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

[GAZZA]

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

That's a really cool idea; amongst other things, this enables you to have some sort of benchmark of how much a "Drain All Mutant Powers" can knock off of Strength. I may well nick that.

[KarinsDad]

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

 

I think this has to do with pure game mechanics.

 

For attacks, Dex and Ego are divided by 3 to create OCV, DCV, and ECV.

 

For skills, Dex and Ego are divided by 5 and added to 9 to create skill totals.

 

Dex or Ego 30 results in skill totals (without any other modifiers) of 15-. That's a 97.2% success rate for typical use of the skill without buying up the skills at all.

 

Ditto for combat. Without taking skill and other modifiers into account, the Dex 30 superhuman character hits the best human Dex 20 character on a 14- or 90.7% of the time.

 

For both attacks and skills, Dex/Ego 30 is already seriously pushing the envelope of what a 3D6 dice mechanic can already handle.

 

 

But, many of the other stats (except PRE) do not use the 3D6 mechanic and hence, do not have that game mechanic envelope.

 

Strength can go as high as someone wants and does not break the 3D6 mechanic (although it can break other mechanics).

 

And even PRE is also used for number of dice (like Str), not just the 3D6 roll and hence, it is understandable that it might sometimes be higher than 30 (course, the same could be said of Ego vs. PRE attacks).

 

But, 30 is a good game mechanics cap for those characteristics that use the 3D6 mechanic and hence, it makes sense that the Champions Universe would use it for the most part.

 

 

I walked into a game a few months back with 350 point PCs and one of the PCs had a Dex of 41. That's ridiculous for 350 point PCs. That PC almost never misses and almost never gets hit. After one session, I just shook my head and never went back. Course, I left for a lot of reasons, not just because of that, but not having reasonable and consistent caps on game elements is just not fun IMO.

 

In a game system where character creation (PC or NPC) consists of buying whatever anyone wants to whatever level one wants, there has to be limits or the game falls apart. And that is probably why Champions Universe does not have much in the way of mega-Dex or mega-Ego NPCs. It just makes game mechanics sense to not do so.

[Trebuchet]

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

 

Worrying about why there aren't more supers with truly superhuman attributes in the CU is like complaining about the laundry service on the Titanic.

[Metaphysician]

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

 

Besides which, the reason there aren't any "truly superhumanly intelligent" individuals in the Champions Universe is because they've set the limit of what is *humanly* achievable in terms of intelligence at incredibly high levels. IOW, this is not a transhumanist setting where AIs and derivations rules over all else; its a supers setting like the Marvel U, where even cosmic aspects of reality go to Reed Richards for help in scientific matters.

[incrdbil]

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

 

I walked into a game a few months back with 350 point PCs and one of the PCs had a Dex of 41. That's ridiculous for 350 point PCs. That PC almost never misses and almost never gets hit.

 

I'd have been curious as to the levels of defenses of the character. Anything area of effect would seemingly be the bane of this character if their defenses were appropriately low due to his enhanced DCV.

 

I'm not worried about the values over 30 unbalancing anything; its not that the mechanics cant handle it--its reflecting the total superiority of the character with superhuman stats facing someone with less than superhuman stats in that area.

 

Just because the CU characters don't hit those benchmarks make it a bad setting or anything, its just sort of curious. Feel free to exceed those benchmarks. Run a Dex 35 super speeder if you wish, or a 45 INT gadgeteer. (I've done the latter, and the phrase 'make a perception roll always makes you smile.) Or an EGO 35 mentalist, not that there is much benefit to egos that high after a while. It won't automatically make your game explode from imbalance--if you can manage to keep your game balanced at current standards, you'll adapt to about anything.

