TheDarkness

I think this is often more a problem if the players have an expectation of what, point-wise, represents a powerful super, which basically is just being used to the conventions of a system. Without knowing what most players and judges of a particular RPG consider the upper end of a power at a certain point in a game, what one group may see as weak, one may see as strong. In one group, an 8d6 blast might, when it hits and rolls decently, be quite a potent blast. In another, 12d6. In another, 15d6. Yet, in each game, the effect of each may be the same. More often than not, whether the gameplay is dynamic has a greater influence on how 'powerful' characters and villains feel than any specific number we can produce to define what is powerful. Sure, in a particular campaign, you could probably find what specific number that is, but once you compare it to another campaign, it may be totally different. The effect on game play could be the same. Definitely, if people are using worlds and supplements that are premade, there will be a specific 'convention' on what is a powerful blast or point expenditure, and players will acclimate to that relative strength value. Otherwise, it is entirely relative. If an 8d6 blast is adequate in one game, and 12d6 is adequate in another, the 12d6 is not an 'advanced' form of the blast, it is probably getting a similar effect, just dealing with more points of ED. They are still producing the same effect. I would think that, if the game starts at a higher value, and the players get a years worth of experience, or at the lower lever(I believe 300 was the number?), and gets a years worth of experience, the lower level characters will often have the same degree of gains, which will still seem like a substantial difference, IMO. What we define as a weak and strong attack may often be the conventions we accept, but what makes it seem weak or strong in-game is the in game-effect. We can say "8d6 blast, pshaw!" because our game has 12d6 as the conventional go-to number, but if, in one game, the 8d6 puts down a wider variety of opponents than the 12d6 in its game, then as far as game feel will go, the 8d6 is effectively more powerful in its game, and will feel that way. The 12d6 might even feel like the been there done that blast. In AD & D, I often found that the gameplay at levels 4-7 was far more dynamic than at either the lower levels, or, especially, the higher levels. So, I think most players will care little about the end numbers if the gameplay is dynamic, and if the gameplay feels like they have progressed and have a dangerous array of powers from when they started, they will be more focused on that than on whether they've reached the 12d6 number that they think of as powerful in other campaigns. I only used blast as an example for simplicity's sake. In short, all power in Champions is relative to other things that tend to hedge its power, and as points go up, not only do the powers go up, but the things that limit those power's effects. Now, some builds and such give that relative value certain stability, so if you want to melt a tank, as long as you use the stats from the book, then there is a value that must be reached. But under that upper end, there is a huge amount of variance. The strength of an unpowered costumed vigilante in a supers game varies hugely from one group's game to another's, for example.

I'll be honest. The jaded, spent too much time in the past on social media part of me told me, "someone is going to continue the argument by following up on what the definition of a pick-up game is." The hopeful idealist said no, you're wrong, obviously any of the four or five of us who have been arguing for five pages are, at this point, completely aware that even a half starved goat wouldn't have the slightest interest in anything more to do with us at the moment, even if we were covered in delicious clover. Well, at least maple syrup is not debatable.

On whether it's a point waster or not, I think things that play an influence in role play often can equate to points beyond what we spend. For instance, on the power to produce a rose. Such a character might, when in trouble, find themselves aided by big point characters solely based on that one time he gave them a rose. I have an NPC, he's support for the heroes, as I didn't want any of them to spend on medical skills if they didn't want to. He's a Batman sort of character in a starting campaign, so he's spread out in a lot of skills and such. So most of the characters could totally take him. Anyway, he's got an underground base. The city the adventure is in is built over the old city, and under that are drained aquifers with tunnels that connect to cave networks in the neighboring mountains. Some supers who just want to be left alone hide out there. His base is just past one such area. He has to pass through the territory of a twelve year old autistic girl(lovingly based off of a girl my wife is a caregiver to). She's very powerful and very dangerous, and very temperamental. Anyway, this NPC, Brother Black, frequently drops off parcels with girly clothes and pokemon dolls while he passes through her territory, and spends a little time with her. As such, by means of role play, he has the protection of points far beyond what he himself could hope to muster. Unfortunately, he has another neighbor that is more problematic. I think some ambiance builds, where they have a positive role play effect, equate to points beyond their expenditure. Whether that effect is "this guy's crazy" to "I LOVE that guy".

When I have the luxury of being a player, I'm totally that guy!

I suspect that X-ray vision was added during the period where sciency stuff was in the vogue, it has its usefulness, but I'd bet it was added for the feel of it.

I consider all of the above pick up games.

Glad you posted this. First, to give me a goal, I'll only have a few weeks in the states to catch up with any abdominal fortitude you may have on me(I may not come back with a six pack, I'll call it a one pack). Second, because, yes, I don't actually have much more to say on the topic, and I think any reader already has plumbed the depths of the opinions of those of us who were arguing, and, unless they are someone's cat who has randomly ended up on this website(which, frankly, would be an amazingly lucky cat, considering the terrifying places someone's little Princey Wincey could have ended up), I can't imagine there being a sentient being saying "I want more of this, right now!" Except the shake stuff. And real maple syrup. Those deserve their own build. But I insist on approving that build.

