If you could add one more...

[TheEmerged]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

I wouldn't add anything myself; I'd break the "roll-less" items currently under the Skills header -- like Skill Levels, Defensive Manuever, and Autofire Levels -- off into their own category.

 

RE: Stealing Powers. Just my opinion, but this is one of those power concepts that *should* be hideously expensive -- a list that includes Time Stop, as another example. I have no problem whatsoever with requireing a VPP and advantages on Transfer for this to work.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Adding 10 inches of flight improves something they already have' date=' giving them 10 inches of Flight gives them an ability they don't have. That seems more powerful and useful to me.[/quote']

Well, it doesn't seem more powerful to me. I need a better reason than that to justify charging more.

 

You could, for example, Give your entire team Flight before a fight (if you buy down that fade rate a bit), which would be more useful than just Aiding the ones that do have Flight already.

So what? You can do that already with UBO. If Running Boy has 60" of running, giving him 10" of flight isn't going to be all that useful to him. If he wants to get somewhere, he's still going to use his running most of the time.

 

Its more useful to give me Energy Blast when I don't have one than to give me more dice, IMO. You've give more options, not just the same options with a little more omph.

Another fine example. BrickMan has 60 STR and can punch for 12d6. AidMan has 6d6 Aid to EB, and on a really good roll, gives BrickMan a 6d6 EB. Which is BrickMan more likely to do: a 6d6 EB or a 12d6 punch? The EB will do 21 STUN on an average roll. A super-opponent might easily have 20 Defense. Aiding BrickMan's STR up to 90 = 18d6 punch, would have been much more useful. Characters are usually built to do what they do. Bricks don't buy EB because they don't need it. Teleporters don't buy up their Running because they don't need it. etc. Adding a new small power that is outside of a character's normal tactics might be a neat trick once in a while, but is generally not the most useful most of the time. Characters built to have a little of everything, doing nothing especially well, tend not to work out.

 

There's also the low dice, high cap, low fade rate approach to Aid thats very effective already. This could make it an easy way to grant Superpowers.

So? That's the whole point of the system - to make it easy to build what you want. Powers should be priced according to their utility, not their rarity, not their complexity, not their weirdness or normalcy, not their special effects.

 

IOW, This is more powerful than Aid as it works now because now the target has to have the powers you are aiding. With this option your Aid is universal. It works on anyone regardless of them having the power or not. At least IMO.

Right. And I do see your point. It does make the power slightly more flexible, and perhaps should cost something. I think a 10 point Adder "Can grant new powers" is about all it is worth, though. This might also be necessary because I wouldn't allow a Limitation for "Can't create new powers."

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Here's a question. How would the ability to Aid powers that the target doesn't have interact with Aid's brought for entire Special Effects? Say someone with Aid to All Mutants Powers +20 Can Aid Powers from Nothing. Could this character create any power in a Target (or himself) that he sees fit as long as the GM deems its possible for it to be a Mutant Power?

 

Though that would be a simple way to model Quantum Supremacy from Aberrant and like powers.

Ai Aid which can create *any* power with the pseudo-restriction that it be justifiable as a "mutant power" would probably be a +2 Advantage right there, if they can give mutant powers to non-mutants. The only restriction would be that you couldn't give powers to a robot/android, or something like that, that doesn't have genes which can be mutated. At that rate, 120 points would buy 4d6 of Aid, which might grant 20 AP of power on a really good roll, which would then fade at the standard 5 points/turn. I would not consider this abusive at all. Wierd, yes, but not abusive.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

If I could add one more...

• Advantage: Smart Charges, as a modifier to charges. These would represent charges that are not expended unless they hit the target. A lassoo could have 1 smart charge, or a boomerang, or a lock-on missile.
  

I like it! How much should it be worth? Off hand, it seems more valuable than Recoverable Charges. I'm thinking maybe three levels down on the Charges chart. This would make 6 Smart charges worth a -0 Lim/+0 Adv. One smart charge would be worth -1 Lim. And 16 Smart Charges would be worth +3/4. This could then be combined with other options, like Recoverable, Continuing, Boostable, etc.

[nexus]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Well, it doesn't seem more powerful to me. I need a better reason than that to justify charging more.

 

 

So what? You can do that already with UBO. If Running Boy has 60" of running, giving him 10" of flight isn't going to be all that useful to him. If he wants to get somewhere, he's still going to use his running most of the time.

