SuperPheemy

Looking through Terran Empire, I noticed that the Plasma Support weapons are built as Energy Blasts rather than RKAs. Considering that as an Energy Blast, non-resistant defenses apply, I was wondering "why?" (for lack of a better term). Unless the intended weapon was to be a "less lethal" weapon, why go with an EB over an RKA, especially for a Military Issue weapon?

Re: Ramming Speed Well, an acceleration of 1g is 9.8 m/sec^2. Lets give a ramming ship a good 5 minutes to build up steam. That's 300 seconds. 9.8*300*300 = a velocity of 882,000 m/sec. Which is well and far below anything approaching C. But is still roughly 3.2 million kph. Now, assuming that your Navigator is talented enough to actually hit something as small as a starship (we'll be generous and say it's a kilometer-long Star Destroyer) at this velocity. Mr. Newton's third Law states that the rammer is going to take as much energy as the rammee. If our ramming vessel is a thousand ton mass (roughly escort frigate sized). Then it's going to give and take 1000 tons * 882,000^2 meters per second or 7.8*10^14 meter-tons of energy. To survive that (and were assuming the target isn't moving), we're gonna need some seriously BOUNCY rubber science. Or to put it in a way that doesn't use so much math. Larry Niven developed a science-fiction tactic of grabbing a chunk of iron (like a skyscraper-sized meteor) and towing it at a sizeable fraction of C to throw at planets and crack them into little bite-size chunks.

Re: Fantasy Art Thread And since I'm in a posting mood. The Throne Globe of Emperor Huon, Tyrant of Granbretan!

Re: A lot of new traffic from the Champions MMO website? SPIDERS?!?!?!!!?? Begins stomping madly... Eeeew eeeew eeew... One's in my hair! It's in my hair! Getitgetitgetitgetitgetit!

Re: Fantasy Art Thread Wouldn't ya know it. The night I get something put together that I feel confident in showing, and it's posting next to a Storn Cook Red Sonja. But, I always made it a habit of sitting next to the talented kids while I was in Art School, so I'm pretty used to it by now. Think of it as a Sorceress placing one of those "long distance calls".

Re: A Blasphemous Idea for HERO 6th It's not the rulebook that's long. After all, that can all be fit into a 300 page volume. Where we get the libraries from is what amounts to published commentary on HERO canon. Which would make these boards something like a College of Cardinals, or some sort of Monastic Order.

Re: High-End Autofire I was thinking of using Area of Effect (Selective) and an increase in DC (to simulate that targets seldom get hit with a single bullet when attacked with a minigun) of a value similar to the Advantage of the high Autofire level. We could go further to limit "Selective" down to the hex level. That way the wall of lead is still somewhat controllable, just not surgically precise (don't shoot your M134 into melee!)

In my tinkering with some weapons builds, I've noticed that volume-fire weapons like Electric Gatling Guns often have hideous amounts of Autofire (20 shots+). Not having the old 5ER close by invokes the question. What good is Autofire above 10 shots? Even if your CV is so high as to make the attack roll 17-, the best one can hope for is 8 hits on a single target. Taking a -10 OCV penalty to attack 10 targets is pretty impractical in and of itself. I can't shake the feeling I'm missing something.

Re: Traveller HERO GCarrier Question 140 cubic meters fits pretty neatly with the GCarrier on Page 60. But the Astrid on the next page still seems really large. I'm not really questioning the conversion from the Traveller source, but now that I'm taking a closer look (and I'm only doing so, because a Military Grav APC features heavily in an adventure I'm planning), the size of the Astrid looks impractical. Depending on how many passengers it carries. I'm basing a lot of my comparison on the BMP-1 the M113 and the M2 Bradley. The BMP-1 is designed to carry 8 troops into battle, the M113 carries 11 and the M2 carries 6. It would seem that the Astrid, at it's size would be carrying upwards of 30 soldiers. Which, if true, changes it's role on the Battlefield. It's more of a troop transport at this point than an APC that keeps up with the Armor units.

In the Traveller HERO description of the GCarrier (TH Book 2 p 60), you have a pair of weapons mounted in exposed coupolas. The VRF Gauss Gun has a 180 degree arc and the Rapid Pulse Fusion Gun has a 360 degree arc. Is the Gauss Gun mounted forward? Also, how many passengers can the GCarrier fit? I'm assuming a crew of 6 (Pilot, 2 for the Power System, 2 for the Fusion Gun, and 1 for the VRF Gauss Gun). That last question can also be applied to the Astrin APC. The GCarrier seems pretty reasonable with a 12.8 ton mass, but the Astrin is *HUGE*. It's over 25 meters long and nearly 13 meters wide and masses 204.8 tons? That's 3 times the size of an M1 Abrams!

