Help me make Awesome Presence

[Willpower]

I am building an ultra villain Brick named Payback. He was actually the old persona of one of the PCs who used to be a bad guy, until he had an accident that not only gave him the mind of a child, but got rid of a lot of his powers. Another villain recently ripped the old Payback from this character, fully powered. Now the team must confront him.

 

I have him nearly done, but am having a little difficulty with one power. I wanted to give him a power called Awesome Presence. This power works based on the the fact that he is SO fierce he can little turn even fully powered tough superheroes into snivveling cowards. It does not change them physically in anyway, just allows him to scare people so bad that for hours they will do almost nothing but cry and shy away from almost anything.

 

I built it using transform. Here is the write up.

Transform 9d6: Person into snivveling coward (Cosmetic) Requires a successful Presence attack at +20 (-1/4... I know, but he has a Presence of 50) Area of Effect (One Hex, +1/2... I didn't think hitting with it should be based off of Dex, but based off of ECV also doesn't seem right, and it would make it so expensive that the Transform would be too low to work.) Attack Versus Limited Defense: Presence (+3/4, I am thinking this should maybe be even lower than I changed it too, and maybe even I should make it a limitation, since I am taking a power that originally used an exotic defense, and turned it into one that uses a normal stat everyone has as a defense.) All or Nothing (-1/2)

 

I am sure there are better ways to do this, and if I wasn't so rusty I could probably find it myself.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

+100 PRE Offensive Use Only (-1)

 

Adds 20d6 to your presence attacks, or +70 effect on average.

[jkwleisemann]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Honestly, I lean towards just taking a schnitload of bonus PRE: Only for Intimidation (-1/2?)

 

A large enough PRE attack simulates what you're doing, and no need to futz around with AVLD. Or convincing people that Harold Heroic should need more than a Cosmetic transform to become Captain Cowardice.

[Supreme Serpent]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

This power works based on the the fact that he is SO fierce he can little turn even fully powered tough superheroes into snivveling cowards. It does not change them physically in anyway' date=' just allows him to scare people so bad that for hours they will do almost nothing but cry and shy away from almost anything.[/quote']

 

Your game, but...unless it's a comedy game or you really know the players are up for that, I'd be careful. Some players would not be happy at having their 'tough superheroes' wet themselves over someone being 'fierce'. It can work with the right group, and can go down easier with some sweetener ("he emits pheromones that work like fear gas" or "manifestation of ancient god of terror") but I'd tread lightly.

 

If it were me, I'd just give him a high presence (40 or so) and PLAY him as super fierce, have NPCs react as incredibly frightened, and let the players decide how the PCs react, subject to normal PRE attacks of course. 40 PRE plus situational modifiers, violent actions and such should be enough to get the point across to most 15-30 PRE heroes.

[Maccabe]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

How about -> Suppress: Presence with Drain Presence? HERO 5 REV page 38.

A negative Presence causes victims to run away or cower in fear.

Maybe Mind Control:Fear might also work:eg:

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Your game, but...unless it's a comedy game or you really know the players are up for that, I'd be careful. Some players would not be happy at having their 'tough superheroes' wet themselves over someone being 'fierce'. It can work with the right group, and can go down easier with some sweetener ("he emits pheromones that work like fear gas" or "manifestation of ancient god of terror") but I'd tread lightly.

 

If it were me, I'd just give him a high presence (40 or so) and PLAY him as super fierce, have NPCs react as incredibly frightened, and let the players decide how the PCs react, subject to normal PRE attacks of course. 40 PRE plus situational modifiers, violent actions and such should be enough to get the point across to most 15-30 PRE heroes.

 

QFE -- this is very good advice as well. GMing 101 -- players generally do not like having their vicarious ego enablers denigrated or defiled against their wills.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

How about -> Suppress: Presence with Drain Presence? HERO 5 REV page 38.

A negative Presence causes victims to run away or cower in fear.

Maybe Mind Control:Fear might also work:eg:

 

 

Yeah, Drain vs the "soft" stats is a frequently overlooked but very powerful option. INT and PRE are very susceptible to this since they only cost 1 point each.

[Willpower]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

+100 PRE Offensive Use Only (-1)

 

Adds 20d6 to your presence attacks, or +70 effect on average.

 

Thanks for the suggestions, but Presence attacks typically do not work completely as they are supposed to against PC's. Most people I play with, simply say you generally aren't supposed to enforce them as much. Plus, the affect I wanted to add would be to keep people scared for a while.

[Willpower]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Your game, but...unless it's a comedy game or you really know the players are up for that, I'd be careful. Some players would not be happy at having their 'tough superheroes' wet themselves over someone being 'fierce'. It can work with the right group, and can go down easier with some sweetener ("he emits pheromones that work like fear gas" or "manifestation of ancient god of terror") but I'd tread lightly.

