Cinniuint

Thought of this while reading about Devachan spells. A magical light that illuminates an area so that it can be sensed magically. This illumination would penetrate darkness and allow objects so illy mined to be somehow perceived through that same darkness. It might also illuminate invisible and immaterial objects and entities, revealing them to easy perception. The light would not penetrate walls, so things beyond a wall would not be so illuminated, but things in the room where the light is generated would be perceivable to entities out side the room. So, the light itself is an AOE transform that transforms all objects to make them have an indirect transform that causes all entities in range to have an N-ray targeting discriminatory perception of those objects. Not the way I think the power should be written up, but I hope it coneys how I think it should function. Two easier builds are just to illuminate with magical or mental energy so that the area can be perceived clearly by anyone nearby with sense magic or mental awareness. Those forms would be shut down by the appropriate darknesses, but none should be affected by sight group darkness.

My early core group liked disads. Peripheral players and everyone since hated them. Have played with various solutions to the problem in my mind, and I do like the HAP idea. Never actually tried anything. I also very much like the Amber Diceless idea of player contributions. Get points for helping the game somehow. Hosting the game, keeping a campaign log, drawing maps to GM specification, and my personal favorite: keeping a character diary. Character points for things not truly in the game. And most groups have that one player who has no time for homework because they have a good job. They often find the simplest contribution is buying munchies for each game session. I would like to see these in hero system. A diary might be worth 20-25 points, and if the player didn't make an entry for this session (of in game or out of game events in the character's life) then they get that many points of unluck for this session.

IMO, it is not that difficult to switch to 6th. Yes, it is the biggest change to the system ever (unless you count Fuzion, which I don't), but mostly everything is still there, just tweaked slightly. No figured characteristics is the big change, but the only difficult change is that some things have new names, making it difficult to look them up. The converting to 6th Ed. section covers some of this, logic and the appendix can help with the rest.

I like the idea of a visible limb. A tongue that grabs and pulls characters through the gate.

Re: Limitations and SFX The focus without the focus limitation was the exact example I was thinking of when I asked the question. A character with an attack and some other powers that were granted by a sword that would appear in his hand whenever he wanted. I wasn't thinking about it, but I have also used the fake focus trick, or the focus is real, but only applies an advantage to a native power. What I was hoping for, was some other apparent limitations that really aren't. The fear of water is close to what I was thinking of, although it is a pretended complication. Reminds me of a blind character I made some years ago. The character took a 5 point physical limitation, in that he couldn't read text or pictures on a page, or perceive colors. And an unusual looks complication in that he had no eyes, or even eye sockets (birth defect). But the character was a telekinetic with telekinetic feedback. He had the sense of touch usable at range. And since the TK had indirect, he also had N-ray on his tactile sense. Come to think of it, that character had misdirection going too. He used several pounds of iron filings in a cloud around him, which allowed him to use his force field against energy attacks, and hid his very distinctive face. It also helped him to pretend that he could only use his TK on ferrous objects.

Re: Chronicles of Amber abilities

Re: Chronicles of Amber abilities

Re: Chronicles of Amber abilities A very good point. Also, a good description of what trumps can do. The either direction teleport seems problematic in Hero, good solution. But what about Trump Artistry? How do you write up that ability? It occurs to me that the main problem here is that Amber has just truly ridiculous power levels. Many characters have the ability to destroy whole planes of existence.

Re: Limitations and SFX Setting aside the coin issue, does anyone have any other interesting uses of fx to mimic limitations without taking limitations?

Re: Chronicles of Amber abilities Got to get to bed, but: I do have 2nd book, but didn't want to muddle the issues. Was unaware of fan rules, will look up. I have played in half a dozen or a dozen campaigns, and I see no insurmountable problems. However; each campaign collapsed pretty quickly, leaving me wondering what the problem I don't see is. Some great responses here, thanks. Will rep later.

Re: Limitations and SFX Wow. Tired. Read that post wrong. Still, the standard rules do allow a location to be a portable object, a person, an airline seat. So a character could teleport to a location, floating or fixed, that he has never been to. If the location is a character, even then the location could be kidnapped and placed in a trap. I fear that the location discussion is going to take over the fx vs focus discussion.

Re: Limitations and SFX No, it couldn't. At least, not if the character paid 5 points for the coin. Then the coin is not a focus, just fx.

