Elemental Controls

[Agent X]

Originally posted by prestidigitator

...and one of the fun things for a player is to be rewarded for a job well done. Roleplaying in itself can be great, but what player doesn't want to develop his/her character, both story-wise and with experience?

 

Additionally, you should increase the likelihood that all players will have fun by rewarding things which tend to facilitate this: good roleplaying, fun and innovative ideas, creative and appropriate characters, contribution to storylines, making a good environment for other players by helping them out and not trying to "cheat the system," etc.

 

You claim I missed the point entirely. I don't think so. They are one and the same.

You did miss my point. You can draw whatever conclusions you want but you're wrong. That is not what I meant and it is certainly not the only way to interpret my statement.

 

As far as the business about rewarding good roleplaying, etc., my response is, "Duh!"

 

If you want to make a point about how games should be run that is fine. If you want to use my statements as an example to make your point, get the meaning of my statements right.

[Gary]

Originally posted by Hugh Neilson

Or if you like to use published material. After all, if you don't allow EC's to yur players, it's only fair that the NPC's also lose these point breaks and get geared down to compensate.

 

Sure, you could just give the opponents enough bonus xp to cover it, but that's hardly equitable, is it?

 

Who the heck cares about points for NPC's? Points are for players. As GM, I have essentially infinite points to build my NPC's, and I never worry about them having precisely the same points as the players. I give them as many points and disadvantages as are needed for their conception and to give a good challenge to the players.

[Gary]

Originally posted by Kristopher

Having built quite a few characters that rely largely on the characteristics, I'd have to say I disagree. They get expensive in a hurry if they're what you're depending on for your character's effectiveness. But, I think they're fairly balanced with the powers.

 

STR, for example. 50 pts gets you a 12d6 attack (60 Str from the base of 10 = 50 pts). Yes, the 50 pts also gets you up to 12 PD, but it's not resistant, and hardly enough PD for a Brick or Quasi-Brick, or most other characters for that matter. Etc.

 

+50 str gives you 10 pd, 10 rec, 25 stun, 10 damage classes, 10" superleap, X1024 lifting capacity and thus the ability to use cars and trucks as free area effects, +25 casual str. Quite a nice package for 50 pts.

 

Originally posted by Kristopher

DEX...9 pts gets you +1 OCV -and- DCV, and + .3 SPD. 8 pts on an Overall Combat Level gets you +1 OCV -or- DCV, but it is flexible and has some other uses, IIRC.

 

For 6 pts after spd savings, you get +1 OCV, +1 DCV, +3/5 on dex rolls, +3/5 on dex skill rolls, and +3 initiative. For 8 pts, you get +1 OCV or +1 DCV or +1/2 DC. So by spending 2 more points, you get fewer CV bonuses plus the option of trading in that CV bonus for 1/2 DC. No thank you. Purchasing dex is way more efficient.

[Gary]

Originally posted by Kristopher

Ah, but once you: 1) ignore the silly rule about no zero-END powers in ECs, and 2) ignore the silly rule about Adjustment powers affecting every power in the EC, then everything is fine, and the Martial Artist and the Energy Projector are both rewarded for good concept and design.

 

It's those rules, supposedly put in to balance ECs, that make them so lopsided in favor of some character types in the first place.

 

Nope, you still wouldn't allow the Batman EC. No GM that I know of would think that batarangs, leap, damage reduction, and missile deflection are closely related enough to warrant a EC. Unless you're suggesting that a player could slap down any collection of powers and get a EC bonus?

[Gary]

Originally posted by zornwil

The problem with that is scalability - having 3 powers linked may be less limiting than 6 powers linked, or more accurately 100 AP linked is worth less than 200 AP linked (just throwing out numbers), although at some point it's a VPP masquerading as an EC and the reverse happens, 300 AP linked is just a benefit basically. However, scalability is a problem with ECs in general. One option for ECs is to make the control cost the max AP of any power in the EC, and costs are reduced for each slot by 1/2 or 2/5 or "flavor to taste". If you want a power to have greater AP than the EC allows, you have to link it to an outside power that also has to meet all EC requirements, sort of like MP, with no "linked" limitation. Or some-such thing. It still gets cost effective as you get too many EC slots, BUT I would argue no worse than MPs.

