mutants & masterminds power profile 6 weather powers

8/9/2019 Mutants & Masterminds Power Profile 6 Weather Powers

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ranging from massive consoles with dish-shapedantennae to hand-held gadgets. Weather technol-ogy is often Removable ( Hero’s Handbook, pages149–150) and may have various complications as-sociated with it, particularly in terms of maintainingand using it.

COUNTERING

Weather powers can potentially counter a number of otherpowers, depending on how they are used. In particular,weather can counter powers with air descriptors. The rightweather can counter the environmental effects of cold andfire powers by raising or lowering the ambient tempera-ture, and may be able to counter fire effects with suddendownpours.

Precipitation like heavy rain may help counter some Con-cealment effects by revealing a target’s footprints andoutline within the falling rain, for example. Rain may alsowash away Area Concealment effects involving clouds offog, smoke, or gases.

Air powers can potentially counter weather powers by shift-ing air masses or even removing the air (see Atmosphere ,previously). Likewise, temperature-affecting powers maybe able to counter or break-up some weather effects: snowand ice melt rapidly in the presence of extreme heat, forexample. The GM should use common sense in handlingthe interaction of weather effects with various power de-scriptors.

WEATHER FEATURESSome potential Feature effects associated with WeatherPowers include the following:

• No matter the weather conditions, you remain dry,your hair and clothing never mussed by the wind.

• The weather dramatically reflects your emotions,giving you a circumstance bonus for appropriate in-teraction skill checks (like Intimidation).

• You can create small gusts of wind, roughly equal toa –5 rank Move Object effect; able to scatter small,light objects, ruffle hair or clothing, blow off hats, andso forth. (See Wind Blast and Wind-Lifting for morefull-fledged wind powers.)

• You can create tiny “micro-storms” focused enoughto water potted plants or to shower beneath.

• The air around you always smells as clean as after arainstorm, dispelling any strong odors.

• You can cause individual clouds in the sky to move, oreven break up, by focusing your attention on them.

OFFENSIVE POWERSFrom bolts of lightning and crashes of thunder to freezingblizzards and searing heat waves, weather powers offernumerous ways to strike at enemies from afar.

ARCTIC FREEZE

A blast of freezing air causes the temperature to plummetaround your target, masses of ice and snow forming in-stantly around them.

Arctic Freeze: Cumulative Ranged Affliction (Resisted byDodge, Overcome by Damage; Hindered and Vulnerable,Defenseless and Immobilized), Extra Condition, LimitedDegree • 3 points per rank.

BLINDING ARC

A blazingly bright arc of lightning temporarily blinds yourtarget.

Blinding Arc: Cumulative Ranged Affliction (Resisted byDodge, Overcome by Fortitude; Impaired, Disabled,Unaware), Limited to Vision • 2 point per rank.

CYCLONE

You create a contained cyclone or hurricane-force stormcapable of battering and hindering foes.

Cyclone: Burst Area Ranged Affliction (Resisted andOvercome by Strength; Hindered and Impaired, Prone andStunned, Incapacitated), Alternate Resistance (Strength),Concentration, Extra Condition, Instant Recovery • 4 points per rank (+1 point per rank per +1 to area value).

EXPOSUREYou alter the atmosphere around your target to causedehydration, heatstroke, or even early stage frostbite byraising or lowering the temperature and humidity. Victimsoften begin suffering effects before they realize what ishappening. Apply the Area modifier to affect multipletargets in an area all at once.

Exposure: Ranged Affliction (Resisted and Overcome byFortitude; Fatigued, Exhausted, Incapacitated), Subtle • 1 point+ 2 points per rank.

HAILSTORM

Frozen chunks of wind-driven hail pummel the targets inthe area of the sudden storm.

Hailstorm: Burst Area Ranged Damage (bludgeoning), Indirect 2(falling from above) • 2 points + 3 points per rank.

LIGHTNING BOLT

You hurl a bolt of lightning from your person—hands,eyes, etc.—to strike your target with the fury of a storm.If you call down lightning from above instead, apply 2ranks of the Indirect modifier as well ( Hero’s Handbook ,page 141).

Lightning Bolt: Ranged Damage (electrical) • 2 points per rank.

