EPIC Champions--unofficial material, what should I write about?

[megaplayboy]

Great, now I'm having visions of Thor doing the weather report on the Local News.

"Verily, we shall have a cold front coming in from the northwest, and this will mix with the warmer Southern air to create mildly tempestuous conditions. Prepare thyself, for a cruel light rain is coming!"

[dmjalund]

but Metrology is the science of measurement

[megaplayboy]

Update--I've completed the section on combat tips(for players and GMs), and have to write some brief notes on roleplaying minor and major villains before starting on one of the longer sections--campaign world setup. Epic campaigns, in particular, require fairly extensive prep work, as they usually have a backstory and timeline in place already, and adventures are quite likely to stray into outer space and even other dimensions. After that, there should be an extensive section on character creation, and a section on troubleshooting, which should include some advice on running groups with mixed power levels. When I revise, I'll probably add some examples to better illustrate some of the things I'm talking about.
The second half of the book will include the six example campaigns I mentioned, some sample writeups for "epic powers", some example epic archetypes to help with character creation, plus writeups for sample heroes, villains, Big Bads, agents, bases, vehicles, items of power, AI and DNPCs.
Right now it's at 25,000 words, or about 50 pages. I expect the final product to be around 200-300 pages.

EPICChampions[1].pdf

[massey]

When running a high-end game, the most important thing is to make sure that all characters are able to contribute. If you have a team with Batman, Superman, and Aquaman, then all three of them should be able to have a roughly-equal influence on the outcome of the game. Too often, Champions games become dominated by combat, and so the character with the most obvious combat abilities gets the starring role. In our Batman, Superman, Aquaman example, you should include a healthy dose of investigation in your campaign, and water-based adventures should be frequent as well.

The best solution to the problems of high-powered games is communication between the players and the gamemaster. Everyone should be on the same page as far as what the campaign will involve, what will be needed in terms of characters, how they will interact, what the players are looking for, and what they should expect. It's not good for the GM to shoot Batman with a 10D6 energy blast and watch in horror as the character is blown in half. "You only have 3 ED and you took vulnerability to energy blasts???" "...It fit my character concept." Okay, that character concept sucks. Moreover, it doesn't work in a "high-powered" game.

It can help if the GM assists players who are new to this style of campaign with the types of characters, and gives sample writeups. Never played a 1000 point game? Not sure what is considered good defense for a martial artist detective at that level? Your GM should have a good idea. It's also okay to use non-standard power constructions in your writeups. Someone mentioned this earlier, that sometimes Green Arrow has a high DCV simply because enemies choose not to shoot at him. As I was flipping through some comics a few years ago, I was struck by the fact that Cyclops of the X-Men is not a martial energy projector (or at least, he doesn't have to be). He operates closer to a brick than anything else. He hits like a truck, and is usually one of the last men standing in a big battle, even though he has no obvious defensive powers. I sketched up a quick version of him, giving him a low dex, a low speed, a giant attack, about 10 PD and ED, and 15/15 combat luck to put him squarely into "normal hero" levels of defense. However, when he's leading the X-Men, he gets an extra 10/10 armor because of X-teamwork. Yes, I'm sure you'd love to shoot Cyke, but Wolverine is in front of you and wants to claw your face off. Or Colossus is in the way and ruins your shot. Or Jean Grey is subconsciously influencing you not to shoot her boyfriend. The game effect is 10/10 armor. It will go away if he's the last man standing. You could even make the armor "visible", at least in the game mechanics sense, where villains realize that Cyclops will be easier to put down once the rest of his team is out of commission. Using powers like this and constructing characters creatively can change the way certain characters interact with the game.

You might even create a "JLA package" of team abilities for the heroes that are normally lower powered. +5 DCV with the effect of "holy crap I'd better shoot Superman instead", or 10/10 defense "only when within 4 hexes of a guy with invulnerability" can be used to make some characters more survivable. I think over-use of those sorts of packages might make the game more bland (you don't want everyone taking the exact same thing), but judicious application of a few of them might be just enough to make a normally underpowered character into at least a useful team member.

Remember, ALL the heroes are powerful. Green Arrow's normal boxing glove arrow might only do 8D6, but it's okay for his nerve gas arrow to be a 16D6 NND explosion if that's what it takes for him to hurt Solomon Grundy. Just because he's one of the "weaker" characters doesn't mean he should be useless in combat against anyone but mooks. He's still a big-name hero, even if he can't bounce bullets off of his chest. One of Batman's biggest assets is, well, his very large amount of assets. A vast fortune comes in very handy in a lot of cases where just punching someone or being strong won't cut it. Now, the big guns should still probably be the most powerful in combat. When it comes right down to it, Supes will hit for more damage and will take more damage than anybody else. Everyone having their own special flavor of 25D6 attack isn't what we're looking for. But everyone should have the ability to be effective considering the jobs they handle and the villains they will face.