 

If it were me, I'd just give him a high presence (40 or so) and PLAY him as super fierce, have NPCs react as incredibly frightened, and let the players decide how the PCs react, subject to normal PRE attacks of course. 40 PRE plus situational modifiers, violent actions and such should be enough to get the point across to most 15-30 PRE heroes.

 

Needless to say this is a gimmicky power for him, and not really meant for too much use against the PC's, maybe one, though not necessarily. He already has a 50 Presence, though as mentioned a simple presence attack, no matter how high, will not make people coware for more than a few instants, unless the PC's are simply playing it right. This is meant to freak people out for hours, and it won't end up getting overused anyway, because of the limitation that it requires a +20 Presence attack roll. Thats hard to get on 10d6.

[Willpower]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

QFE -- this is very good advice as well. GMing 101 -- players generally do not like having their vicarious ego enablers denigrated or defiled against their wills.

 

Players also don't like losing fights as well, but this sort of thing happens, and there are times that it is meant to happen. I don't worry much about people's ego being bent a little. If they aren't grown up enough to take it, they can go play D&D.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

If players choose to ignore the roleplaying guidance and ignore the effects of the PRE attack, you should properly dock the Experience you award appropriately for failure to roleplay vs rollplay.

 

But, if you do want it to last for hours a properly constructed Drain is a better way to go about it.

[Willpower]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Yeah' date=' Drain vs the "soft" stats is a frequently overlooked but very powerful option. INT and PRE are very susceptible to this since they only cost 1 point each.[/quote']

 

This is a good suggestion and I will look into it... I didn't respond to the first post, because I don't have H5R, I simply have H5. This has always been sort of a sore point for me, as I absolutely hate it when game companies put out a ruleset, (particularly one that costs as much as H5) and then very shortly afterward try to get all the loyal fans who shelled out tons of dough for their system to have to shell out the same amount or more to get the same rules, with just a few modifications... But you gotta do it, or you'll never get all of the rule changes. I refuse to get H5R on principal alone because of this. I'll end now, cause here come the lemmings to hijack this thread now as they always do because someone has a personal opinion that differs from theirs.

[nexus]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

If you were going to the Transform route, I would definitely says its more the Cosmetic. You're effectively giving the target a knew Psych: Utter Cowardice Ver Fre, Total). I think a Drain vs Pre would work better.

[pinecone]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Yeah I usually make terror powers Drain: Pres, make it slow recover and it lasts for a while...

[Comic]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Does the PRE attack make people cowardly in general, or only toward Payback?

 

Why isn't it just a Persuasion skill roll with -10 (-1 more for every time increment) vs the Pre roll of the target?

 

What causes it to wear off?

 

What could make it wear off immediately?

 

Why isn't it Mind Control, Telepathic, One command Only: Fear?

 

Is it an aura that makes not only Payback's, but everyone's PRE attacks seem more impressive? (Change Environment?)

 

As a Transformation attack, it is at least major, unless your characters are normally going to behave pretty much like the result, but will make them afraid of everyone and everything, not just Payback.

 

Is it language dependent? (Like Mind Control or Oratory?) Is it culture dependent? (Like acting, Persuasion or Oratory roll?) For some people, a ravening goon waving his arms around, frothing at the mouth, howling and ripping up anything he can get his hands on isn't fear-causing, it's Professional Tennis.

[Lord Liaden]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

I once asked Steve Long a rules question on Lingering Effects of Presence Attacks. As you can see his answer was pretty noncommital, which leaves a lot of room for individual GM interpretation.

 

I posted my own guidelines for Presence Attacks here. That thread contains a fair amount of discussion over a concept similar to your character's, and how best to represent it.

[Willpower]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

If you were going to the Transform route' date=' I would definitely says its more the Cosmetic. You're effectively giving the target a knew Psych: Utter Cowardice Ver Fre, Total). I think a Drain vs Pre would work better.[/quote']

 

And how exactly would that be more than cosmetic? I'm sure if the attack only gave someone a pimple, that would be considerred cosmetic, but physically this is even less of a change than that, since this is not a physical change. It only makes them scared. The only way I could see this being anything more than a cosmetic change is if it affected people who had previous disadvantages such as Knows no Fear, or were an automaton or something like that, in which case this power wouldn't affect those such characters as then it would be more than a cosmetic change.

[Clonus]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

And how exactly would that be more than cosmetic? I'm sure if the attack only gave someone a pimple' date=' that would be considerred cosmetic, but physically this is even less of a change than that, since this is not a physical change. It only makes them scared. [/quote']

 

Only? Turning a superhero into a coward isn't an "only". That's a very fundamental change. That it isn't visible to the naked eye doesn't make it trivial. Just the opposite.

[Willpower]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Only? Turning a superhero into a coward isn't an "only". That's a very fundamental change. That it isn't visible to the naked eye doesn't make it trivial. Just the opposite.

