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Steve

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Everything posted by Steve

  1. Re: Populate a 17th century galleon Wow! I never knew that a ship of that era could hold so many people. I was thinking a hundred to two hundred or so.
  2. Re: Clockwork Tactics Hmm... I was thinking that it took a moment to give out orders, which is why I wrote it out that way with Delayed Phase. The leader takes a second to judge the tactics of the situation, then snaps out some orders before going himself. I took the Extra Time to activate it, thinking the +4 would then work from that segment forward when each character had their phases. Looking at it now, the build seems a bit funny, since a character could get the initiative bonus and then keep it even while out of sight or hearing. Would it work better as something that only works for a single phase? How would you write it up as an extended effect to show the team following orders that would take longer than a couple of seconds to execute?
  3. I was reading through the Stargate SG-1 RPG book, and I came across this feat. Clockwork Tactics: You're the guiding, dominating force within any unit with whom you serve. (Basically, you can increase your teammates initiative by giving orders, I assume is how it works.) Here is my take on it as a Hero System write-up. I suppose I could have gone with Aid, but this seemed an interesting way to do it. Clockwork Tactics: Lightning Reflexes: +4 DEX to act first with All Actions, Limited Range (+1/4), Usable Simultaneously (up to 8 people at once; +1) (13 Active Points); Requires A Tactics Roll (-1/2), Extra Time (Delayed Phase, Only to Activate, -1/4), Incantations (-1/4). Real Cost: 6
  4. Re: Populate a 17th century galleon Hmmm... is this an English galleon or a Spanish galleon? The people on board would tend to reflect nation of origin.
  5. Re: The Future of Small Arms Another thing for the future of small arms is the Gun Kata.
  6. Re: The Future of Small Arms One thing that might change about firearms is the action used could shift to an electric charge instead of the current firing pin model. Firing rates could increase as a result, since it would just be pulses of electricity igniting the primers.
  7. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe There is also the notion taken from the Time Wars series by Simon Hawke, that a timestream split was a VERY BAD THING, since that could trigger off a cascade effect of more and more splits, ending in the dissolution of the entire universe. I also liked some of the pseudo-science used in the series, like zen physics to explain the issues raised by time travel.
  8. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe I suppose Temporal Inertia could also be expressed as the Law of Conservation of Events. There are certain key events in time that can't really be changed, and doing so simply triggers off a divergent timeline. Smaller changes could fall below a certain energy level and not trigger such a divergence.
  9. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe One of the laws of time travel I'm debating including is from Timemaster. The Law of Death: If a time traveller dies, they remain dead even if the circumstances of their death are undone. They simply keel over and die at that instant. Too harsh?
  10. Re: Reproduction I wasn't referring to your posts at all, just a general sense I was getting from posts put forth by everyone. I find it interesting that a number of posters don't find the ability to have kids useful at all, simply on its own merits as an ability. I do, and I think that's where there's a difference in opinion showing up. I keep coming back to the Life Support vs. Aging question. Is it really useful in the context of a game to be able to live 200 years as opposed to 100? How long do campaigns last? For example, why be an elf and buy 4 or 5 points worth of Life Support vs. Aging at all? Your last paragraph misinterprets what I said, so maybe that's my fault in how I presented it. In the shattered post-holocaust landscape I was picturing, the characters would not be coming from regions that would treat breeders as slaves, but they could encounter them in their travels across the world. There are other places where breeders are treated as special, sometimes even revered. What I meant was that, on balance, taking both ends of the spectrum and all points in between into account, I think having the ability to reproduce is a 1 point ability. The default is that you can't. If you never care to have kids, then don't pay the point in this campaign. If you're born into a society that treats breeders as slaves, the campaign won't be starting there, but it gives (I feel) an interesting hook for a PC to have come from one of them, have the ability, and somehow escaped. I could imagine a pretty interesting write-up could be created from that origin. I just find it surprising that the ability to have kids is dismissed as being an utter waste of a point by some posters, if the only benefit it gives you is just the ability to have kids when most people can't.
  11. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe Well, I think it would make a great addition to the Star Hero lineup. There aren't a lot of good time travel RPGs out, so Hero should have one.
  12. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe
  13. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe
  14. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe That is a very good question, and one I have been thinking about a bit.
  15. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe The Time Wars series is what I feel to be the best writing that Simon Hawke ever did, all twelve books of it. It started out with time travel being used as a way to fight wars out of sight. Soldiers would be inserted into historical battle scenes instead, and the results tabulated by means of an elaborate scoring system. Then the Timekeepers started messing with things, a terrorist organization devoted to ending the Time Wars. The first book pretty much set the tone for the series with Finn DeLaney, who was endlessly getting promoted in the field for being such a good soldier, only to get demoted just as often back home for his inability to tolerate spit and polish discipline sorts. With a few other soldiers, like another series regular, Lucas Priest, he's brought in and the officer in charge of the operation offers everyone coffee, alcohol, cigarettes, or whatever they could want. Finn's reaction? "Oh sh*t, we're dead."
