Lupus

Re: Dragonfly. Halfjack, Mastodon I make a point of not having any characters with 'masto-' or other similar-sounding prefixes in my game.

Re: Hey Underling! Heh. Personally, I have no problem with systems that don't have a stat called 'intelligence.' IQ in the real world has enough problems, and having a stat called Intelligence often leads to misunderstandings about what stats actually mean. There being lots of different kinds of intelligence, and the stat Intelligence reflecting only some. TORG, for instance, has no INT stat. They have Perception (analysis/interpretation) and Mind (logic/methodology) instead. All that said, I'm still fine with leaving HERO as is. It doesn't matter that animals should have good perception scores. Just buy up their perception separately to intelligence. No system has to perfectly reflect all life on this and every other planet. It may be a kludge, but who cares? I'd rather build good characters than good cats. I hate cats. So for the purposes of the system, and what the Int stat actually represents in the HERO system, PER based on INT is perfectly logical. So in my games, that's the way it'll remain.

Hero #2 says 'Well, I took all the points that you spent on INT skill levels and bought 20 points of power defence, instead. I'm still immune to the drain.' HERO system ain't perfect, and it doesn't have perfect balance, despite what some people try to claim. Some builds are, simply, more effective than others. I think some of these can be addressed. After all, in GURPS, you pay for more for things that would be harder for the character to get. In HERO, you pay more for things that would be more useful in an actual game. If something's less useful in a session, IMO, you pay less for it.

Re: What would your character do VII? Hmm. I haven't had this happen in a Champions game. Have had it happen in a fantasy game, though not in quite this way. My character (on his way to becoming a paladin) predictably fell in squooshy love with an elf maiden, who turned out to be in the entourage of the campaign bad guy. Who turned out to be a dark elf. My character kept after her anyway, ending up getting her to leave the bad guy and join up with them. That game never finished, but she was, of course, going to stab him in the back (probably literally) and go back to her former master. Brainwashing over love, and all that. I could see it turning out tragically, but it was just so cool that I kept on going with it.

Welcome! Some interesting ideas, too. Myself, I usually steer clear of any real-world leaders... in my players' living memory, anyway. I know I'd get carried away with commentary if I did it any other way. Same reason I never run games set in Australia, despite living here. But I can see that for the right group, it'd be of benefit for a game. Myself, my two favorite alien invasions are from JLA (current volume) issues 1-4, and early issues of Astro City. The former featured super-powered aliens 'making the world a better place!' and fixing things behind the scenes to discredit the Justice League. They end up being exposed as invaders. Give the League a real hard fight to escape, too. And gave Batman an opportunity to show how completely badass he is. The Astro City aliens also tried the subtle invasion route - tying up the local heroes with all kinds of bureaucratic trouble and stirring the population against them. Was told from an interesting perspective (the first issue of it was actually told from the alien's point of view). If you're talking about a more mundane invasion (that is, coming from another earth nation rather than aliens), then things are probably just as tricky. 'Why' and 'how' are still the two primary questions. Both are difficult to answer. There'd probably be a lot of taking out of the chain of command, though.

Re: Re: Re: Perception Yeah. I say we stick with the 'bodily health' thing and tie perception to strength, instead.

Re: Re: Rurouni Kenshin HERO (long) Yeah, seriously. Though, I've noticed that the DVDs of the OVA and movie have reversable covers (at least, the ones out now in Australia do). So I have 'em as Rurouni Kenshin, anyway. But that may have been put in by the local distributors... group called Madman. No idea if they distribute in the US too. Sounds good. I'll keep an eye out for his posts. See if he puts anything in here. *noddles* Sounds good here, too. Guess you could also toss in 'invisible power effects, requires an opposed roll' for certain powers, such as Saito's counter-strikes (damage shield, perhaps?) Ohhhh, definitely. I already use this for spells in Fantasy HERO. Stat blocks for powers can be somewhat obfuscational, and not necessarily conducive to play. More stuff I can use! This kind of stuff should be covered by the style disadvantage... genre rule, rather than statted power/weakness. It's genre rules like that that are most difficult to work out, since they don't use typical HERO power/advantage/limitation/framework mechanics.

