Hero is broken

[TaxiMan]

The underlying basic concept of Hero is broken. That concept is the exponential scale of damage and defenses. They are wrong. Here's why:

A man ("George") attacks an enormous elephant. He has 4d6 attack, and the elephant ("Jumbo") has 16PD. On average, "G" does 14 STUN, which is reduced to 0 STUN after "J"'s defenses.

OK, so even though J has 40 STUN, he'll never go down, the attack is ineffective. J is pretty passive, and just stands there.

This will never work, so G picks up a club that quadruples his damage! He now does 6d6 (4d6 + 2 doublings), and will dish out 5 STUN a phase after J's defenses (21 STUN average - 16 PD). It will take eight phases before J (who holds his breath so he gets no Recoveries) is KOed.

G has learned his lesson! Next time he meets the forgetful J, there is no club available. Fortunately, he has three friends, so they can deal out quadruple damage! At first they are uncoordinated, and ABSOLUTELY NOTHING happens to J. The elephant thinks he's getting a massage. Ho hum.

G's team learns to coordinate their attacks, and so the group of four get to add their damage. Now it's 4d6 * 4, or 16d6 / phase. That's an average of 56 STUN. Working together, G's team takes out J with one blow!

To recap, G's attack can't hurt J.

G quadruples his damage, and takes 8 phases to defeat J.

G has three uncoordinated friends, and can never defeat J.

G's friends learn to coordinate and defeat J instantly.

That's where the exponential flaw is easily seen. Let the flames begin! Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

[TaxiMan]

OK, the thread title was worthy of a "plonk!". I love Hero, and have loads of fun so how could it be "broken"? Still, this seems out of whack somewhat. If nothing else, it should illustrate to players that they should coordinate their attacks - and fear the same from the bad guys. Even a few normal humans trained to fight can take a superhero down!

[Monolith]

Well first off, I don't think a man can hurt an elephant just buy punching him, so that part of the rule makes sense. Now if a man picks up a club then it seems reasonable that he would cause some damage to the elephant. Of course the elephant would attack somewhere between the 1st and 2nd hit and kill the character, so I guess that point is moot.

Now as far as your coordinated attack goes, you do not get to add damages together to do more overall damage. What CA does is allow you to add the STUN which gets past the DEF for each attack so that the combined STUN damage can Stun the elephant. In this case since none of the attacks can do any STUN to the elephant no damage is done by any of them.

[Killer Shrike]

Brilliant deduction. Of course, its based on your incorrect interpretation of the rules, but yes if the rules did work like that you would be right.

I love it when people say "THIS IS BROKEN!!!" only for it to turn out that they are just confused and/or the issue they are so concerned about is only imagined.


Coordinating attacks is only really useful for trying to CON-STUN somebody. The damage does not add together before defenses to be inflicted upon the target as one big attack.

You could have the population of some nation throw 5 million pebbles at a tank all at once, and all of them would bounce (except for the once that happened to fall through vision slits and apertures of course ;) ).

[Super Squirrel]

Oh yeah, well D&D 3rd is broken because Monks can jump themselves into orbit at like 12th level.

[MarkusDark]

An you can't commit suicide in Car Wars with a pistol. ;)

[Monolith]

Originally posted by Killer Shrike
You could have the population of some nation throw 5 million pebbles at a tank all at once, and all of them would bounce (except for the once that happened to fall through vision slits and apertures of course ;) ).
Perhaps the weight of all those pebbles will crush the tank? Let's see... assuming a pebble weighs 1 oz, that is 5,000,000 ounces, which makes it 156 tons. I think 156 tons might do some serious crushing damage to the tank. :)

[Monolith]

Originally posted by Super Squirrel
Oh yeah, well D&D 3rd is broken because Monks can jump themselves into orbit at like 12th level.
We are HERO System players. We already know the D&D is broken. :)

[Monolith]

Originally posted by MarkusDark
An you can't commit suicide in Car Wars with a pistol. ;)
You can if you get taken out by a car named "Pistol." :)

[Klytus]

And in the original version of Shadowrun, you could stuff a grenade down your shorts and suffer - at worst - a Moderate Wound (it takes three Moderate Wounds and 1 Light Wound to be killed in SR).

[Galadorn]

I think this example is badly formed. Critical hits being used? Figure the OCV and DCV and the respective critical hit probabilities, then calculate.

Second, you are using averages only and not accounting for variations in dice rolls.

Third, well, when was the last time you saw a human being, of large size or not, with martial arts or not, take out an elephant with a fist? LOL Never! That's what elephant guns are for.

[Killer Shrike]

Originally posted by Monolith
Perhaps the weight of all those pebbles will crush the tank? Let's see... assuming a pebble weighs 1 oz, that is 5,000,000 ounces, which makes it 156 tons. I think 156 tons might do some serious crushing damage to the tank. :) Its all about dispersion and surface tension. I think the majority of the pebbles would fail to find purchase on the tank and would fall harmlessly to the ground or bounce. Only a very small percentage would actually remain on the tank.

Im sure somebody could program one of those hyper-intelligent new-fangled calculators to model it :D

[BNakagawa]

Originally posted by MarkusDark
An you can't commit suicide in Car Wars with a pistol. ;)

You can, but you have to be wearing a helmet.

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Galadorn

Third, well, when was the last time you saw a human being, of large size or not, with martial arts or not, take out an elephant with a fist? LOL Never! That's what elephant guns are for.

You haven't watched too many chop sockey martial arts movies, have you?

[hybris]

Originally posted by Super Squirrel
Oh yeah, well D&D 3rd is broken because Monks can jump themselves into orbit at like 12th level. You mean, with the leap of the clouds power?

If so: Wizards can do the same at 1st level, assuming they have access to the jump spell. ;)

[Agent X]

Hero isn't broken. It's a game trying to create an effective setting for adventures - not a simulation of real life.

[Arthur]

The original thread starter's interpretation of Coordinated Attacks is incorrect. Others have already pointed that out.

However, the geometric damage scale of Hero DOES cause some odd effects, but you have to extend the analysis a bit.

Our Hero (TM) has 14 BODY. Assume Killing Damage and no resistant defenses. You shoot OH with a 1d KA. It takes four shots to put him at 0 BODY, and four more (a total of eight) to kill him.

"That's too many shots!" we cry. Let's use a weapon that does eight times as much damage! However, 8x as much damage from the characters' POV is only 2d or twice as much in points of damage due to the exponential nature of the system.

Our Hero is put to zero BODY by two shots, and killed outright by four shots (he's having a rough day). Eight times as much KE, but it takes only half as many shots.

You can do a similar analysis of points of BODY, making certain assumptions (IIRC, +2 BODY = x2 mass) and show that also gives counter-intuitive results.

Is Hero broken this way? Yes. Is there any game system that doesn't have similar problems? Not that I've ever found.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Arthur
However, the geometric damage scale of Hero DOES cause some odd effects, but you have to extend the analysis a bit.Where in HERO does it say that damage is geometric, i.e.; 2d6 is twice as much damage as 1d6 and half as much as 3d6? I've never been able to find this anywhere. The only doubling I've been able to find is for Lifting per 5 points of Strength. But the listed damage in the Strength Chart on page 21 of 5th edition (and it says nothing about double damage) for STR doesn't apply in the chart chart on the next page to Throwing or Leaping. If you can't jump or throw twice as far for each +5 STR, why should we assume each d6 of damage is twice as much damage? That it is more damage is inarguable, but it does not follow that it is twice as much. That's as irrational as asserting that each 3.5 points of DEF (enough to counter an average d6) is twice as tough, and therefore a character with 17 PD is four times as tough as one with 10 PD. Neither logic nor game experience support that theory.

[Warp9]

I was starting to make an argument for exponential damage. However, it must be too early in the moring, I can see that my original post doesn't make the point I thought it did.

Never mind :)

[tesuji]

BTW, fr those who think you shouldn't be able to hurt and elephant with a punch from our example, i would like to point out he will.

its bad math to simply apply the average result against the blocking value.

If i attack you with a 1d6 attack and you have a 3 pd, the average hit point per attack is not .5 (3.5 average - 3 per) but rather 1 per attack (6 rolls of 1-6 -3 per each WITH A MINIMUM OF 0 per attack.)

.5 would have been correct if low damage rolls gave hit points back to the elephant, which they don't.

17 is not too far from the average of 4d6 as to be rare. Since i have a 3d6 chart i will reduce this to 3d6 vs 12 defense and point out that this is a 25.9% chance of doing damage. My bet is that needing a 17 on 4d6 is probably in the range of 20% likely.

So the real issue is not the strength vs PD but rather the rate of attack vs the rate of recovery. So a crowd of sufficient size of guys all punching the elephant for 4d6 each will bring him down.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
Where in HERO does it say that damage is geometric, i.e.; 2d6 is twice as much damage as 1d6 and half as much as 3d6? I've never been able to find this anywhere. The only doubling

Firstly, it is implicit in the way that every other damage scale follows the STR model. EB is obviously modelled directly on STR damage with 1d N per 5 points.

Secondly, an analysis of firearm KE vs. DC, which I did when I had a lot of free time, matched that almost exactly. 50 Joules of muzzle energy was DC 1. 100 J = DC 2; 200 J = DC 3; etc. The correlation fit to a surprisingly high degree of precision, given that a game system has a lot of leeway.

[Monolith]

Originally posted by Arthur
Secondly, an analysis of firearm KE vs. DC, which I did when I had a lot of free time, matched that almost exactly. 50 Joules of muzzle energy was DC 1. 100 J = DC 2; 200 J = DC 3; etc. The correlation fit to a surprisingly high degree of precision, given that a game system has a lot of leeway.
I can just envision George McDonald sitting at his kitchen table for 2-3 weeks trying to come up with a game system which would allow him to correctly assign 1 DC as 50 Joules, 2 DC as 100 Joules, 3 DC as 200 Joules, etc. Who would have thought that humble game designer was so smart? :)

[Chris Goodwin]

Someone is confusing damage with force. Doubling the damage does not add +1 DC. Doubling the force of the attack adds +1 DC. Doubling the damage of an attack would add as many DCs to the attack as the attack's original DCs.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Arthur
Firstly, it is implicit in the way that every other damage scale follows the STR model. EB is obviously modelled directly on STR damage with 1d N per 5 points.You've apparently missed my entire point, which is there is no absolute or explicit scale in the game system for what a d6 is. It doesn't matter whether or not EB or Killing Attacks or Transformations are based on the STR damage chart, because nowhere does HERO say that 11d6 is twice as much damage as 10d6. 11d6 is not twice as much damage than 10d6, it is simply 1d6 more damage. What 1d6 actually is is irrelevant. It's simply a way to keep track of relative amounts of damage and defenses.

You are extrapolating from a lifting chart which doubles lifting capability per 5 points, but does not double either throwing or leaping distances. Based on the other aspects of the STR charts, arbitrarily assuming each DC is twice as much damage is not supported.

[Galadorn]

Originally posted by D-Man
You haven't watched too many chop sockey martial arts movies, have you?

LOL. Actually, the criticism was about lack of consistency and reality, so that was the context of my statement. But veeeeeery funny. LOL.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Trebuchet

arbitrarily assuming each DC is twice as much damage is not supported.

However, assuming each DC represents twice as much energy IS supported, by both the lifting chart and and analysis of firearm damage.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by archer
Someone is confusing damage with force. Doubling the damage does not add +1 DC. Doubling the force of the attack adds +1 DC. Doubling the damage of an attack would add as many DCs to the attack as the attack's original DCs.

Energy, not force.

The mixup here is based on what we, the gamers, see vs. what happens in the characters' world. We roll one more die, they see it as twice as much energy. So to speak.

IOW, the game mechanic of "roll twice as many dice" actually converts to a squaring of the energy or power of the attack from the POV of the fictional characters.

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Arthur
The original thread starter's interpretation of Coordinated Attacks is incorrect. Others have already pointed that out.

However, the geometric damage scale of Hero DOES cause some odd effects, but you have to extend the analysis a bit.

Our Hero (TM) has 14 BODY. Assume Killing Damage and no resistant defenses. You shoot OH with a 1d KA. It takes four shots to put him at 0 BODY, and four more (a total of eight) to kill him.

"That's too many shots!" we cry. Let's use a weapon that does eight times as much damage! However, 8x as much damage from the characters' POV is only 2d or twice as much in points of damage due to the exponential nature of the system.

Our Hero is put to zero BODY by two shots, and killed outright by four shots (he's having a rough day). Eight times as much KE, but it takes only half as many shots.

You can do a similar analysis of points of BODY, making certain assumptions (IIRC, +2 BODY = x2 mass) and show that also gives counter-intuitive results.

Is Hero broken this way? Yes. Is there any game system that doesn't have similar problems? Not that I've ever found.

The BODY multipliers for the hit locations sometimes make it easier to kill someone with small KAs. A heavy pistol is about 2d6 RKA, doing an average of 7 body. Two average hits leave the 14 BODY character dying. Now, shoot him in the head. ONE average hit leaves him dying.

I don't find that at all unrealistic.

Now, as for the "doubling," I see no reason to assume that it applies to anything but lifting. There's nothing to imply that the game mechanics of damage, BODY, STUN, or defenses are anything but linear.

The "muzzle energy" example doesn't hold up to a quick glance at the weapons chart in Hero 5th, or a little knowledge of firearms. A .50 BMG is listed as a 2d6+1 RKA, which is about the same damage as a very heavy pistol, which is too anemic for the .50 BMG. A .50 BMG hit to the body or head should be, on average, overkill -- about 3.5d6* RKA if the average person has 10 BODY. The .50 BMG, fired from the typical weapon made to fire that round, also has many times more energy than any pistol round, including the .50 AE that's listed as doing the same damage. If you don't understand why the idea of both weapons doing the same damage or having the same energy is a joke, find someone who has handled both a .50 BMG and a .50 AE round (or better yet, someone who has fired both) and ask them to explain it.

* "Three and a half D6." 3 1/2d6 looks like gibberish.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Kristopher

The "muzzle energy" example doesn't hold up to a quick glance at the weapons chart in Hero 5th, or a little knowledge of firearms. A


The analysis I did used data mostly from the Jane's series for military weapons, and various other technical sources for small arms. This was about ten years ago, so therefore was the previous edition. Hero 4th actually did much better in being consistent in its mathematical modelling. Using THAT data, the doubling of muzzle KE per +1 DC was quite apparent. FRED breaks with tradition in this case, which to me is a huge mistake.



.50 BMG is listed as a 2d6+1 RKA, which is about the same damage as a very heavy pistol, which is too anemic for the .50 BMG. A


Ah. Funny you should mention that one. Yes, that perplexed me as well for some time. Even in 4E, it was an anomaly. The KE progression called for something like a 3d RKA. However, in 4E the .50 BMG was automatically assigned Armor Piercing!
Therefore, its 2d RKA equated (closely enough) to a 3d RKA in terms of Active Points. Balance, of a sort, was restored - or at least I could see why its damage was rated so low.

I fail to understand why there is so much resistance to this idea. Some things are implicit. GURPS doesn't have to explicitly say "4d is twice as much as 2d!" - it is obviously a linear system. When comparing what real-world weapons could do and comparing them to their HERO ratings and the STR chart, the implicate order became abundantly clear, at least in 4E. Once again, FRED, in assigning what appears to be arbitrary damage values, is making a big mistake, IMO. I would love to write or see written a tome not unlike the Weapons chapter of GURPS Vehicles for HERO. Some of you may have seen a similar system in 3G3 by BTRC.

Some of us LIKE to see some sort of pattern. That way, we have an implicit system that can be reverse-engineered into a "convert real-world weapons" game mechanic. Building weapons with Active Points is great for the pure SuperHeroic genre, but I think HERO is a fine Universal System that would be well-served by a consistent modelling for real-world items.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
You've apparently missed my entire point, which is there is no absolute or explicit scale in the game system for what a d6 is. It doesn't matter whether or not EB or Killing Attacks or Transformations are based on the STR damage chart, because nowhere does HERO say that 11d6 is twice as much damage as 10d6. 11d6 is not twice as much damage than 10d6, it is simply 1d6 more damage. What 1d6 actually is is irrelevant. It's simply a way to keep track of relative amounts of damage and defenses.

You are extrapolating from a lifting chart which doubles lifting capability per 5 points, but does not double either throwing or leaping distances. Based on the other aspects of the STR charts, arbitrarily assuming each DC is twice as much damage is not supported. Muhuhuhahahaha! You just can't get away from it, can you Trebuchet? ;) You know what I have to say to you on this one. If anything, you are pointing out an obvious flaw in the system. Why wouldn't leaping and throwing increase proportionately match lifting increases? Also, when players are measuring how mighty a character's strength is do they ask how much he can lift or how much he can leap? If you say leap, I'll have to think silly things about you.

Still, I refute this thread's premise. Hero is not broken!

[Kristopher]

Oh, I refute the thread's premise, too.

I'm just wandering off on my own with some other stuff tangentially related to whatever it was the original post said.

One important thing to note about firearms and KE. It's not the KE at the muzzle that matters, it's the KE at the other end of the flight you have to worry about... ;)

I'm trying to recall some ballistics data I once read, specifically as to whether, in general, there is an increasing or diminishing return in damage as KE is increased.

[Galadorn]

Originally posted by Agent X
Still, I refute this thread's premise. Hero is not broken!

I agree. There are probably issues of simplicity that Hero could deal with. Maybe a little covering for all those nuts and bolts?

All I know is the time it would take to design a Hero character, is far longer then for many other systems. Of course, I get more out of it. ;)

But, I think the initial time up front, especially if they are new to the game system, may be disheartening. But for us people with alot of experience, it's whats makes the game rich. :)

[Thirdbase]

Originally posted by Kristopher
The BODY multipliers for the hit locations sometimes make it easier to kill someone with small KAs. A heavy pistol is about 2d6 RKA, doing an average of 7 body. Two average hits leave the 14 BODY character dying. Now, shoot him in the head. ONE average hit leaves him dying.

I don't find that at all unrealistic.

Now, as for the "doubling," I see no reason to assume that it applies to anything but lifting. There's nothing to imply that the game mechanics of damage, BODY, STUN, or defenses are anything but linear.

The "muzzle energy" example doesn't hold up to a quick glance at the weapons chart in Hero 5th, or a little knowledge of firearms. A .50 BMG is listed as a 2d6+1 RKA, which is about the same damage as a very heavy pistol, which is too anemic for the .50 BMG. A .50 BMG hit to the body or head should be, on average, overkill -- about 3.5d6* RKA if the average person has 10 BODY. The .50 BMG, fired from the typical weapon made to fire that round, also has many times more energy than any pistol round, including the .50 AE that's listed as doing the same damage. If you don't understand why the idea of both weapons doing the same damage or having the same energy is a joke, find someone who has handled both a .50 BMG and a .50 AE round (or better yet, someone who has fired both) and ask them to explain it.

* "Three and a half D6." 3 1/2d6 looks like gibberish.

From the Hero Errata:


Page 332 - the damage for the .50 caliber machine gun should be 3d6. This gives it an Active Point cost of 157, and a Real Point cost of 63.

A .50 BMG round will do a number on just about anything, it started its life as an early Anti-Tank round.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Agent X
Muhuhuhahahaha! You just can't get away from it, can you Trebuchet? ;) You know what I have to say to you on this one. If anything, you are pointing out an obvious flaw in the system. Why wouldn't leaping and throwing increase proportionately match lifting increases? Also, when players are measuring how mighty a character's strength is do they ask how much he can lift or how much he can leap? If you say leap, I'll have to think silly things about you.In the real world people who can lift twice as much don't jump twice as far, so why should that apply in the Hero universe? And even in Hero how much damage delivered by a blow is as much technique as raw strength, hence the popularity of martial artists. I'm more than willing to concede that lifting is a better measurable scale for strength than damage, but that's been my point all along. You have no evidence anywhere to indicate that 11d6 is twice as much damage as 10d6. You are basing your argument on a false premise; which is that the Strength Charts support your theory. In point of fact they neither confirm nor deny it.

While you can plausibly argue that since each 5 points of STR means lifting twice as much and therefore that each Damage Class equates to delivering twice as much energy when striking, I can just as plausibly argue (theoretically) using the very same charts that since leaping distance doubles every 10 points then each 10 STR doubles striking energy and therefore each 2 DCs is twice as much. This is not an insignificant difference. By your method 10d6 is 512 times as much energy as 1d6, by mine it is approximately 24 times as much. "1 DC" is a purely arbitrary number applied in a game system to keep track of an abstraction within that game, not a physics formula. Let's concede we just don't know and move on.


Still, I refute this thread's premise. Hero is not broken! On this at least we can agree. It may be flawed, as are all things made by mortal man, but it is not broken. :D

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
You are basing your argument on a false premise; which is that the Strength Charts support your theory. In point of fact they neither confirm nor deny it.

While I agree that there are some strong arguments to make for damage being linear, there are other reasons than the Strength Chart to lead one to the conclusion that damage is exponential.

1) Mass is exponential with regard to Body--every doubling of mass adds 1 body. Also Every +1 body will double the size of a hole made in an object.

Fact: each DC of normal damage will, on average, do +1 Body.

And thus a 25d6 EB will make a hole (on average) 32 times larger than a 20d6 EB. Or a 25d6 EB will (on average) cut through 32 times as much material with each shot.

The mathematics of +1 Body per each doubling of mass means that a 200d6 EB can destroy the Earth, that being the case, it is hard to argue that damage is _not_ exponential.

2) The Kinetic Energy of the fire arm table supports the logic that +1 DC = twice the energy. (.50 HMG = 3d6K)

3) The standard system for determining velocity damage is linear. However, starting on page 292 of FREd there is an optional Velocity damage table that turns velocity damage from a linear pattern to a exponential pattern based on kinetic energy. KE = 1/2 Mass X (velocity^2), thus every time you double in speed you get 4 times the KE, thus +2 Velocity Factor, and thus +2 DC (at least for most cases).

Right at the beginning of the optional velocity damage section, it says that this new optional system is "useful for gamers who (a) would prefer a more realistic system for determining velocity damage. . ." Why would the new system be more realistic, if damage were meant to be linear? On page 292, it is indicated that the normal system of linear velocity damage is in place for reasons of simplicity rather than realism.

Again, I still agree that there are arguments to be made in favor of linear damage. But I feel that there are many reasons, other than the Strength Chart, for arguing that damage is exponential.

[Old Man]

Originally posted by Klytus
And in the original version of Shadowrun, you could stuff a grenade down your shorts and suffer - at worst - a Moderate Wound (it takes three Moderate Wounds and 1 Light Wound to be killed in SR).

For the wimpy grenades, yes the damage was Moderate. However since you doing a called shot to the vitals, the damage code goes up by one to Serious.

For real grenades, the damage would be Deadly.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
In the real world people who can lift twice as much don't jump twice as far, so why should that apply in the Hero universe? And even in Hero how much damage delivered by a blow is as much technique as raw strength, hence the popularity of martial artists. I'm more than willing to concede that lifting is a better measurable scale for strength than damage, but that's been my point all along. You have no evidence anywhere to indicate that 11d6 is twice as much damage as 10d6. You are basing your argument on a false premise; which is that the Strength Charts support your theory. In point of fact they neither confirm nor deny it.

