Nuke

Re: D&D 3rd ED convert

Here's one that worked surprisingly well in one of my cyberpunk campaigns:

 

Give each player exactly 15 seconds real time to decide an action every phase when you call their action up. Anyone who takes longer loses that phase of actions to "thinking in combat."

I'm a fan of this as well. My players get EXTREMELY concerned with optimizing that they forget about the roleplaying effects of combat . . . "when people are swinging swords at you, sometimes you DO DUMB THINGS!"

*grin*

Re: Character creation problems solved

As a friendly quibble with the above post' date=' I must point out that Hercules started out as a demi-god. He strangled a killer snake in his cradle. By the time he was an adult, he was already the strongest human on the planet. And that's the way it is with most legendary heroes. True, people can work out and get stronger. But most PCs begin at their peak of health. (There comes a point at which you just can't get any stronger without your muscles ripping free of your tendons) In realistic terms, several years of wandering around, being injured in combat, and living off the land, is going to take its toll on the body. Most warriors would likely lose strength and stamina as they grow older. However, they may compensate with intelligent tactics and wisdom. As far as to how people become heroes of legend without increasing their Str and other combat abilities, I refer you to Bilbo and Frodo.[/quote']

 

Duly noted, but I'd hardly call Bilbo and Frodo "warriors" that would have increased their strength! I would say that throughout the course of their adventuring they did increase in stamina (long journeys) as well as dexterity perhaps.

 

I apologize for making it sound like I was talking of Hercules specifically, it was more the Hercules concept. I make a hero that I want to become the "strongest man on earth". Perhaps your "legends of Hercules" came up with those explanations only because they could come up with no other explanation of how a man could be so strong?

 

I disagree with the "muscles pulling off the tendons" part explicitly for the fact that in high fantasy, in the long run, heroes should be creatures of legend and capable of feats beyond mortal man. Sure, that's my opinion for high fantasy, I concur =).

 

I'd disagree on PCs starting at the peak of their physical health, saying that GREATLY depends on your character concept and background.

Re: Monster/Race: Frost Giant (Lesser Niefel Giant)

My only critiques have been addresses (regarding damage and rock-throwing) and rebutted (very well, I might add).

 

But let me add a public 'thanks' to Hierax for posting these. I've managed to cull every one thus far for my own campaign (not that I've used 'em yet, but I have 'em ready).

 

Thanks, Hierax.

DEfinitely! When you're done, Heirax, you should consider bundling your write-ups into some sort of "Monstrous Compendium"!

Re: Character creation problems solved

Balance it with XP.

 

Establish general caps on all primary stats. If someone exceeds 1 stat, they get 1 less xp per award time. If they exceed 2 or more, they get penalized 2, max. You may have to adjust it to mach your specific campaign style and xp awarding schedule, but you get the idea.

 

The key to making this work is either:

A) don't let them increase their primaries after character creation

or less drastic:

impose them beginning immediately after they do increase a characteristic.

 

Power gamers hate getting shafted XP's far more than they love min-maxing in my experience.

 

Keith "The GM's friend" Curtis

[Disclaimer: assuming a "heroic" fantasy hero campaign]

I apologize, but I've never agreed with the "don't increase after creation" concept. Why can't somebody "get stronger"? That's a common concept in our world to work to better ourselves, especially if you are constantly out adventuring, working, training, etc... The reason the book has a "normal stat maximum" is to keep this in line?

I also wouldn't care for getting shafted on XP. I made my character more heroic, and as such I don't gain as much experience. How else do you end up with heroes of legend if your characters do not grow in stature and power beyond what is required?

At the same time, statistics should NOT be linear in cost above human (or your GM set) maximum. Our campaigns increases the cost very similar to one of the earlier suggestions in concept. At 20 (max), the cost doubles. At 25, it triples, at 30 it quadruples, etc... What you'll find is that getting stats beyond 25 is incredibly difficult, and that naturally skills and levels begin to become more important.

This number can easily be tuned to your campaign level. I really like the suggestion above where the cost goes up by one for each value above 15, I think that is great! That way, a person who sees their character as being "Hercules" someday can truly achieve it if they focus hard and devote their concept. Of course, compared to the "swordsman" in the party who has bought many combat levels, the HErcules guy can't hit squat!

I've seen this work in several campaigns spanning several game systems. I can understand how in low fantasy, stats buying could be trouble, but even then I would allow characters to buy the stats, I would just increase the difficulty curve (make the points cost double every value above 10 for example, OUCH!).

Re: Monster/Race: Frost Giant (Lesser Niefel Giant)

I think your write-up sounds fine, one thing about monster write-ups is that it is all relative to your power-level in your campaign.

