Hugh Neilson

We previously saw Cassie on screen at ages 7 and 10, briefly, as the child who established that Ant-Man was a Dad.  If I briefly met you at your parents' house when you were ages 7 and 10, and you then went to your room/the basement/outside to play, do you think I could accurately predict who you would be at age 18? By definition, I would say taking a character who appeared briefly as a 7 yo and 10 yo, largely as background scenery, to an 18 yo we actually get to know is creating a new character.  What did we know about "child Cassie" that was inconsistent with "young adult Cassie" rather than simply unknown from her prior appearances?

5 hours ago, csyphrett said:

Peter Parker on the other hand went to a school known as the Midtown School of Science and Technology which had its own television studio, laser gun, and chemical lab, worked with the Avengers and SHIELD, and had Tony Stark as his personal mentor as well as mentoring himself.

Peter Parker was a poor to average kid in NYC and he had access to enough resources to design his webshooters before he met Stark or the Avengers.  Peter clearly would not have been sent to the finest of private schools. We have no indication he had any contact with brilliant scientists during his upbringing. Do we know where Cassie went to school? 

1 hour ago, Marcus said:

I value limitations by looking at the mirror of it. If ‘only to calm people down’ is -1, then ‘for anything other than calming people down’ is also…-1.  If the first is -2, then the inverse is -1/2.  You get what you pay for.

So.. what would you charge this character, in this campaign, for mind control that can do anything *except* calm people down?

 

THIS - 100%

It is neither easier nor more difficult to calm the same targets down with unlimited Mind Control.  This limitation removes other things that could be done.  The jailer won't unlock the door.  The henchman won't tell you Da Boss's plans.  Mind control can do a lot. This limited version can't do all that much.

1 hour ago, unclevlad said:

 

Sure...but that's to a combat application.  For something outside combat, as in the running case here, and allowing it in *narrow* applications...that's different.

 

Another construction would be an additional few meters of running with seriously increased END cost.  That works too, and stays away from Pushing.  

In or out of combat - that Mom trying to heft a car isn't in combat.

A bit of additional running at extra END as the product of extensive training?  Sure.

1 hour ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

 

It would have been a great deal more honest.

It may have been a bit more accurate, but I could have seen MoM appearing in Dr. Strange comics and QM showing up as an Ant-Man storyline. The challenge for movies is that we don't get three years of monthly comics - we get one movie.  So the movie wants the biggest story, with guest stars and impact on the broader universe.  And you can't leave out supporting cast favourites - no big deal if they miss one week on TV or one issue of the comic, but they're gone for 5 years or more if thy miss one movie.

4 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

I prefer the "pushing is not something anyone and everyone can do if they are willing to spend the END" model. It's a rare moment for especially heroic actions, not a quick way to tack on an extra 2 DCs in the hopes of ending the fight faster.

3 hours ago, Lord Liaden said:

And since at least 4E that's been explicitly stated in the RAW.

I'm pretty sure it's always been in the rules somewhere - as I recall, an early edition used the "mom who lifts up a car" example - remove the stress and her endangered child and she could never do it again.

@Duke Bushido would know (sorry, leaning on you a lot lately, Duke!)

2 hours ago, LoneWolf said:

 

A non-combat multiform can be fairly effective.  You have two forms one has all the combat ability and the other has all the out of combat utility.  The Hulk is a perfect example of this.  Hulk has all the combat ability where Bruce Banner has all the scientific skills.  That is probably not what you meant but it is still a non-combat multiform.    

That was 4e Jaguar - a combat multiform and noncombat detective.

3 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

Well that's new (-ish.  New to me, anyway.  Multiform was new in 4e (to our group).  We dqbbled with it a bit, but have never used it after that.

Multiform was in Champions III, although the extra forms mechanic was very different from the doubling introduced in 4e.

3 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

Even then, though, these forms could be simulated via a Power by pre-building each form. 

Assuming all the powers are allowed in a framework, and even then the shapeshift would not take on new disadvantages/complications.

3 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

And there is the "double forms for 5 points thing- the initial spell is expensive, but once you learn it, it isnt too difficult to get better at it.

True - although one does come up on diminishing returns after a while, especially if the concept is limited to specific types of forms, such as the classic animal forms.

I prefer the "pushing is not something anyone and everyone can do if they are willing to spend the END" model. It's a rare moment for especially heroic actions, not a quick way to tack on an extra 2 DCs in the hopes of ending the fight faster.

