The Weapon

No, hunh?  For the record for that one I would have gone with:

 

Atomic Angel, a superheroic android whose greaves and bracers let her fly and produce energy blasts.  But let's try again:  

The library at a wizard's college, perhaps?

 

 

And the average Ars Magica PC is going .

Hello good Hero folks,

 

I'm in the process of updating/adapting the Western Shores (to 5thr) for the fantasy game I am running. I love the magic college concept. However when looking at the point structure, it seems very expensive for the little amount of power you actually can use. The magic user can do just about the same amount of damage as a warrior but the magic user must make an activation roll and many of the spells have a nasty side effect if you miss the roll.  In the book, there is a paragraph noting why frameworks shouldn't be used and the biggest warning seems to be that it makes magic users too versatile. So here is the question that has been nagging me, would using a power frame work with the common limitations really be that unbalancing? And as the title says, I'm looking at using multipower per spell college. The down side is that of course if i set the pool at say 40 pts and have the slots be variable slots the magic user cannot have a full powered defensive running at the same time as a full powered offensive spell, which may not be a bad thing. Fwiw I choose multipower because its cheaper than a VPP initially although I could see a powerful magic user switch to a VPP doen the road.

 

Thoughts? Experiences?

So just let the fighters use frameworks.  There's lots of things they want to do that should be OK in frameworks.  I'll have a think about it and get back with some details.

One thing you should bear in mind, weapons where you can use leverage are faster than those that can't.  That's why people used swords two handed, because you can pull with one hand, push with the other.  That way the sharp bits move faster.  The longer the lever, the faster the end of it goes.  So with pikes you can strike at one guy, then switch to attacking the guy 3 to his left in a flash.   

Subeditors, editors in charge of various areas (Financial, Sports, Politics, Arts, etc.

I think the current research tends to show that the Luddites weren't upset about losing their jobs to machines so much as they were upset about not being paid to do things that the machines being installed also couldn't do. 

I find that very unlikely, not least because the Luddites weren't being replaced by machines.  There was no new technology coming in.  They were just being replaced by women and children who could be paid less.  They got angry and smashed stuff until the factory owners agreed to give them money again in exchange for work that wasn't worth what was being paid for it.  

Signet ring of XXXXXX

Many years ago the character's ancestor did a big favor for some reclusive and mysterious people.  In return the made promises to help out the heir to the family who wears this ring.  Note that someone with no claim to be heir to the family gains no benefit from the ring.  However if there are multiple characters who might be considered the true heir any can use it.  Note that the character cannot voluntarily contact the "special folk" who honor this deal.  Due their eccentric nature they show up when they want to.

Contact:  14- (5), Very useful skills and resources (2),   Slavishly loyal to character (3) = 10 pts. base

IIF (signet ring) (-1/4), No conscious control (-2) Real cost: 3 

+10 Pre, Only involving friends and allies of the XXXXXX family (-3/4), IIF (-1/4)  Base cost: 10 Real cost: 5

+5 Mental defense.IIF cost 5/4

+5 Power defense IIF cost 5/4

Total cost 15 points real.

Hm, I didn't think it was likely anyone had but worth a shot.

 

I guess I could get the ball rolling

 

"Mind Control: 10d6. AE: 1 Hex, 0 End, Persistent Continuous Uncontrolled, IPE: All Senses. One Command: Put up with my asinine obnoxious and generally insane behavior and lack of anything resembling social skills. 

 

I added Persistent since none fo the rest of the cast has tried to murder him in his sleep.

It's more than one hex.  People do it from meters away.

You have a limit on Thaumaturgy and Sorcery skill, what about PSLs?   If i have a sorcery skill of 17- and 2 PSL to do with range or whatever, does that count as skill 19-?  Can you have specialised skill levels, say in fire magic, healing or something like that?

Bulletproof Samaritan - Flying Brick 

Hombre Panthera - Were-Jaguar 

<UTF> (Universal Translation Fail - his name is never said the same way twice.) - 2 headed alien with Luck Manipulation and a ray gun.

 

We introduced a new character to the group last session: Ivy.

 

Ivy's a descendant of the druids living in a magically shielded location in Canada's far NW. She has druid magic powers over plants and animals etc. 

 

Scene: Ivy is out front of the UN Building giving a (boring) speech about the damage that pollution and over industrialisation are doing to the world.

