boomer

Re: Chess Grandmaster - KS, PS, or something else? I'll add my .02 but a lot of it has been said already....KS, PS, then lots of KS relating to the subject.....yes you can roll only one as a complimentary...but you have them to choose from. Rep's a good one and Rivalry would be good too (stuck for that last Disad....there you go). Don't be afraid to use PS with KS....you can never have enough KS if you ask me.....

Re: Sell me on HERO 5th ed. I agree on the 4 different versions of yes.....in our Fantasy Hero Campaign we had Channelers (ala Robert Jordons WoT)....there were no set spells for those Channelers to use....you made a roll on a table at character creation...found what your sphere of specialty was (ie Fire, Water, etc) then you built Spells with points. It was great because you could specialize your dude/dudette to throw unique spells. With Hero I was able to make (I've used this example before but it's worth repeating) a Feline rogue really bad ass with knife attacks....normally knife attacks do a d6 certain knives do d6-1....but the concept of the character was that he was an acrobatic fighter....he'd leap off a crate, land on his feet (breakfall), go into a front roll (acrobatics) then come out of it nailing his target in the stomach with two daggers (hit location, attack roll, modifiers because of hit location, two handed attack because of natural Feline ambidexterity). Because of all of that, the GM would usually grant me and extra damage class on the weapons...reasoning: momentum of the attack, shock value of the speed of the attack (he's on a crate, next thing you know you have two daggers in your gut). All of that was built into the character with the skills I purchased for him plus the benefits of the Feline Race package that I had to buy as well. That's just an example of how to get creative with character generation.

Re: Sell me on HERO 5th ed. Haven't played GURPs but I've played D&D (didn't we all...), Shadowrun and L5R (the old system....I hear there's a d20 version out) and of course Hero. We could have done everything we needed to do with Hero. Like Thia said...there's no genre you can't play with Hero. Like Indiana Jones? Hero's core rules got that covered. Like Superheroes? Hero's got you covered. Like playing street cops ala Law and Order? Hero's got that covered. Honestly the most fun I had was playing a days from retirement "old guy" New York Italian Detective in a game filled with Supers.......They had their powers and crap...I had a badge and a .38 special. The thing with Hero....it takes awhile to make a character if you are doing it for the first time. So much stuff you can throw in to flesh them out you will be up for hours going..."no...that skill would be better...ooooo I can create any kind of Knowledge Skill I want.....I will have KS: Seedy bars in Campaign City....that will come in handy..." and hey that's only 2 points or so.

Re: Ground Tentacle Attack! Works for me....like I said just curious....my GM's would always impose real world circumstances on you.......

Re: Ground Tentacle Attack! It sounds like the attack has some Desolid aspects then. I think of real World instances when I think up powers so I'm wondering why no rumble? Or how the no rumble is achieved? Like I said if I was building it I'd be thinking how to overcome the obvious ground vibration from something pushing through solid earth.... but hey that's me.... Just curious how you guys are doing it.

Re: Ground Tentacle Attack! One question I have....wouldn't you have to have some kind of Tunneling mixed in there? Also, wouldn't the ground rumble slightly therefore limiting the surprise factor (I might not know where the tentacle is going to come up at, but I can sure feel the ground rumbling under my feet......)

Re: Captain Thunderbolt - help me spend XP Oh CT needs some Oratory skills.....c'mon he's Captain Thunderbolt after all....I'm sure he's on Larry King Live (or the Campaign City's equivalent alot), Conversation works good (I bet he gives good monologue). Perks would be something along the lines of customized off the menu meals from the best Chefs in town at the Best Restaurants in town (Captain Thunderbolt.....because your actions saved my restaurant let me make you a special meal that will be the envy of the other diners.....). He could use his Oratory/Conversation as a kind of prescense attack (ala The Tick who had the best PRE attacks ever). He sounds like a real 4-color Cap America type (I love playing those guys......)

Re: Negative CSLs Could you make it a DEX Drain with an NND? Then Power Defense wouldn't work, would it? It's been awhile since I've looked at the rules....

Re: Negative CSLs I didn't think of Supress.....that sounds good too actually.

Re: Negative CSLs You could do it as a DEX drain.....lower DEX would give lower CSL's naturally. That makes more sense with what the player is trying to do. A swarm of nanobots that attack neurons would make them misfire/not fire at all making the target less dextrous. A Drain sounds like it would be more efficient to build.

Re: Multiform, OIHID or just sfx? How about buying the form as a Multipower? The instant change wouldn't have the limitation of OIHID, but the Multipower would. Yes she can instant change, but until she does that's the only power she can wield without being slivered.

Re: Custom Equipment in Heroic Campaigns Great suggestions by all....pretty much what I would suggest too. Another way to do it is to give bonus points with your XP. In our FH campaign we called them Brownie Points. You would get like 1 or 2 per adventure along with your standard XP. We had a list of what you could spend them on...1,000 gave you a lifetime pass to get into a Kingdom (of course if you misused that privelage it was revoked). They could also be used to upgrade your weapons. You started with standard quality weapons. You could spend 50 Brownie plus whatever the blacksmith charged to upgrade your weapon to Fine quality (extra DC say or +1 OCV say). You could also spend them as if they were levels of Luck to have certain perks.....we knew a meeting was a trap, but we couldn't bring our weapons in and my character spent 25 Brownie to have weapons smuggled in for us. It saved our hides.

Re: Why should I care? I bet combat rounds went so smooth with your military gaming group....man can you imagine....everyone was ready and had their actions already planned.....that is the one thing that can bog down a Hero gaming session especially with Noobs......

