What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

[Kirby]

So [...] are the guys at HERO Games concerned without suffcient reason about creating characters with a DEX higher than 30? I bet you can count the number of 31+ DEX characters in 5E on one hand and still have fingers left over. I looked through the three books with the most characters that I have (Galactic Champions, Conquerors Killers and Crooks, and Champions Worldwide) to find anyone with a DEX over 30 (and found just one!). I also noticed that HERO has a possible persistant non-rational concern against characters having an EGO over 30 and an INT over 30, even though Superhuman is considered 51!

 

According to Champions on page 58:

STR: Superhuman is 31+; highest I found: 120 Fracas (GC)

 

CON: Superhuman is 31+; highest I found: 60 - Rampart (GC)

 

BODY: Superhuman is 31+; highest I found: 30 - Rampart, Maraud, and Supernova, (all GC); Dr. D. and The Monster, [A Lemurian Construct in CKC has 60 Body] (both/all CKC)

 

PRE: Superhuman is 51+; highest I found: 100 - Examiner (GC)

 

PD: Superhuman is 16+; highest I found: 70 x2 Hardened! - Bulletproof (GC)

 

ED: Superhuman is 16+; highest I found: 70 x2 Hardened! - Bulletproof (GC)

 

SPD: Superhuman is 8+; highest I found: 12 - Taipan (CWW)

 

REC: Superhuman is 14+; highest I found: 40 - Eclipsar (CWW)

 

END: Superhuman is 61+; highest I found: 200 - Eclipsar (CWW)

 

STUN: Superhuman is 61+; highest I found: 120 - Fracas (GC), Eclipsar (CWW)

 

Of special note: Mechanon 3000 and his Avatar have the following:

STR 310 / 80

DEX 20 / 28

CON 70 / 50

BOD 70 / 20

INT 40 / 30

EGO 20 / 18

PRE 80 / 15

PD 75 (Hardened) (+30 from FF +20 from Armor, both ablative) / 50

ED 75 (Hardened) (+30 from FF +20 from Armor, both ablative) / 50

SPD 8 / 8

REC 200 / 26

END 900 / 150

STUN 260 / 100

 

Even with Mechanon's (munchkin) uber stats, he doesn't have a high DEX or EGO (Surprising on the EGO) and his INT falls below Superhuman.

 

So while Superhuman DEX is 31+, where are they? Why aren't the speedsters this high? Charm from GC has 35, but are there any others? Why doesn't Taipan have a >30 DEX? Pantera in 4E had 35 DEX, but I've been informed they dropped her to 30 for CU:NotW.

 

As for the mental stats:

INT: Superhuman is 51+; highest I found: 50 - Telios (CU); 40 - Mentiac (U: DoF); 35 - Dr. D., Menton (CKC)

 

EGO: Superhuman is 51+; highest I found: 30 - Menton (CKC)

 

Why are mental stats boosted to 51 if there's no one that high?

 

Comments? Opinions? Did I miss someone with a greater stat than the max I found, or even someone else with a 31+ Dex?

 

EDIT: The following seem to be the only 5E NPCs with >30 DEX:

Charm - 35 GC

The Living Sphinx - 32 CWW

Vector - 36 TUS

[ghost-angel]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

I was going to look up all the characters in the CU line.

 

But then I realized the answer:

 

Because those are the benchmarks they decided to set with the Champions Universe Setting.

 

Feel free to change for your own Settings.

[Kirby]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

But then I realized the answer:

 

Because those are the benchmarks they decided to set with the Champions Universe Setting.

That makes no logical sense. Why would superhuman stats on some superhuman characters (and character types) constantly bypass (in some cases more than double) the superhuman start point, while other superhuman stats are never reached by superhumans?

[ghost-angel]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

That makes no logical sense. Why would superhuman stats on some superhuman characters (and character types) constantly bypass (in some cases more than double) the superhuman start point' date=' while other [i']superhuman[/i] stats are never reached by superhumans?

 

Because they haven't printed a sufficiently Superhuman intelligence?

 

[edit: OK, you got me on the INT and EGO thing. . .]

 

(Vector, BTW, has a DEX36)

[Kirby]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

(Vector' date=' BTW, has a DEX36)[/quote']What book is he in? (I'm guessing it's one I don't have.)

[ghost-angel]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

What book is he in? (I'm guessing it's one I don't have.)

