Soleil Noir

In the "Rules Questions" section, someone recently asked about whether 5-point Skill Levels vs. "All INT-based Skills" would apply to Background Skills like Area Knowledges and Science Skills; Mr. Long's response was an unequivocal "No", citing that it would be "unbalancing".... ...Except that the character could take those same 5 points, buy up his INT by an equivalent amount, and bump up all of his INT-based Skills, INCLUDING the Background Skills, and it's not considered "unbalancing"! I asked Mr. Long where the imbalance was, and wasn't this simply promoting stat inflation, and got the standard "I don't answer game design/philosophy" response. Does anyone else find this completely counter-intuitive and makes no sense? Has anyone else gotten frustrated by an "official" response that just doesn't seem to pass the "smell test", and you're denied the "why" part to the response that might offer the context as to how it DOES make sense? And yes, I know that I'm completely at liberty to disregard Mr. Long and play the game as I see fit, thanks very much. I'm just wondering: since Steve won't, does anyone else here see his point of view and can make the case as to how 5 point Levels boosting background skills is unbalancing, but 5 points spent on INT to do the same thing isn't?

I know in advance that this may be a question you won't answer due to your "I don't answer 'why' questions" policy, but this seems so counter-intuitive that I need to at least pose the question... In a previous post, you said that allowing five point skill levels to improve the rolls of all INT-based skills, including Background Skills (i.e.; AK, PS, and SS), would be "unbalancing"; but couldn't those same five points be spent to increase the character's INT by an equivalent amount, giving the character the same +1 to all INT-based skills (including all those Background Skills) anyway? Where is the imbalance? By not allowing the 5-point skill to improve Background Skill rolls, isn't that just encouraging stat inflation?

I saw mention in another post that Extra Mass multiples couldn't be used to move an unwilling target. The rules also say that a "Usable as an Attack" Teleport couldn't be used by a character to move himself around. But in the comics, we see this sort of thing all the time -- the teleporter grabs hold of an opponent and then teleports the both of them so that the baddy winds up in the path of the speedster's Move Through, or in front of the strongman's fist as he winds up for his Sunday punch, or they're both exposed to some dangerous environment, and so on. What would be a valid power construct that would allow a character to perform these kind of stunts?

The rules say that Telekinesis is "inherently Indirect" in some ways; does that mean that a barrier with the Advantage "Hardened" would prevent someone from using TK through it?

Suppose that The Amazing Adjusting Man has an Adjustment power that simultaneously affects any two defensive powers of his target. He uses this power against the Monstersaurus, who took the "Giant Monster" power construct from the 5th ER rules (PD & ED Damage Reduction). Can Adjusting Man treat PD Damage Reduction and ED Damage Reduction as two separate powers (even though they were bought under the same name with the same special effect for a single point total) and boost each one by the total of the Adjustment dice; or do the effects of the Adjustment power get split, with half going to PD and half going to ED?

A while back I posed the question about whether one could pay the "double" cost for Invisible Power Effects on Transform so that the character could keep racking up BODY against the target, and the target wouldn't be aware of anything going on until he suddenly turned into something else. You said that this wouldn't work; that the target would still be aware that someone was trying to Transform him. However, in the FAQ section under Cumulative, you say that the "double cost" IPE WOULD allow someone to keep building up effect dice in Mind Control, with the target being completely unaware until the attacking character "maxed out" his Mind Control effect. To my mind, these two powers seem to be doing very similar things -- the Mind Control is building up an effect to make someone DO something, and the Transform is accumulating points to make someone BE something. So what's the difference that makes IPE work as desired for one, but not the other? By my way of thinking, it would seem like Mind Control would be the one LESS able to be built up without the target knowing, particularly since (presumably) the attacker would have to give his verbal or telepathic command to the Mind Control victim when he makes his initial attack.....

Suppose Character #1 has Missile Deflection with the Adder to Reflect the attack back at the attacker. Character #2 attacks Character #1 with an Indirect Energy Blast (e.g.; he calls down a lightning bolt from the sky). If Character #1 attempts to Reflect the blast back at his "attacker", does the attack get reflected back up into the sky (back to the hex it originally came from), or would the reflected attack be redirected towards Character #2?

