input.jack

Re: Characters Losing Their Souls - How To Handle It? Kal makes a good point. Ultimately the GM has to decide the answer to the question "Can a deal with a supernatural being override the Divine Order of where souls ought to go, based on the qualities of the soul itself?" In other words, if there -is- a Divine Order of some kind (and the existence of Souls seems to indicate that there is), can anything -less- than a Supreme Being determine where that Soul goes? Does any lesser being have the -capacity- to alter the Soul's destination? Thats the problem I have with "selling your soul" deals; its not necessarily yours to sell.

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... Ok, I posted this story in the "How to Make Bricks Interesting" thread, and it was recommended that I repost it here. A friend of mine was playing a Big Red Cape homage named Ultraman. UM was being chased by one of his nemisese, who knew about his vulnerability to Argonite radiation, and was trying to get close enough to sap UM's powers with the Argonite chunk that the villain had acquired. He flew about as fast as Ultraman, and was chasing him through the campaign city at high speed. Ultraman cant close to hit the guy, or else he will get within range of the Argonite. The guy is wearing reflective armor that deflects UM's heat vision. The exoskeleton the villain is wearing makes him immune to the cold breath, and so on. The encounter went something like this: Ultraman (OOC): Alright, I dive down through this man-hole, and into the tunnels under the city. You remember; the network of tunnels that Gorrillaman had his lair in a while back. GM: Okay. You find the tunnels kind of tight; you cant fly at full speed and maneuver down here. Ultraman (OOC): Thats fine. If I cant go full out, neither can he. GM: Fair enough. Ultraman (OOC): Okay. While Im flying around down here, trying to avoid him, I use my X-Ray vision. GM: What are you looking for? Ultraman (OOC): Pipes I -cant- see through. GM: Okay. Youre under "Oldtown", so there are probably pipes down here you cant see through because theyve got too much lead content in them. Ultraman (OOC): Groovy! Okay, I fly toward the biggest set of those pipes that I can find. Ill use my Ultra-Hearing to see if I can tell if theres anything running through the pipes. [The GM has Ultraman roll. He makes his Perception roll by a ton] GM: Okay, youre pretty sure these pipes arent in use any more. Ultraman (OOC): All right! Ill fly along underneath those pipes, if I can. GM: There are some running along the ceiling of the tunnels youre in, in some places. Ultraman (OOC): Great! As I fly underneath them, I hit them with a strafing run of Heat Vision! GM: Um...ok. The lead pipes melt under your heat beams. Ultraman (OOC): Perfect! As the lead melts, I swoop underneath it, so as much of the lead as possible lands on ME. Ill turn in flight and coat myself with it. GM: Its pretty hot, but considering you have Life Support to heat, and your ED is so high (and fully resistant) *rolls some dice* 22 Stun and 8 Body wont get through your hide at all, will it. Ultraman (OOC): Nope! And now that Im coated in lead, Ill turn around and fly -toward- the bad-guy. His Argonite rock wont help him now; Im wearing a lead liner! [uM proceeds to knock the villains block off]

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

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... I dunno. A lot of the games Im in end up going that direction...

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... From a recent Pathfinder campaign session: --------------- Metrion the Black; the Wizard (OOC): Just stare at the ceiling, and think of the Prestige Class ---------- Varga the Barbarienne: Thats NOT what Mage Hand was originalyl invented for! ------------ Metrion: Its a good thing they taught me Remove Stain right after my voice broke. ------------------ Metrion (OOC): Metrion is thinking of changing his name from "Metrion the Black" to "Metrion the Leather-Daddy" ------------------ Chyra the Gothy Sorcoress (OOC): Chyra dances back away from the walking dead, casting Mage Armor on herself. And she thinks the zombies are kind of cool! ------------------ GM: What do you do this round? Varga the Barbarienne (OOC): Foam. Rend. Repeat. ------------------ Metrion (OOC): You can tell that [our GM] is not [someone else we know that we dont game with anymore], because you dont hear the howling of Damned Souls whenever he opens his mouth to speak! ------------- GM: As the Kobold distracts Varga, a small figure moves up behind her... Chyra (OOC): "Two Dollars! CASH!" -------------- Chyra (OOC): She jumps up and wriggles out of her bedroll when she Zombies break in. She sleeps naked, so you can all see her new tattoo on the inside of her hip Rhiannion (OOC): Ill grab my shield and sword as soon as I can. Im wearing a "come fang me" nightgown. My character is blonde and innocent-looking, in a "save the cheerleader" kind of way, so it seemed appropriate. Metrion (OOC): GM: The ZOmbies attack! [combat ensues] Okay, the one Rhiannon is fighting manages to rake her with its claws, shredding her nightgown! Shes now naked too! Metrion (OOC): ...I hate you all! ---------------- Guard Captain: All right, tell me what happened here. Metrion (OOC): Metrion makes a full report. "And theres this tattoo....right on the inside of her hip"....

