Christopher

Time for a few references to what I wrote: Suffocation as CE effect - APG I 83. Yield Sign warning. "At the GM’s option, a character can use Change Environment to attack a target with a “suffocation” effect. Tis deprives the target of the ability to breathe and subjects him to the Drowning rules (6E2 130). (Of course, it’s possible to build “he can’t breathe” attacks many other ways, such as with AVAD, but those forms usually work very quickly; CE Suffocation works slowly according to the Drowning rules.) Suffocation via Change Environment is a 20 Character Point combat effect that subjects the target to the effects of drowning: he cannot breathe; he cannot take Recoveries (not even the Post-Segment 12 Recovery); and spends a minimum of 1 END every Phase (and eventually STUN, and then BODY, when he runs out of END). (Obviously, this doesn’t work at all on targets that have Life Support: Self-Contained Breathing.) Additionally, a character being suffocated cannot speak or use powers with the Incantations Limitation (but he can still use voicebased powers such as a “sonic scream,” unless the GM rules otherwise). When a character buys Suffocation he must defne a reasonably common and obvious way to remove, negate, or avoid the effect (other than Life Support). If the Change Environment is bought with Area Of Effect, the reasonable way is “get out of the Area”; for singletarget Change Environments characters will have to defne more specifc methods." Physical Manifestation should work nicely here, as the Speaking part is alrady taken care off. However at it is propably the "Mandatory way to turn it off", you should maybe make it a -0 Limitation in the CE case.

If it is mostly about blocking Voice: Voice can be flashed and otherwise disabeled just like hearing (APG I or II). "Throath Punch" could be a Flash vs Voice just as well as any other Sense. Entangle has a adder so it blocks senses. And thus it could block Voice (rather then hearing). The suffocation part, that is the harder part. One of the core rules is that any attack should have a (reasonably common and obvious) defense. And that no attack should just "stick" to the character without a obvious way to turn off. There are a few ways you could let a power keep dealing damage until removed: Persistent Uncontrolled (invest Endurance once, it is self sustained from then on) Damage over Time Change Environment to induce the "Suffocation" natural effect, but could be a bit hard to balance. Damage Shield on a entangle perhaps? From a certain point of view a Entangle is a "remote grab". Could it also choke someone? So how important is the suffocation part? How important the "can not scream" part? How hard to remove should it be? How fast should it kill a Character? Should it even be deadly in the first place? Remember that a lot of stuff that works in movies does not translate so well to the RPG table.

1. If the Utility changed, so should the price. Substracting every perception related utility from INT easily halves the times it is used. Maybe some cross-referencing from other systems helps here: All Systems that have a Atribute derived base value + Skill point invensement system = total value, asume that someone with a high score is able to "pick up" things in that area quickly/intuit it better, even if he has no training. Shadowrun in particular does that. For most other systems I know, Perception is a seperate skill to begin with. But for hero the differnce between a Skill and a Atribute is mostly the pricing anyway. APG II 6-8 two variants of Perception: Perception as seperate Charactersitic Perception as skill. I think charactersitic might be closer to what you want?

Those other people I that I meet waiting at the Ample/Door - about 90% do not get the mechanic. My city is not so overrun with Tourists, that 90% of all people there are tourists. The trains are literally older then me, with the oldest being over 40. Even after a recent retrofit, those door mechanics have not changed one bit. The amples are like this for at least 5 years, propably longer. By pure propabilty I would have to meet people who understand the devices as well as I more then 10% of the time. Interestingly younger children are more likely to "get" that. Regarding the Caveman & Shootgun: I do not think I could identify the sound of a Shootgun being loaded. Much less identify a weapon by it's sound. All my experience with Weapon Sounds is from Shooters. Personally I would think that caveman would be faster at learning to use the Shootgun then me. Firearms are in the end not that differently from a thrown spear or bow. They can be kept ready a lot longer (as long as the Gunpoweder stays viable) and you do not need a target when readying it. Note that there is a "unfamiliarity" penalty for Skills. Easily enough adapted to Perception as well.

