Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Regarding lower level superheroes, I think one of the reasons why the Dark Knight and even Iron Man were such hits because they were relatable, that is not invincible. Iron Man without his suit is must a man, albeit a billionaire genius. So is Bruce Wayne, but even with all his training it didn't prevent him from suffering in the Dark Knight Rises (which I have to admit thought went on a little too long).

 

Marvel is the company of low level superheroes, those with a lot of little abilities and maybe one major powers, and one major weakness.

 

DC has the legends, the bigger then life characters with the attitudes, enemies, and fatal vulnerabilities to go with it.

 

Most thugs are going to have 25 points of characteristics, mostly in STR, DEX, PRE, SPD, and PD. They will have some HA for brawling, a combat level or two, and a RKA in the from of a gun. Most heroes would be able to take them down in hand to hand combat even without martial arts or weapons.

 

Here is a point scale to keep things reasonable

 

0 points - Innocent Civilians, the kind of people the heroes have to protect because they are completely vulnerable.

25 points - Important person or low level thug, someone the heroes have to protect because they have non-combat skills, or some normals armed with a gun, club, or knife and work for the villain cheap.

50 points - police officers, soldiers, and paid mercenaries who are better armed and trained, and skilled normals dnpc for heroes.

75 points - elite soldiers, federal agent, or international spies, or the best of the best hired guns who haven't crossed over into being super villains yet.

100 points - Sidekicks or top operatives for super villains.

250 points - Standard superheroes and super villains.

350 points - Legendary superheroes and super villains who either defend the world, or try and take it over, and who are best being used as NPC to keep the players humble.

 

I can't remember ever not liking Batman or Iron Man. Really, what's not to like? Wealthy and heroic as all get out, they beat up the bad guys using stuff they invent themselves. Growing up, I would have given almost anything to be like them, so I can definitely relate to them; though I'm not so sure they are lower level heroes. The Avengers are comparable to the JLA - aren't they? - and while they are not the most powerful of superheroes, they don't seem to be junior members of their respective teams. But, yeah, it is cool that their civilian personas seem nearly as vulnerable as the rest of us mere mortals are.

 

Do you favor Marvel over DC? They seem to fit your theme, if you ignore my buddy, Thor. I'm guessing you're a fan of both as many of us are (another guess). And speaking of Marvel's style of heroes, I really enjoy the X-Men primarily due to those very qualities. There's something to be said for low-end superheroes.

 

And of course there's something to be said for the more mythic superheroes, too.

 

Thank you for the scale. This kind of information is very helpful to me as I learn the rules. Is the scale you listed for the 6th Edition or 5th Edition rules? The points seem higher in Champions Complete, especially at the higher end of your scale.

[bigbywolfe]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

I can't remember ever not liking Batman or Iron Man. Really' date=' what's not to like? Wealthy and heroic as all get out, they beat up the bad guys using stuff they invent themselves. Growing up, I would have given almost anything to be like them, so I can definitely relate to them; though I'm not so sure they are lower level heroes. The Avengers are comparable to the JLA - aren't they? - and while they are not [i']the[/i] most powerful of superheroes, they don't seem to be junior members of their respective teams. But, yeah, it is cool that their civilian personas seem nearly as vulnerable as the rest of us mere mortals are.

 

Do you favor Marvel over DC? They seem to fit your theme, if you ignore my buddy, Thor. I'm guessing you're a fan of both as many of us are (another guess). And speaking of Marvel's style of heroes, I really enjoy the X-Men primarily due to those very qualities. There's something to be said for low-end superheroes.

 

And of course there's something to be said for the more mythic superheroes, too.

 

Thank you for the scale. This kind of information is very helpful to me as I learn the rules. Is the scale you listed for the 6th Edition or 5th Edition rules? The points seem higher in Champions Complete, especially at the higher end of your scale.

The scale she gave was personal or pre 5E. In 5E 350 points was standard, in 6E it's 400, and the increase is mainly due to the fact that Figured Characteristics were finally dropped.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

The scale she gave was personal or pre 5E. In 5E 350 points was standard' date=' in 6E it's 400, and the increase is mainly due to the fact that Figured Characteristics were finally dropped.[/quote']

 

Oh. My thanks, bigbywolfe, for the clarification. Then I should probably adjust the scale accordingly before studying it.

