Paragon

Re: character balance in supers games

I think you missed the point of my example.

 

Say you have a Martial Artist who can do a 10d6 Martial Strike and a 12d6 Offensive Strike. He gets extra damage from performing a Haymaker. If he purchased extra Damage Classes with his Martial Art he actually does LESS damage. So his MAXIMUM damage cap is actually lower than all other characters.

Yeah, but that maximum damage was rarely relevant for the others in the first place, so I don't see it as mattering much for the balance issue; and since I didn't weigh in the extra two DC from his Offensive Strike there, his average damage-to-target was as good or better. In practice, it didn't seem like the martial artists were suffering.

Re: Fighting against more speed

Of course it is. Just as fundamentally arbitrary as designating a Segment as being 1 second long in the first place.

I think there's a bit of a difference between defining a time scale in general and varying them just on the size of the engangement, though; it doesn't do much to answer the question of why the PCs can act quickly one time but not the other. That's what makes it arbitrary.

Re: Trusting Systems vs trusting GM Judgement

Time to find another GM, methinks. If a player can't trust his GM to adjucate the game fairly, then it's time for that player to move on (or perhaps volunteer to GM, if he thinks he can do better).

 

Since I consider this a universal problem (its just a question of degree) I don't find that much of an answer, honestly.

 

As a GM, I've asked players to leave my game because I could tell they didn't trust me. I hope they found a better GM elsewhere. As a player, I've walked out of games where the GM couldn't be trusted. I hope those GMs were able to take my frustrations as a sign to grow better at their craft. But in no case did it really have much to do with the rules -- it had to do with trust and communication.

As I said, I trust the intentions of a GM or I don't play. But I don't trust the judgment of any GM absolutely, and nothing I've ever seen in the hobby tells me I should.

Re: Fighting against more speed

Oh, for that I just change how much time a Segment represents. I've never felt particularly tied to the idea that a Segment is one second.

 

That's pretty much fundamentally arbitrary, though (though its a common solution, and I think the one the Fantasy Hero mass battles rules use).

 

And yeah, GURPS has it even worse in that regard. Everyone does something every second, rather than everyone gets 2-8 actions every 12. Unless 4th editon GURPS changed that. I haven't looked at it...

Its sufficiently pronounced there it can even be noticeable in firefights; its very hard for a GURPS gun combat to take longer than 4-12 seconds, even in personal level exchanges.

Re: character balance in supers games

GM 'feel' is always going to be a necessary component.

 

I have yet to see a 'hard' cap (active, real, damage etc..) that effectively handles Movement, Martial Arts and/or Haymaker bonus damage.

 

Movement might well have been a flaw in the one I used (sometimes I thought so, sometimes not) but I actually did think it did a competent job with martial arts damage and the like (and I personally thought Haymakers managed themselves since everyone could use them and had the same problems--if anything 5e's flat damage add Haymakers are better there).

Re: Trusting Systems vs trusting GM Judgement

 

What a player would expect from the GM is to be told that his grenades are built incorrectly and need to be corrected before game play. Or simply be informed that he may have them built in that fashion, but that there will be downsides to having that missing time delay since you will consistently applying the SFX the player had in mind.

 

As long as the rules (including Campaign rules - such as all generic grenades are built with Time Delay regardless) are given and adhered to consistently, then the players know what to expect. It's when they aren't adhered to in a consistent manner that leads to problems for the players and the GM.

 

- Christopher Mullins

I agree completely. One of the functions a rules set does is to provide the players an interface into a game world; and the truth is, that interface is never going to match their real world experiences perfectly, even in cases where the real world is something they know about. (Just to be clear, I mean in areas where they have experience; a lot of people's knowledge of specific areas of life is lacking or formed by things they see in media.) In addition, there may well be genre or style based things that don't match reality at all.

Yet people need to be able to run characters who have some understanding of their world, in some cases a far better understanding than the player does. The only way to be able to even halfway consistently do this is when there's a set of rules in play that are visible to the players, so that even if they don't match the player's concept of reality, he can run his characters effectively. The more sketchy the rules are, the harder this is, since few players are able to read the mind of the GM.

(There _is_ a downside to this; when a given character is doing something they aren't familiar with, the player may know too _much_ about how things will likely resolve, but on the whole, I think its a far lesser sin to have characters who are overcompetent in judging areas outside their expertise than characters who are undercompetent in judging areas within it).

Re: Trusting Systems vs trusting GM Judgement

In other words, the players are still the cause of more problems than GMs are. That being the case, I fail to see how cutting back the GM's authority leads to improvement of the game. The GM is the one who put the work into creating the scenario and/or campaign; he should by rights get more of the authority.

 

I used to buy that too, but I don't any more. GMs for the most part do the work they do because they like to GM. And its entirely possible if they don't want to do some of it to offload it on some of the players.

