nexus

Re: Omcv 1?

Does 6E have a defined "Normal Human" included? (You had to search for it in 5ER' date=' but it was there.) If it does, what is the "normal" MOCV?[/quote']

 

Three

Re: Omcv 1?

Just like I used to lob Min-Max Bombs (d6 Drain All Characteristics Only 1 Active Point of CHAR Fade Rate determined by how mean I was feeling) at the breakpointeers' date=' someone selling back their MOCV would find themselves needing to Use the Force or break out of an evasive Mental Entangle. If you design your character to be lame, it's my duty as a GM to snatch away your walking stick. [/quote']

 

Why would a character need OMCV to break out of a Mental Entangle?

 

I don't feel its cheesy to want to sell back something that you'll never get use out of that rules allow. It's only what appears to an awkward game artifact that create the impression 3 is "normal" in the first place. The GM should either make it useful (or give it a function that makes player at least consider selling it back) or declare it or even all CVs can't be sold back; they are figuratively at "O" for that purpose. Fix the oddity, don't punish the player.

Re: Omcv 1?

Does no one see the irony in 6E deleting COM because it's a "seldom used and poorly defined" Characteristic and then promptly adding a brand new seldom used Characteristic (OMCV) which is already generating house rules to rectify?

OMCV is an odd beast. Its well defined but has exactly one function and that function is exceptionally specialized for a characteristic. It's only useful to certain characters and not in all campaigns To use some of the arguments brought up against Comeliness perhaps that indicates it should be something other than a Characteristic.

Re: Power Discussion: Barrier

High BODY Barrier isn't as much of a concern as a high DEF barrier' date=' high BODY you can eventually wear it down but high DEF is there to stay having an effective immunity up to a certain point instead of an effective duration of BODY.[/quote']

 

High Body would be a concern to an trapped character. Being trapped outside the fight for several phases (or even turns) is effectively being take out of it and you (or someone) is wasting phases, endurance or charges to get you out. A mentalist OTOH, might find such a position technically beneficial but...

Re: Omcv 1?

I think that sort of thing should be campaign dependent since I can see the logic behind thinking "Why do non mentalists "normals" (not every campaign has a normals/supers divide) even have MOCV in the first place?"

 

Its like everyone having an ESP Characteristic that most characters can't and won't use (and in game it doesn't exist for them) but is just on the character sheet because of a technicality taking up space like Com was said too) because certain characters can buy the ESP power.

 

If I use this I'm probably just going to set MOCVs base to 0 for most campaigns. It borks mentalists a little but it just makes more sense to me. Maybe I'll make a low cost "Latent Mentalist" talent that gives a base 3 MOCV for free and lets th character use certain campaign defined abilities.

Hm...

Maybe set OMOCV to 0 for anyone that doesn't have a Mental Power/Power that uses it? They get those 3 points for free, like Mental Powers provided Mental Awareness. So the Latent Mentalist Talent You're considering could be priced 1d6 of Telepathy Only to gain active MOCV/Mental Power Perks -2

That's kind of dangerous "something for nothing thinking" though.

Re: The 2nd REALLY important 6th edition question

I think establishing minimums as a means of recreating the effect of Figured characteristics will have an interesting effect on character generation. Since Players will be, for lack of a better term, forced to invest a certain amount of their points in Secondaries according to how much they increase Primary Chars such campaigns might see more "human" levels there (with the likely exception of Con which has a direct combat function, Strength for Brick concepts and Ego* for mentalists) with more points invested in Secondary Chars as needed instead of required and, of course, powers and skills. This might be a boon or a flaw depending on your perspective

*I'm not entirely sure about Ego being increased particularly high since the MCVs are independent

What might make for an interesting experiment is to establish Maximums on secondary chars based on the level of Primaries.,,

Re: Omcv 1?

Do you really want the 10 ocvers taking shots to your head with ease?

Only if your campaign is using hit location and, more subjectively, if 10 OCVs are going to be as relatively common in this 6th with more CVs starting at 3 and CSLs slightly more expensive.

Re: Omcv 1?

Enter the Mindscape A selective AoE EDM Usable as an Attack which draws all of the characters into the Mindscape. They are all more or less unchanged, except that all attacks are targeted and avoided using mental CV's.

