Modeling Characters from Other Sources

[Anaximander]

As my understanding gets better with how the system works, I find myself wondering how to build certain characters from TV, books, comics, and such into the Hero System and am wondering what rules of thumb people use for doing so.

 

 

I can come of with subjective quantities within a story.  In The Beverly Hillbillies, I would give Uncle Jed the highest Intelligence among the character while making Miss Jane the most educated, but I have no idea how quantify those differences into numbers.  Likewise, in an golden age anthology comic book I am reading, I might make Character X stronger than Character Y, but I would make Character Z the better overall fighter.  Again, how do I quantify that information into stats especially since comparing most stories is comparing apples to oranges?  

 

[Nolgroth]

I start with a Normal Human template and adjust from there. I also tend to eschew really high point characters/games so that the Normal Human benchmark actually means something. So if a normal human score is x, then your adaptation should have a score of y to reflect the better/lower than normal value. You really have to dabble with the points to get a feel for character translation. It is not an exact science and if 20 forum posters look at your final product, you will get 25 opinions on how they would have done something differently. Also, the Normal template does have some bearing on really high point characters but it gets easy to forget that when you are dealing with characters that can sometimes squash a normal human just by using casual abilities and 'not rolling an 18' on 3d6.

 

Some guidelines I live by:

• A die roll increase (11- to 12-) has more of an impact in play than you might think.
• A single point of Resistant Def vis-a-vis Damage Class makes more difference than you might think. Less so at really high levels.
• Don't try to model everything. If a background skill can suitably represent something without overriding another skill, use it.
• Even if the character is meant to be an NPC, give yourself a budget to see if you can stick with it. In the long run, that will help you get a feel for how many points any given conversion will actually take. Hint: I usually overblow my budget by 50-75 points. Sometimes more.
• I don't try to do a line item conversion from other sources. I try to go for the feel of the character and translate that to Hero.
• Use the guidelines on Page 35 of Hero 6E1.  Sadly Champions Complete and Fantasy Hero Complete do not include this chart. You can violate the guidelines, but they give you a good benchmark as to where any given power spread should like.

[Lord Liaden]

I frequently refer to Michael "Susano" Surbrook's vast collection of characters adapted from many different sources. I often find a specific character I'm looking for, or something in the same ballpark. Michael presents general guidelines for adapting characters, but his individual write-ups always detail his reasons for modeling particular things a certain way, which is frequently illuminating.

 

http://surbrook.devermore.net/index/archive.html

[Anaximander]

Between the two ideas, this does give me a lot to work with.  It is helpful that I am familiar with some of the characters on Surbrook's website that I can use benchmarks.

[Christopher]

I wrote something about just this themathic (and similar ones) so far back, it is only in the archive

http://www.herogames.com/forums/index.php?/topic/87378-translating-characters-from-fiction-and-the-secret-of-having-fun-in-roleplaying/

 

I could give you some special guidelines for translating D&D writeups.

[Lucius]

As my understanding gets better with how the system works, I find myself wondering how to build certain characters from TV, books, comics, and such into the Hero System and am wondering what rules of thumb people use for doing so.

 

 

I can come of with subjective quantities within a story.  In The Beverly Hillbillies, I would give Uncle Jed the highest Intelligence among the character while making Miss Jane the most educated, but I have no idea how quantify those differences into numbers.  Likewise, in an golden age anthology comic book I am reading, I might make Character X stronger than Character Y, but I would make Character Z the better overall fighter.  Again, how do I quantify that information into stats especially since comparing most stories is comparing apples to oranges?

Among my rules of thumb:

 

Remember what the "average person" looks like - and half the population is less than that.

 

Go for the minimum necessary to get the effect you see.

 

So for Jed I would probably give an INT of 13,maybe up to 18, enough to give an edge against the average person but low enough he can credibly be oblivious to something, or be tricked or fooled or otherwise fail an INT roll - all of which I seem to remember happening. Since he IS a sharp eyed woodsman, I might give a perception bonus on top of INT 13.

 

For Jane Hathaway's extensive education, I'd take Scholar and some very general broad Knowledge Skills like "History" and "Literature" and "Classical Liberal Education." Maybe even a catch-all "Know it all."

