Chris Goodwin

This right here.  Common sense, dramatic sense, special effects.  
 
In most source material, combat generally stops when someone has someone else covered.  If one person yells "Freeze!" and the other person doesn't freeze... we pretty much leave that up to the existing rules to adjudicate.  (Presence Attack to see if he actually freezes.  If he does, he's at 0 DCV.  If not, combat continues.)  
 
Without reference to Cover, what other mechanics do we have to handle this kind of situation?  
Delayed Phases Presence Attacks DEX vs. DEX Fast Draw ...?  

Just to complicate the discussion further, how many GMs allow the "throat slitting" rule?  Meaning, if you have someone completely helpless, you do get to automatically inflict your damage.  I'd guess that most do.  
 
Which is really what we're talking about, isn't it?  
 
(remembering "Aw, man.  I shot Marvin in the face."  In the same tone as if it were "Aw, man.  I dropped my ice cream cone.")

It's not "it always hits" though.  You roll to hit when you first point the attack at them, and then if it hits you get to "save" the damage until such time as you decide to inflict it.  The current verbiage doesn't say anything about whether the target is resisting, and in fact in the example in 6e2 the target is at full DCV.  Which to me doesn't make sense; to have someone Covered, they need to not be moving, resisting, or otherwise at full DCV.  Or at least willing to freeze, which is where the PRE+10 Presence Attack comes in.
 
If someone is at full DCV, and they're ignoring your order to "Freeze!", and you're trying an attack roll against them, you're not properly attempting the Cover maneuver against them.  You're attempting an ordinary attack against them.  

I do to a point. Yes inFantasy Hero. 
 
Somewhat related though is “The Sniper”.  I allow PC snipers to take the shot against unaware NPCs. But in the interests of fairness, lethal shots at PCs, always miss the first time, or shoot the NPC the Hero was talking to, because players need to feel they have a chance. 

I apologize for not stating it in the most lengthy and detailed manner possible.

Oh:  one last thing:
 
Those of you who's arguments against breaking out of cover are along the lines of "but the attack has already hit" now completely understand my outrage at "Combat Luck means it missed me!"
 
[edited]
 
 

How often do we have discussions about players refusing to follow genre tropes?  How often does it work out that their refusal to follow genre tropes leads directly back to being "punished", in-game, for following genre tropes?  If we want these to be used, they need to be neutral at worst, and ideally rewarded.
 
When we want everyone to display higher moral ground and not kill opponents, or show restraint and not fire off full-power blasts at every unknown target, or actually role play rather than looking for the absolute best tactical choice in every situation, and forget the reality that people are seldom guided by a detailed analysis of every possible alternative, selecting the best one with logic and efficiency their sole guide, what do we get?  "Well, my character is a tactical genius who hates to lose and is utterly remorseless in his fight against evildoers, so it's IN CHARACTER for him to only make the best tactical decisions, to hit the bad guy with everything he's got and to kill him off if he thinks the justice system, or poor prison security, will just put him back on the streets."
 
Why?
 
Because the GM rubs the players' faces in the return of defeated foes because a tricky lawyer got a "not guilty" or Stronghold was nowhere near strong enough to hold them.  Because the Hero fires off a low-power Blast that plinks off the unknown villain's defenses, and that villain then fires a massive counterattack that Stuns the Super.  "HA HA - the press runs humiliating stories of your crushing defeat.  All your PRE attacks are -3d6 for the next month due to this negative press."  Because EVERY KO'd villain gets a recovery, gets back up and blasts the heroes in the back, so "screw honour and hit him one more time when he's down, just to be sure".
 
If Cover means that the opponent probably just break cover anyway, why would the player be motivated to take a penalty to OCV and a delay to damage?  ANSWER:  They would not.  They would be motivated, instead, to rationalize why they strike first, and hard, so that they defeat that opponent,  not have him break cover, so they just wasted their action anyway.
 
A desire not to shoot them?  Sure.  But all Covered means is, if they don't cooperate, I either shoot them anyway or I back off.  Maybe I should have Grabbed "Bad Grandma" and restrained her instead of pulling my UberGun, or engaged the mooks using my attacks at less than full DC, or taken that OCV penalty to Pull my Punch instead of Cover.
 
 
If the goal is to show how Super the Super is, yes.  If the goal is to have that Normal still capable of a dramatic threat, no.
 