The other heroes have come along to hear her speak. Hombre Panthera is an environmentalist and keen. The other two are curious as Ivy has been in the news of late as she has made her way across North America on a public awareness raising tour. 

 

Ivy is holding up a small branch from a rare species of tree as an example of what pollution is doing. <UTF> is bored and so he adjusts the dial on his luck manipulator "to make something interesting happen." 

Ivy feels her magic go off involuntarily and the branch grows into very large, fully grown pine tree. It starts falling toward the crowd but it's caught by Bulletproof Samaritan just in the nick of time.

 

Samaritan: (nods toward <UTF>) He fiddled with his knob and she got wood.

Ivy (wondering how her magic could have activated without her will): I will have to get to the root of this problem.

Hombre Panthera (pretending to be sick of the jokes): We should leaf it here.

<UTF> (supporting Hombre's suggestion): We should branch off at some point...

 

My girlfriend comes into the room wondering what all the laughing is about:

 

My GF (OOC): It took me a moment to twig, but I caught on.

I hope your supergroup didn't splinter over this incident.  

Because with some people puns go against the grain.

For when they start being trigger happy, detractors call them:

Usually Lethal to Everyone Totatally Ruins Anything 

My character would say "Great, glad to hear that you're more at peace with yourself.  However whatever your reason, you were a complete dick.  Next time you have a problem accepting yourself try not to deal with it by committing felonies."  

That may seem immature, but he's 12.

If this is just the regular forgotten like the OP. then the Age of Surveillance is just hell for her. They may forget the woman who robbed their bank, but she's on camera. Eventually someone is going to figure out what she does and she will have a trial with her at a remote site in a room with a camera. People will monitor her and she will sit and watch her trial and her incarceration. In Prison she dare not use her powers or she may just starve.

From the OP "and every scrap of evidence that shows she exists just blanks".

Of course that means she has to buy a lot of fake IDs and pay people a lot of money to make "legends" (spy speak for backstory of a cover identity).  

"Remember what happened the last time we trusted a time-traveler?  Of course not because he altered history to cover up how badly he did us over."

A character like that would be like living in total isolation. You could talk to people, but they would instantly forget you. Human beings NEED a certain amount of social activity. Without it we start to go insane. A character with that power always on would have no life, no nothing. The character would be sad not epic. I can swear that either on Heroes or perhaps Alphas there was a Woman with this kind of power. The went a little insane from the lack of attention. Tried to assassinate a government official to get someone to notice her.

She's only forgotten when she uses her healing powers or "sometimes when it happens for no reason".  Depending on how long "sometimes" is she could go decades without anyone forgetting her.  So as long as she can go for years without using healing (at the cost of how many lives?) she could have a normal social life.  Until of course someone realizes, "Hey you've got to be over 60 years old, why don't you have wrinkles?" and then it's heal someone, turn up in town again with gold (or later cash), and start a new business.  If necessary introduce yourself as someone's relative who lives far away/is thought to be dead.  After all if she wasn't who she said she was, how would she know so much about you?

So where does she get the gold?  Well obviously the rise of banking has been a great boon to her, she's been skipping out on loans for years, maybe centuries.  She's also a great spy/police informant.  She only has to get the information, not conceal the fact that she's the one that got it.  Just deliver the proof, let her employer us it, then after a few months heal someone.  The guys who know she betrayed them forget all about it.  She starts again, knowing even more about the organisation she's trying to penetrate.  Consider how much money was in the average weekly payment to Al Capone.  Grab those a few times, get forgotten and you're set for life.  

A sort of social life would be possible, particularly as it would be easy to reestablish relationships (since you know how they react and what sort of person they like).  Oh and they don't remember how she screwed them over last time they knew her.  

While it has some issues I'd still recommend The Phantom, with Billy Zane, Treat Williams, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Kristy Swanson.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Phantom_%281996_film%29

 

-Carl-

Absolutely.

If I've learned anything, it's that non sequiturs are not the answer.

Hm, I didn't think it was likely anyone had but worth a shot.

 

I guess I could get the ball rolling

 

"Mind Control: 10d6. AE: 1 Hex, 0 End, Persistent Continuous Uncontrolled, IPE: All Senses. One Command: Put up with my asinine obnoxious and generally insane behavior and lack of anything resembling social skills. 

