CorpCommander

Re: Napalm vs. Tanks

On SRBM's: Sure, you could put liquid fire weapons in a SCUD but why? It is much better deployed in a dropped, thin skin container that releases the munition over a wide area. I am not even sure what made you think I had made any reference to SRBMs but to clarify, when I was speaking of missiles I was talking about ground-to-air defensive systems such as Strella/Stinger/etc.

On close air support: In a big war this stuff is vital. I think my thinking has become a bit warped with the small scale insurgency currently being fought in South West Asia. NATO and the US tend to conduct "bombing runs" at 10,000 feet or higher now. Not the A-10s of course but everything else.

Random Thoughts 1: Look at the strike or al Zarqawi. The first weapon was a laser guided GBU-12 Paveway II that was lofted when the aircraft was 10km away. The second was a GPS guided GBU-38 (JDAM) that was also lofted from 8km away as the follow up mopup attack. They could have used a firebomb to take out the reinforced building that the Terror Leader was in had one been designed to be A) lofted and guided. Its B that sticks in the craw of most military systems designers. Liquid Fire weapons are area attack weapons. In Hero terms its like giving combat levels to an power with the Area of Effect advantage! In real life though even area of effect stuff misses. In the case of Zarqawi he was close enough to a busy highway they needed precision weapons. Also, they wanted to make sure the building was cracked open, hence the laser guided shot. They did not want a repeat of the airstrike on him in Falluja (perfect hit, but they crapped out on rolling body and he made a getaway!) so they dropped the second weapon. It was GPS guided because the aim point was obscured to laser by all of the resulting dust from the first strike.

Random Thought 2: A tank on the move is probably harder to take out with napalm than a stationary one. One, it might move out of the most effective zone created by the napalm. Two, it is more likely to present a bad angle for the attack. Things like this are best handled by the normal combat rules I think.

Random Thought 3: Napalm sticks to kids...Napalm sticks to ribs

Re: Magic Missiles

I think it's faster and simplier to just let the damn thing hit than making an extra attack roll and/or jumping through a bunch of flaming hoops of twisted Advantages about it but the anti-absolutes crowd seems to be in the majority.

From a GM point of view its the type of advantage that could get severely abused. A smart and savvy GM won't get burned by it, knowing when to say no. An inexperienced one might not - and the player might not even being trying to munchkinize their character either.

Your thoughts about avoiding a lot of twisted advantages is totally dead on.

What an interesting thread by the way. I haven't been on these boards in MONTHS so its good to come back and see the discussions are as vibrant as ever.

Tank Engines - off topic, Re: Napalm vs. Tanks

While doing more homework on the Abrams engine I came across a very cool article that I put up in my blog. Read the whole thing - the initial arguments are all discussed in great detail and its a good eye opener. Sadly it doesn't say anything about the effectiveness of defense vs. Napalm so that is why this is off topic.

My blog: http://corpcommander.blogspot.com

Re: Napalm vs. Tanks

OK got more info. Looks like British, German and American tanks use a system that detects a Napalm attack and basically shuts off all air intakes and shuts down the engine. Of course you have to wait for the napalm to burn off before you can restart the thing so effectively the tank is out of commission for a while. Probably 5 or 6 full turns realistically.

Very interesting indeed. So the defense for a NND defined Napalm is Automatic Intake Shutdown on Napalm attack built as a trigger most likely.

But who is doing bombing runs on tanks now? With MANPADS and effective radar guided AAA in the hands of even the weakest warlord the present belongs to missiles.

--Pete

Re: Napalm vs. Tanks

According to my friend who was a tanker -- a Sargeant in 1st Armor 1-1 Cav' date=' spent time in Iraq a couple years ago -- fire-based weapons such as napalm are of little use against the Abrams and the few other Western tanks of the current generation.[/quote']

 

That is interesting. Being a turbine it has a huge open vent on the back to suck in as much air as it can. It has a filtration system to keep out dust but I was unaware it was sealed against Napalm. I am not saying this is not possible but I am curious as to how it works. The Abrams has an internal over-pressure system to keep out chemical weapons so perhaps they've made some real advances. Worth looking up!