I was reading an old thread talking about using a focus for a teleport location, and found an important point that I felt was overlooked. This thread is a spinoff of that thread, originally posted by Samuraiko. The issue was that her gamemaster felt that using a coin, for example, as a fixed location to be given out to characters to allow the PC to teleport to them when needed was inherently a floating rather than a fixed location. I feel that this is more a matter of how the player and GM choose to interpret the matter, but I respect the GM's position even though I don't quite agree with it. The thread can be found here:http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php/46225-The-Use-of-a-Focus-for-Teleportation The notion was that the above mentioned coin was a special effect, not a focus, and the location, as very easily changeable, was by its very nature a floating location, even though it was on a fixed object. My observation is this: The rules say "a limitation that isn't a limitation isn't worth any points." By the same token, a limitation that is not allowed to take a limitation, is not limiting. In this example, the character takes Floating Location: coin, and gives the coin to a team mate so that when they call her on the cell phone (or whatever) and say "HELP!", she can teleport directly to them. OK, fine. But, if the character did not get to take a focus limitation, then the coin cannot be taken from the recipient and set into a trap. Similarly, I have seen a character take an HKA with the SFX sword, but no focus. The character needed the sword for the RKA, but if it was dropped or grabbed or still in his scabbard, he need only a passing thought to return it to his hand. It could not be taken. I should also note that the previous discussion was mostly focused on fixed vs. floating, was in 5er, and the focus aspect was so largely ignored that I am not sure that level of focus, OAF-IIF was ever addressed. Doesn't matter. What I want to address here is limitation vs. SFX and the fun confusion that can be created by using the one to create the illusion of the other.

For those who have not read the series or played the RPG (that's Role Playing Game, not Rocket Propelled Grenade), Amber is one pole of a multiverse of shadows stretching between two poles of reality. The books, 2 series of 5 each, and a few short stories, were created and written by Roger Zelazny who also had some input into the RPG. The game was created and written by Erick Wujcik, and published by Phage Press. PCs and the main characters of the books, were from one of the two poles of reality (usually Amber) and had the ability to travel in the shadows between from one universe to another, to any universe that they could imagine. Or perhaps they created the universe as they traveled to it, opinions, even among the travelers, vary. The abilities described in the game and books are briefly outlined here: Pattern Imprint: Those of the blood of Amber may attempt to walk the Pattern, a mystical maze of great power. If they successfully reach its center (a matter of physical effort, not tracking. The pattern is flat and has no branches in its twisting and turning path, just great resistance to those who would walk it) then they have successfully attuned themselves to it, and will have attained the ability to walk in shadow. Also the center of the Pattern is point from which one may teleport to any spot you can define. There are lots of little side abilities, but the ability to walk in shadow is primary, and almost indispensible to a PC. Shapeshift: Includes not just the basics, but the ability to copy characters including their abilities, as well. If the subject has a stronger psyche, then the character may lose himself until the copy relaxes its guard. More dangerous than the other powers, and more commonly practiced by characters from the opposite end of the multiverse from Amber, The Courts of Chaos. Logrus Mastery: As the Pattern in Amber is the pole of Order in the Multiverse, the Logrus is the pole of chaos, and is located in the Courts of Chaos. To navigate it successfully is even more difficult than to navigate the Pattern, but is open to more people. As the avatar of Chaos, it cannot be navigated by a fixed creature, but requires a shapeshifter to have any hope of surviving it. Logrus masters tend to navigate shadow more by sending out Logrus tendrils into shadow, seeking what they desire. When they have found it, they either pull it to them or themselves to it. Logrus tendrils can also be used as extra limbs with EDM and scads of stretching with a STR equal to the psyche (EGO?) of the character. The tendrils tend to get painfully disrupted if they touch anything charged with pattern. Trump Artistry: The ability to draw quick sketches and serious works of art which allow anyone concentrating on them to open a psychic link with the subject. If the subject is a person, that person may choose to accept or decline contact, without knowing whom it is attempting to make contact. If they accept, they are in psychic and visual contact. They may converse or do psychic battle and they may choose to use the link as a gate, allowing either one to travel to the other. Physical battle without travel is also, just, possible. If the subject is a place, then the viewer may travel to the place, and might possibly observe it without first making the trip. Sketches are quick, fragile, and have a greater likely hood of missing their target, contact a close shadow in a nearby universe instead of their intended target. Close enough, and it might be sometime before the error is discovered. Depending on needs, the error might not even matter. Full trumps take longer to make, are indestructible, and are more likely to be accurate. A sketch or trump does not require having met the subject, but does require a sense of the psyche of the subject. In the books, Brand, who himself had arguably the strongest psyche of any of the characters in his generation, constructed a trump of Martin whom he had never met, after casually interviewing characters who had met Martin. Sorcery: The ability to create spells with a wide array of effects, to be triggered by defining a few key variables at time of need. The fewer variables left to be defined at release, the less time it takes to release a spell. Spells decay over time and have to be maintained. An active sorcerer might maintain as many as a dozen spells active, and must have something to store them in while they await his need. the Logrus can act as a place to hang spells for storage. Or the character can just wait until he needs a spell and cast it specifically at need. He better not be in a hurry though. Casting a spell takes hours. refreshing a spell takes less time, but to maintain a full suite of spells handy, a sorcerer can expect to spend an hour to several hours each day keeping his spells updated. The RPG also defines a few other abilities less clearly defined in the books. Power words: A few words that the character knows that have a minor but definite magical effect. Figure 5-20 active points. The one example I recall from the books was a hotfoot word, which was strengthened by speaking it in conjunction with the target's true name. It was powerful enough to irritate the target. Conjuration: The ability to conjure objects, even powerful objects, out of nothing, or imbue existing objects with new abilities. Unfortunately, all of the above are more complex and have more abilities than I have described here, and more advanced forms with more abilities yet. Some are relatively simple to build in Hero System, some may not be possible. I would like to start with a middling difficult one: Trump Artistry. It may be appropriate to have a separate thread for each ability. I looked this up and found it referenced in a thread back in 2006 by Samuraiko. I read that thread through, and this was only lightly touched on. This thread should not be construed as a spinoff of that thread.

