Super Squirrel

Re: Aldaric Gaming Presents: The Illuminati

Regarding the campaign itself, if anyone wants to jump in and help me design the three illuminati groups, please feel free to assist. I'm just getting the basic information and subcategories setup so that players and GMs can get the feel for the differences of the group.

Re: A Thread for Random Musings

Doing some work on The Illuminati Campaign tonight I added the section for Media Control. Low and behold, what Google decided would be appropriate for an ad. (Top Most Ad)

Re: Aldaric Gaming Presents: The Illuminati

I have some examples of City Designer below:

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=35286

I also recently made a battlemap for the streets of Calthorn for Alice that we never ended up using. It is very simple to make maps on the fly with CC2.

Re: Aldaric Gaming Presents: The Illuminati

Thank you. I have put a lot of time into it and will continue to put work into it as long as I can. I'm probably not adding any additional campaign settings for a while. My plan has been to get two systems fully available and then work out all the imperfections in the system. I wanted them to be Fantasy and Dark Champions.

Well, those two maps, I didn't make. RPMiller did. But we both use Campaign Cartographer Pro for map making. He has the entire system, I just have CC2 Pro and City Designer. I have a mostly finished map of Calthorn I need to upload. Speaking of which, I need to bug RPMiller about the revised world map.

Oh, those Google Ads on the side are going to pay for commissioned art. Once the ads reach $50.00, I'll get my first check which is going towards paying an artist for some artwork. So feel free to click on those ads anytime you think of it.

Re: Aldaric Gaming Presents: The Illuminati

For group one' date=' I'd go with "The Eight" and have fifteen members. After all, if I were part of an enduring cabal, I'd hardly advertise the real number of leaders.[/quote']

The Council of Thirteen uses base 6 with a left to right number system. Therefore there are really 19 not 13 councilmen.

Re: Aldaric Gaming Presents: The Illuminati

Okay, I have the basic system up.

http://aldaric.com/illuminati

There is nothing special just yet other than room to begin putting in information on The Big Three. I'll be doing a lot of work on that tonight.

Re: Aldaric Gaming Presents: The Illuminati

Group two could be called the peacekeepers their agents could be called Doves.

It unfortunately makes them sound too much like pansies. There is nothing peacekeeping about an illuminati group that permits its agents to use whatever force is necessary and to let the Media Crew take care of the aftermath.

You know the scene in El Mariachi when he walks into the bar and kills everyone in this glorified massive shootout? That is your typical mission for this illuminati group.

Re: Vehicle & Weapon Familiarities

SHADOW_DRAGON, there is no need to post questions in more than one form. It is actually quite obnoxious.

But to answer your question, no you do not need to pay points to operate a vehicle you paid points for. However, I think it is bad form to not at least spend a point on the TF.

In the case of the weapon, if the weapon is built as Universal Focus but is not Independent, you need a WF but if it is built as a Universal Focus and is Independent, I would assume you can access its powers without a WF. Again, it is bad form to run it that way.

Re: Aldaric Gaming Presents: The Illuminati

I like those ideas. I might just go with them. Or at least the Migard Serpent works well.

While the network was a great idea, I've decided that it isn't broad enough of a topic to garner the attention necessary to put it on Aldaric Gaming (for now). Because I needed something to put up there and I wanted a Dark Champions game, I have decided to create an Illuminati campaign setting.

The campaign setting puts players in a world where not one but three illumanti groups exist, struggling to expand their power base to cover the entire world.

Group 1 has existed for thousands of years. The group is countrolled by a certain number of wealth, powerful councilmen. When they die, their heir becomes their successor.

Group 2 was created in the late 1940s after the first atomic test. Its purpose is to protect the world from itself. It does whatever is necessary to see that superpowers are kept like kittens in the real scheme of things.

Group 3 is a mystery. It exists as both groups have encountered it. But neither group knows exactly what its sphere of influence is and what its true motivation is.

Now the only thing I need to finish getting the basics for The Illumanti online is help with some names.

I'm thinking that I'll call Group 1: The Council of Thirteen and giving the council thirteen members. If someone has a better name or a better number of council members to give it, please share.

