Korren

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat I couldn't hold my breath 'til I turned blue... Korren P.S. Fascination with purple much?

Re: OAF or IAF? One of my favorite movies, by the way. Ralph Bakshi! OAF, since, while he's USING it, it's obvious. Even if the other wizard didn't know what it was, he'd know it must be important by the way the good wizard treated it (and aimed it!). What COULD be added is some sort of Invisibility or Stealth/Concealment for "up until the power gets used". There are plenty of other powers that automatically get that by their definition (Wolverine's claws, a pocketed cell phone, even Harry Potter's wand is usually out of sight 'til he needs it!) Sleight of Hand might be a better skill, now that I think of it. Usually I think of stealing something, not hiding it 'til you need it.... Korren

Re: Cowboy Bebop/ Firefly inspired game Nicely put, Jen! An excellent breakdown! You forgot one method, though: Star Trek travel (varies) Travel from one system to another takes as long as the plot dictates, even if it took much less time to GET there than it takes to get back, as long as it builds excitement in the plot-line! Korren

Re: Cowboy Bebop/ Firefly inspired game I saw this thread and got a little excited so excuse me if I get wordy or repeat stuff from other posters! I recommend that MOST of the answers to these questions be from the players preferences! Get their input on which they'd prefer. Same with the colonist/clone concept. (Just give them generalities.) Do they want to play the cops that are chasing the bad guys? Or, do they want to play the rebels trying to take down the evil Corporation? Do they want one ship or several? We played an interesting game, once, where some of us were on a spacecraft that returned to Earth several hundred years after it was supposed to and the remaining Earthers had developed psychic powers. Each player could choose to play a 'spaceman' (new to the psychic powers, but skills from being a scientist) or a 'native' (grew up with psychic powers, but skills based on farming and scrounging only). It made an interesting choice. I would suggest starting them out on a single planet, maybe not even knowing that there ARE other worlds out there, have an adventure or two on that world, then they discover the larger 'verse & where they need to go to fulfill their personal goals. (similar to World of Warcraft questing systems... lead them by the nose but let them think they're making their own decisions!) Don't forget to make any cyberware they get illegally or cheaply to be clunky and malfunctioning! Humour and plot-points! Maybe offer them a series of Limitations based on who built their cyberware. (Lim: Stark-ware (-1/4); Lim: Corp-ware (-1); the Stark stuff works more frequently than the Corp stuff, but they don't have to know that when they buy it! Maybe even the 'Corp Cops' can remotely control their brand of cyberware, when you try to break into their HQ!) Stuff they find, in game (defeating bad guys) and try to put onto their own bodies is even better! YOU get to decide who built the stuff and what 'quirks' it has! ("Why do you keep hitting yourself?") Perhaps going from one 'quadrant' to another is more hazardous than just travelling within the quadrant, to keep their movements more restriced ('leading by the nose' also means 'keeping them contained') The Slingshot around the Sun method of getting from one quadrant to another sounds like a possible plot-device for that. Slightly dangerous, but do-able. Why they're there: There's something the Mega-Corp WANTS or NEEDS and the colonists are the long term method of getting it... Maybe the clones are programmed like the Cylons: Do (this) when you encounter (that) so that you can bring us the (goal). Ancient tech? Magic? Mutation or Alien DNA for gene-splicing? As for weapons, don't forget tazers, bio/chemical agents & such. Also, leave open the possibilies of more sci-fi stuff that are rumoured to exist, microwave lasers & brain-wave scramblers. Keep them as rare and big-bad-guy controlled items that the PC's HOPE to get their hands on, someday! They always seem to be broken after the combat is over! Thoughts: Blakes 7 is excellent! (think Dr. Who does Star Wars!) Servalan is a great villainess. (They don't use the apostrophe in "Blakes", I'm not sure why. It might be easier to find without it.) Also, check out "Earth 2" an American TV show from the late 90's, I think. The colonists were not expected to survive the trip (due to corporate 'planning') and the world they arrived on had been used as a 'prison planet' for years before. Tim Curry does an excellent portrayal of a prisoner who cons the colonists into thinking he's a good guy. The Chronicles of Pern (Novels by Anne McCaffrey) has an interesting origin where the colonists forget even THAT they were colonists & later, find computers that tell them about spaceships and such. Another Amercian TV show that only got 1 season "Earth: Above and Beyond". Mostly character driven plots, very little sci-fi. They travelled by predicting where wormholes would open and where they'd lead (which made the two "they're lost!" episodes kinda stupid!). Also, the clones (called Nipple Necks, 'cuz that's where their navel was!) were looked down upon. More food for thought. (Social Lim?) Basically, Marines in Space. Another interesting source for info, though it sounds like you're not interested in completely copying this, would be the RingWorld series by Larry Niven (I think!). Humanity finds this incredible structure built by long-dead ancients that is a huge ring shape, 90 million miles radius around a sun. People can live on the inner surface & they sometimes find 'ancient technology' (see also StarGate). Also, the Dysun Sphere concept (not a ring but a sphere with a star in the middle and artificial gravity) might give you some good plot points. You've gotta have a 'volcano planet' that has a few cities (mining?) but plenty of unwatched areas for the PC's to land & repair in secret. Then they have to dodge the lava flows and 'geisers of flame' that often pop up! And a asteroid belt... don't forget one of those! Very important detail! Or, maybe they've developed Light Speed travel but not FASTER than LS, so travel within the cluster is possible without cryofreezing, but travel TO the system requires the deep-freeze. They send enough materials to make the small LS ships when they get there, but not enough to get BACK.... Maybe it's just a social experiment... the geeks back home wanted to find out if it WOULD happen like in all the movies & books they've read! Here's a thought.... the 'spaceship' they find has programs for getting to other 'spaceports' around the 'verse and takes them there, but is really just flying to different areas of the same planet and they don't know it! That could lead to some interesting plot! Explains why the gravity and atmospere is always the same! As for guns damaging the hulls of the spacecraft, you could techno-babble that with either "certain parts of the hull have delicate hardware needed for space-travel" or "the force fields that protect it from space dust only work in zero-G or no atmosphere" or even "most guns fire rounds made from something very much like lead, but it damages hulls". If I found a cheap bullet that could take down a spaceship, I'd load my gun with that! Perhaps a gun, if fired while the ship is in space, could make a decent enough hole in the ship that, once the force field drops when starting re-entry into atmospere that it will destroy the ship. Could make an interesting episode where they have to find the parts to fix the hull before they can go to a planet... space stations? All my thoughts, for now. Sorry to be so wordy! Hope it helps! Good luck, Korren

