GreatWyrmGold

Join Date: Oct 2011

Re: GURPS: Remnant: Fan-made rules for adventuring in the world of RWBY

A Semblance is usually[sup]18[/sup] a single ability, usually with many applications. This may be bought as Alternate Abilities, orusing rules in GURPS Powersappropriately-restricted[sup]19[/sup] Modular Abilities.

Semblances often cost Aura. This is a special modifier, giving a 1% discount per point of Aura spent to activate the ability. For instance, an Innate Attack costing 10 character points would only cost 8 if you added a two-Aura cost to it. Enhanced Move (Ground) 3, normally costing 60 points, would instead cost 48 if you had to pay twenty Aura every time you activated itand you would have to pay half of this cost again after one minute! (If the ability is instead activated for one second, again with half cost per second to maintain, this is a -2% limitation per point of Aura.)

Semblances can have limitations based on minimum Aura levels to use.

Code: Fraction of Aura | Value of Limitation 1/2 | -25% 1/3 | -20% 1/4 | -15% 1/6 | -10% 1/10 | -5%



Characters with awakened Auras often perform feats far beyond what should be possible for a normal human, even with the shield provided by their Aura and the specific capabilities of their Semblance; the most common of these is great strength. These are also advantages bought with the Aura power modifier and optionally Aura costs, although they need not fit with a character's Semblance. The GM is encouraged to veto non-Semblance Aura-based abilities which do not seem to be simply enhancing what the character could already do, or if the effect is so extreme that it should qualify as a Semblance on its own. These abilities frequently have the Costs Aura or Minimum Aura limitations listed above.

Appropriate abilities include: bonuses to Strength, Dexterity, or Health, or Striking or Lifting ST; Flexibility or Double-Jointed, Hard to Subdue, Perfect Balance, Recovery, Super Jump; Absolute Direction, Absolute Timing, Acute or Discriminatory Senses, Danger Sense, Detect (Aura, Grimm, etc), Eidetic or Photographic Memory, Sensitive Touch, and certain Talents*; and Aura Transfer**.

*An appropriate Talent would be Gymnastic Talent*** (Acrobatics, Aerobatics, Aquabatics, Climbing, and Jumping) for five points per level.

**A variation of the Healing advantage (B59), which heals only Auranot disease, HP, or even other vitality reservesand costs one point of Aura per point of Aura healed. This totals to a -40% limitation; assuming no other modifiers, this is 12 points. Healing (Aura Only) is -50%, if you had a hypothetical healing Semblance ormore likelyan ability based in powers from beyond Remnant.

***If anyone has a better name, it would be greatly appreciated.





Now, for a tricky part: Figuring out how much Aura a typical character has.



Let's start small.



Goons



Mooks frequently fall to single attacks from main characters, most notably during the Yellow Trailer, when Yang Xiao Long[sup]20[/sup] fights a room full of mooks and knocks them out with one punch (aside from a couple of special minions). Assuming a Strength of 20 (Yang is noted for feats of strength[sup]21[/sup], so this isn't too unreasonable), this indicates that her base thrust damage[sup]22[/sup] is 2d-1. Punches deal thrust-minus-one damage; however, she was using shot-gauntlets[sup]23[/sup]. This increases her base punch damage to thr-1 with a linked shotgun blastin other words, 2d-1+1d+1. Simple math puts this at 3d damage, an average of 10.

However, Yang's shot-gauntlets are not the same as Terran shotguns. First off, the propellant has a higher energy density than any Terran fuel; the pellets may well be travelling faster. One thing that is known for certain is that said shot-gauntlets also produce significant amounts of firenot as massive of gouts as a flamethrower (3d damage), but probably enough for another die or two.

Thus, roughly 15 damage put them down; given the rules for knockdown, this was likely at least 1/2 their Aura capacity. My estimate is that these minions had roughly 20-25 points of Aura. Considering that Yang downed a man with each punch, not just most, you could argue that the actual figure should be lower. On the other hand, considering that none of them seem to have gotten buckshot to the brains, you could argue that it is a low estimate. The nameless White Fang soldiers seemed to be tougher, but not by muchmaybe 30-40 points.



Students



We've never seen a good estimate of what makes the tough students go down[sup]24[/sup]. We do, however, have a solid candidate for a weak-Aura'd student who goes down repeatedlyonce in a way which we can calculate damage for easily.

