nexus

Re: OMCV 1?

You're quite correct; resetting the start numbers to 1 or 0 for every Characteristic would have been a lot more logical.

That was actually one of the proposals tossed around in the 6th Ed forums that appealed to me particularly with figured Characteristics dropped. The main issue I had with it is it would be more points to fiddle with.

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

I was thinking about SA and Com recently and I see no reason why they couldn't co exist in the same game. Striking Appearance would be a form of specialization in appearance or aspect, the character in question is particularly outstanding in one area Comeliness covers over the rest or has feature(s) that will appeal to a certain groups strongly.

This would allow for players to create "the most beautiful Predator of them all" (if its going to matter in the campaign) or the epitome of Goth mystique (though most people find him to be a weirdo that wears to much eyeliner) easily and effectively in game terms. I wasn't if the too levels would be useful but on consideration I think so.

The Three point level would be things like: Sex Appeal, Cute, non threatening, aspects of aesthetics that would appeal to a wide group but not be applicable in all situations or with all people but would generally be (or the player wants to be) positive. Two point levels would be really specific aspects of the character with more limited application or appeal.

Things like: Hawt Goth, looks good in a tux, well groomed ovipositors, boyish good looks, etc.

Re: Post "gotchas" here

Something I noticed' date=' that could cause arguments is a new option for Haymaker called offensive Haymaker, -5 OCV instead of DCV[/quote']

 

Odd name. Seems like Defensive Haymaker would be appropriate.

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

I may be going out on a limb here, but I think there are several different intents where reintroducing/keeping/expanding COM is concerned:

 

1: Some like to use the COM value as an indicator for attractiveness/value for physical attractiveness.

 

2: Some like to use the COM value as the basis for a COM Roll to determine if another character/NPC find them attractive/interesting/charming.

 

3: Some like to use the COM value as game mechanic in itself; i.e. COM Attacks, modifiers to PRE Attacks, modifiers to Interaction Skills.

 

4: Some want several of the above.

 

 

Suggestion: Striking Appearance with RSR.

The RSR is one of the Everyman Power Skill "Appearance", as Chris suggested.

 

This Power:"Appearance" Skill represents the value of noteworthiness (as in a COM value); it also represents the character's chance of being noticed and remembered by a random witness.

It must be defined as Attractive or Ugly, similarly to Striking Appearance, and is subject to the "Eye of the Beholder" effect - a higher value means either more Attractive or more Ugly, as defined. A low value indicates blandness and unremarkability.

This Skill also acts as the RSR for Striking Appearance to take effect (at the level purchased by the character - if any).

 

What'cha think?

How does your suggestion relate to reintroducing an Appearance characteristic? It seems more appropriate to adding variation to the Striking Appearance Talent which is fine but not really the goal here.

Re: Omcv 1?

Stupid Question: Can you get CSLs as Persistent?

Re: Replacements for...

If thats the case you might look at a "naked" APx2 (or AP+Pen) RSR' date=' or make it resistible in some way (say an Int roll?) (or both to save more cost) and call it "good"[/quote']

 

Some folks were talking about a House rule that made AP cumulative. You could attach a roll to that and sort of simulate Find Weakness.

 

or just reintroduce Find Weakness from 5th.

Re: Ben 10: Alien Force

Now that season 3 is only 2 weeks away I have to make a choice...convert to 6E or stay with 5ER?

 

Decisions, decisions...

Don't put all the extra work on yourself (You've got thousands to go. ) leave the older write ups as is since it's easy to convert for readers and do the new ones in whatever edition best suits you.

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

We need a way to deal with Cultural applicability. "You humans don't see it, but all the male dwarves in the room are tripping over their words and their beards when they are within 10 feet of the dwarves princess."

Overall this is not a big deal for me. The "Eye of the Beholder" boiler plate attached to Striking Appearance works just as well for Comeliness, IMO. Either modify the results or the GM can simply decide when it applies or doesn't. If your race's appearance is so selective its not going to come up enough to be worth it then get Com with a limitation or consider it part of the DF Complication for your race.

Really, Presence is just as culturally specific as appearance. What's charming, imposing, seductive or persuasive in one culture is rude and gauche in another and that's not even taking aliens into account.

Finally, there's the Dramatic Realism aspect. In much of the style of fiction Hero deals with: Attractive is attractive and ugly is ugly and judged from an overall human standpoint. In Star Wars, most races seem to think Twi'lecks are attractive (female twi'lecks anyway) and that Hutts are ugly. It's a just a pulp/cinematic fiction thing even though a "real" twi'leck would probably be disconcerting that very least. Also, in many games the appearance of extremely alien character to their own kind doesn't matter that much. The Predator might have been the epitome of beauty in his culture but it really didn't come up in the story.