18 minutes ago, unclevlad said:

 

In this case, tho, saving those points only applies to the base form...and what else is the base form spending points on?  He's said 450 point alternates...so the base is also 450 if you want it to go that high.  130 isn't a problem.   

 

I've goofed around with the occasional multiform, and if the base form isn't combat-capable?  MAN, you've got a lot of points to spend!  

THAT's where 450 came from - Edited my costs above.

Practically, there are lots of ways to get there and, if the base form isn't intended to be played in combat, any variation will leave plenty of points.  A VPP allows infinite variant forms, but the same price will pay for enough doublings to be functionally equivalent, especially if he's not going to use "the same base form, but he has a different set of knowledge skills".

As I think back to those early-1980s days (Champions 1e was published in 1981; 2e was in 1982), how did the Island of Dr. Destroyer compare to other adventures of the day?  It was pretty clearly a first outing, and lasercage traps didn't really feel right.  But was Doc D less developed than similar villains in V&V adventures? Island of Dr. Apocalypse had a bit more plot, with its Part 1, Day of the Destroyers, but when I ran it for Champions, I added some underlings on the Island.  [ASIDE:  V&V modules were a useful resource back then, although a bit challenging to translate due to V&V's resource management structure - Champions characters couldn't be whittled down by a series of minor encounters.]

D&D was just starting to add some setting, plot and villain motivation to some of their dungeon crawls, and move towards incorporating some story into the traditional strategic, tactical and sometimes adversarial model of early RPGs.

Doc D was just another derivative powered armor villain in an RPG sea of derivative adversaries with limited character development back then. Growing him to a full backstory and persona today would be great, but if he had all that back in 1981/82, he would have eclipsed the PCs he was designed to be defeated by.

I found Quantumania, in particular, to be very comic-booky. The ensemble cast (Hank, Janet, Hope, Cassie and Scott) all had relevant parts to play, they interacted with the setting (motivating the natives to join the fight) and the villain (a major character on his own). In prior Ant-Man movies, Hank and Hope were significant players, as was at least one of Scott's prison buddies. The characters don't live in a vacuum.

America was clearly a major player in MoM.  I wonder if an equally important role for Clea would have drawn as much ire, or been overlooked since she is already a big part of the lore.  No one griped about Wong, Mordo or the Ancient One having big roles in the first movie.  No one complained that the third Avengers movie was more about Thanos than the Avengers either - villains are allowed to be a major focus, but not other heroes (or supporting cast?).

I wonder if the issues of "other characters got focused attention" would have been as big a deal if Marvel had just removed "Ant-Man" and "Dr. Strange" from the movie titles.

I think what we are really seeing is that the growth of the MCU is making for a lot of different projects with different themes and different feels, as well as struggling with 21st century inclusivity issues - both very much like their source material.  One difference is that few of us would consume the entire Marvel publishing line every month, but 3 movies and half a dozen TV miniseries a year is a much smaller commitment.  Another is that, with fewer offerings, a lack of diversity/inclusivity in a single offering (or leaving a couple of characters out of this movie) feels like a much bigger gap.

With 5 point doubling of Forms, I doubt that the MP will save points.

Time Limit of 1 hour is a -3/4 limitation.  Time Limit is generally intended for powers with some activation requirements, which I suppose the pills could qualify for, as well as only being able to activate 8 times per day.

Charges would have to be Continuous, so 8 Continuing Charges 6 steps down the table would be a +1 advantage.  Given that Multiform is already both Persistent and 0 END, that's not a reasonable result.  The rules also suggest capping Continuing Charges at -0, "especially if Time Limit is an Advantage".  Multiform is, however, an exception from the normal rule for charges, with each change consuming a charge. That includes the change back, so 16 charges would allow changing to and back from an alternate form 8 times per day. Feels like all paths lead to neither an advantage nor a limitation for 8 alternate forms per day.

So that leaves us either a VPP of Multiform or multiplying the forms.  The rules suggest only putting the base Multiform, not the multiple forms option, in the VPP.  In this instance (he can have any number of forms, but only 8 available at one time), I think I disagree.

EDITED FOR 450 point base forms

We want 450 maximum point Forms, so 90 point base for the Multiform. I don't think we want the Hero standard OAF, Fragile potion so let's go with an OIF pill or small flask used to change, -1/2.  They can certainly be taken away if the character is helpless.  That's -1 1/4 total limitations, for a base cost of 40.  Tack on 15 points for 8 possible forms and we get 105/2.25 = 47.

