Trebuchet

Re: Masked Crimefighters And The Bill Of Rights

Response: Thatman does not take money from the police department for his actions. By the laws of the state' date=' either Thatman must be receiving an appropriate form of compensation from the police department, or Thatman's actions are those of an independant good samaritan. Condoned does not mean Sanctioned. Otherwise, every person who ever called the police or turned someone over to the police would be considered a vigilante. The fact that the police call Thatman using an unusual method of communication does not indicate that it is the same person every time, nor does it indicate that this individual is anything but. Unless the defense can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the same individual always answers the signal, he has no case for dismissal.[/quote']Given that prosecutors use information provided by (often criminal) paid informants, I can't see any relevance to this approach to defense. The info provided by Thatman would be no different than an anonymous tip or envelope full of photos taken by a concerned citizen.

Re: combat luck when grabbed

The rules actually do define it better than that: "depends on a character's ability to dodge, block, or otherwise avoid damage." That says to me that "Luck-based" is really a misnomer - "Dodge-based" would make more sense.

 

What do you think of my proposed line, based on the rules description, that it only operates when Dodge, Block, Missile Deflection, or Dive for Cover theoretically could?

Re: combat luck when grabbed

My point was not that we should consider 'Luck Based' = 'Movement Based' but that you could rebuild Combat Luck using a different limitation and get a much more comprehensible power.

 

Asleep/unconscious/out of combat have NOTHING to do with luck - it is the quite separate 'non-persistent' limitation that covers those bases.

 

There is no reason at all that 'luck' should not intervene to reduce damage for a move through (you hit the target just as he is moving backwards to try and get our of your way, maximising the effect on him, minimising it on you). There is no reason it should not apply to a continuous RKA: yes you are on fire, but a gust of wind or the backlash of a nearby explosion temporarily reduced the intensity.

 

The whole point about something being based on LUCK is that the results will NOT be predictable because luck is not predictable. You can define luck how you like, but you can always think of a way you could 'luckily' avoid a bit of damage: if you can't then you've defined luck into something it is not.

 

That is why I suggested that 'luck based' is not a particularly helpful limitation and you may be better off defining a more tangible basis for damage avoidance - like being able to move out of the way.

 

That wasn't what I was thinking when I first posted in this thread, but that is the conclusion I've come to. point is, however you define it, it is a limitation and has to limit the power (in a way that other existing limitations do not) or it is worth nothing.

"Luck" is only one possible sfx for this Talent. Combat Luck was probably a poor choice of names for this ability; perhaps Damage Avoidance would have been a better name.

Re: combat luck when grabbed

That's my thinking.

 

Batman's and Daredevil's evasiveness always works against guns. There's no randomness there.

 

So...what about my second example (with my players waiting on my final ruling): an Uncontrolled RKA? I applied the CL to the first phase's damage, but not to later phases, since there was no avoiding it.

 

I posted this latest question (and other examples) to Steve.

Re: combat luck when grabbed

I think it doesn't protect against Move Through/By damage because that's damage a character has inflicted upon himself. Just like if you purposefully interpose yourself in front of an attack aimed at someone else. The point being that this power doesn't directly absorb some of the damage of the attack; it serves instead to get you partly out of the way of the attack or whatever' date=' turning a potentially lethal blow into a "flesh wound." So if it is damage that you are actively welcoming rather than trying to avoid....[/quote']That was precisely Steve's reasoning when I asked him for that clarification several years ago. It makes Combat Luck a lot less attractive option for speedsters specializing in Move Through.

 

OTOH, the fact Combat Luck is theoretically "avoiding" the damage rather than blocking it explains why it's Hardened: If it's (ostensibly, at least) not a solid hit, it's not going to armor pierce or penetrate.

Re: combat luck when grabbed

Otherwise you should perhaps redefine the limitation: make it 'Movement Based'' date=' for instance, and call it Combat Dodging - so long as you are capable of moving out of the way of the attack then it works.[/quote']Since Combat Luck doesn't defend a character against damage from his own Move By or Move Through, movement would not seem to be part of the equation for when it works. It's often portrayed in the movies and comics as "luck" but I don't think that necessarily means the "lucky at dice/four-leaf-clover/rabbit's foot" type of luck. I think the 'Luck" portion of it is just a shorthand for the various circumstances it doesn't work: asleep, unconscious, out of combat, doing a Move By/Through, etc.

 

From what I've read, the new 6E Power Negation might be another way to represent this ability.

Re: Omcv 1?

