Need help mage balancing!

[Legendsmiths]

That sounds pretty good, if you are trying to emulate D&D.

 

My only concern with broad Active Point limits is that for the most part they don't work.

 

Example: I am limited to 30 active points. I can create a 2d6 RKA or I can create a 15 rPD/rED force field, or 10" of 0 END Flight. In fact, I can have all 3 allowing me to stand-off, impervious to most any attack, and deal out death. Active point limits don't work on "special" powers like movement and defenses because they are so cheap.

 

Other than that, I think your VPP idea works fine.

[Dino]

Originally posted by mudpyr8

Active point limits don't work on "special" powers like movement and defenses because they are so cheap.

 

Other than that, I think your VPP idea works fine.

 

Yeah, things like Life Support and Mental Defense are way to cheap for game balance in a Heroic game. I basically had to write up all the spells myself to make sure they had the right "feel".

 

Also attacks are much less usefull if you only get one shot: That 2d6 RKA with one charge is pretty useless next to the warrior armed with a bow that does the same damage, and can do it every phase...

[AnotherSkip]

Originally posted by Spyritwind

Of course I empliment an AP cap so that the mage can't crank out a 5d6 RKA.

 

Actually, I am currently in a game where some of the opposition use 5d6RKA Bows.

 

they are uuuuuuuuugly.

 

i got one, how im gonna use it is a mystery to solve(Giant Longbows). but in the mean time i am working on it.

 

Perhaps Magic.

 

It can be soooooooo evil to be a mage....

 

[Old Man]

I'm starting to run into a few minor problems of my own, but now that the game has started, it's almost impossible to change things.

 

Ah well, it's my first shot at it anyway.

[Markdoc]

Hey Shadowpup,

 

tell us what the problems are - there may be ways to solve them.

 

cheers, Mark

[Legendsmiths]

Yeah, bring it. Let's solve dem probos.

[Arthur]

Intriguing.

 

I played a lot of FH in 1st and 2nd Ed, and all the complaints I heard were about how powerful the wizards could be.

 

We did NOT allow Power Frameworks under any circumstances whatsoever. All spells had RSR. We had AP caps. With Gestures, Incantations, Concentration, Side Effects, etc., the average Limitation total on a spell was about 1.5.

 

About the only thing we allowed that I remember being abusive was Flight with Persistent and 0 END. We played that as the mage could be knocked out or bleeding to death, and would float. One almost died up there - nobody could get to him to help out.

 

IIRC, END cost was 1 per 5 AP. I highly recommend that for lower-point games anyway.

 

Some typical spells (rough costs):

 

Shield: FF 6/6. 12 AP; 5 RP. 2 END.

 

Flight 7", Pers 0 END. 28 AP; 11 RP.

 

Sense Magic: Detect with Sense, Ranged, and Analyze. 15 AP; 6 RP

 

3d RKA 1/2 END. 56 AP; 22 RP. 5 END.

 

That's a grand total of 40 points, leaving 110 for everything else. With SPD 3, the END cost was quite manageable.

 

Rest of character (roughly) with Age 40+ Lim:

 

STR 13; DEX 14; CON 13; BOD 11; INT 23; EGO 14; PRE 15; COM 8; PD 6; ED 6; SPD 3; REC 6; END 26; STN 25.

 

Characteristics 60 points.

 

Magic Skill typically cost 15 points.

 

That left 35 points for other skills and spells. The mage had the equivalent of heavy armor, out of range of melee combat, and a ranged attack the equal of a potent fighter's melee attack.

 

The only thing stopping most players from designing wizard characters was the difficulty of the game mechanics. If you knew what you were doing with the game system, your wizard would dominate.

[Old Man]

Originally posted by Markdoc

Hey Shadowpup,

 

tell us what the problems are - there may be ways to solve them.

 

cheers, Mark

 

Actually my problem stems more from my being very casual about magic. The only restrictions that I have are: must have KS: "Spell Casting", Active Points limit based on 2x INT or 2x EGO (whichever is higher) and "spells" be in a multipower. Multipowers are good because it allows a spell caster to have more than a couple spells - variety is a good thing.

