Overdrive Charms

[Kyeudo]

I'm doing some thinking about Overdrive Charms and I'm trying to decide if the fixed 10 mote pool size is something important to game balance or if it was done just to be simple. I'm wondering if having the pool size set by some function of a character's traits wouldn't be a better idea, as that would mean a Essence 10 Solar would have an Overdrive pool large enough to use whole Combos out of it. Anyone have thoughts on the idea?

 

[HowlingCoyote]

Overdrive is meant to allow for creativity, and limit paranoia combat. It wasn't meant to allow for mote positive combat, as that would never, ever, ever end between two Solar-level opponents. If you can toss out entire combos (plural) with just Overdrive, you'd need non-Overdrive Essence exclusively for defense, recoverable through stunting.


In other words, offense is free, defense is covered by stunts, you're mote positive, and can never die.


The 2/7 filter with Lightspeed Body Dynamics is already almost impossible to beat. Increasing the size of Overdrive, or making it based on something other than the charm from which it originates simply means that Solars win, always, because they can't lose. No one else can ever beat them, ever. That's not really hyperbole, it's pretty much the obvious way any Solar would be set up from char gen.

 

[Kyeudo]

Your argument there seems to be based around the rate at which motes come into your Overdrive pool, not how many you can have stored in a given fight. I haven't been planning to increase the rate at which that pool fills. I've only been contemplating the ramifications of what would happen if the pool size grew with your character.

 

[Tsuranis]

To start with, the pool limit is 25, not 10. I don't see allowing that to grow as actually making any real difference to the game - you're going to have a very hard time filling it anyway.

 

[Virjigorm]

I think the Overdrive mechanic is already set up to scale with character development with the fact that having more Overdrive charms creates more ways to fill the pool. If the pool is filling and being spent every action or two, it makes for some intense combat.


It also looks to me like the Overdrive concept was introduced to remove the tendency to max willpower purely for combat combo fuel. With Overdrive motes fueling your offense and opening up charm uses per action, combos with defensive charms are not the only way to stay alive.


It all adds up to a mechanic that could improve or ruin the combat system. As written, Overdrive seems to balance reasonably well, especially if it gets into the charmsets of all the Exalt types. If houserules were to uncap the pool, I think the offensive charm use would get out of control and overwhelm defensive potential. The result might be that instead of willpower attrition resulting from combos because you need the defense charm that's in there, you'll see the same battle of attrition resulting from the extra attack 'combos' being fueled by Overdrive and, as a result, being essentially free.