Invulnerability

[Gnome BODY (important!)]

3 minutes ago, Doc Democracy said:

Again, an imposition of SFX that is not entirely necessary.  As GM, once the can phase through solid objects is taken off the table, I would be content for attacks to deflect off the character, almost lensing.

 

I do think you are focussing on the NAME of the mechanic rather than the EFFECT. 

To me, the effect of desolid is "You and most non-you things do not interact", not anything directly to do with defense.  I think that's a lot of the reason for the disagreement.  If I approach desolid from a different angle, yeah, I can definitely see how it'd become the thing to use for "can't be hurt" effects. 

 

3 minutes ago, Doc Democracy said:

I actually hate affect desolid, in my games no affect desolid will be allowed to blanket hit every SFX of desolid.  I make my players consider why their power affects a desolid character and what kind of SFX of desolid it might not work against.

Here I completely agree! 

The +1/4 level always seemed silly to me.  If your SFX justifies your attack working against a particular SFX of desolid, why doesn't it just... work?  What makes this lightning bolt so different from the half-dozen other lightning bolts in your Multipower?  Why isn't the "weakness" in desolid letting either all the lightning or none of it through? 

The +1/2 level is even worse to me, to the point I actively wish it wasn't a thing.  What in the world justifies an attack working on ghosts and cloud-people and somebody vibrating through matter and somebody a quarter-inch to the fourth-dimensional "left" and people made of light, fire, and radiation? 

[Greywind]

Because reasons.

[Matt the Bruins]

21 hours ago, Ragitsu said:

Correct me if I am incorrect, but...isn't Mr. "I'm technically invincible, but also quite intangible." going to make for a dreadful "human" shield?

 

That's the way I've assumed it to work for my Young Scratch character,  whose immunity to fire and heat I've modeled using the special Desolid build. He can't block such attacks against others (at least not without bringing additional defensive powers into play) because they pass through him unimpeded.

[Doc Democracy]

On 4/24/2020 at 12:12 AM, Ragitsu said:

Correct me if I am incorrect, but...isn't Mr. "I'm technically invincible, but also quite intangible." going to make for a dreadful "human" shield?

 

If I had allowed Desolid, cannot pass through solid material as a power with the SFX of invulnerability, then the character by definition would be a good human shield.  He is invulnerable.

 

It would be inconsistent to allow it in there, as described and not allow it to be used in that way.

 

Doc

[massey]

If I shoot you with my fire blast, you don't know if it's a 10D6 Energy Blast, a 5D6 Drain, or a 3D6+1 RKA.  You just know it's a fire blast.  You can't instantly identify the game mechanics just because an attack is visible.  Likewise you won't know if the guy you're shooting at has Desolid, a Force Field, or what.  You'll just know he activated some kind of full-body power, probably defensive in nature.

[Vanguard]

On 4/22/2020 at 10:12 PM, Amorkca said:

 

How would you do "Invulnerable"?

 

Late to the game but:

 

APG 1 pg 87 - Damage Reduction 100%.

 

Note: APG rules are subject to GM allowance as they aren't "normal" rules but they do have some really neat ideas in there.  Also, just like in the main books it has a Stop Sign.

[massey]

Easiest way to do "Invulnerable" is to just buy up his Defense, Con, Recovery, Body, and Stun to a level higher than would normally be allowed.  In a 12D6 game, a guy with 35 PD and ED and a 30 Con might as well be invulnerable.  It doesn't matter if you get through 7 Stun on an average hit, if the guy has 70 Stun and a 20 Recovery.  Just describe part of his power as the ability to "no sell" attacks and that's good enough.

 

A guy who focuses heavily on defensive powers can be close enough to invulnerable for government work. 

[unclevlad]

On 4/24/2020 at 2:56 PM, Matt the Bruins said:

 

That's the way I've assumed it to work for my Young Scratch character,  whose immunity to fire and heat I've modeled using the special Desolid build. He can't block such attacks against others (at least not without bringing additional defensive powers into play) because they pass through him unimpeded.

