Hugh Neilson

Actually...the Defenders got their start in Sub-Mariner, and three issues of Marvel Feature, before getting their own title. Silver Surfer and Dr. Strange were back & forth early on.

When we come back to resource pools, it is interesting to note that D&D 3e implemented a "wealth by level" model to assess whether characters had appropriate gear. Resource points feels pretty similar.

Or the Brick ignores the martial artist and goes and attacks someone within a half move range. Or he leaves - why does he have to beat up the martial Artist? Or he delays until that Martial Artist moves back into HTH range. Then he attacks and backs away, so the MA has to use his next half phase to close in if he wants to attack. He could just walk behind cover and wait for the MA to come to him not knowing exactly where he is. Assuming that the opponent's sole objective in life is to beat up the Blaster. Maybe he just lets the fellow hide. He'll have to come out next phase if he wants to attack. Maybe toss up a Barrier so that runaway can't rejoin the fight easily and beat up his teammates while they are down a combatant.

If a character can move after attacking, it does not allow a half move to close, a half move to attack and a half move to retreat - the character still only has two half phases. They just gain the option of attacking before, rather than after, moving. This is not far off the d20 model. One move and one standard action, or one full round/full phase action. Free/zero phase actions. No swift or immediate actions, and d20 has no Aborts. If the concept is that attacks can be performed during movement,that would be a further change to the dynamic. Going back to the original post it's not clear which was suggested. I read "attack first. move after" rather than "attack during movement" mainly due to familiarity with maneuvers like move through and move by.

I rarely see Haymakers in general, and I'm not sure why anyone would start a Haymaker and then disrupt it themselves by moving away. If you attack, then move away, I will likely ignore you in my next phase and focus on whatever I was trying to accomplish before I was so rudely interrupted, combine with a teammate to take down one of your teammates, or move even further away from you, depending on my objectives. Maybe I'll set up a barrier or other impediment to prevent your speedy return, or duck into an alleyway (and flee? wait in ambush? guess you will have to come back to find out). Note that, if you half moved away, and I half move further away, you will need a full phase to close in again. Why do you assume that my only goal in life is to close in and attack you? If anything, I think enhancing dynamic combat with people moving around would be a benefit of changing this rule, not a drawback.

We've played with attacking not ending a phase. It did not change much. Take that as one experience only - our group has never focused on eking every last bit of effectiveness and efficiency out of every character point and every phase, so a group more focused on that efficiency could find ways to create more issues. As well, there is already some "analysis paralysis" in many Hero games, especially with newer players, and having more options will only increase that. As has already been highlighted above, how tightly you stick to existing rules about things you can only do once per phase, like reassign multipower pools and skill levels, could have an impact. You could also add a rule that some of these zero phase reallocation "actions" cannot be performed after an attack, or perhaps once you have used the points allocated to an attack or to OCV/damage. That is, once you use a level in an attack (OCV or damage), it's gone until the start of your next phase (unless you abort) and once you use Pool points (Multipower or VPP), they are similarly locked until the start of your next phase.

Restrainable and Physical Manifestation are also options.

It's A Small World After All It's a Small World After All It's a Small World After All It's a Small, Small World!

Agreed, Doc - taken to its ultimate extreme, that rule should eliminate Mental Attack in favour of a Blast with IPE, LoS range, AVAD and ACV. All the options seem to come in a pretty comparable prices, and clearly the cot should land somewhere between "16m, 6 DEF, no variation" and "16M, 13 DEF all the time".

As Doc notes above, for 42 points, I can have 16 m through 13 PD - what we want s clearly less powerful than that, so 42 is not the right answer. Possible options: - use a +1/4 advantage instead of +1/2. That would leave a cost of 35 points, which falls between the two. - keep +1/2 advantage on Allocable, start with 2m Tunnelling through 6PD (14 points) and add 14m Allocable (+1/2, so +21) = 35 points again. The character is not getting Allocable on the base 2m + 6 PD. I prefer the latter. The character could also choose to buy 16m, 6 PD allocable. This would allow 26 meters through 1 PD, an option the character suggested in the original post does not have. Now we have broader options. This would cost 3 + (25 x 1.5) = 40. The base 3 points is not allocatable - you need 1 meter and 1 PD to Tunnel at all. It looks like we are in the same cost range (34 vs 35), so the only question is how to get there. I like Allocatable because it can be fine tuned (how much fixed vs how much allocatable) and it seems portable to some other concepts (like Entangle or Defenses).

