Snarf

You should check out Star Hero or The Ultimate Vehicle. Basically, humanoid mecha are built just like other vehicles but have the extra limbs power. In season 1, before Big O got a new power ever episode, these were the weapons I remember: Grappling and Pulling Chain Thingies - Stretching with limitations, I think. Laser Eyes - Bigass RKA. Hidden Rockets - RKA with charges and autofire or maybe a big RKA with one charge and reduced penetration, to abstract all the missles into one attack, since he always uses them all at once. Arm Shields - DCV or possibly Armor with limitations. Fifth Edition represents ordinary shields as DCV. Arm Piston Blasty Things - RKA with armor piercing, extra time(?), and extra damage linked to a punch. Or maybe just a big HKA. He never actually hurt anyone with the those blasts that missed.

I just finished doing a pokemon conversion, though it was more for camp value than respect for the source material. I've already written some of the items I used out and put them online. You can find those and some other things in this: http://www2.hawaii.edu/~rdeese/RPG/Hero/items.rtf Eventually, it's going to be in a webpage but for now it's just a text file. I worked out a lot of the powers while doing monster write-ups and I thought about others, so I may be able to help you. But maybe not, because my philosophy was that keeping things simple was more important than making them exactly like the game. First of all, all attacks do stun damage only, and all healing heals stun damage only in my version, because the little monsters "faint" instead of dying when they get beat down. Also, all monster attacks use charges instead of endurance. Capturing is a transform attack and wild Pokemons have a Physical Limitation that makes them resist the capture with their current STUN instead of BODYx2, so they can be beaten into submission and captured like in the game. Confusion - Mind Control with limitations. Critical Hits - Extra Damage with an activation roll. Flinching - Presence Attacks or Ego Attacks with an Only for Stunning limitation. Freezing/Paralysis - Entangle with the options for mental paralysis added. Poison - I did this as 1 pip of STUN damage with continuous and minute long continuing charges. Metronome - This would be a VPP with no conscious control and some other limitations. Mirror Move - Another VPP, check out the mimic pool sidebar example in the Fifth Edition Book. Softboiled - Healing with a Side Effect of hurting the user. If you want actual write-ups, I can give you one for some of these.

But that would limit you to using the spell once a day. You'd probably want to use this at every battle.

Does the damage represent one nasty spider bite or a bunch of tiny spider bites? Maybe it could be reduced penetration, like an animal bite.

And since active defense is a standalone roll instead of resisted, buying a few levels makes you invincible to everything but surprise attacks. That's just one way GURPS gets broken when you try to do superhero level games. It would have been way better if they had kept it consistent.

I don't see any reason why this couldn't work. You could forget about CSLs entirely and just by skills with individual weapons like GURPS. I don't even think you'd need an advantage to represent killing damage, you could just eliminate resistant defenses and make all weapons and armor deal and protect against normal damage. Once people get more used to the system you could start reintroducing rules and making things more complex and strategic. Somewhere in the Fifth Edition combat section, it recommended dropping the speed table and endurance costs if complexity and speed of play is a problem. That's another thing you could try.

That's fine if you want them throwing around spells like superheroes, but beginner fantasy wizards are supposed to be limited to a couple spells a day.

Maybe that focus should be bulky.

There's not much point in me mentioning this, since the spell already only costs 1 point, but a 1d6 transform seems like overkill to me, for the body of a small pot of food. If there was some way to buy a 1 pip of effect, I think that would be enough.

This may have already been mentioned at some point in this thread, but the official value for "Only Affect Evil Beings" is -1/2. I just noticed it on page 48 of Fantasy Hero.

Geez lay off the acronyms people Have mercy on the new player.

It's probably talking about the power type of "Adjustment Powers" which you can read about at the beginning of the powers section of your Fifth Edition book. Self Only is used for beneficial adjustment powers that could be used to help others like Aid or Healing. The thing to keep in mind is that a lot of powers are already usable only on the caster by default. You actually have to apply advantages to turn certain powers into spells you can use to help others. For instance, the armor power is something the caster can only protect himself with by default , since armor is more often used to simulate a suit of armor or super tough skin. If you want the option to magically give other people armor, you need to put the Usable By Other advantage on it. For your Mage Armor spell, assuming you've made it with the Armor power, you could just leave it alone and it would work how you want.

Re: calculating MANA costs I don't know how to design spells, but you're probably thinking of the -1/2 Self-Only limitation.

