dsatow

I am guessing because its a beneficial power? I don't know. I think Duke's more on point. A hedging of bets.

My problem with mimicry is that to be good enough to impersonate people is really tough. Some people just can't do it or can only do a few people within a degree of similarity to their own voice. This doesn't seem like the mimicry which you see in movies or even impersonators do who will often say its also mimicking the mannerism and approach-ability of the character which in turn sounds like PRE to me.

Before answering with a rules page or quote from the rule, I know the official answer. What I'd like to know is your opinion. Do you believe Mimicry is an Int or Pre based skill? If you think your answer differs from other peoples opinion, please explain why in the comments.

Sorry, this accidentally went to the wrong forum.

Sorry wrong forum. I have remade the poll in Hero System Discussion. Please ignore.

To be honest, I watched any scifi/superhero/superhero adjacent TV show on the air around that time that I knew about (even the Captain America pilot with the spandex suit, motorcycle, and plastic shield). The sad thing is, I don't remember any episodes, just scenes. PS: I thought Manimal was really dumb. By the time he changed forms, I was wondering why the villains just didn't shoot him.

I remember Automan along with Manimal and Man from Atlantis.

1) Players completely dislike and will not play in a game where Player Characters are captured. In my groups, it isn't a problem if the players are captured when they do something stupid or if the dice roll bad for them. To them, its just a part of the game. But if it feels that they have been railroaded into the problem, that's when they get upset. If the villains are throwing 15d6 with 12 CVs against players throwing 9d6 and 7 CVs, they tend to complain its being rigged, no matter what the payout is in the end. 2) Players completely dislike and will not play in a game where enemies and villains return after the players thought they were dead. This only depends if there is a good and engaging reason for them coming back to life. In my current campaign, I had a brother team (a martial artist and a necromancer) and one of the players accidentally got one of the two brothers killed. In the next story, they meet up with the brothers except one of the brothers is now a zombie and the other brother is trying to get him to become fully alive. This ends with the zombie coming back to full life with the living brother now dead, again due to PC interference. The third meeting has the remaining brother vowing vengeance and getting captured and incarcerated. The last story of the two brothers has the players meeting the dead brother in hell (long story) and if asked if he wanted out, he said no, he would break out of hell on his own. The players loved this story line. 3) Players completely dislike and will not play in a game where captured villains escape or get released from prison. I haven't had an issue here recently. The big issue is how frequent is the escape. If the villain breaks out and its been about 10 sessions since you last saw them, I've found the players are fine with that. If the villains are out by the next game, they tend to hate that. 4) Players completely dislike and will not play in a game where the villain will threaten innocents with death or dismemberment to force the PC to allow them to escape or capture the PC’s. I haven't had a problem with this. Mainly, because villains tend to do villainous things and the players being superheroes usually figure out a way to stop them. 5) Players completely dislike and will not play in a game where an NPC friend/subordinate will turn out to be a betrayer or enemy. I haven't had a problem with this UNLESS the traitor is a PC. It doesn't matter if the treacherous player is fine with the action, only if they can no longer trust the player. A Player told me, he hated these story lines because he wants to enjoy playing with his friends not worrying they will back stab him.

Sorry, I feel lecture mode coming up since I see under your icon "newbie". I am not trying to flame you, just warning. Most GMs I know of will not let a player have a power which effectively makes a combat one sided. Say you have this power of cumulative bombs and you use it in a game. 1) Either you use the power and take out a villain or more in the first round, or you miss and now effectively you are useless in combat. 2) If you take out a lot of the villains, the GM who makes each villain for you to fight now feels like they wasted their time making the villains for the session. Remember, especially in a supers game, the time it takes for you to make a hero is about 1/6th the amount of time it takes for the GM each session. 3) If you throw a lot of over-sized attacks, the GM will try to make a villain which is a challenge for you, making the other players roadkill. At best, this begins a cold war of power inflation. At worst, it kills the game as the other players get disgruntled (or the GM, if the GM has a set image of a game - Playing in Gotham with Supes and GL really doesn't work when fighting Carmine Falcone). 4) You could wreck the game session. I've been in a couple of sessions in the past 32 years of gaming where a lucky killing attack (pre 6th) GM'd the villain in one shot. Think in a 12d6 game a 4d6 killing attack doing 24 body and 120 stun. In both instances, the game was called so the GM could re-set up a new scenario. Worst 5 minutes of game time. If you want to go down this path as a player, pre-6th, the best way to do this is what Grailknight suggested. I called it the forever aid in our gaming group. You basically aid the aid and the power it aids with a long enough fade rate. There is a balance point where given enough time, it becomes an infinite power. Again, if you ever want to see a GM burn up a character sheet, this is one way to do it. Ex 5th ed: Aid 1d6, Can Add Maximum Of 30 Points, Delayed Return Rate (points return at the rate of 5 per Minute; +1/4), any [special effect] power one at a time (+1/4), Persistent (+1/2), Can Apply (Remove) Adders (+1) (66 Active Points) This version adds about 68 active to a power. If you are a GM, then the way the power is constructed for the villain doesn't matter (hopefully you are using it against the players for a dramatic effect). You either hand wave the power as a story effect or you build the villain with the power level for that night's game. But as a warning for the GM, doing this, if done poorly, can ruin the gaming experience for the players. Players like to believe they have around an even chance against villains if they game correctly and an overpowered villain makes them think, why play this game?

