In my group the question has come up about how far a character can go in 'buffing' other characters. It struck some of us as too much to charge a full Action to cause beneficial effects on an ally (treating it as an 'attack'). Specifically the use of Transmutation to gain or give Abilities to another. Related to this, should a character be able to willingly choose to 'fail' a Save? To me, it seems like a person who is, for instance, choosing to allow themselves to be hypnotized is akin to someone allowing themselves to be open to being Mind Controlled, Emotion Controlled, Transmuted, etc.
On the other hand, I don't want to open a huge can of worms to potentially abusive tactics. Imagine a character (Good or Evil) who makes a Transmutation attack that 'buffs' his allies with the following:
Bestows Abilities on his allies, like Willpower: Pain Resistance (so they're not KO'd when they lose more than 1/2 their HP), Heightened Expertise, Heightened Attack, etc.
One could do this for pretty cheap if they bought Transmutation at EN+5 (-30 CP), balanced out with Area Effect, Selective (so it only worked on allies).
V&V GM and player since 1982, my current campaign is 29 years old
Sometimes when an Ability doesn't seem to be a good fit for what you're trying to make it do, it's because it's not 😉
Have you considered giving the character Willpower: Pain Resistance (10), Usable by Others (+5, or +0 if it's only usable on others), instead?
Thanks for the answer, Jeff.
What are your thoughts on characters choosing to fail Saves in general?
V&V GM and player since 1982, my current campaign is 29 years old
Targets who want to be hit and affected have two things they can do.
1) They can choose not to evade the attack, reducing their defense to 0 *and* giving the attacker a +6 to hit because they're defenseless, and...
2) When they've been hit, they can choose not to spend any extra Power to resist the effect.
-Jeff
Makes sense. Thanks.
V&V GM and player since 1982, my current campaign is 29 years old