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat Tick? How 'bout stopping the cancellation of Firefly?? My real answer: D&D 4e uses HERO System as the underpinnings. (With permission, of course....) That'd satisfy my desire for visible balance AND satisfy the masses desire for a class/level based system.... NT: Something you'd bring from an alternate universe to ours (Light Sabers and Transporters (Trek) are OUT! Too easy)

Re: Why the dislike for Find Weakness? An NND that does BODY damage, if I remember the rules correctly. Find Weakness doesn't turn an attack into Stun Only, I believe. Just my 2 cents, Korren

Re: Make them Pay! Images is a way of creating WHATEVER you want people to see/sense. Using it to create light is like using an elephant gun to shoot a fly. If someone asked for an Images power that can only create static images of human beings, nothing else, that would be approximately a -1 limitation. Why should "Creating light to improve peoples' perception of what's really there and no illusions of my own" be only a -1 limitation? And, aren't these forums & discussions supposed to be about ways to better simulate the real world in a game? What's you're basically saying is "I agree with this one particular rule, so I'm not going to try to find a better way."

Re: WWYCD? The Trap I hate to be a nit-picker (especially as a 'newbie'), but I skimmed over the mention of human bodies as "flavour text"..... 10d6 RKA isn't going to leave much recognizable as a human being!! Even the most recent thug got hit twice (once when he fell in, once when the bird got hit). Most of my characters would point out that most villains wouldn't be willing to follow him 5 miles out into the country and unknown territory. Most villains just want to escape from the heroes..... Several characters would work WITH him to make it a non-lethal version. (5d6 RKA NND or 15d6 NND... maybe 2 NND's with different Defences that stop them, GM's permission, of course! Or, even 10d6 RKA No Body.) Then he could get credit for bringing them to justice! Heck, we could even make a few closer to the city! Just a few thoughts..... Korren

Re: Make them Pay! Usually, yes. But, instead of coming up with a WHOLE NEW Advantage to simulate AoE, we COULD just use the one that already exists.... perhaps it wouldn't be as expensive, since it's not an attack, but when dealing with numbers less than 15, the difference between +1 and +3/4 is not too big a deal. I think Cone is more appropriate (or Radius, if it were a torch or torch style flashlight) since ANYONE gets the bonus, instead of buying lots of doublings of "users". How about this? Flashlight: Aid Enhanced Perception Normal Sight (1pt -> +1) 1d6, Area Of Effect (4" Radius; +1 1/2) (25 Active Points); Independent (-2), OAF (-1), Limited Power (Small cone of light is only area where bonus works) Power loses about half of its effectiveness (-1), Fuel Dependent (fuel is Very Common; must refuel Once per 6 Hours; -3/4), Conditional Power Power Only Works In Darkness (-1/2) That's a bit more complicated, but does exactly the right thing.... all people within 24 feet get +1 to +6 (or a standard effect of +3) to their perception, but only in a small area. I think it's kludging a bit too much, but all of them are, really. Korren

Re: Make them Pay! .... Transmit is SUPPOSED to be applied to a sense.... Usually with Radio Receive, so that you can send as well as receive, but if you put it on Normal Sight, then you could "transmit" what you see to others... assuming you bought Night Vision or +4 Sight (even if only to offset penalties for darkness) then you could "transmit" to others what you can see..... Or, another way to look at it, Transmit Radio Waves could change to Transmit Light Waves. +4 PER with Normal Sight (4 Active Points); Fuel Dependent (fuel is Very Common; must refuel Once per 6 Hours; -3/4), Conditional Power Power Only Works In Darkness (-1/2), OAF (-1), Visible (-1/4) Real Cost: 1 PLUS Transmit with Normal Sight (2 Active Points); OAF (-1), Fuel Dependent (fuel is Very Common; must refuel Once per 6 Hours; -3/4), Conditional Power Power Only Works In Darkness (-1/2) Real Cost: 1 Actually, here's another way to buy it. +4 PER with Normal Sight, Usable Simultaneously (up to 2 people at once; +1/2), Mobile (+1/2), Area Of Effect (3" Cone; +1) (12 Active Points); Independent (-2), OAF Fragile (-1 1/4), Fuel Dependent (fuel is Very Common; must refuel Once per 6 Hours; -3/4), Limited Power Power loses about a third of its effectiveness(only to negate penalties) (-1/2) Real Cost: 2 Or, I suppose, you could just raise the number of users with the Usable Simultaneously, but I think CONE is more like a flashlight, since it helps even people you're not aware of. (Would OAF make it Mobile, or would you make a character pay for it?) just an idea..... Korren

Re: Make them Pay! What made you think I was implying that the flame war was against Markdoc? _I_ was the one that felt like I was being attacked from all sides, since everyone was pretty much telling me I was a complete idiot for even THINKING of doing things this way. (ie. it didn't feel like a "discussion" it felt like an "arguement".)

Re: Make them Pay! Ok, finally we've moved past the Flame Wars part of the discussion... This is good! All the previous posts just seemed like ideas you were throwing out to rain on my parade. Thanks for clarifying! Figures it takes a girl entering the discussion for guys to act nice.... Korren

Re: Make them Pay!