 

You have the same problem of scalability with EC's. A 6 slot EC is more vulnerable than a 2 slot EC.

 

I agree with giving points back to the player based on how much the framework actually limits the player. That's why I prefer making it an explicit limitation rather than a framework. The giving 50% discount for a good conception is too nebulous and vague and excludes too many other good conceptions.

 

Originally posted by zornwil

However, at the end of the day, I don't have a problem with #1 as in the quote above. I think all of the frameworks reward characters for tighter concepts as much as they do grant points for limitation. An MP can be (not saying it is innately) way more abusive than an EC, particularly with ultra slots. And so long as it's not abused, ECs seem to work cost-wise okay to me.

 

I personally think that people are just too addicted to free points that don't actually limit the player. Someone previously was actually suggesting to remove the drain one drain all limitation, the only thing that actually limits a EC.

[Kdansky]

ECs may work fine in 4-colour campaigns, but if you use HERO with it's unrivaled "we-can-do-everyting" power, EC (and Frameworks in general) are just not fair. Character concept "Indiana Jones". He's got a load of skills, a whip (done as stretching + some HKA/HA), and a pistol. He'll absolutely never use the pistol and the whip at the same time, yet he pays the full price for both. They don't even are that different, it's a RKA and a KA with 6" range, woot! Double the cost for nearly no effect. Then there's the "firewoman" player, he get's a cheap Damage Shield, Forcefield, EB, Flight, and about anything else just because he's using a stereotype character design? Why should a player be rewarded for a stereotype design? I'd rather reward them for the opposite, something clearly unusual and new (truly, Indiana Jones isn't non-stereotypical, but that's not the point . We've got another player with a Dragon multiform, he was new to roleplaying and came up with the character concept of an evil, ancient dragon who was prisoned for thousands of years and now the spell broke (due campaign storyline). He's got a human form which is still cursed as he cannot tell a lie, hates humans and is obliged to help them at the same time, he's got a dragon multiform which he can't use if someone sees it (except in life-threatening emergency). He does get zero points for great character concept, no Framework at all. True, he got a multiform, but mages can get a multiform inside their framework!

[Rene]

"Good" character concepts are in the eye of the beholder, like so much else in this life. It's all very relative. I have many stories of non-stereotypical super concepts that were just stinking crap.

 

Got a player with gravitic powers who also was invisible to machines. He had two different "origins", one to account for each set of powers. He also owned a bar and was a former secret agent. He also came from the future. No element in the character had any strong connection to any other element. I always remember this player when people badmouth stereotypical characters.

 

Sure it's easy to build stereotypical characters. Just copy some well-known hero. But it can be equally easy to build non-stereotypical characters. Just choose stuff randomly. So I came to the conclusion that the commonality of a character's basic concept has zero relation to his quality.

 

Elemental Controls supposedly reward "unified theme" powers, not necessarily "good" (whatever you define as good) character concepts.

[Kdansky]

Sure it's not hard to do a bad character

 

But I don't even think "unified theme" is a good expression. Is "Fire" a theme? I'd accept Spiderman, but how should someone fly using fire (fantastic four)? Why is it cheaper to buy EB (ice) + Force Wall (ice-wall) + flying (ice-trail) than EB (shooting rays from eyes) + Force Wall (telekinetic wall) + flight (wings) ? These are the same powers and they have no real disadvantage compared to the rest, yet they are about 30%-50% cheaper. Seems to me like every second villain/thug should have a drain/transfer/suppress then.

[prestidigitator]

Originally posted by Kdansky

...he get's a cheap Damage Shield, Forcefield, EB, Flight, and about anything else just because he's using a stereotype character design? Why should a player be rewarded for a stereotype design? I'd rather reward them for the opposite, something clearly unusual and new....

