BigJackBrass

I haven't seen anyone mention this (my apologies if I missed it), but the key here is not to change the Power... it's to change the character's SPD.
 
As CC page 137 notes, "In non-combat situations, everyone is assumed to act at SPD 2 at all times, unless the circumstances require them to use their full SPDs." (You can also voluntarily lower your SPD to 2 if desired.) When simply flying long-distance, you're normally going to be acting at SPD 2, not SPD 4.  So the END cost doesn't need to get down to 3 to be sustainable... it only needs to get down to 6.
 
Just let off the gas a bit, fly with a base of 15m instead of 20m, and you're there:
Flight 15m [15]
Position Shift and 8x NCM (+15 CP]
Combat Acc/Dec, NTM, and NGP (+1 Adv.)
= 60 Active Points = 6 END
 
You can fly at this speed indefinitely (about 45 MPH)...
 

Well, I've been passing some of the suggestions along to my player and honestly they're all helping us to get a better grasp of the rules and options. 

That’s great! However don’t be afraid to adjust or ignore the rules if they impede game/fun.
 
(That advice been around since 1st Ed but it’s been taking me these last 10plus years to really embrace it!). 

Well, I've been passing some of the suggestions along to my player and honestly they're all helping us to get a better grasp of the rules and options. 

Well, I've been passing some of the suggestions along to my player and honestly they're all helping us to get a better grasp of the rules and options. 

Over in the Turakian Age is Seriously Underrated thread, Steve Long mentioned the possibility of publishing a book version of the talk on worldbuilding he gives at conventions. That reminded me: I haven't posted my favorite technique for designing societies. I've shared versions of this essay with several friends and colleagues over the years. Most recently, I adapted it for White Wolf's game Exalted and posted it on a forum for that game. But it can apply anywhere. In fact, it isn't just for Fantasy settings. Y'all might as well have it too. Interested persons might try coming up with Case Study examples drawn from the Turakian Age or other Hero Universe settings.

I'll also break it into bite-size chunks for easier reading.
 
Dean Shomshak
------------------
DESIGNING CULTURES THE SHOMSHAK WAY!
 
Designing made-up societies is a craft, and like any craft you can get better at it. Here is one of the techniques I use in critiquing and designing societies for game settings. I’ll draw examples from Exalted, but what I’m talking about will work for any kind of setting.
 
Be warned: I draw on a notion I took from a book about history and social science, but I’m not a historian or social scientist. Experts can probably tear all of this apart. This essay gives suggestions for gamers, not a technical discussion for scholars.
 
THE GOAL: While world-building can be fun in its own right, the purpose for a game is to create an exciting and memorable setting for the PCs’ adventures. Preferably, for more than one adventure: If you go to the trouble to make a cool setting, you want to get plenty of use from it, yes? And if your players think the setting is cool, they will want to see more of it.
 
THE PROBLEM: All too often, a game writer had one idea for a society, and didn’t look for a second. The resulting society looks boring or gimmicky or just doesn’t make sense when you look at it closely. Exalted fell into this trap early in 1st ed, with “gimmick” cultures such as Chaya, Varangia or Paragon, and the setting has struggled to get out ever since.
 
Even if it’s a cool gimmick, building a society around just one idea limits the stories you can tell about it. Fine, the PCs had a fun adventure coping with the Chayans’ yearly freak-out. [Did you ever see "Return of the Archons," in ST: TOS? It's that.] Then what?
 
There’s no sense that a country could be a real place, with people who have lives apart from when the PCs show up. (To use Tolkien’s terminology, it does not inspire secondary belief.) It’s hard to care about such a setting or the people who live in it.
 
ONE PARTIAL SOLUTION: To make a culture more interesting, start by looking at it from more than one perspective. Real people never lead simple, one-dimensional lives: Neither should the people of your imaginary world.
 
Then use the different aspects of the society to generate factions and conflicts, both internal and external. These conflicts, in turn, present members of the society with choices — and choices are the stuff of drama. But that’s a subject for another essay.
 

By the rules, you can turn an adder off, but not an Advantage.  So you could turn off the Position Shift because it's pointless for cross-country movement.  
 
