Flash: Inner ear/ Sense of Gravity/ Sense of Balence

[APE]

I figure This would mess any one up pretty bad as any one who has had an iner ear infection would attest.

Would this be in Touch Group, Hearing Group, or Unique Group?
What would be the effects?

I figure this would be good for Gravtational, Subsonics, bioelectrical, or mental powers.

[SirViss]

I think that the effect would be best simulated with another power, like a Dex Drain/Suppress. I can't think of anything else that would simulate what you suggest, though I am sure other people will have suggestion soon enough. :)

[Sean Waters]

We've debated this one with darkness to touch. Very silly if you follow it through without reasoning from effects (as is commanded by Holy Writ): it just stops you sensing being touched it dosn't have all the 'logical' effects.

As SirViss suggested you need another power. I'd suggest Mental Images based on CON as you can't be made to throw up with a DEX drain...and if you lose the input from your inner ear, you will be throwing up...

You could get away with change environment, possibly, if you wanted atoned down area effect.

[Lupus]

Hmm. Of course, why not follow through? If you flash the eyes, the person's blind. That's a major combat/movement penalty.

So if you flash sense of balance/touch/etc, the effect would also be a major combat/movement penalty. Why wolud this innately be out of line?

The problem is coming up with numbers... we have them provided for blindness, but not vertigo.

I'm just tossing this into the air. I agree that this may lead to silliness that should be countered by reasoning from effects, but I think it should be explored.

[Sean Waters]

Hmm. Of course, why not follow through? If you flash the eyes, the person's blind. That's a major combat/movement penalty.

So if you flash sense of balance/touch/etc, the effect would also be a major combat/movement penalty. Why wolud this innately be out of line?

The problem is coming up with numbers... we have them provided for blindness, but not vertigo.

I'm just tossing this into the air. I agree that this may lead to silliness that should be countered by reasoning from effects, but I think it should be explored.

Not a bad approach at all, but if you wanted combat effects like you get from blinding someone you'd need to pay the same cost - treat touch as a notional targetting sense.

Personally I don't like the idea, but it could float if handled correctly. :)

[Dr. Anomaly]

I did something like this years ago for a minor villain, but I can't for the life of me remember how I did it. I think I did indeed use Flash, but don't remember the penalties that it imposed. It's possible I still have that sheet around somewhere, but I haven't seen it in over 10 years, and since I've just recently moved, I wouldn't have any idea where to begin looking!

:rolleyes: Y'know, on balance, this post really doesn't add much to the discussion, does it?

[yamamura]

I think that the effect would be best simulated with another power, like a Dex Drain/Suppress. I can't think of anything else that would simulate what you suggest, though I am sure other people will have suggestion soon enough. :)

I also thinks this is the best way to go.

G

[Sean Waters]

I did something like this years ago for a minor villain, but I can't for the life of me remember how I did it. I think I did indeed use Flash, but don't remember the penalties that it imposed. It's possible I still have that sheet around somewhere, but I haven't seen it in over 10 years, and since I've just recently moved, I wouldn't have any idea where to begin looking!

:rolleyes: Y'know, on balance, this post really doesn't add much to the discussion, does it?

It adds length :)

[Greatwyrm]

I think that the effect would be best simulated with another power, like a Dex Drain/Suppress.

Maybe tack on AVLD (Hearing Group Flash Defense).

[Sociotard]

My only problem with building this power as a flash is the rarity of the defense. You see, normally a flash against a sense not included in the big 5 is fine, because while few people will bother with flash defense for that sense, few people will have that sense to begin with. With this power, everyone has a sense of equilibrium, but few characters I've seen buy defense against this. If I were presented with this character, I would insist a suitably common defense be determined. (hearing group for balance maybe, and touch group for the kinesthetic (sp?) sense, etc)

On that topic though, you can do some fun things with Flash. Flash memory, flash hunger, flash sense of passing time, flash color (character can still see, but is color blind), flash sense your bladder is freaking full, flash sense difference between right and left, Flash sense difference between similar letters (temporary dyslexia), maybe even flash certain emotions.

I read an article by some doctors who were studying the brains ability to discern "gross". They found this guy with a little damage up there, who'd lost that ability. He'd touch or eat anything, and while he'd intellectually know "this could give me a disease" he wouldn't have that queasy feeling. Now that would be an interesting sense to flash!

[MarioTani]

It seems to me that the game effects of having been FLASHed at the Sense of Balance, are similar to those of Being Stunned.

So I will go with a Drain STUN power with the SFX "You lose Sense of Balance".

THe difference with the "FLASH" model is that whit are possible several levels of "Losing Balance" represented by the recovering of the Drained poitns, while the flash as a Game Mechanic more All-or-Nothing oriented.

Let me explain with an example

If you drain the STUN (or something else for this matter) in the following turns he recovers some of the drained points, gradually "healing" from teh power effects.
If you FLAH a Sense there's not a gradual "healing" in every given segment you can use the sense or you cannot.

p.s. IIRC if a power that is not bought in increments, like senses, the Character has to recover all the point drained in order to use it. In this case there's not a Gradual HEaling Effect. So the powers share a similar working model.

[APE]

Thank you everyone I'll have to think some more on this. I was thinking it was somthing like a 1/2 dcv concentration just to stand, and 0 dcv concentration to move about. I was also leaning twards the touch group wich the majority of you seem to concur with.

I'm glad to belong to a board were eveyone has put some points into Flash Defence: Common Sence :)

[Dust Raven]

I've done the "sense of balance" thing two different ways. First is a Drain DEX to represent the loss of coordination, although this would typically need to be a really really large Drain. I've also done it as a Suppress, possibly Uncontrolled.

The other way is with a Suppress STUN in hopes of stunning the target, and using the effects of being stunned as the effects of a temporary loss of balance.

[Basil]

Personally, I think there's a need for a new Sense Group: Bodily Senses. This would include Balance, Kinesthesia, Hunger, and so on. That way, this sort of thing could be easily integrated into the existing structure.

[Chuk]

Because some one has to say it:

Transform, Target to Target With No Sense of Balance

And it's probably even minor.

[TheEmerged]

Reason from effect: what does destroying their sense of balance do?

I think you'll find that a Change Environment: Usable As Attack (so it affects and individual instead of an area), with the adders you want is a workable mechanic.

[PhilFleischmann]

Personally, I think there's a need for a new Sense Group: Bodily Senses. This would include Balance, Kinesthesia, Hunger, and so on. That way, this sort of thing could be easily integrated into the existing structure.
I think this is the best idea so far. The sense group system is a little too simplistic to model the way RW senses work. Talking about "the five senses" is almost as oversimplified as "the four elements."

Most of the internal bodily "senses," such as hunger, fullness, the need to go to the bathroom, etc. could all technically be considered part of the Touch Group, but we don't want to add all this extra functionality to a simple Flash vs. Touch Group.

People should be considered to have some free "Bodily Detects" by default - mostly bought with Sense, and Discriminatory, since you automatically feel how hungry you are or how urgently you need to go.

As to the actual effects of loss of sense of balance, I'd say something like this: No powers with Concentration can be used, Ranged powers are 1/2 OCV (or -3), movement is halved, or you can move up to full movement but you make a DEX roll at -X/Y additional inches moved or fall down, PER rolls are -1.

It may be perfectly reasonable to say that some senses simply cannot be Flashed (or blocked in any way) at all. Kinesthesia is one example that comes to mind.

It should also be noted that some "senses" like the "sense of grossness" that Sociotard mentioned, take place in the brain rather than in the sensory organs or nerves. This suggests that a Flash might not be appropriate for these (like causing temporary dyslexia, or "flash" sense of humor), but should instead be built with Mental Powers. Mental Illusions seems good, but I'll give it some more thought.

[Dust Raven]

I think this is the best idea so far. The sense group system is a little too simplistic to model the way RW senses work. Talking about "the five senses" is almost as oversimplified as "the four elements."
Except that there are five senses, and not four elements. Sure we can list off a bunch of stuff we can "sense" like hunger, balance, the need to pee, pain and even your own emotions and like fear and desire. I'm sure we aren't going to build a Flash versus Emotions Group anytime soon (though the idea is intreging, I don't think Flash is the way to do it).

It's better to think of the effects of what happens when a persons loses the ability to sense something, whatever it is. The Sense Groups and Senses have narrowed down some of those for us, others are either too rare in occurance ot too varied in application and effect to group into a single all encompasing this-does-that effect.

So reason from effect. Since it's a game, you can either do research on the RW effects of lacking a sense of balance and methods of losing it, or you can just pick something dramatic/appropriate and make it that way.

[APE]

How's this sound.

Mind Control: xd6, "If you try to do anything make an EGO roll or start retching".

Would you consider this to be a +20, or +30 EGO level?

Or would you consider this to be based on CON?

[Ganesh]

Except that there are five senses, and not four elements. Sure we can list off a bunch of stuff we can "sense" like hunger, balance, the need to pee, pain and even your own emotions and like fear and desire. I'm sure we aren't going to build a Flash versus Emotions Group anytime soon (though the idea is intreging, I don't think Flash is the way to do it).

It's better to think of the effects of what happens when a persons loses the ability to sense something, whatever it is. The Sense Groups and Senses have narrowed down some of those for us, others are either too rare in occurance ot too varied in application and effect to group into a single all encompasing this-does-that effect.

So reason from effect. Since it's a game, you can either do research on the RW effects of lacking a sense of balance and methods of losing it, or you can just pick something dramatic/appropriate and make it that way.



I've actually been using a modified version of the sense groups, with the addition of the "no-range sense group" that overlaps with all other sense groups, but cannot be blinded in any way, and effectively acts as "touch" or "fringe."

Vision sense group is as normal, with heat being the no-range component (add range to that for heat vision).

Tactile sense group is hearing, with tactile touch as the no-range component, measuring texture, density, and the like. Extend the no-sense group to get sonar.

Chemical sense group is smell, with taste being no-range.

Mental sense group is as normal, but the no-range component is what allows you to "hear" your own thoughts, feelings, and needs, and tell when a mental power is affecting you directly. Buying "mental awareness" is gaining the ranged part of the mental sense group.

So four senses makes a lot more sense to me. You can buy the no-range sense group on your invisibility to eliminate the fringe, and on your Images to make it possible to fool people who are right nearby.

I maintian that the five senses are as much an artifact of our current shoddly understanding of how the brain actually works as the four elements (or five elements, or two elements) are of former shoddy understanding of matter.

If you haven't, you should find an article or two on the notion of Active Perception, the idea that we actively (though automatically) querry our environment for information, rather than just passively taking it in, and how perception is related to imagination and memory. It's interestingly orthogonal to any "the n senses" models.

[Dust Raven]

Overall, that's a pretty neat way to go with things. There is one thing I have to point out though...


Vision sense group is as normal, with heat being the no-range component (add range to that for heat vision).
You can still feel heat when you're blind, so there's no way it can be part of the Sight/Vision group. I know, I had a blind friend once and he complained about the Arizona heat as much as any else. There's also a number of things that give off heat but you can't even see that they do, and have no way of knowing until you touch them.

[Basil]

Except that there are five senses,...

No.
It has long been known there are more. The "five senses" idea goes back to Aristotle, and like many of his ideas, he was partly right at best.



See:
1) http://sun.science.wayne.edu/~wpoff/senses.html
2) http://sun.science.wayne.edu/~wpoff/cor/sen/other.html
3) http://www.skidmore.edu/~hfoley/IM3.doc
4) http://sws.iienet.org/public/articles/index.cfm?Cat=59
5) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12953620&dopt=Abstract
6) http://216.239.63.104/search?q=cache:I68vpcY7EVYJ:www.psych.co.uk/Chap12.pdf+%22more+than+five+senses%22+physiologic al&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Of especial note, from link #5:
"The five senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch, enumerated by Aristotle, were incremented in the early-nineteenth century by the muscle sense, multiple dimensions of touch, and a movement sense. ... The division of touch into several sensations...was given anatomical, physiological and psychophysical support in the late-nineteenth century. A separate muscle sense was proposed in the late-eighteenth century, with experimental evidence to support it. However, before these developments, behavioral evidence of the vestibular (movement) sense was available from studies of vertigo,..."

And from link #6:
"In this chapter, we will be looking at how the nervous system gathers information from our external environment.We have many more than five senses which convey information to the brain: at the very least, we have sight, hearing, touch, taste, smell and proprioception (the sense which tells us about the internal state of the body, such as the position of joints and muscles) -- although really proprioception consists of several senses, not just one.We have one set of receptors which inform us about balance, another which informs us about movement, and so on.The empiricist philosophers were mistaken when they assumed that human beings had only five senses -- and if they had taken our internal senses into account at the same time, they might easily have developed a very different kind of philosophy."

[Dust Raven]

From a rules standpoint though... perception has nothing to do with sensing anything about the character sensing; it's about perceiving the world around the character. While an important ability, and assumed by the players (and probably the game designers when they wrote the rules) to be present and functioning, the proprioception senses don't really count as perceiving anything in Hero System.

Has there been much discussion on how to deprive one of these senses and the effects thereof? I also noted that in the sections you quoted there seems to be an unknown number of other senses, as if scientists know there are more than 5, but aren't done differentiating them. I'm sorry if any of this is covered in the articles you linked, but I haven't had time to read them yet.

[Basil]

From a rules standpoint though... perception has nothing to do with sensing anything about the character sensing; it's about perceiving the world around the character.Which way is down (the sense of balance) is not "sensing...the character sensing", nor is whether the character is being moved (sense of movement). As for kinesthesia/prioperception---if a character has to look, right at his gun to tell which way it's aimed, or his feet to be able to walk, that's a severe restriction on him. A removal (by Flash, Darkness, whatever) of balance or kinesthesia has major game effects.


While an important ability, and assumed by the players (and probably the game designers when they wrote the rules) to be present and functioning, the proprioception senses don't really count as perceiving anything in Hero System."Merely" what every limb that's not being looked at is actually doing. All motion is a feedback process: the brain says "tighten these muscles and relax those", and the percepton nerves in the muscles say "these muscles are tightened/relaxed X amount." Without that feedback, or visual "feedback" to replace it, controlled motion is impossible.


Has there been much discussion on how to deprive one of these senses and the effects thereof?Other than in threads like this one, where plenty of people deny the last couple of centuries of research and say "there's only 5 senses," or say "the other senses have no game effects"? No, not to my knowledge.

BTW, how much game effect does the sense of taste reallly have? The sense of smell, yeah, but taste? I mean, from a game-effects POV, why not call it the Smell Sense Group, and not bother with taste? Oh, and for those who are going to come up with examples of usefulness for taste, I can come up with just as many examples for balance, kinesthesia, and even hunger or full-bladder-ness. ;)

[Koshka]

Thank you everyone I'll have to think some more on this. I was thinking it was somthing like a 1/2 dcv concentration just to stand, and 0 dcv concentration to move about. I was also leaning twards the touch group wich the majority of you seem to concur with.


I'd probably go a little stronger (0 DCV concentration to stand), but then a friend of mine has severe Meniere's Disease (http://www.merck.com/mmhe/sec19/ch220/ch220i.html) and I've seen her fall because she can't feel herself tipping over lots of times.

[MikeyMitchell]

I'd probably go a little stronger (0 DCV concentration to stand), but then a friend of mine has severe Meniere's Disease (http://www.merck.com/mmhe/sec19/ch220/ch220i.html) and I've seen her fall because she can't feel herself tipping over lots of times.

That's gotta suck...

Just my $0.02 on this whole "sense" thing - I think the traditional 5 senses are those which can be <I>consciously</I> perceived. Of course, the body has literally thousands of other sensory functions (in controls engineering we call them feedback loops) that control things like heart rate, body temperature, limb position, balance / coordination, and so forth. (It's really pretty amazing when you stop to think about it.) These are "senses" in that they transmit information to the brain, but not in the context of consciously perceiving information. You could also look at it as those items that bring in information about the outside world, as opposed to internal regulatory mechanisms.

For the purposes of the game - I heartily agree that the Taste sense is probably mostly meaningless (unless you could concoct a poison that couldn't be tasted), and feedback mechanisms like balance are far more meaningful.

My first inclination for simulating a loss of balance would be a DEX Drain or Suppress (like Kinetik can do). But that's just me. :)<BR><BR>

[Dust Raven]

Not that I'm ignoring the rest of your post, but what it comes down to is this:
Other than in threads like this one, where plenty of people deny the last couple of centuries of research and say "there's only 5 senses," or say "the other senses have no game effects"? No, not to my knowledge.If there isn't a method of denying someone of these "senses" then 1) it's pure conjecture what the effects of deprevation of them would be and 2) of little importance to a role-playing game.

Since you might think #2 is debatable, think of it this way. There is no way of knowing what the effect of having no sense of kinesthesia/prioperception is because there are no (or so few as to be considered none) documented cases to examine. If even a scientist has to guess, so does the designer of a rules system for a game. It's the realm of rubber science that can only be detailed by the GM or player's conceptions on what would happen based solely on their opinion and nothing but conjecture to back it up. Since we're each likely to have a different opinion on what that might be, we're each left to our own imaginations on how to simulate such things using the rules as-is. It just wouldn't be fair for Steve Long (whom I'm failry certain doesn't possess a degree in human biology or anything close to examining whatever number of senses the human body has) to decide what those effect would be for us, especially since he was writing a tool-kit system.


BTW, how much game effect does the sense of taste reallly have? The sense of smell, yeah, but taste? I mean, from a game-effects POV, why not call it the Smell Sense Group, and not bother with taste? Oh, and for those who are going to come up with examples of usefulness for taste, I can come up with just as many examples for balance, kinesthesia, and even hunger or full-bladder-ness. ;)
I'm sure you could, but can you come up with the game mechanics for lacking those abilities? A number of people can for taste, and the majority of them would likely agree. Could you say the same for balance, kinesthesia, hunger or full-bladder-ness?

