Blue power rings
With strong hearts full, our souls ignite,
When all seems lost in the War of Light,
Look to the stars,
For hope burns bright !”
Context
This profile is for a generic Blue Power Ring worn by the Blue Lanterns, representing the emotion of hope.
It is a companion profile for the Power Rings main article, which you should totally read first.
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Powers & Abilities
Blue Power Rings only have most of their powers (other than flight and some protective powers) when in the presence of a Green Power Ring. This is because Will is necessary to provide the drive needed behind Hope. The Ring can also lead the wielder to where there’s a need for their power.
One of the few rings to be explicitly powered by the emotion they represent, Blue Rings gain great power by drawing on the hope around them. One telling example is when a pair of Blue Lanterns drew on the hope of three billion or so residents of a planet orbiting a dying star, and used the power gained to de-age the star 8.6 billion years.
Should the wielder’s hope waver, due to the situation proving particularly disheartening, or someone targeting their hope in some manner, the Ring may become powerless. There was an example of a Blue Lantern on an important mission who, seeing the general mayhem around him, lost hope, and thus the Ring.
Several of the Ring’s powers (in DC Heroes RPG terms, Exorcism, Force Field, Emotion Absorption, and Neutralize (Orange Ring’s Neutralize)) require practice or guidance for rookie Blues to use.
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Interactions between rings
It can also ignite hope in others, producing illusions specific to them to do so. This can counter the extreme emotional states brought on by some rings, such as the avarice of Orange, or the rage of Red. Furthermore, Blue Rings are the only known means of completely purging the influence of a Red Ring from someone’s system.
They were also able to end the Black Ring’s possession of those who’d been previously revived.
The presence of a Blue Ring has a beneficial effect on Green Rings. They boost their charge and protect them from the corrosive effects of a Red Ring – and a negative effect on Yellow Rings – quickly draining them of their charge. The bolstering of Green Rings can be difficult to turn off for new Blue Ring wielders.
Recruitment
Other rings select the wearer and they can be good to go. But Blue Lanterns are (while the corps is setting up at least) chosen by the last selected Blue Lantern (using the Detect Power of their own Ring) and taken to Odym. There, the responsibilities are discussed with them so they can make an informed decision on whether to accept the Ring. This process can take up to a couple of weeks.
It’s unclear whether the death of a Blue Ring wielder will see the Ring revert to it’s programming and search its successor alone, or whether it would return to Odym. By either method of recruitment they seek optimistic individuals who hope for the best for everyone.
Exemplars of the traits the Blue Power Rings look for include Saint Walker (sector 1), Warth (sector 2), and Barry Allen (sector 2814).
Influence
There doesn’t appear to be any extreme influence on the wielder’s persona from the Blue Ring. But since some of their abilities work better powered by hope, and since that is one of the things the Ring looks for in them, it may give a minor boost in this direction.
Game Stats — DC Heroes RPG
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BLUE POWER RING (A 6950 HP Gadget)
INT 06 /BODY/ (Hardened) 12 BODY 30.
Powers:
Broadcast Empath: (SPI), Broadcast Empath (Drawbacks): (SPI + Power Ring Skill APs), Comprehend Languages: 20, Damage Transference: (SPI), Detect (Need for a Blue Lantern): 20, Detect (Superior candidate for Blue Lantern recruitment): 05, Dimension travel (Storage Tesseract): 01, Emotion Absorption: (Double-User-Linked to (SPI + Power Ring Skill APs)), Empathy: 07, Enchantment: 02, Energy Blast: (SPI + Power Ring Skill APs), Exorcism: (SPI), Flight: 40, Force Field: 04, Force Manipulation: (SPI + Power Ring Skill APs), Life Sense (Blue Power Ring): 15, Life Sense (Green Power Ring): 10, Miniaturisation: 10, Neutralize (Green Power Ring’s communications): 06, Neutralize (Orange Power Ring’s Neutralize): 25, Omni-Power: 00, Regeneration: 04, Sealed Systems: 16, Skin Armor: 04, Telepathy: 05
Formulas:
- Broadcast Empath is User-Linked to SPI.
- Broadcast Empath (Drawbacks) is User-Linked to (SPI + Power Ring Skill APs).
- Damage Transference is User-Linked to SPI.
- Emotion Absorption is Double-User-Linked to (SPI + Power Ring Skill APs).
- Energy Blast is User-Linked to (SPI + Power Ring Skill APs).
- Exorcism is User-Linked to SPI.
- Force Manipulation is User-Linked to (SPI + Power Ring Skill APs).
Bonuses and Limitations:
- None of the Powers has an AV (-1 or -0 Drawback, depending on house rules) – use the relevant Accuracy Skill instead.
- Broadcast Empath only broadcasts Hope, allows Broadcast Empath (Drawbacks) to be used (see below), and projects visions which may or may not be premonitions.
- Broadcast Empath (Drawbacks) automatically targets the wearer of a Blue Power Ring if they don’t have the Power Ring (Blue) Skill, with and AV/EV of 12.
- Broadcast Empath (Drawbacks) and Damage Transference have the Combined Usage Bonus when targeting a Red Lantern’s Rage so as to remove their Power Ring
- Damage Transference has the User Does Not Suffer any Risk of Injury Bonus.
- Detect (Superior Candidate) has a special +75 Range Bonus, and can only be used upon the death of the wearer, to scout for a successor.