The only ones I would start at zero are MOCV and MDCV' date=' as these are the only ones a typical human would have no reason to possess. I wouldn't change a base OCV or DCV as there is some rationale to the typical individual having some level of competency to throw a rock or duck out of the way.[/quote']Well, "1" might be a better baseline number than "0" for that exact reason; but there's no reason that couldn't have applied to all Characteristics, not just OMCV and DMCV. The problem with the assumption that OMCV and DMCV are the only ones a typical human would have no reason to possess is that we don't really know what they represent. We see "normal" characters in movies and fiction all the time fighting off the effects of mental attacks, even in slasher flicks. Ordinary humans can often resist the effects of drugs or other mind-altering substances (and by extension mental powers); who is to say that struggle is not using OMCV and/or DMCV?

Re: OMCV 1?

The more we go around on this' date=' the more it seems the change did not go far enough. Having MCV's based at 0 instead of 3, on the basis that these are something the vast majority of the population lacks any experience with, seems like it would have been the best solution. No one is "unusually easy to target with mental powers" or "unusually incapable of targetting mental powers" - any skill in this regard becomes unusual in and of itself. Of course, you could always take a Complication reducing your capability even further, but then we would clearly look at a character reducing his OMCV when he has no use for OMVC and conclude no points should be awarded.[/quote']You're quite correct; resetting the start numbers to 1 or 0 for every Characteristic would have been a lot more logical. The more we go around this, the more it's becoming obvious that the way 6E reworked Characteristics is fundamentally flawed. It's a half-measure between the old method and a true reworking which, as you noted, "did not go far enough." As with many compromises, the result will be unsatisfactory to people on both sides of the issue. I saw the inherent flaws in the old method; but I don't see the new method as being any improvement whatsoever. It just has different flaws.

Re: Omcv 1?

Whereas I think that Skill Levels actually require a certain amount of clear thinking to use. The OCV and DCV characteristics' date=' would hence, represent either natural talent or training to the point that it has become second nature.[/quote']That actually makes pretty good sense.

Re: Omcv 1?

Depends on what you consider Stunned. I consider it akin to when a pro fighter gets dazed but is still capable of covering up and maybe a little back-peddling. Obviously they're not out but they're still maintaining a marginal defense.

Re: Omcv 1?

Levels... you mean Combat Skill Levels? that are still there? The ones that stopped working when Stunned? The ones that were kind of like, but not actually like having the real CV in question?

 

Nope. not gone.

 

No one said crisis. your being overly dramatic. Steve saw an opportunity to go "hey, I bet I can take this element is expanded it to make it more customizeable for everone." And he did. And it works nicely.

As an aside, Levels no longer applying when Stunned is no more artificial than CV halving when Stunned. Either could have been changed with 6E. Objectively, it makes no more sense for half OCV to still apply when Stunned than it does for CSL's to apply. What rationale is there for a character to retain half of his DCV when the birds are circling his head after a hit that wouldn't just as easily apply to CSL's?

Re: Omcv 1?

It would also demand everyone have equal OCV and DCV' date=' or purchase their abilities with limitations where the two would differ. A lot like the suggestion to merge PD and ED, as I think of it.[/quote']Characters have survived with equal base OCV and DCV, modified individually for maneuvers and circumstances, since 1982. I'm unclear as to when this became a crisis.

 

Would it solve anything? What would prevent the non-mentalist selling back his MCV, and buyinhg back MCV "defensive only", leading to exactly the same issue?

Once upon a time in Hero there were these things called Levels which could be used to purchase bonuses to OCV and DCV separately. I take it those have now been eliminated in 6E? Thank goodness all the system's "flaws" have now been solved.

Re: Omcv 1?

That is the approach in 6E' date=' isn't it? "Everyone starts at 3CV and 3MCV" is the same as saying "Everyone starts with 3OCV, 3DCV, 3OMCV, and 1DMCV" isn't it?[/quote']If almost everyone sells back some of their OMCV, it might come to that, but I suspect we'll see a lot of house rules or other methods to discourage that.

Re: Omcv 1?

We divided them into OMCV and ODCV' date=' and OCV and DCV, despite the fact we used CV and ECV (before 6e) as shorthand for the starting point for both.[/quote']That approach would also have served admirably in 6E and would have helped simplified Characteristics. As it is, it looks like another change for the sake of change.

Re: Omcv 1?

I don't see a problem with DMCV. It seems reasonable that your average person wouldn't be "completely helpless" with a zero. Everyone knows to shut their eyes and put themselves in a happy place from time to time, or, "think of nothing" when the guardian wants to read from your mind the form the big bad monster dude should take.