Basically, I'd redesign the advantages you're applying.  IMO all 3 look better than they play out.  Of them, the one I'd drop first would be Combat Accel/Decel.  "A character may accelerate or decelerate at a rate equal to his full meters of Combat Movement per meter (instead of the standard 5m/meter)."  (Copied from HD's definition.)  OK, well, your combat move is 20;  you hit max speed in 4 meters.  This *sometimes* matters if you're planning a move-by or move-through attack, but otherwise?  You don't use it.  Drop that...slap in Reduced END (1/2 END) for the same +1/4, and you're good to go.  Note that with No Grav Penalty and No Turn Mod, with Position Shift OFF, you're down to 52 active in use, for END purposes...so Reduced END will knock that down to...2.
 
Another option might be to split the Flight into 2 slots.
20m, Position Shift, Combat Accel, No Turn Mode, No Grav Penalty, 1/2 END. 56 points
20m, x8 non-combat, No Grav Penalty, 1/2 END.  52 points
 
This might be cost-effective, if Flight is the most expensive component of the multipower.  Out of combat you're trading off the high-maneuverability aspects (no turn mode, extreme accel/decel, position shift) for sheer speed.  The No Grav Penalty is, for me, related to the style of flight so we keep that.  Altho again, it's something to potentially drop...I like it, but it's MUCH more expensive than I think it's really worth.  Note that if you're moving in combat, even if the advantages aren't really in play, you're still paying the END;  you get a break because you don't have to pay for the non-combat movement, but 20m and +1 advantage...that's still 4 per phase, and we haven't even mentioned attacking.  But I will admit that I prefer to use Reduced END judiciously and not pile on a massive END and REC.
 
Notable adders + notable advantages gets to be a problem on powers you need to sustain or use a lot.
 
 

SOON
 

I'm liking what I've seen skimming through it, although I think some of the reference info is a little suspect.  The floorplan for a farmhouse includes a kitchen island and two interior bathrooms, which I'm not sure is 100% period

Justice League isn't terrible.  I consider it on par with the worst Marvel films, and fun in some parts.  It could have been great but is deeply flawed.  What's frustrating and sad is that they could have avoided those flaws so easily, but they're exactly what DC seems to WANT in their movies.
 
Sometimes I wonder if DC isn't trying to "out-Marvel" Marvel by having its superheroes "down to earth" with "real life problems" the way the Fantastic Four and Spider-Man did when they first came out.  So DC stands out by doing what Marvel did to them, in the 60s.

Except Stan Lee understood what a hero was, what superheroes are supposed to do, and how to keep characters likable, fun, and interesting despite having flaws and difficulties.  Yes, the Thing and Human Torch used to fight, but they were good buddies who really cared about each other still.  Yes, Spider-Man had the worst luck but still when he strapped on that costume, he had a blast and was fun to read.  All that seems to have eluded DC entirely except for a fluke in Wonder Woman.
 

For the Black Adam movie:
 

I have to give Matt Forbeck full credit here, his original Western Hero campaign section made it into this one to a noteable degree. I had to do a lot of editing and rewriting to fit better info about Deadwood, and change some details in the adventure, but he came up with the two major adventure ideas and some of the additional writeups for campaign suggestions (its why he gets credit in the book info at the beginning).
 
I found a more period-accurate Deadwood map, and significantly more accurate details about the characters and events than he had access to in the early 90s, but I leaned pretty heavy on his work for that section.

It took a while, but my group burned out on Savage Worlds. I started with the first release, then revised and so on, none of which seemed to fully address all of the issues with the system. I mean really, how many different stabs at chase rules have they had? 
 
We loved it at first, until all of the characters started to feel identical and it seemed like every roll needed points spending on it because the probabilities are a bit of a mess; and as mentioned above the game collapses at higher power levels due to the nature of its step-dice mechanic. I'm not sure it's possible to fix that. As a superhero game it's at best inadequate and disappointing. 
 
Necessary Evil had its moments, even if it never bothers to give decent advice and support for its core conceit (you're supposed to be playing villains, but the whole setup means you're indistinguishable from heroes), and Savage Worlds is fantastic as a convention game, but I would never consider it for supers. 

It took a while, but my group burned out on Savage Worlds. I started with the first release, then revised and so on, none of which seemed to fully address all of the issues with the system. I mean really, how many different stabs at chase rules have they had? 
 
