Mentor

Originally posted by Trebuchet

Umm, Thunderbird was present in our battle against Eurostar, Mentor. If you'll recall he not only rather easily shot down Ultrasonique, but managed a 12d6 EB hit or two against Mentalla before she Ego Blasted him out of the sky. Without the damage T'bird had already done to her (and which kept Mentalla from focusing exclusively on Zl'f) it's unlikely Zl'f would have been able to take down Mentalla in one hit, no matter how magnificent the actual damage roll was. (44 STUN on 10d6)

 

While it's true that Zl'f was both the last MidGuardian standing and the one that ultimately knocked out Mentalla and finished the fight, without Thunderbird I seriously doubt we would have won that battle.

 

Still at large: Fiacho and Feurmacher.

Oh yeah. Well considering Mentalla drained 3 points of Prodigy's Ego and then hit him with an Ego Blast, my mind was on other things.

Originally posted by Trebuchet

Wasn't Beef Wellington a villain on the same team as Spanish Dagger? I remember him.

More's the pity. We all have skeletons in our closet. This Euro team was one of mine.

Originally posted by Agent X

Being Christian, I don't really try to role play this sort of stuff. It's too close to home. The idea of putting stats on my God or role playing his reaction to things, no thanks.

Same with our campaign. Even the agnostics or atheists are respectful of the believers in our group in their treatment of religious issues.

 

On the other hand, as in Highlander and vampire lore, Holy ground is real and powerful, whether its a church, the wailing wall in Jerusalem, or the Mescalero burial grounds, China's Wudan mountain, etc.

Originally posted by Lord Liaden

This was exactly the function of the (late, lamented) Bora on the 4E version of the team. If they needed to bug out in a hurry she could use AoE Telekinesis (wind) to airlift everyone at once.

 

I'm still using that lineup for Eurostar BTW. It's a much more powerful and better balanced team than the one in CKC.

I agree that Bora and Pantera were a major loss to the lineup, but the Whip guy was a welcome deletion.

 

When our team took down some of the Eurostar team, Scorpia went down early enough for one of our Martial Artists, Zlf to take out Mentalla while she was busy sparring (fairly successfully) with my Mentalist, Prodigy, who had mentally paralyzed Durak for three phases after Durak cold cocked our teleporting brick Sidestep...sort of a cascading rock, paper, scissors effect all around with two of the hero team standing and no Eurostar standing. If Z'lf had fought Pantera instead of Scorpia, the fight might have turned out far differently. Certainly if our flying Energy Projector had been present, Bora would have been a much tougher challenge than Fuermacher. Nonetheless, the fight was challenging enough for those of us involved.

 

As Eurostar was literally the only component of the Hero Universe we have ever used in our campaign relatively unchanged, keeping Bora and Pantera would be an easy solution for the GM who ran the adventure, although he is new enough not to have all the fourth and earlier edition stuff.

Treb, I once designed a comic relief British brick who was called Beef Wellinton. Too stupid a concept or character to use in our campaign, though. I'll work on some ideas.

Gary, you are still the acknowledged master of Stat Fu.

 

Great job.

What is the whole cultural mass psychosis with Paris Hilton all about? Does anybody really think that this quasi anorexic, overindulged, shallow airhead is hot???

 

I saw a segment of those two twits in "Simple Life" on the freaking tube and all I could think of was many blessings on D-Man for having the good sense not to own one of the vile artifices.

 

Maybe we are are entering another Dark Age.

Originally posted by winterhawk

This is exactly what I did in my 4th Edition campaign. Each casino sponsored a hero for the team:

 

Luxor - Pharoah

Caesar's - Gladiator

Treasure Island - Swashbuckler

Circus Circus - Highwire

MGM Grand - Lioness

 

They were very public figures, often serving as greeters and making appearances a big events like boxing matches.

 

For my 5th campaign, I decided to use MfH's idea and had a cabal of casino's covertly hire a supermercenary on Mechassassin's level. He called Wildcard and maintains a Batmanesque 'urban legend' reputation. The last supervillains that tried to knock over a casino, were never seen again.

I love the Vegas themed characters. Consider them respectfully plagerized.

I always end up alpha, even when my PC originally was conceived as more behind the scenes or subtle, if not beta. Most of our gaming group is fairly to very passive, as Trebuchet can attest. He has really picked up the pace when I GM or am not there.

