Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

First off... am i understanding you right that in your game' date=' players get to decide which character of their apparently multiple PCs they will play after learning the nature/timing or other details of the missions?[/quote']

No. You are not understanding me right.

 

However, as a GM, I know in advance what kind of adventure I'm running, and I know if a particular character will be useless in that adventure. I might advise a player to play some other character instead, in the interests of the player having fun. A game isn't fun if you can't do anything.

 

But that's somewhat beside the point. If none of my powers work at night, I won't go on patrol at night.

 

GM: "It's midnight and you get a call that Doctor Happykitty is rampaging through the city. What do you do?"

Player: "I drive my car over to my DNPC's house and get them out of the city."

GM: "No. I mean, what do you do about stopping Doctor Happykitty?"

Player: "Nothing I can do. I wait 'til morning."

GM: "But, he's killing people now!"

Player: "Right! And I don't want to be one of them."

GM: "Aren't you supposed to be a hero?"

Player: "Facing a dangerous opponent unarmed is not heroic, it's foolish."

[tesuji]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

No. You are not understanding me right.

 

However, as a GM, I know in advance what kind of adventure I'm running, and I know if a particular character will be useless in that adventure. I might advise a player to play some other character instead, in the interests of the player having fun. A game isn't fun if you can't do anything.

 

But that's somewhat beside the point. If none of my powers work at night, I won't go on patrol at night.

 

Ok so why in the world would you as a sage Gm approve a character like that whom you know you would not require to play thru his disadvantages like everyone else?

[Robyn]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

Ok so why in the world would you as a sage Gm approve a character like that whom you know you would not require to play thru his disadvantages like everyone else?

 

He still has to play through them. If the player really is running two characters at once, only one of them can get the experience - the one that did the heroic deeds. He also can't bring both of those characters to bear on a situation.

[Chris Goodwin]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

GM: "It's midnight and you get a call that Doctor Happykitty is rampaging through the city. What do you do?"

Player: "I drive my car over to my DNPC's house and get them out of the city."

GM: "No. I mean, what do you do about stopping Doctor Happykitty?"

Player: "Nothing I can do. I wait 'til morning."

GM: "But, he's killing people now!"

Player: "Right! And I don't want to be one of them."

GM: "Aren't you supposed to be a hero?"

Player: "Facing a dangerous opponent unarmed is not heroic, it's foolish."

 

GM: All right. You drive to your DNPC's house. When you get inside, you find..... Doctor Happykitty! "I knew you'd come, hero."

 

Seriously, if you handed me that character I'd have a talk with you right then. "You understand that I'm not going to softball your character just because you took this Limitation, right? I'm running a game of heroes, and it is inevitable that at least one session will take place at night. I will still expect you to be heroic, because heroism is not in the list of numbers and conditions on your character sheet; it's in the way you play your character. Given that, just because I run games at night doesn't mean I'm out to screw your character. I will expect you to show me what kind of a hero your character is. If that's not something you want to explore, I suggest you take a different Limitation or a different character."

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

GM: All right. You drive to your DNPC's house. When you get inside' date=' you find..... Doctor Happykitty! "I knew you'd come, [i']hero[/i]."

 

Seriously, if you handed me that character I'd have a talk with you right then. "You understand that I'm not going to softball your character just because you took this Limitation, right? I'm running a game of heroes, and it is inevitable that at least one session will take place at night. I will still expect you to be heroic, because heroism is not in the list of numbers and conditions on your character sheet; it's in the way you play your character. Given that, just because I run games at night doesn't mean I'm out to screw your character. I will expect you to show me what kind of a hero your character is. If that's not something you want to explore, I suggest you take a different Limitation or a different character."

 

I might be prepared to accept the fact that the player sits on the sidelines since huis character doesn't show up for the adventure to adequately showcase the limitation. Of curse, it would be too bad if Dr. Happykitty, confronted by the remaining PC's, throws his EDM UAA Explosion Grenade, and we embark on a 15 session extradimensional romp without Daylight Man.