I would never say give cost breaks for a stereotypical character design. I say give breaks for consistant and/or imaginative character designs (particularly the latter). Give breaks for things that fit well the concept of the character, for a concept which is creative and fits well with the genre.

 

He does get zero points for great character concept, no Framework at all. True, he got a multiform, but mages can get a multiform inside their framework!

This is exactly why I say allow powers in Frameworks based upon their concept and Special Effects (and don't jump to taking this as "fire powers," or "magic powers," or "mutant powers" necessarily), rather than whether they are or are not Special, and how much End they cost.

 

Originally posted by Gary

Who the heck cares about points for NPC's? Points are for players. As GM, I have essentially infinite points to build my NPC's, and I never worry about them having precisely the same points as the players. I give them as many points and disadvantages as are needed for their conception and to give a good challenge to the players.

This is very true, although I do often think about points as a "reality check" (if that makes any sense ). Also, I often like to construct an NPC in the same way I would a PC. Not necessarily point-wise, but in terms of the way the powers work and are constructed. In tends to give some consistency.

 

Nope, you still wouldn't allow the Batman EC. No GM that I know of would think that batarangs, leap, damage reduction, and missile deflection are closely related enough to warrant a EC. Unless you're suggesting that a player could slap down any collection of powers and get a EC bonus?

I don't base whether powers are close enough to fit in an EC on what Powers they are mechanically generated out of. That is rediculous. Base it on where the powers come from, how they are used, what their Special Effects are, and, well, just generally whether or not they "fit well together." Batman is a super-scientist, with tons of little gadgets he creates himself for various purposes. Based on his background, and his Perks, etc., that is a pretty consitent and well-suited set of things to put in an EC (unless, as I have already said, it is a MP or VPP).

 

Originally posted by Rene

Got a player with gravitic powers who also was invisible to machines. He had two different "origins", one to account for each set of powers. He also owned a bar and was a former secret agent. He also came from the future. No element in the character had any strong connection to any other element. I always remember this player when people badmouth stereotypical characters.

True. Stereotypical characters can be fun. Both types can be terribly piecemeal, or very well-fitted. It really depends on the imagination of the player; how he describes the character, his/her powers, the background, etc.

 

Originally posted by Kdansky

But I don't even think "unified theme" is a good expression. Is "Fire" a theme? I'd accept Spiderman, but how should someone fly using fire (fantastic four)? Why is it cheaper to buy EB (ice) + Force Wall (ice-wall) + flying (ice-trail) than EB (shooting rays from eyes) + Force Wall (telekinetic wall) + flight (wings) ? These are the same powers and they have no real disadvantage compared to the rest, yet they are about 30%-50% cheaper. Seems to me like every second villain/thug should have a drain/transfer/suppress then.

If your entire description and Special Effects consisted of "shooting rays from eyes, telekinetic wall, and wings," then I would never allow you to put these powers in a Framework. I might also have difficulty with "ice, ice-wall, and ice-trail," without further description/background/justification.

[Gary]

Originally posted by prestidigitator

I would never say give cost breaks for a stereotypical character design. I say give breaks for consistant and/or imaginative character designs (particularly the latter). Give breaks for things that fit well the concept of the character, for a concept which is creative and fits well with the genre.

 

In practice, what does this mean? Would you refuse a EC to Human Torch or Iceman because they are stereotypical characters?

 

Originally posted by prestidigitator

I don't base whether powers are close enough to fit in an EC on what Powers they are mechanically generated out of. That is rediculous. Base it on where the powers come from, how they are used, what their Special Effects are, and, well, just generally whether or not they "fit well together." Batman is a super-scientist, with tons of little gadgets he creates himself for various purposes. Based on his background, and his Perks, etc., that is a pretty consitent and well-suited set of things to put in an EC (unless, as I have already said, it is a MP or VPP).