While you can plausibly argue that since each 5 points of STR means lifting twice as much and therefore that each Damage Class equates to delivering twice as much energy when striking, I can just as plausibly argue (theoretically) using the very same charts that since leaping distance doubles every 10 points then each 10 STR doubles striking energy and therefore each 2 DCs is twice as much. This is not an insignificant difference. By your method 10d6 is 512 times as much energy as 1d6, by mine it is approximately 24 times as much. "1 DC" is a purely arbitrary number applied in a game system to keep track of an abstraction within that game, not a physics formula. Let's concede we just don't know and move on.

On this at least we can agree. It may be flawed, as are all things made by mortal man, but it is not broken. :D I understand your "real world" analogy but, let's remember, that the strongest in the real world tend to be big, heavy guys. In a world where strength is not really tied simply to muscle mass it makes more sense for lifting, leaping, and throwing to match more closely.

You already know why I like the doubling concept. It allows for a greater range of power to be represented at a playable level. A technically correct write-up of many comic book super-teams would leave half the team with nothing to do in a conflict if we use the scale you advocate.

[Dust Raven]

Mmm...

A guy who does 4d6 with a punch. That would be a 20 STR, enough to lift and carry over 800 lbs for short distances, and over a ton for a second or two.

Looking at that, I really don't see how this guy couldn't reasonably take down an elephant...especially if he picked up a big stick.

Of course, he could be a martial artist, using a spiffy punch. But then he would also know how to use the stick with that spiffy punch, an it probably wouldn't be just any stick, but a weapon designed to be used with that spiffy punch.

Anyways, HERO is NOT broken! It's not perfect, but neither is reality.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Warp9
Fact: each DC of normal damage will, on average, do +1 Body.

And thus a 25d6 EB will make a hole (on average) 32 times larger than a 20d6 EB. Or a 25d6 EB will (on average) cut through 32 times as much material with each shot.

The mathematics of +1 Body per each doubling of mass means that a 200d6 EB can destroy the Earth, that being the case, it is hard to argue that damage is _not_ exponential.
I believe you are incorrect in this assertation. Nowhere in HERO does it say that +1 BODY damage doubles the size of a hole in all objects. This rule specifically applies to walls only (5th Edition, page 304). In no way is the Earth similar to a wall in configuration. Walls are thin objects with a thin cross-section, the Earth is an oblate spheroid with a substantially different cross section. ( | vs. O )

Can you provide the data on how you arrived at a number of 200d6 destroying Earth? Earth's total volume is 10^21 * 1.1m³, so how many doublings does it take with each cubic game inch taking 8 cubic meters? By my calculations (Admittedly possibly incorrect; math is not my strongest suit) that gives Earth 137,000,000 cubic game inches, of which the square root of is 11726.0394. So wouldn't that mean it would take over 11,000d6 to destroy the Earth?

And what about the vastly denser and tougher core of iron at the center of our little planet? How does that effect your formula? (Although in practical terms, any attack that penetrates to the Earth's core in effect would destroy the planet.)

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Agent X
You already know why I like the doubling concept. It allows for a greater range of power to be represented at a playable level. A technically correct write-up of many comic book super-teams would leave half the team with nothing to do in a conflict if we use the scale you advocate. And I fully support your choice to use your interpretation of the damage scale in your own game. However, in net game effects the difference is virtually nil. In Hero terms, 11d6 is only slightly more powerful than 10d6, be it twice as powerful or hundreds of times more powerful in real world effects. Were we operating in the real world, this would be a much more important bit of information. As it is, it's merely an interesting bit of trivia to argue over.

I think such things are best decided on a campaign by campaign basis. Your numbers make more sense at the cosmic end of the superhero scale (Superman, Legion of Superheroes, Thor, etc.). I think mine work better at the lower levels my campaign uses. My team still fights agents. I can accept our team brick (65 STR, 13d6) hits dozens of times harder than my martial artist (15 STR, 10d6), I have a hard time accepting she's hitting thousands of times harder. That just seems a bit implausible to me. YMMV.

[Killer Shrike]

Not to quibble, and as a complete non sequitir, but according to the X Universe the center of the Earth is composed of Vibranium and is actually a nascent/embryonic Celestial. Thats also why, in the X Universe, Galactus goes around "eating planets"; he's absorbing the Celestial embryo's in a long running war with the Celestials. As an aside to an aside, Galactus is also really Franklin Richards. As a tangent to an aside to an aside, who really cares how many DC's of damage is a doubling of force or KE or whatever? Its either enough damage to do the trick, not enough, or too much and its all relative to the target.

Linear or Exponential, either my defenses are enough to bounce your attack or they arent and I take some damage.

Particular weapons are just SFX.

There is nothing systemic keeping a character from making a 10d6 RKA and calling it a .38 Special. Its just a SFX with which to impart damage. The fact that the 'default' .38 Special that is available as equipment in a Heroic campaign is significantly less lethal than that means slightly less than nothing. The presented weaps are for comparison purposes only. Any GM could chuck the whole thing in favor of a completely altered chart.

Basically, it could read "Tiny Gun Xd6 K", +Yd6 K per Order of Magnitude (rated as Small, Average, Big, Huge, Massive, etc), or anything else. The amount of damage weapons do in terms of effectiveness is only measurable within the context of who/what the target is.

Besides, everyone knows that in the HERO System its the STUN that will get you 9 times out of 10 ;)

IMO, YMMV.....

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
I believe you are incorrect in this assertation. Nowhere in HERO does it say that +1 BODY damage doubles the size of a hole in all objects. This rule specifically applies to walls only (5th Edition, page 304). In no way is the Earth similar to a wall in configuration. Walls are thin objects with a thin cross-section, the Earth is an oblate spheroid with a substantially different cross section. ( | vs. O )

Can you provide the data on how you arrived at a number of 200d6 destroying Earth? Earth's total volume is 10^21 * 1.1m³, so how many doublings does it take with each cubic game inch taking 8 cubic meters? By my calculations (Admittedly possibly incorrect; math is not my strongest suit) that gives Earth 137,000,000 cubic game inches, of which the square root of is 11726.0394. So wouldn't that mean it would take over 11,000d6 to destroy the Earth?



Under "Breaking Things" FREd (page 303) it says: "an object's body depends on it's total mass, each doubling of mass is +1 BODY." My specific assertion in the case of the Earth's BODY rating (and its ability to be destroyed) was based on this fact--and had nothing to do with "walls."

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Trebuchet

<...>
In Hero terms, 10d6 is only slightly more powerful than 10d6
<...>

This makes my head hurt ;)

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Warp9
Under "Breaking Things" FREd (page 303) it says: "an object's body depends on it's total mass, each doubling of mass is +1 BODY." My specific assertion in the case of the Earth's BODY rating (and its ability to be destroyed) was based on this fact--and had nothing to do with "walls." You are correct, however the assertation that each +1 BODY damage to an object doubles the size of the hole applies only to walls. That is a significant fact when we are being told by some that xd6 will destroy the Earth because of the doubling effect. If Earth has 11700+ BODY, it will take that many d6's to destroy it. Equally obviously if each d6 makes the hole twice as big it will take far fewer d6 to vaporize our poor planet.

[Killer Shrike]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
You are correct, however the assertation that each +1 BODY damage to an object doubles the size of the hole applies only to walls. That is a significant fact when we are being told by some that xd6 will destroy the Earth because of the doubling effect. If Earth has 11700+ BODY, it will take that many d6's to destroy it. Equally obviously if each d6 makes the hole twice as big it will take far fewer d6 to vaporize our poor planet. I opt for making it difficult to vaporize the planet; my sense of self preservation demands it ;)

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
You are correct, however the assertation that each +1 BODY damage to an object doubles the size of the hole applies only to walls. That is a significant fact when we are being told by some that xd6 will destroy the Earth because of the doubling effect. If Earth has 11700+ BODY, it will take that many d6's to destroy it. Equally obviously if each d6 makes the hole twice as big it will take far fewer d6 to vaporize our poor planet.

Based on its mass, Earth should have no more than 100 BODY. And 200 Body would destroy it.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Trebuchet

<snip>
is not my strongest suit) that gives Earth 137,000,000 cubic game inches, of which the square root of is 11726.0394. So wouldn't that mean it would take over 11,000d6 to destroy the Earth?

<snip>



Not quite. For a geometric progression, you take the logarithm to the base in question. In this case, it is the logarithm to the base of 2.

Assuming your figure of 1.37E8 cubic hexes is correct, you take the LOG2 of it. For this purpose, all you need is the nearest integer value, rounded up.

Since 2^20 is a bit over 1 million (as in Megabyte), 137 million is about 2^25 or just a bit more. 26 BODY sounds awfully low even for a geometric progression, so there's probably an incorrect assumption in there somewhere.

This reminds me of "Nuko the Atomic Wizard", an exercise in number-crunching in FH. By buying down every stat possible, and using all his points (about 220), a 150-point FH wizard could, by using every Limitation available, build a Power of about 3000 Active Points. I remember designing it with AE Radius until it got to Earth-size. I vaguely recall it being about 80d Killing. We calculated it would vaporize the Earth's crust down to a depth of about forty meters or so. Perhaps a few lichens would survive in caverns somewhere.

So it sounds like there's some other assumptions that need to be made to destroy a planet.

Why I am trying to be coherent at 1 AM I dunno... Maybe I'll get ambitious and figure it up tomorrow.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Killer Shrike
Not to quibble, and as a complete non sequitir, but according to the X Universe the center of the Earth is composed of Vibranium and is actually a nascent/embryonic Celestial. Thats also why, in the X Universe, Galactus goes around "eating planets"; he's absorbing the Celestial embryo's in a long running war with the Celestials. As an aside to an aside, Galactus is also really Franklin Richards. As a tangent to an aside to an aside, who really cares how many DC's of damage is a doubling of force or KE or whatever? Its either enough damage to do the trick, not enough, or too much and its all relative to the target.

Linear or Exponential, either my defenses are enough to bounce your attack or they arent and I take some damage.

Particular weapons are just SFX.

There is nothing systemic keeping a character from making a 10d6 RKA and calling it a .38 Special. Its just a SFX with which to impart damage. The fact that the 'default' .38 Special that is available as equipment in a Heroic campaign is significantly less lethal than that means slightly less than nothing. The presented weaps are for comparison purposes only. Any GM could chuck the whole thing in favor of a completely altered chart.

Basically, it could read "Tiny Gun Xd6 K", +Yd6 K per Order of Magnitude (rated as Small, Average, Big, Huge, Massive, etc), or anything else. The amount of damage weapons do in terms of effectiveness is only measurable within the context of who/what the target is.

Besides, everyone knows that in the HERO System its the STUN that will get you 9 times out of 10 ;)

IMO, YMMV..... Don't spoil a good argument with logic.:)

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Warp9
While I agree that there are some strong arguments to make for damage being linear, there are other reasons than the Strength Chart to lead one to the conclusion that damage is exponential.

1) Mass is exponential with regard to Body--every doubling of mass adds 1 body. Also Every +1 body will double the size of a hole made in an object.

Fact: each DC of normal damage will, on average, do +1 Body.

And thus a 25d6 EB will make a hole (on average) 32 times larger than a 20d6 EB. Or a 25d6 EB will (on average) cut through 32 times as much material with each shot.

The mathematics of +1 Body per each doubling of mass means that a 200d6 EB can destroy the Earth, that being the case, it is hard to argue that damage is _not_ exponential.

2) The Kinetic Energy of the fire arm table supports the logic that +1 DC = twice the energy. (.50 HMG = 3d6K)

3) The standard system for determining velocity damage is linear. However, starting on page 292 of FREd there is an optional Velocity damage table that turns velocity damage from a linear pattern to a exponential pattern based on kinetic energy. KE = 1/2 Mass X (velocity^2), thus every time you double in speed you get 4 times the KE, thus +2 Velocity Factor, and thus +2 DC (at least for most cases).

Right at the beginning of the optional velocity damage section, it says that this new optional system is "useful for gamers who (a) would prefer a more realistic system for determining velocity damage. . ." Why would the new system be more realistic, if damage were meant to be linear? On page 292, it is indicated that the normal system of linear velocity damage is in place for reasons of simplicity rather than realism.

Again, I still agree that there are arguments to be made in favor of linear damage. But I feel that there are many reasons, other than the Strength Chart, for arguing that damage is exponential. Whooh! Where were you when Trebuchet and I danced before? That is some mighty stuff there Trebuchet.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Killer Shrike
I opt for making it difficult to vaporize the planet; my sense of self preservation demands it ;) Are you... confusing... yourself with your... characters. :confused: ;)

[Killer Shrike]

Originally posted by Agent X
Are you... confusing... yourself with your... characters. :confused: ;) The game is REAL!!!

uh......disregard {looks around furtively}

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Killer Shrike
The game is REAL!!!

uh......disregard {looks around furtively} I know some places that you can go to that can help... :)

[Kaeto]

At least it isn't as bad as the guy in my gaming group who took the earth as a focus, and defined it as fragile so that it only took 1 body to destroy it.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Kaeto
At least it isn't as bad as the guy in my gaming group who took the earth as a focus, and defined it as fragile so that it only took 1 body to destroy it. Now THAT is evil. :D

[Blue Jogger]

Originally posted by Trebuchet

You are extrapolating from a lifting chart which doubles lifting capability per 5 points, but does not double either throwing or leaping distances. Based on the other aspects of the STR charts, arbitrarily assuming each DC is twice as much damage is not supported.

It does allow for picking up a dinosaur at 75 STR, dropping it on a normal with 10 BODY (take 15 dice!), and if he gets immediate medical attention within a few turns, he'll live.

"Gee, Mighty Man, if you didn't rush me to the hospital, I might have died."

[dbcowboy]

Originally posted by Kaeto
At least it isn't as bad as the guy in my gaming group who took the earth as a focus, and defined it as fragile so that it only took 1 body to destroy it.

Interviewer: Tick, what exactly can you do? Can you breathe atomic fire?

Tick: er, no

Interviewer: Can you destroy the earth?

Tick: My GOD I hope not! That's where I keep all my stuff!

[Mentor]

Originally posted by Killer Shrike
I opt for making it difficult to vaporize the planet; my sense of self preservation demands it ;) Yah. World saving is tough enough for Superheroes without making it fragile.:D

[Mentor]

Originally posted by Killer Shrike
I opt for making it difficult to vaporize the planet; my sense of self preservation demands it ;) Stupid double post!

[Trebuchet]

Let's look at this logically, and with the obvious caveat that we're dealing with a game system and not the real world, so I'll argue from a system perspective rather than a real world one. Simply put, the results within the game system do not support exponential increases in damage per d6. Based on exponential increase, 10d6 is 512 times as much damage as 1d6 and 15d6 is 16384 times as much damage as 1d6. Are these numbers supported by results in the game world? Absolutely not. Can anyone honestly show me an example in Hero where 15d6 bounces off an object but 16d6 completely destroy it, as would be the case with a 16d6 attack 32768 times as powerful as 1d6? Do you really think 30d6 is 536,870,912 times as much energy as 1d6?

Does each +1 of PD or ED make someone twice as tough in game terms, therefore making someone with 25 PD 3275.8 times as difficult to hurt as a character with 10 PD? Is a character with 30 PD (Over 500 million times as tough as 1 PD if figured exponentially) really 320 times more difficult to injure than one with a 25 PD? Of course not. The game mechanics do not reflect any such disparity in difficulty to injure another character. 30 PD is tougher than 25 PD and way tougher than 10 PD, but the corresponding toughness is not exponential.

And of course extra BODY would also apply: Each +1 BODY should make something twice as difficult to destroy if damage is exponential, but does anyone here think a character with 10 BODY is only half as difficult to mortally wound as one with 11 BODY? As someone pointed out above, 15d6 can't even be guaranteed to kill a normal. A martial artist hitting for 10d6 is not hitting for 1/32 as much damage as the team brick with 15d6. It just doesn't work out that way in the game.

Therefore it stands to reason, based on the way the Hero system works within the game itself, that each d6 is only an undefined but incremental amount of additional damage, not twice as much. Exponential looks good at first glance, but not when you actually do the numbers. The damage/defense scale may not be arithmetic either, but perhaps logarithmic or some other method of scaling. But one thing it is clearly is not is exponential.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
Let's look at this logically, and with the obvious caveat that we're dealing with a game system and not the real world, so I'll argue from a system perspective rather than a real world one. Simply put, the results within the game system do not support exponential increases in damage per d6. Based on exponential increase, 10d6 is 512 times as much damage as 1d6 and 15d6 is 16384 times as much damage as 1d6. Are these numbers supported by results in the game world? Absolutely not. Can anyone honestly show me an example in Hero where 15d6 bounces off an object but 16d6 completely destroy it, as would be the case with a 16d6 attack 32768 times as powerful as 1d6? Do you really think 30d6 is 536,870,912 times as much energy as 1d6?

Does each +1 of PD or ED make someone twice as tough in game terms, therefore making someone with 25 PD 3275.8 times as difficult to hurt as a character with 10 PD? Is a character with 30 PD (Over 500 million times as tough as 1 PD if figured exponentially) really 320 times more difficult to injure than one with a 25 PD? Of course not. The game mechanics do not reflect any such disparity in difficulty to injure another character. 30 PD is tougher than 25 PD and way tougher than 10 PD, but the corresponding toughness is not exponential.

And of course extra BODY would also apply: Each +1 BODY should make something twice as difficult to destroy if damage is exponential, but does anyone here think a character with 10 BODY is only half as difficult to mortally wound as one with 11 BODY? As someone pointed out above, 15d6 can't even be guaranteed to kill a normal. A martial artist hitting for 10d6 is not hitting for 1/32 as much damage as the team brick with 15d6. It just doesn't work out that way in the game.

Therefore it stands to reason, based on the way the Hero system works within the game itself, that each d6 is only an undefined but incremental amount of additional damage, not twice as much. Exponential looks good at first glance, but not when you actually do the numbers. The damage/defense scale may not be arithmetic either, but perhaps logarithmic or some other method of scaling. But one thing it is clearly is not is exponential.

I have two different replies to your post. I cover the first in this post and the second in my next post.

This line of discussion started when you replied to Arthur's Post. However, instead of arguing with it, now it seems like you've simply re-stated his original message, only you've added one leap of logic.

Arthur's original quote

However, the geometric damage scale of Hero DOES cause some odd effects, but you have to extend the analysis a bit.

Our Hero (TM) has 14 BODY. Assume Killing Damage and no resistant defenses. You shoot OH with a 1d KA. It takes four shots to put him at 0 BODY, and four more (a total of eight) to kill him.

"That's too many shots!" we cry. Let's use a weapon that does eight times as much damage! However, 8x as much damage from the characters' POV is only 2d or twice as much in points of damage due to the exponential nature of the system.

Our Hero is put to zero BODY by two shots, and killed outright by four shots (he's having a rough day). Eight times as much KE, but it takes only half as many shots.

You can do a similar analysis of points of BODY, making certain assumptions (IIRC, +2 BODY = x2 mass) and show that also gives counter-intuitive results.

Is Hero broken this way? Yes. Is there any game system that doesn't have similar problems? Not that I've ever found.



Unlike Arthur, you assume that because .50 Cal HMG (3d6 K damage or 9DCs) doesn't play out in the game as 64 times more powerful than a pistol (with 1d6 K damage--or 3 DCs), that it therefore must _not_ be 64 times more powerful. I don't agree with that assumption.

The problem is that the HMG *is* 64 times as powerful as a pistol (based on kinetic energy), if the system doesn't reflect this, it just means that the system isn't perfect.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
Let's look at this logically, and with the obvious caveat that we're dealing with a game system and not the real world, so I'll argue from a system perspective rather than a real world one. Simply put, the results within the game system do not support exponential increases in damage per d6. Based on exponential increase, 10d6 is 512 times as much damage as 1d6 and 15d6 is 16384 times as much damage as 1d6. Are these numbers supported by results in the game world? Absolutely not. Can anyone honestly show me an example in Hero where 15d6 bounces off an object but 16d6 completely destroy it, as would be the case with a 16d6 attack 32768 times as powerful as 1d6? Do you really think 30d6 is 536,870,912 times as much energy as 1d6?



You have asserted that, although 30d6 is supposedly 500 million times as powerful as 1d6, it just doesn't play out that way in the game (and therefore it must not be 500 million times as powerful).

In some cases, you're right. However, in some cases it does play out that way.

Imagine two characters shooting at a 12 Def 5 Body Object. The first character has a 30d6 EB and the second character has a 1d6 EB.

I ask you: how many times will the guy with the 1d6 EB have to shoot at the object to match the damage done to the object by one shot from the 30d6?

According to the system, the 1d6 could not do as much damage to the object with a 500 million shots as one shot of 30d6 would do.

In fact, even if the guy with the 1d6 EB took 9,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999, 999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,99 9,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999, 999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,99 9,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999, 999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,99 9,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999 shots, he would still not do as much as one 30d6 shot.

You simply can't do damage to a 12 Def Object with a 1d6 EB, no matter how many times you shoot it.

So I would argue that, in some ways a 30d6 plays out as even more than 500 million times as powerful as 1d6.

Just because you can find a few examples where the game system doesn't seem to back up exponential damage does not prove anything. I can find many examples where the system does back up exponential damage.

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Warp9
I have two different replies to your post. I cover the first in this post and the second in my next post.

This line of discussion started when you replied to Arthur's Post. However, instead of arguing with it, now it seems like you've simply re-stated his original message, only you've added one leap of logic.


Unlike Arthur, you assume that because .50 Cal HMG (3d6 K damage or 9DCs) doesn't play out in the game as 64 times more powerful than a pistol (with 1d6 K damage--or 3 DCs), that it therefore must _not_ be 64 times more powerful. I don't agree with that assumption.

The problem is that the HMG *is* 64 times as powerful as a pistol (based on kinetic energy), if the system doesn't reflect this, it just means that the system isn't perfect.

You assume that 64 x KE = 64 x more lethal.

That's not necessarily true.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher
You assume that 64 x KE = 64 x more lethal.

That's not necessarily true.

I don't believe that I ever said that it was 64 X more lethal, just that it was 64 X more powerful.

[Kristopher]

Lethality has to come into the equation.

Is a 3d6 RKA rifle 64 times more lethal than a 2d6 RKA rifle?

Is a 9d6 punch from a super 64 times more lethal than a 6d6 punch?

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher
Lethality has to come into the equation.

Is a 3d6 RKA rifle 64 times more lethal than a 2d6 RKA rifle?

Is a 9d6 punch from a super 64 times more lethal than a 6d6 punch?

First of all, every DC doubles--so in the examples you gave we'd be talking about a factor of 8 (not 64).

Second of all, 2d6RKA and 3d6RKA are both equally lethal to a mouse ;)

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Warp9

The problem is that the HMG *is* 64 times as powerful as a pistol (based on kinetic energy), if the system doesn't reflect this, it just means that the system isn't perfect.

The system DOES reflect it, based on each +1 DC being x2 KE (and therefore, twice as powerful).

A mathematical model (which this RPG is, like it or not) does not necessarily have to be based on linear math. Math is just a set of rules for manipulating symbols.

GURPS uses plain arithmetic: twice as much as 6d is 12d. Take a look at the explosive rules in High-Tech.

Hero uses exponents: +1 (or possibly +2) DC is twice as much damage. It is not as clear, since the STR chart and firearm damage imply +1 DC, while the Explosives rules imply +2 DC. However, the fact that it IS exponential when relating game results to real world effects is (or should be) indisputable.

Neither way is right or wrong - it is simply two different operational assumptions.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Arthur
The system DOES reflect it, based on each +1 DC being x2 KE (and therefore, twice as powerful).

