Hawksmoor
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Posts posted by Hawksmoor
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Re: Batman VS Captain America! yeah right...
I think the real point would be to see two agility maestros in the same comic.
One of the small complaints and there are blessedly few of them in JSA is that Mr. Terrific is *not* Siloh Norman AKA Mr. Miracle II with a new bag of tricks. That would have been brilliant!
Hawksmoor
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Re: Character monologues
Wow this is almost like necromancy. Not really far back but deep enough.
As to writing what the PC thinks I do it all the time, so it is a good thing that I'm not in a game with Brandon isn't it?
PBEM is a plumber's dream, all the time to explore the soul of a character. But, the journey loses its richness if no one is along for the ride. I would like to see more 'thought ballons' in games I run and play in. They are important.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
The question here is, do you want to walk away completly unscratched or are you willing to take a recovery in the impact crater before dramatically emerging? Unless you consider skydiving without a parachute fun, how often does this come up? Do you need to be terminal velocity proof all the time, or can you manage pulling it off only occasionaly via power skill rolls, a VPP or a slot in a bricks tricks MP?One Tough Son of a *****: Physical Damage Reduction 75% and +20 PD.
That should let a character with 25 PD walk away from terminal velocity without a scratch and it costs, what, 6 points if he has a 60 point Bricks Trick MP? Now if you always want to be able to do that sort of thing, well, then it probably costs you the full 60 points. But that level of always on toughness should take a decent chunk out of a 350pt PC IMO.
I don't think take a recovery or more to the point take a lot of time waiting to get a recovery (-10 or greater STUN) is acceptable for a character that is supposed to be invulnerable (even on a sliding scale).
HERO lacks utterly the concept of "A Fall From This Height Will Only Hurt The Pavement." This comes from the wargame aspect of HERO's origin. We need to divorce HERO from this set of concepts. Damage Mitigation (or Impervious or Self Only Force Wall or whathaveyou) can do this.
A mechanic that takes the STUN out of an equation the character is likely to face makes the game more genre. Superman doesn't even blink when automatic weapons fire is aimed at him. Those attacks do stun to him most of the time at 3d6 no hit locations (abeit his 50% DamReduct takes care of a lot of it). The idea is Superman *shouldn't* take *any* stun at all.
Damage Mitigation does that!
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
Other than using the Desolid Kludge or the 100% Damage Reduction Kludge yes.
I think that invulnerablilty is a part of a character's ability set. Yet in HERO that simple facet becomes the entire character. see Bulletproof. It is not the body that 'destroys' characters it is the stun. Find a way to remove STUN from the combat equation and invulnerability is accessable.
The original point about walking on the sun is one area, walking away from terminal velocity is another. I am gearing towards the latter, with all the attendant effects, like shrugging off mortar rounds as a nuisance. Which I should be able to do, except that pesky stun drops the character before the point can be made.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
The idea is to make it affordable. Near Invulnerability is a staple of the superheroic genre. It can't be that if the points are set too high, and since 350 is the standard starting point we have to consider the costs as they will impact a 350 pt PC.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Eat slime, Leadball!!
Nope that about covers it.
Running, Armor, and extra STR to really lay the smackdown, or is that Steamroller?
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
For me again it is not about the Body of an attack, although it is important, it is about the STUN. If a character is "immune" or nearly indestructable or what have you the STUn regularly tossed around should not be as much of an issue as it is.
In my mind much of the problem with HERO mechanics come from the tabletop wargame at the root of the system. Deal with that and most of the gamist attitudes and perceptions will fade away. It is why a number of GMs that I have known prefer to game with HERO newbies rather than Gamers that understand the system since the old hands are operating within the game systems and either consciously or unconciously explioting the rules.
Thus while I mention STUN lotto I mean all stun from all attacks below a certain threshold. For instance Robotman, a new GGU PC I have, has 37 PD. Why? Because I want him to virtually ignore the stun from a 10d6 or lower attack. He is still vulnerable to them but he is hard to hurt, ie get stun on. OTOH he is knocked silly by a little 1/4 mile fall. Sure he isn't taking body but he isn't walking away from a minor genre inconvience either. A NORMAL damage attack did this!!!
I would like to see a power like Impervious (which I would call Damage Mitigation now) that rendered the character immune to a point, like Force Wall does. AVLD, NND and other attacks would simply compare the Body totals on the dice, just like they do now with Force Walls. We do not need to worry about that aspect.
Stun is the error in calculating Immunity and Invulnerablity in my opinion. Damage Mitigation corrects this error.