Blackjack has a female brick who is not afraid to mix it up with anyone as a hero, but the character is a Beta "nerd" out of hero ID. Makes some cool roleplay.

 

Interestingly, my two sons, age 14 and 9, now play in our campaign, and are pretty aggressive; sometimes too much so. That will change a team dynamic.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Seeker

 

Originally posted by McCoy

I always thought Steve Irwin would be the perfect Secret ID for Seeker, as well as my first choice to play him him in Champions: The Motion Picture.

Great image, McCoy.

 

"Krikey, its Dr. Destroyer. We'll need more than a staff to take on that beauty, mates.":D

Re: What Would Your Character Do? #30

 

Originally posted by Wormhole

It's lunchtime in the campaign city. In Secret ID, you join one of your teammates and his girlfriend, Heather, for lunch at an outdoor cafe. The three of you are laughing and talking- though trying to avoid certain topics since she doesn't know about his crimefighting career yet- when Teleios shows up with a platoon of his Clone Troopersâ„¢ and grabs Heather! Unable to intervene immediately without compromising both of your Secret IDs, you each sneak off to chance into your costumes only to find Teleios and his henchclones have given you the slip. Your teammate then pulls out what looks like the reciever unit for a tracking device. As you are following the homing signal to Telios's lair de jour, you ask him how he got a tracker on Heather. He then confesses something to you that, though you always knew he was something of a shade of gray, surprises you nonetheless. Last year, when she went in for an apendix operation, he blackmailed her doctor (who was addicted to painkillers and stealing them from the hospital supplies) into secretly implanting her with the tracker during surgery. As shady an affair as it was, he says he believed he was justified in doing it because Heather is "just so damned kidnap prone" and he's always worried that the next time some scumbag abducts her he'll lose her forever (there have been several "close calls" in the recent past). He asks you not to repeat what he has just told you to anyone; not to the others on the team and, most especially, not to Heather. What would you do?

My Egoist, Prodigy, is 900 years old and has been manipulating events in human history for the good all of his career. (Not always successfully given that his opposition is of similar longevity and ability). He views privacy and other modern expectations as convenient rather than necessary. As he would be just as likely to read someone's mind to track down the kidnapped Heather or mind scan the city for her, he would not be too put out.

Originally posted by gewing

IIRC, the extremeyly light and fast "bbs" were made of "AM2" surounded by "Imperium" on impact the shell cracked, and they went off like a fair sized explosive. I can't recall what the actual power level was, just that a hit was pretty much a kill.

 

IIRC, with enough shots, heavy armor could conceivably be chewed through.

 

Neat, but....

 

I was really bothered by the sniper rifle explanation though. "English" works pretty well on a pool table, but just because a projectile is spinning in a preset manner by a computer doesn't mean it should be able to turn right angles in atmosphere. Now a curve to hit the same area, but that is much less useful due to obstructions.

After we accept "AM2" and the "Imperium" shield, a little more "rubber science" to accept a rifle that shoots around corners is just a little more "Annie Oakley" than impossible to accept.

Originally posted by Chuckg

True, the willygun is a nice weapon.

 

They never did explain how they gave it a minimum safe arming distance, though. It'd really suck to fire it off, have the BB hit a twig two feet in front of your muzzle, and blow you up.

I always got the impression that it was a kinetic energy weapon that used its incredible mass and hyper velocity to create the "explosive" effects. Maybe I should reread the series.

I gotta go with the Willys gun from the "Sten" series. A geostabilized battle rifle using a laser to propel force shielded, hyperheavy Antimatter 2 bullets, hundreds of tiny sized rounds per minute are fired from a magazine hold thousands of projectiles. Imagine a full auto BB gun with thousands of rounds packing the punch of a modern day main battle tanks gun. Sweet.

Originally posted by Gary

How about the rocket punch, 1" superleap usable as attack, 6 levels of megascale. 3 active points. Sends targets into orbit with one blow.

 

Would you have a blanket ban on megascale movements usable as attack?

 

How about extradimensional movement usable as attack. Send target to Hell. Would you have a blanket ban on XDM usable as attack?

 

Or a more realistic example. A mentallist with tunnelling and n-ray vision. That's pretty abusive and something I wouldn't allow a PC. Would you ban this construct?

