mikesama Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 So I am getting ready to run a game and one of the players is trying to find a way to give his character and infinate number of duplicates a-la Multiple man. How would one stat this up and would one even allow it in thier game. (Currently the idea of infinite duplications gets a no from me) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Desmarais Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot So I am getting ready to run a game and one of the players is trying to find a way to give his character and infinate number of duplicates a-la Multiple man. How would one stat this up and would one even allow it in thier game. (Currently the idea of infinite duplications gets a no from me) Duplication is an expensive power - for one duplicate. However, it becomes relatively cheap and high volumes in that 5 points doubles the number of duplicates (for 100 active points you can get 1024 250 points duplicates - that's a spicy meat-a-ball). Infinite, however, is a concept that Hero really doesn't do. Would I allow a one many army in a game? Maybe. It would depend alot on what the 1024 characters could actually do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hawksmoor Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Absorbtion to Duplication. Every 5 points absorbed pops out a new duplicate. Add in the +1 Advantage 'Duplicates can Duplicate' and all is gravy. Hawksmoor -Channelling Champsguy! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Desmarais Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot No actual concept here, just playing with numbers... 1024 bricks with 60 STR and 30 DEF who are able to coordinate their attacks. Yuck! Val Char Cost 60 STR50 18 DEX24 30 CON40 17 BODY14 12 INT2 13 EGO6 10 PRE0 10 COM0 30 PD18 30 ED24 4 SPD12 18 REC0 60 END0 62 STUN0 6" RUN0 2" SWIM0 27" LEAP0 Characteristics Cost: 190 Cost Power END 100 Duplication (creates 1024 250-point Duplicates) 0 20 Damage Resistance (20 PD/20 ED) 0 20 Leaping +15" (27" forward, 13 1/2" upward) (Accurate) 2 Powers Cost: 140 Cost Skill 10 +2 with HTH Combat 3 Acrobatics 13- 3 Breakfall 13- 3 Teamwork 13- Skills Cost: 19 Total Character Cost: 349 Disadvantage Points:150 Base Points: 200 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
austenandrews Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Or give all Duplicates Aid to Duplication. John's right. I don't think there's a way to get infinite dupes, but you can get functionally infinite. When would he ever need more than 1000? Personally I wouldn't allow more than a few dupes anyway, since they hog combat egregiously. I'd allow more than a few only in situations where combat was running "off the clock." If someone absolutely wanted infinite dupes, I'd probably allow that buying 1000 gives you infinity. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vorsch Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Summon a exact copy who also has summon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zed-F Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot No, no, no! Or at least, not the way I'd do it. How's about a way to do this in a balanced (or at least balanceable) non-cheesy fashion, for a non-exorbitant cost. One way to do this would be to take a character who's base form is pretty much a highly trained normal. Give him something like this (flavoured with limitations and power frameworks to taste): Multiple Man: Summon 32 50-point Cannon Fodder Duplicate, Slavishly Devoted (+1) (70 Active Points) 7 Knowing Myself: Mind Link , One Specific Mind, Number of Minds (x32) (30 Active Points) Then stat out what a 50-point version of Multiple Man would look like, and Voila! You have a character who can summon as many agent-level versions of himself as he wants, in batches of up to 32. Note that unless the GM says otherwise, only 32 will be present in the scene at a time -- the rest will be 'off-camera' and vanish. The trick here is you run the agents in batches, and don't try to get fancy with the details. If Viper shows up with 30 agents, you don't try to figure out the best move for every individual agent, do you? The same principle applies here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Desmarais Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Summon a exact copy who also has summon Summon is poor substitute for Duplication - for many reason, not the least of which is that you (the player) do not really control the summoned being. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Onyxclaw Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Summon is poor substitute for Duplication - for many reason' date=' not the least of which is that you (the player) do not really control the summoned being.[/quote'] it's same as with followers... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zed-F Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Summon is poor substitute for Duplication - for many reason' date=' not the least of which is that you (the player) do not really control the summoned being.[/quote'] I respectfully disagree. For the type of thing presented here, it's perfect. Slavishly Devoted on the summon, plus Mind Link, means that unless the GM wants to get really crazy on you, you effectively do control them... and if the GM wants to, he can deprive you of control over Duplicates anyway. He pretty much requires GM fiat in either case. Moreover, any Duplicate that is killed is gone permanently. This is not appropriate for a character like Multiple Man who can always generate more. Furthermore, if you try to do this with Duplication... well it's just not possible, as you've seen, and still have a balanced character, assuming you're not going pure Nar and forgoing mechanics for combat entirely. Either you wind up with a char who's no more than an agent himself and a bunch of duplicates who can be present (and killed permanently) in ridiculous numbers, or else you wind up with a one man batallion that renders the rest of the team largely superfluous. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Onyxclaw Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot yes, but if I'm not mistaken the summon rules allow you to give commands to summoned creatures in a number divisible by your ego unless you pay for multiples on that control. So eventually you would not control them anymore, or they would vanish depending on the GMs rules for summons. Which might be fun in and of itself. Having slavishly devoted summons that get out of control is always good for some fun Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zed-F Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Since the SFX is he's duplicating himself, this probably isn't going to be a huge problem. Slavishly Devoted will tend to allow for quite a few commands, especially if the summoner has a reasonable EGO. In the case of cannon fodder duplicates, they would probably vanish after you ran out... but you might be tempted to handwave it since (a)they have a good number of commands to begin with, ( summoning a new one refreshes the command count, and © they're all identical anyway. If the GM is feeling anal about the mechanics here, one could always stipulate that the last command before running out of commands would be to vanish, freeing up that slot for a new summon, so as to avoid having to worry about those sorts of complications. Of course, the GM always has the option to say that some get out of control, if he's feeling nasty, but then he could do that with regular Duplicates anyway. Most of the time, it probably won't be an issue. It's not like he's summoning something that *wants* to get away from him, or like (if he takes the mind link) he'll somehow lose track of them (again, barring GM fiat.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