If that cinematic outlook doesn't work for your games that would be a application of the Striking Appearance Talent or Limited Com (which if it was increased to 1 for 1 would have the same cost anyway)

Another idea that occurred to me was borrowing the Disquise modifier table for intimidating an alien race and using those modifiers for Comeliness rolls and Com based skills when dealing with alien/inhuman races. It seems like that would model the "Beautiful Alien Princess" trope pretty well and allow for some more verisimilitude for those that desire it. .

I'd like to see a method that deals with the value of a hideous appearance that isn't different from all the other characteristics by costing more to lower the number. Perhaps a separate but related mechanic, perhaps limited presence.

I'd like to see guidance on dealing with the downsides of appearance, both positive and negative. The pretty girl and the ugly guy are both more likely to be picked out in a crowd and remembered later. The pretty girl may get a bad reaction instead due to jealousy or prejudice (all blonds are dumb). One a related note, the ugly guy may a positive reaction due to pity. Perhaps this is just guidance on buying Social and Distinctive Features complications.

I'd see those as Complications and special effects. Comeliness doesn't have to mean pretty as I mentioned upthread. A homely but pitiable guy might have a good Com. Com measures the chance your character's appearance has a positive impact. A Complication would reflect a person who's looks give them a bad time (or sometimes another character might have Complications that prompt them to give someone a bad time over their looks).

Having an intimidating/frightening appearance can be handled in a number of ways. Levels with certain Interaction skills and Limited Pre for fear based Presence attacks or you could, using open ended special effects, just say high Com can reflect that but the bonuses are different. This is why I'm going to rename Comeliness Appearance for my games, the word has less baggage. White Wolf's games Adventure defined its appearance characteristic in a similar fashion. It didn't necessarily mean attractive.

This would open up room for all sorts of Appearance based Talents (Striking Appearances, really) too for even more fine tuning of this area. Presence Talents would be interesting too. This could shape up into a decent social system.

Finally, I'd like to see a method for dealing with changing appearance. Shapeshift, Transform, and Images all can change peoples appearance, and are justifiable in many genres. But you can also drastically change appearance with a night a wading through the sewers or a day at the spa. I'm unhappy with saying to the team's shapeshifter, "sure you look like Scarlett Johansson but you still only have a 10 COM."

Well, there is the Make Over adder for Shapeshift already and some guidelines on altering Comeliness/Striking Appearance for Transformation. I sometimes feel like it should be the same deal as altering any other Characteristic. If you want to make changes you need to use an Adjustment Power/Transform. Allowing Com to be cheaply changed enforces the feeling that it's not as "important" as other things. And honestly you can alter someone's effective Pre pretty easily too. Give them a squeak helium voice or make it look lie they just went themselves or passed gas…

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

Nexus,

 

The problem come from the fact that this thread *IS* about re-introducing COM. If all you want to do is port over the 5E mechanic than the answer is obvious and has been given. It's "Port over the 5E mechanic." If that's all you want it becomes a technical question of how do you add it to a HD template and add it to a character sheet.

 

If you want more than that or something different than the 5E and 6E versions then you need to deal with the issue of what you do want COM to do and what doesn't do at all and what it does poorly. And you can't discuss that without without discussing the weaknesses that you want those changes to address.

You seem to be coming at this from the POV that Comeliness was a weakness and a failure at what it was supposed to do. I'd say that's not really the audience this thread was aimed at.

The thing is it has just become another thread arguing over the appropriateness of Comeliness as a Characteristic and which means is "better" with the same old arguments being tossed around and fought over. The thread is about implementing Com and some new ways to use it. Not about how much better it is (if you're interested in the topic, you prefer it already) or how much more appropriate Striking Appearance is (if you prefer what are you doing in this thread?).

Comeliness isn't perfect, neither is Striking Appearance They're just preferences with neither one being Objectively Superior or the One True Way.

But that's all been discussed, debated and fought over. The side that wanted Com dropped has officially won. Can't there be a discussion for that want to use and possibly expand it that doesn't turn into a Defend Comeliness thread, There is no need to defend it and no point to doing so. It's gone officially and its not likely to come back. Some people want to use it in their games though like some people use the Half Move OCV penalty. The objective, or I gathered was to discuss using it and enhancing it for even better use not prove it should be re-introduced at all.

Re: The REALLY important 6th Edition question

This is an element of good scenario design: it's usually a really bad idea to have only one way to progress a story and in the campaigns I post to the web, I always include notes to the GM on how to move the story forward if the PCs screw up or do something utterly unexpected.

Choke points are generally a bad thing I agree. And notoriously easy to unknowingly slip into scenarios. There should generally be more than one way to give at a vital clue or other information than a single deduction or die roll. Any type of success or failure based on a single binary occurrence might be tense but isn't necessarily dramatic.

