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Elemental Controls


Pteryx

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Re: Elemental Controls

 

Originally posted by Pteryx

Is there anything that an Elemental Control can do that a Multipower can't do cheaper and with fewer restrictions and drawbacks? I'm not sure what the point of Elemental Controls is, mechanically... :( Could somebody please explain? -- Pteryx

 

wee - the thread that won't die!

 

Actually, one thing that ECs have going for them, to get back to the original question, is that they are easier to use for beginners. I let two players roll up the characters in the champs quick-start rules, and let them have the EC. Its easier to use than the MP if you're just learning the system. Later I can switch them.:)

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Originally posted by Tom McCarthy

One of the characters in Digital Hero #13 has a pool of powers all tied together and affected by drains but not in an EC. I believe it's Megaera. Worth picking up.

Heres a character that uses this technique:

 

http://www.killershrike.com/MillennialMen/CharacterFiles/Rook.HTML

 

It stems from an entry in the Rules FAQ regarding powers drained as if they are in a EC.

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Theres no way Im going to read thru the 5 gazillion posts on this thread -- I gave up after the 20th or so ;)

 

However, in the interests of responding to the original question, and all heavily IMO:

 

I like to use ECs for characters that have 1 basic "POWER" -- and I mean a Power in the comic book sense rather than the Hero Games sense -- like Fire Control, or Force Field Generation, or Telekinesis, with many different "stunts" conceivably usable concurrently -- like Flight, FF, EB etc.

 

The HERO System classifies each "stunt" as 1 or more Power Constructs, but conceptually all of the EC slots stem from 1 actual "Power". If you take down one Power Construct with an adjustment, you are in effect taking down their 1 big Power and all the Power Constructs attached to it. Thus the EC adjustment double jeopardy.

 

Mechanically, Im not real happy about the obvious illogic of Armor not being a legal slot while 0 END FF is at the same point cost, (although Armor is also Persistent and Invisible, and thus obviously superior aside from the fact that many NND's define FF as a defense), but Im not so unhappy that I worry about it :)

 

Another big plus to an EC is that unlike VPPs and MPs which are Active Point sensitive, EC powers have no upper end AP issues. In fact, you have a direct motivation to have all the slots in the EC to have a certain AP level as the point rebate is a halving of the lowest AP in the EC. In campaigns with AP caps this isnt noticable so much, but in campaigns without AP caps, a character with an EC can be quite powerful. What a MPP character gets in expandibility and flexibility, the EC character makes up for with well-roundedness.

 

As a complete aside I think its interesting that arguments aside, when looked at as a whole, characters based on all 3 frameworks and without can compete with each other at the same point level, based more upon the design skills of the characters creator than the strengths or weaknesses of the frameworks themselves. IME, of course YMMV

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  • 17 years later...
On 9/12/2003 at 10:52 PM, Gary said:

 

The point is that it's far easier for a Human Torch character to justify a EC compared to a Batman type character. Why should the Human Torch save oodles of points on non-attack powers while Batman has to buy most of his non-attack powers straight?

 

You can argue that Batman could buy most of his powers with foci, but the fire character could easily buy his fire powers through a gem or powersuit as well.

 

Since I happen to think that Batman is as good of a conception as the Human Torch, I wouldn't give a cost break to one over the other.

Ancient post but the reason seems fairly obvious.  If something, such as a vacuum or environment which limits flame comes into play the Torch is nothing more than a normal dude with some basic skills.  How about a halon attack from a Bat-Halon-Arang? Batman cannot be hampered in such a way.  His abilities cover a larger spectrum.  The EC is not simply good character conception, it links all the powers to a common source.  Dampen that source and the Hero is a Zero.  This is a BIG limitation.  If Batman was after Torch he would devise attack modes to dampen and defend against flame and that's about all he would need.  Remember how he was able to whoop up on Superman, a god, using a green rock to dampen all his powers?  Superman's powers are all basically an EC based upon our yellow sun, (at least in some versions), with a EC wide susceptibility to kryptonite.   Take away that that susceptibility to his entire suite, (EC), of abilities and he is fairly unstoppable.

