Schmucks?

[Chuckg]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Do you ever wonder why you are the only person to constantly argue power inflation on these boards; why no one else has your opinion as to the appropriate power levels of characters?

 

No, he doesn't -- because he's not the only person arguing that.

 

Unless me, pendaran, and bcaugust are all optical illusions.

 

He /is/ just about the only person who still has enough patience to keep arguing it for /this long/, the rest of us have either already hit our frustration quotas at your attitude, or are about to.

[MitchellS]

Re: Schmucks?

 

No, he doesn't -- because he's not the only person arguing that.

 

Unless me, pendaran, and bcaugust are all optical illusions.

 

He /is/ just about the only person who still has enough patience to keep arguing it for /this long/, the rest of us have either already hit our frustration quotas at your attitude, or are about to.

Yeah, I've run out of patience too. And I think you forgot Jackalope.

[Pendaran]

Re: Schmucks?

 

the various members of the Fantastic Four are also fairly well rounded people with a wide variety of skills, a powerful base, common set of gadgets between them..

 

Reed's gadget pool alone would have to be entirely weighty just for the stuff he'll MacGuyver on up during adventures now and then. Then there's his powers. Then there's the base and the vehicles and the rest.

[gregghelmberger]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Sounds to me like you and every GM you've met who was "worth his salt" has cardboard NPCs and a setting that panders to the players and their characters. You can't treat NPCs like "tools" and "homonculi" and still have them come across as anything other than artificial. A good NPC has his own motivations and his own personality' date=' and what's corrosive to the game is when you ignore that in favor whatever is expedient. Inconsistent characters who change their behavior and/or power level whenever it's convenient to the plot pretty much suck. Authorial fiat is transparent and puts serious strain on suspension of disbelief.[/quote']

 

Hmm. Well, you're entitled to whatever opinion you can come up with. But what you obviously fail to realize is that an NPC can have his own motivations and his own personality and still be a tool. Nowhere did I say they were "inconsistent," "change their behavior" or whatever else you're slinging around. They simply fill a role in the story of the PCs, and they do that best while maintaining their own personalities and goals -- but they must remain subservient in emphasis to the PCs at all times.

 

Basically, I think you can have things one of two ways: either you can focus on the PCs, or not. If you focus on the PCs, you have a roleplaying game where a group of people collaboratively tell a story that has the potential to be interesting, surprising, challenging and involving for all concerned. If you choose to place the focus elsewhere, then you have something else, because if you don't focus on the PCs, you focus on something else -- whatever that might be -- and then the PCs become, by default, supporting cast. If you want to focus on something other than the PCs, you should write a book, or a screenplay, or a comic book, or some other form of creative endeavor, because the story the GM tells while he's got his players gathered around the table is and must remain the PCs story; if it isn't their story then it's someone else's story and you reduce the PCs to homunculi, cardboard cutouts who run around fulfilling the preordained roles the GM has devised as he tells somebody else's story. And that doesn't sound like an RPG to me.

 

Well, OK, it sounds like a White Wolf RPG. It just doesn't sound like a GOOD RPG.

[Pendaran]

Re: Schmucks?

 

And assuming a group that manages to meet weekly, like, honestly, lots of table top groups I know manage to do, that's 120 xp or so a year, so, assuming the system can actually work to sustain a campaign for, let's say, two years, that's right up to 240 points past the point where it is being said the game should operate. By a group meeting all of weekly and bothering to use the guidelines of a book Whamme himself says should be usable "out of the box".

 

edit: and I'm still waiting, where is this survey of all Hero games owners that demonstrates how Whamme can ramble about who's opinions are of a small "obsessed" few and who's aren't?

[MitchellS]

Re: Schmucks?

 

edit: and I'm still waiting' date=' where is this survey of all Hero games owners that demonstrates how Whamme can ramble about who's opinions are of a small "obsessed" few and who's aren't?[/quote']

I think that survey is scattered all over the message boards in the hundreds, if not thousands, of character examples that have been presented for review by various posters. How often do you see a 25d6 character submitted as compared to a 12d6 character? 10 to 1? 20 to 1?

 

I think there are three general types of gamers who post to these boards: Low-powered (like Whamme, making up 10%), Champions standard (like myself, making up 80%), and High-powered (like Metaphysician, making up the final 10%).

[Pendaran]

Re: Schmucks?

 

so, your basic answer is everyone who posts on this message board represents the sum totality of all who play these games and opinions thuswise?

 

I don't think even the people on the white wolf forums try to cop that kind of attitude.