Re: Cursor Transform air into (+1) Improved Results: Anything. 30 points per 1d6. Simple solution already in the rules. I had a Fantasy Hero wizard with this. He generally just used it for tools and snacks. Most of the time he had the real beverage that all other beverages are shadows of as in Plato's perfect objects discussion. A dark, slightly bubbling beverage in a bottle with red and white lettering an stripe is, it turns out, the Real Thing. "One advantage to being a wizard is that you can have pretty much anything you want, when you want it." I don't recall the name of the wizard, but I think he was speaking to Travis Morgan in Mike Grell's *Warlord* comic.

Re: Duplication Hijinks Will start play with many duplicates created. They will mostly be busy holding down secret IDs scattered throughout the English speaking world. Should be very rare that I have more than 4 existing forms to draw into an adventure, and very rare that I create more than four dupes during the course of the adventure. The character will also have two hero identities, stolen from an earlier character: Doppleganger, a male shapeshifter who can take any human form, and Weress, a female with one level growth, one level D.I. And the ability to take on werewolf shape with 2d6 HKA claws. Both characters actually have an identical power suite, of course. The original Weress & Doppleganger had only 4 forms max. Have built a number of characters that risked becoming the focus of the campaign, or of stealing every scene. My last one had an uncontrollable multiform with 32 forms and Multiple Personality Disorder. Was very careful with that one, and quizzed the other players regularly to make sure no one felt crowded out. Everyone really liked the character, and was disappointed when I played something else. I think that the secret of the success of the character was that it was entertaining, and also usually a combat wimp. I expect this character to be combat weak, but not so much so. Also less entertaining and scene stealing, but with even greater out of combat utility.

Re: Duplication Hijinks Actually, the character concept disallows both rapid and ranged duplication. It takes six hours to make a duplicate, and the duplicate has to split off from an already existing duplicate, not out of thin air. Easy and rapid recombination are possible because all that needs to recombine is the mind, and that can happen through Mind Link.

Re: How do you feel about House Rules? Actually, "Con Stunned" replaces a game specific term, not the mechanic, which it leaves untouched. Important distinction, albeit bringing it up is a bit on the pedantic side. Still, I think that making up game terms is a time honored tradition. In Magic: the Gathering, "target player puts cards from the top of his library into his graveyard" is called Milling in honor of the first card with that ability, Millstone. Gary Larson cartoon: Caveman, pointing to the spiked tail on a drawing of a Stegosaurus: "This end is called the Thagomizer, in honor of the late Thag Simmons." Past my bedtime. My computer insists that I keep spelling "honor" wrong, but I can't figure it out. Usually, I can either see that the computer is right, or it isn't. But it is rarely wrong with such a basic word. Oh well...

Re: Duplication Hijinks I am still interested in opinions regarding no base form duplication. Is having each dupe pay for the cost of dupoication enough, or do I need some adder or advantage?