Down with STUN! (at least for Invulnerable/Immune Characters)
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
Right since my version starts out as a new power that like Force Wall stops all damage below a certain threshold that can be limited to create immunity to certain types of damage.
Impervious to me is Superman, Rogue, or Captain America's Shield. Hit them with an inferior attack and they yawn. Hit them with an exceptional attack and they notice.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
I think if I had to build a power I would do what I said earlier and deal with the STUN issue. Champions is all about scoring the precious STUN, even Killing Attacks are not explictly aimed at killing an opponent it is used to play the STUN Lottery and win big!Thus my idea would be to remove STUN from the equation. Crafting a new persistent non-visible power like armor that works on a higher level. Like Force Field and Armor are inaccurately costed with respect to each other, so would the New Impervious power be costed with respect to Force Wall. That is to say Invisible and Persistent are +0 advantages built into the cost of the power.
Impervious
Type: Standard Power/Defense Power
Duration: Persistent
Target: Self Only
Range: Self
Costs END: NO
Cost: 7 Character Points for every 2 points of Resistant Defense
Impervious provides a character with Resistant Defenses. Each 2 Points of fully Resistant Defense (either PD or ED) costs 5 Character Points. Impervious does not cost END to use.
A character must choose the defense (s) his Impervious power provides when he buys it, and cannot change them thereafter. The ratio of points in the various defenses stays the same even if activated or reduced to lower power. For example, an 8rPD/12rED Impervious reduced to half power by a drain provides 4rPD/6rED defense.
Attacks treat characters with the Impervious power as they would when attacking an object. An Attack must penetrate the level of Impervious to damage the target. If the Body of the Attack doesn't exceed the level of Impervious the target takes no STUN or Body. If the Attack exceeds the level of Impervious, subtract the level of Impervious defenses from the attack and apply the remaining damage to the the target normally (he may then use any other applicable defenses to reduce the damage further).
LIMITATIONS:
Only Works Against Limited Types of Attack: Protects versus Punches, Fire, or other SFX mechanic.
Hawksmoor
I noticed that an edit to the cost of the power making it 7 CP per 2 points of resistant DEF worked better.
I also would think that Knockback would apply normally. The SFX of being invulnerable are really up to the character as is everything in HERO. Superman is one kind of Impervious, Iron Man is another, and Giant Man is a third.
As to why anyone would take any other option instead of this power I would say why should they? No I'll stop.
The power is most effective against killing attacks as you can guarantee the level of defense, against normal attacks the amount of defense is more nebulous. In any event it can provide total immunity to a killing attack below a certain threshold and significant defense against most attacks.
Close enough for government work and does what I want: Invulnerability that does not break the character point bank.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
I think if I had to build a power I would do what I said earlier and deal with the STUN issue. Champions is all about scoring the precious STUN, even Killing Attacks are not explictly aimed at killing an opponent it is used to play the STUN Lottery and win big!
Thus my idea would be to remove STUN from the equation. Crafting a new persistent non-visible power like armor that works on a higher level. Like Force Field and Armor are inaccurately costed with respect to each other, so would the New Impervious power be costed with respect to Force Wall. That is to say Invisible and Persistent are +0 advantages built into the cost of the power.
Impervious
Type: Standard Power/Defense Power
Duration: Persistent
Target: Self Only
Range: Self
Costs END: NO
Cost: 5 Character Points for every 2 points of Resistant Defense
Impervious provides a character with Resistant Defenses. Each 2 Points of fully Resistant Defense (either PD or ED) costs 5 Character Points. Impervious does not cost END to use.
A character must choose the defense (s) his Impervious power provides when he buys it, and cannot change them thereafter. The ratio of points in the various defenses stays the same even if activated or reduced to lower power. For example, an 8rPD/12rED Impervious reduced to half power by a drain provides 4rPD/6rED defense.
Attacks treat characters with the Impervious power as they would when attacking an object. An Attack must penetrate the level of Impervious to damage the target. If the Body of the Attack doesn't exceed the level of Impervious the target takes no STUN or Body. If the Attack exceeds the level of Impervious, subtract the level of Impervious defenses from the attack and apply the remaining damage to the the target normally (he may then use any other applicable defenses to reduce the damage further).