Rurouni Kenshin, aka Samurai X (the title under which it was originally distributed in the US), has become something of an obsession for me. I've been trying to convert certain elements over to HERO. The main one of these is an expansion on Analyse. For those who haven't seen the series, Himura Kenshin was an assassin (the best - known as the hitokiri battousai) in the Meiji restoration. He fought for the revoluationaries. Once they gained power, he retired and went a'wandering. He's a master of Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu, a style which concentrates on insight into an opponent's technique and the speed and power to exploit any weaknesses. There are a few genre conventions at work here. Combat is largely single-sword, with no armour (although there are notable exceptions, especially among bad guys. One of the good guys, Sano, is almost exclusively an unarmed combatant). Combat techniques are also largely mundane, but with increasing levels of weirness as the series progresses. But there's little in the way of energy blasts or truly amazing things like that. Still, superhuman feats are possible using the proper skill (such as running fast enough to be invisible over short distances, flying with artificial wings, or making a sword burst into flame with... um... oil...) Further, people tend to concentrate on a single style, mastering techniques that get more powerful and more involved as they go up the tree, until the 'succession technique' is mastered - at which point the character is a master of the style and may now pass it on. (As far as I know, the term 'succession technique' for the final secret of the style is only used in relation to two of the arts, however). The succession technique is usually incredibly powerful and jealously guarded. The Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu technique is essentially an incredibly powerful and fast draw-and-strike iaijutsu move that is reputedly unblockable - because even if you do block the initial strike, the second one will kill you. Another character, Saito, has a style based around the perfection of a single maneuver (the gatotsu). His moves are all based around this single blow - they alter the direction of attack (so he can charge with explosive energy, or defend, or attack aerial targets). His succession technique, the 'Zero Gatotsu' was powerful enough to slice through a shield and still hurl the target halfway up a wall, pinned to it by the sword. Anyway. One reason these techniques were jealously guarded was because, if anyone figured out how they were done, they could be neutralised. For this, I borrow some terminology from the console game 'Way of the Samurai.' There, if you successfully blocked a combo, then that particular combo from that particular enemy was forevermore ineffective against you - your character would block it automatically without any button presses. It was called 'disabling' a combo. I imagine this as being represented by a Suppress (only for user, must witness technique) with a recover time of years. 'only for user' means that the technique can still be used against others - but is ineffective against the person who used the suppress, until it's been long enough for those specific reflexes to fade. For this genre, I'd rule that normal power defence would be useless against this suppress. However, a specific form of power defence could be bought against it, if the character knew a style that specifically trained for randomness and unpredictability (representing a style that cannot easily be disabled, because each strike is never the same twice). This form of suppress also works best if the techniques are bought with powers - perhaps with a cost-reducing structure similar to spells in Fantasy HERO. Or at full cost. I haven't added up points yet to see what's best. But some concepts from spells could be carried over - such as lots of RSRs, and a skill specifically for each style, thus further encouraging specialisation. In addition, each style coudl have its own 'tree' of abilities (each with prerequisite skill levels), eventually reaching the succession technique. The other aspects of analyse style could probably be covered by combat skill levels (RSR - analyse, or in some cases perhaps deduction). However, I'm also looking for more interesting ways to handle things. It'd be a shame to ignore Find Weakness. So I won't. One possibility is to assume that all masters by lots of Combat Luck to represent their ability to block. Find weakness, therefore, gets past a lot of this. Perhaps a genre rule could be that a critical success with find weakness negates defences entirely. Or perhaps it can attack DCV, or even OCV (making it easier to defend against). Find weakness is opposed by lack of weakness... perhaps lack of weakness could be reduced by Analyse rolls. Therefore, swordsmen usually have to fight a bit before the defences start dropping. I was mainly wanting to share these ideas with others who may be having similar thoughts. Was also interested to see if anyone else has any ideas along these lines. Any thoughts?

