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Why purchase a Skill Level with All Attacks?


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7 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

Try tossing in a character whose defensive powers all activate on 14-.  See how he weathers the first hit when he rolls a 16.  Now, if I fire off my 15d6 Blast, I may hospitalize or even kill the guy inside that armor.  But if I "only" use 8d6, or 10d6, I still likely hospitalize him if his armor does not activate, and bounce off if it does.  But if I had an attack that did no BOD, then I can reliably get some damage through without the fear of hospitalization or death if I hit him in an unarmored location.  He also doesn't take a bunch more damage from Knockback after my hit past his armor (with an attack that does BOD) takes him to -5 BOD.

 

Also, assume that a normal human who takes 6 of his 8 BOD does  not shrug it off as "that's OK, it will heal in a couple of months".

 

A 12DC attack averages 12 BOD (10 past normal human defenses of 2, leaving that normal with 8 BOD bleeding to death).  If it takes the paramedics one minute to get there, our normal human has lost another 5 BOD and is now seconds from death.  An above average roll and we're looking at a paramedic roll with a pretty serious penalty right out of the gate, and it had better be someone right there who can act immediately who has the skill to save him.

 

If everyone in a costume is guaranteed to be able to weather a 20 BOD hit from a KA (4d6 does roll 20 occasionally), no problem.  If some possible targets, even accidental targets, are normal humans, not doing BOD has no significant impact.

 

And if everyone is pretty much unkillable, what is the DRAWBACK of doing no BOD if you have already received the limitation for doing no Knockback?  Certainly, entangles, force walls and automatons, but normal humans are also pretty fragile.  I also have played a lot of characters who would prefer NOT to do Knockback and have to close the gap to get closer to their opponent who has ranged attacks again (or give him a head start at escaping, if that is his goal - not every opponent has the goal of KOing the heroes).

 

4 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

 

Why do you ask a question you already know the answer to?

 

Why do you remove all of the context when you quote?

 

I won't damage the automaton.  I also don't destroy the secret files my opponent is carrying, kill the hostage he uses as a shield, slaughter the Mind Controlled civilian dressed up as a supervillain, or have to grapple with how hard I should hit an unknown target if I don't assume everyone in a colourful costume is fireproof and bulletproof.  I also never took "does no stun" on the KA slot in a multipower used against those specific targets.

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10 minutes ago, MrAgdesh said:

Rather than alter the Skill Costs, what about charging more for OCV/DCV? Say, 8 points each?

Then you flip-flop the problem and people who naively buy OCV/DCV straight get screwed while people who buy CSLs get the better deal. 

 

The solution is to kill the concept of CSLs.  There's no valid reason to have two different ways to buy the same thing at different costs. 

Player wants a construct that lets them assign OCV, DCV, or DCs as they want?  Flexible Slot Multipower it up! 

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14 hours ago, Gnome BODY (important!) said:

Then you flip-flop the problem and people who naively buy OCV/DCV straight get screwed while people who buy CSLs get the better deal. 

 

The solution is to kill the concept of CSLs.  There's no valid reason to have two different ways to buy the same thing at different costs. 

Player wants a construct that lets them assign OCV, DCV, or DCs as they want?  Flexible Slot Multipower it up! 

 

 

Making a multipower necessary in order to simulate boosting skill is not something that I personally would like to do. Seems excessive, especially in an Heroic campaign. 

 

I'm just wondering why OCV/DCV are costed at 5pts a point?

 

 

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6 hours ago, MrAgdesh said:

Making a multipower necessary in order to simulate boosting skill is not something that I personally would like to do. Seems excessive, especially in an Heroic campaign.

It's the only way you'll ever have fair costing.  For people who are detail-adverse, it can be easily packaged as a Talent at 7 real per +1 OCV/DCV. 

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If you eliminate the damage bonus, then 7 points for +1 OCV or DCV with all combat, and reduced costs for reduced options, would work fine - that is the Multipower cost.

 

But then, why don't we also eliminate damage bonuses for Martial Arts if we don't want skill in combat to enhance damage?

