The Hyborian

Re: Yet Another "Name This Character" thread. Very interesting. . . Can you give me roughly how to pronounce "Xolotl". Thanks, The Hyborian

Re: Yet Another "Name This Character" thread. Looks like the leading candidate so far is "Cobalt". Anyone else want a crack at it? PS. Yes this is a shameless bump to keep this on the front page another day. The Hyborian

Re: Unarchetypal Heroes Well, I dont want to end up sounding like some kind of powergamer here, I really am not. I truely enjoy gaming with significant non-combat elements. But It can be hard to find gamers for regular groups at all sometimes, let alone poeple who are willing to sit through a four hour session that doesn't have a action sequence or two. Most people who play the fantasy genre expect some combat/action because it part of the genre. If you read a Conan story and no one drew a sword, threw a punch, or stole something you probably would be pretty dissapointed. A "Combat Optional" campaign is going to cost you players. And, it doesn't answer the question of what happens when your back is to the wall and violence does break out. Not every character has to be focused on conlfict, but again its part of the genre that physical conflict will erupt from time to time. If the group as a whole is unable to deal with physical threats then its difficult to feel heroic. I suppose that you could just say that your playing a different genre than traditional fantasy, but your need special and talented players to pull this off. Its going to be hard to find players for a "horror" game, for instance, where the characters run like hell most of the time and have almost no chance of defeating the menace. Im not saying you wouldn't enjoy it. Im not even saying "I" wouldn't enjoy it with the right group of people. But its going to be a hard sell to the general gaming community, and would require some unorthodox storytelling. I also dont want to give the impression that I am against original or non-standard characters. I rather lilke them in fact. But the characters have to be able to function within the genre and campagin setting. If your going to play in/GM lets say a Champions campaign based on the Avengers, i.e heros live in a big mansion and fight supervillians, and one of your players makes a character who's mutant power is to turn purple and pull grapefruit out of his armpits, you have a problem. Unless Baron von Badguy, leader of the villians, happens to have a vulnerability to fruit based attacks, the character really cant participate in the "fight supervillians" part of the campaign. So, I guess I am just saying that you have to work within the expectations of your campaign when you create characters, and if I was invited to play in a fantasy campagin I would create a combat capable character of some kind, unless the GM first explained that the campaign would not include combat. And if that was the case, then I would need some information about the focus of the campaign, so I could make a charcter that would mesh with whatever we were going to do. A vatgrown cyberninja would be just as out of place in a noncombat campagin as Captain Grapefruit above would be out of place in a standard supers campaign.

Re: Question about "DANGER SENSE DODGING" Oh come now my good man. It sounds like you want to punish people for originality. I would have no problem with a GM saying "this power is unbalancing, so no." Or "I think this is stretching the rules, so no." OR even "thinking through the result of this power, it doesn't match the concept you described, so no". But to say no to a power because its not the kind of thing a classical Martial Artists/Brick/Metalist/ what-have-you would take is really class based thinking. The joy of Hero is that it is totally open ended. Now, Im not saying that I would approve the power that the original poster was asking about; that depends on a great many factors. But I would never say, "sorry, your not a brick, you can have defenses that high". Instead I would be happy that I had creative players.

Re: Question about "DANGER SENSE DODGING" Hummmmm. It may infringe, but is that a reason to disallow it? My own feelings would be that you cant make a call on this unless you have information on the campaign as a whole. IF, IF this makes the character significantly more powerful/effective in combat than the other characters, then you can say "this is unbalancing, so you can't do this". BUT, if the only objection is that power "infringes" on another class/archtype then I would allow the power. One of the things I love about hero is there are no predefined roles, no character classes. Who says the strongman cant be really hard to hit? Who says a speedster can't be tough? If you want to play some kind of fusion/crossover from the traditonal design concepts more power to you. I would only stop it if the result was overpowered, and thus unfair to the other characters. The Hyborian

