Sean Waters

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?

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?

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?

Oh this is such another thread
 
However, we've started, so - HERO uses Thresholds i.e. we have subtractors from damage in the form of Defences.  If you have 12 PD you are completely immune to a 2d6 Normal attack, not not from a 3d6 Normal attack (although you are on average).
 
Adding a couple of dice of damage to an attack that would already penetrate defences means that ALL of the damage gets through, whereas if you were not scoring any (average) damage on a target, a couple of extra dice means that most of the extra effort gets through.  Usually.
 
A better example is a 21pd superhero taking a 10d6 punch.  10d6 is almost certain to get stun through defences so any extra damage also gets through defences.  Same Hero facing a 5d6 attack: on average NO damage gets through and, indeed, you'd need a decent roll to get any damage through, but add 2 dice and you are causing damage on average rolls.
 
Here's a thought: Normal Defences do not affect Stun and Body damage equally.  Normal Defences subtract from Stun damage on a 1 to 1 basis, but subtract Body damage on a 2 to 1 basis.  So a 10d6 punch against 20 pd is (on average) 15 Stun and no Body through defences but even a slightly decent roll might cause Body.  Damn, that is another thread right there!
 
Right.  Done that.
 
 

I'm a fan of granularity.  And, you know, doing things in a cock-eyed manner.
 
Maybe we could consider, instead of extra CON you buy extra PD, something like:
 
I'm still standing: +5 PD (Only to avoid being stunned)
 
Now obviously this only applies to normal physical damage (although you could buy resistant defence or defence against other damage types).  It would not reduce the STUN damage you take and it would only really matter if you took damage over CON but less than CON+5, so the limitation depends on how often that would happen.  I'm thinking at least -1, and I might give you -2.  Judgement call and makes no actual difference on 5 points to final cost.  It means you can take a punch but you can still be taken down by taser.
 
Compared to the calculation that GB(i) did as the first response (i.e. -3/4), that sounds about right and is probably a more socially acceptable way of doing it.  I think we can probably all agree that CON is overpriced.
 
 

Yes, true, but I would argue that if PRE is anything is is psychological.  I'm happy with a lucky 'overly impressive' roll.  Sometimes you panic.   You would not normally, you do not know why this time is different, but something is.
 
I find myself arguing against me. Ha. 
 
OK, here is my problem with PRE attacks: generally I do not like the idea.
 
We were playing DnD once, Slave Pits Of The Undercity, IIRC, S1? and the party had a run of great luck. Three or four criticals in a row and even the non-criticals caused serious damage.
 
The DM decided that the defending orcs became terrified and fled, abandoning their posts and making the first bit easy.
 
THAT seemed like a decent use presence: sometimes it all just works out and you ride the wave.  Being able to decide when the waves arrive just seems wrong.  Hmm.  Not even that: you do a good enough  job of set-up, fine, if the plan works it is all far easier than it would have been.  However, the idea that a character, even a superheroic character, can just turn up an demand surrender - and get it - seems distressing and wrong.

But does it work in reverse?  Bonus points if you can guess the recipe!
1 brick, softened 1 martial artist 1 speedster 2 Supervillains 2 teams villain's agents 1 false game goal 2 battle scenes 1 DNPC 3 all-purpose police officers 2 semisweet reporters 1 FBI agents  
Preheat gaming table by 350 XP D&D (1 XP Hero System). Team together the brick, martial artist, and speedster until smooth. Beat in the supervillains one at a time, then stir in the villain's agents. Dissolve false game goal with battle scenes. Add to battle along with DNPC. Stir in police officers, reporters, and FBI agents. Drop by large spoonfuls onto your campaign. Run for about 10 sessions in the preheated gaming table, or until PCs are nicely crowned.

I don't like the PRE attack mechanic: it is like an AOE Instant specific command Mind Control that costs no END.  I genuinely feel that it is more of a GM call than an important mechanic.
 
It should either be scrapped or SERIOUSLY developed.

Hmm.  Always wondered about the 'violent' action bonus: a minion might think melting a bus with an energy blast is terrifying, a super villain might just think it is a challenge.
 
How about this:
 
Make an attack but do not actually apply damage.  No need to roll to hit.  For every 10 points of stun (or part thereof) and 1 point of Body that WOULD have got through defences, you get +1d6 on your PRE attack.  If NO damage would have got through defences, the target is unimpressed and you take a -2d6 penalty on the PRE attack.
 