 

Or call it the Astral Plane.

 

There are certainly ways to force the issue and make a lack of OMCV a handicap.

There are but they are a little extreme (EDM usable as an attack isn't a common ability, IME) and likely to be uncommon. A villain that forces people into the Mindscape, for example isn't just going to "punish" people that sold back their base OMCV its going to punish, to some extent, anyone that focused primarily on Physical combat IE: Any non mentalists unless only the character's with lowered MOCV are targeted. That a risk with any of the methods I can think of.

OMCV is just kind of a special snowflake among the new attributes that brings some unique baggage to the table. IMO. It's a characteristic that only certain character concept have any use for. This wasn't as blatantly an issue when it was a derived value instead of a true characteristic as you couldn't sell it back. Of course there were opportunities gained that some felt were worth the shift.

Re: Omcv 1?

I would allow that never having had mental attack powers, your skill at mentally attacking would be poor.

 

Of course Hero has gone and defined your basic normal as having 3 OMCV, which kinda sets the bar...but doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

I think it would have been better to define base CVs as 0 (and do the same for hitting a hex/1 meter by 1 meter by 1 meter area). If I decouple I might use that as a House Rule.

Re: A Thread for Random Videos

Total Eclipse of the Heart: Literal version

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj-x9ygQEGA&feature=related

Re: Omcv 1?

The thing is, IMO, with OMCV most non mentalist characters do have a valid reason to sell it back: It doesn't exist for them.

Aside from the game convention that all characters have it as characteristic....they don't have it. It controls abilities that they don't possess. Every other characteristic is something that any character will use over the course of their existence, at least once at some point with two exceptions:

OMCV: It serves no function accept to govern accuracy of mental attacks. If your character has no mental powers or mentally targeted powers they have no reason to even possess that attribute again aside from mechanical convention.

DMCV: If there are no mental powers or powers that target it this doesn't exist in the figurative reality of the setting. It doesn't effect anything.

Now it's perfectly valid to say "3 is the base ability of any normal thinking being of normal mental acuity" but that's really a campaign dependent choice and up to the GM, IMO.

IOW, would you allow a character is a avowed pacifist and never thrown a punch in his life to sell back their OCV? Most non mentalists are in the same position when it comes to MOCV. It's part of the flexibility that comes with decoupling.

One solution (if you consider this a bug) is to give OMCV something to do that is more universal than its base function.

Re: Omcv 1?

Selling back MCV is sort of like taking a Vulnerability to Mental Attacks. As long as there are things that use MCV in the game it seems like there's a price potential to pay for those extra points.

Not if you just sell back MOCV. It has no function if the character has no offensive mental powers

Re: Omcv 1?

I'm not sure it's cheesy. It does make a certain degree of narrative since that if a character has no mental powers or abilities that rely on MOCV that it would be deficient. They've never used it the way an avowed pacifist character that's never so much as thrown a punch might sell back their OCV, that's just more risky. You could call it natural talent/raw "human" ability but saying MOCV is deficient is just as justifiable. I don't think those points should be dumped into MDCV with justification like any other purchase but if its something every non mentalist does then its not too bad, IMO.

I suppose one way to make it count might be to require an MOCV vs MOCV roll to attempt to Break out of a Mental Power either on the first try or every time. Or maybe restructure break out all together and make it take MOCV into account.

Re: Power Discussion: Barrier

Spider Man's webs are representative of a specific special effect for barrier' date=' not the abtract base power itself. [/quote']

 

Sean appeared to be arguing against the statement that Entangles being able to be dismissed at will was "Common Sense" not about if Barriers should be, at least in the post you quoted.

Re: Power Discussion: Barrier

I wonder if might be worth House Ruling a small Adder for Entangle that eliminates bonuses from MA and Contortionist.

Re: Power Discussion: Barrier

But not all martial arts require impact. Can you use martial escape? That is a maneuver specifically designed for escaping being grabbed so presumably you are using leverage to get more power out of your escape attempt. I can see the same applying to an entangle.

IIRC, that is left up to the GM judging from the sfx of the entangle* on a case by case basis but I think default assumption is that a character can apply a Escape Exert based maneuver on an Entangle.