With those "intelligent but poor perceptors" you are propably ignoring distractions. Being in a train of thought can be as distracting as being in a conversation (see 6E2 for the hearing penalties). Do not forget that emotions can also be quite distracting. "Love makes blind", as the old saying goes. As well as being tired, hungry or thristy - smart people are often very poor at keeping care of thier body (I know from experience). Thanks to my intelligence I am able to see patterns that others seem to fail at noticing time and again, wheter due to lower intelligence or distraction/being occupied emotionally. I often drive with the Public Transportation. I noticed that busdrivers will only stop at stations when they see somebody standing there or somebody used the door trigger to mark thier intetion to leave. In turn trains hold on every station. The doors will only open if a user triggered the button and the driver unlocked the doors. But at some station/situations the drivers force open all doors (heat and a underground station; common places to switch lines). I have this wierd crossing on my way home. Basically two normal crossroads that somehow fused into a single crossing with a single ample system. As a result along some axis, it takes really long for pedestrians to get green. All three have in common that they use a simple touch-button to detect user intent and a highlegthed text to confirm being triggered. Yet so many people are there hitting the button again and again when the text is already glowing in vain hope for speed it up, when I could clearly tell them why the ample can not yet switch to green/why the door can not yet open. It actually becomes frustrating quickly. And the wierdest part is that many of those people get pissed off when I explain it. They seem to think I want to brag with my knowledge, when in reality I want to lessen my knowledge advantage by distributing the knowledge. People can be utterly confusing.

That measn no intdirect on the attack. As Mindscan EGO+20 level says: "If he wishes to attack the target with a non Mental Power, the attack must be able to reach the target, and the Range Modifer applies." You can actually shoot through barriers (I think the rules are somewhere under Barrier or in 6E2 under Durabiltiy of natural obstacles) and that might lessen the impact if the material is hard enough. The issues with targetting through a barrier only affect the OCV/DCV calculation. Even if you can target through obstacles, your attack still has to punch through those. FYI, the default Barrier Power does not block senses (those are extra adders). So you can actually target somebody through a barrier. Your attack still has to punch through the barrier, however.

The idea of "anti disarm measures" is not really a new one. Even D&D/Pathfinder has Gauntlets you can properly secure a weapon in: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/armor/gauntlet-locked You could make this either as extra STR, only vs Disarm or jsut buying off the accessible part of the Focus with a "Naked Buyoff" (wich does cut both ways, btw.). Near the end of the Aizen Ark in Bleach, they also had people Zanpaktous fuse with thier users arm, effectively making them non disarmable (not that disarming there happened there more then once or twice in total).

The "shifting targetting to alternate sense group" is codified in the ability to sell back senses. Inlcud9ing a mention that at the 3rd targetting sense, the cost should be lessened. CE, self only is about the only way this penalty could work. It can be used for "Stealth Suites" that are shy of full invisibility after all. But honestly that writeup goes way overboard. You should ask why the others do not have to write up the same power for thier Costumes, but with Focus. It is just a "costume by a different special effect". Indeed since it is psionic, you do not even get around still wearing a costume (just think about all those Mobile Phone Cameras). Most of the times if you want to identify someone you would make a photo of that person anyway - much easier then making a Phantom image based on a description. Shape Shift, not Images would be the right power in the first case. Unless you are stuck on the whole "Shape Shift" term - the power explicitly mentions use as self-only Disguise Illusion, like D&D Alter Self Spell - but a lot of people take the power name too literal. I agree with the use of Invisibility - buy the full effect (not being seen at all), then limit it to a lesser effect (only for Discrimitation part of sight).

Anything about his Origin? How about any secondary powers or weaknesses? Based on the colors he could go as the Patriotic hero of a few Nations or Substates. Red is used usualyl as the color of blood, as in "the blood we had to spill for our independance". Logically that a super would want to downplay the red tones.

So has Marvel. Simply do not. Inlcude other Amphibian/Toad characteristisc, like Psychotropic or deadly drugs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychoactive_toad http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/articles/article/tripping-over-psychoactive-toads/ Many newts actually have a Tertodotoxin Damage Shield as defense, together with high Acid resistance to outlife anything that might try eating them alive: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rough-skinned_newt#Tetrodotoxin_binding Tetodotoxin is whole orders of magnitude more posionous then Even Cyanide. Posionous Newts have killed humans that were stupid enough to swallow them. It is the poision that makes pufferfish such a deadly food to eat. The Evolution for surviving agaisnt predators goes: Be stronger Be faster Be more intelligent Or just taste really bad (wich also includes a deadly stomach ache).

