Schmucks?

[zornwil]

Re: Schmucks?

 

You don't need to buy a Hunted if you earn it in play.

 

In any case, the problem is that *eventually* you reach a point that the villain puts more effort into Hunting you than you can readily deal with. Whether this means Dr Destroyer deploying a small army of hunter-killer destroids, VIPER laying an ambush in your home, or simply Holocaust showing up at your headquarters after having charged off a power main, eventually, the villain *will* be more than the heroes can handle, if they have otherwise gotten by on nothing but cleverness.

 

If the villains never put more than a halfhearted effort into getting rid of someone who persisently and severely interrupts their doings, than someone is being misplayed.

I frankly don't see much difference still compared to how villains and heroes deal in even current comics. If someone just wants to kill someone, even at a superheroic level, it's just dad-burned easy, period. Heroic fiction, at least beyond the most realistic, immediately throws that out the window to create its effect; it may throw it out with minimal suspension of disbelief by having villains not that much more powerful, or it may do so with codes of behavior embedded in participants, or it may do it by simply fancy footwork, but it does so, I believe.

 

None of which is to discount that there shouldn't be working towards doing so in RPGs as well as the best fiction. But normally when one's hunted is an uber-villain, it builds slowly and the uber-villain almost always lets the hero gets more powerful faster than an uber-villain would seemingly do - usually with excuses such as over-confidence or megalomania or the like. But in any case, typically the cycle is a very slow build-up and the villain letting things go too far.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Just some more "If the CU has dozens and dozens of guys like these, no wonder the Master Villains need to plan" guys...

 

Doctor America

(from Corporations - stolen whole cloth)

250 100 point Cosmic Power Pool

100 Competent Normal

 

Momentum

140 Momentum Multipower, Can't See or Hear when Powers in use (-1/4)

28m Amazing Repulsion Blast: 46d6 Dispel Knockback Resistance, Does KB (17)

24m Aura of Repelling: 50/50 Force Field, 0 Endurance Cost (0)

u3 Repel Blunt Objects: 12d6 Energy Blast, OIF: Objects of Opportunity (6)

u3 Repel Sharp Objects: 4d6 RKA, OIF: Objects of Opportunity (6)

u2 Repel the Ground: +30" Superleap (3)

m3 Repel the World: 10" Flight (2)

 

35 Awareness: Sense Physical Objects, Discriminatory, Targeting, 360 degree

 

12 Combat Skill Levels: +4 with EB, RKA and Dispel

 

100 Competent Normal

 

This tag team essentially works like this: Doctor America is the delivery system. His purpose is to get Momentum directly above the target and to give him a clear shot with the Dispel. At that point they take ~39d6 damage through being knocked back into the ground. That should be enough to CON Stun anyone.

 

And they're two really nifty power sets, fully capable of doing the normal superheroey stuff.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Schmucks?

 

here's something to chew on--a great many of the master villains and mega villain teams in the CU are ruthless killers. Dr. D, Tak, Mechanon all would snuff out a hero's life without batting a villainous eyelash. Ditto for Eurostar, probably true for the Crowns of Krim. Holocaust would kill heroes.

 

And that's just CKC.

 

So when you have villains who have the capability and inclination to kill 350 point heroes running around, you really kinda sorta need to have some non-tweaked high-pointed PCs or NPCs who form the basis of the rationale for why the villains haven't killed off all the heroes.

 

As a player, I'd want to know. As a GM, I'd want to have the option of having a few powerful NPC heroes out there. What if a hero goes rogue, and his teammates lack the inclination or ability to stop him? Well, the Golden Avenger can show up, lay the smack down on him, and dissuade such anarchy from occurring in the future.

 

Even in a 350 point game, as a player, I'd want to know there were one or two 450+ point heroes out there to handle things if we got jacked up by Deathstroke or Grond. And one team of high level heroes somewhere in the world wouldn't necessarily overshadow the PCs. Someday they might become the high level world savers.

