VPP powers list?

[Echo3Niner]

Anyone know a easy way to make a list of powers for a VPP?

 

My wife has a 240 point VPP, with 120 point Control Cost.  Per my notes from our last game, I should have taken the advice from the book and pre-made several powers, so we were not having to do so "on the fly".

 

Anyone know an easy way to make a list of powers?  I have a spreadsheet of the character sheet, which does some of the math for you, and I have Hero Designer - I thought of just expanding the power list from the spreadsheet, to take up a whole sheet of paper (though clunky), or was wondering if there was an easy way to do it in Hero Designer?  Or, if anyone else knows of another way to do it?

[Terminax]

I do the math/setup in Hero Designer and copy it over to a list in LibreOffice writer. I usually do powers in sets with brief descriptions, then have an a-la-carte list from cheapest powers to most expensive powers to plug and play with. Works well for me for everything from arsenals to gadgets to magic spells and cosmic power pools.

 

[Echo3Niner]

I actually figured out a good way - I just created a second character in Hero Designer, called Solar VPP; then just made 16 various powers of appropriate levels, then created the PDF, and only printed the second page with the powers on it - worked just fine!

[Echo3Niner]

We played tonight - I had added two more powers (total 18) to the list - it worked great!

[Hugh Neilson]

First off, I use Excel for most character builds, so I won't be a very helpful HD advisor.

 

With a 240 point VPP, 120 point control cost, the character has a lot of options.

 

In addition to a list of sample powers, I'd include scaling options - e.g. this attack power uses x points per DC, so the option of shaving a few damage dice off to make room for a utility power is easier to implement.

 

I'd also include some standard configurations of the full 240 points.  This is a typical build for a day with no expectations; this configuration is "stealth mode"; this is expected all-out combat mode; travel mode.  Which ones you'd have depends a lot on the character.

 

My wife had a character for a high-power game years back who had a cosmic "attacks only" VPP with an SFX limitation.  To facilitate switching on the fly, she had a chart of "This many points per d6 [5/10/15] with this total advantages [in +1/4 increments] equals this many dice.  A list of likely attack powers and advantages was also on that page.

 

At that time, there were no multiple attacks, so no expectation of two or more attacks used together, so the pool was intended for one attack at a time.  That made the chart a very effective tool, especially as she was pretty new to Hero at the time.

[Hugh Neilson]

Of course, you can also go crazy with odd powers, and may be doing one on the fly anyway (maybe not if the character can't easily change powers on the fly).

 

"OK, x inches Teleport, Megascale, Usable as an Attack, AoE Radius, Selective, 1 Hex Accurate (so anyone I target is still DCV 3) - grab the team and Teleport x kilometers north."

 

followed by

 

"Actually, a random direction that he just thinks is north, since we just got here and he has no way of knowing which way is north"

 

was a wonderful in-game moment for a character with the psych lim "impatient, impetuous and impulsive". 

 

One splashdown in an alternative earth body of water later, as the team floated and discussed what to do next, "I can try it again" was not well received...but it DID end the standoff while everyone stood around not knowing what to do next

[HeroGM]

Go into your Campaign Rules and under the Rules tab chose "Allow Cost Multipliers". Save and create a new List inside the Powers tab. On the Multiplier change it

to "0" (Zero) and add your powers. You can add your VPP slots w/o affecting the cost of your character.

[Sketchpad]

@Echo3Niner... if you're using Hero Designer, I would recommend snagging the Champions Powers Prefab for it. This would make it easy to just click on the powers needed and add them to the VPP.