 

 

Another fine example. BrickMan has 60 STR and can punch for 12d6. AidMan has 6d6 Aid to EB, and on a really good roll, gives BrickMan a 6d6 EB. Which is BrickMan more likely to do: a 6d6 EB or a 12d6 punch? The EB will do 21 STUN on an average roll. A super-opponent might easily have 20 Defense. Aiding BrickMan's STR up to 90 = 18d6 punch, would have been much more useful. Characters are usually built to do what they do. Bricks don't buy EB because they don't need it. Teleporters don't buy up their Running because they don't need it. etc. Adding a new small power that is outside of a character's normal tactics might be a neat trick once in a while, but is generally not the most useful most of the time. Characters built to have a little of everything, doing nothing especially well, tend not to work out.

 

Running, or Flight or whatever, give a character more options, even if they are no overwhelming, being able to give them to people easily is more powerful than being able to just amp what they already have. A 6d6 eb is still an eb and a ranged attack where he didn't have one before. Speedboy's running might not be useful in getting to a flying villian. If I can give him flight, then he does have more tactical options. This has come up quite a bit in the games I've played in.

 

So? That's the whole point of the system - to make it easy to build what you want. Powers should be priced according to their utility, not their rarity, not their complexity, not their weirdness or normalcy, not their special effects.

 

For "easy" read "Cheap" pointwise. This, IMO, would be too effective for the point cost. Increase another powers, you're own powers AND create a new power for yourself and others. That seems worthy of some cost to me, otherwise UBO wouldn't be much of an Advantage either.

[nexus]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Ai Aid which can create *any* power with the pseudo-restriction that it be justifiable as a "mutant power" would probably be a +2 Advantage right there' date=' if they can give mutant powers to non-mutants. The only restriction would be that you couldn't give powers to a robot/android, or something like that, that doesn't have genes which can be mutated. At that rate, 120 points would buy 4d6 of Aid, which might grant 20 AP of power on a really good roll, which would then fade at the standard 5 points/turn. I would not consider this abusive at all. Wierd, yes, but not abusive.[/quote']

 

IIRC, Aid "Any Mutant Power, all at once" would be a +1 Advantage under the current rules. If Aid could be default create new powers, you could affectively give anything living any power (anything can be a "Mutant Power). I think you're massively downplaying the ability. You'd effectively have a Cosmic VPP that can be granted to others.

 

If it was an Adder, I'd chalk it up to about 20 points or so for Aid, Transfer and Absorption. I'd be more comfortable seeing it as +1 Advantage on those powers.

 

But I'm willing to just chalk it up to differing opinions.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

...being able to give them to people easily is more powerful than being able to just amp what they already have.

You keep making this assertion, but you haven't given any evidence of it.

 

If Running Boy is suddenly granted 10" of flight, he's still not going to be able to catch a villain with 20" of flight. It would be much more useful for AidMan to grant +10" of Flight to Birdman's existing 15" so he then *can* catch the bad guy.

 

A 6d6 EB in the hands of a brick is just enough to injure innocent bystanders, but not enough to help take down the bad guy, whose defenses are at least 20. If the brick's 12d6 punch isn't enough to hurt the opponent, 6d6 won't be either. Better to add those six dice onto Blaster's already existing blast. 18d6 just might do the job.

 

Likewise, giving Blaster an extra 20 STR isn't going to make his primary weapon, an EB any more powerful. Better to give the STR Aid to the Brick.

 

Granted, for a character with NO movement powers at all (other than his standard 6"/2"/2" run/leap/swim), adding 10" of flight is very useful. And for someone with no attack powers (other than 2d6 punch), 6d6 EB is nothing to sneeze at. But how often are you going to be giving full-blown powers normals? (as opposed to Aiding/Healing them for their own protection) That just puts them, and everyone else, in greater danger. The bad guys won't have any compunctions about killing normals who suddenly shoot energy. Yes, you might grant a movement power to a normal for the purpose of enabling him to get away from danger, but then it's just a save-the-innocent power rather than a take-down-the-threat power. It's not "more powerful."

 

I think this argument is pretty much played out, and if I still haven't convinced you, we'll have to agree to disagree. I say being able to grant powers with adjustment powers is only worth about a 10 point adder at most.

[arcady]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Just one?

 

I would add "Advantaged" as an exact opposite of "Limited."