We loved it at first, until all of the characters started to feel identical and it seemed like every roll needed points spending on it because the probabilities are a bit of a mess; and as mentioned above the game collapses at higher power levels due to the nature of its step-dice mechanic. I'm not sure it's possible to fix that. As a superhero game it's at best inadequate and disappointing. 
 
Necessary Evil had its moments, even if it never bothers to give decent advice and support for its core conceit (you're supposed to be playing villains, but the whole setup means you're indistinguishable from heroes), and Savage Worlds is fantastic as a convention game, but I would never consider it for supers. 

What little bit I can add. 
I am most familiar with Deluxe which as Duke mentioned SW is a fun system to run and play.  Oddly, most of my experience has been with Triple Ace Games savage world settings such as their Daring Tales of Adventure and Hellfrost.  Of the SW products by Pinnacle none of them ever grabbed me or any of the players I knew, at least not enough to run.  It was all Deadlands and other gloomy apocalyptic grunge except a few outlying Plot Points like Slipstream and Space 1889. 
 
About the game itself. 
From my experience it handles normal and near normal cinematic action really well.  I was able to run a great 1930's Pulp game using TAG's Daring Tales of Adventure plus Hero's Hero Plus Adventures (most of which made it into Thrilling Hero Tales).  TAGs All for One was another game that ran for a good while.  Rippers was a fun but short lived game as was Hellfrost.  The game mechanics are easy and intuitive and the Benny system is one I have modified and stolen for use in my Hero games.   Progression is in 5 point increments with the PC gaining something new at every 5 points: a new Edge, increase a skill,  that is equal to or greater than its linked attribute by one die type, increase two skills that are lower than their linked attributes by one die type each, buy a new skill at d4, or increase one attribute by a die type.   There are also Rank increases starting as a Novice and increasing at 20 (Seasoned), 40 (Veteran), 60 (Heroic) and 80+ (Legendary).   At Novice to Veteran the game runs great and has a very swashbuckley feeling.  But the higher you get the more the entire feel and play of the game gets "off".  In the Heroic range the game got very, I really can't put my finger on it, but the player enthusiasm went down and mine wasn't far behind.  Really soon after the one of the players hit Legendary we quit playing.
 
Superpowers.  The book that added superpowers was not badly written, but they seem to be more of a module that has been pasted on.  You build the PC normally, with access to a few new new Hindrances and Edges, plus Power Points that you use to buy superpowers. Reading the powers list feels like you are reading Champions 2nd edition with names changed and 6th edition flavor (blandness).  Except for 8 "Generic Modifiers", each power lists power specific modifiers which increase or reduce the power cost.  Attack Melee for instance can be any attack from claw to fist to sword and has modifiers like Armor Piercing and Multiple Attacks.  Attack Ranged can be anything from Blasts to bullets and has modifiers like Area Effect and Cone.  They also have a sectioon on building a headquarters. 
 
All in all they did not do a bad job, but it feels tacked on. And there is still the core game issue of things falling apart are the upper ranks. 
We could never get a super game off the ground. 
 
To be fair there are a lot of people that did not have the issues we had with the game system.  I don't know about now, but there used to be a big following for Necessary Evil, the Earth was invaded and conquered by Aliens with all the Superheroes dying in the defense.  Now, Earths salvation rests in the hands of Supervillains.     Not for me, but a lot of peeps liked it.
 
All in all, IMO, SW is a great game for cinematic near normal action, Pulp, Jame Bond spies, Jason Bourne spies, Pirate adventure, Swashbuckling adventure, Doc Savage, 30's 40's 50's adventure and so on.  But it breaks down at the top end.
 
 
 

I always go back to this as reference.

If you don't mind spending $5.00 you might look at Dean Shomshak's Super Mage Bestiary PDF for 4E Hero. It includes an organization for Champions, The Hunter's Moon, which is strongly feminist in outlook (although not exclusively feminine), is patronized by the goddess Hecate, and which practices witchcraft as well as lycanthropy. If you substitute Gremlin-style transformation for the lycanthropy, and perhaps make it even more female centered, it might be a good template for WITCH, or at least suggest some elements you could lift.
 