Maybe I should have been a little more clear about what I was trying to accomplish.... Let's say the character has 35 STR Telekinesis and 20" of Flight. He uses TK to pick up a small car (1.6 tons, requires 30 STR to lift). Once the TK is supporting the weight of the car, he wants to grab hold of the car with his hands and then fly off with it. How fast would he be able to move with the car? a.) 4" per Phase (as fast as he could move the car around using TK all by itself), or b.) 20" per Phase (with the TK supporting the weight of the car, the car doesn't really "weigh" anything to the muscles of the character, who is then free to move as fast as his Flight will allow).

Suppose a character has Telekinesis that would allow him to pick up something farther heavier than he could with his own muscles. Could a character use his TK on a heavy object (for instance, a car) to "counteract gravity" (effectively reducing the object's weight to zero) so he could then pick the object up with his own two hands and move about with it at regular speed?

Re: Double Knockback too pricey? I could have sworn that I've seen in official published materials characters who have bought Energy Blasts (or extra dice with EB) with the Limitation "Does no Damage" or "Only to Increase Knockback" for -1. With that logic (and assuming completely average rolls), you could build a power that does twice the normal amount of Knockback two ways: Version 1: X Dice of EB * 1.75 (Double Knockback Advantage = 1.75X or Version 2: X Dice of EB + (X Dice of EB / 2 ["Knockback Only" Limitation]) = X + X/2 = 1.5X So by reverse-engineering it, I'd argue that yes, Double Knockback is currently overpriced and should be a +1/2 Advantage, not +3/4.

Re: What fundamental thing would you change about the Hero system? I'd bring back "Always On" Growth and Shrinking for appropriately large or small characters, instead of this kludge they've currently got of trying to buy it all piecemeal. Is there an official party response as to why they changed that rule, when such an elegant solution already existed?

Normally when using AE attacks, the character simply has roll to hit the hex (DCV 3). But what if there are obstacles in the way -- say, the character wants to shoot his fireball so it sails harmlessly through a crowd of people and explodes in the hex of the villain standing on the opposite side; or he wants to launch a grenade through a small window and detonate it inside a room? Does he need to roll to hit the window instead (or first?), or should the GM assign a "cluttered area" OCV penalty, or what?

Suppose a character bought a Transform with the Fully Invisible Advantage at +2 -- not only can no one perceive the attack, but the effects of the attack on the target can't be perceived either. Since the the Transform doesn't take effect until the character achieves x2 BODY on his target, would the target be aware that anything is being done to him (i.e.; the character is building up towards reaching x2 BODY) before the Transform takes effect?

Does the advantage "Stops Teleportation" for Force Walls, Entangles, etc. work to stop Extra-Dimensional Movement as well? If not, is there (or should there be?) an equivalent "Blocks Extra-Dimensional Movement" Advantage to keep targets from escaping extra-dimensionally?

Re: How would you construct and Ecstasy Weapon?

Re: How would you construct and Ecstasy Weapon? There was an OLD issue of Adventurer's Club that had a gadget called the "Auto-Hypnotic Gun", patterned from a gadget from the movie "Looker". Basically, it flashed a hypnotic pulse of light that would put the target into a trance, causing them to lose all track of time for a few seconds or minutes. It was built as a powerful NND (8d6 for Heroic campaigns, 12d6 for Supers) with a -1 Limitation "Instant Awaken". The effect of the limitation was: unless the gun did enough "damage" to CON-stun or KO the target, the target took NO damage and the weapon had no effect; and that once the target recovered from being stunned (or a loud noise or something woke them out of the trance), all the damage was immediately "healed". Of course, once you've got the target Stunned, you could flash them again to put them into a deeper trance (increasing the interval at which they'd gete to take a Recovery and shake off the trance). Maybe you could adapt this game mechanic to help make your Ecstasy Gun.....

OK....if multiple attacks coming from a single attacker aren't inherently Coordinated with one another, could that same character attempt to deliberately Coordinate the individual attacks from his Rapid Fire or Sweep attack -- say, with a Teamwork or DEX roll? Obviously certain special effects would make this impossible -- the Penalizer's semiautomatic pistol can't make two bullets hit a target simultaneously; but what about Armored Suit Guy firing one Repulsing Ray from each gauntlet? Couldn't he conceivably time his blasts so they strike the target together? And if it's not possible, what's the intrinsic difference that makes two attacks from different opponents able to overwhelm a target's pain threshold (the Stunning effect), but makes two attacks from the same attacker unable to do so?

If a lone character hits a single target with multiple attacks within a Phase (say, with multiple shots from an Autofire attack, or using Rapid Fire or Sweep to target a single opponent with multiple attacks), are the attacks considered to be Coordinated with one another for purposes of determining whether the target is Stunned?