 

I added Persistent since none fo the rest of the cast has tried to murder him in his sleep.

Add "Limited power: Doesn't work if confined to a small base in the arctic for months".  Remember what they wanted to do to him?

The Side Effect could easily be sanity loss depending on just how kinky the target's sex life is.

Or other information.  Consider what would happen if you find out that aliens are taking control of the local city council, and the Secret Service has over 2000 undercover agents in your area just to contain the threat.  Let alone when you find out about the mass teleporter being built and the plans to nuke the place if it's ever completed.  

Note that if the above all sounds a bit paranoid, maybe it is.  Maybe you read a paranoid's mind.  Of course there's no way to know the difference between someone's paranoia and their awareness.

Was that a programming joke? As in, DOSShell?

eunuch = unix (a programming language) that uses "shells".  

Disappointed they didn't include a daemon (= a program called by name in unix) reference.  

Ars Magica does both quite well.  There are "arts" divided into "Techniques" and "Forms" (basically "verbs" and "nouns").  Magicians research spells (or learn them from "Lab Texts", basically cheat sheets/spell books).  To learn the spell they need a "lab total" based on the their rating in the two "arts", the Technique" and the "Form" (plus intelligence, magical knowledge, and how magical the place there).

If they don't know an appropriate spell they can cast spontaneous magic, but it's much harder.  The "casting total" (the number that determines if your spell succeeded) is halved if you take a fatigue level and there's a chance it will botch (crit. fail).  Casting known spells only fatigues you and if you fail the roll (and it still works if you fail by >11).  You can cast spontaneous spells without fatigue, but they are pathetically weak, 1/5 the casting "score" of known spells and you don't get to add a dice to get the total.  They can't botch though.

Quick example:

Artemis the maga* has Stamina +2, Creo (create) 7, Ignem (light/fire/heat) 6 =  15 Creo Ignem casting score.  She gets handed a letter late at night and wants light to read it by.  If she can effortless cast the spell "Moonbeam" (level 3)which casts light as strong as moonlight, but it only lasts as long as she concentrates and it's the lowest level of light.  Or she can try a fatiguing spont and roll a d10 add it to the 15 and halve it, to find out how good a spell she can cast.  She would have to roll a 5 or better to be able to cast a "magnitude 2" or level 10 spell.  However she could easily cast a level 5 spell, which could be bright than the level 3 one AND last until dawn, if she wanted.  However is had learned a light spell of magnitude 3 or 4 (level 15 or 20) then she could easily cast it.  There is a chance with the level 20 spell that she might be fatigued, but with the level 15 spell she gets it automatically, unless it's a "stress roll"**.

* Female mage.

** A stress roll is a special roll that happens when the character is stressed.  Basically there's a chance to botch and a chance to do really well.  Spontaneous magic is always stressful. 

All of this is quite hard to duplicate in Hero System.  

If you happen to have a Civil War era muzzle-loading smoothbore cannon (I think those were "12-pounders" referring to the standard weight of ball) you can load "anything that'll fit" in them when you're desperate (at Chancellorsville, IIRC, the Union artillery at some points were shooting chunks of railroad track) ... and you are talking desperation weapons here. Now, loading one of those is a once-every-couple-of-minutes thing so you'd only have one shot, probably at point-blank, loaded with whatever silver stock you had on hand.

 

Sounds more like a movie or story climax thing than something for a regular RPG weapon, of course.

If you're only going to use it one-shot, you can afford to up the powder load for extra damage.  Doing this continually means it eventually blows up, but you're probably OK for one shot.

Many silver things will be sterling, which is 92.5% silver by weight ... should be adequate silver content. Sterling tableware won't include knives that can take an edge, though.

 

A standard propane-air torch won't melt silver, though a propane-oxygen torch could. But most things in which you'd think to melt it can't withstand that heat.

So you melt it above the container and it drips in.  Provided you can construct a bullet mold that can stand the temperature silver melts at, you're fine.

 

 

Whereas the ancient gray-bearded eunuch wizards remain hidden in their shells.

I see what you did there.  

Speaking of .50 caliber: http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2014/02/26/gm6-lynx-50bmg-reciprocating-bullpup/

 

I know when I see a .50 caliber weapon I immediately think "How can I get the explosion closer to my ear.".