Wise Turtle Publishing

OVA Rule Book wrote: Focus - One or more of your Abilities require a special item to use. The ability may need the item as a focusing point of sorts, or the item itself may actually generate the power. If the item is taken away from you or lost, you can no longer use the Ability. At Level 1, you lose a single ability without your focus. At Level 2, you may lose multiple abilities, or lose one or two of your core strengths. With Level 3, nearly all of your Abilities are lost, or you lose powers and skills that are vital to your existence.

I'm a bit confused about Focus. Clay, you mentioned in an earlier post that Focus could be used to represent items that the character has. But non of the sample characters have the Focus Weakness for their Weapon Ability. Karis does have it for Barrier, but not for Weapon...

So I'm wondering when it would be appropriate to use Focus and when it wouldn't. Were the sample characters done before the rules were solidified? Or is there an ambiguity about it that makes it unsure when to be used and when not to be?

In my interpretation of Focus, everything that isn't a part of the character--weapons, armor, stuff--or powers that require an item to work, but the item itself does NOT supply the the Ability, require Focus. So every Weapon and Armor that isn't "built-in" to the character requires its own Focus, and any power that needs that magical locket to work needs Focus, as well.

Looking at the sample characters, it seems that only those items that are extremly prone to being taken, or the magical locket, require Focus.

This is why I think that an Item Ability would work well, to avoid this confusion. Is it something that can be lost/forgotten/left behind/stolen? Then it's an Item. Is it part of the character, and requires extreme measure to rid them of it? Then it's an Ability.

I hope that my ramblings arn't hurting your brain!!

TBP

Your reasoning is pretty much on, as far as i can see. The one thing that seems to be tripping you up is the fact that Armor and Weapon, not to mention Vehicle/Mecha, are already items. Weapon and Vehicle are not particularly ambiguous. You don't need to buy Vehicle and give it a focus (vehicle); that would be risibly redundant. Weapon seems to be much the same: although it's true that you can be disarmed, or leave your Weapon at home when you're not expecting a fight to break out, this little drawback is counterbalanced by the option of adding Perks (by balance, i mean comparing to Martial Arts, which can't be disarmed but which doesn't grant perks; both options are about on par).

The description for Armor does get a little ambiguous, though. It refers to "protective gear" (gear=equipment) and lists examples: a combat suit (obviously an item), an electrical force shield (which could be a mutant or magic power, as well as the produced by an item), and a really thick hide (which seems to suggest superhuman 'natural' armor, but could also refer to being draped in bearskins, i suppose). This seems to suggest that natural armor and equipment armor are considered to be on par, without a 'focus' item. I'm inclined to say that this makes sense, though - it woudl be a really neat trick to 'disarm' someone of their armor in the middle of a fight, unless it's a magic or scifi effect generated by, say, a pendant or bracelet or something that can be more easily removed. Doesn't seem to me like Auren is in any great danger of having his armor stripped off him mid-adventure (though admittedly he could be surprised in the shower).

On the other hand, Shadowman does have his armor-suit listed as a focus, but in his case most of his Abilities arise from the suit, not just the armor ability; and while it's not likely he can be stripped naked in a fight and rendered helpless that way, the fact that he *would* be all but helpless without the suit is worth something - it means that he can't go walking around 'undercover' in streetclothes without being incredibly vulnerable, etc. It's a story hook and a risk/restriction.

So far as i can tell, there's no difference between the Focus weakness and the Item ability/weakness you're suggesting, except for the fact that certain abilities are already considered items. Does this mean that a character who sprouts weapons from his body (like Wolverine, say) has an unfair advantage over somebody who carries a big sword? Well, sure, maybe so. Maybe in your game you'd rather than any and every ability that is item-derived should have corresponding Focus. Personally, I'd say it's not that big a deal.

It's a bit ambiguous, yes. Bhikku kind of hit on it: Focus is for Abilities that are not automatically assumed to be items, or to cover unusual cases (like Shadowman).

In the end, I think making Armor a focus is pretty ridiculous because it's not going anywhere. Although there are situations (ie. being attacked while sleeping) that may result in its loss, such special case scenarios can be applied to many things. (Should there be a "requires sight" weakness because you usually need light for most weapons and you could be attacked in the dark? etc.)

Weapons, too, can be disarmed. But strong characters can be bound or entangled, too. You don't have a Martial Art weakness that states "requires fist" ...

Basically, Focus is just for special case scenarios, usually when an Item powers other Abilities and is not replacable.

Shadowman without his Armor is in trouble. Fukiko is lost without her locket.

If Auren loses his sword, however, he can always make do with another weapon. It's useful, yes, but it's not intrensic to his character.

In the end, you have a point, and if OVA were a game that saddled itself with such particulars, it'd be a salient point. But OVA has many little idiosyncrasies for the cause of simplicity. You can't have your cake and eat it, too.

But, if you want, make characters ALWAYS take the Focus weakness when buying non-permanent items. Just because I chose not to doesn't mean you have to. I would not create an "Item" Ability in any case. It's redundant with Focus.

Clay wrote:It's a bit ambiguous, yes. Bhikku kind of hit on it: Focus is for Abilities that are not automatically assumed to be items, or to cover unusual cases (like Shadowman).

In the end, I think making Armor a focus is pretty ridiculous because it's not going anywhere. Although there are situations (ie. being attacked while sleeping) that may result in its loss, such special case scenarios can be applied to many things. (Should there be a "requires sight" weakness because you usually need light for most weapons and you could be attacked in the dark? etc.)

Weapons, too, can be disarmed. But strong characters can be bound or entangled, too. You don't have a Martial Art weakness that states "requires fist" ...

Basically, Focus is just for special case scenarios, usually when an Item powers other Abilities and is not replacable.

Shadowman without his Armor is in trouble. Fukiko is lost without her locket.

If Auren loses his sword, however, he can always make do with another weapon. It's useful, yes, but it's not intrensic to his character.

In the end, you have a point, and if OVA were a game that saddled itself with such particulars, it'd be a salient point. But OVA has many little idiosyncrasies for the cause of simplicity. You can't have your cake and eat it, too.

But, if you want, make characters ALWAYS take the Focus weakness when buying non-permanent items. Just because I chose not to doesn't mean you have to. I would not create an "Item" Ability in any case. It's redundant with Focus.

I see your point, Clay. Just when loosing the Focus would be detrimental to the character.

Thanks for the clarification!!

TBP