[Trebuchet]

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

 

I walked into a game a few months back with 350 point PCs and one of the PCs had a Dex of 41. That's ridiculous for 350 point PCs. That PC almost never misses and almost never gets hit. After one session' date=' I just shook my head and never went back. Course, I left for a lot of reasons, not just because of that, but not having reasonable and consistent caps on game elements is just not fun IMO.[/quote']I've run a PC with DEX 43 for many years in our 350 point-based Champions campaign without running into balance issues (Since the other GMs in our campaign all post here, I think they can confirm that high DEX is not a game-breaker). It does honestly present the GMs with some difficulties devising opponents and situations to challenge my PC, but no worse than if someone is running a mentalist, VPP user, or other less common archetype. While the character has been quite effective, she's never been overbalanced. Yes, she's pretty hard to hit and seldom misses targets, but both situations still occur with some regularity. Her low defenses and smallish attacks mean she can't afford many mistakes in combat.

 

Hard caps are IMO little more than crutches for weak GMs; as your observation about other problems with that campaign seems to suggest.

[Checkmate]

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

 

Hard caps are IMO little more than crutches for weak GMs;

I whole heartedly disagree. While it is possible to come up with challenges for those that are ungodly high stats/powers etc., it also causes a lot of problems.

 

As a GM I like well rounded characters. Someone that dumps a lot of points into one thing won't generally be as well rounded.

 

Sure if you have a 43 DEX I can throw a bunch of AoE's at you, but those AoE's also make it tougher on your teammates that aren't one trick ponies. Sure if you have an ungodly attack power, I can throw people with a bunch of high def characters at you, but again you're teammates are now suffering too.

 

So while there are a lot of ways of dealing with this type of character, you're really only left with three options:

1. Keep screwing the teammates of the 1 trick pony.

2. Watch your bad guys constantly get taken out by the 1 trick pony.

3. Make up some contrived reason that certain bad guys only go after the 1 trick pony.

 

So you may see it as weak, I see it as a GM that wants to keep all his players happy.

[Trebuchet]

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

 

So you may see it as weak' date=' I see it as a GM that wants to keep [b']all[/b] his players happy.

Gee, we've managed to keep everyone in the campaign happy for 15 years despite playing with that character. What're we doing wrong?

 

As long as everyone gets a chance to shine occasionally (IMHO best enforced with schticks, not caps) high numbers on Characteristics or attacks are not a problem. The DEX 23/ SPD 4 brick is every bit as effective as her DEX 43/ SPD 9 MA teammate. The flying EB makes a good counterpoint to the VPP mentalist.

 

You seem to operate on the narrow assumption that every character has to be equally effective against every opponent and in every situation; or that the ability to pound down opponents is the be-all of superheroing. We've had battles where only my MA could hit the high DCV villain; and we've had ones where it took the 75 STR brick to harm the villain the MA couldn't scratch. Better yet, we've had combats we only won because the two of them worked together.

 

It works because our players are not in competition with each other but are as much a team as our characters are.

[Clonus]

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

 

I'd have been curious as to the levels of defenses of the character. Anything area of effect would seemingly be the bane of this character if their defenses were appropriately low due to his enhanced DCV.

 

 

Why would someone's defenses be low just because they had a high DCV?

[Trebuchet]

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

 

Why would someone's defenses be low just because they had a high DCV?

That goes towards play balance. If a player character has a very high DCV, then lower defenses and/or attacks will help balance the equation. I don't object to balance, I just don't think it's best done by formulas and formal caps. I think it's best handled with cooperation between the various players and GM(s).

[incrdbil]

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

 

Why would someone's defenses be low just because they had a high DCV?

 

Well, if you are comfotable giving a character high dex and high defenses, well, it can be done. But usually, theres sort of a sliding scale--usually the high DCV characters tend to have lower defenses.

 

If the GM allows someone a 41 Dex, and lets them have high defenses, they shouldn't act suprise when normal attacks dont bring that character down.

 

Or they shoudl plan to have plenty of attacks that equialiuze things. Area effect one hex bought as ' accurate' for example, ego attacks, or othereffects that create a challenge for the player.

