Need to come up with a not-quite Story Breaker Eye Power that hasn't already been done to death.

So, I've got a Church Militant group that uses Magitek cybernetics and steals power from Angels. They give their top ranking soldiers an artificial eye that has a unique power for each one, often perception-based, but sometimes stuff like Anti-Magic or Time-based shenanigans. The artificial eyes are imperfect copies of a pair of magical eyes that the Pope's Dragon naturally possesses. Here's the thing: She's already a regenerating immortal with a near-infinite mana supply, the ability to cast any of the church's holy spells including the forbidden ones, is so beautiful that she naturally has the ability to Charm Person, and is over 600 years old and an Elf, and so is naturally more skilled and physically capable than any human fighter. Now, I'm doing the Eye Power thing anyway, that's not up for debate, and I want to do the opposite of my normal tendency to chuck all the Story-Breaker Powers into my villains and instead give her a single powerful ability that has many applications (and in case anyone thinks it's too OTT to stack yet another power onto an already OP character, the eye thing is her natural ability, The immortality and infinite mana come from what is basically a Philosopher's Stone made of Angel's souls implanted in her chest. The infinite mana can be overcome with Anti-Magic of sufficient power, and the immortality is there to make her an unstoppable Hero Killer and is overcome in her last battle. Madara Uchiha has all the powers in the world, so I think I'm justified in giving characters whatever powers I want, especially villains who are supposed to be OP.)

Now, I want to give her a power that is very strong, but not unbeatable like stopping time for as long as she likes or instantly transmogrifying your opponent into a chicken by looking at them. I also want it to be a power that has both offensive and defensive applications. Finally, I don't want to just rehash a power that has already been done a million times before, like Master of Illusion or Telekinesis, I'd like to be able to put my own spin on it. So, I've decided to just brainstorm a bunch of ideas and see what sticks. I'm open to suggestions within the guidelines I've set.

I am tending towards her power being perception-based in some way, but obviously not just straight Master of Illusion or Combat Clairvoyance, or similar. That said, that doesn't mean I'm ruling out those abilities as possible applications of her power. A possible Idea I've had is the ability to perceive and manipulate 'thought waves', and so be able to do stuff like literally see your opponent's moves before they happen, or instantly tell when somebody is lying and exactly what they aren't telling you, and yes, alright, stick your own thoughts inside their head or mess with theirs, giving you Mind Control and Master of Illusion powers. There could be some secondary benefits too, like maybe being able to see psychic imprints left in a room to work out the solution to a puzzle, or speaking telepathically with the dead.

Please, no joke suggestions or hard sci-fi pedantry. I'm writing Urban Fantasy with a Cosmic Horror Story undertone, and I don't need to be bothered with stuff like the exact realistic consequences of stopping time and then performing a Flash Step, or whether or not having four pairs of wings is pointless and unnecessary for flight, or whatever. If I get a good idea and I want it to work a certain way, I'm just gonna play the 'Magic only needs to be internally consistent' card and Handwave any unpleasant side-effects or real-world laws away.

edited 2nd Sep '16 4:49:01 PM by OmegaKross

The ability to see another living thing's impulses.

Yeah, that's pretty much what I'm going for with the 'seeing thought-waves' thing. TBH, I think there's a good chance that I'll end up going with it as her power, but I still haven't worked out all the internal logic behind how it works and for some reason it just doesn't sound right yet. So that's why I've opened up the floor to suggestions since I might end up with a better idea than the one I've got right now.

So far the idea is that the eyes give the character the ability to perceive the psychic energy from the thoughts of sentient beings and decode it as visual information. This would give her Combat Clairvoyance, a form of Telepathy, Living Lie Detector, and probably a few more abilities, all as applications of the eye's primary ability. The eyes also have the ability to fire an invisible projectile of psychic energy that homes in on her opponent's eyes, creating kind of a psychic receiver for her own thoughts within their mind. This allows her to manipulate their thought-waves and implant her own thoughts into their consciousness, which has Mind Control and Master of Illusion applications, with a limiting factor of having to be within a 2 metre radius for the eyes to be able to create the link and needing direct line of sight to the target's eyes. I dunno though, something about it doesn't feel as well thought out as it should be. It's definitely a powerful ability though, perhaps even too powerful. And it's a bit complicated, maybe I should go for something simpler, like the ability to see into the near future or something (which is also kind of generic, and has been done several times in fiction anyway, so wouldn't be suitable.)

And this is why I'm brainstorming. It's so hard to come up with decent abilities when pretty much everything has already been done.

Gonna toss out some ideas:

1). De terminator Tracking - Basically, if she sees somebody or something once, she can constantly track them to tell their exact location at any time. Think... the quest arrows in The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim. Once she spots you, she can quickly locate you at any time later and track you down at her leisure. This makes her especially deadly since even if you encounter her once and manage to fight her off or you pull out some magic item she isn't prepared for, she can just run away to prepare and then follow you back to where you sleep at any time. Could be in a few hours, days, or weeks.