 

I don't require limitations of any kind for two reasons. The first is that the "spells" can represent things that aren't exactly spells - a monk's faith or training powers, a sword master's sword tricks, etc. The second is that some spells just don't need all the arm waving, chanting, incense burning, mumbo jumbo. Not even in D&D which is famous for such things do all spells have the same limitations. I can see RSR but other than that, I can't logically tack on the others.

 

Actually all of that isn't that bad. It's just that some powers are very cheap for the genre. I'll admit to being too lazy to go through the entire Powers list to modify costs.

[Old Man]

I've seen these problems before. There's two root causes: first, some powers are just not costed correctly for the fantasy genre, in particular flight and force field, as well as most other movement powers. Second, there's no mechanic in the 'stock' FH magic system to prevent mages from allocating a huge number of points to one attack spell. So to an extent the system encourages floating howitzers like the example here.

 

My solution to the second problem would be to either force spells to be bought in an EC, or impose a tight real point limit per spell--maybe INT/3 or somesuch. I don't see a way around the first problem without changing some of the power costs. FF ought to cost 5/2, flight should be 5/1", and leaping should be 3 or 4/1".

 

A couple more comments on the 22 point RKA example. 1.5 in limitations is nothing; if that's all the player has they're not trying very hard. It's fairly easy to get up to -3 in lims on any spell. And I hope that mage isn't flinging his 3d6RKA anywhere near his buddies with an OCV of just 5.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Old Man

I've seen these problems before. There's two root causes: first, some powers are just not costed correctly for the fantasy genre, in particular flight and force field, as well as most other movement

 

That seems to be the achilles heel of universal systems. GURPS has the same problem. Buying a DR of 10 for 30 points makes you practically invincible in a medieval setting, while the same DR 10 for the same cost is only pretty good in a modern military campaign.

There is a fairly easy way to correct this, which is easily compatible with Hero Designer: require a 'Difficulty' Advantage on certain Powers. For instance, Force Field may require a +1/2 Difficulty Advantage.

 

powers. Second, there's no mechanic in the 'stock' FH magic system to prevent mages from allocating a huge number of points to one attack spell. So to an extent the system encourages floating howitzers like the example here.

 

That was also a response to the style of games I was in. We had a big combat every session. Point-based character creation systems tend to produce characters in a very Darwinian fashion: environment pushes characters to develop a certain way.

 

The real solution is to construct adventures with less combat. The flying howitzer becomes less useful.

 

My solution to the second problem would be to either force spells to be bought in an EC, or impose a tight real point limit per spell--maybe INT/3 or somesuch. I don't see a way around the

 

The first approach just discourages all those neat little spells that add breadth to the character. The second is better, IMO, although I prefer Active Point caps. A Real Point cap encourages piling on the Lims.

 

 

A couple more comments on the 22 point RKA example. 1.5 in limitations is nothing; if that's all the player has they're not trying very hard. It's fairly easy to get up to -3 in lims on any spell.

 

My point exactly. It's easy to make cheap spells without trying all that hard. It doesn't even take jumping through a lot of hoops.

 

And I hope that mage isn't flinging his 3d6RKA anywhere near his buddies with an OCV of just 5.

 

I designed a magic ring with a crosshair sight on it that gave OCV bonusses. A no-prize to anybody who knows where I got that idea from.

Also, the character didn't have many friends...

[Old Man]

Originally posted by Arthur

 

That seems to be the achilles heel of universal systems. GURPS has the same problem. Buying a DR of 10 for 30 points makes you practically invincible in a medieval setting, while the same DR 10 for the same cost is only pretty good in a modern military campaign.

There is a fairly easy way to correct this, which is easily compatible with Hero Designer: require a 'Difficulty' Advantage on certain Powers. For instance, Force Field may require a +1/2 Difficulty Advantage.

 

 

That works too, but to me altering the actual cost of the power is cleaner. Besides, I don't use Hero Designer.

