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Lucius

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Everything posted by Lucius

  1. I can Smell Intrigue: (Total: 20 Active Cost, 9 Real Cost) Detect: Clue to a Conspiracy A Class Of Things (anything connected to a sinister plot against the character) +2 PER roll (Sight Group), Increased Arc Of Perception (360 Degrees), Sense Affected As Another Sense (The clue could be something seen, heard, or even otherwise sensed; +0) (12 Active Points); Limited Power Only for Trigger (-1), Nonpersistent (-1/4) (Real Cost: 5) <b>plus</b> Eidetic Memory, Trigger (Activating the Trigger is an Action that takes no time, Trigger requires a Half Phase Action to reset, Character does not control activation of personal Trigger; +1/4) (6 Active Points); No Conscious Control (Only Effects cannot be controlled; -1) (Real Cost: 3) <b>plus</b> +1 with Deduction, Trigger (Activating the Trigger is an Action that takes no time, Trigger requires a Half Phase Action to reset, Character does not control activation of personal Trigger; +1/4) (2 Active Points); No Conscious Control (Only Effects cannot be controlled; -1) (Real Cost: 1) This build assumes the character already has Deduction. Lucius Alexander This tagline assumes
  2. Last night I had a Strange dream. As in, Dr. Strange was in my dream. Lucius Alexander A palindromedary wasn't.
  3. I will SWEAR that I have seen something about rules to apply Adjustment Powers to Charges, but I can't seem to track it down now. I know it used to be in the Rules FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)but where the heck are they hiding the Rules FAQ now? Lucius Alexander Did the palindromedary eat it?
  4. Wait a minute, if I have a compound power and/or linked powers that are both attacks, then each and every time I use it I'm at half DCV?? Lucius Alexander Linked with a palindromedary
  5. I believe Champions Complete has some sample superheroes. You might try starting the players out with those, with the promise of being able to build their own unique characters after they've had a chance to learn how the game plays. Lucius Alexander House of the Palindromedary
  6. Just look around at the characters posted. I suspect you'll find a lot of the sort of thing you are talking about, if I've understood you. But perhaps you could share more examples of what you mean? Lucius Alexander Weapon Familiarity: Palindromedary mounted weapons
  7. I so much wanted to take him at his word, but I couldn't think of any supper villains. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary suggests the Frito Bandito but he is a snack villain
  8. I'm already fat and shouldn't have a milkshake but I probably will. Maybe today. Would be nice if it gave me superpowers. I'm glad you're not letting the tempest in this particular teapot drive you away from our tea party but I think everyone's getting close to saying what they feel they had to say on the topic so it may be time to, like the Mad Hatter, scoot down the table and find a clean table setting. Lucius Alexander The confused palindromedary calls that nice Scottish waterfront hotel to inquire about tea rooms, then asks if we want to cancel or confirm the reservations?
  9. I don't understand why you have "Imitation" as, if I read that right, a separate Power in a compound Power. Lucius Alexander Imitating a palindromedary
  10. If two attack Powers are Linked or are a Compound Power, do they count as "Multiple Attack" in that sense? Lucius Alexander Multiple palindromedary attack
  11. Well, that escalated quickly. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary asks if we need reservations at that waterfront hotel in Scotland again.