I'd start by looking at the cost of 16m through 6 PD and 2m through 13 PD (the two extremes). Either would cost 28 points. A Multipower of both would cost 28 + 3 + 3 = 34 points. If we went to the extreme of a multipower for every increment, there are 8, so 52 points. Usable as a second form of movement is +1/4 - I'm not sure anyone has ever assessed how this might be applied to Tunnelling, but it feels like we have multiple modes of Tunnelling here. We'd have to assess how many different forms. Allocatable resistant protection is a +1/4 advantage (with a caution sign). It seems like moving defenses around is no less useful than shifting Tunneling around. If we applied a +1/4 advantage to one of the two extremes, we would get 35 points, which is remarkably close to placing the two extremes in a Multipower (although that's skewed a bit by rounding - we could bump to 20 meters/6 defense or 2 meters/15 defense for 32 + 6= 38 vs 40 for a ++1/4 advantage on 32. Still in the ballpark. This is a bit more flexible than just choosing one or the other. I'd also interpret it as "auto-adjusting" - the player moves 4 meters through defense 6 (or less), then hits rock with 10 PD, so "spends" 8 meters to shift up to 10 defenses and has 4 meters remaining, just as if he had allocated 18m/8 PD from the outset. If it were a VPP, it could have a 28 point pool, Cosmic, no skill roll, Tunnelling Only(-1 1/2), so 28 + 17 = 45 - a bit more pricy but with many more variations (including advantages) available. That also backs up 42 points. So a bit more flexible and valuable than a +1/4 advantage, which leads me to a +1/2 advantage or 42 points. More pricy than a "pick one or the other" multipower and less pricy than "pick any combo" as a multipower. This does not seem unfair, so let's call allocatable a +1/2 advantage. I think I'd also call it +1/2 for defenses, and even for Entangle switching between dice and defenses.

They should be subject to one week's incarceration for every day before Remembrance Day (including that date), with their own Christmas muzak played non-stop throughout their incarceration.

Nothing in the rules prevents combat luck working against an AoE attack. The description is considered a -3/4 limitation (6e Vol 2 p 447), so there's a lot left to the GM to adjudicate, including the possibility that different special effects carry different restrictions. Achieving a common understanding with the player(s) is probably more important than the specifics of that common understanding.

A decision was made in 6e to remove "negative characteristics". Adding a negative concept for other abilities would beg the question of whether characters have 0 by default, can sell into negatives or can be adjusted into either positives (current rule being NO) or negatives. Other than "that much more time to recover into positive", I don't see a huge need to create "negative" rules.

Uphill all the way...BOTH ways!

We are not buying "the characteristic COM". That is all that was eliminated in 6e. An appearance-based mechanic was added to Hero as the mechanics of comeliness. The potential for a mechanical effect from attractiveness (or repulsiveness) was not removed. That is where I will suggest that you are not arguing the merits of eliminating COM from the system, but rather removing comeliness as a mechanic in any form. The player designing the character. The same one who could decide that his character is superhumanly charismatic and has a massive PRE that improves both PRE attacks and social interaction skills used on anyone and everyone for any purpose. Striking Appearance is a special effect for a similar ability to enhance PRE attacks and social interaction skills, but only against certain targets and/or only for certain purposes. Striking Appearance is simply limited PRE bonuses. Just as the player cannot say "My character is unimpressed" by a character with a 60 PRE, in the absence of sufficient PRE defense to mechanically be unimpressed by that character. Even if his PRE has the special effect of "Baby, I am SO handsome I make MEN wet!" Or buy PRE. That also determines how the rest of the world treats you and reacts to you. The guide rests in Striking Appearance only influencing a subgroup of "all characters". In any case, GM agency is universal and unlimited. "Yes, you have a 30 PRE and +10 levels of Striking Appearance. She has 120 EGO, only to resist PRE appearance-based attacks and opposed interaction skill rolls. She is unimpressed by your he-man good looks." I believe that emulation of the source material merits suspension of disbelief, and that a lot more cinematic source material includes a universal attractiveness trope than men who can fly or shoot lightning from their eyes. All it is now is a bonus to PRE attacks and interaction skills, only where that appearance would facilitate success of the PRE attack/interaction skill. Is the ONLY issue the interaction skill bonus?

