Villain Datafile: Loki
To carry on with Avengers Week, we bring you Loki, god of mischief and lies! Kneel before him!
I had a fun time putting this one together, as he’s got a lot going for him, mainly in the Magic side of things. Special thanks to Andrew for getting this put into our signature formatting when I didn’t have time. Enjoy!
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14 comments on “Villain Datafile: Loki”
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I’m amazed no one else has commented yet. Nice work, guys, and this makes me want to actually play this game even more. Thanks!
I think beguiling image is a little problematic and potentially “game breaking”. If you allow Loki to remove the largest die from an attackers pool after he has rolled his die, you may end up removing one of his results die or effect die, thus creating a “back and forth” effect not seen in the game before.
One of the core mechanics in the game is that once the attacker is done with his roll, the die pool is set until the reaction roll is done.
A much better way to handle this would be to allow Loki to borrow the highest die from the attackers pool on a reaction using shape shifting.
I don’t think he would have to use Beguiling Image after the attacker has rolled his dice, just after he has declared his action and built his pool.
Yes, he would, because the defender doesn’t get to declare his reaction until the attacker is done with his action. The wording of beguiling image shifts the whole dynamic of attacker vs defender, and that is one of the few core mechanics in the game that I believe should remain as it is.
Invisible Woman and Shadowcat’s “Reactive Power” works basically the same way. Except they add a die to another character’s pool before they roll a reaction. Beguiling Image does the same thing, it just takes a die away instead. The timing of when the die can be added/removed is the same.
No, they are not.
Both invisible woman and shadowcats powers add a die to a pool before it is rolled, but beguiling image takes one away from a pool that is allready rolled.
Consider this:
Storm decides to dish out some lightning fury upon loki.
Her dice pool looks like this: Team d10, Mercurial d8, Electrical blast d10, combat expert d8 and she decides to spend a plot point to add weather supremacy d12.
Lets say her total is 15 and she gets to keep her d12 as an effect die.
Then its Loki’s turn to react.
He decides to use beguiling image as it is currently worded and removes storms d12 effect die, leaving her with a measly d4. No other effect in the game so far allows the defender to affect the attackers dice pool in a similar manner.
Once an attacker is done with his roll, the defender has to manipulate his own dice pool in order to beat the attacker.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for new and exiting ways to portray characters and their abilities, but not in a way that breaks that particular core mechanic. Marvel heroic roleplaying is almost impossible to “break”, but I think this sfx actually manages to do so.
What I’m saying is that there is nothing in the way the Beguiling Image is written that says you remove the highest die after the roll is made. In fact it says you remove the die from the pool, not the result or effect.
Even using it the way it is worded, Loki can declare his intention to use Beguiling Image as soon as the attacker builds their pool and remove the die then. Again, just like with “Reactive Power”. Then he will be required to use Shapeshifting in his reaction. But he won’t actually build his pool until the attacker’s action is done. In the end it’s no different than saying “spend 1PP”, or “Spend a die from the doom pool”.
Can’t wait to see Loki cause mayhem tonight! Midnight can’t get here soon enough.
Do you mean Sorcery Supremacy (d12) or Sorcery Mastery (d10)?
Oops! I meant Supremacy.
My Co worker and who are gearing up to combine our gaming groups came up with loki’s beguiling image removes the die before the roll from my group so far i’ve got one person playing us agent/wolverine along with cap deadpool and blackwidow along with 3 others who haven’t quite decided yet not counting bryans group and i’m playing ironman
Separate people are playing cap deadpool and blackwidow lol
Used Loki last night in the final session of the Breakout event as the “secret puppet master,” in part because I wanted Loki to be the one responsible for the New Avengers getting together as well.
Anyone interested can peek at the game session here on YouTube:
Loki worked great. He got to heal himself after one of the players tricked the Destroyer into blasting him, and it was really fun to create multiple complications, such as filling Iron Man’s suit with gremlins and making Wolverine see everyone as if they were Jean Grey.
The one thing that is a little perplexing is Beguiling Image. It worked fine, because, as said above, you just have to use Shapeshifting in your die pool after you require your enemy to take the dice out. However, it seems like, from the description, it should actually be tied to Loki’s ability to create illusions. It seems like the game representation of “Are you even not going to fall for that?” from the movies, for lack of a better explanation.
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