 

You would allow batarangs which are a focus, and superleap which is because Batman is athletic, in the same EC??? I repeat, no GM I know of would ever allow that. "Gadgeteering" is a pretty broad description to allow a EC.

 

I have a question for you. In your campaign, how many pure Martial Artists actually have a EC? In the campaigns I've been in, pure MA's have 0. (Some conceptions had some, but they weren't pure MA's and they worked well even if you removed their MA from them).

[Rene]

I dunno. I think flying as a power for fire characters makes sort of symbolical sense. Fire is a dynamic, mobile, very "light" element. If you mean to ask how someone scientifically fly by using fire manipulation, then I'm not the best person to answer, I'm afraid. But supers and hard science not always go hand-in-hand.

 

 

Originally posted by Kdansky

Sure it's not hard to do a bad character

 

But I don't even think "unified theme" is a good expression. Is "Fire" a theme? I'd accept Spiderman, but how should someone fly using fire (fantastic four)? Why is it cheaper to buy EB (ice) + Force Wall (ice-wall) + flying (ice-trail) than EB (shooting rays from eyes) + Force Wall (telekinetic wall) + flight (wings) ? These are the same powers and they have no real disadvantage compared to the rest, yet they are about 30%-50% cheaper. Seems to me like every second villain/thug should have a drain/transfer/suppress then.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by Rene

I dunno. I think flying as a power for fire characters makes sort of symbolical sense. Fire is a dynamic, mobile, very "light" element. If you mean to ask how someone scientifically fly by using fire manipulation, then I'm not the best person to answer, I'm afraid. But supers and hard science not always go hand-in-hand.

Very true. If you expect someone to explain why they can fly because of their fire powers shouldn't you expect them to explain why they have fire powers as well. The answer to why they have fire powers is going to be comic book pseudo-science. If you accept it there I would think you should accept comic book pseudo-science to explain "fiery flight."

[Farkling]

There is another balancing issue missing here.

 

EC's have a linked stack of special effects...that are (in my mind) supposed to be fairly obvious.

 

/QUOTE:: KDansky:: how should someone fly using fire (fantastic four)? Why is it cheaper to buy EB (ice) + Force Wall (ice-wall) + flying (ice-trail) than EB (shooting rays from eyes) + Force Wall (telekinetic wall) + flight (wings) ? These are the same powers and they have no real disadvantage compared to the rest, yet they are about 30%-50% cheaper. Seems to me like every second villain/thug should have a drain/transfer/suppress then. /ENDQUOTE

 

Why is character A cheaper? Look at those powers. GENOCIDE has to show up with ONE set of gear that will pretty much handle all of it. The agents pick out some off the rack low temperature gear, some heat projectors, maybe some sonics for those rigid ice walls...

FireMaster will throw as much raw flame around as possible, and that 20d6 Dispel versus Ice/Water Powers is fantastically useful. IceGuy is imprisoned in a cell with sunlamps. EC's lend themselves to a theme. Themes are perceivable, and the theme SHOULD extend to the Disadvantages also.

 

Now DemonWing there, with his eye beams and wings and TK wall...he's a strange duck that the villains won't be prepped for after one or two encounters/sightings. DemonWing has a decidedly odd set of powers requiring analysis, observation, and experimentation to deal with.

 

There's much more going on here than "Character A unfairly got cheaper powers than me", which seems to be the common theme in the EC arguments I keep reading.

 

And for the record...Bats SHOULD be written up on a VPP or a MP (IMHO)...he rarely uses multiple gadgets simultaneously, and the MP is cheaper than the EC in the long run...and easier to add powers to...which is the whole point of Bats.

 

The EC player is going to be forced to cough up 7-30 points in an standard game to buy a new power (in framework). An investment of at LEAST two adventures. The MP player can typically get one for 3-6 points...one power per adventure. Another factor in the balance of the EC.

 

YMMV

[zornwil]

Originally posted by Gary

You have the same problem of scalability with EC's. A 6 slot EC is more vulnerable than a 2 slot EC.

