The Mind Master

Ah...triggers one of your psyche lims eh? I know the feeling...

Like many others, I suspect, I always thought that "anime" referred to the particular artistic style of the "big eyes, small mouth". Even if the literal meaning is simply "animation", it surely has taken on a more specific meaning in usage in the USA. When I say that "anime" has never been of interest to me, I'm talking about that particular artistic style and the few cartoons I've seen that utilize it. I have a player who is playing a character inspired by some anime feature, but it's played under regular Champions rules, and there are no problems or special considerations. I would have a problem with any kind of special convention (such as "no attacks while powering up") based on anime features and not on the rules of the campaign.

I have had some players who brought in characters inspired or ripped-off from Anime, but so far none who somehow thought this would allow them to do things outside the rules or change the tone of the campaign. I have to admit, I'm not very familiar with it, never caught my interest.

Re: Thanks I'm not normally a game mechanic, and I think you pegged the players correctly as over-the-top, but I do have a minor caveat about the damage from the 70 STR attack. I don't know exactly how you calculated the added damage, but it seems a bit excessive to me that it doubled the average BODY that would normally be rolled on 14d6. The only reason I bring this up is because I had a very high STR brick player in one of my games who found it very frustrating trying to figure out exactly how much STR to use against opponents. He wasn't a "killer" PC, but he wanted to be able to take out weak agent-types quickly with a single punch. It was a high-level campaign, and that was certainly in the genre. In the end, we figured out some rule mechanism (I don't recall exactly what, now) so that he could be confident of taking out a low-BODY character without having to be afraid of badly injuring him. This wasn't your situation, but I usually draw a pretty big distinction between normal attacks and killing attacks...even if the normal attacks are high-level.

Interrogating thugs in this campaign was not only a useless waste of time, it also engendered more "bad stuff" for the PC's, for in spite of our best efforts to be private some bystander would inevitably happen by and take the thug's side. Usually it would be a reporter who would write up a scathing story about the PC's brutality. This campaign had its very good points, but interaction with NPC's wasn't on the list.

These also helpful and cool...

I despise NPC's who are always, continually uncooperative in spite of PRE, Persuasion, Seduction and even appropriate situation. In one campaign I was in, you automatically knew that NPC cops would be hostile to the heroes, that NPC bartenders would be close-mouthed and suspicious, and that NPC bystanders would be afraid and mistrustful. No matter your reputation, your great deeds of valor, or your characteristics, this was just the tenor of the campain world. And don't even mention NPC reporters...

Heh. He may, but that's not one of them. The name is just a goof I pulled out of the air.

Hmmm...sounds interesting. Hope you find a way to make this work.

Heh...then the GM might wind up meeting the evil twins of the players themselves. I've played all kinds of versions of this...direct clones; counterparts with the same powers but different names; counterparts with exactly opposite powers or powers designed to take advantage of your weakness; magical evil doppelgangers who even took over the lives of the PC's including their relationships and secret identities (which was actually one of the best versions and made for some interesting roleplay); and evil versions of other super-hero groups. Don't think we ever did one with evil robot versions of the PC's...but I think I'll give that one a pass...

Got a good laugh on this one. I've seen this happen so many times. For some reason a player gets it into his head that a character should be a pushover, and cannot understand how this character winds up beating him...even feels demeaned and humiliated. I know a player who likes to play bricks. For some reason this player assumes that any opponent who uses martial arts should be a weakling. "Hey! He actually HURT me with that strike? But he's just a puny martial artist! How can a wimpy martial artist hurt Bulging Brick man? "

Thaks for the reply, Steve. I understand this isn't an enemy book and has a different purpose. But for long-time players like me the value of the book increases with a few of those kinds of additions. Stuff that's not just conceptual, but actually provides some nuts-and-bolts stuff to work with. That would help it appeal to those of us who've been around awhile (like ages!) and have already played through several different variants of these basic plots. Obviously, the focus of the book is on scenario-seeds, but I'd buy it anyway if it had a few specific GM helps along this line I could use.

Not to belabor the point, but I still don't understand how 70 STR did so much body in one hit. Even if he threw the car across the mall and it smashed into the wall, it would still be 14d6 normal attack. Falling damage could be applied afterwards, I suppose, if they fell a few hexes when the car was destroyed, but that shouldn't do much BODY to the occupants of the car. Just curious.

Let me second this!!! As a hero player of many years, I've been through almost the plots listed and variations on them. (PLEASE, no more evil versions of the heroes! That's usually the second or third adventure of nearly every campaign I've been in. If you must list it, fine, but it doesn't need anything in depth.) But if the book has some other useful aspects, like new characters, I would buy it anyway. Or if the adventures are given extra detail like maps, villain tactics, stuff that makes a GM's job easier and not just the seed ideas, I'd find it useful. What would not be helpful would be simply a book with only outlines of plot types we've all read in the comics ourselves.