I have no idea at all what to call Group 2. This is meant to be the group the player characters play from though Group 1 could also be used.

For Group 3, I'm thinking of calling it something like: The Circle of Serpeants or The Brotherhood of Serpeants. But I'm definitely open to ideas.

Re: The Problem with Even Characteristic Costs

A huge problem I've always had with Hero System is the fact that Package Deals don't carry much weight. Say someone who selects an Elf Package Deal gets a +2 to DEX and -2 to CON as part of the package. Well... it doesn't make any difference at all in terms of chargen. The +2 DEX, -2 CON mean nothing, because there is no particular benefit or penalty associated with the adjustments. In either case, the player could resell or buy the DEX or CON values up or down to what they would be for a normal human character.

 

What creates this problem? Because of even Characteristic costs at all levels. Buying 1 point of a characteristic costs the same amount of Character Points, no matter WHAT your current score is. If my DEX is 19, it costs me 3 CP to buy it up to 20. If my DEX is 12, it costs 3 CP to buy it up to 13. And no matter what, NCM remains 20 across the board (for basic characteristics). So characteristic adjustments due to package deals have no meaning.

 

I'm not touting GURPS here, but GURPS Characteristics cost exponentially more the higher you buy them. 10 is the GURPS "average" for all characteristics, and having a 10 is free. Buying a characteristic up to 11 (I'm using fanciful numbers here) might cost 10 points, while buying the same characteristic up to 12 from 11 might cost 15 points, while buying it from 12 to 13 would cost 25 points.

 

This means that characteristic adjustments actually have meaning. Because if you have a -1 racial modifier to STR, you have to PAY to have an average score, and it will always cost you more to reach the same characteristic level as someone without the characteristic adjustment. By the same token, if you have a +1 adjustment to a characteristic, you pay LESS to have the same characteristic level as someone without the adjustment.

 

I think Hero should be amended somehow (if only by fans) to give characteristic adjustments more meaning, and I think exponential characteristic progression is the way to do it. That's just me, though.

I shift NCM based on Package Deals. The Elf has 20's in all Characteristics except for the 18 in CON and the 22 in DEX.

The same goes for characters with Physical Limitation: Size

Re: Permanent Size Changes...

What was so terribly wrong with buying it as Growth? Certainly it had the disadvantage that you could technically have it dispelled or suppressed' date=' but doesn't the new Inherent advantage cover that? I'm not totally opposed to "the new regime", but can someone sell me on it?[/quote']

*puts on his BS hat*

 

Fantasy Hero is Heroic Level. In a Heroic Level you automatically have Normal Characteristics Maxima. As a GM for a Fantasy Hero game I'm going to agree that someone bigger than others isn't going to have the same upper limit.

 

Now double human size is +15 STR and +3 BODY. That's NCM of 35 STR and 23 BODY. The point difference they are potentially saving is 21 points. Plus they get permission to buy stretching and knockback resistance which others do not normally get.

 

Now the Physical Limitation is Infrequent, Slightly Impairing. Slightly Impairing is spot on. You have to duck entering buildings and usually walk hunched down when indoors. The rest of it comes from within combat which isn't too bad when you consider the +15 STR is giving the character +3 PD making the hits less effective. Invest 5 points on Damage Resistance to make the giant person thick skinned and you have someone practically immune to small weapons and bad damage rolls.

 

The Infrequent is good unless you find the game going into cities most of the time or if combat is very common in which case you could agree to give the person Frequent. Also don't forget, a large person is likely also going to have Distinctive Features and maybe even a Social Limitation.

Re: A Thread for Random Musings

I would love a seperate move/literature thread from the NGD. I'd start a thread on a particular book series but really, it would be buried in two hours tops and not likely to resurface.

Re: A Thread for Random Musings

I wish there was an option to check that would block all Hurricane Katrina related threads.

Re: Clerical magic?

This is not correct. Saints were not said to have creative power' date=' pantheistic gods were.[/quote']

As far as a magical system goes, that is what I have been using. Spells come from the Saints themselves.

Re: Pulp Hero HC cost

$50.00

Re: ??

