OddHat

Re: Gestalt is Online Gestalt is, at one and the same time, a fantastic Setting, Allies, and Enemies book. The setting itself is a firm step away from comic book homage but still leaves room for costumed heroes and villains, with space available for ordinary people with extraordinary powers. Additionally, it provides a model for balancing Dex, SPD, Attacks and Defenses at different starting point levels, pre-designed powers and power frameworks to speed character creation, plot seeds, a sample adventure, and sage GMing advice with concrete examples from a long running campaign. It tops it all off with very high quality art. I'll be posting a review when I can, but I'm serious when I say that this is one of the best books ever released for Champions. I'd have willingly paid a lot more than $50.

Re: Thoughts on some superhero origins "Stupid Native Syndrome" was classed by Jess Nevins as an aspect of the the "Raised by Indians" character type, well represented in literature. The character, almost always a White European, having been raised or trained by Indians / Black Africans / Australian Aborigines / Chinese / Any Non White, is a greater master of skills practiced by members of the "exotic" culture than any native of the source culture. Lots of overlap with the Halfbreed character type. Off the top of my head, Remo Williams (later retconned as a halfbreed), Cain from Kung Fu, Iron Fist, the lead character from that Viking Indian movie that just came out a few months back, the Shadow and many Pulp characters, Natty Bumpo, etc. I'm not entirely inclined against the type; at least there's some respect for and interest in the skill-source culture (most of the time).

Re: Gestalt is Online Speaking as a moderator this thread is getting too personal. Keep things friendly and respectful, eh? Telling other posters what you believe they are "really" thinking or saying tends to piss people off.

Re: Your Local Generation VIPER Religious Youth Group. May have started out as a genuine attempt by a religious Super to gather young Supers together and offer guidance, but has now been subverted by Viper. Parents of young Supers are happy to see them in the hands of "good" people who can help them, the kids think they're doing G_d's work as they commit progressively more violent acts at the urging of their mentors. A kid or two may have doubts, and may even turn to the heroes for help. Most of the kids believe the Heroes are minions of Satan sent to lie and deceive.

Re: Looking For Equivalent CU Group For A Hunted Demon then, or the Circle of the Scarlet Moon. They've been around long enough, and they're into symbolism enough to care about what a newbie superheroine calls herself.

Re: Looking For Equivalent CU Group For A Hunted If your schtick is that he used to be a member of a vigilante group, try the IHA, Demon or Viper (seriously). IHA members think they're doing the right thing, killing evil muties before the monsters can kill innocent people; the structure is different, but the motivation is the same. Demon and Viper both use various cults and gangs as recruiting mechanisms. Your character could have gotten sucked into one with a vigilante theme before realizing who was really running the show.

Re: The Defilers Bump for GenCon. Some of these guys will be showing up in my convention game.

Re: Looking For Equivalent CU Group For A Hunted They get some press in the Mystic World. Servants of The Dragon, dedicated to spreading evil and chaos for their own sake. No good matches in the CU imo. The League is dedicated to ending crime and corruption through any means necessary, even if innocents get hurt in the cross fire. They're Evil due to means, not ends. Maybe a dark version of the Trismegistus Council could work, willing to destroy a city to end an occult threat. Probably best to just build your own.

Re: [super Team] Young Titans - GenCon 2007

Re: Ultimate books and general utility Hmm. Ultimate Skill is probably the best overall of the series. Ultimate Vehicle is the Ultimate book I open most often, and a good bet for any genre. Ultimate Metamorph, Ultimate Speedster and Ultimate Mentalist probably have the most interesting alternate rules, and helped me finally "solve" the Astral Projection problem to my satisfaction in 5th. Ultimate Brick is fun from a "How strong in Champions terms is my friend Ted" point of view, but I haven't used it for much. Ultimate Mystic was OK, and a good read, but I didn't get much new out of it.

Re: [super Team] Young Titans - GenCon 2007

Re: A Thread for Random Musings I miss my old Usenet community. For a few years, I was a regular on misc.fitness.weights. I was really doing well on my diet and weight training then, and honestly thought I'd be in a position to win a few powerlifting contests in the near future, or at least place. I was never body-builder lean, but I was looking pretty good for, well, me. There were some very smart people posting at that time, weight training geeks and big names in the surprisingly small fitness industry, a few of whom have since both gotten famous and gone to prison. Eventually the trolls started to get to me, and a few posters I respected left. I didn't know how to handle Usenet trolling at that time, and I left myself open in ways I now try to avoid. Then came a car accident, and a back injury. My career hit a major slump. I stopped eating like an athlete and started eating like a fat man. Weight training became something I'd do once a week, or once a month. My body and strength went to hell. Somewhere along the way I just stopped reading and posting. I've tried a few times to go back, but my old friends are gone, as are most of the industry insiders. Mostly these days, it's a bunch of personal trainers with dubious certifications, steroid goofs (and not the fun, geeky ones), and pure trolls. It's not the group I remember. These last few months have been very good for me as far as weight training is concerned. My strength in the Bench Press, Squat and Dead Lift are fully back to pre-back injury levels, and is still going up. I can finally, honestly say again that I'm stronger than I was ten years ago, and stronger than I was ten years before that. I'm still fat, and not happy about it, but I am fit again. And I don't have anyplace to geek out about it. I've thought about going back to Deepsquatter.com or some other fitness board and getting back into the community that way, but none of them have really grabbed me. Too many people selling something, too many kids in love with the latest fake supplement or exercise and nutrition "philosophy". It may be that I'm just not at a stage of life where I can be that enthusiastic about a Squat program. I can do some mild geeking over exercise programs here, but in the end we're a community of gamers. Those of us who do count exercise among our list of hobbies are spread all over the map as far as what types of training we do and why. and there just aren't that many. So, anyway, some good training over the last few months. Makes me nostalgic for a period of my life that I'm not likely to recapture. If I can drop 50 pounds, maybe I'll take another crack at a powerlifting contest.