A mathematical model (which this RPG is, like it or not) does not necessarily have to be based on linear math. Math is just a set of rules for manipulating symbols.

GURPS uses plain arithmetic: twice as much as 6d is 12d. Take a look at the explosive rules in High-Tech.

Hero uses exponents: +1 (or possibly +2) DC is twice as much damage. It is not as clear, since the STR chart and firearm damage imply +1 DC, while the Explosives rules imply +2 DC. However, the fact that it IS exponential when relating game results to real world effects is (or should be) indisputable.

Neither way is right or wrong - it is simply two different operational assumptions.


1) My reply was to Trebuchet not to you, I was only referencing your post.

2) I have ALWAYS been saying that 3d6RKA _is_ 64 times more powerful than a 1d6 RKA.

3) when I said: "The HMG *is* 64 times as powerful as a pistol (based on kinetic energy), if the system doesn't reflect this, it just means that the system isn't perfect." I was only acknowledging the fact that, sometimes during game play, 3d6K does not seem 64 times more powerful than 1d6K.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Warp9
1) My reply was to Trebuchet not to you, I was only referencing your post.


OK. Does it matter? That just changes the meaning of my last post from "disputing your point" to "expounding on your point". Either way, I was just trying to clarify things.

Not every reply has to be a disagreement. Capish? We cool? You dig? Righto? Check? Indubitably? Unquestionably?



2) I have ALWAYS been saying that 3d6RKA _is_ 64 times more powerful than a 1d6 RKA.


Ah yes. I see you are one of Us. But I have already said too much...
:)

[Vondy]

Just as a point of order:

From a real world perspective an exponential doubling of kinetic energy doesn't necessarily translate to a exponential doubling of damage. There are numerous factors that go into determining the lethality of a wound and kinetic energy is only one of them. As such, using the damage classes of an attack to determine relative kinetic energy is a flawed paradigm.

In ballistics we have four basic wound factors:

Permanent Cavity (Bullet Size)
Temporary Cavity (Stretching from Kinetic Transfer)
Blood Loss (Placement)
Nevous System Damage (Placement)

Permanent cavity damage, blood loss, and nervous system damage can all be increased based on various sizes and innovations related to the bullet in question. For instance, a .45 Golden Sabre round will create a bigger cavity, has a greater chance of inducing blood loss and disrupting nervous function, that a .45 hardball round.

Increased kinetic energy does impact temporary cavity, and can, with larger rounds, kill with hydrostatic shock, but in regards to bullets -- size does matter. As does sophistication: a .50 BMG round won't do as much damage to a target as a .50 BMG APEX round will do.

The attempt to use DC's to extrapolate kinetic force makes more sense when relating to muscle powered weapons, but there you don't have the issue of temporary cavity. You just have the force of the swing. There are still issues to address in this context, such weapon concept [blade versus bludgeon] and size [claymore versus dirk], which will effect wound size and type.

The only place kinetic force truly equates to DCs is brute superstrength.

[Kristopher]

D-Man,

Thanks for a more detailed and clear explanation of what I've been trying to get at.

PS: a 3d6 RKA is 3 times as powerful as a 1d6 RKA.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by D-Man
Just as a point of order:

From a real world perspective an exponential doubling of kinetic energy doesn't necessarily translate to a exponential doubling of damage. There are numerous factors that go into determining the lethality of a wound and kinetic energy is only one of them. As such, using the damage classes of an attack to determine relative kinetic energy is a flawed paradigm.

In ballistics we have four basic wound factors:

Permanent Cavity (Bullet Size)
Temporary Cavity (Stretching from Kinetic Transfer)
Blood Loss (Placement)
Nevous System Damage (Placement)

Permanent cavity damage, blood loss, and nervous system damage can all be increased based on various sizes and innovations related to the bullet in question. For instance, a .45 Golden Sabre round will create a bigger cavity, has a greater chance of inducing blood loss and disrupting nervous function, that a .45 hardball round.

Increased kinetic energy does impact temporary cavity, and can, with larger rounds, kill with hydrostatic shock, but in regards to bullets -- size does matter. As does sophistication: a .50 BMG round won't do as much damage to a target as a .50 BMG APEX round will do.

The attempt to use DC's to extrapolate kinetic force makes more sense when relating to muscle powered weapons, but there you don't have the issue of temporary cavity. You just have the force of the swing. There are still issues to address in this context, such weapon concept [blade versus bludgeon] and size [claymore versus dirk], which will effect wound size and type.

The only place kinetic force truly equates to DCs is brute superstrength.

Now I would agree that damage on the human body is a complex thing, and I also would agree that there are many ways to measure such damage. However, Hero is a generic system. Body, and Defense, and damage apply to everything in the game Universe. Human bodies, machines, lumps of rock, aliens, and living-metal-mutants, all take damage in basically the same way. Is this absolutely realistic--maybe not--but that is the way a generic game system functions.


From a Physics Text

The ability to do work is defined as "energy" and the ability of a particle to do work by virtue of its motion is defined as "kinetic energy".



To me, the ability of a particle to do "work" on a target object is probably the best general definition of its ability to do damage. Kinetic energy, by its definition, fits that bill.

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Warp9
Now I would agree that damage on the human body is a complex thing, and I also would agree that there are many ways to measure such damage. However, Hero is a generic system. Body, and Defense, and damage apply to everything in the game Universe. Human bodies, machines, lumps of rock, aliens, and living-metal-mutants, all take damage in basically the same way. Is this absolutely realistic--maybe not--but that is the way a generic game system functions.



To me, the ability of a particle to do "work" on a target object is probably the best general definition of its ability to do damage. Kinetic energy, by its definition, fits that bill.

I guess my point was that a general rule shouldn't be assumed to apply to every specific case.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Kristopher
[B
PS: a 3d6 RKA is 3 times as powerful as a 1d6 RKA. [/B]

As has already been pointed out, the physics of how a bullet damages a human body is an incredibly complex subject. In fact, the debate is still in progress. Most authorities consider KE to be the main deciding factor, others argue for momentum. I've even seen Momentum Density (momentum per cross-sectional area). Then the type of round has to be taken into account.

However, when designing a game system, you pretty much need to simplify a lot. Reverse-engineering shows that +1 DC = x2 KE holds to a high degree of correlation - more than enough for a game construct.

P.S. Go to the local gun store and declare in a loud voice that you think a .50 BMG round is three times as powerful as a .22. Let me know how it goes, if they can catch their breath after all the laughing.

3 times as many points in the game is just that: 3 times as many points. When the points are exponents, it's not a simple linear relationship to attack power.

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Arthur
As has already been pointed out, the physics of how a bullet damages a human body is an incredibly complex subject. In fact, the debate is still in progress. Most authorities consider KE to be the main deciding factor, others argue for momentum. I've even seen Momentum Density (momentum per cross-sectional area). Then the type of round has to be taken into account.

However, when designing a game system, you pretty much need to simplify a lot. Reverse-engineering shows that +1 DC = x2 KE holds to a high degree of correlation - more than enough for a game construct.

P.S. Go to the local gun store and declare in a loud voice that you think a .50 BMG round is three times as powerful as a .22. Let me know how it goes, if they can catch their breath after all the laughing.

3 times as many points in the game is just that: 3 times as many points. When the points are exponents, it's not a simple linear relationship to attack power.

I seem to recall being the one to point out that a .50BMG has woefully underpowered in FRED, having not seen the errata that changed it. 3d6 is *closer* to acurate.

Anyway, IMO, trying to equate DCs to KE is rather pointless. 3d6 really is 3 times as expensive and 3 times as powerful as 1d6. The minimum, average, and maximum damage are all three times greater. The relationship between Active Point cost and each of those numbers is linear, as well. For KAs, every 15 points gets you 1 min, 3.5 average, and 6 max BODY on the damage roll.

Where things get complicated is here: how is a certain number of dice / amount of damage likely to interact with the typical levels of defenses, STUN, and BODY in a particular campaign. 3d6 RKA is brutal in most heroic campaigns, but many supers aren't going to be that frightened by it.

What matters most isn't "What's the KE I'm trying to represent with this power/weapon?" It's, "How lethal / effective is this supposed to be?" One of the reasons bullets are so deadly is that they deliver their KE (and momentum) in a particularly damaging manner. But, I suspect you know that, given the post I'm responding to.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher
I seem to recall being the one to point out that a .50BMG has woefully underpowered in FRED, having not seen the errata that changed it. 3d6 is *closer* to acurate.

Anyway, IMO, trying to equate DCs to KE is rather pointless. 3d6 really is 3 times as expensive and 3 times as powerful as 1d6. The minimum, average, and maximum damage are all three times greater. The relationship between Active Point cost and each of those numbers is linear, as well. For KAs, every 15 points gets you 1 min, 3.5 average, and 6 max BODY on the damage roll.

Where things get complicated is here: how is a certain number of dice / amount of damage likely to interact with the typical levels of defenses, STUN, and BODY in a particular campaign. 3d6 RKA is brutal in most heroic campaigns, but many supers aren't going to be that frightened by it.

What matters most isn't "What's the KE I'm trying to represent with this power/weapon?" It's, "How lethal / effective is this supposed to be?" One of the reasons bullets are so deadly is that they deliver their KE (and momentum) in a particularly damaging manner. But, I suspect you know that, given the post I'm responding to.

From a physics standpoint, are you arguing that the effect that a bullet has when hitting a chunk of rock is not related to its KE? What is your basis for this assumption?

If you don't equate DCs to kinetic energy, what objective standard to you use for translating a real world weapon into Hero terms? How do you determine "how lethal / effective is this supposed to be?"

You have stated that "3d6 really is 3 times as expensive and 3 times as powerful as 1d6." That being the case, do you think that a .50 Cal HMG really is 3 times as powerful as a .22 pistol? If not, how much damage should it do?

[Vondy]

For those who are interested in reports produced by people who don't write for gun magazines go here:

http://www.firearmstactical.com/wound.htm

One of the better articles is here:

http://www.firearmstactical.com/hwfe.htm

And here:

http://www.firearmstactical.com/afte.htm

As for the comparison between a .22 Pistol and a .50 BMG. A comparison between a rifle and a handgun cartidge is laughable, let alone bringing a .50 BMG round into the equation:

.50 BMG Average @ point blank: 15700 Joules
.22PST Average @ point blank: 248 Joules

Yeah, that's three times more powerful (not). It doesn't take into account other major wound factors such as penetration, bullet size, and expansion.

You can't use these types of conversions in a role playing game. Damage is an ABSTRACTION. You have to take a general sense of how lethal a weapon is and translate it into play. A BMG that hits center mass will basically be lethal even for uber tough. At 3d6 it will average 10.5 body, which kills a normal man (8 Body) flat out, or takes off a limb if it hits one. I think that does the basic job fairly well. The question is penetration and stun (kinetic transfer). Add on AP [or Pen] and a +1 StunX [average 37.5] and it translates fairly nicely. Its not always about the dice.

[Kristopher]

Thank you, again, D-Man. Sincerely. That's a better answer than I was going to provide.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher
Thank you, again, D-Man. Sincerely. That's a better answer than I was going to provide.

I'm not sure that D-man's post supports the views you've been arguing for.

What D-man said supports the idea of abstract exponential damage, and contradicts the idea of a linear relationship between power and DCs.

He makes the point very clearly that a .50 BMG (at 3d6 RKA) is NOT 3 times as powerful as a 1d6 RKA. Yet he has no difficulty with using 3d6K as an abstraction to represent the 15700 Joules of an HMG.


from D-man's Post

.50 BMG Average @ point blank: 15700 Joules
.22PST Average @ point blank: 248 Joules

Yeah, that's three times more powerful (not).


You, on the other hand, have been saying that 3d6 IS 3 times as powerful as 1d6--that is the point I'm arguing about.

Based on your statement (that 3d6 IS 3 times as powerful as 1d6) you have two choices: you can argue that an HMG is actually 3 times as powerful as a pistol, or you can re-write the rules so that a HMG no longer does 3d6 (maybe you could re-write it so that the HMG does 60d6 K damage).

IMO you would be better off accepting the idea that 3d6 K is an exponential abstraction that represents weapons of a massive power level (like an HMG). Rather than continuing to hold to the idea of a one-to-one correlation between the Body rolled on the dice and the actual power of the attack.

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Warp9
I'm not sure that D-man's post supports the views you've been arguing for.

What D-man said supports the idea of abstract exponential damage, and contradicts the idea of a linear relationship between power and DCs.

He makes the point very clearly that a .50 BMG (at 3d6 RKA) is NOT 3 times as powerful as a 1d6 RKA. Yet he has no difficulty with using 3d6K as an abstraction to represent the 15700 Joules of an HMG.

You, on the other hand, have been saying that 3d6 IS 3 times as powerful as 1d6--that is the point I'm arguing about.

Based on your statement (that 3d6 IS 3 times as powerful as 1d6) you have two choices: you can argue that an HMG is actually 3 times as powerful as a pistol, or you can re-write the rules so that a HMG no longer does 3d6 (maybe you could re-write it so that the HMG does 60d6 K damage).

IMO you would be better off accepting the idea that 3d6 K is an exponential abstraction that represents weapons of a massive power level (like an HMG). Rather than continuing to hold to the idea of a one-to-one correlation between the Body rolled on the dice and the actual power of the attack.

Actually, I'm not going to do either one. I'm not concerned with any kind of between real-world kinetic energy and HERO Damage Classes. There may be a coincidental relationship, but I honestly don't care and don't think it's at all important.

The only thing that's important is approximating the real-world lethality of an attack or weapon, and the real-world lethality isn't a simple matter of kinetic energy. KE is a **factor**, but it's not the only factor by any stretch. KE is only part of what determines the degree of damage done to, well, a chunk of rock. Angle matters, material composition matters, shape and structure matter, etc, etc, etc.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher
KE is a **factor**, but it's not the only factor by any stretch. KE is only part of what determines the degree of damage done to, well, a chunk of rock. Angle matters, material composition matters, shape and structure matter, etc, etc, etc.

You're missing something there--all those other factors you mentioned relate to (and change with) each specific target. They have nothing to do with the actual attack rating itself. So please list some factors that aren't relative to a specific target.

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Warp9
You're missing something there--all those other factors you mentioned relate to (and change with) each specific target. They have nothing to do with the actual attack rating itself. So please list some factors that aren't relative to a specific target.

You're missing the point. Real life damage and lethality are far more complicated than damage, def, and BODY. So much more complicated, in fact, that you're not going to get the kind of clean and simple corelation between KE and dice of damage.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher
You're missing the point. Real life damage and lethality are far more complicated than damage, def, and BODY. So much more complicated, in fact, that you're not going to get the kind of clean and simple corelation between KE and dice of damage.

We're not talking about the way an attack has effect on a specific target--which might get complicated--depending on the target.

We're not talking about a target of any sort here, just the attack itself. We're talking about the general rating of an attack. Specifically we are looking at rating the attack's raw ability to do damage in a general way to all sorts of objects (people, cars, rocks, etc. . . ).

Please state your reasons against using KE as an indicator of raw ability to do damage. Please show some example cases where kinetic energy just wouldn't be good enough (even for a game) to estimate general potential ability to do damage.

And now I have a specific question for you.

Do you really think that a .50 Cal HMG is 3 X as powerful as a 1d6 RKA pistol? (yes or no)

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Warp9
We're not talking about the way an attack has effect on a specific target--which might get complicated--depending on the target.

We're not talking about a target of any sort here, just the attack itself. We're talking about the general rating of an attack. Specifically we are looking at rating the attack's raw ability to do damage in a general way to all sorts of objects (people, cars, rocks, etc. . . ).

Please state your reasons against using KE as an indicator of raw ability to do damage. Please show some example cases where kinetic energy just wouldn't be good enough (even for a game) to estimate general potential ability to do damage.

And now I have a specific question for you.

Do you really think that a .50 Cal HMG is 3 X as powerful as a 1d6 RKA pistol? (yes or no)

Irrelevent.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher
Irrelevent.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

That's a good attempt at a save! I guess I can't get a simple answer to a simple question.

But I'll explain to you why you can't answer my question. . . .


If you say

"Yes, a .50 Cal HMG _is_ 3 X as powerful as a 1d6 RKA pistol"

you'll risk sounding crazy.


And if you say

"No, a .50 Cal HMG is NOT 3 X as powerful as a 1d6 RKA pistol"

then you'll be accepting that the Hero weapon stats, as written, do not support a linear power to damage ratio.


Hey, please tell me if I'm wrong (and, of course, why I'm wrong).

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Warp9
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

That's a good attempt at a save! I guess I can't get a simple answer to a simple question.

But I'll explain to you why you can't answer my question. . . .

If you say

"Yes, a .50 Cal HMG _is_ 3 X as powerful as a 1d6 RKA pistol"

you'll risk sounding crazy.

And if you say

"No, a .50 Cal HMG is NOT 3 X as powerful as a 1d6 RKA pistol"

then you'll be accepting that the Hero weapon stats, as written, do not support a linear power to damage ratio.

Hey, please tell me if I'm wrong (and, of course, why I'm wrong).

The answer is, "neither."

The idea that a .50BMG is only 3 times as powerful as a 9mm is laughable.

The idea that there is a simple, direct, and strict power to damage relationship of any kind in HERO is laughable.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher

3d6 really is 3 times as expensive and 3 times as powerful as 1d6. The minimum, average, and maximum damage are all three times greater. The relationship between Active Point cost and each of those numbers is linear, as well.

[Kristopher]

Which isn't a contradiction at all. Mechanically, that's entirely true.

[Warp9]

Quote #1Originally posted by Kristopher

The idea that there is a simple, direct, and strict power to damage relationship of any kind in HERO is laughable.


Quote #2 Originally posted by Kristopher

3d6 really is 3 times as expensive and 3 times as powerful as 1d6.

You're saying that Quote #2 is not a statement of a 'power to damage' relationship?

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Warp9
You're saying that Quote #2 is not a statement of a 'power to damage' relationship?

As I've already said, that was meant in a strictly in-game, mechanical sense.

All I care about is whether 3d6 RKA sufficiently translates the real-world lethality of a .50BMG into game-mechanics lethality.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Kristopher
As I've already said, that was meant in a strictly in-game, mechanical sense.

All I care about is whether 3d6 RKA sufficiently translates the real-world lethality of a .50BMG into game-mechanics lethality. Quite right. And I'd say 3d6K reasonably represents the effects of a .50 BMG on a human being. Against most people it will produce a mortal wound (10.5 BODY) which will prove fatal in mere seconds, with a head shot it will result in instant death for normals (21 BODY) and even some supers.

Numbers like "xd6" and "y BODY" are meant only to represent game mechanics for what are ultimately abstractions at best anyway. While engineers may speak of joules and megajoules of energy to represent kinetic energy, there is no corresponding number for physicians to rate "life energy." ("Quick, Nurse Johnson! Call the Crash Team! He's down to only 21% of his BODY!") Heck, we can't even really define life, much less quantify it. (Are viruses alive?) Without such a real world scale to measure life and/or physical toughness, trying to determine the real world equivalents of damage is utterly pointless. And that brings us back to HERO. In HERO, 3d6 is 3X as much as 1d6 just as 3d6 is 1/3 of 9d6 within the game system. These numbers are relative within that system, not logarithmic. Saying it is anything else is ultimately pointless. It's a nice academic exercise, but nothing more. We have to use self-reference within the game because that's the only scale we have to work with that supplies numbers for damage, resistance to damage, and surviving that damage.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher
As I've already said, that was meant in a strictly in-game, mechanical sense.

All I care about is whether 3d6 RKA sufficiently translates the real-world lethality of a .50BMG into game-mechanics lethality.

The only problem is that, in both quotes, you were referring to "in-game mechanics."

Quote #1: "The idea that there is a simple, direct, and strict power to damage relationship of any kind in HERO is laughable. "

Your saying this quote is NOT about "in-game mechanics?" How can relationships between power and damage in HERO _not_ be about game mechanics?

Or are you saying that your other quote is not about "in-game mechanics?"

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet

While engineers may speak of joules and megajoules of energy to represent kinetic energy, there is no corresponding number for physicians to rate "life energy." ("Quick, Nurse Johnson! Call the Crash Team! He's down to only 21% of his BODY!") Heck, we can't even really define life, much less quantify it. (Are viruses alive?) Without such a real world scale to measure life and/or physical toughness, trying to determine the real world equivalents of damage is utterly pointless. And that brings us back to HERO. In HERO, 3d6 is 3X as much as 1d6 just as 3d6 is 1/3 of 9d6 within the game system. These numbers are relative within that system, not logarithmic. Saying it is anything else is ultimately pointless. It's a nice academic exercise, but nothing more. We have to use self-reference within the game because that's the only scale we have to work with that supplies numbers for damage, resistance to damage, and surviving that damage.

You seem to be making the assumption that we are talking about damage being applied to a living person. Or are you saying that damage can only be applied to living objects? (I hope not)

How do you know that we aren't talking about damage to a wall, or a lump of rock?

[Warp9]

I have heard a number of you guys go on and on about how damage is soooooo complex that there can be no easy way to correlate any measurable factor to Hero damage.

Apparently, if we try to use any given factor (such as kinetic energy) to relate to damage we'll come up with results which just won't work. Apparently the results would be too outrageous even for a generic game.

If this is true, why does KE used on an exponential scale match up to the fire arms chart so well?

Can it be that damage in a generic game like Hero is not so complex after all?

And again if no factor can be matched to damage in Hero, why does KE on an exponential scale work so well? Is it all a big coincidence? ---maybe its a conspiracy?

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Warp9
You seem to be making the assumption that we are talking about damage being applied to a living person. Or are you saying that damage can only be applied to living objects? (I hope not)

How do you know that we aren't talking about damage to a wall, or a lump of rock? I was specifically addressing both living and unliving ("Without such a real world scale to measure life and/or physical toughness...'). However, we have no real world way to know exactly how much damage a non-living structure will take to destroy either. That level of knowledge requires either having been the one who created that structure or destroying it in order to analyse it in such detail.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Warp9
If this is true, why does KE used on an exponential scale match up to the fire arms chart so well?
My guess is that George MacDonald, the original creator of Champions, used firearms tables to correlate damage within his system when he was designing it. He had to use some scale, and charts for kinetic energy are easily found in any reloading book. The system works pretty well at the low levels of energy involved with firearms, but breaks down completely when dealing with the power levels of nuclear weapons and city-leveling energy blasts fired by megavillains. If kinetic energy translated directly into damage on an exponential scale then the military would have developed 5mm antitank rounds travelling 1000000 fps rather than wasting their time with clunky 120mm shells in tanks. (And yes, I know the penetrator in an Abrams round is considerably smaller than 120mm, it's closer to 25mm.)



Can it be that damage in a generic game like Hero is not so complex after all?

And again if no factor can be matched to damage in Hero, why does KE on an exponential scale work so well? Is it all a big coincidence? ---maybe its a conspiracy? First of all, you seem to be the one assuming damage in Hero is complex. It's not complex at all, it's a simplified model of a fictional system of physics. All models are simplistic by definition; that's the entire point of working with models be they physical or mathematical: They are simple enough our feeble brains can analyse them. Why do you insist on making this harder than it needs to be?

Damage in Hero is quite simple: 1d6 is half as much damage as 2d6; 10d6 is 10 times as much damage as 1d6. What's so hard to grasp here?

