Duke Bushido

The guy that just dropped a hundred-odd bucks to make his wife and daughter happy at the seafood joint. Well timed, that....

Right, but as you alluded to in your previous post, there's wind resistance, etc, and if you could fall far enough, you would actually slow down in the atmosphere. There would be a constant that could be applied to determine your rate of deceleration, but I am way to rusty to trust myself figuring _that_ out. Game-wise, you'll be fine just using the throwing velocity as your rate of speed. Calculate how far up they are being thrown. They will fall from there.

Mine as well, but that's now HERO handles movement. Two characters with two different speeds and the same movement have different top speeds. By HERO Rules, a character who is moving at SPD 6 and traveling at 100 mph is covering a certain amount of distance _per his Phase_. If the SPD 6 character moves30" per Phase, and he does a move through, the damage he does (and takes) is derived directly from that 30". If a speed 3 Character moves 30" and does a move through, he does / takes the exact same damage, even though he is moving at exactly half the speed of the other guy. There is an _optional_ rule (and has been for several editions now) of segmented movement, and while it stops silliness like this, it's optional. it's also not popular (at least, not in discussions on any web board I've run across), and many people complain that it adds more complexity, etc. I like it, specifically for these sorts of problems, but even I don't use it regularly. I think I use it mostly in westerns (for falling off trains) and cyberpunk (for getting hit by cars), but I don't use it anywhere with particular regularity.

Me, neither, but we don't need one, at least not for the purpose of playing a game. We can make a chart! Now granted, 1G doesn't work out evenly in meters, as it's (rusty memory, and this is something I learned as a kid, so don't expect me to remember all the decimal places. ) something close to 9.8 mps, squared. Again-- we're playing a game, and not building a perfect physics engine (at least, _I_ am not building a perfect Physics Engine. So I'm going to increase the inaccuracy a bit in favor of playability, and call it 10 mps squared. Time Elapsed Distance Travelled Speed in meters per second 1 second: 5m 10 mps 2 seconds: 20m 20 mps 3 seconds: 44m 29 mps 4 seconds 78m 39 mps 5 seconds 122m 49 mps At roughly 5.5 seconds, you hit 54.5 MPS, which is, as Echo3Niner pointed out, terminal velocity for what we will call an "Involuntary jumper." This means they are doing the spread-eagle, spread fingers, opening the coat-- anything they can to air brake, like any sensible person actually would, I think. 6 seconds 177m 59 mps 7 seconds 240m 69 mps At roughly 7.5 seconds, you hit 75 MPS, or the dead center of the range of terminal velocity given for a willfully diving human (listed, depending on source, as between 150 mph and 180 mph. This chart assumes 165, splitting the difference, because ultimately, it's a game, and the difference is a couple of dice of damage. 8 seconds 314m 78.5 mps Now this list can go on and on-- obviously terminal velocity for Solid Steel Man is going to be somewhat different than it is for Giant Sheet of Paper Man, but since I've got laundry to do, I'm pretty much wrapping this up right here. Where you get into trouble converting this into damage is the speed chart. No; I'm serious. When you are moving (voluntarily, I mean), the HERO System assumes that you move X amount _on your Phase. If you want to have a lot of fun with that, picture a bunch of Olympians (the normal leotard ones we hear about every four years; not the ones from days of yore). You've got olympic sprinters, olympic skaters, olympic shooters, olympic weight lifters-- anyway, they're all on a plane, headed to the games. They are traveling at 400 MPH. The sprinters are speed 4. The gymnasts are SPD 5. The weight lifters are SPD3. The curling team is SPD 2. Knowing that the sprinters can move forward every three seconds, and the gymnasts can move forward five times every 12 seconds, how long before the curling team falls out of the back of the plane? Your speed, at least in Champions as-is, is the movement available to you on your Phase. Move; pause, move; pause, over and over. So how do we do this? If we take raw meters per second and apply that as the rate of speed every single Segment-- well, that's absolutely right, at least in terms of the one Segment in question. Frankly, that's the way I would do it. In HERO Terms, though, you should multiply that movement by 12 and then divide by your SPD to find out just how fast you were moving on _your_ Segment. And no; I won't blame you a bit for telling my that I'm being pedantic, because that doesn't mean I'm not completely correct; it just means that I am also damned annoying about it. This is a fairly minor (and seriously amusing) flaw in the SPD chart, of course: the faster your SPD, the slower you're falling. If you have a low SPD, you are getting _way more_ free movement than someone with a higher SPD. The obvious work around is to apply the speed listed as being your actual movement speed at the time of impact. As far as how many dice you should roll, well look for either the distance you have fallen or the time you have fallen to determine your speed at that instant. Treat that as your movement. It's a move-through versus the earth, so you're going to take full damage. If you can sidestep the earth, you can do a move-by and only take half of it. You folks have fun! EDIT: Now I totally understand not wanting to deal with the hole in your monitor if you cut out and save this handy chart, so I spent a moment or two Googlling, and I found this: https://www.omnicalculator.com/physics/free-fall Now put those scissors down!