Re: Magic Missiles

1. Tell that to a level 1 mage. 1d4+1 sucks to those low HP back rank hidin' scum.

2 is clever but, eh. I wouldn't want that to become an example of what to do with spells that are less trivial.

3 is just out of character for the summon spell. Artillery, for instance, should not be bought as a summon.

I do have to say this though - why contemplate the never misses/absolutely hits all the time thing? Its not Heroish. Lets face it, DnD wasn't built on a set of principles from the get go (I'm old enough to remember the original soft bound books so I can attest to this.) Hits 90% of the time to primative screwheads in fantasy worlds IS THE SAME THING AS always hits!

I can think of 3 ways to build it, the good, the bad and the horribly broken

 

1) good: AoE 1 hex accurate affects desolid NND EB (not does body as 1d4+1 damage per missle hardly does body to a DnD character,)

 

2) bad: AoE 1 hex accurate as above but megascaled so 1 hex = the world (this way you can't DFC from it, which i don't like but may appeal to some)

 

3) The Horribly broken (and my favorite) build it as a summon which continues to attempt movebys on the target until it succeds.

Re: Napalm vs. Tanks

Napalm is still very effective against tanks. Its not used by modern armies because, guess what, close in air defense has gotten WAY better since 1967. That said, if you are going to use Napalm it should be NND, causes body. It gets in through vents, hatches and other gaps. It causes catastrophic damage to all sorts of things on the inside. Even if it doesn't take out the vehicle the crew will bail - though the area is probably very inhospitable.

Napalm has a danger space of about 1500 METERS which means that it is not a close support weapon even though in every vietnam movie ever made its used that way.

Napalm has a ~5% failure rate (fail to ignite, bad mix, fail to arm).

Napalm is excellent against bunkers, airfields, can clear jungle and has had somewhat limited success against built up areas. Its main detractions are it has been used against population centers which makes it unpopular and thus a political hazard. It was removed from US arsenals on April 4th 2001 and is no longer in US arsenals.

Re: Vehicle Combat on tabletop!

A very popular series of board games called "Down in Flames" manages to do WWII dog fighting and bomber operations on a card table. Instead of caring about exactly where everyone is you simply indicated which air craft are engaged and what their relative advantage is - nose on, advantaged, tailing.

There is a system in The Ultimate Vehicle if I am not mistaken that has a variety of manuevers you can use beyond straight up Speed X - Speed Y. You may want to look at that more closely.

Sounds like it will be fun!

--Pete

Re: Favorite Sci-Fi Weapon

The Q bomb.

Its much more powerful than the H-Bomb.

Re: Dark Champions Campaigns

One player started with a very cool idea' date=' and promptly normalized it when he realized he'd be expected to follow some of the RP hooks from the concept.[/quote']

 

What a shame. Going from concept to writeup and remaining true to the concept is all so very Heroish indeed!

Re: Dark Champions Campaigns

In spite of the name DARK Champions I've always considered DC to be more or less compatible with Action/Adventure and suitable to doing "realistic" style games based on movies like "Wild Geese", "Hamburger Hill", "The Untouchables" as well as less realistic films such as "Leathal Weapon", "Die Hard", "Rambo (2 and 3 as 1 was very realisitc)" and anything that ever had Gov. Arnold in it.

I would love to do a Viet Nam era game - going on patrols around Chu Chi city, combatting front line NVA Units, trying to get back home in one piece and solving the mystery of how the NVA are supplying men and weapons into the interdicted city.

I would love to do a mercenary game in Central Africa, fighting warlords, getting food and medicine into famine struck areas, fighting other mercenaries...

I would love to do some Gun Fu takedown of a drug overlord, finding his secret distribution center, blowing it all to hell and shooting very big holes through his minions.

