6E Sell/unsell on no double damage cap

[Tywyll]

So I have decided to shift my game from 5th to 6th edition, mostly because I finally found an awesome character sheet print out for HD that actually looks like a printed character sheet.

 

Anyway, I'm running a FH game and one of the changes 6th ed would have on a couple of the characters is the damage doubling rule being dropped. I know it is still an optional rule, but I was wondering how did people feel about it (especially in the context of FH games). Has it worked out well? Is it a good idea, a bad idea? No real impact? Any insight would be appreciated.

[Vanguard]

It all depends on the character builds that are being used as well as genre type (at least in my opinion).

 

In our Heroic games, the removal of the Double Damage rule didn't seem to affect the game at all.  Sometimes you'd have an attack that did a helluva lot of damage but those were few and far between.  Again, depending on character builds.  What we did do, to sorta stop a "problem" before it became one, was to state that that type of damage output had an effect on what you were using.

 

There were many a game were Coop, our team lead, literally broke a bat/board/etc over the melon of an opponent because it just couldn't take the stress from a blow like that.

 

Not sure if this helped at all . . .

 

 

[Tywyll]

47 minutes ago, Vanguard said:

It all depends on the character builds that are being used as well as genre type (at least in my opinion).

 

In our Heroic games, the removal of the Double Damage rule didn't seem to affect the game at all.  Sometimes you'd have an attack that did a helluva lot of damage but those were few and far between.  Again, depending on character builds.  What we did do, to sorta stop a "problem" before it became one, was to state that that type of damage output had an effect on what you were using.

 

There were many a game were Coop, our team lead, literally broke a bat/board/etc over the melon of an opponent because it just couldn't take the stress from a blow like that.

 

Not sure if this helped at all . . .

 

 

No, that's cool. Knowing it didn't affect the game is still good data. How did you handle damaging the object? What determined if the item was at risk?

[Hugh Neilson]

I think there is a suggestion somewhere that, if the weapon (or at least an improvised weapon) is used to hit for more DCs than twice its [BOD + DEF], it breaks, or something similar.  I find that a bit lacking - great skill in placing a shot should not be as bad for the object as a massive STR Giant with a fairly fragile club.

 

I find the removal of the doubling rule solves some issues, but most of my experience is Supers, so it's just the HKA (where it makes HKA and STR a lot like a Multipower - very cheap to change the type of attack).  For Fantasy, I suspect a big change is that you don't need a huge weapon to do huge damage.  You could be a hulking brute with a greatsword, or a surgically precise knife fighter.

[Grailknight]

While it won't ruin your fantasy game, I don't recommend it. It cheapens the value of the larger weapons and further heightens the value of  STR. 

 

Take for example your simple knife(1/2d6  KA) and fork(1 pip KA) ant following characters with 2 levels HTH.

 

Finesse, the 15 STR rogue can do 2d6 KA and  1 1/2 d6  with her tableware.

Throg, the 30 STR barbarian can do 3d6 KA and 2 1/2d6 with his.

 

Bar fights and dinner audiences are really danger fraught affairs now, and armor is something you wear everywhere it's allowed.

 

In Supers games, it'just blatantly unfair to the low STR concepts. 

 

60 STR, 1d6 KA  Man can do 5d6 KA and 12d6 normal damage.

15 STR, 4d6 KA Man can do  5d6 KA and 3d6 normal damage.

 

Both cost the same but one of these  has better options available.

[Vanguard]

9 hours ago, Tywyll said:

No, that's cool. Knowing it didn't affect the game is still good data. How did you handle damaging the object? What determined if the item was at risk?

 

As @Hugh Neilson Explained the RAW (i think) but what we did was rule that if an item was designed to do damage (sword) then, unless it was a super-duper-duper type attack (we're talking x3 or more DCs of the base item) then it should handle the extra damage relatively well.

 

Again, as Hugh states, if it's something not designed to do damage, chair leg etc, then we went with dramatic sense and such. 

 

I would also suggest NOT using the rule in a super's game.  For the reasons stated.

1 hour ago, Grailknight said:

While it won't ruin your fantasy game, I don't recommend it. It cheapens the value of the larger weapons and further heightens the vale of  STR. 

 

Take for example your simple knife(1/2d6  KA) and fork(1 pip KA) ant following characters with 2 levels HTH.

