Power Construction Question

[Lord Hobie]

Herofans,

 

A player of mine wants to play a young mutant whose mutation is this:

 

He basically broadcasts a constant mental signal of "forget me," all the time. It's powerful enough to ensure that normal people (without high EGO or Mental Defense) don't remember him at all, yet not so strong that powerful mentalists won't be able to remember him.

 

I'm thinking Always On Single Command Mind Control, possibly - any other ideas?

 

Many thanks,

Lord Hobie

[Darkhope]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Yeah i built something like this the other day one sec let me find it. It wasn't mind control though thats to expensive and people can make ego breakout roles. What kind of points are you looking to work with?

[Darkhope]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Found it:

2" Radius Darkness vs Sight Group/Sound Group/Mental Group = 45 Base

0 END +1/2 Selective +1/4 = 79 Active

Then tack on whatever limitations you feel appropriate and throw it in his Mutant Elemental Control or Multipower. I would put in an elemental control since you said its always in effect and give limitation Always on -1/2. Its not persistant so it will turn off if he's unconsious. Other ideas are it could take a full phase to activate -1/2 and required Stealth roll -1/2. Throw that in an EC and it costs you 20pts + the 20pt EC.

 

EDIT: woops forgot to put on it No Range -1/2 and personal immunity +1/2, means the 2" radius is constantly surrounding you. So when power is on people that look your way will not be able to sense you with sight/sound or mental.

[Citizen Keen]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Yeah, that's not going to work. That just makes people not see the character. The character wants people to forget him. Also, a good EGO (i.e. mentalists) should be able to break out - they're minds are stronger than that. Also, the people forget him, but if he's doing something in front of them, they'll see it and respond ("This guys smashing all my plates, I must stop him!" Hero runs away. "Someone was smashing all my plates, but I don't remember who!")

 

I'd build it as a Mind Control, Single Effect "Forget Everything About Me When I Leave", AOE, 0 END, Persistent, Always On, No Range. Buy it with enough d6 that a normal will almost always fail, but a 20 EGO mentalist will probably remember the character.

[Darkhope]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

The AOE advantage for that to cover anyone in LOS would be tremendous though. I'de just make it a "Cloud Mind" type thing. If I want you to see me then i'll let you, but if I dont to bad. Granted its not EXACTLY what he described but that AE mod would have to be huge if I'm interpreting what he wants. I see it as like the scene in Replacement Killers in the begining. He's walking through the club to the table and all of a sudden someone walks in front of him and he vanishes. But only to those at the table, he's still there for everyone else cause he's not invisible. He just affects the senses of those at the table.

[Citizen Keen]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Well, having everybody forget you is a powerful thing - it should cost a lot of points. Making it selective would cost even more.

 

I'd also take a Physical Limitation - Magically Forgotten or whatever, to offset some of the points.

[Darkhope]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

I'd also take a Physical Limitation - Magically Forgotten or whatever, to offset some of the points.

 

Gah my pet peeve of this game. Disads shouldn't make powers costs less. Disads define your characters personality archtype and how you ROLE-PLAY in this ROLE-PLAYING game. Those disads determine how many points you get per game. You play crappy, you get 2 pts, you play good you get 5. Shouldn't shrink the points on a power.

[incrdbil]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Gah my pet peeve of this game. Disads shouldn't make powers costs less. Disads define your characters personality archtype and how you ROLE-PLAY in this ROLE-PLAYING game. Those disads determine how many points you get per game. You play crappy' date=' you get 2 pts, you play good you get 5. Shouldn't shrink the points on a power.[/quote']

 

In this case, it may be warranted if his power was always on, non selective--not having anyone remember you 5 minutes after you leave is a huge social disadvantage. no contacts for you. No DNPC for you! (well, no low ego DNPC, anyway). They hero can't even testify at a jury trial!

 

And the secret identity disad should not give the guy many disadvantage points, if any, since his power will negate that disad most of the time.

 

Rival seeing Pc w/o mask "ahaa, I now who you are!"

PC "really?" ::walks away::

Rival "I'm going to tell the world about you really being..umm, you..ummm, well, I'll...umm, what was I doing?"

 

 

So the extra disad he takes in this case is more than compensated by the disads he really can't take now. It's not offsetting the powers cost anymore than if he could take secret ID and such. His power causes a problem though it may have some uses.

[Lord Hobie]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Thanks for the advice so far, guys!

 

Clarification: the player wants the character (at least at first) to have no real conscious control over this power. He couldn't turn it off if he wanted to.

 

I do like the EGO roll to break out, though - it could simulate "Wait! Memories come flooding back to me" effect.