[PhilFleischmann]

Not that I'm ignoring the rest of your post, but what it comes down to is this:If there isn't a method of denying someone of these "senses" then 1) it's pure conjecture what the effects of deprevation of them would be and 2) of little importance to a role-playing game.

1) It isn't pure conjecture. We know the things these other senses give us, and there are RW cases of such senses being impaired, blocked, or underdeveloped. And even lacking such medical evidence, it's fairly easy to make an educated guess as to what the effects of a Flash Balance might be. On this very thread, many have already posted such suggestions, and not coincidentally, they are all somewhat similar.

2) It's only of little importance to an RPG if the RPG system specifically forbids such effects from existing in the mileu. HERO does not forbid these effects, is simply lacks a pre-made method of generating them.

And the "reason from effects" advice is somewhat ambiguous here. The effects can be reasoned in two different ways: A) The effect is simply that the sense in question is blocked/reduced, or B) Describe the specific combat or other situational modifiers that effect a character whose sense is blocked/reduced.

We use method A to attack the Sight Group, et al. We just say "Flash vs. Sight (or whatever)," rather than build a complex power that reduces OCV, DCV, blocks PER rolls, etc. But it seems that if we want to attack some other sense, we have to build the complex power with DEX Drains, Concentration, Extra DEX rolls required, etc.

Why not just use method A for all senses, standard five or otherwise? Then the GM can decide, based on common sense, existing science, and game balance, what the effects are. This may seem like a lot of work on the GM's part, but that's where these boards come in.

I believe method A is better because it allows for exceptions in cases where the target has senses different from a normal human. Just like a Flash vs Sight has little to no effect on someone with Targeting Radar or Sonar, a Flash vs. Kinesthetics, might be ineffective against someone with some other unusual sense to compensate (alien physiology, mystical/psychic awareness, robotics, etc.). This is a lot simpler than having to construct a power to reflect all the precise effects with all the appropriate limitations.

Yes, this can get us into the realm of rubber science, but look around: We've got superheroes, aliens, wizards, monsters, mutants, future technology - we've been here for a long time already!

[Dust Raven]

I wish Descant would get on these boards more often. She's taking classes that are currently discussing things along these lines and can probably explain what I'm trying to say better than I can.

At any rate, there aren't any "this 'sense' is gone an unavailable to the individual" cases documents anywhere. There are a few that discuss vertigo, drunkeness, dizzyness and similar effects, but even these have such a high degree of varience it seems that the effects of imparing any of these inner or self-senses vary with the method of imparing them. I can't find any absolute rules like we'd use for senses that could possibly apply.

Then again, exactly how are we defining the word "sense"? I don't think we're thinking of the same thing.

I think of a sense as something that allows one to perceive the world around him. You seem to be thinking of a sense as being information sent to the brain. I guess an agruement can be made for both definitions, but information sent to the brain encompasses far more than the curent Sense and Perception rules in Hero can deal with without becoming overly complex.

It's best to leave this "other" senses, or whatever science decides to call them, in the realm of other Powers rather than Senses.

[PhilFleischmann]

I can't find any absolute rules like we'd use for senses that could possibly apply.
There aren't absolute rules for many other RW effects either, like simple bullets, but we come up with general common-sense game mechanics to use anyway. Someone could get shot in the leg, break a major artery and die very quickly, yet HERO has a leg wound as being fairly minor (because it is most of the time). President Reagan got shot in the head and lived and didn't even feel it. By the same token, there may not be any "absolute rules" as to what happens when one's sense of balance is disrupted, but it's fairly easy to make game rulings as to the most likely results (reduced DEX, DEX rolls to take certain actions, impaired movement, etc.)


Then again, exactly how are we defining the word "sense"? I don't think we're thinking of the same thing.

I think of a sense as something that allows one to perceive the world around him. You seem to be thinking of a sense as being information sent to the brain. I guess an agruement can be made for both definitions, but information sent to the brain encompasses far more than the curent Sense and Perception rules in Hero can deal with without becoming overly complex.
This is partially a matter of SFX. A flash could be defined as a bright light in the eyes, or as a temporary blockage of the optic nerve. Same game effect, same power.

I didn't mean to confuse the issue when I mentioned "psychological senses" like sense of humor earlier. No, I don't consider these to be "senses" in the sense that we've been discussing them. That's more in the realm of the brain *processing* sensory information rather than simply *receiving* it. Once we get into the brain doing its own work, I would say, for game purposes at least, that we're no longer talking about senses. BTW, you could create a power that could disrupt someone's sense of humor, or sense of propriety, or sense of morality, etc., but that would not be built using Flash, but rather Mental Illusions or Mind Control, IMO.


It's best to leave this "other" senses, or whatever science decides to call them, in the realm of other Powers rather than Senses.
I'm not sure what the distinction is here. Whatever we decide to call them, we still might need to come up with how do deal with them being blocked/impaired. It seems a little odd to call them "Powers" when every normal human has them.

[Dust Raven]

There aren't absolute rules for many other RW effects either, like simple bullets, but we come up with general common-sense game mechanics to use anyway. Someone could get shot in the leg, break a major artery and die very quickly, yet HERO has a leg wound as being fairly minor (because it is most of the time). President Reagan got shot in the head and lived and didn't even feel it. By the same token, there may not be any "absolute rules" as to what happens when one's sense of balance is disrupted, but it's fairly easy to make game rulings as to the most likely results (reduced DEX, DEX rolls to take certain actions, impaired movement, etc.)
This supports my claim that what you describe are not senses, but are variable game effects. Roll dice for effect, as you would for a Drain or Suppress, rather than for duratin of effect, as you would with Flash.



This is partially a matter of SFX. A flash could be defined as a bright light in the eyes, or as a temporary blockage of the optic nerve. Same game effect, same power.I wasn't talking about SFX, but of how we are using the word "sense". If you are talking SFX, then you must be talking about using Powers to simulate an ability not already defined in the rules. Senses are defines, so you must not be talking about them.

In any case, a sense is what you use to gather information about the world around you. Not yourself, not where your hand is, not whether or not you are moving. Most of what you describe is purely psychological anyway. Go to the Imax sometime and watch a roller coaster film and you'll see what I mean. There's no motion to "sense" but you feel it anyway, and there isn't anything other than visual input coming in.


I'm not sure what the distinction is here. Whatever we decide to call them, we still might need to come up with how do deal with them being blocked/impaired. It seems a little odd to call them "Powers" when every normal human has them.Not any more off to call Running and Leaping a Power. They aren't Characteristics. They are Powers, just like Energy Blast and Transform, and aren't listed anywhere else in the rules. Why should something that's still as unexplained as kinesthesis or vestibular sense be any different?

[Descant]

:think:

Not to complain, as I kind of like exploring where this is going, but as far as game mechanics are concerned, I think we are losing track of where this original discussion was aimed. If you break it down to the simplest elements, there are two points I would like to make. Everybody is entitled to their own opinions, of course, and I hope not to incite any flames here, but I think the obvious is being overlooked in favor of theories and speculation.

1) As we have been defining the term in my college Psychology class, the function of senses is to assist us in perceiving the world around us. If we could not see, hear, feel, small, or taste, we would, as living beings, be in serious jeopardy of not surviving. I throw my lot in with those that differentiate a "flashable" sense as being externalized, rather than the internal workings of the human body, most of which go on without our notice, and are automatic. Internal pangs are not so much a sense as it is our bodies telling us to do something (not about something). Hunger tells us to eat, or we will fall down. Weariness tells us to sleep, or we will be fatigued and overwork ourselves. Bladder control tells us to relieve ourselves of waste, else we will poison ourselves. "Senses" in the definition I prefer, don't tell us to DO something... they tell us ABOUT something, usually outside of ourselves, that we can interact with, or that is interacting with us whether we like it or not.

2) Does this mean that we cannot deprive a person of the internal "senses"? Of course we can! We're evil, cutthroat players and GMs! But we lose track of the fact that we're playing a GAME when we try to rationalise SFX based on what they relate to in real life. Depriving a person of a sense will rob them of information. That's a FLASH. Depriving a person of a bodily function will have a physical RESULT... that variable is what needs to be defined in game terms, not the condition. If a person's sight is FLASHed, he cannot see what is around him. If a person's equilibrium is compromised, he WILL FALL OVER, or at least become clumsy. THAT is what needs to be defined here... HOW he becomes clumsy is just SFX... the CLUMSINESS is what has to be bought and paid for. :thumbup:

As always, just my opinion. :whistle:

[Dust Raven]

Well okay. That's what I've been trying to say! Thank's Descant :).

[PhilFleischmann]

Sorry if everyone else feels they're done with this discussion. I don't have the time to get on these boards as often as I'd like, so I can't always respond promptly.


This supports my claim that what you describe are not senses, but are variable game effects.
I see no reason why these are mutually exclusive. After all, the "regular" senses also have variable effects depending on circumstances. If there was no rulebook-defined game effect of blindness, we wouldn't necessarily all agree on what the effect should be. The only reason we don't agrue about it (much) is that there's already a predefined effect in the book. Off hand, I tend to think that the blindness penalties aren't severe enough.


I wasn't talking about SFX, but of how we are using the word "sense".
And my point was that regardless of what you include under the category of "sense" you still deal with it the same way within the game. If I wanted a power that temporarily blocked transmissions in the optic nerves of the target, shouldn't that power be built using Flash? That's the game effect it has, even if the SFX isn't blocking the "sense" itself.


If you are talking SFX, then you must be talking about using Powers to simulate an ability not already defined in the rules. Senses are defines, so you must not be talking about them.
I'm not sure what you mean by this. There are no SFX or specific abilities defined in the rules. The only thing defined in the rules are Game Effects. The ability to block optic nerves is not a *P*ower, it's a *p*ower which I think you'd agree is best built using the *P*ower Flash. The senses of balance and kinesthetics are not defined in the rulebook, even though they are real senses. I find it simpler and more elegant to allow Flash to affect them than to buy a complex Power constuct composed of various Drains/Supresses/Negative Skill Levels. With either method, the game effects of these "other senses" or their lack still has to be defined.

Yes, you could avoid the problem entirely by saying, "Balance, Kinesthesia, etc. cannot be suppressed or blocked in any way by any Power construct." While this may be appropriate for some genres and mileus, I'd find it very "Anti-HERO" to forbid it in every case. There's supposed to be nothing you can't do in HERO.


In any case, a sense is what you use to gather information about the world around you. Not yourself, not where your hand is, not whether or not you are moving.
Says who? Why is sensing information about yourself off-limits? Just because Aristotle listed five senses thousands of years ago doesn't mean he was exactly right. And by the way, the sense of balance *is* about the world around you. The pull of gravity isn't coming from my own body; it's coming from the massive planet I'm standing on. I sense it's position, relative to me with my sense of balance, the same as with any other sense.

It also depends on what you consider "you." Is "you" your physical body, or is it your consciousness? Why shouldn't your physical body be sense-able as any other physical object?


Most of what you describe is purely psychological anyway.
As are ALL senses. That's what makes them so much more complex than most people normally assume. That's why I make the distiction between "raw data coming into the brain from the sensory organs and nerves" and "conclusions and inferences made by the brain processing that data." The former are what I would call "senses" (and IMO, in HERO could be Flashable). The latter would not be senses, but even this is not a clear distinction. There is no clear dividing line between "data gathering" and "data processing." The retinas of the eyes do some processing before the data ever gets to the brain. And the same is true with the sense of touch.

Examples:
Hearing is Flashable (of course), but the ability to understand speech is not.
My sense of sight tells me that there is a green and brown shape about 50 feet in front of me and slightly to the left. My brain tells me that it's a tree, and that from prior experience with trees, it is a solid, non-sentient, inanimate object.


Not any more off to call Running and Leaping a Power. They aren't Characteristics. They are Powers, just like Energy Blast and Transform, and aren't listed anywhere else in the rules. Why should something that's still as unexplained as kinesthesis or vestibular sense be any different?
Fine. Defined or not, these other senses should fall into the same category as sight and hearing. They are very real senses, not any more "unexplained" than any other sense. The sense of kinesthetics is a "Power" in the same way as the sense of sight is a "Power."

I am suddenly reminded of the theme to "Gilligan's Island" where the Professor and Mary Anne are listed as "...and the rest." Balance and kinesthetics are the Professor and Mary Anne of senses. (This has got to be the weirdest analogy I've ever come up with. :ugly: )

[Dust Raven]

I've been thing about this a lot sense my last post. I'm rather enjoying our discussion/debate on the issue, and have done some research into the subject. What I'd like to bring to the table now is how I'm currently thinking.

We have lots of senses, and I agree Aristotle was wrong with numbering it as five. However, not all of these senses can be Flashed or rendered unusable using the Sense Affecting Powers of the Hero System. I know we differ on which one's fall to what side of the line, but I'm assuming we at least agree there is a line and some senses fall on the side that can't be affected by Sense Affecting Powres.

What I've been trying to do is categorize senses by what the effects of being deprived of them would be. Basically, there is an effect for each. What I'm trying to accomplish with this is to determine which of these effects would be universally accomplished with Sense Affecting Powers. The reason for this is because the Senses currently defined in the Hero System are all affected universally by Sense Affecting Powers. It doesn't matter if you are deprived of Sight by a Flash, being in a field of Darkness, or in the presense of an Invisible person or object. The effect is the same, as are the penalties associated with it. Such should hold true of all Senses defined in the Hero System.

There is also the issue of whether or not such effect would have a game mechanic result. If Flashing someone's Hunger didn't actually do anything, Hunger shouldn't be considered a Sense, even though science consideres it a sense. I'm also trying to stay away from SFX of using or depriving one of a Sense, as that shouldn't matter for this discussion.

While it's apparent there is and should be a game mechanic result for some of these senses (most particular, vestibular and kinesthetic), they can't be universally accounted for with Sense Affecting Powers.

What would Vestibular Images be? How would another character interact with such an Image? How about being Invisible to Vestibular Sense? What would that do? The same questions for other senses not currently included in the Hero rules. These don't really make sense (no pun intended), and because of this I don't think they should be included as Senses.

But what to do about them and how to account for them? The same way we account for everything else left undefined in Hero. The GM makes something up and everyone plays with it.

[Descant]

That's not a bad point... many things can be done to senses in HERO... while it may be a SENSE that's being affected, and it may have the appearance of "FLASHing" it... it may not actually be written up that way. Can these senses be affected by other sense-affecting attacks? Hmmmm.....

(Invisibility to hunger.... *intrigued*)

[Basil]

I've been thing about this a lot sense my last post. I'm rather enjoying our discussion/debate on the issue, and have done some research into the subject. What I'd like to bring to the table now is how I'm currently thinking.

We have lots of senses, and I agree Aristotle was wrong with numbering it as five. However, not all of these senses can be Flashed or rendered unusable using the Sense Affecting Powers of the Hero System.Any sense (in the widest meaning) that cannot be affected by Sense Affecting Powers is not a "sense" for gaming purposes. What senses that includes is up to the GM. Personally, I'd call near anything a sense-for-game-purposes, but that's me.


I know we differ on which one's fall to what side of the line, but I'm assuming we at least agree there is a line and some senses fall on the side that can't be affected by Sense Affecting Powres.

What I've been trying to do is categorize senses by what the effects of being deprived of them would be.I'd assume they can be "removed", and try to figure out what that would mean. I get the feeling you'd assume anything outside The Big Five aren't senses, unless someone makes a case for the effects of deprivation being model-able only with Flash, Darkness, etc.


Basically, there is an effect for each. What I'm trying to accomplish with this is to determine which of these effects would be universally accomplished with Sense Affecting Powers. The reason for this is because the Senses currently defined in the Hero System are all affected universally by Sense Affecting Powers. It doesn't matter if you are deprived of Sight by a Flash, being in a field of Darkness, or in the presense of an Invisible person or object. The effect is the same, as are the penalties associated with it. Such should hold true of all Senses defined in the Hero System.

There is also the issue of whether or not such effect would have a game mechanic result. If Flashing someone's Hunger didn't actually do anything, Hunger shouldn't be considered a Sense, even though science consideres it a sense.A person w/o a sense of hunger can starve to death, or, more significantly pass out or become weak in play, w/o warning.


I'm also trying to stay away from SFX of using or depriving one of a Sense, as that shouldn't matter for this discussion.

While it's apparent there is and should be a game mechanic result for some of these senses (most particular, vestibular and kinesthetic), they can't be universally accounted for with Sense Affecting Powers.

What would Vestibular Images be?The victim thinks down is in a direction other than it actually is.


How would another character interact with such an Image?What "other character"? Images covers an area (1 hex unless larger area is paid for, IIRC). Thus, that area is "down" (or modifies the "down" given by gravity) for all close enough to perceive the Image. "Problem" solved.


How about being Invisible to Vestibular Sense? What would that do?The victim cannot tell which way is down. NB: You'd have to render the whole planet Invisible To Vestibular Sense. Which is UAA with a HUGE multiplier on the mass effected. ;)


The same questions for other senses not currently included in the Hero rules.Which get similar answers. E.g., Flash To Kinesthetics leaves the target unable to tell where any of his limbs are unless he looks at them. This effects the ability to aim or swing a weapon (including his fist), interferes with his walking, running, and other movements (including driving), etc. Sure, you can model it with Drains &/or Change Environment &/or negative Skill Levels, UAA. But, you can say the same thing about Flash to any of the Big Five. The question, IMO, is not can you do X, Y, or Z with the existing rules, but does it make things simpler and easier to understand by adding to the list of Senses (and Sense Groups).


