Yet Another Damage Shield Criticism

[Agent X]

With the group I play with, it has been fairly common for about one of the players on average to have a damage shield. Since we switched to 5th, there hasn't been a single damage shield character built by a player.

 

I think this is a damning comment about the 5E take on damage shields. Apparently, none of the players feel that the cost is worth the benefit.

 

Why oh why, did they hold on to this complicated, pointless way to construct damage shields? What was the great damage shield disaster that scarred them so?

[Snarf]

How much did damage shield cost in 4'th Edition?

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Snarf

How much did damage shield cost in 4'th Edition?

It was a +1/2 advantage. I never saw it used in a way that threatened game balance. The general area we had problems with was with non-limiting limitations and evil combinations with autofire and other advantages.

[NuSoardGraphite]

Re: Yet Another Damage Shield Criticism

 

Originally posted by Agent X

With the group I play with, it has been fairly common for about one of the players on average to have a damage shield. Since we switched to 5th, there hasn't been a single damage shield character built by a player.

 

I think this is a damning comment about the 5E take on damage shields. Apparently, none of the players feel that the cost is worth the benefit.

 

Why oh why, did they hold on to this complicated, pointless way to construct damage shields? What was the great damage shield disaster that scarred them so?

 

You know, my group solved this delima really quickly when the FREd was first released:

 

player-1: "Umm, dude. It says here that in order to use Damage Shield on an attack power, that attack power has to be made constant. Whats up with that?"

 

player-2: "What!?! That totally sucks!"

 

GM(me): "Ignore that."

 

Group (collectively): "Woo-Hoo!"

 

It was that simple.

[Agent X]

Re: Re: Yet Another Damage Shield Criticism

 

Originally posted by NuSoardGraphite

You know, my group solved this delima really quickly when the FREd was first released:

 

player-1: "Umm, dude. It says here that in order to use Damage Shield on an attack power, that attack power has to be made constant. Whats up with that?"

 

player-2: "What!?! That totally sucks!"

 

GM(me): "Ignore that."

 

Group (collectively): "Woo-Hoo!"

 

It was that simple.

We've all agreed to do that but I think we feel "rules guilt" or something. The rules on powers we don't agree with seems to have created a chilling effect about using those powers. Wierd huh?

[Yamo]

Maybe it's just me, but +1/2 seems WAY too cheap for an ability that powerful...

[Snarf]

+1 1/2 is is steep, but you do get a lot. It's basically a free attack without even having to roll to hit. You can even actively use it, if you're capable of holding your enemy in a grab or pay the additional +1/4 to have it add to your HTH attacks.

 

Still, I would probably never buy it, so I think you're certainly on to something. Maybe comprising with a +1 cost for damage shield and no requirement of continuous would ease the burning guilt.

[Wyrm Ouroboros]

Actually, I built the lightsaber using Damage Shield rules; made more sense to me to do it that way and add 'can be used with other attacks' than to buy an HKA/RKA AND an RKA damage shield...

[Trebuchet]

I don't really think it's overpriced, my only real objection is that you can't use the "No Range" Limitation on a power that would usually be able to take it such as EB or RKA. That seems a bit wierd to me. But it's extremely effective against lightly defended HtH types like martial artists and speedsters who depend on being hard to hit to survive. Damage Shield essentially guarantees a hit against these types of characters. As a player who runs a PC with only 6 PD/6 ED (The other half of her defenses are Combat Luck, which doesn't work against Damage Shield) I can tell you first hand how dangerous an opponent with Damage Shield is. I've had to fight two of them in the recent past.

 

Ultimately, a well balanced character built to concept rather than munchkined who would have a Damage Shield should buy it even if it's expensive because it's concept. Magmaboy should have a Damage Shield.

[Fireg0lem]

The thing with Damage Shield is that it depends on how it is used. A RKA damage shield on a speedster is fairly worthless; (assuming it isn't just free points but ones that could have been spent on even more dex/spd/running, or on HA). However, consider a low DEX, average SPD brick with a mid-size entangle damage shield. Anyone without super-strength will have to spend time breaking out-time when they are at 0 DCV and can get splattered.

[JmOz]

FOr me it seems WAY over priced now.

 

Most of the complaints I have heard revolve arond munchkin powers, not the basic 8d6 EB DS, so I make people who take DS also take a +1 IF the power is a munchkin (Think AF here)

[Lord Liaden]

Where people seem to have the most complaint with the new construct is in campaigns with active point caps; you don't really get a damaging effect comparable to other powers with the same AP. In this case Damage Shield is relegated to a speciality attack vs. low-defense opponents unless it's heavily Advantaged, which isn't a bad use in and of itself but doesn't always reflect the power concept.

 

Take the recent Hero/SAS showdown match between Firewing and General Winter for example. Firewing's self-immolation was obviously his DS from his writeup, but as written I don't think it's powerful enough to have affected Winter so severely.

