Nucleon

Re: Help Nucleon Build a 200 Pointer That Can Kick A... Why, well of course He will... Currently. the Founders (450+ pts, exclusive characters) are: Ghost Bear; Amerindian (bear, wolverine, coyote, eagle and orca) Shifter, and de facto leader of the group; Thorgon; Hyperborean brick à la Thor, and narcissic gloryhound, the runner up for leadership. Templar; Contemporary bearer of trappings that bestows the lifeforce of previous bearers; a brickish martial artist and Doc Thrust; Tech-based scientist, who uses stimpills and a jetpack to be a flying speedster with some projecting capacities. Allies (450 pts), new to the group but also exclusive, include The Buzzz; Running speedster with Martial Artist overtones Darkstar: Nova-like brickish speedster, based on absorption and move-thrues. Rookies: these are the pool characters Nucleon spoke about; many of them are in the making. The Disciple (320 pts): Pacifist martial artist who can channel the "Ki", thus being proficient in adjustement powers, as well as having limited telepathic capabilities. Blast Girl (280 pts): Angsted teen and energy manipulator, making her a lightweight brick and a projector. Shocker (400 pts): Being composed of living electricity, which he uses and project. Lord Sotak (400 pts); Air-specialized elementalist, who also happen to have a bracer giving him acess to a wide, magical pool. A Cowboy (name yet to find, 400 pts) who is a sharpshooter, a peace officer and a damn good pilot. A Mentalist (still to define, 400 pts) and The Cricket (200 pts); An entomologist and scientist, inventor of the Cricketmech, a entomology-based stealth assault exo-skeleton vehicule, à la Blue Beetle. Nucleons hopes that helps. Don't hesitate to ask for more details if you need some more.

Re: The Things I've learned playing a Metamorph May Nucleon indulge in another comment? Thanks. Too much shapes in a given turn messes up the reaction chart real bad Please help you local gamemaster.

Re: The Things I've learned playing a Metamorph In you change forms often, see to match your forms' Speed Aahh, the number of metamorphs that sat there idle while their phases were getting aligned...

Howdy, mortals. As Nucleon's current campaign slowed down for lack of complementary capacities among the Playing Characters, He decided that the players were to build "non-exclusive" player characters, characters that will go to a character pool and that could be used by any of the players in a given game. A kind of "Heroes Inc", if you will. From then on, things were looking fine. However, as Nucleon gave each of His player 600 pts to build up to two characters each (with a max of 400 pts per characters), He soon discovered that the players uniformely went for a 400 pts one, letting go of the 200 pts that was left. So Nucleon took on Himself to build, for the "heroes pool", the missing 200 pointers that his players dropped. As this post was written, he built but one, and needs another one, fast. The said character must be able to hang with 400-450 pts teamates, and must be able to attract the players to play it sometimes (not a "fill-up" type of character, you knows, the ones who is so useful for the base and vehicules but which nobody wants to play); "it" must come with a solid feel, a modus operandi and background that will permit an easy personification for any given player. Nucleon will be glad to have your suggestions; Please, do not create an extensive hero sheet for it if it does not already exists; a sounf description, main lines and tricks will do just fine. And thanks in advance.

Re: The Things I've Learned Playing a Var.Power-Pool User The more you define your pool, the better it is Limitless possibilities pools are lacking in flavour and bring no inspiration. They are a bore. Here is an exemple. A NPC of Nucleon, Helmur, has a vast pool. However all the powers in it must have Helmur's signature, which is defined as "Mystic Fire" powers: His Darkness is made using with brimstone cesspools creating darkness and sulfurous odor; He can also dominate minds, exacerbating tempers being his speciality. His Force Fields, walls and shields are composed of living fires. Helmur's pool, althought identical in character points to his brother Majestar, is thus completely different. Another one: Variable Pools are great NPC tools along with Damage Reduction. Both of these help to give your players a challenging confrontation.