These don't really make sense (no pun intended), and because of this I don't think they should be included as Senses.I think including at least Balance, Movement, and Kinesthesia makes a great deal of sense (no pun intended). In fact, I'd also include Heat/Cold, Pain, and Fatigue. Hunger and Need to defecate/urinate are distinct possibles IMO, though I wouldn't care if a GM told me "nope".


But what to do about them and how to account for them? The same way we account for everything else left undefined in Hero. The GM makes something up and everyone plays with it.The simplest is to count them as senses, and figure out what the results of Sense Affecting Powers are from that basis.

[PhilFleischmann]

I've been thing about this a lot sense my last post. I'm rather enjoying our discussion/debate on the issue,
So am I. This has been quite fascinating, and remarkably flame-free. Ultimately, since these issues are not covered in the rules, we each have to make our own decisions as to how to handle them in our games. It is beneficial to see others ideas on this.


However, not all of these senses can be Flashed or rendered unusable using the Sense Affecting Powers of the Hero System. I know we differ on which one's fall to what side of the line, but I'm assuming we at least agree there is a line and some senses fall on the side that can't be affected by Sense Affecting Powres.
This seems to be the only area where we disagree. I would allow Flash: Balance, or Flash: "Sense" of Hunger. The latter would not be particularly useful in any context I can think of off hand, but neither is Flash vs. Smell. Sure, it could help you escape a bloodhound, but Flash vs. Hunger might help you lose weight, or not be distracted in combat by being hungry. In any case of Flash, the effectiveness can be drastically effected by the other senses that a target has. Flash vs Sight is pretty much useless against someone with a Targeting Spacial Awareness. Flash vs Smell is pretty useless against a normal human. Flash vs, Hunger or Images: Target feels Hunger should have no effect on someone with LS: No need to eat.


What I've been trying to do is categorize senses by what the effects of being deprived of them would be. Basically, there is an effect for each.
Yes. That's the tricky part.


What I'm trying to accomplish with this is to determine which of these effects would be universally accomplished with Sense Affecting Powers. The reason for this is because the Senses currently defined in the Hero System are all affected universally by Sense Affecting Powers.
Ah. I didn't understand what you meant by this before. However, I still think that the penalties of Flash v Balance and being in Darkness v Balance, etc. should be the same. Images v Balance or Kinesthetics would be a rather strange power and wouldn't be particularly effective unless it was accompanied by other sensory effects (like Sight and Touch). If I feel like my arm is moving, but I don't see it moving and I don't feel the pressure or impact of whatever my arm is touching, the Image is not going to work any better than an Image of a speeding car, if I can't hear the motor running or smell the exhaust or feel the air currents caused. In fact it would probably be even less effective because we humans rely so heavily on sight.


There is also the issue of whether or not such effect would have a game mechanic result. If Flashing someone's Hunger didn't actually do anything, Hunger shouldn't be considered a Sense, even though science consideres it a sense.
I would still consider it a sense for game purposes, even if it didn't have a significant effect. I doubt many players would ever want to buy Flash vs Hunger or Images vs Taste.


While it's apparent there is and should be a game mechanic result for some of these senses (most particular, vestibular and kinesthetic), they can't be universally accounted for with Sense Affecting Powers.
I still don't see why not. You could have Flash vs Balance, Darkness vs Balance, Images vs Hunger, etc. Invisibility vs Balance would have to be applied to a planet or something with significant gravity in order to have an effect, but it could be done.


What would Vestibular Images be? How would another character interact with such an Image? How about being Invisible to Vestibular Sense? What would that do?
I'm not sure what you mean by "vestibular sense". I'm going to assume you mean the sensations of internal body functions like hunger and the need to excrete. An Image vs one of these senses would creat a false sense of hunger, fullness, etc. True, they don't quite work like normal Images in that they might only effect one person. Or if used in an area, cease to effect someone as soon as they leave the area. This is why I mentioned earlier that some of these powers would better be built using Mental Illusions or other Mental Powers.


But what to do about them and how to account for them? The same way we account for everything else left undefined in Hero. The GM makes something up and everyone plays with it.
So how would you build a power that temporarily knocks out someone's sense of balance? I would build it like this:

Xd6 Flash vs. Balance

If I wanted to make a power that caused lack of balance in an area, I would do this:

Darkness vs. Balance, X" radius

If I wanted to cause people to feel like they were sideways to gravity, or feel like the floor was rocking like the deck of a ship:

Images vs. Balance, -X to Balance PER rolls

This seems like the best and simplest way to me. How would you do it? (Descant, you're welcome to answer this as well.)

[BNakagawa]

The fundamental problem with taking an unusual power (causing vertigo like effects) and making it universal (assuming everyone has a 'sense' of balance) is that suddenly there's a brand new way to hose people out of half or all of their dcv and possibly ocv as well.

If you make it a unique (or at least rare) power, incorporating a CE or dex drain, then you don't need to do any further work.

If you make it a universal trait shared by anyone who hasn't bought the appropriate life support, then you have to either retrofit every PC and villain ever made, or else risk them all being hosed by a relatively cheap power.

And I do mean cheap.

[PhilFleischmann]

A person w/o a sense of hunger can starve to death, or, more significantly pass out or become weak in play, w/o warning.
Actually, there should be plenty of warning. Just because I don't feel hungry doesn't mean I don't feel the effects of malnutrition. I'll feel weaker, I'll hear my stomach making noises, and I'll remember that haven't eaten in a long time. I would probably also notice other symptoms long before I starve to death or even pass out.

[PhilFleischmann]

If you make it a universal trait shared by anyone who hasn't bought the appropriate life support, then you have to either retrofit every PC and villain ever made, or else risk them all being hosed by a relatively cheap power.

And I do mean cheap.
Not at all. There are two very easy solutions:

Temporary loss of balance sense need not be that big of a hose. A penalty to ranged OCV and certain other actions, but that's about it. The GM can decide what's fair. It certainly shouldn't be more hosing than being blinded! And even that is fairly well mitigated in HERO.

Another possibility is to assume that everyone has X points of Flash Def vs Balance et al. for free as a default. After all, everyone really does have a sense of balance, and in the real world, it's much easier to blind someone (shine a bright light into their eyes) than to knock out someone's sense of balance.

[The Hyborian]

My $.02 on the issue.

I think that we are confusing sense with awarness. I am with the camp that says for game purposes senses are abilites a character uses to perceive the envrionment around them. Flash disables one of these abilites, the classic being the bright light in the eyes, but it could be any Fx and any of the five senses.

A charcter is also aware of things within themselves, but these are not really "senses" in game terms. Hunger, fatigue, balance, orientation in space, even emotional state are all tied to certain activity in our nervious system, and feed into our cognitive processes, but are not senses the way we mean when we are speaking in game terms.

Perhaps the following could serve as a definition: Unless you could pay the points to make it a targeting sense, its not really a sense in game terms. I dont think you could have "Targeting Balance", (or targeting hunger, targeting need to pee, etc) so they are not senses, they are states of awareness.

So, IMHO, I would not let a charcter flash "Balance". They could drain dex with the Fx that they have messed with the persons balance, they could drain stun or use a NND of some kind to represent the crippling nausia. But "Balance" can not be directly turned off via flash.

[PhilFleischmann]

So, IMHO, I would not let a charcter flash "Balance". They could drain dex with the Fx that they have messed with the persons balance, they could drain stun or use a NND of some kind to represent the crippling nausia. But "Balance" can not be directly turned off via flash.
How much of a DEX Drain would be appropriate in your opinion? Not all of a persons DEX is granted by their sense of balance. I'd say fairly little of it is, in fact. So you might need to apply a limitation to indicate a maximum effect for the Drain, i.e. Non-Cumulative. In addition, and alien or robot that doesn't have a sense of balance would still be effected by the DEX Drain, as would a character who had spent points specifically to protect his sense of balance. The defense in this case would be Power Defense.

Is lack of sense of balance just a lowered DEX, or is there more, like reduced movement, reduced concentration, etc.?

So how would you build a power to block the kinesthetic sense?

[The Hyborian]

How much of a DEX Drain would be appropriate in your opinion? Not all of a persons DEX is granted by their sense of balance. I'd say fairly little of it is, in fact. So you might need to apply a limitation to indicate a maximum effect for the Drain, i.e. Non-Cumulative. In addition, and alien or robot that doesn't have a sense of balance would still be effected by the DEX Drain, as would a character who had spent points specifically to protect his sense of balance. The defense in this case would be Power Defense.



I suppose the questions of how much drain depends on how intese the effect is, and if it is accompanied by nausia, disphoria, etc. I have seen people with migranes get knocked down so hard they literally couldn't stand up. Does your attack make them a little woozy or does it make them beg for an early death?

I agree that the alien/robot/nonhuman issue needs to be considered. If robots and aliens are common in the campaign you probably need a Limited Power limitation on the attack. If they are rare, probably not, it would fall under minor advantages and disadvantages that come will all special effects.

[Dust Raven]

Any sense (in the widest meaning) that cannot be affected by Sense Affecting Powers is not a "sense" for gaming purposes. What senses that includes is up to the GM. Personally, I'd call near anything a sense-for-game-purposes, but that's me.

I'd assume they can be "removed", and try to figure out what that would mean. I get the feeling you'd assume anything outside The Big Five aren't senses, unless someone makes a case for the effects of deprivation being model-able only with Flash, Darkness, etc.One of the other things that occured to me is that the other Senses (the ones we have rules for) do not deprive the character of anything other than the sense when it's remove or made unusable. In the case of the one's we're discussion, there is a direct result on the target's body/mind rather than an inability to perceive something. I'll think more on this and see if I can come up with a better way of describing it.


A person w/o a sense of hunger can starve to death, or, more significantly pass out or become weak in play, w/o warning.A person with a sense of hunger can do the same thing. Without it, you wouldn't know if you were hungry or full, so even if you eat you may overeat because you don't know when to stop.


The victim thinks down is in a direction other than it actually is.Well, he can still sense the real down as well, so what would happen? There are two downs? And what is down? Down is the direction of gravity. Would an Image of "down" cause a character to fall toward it? I don't think so. Making more than one "down" is an aspect of Telekinesis or Flight UAA.


What "other character"? Images covers an area (1 hex unless larger area is paid for, IIRC). Thus, that area is "down" (or modifies the "down" given by gravity) for all close enough to perceive the Image. "Problem" solved.As I just said... down is the direction you fall or are pulled toward. You can't make an Image of down without actually pulling things in that direction.


The victim cannot tell which way is down. NB: You'd have to render the whole planet Invisible To Vestibular Sense. Which is UAA with a HUGE multiplier on the mass effected. ;)I was referring to a single character that is invisible to the vestibular sense. There is no effect, because that character never was the direction of down.


Which get similar answers. E.g., Flash To Kinesthetics leaves the target unable to tell where any of his limbs are unless he looks at them. This effects the ability to aim or swing a weapon (including his fist), interferes with his walking, running, and other movements (including driving), etc. Sure, you can model it with Drains &/or Change Environment &/or negative Skill Levels, UAA. But, you can say the same thing about Flash to any of the Big Five. The question, IMO, is not can you do X, Y, or Z with the existing rules, but does it make things simpler and easier to understand by adding to the list of Senses (and Sense Groups).I agree there is an effect, just not one that can be achieved with Sense Affecting Powers. If you'd like, you can classify kinesthetics as part of the Normal Touch collective, since removing it has similar, though limited, effects to removing Touch. It can be a limited form of a Flash Touch.


I think including at least Balance, Movement, and Kinesthesia makes a great deal of sense (no pun intended). In fact, I'd also include Heat/Cold, Pain, and Fatigue. Hunger and Need to defecate/urinate are distinct possibles IMO, though I wouldn't care if a GM told me "nope".

The simplest is to count them as senses, and figure out what the results of Sense Affecting Powers are from that basis.
I disagree. This is most difficult no matter what you do.

My bottom line (at this point) is that a Sense should have sense related modifiers if it's hindered. There are perception penalties associated with the hindering of any other sense (with Touch being a quasi exception). If a sense if blocked, you simply can't use it. There are no penalties on the character's actually actions (a blind character can still move and attack, they just won't be able to use sight to aim or know where they are going). If it's to be a sense in game terms, it should meet these qualifications: 1) It's able to perceive something about the environment and 2) It's able to be affected/influenced by Sense Affecting Powers.

Kinesthetics doesn't do either (or related senses of Hunger, Thirst, etc).
Vestibular does one (sense which way is down), but can't be affected by Sense Affecting Powers like Invisibility, Shape Shift or Images, and such effects are actually best represented using Telekinesis to actually pull the character toward "down".

(and I've got to run out the door just now, so I'll reply to you in a bit Phil :))

[BNakagawa]

Not at all. There are two very easy solutions:

Temporary loss of balance sense need not be that big of a hose. A penalty to ranged OCV and certain other actions, but that's about it. The GM can decide what's fair. It certainly shouldn't be more hosing than being blinded! And even that is fairly well mitigated in HERO.

Another possibility is to assume that everyone has X points of Flash Def vs Balance et al. for free as a default. After all, everyone really does have a sense of balance, and in the real world, it's much easier to blind someone (shine a bright light into their eyes) than to knock out someone's sense of balance.

eh? Weren't you the guy suggesting no concentration powers at all, 1/2 ocv, -1 per rolls and half movement and on and on and on?

This is not a hose?

Rather than inventing a brand new mechanic, why don't we use what we already have. We have rules for draining dexterity to 0 and below, don't we?

[Dust Raven]

So am I. This has been quite fascinating, and remarkably flame-free. Ultimately, since these issues are not covered in the rules, we each have to make our own decisions as to how to handle them in our games. It is beneficial to see others ideas on this.Absolutely! I love hearing your ideas even though I might not agree with them. It helps keep my thinking. The only reason I haven't given you rep for your recent posts on the topic is that I can't yet.



This seems to be the only area where we disagree. I would allow Flash: Balance, or Flash: "Sense" of Hunger. The latter would not be particularly useful in any context I can think of off hand, but neither is Flash vs. Smell. Sure, it could help you escape a bloodhound, but Flash vs. Hunger might help you lose weight, or not be distracted in combat by being hungry. In any case of Flash, the effectiveness can be drastically effected by the other senses that a target has. Flash vs Sight is pretty much useless against someone with a Targeting Spacial Awareness. Flash vs Smell is pretty useless against a normal human. Flash vs, Hunger or Images: Target feels Hunger should have no effect on someone with LS: No need to eat.I see the whole Flash/Darkness issue as a denial of information, rather than a denial of bodily function (there, that much be what I'm trying to get at!). A Flash versus hunger doesn't deprive the target of any information, just a feeling. Sure, they won't know they are hungry, but for the purposes of game play, did they really need to know in the first place?



Ah. I didn't understand what you meant by this before. However, I still think that the penalties of Flash v Balance and being in Darkness v Balance, etc. should be the same. Images v Balance or Kinesthetics would be a rather strange power and wouldn't be particularly effective unless it was accompanied by other sensory effects (like Sight and Touch). If I feel like my arm is moving, but I don't see it moving and I don't feel the pressure or impact of whatever my arm is touching, the Image is not going to work any better than an Image of a speeding car, if I can't hear the motor running or smell the exhaust or feel the air currents caused. In fact it would probably be even less effective because we humans rely so heavily on sight.
The thing with this is that Sense Affecting Powers that provide sensory input, or selectively remove it (Images and Invisibility) can't do crap for things like vestibular (btw, vestibular sense is the sense of balance) or kinesthetics. An Image of the sensation of an arm moving about won't affect anyone unless someone in range of the Image has a sense that could detect kinesthetic sensations in others (and then the Images should be bought verses that unique/unusual sense and not kinesthetics). The same can be said for Invisibility or Shape Shift, in order for such an affect to be perceivable to anyone, there would have to be another sense for it to work against that people don't normally have instead of the sense it's actually mimicing.



I would still consider it a sense for game purposes, even if it didn't have a significant effect. I doubt many players would ever want to buy Flash vs Hunger or Images vs Taste.


I still don't see why not. You could have Flash vs Balance, Darkness vs Balance, Images vs Hunger, etc. Invisibility vs Balance would have to be applied to a planet or something with significant gravity in order to have an effect, but it could be done.Except that these effects don't actually do what you think they do. You can't use Shape Shift or Images or Invisibility to make someone feel something different about themselves. You could use Mental Illusions for this, but Mental Illusions isn't a Sense Affecting Power (though it has related effects).



I'm not sure what you mean by "vestibular sense". I'm going to assume you mean the sensations of internal body functions like hunger and the need to excrete. An Image vs one of these senses would creat a false sense of hunger, fullness, etc. True, they don't quite work like normal Images in that they might only effect one person. Or if used in an area, cease to effect someone as soon as they leave the area. This is why I mentioned earlier that some of these powers would better be built using Mental Illusions or other Mental Powers.We agree on using Mental Illusions (a wonderful catch-all sense wacking power which really does catch all).



So how would you build a power that temporarily knocks out someone's sense of balance? I would build it like this:

Xd6 Flash vs. Balance

If I wanted to make a power that caused lack of balance in an area, I would do this:

Darkness vs. Balance, X" radius

If I wanted to cause people to feel like they were sideways to gravity, or feel like the floor was rocking like the deck of a ship:

Images vs. Balance, -X to Balance PER rolls

This seems like the best and simplest way to me. How would you do it? (Descant, you're welcome to answer this as well.)I could build it a number of ways.

Mental Illusions (with or without a Limitation depending upon what else the particular character can do with it) is one method.

