Arc Esu

I like Gravitas and Manifest Density. General Relativity is pretty good too.

If you use a Change Environment that subtracts meters of movement, are those meters subtracted before or after figuring Non-Combat Movement? For example, if a standard human with 12m Running with the default x2 NCM is hit with a Change Environment that subtracts10m of movement, and he decides to run at full Non-Com speed, does he move 4m (12m-10m = 2m, x2 NCM = 4m) or 14m (12m x2 NCM = 24m, 24m - 10m = 14m)?

Double Post deleted

I like the powerset and general concept, and I could also see her working as a hero who is trying to be more emotional by helping people. Couple of suggestions: 1) Her Running seems really high. Since she's not a melee fighter, it seems unneeded. 2) Should her multipower have "Incantations," since she needs to say "Smiley Face" or "LOL" or whatnot? Or would her powers work even if she couldn't say that? 3) I'm a little unclear on the reason for the Mind Scan. Is it so she can use her powers on people she's chatting with or the like? 4) I would give her Oratory, not for the usual "I made an inspiring speech," but to represent her saying "LOL" and making an entire audience laugh or the like. 5) You gave her a Profession Skill but neglected to mention which profession it was. 6) I feel having both the Distinctive Features: Emotionless and Social Complication: Emotionless is double dipping. I would get rid of the social complication. 7) As Opale mentioned, you neglected to include her OCV, DCV, OMCV, and DMCV. Overall, nice job, just needs a few tweaks.

While there's no hard and fast rule for this sort of thing, in general I would say a Code versus Killing at the Common, Total level (20 points, as you say) would include prioritizing saving the lives of others, but would not absolutely require it. Code of the Hero or the like would be more along those lines. If the choice was "save those 20 civilians now, or let the villain escape to detonate his nuke," then stop the villain now, because you know of an immediate greater threat to life that he poses. But if it's "save those 20 civilians now, or let the villain escape and he'll probably do something bad down the line," then I'd say you should save the civilians, because the mere potential for future mayhem does not outweigh the immediate lives that you know are in danger now. And since it's a team of heroes, you can always split the party, much as the GM might hate it ;-)

An interesting idea. I would give her skills/powers/equipment related to the increasing tech level, in particular: 1) Proficiency with/access to various future weapons, particularly melee although maybe a huge assault weapon that she can only carry because of her super Strength might work too (laser claymore, chainsword, particle cannon, etc) 2) Proficiency with/access to various future defenses to protect from everyone else's future weapons (force field belt, displacement field, and just increasing her inherent mutant toughness) 3) A teleportation tech device. Cateran is all about freedom, and teleporting seems like the movement mode that grants the most freedom, although maybe she could have a jetpack or anti-grav boots or the like as well. 4) More high tech skills like Computer Programming and Systems Operations at high levels. While Cateran is old fashioned, if she didn't pick those up by the year 3000 she just couldn't get by in daily life. Also, if she's trying to hide the fact that she's immortal, she'll need some high tech Forgery or the like to change ID cards, birth certificates, and other electronic records. 5) A cybereye. Nothing says "future badass" like a cybereye. I know it doesn't make much sense since she is so tough (and I think has Regen, although I don't have her sheet in front of me), but it would look cool. Maybe she got the cybereye voluntarily? If so, maybe she has other cyborg parts now too. Good luck creating "Cateran 3000!"

You should also consider a Drain versus Movement powers. If you drained the default 12m of running and 4m of leaping, an average person would be unable to move. You can raise the effect if you want to prevent above-average people from moving. Depending on the campaign, you could add Flight or other "exotic" movement powers as well. You could also add an "all or nothing" limitation so that if you don't completely Drain their movement powers, it has no effect (special effect could be that the stake "missed").