 

Yeah, you can get that at reasonable cost, when it's "can't pass through solids" and "only vs. fire/heat."  

 

I agree that just the +1/4 for Affects Desolid is too much and too flexible.  If you're using standard Desolid, you either drop the boatload for Selective Desolid, or for Affects Phys World on something.  And if you're staying in that form, the LS:  self contained breathing.  Things add up, to have something that might drop an attack down 2-3 dice totally negate such a large chunk of your character sheet.  

 

A way to do near-invul...let's assume 12d6 average damage.  18 rDef, hardened, plus 9 DC's damage negation, stun only.  Even if the attack has a fair bit of reduced negation...it'd have to be quite a bit to get appreciable stun through.  And that adds up.

 

[DreadDomain]

 

On 4/25/2020 at 7:51 PM, Vanguard said:

 

Late to the game but:

 

APG 1 pg 87 - Damage Reduction 100%.

 

Note: APG rules are subject to GM allowance as they aren't "normal" rules but they do have some really neat ideas in there.  Also, just like in the main books it has a Stop Sign.

 

On 4/26/2020 at 7:49 AM, massey said:

Easiest way to do "Invulnerable" is to just buy up his Defense, Con, Recovery, Body, and Stun to a level higher than would normally be allowed.  In a 12D6 game, a guy with 35 PD and ED and a 30 Con might as well be invulnerable.  It doesn't matter if you get through 7 Stun on an average hit, if the guy has 70 Stun and a 20 Recovery.  Just describe part of his power as the ability to "no sell" attacks and that's good enough.

 

A guy who focuses heavily on defensive powers can be close enough to invulnerable for government work. 

Exactly this. Over the years, I believed HERO tried too hard to come up with clever builds and use other powers to mimic the effect of other powers. HERO, is not a true effect based power system (EABA would be much closer to an effect based system) and powers generally come with a degree of implied special effect. Desolid is a good example of this. The base effect of Desolid is not "resist damage", it's "be intangible". By trying to use it to resist damage one has to build the power in a way that eliminates the primary effect. It is absolutely doable, it's just a build that I don't like (only my opinion and preference).

HERO has already various ways to resist damage. Damage Reduction, Resistant Protection and Damage Negation are really the powers to simulate the desired primary effect of "resist damage". APG offers a way to do it with (at 240 cost for both Physical and Energy). The other way to look at it is to build invulnerability with Resistant Protection or Damage Negation to a level that is "over limit" for a specific campaign and call it invulnerability. In a 12d6 limit campaign, it could mean buying enough to resist 18d6 (to cover Haymaker and/or pushing). It's 180 points of Damage Negation or 189 point of Resistant Protection. GM and players couls settle on Invulnerability, cost 180, 150 or even 120 to suit their tastes and needs.

[dsatow]

I think we are arguing not about Desol being used to simulate Invulnerability, but rather how far you can use a special effect over the mechanics.  This really is a decision for the GM.  Some GMs will be more lenient and some will not.

 

To me, its like asking "If I had a 12d6 Blast defined a Gentle Flower Petal Rush with no knockback and did no Body, then people could not get angry at me for using it as an attack.".  I would still answer it is still considered a hostile action, even if the Stun damage was just you blacking out from the great feeling of joy and well being (don't laugh, I had a player with just such an attack).  People attacked with such an attack would still fight back.  So, I am in the less lenient crowd.  I would say, if you wanted a misleading special effect, you should buy the power as Inobvious or Fully Invisible.

[Doc Democracy]

6 hours ago, dsatow said:

I would say, if you wanted a misleading special effect, you should buy the power as Inobvious or Fully Invisible.

 

I totally agree.  The worst aspect of using desolid for invulnerability would be if, in game, the players were misled into thinking that more of the same kind of damage might be effective.  It is also unsatisfactory if this is the place where Mr MultiTool switches to his affect desolid blast and circumvents the plotline where the characters go to InvulnerableGuy's home planet to learn of his backstory and how to counter the super-armour.