BTW our campaign has an Earth based PC with Tunnellng and N Ray vision. As the player is my 9 year old son and doesn't kow all of the nuances of the game or powers, we allow it. A mentalist with tunneling and N ray seems to be a problem in abusing the character concept rather than abuse of powers. Not very heroic to never come out of hiding. Sometimes balance requires trying something out before banning or allowing something. Given how differently players play the same Supers, these power levels are only meaningful if played a certain way.(ie arena battles vs chasing the bad guy through NYC streets and alleys)

Originally posted by Gary

How about the rocket punch, 1" superleap usable as attack, 6 levels of megascale. 3 active points. Sends targets into orbit with one blow.

 

Would you have a blanket ban on megascale movements usable as attack?

 

How about extradimensional movement usable as attack. Send target to Hell. Would you have a blanket ban on XDM usable as attack?

 

Or a more realistic example. A mentallist with tunnelling and n-ray vision. That's pretty abusive and something I wouldn't allow a PC. Would you ban this construct?

BTW our campaign has an Earth based PC with Tunnellng and N Ray vision. As the player is my 9 year old son and doesn't kow all of the nuances of the game or powers, we allow it. A mentalist with tunneling and N ray seems to be a problem in abusing the character concept rather than abuse of powers. Not very heroic to never come out of hiding. Sometimes balance requires trying something out before banning or allowing something. Given how differently players play the same Supers, these power levels are only meaningful if played a certain way.(ie arena battles vs chasing the bad guy through NYC streets and alleys)

Originally posted by Gary

Here's what I would suggest with Stellar:

 

1) Balance the character's points! Remove enough points to get to 723, or 753 if your campaign allows unlimited disads.

 

2) Remove the DR, absorption, and Life support from the EC. This costs 35 additional points.

 

3) Force the player to buy off the OAF on his flight. This costs 16 pts.

 

4) Remove either the power defense, or the EC framework. This saves 7 pts if the character removes the power defense.

 

5) Remove the last ditch power. I can't believe any GM would ever allow it. This saves 97 pts.

 

6) Enforce the fact that he can't change his VPP in combat since he doesn't have a skill roll with the VPP. He could either buy a 24- VPP skill roll for 29 pts, or he could save 22 pts by removing the 1/2 phase to change on the control cost.

 

7) Keep track of End costs! With the amount of end he spends per phase, I can't believe this issue hasn't bitten him before.

 

8) If he doesn't want to chop enough points to be in balance, give him 1d6 unluck for every 5 pts deficit. Currently, he's 87 pts in deficit so he'd have 18d6 unluck.

 

All this is just my opinion, but I'm sure most of the posters here wouldn't allow this character without massive changes.

Just as an aside, Trebuchet and I were discussing this thread over lunch one day and hoped a real number cruncher would weigh in (as we were too lazy to do the math). At the time we both agreed that Gary would be just the right guy and...Ta Daaaaa. Good job, Gary.

Originally posted by mattingly

The UNTIL Superpowers Database. Makes character creation so much quicker.

 

And, depending on your campaign, Millennium City.

What he said, Jason. Especially new players can be helped a lot when they know how various the "prototype" characters' powers can be. My 9 and 13 year old sons were able to use the concepts in USD to help us put some really tough Superheroes together.

Originally posted by keithcurtis

Wow! First place to the big-headed puppuet from the First Federation!

 

Keith " " Curtis

Hey, did you guys notice that Clint Howard was even bald as a kid? (now that's geeky)

Originally posted by Phraze

I think 150 pts. in disads seems more restricting in chargen than actual play. I agree, it's pretty easy to come up with 100-120, but then you start having to take multiple Hunteds, multiple DNPCs, random Vulnerabilities or Susceptibilities just to eke out the remaining points. And sometimes Hunteds are hard to come up with, because the player may not know the GM's universe; who would make a good Hunted? That's what mystery disads are good for. The GM might have a perfect villain or organization that the players just don't know exists yet.

 

Part of it may be a trust issue. If you have 5 characters with 2-3 Hunteds and 1-2 DNPC's each, with an average roll of 11-, that's a lot of possible complications. And if the players think that all you're going to do is roll encounters randomly and have 7-10 Hunters and DNPC's wander into every supervillain battle, then you'll have trouble getting them to commit to those extra Hunteds. Mystery disads can help here, too, by making the players feel as if they don't have as much weight on their shoulders until they trust you to handle it.