Another I like to use is Suppress STUN xd6, Instant. If the roll is greater than the target's CON+Power Defense he's stunned and is at 1/2 DCV and all is non-persistant Powers turn off and instantly inturrupts concentration. The character might also drop objects he didn't already have a firm hold on (or a resisting object can how easily escape). I usually equate the Stunned game mechanic for temporary vertigo, dissorientation or loss of balance or cooridination, which can be brought about by a number of methods.

There is, of course, the Drain/Suppress DEX route, which brings with it the associated penalties for losing DEX. I preffer using Suppress because it's Constant and can be use at Range by default (and gets more dice, though multiple rolls aren't cumulative unless you toss on an Advantage). a 12d6 Suppress can rob a character of 14 points of DEX on average (-5 CV) and will immediately cause normals and even slightly above normals to start making DEX Rolls (on a 9- or worse) just to move.

[Basil]

A person w/o a sense of hunger can starve to death, or, more significantly pass out or become weak in play, w/o warning.
Actually, there should be plenty of warning. Just because I don't feel hungry doesn't mean I don't feel the effects of malnutrition. I'll feel weaker, I'll hear my stomach making noises, and I'll remember that haven't eaten in a long time. I would probably also notice other symptoms long before I starve to death or even pass out.

Hmmm. On second thought, I put the dangers a little too strongly. Feeling weaker was actually my main point. Passing out and starving are unlikely, but not impossible, for someone w/o a sense of hunger
.
Actually, the stomach stops "gurgling" after about a day-and-a-half or two days.

Remembering not eating is the main method of avoiding the effects of no sense of hunger.

[Basil]

{snip}
Perhaps the following could serve as a definition: Unless you could pay the points to make it a targeting sense, its not really a sense in game terms. I dont think you could have "Targeting Balance", (or targeting hunger, targeting need to pee, etc) so they are not senses, they are states of awareness.
{snip}
Well, since Targeting Taste is not possible, and Smell can never be accurately Targeting, are they not senses? Or are you willing to "hand wave" the science? In that case, why not Targeting Balance?

After all, perhaps my alien-from-another-dimension character can tell what direction is down "way over yonder". Very helpful sense in an Escherverse. ;)

[Basil]

A person with a sense of hunger can do the same thing.
Yes, because he doesn't have food. W/o a sense of hunger he'd do so whether he had food or not.



Well, he can still sense the real down as well,
Says who?
Oh sure, he could determine the correct down, by seeing which way things fall. And someone seeing a tiger charging him, that makes no sound and does not bend the grass under itself, can determine it's an Image. Which is irrelevant to where Sight is a sense or not.
Similarly for the sense of Balance.


And what is down? Down is the direction of gravity. Would an Image of "down" cause a character to fall toward it? I don't think so.
What is light? It's (to simplify) photons. Does an Image of a laser swinging around and coming to point at your face cause burns? In HeroSystem, no; you need another power to do that. The fact that you need TK or some such to make a character "fall" does not mean Balance is not a sense.


Making more than one "down" is an aspect of Telekinesis or Flight UAA.
No, TK makes the character move in some direction. Balance tells him which way is "down". I can have a TK that moves someone without him perceiving that direction is "down"; I see no reason to forbid an Image of "down" that doesn't move the target.


As I just said... down is the direction you fall or are pulled toward. You can't make an Image of down without actually pulling things in that direction
You can certainly declare that's what "down" means, but that's pretty much assuming that which you are trying prove.
If "down" is defined as the direction a being feels, then the perception and the effect of gravity can be separated.

And don't forget, Balance not only tells you which way is "down", but also which way you are undergoing accelerated movement. That is why "getting dizzy" is an effect of the sense of Balance.
.

I was referring to a single character that is invisible to the vestibular sense. There is no effect, because that character never was the direction of down.
Well, if you want to engage is such whimsy, I will be the last person to gainsay you. I'm given to extremes of whimsy, myself. ;)
However, it's totally moot, since the sense of Balance can't detect individuals anyway, so they're essentially invisible to Balance to begin with. Rather in the way that a bacterium is essentially invisible to normal Sight.



I agree there is an effect, just not one that can be achieved with Sense Affecting Powers. If you'd like, you can classify kinesthetics as part of the Normal Touch collective, since removing it has similar, though limited, effects to removing Touch. It can be a limited form of a Flash Touch.
It does have some "Touch-like" elements. However, a Sense Group for the various "bodily senses" is, IMO, a more useful arrangement.


My bottom line (at this point) is that a Sense should have sense related modifiers if it's hindered. There are perception penalties associated with the hindering of any other sense (with Touch being a quasi exception). If a sense if blocked, you simply can't use it. There are no penalties on the character's actually actions (a blind character can still move and attack, they just won't be able to use sight to aim or know where they are going). If it's to be a sense in game terms, it should meet these qualifications: 1) It's able to perceive something about the environment and 2) It's able to be affected/influenced by Sense Affecting Powers.

Kinesthetics doesn't do either (or related senses of Hunger, Thirst, etc).
Vestibular does one (sense which way is down), but can't be affected by Sense Affecting Powers like Invisibility, Shape Shift or Images, and such effects are actually best represented using Telekinesis to actually pull the character toward "down".

(and I've got to run out the door just now, so I'll reply to you in a bit Phil :))

Two points:
1) I'm not sure the "perceive the environment" requirement should be adhered to with total rigor. In the case of Kinesthesia, the usefulness of treating it as a sense outweighs any inflexible "environment vs internal state" rule. I agree though that Hunger, Thirst, etc. are better left out of any expanded list of senses
2) I'm afraid your second qualification can be met, easily, if one is willing to. Your (and others) refusal to, does not show it can't be done, merely that you're unwilling to.

Which is your right, of course.

[BNakagawa]

targetting taste? Ask Tongue-tongue.

targetting smell? Seen that before, too. Repeatedly, actually.

targetting balance? Not seeing it.

[Sean Waters]

The enemy is down.

(noprize for getting that reference!)

Isn't job number one to decide what effect not having a sense of balance should have and then modelling that?

I mean you can get around it with a 3 point skill: ask any astronaut.

Hell, you could probably model it best with a change environment power. That's quite good for making people fall down. You could avoid it with an INT roll or a zero G manoeuvring roll: you can work out where your limbs need to be if you still have a kinesthetic sense.

[Sean Waters]

The problem is that the inability to see or hear is already defined by Hero, as to a large extent is the inability to smell or taste: the effects are set out in game terms already.

Touch is ALWAYS the bugbear though: look at the debate on shapeshifting or invisibility, for example: the sense that makes no sense is touch, and it is the same here.

I would be strongly inclined not to read too much into the loss of touch. I would leave flash or darkness to touch defined simply as the inability to sense external objects/stimulii by touch, and not worry about the possible internal effects (yes, I know gravity is external: ignore that). It is potentially powerful enough that an opponent won't know that you are hitting them with an IPE NND attack until they fall over unconscious: you want to make them dizzy, buy CE or DEX drain or MI or whatever.

Anyway, if you really want to think it through, a lot of the damage you get from most attacks, the stun part anyway, is pain. If you render someone unable to sense pain, then you should be giving them damage reduction (stun only) with the attack. Can't see anyone volunteering to boost an opponent's defences, can you?

At the very basic level, if you are not sure how to apply it, and you are not happy with the way a player applies it in a particular construct, don't allow it. :)

[The Hyborian]

Well, since Targeting Taste is not possible, and Smell can never be accurately Targeting, are they not senses? Or are you willing to "hand wave" the science? In that case, why not Targeting Balance?

After all, perhaps my alien-from-another-dimension character can tell what direction is down "way over yonder". Very helpful sense in an Escherverse. ;)


Why cant smell be a targeting sense? You just have to pay the points to make it targeting. If I am playing Captain Grizzly, avenger of the wilderness, I think he might have smell so sensitive that I can target with it. Its just a matter of playing the points.

As for Taste, the problem is that taste is no range in its default state. You have to touch something with your tounge to taste it. Pay the points for range and you can taste from across the room. Weird FX probably, but you can do it. Pay some more points and your ranged taste is so sensitive you can target with it.

Now, with balance, the issue is that it doesn't give you any information OUTSIDE of your own body. It just affects you, it does not sense other objects, even if you are touching them. As I said in my post, its an awareness, but not a sense. It doesn't tell you where a foe is.

Further, i think significant penalties from a Flash attack are out of game balance. Now, before someone freaks and writes a flame post about what happens when you get flashed, think about this. Flash does not impose penalties, but rather you have combat penalties when you no longer have a working targeting sense. You can flash my sight all day long, but if I have another targeting sense I can use then my CVs stay the same. By flashing balance you want to impose signigicant combat penalties without any recorse for the target character. Who buys a "backup" for balance? What is really being talked about here is a cheap drain, and I would thus disallow it if it was my campaign. I dont have problems with a power that disrupts the targets balance, but it needs to be purchased another way, probably through and adjustment power.

As for your alien with the ability to sense which way is "down" at a distance, thats a detect with range, defined as "detect spacial alignment". It would be nearly useless on a standard earth, but in a dimension jumping campagin perhaps it would be necessary.

[Sean Waters]

where a foe is.

Further, i think significant penalties from a Flash attack are out of game balance. Now, before someone freaks and writes a flame post about what happens when you get flashed, think about this. Flash does not impose penalties, but rather you have combat penalties when you no longer have a working targeting sense. You can flash my sight all day long, but if I have another targeting sense I can use then my CVs stay the same. By flashing balance you want to impose signigicant combat penalties without any recorse for the target character. Who buys a "backup" for balance? What is really being talked about here is a cheap drain, and I would thus disallow it if it was my campaign. I dont have problems with a power that disrupts the targets balance, but it needs to be purchased another way, probably through and adjustment power.


Excellent point. :)

[BNakagawa]

Just because the term 'sense' is often applied to balance doesn't mean there ought to be an option to flash this 'sense'.

Otherwise, I could just as easily flash your sense of wonder, your sense of security, your sense of timing, your sense of fair play or your sense of humor...

[The Hyborian]

Just because the term 'sense' is often applied to balance doesn't mean there ought to be an option to flash this 'sense'.

Otherwise, I could just as easily flash your sense of wonder, your sense of security, your sense of timing, your sense of fair play or your sense of humor...
lol

I flash your sense of comedic timing, no wisecracks for the rest of the fight. . .

[PhilFleischmann]

eh? Weren't you the guy suggesting no concentration powers at all, 1/2 ocv, -1 per rolls and half movement and on and on and on?

This is not a hose?
That was just an off-the-cuff suggestion of some possible effects, not that all of them should necessarily be applied and even those might be too harsh in retrospect. Isn't Flash vs. Sight a significant hose? 1/2 CV with ranged attacks, no seeing things, ro reading, etc.


Rather than inventing a brand new mechanic, why don't we use what we already have. We have rules for draining dexterity to 0 and below, don't we?
I'm not inventing a new mechanic. I'm using the existing mechanic for Flash and some other Sense-Affecting powers.

Another thought for blocked sense of balance:
-2 on Acrobatics and Breakfall rolls
Make a DEX Roll when making a ranged attack, failure=-2 OCV (waived if the target is stationary)
Similar DEX Roll required for certain fancy, acrobatic HtH attacks, like a handstand kick
Something similar for any situation where you have to lean without looking at the ground, such as to catch a thrown object or falling character.

I don't want a Flash vs. Balance to make someone dizzy, or to fall down, or to fall in some weird direction. Only the *sense* of balance is being blocked, which is not the same as actually losing one's balance. Though the former might contibute to the likelihood of the latter.

[PhilFleischmann]

The only reason I haven't given you rep for your recent posts on the topic is that I can't yet.
Likewise. I'm not sure why it's taking so long to reset, but I see you've gained quite a bit recently.


I see the whole Flash/Darkness issue as a denial of information, rather than a denial of bodily function (there, that much be what I'm trying to get at!). A Flash versus hunger doesn't deprive the target of any information, just a feeling. Sure, they won't know they are hungry, but for the purposes of game play, did they really need to know in the first place?
So do I. But Flash vs. Hunger *is* depriving you of information - as to how full your stomach is. And no, in game terms, that probably is of no importance at all, but so what? No one is forcing you to buy a power that isn't useful.


The thing with this is that Sense Affecting Powers that provide sensory input, or selectively remove it (Images and Invisibility) can't do crap for things like vestibular (btw, vestibular sense is the sense of balance) or kinesthetics.
Again, so what? Invisibility vs. Taste doesn't do anything either, unless someone tries to taste you. Just because not every HERO System Sense-Affecting Power makes sense to be used on the sense of balance doesn't mean the ones that do make sense can't be used.

And BTW, even Invisibility to Hunger could be used: If I'm invisible to hunger and a shark eats me, it won't feel satisfied afterwards. (That'll show him!) A bizarre, and not terribly useful, effect to be sure, but again, no one is forcing you to buy something that isn't useful.


An Image of the sensation of an arm moving about won't affect anyone unless someone in range of the Image has a sense that could detect kinesthetic sensations in others (and then the Images should be bought verses that unique/unusual sense and not kinesthetics).
That isn't the way I interpreted it. An Image causes a false sensation. If there's a visual image, I see it myself, I don't perceive others seeing it. If there's a tactile Image, I feel it myself, I don't perceive other's sense of touch. Likewise a kinesthetic Image would cause me to feel a sensation of my muscles moving, not others' muscles.


You can't use Shape Shift or Images or Invisibility to make someone feel something different about themselves.
(A quick aside: Shape Shift is not a Sense-Affecting power. Please let's not rehash that argument again!)
Again, so what? Those powers don't produce any sensory affect on another person. Image doesn't cause someone else to look different, smell different, or sound different either. Invisibility doesn't affect the perceiver in any of his regular senses either. And if you wanted to, couldn't you make, say, a visual Image over someone else's body to make them look different if you wanted them to?


Mental Illusions (with or without a Limitation depending upon what else the particular character can do with it) is one method.
OK, so what would the actual effect be of having the Mental Illusion of "I have no sense of balance"?


Another I like to use is Suppress STUN xd6, Instant. .... I usually equate the Stunned game mechanic for temporary vertigo, dissorientation or loss of balance or cooridination, which can be brought about by a number of methods.
This isn't what I'm talking about. I want a power that cause a loss of a sense, namely balance. Just because you lose your sense of balance doesn't mean you feel dizziness or vertigo, etc. It just means that those organs in your inner ear no longer provide information about your balance.


There is, of course, the Drain/Suppress DEX route, which brings with it the associated penalties for losing DEX. ....a 12d6 Suppress can rob a character of 14 points of DEX on average (-5 CV) ...
-14 DEX seems awefully harsh just for sense of balance. I think we get far more of our DEX and CV from our Sight and our higher brain functions, learning, practice and development of physical skill, and yes, some of it comes from the kinesthetic sense as well.

[PhilFleischmann]

Now, with balance, the issue is that it doesn't give you any information OUTSIDE of your own body. It just affects you, it does not sense other objects, even if you are touching them. As I said in my post, its an awareness, but not a sense. It doesn't tell you where a foe is.
I'd be inclined to say that balance already is targeting. It's extremely accurate in healthy adult humans. And it does detect information from outside the body, namely gravity.

When you come right down to it, no sense gives you information about the outside world - all senses take place within the body. Sight is just a reaction in the cells of your retina, taste is just a reaction of the cells in your taste buds, etc. It's your brain that then draws conclusions about the outside world.

And I don't see what's so important about the whole "inside the body/outside the body" distinction anyway. A sense is a sense. And there are medical case histories of all these senses being impaired or underdeveloped.


Flash does not impose penalties, but rather you have combat penalties when you no longer have a working targeting sense.
Well that's all I'm asking for.


You can flash my sight all day long, but if I have another targeting sense I can use then my CVs stay the same.
And a Flash vs. balance doesn't automatically make you dizzy and fall down. If you have another way of balancing yourself (such as sight), you don't have to fall.


I dont have problems with a power that disrupts the targets balance, but it needs to be purchased another way, probably through and adjustment power.
So how would you build it?

Just because certain HERO System constucts don't make sense with certain senses, either in the real world or with comic-book science, doesn't mean they can't be used in ways that do make sense. Flash vs. sense of balance makes sense, even if Invisibility to sense of balance doesn't.

[PhilFleischmann]

Isn't job number one to decide what effect not having a sense of balance should have and then modelling that?
Actually, that's two different jobs.

Job one is to decide what the effect of not having the sense is.
Job two is to decide if the sense should be allowed to be affected by Sense-Affecting powers.
If not, job three is to decide how to model the effects you got from job one.

If you decide that not having a sense of balance means that you must make a DEX Roll to avoid several different effects (-2 OCV for ranged attacks, -2 on Acrobatics and Breakfall, fall down when leaning without looking at the ground, etc.), how do you model all that with other powers?

Because I've decided in Job 2 to treat all senses as Senses, I don't have to do Job 3 at all! Which is good, because I've got enough to do already. And Job 3 is the hardest one.

[Sean Waters]

Actually, that's two different jobs.

Job one is to decide what the effect of not having the sense is.
Job two is to decide if the sense should be allowed to be affected by Sense-Affecting powers.
If not, job three is to decide how to model the effects you got from job one.

If you decide that not having a sense of balance means that you must make a DEX Roll to avoid several different effects (-2 OCV for ranged attacks, -2 on Acrobatics and Breakfall, fall down when leaning without looking at the ground, etc.), how do you model all that with other powers?

Because I've decided in Job 2 to treat all senses as Senses, I don't have to do Job 3 at all! Which is good, because I've got enough to do already. And Job 3 is the hardest one.


Well you can model it easy enough with negative skill levels and change environment (no area) you can negate with a DEX roll.

Mind you a DEX roll won't help if you lose your sense of balance: what you really need is the experience of working without it, or the smarts to work out where to but your limbs, so an INT/PER roll would work better.