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
I was specifically addressing both living and unliving ("Without such a real world scale to measure life and/or physical toughness...'). However, we have no real world way to know exactly how much damage a non-living structure will take to destroy either. That level of knowledge requires either having been the one who created that structure or destroying it in order to analyse it in such detail.

Why do you assume that things have to be super exact--isn't a general estimate good enough for a game?

Are you saying that physics can't even give a general estimate of the general effect that a projectile of a specific mass, moving at a specific speed, will have on a given wall? Or do you think that I must have created the wall before I could give even a general estimate?

If physics can come up with general estimates about such things, then isn't that good enough for rating damage in a game?



And if you think that there are no real world measures of physical toughness, then you are mistaken. Engineers have many measures of the amount of abuse that a given object can stand up to--and IMO an engineer needs to measure with far more exacting standards than a generic game.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
If kinetic energy translated directly into damage on an exponential scale then the military would have developed 5mm antitank rounds travelling 1000000 fps rather than wasting their time with clunky 120mm shells in tanks.

I don't believe that we have the technology to produce something like a shell that could travel at 1 million fps--if you have evidence that we can, then I'd like to see it.

And you are confusing the exponential scale of Hero (which would generate an exponential amount of KE as the DCs go higher and higher) with the nature of KE itself.

The KE value does go up as a square of velocity, but that has nothing to do with the exponential scale of Hero.

30 squared = 900 (the scale of Kinetic Energy to Velocity)

2 to the power of 30 = 1 Billion. (the exponential scale of Hero)

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Warp9
If physics can come up with general estimates about such things, then isn't that good enough for rating damage in a game? No, because there are no physics in a game. That's what we are telling you. Damage and defenses in Hero are relative only to each other. While engineers may well be able to calculate fairly close approximations of structural strength, they cannot look at a blueprint and say "That thing has 17 DEF and 21 BODY, so we need a 38d6 attack to break it." I watched a show earlier this week on the busting of the Rhine dams by the RAF during WW2. Even under carefully controlled conditions and using actual German engineering drawings of those structures, engineers took dozens of attempts to figure out how big an explosive to use and how to place it. It's just not as cut and dried in the real world as you seem to think. It's simple in Champions because this is a game. :rolleyes:

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Warp9
The only problem is that, in both quotes, you were referring to "in-game mechanics."

Quote #1: "The idea that there is a simple, direct, and strict power to damage relationship of any kind in HERO is laughable. "

Your saying this quote is NOT about "in-game mechanics?" How can relationships between power and damage in HERO _not_ be about game mechanics?

Or are you saying that your other quote is not about "in-game mechanics?"

Now you're just confused.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
It's just not as cut and dried in the real world as you seem to think.

I'd like to see you back that up with more than something that you saw in a show somewhere.

You'll have to give me some lessons in Physics and Mathematics.

And maybe I'll have to get my money back for all the math and engineering classes I took in college.

BTW--a small 5mm projectile travelling at 1 million fps would burn up in the Earth's atmosphere very quickly--a side-effect of it's tremendous KE interacting with the air particles.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Kristopher
Now you're just confused.

Then please enlighten me.


Quote #1 by Kristopher
The idea that there is a simple, direct, and strict power to damage relationship of any kind in HERO is laughable.

Isn't the above a statement about in-game mechanics?


Quote #2 by Kristopher
3d6 really is 3 times as expensive and 3 times as powerful as 1d6.

Isn't this also a statement about in-game mechanics?

So I don't understand what you were saying with the following quote:


Quote #3 by Kristopher
As I've already said, that was meant in a strictly in-game, mechanical sense.

I still don't see how what you've said can be anything but a contradiction.

Please explain yourself so that people with my limited intelligence can understand you.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Warp9
Isn't the above a statement about in-game mechanics?

Isn't this also a statement about in-game mechanics?

So I don't understand what you were saying with the following quote: "As I've already said, that was meant in a strictly in-game, mechanical sense."

I still don't see how what you've said can be anything but a contradiction.

Please explain yourself so that people with my limited intelligence can understand you. I'll put this in simple words since you seem to have identified the problem.

1) Kristopher is discussing in-game mechanics.

2) I am discussing in-game mechanics.

3) You are discussing "real world" mechanics.

4) Game mechanics are not the real world. I don't particularly care if you think 2d6 is a highway flare or a hydrogen bomb in the real world, in the game it does 2d6. Period. End of discussion. :rolleyes:

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
I'll put this in simple words since you seem to have identified the problem.

1) Kristopher is discussing in-game mechanics.

2) I am discussing in-game mechanics.

3) You are discussing "real world" mechanics.

4) Game mechanics are not the real world. I don't particularly care if you think 2d6 is a highway flare or a hydrogen bomb in the real world, in the game it does 2d6. Period. End of discussion. :rolleyes:

I am also discussing in-game mechanics--your statement that I'm not is simply untrue.

And please explain to me how Kristopher's 2 statements are not contradictions.

He has stated that: there cannot be a realationship between power and damage in the Hero game System.

And he has also stated that: there is a 1 to 1 realtionship between power and damage in the Hero game system. (3d6 = 3X the power of 1d6)

How can those 2 things not be contradictions?

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Warp9
I don't believe that we have the technology to produce something like a shell that could travel at 1 million fps--if you have evidence that we can, then I'd like to see it.


The fastest muzzle velocity figure I've ever seen for a real-world weapon was for an experimental railgun (or "mass driver" or "gauss gun"). It was 11,000 meters/second. That comes out to about 35,000 fps.



The KE value does go up as a square of velocity, but that has nothing to do with the exponential scale of Hero.


KE = 1/2MV^2. M = mass; V = velocity.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Trebuchet

4) Game mechanics are not the real world. I don't particularly care if you think 2d6 is a highway flare or a hydrogen bomb in the real world, in the game it does 2d6. Period. End of discussion. :rolleyes:

For you. And, perhaps, for some others. If all you care about is that the game is internally consistent and don't care about any kind of realism or believeability, then great! You're done at this step. Press on, and feel free to ignore us Philistines.

However, SOME of us WANT to have a way to correlate Real World Mechanics to Game Mechanics. I think it is great to be able to look up the specifications for a new weapon or vehicle and have a meta-system or at least a guideline for "Hey! I wonder what that would do in Hero?".

[Catacomb]

Originally posted by TaxiMan
The underlying basic concept of Hero is broken. That concept is the exponential scale of damage and defenses. They are wrong. Here's why:

A man ("George") attacks an enormous elephant. He has 4d6 attack, and the elephant ("Jumbo") has 16PD. On average, "G" does 14 STUN, which is reduced to 0 STUN after "J"'s defenses.

OK, so even though J has 40 STUN, he'll never go down, the attack is ineffective. J is pretty passive, and just stands there.

This will never work, so G picks up a club that quadruples his damage! He now does 6d6 (4d6 + 2 doublings), and will dish out 5 STUN a phase after J's defenses (21 STUN average - 16 PD). It will take eight phases before J (who holds his breath so he gets no Recoveries) is KOed.

G has learned his lesson! Next time he meets the forgetful J, there is no club available. Fortunately, he has three friends, so they can deal out quadruple damage! At first they are uncoordinated, and ABSOLUTELY NOTHING happens to J. The elephant thinks he's getting a massage. Ho hum.

G's team learns to coordinate their attacks, and so the group of four get to add their damage. Now it's 4d6 * 4, or 16d6 / phase. That's an average of 56 STUN. Working together, G's team takes out J with one blow!

To recap, G's attack can't hurt J.

G quadruples his damage, and takes 8 phases to defeat J.

G has three uncoordinated friends, and can never defeat J.

G's friends learn to coordinate and defeat J instantly.

That's where the exponential flaw is easily seen. Let the flames begin! Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!


Gee if only coordination worked that way...you take the stun per attack and add it together for stunning purposes so you don't multiply damage, you add. PLONK!!! Stinking troll.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Arthur
For you. And, perhaps, for some others. If all you care about is that the game is internally consistent and don't care about any kind of realism or believeability, then great! You're done at this step. Press on, and feel free to ignore us Philistines.

However, SOME of us WANT to have a way to correlate Real World Mechanics to Game Mechanics. I think it is great to be able to look up the specifications for a new weapon or vehicle and have a meta-system or at least a guideline for "Hey! I wonder what that would do in Hero?". There is nothing wrong with wanting such a thing. I attempt to do the much same thing in my own game. My point is that the Warp9 (and others) are arguing that Hero's damage system is exponential without any evidence to back up that assertion. An exponential damage system is not supported by game-world results. By stating that each DC is twice as much damage as the preceeding DC, we are led to such ridiculous conclusions as that a 20d6 attack is 524288 times as powerful as a 1d6 attack and 30d6 attack is well over 53 million times as powerful as a 1d6 attack. That is obviously not the case if you look at how the game works. A 20d6 attack will level a building or flatten a hero, but it is patently not 524288 times as powerful as a 1d6 attack. Think Spider-Man could survive a 15d6 punch from Rhino? Of course he can, and has. Think Spider-Man could take a thug's bullet for 1d6RKA (3DCs)? Natch. How about 5461 bullets as Warp9 proposes is the correct damage for 5d6 RKA (15 DCs)? I don't think so, Tim. :rolleyes:

You can create reasonably accurate representations of real world weapons in HERO without resorting to exponential damage. In fact, they would alow you to be more accurate since you have a near infinite number of grades (1d6, 1d6+1, 1½d6, 2d6, 2d6+1, etc.) rather than each d6 being twice as powerful.

[tmutant]

Originally posted by Kaeto
At least it isn't as bad as the guy in my gaming group who took the earth as a focus, and defined it as fragile so that it only took 1 body to destroy it.

Was it a replaceable focus?:D

Was his name Arthur Dent?:D

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
My point is that the Warp9 (and others) are arguing that Hero's damage system is exponential without any evidence to back up that assertion. An exponential damage system is not supported by game-world results.

It takes only double the body of an object to destroy it fully (FREd page 302). And by its mass Earth has less than 100 Body.

But don't take my word for it, here is a quote from thread about how much damage it would take to destroy the planet.

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=4931&perpage=15&pagenumber=2


Originally posted by Monolith

The rules in Star Hero state that the planet has 86 BODY, so that is the number you need to over come to break the planet into pieces. The 177 BODY number is the amount of damage required to "vaporize" the planet.


I'm getting a little tired of making this point over and over again. I have supplied multiple items of game world evidence--but it just keeps getting ignored.

Trebuchet, do you accept the fact that the Hero rules say that the Earth would be destroyed by a 200d6 EB? (yes or no)

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Warp9
Trebuchet, do you accept the fact that the Hero rules say that the Earth would be destroyed by a 200d6 EB? (yes or no) Ah yes, the classic "appeal to authority" of those with a flawed argument. Yes, I can accept the fact that the rules say that without agreeing with that rule. It's patently absurd.

By your line of reasoning, if Earth has only 86 BODY as claimed by Star Hero, then less than a dozen 20d6 attacks would also destroy it. (Average 20 BODY per attack, 20 - 7 PD = 13 BODY to Earth per attack, or only 7 20d6 attacks to destroy Earth.) Let's take that a step further into the absurd. A standard speed 4 brick with a 12d6 attack can break Earth into pieces in only 18 Phases, or less than one minute. Can you see now why this 2X mass per BODY formula is inherently flawed? And of course the equally flawed opposite side of this coin is that each 1d6 is twice as much damage. It just doesn't work that way. Let's take another example of where HERO doesn't jive with observed facts. A person in HERO falling and impacting at terminal velocity takes 30d6 of damage; and conversely ought to do 30d6 of damage to whatever they hit. In Hero this ought to leave an enormous crater in the earth, since dirt has a DEF of 0 and only 10 BODY. Thus a person hitting the ground at terminal velocity should theoretically leave a crater of 500,000 cubic hexes in size since he did 20 more BODY than the dirt had and each +1 BODY doubles the size of the hole. But in the real world do skydivers who fall to their deaths destroy entire cities when they hit? No.

The Breaking Things rules were designed to deal with discreet objects like buildings, doors, walls, bridges, boulders and the like that humans can plausibly interact with, and they just don't scale up well. It cannot be rationally applied to objects millions or billions of times larger. Earth and other planetary sized objects should have millions if not billions of BODY. I agree that a 200d6 blast would do serious damage and would probably make an enormous crater, but destroy the Earth? Hardly.

I 'm sorry, Warp9, but this is one instance where the original game designer had a major brain fart. George MacDonald blew this one rather badly, and I'm only sorry Steve Long didn't see fit to fix this for 5th edition.

Just because something is written down in a rule book doesn't make it gospel. I'm not going to stop using my brain just because "The Bible tells me so." If Steve Long et al want to kick me out of the Church of HERO as a heretic, so be it. In the meantime I'll keep nailing my list of grievances to the cathedral door. :)

[Blue Angel]

One thing about planets they are either fully (or near fully) destroyed or unhurt. A big crater doesn't destroy it. It just relocates it's mass. A planet doesn't care about it's mass distribution. So a 20d6 EB might make a crater but no "real" lasting damage as far as the planet is concerned. If you do enough damage you could render it lifeless but the planet itself would not even notice. All it knows is "I still have my mass". To cause significant "harm" you need to overcome the gravitional binding energy which on a planetary scale is alot of energy.

To build planets properly you need to include some sort of regeneration. The mass falls back down to the surface and the body is recovered.

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet

I 'm sorry, Warp9, but this is one instance where the original game designer had a major brain fart. George MacDonald blew this one rather badly, and I'm only sorry Steve Long didn't see fit to fix this for 5th edition.

Just because something is written down in a rule book doesn't make it gospel. I'm not going to stop using my brain just because "The Bible tells me so." If Steve Long et al want to kick me out of the Church of HERO as a heretic, so be it. In the meantime I'll keep nailing my list of grievances to the cathedral door. :)

Hey look dude, I didn't write the Hero rules--I'm just letting you know what they say. Nobody said that you have to use the Hero rules as written. But I love all the Hero rules just as they are!

And I am saying that there is some strong evidence, in the Hero rules as written, to support exponential damage.

[Blue Angel]

Originally posted by Warp9
Hey look dude, I didn't write the Hero rules--I'm just letting you know what they say. Nobody said that you have to use the Hero rules as written. But I love all the Hero rules just as they are!

And I am saying that there is some strong evidence, in the Hero rules as written, to support exponential damage.

A big support for exponential damage is the 2X body per 2X mass or thickness rule. Looks pretty exponential.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
Ah yes, the classic "appeal to authority" of those with a flawed argument. Yes, I can accept the fact that the rules say that without agreeing with that rule. It's patently absurd.

By your line of reasoning, if Earth has only 86 BODY as claimed by Star Hero, then less than a dozen 20d6 attacks would also destroy it. (Average 20 BODY per attack, 20 - 7 PD = 13 BODY to Earth per attack, or only 7 20d6 attacks to destroy Earth.) Let's take that a step further into the absurd. A standard speed 4 brick with a 12d6 attack can break Earth into pieces in only 18 Phases, or less than one minute. Can you see now why this 2X mass per BODY formula is inherently flawed? And of course the equally flawed opposite side of this coin is that each 1d6 is twice as much damage. It just doesn't work that way. Let's take another example of where HERO doesn't jive with observed facts. A person in HERO falling and impacting at terminal velocity takes 30d6 of damage; and conversely ought to do 30d6 of damage to whatever they hit. In Hero this ought to leave an enormous crater in the earth, since dirt has a DEF of 0 and only 10 BODY. Thus a person hitting the ground at terminal velocity should theoretically leave a crater of 500,000 square hexes in size since he did 20 more BODY than the dirt had and each +1 BODY doubles the size of the hole. But in the real world do skydivers who fall to their deaths destroy entire cities when they hit? No.

The Breaking Things rules were designed to deal with discreet objects like buildings, doors, walls, bridges, boulders and the like that humans can plausibly interact with, and they just don't scale up well. It cannot be rationally applied to objects millions or billions of times larger. Earth and other planetary sized objects should have millions if not billions of BODY. I agree that a 200d6 blast would do serious damage and would probably make an enormous crater, but destroy the Earth? Hardly.

I 'm sorry, Warp9, but this is one instance where the original game designer had a major brain fart. George MacDonald blew this one rather badly, and I'm only sorry Steve Long didn't see fit to fix this for 5th edition.

Just because something is written down in a rule book doesn't make it gospel. I'm not going to stop using my brain just because "The Bible tells me so." If Steve Long et al want to kick me out of the Church of HERO as a heretic, so be it. In the meantime I'll keep nailing my list of grievances to the cathedral door. :) Waitaminnit, you get to disregard rules you don't like in this discussion but will bring up rules that you think support your position?

The argument that there are multiple examples of exponential progression in the game is not refuted by saying you don't like it. If this is merely an argument of taste then don't appeal to authority either.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Agent X
Waitaminnit, you get to disregard rules you don't like in this discussion but will bring up rules that you think support your position?

The argument that there are multiple examples of exponential progression in the game is not refuted by saying you don't like it. If this is merely an argument of taste then don't appeal to authority either. Doug, where do you see me bringing up rules to support my position? I stated the obvious intent of a section of the rules; to wit the section on destroying objects. It is you and your allies who have decided to extrapolate those rules beyond all reason. You are quite correct, there are numerous examples of exponential progression in HERO just as there are examples of linear progression. What I am saying is that Hero System's entire use of exponential progression is wrong, both in game effects and in observable real world examples. I gave examples of several absurd results from using exponential damage and BODY which you chose to ignore, I can only presume because you have no effective rebuttal. Kindly produce a counterargument as to why a 75 STR brick can't destroy Earth in less than 2 minutes using the HERO rules. Without resorting to GM fiat, you can't. Any game system needs to be internally consistent in how it works.

I don't have any problem within my campaign using the rules as written, because IMHO nuclear weapons and planet-shattering attacks are plot devices and don't need that level of detail. I'm simply not so pedantic that I see a need to quantify how many dice the Death Star's™ blast was. As far as I'm concerned it was awholelottad6. This is not an argument of taste, I am merely stating the somewhat obvious fact that in this particular regard the rules are broken.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to grab my sledgehammer and destroy our planet to illustrate my point. I'll be back in 10 minutes. ;)

[Shadow War]

***DELETED AND BANNED***

[Catacomb]

Wow, you spend months on end trying to get back on just to flame...well at least we know that you're obsessed with Steve and Hero. C'mon you love it right? Why else would you try so hard to get Steve's attention?

[Blue Angel]

There is no rath like a woman scorned.

[Blue Angel]

I just checked CKC. It would take an attack of 100 body to kill Grond in a single hit. That is more than the Earth!?

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Blue Angel
I just checked CKC. It would take an attack of 100 body to kill Grond in a single hit. That is more than the Earth!? And the official Hero approved version of the Hulk published in July's Game Trade Magazine would require a 170d6 attack to kill in one shot. (35 PD, 25 BODY, 50% Damage Reduction) Doesn't that illustrate my exact point rather succinctly? :cool:

[Monolith]

Originally posted by Catacomb
Wow, you spend months on end trying to get back on just to flame...well at least we know that you're obsessed with Steve and Hero. C'mon you love it right? Why else would you try so hard to get Steve's attention?
I would not be surprised to find that half the new people posting in this thread are actually the same person. The poster has a history of arguing with himself on message boards to drum up responses.

Just ignore him. He has been reported and Ben and Dan will weedout all his new accounts he has been piling up here since his last eviction.

Besides, if the author had any brains he would realize that Steve did win an Origin's award. It was his friends at GoO and Green Ronin who were shut out. :)

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Monolith
I would not be surprised to find that half the new people posting in this thread are actually the same person. The poster has a history of arguing with himself on message boards to drum up responses.I think you're probably wrong there, Monolith. The only truly new person posting in this thread is Shadow ****. While I may not agree with Warp9's position, I believe he is a legitimate poster who honestly disagrees with me. Shadow **** is too arrogant and obnoxious to disguise himself for long. He's just a more-obvious-than-usual troll. I just do the smart thing and block his posts whenever he appears instead of waiting for Ben to shut him down again.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
Ah yes, the classic "appeal to authority" of those with a flawed argument. Yes, I can accept


Dude (or dudette), you are usually quite sharp and good at the discussion game here, but this one was a swing and a miss.

We are talking about a RULES SYSTEM. EVERYTHING about it is contained in one book written by humans. There is no such thing as independent verifiable evidence on this subject. The author of this work is, by definition, the ultimate authority.

If George MacDonald were to tell us "Yes, I intended that each +1 DC represent a doubling of energy in Real World terms", then that would be IT. Fini. End of argument. The Author is always right as long as you agree to play his game (in novels or movies, this is a symbolic statement, here it is quite literal).

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Arthur
We are talking about a RULES SYSTEM. EVERYTHING about it is contained in one book written by humans. There is no such thing as independent verifiable evidence on this subject. The author of this work is, by definition, the ultimate authority.

If George MacDonald were to tell us "Yes, I intended that each +1 DC represent a doubling of energy in Real World terms", then that would be IT. Fini. End of argument. The Author is always right as long as you agree to play his game (in novels or movies, this is a symbolic statement, here it is quite literal). To a certain extent I agree with you, but not only has George MacDonald not made such an explicit statement but to a large extent the rules defy their own internal logic on this topic. (Nor is George MacDonald the final authority anymore, he has been superceded by a new prophet.) Nowhere in the rules does it state categorically that each +1 DC represents twice as much damage; some people are extrapolating that from other data. Steve Long has repeatedly asserted that one must use common and dramatic sense when playing this game, so why not in this particular and ambiguous case?

What would be harmed within the game by Steve Long categorically stating that damage is linear rather than exponential? Absolutely nothing. It would simply give results more compatible with both real-world and comic book physics. I know this is a game of rubber science, but that doesn't mean we can't strive for internal consistency. If it is left as is we are faced with the absurdity of a vanilla 60 STR brick being able to destroy the Earth in under one minute within the game system. Since that defies both observable real-world physics and the comic-book physics that this game system was originally designed to simulate, I put it to you that this needs correction. We are not dealing with holy writ here; as you correctly pointed out it is a game system, edited and revised by a man who is perfectly willing (and has!) to admit he makes mistakes. If the system were already perfect there would have been no reason for 5th Edition.

[lemming]

Originally posted by Arthur
If George MacDonald were to tell us "Yes, I intended that each +1 DC represent a doubling of energy in Real World terms", then that would be IT. Fini. End of argument. [/B]
Back in the old days, there were plenty of questions you could ask all the different authors and get a different response from each.
Now based on various examples, I don't think it's unreasonable to think that there's a logorithmic scale to damage. I'm too lazy to get off my ass to look into the newer material, but it used to be that every +2d6 N would mean you had doubled the amount of explosive material.
Now with the argument that planets should have more body: I think so. Different components or something. I tend to just hand wave it at that point. Of course, if we went pseudo realistic, the energy released by each brick's haymaker would irradiate the surrounding area.
Which is why I just don't care to go too deep into making things too real. I've got plenty of physics & chemistry in my background, but I've got better things than trying to measure the calories needed to sustain my speedster's metabolism.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
Doug, where do you see me bringing up rules to support my position? I stated the obvious intent of a section of the rules; to wit the section on destroying objects. It is you and your allies who have decided to extrapolate those rules beyond all reason. You are quite correct, there are numerous examples of exponential progression in HERO just as there are examples of linear progression. What I am saying is that Hero System's entire use of exponential progression is wrong, both in game effects and in observable real world examples. I gave examples of several absurd results from using exponential damage and BODY which you chose to ignore, I can only presume because you have no effective rebuttal. Kindly produce a counterargument as to why a 75 STR brick can't destroy Earth in less than 2 minutes using the HERO rules. Without resorting to GM fiat, you can't. Any game system needs to be internally consistent in how it works.

