Ice9

Re: Are Overall Skill Levels overpowered? OSLs are fun, but not incredibly powerful. In particular, they'll never never match raw stats or specific skill levels for being competent in one area. For example: +5 OSLs vs +60 Int: +5 to one Intellect skill at a time, or +12 to all of them at once? +5 OSLs vs +6 OCV & DCV vs +6 DCV & +6 CSLs w/ Medium Group

Re: I've got you Good point, Jet Boots are a bad example. Jet boosters on the bottom of a robot's feet would be more what I'm talking about.

Re: I've got you Somewhat of a side note, but while "Restrainable" might not be exactly the right limitation for it, I've seen many GMs use it as effectively a "Real Wings" limitation, which has definitely been worth at least -1/2. In that context, it covers difficulties from cramped quarters, heavy weather conditions, wearing a space suit, getting hit with certain types of attacks while flying, and so forth. The trickier question is something like rocket boots, which are generally less restrictive than wings, but certainly more restrictive than telekinetic flight or gravity manipulation. Personally, I would just stick a -1/4 on there and call it good. This could also apply to idealized wings that don't suffer from many of the "Real Wings" issues. Re: Entangle - IMO, Entangle would benefit from a +0 "Non-anchored" option. An non-anchored Entangle is not attached to the spot it was created at, and the target can still move (with appropriate movement powers) or be carried without breaking the Entangle. Maybe a +1/4 advantage for Entangles that can be anchored or non-anchored from use to use.

Re: Help with a VPP Ah, I see - Schrodinger's utility belt. That does work, especially for "super planning ability" types like Batman, but I don't think it's what the OP was going for.

Re: The cost of Internet I like this, seems like a reasonable cost when you factor in HRRP. I presume the Restrainable on Cramming is "unable to connect"?

Re: Help with a VPP Which part don't you think is needed? The ability to change weapons/devices as a zero-phase action' date=' or not having to make a skill roll to do so? If it's actually [i']just[/i] weapons, I could almost see requiring the skill roll (make it Fast Draw), except that the -6 penalty would require increasing Fast Draw extremely high. Once you throw in devices like night-vision goggles, you really do need both those advantages. It sounds like what you're saying is that the "must pick weapon load-out at base" limitation should be considered a substitute for the skill roll, canceling an advantage with a limitation instead of having both. While not unreasonable, this isn't RAW either, and not all GMs would accept it. Incidentally, does anyone else think that the Cosmic advantage is confusingly named? Especially since "Cosmic" is given as an example VPP SFX? I've seen more than one player under the impression that it had an effect on what powers you were allowed to have in the pool. I don't think having both advantages needs a special name, but even if it did I'd rather call it "Reflexive" or "Instant Shift" - maybe "Instinctive", but that has its own baggage.

Re: Robe of useful things Also, Transform (air/nothing to small objects) was the pre-APG II method of doing this. Now both Transform and Object Creation will tell you, very emphatically, that under no circumstances should the objects you create be useful for any purpose whatsoever. If there's any conceivable way you could be doing something that another power does, that's forbidden. However - I've found that in practice, you can and should relax this a little. I mean, the player did pay points for the ability - especially Object Creation - it costs, IIRC, 20+ points, up to significantly more depending on what you can create. Saying that the player just threw away 30 points for something with no mechanical impact seems just as wrong as allowing it to mimic all the other powers. So IMC, the guideline is "could you buy this with money?". If it's something you could buy (or otherwise obtain) without spending points, then you can make it with Transform/Object Creation. This obviously varies from campaign to campaign, but I think for most people it would include things like what you're talking about, even if they could hypothetically be bought as a power. Now personally, I allow buying normal non-military weaponry with money (in Superheroic games, obviously it's legal in Heroic ones). It's not nearly as good as what you can get with points, and it has a much higher chance of breaking/jamming/getting lost under the extreme conditions PCs operate in, but I'm not going to say that you can't pick up a knife or handgun.

Re: Help with a VPP That's the point - assuming he's using weapons that are ~60 AP, then whenever he switches weapons, he's switching the VPP. Which means that without Cosmic, dropping his pistol and drawing a grenade launcher would take a full round action and require a skill roll.

Re: Help with a VPP Looks right, although if it's actually just weapons, the "limited type of powers" might be more than just -1/2. I would say that something like "only military gear" would be -1/2. Predetermined load sounds about right, assuming he can carry a medium-large number of things. If he only carries a few, this could be higher.

