Can you create temporary weapons?

[dekrass]

I'm new to the Hero System, and I'm trying to convert a character from another game. We're planning to play a fantasy game, and I was able to replicate everything for my warrior/mage except a few of his spells. He frequently used spells to conjure swords and such. He never actually carried weapons between battles. 
I haven't figured out how to temporarily have weapons and shields. With all the options in the game it seems like there must be a combination of powers and modifiers to make it work, but I haven't figured it out. I got the APG2 because I heard it had a create objects power, but it specifically says it's not for creating weapons. I'm hoping to find a way to do this, and add in the campaign requirements of all spells having gestures, incantations, and time limits.
Is there a way to make that work in this system, or do I need to scrap this PC and start over?

[sentry0]

Sounds like an HKA to me.

 

This thread is very similar to your question: 

 

 

[Duke Bushido]

I don't know the book-legal answer, or even the answer in that other thread, but off the top of my head, I would think a Gadget Pool would work.  Barring that, modify T-form to whatever works for you.  (Not a big fan of that last one, myself, but it's there).

 

The thing with gadget pools and "create" power is that rule: don't make weapons!

 

I tend to think that it's primarily for game balance: you wouldn't want someone running around who can constantly create the most perfect weapon for every situation; it would wreck the fun.  But if you're making something like "a spell that creates a mystical sword composed of the souls of the righteous" or any one or two _specific_ weapons, so long as those weapons abided by the campaign limits, I really wouldn't have a problem with it personally.  Even if you could cast this spell on twenty people at once, I still don't see it as being a major problem _for me personally_.

 

I have no doubt that there will be some disagreement on that.

 

 

[Grailknight]

With some qualifications on usage, it's generally not necessary to buy a separate power to make a weapon or shield. You buy the power , the weapon is just a special effect.You would use Advantages and Disadvantages to further customize the power.

 

Base power- Only you can use it. If you can hand it to a buddy then UBO. If it can be taken then Focus. If it can be disarmed or broken but not truly kept away from you then Physical Manifestation.

[Duke Bushido]

Ah.

 

I was under the impression it was something he could "cast" on multiple people: i,e; arming a crowd via "creating" weapons magically that he could then pass around.

[IndianaJoe3]

How often do other people use his weapons? If it rarely (or never) happens, making the sword out of nothing is a cool special effect of his HKA. If the rest of the party routinely uses his weapons, then his HKA is Usable By Others. If he gives the swords to his personal guards (or army), they need to buy the sword as an HKA (Obvious Accessible Focus).

[dekrass]

It's meant to be a spell that made normal weapons. They could be disarmed, or broken, or used by someone else. They also disappear after 1 minute.

In the previous game other party members rarely used these weapons, but could in a pinch.

[Duke Bushido]

41 minutes ago, dekrass said:

They also disappear after 1 minute.

 

 

 

Oh, definitely UBO.  Buy the appropriate attack and tack "Usable by Others" on it.  If it's worth the effort, you can work "OAF" into it such that the wielders can be disarmed, but if its's only going to last 5 Turns, I wouldn't get too deeply into it.  Remember to do something about your END cost, though.  Maybe an END reserve specifically for this Spell?

 

 

[Lord Liaden]

Or, maybe a 1-minute Continuing Charge?

[Lucius]

Conjure Weapon:  (Total: 96 Active Cost, 25 Real Cost) Killing Attack - Hand-To-Hand 2d6-1, Constant (+1/2), Variable Advantage (+1/2 Advantages; Limited Group of Advantages: Normal weapon Advantages; +3/4), Usable Nearby (+3/4), Grantor pays the END whenever the power is used (87 Active Points); Requires A Roll (Attack roll, -1 per 20 Active Points modifier; Must be made each Phase/use; -3/4), Gestures (Requires both hands; -1/2), Restrainable (-1/2), Real Weapon (-1/4), STR Minimum 4-8 (-1/4), Physical Manifestation (-1/4), Incantations (-1/4), Costs Endurance (Only Costs END to Activate; -1/4), 12 Continuing Charges lasting 1 Minute each (+1/2) (Real Cost: 22) <b>plus</b> +4 to offset Active Point negative OCV modifier with any single attack, Usable Nearby (+3/4), Grantor pays the END whenever the power is used (9 Active Points); Gestures (Requires both hands; -1/2), Restrainable (-1/2), Real Weapon (-1/4), Physical Manifestation (-1/4), Incantations (-1/4), Costs Endurance (Only Costs END to Activate; -1/4), 12 Continuing Charges lasting 1 Minute each (+1/2) (Real Cost: 3)

 

What made this challenging is that to make it on Continuous Charges I had to make it Constant. But Constant means you can hit someone once and then keep doing damage phase after phase without making another to-hit roll, so I used the "Requires a Roll" Limitation to require an attack roll every phase. But that imposes a penalty based on Active Points so I had to add in Penalty SKill Levels to counter that.