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1 hour ago, Hugh Neilson said:

If you eliminate the damage bonus, then 7 points for +1 OCV or DCV with all combat, and reduced costs for reduced options, would work fine - that is the Multipower cost.

 

But then, why don't we also eliminate damage bonuses for Martial Arts if we don't want skill in combat to enhance damage?

Why should the SFX of "Skill" make something be purchased in a manner distinct from every other SFX? 

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I'm just coming to 6E and I'm converting characters over from 5th but I feel that I really have to fix this combat skill issue for my own games because I like Skill levels and don't want to see them shelved for a superior alternative mechanic (purchasable CV).

Without having you guys going round in circles again (I see both sides of your arguments but I like the construct of Skill Levels as is - flexibility, adding damage, and to some degree just being a little different), I'm just curious as to how 5pts per +1OCV/DCV was arrived at as a cost under the system? I notice that the cost to build DEX, SPD, and CV is now double what it was under previous editions (e.g., a DEX 15, SPD 3 character would cost you 20 points and come with CV 5. In 6th all this costs you 40pts). Was 5pts therefore chosen for this reason, or am I missing some other mechanical reason?

 

As Hugh said, if you remove the damage add from skill level use, it also affects how things like Talents are built. My point is would increasingly the cost of CV slightly (between 6-8 points) cause massive ripple-throughs in the system? Or is CV just self-supportive that I could tinker with it a little and not damage other parts of the rules?

 

Its true, as GnomeBODY said that you don't want to make CV so expensive as to people would take levels instead, but is 5 as a cost more open to tweaking without detriment to the system?

 

The 1/2 DC add per Skill level equates to what, about 4 points? (Zero End, Can add to normal or killing damage, Extra Time 0 phase to assign) so need to figure that into the cost of what a floating point of CV is. I need to do maths.

 

I think Massey is correct in saying that "Sometimes you just have to accept that there are just going to be cost breaks" (apologies for paraphrasing) you just don't want the cost break to undermine to the point where the alternative is scrapped. At the moment, 20 points for +2OCV & +2DCV permanently, is far better than two levels with All Combat. What if CV cost 7 points? Then that would be 28pts vs 20pts - which would allow the addition of an extra level in HtH. Your choice would then be +2 OCV +2DV permanently or a +3 Floating CV (with the drawback that you have to assign it) and 1 extra DC (1 1/2 but you get my drift).

 

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Quote

But then, why don't we also eliminate damage bonuses for Martial Arts if we don't want skill in combat to enhance damage?

 

Well the martial arts damage bonus is not built on skill levels, its built on technique.  You can simulate that with hand to hand attacks or extra STR to simulate damage.  

 

As noted before, the only possible excuse for letting people do extra damage with skill levels is to simulate a "critical hit" (whatever that's supposed to be in real life) or hit locations.  Once hit locations were introduced into the game that became ridiculous.

-

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5 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

The only basis I can see for CV being costed at 5 CP is that, pre-6e, the closest thing we had was +1 Skill Level, DCV only, for 5 points. 

 

5 point seemed like a good balance between flexibility vs. coverage.

 

The HERO could spend 5 points for a melee combat level and have either +1 OCV or +1 DCV - whichever was better at the moment - instead of having a +1 OCV with everything.

 

And, generally, Stan the Sword Man is going to be using his sword like 95% of the time.  Charging double to cover the 5% of the time he might have to resort to throwing something or firing a crossbow doesn't work.

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1 hour ago, Ninja-Bear said:

Here’s a crazy concept. How about buying characteristics or Skills based on concept not point efficiency?

Because that just punishes players for picking an 'incorrect' concept. 

 

E: Heck, let me give a nice concrete example. 

I'm building The Gunisher for a Mutants & Masterminds 3e game.  He's a Power Level 8 hero built on 120pp.  In order to meet Power Level, I need +12 Accuracy.  I don't have ranks in Vehicles or Sleight of Hand. 

I can buy Dexterity, which gives me +1 Accuracy per rank with all ranged attacks for 2pp per rank. 

I can buy Ranged Attack, which gives me +1 Accuracy per rank with all ranged attacks for 1pp per rank. 