I'd love to do a game based on the latest high tech SpecOps, going in under cover of night, infiltrating enemy strong points at 1000:1 odds and setting them up for a laser guided present from Uncle Sam.

Its not for everyone but the genre has a lot of appeal to some. I'd like to clean up the crack houses and get the prostitutes off the streets in my real city. Barring an ability to do that, its at least fun to try in a game.

Re: Why is Piercing a power?

RP works significantly better for Heroic level games than strait ole AP.

What is RP? I don't have the book in front of me nor my PDF version of Sidekick. Are you refering to DC's piercing?

It is easier to nudge and tweak to just the right level. We never abandoned RP in my group because we primarily play heroic games (FH & DC).

 

Still, It acts like an Adder and doesn't monkey with damage ratios when it is applied as an Adder. As it stands now, add a single pip of piercing onto your Mongo 2d6 HKA sword and suddenly your damage dropped becuse the STR to boost each DC went to 6.25 (IIRC) instead of 5. (Note: DC is in my bedroom with my sleeping wife, so I am just recalling what I read, rather than verifing that it is indeed the case).

That is a very interesting side effect and one I had not thought of. Yet another reason I like Hero - efficient designs always have tradeoffs and Hero makes you balance so many things - it never gets boring.

Thanks Eosin, that was really quite interesting.

Re: Battlestar Galactica

P.S. sorry for waking up a dead thread!

Haha, ok no I am not. ;-)

Re: Battlestar Galactica

Ok, finally saw the new series. It rocks. I am up to ep. 5 Season 2. I have to buy the boxed set to get the rest of the eps.

Its good enough that I am thinking about getting more cable channels so I can watch it! I don't watch a lot of TV and have "limited basic" for $10 a month which gives me cspan, some religious channels, Sabado Gigante (some spanish channel or is that the name of just one show that lasts for hours?), plus the major networks.

I'd actually consider running a game based on the world if there was sufficent source material.

--Pete

Re: Why is Piercing a power?

Since no character or power gets played until it gets through Hero Designer it is a custom adder for now for my games.

...Or will be when I get rolling again. I've got a lot of interested players but getting them to be interested in the same schedule is like herding cats.

Re: Summon: Weapon?

np, I often sound a lot more antagonistic then I really am.

As to CorpCommander's waryness, You make a valid point, but I'm not actually running a true fantasy, really it'd be more accuratly described as Steampunk with a lot of implied fantasy.

Oh? Tell me more. I ran an Iron Kingdoms Hero game for over a year.

--Pete

Re: Summon: Weapon?

As a GM I'd be wary of this power from the get go.

Part of the challenge of playing a Fantasy Hero type of game is acquring stuff. You need to buy weapons and armor. They are not always easy to find. They cost money. If you have a power like this then you've eliminated one of the challenges of the world. If such a power exists then why not make sure that everyone in the kingdom has a weapon. Heck, we have so many weapons we make furniture and huts out of them. That's two composite bows there on that rocking chair!

Now then, if the summoned weapon was, say, an artillery strike, now we are talking. We have something to work with that has inherent issues. Lets say you can communicate with The Kings 47th Royal Catapult Battery of Nigh Strength via your broach of communication. You'd have to make some sort of skill roll to describe to them where you are and where the target is. The attack is indirect in the truest sense. If the GM declares you fudged the roll (map half washed out when the dwarf spilled ale on it, the crew of the weapon is half out of their mind on ale or the teamsters manhandling the piece are out of ale and pretty upset about it) then you can kick in some fun side effects as the rounds invariably come down onto your position.

But anyway, thats just some free thinking. I am sure no GM here has ever messed with their players like that ever. Hero GMs are nice.

Re: Why is Piercing a power?

Back' date=' in the dawn of man, Champions III to be precise,[/quote']

 

Repped for your historical knowlege of the rules extending back to the mid eighties!

