Playing a horde - Suggestions?

[CHellsmith]

Howdy!

I'm running a HERO System game in the 40k universe, and one of my players had a great idea -- He wants to play a squad of guardsmen.  This sounds like a fun character concept, but I'd much rather avoid using the "Duplication" power because it adds a bunch of complexity with the extra characters, instead I'm looking for an easy way to put the character's damage output on a "sliding scale" as indivdual guardsmen get killed (Body reduced by X amount).  Do you fine folks have any excellent ideas for how to make a character who represents multiple actual bodies, but is still fun and easy to play?

Thanks!

[mallet]

Hmmm... Interesting. 

 

I think what you would need to do is first create one guardsman. That way you have a base point/stat/damage/defense/skills, etc... A single guardsman would obviously be built on quite a few less character points then a normal PC. For example, if it is a 275pt campaign then a single guardsman might only be a 120pt character or something. 

 

Then with that single guardsman made, I would start to add points and abilities to him/her to simulate being a full unit. I can't remember what the rules are for characters combining their STR to lift things but it might be 4 max? anyway, 4 max would equate to having +10 STR to the base character, so give him +10 STR (with the limitation requires a Teamwork skill roll, which represents members of the guardsmen working together). Extra SPD (above campaign limit) to simplify/represent team members acting a different times. Even in a ten man unit not everyone would be attacking ever turn as some would be reloading or recovering or ducking for cover or covering the rear, etc... so you wouldn't need a 10 SPD or anything but maybe 5 or 6.

 

Then other things I can think of: Overall skill levels to represent "group thought on stuff", Extra Background skills to represent the different group members, Extra BODY that is Ablative to represent members dying maybe. Defensive Maneuvers to represent some squad members always covering the rear, etc... 

 

Maybe build all the "extra" group bonuses as costing END, built into a multipower, and fed only by an END reserve which can only recover back at HQ or military base. This END Reserve is linked to BODY or something and goes down as BODY is lost to represent team members dying and eventually you'd be down to one guardsman, the base character, without all the extra stuff since it is one man in the unit left. Since it can only be recharged back at base that represents getting new team members added to the group. 

 

Hardest part would be scale/movement on maps, etc... 10-team unit would take up a lot of hexes. 

 

Also maybe some complications like extra damage from area of effect attacks, not being able to dodge/dive for cover (some "members" might, but not all could, so you'd take damage from it and maybe lose a team member) , penalties to Stealth rolls as it is always a large group. 

 

Maybe Stretching to represent one member going ahead to scout to attack someone hand to hand. 

 

these are all off the top of my head. If I think of other stuff I'll post again. 

[CHellsmith]

I like all these ideas!  

I was thinking of maybe taking the "Ablative" Limitation that you can apply to defenses, and applying that to the DCs of their attack, to represent the waning firepower as members get injured or killed.  That might have the effect I'm looking for, but it might take some fiddling around.  Allowing them to break past the speed limit for the campaign is also a great idea!  Definitely a good way to simulate having more bodies than just a single Space Marine or what have you.

 

This list is full of great ideas, thank you for your contribution!  😃

[mallet]

No problem! I love things like this. 

 

Some additional ideas:

 

-Lots of extra limbs (+18 for a 10 man squad) to represent all the team members can be holding items

 

-somehow work charges into the build. 9 charges which only recover at HQ (one for each extra member of the unit) it is these charges that are lost when a unit member dies, until you are back down at the single, base, trooper. Each charge might give certain bonuses representing the extra people on the team. All of them are activated at first, but as you lose them you lose the bonus abilities/stats/skills/etc... that they provide. 

 

-Naked advantage of Selective, Area of Attack. With a custom limitation that the most targets available to hit is something like number of remaining unit members -3 (1 min) or something similar. That way you can represent lots of guys firing individual weapons each turn at different targets. but the total number of possible targets drop as unit members die off. So at first (with 10 unit members you could hit 7 opponents a turn (the other 3 unit members are said to be reloading or doing "something else" that phase). But when you are down to 6 unit members left, you can only hit 3 targets that phase, etc...

 

-Bonuses to base attack damage based on number or remaining unit members (-3) so if the base guy has a gun that does 2d6KA, at full strength it might do 4d6, when 5 people are left only 3d6, etc... you'd need to find someway of mixing this with the area of effect mentioned above and not be overpowering.  Maybe make it either/or. Either they can area of effect and hit multiple targets at normal damage, or "concentrate" their fire and do more damage at one target, but not both in the same phase. 

[dialNforNinja]

I found a post on Stack Exchange about building a massmind character that suggested using the Follower perk, which seemed like a reasonable approach as explained. It also mentions the (fantastically expensive) 4e villain Tyrannon who had an entire army of transdimensionally Mind Linked subordinates, which sounds like a great enemy idea. I'll have to see if I can find the relevant book somewhere for cheap.

 

I'm posting the link to both the Playing A Horde thread and my own about Shadow Clone not-Duplicates-like-HERO-does-them copies, for the benefit of later searching.

 

https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/125324/how-to-build-a-hive-mind-character-in-hero-system-any-edition

[dialNforNinja]

Shameless double post since it's been a couple hours and I have an actual direct suggestion for the original question: Size Increase + Desolidify (group of normal size bodies) with (interacts with normal world, not other desolids) as a limitation, and base the number added in the "swarm" on the added Body for that Size Level (1-3, 4-6, or 7-9 for the full squad.) Combine that with the earlier suggestions of extra Speed and the ability to spread or concentrate attacks based on how many Size Levels you currently have, and maybe some Stretching to let some members of the squad go further away than Size Increase has reach, and it looks pretty good from my (admittedly very much novice to HERO system) perspective. The Strength and movement increases are probably too much for the concept, but trading those points for the Speed and Stretching should work.