Introduce villains with more exotic powers. Give them motivations that don't involve murdering the heroes. Count Vertigo shows up and he wants to steal all the gold. He uses his Vertigo Effect, a 20D6 Flash versus all sense groups, Area Effect Cone (special effect being that people can still see and hear to some degree, but all targeting senses are screwed). Superman, with his 100 PD and ED, is affected just a much as the Black Canary. The Count, of course, gets the gold and escapes. Now the heroes must track him down.

The players have a responsibility as well. The guy playing Superman has the responsibility to watch out for his teammates. Part of the responsibility of playing the guy with 30 extra defense and 5 extra dice on his attacks is shielding the little guy. It's taking on Darkseid. It's stopping the bridge from collapsing when you could totally kick that giant gorilla in the nuts for 25 dice. Make sure that if a player is going to play the powerhouse, that he's okay with doing everything that goes along with it. Likewise, the guy who plays Hawkman should know that he's not supposed to run up and punch Darkseid in the face. Don't tempt fate, my son. When the really big villain comes along, and everyone knows "This is a job for Superman", don't get mad and sulk. Also, when players are building characters, it's their job to make sure they've got something really cool that they can do. Be like the Legion of Super-Heroes. Have something you can do that nobody else can do. Don't build a character who is going to get killed in 5 minutes, and don't build a character where your concept is "I'm just like Superman, only not as good." If you're playing Aquaman, having a 150 point Multipower for undersea animal summoning powers is good. Just giving him a 40 Str + 10 when he's in the water is not.

The final guideline, and possibly the most important, would be that the heroes should win, generally at whatever they choose to do. Not every fight should be hard. Batman should solve most crimes easily. Superman should be able to get to the disaster in time. He should be strong enough to lift the collapsing bridge. To make an epic game fun, the players should feel like they really are the most powerful heroes on Earth. Don't just give them victories. "Lex Luthor tries to rob the bank with his robot. You smash it easily, Superman. I guess roll some dice or something." That's not exciting. The villains will generally have some sort of plan to deal with Earth's Mightiest Heroes, even if it's just getting them out of the way. But when the heroes make a plan, let it work. They are the world's greatest heroes, after all.

Sorry if that was disjointed and poorly written or planned. I was thinking about this the other day, and then wandered back to the Hero forums after a fairly long absence, saw this thread and just did an info dump.

[dmjalund]

unfortunaltely the best way to give diverse characters equal time to to do what many cosider an RPG faux pas - divide the party.

LOSH has their spy squad.

[assault]

The Silver Age JLA typically worked in groups of 2 or 3.

The Golden Age JSA operated as individuals in stories that were often only fairly loosely connected..

[Goradin]

Strike Force already did this really I would look there for examples.

[megaplayboy]

Finishing up my notes on roleplaying epic and minor villains. Will get started on campaign setup/creation this week. So, if anyone has any thoughts about setting up a campaign world for an epic-level game, I'm all ears(or is that eyes, on the internet?).

[dmjalund]

(all screens?)

[Orion]

Just read through the stuff you posted above, and one item leaped out at me. In the various power levels, someone that can pick up a battleship can only barely dent a modern tank with an average blow (20d6 HTH vs 20rPD). So the person can pick up a battleship and use it to mash the tank flat, but has difficulty hurting it directly? Huh? I would think someone with 100 STR should be able to pick up the tank and mash it into a solid ball using casual strength in a phase or two. Sure, they may be able to push and do various things to up the damage, but it just feels wrong. If my character had 100 STR, I would expect to be need to be very careful so that I didn't accidentally destroy the tank, not that I have to work at it. "Sorry about ripping the turret off - I was just trying to scratch some dirt off it!"

I suppose it's an artifact of the Hero system, but for me there seems to be a disconnect at high levels on the damage STR does vs that done by weapons.

[megaplayboy]

Just read through the stuff you posted above, and one item leaped out at me. In the various power levels, someone that can pick up a battleship can only barely dent a modern tank with an average blow (20d6 HTH vs 20rPD). So the person can pick up a battleship and use it to mash the tank flat, but has difficulty hurting it directly? Huh? I would think someone with 100 STR should be able to pick up the tank and mash it into a solid ball using casual strength in a phase or two. Sure, they may be able to push and do various things to up the damage, but it just feels wrong. If my character had 100 STR, I would expect to be need to be very careful so that I didn't accidentally destroy the tank, not that I have to work at it. "Sorry about ripping the turret off - I was just trying to scratch some dirt off it!"