Re: Help me get into Bricks. The biggest asset a Brick can have is a brain. Look at Mister Incredible; hes a Brick through and through, but what makes him the greatest hero of his generation is his ability to think on his feet. Example: A friend of mine was playing a Big Red Cape homage named Ultraman. UM was being chased by one of his nemisese, who knew about his vulnerability to Argonite radiation, and was trying to get close enough to sap UM's powers with the Argonite chunk that the villain had acquired. He flew about as fast as Ultraman, and was chasing him through the campaign city at high speed. Ultraman cant close to hit the guy, or else he will get within range of the Argonite. The guy is wearing reflective armor that deflects UM's heat vision. The exoskeleton the villain is wearing makes him immune to the cold breath, and so on. The encounter went something like this: Ultraman (OOC): Alright, I dive down through this man-hole, and into the tunnels under the city. You remember; the network of tunnels that Gorrillaman had his lair in a while back. GM: Okay. You find the tunnels kind of tight; you cant fly at full speed and maneuver down here. Ultraman (OOC): Thats fine. If I cant go full out, neither can he. GM: Fair enough. Ultraman (OOC): Okay. While Im flying around down here, trying to avoid him, I use my X-Ray vision. GM: What are you looking for? Ultraman (OOC): Pipes I -cant- see through. GM: Okay. Youre under "Oldtown", so there are probably pipes down here you cant see through because theyve got too much lead content in them. Ultraman (OOC): Groovy! Okay, I fly toward the biggest set of those pipes that I can find. Ill use my Ultra-Hearing to see if I can tell if theres anything running through the pipes. [The GM has Ultraman roll. He makes his Perception roll by a ton] GM: Okay, youre pretty sure these pipes arent in use any more. Ultraman (OOC): All right! Ill fly along underneath those pipes, if I can. GM: There are some running along the ceiling of the tunnels youre in, in some places. Ultraman (OOC): Great! As I fly underneath them, I hit them with a strafing run of Heat Vision! GM: Um...ok. The lead pipes melt under your heat beams. Ultraman (OOC): Perfect! As the lead melts, I swoop underneath it, so as much of the lead as possible lands on ME. Ill turn in flight and coat myself with it. GM: Its pretty hot, but considering you have Life Support to heat, and your ED is so high (and fully resistant) *rolls some dice* 22 Stun and 6 Body wont get through your hide at all, will it. Ultraman (OOC): Nope! And now that Im coated in lead, Ill turn around and fly -toward- the bad-guy. His Argonite rock wont help him now; Im wearing a lead liner! [uM proceeds to knock the villains block off] For myself, when I was playing Guardian Alpha, there were entire fights I spent doing other things than hitting people. Like the running gun battle between some crazed cyber-bikers trying to hold up an armored car, while on a long suspension bridge. While my team mates handled the high-tech goons, I spent all my time grabbing cars that had been knocked off the edge, using my Atomic Vision to spot weld the support cables back together when the bad guys shot them out in an attempt to collapse the brisge behind them, and ultimately I had to support a large section of bridge long enough for everyone to clear off of it when they used some explosives. All things that no one else on my team -could- do! Bricks (especially flying Bricks) also get to do things like lift massive amounts of rubble off of victims of a building collapse (for whatever reason it fell down), stand toe-to-toe with the opposition's heavy hitters, keep space shuttles and jumbo jets from crashing, and all kinds of fun stuff! For great inspiration, I cant recommend the DCAU / Bruce Timm animated Superman series highly enough. Rent it, buy it, borrow it, but see it! Its fantastic

Re: Your Definition Of A Super Hero? A Superhero is an individual who had a great deal of ability to influence the events around themself, who chooses to do so for the good of others rather than personal gain. Typically they adopt a distinctive uniform or costume, and a codename, in order to protect those close to them from repercussions or retaliation, and to make them more easily identifiable to the general populace (in much the same way that police wear uniforms; you know who to go to for help when you need it). A Superhero will risk their own life to preserve those of the people arouind them, and often works outside the law to compensate for its shortcomings. Superheroes generally strive to bring their opponents to the proper authorities for justice. A SUperhero is like a mythic hero, only with a higher moral code.

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... One day youre going to have to write the whole book for Toby the Puma. And I want a copy

Re: Powerless Wasnt that story run in the 60's? Before "continuity" was a real concept, and definately pre-Crisis? If so, it doesnt count (and should never have happened anyway)

Re: Make a Green Lantern Oath Over the finger And past the thumb, So look out Evil CAUSE HERE I COME!