If I am not mistaken, in the past it has been suggested that this can be done with a VPP and perhaps Aid to grow the VPP, with various limitations and advantages that, however you wish to flavor it, come out to be "only to duplicate / imitate another power someone else is using." If you don't want to go that way, then perhaps create an END reserve (for pushing your existing power, if the idea is to use the 'stray energy' to increase it) and an Aid for that END reserve, with limitations on the Aid modeling how it is actually powered-- in the presence of Kinetic Powers, in the presence of Radiation Powers-- whatever. Or some mixture of all of those things. Hope something there helps.

Again, it fails. Everything I do is for the express purpose of having and enjoying a home. If go home is an option that doesnt affect actually havibg a home, I am going to pick it every single time.

That seems quite accurate, actually. I'd rep you, but apparently I am put. I will come back by later.

https://i.imgur.com/xi8Fi6V.mp4

I have _never_ understood the idea of "Go Big or Go Home" as a put-down, as a threat, or as any other kind of trash talk. I work two jobs to afford the home. My wife is there (when she isn't working her two jobs). My kids are there. My food is there. My books and my motorcycles are there. "Threating" me with going home is borderline retardation: having and using that home is one-hundred-percent the singular motivation behind every aspect of my life! "Go big or go home!" No problem, jackass. Have fun grappling other big sweaty men in your pointless sports thingy.....

There was a thread a while back discussing a write up of counterstrike as a damage shield-- it might have even been a discussion of something Steve wrote; I don't remember anymore (nothing personal: I don't use the MA rules, so I wasn't particularly interested in the topic, but I follow along now and again for interesting ideas). What you posted-- the damage shield-- was exactly the thing being discussed, and what I was trying to remember. I think the topic at the time was referring to riposte; but again-- same thing, different SFX. All in all, well done.

What LL has put up is probably the closest anyone has ever tried. The problem is that in HERO, the basic unit of energy is the Endurance Pip. The problem with converting directly to a specified unit of energy is this: Mini Man, who shrinks down the size and mass of a vintage Star Wars action figure by Kenner. When he does so, he gains several powers, including thirty inches of Flight. Gargantu-Juan the Human Tank activates his power and grows to a height of twelve feet as his body turns to solid steel. He also has thirty inches of Flight. Professor Technical has built a diesel-powered rocket capable of attaining low-earth orbit. This mighty manned missile majestically moves it's entire thousand-ton mass with thirty inches of Flight. No matter which character you are using, barring other modifiers to the power, they all use the same amount of END to power their thirty inches of Flight. Now that is _not_ to say that you can't work something up such that one END is equal to X joules, and enforce that by requiring larger characters to spend more END to do the same thing as a less massive character, etc. If that is what you want to do, then by all means, go for it. I heartily endorse do,kering with the rules, after all. I am simply saying that there is nothing in the exiating system that lends itself easily to what you are doing. Honestly, even the END rules are wonky, when you realize that the energy used to power a human being for one day wont keep a lightbulb burning for more than a moment or two.

I dont want to under think this, but isnt this, per the description in the fist post, more or less a counterstrike of sorts?

Ditto. Is that a thing that happened, or was meant to happen?

Anybody find a CoD on Saget? Given his time in Florida, etc..... I was curious, and cant find it in any of ny usual places.

Oh, _that_ explains it! I kept getting quote notifications and I would check in here and decide that my phone and I had gone crazy....

Shadowcat combined my two favorite things and gave us an official Traveller HERO. On the strength of my appreciation for that alone-- and I probably shouldn't admit this publicly, but oh well-- I will blindly buy anything with his name on it. Shadowcat rocks.

