Could your Champions character beat...

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

Batteries of power frameworks? Check.

 

God-awful movement powers? Check.

 

Able to defeat Captain America? Nope.

 

Sure, if Cap's dumb enough to let me control the fight and play my strengths against his weaknesses, the 430 point difference won't help him. But, and here is the subtle point Gary is missing, Cap isn't stupid. He's made a career out of going up against people with more raw power, and defeating them by controlling the fight, with superior skills and experience. Moody wouldn't make him break a sweat.

 

Much as I'd like to think my character is all that and a side of fries

 

 

Are you sure you want W^2 to see this 'skills light' character?

 

I'm going strictly by Treb's Cap writeup in the first post in this thread assuming a neutral GM. I freely admit that in an actual Captain America comic, Lariat would be beaten like a red headed stepchild.

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

2) Feel free to explain the sfx. This time, do it in such a manner as to explain how she can touch someone without them knowing it.

It's entirely possible there's a good explanation. But whatever the precise power set is, there _will_ be something else justified. Fundamental law of life.

 

3) (Sigh). I was explaining what a full PHD would encompass in terms of skills (the answer? several different skills). Had I left OFF bureaucracy it would have made my statement incomplete.

 

And does it really advance your case to score cheap points? (i.e., even if I did miss something on the CS, does that make your case any stronger? No, it doesn't. Because you were claiming the 13- skill roll made her a PHD... speaking of which, does that make those characters with 30pts in skills who 10 skills at 13- or higher PHD's TEN times over?).

 

 

2) Sigh. Why bother? If you can somehow say that stretching is boring while life support is interesting, there is no need to continue down this path.

 

3) Yes, 10 13- KS means the equivalent of 10 PHDs. Most people don't get beyond 11- in their careers, the amount needed to hold a job in that field.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

No, it's obvious you're pulling that number out of your butt.

 

The rule seems to be that any number less than an arbitrary one pulled out of his butt by Whamme^2 is 'skills light'.

 

Try "every good character I've ever had submitted to a game I was running, every fellow PC I've seen the sheet for [or they came within two or three points, anyway]".* Not arbitrary. Well, somewhat arbitrary. But 30 is a nice round number, and it's within the right range.

 

And 15 is a lot lower than that.

 

*And just to be explicit: Not saying you're a bad player. Just saying that this HAS been the (unwritten) standard in every game I've participated in.

[Moody Loner]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

Assuming a neutral GM, if he plays Cap believably, I'm done.

 

With that, I'm done. Night, all.

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

Try "every good character I've ever had submitted to a game I was running' date=' every fellow PC I've seen the sheet for [or they came within two or three points, anyway']".* Not arbitrary. Well, somewhat arbitrary. But 30 is a nice round number, and it's within the right range.

 

And 15 is a lot lower than that.

 

*And just to be explicit: Not saying you're a bad player. Just saying that this HAS been the (unwritten) standard in every game I've participated in.

 

 

Well, to put it bluntly, your circle is much smaller than the total circle of champions players. Other circles have different standards. I usually go for about 10% of a character's points to be noncombat stuff, but it could go higher. I think my High Priestess of Thoth has about 30-40%, but she happens to be a 1800 pt character.

 

And based on what people are actually posting on these boards, 30 pts seems more and more arbitrary.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

No, you made it clear that you expect a 350 pt character to have the same skills as a 1000 pt character.

 

If they had the same background, YES. If someone is playing Superman: As He Began, it will cost him the same amount to be a reporter as it would cost ANY other character.

 

And yes, I would apply the same bare minimum standards for showing that you actually thought about what your character knows.

 

Android, who you brought up earlier, has the same skills as Gadget (well, they're two or three different). That's because that's the kind of skills that kind of ubergenius should have. If I added 400 pts of Doctor Destroyer-esque power armour to Gadget, the character would not be relatively skills heavier or lighter. They would have a smaller %age, but they would still have all the skills the background needs (or at least, all the ones I could think of).

 

Yeah, since obviously PS CEO 13- and KS Business World 13- means she has no idea how to run a business.

 

It's obvious that you're not even pretending to discuss the character rationally anymore.

 

She knows how to be a CEO. No finance skills, no legal knowledge, no knowledge of accounting, no interpersonal skills. No contacts with any of them either.

 

She also seemingly has no line of small talk.