As you walk down the alley the wall to the left explodes outward in a shower of brick. Out of the hole steps a large heavily muscled creature with the body of a man and the head of a ox. He carries what looks to be an unconscious woman in his arms.

 

Phase 12, go.

Deidra will spend a full phase casting "Focus of the Hawk" giving me +4 CSL with Swords, Lingering(5 minutes)

Re: Linked Powers

Just how many forums are you planning on asking this question?

Re: Aldaric Gaming Presents: Easthaven

I finished moving all of the layout over. I'm going to be a bit busy for a while so I won't be doing many major updates on the site for a while. I'll be focusing on smaller updates for the time being that should help ease the system.

Re: Subway Cars

Didn't Keith Curtis do a similar map at one point in time?

Re: Skills

A more detailed skill system would be appropriate for those games where simply rolling 3d6 once doesn't satisfy, in a dramatic sense.

 

A good example would be a modern or near-future computer hacker game. "I rolled a 4 on my 16- skill, so I guess I crack the FBI's security and erase myself and all evidence pointing to me from their database." Eh, no good.

 

A good idea, in my opinion, for this sort of thing, or for any sort of climactic skill roll in any game, would be to work up a system like this for the skill rolls in question:

 

http://www.20by20room.com/2004/01/practical_causa.html

 

Special thanks to Nyrath for bringing this to the attention of the Hero Community.

Dark Champions has some good rules on that.

Re: A Thread for Random Musings

It isn't really new thread worthy but at least worth posting. Today, after 20 months, I picked up my novel I had written a rough draft for and have begun the editting process. I can't do the start to finish edit, instead one of the characters that appears in Chapter 18 started chattering to me. So I'm focusing on that area hoping that it will at least help me work out a better understanding of what is happening to improve other chapters.

Re: The Network: Campaign Setting Idea

Hmmm. Would it be possible with 4th Dimensional Travel that aliens came from Earth on a different part of the fourth dimension?

Re: One Wizard tower is another's shop

this is what Iam talking about Super.

 

But to make the door move would that not be a major tranform?

 

give it focus bonus (OIF) 1/2 and bulky 1/2(wall and building). Bulky might be considered metagaming.

 

thanks Super Spuirrel

No. Shapeshift doesn't change functions, just appearance. You can still enter, the door is just in a different location.

Re: The Network: Campaign Setting Idea

Some questions to answer as a GM, and some answers provided by other authors:

 

A big question is why are they here (Compatible biospheres are rare? This used to be their home? Some other bizarre astrophysical reason why our planet is valuable, like it sits at a wormhole junction or something, and they want a base of operations? Complete accident, they've invaded the wrong place?). Keep in mind that just about any physical resource would be easier to extract from the asteroid belt, or at least another planet without vicious talking apes on it.

Another is why did they land troops first, as opposed to, say, dropping big rocks on all our important cities, etc (They need our biosphere intact, and didn't want to risk an ice-age? They didn't expect us to be here when they came home, and didn't bring big weapons? Some other political force in the cosmos would retaliate if they wiped out an indigenous intelligence? Planet based defenses are so advanced in their tech that 'boarding' is the only real option for warfare?).

A third is why did the ships leave the troops here (The ship engines would eventually warp and degrade the planet's magnetosphere, letting in lethal radiation that would spoil the precious biology? They went to get some reinforcements; they never expected to have to fight, and these troops aren't soldiers so much as outraged explorers returning to an infested home? What they're doing is illegal, and jump-ships orbiting a low-tech world would be a dead giveaway? They expected to have advanced tech resources to plunder to fuel their ships, but without that, they're restricted to 'in-system' drives and hydrogen scooping - they're all out by Jupiter until the troops can build a refueling depot?)

Answers to questions like these will greatly inform the overarching plotline of the game, but not necessarily the game to game stuff - you're still plugging aliens on Main Street. In fact, you can have the accepted theory be totally wrong from the real one, and have the heroes be ostracized for advancing a rival (correct) theory. For instance, if the President thinks they just want to share our ecology, but they really are pirates setting up a base, then his proposed peace initiative (we can share Gaea's bounty) is useless or worse, etc.