Diamond Spear

Re: Taming Absolutes - Final House Rules But isn't Armor Piercing a simple way to offset Damage Reduction? If so I am unsure how the point cost for Damage Reduction is not enough for a high powered/high point game.

Re: Would you play… Just a quick word from the OP. I did not mean that the GM would randomly create the powers. He would create them like he would for any other character it’s just that the players would not know what they were getting until they got them. Poor word choice on my part, I apologize.

… in a game where you were allowed to make your character only as a normal person and then the GM would randomly assign you your powers, including increased stats? The idea would be to simulate the “I never planned on being a hero but look what fate had in store for me” kind of background. Add in some activation rolls to the powers and maybe an uncontrolled and keep some of the additional disadvantages (like susceptibility, vulnerability and the like) secret until they actually affect the PC. I think it could make for an enjoyable game but how about the rest of you?

Is it X-Files style? Is it Buffy (without the camp)? Is it CoC? Something else? How do YOU define it?

Re: Medieval Farming Villages I would recommend picking up a book called "Life in a Medieval Village" by Gies.http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/results.asp?TTL=Life+in+a+Medieval+Village&z=y It should be available at your local Barnes and Noble (which is where I got my copy) it is chock full of information and an easy read as well. I also recommend "Life in a Medieval Castle" and "Life in a Medieval City" by the same author. Great books to read for anyone running a fantasy campaign.

Re: FH weapon damage There is that. Of course it's a lot more fun to put them up against archers with find weakness.

Re: On Fantasy [G.R.R.M.] I am slowly working my way through AFfC and the tedium is killing me. Too many characters, too many chapters with nothing that really happens. Someone needs to choke his editor until he or she remembers everything they ever learned about pacing. The rest of the books I couldn't put down, this one is so slow moving that it has become work to try and get through it. As far as the sex scenes go, he just seems to be throwing them into to break up the monotony in this book. Particularly with Cersi and what's her name. Very contrived and almost like he put it in just because he could.

Re: FH weapon damage Archers, my friend. Introduce them to the pain that happens when you bring a Big Frickin' Sword to a Bow fight. If that isn't enough, or if you are an evil, sadistic GM, design an adventure where their strength doesn't help them. Perhaps the local noble want to reward them for their deeds of valor and of course he just assumes they know proper social etiquette. Add in some scheming from all the rival nobility that are also at the party and they should realize that they might want to think about spending points in something other than combat-related skills. And if they turn out to only be interested in combat, combat, combat, then they will eventually learn the truth of the old saying that those of live by the Big Frickin' Sword will die by the Big Frickin' Sword.

Re: FH weapon damage Archers, my friend. Introduce them to the pain that happens when you bring a Big Frickin' Sword to a Bow fight. If that isn't enough, or if you are an evil, sadistic GM, design an adventure where their strength doesn't help them. Perhaps the local noble want to reward them for their deeds of valor and of course he just assumes they know proper social etiquette. Add in some scheming from all the rival nobility that are also at the party and they should realize that they might want to think about spending points in something other than combat-related skills. And if they turn out to only be interested in combat, combat, combat, then they will eventually learn the truth of the old saying that those of live by the Big Frickin' Sword will die by the Big Frickin' Sword.

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... From my VIPER game on Hero Central: Elwood: "Sorry about missing the meeting." Looking over the assembled agents with a questioning look on his face asks," Where's Donald?" Scott: "He won't be joining us for this, or any other mission. If you saw them scrubbing out the conference room, that was Donald on the walls."

Re: Quick Question I don't think Ray would care. As for the rest of them, I'd love to see you explain how the, now two inch tall figurines trashed the bank.

Re: Quick Question Since you brought it up you are not allowed to complain if you guys walk out of the bank on the 11th and find Project Sunburst waiting for you. Something about trashing their safe deposit box in the fight.

Re: Quick Question Now would I be the kind of GM to break out my 4th edition Classic Enemies and convert Project Sunburst over to 5th edition?

Did Project Sunburst make it into 5th edition?

Re: SPD Standards If that's true than you are not playing your 8 Teams like they should be played. Of course it makes a big difference if they know who they are going up against but assuming they do the hero should lose at least 75% of the time to a properly run 8 Team.

I am trying to work out how to make a particular power work the way I envision it. It is Absorption to an attack but when the attack is used at the boosted level the extra points are lost. For instance if a SPD 4 character absorbed 10 points to his energy blast they would normally fade at 5 points per turn. My character would lose the 10 points as soon as he made an attack with that power. The idea is that his absorption works more like a capacitor than a short term battery as in the case of normal absorption. I am thinking I could use regular Absorption with a -1 Limitation but I am not sure that is the best way to build it. Thoughts?

Re: Gamemastering Tutorial Adventures Since combat seems to be the part of the HERO system that gives people the most problems I would reccomend an "Arena" style combat session to get everyone familiar with the system.

Re: VPPs -- what's the logic? Part of the problem is that you are assuming the VPP will be bought without "Requires a Skill Roll" and with "Can Change Powers as a Zero Phase Action". The cost is reasonable to expensive if you have to make a skill roll and if it takes time to change powers. Consider a 90 point pool (60+30); if I want to change from one 60 point power to another I have to make a skill roll at -6 to do so. Suddenly that cost seems more reasonable. Another thought. If I want to increase my energy blast in a multi power by 2D6 it will cost me 11 points. One for the slot cost and ten into the multipower reserve. If I want to increase my energy blast in a VPP it will cost me 15 points. Ten points in to the pool and Five points into the control cost. Again the advantage goes to the multipower.

Re: RFC: SPD on Demand See, I knew someone could say what I wanted to better than I could!

Re: RFC: SPD on Demand I like how you've written the power up but I do have a couple of suggestions. In order to prevent one potential abuse, that of the "Double Recovery", make the power inherently unable to be used to take a recovery. You can then add an advantage at either +1/4 or +1/2 "Usable for Recoveries". Also to ensure that clever players (helped by unobservant GM's) do not add enough limitations to really drop the price (Focus, charges, power frameworks etc.) make it inherently unable to be purchased as anything other than an inherent, stand alone power. In other words, you are either born with it or can't use it. You could always allow an advantage, again at either +1/4 or +1/2, to allow it to be bought through a focus or framework. Or course these could also be the worst suggestion you've ever heard so...

Re: Killing Attack Defences My old group always house-ruled that any damage (STUN and BODY) done by a killing attack could only be reduced by resistant defenses. SO if, for instance a character had 25 PD only 5 of which was resistant and was hit by a killing attack doing 10 BODY and 30 STUN he could only apply the 5 resistant defenses so he would take 5 BODY and 25 STUN. It worked very well for us.

Re: "The bigger Bulk get, the dumber Bulk get!!!" I was going to reccomend side effects but Barton beat me to it.

Re: Lost in a crowd The ability to "completely" disappear with NO chance of anyone seeing him seems to run contrary to the HERO ground rule that NOTHING is absolute and to everything there is a counter. Have you considered that?

Re: Clown, Inc. Any time the flavor text includes a statement like: “CLOWN has been responsible for more heroes buying off their Code vs. Killing disadvantage than any other group.†You just know it’s going to be fun!

Has anyone ever tried this?