He all, Have been working on a 350 pt champs guy just for fun, no specific game in mind. He is done execpt for a good name. I wont spend the time typing out the character competely, but here is a thumbnail: His is big, cobalt blue, and bald, with crytaline skin. (A mutant). He is faster and tougher than a normal person (although only in the moderate range as supers go) and has low end superhuman strength (pick up a car, not a buidling). His powers focus on an EC defined as "bio-electrical generation", which includes a force field, and area affect flash and stun drain, a dammage shield, and flight. His skills include some martial arts training (Judo/Akido style, focus on blocks/grab/throw) His combat roll will be hand to hand and short range utility powers. He has a good deal of academics skills (he is an archeologist/anthropologist specializing in Meso-American cultures.) He speaks Spanish well, but is not hispanic himself. He is in his Mid thirites, and his powers only recently manifested. He has a forcefull personality (high Pre) and is a effective speaker (Converstaion, Persuasion). Enemies include Demon, and he is watched by the US government, mostly for Blogging about radical left wing politics and advocating theories about how metahumans will eventually take over leadership of society. So, I feel that I have a well rounded character here with an effective combat role, significant non-comabt skills, and some story hooks for a GM to work with. (Public ID, media involvment, controversial ideas on his websight) I just need a freakin' name. Rep for whoever suggests a good one (I have plenty to spare). The Hyborian

Re: Unarchetypal Heroes Not to criticize anyone's campagin, but you guys must be HARDCORE roleplayers. I say that with both envy and touch of fear in my voice. I like to see players with dedication to avoiding cookie cutter characters, but what keeps them all from dying a horrible death the first time they get in a tavern brawl, much less take on a genuine "monster". If your campaign is almost entirely role playing opportunites, ok, have fun. But what do you do with characters that are ineffective in the name of originality/role play. You have a fighter without fighting skill, a scholar (possibly useful character, depending on what they know, but again it sounds like a noncombat character) and lounge singer. Dont they all die the first time a 50 pt. goblin with a shortbow shows up? Physcial conflict is a standard genre element in most fantasy stories and games. Your characters sound well adapted for lifting heavy things, knowing obsure information, and social situations, but how do they make it through the action sequences?

Re: Crazy Idea to Remove the Math A couple of years ago I played in an Abberant campaign (The White Wolf superhero system). I remember discussing the Hero system once with the GM, and he said something like "I tried it once, you needed sliderule to play". Honestly, I really didnt find Hero any more difficult,at least in gameplay,than the Storyteller System. But I think its quite correct that what freak people out is the fact that there are numbers over 20 and you have to be able to add fractions. I personally have always been of the opinion that anyone who cant add fractions, multiply and divide should go back to remedial junior high math. I mean, what good is taking the 25 point social limitation Gamer Geek if you dont spend at least a few of those points in Int. But, non the less, I think this is way d20 and Storyteller are the most popular systems and hero is something of a niche game. Which brings up a interesting question, Do you think there are more Hero gamers than GURPS gamers, as GURPS is the other major "universal" system? Just wondering The Hyborian.

Re: Fantasy Campaign Guidlines: Please comment (stupidly long) Hummmm, I like x3 stun multiplier idea. Less dice rolls= good thing. Thanks for the suggestion. And I see what you mean about the limited class of powers limitation, there is some possible abuse there. Will make it mandatory at +0 on mp, leave it as is on VPP.

