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No Complications Please - Simplifying Hero


Lucius

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I like using the characters Disadvantages (and other items) as a starting point for talking over what they players might like to see. I've found it really helps since some people feel shy about just asking for stuff and don't understand exactly what they'd like without something of a menu to choose from. Having players select Disadvantages provides me with a good way to see what they might be interested in seeing actually matter in play or what's fluff. Which isn't to say its perfect. I've worked with players and changed some things around and ended up lowering the amount of required Disads overall to fit my playstyle. But for me it was better the alternatives. Disads have also allowed Players some input into the setting. Hunted, Social Limitations, even some DFs, etc, can add background material, inspire ideas and expand on some aspects of the setting even if you don't want to go the full communal setting creation route.

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  • 1 month later...

Complications are mainly there to round out your character and make him more interesting, if you have taken more than the max in complications then you want to do one of two things, either you want to make a very interesting and possibly handicapped (in terms of playability) character, or your just trying to sleeze the rules and get more points than the GM wants to give you. By putting some of your complications to negative powers instead, your unbalancing your group by giving yourself more points to play with than everyone else in your group. Stop the sleeze and just try to have fun.

 

Nothing says you have to take complications anyway, you just dont get the additional points and you dont have to deal with the complications

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I also very much like the Amber Diceless idea of player contributions. Get points for helping the game somehow. Hosting the game, keeping a campaign log, drawing maps to GM specification, and my personal favorite: keeping a character diary. Character points for things not truly in the game. And most groups have that one player who has no time for homework because they have a good job. They often find the simplest contribution is buying munchies for each game session.

 

I would like to see these in hero system. A diary might be worth 20-25 points, and if the player didn't make an entry for this session (of in game or out of game events in the character's life) then they get that many points of unluck for this session.

Cool idea.

 

I've always liked the idea of XP for out-of-game things.

 

Then again, maybe I like it more as a player than as a GM. Being the only artist in the group, I churn out all sorts of pics and strips and stuff. (Gotsta have something to do while I'm  unconscious!)

 

 

GM: "Hex map please. It's Phase 12!"

Me: "I tune my Electro-VPP to a 60PD electro-force-field and electro-superleap 30" into the compound!"

GM: "Great. at the top of your arc, you are hit with an 18D6 missile for. 63stun and 18body against your ED. You make a small crater when your unconscious body lands. You will regain consciousness ... mmm... tomorrow."

Me: "I'll get my sketchpad."

True story.

I balanced my Force-field after that. Also, next time the GM said "This is a dangerous mission." I listened.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Legion, a few points.

 

First, I'm not one of the players, I'm the one running the game.

 

Second, part of my motivation is to correct what I see as balance or fairness problems in the Rules as Written, some of which I've already addressed.

 

In that context, I hope you can see that the accusation of "your unbalancing your group by giving yourself more points to play with than everyone else in your group" is pretty meaningless. If I'm changing the way everyone's characters are built I'm hardly giving anyone more points than anyone else, and certainly not myself. If I were in someone else's game I might like to see them adopt my ideas but NOT as some special favor to my character, only if it's the same for everyone. A point I would not have thought even needed to be made until reading your post.

 

Finally, I don't think throwing around words like "sleeze" contributes to a fruitful dialogue.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Sometimes the palindromedary contributes to a fruitful dialogue but admittedly not always.

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Lucius, personally I wouldn't do it.

 

Don't try to balance it, just "hey, you get X points. Don't bother with complications. They won't be needed." Resolves your apples/oranges conflict from what you perceive as an imbalance between power costs and complication values.

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  • 1 month later...

Well, sure. In the 3e point level days (base 100 points), you were more or less "forced" to take enough Disadvantages that your character would be at least viable if not competitive, but upper limits weren't formalized. In 6e, you're not so much; 350 or even 325 points can easily be viable in a game with 400 point characters.

 

4e kind of changed it, from "no upper limit" to "here's a 150 point hole that you can fill, But No More." Which is what we've had ever since.

 

I personally think that 75 points is enough for a standard heroic game but not quite enough for a standard superhero, and my own anecdata from looking over posted builds seems to bear this out. So if you were to play in the 400 point game, with no requirement for Complications, would you take 100 points worth? I've had superheroes that I could easily come up with 100 points worth for, and in fact many where those last 50 were somewhat painful (and then I was making painful point shavings on top of that to get it down to the hard limit).

 

If you were to play in, let's say, a superheroic game where you got 300 points for free, and could take any number above that -- and got points for all of them, except with 3e style diminishing returns* -- how many would you take? Let's say around 75-125 points, with most characters taking around 100. I know, the answer is fully "It depends," but I'm curious about reasoning.