Re: Is Always On Necessary for this Inherent Power?

Re: HERO System Tips, Tricks, and Advice When I want to run combat more quickly (like for convention games), I have some modifications I use: * Don't worry about exact counting of squares, just roughly estimate distances. * Partially-average the effect rolls. For example, you can replace 12d6 with 2d6+35. * Knockback: Body >7 (or 10 for 3d6), knocked down and slightly back. Don't bother with exact distance or KB damage unless it was a lot. These do have some trade-offs. For example, abstracting distances works best when people have either the same movement speed or significantly different ones. Small differences, like Running 12m vs Running 16m, can get lost. General speeding up rules, not just for convention games: * If you have a VPP, any power must be fully calculated out before the turn you want to use it on. * In general, if you don't know what you want to do when your turn comes up, go to Delay. * Don't roll or calculate things that aren't necessary. If an '11' hit your target before (in the same conditions), and you just rolled a '6', stop calculating there. If you just knocked someone back 6m, don't bother rolling the 1.5d6 damage. If you hit a barely-up foe and the GM says they're down before rolling, nobody cares how much overkill you did. * When using Summon / Duplication, don't make so many that it slows down the game. One summoned thing, or a small group with simple actions, is ok. Summoning a dozen helpers that each make two attacks a round from a variety of options is not ok, regardless of how weak or powerful they are.

Re: 5th edition, dimensional base + access how to write up? Maybe something like: On the base - XDM (one dimension, any location), Usable Simultaneously, AE, Portal - The portal generator. On the character - Mind Link, One Specific Mind, Transdimensional - The signal device, to transmit where to make the portal.

Re: The cost of Internet Double post.

Re: The cost of Internet I know this was just an example, but ... I found this within a few seconds. Just doing the search "mayor of new orleans" on Google produced a "best guess", without even clicking on any of the results. The first result on the list confirmed it. Given that I have never looked up mayors before, and in fact know the names of very few mayors outside my local area, I really doubt that I have an applicable KS at the level necessary. I'm not disagreeing that the AI would actually need to have a skill like PS: Internet Research, just that it wouldn't need to be massively high for most information, and that they certainly wouldn't need a KS skill at 30-. I just see "able to look things up on the internet" as a feature of a modern-era setting, much like "able to travel places by airplane" does not require every person to have Megascale Flight.

Re: EPIC Champions--unofficial material, what should I write about? It's true that as point levels rise, you do have to think and talk more explicitly about a character's "portfolio" - the limits of what their power source can and can't do. At low point levels, this often (but not always) resolves itself - The Supreme Swordsman ends up not having enough points to also be reading minds or building robots. But once he gets into the 600+ range, he could very easily become The Avatar of Blades and have powers like "Occam's Razor, calculate simplest solution" and "Slice Space Itself, extradimensional movement", or The Mystic Swordsman with a collection of magical blades. And this might even be right for the campaign, but you probably want to actually discuss that instead of sliding into it. There are pretty much five approaches here: 1) Everyone is Versatile. With a little tweaking, almost any SFX can support a large portfolio, especially when you add magic / tech items to the mix. So do that. 2) Versatility Cap. Put a limit on how broad a portfolio can be. "Magic", "cosmic power", and "high tech" are out. 3) Versatility Trade-Off. Set up a few tiers, where you get higher limits in other areas for lower versatility. For example: * Ultra-broad (magic, cosmic, tech) * Semi-broad (EM manipulation, bio-splicing, space control), +10% to caps * Semi-narrow (heat control, telepathy, short-range teleportation), +20% to caps * Narrow (laser eye beams), +30% to caps 4) Unofficial Trade-Off. As #3, but there's not a hard and fast rule, it's just a factor you take into account when approving characters. 5) Hope for the Best. Just because players can go for maximum versatility, doesn't mean they will, and total balance may not be necessary anyway.

Re: The cost of Internet Well, the AI is certainly not going to be a slower typist than a human. Auto-complete is irrelevant here, because the AI won't be typing individual keys, rather sending the whole search URL in one go. Personally, I might give "instant typing" to an AI for free, but even if not, then Rapid on the HRRP and enough skill levels to bump data searching down the time chart would cover it. It needs some power, but (IMO) just the data search ability, not the KS skill for anything it could look up. To cost it that way would require that other characters can't look things up on the internet, and that doesn't work for me. Now sure, there's in combat vs out of combat. However, this is less of a distinction than for many abilities. Having a 100% reliable gun is worth points compared to having a gun that could be easily damaged, jammed, and so forth. Being able to data search while being shot at is a rare case that deserves maybe a few points, not something that should be a major character investment.