Re: Fantasy Campaign Guidlines: Please comment (stupidly long) Mr. R- Thanks for the feedback. My thoughts on Heirloom item: The Independant limitation is supposed to be the vehicle for creating magic items that are not strictly linked to the character. A wizard's staff is might be a focus, if its broken or lost the wizard can enchant a new one with some time, expense, and materials. But if a warrior character looses his magic sword they are not going to be able to go back to th keep, spend a week in the blacksmiths shop, and walk out with a new one. If its lost its lost. The compensation for this for the player is that Independant items are darned cheap. It allows a character for a modest point investment to start the game with a fairly powerful magical attack (or defense, or utility power), which is ok with me. I see the campaign as high level to epic fantasy, the characters are larger than life heroes who do things normal people cant dream of doing. Yes, there is the chance to loose the points, but if you want to be able to actually make magical swords you have to pay for the more expensive Magic Weilder perk, and buy the sword with a lesser limitation, thus making it more expensive. It gives the players a choice: cheap or secure. If the possibility of loosing the points bothers you then you should chose the secure option. FiregOlem - thanks to you as well for the feedback. My reason for avoiding hit locations was speed of combat and maintaining a cinimatic feel. Im not a hard core "simulationist" gamer. I dont need to know exactly where the blow landed, how much dammage was soaked by armor vs, natural pd, the chance of contracting infection and how to modifiy it by weapon type and climate, etc. I like to focus on story and keep the action sequences fast paced. Its not that I dont like action sequences, I do, and would generally have several in any game session, but I dont want them to bog down. Hit locations are another dice roll and another chart for each attack. On the other hand, I dont want it to be D&D where the characters get shot, stabbed, burned, bludgened, crushed, and impaled and just keep going until they run out of hitpoints. Thus the houserules for the imparing effects. I know this approach bugs some people, they want as highly accurate a simulation as possible, but I am willing to accept some abstract elements in combat to keep it moving faster. Even without the hit location rules Hero system combat is not the fastest thing to play. My reason for limited class of powers on MP: I wanted to avoid a generic wizard who buys a MP and a laundry list of fixed slots with no real linked special effects. Its dull, ends up looking like a D&D wizard, and promotes powergaming as players build a set of usefull powers, rather than an interesting character. By forcing characters to define their magic this way I was hoping to add some role playing elements to character design, and flavor to the magic system. Its only a -1/4 limitation, and it only applies to the reserve cost, not the powers in the slots. I dont really see the potential for significant abuse. I suppose the other option would be to make it a manditory +0 limitiation if I thought players were really getting away with something when I saw their characters. Anyway, thanks again to all who replied.

Re: Invulnerability I agree. I would never allow 100% Dammage reduction. I think that the EC would be ok for Invulnerablity if you defined the Special effect well and purchased powers that simulated it. Why is your character (nearly) invulnerable to physcial harm. Dense molecular structure? Incredibly powerful rengeration? Admanitum Armor fused with your skin? As long as it was interesting, not just a huge lump of Armor backed up with a huge lump of dammage reduction I think I would allow the EC. And if you just wanted the afore mentioned huge lumps of armor and Damage Reduction you could always pay full price.

Re: Can you suffocate foes with an Entangle? Steve posted over in the rules forum that there is a suffocation power is the USPD (Ultimate Super Powers something??????) If anyone has a copy of whatever that stands for could you share the "official" version. Thanks, The Hyborian. P.S. I posted in the rules forum about the gradual effect. According to Steve a continuous attack with gradual effect would start, take the gradual effect time to inflict its dammage, and then start again, so the version that I wrote up would work if the recovery issue was solved. Im still not quite sure how to do that part though, perhaps a Rec drain also linked, or changing the NND EB to a drain instead. I would love to see someone's suggestion for how to actually write up the power.

Re: Pregnancy and combat As the father of a 3 month old I can say without reservation that being pregnant adds the following to a character: Power: Shapechange- retain water like a sponge. Psy Lim- Very common, Strong- shreik at husband for no reason. Dependence: Air conditioner on High or above psy lim becomes Total instead of strong. New movement power: Waddle, 3-4 inches on average. Physical Limitation: Must pee every minute and a half, on average. Social Limitation: Complete strangers give parenting advice and want to touch your stomach. Enraged: Set off by pretty much anything the husband does. Any disadvantages to combat values would be offset by the new Power: Gaze of Doom, where the pregnant mom stares with withering despite at her loving husband, more or less affecting him with all the mental attack powers at once. Then the baby arrives, and you trade in the above for physical limitation: Never sleep again, but that is another story. But, I will say, the baby is about as cute as cute gets. The Hyborian

A question for you oh exhaulted rules guru: Suppose I buy an attack power With Uncontrolled, Continuous, and Gradual Effect 1 turn. I hit with the power and pay endurace as needed. Does this mean that the target would: Option A: Suffer the effects of the attack power once a turn, and I would pay the endurance cost of the power once for each turn I wanted it to run. Or Option B: The attack would "hit" on each of my phases, but the dammage from each attack would be applied gradually over one turn. I would have to pay the endurance cost once for each phase that I wanted the power to run. OR Option C: Something I have not even thought of. By the way, the the answer is Option B or C, could you suggest a means for building an attack power that worked like option A. Supplications and menial gestures, The Hyborian.