6d6 Tank Shells are highly under-powered by the book. If a normal hero can live until -10 BODY, that means on the average, a tank blow to the chest (21 BOD) just BARELY kills him? Now put him in a kevlar vest, and he actually LIVES from it!

I think that's ok because in Champions, you can't just have heroes getting killed all the time, the damage is listed for a balance that let's heroes do heroic things. In Fantasy Hero, things are bloodier and nastier and people die.

I'd say tune it to what your campaign is. A great big guy swinging a great big sword would be pretty devastating if he hit!

Re: Spell for making a sailing vessel move more quickly

You can also just buy +X" Swimming, 0 END Persistent, UBO, Sailing Vessels Only (-2)

 

Or Aid to SPD instead (which can make it harder to control for slower pilots) which can be faster in some cases (if the vessel already has a lot of movement or NCMs).

I would use your first example, except I would make it Usable Against Others, and increased mass for the ship. Making a boat move faster shouldn't be too cheap of a spell, and swimming is VERY cheap. Then, I'd make the "sailing vessels only" something smaller, and include a -0 limitation, only on the surface =).

Re: Char: Khurragh the Clever.

The only comment I'd give is that for a mass murdering scary ogre, his presence seems a little low. But that is all relative to the average presence in your campaign, of course.

Other than that, nice write-up!

Originally posted by Galadorn

The power levels for magic spells in my campaign are:

• 
  Wizards/Priests: 30 pt.s
  Bards/Divine Magic Layperson: 15-20 pt.s
  Ranger/Paladin: 10-15 pt.s

[/b]

But here's a comparison of the two types of "affect evil" spells of equal active points, though:

30 AP

- 2d6 RKA, "-1 only against evil"

- 2d6 EB, "+1 NND (don't be evil)", "+1 Does BOD"

The first attack averages 7 BOD, 21 STUN. Let's say you hit your typical Joe in the chest wearing leather armor (DEF 3?) who has a 5 PD/ED. Joe will take 2 BOD and 13 STUN.

The second attack averages 2 BOD and 7 STUN. Joe is evil and therefore takes 2 BOD and 7 STUN.

Since dealing BOD is more the typical way of defeating baddies in FH campaigns (at least what I've played in often), then both attacks are roughly equal in power. What that tells me is that both powers are roughly equal, but you are correct, the first will take less real points (perhaps 1 for a 30 AP spell depending upon your required limitations) because of the added limitation.

I believe the second version of the attack gains in power when you are fighting evil monsters and not evil people. It seems like monsters, especially those of the evil type (undead, demons, devils, etc...) like to have high DEF and often take no stun.

After all that spiel, I think overall the two methods are fairly compatible with each other balance-wise, which is a tribute to the Hero system. If I left any holes, I apologize, not enough sleep last night!

Originally posted by Markdoc

Solomon has it right: the problem is that the linear chart is too little, while the geometric chart is too much.

There are a million ways to solve this with numbers, but one way is that each 10 strength doubles how much you can lift instead of each 5 strength. Obviously, you can replace "10" with a number of your choice resulting in a balance you like for your campaign.

Re: Re: Cipherspace: Elemental Plane of Information

Originally posted by Nuke

Shouldn't the God of Information be Al Gore since he obviously invented the Internet.

 

*GUFFAW*

btw, this was by no means intended to be a slam on your idea. I have played in several campaigns where the mages of old organized their knowledge into basically a "plane of existence." You have taken this concept to a highly organized level and that is very neat.

Originally posted by badger3k

The fact that defenses have to be common, or a set of resonably uncommon powers or circumstances. It's the "common" bit thats the key - it turns the power from being a game winner (potentially) into being more of a specialized power - good in certain circumstances, useless in others.

You're comparing apples to oranges here I think. If you buy

8d6 EB, limitation only against evil

vs.

8d6 NND EB, defense is "don't be evil"

The latter is HUGELY more powerful against evil creatures. Don't forget they get no defenses!! That is a tremendous advantage. It's something I neglected to mention earlier in this discussion that everyone here needs to keep track of. The first example, those evil struck by the attack still apply all their defense, and might very well laugh the attack off. The second deals MAJOR damage to the evil foes and should be monitored very closely by the GM.

Make sense? Just make sure you keep track of this. I see the "NND vs. Evil" being used in campaigns where there is a good balance of good/neutral/evil, and where the lines of morality are clear cut.

Re: Cipherspace: Elemental Plane of Information

Originally posted by Jkeown

...waits Cypher, the God of Information, ready to reward or punish those who trespass in his realm...

 

...Inspired by the real-world internet (you may have heard of it...)

