Grail Quest

The SFX The benchmark SFX is supposed to be similar to person A confronting person B and blocking their every move. * For example, if person B wants to sidestep and move past, or back off and retreat, person A somehow blocks them such that they get neglibible movement in any direction. * If person B wants to initiate an attack, person A somehow interferes or neutralizes without necessarily resorting to superior skill. This could be an attempt to grapple with their weapon, for instance. Whether they succeed or not is irrelevant, so long as the attempt, at least for that phase, is neutralized. In order to match this SFX as closely as possible, it will only work if both A and B are ready to act, and A has initiative over B to frustrate B's action. B can get past this by being able to act more frequently than A. Suppose, for instance, that A has SPD 2 and B has SPD 3. B has therefore 1 phase of action more than A can block.

Re: Animal Writeups A bit off-topic, but I've been finding this site to be extremely useful for rustling up realistic stats on animals: http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/index.html Many of the key stats (like length and mass) are in convenient shaded boxes for quick location/reference.

Does this writeup do what I want it to? Feat: "Check Enemy" This character can counter some of an opponent’s moves. If the character has equal or higher SPD, it is possible to block all his opponent’s actions. 3d6+1 Suppress SPD Area of Effect (Accurate; -0) Area of Effect (One Hex; +½) Instant (-½) No Range (-½) One Target at a Time (-½) One Use at a Time (-½) Standard Effect Rule (+0) Total Modifiers: (+½, -2) BP 17, AP 26, RP 9 With this power, the character may drain 1 point of SPD from one target they can come to grips with. They may not use this power on more than one target at the same time, and a target may only have 10 points worth of SPD (i.e., 1 SPD) Suppressed at any one instance. The effect is not Continuous like a regular Suppress, and fades after the attack, so in order to use this, the attacker must essentially hold their phase to act just before the target acts, and in activating this power, neutralize the action by neutralizing the point of SPD the defender was using to act that phase.

A suit of mail, worn _without_ the usual padding beneath, can protect you from sword cuts so that you don't get any lacerations. Is a suit of mail, _without_ the usual padding, therefore 6 points of Physical Damage Resistance even if the target's PD is less than 6?

Re: Start BODY at 2 instead of 10 This type of situation is why I came up with this proposal for Killing Attacks: http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=39253

Re: Choking The Life Out Of Someone

Levels of being Grabbed It came up in another thread, and I thought of maybe having levels of Grab depending on how much a STR check succeeded. (1) IF we have a definition of Casual STR as being 40 points of STR less than what is necessary, we can try something like this: +8 or more: 0 Phase to escape (Casual STR) +7 to +4: Half phase to escape +3 to +0: Full phase to escape -1 to -4: Standard grab success +5 or more: No hit roll required to use Squeeze or Throw (2) No character rolls less than 3 dice for a STR check. Therefore, everyone involved gets a flat number of dice so that the lowest-STR character is rolling 3 dice. For example, STR 10 versus STR 15 means 3d versus 4d. (3) We need to formulate some way to continue to lower STR below 0 when a character weakens. Perhaps when a character is at 0 END and forced to stay that way, STR reduces by 5 per Phase, and can go into an unlimited negative amount. In a choke hold situation then, the target does not get any Recoveries (p424). Therefore, as he weakens, and as STUN continues to be wrung out of him, he will have less and less STR to resist the choke.

Re: Lion versus Gazelle / Buffalo Benchmark

Lion versus Gazelle / Buffalo Benchmark Further research on the net has suggested that one of the benchmark situations I had in mind was probably wrong. Lions that hunt Cape Buffalo frequently resort not to raw damage at the neck, but to asphyxiation, as it is often the case that their teeth do not actually break the skin: "In fact, when killing very large prey, such as cape buffalo, a lion's teeth often don't even break the skin," he added. "Big prey are killed through slow suffocation." (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/04/0405_050405_marsupialjaws_2.html) Which suggests that if our HERO lion can get its jaws around a gazelle or a buffalo, it might take more than a single chomp to kill it. As long as they hang on, they'll eventually do the job. Allowing for a longer duration for the actual kill, and further allowing the lion a much smaller CV penalty to strike the neck because it's simply longer and wider on the prey, it can be the case that our HERO lion indeed does go for specifically for a neck strike (probably after grabbing the body), and even if it can't do enough to immediately inflict BODY by biting, by virtue of having a stranglehold on the neck, we can bring in "drowning" (asphyxiation) rules. My revised lionness writeup (a typical female lion, massing 126 kg, and assuming a bite force corresponding to mass) does 4 DC killing on her bite against a Thomson's Gazelle and can hang on with STR 17. The Gazelle (large 30 kg specimen) has STR 5 to shake her off, PD 1, 9 BODY, and would be dead in approximately 5 phases, or, at the lion's SPD 2, about 30 seconds from the time the jaws go around its neck.