 

Obviously all that can indeed be done in other ways.  DreadDomain has a real point but I do think there is value in a lot of the tricksy builds.  I think THAT is simply another manifestation of the HERO System not being a game to play but an engine to build a game to play.

 

Doc

 

[Ninja-Bear]

On 4/21/2020 at 2:43 AM, Amorkca said:

Interestingly, the Character Creation Cards list desolidification as a way to be Invulnerable.

 

Card #52

1) Invulnerable:  Desolidification , Reduced Endurance (1/2 END; +1/4) (50 Active Points); Limited Power Cannot Pass Through Solid Objects (-1/2)

2) Affects Physical World Cost Based On Strength (50 Active Points)

 

Probably cause Steve Long proposed such a solution in .5th ed iirc. 

[Ninja-Bear]

Let’s no forget that using Desolid as Invulnerable becomes really expensive. If you want your Superman knock-off to still be able to punch, your Strength has to have the Affects real world advantage.

[Amorkca]

2 minutes ago, Ninja-Bear said:

Let’s no forget that using Desolid as Invulnerable becomes really expensive. If you want your Superman knock-off to still be able to punch, your Strength has to have the Affects real world advantage.

 

Yes, this was built into the Character creation card

 

[Ninja-Bear]

6 hours ago, Amorkca said:

 

Yes, this was built into the Character creation card

 

True, but I felt it was worth repeating.

[massey]

Captain Invulnerable

 

Str 60

Dex 20

Con 30

Body 15

Int 13

Ego 14

Pre 20

Com 12

 

PD 20

ED 20

Spd 7

Rec 18

End 60

Stun 60

 

15" Flight x4 noncombat

1" Flight Megascale (1" = 1 km)

 

15/15 Damage Resistance

 

40 point Multipower "Invulnerability"

--Desolidification, cannot pass through solid objects

--20/20 Force Field

--Missile Deflection (all), and +4 DCV

 

+2 OCV w/ punch, grab, and missile deflect

 

Breakfall 13-

Deduction 12-

Electronics 12-

Mechanics 12-

Paramedics 12-

Persuasion 13-

Teamwork 13-

 

Scientist

Biology 11-

Chemistry 11-

Physics 11-

 

 

Physical Limitation:  In combat, 2 points of Speed per turn must be used for holding action/aborting to defensive actions (max Spd 5 for attacks)

 

350 points total

-----

 

There you go.  That's a quick and dirty, 5 minute character.  He's super strong, he's got an array of what I consider to be classic competent superhero skills, and as long as you aren't stupid with him he'll be really hard to hurt.

 

His multipower lets him shrug off all kinds of stuff.  He just looks tougher when he's using it.  He practically... umm... glows with toughness, or something.

 

He gets actions on 2, 4, 6, 7, 9, 11, and 12.  To prevent him from being lazy and just leaving his multipower in Force Field, he's got a physical limitation where he's supposed to use 2 actions per turn defensively.  Most phases he should probably hold until after everyone else has acted, but use it before he would lose his action.  So we'll say he starts the turn with his force field active.  Then on segment 2, he holds until towards the end of segment 3.  Nobody shoots at him with anything major (no Giga-Buster attacks, nobody throws a fuel truck at him), so as you get down to about Dex 10 on segment 3 he decides to fly over and punch somebody.  On segment 4 he holds again, knowing that the bulk of the opponents will probably be acting on segment 5, he holds until near the end of 5.  Again, nobody does anything crazy, so about Dex 10 of 5 he punches somebody again. 

 

Then on Dex 30 of Segment 6, Death Ninja jumps out of the shadows with his Atomic Blade and takes a swipe at our hero.  The player has peeked at the bad guy's character sheet and knows that it's an NND that Does Body.  So Captain Invulnerable aborts his Segment 6 and activates Desolidification.  Special effect-wise, it looks like the blade just bounces off of him.  Or the energy of the blade goes right into him, maybe even coming out the other side, but when the blade is pulled back out there's no injury apparent.  Game-wise, everybody knows it's Desolid and can react appropriately, because he didn't buy it invisible.  But for coolness and description, it just looks like it harmlessly bounced off.  Captain Invulnerable has now used one of his actions defensively.