You lost whatever benefit +10 COM provided, and the same benefit that buying an additional 10 COM would generate. But negatives became positives, which was an oddity. Being hideously ugly could be distinctive features - acting to your detriment. It could be Striking Appearance - acting to your benefit. It could be both, or it could have no in-game effect and be neither. Being supernaturally beautiful has all the same possibilities. In these cases, appearance is merely the SFX for a game mechanic. If there is no mechanic behind it, there are no points spent or gained. You can be a redhead for free. You can be a stunning redhead with a drop-dead gorgeous face and figure for free. If, however, people notice and remember you, or even lust after you and seek to hunt you down and imprison you for their own, it is a complication/disadvantage. If it allows you to wrap people around your little finger, then it is Striking Appearance, a benefit you pay for. Maybe it's even Mind Control. The appearance itself is just a special effect for what you want that appearance to do, in-game.

I think this is a different argument. Stunning Appearance was created to be the appearance-based modifier to interaction skills which was the only game mechanic ever officially associated with COM. Since all it did was modify some aspects of another characteristic, Steve considered that it was not, itself, a characteristic. As to Stunning Appearance, Dobby does not decide that people think he is attractive (or grotesque) enough to merit modifications to interactions. He does not decide that he has a high CON, magical powers or is enslaved to his house master. The author decided that. In Hero, the role of author is shared between player and GM. If I say that my character is a twisted elfin caricature and his appearance grants +3 to positive interaction skills (or imposes a -3 penalty) and adds 3d6 to friendship-based (or fear, or disgust-based) PRE attacks, then it is so. Dobby may revel in his appearance or despise it and seek to hide from the world. The player makes those decisions, if Dobby is a PC. And the GM assesses who will, or will not, be affected, guided overall by the frequency level set for Dobby's Striking Appearance. This is cinematic reality - it does not matter that no one standard of beauty exists in reality. If Troia of HelensTown has +6 Striking Appearance due to her beauty, then it is universal in-game, the same as it would be universal in the source material.

That was my initial thought as well - that it looked like END may simply not be in use, so it's not being tracked. But it was on the sheet, so I assumed that it was in use. I'm a bit confused that END was not a big factor, just something tracked for no real purpose unless an END drain was used. If one is used, or a character is KOd and recovers also adds an END element. A sudden need to introduce a brand-new mechanic in mid-combat seems like an issue. Not having END costs readily available at that point seems even more problematic. Also, it looks like it would be a factor if it were not assumed away. As well, both of Wasp's blasts are annotated "Autofire (Up to 3 shots). I questioned earlier whether it was intended that both the 10d6 attack and the 8d6 Stun Only attack be Autofire, as there seemed to be little reason to use the slightly smaller attack. With a 6 SPD and 42 END, I'm not sure how autofire attacks that cost 12 or 15 END per use was "not a big deal", even before factoring in shrinking and flight. With a 7 SPD, Supergirl would run through END pretty quickly too, although having 100 END gives her a bit of staying power. Maybe the builds behind the scenes build in some reduced/0 END to offset this, though. More broadly, END is really an "old school RPG" resource management element. It does balance out some elements, like lower-cost exhausting powers, and some costs (like autofire) might need reconsideration if it were eliminated, but when many builds are designed around enough reduced END to remove its impact, the possibility of replacing it with something less fiddly seems to merit consideration, at least. To some extent, I think this can be a question of the game constructed using the Hero system. All of that stuff can be included as character sheet detail, but be left off for a one-off where it will not come into play - maybe we have a bunch of minutia skills and perks offset by a few complications. Maybe the game style is more streamlined, so a lot of background issues (skill/perks, etc. and complications) are not used in the game, or are simply non-costed background elements with minimal or no in-game effect. This is a dial setting that really merits more discussion in the rulebooks.