That sort of addresses another issue I have with PRE attacks: there take no time and there really is no downside to using them.  This way you have to waste an attack, in effect.  Well, not waste exactly, but certainly forfeit causing actual damage.
 
It also allows you to apply different bonuses to different opponents with the same action. 
 
 

Sad = True
AND
Funny = True
SO
 
It's funny because it is sad.
It's sad because it is funny.
 
Also I have a real munchkin build for macaroni cheese....

I'm a fan of granularity.  And, you know, doing things in a cock-eyed manner.
 
Maybe we could consider, instead of extra CON you buy extra PD, something like:
 
I'm still standing: +5 PD (Only to avoid being stunned)
 
Now obviously this only applies to normal physical damage (although you could buy resistant defence or defence against other damage types).  It would not reduce the STUN damage you take and it would only really matter if you took damage over CON but less than CON+5, so the limitation depends on how often that would happen.  I'm thinking at least -1, and I might give you -2.  Judgement call and makes no actual difference on 5 points to final cost.  It means you can take a punch but you can still be taken down by taser.
 
Compared to the calculation that GB(i) did as the first response (i.e. -3/4), that sounds about right and is probably a more socially acceptable way of doing it.  I think we can probably all agree that CON is overpriced.
 
 

If you do a move through and no KB then you take the full damage that the move through would have done, so I figured that was like hitting a planet.  It is all a bit complicated: you can work out the momentum of a falling object easily but the force that is applied in stopping it *almost* instantaneously is harder to guestimate and isn't necessarily that useful as it is hard to compare that to, say the force a super strength punch generates.
 
Agreed - hit locations (and bleeding) make damage far more deadly.  The NND Does Body thing is an attempt to unify the worlds of normals and superheroes: 30d6 (or 27d6) sounds far too high compared to other sources of damage, but it needs to by high (if it is Normal damage) to scare superpowered characters.  It is so high though that even a maxed-out human could never realistically survive (and a few have).
 
In comics, though, some characters can jump off skyscrapers with little ill effect, of fall from orbit without dying.  Others are in genuine fear of dying.  There are very few characters who are not specifically (and expensively) built to withstand falls that could take 30d6 normal and not be unconscious or at least stunned.  Even most Brick characters will take Body from that.
 
Now whilst I agree that Hero is not a physics simulation, it is just lazy to say it is not intended to simulate realism: it clearly is, at least to some extent.  I agree that gameplay has to take precedence over simulation, but there's no reason to avoid simulation where it can be efficiently integrated.  There are huge advantages to simulating realism, not least that it accords with people's intuitions and expectations.  I appreciate that we are often playing superheroes: I get that  but there is no need to make the level of abstraction arbitrary or greater than it need be.
 
So, accepting that Hero is not intended to simulate realism but IS intended, presumably, to simulate the sort of things you see in the comics, why don't the falling rules do that?  Rhetorical
 
This is not meant to be a simulation as such, just getting a bit closer to a shared reality.  I mean, if you had 30 points in Shrinking you should probably never take falling damage, right?  Something that weighs 4 grams could probably survive a terminal velocity fall easily.  I'm not going there.  Not yet
 
 
 
 

Are you asking if I see the Light?!?

Slightly off-topic:
 
I've always felt that there should be an equal bonus for receiving a violent action (assuming you can shrug it off).  If the enemy lobs a grenade at you, and you swallow it and burp, that's imPREssive.  If the enemy mooks unload a hundred rounds of machine gun fire at you, and you're reduced to an unidentifiable bloody mess on the floor, and then the next phase you regenerate, and your parts fuse back together and you stand up and smile - that's imPREssive.  These should also be worth bonuses to a PRE Attack.

As above, for thirty years, I have thought that this was why more powerful characters had higher PRE and builds such as Presence Defense ("+ X Presence, only for defending against Presence Attacks" is just so cumbersome to type and to say, and it turns out that "PreD"  or "FD" fits right into the characteristics block, so....). 
 
 
 
 
You can house rule that they take an attack action.  My first GM did that, until we stopped using them to cow opponents and instead used that attack action to unload laser vision, heat rays, and a few grenades on the opponents instead-- which, by the way, cowed them equally as well, and sometimes for days at a time. 
 