I don't have any problem within my campaign using the rules as written, because IMHO nuclear weapons and planet-shattering attacks are plot devices and don't need that level of detail. I'm simply not so pedantic that I see a need to quantify how many dice the Death Star's™ blast was. As far as I'm concerned it was awholelottad6. This is not an argument of taste, I am merely stating the somewhat obvious fact that in this particular regard the rules are broken.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to grab my sledgehammer and destroy our planet to illustrate my point. I'll be back in 10 minutes. ;) I understand your position. I just don't think that's where the rules lead. I also think that your position makes it very hard to play a game that takes advantage of higher end comic book characters from DC and Marvel.

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Arthur


Dude (or dudette), you are usually quite sharp and good at the discussion game here, but this one was a swing and a miss.

We are talking about a RULES SYSTEM. EVERYTHING about it is contained in one book written by humans. There is no such thing as independent verifiable evidence on this subject. The author of this work is, by definition, the ultimate authority.

If George MacDonald were to tell us "Yes, I intended that each +1 DC represent a doubling of energy in Real World terms", then that would be IT. Fini. End of argument. The Author is always right as long as you agree to play his game (in novels or movies, this is a symbolic statement, here it is quite literal). [/B]

Um, not to burst your bubble, but your whole post is pretty much a giant appeal to authority.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Kristopher
Um, not to burst your bubble, but your whole post is pretty much a giant appeal to authority. He's saying that any argument over someone else'e rules system has to be an appeal to authority, so you aren't bursting his bubble.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Agent X
I understand your position. I just don't think that's where the rules lead. I also think that your position makes it very hard to play a game that takes advantage of higher end comic book characters from DC and Marvel. Doug, it seems to me as if you are rationalizing exponential damage progression solely for the purpose of playing higher end characters. My position does not make it in the least bit harder to play high-end characters. I see absolutely no problem with playing such characters or building them within HERO using linear damage, you just can't build them for 350 points. But there is not a darn thing wrong with building Thor or Superman for 1500 points and giving them both STR well above 100 or even 150. Why do you think HERO has a Cosmically Powerful category for supers? :)

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
Doug, it seems to me as if you are rationalizing exponential damage progression solely for the purpose of playing higher end characters. My position does not make it in the least bit harder to play high-end characters. I see absolutely no problem with playing such characters or building them within HERO using linear damage, you just can't build them for 350 points. But there is not a darn thing wrong with building Thor or Superman for 1500 points and giving them both STR well above 100 or even 150. Why do you think HERO has a Cosmically Powerful category for supers? :) Using exponential damage, you would have to spend about 1500 points or more to build Thor or Superman. Using the scale that I think you are suggesting, the mind boggles at how many points these characters would cost. I remember what you describe as proper defenses for a tank.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Agent X
Using exponential damage, you would have to spend about 1500 points or more to build Thor or Superman. Using the scale that I think you are suggesting, the mind boggles at how many points these characters would cost. I remember what you describe as proper defenses for a tank. I dunno. Just how many dice did you anticipate Thor or Superman need? I would think 30-50d6 would do pretty decently to represent either hero, unless you go back to the absurd "Superman can move planets" version of the 70's. I am not suggesting changing the damage system itself, only redefining of what that damage represents. 50d6 is still one heck of a wallop no matter how you look at it. It just won't break our planet in two hits. Is that really such a bad thing? To paraphrase the Tick: I don't want the Earth destroyed, that's where I keep all my stuff. :D

Let's not rehash the tank thing now, shall we? That is one place where we will likely never see eye to eye. Besides, if we change to a linear damage scale then I think you will probably rethink your position on tank defenses anyway. (Which is of course the ultimate goal of my entire nefarious scheme.) ;)

[Warp9]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
I dunno. Just how many dice did you anticipate Thor or Superman need? I would think 30-50d6 would do pretty decently to represent either hero, unless you go back to the absurd "Superman can move planets" version of the 70's. I am not suggesting changing the damage system itself, only redefining of what that damage represents. 50d6 is still one heck of a wallop no matter how you look at it. It just won't break our planet in two hits. Is that really such a bad thing? To paraphrase the Tick: I don't want the Earth destroyed, that's where I keep all my stuff. :D

Let's not rehash the tank thing now, shall we? That is one place where we will likely never see eye to eye. Besides, if we change to a linear damage scale then I think you will probably rethink your position on tank defenses anyway. (Which is of course the ultimate goal of my entire nefarious scheme.) ;)

First off, thank you for believing that I'm are real (and legitimate) poster, Trebuchet.

I don't know if Monolith was referring to me or not in is statement, but I might point out that I am not that new. I've been registered since Feb (as long as I could be on these new boards). I'm just generally more of a lurker than a poster.



Anyway, for a look at what linear damage might be like on a massive scale, I'd refer to GURPS.

Some Weapon stats from GURPS (linear system)

A big Particle Beam weapon on a Mech (from GURPS Mecha) does 6d6X500 (or 3000 d6)

A big star ship weapon (from GURPS Traveller) does 6d6X10,000 (or 60,000 d6)

A 1 Kton yield Nuke (from GURPS Mecha) does 12d6X200,000 (or 2.4 Million d6)

[Warp9]

Oh, and for a sense of comparison

a 9mm pistol does 2d6 in GURPS

a 15mm BMG does 16d6 in GURPS

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Warp9
Oh, and for a sense of comparison

a 9mm pistol does 2d6 in GURPS

a 15mm BMG does 16d6 in GURPS

But that's GURPS, which, to be frank, stinks.

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Warp9
First off, thank you for believing that I'm are real (and legitimate) poster, Trebuchet.

I don't know if Monolith was referring to me or not in is statement, but I might point out that I am not that new. I've been registered since Feb (as long as I could be on these new boards). I'm just generally more of a lurker than a poster.



Anyway, for a look at what linear damage might be like on a massive scale, I'd refer to GURPS.

Some Weapon stats from GURPS (linear system)

A big Particle Beam weapon on a Mech (from GURPS Mecha) does 6d6X500 (or 3000 d6)

A big star ship weapon (from GURPS Traveller) does 6d6X10,000 (or 60,000 d6)

A 1 Kton yield Nuke (from GURPS Mecha) does 12d6X200,000 (or 2.4 Million d6) I don't know if Monolith was referring to you either, but it seemed at least to me that you were the most vocal "new" guy on this thread. (And most of us rate "newness" more by number of posts, not date of registration.) I have certainly not found your arguments in this thread to be abusive or derogatory in any way.

Jeez, I hope GURPS uses a Standard Effects rule or you'd spend your entire life rolling dice! I am certainly not proposing a GURPs type damage system either. That's taking the equation way too far in the other direction. There is nothing wrong with the HERO damage system except it's definition of what the scale of that damage is. Even in the comic books, beings who can shatter planets with a single blow are virtually unknown. But in Champions you can take out a planet with an absurdly puny character. The simple act of redefining Earth to have (say) 100 million BODY eliminates this problem. Then we can move on to kicking each other's spandex-clad behinds all over the planet without worrying that a couple of misses will kill our kitty. :)

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Kristopher
Um, not to burst your bubble, but your whole post is pretty much a giant appeal to authority.

I know that. My point is that this is a case where the appeal to authority is perfectly valid, since everything is contained in one book.

We have a situation similar to that of the Christian Church. Everything they deal with is contained within one book, therefore any argument about doctrine falls within their Bible, and therefore can be resolved by appealing to its authority.

The only way to nullify that is not to be a Christian - at that point you are not agreeing to play by their rules. In a very similar way, as long as you are agreeing to play Hero, anything can be resolved by an appeal to the authority of the rulebook. The rules of logical fallacies can easily be invalid within certain strict parameters.

Now, just as in religious circles, the debate is how to relate the doctrine to real life. The math of the exponential is quite clear; the results at very high power levels may seem counterintuitive, but they do follow.

Now, the STR 60 brick. He can do, what, 16d with a Haymaker? 16 BODY per attack. What's the DEF and BODY of a hex of the planet? The DEF must vary, but I would imagine bedrock would be around DEF 6 or so, at least. He'd wear himself out before doing more than creating a large crater. Sure, you could create a specialized planet-killer with everything at 0 END; it would still take a very long time to appreciably damage the Earth.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Kristopher
But that's GURPS, which, to be frank, stinks.

GURPS was once a great system. However, it fragmented into the mass of special cases and different rules subsets that it was supposed to save me from.

Had they done a Hero-style power creation toolkit on top of GURPS' excellent base system (for handling time in combat and such), it would have kicked ass.

Whether you like the game or not, it DOES show what linear damage looks like in an RPG. 12d is defined to be exactly twice as much RL energy as 6d wherever possible.

GURPS' version of Standard Effect is the best I've ever seen: high numbers of dice are done by a 'small number of dice x multiple' system. Some examples:

24d = 6dx4

25d = 5dx5

26d = 13dx2

27d = 3dx9

The idea is to make the base at least 3d but no more than 8d, hopefully.

It gets a little more complicated with numbers that don't factor well (note 26d). There really is no easy way around it. GURPS Autoduel is really weird this way: whoever wrote it designed the weapons using Vehicles, but a lot of them do a prime number of dice! 19d and 23d, etc. I personally redefined those weapons a bit into 5dx4 and 6dx4, etc.

You can do the same thing in Hero. Doing 18d with that pushed Haymaker? Roll 6d, add up STN and BOD, then multiply by 3.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Warp9
First off, thank you for believing that I'm are real (and legitimate) poster, Trebuchet.


FWIW, I'll second that. I was a bit shocked that anybody could even remotely consider you a troll. Any resemblance between an abusive poster and you is nonexistent.

If anything, I have a bad habit of becoming a bit too strident. If I ever come across as personally insulting to anybody, please let me know so I can take a chill pill. Sometimes I don't realize how abrasive I'm getting.

[Monolith]

Originally posted by Arthur
FWIW, I'll second that. I was a bit shocked that anybody could even remotely consider you a troll. Any resemblance between an abusive poster and you is nonexistent.
First off, I do not consider him to be a troll. I just stated that it would not surprise me if several of the newer people posting were not the same troll. We tend to forget that Shadow (fill in the blank) had nearly 200 posts between his 6 accounts before he went off the deep end. He did not post only once and then go insane. It would not surprise me at all to find him posting here again under another half-dozen accounts; and all of those posts under those accounts appearing quite rational.

[NuSoardGraphite]

Its very obvious that Heros basic damage dice are based on a somewhat exponential progression. Anyone with basic math skills can figure that one out.

However, if you want to ignore that yourself, there's nothing wrong with that. People shouldn't rag on you for it, but neither should you rag on people for accepting the apparent exponential nature of Heros damage system.

In other words, its kinda silly to argue about, isn't it?

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Arthur
Now, the STR 60 brick. He can do, what, 16d with a Haymaker? 16 BODY per attack. What's the DEF and BODY of a hex of the planet? The DEF must vary, but I would imagine bedrock would be around DEF 6 or so, at least. He'd wear himself out before doing more than creating a large crater. Sure, you could create a specialized planet-killer with everything at 0 END; it would still take a very long time to appreciably damage the Earth. Yes, but that's not the way it works in HERO. Why would he get tired? A 60 STR brick haymakering does 16 BODY on average. I calculated rock as having 7 DEF for the purposes of my example (When I did my original calculations I didn't even take Haymakering into account). Star Hero says Earth has 86 BODY. By the rules as written, if our brick hits Earth once it now has 77 BODY left. He hits it again 3 seconds later: 68 BODY. Again: 59 BODY. Again: 50 BODY.

So in a single 12 second Turn with just 4 blows our generic 4 SPD brick has managed to reduce Earth's BODY by 41%, and he still has 4 more Turns left before he has even gone a full minute. That's how the rules for breaking objects "work" in Hero: When an object has taken all of it's BODY it is "broken." When it's taken 2X it's BODY it is destroyed. Heck, given a couple of minutes even a martial artist with a puny 8d6 attack could destroy a planet in mere moments. Now I ask you: Does that make any sense at all? Or would it make more sense to conclude that planets and other celestial bodies operate on a scale far beyond HERO's rules for breaking objects, and hence use entirely different rules?

Of course this is a ridiculous example, but so is the assertation that Earth has only 86 BODY and/or would be destroyed with a 100d6 attack. :rolleyes:

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
Does that make any sense at all? Or would it make more sense to conclude that planets and other celestial bodies operate on a scale far beyond HERO's rules for breaking objects, and hence use entirely different rules?



I agree with you on this post, but I confess that I just had a nerve-wracking fear-inducing must-have-a-drink flash of the letters S.D.C. followed by a flash of the letters M.D.C. before my eyes.

The Earth has MEGA BODY!!!!

Earth: 81 Body -- Megascale at the planetary object level. To damage it your attack must be purchased at the same level of megascale...

[Agent X]

Originally posted by D-Man
I agree with you on this post, but I confess that I just had a nerve-wracking fear-inducing must-have-a-drink flash of the letters S.D.C. followed by a flash of the letters M.D.C. before my eyes.

The Earth has MEGA BODY!!!!

Earth: 81 Body -- Megascale at the planetary object level. To damage it your attack must be purchased at the same level of megascale... That way lies madness! ;)

[Trebuchet]

Originally posted by Agent X
That way lies madness! ;) That's OK, we're all nuts anyway. :D

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
That's OK, we're all nuts anyway. :D Obliviously, I mean obviously. :cool:

[Kristopher]

I'm going to have to leave work early and stop by the liquor store after the Paladium flashback you just induced.

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Kristopher
I'm going to have to leave work early and stop by the liquor store after the Paladium flashback you just induced.

I do what I can.

[Demonsong]

All right, we will have none of that Palladium bashing. You guys play HERO, I would think that a concept as simple as S.D.C and M.D.C. wouldn’t overwhelm you. It’s a good system. Not perfect by any means but It’s not that Bad!

Demonsong

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Demonsong
All right, we will have none of that Palladium bashing. You guys play HERO, I would think that a concept as simple as S.D.C and M.D.C. wouldn’t overwhelm you. It’s a good system. Not perfect by any means but It’s not that Bad!

Demonsong

It was an awesone system... until rifts.

D-Man goes to belt back another martini in the hopes of fogetting all about the horror that is MDC abuse.

[NuSoardGraphite]

Here's why I correlate X2 energy per +1 DC in Hero:

Body: The body of living creatures and vehicles is gained at a rate of +1 Body per X2 Mass. +3 Body per X2 height or length.

Defense: Armor gains +2 Def per X2 mass. Check the armor table in the equipment section.

Damage: Each DC has a potential of doing 2 Body damage (this varies for killing damage, but averages out to 2 body per DC).

Comparison: Armor has to be twice as massive/tough to completely protect against a gain of +1DC.

DEF/DC
2/1
4/2
6/3
8/4
10/5
12/6
14/7
16/8
18/9
20/10
etc...

Thus, it requires a Defense of 20 to completely protect someone/thing against a 10 DC attack (note, this accounts for Body damage only). It is well known in Hero, that DEF20+ is the realm of Tank armor.

The progression seems exponential at this juncture. This is where I tend to leave it, as it makes sense to me and I've had no problem using this formula (X2 KE = +1DC) to represent real-world weapons such as Infantry weapons and vehicular cannons, such as the M256 Rheinmetal (120mm cannon putting out around 10Mj of Energy...comes out to about 6D6+1K or 19DC in my book)

Of course, you must account for such things as Killing attacks vs Normal attacks. Killing attacks are much more efficient at destroying soft targets. Normal Attacks may have high energy, but cannot deliever it efficiently (thus their inability to bypass Normal Defenses).
In addition, Advantage adjust this as well. AP, PEN, +1 StunX, etc can all represent various methods of delivering damage beyond the norm. Therein lies your variables based on situation.
Thus, Grond may have a punch thats equivalent to a 105mm cannon, but it doesn't penetrate armor like an APDS shell does. He's not going to get his 16D6 punch to routinely punch through tank armor (unless he's lucky rolling the dice). He is strong enough to damage the tank, but in general, the tank armor is sufficient to repell his attack. An attack from a tank cannon with the same energy will likely punch through the tank because of the advantages applied to the attack (AP shell) which modifies how the damage is delivered.

At least, thats how I see it.

DC is your base damage, which is based upon the principle of X2 KE = +1DC with specifics being represented via Advantages and Limtations...

[Trebuchet]

All of that is true, NSG, but it doesn't alter the fact that the Damage/BODY system fails completely at high levels. Massive objects like mountains, continents, moons and planets need more than +1 BODY/2X MASS. Grond may not be able to punch through that tank's hull, but he can destroy the entire planet it sits on in mere seconds using the current rules. The rules as written were designed to allow superheroes/villains to smash buildings, bridges, and the like. The game designers clearly never extrapolated their formula beyond those levels, and so they missed the rather appalling fact that Earth has only 86 BODY by their own formula. It's like allowing a character to buy unlimited Followers without realizing that for less than 200 points he can have everyone on Earth as a Follower.

All I am suggesting is that hyper-large objects gain BODY by a different formula. I suggest 1 BODY per cubic hex (8 cubic meters), which IIRC would give Earth about 137,000,000 BODY. That certainly seems more plausible than 86 BODY.

The formula for creating holes is equally flawed. By the rules a 20d6 blow to the ground (assuming dirt with 0 DEF) makes a crater of 524,000 cubic hexes, which would probably level Phoenix. By the HERO rules a character falling and impacting at terminal velocity (30") does 30d6, creating a crater of 536,870,912 cubic hexes. A crater that large would undoubtably destroy North Dakota. What's wrong with this picture? Well, for one thing we know that airplanes that crash don't leave craters the size of Phoenix.

While I can certainly see and understand your logic for 2X Mass = +1 BODY and 2X Energy = +1 DC, it fails the test severely when applied at all levels. We need a better method to figure this; one that agrees with real world results as well as the comic book source material. I'm not at all certain a linear method is the right formula, and I'm not enough of a mathemetician to see if some other method such as a logarithmic scale might be better. I'll leave that to those smarter than I am.

Does this mean "HERO is broken"? Not really, it just needs a little tweaking occasionally. As do we all. :)

[Blue Angel]

When encountering the "normals cause too much damage" problem in a Fantasy campaign I am running, an idea popped into my head. When applying damage to something like a wall, or a planet, why not apply the damage as material destroyed instead of total body destroyed.

EG: Hero X aproaches a 1m thick concrete wall with DEF 6 and 11 Body. For this example his 10d6 EB is assumed to do average damage every time so 10 body on each shot.

By the rules as written it will take three hits to blow a hole in the wall, knocking off 10-6=4 body per hit.

Under this suggestion a 10-6=4 body hit is enough to destroy about 125mm thickness of concrete. So instead of having 7 body remaining the wall has 775mm of thickness left which has about 10 body. So under the new math in this particular example 11 body minus 4 body = 10 body.

So a single big hit may destroy the wall in a single hit but small hits will have to chip away at it. A single massive attack could destroy the earth in one hit but a sledge hammer becomes less practical as a doomsday device.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
All of that is true, NSG, but it doesn't alter the fact that the Damage/BODY system fails completely at high levels. Massive objects


All too true. In fact, IIRC, that was my first point in this subject. The way damage is exponential, but cumulative damage is not, causes odd results. Also, a geometric progression gets out of hand REAL quick (ask anybody who's tried a Martingale betting system).



Grond may not be able to punch through that tank's hull, but he can destroy the entire


OT:
No, but he should be able to tear it apart or turn it upside down (as in the Hulk movie, which was disappointing on many levels, but that scene was good).



game designers clearly never extrapolated their formula beyond those levels, and so they missed the rather appalling fact that Earth has only 86 BODY by their own formula.


You know, I don't think ANY game system has ever handled extreme cases like this well. It's a simplified mathematical model with lots of simplifying assumptions, so it breaks down when extended.



All I am suggesting is that hyper-large objects gain BODY by a different formula. I suggest 1 BODY per cubic hex (8 cubic meters), which IIRC would give Earth about 137,000,000 BODY. That certainly seems more plausible than 86 BODY.


Now THAT seems like a very good idea.

The general rule should start to apply for any object over a certain size (in hexes). Maybe it could be as simple as "divide the number of hexes by 5 and multiply BODY by that much, with a minimum multiple of 1".

Are you pondering what I'm pondering?



The formula for creating holes is equally flawed. By the rules a 20d6 blow to the ground (assuming dirt with 0 DEF) makes a crater of 524,000 cubic hexes, which would


Large attacks shouldn't automatically get a large AE like that. Dunno what the rulebook says, exactly, but that should be clarified or changed. If you are correct, that needs a tweak, too.



Does this mean "HERO is broken"? Not really, it just needs a little tweaking occasionally. As do we all. :)

Tweak me! Tweak me! :D

[NuSoardGraphite]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
All of that is true, NSG, but it doesn't alter the fact that the Damage/BODY system fails completely at high levels.

It does get fugly at high levels, but then again, no game system has ever given satisfactory results at this level (none of the one's I've played, anyway...most don't even go into that territory)



Massive objects like mountains, continents, moons and planets need more than +1 BODY/2X MASS.

Don't forget, that adding +1 Body to an object actually gives it +2 Body. You have to reduce an object to negative its positive Body to completely destroy it. In the case of the Earth with 86 Body, you need to do a total of 172 Body to destroy it.

Also, there is a rule in The Ultimate Vehicle that may apply here for those of you who think large objects don't get enough body. In TUV, in order to "Disable" a vehicle, you must reduce it to negative its Body score. In order to completey "Destroy" a vehicle (render it completely irrepairable) you must reduce it to twice that amount. Example:
The Earth has 86 Body.
Reducing the Earth to -86 Body (a total of 172 Body damage done) makes it completely uninhabitable, but it can repair itself over a few millenia (some slow regen as mentioned above)
Reducing the earth to -172 Body (a total of 258 Body damage done) turns the earth into a new Asteroid Belt.

Does that sound a bit more reasonable? And thats not even a House Rule, its straight from TUV.



Grond may not be able to punch through that tank's hull, but he can destroy the entire planet it sits on in mere seconds using the current rules.the rules as written were designed to allow Heroes/villians to smash buildings, bridges and the like. The game designers clearly never extrapolated their formula beyond those levels and so they missed the rather appalling fact that Earth has only 86 Body by their own formula. It like allowing a character to buy unlimited Followers without realizing that for less than 200 points he can have everyone on Earth as a Follower.

Actually, I think this is more of a case of the game designers assuming that the majority of players would be mature enough to use common sense and discretion when encountering situations of this nature. I doubt they saw the necessity of taking their calculations to their illogical extreme and accounting for it, relying on GM's to say things like "No Ralph I don't care how much Body you just rolled for Grond. He can't crack the Earth in half with his Haymaker."



All I am suggesting is that hyper-large objects gain BODY by a different formula. I suggest 1 BODY per cubic hex (8 cubic meters), which IIRC would give Earth about 137,000,000 BODY. That certainly seems more plausible than 86 BODY.

Personaly, I don't like playing with numbers that high. At that point I just consider large objects of that nature as Plot Devices and say their destroyed when I think they've taken enough damage. Thats one of the reasons I didn't choose GURPS as my main system, because their Vehicles rules do get into numbers that absurd. I don't mind busting out a calc during the design process, but during actual gameplay, I wanna be able to do it all in my head...