Without putting any thought into it (nothing personal; I have to take my wife to see her beast friend in a few minutes. Ms J suffered a stroke a couple of months ago and, being how close they are (my wife _really and truly_ does not bond well with other people-- to the point where for twenty years she has only two friends: Ms J and my brother D. She _likes_ people; she just doesn't bond easily), I make it a point to take her any time she wants to go. Short version: that leaves me with just a few minutes here: +X DCV, only affects the hex the character is standing in (consider enlarging this with AoE, centered on the Character, of perhaps centered on a particular hex near the character. Remember that if the Character is going to be _outside_ the Area of Effect of his power, you might want to apply Ranged as well-- for what it's worth, I would require it in that case. Also noted that I probably wouldn't make him buy Ranged because I _probably_ wouldn't allow him to use this "power" at a range sufficient enough to put him outside of his AoE. Not because I'm a jerk, but because a reasonably crafty player could make this a real nightmare for your heroes. Perhaps he could develop this ability after the Players have encountered him a couple of times-- once they get a feel for his Schtick, he could grow it up a bit-- staying in theme, just getting a bit more powerful as they do. Now because you want the "here I am!" effect of him actually appearing to be somewhere else, considering Images: Here I am! Linked to your new Fractured Perceptions power (and yeah: I had a villain named Fracture with this ability. For what it's worth, now that I have read your suggestion of Prism, I wish I had a time machine and could go back thirty years.. . His SFX was making the area around him (his defenses usable on hexes-- to explain that: Steve Long added a thing to HERO cannon to simulate Magic Missile: "One Hex Accurate." I had a Player figure this out thirty years ago (if you're curious, he specifically named this power "Screw Your Ninjas!" as a reference to the Martial Artist tendency to have lots of Combat Skill Levels). It didn't take long before _everyone_ had this. Fracture was intended to demonstrate that maybe the heroes should have a power or two that did _not_ have that, just in case. . Oh; sorry: his SFX were making the world within a certain area appear as though you were viewing it through a shattered mirror, hence the name) You can get as simple or as complicated as you want to fine-tune the effect, but whatever your final build is, remember that it needs to be something that you would allow a Player to use not just in the game you have next week, but in the one you had two weeks ago, too. Gotta run!

Also, SmokeySmokey: Thank you! I love the idea so much that I am going to task the youth group with defending the city from a Valentine's variant of this concept. They've almost wrapped up the Christmas Treant. I think I am going to enjoy the gooey antics of Nougat.... Thanks!

I'm going to go out on a limb and say enough mould and Legionnaire 's Disease to wipe out an entire county. Still, cool picture!

All of my games are like this. All of them. I have never run a "short" campaign. My players all _like_ starting at the bottom and growing the character-- even when we are doing supers. They like starting out as 1965 Spiderman and ending up as Not-Evil Thanos. And since they like that, that's what we play. Fantasy games run the same way. Our Sci-Fi games usually end up with players laying the foundations of empires by the time we wrap up, and cyberpunk games usually end with the PCs toppling some of the mightiest corporations on the planet, staring from their humble characters stealing from street vendors just to stop their stomachs from rumbling. I don't want to be seen as kidding here, but for most of our gaming lives, we kinda thought that this was the _point_ of a campaign: the creation and growth of the characters. because of this, that's how we did it. We like it. And now that I am thinking about it, that's probably one of the reasons I detest urban fantasy fiction overall: the characters are _not allowed_ to grow to any level that would draw the world's attention to the existence of this hidden magical world living amongst them.

My first instinct was to go with a favorite pejorative of the supers genre as a whole: "Spandex Commandos." However, even before I finished thinking it, it occurred to me that an intelligent group of criminals-- mafia or not-- would realize that advertising the idea that this group is organized by super-powered individuals increases the risk of drawing super-powered scrutiny. The much more clever thing to do would to be name themselves after an archaic organization or a name that sounded "kinda like all the others" while quietly encouraging the _rumor_ that this organization is run by "way more powerful men than most other families can boast of" and kind of let it ride.