LIMITATIONS:
Only Works Against Limited Types of Attack: Protects versus Punches, Fire, or other SFX mechanic.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
Like I said before I want a way around Stun. Something like hey DEF! I want to buy DEF for my characters! Ignore that silly stun until you breach my DEF.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
I disagree. As a for instance' date=' you want to have a character that is totally immune to fire. I want a character that has a fire attack that can damage anything. Or do you mean you think that HERO only needs absolutes for defense?[/quote']The WW game, Exalted, often talks about the applicability of perfection. To introduce the idea of perfect defenses into HERO one would have to obviously consider the possibility of a perfect attack. In this case the metarule of a defense being cheaper and more efficient than an offense would apply. If it costs 320 or 48 cp for invunerability then it should cost 640 or 96 cp for potency.
But yes in general, given the STUN mechanic and the inability to survive (read as walk away from) falls of terminal velocity defensive perfection would be a valued addition to HERO.
Hawksmoor
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Re: NCM-type for strength
I'd rather see those rule fixes in a PDF as part of the errata. Now MitchellS is going to kick me for saying this but I am not buying UB just to see what the new rules are about. I want to see them because I play HERO and have already paid money for the hardback rules (5e and 5ER).
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
Danger' date=' WIll Robinson, Danger! Stellar atmosphere geek in maximum geek-out mode![/i']
Depending on where you are -- if you blunder into a sunspot, in particular -- you may need protection against strong magnetic fields as well. The strength of the high-energy particle bombardment (one part of the "radiation") is tightly correlated with the local magnetic field strength.
Part of the issue is that the Sun doesn't have a surface; it's gaseous throughout, so defining what you mean by "surface" pins down the physical conditions you have to protect against. The temperature is characterized at 5770 Kelvin, but it varies with height. The gravity isn't that big a deal, only about 20 times that of Earth's surface (and that's constant through the area in question). The gas pressure depends on the altitude ... high up it's vacuum, deep in it's rather high.
So yeah it's the weather, but at least it's a dry heat.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
Didn't Steve create 100% damage reduction for 350 points or something? What more do you want?
What I asked for?
Cheap total immunity/invulnerability.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
It really isn't about all the Body of an attack it is about the STUN. Chris Goodwin wrote a post about an invulnerability variant using the TAKES NO STUN rules that really made sense (IMO). Damage Reduction is a great tool, but it only reduces the amount of damage you take by so much.
In many genres (Dungeons and Dragons FOREX) some characters are like you say immune to one or at most two types of attacks (Blue Dragons are immune to electricity, Oozes are immune to polymorph spells). HERO needs to embrace the idea of absolutes. More importantly the system needs a absolute that will not break the character bank, because what ever games you run (500+ points), Fox1 runs (pointless), or I run (410 points) most Players are in the 350 points or less bracket. And the ability has to be affordable in those arenas.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Walking On The Sun
Of course if your character is tough enough to endure the sun, which really isn't that big of a feat...it is the weather there that is the killer that and the gravity, but I digress. It is the fact that a character that was physically resilient enough to endure the ravages of the Sun would be a very important character since that invulnerability can apply to numerous situations.
Steve and gang really need to create a cost effective invulnerability power so that high temps, long falls, and other superheroic staples can be dealt with on a cost effective basis. A low, medium, high spread costing 50, 75 and 100 CP would be ideal.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Firearms granularity
Show him the firearms rules from FENG SHUI' date=' then when he recovers from the shock, HERO will seem to be just fine.[/quote']I am soo gonna kick you in the head for that one.
I'll just need to work up a good enough Stunt to pull it off.Hawksmoor
-Drunken Master
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Re: name for 5er?
I think that the revised edition is superior as Killer Shrike said with the inclusion of rules clarifications. Importantly the TRIGGER advantage has taken on a whole new dimension with a rich ruleset that allows for some particularly stupendous feats.
I call the revised edition the BBB or Big Bulletproof Book in honor of the Sticky Thread and the HERO books legendary ability to protect Presidents.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Shrinking
That is because there is no limit made on shrinking as pertaining to the use of physical strength. If you want to add that limitation in feel free to do so, it is just that you are going to be applying more real world physics to the game.
IMX real world and make believe are mutually exclusive.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Invisible FF or Armor that Costs END
That's the approach I would most likely use (well, use 3 END per phase of use, but same thing basically), but why should it be necessary to resort to Side Effect to make a power cost END, when Costs END is already a limitation.Part of the problem is that limitations like Visible and Nonpersistent are already inherent in Costs END. Why not make your Armnor Visible (-1/4), Nonpersistent (-1/4) and have the -1/2 Side Effect such that you get a -1 limitation for all the same effects Costs END would have had at -1/2?