Look up sense effecting powers 5ER 125: they limit, hinder or alter senses, nothing more. Losing vision gives you penalties because you can not percieve your opponent: in reality you'd probably fall over if you suddenly went blind, and didn't stand still, but that is not what the system does - the penalties imposed are the consequences of not being able to perceive a target or an aggressor, not the internal consequences of sudden inability to see. Losing touch (pi) should work the same.

[PhilFleischmann]

Look up sense effecting powers 5ER 125: they limit, hinder or alter senses, nothing more.
I know that. That's all I'm asking for. Maybe I'm not making myself clear. I feel like I'm repeating myself.

Not being able to see has an impact, right?
Not having a sense of balance also has an impact, right?

I've had bright lights flashed in my eyes before. They didn't cause me to fall down. I've also been in pitch darkness before. I didn't fall down then either. In both situations, I was still able to do stuff. It was a little more difficult because I couldn't see.

If an outfielder suddenly loses his sense of balance while trying to catch a fly ball, he's going to be hindered. He has to keep his eye on the ball, rather than on the ground. He may have to move backwards or lean backwards or sideways, etc. Without his sense of balance, he won't be able to tell when he's leaning too far to avoid falling over, since ha can't look at the ground, or his feet, at the same time as he looks at the ball.*

So if you disagree with Flash vs Balance, how would you build such a power? I don't think Suppress DEX or STUN does it. This is not a "Cause Dizziness/Vertigo" power, merely lose a sense temporarily.

*That gives me an idea of a sense that might compensate for a Flashed sense of balance: 360 degree vision. So he sees the ground and the ball at the same time.

[BNakagawa]

That was just an off-the-cuff suggestion of some possible effects, not that all of them should necessarily be applied and even those might be too harsh in retrospect. Isn't Flash vs. Sight a significant hose? 1/2 CV with ranged attacks, no seeing things, ro reading, etc.

Yes, it's limiting. It's also common enough that many characters and villains have powers and abilities that compensate, either partially or fully.



I'm not inventing a new mechanic. I'm using the existing mechanic for Flash and some other Sense-Affecting powers.

I disagree. To the extent that we're even discussing what flashing ones 'sense of balance' does, we're obviously inventing new mechanics. If it was simply using the standard flash mechanics, that part of the discussion would be over.




Another thought for blocked sense of balance:
-2 on Acrobatics and Breakfall rolls
Make a DEX Roll when making a ranged attack, failure=-2 OCV (waived if the target is stationary)
Similar DEX Roll required for certain fancy, acrobatic HtH attacks, like a handstand kick
Something similar for any situation where you have to lean without looking at the ground, such as to catch a thrown object or falling character.

I don't want a Flash vs. Balance to make someone dizzy, or to fall down, or to fall in some weird direction. Only the *sense* of balance is being blocked, which is not the same as actually losing one's balance. Though the former might contibute to the likelihood of the latter.

here, you prove my point.

[atlascott]

Why not buy it as Flash with a Modifer saying that it doesnt affect sight, but instead caused vertigo. A Special Effect (and therefore having no real rules implications) could be that the negative to hit modifiers, instead of being based on loss of sight, is due to vertigo and nausea.

If you want it to stop someone from moving, buy it as a dex drain instead.

[Basil]

{snip}
Perhaps the following could serve as a definition: Unless you could pay the points to make it a targeting sense, its not really a sense in game terms. I dont think you could have "Targeting Balance", (or targeting hunger, targeting need to pee, etc) so they are not senses, they are states of awareness.{snip}
Well, since Targeting Taste is not possible, and Smell can never be accurately Targeting, are they not senses? Or are you willing to "hand wave" the science? In that case, why not Targeting Balance?

After all, perhaps my alien-from-another-dimension character can tell what direction is down "way over yonder". Very helpful sense in an Escherverse. ;)
Why cant smell be a targeting sense? You just have to pay the points to make it targeting. If I am playing Captain Grizzly, avenger of the wilderness, I think he might have smell so sensitive that I can target with it. Its just a matter of playing the points.

As for Taste, the problem is that taste is no range in its default state. You have to touch something with your tounge to taste it. Pay the points for range and you can taste from across the room. Weird FX probably, but you can do it. Pay some more points and your ranged taste is so sensitive you can target with it.
Sigh
That's what I get for being clever. Please, re-read what I said, assuming I'm being satirical.

Yep, that's it. My statement "since Targeting Taste is not possible, and Smell can never be accurately Targeting," while it is true in a "realistic" setting, is (as a general rule) completely arbitrary.

So is saying you can't pay for Targeting for Balance, etc. There is nothing in the rules, *nor in an unfettered imagination* that forces non-Targetability on Balance. If you don't want Targeting Balance, fine. But please stop assuming your preferences have to limit my imagination.


Now, with balance, the issue is that it doesn't give you any information OUTSIDE of your own body.
God, can people please stop saying this? It's utterly WRONG. In fact, it doesn't give me any information about what's inside my body, ONLY what's outside it.


It just affects you, it does not sense other objects, even if you are touching them.
Wrong. It senses any significantly large mass. With Discriminatory (or, arguably, with sufficient plusses to PER), it can sense irregularities in the gravity field (MasCons). As well, in a Science Fiction setting it may sense artificial gravity generators (if there are such)


As I said in my post, its an awareness, but not a sense. It doesn't tell you where a foe is.
If my foe is microscopic, Normal Sight won't tell me where he is; that doesn't mean Normal Sight isn't a sense. On the flip side, a Sense of Balance with Discriminatory, or even a sufficient number of plusses to PER could tell you where your foe is. Indeed, this is the only reasonable explanation for Spatial Awareness I've ever encountered (from a semi-realistic/preserve verisimilatude point-of-view)---well, that or a highly sensitive Magnetic Sense.
Perhaps it would be clearer to you if you considered humans to have, innately, major-league minuses on Balance PER Rolls. Thus, we get only the crudest information, and are capable of sensing only largish masses. More sensitive creatures, and machines, can sense more clearly; some can even use it to locate (potential) foes.


{snip}By flashing balance you want to impose signigicant combat penalties without any recorse for the target character.
That is an unwarrented assumption.


As for your alien with the ability to sense which way is "down" at a distance, thats a detect with range, defined as "detect spacial alignment". It would be nearly useless on a standard earth, but in a dimension jumping campagin perhaps it would be necessary.
You can define it that way if you want. However, I can define Senses as Detects for all the "Big Five" senses. That doesn't mean it's the best way to do things.

[atlascott]

Actually, that's two different jobs.

Job one is to decide what the effect of not having the sense is.
Job two is to decide if the sense should be allowed to be affected by Sense-Affecting powers.
If not, job three is to decide how to model the effects you got from job one.



I have to disagree. I think you are making this needlessly complicated, though I appreciate your detailed and interesting posts on the topic. We can argue academically what senses innner-ear sensation provides us. If that is what you are interested in doing, take a class at the local university. But for game terms, what do you want the power to do? If you really dont care WHAT combat or game effect it has, you can just call it a power effect of any other power and define it as "inner ear equilibrium disruption." Nausea or whatever effect you want to define that has no effect on anything is a free power effect.

If you DO want it to have some impact on the game, then it is up to YOU to decide what game effect you want it to have. Another person modeling the exact same effect may choose a different route, a different power to emulate an effect on inner ear equilibrium. Neither route is wrong or right, assuming it complies with the rules.

The "sense" of balance does not provide you information about the outside world in a useful cognitive sense, like sight or hearing does, for example. It merely allows us to keep our balance. So IMO, HERO does not need to imclude 'sense of balance' as a sense. It is a sense in a sense but not in the sense you suggest.

You could build an entire hero whose ONLY powers derives from disrupting inner ear equilibrium. Or you could build one for whom it is a minor power effect. Neither is right or wrong or more correct. That is a strength of the system.

[The Hyborian]

Not being able to see has an impact, right?
Not having a sense of balance also has an impact, right?



A subtle point is being missed here. Actually, not being able to see has NO GAME MECHANIC IMPACT on combat, unless sight is your only targeting sense. If my character has passive sonar as a targeting sense, and you flash my sight, I am still at full combat value. You have to flash both sight and passive sonar, THUS REMOVING ALL MY TARGETING SENSES, to give me CV penalties. Flashing "balance" would not give me a penalty in combat, because I was not using "balance" to target you in the first place. All flash does IN MECHANICAL TERMS is temporarily prevent a character from using a sense to target.

I think buying this kind of attack as a flash is a way to get a drain or transform around a target's power defense. Who is going to by flash defense for their "balance" when they build a character? No one. Basically Its a NND that costs no points, and that is unfair and unbalanced. That doesn't mean that you cant have balancing affecting powers, but I would see it as a drain, or perhaps a transform.

[The Hyborian]

[So is saying you can't pay for Targeting for Balance, etc. There is nothing in the rules, *nor in an unfettered imagination* that forces non-Targetability on Balance. If you don't want Targeting Balance, fine. But please stop assuming your preferences have to limit my imagination.[QUOTE]
Well, you could buy some kind of detect, define it being related to balance, put it in the unusual sense group, and then buy targeting for it. I still do not see how my ability to walk on a balance beam would tell me where anyone else in the room is. I would suggest that you cant just pay the points for targeting on balance without buying it as a detect first.

[QUOTE]God, can people please stop saying this? It's utterly WRONG. In fact, it doesn't give me any information about what's inside my body, ONLY what's outside it.[QUOTE]

Explain to me how your sense of balance lets you tell where your enemy in combat is and I will stop saying it. I do not see how balance gives you any information other than about your body and its orientation in space. If you put on a blindfold and use your blance you get ZERO information about MY body's orientation in space, or which side your about to be attacked from.


[QUOTE}Wrong. It senses any significantly large mass. With Discriminatory (or, arguably, with sufficient plusses to PER), it can sense irregularities in the gravity field (MasCons). As well, in a Science Fiction setting it may sense artificial gravity generators (if there are such)[QUOTE]

OK, if your are being attacked by a planet sized object, I would allow you to use your balance as a targeting sense. Still doesn't do squat about that ninja sneaking up on you.


[QUOTE]If my foe is microscopic, Normal Sight won't tell me where he is; that doesn't mean Normal Sight isn't a sense. On the flip side, a Sense of Balance with Discriminatory, or even a sufficient number of plusses to PER could tell you where your foe is. Indeed, this is the only reasonable explanation for Spatial Awareness I've ever encountered (from a semi-realistic/preserve verisimilatude point-of-view)---well, that or a highly sensitive Magnetic Sense.
Perhaps it would be clearer to you if you considered humans to have, innately, major-league minuses on Balance PER Rolls. Thus, we get only the crudest information, and are capable of sensing only largish masses. More sensitive creatures, and machines, can sense more clearly; some can even use it to locate (potential) foes.[QUOTE]

Ok, I see where you are going with this, but what you are talking about here is a superpower, a detect defined as the ability to sense objects by registering the minor changes in gravity the generate. Well and good,thats a perfectly fine special effect for a detect. BUT, its not something most people could do. And if my character does not have that power, I think its its unfair for you to get a combat advantage by flashing my balance. As I have said in a couple of other posts, the combat effect from flash comes from using flash to take away a targeting sense. If I have another targeting sense, I might have a slight disadvantage related to the sense loss, like not being able to tell colors if my sight has been flashed, but my CVs stay the same. There is not MECHANICAL effect from the flash as long as I have a targeting sense up and running.

Now, by imposing penalties from a balance flash you have turned flash into a drain of sort, one that will almost never encounter a target with a defense against it. Who has ever built a character with a flash defense for their balance? People have talked about things like 1/2DCV and no concentation powers for the effect to this. That hugely unbalancing to give that effect to a flash power, one that one one will have defences to, and in one that will take effect even if the target has another targeting sense. As I have said before, I dont object to the concept of a balance affecting power, I object to the mechanical way it is being imposed. This is either a drain or a major transform.


[QUOTE]That is an unwarrented assumption.[QUOTE]

Well, if you want a flash that doesn't impose combat penalties, then I guess you can have as much as you would like. I would suggest 11d6. My assumption was that you would like the flash to do something to the target.

[QUOTE}You can define it that way if you want. However, I can define Senses as Detects for all the "Big Five" senses. That doesn't mean it's the best way to do things.

Actually, its the only way to do it, at least that I can think of. If you want a power that can give you information over range about things a typical person can not sesne, thats pretty much a ranged detect. What other rule would you purchase it under? You can call it whatever you want in terms of Fx, But I can not think of another standard rule that would let you sense spacial orientation over range.

[The Hyborian]

HUMM, major formating boo-boo in above post. Sorry if its hard to read. Im a rules lawyer, not a computer geek.

The Hyborian

[Basil]

HUMM, major formating boo-boo in above post. Sorry if its hard to read. Im a rules lawyer, not a computer geek.

The Hyborian
You need to put a slash after the first "[" and before the "quote]" to end a quotation block. Also, you said "[quote}" a couple of times --- with a "}" instead of a "]"
:)

[Basil]

So is saying you can't pay for Targeting for Balance, etc. There is nothing in the rules, *nor in an unfettered imagination* that forces non-Targetability on Balance. If you don't want Targeting Balance, fine. But please stop assuming your preferences have to limit my imagination.
Well, you could buy some kind of detect, define it being related to balance, put it in the unusual sense group, and then buy targeting for it. I still do not see how my ability to walk on a balance beam would tell me where anyone else in the room is.
Because you haven't bought Targeting for your Balance. My character has, so he can tell where others are.


God, can people please stop saying this? It's utterly WRONG. In fact, it doesn't give me any information about what's inside my body, ONLY what's outside it.
Explain to me how your sense of balance lets you tell where your enemy in combat is and I will stop saying it.Because I bought Targeting for my character's Balance.

I do not see how balance gives you any information other than about your body and its orientation in space. If you put on a blindfold and use your blance you get ZERO information about MY body's orientation in space, or which side your about to be attacked from.That's because humans don't have Targeting for the Sense of Balance.


Wrong. It senses any significantly large mass. With Discriminatory (or, arguably, with sufficient plusses to PER), it can sense irregularities in the gravity field (MasCons). As well, in a Science Fiction setting it may sense artificial gravity generators (if there are such)
OK, if your are being attacked by a planet sized object, I would allow you to use your balance as a targeting sense. Still doesn't do squat about that ninja sneaking up on you.
And what about when my character has Targeting on his Sense of Balance? Then he can detect the ninja.


If my foe is microscopic, Normal Sight won't tell me where he is; that doesn't mean Normal Sight isn't a sense. On the flip side, a Sense of Balance with Discriminatory, or even a sufficient number of plusses to PER could tell you where your foe is. Indeed, this is the only reasonable explanation for Spatial Awareness I've ever encountered (from a semi-realistic/preserve verisimilatude point-of-view)---well, that or a highly sensitive Magnetic Sense.
Perhaps it would be clearer to you if you considered humans to have, innately, major-league minuses on Balance PER Rolls. Thus, we get only the crudest information, and are capable of sensing only largish masses. More sensitive creatures, and machines, can sense more clearly; some can even use it to locate (potential) foes.
Ok, I see where you are going with this,
No, clearly you don't. I am showing that all your objections to Balance as a Sense that are based on the lack of fine discrimination, are nonsensical objections since the same objection can be leveled against Taste, Touch---hell, all the non-Targeting (in humans) senses, to some degree.

but what you are talking about here is a superpower, a detect defined as the ability to sense objects by registering the minor changes in gravity the generate. Well and good,thats a perfectly fine special effect for a detect. BUT, its not something most people could do.
Most people can't Taste at a distance. Does that mean Taste isn't a sense? Does it mean I have to cobble together a Detect if my character can taste at a distance?
If you answer "no" to those two questions, then your only "defense" against calling Balance a sense is "It's not in the book".

And if my character does not have that power, I think its its unfair for you to get a combat advantage by flashing my balance.
Which power? Targeting Balance? Why should having that defend against a Flash vs. Balance?
Or do you mean Flash Defense for Balance? If your character doesn't have Flash Defense for Hearing, how is my having a Flash vs. Hearing "unfair"?

As I have said in a couple of other posts, the combat effect from flash comes from using flash to take away a targeting sense. If I have another targeting sense, I might have a slight disadvantage related to the sense loss, like not being able to tell colors if my sight has been flashed, but my CVs stay the same. There is not MECHANICAL effect from the flash as long as I have a targeting sense up and running.

Now, by imposing penalties from a balance flash you have turned flash into a drain of sort, one that will almost never encounter a target with a defense against it. Who has ever built a character with a flash defense for their balance? People have talked about things like 1/2DCV and no concentation powers for the effect to this. That hugely unbalancing to give that effect to a flash power, one that one one will have defences to, and in one that will take effect even if the target has another targeting sense. As I have said before, I dont object to the concept of a balance affecting power, I object to the mechanical way it is being imposed. This is either a drain or a major transform.
I can only repeat what I said before:
That is an unwarrented assumption.
More accurately, it is a series of unwarrented assumptions. I.e., it is a Straw Man. Have fun knocking it down, but you fool no-one into thinking you've supported your point.

Well, if you want a flash that doesn't impose combat penalties, then I guess you can have as much as you would like. I would suggest 11d6. My assumption was that you would like the flash to do something to the target.
Yes, I do. Something comparable to the effects of a Flash vs. Hearing, or Sight. Minuses to DCV, OCV, etc.
IOW, a Flash to one Sense (Balance) is commeasurable with a Flash to another Sense (say, Hearing). Simple. What is so hard to understand about that?

