Kenn

Re: Elves

Early in my role-palying days I joined the group playing a character the DM (yes we were playing D&D) had built to be either a GMPC or NPC (I'm not sure which) but offered to me when I said "I want to play, but I have no ideas for a character."

The idea for the character was a Hobbit/Halfling who'd not been raised among his own kind but in the mostly human empire, living as a gladiator. He didn't know what he was.

When he met the party they were "You're a halfling!" I/Marcus said "Uh- Okay. What are all of you?"

When he learned that there were Elves and Half-elves and Half-Orcs (and he had learned what an Orc was by then) he had the realisation "We have elves and half-elves and orcs and half-orcs. You said I'm a half-ling. What's a 'Ling.'"

And I always wondered why there were no half-dwarves or half-halflings or orc/elf cross-breeds or any number of possibilities that become possible when you open the interbreeding races door.

And I always found it odd the disproportionate number of half-elven adventurers there were given how, suppossedly, rare the cross-breeds were.

Re: Question about STUN and BODY

It's not in the rules any more? I've never played without that rule. I don't remember where I saw it, though.

Re: more PRE related powers

Actually, this sounds like Invisibility with a limitation.

Like what Ghost-Angel posted whilst I was writing.

Re: PRE (or lack there of) question

Another route would be the 5 PRE base, +25 PRE, only for defending, structure, but then also add a +10 (or 5 or 15) PRE Only for friendly interactions (not intimidation/fear).

Re: Amnesia

In my experience, Amnesia is a PLAYER Limitation.

In the PbEM version of my campaign I had one player who had no desire to take the time to reread old posts or (as near as I could tell) even the part of the post marked "[OLD]" that people usually include to help maintain context. So his character developed the odd quirk of being unable to give an accurate accounting of what had happened (game time) two minutes earlier.

This was made worse by the fact that when he was brought into my game world from another campaign the global villain organisation (actually parahuman terrorists) he (and his GM) chose as a substitute for Viper isn't all that Viper-like. And I told him this. Yet he kept trying to describe them in Viper-like terms. The character looked like a mind-addled idiot.

Re: STR vs. Gravity

This is the Hero System. You work out what the effects of the ability are and work from there. For some gravitic effects, Change Environment is called for, STR is good for others, Flight, Telekinisis. I think trying to find a single power that best represents gravity is a non-starter.

Re: What pre-5th Edition Hero books do you still use?

In the Seeker vs Nighthawk debate, I see one thing missing: Crusader!!!

I gave up on most of the Champions Universe characters in the first few years of my GMing. So the whole 4th Ed. vs 5th Ed. Champions Universe debate is null and void to me.

"Aaron Allston's Strike Force" is still a book I use, albeit indirectly. I learned more about maintaining a long-running game from that book than any other.

My original "Champions" mentor has come back to the group after being away for over sixteen years. Thing is, he'd been away from "Champions"/Hero games that whole time. So he completely missed the BBB. He's going from the light blue paperback 3rd Ed. Champions to FrED! That was a system shock.

Re: "Active Points" in VPPs - follow up from the Hero System Questions forum

I run a game where the number of characters with VPPs is a rather high percentage of the player characters. And I've been running the game for a long time.

The thing I've seen is that it is't the size of the pool that matters. It's the intelligence and imagination of the player, and that you can't limit.

I had one player who had a character with a 30 pt. power. It made the character so versatile it made him virtually a god.

I had one player who came to be known as the "King of the Power Pools" because he was so effective with his characters (he'd come up with fascinating builds on the fly.)

I had one player who after several years converted a Multipower to a Variable Power Pool because a) he had the points, and he saw how versatile the VPP structure was. His style of play was such that the character got no more versatile.

I had one player who had a massive imagination, and a huge amount of Math Anxiety. She had a mentalist character with a VPP. Easiest way to keep a mentalist from being abusive: let the GM (or his assist.) do the point constructions.

I have two players that when they were each running their own games, the other brought in a VPP character. And each, as a GM, had a problem because the other player's character was too powerful/versatile for the kind of stories they wanted to tell. At about the same time. It was painful for everyone, but I, at least found it funny too.

So, no power built with a VP pool may exceed the campaign AP cap. Anything else is just an overcomplication.

Re: Getting rid of Endurance

I'll regularly encourage my players who dislike the "extra" bookkeeping of END costs to buy things like Reduced END, END Batteries, Charges or a monstrous REC score.

That last option is rather potent, as it gives them a lot of staying power.

Re: How would you build a time/space Superphone?

I'd look up the cost of the Transdimensional advantage. Then if entering it into Hero Designer, I would use the "Custom Advantage" to attach a custom advantage named "Transdimensional."

There are some rules that are meant to be circumvented.

Re: Lameness Is Not Illegal

I have a friend who fell into a similar trap with the Nimrod thing. We kept telling him that naming a character that would make the character look like an idiot to most people because whomever the Babylonian king/hunter guy was most people know the derogatory meaning.

And on the issue of lameness of characters. A conversation I had with one of my players.