[incrdbil]

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

 

Sure if you have a 43 DEX I can throw a bunch of AoE's at you, but those AoE's also make it tougher on your teammates that aren't one trick ponies.

well, the GM does have some options here. Unless the team is a group of siamese sextuplets..Aoe's like one hex, or explosion are godo enough to hurt high dcv person without crushing the team. And again, if the high DCV PC has low defenses, you could hit the group with an AOE most of them shrug off, but hurts the high DCV character.

 

Sure if you have an ungodly attack power, I can throw people with a bunch of high def characters at you, but again you're teammates are now suffering too.

 

It only takes one high defense character to occupy that person if you do it right. Or a little missiel defection, or entangles.

 

 

 

So while there are a lot of ways of dealing with this type of character, you're really only left with three options:

1. Keep screwing the teammates of the 1 trick pony.

2. Watch your bad guys constantly get taken out by the 1 trick pony.

3. Make up some contrived reason that certain bad guys only go after the 1 trick pony.

 

Well, if you chose the same solution of overkill to meet every challenge the individual PC's have, maybe. Or you can simply make relatively minor adjustments (very plausible ones if the PC's fight anyone smarter than Grond or a Giant Clam) you can challenge the high DCV or high Defense character without penalizing the team.

 

Otherwise, it seems an argument that everyone must be the same for the teams own good..which isnt much fun at all.

[Lord Liaden]

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

 

Just for the sake of completeness, there are more "superhuman" examples in the HERO System Bestiary, although a number of them are for creatures much larger than human, and are mostly BODY scores. Whales and dinosaurs, for example, run up to 40 BODY. The "Giant Dinosaur" (Godzilla homage) has 50 BODY, the "Engine Of Destruction" (planet killing machine) has 100 BODY, and the "Giant Space Amoeba" has 1,000 BODY.

 

OTOH a couple of the Demon Princes (who are very suitable as threats to an entire superteam) would have to count as fair examples of superhuman stats. The Demon Prince Of Power has an EGO of 33, while the Prince Of Strength is at 33 DEX and 40 BODY.

[Lucius]

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

 

I don't understand. What was the issue again?

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Sometimes I can't get any sense ouf of the palindromedary...

[Lucius]

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),

 

To give DOJ their due (and as I've alluded recently in a thread on the topic) they have at least begun to address that issue. For example, by giving a limitation to Hand to Hand attacks to make them cheaper than Hand to Hand Killing Attacks (although I'm not sure why the next logical step wasn't taken, applying the same "universal limitation" to Energy Blast to help balance it against Ranged Killing Attack.) Also in terms of Martial Arts, one Damage Class of Killing Attack is considered the equivalent of TWO Damage Classes of Normal Attack.

 

 

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?

 

I don't know about ungrateful - to me, hard to understand. I don't quite get what the issue is here.

 

But as for the argument about "Normal Maximum Characteristics" the only arguments on that score that I remember have to do with the ill-advised idea of the NCM or "Normal Characteristic Maxima" rule.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Characteristically Abnormal Palindromedary

[sinanju]

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

 

I'm on record as thinking that there is way too much stat inflation already. I'd give Spider-Man, the epitome of the high-DEX character a DEX of 33, maybe 36. And that would be the absolute limit for dexterity. Similarly with just about every stat except STR, which I would allow to go higher (insanely strong is okay). So the fact that no (or almost no) published characters have DEX above the official threshold doesn't bother me. (It also makes me wonder if maybe the writers think that stats that high are unreasonable, but I don't know for sure).

 

On the other hand, I've never run a straight out-of-the-box gameworld campaign. I always build my own, though I may crib large pieces (organizations or characters). So what the "official benchmarks" may be is irrelevant.

[Trebuchet]

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

 

Stat inflation is relevant only in context to each individual campaign. If the average super has a 23 DEX, then 33 or higher isn't really inflated. Being that I've played in Pulp Hero and Fantasy Hero campaigns with player characters having DEX of 17 - 20, I hardly think numbers in the 30's are out of line for true superhumans.

