KISS vs MEPD

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

This is all good feedback from everybody (even, or maybe especially the irritated ones.

 

Archermoo and Occam's Spoon explained the origin of the KISS principle perfectly. It's not something to browbeat others with, but a Mantra to remind yourself not to be so impressed by your own genius that you forget that unnecessary complexity is the enemy of good design.

 

As far as mundane or found items go (aka Possessions Of Opportunity), I give two different examples:

 

The Frequency-Adjustible Radiation Transmitter carried by Acronym Man that acts as a flashlight is still better than a flashlight. The flashlight Blind-as-a-Bat-Man bought on sale at Wally-mart will produce some amount of useful light. It will also be liable to failure at the GMs discretion. Acronym Man's device may, as A-M earns experience, be tinkered with and improved. The thing is, its points are his points. If he loses it, he can make another or, in the case of a unique item, it will show up later.

 

If Captain Klepto finds the Thermonuclear Potato Peeler dropped by Atomic Vegan in their last battle, he can keep it. If it's a universal focus, he might even use it. It will, however, cease to function at some point. Afterwards, if Captain K wants it to do more than look spiffy in his trophy case, he'll have to cough up the points for a working model.

[Thia Halmades]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Uh-huh. See, this is exactly what I'm against. Billy-Jo fights Billy-Bob and Bob drops his knife. Joe picks it up. He stabs Bob with it, and wanders off, pocketing it. It's now Jo's knife. This assumes any genre other than Super Heroic, where you pay points for everything because they're all SFX of your personal powers.

 

Later, Bob meets Jo in a dark alley and Jo produces a shotty he bought on sale at S-Mart. Bob beats Jo down and takes the BOOM STICK. It is now Bob's boomstick -- this is Heroic level play we're talking about, and mundane items to boot.

 

If you want to deal with something more complex:

 

Duke, a GenGiant, steals a HAC Cannon from his opponent, another GenGiant who is currently Hunting him. He uses the HAC cannon (which at the time has 5 of 6 rounds) and proceeds to blast his way out of the situation with said weapon. The HAC cannon is an expensive, difficult to obtain, illegal piece of equipment.

 

Duke has yet to pay points for it. However, he also can't reload it, maintain it (Real Weapon, -1/4) or modify it; it is what it is, and it has... 3 rounds left? He may be down to 2. Duke is a Heroic (Pulp Heroic) character in a Sci-Fi campaign; he does not pay for this weapon.

 

He could, I suppose, choose to purchase it, but I'd likely veto that plan, as it isn't the point of Heroic campaigns; the weapon is of limited use, it's designed for dramatic moments and dramatic action, and works very well.

 

Later, Duke & his team encounter a squad of black-clad counter-terrorists, and engage in an extended gunfight. On their way out, the party relieves their opponents of a pair of H&K MG5 SMGs. They still won't pay for it; these are Firearms, and are common in the world.

 

So what do they pay CP for? Skills, stats, abilities, super powers/psionics, super skills, and so on. They constantly pick up & discard weapons, eventually they'll start tossing armor off and on. But in a heroic campaign, it still seems to me that there's this insistence that everything be paid for in points - even basics, like a flash light.

 

I suppose everyone who played in my game would either be over joyed (YAY! I can use money instead of CP!) or overwrought (NAY! He has more money than me!). Not sure what to tell y'all about that.

[Enforcer84]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Hence the song Millenium Rock City?

 

Millenium City Rock City?

 

Precisely.

 

 

Get up everybody's gonna move their feet

Get Down everybody's gonna leave their seat

Gotta lose your mind in MC - Rock City!

 

 

 

[Sean Waters]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Sir' date=' please do not take it personally that some people might think you are stupid, ignorant subhuman scum just because of the way you prefer to play Hero. Or you could tell them to KISS your #$![/quote']

 

Well at least they are pretty perceptive...but I wouldn't wish that one ANYBODY

[archermoo]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Uh-huh. See' date=' this is exactly what I'm against. Billy-Jo fights Billy-Bob and Bob drops his knife. Joe picks it up. He stabs Bob with it, and wanders off, pocketing it. It's now Jo's knife. This assumes any genre [i']other than[/i] Super Heroic, where you pay points for everything because they're all SFX of your personal powers.

 

Later, Bob meets Jo in a dark alley and Jo produces a shotty he bought on sale at S-Mart. Bob beats Jo down and takes the BOOM STICK. It is now Bob's boomstick -- this is Heroic level play we're talking about, and mundane items to boot.

