Classes of Minds

[Sean Waters]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

You get nothing for free in Hero, so you are all right: if your character sfx give an undue advantage then you should pay something.

 

Mind you I don't think that the relative paucity of cyber-paths should be an argument against taking the machine class for free: why are cyber-paths rare? because there are not that many things for them to control, and/or because they spend all their time at home hacking mainframes. As soon as word gets out the PC is an android, the cyber-paths will be out in force: there may be less of them in the world, but there will be a higher relative concentration around the android!

 

Similarly if you are an alien with an alien mind, you might find out that every alien mentalist comes to Earth you wind up getting sought out and brain drained: you are the only one they can effect!

 

If the GM is not willing to put in the effort in that campaign, fair enough: the player can not have an unusual mind-class OR has to define it with mental defences.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

Not versus Cyberpaths, for someone who is affected by them with 0 penalties, and will likely be a target for any that exist, is worth more than -1/4. I'd say -1/2, minimum.

 

At that point:

 

10 (+3 DECV, NVC)

5 (10pts Mental Defense, NVC, Not versus EGO Attack)

 

Gives you the benefits of a non-human class of minds.

Take:

10 Fully Affected By Cyberpaths

 

And it's a net cost of five points. Tack on:

5 DF: Non-Human Mind

 

and it's a 0pt difference.

 

So. Broken?

[Hawksmoor]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

This may be opening up an even bigger can of worms' date=' but given the way this discussion is trending I have to ask: If the logic is that PCs should not take Machine class of minds because in most campaigns, Mental Powers vs. Machine minds will be rarer, wouldn't that make the Machine Class for MPs less useful... and therefore, shouldn't Machine Class MPs cost less?[/quote']

 

True Liaden. One of the stupidist calls on the part of the developers was to make non standard minds not a limitation according to genre.

 

Cyberpunk HERO might not get the limitation, Fantasy HERO might get a weird Alien one (for all those Aberations and Other Planar Entities), but in Champions most campaigns have it as a serious limitation.

 

OTOH I think that Mechanon is immune to non-Machine Based mental powers, the fact that he takes STUN is not even a issue. Automaton rules Mechanon is scary.

[Silbeg]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

Or you could have him hunted by Bill Gates..... (He get's caught when they load Windows XP2 into him by wireless LAN' date=' and turns into a blithering idiot)[/quote']

 

4d6 Major Transform (mental) into useless piece of hardware

plus 4d6 Cosmetic Transform (eyes into "blue screen of death")

[MikeyMitchell]

Re: Classes of Minds

Or you could have him hunted by Bill Gates..... (He get's caught when they load Windows XP2 into him by wireless LAN' date=' and turns into a blithering idiot)[/quote']Nah...any alien computer that's self-aware would treat XP2 as a virus and simply destroy it.

[Silbeg]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

Nah...any alien computer that's self-aware would treat XP2 as a virus and simply destroy it.

 

 

NOt according to the movie Independence Day... a simple virus can take out a mothership, and its entire fleet! Even easier than a kid firing a shot at a vulnerable control dome...

[Blue]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

This is all sounding more complicated than it is.

 

Dr. Voltz (Human), T1911 (A robot), and Mandark the Mentalist (Human) are all in a laboratory...

 

Dr. Voltz uses his patented GIZMO to control the T1911. Since the T1911 was created using the "Automaton" rules, it can be controlled by the device. Mandark the Mentalist, not realizing the T1911, that is shaped like a cheeerleader, is actually a robot, tries to control 'her' and fails automatically, because he can't control the "Machine" class of minds. The T1911 has a mind control of it's own. It uses it's control over the machine class of minds to compel the labs computers to lock the doors and gass everyone present in an attempt to uphold it's "Lifeforms should be annihilated" programming. The T1911 can't hurt anyone directly with the Mind Control v. Machines, but it sure found it quite useful to hurt them indirectly.

[TheEmerged]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

RE: Alien class of mind. Now, this is just my opinion here, but I always took this as being Alien as in "something outside the realm of animal, computer, plant, or humanoid" not Alien as in 'brother from another plant'. Cthulu is an alien, Ironclad is not.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

RE: Alien class of mind. Now' date=' this is just my opinion here, but I always took this as being Alien as in "something outside the realm of animal, computer, plant, or humanoid" not Alien as in 'brother from another plant'. Cthulu is an alien, Ironclad is not.[/quote']

 

This I agree with. There's actually a little bit about this in Star Hero. It suggests grouping aliens into their own groups, such as Mamilian Races, Reptilian Races, Crystaline Race, etc. and use those as the mind categories (with Animal being any self-willed creature that's not sentient/human intelligence). You could do something similar in a Champions game. So if the alien is mamilian (or close) the Mental Powers you use on your fellow humans will also work on the alien.