I have a co-GM that also runs his own campaign with another group (that I Wish I had time in which to do more that just put in a periodic "guest appearance"), and he rules that they take a half-phase, but not necessarily an attack action. 
 
More to the point: if you want them to take some bit of the available charted combat time,  you can still use the existing mechanic; just change the "takes no time" bit.  If you want them to go away all together, rule that they use an attack action.  Actually, that _can_ result in crazy-high-value presence attacks as well, for those players wishing to "get their money's worth" out of an attack action but not necessarily open with lethal force. 
 
YMMV
 
 
 
 
 
It really seems to me that it's just the reverse way of doing the same thing: traditional builds where "been there; done that" powerful characters have higher PRE and Presence-defending builds and mere mortals are intimately acquainted with their paper-like durability yields the same effect.  And don't forget that Reputation, on either side, affects the outcome not just because of who one or more of the characters are, but because of who knows what about the character and who or what the character is reputed to be. 
 
And I get the feeling I am the only GM who has allowed one person or a small portion of a group to be targeted by a PRE Attack.  There is nothing in the rules (at least, not in any of the editions I pull from) that mandates everyone within eyeshot is affected.  What happened to the blaise New Yorker?  

Don't know Modiphious, but Chaosium is % chance to hit, IIRC.
 
I think that people understand percentages and if you have a 45% chance they instinctively know that is 1 to 45: above that is bad.  Also Chaosium doesn't (or didn't) have an equivalent of DCV.
 
Psychologically, I think Hero is different.  If you work out in advance what your hit chance is and call for a roll of 13 or less, that is fine, everyone knows where they stand, but the way the system actually applies hit rolls in combat is, frankly, weird.  It is not intuitive to add 11 to your OCV then subtract your 3d6 roll to determine what DCV you can hit.  It is easier and more intuitive to just say "Difference in CVs added to 11 and roll under that", but that tells the player what the target DCV is.  I mean the player might well work that out after a few hits and misses anyway, but the rules as written don't feel intuitively like the right way to do it.  To me.  YMMV.
 
 

Sad = True
AND
Funny = True
SO
 
It's funny because it is sad.
It's sad because it is funny.
 
Also I have a real munchkin build for macaroni cheese....

LOL, we should continue the light argument here but force everyone to use recipe terms.  
 
 

It's sad because it's true.  
 
It's funny because it's true.

....I know it is kind of off-topic for the forum but I thought it was apposite given the nature of a few recent threads...
 
 
 

What?  Derek Bentley?

Honestly, for thirty years now, I have assumed that this was the definition of the "violent action" bonus. 

Hmm.  I always though that Teleportation 2m, no relative velocity (12 points) with trigger (just before taking damage) was pretty cheesey.  Originally I saw it used to just avoid falling and KB damage (and for 15 points that is not too unreasonable), but then it got pointed out that if the trigger automatically reset instantly (another +1/2, for +6 points), it could be used to avoid all attacks, other than (most) AoEs.  That's pretty impressive for 21 points.  The whiff of ancient Camembert became overwhelming.  It was far runnier than I'd have liked, then the cat ate it.

Other than in character creation, it is rare for a character to want to round down.  By 'character' I mean anyone with PC in their description, even if that is preceded by a 'N'.
 
So, if a character with an odd numbered DCV is at half DCV, round up.  If a character with an odd numbered OCV is at half OCV, round up.  Round in favour of the character (PC or NPC) that is applying the modifier.  Attacker or defender, no matter.  PCs do not get a better deal from the rules than NPCs do.
 
That's my take, anyway.

Best not get me started on this one as this is already page 10, but you can't really build normal sight with the Enhanced Senses rules straight out of the box, you need a custom modifier because, apparently, 'discriminatory'.
 
I, well, I'm confused.  Who thought that was a good idea?
 
Interestingly enough there's an argument to be made that the value of blindness should not be the same as the value of sight because you have other senses and you can buy 'targeting' for 10 points for a single sense.  Also even if you don't you can still perceive a great deal with a PER roll using another sense.
 
The Complication should be based (arguably) on how often and how much it is a problem rather than a direct cost comparison.  We do not, for example, cost Vulnerability (2xStun) to Fire by the cost of buying 1/2 Damage Resistance to Fire.