I tend to enjoy when players do some things with their builds that aren't about the practicality of it, but because they simply like the idea they have in mind. These are usually in addition to their main powers, or an aspect of one use of a main power that has an odd touch to it. Of course, if no players are doing this, it becomes hard for players to do. But my players tend to all start having some signature builds like this, so it's not a big problem. One classic example we could use is Superman. Super strength, flight, heat vision, these are all staples of many such heroes. X-ray vision? Sure, it has it's uses, but it is definitely the outlier in that list. One player has been building a gadgeteer. One of his items, which he picked people's brains on this forum for, is a tracking device fired from his gun. He's still working out the details, but the trackers are like some sort of small creature that seeks to get under the target's skin. Now, he considered just having that be the effect, but he really wants them to actually be what they are described to be, if they don't penetrate, he wants them to come back to him, he likes the idea of the people who just had some weird creature try to get inside them trying to stomp on them. Not sure if he'll end up going with this build, but I also find it funny. Anyone else occasionally enjoy doing some custom build where the goal is not about the efficiency, but the feel for it?

Oh, and I will make myself a waffle and drown it in real maple syrup. Perhaps very fat.

China. But, visiting the states in a few weeks, I will definitely be finding a shake, perhaps a malt, a proper pizza, a hamburger, and mexican food. Then, I will be fat.

Me too! There is literally no good milkshakes where I am short of a bullet train ride. It's tragic. And I totally agree, the argument up to now is over inches. I've been aware of this since page 1. I'm not trying to make anyone take my route. I was more interested in seeing others' approaches to the topic than in defending mine, so I'm not going to be defending mine further.

I've got the stats for normal, skilled, and talented. I tend to try to keep normals normal, and so I'm always curious what qualifies as normal in different games. And since I'm working on a dark champions game and a supers at the same time, I figured I'd ask. Since, really, from campaign to campaign, especially if people aren't using premade stuff, what is weak and strong is entirely relative. 12d6 blast is overpowered in one game, underpowered in another, just right in many. Also, I have some scenarios going on for story development that involve street criminals, and so I had crime on my mind...

And where did I say that 5 CSLs at a time never get approved, or did I provide context? [hint: I did] And actually, I did give concrete examples of what sort of thing might be a problem and why. Despite your 'trigger looking for a trauma' of "I had a bad judge once who controlled experience badly, and I will argue down until I'm blue in the face even though you clearly are not him." You want communication? Perhaps try it in the context of, "I've had bad experiences with this sort of setup, but I'm curious and I don't want to treat some random stranger to a tirade and assume a whole lot about them based on my past experiences when they may actually be working hard to give their players a fun game." You have jumped right to the straw man and ad hom route, this does not exactly make me feel like, well, I actually need to explain to you. Funny, how you always paraphrase badly instead of quoting. Maybe I'm not saying what fits your argument? And yes, I did explain exactly that about the danger rooms, when you only read others' posts to find what you're going to argue with them about, you will tend to miss things. Since pick up games tend to come between sections of story, they're a good time for role playing experience expenditure. That is how. Done repeating myself and having a SMALL group ignore anything I say that doesn't fit what they want me to be saying. I'll now be posting thoughts on the topic and responses to others who aren't overplaying bad game trauma. Everyone has been in bad games. That is not an excuse to use other people as proxies. Got a problem with some bad GM, call him, I'm not him. I will play the style I feel best, my players seem to like that style. I will compare notes with others without someone assuming I owe them answers because bad GM did bad things to you.

Post in the spirit of the topic, not in response to anything: A couple examples of games where character development had requirements that, when played well, provided many new realms for adventure and fun: Dungeons and Dragons(back in the day): mages who got new powerful spells couldn't even use them until they had the physical components for them, which were sometimes not easy to get, and could make for whole fun adventures under the right DMs. Games that didn't use this often had balance issues at the upper levels. Same with making items. Traveller: Training and building during interstellar trips was the norm. Of course, Traveller players often tended to make sure to define these things. MOST games, for continuity issues, would make skills a process. Now, this does not mean all campaigns have to. Mine will tend to. Everyone in my game knows this from the outset. I find they tend to put more thought toward their purchases, but I also find that, more often than not, they change what their expenditure is going to be because what they originally were going to do didn't work like they were thinking, or fell in love with something else in the interim, not anything on my part. In such a case, I don't assume they spent three quarters of their down time on what didn't end up working, but what they chose in the end. Because my players are very cognizant of their choices, always wanting to pick just the right thing for their character, and often more for their idea of their character than immediate effectiveness, I DO ruthlessly nitz power creep for power creep's sake by a player when it would immediately force the rest of the players, who know that I will design the scenarios for their characters as they make them, into a position of either matching that power creep, or being swamped in the aftermath. Since I don't design scenarios in which the players are swamped and are mostly missing their opponents for stat reasons vs. just a day of bad rolls, attempts at power creep stick out to everyone like a sore thumb, as do builds that none of us, the player who came up with it included, realized would do exactly what it did. One player just changed a power that was just such a case, he likes that I encourage a blend of effective builds with ambiance builds, and as soon as he used the power and it turned out to be overkill, I could tell he thought it was lame in game terms, replacing it with something less powerful in effect, but more in keeping with his character. Further, they know that improvising uses of powers in a scenario is the go-to signal for "I might be buying this soon," they will tend to more often.

