Vurbal

Re: How do I build a . . . ?

 

I'm going off of an example in play from McCoy's game. It was' date=' as I recall, a flying surfboard that was snatched out of the air by an enemy, and Number Two Son asked if he could get it back by using the power pool. I only recall the word "Focus" being used, but it's entirely possible that I forgot the somewhat less common word "Independent", or even that they were alluding to concepts they didn't need to directly name because they were all experienced players.[/quote'] As others have indicated, as long as the focus isn't independent you will get it back - eventually. One interesting aspect of a focus is that you may have to go through some trouble and spend a fair amount of time without the focus. It might get stolen, requiring the hero to find the villain who has it or the place he has it hidden. It might be destroyed and the hero has to have another one made or go on a quest to get a replacement. The possibilities are endless.

Re: The interaction skills

 

Looking through the 130+ page 5ER faq document, I noticed that skills get about seven pages. In those seven pages, none of the questions cover any of the interaction skills (e.g., Conversation, Seduction, Acting). It's almost entirely combat-related skils, KS, and TF. Since the questions in the FAQ are (AFAIK) generally fan-submitted, it made me curious...

 

Do you use these skills in your game? If so, how? If not, why not, and what do you do instead?

 

My group has been playing FREd/5ER for three years now (mostly Champs), and these skills have never once come up.

I suspect there are 2 major reasons why interaction skill questions don't come up very often. Either people don't use them (ie they use pure roleplaying to resolve those situations) or they don't assume any official mechanic would be helpful in resolving issues they might have with those skills. Probably the latter for most people.

 

Every character I make has interaction skills. In fact the one I'm playing now has 30 points in them. Generally we don't make a lot of rolls for them, relying on the level they're bought at vs. the subject's inherent interest in doing what I want them to. When there's a question of whether my roll should be enough to get the desired affect (or when someone is actively trying to resist my influence) we start rolling dice.

Re: Ego Attack: What am I missing?

 

Well, it is limiting about half the time, but the severity of the limitation is debateable. Assuming an 8 ECV (not unreasonably high for a mentalist), the characters listed will still be hit well over half the time. The median difference looks to be 3, the median DCV 6 and the median DECV 4, so I go from hitting on a 15- to a 13-. That doesn't strike me as being hugely limiting. I doubt I woud call -2 OCV, or even a -3 OCV, with a 10- activation roll a -1/2 limitation. I might not even cal it a -1/2 limitation if it happened with every use of the power.

 

[NOTE: costs +1 END on 10- would also be limiting 1/2 the time, since I'll roll 10- half the time, but I wouldn't call that a -1/2 limitation either]

Depending on the exact power it might even be variable within the same campaign. For example if the power doesn't do any significant amount of damage but is instead just useful for breaking concentration of mentalists or mages it might be an advantage because they're likely to have lower CV than ECV. OTOH it could be a power that's used to do damage to brick or blaster type characters who would likely have higher CV than ECV so it could be a limitation. On the third hand it could be a power used for a crowd control type power used primarily on groups of normals or agents and be a -0 limitation because they'll likely have pretty much equivalent ECV and CV. Realistically the same character could have powers with each of these variants, making it a +1/2 advantage on one, a -1/4 limitation on another, and a -0 limitation on a third. Obviously these specific numbers aren't meaningful since the point is that it depends on the assumed target.

 

What this really points out is the problems inherent in placing a fixed value on modifiers where the net result depends on a range of external targets and what assumptions you can (or can't) make about those targets.

Re: Sudden impulses - the interaction between system and emotion

 

Two factors may have contributed to this effect:

 

1) I came back to this thread after something on another thread inspired me to an alternate approach to this matter.

 

2) I've been amenable to discussing on this thread the topics that have come up on others, and even mentioned a few of them first. Though the secondary topics might have been "branched into" from what was being said here, it does mingle the different threads, which could cause some confusion to people looking for a single, central focus to the thread.

If you can clarify what you're looking for per Ghost Angel's questions a couple of posts back I think we can help you get where you want to go.

Re: Not that you're going to see this, but...

 

You've been using Nar language to describe Gam desires' date=' motives, and end results, which is where I (and I suspect many others) have gotten confused.[/quote']

I think that's where he lost me.