Re: Anyone have solutions for the Stun Lottery that a high dice Killing Attack creates? What Assault said. Yes, 6d6 KA is a big one. However, that does not excuse the fact that KAs can be more effective Stunners than regular ones. If, over that, they're bought with Autofire, the chance to win at the Stun Lottery is almost automatic. Plus, there are actually few chances of a KA actually killing a character. Most of the time, they drop stunned before that. This bizarre Stun Mult rule is a stand-alone curiosity in the HERO system; Nucleon's opinion is that it is both archaic, and broken. What he does in His house rules is a) eliminate KA as Powers and instaure them as a +.25 Advantage. Such a "killing powers" does normal, rolled Stun and 1.5x rolled Body (as well as half the knockback -knockback determination rules do not include KAs anymore). And we all have a more pleasant campaign for it.

Re: Duplication old school Another trick you should consider for your built if you consider buying hordes, one that Nucleon saw right here on this very board, is Summon. Summoned "duplicates" of the user also have the advantage to be both expandable and unlimited (but by END cost). They're also more under their own control (read: the GM's), which makes having many in a combat more pleasant an ordeal, as verbatim is used in the stead of pointless rolls. Or maybe a combination of both powers... Have fun, Mortal.

Re: Controlling Machines Valid points, but mostly because of the nature of the CON element explained therein. If we explain the Control as a radio-induced form of piracy, Nucleon supposes mundane ED can be used as a defense in this case. As for the "obeys first command" features, He guess making the Mind Control option "telepathic" mandatory should allevate concerns, as well as cutting a bit in the whole -1 Limitation (who must also be accounted on the power now having a range, being perceptible and not giving Mental Awareness to its user as well).

Re: Controlling Machines

Re: Sponding to a Lot of Posts Maybe Nucleon's tutorial skills are not what they used to be. He'll try to explain His previous exemple in a more elaborate manner. So, we have this STR 20 Cyborg. She have a retractable blade in her forarm, that will increase the damage she does by 2d6 (she already got 4d6), as well as make it Killing, refered in His exemple an +¼ Advantage. First, Nucleon puts the Killing Advantage to the whole damage that blade would do, that is 20 (Cyborg's STR cost in AP) plus 2d6 worth of HTH Attack (10 AP before the mandatory HA Limitation). That makes 30 Active points. The Killing Advantage being at +¼, Nucleon multiplies this 30 pts by 1.25: (20+10) x1.25 = 37.5 pts. This is the Active cost. Then, He substract the Cyborg STR's Active cost (20 pts). These basic 4d6 to damage are already paid for with Characteristics. What we needed was the additional cost for the Killing advantage to be bought for these same 4d6. So then we have: (37.5) -20 = 17.5 pts. This is the amount on which the Limitations will be effective -they do not affect base STR. The only Limitation here will be the mandatory HA Attack (-½) for simplicity's sake (Nucleon has forgotten about it the first exemple, His mind probably wandering on the far reaches of Centauri at the time): (17.5) /1.5 = 11.6 pts. This is the Real cost. The whole power would be written like this: Cyber Blade; HTH Attack +2d6 (6d6 w. STR), all Killing (+¼), HA Attack (-½): (((20+10) x1.25) -20) /1.5 = 11.6 pts (37.5 pts Active Cost). Now doubts are striking at Nucleon; It is what you asked Him for, isn't it? If it isn't, well, Nucleon would bode you well to re-phrase it, if you please.

Re: Controlling Machines Mmh. Yet another thing that Nucleon's omniscience seems to have ignored... Thanks for the useful, interesting link.