 

In one respect I applaud DoJ's pre-built characters: By hardly giving any supers Characteristics (except STR) beyond HCM, they help keep stat inflation down within games set in the CU. Given how competitive some RPGers are, if there were lots of CU supers with 28 DEX I expect we'd see a lot of players justifying 40+ DEX. Fortunately, none of them will play in our campaign. And like sinanju, we don't play in the CU either.

[rjcurrie]

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 )

 

 

This has always been my interpretation as well. Basically, it allows for a Batman type character to have attributes that exceed those of a lot of superpowered characters.

[Spidey88]

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

 

I'm on record as thinking that there is way too much stat inflation already. I'd give Spider-Man, the epitome of the high-DEX character a DEX of 33, maybe 36. And that would be the absolute limit for dexterity. Similarly with just about every stat except STR, which I would allow to go higher (insanely strong is okay). So the fact that no (or almost no) published characters have DEX above the official threshold doesn't bother me. (It also makes me wonder if maybe the writers think that stats that high are unreasonable, but I don't know for sure).

 

 

I can't help but respond to this one...

 

 

I'm pretty much in the same boat on this one. Like I said in another thread, I think the reason we don't see a lot of high-DEX characters is a) concern over stat inflation, and point budget. There just aren't a whole lot of CU characters who have a big point budget and have super-agility as part of their powerset.

 

If I have to build a Spider-Man homage on 350 points, I'm not going to give him a 39 DEX - it's simply too expensive, and sets the bar a little too high (considering everyone else in the campaign will be working with a similar point budget). In that case, 30 seems about right. In my current game that I'm running, where the characters have over 500 points, my GMNPC character (who is a very obvious Spidey homage) has a 39 DEX. Any higher than that, and the gap between my character and the rest is a little too much to be comfortable - but he is supposed to be pretty much the avatar of agility, so I figure it's justified where it is. His DCV is positively stratospheric (thanks to having extra DCV, Requires Danger Sense roll) - coupled with flying dodge, he's next to impossible to hit - but he's got 11 PD and 10 ED, so when he does get hit, POW! That's the tradeoff I went with so he doesn't overwhelm the other players - the artful dodger shouldn't be able to take a punch on the chin and smile, because it's not really fair to everyone else if he can!

 

Like I've said before, it's all relative. I want my character to be truly awesomely agile (I'm the Pro from Dover type), but not so much more than other super-agile guys (like Vector at DEX 36) that he makes them or the other players look stupid. My character, in my mind, anyway, sets an upper limit for DEX unless I want to make a point about how "there's always someone better".

 

 

On the other hand, I tend to assume that a characteristic over the NCM is pretty darned impressive, at least compared to the average guy on the street. My personal benchmark for mental characteristics as "superhuman" is a lot lower (say, 30 or so), but it's a lot easier for me to justify having an INT or EGO over that level than a physical stat. I'd give Reed Richards an INT score well over 30 without hesitation, even though it's not technically a superpower - it's just part of his schtick. Mental stats just have less of a hard cap on them in my mind.

[Vondy]

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

 

 

Hard caps are IMO little more than crutches for weak GMs;

 

This is a bit sweeping in my opinion. To run a good game where the GM doesn't have parameters in place also requires mature players with a good sense of the genre and setting being played. A strong (meaning talented and experienced) GM with a bunch of nitwits for players, or players who are new to the genre being run, will have to set some limits - sometimes hard limits - for things to work. Genre and setting simulation are also factors in deciding if there will be caps or not. In a high-end super-heroic or high-fantasy game its pretty easy not to set parameters and still run a pretty smooth game, but not so much in other settings or genres. This is especially true for grittier heroic games. Its very easy for those of us who have, or had, long standing groups who grew into an implicit mutual understanding and style together, to forget how easily games get screwed up without guidelines - especially when that game runs on the higher end to start with.

[Dust Raven]

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

 

I'd have been curious as to the levels of defenses of the character. Anything area of effect would seemingly be the bane of this character if their defenses were appropriately low due to his enhanced DCV.