 

The Torch on the other hand would need a vast array of tools to counter Batman's array of toys and abilities.  Think about PSI Boy, whose powers are all PSI based.  Batman tosses Bat-PSI-Null-Arang and oops!  PSI Boy is toast.  And of course anyone with an EC would find their returning foes leveraging that weakness if at all possible.  Lack of Oxygen becomes kryptonite to a EC flame based hero.

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On 12/22/2020 at 12:18 AM, Christopher R Taylor said:

I always found Elemental Controls more challenging to build but yes, easier to use. They just worked, there was no figuring or moving around of powers.  But it was not really a fair or reasonable construct: you got a big point break just for having a tight concept your GM liked.

Only reason I was reviewing this is I just got 6th ed and was trying to get why EC's were dropped.  To me it seemed like a good why to create sensible characters, (common power source), with an Achilles heel.  As long as the GM enforces that weakness and has villains capitalize on it often enough to be a PITA for the player.  I liked the 'tightness' of it.

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54 minutes ago, Sicarius said:

Only reason I was reviewing this is I just got 6th ed and was trying to get why EC's were dropped.  To me it seemed like a good why to create sensible characters, (common power source), with an Achilles heel.  As long as the GM enforces that weakness and has villains capitalize on it often enough to be a PITA for the player.  I liked the 'tightness' of it.

IMO (and we won't ever know the why for sure, Steve does not comment on such things as a rule), it was too frequently ignored entirely or the player would either be bored to tears or throw a fit if something came up that kept them from using their EC. Unified Power to me was a reasonable compromise that meant if one gets drained they all get drained, which would be a more common appearance and is not all or nothing.

 

Edit: It is also not as prone to gaming the system with things like "Oh, my flames burn a material that my body excretes which produces it's own oxygen, so the Bat-Halon-arang does nothing to me" or similar nonsense.

 

Edited by eepjr24
Example of power gaming
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2 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

It's not exactly the same, and it's a bit more work, but if you just liked the ebb and flow of EC, take a look at the Limitation: Unified Power.

 

Or do what I did and use EC anyway.

 

 

Not sure why you think Unified is more complex than Elemental Control.  EC had limits on what could be put in them. Also you had to have a minimum to put in the EC. So depending on concept/build you either put a small amount in the EC (I think the lowest I went was 15pt in Control Cost) or the power that you really didn’t see to be that powerful was bought powerful or not in the EC at all.  

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Ah--

 

I under clarified:

 

It's not complex at all; it's-- what?  a 1/4 Limitation, I believe?

 

Using it to completely recreate Elemental Control's pricing structure, etc--   _that_ is a bit more complex (recall that I do not "sarcasm," by choice: "a bit" in this instance means "a small amount") more complex than is simply using Elemental Control.

 

 

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3 hours ago, eepjr24 said:

Edit: It is also not as prone to gaming the system with things like "Oh, my flames burn a material that my body excretes which produces it's own oxygen, so the Bat-Halon-arang does nothing to me" or similar nonsense.

 

I cannot even imagine someone besmirching the efficacy of the Bat-Halon-arang! :shock:

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Ok, I looked at the Unified Power limitation and it seems to me at first consideration that it is a decent replacement for EC.  It forces part of the limitation I thought should be attached to EC but I might offer it at 1/2 for dampening effects other than Drain attacks.  Such as a fire hose or lack of oxygen putting out the Flying Flamers Unified Suite of powers as well as a Drain attack.  I would have to think about it though.  In the case of flame, water and vacuum are fairly obvious and common.  Something which would dampen cosmic powers, like magic green rock, would be less obvious and uncommon.

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I've found that point savings of an EC were too much bang for the buck, and toyed with a few house rules from time to time.

 

Achilles Heel:  ECs require additional Disadvantages related to the EC's special effect, equal to the amount of the EC pool.  Ex: a Luck EC had the Psych Lim: Superstitious.  If you can't find a disadvantage that works, maybe it's not a good EC?

 

One Power: As the expression of a single power effect, all powers in the EC must either all cost END, or none of them can cost END - no mix and match. They must all turn on and off together, not individually.  Suit EC's need not apply unless the same SFX applies to all powers.  Repulsor Suit EC might have Flight and Blast, but the Armor isn't repulsor tech, so it can't be in the EC.  (Yes, you could put in a Force Field.)

 

Inverted Multipower: Reduce the EC pool amount to 1/5 the cost of the lowest power, and subtract that cost from the individual powers.

