Tech

Re: Tornado Building

Everyone forgot one of most common aspects associated with Tornados: fear. If bought as Summoned, I'd give it a high PRE for presence attacks with mucho bonus presence to resist presence attacks. If bought as an attack, I'd buy it with bonus dice to presence attacks.

Re: Extra Fast Thought

 

Hail to Dust Raven and TheEmerged! This is a *great* mechanic. I tip my hat and say YOINK!

 

Hawksmoor

I have to say I've used stuff like this for years now for heros and villains in my campaign. I guess it always seemed so obvious to me to try this.

Re: Sand Powers

The ever popular Sand in your eyes attack is a must here! I'd define it as:

6d6 NND Flash vs Sight (Def: anything that protects your eyes from being hit by the sand). Regular Flash Defense won't help in this case.

I would go with an PD EB, though I wouldn't make it usuable while Desold.

A physical Area Effect attack EB would be nice also, defined as a Sandstorm. Yeah, a Flash attack could be linked here but it might be redundant to the one I previously mentioned.

I thought about mentioning Tunneling but that's up to you. I can see a case for and against this power.

You could give a few levels of Growth with the limitation 'Must have substantial amt of sand nearby to absorb'.

If you're concerned about the cost of Damage Reduction, you could simply give a much higher PD than usual and crank up the STUN.

Re: Is this overkill?

Okay, I've checked out the villain. No, it's not overkill. Overkill means that it's overdone in terms of how powerful he is and that it's pointlessly powerful in it's write-up. I don't deny that he's quite quite a bit of power, especially with Damage Reduction & 5 Overall Levels but if he's a solo big boss-guy, then he needs to be powerful or else he'll get smeared.

Re: Dealing with Invisible Heroes

I agree with Vex & Fenixcrest: robots, computer-assisted traps and other no-mind adversaries will be the bane of this hero. A villain in a powered-armor suit will have his suit telling him something's there while he doesn't see anything, allowing him to attack the hero.

Armored suits are wonderful, aren't they?

Re: UNTIL's Theme Song / Reality Show

I would call it.... "UNTIL, We Meet Again"

 

There's a reason I don't work in Hollywood. :-)

 

Scott Bennne

Boo! Booooo! That's so bad I like it.

Re: [Fifth Ed Conversion] Villainy Unbound: Phobos and Deimos

Any chance of seeing TeraStar and his brother MechaTStar ?

I know PLUNDER had Phobos & Deimos, Sleeper, Terastar & Silver Dragon. Where does MechaTStar come from?

Re: M&M: this is a Nightmare?

I recently bought M&M for $10. Okay, the book had some soda spilled on it and even though it was marked down $16.50 or so, I said to the guy, "I like this but I'm not paying 16 bucks for this." He lowered it to $10. I was later able to unstick the pages.

M&M has some cool rules and no Hit Points, Stun, Body or anything else. I think some of the rules could be better put together (seems like everything says 'See page ###') Still, it's interesting but I'll stick with Hero.

Re: AVLD's to beat the band

One of my players bought 6d6 AVLD vs Ego (+3/4 since eveyrone has the defense). Yup, everyone had the defense but the weaker your Ego stat, the more damage you took. It is defined as being 'sung to sleep' so damage isn't painful - it just makes you yawn.

I'm interesting in hearing someone else's take on this also. FYI though, I have a 4 ft tall hero who has Inherent on his DCV levels due to size. Although Inherent is interesting, I can't recall off-hand anyone in CKC having taken this advantage.

Originally posted by Derek Hiemforth

1. Let 'em keep Holding. If they Hold into what would have been their next action, they lose the action they have held. (H5E, page 235)

 

2. All characters wanting to act at the same time make DEX rolls (or EGO rolls for mental powers, etc.). The one who makes it by the most goes first, and so on. (H5E, page 235)

 

3. All characters with the same DEX roll 1d6, high roll goes first and so on. Ties reroll. (H5E, page 232)

Wow, this is similar to my campaign rules.

#1 is the same.

#2 & #3 is handled by simply going down the Dex again in the phase both people who held their actions act. If they both have the same Dex, roll 1d6. If 1d6 rolled is the same, the act at the exact same time. This has led to some interesting fights where both attackers KO each other after attacking.

Originally posted by Kdansky

When exactly do you have a high OCV but a low DCV? Switch your combat levels and dodge, it's just better. Buying dozens of 2cp levels and blocking is real munchkinizing (because 2 cp levels are too cheap per se).

Hm, I seem to recall saying the characters had several levels they could switch around, whether to OCV or DCV. These are 8 pt Combat Levels and 10 pt Overall levels. I don't recall saying anything about buying dozens of levels or munchkinizing. Chill; don't read stuff in my text I didn't say.

A Dex of 21 giving a CV of 7 with 4 levels can be OCV 7 DCV 11, OCV 11 DCV 7 or any combination thereof. I could dodge and throw all levels into DCV and be DCV 14 or I could Block and be OCV 11. With a 4 CV jump from 7 to 11, that sure makes Blocking a lot easier. It also makes protecting innocents or teammates easier, not to mention heroic in the process.