 

On Segment 7 Dex 30, Death Ninja decides to go elsewhere.  He's an ambush hunter, and his best attack failed to do anything, and he doesn't want Captain Invulnerable to smack him with a car.  Since that was the good Captain's plan, and now he doesn't have an immediate target (and he likes to appear invulnerable), he holds action until the end of 8.  He's still Desolid at this time.  On Segment 8, Dex 20, Crazed Scientist Man whips out his Ghost Murderer Beam, which looks exactly like a Ghostbusters proton pack.  Captain Invulnerable thinks "Yipe!", and knowing it probably Affects Desolid, he decides to use his held action to switch to his Missile Deflection power and DCV levels.  His DCV goes up to 11, and he uses OCV 9 to try to block the incoming beam.  So whether he blocks it, or whether the scientist misses his new higher DCV, the visual effect is the same.  Captain Invulnerable performs a chest block and the beam harmlessly scatters off of him.  The hero has now used 2 of his actions defensively, and he's free to attack the rest of the turn.

 

On Segment 9, the player knows he wants to get in his attacks, so he's done holding action for now.  He switches back to Force Field, and flies over to the evil scientist and starts pounding him.  On segments 11 and 12 he does the same thing.

 

There you go.  Now, yeah it's possible that he'll get caught with his pants down.  He could blow a missile deflection roll, or switch to desolid and get hit with an affects desolid attack.  Them's the breaks.  Even Superman gets hit by things that lay him out on occasion.  That's why Captain Invulnerable has a really high Speed, so he can burn actions defensively to preserve his "I can't be hurt" mystique.

[DreadDomain]

On 4/26/2020 at 5:24 PM, Doc Democracy said:

DreadDomain has a real point but I do think there is value in a lot of the tricksy builds.  I think THAT is simply another manifestation of the HERO System not being a game to play but an engine to build a game to play.

 

I do not disagree at all. One of the strength of the system is to use powers, distill them down to it's basic effect and build something different with it. As long as the mechanics support the in game feel and intent, why not?

I am simply saying that since 5E, complex, clever builds have taken too much of a center stage and became almost the default approach. Invulnerability-as-Desolid is an example of that. Take Desolid, apply modifications to strip it out of its primary effect (being desolid) and then buy a side construct with naked modifiers to enable you to attack while Desolid (because you're not) and make sure you point enough point into it to cover your offensive powers (if you level up your offensive powers later, don't forget to put more points into this).... or buy enough levels of Damage Negation. If it's only to build straight Invulnerability, I know which build I prefer.

  

7 hours ago, massey said:

Captain Invulnerable

 

And this is a good example where I believe the mechanics are supporting the game play intent and effects. Captain Invulnerable would have a fairly different feel in play then a classic flying brick and it is enabled by the way he is built. The only caveat that I would have is the agreed special effect behind an "affect desolid" attack. Why would a gun designed to blast off ghosts would affect Captain Invulnerable? It's probably easily managed with a good understanding between to GM ad player. 

[dsatow]

You should probably make part of his normal PD/ED resistant.  As you said, there is a chance something might screw up and he takes damage.  A single killing attack would really mess up his image at that power level.

[Doc Democracy]

He has 15/15 Damage Resistance...

[massey]

11 hours ago, DreadDomain said:

The only caveat that I would have is the agreed special effect behind an "affect desolid" attack. Why would a gun designed to blast off ghosts would affect Captain Invulnerable? It's probably easily managed with a good understanding between to GM ad player. 

 

It normally wouldn't.  That's why he's got a higher Speed.  The intent is for him to abort to whatever the best defense is, so that he doesn't have to face that issue.  If it were drawn on a comic book page, he wouldn't be doing anything other than standing still, shrugging off the attack.  Now obviously, he's not always gonna know what the best defense is.  That's life though.

 

 

Here Superman uses his held phase to go desolid.