 

Lord Hobie

[Darkhope]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

So a character with 50 str has the Disad Overconfident (com/str) 15pts gets deducted from his overall total. BS. I dont use the rule and never have never will. To each his own.

[Citizen Keen]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

I'm not sure how you're using the phrase "deducted", Darkhope. A 50 STR Superhero with Overconfident isn't as powerful as a 50 STR Superhero without it. I've played many characters with no real disadvantages - I had 75 points to spend, and everyone else had 150, but they were being hunted, and were limited in some ways. My character didn't really have any limitations. And it led to a lot of interesting role-playing opportunities. But you're right - to each his own. It's cool you've managed to make the system work without Disadvantage points.

 

Lord Hobie - then make sure the power has AOE (Nonselective) - he can't pick who is affected, and Always On (he can't turn it off). Take the Disadvantage for being completely crippled by this power.

 

Sounds like you've got either a great roleplayer or an extreme masochist in your group! Sounds like a great player! ;-) Good luck!

[incrdbil]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

So a character with 50 str has the Disad Overconfident (com/str) 15pts gets deducted from his overall total. BS. I dont use the rule and never have never will. To each his own.

 

Ok, I'm confused. Please, what are you talking about?

 

Disadvantages aren't deducted from power costs.

Having a 50 Strength and being Overconfident isn't abusive in any sense. You mean you don't have bricks that are overconfident? Being overconfident will get you in trouble, regardless of what your strength. An overconfident guy with 20 Strength will pick a fight with Bulldozer, and pay the price. An overconfident hero with 50 Str will pick a fight with Grond, or Gravitar, or Firewing..and really, pay a price.

 

You have a total cost of skills, characteristics and powers. That has to equal base +disads +exp spent. There's no cost reducing connection between a disadvantage and a power. I know someone mentioned offsetting the points of a power by taking a disadvantage based on that power, but with point limits (and disad category limits) it really isn't working that way. and even if you are working under the questionable premise of 'take as many disadvantages as you want), if a disadvantage is appropriate if the power puts the character at a real disadvantage in many situations thats more than just what rolling the dice would acheive.

 

Why I wouldn't reccomend taking the disadvantage in the specific case is that if they player planned to make the power selective, he'd also have to pay off the disadvantage--I'd be inclined to initialy take it as a zero point disadvantage just for roleplay possibility.

[Citizen Keen]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

If he wanted to buy off Non-selective, I'd make him buy off "Always On" as well - if he can make it so the Power doesn't effect anyone, it's not really being Limited by being Always On, is it?

 

;-)

[incrdbil]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

If he wanted to buy off Non-selective, I'd make him buy off "Always On" as well - if he can make it so the Power doesn't effect anyone, it's not really being Limited by being Always On, is it?

 

;-)

 

Well, by being always on, he can't hide the fact he's using the power to anyone with mental senses-ever. I need to read a bit more on selective, non selective, and the effects on ECV when I get home..I'm overlooking something, I just know it.

[Darkhope]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

You have a total cost of skills, characteristics and powers. That has to equal base +disads +exp spent. There's no cost reducing connection between a disadvantage and a power.

 

What are you talking about? This is taken from the first paragraph under CHARACTER DISADVANTAGES on pg 117 of Hero System sourcebook:

 

Determining a character's Disadvantages helps determine his personality, gives the GM interesting ideas for adventures, and gives the character more Character Points to spend.

 

It continues on, in the third paragraph:

 

The more Disadvantages each character has, the more flaws he has, and the more points he gets to spend on Powers, Skills, etc.

 

If you run a 75pt normal game and build a 75 pt character with no disadvantages your playing a person that has no concept. He has no personality querks, fears, hatreds etc.. But you still only get 75pts. No person on the PLANET has no disads. But the way you play your game, the other players can build a 150pt character, but can take 75pts in disads, and effectively be a 75pt character. That, in my opinion is just stupid. Disads shouldn't have any effect on how powerful your character is. If we build exact copies of a character, mine has no disads and a 3D6 HA, your character with 75pt in disads can afford a 6D6 HA. So because you have Disadvantages that basically give your character depth, history, concept, attitude, a PERSONA you get to be more powerful than the other players who have fewer or no disads. Basicaly they dont even have to roleplay cause they dont have disads. So how on EARTH do you determine who gets exp and how much ? How do you base the role-playing experience in your game to determine how many character points the players get if you use that part of the system? /boggle. I'll NEVER agree to that.

[incrdbil]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

If you run a 75pt normal game and build a 75 pt character with no disadvantages your playing a person that has no concept. He has no personality querks, fears, hatreds etc.. But you still only get 75pts. [

No person on the PLANET has no disads. But the way you play your game, the other players can build a 150pt character, but can take 75pts in disads, and effectively be a 75pt character.

