Phasers in HERO

[wcw43921]

Everything that's ever been said about Star Trek's Phasers suggests that they're among the most powerful hand weapons in science-fiction TV/movies--too powerful, I would think, for the comfort of a GameMaster.

Has anyone ever built a Phaser in HERO System, from any of the series or movies? How many points did it come to? How do GameMasters handle players with that much power? What about some of the other Star Trek weapons, like Klingon Disruptors? Just as powerful, or not so much?

Looking forward to reading the answers.

[Steve Long]

See Star Hero, page 154.

[Jhamin]

As for the "how do I deal with it" thing, Star Trek characters were supposed to be avoiding combat with natives and less advanced species. That whole prime directive deal. Against equal opponents, you shoot them and they die. Not that different from alot of other genres only you have the option of them dropping unconscious rather than outright killing them.

You note that there aren't any gunfights in old school star trek. It is just over too quick. And the budget didn't allow for it.

Food for thought:

In the show, this is how it actually seemed to work in the Origional Series series and eary Next Gen.
While there is no in world logic for it, it seems like somewhere along the line phasers aquired the the " full damage only vs. rocks" limit because the metal barrels everybody hid behind seemed to be able to stop the blasts and Later Next Gen and onward showed people surviving multiple phaser hits.

I suspect the powers that be decided that instakill weapons shortcircuted too many stories which is kind of what you are worried about, so they just stopped being instakill. This allows everybody to have neat FX gunfights, regardless of the logic.

[Arthur]

Noticed that too. I would watch phaser firefights in DS9 and wonder why those barrels didn't disappear. Just part of the way ST slowly turned into a Star Wars clone after Roddenberry died.

Here is my take on why it happened (real world, not fictional world): original Trek took its cultural cues from the Cold War. In 1966, war meant nukes, which meant instant annihilation (at least that was the perception). Therefore, combat in 1966 Trek was like that.

Trek in the 1990's reflected the conventional war mentality. Phasers essentially became handheld versions of the current perception of war.

However, they lost a lot of credibility with me, and contributed to the demise of Trek. I liked Star Wars a lot (the first three), but I didn't want Trek to acquire the same paradigm. However, it did and now it is apparently dead or dying. Just as well, it has changed beyond recognition. It's no longer the Star Trek I knew and loved.

[MarkusDark]

Originally posted by Arthur
Noticed that too. I would watch phaser firefights in DS9 and wonder why those barrels didn't disappear.

Realise that phasers have a series of settings. Stun, Kill, Disintegration and I believe another that helped to produce heat (perhaps the "stun" setting of Disintegration). Perhaps the Disintegration setting would drain a phaser of its power quickly so doing a gunfight with it would not work well. Also, carrying around a phaser on Disintegration settings wasn't a fashion. Cycling from one setting to the other could take time so they just draw, fire and keep firing.

Now, why they didn't fire disintegration at the barrels to remove them, again I dont' know. Maybe the ease of diving for cover would make such a tactic useless.

Now, to answer the original question - the phasers I had as a Multipower, full phase to change slots, with a non-recharging endurance battery attached. I would have a maximum of 12d6 Stun NND (Force Fields) [Stun] and a 4d6 RKA NND (Force Field) [Kill], a 8d6 RKA for [Disintegrate] and a Change Environment, continuious, for the heat. I debated of having a no knockback option but there were times that people went flyin' a bit - but not much.

Also, you can include an 8d6 RKA Explosion, No range, throwable, for the overload of the phaser - but destroys the phaser in the end.

I had disruptors in a similiar manner, except no stun setting. If I wanted to have phasers as 'superior weapons', I would reduce the disruptors to 3d6NND/6d6 RKA.

Not sure what is listed in the books, but I always tried to keep things simple.

[Tom Carman]

Originally posted by MarkusDark
Realise that phasers have a series of settings. Stun, Kill, Disintegration and I believe another that helped to produce heat (perhaps the "stun" setting of Disintegration). Perhaps the Disintegration setting would drain a phaser of its power quickly so doing a gunfight with it would not work well. Also, carrying around a phaser on Disintegration settings wasn't a fashion. Cycling from one setting to the other could take time so they just draw, fire and keep firing.