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THUNDERCLAP

A thunderous boom deafens your target. Thunderclap isoften Linked with a Lightning Bolt attack, simultaneouslydamaging and deafening a target, perhaps even connect-ed with a Blinding Arc as well, expanding the effect of theAffliction (simply removing the Limited to Vision flaw from

Blinding Arc’s Affliction effect).Thunderclap: Cumulative Ranged Affliction (Resisted by

Dodge, Overcome by Fortitude; Impaired, Disabled,Unaware), Limited to Hearing • 2 points per rank.

WIND BLAST

A powerful blast of wind sends targets scattering likefallen leaves. The effective Strength of the Wind Blastequals its Move Object rank. Targets make a Strength re-sistance check against your power’s Strength (half that if

they succeed on their initial Dodge check against the areaeffect), success allows them to hold their ground whilefailure means they are thrown a distance value equal toyour Move Object rank minus their weight rank.

Wind Blast: Cone Area Move Object, Close Range, Limited toPushing Away • 1 point per rank.

DEFENSIVE POWERSCommand over the weather can provide protection

against many hazards of the environment, as well as har-nessing the winds and clouds as defenses.

FOG

A thick bank of fog rolls in, impairing or disabling visibilityin the area (a –2 or –5 modifier to Perception and relatedvisual checks).

Fog: Environment (Visibility) • 1 point per rank (impairment) or2 points per rank (disabling).

Alternately, you can create total visual concealment in asmaller area, with a fog cloud so thick visibility drops to prac-tically nothing. A successful Perception check may reveal atarget’s general location but the character still suffers froma –5 circumstance penalty to actions requiring visibility. Anon-visual accurate sense can overcome this penalty.

Fog: Visual Concealment Attack 2, Cloud Area 4 (120-foot radius)• 12 points, +2 points per +1 increase in area rank.

IMMUNITY TO WEATHER

Your powers protect you from the harmful effects ofweather; you’re never hot or cold or affected by exposureor other (Earth-like) weather conditions. Some weather-controllers may have lesser degrees of Immunity to singu-lar environmental conditions like cold or heat, rather thanweather in general.

Immunity to Weather: Immunity 2 (Earthly Weather) • 2 points.

Some have a greater degree of immunity, extending to all effects with the “weather” descriptor, including Afflictions orDamage. This includes attacks like lightning, provided theyhave the “weather” descriptor; immunity to all electricity re-quires additional ranks as a separate common descriptor.

Immunity to Weather: Immunity 10 (Weather Effects) • 10 points.

WHIRLWIND

You create and maintain an area of powerful winds thatdisrupt ranged attacks.

Whirlwind: Deflect, Cloud Area 2 (30-foot radius), Limited toAttacks Targeting Dodge • 2 points per rank.

WIND SCREEN

Swirling winds moving at high speeds around you deflectphysical projectiles and attacks before they can strike you.

Wind Screen: Impervious Protection, Sustained, Limited toPhysical Damage • 1 point per rank.

MOVEMENT POWERSWeather powers can grant, enhance, or inhibit movement,particularly through the air or along the ground.

WEATHERPROOF

Your movement is unimpeded by the effects of the weatherand you suffer no circumstance penalties for weather-relat-ed environments. So you can move at normal speed in astorm or high winds and ignore things like visibility modi-fiers (for anything less than total concealment).

Weatherproof: Movement 1 (Environmental Adaptation:Weather) • 2 points.

WIND-RIDING

You can harness the power of the winds to soar throughthe air as fast as they can carry you. Wind-Riding tends tobe limited to the speed of rank of hurricane-force windson Earth, rarely more than rank 6 (120 miles per hour).

Weather controllers with Wind Lifting (following) may useit to carry others aloft on the winds with them, flying attheir normal speed so long as the weight value they carryis within their effect limits.

Wind-Riding: Flight • 2 points per rank.

UTILITY POWERSControl of the weather provides a number of other usefuleffects. Take a look at the Weather Descriptors section

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for some useful applications of weather powers as well,particularly in terms of countering other effects.

WEATHER CONTROL

You control the weather in a radius around you with a dis-tance rank equal to your Environment effect rank, so rank10, for example, creates weather effects within a 4 mileradius. Rank 20 is sufficient to affect a 4,000 mile radius,essentially an entire hemisphere. Rank 21 can encompassmost of the Earth’s surface.