 

A PS is enough to be the boss. You'd need more skills to be able to guide those below you.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

Are you sure you want W^2 to see this 'skills light' character?

 

I'm going strictly by Treb's Cap writeup in the first post in this thread assuming a neutral GM. I freely admit that in an actual Captain America comic, Lariat would be beaten like a red headed stepchild.

 

Do I *care* that other people play skills light characters? No.

 

 

Now, if Lariat _should_ be beaten by Cap... what could be done to Treb's writeup to make it so?

 

I'm thinking some kind of induce stupidity power, designed to stop an enemy from playing to their strengths, might be in order.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

2) Sigh. Why bother? If you can somehow say that stretching is boring while life support is interesting, there is no need to continue down this path.

 

3) Yes, 10 13- KS means the equivalent of 10 PHDs. Most people don't get beyond 11- in their careers, the amount needed to hold a job in that field.

 

2) It's not boring. It's just not very out of combat oriented, since she doesn't have any of the power tricks required for that.

 

Life Support, OTOH, has it's "tricks" built in.

 

3) Most people have more than one thing they're okay at. And INT 18 superheroes aren't "most people" anyway.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

Well' date=' to put it bluntly, your circle is much smaller than the total circle of champions players. Other circles have different standards. I usually go for about 10% of a character's points to be [b']noncombat[/b] stuff, but it could go higher. I think my High Priestess of Thoth has about 30-40%, but she happens to be a 1800 pt character.

 

And based on what people are actually posting on these boards, 30 pts seems more and more arbitrary.

 

So what IS skills light in your mind anyway?

 

Incidently, PC's tend to have more points in skills than generic characters, as a PC is someone you'll have to run for extended periods of time, so you think about them more and make them more of a person.

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

If they had the same background, YES. If someone is playing Superman: As He Began, it will cost him the same amount to be a reporter as it would cost ANY other character.

 

And yes, I would apply the same bare minimum standards for showing that you actually thought about what your character knows.

 

Android, who you brought up earlier, has the same skills as Gadget (well, they're two or three different). That's because that's the kind of skills that kind of ubergenius should have. If I added 400 pts of Doctor Destroyer-esque power armour to Gadget, the character would not be relatively skills heavier or lighter. They would have a smaller %age, but they would still have all the skills the background needs (or at least, all the ones I could think of).

 

 

To put it bluntly, you're wrong. Every gaming group I know of allows, indeed encourages, the players to add noncombat stuff with XP. Usually GMs prefer players to do so, rather than adding combat stuff such as Dex/Spd or damage/defenses.

 

And you have 1 set of characters with what you would classify as reasonable noncombat stuff. The rest of your writeups have, to put it charitably, failed to meet your standards.

 

 

She knows how to be a CEO. No finance skills, no legal knowledge, no knowledge of accounting, no interpersonal skills. No contacts with any of them either.

 

She also seemingly has no line of small talk.

 

A PS is enough to be the boss. You'd need more skills to be able to guide those below you.

 

 

You were implying that she didn't know how to run a business. Your exact words were:

 

Business success, when you have no idea how to run a business, takes a lot of luck.

 

Obviously, PS CEO and KS Business World is EXACTLY what you need to run a business! And bureacratics should take care of the rest, the handling of protocol and procedure and subordinates.

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

2) It's not boring. It's just not very out of combat oriented, since she doesn't have any of the power tricks required for that.

 

Life Support, OTOH, has it's "tricks" built in.

 

3) Most people have more than one thing they're okay at. And INT 18 superheroes aren't "most people" anyway.

 

2) Watch the Incredibles or any comic with Reed Richards or Plastic Man. Stretching has enormous out of combat uses. A gas mask is more interesting than Elastic Girl?

 

3) She has 5 things she's more than 'okay' at.

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

So what IS skills light in your mind anyway?

 

Incidently, PC's tend to have more points in skills than generic characters, as a PC is someone you'll have to run for extended periods of time, so you think about them more and make them more of a person.

 

 

I told you, 10% or so in noncombat stuff is acceptable in my mind. And further skills could always be bought up with XP, at least in most worlds.

