Impervious toughness in 3e

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RainOnTheSun
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Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by RainOnTheSun »

To get straight to the point: Is it any good?

Between Power Attack and Penetrating, Impervious toughness never seemed that hard to get around in second edition, at least to me. I know a lot of people have had different experiences with it than I did, but it always seemed to be only barely worth its price. Has anyone used Impervious toughness as-written in third edition and been satisfied with it? I've never really given it a fair chance; it just seemed like an unwarranted nerf to an already marginal ability to me.

Have you ever seen it save a PC, or give the players a challenge when given to an NPC?
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Arkrite
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by Arkrite »

I had a revelation about impervious at one point.

Impervious isn't designed to save you from Super Villains/Heroes.
Impervious is designed to make you unstoppable when facing mooks or mundane threats.

Almost any character you fight that's on your own level will be able to power attack a few points in 3rd edition, which means unless you're incredibly toughness shifted, they'll still be able to force you to roll damage as per normal.

Which how I'd expect any super vs super fight to go. You're not fighting nobodies, you're facing off against some of the greatest threats in the world. And in gameplay terms, never having to worry about any opponent you fight is largely going to be boring after awhile.

But it's a great way of making sure you're not bothered by minor threats.
Best example I can think of is Superman in later parts of the Justice League Unlimited series. (Earlier versions apparently had him without impervious, but I digress)

Against pretty much every opponent Superman ran into was able to hurt him, even if they couldn't knock him down or out.
But against minions? It should go something like this:
(Warning, starts with an alarm noise, please turn down your headphones)
Superman Vs Mooks

Also a fun example of two ranks of Takedown in action.

Sadly unless the GM throws in mooks, or lower leveled minions, Impervious is really just for character flavor. I don't think it will ever really save you from the big bad, and it probably shouldn't.
But it is perfect for making you feel like a god in the normal world.

As always, this is only my opinion.
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Ken
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by Ken »

It's fairly common for PCs and NPC in the RCU.

Then again, my gaming group never played 1e or 2e; we went from Hero to DCA.

We had no preconceived notion of what it "ought" to do. We used it, and learned what it did. Came to the same conclusion as Arkrite. It helps with mooks and the like.
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RainOnTheSun
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by RainOnTheSun »

I should probably give it a try, I guess. It just feels so expensive for a mostly cosmetic effect.
greycrusader
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by greycrusader »

The consensus on 3e Impervious Toughness is it's a "broken" effect; the Power Profiles: Armor Power offers alternative mechanics for the power. The proposed alternatives are A) Impervious negates any attack effect equal or less than its rank, but has a "hard cap" equal to the series Power Level for PCs, i.e., PL 10 heroes cannot buy more than 10 ranks of Impervious Toughness; B) Impervious Toughness adds 10 to any resistance check against non-Penetrating attacks equal to or under its' ranks; or C) Impervious Toughness reduces the condition caused by any successful attack/damaging effect under its rank by one degree. A fourth proposed option is only applying Power Attack after accounting for Impervious ranks, which makes the Extra MUCH more useful in practice.

My personal preference is option A, though I would dilute it slightly by simply subtracting ranks in Impervious Toughness from any attack under its' rank, so a Damaging effect of equal rank would still trigger a resistance check against a "rank 0" attack.

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FuzzyBoots
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by FuzzyBoots »

Another option posted on the boards is that, for any attack that is at the Impervious level or below, any roll of 10 or below counts as 10. Attacks at 5 below (minions) are tanked, and up to PL, it's just a Bruised at worst for the first hit.

Half was just a bad idea because the game scales arithmetically.
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Ken
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by Ken »

Consensus? HA!
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greycrusader
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by greycrusader »

I just meant nearly everyone who raises the topic believes it doesn't work as intended-or as it seems to work in comics.

All my best.
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Ken
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by Ken »

greycrusader wrote: Tue Oct 10, 2017 9:20 pm I just meant nearly everyone who raises the topic believes it doesn't work as intended-or as it seems to work in comics.
Well, yes. But you see, it only makes sense that everyone who raises the topic believes there's a problem. That's why they raise the topic.

If I, as someone who thinks it represents what I see in the comics, TV, and movies, raised the topic "I think Impervious Defense works great in M&M3e" it would just be weird. Unless I was spoiling for an argument, what would be the point?

I don't know how many people agree with me. But I've never seen a poll on the subject either.