 

I agree with giving points back to the player based on how much the framework actually limits the player. That's why I prefer making it an explicit limitation rather than a framework. The giving 50% discount for a good conception is too nebulous and vague and excludes too many other good conceptions.

 

 

 

I personally think that people are just too addicted to free points that don't actually limit the player. Someone previously was actually suggesting to remove the drain one drain all limitation, the only thing that actually limits a EC.

 

Why get 350? or 250 XP to start with for free? Why not start with 0 and build your XP up through experience? Why award experience points, as someone else posted, for good role-playing?

 

Because in all these instances they are not precisely free. They are solely to build characters with the correct genre conventions to be functional at a certain level, and for reasonable conceptions.

 

XP are awarded not just for tangible accomplishments or hours spent doing something; they are awarded (at least for most games which award them) based on roleplaying, with bonuses for great moments, along with those for results.

 

I see no difference in awarding XP versus a bonus for character conception at creation time - especially when that conception isn't fitting within the points limitation - which is arbitrary to begin with.

 

Also, you are ignoring that those who would argue that the "drain one, drain all" limitation be removed mostly believe that if the drain SFX warrant, the whole EC is affected. What most (including me) object to is the silly rule that if I have a "Drain Aggressive Powers" (again, bear with the example) and it drains Fireman's Fire Blast it should also drain his Fiery Damage Resistance which is purely defensive. Most people who argue against the automatic "drain one, drain all" would wholeheartedly agree that "Drain Fire" would affect Fireman's whole EC. I think your criticism is pretty unfair as it snips a lot of this rather elaborated-upon point in this thread.

 

You're welcome to believe ECs unbalance the game - and other GMs feel this way - and ban them. So far it seems to me the majority of people with experience over the years see them as having problems but not inherently unbalanced. At least no more than MPs - which I still argue are at least as much prone to abuse, if not more given that the scalability issues with MPs are far more serious.

 

Quick edit, hope you haven't read it yet - also, what's the worry about "free points" (I meant to put this above) given it is a game - not a simulation?

[zornwil]

Originally posted by Kdansky

ECs may work fine in 4-colour campaigns, but if you use HERO with it's unrivaled "we-can-do-everyting" power, EC (and Frameworks in general) are just not fair. Character concept "Indiana Jones". He's got a load of skills, a whip (done as stretching + some HKA/HA), and a pistol. He'll absolutely never use the pistol and the whip at the same time, yet he pays the full price for both. They don't even are that different, it's a RKA and a KA with 6" range, woot! Double the cost for nearly no effect. Then there's the "firewoman" player, he get's a cheap Damage Shield, Forcefield, EB, Flight, and about anything else just because he's using a stereotype character design? Why should a player be rewarded for a stereotype design? I'd rather reward them for the opposite, something clearly unusual and new (truly, Indiana Jones isn't non-stereotypical, but that's not the point . We've got another player with a Dragon multiform, he was new to roleplaying and came up with the character concept of an evil, ancient dragon who was prisoned for thousands of years and now the spell broke (due campaign storyline). He's got a human form which is still cursed as he cannot tell a lie, hates humans and is obliged to help them at the same time, he's got a dragon multiform which he can't use if someone sees it (except in life-threatening emergency). He does get zero points for great character concept, no Framework at all. True, he got a multiform, but mages can get a multiform inside their framework!

 

I dunno, a multiform si pretty darn cheap for what you get in versatility and it requires a pretty solid conception to be allowed in many games IMHO.

 

However, I agree there's a seeming issue as to what you indicated. However, I'm not sure Indiana Jones is such a good example as he's heroic-level and now you're comparing a super-hero though. I think once you "up-size" Indiana Jones into the super-heroic level he's either going to end up with an MP of gadgets which can include his bullwhip and gun or if he's way flexible a VPP as it's advantageous.