Weiss Schnee[sup]20 23[/sup] goes down several times over the course of RWBY. The simplest time to estimate minimum Aura capacity can be found in Season 1, Volume 2, Episode 1, "Best Day Ever," when she is thrown into a cafeteria pillar by a Cloudcuckoolander[sup]25[/sup] Irish-phenotyped girl based on the Norse god of thunder wielding a hammer improvised from a watermelon and a pole she got from...somewhere[sup]23 26[/sup] and appears to have her Aura depleted. It's hard to estimate the speed she hit said wall atespecially since I couldn't find a decent stopwatchbut she seems to have covered about half the cafeteria in one and a half seconds, putting her speed around 0.33 cafeterias per second. If the cafeteria is as long as a football field, this is equal to 33 yards per second[sup]27[/sup]. If Weiss has eight hit points (she's pretty small), she takes 33*8*0.01*1d6 or 3d crushing damage. A hard surface (like rock) deals double damagean average of 21.

Since the pillar shattered, we can check this by looking at how much damage a stone pillar should take. Sadly, the Structural Damage Table doesn't include an entry for four-foot-thick stone pillars, but a three-foot-thick, ten-square-foot chunk of stone wall has 135 hit points. The amount of pillar damaged is about the same as Weiss's height, on average, so about 5'3"[sup]28[/sup]. Call it a five-foot-by-four-foot-by-four-foot section of wall, and you see a problem.

This leaves us with two estimates for our problem. Accounting for previous injuries and Aura expenditures during the fight, Weiss would probably have either 30-40 Aura or 140-160 Aura. There is no easy way to determine if we should determine damage via speed or via breaking-the-pillar...but we do have a way of establishing that one of these estimates is implausible.

Look at every fight between a Huntsman student and a group of mooks. We consistently see the student overpowering them without much effort. Now, this is true even of stories where there isn't a supernatural force protecting the heroes, but I'm inclined to lean towards Watsonian explanations. Thus, accounting for the knockdown rules, I conclude that Huntsman students have, at least, 200-250 points of Aura, with many students having more. That said, in a "grittier" Remnant campaign, 30-50 is a good minimum.



