Ceiling

[Khas]

Hello, i'm going to master a MHI game and i'm also new to hero system (as all my group). I'm searching a way to balance the game avoiding my players from doing too much damages ruining the feeling. I know the rule of X and characteristics maxima but i'm not sure about the damage class limit and a good way to mix all together. 

MHI is an heroic game so maxima should apply, can you give me advices? 

Thanks

[Brian Stanfield]

I’m a bit surprised nobody has responded to this. Maybe you could try asking the same thing in the more general “Hero System” discussion and get more responses. I’m not sure how many people are playing MHI, but many do play heroic level games and ,at have some good insight. 

[Duke Bushido]

7 hours ago, Brian Stanfield said:

I’m a bit surprised nobody has responded to this.

 

To be fair, though, it's a holiday weekend for a lot of us.

 

 

7 hours ago, Brian Stanfield said:

 

Maybe you could try asking the same thing in the more general “Hero System” discussion and get more responses.

 

This is an excellent idea, so long as you are asking "general" questions such as your question about rule of X and such as that.

 

7 hours ago, Brian Stanfield said:

 

I’m not sure how many people are playing MHI,

 

Apparently not as many as any fan of HERO would like.  I hate it for Jason, but evidently he got stuck with a lot of material after some political backlash.  Evidently, the author of the source material is a loud-mouthed fellow who doesn't play politically correct very well, and poor Jason caught the brunt of it.  Personally, I can differentiate between a person who said something that offended me (God knows, JK Rowling can't open her mouth without irritating the crap out of me) and something I'm interested in (still watched the Harry Potter movies).  I don't know who is aware of it, but realistically the only one getting burned when someone decides "I won't buy this tie-in product because I'm mad at the author hurts only the makers of the tie-in product; the author already has his money.

 

I did buy the MHI complete book (it really feels "unfinished" or "accidentally over-edited" or something; there just seems to be some stuff that's flat-out missing), and have read it a couple of times, but I'm afraid I don't play it.  It has nothing to do with the author, though: I don't like the source material, and am not interested in reenacting it.  I bought it to support HERO, who I want to move beyond this slump and reattain their former glory.

 

I will attempt (in a general way; I am very sorry, but I'm not 6e-friendly, and so I can't help you with specific rules or examples) to help you with the damage classes the best I can.

 

The problem you have is rather unique with regard to damage classes, because your players will often be fighting humans as well as monsters.  If you allow DCs high enough to take out the monsters, human enemies become something of a joke, then something of a fine red mist.  The first thing you want to do is determine just _how difficult_ should it be for a single player, or perhaps two players, to take out a single monster.  That information will help you get a rough idea of your max damage cap.

 

A quick and dirty method I use-- and again, this is just to get the ball rolling; it won't put me right where I want to be, but it provides a convenient start-- is to look at the characteristics of a couple of the "typical" foes I expect the PCs to encounter.  I then think about how "tough" they should be: what does it take to bring one of these enemies down?  How many "typical" successful hits should it take?  How many players do I expect to have?

 

If I'm expecting say...  

 

well, let's keep it easy.  Let's say I'm expecting 5 players.  I want each player to have to get in a solid hit or two, so I'm going to start by figuring that the typical foe should go down with roughly 10 "typical" hits.  As we're talking MHI, we're talking killing (as opposed to knocking them out or subduing them), so we're going to look straight at the BODY score.  Let's say the BODY score is 20 (just to keep it easy).  Divide that by the 10 hits I expect this opponent to take and I get the need to inflict an average of 2 BODY per hit.  Add in the foe's DEF-- again, as this is Heroic and relatively "normal" weapons, we're talking Killing Damage, so just add in the Resistant Defenses.  Let's say there are 10pts of rPD.  Now we need a "typical" attack that averages around 12 BODY per hit.  With an average roll of 3.5 on a D6, we're going to need somewhere between 3 and four dice of KA-- somewhere around 10 or 12 DC-- of "typical" damage to get the action-packed fight I'm looking for.

 

Now again, you also have to remember that you will periodically have human opponents that may bring a firefight.  What does 12DC do to a human in your game?   Now to be clear, you're opponents will likely be unwitting agents of the monster, or other Monster Hunters, so beef them up appropriate before doing the math.  Easiest way is to grab two player characters and "average them together" to get a baseline "Monster Hunter" generic template at which we can throw damage.  Let's say he ended up with a BODY 15 and an rPD 5.  Thow a 4d6RKA at him and typically you can expect 14 BODY worth of damage, meaning he's going to take over half his BODY (9 points after rPD).  He may live to get another shot off, but he can reasonably expect to be downed (and probably in need of immediate medical attention) if he gets hit again.