 

Okay, so let's take what you wrote at face value and have a heroic character compared to a super-heroic. If the heroic character is less cost-effective than the super-heroic, that's unfair...except for the fact that the super-heroic one is actually beyond the other character by leaps and bounds. The points scale is not straight-forward and I'd expect the super-heroic to be more cost-effective for all his neat abilities.

 

I don't think HERO is intended to scale on a 1-for-1 basis. I also think HERO deliberately rewards CERTAIN character concepts at the expense of others (non-standard ones). Related, I think you are right in that ECs are a remnant of HERO's past as originally a super-hero game only. It doesn't translate as well to heroic and other such games, but sometimes MPs and VPPs don't, depending.

 

Is this a flaw of HERO? Depends on your point of view. It is a part of how it reinforces genre conventions; as the game expanded to include non-super-heroic action, it attempted to stretch to encompass "heroic" genre conventions at large. Personally I've never been convinced it did so in as decent a fashion as it did the super-heroic, but as a "unviersal" system (which I don't like the idea of anyway) it's probably the best series of trade-offs out there, and minimally at least among the best. Still, yes, it is flawed as you try to shoehorn non-traditional character conceptions. I think all other games are, too, to some extent.

[zornwil]

Originally posted by Gary

In practice, what does this mean? Would you refuse a EC to Human Torch or Iceman because they are stereotypical characters?

 

 

 

You would allow batarangs which are a focus, and superleap which is because Batman is athletic, in the same EC??? I repeat, no GM I know of would ever allow that. "Gadgeteering" is a pretty broad description to allow a EC.

 

I have a question for you. In your campaign, how many pure Martial Artists actually have a EC? In the campaigns I've been in, pure MA's have 0. (Some conceptions had some, but they weren't pure MA's and they worked well even if you removed their MA from them).

 

Depends on the MA's basis for his powers. First, I've played few MAs and there's been very few MAs in my campaigns. As to your point, if it's just a few maneuvers, they're too cheap to really put in an EC.

 

Anyway, my current character in someone's game is an MA who depends on his EC. His EC includes: missile deflection, knockback resistance, damage resistance, stun, and con. All of these are mana-dependent; if he does not or cannot recharge his powers by communing with nature and performing rituals, he loses his powers.

 

As an overall issue, though, let me say this: ECs DO help to realize characters who are well-founded, non-abusive, and don't fit the points caps. They've traditionally been used in this vein for years with no ill effect on other characters. Are EC definitions somewhat arbitrary? Sure! Is much of the game when it comes to frameworks...I would say equally, SURE! Anyway, I have a character in the game I'm GMing who has a robot with an EC of the powers based on his robotic body structure/mechanics. Is that cheesy? Maybe. Did the character work without it? No, otherwise I would have had to raise the points just for him.

 

I would argue that it is less arbitrary to use ECs, which have a defined structure and have been playtested over a couple decades, than to raise points caps here or there according to character conception and how good it seems.

[Gary]

Originally posted by zornwil

Why get 350? or 250 XP to start with for free? Why not start with 0 and build your XP up through experience? Why award experience points, as someone else posted, for good role-playing?

 

Because in all these instances they are not precisely free. They are solely to build characters with the correct genre conventions to be functional at a certain level, and for reasonable conceptions.

 

XP are awarded not just for tangible accomplishments or hours spent doing something; they are awarded (at least for most games which award them) based on roleplaying, with bonuses for great moments, along with those for results.

 

I see no difference in awarding XP versus a bonus for character conception at creation time - especially when that conception isn't fitting within the points limitation - which is arbitrary to begin with.

 

The starting points is so everyone has a even playing field. If you're going to give someone a few dozen or a hundred bonus xp, why don't you give it explicitly instead of trying to pretend that it's balanced?