 

I do find it interesting, though, that most of the complaints about the new DS cost are coming from 4th Edition veterans; those who have come to HERO since 5E keep asking, "What's the big deal?" Makes you wonder how much of the dissatisfaction is with the effectiveness of the construct and how much is just because it costs more than it used to.

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Trebuchet

I don't really think it's overpriced, my only real objection is that you can't use the "No Range" Limitation on a power that would usually be able to take it such as EB or RKA. That seems a bit wierd to me. But it's extremely effective against lightly defended HtH types like martial artists and speedsters who depend on being hard to hit to survive. Damage Shield essentially guarantees a hit against these types of characters. As a player who runs a PC with only 6 PD/6 ED (The other half of her defenses are Combat Luck, which doesn't work against Damage Shield) I can tell you first hand how dangerous an opponent with Damage Shield is. I've had to fight two of them in the recent past.

 

Ultimately, a well balanced character built to concept rather than munchkined who would have a Damage Shield should buy it even if it's expensive because it's concept. Magmaboy should have a Damage Shield.

 

I house ruled it and said: damage shield is a +1 advantage and implies "no range" for ranged attack powers.

[NuSoardGraphite]

I feel that the original +1/2 cost was very balanced.

 

It was like it had the +1 cost of the Continuous advantage with the -1/2 limitation of No Range removed from that, for a total of +1/2.

 

Considering that Damage Sheild is mostly a defensive power (though this does depend on character concept and who's running the character), I think +1 1/2 it way too much. I wouldn't be too offended by a compromise of +1, but as long as I'm running the game, DS will always be +1/2.

[tesuji]

Well my take on it is close to the others.

 

At +1/2 dmage shield puts itself in the same league DC wise as AP and Autofire, both of whom provide a significant benefit. At +1.5 it puts itself in the league with AVLD or a rather potent variable advantage, and it seems no where near that level of gain.

 

Like may other advantages in HERo, including AOE as a big case in point, combining it along with attacks that dont go off normal defenses makes it very effective, much more than when applied to regular attacks.

 

By raising it to +1.5 so that the clinging, entangles, body brains and the like all come more or less into balance, HERO5 seems to have eliminated the most often seen in comics version of DS... the fire guy or the electirc guy as a reasonable commodity.

 

Damage shield in HERO5 is now only good for HEROisms characters (ones built for the mehcanics) such as NND shielders or drain shielders or the new fave... the spiney brick which has a DS to tag on some more dice to his HTH attack that we can work into an EC to save on... and it has become less useful for the human torch we see in the actual comics.

 

There needs to be a styep after "is it buiult right" to see if the results make sense. In the case of DS for HERO5, it did not seem to have been done.

******************

 

My recommendation would be to use the AF hint... make DS +1/2 for regular defense attacks and add another +1 on top of it for attacks that do not go against normal defenses so that the clinging shields, the entange shields, the nnd shields and so forth are much more in line.

***********************

 

Consider... against the standard 20 defense and assuming about 60 points...

 

DS Fire shield 8d6 +1/2 damage shield will do an average of 8 stun thru each time you get hit for 60 active points.

 

D6 Aether shield 3d6 +1.5 AVLD +1.5 damage shield will do about 10 except when the AVLD kicks in so unless the AVLD is common you are not too far off from the 7-8 range..

 

Those two seem a lot closer in cost for effect than if you use...

 

Fire Shield 5d6 eb +1.5 damage shield for 62 ap as your normal fire shield which means the typical super takes nothing, or close to it.

 

BTW look at AOE the same way and it looks a lot better too.

[J4y]

I don't have a 5E book in front of me, so I'll probably make some mistakes here but as I see it if you compare it to just a straight EB... The main advantage is no to-hit roll, which should be a big advantage, however, using Tesuji's example of a 62pt shield giving 5d6, if you took that as a straight energy blast you'd have 12d6, you could spread that for +7OCV and still get the same 5d6 damage. +7OCV is pretty likely to hit, which makes the no-roll needed advantage seem fairly small (although I'm more inclined to think maybe spreading is too powerful or I've misread it.)

 

The next big advantage is the fact that it can hit lots and lots of enemies. A 5d6 shield could get triggered dozens of times in a turn while a straight 12d6 EB is fairly limited in how much it can be used, however, again, spreading lets you turn a 12d6 into 6 hexes worth of 5d6, so I think very very rarely will a DS hit more targets than an EB can in a turn, making this advantage again somewhat questionable in making a DS worth it's points.

 

So I think either the DS is overpriced or spreading is too cheap, or both. I'd be inclined to say that DS is probably a bit overpriced but at the same time +1/2 is too cheap.

[TheEmerged]

Originally posted by J4y

So I think either the DS is overpriced or spreading is too cheap, or both. I'd be inclined to say that DS is probably a bit overpriced but at the same time +1/2 is too cheap.

