Hulk Strength

[MrAgdesh]

So, building a Hulk with an Aid STR (activated by becoming Enraged, which is in turn activated by a variety of effects) but not wanting an upper limit on his STR (i.e., no Maximum Effect)

 

What sort of level of Advantage do you think we are talking here? I'm not worried about it breaking the game rules. Sure, I could just spend a heck load of points increasing his Max Effect, but essentially I want it to be limitless (his STR just won't stop increasing for the duration that his Enraged lasts).

[megaplayboy]

Just buy +2-400 to the maximum. At 500 STR your Hulk could "lift" a neutron star, which is about the heaviest coherent object in the universe that could conceivably be shifted by super-strength. At 800+ you are in "mass of the universe" territory. Anything above around 300 STR should begin to be a threat to the structural integrity of whatever planet he happens to be on at the time.

[Christopher R Taylor]

You can't really make it limitless.  You used to be able to in 4th edition with infinite recursive Aids (the aid feeds into points that increase the maximum), but you really don't need to make it go forever.  All you  need is to make it go to the point where any more strength is effectively meaningless.  At around 200 strength you've reached absurdity and any more doesn't actually make any difference.  When you can haymaker for 44d6 and lift planets, do you really need to simulate any more strength?

[massey]

So, building a Hulk with an Aid STR (activated by becoming Enraged, which is in turn activated by a variety of effects) but not wanting an upper limit on his STR (i.e., no Maximum Effect)

 

What sort of level of Advantage do you think we are talking here? I'm not worried about it breaking the game rules. Sure, I could just spend a heck load of points increasing his Max Effect, but essentially I want it to be limitless (his STR just won't stop increasing for the duration that his Enraged lasts).

 

I'd be fine with a +2.  That's normally the highest level of advantage, and should carry a big "stop" sign beside it.  I think that is fair.

 

I wrote the Hulk up once, and gave him a Triggered Aid with a lot of extra points.  The problem I ran into was that at that point, it would have just been cheaper to give him all that extra Strength all the time.  

[zslane]

One issue I see is that there is no way to answer the question, "How enraged is he?" at any given moment (you can ask, "How strong is he?" but that's not the same thing). That's because the Enraged disad is binary: a character is either Enraged or he's not. Mechanics-wise, Enraged is not subject to gradation. Yet conceptually, the Hulk's level of fury is.

 

This is important because we presumably care about cause and effect. Well, I do. I notice that a lot of questionable builds sweep that under the rug, claim "design by effect", and call it a day. And then they use the character in actual play and run into problems. If the Hulk's STR is subject to gradation (effect) because his enragedness (the cause) is subject to gradation, then we first need a way to represent enragedness that increases in steps. Enraged doen't do that on its own. And last I checked, the HERO System doesn't provide a Fury characteristic. STR isn't a measure of his enragedness, it is only a measure of his strength, and we shouldn't conflate the two, call it design by effect, and start rolling dice.

 

If you don't figure out a way to increase his fury in steps, there is no good way to decrease it either. Calming him down, whether its by Black Widow's "lullaby" technique or some sort of mind control, requires some value (other than STR) that can go up and down as these external factors work upon it. The STR merely tracks this other value as a side effect.

 

A reasonable approach might be to invent a Fury characteristic, much like some Cthulhu-inspired horror campaigns might invent a Santiy characteristic to track fine gradations in a character's mental stability. It doesn't have to cost points or anything; it is merely a way of tracking the Hulk's level of enragedness, upon which other conventional effects (like increasing STR) can be hung.

[Supabeasto]

If you don't figure out a way to increase his fury in steps, there is no good way to decrease it either. Calming him down, whether its by Black Widow's "lullaby" technique or some sort of mind control, requires some value (other than STR) that can go up and down as these external factors work upon it. The STR merely tracks this other value as a side effect.

 

So, I may be making this more complicated than it needs to be, but in the 6e Martial Arts book under the video game abilities section is a possible solution: A Rage Meter power and a Rage Meter Energy Pool. Filling the pool would be a way to measure how angry Hulk is, with a full pool signifying max rage. From there, you can buy increased STR with an increased END cost (or regular END cost and the pool has an increased decay rate).

Adding to this, you could also buy the Power Up ability (to replenish END) and have it be triggered by anything that angers Hulk. 

[massey]

I have tried building him a few different ways.  I'll list some of them here in case it inspires anybody.

 

-Hulk is the strongest one there is -- The Hulk should get a Str boost if he encounters someone stronger than him.  If he's running around with a 75 (feeling really mellow and maybe about to change back to Banner), but then he gets in a fight with Superdude (Str 125), then Hulk will become angry that there is someone stronger than him.  His Str boost power (however you build it) will kick into overdrive until he passes this level.

 

-Give Hulk a lot of additional Str at extra End -- This technique has the benefit of letting the player decide how mad Hulk is at the moment.  In an instant, he can be as mad as he needs to be.  So your 75 Str Hulk can jump up to 150 if that's what is required.  The thing Hulk hates more than anything is to not be able to do something Str related.

 

-Create a tiered Enraged -- While Hulk is frequently angry, that doesn't mean he necessarily has the Enraged disadvantage.  Enraged makes you stupid when it comes to target selection.  You've got to fight until all your enemies are down.  Hulk often chooses to smash somebody with one or two hits, and then turns and jumps several miles away.  So you don't have to use the disadvantage.  You might set up tiers.  75 Str, Hulk is happy.  90 Str, Hulk hates this commercial, where Kardashians go?  115 Str, somebody shooting at Hulk!  130 Str, one Turn go by and them not fall down yet!  150 Str, Deadpool say those mean things about Hulk's mom on purpose!!!   ...-20 to Str, pretty lady smiling at Hulk.  Hulk like that.  -20 Str, guy who made Hulk mad looks funny with head up own butt.  -15 Str, no one shoot at Hulk for a while.  -15 Str, ooh ice cream, Hulk likes ice cream.  -10 Str, Hulk likes this song.  Hulk want take Chevy to levee too.