[assault]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Conversion between 5e and 6e can be awkward for some characters. That's why I started trying out building JLA members on Low-Powered Superhero points (250 pts in 5e) and converting them to Standard Superhero point totals in 6e. Too many of them were exceeding the 6e 300 point allowance for Low-Powered Supers.

 

Along the way, I discovered that 400 point versions built according to the 300 point guidelines gave quite nice versions of many of the characters. An alternative would be 500 point characters built according to the 400 point guidelines, but I've been building characters since first edition, and lower point totals were the norm then.

 

What I am experimenting with works like this. In 5e, at 250 points, I build characters around a "standard" set of characteristics that adds up to 90 points. I then set aside 35 points for skills and perks. (Unfortunately, I tend to raid this allocation for extra points, so it's rare for them to end up with this much). That leaves me with 125 points for powers.

 

At that point I tend to follow a suggestion that dates back to 2nd edition, and allocate points to Offensive Powers, Defensive Powers, Movement Powers and Miscellaneous Powers. Usually, each category gets between 20-40 points, although I will sometimes rob some categories to favour others. That gives you a pretty standard low-powered super. Limitations on their powers and the use of power frameworks can make them tougher, of course.

 

All this is normal. What I've started doing recently is add an extra hundred points afterwards. Originally, I tended to overestimate the costs involved in the conversion, and assumed that there would usually only be around 50 extra points to play around with, but I've since realised that that was too pessimistic. What I'm doing, essentially, is using the extra points to fill out the characters' power sets.

 

For example, I would build the Atom the traditional way - but buy his Shrinking with the extra points! With the initial points, he would be a fairly mediocre martial artist who can teleport along phone lines, but with the extra points he becomes the Atom.

 

Aquaman would be a rather mediocre brick who can operate underwater, but the extra points allow him to talk to (and command) sea life.

 

Green Arrow would be a martial artist with a car, but the extra points buy him his bow and arrows.

 

The Flash is a character where the extra points would mainly be sucked up in the conversion cost. He'd still get to run faster, and do a bunch of superspeed tricks though.

[Grailknight]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Sometimes objects (especially vehicles) will cause problems with genre simulation. Getting hit by a speeding car(12-14 DC's) can be a problem for bricks in low to medium point builds when in the source material, cars bounce often without doing any stun or knockback. Destroying a vehicle or even a large tree or wall may take several hits from a charcter doing 12 dc's which is fine unless you're trying to model iconic heroes at that level. Military vehicles, bank vaults and the like can take this even further. Don't get too caught up in this, theres nothing wrong with handwaving these situations until you have some more experience with rules.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Conversion between 5e and 6e can be awkward for some characters. That's why I started trying out building JLA members on Low-Powered Superhero points (250 pts in 5e) and converting them to Standard Superhero point totals in 6e. Too many of them were exceeding the 6e 300 point allowance for Low-Powered Supers.

 

Along the way, I discovered that 400 point versions built according to the 300 point guidelines gave quite nice versions of many of the characters. An alternative would be 500 point characters built according to the 400 point guidelines, but I've been building characters since first edition, and lower point totals were the norm then.

 

What I am experimenting with works like this. In 5e, at 250 points, I build characters around a "standard" set of characteristics that adds up to 90 points. I then set aside 35 points for skills and perks. (Unfortunately, I tend to raid this allocation for extra points, so it's rare for them to end up with this much). That leaves me with 125 points for powers.

 

At that point I tend to follow a suggestion that dates back to 2nd edition, and allocate points to Offensive Powers, Defensive Powers, Movement Powers and Miscellaneous Powers. Usually, each category gets between 20-40 points, although I will sometimes rob some categories to favour others. That gives you a pretty standard low-powered super. Limitations on their powers and the use of power frameworks can make them tougher, of course.

 

All this is normal. What I've started doing recently is add an extra hundred points afterwards. Originally, I tended to overestimate the costs involved in the conversion, and assumed that there would usually only be around 50 extra points to play around with, but I've since realised that that was too pessimistic. What I'm doing, essentially, is using the extra points to fill out the characters' power sets.