 

 

Most of the people these characters are contrasted with should be pretty "ordinary." For example, I seem to remember an episode where Jethro was pitted in feats of strength against a famous bodybuilder/strongman type. The bodybuilder might have had STR 18 or 20. Jethro could have STR 20 and +5 with a Limitation (only when it's funny) or maybe just 20 with 0 END cost to emphasis how effortless his STR is and a +5 with extra END cost for when he bothers to make the effort.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary is telling me to get my pants on now

[NuSoardGraphite]

I prefer the concept of an average RANGE of characteristics. That is between 8 and 12 with 10 being right in the middle. 50% of your population should be in that range, with 25% being below that and 25% being above the normal range.

 

The difference between Uncle Jed's Intelligence and Miss Jane's education are Characteristics vs Skills.

 

Uncle Jed has an above average Int of 13. Enough to have a bas Intelligence skill roll of 12 or less.

 

Miss Jane has an 11 Intelligence, but she has spent points going to college and years of work experience, so she has the appropriate skills and a few Skill Levels to boost them. So while Uncle Jed is brighter than Jane, he doesnt have her repetoire of skills to draw from and thus Jane seems smarter, but in truth she is just more knowlegeable.

[Anaximander]

According to 6e game rules attributes of 10 is the average for player characters and important characters, but 8 is average for John Q. Public; so, if you are going by average which average is better to use.

[Nolgroth]

Good question. I usually use the player character starting values unless I am deliberately building a lower point/power campaign. 

[massey]

When try and model characters, a lot ends up being determined by the genre.  Mostly we play superheroes, so those characters will end up being a bit more competent overall than people from other types of stories.  Horror characters, on the other hand, tend to be much lower powered.

 

I've got a HeroDesigner directory filled with Marvel and DC writeups.  There's probably over 300 characters in there at the moment.  One thing I've found is that I keep going back and tweaking the character designs as I go.  I'll add a new character, and then I've got to go back and change a dozen guys to make sure the new person fits in with the older ones.

 

In super games, I treat normal characteristic maximum as basically the max for normal people.  Like normal boring people that you meet every day and stuff.  Stephen Hawking isn't "normal" and neither are any of the people you're watching on the Olympics right now.  Not that those people would have to have stats higher than 20, but they theoretically could.  It's fine for your Arnold Schwarzenegger knock-off to have a 25 Str, regardless of what real world weightlifting records are.  Remember that it's a cinematic game system.

 

So average stats are probably something like this:

 

5 -- Pre-teens or really old people (for strength), the mentally handicapped (Int), total shut-ins (Pre)

8 -- The people of Wal-Mart.  Average person, as in the lowest common denominator.

10 -- The average healthy adult, 25-45 years old.

13 -- Noticeably better than average, but still not that impressive.  The smartest guy on a reality TV show.

15 -- High school athlete/honors student.

18 -- College athlete/honors student.**

20 -- Best person you're likely to meet in your normal life.  The anesthesiologist you see when you have surgery (Int).  The cop whose arms are as big around as your head (Str).

25 -- Basically the best in the world without being borderline superhuman.

30 -- Borderline superhuman.

 

**I know that there are smart people who aren't honors students.  Some honors students just work really hard.  And some of the smartest people I know almost flunked out of school because they were lazy.

 

Generally, I don't give normal people as much Ego or Body.  The average person doesn't have to make Ego rolls very often, and it's mostly used for mental combat, which normal people don't engage in.  And Body is just how you survive traumatic injury.  Most normal people don't seem to have much beyond 10 or 12 for that.  Mostly, normal people don't have jobs that require them to have a lot of either one of those.

 

--

 

For modeling superheroic characters, there are a lot of ways to do that.  I try to give the character the ability to do whatever he or she normally does in the comics.  I don't try to restrict the characters to any particular points limit.  If Superman costs 2000 points, then he just costs 2000 points.  One-off abilities, something that they do one time and then we never see again, don't normally have to be represented.  If a fight between two characters goes differently than I expected (somebody who seems less powerful, beating up someone who seems much more powerful), then I tend to write that off as lucky rolls.

 

Some characters have powers that should theoretically be able to one-shot most opponents.  A basilisk or something like that, that can turn someone to stone with a glance, might need like an 8D6 Transform to do that reliably in a supers campaign.  But just because they can one-shot someone doesn't mean they should every time.  A lot of characters (villains particularly) seem to have a lot of potential, but that usually doesn't play out in the most effective way.  Giving Basilisk Lad an 8D6 Major Transform might make him more powerful than he is in the comics, because you're building towards his theoretical max.  Giving him a 5D6 Transform, with maybe an extra D6 with increased End cost, would be a better way.  And then you just assume that the time he used his power on UltraGuy, he haymakered and rolled really well.  That would let Basilisk Lad still be kind of a punk who loses to lower powered characters on occasion.