Re: The cost of Internet IMO: * Computer Link (at a 1 point level) would give you access to the internet. * HRRP would let you access it from anywhere there's cellular coverage. * Not really sure how to simulate satellite phones, but maybe a lot of Telescopic on HRRP, enough to "view" someplace that does have coverage? Then you (or your AI) need to find stuff on it. * I'd call internet searching a PS that's an everyman skill. Usual time is too slow for combat though, so you'd need enough levels to bump it down the time chart. * For really fast searching, you might need Rapid on the HRRP. * To be searching without using your actions, you'd need an AI Follower to do it. So, some points, but not as much as the pure KS approach. The reason I'm not comfortable with that approach is that to justify the high point cost, characters who didn't buy it would have to be unable to use a smart phone - and I just can't do that, it shatters WSoD for me.

Re: Running and jumping in the same Phase. I personally run it that when you split your movement between two modes, you can mix those modes how you like. So with 14m Running and 4m Leaping, you can move 7m and make a 2m jump at any point during that movement. Or double both of those if you go to non-combat movement. If the obstacle was awkwardly placed (just past a corner, appeared suddenly, etc) then I'd call for a DEX or Acrobatics roll. I'm pretty sure this isn't RAW, but it's worked pretty well, and it avoid the oddness of hurdles or small gaps bringing people to a standstill. Also makes it more worthwhile to have multiple good modes of movement.

Re: Do random power SFX games work? This seems a bit better. I'd be ok with it, as long as the SFX were broad enough to support more than one type of application. One thing though is that the numbers you gave have people spending a pretty large fraction of their points before knowing what their power is. That could definitely cause problems if they get an SFX which really doesn't mesh with their "normal" abilities. I would go more with making a normal or just above normal person to start, adding the "inherent" aspects of the power as soon as they get it, the "learned applications" over a few games, and over those same few games some general-purpose points to represent adapting to a much more dangerous lifestyle / protagonization.

Re: Summon specific being? Having those perks increases his points, which means he costs more to summon. Alternately, the GM might not even allow summoning people with those kind of powers (especially for a summon that gives you control over them). Specific Being doesn't really factor into this at all. Now if you have a houserule that normally characters with those abilities are not available for summoning, but with Specific Being then they are, that's fine. It does make the advantage actually advantageous. But - it's a houserule.

Re: Summon specific being? I'll say the same thing now that I said earlier, to you, in this thread.

Re: Summon specific being? As has been mentioned, Specific Being is great if you are allowed to combine it with Expanded Class / Variable Effect / whatever to have it summon any specific being of the given type. However, it's arguable whether that's legal - and if it isn't, then Specific Being has as many downsides as benefits.

Re: How to Make: Uncontrolled Super-Strength Something like: 60 STR (base) Uncontrolled Strength: +60 STR, Side Effects (poor control / causes collateral damage, side effect always occurs) Physical Complication: If bands are lost, Uncontrolled Strength must be used, Rare, Significant For how much the Side Effects are worth, it depends on just how uncontrolled that Strength is. Are we talking "sometimes breaks a door trying to open it", or "can't even pick something/someone up without destroying it/them". Likewise for how severe the Physical Complication counts as.

Re: Regenerating teeth For teeth-only regeneration, I would charge at most a point - that would be for settings where replacement teeth were difficult to get, and there was a least a potential chance of losing them. In a modern or future (non-postapocalyptic) setting, it would be free. Now in real life, that would be a pretty sweet thing to have - it's just not something that tends to arise in a game.

Re: Creating "End Of Level Boss" villains Seconded on Damage Reduction. Also, for a foe that's supposed to be really challenging but ultimately beatable, consider some ablative defenses (not just the Ablative limitation specifically, but the general concept). For example, here's some ideas: * Experimental Teleporation Belt - Teleportation X", Position Shift, Trigger (zero-phase), X Charges, Burnout * Surge of Willpower - +X on Breakout Rolls, One Recoverable Charge (recovers when he has a chance to concentrate and refocus). * Metamorphic Rebirth - Dispel Poison/Disease, Side Effects (takes BODY) This lets you avoid going down to the first exotic attack you face, without completely negating characters that focus on those attacks.