Re: Start BODY at 2 instead of 10

Re: Start BODY at 2 instead of 10

Hitting the Head an FX or mandatory?

In a superhero game (and especially when you see how superheroes in comics turn up with a fresh costume 2 frames after the most brutal battle ever), starting at 10 BODY seems fine. However, for a more heroic-level or gritty / realistic level game, I was thinking of starting BODY at 2 for 100 kg of mass, plus (EGO - 10)/5 if (EGO > 10). This way, a club or mace actually has a decent chance of braining you in one go, and getting stabbed by a dagger can actually be fatal. Has anyone tried something like this? Is 2 BODY too low? (remembering that death technically occurs only at -BODY).

Re: Killing Attack as a special Penetrating Attack Thank you all for the feedback. I guess one of the assumptions that I forgot to put down is that the way I view BODY versus STUN is that STUN damage is more of trauma than damage to the structure of a creature. Example: Heat versus fire. If you pass your finger right through a candle flame, you take STUN from the heat and a possible blister. If you left your finger in the fire and it started to burn you for skin damage and skin loss, you took BODY. Maybe a tiny amount that is a fraction of a full point of BODY, but you still took BODY. A Killing Attack is one that harms the structure of the target. A Normal Attack is one that is meant to inflict trauma. If it kills the target (inflicts BODY), this is secondary because of overwhelming force. Now, going back to your question. There's a two-part answer. Part 1: We already do it. Part 2: Real-world correlation to accumulated minute damage. Part 1: We already do it with STUN, but it is useless to overtly track the values. We apply this to Killing Attacks because the ability to recover BODY is typically very slow. Because it is very slow, there is enough time for the accumulation to possibly make a difference. This is not the case with STUN. Example 2: Applying the system to STUN. We could apply it to Normal Attacks as well. An example would be a bunch of thugs swarmed all over Hercules and pounding him down--a common scene in the now-cancelled Hercules: the Legendary Journeys. However, since Normal Attacks inflict trauma, and since just resting recovers from trauma (i.e., what REC and taking a Recovery does), all accumulated fractional amounts of STUN can be considered to be cleared as soon as the character gets a Recovery. That, and combined attacks are already summed by Non-Linear Addition under existing Coordinated Attack rules. In a sense, we already do it, but handwave the results away as negligible and/or not worthwhile to keep track of. Part 2: There is a "real world" correlation for doing this with BODY (and thus, with KAs). The ant example is pretty extreme. We can scale up to, say, a thug wielding a Swiss Army Kinfe against an average person. Yes, it's dangerous, and if they hit someone in the neck, can be quite quickly fatal. But if the target got stabbed in the thigh or slashed on the shoulder, I don't think it should be rated at 3-4 points of BODY, which would be what it might be after factoring in STR and under the existing all-or-nothing AVLD-like type system. And it should do less to a buffalo or a whale because their sheer size makes them less vulnerable, not the type of defenses they possess. At the same time, a high rPD for these creatures is really not warranted for their skin type, and (IMO) the high rPDs assigned to them right now are an artificial attempt to toughen them because of the inadequate mechanic, and the rPD ratings do not correspond well to the "real world" and will not hold up to scrutiny when compared to what other creatures have in terms of rPD for their skin/defenses.

Here is an idea on how to handle Killing Attacks, in a way that is sensitive to being very large relative to the attack, and neither completely vulnerable in an out-of-proportion way, nor completely immune. In this scheme, there is no special way to roll BODY for a Killing Attack. It is just like a Normal Attack, with a +0 advantage "Killing Attack". A Killing Attack is an Advantage that changes the way BODY damage is applied. Because of the commonness of what can qualify as Resistant Defense, this advantage is worth +0. * A Killing Attack affects only the BODY of damage rolled. STUN damage is calculated normally. * If (BODY < Resistant Defense), there was no BODY Damage. * If (BODY – total Defense) is 1+, this is the amount of BODY damage inflicted. * If (BODY – total Defense) is 0 or less, retain this value. As more damage is taken, use Non-Linear Addition (see below, past the example) to sum damage until it is at least 1 BODY, then apply to the target. E.g. A large ant 5mm long might have a STR of –76. Assuming a powerful bite rated at +2 DC, it has a net –13 DC bite attack, which might be expected to, on average, inflict –13 BODY. Against a typical human with 0 rPD and 2 PD, it will do –15 BODY. It will therefore take an average of 2^(15+1), or 65,536 bites to inflict 1 point of BODY damage on a human. This can be one ant biting repeatedly, or an army of ants swarmed over a target. Non-Linear Addition Where “Non-Linear Addition” is mentioned, it refers to adding based on effect-value rather than absolute value. Treat the values to be added a points of STR. Combine the lifting amount, and look up the corresponding STR. E.g., 10 STR has a lift of 100 kg. Two robots with 10 STR can lift (100 + 100) or 200 kg, which is 15 STR. Two instances of 10 STR is therefore 15 STR.