 

Again, look at how effective the character is in the source material (not just how effective they are described as being, go with what is actually shown), and build from there.

[bigdamnhero]

All the above is solid advice and I don't disagree with any of it.

 

There is another way to look at it tho, which is to remember that the numbers are really only meaningful when compared to other characters in your game. One of the great strengths of the Hero System is that its great at consistently modeling characters from different settings/genres/etc, but whether Jethro is stronger than Conan or not really only matters if you're planning to mix them together in the same game. With the exception of Lifting STR, most Characteristics aren't benchmarked to any measurable reality, so a 15 DEX is exactly as fast as you want it to be, no more, no less. It doesn't actually make that much difference if the Smartest Guy In The Room has a 15 INT or a 25 INT - it just matters that his INT is enough higher than everyone else's that he gets the appropriate in-game benefit from it.

 

I say this because I see a lot of people building "normals" games where the entire range of most Characteristics winds up between 8 and 13, maybe 15 tops, and then complaining that Hero "lacks granularity" at that level. And when the obvious answer is pointed out - just broaden the Char range - they freak out because giving higher stats means the characters won't be one-for-one translatable to other campaigns/genres/etc. Which is indeed a problem if you in fact plan to cross them over, but otherwise it has little to now effect on gameplay.

 

So yes, it's good to get a sense of how to translate and compare different characters, especially as you're still mastering the system. I'm just saying don't lose too much sleep over how "accurate" your translations are. If it works for your game, then it works.

[NuSoardGraphite]

I try to make all my people 1:1 transferrable between any game, but thats how I like to write up characters and I have zero issues with Hero's granularity.

[Christopher]

I say this because I see a lot of people building "normals" games where the entire range of most Characteristics winds up between 8 and 13, maybe 15 tops, and then complaining that Hero "lacks granularity" at that level. And when the obvious answer is pointed out - just broaden the Char range - they freak out because giving higher stats means the characters won't be one-for-one translatable to other campaigns/genres/etc. Which is indeed a problem if you in fact plan to cross them over, but otherwise it has little to now effect on gameplay.

I even doubt crossign over is possible that easily.

Heroic Characters and Superheroic Character are build with totally different concepts for gear in mind. It is slightly easier then translating a character from D&D to heroic Hero, but that is about it.

 

We recently head a thread about the values for a tank. All I could say was "that in 6E2 is a heroic writeup, where the weapons/attacks do not need to consider Active or Real Point Values. It does not work in superheroic settings."

 

 

I try to make all my people 1:1 transferrable between any game, but thats how I like to write up characters and I have zero issues with Hero's granularity.

I think you forgot to mention some limits and conventions you "naturally" apply to this.

Like never doing Heroic/Superheroic crossovers. Or using something like Equipment Pools for the Heroic games.

With those in the room, it can become feasible.

[massey]

I'm not so concerned about the differences between heroic and superheroic.  It isn't really important whether a cop pays character points for his gun or not.  The stats pretty much remain the same.  But you should account for changes in the genre.  Depending upon the genre, different degrees of realism are desired.  Arnold Schwarzenegger in Kindergarten Cop or Jingle All the Way probably has something in the range of an 18 Str.  In Commando, he's probably got a 30.  Yeah, he's playing different characters (as much as Arnold characters are different, anyway), But basically each character is about as strong as you can physically get in that world, be it cheesy action movie or cheesy family comedy.

 

The kid from Home Alone will have very different stats in that movie than a kid from a Nightmare on Elm Street movie.  But now I'm imagining Freddy Krueger running through that house, getting hit with paint cans, having a bowling ball dropped on his head, and bumbling around like Daniel Stern, and that would be a good movie.

 

In a kids movie, every kid is going to be more competent than the adults.  One of the kids from Monster Squad kicked wolfman in the nuts.  The older kid (who has in junior high if I remember) was able to fight vampires and the mummy and all kinds of stuff.  Meanwhile, the adults in the movie were basically useless.  So your characters will be different depending upon what genre they come from.