Re: Make them Pay! So, it's perfectly ok for one PC to be carrying 200 points worth of INDEPENDENT items and one PC to only have 10 points worth... the guy with 200 takes the lead during combat, kills everything, and the guy with 10 just sits back and hopes he can find some items that will allow HIM to have a good time during the NEXT game session..... It's PART of the game.... it's what stops one PC from outbalancing all the rest, by having a higher point total.... Why bother using a point based system if any character can have 10 times as many points as all the others, put together, just because he's been collecting items.... stealing, sneaking, convincing others that they're better off in his hands..... And, if you'd read, I didn't say that magic items that weren't paid for had NO effect on the game.... Just that they were not anywhere near as EFFECTIVE or RELIABLE as items a character has paid for. Do people even READ both sides of a discussion before posting? Korren

Re: Make them Pay! Once again, you don't have to pay points for temporary "powers" such as renting a boat. (unless it's a VERY special boat!) If you grab a sword off a dead body during the middle of combat, it will work fine for a few turns (or even days!), but it could disappear at any point. (Thieves? Pixies? Wandering Holes? LoL) If you want to make sure it's always there & working properly when you really NEED it, pay the points for it! Even it means that the sword that you WERE using now runs the risk of disappearing, randomly. And, if someone acquires a follower or castle, that's fine, too. They don't HAVE to pay points for them. But, will they ALWAYS be there when you need them? If you lose them, how likely are you to get them back, if you didn't pay at least SOME points for them? And, how useful will they be when they ARE there? So, it's fine if the Fighter has a sword that does +12d6 HKA and always teleports back to his hand because it's an Independent OAF costing 100 points that HE didn't have to spend. All he has to do is spend his points on OCV, so that he can always KILL anything on the first swing. Still balanced? I know: "Why did you put that item IN there?" Maybe it was an accident! Maybe the GM intended that item for the Rogue (who finds he's never doing enough damage and always dropping his weapon), but the Fighter grabbed it, first & won't give it up! The point is, I don't want the GM to have to keep guessing what items will and won't be balanced at the end of the adventure. Nicely put! But, they would get BACK the points for items that had been paid for, then lost. That way they could pay the points for any new items to replace the old ones. That way, the character would still ADD UP at the end of each session to be something similar to the other characters, which has always been the thing I liked most about Hero/Champions. I mean, what's a character sheet if NOT a fairness meter, to be compared to the other PCs? I don't want to play if I'm way underpowered compared to my 'peers'. (see the example at the end of this post.) The only time a character would be paying for a 'power' (item/spell/whatever) that they currently don't have access to is that they are expecting to get it BACK, sooner or later. True, the GM would have to give permission before items are 'bought back' like this, just in case the GM is expecting them to find the item (etc) in the next dungeon (etc) OR a similar/better item that will be an excellent replacement/upgrade. So, what you're saying is, the GM deserves to do a TON of extra work, balancing all the equipment, just 'cuz D&D didn't make people pay points for magical equipment and we want to make players comfortable in their old fashioned habits instead of encouraging them to play a more mature and fair game? The whole point of this idea was to show people who are still kludging their way through D&D that Hero CAN be used for a D&D style game, with many of the same fun points that a lot of people like in their D&D games. (I know, I used "D&D" 3 times in that sentence! ) But, I don't want to put the huge weight on a GM of trying to balance every loot hoard to make sure all the characters end up approximately the same power level at the end of the adventure. (I just played in my first Hero game in several years, last week. One of the characters (I have to check his math!) ended up with an 8 SPD, while the rest of us were at 4 & 5. Plus, his attacks were at least as powerful (if not more) than the rest of us.... I was quite bored and/or depressed. I'm pretty sure the other players were, too.) Korren