 

* First two at full value (edit: per category), next two at half value, all further ones at one-quarter.

 

At least one player in my group would take at least 150 and would try for more until they stopped being able to think of any. I prefer the psychological trick of docking character points for not having enough complications combined with the much lower complication minimums in 6e. Uncapped diminishing returns on complications merely encourages building characters like Pete from Darths & Droids.

 

I do have one major complaint with Complications though: I think a lot of the example complications were built too severely and should have been toned down in 6e, but thankfully the new frequency and severity rule make that more obvious to new players. It's now much easier to notice, for instance, that you probably don't want a 20-point Code vs Killing unless your name happens to be Bruce Wayne.

 

Even most characters with a similarly absolute CvK won't want the 20 point level, because very few people with a Code vs Killing would want to be put into a situation were they might have to actually kill someone every three or four sessions. And in games where the GM has made CvK an everyman complication you probably don't want it at all, because the GM clearly doesn't want the player characters to kill anyone and, therefore, it should rarely, if ever, be an issue. That last point is something I've noticed that even a lot of GMs missed, at least when running earlier editions, and should probably have a paragraph devoted to it if they ever release a revised sixth edition.

 

In fact, the over-estimated values of the example complications are why, sometimes, the minimum of 75 points in complications are too high for a 400-point supers game. Thankfully, this is true much less often than it was when you were required to take 150 points in disads.

 

Hm, just riffing but... what if all stats started at 0? Want to be White Death, The Turburculoid Poet? No probs. Just don't spend so many points on your physical stats. No need for a complication/disad - having barely enough STR to lift yourself up is disad enough. Yes characters would require a lot more points (immmm, 147 points in 5th ed if I counted right) just to come out at the same level.

 

 

Aside from the minor point inflation this generally works better than selling back stats.

 

PS. I've never really considered points in disadvantages to be equivalent to character points. The point costs are, I believe, solely for the purpose of comparing complications with other complications and to the complication limit. This was one of the reasons why I disliked the,"stack as many  disads as you can to get more points" approach.

 

PPS. You could easily remove the point penalty for not taking complications altogether and have the limit merely be a soft guideline for how many complications players should take, but then a certain kind of player wouldn't take any at all unless the GM forced one on him in play and then wouldn't roleplay them. Those same players will gladly take, and roleplay, their complications if you tell them that they'll be docked points for not taking a certain amount. In short: people are strange.

 

PPPS. I can tell you from experience that selling back senses is a can of worms that you don't want to open. Physical Limitations oddly manage to handle it better than the buyback rules (and don't give PCs extra points to play with either). The point costs of base senses are screwy.

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I use a heroic action point based system for complications rather than point values. If I step on a complication in a scenario the character gets an HAP. I also give them for the usual swath of HAP reasons. On occasion I've allowed players to burn an HAP to avoid complications kicking in.

 

I think that will be my approach in the future.  Then one doesn't need to assess frequency (and typically get it wrong) for the various disads like hunted, vulnerability, etc., - if it comes up, you get awarded appropriately, based on the actual frequency.

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Now there's a way to make someone paranoid.

 

Player: "Hey, why'd I get an extra Action Point this time?"

 

Game Operations Director: "You don't know."

 

Player: "Is it one of my Hunteds pulling strings behind the scenes again? or....hey, when's the last time I checked up on my DNPC?"

 

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Hey, why did the palindromedary get all those Action Points?

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  • 10 months later...

Lucius, personally I wouldn't do it.

 

Don't try to balance it, just "hey, you get X points. Don't bother with complications. They won't be needed." Resolves your apples/oranges conflict from what you perceive as an imbalance between power costs and complication values.

 

There's a problem with that. I WANT a player to be able to, for example, take a Vulnerability to silver if a lycanthrope, or to iron if a faerie, or whatever. Or to take Unluck, or Susceptibility. And to gain an appropriate number of points for that.

 

Just as I want a player to be able to take Blast or Regeneration or Leaping, and for that to cost an appropriate number of points.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

An appropriate number of palindromedary taglines

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There's a problem with that. I WANT a player to be able to, for example, take a Vulnerability to silver if a lycanthrope, or to iron if a faerie, or whatever. Or to take Unluck, or Susceptibility. And to gain an appropriate number of points for that.

