Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

[radioKAOS]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

As the character grew and grew and spent more and more years worth of experience, he was again becoming a Drain: Duke's fun (seriously, Archermoo-- he had a 385 STR, for Pete's sake! You can't pound a villain with a 77d6 attack; you just can't!), and something had to be done.

 

Not to say you didn't earn it, but what GM in his/her right mind would let you put that many points into STR???

[Duke Bushido]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Trust me---

 

there was nowhere else to spend them. There just wasn't. And really, once you break the threshold of 'too much to actually be practical,' well, really--- it's alread not practical. What's more going to hurt? The defenses were the same, at that point-- he could already survive anything that campaign could through at him.

 

I would like to take just a minute to refresh the point that this character should have been retired-- I _wanted_ him to be retired-- _long_ before he ever got anywhere _near_ as cosmic as he ended up being. But when the chips are down, I'll usually give in to the enjoyment of the group. I'm not going to be the one to rob the fun for everyone else.

[Duke Bushido]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Sorry, KAOS---

 

it just occured to me that I hadn't actually answered your question:

 

Not to say you didn't earn it' date=' but what GM in his/her right mind would let you put that many points into STR???[/quote']

 

The shortest, most concise answer that I can give you is "One who implicitly trusts you to remain true to the character concept, and to never, ever actually pound on someone with a 77d6 attack."

 

One that by that point has known you for a very long time, and knows that you're not going to screw up his game, no matter how easy that might be.

[radioKAOS]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

well sheesh, how many points was the campaign at that point???

[Phil]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

I have actually built and played characters who could have been a hero or a villain. They usually had some mighty strong temptation that could lead to a fall from the path of the hero' date=' and they might slip from time to time, but they kept trying to do good in spite of themselves[/quote']

 

I went further and built a character with multiform who had a light and dark side. Original concept was kinda Supes/Batman or Apollo/Midnighter contrast, but in the end I decided it was actually more appropriate as an Jekyll/Hyde NPC, with the dark-side character actually being a murderer and the light-side character being the Heroic Paragon. It's called irony, I guess

 

Edit: needless to say, that was one crime the heroic paragon just *couldn't* solve. Hence, hook to involve the PCs, do away with the heroic paragon and set themselves up for a new campaign..

[Super Squirrel]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Side Effect (GM Gets to Punch You If Power is Involved with Metagaming)

[Phil]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Side Effect: Loses 10 points from every characteristic deliberately made to end in 3 or 8 to take advantage of rounding

 

OK, so it's a pet peeve that others will doubtless call good common sense. I still needed to post it - HERO forums are cheaper than therapy

[Duke Bushido]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

well sheesh' date=' how many points was the campaign at that point???[/quote']

 

Nowhere near enough to justify that character. As noted, the character had stopped being fun to use a few campaigns prior. Nobody likes to hobble their every move, and even though I don't care too much for 'combat only' type games, I do like to be able to participate with my teammates. Not an option with that character. I was constantly evolving his personality to find reasons why he wouldn't attack anyone, etc.

 

But I digress.

 

The power level of this character outstripped the upper limits of the campaigns in general during the fourth campaign. Despite my own desires, he was around for seven or eight more....

[Sean Waters]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Side Effect (GM Gets to Punch You If Power is Involved with Metagaming)

 

Now that is witty.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Totally. For all of the above. The first time I had someone else on the team tell me, "Well, I built her so she could go either way . . . she could be a hero OR villain, depending on what happens," I could only smack my forehead and shake my head. I then contemplated having my mentalist mind control her into behaving.

 

She ended up kidnapping a town's worth of children, and left the game. Her defense at doing something that appalled the entire team so was, "The GM never SAID he wanted us to be total good guys! It's mixed messages!"

 

The GM should not have to SAY, "I want heroes in this game."

 

 

LOOK AWAY NOW, NO REALLY, DON'T READ THIS POST

 

Off topic, but....this post reminds me of a DnD 'evil' campaign, way back.

 

One particular character made a bargain with a devil for all sorts of power in exchange for the sacrifice of 13 virgins within 3 days.

 

Completely unperturbed, he made his way to the nearest town with a bag of gold and opened a children's hospital.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Ah! Excellent question, Archermoo!

..........

It's enough to drive you nuts.

 

 

Short answer:

 

I would have jumped on it like a shot. It was the single most important thing in the world to the character, and I alread had other characters I was itching to try out.

 

Isn't it nice to see someone who finds 385 strength a burden rather than some indication of 'the greatest character ever'. Rep when next able, and stop being so damn reasonable.