Possible limitations may be that she can only track something if she sees it in person (show her a picture of someone and she can track the picture but not the person) or that she can only track one person or object at a time even if she can easily switch between multiple things in a relatively short order. There might even be anti-scyring spells or protection that can disrupt her... or it could be where if she spots a person in a concealing robe, she can track the robe but not the person.

As for utility... let's just say she never loses anything. Ever. She always knows where her house keys are, where her kids and grandkids are (even if she can't necessarily tell what they are doing at any given time), and sometimes for giggles she can select a gold or silver piece to track, spend it on something, and a few days later use her power to track down where it has traveled.

2). Magic or Power sense - Imagine something like those scouters from DBZ that let you determine someone's power level, or something like a detect magic thing that lets you see concentrations of magic as if you were looking through infared goggles. Basically, she can look at something and quickly determine how powerful they are and where that power is located.

If you have a magic sword, she sees the sword glowing bright. If you are some kind of ki master who is incredibly powerful, she can see the concentration of power in your body... probably focused around your heart or fists or however ki power works. She can glance into a crowd of people and quickly determine which of them are powerful, which of them are mid tier mercenaries, and which ones have little to no combat experience (and possibly which of those ones have the potential to become mages or something).

Her eye power might even give her a split second warning before a spell is cast due to her seeing the magical fields shift as the spell is forming, and let her completely ignore alot of stealth or invisibility spells since she can still see the magical field shrouding the invisible object.

Utility wise, this power might make it very easy for her to locate magical items or traps along with quickly judging the magical potential of prospective students or battle mages.

3). Magical VATS - Think, the Vault-tech Assisted Targeting System from the Fallout games. Basically, letting her momentarily speed up her own reaction time, quickly calculate the distance and position of her enemies, and rapidly fire off several attacks in quick succession regardless of whatever surprise, speed, or stealth her opponent might employ. It also gives her supernatural accuracy, and the power to pull off things like shooting arrows out of the air with other arrows or disrupting enemy magical attacks with her own, or pulling off seemingly impossible shots with semi-reliable ease.

It wouldn't necessarily be perfect, but the key point is that she can almost freeze time for herself even in the middle of battle to better give herself more time to think or plan her attacks... even if to an outside observer it just looks like she goes into a split-second trance and suddenly starts pulling off bullshit accurate attacks in the middle of combat, even if she had been caught flat-footed not two seconds earlier.

4). Sort-of Shinigami Eyes - Basically... her eyes let her see a person's True Name. Or something like that. Imagine her being able to look at a person and around their head she sees various names appearing... like the name they were given as a child, the name they use in conversation, their false names, the magical names that could let a spellcaster control them, etc.

She might also get an idea of their strengths and weaknesses that can be exploited in combat or see images of attacks and techniques they used in previous battles. Basically, think of the 'Scan' ability you might see in various RP Gs that let you quickly identify an enemies name, elemental type, and other details.

She might not be able to instantly tell what a person is going to do before they do it... but she might get an instinctive understanding of their most-used attack patterns and techniques. Kind of like being able to look at their 'character sheet' to see what attacks and spells they have, or rewatching their previous battles instead of foreseeing the future.

As a power, it's better suited to her being able to watch her enemies from afar before jumping into the fray since every second she observes them gives her a better understanding of their abilities and weakness. It's kind of like Batman being able to beat anything if he has prep time. Or, she can use it to find their True Name and use that in some kinds of tailor made spells to use against them.

5). Strings of Connection - She can see the emotional bonds between people. If she sees someone, she can see little 'strings' leading out of them that connect to the people they care about (for good or ill). If they have one or more lovers, she can see a pink bond leading out of them. An enemy? A burning red string. Things like close friends or allies are also shown.

This lets her quickly determine where a person's loyalties lie and what they feel about the people around them. She can locate the leader of a group, the least liked member, the cute nice once that everybody wants to protect, etc.

A potential mind-control application might be the power to sever those connections. Destroy the bond of love connecting a person to their spouse, break apart the bonds of allegiance between members of a group, etc. Then, potentially reform those bonds with herself or one of her own allies or underlings. Imagine her facing a group of enemies, systematically destroying the emotional bonds that tie them together as a group, and then remake those bonds to connect them with her own allies. She could force someone to love her enough to fight by her side, or take a former enemy and make them fanatically loyal or have undying respect for one of her own underlings.

Note, this power was kind of used by a villain in the fanfic Luminosity, where one member of the villain team has the power to alter people's relationships and they play an integral role in that groups plans by basically brainwashing their enemies into being loyal soldiers.

Wow, those are some really interesting ideas. I'm definitely gonna use a couple of them for some of the other inquisitors, especially the magical tracking thing. Some of those are already covered though, either by other characters with equivalent abilities or by standard-issue equipment (that would be the 'Detect Supernatural Power O-Vision' which is facilitated by magitek binoculars.)

Can anyone come up with a unique spin on being able to see the near future?

Well, on its own, Combat Clairvoyance isn't really useful on its own. I mean, if you can see that yourself get hit by bullet, but too slow to evade it, then that's just useless.