The problem would still be the partial transparency on the Forcewall needed to get stuff through (that you want), without letting enemies/thier attacks through. That is not a cheap form of transparency. But let us not get ahead of ourself: Since you said you left around when 6E came out, are you using 5E or 6E right now? The answer will varry heavily based on it.

We still would need to figure out how it works, before we can scale it up. And know if it would even work in deep space. We would need a space station outside earths magentic and gravitational field to even test the thing properly. As all the thrust might just be an interaction with either of those two (wich would be useless once you leave those two).

Restrainable and Material Manifesation implement the Accessible and Destructible parts of a Focus Limitation respectively. But the Restrainable = Accessible example is not as clear here. It deals more with stuff like "Wings getting grabbed/tied" then "Material Component being stolen". So plain focus might still be better. Those sounds more like stuff you should not write up in the first place. My usual benchmark for "What not to spend points on" rule is how often it is likely to come up in a Campaign. 1-2 would still be likely free for me. And that power literally can not be used more then once. Abilities that are so powerfull their use is limited like that should not be given to the players unless planned for in the Campaign - wich usually means it is needed to be used in the Campaign and thus not realy under player control to begin with. @OP Question: Personally I think "Charges, do not Recover" never belongs onto a sheet in the first place for above reasons. Once you have used all uses you effectively have a worthless point dump on your sheet. That is only likely to force the player to make a new sheet/character without repeating that mistake. And if it is not written onto the sheet, that it does not recover does not mater either. Unless you got some Formula to derive money cost from Active Points and Real Cost of it's power. If this is for a villain, no writeup is needed. The Evil Mage housing in that spooky castle over there needs no base for the castle, follower for all the guards/skelettons, follower for the riddle demon guarding the inner sanctum and the like. Those are there because they are needed for the adventure to be challenging, not becaue the master bought them. Once he was driven out - even if he survived - he will not come back there. Those guards/the demon will not appear elsewhere working for this character. If they did, followers/base would be in order. But for heroic levels you can usually ignore those perks anyway.

Just rename it Rail/Energy Rifle and it works. By default all ranged attacks leave a "visibile Trail", have a visible pulse or otherwise easily traceable if they just happened in your line of sight. Bullets are a bit special here - they kind of border on IPE here, but are not really. We have not figured out how to interpret visibiltiy ruels with Bullets. (The visibiltiy rules speak of the Source being obvious). Range modifiers towards the shooter might still apply after the first shoot. But 2nd or so and the enemy knows to look into the right direction already. Luckily 99% of all Superheroic attacks are either Melee or some form of energy beam/slower physical object where tracing is kind of easy. "She'd need LOS for the rifle, but otherwise? No sight needed. So, if Pixel had holographic decoys? She wouldn't be fooled by that. If Crimson was invisible? Doesn't help. Pitch black? No worries. Also, the mental powers help predict movement - this is why I'm thinking OCV vs ECV/DMCV." Okay that is confusing. LOS is blocked by not having Sight of the Target. Like Invisibility, Darknes, being flashed in the Sight, Targetting a Decoy, etc. As Hero needed to keep the rules abstract (to include many possible targetting senses), it can get a bit hard to read. Or make sense out of - I tried going heavily by "rules as written" and we still ended up arguing about some corner points: http://www.herogames.com/forums/topic/93975-making-sense-out-of-senses-in-6e/

Toad has become less pathethic in recent years. Apparently that started with the Ray Park version in the 2000 X-Men Film. Take a look at his Wikipedia Article. THere are a lot of powers added from other Amphibians like secreting various poisions through his skin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toad_(comics)#Powers_and_abilities

Personally I prefer to go for the HERO System Discussion. However there you should always say what kind of game you have (Heroic or Superheroic, what point level) as the answer can varry greatly between the two. However the sub-genre forums can be used if the question is about a specific genre. That also means we can imply the kind of game if you forgot to mention it.

