In HERO terms, a focus _can't_, as you said "use the power." A _Character_ must use the power. The focus may _contain_ the power, such as a handgun or a cattleprod, but neither can use itself. The obvious "next step" is an automaton of some sort, but even that comes down to Characters: either a Character built the automaton to do what it's doing-- that is to say, "the Character is using the power in a manner of speaking, even if it has the "uncontrolled" limitation, _or_ the automaton itself is a character-- it doesn't have to be _the_ character, mind you, but is a character nonetheless.
Now if you are asking about the difference between "a focus that helps me use my natural power" versus "a focus that actually _is_ or contains the power," then there is really no difference. RRavenwood is not wrong with his suggestion of a "personal focus," in as much as anyone else using the focus will not have the same results. There are other possibilities, but frankly, I've always done precisely what he suggested: make it a personal focus (as a handy bonus, it's not likely to be used against you should someone managed to wrest it from your grasp
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How to build a Force Wall that works like Force Field:
Use Force Field. You have the option of Area of Affect: Line or, if you want to go a bit wierder, "useable as attack," providing protection for lots of scattered people. For what it's worth, I don't like that much, as it's _not_ a "Force Wall." If it's any consulation, you're not the only GM who has been disappointed with the "and then it collapses" aspect of Force Wall. If it makes you feel better, I am not the only GM I know who has put AoE: Line on Force Field to get the effect I wanted. And, just to cheer you up by proving that you are not as far separated from the fandom as you might think: I think I _might_ be the only GM who argues that Barrier and Force Wall should be different powers, and that realistically, Barrier should be some aspect of Change Environment-- a power that I really feel got completely dicked up in the Long Editions.
Wall of water that people can pass through? Force Field AoE: Line, permeable or a custom linked power: Tunnelling (or Desolid, if you're using an edition that still recognizes Desolid as a movement power) through the appropriate amount of DEF (that provided by the wall of water, obviously) at a very lowe movement rate, and that Tunnelling includes Useable by Others, Only for going through the water wall, must touch the water wall to activate, No Conscious Control, and any other seasoning.
That one's actually fairly easy.
However, I feel your pain: I am in the same boat; I have been since Red October, which was very clearly skewed toward 4e. See, the Players of today-- the long term legacy players such as you, myself, and many others, have kind of screwed themselves over by constantly staying in touch: at some point, everything had to be built. Someone had to prove that this or that _could_ be built, and that every single _potentially applicable modifier_ simply _had_ to be applied. I don't know why: perhaps it was a sort of showing off of one's mastery of the system. It gets worse with each edition as, since the sounding board began to echo this over and over, it was seen as some essential part of the game.
Now before going on, let me also point out that as this becomes more and necessary for the core fans, note that the number of core fans has slowly declined, and the number of new converts is at the "Holy Shit! Guys! I just found out that Champions is still being published! Remember Champions?!" level, suggesting (but not proving, of course) that this is _not_ a healthy direction for the game....
Skip back to the old rules, and you see emphasis on the one part of the game that is slowly being pushed out:
Special Effects. Special Effects make the game work, period. It's what turns :Blast 6d6 into ten-thousand different powers. Not Modifiers, not frameworks, but Special Effects.
Today it's a matter of "But if it's fire, then you must take these four Advantages and these six Limitations, and to cover the corner cases you should add X and consider Y; also, ...."
That's crap. You don't need _any_ of those. Sure: you can take those if you want, but consider two things: according to the rules (at least the earlier ones; I really don't give a rat's red nutsack about the newer ones), any power with a modifier is _not_ that power with a modifier to be toggled on and off, but a whole new power, different from the base power," etc.
So... if you want to make sure that your 6d6 Fire Blast will _always_ set the carpet on fire, then sure! Build in that Advantage or Limitation that makes it happen; that way, it happens every single time you use the Fire Blast.
The problem is very similar to that of jurisprudence, really.
Just like jurisprudence, we pay a considerable amount of lip service to SFX today.
We don't mean it. Each new layer works harder and harder to minimize it; each new build pushes more and more mechanics to ultimately _replace_ the whim of the SFX.
Jurisprudence is, in a horribly-broad nutshell-- the fact that the jurors are beholden only to themselves. No matter how much evidence or posturing for or against the person on trial, the verdict is _entirely_ the decision of the individual jurors. in really big cases, lawyers from both sides will go to _extreme_ lengths to "remind you" of this that and the other: your duty to obey the evidence; your mandate to do X or consider Y, when none of that is true. The jury is the absolute last line of defense against railroading or other sketchy behaviors-- the last hope of the accused, and he is expected to vote his conscience: if he does not feel there is enough to convict, then he is _not required_ to vote for conviction, period.
That same caterwalling-- the pressure to forget jurisprudence-- is what has been happening to HERO for a couple of decades. The push to ignore the special effects and the demand that they be simulated with mechanics.