< snippage >

Not sure what is listed in the books, but I always tried to keep things simple.

The version in Star HERO (not called a "phaser" of course, that would be copyright infringement) came in at a whopping 480 REAL points, with a 315-pt reserve and 1000 Boostable Charges. It has multiple stun and blast settings (single-target and radius), heat rocks, and two disintegrate modes. You could stun people all day with it, but the disintegration settings chewed through the charges real fast.

[Agent Escafarc]

Originally posted by Tom Carman
The version in Star HERO (not called a "phaser" of course, that would be copyright infringement) came in at a whopping 480 REAL points, with a 315-pt reserve and 1000 Boostable Charges. It has multiple stun and blast settings (single-target and radius), heat rocks, and two disintegrate modes. You could stun people all day with it, but the disintegration settings chewed through the charges real fast.

The only thing missing was the self-destuct slot.

[Eodin]

I don't have the information with me at the office, but I ran a HERO Trek campaign twenty years ago, and the phaser was something like this:
Multipower, 120point Reserve, OIF weapon
1) u - 12d6 EB, Stun Only, lockout
2) u - 12d6 EB, Cone, No Range, lockout
3) u - 6d6 RKA, lockout
4) u - 8d6 RKA Explosion, lockout, 1 charge
END Battery, 160 END, REC 1 (Limited: Only recharge from Fed Power Source).

The assumption was that light stun was 6d6 EB, medium stun 9d6 EB, heavy stun 12d6 EB; heat was 1d6 RKA, disrupt was 3d6 RKA, disintegrate was 6d6 RKA.
I ran both Star Fleet and Merchant campaigns, and I never had any trouble with the players. Combats usually had phasers set to stun, one so there would be prisoners to question and another because of the natural aversion to killing of most Star Fleet / Federation groups.

When I finish converting all my old notes and stuff to 5E, I'll post them to my web site.

[wcw43921]

Originally posted by Eodin
I don't have the information with me at the office, but I ran a HERO Trek campaign twenty years ago, and the phaser was something like this:
Multipower, 120point Reserve, OIF weapon
1) u - 12d6 EB, Stun Only, lockout
2) u - 12d6 EB, Cone, No Range, lockout
3) u - 6d6 RKA, lockout
4) u - 8d6 RKA Explosion, lockout, 1 charge
END Battery, 160 END, REC 1 (Limited: Only recharge from Fed Power Source).

The assumption was that light stun was 6d6 EB, medium stun 9d6 EB, heavy stun 12d6 EB; heat was 1d6 RKA, disrupt was 3d6 RKA, disintegrate was 6d6 RKA.
I ran both Star Fleet and Merchant campaigns, and I never had any trouble with the players. Combats usually had phasers set to stun, one so there would be prisoners to question and another because of the natural aversion to killing of most Star Fleet / Federation groups.

When I finish converting all my old notes and stuff to 5E, I'll post them to my web site.

Good job, Eodin--but what is Lockout? I'm not familiar with that Limitation.

[Eodin]

Lockout as a limitation means that if that power is used, all other slots are unavailable, no matter how many points in the multipower reserve... it "locks out" the use of any other slot at the same time. It used to be worth -1/4.

[Peregrine]

Originally posted by Eodin
Lockout as a limitation means that if that power is used, all other slots are unavailable, no matter how many points in the multipower reserve... it "locks out" the use of any other slot at the same time. It used to be worth -1/4.

Doesn't making a slot an 'Ultra' slot do the same thing?

[Eodin]

Only in the fact that the active points of each slot are too big for any two slots to be used at one time. When I convert to 5E, I'm sure the "lockout" limitation will be gone in the writeups.

And now I remember why...the 8d6 RKA Explosion is 180 AP, so the MP reserve is 180 instead of 120. So without lockout, it was technically possible for the multipower to use both slots 1 and 3 at the same time, which is not possible with a phaser.