James Gillen

Of course, that goes into the old subject of COM being damn near useless as a Characteristic or Special Power- unless you change the rules to make it work like the GURPS Attractiveness Advantage or the new HERO rules for positive Reputation Perk. JMO. JG

Superheroes or soap operas. JG

So which Champions Universe character would look best in a catsuit? Or anything tight? JG

Well, the cool thing about Firefly getting cancelled so quickly was that there isn't much "canon" to violate. There may have been a few active psionics in the universe, they just weren't the focus of that show. JG

I'm getting a bunch of '404' errors on your links, dude. JG

"Is RIFTS a superheroic or heroic level campaign?" That's the problem. It's both. The core book centers on Coalition/resistance characters, most of whom would be heroic-level, but even then you have Juicers, Glitterboys, and some others that would need to be statted as supers. And then you get into the sourcebooks with various magical races. I'd say the point base depends on character concept. If the character has few innate powers and doesn't NEED many points, it should be 100+100. If the concept needs lots of points to work (Glitterboy, Chiang-Ku dragon, etc.) use 200 base. JG

We should tell Steve to include "Pimp" as a Package Deal in Dark Champions. JG

First off: If you live in Las Vegas, can I be in your game? JG

The way Luck works in 5th Ed., "dramatic editing" might actually be feasible. If you still want Inspiration to be disposable points, just make the Luck dice Independent. JG

I should see if Gary Ciaramella can contribute to this. He's giving me his WoT novels to read (I just finished Path of Daggers) and he also has the D20 game. JG

I think it's fair. I had something similar in my D&D adaptation where a spellcaster's "slots" were represented as an END Reserve and continuing-effect spells were marked as costing END once in order to represent using up the "slot." JG

Yes... I think that would solve a LOT of the problems that are unfairly associated with HERO. JG

Which I think is a major factor here. Most people I've seen debate conversions of other fantasy systems have resorted to VPPs in order to convert the magic systems. Personally, I'd define magic VPPs much like Gadget Pools in Champions- not a "pool of do anything you want", but a pool that covers a lot of miscellaneous capabilities that it is no longer cost efficient to represent with separate spells or Multipowers. That is, if you've spent so many points on Multipower slots that you might as well convert them to the Base Cost of a VPP, then that's the time to do it. IMO, a beginning character shouldn't have a pool, and a beginning HERO player shouldn't have one until he's familiar enough with the system to know how it works. In story terms, most beginning mages know a few separate effects. By the time the character is skilled enough to channel effects at will (Rand in Wheel of Time, Willow in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, etc.) the character in game terms will have enough experience (and Experience Points) to make the transition to VPP worthwhile AND justified in terms of story background. If VPPs seem too powerful, remember that they normally require an extra action and a Skill Roll to change over. For most fantasy (i.e. simulating D&D-type stuff) the 'Cosmic' Advantages shouldn't be allowed. Most casters can't simply make up spells on the fly; 'arcane' casters need to consult their books to change the VPP, meaning also that they are limited to the spells that they've actually researched- i.e. only those the GM allowed him to have or that he made up with Inventor/Spell Research (ultimately, the same). Clerics would only have those powers their god allowed, meaning that they're even more under GM control. Basically, in HERO System, with great power comes great responsibility. The GM has more freedom to design the parameters of his game system than with any other rules, but that also means weighing how things would work without relying on some designers' notion of "game balance." Hope this helps. JG

My review of FH just got posted: http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/9/9598.phtml James Gillen

The Possibility Points would be equivalent to Luck (as defined under the new optional rules allowing Luck Points to count as re-rolls and such). Each point would be bought as "Does Not Recover" (-2), requiring PCs to spend XP to replenish them. Reality storm conflicts would thus be bidding wars resolved through the characters' Reality Skill vs. Skill Rolls. The TORG rules say that these conflicts also create storms over the area of the conflict which increase in size the longer it goes on. The PCs wouldn't buy the Reality Storm rules with points- it would be an inherent limitation of the setting. JG

Most military vehicles in 5th Edition (for example Terran Empire) have a similar Distinctive Feature. JG

It was probably by demand of all the Knights of the Dinner Table fans. JG

Western HERO? What, that IS coming out? Is it gonna be something other than Rolemaster conversions from OUTLAW? JG

What about for snoring too loud? JG

From what you're describing, Army of Darkness was more historically plausible. JG

Re: Re: another cheesy b-movie "Groovy." JG

That, and (according to both the movie and the comic) Hyde was the killer 'ape' in Poe's Murders in the Rue Morgue, and Poe died several years after the LXG story... JG

Then she couldn't justify 30 COM, in my opinion. Britney's a real "butterface." JG

Yeah, basically because you're using Transform as the mechanism for what would otherwise be Duplication, except that the power has potentially infinite use (duplicates) and requires "overriding" the original target. That's why Smith seemed to apply. JG

Sounds like one of those "Let's build Smith from Matrix Reloaded" ideas... JG