The formula for creating holes is equally flawed. By the rules a 20d6 blow to the ground (assuming dirt with 0 DEF) makes a crater of 524,000 cubic hexes, which would probably level Phoenix. By the HERO rules a character falling and impacting at terminal velocity (30") does 30d6, creating a crater of 536,870,912 cubic hexes. A crater that large would undoubtably destroy North Dakota. What's wrong with this picture? Well, for one thing we know that airplanes that crash don't leave craters the size of Phoenix.

Its less flawed than just giving the Earth a Body of 86 and being done with it. This method requires one to either have an attack with enough Area of effect to effect the majority of an Object to destroy all of it, or to do enough Body damage in a single hit to render it to rubble.

As far as people/planes/comets etc crashing into the Earth are concerned, the damage is normally locallized at the impact point. The main damage is done by the physical object to an area the size of the Object itself. In the case of a human, A human only takes up .5 hexes of space, thus when he/she impacts, its only going to do damage to .5 hexes worth of ground. A large comet (say 20" across) would do significantly more damage because it impacts a much larger area.
In the case of Large Impacts, you could probably treat damage beyond the immediate area of the "impact" zone as an explosion-type attack, and use that to calculate the size of your craters. Easy enough to do.

Don't forget also, the "Path of least resistance". A human is soft and squishy. Hard-packed earth is not. When this soft/squishy human hits the Hard-packed earth at several hundred meters per second, that soft/squishy human isn't going to do much damage to the ground. The human is going to absorb 90% of the energy of the impact and go SQUISH!. In the case of soft earth, the Human is probably going to leave a nice indention in the ground (and may not actualy go Squish, but probably all kinds of Crunch!)
This is one of those situations Steve was talking about in the 5E when he mentioned something he called "Common Sense".



While I can certainly see and understand your logic for 2X Mass = +1 BODY and 2X Energy = +1 DC, it fails the test severely when applied at all levels. We need a better method to figure this; one that agrees with real world results as well as the comic book source material. I'm not at all certain a linear method is the right formula, and I'm not enough of a mathemetician to see if some other method such as a logarithmic scale might be better. I'll leave that to those smarter than I am.

Well, my point is that irregardless of the fact that it breaks down at higher levels, the damage system in Hero is most certainly based on the basic principle of X2 Energy = +1DC. I don't think the designers meant for it to be used to cacluate how much damage it takes to destroy a planet or a star or the Galaxy. It was meant to be able to represent high level supers combat, where mountains and entire skyscrapers were in peril when superbeings do battle. Attempting a linear system is madness. You will end up looking like GURPS high level damage (6D6X20 for a Tank cannon? 25,000 Body for an Aircraft Carrier?). Frankly, the current damage system used in Hero is the closest approximation that can be reasonably done without completely re-tooling the entire damage/body system. As long as you aren't trying to regularly destroy planets and Miles-long spacecraft, there no problem with the system whatsoever. However, for those who want to run genres where the planet is in danger of being blown away (Dragon Ball Z comes to mind, where Goku's Kamehameha Wave was capable of destroying small worlds!) then having a body of 86 for the Earth may be exactly what their looking for....



Does this mean "HERO is broken"? Not really, it just needs a little tweaking occasionally. As do we all. :)

Very little, IMO. I like the damage system the way it is. I will admit though, that when I first got into hero, the Body system gave me fits. But once I understood the game a bit more and understood about the correlation between DC, Body and Defense, it made a lot more sense. Its just a matter of perspective I suppose.

[Kristopher]

The _system_ is fine. I don't think anyone is unhappy with the system. This is more about the stuff underlying the system and how it connects to reality.

[Vondy]

I think the issue has less to do with the system than whether or not its rational to apply the general underlying premise of exponential value to everything we try to model with the system. We all understand that the exponential system loses granularity and viability for modelling things on the higher end of the specturm (like nukes, planets, etc).

The question then becomes: is the general principle of exponents sacred as though it were biblical chapter and verse requiring dogmatic adherence in every circumstance, or does it allow interpretive wiggle room?

I think the meta-rules of the system, and the fact that we are encouraged to change what doesn't work for us in the text itself, clearly puts playability over mathematical exercise. This is a role playing game, not a math class. The entire reason we have rules is to provide a rational and equitable resolution of conflict within a shared story. I don't think too many people play role playing games in order to revel in the mathematical glory of it all. They want to be entertained by way of their imagination. Rules are a means to that, nothing more.

All general principles and rules have exceptions -- this one has lots.

[TaxiMan]

I play where an attack doesn't destroy more than it hits. If SuperGrond punches the ground for 500 Body, the hex he hit is atomized. All other damage is in GM-discretion land. The ground can crack, sound can deafen, etc. but it's all roleplaying. He can bring down buildings and destroy vehicles (they depend on structural integrity), but the Earth is more resilient. SuperGrond would have to destroy the Earth a piece at a time using his SuperPunch.

Similar thing for EB and RKAs. They'd affect whatever area they target first. If there's more destruction remaining after subtracting the damage done, it'd penetrate further. Consider the Earth made up of 1 hex thick Force Walls if you will. Blast through one and proceed to the next, attenuated. Again, very hard to destroy the Earth.

So Earth-destroying attacks need mega-area, or continuous uncontrolled, or some other easy-to-spot advantages.

[Mentor]

Originally posted by Trebuchet
No, because there are no physics in a game. That's what we are telling you. Damage and defenses in Hero are relative only to each other. While engineers may well be able to calculate fairly close approximations of structural strength, they cannot look at a blueprint and say "That thing has 17 DEF and 21 BODY, so we need a 38d6 attack to break it." I watched a show earlier this week on the busting of the Rhine dams by the RAF during WW2. Even under carefully controlled conditions and using actual German engineering drawings of those structures, engineers took dozens of attempts to figure out how big an explosive to use and how to place it. It's just not as cut and dried in the real world as you seem to think. It's simple in Champions because this is a game. :rolleyes: Exactly. Are we going to get rid of the game because Steve Long can't give you the physics model on the electromagnetic properties of a force field? The physical damage to a character with Speed 6 flying 20" a phase noncombat? We are on this forum in the first place because Hero System has given as much versatility in power design as any system devised. I have tried most of the others. To be "official", the common sense rule to offset mathematical inconsistencies in what is already a totally fictional genre is part of FRED's "official" language, too. Give the designers some credit for knowing that they are not perfect. Trebuchet has this one right.

[Mentor]

Originally posted by D-Man
I think the issue has less to do with the system than whether or not its rational to apply the general underlying premise of exponential value to everything we try to model with the system. We all understand that the exponential system loses granularity and viability for modelling things on the higher end of the specturm (like nukes, planets, etc).

The question then becomes: is the general principle of exponents sacred as though it were biblical chapter and verse requiring dogmatic adherence in every circumstance, or does it allow interpretive wiggle room?

I think the meta-rules of the system, and the fact that we are encouraged to change what doesn't work for us in the text itself, clearly puts playability over mathematical exercise. This is a role playing game, not a math class. The entire reason we have rules is to provide a rational and equitable resolution of conflict within a shared story. I don't think too many people play role playing games in order to revel in the mathematical glory of it all. They want to be entertained by way of their imagination. Rules are a means to that, nothing more.

All general principles and rules have exceptions -- this one has lots. D-Man, you have in my opinion hit the heart of the debate. I want to be as consistent as possible to the rules and capability progressions as anybody, but when the intangibles like special effect or rubber science come in to play, I am OK with the fact that it is not possible to perfectly quantify. Our campaign is able to excel in fun, playability, and balance using the rules as written. FAQs and addenda are use at our discretion as applicable to concept. To those who demand the "absolute authority" concept, no "Stop sign powers" or "GM discretion powers" would be used by anyone. How boring.

This discussion is more controversial thatn political forums.:D

[Mentor]

Originally posted by Agent X
That way lies madness! ;) So what? We are gamers after all.:D

[NuSoardGraphite]

Originally posted by D-Man
I think the issue has less to do with the system than whether or not its rational to apply the general underlying premise of exponential value to everything we try to model with the system. We all understand that the exponential system loses granularity and viability for modelling things on the higher end of the specturm (like nukes, planets, etc).

The question then becomes: is the general principle of exponents sacred as though it were biblical chapter and verse requiring dogmatic adherence in every circumstance, or does it allow interpretive wiggle room?

That question is exactly what this issue is about. The answer is within the pages of the 5E.

No, it is not sacred. Change what you want for what you need. Ignore anything you believe that doesn't make sense. Use common sense when applying the rules for an effect. In other words, even though the printed rules say the Earth has an 86 Body, in any Heroic level game you are playing (except maybe Sci/fi games where Planet Busters are a reality) nothing will be able to destroy the planet, or at the very least, if something can, its a plot device.

Even in a Superheroic level game, the Earth should not be in peril 99.9% of the time. Only in games of extreme power level (like the above mentioned DBZ) should you even consider the body of things like Mountains, humongous skyscrapers and planets. In which case, just use the model supplied by standard Hero math and you will get your Uber-battles where mountains are turned to rubble, mile-wide craters are made when characters impact the earth and entire skyscrapers crumble with but a single hit...

[Demonsong]

You mean apply common since? What an appalling notion! :D

[Narratio]

Common sense, common sense? I'm not I've got any left, hang on while I check the sock drawer.

And NuSoardGraphite sums the whole thing up nicely. The game is designed for midrange comic book effects. Don't expect reality, in any shape or form.

[sbarron]

"Damn, Narratio brought this thread back from the dead. I don't know if I have the power to send it back to thread hell before it starts wrecking havok...but I've got to try!!!" :bmk: :dh:

[Lupaerian]

Narratio,

Nice necro you made there :rofl:

[Warp9]

HAHAHAHAHA

It's back again from the grave! :celebrate


And NuSoardGraphite sums the whole thing up nicely. The game is designed for midrange comic book effects. Don't expect reality, in any shape or form.
Have you considered that even comic books might incorporate some crude level of "reality" ?

[Fox1]

HAHAHAHAHA

It's back again from the grave! :celebrate


Have you considered that even comic books might incorporate some crude level of "reality" ?


I have.

About the same amount offered in the HERO core rulebook in fact.

[Warp9]

I have.

About the same amount offered in the HERO core rulebook in fact.

LOL

Of course, once you admit that you are trying to simulate reality (even at a crude level) there are some standards that you'll want to follow.

[Hugh Neilson]

Have you considered that even comic books might incorporate some crude level of "reality" ?

Let's asume we hold RPG's to a strict standard of reality. What genres are left?

Science fiction? Sure...with no FTL, no transporters, no phase weapons/personal disintogrators, no stargates, no psionics, no mutations, no aliens (too far away with no FTL), no lightsabers, etc. etc. etc. NOt much left.

Fantasy? Sure...but no magic, and don't forget to roll for youi 25% chance of surviving childhood, wounds commonly become infected and over 95% of the populace are serfs, so role play that cabbage farming! ["Realistic fantasy" is an oxymoron anyway]

Supers? Not likely!

Horror? Nope...unless you want to play a game revolviong around serial killers, I suppose. But, realistically, how many serial killers is a single team of crimefighters involved in dealing with?

Pulp? No, not really...

Modern Action-Adventure? "OK, you dive through the plate glass window. roll roll You're lucky - only one severed artery!"

Westerns? How long did the average gunfighter live again?

So that leaves "Your bus was on time, so you arrive at work at three minutes to 9. Let me roll to see if the boss is in a bad mood today."

[Warp9]

Let's asume we hold RPG's to a strict standard of reality. What genres are left?

Science fiction? Sure...with no FTL, no transporters, no phase weapons/personal disintogrators, no stargates, no psionics, no mutations, no aliens (too far away with no FTL), no lightsabers, etc. etc. etc. NOt much left.

Fantasy? Sure...but no magic, and don't forget to roll for youi 25% chance of surviving childhood, wounds commonly become infected and over 95% of the populace are serfs, so role play that cabbage farming! ["Realistic fantasy" is an oxymoron anyway]

Supers? Not likely!

You have a pretty limited view of reality :p

For example, can you prove that there couldn't be any teleporters in reality?

[Hugh Neilson]

You have a pretty limited view of reality :p

For example, can you prove that there couldn't be any teleporters in reality?

By definition, proving something is not possible is virtually impossible. I also can't prove that magic does not exist, that telepathy does not exist, that dinosaurs oince walked the earth (maybe the skeletons, along with the rest of the universe, was created last Tuesday, complete with all of us and our fictitious memories of what has gone before) or that the moon landing was real, not some elaborate conspiracy.

Can you prove there COULD be teleporters in reality? This is normally the category of proof required to ove something beyond a fanciful theory and into "reality" as it is perceived at any given point in time.

You can certainly broaden the net to include things you think might be possible. But "a strict standard of reality" (and note that this was where my post started) would, in my opinion, exclude these things.

My point isn't that these things cannot exist, only that they do not fall into the strictest sense of "realism". If you don't accept some measure of fantasy and speculation, you probably have no game or, at best, a pretty bleak one.

This is a problem at the core of any drive to make the game "realistic". Where "realism" ends is very much a subjective determination, and the point at which you may set the bar (say, Teleporters, FTL, space aliens and time travel COULD exist, and this game posits that they DO exist) may be seen as unrealistic in the extreme by others.

How much realism varies with the individual. There is a school of thought, for example, that would separate "Science Fiction" (based on hard science and extrapolations of current knowledge and theories) and "Science Fantasy" (which simply posits unexplained scientific SFX for things we consider impossible under current scientific knowledge). Star Trek and Star Wars fall under the "Science Fantasy umbrella (for teleporters, warb/hyper drives, lightsabers, blasters, phasers and photon torpedos, various unexplained alien species, etc.). [Star Wars, to me, is the Sicence Fantasy archetype - wizardly mentors, princesses, pirates, monsters, evil emperors with dark servants, a mystical force, magic sweords, etc. etc. etc.]

For myself, I don't really like "hard" Science Fiction much. I prefer the fantasy element. And I prefer my games to err on the side of enjoyable playability, to the expense of "realism".

[stmichaeldet]

So, if Hero is broken because it breaks down in certain extreme situations, is Newtonian physics broken because it breaks down under highly relativistic conditions? Yet, we keep using it because in virtually every practical case, it works just fine.

Seems to me, it doesn't matter if the system would assign 86BP (or whatever) to the Earth, 'cause for the most part, it's irrelevant. Grond can't target "the Earth," just some little piece of it that's close to him. And if aliens show up with a big planet-shattering cannon, I certainly don't want to be rolling dice when that thing goes off - that sort of thing is resolved through the storytelling. The only time the Body value of a planet would matter is in a campaign where virtually everyone goes around packin' a Death Star, blowing up real estate left and right.

- St. Michael

[Fox1]

Of course, once you admit that you are trying to simulate reality (even at a crude level) there are some standards that you'll want to follow.

There are standards I wish to follow. But it does not follow that those standards are the same as yours.

I'm happy with the HERO rules as given modified by my own house rules. Further appeals to 'realism' in areas I don't care about have no impact on me.

[Warp9]

By definition, proving something is not possible is virtually impossible. I also can't prove that magic does not exist, that telepathy does not exist, that dinosaurs oince walked the earth (maybe the skeletons, along with the rest of the universe, was created last Tuesday, complete with all of us and our fictitious memories of what has gone before) or that the moon landing was real, not some elaborate conspiracy.

Can you prove there COULD be teleporters in reality? This is normally the category of proof required to ove something beyond a fanciful theory and into "reality" as it is perceived at any given point in time.

You can certainly broaden the net to include things you think might be possible. But "a strict standard of reality" (and note that this was where my post started) would, in my opinion, exclude these things.

My point isn't that these things cannot exist, only that they do not fall into the strictest sense of "realism". If you don't accept some measure of fantasy and speculation, you probably have no game or, at best, a pretty bleak one.

This is a problem at the core of any drive to make the game "realistic". Where "realism" ends is very much a subjective determination, and the point at which you may set the bar (say, Teleporters, FTL, space aliens and time travel COULD exist, and this game posits that they DO exist) may be seen as unrealistic in the extreme by others.

How much realism varies with the individual. There is a school of thought, for example, that would separate "Science Fiction" (based on hard science and extrapolations of current knowledge and theories) and "Science Fantasy" (which simply posits unexplained scientific SFX for things we consider impossible under current scientific knowledge). Star Trek and Star Wars fall under the "Science Fantasy umbrella (for teleporters, warb/hyper drives, lightsabers, blasters, phasers and photon torpedos, various unexplained alien species, etc.). [Star Wars, to me, is the Sicence Fantasy archetype - wizardly mentors, princesses, pirates, monsters, evil emperors with dark servants, a mystical force, magic sweords, etc. etc. etc.]

For myself, I don't really like "hard" Science Fiction much. I prefer the fantasy element. And I prefer my games to err on the side of enjoyable playability, to the expense of "realism".

I don't see the point of the "a strict standard of reality" argument. Because nobody is saying that the game should be limited to exact situations which we'd encounter in normal life.

But I do believe that there is a point where we may differ. . . .

To me, there is a major difference between something like a teleportation device, and something like "sound effects which occur in airless space."

A teleportation device is simply an unknown--who knows if it is possible? It might be.

But "sound effects in space" actually contradict what I belive to be true about reality.

I have no problem with allowing all manner of strange things, as long they do not actually contradict reality without any special explaination.

In other words, I do not mind the existance of beings that fly, but normal unaided humans should fall at approx 32 feet/sec/sec when in Earth's gravity.

[Warp9]

Grond can't target "the Earth," just some little piece of it that's close to him.

How much growth will I have to buy before Grond can no longer target my character?

With 400 points of Growth my character will be bigger than the Earth.

[stmichaeldet]

How much growth will I have to buy before Grond can no longer target my character?

With 400 points of Growth my character will be bigger than the Earth.

I freely concede that, if you are running a campaign with characters that can reasonably grow to the size of planets, then you have a problem. But I just don't see how that affects play in the overwhelming majority of campaigns that take place on more familiar scales.

[Warp9]

I freely concede that, if you are running a campaign with characters that can reasonably grow to the size of planets, then you have a problem. But I just don't see how that affects play in the overwhelming majority of campaigns that take place on more familiar scales.
You said that Grond could not target the Earth. My point was that (as far as I know) there is no specific rule that says: "when a target get bigger than X size, normal attacks will no longer have an impact on it."


Don't get me wrong, I like the whole exponential concept, but I do think it needs to be consistent in application.

[stmichaeldet]

But when would I need such a rule? In my experience, I've never, ever needed to know the Body value of a planet, nor had to calculate system-based damage on a planetary scale, and I'm hard pressed to imagine a workable campaign that would need to. I guess my advice to anyone who wants to run such a campaign would be to give up on Hero and try to find something with a combat system designed to work at astrophysical scales. Good luck with that.

[Warp9]

But when would I need such a rule? In my experience, I've never, ever needed to know the Body value of a planet, nor had to calculate system-based damage on a planetary scale, and I'm hard pressed to imagine a workable campaign that would need to. I guess my advice to anyone who wants to run such a campaign would be to give up on Hero and try to find something with a combat system designed to work at astrophysical scales. Good luck with that.
I can't tell you when you'd need the rule, but you are the one who brought it up--I just wondered where you got it from.



And to address the point about astrophysical scales: one of the main points of an exponential scale is that it allows for vast flexibility, there is no reason why HERO can't work on a planetary scale, or on an ant scale.

The problems that you are seeing have nothing to do with the exponential scale, but instead are based on trying to mix a linear scale with an exponential one.

[Roy_The_Ruthles]

i read all of this thread, and my conclusion...


Nuko: the atmoic mage by arthur should be a character concept that i play. And soon.


"No Ralph i don't care how much damage you rolled on your haymaker"

has caused me to burst out laughing in work.

Twice

[Black Lotus]

NEWS FLASH:

By the standards offered in this thread, and in fact, by universal rule, ALL roleplaying systems currently in existence are broken. If you consider it remarkable that HERO is unrealistic in certain aspects -- if you even CARE about that unavoidable fact of all PnP RPGs -- stop playing roleplaying games entirely, while you still have your health. You'll never find a perfect RPG. Some are better than others; the most you can do is to find the one you like best, and stick with it.

As a friend of mine once said: "All roleplaying games suck, deep down. You just have to ignore that and get to the fun of roleplaying."

[Fox1]

As a friend of mine once said: "All roleplaying games suck, deep down. You just have to ignore that and get to the fun of roleplaying."

There are different degrees of suckage however. And the suckage in one game may well be in a different area than the suckage in others.

And of course one person's suckage is another person's gold.

None of this is reason to ignore problems in RPG design however. The primary reason we have others games beside D&D is because of designer efforts to reduce suckage or change it into gold.


However Warp 9 has IMO gone far enough in his "HERO is Broken" stance that its time we agree with him, i.e. For Warp 9, HERO is broken. He needs to move on to another game.

I'd suggest JAGS (http://www.jagsrpg.org/) as a possible start. It's designer had some of the same problems as he in respect to HERO.

[Black Lotus]

There are different degrees of suckage however. And the suckage in one game may well be in a different area than the suckage in others.

And of course one person's suckage is another person's gold.

Yeah, man. I mentioned the fact that some are better than others. That's not what this thread is about, though; it's about HERO being broken. And the fact that one man's trash is another man's treasure is always in effect.


None of this is reason to ignore problems in RPG design however. The primary reason we have others games beside D&D is because of designer efforts to reduce suckage or change it into gold.

I didn't say to ignore it. Fact is though, HERO isn't broken. That's like saying a trout is a fish -- because all RPGs are inherently "broken," why are we singling HERO out for it? It's no more "broken" than all other RPGs, and far less "broken" than some.


However Warp 9 has IMO gone far enough in his "HERO is Broken" stance that its time we agree with him, i.e. For Warp 9, HERO is broken. He needs to move on to another game.

I've searched long and hard to find HERO. Personal preferences aside, the realism I know Warp9 craves cannot be found anywhere outside of physics equations.


I'd suggest JAGS (http://www.jagsrpg.org/) as a possible start. It's designer had some of the same problems as he in respect to HERO.

Hmmm, wonder what that is....

[Fox1]

I've searched long and hard to find HERO. Personal preferences aside, the realism I know Warp9 craves cannot be found anywhere outside of physics equations.


Warp 9 does not seek realism. Much of he wants is actually unrealistic.

He just seeks a different approach whose failure points are outside his own personal tunnel vision.

Or he may be the kind of person that will never be happy with anything.

Whatever the case, it's time he moved on.




Hmmm, wonder what that is....

It bills itself as a free rpg (or did the last I checked) to be used in the same role as HERO or GURPS.

The designer is a good guy, but like Warp 9 had major problems with the mix of linear and EXP mechanics in HERO (and other issues). So he went out and made his own game.

I've heard good things about it although I've never played it. The noted issues in HERO don't bother me, as a result his solutions didn't offer me any reason to change.

[Black Lotus]

I've heard good things about it although I've never played it. The noted issues in HERO don't bother me, as a result his solutions didn't offer me any reason to change.

I still think people need to come to terms with the fact that no RPG is perfect. I used to wish for perfection myself, but it can't be had. All systems have their flaws -- some more than others, but there are no exceptions.

[Fox1]

I still think people need to come to terms with the fact that no RPG is perfect. I used to wish for perfection myself, but it can't be had. All systems have their flaws -- some more than others, but there are no exceptions.

I play two perfect RPG game systems, i.e. perfect within the limits of what I use them for.

[Black Lotus]

I play two perfect RPG game systems, i.e. perfect within the limits of what I use them for.