 

 

Originally posted by zornwil

Also, you are ignoring that those who would argue that the "drain one, drain all" limitation be removed mostly believe that if the drain SFX warrant, the whole EC is affected. What most (including me) object to is the silly rule that if I have a "Drain Aggressive Powers" (again, bear with the example) and it drains Fireman's Fire Blast it should also drain his Fiery Damage Resistance which is purely defensive. Most people who argue against the automatic "drain one, drain all" would wholeheartedly agree that "Drain Fire" would affect Fireman's whole EC. I think your criticism is pretty unfair as it snips a lot of this rather elaborated-upon point in this thread.

 

I don't think it's unfair. My point is that EC's are a cheap excuse for people to get points back for a limitation that doesn't really limit them. If you're weakening the already existing built in limitation of a EC, that removes one of the few checks that a EC has at all. After all, a player could simply build a weird EC such as stretching powers where it's highly unlikely for an enemy to have stretching drains.

 

Originally posted by zornwil

You're welcome to believe ECs unbalance the game - and other GMs feel this way - and ban them. So far it seems to me the majority of people with experience over the years see them as having problems but not inherently unbalanced. At least no more than MPs - which I still argue are at least as much prone to abuse, if not more given that the scalability issues with MPs are far more serious.

 

Quick edit, hope you haven't read it yet - also, what's the worry about "free points" (I meant to put this above) given it is a game - not a simulation?

 

The worry about free points is that some people have them, and others don't. I don't believe it's fair giving 50-100 extra points to a EB while not giving the same to a MA for example. And if you're going to play favorites, why don't you simply give the extra bonus points explicitly to the player that you favor?

[prestidigitator]

Originally posted by Gary

In practice, what does this mean? Would you refuse a EC to Human Torch or Iceman because they are stereotypical characters?

This is non-logic. I said I would not allow an EC for (because of) a stereotype. That does not mean I would disallow an EC because of a stereotype (A does not imply B is not the same as not A implies not . I was stating that the criteria should be different, not that stereotypical characters should not be allowed ECs.

[zornwil]

Originally posted by Gary

The starting points is so everyone has a even playing field. If you're going to give someone a few dozen or a hundred bonus xp, why don't you give it explicitly instead of trying to pretend that it's balanced?

 

 

 

 

I don't think it's unfair. My point is that EC's are a cheap excuse for people to get points back for a limitation that doesn't really limit them. If you're weakening the already existing built in limitation of a EC, that removes one of the few checks that a EC has at all. After all, a player could simply build a weird EC such as stretching powers where it's highly unlikely for an enemy to have stretching drains.

 

 

 

The worry about free points is that some people have them, and others don't. I don't believe it's fair giving 50-100 extra points to a EB while not giving the same to a MA for example. And if you're going to play favorites, why don't you simply give the extra bonus points explicitly to the player that you favor?

 

In short, I would still argue that the relative value of things like Martial Arts maneuvers and MultiPower Frameworks are every bit a cost break as Elemental Controls (edit adding) and those are based on concept bonuses (particularly MPs).

 

As to your last question, I think you're not "listening" to what I said in this thread - the ECs provide a more balanced and time-proven method than arbitrarily giving more points. If you can "squeeze" your points in via an EC, your character is likely more balanced than me arbitrarily saying "oh, if you can't fit it in, here's an extra 50 points for you, and here's an extra 100 points for Feral Lad over there".

[zornwil]

Oh, I'll PS instead of another edit - Gary, you and I won't cross the chasm that you don't see ECs as having a significant enough limitation and I do. For the life of me I don't see why you don't see MPs as just as problematic and just as not-quite-as-limited for the points, though.

 

And just to emphasize, while I and others don't but the auto-drian-one-drain-all, it doesn't mean we don't see ECs as innately non-drainable, or more tangibly, affected by MANY conditions. I can imagine lots of conditions ECs change in - I"ve had it happen to players when crossing dimensions. It just is SFX-based and some of us dispute that it makes any sense that an inappropriately-designed drain EB would affect an entire EC.

[Gary]

Originally posted by prestidigitator

This is non-logic. I said I would not allow an EC for (because of) a stereotype. That does not mean I would disallow an EC because of a stereotype (A does not imply B is not the same as not A implies not . I was stating that the criteria should be different, not that stereotypical characters should not be allowed ECs.

