Paragon

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

Sorry I ever gave you the impression that the original goal of the people who wrote the first edition was particularly important to me. As I said in my last post, it isn't.

 

At which point that part of our exchange was a simple miscommunication.

 

 

Because, as I've already said, there is a middle ground between "The points are all, and balance everything perfectly" and "The points mean nothing, lets get rid of them". You've already stated that the first one is an unattainable goal, and I've said I have no interest in the other one. Hero does a nice job of falling in the middle. The points have meaning, without the system making the internal assumption that all that is needed to balance things is the points themselves.

That doesn't mean the middle ground is, however, the design ethic of the system, and in fact, I have no evidence it is. As I said, if mechanical balance isn't an important criteria, then almost any critique of the design system and costs is moot; if it is important, its as legitimate here as anywhere else, as long as you understand the limits of process.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

Who said anything about micromanaging. Just oversight.

 

The difference is entirely in degree, and often in the eye of the beholder.

 

Personally - I think you're just being contrary at this point.

I'd have said the same about you, so I'd say we're even.

Re: Repeated Attempts

This is the standard ruling of the System regarding failed Skill Rolls.

Probably where I got it from; I've GMed Hero so much over the years its sometimes hard for me to remember where my houserules end and the book rules start (the fact that one of my houserules migrated into FRED doesn't help...)

Re: Repeated Attempts

Attacking with telepathy is like attacking with a punch: Eventually even Mr Incompetent is going to hit. The time chart is an attractive idea but doesn't really make any more sense than ruling that if you misswith a punch you can't try again for a minute (or whatever).

 

I don't find blind consistency a virtue here, since this sort of thing has far greater implications than most other single attacks; its no better than letting someone keep rolling their Computer skill until they penetrate the system they'll only get into on a 4-.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

And I disagree. But we've already determined that.

 

 

 

And I disagree even more strongly here.

 

Then are we doing anything here but repeating ourselves?

 

I'm much less concerned with what the writers intended initially quite honestly. When researchers at 3M came up with the adhesive that is used

 

Then I'd not use phrases like "their goal was not yours." Actually, yes it was, at least in George's case, as far as I can tell. If you want to state their goal shifted, I'd agree, but that was out of necessity, which is what I've said all along.

Hero to me, and one of its main strengths. It doesn't try to pretend that there is in reality some way of making sure that points always balance. You

 

And here _I_ don't agree. I think in parts it does just that, and in parts it doesn't. As I said, if values aren't going to balance, what's the point of worrying about values of Advantages, Limitations, Drawbacks and even base costs? Those are only relevant in terms of matching cost to value, and I've yet to hear anyone actually present an argument as to that _not_ being their purpose. Its the claim that this is _not_ a primary purpose of those rules that I'm having issue with, and why I've continued with this thread.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

the Point system is merely to provide a common starting point for everyone involved in any given Game.

 

That's the practical effect of it, but at that point none of the individual costs matter if taken to its logical extreme.

GM and Player oversight being required is a virtue because it plays into the concept of cooperative interaction. Otherwise I have a million video games to choose from.

Nice false dichotomy. I don't need to micromanage player design to not have a video game, and if you do, I'd say you have other problems there.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

And I disagree with your interpretation. It isn't an all or nothing situation. It doesn't have to be either "There is no need for Ref oversite, as the rules take care of everything already" or "The Ref has to do everything and we should just throw points out the window". Like most things, it is a middle ground between the two. And has been since I started playing in '81.

 

Of course there's a middle ground, but the question is, is the middle ground the consequence of desire or necessity? Did George and Steve design it Champions so that referee oversight was a part of character design because they thought that was intrinsically desirable? I don't think so. They did so because the reality was there was no good way to make a rules set entirely self-reinforcing, which they quickly figured out. That doesn't mean they thought those necessities were a virtue.

(Note I'm _not_ talking here about the necessity of GMs to intervene to get the rules to do precisely what they want: that _is_ a virtue. But there's no reason why a lot of Champions GMs wouldn't have found the intended result just what they wanted. The rules just weren't going to do it by themselves).

Just because the system is based on points doesn't automatically mean that all point expenditures are going to be worth as much as each other. No rules set that allows for people to be involved could do that, as different things will

 

And that's my point. That's a flaw in process. In a perfect system, that would, indeed, be the result for the intended purpose of the game. In practice its impossible, but that doesn't make that a virtue.

