casualplayer

Re: Alternate System: Killing Attacks/Resistant Defenses I like Schir1964's suggestion, and most of the detractors have taken the logic to illogical extremes. Every system breaks down if you run it past its tolerances, and I have to wonder who the heck would ever let someone put more than +2 Advantages on a power anyway (aside from goofy kludges like turning Entangle into Mental Entangle.) That's not a stopsign power, that's a Do Not Enter.

Re: The Defilers No wonder Tetsuronin is such a beast if he has to tussle with these guys! I have to say that anyone who buys Desolidification in an Asian campaign is just squandering points, because 90% of your adversaries will still be able to touch you. I have to wonder why you don't seek to publish, Oddhat. Your stuff is worth money. Why haven't Steve and Darren signed you to a contract yet?

Re: Anyone know what happened to JLU? They are going to be doing direct-to-video movies for JLU and TT. I think The Avengers d-t-v movie made a ton of loot and DC is following.

Re: What pre-5th Edition Hero books do you still use?

Re: Class of the Titans You think so? I think this looks great, much better than Toon Titans. And I knew I smelled Nelvana's hand in this. They make good toonage.

Re: What pre-5th Edition Hero books do you still use? Wow, almost the same list for me except I was never a big fan of Dark Champions. I also still use Champions of the North and Kingdom of Champions.

Re: Undetectable Firearms Good thinking! Always has a gun, even when he shouldn't, couldn't and wouldn't means focus rules do not apply.

Re: Talking about doubling equipment If I buy all my powers and characteristics as foci, can I have 1 level of Duplication for 5 points? To me, having a spare set of Iron Man armor around for 5 points makes about as much sense as having a spare Vision around for 5 points. If we have to have the rule at all it should be an Advantage (+1/4 for each x2) so that expensive powers and builds cost more to double and cheap stuff is cheap.

Re: Undetectable Firearms I would probably just make it an Inobvious Focus. IPE makes it sound like you could use it with making noise, as if it were silencer equipped, or without drawing the attention that firing a gun would normally draw.

Re: Your scenario style I was going to say "Yes." Ideally I try to match the structure to the genre. 4 color Heroes should have a 23 page comic feel, which I used to emulate by self-enforcing a time limit on the game session. 2 hours and end with a cliffhanger or denoument. Occasionally a giant-sized issue or annual that would run for 3+ hours. I would even run 4 issue mini-series, 4 sessions and that's it! The current comic tendency to have 6 issue story arcs doesn't jibe with me because I really don't need the constraints of being collected in a trade paperback. My fantasy games tend to emulate the "small beginnings-grand endings" style of Lord of the Rings, Dragonlance, etc. They tend to start in a hamlet and end in havok. One shots are, IMHO, the only way to go with beer-and-pretzels RPGs like Paranoia or high mortality games like Call of Cthulhu. I used to run an annual CoC game every Halloween that was a lot of fun. The Vietnam Tunnel Rat one was kinda cool.

Re: Practical Costuming (not quite a WWYCD) Since a scary amount of my characters are Spirit homages, most wear a suit cut loose, trenchcoat, gloves, hat and a domino mask. Otherwise I'm fond of motorcycle racing gear for costuming. The leather straps, dominatrix stuff does it for some but I usually don't play that type of character. My NPCs on the other hand....

Re: Wwyd ???? This is like the premise to the comic Strikeforce Morituri, where you got powers but would only live up to a year after gaining them. They were making super-soldiers to repel an alien invasion. One poor girl got her powers and died almost immediately because of them. Even though I wouldn't get to see my youngest turn 6 years old, I would still take the djinni's offer. I would want Reed Richards-level intelligence and engineering skills, and then I would start creating solutions to hunger and want. I would just throw the plans up on the web because money would shortly go by the wayside so why bother trying to make a fortune selling the devices. If I felt like trying to cheat I may whip up a djinni blaster or clone myself, but I doubt if it would be that easy. I would be ok with leaving a legacy of every person on the planet going to bed well fed.

Re: Lego Guy - ideas and power questions A Susceptability to couches, as he loses mass between the cushions never to be seen again. Only American Maid can save him now!

Re: Lego Guy - ideas and power questions Sounds like you want to make Plastic Man, but when people look close up you look a little blocky. Would you have Growth, and then the blocks get huge like Duplo? Would you have a nemesis, Mega-Blok? Would your innards look like this insanely complex Technics clockwork?

