Kristopher

And again, you can usually tell why and how.

Not so in comics, where the only determining factors in who beats who are A) the needs of the story this month's writer wants to tell, and continuity be damned, and what results in the coolest art this month, continutity be damned.

Continuity. That's what I want.

When it comes to number crunching vs role-playing, I prefer the latter, but often find I have to do the former in order to make a character last long enough to bother with. I know it doesn't bother some people, but I can't stand putting gobs of work into the role-playing aspects of a character, only to have him or her taken out.

Originally posted by Champsguy

Actually, there is a little bit of real-life precedent for these sorts of mismatches. Take sports for example. Often, team A will beat team B by only a few points, team B will beat team C by only a few points, and then team C will absolutely maul team A.

 

College football, last year:

University of Southern California beat Colorado by a score of 40 to 3.

The next week, Kansas State beat USC 10 to 3.

Two weeks after that, Colorado beat Kansas State something like 35 to 31.

 

If this can happen in real life, it can happen in comics.

It gets a little more complicated when whole teams are involved.

Additionally, you can usually go back and see why and how it happened in the real world. In comics, that's typically not the case.

Originally posted by Morningstar70

It all depends on the tactics, and the luck of the hit.

 

Namor doesn't just punch out Ben. He takes hits until he finds a way to turn the environment against the Thing.

 

I mean, it drives me nuts when people say strength is the only determining factor in a fight. Tactics, terrain, resourcefulness.

 

The Thing has been swatted around by characters who can only lift less than 2/3'ds of what he can because they're faster, or use better tactics or both.

I'm trying to find where I said strength was the only determining factor.

It's not real-world realism I'm looking for, just "within-setting realism." Given that there are beings with fantastic superhuman abilties, logically expand from there.

If a character has saved the city scores of times, the city should not instantly demand his head the first time a shapeshifter "puts on his face" and robs a freakin bank.

I want consistency. If a character can lift a battleship in issue 9, he should be able to easily lift a bus in issue 17. If A and B are a match in a fight, and B and C are a match in a fight, then (barring some logical reason) A and C should be a match in a fight -- C should not take A out in three moves or less.

Originally posted by Deacon Blues

This is the most original answer I've heard yet, and probably the best. A character's "impulses" should be represented by their Psychological Limitations; anything which lowers EGO makes the Psych. Lims more likely to hold sway.

 

A vicious melee combatant with the Vengeful psych. lim (Common, Strong) will take vengeance at the least slight, including being cut off in traffic or the sun passing behind a cloud.

 

A delicate mentalist with the Cautious psych. lim (Common, Moderate) would suddenly be scared to leave her house. No, wait, even the bathroom looks sketchy - best just stay in bed.

Sometimes, though, PsychLims represent just the opposite...the character is fighting his impulses.

My longest-running Champs character was a demon, the soul of a man wrongly condemned to Hell. The game he was in included the "standard comics element" of an ancient tradition of "sorcerer supremes," who had long summoned him to the mortal realm for various tasks.

In dealing with the next-to-last one, he made a comment in jest, "If you're ever killed, *I'll* become a superhero." Unfortunately, the sorcerer *was* killed, and the demon felt that he had given his word.

So, he had the PsychLim "Vow to be a "Superhero". He attempted to act in the way that the sorcerer would have acted, instead of taking more expedient, efficient paths. (The sorcerer was an honorable and merciful man who only killed as a last resort.)

The only time the demon PC ever tried to kill anyone was when he faced off against another demon, who had conspired to kill the sorcerer -- AND who used to be the man who had wrongly condemned him to hell all those centuries ago.

"Wanna reflect that attack at a dramatically perfect moment, huh? What, no Missile Reflection? OK, gimme a perfect 3. Wow, nice 3. Stop celebrating, you haven't made your hit roll yet...might still fumble and reflect the shot into a nun..."

The Ambidexterity is more for the purpose of reflecting how much she's improved her own body than for raw combat effectiveness.

Well, at least I got 40-some views and one answer...

(Thanks, winterhawk.)

There are all sorts of other things you can do with an Autofire. If no one else details them before I get home tonight, I'll do it. But I bet someone else will beat me to it.