Just because the rules don't meet up to the standard you have for them doesn't mean that they are flawed. It means that their goal wasn't necessarily the same as yours.

Actually, having known at least one of the two designers fairly well, I think it was indeed their goal. They just concluded quickly (by the time of 2nd Edition) that it was in impossible goal.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

That seems to be the disconnect: The rules aren't designed to produce a balanced game. They are designed to give a Ref the tools to make a game that balances how they want it to.

 

I don't believe that the first statement is correct; it certainly wasn't correct at one time. The rules most certainly were designed to produce a balanced game within the limits of rules design. Otherwise, as I said, the focus on precise point costs would be, well, pointless.

Re: Repeated Attempts

For me' date=' with something like Telepathy, if the character has a reasonable length of time to keep trying until they succeed (and they are likely to succed eventually -- probably greater than 20% or so chance of success), I just tend to let them succeed with the to-hit roll automatically. In a more time-sensitive situation, I'm not sure what I would do -- probably let them roll every phase if it's in combat time or likely to drop into combat time. Out of combat, I might still let them have the to-hit automatically (unless it's impossible for them to hit) because even if they need a 3-, that's 1 in 216 -- assuming a SPD of 2 (to let them recover the END spent) that's 108 turns or about 22 minutes.[/quote']

 

Well, the big issue usually is with information gathering powers and the like like this, and turns on whether you want there to be only two classes of people: the immune and the transparent. If you let unlimited rerolls, given non-tactical time, almost everyone is transparent to even a moderate powered telepath. This tends to be an even bigger problem with Mind Scan, where if you let it be used unlimitedly, it becomes the all-purpose location tool once someone knows anything about their target, as they'll make the rolls in a very short time on larger time scales statistically.

Re: Killing Damage: Adding damage, manuevers and velocity

The simple difference, far as I can tell, is that damage added from movement, whether via special manuever or not, are not the same as direct DC added effects; they both cap at twice the killing DCs, but the first adds at full value, the second at half value.

Re: Repeated Attempts

The rule of thumb I've had on tasks I didn't see as trivial is "you can't do it again until you can improve your success chance". You'll note the time chart is one way to do that...

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

I look at it the other way around - the rules are unrestricted beyond what I impose on them. Not I'm restricted by what he rules impose on me.

 

I understand the difference and I think you are so far on the side of wrong it hurts.

Then you don't need any rules at all, and any mechanical discussion is fundamentally irrelevant to you. And you're welcome to think what you like.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

OK, it's later.

 

This says that using judgement and personal involvement in a cooperative, interactive experience like a Roleplaying System is a bad thing.

 

That doesn't make any sense at all. How can tailoring something to your own needs with personal judgement be bad??

It isn't. Being forced to do it because the rules don't provide any limitations on it is. Again, if you can't understand the difference between those two statements, don't know what to tell you.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

And I don't. Sorry' date=' I just don't consider the Ref having a central role in determining the balance of their campaign to be a bad thing. Obviously YMMV.[/quote']

 

I don't recall saying it is a bad thing. What I said is that the _requirement_ for it is a failure of rules designed to produce a balanced game. In a game where that's not the point in the rules it'd be no failure at all, and there are such games. However, as I've noted before, Hero isn't such a game; it spends a lot of time and effort on fine detail in ability costs that don't make much sense accept to make cost commensurate with value. If you then have a power that's not so commensurate, that's at odds with the rest of the rules. If you don't see why that's the case, I just don't know what to tell you.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

Fortunately the Hero system doesn't wait for campaign specifics to talk about balance. It talks about it at the system level' date=' and how the judgement of the Ref is a of central importance to balance. It [/quote']

 

And these two statements together are why I say the design is fundamentally conflicted. Perhaps necessarily so, but still conflicted.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

Certainly your prerogative, just as I don't buy your counter arguments. As I said in the bits of my post that you didn't quote, what is balanced in one campaign might not be in another. The rules give options,

 

And any rules set can only aim for the middle. Other things within the system may or may not be balanced in some campaigns, but if you wait for campaign specifics to talk about balance, no rules set can ever try for it at all, and even such things as point costs are essentially, well, pointless.

 

some of which might be unbalanced in some campaigns. But they might not be in other campaigns. If you make it so people can't do things that are broken, you make it so they can't do clever things either. Requiring that Ref's pay attention to the characters that their players design means that I can do more clever things with the rules.