Re: WWYD if you could recieve ONE super power

Re: throw and attack airborne target Yeah, exactly! Oh wait, you were being facetious. Like there's not nearly enough facetiousness in HERO as it is now.

Re: Countering the Speed Zone The Speed Zone seems to be HERO's "Close-but-not-Infringing" version of DC's Speed Force which, point of order, was so imbalancing that they just recently jettisoned it. Now along with most of the Flash Family taking Psych Lims boiling down to "Must Ignore Science Training When Using Powers" (Very Common, Strong) all the characters seemed to have some sort of Fair Play disad also. Witness Professor Zoom, a Speed Force (Zone) character without restraint. Imagine him running amok in your campaign. As a player. Now if you take a look at the Flash Family Rogue's Gallery, it's almost a non-stop parade of Focus Freaks. Jay Garrick/Silver Age Flash used to spend all his time fighting the Fiddler and the Shade. Barry spent all his time dodging boomerangs and fighting the Pied Piper. Wally inherited Barry's foes. It's a stretch to see how any of these people would be more than a moment's trouble for any Flash but they all seemed to have some sort of Flash Defense , usually part of their VPPs being set as Triggered damage or Damage Shield. Often the pipes, skates, violin, philosophers stone, weather wand, etc was also Flash-trapped if touched. Sometimes these folks would stray into Gotham and Batman would take away their toys and beat them unmercifully, so specific anti-Speed Zone powers are in genre if not very fun in the game setting. One of the speedster's cool bits is to strip guns away in a blink. That's great if it's VIPER grunts, not so great if it's Mechassassin. Maybe it's time to start buying sidearms as OIF even if they aren't cybernetically attached to simulate that they can't just be nabbed with a grab. Another way to rein the Speed Zone in is to populate the dimension. Here There Be Dragons. Maybe the residents don't like meatpeople trespassing. You could make Speed Zone characters take Hunteds to reflect the angry natives. It's a whole lot cheaper to Suppress characters ability to reach and perceive out of the Speed Zone than it is to stop them from entering. I'm sure more stuff will occur to me when I actually get the book.

Re: -31 Stun Generally, if it hinged on a Skill Roll, I applied an additional -1 to Paramedic/Medicine roll for every 10 points further in the hole the patient's STUN was. You can beat someone to the point where the best doctor in the best equipped hospital can't rouse that patient and the patient's only getting recoveries once/month.

Re: throw and attack airborne target What a fine example to show how weak the throwing rules are. Throwing should involve calculating force applied, convert to acceleration, object goes til it slows, stops or smacks into something. A 40 STR brick should be able to throw a baseball across town, but it should take about a minute to get there and have to travel in an arc.

Re: WWYD if you could recieve ONE super power Does wanting to be a DC Comics Martian count as one power? Probably not or everyone would want to be Kryptonian. Having Telepathy would be amazing but it would also be like knowing where everyone keeps their diary and where the key is. It would take a better man than I to not peek at random, but you could help so many people with that. 40 pts of PRE later and soon I'm living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Apparently I wouldn't even have to buy Oratory, as it's clear that Presidents don't need it anymore. The game I played in where the players were themselves and we got to make this choice I chose to be a Tough Brick. Caught a 30-30 round in the teeth and got back up spitting mad. I could military press a military vehicle. I was the only one able to lift Mjolnir (turned out I was an avatar of Thorr.) Good times.

Re: Thoughts on the Speed Zone

Re: Thoughts on the Speed Zone This sounds as cheesy and boring as Desolid/STR Affects Real World or armchair psychics who fight crime in their pajamas. I'll have to look at this firsthand, but it smells like HERO just shot themselves in the foot. Game systems never get this kind of munchkin genie back in the bottle. Is this something that can be incorporated into some new version of the Rule of X, or are GMs going to get real tired of seeing this power build on a character sheet and vetoing it? Wait til there's an open game at a convention and everyone shows up with a Speed Zone character!

Re: Character: The Accelerated Man

Re: Need help with a Group name. I don't know. Exercise gives you more STR and CON, but assaults help you build the PD. Seems like the students would be justified in buying more EGO, but not MD. You know, when the inspiration and precedent for the team name and concept is the New Mutants (because they were, like, mutants and new) I don't think you can fail to do better. Something a kid might think up and find cool actually might work best. Varsity Flight? The Truants?

Re: Need help with a Group name. For the Administrator I would go with Headmaster, or Headmistress if you want to be gender specific. For the team I keep thinking Proteges, but I don't think that is what you want. Hall Monitors? Glee Club? The Clique? Afterschool Specials?