Unless, of course, you put Combat Clairvoyance on, say, some Master Swordman that can reliably kill a tank. With sword. On its own.

Ashkatic Archive Access. Whatever she sees comes with written annotations from the archives of heaven. Flower, insect, person - Doesn't matter, it comes with a summary of what it is, what it does, and so on.Limitation: She has to actually read it, she doesn't just magically know, but still, effectively impossible to disguise yourself in her presence or, for example poison her, because the poison will come with a label saying "xyz-toxin, deadly in 3 minutes, known anti-dotes.."

Well, considering she's A) an elf, and in this story elves already have superhuman reflexes and physical abilities, and B) she's powered up with the souls of a horde of Angels which further boosts her abilities, she's pretty much got the bases covered when it comes to Combat Clairvoyance.

Besides, if you know somebody's gonna shoot you then you don't actually have to be fast enough to dodge the bullet, just fast enough to get out of the way of the gun. Combat Clairvoyance is useful even if you're an otherwise baseline human as long as it gives you enough advance warning to dodge.

The Pope has an upgraded version of that one in his One-Winged Angel form, along with Retrocausal Negation and the power to turn everyone in his field of vision into salt. Yeah, I made him super OP. But he's the Final Boss of the Church, so he's meant to be stupid powerful.

edited 6th Sep '16 8:58:40 AM by OmegaKross

Okay, so after writing down all the possible applications of the power to see and manipulate thought-waves, I decided it's 1: Super OP, and 2: basically too generic as it's the equivalent of giving the character all the most OP Psychic Powers at once which just results in 'Hot Elf Chick!Professor Xavier'. So I decided to rework the concept around the ability to see someone's hidden thoughts and desires, as well as create illusions based on those hidden desires. I also decided that the eye powers have evolutionary levels which unlock enhanced applications for the power, so there'd be three tiers of power that get progressively more OP but cost more mana or have conditions on their use.

So far what I've come up with for each power tier are:

Tier 1: Heart-Seeing. The ability to see someones hidden secrets, desires, and unconscious thoughts. Aside from the obvious political and strategic advantages such an ability would give, it also provides advance warning of killing intent within a 50m spherical radius and Combat Clairvoyance (Anyone who's played Vagrant Story will know this is basically the same as Merlose's ability but with a couple of tweaks that give it combat applications.) Costs basically nothing to activate and is triggered whenever the user wants to glean hidden information from someone. Only limitation is that they have to be looking at their target (except to detect killing intent), and that someone who is skilled in shielding their mind from psychic probing will be harder to read.

Tier 2: Heart's Reflection. The ability to project illusions of the target's hidden desires and fears. Ranges from simple things like altering your appearance to look like the target's significant other, up to full-blown Lotus-Eater Machine. Limitations are that the illusions aren't real and always have a subtle imperfection that makes it possible for the target to realise that they're seeing an illusion, and that the ability only works through direct eye contact within a 2 metre radius (though this is only to trigger the illusions: once the target has been affected the illusions persist until either the user stops them or the target sees through them, or until 2 hours have passed.) Mana cost is low, but balanced by the limiting factor that direct line of sight to the target's eyes is needed. More powerful and complex illusions require concentration to maintain. Can affect multiple targets as long as they are all within range and line of sight.

Tier 3: Moonlight Hallucination. Permanent mass-hypnosis which traps the target in a perfect illusory reality by reflecting the eye's power off the moon, causing anyone who sees the reflected light to be affected. The illusory reality is indistinguishable from the real world and works on all the senses. Although the illusion will not wear off and cannot be cancelled, the target can still escape the false reality by killing themselves within the illusion, thereby rejecting it. However, since the illusion is indistinguishable from reality and is based on the target's desires, extraordinary willpower is required to break free. Limiting factors are that the mana cost is extremely high, and that it requires a full moon in order to reflect the eye's power. However, since the character has a near unlimited mana supply and knows magic to bring about a full moon anytime, she can do this whenever she wants once her eyes have reached this tier. The preparation time for this ability is also quite long and so it is unsuited for use in the middle of a fight. Also once someone has broken free of the false reality they can no longer be affected by either illusion ability.

Tier 4: Delusory Rapture. Only useable when the character transforms into her One-Winged Angel form, this is basically the same as the above ability only it can be used without the full moon, and killing yourself doesn't break the illusion. And it works on you even if you've previously broken the illusion before. And it's less 'illusions projected into the target's mind' and more like 'causes hallucination-inducing insanity.' The only reason this isn't an automatic 'I Win' button is because this is the battle where said character is finally killed, and the character she's fighting has a demonic eye that can see through illusions. Once she's dead the madness wears off.

So yeah, I think this is a bit more coherent than vague psychic powers, as well as being balanced well enough that the super OP mass hallucination ability has enough of a weakness to not be completely story-ending (since of course the main character will break the illusion and then it can't be used again on her for the rest of the story), and the super-mega-ultra OP hallucination ability is a one-shot deal that exists to render the rest of the cast incapacitated apart from the one who beats the character. Still some specifics to work out, but I think this is a pretty decent idea to work with.