 

Evil Unleashed & Ultimate Speedster

 

I haven't given Ultimat Speedster a completely thorough readthru, but a lot of Superhumanly Dexstrous Things are probably more accurately and easily accomplished with Powers and not simply Raw DEX.

[GAZZA]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

I don't have the new Enemies book, but that was certainly true in 4th as well.

 

For DEX the answer is presumably related to the suggested Champions OCV/DCV limits. You could argue that they set those limits too low considering what superhuman DEX is supposed to be, and frankly I'd have to say you have a point.

 

As far as the rest goes, (shrug). My guess is that most superhumans are only "slightly" superhuman - they tend not to be better than normal folks at everything, but only in a few special areas. (Unfortunately virtually all superhumans tend to have high DEX and SPD - even bricks rarely have a DEX of less than 14 or SPD 3 or less, which is kind of a counter example). EGOs are probably restricted for much the same reason DEX is (ie CV related), as well as the observation that (at least in 4th edition) most EGOs for non mentalists tended to be in 10-14 range, so you didn't really need an astronomic EGO to be competitive (therefore why not save the points?) INT isn't really unbalancing at enormous levels, but most GMs are not themselves ultrageniuses so it can be hard to portray such a character as an NPC (the usual method I use: cheat. Have your super genius characters get a whole pile of "free precognition" - it's not really seeing the future, but compensating for the fact that they figured out something before the GM portraying them did. Bill and Ted are good for examples. ).

 

But hey, making up your own villains is always fun if you think those losers in the Champions Universe suck.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

I think the problem here lies in your interpretation of what "superhuman" means.

 

It seems that you think "superhuman" means that to be considered a "superhuman" a person must have AT LEAST that level in their characteristics.

 

This would be an inaccurate and overly literal interpretation, in direct conflict with the statement in the rule books to the contrary under "Characteristic Comparisons".

 

 

Some characters might have "superhuman" characteristics if it fits their concept, but no "superhuman" has to have even a single Characteristic in the "superhuman" range to qualify as superhuman. The only thing the "superhuman" threshold really means is that any character that has one or more Characteristic at that level is by definition superhuman -- even if they have no other "superhuman" ability.

 

For instance, you could take 10 "supers", 9 of which have a bunch of powers and no Characteristic above NCM. They can even all have the actual "NCM" Disadvantage and still be considered "superhuman" by virtue of their unusual powers / abilities. The other 1 super has no powers at all, and all Characteristics are below NCM, but he has a 9 SPD...the character could represent Woody Allen with an 9 SPD and be totally combat "useless" by any practical measure, but they are automatically considered to be "superhuman" just by the virtue of having a SPD that high.

 

That's all the threshold means, nothing more.

 

The CU uses the standard, default guidelines for where that threshold is, but your campaign can be different -- higher or lower -- if thats what works for you.

 

 

Beyond Characteristic Guidelines, there are also Character Ability guidelines in place for the CU. In some areas they overlap / come into conflict with particularly high stats -- obviously in the case of CV and Dmg from DEX and STR, but potentially also in the realm of AP and Def limits. Characters with particularly high Characteristics in certain areas can crowd against the ability guidelines and might be toned down accordingly if the designers think it advisable.

 

 

Finally, there are balance issues to consider. Their are interdependencies between OCV / DCV, avg attack damage and defenses and CON, the number of actions taken and END spent, and pacing in an objective measurement of elapsed time, among other things to consider.

 

While the game scales decently in a relative fashion to a certain point, what it does not handle well is when the spread between highs and lows gets too wide. If you permit too great a range, you eventually devolve into "rock paper scissor" encounters, where one character can't hit another due to relative DCVs, one character cannot hurt another due to relative damage vs defenses, one character cannot interact effectively with another due to relative SPD, and so on.

 

Once inflation is allowed, either everyone scales accordingly, or the game breaks down to where only few "tier-1" archetypes are effective. And if everyone scales accordingly, since the system is largely relative, you might as well have not had the inflation in the first place.

[MitchellS]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

I was going to look up all the characters in the CU line.

 

But then I realized the answer:

 

Because those are the benchmarks they decided to set with the Champions Universe Setting.

 

Feel free to change for your own Settings.

That answer is not consistent with the benchmark table Hero Games choose to use with the CU. That table states that 31+ dex is superhuman. As I said in another thread, there are only 3 characters out of over 400 currently published who have a superhuman dex: Charm, Vector, Living Sphinx [and Charm is part of the augmented C3000 line].

