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New Power (?)


Jazzidemus

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16 hours ago, Hyper-Man said:

 

What rules do you use?  Can you cite a page number?

 

I generally prefer the BBB, but I know this rule hasn't changed:  an Attack Action ends the phase.  With Linking, you get to circumvent that slightly, but you're still constrained by the Active Point limit, and the Linked power isn't usable separately.

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1 hour ago, steriaca said:

It is ballanced out by...

 

1) Having to devide the power points in such a way so that they always equal the Multipower pool of points. This means nothing to a straight up attack based Multipower with all fixed slots, but add Flight and/or Resistant Protection, and we are talking some serious stuff. Want protection of a "force field"? Then you can't fly far or do much damage with your "force blast". Want to do damage? Then you have to lower your "force field" and flight.

 

 

That does not cover the very common scenario of the character with three attack powers in his multipower.  For 78 points, he can have a Blast, a Flash and an Entangle, each 60 points, in his Multipower.  He can use any one of the three powers at a time.  He cannot use parts of each power - these are fixed slots. 

 

He could spend another 18 points to make them Variable Slots.  Under your vision, what benefits would he get for raising the cost from 78 points to 96 points?  I am seeing no benefits at all under your model.  In the actual game (6e), I see nothing on Page 74's discussion of Combined Attacks which would prevent the character allocating 50 AP to Blast and 10 to Flash, launching a Combined Attack which would inflict a 10d6 Blast plus a 2d6 Flash.  So a little more flexibility for that extra point investment.

 

He could spend a total of 180 points to have a Flash, an Entangle and a Blast outside his Multipower.  It does not seem like that extra cost (from 78 to 180) gives him any benefits.  That is a huge extra cost.  Under the rules of Hero, he could take advantage of that massive point expenditure to fire off a Combined Attack of a 12d6 Flash, 6d6 6 DEF entangle and 12d6 Blast. 

 

Powerful?  Sure.  It cost him 180 points, so it should be powerful.  It's likely not as powerful as a 36d6 Blast, 18d6, 18 DEF Entangle or 36d6 Flash, all of which would have the same point cost as the three 60 point powers.  Now, a GM is not likely to allow a 36 DC attack in a game centred around 12 DC attacks.  But then, the GM is not required to allow the character to spend 180 points on three separate 12 DC attacks either.  But if he is going to rule that they cannot be fired as a combined attack, then he is requiring the player attach a limitation to those attacks, which should reduce their point cost. 

 

If the GM is going to require that the player never combine the three attacks to more than 12 DC in total, it sounds like the player should spend only 96 points (the variable slot multipower).  If the GM is going to limit the player to using only one of the powers at a time, then the cost should be 72 points, as the player is getting that fixed slot multipower in game effectiveness.

 

 

1 hour ago, steriaca said:

 

2) Person who bought all three powers outside the Multipower can use them at full power at all times. Multipower boy has to shift points around some. Also, unless he has enough points in the Multipower to cover it, he can't do a Multiple Attack or a Combined Attack with attacks exclusively in his Multipower. Note: He can Multiple or Combined Attack with a Multipower power and a power outside his Multipower without any extra penitlies.

 

The limitation on the Multipower is that it cannot use more than its AP - our Variable Slot MP, cost 96 points, can mix and match as much as its weilder wishes.  6e page 78 discusses that.  But he only has 60 points to allocate, so he can't fire off a 12d6 Blast and a 12d6 Flash without 120 AP in his reserve.

 

The character who buys all three powers at full cost can use all three at once as a combined attack.

 

A character with a 120 point reserve and a dozen 60 point Fixed slots could fire two of them at once as a combined attack every phase, with no penalties.

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51 minutes ago, Watchman Mk. IV said:

 

I generally prefer the BBB, but I know this rule hasn't changed:  an Attack Action ends the phase.  With Linking, you get to circumvent that slightly, but you're still constrained by the Active Point limit, and the Linked power isn't usable separately.

 

A Combined Attack is a single attack with multiple powers.

 

A Multiple Attack allows the character to attack more than once - why didn't the first attack end his phase?

 

Oh, and even before 4e, we had Multiple Move Bys - the first attack did not end the character's phase.

 

The first attack action ends the character's phase.  That could be a single attack with one power, a combined attack with multiple powers, a multiple attack with a single power, or even (from the 6e rules)

 

Example: Defender has a Blast slot in his Multipower and a Sight Group Flash (bought separately, outside his Multipower). He may make a Multiple Attack with both Powers in the same Phase (assuming he has enough END to pay for both). He could use both Powers against a single

target, or one or both against each of multiple targets. Making the Multiple Attack reduces his DCV by half.

 

During a battle against the Ultimates, Defender finds himself facing Binder, Blackstar, and Slick. He decides to make a Multiple Attack using his Blast and Flash. He declares that he’ll shoot Binder once with each Power, Slick once with each Power, and Blackstar with just the Flash. That’s five attacks, so he suffers a ((5-1) x -2 =) -8 OCV penalty on each Attack Roll. Good luck...