 

If you want to deal with something more complex:

 

Duke, a GenGiant, steals a HAC Cannon from his opponent, another GenGiant who is currently Hunting him. He uses the HAC cannon (which at the time has 5 of 6 rounds) and proceeds to blast his way out of the situation with said weapon. The HAC cannon is an expensive, difficult to obtain, illegal piece of equipment.

 

Duke has yet to pay points for it. However, he also can't reload it, maintain it (Real Weapon, -1/4) or modify it; it is what it is, and it has... 3 rounds left? He may be down to 2. Duke is a Heroic (Pulp Heroic) character in a Sci-Fi campaign; he does not pay for this weapon.

 

He could, I suppose, choose to purchase it, but I'd likely veto that plan, as it isn't the point of Heroic campaigns; the weapon is of limited use, it's designed for dramatic moments and dramatic action, and works very well.

 

Later, Duke & his team encounter a squad of black-clad counter-terrorists, and engage in an extended gunfight. On their way out, the party relieves their opponents of a pair of H&K MG5 SMGs. They still won't pay for it; these are Firearms, and are common in the world.

 

So what do they pay CP for? Skills, stats, abilities, super powers/psionics, super skills, and so on. They constantly pick up & discard weapons, eventually they'll start tossing armor off and on. But in a heroic campaign, it still seems to me that there's this insistence that everything be paid for in points - even basics, like a flash light.

 

I suppose everyone who played in my game would either be over joyed (YAY! I can use money instead of CP!) or overwrought (NAY! He has more money than me!). Not sure what to tell y'all about that.

 

Ummm, not paying points for normal equipment in Heroic campaigns is the normal situation for Hero. There are people that like statting out how you would buy things like flashlights. Even people that find it useful to have them statted out whether the PCs are paying for them or not. But most people don't have PCs pay points for normal equipment in Heroic level campaigns.

 

Keep in mind that if someone doesn't specify what level of campaign they are talking about, Superheroic would probably be a good assumption. So if you see people talking about paying points for normal guns and such, unless they have specifically stated they are talking about a Heroic level campaign, chances are they aren't.

[Sean Waters]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Equipment shouldn't be a problem in superheroic games: anything vaguely normal, even by superagent standards, should be markedly inferior to the attacks you can buy with powers.

 

Now that still leaves 'superequipment' - well, not really - if you define such stuff as being tuned to the kirillian field, or mutant signature, or whatever, of the user and being, in effect, little more than an external focus for an existing ability, the problem goes away.

 

Afterall, there has to be a reason why, if you can build personal force field belts, they are not far more common in everyday life, keeping the President safe and such. If all the belt is in fact doing is tuning your own natural force field to useful levels - and so wouldn't work for (most) Presidents, we then have an explanation.

 

If you define, without even necessarily telling the players, how your world works, at least in broad brush terms, an awful lot of problems go away

 

I suppose that is a bit of a MEPD approach: simplicity isn't ALWAYS desireable

[OddHat]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Equipment shouldn't be a problem in superheroic games: anything vaguely normal, even by superagent standards, should be markedly inferior to the attacks you can buy with powers.

 

Unless you're slavishly married to the CU guidelines, enforce a DC of 12d6, then cheerfully hand out the military grade arms and ammunition listed in Dark CHampions or the various equipment guides. In which case, your players are perfectly justified in [CENSORED] until, assuming you retain consciousness, you agree to never do again.

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

The following applies only to Superheroic campaigns and is not intended to suggest, imply or accuse anybody/anything else.

If someone takes the focus you paid points for, you will eventually get it (the focus) back, or at least the points it cost so you can replace it with something similar. If you pick up Evil Pediatrician's Lollipop of Doom®, you can use it so long as it's a universal focus. If it isn't a universal focus, you still may keep it. In either case, the points it's built from aren't yours, so it is entirely up to the GM how long the thing remains functional once it's been removed from the person who routinely does whatever maintenance is required to keep it that way.

 

If Captain Illuminator's powers of illumination are so feeble that he can't compete with a flashlight from K-Mart, Id've had him rewrite the character until he was superior to a flashlight. Normal equipment that does what superhero equipment does is bigger, heavier, liable to failure when operating at maximum capacity, liable to run out of fuel sooner than super equipment, etc. It only takes 15 points to be fabulously wealthy. Why shouldn't Splatman's 12D6 physical Energy Blast (a big jet of water) be superior to Fire Man's 1952 LaFrance fire engine? At least Splatman doesn't require a crew of professional firemen to wet something down.

