esampson

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group...

A little setup is in order first: Deathstar, a class A villain (solo villain who takes on the whole hero group) is an immensely strong brick. Tired of getting pummeled and forced to retreat by heroes who have figured out his abilities and worked out strategies to deal with him he disguises himself as Nuke, a class B villain (villain who teams up with other villains to take on the hero group), a brick who is weaker and nowhere near as skilled but who unleashes kinetic explosions whenever he connects.

His disguise consists of nothing more than copying Nuke's costume and he does not do anything to imitate Nuke's explosive abilities, relying on the heroes to make assumptions that something must have changed with Nuke's abilities. He also dresses up some poor schlub in a suit of armor that looks like the agent/villain Transport, a mutant who frequently shows up with Nuke and certain other villains who possesses the powers of teleportation usable on others at range and in an area of effect, provided the targets are wearing special beacons. As his name implies Transport's responsibility is to get the bad guys to the fight and to get them out of there if things go south. He never engages in combat and his first action upon arrival is basically to hold an action to evacuate the villains if needed. While not always successful (sometimes not all the bad guys would be close enough together for him to evacuate everyone) you can probably well imagine how beloved Transport was by the players and their characters, making the poor schlub in the copied armor a prime target for the players.

So as expected rather than going for the 'big guns' at the start of combat the players make a bee-line for the faux-Transport who is placed into a vulnerable position and just beat the tar out of him. This leaves them open for several rounds to Nuke/Deathstar who immediately clocks the martial artist (who presents his biggest problem because while he has difficulty injuring Deathstar he is capable of doing a great deal to shut him down with blocks, throws, and other such maneuvers). Nuke/Deathstar then pummels several other characters unconscious until only he and Shockwave, another brick with explosive powers, are left standing (Nuke, the real one, is in fact an enemy of Shockwave, both of them having received their abilities from the same process).

So at this point the only person left standing is Shockwave who is normally right on par with Nuke. Shockwave is overconfident and pretty much completely fresh, Nuke/Deathstar has taken several shots, and it hasn't sunk in yet that Nuke doesn't seem to be using his explosive abilities, is exhibiting a lot more skill than previous (the martial artist had been relying on a high DCV to protect him when he went after Transport and was surprised when 'Nuke' hit him), and is throwing around a lot more damage than previous so he's thinking he's in pretty good shape to clean 'Nuke's' clock.

Nuke (looking at Shockwave who is the only one standing): I'm going to wad you up into a little ball and throw you away.

Shockwave: Bring it!

GM: Ok. He's going for a grab.

(Dice are rolled and even before the damage is totalled Shockwave suddenly realises that not only is he taking horrible amounts of damage but that he's going to have pretty much no chance at all of breaking free from such a strong character.)

Shockwave: AUUUGH! I'M BEING WADDED!

The sudden transition was enough to have us laughing for the next five minutes and was quoted by us for years afterwards.

Re: If accused of terrorism and emprisonned into Stronghold

He would promptly escape to the Los Angeles underground where wanted by the government he would survive as a soldier of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find him, maybe you can hire him.

Re: [New Product] Champions Complete

But in what way would you be applying a different ruleset to him? Do you roll hit locations when he's attacked? Pretty typically someone like Agent Coulson is an NPC who still follows all the same rules as the superheroic characters. He just has abilities in the normal human range and the equipment he's armed with tends to be either mundane (such as the automatic pistol) or else the special SHIELD equipment he doesn't understand (being an NPC you don't really have to worry about things like whether he has to spend double points on stats exceeding characteristic maximums since he probably doesn't have any and even if he does you as the GM don't have to balance out the NPC)

Re: [New Product] Champions Complete

Hm. This book will have the full 6E rules' date=' right? So does that include the rules for Heroic characters, which despite the delineation between them and Superheroic, can and do show up in superheroic stories?[/quote']

According to what I've read it seems that it is the full 6E rules, including the rules for heroic campaigns. The 'Heroic' and 'Superheroic' rules tend to be applied more to campaigns than characters. Can you give a better example of what you mean in terms of a heroic character in a superheroic campaign and the rules you would apply to them that don't apply to the superheroes?

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group...

This one is a very, very old quote from one of our games:

"I'm sorry if you find me a bit overbearing, but I get 20 points for it."

Re: [New Product] Champions Complete

Okay' date=' so for a new player, what would be the best starting setup for gaming in the Champions universe? I'm assuming Champions Complete, of course, and Champions Universe and whatever else? What do you recommend?[/quote']

Do you mean a new player with an experienced GM (introducing a new player) or do you mean pretty much everyone playing will be new to the game?

Re: Wealth and Super Heroes

That is the high soceity skill.

 

 

Is he the first there because of his wealth, or is the attack on this party because he is there and the GM wanted to get him there?