 

Finesse, the 15 STR rogue can do 2d6 KA and  1 1/2 d6  with her tableware.

Throg, the 30 STR barbarian can do 3d6 KA and 2 1/2d6 with his.

 

Bar fights and dinner audiences are really danger fraught affairs now, and armor is something you wear everywhere it's allowed.

 

In Supers games, it'just blatantly unfair to the low STR concepts. 

 

60 STR, 1d6 KA  Man can do 5d6 KA and 12d6 normal damage.

15 STR, 4d6 KA Man can do  5d6 KA and 3d6 normal damage.

 

Both cost the same but one of these  has better options available.

 

This is true.  But, and this is based on what GMs would allow, in our games, that fork wouldn't do more than it's pip of damage.  If it was allowed to do more, say the damage values you say, it would be able to do it once and then be destroyed due to the massive amounts of force being applied to something not designed to handle it.

 

Again, each table/gm/group will have it's own way of handling things. I'm just explaining how we'd handle it.

 

Also, like I mentioned above, I wouldn't recommend the "more than double" thing for a supers game. 

[Hugh Neilson]

18 hours ago, Grailknight said:

Take for example your simple knife(1/2d6  KA) and fork(1 pip KA) ant following characters with 2 levels HTH.

 

Finesse, the 15 STR rogue can do 2d6 KA and  1 1/2 d6  with her tableware.

Throg, the 30 STR barbarian can do 3d6 KA and 2 1/2d6 with his.

 

Finesse the 15 STR Rogue does 4d6 normal damage when he clubs someone with a +1d6 Bar Mug, while Throg the Barbarian does 7d6.

 

18 hours ago, Grailknight said:

60 STR, 1d6 KA  Man can do 5d6 KA and 12d6 normal damage.

15 STR, 4d6 KA Man can do  5d6 KA and 3d6 normal damage.

 

Both cost the same but one of these  has better options available.

 

This is really an outgrowth of allowing STR to add to KAs at all. 

 

30 STR 2d6 HKA Man can do 4d6 KA and 6d6 normal damage.

10 STR 3d6+1 HKA Man can do 4d6 KA and 2d6 normal damage.

 

If we are really concerned when both cost the same but one of these  has better options available, STR should not add to HKA at all.  You want more KA, buy more KA.  You want it to require STR, add a limitation.

 

What stops 60 STR man from doing a Multiple Attack to do 5d6 KA, or 2d6 KA if you apply the doubling standard, and a 12d6 Normal attack at the same time?

 

Maybe 60 STR Man should buy 15 STR and a Multipower of 4d6 HKA and +60 STR.  +12 points to get +15 STR when he does not want to use the KA seems like a good deal, and now he can add lots of other STR tricks as new slots.

[Tywyll]

2 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

Maybe 60 STR Man should buy 15 STR and a Multipower of 4d6 HKA and +60 STR.  +12 points to get +15 STR when he does not want to use the KA seems like a good deal, and now he can add lots of other STR tricks as new slots.

 

Interestingly I think some of the brick trick builds in Complete Brick did something like this. 

[Lee]

3 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

If we are really concerned when both cost the same but one of these  has better options available, STR should not add to HKA at all.  You want more KA, buy more KA.  You want it to require STR, add a limitation.

 

Agreed. In a FH context, I'd make weapons that did more damage heavier (or more unwieldy), requiring more STR to wield without a penalty and not allow STR to add to the HKA damage at all. So the "advantage" of a high strength is being able to use weapons that do more damage rather than adding to damage.

[ScottishFox]

On 1/16/2020 at 2:13 AM, Tywyll said:

So I have decided to shift my game from 5th to 6th edition, mostly because I finally found an awesome character sheet print out for HD that actually looks like a printed character sheet.

 

Anyway, I'm running a FH game and one of the changes 6th ed would have on a couple of the characters is the damage doubling rule being dropped. I know it is still an optional rule, but I was wondering how did people feel about it (especially in the context of FH games). Has it worked out well? Is it a good idea, a bad idea? No real impact? Any insight would be appreciated.

 

Out of curiosity - Which one are you using?

[ScottishFox]

1 hour ago, Lee said:

 

Agreed. In a FH context, I'd make weapons that did more damage heavier (or more unwieldy), requiring more STR to wield without a penalty and not allow STR to add to the HKA damage at all. So the "advantage" of a high strength is being able to use weapons that do more damage rather than adding to damage.