 

The following applies only to Heroic[/i] campaigns and is not intended to suggest, imply or accuse anybody/anything else.

In my heroic campaigns, nobody pays points for equipment without special GM permission (and probably Inventing and some other relevant skills, besides). Money for equipment is the default condition.

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

I suppose that is a bit of a MEPD approach: simplicity isn't ALWAYS desireable

 

Actually, that's an elegantly simple approach. That method is just the opposite of the excessively nitpickey methods fostered by MEPD.

[SuperPheemy]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Darn' date=' I thought KISS had come to Millennium City.[/quote']

 

Me too. I was waiting for maps and descriptions of the Park and everything. Darren, you need to make an adventure based on this premise for the 2008 Convention season.

[ghost-angel]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

I paid the points and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.

[Labrat]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Darn' date=' I thought KISS had come to Millennium City.[/quote']

 

Why wouldn't they? I'm sure there's an Amusement Park around, and where there's an Amusement Park there surely should be a Phantom...

 

Starchild! Demon! Catman! Space Ace! GO!

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiss_Meets_the_Phantom_of_the_Park

 

Shock ME! The Best Worst Movie Ever! A MUST SEE!

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Why wouldn't they? I'm sure there's an Amusement Park around, and where there's an Amusement Park there surely should be a Phantom...

 

Starchild! Demon! Catman! Space Ace! GO!

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiss_Meets_the_Phantom_of_the_Park

 

Shock ME! The Best Worst Movie Ever! A MUST SEE!

 

When I first read the above I thought "Wasn't that an episode of Family Guy?"

[Sean Waters]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

The following applies only to Superheroic campaigns and is not intended to suggest' date=' imply or accuse anybody/anything else.[/size']

If someone takes the focus you paid points for, you will eventually get it (the focus) back, or at least the points it cost so you can replace it with something similar. If you pick up Evil Pediatrician's Lollipop of Doom®, you can use it so long as it's a universal focus. If it isn't a universal focus, you still may keep it. In either case, the points it's built from aren't yours, so it is entirely up to the GM how long the thing remains functional once it's been removed from the person who routinely does whatever maintenance is required to keep it that way.

 

If Captain Illuminator's powers of illumination are so feeble that he can't compete with a flashlight from K-Mart, Id've had him rewrite the character until he was superior to a flashlight. Normal equipment that does what superhero equipment does is bigger, heavier, liable to failure when operating at maximum capacity, liable to run out of fuel sooner than super equipment, etc. It only takes 15 points to be fabulously wealthy. Why shouldn't Splatman's 12D6 physical Energy Blast (a big jet of water) be superior to Fire Man's 1952 LaFrance fire engine? At least Splatman doesn't require a crew of professional firemen to wet something down.

 

The following applies only to Heroic[/i] campaigns and is not intended to suggest, imply or accuse anybody/anything else.

In my heroic campaigns, nobody pays points for equipment without special GM permission (and probably Inventing and some other relevant skills, besides). Money for equipment is the default condition.

 

 

Captain Illuminator:

 

Superior to a flashlight!!!

 

Do you think he will get his own comic?

[Sean Waters]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Unless you're slavishly married to the CU guidelines' date=' enforce a DC of 12d6, then cheerfully hand out the military grade arms and ammunition listed in Dark CHampions or the various equipment guides. In which case, your players are perfectly justified in [CENSORED'] until, assuming you retain consciousness, you agree to never do again.

 

IMO Superheroes should not have to worry about guns: they should ahve to worry about the person holding the gun.

 

Someone ran off with my copy of Dark Champions, so this is not a problem

[zornwil]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

One of the things that surprises me about old-time Champions/now HERO players is their insistence on paying for EVERYTHING in points. I was talking to Klaital today, and one of the things we agree on is that in many settings, paying for everything is both silly and cumbersome; one of the draws of RPGs is to get good stuff and whup up on people with it.

 

In d20, everyone gets gear all the time because it's built as a Wealth Management System, whereas HERO uses Point Management; however, just making everyone pay for everything to the same sum total does not balance make. Balance only really comes into play when things are properly thought out.

 

I agree that mundane equipment can be bought with money. I'll go so far as to say that if Dr. Macho drops his Injector, a PC can pick it up and use it. They can walk home with it, take it apart and figure it out. They'll probably run out of serum fairly quickly (I use the same mechanic for a PC's HAC Cannon -- he's got the gun, but only three rounds for it). If people are going to pay for their gear, then it is "part of them" at that point, and I have no problem with that; some things need paid for. But it depends on the campaign and where you want it to go and the feel you want to lend to it, as much as anything else.