Actually, its the only way to do it, at least that I can think of. If you want a power that can give you information over range about things a typical person can not sesne,
What about "that way feels down" can a typical person not sense? And don't say "which way is down over there", because that's what the Targeting is for.

thats pretty much a ranged detect. What other rule would you purchase it under? You can call it whatever you want in terms of Fx, But I can not think of another standard rule that would let you sense spacial orientation over range.
#1) The lack of a "standard rule" is the point. The Sense Groups as currently written are lacking a clearly needed Sense. So, let's add it. Proclaiming "it doesn't exist, therefore it cannot exist" is "argument from authority", which is garbage.
#2) I'm afraid we've hit an impass. It seems to me you are assuming Balance can never be a sense, and your "proofs" are merely showing that your POV is logically consistant. Which is fine in its way, but no reason to accept your prefences as requirements. IOW, I don't think there's any point to my responding further to your posts on this subject. You can keep Begging the Question; I'll limit my responses to those less illogical and bullheaded.

[atlascott]

Basil, buddy.

Why can't I buy sense of strength as a targeting sense? Then my sense of strength would let me target enemies? Or why not buy sense of honor as a targeting sense?

Same reasons. Because a sense of balance and a sense of honor are not senses in the same way as sight smell or touch are. A "sense" of balance allows you to stand and balance yourself. A "sense" of honor means you play by the rules. But neither provide cognitive information about the outside world. You need a sense of sight to tell up from down--a "sense" of balance just allows you to stand up!

Take it another way--we see because light enters our eyes, things reflect light differently, and our brain interprets the differences as shapes and movement. WE hear because sound molecules bounce off one another and vibrate a seneitive peice of skin in our ear which our brain interprets as sound. Through what mechanism does one sense anything other than in-balance/out-of-balance with one's sense of balance? By what means would any discrimination beyond that occur?

[Sean Waters]

I know that. That's all I'm asking for. Maybe I'm not making myself clear. I feel like I'm repeating myself.

Not being able to see has an impact, right?
Not having a sense of balance also has an impact, right?

I've had bright lights flashed in my eyes before. They didn't cause me to fall down. I've also been in pitch darkness before. I didn't fall down then either. In both situations, I was still able to do stuff. It was a little more difficult because I couldn't see.

If an outfielder suddenly loses his sense of balance while trying to catch a fly ball, he's going to be hindered. He has to keep his eye on the ball, rather than on the ground. He may have to move backwards or lean backwards or sideways, etc. Without his sense of balance, he won't be able to tell when he's leaning too far to avoid falling over, since ha can't look at the ground, or his feet, at the same time as he looks at the ball.*

So if you disagree with Flash vs Balance, how would you build such a power? I don't think Suppress DEX or STUN does it. This is not a "Cause Dizziness/Vertigo" power, merely lose a sense temporarily.

*That gives me an idea of a sense that might compensate for a Flashed sense of balance: 360 degree vision. So he sees the ground and the ball at the same time.

Hi, Phil. Tetchy thread, eh? :)

I understand what you are saying about operating in the dark without falling over, but I'm willing to bet you either stood still or moved very slowly, i.e. went non-combat. If you were trying to dodge and duck and maybe even attack someone then you'd probably fall over pretty quickly. Same with a loss of sense of balance. If you stand perfectly still or move very carefully you can scrub around it.

I think that Hero lacks some basic powers at the moment: suffocation being a point discussed recently - how do you do that? USPD says use change environment, and that is probably how I would do a vertigo-type too - it is the only power in the book that allows you to make an opponent make a roll or fall down, so it seems appropriate for a vertigo-type power too. You can also use it to impose penalties to combat and skill rolls.

I'm using 'vertigo-type' here in a non technical sense: just to hang a label on the effect of losing your sense of balance. :)

If you wanted to you could link it to a flash effect and define it as only working as long as the flash 'damage' is in effect, or make it uncontrolled and function for (say) 6 segments with a limitation that an appropriate flash defence prevents the power working or reduces duration.

[Silbeg]

I figure This would mess any one up pretty bad as any one who has had an iner ear infection would attest.

Would this be in Touch Group, Hearing Group, or Unique Group?
What would be the effects?

I figure this would be good for Gravtational, Subsonics, bioelectrical, or mental powers.
Ok, I admit I am skipping most of the responses, but I figured I would just chime in, anyways.

I created a power like this very recently for a player who described his ability of "Sumo Yell" as attack that causes deafness and loss of balance...



22 Sumo Yell: (Total: 44 Active Cost, 22 Real Cost)
Hearing Group Flash 8d6 (24 Active Points); No Range (-1/2),
Requires A Brick Tricks Roll (-1/2) (Real Cost: 12)
plus Drain DEX 2d6 (20 Active Points);
Linked (Compound Power; Lesser Power can only be used when
character uses greater Power at full value; -3/4),
Limited Power Only Affects Target if Flash Affects Target (-1/4)
(Real Cost: 10)


Since a person's balance is affected by the inner ear, this seemed appropriate.

[Dust Raven]

Says who?
Oh sure, he could determine the correct down, by seeing which way things fall. And someone seeing a tiger charging him, that makes no sound and does not bend the grass under itself, can determine it's an Image. Which is irrelevant to where Sight is a sense or not.
Similarly for the sense of Balance.


What is light? It's (to simplify) photons. Does an Image of a laser swinging around and coming to point at your face cause burns? In HeroSystem, no; you need another power to do that. The fact that you need TK or some such to make a character "fall" does not mean Balance is not a sense.


No, TK makes the character move in some direction. Balance tells him which way is "down". I can have a TK that moves someone without him perceiving that direction is "down"; I see no reason to forbid an Image of "down" that doesn't move the target.


You can certainly declare that's what "down" means, but that's pretty much assuming that which you are trying prove.
If "down" is defined as the direction a being feels, then the perception and the effect of gravity can be separated.
To sum up...

The problem is that you are not detecting "down", you are detecting the pull of gravity. You just can't sense anything else as such unless it also pulls, and feels like gravity. TK can do this, and the "feeling" is just part of the SFX. A Sense Affecting Power cannot pull, and can never acheive this effect.


And don't forget, Balance not only tells you which way is "down", but also which way you are undergoing accelerated movement. That is why "getting dizzy" is an effect of the sense of Balance.
Getting dizzy is easily written off as an SFX of being Stunned, or of losing STUN. This are already game mechanics present in the system and need not be duplicated.


Well, if you want to engage is such whimsy, I will be the last person to gainsay you. I'm given to extremes of whimsy, myself. ;)
However, it's totally moot, since the sense of Balance can't detect individuals anyway, so they're essentially invisible to Balance to begin with. Rather in the way that a bacterium is essentially invisible to normal Sight.
It is whimsy, but in my opinion there shouldn't a mechanic present just to satisfy a player's whimsy.



Two points:
1) I'm not sure the "perceive the environment" requirement should be adhered to with total rigor. In the case of Kinesthesia, the usefulness of treating it as a sense outweighs any inflexible "environment vs internal state" rule. I agree though that Hunger, Thirst, etc. are better left out of any expanded list of senses
Maybe it should, maybe it shouldn't. However, so far is has been by the current rules for Senses. I'm suggesting that any new senses continue with that trend, as that was seems to be the purpose for those rules.

2) I'm afraid your second qualification can be met, easily, if one is willing to. Your (and others) refusal to, does not show it can't be done, merely that you're unwilling to.

Which is your right, of course.
Anything can be done to the rules if one is willing to. but that doesn't make such a rule necessary or applicable.

[PhilFleischmann]

A subtle point is being missed here. Actually, not being able to see has NO GAME MECHANIC IMPACT on combat, unless sight is your only targeting sense. If my character has passive sonar as a targeting sense, and you flash my sight, I am still at full combat value. You have to flash both sight and passive sonar, THUS REMOVING ALL MY TARGETING SENSES, to give me CV penalties. Flashing "balance" would not give me a penalty in combat, because I was not using "balance" to target you in the first place. All flash does IN MECHANICAL TERMS is temporarily prevent a character from using a sense to target.
Incorrect. It also prevents you from reading, distinguishing colors, etc., IOW, all the things that sight specifically allows you to do. Let's see you cut the red wire and not the blue wire with just your passive sonar before the bomb goes off. I think you're missing a subtle point here (though I didn't think it was all that subtle myself, and I certainly didn't mean it to be): There are other impacts of the loss of a sense besides combat targeting. There are several published characters that have Flash vs. Hearing or other senses that are not normally targeting.

I do not claim that a loss of sense of balance must give a penalty in combat. That was the whole point of this thread. It *might* give penalties in combat, or it might do something else. What you you think it would do? The sense of balance is a real sense, and its temporary loss would do something.


I think buying this kind of attack as a flash is a way to get a drain or transform around a target's power defense. Who is going to by flash defense for their "balance" when they build a character? No one. Basically Its a NND that costs no points, and that is unfair and unbalanced. That doesn't mean that you cant have balancing affecting powers, but I would see it as a drain, or perhaps a transform.
I don't know if you've been actually reading my posts, so I'll say this again: I am not looking for a power that drains characteristics (Drain) or causes unblockable STUN damage (NND); I'm talking ablout a power that blocks a sense, in this case, the sense of balance.

[PhilFleischmann]

I have to disagree. I think you are making this needlessly complicated,
Actually, I'm making it quite simple. Balance is a sense. There is an existing power for temporarily disrupting senses: Flash. Therefore, to temporarily disrupt a target's sense of balance, use Flash vs. Balance. Is this brain surgery?


We can argue academically what senses innner-ear sensation provides us.
But we don't need to do that, because we already know.


But for game terms, what do you want the power to do? If you really dont care WHAT combat or game effect it has, you can just call it a power effect of any other power and define it as "inner ear equilibrium disruption." Nausea or whatever effect you want to define that has no effect on anything is a free power effect.
This is not about "reasoning from effects". That isn't my point at all. I'm trying to determine what are the effects of a real-world scenario. What I want the power to do is simulate in game terms the loss of sense of balance. What those game term effects are is open to debate. I don't claim to fully know what they are. I've made a few suggestions and am open to reading others. I am not talking about an "induce nausea" power, or an "induce dizziness" power.

Maybe an analogy would make it clearer: AFAIK, there is no official game mechanic write-up for AIDS - the actual effects of AIDS on a character. If I wanted to come up with one, and I asked for suggestions on these boards, it doesn't help me at all for people to say, "What effect do you want?" The effect I want is as realistic an effect as possible. Someone else might say, "It's a Physical Limitation." Again, this would be of no help. What are the actual game effects of that Physical Limitation?

AIDS is a real disease in the real world which has a real effect on real people.
Balance is a real sense in the real world which, if disrupted would have a real effect. The question is: what is that real effect, in game terms? Simply blocking the signals of the nerves in the inner ear would not cause dizziness or nausea. It would only prevent the person from sensing balance. Hence: Flash.

[Dust Raven]

I don't want a Flash vs. Balance to make someone dizzy, or to fall down, or to fall in some weird direction. Only the *sense* of balance is being blocked, which is not the same as actually losing one's balance. Though the former might contibute to the likelihood of the latter.

So you want to be able to take away someone's sense of balance without them losing it? :think:

[Dust Raven]

That isn't the way I interpreted it. An Image causes a false sensation. If there's a visual image, I see it myself, I don't perceive others seeing it. If there's a tactile Image, I feel it myself, I don't perceive other's sense of touch. Likewise a kinesthetic Image would cause me to feel a sensation of my muscles moving, not others' muscles.

I think I see why we aren't connecting here. At least in part. We interpret the Sense Affecting Powers differently. The way I understand them, and assume the majority of Herodom does as well, is thus: They either provide or remove information about the enviornment by adding to or subtracting from information gained through a character's senses. None of them change or alter any aspect of the characters involved. If there's an image of a slimy blob placed around character A, character A won't feel slimy, he'll feel something slimy covering/enveloping him. Likewise, if you were to use kinethetics as a sense in Hero and created an image of arms moving about around character A, character A wouldn't feel a thing, because he's arms are doing exactly what he wants them to and won't be confused by the image any more than he would if there was an invisible character B there moving his arms about instead of an image.

You are free to interpret the rules as you see fit, but the above is how I do it because I believe it makes more sense.



(A quick aside: Shape Shift is not a Sense-Affecting power. Please let's not rehash that argument again!)
Technicalities! ;)

Again, so what? Those powers don't produce any sensory affect on another person. Image doesn't cause someone else to look different, smell different, or sound different either. Invisibility doesn't affect the perceiver in any of his regular senses either. And if you wanted to, couldn't you make, say, a visual Image over someone else's body to make them look different if you wanted them to?
According to your agrument earlier concerning making someone think that "down" is different than normal, they would. According what you've just said, you have just invalidated those examples.



OK, so what would the actual effect be of having the Mental Illusion of "I have no sense of balance"?
Whatever the player and GM agreed upon as being the effect would be the effect. Mental Illusions is quite flexible. You might as well have asked what the effect of being on fire would be.



This isn't what I'm talking about. I want a power that cause a loss of a sense, namely balance. Just because you lose your sense of balance doesn't mean you feel dizziness or vertigo, etc. It just means that those organs in your inner ear no longer provide information about your balance.
I'm a little confused as to exactly what you want here, and how it would apply at this point. I'll read your posts after this one I'm replying to and see if it becomes more clear.



-14 DEX seems awefully harsh just for sense of balance. I think we get far more of our DEX and CV from our Sight and our higher brain functions, learning, practice and development of physical skill, and yes, some of it comes from the kinesthetic sense as well.
Not necessarily. I've never known anyone without a sense of balance, even temporily. The dizziness alone could account for an immediate drop to 0 or less DEX. Even with a single point of DEX you can still stand up and move normally, you'd just have touble moving accurately at high speed. That's not dizzy, that's clumsy, which has nothing to do with being dizzy or having a lack of a sense of balance.

[Dust Raven]

Likewise. I'm not sure why it's taking so long to reset, but I see you've gained quite a bit recently.

I see that too. It usually comes in large spurts. Nothing for two or three months, then BAM and suddenly I'm repped by everyone for one reason or another and I gain another little green box. I try to spread it back but the boards won't let me. I think I'll just have to start repping people at random just to "spread" enough to make the message board gods happy...

[Dust Raven]

Now, with balance, the issue is that it doesn't give you any information OUTSIDE of your own body.

God, can people please stop saying this? It's utterly WRONG. In fact, it doesn't give me any information about what's inside my body, ONLY what's outside it.

Well, technically, you are wrong as well. the sense of balance, if it senses anything at all, detects a force applied to the body and nothing more. It's used to determe motion and orientation and applies outside of a gravity well (ask any astronaught).

The question is, what's this "force" then? It's nothing but Newtonian physics in motion (pun intended ;)).

To follow up on Phil's job list:
Job one turns out to be the most complicated. Obviously the effects of losing the sense of balance would be to not be able to detect these forces. The questions then is: What would that do? It's that answer that can't be answered simply because it all depends on what the force is doing and how it's being applied. Turning around is different that walking forward, which is different that standing up, which is different than "knowing" which way is down... but it's all in those vestibulars and it's all the same sense.
Job two, at least in my opinion, is a no brainer. Vestibular sense can't be affected by Sense-Affecting Powers. Vestibular doesn't act like other senses, isn't used like other senses, and the things it detects aren't nebulous information subject to interpretation, but rather kinetic and potential energy. These are best simulated through other Powers, such as TK (great for that motion effect).
Job three is obviously up to debate, as none of us can agree on what the loss of balance would exactly do, at least in game mechanics, but at least most of those who have tried have come up with a working solution rather quickly, so it's hardly a difficult task.

[Dust Raven]

First, sorry to everybody for the sudden massive posting... I've just moved and it was horrible and I just got my internet back and... and... I guess I'll continue my post now...


Balance is a real sense in the real world which, if disrupted would have a real effect. The question is: what is that real effect, in game terms?

Pain is a real sense in the reas world, which, if disrupted would have a real effect. Just as real as sight, hearing and balance. That doesn't mean you should be able to Flash it. Removal of the pain sense would pretty much mean the character won't take STUN anymore, or at least won't take STUN damage cause by the effects of pain. I seriously hope you don't think you can Flash pain, or create an Image of pain, or be Invisible to Pain, or have Discriminaroty, Analyse x100 Rapid pain with Range and Targeting.

[The Hyborian]

Incorrect. It also prevents you from reading, distinguishing colors, etc., IOW, all the things that sight specifically allows you to do. Let's see you cut the red wire and not the blue wire with just your passive sonar before the bomb goes off. I think you're missing a subtle point here (though I didn't think it was all that subtle myself, and I certainly didn't mean it to be): There are other impacts of the loss of a sense besides combat targeting. There are several published characters that have Flash vs. Hearing or other senses that are not normally targeting.

I don't know if you've been actually reading my posts, so I'll say this again: I am not looking for a power that drains characteristics (Drain) or causes unblockable STUN damage (NND); I'm talking ablout a power that blocks a sense, in this case, the sense of balance.

Quite correct. What I should have said is that it does not have an effect on your Combat Values.

As for loosing your sense of balance, Im not sure what effect it could have other than penalites to movement and targeting. Balance keeps you oriented in space, and messing with it should have some negative penalites. But, flash is the wrong tool to simulate this. If you flash my blance, I cant target with it, which I probably was not doing in the first place (except for Basil of course). To impose combat penalites beyond that exceeds the mandate of what the flash power does. And if the power has no effect beyond removing balance as a targeting sense, then you have paid points for an attack that makes your target a little woozy, but has no real game effect.

You ask "what would this do?" The real question is "what would you want it do?" The heart and soul of Hero is that the powers are FX independant. Think of what you want your attack to do, and then choose the power(s) that best represent it. Its totally up to you what disruption of balance would do to someone. Thats because disruption of balance is a Fx, not a power or game mechanic. Don't think in terms of "what would happen if I flashed balance?" Thats a game mechanic effect. Decide what your special effect would do, then look at some other powers to simulate it.