 

No, that would be a 150 point character. characters are a sum of their base costs, and disadvantages. if someone doesn't want to take any disadvantages, and play a 75 point character in a game where the character point limit is 150, well thats up to them. They will be, of course, quite weaker, but then that's what they get for not taking disadvantages. If you want to play a 75 point normal game, you give the Pc's an amount from 25 to 50, tell them to pick up the rest in disadvantages.

 

 

That, in my opinion is just stupid. Disads shouldn't have any effect on how powerful your character is.

 

Well, they do, and thats how the hero system works. If you don't take any disadvantages, you get fewer character points.

 

 

If we build exact copies of a character, mine has no disads and a 3D6 HA, your character with 75pt in disads can afford a 6D6 HA. So because you have Disadvantages that basically give your character depth, history, concept, attitude, a PERSONA you get to be more powerful than the other players who have fewer or no disads.

 

Absolutely. since I took disadvantages, I'll toss your character around in a one on one fight. I also don't have a rival trying to kill me, a DNPC who gets in danger, a weakness, or even vulnerability that makes me weak in combat, or a psychological flaw so strong that an enemy can exploit it, and I can't escape it without an ego roll (or at all, depending on the level of the disad). also, the character aren't exact copies. You are building a 75 point character, I'm building an 150 point character. Pretty obvious who will win.

 

Why would a character in one of your games take a vulnerability if you don't allow points for it?

 

I'm not really understanding where you are coming from--this is Hero games 101 I'm talking.

[Tae Kwon Dan]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Really this argument is just semantics anyway. Everyone in this system is going to want all of their 350 points for supers so you can say you're building a 200 point character with up to 150 disad points, but in actuality you're building a 350 point character with a required 150 disad points.

 

Because I can't think of too many instances with well balanced campaign rules where I will come out ahead by giving up points for powers, skills, etc, in order to not take a couple of reasonable disads.

[Darkhope]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Absolutely. since I took disadvantages, I'll toss your character around in a one on one fight. I also don't have a rival trying to kill me, a DNPC who gets in danger, a weakness, or even vulnerability that makes me weak in combat, or a psychological flaw so strong that an enemy can exploit it, and I can't escape it without an ego roll (or at all, depending on the level of the disad).

 

Uhh thats called character concept, not pile on disads so i can get more points for powers.

 

Why would a character in one of your games take a vulnerability if you don't allow points for it?

 

Never said vulnerabilities don't give points, All my examples were psychological limitations.

 

I'm not really understanding where you are coming from--this is Hero games 101 I'm talking.

 

I'm not a moron I understand the disadvantages system. I just don't agree with the concept it provides. Vulnerabilities, physical limitations "blind, parapalegic", susceptibilities "sunlight, silver" for example I allow extra points for. But disads that describe how your character is to be role-played?! Nope, aint bending on that principle. I don't run hack-n-slash games so my players don't have to worry about stacking on huge amounts of disads to be even with the rest of the group. If you run a 500pt super game you really want your players picking out 750pts of disads just so they can have more points. They'll be so insane and shifty they would be unplayable. No thx not for me.

[Citizen Keen]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Let's not hijack Lord Hobie's thread about the permanent-forgetting power. If you want to discuss Disads, fine, but we should move it to a new thread.

[Darkhope]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Lord Hobie already thanked us for his input and moved on to other things. Meanwhile me and Dan the man are still discussing something. No need cluttering up the board with another thread.

[incrdbil]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

I'm not a moron I understand the disadvantages system. I just don't agree with the concept it provides. Vulnerabilities, physical limitations "blind, parapalegic", susceptibilities "sunlight, silver" for example I allow extra points for. But disads that describe how your character is to be role-played?! Nope, aint bending on that principle. .

 

So your characters simply don't have psych disadvantages unles they volunteer for it and get no compensation for restricting themselves--hey, whatever makes you happy. I do hope you understand that point limits are the rule of the day--characters can't keep piling on disadvantage points, whatever your limit is, players can't go over that with disadvantages. Well, once they hit the cap, they can keep taking them, they just get zero points.

 

But there's nothing wrong with psych limits--a character who won't break a word of honor definitely is limited more than a character with no problems with lying. I guess you can hopr all your folks voluntarily take on appropriate psych limits and roleplay that way--thouh their is no mechanic to force that, such as a required ego roll for someone breaking a strong psych limitation. Of course, to make up points since they don't get psych limits, they have to be more vulernable/hunted/prone to beserk, as their disadvantages have to come out of the other categories.

 

 

Psych disadvantages can be a legitimate part of a character creation process, and are not munchkin at all. If anything, they help enforce roleplay.