Kenn: You know, your character, Fireforce, he's lame.

Jim: What?

Kenn: Well, without his power armour.

(pause as Jim recalls that Peter McMurphy, sans the Fireforce armour, is unable to walk.)

Jim: D'oh!!!

Re: "Thing ring, do your thing!"

Sadly, I have been unable to completely blot it from my memory. It was a painful experience.

Re: Titles for your character

My characters don't really have them. Some of my players' characters are starting to get them. Savien's Eidolon character is becoming known as the Emerald Enchanter. Another player's speedster (who wears blue and silver) is becoming (alternativly) the Sapphire Speedster or the Silver Speedster.

Re: Campaigns that don't use Disadvantages???

I can barely imagine running a HERO game without using disadvantages, but I also think there is a propensity to make them overly important.

Over the years I became really sick and tired of the "I need X more points to make my character balance," routine. And like many of you have found that taking more than 120-130 that actually make sense to the average super hero's background is all but impossible.

I also decided years ago not to be ruled by the die rolls listed by the disads. If it makes sense for the hero's wife/girlfriend/brother to be there s/he will be. If not, s/he won't. And I tell my players to not take a DNPC at more than 8- because I'm not gonna have them there that often. Same deal with Hunteds. I'll use them as story hooks, and bring them in when they belong. But there are many characters in the campaign, and I don't want one character's hooks to dominate the whole story.

At this point, I tell my players, "Take the Disadvantages that are appropriate to the character; it'll probably be around 120, maybe 130 points." If they still need points, to balance their abilities, I'll kick them up a level on Base Points.

Re: Practical Costuming (not quite a WWYCD)

Well, assuming I gained a super-hero physique along with my powers, I might be tempted to go with the traditional tights, just because I'm a traditionalist. I'd even do the traditional trunks on the outside (just because I don't think I need to advertise/show off the size of my package.)

Re: Real World Stuff That Only Sounds Like A Comic Book

This Greenstein chap sounds like the inspiration for a certain fictional character named Al Pratt.

Re: Free Will

I once a character that was worried about his free will. Eventually he changed from his speedo trunks that kept slipping and letting the goods out to long pants.

Re: Lego Guy - ideas and power questions

Activation roll. To represent when you're building something but you can't quite finish it without that one uncommon piece that always seems to get lost.

Re: Point Efficiency vs. Concept

Alternately' date=' you have people like Batman, who originally probably had #1 (too agile) going for him, but current versions of him DO wear kevlar.[/quote']

 

For the record, in the very first Joker story, ever, from Batman #1, 1940, the Joker empied a pistol into a charging Batman crying out in frustration "Die blast you! Why won't you die!"

 

Batman was shown thinking "Hasn't the Joker heard of a bullet-proof vest?"

 

Of course, there were multiple shots fired, and Batman wasn't even knocked down, so something was slightly off. But it was in Feiffer's "The Great Comic Book Heroes" and it was my very first Batman comic story.

 

 

Conceptually, I like it. Especially with the whole "bullets sting" events pre-game.

 

I had a player once who had a lady martial artist he used to decent effect for several years in one campaign. The GM there and he were on about the same level of "Hero Combat skill" so the character did well. When he brought her to my game, she kept getting her butt kicked, usually because he (the player) would target the toughest bad guy, who would be whittled down maybe 70%-80% of the way down, and then the ever fickle dice would give him the one shot to drop the martial artist (who never grasped that repeated Sacrifice Strikes isn't usually a good tactic.)

 

So eventually, he ended up trying to find ways of turning her into a brick. And then ran into a problem because of campaign damage caps. It was a long painful experience.

Re: Entangle that costs end to maintain?

It sounds like an effect you could achieve with either Telekinisis (grabbing the target and holding him down) or Force Wall (targeting the Force Wall on the target, trapping him.)

Re: Ten Most Powerful Champions Villains - Thoughts!

Don't forget R. Talsorian Games. They did more to try to destroy the champions Universe than nearly anyone.

Re: Attracting villians

Want to attract supervillains? Make sure a powerful local heroine has (as they say in Monty Pythom-land) "huge tracts of land" and a nice keyhole opening (as the clothing designers call it) on her uniform (a la DC's Power Girl.)

Re: Wow....that is a useless power for sure....

What is the most useless power/ability that you have heard, read, seen, or know of?

 

The character that can call rain.

The character that can transform small matter into food.

For crime fighting, I suppose, yes, those would be useless.

But truly useless - no. Two words: northern Africa.

Re: Vancouver Island City

I think Keith's right. Bamfield sounds pretty cool.

Re: Please help me with new game setting

I see a more fundamental problem.

I'm an alien invader. My alien technology is more than a match for you puny terrans. Except you have these freaky super powered parahumans which can match us and drive us away.

But we have a weapon that will destroy the parahumans.

So we deploy it after we leave? Or set it up, so it will go off after we leave?

Maybe the extra time is needed for the weapon to be fully armed.

So why don't we come back next week? Or maybe next month or next year depending on how long it takes to replenish our forces.