[Chris Goodwin]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

I might be prepared to accept the fact that the player sits on the sidelines since huis character doesn't show up for the adventure to adequately showcase the limitation. Of curse' date=' it would be too bad if Dr. Happykitty, confronted by the remaining PC's, throws his EDM UAA Explosion Grenade, and we embark on a 15 session extradimensional romp without Daylight Man.[/quote']

 

Well, no. It goes both ways. Taking "Not At Night" on Powers doesn't mean the player doesn't get to play at night. The other part of my statement above is this: just because I, the GM, activate your Limitations doesn't mean I won't give you something to do. In fact, it might be your night in the spotlight. It's not "Sorry, it's night time, you don't get to play." It's "Okay, it's night time. Show me what you're made of!"

[tesuji]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

He still has to play through them. If the player really is running two characters at once' date=' only one of them can get the experience - the one that did the heroic deeds. He also can't bring [i']both[/i] of those characters to bear on a situation.

 

Not in the response i was commenting on... I might advise a player to play some other character instead,

 

If the Gm is simply telling the player to run an alternate character when the disad will kick in and such, the disad isn't getting played thru.

 

Imagine if, in a typical game, i build the two characters, knowing we will only play one at a time.

 

Solar boy only has powers during the day at a hefty -1/2 discount and nightwing only has powers at night for an equal discount.

 

Does powered armor guy have a backup gadgeteer to run when his foci get broken or damaged too (and vice versa.)

 

Sorry but it seems like rewarding the "all or nothing" hero design by saying "take the discount but don't worry, if it ever comes up you can bring in a pinch hitter."

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

Well' date=' no. It goes both ways. Taking "Not At Night" on Powers doesn't mean the player doesn't get to play at night. The other part of my statement above is this: just because I, the GM, activate your Limitations doesn't mean I won't give you something to do. In fact, it might be your night in the spotlight. It's not "Sorry, it's night time, you don't get to play." It's "Okay, it's night time. Show me what you're made of!"[/quote']

 

My point was intended somewhat sarcastically. I agree with you that he took the limitation, and now he hasb to work within its parameters. If the player is going to play "Ruby Tuesday" and limit all her powers to "Only work on Tuesdays", then buy her an impregnable base which she hides in from Wednesday to Monday, she's going to be sitting out most of the campaign. That makes her "not a viable character", IMO, and I wouldn't allow her in the game at all.

 

This is, however, another case to highlight the need for GM/Player communication during character design. The GM should be telling the player "This is how I interpret your limitation, and how I expect it may come up in play. Does that match your interpretation?" If yours is "If it's dark he'll stay home" then I'll tell you flat out that this will mean you spend a lot of game time sitting on your hands (or using your phases to get some chips or change the channel on your TV) since your character isn't in the game. As such, you should scrap that character and build one who will be part of the game.

[Robyn]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

If the Gm is simply telling the player to run an alternate character when the disad will kick in and such' date=' the disad isn't getting played thru.[/quote']

 

I'll assume your statement would be the same if the GM doesn't tell this to the player, but the player does that anyway.

 

Imagine if' date=' in a typical game, i build the two characters, knowing we will only play one at a time.[/quote']

 

In my (albeit limited) experience with multiple characters, they can be played at the same time. It's confusing (and not recommended for anything less than an experienced player), but doable.

[tesuji]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

I'll assume your statement would be the same if the GM doesn't tell this to the player, but the player does that anyway.

This is getting a trifle confusing since we are flipping around on what i would do vs what the guy i responded to does.

 

Let me explain a bit.

 

I won't normally permit a character as a PC with in essence the "all or nothing" kind of build that somehow got tossed into this mix. if a player intends to not play the character when the disads kick in, i wont let the character be one of the stars of my campaign. I won't approve "only at night man" as a generaly rule.

 

Now, one exception is the genre specific powered armor dude, but with PA i can break this and damage that and do little bits to keep him feeling his OIF without running into the "doesn't have any powers" angle. Similarly, its not a problem to temporarily deprive him of suit for a part of session but let him come back in the end (power drain, software glitch, suits computer develops Ai and has its eye on a sleek sexy miata down the block...)