"Only use if it adds to game" is literally written into the rules on 6E2 132: "Tis optional rule involves the use of END over long time periods. It reflects the fact that characters become more and more fatigued if forced to continuously exert END. Te Long Term END (LTE) rules are complicated; you should only use them the GM feels they’ll enhance the adventure. Tis rule is particularly useful to keep wizards from casting spells too frequently" The consistent uses rules are pretty easy: Figure out END use per Turn (derived primarily from using movement powers, STR needed to lift the load, SPD and actual movement). Compare with REC/2. Use LTE accordingly to table. Alternatively just consider it as a Cap on persistent END use so you will not incur LTE loss. The inconsistent ones depend on how much you use. If you do not at least use twice your REC/Turn, it does not really mater. Below that LTE loss is measured over minutes (5 turns equal 1 minute, not exactly how long a normal fight lasts), so it falls under the consistent use anyway. Jsut ignore uses that small. Maybe the GM can add one LTE loss after longer combats (3 or more turns). But more likely you will already have had LTE loss during those 3 Turns. Only starting with twice your REC will you start loosing LTE on a turn by turn basis. And then it simply depends on how high a multiple of your REC you used. Simply look at the Phase 12 recovery: Just check how much your endurance changed between this Phase 12 rec (before you make it happen) and the last one (after you made it happened). Divide by Rec, round down. And as said before, ignore anything below 2. If you got 7 REC, figuring out you can ignore any use less then 14 END is quite easy.

I have been thinking about a few things regarding history and the people before us. And what that might say for our future. When talking about past people, we have a tendency to look down on them. They knew less about the world. They were more bound up in superstition. They made stupid mistakes. But maybe the sum of thier knowledge is not significantly less then ours? Maybe thier knowledge just a had a different focus? See, a peasant lived in a time where farming communities had to be self sufficient. Limited travel for people, messages and goods meant that no real specialisation could take place. The average peasant needed to know about stuff like farming, building, animal husbrandy, making clothng, heating, treefelling, etc. Maybe even medicine (or what approximation they had at those times). They needed religion just to make any sense of all those parts of the world they did not understood (illness, weather, natural disaster). I do not know how to do any of those things. I can not even sow to save my life. The modern person does not need to know how to farm, build, raise animals or make clothing. We have specialists to do that for us. People who know one of these jobs really well, but nothing about the other 15 in return. If I and a peasent of long gone times were stranded in the wilderness without technology, I would be the helpless idiot that knwos nothing and he would be the specialist that knows more. What does that mean for our future? If there is some form of hard cap on what sum of knowledge we can aquire, then that also means there is a hard cap on wich knowledge we can aquire. If you need to know A+B to get to C but A, B and C do not fit into your mind fully, you have a problem. Even including some breakout minds like Newton, Hawkins or Einstein, there might simply be a cap on knowledge we can aquire as a species. If FTL or interstellar travel is even possible/feasible, who says we will be able to aquire the nessesary knowledge to do so? Now we do have some hopes/fears regarding singularity level AI's. But there is the same caveeat there: First we need to understand that there is a massive difference between "Engineering AI" or Smart Technologies and "Cognitive AI": A Cognitive AI is what we would need for the Singularity. And so far we failed utterly at that. And what if our knowledge cap is below what is needed to make Cognitive AI in the first place? Much less a Cognitive AI smart enough to actually improove itself?

Why? This is basically a loveletter out of Frost-kau.

Lady Liberty is a odd case among supers - she is a patriotic Mage. Her totem and cloth is Star Sprangeled Banner. Her staff is the always burning "Torch of Truth". She can harness the raw power of love for Freedom into powerfull magical effect, but prefers to control the fire from her torch in numerous ways. She is also able to heal people, as with Freedom time can heal all wounds.

I guess that means Thrym sends his regards: http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1012.html

It would either have to be a target side weakness (Complication or Disadvantagte; in particular succeptibility). Or a quite expensive power. A presense attack might also work. It is not easy to translate powers from D&D because D&D as a game system has quite a few bugs that hero does not share. And a lot of the constructs are only there because of said bugs or using said bugs. The Pathfinder variant wich does plain damage or healing to the living/undead (rather then mental effects) might work a lot better. Getting around the targets primary defenses (PD/ED) might be an issue. That defenses do not reduce damage is what I consider the main weakness of D&D/Pathfinder. But it could be done. In any case you need to narrow down the effects a lot more then just "Turn Undead", there have been very different abilities of that name.