 

Just as I want a player to be able to take Blast or Regeneration or Leaping, and for that to cost an appropriate number of points.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

An appropriate number of palindromedary taglines

 

I'm pretty much with you on this: complications (flaws, hindrances, negative aspects, etc.) are a fantastic tool to add color to a character in a way that's meaningful, and having rules to support them helps them feel fair. If a character has a vulnerability to silver, 2X BOD, then when they get hit with a silver bullet, everybody knows what's up. If they just say "I'm a werewolf, so silver hurts me," then there's a lot of room for misunderstanding there. How much does it hurt? What does that mean?

 

In a more abstract system, sure! Absolutely. But in HERO, I'm really here for granularity in expressing characters. That's a massive draw of the system for me.

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Vulnerabilities are just as easily (if not more) modelled through limitations on defences, possibly even on BODY. I was wondering if that might give better values than complication tables. Of course there are lots of complications that might not be so easily modelled through limitations...

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Vulnerabilities are just as easily (if not more) modelled through limitations on defences, possibly even on BODY. I was wondering if that might give better values than complication tables. Of course there are lots of complications that might not be so easily modelled through limitations...

 

I suppose one could put a Limitation on STUN or BOD such as "only counts half value vs X attack."  Susceptibility could be defined as a Drain Side Effect on STUN, BOD, or whatever else might be effected. Same with Dependence.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Unlimited Palindromedary

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Negative Powers:

 

So a Psych. Lim could be viewed as a Negative Mind Control, only affects self, side effect always occurs when triggered?

 

Addiction:  Negative Mind Control "Must acquire or consume addictive substance" self only, side effect always occurs when proximate to substance?

 

Enraged.  negative mind control attack offending target.

 

Berserk.  Negative Mind Control attack random target.

 

Dependence.  Negative Susceptibility xd6 per time increment away from trigger.

 

Distinctive Features:  Change Environment +3 to perception rolls, Area of Effect Radius, Persistent, Inherent. Dimensional (time).

 

Negative Reputation:  -3 to social interaction skills, and/or Change Environment +3 to Ego Rolls, only affects other, only for the purposes of resisting PC's social interaction?

 

 

It's an idea.  Gets a little recursive with Mind Control affecting someone with a Psych. Lim defined as a Negative Mind Control, but I can see the appeal.  It could provide more granularity in that aspect of character building (the perennial problem of the 10 pt. vrs. 20 pt. Psych. Lim. of the same name e.g. Code v. Killing).  It also provides a rules as written way for dealing with the various compulsive behaviors PC's have, and what other PCs may be able to do to help the character overcome that compulsion.

 

On the other hand, such a construct would give an "advantage" to characters with strong Egos in that the Negative Mind Control Power would require more DC to create the same effect thus providing the strong Ego character with more points for an equivalent complication of a low Ego character.

 

I think Susceptibility and Vulnerability are fine the way they are, and honestly, I can't think of a good way to build Susceptibility that's isn't a whole lot more cumbersome than currently.

 

I once made a player character who was addicted to amphetamines.  In addition to the Addiction, many of the characters abilities were tied to whether or not he was high.  One of the things that I had wanted to do, but couldn't figure at the time, was how to make the character manic when he was high, and a paranoid depressive when he was "sober."  Using a derivative of the OPs point I could have had a conditional Psych. Lim:  Either depressed and paranoid (sober) or manic, irrational, slightly delusional.  Which seems a lot more elegant than my Multiform construct.

 

I'll be interested to see what becomes of this.

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Negative Powers:

 

So a Psych. Lim could be viewed as a Negative Mind Control, only affects self, side effect always occurs when triggered?

That's not where I was going with this.

 

 

Addiction:  Negative Mind Control "Must acquire or consume addictive substance" self only, side effect always occurs when proximate to substance?

 

Enraged.  negative mind control attack offending target.

 

Berserk.  Negative Mind Control attack random target.

On the other hand, it's obviously where you're going...

 

 

Dependence.  Negative Susceptibility xd6 per time increment away from trigger.

 

Distinctive Features:  Change Environment +3 to perception rolls, Area of Effect Radius, Persistent, Inherent. Dimensional (time).

That I don't even understand.

 

Negative Reputation:  -3 to social interaction skills, and/or Change Environment +3 to Ego Rolls, only affects other, only for the purposes of resisting PC's social interaction?

 

 

It's an idea.  Gets a little recursive with Mind Control affecting someone with a Psych. Lim defined as a Negative Mind Control, but I can see the appeal.  It could provide more granularity in that aspect of character building (the perennial problem of the 10 pt. vrs. 20 pt. Psych. Lim. of the same name e.g. Code v. Killing).  It also provides a rules as written way for dealing with the various compulsive behaviors PC's have, and what other PCs may be able to do to help the character overcome that compulsion.