Re: Tips/Tricks/Advice Combat is what is going to take time, in a universe where characters are both fast and tough. To fully let your main players express themselves in the intense strategical feat that HERO combat represent, Nucleon would suggest you the following: * Resolve NPC combat in a abstract ways. Don't bring the spotlight on NPCs fighting among themselves unless they're critical plot device. * Throw few dice yourself. Damage dice are long to count. Use damage averages (1d6=3, 2d6=7) on both Stun and Body dice, unless something critical and/or dramatic occurs, for your own NPCs. Throw only "to hit" dice. Replace dice counting with descriptions. For players, who by all means just love to throw dice around, suggest them to regroup Stun damage dice by groups of ten (sixes with the fours, and so on). Also, make "DCV/OCV To Hit" tables so even novice players can play smoothly. *Delegate. Pass the Speed initiative table to a player. Make another one have a rulebook ready if "looking for a rule" occurs. Make another one responsible for the Base, etc. *Finally, play it big; Not only do they have superpowers, but super-attitudes as well. Give to the genre. Make your NPCs bigger than life. Powers may come and go but a fascinating personality will imprint the player's memory for a long time. Nucleon whishes you a most pleasant campaign, Mortal friend.

Yes, but... Isn't these simply exemples of well-made heroes? If instead of Peter Parker the spider bit Flash, who would confront the bullets instead of dodging them, maybe we wouldn't have heard of Spiderman as well. Much true. However, as a GM, it is Nucleon's duty to "fix" those rules who interferes with His personal gaming style, or genre. And He happens to find out that many GMs have experienced the same observations as He did. So, at this point, why not share our solutions? Nucleon is all for houserules.

Howdy, Mortals! Nucleon got a query from one of His players; The character he plays is a robotic lifeform, and among his (its?) powers, it is expected that he could a) control machinery (vehicles) at a distance, as well as taking control of some automatons, maybe by taking over their programs via radio senses. For the first, Nucleon proposed a Mind Link, with any machine that also got ML (as a remote interface), no LoS, Subject to Radio Senses Attacks (-¼), linked with Claisentience, Only to Use Subject's Senses, as per the book. With that, He created a Remote Combat Piloting skill (based on INT) et voila. For the second one, however, Nucleon didn't got it that easy. First, he thought about Telekynesis, but the effects we were thinking of were of a more subtile kind, like if the character changed programs. We realized that Mind Control was to be the working base here. Taking the Based on CON set of Limitations, we figured we could substitute CON for INT (the players didn't mind "dumb" machinery, such as vehicules there, but rather computers and automatons) with the same modifiers. The adequate defenses would be Energy Defense. A Require a Computer Programming Roll sounded to Nucleon like a nice touch to this power. We didn't tried it yet; So Nucleon can't predict the measure of its presumed success. Being a bit of a megalo Himself, He turned it into a New Power; Automaton Control (Standard/Mental Power, Instant, Range APx5", Costs END, visible on four sense groups); Using normal ECV, the User targets an Automaton or Computer's INT Combat Value (ICV) as a substitute for ECV, and INT for EGO on the Effect Table of Mind Control, effectively creating new programs or commands using the same rules. Target can apply Energy Defense to the rolled total effect. The power comes with the mandatory Limitation; Does Not Work on Targets that have EGO (-0). Cost; 5pts for 1d6 of Automaton Control. Isn't Nucleon great? But He's sure some of you have come with an all-different set of answers or suggestions... If so, can you reveal them to Nucleon? It should most certainly please Him.

Re: Killing as an Advantage; Some Results True. Under another name, Nucleon has played a 100 pts Heroic campaign once and He found out that the whole KA concept works better in this particular setting. His problem is, need it to be repeated, the Stun Lotto in superheroic campaigns. So what you did is raise the cost of KAs while letting the mechanics be the same. Do you still use a Stun multiplier with this method? It is Nucleon's opinion that KA should be reflected as either a cheap and easy way to get a dirty job done, and an efficient way to bust throught things; To raise their cost to high may make 38 Specials and knives too costly for the common thug. The superpowered genre still need death threats, even thought it should be a relatively uncommon occurence. Nucleon does not want to embark in His own houserules more than it is necessary, but here is how He defines, say, a 20 STR cyborg with a retractable forarm blade; Rectractable Blade; +2d6 HTH (6d6 w. STR), all Killing (+¼), Restrainable Cyberware (-¼). This is the power's description. Now for the calculations: ((30x1.25)-20)%1.25, =14 pts Real Cost First, Nucleon figured the entire damage (30) before He multiplied it by the Advantage (1.25) to get the Active Cost (37.5), then He substracted the Active pts of the Character's own STR (20), Before dividing the result by the Limitation (1.25). Works like a charm.