 

It doesn't matter where the benchmark is set. The point is there needs to be consistent use of the benchmark. Where are the Spidermans and Nightcrawlers in the CU? The benchmark becomes meaningless if no one ever uses it. With the vast majority of CU characters being super-powered rather then trained humans it would certainly make sense that some of them should have superhuman dexterity. Unfortunately only 2 make into the mainline CU.

 

The real problem with the CU is consistency, IMO. You have two different main authors who each have two different game benchmark systems, and neither of those systems fit within the benchmark system they designed for their universe. If Hero Games wanted superhuman dex to begin at 26 then they should have made the benchmark 26+, not made the benchmark 31+ and then virtually never use it, IMO.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

It doesn't matter where the benchmark is set. The point is there needs to be consistent use of the benchmark. Where are the Spidermans and Nightcrawlers in the CU? The benchmark becomes meaningless if no one ever uses it. With the vast majority of CU characters being super-powered rather then trained humans it would certainly make sense that some of them should have superhuman dexterity. Unfortunately only 2 make into the mainline CU.

 

So very few characters in the CU possess Superhuman Dex. What percentage of Marvel characters have superhuman DEX? The MU certainly has more, in absolute terms, characters of superhuman DEX. But it also has more characters.

 

The real problem with the CU is consistency' date=' IMO. You have two different main authors who each have two different game benchmark systems, and neither of those systems fit within the benchmark system they designed for their universe. If Hero Games wanted superhuman dex to begin at 26 then they should have made the benchmark 26+, not made the benchmark 31+ and then virtually never use it, IMO.[/quote']

 

Perhaps this indicates that virtually no one in the CU has a truly superhuman stat.

 

To the issue of consistency, I believe INT should adopt the same 31+ benchmark for superhuman status, especially as virtually no one meets this criteria anyway. However, I also think the 5e CU is much more consistent than previous editions in that we no longer see different benchmarks from different authors in different books. I can recall reading supplements in the old editions where you would read the whole supplement and realize everyone in the book had DC's that were 3 or 6 higher than another recent book, but their DEX and SPD was 6 and 2, respectively, lower. Some books would be extremely high powered in all respects, and others very low powered, not because that was the aim of the characters in the book, but because that was how the writer had built the characters. The 5e CU seems to have done a much better job of:

 

- making the exceptional characters true exceptions

- maintaining a consistent power level (ignoring GC, which is a different setting)

- not having a "power creep" effect as each book strives to outpower the last.

 

To me, these are all good things.

[ghost-angel]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

That answer is not consistent with the benchmark table Hero Games choose to use with the CU.

 

Yes it is.

 

The CU itself even says "You don't have to have Superhuman Characteristics to be Superhuman."

 

Amazing Couch Boy whose only power is to turn into a couch has 8s across the Characteristic board - he's STILL Superhuman simply because he posseses an ability.

 

A number of examples they give like "Aliens" and "Well Trained Humans" can both have all their stats below even Legendary and still be Superhuman if they posses some quality that puts them above and beyond - like Powers, or strange alien abilities like Psionics.

 

The CU Setting book itself (p28) tells you that the 31+ is just a benchmark number because it had to be set somewhere, you don't need Superhuman Stats To Be Superhuman. I don't know how much clearer that can be said.

[Bloodstone]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

In the normal CU I believe Telios is the smartest with his 50 INT (Champions Universe and Evil Unleashed)

 

Next in line is Mentiac with a 40 (UNTIL: Defenders of Freedom)

 

As I said in another thread' date=' there are only 3 characters out of over 400 currently published who have a superhuman dex: Charm, Vector, Living Sphinx [and Charm is part of the augmented C3000 line'].

 

You forgot one.

 

Slug 3000 has a base 31 DEX. With the Bracers of the Elders, it becomes a 37, which I believe makes him the highest published DEX in either version of the CU (don't have News of the World yet, so not sure)

 

He also has an EGO of 35...

[incrdbil]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

Yes it is.

 

 

The CU Setting book itself (p28) tells you that the 31+ is just a benchmark number because it had to be set somewhere, you don't need Superhuman Stats To Be Superhuman. I don't know how much clearer that can be said.

 

And it seems also clear benchmarks that are rarely used or seen in even a fraction of all superhumans make an very odd, or even inaccurate set of benchmarks for superhumans.