 

Story-wise, he's not using an action (even though in game rules, that's exactly what is happening).  Story-wise, it's just the other guy's turn to go, and the attack harmlessly bounces off of Captain Invulnerable.  Now when he gets attacked by the ghost blaster power, the player may choose to switch away from Desolidification to some other power, but the character is just standing there.

 

Occasionally you'll get a situation where he guesses wrong, and an attack that doesn't seem that it should be particularly damaging will do a significant chunk of Stun to him.  That happens in comics too.  Sometimes you just get a weird interaction of powers.  And you can either come up with some BS explantion ("the ghost blaster is interacting with the strange energies I encountered earlier!  It's harming me even through my invulnerability!"), or you can have him pretend it doesn't hurt.  Instead of saying "yeeaargghh!" when he takes 25 Stun, he just laughs it off.  He's got 60 Stun, after all.

[DreadDomain]

7 hours ago, massey said:

Story-wise, he's not using an action (even though in game rules, that's exactly what is happening).  Story-wise, it's just the other guy's turn to go, and the attack harmlessly bounces off of Captain Invulnerable.  Now when he gets attacked by the ghost blaster power, the player may choose to switch away from Desolidification to some other power, but the character is just standing there.

 

Yup, totally understood your intention for how it worked in play (you explained well in the previous post) and I was only talking about the edge case where he guessed wrong. 

 

7 hours ago, massey said:

Occasionally you'll get a situation where he guesses wrong, and an attack that doesn't seem that it should be particularly damaging will do a significant chunk of Stun to him.  That happens in comics too.  Sometimes you just get a weird interaction of powers.  And you can either come up with some BS explantion ("the ghost blaster is interacting with the strange energies I encountered earlier!  It's harming me even through my invulnerability!"), or you can have him pretend it doesn't hurt.  Instead of saying "yeeaargghh!" when he takes 25 Stun, he just laughs it off.  He's got 60 Stun, after all.

As long as the gm and characters are cool with this (and will also use it as a story element like you have done!), it's totally cool.

 

For Speed, have you thought about buying +2 with a limitation on ii instead of talking a Physical Limitation? You could even unify it with your MP so when his Invulnerability is drained/weaken, he even lose these extra defensive move. Anyway, I like the write-up. Simple, effective and supports the in-game feel of the character.

[massey]

Putting a limitation on Speed brings up a lot of arguments about exactly how it works, so I figured this way was easier to handle.

[Gnome BODY (important!)]

26 minutes ago, massey said:

Putting a limitation on Speed brings up a lot of arguments about exactly how it works, so I figured this way was easier to handle.

I think there are far bigger concerns anyone in a game with this character would have than "does this Limitation on two points of SPD work this way". 

[unclevlad]

On 4/27/2020 at 10:52 PM, Ninja-Bear said:

Let’s no forget that using Desolid as Invulnerable becomes really expensive. If you want your Superman knock-off to still be able to punch, your Strength has to have the Affects real world advantage.

 

You'll often be better off taking Selective Desolid.  First, that way you never have to worry about applying it to multiple powers, so you can do a Desolid Blaster for example.  Second, it's slightly cheaper.  Third, from an END perspective, it tends to play better.  You're often going to buy 0 END for the Desolid anyway, if you're going to be in the form.  You'd almost HAVE to do it if you put Affects Phys World on your STR, because it's spiking the END cost for every punch.  Fourth, it's a little easier to mitigate:

 

Desolid

END only to activate (+1/4)

Selective Desolid (+1 1/2)

110 Active

1/2 DCV, and Extra Time to activate for a net -1/2

73 points

 

Desolid, END only to activate would be 50;  with 1/2 DCV and Extra Time, 33.  So the cost here's 40 points.  Let's say you're looking at 20 STR.  The Affects Phys World and 1/2 END (to get the punch END cost down to 3) is 50...and you're looking at buying a lot of MA DCs.  OK, you can cut some of that down by saying the Affects Phys World itself is linked to the Desolid...at that point it's a tad cheaper for that side of it.

 

 

[Ninja-Bear]

Unclevlad, selective Desolid? I haven’t heard of that. Is it in on of the Advance Books? Interesting though.