Heroes and Nukes!

[MilkmanDan]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

An interesting twist for this sort of thing is that a series of the PCs' regular foes get word of the "hero" (and I use that term very loosely) having a nuke and offer to help to try to stop them; after all, they're bank robbers in funny pants, not mass murderers. You could wind up with a situation with one PC frantically trying to escape not only his arch-rival, but his teammates as well.

 

That being said, I agree with Oddhat that the player needs to go. Anybody who ever suggests "maybe I should use a nuke" probably doesn't get the whole "superhero" genre and should find another game.

[Cancer]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

If you want a crater to be left behind, you'll have to detonate it under the surface. Otherwise you just flatten the terrain with an airburst.

 

If I've done my envelope right, 300 MT is the kinetic energy you'd get from an iron asteroid with about a 90 meter diameter striking at 30 km/sec.

 

That'd give you about 3-kilometer crater. You can investigate other possibilities here.

[HatchlingDragon]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

I'm still interested in finding out how a PC got his mitts on an atomic weapon, or even something of that power level. How many points are the characters based on at this point in the campaign? What power level is the BBEG operating at that anyone would even contemplate using such a weapon on him/her/it?

 

Oh, and where is this secret island base exactly? Does anyone know how big a detonation it would take to cause significant wave action? I'm thinking of the classic 'Tidal Wave' scenario, and which countries would be the likeliest victims of said waves.

[Certified]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

I'm still interested in finding out how a PC got his mitts on an atomic weapon, or even something of that power level. How many points are the characters based on at this point in the campaign? What power level is the BBEG operating at that anyone would even contemplate using such a weapon on him/her/it?

 

Oh, and where is this secret island base exactly? Does anyone know how big a detonation it would take to cause significant wave action? I'm thinking of the classic 'Tidal Wave' scenario, and which countries would be the likeliest victims of said waves.

 

Seconded, what has the villain done to merit this level of retaliation? How did the Hero get access to this super bomb? Do any government agencies know they have access to it?

 

Set the stage for us...

[Cancer]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

I also don't think you do appreciable damage to any fortified subterranean portion if you use an airburst. You bury it with radioactive debris, certainly, but a real hideout ought to be able to withstand mundane stuff like a hurricane passing over the island. While the airburst is rather more powerful than a tropical storm it lasts less time. I suspect that anything underground ought to get by more or less untouched.

 

Hence my subterranean explosion suggestion. And that would kick enough junk into the stratosphere to severely affect world climate for a year or two, even ignoring any radioactive fallout issues.

[Twilight]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

An interesting twist for this sort of thing is that a series of the PCs' regular foes get word of the "hero" (and I use that term very loosely) having a nuke and offer to help to try to stop them; after all, they're bank robbers in funny pants, not mass murderers. You could wind up with a situation with one PC frantically trying to escape not only his arch-rival, but his teammates as well.

 

That being said, I agree with Oddhat that the player needs to go. Anybody who ever suggests "maybe I should use a nuke" probably doesn't get the whole "superhero" genre and should find another game.

 

Forget the PC's regular foes, they've got a mega nuke for crying out loud I could see other heroes trying to stop them. After all they've just stepped over the line in a VERY big way.

[jkwleisemann]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Hmm... carry the two....

 

I think everybody's ignoring one crucial aspect of this.

 

Comic. Book. World.

 

It *never* works to nuke somebody if you're trying to kill them. It just doesn't. Ignoring *all* of the other consequences (since everybody else has gone into them), there's one that they're missing.

 

The villain *will* come back. And he *will* glow in the dark.

 

Which only means your 'hero' gets to open his eyes and see what he has created before being reduced to radioactive ash by a megavillain who's been given enough bonus points from a very intentional radiation accident to take on the combined forces of Destroyer, Tyrannon, and Mechanon 3000 and survive to tell the tale.

[Certified]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Hmm... carry the two....

 

I think everybody's ignoring one crucial aspect of this.

 

Comic. Book. World.

 

It *never* works to nuke somebody if you're trying to kill them. It just doesn't. Ignoring *all* of the other consequences (since everybody else has gone into them), there's one that they're missing.

 

The villain *will* come back. And he *will* glow in the dark.

 

Which only means your 'hero' gets to open his eyes and see what he has created before being reduced to radioactive ash by a megavillain who's been given enough bonus points from a very intentional radiation accident to take on the combined forces of Destroyer, Tyrannon, and Mechanon 3000 and survive to tell the tale.

 

Now that would be a nice way to reboot the campaign setting. Letting the Hero nuke the island. Evil Villain becomes Rad-Living God Master Villain. Kills some, most major heroes especially the PC who set them up the bomb. Fast Forward.

 

. . .

 

1 year later

 

Now how do you fix this?