 

"Variable Advantage" is to cover whatever Advantage makes sense for weapon type - if you conjure a hammer, it can have the Stun Multiplier, if a pick, it can be Armor Piercing, etc. This could be dropped for a cheaper and simpler version.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

A cheaper simpler version of a palindromedary tagline

 

 

[Doc Democracy]

Dekrass, I think you have the answer you need but we do speak HERO rather carelessly. We understand each other but it is useful to check whether you understand what you have been told.

 

HERO has a very clear divide about the effects you have in game terms (the actual mechanics) and how that looks (special effects). In most games you would give people swords by giving people swords. In HERO, you are looking to give people the ability to deal damage. Therefore you buy the game effect, Killing attack, usable by others, and describe the special effect (swords appear that folk can use to attack).

 

There is a lot of guidance on how to use Usable by others to get exactly what you want.

 

Doc

[dekrass]

 

52 minutes ago, Lucius said:

What made this challenging is that to make it on Continuous Charges I had to make it Constant. But Constant means you can hit someone once and then keep doing damage phase after phase without making another to-hit roll, so I used the "Requires a Roll" Limitation to require an attack roll every phase. But that imposes a penalty based on Active Points so I had to add in Penalty SKill Levels to counter that.

 

I had considered making it constant, but I didn't see a way to turn it into separate attacks. This is complicated, but it's an interesting solution. Thanks for lending your expertise.

[dekrass]

Thank you everyone. Your input has been very helpful. I think I understand the system a bit better now, and can work out the rest of my character.

 

Doc Democracy, thanks for checking in. I don't speak HERO as fluently as others here, but I'm learning.

[Gnome BODY (important!)]

1 hour ago, Lucius said:

What made this challenging is that to make it on Continuous Charges I had to make it Constant. But Constant means you can hit someone once and then keep doing damage phase after phase without making another to-hit roll, so I used the "Requires a Roll" Limitation to require an attack roll every phase. But that imposes a penalty based on Active Points so I had to add in Penalty SKill Levels to counter that.

5e allows power constructs wherein the power that is UBO has one set of modifiers and the UBO itself has another set of modifiers.  It's under Differing Modifiers on page 276 of 5ER. 

If 6E has something comparable, using it would massively decrease complexity. 

[massey]

Everybody has their own opinions, and most of them are probably going to disagree with me, but I'll chime in anyway.  And I'll walk you through my chain of logic so you can see why I think the way I do.

 

First, you've got the base power.  This sounds like a simple Hand Killing Attack.  Now an HKA can be defined as anything you want (subject to GM approval).  Razor sharp claws, big ass sword, mystical death touch, even a lightsaber.  At its basic level, HKA is a power that does killing damage in hand to hand combat (no range), and it is visible when you use it.  You could easily define it as a weapon that appears in your hand when you want to attack with it, and then disappears when you are finished.  It could also be Wolverine's claws, or an acid touch, or a fire punch.  The description of it being a sword (or other weapon) doesn't require you to do anything special.  Just buy HKA.

 

Now, we'll look at the little details.  We've got the basic power down, so these details are only as important as you want to make them.  If you want to use the power in a different way, you may want to look at putting an Advantage or a Limitation on the base power.  So think about how you normally function when you use this spell, all the kinds of things that you're going to expect to be able to do with it.  Then we'll see if any Advantages or Limitations sound like they fit.  Remember (and this is where I differ from some Hero players), you don't have to take an Advantage or Limitation from something that might theoretically come up every once in a while, they are only for things that you expect to do in your normal course of business.

 

So, you create weapons out of thin air.  Are these primarily for your own use, or do you hand them out to people?  A lot of posters have brought up the Usable By Others Advantage, and that's what they're talking about.  Generally a power is only usable by the person who bought it.  Cyclops can't use Wolverine's claws (not without picking him up and waving his arms around, Weekend at Bernie's style).  Now weapons that have the Focus Limitation can often be picked up by someone else and used.  Focus means that the power is in the object (there are a few exceptions, like Dumbo's feather, where picking it up doesn't give you the power).  So if I pick up somebody else's gun, I can normally use it.

 

What you've got to decide is what the intent of your spell will be.  If you want to be Captain Weapons Locker, where you cast the spell over and over again and hand a bunch of weapons to your buddies, then you need to buy Usable By Others on the power.  That's something that you're going to be doing a lot.  But if that's not your intention, and other people only use your weapons incidentally (like if you get disarmed and someone else picks it up), you don't need to worry about it.  It's an extra expense for something you don't intend to do.