 

The comic book doesn't really keep track of a rage meter mechanic.  Hulk is as strong as the plot requires, and tends to err on the side of having a higher Str than absolutely necessary.  So I'm not sure that creating a precise measuring tool is really needed.

[Christopher R Taylor]

I would probably use Ego rolls based on psych complications to determine if an event made Hulk more angry, and things like circumstance (Hulk takes damage, Hulk is unable to lift something, etc).  Then I'd give the go ahead for a roll.  No need for an exact codified system, since its going to end up being subjective anyway.

[drrushing]

I created a Hulk-like character, with a standard 60 STR, then a max. of 300, with 20 pt. intervals, increasing per each of his phases, and reducing the same.  Much simpler construct than the aid, and had a gradiation free of the enraged.  I think I "limited" the STR increase with a -1/4 lim.

[wcw43921]

You can't really make it limitless.  You used to be able to in 4th edition with infinite recursive Aids (the aid feeds into points that increase the maximum), but you really don't need to make it go forever.  All you  need is to make it go to the point where any more strength is effectively meaningless.  At around 200 strength you've reached absurdity and any more doesn't actually make any difference.  When you can haymaker for 44d6 and lift planets, do you really need to simulate any more strength?

 

 

 

"Do not tell The Hulk how strong The Hulk can or cannot be!  The Hulk is as strong as The Hulk needs to be!  The Hulk is as strong as The Hulk wants to be!  NO ONE IS AS STRONG AS THE HULK!  DO YOU HEAR ME!  NO ONE!!!"

[zslane]

Okay, well, if this is just an NPC and we don't care about tracking his rage or figuring out the "mechanics" of how his STR increases and decreases, and he's just a GM plot device, why are we even discussing this?

 

On the other hand, if we do care about the mechanics (and less importantly, perhaps, the point cost), then we can't just sweep the rage component under the rug because that rage component is what produce the STR variations. You can dissociate the two for "simplicity's sake", but it sounds like the OP wants to connect them, as is the case with the original character. "As he gets angrier, his STR goes up, without limit." Okay, what does it mean in the HERO System terms to "get angrier" and how do you measure/track that? If you can't answer that, then you can't really come up with STR-varying mechanics that mimic the Hulk.

 

And as for him not being out of control (ala Enraged), have you ever read The Ultimates? The point being, I guess, that it helps to know which Hulk we're modeling here in order to get it "right".

[Altair]

+1. So many Hulks, ranging from Doc Green "I refuse to speak in the third person" to Ultimate "HULK SMASH FREDDY PRINZE JUNIOR!" 

 

The 6E martial arts Rage Meter sounds like a good bet - admittedly, I haven't looked at it myself - but if you need to quantify the amount of rage goin' on, that might save you inventing a new mechanic.

[massey]

Okay, well, if this is just an NPC and we don't care about tracking his rage or figuring out the "mechanics" of how his STR increases and decreases, and he's just a GM plot device, why are we even discussing this?

 

On the other hand, if we do care about the mechanics (and less importantly, perhaps, the point cost), then we can't just sweep the rage component under the rug because that rage component is what produce the STR variations. You can dissociate the two for "simplicity's sake", but it sounds like the OP wants to connect them, as is the case with the original character. "As he gets angrier, his STR goes up, without limit." Okay, what does it mean in the HERO System terms to "get angrier" and how do you measure/track that? If you can't answer that, then you can't really come up with STR-varying mechanics that mimic the Hulk.

 

And as for him not being out of control (ala Enraged), have you ever read The Ultimates? The point being, I guess, that it helps to know which Hulk we're modeling here in order to get it "right".

 

The comics don't use a "rage meter" or anything like that.  The point is that if you are trying to accurately simulate the comics, he tends to get to whatever Str level he needs pretty darn quickly.  He doesn't really have to "power up" or anything like that.  I can think of maybe one or two instances where he's gradually gotten stronger -- the rest he just seems to get there like it's an on/off switch.  He goes from Puny Banner, to mad enough to be the Hulk, to whatever Str his opponent is +10, to plot device mad.

 

And no, I don't read the Ultimates.  I try to stay away from that crap.

[zslane]

Accurately simulating the comics is a tricky thing. You can't simulate the complete freedom comic book writers have to create plots and scenes with outrageous inconsistencies and expect RPG players to go along with it. At best, a game can capture the general spirit of the comics, but grasping for the details is futile in most cases.

 

As for the Hulk, a "limitless" STR boost, as requested by the OP, suggests that something is continually increasing the Hulk's strength. If it isn't an ever-increasing degree of rage, what is it? Regardless, I'm not sure his strength should be going up and up and up. Even the FASERIP description said that "in times of great stress" he gets a single level shift in Strength and Fighting (and a fixed damage boost). Sometimes the arbitrary artistic license of comic book writers has to be set aside in the interests of usable game mechanics.

[massey]

But since that's not what the OP asked for, I think we should focus on what he wanted.

[Comic]

The real question will be when you have Juggernaut's "Limitless" 'Unstopability' run into Hulk's "Limitless" strength, which one wins.

 

Which is one of the original questions discussed in the first edition of Champions, IIRC, and why "Limitless" isn't part of the design.

 

I'm okay with a Hulk whose strength is limited to below the 165 or so that would destroy the world with a single kick. To me, that's an okay level of strength for storytelling. Going beyond that is of course feasible, but.. why?