Looking at the source material, how often has MightyMan heard "Back off, buddy, or I'll shoot Nellie, here, in the head" [Nellie is Covered by Gunman] and thought "Hey, I'm virtually certain to win the DEX roll-off anyway, and even if I don't, a handgun can't do enough BOD to kill Nellie in one shot anyway, so my teammate with Healing powers can save her."?
 
I see a lot more thought bubbles like "For all my power, he's rendered me helpless - I cannot allow harm to come to an innocent girl like Nellie!"
 
We accept that, in the time it takes MightyMan to ignite his heat vision, his opponent can activate his force field, go Desolid and Dodge, Dive for Cover or Missile Deflect (all by Aborting - ha ha, that always goes first).  But we can't accept that Cover means the attacker has a "priority abort" to roll his damage?
 
Now, I would classify the hero doing something with no visible cues, that the attacker could in no way expect, as being a potential "distraction" that provides the potential for breaking cover.  Maybe that should require a Stealth roll, or an Acting roll, against the attacker's PER roll (with bonuses if the power he wants to use has Invisible Power Effects).  The attacker already took a penalty to OCV, hit anyway and delayed his damage.  It seems reasonable that this should not mean "no problem - the target can easily avoid the attack".

Okay--
 
I'll take a simple stab-- sorry, but I just walked in for real about twenty minutes ago and cycled the kids through the eat-and-shower routine, I'm due to pick up the Leviathan and the wife left her lunch in the kitchen (she works nights), but I said I'd try (though technically, I'm really rushing things)
 
First:
 
Why would someone "use cover if it's such a waste?!"  [paraphrasing my own]
 
I don't know.  Morality, perhaps?  A desire to _not_ have to shoot someone?
 
Lack of choice?  "I'm supposed to bring in Bad Granny for questioning, but all I've got is my 4d6 RKA blast pistol...."
 
And of course, the fact that it works on mooks without having to _actually_ splatter them.
 
 
Anyway, this was supposed to be just a quick example, and I'm wasting time.

 
 
First off: this works best for a super escaping a normal. And let's be honest, it makes sense that a super _should_ have a chance to escape a normal.  Also would like to note that I use the Cover rules from 4e, simply because at the time we adopted them more players owned 4e than anything else (it was the "new" book back then   ).  I will state up front that I don't know ( or -- and this is not rude; it's just to head off a rush of corrections that may be coming-- really care if it's different in later editions.  This works for us, and I'm not changing now).
 
If you have HSRB 4e, you can find Cover on page 155.  Probably there in BBB, too. I know it's in there somewhere, just don't remember where.
 
As folks have pointed out, I looked to Western HERO-- it is my single most well-worn sourcebook.  I use it the way the rest of you use Ninja HERO or the MA book for whatever generation you're playing at the moment.  Anyway, the idea was inspired by the showdown ideas.  Moreover, page 40, bottom right:
 


 
 
Hilariously, there is no list below.  Not here, and not in that book.  Talk about a need for an errata.
 
If you go to p155 of the HSRB 4e, you'll see this helpful phrase:
 


 
Now it doesn't specify if it's referring to the Hit Location Chart, of if there are special penalties for where the two of you are standing.  Presumably the HLC, but who knows?
 
At any rate, it mentions distractions, and the Western HERO book starts to give us some stuff to play with and utterly fails....   I can't help but think that at some point, there was meant to be an option or two-- at least one-- outside of PRE Attack.  Right or wrong; doesn't matter: you do you, after all.  If your players _enjoy_ being auto-hit by everyone who manages to sneak up on them, then go for it.  I'm not here to tell you they don't, after all.  If your players enjoy auto-hitting everyone they get the drop on, then the more the merrier.  Personally, I'm looking at the source material:  the super-fast sleight of hand that let's the ninja stare at a gun in his face (which I am going to argue suggest's he's pretty much _covered_) and in the blink of an eye he's holding the gun and his attacker is nursing a sprained wrist.  (yeah; that's Disarm, but given that the source material is chock-full-o-nuts _packed_ with this sort of exchange, I'm inclined to think that cover should _not_ be auto-hit.  And don't get me started on "covering" Speedsters.....
 
Though as noted, I'm also inclined to think it should be a scary damned thing when you're both on roughly the same level.  Hence the DEX-off.
 