It sounds like a convenient way to trigger a Secret Identity Complicaiton, not an effect flowing from him having teh money perk.

 

 

Hero generelly asumes to go from the effect, not the special effect. If your effect is having "numerous small favors" Ultimate Contact from the APG I is propably the way to go. Not the money perk.

You seem to agree that the perk: money itself has no value in a superheroic game, but then go on and try to give it a value that totally different game elements have (Folowers, Skill Bonus). Choosing game elements based on them being named like the special effect you have in mind is most often a bad choice. Instead the hero way is to choose the game effects and built them

 

 

That sounds liky "buying" the contact with character points. Using money is at best a special effect/in game explanation

As for getting a bonus to charm rolls, that is covered by the rules on APG I 26.

 

As an alternative build, Great gifts: 2 4-point skill level w/ all interaction Skills, 8 AP, Extra Time (1 Hour; -3), 2 Real.

The character gifts an NPC and as a result he is viewed more favorably in the near future (this adventure). However, between gifting and the time you can reap the effects a certain amount of time has to pass. Everything "faster" is simply rolling Bribery as Complimentary roll.

 

 

That sounds like the special effect of buying a positive reputation, not a function of the money perk.

Can you find ways to do those effects with characteristics other than wealth? Sure, but that's just part of how the Hero system works. You can also buy Flight with a limitation that you have to remain in contact with a surface or you can buy Running, Clinging, and Swimming with corresponding limitations. Often when you do that the cheaper solution has more limitations (such as the turn mode for flight) but you can still achieve similar basic effects through more than one way.

Re: [New Product] Champions Complete

not super thrilled about this. would rather have a reprint of 6E1 so that i can have a real hardcopy. reading PDFs all the time gets tiring. looks like this will never happen now.

 

also, 'champions core' sounds like a more appropriate name for this version. 'complete' implies everything under the sun which is 6E1 + 6E2 + whatever else.

Just order a 6E1 with a damaged cover. The damage is typically very, very minor. In the case of the one I just ordered there was a very slight bending on the corners, the same thing you get after you've been using you book for a few weeks. "Damaged" in this case seems to be the very literal meaning of "not pristine".

As for it being "complete" it actually sounds as though it is pretty darn complete. Derek says it will have all the optional rules. They are just going to reorganize some things and slim down power descriptions and the like as they did in the basic rules.

Re: [New Product] Champions Complete

Folks' date=' I suspect the goal here was to produce a product [i']adequate for most customers' needs.[/i] Not something that would meet all our wishes and expectations. It's affordable, concise and relatively complete. It doesn't have color pages, doesn't have all the bells and whistles we're accustomed to, but it gets the job done. At this point, we should be thankful for that, imo.

Actually, it's pretty interesting. Almost all the comments that I'm seeing aren't based on what people want for themselves but what they think will make the product better. People talk about color not because they want to look at color pictures but because they think it will make the game more marketable. My own comments aren't based on the fact that I have a problem with all the optional rules or that I find character generation particularly difficult. I've been making characters for years and have used pretty much all the optional rules at one time or another. Instead they are based on what I think would make the game more accessible to new players.

Re: [New Product] Champions Complete

Yes and no. The Superhero Gallery does help out someone who needs to make a character quickly but it still requires quite a few decisions on the part of a newbie (I'm counting around 11 for the Blaster). Even worse some of those decisions include advantages and limitations or powers I probably would not recommend for a completely new player (indirect, force field + deflection). I'm thinking of something much more basic than that.

As an example here's a character template from Eclipse Phase:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]44052[/ATTACH]

Now in this case they don't really leave any room for customization. I would think a few of the skills, especially Knowledge Skills and Professional Skills, could be left generic so the character can chose whatever they want. Likewise if the character is built with a Hunted it is simply "Hunted: More Powerful, NCI, Infrequently". The player can then chose a group to fit in there and come up with their own story why they are being hunted. The end result though is a sheet which can be pretty much photocopied and played right away by someone with almost no knowledge of the game (with some help from the GM).

Re: [New Product] Champions Complete

While it's not as complicated as something like the old BTRC's Time Lords systems Champions is plenty complex, especially in the character creation. That's both good and bad. Good because you can really make fantastically well thought out characters but bad because for someone jumping in it can be really off putting.

Forget that I have to understand this concept of base points to active points to real cost. If I'm going to make an energy projector I have to flip through pages of powers trying to spot the ones I want, then flip through all the advantages doing the same thing an finally flip through all the limitations, repeating the process for the third time. The whole time I'm doing this a lot of the information that I might want (blast, flight, resistant defenses.) are buried among things I more than likely have no interest in (stretching, leaping, swimming, etc.).

Most game systems with any moderate degree of complexity include template characters now. I'm not referring to the balanced starter characters that appear in the book such as Eagle-Eye and Hardpoint but characters who are given more generic names (Dark Detective, Powered Armor) who are more or less complete although there is still some room for new players to personalize by deciding what Professional Skills, Hunteds, Susceptibilities, etc. that they want.