Re: Make them Pay! Shadow Pup said: "Actually I was referring to Korren, when I made my statement. I see nothing wrong with charging points for stuff characters make or are magical. Korren plans to charge for everything magical or not. That just rubs me the wrong way for a Fantasy Hero campaign." I didn't say they had to pay for EVERY item they want. Just the ones that they DEFINITELY want to KEEP, at all times. If they pick up a rope, even a magical one, it works like a normal rope.... it could tie a guy up, but, since it was NOT bought as an Entangle, there's much more of a chance of him escaping when they leave him alone. I mean, they can CARRY all the items (magical or not) that they want (or are able to lift/push!), but they won't get full effect from the ones that they haven't paid for... or, maybe, they'll have trouble FINDING the right item in their sack/wagon, if it's just a carried (not paid for) item. And, I sorta WANT people to focus on the 'powers' (whether innate, like 'Mages' or item based, like 'Warriors') instead of the skills. (Just one of my own preferences, really.) Plus, they probably won't be choosing to buy ordinary weapons, unless it's part of a disguise. They wouldn't likely choose to pay points for non-magical weapons, unless they want to make sure that they almost never LOSE them. And, I believe, people keep saying "Well, you can just keep track of things to make sure no one character is much more powerful than any other.". That's what I want to AVOID.... spending hours checking what people have and guessing how they might use them. Making sure each treasure chest has an equal number of items (or points worth of items) for each player, then worrying whether the right player will GET the item. (what if the "Rogue" pockets the ring that was supposed to go to the "Mage"? What if the party decides that the Ring of Feather Fall that I thought would go well on the "Rogue" should go to the "Fighter", since he's always jumping off things?) Suddenly, each character's point total is scewed and I have to fix the next treasure chest and hope things go better. Curufea said: "Not only that - there will be less mystery. They will have a good idea how powerful a magic item is based on its real cost." THAT is certainly true. I suppose I could reveal the TOTAL cost they have to pay, but not all the powers of a mysterious item. Or, make them pay points for the magical effects they HAVE figured out about the item, but maybe there are some secret powers, also. Maybe not so NICE powers!? Thia said: "In a Fantasy setting, it very much breaks genre convention to charge someone XP for finding a magical item, and while it is listed among the options, it isn't one I would recommend." Well, that's like saying "It breaks 'genre' to have super heroes pay for their super powers, since it's all about super heroes!" Or "my super found a ring (on the finger of the villain he just killed/defeated) and it gives him more power, so he shouldn't have to pay for it, since he found it!" Or "My space hero HAS to have a space ship, even though it costs 1,000 points, I FOUND it!" Just 'cuz D&D never had you "pay points for" the magical things, doesn't mean that Hero should follow that 'convention'. It breaks the HERO convention to give out powers for free, n'pas? The point is, I'm trying to get the Point Based System to do part of the work of making sure the characters are balanced. I don't like the concept behind d20 of letting someone ELSE decide if my 5th level Mage is balanced with someone else's 5th level Rogue, etc. By having the points add up to the same (or similar) totals at the end of each session, I can be relatively sure that, just as in a Super game, the PC's are all about the same "level" as each other. Plus, I can balance the villains, better, also! Thanks for the input. Korren