 

I ran a character with a 36 DEX once, called Suicide Dancer. He also had a PD and ED of 14. His basic shtick was to take out an infinite number of mooks. Well, mooks without AoE attacks anyway. He was almost useless against full blown supers though, except as support (DC of 9 in a DC average 12 campaign). Great fun to play, but he would get boring in solo adventures.

[Dust Raven]

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

 

That goes towards play balance. If a player character has a very high DCV' date=' then lower defenses and/or attacks will help balance the equation. I don't object to balance, I just don't think it's best done by formulas and formal caps. I think it's best handled with cooperation between the various players and GM(s).[/quote']

 

Agreed 100%! For a long time now I've tossed out my "limits" and replaced them with "guidelines". I expect everybody to keep their stats and powers within a certain range, but I'm willing to allow some, or even all, to step outside that if it fits their concept and it doesn't unbalance the game. And of course, just because something falls well within the guidelines doesn't mean I'll automatically allow it either.

[MitchellS]

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

 

I don't believe this thread is really about stat inflation or whether you play NCM Champions or standard Champions. If you play NCM Champions that only means most of your characters are going to have a 20 dex or less because that's your benchmark for normal humans. There's nothing wrong with using a 20 for normal humans as long as you're consistent in your game.

 

But, even in an NCM Champions game there are going to be characters with a 21+ dex in the game. There's going to be the speedster with the 24 dex and 6 speed or mutant spider-clone with the 27 dex. The normal human benchmark is going to be exceeded by a decent percentage of superhuman characters in the NCM universe; maybe 5%, maybe 10%, maybe 20% depending on each person's homebrew universe.

 

In the mainline Champions Universe there are only 2 characters who exceed the normal human benchmark [Vector and the Living Sphinx] out of over 400 published characters. We're not talking about 5%, 10%, or 20% here. We're talking about less then 1%.

 

The benchmark Hero Games choose to use for normal humans is so high that they're not creating characters who exceed the benchmark. It's almost as if Hero Games said the universe's ceiling was 30 rather then the normals' ceiling; and those are really 2 different things.

 

If your universe's Captain America is a 30 then there needs to be room for your Spiderman, and Nightcrawler, and the other superhumanly agile characters to exceed your pinnacle normal. That's not happening in the CU because the characters you'd think would be superhumanly agile are listed as 29 and 30s.

 

As I said above, this isn't an issue of stat inflation. It's an issue of publishing characters that meet and exceed the published benchmarks. If you have superhuman characters with 21+ dex in an NCM Champions game then there needs to be a like number of superhuman characters with a 31+ dex in a Standard Champions game. Otherwise the benchmarks are meaningless.

[Dust Raven]

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

 

This is a bit sweeping in my opinion. To run a good game where the GM doesn't have parameters in place also requires mature players with a good sense of the genre and setting being played. with.

 

As a GM, I've dealt with such nitwit players before, but I didn't set limits. I kept to my guidelines and told my players when they build an unreasonable character that they've done so and made some suggestions on how to fix it. Some whined, but in the end they got the character they wanted, and I got a player playing a balanced character for my campaign.

 

Well, there was that one time when even after all that I had to ask one particular nitwit to leave... but that's a different story.

[Guest steamteck]

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

 

I like soft caps myself. It gives a ceiling while still giving some wiggle room. In my Superhero universe the Spider-man type ( well actually Spider-man/Batman/Jane-Claude Van Damm) type has a 38 DEX it seems to work pretty well. She's worn down and beaten some top line bad guys but sometimes the mega bad guy gets a lucky shot or two. Makes pretty exiting battles.I also pretty much say that if a Stat isn't covered by your SFX it should stay in human norm. That is under 20 Everyone is cool with that. I'm willing to go with logical exceptions but none asked for so far.

In my more heroic games I have the Stats cost normal up to 20 then double every 5 points after that. players push the limits more here but the awareness of the norm help them focus their characters.