Re: Can you suffocate foes with an Entangle? I am with you on the first paragraph. This is a hard one to simulate. But the supress idea sounds suspicious to me. Its looks like a darn cheap way to by a fairly powerful attack. I would probably disallow it if a player brought it to me as a GM. For the original poster: By definition an entange would not do dammage. If you want one that does dammage you have to buy an attack power of some kind and used the Linked disadavantage on it. Exactly how is darn tough, however. To simulate suffocation you would have to gradually knock the person out, then start doing Body damage, but the effects should be healed pretty quickly if the person starts to get some air again. How about this: a small Uncontrolled Continuous NND energy blast, Defense is having life support or breaking out of the entange, Perhaps a short duration Gradual Effect limitation would be necessary as well to represent having a target pass out after a minute or two. Does Body - normally a (+1) advantagne - How about does body only after stun has been depleted (+1/2). That way the target looses stun first and after passing out starts to loose body. No serious damage if the target breaks out fast, but potentially fatal to someone who cant get out of the ice. SO: 1d6EB, Uncontrolled, (+1/2) Continous (+1) NND (+1) Does Body after stun is depleted (+1/2) Gradual Effect 1 Turn (-1/4) Linked (-1/2) 20 Active points, 11 real points. This will knock a normal out in a minute or two depending on how tough they are start to kill them once they pass out. Supers could conceivably last a long time under this power, buy hey, superheroes rarely suffocate, even after being frozen in an iceburg since WWII in the North Atlantic. I would say it roughly approximates suffocation, at least on normals. EXECPT, as i think about it, it doesn't solve the recovery problem. A super (heck, a tough normal) would almost certianly be recovering this dammage faster than they were taking it, making all of the above math a moot point. Bugger. And anther fatal flaw to my plan just hit me. If its a Gradual Effect, 1 turn, does that mean that the power only works once per turn, or that the attack that is made each phase and it takes a whole turn for the dammage to soak in? i.e. if the attack has a speed of five, would it attack five times per turn, and the dammage of each attack would "register" a turn later. If the second is the case then it does way more dammage than I though it would in the first place. Double bugger. You see what I mean about this being a hard one. Maybe some kind of drain effects would be the way to go. This is making my head hurt. I will think about this and try to post again at a later time. Happy confusion, The Hyborian

Re: A Secret Service Question This is off the cuff, but the one that spends her time KILLING FREAKIN' VAMPIRES probably presents the most significant security issues for her secret service detail. Sheesh.

Re: Fantasy Campaign Guidlines: Please comment (stupidly long) Thanks for the replies all, I appreciate the feedback. And I was looking at combat luck after I made the original post. It does seem that everyone and their aunt Fannie will probably want to take it. Have to think that one through a bit. thanks The Hyborian

Re: How Long to Learn Hero System? The easiest way to pick up Hero is to play with someone who knows the system. With a good guide you can learn the mechanics in one session, although making charcters will still be mysterious for a while. If that is not possible (and it sounds like you are teaching yourself), then I would suggest ordering the book for the genre that you want to play (i.e. Champions, Dark Campions, Fantasy Hero, etc). The one thing that 5th and 5th revised lacks compaired to earlier editons in sample characters. Back a couple of editons ago when I started playing Champions I had the advantage of looking at the bunch of sample characters that came with the rules and saying, "ok, this is how to make a brick, this is how to make a martial artist, oh thats an interesting idea over there". It really helps to see someone pull it all together for the genre you want to play. If you cant swing the green for the supliment, then all I can suggest is that you post freqently to the boards, including the rules board. (What other system has a message board when you can ask the author about rule issues? These guys define class act.) Put up your sample characters, pester people with questions, and generally solicit advice. Also, In your studying of the rules focus on the combat mechanics and playing the game, not every tiny detail of every power. If you can sit down with some friends and make a skill check, run a combat, and award some xp when you are done you can play. Character theory and design will improve with time.

Re: I smell something fishy Humm, I really need to remember to review rules before I post something. slighlty embarassed, The Hyborian

Re: Rep? OK, rep for everybody that replied!!!!! Feel the love. The Hyborian

Re: Rep? Hummm, thanks for the info. I may have been the target of a mass drive-by Repping. The pirate post had a pretty good joke in it, but not THAT good. No matter. I am totally willing to stand around lookng wise and famous if people want me to. Thanks The Hyborian.