I think you hit it on the nail, Phraze. The players need to develop trust that the GM will use disads to enhance their enjoyment of the game. When a PC whups up on the Hunted who singles him or her out, the player knows that his character matters. Likewise, players need to use disads that make their PC three dimensional and real, not a cripple or campaign stopper. Most of our campaigns' Psych Lims and such never have to be called in by the GM as the players run their Superheroes with those personality characteristics "on" all the time.

Originally posted by Captain Photon

Hey Trebuchet + Mentor!

 

Any chance of seeing Zl'f's character sheet, or at least a picture?

 

:D

See page 4, this thread.

Originally posted by Agent X

Hey, I like the character. I just worried she might meet an untimely end.

 

Our attacks usually range around 12-15DC but we get awfully inventive with rapid attacks, terrain, haymakers, and move throughs so the dice can creep up once in a while.

Zl'f is fast and capable and doesn't get hit often, but she does get stunned or KO'd when when the baddies do connect. The rest of our team has been really good at jumping in to keep a downed team mate from getting the Coup De Gras, so far. All in a days work for Superheroes.

 

For some reason, a Brick named Fezzek (yes that Fezzek) seems to have her number and I always seem to roll a 4 or 5 to have him hit her. I will admit to fudging the attack from a 15D6 punch to a 10D6 grab and squeeze. GM prerogative and Fezzek doesn't like to hurt little girls. She still took a little nap.

Originally posted by GenreFiend

Etc., etc. If anything, this is the one problem I've always had with Champions. GMs give their villains a really cool ability, and then feel the need to figure out exactly how, in game mechanics, it works. He's an NPC! He absorbs energy blasts from the surrounding area BECAUSE THE GM SAYS SO! Sorry, I just get bogged down in the mathematics of the Hero system sometimes, and long for the simpler days of the original Marvel Superheroes RPG.

While I am in agreement that the GM has infinite points and doesn't have to justify design parameters to the players or fill in all the boring details and trivia, having the design mechanics too loose or nonexistant seems to run the risk of having the outcome of the encounter predetermined by the GM

 

I have run Supervillains that I feared might be overpowering, but through great gameplay and teamwork, our team, Midguard rose to the challenge and beat them at the last minute. Likewise, villains I threw in as fodder had just the right combinations of abilities to completely frustrate the team.

 

How do you deal with the question of spontanaity and real accomplishment by the players if the abilities aren't specified? Or am I reading too much into your description?

Originally posted by Trebuchet

Quite probably. The biggest attack I can remember ever seeing in my campaign was 16d6, and a couple of 10d6 AP attacks. Most villains hit for 12-14d6. Our campaign is Silver Age 4-color all the way. If I were running this character in most other campaigns, she'd have higher defenses and her Regeneration would be much faster.

 

My character Zl'f lives up to the low defenses tradition of my favorite comic book superheroes, such as Spiderman, Batman, Daredevil, and Captain America. Like them, she gets cracked ribs, nicked by a bullet, or the like and grits her teeth and keeps fighting. How many times over the years have we seen Spiderman fighting with his arm in a sling or Batman with his ribs wrapped? If her defenses are too low, she's got plenty of excellent company.

I am quite proud of Trebuchet's willing ness to play Zl'f and play her so well. You guys have no idea what a departure this type of character is for Trebuchet. His most famous PC was a Power Armor guy, named Ranger, with every type of defense built into the suit and the highest PD and ED (combining armor and force fields to cover those nasty NNDs, you know) of any character in any of the campaigns I have played in or seen. The original omni defense dude. Dr. Destroyer might have gotten Ranger's attention.

Originally posted by Hugh Neilson

How often do your players say "well, I'm at -3 STUN - just count me as out for the fight". Depending on the villain, recovering from -3 STUN may be the time for a hasty retreat, rather than "one last heroic blast thak knocks him out due to negative END", but he has that REC stat for a reason.

 

Your point is well taken, however. If the Heroes regularly blast an opponent one more time to make sure he'll stay down, maybe the villains should take that same opportunity more often. And they likely won't be as scrupulous about ensuring using non-body attacks, or ensuring your defenses are still active.

Must be the elitist in me but I do expect the "heroic,idealistic, selfless, superheroes" to be more likely to tough it out and get back in to the fight after being KOd, never giving thought to surrender than the "selfish, evil, obviously flawed supervillains". There will be exeptions on either side, but as our campaign is four color, unless the villains are homicidal/suicidal maniacs, they would usually rather stay down or run away than be crippled.