 

Minimum Investment:  An EC must have at least three powers.

 

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34 minutes ago, Christougher said:

I've found that point savings of an EC were too much bang for the buck, and toyed with a few house rules from time to time.

This is really what I meant above when I said that players would have problems if you enforced the actual value of the limitation in points. There was generally no way to do this a little bit each adventure like there is with "not in magnetic fields" or "only in contact with ground", so when it happened it tended to take them out of play, which is really not fun for anyone, GM or player.

 

- E

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I think there's a certain playstyle that old school Champions assumed you would use, and ECs fit pretty well into that.  The Human Torch would often have his fire extinguished during a battle, and when that happened he was basically out of the fight.  He probably had an Elemental Control with a "not in vacuum/water" limitation on it, and a Vulnerability to wind/vacuum/water" attacks.  So Dr Doom can whip up a 6D6 Ranged Drain with his gadget pool, defined as a "wind cannon" and knock out most of Johnny's powers with one shot.  But Doom would then write Johnny off as inconsequential and turn his attention to other characters.  He wouldn't fire up his RKA and blow a hole in Johnny's torso.

 

The game kind of assumed that players and GMs both understood this.  In old school comics, characters might have their powers deactivated fairly frequently, but they didn't get murdered when it happened.  In game, it's a good excuse to take a character off the board when a player has to leave early, or you need to move on to the next plot point.  Something happens and Batman wakes up without his utility belt, Superman finds he's in a room with red sun radiation emitters, the Human Torch got hit with a vacuum blaster and he's still recovering.  But then the characters escape and their powers come back.  It's not a "game over" scenario.

 

In my experience, there's another factor as well when it comes to ECs.  Unlike normal limitations, Elemental Controls push characters to have similarly priced powers, which alters the optimum build (sometimes in positive ways).  For instance, an energy projector character might normally want 13" of Flight, an 18/18 Force Field, and a 12D6 Energy Blast.  For the sake of argument, let's just pretend that those are the most efficient purchases for the character.  That's a 26 point power, a 36 point power, and a 60 point power.  Now he can save points by purchasing a 13 point EC (saving a total of 26 points on the 3 powers).  But the structure of ECs means it may be in his best interest to bump up his Flight to 18", so he can have an 18 point EC (in fact if those are the only 3 powers, it's definitely in his best interest, because the cost remains the exact same).  If you really look at trying to maximize your points, you're going to wind up with a different construct than you would otherwise.  An EC character is not going to look like a brick, and is not going to look like a multipower character.

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1 hour ago, massey said:

In my experience, there's another factor as well when it comes to ECs.  Unlike normal limitations, Elemental Controls push characters to have similarly priced powers, which alters the optimum build (sometimes in positive ways).  For instance, an energy projector character might normally want 13" of Flight, an 18/18 Force Field, and a 12D6 Energy Blast.  For the sake of argument, let's just pretend that those are the most efficient purchases for the character.  That's a 26 point power, a 36 point power, and a 60 point power.  Now he can save points by purchasing a 13 point EC (saving a total of 26 points on the 3 powers).  But the structure of ECs means it may be in his best interest to bump up his Flight to 18", so he can have an 18 point EC (in fact if those are the only 3 powers, it's definitely in his best interest, because the cost remains the exact same).  If you really look at trying to maximize your points, you're going to wind up with a different construct than you would otherwise.  

I was going to try to post something like this last night but Massey said it better. And this is another point probably why ECs went away. 

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1 hour ago, JmOz said:

Serious question:  DId anyone who used an EC not also have a MP.  Seriously  Every character I can remember with an EC had both

 

Normaly 

15 EC

15/15 FF

15" Flight

 

60 MP

6 12d6 Blast

6  8d6 AP Blast

6 8d6 0End Blast

6 8d6 Exploding blast

6 4d6 RKA

 

 

That's pretty much the basic version, but the more I fooled with them, the more my characters diverged from that.

 

Let's suppose you have a character with Shadow Control.

 

22 pt EC

23  18/18 FF, 1/2 End

23  18" Flight, 1/2 End

23  4" Darkness vs Sight, Alterable Size

23  8" Images vs Sight, -5 Perception rolls

38  12D6 EB

 

Something like that gives you enormous versatility, since you can use all of the powers at once.

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