I think my first step would be to assess whether the sheets could be customized for the specific Con game. For example: If no characters have mental powers, and no villains will, do we need Mental Combat Value or Mental Defense? Do we need rDEF at all? Only if the game will see killing attacks. I guess Supergirl has one, so it needs to be explained. Will there be adjustment powers? If not, noting “unified power” isn’t relevant to the player. If they will, Unified Power will make them extremely complicated to deal with. I’m trying to look at this like I have never played Hero before. Some thoughts: There is some extra space in the bottom right of the Characteristics box. Stretching Defenses into that area would allow “Resistant Defenses” to be more clearly identified. So what’s this “Endurance” stat? None of the abilities indicate their END cost, so this will be opaque to a new player. The various “+x Characteristics” risks confusion as a player looks at Supergirl (for example) and thinks “OK, she has an OCV of 12. I’ll use her Enhanced Physiology and Battle Training to increase that to 20”. Flight could have a better explanation of Megascale (e.g. just “30 km out of combat”). The player needs to know what “Absorption” does. The player needs to know what “Damage Reduction” does. This may be another unnecessary complication A lot of abilities “Requires INT Roll” – the player needs to know what to roll. A note that she can use only one Multipower ability at a time would help the player. Having these and the UP powers numbered suggests they have some common mechanic – one group is all usable at the same time and the other only one at a time? This will not be intuitive to a player. Are all of the Complications necessary? The player doesn’t need to know about Hunteds, and either the Danvers Family will be relevant or they won’t in the Con game. A summary of attack options (especially for Supergirl’s STR) could be helpful to a player. Dropped to Wasp here An explanation of “Autofire” would also be useful. Is there any reason the player would choose the 8d6 attack instead of the 10d6 attack? Maybe the 10d6 was not intended to be autofire? Do any of her powers require that she shrink? Is that +5 OCV over and above the 11 at the top of the sheet? Striking Appearance is unclear – does it add to the stats already presented? Is it always applicable? What does “+1 PRE” mean? On the Builds I assume the intent is not to run Supergirl and the Wasp together. If the goal is to introduce players to the game, I like the Wasp’s power level a lot more than Supergirl’s. Neither have much investment in skills. As Doc D notes, having a two-sided sheet would open up more explanatory notes and more “how to run the character in a game” options. I would also consider “full build” sheets, but only for interested players after the game, perhaps with "campaign guidelines" like DC and defense ranges, an expected focus on superhuman powers over skills, etc.

Following on Lone Wolf: Overconfident character's player: "If I can avoid Firewing's Ph 12 attack, I'll get a recovery and I can hold him off another couple of phases. Can I make an EGO roll at -3 to bring myself to believe he really CAN beat me?" Same player/character: GM - what's your DCV? Player - ummm....4 Other player: WHAT? 4?? What's your DEX?? Player: "23...but I have never even HEARD of this guy - clearly he is no threat. DCV 4 as I don't make any real effort to avoid his attack." Different player; character with "Impatient, impulsive and impetuous" Use my Explosion. Oops - that will catch my flying ally. Well, he goes with the first thing he thinks of. Explosion. "Swap VPP into complex UAA on Others Teleport with AoE, Selective and AoE accurate. We go five km due north. Except we just got here and I don't know which way "north" is, so go ahead and roll at random which way he thinks is 'north'". On arrival, we splash into a bay. Well, they do, he can fly. The rest of the group starts discussing what we should do now. "I can 'port us again!" Every other player at the table chorused "NO!" in unison. D&D game; character is a superstitious believer in old wives' tales and a warrior first, last and always. We encounter what is clearly an Umber Hulk. [SPOILER: Umber Hulks' gaze causes Confusion] "OK, my turn - move to melee with the Umber Hulk". GM: How are you approaching and looking at the Umber Hulk" "As ANY true warrior would - looking it straight in the eyes so it knows I do not fear it!" The GM allowed a save. The dice understood what was going on and came up '1'. In a role playing game, characters have personalities, strengths and weaknesses. In a roll playing game, characters are bundles of stats represented by pawns on the board, and always seek the best possible tactical choice; they are efficiency ciphers,