[Nolgroth]

Granularity is an illusion. In just about every game system, you have a range of abilities. That's the range of your granularity. Hero's granularity is pretty much on par with most things I've seen. Level based games seem to have granularity but try stepping out of the level challenge range when designing adventures. Too low of level and the characters walk all over everything. Too high, yup, they get the squish. Just like grape. Percentile systems have the largest range of possibility, but again, there is a sweet spot where challenge and success finds a certain balance. Hero codifies this sweet spot right into the game mechanics. (For the record, I used to complain about Hero's granularity. It took an exploration of other game systems to determine all of that.)

 

There are also a few tricks, as described in 6E1, Page 55, to really stretch that granularity and even the tactile sensation of the mechanics. I particularly like the sidebar about applying the combat resolution mechanic to the skill resolution mechanic. It reduces, I think, the learning curve by one set of mechanics. 

 

When it comes to certain things, I believe Hero may be too granular. Looking at the skill lists is sometimes overwhelming and don't even get me started on the Language Familiarity chart. You want to talk killjoy? (Yes, I realize that the massive skill list is preferable to certain players and the Language Familiarity chart is akin to cognitive porn. Just not for me.)

 

Bottom line is that Hero granularity is just fine.

 

Converting/translating characters from other sources then runs afoul of one of Hero's greatest illusions; the Heroic model of equipment purchase. Hero was designed as a point buy system and the "monetary" equipment thing was later shoehorned into it. Hero has suffered for that over the years. I've seen the "Spells cost points but swords don't!?!" arguments way too often. Resource Pools went a long way to fixing that, as have ideas like making spells a form of equipment. While I am no proponent of crossing Heroic and Superheroic characters (I don't believe it is necessary nor desirable), 1:1 conversions between the two models would be a lot easier if every genre had to buy its equipment as powers, frameworks, etc. That is my next project. Build a character using the Heroic rules and then translate him over to Superheroic, at least in terms of buying equipment with points. I would like to see how that balances out.

 

Be interesting to see.

[Amorkca]

I have played Champions for years, with the odd hiatus, and am back in again.  My world is a Superheroes game but the characters are still "normals" and I'm moving them slowly towards the powers based.

 

In our next game they are running agents level guys with equipment, that I paid points for cause that helps me to "balance" the play level, I like how it turned out and will likely stick with that format in the future...

[Christopher]

I'm not so concerned about the differences between heroic and superheroic.  It isn't really important whether a cop pays character points for his gun or not.  The stats pretty much remain the same.

How can that be?

The Heroic Pistol uses values from 6E2 Weapons Table, while the Superheroic has to conform to caps.

The Superheroic Cop has to pay points for that 30-60 AP attack with minimal limitations. While the Heroic cop does not.

For them to be equal effect wise, you have to build the Superheroic on more points. At wich point he is not equal by at least one metric.

[Ninja-Bear]

After years of messing around converting stuff, I realized what other people were saying about going by feel. I just now go with the concept that if I can't or don't want to transport a mechanic over thats fine because Hero is an alternate universe with its on set of rules.

[Ninja-Bear]

How can that be?

The Heroic Pistol uses values from 6E2 Weapons Table, while the Superheroic has to conform to caps.

The Superheroic Cop has to pay points for that 30-60 AP attack with minimal limitations. While the Heroic cop does not.

For them to be equal effect wise, you have to build the Superheroic on more points. At wich point he is not equal by at least one metric.

Yeah I used to think like that but now I go with Massey's way of thinking. The weapon list you mention, is that only Heroic in sixth? Prior editions listed weapons both as Heroic and Superheroic. But here's the key, the damage never changed from one to the other. Points did because certain limitations are legal for heroic rather than super. Inplay though, this doesn't really matter. If you really wanted a 1:1 build, I bet it could be done.

 

Time for a new thread?

[Tjack]

If you're going to use The Beverly Hillbillies as an example, you have to realize that Jed Clampett's land back in Tenn.was not only covered in oil deposits but in veins of radioactive ore. This accounts for the subtle mutations of the family who drank from the springs and ate crops from that irradiated water table.

Jed & Granny's longevity and vitality. Granny remembers the Civil War as a young girl and was able to perform feats of strength and agility no woman of her age should be able to perform. Jethro and his twin sister Jethrine both had extreme strength and invulnerability, fueled by incredible appetites. Elly Mae's ability to communicate with animals. There is also the idea that the mutated vegetation used in Granny's potions and Moonshine gave them their miraculous properties.

Y'all come back now. Ya hear?

[massey]

How can that be?

The Heroic Pistol uses values from 6E2 Weapons Table, while the Superheroic has to conform to caps.