Based on that I would agree on the Mental attack aspect. Maybe a Mental Attack that can do body? Petrification can be could be a result of a transform. Or just the special effect of how you died after receiving enough damage from that Power. Maybe that power just happened to be the Mandatory Resurrection weakness for the villain of the week and "turning to stone" was how true death was for that guy? The part where both sides have to lock eyes is a bit tricky. Could be a limitation of the power. Or maybe when being Stunned the victim is forced to look at the Ghostrider, thus making it only appear as if eye contact is needed?

First problem with Sniping is perceiving the enemy with a Targetting Sense. And Clairsentience does not count for this by default (see there). Mind Scan is a combo Mental/Sensory power and can indeed create a full Targetting Perception "Lock" for non-mental powers: "Mind Scan is a Sense (part of the Mental Sense Group). It operates in “360 Degrees” (in the sense that it searches an entire area at once) and is a Targeting Sense for other Mental Powers (and, at EGO +20, for other attacks as well)" "[EGO +20] Mentalist knows the exact location of the target. He can attack with all attacks. If he wishes to attack the target with a non Mental Power, the attack must be able to reach the target, and the Range Modifer applies." You could also buy any Targetting sense with lots of Telescopic and put it into the Mental Group. While it does cost a premium in Sense Modifiers, there is no way to break out of it like Mind Scan and no direct way to be attacked. Secondly OMV vs DMCV: It does not need to be that. With a Mind Scan lock,her chances of surprising them is still great enough, as effectively normal sight does not mater. However obstacles still do mater for her attack and barriers/walls will normally affect her. Increased OCV and Damage with time: Set, Aim and Haymaker Standart Combat Maneuvers. This character can basically ignore Defense as a Sniper. "Because she's telepathic, she has a better idea of what they're going to do, where they're going, etc." That is plain extra OCV/OMCV, depending wich route you go. Maybe Limited to "only with Mindscan Lock". Of course with Mind Scan you also know Surface thoughts, so you can play a bit with the turn mechanic - not attacking the guy having held a phase; attacking with AoE when the enemy is prepared to Dodge. That I have to reitterate: Being attacked without proper defense (not being able to perceive enemy), much less being able to act agaisnt this enemy is no fun. However Champions 6E does mention that one can use a "Force of Nature" villain as major plot background. A antagonist so powerfull the Heroes can not beat them in a straight up fight (or on his terms). With the whole plot being to reach a counter or do what the villain wants. A swarm would be a similar example of this: Yes, you can build something with "Desolidification" and an attack power that "Affets Physical world". I even thought about using that combo to make a swarm enemy. However unless the Desolid weakness is somewhat common (like every AoE attack), this can quickly get frustrating as well. A common trap is the GM trying to "beat" his players or creating unbeatable combinations using his On the other hand this character can be very weak if she faces a enemy Mentalist or Anti-Mentalist. If you Mind Scan "into" a Mind Link you get results on everyone. But in turn you can be mentally attacked by everyone in the Mind link too - like the enemy Mentalist. If the enemy has Darkness "Mental Group", he can cut the mind link or any other Mental Group Sense. Same with a Barrier that blocks the Mental Sense Group. I actually developed quite a few counters to mentalists that do not require mental powers yourself. Also if they can get into range, she will be glass cannon. Due to the excessive focus on Sniping, she would be quite vulnerable.

I agree with the "everyone with the Secret ID get's aproporate disguise ability". Captain Marvel/Shazaam becomes a big boy. Superman takes of his glasses. Batman dons a mask. The whole idea behind a Secret Identitiy is that there is a identity to hide in the first place and that the character has the means to do so somehow. Many of hte Green lanterns did not have a Secret ID for example (I think Hal Jordan was one of the few, and it's stability was questionable). But this thread comes dangerously close to the "negating a complication with a power" territory, so I find it nessesary to point it out that potentially poor path. Besides I also said that buying it as a lesser value is also an opton. In any case buy the complications you actually want to play on the level you actually want to play them. Not ones you do not want or on a level you do not want, that you then negate or lessen with a power.