 

For example, I would build the Atom the traditional way - but buy his Shrinking with the extra points! With the initial points, he would be a fairly mediocre martial artist who can teleport along phone lines, but with the extra points he becomes the Atom.

 

Aquaman would be a rather mediocre brick who can operate underwater, but the extra points allow him to talk to (and command) sea life.

 

Green Arrow would be a martial artist with a car, but the extra points buy him his bow and arrows.

 

The Flash is a character where the extra points would mainly be sucked up in the conversion cost. He'd still get to run faster, and do a bunch of superspeed tricks though.

 

So, in other words, you use your large, base pool of points to build the concept archetype(s) and the smaller, supplemental pool of points to actually purchase the identifying attributes for the character? I like it. It seems like it should allow me to draft characters more quickly with this approach than simply crafting "Aquaman" from the first point spent.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Sometimes objects (especially vehicles) will cause problems with genre simulation. Getting hit by a speeding car(12-14 DC's) can be a problem for bricks in low to medium point builds when in the source material' date=' cars bounce often without doing any stun or knockback. Destroying a vehicle or even a large tree or wall may take several hits from a charcter doing 12 dc's which is fine unless you're trying to model iconic heroes at that level. Military vehicles, bank vaults and the like can take this even further. Don't get too caught up in this, theres nothing wrong with handwaving these situations until you have some more experience with rules.[/quote']

 

Now I understand. Thanks, Grailknight. I'm still reading through the crunchy powers and I must admit I am wondering how long it'll take me to run this thing without pausing the action to flip through the book and reference the rules. When I bought the book, I thought it was maybe a little lean, but now... I'm thinking it's big enough. To make it easier on myself, I'm going to run practice combats, but I'm sure that'll not simulate the creativity of the players! I might be doing plenty of handwaving (or armwaving and running in tight circles) at the start.

[Cassandra]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

My Point Levels are based on 5th Edition Rules, which I use.

 

If Batman and Wonder Woman are at 250 Points, then Jack Bauer and Nikita are 150 Points, and Robin and Wonder Girl are 200 Points.

[assault]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Here is an example of how I am designing characters in two passes these days. I should note that I am less familiar with 6e than with 6e, so errors are likely. Where possible I have taken stuff from published sources, in particular the Champions genre book. Doing that saves a whole lot of time and effort.

 

Aquman (Silver Age) – 6e

Arthur Curry

First Pass

 

Val Char Cost

10 STR 0

20 DEX 20

20 CON 10

 

13 INT 3

10 EGO 0

20 PRE 10

 

7 OCV 20

7 DCV 20

3 OMCV 0

3 DMCV 0

 

5 SPD 30

2 PD 0

2 ED 0

 

10 REC 6

50 END 6

15 BODY 5

40 STUN 10

Total Characteristics Cost: 140

 

35 35 Character Points’ worth of Skills and Perks

 

125 Points worth of powers:

 

(30) Offensive powers

30 +30 Str

 

(38) Defensive powers

10 Tough Body: Resistant (+½) for 10 PD/10 ED

+14 PD

+14 ED

 

(30) Movement powers

30 Super-Swimming: Swimming +60m

 

 

(27) Miscellaneous powers

10 Delphine Sonar: Active Sonar (Hearing Group); Costs Endurance (-½)

3 Undersea Dweller: Life Support (Safe Environments:

Intense Cold, High Pressure)

5 Undersea Senses: Infrared Perception (Sight Group)

5 Undersea Senses: Nightvision

4 Aquatic Movement: Environmental Movement (no penalties while in

water)

 

This is 300 points worth. He’s not bad, except that his defences are inadequate. Hopefully this can be fixed in the next pass.

