Hakkonen

Re: Help me grok HERO! Well, the campaign ended on what I consider a successful note. We covered everything I wanted to cover, and I think my players enjoyed it. An issue came up in the last session, though: does Duplicating and then recombining reduce the duration of a Flash effect, "healing" it as if the Flash were damage? One of my players insisted that it does, but I could not find anything in the book supporting that and was forced to rule against him. The scenario is that the PCs were attacked with a flashbang grenade, which I built as a Flash affecting both sight and hearing; the rolled duration turned out to be 13 segments. One player wanted to be able to reduce that to 2 segments by duplicating and recombining.

Re: The Forgettable Man No. Yes. It works against remote viewing (technological or otherwise, including things like Clairsentience) just as well as against being in the same room with him. Airseal is irrelevant. A sufficiently strong (precise value TBD) Mental Defense could block the effect. See above about remote viewing. I quite like Sean Waters' idea of a Mental Transform that is healed by being in the character's presence. Having dinner with him presents no problems. In the case of the conversation, as soon as he leaves the room you forget that he was ever there, and while you would remember having the conversation, after a few minutes you would no longer remember who you had it with. This is strictly a thought experiment. I don't have a campaign in which to play him.

So, the Star Hero book listed on the main site is described as being for HERO 5E. Has there been any news on the possibility of a new Star Hero book for 6E? How compatible is the current book with 6E?

Re: The Forgettable Man I quite like this idea.

Re: Help me grok HERO! The reason I want to keep the action in Middleton is simple: focus. This is a relief campaign, meant to last no more than four to six sessions. In an open-ended campaign, I'm much more willing to tolerate what I call "sprawl:" the tendency of PCs to wander and explore areas of the world that weren't necessarily detailed ahead of time. I'm pretty good at detailing on the fly, but with a short-form game like this I really need to maintain focus in order to tell the whole story in the time allotted. Hence, Middleton's town limit becomes the line of demarcation between "onstage" and "offstage."

Re: Help me grok HERO! I'm not convinced that superior mobility on an individual scale constitutes an unbeatable strategic advantage, but that's an argument for another thread. I think you're right about the point values. I don't normally like to change parameters, especially chargen parameters, once given, but in this case I'll make an exception.

I like characters with strange superpowers The last supers game I played in was a Marvel Universe RPG where I played a man with a severely limited form of telepathy: no one within ten feet of him could tell a lie. He couldn't control it or turn it off. That was his only power, and it led to some pretty interesting situations. The other day I had an idea for another strange power: the power to be forgotten. He's not invisible; as long as you're looking directly at him, you can see him perfectly clearly... but as soon as you look away, you forget he's there. After a few minutes you've forgotten what he looks and sounds like, and a few minutes after that you've forgotten that he exists at all. How would I build this?

Re: Help me grok HERO! Yeah, that's not at all what Rodger was talking about. This issue has already been clarified, starting with post #33.

Re: Help me grok HERO! 9-10 OCV would be in the "Legendary" range, which I have declared off-limits except by special permission (i.e., you need a damned good reason). I think professional soldiers, particularly front-line combat troops, should have 6 or 7 OCV and DCV; ordinary civilians would have Combat Values of 2 or 3.

Re: Help me grok HERO! There will be no supernatural elements beyond the PCs; this is "supers in the real world." Also, I apologize for not making myself clear before: I'm running this game as a break from running Shadowrun. If it comes to a knock-down, drag-out fight between the PCs and the U.S. military, the military is going to win. I don't know what DC a 2,000lb laser-guided bomb develops, but I'm guessing it's pretty damned high, and those things are cheap as dirt (compared to the cost of crazed superhumans running free).

Re: Help me grok HERO! Not at present, but as we haven't gotten to the crunchy part of chargen, I'm open to suggestions. Attributes are limited to the "Average," "Skilled," and "Competent" columns of the Characteristics Comparison Table (6E1, p. 48). Most likely, the U.S. Government. If they try to be capes, they'll be the targets of a, shall we say, aggressive recruitment drive. If they go bad, the recruiters will become even more aggressive. If they go really bad (mass murder), they'll more likely just be killed out of hand. Tone is not super-grimdark, and with this group I expect there to be humorous moments, but overall I'm aiming for a fairly serious tone. As for the age, I don't know enough to be able to answer that. I suspect they will be mostly "good," with the possibility of a "chaotic neutral" character. The campaign will be set in Middleton, Kansas, a small farming town. I want the action to stay in the town, and have already advised my players that any power that takes them a significant distance away (flight, superspeed, megascale teleportation, extradimensional travel, etc.) will put them "offstage." Honestly, my plans in that direction are very loose. The first gameplay session will be the empowering event and its immediate aftermath. After that, it depends on

