Hugh Neilson

"Stop on a dime" implies a lot of acceleration/deceleration. For a +1 advantage, you can accelerate/decelerate yur full noncombat move per hex moved, so to stop a fall (30" terminal velocity), you'd need 15" flight, +1 advantage, so 60 points (or 30" flight +1/4 advantage; 75 points) Of course, you've got some pretty steep limitations as well (the time before it can be used, only to hover for exactly 2 seconds, etc.) so the actual cost should be fairly low. I'd give a -2 limit for the Hover/Stop Movement Only alone.

Perhaps the better approach would be that Summon always costs Points/5 - you don't get a "points/25" effect by Summoning a vehicle (or a follower, or a base, etc.).

But +1/4 Amicable gets you out of the control roll (although you can't mistreat the Friendly or it may become less friendly).

Why not? If 5 points gets a backup, 5 points should get a backup

Perhaps we need to re-examine the Summon paradigm. In my view, it was designed for "combat helpers" where significant variance was not hugely advantageous. Getting "White Fang" instead of a generic wolf made no difference if their stats were the same. Perhaps "specific being" should be +1/4 to +1, similar to the handling of expanded class. +1/4 would permit the summoner to select one specific being he may summon instead of a random pick. +1 would permit any specific being from the class available (within the point limits, of course). Not sure how 1/2 and +3/4 would work, or if these are even needed. If the character restricts the pool, he should get a limitation.How about -1 for this specific being" assuming he can be replaced if he dies. Note that I get +1 for "any wolf" and -1 for "only that wolf until he dies" for a net nil - Summon Generic Wolf is identical, and should cost the same. If he's irreplaceable, a further -2 might apply (ie he's "expendable"/"independent), to reflect the fact I can lose these points permanently if something bad happens to my "summonee".

This seems to highlight at least some of the problem. Summon was designed (or so it seems) to summon creatures to aid you in combat. Summon was introduced in Fantasy Hero (many editions ago) presumably to match the Summoning spells available in other fantasy RPG's. It wasn't created (at least initially) to let you, for example, create lions with your Power Ring, or Summon a head of state. Oh, and if I can summon "Tony Blair", what happens if, in campaign, he is killed or retires from politics? Do I get points back? If I choose the generic "PM of Great Britain", I have a useless power if a new PM with a higher point base is elected, or I lose some points for no reason if he has a lower point base. If they have the same effects (in most likely in game situations), there's no advantage. I said the same thing in an earlier post. Lenny the Cabbie vs any other NY cabbie. Dead mentor vs. a random experienced wizard. The rules indicate there is an advantage - it is +1. I didn't suggest that the main advantage should ever be that the spirit was amicable. I did mention continuity of experience, but that's a different issue. Now that you mention continuity of experience, Amicable notes even a devoted being can have their loyalty strained. Would you rather have the ability to ditch your (now not so loyal) summoned creature and get a new one? Can't do that if you only Summon the same one over and over (ie a specific being), can you? Or, as Steve Long posted, it's a -1/2 restriction on the original +1.5 advantage. That's why I suggested allowing players to take a +1.5 summon any specific individual advantage. Actually, Steve posted the assertion that "specific being" was made up of an advantage and a limitation. He used +1/2, but seemed to indicate he hadn't considered the relative values. To me, moving from "You can only summon this one being" to "you can summon any being in the pool" merits more than an added 1/2 advantage. This is kind-of valid. On the other hand, there are always situations where a given power would be more or less useful. If your GM wants to make your +1 Summon Mentor worthwhile compared to Summon Knowledgeable Wizard, he should probably allow for situations where your mentor has knowledge that is very applicable to a given situation. I admit that it's a bit of a kludge to say that the GM should find a way to make something worthwhile. On the other hand, that's true with almost all non-combat skills. Why spend points on stealth / lipreading / universal translator / whatever if it's not going to be useful in a campaign? The answer is that it would be a waste of points in that campaign, but that doesn't mean that it should be free in the standard rules. I don't see any cases where moving quietly/reading lips /speaking and understanding any language is a disadvantage. There are lots of examples where being restricted to one specific being, rather than having access to the whole pool (even at random) is a drawback, and very few where it is an advantage. Sometimes, a Disadvantage or a Limitation works to your advantage, but if it acts to your advantage more often than not, it stops being a point saver and you need to pay points for it. Similarly, if an advantage doesn't carry a benefit, it should cost points. A fair question. Maybe the GM goofed by permitting a category like "Spirits of Knowledgeable Wizards" that was, in his campaign, more powerful for the same puposes than a more expensive power. I think the rule book goofed by charging the character a +1 advantage for something that actually limits the effectiveness of his power. If there are other circumstances where he is more useful (as there should be if the GM green lighted the power), then yes. This sounds like the GM should only allow the +1 advantage if the benefits actually justify the point cost. Wouldn't it be simpler to just allow a sliding scale for the advantage, so the cost of the power would depend on its utility?