And while _individual_ players may cause more problems than GMs (because they're less prone to seeing the big picture), I think GMs cause more problems than the group _as a whole_ does, so I think giving them a collective tool to restrain his excesses is, on the whole, good.

 

Players and GMs should constitute a team. Making them into adversaries is a guaranteed way to destroy a campaign. Making the printed rules into some kind of Bible to pummel one group or another into submission sounds like an even worse idea.

Its a nice theory that the GM and players are a team, but the flat out reality is that in the majority of cases there are conflicts of interest on some levels involved, and some method other than "the GM wins" needs to be used for that. I've seen far worse problems when there weren't solid rules as the basis of discussion than when they were. Otherwise, it all comes down to what everyone's personal perceptions of the situation are, and that's not a jot better than arguing rules--far worse, in fact.

Re: Fighting against more speed

Yup. I would frequently wait for my opponent to commit to something before acting to counter it. Or pause briefly to marshal myself for a flurry of attacks. Or any number of other similar things.

If there's any problem with the timing in Hero (and this is much pronounced in GURPS, so its not something Hero is alone in) its that its pace of resolution is, in some circumstances, too fast. You particularly see this in battle situations, where there's no real reason to take the relatively long pauses that happen in real battles while people reassess, gather their nerves, and so on. A minute long battle is forever in Hero, but you certainly see their equivalent or longer in the real world.

Pretty much all Hero fights translate into really short duration rapid firefights, which is dramatically interesting but creates some problems when you start to get to the interface between normal combats and military actions.

Re: Do you have any "deal breakers" when it comes 6th edition?

There is undoubtedly an economic aspect involved. DoJ is after all a business. However I think a bigger factor is that Steve initially wrote the 5th edition rules for someone else' date=' using their guidelines. And when DoJ formed and bought the Hero IP there wasn't sufficient time to go back and rewrite everything how Darren, Steve et al would have preferred it be written. At the point where 6th edition will be coming out, 5th will have been out for more than 7 years. Longer than any other version of the rules except 4th, and the main reason it took so long for 4th to be replaced was a lack of a company willing or able to publish a new version.[/quote']

 

Yeah, honestly I have to say that six to seven years is pretty typical for edition cycle. And there's certainly an argument that Steve Long has that when he took over, 5e was already partly a fait accompli, so some things he thinks should have got done--didn't. Whether you agree with what all he wants to get done doesn't change the basic logic of that.

Re: Trusting Systems vs trusting GM Judgement

What's your basis for that last statement? Who would be better to fix an error than the GM running the game?

Sometimes the player group as a set. While typically better than an individual player (though not always), GMs are individual and as such prone to tunnel vision like everyone else. Its my personal opinion that virtually from its start, the RPG hobby has vested too much assumption of quasi-infallibility in GM judgement, when in fact, GMs are just about as often the source of problems as players are.

Re: Fighting against more speed

I'd say many of the timing games Hero produces because of the Speed chart feel far _more_ realistic than what occurs in most initiative systems; I certainly know that back when I was fencing and doing martial arts they definitely had the equivelents.

Re: Do you have any "deal breakers" when it comes 6th edition?

I make it a practice to avoid making statements about things I have no experience with. If I care enough about something to make a statement about it, I'll try it first.

 

Whereas I'm quite comfortable extrapolating from the similar in regard to evaluating my tastes, and will not hesitate to do so.

I think we're all clear on our positions now.

Re: character balance in supers games

While there's certainly an argument that eyeballing can be better than any systemic approach, I personally prefer the latter as it tends to cause less social strife. The last time I ran an actual Champions campaign, I'd constructed a pretty elaborate Rule of X that seemed to handle 95% of the cases without needing my intervention, and that's more than sufficient to be useful from my POV.

Re: Earthquake and Move Earth

for just knocking people down

area tk pick everyone up and drop them

 

It seemed a bit overkill for the job, and has the problem its based on mass and strength.

 

str or dex suppress area most characters won't have over a 20

 

If DEX suppress would actually cause them to fall, that'd almost work, but its way too expensive.

 

area effect on a legsweep

 

I actually did think of something like that, but I wasn't sure how to buy it, and I couldn't remember off the top of my head if there was a resistance roll of some kind (which there should be).

 

for devestating the landscape

lots of tunneling

3-6d6 rka area effect 1d6 of which can hurt anybody

2d6 can hurt those in or near slight structures

3d6 can hurt those in or near medium structures

4d6 etc

the higher damages should only happen if the body exceeds the wall def

Well, I figured damage from walls falling on people could be handled just by the walls themselves at need (though KA seems excessive, honestly).

Re: Do you have any "deal breakers" when it comes 6th edition?