 
At any rate, -- well, never mind.  Phone is ringing (looks like the phone at the wife's job, so let me hurry this up)
 
Important thing to remember:  I don't generally just up and tell my players what SPD their opponents are, and between held actions, etc,  I don't make it easy to figure out (though I don't go out of my way to make it difficult, either)
 
Other important thing:
 
Remember what the SPD chart represents:  you don't do everything in a single second, then wait for your next single second out of twelve; you are assumed to be "doing the thing" at a rate that carries you from the start of your Phase until the start of you next one.
 
Both of those are important.
 
Why?
 
Because it doesn't matter _what_ you do the Phase your opponent Covered you-- he is in the active process of getting a bead and deciding whether or not he's going to pull the trigger.  If you do something (that isn't "instant" or that has a Tell of some sort, Bang!  you have made up his mind for him; he has decided _not_ to wait, and you get hurt (maybe.  You definitely get hit).  Best thing for you to do (I've heard my older players teach this to new players  ) is take a Recovery or two and hope he doesn't have a SPD under 3.  The way I figured it when we started cobbling these rules, during that Phase, he is _intent_ on getting a bead on you and waffling as to whether it's worth it to go non-violent.
 
The other important thing is how _well_ he has you covered.
 
 
So you're ready to try something?
 
Jimmy Crookneck has the drop on you!  He made his Cover roll by 4 (think of this as "how well he has you covered").  Remember this, because it's going to work against you if you try something.  
 
Jimmy Crookneck is a local thug, working for the mob you're investigating.  Obviously, you're getting close to something the mob doesn't want you to get close to.  You carefully, obviously stop moving and let him see that you've stopped moving.  Take a minute; think this out.  Look around, see what might be of some help to you.  (Probably not the manila folder you're still holding after rifling through it.
 
Jimmy is standing at your back.
 
 
Break:
 
Let's look at Jimmy's "covered" success:  this is a raw bonus he gets if you try something stupid.  If there's more than one of you, and he's trying to cover _all_ of you (or at least more than one), then this bonus is divided across the number of people he's trying to cover.  The bonus he gets for standing directly behind you, though-- that's just for you.  Let's say you've got a sidekick with you.  Jimmy's Covering bonus is divided by two as he wants to cover both of you.  Your sidekick is pretty much head-on to Jimmy, so no extra bonuses there: he can see Jimmy's every move, and you can't.  Oh, if only you had a telepath for a sidekick!  
 
You spend a few moments doing _nothing_; letting Jimmy get comfortable with the idea that he's got you dead to rights and you're smart enough to know it.  You take that recovery while you're standing there, and maybe one more.   You've decided you're going to make a break for it!  You don't know if Jimmy's in striking range, and you can't draw a bead on him with Electro Bolts until you can actually aim at him (unless you want to try a hip shot.  Turns out you don't.)
 
You are pretty sure you can drop and spring into a leap and get behind that heavy desk long enough to re-orient yourself and maybe get a shot off.  Dex off:
 
Jimmy's a norm-- and athletic normal, sure, but he's only got a DEX of 15.  You, on the other hand, have the twitchy reflexes of living lightning, and your DEX 22 shows it.  You give a wink to your sidekick, and he knowingly activates his IPE Desolidification.  He can only keep it up for one minute, but he's safe for a moment...  you drop, hoping to screw up the bead he has on you, roll your shoulders forward, then spring into a leap to get behind the desk---   Fortunately, it's a new phase for Jimmy, or you'd feel hot lead somewhere just north of your foramen magnum!
 
You make your DEX roll by 9; Jimmy makes his by 4.  Subtracting his from yours, you have a 5 pt bonus(the new editions call this a penalty skill level, but we didn't have that word when we came up with this.  At any rate, you can apply that toward the original "Covering" roll.  As Jimmy made his original roll by 4, and your bonus (his PSL) subtracts from that, wo-hoo!  You _almost_ got away with it.  He has now made his cover roll by exactly zero, but hey-- he made it.  Bang!  You've been shot!  
 
Better for Jimmy, not only have you been shot, but he's still got that bonus +2 (his covering bonus of 4, divided across the two characters) he can add to his roll to cover you again, if he should so desire.  Or, since he's tracking you so well, he can use it to flat out shoot you.  You're not very cooperative, after all.
 
Fortunately, Ghost Boy used this distraction to phase through the wall behind him, and is safe.
 
 
Now let's say you had made your Dex roll by 10!  Then subtract Jimmy's Dex success of 4, and you can assign a PSL of _5_ to the covering roll.  As it made it only by 4, you manage to pull it off!  You manage to to get out of harm's way (for a moment!).  However, Jimmy still has his Covering bonus of 2 (since he voluntarily split it) he can apply to re-Cover you, or just open fire.
 