The description indicates that the advantage should be allowed only for summoning deceased beings (Kid Eternity, anyone, or Necromancy) or has been precisely located with some other power. Hence my "spirits of the dead" example.

We had a bug and on the battlemat in the middle of a pitched battle - "Look out for the Giant Fly!"

There's a huge thread on Castling (swapping two peoplke using teleportation) one either this or the System board - that may provide you some ideas.

Hmmm...make the damage from the extra 30 STR "standard effect" (18 STUN, 6 BOD) and Side Effect - anyone strick gets 18 bonus PD, 12 of which is only versus STUN. Solves the problem, I guess. So that's a zero END Succor that buys 18 stat points, double the cost since they're defenses, 1/2 limit on half of them, so that's 6 x 2 + 12/1.5 x 2 = 33 stat points = 11d6 Succor at standard effect, side effect always happens so it's double value... Succor costs 5 points per die, right? So that's an 11d6 side effect on a 6d6 attack power - that STR will be pretty cheap, won't it?

The Summoned creature should clearly be built on a point base which is appropriate to his power/usefulness in the game. And the summoner pays for that extra-powerful character. If his Summon is 1 point, standard human, he doesn't get Tony Blair - he's clearly got more points than "nil balance". But if he's paid for the ability to summon a 150 point human instead, he should get a 150 point human. The Summon should be somewhat better defined (which is why it works better with summoning generic creatures). But why should my "Summon spirit of Mentor" power cost twice as much as your "Summon spirit of a random knowledgeable wizard power when we both get the same effects? As pointed out elsewhere, if the only advantage is that the "specific person" is amicable, either I must have paid for "amicable", or I will quickly wear out his good feelings by constantly bugging him. The ability to select ANY specific person from your potential summonees is clearly a big advantage, well worth the +1. The ability to summon only one specific entity, rather than a broad range, is a restriction. Going back to my "specific wizard versus generic wizard spirit", if I use my Summon and ask about the Talisman of Iq'Kwerty, and my mentor says "never heard of it", I'm out of luck Your randomly summoned spirit says "No, never heard of it", so you say "Oh well - thanks anyway! Back you go" and call up a different one, until you get an answer. Assuming the information would be known by a reasonable subset of "knowledgeable wizards", you'll get an answer eventually. I won't. If this is knowledge our group wouldn't have (eg. a question about fencing styles), neither of us will get an answer - that's the limitation of the Summon we selected, and we need a broader group (like "all spirits of the dead") to get beyond that limit. Which of us has the power which should cost more points, the guy who gets one chance, or the guy who gets to keep trying until he gets what he wants. But, you say, My character knows exactly what he gets - perhaps my mentor is an expert in spell research and knows little about magic objects. Advantageous? Well, I guess I know to save the END and not summon him to ask my question - is that worth +1? What would truly be advantageous to the point of making it worth doubling the cost would be the ability to select from a pool of Knowledgeable Wizards, and pick one I know (or who was reputed to be) expert in magical artifacts.

Let's take this one step further - I buy a 16 charge EB through a gun. Let's make it a 12d6 EB I spend 15 points to get 8 guns instead. Then, I buy extra limbs - so I have 8 arms. Using the multiple power attack rule, I fire all 8 guns at my opponent. I get one, unmodified ton hit roll. If it hits, I hit him 8 times with my 8 guns. I didn't buy any autofire skills, take the autofire advantage or pay an advantage for having 128 charges available. I get all the benefits of these abilities, plus I hit with ALL attacks assuming I make my to hit roll, instead of one for every 2 I make the roll by. If this is the case, why should Human Flame Man not be allowed to fire flame bolts from each eye, each hand, each foot, his chest, ad infinitum, as a "multiple power" attack?

He's not worth that much more. And let's take the comparison further - 150 points would be a ton to build our hypothetical world leader with, so a 30 point summon with a +1.5 advantage to select from a group of world leader makes 75 points. Or we can buy a similar summon to get a specific 150 point fire demon. Compare this to the power to Summon a (random) 300 point Fire Demon who's friendly, so will do what you request within reason. Same cost - 60 points and a +1/4 advantage to make him Amicable. Which ability is more useful?

There's no reason to bel;ieve most heads of state are much more than competent normals. A 150 point character ("Hero") would seem more than adequate to design a world leader. After all, how many of THEM get their own comic book or movie? Remember that Hero focuses on adventure gaming, so many skills and perks, and most talents and powers, are combat oriented. Leaders of state don't need combat abilities, so they don't cost much to build. They have "extensive non-combat influence", which comes from that perk "head of state".

As easy as I can put it: In most cases, an advantage applies to a specific power possessed by the character. So, he may have Energy Blast, 0 END or RKA, Armor piercing. A naked advantage is purchased without any power to which it is attached. Perhaps the character has Absorption to his Energy Blast, and his Energy Blast costs END normally. However, he wants his Absorbtion dice to cost no extra effort. Assume his limit absorbed is 40 active points. He buys "Extra EB from absorption costs no END" He doesn't have the EB to attach it to, so it's naked. He pays 20 points (the 40 points of EB he wants at 0 END x 1/2 advantage) for this naked advantage.