[zornwil]

Re: Schmucks?

 

here's something to chew on--a great many of the master villains and mega villain teams in the CU are ruthless killers. Dr. D, Tak, Mechanon all would snuff out a hero's life without batting a villainous eyelash. Ditto for Eurostar, probably true for the Crowns of Krim. Holocaust would kill heroes.

 

And that's just CKC.

 

So when you have villains who have the capability and inclination to kill 350 point heroes running around, you really kinda sorta need to have some non-tweaked high-pointed PCs or NPCs who form the basis of the rationale for why the villains haven't killed off all the heroes.

 

As a player, I'd want to know. As a GM, I'd want to have the option of having a few powerful NPC heroes out there. What if a hero goes rogue, and his teammates lack the inclination or ability to stop him? Well, the Golden Avenger can show up, lay the smack down on him, and dissuade such anarchy from occurring in the future.

 

Even in a 350 point game, as a player, I'd want to know there were one or two 450+ point heroes out there to handle things if we got jacked up by Deathstroke or Grond. And one team of high level heroes somewhere in the world wouldn't necessarily overshadow the PCs. Someday they might become the high level world savers.

Hmmmm, you know what, somehow it sunk in better when you put it that way. I forgot - especially as I'm not a CU person - that the huge bad guys are ruthless, wanton killers. You're right actually - Metaphysician et. al., point granted, gentlemen.

 

PS - I do think though that HERO deliberately didn't stick in Green Lantern-level good guys out of fear for overshadowing PCs. But to your point, even if so, then that's a flimsy excuse as it doesn't work.

[Guest Champsguy]

Re: Schmucks?

 

This tag team essentially works like this: Doctor America is the delivery system. His purpose is to get Momentum directly above the target and to give him a clear shot with the Dispel. At that point they take ~39d6 damage through being knocked back into the ground. That should be enough to CON Stun anyone.

 

You only take 1/2 damage if you KB someone directly into the ground. So they take 18 1/2 D6 damage. You also can't take more dice than the Body + Def of the object they collide with. So even if you knock them back into a car, they won't take the full 39D6. Even if you did daze someone like Dr Destroyer, your Speed is so low that he'll get a recovery, and then an action, before you ever get to go again.

 

Phase 12: Dr D is distracted by something and doesn't take an action. You blast him and daze him.

Phase 2: Dr D recovers from being dazed.

Phase 3: Dr D blasts you into dust.

Phase 4: This is when you would have gotten to act again.

 

But again, these guys are gonna get massacred. Competent normals? They're going last. Which, effectively, means they aren't going, because they'll be dead or unconscious first.

 

Listen, you keep trying and trying to build these characters who can defeat Dr Destroyer. But I wouldn't allow any of the characters you've described into any game of mine, and I'm one of the most liberal GMs you'll ever find. These are one-trick ponies, for the most part.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Schmucks?

 

You only take 1/2 damage if you KB someone directly into the ground. So they take 18 1/2 D6 damage. You also can't take more dice than the Body + Def of the object they collide with. So even if you knock them back into a car, they won't take the full 39D6. Even if you did daze someone like Dr Destroyer, your Speed is so low that he'll get a recovery, and then an action, before you ever get to go again.

 

Phase 12: Dr D is distracted by something and doesn't take an action. You blast him and daze him.

Phase 2: Dr D recovers from being dazed.

Phase 3: Dr D blasts you into dust.

Phase 4: This is when you would have gotten to act again.

 

But again, these guys are gonna get massacred. Competent normals? They're going last. Which, effectively, means they aren't going, because they'll be dead or unconscious first.

 

Listen, you keep trying and trying to build these characters who can defeat Dr Destroyer. But I wouldn't allow any of the characters you've described into any game of mine, and I'm one of the most liberal GMs you'll ever find. These are one-trick ponies, for the most part.

