in the shower today (where i usually have my epiphanies) for some reason i remembered the movie "brain smasher: a love story".

awful to the nth degree, there was still a pretty cool part where the main villain stops pistol rounds with the palm of his hand. they embedded themselves in his palm, and he was bleeding from it, but nonetheless he stopped the bullets from entering other more vital parts of himself.

so, that got me thinking about a possible adept power, costing 1 or 2 magic points depending on the level, that would automatically reduce the damage of a small caliber round by one level per adept power level.

i thought that one could make a reaction test against a base target of 4 plus the number of opponent's successes, plus modifiers for bursts, plus typical mods.

i really haven't fleshed it all the way out yet.

so, any thoughts?

My thoughts are that that's what happens when you succeed on dodge and soak tests.

[edit]I thought you were gonna start off with something like Neo from The Matrix. [/edit]

Sounds like a combination of missile parry and improved body (since mystic armor only gives ballistic armor in SR4. *fumes*).

As written, it seems grossly overpowered to me, at least in the hands of someone with good enough reaction. Even though you'd be adding the opponent's successes to the TN, there will still be many situations in which this would be the easiest way to stage the damage down, by far.

You also didn't seem to consider how many times you could do this per combat phase.

And finally, it really does step on the toes of the current Dodge system, where you need to expend CP to have a (usually) much lower chance of staging.

yeah, like i said it just occurred to me and i haven't really thought it out.

but I do think steep magic cost counters the overpowered aspect.

Well, blocking it with your palm is a parry, so I'd say it would be a power that would allow you to use unarmed (Or armed) combat to defend against ranged attacks, incuding bullets, with a parry. This would only work with a parry action, like any other active defense. So if you took no action, then they go against your reaction. If you took an action, you roll your reaction + melee skill. Just like when using a gymnastic dodge or full dodge action. This would only be useful to a certain type of character (One who took a melee skill, but did not take dodge or gymnastics), but I think its a good thing because it gives us more option in character creation that "Melee + gymnastics" Or "Dodge, with no Melee or gymnastics."

Point cost .25 or .5 magic. Since it doesn't provide a numerical advanage, just opens up a new use for an existing skill, I'd say it should be rather low cost wise. I'm leaning toward .25 magic.

:: Oh, yeah. Actually, it really kicks butt when you think about the fact that you get to save the adept power point cost on upping ranged dodge with improved ability. Thats a whole improved ability you no longer have to buy. Additionally, weapon foci add their dice to parry attempts with them, so that would appy here too. Throw that cost up to .5, maybe even 1, magic. ::

For a moment there I thought this was going to be an Adept power that stops bullets in the air like Neo in the Matrix.

Bah! As a good follower of Thales, I assume nothing. NOTHING!

Alright, heres how to handle it is SR3. Convert to SR4, then follow the steps above.