[Guest bblackmoor]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

You keep making this assertion' date=' but you haven't given any evidence of it.[/quote']

 

It's called the law of diminishing returns. The first ten points of Flight (Tunneling, Teleport, Drain, Power Defense, etc.) make a much greater difference than ten points added to a sixty point power. It's not always true, of course: the more "ordinary" the power is, and the more common the defense is, the less useful a small amount will be, and the more useful a 10-point increase will be. Strength, for example. But those are also the kinds of powers that characters are most likely to already possess.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Again, I'm looking for evidence, not repetition of the assertion.

[Guest bblackmoor]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Again' date=' I'm looking for evidence, not repetition of the assertion.[/quote']

 

I can tell you the sky is blue, but if you can't look at it and see that it is so, I don't think any amount of convincing will be sufficient.

[cutsleeve]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

the power id throw in would be Possession. Make it expensive but give it adders and advantages to modify it a bit. id say 20 pts per DC would satify the game balance issues.

[Sean Waters]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Again' date=' I'm looking for evidence, not repetition of the assertion.[/quote']

 

 

I'd say that adding points to an existing attack power is more useful than granting one you haven't got, most of the time. Boosting defences is very useful, but so is getting defences you didn't have. Probably the latter is marginally more useful. Movement is again a mix: more movement you have means bigger movethroughs (IF you have enough strength to take advantage of the extra damage) but getting flight that you didn't have if you fall off a building can be a life saver.

 

We can go round forever with this.

 

My take is that it is not about power, but flavour. I know you can grant powers with UBO, but that is quite expensive and you have to buy it specifically. Aid is far more common, and if you could add new powers there would be substantially reduced differentiation between characters. I have no idea if that is why it is done that way (Steve won't discuss design philosophy), but I can see that as a good enough reason. If it worries you, a 10 point adder 'Can aid powers from zero' should do the trick.

[Sean Waters]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Not really something new, but I'd like to see the TK adder 'Fine Manipulation' made into a sort of general adder so that you could do cool stuff with other powers, like forming really intricate structures with your force walls, shaping your energy blasts into interesting shapes (not adding indirect or area: just making your EB look like a dragon, or whatever) and so on.

 

Wouldn't add a lot of utility, but it would look good.

[nexus]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Poession would be a good one to add. I've never been able to come up with a "body jacking" style possesion that I was happy with.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

I'd say that adding points to an existing attack power is more useful than granting one you haven't got' date=' most of the time. Boosting defences is very useful, but so is getting defences you didn't have. Probably the latter is marginally more useful. Movement is again a mix: more movement you have means bigger movethroughs (IF you have enough strength to take advantage of the extra damage) but getting flight that you didn't have if you fall off a building can be a life saver.[/quote']

 

Definitely "it depends".

 

Would you rather have a 2d6 EB vs Cold added to your repertoire, or have your existing 12d6 FireBolt receive a +2d6 bonus? In a situation where you can use your firebblast, it seems clearly superior to get an extra 2d6 and inflict another 7 stun (or spread to get +2 OCV or hit multiple targets). Even if you can't use your FireBlast for some reason, hpow much damage will 2d6 inflict to a credible threat?

 

Defenses depend. If I'm getting hit with 2d6 Flash MPA'd with a 10d6 EB, getting 5 Flash Def is very useful, certainly more useful than ading 5 to my 40 ED. On the other hand, if I'm getting hit with a 12d6 EB instead, I'd rather have +5 ED than get flash defense when I'm not being flash'ed. And 5 power defense only blunts a 6d6 STR drain, so while useful, it probablky won;'t change the ultimate outcome any more than adding 5 PD when I'm fighting a martial artrist.

 

Movement - your examples are great. The game envrionment also matters. If FastMan has 60" running already, and your battlemat is 30 hexes by 20 hexes, how much difference will +5" running make? Now, granting 5" teleportation makes a world of difference if there's a big force wall in the middle of the map, and 5" flight matters a lot if, as you say, I just fell off a building..

[SteveZilla]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

I don't know if I agree with you about point caps being a meta-philosophy of the game system - there is no cap on drain or suppress' date=' if I'm remembering correctly. So, while I do agree that Steal would certainly be more expensive than Transfer, I'm not going to rule out it having no maximum limit, or an increased maximum limit (say, twelve points per d6).[/quote']

 

I think that point caps actually is a meta-philosophy of the Hero System. Every Adjustment power that adds points has a cap. It's always the max the dice of the power could roll in a single roll (barring expenditures to raise this limit). The one exception is Healing-as-Regeneration in 5th Ed., which still has a cap of sorts -- it stops when fully healed).

