BenKimball

Very groovy stuff! Thanks all. I'm all set for Friday. Cheers! Ben

CAUTION: MINOR SPOILERS So I kicked off a new story arc in my Champs game last night with Act I of Shades of Black. We had a grand time with the murder investigation and associated revelations, along with the exploration of Millennium City (the party is from California). Then we got to the mansion and hit a snag: the villains Knocked Out three of the party members, and caused the fourth (their mentalist) to flee. Now I'm trying to think of a way to get the adventure more or less back on track. I'm trying to think of something for Black Paladin to do with his captives that will let me continue the adventure (i.e., he can't kill them) despite his evil nature. Anyone have any ideas about where to go next? Clearly the three PCs are captured, and the mentalist will want to effect a rescue... what I need ideas on is why Black Paladin wouldn't just kill them. None of the PCs is the "perfect vessel." Cheers! Ben

When a spaceship has a force shield built with Force Wall (see TE, AW), must it "lower shields" to be able to fire its weapons unimpeded? How about a force shield built with Force Field? Thanks! Ben

It seems as though rolling half the number of dice for a Reduced Penetration attack wouldn't always be feasible. For example, how would one calculate the BODY done by a 5 1/2d6 Energy Blast with Reduced Penetration? Thanks! Ben

Here's what I've done in my game. I didn't want to just give the cell phones away, but I wanted them cheap, too. 1-800-CHAMPION: High Range Radio Perception (Radio Group) (12 Active Points); Independent (-2), Cellular voice communication only (-2), Extra Time (1 Turn, -1 1/4), OAF (-1), Sense Also Affected As Hearing (-1/2). Real Cost: 1. The Extra Time limitation is pretty much just to make the cell phone useless in combat, and represents time dialing, waiting for the cell phone to connect to the network, etc. The Cellular voice communication only is (obviously) a custom disad meant to represent the extremely limited spectrum of HRRP that the cellphone makes available. Cheers! Ben

Me again! A friend has a character with a Major Transform (man-made materials into natural substances) to simulate his shamanistic ability to cause the innate natural earth spirit to revert anything "unnatural" back to its primitive form. Let's say he wants to use this power to transform a villain's powered armor suit back into its natural components (iron, copper, and tin powder, I guess), effectively destroying it. How is the target's BODY determined? This gets really complex when the armor suit is bought as separate powers (i.e., Armor, Damage Resistance, Knockback Resistance, +STR, and +CON). Secondly, am I correct in thinking that this sort of power sounds more like a Dispel (all technological powers simultaneously)? Thanks as always! Ben

Happy New Year's Eve! I have a few quick questions about Megascale that I didn't see answered in the FAQ, probably because they're too obvious. 1) The example of the "Galactic Federation's Transport Booth Network" on FREd p169 states in part "This gives it a range of 10,000 km, enough to Teleport anywhere on a planet." Can this device teleport someone 6,432.34 km? On the one hand, I'd think not; it can't be scaled down to less than 1,000 kilometers. On the other hand, it's pretty useless if it can't. 2) Related: Can Takofanes (CKC 32) use his "Invocation of the Dark Sun" example VPP power (Change Environment 1" radius, MegaArea (each hex is 13,000 km tall, wide, and deep)) to create darkness only within the irregularly shaped area of the Millenium City city limits? 3) Finally: this isn't so much a rules question, I guess, but rather something that's been troubling me. FREd p170 tells us that MegaMovement powers without MegaSense powers are difficult to use at best. On the other hand, I'm not used to seeing characters (even published ones) with MegaSenses. For example, Cyclone (CKC 106) has Flight 5", MegaScale (1" = 1 km), but only +6 vs. Range Modifier for Sight Group (corresponding to 64 meters). Can he fly at 5 km/Phase in a city without running into something? Logically it seems that he should be able to, since he hasn't exceeded the "speed of sight". But the rules say otherwise. Thanks for taking the time to read this through; it got a lot longer than I thought! Best, Ben

Hey Steve. Is this the right forum for reporting errata? Hope so. Here goes. FREd, p. 224, "Skilled Normal." When I put the skilled normal into HD v2.09, I noticed some discrepancies in his characteristics. According to HD's math (rounded to either one or two decimal places): If the values are correct, Cost for ED 3 should be 0. Cost for REC 5 should be -2. Total Characteristic Cost should be 20. If the costs are correct, ED should be 4. REC should be 6. Cheers! Ben

