Enhanced Senses
From D20advanced
| ENHANCED SENSES | ||
| Type: Sensory | Action: None (passive) | |
| Range: Personal | Duration: Continuous | |
| Resistance: None | Cost: 1 point per rank | |
One or more of your senses are enhanced, or you have additional sensory abilities beyond the normal five senses. Allocate ranks in Enhanced Senses to the following FX. Some options require more than one rank, noted in their descriptions. Like all sensory FX, Enhanced Senses uses the sense types described in sense types.
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Additional Senses
The FX here grant additional sensory capabilities or senses beyond the normal five senses.
- Communication Link (1 rank): You have a link with a particular individual chosen when you acquire this option, who must also have this ability. The two of you can communicate over any distance like a use of the Communication FX. Choose a sense type as a communication medium when you select this option; mental is common for psychic or empathic links. If you apply the Dimensional FX feat to your Communication Link, it extends to other dimensions as well.
- Danger Sense (1 rank): When you would normally be surprised in combat, make a Perception check (DC 15). Success means you are not surprised and may act during the surprise round (if any). Failure means you are surprised (although, if you have Uncanny Dodge, you retain your Defense bonus). The GM may raise the DC of the Danger Sense check in some circumstances. Choose a sense type for your Danger Sense. Sensory effects targeting that sense also affect your Danger Sense ability and may “blind” it.
- (Descriptor) Awareness (1 rank): You can sense the use of effects of a particular descriptor with a successful Perception check (DC 10, –1 per 10 feet range). Examples include Cosmic Awareness, Divine Awareness, Magical Awareness, Mental Awareness, and so forth. You can apply enhanced sense traits to your Awareness to modify it. Choose the sense type for your Awareness; it is often a mental sense, but doesn’t have to be. Awareness counts as an “exotic sense” for noticing effects with the first rank of the Subtle FX feat.
- Detect (1–2 ranks): You can sense a particular item or effect by touch with a Perception check. Detect has no range and only indicates the presence or absence of something (being neither acute nor accurate). Choose what sense type your Detect falls under (often mental). For 2 ranks you can detect things at a normal range increment (–1 per 10 feet).
- Direction Sense (1 rank): You always know what direction north lies in and can retrace your steps through any place you’ve been.
- Distance Sense (1 rank): You can accurately and automatically judge distances.
- (FX) Awareness (1 rank): This works like Descriptor Awareness (previously) but applies only to one FX regardless of descriptor(s). Examples include Concealment Awareness, Mind Control Awareness, Teleport Awareness, and so forth.
- Infravision (1 rank): You can see in the infrared portion of the spectrum, allowing you to see heat patterns. Darkness does not provide concealment for objects differing in temperature from their surroundings. If you have the Track ability, you can track warm creatures by the faint heat trails they leave behind.
- Microscopic Vision (1–4 ranks): You can view extremely small things. You can make Perception checks to see tiny things in your own area. Cost is 1 rank for dust-sized objects, 2 ranks for cellular-sized, 3 ranks for DNA and complex molecules, 4 ranks for atomic- sized. The GM may require a knowledge skill check, particularly Science to interpret what you see.
- Postcognition (4 ranks): Your senses extend into the past, allowing you to perceive events that took place previously. You can make Perception checks to pick up on past information in an area or from a subject. The Gamemaster sets the DC for these checks based on how obscure and distant in the past the information is, from DC 15 (for a vague vision that may or may not be accurate) to DC 30 (for near complete knowledge of a particular past event as if you were actually present). Your normal (present-day) senses don’t work while you’re using Postcognition; your awareness is focused on the past. Your postcogntive visions last for as long as you concentrate. Postcognition does not apply to mental effects like Mind Reading or any other ability requiring interaction with the past. Postcognition may be Limited to past events connected to your own “past lives” or ancestors, reducing cost to 2 ranks.