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

By the way, could you post a 350 pt version of Android, with the same skills and noncombat abilities, who you feel would be playable as a PC? Gadget I'm afraid, would be far too weak unless the GM lets you get away with murder with the VPP.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

By the way' date=' could you post a 350 pt version of Android, with the same skills and noncombat abilities, who you feel would be playable as a PC? Gadget I'm afraid, would be far too weak unless the GM lets you get away with murder with the VPP.[/quote']

 

Gadget is sub-350. I'd probably just add some DEX/defenses/miscellania:

 

20 STR 30

48 DEX 26

30 CON 25

2 BOD 11

28 INT 38

16 EGO 18

0 PRE 10

4 COM 18

4 PD 10

5 ED 10

24 SPD 6

2 REC 12

0 END 50

0 STN 40

===

173

 

3 Acrobatics 14-

3 Breakfall 14-

3 Climbing 14-

3 Computer Programming 17-

3 Cryptography 17-

3 Deduction 17-

3 Electronics 17-

3 Inventor 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Geography 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Government Studies 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: History 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Literature 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Music 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Religion 17-

3 Mechanics 17-

3 Professional Skill: Clarinet 17-

3 Systems Operations 17-

3 Scholar

3 Scientist

2 Science Skill: Astronomy 17-

2 Science Skill: Biology 17-

2 Science Skill: Chemistry 17-

2 Science Skill: Mathematics 17-

2 Science Skill: Physics 17-

10 Skill Level: +1 Overall

==

71

 

60 Gadget Pool

15 Control Cost: Needs Toolkit to change (-½), Devices Only (-½)

17 Hidden Armouring: 7/7 Armour, IIF (-¼)

12 6/6 Combat Luck

 

(I went with this one, because paring off 400 points takes time. )

 

This version is a mutant with enhanced stats and a gadget pool. She'd be what I'd run if I was playing her and Android was a fellow PC; the enhanced stats make the physical power mismatch a bit less (also, I was running out of ideas. ) (plus, if you take away her toys in this version, she's still a low end martial brick, which is good enough for dealing with evil minions).

 

The gadget pool is a bit smaller since most 350 games have a 12 DC cap or something equivalent.

 

The disadvantages haven't changed at all (except to cut them down to 150).

 

Oh, and I pared off an extra BODY point becuase most Champs games are less lethal than what she was in.

 

Yeah. That's my ballpark for "Teen Supergenius with a mastery of every school subject...".

 

 

 

Edit: And to wander back on topic, she should be absolutely screwed vs Captain America. He trashes brilliant inventors all the time. He'll probably catch her monologing, disarm and disable her devices, and talk her into surrendering.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

2) Watch the Incredibles or any comic with Reed Richards or Plastic Man. Stretching has enormous out of combat uses. A gas mask is more interesting than Elastic Girl?

 

3) She has 5 things she's more than 'okay' at.

 

2) Those are power tricks Lariat doesn't have. Stretching, the Champions power, just gives you extra range for HtoH. She simply has not bought the tricks. Full LS, OTOH, let's you ambush from inside a pond, or a furnace, or disarm the reactor core from the inside (this may still do damage, obviously, but probably reduced enough that a brick can do take it).

 

3) They're all heavily tied together. In a genre where a common archetype is 'has all her skills, plus absolute mastery of martial arts, plus science, plus detective work' and another is 'all her skills, plus weapons design, plus science skills to here'... yeah.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

To put it bluntly, you're wrong. Every gaming group I know of allows, indeed encourages, the players to add noncombat stuff with XP. Usually GMs prefer players to do so, rather than adding combat stuff such as Dex/Spd or damage/defenses.

 

And you have 1 set of characters with what you would classify as reasonable noncombat stuff. The rest of your writeups have, to put it charitably, failed to meet your standards.

 

I did not say it was not allowed, I said it was not required.

Look. Take Gadget. Expand her to 750. She'd gain an assload of skills, because she's a genius, and 750 her would no longer be "still young, still finding herself". She'd probably be Doom-lite.

 

The Flame would definately gain a lot of noncombat abilities. Mostly because he was concepted with more. (So I thought a little too big...)

 

But Wraith? He might add a few here and there, but I'd mostly toy with his powers. He's comfortable with "who he is", it's his powers that worry him. (He is, of course, dead, so he won't be gaining XP in that form any time soon). Not directly adding raw power, but he'd add various powers.

 

You were implying that she didn't know how to run a business. Your exact words were:

 

Business success, when you have no idea how to run a business, takes a lot of luck.