Though I do think victory/success should not be assured in most conflict/obstacle situations. The PCs should be able to screw things up to the point success is impossible or Pyrrhic and useless at best. The ability to fail, IMO, is an important aspect indistiguishing role playing games from shared fiction creating, maintain both tension and drama and the game aspect of role playing game. Not to mention a sense free will (for lack of a better term) among the players, their descisions and actions matter. Being railroaded to success is still being railroaded.

But I digress from what was being discussed I think

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

Is there any chance of letting this thread go back to it original topic? It's quickly turned into a defend your preference thread which seems odd since the those that wanted Comeliness removed have won (until some highly unlikely future edition re-addition). Yes, there are going to be some statements that express a preference for how Com handled things in a thread about reintroducing it but that's not really a call to rehash an old debate.

Re: Post "gotchas" here

Oh. That's not the way it worked in 5ER? I could swear dropping Sweep/Rapid Fire to a Half-Phase action was all it ever did. Hmm.

Whoops!

You're right, I'd conflated some of the text in my mind over the years.

Re: Post "gotchas" here

Rapid Attack no longer allows a Full Move and Attack instead it allows the character to perform a multi attack as a half phase action instead of a Full Phase.

Re: How to: Spatial Compression technology

Ah. I should clarify a few things, I guess.

1. In Ultraviolet, the technology can be used to store a very large number of weapons (more than a person could lift, let's say). These weapons weigh nothing and do not encumber the user until summoned for use. (You could literally carry around a ton of weapons without difficulty).

Yeah, at one point she's carrying around a kid of 10 or so in a unit thin as a book and about the size of back pack with the same weight.

Possibly a Gadget/Weapon pool changeable in Combat with a OIF and other limitations to reflect it's nature. Make the points expendable, that is if she loses or empties a weapon she has to buy it again or wait until she can "refill" her pool at an appropriate locationl.

The other benefit is, without proper detection equipment, the weapons are perfectly concealed from outside observers

Hmm, Invisible to Weapon Detection or huge Concealment Bonus?

.

2. In DBZ, 2 story homes, motorcycles, even large airplanes are compressed into capsules than can fit into the palm of one's hand, carried with minimal encumbrance, and then deployed quickly for use.

Summon: Base or Vehicle?

Simple structures might be doable with Barrier?

3. Vehicles and bases which contain more interior size than that indicated are in effect, at the very least, concealing that additional size from outside observation/detection. If the TARDIS' real size is the equivalent of a Borg cube, say, then having it appear externally to be the size of a phone booth obviously conveys some tangible benefit. Ditto for a truck whose interior is the size of a warehouse. All of these things do seem to convey tangible benefits, above and beyond sfx.

The object in question (Tardis, the vehicle, etc) is just a OIF or has EDM to an Extra Dimensional Base.

Just some suggestions. I hope they help.

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

rjcurrie has already named the other way of doing COM: Describe how your character looks, then let everyone else decide if that is pretty or ugly.

 

Presence is a very abstract "how impressive am I" stat, similar to HP (Body) or EGO. If you want to abstract COM as far, you end up wit PRE. If you abstract a bit less than that, you end up with limited PRE, and if you abstract as less as possible, it's probably best left to SFX (after all, the Fire Blast and the Iron Spikes Blast cost the same, even though Fire is a lot more beautiful) or some incredibly complex construction involving Mind Control or Transform.

 

I'm not trying to convince you to drop COM. I'm trying to convince you that limited PRE is the best mechanical representation for it. You may still write it down as COM, starting at 10 (equaling +0 PRE), and going from there. I really don't see any better way to use COM in game terms. It does not make you stronger or faster, it does not directly give you a reputation, it does not allow you to do damage, it only makes you more pleasant to look it, which is essentially a function of PRE. You could even go as far as to separate PRE into two parts, such as "frightening" and "lovely", where the first one is used for "FREEZE" type attacks, and the second one (COM) is used for Seduction.

 

And yes, you may houserule as much as you like. I only recommend not doing it for COM, because you're not gaining anything, you're only introducing unnecessary complexity.

 

Yesterday was always better, until you realize that you're wearing rose-tinted nostalgia goggles.

kdansky, please. This not the thread to rehash this debate for the nth time..

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

With respect to the OP

Perfectly happy to let this thread die if someone must start another' date=' but it should probably start somewhere. This thread is intended for people who want COM to be returned to their game as a house ruled Characteristic, to share ideas about what place it can play in the game.[b'] It is not a place to post arguments for or against its appropriateness in the game for anyone else or as an officially supported rule, so please post such elsewhere.[/b]

Emphasis mine. For both sides of the debate. I can't be as active in the thread as I'd like I don't want to see it to turn into yet another Com war.