 

It's an internet message board, whatever this place gets, it's a fraction representing people who have time to regularly post on an internet message board. That is representative of all of nothing.

 

That's why I certainly don't try to do anything as grandiose as claim that those who hold opinions different from mine are part of a small obsessed few.

 

I mean how the hell would I know that?

[MitchellS]

Re: Schmucks?

 

so, your basic answer is everyone who posts on this message board represents the sum totality of all who play these games and opinions thuswise?

 

I don't think even the people on the white wolf forums try to cop that kind of attitude.

 

It's an internet message board, whatever this place gets, it's a fraction representing people who have time to regularly post on an internet message board. That is representative of all of nothing.

 

That's why I certainly don't try to do anything as grandiose as claim that those who hold opinions different from mine are part of a small obsessed few.

 

I mean how the hell would I know that?

Friend, you have a major chip on your should that you need to cover for a bit. It is only a game and you're talking this all too personally. No one's attacking you but you seem to go out of your way to attack others.

 

As far as the boards, you ever heard of polling? When ABC does a poll do they ask the entire country or do they just attempt to find a representative sample? The Hero boards are not the totality of the Hero gaming community but they are as good a cross-reference as you will ever likely get.

[Chuckg]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Friend' date=' you have a major chip on your should that you need to cover for a bit. It is only a game and you're talking this all too personally. No one's attacking you but you seem to go out of your way to attack others. [/quote']

 

Mitch, you've been doing nothing but dumping condescending crap on him since the moment he arrived in this thread, so you have *no* call to cap this particular 'tude with him now.

 

Pendaran's point is absolutely valid -- this board is, statistically speaking, a non-representative sample of HERO gamers, and as such, you can't say 'this board is my survey' with any validity whatsoever.

 

Edit -- yes, we have heard of polling. Scientific polls, however, have techniques and methodology with which to make sure that the cross-section of people they question demographically matches the cross-section of the entire target population... which this board most definitely does /not/ do.

 

By the nature of topic-specific internet message boards, the majority of people who come here are specialists in the topic with lots of free time (and handy web access). That, by itself, skews the sample massively.

[MitchellS]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Mitch, you've been doing nothing but dumping condescending crap on him since the moment he arrived in this thread, so you have *no* call to cap this particular 'tude with him now.

 

Pendaran's point is absolutely valid -- this board is, statistically speaking, a non-representative sample of HERO gamers, and as such, you can't say 'this board is my survey' with any validity whatsoever.

 

Edit -- yes, we have heard of polling. Scientific polls, however, have techniques and methodology with which to make sure that the cross-section of people they question demographically matches the cross-section of the entire target population... which this board most definitely does /not/ do.

 

By the nature of topic-specific internet message boards, the majority of people who come here are specialists in the topic with lots of free time (and handy web access). That, by itself, skews the sample massively.

Nor can you say that it's not.

 

In any event, I'll leave the threat to the extremists now. Enjoy yourselves.

[Chuckg]

Re: Schmucks?

 

> Nor can you say that it's not.

 

I can, have, and will continue to do so. This board is not a representative sample of all HERO system gamers, and no reputable pollster would dream of claiming that it was for a nanosecond.

 

> In any event, I'll leave the threat to the extremists now.

 

No personal attacks. Got it.

 

> Enjoy yourselves.

 

[Metaphysician]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Meta' date=' I completely disagree. It's not a flagrant double standard. It's not a slight double standard. It's not any kind of double standard at all. For me at least, and for every GM I've ever met who was worth his or her salt, the campaign is the tale of the PCs and their actions, period, paragraph, end of story. Every other character, setting, organization, whatever are all plot devices and nothing more. The GM doesn't need to worry about being fair or unfair to NPCs because NPCs are merely his tools, his pawns, his homonculi. They don't "earn" or "deserve" experience the way PCs do; they expand or contract, go away or come back purely as the PCs story dictates and nothing more, ever. To say that there's a "double standard" implies that the GM has the burden to treat the NPCs on par with the PCs, and not only is that grossly fallacious, it's positively corrosive to any properly run game.[/quote']

 

No more corrosive than the idea than an entire world ( not story, *world* ) revolves around 5-6 characters within it.

[Pendaran]

Re: Schmucks?