Re: Traveller Hero Character Point Scale Your seventeen year olds have 25 points in Disads, yet can't spend any points in any one Disadvantage category But all in all, it's a pretty good patch to bridge HEROthink with Travellerthink. I noticed Traveller HERO mentions enlistment terms, but doesn't give any more details. There might be some figgledy bits if a character concept ends up a Noble Spec Forces Officer (Prince Harry anyone?), but any GM worth the title knows when to let the rules bend, especially house rules

Re: THE ATLANTEAN AGE: What Do *You* Want To See? Give me Gods and Monsters, and keep 'em coming. Specifically I'd like to see these Titans (for lack of a better term) have tangible threads that connect with the Mythology of the Ancients. Not so much of a "Zeus with the serial number filed off", but an extensive "proto-pantheon" which could connect nicely with Mythic Greece, or Egypt, or Babylon. And I want characters to be able to challenge and overcome them. Storm the Gates of Heaven, bodily throw Titans into the Maw of Sheol. I'd like to be able to create campaigns that at the end my players can say "wow, I think the actions of our characters would be retold in Phoenecia! Or Assyria! Real Myth-making stuff.

Re: Stronghold Concept Art What I do like about the COMMO Stronghold is that it looks to me less like a "cutting edge state of the art superprison" that their PR advertises, and more like a 30 year old warehouse for dangerous supervillains that the government can't safely contain anywhere else. It looks like it's suffered from the numerous breakouts and breakins over the years, and the definite lack of budget to thoroughly fix it. Which makes it ripe for all sorts of abuse

Re: Champion Bay's Silver Avenger I haven't seen the 5th edition Silver Avenger write-ups, but if they're less powerful than their 4th edition counterparts, I probably won't use them in my campaign. In My Champion Universe, the Silver Avengers are government-sponsored superheroes, running around 300 points. It's one of the things that helps to seperate PRIMUS from UNTIL in my mind. UNTIL relies on highly trained agents (and their international super team UNITY) while PRIMUS works through Silver Avengers (and highly trained agents.)