[Dynamo]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

So I guess the question is' date=' was he just THAT bad at math, or was he just cheating scum?[/quote']

Just because I think people might enjoy the history on this one:

 

I was running the game in the Army because I sick unto death of D&D. I had opened the game to all comers and ended up running 3 sessions a week to handle the load. I wouldn't want to try that again, but it sure was fun at the time. Each night was a different superteam in a different city, with frequent crossovers to work around field exercises and other deployments.

 

I'd been warned about this guy and his cheating ways, and I'd reassured the sources that I would keep an eye on him. He wasn't the only one who showed up to the first several sessions with powers outside the AP limits or with otherwise abusive constructs, but I treated each infraction as an opportunity to teach the system.

 

Gradually, most of the abuses were transformed into worthy Champions characters. Some players hated the control I was exercising over character creation and stopped showing up, eliminating the need for a 4th night. But this guy kept showing up and seemed to have a compliant character after enough cajoling.

 

Until a couple weeks later, when he seemed to be hitting awfully high DCVs rather consistently. I had introduced a trio of high DCV low DEF badguys to give two AoE specialists a chance to shine, but this guy never seemed to miss. I started watching his die rolls and estimated his functional OCV had to be about 19.

 

Now I was allowing OCV to hit 18 as long as DC didn't exceed 10, or DC could be 15 as long as OCV capped at 8. I pointed out the problem, made an on-the-spot adjustment to his OCV and DC and asked him to stay after so I could look over his sheet.

 

It looked nothing like the one he'd submitted two weeks prior. He explained he'd spent some xp and reworked some disappointing powers. I countered that any changes to finalized characters required my approval and went over his new sheet. Everything on it was undervalued. He had one power marked at 25 points that should have cost over 100.

 

Asked how he came up with his real costs, he replied that he'd thrown away his scratch paper and didn't recall the actual calculations. I didn't believe him, but decided to give him enough rope to hang himself. I explained the system again and sent him back to the barracks with a spreadsheet he could use to calculate power costs.

 

It was about this time that I got in a fight in the motorpool. During this fight, I threw another soldier over the fence into the parking lot. Despite the incident getting swept under the rug by the chain of command (we were 2 days from a field exercise and at least 10 of us would have been in lockup), word got around, my temper and throwing distance increasing with every retelling.

 

Meanwhile, my problem player was continuing his out-of-spec power shenanigans. Every week, something was wrong with his costing, and he clearly was not using the spreadsheet I'd given him. Finally, I made the addition to his disads:

 

0 Player will be thrown bodily out the front door upon failure of randomly scheduled Calculator Audit

 

He nervously laughed it off at first, but broke a sweat at the next session when I announced that each session would start 15 minutes earlier so that at least one character sheet could be audited each week. It didn't stop him from cheating however. Rather than call him on it each time, I bided my time while his abuses grew each week.

 

When I named him for the audit a couple week later, he at first claimed he'd forgotten his sheet. When presented with a fresh printout of his approved version (also known as a lifeline; I'm not entirely heartless), he suddenly "found" his copy. I guess the lure of cheating his buns off was greater than his fear of a ballistic incident.

 

I'd specifically set aside a red pen for the audits. I'd used it only once the previous week for a rounding error (the guy had shorted himself a point, so I have to assume it was innocent). When I started shaking my head and liberally marking his sheet in red, he became visibly agitated and shortly bolted for the door.

 

And well he should have. He had exceeded every maximum cap, including the ones that lowered your other caps, and had undervalued the cost of literally everything on the sheet except COM, which he had left at 10. We packed up his stuff, and I launched his backpack out the front door to the cheers of the other players (and one muttered comment that I'd gotten better height with Pvt Grant).

 

I assume he got his stuff, but he never spoke to me again, and I don't actually care.

[radioKAOS]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

I went further and built a character with multiform who had a light and dark side. Original concept was kinda Supes/Batman or Apollo/Midnighter contrast, but in the end I decided it was actually more appropriate as an Jekyll/Hyde NPC, with the dark-side character actually being a murderer and the light-side character being the Heroic Paragon. It's called irony, I guess

 

Edit: needless to say, that was one crime the heroic paragon just *couldn't* solve. Hence, hook to involve the PCs, do away with the heroic paragon and set themselves up for a new campaign..

 

Sounds like a great character! Did you actually get to play the Dark Side Character?

[radioKAOS]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Isn't it nice to see someone who finds 385 strength a burden rather than some indication of 'the greatest character ever'. Rep when next able' date=' and stop being so damn reasonable.[/quote']

 

Agreed. Though I think most of the reasonable people here would think this way.

 

What's the fun of playing if there isn't any challenge???

 

I'm sick to death of players who want to start off as the Dark Lord of the Sith... without ever working their way up from being a whining farm boy....

 

I'm sure most here will agree that we love to watch our characters grow, both in 'spirit' and in points.