 

I'm wondering how being derided as extremists, having been told my opinions are those of a small obsessed few that should be snubbed, and the listening to said opinions would be bad publishing policy for a company is not particularly supposed to be taken as insulting.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Do you ever wonder why you are the only person to constantly argue power inflation on these boards; why no one else has your opinion as to the appropriate power levels of characters? You enjoy stat/power inflation games and that's fine but your concept of power levels is not supported by nearly 24 years of published Champions material. Apparently everyone who has ever worked on a Champions book in all those years was wrong and you are right.

Odd, how apparently, none of the other people who advocate powerful NPC heroes count. . .

 

As to why your comments discredit you:

 

#1 You're comparing apples to oranges. The two vehicle's systems are different and can't be used as benchmarks for each other.

So, a brick wall is not a brick wall, if it is in a Champions-run universe rather than a Marvel-run universe??

 

#2 You used the vehicle example as your basis for benchmark when you knew just as well as everyone else that Hero System vehicles are exceptionally poorly designed and can't be used in conjunction with superheroes. Military vehicles have inflated defense values, and because of that must have inflated weaponry to be able to damage each other. That's why they give you "cheat" rules in Galactic Champions. You know this not a good basis for comparison and still used it to try and prove your point.

Has it *ever* occured to you that maybe its the *super hero* benchmarks that are out of line, and not the vehicle benchmarks??

 

#3 You just got through telling me that 30d6 is Monstrous level and then give me a 24 DC example to prove your point. 30 is more than 24. If you wanted to prove your point you should have used a 30 dc example.

 

Its called "approximation." That is, if 24d6 is Monstrous, than its unlikely in the extreme that 30d6 is ShX, considering the wide gap in the Marvel system between Mn and ShX.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Okay, lets try this another way:

 

Look at Reed. Now, the two biggest things into which points would be placed for him are, pretty obviously, his technological wizardry and his plasticity powers.

 

Now, the main representation of his technical wizardry would be a tech skills VPP. Lets assume its 100 pool points ( making his skills only 2/3rds as good as Teleios, mind you ). That makes the total power cost 140 points. Assuming he's got at least as good a power skill roll as Teleios, thats another 15 points ( or more ).

 

155 points. For what amounts to one single power. At minimum.

 

Now, Elasticity powers. Looking over Zig-Zag's writeup, I don't see anything he has that Reed hasn't done, all his skills look like stuff Reed has, and his characteristics don't seem higher in any way. Zig Zag is a 350 point character. Reed has at *least* all of his capabilities.

 

We've already hit 505 points, with the elasticity powers selection in particular being almost certainly an underestimate ( Reed has almost certainly done every plasticity trick in the USPD before, and warrants a plasticity VPP for active tricks ). We have not touched Reed's mental characteristics. We have not touched his extensive skill list. We have not touched combat skills. We have not touched perks, bases, and vehicles.

[Chuckg]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Also, all of Zig-Zag's tricks, Reed has done /repeatedly/ and /routinely/, so please, spare us the '... it's just the Power skill!' routine.

 

As the big black book emphasizes, the Power skill is not for stuff you do routinely -- for that, you buy the ability with points.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Okay, lets try this another way:

 

Look at Reed. Now, the two biggest things into which points would be placed for him are, pretty obviously, his technological wizardry and his plasticity powers.

 

Now, the main representation of his technical wizardry would be a tech skills VPP. Lets assume its 100 pool points ( making his skills only 2/3rds as good as Teleios, mind you ). That makes the total power cost 140 points. Assuming he's got at least as good a power skill roll as Teleios, thats another 15 points ( or more ).

 

155 points. For what amounts to one single power. At minimum.

 

Now, Elasticity powers. Looking over Zig-Zag's writeup, I don't see anything he has that Reed hasn't done, all his skills look like stuff Reed has, and his characteristics don't seem higher in any way. Zig Zag is a 350 point character. Reed has at *least* all of his capabilities.

 

We've already hit 505 points, with the elasticity powers selection in particular being almost certainly an underestimate ( Reed has almost certainly done every plasticity trick in the USPD before, and warrants a plasticity VPP for active tricks ). We have not touched Reed's mental characteristics. We have not touched his extensive skill list. We have not touched combat skills. We have not touched perks, bases, and vehicles.

 

Well, iirc, his tech skills have become an extension of his flexiblity powers (or vice versa).

 

So I'd _start_ by mixing the two.

[Pendaran]

Re: Schmucks?

 

they really haven't at all, I'm not sure where you're getting that from. The most they've interacted is when he'll stretch his arm to get some lab equipment he doesn't want to move to reach.

 

Things like on the spot cobbling together a weapon to amplify Black Bolt's powers from tech lying around him had nothing to do with elasticity tricks

[caris]

Re: Schmucks?