 

Oops. This how his characteristics will turn out with the extra stuff bought under powers added to his original characteristic set:

 

Val Char Cost

40 STR 30

20 DEX 20

20 CON 10

 

13 INT 3

10 EGO 0

20 PRE 10

 

7 OCV 20

7 DCV 20

3 OMCV 0

3 DMCV 0

 

5 SPD 30

16 PD 14

16 ED 14

 

10 REC 6

50 END 6

15 BODY 5

40 STUN 10

Total Characteristics Cost: 198

[assault]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

An extra 100 points on the second pass:

 

60 Talks to Fish: Multipower, 60-point reserve

4f 1) Aquatic Telepathy: Telepathy 12d6 (Animal class of minds); Aquatic Creatures Only (-½)

4f 2) Aquatic Control: Mind Control 12d6 (Animal class of minds); Aquatic Creatures Only (-½)

6f 3) Aquatic Command: Summon up to 4 Sea Creatures built on up to 150 Character Points, Expanded Effect (+¼), Friendly (+¼)

 

(These are taken from the genre book. They don't allow him to do his more bizarre effects, but he can more or less do what he is supposed to).

 

2 +2 CON

5 +1 OCV

5 +1 DCV

6 +2 OMCV

4 +4 PD

4 +4 ED

 

With these upgrades, his characteristics look like this:

 

Val Char Cost

40 STR 30

20 DEX 20

22 CON 12

 

13 INT 3

10 EGO 0

20 PRE 10

 

8 OCV 25

8 DCV 25

5 OMCV 6

3 DMCV 0

 

5 SPD 30

20 PD 18

20 ED 18

 

10 REC 6

50 END 6

15 BODY 5

40 STUN 10

Total Characteristics Cost: 224

 

Still need to fill in his skills, perks and complications, but basically that 's the character done. Not the most powerful character in the world, but plausibly Aquaman. Of course you can keep piling on the points as high as you want - this is a starting point.

 

I'll do the Atom next, but probably not until tomorrow.

[Kirby]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

By chance, has anyone made characters (based on 250 or -hopefully- 350 points) for DC's Female Furies? Even Big Barda and Lashina would be nice.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Here is an example of how I am designing characters in two passes these days. I should note that I am less familiar with 6e than with 6e, so errors are likely. Where possible I have taken stuff from published sources, in particular the Champions genre book. Doing that saves a whole lot of time and effort.

 

Aquman (Silver Age) – 6e

Arthur Curry

First Pass

 

[...]

 

This is 300 points worth. He’s not bad, except that his defences are inadequate. Hopefully this can be fixed in the next pass.

 

Oops. This how his characteristics will turn out with the extra stuff bought under powers added to his original characteristic set:

 

Val Char Cost

40 STR 30

20 DEX 20

20 CON 10

 

13 INT 3

10 EGO 0

20 PRE 10

 

7 OCV 20

7 DCV 20

3 OMCV 0

3 DMCV 0

 

5 SPD 30

16 PD 14

16 ED 14

 

10 REC 6

50 END 6

15 BODY 5

40 STUN 10

Total Characteristics Cost: 198

 

An extra 100 points on the second pass:

 

[...]

 

With these upgrades, his characteristics look like this:

 

Val Char Cost

40 STR 30

20 DEX 20

22 CON 12

 

13 INT 3

10 EGO 0

20 PRE 10

 

8 OCV 25

8 DCV 25

5 OMCV 6

3 DMCV 0

 

5 SPD 30

20 PD 18

20 ED 18

 

10 REC 6

50 END 6

15 BODY 5

40 STUN 10

Total Characteristics Cost: 224

 

Still need to fill in his skills, perks and complications, but basically that 's the character done. Not the most powerful character in the world, but plausibly Aquaman. Of course you can keep piling on the points as high as you want - this is a starting point.

 

I'll do the Atom next, but probably not until tomorrow.

 

Very good, sir! I love that you started with Aquaman. How long did this take you, do you think? Just curious, because you know what you're doing. I will definitely attempt this method myself. It seems a good way to make sure I cover the basics and don't fritter away too many points pursuing specific abilities.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Most thugs are going to have 25 points of characteristics, mostly in STR, DEX, PRE, SPD, and PD. They will have some HA for brawling, a combat level or two, and a RKA in the from of a gun. Most heroes would be able to take them down in hand to hand combat even without martial arts or weapons.

 

Here is a point scale to keep things reasonable

 

0 points - Innocent Civilians, the kind of people the heroes have to protect because they are completely vulnerable.

25 points - Important person or low level thug, someone the heroes have to protect because they have non-combat skills, or some normals armed with a gun, club, or knife and work for the villain cheap.

50 points - police officers, soldiers, and paid mercenaries who are better armed and trained, and skilled normals dnpc for heroes.