You would have to spend a ridiculous amount to be able to duplicate someone worth a lot more points than you. This might end up costing more than it's worth for its usefulness.

I guess the lack of response means nobody has seen this movie. Seriously, check it out at the video store everyone. It's like a Twilight Zone episode made on a movie budget. That surprises me, because to me luck is the quintessential hero power. Every time I see someone run through a wave of gunfire or jump off a 4 story building and live in a movie I think that guy is damn lucky. Or sometimes I think, "Whoa! That guy must have like 6 levels of Combat Luck!!"

If you haven't heard of this movie, it's about people who have the power to steal luck, either by touching someone or taking a photo of them. They compete against each other in clandestine games of chance, some of which are extremely dangerous and high stakes. Here's a trailer: http://www.apple.com/trailers/lions_gate/intacto.html I was thinking of different ways this power could be done in Hero and this is what I came up with: Luck Stealing: Transfer Luck 4d6 (target's luck to character's luck), Can Transfer Maximum of 40 points, (AP 68); (RC 68). This would be the simplest way to do it, but you have to talk your GM into allowing Luck to be drained into negatives like a characteristic. If this isn't allowed, it could be done with a transform which inflicts the Unluck disadvantage, and a bunch of Luck or an Aid Luck linked to that transform and limited by its effect. Luck Stealing: Transfer Luck 6d6 (target's luck to character's luck), Reduced Endurance (0 END, +1/2), Delayed Return Rate (5 points per year, +2 1/2), Can Transfer Maximum of 150 points, (AP 423); (RC 423). Here's something closer to the overpowered luck stealing used in the movie. The contest of luck used in the movie (like running through a forest blindfolded and whoever doesn't ram into a tree wins) could be done as luck vs. luck rolls, similar to skill versus skill rolls, or whoever has the most levels of luck could automatically win, which would be more like how it was described in the movie. The modified Russian roulette game could be done as an opposed luck roll. Stealing luck through photos would just be part of the cosmology of that world. Photos steal part of your soul there and you can steal luck or use other touch powers on a target through them. So, what do y'all think? Would you allow the Transfer Luck power in your game? Have you ever used luck extensively in your games?

There was power in USPD called Blink Teleport or something like that. It's just a bunch of DCV with costs endurance. Put in a teleportation tricks multipower or EC and you'll be nighcrawlering with the best of them. Well, that handles the defense part but it doesn't move you any noticeable distance. You'd need to do something else if you wanted the movement.

I also recommend the UNTIL Superpowers Database as the second book to buy. It's much easier to get started in Hero with a lot of examples to look at.

When I wanted this effect, I ended up just doing Drain Dex as a copout. That's sort of paralyzing =/ I think the book needs an specific option for paralyzing drug, like it has for mental paralysis. This could be just be a small conditional power limitation. Something like Conditional Power: Does Not Work On Individuals With LS: Vacuum/High Pressure (-1/4). A whole -1/4 seems like a bit much for that though, unless it's more common than usual in your campaign. If it's not that common, maybe you could expand that to a slightly broader category of protective things.

Well, the technology is rubbery, but the theory is real. In that way, it's no more rubber science than fusion drives.

The thing about Hero is that it prices social abilities as considerably cheaper than powers and most combat abilities. For instance, the relative costs of PRE and DEX. The simulation aspect works fine but the game balance might be off in an almost entirely socially based campaign.

Another thing about that book. The fuel source in that spaceship was extracting energy from empty space. This is theoretically possible - physicists have theorized that space is a bubbling foam containing an unbelievable amount of energy - but of course nobody has the faintest idea how we could get that energy.

In case you haven't heard of ramscoops Von-D Man, a ramscoop is a device that magnetically grabs the loose particles of hydrogen floating in interstellar space and compresses them for a fusion reaction. You have to be going fast already for it to work at all (thus the laser/light sail for launching) but once it's running you don't need to carry any fuel and it can go fast. It's theoretically possible to do all of this, but the technology to magnetically scoop up and compress hydrogen, and protect the ship from radiation and meteors is needed. Since you're already are using mag shields in that campaign that stuff sounds pretty reasonable.

UNTIL style would be awesome. Some disadvantage builds could be common, useful stuff and others could be clever stuff that uses the rules in unexpected ways.

Yeah, that's interesting to consider. My first thought is that it's still more of a disadvantage in an RPG but I need to think of more examples.