Most of what you have described is just special effects: what you look like, etc-- is all just declared and done. Now I want to tell you to ignore this, because a lot of folks will jump and tell you that you must do X because you look like Y. The fact is that you don't, but again-- feel free to ignore this and spend eighty points based on what you look like. What you will be paying for is any _genuine advantages_ that this look gives you. I _stress_ genuine advantages because a lot of folks have a hard time distinguishing between _genuine advantages_ and _perceived advantages_. Perceived advantages (patent pending) are those things that people will tell you that you _have_ to buy because your chosen SFX have the _potential_ to logically be used in particular way, even if that usage is not within your character concept. Like someone telling you that you _have_ to buy Damage Shield because your SFX include your entire body turning into flame. Therefore, it follows that anyone touching you will automatically be burned. But it _doesn't_ follow. If you _don't_ buy Damage Shield, then it doesn't happen. For whatever reason, people can give you the Bum's Rush and not actually catch fire or even feel abnormally warm. They are merely bear hugging a guy who is on fire, and yet they are fine. This sticks in a lot of craws, by the way, but the fact is that this _is_ the way the game works: if you don't buy it, then you don't get the advantage for it. If you don't _want_ the advantage-- no matter how relevant is may possibly be-- you don't _have_ to buy it. You have to really, _really_ understand that. As far as all the "how does this make sense to not buy" arguments, remember that first and foremost, the entire game system is designed to emulate comic books. Keep that _foremost_ in your mind, because at some point you are going to have your own train of thought that starts with "well, logically, I _should_--" The minute you start thinking that, you need to _immediately_ scream-- out loud, mind you-- COMIC BOOKS! Logic has no real solid footing when you are creating a character with seven wings, nine eyeballs, who can fly and recharges by taking vacations at the core of the sun. COMIC BOOKS! So ask yourself what genuine advantages you see the character's form actually putting to use. That is, what possible Powers will absolutely most definitely come up in the story arcs and scenarios you have plotted out of this adventure? Once you have an idea of that, then you have a good grasp of what is a "must buy." For example, immediately upon reading your example, I saw two possible builds. The longer I type, the more I can think of. But let's go with the initial two: shots to the "body" don't hurt him. So you have the option to go with either ridiculous defenses-- those that would exceed campaign limits, to ensure that shots to the body don't actually hit him-- with a Limitation that these defenses don't apply to head shots. There. The SFX for getting attacked is getting little bits of goo flung away until he is gone, but he continues to grow back. Alternatively, ridiculous levels of healing and regeneration that keep him coming regardless of how much damage he takes-- so the bits of his body being blown away are actually bits of his BODY being blown away, yet he continues to regenerate over and over, etc. Again, limitations that prevent him from recovering from damages delivered via headshot. Do keep in mind that certain SFX of certain attacks-- like an "all-over bath of radiation" or an area effect of a billion shards of ice-- are going to default in some parts of that attack hitting his head, so... Now... You want a really simple build? Shrinking. He is the size of a helmet. This has the advantage of not having to include using Hit Locations (which I tend to avoid, as HERO combat is already a bit sluggish) and still giving you what you want. How do you play this? Easy enough. Let's say that this Character's base DCV is -- well, whatever an appropriate base DCV is for your universe. But he gets a lot of DCV bonuses from Shrinking. You could play this that any attack that registers as a "hit" against his un-shrunk DCV value hits his gooey nougat-y "body," where is flings away streamers of caramel and peanuts, essentially harmless to the Character. Any attacks that successfully hit his Shrinking-corrected DCV have struck him on his hard chocolate shell of his helmet, where it does real damage. You might even consider, after a combat or two, allowing PER rolls for Characters who have previously struck him in the helmet to notice that this actually kinds of bothers him. Sure, it brings called shots back into the game, but your players will feel pretty good for figuring this out, etc. Yes, it's something of a deception, but ultimately no more of a deception than is rules-approved Combat Luck, where a successful attack roll is made, and then turned into an unsuccessful attack roll by dint of the definition of the power: "The SFX of this extra DEF is "Nope; you missed." If you're not cool with the Shrinking, then consider adding some sort of Disguise Skill at a ridiculous level or Images to create an illusory tar-like body. Personally, I wouldn't require that, but this isn't my Character. My Character is Nougat, who is the light-hearted rip-off of your delightful concept that I am going to use to challenge the youth group once they're done defending Campaign City from the Christmas Treant. (I deeply thank you for the idea, too!) It might be suggested that you must by Flight Always On or something like that since you are just the helmet, six feet off the floor, but again: are you getting _any_ of the flight advantages besides having your head at head height? If he is not going to be able to fly away or levitate up to the top shelf, I don't see the need-- but again, it's a matter of _perceived_ advantage versus _actual_ advantage. Remember that SFX are _free_, and even if they are defined in language that can push them into Powers territory, they are _not_ Powers if you are getting none of the advantage of actually having the power. COMIC BOOKS! Ultimately, it boils down to what you are "getting" from the SFX. If you aren't really getting Stretching, you don't have to buy Stretching, even if it seems possible that you _could_ Stretch. After all, I am a human being. It seems _possible_ that, since I am a human being, I could design and construct a working orbital platform and all the equipment needed to get it into space. Realistically, I _can't_, and I never, ever will, so I'm going to skip buying that Engineering Skill. As a human being, it seems _possible_ that I could run as fast as fast as Usain Bolt, but seriously, with my back, It's all I can do to outrun a daschund. With my heart, I can't run across the entire yard. So I'm not going to buy any extra Running because my SFX (ie, "I am a human") means that I have the potential to do those things. (NOT COMIC BOOKS!) Now all that said, and to explain with certainty that there is no snarkiness or treachery here (I don't know how long you have lurked, but I don't sarcasm. I just don't), I want to add a bit of explanation: The proper level of "what must I buy" is tied to, as I said, "what are you actually getting?" The proper level of "how complex or simple must the build for this effect be" is tied _one-hundred-percent to fairness. Is this something that you would allow a Player to submit to you? After hearing his explanations of why this should be like that, would you allow it? If you won't let your players do it, then as a GM, you are obligated, out of a sense of fairness, to not require that your players simply deal with it. Why not? It's like the boss fight in an SNK game: the players _not_ have fun if their opponents aren't playing by the same rules that they themselves are forced to use.

I think N-B is likely on the nose. Given the nature of HERO, equipment books are kind of boring, since ultimately, each entry is a cluster of powers and limitations, and that is about it, they are not nearly as enticing as such books for other games where that equipment isn't simply built like it was just another character.