 

 

 

multiple combined attacks (although, as I read it, why can't he make a combined attack against each of Binder and Slick, so he only has to suffer a (3-1) x 2 = -4 OCV penalty on each attack?  Perhaps there is a flaw in the example.  Mind you, if Defender chose combined attacks, each would either hit or miss on one attack roll - here, each Blast and each Flash gets a separate chance to hit.

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11 hours ago, steriaca said:

Ok. You got it. But a good multipower, IN MY OPINION, contains not just attack powers, but defense and movement also. This, the need to shift points.

 

Multipowers with only attacks seems munchkin to me.

 

Given the sheer quantity of official characters with "attack only" multipowers in official publications, that would mean the Hero system is pretty much a munchkin game.  If Fixed Slot multipowers were not specifically designed to facilitate "choose one attack at a time" construction, then you could not tell that by official character write-ups from 1e onwards.

 

What if I add one slot that provides maximum Resistant Protection available within the MPs AP (1) and a second which provides massive Running (2)

 

(1)  To be used only when I want to turtle up and not attack (maybe it should be +X DCV instead...)

(2)  Maybe with Megascale, to be used when I want to travel large distances, and don't have time for attacks

 

I see a ton of multipowers in official character write-ups that are clearly intended to use one slot at a time.  How many do you see that are clearly intended to regularly trade off each power against the others?  Examples would be great!

 

10 hours ago, Hyper-Man said:

You mean Dr. Destroyer is a munchkin? :)

 

Well...

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Ok. I went through my electronic copy of Champions Villain Volume 3, and came up with 30 characters who's Multipower is not all attack powers. I exclude characters with Multipower composed only of defense or movement powers.

 

Arachne: Swinging

Armadillo: Tunneling

Arrowhead: Swinging

Bromion: Darkness, Resistant Protection

Doctor Teneber: Desolification, Teleportation

The Eninger: Summon

Foxbat: Darkness

Gauntlet: Flight, Resistant Protection

Green Dragon: Skill Levels

Hell Rider: Teleportation

Herculan: Flight

Incubus: Images

Lamplighter: Desolification and linked Invisibility

Lash: Swinging

Li Chun The Destroyer: Images

Loadstone: Barrier

Mechassasian: Darkness

Mirage: Images

Nebula: Extra-Dimensinal Movement

Shadowdragon: Teleportation, Invisibility, Barrier

Shrinker: Teleportation

Snowblind: Change Environment

Spwktr: Darkness

Utility: Swinging

Valak The World-Ravager: Resistant Protection

Witchfinder: Darkness, Change Environment

Zephyr: Tunneling

Zorran the Artificer: Darkness, Barrier, Images, Invisibility, Desolification, Life Support, Flight, Teleportation

 

That is just one book. Shall I expand this?

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4 hours ago, steriaca said:

Ok. I went through my electronic copy of Champions Villain Volume 3, and came up with 30 characters who's Multipower is not all attack powers. I exclude characters with Multipower composed only of defense or movement powers.

 

Arachne: Swinging

Armadillo: Tunneling

Arrowhead: Swinging

Bromion: Darkness, Resistant Protection

Doctor Teneber: Desolification, Teleportation

The Eninger: Summon

Foxbat: Darkness

Gauntlet: Flight, Resistant Protection

Green Dragon: Skill Levels

Hell Rider: Teleportation

Herculan: Flight

Incubus: Images

Lamplighter: Desolification and linked Invisibility

Lash: Swinging

Li Chun The Destroyer: Images

Loadstone: Barrier

Mechassasian: Darkness

Mirage: Images

Nebula: Extra-Dimensinal Movement

Shadowdragon: Teleportation, Invisibility, Barrier

Shrinker: Teleportation

Snowblind: Change Environment

Spwktr: Darkness

Utility: Swinging

Valak The World-Ravager: Resistant Protection

Witchfinder: Darkness, Change Environment

Zephyr: Tunneling

Zorran the Artificer: Darkness, Barrier, Images, Invisibility, Desolification, Life Support, Flight, Teleportation

 

That is just one book. Shall I expand this?

 

Sure, I am curious.  For instance Flight isn't an attack power but can be used as an attack.  Most movement powers can be viewed that way.  Barrier is not an attack power but I've seen people use it like an entangle to isolate targets.  Darkness is an attack power, at least in my mind.  Skill levels could be considered an attack power as it could be used to increase damage if the levels are offensive.  

 

I am more interested, of those multipowers, how many of them have variable slots?  Since the premise is that attack multipowers are munchkin because they just switch slots to different U slots.  By the same logic, multipowers with just defensive or movement could also be considered munchkin.  So a better measurement would be how many of the characters out of the total list as a ratio have variable multipowers? 

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7 minutes ago, dsatow said:

 

Sure, I am curious.  For instance Flight isn't an attack power but can be used as an attack.  Most movement powers can be viewed that way.  Barrier is not an attack power but I've seen people use it like an entangle to isolate targets.  Darkness is an attack power, at least in my mind.  Skill levels could be considered an attack power as it could be used to increase damage if the levels are offensive.  