Ah, my sense of humor can be too subtle sometimes (who'd've thunk?). I wasn't suggesting it was the logical course; just the opposite, in fact. I think calling me a Hero-boards troll is just plain silly. In all the years I've been part of these boards, in all the arguments and debates I've participated in, I don't think anyone -- even those I've disagreed vehemently with -- has ever called me a troll.

Troll.

Re: Ego Attack: What am I missing?

 

My comment was more for the "Steve said so-and-so, and therefore it must be done this way" crowd. There seems to be a lot of people who take anything Steve says as gospel without considering whether or not it actually makes sense to them.

 

Kelcyron

I agree 100%. In fact within the last few days Steve had this to say:

Questions of what's "legal" for a given game I have to leave to the GM -- if you have specific questions on specific rules issues I'm happy to answer 'em, but I definitely don't want to get into the business of evaluating individual power constructs for acceptability.

Re: Ego Attack: What am I missing?

 

Just because Steve said something isn't legal doesn't mean that you shouldn't do it if it make sense.

 

Kelcyron

Steve would also never say such a thing. He'll tell you whether it's legal within the framework of the official rules, but he'll also be the first to tell you to ignore those rules if it makes your game more fun.

Re: Sudden impulses - the interaction between system and emotion

 

As for "frequency"' date=' I've already explained my understanding of that: it reflects how often the situation crops up in the game world, not how often the Disad affects the character. If the campaign is centered around a team of mercenaries who often go into combat, the Code versus Killing would be "Very Common", to reflect how often the situation came up. The frequency [i']wouldn't[/i] be "how many times the character's CvK affects his decisions".

Wrong. The psych lim affecting decisions is the only thing that makes it a disad.

No, that's not the only way it works. Psychologically speaking, this is one of the ways we become afflicted with permanent mental conditions. (But psychology is so out of place here - I mean, "Psychological" Limitations? [/sarcasm])

Nothing wrong with that at all. It's also not the only way that a psych lim works. People don't make decisions that way. As many people have stated the real process you go through to make a determination of how to act is far more complicated than anything you can write up with Hero disads. You'd need Hybrid for that

If all I'm using is the raw mathematics, yes. But - funny thing about that - the HERO system goes beyond just math and formulas. It also lists things like (from the double table in the Psychological Limitation section under Disadvantages, page 123 in my 4th Edition rulebook) "Situation is" and "Intensity". No, the math doesn't have my answers - but who was it that said in the first place I was only looking at the mathematical aspects of a character's Disadvantages?

Since those beliefs are mathematically expressed in the system, we must interact with that aspect of them mathematically.

My point isn't that you're only using math. My point is that you're using math that's intended to derive a figure that isn't included in the original equation.

I don't want to. There. Clear enough for you? I came up with one in the process, yes, but what I want is to come up with a relationship between disads (if you stop reading here, you can pretend I've just admitted to everything ) and roleplaying.

 

I initially tried this as a "convert mechanics to roleplaying", and that was what required me to figure out how strong in the RP sense a given Disad would be. Trying it the other way around, I found that work helpful in preserving game balance (and, more importantly, clearing the path for roleplaying to be more dominant in the game).

Basically this seems to be your problem. At least based on your own descriptions you're trying to quantify role playing. As Ghost Angel pointed out that's the definition of roll playing. Good luck with it though. I hope you figure out something that works the way you and your players want.

Re: Ego Attack: What am I missing?

 

I can accept that, but there is a lot more to that post than just that. When I read Steve's response, I took it to mean you can't just add a modifier to EGO Blast and call it good.

 

Since I believed I couldn't go the easy route, I wanted to come up with a work around, which I did. I've done work arounds before, but there were things I didn't take into account and messed them up. When I saw the cost of my work around, I figured I had messed something up again, so I started this thread to see if someone else saw a mistake I had made.

 

A couple mistakes were pointed out, but when I fixed them it didn't change the cost at all.

 

Now you say I want a car, so I've put wheels on a horse, but the way I read Steve's response, he's outlawed cars so can anyone figure out a better way to get one?

