Hey all. I have a quick question:



Would Alfred bump the Defense of ALL adjacent characters named Batman, or would he only be able to bump one?

Thanks in advance!

C

I may be wrong here, but I believe unique modifiers check the target of the effect rather than the source. I would contend that Alfred can modify any number of Batmans (Batmen?) that he wants, but each Batman can only be targeted by one Alfred.

Yes, and no matter how many Batmans he's adjacent to, Alfred would still only get +1.

Neither of these address the question I see being asked, which is whether having a single Alfred adjacent to 8 Batman pieces will buff all of them via Can I Be of Service, Master Bruce? I don't know of any rule that would have you single out a specific one, even though this effect speaks basically in terms of just 2 pieces. My "gut judgment" is that a group of Batman can be affected by 1 Alfred in this way, but I'm not sure how to prove it.

Unique modifier means that the power can only be used once, i.e. regardless of how many alfreds you have you only apply one of the modifiers. but I don't think it limits how many batmans are affected... this is a weird application and should have been worded more clearly. they have put parentheses on some powers for clarification, it would have been nice to see "(multiple Batman characters may get +1)"

At first I thought, this power is only checked when a character is targeted with an attack, so it could happen independently for each batman, but that doesn't cover Energy explosion and other multiple target cases... unless each defense value is determined one at a time? in that case, each batman would check Alfred's power separately, but I'm not sure how it plays out technically.

That is not what unique modifier means at all. If it did then only one Batman could be affected. Here's the exact definition of unique modifier.

"This effect can’t modify the specified combat value(s) if they are already modified by this same effect."

Right from the PAC. Nothing in there about using the power once and only once

Based on that, Alfred can give as many Batmans as are adjacent to him a plus 1, but he himself is getting a max plus 1. Likewise if 3 Alfred's were adjacent to a Batman, the batman would get a total of plus one to his defense, but each alfred would also be getting their plus 1. Batman can't be modified more than once because the modifier isunique, but he can still trigger multiple alfreds just like Alfred can trigger multiple Batmen.

This question now poses a very stupid, yet perhaps plausible idea that I should now bring a series of Batman with an Alfred or two on the Gotham City Downtown map with Batman bonus... and the more I think of it, the more I think this could actually work.

It's in the text of the power "A" character named Batman "A" as in singular
if the power was intended to be multiple the power would say ALL adjacent characters named Batman

This is incorrect. There is no definition for "A" in the rules. This interpretation even goes against Standard Powers, such as Mind Control, which would mean you could only ever MC a single target, which is not correct.

As was previously stated, and then more clearly exemplified by Morand, the 'uniqueness' of a 'Unique Modifier' only applies as far as the 'same effect' modifying the 'same character'.

This makes total sense. Thanks much!

C