 

So my answer is usually "the book got it right on this one. All or nothing builds don't usually work well for PCs. "

 

 

In my (albeit limited) experience with multiple characters, they can be played at the same time. It's confusing (and not recommended for anything less than an experienced player), but doable.

 

Again, working differently from "how i do things" to "how the other guy described things...

 

the only experience i have with multiple PCs per player was low level DND, and yeah, there you deliberately ran more than one guy at a time.

 

Thje description given above however described running other characters INSTEAD OF not IN ADDITION TO your disad cropped up PCs.

 

Now, this is certainly a VIABLE campaign model. Can you say JLU, where week after week a batch of 2-3 different characters are the focus? It would be finew to tell each player to build 3-4 PCs and have mix-n-match with each guy still only playing one character. At the end of an episode, it might be fun to determine "who is up next" so the Gm gets to pick appropriate story lines.

 

So, the "choose which guy to bring this week" is an Ok model, and certainly saying things like "next weeks mission is a space one" so that players choose appropriate space worthy characters, is fine I reckon (assumes you develop your story before you determine your stars... which is now an alien concept to me but...)

 

But allowing a character to take disads and lims for "cannot survive in space" knowing you wont ever let him be scripted into a space game just like letting him earn big discount for "never during the day{" when you aren't gonna ever have him scripted into the daylight... thats just not kosher from any reading i have of things.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

This is getting a trifle confusing since we are flipping around on what i would do vs what the guy i responded to does.

 

Let me explain a bit.

 

I won't normally permit a character as a PC with in essence the "all or nothing" kind of build that somehow got tossed into this mix. if a player intends to not play the character when the disads kick in, i wont let the character be one of the stars of my campaign. I won't approve "only at night man" as a generaly rule.

 

Now, one exception is the genre specific powered armor dude, but with PA i can break this and damage that and do little bits to keep him feeling his OIF without running into the "doesn't have any powers" angle. Similarly, its not a problem to temporarily deprive him of suit for a part of session but let him come back in the end (power drain, software glitch, suits computer develops Ai and has its eye on a sleek sexy miata down the block...)

 

So my answer is usually "the book got it right on this one. All or nothing builds don't usually work well for PCs. "

 

An excellent example all round. I would ask "Only at night" man the same basic question I would ask of "Powered Armor Man". If you don't have the armor/the night, what can your character do? Because there WILL be times when you will not have the powers you have limited in this fashion. Just as PA man should be able to do something useful without his armor, NightMan should be able to do something useful in the daytime.

[Robyn]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

Thje description given above however described running other characters INSTEAD OF not IN ADDITION TO your disad cropped up PCs.

 

I'm not sure I grasp the difference. If the player is still actively playing both PC's, but one of them is running up to the villain to slug it out, and the other is staying back to run communications or running around the city gathering up DNPC's so the first character doesn't have to worry about them first (but can go straight to the villain), only the first PC will gain experience for having defeated the villain.

 

Of course, if the first PC is searching the city for the villain while said villain is at home to meet the second PC, a good question then becomes "How long does the first PC spend running around the city looking for signs of trouble?". Another interesting question would be, well, interesting enough to post this as an WWYCD.

[tesuji]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

 

I'm not sure I grasp the difference. If the player is still actively playing both PC's, but one of them is running up to the villain to slug it out, and the other is staying back to run communications or running around the city gathering up DNPC's so the first character doesn't have to worry about them first (but can go straight to the villain), only the first PC will gain experience for having defeated the villain.

We seem to not be communicating.

 

I will try again...

 

If, hwhen your all or nothing character's disads/limitations hit, you play some other guy INSTEAD of him, then you are not actively playing your PC during his disad/lim flare up time and so in effect have gained points up front for nothing. Examples of this would be a one PC per player campaign where you are allowed to bring in a substitute for your character "on his bad days."