 

So it's OMCV that causes the problem in my mind. And I'm inclined to want them to start at the same place in general. **shrug**

Re: Omcv 1?

As to splitting MCV' date=' how do we apply levels if we have only MCV, not OMCV and DMCV? A Mental Skill Level seems a pretty good buy if it enhances both ofense and defense at the same time.[/quote']How did we do it before 6E when all we had was ECV? That method seemed perfectly adequate for 27 years. OCV and DCV not separate entities on a character sheet; they started at the same base number by default and then actions and maneuvers modified them individually.

 

What I find problematic is the theory that normal people will have OMCV superior to 95%+ of more powerful characters. With that in mind, I would prefer an approach that sets the starting point at 0, so the average Super is just like Joe Normal - he has 0 OMCV, 0 DMCV, can't fly, can't shoot bolts of energy, etc. PC's could then pay for mental CV's that put them above the Masses, just like they buy numerous other abilities that place them beyond the realm of "normal human".

Sure, but that would screw mentalists because other character archetypes would have their base CV starting at a higher point.

Re: Omcv 1?

If the character gets 5 points for a Complication, it should come up in the game. That's not "screwing over a character", it's adhering to the contract undertaken by the character sheet.

 

If a character gets 5 points for slapping "1 1/2x STUN from green and purple froglike martians wielding solar powered heat weapons", then I expect the game will eventually include green and purple froglike martians wielding solar powered heat weapons. Not very often, as it's only 5 points, but it should be expected to happen at some point, and the character will have to find a way to deal with this weakness.

 

If the player is selling back 2 points of OMCV so he can buy something else advantageous with the 6 points he gets back, he should expect there to be a drawback at some point in time due to his reduced OMCV. Maybe it's an opponent with a potent mental blast blocked only by strength of will (NND: blocked by a combat roll of target's MOCV vs attaker's MOCV, or some variant of alternate CV that attacks the target's MOCV instead of his MDCV). Perhaps it's Heroic items for sale that are psionic in nature and target using MOCV. It might be a scenario or two set on the MindScape, Astral Plain or some other alternate dimension where MOCV is used to target all attacks. There are, I'm sure, numerous other possibilities if one is creative. But the reduction to MOCV indicates that the character should have this unusual attribute highlighted at some point in time.

 

"Screwing the character over" would be shifting the campaign to the Astral Plane, giving every VIPER agent on up attacks that target MOCV in some manner, etc. - rubbing his nose in this relatively minor deficiency. That's no different than constantly targetting the low rDEF, high DCV character with AoE killing attacks, and the Brick with attacks vs exotic defenses he doesn't possess, or basing the campaign in its entirety on the Invasion of the Green and Purple Froglike Martians Wielding Solar Powered Heat Weapons.

To me, this entire issue illustrates that breaking MCV into two parts was a mistake in the first place; akin to breaking STR into "Damage STR" and "Lifting STR."

Re: Omcv 1?

I agree that screwing over the character is going too far. But giving him a bit of hassle now and then is a time-honored GMing tradition. After all' date=' you're not going to let someone who sold back Running win any foot races, are you? [/quote']Nope, but chases and pursuits are pretty common no matter what the genre. OTOH I'd have to come up with a pretty off-beat scenario to justify penalizing a non-mentalist PC for his OMCV 1 over his teammates' OCMV 3+.

Re: Omcv 1?

Regarding 6E2, p270, Character Sheet As Contract:

 

Buying stuff tends to mean you intend to get any use for, taking Complications would mean you expect them to have an impact on the game.

 

My (personal) interpretation of that would be that by buying up or down CHAR values, I expect that to have an effect on the game. That would mean that the GM should rightly inform the player that "buying up or down OMCV would have no impact on that character who is probably not going to have any use for it in this campaign, thus it is worth no points either way, up or down".

 

Just my long-winded way of restating "a limitation that does not limit the character is not a limitation (or Complication)". Like Alibear said.

 

However: As a GM, I might suggest a possible scenario where a reduced OMCV might come up, to a player who was thinking about buying it down. That usually causes people to drop the issue, IME.

As an aside: No matter what I think of the probable cheesiness of a PC selling back OMCV, I think a GM who decides to screw over a character for following the written rules in such a trivial case is reaching more than the player.

Re: Reactions to 6e

I paid about $1,500 CDN for a 21" pivot about 5 years ago. A 17" or 19" one should be really cheap by now... Hmm, a 22" pivot is $270 CDN! Wow, if you have a desktop why wouldn't you have a pivot monitor?!