I can buy the skill Ranged Combat: Customized Firearms Array which gives +1 Accuracy per rank with all the ranged attacks on my sheet for 1pp per two ranks. 

 

If my concept is "The Gunisher is a highly skilled man, who achieved superhuman accuracy through hard work", I pay 6pp for my Accuracy.  Up to 12 if I'm really worried about needing to pick up and use other people's weapons, which I find never happens. 

If my concept is "The Gunisher has naturally superhuman hand-eye coordination", I pay 24pp for my Accuracy. 

That's a price difference of 10-15% of the character's total points!  For the same thing! 

Even just comparing Ranged Attack ("Trained with all weapons") and Ranged Combat ("Trained with his guns") is a 5% total price gap! 

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43 minutes ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Well, in a point-based game, you don't want to be ripped off.  I mean if I have a concept that I'm tall, its not worth 50 points to be slightly taller than everyone else.  That has to be a consideration at least at some level.

True to an extent. At what point (no pun untended) do we go from not being ripped off to being petty? Petty as in you got one more sprinkle than me on the ice cream petty. 

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31 minutes ago, Ninja-Bear said:

True to an extent. At what point (no pun untended) do we go from not being ripped off to being petty? Petty as in you got one more sprinkle than me on the ice cream petty. 

Never. 

It is never 'petty' when you can point to cold hard numbers and say "Skillman paid ### more for the same thing".  Doubly so with CSLs, where it instead becomes "Skillman paid ### more for a slightly worse thing". 

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9 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Well the martial arts damage bonus is not built on skill levels, its built on technique.  You can simulate that with hand to hand attacks or extra STR to simulate damage.  

 

I would consider skill levels can also represent technique.  Your approach does not allow for enhancing forms of damage such as Flash, Drain, or even KAs which a Martial Arts DC can enhance.  Hand Attacks do not increase Disarms, Grabs or Trips.

 

9 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

As noted before, the only possible excuse for letting people do extra damage with skill levels is to simulate a "critical hit" (whatever that's supposed to be in real life) or hit locations.  Once hit locations were introduced into the game that became ridiculous.

 

I found hit locations a suitable substitute for critical hits.  Skill levels reflect a sacrifice of finesse for power - whether leaving oneself open for counterattack (by not placing levels in DCV) or firing a wild, but powerful, shot (by placing levels in damage rather than OCV).

 

BTW, should we also remove the option of reducing DCs of ranged attacks to improve the chance to hit (which Spreading currently allows)?  Maybe that is my solution - a Multipower of +1 DC and +1 DCV would allow me to select between +1 OCV, +1 DCV or +1 DC (twice as much DC as I would get with a skill level, albeit at the cost of paying END for either the OCV or the DC).

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4 hours ago, Ninja-Bear said:

Here’s a crazy concept. How about buying characteristics or Skills based on concept not point efficiency?

 

Here's a crazier concept - why not price characteristics and skills based on what they achieve so there are no concepts which the system's pricing model incents or disincents?

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Sorry if this has been mentioned but you get more leeway to putting limitations on skill levels. For example:

A magic sword that can help you fight can have a focus and "only with sword attack/block" limitations.

A targeting computer could have a limitation of "needs to observe target for one turn" or an activation roll like on Find Weakness (if you fail, you can't use it on that target for the rest of the combat)

A low-level TK field that helps you can cost END and have other special effect limitations

 

Since, mathematically, giving yourself +1 OCV is the same as giving the target -1 DCV you could define your combat skill as messing up with the target's attempt to avoid your attack. But that may not pass GM's approval.

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23 minutes ago, Greywind said:

That presupposes that such balance is actually attainable.

I dunno man, "Only have one way to buy CV stuff" seems pretty attainable to me. 

Here's OCV, you buy it for 5 points if you want OCV.  Here's DCV, you buy it for 5 points if you want DCV.  Here's the Talent "Combat Skill", you buy it for 7 points and it functions either as a point of OCV or a point of DCV.  (It's really just a 5 point Multipower with two Flex slots, but don't tell anyone!)

Want to only be good with/against a particular thing?  Ask your GM if you can take a Limitation!  Here's our recommended values, which your GM should overrule if it makes sense! 

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