Alright. You thought my Arena ideas were crazy BS? You have seen nothing. I know this will be a ...

Alright.

You thought my Arena ideas were crazy BS? You have seen nothing. I know this will be a stupid idea. I know I will loose all the very little respect I had so far. And I know that no sane person would ever consider what I'm about to do. But I simply have to get this out of my system.

Ladies and gentlemen I present you:

Signature Program Advances!

Still here? Great.

Sig Program Advances are PAs that use one of your sig attacks. Before you say that this has no base whatsoever, remember that in the MMBN games, some of the more powerful sig attacks required navi chips. How does that make SigPAs legitimate? Well, the navi chip summoned the navi that did his signature move. Roll healed you, Blues dash&slashed the enemies, etc... These signature attacks were used in the PA, so logically, your signature attacks might also deserve a place.

You might ask: Why in Lords name?!!!! ARE YOU INSANE?!!!!

The purpose is to give more flexibility to your sigs, without them being complicated to begin with (*cough*Eon*cough*). SigPAs (in my system idea) make a signature flexible and not stronger, or more powerful (unless upgraded... see later).

The rules are not much complicated than normal signature rules.

Basic Rules:

You must buy a PA expansion then post your SigPA for approval, as if it were a signature attack. However, it does not take up a place among your signatures (so you can have the maximum number of 3 lvl1, 2 lvl2, etc number of sigs, regardless of how many PAs you own).


In dept rules:

PA expansion lvl"x": This expansion lets your navi use a basic PA. You need these for normal PAs (such as life sword) and SigPAs too. One PA expansion = one new basic PA you can use, or an upgrade to your SigPA (see later)
Cost: 1500 times x zenny (only example, can be increased/decreased for balance) in scilab shop XOR if you think thats too easy, mission rewards, similar to GMOs *stares at undernet boards*

The SigPA rules:

For a SigPA, you need:
- A base Sig (available=not in cooldown; can be any level, but must be an active type)
- Pre-determined chips (available, not yet used; for example you can't use the rageclaw you are already using)
- A bought PA expansion

The SigPA can do almost anything BUT! it cannot exceed the dmg/effect limit the base signature originally had (unless upgraded, but that comes later). As I've said, the purpose of SigPAs is to make the options of the navi more versatile. The ingredients have to fit the theme of the attack, and a mod (as with usual signatures) can ask you to change just about anything about the sig (including the chips)

Restrictions/Drawbacks:
- The cooldown of the base sig is increased by one. That is the price of versatility.
- The chips and the sig attacks are used (obviously, the cooldown of the PA is the same as the sig, and you can only use it as many times as many chips you have)
- You can only have 2 SigPAs at most. They don't have to choose a different base sig, however.

Upgrades:

Once you have a PA, you can upgrade it (in the game there was a lifesword1, 2 and 3. A basic lvl1 PA expansion would only let you use lifesword1), by buying a next level of PA (2 if you want to upgrade a lvl1, 3 if you want to upgrade a lvl2).

The upgrade of the PA makes it more powerful (duh). The damage limit of the PA is expanded to one or two levels above the sig (depending on what lvl the PA is), but it can't deviate from its origianl effect (so if your lvl1 sigPA dealt straight dmg, it cannot suddenly get a stun and a lightning effect).

However, this requires a more and/or rarer chips. Usually, upgraded version of the base chips, but a mod (as usual) is free to describe the ingredients every time you upgrade your sigPA.

Example:
Lifesword1: longsword, widesword, sword
Lifesword2: Fire-, Aqua-, Elec-, Bamboo-sword
Lifesword3: Fire-, Aqua-, Elec-, Bamboo-blade

As you can see, the lvl2PA chips are not upgraded versions of the lvl1 (because there isn't a sword2, longsword2 etc...), unlike lvl3 is to lvl2.

While I find this a even crazier idea than the original, a mod might request you to use another sig or a cross as an ingredient.

That sums up most of my thoughts. I'll put up a Q&A just please, I beg you, ASK before calling the idea stupid (...since I have doubts about it myself that'd really crush my self esteem)

Honestly...I kinda like the idea. It would be interesting to say the least, though I am not sure if it is really necessary. However, just for the RP aspects of it I would be willing to try it.

So a question and possible problem for this. First, would these be transferred with Crosses so that others could use funky PAs as well? Second, since its unlikely that anyone will incoorporate chips that they don't own into these, this means that most people will probably just BS something based on what they have. For instance:

Sexy Party: Sexy Wink
Bubblestar
Varitail

Junior grows x number of tails along with cat ears and paws. He then does a seductive dance to stun the enemy. The bubbles he creates make mirror images of himself to increase the effect.

Mechanics: Grows one tail for every turn passed in battle (x equaling amount of turns). The attack does minus one action for each tail to every affected enemy. Three enemies are affected (one for each bubble).

....................... Yeah, I mostly wanted to post something silly for that. Still, I can see a lot of people trying to combine an odd variety of attacks just because they want a custom PA but have no logical combinations.

I see your point. Perhaps, much like how one changes their subtype, the member would have to make an acceptable excuse as to how it all fits together?