[atlascott]

What if I wanted to make "Hunger Boy," whose tremendous 'sense' of hunger gave him superhuman powers. HUNGER IS A SENSE. End of story. You are an infantile monkey with a speech impediment if you do not agree.

So he could close his eyes and fight bad guys with this superhuman sense of hunger. He could shoot his hunger energy blast at whoever and make them hungry. He could mind control people and make them hungry. He could eat 20x his body weight in 10 minutes (probably a Tranform).

This character conception is 100% within the rules.

But, he would STILL need to define his "hunger sense" according to the rules--ie., fit hunger sense into the rules. Does his hunger send undulations in the space-time continuum, which bounce back to his massive belly, and THAT is how he senses the location of his enemies? Active sonar. Does others' hunger emit energy that bounce off his bulbous belly? Passive sonar. Get the idea? A sense in the game which cannot do what you want it to do inherently can only be defined as either extending the sense in a rational way, or by defining it using the other HERO system Powers.

A "sense" of balance helps keep your balance. If you extend the "sense" of balance, you buy more DEX or something. No additional amount of DEX is going to allow the "sense" of balance to help you perceive things outside your body, other than the direction of the gravitational pull. So, build Balance Boy or Hunger Boy, but if you really want to build him according to the rules, and he is going to sense enemies (ie, make his 'sense of hunger' or 'sense of balance' targeting), then he must build them by buying existing sense powers and simply defining them as balance sense--but built with, eg, sonar, etc.

And, Basil, by REFUSING to define what GAME EFFECT you want your "block sense of balance" power to have, you ask the unanswerable question. Because determining game effect is EXACTLY how you are supposed to build and balance characters in the HERO system.

Or, if Balance Boy's "block balance" power does nothing, he gets that power for free. Because it has no game effect.

[Basil]

{snip}
TK makes the character move in some direction. Balance tells him which way is "down". I can have a TK that moves someone without him perceiving that direction is "down"; I see no reason to forbid an Image of "down" that doesn't move the target.

If "down" is defined as the direction a being feels, then the perception and the effect of gravity can be separated.

To sum up...

The problem is that you are not detecting "down", you are detecting the pull of gravity.
No, you are detecting a sensation which may as well be called "down". Just as you are detecting a sensation of "light" or "noise". Such a separation between what may or may not be "out there," and the action of sensing must be made, or the Power Metal Illusions becomes impossible. If I can make a Mental Illusion of it, then there has to be a damned good reason why I can't make an Image of it. BTW, 5th Ed p.130 specifically mentions "...the target's sense of balance..." And in all the examples of Mental Illusions on that and the preceeding page there is not one, that, I bet, anyone here would deny could be done with Images, save those who who do not accept Balance as a sense.


You just can't sense anything else as such unless it also pulls, and feels like gravity.
I think we need to review the mechanism of the sense of balance.
The sense of Balance comes from the Semi-circular Canals; a set of three semi-circular tubes next to each cochlea. The three tubes are set at roughly right angles to each other. Each fluid-filled tube is lined with "hairs" and contains a small "stone". As that stone moves, the hairs are brushed against, and report the stone's movements. The primary force moving the stones most of the time is gravity, but the centrifugal effect, and acceleration, can also move them. Thus, one does not detect "the pull of gravity"; one detects the sum of all forces/effects on 6 little bits of grit in the inner ear. This usually reflects the force of gravity; when one is in motion, other forces and effects are detected.
As with all senses, false detection and non-detection can occur. For instance, various diseases can interfere with balance; indeed, many times a high fever will do so. As well, Mental Illusions can substitute a "lie" for the true report of the semi-circular canals. Why, therefore, cannot an Image do so? Why cannot a Flash, or a Darkness act against those nerve impulses?
That a Darkness or a Flash to the sense of Sight can be caused completely externally to the body does not mean they cannot be caused by interfering with the nerve impulses: after all, isn't "interfering with the nerves/brain" the classic explanation for a mentalist's Flash or Darkness?
Thus, the idea that one could cause an effect to the nerve impulses thereby creating a Flash or Darkness (or Image) to the Sense of Balance cannot be dismissed out of hand.



Two points:
1) I'm not sure the "perceive the environment" requirement should be adhered to with total rigor. In the case of Kinesthesia, the usefulness of treating it as a sense outweighs any inflexible "environment vs internal state" rule. I agree though that Hunger, Thirst, etc. are better left out of any expanded list of senses.
Maybe it should, maybe it shouldn't. However, so far is has been by the current rules for Senses. I'm suggesting that any new senses continue with that trend, as that was seems to be the purpose for those rules.

I would say the purpose of any new sense is to better model those aspect of the real world that have (A) an effect in game and (B) are most simply, clearly, and intuitively modeled by Senses in game-language terms. I think Kinesthesia falls into the category, but I admit I fell far less strongly about that than about the Sense of Balance.




2) I'm afraid your second qualification can be met, easily, if one is willing to. Your (and others) refusal to, does not show it can't be done, merely that you're unwilling to.

Which is your right, of course.
Anything can be done to the rules if one is willing to. but that doesn't make such a rule necessary or applicable.
True, but I think adding another Sense is an inherently simpler and more elegant method than bodging together a bunch of Lims & Advantages on a Drain or what-have-you.

Still, to each his own.

[Basil]

{snip Straw-Man argument and argumentum ad hominem}
And, Basil, by REFUSING to define what GAME EFFECT you want your "block sense of balance" power to have, you ask the unanswerable question. Because determining game effect is EXACTLY how you are supposed to build and balance characters in the HERO system.
I want any "block", etc. to the Sense of Balance to be that which occurs with a "block", etc. to any other Sense. As it says on page 114 of the 5th Edition:

See pages 226-227, 245, 283 for details.

[Basil]

I was referring to a single character that is invisible to the vestibular sense. There is no effect, because that character never was the direction of down.
Well, if you want to engage is such whimsy, I will be the last person to gainsay you. I'm given to extremes of whimsy, myself.
However, it's totally moot, since the sense of Balance can't detect individuals anyway, so they're essentially invisible to Balance to begin with. Rather in the way that a bacterium is essentially invisible to normal Sight.
It is whimsy, but in my opinion there shouldn't a mechanic present just to satisfy a player's whimsy.
I'm afraid you misunderstood me. I was saying that having a single character take "Invisibility to the Sense of Balance" would be whimsical, as he cannot be sensed by ordinary, unimproved Human sense of Balance. Now, if there were a foe who had Targeting, Discrim, or some-such on its Sense of Balance, it would not be so whimsical.

The only "mechanic present" in your original statement is Invisibility, and I do no think it exists "just to satisfy a player's whimsy."

If you think I urge adding Balance to the list of existant Sense solely, or primarily, out of whimsy, you sadly mistake me.

[The Hyborian]

I want any "block", etc. to the Sense of Balance to be that which occurs with a "block", etc. to any other Sense. As it ways on page 114 of the 5th Edition:
[quote=5th Ed.]See pages 226-227, 245, 283 for details.

That means almost nothing.

All it says is that it allows you to "blind and opponents sense", and that "A flashed character who cannot perceive his opponents with a targeting sense suffers penalties to his DCV and OCV."

Unless the target's only active targeting sense was a special sense with a balance Fx, there are no combat effects.

For the duration of the power, the target feels woozy and cant tell which way is down with his eyes closed.

If you want it to do anything other than that,which is more or less nothing, you need to buy another power with the same special effect to inflict those effects on the target.

That assumes the GM lets you buy the "balance flash" in the first place, but as it looks like it would not actually do anything, I would probably let you waste the points.

[Basil]

That isn't the way I interpreted it. An Image causes a false sensation. If there's a visual image, I see it myself, I don't perceive others seeing it. If there's a tactile Image, I feel it myself, I don't perceive other's sense of touch. Likewise a kinesthetic Image would cause me to feel a sensation of my muscles moving, not others' muscles.
I think I see why we aren't connecting here. At least in part. We interpret the Sense Affecting Powers differently. The way I understand them, and assume the majority of Herodom does as well, is thus: They either provide or remove information about the enviornment by adding to or subtracting from information gained through a character's senses. None of them change or alter any aspect of the characters involved. If there's an image of a slimy blob placed around character A, character A won't feel slimy, he'll feel something slimy covering/enveloping him. Likewise, if you were to use kinethetics as a sense in Hero and created an image of arms moving about around character A,
It seems to me this is where you are missing Phil's point. If I understand correctly, he is not talking about "an image of arms moving about around character A," but about an Image of character A moving his own arms around. That is, the Image is what the character perceives about himself, not about some disembodied arms.
Now, admittedly, this is where the sticking point about Kinesthesia comes in; it does not sense something happening outside the individual's body. If the usefulness and elegance of treating Kinesthesia as a Sense (in Hero System terms) is, to (generic) you outweighed by the "internal" characteristic of Kinesthesia, then I have little objection to your not treating it as a Sense.
BTW, although the rules (5th Ed., page 121) say: "All characters with Line Of Sight notice the Image", this is contradicted by common sense. After all, I can't detect an Image to Touch (sans Targeting, etc.) if I'm outside the area covered by the Image, so there's no reason to insist an Image to Kinesthesia (or Balance, for that matter) be perceivable by someone outside the area of that Image.

[atlascott]

Basil:

A 'straw man' argument is one meant to direct attention away from the real issue. An ad hominem att ack takes the form of "Mr. X's argument is false because he is an alcoholic (or insert whatever name-calling you want)"--it is basically saying that, despite reasoning and the truth or falsity of the position on its merits, one should not give the idea any credit because the owner of the arument is a _____, and in the blank, insert whatever name you want.

I agree that either is not fair argument. But I also deny using either.

I did use the Hunger Boy and Balance Boy example, and I apologize if you feel that my post attacked you.

I stand by what I wrote. By refusing to define the game effect 'block balance' has, you'll never be able to legally fit it in the hero system.

Personally, it is my impression that the characteristic of DEX simulates sense of balance, and no 'sense' of balance should be appropriately added to HERO system rules, since any balance effecting power can be easily simulated with the rules which exist.

[PhilFleischmann]

So you want to be able to take away someone's sense of balance without them losing it? :think:
They lose their *sense* of blance, without necessarily losing their *balance*.

If I see a stationary chair, and then I lose my sense of sight, I don't instantly forget where the chair was.

If I am standing well-balanced on the ground, and then I lose my sense of balance, I don't instantly fall down or become dizzy.

This is at least the second time I've said this. I don't see why it's so difficult to understand.


According to your agrument earlier concerning making someone think that "down" is different than normal, they would. According what you've just said, you have just invalidated those examples.
No. A sense affecting power does not make anyone "think" anything. That would require Mind Control or some other Mental power. Sense Affecting powers alter or prevent sensory input. If I can no longer detect the force of gravity with my semicircular canals, I can still tell which way is down with my sight (I see the ground and the sky, etc.), with my touch (I feel the pressure and weight of my body and on my feet), and also somewhat with my kinesthetic sense (when I relax my muscles, they go down, when I lift my limbs against gravity, it takes more effort, etc.).


Whatever the player and GM agreed upon as being the effect would be the effect. Mental Illusions is quite flexible. You might as well have asked what the effect of being on fire would be.
But I already know what the effect of fire is. Fire is a well-established effect in HERO rules. I don't understand why everyone keeps dodging the question: You are the GM. What is the game effect of the loss of the sense of balance?

a) Nothing.
b) Direct loss of DEX or CV.
c) Loss of STUN or other characteristics.
d) Other.

This is "job one" and I understand that it is the most difficult. My answer is d. If I wanted the effect of b or c, then yes, I would use a Drain/Suppress and I wouldn't have even felt the need to discuss it.


I'm a little confused as to exactly what you want here, and how it would apply at this point. I'll read your posts after this one I'm replying to and see if it becomes more clear.
I'm not sure how I could make it more clear.

A Flash could have many different SFX. All that is required is that the brain doesn't receive the information that would have been provided by the sense. That could mean the nerve carrying the info from the sensory organ to the brain is blocked. It could mean that the signal in the nerve is scrambled. It could mean that the sensory organ is overloaded with stimulation. It could mean that the sensory organ is covered or blocked off from its source of stimulation. It could mean the sensory organ is given weird information that it can't process.

Another possible* effect of loss of sense of balance occurs to me: Without a sense of balance, you might* not be able to Set or Brace properly.

* The standard disclaimer applies. Not I said "possible" and "might," not "definite" and "must."

[PhilFleischmann]

Well, technically, you are wrong as well. the sense of balance, if it senses anything at all, detects a force applied to the body and nothing more. It's used to determe motion and orientation and applies outside of a gravity well (ask any astronaught).
Well, technically, ALL senses ONLY give information about things WITHIN the body. The easiest example is the sense of smell. Contrary to the rules mechanic, smell is not "ranged." You only smell the air that is in your nostrils. You don't have any "nose nerves" that reach out of your nose like tentacles and seek out smellable gasses and particles in the air.

Likewise, you only see the light that passes though the lenses of your eyes and is absorbed by your retinae. You only hear the vibrations of your eardrums. It's all stuff going on inside your sensory organs. The semicircular canals are no different.

And there are plenty of sensations that originate within your body that you can sense with your normal senses as well. If you plug your ears, you can hear blood running through the vessels near your ears, and you can still hear your own voice. Without any outside-your-body influence, you can see the "floaters" - little distortions in the vitreous humor - within your eyes.

Inside the body or outside the body makes no difference. It's still a sense. It's still providing information that the brain can then process.

[atlascott]

Phil:

if all your eyes, ears and nose did were process things already inside them, we'd be in real trouble. Obviously light bouncing off different things differently comes from outside the body, into the body, to help us interpret stuff on the outside world. SAme with smell--we are actually smelling particles of something without that came fromw ithout, into our nose. Same with sound vibrations.

Contrast that with liquid in our ears being pulled downward by the force of gravity.

As as far as blocking sense of balance not causing anyone to fall down, as long as they can see the ground, talk to anyonew with a bad ear infection or inner ear injury. Yeah, they DO experience vertigo.

Obviously, no one is going to convince you or Basil of anything, so play the rules as you see fit. You aren't goign to convince anyone that HERO is broken because its doesnt contain the Sense: Balance.

[PhilFleischmann]

Pain is a real sense in the reas world, which, if disrupted would have a real effect. Just as real as sight, hearing and balance.
I'm with you so far.


That doesn't mean you should be able to Flash it. Removal of the pain sense would pretty much mean the character won't take STUN anymore, or at least won't take STUN damage cause by the effects of pain.
If that's how you would interpret the effects of a Flash pain, then I can certainly understand why you wouldn't allow it. However, I wouldn't interpret it that way, and therefore I might still allow it. I would say a person with his sense of pain Flashed would still take STUN, he just wouldn't be able to feel pain. Again, the only thing a Flash should do is stop sensory information from getting to the brain that would otherwise do so.


I seriously hope you don't think you can Flash pain, or create an Image of pain, or be Invisible to Pain, or have Discriminaroty, Analyse x100 Rapid pain with Range and Targeting.
Well I certainly wouldn't allow someone to get the benefits of a "Temporary Immunity to All STUN Damage, Usable on an Unlimited Number of Others" for the price of a simple Flash. And I also have no idea what Rapid, Range, and Targeting would do for Pain.

But I seriously hope that you would allow someone to take Flash vs Touch, since that is a defined sense in the rulebook, but that you wouldn't give it a disproportional effect like total immunity to STUN damage, but rather let it have an effect appropriate to the points spent. Remember also that pain is a part of the Touch sense.

[PhilFleischmann]

You are an infantile monkey with a speech impediment if you do not agree.
This sets off my "Detect Troll" sense.

[atlascott]

I'm not a Troll, dude. That was a joke based on another guy's post adamantly asserting that balance is a sense like sight, 'end of discussion.' See my other very sweet apologetic post, above.

[The Hyborian]

Basil:

A 'straw man' argument is one meant to direct attention away from the real issue. An ad hominem att ack takes the form of "Mr. X's argument is false because he is an alcoholic (or insert whatever name-calling you want)"--it is basically saying that, despite reasoning and the truth or falsity of the position on its merits, one should not give the idea any credit because the owner of the arument is a _____, and in the blank, insert whatever name you want.

I agree that either is not fair argument. But I also deny using either.

I did use the Hunger Boy and Balance Boy example, and I apologize if you feel that my post attacked you.

I stand by what I wrote. By refusing to define the game effect 'block balance' has, you'll never be able to legally fit it in the hero system.

Personally, it is my impression that the characteristic of DEX simulates sense of balance, and no 'sense' of balance should be appropriately added to HERO system rules, since any balance effecting power can be easily simulated with the rules which exist.

Don't worry Atlascott, I took Basil's comments about the "Straw Man" etc. to be a rather high handed way to not answer the meat of your argument. Its a strategy less formally known as the "try to look smart and keep talking" method. Its typically what a college professor/politician does when someone asks them a question they can't answer.

If Basil wanted to discredit your arguments he should have attacked its merits, not made an arcane reference that only some of the posters he would catch and then move on as if that settled the matter. It would have been better so say nothing, quote only the part he chose to respond to, and make his point there. I find the whole approach very telling.

T.H.

[Dust Raven]

I'm afraid you misunderstood me. I was saying that having a single character take "Invisibility to the Sense of Balance" would be whimsical, as he cannot be sensed by ordinary, unimproved Human sense of Balance. Now, if there were a foe who had Targeting, Discrim, or some-such on its Sense of Balance, it would not be so whimsical.

The thing is, even if you make the sense of balance a Sense, putting Discriminatory, Tageting, blah blah blah on it wouldn't allow you to detect another character, or anything really. In fact, you really couldn't put targeting on it at all, because there is often nothing detected that can be targeted (just try to shoot the force of gravity or a centrfugal force).