 

On the other hand, such a construct would give an "advantage" to characters with strong Egos in that the Negative Mind Control Power would require more DC to create the same effect thus providing the strong Ego character with more points for an equivalent complication of a low Ego character.

High EGO characters already gain an advantage under Rules as Written when it comes to resisting their own Psychological Complications. You are I think correct that doing it your way would hand them even more of an advantage.

 

 

I think Susceptibility and Vulnerability are fine the way they are, and honestly, I can't think of a good way to build Susceptibility that's isn't a whole lot more cumbersome than currently.

I was initially inclined to think they were "fine the way they are" except of course for things like the Complications Cap. I may go back to that opinion, but I have learned that not everyone sees things the same way.

 

I once made a player character who was addicted to amphetamines.  In addition to the Addiction, many of the characters abilities were tied to whether or not he was high.  One of the things that I had wanted to do, but couldn't figure at the time, was how to make the character manic when he was high, and a paranoid depressive when he was "sober."  Using a derivative of the OPs point I could have had a conditional Psych. Lim:  Either depressed and paranoid (sober) or manic, irrational, slightly delusional.  Which seems a lot more elegant than my Multiform construct.

 

How did you write up the amphetamines themselves?

 

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary goes on Sesame Street to announce that this day is brought to you by the letter D

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I really like the ideas here.  First, anything that makes character creation easier and faster is a good thing.  In the last game I ran, which was an UNTIL super agents game, I did not require disads/complications for the first game and was willing to allow player's to develop them in-game.  I like the idea of taking the idea of disadvantages/complications and moving it from the character creation to campaign section.  But I would also like to keep it as simple and easy to apply as possible.  I also would like flexibility for the GM on how to award players when they are used in play.

 

Perhaps a player would be asked to pick a set number of disadvantages/complications at the start of play, based on the character's conception.  There are no CP's awarded, they are just aspects of your character's origin/background, etc.  When the disadvantage/complication comes up in play, the GM can give an award to the player depending on how it was played out, with the player's response factoring into the consideration.  Possible awards could be:  Luck dice, Hero Points, Bonus XP, a new Contact or Perk, or whatever the GM may see as appropriate based on how the complication/disadvantage affected play.

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Crossposted

 

 

Yeah, I think I prefer the complications not giving points, but instead Hero points or Fortune tokens, or whatever the preferred nomenclature is. In pretty much every game I've played with Disadvantages or complications or flaws that give back points for simply taking the complication, it always feels like there's a level of Min-maxing to taking them, if only to try to meet but not exceed the maximum complication limit. With systems that give back expendable resources, it becomes a lot more justified in taking complications based on the character, since they have their effect proportional to how much they actually impact the character.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Complication: Palindromedary

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I really like the ideas here.  First, anything that makes character creation easier and faster is a good thing.  In the last game I ran, which was an UNTIL super agents game, I did not require disads/complications for the first game and was willing to allow player's to develop them in-game.  I like the idea of taking the idea of disadvantages/complications and moving it from the character creation to campaign section.  But I would also like to keep it as simple and easy to apply as possible.  I also would like flexibility for the GM on how to award players when they are used in play.

 

Perhaps a player would be asked to pick a set number of disadvantages/complications at the start of play, based on the character's conception.  There are no CP's awarded, they are just aspects of your character's origin/background, etc.  When the disadvantage/complication comes up in play, the GM can give an award to the player depending on how it was played out, with the player's response factoring into the consideration.  Possible awards could be:  Luck dice, Hero Points, Bonus XP, a new Contact or Perk, or whatever the GM may see as appropriate based on how the complication/disadvantage affected play.

 

Can I quote you on that?

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary explains that he means, in another thread

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Can I quote you on that?

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary explains that he means, in another thread

Of course.  Though some of statement could bear some elaboration.  Also, I wish I could edit/clarify the following sentence:   "I like the idea of taking the disadvantages/complications [section] and moving it from character creation to [the] campaign section."  What I mean by this is that as a part of the character creation process, players are invited to consider aspects to their character's conception that may be disadvantageous to the character.  I think the basic concept from the source literature is that "power" does not come for free, but at a price.  This price often involves to a change to a character's physique and psyche in conformity with the source and type of power.  For example, wolverine has a "beast-like" aspect to his disadvantages/complications which relate to his powers.  However, if the  "rewards" aspect of the complication/disadvantage now is a GM's option based on how the complication/disadvantage affected game play, then this discussion could now properly placed in the GM's campaign section.  

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