Actually he didn't say it was against the rules. What he said was that there are no official rules that cover this. That just means you need to come up with your own.

Re: Sudden impulses - the interaction between system and emotion

 

I never said there was.

Actually you did, or more accurately you implied it:

Since those beliefs are mathematically expressed in the system, we must interact with that aspect of them mathematically.

In order for you to extrapolate a mathematical interaction between multiple disads there needs to be a mathematical relationship between them. In reality there isn't. The closest thing to that would be when a disad is likely to come into play at the same time as another that contradicts it. If one of them is likely to cancel the other a significant amount of times it might be worth fewer points, but that's due to its own frequency, not the fact that another disad is a factor in the frequency.

Not relevant, since the point you're responding to there is whether a given Disad can apply at all to a situation. That has nothing to do with whether or not other Disadvantages would also apply in a situation.

No, what I'm saying is that the disad's point value is based on it's frequency, not whether that frequency is partially a result of another disad.

Again, not relevant, since we're discussing deliberate "thoughts/feelings to instincts" here, not "mental illnesses". For example, a Code versus Killing integrated on that level would not qualify as a mental illness.

That only works if your characters are programmed like machines. If that's how your world works fine.

Please take note of the numerous times within this thread (such as in the very first post) that I have specifically stated I am trying to come up with a new mechanic to do something that would be appropriate within my game.

 

Criticisms based on "well this isn't what's in the original rules" have no place here, because I am not and never was trying to describe such mechanics.

 

My sole intent this whole time has been nothing more and nothing less than to create a new mechanic to govern the interaction between statted powers/Disads and the roleplaying we do.

And what I'm saying is that you're trying to extrapolate something from the disad points that wasn't put in to begin with. It's like trying to figure out the speed of light from 2+2=4. No matter what formula you use the information just isn't there. If you want to have a mathematical interaction between disads you should start by altering the math that goes into them.

Re: Sudden impulses - the interaction between system and emotion

 

Since those beliefs are mathematically expressed in the system' date=' we must interact with that aspect of them mathematically. As for "reasoning", this again falls under discretionary willpower.[/quote'] There is no mathematical (or any other) relationship between multiple disads in the rules. If there is please give me a page # to find it on.

That's covered by the scope of a Disad.

Once again, please cite the page where you can find rules for which disad will be in effect if 2 or more come into conflict with each other.

To simulate the ability of a character to make something that exists only in their conscious thoughts, part of their subconscious mind, therefore ensuring that it will apply at all times, not just when it occurs to them.

The level of control that psych lims have in your description is what I would classify as mental illness. If that's what you want in your game, good for you and have fun, but you're not describing Hero rules.

Re: Sudden impulses - the interaction between system and emotion

 

Thank you. That is exactly what I've been saying all along. (Except that they're all under the aegis of a character's "discretionary willpower", unless the player wants to bring it out with an origin story and make it a full Disad.)

 

As for "points", the campaign rules specifically note that there will be no "point limit" on characters (one could cost seven hundred points while another came out at three thousand), so there's no reason other than compulsory habit (Psych Lim: Player must always take half their base point value in Disads, Frequent, Total?) to take personality traits as full Psychological Limitations.

So why use disads at all?

Re: Sudden impulses - the interaction between system and emotion

 

In the case of Vorbal's example' date=' the Psych Limit is [i']already[/i] defined narrowly enough to not include spiders. Obviously, in my own example goblin children were recognized as such and this led to a conflict.

Assuming you're saying that this specific character sees goblin children as equivalent to human (or at least that the player acknowledges that the disad applies) then ghost-angel's analysis is exactly correct. The purpose of disads is to represent the character, not the other way around. Real people have many values that are in conflict with each other. Those conflicts are resolved by applying whatever reasoning seems appropriate to the situation based on an overall worldview, not based on a mathematical weighting of different beliefs. Characters should be roleplayed the same way. Occasionally that will mean ignoring one disad in favor of another that is more applicable in a given situation. If that's something that occurs often enough it may be appropriate to lower the value of certain disads. More likely it's just good roleplaying.