I haven't bought it because international orders are way too fiddly for my taste. I don't have a credit card, but I can borrow one if I need it (I pay the cardholder back in cash on the spot). But I don't like going through the hassle of international money orders and all that. Partly it's not knowing if the thing will really go through, and having to wait all that time to find out if I can even buy it. But also, I'm an impatient bugger. If I spend my money, I wanna see the results. Especially since most of my gaming dollar goes on impulse purchases.

Of course, the mage can do all kinds of things that the dude with the longbow can't. The dude with the longbow has likely sunk all kinds of points into it - weapon familiarity, levels, fast draw, etc. There are problems associated with using it (need to load the arrows, concentration, or penalties to hit if firing defensively). And, of course, it takes time to string that sucker. Or it degrades if you carry it strung. A mage, meanwhile, can throw a fire bolt in battle, move quickly here, teleport there, read minds back in town, fly to the magic shop, etc etc etc. The mage can do all kinds of things that equipment-using characters can't. So, for me, wizards not keeping up in the damage stakes (without spending points) is not a problem. Of course, as a player, I don't like being able to keep up in a fight. I like to be a useful member of the party. So when I play mages in HERO games, I go for odd abilities. I throw entangles. I flash. I heal. I do things other than dealing straight damage. Essentially, in a fight, straight damage is all most people dan do. A mage can do aaaalll kinds of things. But they spend points for everything. So that's where the balance comes from. 'Course, it varies by system and genre. Some genres may see it as vital that mages are powerful in all reas. The FH book provides magic systems for that. In my own game that I'm planning, mages are relatively low-powered. I'm not shooting for anyone to be a primary spellcaster, but rather to have magic possessed by most PCs, though only to a limited degree. But don't assume that just because mages have to spend points to equal a fighter, they're weak. You have to take the whole character into account. And remember that it's not about who can beat up who. A much better measure is how much a particular character contributes to the success of the team.

Sounds about right to me. I'd give an arrow pretty crap damage, though. Better take that -12 OCV to hit the eye! (I forget what book those extra hit locations were in... was it Eye for an Eye?) Helps if you use impairing/disabling and rule that any minor NPC who takes an impairing wound to the head or torso is out of combat/dead. Yeah, I'd put Leggy at over 20 DEX. 'Course, he has to pay double for that extra dex. He won't get it for free. As for orcs being defensive, almost all his shots were at pretty close range. He'd have good bonuses to hit, and range penalty skill levels (those big shots he did when going down the huge stairs). He also handily uses two knives (fast-drawn, natch)... but remained perfectly defensive.That campaign was possibly using the easygoing rules for two-weapon fighting, though. Or perhaps he bought Deadly Blow, defining it as 'hitting multiple times with two weapons.' (cost reduced by taking the 'two-handed' limitation?) Oh! And possibly a variation on the cleave feat from FH... can kill two people with a single arrow, if the second one is directly behind the first. Doesn't take an enormous number of points to make a combat monster. It'd take a serious points-squeeze to get him in under 200, though. And penalty skill levels (bow, targetting) and (bow, range) are damn cheap, too. Say, how would you do his snow-walking? Ground gliding?

Exactly. Before I use any new technology, or tactic, or anything like that, I ask: 'if it's so damn simple, why hasn't anyone done it before?' If I can't come up with a convincing answer, I assume that either it has been done before, or it's impossible.

Of course, extra SPD does benefit you all around the turn. As you pointed out later in your tirade, if you go from SPD 3 to SPD 6, you act earlier - from segment 4 to segment 2. That means you're benefitting turn-round. That's also why I monitor SPD very closely and don't usually like limited SPD at the best of times. I do think it's a bit harsh to demand the END cost be paid every phase. I'd like there to be a middle ground. But I think it's beneficial enough over the entire turn to warrant something to reflect that. 'Course, you're always free to rule it otherwise in your game. If it doesn't make sense to you, don't do it the official way. (With your example of turning the power on and off: wouldn't he pay the cost in phase 2 anyway, even if he turned it off? Even if not... in phase four, he turns it back on again. But if I understand correctly, once you activate a speed boost, you have to wait until the next segment that's an action for both SPDs - in other words, segment 8, not 6. That's if I remember those rules correctly, anyway.)