The Superheroic Cop has to pay points for that 30-60 AP attack with minimal limitations. While the Heroic cop does not.

For them to be equal effect wise, you have to build the Superheroic on more points. At wich point he is not equal by at least one metric.

 

Easy.

 

 

Average TV Cop

Str 13

Dex 12

Con 13

Body 10

Int 10

Ego 10

Pre 13

Com 10

PD 4

ED 3

Spd 3

Rec 6

End 26

Stun 24

 

Deduction 11-

KS: Police procedures 11-

PS: Cop 11-

Perk: Cop

 

Police issue 9mm -- D6+1 RKA, 8 charges, 4 clips

Bulletproof vest -- 5/5 Armor, activation 12-

Cop radio -- Radio Transmit and Receive

Handcuffs -- 4D6 Entangle, no range, extra time, must follow grab, arms only

 

 

Done.  The exact point values don't matter.  The cop doesn't get more points when he goes from a heroic game to a superheroic game.  We're doing character modeling.  He has XYZ stuff.  He costs as many points as he costs.  There is no budget whatsoever.  Besides, points are for players.  Points are not for NPCs.

[massey]

Sometimes, when I'm writing up characters, somebody winds up very close to one of the traditional Champions point values.  And in those cases, I try to see if I can round them off and make them even.

 

For instance, when doing the 1980s New Mutants, the first 3 or 4 that I did, all turned out to be right around 250 points.  They're all very low on skills, their physical abilities aren't exceptional (most of them are still skinny kids), and they're still learning to use their powers.  Sunspot, Wolfsbane, Cannonball, Magma... all pretty easy to do even on a limited points budget.  A lot of characters ended up being like 238 points, or 254, or somewhere in there.  And at that point, I felt okay with tweaking them to make them fit the points.  "Well, I guess he can have a 12 Ego, and that'll make him fit".  But that's the last step I normally do.

 

The only character I couldn't fit was Illyana.  She's about a 400 point character running around with a bunch of 250s.  Probably played by the GM's buddy from a previous gaming group, who is always hiding his real character sheet so the rest of the group doesn't see how many points the character is built on.

[bigdamnhero]

Granularity is an illusion. In just about every game system, you have a range of abilities. That's the range of your granularity. Hero's granularity is pretty much on par with most things I've seen.

I think we're talking about two different things. I'm not talking about level of rules "crunch" or whatnot. I'm talking about the level of differentiation in game mechanics between Characters, and particularly Characteristics, at the level of Normals. This shouldn't be too surprising since Hero isn't designed to be a game about Normals. But it can become a problem when you're running a game where the PCs are all/mostly Normals (or at least start out that way). When all the Characters fit in a range of less than 5 points, there's simply not that much practical difference between Characters. Say you're running a Vampire Slayer Hero game, where the PCs are all in high school; when the mechanical difference in STR between Xander and the School Jock is 1/2d6 to maybe 1d6 damage, that's a lack of granularity.

 

Compare to something like Call of Cthulu, which assumes all PCs are basically Normals, but there's a huge difference between the top and the bottom of their "Normal" scale in terms of game mechanics.

 

And again, I think this problem is easily solvable, as long as we don't try to equate my DEX 15 Cheerleader in my Vampire Slayer Hero game to your DEX 15 martial artist in your Ninja Hero game. They are each DEX 15 relative to other characters in their game world, but not necessarily to each other.

 

Heroic Characters and Superheroic Character are build with totally different concepts for gear in mind.

Easily solved; you just give the Heroic character an allowance for equipment and recognize that's going to put them way over the "recommended" point totals. Our late colleague Lapsedgamer, once statted out all the gear he carried with him as a police officer and figured it was worth about 100 points. And that's "just" a patrol cop, not a suitted-up SWAT Team member. And yes, that can change the dynamics of many superhero games when the "Normals" turn out to be reasonably competent and the tanks aren't made out of cardboard. But it's mechanically very easy to do. I do a lot of mash-up and genre cross-over type games, and Hero is awesome at balancing stuff like that - it's actually one of the things that first attracted me to the system way back when.

 

My point is just that you don't have to balance them unless you want to.

 

IBut you should account for changes in the genre. 

...

In a kids movie, every kid is going to be more competent than the adults.

