Grailknight

Bion would just watch the parade, and he'd tell the rest of the team and any other heroes to just watch also. CLOWN wants attention more than anything, so unless they blow their MO and start something with the citizenry, just don't give it to them.

If you have access to 4th or 5th, the rules for Negative Characteristics are very complete.

Some of the courts are ... distinctive but others are pretty nice. The red ones should all go into the woodchipper as soon as their team is eliminated though. NBA debuts In-Season Tournament courts for all 30 teams | NBA.com

Which is exactly what Striking Appearance is.

Hero is not overly complicated. It is overly frontloaded.

While I agree with on one level, I do see an inconsistency in your stance. Yes, COM and Striking Appearance are both attempts to place a mechanical value on a subjective value, but that doesn't mean either should be free. By the nature of HERO, spending points on either means that you should get some value from them and that does affect GM agency. I think that NPC who varies from the general consensus is better represented as one with a Psychological Limitation- Likes/Dislikes COM/Striking Appearance of SFX X though. This can vary from a 0-point quirk to a 25-point murderous hatred and fits perfectly in the rules. It's an extra step but it perfectly restores GM agency for that NPC while allowing the PC the general benefit of his spent points. And there are several mechanics that affect the way that NPCs react to a character. Mind Control is the most absolute and the scale descends to Mental Illusions then Images/Shape Shift and finally to PRE and PRE-based skills which is where COM/Striking Appearance enters the discussion. But note that there is always GM agency involved here, it just comes at character generation for both PCs and NPCs. If it best fits your GM preferences for your game, you are perfectly justified in not allowing it. And if you do allow it, then you are perfectly within your rights to create NPCs that have qualities that negate the effects of a particular powerset. That can be Mental Defense/EGO, increased PER, high PRE or conflicting Psychological Limitations. This way your PC has their general desire, but you retain your GM freedom.

I'll ask him at lunch tomorrow.

I know at least one Clippers fan.

Wilson's contract is hard to deal with because of salary cap rules, so they're stuck with him. But while there's no limit on a coach's pay, Payton's 18-million-dollar salary also doesn't restrict team spending in any way. It's not a small amount but they can move on from him without it affecting team spending in any appreciable way.

That would allow you to use an attack and then switch to defenses though. That's one the single change is there to prevent.

That's just teleport with an SFX and a Limitation. I doubt the Shadow Clones will leave LOS. Like I said, incredibly expensive but I think it covers what he wants. Sometimes HERO is like that. Thank you, I had a mental block that kept me from recalling that one.

I think I've figured a way to do this, but it's really complicated and expensive. Zed chould buy all the Powers that the Shadow Clones will have access to first. Then buy Auto-fire and Indirect on all of them as Naked Advantages and add a Custom Limitation based off Retrainable to allow for them being destructible and perhaps an Extra Time to manifest them. I think that covers everything, but I wouldn't want to have to write this up. Or with GM permission, he could make use of the 5-point doubling rule to make copies of a Multipower bought through a Focus and just have them be Fragile.

It's a matter of campaign utility. If none of the other PC's have Enraged/Berserk, then just used the guidelines for Emotions only. If, however your group has one or more members that constantly go out of control, the utility greatly increases, and I'd knock -1/4 off the Limitation. It's still a Limited power but it's no longer niche.

Cellular is for fooling things like DNA scanners or blood tests not changing appearance. You'd need Sight for sure and if there's going to be close interaction, you'd add Touch, Hearing and Smell/Taste.

Nah, you can only accelerate to 25 on your first movement from 0. You'd need to add Noncombat Acceleration to cover the distance in two moves.

Who's using it and on whom?

I'm scared of your campaign. Just how did they beat him?

Hugh covers most of it very well. Here's some other options. Just like Aid isn't permanent, neither is Drain. Buy an Aid with a Fade Rate equal to that of the Drain and limit it to Healing Drained abilities only. If that's too much, buy Power Defense with a Custom Limitation that makes it work similarly to Delayed Effect/Damage over Time. The defenses kick in over time.

I'm just saying that you should give your VPP a SFX and then make all powers therein conform to that SFX. I tend to be a restrictive GM because I've seen what happens in HERO with a group of players that were all engineers and programmers. How you want to do AVAD's is on you.

It's only abusive if you allow that Magic Fire to trigger Vulnerabilities and Susceptibilities to fire. If it only affects magic limitations, then there's no issue. The hardest and most important thing for a GM is to learn when to say "NO" in a consistent and fair manner. Reward creativity but not gamesmanship. By the way, 6th does say that any character should have no more than one type of AVLD, but the writer then proceeds to violate that repeatedly in the villain books.

Many powers are OP on villains. Trying to make a PC within the campaign guidelines using that power will show its flaws.

No, if your SFX when you design the VPP is magic or cosmic energy or nanite technology then that's what it is. It may look like something else but that's purely cosmetic. If you want to be able to change your SFX buy the Cosmic Advantage on your VPP or buy Variable SFX on individual powers. The ability to alter SFX varies from niche to instant win. It's a powerful ability and shouldn't be given for free with VPP's.

Actually, the part you're all ignoring is the Limitation to make Damage Negation only affect Normal damage and AVAD's. That makes it ineffective against all Drains and KA's. There are already rules to limit effectiveness in RAW. . Damage Negation versus AVAD's is merely an all-inclusive method to not take full STUN from them. And it's still restricted to matching damage type, (Physical, Energy or Mental) so it has to be purchased for each category. Yes, if you invest in all three types you can mitigate all AVAD's, (There's no such thing as a damaging power that doesn't fall into one of them no matter how convoluted you twist the SFX.) but the cost is high. Using Damage Negation as a character's main defense takes a larger points investment than any other method by percentage. I've never seen a PC use it for anything other than being able to shrug off attacks that share their SFX.

It'll be extremely difficult for that villain to ever regain the respect lost. He'll always be that guy we beat when where just beginners, playing catch up to the PC's rather than the major player he was intended to be.

There are times when these come into play such as when you want to create a ravening monster or a loyal slave. I usually handle these by requiring both a Physical and Mental Transform. If you're using Damage Negation as your main defense, it's actually pretty expensive in a Supers game because you have to protect versus both physical and energy-based attacks. And Damage Negation can be pretty risky when that boss or mastermind shows up with attacks 4-6 DC's beyond what you're immune to especially against KA's. Damage Negation takes away dice before they are rolled. For example, a 12 DC Blast against 4 DC Damage Negation would only roll 8 dice.