Sigh. Obviously, it will be simpler to just respond to the straw man arguments. At which point did I say what percentage of big purchases don't get okayed versus small purchases? [As in, the entire basis for your assumption that I favor one over the other.] At which point did I say I couldn't decide when 6 CVs is unbalancing? Are you saying that I didn't say that the danger room games are generally pick up games? Non-straw man bonus: Are you saying that a meme that appears frequently in the comics, like danger rooms, but any lengthy use in the comics requires a further plot, will play the same in another medium, like an RPG, where the players actually make decisions? So, simulations in simulations don't work, like having little green guys play rugby, or imaginary cars play demolition derby? If my players like it, what problem is there? What on earth is there to argue down on this idea?

Actually, for role play, often it is. And I've cited clear examples of this already. If you don't want to accept those example, I believe Tasha made the same exact one as me in one case, 5 CSLs and buying them over time instead of dumping them all at a time that would be a problem for balance or believability.

And I see reason to.

First, your paraphrase includes an assumption, but I did not state that CIDs were added for that reason, but the error is natural given the topic and converstation. Given, however, that you HAVE certainly posed straw man's and ad hocs regarding my motivations that I have, for any reasonable person, demonstrated to be incorrect, you might want to keep in mind the limits of text in conveying intent. CIDs were added to make skills more dynamically playable, the experience issue was just a minor side benefit that helped with the first goal. Toward the last question: Using danger room scenarios designed to be fun for the players. Or, if the player wanted to play it safe, rebuilding parts that he felt the first build roll might have been borderline. The part from the first build might then become an emergency spare part.

The comment was in relation to the ASSUMPTION that I had many players doing this, which was taken further by several to suggest that these imaginary players were railing under the dictatorial regime of my DMing. In the context of that, I asked where I cited the frequency. Most of my players don't munchkin. This does not mean that the rules in the Heroes book designed to work against this are unnecessary. So, when you say "All of your comments on the problems this is intended to solve suggest such problem builds," which position do you wish me to argue, that my players, suffering under my dictatorial regime, are being denied valid builds weekly for no reason, or that there is no problem at all, or that there occasionally is a problem, and perhaps I find that this heads off the problem at the pass, but you wish to argue what frequency problems occur before rules are necessary in general? The last one is based in fact, and gives a point to argue. My response is, if the build messes with role play or balance, it is easier to have a system in place and us all acting as a team for both purposes than to deal ad hoc with it. You may find other ways to your liking.

That said, if I were running a game in Earth: Retcon, the only builds I might contest would be the ones that weren't retconned enough.

X-Men danger room was a frequent genre norm. Daredevil has, a great number of times, been shown extensively training because of a weakness. Batman's is largely in retconned back stories, definitely true. There's a lot of examples to go either way on this one. The danger of always defaulting to genre norms is one often becomes stuck trying to fulfill the genre norms and not the genre feel. The other players get a tactile sense when one player's build imbalances the game, or when one expenditure is allowed, but is not given any means for using in actual play, so the medium is different in role play than the genre. Generally, the campaign has an advantage that the comics do not have, it is largely run by the same group of people with similar goals, so there is way less need for retconning. Giving up this advantage to try to typify a weakness of the genre(on-going comics who are ongoing due to a business model supported by periodic inspired talent, and so have long periods of weak writing that must be explained through retconning) is often, IMO, not worth it.

The boards are the forums. He's saying feel free to post your questions on the forums here, and usually someone can answer them.

To further clarify: Scenarios to have fun, develop stories and characters, and pick up experience. Pick up games for role playing experience expenditure(if it wasn't already role played in the main campaign), if not necessary, pick up games to give me time to develop the campaign arc by implementing the changes the characters introduced to it through their own actions.

Actually played out, two test test scenarios, just simple combats, were done, I've only written the first one out.

Gaining skill in Traveler must make some people's heads explode. If I'm draconian, that's tyrannical. I'm actually quite glad I played that game. It lets me know I have to let players be aware of time, of when they have downtime, etc. Also, it helps me set up a game where the players feel free to tell me, "Our characters are going to take a training break at the next available opportunity." And where I ask. And the advantage of having periodic events in the game where downtime is likely to be possible. When two powerful enemy groups are at odds for an extended period, and so those hunted bys are not an issue.