Amen. That was my big disappointment with the PS238 book Hero did a few years back. (Based on the excellent webcomic about superhero kids.) They tried to make the kids proportionally weaker than standard-level "adult" Champions superheroes, and wound up making them so wimpy they wouldn't last 5 minutes against a couple of mall cops, which needless to say is NOT how the kids are portrayed in the comic. That goes exactly back to my point about 1-for-1 conversions being problematic: a 10-year-old superhero in a game about adult superheroes is not the same as a 10-year-old superhero in a game about 10-year-old superheroes. You have to adjust for genre.

 

(BTW, it looks like the PS238 book is no longer available in the online store, not even in pdf form. Anyone know why?)

[Nolgroth]

I think we're talking about two different things. I'm not talking about level of rules "crunch" or whatnot. I'm talking about the level of differentiation in game mechanics between Characters, and particularly Characteristics, at the level of Normals. This shouldn't be too surprising since Hero isn't designed to be a game about Normals. But it can become a problem when you're running a game where the PCs are all/mostly Normals (or at least start out that way). When all the Characters fit in a range of less than 5 points, there's simply not that much practical difference between Characters. Say you're running a Vampire Slayer Hero game, where the PCs are all in high school; when the mechanical difference in STR between Xander and the School Jock is 1/2d6 to maybe 1d6 damage, that's a lack of granularity.

 

I think we are talking about the same thing, but coming at it from different angles. I am not seeing a real big drawback with your example. At the normal level, training and the use of tools would be the primary difference in dealing damage. If Xander was the hypothetical everyman at an 8 Str, he would have 1 1/2d6 Normal Damage? The half Normal dice thing throws me off and I am not particularly fond of it breaking the 1 DC = 5 points meta-rule. But lets go with that. Figure the average high school jock would have between 10-13 Strength which would be 2 - 2 1/2d6 Normal damage. As you say, about 1/2 - 1d6 higher damage potential than Xander.

 

Now let's look at PD. Xander probably has the bone standard 2 PD. The School Jock is probably pushing 4-5. Xander can still hurt the jock with a punch, but he is going to have to roll lucky and maybe score a hit to the vitals, head or whatnot to really do a lot. Just figure that Xander is probably going to make the Jock mad if he punches him. The jock, on the other hand is going to cream Xander, and with a really high damage roll to the head, knock him out.

 

This whole scenario fits right into the early Buffy episodes. Xander was not tough or strong or brave for that matter. More often than not, he armed himself with a makeshift weapon that could serve as a club, giving him a bonus of 2-4d6 regular damage.

 

The oddball in that whole universe, is the slayer. Well okay, the demons, ghosts, witches, and vampires all were way more powerful than either Xander or the Jock. Eventually Xander trained and used the right tools to take on vampires, but usually those were recently turned or otherwise "mook" vampires. By that point in time, he could have easily beaten the Jock. Buffy could have done so right from the start and that would have been an interesting sale to the other players:

 

"Yeah, gee, you see Buffy is a Vampire Slayer and you are just normal kids. Wouldn't it be a hoot to watch her kick the crap out of countless supernatural creatures why y'all just go "squee" and fall down a lot?"

 

"So how many points do we start out with?"

 

"Um, well, you can take up to 25 points in Complications to buy stuff with. Plus you get the Everyman skills for FREE!"

 

"And how much does Buffy get?"

 

"Well she is a low-powered Superhero who is really tough and strong and all that."

 

"So you're saying she gets 300 points?!?"

 

"Um. Yeah...but..."

 

<later, after the massive player revolt>

 

"Okay, okay! You guys also get 300 points but you can only spend a few up front and a few each time experience is awarded. That way you will eventually catch up to Buffy. Jeez."

 

 

(BTW, it looks like the PS238 book is no longer available in the online store, not even in pdf form. Anyone know why?)

 

 

Maybe the license expired?

[bigdamnhero]

Nogroth: The problem isn't the comparison between just those two character. The problem is when nearly every character in the entire game falls into that same narrow band. It just doesn't give you much room to differentiate between characters. As an extreme example, look at the MHI RPG book, where the entire range of Strengths among the human Hunters ranges from 12...all the way up to 15.

 

And yeah, games with a bunch of normals and one superhero are problematic. I once saw a Buffy convention game where the player having the most fun was the guy playing Cordelia; she had been given a "endless nagging" power - can't remember if it was done as Mind Control or just a PRE Attack - and spent the whole game getting up in the Bad Guys' grills and yelling at them. And  Xander basically had a bunch of Aid Teammate powers that were all activated by him getting his ass kicked. It was great fun...for 4 hours or so. Not sure how well it would work for an ongoing campaign.