Active Denial System: perhaps a drain to STUN, all points return within 1 turn when the beam goes away? That's kinda vicious on the active points, though. Continual flash: Something like this probably needs a damage component, too. Flash just blinds someone. Doesn't stop them operating. Flashes like this, though, sound as though they should restrict action beyond that - by causing pain or disorientation. When I build flashbang grenades, I build in an NND (flash defence) EB, stun only, 'Only to stun opponent, not to cause damage.' That is, if the amount of damage dealt exceeds CON, the target is stunned, but their STUN total is not reduced at all. And, of course, if you have eye and ear protection, you can set 'em off at ground zero without a fuss. I find that better reflects the disorientation effect than a simple flash attack. However, your idea of a DEX drain also works. Perhaps, for a harsh enough system, both could be used? That'd be kinda nasty. As for the continuous component, does it continue to 'attack' after the beam goes away? Or is it more like something that needs to be trained on a target (probably requiring a new attack roll each round, and so no need for the continuous modifier). Or perhaps it is continuous, but not uncontrolled... I don't mess around with those advantages much, so I don't know the ins and outs of them as well as others.

For 'lesser' speedsters, I use jumping. Had a player who wanted his speedster to be able to go up walls and over water, but only for brief bursts, and only in straight line. So I called it jumping, must remain on surface. Works neatly. You get straight-line-only movement and, if the character doesn't reach the other side of the river soon enough, they sink. Same with buildings - they only defy gravity for so long before they fall off. I called 'must remain in contact' a -1/2 limitation. That's because you can only 'jump' up if there's a surface available, and if you're going horizontal, and there's a gap that's too big for your base jump movement, your extra jumping speed doesn't help you get over it. It's bigger than flight at -1/4, but flight at -1/4 is ridiculous, in my opinion. I did, however, state that the run-on-water inches didn't stack with regular jumping inches. Character had to build up that movement mode from zero.

Nah, it's not really a problem. Not a CvK game. Not an entirely heroic game, either. Was set up that way. I just put too much effort into creating villains who aren't really meant to last longer than fight or two.

Dunno about you, but I get protective of my poor NPCs. Silly trait, really, but every time I make a villain who has a cool backstory, a name, a goal, a raison d'etre... he gets his head lopped off by a murderous PC before he gets to say anything. Gets you down, gets you down.

That'd be so cool.

*shudders*

*grins* I started looking into this after watching Matrix Reloaded. I came up with the following: you can turn desolid as an abort. But that's all you do - you can't dodge and turn desolid, for instance. So if the attack affects desolid, they attack your base DCV. (Well, you can redistribute levels, as usual.) Of course, since you've aborted to an action, you lose your next action. Activating a power may be a 0-phase action, but dodge is a 1/2-phase action and you end up losing the other half. If you go desolid, you lose your entire next action. But you're desolid and the shots pass through you. Unless they affect desolid. Doh. I will note that in the game I'll be running, affects desolid attacks won't be too uncommon. I'm making desolid a little cheaper because of this. In a game where AD attacks are real rare... well, you may want to rethink letting people take desolid at all.

I do like this point. Also, how do other villains react? PC kills one of their own, do they go gunning for that PC? I've always held that there's something of an unspoken code between hero and villain - that they don't truly pull out the stops. However, if one does, the other will. If a hero goes around killing villains, those villains will get extra-nasty. If they weren't aiming to kill before, they may start now. If they were aiming to kill before, they may start taking hostages or stepping up attempts to find out his secret ID so they can play with DNPCs. Of course, if the villains are already takin' out the stops, then that kind of enforcement becomes harder. As for the vigilantism issue, if I remember correctly, vigilantism is illegal. If someone is killed in the course of committing a felony, then that's defence... but it gets muddy. If you stalked them beforehand, waiting for them to do something wrong, then that's premeditation. And if you do it more than once, that's forming a pattern. Basically, vigilantism is illegal, and there are laws to restrict it. I am, however, unsure of the exact technicalities. Also remember that villains don't always live alone. Wrongful death lawsuits on the part of the villain's family are a bitch.

