Sean Waters

I do not disagree.
 
But That hasnt stopped them from trying a couple of thousand pages of rules in the ongoing attempt.   
 
 

EGO / 5 Adding to ego damage would be game changer.  I like it, put it in the game.  Maybe Dex can add to OCV, no wait, have I heard that before?
 
  

If you get drained of PD and some of that PD comes from DI it doesn't also drain your strength. Sure, if your DI is drained then everything you get from it is reduced, but that's probably not a common drain. 
 
If you unify your perma density powers then a PD drain would also drain your Strength.
 
Conversely if you have 'perma density' using the Hero template it might look like a DI drain would work against you but it wouldn't. Sure the GM could fudge it but:
 
1. That's not fair, and
2. This is a problem entirely created by having unnecessary alternative ways of doing the same thing.
 
 
 
The problem, as I understand it, and if I do then I agree, is inconsistency of approach. Either all movement should be affected by increased mass or none of it should.

If you get drained of PD and some of that PD comes from DI it doesn't also drain your strength. Sure, if your DI is drained then everything you get from it is reduced, but that's probably not a common drain. 
 
If you unify your perma density powers then a PD drain would also drain your Strength.
 
Conversely if you have 'perma density' using the Hero template it might look like a DI drain would work against you but it wouldn't. Sure the GM could fudge it but:
 
1. That's not fair, and
2. This is a problem entirely created by having unnecessary alternative ways of doing the same thing.
 
 
 
The problem, as I understand it, and if I do then I agree, is inconsistency of approach. Either all movement should be affected by increased mass or none of it should.

Well as I said: T-port, Leaping, Tunnelling, and even the original Desolid all had allowances for interaction with certain masses.  Flight never did.   It just bugged me.  It has always bugged me.  I know that runming doesn't, either, but at that is the "gimme" that all humans have (to a point), I rolled with it and moved on.
 

While I thoroughly enjoy Sean's tinkering and conversations about said tinkering, this one has taken a turn that has led back to an old disgruntlement of mine about Flight not having Strength / Lift components.
 
Leaping does (did?  I can't remember how it worked in 6e; it might be different): determine your mass, deduct from your STR, use remaining STR to determine leaping distance.
DI sort of does: the "extra" STR doesn't increase leaping, etc-- almost as if it's to offset your additional mass (and there is the damage boost, but....)
Clinging has STR ratings.  Even Teleport has a sort of "strength limit" via mass carried, what you can and can't take, etc, and it is independent of the character's own STR.
 
Not flight.
 
1" of flight can move a one-kilogram character no further, faster, or more easily than it can move a 10,000 kilogram character.
 
 
Yeah; I get that it's "a power of flight tailored for that character."  Which is probably why that poor pixie is paying the same END for his flight as is Goliath, the gigantic aeronaut.  
No; I have never found a solution that satisfies me.  It still feels hinky, though.

They are good company and often make excellent points that get me thinking

But he's allowed to move away from the initial point in a power with No Range.  Why NOT have the converse, when you're paying big points to make it mobile?  The mobility isn't free.  And, sure, if you wanna make it complicated, you put it on the mobility angle only, but that to me is just too much of a PITA. 
 
What it comes down to, is whether you treat the effect on the whole power synergistically, or you're trying to  split the hairs on the rules.  I'd rather go heuristic and synergistic, and IMO the overall power becomes GREATLY limited if the initial point of origin is adjacent to you.

It's not No Range, it's No Initial Range. He can move his perception point after he starts it.

There are limits to where you can take the concept but yeah, you can already make an entangle against EGO so why not DEX or CON?

@Sean Watersdis you happen to see an article several years back where Entangle could be used for other Characteristics and resolved as if the characteristic was STR? So Slick could have his Entangles work against DEX instead of Strength. I could see the merits of this BTW.