Re: Duplication Hijinks The limitation comes from the fact that it must be organic matter, at least, that is consumed to gain mass. When in captivity, getting enough to eat to make full size dupe could be difficult to impossible. In the ocean, it would be easy. Since this character cannot turn into the Blob, and simply absorb organic matter at high speed, it creates time delays. In an urban environment, it might also be difficult to find cheap biomass that isn't impolitic to consume(Sorry about your rosebushes!). I estimate 800 BigMacs to create one full size dupe, or achieve one level of growth or density increase. Well.. maybe less. Water might do for a good portion of the weight. And water, at least, can be absorbed and used very quickly. For shrinking (with shapeshift) Just sloughing off excess mass allows for a fairly quick change. The problem here is the excess mass can be something of an embarrassment. As the character is rich, I don't really expect the cost of food to be an issue. But the character will have to spend hours creating a duplicate, and will have to spend hours eating to gain the mass to do so. Several levels of shrinking means that the character will need hours of eating to turn off each level of shrinking. Perhaps I could define it as gestures and incantations, continuous while activating power with time delay. Will have to look it up, but that seems like the answer to me.

Re: How do you feel about House Rules? On the subject of Con-stunned: Been playing off and on since 1983ish. Never heard the term before that I recall. Cool expression. Will try introducing it soon. Also: if you don't like terms that are not in the rules, don't use terms like RAW, which is not in the rules. Same thing. Well, okay, almost the same thing. In language, rule books and dictionaries do not determine what is correct. (Although, admittedly, most dictionaries besides the Oxford English Dictionary, are prescriptive dictionaries and try to do exactly that.) Usage determines what is correct. I am speaking as a Linguist, and claim the title based on a mere two college courses, so probably do not deserve the title. On house rules. Most house rules arise from one of two circumstances. I don't know the rule, and don't want to take the time to look it up, so I will make it up. This rule is best only kept only until the actual rule is found (often exactly the same). The second kind is: I want to do something not allowed by the rules. This rule is often best disallowed, because the rules are there for a reason. As I type, a third common house rule variety comes to mind. This rule is too awkward to keep using. This rule is also quite common, and generally best held onto. Please note that the first of these rules is, or at least should be, temporary. The second and third apply more to other game systems than they do to Hero System and especially Champions. This is because Hero System is effect based, not class based, and allows for much greater creativity in character creation, and because Champions is at a higher power level than most game systems, allowing for character concepts that would be overpowered in most other systems. So, within the restriction of Champions, I mostly agree with Tasha. House rules are an unnecessary annoyance. That said, let me share a 3rd Ed. house rule from a campaign called "Le Club Immortale". 30 Points: Immortality. The character cannot die. Except by some means defined when the power is bought, if a character would die, instead that character does not die. The character still takes damage, gets knocked unconscious, cut apart, blown to atoms, whatever, but does not die as a result. Bear in mind that, as I recall, resurrection did not exist in the rules at that time. I have kept it as an option in subsequent campaigns mostly due to a personal obsession with immortality, It has also just occured to me that, while I have only 61 posts, counting this one, that I am quite long-winded. If ratings were based on number of words posted, I would be higher ranked. But, I must say, I can find no fault with a system that rewards brevity.

Re: Duplication Hijinks Since the character will be maintaining many, many scattered identities, I really think that Duplication, rather than Summon is the way to go here. I hope to usually rely on recombining before death, creating the appearance of death with the left behind body. Starting character lacks either the regen/death option or the house rule option that follows: Immortality: 30 points. The character cannot die except (exception). In the character's case, that would mean that the character could only die if all of the characters bodies were killed, or individual dupes could be killed if first mentally secluded. (Mind link severed somehow) I would also like to hear comment on the 'conservation of mass' limitation. I have combined this limitation with the time delay limitation, which seems a little like taking the same or similar limitations twice.

Re: Duplication Hijinks This thread should be deleted.

Re: Duplication Hijinks I posted this in rules questions area as well, to get an answer to the "no base character" portion of the question, and to invite comment on my use or abuse of other rules. Because I phrased it the same way there, it got moved here.

Am trying to build a character with duplication, and no base character. (or all the duplicates are base characters) What I mean is that any duplicate can recombine with any other, not just with the base character. Naturally, all the duplicates are identical. The logical way to handle this, IMHO, is to make all the duplicates pay for the duplication. Unfortunately, the rulebook suggests they do that anyway. I am currently just ignoring that particular problem. I have also purchased, easy, ranged, invisible fx recombination, based on EGO and mind link for all the duplicates. So a duplicate can choose to recombine at a distance, leaving a dead body behind. Creating a duplicate is much more time consuming. Takes six hours to make a duplicate, and the process requires conservation of mass, so the character needs to eat a LOT, or make a very small duplicate. I have set Conservation of Mass at -1/2 for shrinking and -2 for Growth and Density Increase. I would be interested in any feedback people might want to give on these points. The character is a shapeshifter.