 

--CC

Re: Why is Piercing a power?

What is a duck scenario? (yes, I am expecting this thread to get hijacked by jokes rather than serious responses at this point...)

It seems to me that Piercing should be an advantage. It modifies other attacks but when I was reading Dark Champions last night it is listed as an attack and a special power. Actually it is probably better looked at as an adder, no? Why am I not getting this?

--Pete

Re: Clever Future Weapons

I for one am opposed to fighting on a battlefield where the use of weapons designed to shoot through friendlies is in effect!

signed,

Private Mancini,

Red Shirt, Engineering Section

Re: Clever Future Weapons

Sorry but Star Hero games that sound like the following are going to be pretty damn wierd.

Sonar: "Conn! Sonar! High-output reactor contact bearing 72 by 180 by 45, range one point five mega meters!"

XO: "Damn they've spotted us! We can't stand up against their rays! Captain, what are we to do?"

CO: "In the brig, you still have those men we picked up?"

XO: "Sir, you mean the three men in the tug, the butcher, the baker and the Candlestick Maker?"

CO: "That's them! Space the first two but bring me the third. I think he can help us out here!"

Re: The Stilleto

I guess it all depends on the setting location and the need for such a vehicle.

My intention is to do a military style campaign - SpecOps vs. Very Bad People (think Bond style villians in addition to terrorists, etc.)

Also with a vessel this size people can have and easily justify a 2ndary character to use if (when?) their first one gets killed off.

Re: K. Hite: Legends of the Fall & Hero Games

Some interesting ideas here. I don't have an MBA but I did get a degree in business (with a concentration in entrepreneurship). There is one book I wish I kept from all of my text that, at the time I didn't appreciate. It was all about setting up various deals between companies. In retrospect it was very interesting but at the time it was confusing, dense, dull and the worst read of all the books I had to read in the years I was in college.

What I am curious about is how much of a benefit does this website give Hero Games? I assume a lot. I come back for the wonderful forums. I can shop here and have done so in the past. I have never bought a Digital Hero credit but have been tempted. I think the one thing that has kept me from doing so is the absolutely poor quality of the html giveaways - I would like to assume the real thing is better laidout and easier to read.

Its not easy being a company that creates a creative product, packages the product, takes orders and ships the product. The reason why distribution systems have come into being is because that aspect is difficult. Its also not the core business of a company like Hero. However, if the distribution system is broken and skewed against smaller companies like DOJ then I certainly can see why they would want to bring more of it in house. I certainly will support that and buy my next product from them from this website. I have no real loyalty to any FLGS (I have 4 within 25 minutes driving).

The web has the promise to make things easier for businesses like DOJ. With a B2B link Hero could be the Point of Sale for their products and allow external companies actually execute the orders. Via the B2B they can bid on existing orders and ship from their stocks. If no external company bids on an order then DOJ can execute the order itself. The bidding system works well for DOJ and the execution companies by balancing the risk and payoff. The more popular the product the more money DOJ makes. Something less popular like Star Hero or the Ultimate Martial Artist product would make more money for the company fulfilling the order. Much like as if it were a special order.

With the advent of Print on Demand systems that produce color covers and very decent internal B&W printing it would see, without having looked at any of the numbers, a promising start.

I would bet that something like this already exists. Anyone know? My guess is big department stores must operate like this using B2B for inventory control, new orders, etc.

Re: Clever Future Weapons

I liked the STAR HERO "Fast Neutron Rifle" that went right through people with light or no armor but fried those in heavy armor -- i.e.' date=' rebel scum like on Hoth against fully armoured stormtroopers, so you could fire through your mass of cheap light troops without worrying about "friendly fire" and hit the bad guys easily. (NND vs. <5 DEF Armor)[/quote']

 

It would never be fielded. Think of the lawsuits! Also, energetic neutrons are scattered by other neutrons and they won't know the difference between "hard" armor or soft tissue.