  16. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe I think multiple timelines might muddy the waters too much, especially since the Hero Universe's standard timeline offers quite a lot of variety on its own. If the number of time travellers is kept really small, it minimizes their impact and makes the heroes feel even more special for being able to do such travelling. V'Han raises some interesting questions. From what I recall in Galactic Champions, at the end of the Superhero Age she swears to leave Earth alone for a thousand years. But does that mean that region of time is what she leaves untouched? Or does it mean she leaves all of its history untouched for a thousand years? Magic is another thing to consider. Does it sweep all over the universe equally, or does it have zones where it's stronger some places and weaker in others? What I get from reading the Champions line of sourcebooks is that magic is a universe-wide phenomena, and its levels affect everywhere at once. It may rise and fall like the tide, but that tide is evenly dispersed. Malvan-tech seems like it is "genuine" super-technology as opposed to "superhero" super-technology. Magic levels are low in Terran Empire times, but it all still works just fine. That raises an interesting notion of comparative technologies when looked at across time. When magic allows it, some really oddball stuff works, and that might be fascinating to technology types. I mean, pick up an UNTIL blaster in 2001 and then zip forward to 2601, and it become so much junk. Zip forward to 3001, and it works again. But take a blaster from 2601 and zip back to 2001, and it works the same. Can you imagine what that would do to an engineer or physicist?
  17. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe I give thee rep, sir!
  18. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe I'll have to take a look at the Timelords RPG. Having a single timeline does fit more in line with Doctor Who, but it's also the classical view of time, where it's like a river you can travel up and down. Although that does raise the specter of something like a timestream split as a very bad thing to try and avoid, which was how it was presented in Simon Hawke's Time Wars series.
  19. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe
  20. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe Keep the ideas coming! In order to do a proper homage to the good Doctor's adventures (which is part of my goals), I would use something like a TARDIS, an actual vehicle that the PCs would arrive in, park somewhere, and then leave to go have the actual adventure. Based on descriptions of Malvan technology in the Terran Empire sourcebook, I'd rate it as being darn near indestructible from anything short of equivalent technology. As far as picking the lock, I couldn't see that happening without Malvan technology either. That leaves the chronoporter (or whatever I end up calling it), as more of a plot convenience to get the PCs from place to place across time. Having an enemy able to commandeer the vessel is definitely a possibility, but it would require another Malvan or maybe an Elder Worm to do it. I haven't decided how 'user friendly' to make the vehicle. It could require a skill roll, which would keep down the numbers of Malvans who would pursue such a hobby. But it could also require a telepathic link as well. One feature that the TARDIS provided which was nice was its universal translator ability, so everyone seemed to be speaking English, even nightmarish aliens. That would pretty much eliminate any need to buy languages though, unless taken just in case the chronoporter left without a PC, and he needed to talk with the natives. As far as camouflage, it would definitely need that. I could also borrow a notion from Timemaster. Their vehicles could be set to hover on the verge of being, essentially desolid and invisible until called back.
  21. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe That is pretty much my thinking for how to make this campaign work. It's a way that I could put together a party that could include such wildly different origins as a 1930s detective, a barbarian from the Valdorian Age, and a noble from the Terran Empire of the 26th century, to name a few options off the top of my head. Yes, they could go to London in 1941, but that's more of a setting for the actual adventure than going there to try and change history or something. With the Elder Worm and their minions lurking in the dark corners of history, my Malvan time traveller and her companions could foil their plots, among other adventures. If I go with the notion of a small society of Malvan dilletantes as time travellers, it also lets me play with some intrigue and politics, especially if these other Malvans also have small groups of assistants with them. Romana herself would be more of a way for me to do infodumps to the players, so I would need to make sure I don't overshadow the PCs with her.
  22. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe That sounds pretty much like how GURPS approached it with their "Observer Effect" notion. I'll have to dig out my old Timemaster stuff to see what kind of time tricks I'll allow, and I'll compare it to the Doctor Who info that tkdguy posted a link to. Rep to him for that, btw.
  23. Re: Time travel Dr. Who style - Hero Universe
  24. Re: Reproduction Well, I hope I didn't come across as huffy or something. I agree that more should be involved than the Talent purchase, but I was thinking of having the Talent be a pre-requisite to taking a Perk. I don't often do pre-requisite abilities as a requirement for certain Perks, but this seems to make sense. Dealing with gender and reproduction also becomes a possible plotline to explore. Imagine if most women are fertile, but very few men are. That makes fertile men a rare and valuable commodity. Would they be kept safe in harems of some kind but be slaves, or would they be honored as pinnacles of manhood, expected to take their pick of any woman they want? Think about the reverse, with men being fertile, but very few women. A different dynamic opens up. I could see conquest being a more common thing than it would be if women were the more fertile gender.
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