I've been reading an interesting thread on The Atomic Think Tank comparing Damage and Affliction. The consensus seems to be that while Damaging powers whittle away at their targets and eventually take them out, Afflictions are too easy to save against. Apparently inflicting a 3rd degree condition almost never happens, or at least not for the same PP value you get out of Damage effects.

I don't have enough experience with 3e under my belt to know whether or not this is the case, and in fact I've lately been building a lot of characters that favour Afflictions over Damage. So before I start implementing any house rules for Affliction in my games (see below), I want to ask my fellow Weavers about their experiences.

So, please chime in: In general, do you find that Damage effects tend to be more efficient (per PP spent) in combat than Affliction effects? I'm trying to determine the general trend, and individual anecdotes aren't going to be very helpful in that regard.

- change the base save for Affliction to 15+rank
- have Afflictions impose a cumulative -1 save penalties per failed save
- making the Cumulative modifier on Afflictions a +0/rank Extra and include it by default

I think part of the problem stems from the fact that the game designer(s) has a long history of building characters that don't hit their caps with (non-toughness) saves. With the sentinels, for example, most of them are two points (20%) below the cap with both their saves. The same is true for a good number of the builds in DCA. This increases the likelihood of getting a 2nd or 3rd degree condition when using an Affliction that does hit the cap.

Affliction is less powerful on a per-point basis than many of its 2e counterparts. But then again, 2e had quite a few "save or die" (where "die" means "taken out of the fight") powers, that so many M&M GMs house ruled in some form or another put the brakes on them.

I do think making the Cumulative modifier a +0 extra is a good fix for someone who finds this problematic in their games.

One thing to note about Afflictions is that they do stick around if you do hit with them. You take a Damage effect and you deal with it that turn, so you miss the roll by one degree and take a -1 penalty to checks, life goes on.. You miss an affliction by one degree, that puts you in a maybe not a crippling Condition, but certainly an one that you'd rather not be dealing with, but also you have to deal with that condition until you do manage the resistance check against it.

I don't really know if that evens things out, but it's something, though I guess the toughness check penalty sticks around too, and staggered for quite a while (but staggered is on the level of 3rd level afflictions)... Most of my players seem to just do damage. I don't think I've seen one affliction in my game so far....