Fox, you know what I mean.

[Fox1]

Fox, you know what I mean.

Yes I do.

And I hope you know what I mean when I say that I play two perfect games.


I'm no fan of Warp 9 by any measure. However I'm not ready to label him with the title of "he who endlessly seeks perfect realism and must whine in he search".

If I was willing to do that, I would have done it to myself in the last days of my own personal D&D era.

He may deserve such a label. I haven't watch him long enough to determine that. But in the meantime I'll assume that Warp 9 is looking for perfection in the same manner that I was when I left D&D for my fantasy game and V&V for HERO.

The main problem right now is that Warp 9 wants to change HERO to match his imagine.

That's unacceptable. He needs to move on to something else.

Here are his best options:

1. House Rule HERO to match his needs. Put it up on the website and brag about it.

(This is my own choice with dealing with HERO problems, but I don't do all that much bragging IMO).

2. Find another game that is closer to his expectations.

3. Give up Gaming.

OR

4. At least give up complaining about a game that suits thousands of other people just fine.


If he doesn't pick one of those options in the next few months... yeah. He's just in it for the whine. Or the ego boost of trying to force his view of the game onto others.

[Roy_The_Ruthles]

I still think people need to come to terms with the fact that no RPG is perfect. I used to wish for perfection myself, but it can't be had. All systems have their flaws -- some more than others, but there are no exceptions.

I agree to this. If you are a simulationist (i'm not very much of one) all games do not mimic life perfectly.

But they sure are fun!

[Fox1]

I agree to this. If you are a simulationist (i'm not very much of one) all games do not mimic life perfectly.


I used to hang with a bunch of serious simulationists. The first ones on the Internet in fact.

They considers simulation and Superheroes to be incompatible goals. I can see their point.

[Black Lotus]

I used to hang with a bunch of serious simulationists. The first ones on the Internet in fact.

They considers simulation and Superheroes to be incompatible goals. I can see their point.

Simulation is not about realism. It is about portraying something as accurately as possible, even if that thing is fantastic.


1. The act or process of simulating.
2. An imitation; a sham.
3. Assumption of a false appearance.
4.
1. Imitation or representation, as of a potential situation or in experimental testing.
2. Representation of the operation or features of one process or system through the use of another: computer simulation of an in-flight emergency.

Realism and simulation are not the same.

[Roy_The_Ruthles]

ah my mistake in wording then

[Fox1]

Simulation is not about realism. It is about portraying something as accurately as possible, even if that thing is fantastic.


I have no idea what you think you're correcting from my post, but I made no claim of Simulation = realism.

[Black Lotus]

I have no idea what you think you're correcting from my post, but I made no claim of Simulation = realism.

You claimed your "simulationist" friends did not believe it was feasible to "simulate" superheroes, which is ridiculous. They can easily be simulated.

[Fox1]

You claimed your "simulationist" friends did not believe it was feasible to "simulate" superheroes, which is ridiculous. They can easily be simulated.


Hmm, I'm not certain they'd consider me a friend.

Their point was that in order to have a simulationist mindset, realism as such is not necessary- however consistent 'laws' of physics and behavior need to be. They considered the genre requirements of superheroes to be inherently irrational and inconsistent- and thus not open to a true simulationist.

Beyond that, take it up with them, not me. I'm just forwarding on a interesting opinion that may or may not have some relation to the problem Warp 9 has with HERO.

But be aware that you're talking to the very people who first coined the term "Simulationist" on the internet. They will consider your effort to define it back to them amusing.

[Black Lotus]

Hmm, I'm not certain they'd consider me a friend.

Their point was that in order to have a simulationist mindset, realism as such is not necessary- however consistent 'laws' of physics and behavior need to be. They considered the genre requirements of superheroes to be inherently irrational and inconsistent- and thus not open to a true simulationist.

Beyond that, take it up with them, not me. I'm just forwarding on a interesting opinion that may or may not have some relation to the problem Warp 9 has with HERO.

But be aware that you're talking to the very people who first coined the term "Simulationist" on the internet. They will consider your effort to define it back to them amusing.

I really don't feel the need to speak with those persons. I'm taking part in this conversation here, now. And seniority on the internet means not a damn thing to me. :rolleyes: Woooooow... you were a geek ten years ago, too? I'm not worthy! (Not you, those guys.)

[Fox1]

I really don't feel the need to speak with those persons. I'm taking part in this conversation here, now. And seniority on the internet means not a damn thing to me. :rolleyes: Woooooow... you were a geek ten years ago, too? I'm not worthy! (Not you, those guys.)

Redefining the words in common usage simply because you want to?

And this coming on the heels of calling people who hate long chargen system various names in another thread. Has it been a bad day?

Whatever.

Call the concept I'm speaking of George then if it makes you happy. I certainly wasn't speaking about whatever it is that you had to pipe up about.

[Black Lotus]

Redefining the words in common usage simply because you want to?

No, my fine friend, I didn't redefine the word. The dictionary defined it the first time for me.


And this coming on the heels of calling people who hate long chargen system various names in another thread. Has it been a bad day?

I am entitled to my opinion. Calling dislike for long chargen "preference" is an excuse for laziness IMO.


Call the concept I'm speaking of George then if it makes you happy. I certainly wasn't speaking about whatever it is that you had to pipe up about.

Why don't you chocolate it where the moulding don't shine?

Apples and oranges comparison, here.

[Fox1]

Why don't you chocolate it where the moulding don't shine?

Whatever.

Two people were speaking about a subject using common internet jargon for a concept you're seemingly clueless about, so you poke your nose in and try to 'correct' people.

And now you get mad about it.

I think you're funny.

[Black Lotus]

Whatever.

Two people were speaking about a subject using common internet jargon for a concept you're seemingly clueless about, so you poke your nose in and try to 'correct' people.

And now you get mad about it.

I think you're funny.

I'm not mad. Only crazy people get emotional at a message board. :stupid:

[Fox1]

I'm not mad. Only crazy people get emotional at a message board. :stupid:

Oh, so you call people names and insult them when in a happy mood.

Whatever.

[Black Lotus]

Oh, so you call people names and insult them when in a happy mood.

Whatever.

Yes! It's text messaging. I don't know you. I get excited and eager to proffer my opinions, because it's intellectually stimulating to exchange ideas with other intellectual persons; beyond that, it's roleplaying the way I tend to feel about my opinions.

And stop saying "Whatever," you sound like an angsty teen.

[Fox1]

Yes! It's text messaging. I don't know you. I get excited and eager to proffer my opinions

You get excited and eager to call people names?

Ok.

[Black Lotus]

You get excited and eager to call people names?

Ok.

No, I get excited about sharing ideas. As I said, the rest is a sort of roleplaying.

You're right, though, I shouldn't call people names. I should instead resort to fantabulously heavy sarcasm, negativity, and super-biased criticism like my good friend Fox1.

[Fox1]

You're right, though, I shouldn't call people names. I should instead resort to fantabulously heavy sarcasm, negativity, and super-biased criticism like my good friend Fox1.

If you could restrict your 'role-playing' to solely matters of fact instead of perference, I'd be ok with whatever you do.

[Black Lotus]

If you could restrict your 'role-playing' to solely matters of fact instead of perference, I'd be ok with whatever you do.

ROFL. All I am saying is that you won't hear me yelling "What the hell!?" and see me bang my fist on the PC desk over a conversation on a message board. I don't know what your opinion of me is, precisely, but I'll say that I've been on many message boards in my time, several of which I now moderate. Yes, sometimes we're insulting. We argue. We congratulate. But it's not the same as in real life. Some people lose sight of that, and that's not healthy.

Anyway, I know what you mean. I see some so-called "preferences" in a very specific light, and the fact that I see them that way is -- indeed -- a fact.

[Roy_The_Ruthles]

to answer the original question, i don't think hero is broken, but i mostly use it for fantasy

[Warp9]

However Warp 9 has IMO gone far enough in his "HERO is Broken" stance that its time we agree with him, i.e. For Warp 9, HERO is broken. He needs to move on to another game.


Given your stance on HERO I'm not sure what to say to that:

(This is your quote from the thread "Loop model of RPGs and why long chargen is okay" : Post #66)



If there was a *good* Marvel Superhero game on the market, I'd drop HERO like a rock.

And I'm not even going to touch those "powers of 1.5777838437" strangeness that you use instead of the normal powers of 2.

Of the two of us, you are are probably the one who thinks HERO is most broken. :nya:

[Warp9]

I've searched long and hard to find HERO. Personal preferences aside, the realism I know Warp9 craves cannot be found anywhere outside of physics equations.

Care to explain what you base that statement on?

Here are some relevant quotes I've made on the matter in the past:



I'd be happy with using the energy of the attack as a basis for damage. It is not perfect, but generally it is good enough for me.



I am more interested in a system that gives broad reasonably accurate "ball-park" answers to general situations, rather than one which gets too specific over a narrow range.


And people have actually complained about my approach being too simplistic:

(a quote by Kristopher "Exponential VS Linear ?" Post #87)


One of the things that keeps coming up is the fallacy that energy/force and damage are directly proportional -- in the real world, that's just not true. There are so many other factors involved, and there are many examples in which increasing energy or force delivered onto the target has diminishing returns.

I am not the one who is asking for ultra-realism here.

[Warp9]

Warp 9 does not seek realism. Much of he wants is actually unrealistic.

I should have read this before posting my own comments to Black Lotus :)



He just seeks a different approach whose failure points are outside his own personal tunnel vision.

Or he may be the kind of person that will never be happy with anything.

Whatever the case, it's time he moved on.

I'm probably never perfectly happy with anything (it's just my nature). . . . But at least I'm not ready to "drop HERO like a Rock" as some others around here are.




It bills itself as a free rpg (or did the last I checked) to be used in the same role as HERO or GURPS.

The designer is a good guy, but like Warp 9 had major problems with the mix of linear and EXP mechanics in HERO (and other issues). So he went out and made his own game.

I've heard good things about it although I've never played it. The noted issues in HERO don't bother me, as a result his solutions didn't offer me any reason to change.

I'll have to check that one out--sounds cool :thumbup:

Of course, that doesn't mean that I'm ready to "drop HERO like a Rock" ;)

[Fox1]

Given your stance on HERO I'm not sure what to say to that:


My stance where I said that if a better more specific game came along I'd switch from HERO in a flash?

I don't see that as a negative stance on HERO. I see it as a desire for, and willingness to change to better and more suitable games.

I don't see any, so there won't be any switching in the near future. I've been waiting for 20 years after all.




And I'm not even going to touch those "powers of 1.5777838437" strangeness that you use instead of the normal powers of 2.

Of the two of us, you are are probably the one who thinks HERO is most broken. :nya:

I change the progression on one chart to match the Marvel setting and to provide me with a good range of dice for modeling that setting.

That's a far cry from the type of changes you wish to make.

[Warp9]

I change the progression on one chart to match the Marvel setting and to provide me with a good range of dice for modeling that setting.

That's a far cry from the type of changes you wish to make.
Of course there are all the firearm changes that you've made. . . .

And if you change the STR progression, what happens to growth, and density increase? Do you still gain X2 Mass and X2 STR for each 5 points? Do you grow 2 X tall for every 15 points? Or do you change that as well? If growth gives 1.577847 X Mass and STR along with +1 BODY, do you also rewrite the Breaking things rule so that it is based on +1 BODY per each 1.577847 X Mass?



As for myself, I only started pushing the concept of the exponential changes after Zornwil started up his committee. Before this thread was brought back from the dead (in its previous life), I was only saying that there was evidence to believe that HERO in logarithmic in nature. I was not proposing any changes to the system.

The Exponential VS Linear thing is the top of my "HERO-change-wish-list," but it is not a mega-big issue for me. After using the Optional Velocity Factor stuff I'm actually fairly happy with the system right out of the book.

[Fox1]

Of course there are all the firearm changes that you've made. . . .

Just different contructions using consistent measures.

It's still the same game.



And if you change the STR progression, what happens to growth, and density increase?

They change as well, but those powers are almost never used in my games anyway.




do you also rewrite the Breaking things rule so that it is based on +1 BODY per each 1.577847 X Mass?

Haven't bothered.

There no good way to make those numbers realistic with any single progression, so it's an unimportant matter to me.





The Exponential VS Linear thing is the top of my "HERO-change-wish-list," but it is not a mega-big issue for me. After using the Optional Velocity Factor stuff I'm actually fairly happy with the system right out of the book.

That's an quite the sendate change after all the noise you've caused.

[Warp9]

That's an quite the sendate change after all the noise you've caused.
Well it IS the top of my wish list! :D

[PhilFleischmann]

I can't keep silent on this issue any longer. I haven't read the entire thread, but you're welcome to try and convince me that it would be worth my time. It's right there in the very first post: the false statement that some people seem to cling to in the face of all the facts that I can see.

HERO SYSTEM IS NOT EXPONENTIAL!

It is LINEAR! Though and through, with only about seven exceptions:
1) Lifting capacity from STR. (Notice that all other aspects of STR are linear.)
2) Increased Non-Combat multiples for Movement Powers (and related Powers like Stretching).
3) The MegaScale Advantage.
4) A few "extended" Advantages like Increased Range and Increased Area.
5) The size and mass results for Growth, Shrinking, and Density Increase.
6) The Range Modifier.
7) A few Enhanced Sense bits like Rapid Sense, Telescopic and Microscopic.

Is there anything else I forgot? Notice that many of the above things really don't come into play that often. YMMV, but I hardly ever see #'s 3, 4, and 7. Compare that to all the central "meat and potatoes" bits of the system that always come into play:

1) Damage: 5 points for 1d6, 10 points for 2d6, 15 points for 3d6, 20 points for 4d6 - Linear.
2) Defenses: 1 point for 1 PD, 2 points for 2 PD, 2 points for 3 PD - linear.
3) Speed: 10 points for 1 action per turn, 20 points for 2 actions per turn, etc. - Linear.
4) Movement (combat): 2 points for 1", 4 points for 2", 6 points for 3", 8 points for 4" - linear.
5) Skills (combat and otherwise): 2 points for +1, 4 point for +2, 6 points for +3 - linear.
6) Characteristics: 2 points for 1 BODY, 4 points for 2 BODY, etc., 1 point for 1 INT, 2 points for 2 INT, etc. - Linear.
7) Perks: 1 point for a 5-pt Base/Vehicle/Follower, 2 points for a 10-point Base/Vehicle/Follower, 3 points for a 15-point Base/Vehicle/Follower - Linear. (Oh, yeah. That reminds me of one other exponential aspect - the +5 for x2 equipment/followers, but that also doesn't come into play that often. Most people use the extra equipment as backups only, rather than for in-play multiple powers.)

All the really essential parts of HERO are linear. The exponential stuff is thrown in because every once in a while, Superman is going to need to lift the Statue of Liberty, or a star ship is going to need to get to another planet really fast, or something like that.

Yes, I know it says somewhere that a stick of dynamite does 1d6 K, while it takes 4 sticks to do 2d6 K, but it's still linear - because a stick of dynamite is not a game construct - a d6 K is.

[Mister E]

I can't keep silent on this issue any longer. I haven't read the entire thread, but you're welcome to try and convince me that it would be worth my time. It's right there in the very first post: the false statement that some people seem to cling to in the face of all the facts that I can see.

HERO SYSTEM IS NOT EXPONENTIAL!

It is LINEAR! Though and through, with only about seven exceptions:
1) Lifting capacity from STR. (Notice that all other aspects of STR are linear.)
2) Increased Non-Combat multiples for Movement Powers (and related Powers like Stretching).
3) The MegaScale Advantage.
4) A few "extended" Advantages like Increased Range and Increased Area.
5) The size and mass results for Growth, Shrinking, and Density Increase.
6) The Range Modifier.
7) A few Enhanced Sense bits like Rapid Sense, Telescopic and Microscopic.

Is there anything else I forgot? Notice that many of the above things really don't come into play that often. YMMV, but I hardly ever see #'s 3, 4, and 7. Compare that to all the central "meat and potatoes" bits of the system that always come into play:

1) Damage: 5 points for 1d6, 10 points for 2d6, 15 points for 3d6, 20 points for 4d6 - Linear.
2) Defenses: 1 point for 1 PD, 2 points for 2 PD, 2 points for 3 PD - linear.
3) Speed: 10 points for 1 action per turn, 20 points for 2 actions per turn, etc. - Linear.
4) Movement (combat): 2 points for 1", 4 points for 2", 6 points for 3", 8 points for 4" - linear.
5) Skills (combat and otherwise): 2 points for +1, 4 point for +2, 6 points for +3 - linear.
6) Characteristics: 2 points for 1 BODY, 4 points for 2 BODY, etc., 1 point for 1 INT, 2 points for 2 INT, etc. - Linear.
7) Perks: 1 point for a 5-pt Base/Vehicle/Follower, 2 points for a 10-point Base/Vehicle/Follower, 3 points for a 15-point Base/Vehicle/Follower - Linear. (Oh, yeah. That reminds me of one other exponential aspect - the +5 for x2 equipment/followers, but that also doesn't come into play that often. Most people use the extra equipment as backups only, rather than for in-play multiple powers.)

All the really essential parts of HERO are linear. The exponential stuff is thrown in because every once in a while, Superman is going to need to lift the Statue of Liberty, or a star ship is going to need to get to another planet really fast, or something like that.

Yes, I know it says somewhere that a stick of dynamite does 1d6 K, while it takes 4 sticks to do 2d6 K, but it's still linear - because a stick of dynamite is not a game construct - a d6 K is.So you think a 20 DC attack does twice the damage of a 10 DC attack? Hm... interesting. :joint:

No seriously, BODY is exponential by increments of +1, the same that damage is exponential by increments of +1d6. Check this out:

If the Mass of any object is doubled, it gains +1 BODY. If a character gains +5 STR, it gains +1d6 DC's, and is able to do an average of +1 BODY damage per hit.

+5 STR = +1d6 DC's = +1 BODY = x2 Mass (a measurable aspect of the physical world)

... the same as...

+5 STR = x2 Lifting Weight (likewise, a measurable aspect of the physical world)

These quotes were taken from the "What is Casual STR meant to be?" Thread...
The point where everything becomes wonkie, is where characters come in. A character can have whatever BODY he wants, and likewise, isn't going to be considered 'destroyed' until receiving twice his BODY in damage. This is totally cool, however, because heroes are supposed to contain some ineffable quality of story-telling that makes them much more than the sum of their base parts... and, the system distinguishes a difference between inanimate objects, and biological life-forms, for the purpose of game-play.

Another place where this concept of doubling breaks down, is in any situation beyond simple doubling, and I think this is your argument. 12 BODY is four times the material of 10 BODY, but without DEF, with 50 STR, you will only need to hit it twice... Likewise, with an object with 20 BODY, which (doing the math in my head) I think is 1248 times the material... two puches should do it. Oh well...
The only correct answer to "How much more powerful is an attack with an extra 1d6 of damage?" is "One more d6." It's not quantifiable beyond that.
You are, of course, right. However, despite the fact that the exponential factor of damage and BODY can only be shown accurately in a few scenarios before it breaks down into a more linear system, I think, at its heart, that this was the intended quality the system is meant to have... at least theoretically.

[Kristopher]

A 20d6 attack does twice as much damage, before defenses, as a 10d6 attack. Simple as that. The average on the 20d6 attack is 70, while the average on the 10d6 attack is 35. Minimums are 20 vs 10, and maximums are 120 vs 60. Any way you look at it, 20d6 is double the 10d6.

You can talk about how the 20d6 attack is supposed to be something like 512 times the energy of a 10d6 attack, but that's pretty much pointless.

As for +1 BODY = x2 MASS, that's nothing but a pile of problems, which ends up with many supermassive objects far too easy to destroy.

[zornwil]

Effectiveness is neither linear nor exponential. Force may be doubling per 5 CP, as far as I'm concerned the jury is out as to the precise in-game consequences, though.

Anyway, the point is, a 5d6 EB against a target may have a negligible effect, whereas a 6d6 will normally be harmful, and a 7d6 is devastating, and beyond that quickly sends the victim into la-la land.

I don't find the +1 BOD = x2 Mass so critically problematic, the simple problem is the entire nature of inflicting damage on a small subset of a large object, and that's a different issue. A 500d6 attack that hits 1 hex is still only 1 hex of the Earth. There should be similar questions in regard to a pin-prick attack against a person IF that attack were truly so microscopic and without explosive ramifications.

[Vorsch]

This thread is like mana from heaven

To see so many people argue about "the brokenness of Hero" from both sides, is just funny.

TO hero philes nothing is broken, or if it is is because it simulates genre.#

total crap, hero rules are a incosintant mess.

this whole 1d6 = double force debate, well its true.

i try to pull your head of with str 20, then i powerer up and do it with str 25 , double force. actual real lifting power, not hypothetical game balance. twice the energy.

anyone arguing other wise is wrong ( and that a fully formed oppinon ) . sorry its not politically correct to say some one wrong.

hell you wrong, whoever you are

[Black Lotus]

So you think a 20 DC attack does twice the damage of a 10 DC attack? Hm... interesting. :joint:

Yes, a 20 DC attack causes precisely twice as much damage as a 10 DC attack. Here, let me go get my dice and rulebook. Ah yes, 10d6 and 20d6. (10d6 x 2) = 20d6. That's certainly linear. Even if you assert that it has "an exponential effect", and I know why you do -- the BODY of objects, which I will address later -- it's a linear progression.


No seriously, BODY is exponential by increments of +1, the same that damage is exponential by increments of +1d6. Check this out:

If the Mass of any object is doubled, it gains +1 BODY. If a character gains +5 STR, it gains +1d6 DC's, and is able to do an average of +1 BODY damage per hit.

All that proves is that being bigger doesn't make you equally more resilient, since in game terms, a 15-year-old girl can have more BODY than a Mack truck, within NCM, no less. The slow progression of Mass:Body ratio is necessary unless you want every large building in a campaign to withstand the force of an atomic bomb. There's more to BODY than just Mass. That's why a doubling of mass does NOT equal a doubling of BODY. Just because you can compare the two values and come up with an exponential progression, does not mean the whole group of attributes is exponential.

Also, DEF progression is linear, instead of exponential. So why just use BODY to measure? Why not include the DEF of object in there with your calculations?


+5 STR = +1d6 DC's = +1 BODY = x2 Mass (a measurable aspect of the physical world)

... the same as...

+5 STR = x2 Lifting Weight (likewise, a measurable aspect of the physical world)

If +5 STR = x2 Lifting Weight, it's linear. Do you know why? When talking about BODY:Mass, Body is at first set to 10. However, when the Mass of the object doubles, you only get +1 BODY. +5 STR equals a doubling of Lifting Weight, believe it or not, is a linear progression. A multiplicative linear progression, but linear nonetheless.

[Warp9]

All that proves is that being bigger doesn't make you equally more resilient, since in game terms, a 15-year-old girl can have more BODY than a Mack truck, within NCM, no less. The slow progression of Mass:Body ratio is necessary unless you want every large building in a campaign to withstand the force of an atomic bomb.

No it's not.

In GURPS 3rd ed a battle ship has 25,000 hit points, and a Nuke can do 1,000,000+ points of damage.



If +5 STR = x2 Lifting Weight, it's linear. Do you know why? When talking about BODY:Mass, Body is at first set to 10. However, when the Mass of the object doubles, you only get +1 BODY. +5 STR equals a doubling of Lifting Weight, believe it or not, is a linear progression. A multiplicative linear progression, but linear nonetheless.

