating the physiology of others to their detriment or benefit, to the sorts of things that are possible for biological systems to do (like have electricity attacks, or biological radios is possible to have evolved, even if it didn't), to all the various sorts of healing and regeneration, to all of the awesomeness of being something like 'genetically perfect', to plant manipulation, to puppeting things, to making temporary 'minion' creatures by shaping some sort of temporary force (meatspace? All that regeneration matter has to come from somewhere... same for the plant growth matter...), to being some sort of hive queen (psychic communication? direct power manipulation? radio communication with the minions?), to plagues...

Argh, it's just too much. If I were to stat it out based on all the effects I might want a character to plausibly have, it'd be wayyyy overcosted. How might one stat some of the 'example' characters for this power, and what would be an efficient way to get the most important effects? Hell, how do you determine the most important effects? Any help would be appreciated!

[The Glyphstone]

Isn't that what the Shapeshifting/Variable power is for?

[Gavinfoxx]

That's some of what I've noticed. The answer seems to be 'Variable'.

But, okay. What powers should be 'core' powers that are NOT part of the 'Variable' array? Also, what are some example loadouts of the 'Variable' for different use-cases?

[Grod_The_Giant]

I can only speak for 3e here, but...

Isn't that what the Shapeshifting/Variable power is for?
That's what Alternate Effects and Power Stunts are for. Variable is an answer, but perhaps not the best answer. Most characters in fiction, even the crazy versatile wizard-y ones, only have a few techniques they rely on regularly.

Take Alex Mercer, for instance. I'd start with a basic powerhouse chassis-- high Str and Con, some Regeneration, some Leaping-- and add an array for fancy biomass powers-- say, Blades, Muscle Mass, Whip Fist, and one of those big spiky area blasts.

For you... think about what you want your character to focus on. As you've noted, "biological control" is effectively as broad a powerset as "magic," especially in a superhero setting. Focus in on things-- does your character work primarily by enhancing their own body? By disrupting others? Are they stretchy, or more of a "real biology" shapeshifter? And so on.

[Gavinfoxx]

I'm thinking 'really biologically plausible' might be a good limitation.

With a few notable exceptions... the exact direct mechanism of the action of the power itself just is a plain old super-power with no visible power source, though most of the effects have to be plausible.

Though it could presumably link to whatever dimension the extra mass people get when regenerating or growing in size link to, and the same for the growing plants, but it's limited in what it can do with that. IE, it can use it to regenerate things, it can use it to make permanently real minions, it can use it to make projectile attacks using biological substances or otherwise conjure/summon biological material for myriad purposes, it can use it to make shape-shifting more plausible. Other stuff which doesn't get a boost would mostly have to be done under the slower timeframe of more plausible biotech solutions. Communication wouldn't be psychic, but instead radio-based, perhaps?

I'd like to mostly have base forms slowly get useful, 'permanent', animal-based powers, and have a limited set of alternate forms, mostly for flight or swimming I guess, with most of the base work done in a slowly-tweaked normal form as character resources are spent, where the benefits of the tweaking go into the alternate forms, perhaps?

What are some good limits of some of the various characters who have these power sets?

[daemonaetea]

I'm assuming the Panacea you're referring to is from Worm. If so, I think her full power set just wouldn't work well within the confines of a game. It's just too powerful and varied to boil down to just a few powers to fully represent it. Unfortunately I think sometimes it's impossible to fully recreate a character in a system. I agree with the advice above to instead boil down a character to a few essential facets and use them to represent the character.

Slight spoilers follow: For instance, Panacea's complete biological control of others could instead be broken down to a few essential aspects, depending on which aspects of her character you wish to play up. Healing is of course a given, but other good choices would be buffing of physical stats, creature summoning, or even mind control.

So in general, instead of trying to represent every ability a character has, instead think of what abilities you consider essential to capturing what a character is and does. Then it's easy enough to justify gaining new powers from the character's move set as the game continues and they "understand" more of their ability.

[Gavinfoxx]

Yes, Panacea from Worm. Also relevant for Worm would be Bonesaw or Nilbog.

For example, what's a good way to stat out a minion-creation power?

[Gavinfoxx]

Alright guys, here's some info.


Kerrigan is as an Infested Terran / the Queen of Blades


http://starcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Sarah_Kerrigan
http://prototype.wikia.com/wiki/Alex_Mercer
http://worm.wikia.com/wiki/Panacea
http://marvel.wikia.com/wiki/Joshua_Foley_(Earth-616)
http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-040


Here's an interesting set of links I found (of fan-based insight) discussing two of them:

http://necromoprhvsfellowship.blogspot.com/2011/10/back-for-blood-sci-fi-championship.html
http://necromoprhvsfellowship.blogspot.com/2011/12/kerrigan-vs-mercer-prologue.html
http://necromoprhvsfellowship.blogspot.com/2011/12/kerrigan-vs-mercer-final-showdown.html