 

 

How does this compare to your typical monster?  Is this what you want-- monsters roughly 5 times tougher than a Monster Hunter?

 

If not, adjust (either the humans or the monsters) to what you think they should be and try again.  Or-- and this is important-- alter the damage classes.  Maybe you want humans and monsters to scale out about like this, but want them both to be easier or harder to kill.  Changing damage classes can do that for you.  Add or subtract another die and run through it again.

 

One other important thing:  this is probably the best place in this operation to make adjustments to your DEF caps as well.  Higher DEF-- especially in Heroic-level games-- can really change things up with regard to what you and your monsters can endure.  This is because of the way HERO allows DEF to modify (in this case, reduce) the amount of damage actually applied to the character. Even then, though, remember this same method has drawbacks as well.   Consider that an rPD of a mere 4 can be expected to consistently nullify one entire die of Killing Attack.  That's _3_ DCs you are likely to shrug off.  rPD6, or course, guarantees it, but a mere 4 makes it consistent.

 

The drawback, of course, is that adding another die of KA not only gets through it, but it carries a _lot_ of damage with it.  Another 2 dice and-- well, you can see where this is going.  Just remember at all times to attempt the model what you are looking for as a "typical" situation.

 

Once you have established a baseline of the "typical" attack, think about the limit.  What is the most powerful weapon the characters could conceivably run across without too terribly much difficulty (that is to say, something they could _technically_ access, but it won't be particularly handy and likely not always available).  How much more easily should such a weapon take out the monster?  Or a rival Hunter?  Or a human agent of the monster?   Toss on another couple of DCs and run your quick-and-dirty simulation again.  When that attack does what you want, then likely you have found your _max_ DC limit.  If all the players want to jump straight to that limit, then reduce it a bit to get more of what you want.

 

Before finalizing it, think about the "boss monsters," if you'll forgive the video game terminology: that one big-bad that shows up after you have waded through a couple of other monsters-- either one that's been better at hiding until your success has put him on the run, or perhaps one who was running the entire pack of monsters you've already waded through-- at any rate, he's generally notably tougher than those who have gone before.

 

How are you going to make him tougher?  You can add BODY and STUN and END so that he can soak more damage and make more attacks.  This creates for some powerful scenes.

 

But for less investment, you can also add Defenses.  BE CAREFUL IF YOU DO THIS!  Yes, he can get hit _way_ more times and keep going.  The problem comes in when you stop to consider your DC caps: is there an attack anywhere in your campaign that can actually penetrate his DEF?  If not, then you have created an effectively-unkillable beastie.  While they are fun for pushing things in a certain direction when things are too far adrift, I absolutely _promise_ you that your players are going to absolutely _hate_ running into things that flat out don't bleed, ever.

 

I am sorry; I did not mean to ramble on quite so much, but I do hope that this little "quick and dirty" test helps you in some way.  It's been doing great by me for three decades or so, so I thought I'd pass it along.

[mattingly]

For heroic games, I generally cap it at 8 DCs to start off.

[Brian Stanfield]

Ha! You fools! The bump worked! Mmmwwwwaaaahaaaahaaaahaaaaaaaa . . .

 

 

On 12/30/2018 at 6:43 PM, Duke Bushido said:

To be fair, though, it's a holiday weekend for a lot of us.

 

To be fair, this question has been sitting around for a month without responses, but you made up for it just fine. Thanks for your "Duke's rule of thumb"! It's really well explained.

[Khas]

Thank you for the reply, is really appreciated. I was thinking of something similar for balancing but i wasn's sure if it would have worked. Il'll also keep a close eye on the pdef allowed to players beacause seems that a 10 pd added to resistant armor derived from kevlar is a bit too much. 

Now i'll do the math for it ? thanks. 

[Amorkca]

Marcomaiano, Did you start your game yet?  I hope you didn't wait for replies to your thread to get going!  If you did, tell us how its going!

[Khas]

39 minutes ago, Amorkca said:

Marcomaiano, Did you start your game yet?  I hope you didn't wait for replies to your thread to get going!  If you did, tell us how its going!

Not yet, i was introducing my friends to the hero system and in the last month we did character sheets and i explained the game mechanics, we are all old d20 players so i preferred to start slowly ?

But i'll keep you update, this week we should have the first session ???

[Duke Bushido]

2 hours ago, Brian Stanfield said:

Ha! You fools! The bump worked! Mmmwwwwaaaahaaaahaaaahaaaaaaaa . . .

 

 

 

To be fair, this question has been sitting around for a month without responses, but you made up for it just fine. Thanks for your "Duke's rule of thumb"! It's really well explained.

 

 

Yep.  It worked, all right.

 

 

And thanks!

 

Duke