Re: Sudden impulses - the interaction between system and emotion

 

You're missing one critical step there - Does the character see Goblin's as something even remotely worth protecting ... has the "dehumanization" become so total that even a goblin child is merely "a smaller goblin that squishes easier"

 

The two Psych Lim's you site may be mutually exclusive in that one has no effect on the other. It's not enough to just know the Psych Lim's written down (especially AS written down). You need the whole character's psychological profile factored in, situal issues, et cetera.

 

It's not enough to just compare the strengths of the Disads on the sheet.

To give a real world example of this, lots of people love babies and hate spiders. That doesn't mean they'd have to weigh these 2 things to decide whether to kill a baby spider. There's no conflict between the two because they don't see a baby - just a spider.

 

The disadvantages a character has are just specific things you've quantified to get points. Any good character is more than the sum of his points.

Re: What Are You Listening To Right Now?

 

Shoot Your Shot - The J Geils Band

Re: Gps

 

My overall point is that it's reasonable to give a GPS device less than 100% accuracy. They can be wrong.

The rural water utility I work for uses GPS readings to map the location of every water meter so we can read them. We've determined that sometimes we can have 2 different GPS units at the same meter and get 2 different readings. I don't recall how far off they were when it happened but it's enough that we still have to keep additional notes about meter locations so we know we can find them again later.

Re: Campaign Ground Rules Sheet

 

Since there's a Campaign Ground Rules Sheet in the Resource Kit I'm guessing you weren't the only one who found it useful.

Re: What Are You Listening To Right Now?

 

Your Love Belongs Under A Rock - The Dirtbombs

Re: Thrown non-killing weapon

 

Given the right SFX I would allow it. I can see using TK as extra propulsion for some ranged attacks.

Re: Thrown non-killing weapon

 

If you mean pro-rating' date=' I can certainly see your point. OTOH the current damage-adding structure for HA does distinguish it from STR with No Figured Characteristics, which it otherwise would cost the same as but be inferior to in the range of benefits it confers.[/quote']

I guess I can see that, but I still prefer pro-rating.

Re: Thrown non-killing weapon

 

Just about everyone I've ever played with has also used that rule for all HA attacks. It doesn't make any sense to me not to.

Re: Thrown non-killing weapon

 

Range Based On STR means the STR that would otherwise be increasing the HTH damage of this weapon is being used convert it into a ranged attack. When thrown it would only do 2d6 Killing. If you want it to do 4d6 Killing at range you must buy the full +1/2 Ranged advantage.

I don't see where it says that at all. The description in 5ER doesn't mention anything about damage and since the example in the sidebar of the advantage is a throwing knife I think it would if that were the case.

Re: Thrown non-killing weapon

 

Is this version of Ranged Based On STR a new Advantage in 5ER? The only FREd reference I have to it is as a Limitation.

Yes. 5ER also lists it as a variation on the Ranged advantage with a reference to the limitation.

Re: Fiddling with ECs

 

I agree with this theory' date=' but unfortunately it makes for more bookkeeping in game. Must easier just to subtract a single value from all Powers in the EC. [/quote'] Exactly my problem with this solution. If everything were nice round numbers there would be no issues, but as you say it will generally require some annoying math during game sessions because the numbers won't be like the ones I posted above, and while I have no problem with adding math to character creation it's different when it has to be done during play.

There's also the problem of what happens if you Drain one of the smaller Powers in the EC. If you Drain one 30 point Power by 15 points, is it fair to have the 90 point Power in the same EC suddenly drop by 45 points?

You could argue that this is a fair trade for allowing lower cost powers to go into the same EC as higher cost ones, although I don't know that I buy that myself. So maybe the question we should be asking here is whether there's any legitimate balance reason to require a slot to use the entire base cost. If there is then it makes sense that there should be some kind of penalty for using the highest AP of a group of slots with varied AP for the base. Otherwise it makes more sense to simply allow the lower AP powers and not worry about it.

 

Edit: Actually the more I think about it the less sense it makes to me to use the method I posted above. I don't see anything magically balancing about getting a discount for fewer high AP powers vs. a mixture of 1 or 2 high AP powers with several low AP powers. IME most powers become exponentially more useful with a linear increase in AP.

Re: Introducing Scott Free Press!

 

Yes, definitely get V3.