 

No, they are "one sledgehammer" ponies. They are perfectly average for 350 pt characters otherwise. (okay, low on SPD and DEX)

 

Momentum is a flying energy projector. If you removed the Dispel and halved the force field, he'd fit into almost any campaign. Heck, the huge Force Field isn't even needed (except for his superheroing duties, ond not getting casually geeked). The Huge Dispel is a 150 active point power. Actually, compared to a 30d6 EB (which is what DD throws around, btw), this isn't that bad. It's just a bit of extra damage, which is a limiter because of how it works.

 

Dr America was stolen, completely, from a sourcebook where he was an NPC hero. (from a GOOD sourcebook). He actually existed in the 4th Ed CU.

 

 

Going last isn't much of a problem, either. Because both of them have "Defenses up the yin-yang' as their default setting... and they're there not for a meeting engagement _on their own_ anyway.

 

And note the commentary given? Here's what happens. They learn of Destroyer's location. They figure out a sneaky way in. They get the element of surprise, and go for the one shot STUN, second shot KO. (them and some support... or just have that guy with the cosmic power pool actually contribute to the fight, as opposed to the sneaking up part).

 

-These are only two characters. They'd have support to hurt him once they STUN the target. (Because, y'know, there should be multiple 350pt characters - heck, just clone them both. That should be enough damage for a KO).

 

The 'knockback halved' is for when the knockback does not knock them into a solid object. Being knocked into the earth, from above, IS being knocked into a solid object (and one with more than 39 BODY... although this tactic DOES create an approximately 1km crater in the ground).

[Pendaran]

Re: Schmucks?

 

that's a suprising number of plot gimmes they need there, barring the statistics discussion.

[caris]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Hmmmm, you know what, somehow it sunk in better when you put it that way. I forgot - especially as I'm not a CU person - that the huge bad guys are ruthless, wanton killers. You're right actually - Metaphysician et. al., point granted, gentlemen.

 

PS - I do think though that HERO deliberately didn't stick in Green Lantern-level good guys out of fear for overshadowing PCs. But to your point, even if so, then that's a flimsy excuse as it doesn't work.

Perhaps, Zornwill, the problem is that the real contention for some of the poster on this thread is not that high powered heroes do not exist. They acknowledge that there are probably such heroes. They may even acknowledge that specificly mentioned characters like Walkabout, Iron Imam, or Star Gaurd, might be powerful enough to meet their desires (and yes, people this is a desire not a need), but until they see an official write up they will not accept that they are that powerful.

 

Personally, I don't mind the idea of seeing a write up, but I do not want to see tons of references to those characters. I don't want those characters to become the focus of the setting.

[OddHat]

Re: Schmucks?

 

For me, the Allies issue comes down to this:

 

1) Yes, as I've said from the start I'd be happy enough to see allies at all point levels, both for their value as background characters and for the (much less important to me) metaplot value.

 

2) However, no matter how many points you give allied heroes, it is still the case within the CU that a villain like Tak has only failed to achieve his goal so far due to GM fiat. He is not out to conquer the world; he is out to kill off humanity, and he has the resources to do so regardless of what Heroes of any point level might try to do to stop him. To a lesser extent this is true of (poor, easy to beat in combat) Mechanon as well. As the continued existance of Earth in the CU, like most Comic Book worlds, is all the authors'/GM's call anyway, I can't see the point in getting passionate over how much of a GMs call you're willing to accept.

[JmOz]

Re: Schmucks?

 

You only take 1/2 damage if you KB someone directly into the ground. So they take 18 1/2 D6 damage. You also can't take more dice than the Body + Def of the object they collide with. So even if you knock them back into a car, they won't take the full 39D6. Even if you did daze someone like Dr Destroyer, your Speed is so low that he'll get a recovery, and then an action, before you ever get to go again.

 

Phase 12: Dr D is distracted by something and doesn't take an action. You blast him and daze him.

Phase 2: Dr D recovers from being dazed.

Phase 3: Dr D blasts you into dust.