Re: Reasonable Construction Times I cant give you a realistic time frame for plate, but would toss in the fact that it had to be made to order and fitted to the wearer. You dont go into a shop and buy a set of platemail, as has happened in so many D&D campaigns. If its not made to fit your body it probably would do more harm than good (transfering the force of the blow squarly into your collar bone, that kind of thing). My semi-informed guess is that you are looking at a several weeks work at least for a master and some assistants, but thats half guess.

Not sure where else to put this. I opened my user control panel today and there were a long list of people giving me "Rep" for a post I made about a pirate campaign. Is Rep reputation? How is this awarded? The feedback seemed positive so I assume its something you do when someone posts something you like, but I am not sure how the mechanics of this work. If someone posts something I find helpful how do I flag them for this honor (I assume its an honor.) Just new to these boards and unfamiliar with the interface. Thanks.

Re: Grimjack Tech levels My solution for Grimjack dimensions: Superheroic rules, characters purchase their equipment with points. Characters may take a (-1/2) disad: Subject to Dimensions, on powers and equipment. Powers without this limitation are either lowtec things that work everywhere like swords, or have a portable reality generator built in. Insist that players rigorously define the speical effects of their powers (Is it magic, gunpowder, electrical. etc) Make sure that the players understand that part of the Grimjack genre is that their powers and gear will not always work. The GM makes ad hoc choices on what works where, doing this TO ENHANCE THE STORY, ADVANCE THE PLOT, ETC, not just randomly or at a whim. Let the players know that they can buy skills like KS: City Dimensions to know what works where (I remember an issue where Gaunt defeated some enemies by fleeing into a area where their guns no longer worked.) and Analyze: Dimension to figure of the effects of the local area. And overall, not to take character powers away all the time, just often enough to make them remember they got a point break on it. And as I said above, do it for story reasons, to provide challenges, to make the characters think, etc. Anyway, just my $.02

Re: On balance...when no one else follows it. I'm not sure that I have ever made a character without some kind of of power framework, at least for a champions campagin. Im not sure how the other players are acting. Do you think that they are building abusive, unbalance characters, or do you think that when they got into the nuts and bolts of charcter creation they found they really couldn't build the characters they wanted with the suggested limitions on character design? No frameworks is a bugger of a setback on what you can do with your points, and the powers with stop, !, and the mag glass are not necessary unbalanced, they just need DM oversight to make sure everything is ok for the campagin in mind. It may be your fellow gamers agreed without thinking through the effects of what they were agreeing too. My advice to to rebuild your character to be on par combat wise with the rest of the group. Dont min/max your character, dont come up with anything that pushes the spirit of the rules, don't build something "abusive", but make sure your character competes in terms of speed, attacks, CV, defense, etc. It's hard to feel super if you get you tail handed to you in every combat. And just because your character is less effective doesn't mean that the other characters are abusive. You can build characters for the same point base that work radically differently. I played in a champions champaign once where I built a Shadow-esq crimefighter, with stealth, guns, gadgets, tons of skills, and a normal stats maxima. He was a great character, but was out of place in the campaign. Everyone else had built Avengers style conventional supers, and while they had less depth and skills than I did, their basic attacks and defenses were so far beyond mine that I just couldn't compete. I would struggle to take out agents that the others just smashed in one phase, and when the supervillians showed up my attacks pretty much bounced off. This didn't mean my character was broken, just misplaced. I had make a great character for a Dark Champions street level supers campaign, but was playing in a conventinal four color supers campaign. The result? My character was turned into a NPC ally of the group who went off to scour the shadows of the night for evildoers, and I built a new character based on a power ring with lots of shiny energy blasts and forcefields. He melded much better with the campaign and I had a better time. And please note that the change in character theme was not really necessary. I could have built my dark detective over at a higher powerlevel, I just chose to go in a really new direction. It would have been just a viable to drop the stats maxima, edit his skills down a bit, give hime a combat exoskeleton that enhanced his stats, some bigger guns, a force field belt maybe, and there you go, dark detective than can smack superpowered foes.