So our VPP could be either:

Option A:  40 point pool; control cost based on 90 points, Cosmic (+2), One type of power (Multiforms; -1/2 RAW), 16 charges (-0), OIF Pills (-1/2), 1 hour time limit (-3/4), 49 points for a total cost of 89.

Option B:  47 point pool; control cost based on 105 points, One type of power (Multiform with x8 forms; -1/2 RAW), 16 charges (-0), OIF Pills (-1/2), 1 hour time limit (-3/4), only changes between scenes (takes hours to make new pills, -1/4) 18 points for a total cost of 65.

The advantage of Option A is that he can select his 8 forms on the fly ("How fortunate that I brought along EXACTLY the right pill!"), while Option B requires the player pick out the right pills in advance (although I guess he could have 8 pills for each form, not be limited to one hour of each form - the remaining pills become dormant, or maybe the strain of changing limits him to 8 per day). 

For 89 points, he could have over four million alternate forms, which is also basically Option 1's "select any form you want, any time you want".  200 points (90 base + 22 doublings for 110) / 2.25 = 89. 

He could have 11 doublings for 55 points, so over 2,000 alternate forms, plus 90 base = 145/2.25 = 64 points - close enough to Option B. It seems unlikely that the character would use more than 2 thousand different forms over the course of the campaign, so the only reason to take the 89 point approach would be the flexibility to have just the right form for this occasion picked out. 

Note, however, that 11 doublings still allow him to choose any form on each switch. Perhaps we might allow a further limitation on the doublings only for restricting his choices to 8 pre-selected forms that can only change between scenes; the same -1/4 a VPP would have seems reasonable.

That would leave us with a 450 point Multiform (90 AP) 16 charges (-0), OIF Pills (-1/2), 1 hour time limit (-3/4) 40 RP; + 11 doublings (2,048 forms) (55 AP), must select 8 at one time and can only change between scenes (-1/4), OIF Pills (-1/2), 1 hour time limit (-3/4) 22 RP = 62 points.  Pretty close to that VPP after all that work.  He could shave off some doublings and not lose a lot of utility.

Depending on the vision of the base character, the cost may be irrelevant - he has over 350 points left over to spend on his base form regardless of which approach we take.

12 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

It also, despite the cover blurb stating otherwise, was absolutely not an adventure.

Stronghold was the start of Hero's "every module should bring something of lasting use, outside the adventure" model.  It was definitely more setting than adventure, with any escape scenario being more plot seed than actual adventure.  Of course, we called them "modules" back in those days (and yes, using that phrase makes me feel old), and either the Island Adventure or the SuperPrison could be slotted into an ongoing campaign.

9 hours ago, Lord Liaden said:

8.)   Consider the suggested Characteristic ranges for the Average human from the 6E Champions genre book p. 72: SPD 1-2, Running 7-12 meters. By the time you get to SPD 4 you're already in the Competent range: "Normal people can sometimes edge into Competent, but usually Competent-level Characteristics result from intensive training, truly rare genetic gifts, or the like. Many heroes, even in Heroic campaigns, have a majority of their Characteristics in this range or higher — that’s one of the things that makes them heroes." Champions 6E p. 71.

In other words, edging into those maximum SPD and running values values reflects someone with rare genetic gifts related to sprinting engaging in intensive training to make the most of them - sounds a lot like an Olympic-level sprinter to me.

6 hours ago, dmjalund said:

would using Long Term Endurance change the math?

My first thought as well, but he's running less than a turn, so it could prevent multiple world-class times in rapid succession, but not a single sprint.

11 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

While I very much liked the comment, it is also _exactly_ the reason I hold out that Multiform should be considered to be a framework: so you dont take your 80 percent discount and then shove it into another framework.

It would be pretty reasonable to classify Multiform as a special power so that it would default to "not allowed in a framework".  However, that could be problematic for some games. In a Fantasy game, a Wizard with a spell to take on the form of an elemental, an animal, a dragon, whatever would not be able to incorporate this into a spells framework, if that were the structure of magic in-game.

The costing question is a good one, though.  I'll have to take a look at that later.

8 hours ago, LoneWolf said:

That is still going to cost a lot more.  If you use a multipower with the limitations on the slots you pay 80 points for the pool and 6 points per slot assuming each slot has 1 continuing charge of 1 hour.   That would mean the cost for 8 forms is now 128 points vs 54.  