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

My first thought was: re-introduce COM by having it start the level defined by Steve's conversion notes (currently stickied at the top of this forum). Then allow players to buy COM up or down 5 points at 0.5 CP per point. Use COM as a tie breaker or complementary roll for Striking Appearance rolls.

Not to sound argumentative but wouldn't the last work a little better the other way around: Striking Appearance as a modifier to Comeliness. I think if someone took this approach they might want to limited Striking App to the 2 point level only, defined a little more narrowly as a bonus against specific people or in certain situation. This could also address the issue some had with Com being too universal for their sense of disbelief.

Re: Re-introducing COM to 6th Edition

After all' date=' STR can be muscle power or gear power or low-range Telekinetic power, couldn't Comeliness also have different special effects than being good-looking specifically? [/quote']

 

I've always assumed it could and did. The name "Comeliness" is somewhat prejudicial but I've alway interpreted the Character to mean aesthetic appeal or similar effect that has a game mechanics impact.

 

I've had characters define their Com as "a subtle psionic field that nudges people to like me though I am quite plain" to "I kind of homely but in a cute "Hollywood" way that charms people and they find it disarming". As long as they could convince me that their definition fell without the bounds of Com (or whatever's) mechanical effect I was good with it.

 

Edit: Even a different description is, IMO, a different sfx of Comeliness. Brad Pitt does not have the same Comeliness as a beautiful Arabian stallion.

Re: Cage Barrier

Im looking at building a barrier that is like prison bars. what this implys is that it stops movment but not ranged attacks because you can shoot through the gaps (though it probobly offers cover). so what kind of limitation do you think it would be for a barrier to provide cover only' date=' not stop attacks my guess is 1/2 lim[/quote']

 

Maybe you could get the Barrier with Activation roll for its defensive aspects. If it active the "bars" are hit, it if not the attack pass through the gaps similar to sectional armor.

Re: Cage Barrier

Im looking at building a barrier that is like prison bars. what this implys is that it stops movment but not ranged attacks because you can shoot through the gaps (though it probobly offers cover). so what kind of limitation do you think it would be for a barrier to provide cover only' date=' not stop attacks my guess is 1/2 lim[/quote']

 

Characters with contortionist or pliable body sfx (shapeshift vs touch, Desolid cannot passe through Solid matter,) can at least attempt to squeeze through it to.

Re: Cage Barrier

Im looking at building a barrier that is like prison bars. what this implys is that it stops movment but not ranged attacks because you can shoot through the gaps (though it probobly offers cover). so what kind of limitation do you think it would be for a barrier to provide cover only' date=' not stop attacks my guess is 1/2 lim[/quote']

 

Well, anyone englobed can fire out but others can fire out (and certain types of melee attacks can get in and it offers no protection from special effects (gases for example). Maybe -1/4 depending on the frequency of attacks that can bypass it's effects.

Re: Champions 6th version

Personally I am in the "wait and see" camp' date=' but I am not real happy about the changes I have heard about so far. I want to see how the figured characteristics are going to be done and what else has been changed to gain the "granular" feel Steve mentioned he wanted to obtain. I'm not holding my breath on this one.[/quote']

 

There are no figured Characteristics in Hero 6th edition, that is no Characteristics are derived from another. They're all set at a base and players purchase them to whatever level that want individually.

Re: Negative Adjustment Powers vs Summoned Beings after the fact

No, I get that. It just cause me a little cognitive dissonance when the mechanics clash with setting. If all Demons are summoned then it just clicks more with me for them to all work as if they were Summoned. I'd like for a Mage's Spell of Infernal Banishment to work the same way on all demons unless there's a both a coherent reason why it doesn't aside from fiat. For example, if a PC has a Demonic Follower in a setting where all Demons have to summoned and have no way to have summoned it (Does not have Summoning) I'll have to talk with the player about where it came from. And there's a chance it could Banished (The Summoning that brought Dispelled).

 

I'm not demanding that is how the RAW should work or how it should be in anyone elses game I just personally like as much mechanical and narrative consistency as I can get. Years of White Wolf* have put off mechanics that don't match the setting fluff.

 

*Exalted and Aberrant I'm looking at you...

You could make a House Rule that the longer a summoned being (however you want to define them) stays around the harder it is banish them with Dispel. Set an interval and each time it passes, NAPs used against the original Summon lose one die and so eventually all but the most mighty spells become ineffective. It will save you the trouble of working a different version like some kind EDM usable as an Attack.

As an alternative (and probably simpler option), rule that once a summoned being has done as ordered it is no longer considered bound and can't be forced back to wherever it came from by breaking the spell. Maybe I can opt to return on its own or maybe nut as suits your campaign world.

How much was the option to use combat skill levels to increase damage used in your games? A general estimate like "Allot", "occasionally" or "almost never" is fine, I don't need precise numbers.

Re: Omcv 1?

Edit: Actually, its just not worth it.