Simon

Think less instantaneous effects and more ongoing (like a TK grab).  Still not a great fit…and I’m not trying to justify the universal inclusion, but instant effects aren’t the best application .

Just to clear up on the official rules side, Costs END to Maintain was something that Steve had added to some rather esoteric Constant Power builds. Since those had become canon, the rules in HD had to be adjusted. When I asked if there was any hard/fixed rules around the application of Costs END to Maintain on Constant Powers, the statement was no...just common sense of the player/GM.

The impression I have is that Costs END to Maintain on a Constant Power is primarily applicable to something with a continual effect - something where you would normally be paying for the instant application/use of the ability but then relying on the target to break out after.  But Steve didn't want to preclude other builds with it, so no hard rules surrounding its application -- the player and the GM just need to agree on it.

PSLs apply to the active/effective Range Mods, so the first option is correct -- Half Range Mod first, then PSLs.

It won't have any rules-effect, but it will affect the display -- the "input"/type is displayed in parens beside the VPP display/alias:

Test VPP:  Variable Power Pool (Magic Pool), 60 base + 30 control cost

1 minute ago, dmjalund said:

my guess is wearing a kilt subconsciously affects your posture

Not really (and I thought of/tried that)...I think it's more about having the hips completely unencumbered/unbound.  

Part is where jeans and most pants ride -- right on the notch on the back of the hip where the sciatic and femoral nerves descend -- the scoliosis is such that those two nerves are compressed on the inside of the curve (they originate between L4 and L5).  So those two nerves are under some compression from the start...add in a second point with jeans/whatever and it goes into a feedback loop.

Part is having as little in the way of my hips moving as possible -- any lack of motion on my hips is transferred directly to the spine, significantly exacerbating the compression of those nerves. My hips have a tendency of getting out of line (too many years in gymnastics and a generally misspent youth)...so I have some issues with movement from the start.  I've definitely noticed an inability to move my hips well when wearing jeans (couldn't take a large step up onto a ledge, etc. as my hip would just...stop).  A kilt rides at your true waist (just over the top of the hip bone...immediately below your navel), so everything is much freer/easier to move.

The reaction of most women to a guy in a kilt is something that I wish I had known about in my single days...and definitely doesn't hurt 😉

So I'm a serial-kilter now.

On the thread topic, I tend to a decidedly casual look >95% of the time -- work boots, kilt, t-shirt. On the rare occasion that I need to be more formal, swap the t-shirt for a dress shirt, full kilt hose in place of scrunched-up socks, add in a vest and potentially a jacket and I'm good to go.

Outlier here - about 8 years or so ago I found that wearing a kilt fixed some rather worrying degenerative nerve issues I was having (due to L4-L5 scoliosis).  It had gotten to the point that I couldn't stand in one place for more than 15 minutes without either severe sciatic pain and/or femoral nerve pain (left leg would go "dead" from the hip down).  Put a kilt on for the first time for St. Pat's one year and realized after about 6 hours of standing at the bar that I had been standing at the bar for 6 hours and didn't have any pain. Other than testing out the somewhat bizarre theory (and always finding that jeans, khakis, dress pants, etc. would cause the issues to come back), I haven't been back in pants since.  Don't even own any these days.

Plus side, is that no one knows what to make of a kilt when it comes to dress codes -- can be casual or formal with the simple addition of a jacket.

And some vintage work boots are the norm for footwear.

HD’s math is correct - rounding occurs at each calculation/step.

I believe it was first defined in UMA, but the description gives you everything you need on it:  STR +2D6 Strike, must follow Block.

If the Barrier is bought with 0 Defenses, then it does not have any Defenses that need to be specified. Characters englobed by the Barrier are protected from attacks that are affected by the Barrier (e.g. Physical or Energy Attacks or other attacks based on Adders purchased and SFX) the same way they would be by a physical wall. If the attacks can bypass or penetrate the Barrier, or if the attacks exceed the Barrier's BODY, then the character can be struck as normal.

See APG 2, page 80 - specifically the "Defending" section. If using Social Defense, all characters possess the attribute. How common Presence Attacks are going to be is a question for the GM to decide.

You'd likely have an easier time enabling any of the notes tabs for that (under campaign rules).

Changing forms has no impact on the existing effects of Powers.

The answer remains the same.

Temperature Levels are defined on 6E2 page 145 and represent levels of combat effects.

I've got that corrected - it'll be in the next update.

Thanks!

Hmmm...not sure where that -1/2 came from. Since I can't find any notes from Steve regarding errata, I've got that changed and have posted an update.

Probably just a matter of an equally old appPrefs.xml placing modal dialogs off of the current screen.  Delete appPrefs.xml before starting HD and see if that fixes things. 

It's a Defensive Throw - the maneuver is used as a defensive action (a Block) and is not meant to be used as an attack.

Nothing so granular within HD's export process, though with some clever JavaScript within an HTML-based export format you should be able to pull those values out - the existing export tags have more than enough to uniquely identify an ability like Combat Luck (the XMLID should suffice).

Yup...it’s developed on a mac.

HDv3 was sold under a 2-year support contract, which has long since expired. You'd need to purchase the current version in order to download the software.

The good news is that we kept the cost to purchase HDv6 (the current version) the same as the prior cost to renew a service contract.

Offhand, sounds like you're running afoul of Windows' UAC. Do you have HD beneath "C:\Program Files" or some other directory that you do not have full access to?

@Tom will no longer be engaging in gun "debates" on this site.

Also bear in mind that without some pretty serious constraints wrapped around the ability, it's a game-killer.  As others stated, at a minimum you need to define what abilities the character can mimic (and how) and to what level. You're not going to have a starting character able to take on the abilities of cosmic-level villain because they managed to shake their hand. Even without power level concerns, as defined in the initial post the character could simply touch someone and suddenly know everything about their abilities -- quite the Secret ID killer, there....and the GM can forget about having any secrets to their NPCs or villains.