[Great Beyond]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

300 MT is larger than any real bomb which has ever been detonated even by the Soviet Union or the US. It's about 20' date='000 times bigger than the bombs dropped on Japan in WW2.[/quote']

 

Fancy that - I was just at Mount Saint Helens over the weekend - 300 Megatons is about the size (give or take - it's a bit larger) of the may 18th eruption in '80.

 

* The innermost zone of destruction around the mountain was about 8 miles in radius, an area in which virtually everything, natural or artificial, was obliterated or carried away.

 

 

* The next zone of destruction extended out as far as 19 miles from the volcano, an area in which the eruption flattened everything in its path. (thats where all those pictures of neatly flattened trees all pointing in the same direction come from).

 

* The outermost zone of the blast was an area where trees remained standing but were scorched by the hot gasses, extending 23 miles across and 19 miles long. The ashfall was deposited in eleven states.

 

If a villain requires such extreme measures to stop, then it would be logical for him to possess the means to counter the attack or even to use it for his own ends. "Thanks for delivering this toy, you fools! I'll now turn it against Manhattan!"

 

Or they detonate the bomb, but the clever villian has devices in place that will channel that destructive energy to jump start his SuperBattleDeathRobot, which he will then unleash on Manhattan.

 

Or, assuming they dont have degrees in advanced earth sciences and geolology and/or didnt bother doing research, the bomb sets off a much bigger problem. The island was positioned right on a geological nexus point where several faults meet. The explosion tears a rip in those faults, setting off eruptions and earthquakes all over the globe. Plate techtonics gone MAD - causing a massive fault to form and grow within the earth's crust, which threatens to split the earth in two if it is not stopped in time!

 

And heaven forbid if someone figures out that they were behind the accident!

[Greywind]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Well, once upon a time, it was stated that Dr. Doom's personal forcefield could take a hit from a nuke.

 

But just think about the knockback he'd suffer...

[Captain Obvious]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Not worth bothering; that writeup was overpowered to the point of ludicry. Nukes are big' date=' but they aren't Magic Armageddon Devices That End The World. They just blow up real big, big enough to wreck cities in one or two hits.[/quote']

 

If the one in the Almanac and the one in the Equipment Guide are the same writeup, I don't see it as overpowered. It is supposed to represent (IIRC) a 1 Mton payload, which is no sissy weapon. And a 20d6 will mess up a city but good, but it's far from destroying the world.

[Inu]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

If the one in the Almanac and the one in the Equipment Guide are the same writeup' date=' I don't see it as overpowered. It is supposed to represent (IIRC) a 1 Mton payload, which is no sissy weapon. And a 20d6 will mess up a city but good, but it's far from destroying the world.[/quote']

One good roll, and you've hit that magical 86 BODY. ^_-

 

(But we shouldn't get into that argument here.)

[Metaphysician]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

If the one in the Almanac and the one in the Equipment Guide are the same writeup' date=' I don't see it as overpowered. It is supposed to represent (IIRC) a 1 Mton payload, which is no sissy weapon. And a 20d6 will mess up a city but good, but it's far from destroying the world.[/quote']

 

Its more the "multiple stacking damage effects." The writeup was basically as over the top as the Word of Unmaking, which is completely unnecessary. You don't need to make a nuke as six different 200+ active point attacks, especially since in Hero, x2 power does *not* equal x2 dice.

 

IMO, a better benchmark is 1 megaton = 15d6 RKA, with appropriate area, and most of the secondary effects left as plot devices that are mostly irrelevant if you can survive taking 15d6 work of RKA.

[Greywind]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Some of those "plot devices" have an effect upon detonation beyond the range of the 15D6 RKA...

[Captain Obvious]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Its more the "multiple stacking damage effects." The writeup was basically as over the top as the Word of Unmaking, which is completely unnecessary. You don't need to make a nuke as six different 200+ active point attacks, especially since in Hero, x2 power does *not* equal x2 dice.

 

IMO, a better benchmark is 1 megaton = 15d6 RKA, with appropriate area, and most of the secondary effects left as plot devices that are mostly irrelevant if you can survive taking 15d6 work of RKA.

 

The different powers in the writeup are to allow for all the varying deadly special effects in the attack. Just because Asbestos Man can take the heat doesn't mean that the flying debris and/or radiation won't kill him.

 

Maybe for a character that isn't immune to one or more of the damaging effects, it adds up overly quickly. I haven't analyzed it that far myself. Although, I'm sure Steve used the same damage analyses I've seen for a nuclear attack on an urban area, so I'm willing to bet the numbers on the dice will match up pretty well with the predictions.

 

This may make a nuke over-powered for a cinematic scene, but IMO if you're playing with nukes, you should expect to be burnt. You could always tone down the payload if a Megaton is too powerful, as well.