 

thats not playing the lim/sdisad any more than having mr BOWMAN take the focus lim but have him expect that "when i lose my bow for three sessions, the Gm will provide me with an equivalent offensive weapon for that time frame, like maybe a picked up blaster."

 

If, however, you are ina game where you run more than one character at the same time, if the result of your character hitting one of his bad days is that you now run the one good character and don't have a second character to play, then you are at least feeling a pinch for the disad. I wouldn't automatically assume this is "good enough" but then i don't normally run two PC per player games in this genre so I know if i did thoughts about this and other things would go into the pregame rules.

 

As for experience points...I am wondering what that has to do with any of this.

 

Xp are a non-issue and I don't give points for a specific villain or such when I GM. I don't use a DnD style system where the CR of your adversary determines some formulaic XP award.

 

Most of the time, I just have a flat rate per session.

 

Of course, if the first PC is searching the city for the villain while said villain is at home to meet the second PC, a good question then becomes "How long does the first PC spend running around the city looking for signs of trouble?". Another interesting question would be, well, interesting enough to post this as an WWYCD.

 

you got me?

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

Ok so why in the world would you as a sage Gm approve a character like that whom you know you would not require to play thru his disadvantages like everyone else?

I never said that. Read carefully: I would not require a player to play a character that I know in advance will be useless in a particular adventure. That would be no fun at all for the player. I never said that players can avoid playing characters so their disads and limitations never have an effect.

 

If a character's powers don't work under a particular situation that is obvious, he can avoid that situation. ex: Not on Tuesday, not at night, not in water, etc. He still might find himself in those situations however, despite his planning.

 

If a character's powers don't work under a particular situation that he has no way of knowing, he can't do anything to avoid the situation. ex: Not vs. Mutants, not in an intense magnetic field, not vs. aliens, etc. He won't know in advance if a particular opponent is a mutant, or an alien, etc.

 

Thus, the limitation "Not on a Tuesday" is less limiting than "Won't work one-seventh of the time with no way to predict".

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

GM: All right. You drive to your DNPC's house. When you get inside' date=' you find..... Doctor Happykitty! "I knew you'd come, [i']hero[/i]."

That's perfectly fair and reasonable. If I take a disad/lim, I expect it will effect me occasionally. That doesn't mean I'm going to deliberately put myself in situations where I know in advance that I'll be powerless.

 

I'm not talking about a free ride for disads and limitations. I'm only talking about the difference between a disad/lim that you know is going to apply and can take steps to avoid most of the time and one that you don't know is going to apply. IMO, the former type is less disadvantageous/limiting. And therefore, worth fewer points.

 

If Doctor Happykitty ambushes me at night, I have to deal with it. If I'm tracking down Doctor Happykitty and I find his secret base, I'm not going to raid it at night.

[Robyn]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

If' date=' however, you are ina game where you run more than one character at the same time, if the result of your character hitting one of his bad days is that you now run the one good character and don't have a second character to play, then you are at least feeling a pinch for the disad. I wouldn't automatically assume this is "good enough" but then i don't normally run two PC per player games in this genre so I know if i did thoughts about this and other things would go into the pregame rules.[/quote']

 

If you normally run two PC's per game, with both of them able to enter a single fight, you have a certain amount of power you are usually able to draw upon in a single session. But, when one of them is taken out of commission, you can only use the one character's powers.

 

I don't see how that's very different from having a character that works at full power most of the time, but only at half power under some circumstances.

 

As for experience points...I am wondering what that has to do with any of this.

 

Xp are a non-issue and I don't give points for a specific villain or such when I GM. I don't use a DnD style system where the CR of your adversary determines some formulaic XP award.

 

Most of the time, I just have a flat rate per session.

 

The question might be whether you are awarding those XP to your players or to their characters. One of my Champions GM's let us "save up" unspent points from one character, to use on another, even one in a new campaign. But if you're awarding points to the characters, it makes sense that each character receives points, and then, instead of both PC's getting that flat rate for the session, only one of them (the one who actually participated and helped out, instead of gathering up the DNPC's and fleeing the city) would get the XP.

[tesuji]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

 

If you normally run two PC's per game...