I agree entirely. One of the foibles of the HERO system was in deciding that some advantage/limitations were not mutual in point cost. Take the ranged/no range combo or the Zero END/Costs END combo, both are costed at 1/2, but Continuous (Constant)/Nonpersistant are +1 vs -1/4. Makes absolutely no sense.
But Costs END gives up too much utility for the cost break. Making it a -1 or -3/4 would be better. My vote would be for -1. Alternately, forbid taking Armor with these limitations since it is essentially crafting an inferior force field and go with the axiom:
"If it is defense that costs END then it is force field, if the defense does not cost END it is Armor."
Hawksmoor
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Re: Thinking Differently About SPD
The issue was if I recall that some people, yourself included, felt that too many characters clumped up at the high end of the DC scale as accepted by the campaign. Thus you are right that caps could be done without, but that is unlikely to happen in most campaigns. GMs are used to the simplicity of employing them if the characters are made by players. It makes auditing quick and easy.
I just believe, wholeheartedly, that the GM should expect the clustering rather than wring his hands when he gets a tight grouping at the top of the campaign accepted limits.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Thinking Differently About SPD
I just think it's boring, it lacks diversity. One could argue (and I would) that it also reduces the verisimillitude a bit since it seems at the least unlikely a group of adventurers would be so similar in striking power (to me).i'm not condemning it for others, and I'm certainly willing to play in such games.
This is why I hate setting hard maximums - they quickly become minimums as well. Tell players "Maximum 12 DC attacks" and watch how many 10DC attacks come in...Yet that is the game. AP limits are there to prevent the 135CP Armor Piercing Hand to Hand Killing Attack in the standard 350 Point game, not to make a ceiling/floor for attacks. There is a subtle difference here that I'll try to explain.
Yes, in genre, there are characters in the source material that have attacks that are widely dissimilar. Matter Eater Lad, oh how I love him, is essentially just a low level boxer in most engagements. Well that is boring, so the action scenes depict the heavy hitters of the LSH, because the comic is about excitement.
The problem here is that only the rarest of Players wants a character that is outclassed in nearly everything. A player is interested in getting to play his character, he has some interest in cooperatively telling a story, but he is most interested in what his character can do. And the most common part of that enjoyment is defeating the opposition.
Even the occasional anecdote about "clinging to the megabrick and blinding him with my hands!" is fundamentally about a character doing, allowing for spotlight time in a situation. Nothing wrong with that, and given the rock/paper/scissors element of HERO most characters will encounter situations where their powers are of very limited utility.
Most of the time, however, each character is going to be built, by convention, to be the most effective he can be. Thus they are going to hover around the maximum accepted levels the GM is willing to run. If the GM doesn't want to have everyone clustered at the top of his range, perhaps he should loosen it, or employ a variant of the GGU Global Guardians rules and allow one power to break the AP cap for schtick protection. Judicious application will result in a wider array of divergence, but make no mistake by design the results will be skewed to the higher end rather than the lower end of the spectrum.
And there is nothing wrong with that.
Hawksmoor
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Re: Thinking Differently About SPD
This is why I hate setting hard maximums - they quickly become minimums as well. Tell players "Maximum 12 DC attacks" and watch how many 10DC attacks come in...Is that really a problem though? The rarebreed roleplayer might submit a character that breaks convention, but most of the players are playing the game , correctly I might add, and are trying to find ways to make their PCs effective. The average difference of 7 STUN from a 12d6 attack compared to a 10d6 attack is in my game the difference in bouncing (target takes no stun) and getting a few points in to whittle him down.*
*note I never bought into the idea that HERO combats took too long, after all it is the SPEED chart that breaks time into 12 second chunks. My characters should be able to last at least a minute given recoveries.
Hawksmoor
I'll just need to work up a good enough Stunt to pull it off.
Walking On The Sun
in HERO System Discussion
Posted
Re: Walking On The Sun
For Superman I would give him say 25rPD 25rED Damage Mitigation. Stacked with his PD that puts him at around 50-55 PD total. Remember with my idea Superman ignores Damage that does less than his Damage Mitigation, but once that level is breached the damage from that attack applies normally (as Force Wall does) to the STUN and Body.
An average 60 STR Brick would have what ever level his SFX justify and the GM allows. For me it would be around 12rPD 12rED Damage Mitigation allowing the character to ignore utterly 2d6 RKAs or the average roll of a 4d6 RKA yet still be vulnerable to the campaign maximum Energy Blast. (To gain this level of Damage Mitigation would cost 60CP at 5 CP per 2 points of Resistant Damage Mitigation)
Hawksmoor