Old School 4th Edition "Blue Book" Question

[Bathawk1]

  In the 4th ed sample adventure "Mob Rule" there's an Earth elemental character named "Montana"...he has an energy blast {30 end}, linked to an entangle {32 end} for a total of 62 end!....but he only has 60 end to use....how does the power work??

[Christopher R Taylor]

He burns stun, apparently.  Which kind of makes sense, because its basically burying someone in  his body.

[Duke Bushido]

2 hours ago, Bathawk1 said:

....how does the power work??

 

 

Briefly.

 

As Chris pointed out, he burns thw STUN.  The design, first and foremost, affects tactics.   This is _not_ something that you want to miss with.  You cannot burn STUN very long without running into some serious problems.

 

 

The design itself is a limiter on how often this power will be used, and more then likely it gives some solid insight into how Montana  feels about it.  No one is going to make the power that actually hurts to use a favorite attack.

[Ninja-Bear]

@Bathawk1, good catch. I’ve owned the book for years and never saw the END usage.

 

Couldn’t Montana just use a lesser version of that attack to save END? Is it an all or nothing attack?

Edited August 25 by Ninja-Bear

[Stanley Teriaca]

46 minutes ago, Ninja-Bear said:

@Bathawk1, good catch. I’ve owned the book for years and never saw the END usage.

Same.

46 minutes ago, Ninja-Bear said:

 

Couldn’t Montana just use a lesser version of that attack to save END? Is it an all or nothing attack?

I don't remember a "must use a full power" limitation on that power, but then again, I no longer own a BBB. If there is no limitation that Montana must use a power at full power or not at all, then he can use it at a lesser level of power.

[Duke Bushido]

29 minutes ago, Ninja-Bear said:

@Bathawk1, good catch. I’ve owned the book for years and never saw the END usage.

 

Couldn’t Montana just use a lesser version of that attack to save END? Is it an all or nothing attack?

 

It is not an all-or-nothing, but it _is_ Linked, so...

 

 

And yes: since it is not mandatorily full-strength for every use, he can use it at a lower level, but must use them in proportion to each other.  What the build does is provide a serious hard limit to how frequently he can do it and how long he can maintain it before he begins hurting himself.

 

I never really questioned it, as a I found it to be a very rare in-print example of making a potentially overpowering build playable without being unbalancing.

 

As always:

 

For whatever reason, HERO fans have overhwhelmingly and incorrectly pointed at "points" --and "Active Points" in  particular-- as being some kind of universal balancing factor when there is _so much more_ to it as to make chasing points totals meaningless.  The only "balance" that points builds provide are in _potential_.  Everyone has the same _potential_ to build evenly-matched characters.  It doesn't mean that they _will_.

 

As an example, I offer a guy from a comic (if you know who it is, please help those who don't, because I don't remember his name) I saw a youtube video about (this is how I research to ideas for new villains when I am tapped.  A free youtube video by a comic book guy is a _way_ better investment, I think, than a dozen eight-dollar comic books.  As always, since I am not a comic book guy, I may be hopelessly wrong, but I am also not stuck with a thousand dollars worth of comic books, either).

 

Anyway, this guy can fly and can survive in space (based on the few bits of artwork displayed).  I don't know if he is bulletproof, if he is a bad guy or a good guy (I _assume_ a good guy, because he is presented as "one of the most tragic characters ever written." (Yes; that was a quote from the YouTube guy).

 

I _think_ he's mute.  He was presented as mute, and none of the art had washed-out speech balloons (you know: copyright stuff), but apparently he can whisper?  Anyway, in one of the bits of art, he is flying in space, looks at a bubble city on a presumably airless planet, and _whispers_ the words "good-bye" (you know: _in space_....) and in so doing blasts the entire city free of the planet and into orbit.

 

And apparently, this is _not even close_ to most impressive display of his power.

 

 

Weirdly, I am pretty sure that this demonstrated power set could be built for three hundred points or less.