The Selective modifier, rather than allowing you to choosewho in the area is or is not affected, allows you to choosehow the Environment effect’s points per rank are distrib-uted amongst cold, heat, impair movement, and visibility(see the Fog power; if you have this power, you can alsoproduce its effect). To increase the amount of weathereffects you can produce in an area at once, increase thepoints per rank of the Environment effect.

If you can also selectively choose your targets, or applydifferent effects to different targets, apply the Selectivemodifier twice. Gamemasters should be cautious aboutpermitting two applications of Selective to Environmenteffects, given their potential to impose circumstancemodifiers to a wide area, affecting everyone present,without imposing any penalty on the hero’s allies. Such aneffect can strongly shift the balance of an encounter.

Note that you can also use your Weather Control to negate up to your effect rank in weather conditions in your areaas well, creating calm, clear weather. So you could, forexample, eliminate intense cold and impeded move-ment (due to ice and snow) in your area, transforming itfrom the depths of winter to a temperate, Spring-like day.Normal weather conditions reassert themselves once youstop maintaining the effect.

Weather Control: Environment (3 points of effect), Selective• 4 points per rank.

WEATHER PREDICTION

You can sense weather patterns in your area, predictingweather conditions in the coming hours and days. TheGM may require a secret Perception or Expertise (Meteo-rology) skill check for detailed or long-range information.

Weather Prediction: Senses 4 (Precognition), Limited to Weather• 2 points.

WIND-LIFTING

You focus powerful gusts of air or even mini-tornadoesto lift and move objects around, push things over, and soforth. Each individual object in the affected area cannotexceed your effective lifting Strength, although their com-bined weight value may do so. So, for example, if your effectrank is 4, each object you move cannot exceed 800 lbs., butyou can move as many as fit into your area of effect.

Wind-Lifting: Burst Area Move Object, Selective • 4 points per rank.

WEATHER ARRAYSWeather-controllers will often have various weatherpowers—particularly offensive and some utility powers—as Alternate Effects of each other in an array (See Alter-nate Effect , Hero’s Handbook, pages 136–138). Thesearrays may be Dynamic, allowing for mix-and-matching of

different weather effects reflecting the character’s abilityto control different aspects simultaneously, but with afinite amount of power and concentration.

Weather arrays are well-suited for performing weather-relat-ed power stunts, temporarily adding a new Alternate Effectto the array and making even powers a weather-controllerdoes not have from this Profile a useful source of ideas.

The Weather Control utility power (previously) might bepart of an array or separate, allowing the character toaffect environmental conditions while also producingspecific weather effects.

OTHER WEATHER POWERS“Weather” includes a broad range of effects and descrip-tors, from air and wind to thunder and lightning, or rain,snow, ice, and fog. Thus many of the powers in otherPower Profiles may also be weather effects, dependingon the character’s degree of control over the elements.Look at Air Powers , Electrical Powers , Ice Powers , andWater Powers for some other potential weather abilities,either as regular power effects or occasional power stunts.

WEATHER CHALLENGESA common challenge for weather-controllers is the en-vironment itself; heroes are called upon to tame out-of-control storms and impose their will upon the ragingweather. This can be considered a simple matter of coun-tering weather effects (see Countering Effects , Hero’sHandbook, pages 95–95) but reducing the feat to a singleeffect rank check may reduce the drama of the conflict.

Gamemasters may wish to consider these kinds of strug-

gles as challenges ( Hero’s Handbook, pages 185–186, andthe Gamemaster’s Guide, pages 173–182), requiring mul-tiple checks in order to achieve complete success, withsome back-and-forth as the character struggles to gainthe upper hand over the challenge.

WEATHER COMPLICATIONS The weather is a vast and complex system, often subjectto unexpected shifts. As the chaos theory maxim suggests,the stirring of a butterfly’s wings may radically change theweather months later and half a world away; how muchmore complicated might direct intervention in the shapeand expression of the weather be?

ACCIDENT

Controlling a primal force like the weather may require agreat deal of self-discipline and awareness. It is easy for

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something to go wrong when unleashing the fury of ahurricane or tornado in the heart of a city! This complica-tion turns the weather-controller into a living natural di-saster, just looking for a place to strike.