 

That seems like it would tilt in favor of ranged attacks pretty heavily.  And those already have the advantage of not having to get into melee range to use.

 

Last weeks final FH encounter took place in a large room and the two melee-heavy characters in the party spent 3+ phases getting into melee range as they dodged enemy fire.  The wizard, druid and ranger just braced and lobbed shots.

[Grailknight]

2 hours ago, Lee said:

 

Agreed. In a FH context, I'd make weapons that did more damage heavier (or more unwieldy), requiring more STR to wield without a penalty and not allow STR to add to the HKA damage at all. So the "advantage" of a high strength is being able to use weapons that do more damage rather than adding to damage.

 

The Heroic rules already do this to some degree with STR minimums so only STR in excess of the weapon's STR minimum adds to damage.

 

Forbidding STR frpm adding to weapons may be points balanced but it is a monstrously huge disconnect  from any of the source material, any other game system and even real life.  A compromise between play balance and suspension of belief must be reached to have a successful system. The doubling rule isn't perfect but it's proved playable for 20+ years and I haven't come across a better alternative.

[dsatow]

I haven't found not having the doubling issue a problem in the supers genre or to say, it isn't any more troubling than before with the doubling.

 

As far as weapon breakage goes, I don't remember if it was a house rule or if it was in the pre-5th edition fantasy hero, but there was a rule about a weapon having def = 2 * DC or 3 * DC.  So a sword doing 2d6K would have either 12 def or 18 def.  If the sword did more than the def of the weapon, it would take body damage.

[Grailknight]

6 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

Finesse the 15 STR Rogue does 4d6 normal damage when he clubs someone with a +1d6 Bar Mug, while Throg the Barbarian does 7d6.

 

This just shows that the doubling rule should be applied to Normal attacks as well as Killing attacks.

 

Quote

 

 

This is really an outgrowth of allowing STR to add to KAs at all. 

 

30 STR 2d6 HKA Man can do 4d6 KA and 6d6 normal damage.

10 STR 3d6+1 HKA Man can do 4d6 KA and 2d6 normal damage.

 

If we are really concerned when both cost the same but one of these  has better options available, STR should not add to HKA at all.  You want more KA, buy more KA.  You want it to require STR, add a limitation.

 

What stops 60 STR man from doing a Multiple Attack to do 5d6 KA, or 2d6 KA if you apply the doubling standard, and a 12d6 Normal attack at the same time?

 

Maybe 60 STR Man should buy 15 STR and a Multipower of 4d6 HKA and +60 STR.  +12 points to get +15 STR when he does not want to use the KA seems like a good deal, and now he can add lots of other STR tricks as new slots.

 

As I replied to Lee, STR not adding to weapons at all does give better balance. It is also completely counter-intuitive to Hero, any other game system you care to name and and even real life. STR minimums and the doubling rule combined with the Real Weapon DEF/BODY for weapons in Heroic games are the system's compromises between play balance and suspension of belief. To date, I haven't seen a better suggested.

 

Having a KA permit STR rather than more KA would be an Advantage because barring an unusual build, everyone has some STR they could add(thus the rules for STR minimums)

 

Nothing prevents the Multiple Attack, but that is the case with any powers. STR and KA are not a special case so Multiple attack rules should apply as normal.

 

The Multipower is fine for some concepts like Ultraboy.  Not having to choose between and STR and KA is more common IME(or na case for variable slots and a larger reserve). Doubling in Supers make the high STR character pay more for the larger KA(not full because play balance/realism suggests STR does add to weapons) and doesn't devalue the points spent by the lower STR character.

 

I suppose you could get rid of doubling by allowing characters to freely interchange KA and Normal damage but that would create another set of problems.

 

[Grailknight]

6 hours ago, dsatow said:

I haven't found not having the doubling issue a problem in the supers genre or to say, it isn't any more troubling than before with the doubling.

 

As far as weapon breakage goes, I don't remember if it was a house rule or if it was in the pre-5th edition fantasy hero, but there was a rule about a weapon having def = 2 * DC or 3 * DC.  So a sword doing 2d6K would have either 12 def or 18 def.  If the sword did more than the def of the weapon, it would take body damage.

 

That's part of the Focus rules in durability.  The problem arises is that by those rules most foci  used for KA or HA have to be defined as durable(and even these break regularly) or unbreakable(which should be exceedingly rare) and not the default.