 

The limiter is that, according to the YouTube guy, he cannot use this power at _less_ than "throw the entire city into space" levels. 

 

That is an extreme example of the non-points limits amd balances built into Montana:  yes; he has a power that would let him crush almost any peal-human-condition guy to death without breaking a sweat, and to suffocate to death almost anyone who has a regular dependance on easily-acessible atmosphere, but taking it that far- at least more than once- is ultimately very, very bad for his own well-being.

 

So is he unbalanced or not?  Is Whisper-New-York-to-instant-destruction guy unbalanced?  They are both _clearly_ overpowered, but are the unbalanced?  (Assuming space guy is a HERO, of course.  But hey- even bad guys want someone left alive to rule over, so....)

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

That would be Black Bolt who can speak, but his voice is almost incomprehensively destructive.  His only appearance in the movies was in the unfortunate Multiverse of Madness Dr Strange movie, where he dies a stupid and pointless death just like everyone else in the "Illuminati".  

[Bathawk1]

Technically he was also in the "Inhumans" tv show, but it's connection to the MCU is debatable....they do use the same actor in the Dr.Strange sequel though

7 minutes ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

That would be Black Bolt who can speak, but his voice is almost incomprehensively destructive.  His only appearance in the movies was in the unfortunate Multiverse of Madness Dr Strange movie, where he dies a stupid and pointless death just like everyone else in the "Illuminati".  

 

[Duke Bushido]

3 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

That would be Black Bolt who can speak, but his voice is almost incomprehensively destructive.  

 

 

Thank you, Christopher.    I believe that is the name the YouTube guy gave, but as I was composing the post, though, I couldn't remember his name for anything.

 

 

3 hours ago, Bathawk1 said:

they do use the same actor in the Dr.Strange sequel though

 

 

 

Kinda wish they had sone thw same thing with the Flash- use the TV for the movie.

 

At they very least, I wish they had written him as the warm, happy, well-adjusted genuinely nice guy that I understand the Flash to actually _be_.

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Yeah if I did the Flash movie, I would have cast the TV guy as Flash and had the scumbag child bothering nutjob be reverse Flash and his enemy.

[Bathawk1]

Oh back on topic...where can I find in the BBB the rules for substituting STUN for END?

[Stanley Teriaca]

51 minutes ago, Bathawk1 said:

Oh back on topic...where can I find in the BBB the rules for substituting STUN for END?

I don't know where, but what I do know is you can't have negative END. Any amount below 0 END is taken from STUN, on the cost of 10 points of STUN for each -1 END, and you can get Stunned as that becomes damage.

Edited August 26 by Stanley Teriaca

[Hugh Neilson]

2 END used at 0 END did 1d6 STUN in BBB, as it does now.

[Stanley Teriaca]

37 minutes ago, Hugh Neilson said:

2 END used at 0 END did 1d6 STUN in BBB, as it does now.

Thanks. I stand corrected.

[Duke Bushido]

4 hours ago, Bathawk1 said:

Oh back on topic...where can I find in the BBB the rules for substituting STUN for END?

 

 

Page 168 begins a mini-chapter on Endurance.  Second paragraph under the heading "Endurance", first column:

 

"A character who runs out of END and still wishes to take action [sic] may use STUN as END.  The character takes 1d6 STUN for every 2 END used, and no defense is allowed against this damage."

 

The entire section is kind of important, but I am not comfortable quoting more that two or three lines; copyright, etc.  I figure three sentences from the whole book could fall safely into Fair Use territory. 

 

I will offer this, though: the rules do not ban Pushing your END.....

 

 

The massive amounts of STUN damage that follows, though...,  that is probably deterrent enough. 

 

 

[Hugh Neilson]

On 8/26/2024 at 5:36 PM, Duke Bushido said:

I will offer this, though: the rules do not ban Pushing your END.....

 

 

The massive amounts of STUN damage that follows, though...,  that is probably deterrent enough. 

 

 

You can't push something that does not cost END, and I really don't want to consider END that costs END...