There is, of course, no reason to build an android PC to be stronger/tougher/whatever than a human. you also don't have to go into the android powers (does not bleed, cannot be stunned, etc). It can just change special effects. If the PC wants to be Data... then it's gonna cost a lot of points, probably too many for most heroic games. Unless you allow points breaks (say, 'restrainable, only by EMPs, -1/4' on everything, although something like that would be better-represented by a phys lim) the android is going to be, overall, no more effective than a normal human. You may wish to allow an android PC to break the disads limit, but I'd be wary of that. Myself, as a GM, I'd never allow it. But that's mostly because I've seen too many Data-like androids (what is humanity? what is love?) and just can't stand them any more. On the other hand, in a heroic game, I /would/ consider letting an android be built with a few more points for the purpose of buying things that are normally replicated by equipment. Say, certain levels of life support. That kinda thing could be interesting. But I'd have to look very carefully at what those points buy. As for packages... I was under the impression that the disads in package deals count towards the character's disadvantage limit. Therefore, they don't provide 'free' points at all. Yes, this does mean that 'package cost: 0' is deceptive at worst and uninformative at best. It's just the way it's done.

12d6 sounds fair enough to me. 8d6 was just way too low. Presumably, the character can throw things other than baseballs? Otherwise, you'll have ammo problems. Though this could be a case for that rare 'charges/costs endurance' combo.

I've also decided cell phones, and other very-common technology, is free. My reasoning is that if you want to charge someone points for everything they have... well, the average geek's house would put them well over many campaign limits. Imagine buying all the knowledge skills necessary to represent the internet, even at a one-per-five discount. In addition, these things have problems. Mobile phones are neat, and useful. But if a hero drops his phone in the middle of a fight, that's nasty. That's a real big problem. Suddenly, the bad guys know who they are, can access their messages, address book, all of that kind of stuff. Not to mention making free calls. Now, if characters want a mobile phone with a blank ownership, or something like that, then they buy a limited form of the 'anonymity' perk. Basically, if they use real-tech, it comes with limitations. If they spend point, it has only those limitations they buy. My thing of buying perks is essentially a round-the-back way of charging points for PerfectTech.

I'm planning two games at the moment. One is a regular Champions Universe game - there, the bad dude is Dark Seraph. It's a mystic-oriented game, set in London. The next game is one I'll be running after the regular CU one. Kind of a 'world of darkness Champions Universe.' Supers haven't made an appearance yet publically, and the government is controlling things very carefully. Nazi Germany is also out and about (WWII was fought to a draw in the European theatre). The bad guy for the first few stories, though, will be a government man, military, who collects, controls and studies metahumans. He's human, but has high technology at his disposal. I don't have an identity for him at the moment, but I may use the Warlord. Or perhaps Defender. At the moment, I'm imagining him as a cross between Midas (evil Iron Man from Grant Morrison's Marvel Boy) and Donald Lydecker (from Dark Angel). That game's still being planned. In a previous game (sci-fi Star Champions), the triple-team of bad guys was Hass, Zorn and Rache (Hate, Anger and Revenge, in German). Humanity was living far away from earth at the time, having been chased off by aliens. The three dudes above had gone back to earth and taken it over. Essentially, their base was a planet populated by slaves and automatons, giving them an immense industrial base. They had the nastiest everything out there, as well as methods of brainwashing that were particularly difficult to fight. No-one was immune to them, though strong-willed people were more difficult to subvert. However, once subverted, their morals were totally changed - they would now resist any attempt to turn them back. It was essentially impossible with current tech available to the good guys. Interestingly, it meant people who were weasels before conversion remained weasels... so could sometimes throw off the conditioning.