 

The problem still exists but I'm happy you haven;t encountered it. Still, the 60 STR Hulk with an Adamantium pocket knife should not get 12d6 and 5d6 KA while the 15 STR Swordsman with a 4d6 KA can do only 3d6 along with his 5d6 KA

 

 

[Tywyll]

3 hours ago, ScottishFox said:

 

Out of curiosity - Which one are you using?

 

6962-HERO6e_CharSheetDeluxe_TreChriron_form_forHD_rev1

[dsatow]

1 hour ago, Grailknight said:

 

That's part of the Focus rules in durability.  The problem arises is that by those rules most foci  used for KA or HA have to be defined as durable(and even these break regularly) or unbreakable(which should be exceedingly rare) and not the default.

 

The problem still exists but I'm happy you haven;t encountered it. Still, the 60 STR Hulk with an Adamantium pocket knife should get 12d6 and 5d6 KA while the 15 STR Swordsman with a 4d6 KA can do only 3d6 along with his 5d6 KA

 

 

 

In Supers, its generally not breakable unless targeted (i.e. normal use even by supers standards will not break the focus). 

 

Mostly, the reason its not been a problem is there is a damage cap  in all my Hero games, even Fantasy Hero.  A lot of the damage cap is controlled by me in Heroic games, but its still there.

 

The big note I wanted to make in this post is that Hero games now says whether to institute a double cap or not, is now up to the GM (i.e. a campaign trait).  Kind of like normal characteristic maxima.

[Hugh Neilson]

21 hours ago, Grailknight said:

 

The Heroic rules already do this to some degree with STR minimums so only STR in excess of the weapon's STR minimum adds to damage.

 

Forbidding STR frpm adding to weapons may be points balanced but it is a monstrously huge disconnect  from any of the source material, any other game system and even real life.  A compromise between play balance and suspension of belief must be reached to have a successful system. The doubling rule isn't perfect but it's proved playable for 20+ years and I haven't come across a better alternative.

 

For Heroic games, where equipment does not cost points, the build for equipment is largely irrelevant.  Having melee weapons built as, say, "1d6+1 HKA, plus 1d6+1 HKA, 1 DC per 5 STR in excess of 6 STR Min" works just as well as the present model.  If anything, it opens up more options.  Some weapons might require more or less STR per added DC, or cap at more or less than double, or be especially suited for swift, agile maneuvers (e.g. +1 DC per 3 DEX over 12).

 

Every other Hero concept says "if that's what it should logically do, that is what you should logically pay for as part of the build".  Why can't I have a bow with stronger pull that does more damage?  Those exist in real life.  Why doesn't my "Life Support:  immune to the heat of the sun and the cold of the vaccuum" provide the slightest defense from a flamethrower or a cold blast? 

 

20 hours ago, Grailknight said:

This just shows that the doubling rule should be applied to Normal attacks as well as Killing attacks.

 

Like punches and kicks, when augmented with CSLs and Martial Arts?  Or should the martial arts maneuver have base damage that cannot be more than doubled with STR?  Brass knuckles add +1d6, and cap out at 2d6?  Breaking a chair over someone's head allows a 10 STR character to do more damage, but results in a 30 STR character doing less damage?  Yes, that's very intuitive...

 

Treating HKA like every other attack power, and providing a couple of sample builds where the KA is greater when higher STR is applied (capping out at the total KA paid for even if you have more STR) is also a compromise of play balance and suspension of disbelief.  As is the D&D "no max to added damage" model, where no one, however strong, is better off to punch bare-handed than stab with a knife.  That seems pretty intuitive as well

 

20 hours ago, Grailknight said:

As I replied to Lee, STR not adding to weapons at all does give better balance. It is also completely counter-intuitive to Hero, any other game system you care to name and and even real life. STR minimums and the doubling rule combined with the Real Weapon DEF/BODY for weapons in Heroic games are the system's compromises between play balance and suspension of belief. To date, I haven't seen a better suggested.

 

See above for real life.  In Hero, we simulate real life by reasoning from effect and paying the points to build that effect, not arguing about what, logically, our special effects should provide in terms of game benefits.

 

I wonder how different this discussion would be if 2e had  not implemented the doubling rule on HKAs, Fantasy Hero had implemented something based on Real Weapons, and 6e added it to HKAs for the first time.