75 points - elite soldiers, federal agent, or international spies, or the best of the best hired guns who haven't crossed over into being super villains yet.

100 points - Sidekicks or top operatives for super villains.

250 points - Standard superheroes and super villains.

350 points - Legendary superheroes and super villains who either defend the world, or try and take it over, and who are best being used as NPC to keep the players humble.

 

My Point Levels are based on 5th Edition Rules, which I use.

 

If Batman and Wonder Woman are at 250 Points, then Jack Bauer and Nikita are 150 Points, and Robin and Wonder Girl are 200 Points.

 

Thank you, Cassandra. I don't always "upgrade" either. I never have tried 4th edition D&D and never will. Still, Champions Complete is all I have, unless I wish to stick with DC Adventures. And I'd rather not!

 

So, I've checked out the guidelines provided and here's what I think your scale might look like in Champions Complete values:

 

Standard normal: 25 points (+25 points) - Innocent civilians.

Skilled normal: 50 points (+25 points) - Important person.

Competent normal: 100 points (+50 points) - Police officers and soldiers.

Standard heroic: 175 points (+100 points) - Elite soldiers, federal agents, or international spies.

Very Powerful heroic: 275 points (+175 points) - Sidekicks or top operatives for super villains.

Standard superheroic: 400 points (+150 points) - Standard superheroes and super villains.

Very High-Powered superheroic: 650 points (+300 points) - Legendary superheroes and super villains who either defend the world, or try and take it over, and who are best being used as NPC to keep the players humble.

 

Either I've misread the guidelines or there's a significant difference in the number of character points used in 5th edition and CC. Or both.

[bigbywolfe]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

My Point Levels are based on 5th Edition Rules, which I use.

 

If Batman and Wonder Woman are at 250 Points, then Jack Bauer and Nikita are 150 Points, and Robin and Wonder Girl are 200 Points.

250 is not "Standard Superheroic" in 5E (unless the difference between 5E and 5ER is really that dramatic. It may have been in 4E. In 5ER Standard Superheroic is 350. Low Powered Supers (such as Teen Champions or some "Street Level" Heroes) are 250.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

250 is not "Standard Superheroic" in 5E (unless the difference between 5E and 5ER is really that dramatic. It may have been in 4E. In 5ER Standard Superheroic is 350. Low Powered Supers (such as Teen Champions or some "Street Level" Heroes) are 250.

 

Well, she did say the points scale was based on 5th edition... I think then that she's not going to agree with my revised scale.

 

Thank you for the 5ER Standard Superheroic value, bigbywolfe. It helps me understand where she's coming from.

[Cassandra]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Standard is a relative term. Let's say starting levels then.

 

Superman didn't have the power to fly, heat vision, or a good reputation.

 

Wonder Woman couldn't fly without her Invisible Plane.

 

You build a starting version and as long as you're facing a Lex Luthor or Cheetah built on the same amount to points they don't lose anything.

 

Further, villains gain experience points as well. After a few battles with Superman Lex buys a good reputation so he can make it harder for the Man of Steel to take him out without a public backlash.

 

Now that's good role playing.

[BlackEagle]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Agrees with Cassandra. Perhaps a better Joker or Catwoman. Lets say Catwoman had special martial arts skills or the Joker had some special power. Perhaps Batman could have some special power. Gotta even the playing field for both villons and heros.

[assault]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

How long did this take you' date=' do you think?[/quote']

 

Not much longer that it took to type the following:

 

The Atom - Silver Age

Ray Palmer

 

Standard Characteristic set (paste into file)

35 points of skills and perks (he's a scientist)

 

Offensive Powers (30 points):

+10 Str

Martial Arts

 

Defensive Powers (32):

Legendary level PD (15): 13

legendary level ED (15): 13

Combat Luck: 6

 

Movement Powers (20):

That teleport build from USPD: (time spent looking it up and copying it in. Select faster option rather than basic one): 20

 

Miscellaneous Powers (43):

Umm... that's quite a bit left over. Time to buy characteristics and skills!

 

That's just the first pass, of course. The second pass will probably be quicker, although I will take the time to consider modelling him at his six inch height using the small critter rules rather than shrinking.