Note:   Characters covering a group can _voluntarily_ relinquish some of the targets to "get back" some of the bonus, _provided_ they do so before they lose Covered status.
 
For example, in the above, Jimmy could have decided that Ghost Boy was not a real threat, and decided to focus his attention entirely on you, granting him the full +4 in the event you tried something and succeeded.  However, once he loses track of any of the covered people (say one teleports away or something), that option is no longer available: he has divided his attention too far, or something like that, and only has whatever his bonus was after the initial division.  Similarly, he can voluntarily split the bonus further to cover additional people who come into the area, should he want to.
 
 
I have _really_ got to get my wife her lunch, so I'm going to go.  I trust you can see how this is still a deadly option for "heroic" normal-v-normal type stuff, and nearly as dangerous for super-v-super.  That's pretty much what we wanted: a chance for super characters (not just super heroes, but the Ninjas and fast aliens and what-have-you in Heroic stuff) to actually _be_ action heroes, and for that "little bit better than normal" to be the deciding factor (dice willing, of course )
 
I'm sorry if this doesn't answer your questions, but if you want to know more, just ask.  I'll try to get them answered tomorrow.
 
There is no point in saying "feel free to point out all the flaws and problems and anti-HERO System things in these house rules (crap!  I need to track down Chris Goodwin's House Rules thread and put a cleaner version there at some point in the future), so long as you understand that I'm not changing the way I do this at my table.  It's worked since '92.  I have absolutely _no doubt_ it will work until I'm dead or too damned old to draw players.

Which might be why this was originally a Danger International thing and not a Champions thing.  None of that ever had to come up when it was just guns...

As defined in the rules, but... where in the source material or genre support is this ever shown?  I'm not even talking about real life here.  Where is there EVER a situation where someone covers a guy and its impossible for them to miss or fail to shoot before the other guy takes action unless a hot girl walks by?
 
And yeah, Western Hero has rules for showdowns, giving rules on dex roll/fast draw modifiers based on circumstance, equipment, etc.

Aid originally appeared in FH 1e, and was generally intended to be used for Characteristics.  First-gen Champions assumed that if you wanted to increase someone else's stats that you could buy a Characteristic with Usable On Others.   Fantasy Hero didn't have any provision for buying raw Characteristics as a spell effect, but aiding others with a spell is extremely common throughout the source material, so -- and this is conjecture on my part -- they came up with Aid to use instead.  It was a spell, costed END every Phase to maintain, and as a result took up a spell slot as long as you kept it going, thus didn't have a fade rate.  It was later errata'ed in the first-gen FH Magic Items and Spell Book supplements to not be diced, with a cost of 2 points per +1 point worth of Aid provided (thus, Aid, +1 to SPD, would have cost 20 points).  4e ignored those supplements and made Aid work as the sort of anti-Drain.  
 

Aid originally appeared in FH 1e, and was generally intended to be used for Characteristics.  First-gen Champions assumed that if you wanted to increase someone else's stats that you could buy a Characteristic with Usable On Others.   Fantasy Hero didn't have any provision for buying raw Characteristics as a spell effect, but aiding others with a spell is extremely common throughout the source material, so -- and this is conjecture on my part -- they came up with Aid to use instead.  It was a spell, costed END every Phase to maintain, and as a result took up a spell slot as long as you kept it going, thus didn't have a fade rate.  It was later errata'ed in the first-gen FH Magic Items and Spell Book supplements to not be diced, with a cost of 2 points per +1 point worth of Aid provided (thus, Aid, +1 to SPD, would have cost 20 points).  4e ignored those supplements and made Aid work as the sort of anti-Drain.  
 