[radioKAOS]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Just because I think people might enjoy the history on this one:

 

And I, for one, certainly did

[Dr. Anomaly]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Just because I think people might enjoy the history on this one:

That's a great story! I'll rep you tomorrow, when I have some more to use (already used today's allotment.)

[Dynamo]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Here's a Limitation for Speed I'd like to see:

 

Each phase only works if plan of action is already made (-3/4).

 

Now that's a pet peeve of mine.

 

"Ultra Fury, you're up."

"OK, um... What just happened? Where'd Darkvixen go? I was punching her in Segment 6. Oh, there she is. How'd she get there? Uh... OK... Hold on a sec..." ::reaches for rulebook::

 

GAAAAAAAH!!!!!!! DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE!

[Dust Raven]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Side Effect: Loses 10 points from every characteristic deliberately made to end in 3 or 8 to take advantage of rounding

 

OK, so it's a pet peeve that others will doubtless call good common sense. I still needed to post it - HERO forums are cheaper than therapy

 

Whew... good thing my DEX is 14 then...

[Dust Raven]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Here's a Limitation for Speed I'd like to see:

 

Each phase only works if plan of action is already made (-3/4).

 

Now that's a pet peeve of mine.

 

"Ultra Fury, you're up."

"OK, um... What just happened? Where'd Darkvixen go? I was punching her in Segment 6? Oh, there she is. How'd she get there? Uh... OK... Hold on a sec..." ::reaches for rulebook::

 

GAAAAAAAH!!!!!!! DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE!

 

I hate it when players do that.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

How about a slight topic shift?

 

A list of Limitations you know you'll never see on a character sheet:

 

Power only works if another character suggested the action it's being used in.

 

Power does not work if the other players had to wait for the player to get out of the bathroom to take his smegging turn already!

 

Side Effect (Character suffers INT Drain, activates if Power used during a Phase when the Player can't remember what happened in his previous Phase).

 

I could go on... but I should probably let the rest of you have a turn.

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Here's a Limitation for Speed I'd like to see:

 

Each phase only works if plan of action is already made (-3/4).

 

Now that's a pet peeve of mine.

 

"Ultra Fury, you're up."

"OK, um... What just happened? Where'd Darkvixen go? I was punching her in Segment 6? Oh, there she is. How'd she get there? Uh... OK... Hold on a sec..." ::reaches for rulebook::

 

GAAAAAAAH!!!!!!! DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE!

And here I thought that kind of conversation was unique to games with the Dither Twins . . .

 

I swear, combat wouldn't have taken HALF as long if they'd just figured out what they wanted their damn actions to be by the time it was their turns. That they tended to take high-DEX characters drove me NUTS!

[prestidigitator]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

I think GMs really need to work out an explicit list of dos and don'ts for character design....

DAMN! Nice. As is! Snippey snippey. Printy printy. Goin' on my gaming wall.

[prestidigitator]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

I went further and built a character with multiform who had a light and dark side. Original concept was kinda Supes/Batman or Apollo/Midnighter contrast, but in the end I decided it was actually more appropriate as an Jekyll/Hyde NPC, with the dark-side character actually being a murderer and the light-side character being the Heroic Paragon. It's called irony, I guess

 

Edit: needless to say, that was one crime the heroic paragon just *couldn't* solve. Hence, hook to involve the PCs, do away with the heroic paragon and set themselves up for a new campaign..

Cool. Makes me want to build a character who has an Accidental Change into his Hunted! That would be interesting....

[Duke Bushido]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Agreed. Though I think most of the reasonable people here would think this way.

 

Wonderful! I'm in outstanding company, then!

 

What's the fun of playing if there isn't any challenge???

 

Precisely.

 

I'm sick to death of players who want to start off as the Dark Lord of the Sith... without ever working their way up from being a whining farm boy....

 

Agreed. Developing a character is part of the fun. At least for me and most of our group. With the above noted exception, most of our characters start out around 250 pts, and eventually are voluntarily retired around 500 or so (if the campaign doesn't end sooner, of course).

 

 

I'm sure most here will agree that we love to watch our characters grow' date=' both in 'spirit' and in points.[/quote']

 

yep.

 

Though I _do_ have one positive angle on the 'same character for a dozen campaigns' thing:

 

I think that character had the most complex, most fully-developed personality of any character ever, period. Lots of time to enjoy little else, after all.

[archermoo]

Re: Limitations You Would Like to See More Often

 

Just because I think people might enjoy the history on this one:

 

--snippage of cool story--

 

Heh. You are much nicer than me.

 

Though this type of thing is one of many reasons that I always have a copy of all of the characters in any game that I'm running. Main reasons are for ease of creating combat order sheets and for dealing with skill rolls that the characters need to make but the players don't need to know about. The keeping people honest thing is mostly a side effect.