Ok, this question may have been asked and answered, already, but I don't know how to search for it. If you know of a thread about this subject, just send me there and I'll be happy. I was thinking of a Fantasy based game where the Independent limitation was almost completely missing. "No-one gets it for free!" I mean, if someone finds a sword and wants to use it, that's fine.... for a few sessions! If they want to KEEP it, they have to pay the points for it! I mean, why should the "Mage" have to pay points for every one of his spells, but the "Fighter" has 16 different "Independent" weapons that he's carrying around, for different situations? All he has to do is buy a horse or weight-reducing sack to carry them all around with! Each piece of armor, each weapon or magic "item" has a point cost that a character can choose to pay to make the item part of themselves, so it can't be taken away, easily. I know this seems "mean", but I think the whole point of using Hero instead of d20 would be to insure that all characters add up to the same point total (or, close to it) at the end of each session. I posted this in General Discussion and got responses. Theses were my answers: Yes, I plan to make people pay "full cost" for their spells. The whole "divide by 3" thing sounded kinda random & it just didn't grab me. And, yes, I plan to use OIF/OAF withOUT the Independent. I was gonna ignore the Real Weapon limitation, too, since that would just require me to remember to make sure people took care of their weapons.... the magical ones usually don't need 'care', anyway. And, yes, if a person loses or gives up a weapon/armor/item, they would get back the points to invest in something new.... maybe not IMMEDIATELY, but fairly quickly. I was thinking that you don't need to pay for the skills to use the items that you pay for, but, if you DO get weapon/armor/magical-item skills, that allows you to pick up toys you have NOT paid for and use them (for brief periods of time), even if you don't have the points to invest, at that moment. I like the idea of RolePlaying the "investing yourself into the item"... this could be as simple as "attuning oneself" to a magic item. Or figuring out its command words or something. Also, the main reason for doing this is so that I don't have to keep checking unpaid for items on each character sheet, in haversacks & on horses, & guessing and calculating to see if everyone is balanced with each other. I can just add up point totals. I wasn't going to use the STR minimum rules, since when the character pays points for it, they generally know what their STR is. Unless I plan on having a lot of STR Drain traps! LoL Oh, the incentive would be that the Magic Sword (armor, wand, etc) would have special properties or abilities that the character couldn't just spend points to get. Like, the sword that gives 2d6 Luck. I wouldn't just allow a character to buy 2d6 Luck, suddenly, on a whim, just because they have 10 points saved up. Also, I think I would start them with a slightly higher point total, but also give them more XP per session. Not a whole lot, but to be able to afford the nice items that "drop" from their adventures! That's my idea..... discuss! Thanks, Korren

Re: Make them pay!! Ok, I forgot a few points in my original post. Sorry! Yes, I plan to make people pay "full cost" for their spells. The whole "divide by 3" thing sounded kinda random & it just didn't grab me. And, yes, I plan to use OIF/OAF withOUT the Independent. I was gonna ignore the Real Weapon limitation, too, since that would just require me to remember to make sure peopre took care of their weapons.... the magical ones usually don't need 'care', anyway. And, yes, if a person loses or gives up a weapon/armor/item, they would get back the points to invest in something new.... maybe not IMMEDIATELY, but fairly quickly. I was thinking that you don't need to pay for the skills to use the items that you pay for, but, if you DO get weapon/armor/magical-item skills, that allows you to pick up toys you have NOT paid for and use them (for brief periods of time), even if you don't have the points to invest, at that moment. I like the idea of RolePlaying the "investing yourself into the item"... this could be as simple as "attuning oneself" to a magic item. Or figuring out its command words or something. Also, the main reason for doing this is so that I don't have to keep checking unpaid for items on each character sheet, in haversacks & on horses, & guessing and calculating to see if everyone is balanced with each other. I can just add up point totals. I wasn't going to use the STR minimum rules, since when the character pays points for it, they generally know what their STR is. Unless I plan on having a lot of STR Drain traps! LoL Oh, the incentive would be that the Magic Sword (armor, wand, etc) would have special properties or abilities that the character couldn't just spend points to get. Like, the sword that gives 2d6 Luck. I wouldn't just allow a character to buy 2d6 Luck, suddenly, on a whim, just because they have 10 points saved up. Also, I think I would start them with a slightly higher point total, but also give them more XP per session. Not a whole lot, but to be able to afford the nice items that "drop" from their adventures! Thanks, Corey

Ok, this question may have been asked and answered, already, but I don't know how to search for it. If you know of a thread about this subject, just send me there and I'll be happy. I was thinking of a Fantasy based game where the Independent limitation was almost completely missing. "No-one gets it for free!" I mean, if someone finds a sword and wants to use it, that's fine.... for a few sessions! If they want to KEEP it, they have to pay the points for it! I mean, why should the "Mage" have to pay points for every one of his spells, but the "Fighter" has 16 different "Independent" weapons that he's carrying around, for different situations? All he has to do is buy a horse or weight-reducing sack to carry them all around with! Each piece of armor, each weapon or magic "item" has a point cost that a character can choose to pay to make the item part of themselves, so it can't be taken away, easily. I know this seems "mean", but I think the whole point of using Hero instead of d20 would be to insure that all characters add up to the same point total (or, close to it) at the end of each session. That's my idea..... discuss! Thanks, Korren