If "count the BODY" became a core mechanic, I think it might drop Hero below a reasonable amount of variability in the dice.  For example, some folks already struggle with the fact that, in practical terms, you're likely to see fewer results with a 3d6 roll (most results will be between 6 and 15) than with, say, a d20 (where all results from 1-20 are equally likely).  Obviously, this is a bit of apples and oranges because one is a curve and the other is flat, but still... About 85% of the time, a 3d6 roll is only going to give you one of 10 results (with the middle of even that range coming up much more than the ends).
 
With "count the BODY," we'd see even fewer distinct results. Instead of only 6 possible outcomes on each d6 (all equally likely), we'd have only 3 possible outcomes, and 2 of them would only come up 1 time in 6.
 
Part of what I like about Hero is that characters seem pretty competent, and that I as the player can gauge my chances of success pretty well (i.e., it's fairly predictable).  But I wonder if this approach would make characters seem too competent, and make results too predictable...

It seems like a better build might be Clairsentience with Extra Time.  That would also allow each range increase to have steadily increasing Extra Time increments.  The extra time simply reflects how long it takes the perception point to get where it's going.  The pricing seems like it would be much more in line with the value of the ability.

Side point first...adders do not increase base cost for the purpose of determining range.  6E1, page 129.  There are some ambiguities here;  there are things where the intent is not clear.  For example, on clairsentience, does adding another sense count as increasing the base cost, and thereby the range?  I asked, and Derek said yes.  There's some other cases.
 
On the flip side, tho, a mobile perception point is explicitly an adder, so it does not, by the rules.  Neither does the extra range.  The additional senses do, so your range is 30 * 10 *32, or 9.6 km.
 
Yes, it bites.  It's extremely hard to build any clairvoyant...probably because they're such potential game-wreckers.  I've done it by dropping as much as I could OUT of the clairsentience, and into the sense(s).  That lets me slap MegaScale onto it, but it's still expensive as heck.  But it's intended as a very high-powered character;  his major powers are the clairsentience, and teleport using gates.  (Yes, the clairsentience is targeting.)  
 
I'm going to disagree with the other two.  Back to page 129:
 

So by analogy, the perception point appears at the current location.  The power user can then, by this, move away from that point...the target location doesn't move.  So the perception point, on this argument, does NOT always remain adjacent.  If we accept things so far, then there's no sound reason to assert that the perception point can't get moved.
 
And note that it's still a severe limit.  Perception point mobility is expensive, and it's bloody SLOW.  (Or you're spending a fair bit on that mobility.)  LOS has to be maintained, which is a significant reduction in applicability...it can't pass through a wall, for example, or turn a corner.  He's bought 96 meters of movement, so it'll take 100 phases to get this to max range.  100 phases of very high END costs, too.
 
So I think this is legal, and generally should be balanced.
 
Side point 2:  base Clairsentience covers a sense group.  Might as well make it the sight or hearing groups;  as written, it looks like you made it smell.  Sure, fine, but it's so hard to build this power in the first place, I don't want to gimp it unnecessarily.
 

It is remarkably inexpensive to buy affects desolid on STR, but its really not too expensive to buy Affects Physical World on heroic-level STR as well.

If Spirit is a ubiquitous thing in your game and all of characters and most NPCs have a spirit score, it would be worth just duplicating the physical stats with new names and treating that as the 'Spirit' of the character.
 
For example Body would become Spirit, Constitution could be used as is or could become Resilience, Defence (PD/ED) could be Spiritual Defence, Stun could be used as is or could become Energy.
 
Basically you just have a new set of stats in addition to the existing ones and use those for Spiritual attacks and such.  The cost would be the same as the equivalent physical stats and you can buy powers to affect Spirit in the usual way and at the usual cost.
 
Effectively it would be a sort of new character that is 'linked' to the physical one.  You might want to have a separate pool of character creation points for Spirit.
 
If it is a thing that only a few characters in the game have then it would be best to use existing mechanics as suggested above.
 
 
 

<NITPICK>
An 8- roll is about 25% success, and an 11- roll is over 60% success...
</NITPICK>
 
I agree that it's a sizable swing, though.

You should hire a dog walker.... 
 