[Darkhope]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

you can't MAKE a person role-play. Its called free will. I base the exp rewards on how well they role-play the disads. If a person has the disad Honorable: cannot tell a lie(com/str), then thats his character concept. Like a bushido monk or lawful good paladin. If this person does not role-play these disads in my game he faces the in game consequences of losing his paladin hood and powers that are granted to him (not the points) or the monk gets dispelled from his order and has to find a new place to live. And now they both have a "reputation" disad. They don't get free points for that. They get to live with their consequences of not playing their character. They also have to face the fact out of game that they aren't gonna get as much exp as the other players because they aren't role-playing. Not after alot of lying the disad will slowly go away. Real people change over time just the way the characters can. Again, straight from the book pg 117 under disads :

 

A GM who doesn't want to worry about Disadvantages could raise the starting base and decrease ( or even elimnate) the points gained from Disadvantages.

 

Lets go through a scenario real quick; I decide to start up a new campaign. Its going to be a 75pt Horror 1930's campaign. Straight from H.P. Lovecraft. I call Joe, ask what he wants to play. He says:

 

I wanna play a student with a part time PI job. He like little adventures so he'll be a Thrillseeker (com/mod). He has a fear of heights though (com/str). Since I want to be playful with him towards other characters and NPC's I'll make him a Prankster (com/mod). This will fit in cause he's a student he's still young. He is hunted by a member of the local mafia, no one big, just a street thug I got some incriminating evidence on while doing my job. Hunted(as powerful/limited area/mildly punish) 11 or less.

 

This is what I call character concept. This is what the player wants to play. I'll set a minimum, usually half the base that they have to pick just so there can be some substance to the character. If they want more go for it, play what you want but your not getting a billion points for the attitude your character has. That takes away totally from the role-playing aspect of the game to me.

[Rick]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Ok so you've a style of play and character creation that's different from most Hero gamers. Cool. I infact encourage players to have fun quirks in their character's personality, that they may not get points for.

 

I've a character right no that is festitious, however he can function in a mess, in game he grouses and bemoans it (the Player recieved 0 pts for this).

 

If however it is OCD, and is diabilitating, he stopped everything in game to start cleaning, than yeah he should get points for that. His character has to do it or make a difficult Ego roll to avoid it. That's Hero as written, out of the box.

 

I know you think this is, BS!!!! Well good for you, we can all appreciate that. This thread is not the forum for you to express this, though. This is a thread for players talking about the rules as they are.

 

Now you have a valid arguement. Start another thread bringing up this debate, where you talk about this meta game issue. In a more appropriate place this could be a fun topic of discussion.

[incrdbil]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

my apologies for my contribution to the threadjack

 

back on topic: Mr forget about me--this might be a case where a construct is perhaps too much--if bout always on non selective..I mean, life would be rough.

 

Now if he could make a roll to stop it it might be manageable..but maybe you could rule that he manages to work by telecommuting, and his significant others/family have enough ego to remember him

[ghost-angel]

Re: Power Construction Question

 

Lets go through a scenario real quick; I decide to start up a new campaign. Its going to be a 75pt Horror 1930's campaign. Straight from H.P. Lovecraft. I call Joe, ask what he wants to play.

 

{Continued Hijack of Thread.... because I have to say something here}

 

Darkhope... while you aren't doing anything wrong, conceptually or mechanically.. I think you're misunderstaning what is being said by "More points for Disads"

 

FREd Pg14-15 .. goes into character point and Level Of Play (from Incompetant Normal to Cosmically Powerful, table p15).

 

pg14 "Every character has a base number of Character Points, as indicated in the Character Types Guidelines Table... A Character can also take Disadvantages, up to the maimum point value listed, the get extra Character Points and develop his background."

 

to take an example, a Standard Superhero game gives you 200 "free" points and up to 150 "disadvantage" points for a total 350 Character Points. In order to get to the 350pt Maximum you must take 150 points worth of Disadvantages. If you do you are considered a 350pt Character. You also cannot just keep stacking Disads until the cows come home. The guidelines stop you at 150.

 

As an aside, since the Disadvantage Points are optional and not required people will use terms like "Take a Disad to gets some extra points" since there are many who may or may not take the maximum allowable disadvantage point for a character. I've done that in the past on several occasions playing with lower charater point totals than the rest of the group.

 

Now, what you're doing is basically what my GM does: "Build a 350 point character, I expect some Disads in there, I'd like to see maybe 100pts, but we can work with concept" and does not bother with Base Points + Disadvantage Points = Character Points. Essentially Disads don't garner extra points but then there is no "base points" in the game, there is only Character Point Totals.

 

This is also perfectly valid and I know many long time Hero groups who use that method.

 

Both are valid, both give the same basic end result. Neither are BS.