Shouldn't the God of Information be Al Gore since he obviously invented the Internet.

*GUFFAW*

Originally posted by Outsider

Either of us could be right, depending on the foe-balance in the campaign. Only the GM who is going to run it knows the balance though.

Well spoken.

It's similar to having the disadvantage "Hatred of Orcs". Imagine your character comes across an orc once every 30 adventures compared to your character coming across an orc when they have a political presence in the society. Suddenly there are dangerous effects of hating those orcs, and thus the value of the disadvantage changes.

Originally posted by Galadorn

I'm not getting into a moral philosophy seminar here, but which neutrals are you talking about, the invincibly ignorant neutrals who don't know any better? Or the neutrals who know better, but just claim to be neutral? [/b]

It was a silly joke, that's all.

I won't argue the morality of it in real life terms, this is plainly a fantasy discussion. I would argue that the definitions of good/evil are deity dependent. So I could easily see one deity's "affect evil" spell hitting "neutral" characters where another's would not. Likewise for an evil deity's "affect good" spell.

I would say this is the job of the GM to determine at the campaign's deities views of "neutral" characters, or basically, those characters who have decided not to decide.

I want to write up an attack that only affects neutral people...

"PICK A SIDE, DANGIT!"

Originally posted by Outsider

I always liked Variable Limitation (Extra Time, Extra END, or Side Effect (EB)) They could cast quickly, they could cast safely, or they could preserve mana, but not all three.

That's neat. The only thing to watch for about this is whether or not it actually is a limitation since the player can manpulate the limitations as they please. For example, when you make a blanket statement "gestures are required for spells", then all casters are penalized (no spells) when they are entangled or tied up. However, this is no problem for the "Variable Limitation" mage. That doesn't make it wrong, it just depends upon your campaign flavor.

"Epic" characters

I think it would be nice to see rules for high powered characters, not that start that way but that grow that way. A campaign needs to have a life, and that life needs to be able to handle the days when the PCs become powerful, and what to do. What happens when your PCs are just as powerful as Turak for example? Does he take notice and attempt to assassinate all high powered foes?

I think it would be nice if adventures were posted in later books with guidelines of what powered characters they were written for (rough guidelines of course because "total points" isn't always the best judge of character power).

Lastly, a working economy. Being a fantasy hero GM, it's tough some times to balance why the whole world wouldn't want to become mages because magic items sell for so much money. But you can't fix that by making magic items cheap. You want characters to be adventuring to become rich, but you don't want to punish them for taking time off to attempt to make money. Almost every fantasy character needs or wants money in some aspect, whether it's to build a church or a castle, or to fund magical constructions.

I'm sure it will be a good product regardless.

Isn't this a contact?

Would you have to write this up as a power? Isn't this just a contact or a favor? I thought that calling on the help of NPCs was the purpose of those perks?

Favors are independent points, that means your character would have to pay for a new favor each time he used it. That gets to be very expensive. You could alternatively allow the player to "earn" favors through the roleplaying you suggested, which is indeed a wonderful opportunity.

Originally posted by austenandrews

I'd approach the issue in a slightly different way. To solve the problem of same-size people having no size bonus/penalty, just reduce the DCV modifier by the difference (that is, net DCV mod = (defender's DCV mod) - (attacker's DCV mod)). Then the DCV modifier acts as normal. This methods seems simpler to remember & calculate.

 

DCV of little people against little people:

 

- regular-size (+0 DCV) v. regular-size (+0 DCV): 0-0 = +0 DCV

- small (+3 DCV) v. regular-size (+0 DCV): +3-0 = +3 DCV

- tiny (+5 DCV) v. regular-size (+0 DCV): +5-0 = +5 DCV

- tiny (+5 DCV) v. small (+3 DCV) = +5-(+3) = +2 DCV

- tiny (+5 DCV) v. tiny (+5 DCV) = +5-(+5) = +0 DCV

 

DCV of big people against big people:

 

- huge (-3 DCV) v. regular-size (+0 DCV) = -3-0 = -3 DCV

- giant (-5 DCV) v. regular-size (+0 DCV) = -5-0 = -5 DCV

- giant (-5 DCV) v. huge (-3 DCV) = -5-(-3) = -2 DCV

- giant (-5 DCV) v. giant (-5 DCV) = -5-(-5) = -0 DCV

 

You can extend this method to combat between big people and small people. I probably wouldn't do that, but the math works out:

 

DCV of big people against little people:

 