I'd say I prefer leaving limited characteristics to making each bit a separate mechanic largely due to the tradition of having characteristics in RPGs in general, and the easier familiarity with them. We could break "do damage" and have ranged and HTH normal damage. But should we then break out knockback and separate STUN and BOD damage? They are all "their own thing" aren't they? On the skills front, I think "Hero as game design" could be better defined. In Supers, we could likely get by with a single skill a la Detective Work. A police procedural game might focus more on that aspect, mandating more granular skills. Lawyer and Medical Doctor are likely enough for Supers where a courtroom or hospital drama, respectively, would need a finer breakdown. Ditto Science. I recall a very "user-designed" game where "Lawyer" or "Scientist" would give you an unmodified roll on all relevant challenges, unless someone else had a more specific skill like Business Law or Biologist. The general skill would take a penalty when those specifics arose. But then we might see an "International Tax" or "Molecular Biology" skill. Now the middle skill takes a penalty and the generalist takes an even bigger penalty. In the source material, in a Marvel movie, Stephen Strange knows all branches of medicine and Daredevil is well-versed in all aspects of the law. In St. Elsewhere or Law & Order, they would be more specialized as every character would have some skill in these areas, and need to be differentiated.

I think many costs were fixed. Reducing the costs of END, STUN and REC was the right answer - no one bought them up at those prices. It just made STR and CON even more must-have bargain purchases. I would price INT, PRE and DEX the same, and revamp skill levels, PER, PRE Attacks and Lightning Reflexes so that you could buy +1 to all rolls based on that stat, plus +1 PER rolls/+1d6 PRE attack/+5 Initiative for all purposes for the same 10 points as +1 to the characteristic. I would seriously consider making all of these abilities limited CHAR rather than separate abilities. COM was not eliminated because "Steve didn't use it in his games". It was eliminated because, after reviewing the massive discussion on the Boards on how it might be used, every single use anyone put forward was a limited enhancement of another characteristic. The decision was that every char should have a unique purpose and stand alone. COM did not, so it was eliminated. The "hey, good-lookin'/so butt-ugly" element became Stunning Appearance as all it ever did was modify PRE attacks and/or PRE skill rolls. BOD will not be eliminated - it is the damage counter to death (and other uses like Transform). CON will not be eliminated - it is the measure for being STUNned. What did we ever see suggested as a mechanic for COM that no other characteristic did?

I played a game with an excellent GM not that long ago. When characters failed skill rolls in areas of focus, he narrated a reason for the failure that did not reflect incompetence by the character, but how the situation, combined with luck factors outside of the character's control, contributed to a less than ideal implementation by a competent character.

I think what 6e really did was remove the bargain purchase aspect of DEX, CON and (to a lesser extent) STR and EGO by making it practical (that is, not cost-prohibitive) to buy Figureds instead. The designer was then left with the choice of repricing them (and maybe revising the formulas) to retain Figured Char at an equitable price, and revising the No Figured limitation to go with it, or acknowledging that there was no great benefit in having two different ways to buy Figureds. He chose the latter. What 6e did not do was really step back and ask what other Char do, and whether they were reasonably priced. To me, DEX is not worth double INT and PRE. Initially, I considered DEX overpriced, but I've come to see INT and PRE as underpriced. Each of these does two things - drive many skills and drive initiative/PER/PRE attacks. The pricing on the component parts exceeds the price of the characteristics, especially as skill levels enhance only one roll at a time. Pricing them at 2 each, setting a limitation on "only to boost rolls" and further limitations to either focus those rolls or be "only one at a time", and limitations to only grant the secondary effect, would be preferable, to me, to removing the link from skills. A shift to complimentary rolls would just further disguise the connection, change the relative value of CHAR to Levels, slow resolution down in-game and increase volatility of skills as two good, or two bad, rolls would create outcomes further from the average. Whether the last is a plus or a minus depends on how (un)predictable one wishes success with a skill to be. EGO is the most challenging to price, as its value depends a lot on how common mental attacks/effects are in the game. Its rolls are less common. I would stick to its 1 point pricing, with the same "for rolls" limitations, but make it the core stat to resist PRE attacks (removing this from PRE) as well as mental attacks. Low EGO, high PRE is a slick con man who is still easily shaken himself. High EGO, low PRE is basically unshakeable, but not a charmer, orator or impressive in their own right - calm, quiet and steady. Is the issue the characteristics or the price of skills relative to their utility? How often do those INT-based skills come up in play to justify spending 18 points (over and above the cost of INT driving them)? If they are only on the sheet to sell the "He is a genius scientist" background of the character, but are rarely or never relevant in-game, then they should not cost 41 points. No one should have to spend 30 or 40+ points to have a specific background that rarely or never has any beneficial game effect. Day labourer and fry cook should not be the background of choice because they permit you to spend your points effectively instead of burning huge points on a back story.