 

I can't think of anything that grants or boosts an ability that is naturally open ended in Hero System.

[SteveZilla]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Hero is pretty complete and there's not much you can't do or at least fake nicely, but if you could add one more:

 

1. Characteristic

2. Skill

3. Power

4. Advantage

 

What would it be?

 

Characteristic: Spirit (or maybe "Life Essense" or "Lifeforce"). A Tranformation Attack can affect either a target's body (All Stats & Powers), mind (Skills/Memories), or spirit (???). also, undead that in D&D "Drain Levels" can instead Drain SPI (Spirit) in Hero System This Stat might also serve (with slight modificaiton) as a Sanity stat in horror genres.

 

Power: 4th Ed. Regeneration, with the adders from 5th Ed, and add some more adders that allow the Regeneration to restore other things lost/damaged (like drained powers, drained stats other than Body, and incorporate Healing's ability to "heal" Flashed senses).

 

Power: An "Overall" class of mind adder. Similar to the way things can be bought for a specific sense, or the whole sense group, Classes of Minds adders should have a higher-costed version the character can buy that applies to *all* of his mental powers. Since such an "Adder" isn't part of any single Mental Power, it would likely be bought outside of any framework (i.e., "Straight Up"). This is in similar fashion as Locations for Teleportation (seperate from all the actual Teleport Powers the character has).

 

Power: An adder for Force Wall that gives it a bit of Body so it's more like a real wall.

 

Limitation: Ablative that involves the defensive value getting smaller instead of the current system of increasing Activation Rolls.

[Guest bblackmoor]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Every Adjustment power that adds points has a cap.

 

You know, I knew this, but I had never thought of it quite that explicitly. Good point.

[transmetahuman]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

I think that point caps actually is a meta-philosophy of the Hero System. Every Adjustment power that adds points has a cap. It's always the max the dice of the power could roll in a single roll (barring expenditures to raise this limit). The one exception is Healing-as-Regeneration in 5th Ed., which still has a cap of sorts -- it stops when fully healed).

 

I can't think of anything that grants or boosts an ability that is naturally open ended in Hero System.

I'm not weighing in as for or against this idea, but it occurs to me that there would be a cap: the power of the character stolen from. Can't go any higher than that. Just make it clear that if you steal Fishbike's Omni-Blast, then steal her twin brother Wheeeeeeble!'s identical Omni-Blast, the points don't add - each power is seperate even if it has the same SFX.

[Legendsmiths]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

I'd like to see all of the character states statted out as separate powers or as adders to CE. This would include stunned, suffocating, etc. An example of this would be GURPS 4ed Affliction power - it is used to apply character states or events to a target (such as heart attack, dazed, etc.). I realize for many of the offensive states (e.g. heart attack) you can probably represent this easy enough with existing powers ans SFX, but things like a suffocating environment and so on would be nice. This is similar to pointing out that normal sight is worth 35 points (is it?), so you have a target to suppress or dispel.

 

Also, which DH are the object construction rules in and Mattingly's AoE rules? Thanks.

[Guest bblackmoor]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

I'd like to see all of the character states statted out as separate powers or as adders to CE. This would include stunned' date=' suffocating, ... heart attack, dazed, etc...[/quote']

 

Ladies and gentlemen, the Physician's Desk Reference, Hero Edition. And at nearly 3000 pages, it's a bargain at only $92.95.

[nexus]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

Ladies and gentlemen' date=' the [i']Physician's Desk Reference, Hero Edition[/i]. And at nearly 3000 pages, it's a bargain at only $92.95.

 

If GURPS can pull it off in less that "3000" pages I think you might exxagerating just wee bit.

[Legendsmiths]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

I have to agree with Nexus on this one. The write-up in GURPS 4e is actually quite elegant and useful. I could easily model that in a HERO context but I'd like to remain closer to the rules as is.

 

The flavor of such powers would be significant, IMHO, and would add value to the game.

[Guest bblackmoor]

Re: If you could add one more...

 

If GURPS can pull it off in less that "3000" pages I think you might exxagerating just wee bit.

 

Obviously. But it could fill 20 to 30 pages, easily, if it includes such common maladies as "hearts attacks". Personally, I'd rather it not be part of the core rules, and I'd be unlikely to buy it if it were a supplement.

 

However, I would not object to having mechanical guidelines for creating the environmental effects already described in the game system (suffocation/drowning being the best example).