Detect itself will scan for quantitative aspects such as the relevant Power Link Skill, Attribute, Advantages, but the process also allows for benchmarking against an exemplar to determine ethical suitably. This exemplar is programmed in the rings, but this is not a flawless process and sometimes it can authorise persons who aren’t that right. - Dimension Travel (Storage Tesseract) can hold a Power Battery.
- Emotion Absorption only targets hope, has an Area Effect or can target the Blue Lantern themselves, and powers Omni-Power or Damage Transference.
- Enchantment has an Area Effect, is Always On unless turned off, only affects Green Power Rings, and its APs are spread between the currently active Powers (GMs choice if more than two active).
- Energy Blast and Force Manipulation can only be used in the presence of a Green Lantern.
- Flight can have the Area Effect Bonus.
- Force Field cannot be used while Skin Armor is active, can only be used in conjunction with those of other Blue Lanterns (using AP maths) and the team cannot take other actions while maintaining the Force Field.
- Life Sense (Blue Power Ring) is limited to detecting active Blue Power Rings, and has a +30 Range Bonus.
- Life Sense (Green Power Ring) is limited to detecting active Green Power Rings.
- Neutralize (Green) is Always On, has an Area Effect, and only affects Telepathy of Green Power Rings.
- Neutralize (Orange) affects only the Neutralize Power of the Orange Ring.
- Telepathy cannot be used to engage in mental combat – only for communication, often helped by the ring’s Comprehend Languages.
- When used to communicate with members of the Blue Lantern Corps, Telepathy has a special +75 Range Bonus.
Advantages
- Insta-Change.
- Miscellaneous: Recharges Green Power Rings in proximity (around 6 APs) to double their normal charge level, and protects them from the Burnout caused by Red Power Rings (see below).
- Miscellaneous: Can give Yellow Rings in proximity Power Burnout (see below).
Drawbacks:
- Power Loss: The ring will stop working if the wearer’s hope is in some way neutralized (such as by Broadcast Empath, a directed interaction manoeuvre, or the Lantern facing a severely disheartening situation).
- Power Loss: The ring runs out of charge after roughly 24 Earth hours of fairly heavy use. When the ring’s charge is exhausted, all Powers go to zero until recharged. The ring provides updates as to its charge status (usually as a percentage) whenever requested or when passing certain thresholds.
- Gradual Power Loss: Mental conditions that make it difficult to accurately visualise force constructs drastically lower the efficiency of the ring. These include psychoactive drugs, neural scrambling, inner ear scrambling, some sonic attacks, etc. Any RAPs from such an effect means an immediate Gradual Power Loss of (RAPs+1) Columns on all of the ring’s Powers, as long as these effects are active. In the same spirit, RAPs from Mental and Spiritual attacks are subtracted from the EV or RV of any power ring use during the next Dice Action.
- Miscellaneous: Once a Ring is worn it can only be removed once they honestly hope for something (Hal Jordan got rid of it by hoping it’d stop asking what he hoped for).
Mixing Colours
Blue Power Rings affect Green and Yellow Rings which come into their proximity (around 6 APs). By default its effect on Green Power Rings is always on, but may be turned off at the experienced wielder’s will. Their effect on Yellow Rings has to be triggered by consciously willing it.
Green Power Rings – as many as are in range – are charged up to 200% in a few rounds, increasing their power level (Enchantment). They also suppress the Burnout caused by Red Power Rings triggered.
They can cause a Yellow Ring’s charge to deplete at an increased rate, giving them Power Burnout (as described in the Power Rings (Main Article) entry).
Drawback Manipulation
A Blue Lantern’s hope-generating aura can affect certain Drawbacks, such as the Irrational Attractions caused by Red and Orange Power Rings, and the Rage of a Red Power Ring.
If the target of a successful Broadcast Empath attack has an Irrational Attraction/Fear/Hatred or Rage an attack may be made by Broadcast Empath (Drawbacks) (a multi-attack if the target has multiple suitable Drawbacks) against the Resistance # of the Irrational Attraction/Fear/Hatred (5 for Minor/11 for Serious/18 for Catastrophic), with the same levels used for Rage.
Success indicates the Drawbacks are neutralized for as long as the Blue Lantern focuses on maintaining them (or permanently in the case of the effect of the Red Power Ring (see below), if the target is wearing another colour Power Ring), and would have to be triggered again after that time.
When targeting a Red Lantern’s Rage it performs a Combined Power attack with Damage Transference, reactivating the Red Lantern’s heart and cleansing their blood so they don’t die from losing the Ring.
Did you Wish Really Hard ?
By harnessing the hopes of those around them, Blue Lanterns can produce miracles. The most extreme manifestations of this was when two Blue Lanterns harnessed the hopes of the three billion residents of a planet to de-age their dying star about 8.6 billion years.
This would be an Area Effect Emotion Absorption on the three billion residents of the planet, fuelling the Omni-Power for Flame Control to reignite it.
Blue Lanterns can also fuel this with their own hope, such as when Barry Allen used it to help Bart Allen resist the Black Power Ring.
Source of Character: DC Comics.
Helper(s): Peter S Piispanen, Heathyr Stewart, Sébastien Andrivet, Eric Langendorff, Francisco, Roy Cowan, Adam Fuqua.
Writeup completed on the 19th of October, 2013.