 

 

The real solution is to construct adventures with less combat. The flying howitzer becomes less useful.

 

 

That's only part of the solution. Wizards can dominate non-combat campaigns just as easily, with telepathy, clairvoyance, desolid and invisibility.

 

The first approach just discourages all those neat little spells that add breadth to the character. The second is better, IMO, although I prefer Active Point caps. A Real Point cap encourages piling on the Lims.

 

I've found active point caps just don't work. All they do is encourage use of the cheaper powers at the expense of cooler but less cost-effective ones. I have no problem with piling on the lims as long as they're limiting lims--ritual magic is like that. In fact I encourage limitations because they are what sets a magic spell apart from a superhero power.

 

ECs have their drawbacks but they do put a stop to the one-spell howitzer.

[Markdoc]

>>>I designed a magic ring with a crosshair sight on it that gave OCV bonusses.<<<

 

I'm Bored-Flak Boltlobber the wizard, and I very rarely miss at this range! :-)

[Markdoc]

My approach is to design the magic system for each game to promote the feel you want.

 

It's easy to say "anything goes" but in truth, it does get out of balance easily. This is what we did in our early FH games and we got some pretty strange characters. That's OK if you *want* wierd fantasy, but not good if you want to play Arthurian Britain, or Middle Earth or Lankhmar.

 

I gotta admit I hate points caps - either real points or active points. They distort the game in weird ways and usually lead to more problems than they solve. Plus they lead to same-y chracters with everybody piled up against the limit. Bleh :-P

 

My take is normally to require limitations on all magic that limit its usefulness in combat (concentration is a goody - a 10 PD force field is much less use if you have to be DCV 0 to cast your fireball - inviting an arrow in your forehead). That gives the fighters a chance to shine in combat and encourages the mage to focus on other areas.

 

cheers, Mark

[Blue Angel]

Point Caps

 

I was looking at point caps and found that they only made sense for attack powers. For defensive powers they could be way out of line because, as noted here previously, the cost per point of defense is just way too low for hero level.

 

The only real hard rule I have is that the GM has sole responsibility for play balance and aproves all powers. Perhaps also it is needed to stipulate that all powers can be rescinded if the first session of use reveals the power to be too powerful.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Markdoc

>>>I designed a magic ring with a crosshair sight on it that gave OCV bonusses.<<<

 

I'm Bored-Flak Boltlobber the wizard, and I very rarely miss at this range! :-)

 

I'll accept that!

 

It's from early Fineous Fingers. It was a wizard that showed up occasionally - it was "I seldom miss at this range".

[Markdoc]

Yeps. I think I still have the copy of Dragon Magazine with that Fineous cartoon in it somewhere (it had a handy table of weights for different materials - useful for calculating how big a one ton boulder actually is, or how heavy a chest of gold coins is, and so on. Although I might have given it away. I don't think I have looked in the box of old DnD stuff since I left New Zealand (about 14 years ago).

 

But I have dragged it with me all over the world, anyway :-)

 

cheers, Mark

[Killer Shrike]

Yamo, it depends on the power level your going for really. In a High Magic campaign the concerns of where the balance of power lay will clearly differ from a Hynerian campaign.

 

Also, the starting points and expected range of character points in the campaign will affect this decision and balancing as well. Some people favor low point for that gritty feel, others prefer supers with cloaks & platemail.

 

From most of your posts, I get a feel that you come from an D&D type background, and in that setting spellcasters start out on the short end of the stick, but with each passing level get a little bit more of the haft until at the highest levels they are running the show, no questions.

 

VPPs and MPPs can both model this, as thier big up front will leave a low level spellcaster stretched, but as they blossom out their power base scales nicely until they have a clearcut advantage.

 

The key detail that IMO makes the difference between too powerful/not powerful enough magic systems is the control factors that you as the GM put in place. It doesnt really matter what those factors are so long as they work for you and your group, you are consistent with them, and they succesfully maintain a balance point within a margin of tolerance among the PCs and equal pointed NPCs.