I used the Silver Avenger from the 4th edition Classic Organizations book as a starting point. And while some of the builds are pretty straightforward, others were completely wonky (OAF on Gauntlets? What are they snap-ons?) One big difference in style I've learned from 4th edition to 5th is the flexibility afforded by Social Limitations and the expanded Perquisites. As a specific character, James Bryant represents a Silver Avenger with a couple of years of contacts and experience under his belt. See my Champion Bay blog for more details (which should make his relationship with UNTIL more clear). [b]Silver Avenger - James Bryant[/b] [b][u]VAL[/u] [u]CHA[/u] [u]Cost[/u] [u]Total[/u] [u]Roll[/u] [u]Notes[/u][/b] 40 [i]STR[/i] 30 [b]40[/b] 17- HTH Damage 8d6 END [4] 26 [i]DEX[/i] 48 [b]26[/b] 14- OCV 9 DCV 9 23 [i]CON[/i] 26 [b]23[/b] 14- 13 [i]BODY[/i] 6 [b]13[/b] 12- 13 [i]INT[/i] 3 [b]13[/b] 12- PER Roll 12-/15- 14 [i]EGO[/i] 8 [b]14[/b] 12- ECV: 5 18 [i]PRE[/i] 8 [b]18[/b] 13- PRE Attack: 3 1/2d6 14 [i]COM[/i] 2 [b]14[/b] 12- 20 [i]PD[/i] 12 [b]20[/b] 20 PD (10 rPD) 19 [i]ED[/i] 14 [b]19[/b] 19 ED (10 rED) 6 [i]SPD[/i] 24 [b]6[/b] Phases: 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12 13 [i]REC[/i] 0 [b]13[/b] 46 [i]END[/i] 0 [b]46[/b] 45 [i]STUN[/i] 0 [b]45[/b] 9 [i]RUN[/i] 6 [b]9"[/b] END [2] 2 [i]SWIM[/i] 0 [b]2"[/b] END [1] 8 [i]LEAP[/i] 0 [b]8"[/b] 8" forward, 4" upward [b]CHA Cost: 187[/b] [b][u]Cost[/u] [u]POWERS[/u][/b] 8 [b][i]Flare Gun[/i][/b]: Sight Group Flash 2d6, Armor Piercing (+1/2), Explosion (+1/2) (20 Active Points); OAF (Gun; -1), 8 Charges (-1/2) - END=[8] 16 [b][i]Fatigue Baton[/i][/b]: Drain END 4d6 (40 Active Points); OAF (Baton; -1), 8 Charges (-1/2) - END=[8] 18 [b][i]Bolo Gun[/i][/b]: Entangle 4d6, 4 DEF, Entangle And Character Both Take Damage (+1/4) (50 Active Points); OAF (Bolo Gun; -1), 8 Charges (-1/2), Cannot Form Barriers (-1/4) - END=[8] 13 [b][i]Avenger Gauntlets[/i][/b]: Armor Piercing (+1/2); OIF (Gauntlets; -1/2) for up to 40 Active Points of Strength (13 Active Points) - END=1 10 [b][i]Avenger Conditioning[/i][/b]: Reduced Endurance (1/2 END; +1/4) for up to 40 Active Points of Strength (10 Active Points) - END=0 7 [b][i]Avenger Physiology[/i][/b]: Power Defense (10 points) (10 Active Points); Activation Roll 14- (-1/2) - END=0 6 [b][i]Avenger Vision[/i][/b]: +3 PER with Sight Group - END=0 8 [b][i]Silver Avenger Uniform[/i][/b]: Damage Resistance (10 PD/10 ED) (10 Active Points); Only In Heroic Identity (-1/4) - END=0 [b]POWERS Cost: 86[/b] [b][u]Cost[/u] [u]SKILLS[/u][/b] 3 Acrobatics 14- 3 Breakfall 14- 3 Bureaucratics 13- 3 CK: Champion Bay 12- 3 Combat Piloting 14- 6 +3 with Punch 3 Conversation 13- 3 Criminology 12- 3 Interrogation 13- 2 KS: Criminal Law 11- 5 KS: Criminal Organizations 14- 3 KS: PRIMUS 12- 3 Oratory 13- 3 Persuasion 13- 7 Tactics 14- 3 Teamwork 14- 6 WF: Common Martial Arts Melee Weapons, Common Melee Weapons, Small Arms [b]SKILLS Cost: 62[/b] [b][u]Cost[/u] [u]PERKS[/u][/b] 3 Fringe Benefit: Federal/National Police Powers 5 Fringe Benefit: Security Clearance 5 Fringe Benefit: Membership 9 Reputation: Silver Avenger (A large group) 14-, +3/+3d6 15 Contact: PRIMUS (Contact has access to major institutions, Very Good relationship with Contact), Organization Contact (x3) (15 Active Points) 11- 3 Access to UNTIL Champion Bay Headquarters 15 Contact: UNTIL Champion Bay (Contact has access to major institutions, Contact has extremely useful Skills or resources), Organization Contact (x3) (15 Active Points) 8- [b]PERKS Cost: 55[/b] [b][u]Value[/u] [u]DISADVANTAGES[/u][/b] 5 Distinctive Features: Silver Avenger Uniform (Easily Concealed; Noticed and Recognizable; Detectable By Commonly-Used Senses) 25 Hunted: PRIMUS 14- (Mo Pow, NCI, PC has a Public ID or is otherwise very easy to find, Watching) 15 Psychological Limitation: Fiercely Patriotic (Very Common, Moderate) 15 Psychological Limitation: Overconfident (Very Common, Moderate) 15 Psychological Limitation: Sworn to Serve and Protect Innocents (Very Common, Moderate) 15 Reputation: Government Super Agent, 14- 25 Social Limitation: Subject to PRIMUS Orders (Very Frequently, Severe) 15 Social Limitation: Public Identity (Frequently, Major) 10 Vulnerability: 1 1/2 x STUN Poisons and Toxins (Common) [b]DISADVANTAGES Points: 140[/b] Base Pts: 200 Exp Required: 50 Total Exp Available: 50 Exp Unspent: 0 Total Character Cost: 390

Re: The Champion Bay Blog! All three chapters of the Champion Bay History are now up on the Blog. Next, I'll be posting a few of the characters around the City.

Go and see my New Blog Entry on the HEROgames Blog feature! Let me know what ya think! Is it brilliant? Does it suck? Should someone amputate all my fingers before I type again?

Re: Betatesting? I was talking to one of the Cryptic folks over at GDC. They're *amazed* at the sheer volume and enthusiasm of the Champions/HERO fanbase. I think they're list of registered users hit 5,000+ in two days of opening on Midnight Wednesday. I have a real feeling that Champions Online is going to be HUGE.