 

Unless I am not understanding what you are doing that seems to be a really bad way of doing it.

I think the Time Limit is more appropriate than the Continuing Charges. That would allow the pool cost to be reduced for that common limitation.

4 hours ago, Gauntlet said:

But if the GM is worried about time limits, and has newer players, Multiform is probably the best way to go as everything is already written up and they just switch sheets. Using VPP can be rather slow as the player has to write everything up on the slot and keep an eye on the point total especially if the player does not have all the powers, limitations, and advantages completely to memory and has to use the book to look them up.

 

But overall, the choice would best be based on your character's special effect. For example, if it is a wizard that has hundreds of spells he/she can cast and can change them rather quickly (perhaps even while in the middle of combat), VPP is the way to go. But if your character has the option to be completely changed in several ways (such as various types of power armors or various types of actual forms) then Multiform is the way to go.

The VPP could work similarly if used to simulate 8 alternate forms at a time, creating the faux "character sheet" for each combination of abilities in advance. The switch between them could be charges on the Cosmic advantages, with limitations such as only using each combination once, with a single charge for each (so 8 switches in total) requiring a pill/potion, and powers fading after one hour. The Multiform is much cleaner, though. The non-Multiform option does not allow for new complications of the SuperForm.

1 hour ago, unclevlad said:

 

Fair, but I'd really rather NOT allow Regen in a framework...altho if the framework is nothing but Regen variants, well, that might be OK.  If you want your regen to apply to all the stats, one at a time, the slot costs are going to be higher than the cost of the advantage.  Note that per-turn regen is 16, so the slots cost 2.  You're on the nasty side of the breakpoint.  But even if it was 1 per, there's more than 8 characteristics.

Agreed that I'd definitely be reviewing the cost for reasonableness. This is not an overpowering ability.

1 hour ago, sevrick said:

I can't seem to find in the books where it talks about what you do if you have multiple modifiers and how they are calculated. For example if you do somthing that puts you at 1/2 DCV and another condition you have a -2. Do you calculate the 1/2 1st and then add the -2? or the other way around?

 6e V2 P 37

Quote

 

DCV CHECKLIST
1. Determine base DCV (character’s DCV Characteristic).
2. Add any applicable Combat Skill Levels the character wishes to use to increase his DCV.
3. Apply any modifiers for the particular weapon, armor, or shield the character uses.
4. Apply any modifiers for the particular Combat Maneuver or Martial Maneuver the character uses.
5. Apply any Combat Modifiers.
6. Apply any other modifiers.
7. Apply any modifiers that halve DCV (or otherwise reduce it by a fraction or percentage).

 

A character’s DCV can only be halved once, regardless of how many “halving” modifiers he’s subject to.

 

So first subtract 2, then halve the remainder.

1 minute ago, unclevlad said:

Why not just leave it with Variable Special Effect?  How often are multiple stats drained at the same time?  Doesn't feel like it'd be often enough to justify much in the way of Expanded Effect, it feels tailor made for VSE.  

 

Oh...never mind anyway.  Regen is a Special Power.  Can't be put into an MP.

VSE sounds fairly priced.

Regen also can't regenerate things other than BOD, so we're already past "without GM permission" and into "special GM customization".

If we assume he is limited to 8 potions (just to pick a number), this could be a VPP of Multiforms with x8 forms.  He can have any 8 forms available, but has to spend considerable time brewing a new potion (changing 1 or more of the 8 possible Multiforms). Charges would actually be expensive as you would need continuing charges of an hour.

Or the VPP could hold 8 separate Multiforms, each with a 1 hour Continuing charge.

So what is your solution?  AP at +1/2 is utterly useless.  AP at +1/4 means more STUN at most levels if the defender chooses to have more defenses, instead of hardening existing defenses.  Do we eliminate AP (and watch the gun bunnies shriek at the loss of AP ammo)?

Let's look at this from another angle.  Our defender has a budget for spending on defenses. She can either buy higher defenses and take more damage from AP attacks, or Harden her defenses but have lower defenses against attacks overall.

So if the budget only allows 10/10 defenses or 8/8 Hardened. she takes either 32 STUN normal/30 STUN AP, or 34 STUN normal/27 AP.

If the budget allows 20/20 defenses or 16/16 Hardened. she takes either 22 STUN normal/25 STUN AP, or 26 STUN normal/19 AP.