Re: Recommended Champions Adventures? Although they are Fifth Edition, I own both Shades of Black and Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth. I haven't run them for my group yet, but will be doing so in the near future, and so I have read through both adventures thoroughly. I would recommend both of them as solid Champions adventures, with the caveats that a) they are both 5th edition, so minor conversion will be needed and both rely to a greater or lesser extent on other 5th edition books. Shades of Black does not have stats in it for Black Paladin or Talisman (the two main villains), and Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth doesn't have stats for the Ultimates (who play a minor role in the adventure). Plus, Viper features prominently in Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth (no surprise, given the title), so Viper: Coils of the Serpent is helpful but not strictly required. To describe the adventures without spoilers, Shades of Black involves solving a supernatural murder mystery and preventing a great evil from coming to power, and Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth involves the rise of a new master villain and his fiendish organization attempting to blackmail the world.

Re: Resistance is useless I've been considering dropping PD, ED, and Resistant Defense entirely and instead going with Body Defense (reduces any Body damage you take, no matter if it's a Killing or Normal attack) and Stun Defense (reduces any Stun damage you take, no matter if it's a Killing or Normal attack). My problem with PD, ED, and Resistant Defenses are that they are priced the same in every game/genre, but not equally useful in each. For example, in an Old West game Energy attacks are few and far between, so why should I pay the same for a point of ED as I do for PD? By making the defense generic, the GM can set the limitation value of "only versus physical," "only versus energy," "only versus Killing attacks" or the like based on his/her campaign. But in my system, unlike the current one, Body defense would be not be added to Stun defense; the two are completely separate. Take the T-1000 from Terminator 2, for example. It is almost impossible to kill (it doesn't really take any Body damage until the end) but relatively easy to Stun (although it recovers Stun quickly). In the current system that is difficult to model since resistant PD/ED adds to normal PD/ED. Cost for 1 point of Body defense would be 1 (in the current system, 1 Resistant PD/ED would be 3 points, but would also reduce Stun damage, so if you subtract out the cost of 1 Normal PD and ED you get a final cost of 1). Cost for 2 points of Stun defense would be 3. A character starts with 1 Body defense and 2 Stun Defense for free. Recommended defense totals would be 1 Body defense per DC (so an average normal attack will do no Body, an average Killing attack will do 1 or 2 Body) and 2 Stun defense per DC (so an average Normal damage attack will still get a good chunk of Stun through, while the average Killing attack will still get at least a few Stun through). Obviously, suggested defense totals would be adjusted up or down based on character concept and role (more for bricks, less for glass cannons). Does this strike anyone else as a good way to deal with the resistant defense issue?

Steve- Suppose the hero Ground Pound is being Grabbed and carried by his teammate Fly Boy (because Fly Boy can fly and Ground Pound can't). If Fly Boy moves at Non Combat speeds, and Ground Pound wants to make an attack at an enemy (while still being voluntarily Grabbed), does Ground Pound also suffer the Non Combat movement penalties (i.e. 0 OCV, 1/2 DCV), or does he just suffer the usual penalties for being Grabbed?

Re: Silver Age Champions playtest begins! Oh man, Atomic Eye is going to make so many Eye puns at the start of the next session. It will be EYEsome.

Re: Silver Age Champions playtest begins! Wait, "Are they Threats or Menaces?" Don't you mean "Are they Heroes or Menaces?" Or are the papers trying to really pin down the exact right descriptor of their evil...

Re: Detect Correct Answer I'm also not a fan of using the Detect. If you wanted "Detect Correct Answer" to mean "Of the three answers I've researched, which one is right?" I might be more ok with it. I prefer Derek's solution of KS: Everything (or maybe KS: Researchable Knowledge), but instead of buying it to 40, I would buy it to 25 or 30, then also buy Skill levels with the limitation "only to offset the time modifier." Since everything the amulet tells you is supposed to be researchable, these levels will counteract the time penalty that you would take for skipping the research. In other words, if it would normally take a week to research a particular question and you're looking for an instant answer, that would normally be a -24 penalty (Week to Day, Day to 6 Hours, 6 Hours to 1 Hour, 1 Hour to 20 Minutes, 20 Minutes to 5 Minutes, 5 minutes to 1 Minute, 1 Minute to 1 Turn, 1 Turn to 1 Phase), so buy +24 to the skill with the limitation rather than buying a crazy high skill.