Before the advent of usable by others, Life Support AoE was the way we used to make life support bubbles in games. Though some GMs I have read still require Usable by Others even with the AoE.

Not about what rules you should skip, but in general, I think running a heroic level game without hit locations is a good way to start. I think the most daunting task to the new player is powers creation. Something about the math drives new players off. The best scenario to start in the heroic setting is the bar fight. Seems to work for any heroic level genre with generally low fatality rates and pretty easy foes to beat up to build confidence.

Just another useless poll to provide general non-argumentative talk. We've all had them in our complications/disadvantages. DNPCs. What DNPCs do you see on character sheets over and over again? Many DNPCs cover multiple spots, so choose the ones the best describe what you see.

There is one situation (multiple attack) where you will pay for end more than once for strength, but in the rules, it explicitly calls out that you will pay the extra end. In general, you only pay end once for strength.

That depends on GM and players. If you remember, the original Marvel Superhero game had effectively static damage. A Good attack did 10 points of damage effectively but gamers wanted variance based on the hit so they housed ruled variant damage. Amber did away with numerical damage, but you had to really trust the GM and I found if you weren't the top or near the top in stats, your value really didn't matter so long as you had an amber level ability.

This idea was suggested a long time back when I think 5th was about to come out. I kind of agree with Duke's idea and I can sort of see Hugh's point. 1) The cost change of 1d6 killing from 15pts to 10pts, severely changes the effectiveness of point cost on the killing attack. A 60 active point attack would be an average of 6d6 killing or 21 Body, 42 Stun. Currently, a 60 active point killing attack would do an average of 4d6 killing or 14 Body and 28 Stun. That's a big jump in power. (unless you are talking about treating a killing attack as calculating as a normal attack, if so, I apologize and please correct me as I scanned this quickly while on slack at work) 2) We get very kludgy with advantages and limitations as Duke noted. This applies here or there but not here or there. It would be better to simplify it. My suggestion would be to do the following. (note this idea has not been thought through) 1) Get rid of HA and HtHKA. 2) Have the advantage +1/2 to add a stat to a power. Have a -1/2 to make a ranged power no range. This would alleviate the possible point cost effectiveness of the changing killing to 10 pts per die while adding possibilities with the +1/2 advantage to add a stat to a power (though that advantage would be extremely abusable so probably a GM warning). The +1/2 adv. to add a stat would make interesting builds, such as EGO powering a killing attack. Another interesting build would be if it was powered by END or STUN, the power would quickly diminish as the character used the power or was beaten up in combat.

How does damage negation and penetrating work against each other? I tried searching the forum as I thought this was asked a while back but didn't find it. i.e. If someone has 6d6 of damage negation and is attacked by a 4d6 blast penetrating(say 6,4,3,1 in damage for a minimum of 4 stun), how much damage would they take?

There is a good point to what you said Duke Bushido. A game should have it rules changed to suit the game master and the campaign. And those changes as I have noted are all well and good and should be discussed between the GM and the players. People do specialized formats of critical hits, penalties on skills, light, etc. None of that is wrong, but its not a commonality. The one commonality is the rules as written. If you go to a HERO game on the West coast, then to a game on the East coast, and then in middle America, the only commonality is the rules as written in the book(s). If you ask how to build something using the rules, then I will point out if something isn't in the rules. It isn't that it isn't playable. It isn't that its not GM OK'd. Its just not how the rules are written to accept it. This isn't about whether you like the rule(s) or how the power plays, at least not in this particular thread. God knows, I've suggested tons of changes to the rules on this board. Its not that the writers/creators of the game created a perfect game. They are human and a "utopia game system" for everyone doesn't exist in real life. The original poster asked about how to do something in the rules, so it doesn't help if you say just "change the system". We don't know the GM/players. We don't now the rule changes they will accept or play by. We can only know the initial rules they have read or can reference.