[psyber624]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

I will admit that I have not had a chance to test out some of this, so it is all theory, but something I want to point out when it comes to making villains.

 

Assuming you have a team of characters (and its not a one on one fight) you have to be careful with your villains. You want them to be a threat to the team, but you don't want the team to feel like they have no way of stopping him.

 

A couple of Do's and Don'ts I have picked up from reading the forums and the books.

 

Do: Use Henchmen. Giving the hero's more to fight than just the main badguy is one way to make it dangerous but doable. If you do this you should make sure that the henchmen have attacks that are capable of hurting the heros, but OCV's that make hitting rather rare. If the attacks aren't strong enough smart heroes will just ignore the henchmen and focus on the Big Bad. If they are strong enough and they have a decent chance of hitting the henchmen might wind up getting lucky and taking out the heroes, very anti-climatic. Another option instead of attacks is to have the henchmen use "debuff" type powers, entangles, drains, grabs, etc. This ensures that they don't wind up taking out heroes themselves, but if the heroes try to ignore them they will regret it.

 

Do: Use Damage Reduction: Damage Reduction is probably one of the best powers for designing head villains. It allows all of the heroes to hit him and hurt him, without letting a couple of high damage rolls end combat against him too quickly to be climatic. Also, try to ensure that it is unlikely (but not impossible with coordinated attacks and such) for him to be stunned. If he is outnumbered (and he usually will be) a single stunned result is likely a death sentence and a quick "game over" and if this happens on the first attack you really don't have much of a climax for your campaign.

 

Do: Unless your intent is to allow a certain hero to shine Do make sure his defenses can account for all the powers he is going up against, even if a writeup in a book doesn't include them. As an example, If you have a mentalist in your campaign and none of your villains bother with MD then he will suddenly be more powerful than everyone else on the team. There is nothing wrong with designing a villain that will be weak to one of the team members, as long as everyone on the team is occasionally given a chance to be "top gun" in this fashion.

 

Don't: Give your Villain High innate defenses (PD/ED or Resistant Protection that is always on). If the defenses are too high it will become nearly impossible for your hero's to actually damage him. If you want a high Def villain make sure his defenses are ones that can be eliminated in some way (Force Fields that cost END, Barriers that can be knocked down to allow clean shots, etc.) Remember the correlation between DC's and Defenses. If you are going over 3-4 PD/ED per die being rolled you are making it highly unlikely that any attack will ever manage to get past his defenses.

 

Don't: Increase the DC's your master villain is throwing around by much. Most Heroes defenses are designed to handle the attacks that they dish out (The standard is 2 PD/ED per DC). If you boost the master villains attacks by more than a DC or two over what the heroes use your Master villain will likely nearly always stun when he hits, and certain Hero designs may even be one shot KO'ed on a decent roll. If you want him to feel more powerful than the heroes use things like linked attacks (each applies to the defenses separately and stun separately) different sorts of advantages (AOE's, autofire, etc) and the like so that he isn't simply knocking them over like dominoes. Also be aware of the different types of Defenses. Some villains should be able to take out dodge-masters (high OCV or AOE attacks) some should be able to take out tanks (Armor Piercing, AVLD, etc) and some may even have attacks they can tailor to whatever defense your Heroes have (best of both worlds).

 

Again this is just what I have garnered from the boards and the books. Hopefully other, more experienced GM's will chime in with their own impressions on this.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Standard is a relative term. Let's say starting levels then.

 

Superman didn't have the power to fly, heat vision, or a good reputation.

 

Wonder Woman couldn't fly without her Invisible Plane.

 

You build a starting version and as long as you're facing a Lex Luthor or Cheetah built on the same amount to points they don't lose anything.

 

Further, villains gain experience points as well. After a few battles with Superman Lex buys a good reputation so he can make it harder for the Man of Steel to take him out without a public backlash.

 

Now that's good role playing.