Usable by/Against others also means spending more END (either your own or the recipient's) which also changes the efficiency of the power. The bottom line is, if you're shooting for the Invisible Girl, you need force wall. Force fields don't block entry.

The bottom line is that the unwritten corollary to the basic rule of limitations needs to be considered here. "An advantage that does not actually provide an advantage does not cost points."

So for +1.5, I change from "a random NY cabbie" to "any specific NY cabbie" or from "a random head of state" to "any specific Head of State"? Are these advantages of similar value? With one, I get to my destination faster. With the other, I can kidnap the head of government of any world nation whenever I want. Now, I expect the base points will differ, but it seems to me the selective ability on heads of state is worth quite a bit more that selecting my cabbie. I can PHONE Lenny and ask him to specifically come and pick me up. Try calling Tony Blair and asking him how 3 o'clock works for him!

OH WOW! I would probably start with the chart on FREd p. 15 on "average characters", but I can't imagine you'll ever get a consensus on "average damage", "average defenses", etc. I seem to recall Hero running a survey years ago, and finding campaigns with 10d6 average attacks and 35 average defenses, and with 12 average defenses and 14d6 average attacks, and pretty much everything in between.

That's really a matter of semantics. If I determine that Danger Sense is not available in my game, I have "changed the rules" in that I have eliminated an option which is permissable under the rules as written. In someone else's game, Danger Sense is perfectly legal. Disallowing any given power, skill, rule, etc. is a house rule, the same as "Charges advantage maxes out at the cost of 0 END for the same power". The rules themselves encourage such house rules, but that doesn't make them any less house rules.

That, to me, makes more sense. If you don't pay the +1, well you get a 50 point NY cab driver. You don't get a 10 point NY cab driver - you paid to summon a 50 point character. For a +1, you get your pick of NY cab drivers. Normally, I ask for Lenny since I know what I'm getting and I like him. But for this mission, I'm summoning "not Lenny" because I think there's a strong likelihood the cabbie won;t get out alive, and I like Lenny! This implies there should be a limitation for "can only summon Lenny". Steve's suggestion was that the actual "get a specific person" advantage is higher, but reduced if you can only get that specific person. That's a rational approach as well. But why should the cost to get GRKZT the specific generic Fire Demon be double the cost to get a generic fire demon?

These should be GM-defined IMO. How great it is to summon a specific being rather than generic examples depends greatly on who that specific being is. If I can summon "spirits of the dead", that seems to me more powerful than "summon the spirit of a specific dead person". At least I can keep trying until I get someone with the info I want. But it would definitely be advantageous to Summon the spirit of someone I know had that info.

It depends what you're trying to accomplish. In my experience there are two classic uses for Multipower. First, the character who can do numerous things, not all at once but not mutually exclusive either. All his slots are standard. For example, a character had EB, Flight and Force Field in his multipower. Let's say it's got 75 active points. He takes a standard slot for each power, so he can mix and match as he sees fit. Perhaps he generally uses an 8d6 EB (40 points), a 10/10 force field at half END (25 points) and 5" flight (10 points). However, he's getting low on STUN, so he decides to shut down his Flight and increase his force field to 14/14 at 1/2 END (35 points). Or he shuts down both flight and force field to fire off a 15d6 EB. The second is the character whose multipower slots are mutually exclusive. He can only use one at a time. An example of this type of character is the classic comic archetype of the Archer. His multipower slots are all attacks, each a different trick arrow. He will never use two arrows at once, so he makes each slot an ultra. One phase, he can fire an RKA, the next a flash, but he has no way to combine the two - each slot is all or nothing.

Absorption to STUN (or partially to STUN) combined with Damage Reduction at a hugh level can be very effective.

Just to play the Devil's Advocate here, the damage component of STR can be hived off and purchased separately as a Hand Attack, can't it? Yes, we normally look at it as an EB with no range that can't spread, but it's just as easily "STR, no figured, no lifting, no leaping, no throwing, etc., etc. - Damage only, right?" So perhaps the cost of STR - no Damage should be the cost of STR less the cost of a Hand Attack that would otherwise have added the same damage. I acknowledge that's pretty low cost, but only because of the figured characteristics. Both STR and CON have the problem they add more points in Figured than they cost directly, but how many characters buy up either stat as a result? Not many. Why? Because they wouldn't otherwise pay for the extra figured Stats, and they can only sell back one of them! I can count on one hand (with room to spare) the characters I have who buy more STUN or END (beyond one or two points to round the character to a multiple of 5 points), and buying more than a couple of points of REC is pretty rare as well. PD and ED get raised all the time (in one form or another), but the other three stats tend not to get bought much beyond their figured amounts, at least in my campaigns and on my characters. Of course, this is why DEX really only costs 2 points each - everyone buys their Speed up beyond its figured number anyway!