Kadu
Kadu resemble nothing so much as a nautilus with a plasma cannon protruding from its tentacles. They are huge creatures, the size of a medium starship.
The first thing you notice about a Kadu (right after you finish screaming and changing your pants) is the great spiraling shell of the beast, decorated with flowing bio-luminescent whorls and stripes. The tentacles are next, followed by that gun.
What a monster that gun is, powerful enough to shred starship armor, it sticks out almost obscenely from the tangle of tentacles. It also glows brightly across the spectrum, mostly in the infrared.
It has been suggested that Kadu could not have evolved naturally. This is plainly obvious. Self-replicating polymers like Kadu DNA would be torn down by ultraviolet radiation before they could develop cell walls and cytoplasm.  The scarcity of food in a vacuum also presents a problem evolution would have to overcome.
It is therefore correct to conclude that they were provolved in the deep past by some alien super-race such as the eons-old Forerunners, long-dead Rhal Shee Dha, or the Benefactors of the last few thousand years. If this is indeed the case, it tells us at least one thing about the ancients. They were dicks.
Related functionally to the Archangels, Auto-Wars, Bio-Destruct-os and Vacc-Blasters; Kadu are uplifted sea creatures certainly designed for war in space. That they have outlasted their creators is a testament to the wisdom of such technology.
Kadu are quite the sight, flying in formation against the black star-studded void of deep space. They can be seen chasing swarms of rock munchers, snacking on planetary rings or derelict starships. They are also quite the sight when dining on a not-so-derelict ship (or mine, specifically).
They are sensitive to infrared wavelengths, known for its ability to penetrate dust clouds. Star Whales are often found in molecular clouds and ring systems, and are best detected in the IR.    
Attempts to breed such beasts in captivity have been universal failures. Such efforts have resulted in fourteen destroyed orbital habitats, nine ring-stations and seven major lawsuits. Two of which are still affecting my credit score and dating fitness on Malabar/Hlevakha.
Of all the evolutionary drivers, provolve technology is the most difficult, sexual selection is perhaps the most complex, with financial selection being the most depressing.
There are rumors whispered quietly in seedy star town bars, and screamed aloud in seedy star town asylums, of "Old Galactic Kadu" the size of Union dreadnoughts.
Don't go outside, is what I'm saying.   
Kadu.hdc

Adjustment powers against characteristics are pretty common in the source material (spells, superpowers, drugs).  Affecting powers is more hit and miss, although abilities that prevent, say, Teleportation or Scrying come up.  One could assert these are against a specific SFX (e.g. superscience; magic) given the genres they tend to appear in.
 
If we want adjustment powers that are more focused on SFX, the rules certainly provide for it.  Campaign ground rules that adjustment powers must have Variable Effect, allowing any one power of a given SFX to be affected.  We could even go so far as to require they also take, say "four powers at once (+1 1/2) for a total of +2 (triple the normal cost) and campaign-define 4 at once as being "all powers of that special effect".  Yeah four is a pretty tiny number for all magic powers in a fantasy game, but +2 is a pretty huge advantage cost.  In a typical Supers game, restricting to one SFX is much more restrictive, so it feels like the advantage of affecting multiple powers is very much offset by the drawback of only one SFX.

Aha!  Neutralization (Champions III, equivalent to Suppress in 4th and 5th) did specify Active Points, though it seemed to imply that it was meant more for Powers than Characteristics, contrary to Power Drain.  
 
Edit:  FH 1e also specified Active Points for Suppress and Dispel, but not for Drain, which was specified to work against Characteristics only.  The former two were specified to work against spell effects.

In the first-gen days, even though Power Drain was called that and specified that it could be used on Powers, it was most often used on Characteristics.  For Characteristics you'd pay the cost per die times the cost multiple of the Characteristic and would drain that many pips of the Characteristic (so that 1d6 DEX Drain would cost 3 x 10 = 30 points and drain 1d6 DEX).  
 
However, it was the first-gen supplement Champions III that introduced Adjustment vs. a special effect, either one power at a time or all powers simultaneously, and I think that probably moved the use of the Adjustment Powers more toward being used against Powers.  (It also specified that powers in Frameworks are automatically considered linked by SFX though they didn't automatically suffer from combined Adjustment the way EC in 5th and Unified Power in 6th do).
 
All of that having been said, it never did specify Active Points in any of the core books or primary supplements until 4e.  Maybe an Adventurers Club clarified it somewhere?

Try this:
 
Drain: certain power
 
or 
 
Drain: certain SFX
 
Then consider the _actual_ power being built, as opposed to the mechanic behind it.  In DD's examples: the Flight only on a surface would count as running for Drain: running.   Flight: usable as swimming would be reduced in efficiency as swimming for "Drain: Swimming."
 
 
Further, --- and there's no way to write a mechanic for this, so I'm pretty sure it'll be jeered-- consider the SFX _first_.  The player with the Drain should assign an SFX or a related set of SFX against which his Drain is effective.  Against those powers, his Drain works normally.  However, it can also be applied to other powers with similar SFX, though much less effectively.  
 