BTW I remember some discussion on these forums involving players in the very early Champions campaigns, to the effect that the formula which transformed Gremlin was the same as made Gargoyle, the microphone-munching member of the Guardians superhero team.

Ah!  Yes; I see.  Thank you for the clarification.
 
I apologize in advance for what you have just cut the straps on.  ;)*
 
 
Loaded question, Sir, but I suspect you already knew that.
 
So let me answer it as objectively as I can:
 
_mmmmMaybe_....
 
See, the thing is, I-- I, you, Doc, Hugh, LL-- anyone who knows the system, really-- can _easily_ paint you a thousand-and-two pictures  of a game broken by T-form on self.  Hell, we can all paint you a picture of how Energy Blast can break the game!  All you have to do is....  take the controls off of it.   Combine NND and Does BODY.  Make it exempt to damage caps.  Put a freakin' AOE and an auto-reset Trigger and even a couple of Autofires on there for good measure.  That's break the _hell_ out of a game right there.
 
And that's it.  That's the whole thing.  We don't use "T-form (self)" because we don't want to impose limits on T-form.  Ironically, we do it all the time.  Even know, T-form is broken into three district classes (you know: to make it _cheaper_ for a lot of things that are actually _more_ useful than a dead guy, which is still going to cost you 15 /die as a Killing Attack.)
 
But for some reason, when we see T-form (self), we don't see those limits.  We don't see the GM saying "I want a list of what you can and can't T-form into before game time" or "fine, but no more than X AP in your new form" or _any_ sort of ruling or guidance.  What we see is "holy crap!  he can turn himself into anything; have any power; touch any cap--!  We can't allow that!"
 
So do I think it's possible to have T-form (self) and it _not_ break the game?  Sure.  Of course I do.
 
Do I think T-form (self) is just automatically going to break the game?
 
No more than "Power Pool."  Seriously.  Power Pool can do exactly what T-form (self) can do:  it can give you any power, any ability, touch any limit or cap....
 
If you take the controls off.  I don't know any GMs who don't limit pool size right off the bat, and most of them demand some sort of thematic thread running through whatever gets pulled out of the pool.  T-form can do it cheaper (if you wait long enough); Power Pools can do it faster (zero phase change?  No problem.    )
 
Put some heavy borders on T-form (self), and you've got a different sort of Power Pool, and not much else.  So for my money, T-form self is no more broken or dangerous than an unregulated Pool or really, an unregulated anything else.
 
 
 
Why'd you go and do that?  
 
The only problem with Shapeshift is that it's not valid because it makes you pay for a special effect.  Well that, and you don't actually shift shape: you just convince everyone else that you did.
 
You asked for it, my friend.  Please forgive me for doing it this way, but I actually have a "standardize rant" on this subject that I just save and re-paste as needed.  I really didn't want to do that to you, but it's stupidly late here, and I've got to go to work in the morning.  I hope you can forgive this, or at least excuse it long enough for me to have time to think up an all-new rant on this topic.  
 
Enjoy:
 
 
First and foremost, I have no idea what edition of HERO / Champions anyone started with.  Most of the membership seems to have started with 3e, but there are few that started with 2e, and a few less (like me) who started with 1e.
 
The problem I have with the new "official shape shift" is twofold:
 
1) there was already something in place that worked extremely well.
 
2) it's not necessary.  You're quantifying and then paying for the quantification of what amounts to a special effect.  I have no idea why this isn't anathema to more people.
 
 
So to get a summary that might start a conversation, let me offer this:
 
Only in Heroic ID. 
 
This is a Power Limitation that I _know_ has been around since 2e, and may have appeared in 1e as well (I really don't remember; I haven't played 1e since I got my first 2e book).  It wasn't in the main book, but was a found in a write-up -- I can't recall if it was a sample of "how to" or an actual character in a supplement; Chris Goodwin could help you with that, if you're interested.  Guy has a mind for details like Hugh does for math. 
 
Anyway, only in HERO ID rather readily becomes "Only in X ID."  pair it with something like Instant Change, and poof!  Shapeshifter.   Seriously.   Had a character way back when who wanted to emulate some comic book guy (I'm not much up on comics; I love Champions, but never got into comics.  Accordingly, my take on superheroes may be a bit skewed.   ) who had the power to turn into various animals but they all had to be green or grey or-- anyway, they were all the wrong color.
 