If you think I urge adding Balance to the list of existant Sense solely, or primarily, out of whimsy, you sadly mistake me.
No, I do not mistake you, I just believe you are trying to make something into something which it is not just because of semantics that have nothing to do with game mechanics.

[Dust Raven]

It seems to me this is where you are missing Phil's point. If I understand correctly, he is not talking about "an image of arms moving about around character A," but about an Image of character A moving his own arms around. That is, the Image is what the character perceives about himself, not about some disembodied arms.
I understand this, I just disagree with it. Images doesn't work that way. Otherwise you can make an "Image" of ruptured organs, of an object mysteriously appearing inside someone's head, etc. Images just can't do this. Other Powers can of course, but not Images.

Now, admittedly, this is where the sticking point about Kinesthesia comes in; it does not sense something happening outside the individual's body. If the usefulness and elegance of treating Kinesthesia as a Sense (in Hero System terms) is, to (generic) you outweighed by the "internal" characteristic of Kinesthesia, then I have little objection to your not treating it as a Sense.
BTW, although the rules (5th Ed., page 121) say: "All characters with Line Of Sight notice the Image", this is contradicted by common sense. After all, I can't detect an Image to Touch (sans Targeting, etc.) if I'm outside the area covered by the Image, so there's no reason to insist an Image to Kinesthesia (or Balance, for that matter) be perceivable by someone outside the area of that Image.Common sense and logic have little to do with the rules. When you bring those into play, you are bringing along preconceptions of certan SFX which will not apply in every situation. I think the word "sense" is one of those situations. It doesn't always mean the same thing, and just because science has called certain things senses doesn't mean the rules have to, or should.

[Dust Raven]

If that's how you would interpret the effects of a Flash pain, then I can certainly understand why you wouldn't allow it. However, I wouldn't interpret it that way, and therefore I might still allow it.

Once again, we are defining things differently. It's obvious what these "senses" are and what they do, but it's also obvious what we all have different ideas of what the game mechanics of them are. That alone is enough arguement against incorperating them into the rules as Senses.

Personally, I can't see now one could still take damage from pain if they can't feel it in the first place. It's how pain works. Try some anesthic. Not the big stuff that knocks you out, but the local stuff, like what dentists use or whats use for minor surgery. Shoot up your foot with enough of that stuff and you could happily hack it right off and not feel a thing. Do it right so you don't lose much blood while tying it all off and you'll be just fine (though footless). You aren't any closer to being unconscious either, which means no STUN loss, despite the fact that you just took a tremendous amount of damage.

But I digress, we're beating to death...ahem... discussing... the sense of balance. :)

I've about run out of agruements about balance and kinesthetics, but I'll stand by the ones I've made. What I do know is that theres no convincing anyone who things the effects of losing such senses are different from what I think they are, and vice versa.

[Sean Waters]

Hi. This one's rattling on isn't it?

Apologies if this point has already been made, but...

If you can flash an internal sense, whatabout the feed back nerves that regulate your heartbeat and breathing? I can flash them and for a real bargain price I can give you a heart attack.

This seems (to me) directly analogous to flashing the sense of balance: it is switching off an internal monitoring system, which doesn't appear to me to be what the power is about.

Now 'down' is a quality of the outside world, you might say, that your inner ear detects, so it is not an internal sense at all.

I'd say it is: it is a way of regulating your orientation, an internal feedback system that performs a function directly related to the maintenance of your body.

To take a perhaps more pertinent example: if I flash your abilty to sense temperature I would say that prevents you sensing any external heat source, but not your own internal temperature, otherwise I could cause someone to overheat because they do not sweat and pant as their body temperature increases, and soon they will be unconscious from heat stroke.

I don't think that is what the power is supposed to do. We need to ask what effect we are trying to accomplish. I'd say anything fooling 'internal' senses should probably be built with a variation of mental illusions, a power that can kill or cause a wide variety of other effects, if used in sufficient quantity.

[PhilFleischmann]

Common sense and logic have little to do with the rules.
If I believed that, I wouldn't be playing HERO. I don't understand why anyone would play a game (especially an RPG) that doesn't comply with logic and common sense.


When you bring those into play, you are bringing along preconceptions of certan SFX which will not apply in every situation.
I still don't understand what you think is so important about "not applying in every situation." Must something apply in every situation in order to be allowed in the rules? If something applies in some situations, why not allow it in those situations? The rules should not forbid me to build something I can conceive of with my imagination just because it doesn't apply in every situation. Just because Invisibility to Balance doesn't apply, doesn't mean I shouldn't be allowed to take Flash vs Balance.


It's obvious what these "senses" are and what they do, but it's also obvious what we all have different ideas of what the game mechanics of them are. That alone is enough arguement against incorperating them into the rules as Senses.
This seems like a complete non-sequitur to me. We have different ideas of what the game mechanics of lightening or guns or intelligence or time travel or elves or psychic powers are. Does that mean we shouldn't allow any of those things in the rules?


Personally, I can't see now one could still take damage from pain if they can't feel it in the first place. It's how pain works.
From a balance (no pun intended) point of view, Flash vs Pain shouldn't have that effect because that isn't what Flash does. If you want to prevent damage, use a Defensive Power. Flash simply stops the target from receiving information from one or more senses temporarily. How it actually does that is a matter of SFX. If you or I can't imagine the specific SFX for a particular rule mechanic, that doesn't mean someone else can't and shouldn't be allowed to use it if he does. By the same token, I can't think of any realistic SFX that could justify a Flash vs Taste with Does Knockback, even though it's perfectly legal by the rules.

[PhilFleischmann]

If you can flash an internal sense, whatabout the feed back nerves that regulate your heartbeat and breathing?
Simple: Those aren't senses. Flash blocks sensory information, not bodily function. It isn't the reception of information that keeps your heart beating or your lungs breathing.


This seems (to me) directly analogous to flashing the sense of balance: it is switching off an internal monitoring system, which doesn't appear to me to be what the power is about.
One is about switching off information that you are consciously aware of and the other is about stopping an autonomic function. I don't see the similarity at all.


Now 'down' is a quality of the outside world, you might say, that your inner ear detects, so it is not an internal sense at all.
I'd say it is: it is a way of regulating your orientation, an internal feedback system that performs a function directly related to the maintenance of your body.
You might also say that ALL senses are "internal" and help you perform maintainance functions, like eating, breathing, avoiding danger, and dealing with injury and illness. If you didn't feel pain (sense of touch), you'd have a harder time dealing with injuries. A minor cut could go untreated and become infected. This is what happens in cases of leprosy. All our senses are for helping our physical survival, including balance and kinesthesia as much as sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell.


To take a perhaps more pertinent example: if I flash your abilty to sense temperature I would say that prevents you sensing any external heat source, but not your own internal temperature, otherwise I could cause someone to overheat because they do not sweat and pant as their body temperature increases, and soon they will be unconscious from heat stroke.
Why wouldn't they sweat? Flash only stops conscious sensory information. You don't make a conscious decision to sweat. Flash vs Sight doesn't stop you from blinking to keep your eyes moist. Flash vs Smell doesn't stop you from breathing. Flash vs Taste doesn't stop you from salivating or digesting. And Flash vs temperature doesn't stop you from sweating. And BTW, Flash vs temperature is already in the rules because it's part of the Touch sense.


I don't think that is what the power is supposed to do.... I'd say anything fooling 'internal' senses should probably be built with a variation of mental illusions, a power that can kill ...
Right! A power that can kill or alter a persons bodily functions should not be built with Flash, or any other Sense Affecting Power. However, powers that stop or alter the reception of sensory information should be build with Flash or other Sense Affecting Powers.

(Of course, you can always die as an indirect result of losing a sense: Blinded and didn't see the edge of the cliff, Deafened and didn't hear the train coming, De-tasted and couldn't tell the food was poisoned, etc.)

[atlascott]

"It isn't the reception of information that keeps your heart beating or your lungs breathing."

BZZZT. Wrong, thats what nerve impulses (information) from the medulla does.

[Dust Raven]

If I believed that, I wouldn't be playing HERO. I don't understand why anyone would play a game (especially an RPG) that doesn't comply with logic and common sense.


I still don't understand what you think is so important about "not applying in every situation." Must something apply in every situation in order to be allowed in the rules? If something applies in some situations, why not allow it in those situations? The rules should not forbid me to build something I can conceive of with my imagination just because it doesn't apply in every situation. Just because Invisibility to Balance doesn't apply, doesn't mean I shouldn't be allowed to take Flash vs Balance.


This seems like a complete non-sequitur to me. We have different ideas of what the game mechanics of lightening or guns or intelligence or time travel or elves or psychic powers are. Does that mean we shouldn't allow any of those things in the rules?
You prove my point again. There are no rules for lightning or guns or time travel in Hero. You have to use the toolkit to model them. Same thing with the sense of balance. You can do it, nothing is stopping you. But that doesn't mean it needs to be directly incorperated into the rules where everybody has to use it the same way.



From a balance (no pun intended) point of view, Flash vs Pain shouldn't have that effect because that isn't what Flash does. If you want to prevent damage, use a Defensive Power. Flash simply stops the target from receiving information from one or more senses temporarily. How it actually does that is a matter of SFX. If you or I can't imagine the specific SFX for a particular rule mechanic, that doesn't mean someone else can't and shouldn't be allowed to use it if he does. By the same token, I can't think of any realistic SFX that could justify a Flash vs Taste with Does Knockback, even though it's perfectly legal by the rules.

Only that's what a Flash vs Pain would do. I have the same arguement against a Flash vs Balance. If you want to take away someone's sense of balance, use a Power that simulates the effects of doing just that.

[PhilFleischmann]

You prove my point again. There are no rules for lightning or guns or time travel in Hero. You have to use the toolkit to model them. Same thing with the sense of balance. You can do it, nothing is stopping you. But that doesn't mean it needs to be directly incorperated into the rules where everybody has to use it the same way.

Only that's what a Flash vs Pain would do. I have the same arguement against a Flash vs Balance. If you want to take away someone's sense of balance, use a Power that simulates the effects of doing just that.
I am getting very frustrated with this discussion. Your above post suggests to me that you haven't understood anything I've said. It's as if we're speaking two different languages.

I think you are confusing (your interpretation of) the results of a particular real or imaginable "power" with the game effects of a HERO System Power construct. Flash vs pain would not render someone immune to STUN Damage because that is beyond the scope of what a Flash does according to the rules. Likewise Flash vs sense of balance does not make someone dizzy or nauseated. To add that capability to the HERO System Power "Flash" is to make it more powerful than its point cost warrants.

A Flash vs Hearing is usually defined as a loud sound in the ears. A real world loud sound in the ears can cause pain and distraction from tasks that have nothing to do with hearing or deafness. This does not mean that the HERO Power Flash should do STUN damage to represent the real world pain, or that it should stop the use of Powers with Concentration or prevent other actions to represent the real world noise distraction. A Flash blocks sensory awareness. That's all.

[Dust Raven]

I am getting very frustrated with this discussion. Your above post suggests to me that you haven't understood anything I've said. It's as if we're speaking two different languages.
I don't think so, but maybe we are just missing each others points.


I think you are confusing (your interpretation of) the results of a particular real or imaginable "power" with the game effects of a HERO System Power construct. Flash vs pain would not render someone immune to STUN Damage because that is beyond the scope of what a Flash does according to the rules. Likewise Flash vs sense of balance does not make someone dizzy or nauseated. To add that capability to the HERO System Power "Flash" is to make it more powerful than its point cost warrants.
I'm not confusing anything. I'm reasoning from effects. Personally, I can't see how to remove someones sense of pain without making them immune to some STUN damage, or how to remove someone's sense of balance without making them dizzy when they move. Hence, Flash can't be the correct construct for removing them and so they simply aren't Senses as defined by the Hero System rules.

If there is anything I'm confusing there, it's how you have rationalized a ruling and a Power that doesn't actually do anything.

[/quote]A Flash vs Hearing is usually defined as a loud sound in the ears. A real world loud sound in the ears can cause pain and distraction from tasks that have nothing to do with hearing or deafness. This does not mean that the HERO Power Flash should do STUN damage to represent the real world pain, or that it should stop the use of Powers with Concentration or prevent other actions to represent the real world noise distraction. A Flash blocks sensory awareness. That's all.[/QUOTE]
Agreed. Though depending on the SFX of the Flash, it might have to ruin a character's Concentration.

A Flash that caused pain would have to have another attack Linked to it to simulate the damage from pain, or of the pain is so insignificant as to not cause STUN damage, it's just part of the SFX.

But with blocking the sense of pain or the sense of balance....those things don't do what Senses in the hero system do, and shouldn't be treated the same.

[PhilFleischmann]

Personally, I can't see how to remove someones sense of pain without making them immune to some STUN damage, or how to remove someone's sense of balance without making them dizzy when they move.
Are you talking about the real world or the HERO system? In the real world, you are probably right: if you remove someone's ability to feel pain they also become immune to being stunned or incapacitated by what in the HERO System is represented by STUN damage. In the HERO System however, these two things are easily separated because they are two different parts of the system: a Sense and a damagable Characteristic. How do you do this? Simple. You say, "You don't feel any pain from the hit you just took. Lose 20 STUN which you'll get back with normal recoveries." The game action takes place in our imaginations, where these two things - Senses and STUN - do not have to be inextricably linked.

Yes, it's an odd thing to have happen, even in an imaginary story (an RPG). You may have a hard time thinking of a special effect to justify it, but that shouldn't stop someone who does.


A Flash that caused pain would have to have another attack Linked to it to simulate the damage from pain, or of the pain is so insignificant as to not cause STUN damage, it's just part of the SFX.
Right! And a Flash without another attack linked to it CAN'T cause STUN Damage or any other effect besides temporarily blocking the sense of hearing. Because that's all Flash can do.

And If I buy a Flash vs pain or balance without linking any additional powers the only thing that happens is those particular senses are temporarily blocked. No dizziness, no STUN immunity. That may not be as much as you think ought to happen based on real world effects that you can think of, but that's all the rules allow to happen. It may not be much, but it is doing something.

Questions:
1. Would you allow a player in your game to buy Flash vs Touch without buying any additional Linked Powers?
2. Is pain part of the Touch sense?
3. Would that Flash vs Touch grant immunity to STUN damage to the target?
4. Would you grant that power other effects/results besides blocking awareness of tactile information? If so, what would those effects/results be?

Note that Touch is explicitly defined in the rules as a Sense, and that Flash vs. Touch is perfectly legal.

My answers to the above questions, in case I haven't made myself clear are:
1. Yes.
2. Yes.
3. No.
4. No.

[Dust Raven]

My answers would be

1. Yes
2. No
3. No
4. No

I'm not sure, but I think we've gotten to a point where we don't agree with what the arguement is about. It would explain our miscommunication at least. [shrug]

My point here is that you shouldn't have a Power that doesn't do anything. If you remove someone's pain, there should be an effect. Specifically an effect that messes with the mechanics of how the character interacts with other characters and the world around him. If a Flash versus pain or balance wouldn't accomplish this, it's pointless and there is no reason it whould be there, official or otherwise.

[PhilFleischmann]

But there is an effect: he can't feel pain. How is that not an effect? He could be hurt and not know it. He could hurt himself and not know it. That's significant.

If you agree that a Flash vs Touch shouldn't have any effects besides blocking awareness of sensory information (No on question 4), then why do you insist that a Flash vs Pain or Balance should have some additional effect?

[Basil]

You are an infantile monkey with a speech impediment if you do not agree.
This sets off my "Detect Troll" sense.
Oh, he did that to mine quite some time back.

I finally tossed him into my Ignore List when he redefined "Straw Man Argument" to be the same as "Red Herring." A Straw Man Argument is where one makes a statement or serious of statements and falsely claims it/they are the same as, a rewording of, or a example based on, one's opponent's statement(s), and then disproves the statements one made rather than one's opponent's. As far as I can see, atlascott has made no post in this thread that is not riddled with, or composed solely of, Straw Men.

For that and other reasons, I am bowing out of this discussion. I think nothing more can be served by continuing; I have, IMO, made a good case for including Balance as a Sense, and for considering doing so for Kinesthesia. I have seen some posts raising interesting points in contradiction, but far fewer than the number of posts showing malice and blind worship of "The Rules As They Are Written."

[atlascott]

AHHHH!!! He used humor!!! He doesnt agree with my untenable position! I will ignore his civil posts and apology!!! He must be a TROLL!!!! I'm ignoring him! Go Away, Bad Troll!!! Go Away! Im going to Flash my sense of humor, flash my sense context, and Flash my sense of memory, so I can get away from this Eville Troll!!!!!

[Dust Raven]

But there is an effect: he can't feel pain. How is that not an effect? He could be hurt and not know it. He could hurt himself and not know it. That's significant.
Yes, significent. Just like a Drain or Suppress is significent. Just because it's significent doesn't mean it should be considered a sense. What you are describing, using the Sense rules, would have no game effect. The character/player wouldn't feel the pain, but would still know he's taking damage, how much and what those effects are. To me that's not worthy of assigning points to it.


If you agree that a Flash vs Touch shouldn't have any effects besides blocking awareness of sensory information (No on question 4), then why do you insist that a Flash vs Pain or Balance should have some additional effect?
Because it would. I know that sounds insufficient, but it really isn't. To me it's like asking why gravity makes things fall down. It just does and that's the way the world works. Now, as far as game mechanics go, there has to be a game mechanic result; something tangable to the system. Your description of a Flash versus pain or balance has none, and so isn't really a Power but a colorful description with no mechanics that can be attached to it. Sure, you could buy it, if the GM allowed it, but it would be worthless.