Re: Silver Age Champions playtest begins! I'm also reading, but like Epiphanis I'm playing in the game, so my opinion may be biased. But let me just say that the Atomic Eye sounds like a brave and charming fellow, not to mention sexy!

Re: Quick Question: RAW? RAI? In the context of RPG discussions, they usually stand for "Rules As Written" and "Rules As Intended."

Re: Ripper 6E Statblock? What Book? Dammit, Ninja'd by Derek!

Re: Ripper 6E Statblock? What Book? To my knowledge, there isn't one. I own all the 6th ed Champions books and I don't remember ever seeing him. But converting his 5th ed stats from the Viper sourcebook shouldn't be too hard.

Re: Summon vs. Follower I think APG has rules to double the number of tasks a Summoned creature performs for a +1/4 Advantage. However, if you want a truly permanent being you should buy it as a Follower, because otherwise you could spent months using Summon over and over again and eventually have an endless army for a relatively low cost. As a plot device for a villain that works fine, but not so much for a PC.

The rules for the Concentration limitation mention that a character cannot move more than 2m per Phase while concentrating. However, if a character takes Concentration on an Instant power (for example, an attack power), can the character take a Half Move, then start Concentrating to use the power?

Re: Ghostbusters Plus I think the best thing to do would be to steal the plot from the recent Ghostbusters video game or steal plots from the cartoons. Just redress the plots to be "X years later" and you're done. Or, a crossover between Ghostbusters and the Lovecraft Mythos could work as well (and I think they did that in one episode of the cartoon, albeit lightheartedly).

I know that ultimately it's up to the GM, but by default should the advantages Variable Effect and/or Expanded Effect (for Adjustment powers such as Drain) count as "advantages that directly affect damage" per 6E2 p. 98, and thus affect the DC of the attack? My gut says Variable Effect no, Expanded Effect yes.

Can you apply Megascale to the height, length, or thickness of a Barrier (for example, to create a Barrier that could protect a city from a meteor strike)? If so, does applying it once affect each aspect (height, length, thickness), or would you need to buy it multiple times (like you would to affect both the range and Area of Effect of an attack power)? If buying it once does affect all three, does it have to affect all three the same way (i.e. could I make a Barrier where 1 meter = 10 km for length, but 1 meter = 1 km for height, and leave the thickness at the standard 1/2 meter)?

Re: Map Pieces I second Beast's opinion of "cool stuff." Also, do you recommend Campaign Cartographer for this kind of stuff? I'm starting an online Hero game using Maptools soon and it might be nice to be able to build my own maps rather than scrounging them from the internet.

Re: Transform Your build for the long lasting effect looks correct as far as the rules are concerned. As for it unbalancing the game, keep in mind it is 206 Active Points. That's equivalent to a 13 1/2 d6 Killing Attack, so you're talking about quite a bit of power here. And keep in mind that most supervillain NPCs are supposed to be major world threats, and the only thing stopping them from taking over are your PCs. All that being said, the power is quite limited and easy to overcome if the PCs are clever. He can't really have an army of thousands of women that he controls directly, because then he would have to see each of them at least once a week, and he'd have time for nothing but that. Even if the entire army lives close to/with him, that's great, but it's hard to rule the world if all your followers have to stay in the same city. Also, since any mental defense renders the power useless, many superheroines would be immune anyway, and those that aren't can have the team gadgeteer whip up some counter-technology. In short, this power build seems to be a god mix between "Oh my God that's scary" and "With proper planning, we can beat it."

Re: Superteam Package Deals Enforcer84- Some good ideas here that have inspired me in making my own package deal for the supergroup in my soon to start online superhero RPG. Repped.