 

Heh...this is funny, actually. Usually when nukes come up on the boards, people are saying "why bother? Just kill everyone, it's a nuke" and I have to argue that if you're not a ground zero, a nuke is survivable. Now it seems I have to argue that a nuke is, in fact, very deadly.

[Trebuchet]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

The damage generated by nukes in Hero official writeups have always been inadequate. At the very least they'd need a significantly increased radius of effect to simulate damage miles away from ground zero. To think a 1 megaton blast is accurately simulated by a mere 20d6 EX RKA is patently absurd. That's more appropriate for a suitcase nuke or nuclear artillery shell. Megaton+ attacks need to be simulated with scores of d6, not a score.

 

In our campaign we treat the listed 20d6 EX RKA as virtually a floor for nukes, not as a ceiling.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Oh, certainly, they need Megascale for the area of effect/explosion. I'm just saying that there is precisely zero need to exaggerate the actual raw damage, especially not for the comic genre.

[OddHat]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

The damage generated by nukes in Hero official writeups have always been inadequate. At the very least they'd need a significantly increased radius of effect to simulate damage miles away from ground zero. To think a 1 megaton blast is accurately simulated by a mere 20d6 EX RKA is patently absurd. That's more appropriate for a suitcase nuke or nuclear artillery shell. Megaton+ attacks need to be simulated with scores of d6, not a score.

 

In our campaign we treat the listed 20d6 EX RKA as virtually a floor for nukes, not as a ceiling.

 

Area wise I agree, but I'd use increased area or megascale for that eather than pumping the dice; there are a fair number of high end but still playable Supers who should be able to survive at ground zero (any Kryptonian type for a start), even if severely injured; I'd rather not have to build all of them with double hardened resistant PD and ED in the 100s. It may be "realistic", but it's not really genre. Ymmv and all that.

[Greywind]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Oh' date=' certainly, they need Megascale for the area of effect/explosion. I'm just saying that there is precisely zero need to exaggerate the actual raw damage, especially not for the comic genre.[/quote']

Having seen pictures of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, why would it be an exaggeration?

[MilkmanDan]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Having seen pictures of Hiroshima and Nagasaki' date=' why would it be an exaggeration?[/quote']

 

Because a lot of people survived Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

[DarkGreen]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

A random bit of physics from someone with a real-life nuclear materials certification...

 

At about 3 TT (TeraTons) the blast would be energetic enough to start an atmospheric fusion reaction that would consume earth's atmosphere in a horrendous conflagration.

 

So make sure your heroes don't drop any decimals when building that thing. Of course your badguy could tell the PCs at the last minute that he has a "strong force amplification field" that will increase the yield of their bomb enough to do the trick. So now the heroes have to race against time to stop their own bomb from going off!

 

Yarr! Plot twists FTW

[Cancer]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

At about 3 TT (TeraTons) the blast would be energetic enough to start an atmospheric fusion reaction that would consume earth's atmosphere in a horrendous conflagration.

 

I would've thought the density of the atmosphere was too low for sustained nuclear reactions at all, unless you heat it all up and compress it at once.

 

FWIW, that 3 TT is about a factor of 10^11 less than a simplistic estimate of the gravitational binding energy of the planet.

[DarkGreen]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

I would've thought the density of the atmosphere was too low for sustained nuclear reactions at all, unless you heat it all up and compress it at once.

 

FWIW, that 3 TT is about a factor of 10^11 less than a simplistic estimate of the gravitational binding energy of the planet.

 

Both the sun and the torus fusion reactor work at very low pressures and densities.

 

I didn't come up with the number, it's been around since the manhattan project when some of the scientists were tasked with figuring out whether they would blow up the planet. It was mentioned to me by Edward Teller (father of the hydrogen bomb) at dinner once, and I think I recall seeing it in Richard Rhodes book "The Making of the Atomic Bomb". I didn't do the calculations myself, but those seem like pretty good sources.

 

What is the gravitational binding energy? Is that the energy required to lift all the matter in earth out of the gravity well and separate it? That's an interesting number I've never thought about.

 

Darn it, now you've made me want to go look this stuff up... but I'm at work.

[Cancer]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

Well, the solar core, where the fusion is happening, has a pressure about 10^11 times and density about 10^5 times higher than STP. That's what made me wonder about densities. I admit I'm ignorant about tokamak conditions.

 

I haven't seen the derivation of the old Manhattan Project era number, so I'll have to go looking for it.

 

That gravitational binding energy number is the value you get assuming Earth is a uniform sphere and freshman physics.

[DarkGreen]

Re: Heroes and Nukes!

 

That gravitational binding energy number is the value you get assuming Earth is a uniform sphere and freshman physics.

 

Probably pretty close. As long as velocities are low gravity is pretty easy

 

Standard physicist joke regarding figuring out the potential distribution of a herd of cows, Step 1: assume the herd of cows is a sphere.