I suppose it's an artifact of the Hero system, but for me there seems to be a disconnect at high levels on the damage STR does vs that done by weapons.

I tend to agree. A 100 STR is sufficient, for the sake of argument, to lift 25,000,000 kg one meter up off the ground, in one second, under Earth gravity(9.8m/sec/sec, rounded up to 10 for the purpose of making the math as easy as possible). Potential energy is (mass) * (gravity) * (height). In this case, we're talking about 250,000,000 joules, or 250 megajoules. Now, that represents a person using all four limbs, essentially their whole body, to lift as much as they can. For the average human being, leg strength is roughly triple arm strength. That means that total strength of all four limbs combined is roughly 8x the strength of one arm. Let's assume an "untrained" punch channels about half the arm strength into a punch. We now have a starting point for the kinetic energy, in joules, of a 100 STR punch--about 16 megajoules. A modern anti-tank "sabot" round is 2-3cm in diameter and is 50-60cm in length, weighs 19 grams per cc(if it's depleted uranium), and travels at a velocity between 1400 and 1900 meters per second. A "human-sized" fist has a cross-sectional area of about 50 square centimeters(2 inches by 4 inches, less for a "trained" punch). Let's posit a sabot round at the upper range of all that--3cm diameter(cross-sectional area is roughly (2.25 x pi) square cm(about 7 sq. cm), 60cm in length(total volume about 420cc), weighing about 8kilograms, and travelling at 1900 m/second. 14.4 megajoules of kinetic energy, and about 2 megajoules per sq. cm of cross-section area hitting the target. An untrained punch is hitting with just as much kinetic energy, but is spread out a bit more, so only about 320kj per sq. cm is hitting. However, we can assume that a "haymaker" is essentially a punch where the character is putting their whole body/STR into the punch, and since it goes up +4 DC, we can say that's equivalent to x16 as much kinetic energy. 250 megajoules divided by 50 sq. cm equals 5 megajoules per sq. cm, or 2.5 x as much concentrated KE on target. Conclusion--a 100 STR brick who throws a haymaker at a tank should be able to easily punch through its armor, even it it's an Abrams tank. If they push a regular punch, that should also be sufficient to heavily damage most tanks. When you get up to 150 STR or more, the "confetti rule" from Car Wars seems apropos. I'd probably suggest either lowering tank defenses by a few points, or converting super-brick STR damage directly into killing damage(6.5d6 will put a few points of body through, on average, and 8d6 will do quite a lot).

[megaplayboy]

As I said earlier, the section on campaign setup is likely going to be one of the longest in the book. I just finished the very first part of that--campaign backstory--and that ran around 3500 words! I'm currently working on advice for setting up campaign timelines, so if anyone has any suggestions specific to that, I'm open.

I do know a few basics I want to say about it. As a GM, you need to decide how long ago superheroes first appeared, what major events happened in "pre-history"(i.e., before recorded history), and what major real-world historical events may have been altered or not happened(either due to superhuman intervention or for other reasons). Once you set those "data points" on your timeline, you can begin to flesh out various aspects of it, like the progress of technology, major superhuman battles and "firsts", the rise and fall of various organizations, major magical and supernatural events, etc. You also, as a GM, need to think about creating at least 2 timelines, one for yourself and one for the players. The one for the players will contain the information known to all of them. The one for yourself will contain any campaign secret events and any obscure information known only to one or a few players, or which they might be able to learn with some effort.

[Pattern Ghost]

Give the brick a HKA with equal active pts to his STR and the limitation "only vs inanimate objects" and he'll have less problems with tanks and stuff. Because, really, breaking things is a brick trick type of thing more than a combat type of thing.

[megaplayboy]

Another update. I've written a bit about creating a backstory and timeline for a campaign setting, and I still have a bunch to write about various sub-topics regarding campaign setup(magic, technology, politics and law, aliens, gods, culture, etc.). I don't know what the record is for an official supers product, in terms of advice on campaign setup, but this section is going to be pretty long, based on what I've written so far.

EPICChampions[1].pdf

[megaplayboy]

I plan to get back to work on this in April. I'm about halfway through the campaign setup section, then it's on to advice on character creation, troubleshooting, a bibliography, several example campaign settings, and then the second half of the book, writeups.