Re: Superhumans pulling an Authority So, basically, like a lot of things, it all depends on the tone of the campaign and the Players' actions. Fair enough

Re: Going from Champions to Mutants and Masterminds Im one of those people who has gone from HERO to M&M, as far as what I mostly play. While M&M looks less crunchy, fact is that if you include the Ultimate Powers book (which the guys at Green Ronin have admitted was how they -should- have written powers in the main rule book), you get a lot more crunch from the system. Ultimately the big advantages I see M&M having over HERO are (1) the Hero Point mechanic and the Minion mechanic both strongly reinforce the genre, (2) Power Level can be seperated from Character Points, allowing a GM to run -exactly- the power scale they want to without having to contort the game, or suffer from "power creep", (3) its about 10x more time-consuming to write things up in HERO than it is in M&M, meaning for someone who uses all original material (like me), Im getting a heckuva lot more done in the same amount of time, and can concentrate on plotlines rather than writeups. (4) The PL 10 setting gives a very "DC Animated Universe" feel to characters, and with a few extra points you can do almost any comic character imaginable without breaking the system (150 points is fine for "Day One" characters, but experienced characters should be built on 175 to 200 points, even at PL 10. We settled on 180). HERO still has some advantages. It -is- a more detailed system, although honestly characters written in M&M feel as solid as HERO characters, to me. But for setting where you want to evoke a feeling of dread in your Players, like horror settings, zombie-pocalypse, and so on, HERO is the better way to go. With the Wounding and Bleeding rules in place, HERO is the better system for a straight-up Western campaign, for example. So I -do- still play HERO. Just not for superheroes. BTW, if your Players are hoarding all their Hero Points for "bad die roll nights", maybe you should try to encourage them to buy more Luck, and maybe be a bit more generous with handing Hero points out during play

Re: How to open a door? Grond. (Ok, so thats not so much with the "stealthy")

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... Honestly, it had a leather loincloth instead of mail, anyway ;P

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... Youll note she DIDNT buy it

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... A couple of quotes from the 1960s supers game, then some from the new Pathfinder campaign one of my roomies started ------------------ Goblin (OOC): Its the kind of Punk band where it sounds like theyre just squeezing a Pit Bull into the microphone for half an hour ------------ Star Ranger: ...So I used my federal credentials to go in, look around, and buy you a cheesecake. ------------ ------------ Varga the Barbarienne: Ive gotten much better at not standing in the animal traps ------------- GM: So....Rhiannon is basically "the littlest Roherrim?" Rhiannon: -------------- Rhiannon (OOC): Badminton in the Land of Nod! ------------- GM: It appears to be an ancient Dakani Goblin tomb. Rhiannon: We should be all right, so long as we dont defile anything. I mean, Goblins are Goblins, but tombs are tombs! Metrion the Black (OOC): Thats very Zen. Rhiannon (OOC): Is it? ;P ---------------- GM: Then there comes a CRACK of lightning SO loud... Rhiannon (OOC): That you almost dont hear me squeak! ---------------- GM: Inside the chest you find a circlet, that looks as though its made of twined black thorns Metrion the Black (OOC): If I put it on, maybe someone will come along and nail me up to something! --------------- GM: The coins are all stamped with the symbol of Bane; God of Tyranny Chyra the Sorceress (OOC): But its still gold! --------------- GM: Whats your damage roll? Metrion (OOC): 2 points! .....Its like basketball, only sadder. -------------- Rhiannon: Um...where are the pants for this armor? Shopkeeper: Its "subligar". It doesnt have pants. You wear the breastplate, the helmet, the gauntlets, the g-string, and the boots. Rhiannon: [Later] Chyra: Why didnt you buy that armor? Rhiannon: It was 50% off

Re: Multiple pushing We required an EGO roll to successfully Push, with the amount of the Push being determined by the amount you made the roll by (make the EGO roll exactly, you can push up to 5 points. Make it by 3 and its the full 10). We allowed people to try to push multiple things in the same Phase if they wanted to, but theyd have to make a seperate roll for each Power, and you had to pay the END you were hoping for, regardless of what your die rolls told you that you got. Ive seen a couple of PCs Push themselves unconscious (since every 2 END you spend that you dont actually have costs you 1d6 Stun instead, as I recall)

Re: Ringers (prompted by the Black Widow thread on Dark Champions) Wylodmayer, I think what youre doing is totally wrongbadfun and...... Oh wait..I -am- in your current game group.... And playing a ringer or two myself... Nevermind