Re: Help me grok HERO! I don't think Rodger was going for "psi." Maybe it would help if I clarify the campaign a little. This is a relief campaign from my regular Shadowrun game. The game will not be a typical supers game. It will start with a shared empowering event, and thereafter will be about the world dealing with the sudden appearance of superhumans. The PCs will be the only supers on Earth. Will they choose to reveal themselves, or keep the secret? Will they use their powers at will, sparingly, or not at all? No matter what they choose, I'll try to provide a world that reacts to them realistically.

Re: Help me grok HERO! I didn't say I was unable to say "No," I said I prefer not to. In this case, though, it looks like it's unavoidable. You've all raised excellent arguments against allowing this concept, and I'm going to let Rodger know he needs to come up with another idea.

Re: Help me grok HERO! Is there any way (i.e., any Limitation or combination of Limitations) to make this balanced? As a GM, I dislike giving my players an absolute "No." Maybe restrict it to touch range, and have it take time rather than being a zero-phase action?

Re: Help me grok HERO! OK, so Rodger has gotten back to me about the nature of his "flesh shaping" power, and here's what he has to say: "I kinda like the idea of being able to warp them [targets] in the manner similar to how the creature in The Thing did to itself. And maybe force them into a normal version of something else, like changing someone into a sheep or something." So, what are we looking at?

Re: Help me grok HERO! The term was introduced into the game by Pattie (I'm going to start using names to reduce confusion); it refers to a character with the power to shape flesh, both his own and others'. Rodger wants, as described above, his character to be able to change himself and other living targets into different living things. I think we looked at Shape Shift, but for some reason decided it didn't do quite what Rodger wanted. I'm perfectly willing to entertain the idea that we were wrong, though. I have a couple of questions: 1) If Rodger ends up going with Transform, would he have to buy each level separately, or does each level include the abilities of lower levels; i.e., if Rodger buys 10d6 of Major Transform, would he also be able to use that as 10d6 of Minor or Cosmetic Transform? 2) Shape Shift seems extremely cheap (undervalued), and I want to be sure I'm reading the Shape Shift Summary Table (6E1 p. 277) correctly. To purchase a "classical" Shape Shift, i.e., one in which the user actually changes into another person, being, or object, the base cost would be 8 (Sight Group) + 5 (Hearing Group) + 5 (Touch Group) + 2 (Smell/Taste Group) = 20 points, correct? That's only for a single alternate shape, of course, but the ability to assume a Limited Group of shapes (say, any living thing) is only +5.

Re: Help me grok HERO! Well, chargen day 1 (of at least 2, since one of my players wasn't able to make it) was last Saturday. One of my players wants his character, a "biokineticist," to have a Transform power. Since Transform is one of the "Stop!" powers, what do I need to do or know in order to make sure the end result isn't game-breaking?

Re: Help me grok HERO! I'm not sure what you mean. Do you mean buying the skills as powers? The Powers chapter gives the cost for buying Skills as Powers as being equivalent to the cost of the Skill. Why is 12d6 considered the "standard?" What Defenses would be more appropriate? Interesting. Where can I find more information relating HERO stats to RL constants?

Re: Help me grok HERO! Actually, I bought HERO with a very specific idea for a game I want to run for my group: what if a small group of superhumans suddenly cropped up in the real world? All the PCs (3-6 of them, depending on how many of my players sign on) will have a shared origin, in that they are all from the same small town in Midwestern America, and will experience a shared empowering event. Thereafter, I'm going to try to make the campaign as free-form and player-driven as I can. Will the PCs use their powers at will, sparingly, or not at all? Will they go public, or try to keep the secret? If they go public, how will they react to their sudden global fame, and the targets painted on their backs? That sort of thing.

My copy of 6E1 arrived in the mail the other day. Man, this thing is a whopper. I could beat a man to death with this book! Anyhoo... The way I generally familiarize myself with a new system is to start making characters. Behold my first attempt: Aaron "Apogee" Adair https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AhE9UGQsIOoSdG1tNkFPWTB4ZzU2WnV2UVJzNzVBdWc The concept is an astrophysicist who acquired gravity control and spatial manipulation powers, probably by fooling around with some gravitic doohicky. Amidoinitrite?