- Precognition (4 ranks): Your senses extend into the future, allowing you to perceive events that may happen. Your precognitive visions represent possible futures. If circumstances change, then the vision may not come to pass. When you use this ability, the Gamemaster chooses what information to impart. Your visions may be obscure and cryptic, open to interpretation. The Gamemaster may require appropriate Perception skill checks for you to pick up on particularly detailed information, with a DC ranging from 15 to 30 or more. The GM can also activate your Precognition to impart specific information to you as an adventure hook or plot device. Your normal (present-day) senses don’t work while you’re using Precognition; your awareness is focused on the future. Your precognitive visions last as long as you concentrate. Precognition does not apply to mental effects like Mind Reading or any other ability requiring interaction with the future.
- Radio (1 rank): You can “hear” radio frequencies including AM, FM, television, cellular, police bands, and so forth. This allows you to pick up on Radio Communication. This is the base sense of the radio sense type. It’s ranged, radius, and accurate by default.
- Time Sense (1 rank): You always know what time it is and can time events as if you had an accurate stopwatch.
- Ultra-Hearing (1 rank): You can hear very high and low frequency sounds, like dog whistles or ultrasonic signals.
- Ultravision (1 rank): You can see ultraviolet light, allowing you to see normally at night by the light of the stars or other UV light sources.
- Uncanny Dodge (1 rank): This feat may also be a feature of Enhanced Senses rather than training or talent. Choose a sense type for your Uncanny Dodge; sensory FX of that type may overcome it.
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Sample Enhanced Senses
Listed here are some examples of Enhanced Senses using the enhanced and additional senses listed previously. Players should feel free to take these pre-fabricated examples as abilities of Enhanced Senses and to use them as models for creating their own unique Enhanced Senses.
- Aura Reading (5 ranks): You can “read” the invisible psychic auras that surround all creatures, showing their mood, physical condition, and any outside psychic influences affecting them. Aura Reading is a mental sense, although the information (the auras) is perceived as visual. Detect Mood and Physical Condition (both ranged), Psychic Awareness.
- Cosmic Awareness (2 ranks): You are innately “plugged in” to cosmic forces, able to sense them at work in the universe. You sense cosmic effects in your local area, plus you may pick up on universe-affecting forces at a much greater distance (at the GM’s discretion). Apply the Extended option to expand this sense’s range. Additionally, you can spend a character die to ask “the Universe” (the Gamemaster) a direct question and get an answer (essentially a specialized use of the inspiration aspect of spending character points). Cosmic Awareness and Benefit (directed inspiration).
- Darkvision (2 ranks): You can see normally in the dark, even darkness created by an Obscure FX (although other Obscure descriptors, such as fog or blinding light, affect you normally). Vision Counters Obscure (darkness).
- Detect Magic (2 ranks): You can make Perception checks to detect the presence of magical effects, creatures, and items, with a normal modifier of –1 per 10 feet distance. Mental Detect (magic), Ranged.
- Detect Weakness (4 ranks): You can pick up on any potential weaknesses a target may have. A successful Perception check (opposed by Persuasion, Perception, Infiltration (for stealth), or a trait of the GM’s choice) gives you insight into the subject’s drawbacks, flaws, and similar weaknesses. The Assessment feat may be added to Detect Weakness for an additional rank. Detect Weaknesses, Ranged, Acute, Analyze.
- Ladar (3 ranks): By emitting infrared lasers that bounce off solid surfaces, you can build an accurate picture of your surroundings, even when you cannot normally see them. Vision Counters Obscure (darkness), Radius.
- Low-Light Vision (1 rank): You can see twice as far in low-light conditions as normal. Vision Counters Obscure (darkness), Limited.
- Radar (4 ranks): By sending out radiowave emissions that bounce off solid surfaces, you can build an accurate picture of your surroundings. Accurate, Radius, Ranged Radio Sense.
- Scent (1 rank): You can differentiate and identify individuals by scent alone, although you cannot determine things like exact location (since your sense of smell is not necessarily accurate). Acute Scent.