Nope, it just sounded from your post that you just add "target falls" to an existing power. Its a bit more complicated than that.

Unless you are saying, fudge the rules or GM's fiat. It doesn't apply, as neither leaping nor UAA has a Target Falls Adder nor is there a target falls advantage. If you are going with fudging the rules or go GM fiat, it really doesn't matter and should be just discussed with the GM. Technically, you could do a multiple attack but that severely affects the attacker's CVs. You could do a combined attack, but since the attacker wanted a ranged attack, you could not do a martial throw (HTH) with a ranged leaping UAA. Finally, there is a way to do this by the RaW. You buy the ranged leaping UAA and then a ranged martial art trip with it. If you buy the standard ranged trip, it's -1/-1 and v/5 damage. If you buy the offensive ranged trip, it's +1/-1 and STR+v/10 damage. Another way, which is broken is to link a change environment to it and force them to make a Dex roll to remain standing up. This was used in some write up for a villain or a power example. I say its broken because to have an effect which Stuns those in it is 30 points while dropping people to the ground is almost as effective (dropping people to half DCV) and is free. However, IIRC, the OP wanted to do no damage and possibly as an area effect. If its an area effect, you would have to do a multiple attack with the CV penalties as you can not do a combined attack against more than a single target. The trips do damage based on velocity so even if you pull all the strike damage, technically, then movement will do damage. In any case, my original question was if dropping them to the ground mattered. If it didn't, then none of this really matters to the build.

Just wondering, what are people's favorite supervillain types? Since its a favorite, you only get one choice.

That doesn't apply to what I was noting which was to use Leaping Usable against another as effectively a type of throw. When using the leaping power to represent being thrown back, Leaping normally leaves the user standing at the end. So I was asking if this mattered to the person who was designing this version of the power. Using martial arts is fine and I'd prefer this, but some people want to make sure that what they do isn't stopped by a high breakfall roll or some such.

Hrmmm, this popped in my head while reading Steve's recent posts after a long delay. I have not thought it through though so take it with a grain of salt the size of Texas. The last post on this thread is in January when my mind was not addled by a stay at home order for 2 months. Okay, so you have a skill roll. Say PS: plumbing 12- as an example. You roll your skill roll and you get 1 + the amount you roll by in dice to a stat which might be used to solve the problem. So in the example of the plumbing skill. Say you get a 10. That would be 1+2 or 3d6. The plumber is trying to figure out how the house is piped. That would be an INT test which the plumber would roll his 2d6 for his 10 INT + another 3d6 for how much he made is skill roll by for 5d6. The clog is a minor problem or a 2 difficulty so he would roll 5d6 and hope to get 2 "Body" to solve the problem. In a similar example, you have a computer geek trying to get past the security defenses on a computer. He has a 18 INT which would be a computer programming roll of 13-. The security defenses of the system rate a 5. He rolls an 11 on computer programming roll which is +3d6. The geek rolls 6 1/2 d6 hoping for 5 "Body". People would never be penalized for failing a skill roll. So if the computer geek rolled a 15, he would NOT be at a -1. What do people think?

Massey's response pretty much covers it. I would just like to add two more points. Point 1: If the attack would normally do more normally than what get penetrated, you go with the larger damage. So if a 6d6 blast does 6,5,4,4,2,1 = 22 stun against 15 defenses. The attack would normally do 7 stun. Calculating penetrating, it should do 6 stun (2,1,1,1,1,0 respectively). Because 7 is greater than 6, the attack does 7 stun. Point 2: The penetrating damage is calculated after all defenses, including damage reduction and damage negation. These defenses normally do not affect the penetrating damage unless, I guess, it's bought with impenetrable. To be honest, I have never seen anyone put impenetrable on either reduction or negation, but I would assume it would be fine.

I can see the module being called "Storm Front". Here are some more storms: Desert Storm (Pres. Bush Sr.) Packet Storm (internet networking reference) Super Storm Media Storm Some StormX: Stormy Weather Stormy Daniels Storm of the Century Storm Season Storm Cell

My mind thinks "Blade" but then again, my mind likes to play tricks on me.