 

Obviously, PS CEO and KS Business World is EXACTLY what you need to run a business! And bureacratics should take care of the rest, the handling of protocol and procedure and subordinates.

 

It's part of what you'd need. Look, those three would, if I was GM, be enough to manage the company. However, as the face (wo)man of the corp, the lack of interaction skills should, and would, hurt, and she'd be relying extensively on NPCs who she has no reason (beyond 'she pays them') to run the company.

 

But get a business empire off the ground by herself? Someone that hard working and intelligent should pick up a bit of info about a lot of things in the process, and she should (IMO) have something reflecting her style of business management.

[Bloodstone]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

lol.. BOD of 2. Nice typo.

 

For the record, I have several characters that could possibly take Cap, but they all play to his weak points. Menatalists, Super Mages, characters with Exotic attacks.

 

The character that I prefer to play, which are mostly physical types like metamorphs, speedsters, bricks and martial artists, would tend to play to Caps strong points. Since none of them are in the 750pt range, I would expect to lose. If any one of them could reliably beat Cap when he has 300-400pts worth of combat experience on his side, then I would tell the GM to go back and rewrite Cap...

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

lol.. BOD of 2. Nice typo.

 

For the record, I have several characters that could possibly take Cap, but they all play to his weak points. Menatalists, Super Mages, characters with Exotic attacks.

 

The character that I prefer to play, which are mostly physical types like metamorphs, speedsters, bricks and martial artists, would tend to play to Caps strong points. Since none of them are in the 750pt range, I would expect to lose. If any one of them could reliably beat Cap when he has 300-400pts worth of combat experience on his side, then I would tell the GM to go back and rewrite Cap...

 

No typo; I listed it cost/stat/value. It's easier to tally that way.

[Bloodstone]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

ooops... yeah, I probably should have noticed that once I got down to the Presence of 0...

 

(where's the "dies of embarasment" emoticon?)

[Fox1]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

But get a business empire off the ground by herself? Someone that hard working and intelligent should pick up a bit of info about a lot of things in the process' date=' and she should (IMO) have something reflecting her style of business management.[/quote']

 

Here's the set I used for a capable business version of Emma Frost (I believe the one in the comic wasn't so capable, but that was long after I put this together):

 

3 Acting 13-

3 Bribery 13-

3 Bureaucratics 13-

3 Conversation 13-

5 High Society +1 14-

3 Oratory 13-

3 PS: MBA 13-

3 Persuasion 13-

3 Seduction 13-

3 Skill: +1 High Society, Seduction, Conversation

 

10 Wealthy: $5,000,000 per year 15-

18 Contact: Frost Industries (Organization) 15-

- 6 Useful Skill or Resources

- 9 Slavishly Loyal

- 3 Contacts of it own

3 Contact: Rotating High Society Personage 12-

- 1 Contacts of its own

- 1 Useful Skill or Resources

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

Gadget is sub-350. I'd probably just add some DEX/defenses/miscellania:

 

20 STR 30

48 DEX 26

30 CON 25

2 BOD 11

28 INT 38

16 EGO 18

0 PRE 10

4 COM 18

4 PD 10

5 ED 10

24 SPD 6

2 REC 12

0 END 50

0 STN 40

===

173

 

3 Acrobatics 14-

3 Breakfall 14-

3 Climbing 14-

3 Computer Programming 17-

3 Cryptography 17-

3 Deduction 17-

3 Electronics 17-

3 Inventor 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Geography 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Government Studies 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: History 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Literature 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Music 17-

2 Knowledge Skill: Religion 17-

3 Mechanics 17-

3 Professional Skill: Clarinet 17-

3 Systems Operations 17-

3 Scholar

3 Scientist

2 Science Skill: Astronomy 17-

2 Science Skill: Biology 17-

2 Science Skill: Chemistry 17-

2 Science Skill: Mathematics 17-

2 Science Skill: Physics 17-

10 Skill Level: +1 Overall

==

71

 

60 Gadget Pool

15 Control Cost: Needs Toolkit to change (-½), Devices Only (-½)

17 Hidden Armouring: 7/7 Armour, IIF (-¼)

12 6/6 Combat Luck

 

(I went with this one, because paring off 400 points takes time. )

 

This version is a mutant with enhanced stats and a gadget pool. She'd be what I'd run if I was playing her and Android was a fellow PC; the enhanced stats make the physical power mismatch a bit less (also, I was running out of ideas. ) (plus, if you take away her toys in this version, she's still a low end martial brick, which is good enough for dealing with evil minions).