 

As a long-time D&D player, I am very familiar with the 1st level, or starting, character. In fact, that's really what I'm doing here, more or less, considering this is a JLA campaign, despite the fact I'm likely using 400+ CP characters on this, my first attempt to run a Champions campaign. Remember, unlike the 5th edition rules, Champions Complete doesn't have any figured characteristics, so no freebies there.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Not much longer that it took to type the following:

 

The Atom - Silver Age

Ray Palmer

 

Standard Characteristic set (paste into file)

35 points of skills and perks (he's a scientist)

 

Offensive Powers (30 points):

+10 Str

Martial Arts

 

Defensive Powers (32):

Legendary level PD (15): 13

legendary level ED (15): 13

Combat Luck: 6

 

Movement Powers (20):

That teleport build from USPD: (time spent looking it up and copying it in. Select faster option rather than basic one): 20

 

Miscellaneous Powers (43):

Umm... that's quite a bit left over. Time to buy characteristics and skills!

 

That's just the first pass, of course. The second pass will probably be quicker, although I will take the time to consider modelling him at his six inch height using the small critter rules rather than shrinking.

 

Well, I can tell you, sir, that I'm working on making an NPC and I've already spent way more time than that and have nothing good to show for it! But I will get there. Eventually. Assuming the world does not end in cataclysm on the 21st.

[Sammael]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

I will admit that I have not had a chance to test out some of this, so it is all theory, but something I want to point out when it comes to making villains.

 

Assuming you have a team of characters (and its not a one on one fight) you have to be careful with your villains. You want them to be a threat to the team, but you don't want the team to feel like they have no way of stopping him.

 

A couple of Do's and Don'ts I have picked up from reading the forums and the books.

 

Do: Use Henchmen. Giving the hero's more to fight than just the main badguy is one way to make it dangerous but doable. If you do this you should make sure that the henchmen have attacks that are capable of hurting the heros, but OCV's that make hitting rather rare. If the attacks aren't strong enough smart heroes will just ignore the henchmen and focus on the Big Bad. If they are strong enough and they have a decent chance of hitting the henchmen might wind up getting lucky and taking out the heroes, very anti-climatic. Another option instead of attacks is to have the henchmen use "debuff" type powers, entangles, drains, grabs, etc. This ensures that they don't wind up taking out heroes themselves, but if the heroes try to ignore them they will regret it.

 

Do: Use Damage Reduction: Damage Reduction is probably one of the best powers for designing head villains. It allows all of the heroes to hit him and hurt him, without letting a couple of high damage rolls end combat against him too quickly to be climatic. Also, try to ensure that it is unlikely (but not impossible with coordinated attacks and such) for him to be stunned. If he is outnumbered (and he usually will be) a single stunned result is likely a death sentence and a quick "game over" and if this happens on the first attack you really don't have much of a climax for your campaign.

 

Do: Unless your intent is to allow a certain hero to shine Do make sure his defenses can account for all the powers he is going up against, even if a writeup in a book doesn't include them. As an example, If you have a mentalist in your campaign and none of your villains bother with MD then he will suddenly be more powerful than everyone else on the team. There is nothing wrong with designing a villain that will be weak to one of the team members, as long as everyone on the team is occasionally given a chance to be "top gun" in this fashion.

 

Don't: Give your Villain High innate defenses (PD/ED or Resistant Protection that is always on). If the defenses are too high it will become nearly impossible for your hero's to actually damage him. If you want a high Def villain make sure his defenses are ones that can be eliminated in some way (Force Fields that cost END, Barriers that can be knocked down to allow clean shots, etc.) Remember the correlation between DC's and Defenses. If you are going over 3-4 PD/ED per die being rolled you are making it highly unlikely that any attack will ever manage to get past his defenses.

 

Don't: Increase the DC's your master villain is throwing around by much. Most Heroes defenses are designed to handle the attacks that they dish out (The standard is 2 PD/ED per DC). If you boost the master villains attacks by more than a DC or two over what the heroes use your Master villain will likely nearly always stun when he hits, and certain Hero designs may even be one shot KO'ed on a decent roll. If you want him to feel more powerful than the heroes use things like linked attacks (each applies to the defenses separately and stun separately) different sorts of advantages (AOE's, autofire, etc) and the like so that he isn't simply knocking them over like dominoes. Also be aware of the different types of Defenses. Some villains should be able to take out dodge-masters (high OCV or AOE attacks) some should be able to take out tanks (Armor Piercing, AVLD, etc) and some may even have attacks they can tailor to whatever defense your Heroes have (best of both worlds).