Just to attest to what others such as archermoo have said, I am also an old-timer who doesn't make people pay for mundane stuff.

[zornwil]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

What I'm getting at is that there are lots of different ways to do things in HERO System, and there seems to be a strong bias towards making things as difficult as possible. Modeling ordinary things in extraordinary ways is MEPD.

 

If You want the characters to put out a fire, model the fire in a way that is as intuitive as possible. Everybody knows, in general terms, how to fight fire. Let them use this knowledge without having them have to pay points for PS: Fireman.

 

If we're talking about conventional fire, I just let them put out the fire if they have appropriate SFX. Aside from dealing with damage, I've never modelled how to put out fire.

 

If the giant rubber suit-monster is supposed to be an unstoppable force of nature, except when confronted by another of its kind, you don't have to let anything damage it unless you say it can. You do owe it to the players to give them some clues as to why their shoulder-fired nega-cannon doesn't seem to be having the desired effect, though. Simply telling them "No effect." doesn't cut it. Try something like: "It doesn't seem to be affecting the monster. Maybe he's so big it's like a mosquito bite would be for you?"

 

I'll have to admit this is harder for me to manage this way in most supers games I've run. In large part that's because a "monster" is almost never considered out of supers leagues, for me, and I guess I think other people tend to think that (I could be wrong, of course).

 

That said, I have Invulnerability based on SFX as a house rule power.

 

I don't make people count all the dice if an attack can't penetrate - but I DO make them roll, so that the whole clatter of dice goes off and then they get, "Don't bother counting." It has a nice dramatic effect.

 

It all boils down to this: The ratio of book-keeping to actual gaming should be manageably low. It's never a good time to bring the action to a complete stop, so keep those moments to a minimum. Recognize that your players might not know everything you do. If key clue clue of the scenario is: "You smell formic acid.", be sure they know what it is. Have pregenerated PCs available for newcomers so you don't have to postpone the game until you work one out with the newbies. After they've played a session or two, they'll have a better idea of the kind of character they want to play and should be given the opportunity to create it.

 

Good advice.

 

I do have an exception that "an hour" of time invested in building a character is a lot. I'm not suggesting that people should all want to spend an hour or more, but I think it's reasonable for a game to create that "bar" to entry. Broadly speaking (of course there are exceptions), I prefer people who would spend that time and more.

[zornwil]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Agreed on all points, but I'd like to expand a bit:

 

Points as Economics, not Physics, also helps with power stunting. In a solo game, if Billy Joe Hero comes up with a new power every session using Power Skill, and you as GM are cool with it, who cares? If you feel the need, give him the points to add it to his sheet; it'll help you track approximately how tough the bad guys should be. In a team game, if you let him keep using the power without paying, you're "paying" him more than the other players. If you want to keep things roughly fair, give him the points to buy the new power and the other players a chance at a similar number of bonus points as well. If point totals are shooting up too fast, slow things down.

 

Gaming is fun before art, art before accounting, accounting before physics. Rules lawyering is masturbation; good gaming is intercourse.

Wow, great closing sentence. Can't rep you yet.

[zornwil]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Ummm, not paying points for normal equipment in Heroic campaigns is the normal situation for Hero. There are people that like statting out how you would buy things like flashlights. Even people that find it useful to have them statted out whether the PCs are paying for them or not. But most people don't have PCs pay points for normal equipment in Heroic level campaigns.

 

Keep in mind that if someone doesn't specify what level of campaign they are talking about, Superheroic would probably be a good assumption. So if you see people talking about paying points for normal guns and such, unless they have specifically stated they are talking about a Heroic level campaign, chances are they aren't.

And, at that, it's probably a low-level supers game. The awkwardness primarily comes in where normal weaponry is as or close to as powerful as what the supers have (or against the supers' defenses). There's all sorts of lateral solutions (resource points, make people/etc. more vulnerable to super-powers, enforce "real weapons" issues, etc.).

[zornwil]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Unless you're slavishly married to the CU guidelines' date=' enforce a DC of 12d6, then cheerfully hand out the military grade arms and ammunition listed in Dark CHampions or the various equipment guides. In which case, your players are perfectly justified in [CENSORED'] until, assuming you retain consciousness, you agree to never do again.