 

Now let's look at the Focus limitation.  I'm not sure that Focus is appropriate in this situation.  A Focus saves you points because the power can be taken away from you.  You have to ask yourself, is there a way for this power to be taken away?  You said you can be disarmed, but the spell ends after 1 minute.  Can you cast the spell again to get the weapon back?  If somebody grabs your sword, can you mutter a magic word and suddenly another one appears in your hand?  If you do, what happens to the one the bad guy grabbed?  Does it stick around for the full minute or does it vanish into thin air?

 

From what I can gather, what I think you're trying to build, I'd probably go with something like this:

 

1 1/2D6 Hand Killing Attack (change the number of dice to suit your game), 3D6 HKA with Strength added

Limited power: requires incantations and gestures and a 1/2 phase action to summon weapon, weapon vanishes after 1 minute (-1/2)

Physical manifestation: can be disarmed, weapon can be used by someone who picks it up (-1/4)

25 active points, 14 real points

 

And there you go.  The power requires you to take a 1/2 phase action to summon it.  It's not an attack action, so you could summon the weapon and then attack in the same phase (but you couldn't move).  I used a custom limitation to represent this, which falls under the "Limited Power" limitation.  You actually have to do something to make your weapon appear, it's obvious, and you can be stopped if somebody gags you or restrains your hands.  The weapon also has a physical manifestation, which means you can be disarmed, the weapon can be broken, and if you drop it somebody can grab it and use it against you.  Now, logically with the description of how this power works, you should be able to hand out weapons like candy, and supply your whole team with them.  But since you didn't buy Usable By Others, just don't do that.  It should be okay if one person on your team picks up the sword you dropped, and you may even be okay with summoning another for yourself and continuing to fight.  But if it happens, it should be something that takes place like once in the campaign, and not something you try to do every combat.  You know that you didn't by UBO, so don't try to get it for free.  It's okay to get a minor bonus from the description of your power in certain circumstances, but don't lean on them again and again.

[massey]

Oh, and my #1 rule when building powers is that something that makes your power worse should never make it more expensive.  If it does, you're doing it wrong.  Continuing charges and things like that are generally priced for "fire and forget" attacks, like a fireball that keeps burning after you hit your target with it.  They aren't priced for creating a weapon that you still have to swing every round.  

 

There should always be a direct relationship between how powerful something is, and how much it costs.

[Lucius]

1 hour ago, massey said:

There should always be a direct relationship between how powerful something is, and how much it costs.

 

Which is why this construct might be considered undercosted:

 

Summon Weaponrack:  (Total: 3 Active Cost, 1 Real Cost) Summon 1-point Weapons Racks, Expanded Class of Beings (Very Limited Group; +1/4), Slavishly Devoted (x8 as many tasks; +1 3/4) (3 Active Points); Conditional Power Weapons only last 1 minute (-1), Gestures (Requires both hands; -1/2), Incantations (-1/4) (Real Cost: 1)

 

First, build  Weapons Rack as an Automaton character with zero STR, zero SPD, zero move, and minimal in most characteristics. Buy for it a number of weapons, using the +5 to double number of weapons rule. Build  spell to Summon one, with Expanded Class to vary the kind and number of weapons on it.

 

As far as I can tell this is technically legal, but will only be acceptable if the person running the game decides that since you can ordinarily carry and use a mundane weapon ANYWAY without any point expenditure except for a Weapon Familiarity, and all this does is provide such mundane weapons, maybe 1 pt is all it should be worth.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Summon palindromedary

[Christopher]

On 1/9/2019 at 6:42 PM, dekrass said:

I'm new to the Hero System, and I'm trying to convert a character from another game. We're planning to play a fantasy game, and I was able to replicate everything for my warrior/mage except a few of his spells. He frequently used spells to conjure swords and such. He never actually carried weapons between battles. 

There is a huge difference in creation weapons between Hero and many other games.

In Hero a Sword is at least a:

2D6 HKA (30 Base Cost/6 DC) with 0 END (+1/2)

That is quite the power. 6 DC is about half the Damage a Superheroic Character should have.

 

Especially as in Hero games defense actuall reduce damage. They are not like D&D. That makes the magnitude (number of DC) of any attack very important.

I fear you need to be a lot more specific about wich power from wich game you try to simulate. Also please specify if this is on Superheroic or Heroic level - "Fantasy" alone only indicates Heroic level, but does not exclude superheroic.

[Ninja-Bear]

Ok I looked up Steve Long’s Harbinger of Justice in the original Dark  Champions. He can T-Port weapons to himself.  And as Duke Bushido suggested, he bought it as a Gadget pool with limitations  So I would just go with that.