  12. Phillip Vigoda is another speedster in a red suit, with one quirk: he's superhumanly fast to start with but if there's someone faster around, he speeds up until he can catch up. He is therefore known as Ketchup, or sometimes as Tomato Tornado. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary says someone should stop Lucius before he does some version of Captain Carrot
  13. "Yes but" is what I thought I heard the Darkness saying, but I may have misheard them. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary heard something about a milkshake
  14. Spinach Man was famous as the strongest man in America's merchant fleet. He had been a member of the Fit Five, a government sponsored "superteam" with an agenda of promoting health and fitness, as a result of his public advocacy of nutrition, touting eating ones vegetables, especially spinach, as the way for children to grow up big and strong. He is also very fond of sweet peas and of olive oil, quick to point out how rich it is in vitamins E and K. He likes to say that eating burgers will make you wimpy. The secret that, when exposed, got him bounced from the Fit Five is that not only does he privately enjoy fried chicken on a regular basis, but he owns a restaurant chain specializing in that fried, fatty treat. Also, he had supposedly given up smoking but occasionally pictures still turned up showing him with his old corncob pipe. Besides his natural strength and pugnaciousness, and the low profile armor built into his sailor suits, his gimick is canned "spinach" that is formulated to give him temporary superpowers. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary says "Pontiff affirmative"
  15. That can't happen. First of all, sooner or later you fail the Block roll and have to stop. And you're not even going to be able to start a repeating cycle like that unless the attacker has an attack with Trigger taking no time where the Trigger is something like "Being Blocked." The attacker, remember, JUST attacked and therefore can't abort to Block in turn. Someone with a Trigger "Being Blocked" meeting someone with a Trigger "Blocking" meeting in combat strikes me as a bizzare and unlikely situation unless it's deliberately engineered, and even if it happens, it's self limiting because it shouldn't take long before the Blocker fails a Block roll. edit: as I recall, each Block is at a cumulative penalty isn't it? Lucius Alexander The palindromedary isn't afraid of Country Western Singers! It is afraid of Classical Musicians....
  16. "Assigned XP" is something different than what we're talking about in this thread. That's when the characters are assigned extra XP that is earmarked for something specific, usually in ADDITION to regular XP not INSTEAD of regular XP. Examples: "You've been fighting VIPER a lot, everyone gain 2 pts in a KS: Viper Skill." or "You've been in France for months, everyone gains 1 pt in the French Language or if you're at 4 pts in French already gain a point in an Area or Culture Knowledge." What the Original Poster saying, as I read it, is NOT "I tell the player how to spend XP," it's "The player says how they want to spend XP and I okay it, or veto it and explain way, or suggest ways to justify it - exactly the same as my role in character creation when we start the game." Basically, in a system like Hero, character creation is not a one time thing but an ongoing process, and the person running the game has a role in that process. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary has no role in that process, usually.
  17. Not to be a rules lawyer, but I'm going to quote selected passages from Hero System 6th Vol 2, Combat and Adventuring, specifically from the section on Experience. “Some Skills may require a fair amount of time in the campaign to learn; for others, a character may need training under an instructor. A character may have to go off the beaten path to find someone who can teach him some of the more esoteric Skills or Talents.” “In a Superheroic campaign, you should take special care to manage how the characters spend their Experience points.” “...examine any new Powers or Talents....as carefully as you would for a starting character.” “..a character should usually have a good rationale for spending his Experience Points” “Wherever possible, you should try to structure adventures so that characters can buy off Limitations and Complications.” And of course the famous “ ...a character with a Focus couldn't put the item in a milkshake and drink it – there would have to be a better explanation for losing the Focus Limitation.” I suspect this may be a case where despite the apparent disagreement, the actual disagreement in PRACTICAL terms is smaller than it appears. For example, Tasha, if I were in your game and declared I was buying off a Focus Limitation by putting it in a milkshake, would you let that pass, or raise an objection? On the other hand, a Game Operations Director can be TOO controlling of how players spend experience. I remember playing a character with a DEX of 17 and making a point of practicing gymnastics, taking up juggling, etc. to try to get permission to raise my DEX, but I was up against a Game Operations Director who thought 17 was the perfect DEX for the character I was playing. To lay out my own opinion: Letting a power armor character lose the Focus and get Inherent Always On Defenses by grinding the armor into a really big milkshake and drinking it down is too permissive (although a "radiation accident" that's more "reasonable" in comic book terms might be okay.) I could play in that game, but might have a hard time taking it too seriously. Not letting a brick with DEX 17 buy it up when the character is going out of their way to practice agility and coordination is too restricted (although forcing them to buy it point by point instead of going to 23 DEX in one session might be okay.) I could play in that game, but might feel a littles stifled. Letting a frail old wizard go from STR 8 to 13 over the course of several months because adventuring is a lot of exercise and he's no longer leading a sedentary lifestyle, or letting a character get Mental Defense after encountering a mentalist with the justification "He's strong willed and 'always' had it and was just having an off day mentally that day" - I could accept a ruling either way, I suppose. Pretty much everyone in my circle of gamers agrees that experience spent should be justified somehow and is subject to veto, and I think we all pretty much agree that it should be very easy to justify and that if a player wants something for their character, the Game Operations Director should try to make it happen unless it's somehow game-breaking or unbalancing. Lucius Alexander Spending five points to double the reifier of palindromedaries again
  18. Once you abort to Block, you can keep rolling to Block until you miss the roll. If we use the "No time to reset" option and define the trigger as "Blocking" would that enable the Trigger to go off each time a Block is rolled? Lucius Alexander The palindromedary thinks it's going off on Trigger, then is embarrassed to learn it is going off on Dale Evans.