Re: Would You Allow.....? I like it actually. Kind of like the insights MacGyver used to get.....makes a tech dude even more useful.

Re: Why should I care? In our FH campaign we did lots of travelling too, and had the occassional character that wasn't comfortable in cities. We would always have volunteers stay out in the woods with them while the rest went into town. They accepted, like mentioned above, that they would have some down time while the rest of the party was occupied in the town. It can work out, you just have to have players willing to compromise.

Re: Why should I care?

Re: Why should I care? I actually like games where the campaign parameters aren't announced. We had a GM tell us to make skilled normals who had Security/LE/Military backgrounds. That was it. Gave us points, etc. I ended up making John Clark from the Tom Clancy books (if you don't know the character; Ex-CIA type). We ended up getting scrolls handed to us by an Elderly Asian Gentlemen that when read gave us Powers. It was a quite good game. Now back on topic: It seems that you have 1 "I'd rather play WoW or Halo" player, 1 gung ho gotta get in the game player (love those kind) and 1 "what's my motivation again?" wanna be thespian....... Have these guys/gals role played before??? It's Champions.....all Champions games usually start with "your walking down (insert place here) you see (action, noun, etc) what do you do?" I also like the suggestions of just going after their characters. This would be the time to hit those two "meh" types with an ambush by Viper or something......

Re: Who's your favourite NPC? It's an NPC from a Shadowrun game we did at a con...... Dave the Krispy Kreme guy....picture two large and very dumb trolls plus one large human....dress motif..Cold War Russian Military circa 1980.....coming up with a "cunning plan" to get past a security guard in a secured apartment complex by tempting him with Krispy Kreme Donuts. Dave was played wonderfully by the GM in the way he dealt with the three Kooks asking to borrow his truck.

Re: Characters you've always liked but who never fulfilled their potential... Captain Sun.....a typical costumed EP who wore glowing wristbands of the sun. He was boring in his original form. Simple one piece spandex with Spidey like mask with a sun emblem on it. Lame...lame lame..... I changed him to El Sol. He found the wristband of an Aztec Priest of Huichilobos (sp?) the Aztec God of the Sun....his costume is now an elaborate Aztec Mask with gold neck piece...(you know the look...remember Social Studies in school)....sandals, loin-cloth like thing.....anyway it gave him more of a unique feel. Same basic character but was changed from an white anthropologist to a Mexican National from the University of Mexico City......who could trace his ancestry back to the Aztecs. Definitely gave more flavor to the character. Siphon: Speedster who has the "curse" of draining strength by touch. Has to wear gloves all the time, doesn't shake hands, etc. He started off as a Villan (yes we toyed around with doing the Villan Group but it never took off.) After much thought, he being a villan would be too vanilla to play.....and too powerful...no compunctions about draining people's strength until the passed out or died, etc. Made him a Hero who is traumatized by the memories of his powers manifesting (petting a cat when he was 13 and all of a sudden he drained the poor thing of all strength basically killing it.) Being an extroverted person by nature, I found it a challenged to role play an introvert (hey you would be too if you could never touch another person with your bare hands....)

Re: questions about disads for dryad-like race The first is a definite dependency......as is the second really. They have specific types of nourishment and that may be hard to find. The last should be a susceptability with the tree being a Foci of some sort....essentially it's where the life essence is stored.

Re: Steampunk/Victorian fantasy setting questions I really like it McManus....I'd play a character in it. Gives me that League of Extraordinary Gentlemen vibe/Girl Genuis vibe. I like the suggestion of Warlock, I would say something along the lines of WarAlchemists or War Weavers possible.....

Re: Catgirls (and Catboys) for Fantasy In our Fantasy Hero campaign we had Felines...bi-pedal cat-people basically. They had clawed feet and five fingered clawed hands. Covered in fur from head to toe. Used weapons and wore armor. The all had the Talent: Light Sleep. Cats will pop out of a dead sleep at the drop of a hat. Acrobatics was a must as was breakfall. Being carnivores doesn't mean eating things raw necessarily. We had two types of Felines: City Civilized and Wilderness Primative. The City types were referred to as Domi's and the wilderness types as Fe'rals. I've played both. Stealth was also a required skill as was a higher speed than most. Cats are fast. I had a Lion Feline who was a Blademaster and he normally had a 4 speed but could channel an ability that made him faster...possibly 5 speed. For Fantasy Hero that's fast.

Re: The Heroes blew it! Evil Wins Sounds like the Plot of the Movie Mystery Men.....

Re: List of Professions Driver Required: TF: (chosen vehicle type), PS: Driver, Perk: Drivers License Recommended: Combat Driving, Mechanics (car repair), KS: (chosen vehicle type) Related Skills: Conversation (for drivers that carry passengers), Systems Operation (CB Radios, familiarity), Language: (local languages), Shadowing, Streetwise Notes: Cab drivers may take WF: Small Arms and/or Martial Arts, depending on how dangerous the neighborhood is. Bump of Direction is a useful Talent, though few drivers have it. Like the changes you made and additions.....looks good.

Re: Steampunk/Victorian fantasy setting questions Can't help you on the metalurgy and I'm more of a Fire guy myself....You can create a magical process yourself. Give certain metals a failure rate based on the forgers PS or KS of the process. Certain "rare" metals get a penalty (-4 to roll because the Metalurgist just doesn't have the familiarity with that metal). Steam Locomotion was possible, just not practical (too expensive, or just wasn't mass produced yet). Jules Verne was great at picturing Victorian "Hi-Tech". Iron was a very reliable metal, ie Cast Iron. Cannons were made of it...yes they sometimes failed, but that's probably part of what you are going for. It sounds like you are really going to have a great campaign.