 

Well, I disagree. If his attitude was changed completely, so that his friends were his enemies and vice versa, I could see your point, but given that this would only affect people capable of fear, and that it would have to be preceeded by a +20 Presence attack, which would make anyone scared anyway, it is only really just keeping them scared longer. I seriously don't see how it can be argued that this is more than minor.

 

Everyone always tries to jump on transforms and think the smallest things have to be major, simply because there is now a scale. The scale was included as somethings should be easier than others. Something that just keeps someone in a scared state if they are already scared shouldn't be that difficult. Certainly it shouldn't be as difficult as turning a human into a frog, which is a real use for a major transform... something that ACTUALLY transforms something.

[Willpower]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Does anyone have something to offer as to what should be done with the advantage Attack Versus Limited Defense when you are changing the defense from an exotic defense to a stat like presence? As I am looking at changing this to Presence Drain, as it seems better suited, but I still want it to be defended by Presence, and not Power Defense. Power defense is more for defending against normal drains and this isn't really a power sort of thing, it is just that he is that fearsome. (read 50 presence, and able to go toe to toe with Grond and win, plus he doesn't have a lot of the typical brick weaknesses)

 

I am planning on adding this Villain to Storn's character thread as I have added some pretty unique abilities to him. This was the only one that required some tweaking.

[Supreme Serpent]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

If you're going the transform route, maybe just make it NND (defense is being robot or otherwise immune to fear) instead of AVLD.

[Clonus]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Well, I disagree. If his attitude was changed completely, so that his friends were his enemies and vice versa, I could see your point, but given that this would only affect people capable of fear, and that it would have to be preceeded by a +20 Presence attack, which would make anyone scared anyway, it is only really just keeping them scared longer. I seriously don't see how it can be argued that this is more than minor.

 

 

Oh I agree. It isn't more than minor. But it isn't cosmetic. It isn't just changing the way things look or seem.

[nexus]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

And how exactly would that be more than cosmetic? I'm sure if the attack only gave someone a pimple, that would be considerred cosmetic, but physically this is even less of a change than that, since this is not a physical change.

 

Yes, if the attack just have the target a pimple, it would be a cosmetic transform since it does not effect how the character functions, which is the definition of Cosmetic Transform. However that doesn't seem to be what the power does.

 

It only makes them scared. The only way I could see this being anything more than a cosmetic change is if it affected people who had previous disadvantages such as Knows no Fear, or were an automaton or something like that, in which case this power wouldn't affect those such characters as then it would be more than a cosmetic change.

 

Define what you mean by "makes them scared". Are the free to act how they wish except the playeres must role playing being "afraid" or are they effected as per a +20 Pre attack for the duration. 1/2 DCV, the "attacker" always goes first, etc. Which is a signficant affect on how the character functions so Minor at least.

[Willpower]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Changes inflicted by transformations don't have to be physical to be important. A cosmetic change generally doesn't alter the character sheet in any signifnicant fashion. It doesn't matter if its "physical" or not. Changing a character gender (and altering nothing else about them mechanically) would ususally be considered "Cosmetic"' date=' particularly if they're still recgonizable as themselves. This transformation gives them a 20+ point psych lim until its revered. They are complete and utter cowards, afraid to act, or even face their opponent(s) or behave in a heroic fashion. That's a bit more than a pimple. A +20 Pre attack makes someone scared for.. a moment, this makes them utter cowards until its heals or its reversed. Saying that only effects those that know fear isn't really a limitation, since the exception is going to be pretty rare. It might be "Minor" if they were only afraid of this guy not generally turned into cowards for possible weeks. Cosmetic Tansforms have no effect on how the character functions mechanically, this one would.[/quote']

 

Well, we disagree on how something is defined as to ho much of a change it is. I think keeping someone in a state they are currently in, is less of a change, than changing their gender... Thats just me though I guess. It hardly matters at this point. However, I need to correct you on one point. I wasn't making only affects people who know fear as a limitation. I was using that as an example of why, as a cosmetic transform, it wouldn't affect that type of person. If it was more than cosmetic, I think it would work on people normally even immune to fear.

[nexus]

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

 

Well' date=' we disagree on how something is defined as to ho much of a change it is. I think keeping someone in a state they are currently in, is less of a change, than changing their gender... Thats just me though I guess. It hardly matters at this point. However, I need to correct you on one point. I wasn't making only affects people who know fear as a limitation. I was using that as an example of why, as a cosmetic transform, it wouldn't affect that type of person. If it was more than cosmetic, I think it would work on people normally even immune to fear.[/quote']

 

The way the power is written the degree of change doesn't matter. Its how much the change effects the way the character's performs. Giving someone a pimple or a minor allergy to pollen (they sneeze around it) is a Cosmetic transform because it doesn't alter how they function, given them an allergy that causes them actual penalties to performance is more then Cosmetic. Its not reduced to a cosmetic transformation if the person already had a mild allergy or the power only effects people with some form of allergy, That would be a Limitation on the power, possible. Check Transformation in the book.