 

Why doesn't a doubling rule apply to other attacks augmented by skill levels or ranged martial arts?  Surely your Spark of Flame can only burn so hot?

[Hugh Neilson]

20 hours ago, Grailknight said:

 

Nothing prevents the Multiple Attack, but that is the case with any powers. STR and KA are not a special case so Multiple attack rules should apply as normal.

 

The Multipower is fine for some concepts like Ultraboy.  Not having to choose between and STR and KA is more common IME(or na case for variable slots and a larger reserve). Doubling in Supers make the high STR character pay more for the larger KA(not full because play balance/realism suggests STR does add to weapons) and doesn't devalue the points spent by the lower STR character.

 

Because adding STR to HKA and making a separate normal STR attack is effectively using STR twice, while most multiple attacks use each purchased ability only once.

 

How many people have seen characters routinely use HKA + STR?  Why would we not do this?  How many posters on this thread would let Throg, the 30 STR Barbarian, routinely strike with his Greatsword with full STR adds, plus a 6d6 normal attack (both augmented by any HTH levels applied to add damage)?

[Ninja-Bear]

Iirc in Fifth ed martial arts are limited by the doubling rule. However Steve Long points out that almost no one follows said rule. 

[Ninja-Bear]

In Heroic games in Fifth iirc, HA are also bound by the doubling rule and it didn’t matter how you got there too. 

[Vanguard]

On 1/17/2020 at 1:11 PM, Grailknight said:

The problem still exists but I'm happy you haven;t encountered it. Still, the 60 STR Hulk with an Adamantium pocket knife should not get 12d6 and 5d6 KA while the 15 STR Swordsman with a 4d6 KA can do only 3d6 along with his 5d6 KA

 

And there comes a point where common sense must come into play or, if that's not possible, then the GM needs to step in.

[Hugh Neilson]

On 1/17/2020 at 1:11 PM, Grailknight said:

The problem still exists but I'm happy you haven;t encountered it. Still, the 60 STR Hulk with an Adamantium pocket knife should not get 12d6 and 5d6 KA while the 15 STR Swordsman with a 4d6 KA can do only 3d6 along with his 5d6 KA

 

This always seems to be the question the issue attracts.  Why does not one ask whether the 60 STR Hulk with an Adamantium pocket knife should gets with the same weapon.  Shouldn't the Hulk do more damage?

 

Funny...if Hulk did 1d6 Killing + 12d6 Normal, and Swordsman did 1d6 Killing + 3d6 Normal, their power levels would be a lot more consistent with their relative strengths and points spent.

 

One option would be to adopt the old Advantaged Hand Attack rule - once you add more STR than the base damage, the whole thing becomes a Normal Attack, so Hulk does 15d6 Normal while Swordsman does 2d6 KA with that knife.

 

Of course, the current rule for "no doubling when increasing a KA" also follows the current "adding STR to HA" rule of pro rating STR to account for the advantages on the HA - considering that an RKA, Blast, HKA and STR each cost 5 points for 1 DC.

[Grailknight]

1 hour ago, Vanguard said:

 

And there comes a point where common sense must come into play or, if that's not possible, then the GM needs to step in.

 

I'm glad you can see this. At some point a weapon just can't do more damage and still be considered a small HKA.  Sinking battleships with pocket knives just is within the scope of the game  but you should have to pay more than 5 points for the KA. Put the common sense back into the rules.

 

Some people would rather die on the RAW hill and will justify it as they can.  Doubling has been the rule for most of Hero's existence and I've never seen complaints about it but now that it's gone(even thought the decision maker left it as an option, the only such option in the 6th book) the game is now apparently closer to perfection.

 

I am going to agree to disagree and leave it here rather than rehash old arguments. It won't affect either of our games. But I'll leave with one question. How many times between 1st and 6th editions did you ever complain about not being able to have 60 STR penknife man be a thing?

[Vanguard]

19 minutes ago, Grailknight said:

But I'll leave with one question. How many times between 1st and 6th editions did you ever complain about not being able to have 60 STR penknife man be a thing?

 

Never.

 

But that's probably because we never had a 60 STR character in a Heroic level game so it was never an issue.

 

And the 60 STR character's we had in a superheroic games, never used penknives and also never used "real weapons" so the doubling rule never came into effect.

 

Am also not really sure why you thought I agree with the whole penknife thing to begin with as we seem to be on the same page here . . .