Phase 4: This is when you would have gotten to act again.

 

But again, these guys are gonna get massacred. Competent normals? They're going last. Which, effectively, means they aren't going, because they'll be dead or unconscious first.

 

Listen, you keep trying and trying to build these characters who can defeat Dr Destroyer. But I wouldn't allow any of the characters you've described into any game of mine, and I'm one of the most liberal GMs you'll ever find. These are one-trick ponies, for the most part.

 

 

60 Martial Arts MP:

One slot of which is a very large Missile Deflection/Reflection

Another slot is Desol (Super dodge)

 

Dr D shoots at you: abort to Desol

Dr D shoots again

This time you reflect 30d6 EB back

[MitchellS]

Re: Schmucks?

 

I agree with Oddhat almost 100%, nothing is perfect.

 

I would also add that characters like Dr. Destroyer and Takofanes are not good rolemodels for most Master Villains. They are as far above Master Villains as the Avengers are above Power Pack, in my opinion, and you cannot use them as a basis for power-level justification. When thinking about needing heroes to defeat Master Villains you need to look at Gravitar and Menton, not Dr. Destroyer and Takofanes. AS Oddhat says, they are GM's fiat characters.

[nexus]

Re: Schmucks?

 

For me, the Allies issue comes down to this:

 

1) Yes, as I've said from the start I'd be happy enough to see allies at all point levels, both for their value as background characters and for the (much less important to me) metaplot value.

 

2) However, no matter how many points you give allied heroes, it is still the case within the CU that a villain like Tak has only failed to achieve his goal so far due to GM fiat. He is not out to conquer the world; he is out to kill off hmanity, and he has the resources to do so regardless of what Heroes of any point level might try to do to stop him. To a lesser extent this is true of (poor, easy to beat in combat) Mechanon as well. As the continued existance of Earth in the CU, like most Comic Book worlds, is all the authors'/GM's call anyway, I can't see the point in getting passionate over how much of a GMs call you're willing to accept.

 

Well said.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Schmucks?

 

60 Martial Arts MP:

One slot of which is a very large Missile Deflection/Reflection

Another slot is Desol (Super dodge)

 

Dr D shoots at you: abort to Desol

Dr D shoots again

This time you reflect 30d6 EB back

 

Why, exactly, is Dr D shooting his 30d6 EB at a martial artist, especially one who has already dodged it once??

 

If he's fighting casually, than he'd probably stick to 20d6, while if he's fighting seriously, the antimartial artist slot is the 20d6 Explosion.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Re: Tak, exactly how are you figuring he "should" have already succeeded?? A megascale transform: human into undead slave VPP slot??

[OddHat]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Re: Tak' date=' exactly how are you figuring he "should" have already succeeded?? A megascale transform: human into undead slave VPP slot??[/quote']

 

If you ban such a slot, you've just made a GM's call.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Schmucks?

 

True enough. However, there is a perfectly viable in-game justification for the lack of such a slot: "If such a spell exists, Takofanes doesn't know it."

[Vondy]

Re: Schmucks?

 

I find it ironic that this comment would come from the Dark Champions board, a board based on a game where a 350 pt character would be the 'Harbinger of (frickin') Justice'. I'd expect the comment to be "anyone who feels they need that many points in a Dark Champions game is a schmuck, this should be a 'heroic' level game".

From the sound of it some of the people on the Dark Champions board should be playing 'Galactic Dark Champions: Defending the Universe from the Scum of the Earth'.

Of course I may just be misreading...

 

Go look at the character write up in the She Wolf Files thread. She's a heroic character - not a superhero - and she weighs in at 339 points without being uber or being anywhere near HoJ's league. She's just well rounded.

[OddHat]

Re: Schmucks?