Re: Killing as an Advantage; Some Results Well, it was bloody when the said houserule was twice the Body damage rolled, as Nucleon stated in the original post. It is now somewhat more "normal" in feel. It does have some qualities that makes Nucleon ponders. However, he thinks that this dramatically decrease the effectiveness of Entangles and Barriers; Do the math, and compare it to your exact point about it. By the Stars, that's quite valid too. At least it's got the merit of disturbing less things around.

Re: Killing as an Advantage; Some Results (Since thy post contains elements raised up by EverKnight, ghost-angel and Sean Waters, this post is a response to them as well.) It now does a wee bit more Body damage for the same AP value, at a rate of about 1-2 body more on 60 Active points. Nucleon must say here that the tryouts were largely done with Killing doing twice the amount of Body rolled, and it turned out to be too gory at higher levels (over 60 AP). The decision to bring it down to +50% is relatively as recent as Nucleon's current campaign. Granted. Or... Nucleon could let go of the rules He made concerning Kb from Killing attacks. That would mean; rolled Body dice minus (typically) 3d6 for determining actual Kb. He has to ask his virtueous players about that tryout, thought. Thy proposition is quite valid, but it will tend to significally increase the Body damage, as thou also concluded. Correct; this is the reason why the Body Damage isn't that much superior now. That shouldn't do too much difference; in the most extreme cases, the target will get out of an Entangle or pierce a Force Wall about a phase faster, maybe. Not perfect, He admits. But still better than having your main PC getting offed in the first Turn by sheer Stun damage from a lucky multiplier IHO. Nucleon had a Punisher-like PC who used to eliminate superpowered opposition with autofire KAs; when a few of them hit, the chance of getting a "6" were getting quite probable even thought the Body damage itself is more predictible -Nucleon is sure you know what He means. The Body damage never was the problem here. Nowadays, the very same player has abandonned the concept of killing attacks as a mean to stun (as do many players in HERO's superpowered genre). For that, he now takes regular attacks, or NNDs and the such. Killing attacks are now bought to dismiss vehicules, automatons or barriers, or simply to kill. The KA system sounds somewhat out of place IHO, but buying a KA with a capped multipower strikes Nucleon as ineffective, or even odd. Few of Nucleon's player would do it, but still, there is a need for an attack that does an efficient, predictible amount of Body damage.

Salutations, Mortals. Nucleon, having seen enough of the KA's Stun Lotto in His (superheroic) campaigns, has decided to make a houserule which eliminated KAs, making Killing an Advantage in its stead. Here is, after a few months tryout, what this change has brought for Him and His players. First, here is the Killing Advantage: Killing; Adds 50% to the Body damage of a given attack, which is soakable only with Resistant defenses. Stun damage stays the same. Knockback, however, is half the Body dice rolled (no more adding an extra die of Knockback reduction for "killing attack"). If the Advantage Penetrating is also chosen, it is determinated with the same formula as for knockback (half Body dice rolled). Cost; +¼. In the first incarnation of this new rule, Killing was doubling Body damage instead, which has made of Nucleon's campaign a bloody one. At that point, Nucleon thought about making Resistant defenses cheaper, like a +¼ Advantage on a given defense rather than the +½ it actually costs -and He even give some considerations about eliminating Resistant defenses altogether (after all, a Killing attack is somewhat of a cheap, common AVLD when we think about it, much cheaper than an AP attack wich is stopped by Hardened, a mere +¼ Advantage)- But that would changes things that are too close to the system's core, like Armor, Force Field and Damage Reduction. And let's admit it, Nucleon was too lazy to quell all the shockwaves that this would cause. Finally, after some tryouts, He opted for the Advantage that has been described above. Let's see some average numbers to see how it works: A 44 Magnum revolver was originally listed as a 2d6 RKA; Average damage was 7 Body, plus a wildly decided amount of Stun Damage that could reach, with the +1 multiplier of this particular weapon, from 7 to 42 Stun. Typical knockback (7 minus 3d6) was inexistant. Nowadays, a 44 Magnum is an Energy Blast 6d6 Killing; It averages 9 Body (6+50%), does 21 stun, and has a (as feeble) knockback of (6/2=3)-(2d6). Now, something more muscular; A former 6d6 HKA, Penetrating. That used to amount to an average of 21 Body, 6 of them Penetrating. The Stun Lotto's first Prize was 105 Stun. Knockback was 21 minus 3d6, for an average of 10". With the Houserule, the same amount of active point (a bit less in fact) gets thee a 15d6 attack, Killing and Penetrating. Such an attack does, once again on average, 22-23 Body, 7-8 of them Penetrating, 52-53 Stun, and knockback was 7-8", minus 2d6, or almost inexistant. This somewhat lack of knockback is a bit of a problem; Many players, seeing how ineffective the knockback is, will simply buy back the Killing Advantage's worth with "Does No Knockback" Limitation. But apart from this, the houserule holds the road quite well Yep, that has prompted Nucleon to do some changes regarding Independant trinkets such as weapons, and some conversions to published charaters as well, but all in all, it works rather well now. Nucleon must also give credit to His roleplaying group and their patience regarding their GM's revisions. What doth you think about that?