  19. You say this, but then nothing else you say has anything to do with divination. What does the character do, let a drop of blood fall into a bowl of water and read meaning from the dispersal patter or something? Lucius Alexander Palindromomancy is the art of predicting the future by assuming it will be like the past, but backwards.
  20. Not necessarily. Magic Bow with Autofire (conjures extra arrows following the first.) Superskill: Naked Advantage Autofire 2 to represent swiftly loosing two arrows in the same phase. Lucius Alexander Accurate Autofire Alternate Defense Palindromedary
  21. I can't. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary also has no idea.
  22. Judge Judy: Mr. Punch! That is NOT the way you do it, not in my courtroom! Lucius Alexander And who let a palindromedary in?
  23. I have to agree with you - it's not. There's nothing wrong with a graduated critical hit system, and I have thoroughly enjoyed at least one game I remember that had one (Runequest.) Nor with wanting a good to-hit roll to translate into doing more damage. I often grant an "ad hoc" advantage of some sort on low rolls in Hero games I run, such as bypassing armor or knocking someone down. And I can't see a good reason to object to something more formal and codified in that regard. But what Steve was describing is also not "Incorporating Hit Location effects into Attack Roll." It's "Do More Damage on a better Attack Roll." "Incorporating Hit Locations" would mean it actually makes a difference WHERE you hit; Mallet's proposal of giving a combatant a wider choice of targets on a better roll, with meaningful consequences such as disarming someone by hitting the hand, would be an example of "Incorporating Hit Locations" although I may have some questions and concerns with it on other grounds. As for the issue of multiplying damage by 1.25 or 1.75, I was trying to point out that the standard Hit Location chart doesn't call for math more complex than multiplying by 1.5 (unless my memory is failing badly) and speaking just for myself, I have some players who are challenged by doing that much. So I apologize for being snarkier than I have cause to be. I'm just saying that multiplying damage by 1.75 in the middle of combat is something I don't want to try at my table, and that while I have nothing in principle against a graduated critical hit system I dislike calling it "Hit Locations." Also, a Hit Location Chart consisting of "Head" and "not Head" bugs me. I also probably shouldn't post right after getting out of bed. I hope I'm not coming across as grouchy or snarky and making things worse. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary says I'm probably making things worse, but doesn't make anything better by proposing a chart consisting of "Head" "Not Head" and "Other Head."
  24. No. Unless the martial artist can also fly, I can't see them using their DCV in an uncontrolled fall any more than they get their DCV while asleep. I don't know if there's an explicit specific rule about this, but I think it falls under the "common sense" rule. That said, I agree with you that what was described, a trick arrow exploding into a mass of foam for a soft landing, should probably be an Area Effect, maybe Damage Negation or maybe Leaping with a Limitation only to slow down falls. Or if it's a big cushion that can be used as a trampoline, maybe don't use the Limitation. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary sings about Shaving Cream
  25. If I use Damage Reduction at all, I will almost always use it at the 50% level. What I was trying to say is, if you aren't using Impair & Disable rules, I don't see a reason to use "Locations" at all. What you seem to be trying to do is create a kind of "graduated critical hit" scheme. Lucius Alexander The palindromedary thinks a graduated critical hit must have graduated from the school of hard knocks.
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