So how did we do that?  How did we do that in any edition prior to 5e?  
 
Well there was multiform in 4e.  I can't remember where that came from, either.  I want to say it was an old Adventurers Club article, but I could well be wrong.  It could have been Champions III for all I remember-- sorry; when I get tired, my memory gets terrible.  I actually know this answer, and just can't think of it right now.  Not that it's terribly important, of course: the final answer is that Multiform became "officialized" in 4e.
 
Ironically, we didn't really need _that_, either, as it's pretty much Shape shift all over again:  
 
I have a guy who turns into different things!
 
Cool!  A shapeshifter!
 
No; he doesn't shape shift.  He just turns into different things.
 
So he turns into multiple forms?
 
Right.
 
And each form has a different shape?
 
Well sure!
 
Shape shifter.
 
No!  You're not listening to me...!
 
 
 
You see how that goes?   
 
 
Between you and me, I can't help but think that Multiform was implemented to make shape shifting somehow "cheaper," but it bit them in the backside, as it limits the number of shapes into which you can shift.  Perversely, it lets you make a limited number of forms that are extremely powerful, which you may or may not be able to pull off "old school."  You can _certainly_ do it cheaper than new-fangled Shape Shift!
 
 
So...   absolutely no one before 4e made a shape shifter, ever.
 
 
Well that's a damned lie, and I can prove it, because I had several players make shape-shifters even before there was a _third_ edition, let alone a fourth.  Plastic Man is a character I am passingly familiar with, and in the mid-eighties, he had a Saturday morning cartoon, and clones just _kept_ popping up in my games for a while. And of course, person-to-an-arkload-of-animals never really went away completely.
 
 
How where we doing it?   Well that's pretty simple, really:  Only in X ID became "Only in appropriate ID."  Call it "only in Hero ID," if you want, because when he was shifting shapes, well that wasn't as Joey Bagadonuts; that was as the hero!
 
 
 
Let's back up a bit and examine something:
 
When you're building a character, what does it cost to be a normal human male?  Wait--- "Nothing?"  Are you _sure_ about that?  Woah-- seriously?  It really costs _nothing_?  You can just say "okay, my guy's a normal human male, about six-foot two (so Batman can still feel tall), two-hundred sixty pounds, thirty-two years of age, brown hair, green eyes-- you can just _be_ all that, and it costs _nothing_?!  Dude, that is _cool_.  I mean, that's just an awesome game right there!
 
No; wait-- can't fool me!  I've got it now-- what's it cost to be a normal human _female_?   WHAT?!  "Nothing" _AGAIN_?!  No; something can't be right here.  You can be a man or a woman and neither one costs _anything_?
 
Oh!  It's because I said "normal," right?   So what would it cost to be like, a cyborg or something, with like mechanical legs and an electric heart?  Dude, you are LYING to me!  It can't possibly be _NOTHING_!
 
 
All right, how about an _alien_?!  Yeah; I want to be a blue-and-red-skinned alien with like a big shark fin on my head and webbed hands and my eyes on like snake stalks and four arms.  How much does _that_ cost?  Wha-- this is BULL, Man!  That can't be free!  Well how about if I wanted to be a robot?  That, too?!   A mannequin possessed by the tormented soul of a Victorian orphan child killed in a ritual satanic sacrifice?  A multi-dimensional hyper-intelligent barracuda?  How about the _car_ Barracuda?  Hemi-cuda?
 
Dude, how is all that free?!  It doesn't make sense!   Wait?  What's this about "just being?"  So...  'what I am' is just the special effects of 'being'?   That's pretty deep, man...
 
Oh!  How about if I want to be like, really short, like dwarf tall?!  Free?!  
 
Well okay, but in what _way_ am I a female alien cyborg?  No, I mean, like, do I just _look_ like one; do I just _sound_ like one; do I just _feel_ like one; do I---?
 
I "just am?"  So there's no way that someone is going to look at me or put me under a magnifying glass or examine my nostril leavings and go "Oh, wait!  It's just a guy in female alien cyborg suit---- WAIT!  What if I wanted to be a _black guy?_!  That's got to cost, right?   Are you _kidding_ me?!  So I can just _say_ that I am something, and I _am_ that thing?!
 