Re: How to handle RKA? Nucleon had this kind of player; A Punisher-like character, he was stunning everyone with +2 Stun mult, Autofire RKAs. Yet he wasn't killing anyone for it. The rule as it it fits well for heroic genres. In superheroic, nodoby gets killed anymore but bystanders and varlets. So Nucleon made a house rule, between campaigns. Here it is, as an exemple of what can be done. No more KAs as Powers. Nowadays, Killing is a +¼ Advantage. What it does is double the amount of BODY done for determining damage (Knockback however is half of the Body dice rolled -no more additional d6 of Kb reduction for killing. A furthermore Penetrating Advantage operates on the same calculation BTW). Stuns stays the same. It is some rework to do, but getting rid of the Stun Lotto is well worth it IHO. If thou seek to go along the existing rules - and do not want to impose rules change in the middle of a campaign-, Nucleon would stress any one of the Damage Reduction tricks proposed here and there in the hopes that it will makes your game plannings a simpler thing.

Re: How important is heroism in your campaign? There are such things as "proactive heroism". And there must be a fee to pay for it as well. At the end of the day, heroism is the hability to put everything on the line for a un-interested cause. Most player heroes do that allright. In fact, they do it to the point that even when we tried to play a vilain campaign, all "vilains" in the group turned "good". Is there, Mortal? Nucleon's universe is mostly shades of grey. True blinding light or pitch-black darkness strike more in a grey setting. Even the master vilain, after a demonstration of power and a terryfying speech, faces the mirror after he pull the mask off, alone in his high-tech abode. Even the hero can be subject to a revenge frenzy of infinite violence. There is no real bad cops; only cops who have a bad day. And then there is a real occasion for a soul to show true colours; One occasion for infite good, or one for infite interest.