Re: Help on defining a "Break" superpower I'd just do it with Find Weakness and an HKA. Easy, well covered by the rules with no fudging, and it will break almost anything with enough points.

Re: [super Team] Young Titans - GenCon 2007 Bump for GenCon (I'm getting the final sheets ready today).

Re: Gestalt is Online Go buy this. Now. Seriously. Review coming as soon as I have time to type it.

Re: Defense vs. mind-switch Ask the GM to define how Mind Switch works mechanically in the campaign (vs Mental or Power Def). Then ask permission to buy +X Power or Mental Def, Only vs Mind Switch (-2). If the GM later hits your character with a Mind Switch that doesn't act against the Def he specified, he was the type who'd find some way to nerf your character's powers no matter what you did.

Re: How would you build missles comic style The official answer is to build it as a Vehicle or Automaton. The character uses Summon to "fire" the missile, then the missile chases the target. The drawback is that you need an extra character sheet (or two if the missile has an AI), and it does present balance issues (like many uses of Summon). The advantage is that the missile can keep chasing the target, phase after phase, without further actions on the part of the attacker and without piling on limitations and advantages to simulate the missile's behavior. You can of course just build an EB with whatever limits and advantages you like and call it a missile; there's usually more than one answer to a power build question in HERO.

Re: Doubled equipment + multiple power attacks? Yup. This is a case where we need to remember the whole Optional aspect of MPAs, Sweeps, and the Doubling rules. They're there to simulate specific genre bits for a reasonable price, not to let players toss the balance you're going for in your campaign into the dustbin.

Re: Doubled equipment + multiple power attacks? By the rules, no; he paid points for the power, and doesn't get an off hand penalty any more than someone whose EB just happens to come from his left hand. If the equipment were free, then yes, if the campaign uses Off Hand penalties then he takes them.

Re: Doubled equipment + multiple power attacks? An MPA isn't a sweep; as long as you have two separate attack powers not in the same framework, you can attack with them at will as part of an MPA. See 5thER, p.358. Extra weapons purchased using the 5 point doubling rule count for this. Note that I'm not saying that you as a GM should permit Mr.16 Limbs+16 guns to fire his attack 16 times per phase; I wouldn't. However, it is legal, if the MPA attack rules are used.

Re: Doubled equipment + multiple power attacks? It's legal. It's also potentially grossly unbalancing, just like most of the double-for-5-points options (Summon, Duplication, Multiform, Bases and Vehicles, Followers). Part of the GM's job is to say "no" when the player comes in with a build that will not work in the campaign.

Re: Are Hero characters too rugged? Large numbers of real world humans survive gunshot wounds to the face and head, let alone comic book superheroes. There's a case to be made for "gritty" damage, and groovy for you if it's your pref, but it's worth considering the space between "gritty" and "instant PC kill".

Re: SPD and DEX for superheroic martial artists? I've done a Hugo Danner on 250 points I'm happy with, but prefer 350 for 1938 Superman. He grows pretty fast from 1938-1940, and even with all the XP he's getting between the comics and radio adventures, I prefer seeding those powers that will eventually develop. My WWII Era Supers campaign starts with 350 point Heroes.

Re: Adventuring company name The Bastard Squad The Devil's Six The Butchers Hell's Heroes Hell's Half Dozen The Damned Butch Manly and his Masters of Mayhem --------------------------------- With their new, super macho names, give them new, over the top super macho attitudes. Hodgeson - Now talks like a cross between Hunter S. Thompson and the drill Sargent from Full Metal Jacket. Tawney Rose - Swaggers constantly, never seen without a drink in her hand, develops spells that let her punch people through walls Golden Darkhair - Now dresses and talks like Dr. Frank-N-Furter, complete with bursting into song. Octavia the Lovely - Dominatrix outfit, WF: Whip, refers to all males as "Simpering Lackeys" or worse. Because of her basic personality, not at all good at it. Thor Thorsen - Bluto from Animal House Vestnik - Ivan Drago, complete with the bare chested look. Have them keep up the routine for one game, then show up the next time back in their original persona, pretending that nothing ever happened.

Re: VPPs and Game World Logic I'd treat this as -1/4 "Limited Class of Powers Available: Pre Approved Psychokinetic Abilities with Limited Raw Power". Then I'd discuss what I felt Raw Power meant with the player, and write up a list of sample powers. "You can have no more than STR 10 TK, but a 2d6KA NND Does Body defined as reaching into his brain is fine". No different than the limits on a magic system as you create a fantasy world. Maybe I'd go to -1/2 on if I felt the list was limited enough.