Alternately, someone might take advantage of the idea ofthis complication, setting things up to look like the weath-er-controller is responsible for some accident in order to

blacken a hero’s good name, sow doubt and dissent withthe public, or simply sue the hero (or a wealthy patron) inhopes of a big settlement.

HONOR

A sense of honor and responsibility concerning theirpowers is common for heroic weather-controllers, and theyoften choose not to use their ability in order to allow thenatural cycles of the weather to continue uninterrupted,even when that decision may be personally difficult.

OBSESSIONA strong personal connection to the forces of nature cangive weather-controllers a sense that the natural worldis more important—even all-important—compared tohuman civilization. Certainly humanity is still at the mercyof the weather in various ways, but also affect the climate.Weather-controllers may be obsessed with studying weath-er-related phenomena, working to slow or prevent climatechange, or dealing with the impact of civilization upon theweather (or vice versa).

PHOBIA

Given that weather occurs outdoors, under the open sky,weather-controllers may be given to claustrophobia, afear of small, enclosed spaces where their powers may belimited or ineffective (see Power Loss , following).

Similarly, even weather-controllers may be awed by thetremendous unleashed power of the weather, fearingwhat might happen should their powers get out ofcontrol or if they summon up a storm they cannot stop.

This fear may cause hesitate or even paralysis in somesituations as the weather-controller fears to call uponthe weather’s full fury.

POWER LOSS

The Weather Descriptors section discusses some ofthe necessary conditions for weather effects, notably anatmosphere sufficient for “weather” to occur. Tightly en-closed conditions —ranging from being inside a buildingto trapped inside a small, enclosed space—could limit or

negate weather powers. So, too, would being underwa-ter, in space, or anywhere else lacking an atmosphere tomanipulate.

Note that this does not have to be the case: a magical ordimensional weather controller, for example, may alsohave the ability to create the necessary environment, ableto summon storms anywhere, even in the air-less depths

of space! This is still just a descriptor for the character’sweather powers, since the player is effectively giving upan opportunity to earn hero points for the advantage ofnot dealing with this particular power loss complication.In essence, think of the hero points the player would oth-erwise earn being “spent” on ignoring the complicationinstead.

RESPONSIBILITY

The power to control the weather can be an awesomeresponsibility. Weather threatens—or is responsiblefor—the well-being of people around the world everyday. How does a weather-controller deal with this? Doyou bring rains to the deserts, turn aside hurricanes,melt blizzards, and stop tornadoes before they strike? Ifso, how much can you interfere with the world’s weatherwithout actually making it worse due to unforeseenconsequences of your changes? Weather controllers

must often balance their sense of responsibility towardshumanity with their code of ethics (see Honor ) and re-sponsibility towards the environment and the cycles ofnature.

TEMPER

Weather is often used as a metaphor for emotions. Inyour case, the weather actually reflects your emotions:When you are happy, the sky is clear, when you are sad,it is grey and drizzly, and when you are angry, dark stormclouds gather and thunder crashes. This complicationstelegraphs what you are feeling to anyone paying at-tention and can have other inconvenient side effects(such as literally raining on somebody else’s picnic). Inextreme cases, your feelings—and the weather—mayget away from you (see the Accident complication, pre-viously).

WEAKNESS

Weather-controllers may face weaknesses associated withtheir powers and adaptations involving them. Some pos-

sibilities include the following:Beyond just power loss (see the Power Loss section) aweather-controller cut off from the natural environmentmay begin to weaken or suffer other conditions. So timespent outside of an atmosphere might lead to the char-acter becoming impaired, disabled and, eventually, inca-pacitated or even dying. This could even be so extremeas to extend to time spent in enclosed areas, beyond justpsychological claustrophobia to a physical effect.

Just as the environment can reflect a weather-control-ler’s mood, so the environmental conditions can influ-ence someone so strongly connected to them. So pol-luted and toxic environments may have a more seriouseffect on the character, or weather patterns might alterthe character’s moods: sad and morose when it rains,for example, cheerful when it’s bright and sunny, angryduring storms, and so forth, shading into the Tempercomplication (previously).

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mutants & masterminds power profile 6 weather powers

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