Gravity manipulation

[Whiskeyjack]

Anyone have any unique ideas they've used for this power and have some game mechanics worked out for them?
My son has a character in Phase World with this power and he's been struggling with it (mostly I think due to lack of imagination). He mainly uses it to run super fast and hit people (Extraordinary speed and bio-armour are his other powers).
Some of the things I'm curios about is the effect of increased or increased gravity on projectiles, explosions and physical attacks.
For instance. If he is being shot at, would increased gravity allow him to effectively push the bullets into the ground (or in reverse make them go high)?
What would happen to an explosion in zero G?
One other move I though could be interesting if I can figure out the mechanics is to have some one do a gravity assisted punch or body block. If they were coming down from a height and had their gravity increased, would they hit for extra damage?
Any assistance on figuring out the game mechanics or any other ideas you've used would be appreciated.

[Borast]

Anyone have any unique ideas they've used for this power and have some game mechanics worked out for them?
My son has a character in Phase World with this power and he's been struggling with it (mostly I think due to lack of imagination). He mainly uses it to run super fast and hit people (Extraordinary speed and bio-armour are his other powers).
Some of the things I'm curios about is the effect of increased or increased gravity on projectiles, explosions and physical attacks.
For instance. If he is being shot at, would increased gravity allow him to effectively push the bullets into the ground (or in reverse make them go high)?
What would happen to an explosion in zero G?
One other move I though could be interesting if I can figure out the mechanics is to have some one do a gravity assisted punch or body block. If they were coming down from a height and had their gravity increased, would they hit for extra damage?
Any assistance on figuring out the game mechanics or any other ideas you've used would be appreciated.

You're curios? You are a piece of chotchke?

Seriously...for anything other than thrown weapons, I'd ignore the effect of gravity increasing or decreasing of ballistics. The math would be quite involved.
For thrown weapons, apply a scaling penalty due to the unexpected change of flight if between attacker and attacked. If the g-field is under the attacker, I'd suggest a -1 to hit for every 10% increase in effective gravity (and for every 20% decrease in gravity).

If you were to increase the g-field under an attacker making a punch, remember that his or her muscles are designed to keep his/her mass upright and mobile at 1G...so increasing the G-field when punching would encourage a miss, and potentially cause damage to the puncher.
A body block in this instance would be less likely to be fully successful, since it would cause the blocker to block lower than intended. The attacker, however, would also be affected, but since (s)he is coming into it, the effect would be lessened.
A THROW, however... Tossing someone into an increased G-field, *would* result in them hitting (the ground) faster and taking more damage. I'd say to double (or halve) for every 25% change to the field the victim falls in.


Now, in "zero" G, all explosions are perfectly spherical. So, whether a stick of TNT, or a nuke, the resulting blast will be a perfect sphere. (They simulated this in a ST[?] movie by filming from underneath the model as they blew it up.) Outside that, no changes to game mechanics. (Unless you want to make calculations for shrapnel in 3 dimensions...)

[Stone Gargoyle]

I agree. Gravity Maniplation is one of those powers that is an ordeal in terms of mechanics of play. The only real use of it is to immobilize people because they are held down by the gravity.

[Whiskeyjack]

The power has definitely be a chore to manage from both a GM and player perspective. One of the abilities of the increased gravity is to have it encompass an area, or an object. How fast moving would you think an object would have to be moving to still allow him to increase its gravity? I would assume a bullet would be much too fast, but would an arrow or knife that is being thrown have the gravity increased? The effect could either be to cause more damage if it's coming from above, or as a parry to try and force it to the ground. Thoughts?
Would you allow as a gm to choose a body part as an object, or would the entire body count as an object? Hard to punch when your fist is suddenly too heavy to lift. Alternately he could always increase the gravity on a weapon.

[drewkitty ~..~]

The Grav. Manipulations super power was to put it mildly, Written poorly. And should be rewritten with the help of a physicist, or someone that understands gravity more than Keven did last millennium.
For increasing gravity I would have you look at the L1 spell (HUGMG) Increase Weight for a better example the effects, even if on on a person.
For decreasing gravity I would have you look at the L2 spell (HUGMG) Weightlessness for better example of the effects of reduced gravity.

Increased gravity....it would take a gravity field measuring in the 100's or 1000's of gravities to deflect firearm projectiles enough to hit the floor or otherwise miss within the 200 feet of the range of the power.

There is not provision in the power to 'reverse gravity'

zero G explosions....spherical like when the DS blew up in Ep4 ANH redux. At least till it hit the area outside the power.

The Terminal V would be higher...but what difference, damage wise, I would be remiss in attempting to define without doing a lot of math.
----
decreased weight on just yourself could let the char walk on quicksand of maybe liquid water.

[Whiskeyjack]

Poorly written is an understatement.
I don't have HUGMG, but did find the spells in PFRPG. Unfortunately, they don't offer much insight. Increased gravity just reduces a persons speed. Weightlessness actually contradicts the power. It reduces a persons speed and damage, where the power triples the speed (unless you make a zero G area, then speed is reduced to 1). Unfortunately, the reduce gravity side of the power is left open ended. It reduces gravity to a fraction, but no amount is ever given. Increasing goes to a max 50 times (although I've changed it to 5 to remove the desire to liquify people).

[drewkitty ~..~]

Poorly written is an understatement.
I don't have HUGMG, but did find the spells in PFRPG. Unfortunately, they don't offer much insight. Increased gravity just reduces a persons speed. Weightlessness actually contradicts the power. It reduces a persons speed and damage, where the power triples the speed (unless you make a zero G area, then speed is reduced to 1). Unfortunately, the reduce gravity side of the power is left open ended. It reduces gravity to a fraction, but no amount is ever given. Increasing goes to a max 50 times (although I've changed it to 5 to remove the desire to liquify people).

The weightless spell is written more scientificly accurate, then the power.
Reduce the gravity to 1/6th G and you'd be hopping around like the Astronaughts did in the 60's.