I've just been working on a system of determining the statistics of melee and muscle-powered ranged weapons. The document is here: http://www.freewebs.com/d20elements/HERO%20Weapons.htm It takes into account weapon weight and reach, and the type of attack (swing or thrust). The "Equipment" link on this page opens an Excel spreadsheet that lists common weapons and their calculated base damage for Swing and Thrust: http://www.freewebs.com/d20elements/herosystem.htm Constructive criticism welcome.

Re: Average Human Running Speed and What is Sprinting I've been thinking about that... What _is_ SPD 3 versus SPD 2, anyway? Can anyone give me a solid example? I've been thinking about limiting normal anything to SPD 2, and maybe only supers get SPD 3+.

Re: Average Human Running Speed and What is Sprinting 10" x 2 m/" x 2 NCM x SPD 4 / 12 = 13.33 m/s. The fastest person in the world, at full sprint, with years of training and constant conditioning, going for Olympic Gold, is just a hair over 10 m/s. (S)he isn't anywhere close to even 11 m/s. And this is supposedly without pushing, which is not allowed to non-Heroes. Yes, it's a "few m/s" more, but realize what you're saying here.

Re: Average Human Running Speed and What is Sprinting The spreadsheet shows 6"x2 at SPD 2 = 10 m/s Manual calculation shows 6" x 2 m/" x 2 NCM x SPD 2 / 12 = 4 m/s Or do I have to lay off the decaf and wake up here?

(1) A quick Google came up with the average human walking speed to be 1.3 meters per second. I was thinking of making this the new basic movement, so people in the game world would have 4" of Running instead of 6". However, is the average human walking speed a Combat speed or Non-Combat Speed (which would base base Running 2"x2). (2) If I want to let sprinting max out at 10 meters per second, which is a hair under what world-class sprinters are doing nowadays, what sort of stats should I be using as a benchmark? (a) Are sprinters SPD 2 or should they be SPD 3-4? After all, being able to run faster doesn't mean you think/do everything else faster. ( Is sprinting more inches of movement, or a higher NCM multiplier, and making the use of an NCM multiplier cost END? At 4"x4 Running and SPD 4, a character is approximately running 10 m/s. But if he Pushes, he'll be way beyond world-class.

Re: And in his wake ... desolation (Power Design Help) Don't target a hex--target the planet. Just as when you attack a battleship with a missile, you target the battleship as a whole, not one hex of the battleship. The Earth is 5.9742 × 10^24 kilograms, or only about 86 BODY. If the earth does not have an appropriate defense against the Transform, it'll go pretty quickly--when it shouldn't. This is the issue I was having with large targets versus small attacks in another thread.

Re: Null Characteristics replaced by negative CHAR rules? Yeah--this is what I was thinking of! Looking at the text you've quoted, it looks like they've basically allowed disembodied AI Computers to be "spirits". I think all I really need to do for a character without personal mobility, such as a sword or focus or whatever, is buy down STR to 0 in addition to taking a 25-point Physical Limitation for having null STR. Then use Automaton Powers for the body if it needs to be essentially an automaton, albeit one that can't move. Of course, someone will have the carry around the object-character, but that's not the issue here.

Re: Adjustment Power vs. Base Points only Problem is, HERO is non-linear when converting SFX to numbers, but the damage system is strictly linear when an NND or AVLD is unopposed. The mass of the moon is 7.36 × 10^22 kilograms. It has approximately 69 BODY according to the guideline where x2 mass = +1 BODY (for example, see page 575, Size Templates). If you had a small NND gas or poison or whatever attack, you could kill a Moon-sized creature very quickly if it doesn't have the appropriate defense. AND using the moon is an extreme example. The world's biggest elephant weighted in at 12,200 kg. This is only +6 BODY.

Re: power limitations as naked power advantages? This seems to be building the power around a mechanic, rather than the SFX. I would find quibbling over the exact mechanical definition of a power to be somewhat suspect, but anyway... Sounds like the player wants actions to be more strenous. In that case, I would just build it as an END Suppress. If you normally have 100 END, an action that costs 5 END takes up 5% effort. If you suddenly only have 50 END, now it costs 10% effort. The more END you suppress, in SFX terms the more effort will be felt by those in the AoE for each action they wish to take that costs any END at all. It's possible that the player wants instead, or in addition, that actions tire people out more. In that case, I'd go with a REC Suppress. In SFX terms, it might be similar to being tired out faster. If you could, say, sprint for 2 minutes before getting a heart attack, now you might only go for 1 minute before the same.

Re: If you hate Killing Attacks, how would you replace them?