These sorts od things seem,to occurr to you regularly when the dog is leading you about the neighborhood.
 

Remember: dog walkers make the best pets 😛🤪

Psych Lim: struggles to get out of bed in the morning or complete tasks
 
No.  Hang on.

MD does not provide defence unless you buy it with an advantage.  That is a silly way to defend against this though: EGO (only to break out of Mental Paralysis) is cheaper, unless MD is of broad utility in your game.
 
Mind you, 22.5 points per 1d6.  What is the GM going to allow?  2 dive is 45 points, 3 is 67.  You aren't allowing more than that, surely?
 
EGO can be used for a breakout and can be pushed.  
 
15 EGO gets you 3d6 and, if I were you, I'd push it, so 5d6: 2 rolls to get out.  Then I'd spend a few points on making sure that didn't happen again.

Hello chaps,
 
I was walking the dogs the other day and I had this idea.  That happens a lot.  Here it is.  Too long, probably, but this is more about getting it off my chest than anything else 😊
I’ve never been entirely satisfied with the skill system in Hero.  Story of my life.
 
The basic idea: So one of the real stand out mechanics of Hero is the damage roll, specifically how a single roll yields a Stun and a Body total.  We can use that as an alternative skill resolution method.
When you buy a skill you get CHAR/5 d6 in that skill.  Skill levels add 1d6 per skill level.
Roll the total as if you are rolling damage and compare to a Difficulty.
A standard difficulty take would be Difficulty 10.  3d6 will get you to 10 or more 62.5% of the time, same as 11- on 3d6.
More difficult tasks have a higher difficulty.  They should probably go up in increments of 3 or 4, but any number can be used.
Bonuses are added to your dice pool.  Penalties form their own dice pool and are rolled separately then subtracted.
 
Complications: So the ‘damage’ roll also yields a Body result.  This can be used in two ways.  First the task may require a Body total as well as a Stun total.  I would suggest that everyman skills are ‘Stun only’, meaning there are some things you can not do with knowledge that you have not paid points for.
Second, Body points can be used to give you bonuses.  For example, if the task you are trying to accomplish normally takes a minute and is Difficulty 15/1 (meaning more difficult than usual and can only be accomplished with trained skills) and you have 5d6 to roll, and get (say) 17/5, you accomplish the task (exceed the difficulty of both the ‘Stun’ and ‘Body’) – the excess Stun is wasted, but the excess Body (5-1=4) can be used as a bonus.  The typical bonus would be reduced time.  Each point reduces the time taken by 1 unit of the next point in the time chart.  So, if the task normally took a minute, the next time point is a turn.  You have 4 Body excess so can reduce the time the task takes by 4 turns, or 48 seconds, meaning it only takes you 1 turn.
If you had managed to roll 7 Body (6 excess), 4 Body reduce total time to 1 Turn then the extra 2 reduce the time taken by 1 segment each, so instead of a minute, it takes you 10 seconds.
You can use the excess Body for other bonuses too.  Off the top of my head, if you are rolling Persuasion and get extra Body, you get the target as a single use favour or contact, each excess point translating to 1d6 of effect to see how affected they are.
You can also use Body for penalties.
Tasks are either Repeatable or All Or Nothing, either Cumulatively or not and may attract Penalties.
 
So, a Repeatable task example might be Research: you have to comb through a lot of material to find out what you want to.  This is not an enormously difficult task and you will find what you need eventually but there is a lot of stuff to go through.
The task difficulty might be 40/3 (1 hour).  Basically you can keep rolling and adding Stun until you get to 50: the number of times x the time the task takes for one iteration tells you how long it takes.  Body is NOT cumulative.
Say you have a Research skill of 4d6 (or just Research/4).  You roll 14/4 and you have 14 points to your total and it took 55 minutes (as you had one extra Body).
Next you roll 19/5, your total is now 31 and that took an additional 50 minutes.
Next you do badly and roll 10/2.  The Stun should take you to 41, so you should complete the task, but because you did not roll 3 Body, that hour is wasted and the Stun does not add.  Finally, you roll 12/3 and get to 43 points.  That took another hour, but now you have your answer.
That took 3 hours 45 minutes in total.
 