It seems likelythough unsupportedthat Aura increases with training[sup]29[/sup]. This would explain why Huntsmen have such powerful Auras compared to...well, everyone else, and why members of Team CFVY[sup]30[/sup] are capable of greater feats than the first-year pro- and deuteragonists, and why their teachers are greater still. Sadly, we don't have any good way of estimating the Aura capacities of such individuals. Semblances are simply advantages provided by the Aura power[sup]14[/sup]. It has no apparent countermeasures or method to disrupt the internally channeled energies; nor is there any suggestion of fickleness or required behavior. In short, an ability provided by the Aura power is not in any way less useful than a "wild" ability[sup]15[/sup]. The Aura power does not have an associated power discount, as many powers get[sup]16[/sup]; however, if there are sources of supernatural powers other than Aurafor instance, if you put Remnant into an Infinite Worlds[sup]17[/sup] campaignyou must note which abilities are powered by Aura. If nothing else, this tells you what you can spend Aura on and what you can spend that psionic reserve on.A Semblance is usually[sup]18[/sup] a single ability, usually with many applications. This may be bought as Alternate Abilities, orusing rules in GURPS Powersappropriately-restricted[sup]19[/sup] Modular Abilities.Semblances often cost Aura. This is a special modifier, giving a 1% discount per point of Aura spent to activate the ability. For instance, an Innate Attack costing 10 character points would only cost 8 if you added a two-Aura cost to it. Enhanced Move (Ground) 3, normally costing 60 points, would instead cost 48 if you had to pay twenty Aura every time you activated itand you would have to pay half of this cost again after one minute! (If the ability is instead activated for one, again with half cost per second to maintain, this is a -2% limitation per point of Aura.)Semblances can have limitations based on minimum Aura levels to use.Abilities which cost hit points to activate may not drain Aura instead. There are no such abilities on Remnant, however, so this point is generally moot.Characters with awakened Auras often perform feats far beyond what should be possible for a normal human, even with the shield provided by their Aura and the specific capabilities of their Semblance; the most common of these is great strength. These are also advantages bought with the Aura power modifier and optionally Aura costs, although they need not fit with a character's Semblance. The GM is encouraged to veto non-Semblance Aura-based abilities which do not seem to be simply enhancing what the character could already do, or if the effect is so extreme that it should qualify as a Semblance on its own. These abilities frequently have the Costs Aura or Minimum Aura limitations listed above.Appropriate abilities include: bonuses to Strength, Dexterity, or Health, or Striking or Lifting ST; Flexibility or Double-Jointed, Hard to Subdue, Perfect Balance, Recovery, Super Jump; Absolute Direction, Absolute Timing, Acute or Discriminatory Senses, Danger Sense, Detect (Aura, Grimm, etc), Eidetic or Photographic Memory, Sensitive Touch, and certain Talents*; and Aura Transfer**.*An appropriate Talent would be Gymnastic Talent*** (Acrobatics, Aerobatics, Aquabatics, Climbing, and Jumping) for five points per level.**A variation of the Healing advantage (B59), which heals only Auranot disease, HP, or even other vitality reservesand costs one point of Aura per point of Aura healed. This totals to a -40% limitation; assuming no other modifiers, this is 12 points. Healing (Aura Only) is -50%, if you had a hypothetical healing Semblance ormore likelyan ability based in powers from beyond Remnant.***If anyone has a better name, it would be greatly appreciated.Now, for a tricky part: Figuring out how much Aura a typical character has.Let's start small.Mooks frequently fall to single attacks from main characters, most notably during the Yellow Trailer, when Yang Xiao Long[sup]20[/sup] fights a room full of mooks and knocks them out with one punch (aside from a couple of special minions). Assuming a Strength of 20 (Yang is noted for feats of strength[sup]21[/sup], so this isn't too unreasonable), this indicates that her base thrust damage[sup]22[/sup] is 2d-1. Punches deal thrust-minus-one damage; however, she was using shot-gauntlets[sup]23[/sup]. This increases her base punch damage to thr-1 with a linked shotgun blastin other words, 2d-1+1d+1. Simple math puts this at 3d damage, an average of 10.However, Yang's shot-gauntlets are not the same as Terran shotguns. First off, the propellant has a higher energy density than any Terran fuel; the pellets may well be travelling faster. One thing that is known for certain is that said shot-gauntlets also produce significant amounts of firenot as massive of gouts as a flamethrower (3d damage), but probably enough for another die or two.Thus, roughly 15 damage put them down; given the rules for knockdown, this was likely at least 1/2 their Aura capacity. My estimate is that these minions had roughly. Considering that Yang downed a man with each punch, not just most, you could argue that the actual figure should be lower. On the other hand, considering that none of them seem to have gotten buckshot to the brains, you could argue that it is a low estimate. The nameless White Fang soldiers seemed to be tougher, but not by muchmaybeWe've never seen a good estimate of what makes the tough students go down[sup]24[/sup]. We do, however, have a solid candidate for a weak-Aura'd student who goes down repeatedlyonce in a way which we can calculate damage for easily.Weiss Schnee[sup]20 23[/sup] goes down several times over the course of RWBY. The simplest time to estimate minimum Aura capacity can be found in Season 1, Volume 2, Episode 1, "Best Day Ever," when she is thrown into a cafeteria pillar by a Cloudcuckoolander[sup]25[/sup] Irish-phenotyped girl based on the Norse god of thunder wielding a hammer improvised from a watermelon and a pole she got from...somewhere[sup]23 26[/sup] and appears to have her Aura depleted. It's hard to estimate the speed she hit said wall atespecially since I couldn't find a decent stopwatchbut she seems to have covered about half the cafeteria in one and a half seconds, putting her speed around 0.33 cafeterias per second. If the cafeteria is as long as a football field, this is equal to 33 yards per second[sup]27[/sup]. If Weiss has eight hit points (she's pretty small), she takes 33*8*0.01*1d6 or 3d crushing damage. A hard surface (like rock) deals double damagean average of 21.Since the pillar shattered, we can check this by looking at how much damage a stone pillar should take. Sadly, the Structural Damage Table doesn't include an entry for four-foot-thick stone pillars, but a three-foot-thick, ten-square-foot chunk of stone wall has 135 hit points. The amount of pillar damaged is about the same as Weiss's height, on average, so about 5'3"[sup]28[/sup]. Call it a five-foot-by-four-foot-by-four-foot section of wall, and you see a problem.This leaves us with two estimates for our problem. Accounting for previous injuries and Aura expenditures during the fight, Weiss would probably have either 30-40 Aura or 140-160 Aura. There is no easy way to determine if we should determine damage via speed or via breaking-the-pillar...but we do have a way of establishing that one of these estimates is implausible.Look at every fight between a Huntsman student and a group of mooks. We consistently see the student overpowering them without much effort. Now, this is true even of stories where there isn't a supernatural force protecting the heroes, but I'm inclined to lean towards Watsonian explanations. Thus, accounting for the knockdown rules, I conclude that Huntsman students have, at least,. That said,It seems likelythough unsupportedthat Aura increases with training[sup]29[/sup]. This would explain why Huntsmen have such powerful Auras compared to...well, everyone else, and why members of Team CFVY[sup]30[/sup] are capable of greater feats than the first-year pro- and deuteragonists, and why their teachers are greater still. Sadly, we don't have any good way of estimating the Aura capacities of such individuals. Last edited by GreatWyrmGold; 09-22-2015 at 07:55 AM . Reason: Rethought Aura costs, still not sure.