Re: Hey Gang! YO! Hey Steelers Fan! Oh, I mean, welcome to the boards, Jack. Glad to see you here

Re: How to make an ice planet plausible I'd put it on the outer fringe of the Habitable Zone. Cold enough that giant glaciers cover most of the planet, but not so cold as to freeze everything out of the atmosphere. Sort of like a permanent Ice Age. There can still be an ecosystem, and there would probably even be open water in isolated areas (maybe a seasonal opening of the seas in the warmest climates. And of course, there would still be liquid water under the ice. Such a planet can be inhabited though like Antarctica, the colonists would have to stay in their habitat compounds continually, only venturing out into the icy wilderness with extreme preparations.

Re: Dune HERO I put together a Bene Gesserit Acolyte Package. It came out to 123 points. But that's what happens when you have complete body control, and the political clout of the Bene Gesserit...

Re: Dune HERO Of course not. Just like micrometeors don't equal fleet bombardment. But both still eventually cause the shield to fail. A further complication of shields on Dune is the annoying tendency for them to attract lots of angry Sandworms. A shield user will probably be eaten before his sheild fails from the blowing sands.

Re: Dune HERO Spice Addiction comes as a group of Disadvantages... Distinctive Features : Blue within Blue Eyes (Easily Concealable; Noticed and Recognized) Dependence: Melange (1d6 damage per day; Prohibitively Expensive) Dependence: Melange (-3 to Characteristics per day; Prohibitively Expensive)

Re: Dune HERO Instead of doing what I'm supposed to be doing, I've modeled my interpretation of the spice Melange.. Regular Use: (Total: 18 Active Cost, 5 Real Cost) Life Support (Immunity: All common terrestrial diseases; Longevity: 400 Years) (12 Active Points); 1 Continuing Charge lasting 1 Day which Never Recovers (-1 3/4), Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (Spice Addiction (1/2 D6 Cumulative Transform from non-addict to addict); -1) (Real Cost: 3) plus +2 PER with all Sense Groups (6 Active Points); 1 Continuing Charge lasting 1 Day which Never Recovers (-1 3/4), Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (Spice Addiction (1/2 D6 Cumulative Transformation: Non-addict to Addict); -1) (Real Cost: 2)[1 cc]2) Overdose: (Total: 182 Active Cost, 18 Real Cost) Precognitive Clairsentience (Sight, Hearing, Touch And Smell/Taste Groups) (70 Active Points); 1 Continuing Charge lasting 1 Hour which Never Recovers (-2 1/4), No Conscious Control (-2), Activation Roll 8- (-2), Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (Spice Addiction (2D6 Cumulative Transformation: Non-addict to Addict); -2), Precognition Only (-1) (Real Cost: 7) plus Retrocognitive Clairsentience (Sight, Touch, Smell/Taste And Hearing Groups) (70 Active Points); 1 Continuing Charge lasting 1 Hour which Never Recovers (-2 1/4), No Conscious Control (-2), Activation Roll 8- (-2), Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (Spice Addiction (2D6 Cumulative Transformation: Non-addict to Addict); -2), Retrocognition Only (-1) (Real Cost: 7) plus Spatial Awareness (Unusual Group), Discriminatory, Analyze, Increased Arc Of Perception (360 Degrees), Range (42 Active Points); 1 Continuing Charge lasting 1 Hour which Never Recovers (-2 1/4), No Conscious Control (-2), Activation Roll 8- (-2), Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (Spice Addiction (2D6 Cumulative Transformation: Non-addict to Addict); -2) (Real Cost: 4)

Re: Dune HERO In the Butlerian Jihad novels, it's mentioned several times that shields overheat if they reflect too much energy in too short of a time. I can't remember if this was mentioned in the Dune Novels. From what I've been able to gather, it seems like an immense amount of energy is required to overheat a shield. To the tune of dozens of automatic weapons blazing away for minutes. One example I recall was a ship in an asteroid field burned out it's shield because of the effects of tens of thousands of micrometeors coupled with about a dozen battleships pounding away at it. In addition, there is a mention that Shields are useless in the Desert because the constant blowing sands quickly overheat them. In game terms, this limitation seems too small to be worth points, but should be kept in mind in those specific circumstances. The overheating problem is not sudden, so a shield user would have some warning as to when the shield was going to fail. Finally, there were several instances of shields not really mattering. The atomic explosion of the Shield Wall overwhelmed the Holzman Shield. Being eaten by Shai-Hulud overcomes the shield. Being caught in an orbital bombardment. The Honored Matre's Obliterators glass everything, including shielded installations.