A repeatable task that is not cumulative might be lockpicking.  That might have a difficulty of 12/3.  You can keep going until you succeed in rolling at least 12/3 in a single go.
 
An example of a repeatable roll with a penalty might be Persuasion.  That might have a difficulty of 16/5.  You have Persuasion/6 so you are confident. If you roll 16/5 or more, you succeed but if you fail then you can have another go, but with a penalty.  The penalty is whatever you failed the Body roll by, so if you rolled (1, 5, 2, 3, 1, 5) 17/4, for example, then you do not succeed and any subsequent attempts are made at a penalty of (5-4)=1.
Penalties are rolled separately and subtracted from your total.  Next time you roll (4,3,5,2,5,3).  That is a total of 22/6, which is great and would easily pass, but you have a penalty of 1d6.  If it comes up 6 you fail as your total is now (22-6)=16/(6-2)=4.  Next time you have 2 penalty dice if you try again.
 
Penalties also apply to others trying the same thing on the same target, usually, and they usually reset after a time, in the discretion of the GM.  Someone you have failed to persuade might always see you as a pest, however.
Some tasks might START with a penalty, if they are particularly tricky.
Some tasks, for example bomb disposal, might not be repeatable: they are all or nothing.  Fail and BOOM!
Skill vs skill just compares totals.  The ‘attacker’ has to equal or beat the ‘Stun’ and ‘Body’ of the ‘defender’s total.  If the attacker fails at both they fail.  If they fail at one the GM might declare a draw and allow another attempt.
Alternatively, Characteristics can be used as difficulties.  If you are trying to use Stealth to get past a character with 14 INT, the difficulty is 14/3 (to get the Body total, divide by 5 and round).
 
Finally, you could rule that if you roll all '1's (or if you have a zero or less Body total after penalties) that is a fumble and something horrible happens.  It is less likely as you become more skilled, unless you are doing something really tricky, which seems realistic.  If you roll all '6's then you get lots of Body which will give you some sort of bonus anyway, so a 'critical' rule is not needed.
 
Thoughts?

If we are talking realistic weapons then we are probably looking at a Heroic game and there are rules that allow for quite realistic damage, such as hit locations, disabling and bleeding rules.  Quite often gunshot or stab woulds are not instantly fatal but do kill because of bloodloss.  A bullet to the head is worth two to the chest (or something like that).
 
Massey points out that realism is a movable feast (I paraphrase), but most people would agree that a normal being shot or stabbed should have serious consequences, barring body armour.  On the flip-side, as Ninja-Bear points out, you don't want to have to rest up for a week every time there's a gunfight (I paraphrase).
 
The trick is to make the players feel their characters are genuinely threatened without requiring new character sheets every combat.  Unless, you know, they like that sort of thing.

A huge killing attack.

There have been many attempts at producing a decent but manageable killing attack, right?  Maybe we have been going about it all wrong…
 
So, thinking about damage, superheroes seem to be largely immune to Body damage from Normal attacks, right?
 
How about this:
 
1.       Normal Defences only count half against Body damage.
2.       Killing attacks are a +1/4 advantage and mean that Normal Defences only count a quarter against Body damage.
 
So:
 
50 points: 10d6 attack against 20 (normal) pd:
 
Average Roll: 35/10 = 15 Stun through Defences and no Body and no real chance of Body using existing system (10 average against 20 defence) BUT an above average Body roll WILL cause some Body damage: not likely to be much and the result is not highly volatile, but some.
 
Same 50 points, gets you an 8d6 attack with (+1/4) killing.
 
So, Average Roll for 8d6: 28/8 gets 8 Points of Stun and 3 Points of Body through Defences.   Again, not highly volatile, but a worry.
 
I think this would make healers more valuable , and regeneration.  I think this could be really interesting.  Thanks to ScottishFox for basically handing me the idea.
 
So.  Whaddya think?