Re: Marvel/Dc Writeups First, Nucleon must congratulate you for the effort and depth of your write-ups. However... ... He ponders about some of the traits you are giving them, as can be expected. Here are some of the things that itched Him; Comeliness; Yes, that seemingly insignificant Characteristic; Nucleon noticed that you gave B-Canary a 27, Cap 30, and (drum roll) Superman a 35. And for his part, Cyclops had a "meagre" 13 (while Booster Gold, an admitted womanizer, only had a 17). First thought: What does Superman have that gives him three times Cyclops' appearance? He seems pleasantly bland to Nucleon, but why poor ol' Cyke so underated? Another thing; When Steve Rodgers just got the super-serum, did he get a 30 COM at that point? That must be tough for these guys going out with women who only achieved a miserable 18 in this domain. 18 COM? Yeuck! Dexterity and Speed; By now, Nucleon is used to this board's facility to give humongus DEX and SPD scores to anybody who fights a lot; But where do you find relativity if you give B-Canary a 27, Booster Gold a 28 and Cap 30 while Spiderman has to contend with 39? Spider Man is superagile, whereas Cap and Black Canary are super-trained (More CSLs than Agility). Just look at Cap's bulk and that big shield he's carrying; This is no bullet-dodger in Nucleon's eyes. Even the Blob, renown tub of lard, got a DEX 15... Contacts; Do these characters really need to mark everyone they know as a contact? Do you require, when you form a group of players, that each character has all the rest of the team as contacts? Nucleon thinks that contacts are external sources, NPCs with certain importance, but what separates a DNPC from a Contact? What difference between friends and acquaintances? Here is an example; Booster Gold and Blue Beetle are often working togheter; Do they really need themselves as contacts? Is, say, Mary Marvel a suitable Booster Gold Contact? I think not; she would help him like she would help anybody else IHO. On the other hand, if B-Gold didn't knew that B-Beetle is Ted Kord, he could reasonably have him into his contacts for reparation, in case his trinkets fail him. Finally, it is Nucleon's opinion that you made these Icons untoucheables; Do you give your players 500 pts to make their Characters with, and 10 pts experience every session? That would be the only way a fan can emulate Cap or Cykes and become a "big one" in your Universe. For Nucleon's part, he likes to remind His players that these Icons are not so far from them XP-wise, that yes, you can do a credible Cap-like character at 350 pts, using imagination and special effects. But when even a comic relief like Booster Gold is 573 pts high, players got the feeling that they are at the wrong end of the food chain, because they can't even reach Robin. That being said, Nucleon commands you for your impressive efforts, Mortal.

Re: The Munchkin Build Contest Some dirty tricks Nucleon saw here and there, things that made Him ponder: The Telekynesist's Last Line of Defence: Dispel Knockback resistance 16d6 (48 base pts), Does Knockback (+¼, for 60 active points; Apply standard shipload of Limitations and, of course, place in a fixed Multipower slot). Or; A Mentalist with the typical Mind Scan, Mind Control and Ego Attack. Buy them cheap with 0 DCV concentrations Limitation (plus the usual one...) and then get him "Tunneling".

Re: Immortals In Our Midst! Another fine Immortal design. Can a player who's been awarded 350 building points design one of these in your campaign? What would be the guidelines that you would require then?

Re: Immortals In Our Midst! He is fine; Nucleon appreciates the facts that despite his enormous power, Ithecles (great name!) still got a 23 DEX and a 5 SPD. That's one damn good Immortal.

Re: Immortals In Our Midst! Heartfelt thanks to thee. Well, Nucleon has put into place a rather strict hierachy of Immortals, ranging from the playable Demigods and Champions up to the Celestials and Eternals. A Hyperborean Immortal package for a Demigod looks like this (Nucleon won't bother with the costs); - STR+10, CON+10, BODY+5, PRE+10, COM+6 (yep; even the ugly ones are classic in their ugliness!) - Life Support; Safe in intense heat/cold, High pressure and Vaccum; Immune to all earthly diseases, extended breathing, eat/sleep once a week as well as some immunity to age. (What? "Some immunity to age"? How come they're Immortals if they're not immune to age, would you ask; -Simple. A demigod Immortal does ages, slowly, until he/she reaches the Idealized age, at which point Immortality of the body is achieved.) - Power and Mental defense, 10 pts each; Lack of Weakness, 5 pts. - Skills: KS; Hyperborean Society - Perks; Higher nobility; Hyperborean Immortal. - Disavantages; Social Lims; Cannot Love Mortals Without Tragedy (Frequently, Minor) Psych Lim; Sense of Superiority (v-com, mod) Distinctive features; Mystical Perfection; The character always smells fine, has perfect, healthy hair...etc. (E-Concealed, Noticed) Usually, Hyperboreans who do embrace a life of adventure or research chose one or a few paths, such as the path of life, of war, of strength, or any such classical "mastery". Other Immortals are, of course, different.