I've got a player who wants a biomanipulating character. The disads are on paper, and aren't the question. She's not experienced enough with the system to run a VPP, so that's out. Here's what we have as a 2nd draft. All (well-meaning) comments and observations appreciated. In Progress

Base Points: 150Experience Required: 150Total Experience Available: 0Experience Unspent: 0Total Character Cost: 300

As a sometimes GM and a voracious reader with a good memory, I tend to have a lot of the game world in my head.

I know that one of my weaknesses as a player is that I can't set my character up for what I know is going to be a nasty fall, so I typically spend the points for stuff that justifies the character knowing a lot about the setting, etc, so that I'm not abusing OOC knowledge so much when I can't help but act on what I know. This saves up my "benign ignorance" for the things that my character simply could not know.

Originally posted by Killer Shrike

"and it can explicitly only be used on a willing subject."

My concern is that the "willing subject" doesn't have to lower his defenses to allow the Mind Link to work.

Heh. It would be quite a bit of cheese to have Mind Link, Usable Against Others, wouldn't it?

OK. I'll have to look at that again when I get home tonight.

Originally posted by Lord Liaden

Under the 5E rules, he could use TK on that object without damaging the window - that's an explicit example from the description of Telekinesis in FREd.

 

Under my proposed house rule, not unless he broke through the window first, or bought the "Does Not Cross Intervening Space" Advantage at +1/4. Once he could get at the object, though, he could still use all the other abilities of TK, including attacking the object from behind; he'd just be reaching around it.

IMO, TK is already expensive enough for what it does. IMO.

Originally posted by Lord Liaden

Thanks for the reference, KS. That Lim is for Stretching, of course, but I can see why you would apply it to Telekinesis.

 

Thing is, the two Powers are not wholly analogous in the degree to which they are Indirect. Stretching does not appear to be able to pass through solid barriers or into enclosed spaces as a default; I think that's implied by the additional "Does Not Cross Intervening Space" Advantage (+1/4). Given that, I'd be more inclined to set an "Always Direct" Limitation at -1/2.

 

Actually, now that I think on it, I'd probably be more comfortable with a house rule making the default Indirect ability of TK comparable to that of Stretching: reaching over or around barriers or people, but not through them. I've long felt that the current 5E TK is a little too versatile for its points. I'd then be justified in using "Does Not Cross..." to make the Power fully Indirect, or using the "Always Direct" Lim, at the same values listed for Stretching. Makes everything simpler and more consistent.

 

Thank you for the input, everyone. Feel free to continue to discuss this - you can never have too many great minds at work on a problem.

Test Case:

The telekinetic can see something through a sealed window. Can he use his TK on that object?

It's 8? How does that work out?

FRED, pg 265. Under Weapon Elements.

So someone with 20 pts of Mental Defense up and running can still be contacted by a Mind Link, no problem?

Huh...I'm not sure I like that.

Originally posted by Killer Shrike

IIRC Mind Link doesnt apply vs Mental Defense. I dont have my book, but Im pretty sure its a flat effect.

For some reason, I was under the impression that there was something of an NND relationship between the two.

So take the example of Mental Defense that can't be lowered, and the character in a team that relies on its telepath's big Mind Link for communications?

How often does the "partially indirect" nature of TK come into play, and benefit the character?

My first instinct would be -1/2.

If you don't mind taking another un-PC stride, you could have her face of against a team of gay supervillains who just aren't impressed.

Or Captain Blase, the man with 60 PRE (Only for Defense).

An interesting topic came up during some character creation here. Is the Always On limit at all appropriate for certain types of defensive powers? Examples:

A) Power Defense that can't be dropped to let the team healer fix the character up.

Mental Defense that doesn't allow the character to accept a Mind Link from the team mentalist.

C) A Force Field that's on all the time, making for some awkward moments.

Actually, that brings up another question...can power like Power Defense be consciously "switched off" by the character in the first place?

A "Code vs Killing" that allows a character to hold a victim in place so that the character's teammate can kill him isn't worth any points at all.

The character can take the Disad "Prone to Moral Weaseling and Lawyer-like Thought Processes," however. Or maybe that's the character.