Elongation

Type: Alteration

Action: Move (active)

Range: Personal

Duration: Sustained

Saving Throw: None

Cost: 1 point per rank

You can elongate your body and limbs to extend your reach. You can elongate 5 feet at rank 1; each additional rank moves your maximum

range (in feet) one step up the Progression Table: 10 feet, 25 feet, 50 feet, and so on. Past rank 6, you can’t elongate your entire distance

in a single move action. You can elongate up to (rank x 50 feet) per move action, up to your maximum distance. So at rank 10, for example,you can elongate 500 feet per move action to a maximum of 5,000 feet, so it takes five full-round actions to reach your maximum extension. “Snapping back” to your normal shape is a free action, unless you elongate past rank 6, in which case retracting completely requires the same amount of time as elongating that distance.

You can use Elongation to make melee attacks at a greater distance by elongating your limbs. It requires a full action to both elongate (move action) and attack (standard action). Once elongated, you can make melee attacks within your new reach as a standard action. Your elongated attacks have a “range increment” of (power rank x 10 feet), each increment beyond the first applies a –2 penalty to your attack rolls and checks, since it’s harder for you to coordinate your limbs at a distance. If you can’t accurately sense your target at all (around a corner, for example), apply the rules for concealment (see Concealment, M&M, page 161). The range increment is based on the distance between your target and your head (or wherever your accurate senses originate), so if you elongate your neck so your head is within one increment of your target, you suffer no range penalties, although you’ll be less aware of what’s going on around the rest of your body!

You gain a bonus to Defense against attacks on your elongatedlimbs as if you were one size category smaller than usual (see Size, M&M, page 34). So the elongated limb of a medium character has a +1 Defense bonus (like a small character). Elongation gives you a bonus on Escape Artist checks and grapple

checks equal to your power rank due to your greater flexibility and reach.At rank 3 or higher, you can move more quickly than normal by stretching out to a spot as a move action and pulling the rest of your body in after you, or extending your limbs to give you a longer stride. The maximum distance you can move

in this way is the amount you can elongate in a single move action. You can take two move actions to double the distance (as a full round action) but you can’t move “all out” with Elongation.

POWER FEATS

• Extended Reach: This feat does not apply to Elongation, which provides its own means of extending your reach.

• Improved Range: This feat can improve the range increment of your elongated attacks.

• Indirect: At the GM’s discretion, this power feat can indicate a form of Elongation that “bypasses” normal spatial relationships or barriers, such as using the ability to generate spatial “wormholes” or fold space to extend reach. This may allow you to reach “through” walls (Indirect 1), punch someone standing behind

you (Indirect 2), or hit someone standing in front of you in the back of the head (Indirect 3), good for surprise attacks.

EXTRAS

• Projection (+1): Your elongated limb(s) are a projection of your power rather than an actual extension of your body. Therefore, they are not vulnerable to attack on their own; any attacks specifically against your elongated segments have no effect. So, for example, an elongated “psychic hand” could reach into a container of acid to pull out an object without any risk of harm. This extra does not provide you with any additional protection for your normal body parts.

FLAWS

• Permanent: A character with a Permanent Elongation effect is stuck at maximum extension for the effect’s rank, so someone with Permanent Elongation 4, for example, has a 50-foot reach and can cover 50 feet with a single move action.

DRAWBACKS

• Full Power: You can only Elongate out to your maximum extension or return to your normal shape; you can’t stop at any point in between. This is only a drawback for more than one rank of Elongation, and the GM should consider its value before allowing it.

ASSOCIATED EFFECTS

• Immunity: Elongation—and an elastic body—may also provide things like Immunity to falling damage (5 ranks).

• Insubstantial: Elongation often implies or includes the ability to reshape your body in other ways. A truly elastic character should also have the first rank of Insubstantial, able to flow like a fluid.

• Morph: Characters able to reshape their physical forms beyond just elongating their body and limbs should acquire the Morph effect at the appropriate level.

• Super-Movement: The ability to elongate may provide certain Super-Movement traits, particularly swinging (by elongating your arms) or slithering (elongating your body like a snake).

POWER STUNT: ALL TIED UP

In the comic books, a fast enough character attempting to evade a grappling attempt by an elongating opponent will sometimes trick the attacker into tying himself up into knots! If you want to include this trick in your Mutants & Masterminds games, use the following guidelines: A character who successfully avoids the melee attack to start a grapple from an elongated character, or escapes from a grapple with such a character, can make an Acrobatics or Bluff check at a –5 penalty as a standard action against the result of the elongated character’s Sense Motive check. If the tricking character wins, the elongated foe is entangled. If the tricking character wins by 5 or more, the elongated foe is bound and helpless. Getting out of being all tied up requires a full-round Escape Artist check by the victim, with a DC equal to the original Acrobatics or Bluff check (including the –5 modifier). The normal Elongation bonus to Escape Artist checks applies to this check. At the GM’s discretion, a tricking character taking a full-round action on the attempt may add the rank of any relevant movement effect—particularly Flight or Speed—to the skill check, representing the ability of a faster character to get the victim all turned around more easily. As with all forms of tricking in combat, this variant grants a +1 bonus to the victim’s Sense Motive check per time it is attempted in the same encounter. Example: While fighting the Stretcher, Rocketeer tries to distract the alien super-soldier and trick him by running at super-speed around him. He takes a full-round action and Rocket's player makes a Bluff skill check (+8 Bluff bonus, +10 for Super-Speed, –5 for the maneuver), getting a result of 24. The GM makes a Sense Motive check for the Stretcher (+11 bonus) and gets a 20. Since the Stretcher failed the check, he’s entangled. If his check result had been 1 less (enough to fail by 5) he would have been bound and helpless. As it is, the alien warrior has to take an action to disentangle his limbs before coming after Rocket in a rage.