 

Again this is just what I have garnered from the boards and the books. Hopefully other, more experienced GM's will chime in with their own impressions on this.

 

I'm going to copy and paste this stuff. Seems like good guidelines to me. I'll try it.

[massey]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Sammael, I think I need to put a few things in perspective. There is a bit of a divide in the HERO community as to the best way to represent established characters like the Justice League. What we have in this thread are some of the champions of the "low powered" side of the debate. If you search for "how do I build Superman" or other similar threads, you'll see quite a bit of disagreement on the subject. It's a shame these guys got to you first.

 

I'm not that familiar with 6th edition, 5th has served me well and our group saw no reason to change. So some of the point totals I talk about will be a bit off. But if you know MEGS and have been using the Mutants and Masterminds system, you're already good as far as the basic concepts that drive HERO. Like MEGS and M&M, strength is exponential. So the Supeman writeup in the basic DC game would translate to a STR of 115 or so in Hero. So forget all this "Superman has a 60 STR" stuff.

 

The problem is that differences in attacks in HERO are probably more noticeable than in M&M. A PL16 Superman vs a standard PL10 villain, Superman is going to stomp the guy most of the time. Unless he gets some really bad rolls or the other guy catches him by surprise, Superman doesn't break a sweat. But in HERO, a STR 115 Superman with 50 PD and ED and an 8 SPD simply will not lose, ever, to the standard 350 point villain. Like, they can't even scratch him. Now, the differences in Champions aren't as extreme as they are in MEGS, where Superman has 25 APs of Strength and 18 APs of Body. But it will still play differently than Mutants and Masterminds.

 

My suggestion would be to start out a standard power level game (and yes, you can't play a decent JLA on standard points unless you're playing the adventures of Hawkman, Booster Gold, and Vibe), and then work your way up to the big boys. To get a good translation of Superman, ported over from M&M, you're gonna need like a thousand points. But that is not the place to start with your first Champions game. It's harder to scale and won't work as smoothly as M&M if you try to do it right out of the box.

[Hyper-Man]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

[massey]

Re: Justice League-type DC/Champions campaign. Advice, please.

 

I wrote a great post about how to balance out a JLA level game and the board ate it.

 

Best advice (short version), decide how powerful you want your average superhero to be. Push the JLA characters above that average in areas where they show strengths. Be careful with direct conversions from other sources, because a 115 Str Superman is going to one-shot every single "average" character, so be aware of how those high power levels interact. If your world's average is 12D6, then most heroes (Hawkman, Aquaman, Batman, etc) should probably be in that range. Guys whose schtick is hitting really hard (Martian Manhunter, Supes, Wonder Woman) get more.

 

If you use a (5th edition) 350 point character as the standard for a normal superhuman (Captain Lightning of Sentinel City or something), and he's a 12D6, 20 Dex, 5 Speed, 25 PD/ED with 40 Stun kind of guy, and most of the world's villains are going to be built to fight him, then look and see how combat effective you want your JLA to be against that level of villain. Superman can be quite effective against that level of opponent if he's got 35 or 40 PD and ED and throws 15 or 16 dice.

 

"Average" brick (5th edition, with figured characteristics)

Str 60

Dex 18

Con 30

Body 15

Int 10

Ego 15

Pre 20

Com 10

PD 30

ED 25

Spd 4

Rec 18

End 60

Stun 60

 

15/15 DR

20" superleap

+2 levels hand to hand

assorted skills

 

Superman (balanced against average brick)

Str 75 (he's so strong even bricks are impressed)

Dex 26 (way fast)

Con 35 (tougher than normal bricks)

Body 15

Int 18+ (depending on how smart your Supes is)

Ego 20

Pre 30

Com 18

PD 40 (he's even tougher than a normal brick)

ED 35

Spd 7 (superspeed baby)

Rec 22

End 70

Stun 70

 

DR 25/25

25" flight plus some megascale

superbreath/heat vision in the 12-13D6 range, enough so he's also an effective blaster with his "lesser" powers

 

That will be a functional Superman as long as you keep most heroes down in the average range. Now if you start introducing 30D6 Dr Destroyer, Supes has to get a power boost.