[Mortuorum`]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

OK, so to recap what I think is the sentiment of most present...

 

If you're a machine, but are self-aware (Mechanon), you have a human-class mind.

 

If you're an animal, but are evolved to human-level intelligence (Dr. Silverback), you have a human-class mind.

 

If you're an alien, but are of a mentality that is essentially human-like (Ironclad), you have a human-class mind.

 

If you're a PC and you fall into one of the above categories, you have a human-class mind.

 

If you can be affected by mental powers that affect human-class minds and another class of mind, it is a Disadvantage.

 

Is that about right?

[Blue]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

I purposely made alien and human class of minds the same. I had a couple of reasons for this.

 

First, I didn't want to introduce aliens right away. And if such was the case, than no player character was going to buy "alien class of minds" because they were not going to get to use it. So when they finally do encounter aliens they'd be at a huge disadvantage.

 

Second, I want incomprehensible intelligences to take up the slot where Aliens were on the scale. THIS is where Cthulhu will be, should he ever rear his slimey head, and maybe some aliens that I've not even created yet.

 

I like having the aliens and humans able to hurt each other without additional charge. This is more like superheroic games (and old sci-fi for that matter).

[scarlett]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

If I recall correctly, 5ER addresses this issue under the classes of mind section under mental powers. In fact, I believe the recommendation is that the PC be treated as the same class of mind as the other PCs (usually human)...perhaps with the additional physical limation that they can be affected as machines.

[TheEmerged]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

RE: Mechanon. I'm resisting the urge to get editorial here... but that's why I adopted the "As written, no errata and the text doesn't matter" rule when I did the Champions vs Viperia combat. Game-relevant information should be on the character sheet, not as a sentence in the description that's open to interpretation.

[MikeyMitchell]

Re: Classes of Minds

NOt according to the movie Independence Day... a simple virus can take out a mothership' date=' and its entire fleet! Even easier than a kid firing a shot at a vulnerable control dome...[/quote']Well, the virus in ID was specifically tuned to work against the alien ship. Which wasn't self-aware, and wasn't AI. Heck, Windows often refuses to run even on machines it's supposed to be compatible with... ;)However, an alien civilization that travels from planet to planet, conquering as they go, being vulnerable to a hacker from some backwater called Earth...okay, so you have to suspend disbelief.

[Blue]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

Used an I-Mac, didn't they?

 

That brings to mind two opposing jokes: "If aliens don't use Windows they MUST be a superior race." and "They used a Mac and it took out their whole interstellar network!"

[MikeyMitchell]

Re: Classes of Minds

Used an I-Mac' date=' didn't they?That brings to mind two opposing jokes: "If aliens don't use Windows they MUST be a superior race." and "They used a Mac and it took out their whole interstellar network!"[/quote']Heh heh.Not an iMac, but a PowerBook. (Apple must dump a lot of money into having their computers appear in movies.)But we're grotesquely off topic here, so we should probably halt the Mac lovefest.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Classes of Minds

 

I think this is one for the individual game, rather than something you can necessarily set hard and fast specific rules for.

 

You can set a general rule though, and it has already been done as part of the core ethos of Hero: you don't get anything other than marginal, balanced, advantages and limitations from sfx.

 

The class of mind is a sfx.

 

If having a machine mind that is not also effected by human class mind powers gives you anything over a marginal and balanced advantage, you should be paying points. Now whether it is an advantage or not is going to depend on how the game is run, so, looking at tinman's origninal post, and assuming from the fact that he wanted to charge 100 points for mental invulnerability to simulate the machine mind, I would assume that a machine mind would be a substantial, unbalanced advantage and should not be allowed: the effect should be built with points.

 

OTOH, if a player wanted to do it in one of my games, I'd probably allow it and balance it in-game, somehow.

 

If you want to balance it, can I suggest you could do it without being too direct: for example you could say the character has a machine class mind and therefore is immune to human class mind powers BUT takes double effect from anything with an electricity or lightning sfx. Neither the mental immunity nor the vulnerability are worth points or disadvantages, that's just the way it works for this character.

 

I know that approach will not find favour with everyone: all points should go in the balance. Fine, but it could work in this situation, and so long asit balances in practicce, I'd be OK with it.

 

Horses for courses.