Re: Normal/non-super/average people Welcome to the HERO forums, Lord Dynel HERO is an extremely flexible game system, capable of handling all kidns of settings. My game group and I have been using HERO system for most of our campaigns (including fantasy, science fiction, pulp adventure, Victoriana / Wild West, prehistoric fantasy, and so on) for decades. The system itself is excellent for handling "low-end" cinematic adventure campaigns. The key is in the GM, and the scale that the GM sets for the game. Id be happy to give you more information if youd like. Just send me a Private Message

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... From the Sequoia City Slayer game: ------------------------- Jinx (OOC): Jinx slinks out to the car, wearing a trenchcoat and HUGE sunglasses, trying to be "inconspicuous" GM: ...Youre on campus. Jinx (OOC): I know. GM: Everyone here knows you already. Jinx (OOC): I know! ----------------- Charles: Drink this energy drink, Jinx. Itll wake you up. ...Tastes like bat guano tho Teddi: Thats "guarana". Theres a difference ;P ----------------- The gang confronts the Vice Principal/Evil Wizard whose been up to nefarious shenanigans, cornering him in his house after school VPEW: Stupid children! This is why you dont F**K with a SUMMONER in his own TOWER! VPEW: *Summons humongous amounts of mystical energy* Jinx: *Counterspells him and takes the humongous mystical energy!* Teddi: And this is why you dont f**k with a Witch, a Paladin, and the SLAYER! *Kicks his bootay* ------------------ VPEW: Ill...Ill make you a offer. So that you can live to see another sunrise! Teddi: Yes. Do threaten us, while tied to a chair. Its quite effective. ------------------ Jinx: Looks like the beer is laced with a spell; the more you drink, the more you want to "do it", and the longer you can go. Charles: This is from that local micro-brewery? Jinx: Yes. Teddi: We should buy stock

Re: Bolt, the super dog Id give him a minimum 60 STR, personally. His powers seemed to be on par with a Kryptonian, considering the massive area of carnage wreaked by his super-bark. PS: I loved that movie.

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... From the Bad Girls Heroes game, set "20 Minutes into the Future" -------------------- Shadowstar: Ive been finding, lately, that inconvenient things happen when you make plans. I try not to plan too far in advance. Arachnia: You dont get to the dentist much then, I take it? Shadowstar:.....Im English ;P -------------------- Arachnia (OOC): What about the female Demon? GM: Shes likely some kind of Temptress Demon Arachnia (OOC): Unless shes got chocolate I dont want to talk to her ------------------ Arachnia: *Leaps to grapple the Demoness and throw her to the ground* OH YOU SUCK! YOU A CUBS FAN! -------------------- Shadowstar: That costume should make it easy to get a date on a Saturday night Arachnia: Id rather learn macramae. Black Bat: Its not all its cracked up to be ---------------- Demoness: For rescuing me from the Pit, I grant you each a Boon. Black Bat: Fine. My "boon" is that from now on, you turn from the path of evil, and walk the path of good. Redeem yourself; earn the freedom we have bought you Demoness: ...I accept your challenge. With the proviso that I am able to maintain my prior arrangements, made before this agreement. Black Bat: Very well. With the understanding that if I find your "arrangements" unconscionable, I shall beat you with a stick. Arachnia: My boon is I want a Demon-beating Stick!

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

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... Sounds like a fun game!

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... Some quotes from the Shadowrun game Average Joe is a Human street samurai with maximum wired reflexes, and a crack shot. he looks like Jason Statham. Shay-Shay is an Elf, and an Owl Shaman. She looks like Kiera Knightley. Cat is a genetically engineered supersoldier who looks like Jessica Alba (based heavily on Max 452 from Dark Angel). ------------ Shay (OOC): They mouthed off to me. So I ate them ----------- Shay: Hey, Ordell? We've got some merchandise you might be interested in. Ordell (Orc gun-runner): Guns? Say, this wouldnt have to do with all the gunfire heard out near Quinn's last night, would it? Shay *innocently*: I dont know what you mean.....Besides, we couldnt just leave this stuff there. A kid might find it! --------------- GM: Ok, so Shay-Shay and Tam go to see Tough Love. Its a prison romance...kind of like yaoi for Oz fans. ------------ Cat: We have the "package", Ordell. Im not really happy about destroying the package though. Ordell: The package is too muthaf***ing dumb to let live! If you dont waste the package the package will figure out some way to come back and **** everything up. Ive known the package his whole life and hes a total f*****g MORON! ------------- Cat (OOC): Wow... a Zapped! reference... ------------- Shay: Im an ELF! Of course my @$$ tastes like French vanilla ice-cream!