 

I am more interested, of those multipowers, how many of them have variable slots?  Since the premise is that attack multipowers are munchkin because they just switch slots to different U slots.  By the same logic, multipowers with just defensive or movement could also be considered munchkin.  So a better measurement would be how many of the characters out of the total list as a ratio have variable multipowers? 

Drat. I knew I forgotten something...

 

Ok. Quick check...they are mostly "f" slots, not "v" slots. So, why have the rule of variable slots when the official write ups don't use any?

 

Which proves Huge's point. I stil say v slots should be the norm, even with villains and other NPCs (it is not like they need to conserve points). Can anyone show me a villain in 6ed/Champions Complete which uses a Multipower with v slots?

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1 hour ago, steriaca said:

Drat. I knew I forgotten something...

 

Ok. Quick check...they are mostly "f" slots, not "v" slots. So, why have the rule of variable slots when the official write ups don't use any?

 

Which proves Huge's point. I stil say v slots should be the norm, even with villains and other NPCs (it is not like they need to conserve points). Can anyone show me a villain in 6ed/Champions Complete which uses a Multipower with v slots?

 

They used to have one or two characters which did have the v slots.  I have a couple of heroes and villains which use v slots.  But I have found some GMs have a problem with certain issues raised by it:

  1. If you have your defense, movement, and attack in v slots, more than likely you will have the slots can go extreme (i.e. more points than normally allocated to the slot).  More movement usually doesn't annoy the GM but more defense can be irksome depending how much greater it can be.  And if your attack goes too high, well, this is just "too unbalancing" regardless of how low your defenses and movement have gotten.
  2. A GM running a character with lots of v slots has just multiplied what he has to remember on that character during combat.  For experienced GMs, this usually isn't a problem with one or two characters.  But if you have to allocate pools for 6 villains, along with maintaining records of END, STUN, Body, Charges, End pools, Flash rounds, who is delayed, who is stunned is gets a bit daunting.  The fixed multipower is easier to run.
  3. Since force field went away, its harder to make an attack, defend, and move variable multipower.  Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of a generic Resistant Defense power but in this character design, the extra cost for the resistant and getting it for 0 end doesn't make this build any cheaper nor easier to allocate points.
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As I look at that list, a few questions crop up:

  • How often would I want to use Images and an attack power at the same time?  Images is an Attack Power, by the way, although the Images stick around as long as you keep paying END, so it would shut down if the points were reallocated.

  • Change Environment and Darkness are also attack powers, but much more likely I would want to maintain them.

  • Summon and Barrier are both Fire & Forget, so having them in an attacks multipower only means the character cannot attack in the phase they create a barrier or summon something.

  • Why would I need my attack powers if I am Desolid?  Do the Affect the Solid World?

  • If the characters with Swinging, Tunneling, Teleportation or Flight don’t have access to those powers, do they still have movement options?  One slot that is only used when I need to move faster does not seem like much of a tradeoff.  Tunneling especially isn’t often used throughout combat.

  • Extra Dimensional Movement requires a full phase, so you would not be attacking anyway.

  • I am pretty sure Foxbat’s Darkness runs on continuous charges, so it is a Fire & Forget attack power as well.  How many others have continuing charges or similar on some or all of these powers?

Losing access to resistant protection could be painful – how are those characters’ defenses if they lose that power?  Is it needed for them to be combat-capable, or does it allow near-invulnerability at the cost of not attacking?

How different is trading off attack dice for skill levels to Spreading an attack power for more OCV?  +1 OCV = +1 DC at 5 AP each so he gets to save a bit of END.  Or are the skill levels for skills not likely used in combat?

Invisibility is painful to lose – would it typically be useful in combat, or are his attack or defense powers visible anyway?

 

Finally, 30 characters with at least one attack and at least one non-attack or constant power, of how many that have multipowers (or compared to how many with attack only MPs)?

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1 hour ago, Hugh Neilson said:

As I look at that list, a few questions crop up:

  • If the characters with Swinging, Tunneling, Teleportation or Flight don’t have access to those powers, do they still have movement options?  One slot that is only used when I need to move faster does not seem like much of a tradeoff.  Tunneling especially isn’t often used throughout combat.

While not used in combat often, I have GM'd several tunneling heroes use tunneling move throughs.  They go down and then up at full speed, bursting out of the ground to attack the target above them.  

 

I have seen a PC (not one I GM'd) do a swing by in my early years of Champions.  The character was sort of a black widow/daredevil kind of character.

 

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5 minutes ago, dsatow said:

While not used in combat often, I have GM'd several tunneling heroes use tunneling move throughs.  They go down and then up at full speed, bursting out of the ground to attack the target above them.  

 

I have seen a PC (not one I GM'd) do a swing by in my early years of Champions.  The character was sort of a black widow/daredevil kind of character.

 

At that point, the movement powers are attack powers, so locking out other MP attack slots is not a big deal.

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