 

True enough. However' date=' there is a perfectly viable in-game justification for the lack of such a slot: "If such a spell exists, Takofanes doesn't know it."[/quote']

 

Yes. That's a GM's call, all of which (imo) should have some in-game justification. The GM might also need to justify Tak not going into another dimension and calling up an endless army of his Demons (such an action is legal, depending on GM's call) then releasing them on the Earth at hundreds or thousands of different points, a few hundred more demons every minute: That is a set of spells he certainly does know, and keeping himself from being detected from those few who might try is nothing. Then you have to justify him not simply, undetectably taking over the minds of ket players in Russia, China and the US and starting WWIII, again with no chance of heroes getting in the way. Then you have to ...

 

High powered heroes or no high powered heroes, past a certain point only the choices of the writers keep fictional Earths alive. As the GM, even if you follow the rules exactly as written, it is entirely your choice whether or not a certain class of villain will win.

[Chuckg]

Re: Schmucks?

 

re: releasing the hordes of the Underworld onto the Earth -- ummm, the entire /cosmology/ has changed between Kal-Turak's heyday and now. They didn't /have/ the Divine Ban back then, remember? (See 'Mystic World')

 

So it's entirely possible that most of Takofanes' "Turakian Demon Horde Summon" spells don't work no more. Due to the laws of magic having taken a slight step sideways in the interim.

 

His description does explicitly say that the power levels he wields now, however mind-shattering, /are/ a step down from what he used to do in the old day. Combining that text with the backstory from Mystic World provides a reasonable, consistent, explanation.

 

Of course, the Divine Ban doesn't prevent black occultists from summoning individual demons, or demons in /small/ numbers -- witness Demonologist, for example. So Takofanes can still easily do that.

 

He just can't call out the Legions Of Hell Assembled the way he used to.

 

In-game justification with reason. Next?

 

 

 

And as for 'taking over the minds of key players' -- as a time-lost refugee from Fantasy Hero, Takofanes doesn't get Modern Everyman skills.

 

So he won't know where those countries /are/, much less enough of the political landscape to know who to mindwhack in each one, unless he buys the relevant KS'es.

 

Which aren't on his sheet.

 

His main limitation is supposed to be that he has no grasp of the modern world, after all.

[MitchellS]

Re: Schmucks?

 

And as for 'taking over the minds of key players' -- as a time-lost refugee from Fantasy Hero, Takofanes doesn't get Modern Everyman skills.

 

So he won't know where those countries /are/, much less enough of the political landscape to know who to mindwhack in each one, unless he buys the relevant KS'es.

 

Which aren't on his sheet.

Takofanes came out of the hole 17 years ago and does have a 30 Int. He's not an idiot or a Grond with magic. He's an archlich with vast power and knowledge, and the ability to learn. He once was a ruler and understood political boundaries, powers, and kingdoms.

 

And those KS's aren't on my "real life" sheet either, that doesn't mean I have no idea who Canadians and Mexicans are.

 

As for not understanding the modern world, that's not on his character sheet either.

 

And Takofanes does use demon servitors.

[OddHat]

Re: Schmucks?

 

re: releasing the hordes of the Underworld onto the Earth -- ummm, the entire /cosmology/ has changed between Kal-Turak's heyday and now. They didn't /have/ the Divine Ban back then, remember? (See 'Mystic World')

 

So it's entirely possible that most of Takofanes' "Turakian Demon Horde Summon" spells don't work no more. Due to the laws of magic having taken a slight step sideways in the interim.

 

His description does explicitly say that the power levels he wields now, however mind-shattering, /are/ a step down from what he used to do in the old day. Combining that text with the backstory from Mystic World provides a reasonable, consistent, explanation.

 

Of course, the Divine Ban doesn't prevent black occultists from summoning individual demons, or demons in /small/ numbers -- witness Demonologist, for example. So Takofanes can still easily do that.

 

He just can't call out the Legions Of Hell Assembled the way he used to.

 

In-game justification with reason. Next?

 

 

 

And as for 'taking over the minds of key players' -- as a time-lost refugee from Fantasy Hero, Takofanes doesn't get Modern Everyman skills.