- See Invisible (2 ranks): You can see anything hidden by a Concealment FX as it were not concealed. Vision Counters Concealment.
- Sonar (3 ranks): By sending out ultrasonic emissions that bounce off solid surfaces, you can build an accurate picture of your surroundings. Accurate Ultrasonic Hearing.
- Spatial Awareness (4 points): You are mentally aware of your surroundings, even when you cannot see them. Accurate, Radius, Ranged Mental Sense.
- Trace Teleport (1 rank): You can “track” another teleporter, provided your Teleport range is at least equal to theirs. Make a Perception check, DC 10, +1 per round since the target teleported (+10 DC per minute) and –1 to your check result per 10 feet between you and the departure point (no modifier if you are on the same spot). If the check succeeds you teleport to the place where your target went (or the closest open space, if that point is occupied). If the check fails, you don’t go anywhere; you can’t get an accurate “lock.” You only get one attempt to track a particular teleport, and you can’t take 10 or 20 on the Notice check. Track Teleport.
- Tremorsense (3 ranks): You can accurately feel the location of moving objects in contact with the same surface as you (such as the ground). If used underwater, you can feel objects moving through the water all around you, like a normal radius sense. Accurate Ranged Touch.
- True Sight (10 ranks): You automatically see through any Concealment, Illusion, or Obscure FX, see the true form of any disguised creature (including traits that grant a bonus to Art checks to disguise, like Morph), and see any deliberately hidden or concealed item (secret door, hidden panel, etc.), although the GM may require a Perception check to detect the latter. Vision Counters Concealment, Counters Illusion, Counters Obscure (all), Detect Hidden.
- X-Ray Vision (4 ranks): You can see through solid objects as if they weren’t there (such objects provide no concealment to you). You have to define one reasonably common substance you can’t see through, such as lead, gold, iron, wood, or such. A subject with no concealment relative to you cannot use Concealment to hide from you without a feat like Hide In Plain Sight or an FX like Concealment. X-Ray Vision may be Limited to particular substances (natural earth, for example), reducing cost to 2 ranks. It is a commonly associated effect of the Permeate ability of Enhanced Movement, allowing you to see where you’re going as you pass through a solid object. Vision Penetrates Concealment.
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FX Feats
- Alternate FX: At the Gamemaster’s discretion, a “sensory array” is an option if all the senses included are sustained or continuous in duration, allowing the character to switch between them as desired. Note that this may represent a cost savings for a wide range of Enhanced Senses, but those senses will not all be available at the same time, so the character may miss certain things or not have the right sense(s) active at the right time to avoid a particular hazard or pick up on an important piece of information.
- Dimensional: This FX feat allows you to extend your senses into other dimensions. It’s assumed to apply to all your senses, allowing you to sense your proximate location in the other dimension(s). For a more extended range, use ESP with this feat.
- Extended Reach: This FX feat does not apply to Enhanced Senses; they have their own options (notably the Extended feature) for enhancing their “reach.”
- Improved Range: Likewise, this FX feat does not apply to Enhanced Senses; use options like Extended instead.
- Innate: The Enhanced Sense abilities of many creatures, particularly aliens or constructs like robots, may be Innate, although this does not prevent sensory effects like Dazzle or Obscure from disabling them (which is different from countering or nullifying them).
- Subtle: As passive FX, Enhanced Senses are Subtle by default and do not require this FX feat.
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Extras
Enhanced Senses often take advantage of the partial modifiers rule when applying extras and flaws so they affect only particular ranks (and therefore senses). See the information under Super-Movement on applying modifiers to individual ranks of the FX.
- Affects Others: With this extra, you can grant the benefits of one or more Enhanced Senses to another character. Apply Affects Others only to the ranks of the chosen sense(s).
- Attack: This extra does not apply to Enhanced Senses. For sense-affecting attacks, use other sensory FX like Dazzle, Illusion, and Obscure.
