Lee

I agree. I would never charge character points for items the character(s) "found" in the game. I also don't buy the idea of "not a currency" either. For example, let's say that Paladin character, who is wearing non-magical chainmail, finds in the treasure trove of the boss the party has just defeated, as shiny new suit of non-magical plate armor that fits! It will increase the character's effective point value even though it is non-magical. Do you charge the character CP's for the non-magical plate? If so, what if instead, the character goes to the local city and buys the armor from the armorsmith there for, say, 500 gold pieces. Should the character also have to pay in character points in addition to the gold? I'd say no. Well, if you're not going to charge CP's for the non-magical plate (or sword or dagger or whatever), why charge CP's for a magical one? Sure, being magical may increase the item's capabilities beyond those of an equivalent non-magical version, but in either case, they increase the character's effective point value, just one more than the other. And, what about the case where you have a magical set of chainmail that has +10 resistant defenses but, there is also an armorsmith who can forge a set of non-magical plate that has the same defenses? Do you charge CP for one and not the other? That doesn't seem right to me. Do you charge CP for both? Then having weapons and armor price lists (in currency) is meaningless. It seems to me that the answer is don't charge CP for either. Now, the GM will need to make sure that the character(s) opponents will more often have equally powerful items to offset the ones they let the character(s) "find". But, before anyone says anything about a potential arms race, bear in mind it's the GM giving out the magic items and the GM equipping the adversaries. So, effectively the GM is in an arms race with themselves. They can stop the arms race anytime they want simply by not giving out any more magic items. That said, the GM will need to be careful not to give the character(s) too many, too powerful items, too quickly. To mitigate this, I could see using the experience points the character's have accumulated as a guide to how powerful an item to give. You wouldn't necessarily want to give a 50 point magic item to a character who had only accumulated 10 XP. But, if they'd been campaigning long enough to have accumulated 60 XP, a 50 point magic item might be appropriate. However, their accumulated XP would only be a guide and no XP would be spent on the "found" item. The only time I'd charge CP's for a magic item would be if the character wanted to forge/enchant a brand new item, assuming I didn't have any crafting rules in place for creating new items. Then, I think it would be appropriate. It would be similar to the way in D&D you create magic items by spending XP (and gold for materials) to create a new item. If you ARE going to charge him 20 points for the sword and it gets eaten, the way I'd work it would be to have him come across another (but different) 20 point item as soon as you can. That would seem to make it like an accessible focus in a supers game where someone can take away your focus, but it's never gone permanently. So, they're down 20 points but just for a short while. Making the item different than the sword makes it make more sense (to me at least). It's not likely that you'd come across a sword that is exactly like the one the dragon ate. But, you might find something just as useful. Anyway, that's my take on it. YMMV (probably a lot). Lee

Like this one? “When a distinguished but elderly scientist says something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he says something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.” --- Arthur C. Clarke (1917-2008)

You are absolutely correct. That's the volume of a rectangular prism (box) where the width and height are 1/2 the length. I was assuming that you had the volume of the pyramid and were trying to determine the length of a rectangular prism for lookup in a table. If I'd known you wanted the volume of that rectangular prism, I'd have posted the formula you determined instead (or both). Lee

Really? Remember the old joke (paraphrased here for the given context): "Which has more mass, one kilogram of lead or one kilogram of feathers?" Of course the answer is they have the same mass (one kilogram). But, they will have radically different volumes. So, for determining the "size" of something, I think that volume would be a better measure. The "size" of one kilogram of feathers would be much larger than one kilogram of lead. Having said that, I think mass would be better for determining things like STR, CON, BODY, etc. as that would seem to have more to do with mass (or density which is mass/volume). But strictly for the "size" of something, I like volume better. That's just my opinion, I could be wrong. Lee

I did the math (for anyone who's interested). To determine the Length of a rectangular prism where the Width and Height are each 1/2 the length, you can use the following formula: Length = ∛(4v) (the cube root of 4 times the volume) That should give you, for any volume, the equivalent Length (and thus the Width and Height) of a rectangular prism with the same volume. It might help if you have a size table based on Length but have an unusually shaped volume. Calculate the length and find the nearest entry in the table. Lee

Mine, too and me, too! Lee

Unfortunately, no I don't. Sorry. Actually, it might be from The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, but I don't remember and didn't check. I just checked, and it is indeed from that book. Sorry for all the edits (including this one), I just hated not to be able to give you the information you wanted. 😊 Lee

“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It's simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we've been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.” ---Carl Sagan, astronomer and writer (1934-1996)