 
All right.  I think that horse is as dead as it's going to get. 
 
Now let's look at that in the context of powers:  If I have -- forgive me if you started with 6e; I don't use much 6e terminology as I didn't start with and don't really use it-- Energy Blast.
 
If I say "It's fire from my hands," then it's fire from my hands, period.  No other player will question it; no GM will question it.  It _is_ fire, period.
 
If I say "it's fire from a flame thrower," the exact same thing happens:  it just _is_, and it is because I said it is.  If I say it's gun or a taser or a lightning bolt, that's what it _is_, period, and no sense-- not even the special ones-- is going to determine that it is anything else, because that's the special effect I have chosen.
 
 
Now let's say that I have a gun that shoots poison-- liquid poison, directly into someone's eyes?  I build it as a Linked attack: it does damage, and it has a Flash Attack, and possibly even a Transform: sighted to blind-- all rolled into one.  No one will for a moment doubt that that gun is real, because that gun _is_ real.  It's the special effect for that attack:  I whip out my "what the hell kind of sick twisted person invented something like this?!" gun and I start doing evil things to every person I can see.  It's valid, because it's the real special effect for my power.
 
 
Now suppose my character is an alien snake man who "just do" this thing:  maybe he's got little ducts in his teeth and he just spits a venom that does damage, contains a flash and does Transform: sighted to blind.  Who doubts that he-- my character, the alien snake man-- is a real alien snake man?  No matter what "sense group" I probe with, the result is always going to be "alien snake man who isn't a cyborg or a guy dressed up like an alien snake man," right?
 
 
Now suppose I have that _identical_ power, but my special effect is that I turn into a spitting cobra to do it?
 
 
Suddenly there's a problem?  Suddenly I _look_ like a spitting cobra, but I smell / feel / taste / sound like a six-foot-two two-hundred-forty pound normal human _camoflagued_ as a spitting cobra?
 
What the heck, Man?
 
It's ridiculous.  You are not only being required to pay for a special effect, you are being required to pay _multiple times_ for a special effect: you want to appeal to all eleven possible HERO System senses, right?   _all_ of them!  Not just sight, but infrared sight, too!  It would suck to _look_ like a snake, only to show up in IR scans as a rather large guy in his late thirties.....
 
So how did we handle shape shift before "the rules finally allowed it?"
 
Just like that:  it was the special effect for your powers, period.  We could get creative:  if we wanted to "lock out" certain things and "lock in" certain things, "Only in appropriate form." You know:  Only in Heroic ID.   Animal guy (I swear, I _think_ he called himself "Animan," so that we wouldn't realize he was ripping off "Manimal" from the then-popular TV show) had a laundry list of powers, all bought with the limitation "only in appropriate form."  Seriously:  a list of powers and bonuses to his Characteristics, all with that limitation.  If he wanted to fly, he turned into something that could fly.  If he wanted to fly and have excellent perception, he turned into something like that-- a hawk or something: Flight and +4 PER (sight) and telescopic sight (x100), but he had to be a winged raptor of some variety.
 
If he wanted to be strong, he could turn into an ox.  If he wanted to be strong and have a manipulable appendage-- Gorilla!  Or an elephant...  Bonus!  As an elephant, he could use that +4 PER (Hearing) he has listed for "only in appropriate form".   He could be a cow, a dinosaur, a mule-- whatever he wanted, so long as it was appropriate to the power or powers he was wanting to use at that time.  More PD and Shrinking?  Tortoise!  (no bonus to his movement, though).   Ultimate move-through?  Cheetah, launching itself into the air and becoming a buffalo!
 
 
All that with a handful of powers.  Strangely, cheaper-- way cheaper-- than just having four or five multi forms, and _better_, too, because he had _unlimited_ forms!  UN-STINKIN'-LIMITED!  
 
 
And he _was_ those things, because "just being" those things was his special effect, and there was no "versus this off-the-wall sensory concoction reveals that you're an old Brittish sketch comic in a dress and bad wig" nonsense that the current pile that Shape Shift is.
 