 

they really haven't at all, I'm not sure where you're getting that from. The most they've interacted is when he'll stretch his arm to get some lab equipment he doesn't want to move to reach.

 

Things like on the spot cobbling together a weapon to amplify Black Bolt's powers from tech lying around him had nothing to do with elasticity tricks

WhammeWhamme is referring to something that one of the recent writers for one of the versions of the FF through out. The idea is that Reed is actually able to make himself "smarter" by reconfiguring his brain through his elastic body.

[Pendaran]

Re: Schmucks?

 

considering the Reed without doing that trick has jigged up functional time platforms and dimension crossing spaceships...

 

I'm aware of the mini where he did it, it's just not very relevant, it's not like without doing that he isn't the guy who invents devices to consult with alternate reality versions of himself to get second opinions on things.

 

edit: or the guy who on being tossed unfamilliar technology at him by Doom to fight him with in a duel, mastered the use of it in seconds to the point where he had Doom on the defensive as far as the terms of said duel.

 

or whipped up a supervillain locating tracking device on demand when he realized he didn't have one, or...

[Gary]

Re: Schmucks?

 

I'd like to see someone actually post a 350 pt character who can go toe to toe with Takofanes or Dr. Destroyer.

 

The only way it happens is if:

 

1) The characters are really 1000+ pt characters, but due to massively abusive power frameworks or limitations that aren't really limiting, they come in at 350 pts.

 

2) Adjustment powers with the +2 advantage to everything, thus inflating the character points to far more than 350 pts. A variation on 1.

 

3) Tricks involving the 1:5 powers such as Summon, Duplication, or Multiform.

 

4) Some variation on a small base power with gobs of advantages on them.

 

5) V/5 martial maneuvers

 

6) Abuses of the +5 pt per doubling rule for foci.

 

7) Abuses of the Vehicle/Base rules.

 

8) Stuff like +8 penalty skill levels to aimed shots at the head.

 

9) The Cumulative advantage.

 

10) Rapid Fire abuses.

 

I'm sure I'm missing a couple of abuses.

 

However, I'd like to issue a challenge to those who think that 350ers can deal with Tak or DD, to build a few sample 350 characters who can do so.

[assault]

Re: Schmucks?

 

However' date=' I'd like to issue a challenge to those who think that 350ers can deal with Tak or DD, to build a few sample 350 characters who can do so.[/quote']

 

You take the disadvantage "Chosen One", as well as a few others like "Watched by forces of Good", and so on.

 

It's called destiny, although it might be better to spell it Destiny.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Well, iirc, his tech skills have become an extension of his flexiblity powers (or vice versa).

 

So I'd _start_ by mixing the two.

 

Um, what the hell??

 

Tech skills are *not* connected to his elasticity powers. No. Common. SFX.

 

Edit: Or, to put it another way- If Reed's intelligence were somehow the result of his plasticity powers, than either

 

A. Doom was smarter than him by a large margin during college

 

B. Reed is smarter than Doom by a large margin now

 

Since neither of these are true. . .

[Kristopher]

Re: Schmucks?

 

No more corrosive than the idea than an entire world ( not story' date=' *world* ) revolves around 5-6 characters within it.[/quote']

 

 

Exactly.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Schmucks?

 

I'd like to see someone actually post a 350 pt character who can go toe to toe with Takofanes or Dr. Destroyer.

 

The only way it happens is if:

 

1) The characters are really 1000+ pt characters, but due to massively abusive power frameworks or limitations that aren't really limiting, they come in at 350 pts.

 

2) Adjustment powers with the +2 advantage to everything, thus inflating the character points to far more than 350 pts. A variation on 1.

 

3) Tricks involving the 1:5 powers such as Summon, Duplication, or Multiform.

 

4) Some variation on a small base power with gobs of advantages on them.

 

5) V/5 martial maneuvers

 

6) Abuses of the +5 pt per doubling rule for foci.

 

7) Abuses of the Vehicle/Base rules.

 

8) Stuff like +8 penalty skill levels to aimed shots at the head.

 

9) The Cumulative advantage.

 

10) Rapid Fire abuses.

 

I'm sure I'm missing a couple of abuses.

 

However, I'd like to issue a challenge to those who think that 350ers can deal with Tak or DD, to build a few sample 350 characters who can do so.

 

 

I think you've covered basically every form of cheese known ( well, some of it isn't cheese, necessarily, but almost certainly is on a 350 pointer ).