Remember Stanley's question earlier today on the official board? 'How do I model invisibility that doesn't prevent reflections?' My own suggestion was that you don't have to model that. You know why? Because you _don't_ have to model that. The rules require that you have a "Fringe Effect" unless you pony up for the adder. In this case, don't pony up for the adder and declare the reflections of whispy shadows or whatever to be that particular character's fringe effect. Having already fended off a PM and some e-mails about that, let me head off the next protest:
But that's not a fringe! A fringe means like a blurry circle or something around them.
Really? Where do the rules say that? The do offer the _example_ of that, even mention "something around the character." It doesn't specify that "around" means englobing them, and it doesn't specify that "around" doesn't mean "in the near vicinity of," both of which are definitions of "around." I expand upon that by stating that if being encircled or englobed by the fringe was mandatory, there would be some mention of not only if the character was englobed or encircled, but at just what point / distance! Is the fringe at the skin or the "edge" of the body as it would normally be perceived where it not visible? Is it six inches away? A meter? Ten meters? _None_ of those things are there, meaning that _none_ of those things are absolute defining characteristics of the Fringe Effect. Sure, "common sense" and "everybody knows that" will lead to a lot of peer pressure to "do it the way that we do," but that's just like "everybody knows that if the prosector has more evidence than the defense attorney, then you are supposed to vote to convict!"
Well _that's_ crap on a crutch right there. On a related tangent: If you ever want to get out of jury duty, when being interviewed for selection, state calmly "there is no reason to worry about me. I fully understand jurisprudence." You will be rejected faster than a ham with cigarette butts sticking out of it. HA! You see, _neither_ side wants that, because each is looking for someone they can swing by a handle, and that handle is "who had the most" or "who had the best" when the reality is that you are meant to focus on "did the prosecution have _enough_ to convince me that this person should be deprived of their place in society?"
Sure: you can pick fifty-eight modifiers to exactly mechanically duplicate your chosen SFX, making all the late-comers and all the mechanics fans very happy, or you can go right back to the roots of the game: SFX trumps everything. Did the carpet catch fire? Maybe. The SFX _is_ a gout of flame, and that's some pretty old and dry carpet. You _might_ have gotten it too hot. Let the GM decide if it's fire-retardant or not. Sometimes you win; sometimes you don't. "But my fire blast doesn't work under water!" If you didn't take the limitation "doesn't work underwater," then by God, it _works_ underwater: as I said, just because something _can_ be applied doesn't mean it _has_ to be applied. That's up to you, and it is not just _one_, but it is _the_ core rule of HERO; it is _the_ rule that drew me to this system above all others (though I still enjoy me a good Traveller game now and again
).
All that said: you build your Force Field: Wall of water, AoE: Line as just that: a wall of water, and simply state that because of your chosen SFX, self-powered beings can slowly "wade" through it if they push against it enough. It's every bit as legal as the complicated Linked I described. Moreover, you should _have_ to build the Linked power simply because this is a _reduction_ of efficiency: the bad guys can press through, too. What GM in his right mind would make you pay for that?
As to the detractors screaming "but these are the rules!," remember (but don't bother reminding them, because the very few that will hear you likely won't care anyway) that the _majority_ of the rules today started out in supplemental materials. 2e had 2 rules supplements published before 3e existed; 3e had rules supplements in the adventure modules (most memorably the rules for drowning); 4e pulled rules from several different games that used a lot of Champions concepts but not exactly Champions rules and even then went on to add more and more rules in each genre book, the almanacs, and some of the adventures! 5e contained Steve's opinion of what the game should be, potentially input from a lot of other people, and there's a good bet some of his own favorite house rules to boot. There's nothing wrong with that, of course: it's his game now; he can change it how he sees fit. It contained that damned "Light must be made with Images" nonsense, in spite of the fact that the Images rules don't apply in any way shape or form (look to the times I've tried to point that out and how thoroughly disagreed with I was. You know, now that I think about it, Ed was a pretty big dick on a couple of those threads, too. Yet who gets the official rebuke? Yeah....)
6e-- all bajillion pages of it-- added two more additional booklets of rules via the APGs, and Steve talks now and again about a third one! The rules have been out of print for some time; there is zero interest in all but the most diehard of fans in anything to do with the HERO System, and yet there may be some more rules coming....!
Take that-- take all of that above, and what you want.
Seriously: if you want something to work a certain way, then build it the way that you think it should be built. Describe it briefly if it helps, but do it the way that you want. Are you writing this material because you have something inside of you that you want to share, or because you desire the approval of a bunch of someone else's sycophants? If you just have something in you that wants out, then by all means: let it out. If they don't like this or that about it, so what? What affect does that have on you, ultimately?
Don't get me wrong: I understand that we are different people, and I understand that I am quite different from the modern internet citizen, in that I really am not affected by someone else's opinion of me or my work simple because I never did it for them in the first place. I did it because I wanted to, and I genuinely do not care if they don't like my Thing, because I made that Thing for me. They are _welcome_ to use it or to bash it all they want. And hey: just remember, if they criticize something in it, well then they must have bought a copy.
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