*And the maneuver really. There's nothing that says a character's martial escape might not represent a brief surge "chi" that lends them strength or magically making the body slightly amorphous in a really wild MA campaign.

Re: Omcv 1?

I understand the OCV' date=' but in most games, even the mentallist / mage may have to throw a blow / use an ability that uses OCv, but in most games with mental powers, the non-gifted will almost never have to use OMCV[/quote']

 

You can potentially use the points gained from selling back your MOCV to boost your MDCV if you expect to defend against Mental Power regularly.

Re: Power Discussion: Barrier

Hmm' date=' Entangle could just be a modifier/adder to Barrier like Accurate or Explosion are to AoE.[/quote']

 

When I first heard of the Barrier Power I assumed Entangle was subsumed into Barrier.

Re: Reactions to 6e

I did like the option to Reflect HTH attacks. That's been needed for awhile, IMO.

Re: Reactions to 6e

Having done a basic read through of the 2 books (most attention payed to the character creation book)...

 

Very pretty - they look awesome.

 

Some very cool new stuff - Barrier, Damage Negation, the new Area Effect stuff, and a number of other powers and modifiers. The change to VPPs is going to be something I am going to be looking at.

 

I went into this with something of a "prove to me you are better than the Hero I play now" attitude (which is really the same attitude I give any RPG I read). It didn't.

 

I still don't like the way characteristics are handled, and I dislike the removal of ECs. Some cost things just seem a bit wonky to me (6 pts per die on a few powers, and the changes to skill levels costs and Regen).

 

For me, enough stuff that I liked / thought was fine was changed and little enough stuff was "fixed" that I prefer 5th. I suspected that with the prerelease info (ECs and Fig Chars), but reading through the books prove it.

 

So my user titles stands for now - 5th ed Grognard. But I will be incorporating a number of 6th powers lims and advantages. Still using Hero as a toolkit - just doing it across edition lines, as it were.

I'll be using a FrankenHero too I think. There's some interesting new stuff in 6th edition but nothing that turned me against 5th.

Re: Reactions to 6e

Whether stealth works against Danger Sense or not depends on properly defining how your danger sense works. If it relies on noticing things that are odd, or out of place, I might not allow stealth to work, but I might allow shadowing (which is the art of blending in).

I agree. I feel the default should be that it doesn't with a Limitation (maybe -1/2 or even -1 depending on how common mega stealthy types are in the campaign) if Stealth skills do.

Other wise sfx would determine what does and doesn't work. If your ability is short range precog maybe only an invisibility type power would work. If it's "sensing hostile chi/power level/whatever" then some skill at a manipulating chi might apply which could, of course be assumed to be a PART of Stealth training in wuxia/anime martial arts/appropriate setting by the GM

Re: Reactions to 6e

The Stealth/Danger Sense interaction hasn't changed at all. Not one bit. Not a single word of it.

 

STEALTH 5ER p71 = 6E1 p89 WORD FOR WORD.

Guess I've been ignoring it for so long I assumed it wasn't there. And I see no reason to stop now.

Re: Reactions to 6e

[*]p71: Cost of Combat Skill Levels

Given that a CSL is basically a multipower of OCV, DCV, and some form of damage boost (at double cost), general-purpose CSLs really shouldn't cost more than 8 and even then are almost never going to be worth the cost. Given the cost of OCV, cost should probably be 3/4/5/6/7, not 2/3/5/8/10.

If I adopt decoupled DCV in my 5th hybrid I'll probably do some thing like this.

[*]p76-77: Forgery and Gambling

Forgery (all types) is not so potent that it should cost 10 points. Cost should be 1 for a subcategory, 2 for a category, 3 for all. Same for Gambling.

Seems reasonable

[*]p89: Stealth

Stealth applies to danger sense now. Not sure how I feel about that

Not sure I like that either. SOMETHING should work against Danger Sense but I'm not sure Stealth should, at least not be default. I can see it being a Limitation on Danger Sense.

Re: Reactions to 6e

Well as it turns out I did get a copy (Belated and highly unexpected birthday gift) so I may post some thoughts here.

Re: 6th Edition Question: New Powers?

Perhaps the "heals as fast as you can wound him" character is better designed with Healing and reduced reuse time than with Regeneration.

Or Defenses with Instant Healing as the sfx