[dekrass]

On 1/11/2019 at 4:18 AM, Christopher said:

I fear you need to be a lot more specific about wich power from wich game you try to simulate. Also please specify if this is on Superheroic or Heroic level - "Fantasy" alone only indicates Heroic level, but does not exclude superheroic.

Fair point. Specificity is often helpful.

I'm trying to replicate a series of spells that all just make different weapons. They were made in O.L.D. Which is a game with a flexible magic system in which you build your spells based on a bunch of variable parts with magic point costs attached.

One of the original spells looked like this.

Instant Longsword

Create Metal

Cost 2MP ; Skills creation 1

Casting Time 1 action

Duration 1 minute

Range: touch ; Target: object created

You create a longsword. It is medium and does 3d6+2 slashing damage. It weighs 4 pounds.

Costs: 1MP create object, 1MP duration

 

The above constitutes a simple low level spell in that game. I'm trying to translate that into a heroic HERO 6th edition game. The GM has decided to make all spells part of a multipower framework. Spells must have either gestures or incantations, usually both. All spells require a casting roll. All spells cost endurance, and the spellcasting multipower draws from an endurance reserve.

The example spell would have a simple base. A HERO 6e longsword would need 4 DCs, strength minimum 12, reduced endurance, and a linked 1m reach. The tricky part is the requirements of the campaign's spell system.

 

As an aside, are there guidelines in the books for how much damage characters should be doing? If so, where might I find them?

[Christopher]

30 minutes ago, dekrass said:

I'm trying to replicate a series of spells that all just make different weapons. They were made in O.L.D. Which is a game with a flexible magic system in which you build your spells based on a bunch of variable parts with magic point costs attached.

I guess you mean this System?
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/209297/OLD-The-Fantasy-Heroic-Roleplaying-Game

I could not find it on Wikipedia.

 

32 minutes ago, dekrass said:

The above constitutes a simple low level spell in that game.

It will not be a simple, low level spell in Hero by Rules as Written. Bookwise it would have to be " 2D6 HKA (30 Base Cost/6 DC) with 0 END (+1/2), UBO (+1/2)", wich is 60 Active Points.

 

Of course the GM can allow you to break/bend the rules, by allowing you to use object creation or summon. Just the 1 minute time limit would be enough to avoid most of the Abuse potential inherent in weapon/object creation. Combing that with "Weapons are not that hard are to come by" would be okay-ish balance wise I think.

[massey]

Book-wise, it doesn't have to be anything.  He can build it however he wants.

[Christopher]

51 minutes ago, massey said:

Book-wise, it doesn't have to be anything.  He can build it however he wants. 

And book wise you do not have to use Points or 3D6.

But let us asume he is not trying to break the game before he even started playing it?

[massey]

3 hours ago, Christopher said:

And book wise you do not have to use Points or 3D6.

But let us asume he is not trying to break the game before he even started playing it?

 

Well let's pick apart your example.

 

First, it doesn't have to be a base of 2D6 HKA.  You didn't include a Str minimum, so let's presume his magically summoned swords don't have one.  I think Str minimum for a purchased power is unseemly anyway, because you've either got enough Str to ignore it (so it's not a limitation) or you're wasting points.  You could easily have a longsword or something that was 1D6+1 HKA with no Str min, and your average fighter type can get it up to 3D6-1.  Pretty powerful for a Fantasy Hero character.

 

Second, you don't have to buy it Zero End.  That's what many players on the board do, but it's certainly not required.  He'll use up more Endurance, but in 6th particularly that's no big deal.

 

Finally with UBO, as I said earlier, it depends if he wants to hand them out or not.  If he's just summoning his own weapons and isn't intending on handing them out (so that team-mates using his weapons is only incidental) then he doesn't have to worry about paying for the ability.

 

So I'm seeing lots of ways for him to do it cheaper than what you've proposed.  I mean, I wouldn't build it your way, so I think he certainly doesn't have to.

[Christopher]

5 minutes ago, massey said:

First, it doesn't have to be a base of 2D6 HKA.

6E2 204.

Battle Axe: 2D6

Sword, Great: 2D6

Sword, Broad/Long: 1D6+1

 

So yeah, 2D6/6DC is a pretty common figure for Heroic weapons. Certainly the upper bound you have to aim too.

 

FYI, I did say:

"Of course the GM can allow you to break/bend the rules, by allowing you to use object creation or summon. Just the 1 minute time limit would be enough to avoid most of the Abuse potential inherent in weapon/object creation. Combing that with "Weapons are not that hard are to come by" would be okay-ish balance wise I think."

So I am not even certain what you disagree on.