Stop:
 
I want to take a minute to post the reminder that I play 2e, and that Drains worked entirely differently then, and to be honest, I'm not sure I remember how the work in the newer editions, so what I'm saying may not help anything.
 
That being said, a character with Drain: Flight-- wind SFX can use his drain against wind SFX-powered Flight as normal.  Other Flight that ties in to that SFX: say actual wings, for example: not a lot of good against a character who can somehow affect the wind, even if it's only to steal Flight, so in this case, the judgement is that the SFX is related closely enough that the Drain works in this case as well.  He can also use it against other wind-SFX powers, but much less effectively.  He could use it to drain a wind-based RKA, for example, but would ---hold it. 
 
One more note; bear with me:
 
2e doesn't specific "Active points" for Drain (though to be fair, I don't know if later editions do, either), so we don't play it as having to drain Active Points: if you've got enough power modifiers that the whole 60 AP power costs you 10 points, well when 10 points are drained, you don't have that power (at least until it "heals back.")
 
Like everyone else, this mechanics v SFX issue has plagued us since the early days with regard to "adjustment" powers, so we resolved it by allowing Drain to affect powers with similar SFX, but that the Draining character would have to drain Active Points for powers that were not the power specified when the Drain was purchased.
 
 
It's not perfect, per se, but if you make it clear going in, then players don't see to unhappy with the results, and they like the trade-off utility for not being able to Drain, say Flight as powered by rocket boots.
 
At any rate, that's how we've been dealing with it for a few decades.  Works "okay enough" for our purposes.

I'm with Greywind:
 
It would turn off the effect of the power.  That is, the moment you turned it off, he would begin to age.
 
At the "normal" one minute = one minute rate.  When the Drain "healed back," he would stop aging again.
 
Like GB(i!), I have ruled that certain things are innate, simply because it makes dramatic sense.  However, some of these can still be affected by Drains, Suppress, etc---  this is one of those instances where SFX is _important_.  For example: I'm not going to let a Drain: Flight just automatically rob a winged character of his Flight because the mechanics say so.  If the Drain were defined as doing something to the portion of the brain that controls Flight, or turning the air into Jell-O-- something like that?  Okay, sure.  Wing Guy can't fly for a bit.  It's a double-edged sword, though: I'm not going to let him fly if there isn't room to spread his wings, either, even if he didn't opt for the Limitation: Restrainable.
 
To use the Atlantean reference given above:  someone with Drain: Life Support isn't going to automatically deprive another character of his gills.  If, however, this Drain was defined as a cloud of billion teensy bits bits of plastic that are released into the air (or water), then yes: I will without problem let them affect gills (when released into the water) as easily as they might affect lungs (when released into the air).
 
I also know that I'm an odd-man out; there are a lot of people who will rule "it works because there's a mechanic," without regard to how appropriate the interaction may or may not be.  Mileage will vary.
 
 
 

This is a good point.  The 6e books are great as a reference tool - like an encyclopedia set.
 
They are terrible for learning how to play.  750+ pages is just too much material to expect players to read through, much less learn.
 
D&D 5e made a decision to streamline their product and there are now more players than ever - by a lot.
 
I recently skimmed my champions 4e book and it reminded me just how well it balanced crunch vs. readability.

I would call 4e the transition point.  Older editions were much shorter, and were games powered by Hero System, rather than Hero System - build a game with it (moderated a bit by the rules being released with Champions guidance).  The BBB was also the only time I think we had both genre information and character benchmarking guidance in the same product.
 
But 4e was a weighty tome, not a "read in an afternoon" booklet.  1e and 2e were 64 and 80 pages, respectively.  Did we want more?  Sure - and it came in Champions II and III, similar sized volumes of new rules we could add if we desired.  4e was the start of the "everything you need in one (now two) volumes" model.

Naked Advantages cost END because Advantages adjust Active Points which determine END cost. 
Limitations don't alter END cost so I don't see any reason to make a naked buyoff cost END except to screw over people for going that route instead of making a custom "Must have OIF (Visor) or IAF (Glasses), otherwise Eye Beam is Always On" Limitation. 

Thank you for a good idea. I do not have the equipment guide. I may pick up the character pack to get the Hero Designer files, that should cut a lot of time off my prep. Sometimes you need someone to say something obvious for it to occur to you 😛

The Cloud

(With sincere apologies to Fred Hoyle and Gene L. Coon)

From the 1930s, mankind was aware of complex organic chemistry in deep space. From the discovery of methylidyne in 1937, to the confirmation of fullerenes in the century following, it was made clear that organic chemistry was not confined to planetary surfaces.