Some people can BS anything. Justification for mine would be Sexy Wink is sexy, which it uses to stun. He would use the cosplay items to increase his sexiness, thus increases the power a bit. Compare it to how women dress up in bunny or cat outfits. Bubbles are pretty, plus since their liquid, would hold some sort of reflective property. Thus, by what I just pulled out of my ass, its some how magically logical to my brain.

Now with Knight's rules, the overall damage and effects would still be the same as the combined attacks. However, to me this just seems to encourage stupid combos, like how I saw someone combine a Shotgun and Markcannon into one blast, even though the damages were separate and it still took two actions to use. Really all it did was turn the attack into an all or nothing deal, which seems like a hinderance. I dunno, I get the feeling that this will just have people using stupid combos because they can.

As much as I like the concept of my navi tearing off his arm, hurling it at an opponent then having it clamp on then detonate with the damage of 2 energy bombs, I am not sure if this idea has much practical merit. Same as majin's complaint mostly.

Why in Lords name?!!!! ARE YOU INSANE?!!!!


...


Okay, so it might be kinda cool, but you'd be pretty much slopping some weird stuff together into a stange PA of awkwardness.

I kinda like this idea. It's eerily similar though to a set of combos I've been working on. But I guess I just got the combo idea from the games then.

My idea would be like...Fusing two Guards with Knightly Aura to make Rune Shield or something. It's interesting...But there would be a number of issues.

Such as me making Electric Armageddon an actual PA?

Alright Q&A time

Quote (Question)

The stupid people will flood the boards with stupid sigPAs!

Thats not a question!

Fine... I understand your concern. However, even if a member talks his way into getting his stupid sig approved, (which he/she probably wouldn't, as mods could ask for a change in about anything, similar to normal signatures), then what? He has a silly attack that does the same dmg that the base sig could do ( I think I didn't outline this enough: THE DMG/EFFECT LIMIT OF A LVL1 SIGPA IS THE SAME AS THE BASE SIG. NOT THE COMBINATION OF THE CHIPS. That would be mighty imba, as you'd unleash 3 actions in one. If you choose a lvl1 as a base sig, then 70 is your dmg limit without process and PA upgrades). And you have only one SigPA space left.

My question is, why do you need chips for this? Why not just make it so that your navi can spontaneously generate the two other components and use them like that? I mean, I can understand where you're coming from, but it seems that it's not allowing you to do anything new. Additionally, I have no problem with you imposing these sort of things on your sigs, but really, why would you want to when you can do anything with sigs? I mean, ANYTHING. You can already duplicate the effects of any chip you'd like, so why not just make the sig fuse together some other kind of two elements into an existing sig? Since you have so much freedom on what you can create out of thin air, I don't see why you need to be able to use chips for it. It seems like that just complicates things (though granted, not terribly heavily).

Quote (question)

Why would you use chips when a signature can simulate about everything without them?

1. Flavour (:P)
2. SigPAs basically grant you a totally different use for a sig attack. It gives you a choice to have more signature attacks than normally possible, without actually boosting your overall power by much (only giving you more flexibility). You could make it like that to begin with, but that means you have to create multi use SigAttacks, which are, lets face it, even more ridiculous (it deals 80 dmg, but if my hp is low it heals me 30, oh and it can be used to stun enemies...). This is basically a multi-use sig cut in half.

Quote (question)

Why would you use chips when the SigPAs aren't stronger than the original sig anyway?

Lvl1 sigPAs only grant flexibility. That is why the requirements are so minuscule. However, Lvl2 sigPAs have their cap of dmg/effects boosted by one. That is why the requirement for a lvl2 sigPA is decided by a mod. You could potentially have another lvl5sig. But you will have to use 2 of your best chips (IF you can get them), and your lvl3 signature. (if this part seems too strong, simply add a rule that only lvl1 based PAs can be upgraded)

Just to clarify, I never asked that second question, because I understood that point.

All I've gotten out of this is that you'd like more signature abilities for characters, really. XD

Actually, that example you gave is quite feasable as a realistic sig. That's not at all too many effects, with what you've listed there. You can already have some pretty freakishly complex sigs, trust me.

Other uses for sig attacks might be cool, but this doesn't seem like a useful way to go about doing it.

Quote ()

All I've gotten out of this is that you'd like more signature abilities for characters, really. XD

Thats kinda true you know XD

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Actually, that example you gave is quite feasable as a realistic sig. That's not at all too many effects, with what you've listed there. You can already have some pretty freakishly complex sigs, trust me.

Does that really not bother you? I dunno, I always felt that multi use sigs are abominations, or hax, or both. Especially low level signatures. Complex signatures are yet another thing, just to clarify.

*Looks at Wiz, who's entire theme is multiple-use, versatile sigs* *Walks away slowly, whistling innocently*

-Twi

Yes, but we already know about that, twi.

If we're being real though, it's kind of hypocritical of you to typically deny other such sigs right off the bat, but who am I to judge? XD

As for Knight, and this......................................Eh. I can't really say I'm one way or another. It seems...superfluous, IMO, but in a workable way. I still say more sigs would work just as well, but w/e. On that note, I like multi-use sigs when they're done 'properly'. IE: the combination of the components adds up to the cap, if not less, and never mesh(which is two say that each 'use' is separate. I'll give an example tomorrow, if I feel like it. XP)