austenandrews Posted August 11, 2005 Report Share Posted August 11, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot You're seriously discussing Summon as an option? Please God, make it stop! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vorsch Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot As all the almight of these boards keep saying "dont get hung up on names" "Energy blast dosent mean energy blast," nor does any other power mean intrinsically what it says it is, you want to create infinite copies of yourself, use summon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
austenandrews Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot And if I want to create a gun, I should build one and then Summon it. Yadda yadda yadda... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dr. Anomaly Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Absorbtion to Duplication. Every 5 points absorbed pops out a new duplicate. Add in the +1 Advantage 'Duplicates can Duplicate' and all is gravy. Or use the "Can Add/Subtract Adders" option, and every 5 points doesn't give you an extra duplicate...it gives you double the number of duplicates you had a moment ago... That could get ugly really quick. Of course, if you want it really infinite, you'd have to split the absorbed points between the Duplicate and the Absorption itself. It gets tricky, but it can be done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dr. Anomaly Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot And by the way, check out this thread. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vorsch Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Simply tell the player NO Hero requires you to use the most expensive way of simulating this power.. and he dosent have infinite points A triumph of stupidity over playability Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Democracy Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot The last duplication character that I had used the infinite duplicates as SFX for other powers. What does the player want the duplicates to do? My game was rather iron age and the SFX of his force field was multiples of duplicates getting killed as more poured forward to continue whatever was going on. Clairsentience as duplicates moving elsewhere etc etc. It only takes a bit of thought to see what might be possible - build in some time delays for bringing the duplicates forth and those infinite duplicates are all just SFX... Doc Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hugh Neilson Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot You're seriously discussing Summon as an option? Please God' date=' make it stop![/quote'] Why not? [History Lesson] Champions III introduced Duplication intended for use in Supers games because that's the genre where the ability tended to see play. Meanwhile, Fantasy Hero introduced Summon, because that's the genre where the ability tended to see play. Since then, the rules have steadily moved the two to greater and greater similarity, and overlap.[/History Lesson] As has already been pointed out, a Slavishly Loyal summoned character with stats identical to the summoner is, functionally, a duplicate. Some characters who Duplicate in the comics encounter problems that their duplicates are NOT slavishly loyal. The Madrox limited series had a lot of this for Multiple Man, and Multiple Man has also had problems with Duplicates who don't want to reintegrate in the past. Similarly, is there a lot of difference between a slavishly loyal summoned creature, and a duplicate who pays the advantage to spend 100% of his points in a manner different than the base character? I don't think so. As for "a dead duplicate is gone forever", with the sole exception of the LSH character Triplicate Girl/Duo Damsel, I cannot recall such an occurence in any character with duplication as his schtick. Even Flashback (now knowing he would someday be summoned to his death) didn't lose the ability to summon duplicates. I wouldn't be surprised for the two to merge in some future edition of the rules. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hugh Neilson Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot ABsorbtion is an easy way to go. Define half its points going to Absorbtion (to increase the maximum points which can be absorbed) and half to duplication, and it is infinite. And Jamioe Madrox, Marvel's Multiple Man does use Absorbtion to duplicate, although he seems able to create some number of duplicates with very limited physical force absorbed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlackSword Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot And if I want to create a gun' date=' I should build one and then Summon it. Yadda yadda yadda...[/quote'] That's just silly. You build as a summon, tiny piece of metal moving at high speeds, one command only (hit that guy), disappears after one phase. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zornwil Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot Re Summoning someone with Summon (a cool idea, actually), somehow it reminds me of the Sealab 2021 where 2 of the characters, Sparky and the smart guy (forgot his name, but I should add that Sparky is the idiot), got into some trap and then got into this weird time recursion thing where duplicates would get created. But each duplicate was degraded and mutated, and all were independent-minded with no reintegration possible and no inherent tendency towards such (so Summon probably better than Duplication), it was really funny if anyone saw that. Anyway, was just thinking that you could indeed have a good case for Summon a Summoner... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prestidigitator Posted August 12, 2005 Report Share Posted August 12, 2005 Re: Duplicating alot And by the way' date=' check out this thread. Yep. With 5E it bacame quite possible to buy Duplication in which all the duplicates also have Duplication. Adjustment Powers aren't even necessary. Thus I can create two duplicates at once, and they can each create two duplicates.... I don't see this as entirely unbalanced, actually. There are serious drawbacks, too. Once a duplicate is killed, it's killed. End of story, find a suitable Resurrection Power or earn more experience. If that duplicate didn't create his duplicates, his Power no longer exists to continue the infinite progression. You have to consider the parent/child relationships in this kind of build. If the character can create two duplicates and they both die, you're out of luck. Summon does get around this issue, and can become unbalanced if not mitigated well by the GM. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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