Its just as easy for a GM to make something legal that normally isn't as it is for him to block something that is, and is far less likely to blow up in his face.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

That the rules need the oversight of the Ref is a strength of Hero. It isn't a

That they need them to be balanced is not. It may not in practice be a flaw in most cases, but there's nothing intrinsically good about a rules set that requires intervention to be used in a balanced way. If people want to keep telling me to the contrary, feel free, but I'm telling you flat out its not going to get anywhere.

That's why I say its a virtue that you can do so, but not a virtue that you must. If you feel otherwise that's your business, but frankly, I don't buy it.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

You don't HAVE to do anything.

When using these powers, you certainly have to use judgement, and that's not a virtue in and of itself.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

Funny' date=' I think it's a strength.[/quote']

 

That you can do it is a strength. That you have to, isn't.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

With multiform at least I agree that the power minus those aspects that require special permision is not really overpowered and I don't think anyone on the super team that included Doppelgang (my Duplicating Shapeshifter) would say that Duplication in inherently overpowered.

Even without the point break, Multiform (and to be upfront, this was just as true with earlier edition's versions of it) has one questionable balance trait; it allows you to hyper-specialized your character. Usually some amount of a character's points are spent on things that are, fundamentally, not needed at the same time. Multipowers make their living off this fact. Multiform turns the dial up to 11 on this, as it allows you to, essentially, discard any traits of a character that you don't need for one general task.

The iconic 4th Edition Multiform character was, in fact, a demonstrator for this: Jaguar had a human form that had all the investigative, knowledge and interpersonal skills he needed, and then his were-jaguar form that was a fighting machine.

This can be an excessively attractive idea outside of concept for any player who uses up a sixth of more of his points on skills, characteristics or other traits he doesn't actually need to use in combat.

Duplication is a lot more complex, and tends to be less of an issue, if for no other reason but most Duplicates don't vary that much from one another, so most of the most beneficial features of Multiform are moot for them, and even when they do vary, the extra overhead on Duplication isn't helping them that much compared to doing something similar with Multiform.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

I think what I'm saying is that in Role Playing Games there is an organic component to mechanical balance and unlike most games that I've read (and they are legion) or played (merely many) Hero gives you roadsigns as to where those organic components will do the most good.

And that's fine, but I don't really think that's an aspect of the system so much as an acknowledgement of the limits of game system.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

For the record, I don't think these Powers are out of balance anymore than any other Power in the System.

 

They may be more straightforwardly blatant about how/when they become abusive. But they are not out of balance.

And that's where I'm in fairly profound and specific disagreement. I think powers that literally let you manufacture points are, on the face of it, out of balance, even if they're needed for certain purposes.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

When your go to example is a power that includes a built-in caution I'd say that it weakens your point considerably.

 

Not in the least, since I never qualified that statement in the first place; I was simply taking issue with the idea that Active Point limits really limit offensive output by themselves.

 

 

I would counter that when we're talking about powers that direct the GM to keep an eye on them or that include 'If the GM allows' options, it's perfectly reasonable to consider the importance of a reasonble player/attentive GM.

 

Only if you consider that a mechanical balance in the first place, rather than essentially saying that the power isn't balanced, and the GM will have to do the work. As I've noted, Hero is conflicted on this sort of thing; it does it sometimes even though its really not consistent with the ethic of the rest of the system, which is that you get what you pay for and you pay for what you get. The fact it may be necessary in some of those cases doesn't make the conflicted nature of that design any less true.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

Okay....but that kind of goes back to my point abotu the system requireing cooperation between players and GMs to avoid balance issues. The way I'm understandign the argument the acceptance (or lack of acceptance) of that basic point is at the heart of this argument. YMMV

And mine is that I think Hero is at its heart a bit personality-fragmented on it, and people should be aware that fact is going to lead to differences in expectation here; we are talking about about a system that goes out of its way to have a very detailed and specific incremental point build after all.

Re: 1 for 5 powers (summon, duplicate, mult-form, follower etc)

I don't think anyone is in denial about them being imbalanced; that's the whole point of the warning symbols in the first place.

 

Then I think the most straightforward answer to the original poster would have been "Yeah, they're out of balance. So?" But that's not been the tone of some answers which added up to "Not really."