[ghost-angel]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

And it seems also clear benchmarks that are rarely used or seen in even in a fraction of all superhumans makes an very odd' date=' or even inaccurate set of benchmark for superhumans.[/quote']

 

OK, well that I won't much argue with.

 

But if they set Superhuman to 26+, or put many of their published characters at 31+ I just think we'd be having the same discussion over either the benchmark being too low, or stat inflation. Which tells me it's all pretty arbitrary.

 

Especially when we sit down to game we set our own rules anyways.

[MitchellS]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

Especially when we sit down to game we set our own rules anyways.

I guess my point was that you don't set your own benchmark rules when you choose to game in an official world. The setting sets the benchmark rules for you whether that's starting with 8s in The Valdorian age, using NCMs in Dark Champions, or the benchmarks presented for the Champions Universe for supers. What benchmarks you set in your own world are your own business.

 

There are plenty of published characters who have superhuman con, pd, and ed but the CU doesn't, IMO, reflect it's own benchmarks when it comes to characters with superhuman dex, int, ego, or pre [mostly because those last 3 benchmarks are set way too high]. In a superhero setting their needs to be some characters with superhuman dexterity, intelligence, and ego.

[Vondy]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

Personally, there shouldn't have been a "superhuman" benchmark to start with. It puts a literal, linear break in an abstract progression that is heavily dependent on the organic whole in terms of what builds appear in the campaign. In the official Hero publications, the "superhuman" benchmark doesn't actually fit the reality the materials present very well (its not totally off, either). Also, not every super has to be super in every stat. In truth, I don't think there's a call for a character to be superhuman unless that's their shtick. Dr. D may be uber, but he's not a speedster. He doesn't really need a 31+ Dex (He's bad enough without it).

 

The real question is not what label you put on it, but what practical effect it has on play. If all of my Navy Seals have a 30 Dex, then to be "superhuman" my supers would have to have well beyond that (though we'd probably hit the threshold around 21+), but if they average 15 Dex, then 21-30 should be sufficient for almost all the supers in my game whose shtick doesn't require them to be above the curve. Indeed, a lot of "supers" in my game run 18+ (but my game is on the grittier side).

 

I think part of the problem is that the difference between legendary (21+) and superhuman (31+ for most stats) is pretty gray for most characteristics because, with the exception of strength, they don't have a linear progression. It would have been just as useful to have a statement like "most normals in the official CU have stats between 10 and 20, with some exceptional individuals exceeding this in some areas."

 

Its a question of benchmarks, and with Hero benchmarks don't have a "one size fits them all" solution. This has long been one of my issues with trying to have one benchmark, one set of animal write-ups, one set of vehicle write-ups, and one set of weapon write-ups for all genres and levels of play. The system really breaks down when you try to use it that way, in my experience. There's a difference between a toolkit you can use to tailor a setting and a universal system.

[Vondy]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

 

The CU Setting book itself (p28) tells you that the 31+ is just a benchmark number because it had to be set somewhere, you don't need Superhuman Stats To Be Superhuman. I don't know how much clearer that can be said.

 

In my Freedom Patrol game the most powerful characters had almost all stats in the normal range, with Con being the one that usually went over. It was the bricks (2) and trained supernormal operatives who had other scores in the legendary or superhuman range. And yet, Liberty Belle, who had a 150 Point Variable Power Pool (inertia, friction, velocity, etc), was easily the team's powerhouse...

[Metaphysician]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

I think part of the problem is confusing super attributes with super human attributes.

 

That is to say, 30 DEX is the absolute maximum a human can reach without super powers of some kind. That is *not* the same thing as saying that you need to have 31+ DEX to have superpowered DEX. It just means that, what your powers give you, could theoretically be matched by a genetically normal human.

 

For example, Dr Destroyer has a 30 DEX. Is it a superpower? You bet it is, because without his power source ( his armor ), he'd be lucky to have a 10 DEX. OTOH, Teleios' 30 DEX is not a superpower, because he's entirely genetically normal, if perfect within those ranges. Kinetick used to have a DEX of 26, IIRC, but it was a superpower, because it derived from his superspeed. OTOH, Seeker's DEX of 27 wasn't, because it came purely from training.

 

( I'm not touching chi powers, because that introduced an unneeded ambiguity )

[Clonus]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

So why are the guys at HERO Games paranoid about creating characters with a DEX higher than 30? I bet you can count the number of 31+ DEX characters in 5E on one hand and still have fingers left over.?