 

It's actually an odd artifact of computers that monitors are landscape orientation by default, portrait makes so much more sense, especially if you deal with books and e-books. They had pivoting CRT's in the early-mid 90's but cultural innertial and needless tradition reach even into the high tech world.

 

Just saying, if you read a lot of stuff on the screen, be it webpages or e-books, the absolute best investment you can make for your desktop is a pivoting monitor.

 

Sorry, end of digression. Back on topic. "Nuff Said"

Re: Omcv 1?

Make it 9 - 3 more levels of combat luck. Right in concept.

 

But have her sell back MOCV to pay for it? Is there any reason that she would be less adept at mental combat than the typical man on the street, despite the fact that I'm sure she could easily find an in-concept use for 6 points? Sellbacks should be just as much in concept as purchases.

My point is, I can't look into another player's heart and know what his concept is. We do discuss character concepts amongst ourselves so I might question his rationale (or suspected rationalization) for selling down OMCV, but I probably couldn't say "That's against your character concept, so I won't allow it." I just have to trust my players, as my GM's have to trust me, to perform some level of self-policing of concept.

Re: Omcv 1?

I agree with both points. Go ahead and sell it back' date=' subject to the same conditions in the game as any other sellback. In some games, that might mean it must be justified by character concept (would your group agree with Z'lf buying an extra 10/10 rDEF because she needs the defenses, concept be damned, not that I expect you would ask to buy it?). In most, it likely means this is anticipated to have negative effects a bit more than with a 5 point complication ("Oh, let him call it Common and have it come up Uncommonly - 5 points certainly isn't going to throw off the balance of the game") , or more or less on par with any other sellback that generates 6 points.[/quote']Character concept should always be looked at, although not all players are equal in their grasp or adherence to their character's supposed concept.

 

Let's look at the example you gave: Zl'f adding +10 rDEF. Her current defenses are 12PD, 12ED, 8 of each Resistant and Hardened. So she'd be in essence asking to nearly double her defenses. Her concept is the Fragile But Artful Dodger; the character that uses her inhuman agility to avoid being hit in the first place, but whose ability to take a hit is deliberately poor. She'd have to be a lot less dodgy if her defenses go up by 90%, so it'd be fair for my GMs to question whether I'm altering Zl'f's concept a bit too much (which it certainly would). I think my GM's would rightly conclude that if I honestly feel Zl'f needs higher defenses, then perhaps something a little less radical would be in order: Maybe buy another level of Combat Luck and increase her CON to 19 or 20. That would make her a bit tougher, but not so much so that she would become unrecognizable. Adding 10rDEF would let her ignore bullets, which blows the concept right out of the water.

 

I have resisted the urge to increase Zl'f's defenses for many years now, despite my personal tendencies to build defensively. If I didn't stick with the core concept, by now she'd be wearing powered armor.

Re: Omcv 1?

Actually, I'm inclined to think the best solution is to start OMCV (and maybe DMCV as well) at 1 (and allow no sellbacks below 1) or 0 - that is, to make these traits that most people simply do not have at a baseline because they have no opportunity to learn the ability.

I think the issue is that the fact that OMCV starts at 3, and seems to be easily sold back at no penalty by many characters, is where a problem is viewed to arise. If most characters sell it back, why have a base of 3 anyway? If there is a drawback to the sellback, problem solved.

 

Having an Ego of 10 means "I am slightly better than the Man in the Street". I would compare this to having an EGO of about 3. I would expect an explanation of why this character is so unusually weak-willed, and I (player or GM) would expect to see that weak will exploited in-game on occasion to cause difficulties for the character in question.

 

I would similarly look sideways at players deciding "Well, my character lacks Agility Skills and has no compelling reason to go first in combat - guess I'll sell his DEX back to 1" or "my Energy Projector will never throw a punch - may as well sell off 9 STR". Might I allow it? Sure, with a reason the character is so deficient in this regard, and with the expectation it will come back to his detriment in some fashion. The same yardstick I would apply to sellback of OMCV.

I'd be fine allowing selling back OMCV, with the caveat to the player that it's possible he'll miss that extra couple of OMCV points someday. Six character points certainly isn't going to throw off the balance of the game.

Re: Bigtime Blowout

The white background hurts my eyes... It sucks having incredibly light sensitive eyes... They are pretty though.

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

Steve stated somewhere that "a thing that enhances the effect of a Characteristic" is a Talent, not a Characteristic.

 

If I recall correctly there's usually a space for "Appearance", in which you can write whatever you want.

 

Treb, I was one of the defenders of COM. I even had it in my signature here for a while. But the fight is over.