 

So he won't know where those countries /are/, much less enough of the political landscape to know who to mindwhack in each one, unless he buys the relevant KS'es.

 

Which aren't on his sheet.

 

His main limitation is supposed to be that he has no grasp of the modern world, after all.

 

You've just made two more GM's calls, proving my point again. Neither were particularly convincing either.

 

We know Tak still has his demons, because his entry in CKC includes a write up for them. Getting familliar with the modern world for a mage like Tak requires almost no effort; a simple steal memories spell does it. You wouldn't allow that? Fine. That would be a GM's call.

 

He has an very large number of sure wins to pull out of his spell pool. Good thing for your game world that you don't want him to actually win, eh?

[OddHat]

Re: Schmucks?

 

Takofanes came out of the hole 17 years ago and does have a 30 Int. He's not an idiot or a Grond with magic. He's an archlich with vast power and knowledge, and the ability to learn. He once was a ruler and understood political boundaries, powers, and kingdoms.

 

And those KS's aren't on my "real life" sheet either, that doesn't mean I have no idea who Canadians and Mexicans are.

 

As for not understanding the modern world, that's not on his character sheet either.

 

And Takofanes does use demon servitors.

 

17 years and, considering his potantial, he has done so little. What a slacker.

 

Or maybe he's just scared of all the duck hats...

[Kristopher]

Re: Schmucks?

 

2) However, no matter how many points you give allied heroes, it is still the case within the CU that a villain like Tak has only failed to achieve his goal so far due to GM fiat. He is not out to conquer the world; he is out to kill off humanity, and he has the resources to do so regardless of what Heroes of any point level might try to do to stop him. To a lesser extent this is true of (poor, easy to beat in combat) Mechanon as well. As the continued existance of Earth in the CU, like most Comic Book worlds, is all the authors'/GM's call anyway, I can't see the point in getting passionate over how much of a GMs call you're willing to accept.

 

A) What makes you so certain that Takofanes could simply wipe out all life on earth with a wave of his hand? The CU setting is so hit-and-miss with details that someone out there could have up some kind of permanent defensive spell that we haven't been told about yet.

 

So no matter how powerful one of these NPC heroes or hero teams is, no matter how capable, they'd never ever be able to even slow down Takofanes?

[Kristopher]

Re: Schmucks?

 

You've just made two more GM's calls, proving my point again. Neither were particularly convincing either.

 

We know Tak still has his demons, because his entry in CKC includes a write up for them. Getting familliar with the modern world for a mage like Tak requires almost no effort; a simple steal memories spell does it. You wouldn't allow that? Fine. That would be a GM's call.

 

He has an very large number of sure wins to pull out of his spell pool. Good thing for your game world that you don't want him to actually win, eh?

 

What you're really saying is that any character with a large open-ended VPP should have long ago accomplished his goal because you can use the points in that VPP to construct powers that would accomplish those goals.

 

You sound like you consider the purely mechanical considerations of what someone's character sheet would allow them to do to be the only thing that matters when considering what they should / could have accomplished.

[OddHat]

Re: Schmucks?

 

A) What makes you so certain that Takofanes could simply wipe out all life on earth with a wave of his hand? The CU setting is so hit-and-miss with details that someone out there could have up some kind of permanent defensive spell that we haven't been told about yet.

 

So no matter how powerful one of these NPC heroes or hero teams is, no matter how capable, they'd never ever be able to even slow down Takofanes?

 

Mechanically he has all the power he needs to destroy all life on Earth in multiple ways that Heroes absolutely can not interfere with no matter their point levels; No uber protective keep the Earth safe spells have been mentioned in any CU source book. If you want to add such, fine; that is a GM's Call. If Steve, Allen, Darren, etc. add it, that is an Author's Call. And no PC or NPC hero team has a hope of stopping him, unless the GM or the Author choose to let them. That's the way a Tak class villain works.

 

If you don't like it, change the character in your campaign; there, you're the GM.