I would also personally vote for chucking out the optional rules (hit locations, bleeding, impairment, etc.) and recommend putting them in a separate book. They're great rules, don't get me wrong. They just add greater complexity to the game and if everyone at the table is playing Champions for the first time you need to reduce that complexity. Where they currently sit many newbie gamemasters might decide to throw them in and try running before they've even learned to walk.

Barring removal I would recommend putting them in a separate section of the rules such as an advanced section that starts out "With a few games under your belt maybe you feel like experimenting with the world, making it darker and grittier. Here's rules that might interest you" or something.

Re: [New Product] Champions Complete

Does that mean Naked Advantage is the exact opposite of Overall Levels?

Re: The Good and Bad about Marvel and DC

re: Warbird to Captain Marvel

Marvel Comics has to have a Captain Marvel character in print every so often in order to protect their trademark. It actually sort of makes sense when you think about it and understand the intent of the law. Trademark is meant to protect an entity (originally a tradesman but now corporations) from having their work ripped off by other entities using their trademark. If you don't use the trademark for a protracted period of time then you lose the right to protection since you are no longer producing anything that needs protecting and the purpose of trademark isn't suppose to be to shut out other people.

That's how Marvel got the trademark on Captain Marvel in the first place. The old Fawcett character had been out of print for so long his trademark was no longer enforceable allowing Marvel to grab it. However because the intent of trademark isn't to allow someone to shut someone else out DC (who purchased the rights to the Captain Marvel character) is allowed to continue using him since he constitutes 'prior art'. They just can't make a new Captain Marvel character.

And before someone thinks that Marvel creating a new 'Captain Marvel' character or renaming an old one (as in this case) is a stinky thing to do and they are just trying to abuse the trademark law to shut out DC, if Marvel were to let their trademark on Captain Marvel lapse they would be in the same situation as DC; they could continue to use whoever the current 'Captain Marvel' was when someone else acquired the trademark but they wouldn't be able to make a new Captain Marvel character should someone at Marvel come up with a really good idea for one.

And now, Ob DC Bad so I'm not totally off topic:

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Re: [New Product] Champions Complete

And here I just received my copies of Hero System Volumes 1 (damaged cover) and 2 in the mail.

Not that I'm unhappy to hear about this or anything*. I actually purchased the books for my son and his group because I use to play Champions when I was his age. I was torn between buying the two volume and the basic rules because I was a bit worried about that the size of the two volume rules would be a little off putting (as well as concerns about how his friends would afford the rules). The two volume ultimately won out because I liked how a lot of the powers had examples and because I'm a completist.

I think for people just getting into the game the thinner format will be much more accessible (Hey, when I first got into it it was something like 80 some odd pages). The fact that they won't have to sort through so many optional rules that aren't used in most Champions games (bleeding, hit locations, str mins, etc.) should definitely help the learning curve.

I'm really sorry to hear that the two volume ruleset is going out of print, however. I was playing Champions when Espionage was first released and I realized right at that point that the ruleset could be tweaked around for so much more than superheroes (I made a modified ruleset that was a lot like Fantasy Hero before it was first released) and ran a great campaign for a couple of years that was a superhero campaign but which did include lots of things such as hit locations, bleeding, an altered strength chart to reduce lifting, strength mins for lots of weapons an the ability for characters to purchase 'normal' equipment with money instead of character points (guns, swords, body armor, etc.). Definitely not a four color campaign but it worked really well for us.

I wish it were possible to have both the combined Champions Complete rules (as well as Fantasy Hero Complete, Star Hero Complete, etc.) to get people up an running with a single book and then a two volume "master set" of rules so that people could pull options into their game without it feeling quite so "cross genre". Additionally a master set like that might help keep the various Hero editions from drifting apart like they originally did.

However I understand all the problems with production runs and having to store slower moving material so I realize that such business decisions have to be made as taking the two volume ruleset out of print. The only thing I wonder is if it might not be possible to make a deal with some print on demand company so that it would still remain possible for people to order hard cover bound books (albeit the price would probably be something like $60 for volume 1 of the two volume set). Obviously people who purchase the PDF could locate a POD company themselves and do so but the ability to do it straight through the website would make it a much more user friendly operation.

*Packed in with the two books I ordered was a free Arcane Adversaries that I didn't order with a little Post-it making it clear it was a gift. I'm guessing this was to help ease the sting that some might have felt finding out that a week after they ordered their books they were going to go out of print and a new, cheaper book was being published. Even without the gift I am very happy with my purchase since I see real value in the two volume set in addition to the new book that is coming but I have to applaud you for your customer service on this. Thank you for thinking of us rather than simply sending off the orders and hoping people won't be too upset.