Paragon

Originally posted by Crimson Arrow

Originally posted by Paragon

 

 

I agree with this. It's a side-effect of the "shopping list" approach to senses, plus all of the adders, which bump up the base cost of the power (IMHO) well above what you'd get for an equivalent number of points investef in STR or EB. Start

It doesn't need to be that bad, however, even with the shopping list. Use base costs of 5 and 3 for the first sense (targetting/nontargetting) and 3/2 for the secondaries, and the prices look much more reasonable. The adders are a little more problematic, perhaps.

 

adding in Advantages such as Reduced Endurance and you're looking a mucho points for a relatively minor power.

 

I also don't like the way Cellular is needed to duplicate fingerprints or retina patterns. A shapeshifter should be able to choose to create fingerprints without changing his DNA necessarily. I'd have liked to split the Adder, so that for 5 points you can replicate fine detail (such as fingerprints and retina patterns) and for a further 5 points (probably with "Fine Detail" as a pre-requisite), you can have Cellular, so that even the character's cells change.

 

Yes, I know I could house-rule it etc, but bearing in mind the granularity of the power in 5th Ed, I don't see this would have hurt.

Nor I. It's the single power I've seen more people look at and go "what the hell" than any other.

Originally posted by Monolith

It does not bother your players that a Killing Attack does less STUN, on average, than an Energy Blast? My would probably shoot me if I tried to do that.

Why should it? Killing attacks are optimized to do Body, not Stun. In fact, it's not even true with even dice sets; the stun from the x3 stun multiple is exactly the same on a 4d6 KA and a 12d6 EB for example.

Originally posted by Lord Liaden

I can respect your position on that, zornwill, but I have to disagree. IMO 4E left too much of the detail up to the GM. I've seen too many questions on the order of, "If I Shape Shift into a rock, I look and feel like one, but can someone with enhanced Smell find me because I don't smell like a rock? How about if someone tries to read my mind - does it appear to be just a rock to him?" House rules to fine-tune these situations abounded, without cross-campaign consistency. Now we're all pretty much on the same page. I like the clarity, and I'm actually quite comfortable with the new Shape Shift.

I don't have a huge problem with the construction of it, but I tend to think it's grossly overpriced. What in the end is usually a super disguise power a lot of the time shouldn't be as pricey as it often comes out.

Re: Re: Power Defense Question

Originally posted by Tech

Wow. Good question. I don't know if I've ever seen an AP Power Drain. Inquiring minds want to know.

I don't see why within the rules it can't (both AP on power based attacks and hardened on Power Defense. ) In routine campaigns, I doubt it's worth it, but I've seen the occasionally AP Transform or the like.

Originally posted by TheEmerged

Hello, Vehicle Def debate? Yes, Strength Cost, Kryptonite Man, and Linked have agreed to add you to the Legion of Things HERO Players Debate A Lot. What symbol should we paint on the chair?

Break-dancing APC?

Originally posted by Monolith

Well, as I said above, the GM is the person who limits the DEF of a vehicle. If the GM lets someone buy 20 DEF (and thus making the vehicle to tough to damage) then that is the GM's fault not the systems. Either way I do not see it being a real cost issue. A vehicle's DEF is not as versatile as a Force Walls, and IMO should not cost more.

And I thoroughly disagree; on the whole, a vehicle itself is far more useful than a Force Wall, and it's defense is an intrinsic property of that benefit. And it doesn't take a 20 Defense to be a problem; in fact, if you just use the resistant defense values suggested in the rulesbook, it will protect a character inside it long after any other defense would have failed them.

Now you _can_ patch the problem at that end by limiting the maximum far lower than on a character, but that's still only addressing half the issue.

The bottom line is almost every excuse made for vehicles can be made for automatons; it's simply not consistent to do it two different ways here, and while not a critical system flaw, it is a system flaw.

Originally posted by Monolith

The only time the DEF number of a vehicle really becomes an issue is when the GM allows a player to buy one as a Powered Armor suit. Any other time a vehicle becomes nothing more than a plot device.

I'm sorry, but I can't agree; any character who is built around a vehicle as an operating prodedure will use it frequently, not just the power suit vehicles. Mecha drivers, your Jetboy equivelents and more. It's not an extremely common trope, but it's not as rare as you're putting on here.

 

Batman is driving down the street, the Joker's thugs shoot at him in the Batmobile, Batman loses control and crashes into a dumpster, Batman gets out and beats up the Joker and his thugs.

 

The Avengers are flying from New York to St. Louis and over Ohio the Quinjet is hit by some missiles. Thor uses his weather powers to create wind and help Cap land the jet.

 

99.9% of the time a vehicle is nothing more than a conveyance device. It gets attacked if the GM wants to advance the plot (Oh No! The X-Men are trapped in the Savage Lands!) but most of the time it is just a way to get from point A to point B. There is no real need to increase the cost of a vehicle's DEF when it is not a central point of the character. Those points are better spent on things the character WILL use 99% of the time, IMO.

And in most of those cases I don't see why the players should be purchasing the vehicle in the first place; it's a convenience for the GM, not a functional ability ot the PC. It's the cases where they do purchase them where I expect them to be problematic, and those are just the cases where I expect the costs to be relevant in the first place.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Changes from 4th to 5th Edition

Originally posted by Agent X

So, if you don't want to ride around in a paper tissue, you have to spend a great deal of points on something that often won't even be involved in the adventure. We have a difference of opinion.