Hey Steve. I've checked FREd and the FAQ, and just wanted to confirm this with you (since another GM in my group disagrees): Lodestone is 26" away from an iron statue massing 400 kilos. 10" beyond the statue is Our Hero. Can Lodestone, whose Flight is 20", do all of the following in a single Phase: a) Fly 10" towards the statue Use his 60 STR TK to Grab the statue c) Throw the statue at Our Hero using the stats for a Running Throw with 40 excess STR (32" max distance)? If so, what rolls would be necessary on his part? I assume the Grab will need an attack roll at -4 for range, but only against a DCV of 0? Then for the Throw he'll need another attack roll, but this time with a range mod of -6, against either Our Hero's DCV or DCV 3 if I rule that the statue is large enough to be an AoE: One Hex attack. Thanks in advance for your customary elucidation. =) Happy New HERO GM, Ben

Hey Steve. I'm trying to build a nonlethal sonic weapon that causes knockback. To do so, I tried: EB 8d6, No STUN (+0), Double Knockback (+3/4); 70 AP. The special effect is the same as that huge speaker Michael J. Fox plugged his guitar into in Back To The Future; hitting a power chord, he was stunned and thrown across the room, but no real damage was done. (Of course, if he'd landed on a bed of nails, that would be different.) Anyway, the obvious problem is that No STUN stipulates that the power it's applied to does no knockback. So: does the Double Knockback Power Advantage "put back" the knockback into the EB, or would a greater advantage be required to achieve this? Or perhaps a compound power, EB No STUN + Telekinesis? Thanks! Ben

Excellent! Thanks for all the great advice. Good catch, Zed-F; I meant to type OIF. Based on further correspondence with the player, who describes the helmet as some sort of mechanical device with a big, loud turbine (!) attached, I think I'm going to grant him a custom limitation Audible (-1/4), and incorporate the suggestions here. Mental Illusions: A load whirring noise comes from the mentalist's helmet, which can be seen spinning up; onlookers can perceive that the rush of wind/power/sound is directed at the target, who is clearly disoriented; the target perceives the illusion, and may be dimly aware of something like jet plane noise around him (maybe with a PER roll). Mind Scan: Same effect for the mentalist, and the target is suddenly surrounded by this loud noise as well. ("Whoa! Where's the plane?!") Mind Link: As Mental Illusions, but the effect is audible to anyone with a Hearing Group sense. The actual content of the conversation is, of course, not audible. Sound about right? (No pun intended; hey, at least I didn't mention his turbine turban. ) [Edit: Hey! I'm competent! Yay!] Cheers! Ben

I'd like the opinion of Herodom Assembled on this one. I'm preparing to GM for the first time, and I'm overseeing character creation. One of my players has a mentalist whose powers come from a strange helmet that he's learned to control. The player also likes the idea of his character's mental powers being visible. The trouble is, I'm not sure if these two limitations make sense on most (if not all) of his powers: Mental Illusions, OAF (helmet) -1/2, Visible -1/4. Mind Scan, OAF, Visible. and my favorite: Mind Link, OAF, Visible. Now, if an illusion has a visible power effect, wouldn't that make it less likely to work? ("Uhm, Bob, there's a weird blue energy stream connecting that mentalist with that dinosaur.") If a Mind LInk is Visible, does that mean there'd be a glowing green line linking all of the PC's heads? In short: if a focus is already Obvious, does it make sense for its powers to be granted -1/4 for Visible as well? Thanks! Ben

I'm GMing Hero for the first time soon, and overseeing character creation. One of my players has added the Power Limitation "Stops Working if Mentalist is Stunned" (-1/2) to his BOECV Entangle. Is this a valid construction? Hero Designer v2 says no -- presumably because Entangle is an Instant Power...? Thanks as always for a great game and greater support. Cheers, Ben

Excellent. Will add to my vocabulary. Sorry, couldn't resist. Cheers, Ben

No change in initial acceleration or speed. Remember that F=ma, and neither F (derived from the strength of your brick) nor m (the mass of the weightless character) has changed. However, in the absence of any downward force, the thrown object won't stop until air resistance reduces his speed to zero. It seems quite plausible to me that without the downward force of gravity, air resistance alone might not suffice to stop a thrown character from leaving Earth. Of course, I wouldn't allow this to work in *my* campaign. =) Cheers, Ben