 

I don't see how that's very different from having a character that works at full power most of the time, but only at half power under some circumstances.

I didn't say it was. Note that is the case where I said it is being seen as an impact. The case i wont allow is the INSTEAD OF, not the IN ADDITION TO.

 

As for whether or not this equates to a character who fights at half strength, maybe. Thats something i would need to see more often. There IS a difference.

 

Taking one full strength PC instead of two means THE GROUP is weaker but not "my character." My character is not slower than the others, My character is not less able to hit and do damage. My character is not more vulnerable to attacks. At best it boils down to the equivalent of "cut speed in half" as I get half the number of actions.

 

A character who is at half strength has at least one maybe more of the flaws I mention above. he must work to find a way to even be effective, and feels the lack of potency.

 

In general, i would not say "your speed 6 character is speed 3 for this session" as anywhere near as bad as "your character is at half strength for this session" and "you only run one character tonight, but he is at full strength" is far more like the former than the latter.

 

Which would you rather take to tonight's run...

 

PA dude whose armor has been damaged is broken, so in the 12 DC game he now has only got his 6d6 strength as offensive power (not his 12d6 EB shockbolt) and whose +15/15 Armor has an Act 11- tonight...

 

or...

 

PA dude whose armor is damaged and so he is at speed 3, not speed 6 but everything else (12d6 shockbolt and full armor) is fine?

 

Thats the difference between playing a character at "half strength" and playing "hal;f as many characters". I see it, gut instinct level or IMX, as very different, or at least enough that I would give it serious thought before starting a campaign where that was the norm.

 

IMO.

 

Like i said, this would be something I consider strongly when starting a "two PC per player" game and approving a "take a night off" character.

 

The question might be whether you are awarding those XP to your players or to their characters. One of my Champions GM's let us "save up" unspent points from one character, to use on another, even one in a new campaign. But if you're awarding points to the characters, it makes sense that each character receives points, and then, instead of both PC's getting that flat rate for the session, only one of them (the one who actually participated and helped out, instead of gathering up the DNPC's and fleeing the city) would get the XP.

 

I use Xp solely as a rate of advancement of characters in the game. Its a campaign pacing thing more than anything else. If a new player joins, he starts at the current level. If a player for good reason changes characters, then his new guy is at the same level as everyone else. I don't have Xp be a competition to see who gets more and advances more or anything like that. heck, the Xp is usually gained even if you miss a session entirely.

 

So, again, to me, Xp has no role in this limitation issue.

 

I know some Gms award bonus Xp to those who "play their disads well" and dock players for "not roleplaying their disads well" and so forth but I don't do that. i handle such things in game or out of game by talking with the players, not in bookkeeping.

 

So if VP is intrinsically a part of this for you, thats cool, but its not related at all for me.

[Egyptoid]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

Only if I'm the GM and I built the power for the player.

[Lemurion]

Re: Is "Its cheaper this way" enough for you?

 

As I have been reading this thread I've also gone ahead and double-checked my trusty copy of 5ER.

 

There are actually two sections that apply here.

 

The first is the following section sentence from the second paragraph under the heading Using Teleportation: A character with Teleportation who Grabs a character cannot then Teleport and carry the Grabbed character with him unless he has enough Increased Mass to handle the extra weight and the GM permits this. (5ER, p233)

 

The second is the section that most of you appear to be referring to from the header Advantages and Adders under the first subheading Increased Mass: The character does not have to be able to carry this additional mass; he only has to touch it. If the additional mass is additional persons, those persons have to want to be Teleported; involuntarily Teleporting someone requires the Usable As Attack advantage. (5ER, p234)

 

I interpret this to mean that the UAA advantage is not required (provided the GM does not rule otherwise) to Teleport an unwilling victim who the Teleporter has successfully Grabbed. It is only required to Teleport an unwilling person that the Teleporter does not have control over; ie. someone they are only touching and have not Grabbed.

 

I wouldn't do the "it's cheaper" thing myself, I prefer the "it's more appropriate to the character concept or power build" option.