What mankind did not know was just how complex such chemistry could be.

In dark nebulae, organic molecules cluster inside carbon fullerenes, shielding them from UV radiation and allowing electrical connectivity between self-replicating molecular structures. It is a short trip from there to animation. From animation to intelligence is a longer journey, but it is one the universe attained at least once. What I’m saying is the Rho Ophiuchi Cloud Complex is alive. Not only is it alive, it is intelligent.

Energized by its proximity to several bright stars and churned by the shock front from the Scorpius-Centaurus Association of O- and B-type stars, intelligence arose in the Cloud Complex millions of years ago and in that time, largely sat and thought about things. After a time, on what to some lifeforms would be a Thursday afternoon in late autumn, it hit upon the idea of shaping ambient carbon in its own mass, creating gigantic diamond mirrors and lenses. It used these to view the universe and extend its understanding of itself.

It discovered tiny worlds, strange stars, other dark clouds and on another Thursday just two hundred years ago, life. A mis-jump brought Raymond Nix and his one-man hyper-pod into the nebula. His drive smashed and his life in grave peril, he faced death alone in the dark. Carbon nano-tubes, like soft fingers, ran over his tiny craft, understanding it to be a small self-contained world. Using spectral analysis, it formed a plan. Quickly spinning up a diamond sphere and filling it with free oxygen and other seemingly important gases, it pried open the pod and allowed Raymond Nix a second chance at life. Floating in a diamond bubble 132.5 parsecs from Earth is the last place Nix expected to be. Terrified yet hopeful, he spoke in his characteristic Lupus/Wauwatosa accent (one that always make the listener think you’re from somewhere near Milwaukee), politely requesting what the hell was happening.

More nanotubes extended from the inside surface of the diamond sphere and infiltrated deep into his body. They probed, queried, sent test signals that gave Raymond hallucinations and alien thoughts. Full communication followed, and understanding blossomed. The Cloud requested that Raymond take some portion of itself with him, to let the Cloud explore the universe.

“Your vacuum adapted form won’t survive in a gravity well.” Raymond explained, “You would collapse without a physical form like mine.”

“Not yours.” It spoke, “hers.”

The Cloud probed again and began copying memories and spinning up bones, organs and a functioning human brain. Within a few hours, a perfect copy of Raymond’s dead wife Riley stood in front of him. All of the Cloud’s millions of years of knowledge and observations flooded into the new being. A spark animated the body and she asked simply, “Can we go now?”

At first Raymond resisted, this form was perfect, at least as perfect as he remembered her. Thus, she was an idealized copy, a clone the Cloud designed to tempt him into acceptance.

“I could go without you. Spin up a pod of my own and venture across space for the next few million years.” It threatened, the implication that he would remain here, without hope of escape, for the hours his air supply would last.   

It hit him that this being, the cloud and its tempting avatar had no companionship, nothing to compare itself to, no instances of having to make rational or moral choices. This thing was a monster. A monster that was about to be inflicted upon the universe. It needs a balance.

“We’ll go together.” He stated flatly. Maybe he could prevent disaster.

So next time you’re at some seedy booze-pit on Remmick, or slumming with the Tribals at Collinz-Port, or even drifting through the cybernetic microcosm of the Quantum Jones Very Large Brain at Mercator University on Planet Clarke, and you see a couple laughing at the next table, and one of them looks very like long-lost Raymond Nix, just walk away.  

It seems that the penchant for "creative naming" of children will never go out of style.   

The big thing that HERO does it that it's all about a set of reused building blocks and modifiers.  Once I know what Drain, RKA, Blast, Armor Piercing, AoE, and Autofire do individually, I know what any combination of them do because their meanings don't change.  There's a finite pool of things to learn, and a much smaller pool of things that come up frequently.  Once I know them, I know them. 
Contrast this with things like D&D, where every feat, spell, magic item, and monster ability is a brand new and totally unique thing.  No amount of playing in a cleric-less party will let me the player pick up what cleric spells do.  The instant a new monster comes out, the GM has that many new things to learn and keep track of.  So on and so forth, with each new splat or module pushing the rules larger. 
HERO might seem complex at first (it is) but as soon as you're over the hump, you're a master since it really is all in the core book(s).