If I were going to make statements that it were the best thing ever' date=' or that it were the worst thing ever, I would damned well make sure I've tried it first.[/quote']

 

I don't think I made such a statement. Saying something is a dealbreaker for me says nothing whatsoever about its general application. I can have opinions about the latter, but they can't be anything but opinions.

 

I can, however, say that its essentially impossible for someone to truly decouple anything like the current figured characteristic set from the base set and have me like it, because the very concept puts me off, and no execution is going to fix that.

 

Maybe you go through your life trying things you have every reason to expect you'll dislike, Chris, but bluntly, I have better things to do with my time. If I have an overwhelming reason to believe I won't like it (as compared to just being dubious) I don't bother. If that annoys you, honestly, that's your problem far as I'm concerned.

Re: Do you have any "deal breakers" when it comes 6th edition?

Personally' date=' I'm generally against anything that leads to point bloat. I like the figured characteristics. I will be using them even if 6th edition makes them straight buys with no derivations. I already have the formulas and point totals. Its literally two minutes worth of work to put them back in. Thus, it doesn't constitute a deal breaker.[/quote']

 

I think the loss of potential use of too much published material that would be ignoring them is enough of an off-putting process for me that I can't be so blaise.

Re: Trusting Systems vs trusting GM Judgement

The point of the example was that the mechanics do not provide a prophylactic against abusive' date=' moronic, asinine game-masters. It was implied pretty strongly that one of W9's reasons for wanting more mechanics was that he had bad game-master's in the past [i think we all have']. The mechanics in of themselves can help a good game-master be better, but can't save you from bad faith - or a complete lack of shiqul daat (common sense). And in both cases, fire said game-master.

 

Ah, but I think they _can_ limit the impact of bad gamesmasters. That's because when it comes down to it, whatever dim thing a GM does with a sophisticated rules set, the players have some sense of the range of results (and in fact, some sense of how dim he can be while still staying within the rules). This doesn't prevent abuse of process of course, but since my view is that GMs who are simply being stubborn and not too smart are a far larger group than the actively malign, I think that's still pretty valuable.

I think hero would lose big if we removed effects based definition (as was strongly implied in the other thread) and went with a trust no one model. And again, I think the overaching principle of this hobby is good faith. Yes, game-masters make mistakes, but you can't ride with training wheels your whole life, and by and large, that's the role of communication. This is a social hobby. Its not all dice and calculations. People have to talk and decide among themselves what worked, what didn't, and what should happen in the future.

 

And they have to forgive the occasional honest mistake and not act like sullen, froward, resentful paranoids.

I think, however, as I've mentioned here, that there's a big difference between distrust of people's motives and of their judgment. Playing with someone who's motives you don't trust is simply masochistic for the most part. Playing with someone who's judgment you don't trust is, to me, a fact of life, because almost all GMs have bad judgment from time to time. I think playing in such a fashion that you reserve the right to limit the impact of the latter is neither unreasonable nor antisocial; its simply saying that errors are going to happen, and you can't assume the GM will always be the best person to fix them.

Re: Earthquake and Move Earth

The volume of earth you're moving, of course. What is it, 5 Body for each cubic hex of earth? Going by damage stats, you need +1 Body for each additional inch radius? So if it's a 10" wide, 20" long, and 3" tall chunk, you're looking at 600 cubic inches worth of earth; volume of a sphere is 4/3 (pi) r^3. Reversing it and plugging 600 in, you'll need to affect ... 3.63" worth of earth, rounding to 4" -- or 8 BODY worth of earth. (That, by the way, is a hill roughly 60' wide, 120' long, and 18' high.)

 

That might really be considered ridiculously easy; I might alter it so that the radius is be 'radius outwards', and then increase it by the base amount for every doubling of inches 'deep'...

 

For your future information, the inches is equal to the cube root of (Volume * 3/4) / PI. Or, if you use Excel, '=((A1*3/4)/PI())^(1/3)'

 

Just don't forget that many 'hills' are only a few feet of soil, with rock underneath. Moving rock increases your difficulty ...

And rock and more "permanent" features are really what this is all about.

My understanding always was that the Body increased per each doubling of volume, so it'd be considerably more than that. Of course with cumulative transforms, all that really effects is how long it takes, which is fine.

Re: Trusting Systems vs trusting GM Judgement

This isn't an accurate read of what I'm saying, or what I think. If you haven't read the mechanics vs. effects thread you need to do that. This thread is a continuation of that discussion and really shouldn't exist. It puts most of what's being said here in perspective.

 

Fair enough.

 

 

That has nothing to do with the example I gave, but your comment is interesting.

Well, it sort of did because your example was partly based on them assuming the GM would not use the rules in a straightforward (and simpleminded and dim) fashion; I was simply noting that with a detailed rules set, the simple solution there is to do just that as a default assumption, and then be pleased when he doesn't. At least at the point when the GM is simpleminded about it, you have the body of the rules to use as an argument point if you need one to get what you want done.