Congrats

Hope your first game goes well.

Kdansky, you obviously feel that a Block manuever is a waste and that the Dodge manuever is incredibly more worthwhile. Go for it, it's that's how you view this manuever. Everyone while playing tends to view combat a certain way and reacts accordingly.

However, being able to protect innocent civilians or teammates cannot be underestimated. Dodging may give a +3 to your DCV but with a Block, you can block multiple attacks at yourself. I have characters each with several levels and can shift those levels into DCV as I please or OCV for a Block. That +3 to DCV isn't such an incentive to those characters. Also, the character can look cool blocking multiple attacks and get to attack them first, especially with a Sweep manuever.

When you Dodge, the GM has the final word whether you're hit or not. When you Block, you get the final word. In general, dodging requires the ability to move around the battlefield, if only a little; blocking does not.

Blocking is more heroic-looking than always dodging, IMO. It protects yourself and potentially others. This is particularly true is a Killing Attack goes for your teammate and they don't have resistance defenses. It grants you the ability to go first. You have the final word in whether the attack hits or not. Hm, these seem pretty good reasons to me to use the Block manuever.

Originally posted by KA.

"Mind Control Chips"

 

No One can eat just one!

Mmm, crunchy with a taste of iron, steel and plastic. It's delicious! Of course since I've eaten 20 of them, instead of 10d6 transform to slave it's now 200d6. (munch some more)

Originally posted by Vex

How many points are you going to allow for disadvantages? It seems that the Michael characters will be very powerful and in the tv series, he was just a normal guy without any "real" martial arts and he didn't even carry a gun most of the time. He had some skills, but he relied on KIT to do most of his thinking and butt saving. KIT seems like it would be pretty expensive but I would have to sit down and take a look. Didn't he have a lot of gadgets that he used in one or two episodes?

I'd give Michael Knight some KS, some PS, Deduction, Oratory, Persuasion and Systems Operations to name a few. He does have 'real' martial arts and specifically mentions it in an episode having a black belt in some martial art. I forgot which.

These are cool team logos. I've got to add two team logos I whipped up to these.

Let's see:

1 EB'er

1 Brick with an EB

1 Powered Armor

1 'toon character

1 Heavy EB'er

1 technological hero (non-powered armor)

1 sharpshooter

Hm, I don't really see a trend. Let's try Intelligence. (rethinks) Nope, they range from average to highly intelligent. Flight? About 1/2 of them have flight, so nope.

Ah, I've got it! They have ranged attacks with at least some Damage Resistance/Armor! That took some thinking there.

I think simply buying it as a robot would do. IMO, the Duplication is unnecessarily complicating things. Still, do whatever works.

Originally posted by JayH

Or how about Cloak from Cloak and Dagger? He "swallows" people. Or is that an Extra-Dimensional Movement, Usable Against Others? Never mind.

Never mind? Naaaaah. I'd give Cloak a couple attacks:

1) (I don't like this but...) Xtra Dimen, usuable against others

2) Entangle (no range, takes damage from attacks against Entangle) + NND (no range, linked) Cloak has released people from his cloak and they were freezing cold.

Of course, I haven't read or seen C & D for years now so I'm not up-to-date.

Re: Increasing Casual STR

Originally posted by devlin1

Is it legal/accepted to put a Limitation on STR that's "Only to increase Casual STR"? If so, what would it be worth?

Oh yeah, I guess we forgot to tell you: yes, we think it's legal but I guess ya figured that from our posts, eh?

Nobody thinks it should be -1 1/4, -1 1/2 or -1 3/4? I bring this up merely because it's so easy to jump from 1 to 1 1/2 to 2, ignoring the other inbetween numbers.

Damage Reduction can be difficult but since I'm a wiz at math, it doesn't bother me.

I believe it's already been suggested but having charts for combat is a quick method. You roll the 3d6 and consult the chart which DCV you hit. Not having agents/villains get up after being knocked to zero, not using END and having simpler characters for beginning players adds up in time-savings.

I personally use END, even for villains but as I mentioned, math doesn't bother me. I have a hero with variable PD & ED with Damage Reduction but I'll add - yes, that can strain even my brain. Still, for my villains with D.R., rarely does any player realize they have it (unless I mention it for the sheer pleasure of letting the players know.)

Another suggestion is ignoring Knockback or the BODY done from an attack, unless a Killing Attack.

How to speed up combat? How about:

a) Flip a coin when you attack. Heads - you hit, tails - you miss.

If you hit, heads - the villain's defeated, tails - he's not.

Oh, you mean a serious suggestion!

Originally posted by austenandrews

Where possible, avoid Damage Reduction. What a time & attention hog that is.

-AA

I would qualify the statement by saying 'Avoid giving unseasoned players Damage Reduction.' Seasoned players should be able to handle it. Everyone in my campaign is a seasoned player. Everyone can handle D.R. and it doesn't slow things down.

I'm rather glad CLOWN isn't around anymore. Neutral Ground just never worked for me, either.