I think perhaps the discussion has exceeded your grasp of mathematics.

The term "linear" relates to the graph of a given equation.

y = x will give you a graph of a line (it is linear)
y = 2x will also give you a graph of a line (it is linear)
y = 25/17 x will also give you a graph of a line (it is linear)

However, the lift formula in terms of kg lifted will give the following formula: y = 25 * 2^(x/5) such a formula will not give you a graph of a line, instead it will create an exponential curve. It is because of this reason that we say that it is not linear progression.

[Black Lotus]

No it's not.

In GURPS 3rd ed a battle ship has 25,000 hit points, and a Nuke can do 1,000,000+ points of damage.

We're not discussing GURPS.


I think perhaps the discussion has exceeded your grasp of mathematics.

The term "linear" relates to the graph of a given equation.

y = x will give you a graph of a line (it is linear)
y = 2x will also give you a graph of a line (it is linear)
y = 25/17 x will also give you a graph of a line (it is linear)

However, the lift formula in terms of kg lifted will give the following formula: y = 25 * 2^(x/5) such a formula will not give you a graph of a line, instead it will create an exponential curve. It is because of this reason that we say that it is not linear progression.

I'm probably wrong insofar as my facts are concerned, since math is not my forte, and I hadn't had my coffee yet when I wrote that post (note: convenient, yet worthless excuse there). Fortunately, I'm more interested in how smoothly/ relaistically the game can be run as-is than in whether certain aspects are linear or exponential.

I stand by this, though: STR progresses, and is purchased, in a linear fashion. Many of its effects, such as its role in Character vs. Character combat, are linear: Characters buy BODY and DEF a point at a time, same with STR; there's no exponential component. However, SOME of the game effects of STR are exponential, for example: when observing the effects of linear STR on, say, the BODY of a succession of generic, unaltered inanimate objects.

[Trebuchet]

If the Mass of any object is doubled, it gains +1 BODY.I am not, and never have been, of the "Damage is Exponential in HERO" school of thought. If you're going to go about quoting me, at least try to understand the point I was making. I was not supporting your position in any way, shape, or form.

Your statement is accurate only so far as inanimate objects go. It quite clearly does not apply to characters, player- or otherwise. Since a character must be driven equal to his BODY below 0 BODY in order to be killed, quite clearly each +1 pip of BODY is not doing twice the damage to a character. It takes twice as many dice to kill in a single hit. Damage in HERO is strictly linear except versus inanimate objects; which in HERO generally amount to mere props. Stop ignoring the inconvenient facts that disrupt your little theory.

ExampleMan has 10 BODY and zero PD & ED. Villain Guy shoots him with a 10d6 EB, which on average does 10 BODY to Exampleman. ExampleMan has 10 BODY left before he dies at -10 BODY. If Villain Guy buys up his EB to 11d6 with XP, he still won't kill ExampleMan in one shot. Villain Guy must buy his EB up to 20d6 to be assured of a one-shot-kill on ExampleMan. Thus, it requires 20d6 to be "twice as powerful" as 10d6, not 11d6. Any rational definition of "twice as powerful" means it should be able to accomplish the same thing in half the time in every case. Your reasoning fails even if you compare Character Points: 10 CP buys +2d6 to an EB or STR damage, which as I illustrated above is very clearly not twice as powerful. 10 CP of BODY buys +5 BODY, making the character literally 50% harder to kill than a character with 10 BODY. If ExampleMan buys 10 CP of BODY each time Villain Guy buys +2d6 to his EB, Villain Guy will never be able to kill ExampleMan in one shot.

In fact, after a while ExampleMan will be able to start spending his CP on other things, because his toughness from being killed is increasing far faster than Villain Guy's ability to kill him. Maybe ExampleMan can finally buy that base in the Caribbean he's always dreamed about... :D

[Warp9]

I can't keep silent on this issue any longer. I haven't read the entire thread, but you're welcome to try and convince me that it would be worth my time. It's right there in the very first post: the false statement that some people seem to cling to in the face of all the facts that I can see.

HERO SYSTEM IS NOT EXPONENTIAL!

It is LINEAR! Though and through, with only about seven exceptions:
1) Lifting capacity from STR. (Notice that all other aspects of STR are linear.)
2) Increased Non-Combat multiples for Movement Powers (and related Powers like Stretching).
3) The MegaScale Advantage.
4) A few "extended" Advantages like Increased Range and Increased Area.
5) The size and mass results for Growth, Shrinking, and Density Increase.
6) The Range Modifier.
7) A few Enhanced Sense bits like Rapid Sense, Telescopic and Microscopic.

It seems like you've missed out on a number of examples.

"The Breaking things" section of the book provides a strong argument for an exponential nature of the game. Both the breaking of normal objects and walls work on an exponential basis.

You might notice that a 30d6 attack will do knock-back to an aircraft carrier, which seems pretty exponential to me (although I admit that the actual distance of knock-back is linear).

You might also check out the optional velocity chart (FREd pages 292-293), which is described in the book as being "more realistic." It also works on an exponential basis.



1) Damage: 5 points for 1d6, 10 points for 2d6, 15 points for 3d6, 20 points for 4d6 - Linear.
2) Defenses: 1 point for 1 PD, 2 points for 2 PD, 2 points for 3 PD - linear.
3) Speed: 10 points for 1 action per turn, 20 points for 2 actions per turn, etc. - Linear.
4) Movement (combat): 2 points for 1", 4 points for 2", 6 points for 3", 8 points for 4" - linear.
5) Skills (combat and otherwise): 2 points for +1, 4 point for +2, 6 points for +3 - linear.
6) Characteristics: 2 points for 1 BODY, 4 points for 2 BODY, etc., 1 point for 1 INT, 2 points for 2 INT, etc. - Linear.

Many (not all) of the factors you've described as "linear" involve the cost of buying extra points, which has nothing to do with the argument being made.

The argument being made is: X points of Hero = an exponential Y increase in effective ability.

The cost of each point of X ability during character development has nothing to do with the end result that such an ability gives in the game world.

[Warp9]

As for +1 BODY = x2 MASS, that's nothing but a pile of problems, which ends up with many supermassive objects far too easy to destroy.
So how would you rate objects? Would every aircraft carrier have 1 million BODY?

[Warp9]

A 500d6 attack that hits 1 hex is still only 1 hex of the Earth. There should be similar questions in regard to a pin-prick attack against a person IF that attack were truly so microscopic and without explosive ramifications.
Is this stance coming from a "realistic" perspective, or from an "game-logic" perspective?

[Warp9]

We're not discussing GURPS.

No. But we are discussing how HERO might do things. . . .

Your statement was:

"The slow progression of Mass:Body ratio is necessary unless you want every large building in a campaign to withstand the force of an atomic bomb."

My point is that, if an atomic bomb is rated to do damage at a linear rate, then buildings can also be rated at a linear Mass:BODY ratio. In that case the buildings will still be destroyed; so your argument doesn't hold water.

[Black Lotus]

So how would you rate objects? Would every aircraft carrier have 1 million BODY?

Let's check. A Nimitz-class aircraft carrier weighs 97,000 tons full load (I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt with the crew and all). At 100 ktons on the chart, that's 30 BODY.

Fricking. Ridiculous. I could stab the thing a few dozen times with a knife and sink it, according to the rules.

So, yes, it may be exponential... but it's the BASELINE BODY. You'll be adding waaaaay more for an aircraft carrier, or anything else that's not made out of rice paper. You can't base the claim that the system is exponential on the baseline BODY suggestion.

[Warp9]

Let's check. A Nimitz-class aircraft carrier weighs 97,000 tons full load (I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt with the crew and all). At 100 ktons on the chart, that's 30 BODY.

Fricking. Ridiculous. I could stab the thing a few dozen times with a knife and sink it, according to the rules.

So, yes, it may be exponential... but it's the BASELINE BODY. You'll be adding waaaaay more for an aircraft carrier, or anything else that's not made out of rice paper. You can't base the claim that the system is exponential on the baseline BODY suggestion.
On the Object Body Table, a battleship is listed at 29 BODY.

Is this argument about "BASELINE BODY" somewhere in the actual rules?

And BTW what BODY do you think an air-craft carrier should have?

[Black Lotus]

On the Object Body Table, a battleship is listed at 29 BODY.

Is this argument about "BASELINE BODY" somewhere in the actual rules?

And BTW what BODY do you think an air-craft carrier should have?

No, it's from common sense. I was using the Expanded Vehicle Size Table from Star HERO, since an aircraft carrier is a vehicle.

What body do I think it should have? A lot more than 29, considering that (since no DEF is suggested for objects of any size on the tables) I could KICK an aircraft carrier and sink it in less than five minutes. I don't run aircraft carriers, though.

The values on the table don't list any DEF, either. So I suppose an aircraft carrier has 0 DEF? All I'm saying is that the tables are a guideline, and that using them to prove that the system is exponential is an unscientific way to go about it, since it takes only very arbitrary, baseline objects into account.

[Warp9]

What body do I think it should have? A lot more than 29, considering that (since no DEF is suggested for objects of any size on the tables) I could KICK an aircraft carrier and sink it in less than five minutes. I don't run aircraft carriers, though.

That is not an answer to my question



The values on the table don't list any DEF, either. So I suppose an aircraft carrier has 0 DEF?

It also doesn't tell us how tall it is, I suppose you think that means it has no height?

The table is there to rate an object's BODY--nothing else. I have no idea why you think it should list defense too.




All I'm saying is that the tables are a guideline, and that using them to prove that the system is exponential is an unscientific way to go about it, since it takes only very arbitrary, baseline objects into account.

The formula given in the book is +1 BODY per 2 X mass. That formula establishes an exponential pattern.

Are you saying that the formula was never meant to be applied to most objects in the game?

[NuSoardGraphite]

Let's check. A Nimitz-class aircraft carrier weighs 97,000 tons full load (I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt with the crew and all). At 100 ktons on the chart, that's 30 BODY.

Fricking. Ridiculous. I could stab the thing a few dozen times with a knife and sink it, according to the rules.

It seems ridiculous until you add the appropriate DEF. The main structure of an Aircraft Carrier is made of various grades of steel. The DEF of solid steel starts somewhere around DEF 8 and goes up from there depending on the density and hardness of various alloys used in its construction. Considering its a military grade vehicle, its not made with normal steel, but various superior alloys (i'm not sure which alloy, I'm a submarine guy, not a Carrier guy) so one can assume that the base Defense of the Carrier would be quite a bit higher than DEF 8. Probably closer to Def 12. Maybe even Def 14 or 15.

There's absolutely no way you chould sink a carrier by stabbing it with a knife at this point.

The point I'm trying to make here is that Body is not the only determination of how "tough" something it. Its a combination of Body and Defense. In Hero the average Tank only has 19 Body, but that Defense of 16-25 is what makes them so damned hard to take down.

Its all about thresholds here. An Aircraft Carrier with a Body of 30 may seem "fragile" but with a Defense of 15, its going to take a minimum of a 9 DC attack to do any damage whatsoever to the craft, and even then, it can only occasionaly acheive between 1 and 3 Body damage to the carrier, meaning its going to take from between 10 and 30 hits to disable the carrier (make it sink maybe) and a minimum of 20 to completely destroy it. By the time you can acheive that, the carrier will have dealt with you. (or one of its planes or copters would have, anyway)
In order to sink the carrier with only 1 or 2 hits, you are going to need an attack on the order of 36 DC! A 12D6 killing attack does an average of 42 Body damage. It takes a 45 Body attack (30 Body plus 15 Def) to drop the carriers Body to 0 in one shot.

Thats a whole lot of damage.



So, yes, it may be exponential... but it's the BASELINE BODY. You'll be adding waaaaay more for an aircraft carrier, or anything else that's not made out of rice paper. You can't base the claim that the system is exponential on the baseline BODY suggestion.

I wouldn't be adding too much more to the Body of the carrier to get it right. Depending on what I want to do with it, I might add 3 or 4 Body. Or I might reduce the Body a bit if I want it to be easy to sink during a naval confrontation. Its all relative.

And yes, the Body system is the most obvious evidence that the Hero damage system is exponential.

[Black Lotus]

That is not an answer to my question


It also doesn't tell us how tall it is, I suppose you think that means it has no height?

The table is there to rate an object's BODY--nothing else. I have no idea why you think it should list defense too.



The formula given in the book is +1 BODY per 2 X mass. That formula establishes an exponential pattern.

Are you saying that the formula was never meant to be applied to most objects in the game?

The chart is flawed, that's the problem -- because the system is flawed, as are all roleplaying systems. Some things (characters) can have lots of BODY -- as I said, someone with NCM restriction can have more BODY than a Mack truck -- and be much smaller than an object with comparable BODY on the chart. In any case, I think the chart should be applied as a guideline to ALL objects in the game, but you often need to modify the values given.

Look, I'll concede that the Object Size Table has an exponential component. So? Our original discussion was how STR is exponential. Well, I don't believe it is. I believe that in SOME cases it has a linear effect, and in OTHER cases it has an exponential effect. It's both.

In any case, I really shouldn't have gotten into this discussion, because -- and not to be mean, or insulting -- I just don't care about whether something is linear or exponential. It's that people claim one or the other extreme, and I'm saying it's a combination of both.

[zornwil]

This thread is like mana from heaven

To see so many people argue about "the brokenness of Hero" from both sides, is just funny.

TO hero philes nothing is broken, or if it is is because it simulates genre.#

total crap, hero rules are a incosintant mess.

this whole 1d6 = double force debate, well its true.

i try to pull your head of with str 20, then i powerer up and do it with str 25 , double force. actual real lifting power, not hypothetical game balance. twice the energy.

anyone arguing other wise is wrong ( and that a fully formed oppinon ) . sorry its not politically correct to say some one wrong.

hell you wrong, whoever you are
So is it 1d6 or 5 points?

[zornwil]

Is this stance coming from a "realistic" perspective, or from an "game-logic" perspective?
Both, in this case. Note I said "non-explosive". Most such massive blasts are explosive in nature, such as when a meteor fragment hits.

[Warp9]

Both, in this case. Note I said "non-explosive". Most such massive blasts are explosive in nature, such as when a meteor fragment hits.
Are events which are "explosive" in real life automatically explosive in HERO game terms?

Lets say that a character does a move-through on the Earth at VERY high speeds (meteor-like speeds). Would such an attack be considered explosive in HERO game terms?

Would you argue that, because a move-through (no matter what the speed involved) is considered "non-explosive" in HERO terms, it should only do damage to 1 hex?

Or are we going to start automatically granting "explosive" status to any attack which seems to warrent it?

[zornwil]

Are events which are "explosive" in real life automatically explosive in HERO game terms?

Lets say that a character does a move-through on the Earth at VERY high speeds (meteor-like speeds). Would such an attack be considered explosive in HERO game terms?

Would you argue that, because a move-through (no matter what the speed involved) is considered "non-explosive" in HERO terms, it should only do damage to 1 hex?

Or are we going to start automatically granting "explosive" status to any attack which seems to warrent it?
Well, there's real-world, game-world, and Hero-world...

I think Hero gets wonky at larger scales, but not because of the power levels themselves but more so in terms of the mass of targets and how that interacts.

An explosion to a human is not an explosion to the Earth...an explosion in Hero terms engulfs whole characters. An explosion on the Earth to the Earth is much like a single strike on a person.

I think at some size, targets move into a megascale world, I suppose you'd say. But I don't pretend to know the best way to handle it systemically.

[Black Lotus]

Are events which are "explosive" in real life automatically explosive in HERO game terms?

Not automatically. You have to add the proper Advantages and/or Adders to properly simulate explosiveness in HERO terms.


Lets say that a character does a move-through on the Earth at VERY high speeds (meteor-like speeds). Would such an attack be considered explosive in HERO game terms?

Not unless you buy an Area of Effect Naked Advantage for use with Move Throughs. That one hex would be vaporized, though!


Would you argue that, because a move-through (no matter what the speed involved) is considered "non-explosive" in HERO terms, it should only do damage to 1 hex?

Yep. Unless you buy that naked Advantage for it, in game terms, it affects only that one hex.


Or are we going to start automatically granting "explosive" status to any attack which seems to warrent it?

No, we buy it Area of Effect to simulate its real-world effects. All dpends on common sense/ GM discretion.

[Warp9]

Well, there's real-world, game-world, and Hero-world...

I think Hero gets wonky at larger scales, but not because of the power levels themselves but more so in terms of the mass of targets and how that interacts.

An explosion to a human is not an explosion to the Earth...an explosion in Hero terms engulfs whole characters. An explosion on the Earth to the Earth is much like a single strike on a person.

I think at some size, targets move into a megascale world, I suppose you'd say. But I don't pretend to know the best way to handle it systemically.
I wasn't thinking on a planet scale when I ask the question. The question was simply about what you would rate as a "non-explosive attack." Would you limit someone who hit the ground at meteor-like speeds to damaging a single hex, or would you have the attack impact a larger area (maybe several hundred feet).

Given your previous statements, I'd sort of assume that you'd limit them to 1 hex, but I can't see that as a "realism based" limitation.

[Warp9]

Not automatically. You have to add the proper Advantages and/or Adders to properly simulate explosiveness in HERO terms.



Not unless you buy an Area of Effect Naked Advantage for use with Move Throughs. That one hex would be vaporized, though!



Yep. Unless you buy that naked Advantage for it, in game terms, it affects only that one hex.



No, we buy it Area of Effect to simulate its real-world effects. All dpends on common sense/ GM discretion.
So how much growth do I have to buy before my character becomes immune to non-area-effect attacks?

[zornwil]

I wasn't thinking on a planet scale when I ask the question. The question was simply about what you would rate as a "non-explosive attack." Would you limit someone who hit the ground at meteor-like speeds to damaging a single hex, or would you have the attack impact a larger area (maybe several hundred feet).

Given your previous statements, I'd sort of assume that you'd limit them to 1 hex, but I can't see that as a "realism based" limitation.
A "character", probably limit to the hex, but it'd depend on the SFX of their ability. If a character could do this, I'd tend to assume a lot of rubber physics anyway.

[Black Lotus]

So how much growth do I have to buy before my character becomes immune to non-area-effect attacks?

No amount of Growth causes you to become immune to attacks without the Area of Effect Advantage. If the attack hits you, you take damage.

[Warp9]

A "character", probably limit to the hex, but it'd depend on the SFX of their ability. If a character could do this, I'd tend to assume a lot of rubber physics anyway.
The character might be an Artificially Intelligent Combat Droid made of some hyper-dense futuristic material. Such a situation could take place in a fairly hard sci-fi setting, especially if the droid was willing to sacrifice itself to accomplish some objective.

The point is that the 1 hex limitation is not something that is based on "realism." Almost any mega power attack is going to have secondary explosive effects (all that energy has to go somewhere).

So (it seems to me) the reason for the 1 hex limitation must be based on "in-game logic."

[Warp9]

No amount of Growth causes you to become immune to attacks without the Area of Effect Advantage. If the attack hits you, you take damage.
But 400 points of Growth would allow my character to be bigger than the Earth.

So what if I build Mr Planet (bigger than the Earth).

Can non-area-effect attacks harm him?

And what about Death Star sized vehicles? Will a normal attack only destroy 1 hex of such a vehicle, or can a non-area-effect attack take out the Death Star?

[Black Lotus]

But 400 points of Growth would allow my character to be bigger than the Earth.

So what if I build Mr Planet (bigger than the Earth).

Can non-area-effect attacks harm him?

Yep. There's more on this in Star HERO.


And what about Death Star sized vehicles? Will a normal attack only destroy 1 hex of such a vehicle, or can a non-area-effect attack take out the Death Star?

According to the rules, a non-area-of-effect attack can indeed take out the Death Star. Even if you only do damage to one hex the whole time, the whole thing is destroyed once its BODY is gone. Arguably, you can say that that one hex is the Earth's crust, not the whole thing. Special rules for planets are in Star HERO.

[Warp9]

According to the rules, a non-area-of-effect attack can indeed take out the Death Star. Even if you only do damage to one hex the whole time, the whole thing is destroyed once its BODY is gone. Arguably, you can say that that one hex is the Earth's crust, not the whole thing. Special rules for planets are in Star HERO.

OK a single shot from a very large non-area-effect attack can destroy something like a borg cube. So where are you getting the idea that a non-area-effect attack can't destroy more than a single hex in one shot? Those two things sound contradictory.

Is there a specific place in the rule book where it makes the statement about the one-hex limit?

[Mister E]

Yep. There's more on this in Star HERO.



According to the rules, a non-area-of-effect attack can indeed take out the Death Star. Even if you only do damage to one hex the whole time, the whole thing is destroyed once its BODY is gone. Arguably, you can say that that one hex is the Earth's crust, not the whole thing. Special rules for planets are in Star HERO.Gawd... I love Star HERO. :D

[Mister E]

OK a single shot from a very large non-area-effect attack can destroy something like a borg cube. So where are you getting the idea that a non-area-effect attack can't destroy more than a single hex in one shot? Those two things sound contradictory.

Is there a specific place in the rule book where it makes the statement about the one-hex limit?Having been in the Navy, I think I can safely assert that there are very few hexes on a major sea vessel that have the potential of destroying the whole ship if damaged. I think this issue could be very easily managed realistically by any competent GM, (and maybe even by "Skilled" or "Average" GM's :D ).

Zornwil's issue about a super-high dice attack targeting only one hex is interesting, but just as a comment, I don't think high dice attacks inherently should have any kind of Explosive properties beyond special effect. Knockback is itself a fairly explosive biproduct of most attacks. There is no reason not to simply add Explosive to these large-scale attacks, if it is appropriate. Conversely, balistic cavitation from a bullet inside the human body, could be considered a mini-explosion. A needle, maybe not so much, but its's all about scale. To a transdimensionally size-shifted character, that is another matter. Transferal of kinetic energy always has some kind of entropic dispersal effect. Zorwil is no doubt an extremely good GM, and has a very strong conceptual grasp of the HERO System, and its game machinics.

[zornwil]

The character might be an Artificially Intelligent Combat Droid made of some hyper-dense futuristic material. Such a situation could take place in a fairly hard sci-fi setting, especially if the droid was willing to sacrifice itself to accomplish some objective.

The point is that the 1 hex limitation is not something that is based on "realism." Almost any mega power attack is going to have secondary explosive effects (all that energy has to go somewhere).

So (it seems to me) the reason for the 1 hex limitation must be based on "in-game logic."
Yes, but it depends on what we're talking about.

[zornwil]

Having been in the Navy, I think I can safely assert that there are very few hexes on a major sea vessel that have the potential of destroying the whole ship if damaged. I think this issue could be very easily managed realistically by any competent GM, (and maybe even by "Skilled" or "Average" GM's :D ).

Zornwil's issue about a super-high dice attack targeting only one hex is interesting, but just as a comment, I don't think high dice attacks inherently should have any kind of Explosive properties beyond special effect. Knockback is itself a fairly explosive biproduct of most attacks. There is no reason not to simply add Explosive to these large-scale attacks, if it is appropriate. Conversely, balistic cavitation from a bullet inside the human body, could be considered a mini-explosion. A needle, maybe not so much, but its's all about scale. To a transdimensionally size-shifted character, that is another matter. Transferal of kinetic energy always has some kind of entropic dispersal effect. Zorwil is no doubt an extremely good GM, and has a very strong conceptual grasp of the HERO System, and its game machinics.
(blush) Thanks.