Yeah, this is a disconnect, granted. I should have modified my above statement, since it's often also CU-driven games - I just can't see running 350 point supers with some of that weaponry/armor combo as suggested in contemporary HERO.

[OddHat]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Captain Illuminator:

 

Superior to a flashlight!!!

 

Do you think he will get his own comic?

 

I'd be willing to bet that a similar character already has.

 

In fact, he vaguely reminds me of the Nyctalope, another of those characters who compete for the title of first Superhero. His main "power" was to see in the dark. Early 20th century French pulp character.

 

IMO Superheroes should not have to worry about guns: they should ahve to worry about the person holding the gun.

 

Yeah' date=' this is a disconnect, granted. I should have modified my above statement, since it's often also CU-driven games - I just can't see running 350 point supers with some of that weaponry/armor combo as suggested in contemporary HERO.[/quote']

 

Agreed with both of these. For better or worse the current CU is built on the idea that most Supers should fear guns, fine if you're running Daredevil or Batman, not so much if you're running Iron Man, Thor or Captain Marvel. There are design paths around this, but that discussion wanders way off this topic.

[KA.]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

1. I utterly LOATHE the acronym: KISS, that extra 'S' is ridiculously contrived and makes no sense, unless it is as some sort joke. Thing is, jokes are meant to be funny at SOME point in their life cycle. Moreover, you do not persuade someone to your POV (see: it isn't acronyms in general, just this one) by insulting them. I can't think of a level it does work on, although enough people seem to like it that I must be missing something.

 

Agreed and repped!

 

Even though I have heard the context and the various explanations about the acronym, I still find it highly irritating.

I always have.

I probably always will.

I consider it like one of the many songs that have been #1 hits because they 'caught on', even though they were crap.

 

I also find it contradictory.

If the idea is to 'keep it simple', why would you tack on an extra, unnecessary word that is potentially insulting.

That is like 'improving' a ham sandwich by the addition of a chunk of mud.

 

Sorry for the rant, but, hey, that's what the internet is for.

 

KA.

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

Agreed and repped!

 

Even though I have heard the context and the various explanations about the acronym, I still find it highly irritating.

I always have.

I probably always will.

I consider it like one of the many songs that have been #1 hits because they 'caught on', even though they were crap.

 

I also find it contradictory.

If the idea is to 'keep it simple', why would you tack on an extra, unnecessary word that is potentially insulting.

That is like 'improving' a ham sandwich by the addition of a chunk of mud.

 

Sorry for the rant, but, hey, that's what the internet is for.

 

KA.

 

You don't know engineers. That extra "S" is absolutely necessary because their egos tend to blind them to potential improvements in their designs (and most of them know it). The inclusion of "Stupid" at the end of KISS is a reminder that a little humility* enables you to look objectively at something you designed, to "see the warts on your own baby" as it were. This allows you to find more efficient ways to do the same thing.

 

You don't have to like it. The engineering community has embraced the KISS principle as an eternal TRVTH, a valuable tool that helps produce better work. It just so happens that the above principle has applications in other fields of endeavor, and so I embrace it as well. That one word "Stupid" is an essential part of keeping things simple, and makes the acronym a poetic mnemonic. KISS isn't just about simplicity, it's about approaching problems with full knowledge of your capabilities and limitations. If you aren't aware of your limitations, you will never overcome them.

 

If you simply cannot abide the notion that you might have some blind spots (aka: Stupidity), or simply don't want to admit even occasional, slight stupidity, then perhaps you still might find utility in Colin Chapman's aphorism: "Simplify and add lightness". Whenever you see KISS you can simply substitute SAAL.

 

*Humility isn't thinking less of yourself, it's thinking of yourself less. Humble people know their limitations and are therefore able to compensate for them.

[JmOz]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

or change the last word to "silly"

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: KISS vs MEPD

 

or change the last word to "silly"

 

Nonsense. "Silly" is too mild a word to penetrate an engineer's ego. Attempting to humble an engineer by calling him silly is about as effective as trying to protecting yourself from an attacking grizzly by wearing armor made out of marshmallows and coldcuts. "Stupid" is sharp enough to deflate an engineer's ego without causing lasting harm to his psyche. Anyhing less is unlikely to divert his attention.

 

Save your indignation for words that convey truly vile sentiments. Mature people can use most words to convey civil meaning even if children (some in adult bodies) may use these same words in an uncivil manner. If you can't hear certain words without breaking into a rash of indignation (and without regard to context), you're too thin-skinned to be allowed in public without adult supervision.