Balancing Duplication/Summon PCs

[Zed-F]

I must admit I've never seen a PC that uses duplication in action. As a GM, if a player wants Multiform, sure no problem... you just make each form as per usual, with the caveat that the player shouldn't be able to outdo other PCs in their specialties (i.e. each individual form should be a bit weaker than a PC that specializes in what that form does.)

 

But what about Duplication? Normally, you're supposed to get the same abilities as your character has, minus the duplication itself. That means if you buy a duplication with 8 forms, you essentially get 8 times as many actions. How does one balance that against other PCs? Granted you are paying a significant number of points for the privelage (on a 350 point character, that's something like 85 APs (less if you take the cost of Duplication out of the purchase price for the duplicates) but we all know limitations can reduce that by quite a bit. Even if you only get the RP cost down to 50 or so, that still leaves 8 300-point characters running around. You probably can't guarantee that those duplicates will be split up such that only 1 or 2 will be present for any given battle; he can just stay merged & only duplicate once a battle is imminent or started, if nothing else. As a GM, how does one manage that?

 

The same holds for summons. A character who can summon a number of smallish minions is not that big a deal, just bring along a like number of agents/thugs to compensate. But what about a PC who wants to be able to summon a significant number of minions that approach or equal the PC points totals? Since higher points total beings tend to be more capable for the points than smaller points beings, this could be hard to deal with without sending in a villain team just to tackle that one character. Obviously this is a candidate for the "just say no" treatment, but are there any other ways to deal with this?

[dbsousa]

Don't forget, summoned creatures, even slavishly loyal ones, are under the GM's control. Beyond simple commands, the PC should not be able to dictate their actions completely...

 

Villians with appropriate Dispels should neutralize such a PC, as should Mentalists. Imagine the look on your PC's face when his minions turn on him...

[Zed-F]

You might need a custom villain with an AoE mental attack for the latter, if he just brings out the summons in combat. Or else GM fiat (mind control booster or something.)

[OddHat]

Funny enough I just ran a game with a player who had the power to summon 16 100 point Ninja; it wasnt a problem from a combat point of view. They made for great agent fodder but were taken out by a selective area of effect attack. For that matter, very few constructs are really a problem from a 'defeat in battle" point of view; as GM you have unlimited points to work with.

 

The biggest problem in handling that kind of character is time; as GM you have to hand wave some of the summoned characters actions, otherwise combat slows down to an absolute crawl. Duplication is tougher; the player has a reasonable expectation of being allowed to control his or her duplicates. Here it comes down to the experience level of the player and GM. A relatively new player in a small group can handle two characters (the primary and one dupe) without slowing things down much; a more experienced small group might be able to handle one player running four characters in a single combat, but it would get awkward. I probably wouldn't permit a player character with combat-worthy duplication beyond that level, unless it was a one player game.

[zornwil]

I've only GMed with 1 PC with Duplication, and he only split into 2 people. The balancing factor was that Dup was so costly you really were weak in other areas (in his case, his CVs were substantially sub-par compared to all others and he was slower). But that was back in the days when Dup costed a lot more. So it wasn't an issue.

 

However, between Followers and Summons and Dups, there's lots of potential for way too many characters running around and way too powerful PCs. Here's a few thoughts on the matter:

 

- Summons - they must make them as well-defined as PCs, even if under GM control; there's no confusion, and besides, the more work the PC has to do, the more likely that although it may be very effective, he's limited by how much he can get done - if he dumps on you "build me 2 vampires, 3 werewolves, an agent who does this, an agent who does that, etc." then an expectations gap occurs - you can't do it all without fudging and he may be unhappy at the results. Now, of course, you can tweak the Summoned characters in ways the PC might not know (so long as it's reasonable/within the context of the game and character and Summoned things).

 

- Dups - Pay careful attention to the limitations in the book built into Dups. Ensure the PC understands that these Dups do not have any innate link (if he wants it, he has to build it), and they are SEPARATE versions of him. If he can't handle that, you, GM, take half.

 

- Any of these - I wouldn't let a player have too many dups or summons or followers at one time unless there was not merely a good rationale but ALSO some built-in modifiers to ensure that they act quickly. I'm not sure what "too many" is, but 8 definitely is a lot. A whole lot. So they should have something that would make their phases go quickly ("follows leader" (especially interesting if it's the team lead and not the player), "takes hasty actions", "does the opposite of the last guy to do something", etc.) - do NOT apply this as a limitation on the DUP power; if you want to give any points for it, give them as a disad. Yes, this impinges on the concept - but having a player with 8 characters impinges on the game. That's like my time traveling guy - I made him take a disad of "always upholds 'true' time stream" so he wouldn't competely muck things up.

 

- I don't do this, but again, for any combo of many players, enforce some limits on powers and such, much more scrupulously than with regular PCs. Maybe even make more stringent limits and consider the cumulative effect.

 

That's a few thoughts for now, may have more later.

[Bartman]

Originally posted by OddHat

The biggest problem in handling that kind of character is time; as GM you have to hand wave some of the summoned characters actions, otherwise combat slows down to an absolute crawl. Duplication is tougher; the player has a reasonable expectation of being allowed to control his or her duplicates. Here it comes down to the experience level of the player and GM. A relatively new player in a small group can handle two characters (the primary and one dupe) without slowing things down much; a more experienced small group might be able to handle one player running four characters in a single combat, but it would get awkward. I probably wouldn't permit a player character with combat-worthy duplication beyond that level, unless it was a one player game.

Bingo! I was in an abortive campaign where the GM allowed a first time Hero gamer to have x16 duplication. The player was slow in systems he was familiar with. And he most certainly was not familiar with Hero. Add in the fact that he had to think out each dupes actions in detail and the very existance of the character slowed the game to a crawl. Out of combat each dupe had to go a different way and investigate a different thing. In combat they would each pick different opponents and take unique actions, so the GM couldn't even just say "roll once for your to hit roll for each character." It took us some 8 hours to play through a quick combat and another 8 hours to play through the relatively straight forward investigation that followed. 16 hours of roleplaying into the campaign and we weren't even 1/4 the way through the first session. For some reason we never got back together. After seeing that I would never let a player take duplication unless I had played with them before and decided that they were relatively quick.

[prestidigitator]

Remember that the duplicates from Duplication are dead if they die. This is like buying an Independant power: you can lose it forever. That is more like a number slavishly loyal Followers you can hide in your back pocket than a true power.