"Toute nation a le gouvernement qu'elle merite [Every country has the government it deserves]." ---Josephe de Maistre, Lettres et Opuscules Inedites (1851) vol.1, letter 53 (15 August 1811)

The Mythbusters did an episode on this where they tested a fall using Buster and accelerometers. What they found out is that hitting the water is not like hitting pavement--at least not from the same height. The G-loads were considerably lower when hitting water than when hitting pavement from the same height. However, they did not try to determine the different heights that would be necessary to get equivalent G-loads. Maybe you could take the different G-loads they mention and come up with some kind of conversion? I found this clip on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGJqqDaKscQ Lee

Wouldn't that already be the case in a heroic level game? Most of the gear the characters get is purchased with in-game currency and not CP anyway. Magic items found would be another way to improve the character without using CP. It seems to me the only time CP would come into play would be for things like an increase in STR to do more damage or INT to be better at spell casting, etc. In that case would you really want the players to be able to trade currency for CP? Lee PS: I guess maybe you mean you want the characters to be able to purchase magic items and the like and are looking to find a currency to CP conversion?

Another issue you could add to the list would be ricochets. The firearm may not be able to penetrate the hull or bulkheads of the vessel you're on, it might "rattle around a bit". It might not be as bad as Han Solo's blaster bolt when he was in the garbage masher on the Death Star, but it still might not be very fun.

This. I don't like the idea that the helm looks magical even if it isn't doing anything. But, if Allen is actually using the power, it ought to glow (or something) making it, um, obvious, that he's doing something and it's happening through the helm. But, there's no "energy beam" (or some such) that goes from the helm to Bob so the power effect is still invisible per a Mental Power. Obvious focus with invisible power effect. On the other hand, I guess a case could be made that part of the limitation of being an Obvious focus is that it makes the power(s) that require it also obvious (even if they normally wouldn't be). But, that seems too limiting to me, especially if there are a lot of powers that use the focus. If I were GM, I would use the former and not the latter. YMMV of course. Lee

For a monomolecular sword, I'd be tempted to stat it up as a NND attack as that stuff is supposed to be able to cut through (almost) anything. The defense could be a force field of some kind.

Precisely my point. The drive fields alter things such that energy weapons, gunpowder weapons, or any other weapons you might like as a GM won't function aboard a ship. Thus, the need for swords and other such things shipboard. Another idea would be to posit the idea of it's the artificial gravity field generators that cause the issue. In either case, there's an added complication when the fields get shut off (i.e. damage, someone hits "the big red switch", etc.). Suddenly, those weapons now work, but in an environment where their recoil (for the gunpowder weapons at least) makes the situation more interesting. Lee

Indeed we do. That's the sentiment I was trying to convey in my post. Lee

Interesting how many of the same conservatives that reject this idea, used the same idea to justify the Strategic Defense Initiative. Experts indicated that SDI could at best be 90-95 percent effective and that given the number of nuclear weapons the Soviets (at that time) had, 5-10% would still completely destroy the United States. The question that was asked, "why spend all that money when the country would be destroyed anyway?" Their answer was "just because we can't stop all of them doesn't mean we shouldn't try..." Strange how people will use an argument when it works in their favor, but reject the very same argument when it doesn't... I didn't know that! What a fascinating and, dare I say, unique way of looking at the issue. I've learned something new...it's going to be a good day. 😊 Lee

Well, one idea as to why they would be used on a starship could be that the power plant, maneuver drive and/or FTL drive causes some kind of damping field that prevents energy weapons from functioning. You might can handwave that to include gunpowder weapons by positing something akin to the realm of Amber in the Chronicles of Amber books where gunpowder didn't work in Amber. Maybe the exotic field generated by the power plant/drives has a similar effect. You could even use that as a plot hook so the characters can try to discover something similar to what (a rouge, IIRC) Corwin found in the Amber books that works like gunpowder even in those fields. Lee

The are available in the downloads section of the site. Go to where the templates are and the oldest download should be the one you're looking for. It has the title "HERO Designer Built-In Templates" by Simon. Lee

“Many people consider the things government does for them to be social progress but they regard the things government does for others as socialism.” ---Earl Warren, jurist (1891-1974)

I may have found a tiny typo. On the third page, under the Brace maneuver, the Effects column says: -2 OCV vc R Mod. Should that be: -2 OCV vs R Mod. ? Lee

Indeed. I'm reminded of the following quote: Lee

Let's just hope that we're not stupid enough to go up against a Sicilian when death is on the line...😊

Indeed it does starting on page 69

"We live on an island surrounded by a sea of ignorance. As our island of knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance." --- John Wheeler