The fact you already pay one-fifth the cost of buying the defense normally makes me remarkably unsympathetic to this claim; if it really rarely is involved in the game, why is the player being charged at all? If it's occuring often enough you should charge him, then I think it should be charged appropriate to what the defense often means...which is that no damage gets to the character at all.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Changes from 4th to 5th Edition

Originally posted by Agent X

What's your fix? Superhero games aren't all about building your vehicles. If we set costs on vehicles high enough to alleviate your concern, then we punish people for wanting to have a Weavel-Mobile. There is more to game balance than simply measuring the cost of DEF for vehicles and the cost of Armor for characters.

Trippling the cost, same as for automatons. I see nothing punishing about that; for a routine vehicle the difference will be trivial; it's only armored vehicles which will show a noticeable increase.

And in this case I think that the game balance issue really _is_ that simple.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Changes from 4th to 5th Edition

Originally posted by Monolith

Well, you are not supposed to be buying a vehicle just to get some DEF. You are supposed to be buying a vehicle to get something to ride around in/on.

 

I will just stick with my opinion, expressed in my last post, that the GM is the final arbiter as to how much DEF is too much. The untimate difference in cost, whether it is 3 points for 1 DEF or 5 points per DEF like Force Wall is really unimportant if the GM limits the vehicle to 10 DEF (+8 DEF costs a player 5 points at 3 per and 8 points at 5 per. 3 points one way or the other does not make any real difference).

I'm afraid I can't agree; costs should be commensurate with value, or what's the point in having a cost system? While a different cap for vehicles than characters produces the effect, it's an overt sign that the costs are off when otherwise the process would be overly attractive.

And vehicles and vehicle-like constructs are a bit too common for me to find this something I can feel blaise about.

Re: Re: Changes from 4th to 5th Edition

Originally posted by Monolith

Vehicles already have the cost of the DEF triples (+1 DEF cost 3 points). An Automation, unless he takes the No Stun Option, only has to pay +1 for 1 point (it becomes +1 for 3 points if he takes the No Stun option).

 

1. This is a common error; unless it's changed in 5th, defense on vehicles is bought for both PD and ED, and is resistant as a default. As such, the price given is exactly the same as buying armor; there's no increase at all.

 

2. Vehicles already take no stun, so they're already in the same category as the latter sort of automaton.

 

It really is simply inconsistent. And it make vehicles way too efficient a way to effectively buy defense.

 

Originally posted by zornwil

Sorry, I copied and pasted the text not the links. Here you go...please note they will LOOK the same on the page but the actual underlying URL is in the hyperlink so just click on them...

 

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=278

 

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1383

Thanks. Those worked. And gave me considerably more food for thought on this subject, though I'm going to let this thread taper off before I make a decision.

Originally posted by zornwil

T

Anyway, here's some threads in response to the original poster, I highly encourage these - apparently the last time they persuaded somebody to buy it - despite my best efforts! (just kidding, you'll see I have some negative opinions on HD but I do think it is highly useful for a lot, if not most, of HERO followers)

 

http://www.herogames.com/forums/sho...s=&threadid=278

http://www.herogames.com/forums/sho...=&threadid=1383

I get "not found on this server" errors on both of these.

Re: Speeding up combat suggestions?

Originally posted by arosslaw

My question (finally) is, for those using the 5th edition on a regular basis, any particular tricks you've found useful for speeding things along. I always liked the Hero System because I could make anything and instantly know how it balanced against anything else, but we also tend to run a combat-heavy game and I'm worried about the slow pace.

 

Right now I'm down to considering using either Hero 5th or Mutants and Masterminds for our new game. Input appeciated. Thanks.

I'm not using 5th yet (I've been off doing other games for the last couple years) but one conclusion I came to over the years of running Hero was that it wasn't the actual combat resolution that took so much time; it was distraction and indecision.

Distraction: Fact is when you've got any decent number of people playing, there are going to be distractions; people will be looking things up in the book, working on a new character on the side, going to the restroom, making a snack...whatever. You can try to be draconic about controlling it, but usually all that really serves to do is tick people off.

Indecision: One of Hero's strengths is it has a very rich combat system; there's a lot of actual, meaningful decision you can make in a fight. In Champions there's often even more, as doing things like managing a multipower or otherwise chosing from a repetoire of attacks for the situation can take some thought. Some people can do this in a snap second; some can't. Again, pressuring people rarely has overall benign effects.

There is one solutiond to both these problems, and it's already in the rules: Holding an Action. Currently, Holding is a little too rigid to solve this; you have to specify situations and so on. But if you let people Hold to a later time and declare when convenient, there's often no need to pause and wait for them to make up their mind, come back from the restroom, get up to speed on what happened while they were distracted, or whatever; you can just give them a short response time, and if they can't come up with it, say "Okay, you're Holding, let me know when you decide what you want to do."

95% of the time this is harmless; the player decides a moment later and acts, and you move on, or decides to interrupt a bad guy, you make the contest of Dex rolls , resolve events and move on. And it cuts out astounding amounts of time wastage.

I'm interested in what people who've used both of the two Hero 5th capable character creators (Metacreator with one of the 5th Templates and Hero Designer) think of the two of them. What are the advantages and disadvantages of the two?