Re: Trusting Systems vs trusting GM Judgement

 

I think you're confusing "mechanics are the perfect solution" with "mechanics help". Mechanics doesn't prevent someone who's actively malign from being so, and they don't perfectly prevent one from screwing up, but they _do_ restrain the latter, and significantly, for a very simple reason: everyone knows what they are. In your example, a set of players who knows their GM is prone to fits of dimness simply _assumes_ he won't use good sense, but will operate by the letter of the rules; if he does use good sense they're fine, if he doesn't they aren't suprised and can account for the problem.

 

On the other hand, in a rules light system, they essentially have little grounding for any specific expectations, and the lighter the rules the more this is true. By its nature it throws more and more on the judgement of GMs, and to be really blunt, nothing in my career in the hobby tells me that on the whole that's a good thing. It can produce good results under ideal circumstances, but I tend not to assume ideal circumstances.

Re: Earthquake and Move Earth

Earthquakes are nasty long-term things; I'd put it on a Continuous Charge or Uncontrolled, with a short (1-2 Turn) duration if the character makes it 0 END. However, the Change Environment rules are all you could wish for in that regards, reducing movement or forcing DEX rolls, doing damage ('only to structures'), and the like.

 

The Earthquake involved is of a really short duration; "Earthshake" might be a more appropriate name.

 

'Move Earth' might be trickier, but you could probably do it with a Change Environment as well. Failing this, a Transform might be necessary.

I wouldn't think you could, for example, relocate a small hill with Change Environment. I thought about Transform, but wasn't sure what to base the necessary success number on.

Re: Do you have any "deal breakers" when it comes 6th edition?

If you can't tell me' date=' yes, I have tried them, and they don't work, and here's why, your opinions on the issue don't mean diddly. They're uninformed, armchair judgements without one speck of experience. Why in the world should I give them any credence? They're no better or worse than anyone else's uninformed opinions.[/quote']

 

This assumes that I expect anyone to give them credence. As noted, I really don't. That just means I'm fatalistic about the issue.

Re: Do you have any "deal breakers" when it comes 6th edition?

not to be harsh, but honestly, I can't think of any faster way to having ones input disregarded than saying this.

 

 

 

.....except maybe that.

As noted, I don't expect my input on this matter to have any impact. It doesn't change my feelings about it, but there's no connection between the two; my ability to express why I have a problem with it, and my having a problem with it have no relationship.

That's why in the latter parts of the Characteristics thread I've limited my comments to appropriate costs of characterstics with or without decoupling, rather than about the decoupling itself; I think feelings about the latter are such a vast gulf that there's literally no point in arguing about them.

Re: Do you have any "deal breakers" when it comes 6th edition?

Name one?

 

Though not to the same extent, M&M's disconnect of Dexterity from combat capability comes to immediate mind.

 

 

But everything you have to say about is based on not trying it. If you tried it, sure, you might still not like it, but then you'd have a basis from which to convince Steve. You could say, "I've tried it, and here's why it doesn't work." At the moment, you're saying "I won't like it, I know I won't, even though I haven't tried it."

 

The problem is that it doesn't work for me on a sufficiently basic grounds that I don't think its possible to explain why; certainly playing it won't change that, because as I said, its a fundamental conceptual level. It simply disconnects things I think should be connected.

Let me give a broad analogy: you could have a system where your primary unarmed damage bonus was based on Appearance. In the end, it wouldn't matter how much or little this really mattered in play, the basic idea would put me off. The same is true here.

I can't and won't speak for Steve, but if I were in his position, I'd put a lot more stock in statements from people who have tried it and found it wanting, than from a hundred yahoos on either side who haven't. (I say this as one of those yahoos, but then I'm not in the position of trying to change his mind.)

I don't actually expect Steve to change his position on this, so that's pretty much a nonstarter. I don't actually expect anyone who doesn't have a problem with this from the outset to have their mind changed, because I think this is a fundamental enough issue that it either bothers you or it doesn't.

Re: Do you have any "deal breakers" when it comes 6th edition?

Re: decoupling figureds... it's an easy thing to playtest' date=' if you really want to see how it works. I say, give it a chance. You're in the position of saying you don't like something without having ever tried it. If you playtest it, and can go to Steve with actual playtest data saying "We've tried it and it doesn't work; here's why," I'd imagine you've probably got a much better chance of changing his mind than all of the 115+ pages on the 6e Characteristics thread.[/quote']

 

Honestly, I don't need to playtest it; I've seen other systems that did the same, and I didn't like it there either. I dislike it on a sufficiently basic conceptual level that no execution is going to be able to make me like it. Its not got anything to do with costs, but the simple idea of making certain things independent that I don't think should be completely independent. It could create no game balance or actual game play problems and it would still bother me.