If the budget allows 25/25 defenses or 20/20 Hardened. she takes either 17 STUN normal/22 STUN AP, or 22 STUN normal/15 AP.

If the budget allows 35/35 defenses or 28/28 Hardened. she takes either 7 STUN normal/17 STUN AP, or 14 STUN normal/7 AP.

We all approach this from experience.  With AP at +1/2, I never saw a situation where it was a worthwhile attack, never one's main attack and even a Multipower slot was rarely if ever used.  At +1/4, it at least has a shot at competitiveness.

And I REALLY laugh at pre-6e double AP.  I can have 6d6 Blast that halves even single-hardened defenses.  Or I can do 12d6 against full defenses, get twice as much damage through as the AP option, even more if they double-harden their defenses for some reason.

I'm not sold on carving Impenetrable out as a separate advantage, though.  Players who have several defense powers so they can have a tiny bit Impenetrable and a few more Hardened should be looked upon as min/maxers and dealt with accordingly.  But my group has typically operated on the basis that no one character can do everything, so being heavily defended  against all forms of attack would have to be accompanied by being well below average in some other area(s), such as below campaign standard offensive capabilities.  In a game where a moment's weakness (such as being Stunned) means "get out a new character sheet", rather than "an opportunity for other characters to shine this time", I might feel differently, but I prefer games where characters work together, and each has different strengths and weaknesses.

55 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

Dr. D was a 1e villain written for one specific groyo's campaign and pulled to play the (undetectable) bad guy in the only 1e adventure ever written, and frankly, that should have been the end of him.  His only appeal has aleays been "well, I dont have to write up a planetary scale villain if I chuck this guy into my adventure," and I have no idea how that has carried him for forty years.

I think his staying power is that nostalgia that he was the villain in the very first Hero Module.  [Wasn't Stronghold 1e? Pretty sure Deathstroke was 2e.  The editions weren't overly different.]  Adventures in the mid-1980's were not as developed as they evolved into. The personality and backstory was typically the GM's job, not the module's job.

23 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

I dont remember for certain, but I _think_ 6e regeneration is some,sort of screwball Healing derivative; is it not?

As CRT notes, that was a 5e experiment that was reversed in 6e.

23 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

At any rate, were I doing this in my game, I would use Regeneration as-is, except declaring that this instance of Regen is specifically for DEX (o4 whatever).  That just seems,the simplest place to start.  Modify as playtesting suggests.

BOD is likely reduced more often. STUN and END get reduced even more often than that, so gut feel, setting the same price feels excessive for other stats.

That could be fixed with the later edition Adjustment Power halving for defensive powers. Regen for DEX, STR, etc. would get 2 CP per time increment, unlike BOD (which costs 1 CP in 6e).  This would still be very pricy to regenerate all reduced characteristics.  It could be a bit cheaper if constructed as a Multipower - only one stat recovers at a time (multiple drains requiring the body to multitask).

30 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

I think that for 6e- what with all characteristics costing the same and no characteristics derived from any others, this would be even less likely to cause problems.

All characteristics don't cost the same in 6e, but variable costs are no harder to work around than it is in any edition.

Buy a VPP limited to only Multiform and you have an unlimited supply of possible Supers forms.

31 minutes ago, unclevlad said:

Not entirely functioning yet, so a quick point about the NND.

NND defenses are binary...you have them, or you don't.  It's built into the definition of the attack.  It isn't that the defense is so good;  it's the loophole designed into the attack itself.  It's the flip side of Desolid...nothing can affect the Desolid, except for the very narrow SFX, or with Affects Desolid.  NND is the perfect attack...until it isn't.  Desolid is the perfect defense...until it isn't.

And the halving of non-hardened defenses is a function of the AP attack, not of the defenses themselves. It works better until it comes up against a target with Hardened Defenses, making it less effective than the same non-AP DCs.

A further thought:  If the unlimited ability to halve a target's (non-hardened) defenses using AP is a concern, do you similarly want to cap the amount of defenses that an NND can avoid entirely?

hmmm...it did not merge them. I guess that's OK.

I am also a bit disappointed at the number of comments in the "well, capping it at the number rolled on the dice seems overly complicated/ is a pretty high cap/etc.".

To be clear, it's absolutely meaningless.  It will never have a different result than halving defenses since,, once we hit the cap, the target is immune anyway because the target's defenses at least double the roll.  Practically, it is identical to just halving the defenses, other than being a more complicated way of getting there that provides some bafflegab about tying the cap to the power of the attack.