- huge (-3 DCV) v. small (+3 DCV) = -3-(+3) = -6 DCV

- huge (-3 DCV) v. tiny (+5 DCV) = -3-(+5) = -8 DCV

- giant (-5 DCV) v. small (+3 DCV) = -5-(+3) = -8 DCV

- giant (-5 DCV) v. tiny (+5 DCV) = -5-(+5) = -10 DCV

 

DCV of little people against big people:

 

- small (+3 DCV) v. huge (-3 DCV) = +3-(-3) = +6 DCV

- small (+3 DCV) v. giant (-5 DCV) = +3-(-5) = +8 DCV

- tiny (+5 DCV) v. huge (-3 DCV) = +5-(-3) = +8 DCV

- tiny (+5 DCV) v. giant (-5 DCV) = +5-(-5) = +10 DCV

 

NOTE: I would not apply this rule to the DCV of normal-size people. Characters with Shrinking/Growth (and equivalent constructs) are specifically changing their DCV. Normal-size people shouldn't be penalized for being normal-size, IMO. Should Frodo hit Boromir more easily because he's little? Should the cave troll hit Boromir less often? Somehow that doesn't ring true to me. That's one reason I prefer DCV modifiers to OCV modifiers. (The main reason, though, is for simplicity.)

 

However, the method does work if you do want to apply it to normals:

 

DCV of regular-size people:

 

- regular-size(+0 DCV) v. huge (-3 DCV) = 0-(-3) = +3 DCV

- regular-size(+0 DCV) v. giant (-5 DCV) = 0-(-5) = +5 DCV

- regular-size(+0 DCV) v. small (+3 DCV) = 0-(+3) = -3 DCV

- regular-size(+0 DCV) v. tiny (+5 DCV) = 0-(+5) = -5 DCV

 

Hopefully that makes some sense.

 

-AA

If you wanted to be very technical and have an additional rule that makes sense, you could also say that any creature attacking a smaller creature whose DCV is say 6 more because of size, the larger creature automatically gains the "Area Affect: Hex" advantage against the smaller.

Our GM roughly uses this rule, with a slight modification. The attack is area affect AND verses DCV. So, if you dive for cover and the attack still hits you, you are hit. If you don't dive for cover and the attack hits the hex, you are hit.

This is to simulate how large creatures can have a huge advantage when striking against small creatures. Our GM does not use this with all giant creatures, just those who are able to move with some dexterity still in combat.

One thing I always liked to do in Fantasy Hero is ignore the "lifting" amount numbers provided in the main rulebook for how much a character can lift, and use an alternate system? We have begun to find in general that the exponential raise of things in Hero works nightmares in Fantasy (but wonderfully in Champions). So, we are trying out a "linear" replacement.

Currently, a 15 STR is twice as strong as a 10, 20 STR is 4 times as strong as a 10, a 25 is 8 times as strong, etc... Replace this with 2, 3, 4, 5, ... Now, suddenly a 20 STR person is 3 times as strong, a 25 STR person is 4 times as strong, etc... Keep the damage rules in place, but suddenly you don't have 20 STR character's able to lift a half a ton. Granted, they can skill lift 660lbs, and that ain't shabby, but you'll find that the weight lifting charts quickly become bounded. You also don't have troubles with giants being able to lift hundreds of tons, which just doesn't make sense.

Likewise, it helps with avoiding overpowered "army buster" fireball spells by slapping on the "1/4 doubles the area effect" four times to get 16 times the area. By using the above linear rule, the fireball with four "increased area effect" advantages would be x5 area, something far more bounded.

Just a suggestion, each GM should handle this in their own way. As for being DnD like, equipment costs should always be adjusted to the gold system in your campaign. Don't just say, "We use DnD equipment costs", be balanced on them. Make your full plate cost 2000gp and watch it become more rare.

Nuke

Originally posted by The Mad GM

Actually, I'm trying to think of ways for players who may or may not have any bardic talent themselves come up with something. I like the idea of filking a known song (for those who don't know, filking is a term from Fantasy/Sci-fi conventions for making parodies of popular songs, re-writing the lyrics to fit the genre in a humorous way). Then letting any bardic skill the character has polish off the edges.

 

My group is old enough (all in our thirties+) that I doubt a comparison to English class will come up. But we are all really busy, so having them write up something ahead of time sounds impractical. I think what I would do is assign the task to the bard character (allowing kibitzing with other players if asked for), run the other competitions, then have the bard recite the piece.

One of the quests in our campaign for a priest (bardic like) was to write a song and perform it. The GM cared little about the quality of the song and more about the effort of the player. It was done to the tune of "YMCA", and it was for the deity of air. So naturally the song was "WIND".

All the players got involved in some fashion or another, the GM (as well as many of the players' wives) laughed hysterically, and the priest got his quest.