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Logic of tripling cost of Takes No STUN


WistfulD

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Hi all, relatively new lurker, I think first-time poster, and relatively new Heroes 6E GM (6E is the first edition I've played, we've played 3 campaigns in it, 1 for over a year).

 

If there's a better section for this kind of thing, let me know (I have more questions about the why of certain rules).

 

Anyways, I have a question about Takes No STUN.

 

As is often said, complete immunity is not something that HERO is set up for, and so things like Life Support and Takes no STUN are nice big wrenches in the system.

 

Still, I want to understand why Takes No STUN triples the cost of Defensive Powers.

 

This isn't a sour grapes "this makes my idea super expensive" kind of complaint, it is a "this makes zombies and golems significantly more expensive than they weight they hit at, and none of my players ever take it, even if they make Robots (there is a precident that some Androids are so complex that they can be stunned precident, and they all take it if offered)" complaint.

 

I understand that taking Stun out of consideration is a significant disruption in combat, particularly if the opponent up against it has invested heavily in blasts or HAs or increased stun modifiers on Killing attacks, but I do not see the solution given really fixing the problem, but instead causing a whole horde of others.

 

For starters:

 

For the 60 points that the (more useful of the two) Takes No STUN power costs, you can get

  • The Cannot be Stunned power for 15 points,
  • +20 to REC, with the Limitation (only for the recovery of STUN points, which I think would reasonably be -1) for 10 points,
  • +10 pts each of PD and ED for 20 points, and
  • +30 points of STUN for 15 points.

All of which without invoking the defense trippling. If you have even a few reasonable amount of defenses (say DCV of 5 and rPD/rED of 3/3, normally 19 points, but instead 57), you can purchase the PD/ED to +20 apeice and the STUN up to +62 for the difference in price or start putting in 25% or 50% Damage Reduction for Stun Only (-1/2). In campaign power levels in which we play, that's effective immunity to Stun, without additional defenses being tripled.

 

Therefore, my players see no incentive to take the power. There's a precidence for automitons not taking it (vampires and Champions villian robots), and simply saying no to them just disincentivizes robot and undead characters.

 

As for me as the GM, it means that, while skeletons and zombies are fine, since they pretty much have no defense except not taking stun, golems and such are wildly overpriced for their hitting power against the PCs.

 

Beyond the fact that it makes golems more expensive than I feel they should be and my players not take the power, there's simply the logical aspect of the trippling. Trippling is a geometric effect for a benefit that I'm not convinced is geometric. Trippling means Power Advantages and Limitations are trippled, is that better or worse than giving defensive abilities a +2 power advantage cost? It just seems like a really clunky and clumsy mechanic. If anyone has had a different experience, or horror stories of an earlier edition where the trippling wasn't there, I'd love to hear it.

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I think the best way to get a feel for this is to have a character take it, follow the rules as written, and find out in play how it works out.  From personal experience running an automaton character, the cost increase for PD and ED (and resistant) is much easier to swallow once you've seen it in play.  In play, the increase in DCV, DMCV, and alternate defenses such as power and flash are much less reasonable.

 

The reason it plays out differently than the numbers you're crunching has to do with never ever being knocked out and having to wake up at low stun and END and never ever being stunned.  No matter how high your STN or CON is built, eventually you can be knocked out or stunned, and you have to work around that happening.  Give it a try and see how it works out.

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1)  You usually take about 3 times as much Stun as you do Body.  If you aren't taking Stun, only Body, then each point of defense only needs to cover 1/3 the damage that a normal attack will do.

2)  You don't have to purchase Con anymore.

 

I don't think you quite realize how powerful "takes no Stun" can be.  If your defenses are high enough that your opponents can't put Body damage on you, then they just can't affect you at all with normal attacks.

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It follows, roughly, that 1D6 of Killing Attacks costs 3x as 1D6 of Normal Attacks; and those are generally the only attacks that are going to do any good given your average Defenses Vs Normal Attack ratios. And just using the standard Resistant Defense costs can make even Killing Attacks useless.

I think that would be true if combat were made up of basic blasts, HAs, HKAs and RKAs, and I suppose I agree with it's use for PD, rPD, ED, rED, but not everything else.

 

As it stands, it's not horribly hard to be "nearly immune" (as Chris Taylor points out, the difference between nearly immune and completely immune is never having to worry about the exception, and thus valuable) to ONE given type of attack, be it RKAs, transforms, drains, etc. The already existing flaw in Heroes is the ridiculous number of defenses you need to have and keep track of (and most of which cannot go into a power framework, unlike the attacks against which they defend). If you can't stun a Robot, there's Drains and flashes, and AVAD flashes against resistant flash defense for the mental sight group (where the flash has the does body modifier). 

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There's no good justification for having DCV and DMCV triple in cost, though.  You're no harder to hit, just harder to hurt.  And I think its a poor argument that Flash Defense should be tripled.  I understand the argument - an AVLD could be built against that - but it just doesn't hold much weight for me.

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I know AVAD, what is AVLD?

 

There's no good justification for having DCV and DMCV triple in cost, though.  You're no harder to hit, just harder to hurt.  And I think its a poor argument that Flash Defense should be tripled.  I understand the argument - an AVLD could be built against that - but it just doesn't hold much weight for me.

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It follows, roughly, that 1D6 of Killing Attacks costs 3x as 1D6 of Normal Attacks; and those are generally the only attacks that are going to do any good given your average Defenses Vs Normal Attack ratios. And just using the standard Resistant Defense costs can make even Killing Attacks useless.

 

You see, we haven't found that to be a problem, and I think it highlights what I don't understand about Heroes--In heroes there are SO Many Defense powers one has to have to be free from harm: DCV, PD, ED, rPD, rED, Mental Defense, Power Defense, Flash Defenses (that might be required defenses vs. someone elses attacks other than blinding you, because of AVAD), entangles and englobing barriers which don't even have a set defense so much as need you to be able to defeat them in battle before moving on, etc. etc. yet the rules and rulebooks seem to be still be absolutely terrified of people being too hard to hurt. Many of the defensive powers have "!" warnings in the book, many can't be put into power frameworks. Attack powers, on ther other hand, have very few limitations and seem to be encouraged in power frameworks. Lots of very gooey pluses exist on different attacks (AoE makes hitting the enemy very likely, auto-fire and armor piercing are amazingly useful abilities that start at a mere +1/4 advantage), yet it's defensive abilities that seem to be feared. I wonder if our campaign is so different that we haven't run into the need for this.

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The game warns about possible abusive combinations.

 

The game is not, has never been set for absolutes. Is it possible to be impervious? Yes. It will cost, because you will have to set your defenses higher than the campaign's maximum attack level. Most GM's that are in their right mind won't allow that level of defenses.

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