Suppose we had that, back in the old 250-point superhero days (which I still play, incidentally)?  By the time you bought _all_ of your shape shifts and a metric boatload of modifiers to use against your opponent's PER, -- well, you actually _couldn't_, because getting it nearly fool-proof would cost you more points than you actually had at your disposal, and there'd be nothing left to actually buy _useful, functioning_ powers with!
 
Note that, and note it well:  No matter _how_ much you spend on your Shape Shift under the 5e / 6e rules, you will never actually _be_ the thing.  You will always look / smell / taste / feel / sound like the thing, but never actually _be_ the thing.  There are many, many board members who will tell you that "it's the same," but it is _not_ the same, at least not if you are playing by the rules, _because_ ---
 
if anyone examining you rolls a natural 3, you're still a female alien cyborg trying to pass yourself off as a designer coffee table.  Amusingly enough, though, by the rules, they will _never_ disprove that you're a female alien cyborg, even if you're actually a middle-aged fat guy string around a table with his friends and some dice, and they will never disprove that because that was the special effect that you chose for "just existing" in the game world.
 
 
Shape shift is _nothing_, and I mean _nothing_ but a special effect for something else.  At no point in my gaming career (started mid-seventies, with the rest of us old fat guys) have I, in _any_ game system or any character conception, seen "Shape Shift" be the means to its own end: it was _always_ an enabling device for something else, _always_.   And what do we call enabling devices for skills and powers in the HERO System?
 
 
Special Effects.  They are completely _real_ in game terms, and they are completely _free_.
 
 
 
Honestly, today-- I mean right up through 6e, if I didn't already have a thirty-year "only in appropriate form" habit, I'd do it with Power Pool  and be done with it.  The only draw back to that approach is that there wouldn't be a laundry list of "pre-boughts" already written out on the C-sheet.  Sure, I could request them, but I'm not likely to change at this point.
 
 
 
 
 
Yep, and nothing.  It's a matter of perspective:  Oh!  T-form can give you powers you don't have!"
 
So can Power Pool, and no one bats an eye.
 
It's all about where you put your controls.
 
Good night, All.
 

Ooh, I'll have to get Super-Magic Powers. Professional interest, doncha know. A while back, I thought of doing an updated 6e version of the Hermetic Theurgy section from Ultimate Super-Mage, since the treatment in Ultimate Mystic was so brief, but I figured not many people would be interested.
 
Dean Shomshak

That certainly surprises me, but then the popularity of child and teen protagonists was something I was baffled by even as a child and a teen 😁 

Hey, all y'all Champions players! I've got three new mini-supplements available at the Hero Games Online Store. Each of them expands on CHAMPIONS POWERS to offer an new category of powers. They are:   Aquatic Powers, which features nearly four dozen powers for characters who live in or often work underwater. Whether your character is a native of Atlantis, a water manipulator, or has powers derived from a marine animal, Aquatic Powers has just the powers you need to create him!   Hard Energy Powers let a character create energy constructs with sufficient solidity and stability to function like physical objects. Since the character can create a practically infinite variety of hard energy items based on his imagination and the perceived needs of the moment, he has far more power at his fingertips than the owner of any merely physical arsenal. Get plenty of ideas of powers such characters have in Hard Energy Powers!   Super-Magic Powers presents powers for use in creating super-mage characters who don’t use the Super-Thaumaturgy spells found in The HERO System Grimoire. Instead, these characters have powers that follow a distinct magical tradition — such as Alchemy, Black Magic, or Witchcraft — or which hide behind a veneer of Stage Magic. Super-Magic Powers provides dozens of example powers to help you build these characters.   Please check 'em out and pick yourself up a copy!

If those three aren't enough, please take a look at my PDFs of Control Powers and Insect Powers, which are still available -- and be on the lookout for more PDFs containing even more additions to Champions Powers!

Slight conversational sidestep, but I had a bored moment and access to Twitter earlier, so… 
 

Slight conversational sidestep, but I had a bored moment and access to Twitter earlier, so… 
 

Here you go. I'll also throw in the collected Tables of Contents from DH for good measure.
DH Adventures .doc DH TOC.doc

Thanks,for,bumping this, guys.  Just ordered my paper copy of Island of Dr. D a few minutes ago.
 
Shoddy work or not, I just prefer print.