 

Which is why many of us have adopted the straight +1

[Kristopher]

From a Champs prespective...

 

The problem with making DS so expensive is that an affordable number of normal (5d6) or killing dice (1.5d6) won't, on average, do -anything- to most opponents in a superheroic compaign. Unless the super is fighting agents, it's not worth the END.

 

I can see making DS +1/2 for normal and killing attacks, and +1 for all the special cases.

[Yamo]

The problem with making DS so expensive is that an affordable number of normal (5d6) or killing dice (1.5d6) won't, on average, do -anything- to most opponents in a superheroic compaign. Unless the super is fighting agents, it's not worth the END.

 

I dunno. You can fit a HKA 1d6 DS with Penetrating under most AP limits fairly easily.

[JmOz]

Originally posted by J4y

I don't have a 5E book in front of me, so I'll probably make some mistakes here but as I see it if you compare it to just a straight EB... The main advantage is no to-hit roll, which should be a big advantage, however, using Tesuji's example of a 62pt shield giving 5d6, if you took that as a straight energy blast you'd have 12d6, you could spread that for +7OCV and still get the same 5d6 damage. +7OCV is pretty likely to hit, which makes the no-roll needed advantage seem fairly small (although I'm more inclined to think maybe spreading is too powerful or I've misread it.)

 

The next big advantage is the fact that it can hit lots and lots of enemies. A 5d6 shield could get triggered dozens of times in a turn while a straight 12d6 EB is fairly limited in how much it can be used, however, again, spreading lets you turn a 12d6 into 6 hexes worth of 5d6, so I think very very rarely will a DS hit more targets than an EB can in a turn, making this advantage again somewhat questionable in making a DS worth it's points.

 

So I think either the DS is overpriced or spreading is too cheap, or both. I'd be inclined to say that DS is probably a bit overpriced but at the same time +1/2 is too cheap.

 

One problem with your analysist:

 

Ragamufion the Martial Artist is fighting Fire Boy the flaming hero:

 

If Fireboy uses his Fireblast and spreads there is not much that Ragamufion can do about it, but at the same time if Fireboy is using his Flame Shield Ragamufion can SEE that it is up, and then avoid it by figuring out another way (Start throwing stuff at him?)

 

So while the damage potential is there, the odds of the damage happening is much less with the DS

[Osprey]

[/b]Originally posted by tesuji

I do find it interesting, though, that most of the complaints about the new DS cost are coming from 4th Edition veterans; those who have come to HERO since 5E keep asking, "What's the big deal?" Makes you wonder how much of the dissatisfaction is with the effectiveness of the construct and how much is just because it costs more than it used to.

 

I'm a 2nd Edition Geezer

My friends griped when the 3rd came out that the EC was changed and now they had to rework the heroes or convince a GM to "Grandfather" 'em.

I saw it as a Clarification. I liked it.

 

when 4th Ed came, I was perplexed that "Flash" was a single target attack (instead of an AE). But I saw the reasoning.

and I was overjoyed that the advantage "Affects Real World from Desolid" was now legal and a +2 advantage because

My House Rule (That no other GM in my state{!!} agreed with) had it as a +4 Ad.

 

Then 5th Ed does this to DS??? Huh?

 

Originally posted by tesuji

There needs to be a styep after "is it buiult right" to see if the results make sense. In the case of DS for HERO5, it did not seem to have been done.

******************

 

My recommendation would be to use the AF hint... make DS +1/2 for regular defense attacks and add another +1 on top of it for attacks that do not go against normal defenses so that the clinging shields, the entange shields, the nnd shields and so forth are much more in line.

***********************

 

I'm with you Tesuji!

If you can make an NND do Body for +1 more, then a DS makes sense this way!!!!

[The_Hero]

I notice Steve has never clarified the whys and wherefores of the new cost, tried asking him at Last year's Origins and he got defensive...

 

It caused a group of ours to eventually disband, it was one of the reasons anyway. We had point caps the GM wasn't willing to work with, and I had a megahard brick who should have hurt hands that punched her, but doing the Thing's hide always on is too expensive for what little good it does...

[JmOz]

According to Steve it was a clarification not a change...

 

Of course DC:HOV and the original TUM (Both written by him) would say differently...

[Kristopher]

According to Steve it was a clarification not a change...

 

Game designers say that kind of thing quite often. When Justin Achilli took over one of the product lines at White Wolf and CHANGED the way XP was spent to increase various stats, he insisted on and on that it was a clarification.

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Yamo

I dunno. You can fit a HKA 1d6 DS with Penetrating under most AP limits fairly easily.

 

Shouldn't have to slap a second Advantage (Pen) on to make the first Advantage (DS) effective. DS should be effective in its own right, and at a total of +1.5, it's not.