- Area: The Area modifier only applies to Enhanced Senses which affect others, and only to extend their benefits to everyone in an area. Apply the Selective FX feat for the ability to choose who in your area does and does not benefit from the Enhanced Senses. To affect the area of a sense, use the Extended and Radius traits of the Enhanced Senses FX.
- Range: Likewise, the Range extra only applies to Enhanced Senses that affect others, extending the range at which you can grant their benefits. To extend a sense’s range, use the Extended, Radius, and Ranged traits of the Enhanced Senses effect.
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Flaws
- Distracting: Using some Enhanced Senses may prove distracting compared to one’s normal senses, in which case this modifier applies. It is best reserved for Enhanced Senses intended to be used outside of combat, and shouldn’t apply to senses that help users avoid surprise or overcome concealment, since it takes away much of their utility (robbing the user of dodge bonus as surely as those conditions).
- Duration: The duration of Enhanced Senses cannot be changed, although the action required to use them may be, at the GM’s discretion (see the Action drawback in the following section for details).
- Limited: Some Enhanced Senses may be Limited to only sensing certain things or only under certain circumstances. As usual, the sense must lose about half its utility to qualify for this flaw, less than that is more likely a particular descriptor associated with the sense and may constitute a complication at the GM’s discretion when it comes up in play.
- Permanent: This flaw does not apply to Enhanced Senses; the inability to turn them on and off is generally a complication at best rather than an actual flaw in the FX.
- Sense-Dependent: Enhanced Senses are, naturally, already sense-dependent and so cannot have this flaw.
- Unreliable: Some Enhanced Senses may be unreliable; the GM makes checks for reliability when the sense is used. Two variations of this flaw may apply: in the first, the Enhanced Senses effect is unreliable, when it doesn’t work, the character perceives nothing with that sense. In the second, the character’s perceptions are unreliable, the sense appears to work, but the should make all reliability checks for Enhanced Senses in secret, just informing the player of what the character does (or does not) notice.
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Drawbacks
- Action: Enhanced Senses normally don’t require an action apart from that of the normal Perception check. However, this FX drawback makes using Enhanced Senses more of an effort. The value of the drawback depends on the action required: 1 point for one action, and 2 points for two actions. Further time requirements move one step up the Time and Value Progression Table per point, although the GM should decide of such constitutes a desirable drawback (Enhanced Senses taking a minute or more aren’t particularly useful in most settings). As with all drawbacks, this one must have a point value less than the total cost of the Enhanced Senses FX.
- Disability: Some comic book characters with Enhanced Senses also lack one of their normal senses, such as blind characters with “radar sense” or deaf-mute characters with Mental Communication. Keep in mind that the value of the Disability drawback—like all other drawbacks—is situational and based on how much of a drawback it is for that particular character; A drawback that doesn’t inconvenience a character isn’t much of a drawback. Thus blindness is less of a drawback for a character with another accurate sense (and a radius one, at that), worth only a point or two at most for the hindrance it imposes.
- Noticeable: Enhanced Senses with this drawback are particularly noticeable in some way: your eyes may glow, for example, or you may emit a noticeable sound, vibration, energy, or the like for use as a sensor.
- Vulnerable: Characters with Enhanced Senses may be vulnerable to certain sensory effects, making saves against things like Dazzle FX more difficult, for example. The default assumption is that Enhanced Senses carry no automatic vulnerability to such FX, but in realistic setting they make sense unless the character has some specific ability to “filter out” unwanted or dangerous sensory input.
- Weakness: Likewise, Enhanced Senses may imply a weakness caused by increased sensitivity. A character with darkvision might be dazzled or blinded by bright light, for example, while a character with super-sensitive hearing could be deafened or stunned by the noise of a crowded city at rush-hour. This type of Weakness could be in conjunction with a Vulnerable to Dazzle FX drawback.
