Area Attacks

[drayven]

Me again with yet another question! In the weapons section it says that some weapons have pros, for example the assault rifle having "area". The description for the area pro says:

"You can affect or target everyone in an area of effect, whether friend or foe, when you
use this ability. “Area” means the area of effect is centered on some distant point; “Burst”
means it’s centered on you. All characters in the area are affected separately"

How do you normally handle this, like what do you consider the area to be? 5'? 500'? I realize it's probably supposed to be based on the narrative that makes sense but I'm wondering what guildelines you all use.

[Nestor]

In the demos I ran, I did handle it very vaguely. The mooks were spraying the crowd with their SMGs filled with rubber bullets, so I just had the PCs all roll their Defenses, with the narrative effect of civilians dropping to the left and right of them.

Essentially, I interpreted the Pro as allowing you to target multiple opponents at once, with the specific number dependent on circumstances. YMMV.

[LakeSide Len]

Obviously, the exact definition of an "area" is: the amount of physical space represented in one large (and possibly full page) comic book panel.

Okay, seriously, it was intentionally left vague and is intended to be used exactly as Nestor describes.