 

Because that reflects the source material. Characters who supposedly have no superpowers (or whose superpowers are not relevant to their INT and Dex) are only marginally inferior, if that, to almost all the superpowered characters when it comes to agility, precision, genius, and alertness (independant of actual super senses like those of Wolverine and Daredevil). The benchmarks are supposed to set how far a mere training based mortal can go. It just happens that when it comes to Int and Dex, the limit that the training based characters can achieve happens to not be far off from maximum that almost all super powered characters achieve as well.

[GAZZA]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

The Hero designers must be feeling a case of "damned if you do, damned if you don't" here.

 

In 4th edition, there were basically 3 common arguments: The Great Linked Debate (neutered in 5th), KAs vs NAs (still going strong), and "Human Maximum Characteristics". In other words it was not uncommon for people to wonder what the theoretical maximum Characteristic value was for a normal human with intense training - was it a little over 20? Higher? Much higher? (Rainbow Archer suggested that a DEX of 35 could be had through training only - and archery training at that).

 

So they obviously decided to take a stab at answering this, and now they are probably regretting having done so. Aren't we an ungrateful lot?

[Lord Mhoram]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

 

So they obviously decided to take a stab at answering this, and now they are probably regretting having done so. Aren't we an ungrateful lot?

 

Quoted for Truth; and repped

[JmOz]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

One thing I have been considering doing is asking all my players to make all characters have a clearly noted where they get there characteristics from, so to take a Brick as an example

 

12 Str

+48 Str Super Strength

 

or maybe for a martial artist

 

15 Dex

+8 Dex, Combat reflexes

[Dust Raven]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

The benchmark guidelines presented in the rulebook should be considered nothing more than just another graphic. It's a picture of benchmark guidelines, but as far as actual benchmark guidelines go, they don't seem to apply to anything else ever published. Really, out of 400+ (or whatever) characters there are absolutely none with superhuman intelligence or ego? None at all? Ever? Oh sure, lot's of legendary people, but none that are actually superhuman. Lots with superhuman strength or stamina, and though not many at least there's a few with superhuman agility... but no one, not even gods or supercomputers, has superhuman smarts or willpower.

 

It's gotta be the benchmark is just a neat picture of a benchmark and nothing more. Please disregard completely and create your own.

 

By the way... since so many people have gone through so many characters... any of you want to compare stats to character descriptions of published characters and take a stab at listing the actual benchmarks?

[BNakagawa]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

The reason that the vast majority of published (combat-worthy) characters in the CU have Dex scores between 20 and 30 is because CVs don't scale well.

 

Once you have a discrepancy of DEX of 10 or more, you gain a massive advantage over your opponent.

 

Two opponents with equal DEX scores have a 62.5% to hit eachother. Give one of them +10 DEX and the odds go to 90.7% for the high DEX to hit vs. 25.9%. (actually, there's a 1/3 chance the change is even more drastic)

 

Granted, someone can always hit the high DCV character with area effect attacks, but there you lose at least 33% of the damage. (unless you employ advantage stacking)

 

if two bricks both have the same dex and 60 str, 30 pd and 60 stun, then they'll both knock eachother out in 5 hits, taking roughly 8 attacks. (assume no recoveries)

 

If you give one +10 dex, then that brick will take the other out in 5 hits, taking about 5 attacks. In order for the other brick to have a good chance of taking out the +10 dex brick in 5 attacks, he'd need a STR of 130 or so.

 

A crude example, to be sure, but dex escalation can be a very dangerous thing.

[Gideon]

Re: What does HERO Games have against >30 DEX, INT and EGO?

 

I have to agree with BNakagawa.

 

And EGO follows the same resoning as DEX.

 

INT (IMO) isn't as high as it could be because every +5 INT gives +1 to all INT based skills and PER rolls which could potentially save a character hundreds of points.

 

compair a 20 INT character to a 25 INT character:

 

20 INT (10 points)

25 INT (15 points)

 

If both characters have 10 INT based skills at base level that costs 30 points. 13- for the 20 INT character, and 14- for the 25 INT character.

 

Now if the 20 INT character wants to raise his skills to 14- he has 2 choices: spend 20 points to raise each skill by 1 seperately, buy a 5 point skill level (which only adds to one skill at a time), or spend 5 points to raise his INT to 25 (gaining +1 with all 10 skills for 15 points less than if he had baught up the skills themselves).

 

And the more skills (or senses) the character has the more a character saves by buying more INT.