 

In practice, this would seem to imply that stereotyping isn't a criteria at all for whether you would allow a EC.

 

Would you allow batarangs and superleap to be in the same EC for Batman? Would you allow extremely broad EC's such as "superscientist"?

[Gary]

Originally posted by zornwil

In short, I would still argue that the relative value of things like Martial Arts maneuvers and MultiPower Frameworks are every bit a cost break as Elemental Controls (edit adding) and those are based on concept bonuses (particularly MPs).

 

Multipowers have a real disad. You can only use the reserve in points at the same time. EC's have no such disad, except for preventing MPA's. In a EC, you can use every single defense and movement at the same time. Martial maneuvers are efficient up to about 20 pts worth, but each additional maneuver becomes less and less efficient. For example, buying defensive strike, martial strike, and offensive strike together is horribly inefficient.

 

Originally posted by zornwil

As to your last question, I think you're not "listening" to what I said in this thread - the ECs provide a more balanced and time-proven method than arbitrarily giving more points. If you can "squeeze" your points in via an EC, your character is likely more balanced than me arbitrarily saying "oh, if you can't fit it in, here's an extra 50 points for you, and here's an extra 100 points for Feral Lad over there".

 

Yeah, you also have the advantage that you don't have to show other players exactly how much you're favoring Feral Lad.

 

The EC format encourages lots of powers all at the same power level. If the player can't afford all the powers he wants, maybe he should scale back his concept and "grow" into the character he envisions. Maybe instead of 30" flight and 60 pts of force field, he should settle for 15" flight and 30 pts of force field. Use xp to increase the power level.

 

Remember, player's conceptions are unlimited. Player's points shouldn't be.

[McCoy]

Originally posted by Gary

Would you allow batarangs and superleap to be in the same EC for Batman? Would you allow extremely broad EC's such as "superscientist"?

Again, would you post a character sheet for Batman? I don't think the character can be done, EC or no, on less than a thousand points without a VPP that includes gadgets, talents and skills, which I feel is cheeser than anything I've ever seen done with an EC.

 

If you are going to continue to cite Batman as a Good Example, let's see this example.

[Gary]

Originally posted by zornwil

Oh, I'll PS instead of another edit - Gary, you and I won't cross the chasm that you don't see ECs as having a significant enough limitation and I do. For the life of me I don't see why you don't see MPs as just as problematic and just as not-quite-as-limited for the points, though.

 

And just to emphasize, while I and others don't but the auto-drian-one-drain-all, it doesn't mean we don't see ECs as innately non-drainable, or more tangibly, affected by MANY conditions. I can imagine lots of conditions ECs change in - I"ve had it happen to players when crossing dimensions. It just is SFX-based and some of us dispute that it makes any sense that an inappropriately-designed drain EB would affect an entire EC.

 

If you take out the drain one drain all limit, do you really think that these vague intangibles are worth the functional equivalent of a -1 limitation on EC powers (I don't think it's worth -1 even with drain one drain all)? Let's call it what it is, free points for a structure that rarely limits the player.

 

In fact, EC's could be worth even more than -1 if the player can stack other limitations on the framework.

[Gary]

Originally posted by McCoy

Again, would you post a character sheet for Batman? I don't think the character can be done, EC or no, on less than a thousand points without a VPP that includes gadgets, talents and skills, which I feel is cheeser than anything I've ever seen done with an EC.

 

If you are going to continue to cite Batman as a Good Example, let's see this example.

 

About 250 pts in characteristics, 200 pts in skills and martial arts, 50 pts in perks, 200 pts in vehicles and bases, 50 pt gadget pool, and 75-100 pts in commonly used gadgets.

 

He is not and should not be a starting character, but you can easily scale him back by getting rid of a lot of stuff like the perks, vehicles and bases, and gadget pool. You can use xp to buy that stuff.