"The general agreement of everyone who have ever said there is a problem with ________x__________ think there is a problem with ________x__________" will ALWAYS be true.
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Chris Brady
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by Chris Brady »

I've been running M&M 3e since the DC Handbook and I'm still not entirely sure how it works. I've house ruled it, but Iunno...
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catsi563
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by catsi563 »

Chris Brady wrote: Fri Jan 12, 2018 6:31 am I've been running M&M 3e since the DC Handbook and I'm still not entirely sure how it works. I've house ruled it, but Iunno...
Well the simplest is often the best

Impervious per the basic rules works thusly

if an attacks ranks are less then the ranks of impervious the attack does no damage at all

if they equal or exceed the ranks of impervious the attack causes normal damage and the hero must save as normal

So lets use the basic paragon as exmaple the Paragon has +12 toughness with 10 tanks of impervious

Mook with club +3 total damage giggle snort nah not happening

mook with pistol +5 damage cannot hurt the paragon in the slightest 5 ranks vers 10

mook with assault rifle +7 damage nope not here either

Mook with machine gun +8 damage nope nada

mook with rocket launcher +10 damage and here we go the Paragon must make a normal toughness save since the Rockets damage of +10 meets the +10 impervious

Supervillain with a +11 blast just goes right through the Impervious normal toughness save needed

Impervious in effect bascially means as long as the attacks ranks are -1 to the total impervious tanks the Hero bounces the attack.

this by the way does not preclude the GM from introducing story fluff such as the machinegun making the paragon cover up since the bullets sting or a rockert launchers blast knocking the hero on their heiny. Just apply common sense and rule of cool as needed
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Chris Brady
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by Chris Brady »

That doesn't sound 'right' to me. I see how it reads that way, and is probably the right way to rule, but I don't like it.
Insaniac99
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by Insaniac99 »

catsi563 wrote: Fri Jan 12, 2018 10:09 pm
Chris Brady wrote: Fri Jan 12, 2018 6:31 am I've been running M&M 3e since the DC Handbook and I'm still not entirely sure how it works. I've house ruled it, but Iunno...
Well the simplest is often the best

Impervious per the basic rules works thusly

if an attacks ranks are less then the ranks of impervious the attack does no damage at all

if they equal or exceed the ranks of impervious the attack causes normal damage and the hero must save as normal

So lets use the basic paragon as exmaple the Paragon has +12 toughness with 10 tanks of impervious

Mook with club +3 total damage giggle snort nah not happening

mook with pistol +5 damage cannot hurt the paragon in the slightest 5 ranks vers 10

mook with assault rifle +7 damage nope not here either

Mook with machine gun +8 damage nope nada

mook with rocket launcher +10 damage and here we go the Paragon must make a normal toughness save since the Rockets damage of +10 meets the +10 impervious

Supervillain with a +11 blast just goes right through the Impervious normal toughness save needed

Impervious in effect bascially means as long as the attacks ranks are -1 to the total impervious tanks the Hero bounces the attack.

this by the way does not preclude the GM from introducing story fluff such as the machinegun making the paragon cover up since the bullets sting or a rockert launchers blast knocking the hero on their heiny. Just apply common sense and rule of cool as needed
I know I'm late to the party, but that is not how Impervious works in 3E.

As per http://www.d20herosrd.com/6-powers/modifiers/, which echoes the main rulebook for M&M 3e, but I can share freely,
IMPERVIOUS (+1 COST PER RANK)
A defense with this modifier is highly resistant. Any effect with a resistance difficulty modifier equal to or less than half the Impervious rank (rounded up) has no effect. So, for example, Impervious Toughness 9 ignores any Damage with a rank of 5 or less. Penetrating effects can overcome Impervious Resistance (see the Penetrating extra description).

Impervious is primarily intended for Toughness resistance checks, to handle characters immune to a certain threshold of damage, but it can be applied to other defenses with the GM’s permission, to reflect characters with certain reliable capabilities in terms of resisting particular effects or hazards.
So you are correct that the rank 3 and 5 effects have no requirement of a roll, however, it is incorrect to say that the 7 or 8 ranks don't require a roll.

You might be thinking of 2e where Impervious does indeed work as you described.
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catsi563
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by catsi563 »

Yeah I was mostly referencing 2nd Edition but that's because a lot of people house rule back to it due to third editions very convoluted rule on it.

the 2nd ed version lays the level of power of impervious out much more smoothly imo giving a GM an easier time with what can and cant harm an impervious hero
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Re: Impervious toughness in 3e

Post by Chris Brady »

I've decided to stay with my house rule. Every two ranks of Impervious removes one rank of damage from the incoming attack. If it reduces it down to 0, then the attack does no damage.
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