This, in my experience is not uncommon. I keep extra character sheets on hand because some players inevitably come without their sheet. Doesn't really bother me any more, because I've learned to prepare for it.

I thought he just picked up the car and smashed it down. But whatever, 70 STR is 14d6. Assume a BODY count of 14 and a DEF for the car of 3, that gives you the -11 BODY for the car. So 11 BODY gets through, and any occupant in the car who has at least 11 PD (which I think Foxbat has) takes no body. Or am I missing something?

I had the same thought, wondering how so much body could have gotten through to injure Foxbat so badly if it wasn't a killing attack. I didn't think the action was excessive in the genre. Sounds like you've already talked to the players and they don't understand, which is unfortunate. Punishing them in-game is not a good option, IMO, as I've rarely seen it work to change behavior if talking has already failed. Plus it diverts the whole campaign into something that often neither the GM nor the players enjoy. I think the only real options are to strike some kind of compromise with them so they can hack at times if that's what they want (of course I'd armor up my villains, then) ...or else find some players who want to play the same genre that you do.

Regardless that such a thing might well happen in real life, it is by no means the only thing that could happen in real life. In other words, the player didn't have to take this route to remain "in character". Anyway, it seems to me that the discussion IS really about the genre of a game, and whether this was fair to the GM, and not about whether there might be some crazies out there who might actually do this.

Man, I definitely know where you're coming from. I think laying out guidelines for a specific type of campaign is important, and I have tried to do that as well in my games. However, I have learned the hard way that if a player isn't interested in his character, then it's going to drag the campaign down. Players may be willing to go along with the guidelines, but find themselves in the middle of the adventure not enjoying themselves. It's no good trying to run certain types of campaigns if the players ultimately aren't interested. And then the campaign just kind of dies a slow death. I guess the key is to find those players who are interested in running the same kind of campaign you want to run...not always easy.

I kind of hesitate to jump in here, since I've never played a Cyberpunk campaign...and I don't know if perhaps the original character had some kind of psyche lim like "casual killer", or "loves to murder" or that sort of thing. But when I read the original post, my initial reaction was that a PC who did this would not be swiftly invited back to my gaming table. Aside from the genre, there are certain conventions of courtesy, it seem to me, that when a GM is trying to bring the PC's into a scenario, you go along with his setup even if there may be some flaws. GM's can't anticipate everything, and in the opening things sometimes get glossed over. The action of killing the guy who hired you may have been in character if he was a murderous backstabber, but it certainly doesn't strike me as logical, given the possible consequences of such an act. And on a purely gaming level, it does seem as if it were a deliberate attempt to screw the GM. But, I admit, I don't know much about the Cyberpunk genre. If this is part of it, I'm just as glad I don't.

WH-A-A-AT!??? Of course we do! Most of the players in my groups over the years have been interested in trying different roles. But one player, no matter what his character type or powers, always had to be a source of contention among the other players. That was his playing style, who knows why. He generally tended to put a lot of points into defenses, but the characters were a wide variety without a lot in common. Until I got used to it, his style of play drove me nuts as a GM. As an example, the group would all bring in new characters for a gaming session. I'd throw together some little scenario to get the heroes together before the main adventure started...some quick little combat, to let the players test out their powers and meet each other. Well, with this guy's character initially refused to believe that the other PC's were really heroes, and began attacking them as villains. Okay, I thought, so this is a Marvel Comics approach to heroes meeting, that's cool. But it went on and on and on...nothing the other heroes could do would make his character believe they were on the same side. No display of good will was good enough, no persuasion or logic prevailed. We spent a good half of our gaming time on this little "throwaway" episode, and in the end he still wouldn't join the other heroes. Finally they had him grabbed and restrained, helpless. They could have killed him if they had wished. But to prove they were good guys, they let him go, hoping that this would at last convince him they weren't his enemies. Of course it didn't work. Finally they just knocked him out and left him, so he couldn't continue attacking them. Hmm...this post may not seem exactly on topic, but that was the "common" element in his playing.

Enjoying the other thread about the most annoying player habits, and decided that turnabout is fair play. What's the most annoying thing a GM has done to you? Here's one...had a GM send along his own characters with us on a mission. Our characters basically failed at everything, were overpowered and trounced by the badguys. Every plan we came up with met with random and unforseen complications that caused it to backfire. The GM's characters solved all the puzzles, found the badguys weaknesses and defeated them. I never played with that GM again.

Oh man, thanks for sharing these...!

I like the simplicity of the Transform myself. I may just go with that and make it easy on myself.

Hoooo boy, did I laugh at your post BlackSword. It just rang so true. (Wipes tears of laughter from his eyes.)