how many points to spend on villains

[SuperJerry]

I am running a champions game with 400 base points and up to 200 points in dis-ads, 100 point cap in any one power/ability and 20 dc limit on any attack. I was wondering, if I choose to run them up against a villain that has the ability to take them on all at the same time, what point range should I make him in?

[Derek Hiemforth]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

Points are for players.

 

Make him as many points as he needs to be in order to present the PCs with the level of challenge you want him to present. Doesn't matter how many points he is. Focus on his power levels instead, IMO.

[Pariah]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

Personally, I wouldn't worry too much about points. Spend as much as you need to in order to make him challenging to the whole team at once--but no more.

 

Now, in order to do that, take a look at the defenses, DC of attacks, and overall stats of your team members. If the average team member does 20d6 normal damage, on average, that's 70 STUN or so. For him to be competitive, you need to make sure your master villain can stand getting hit by 70 STUN attacks several (or many) times before going down. High defenses are an obvious necessity, but Damage Reduction is also your friend in this area. Exotic defenses (Mental D, Power D, Flash D of various sorts, Hardened, Lack of weakness, etc.) and Life Support are also helpful.

 

As far as attacks go, your villain should be able to deal the team members enough damage that he doesn't have to hit them five or six times each to knock them down. To really make him competitive, I'd recommend that you shoot for attacks in the range that will knock the average character down in two or three shots. You're not going to get many more shots than that anyway.

 

Just my $0.02.

[Vanguard00]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

Points are for players.

 

Make him as many points as he needs to be in order to present the PCs with the level of challenge you want him to present. Doesn't matter how many points he his. Focus on his power levels instead, IMO.

 

What he said. Or as a former GM once said, "...as many as it takes".

 

Just be consistent and write down what you use.

[Narratio]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

Agreed with the above. A decent threat level is all that's required. It's the rational behind ,in mid-battle, having another half dozen thugs appear as reinforcements for the first crew now falling before your Avenging Fist of Justice . So you've a low point villain? Add another couple and make them a team.

[Doc Samson]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

If you still want a point base, I would go with +25%. So for a 600 pt. campaign I would make a master/ arch-villain 750 pts.

 

I would scale his attacks and defenses accordingly.

For example if your players are using 18d6 attacks and 45/45 defenses, I would make your villain 22d6 and 56 defenses.

Players will still be able to damage the villain (63 average damage - 56 def = 9 damage) but he should still be able to take a beating from the whole group without going down too fast. Conversely, each player needs to be careful not to take too many hits (77 average damage - 45 def = 32 damage) or they will be knocked out fast.

 

Other things to be aware of...

Unless all of your players have CONs above 32, the villains average attack may STUN the character. I like this as a GM as it forces the players to use defensive tactics (dodges, block, ect.)

Also, if you have a five man or larger group and they all coordinate their attacks, they can keep your villain STUNNED for most of the fight. To avoid this, make sure you invest in sufficiently high CON (45+) or throw in some Damage Reduction.

I hope that helps.

[Wakshaani]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

Yeah, a lot of it comes down to math.

 

Let's say that you have 6 heroes, each at SPD 6 (At that point level, a given), tossing 20D6 attacks each. That means that he'll be getting around 30 attacks a round on his chest (assuming 6 miss or lost due to dodging) ... that's an awful lot. EVen if he had 60 PD and ED, he'd be taking 300 STUN a turn.

 

Yikes.

 

He'll need a SPD of at least 9, probably higher, to deal with teh heroes as well ... SPD enough to attack each oen once, plus some "Follow up" shots.

 

His attacks need to be high enough to Stun the average hero in one hit. If they each have 60 PD and ED, plus a CON of 30, you need to toss off 90 damage attacks, which is, what? 30d6? That's a rough number, yeah.

 

...

 

Might want to ski ahead and just use Dr Destroyer at this point.

 

-- Wak, can't hang at that power level!

[Theron]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

One thing I always do is make my solo villains faster than they conceptually need to be. I don't care if Mag-Maaa, the Lord of UnderMuncie is a gigantic shambling pile of molten rock, he gets a SPD of 7 or 8. Because even with a SPD of 7 or 8, a group of four PCs with an average SPD of 5 will get 20 actions to his 7 or 8; as such, he needs to be able to blow a few on Blocks, Recoveries, etc.

 

Then again, I map SPD to screen time, so a SPD 4 speedster is a perfectly valid concept in my games.

[Psybolt]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

Most of my big villains have some kind of attack that is special... such as AVLD or drain or something that goes against one of the different defense that PC have less of than PD/ED.

 

Points aren't that important for the villains. Just be fair with the rest.

[SuperJerry]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

Thanks guys!

[Clonus]

Re: how many points to spend on villains

 

I am running a champions game with 400 base points and up to 200 points in dis-ads' date=' 100 point cap in any one power/ability and 20 dc limit on any attack. I was wondering, if I choose to run them up against a villain that has the ability to take them on all at the same time, what point range should I make him in?[/quote']

 

Personally I'd go with maybe 100 points of resistant PD and ED and 20-24DC in a variety of attacks so he can fit the attack to the target. Speed maybe a couple of points faster. OCV/DCV also a couple of points faster. Whether that will be enough depends on how well the players and their characters grasp the concept of teamwork. But try it and see how things go. It'll let you know for next time.