 

The gadget pool is a bit smaller since most 350 games have a 12 DC cap or something equivalent.

 

The disadvantages haven't changed at all (except to cut them down to 150).

 

Oh, and I pared off an extra BODY point becuase most Champs games are less lethal than what she was in.

 

Yeah. That's my ballpark for "Teen Supergenius with a mastery of every school subject...".

 

 

 

Edit: And to wander back on topic, she should be absolutely screwed vs Captain America. He trashes brilliant inventors all the time. He'll probably catch her monologing, disarm and disable her devices, and talk her into surrendering.

 

 

I asked for Android specifically because he has lots of 'conception' powers that you can get away with on 731 but not on 350. I was interested in seeing what conception you were willing to sacrifice.

 

I guess the answer is that you simply wouldn't play Android in a 350 game because he wouldn't be competitive unless you pared away some skills/conception powers.

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

2) Those are power tricks Lariat doesn't have. Stretching, the Champions power, just gives you extra range for HtoH. She simply has not bought the tricks. Full LS, OTOH, let's you ambush from inside a pond, or a furnace, or disarm the reactor core from the inside (this may still do damage, obviously, but probably reduced enough that a brick can do take it).

 

3) They're all heavily tied together. In a genre where a common archetype is 'has all her skills, plus absolute mastery of martial arts, plus science, plus detective work' and another is 'all her skills, plus weapons design, plus science skills to here'... yeah.

 

 

2) As I repeat over and over again, she has lots of power tricks that she does have. You're just ignoring them. Who the heck cares if she can't disarm a reactor core? That's your criteria for what an 'interesting' power is? Unbelievable.

 

3) I just pointed out in this very thread, a whole bunch of characters who don't have 'all her skills, plus absolute mastery of martial arts, plus science, plus detective work' or 'all her skills, plus weapons design, plus science skills to here'. Apparently it's not as common as you think.

[Gary]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

I did not say it was not allowed, I said it was not required.

Look. Take Gadget. Expand her to 750. She'd gain an assload of skills, because she's a genius, and 750 her would no longer be "still young, still finding herself". She'd probably be Doom-lite.

 

The Flame would definately gain a lot of noncombat abilities. Mostly because he was concepted with more. (So I thought a little too big...)

 

But Wraith? He might add a few here and there, but I'd mostly toy with his powers. He's comfortable with "who he is", it's his powers that worry him. (He is, of course, dead, so he won't be gaining XP in that form any time soon). Not directly adding raw power, but he'd add various powers.

 

No, throughout this thread, you've implied many times that a character should have pretty much as many skills at 350 as she does at 1000. Now you're contradicting yourself.

 

 

It's part of what you'd need. Look, those three would, if I was GM, be enough to manage the company. However, as the face (wo)man of the corp, the lack of interaction skills should, and would, hurt, and she'd be relying extensively on NPCs who she has no reason (beyond 'she pays them') to run the company.

 

But get a business empire off the ground by herself? Someone that hard working and intelligent should pick up a bit of info about a lot of things in the process, and she should (IMO) have something reflecting her style of business management.

 

I guess you've never heard of a company spokeswoman have you?

 

Lariat has KS Textiles 13-, which is the industry specific knowledge she would pickup. And she has PS Fashion Design 13- which does reflect the process of knowing her product and getting it off the ground.

 

Are you even reading the character sheet?

[Guest C--]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

I don't build beginning characters with all the skills/contacts/perks they "should" have. I buy those things when I expect to use them. Sure, Ferrous Man is a billionaire playboy, but for the first 3 or 4 sessions, the GM will be running how he built his power suit to escape from the jungles of Cambodia and defeat the Predator that is killing off all the rebels. So I don't really need to buy all his social contacts until he gets back to civilization.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Could your Champions character beat...

 

No, throughout this thread, you've implied many times that a character should have pretty much as many skills at 350 as she does at 1000. Now you're contradicting yourself.

 

At a _minimum_. The _minimum_ is the same. The __minimum_. The _minimum_.

 

Minimum. Required. What a character should have AT MINIMUM.

 

Minimum.

 

Read in context. Skills light is skills light, whether it's a 200pt character, a 100pt character, or 1000pt character, they should have a certain minimum level of skills.