Theron

Re: hero vs rolemaster Neither reflects the realities of fighting (on a man to man basis, anyway) particularly well, though with Hero, there's sufficient abstraction to move it into a more realistic direction (IMHO). The best system for "realistic" combat is probably The Riddle of Steel, which oddly enough combines a lot of dice rolling with some charts reminiscent of but less involved than, RoleMaster. Of course, the game has other issues, but I have to give props for the combat system. Honestly, I prefer something fairly abstract and simple like Pendragon. It still manages to be fairly brutal without becoming overly detailed.

Re: Possible solution for common GM problems Let us not forget also that for studying, the standards have changed through time. The average Sunday edition of the New York times contains as much verbiage as a literate 16th century man might read in an entire year (of course, no one reads every single word in the Sunday New York Times, but you get my point, I hope). Saint Thomas Aquinas (no intellectual small-fry himself) once commented on a remarkable monk he'd met who not only didn't need to use his finger to keep his place while reading, but his lips didn't move when he read either. Medieval and Ancient people weren't stupid. Their myriad achievements show that. But they did have a different set of working definitions.

Re: All the superhero PCs I've ever played Lordamercy, this will take some thought... V&V: No clue. I started GMing it almost immediately, so it's entirely possible I've never played a PC. Champions: Spectrum (the guy in my avatar), Ronin (a Shang-Chi knock-off), The Mighty Mongoose (a flying martial artist/gadgeteer), Gibraltar (a brick), The Crimson Bat (a Batman knockoff), The Red Rapier (Golden Age Swashbuckler Motif), Lodestone (a mystical Starman clone), Nemesis, the Invincible Kid (a teenaged brick), Atlas (a growing brick), Troubadour (Warrior, Poet, Lover), Delta (a sizemorph), and Spectrum again (a new version of my oldest PC). Marvel Superheroes: Captain America in an Avengers campaign a friend ran. It rocked. DC Heroes: Martian Manhunter in a short-lived Pre-Crisis JLA game. Challengers (a sort of supers game Ragnarok Press put out): Defender (the son of Renny and Pat Savage, an unpowered martial artist - one-shot character). Superworld: Zephyr (a teen air elemental) I think that covers it. It's hard to say. I've GMed so much more than I've played, so I lose track. Aberrant: Valentine Drake (movie star with charisma and attractiveness out the wazoo, and minor psychic powers)

Re: The Authority:What the heck? Hey, I'm a slow learner. I racked up over 16,000 post on RPGnet before I gave up on them. But seriously, what is accomplished by arguing over matters of individual taste in funny books?

Re: The Authority:What the heck? [meta]Generic call for tolerance.[/meta]

Re: What do you think is the best way to balance armor use? [i wrote a longer reply to the above and the system seems to have eaten it. Here's what I remember saying.] Endurance penalties, Movement penalties, and nasty rashes are good starters. Perception penalties for helm wearers. Remember that even lightweight armours tended to have leather or quilted cloth foundation garments, all of which trap heat against the body in a big way (I've worn and fought in a wide variety of replica armours, from Crusades-era maille to 14th century transitional plate, 15th century Gothic plate, to a 17th century buffe-coat. All are hideously hot. Even in winter.) Not to mention, depending on your fantasy world, even the great outdoors may belong to somebody. And that somebody may very well have an interest in what busness a well armed body of adventurers has on their property. Look at the questioning Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli faced from Eomer on the plains of Rohan.

Re: The fall of the Soviet Union sucked. That's why my campaign is set in 1985. Gotta love them godless commies. - You ain't done nothin' if you ain't been called a Red TB

Re: "Super" Cities- How many is too many? Our Silver Age game had Fair City (the home base), Capitol City, Empire City, Bay City, Atomic City, and Darkness Falls. It worked.

Re: Things that work in comics but don't work in Champions

Re: What do you think is the best way to balance armor use? Roleplaying out the social factors works for me. Then again, I spent many, many years as a pedantic medievalist with far too much of my interest involving medieval ironmongery and its practical applications. One of my favorite explanations came from Robin Laws, creator of the HarnWorld setting: Guard: Is the a war on somewhere? PC: No. Why do you ask? Guard: Then what's all the armour for? PC: I always dress like this. Guard: Why? PC: Well...when there's trouble, I don't have to put armour on. It's right there. And I save a lot of time this way. Putting armour on and taking it off again takes hours. Waste o' time that is. Guard: What kind of trouble were you planning to make? PC: I wasn't going to start it... Guard: Start what? You're fast enough with the denials...and didn't you just say you're often in trouble...Perhaps you're planning an attack on the citadel (some of his fellow guardsmen laugh). PC: No, No, it's nothing like that. I just want to be ready to defend myself... Guard: Against what? PC: Ruffians, thieves, and outlaws, of course. Guard: So, you lack faith in our ability to police the town and protect honest citizens from harm? PC: Yes. I mean no. These streets can be dangerous at night and you aren't around much then, are you? Guard: Are you saying we shirk our duty? PC: Oh no! Not that. No sir. It's just that there's more ruffians than guards at this time o' night. Guard: I see. So, you like to wander about town armed like a knight in the middle of one? (chuckling at his pun). Are you a knight? PC: Er...well no. It's like I said, I'm just an honest citizen heading home from a late night at the tavern and... Guard: Or from your attack on the citadel? PC: I wouldn't start any trouble. Guard: You just attract it, eh? And you just want to be prepared? PC: That's right...well sort of... Guard: Sort of? Well, I trust you're prepared to come to the castle where we can spend a few pleasant days checking out who you really ar, whether you have the right to carry these "tools", and if your wanted for any felonies or somethin'. PC: But I don't have time for all that... Guard: Of course you do. You have all that time you saved by not donning and doffing your armour. PC: But I've committed no crime...this is unfair. Guard: So's your odor. We'll have to dip you in the moat before we lock you up. The other prisoners might object. Grab him men!

Re: Things that work in comics but don't work in Champions My last long term PC was a combat monster with no resistant defenses I don't think it was ever a problem.* *To be fair, he WAS the best martial artist in the entire game world and could crank his DCV past 20 with the right skill levels and a Martial Dodge. But still...

Re: Things that work in comics but don't work in Champions The classic Gardner Fox, "Let's split up and tackle the individual pieces of this crisis (or recover the McGuffins, or investigate, or whatever) and then get back together in the last act and whomp it" story is extremely hard to pull off. Actually, it can be done, but it requires a GM and players who are entertaining enough to keep the players of the off-screen characters engaged. It's rarely done well though. The sense of learning/coping with powers. There are some kludgy ways around it (mystery powers, where the GM creates abilities and springs them on the player at a later date, for instance), but, by and large, everything about a Champions character is so quantified, it's hard for the player to be truly surprised by anything he or she can do.

Re: What is a Superhero to you? So all those guys who've been given the Congressional Medal of Honor got it for "warrior-ism?"

Re: What is a Superhero to you? While I think a moral code is an inevitable part of the path of the Hero, I don't believe it's as inflexible as some here. The definition of the Hero has changed throughout time. To say The Authority aren't superheroes because they don't fit a particular definition of said code is hair-splitting. IMHO, YMMV, ONGINS, etc.

Re: I love The Ultimates Thor's also got some sort of mind reading or omniscience or something. Remember how he shut up Banner by revealing his secrets in front of Fury?

Re: What is a Superhero to you? Someone with preternatural abilities who fights against that which society deems bad or evil. By my definition, this covers Achilles, Superman, Captain America and Jack Hawksmoor. I don't equate heroism with being a nice person.

Re: What genre is Champions really about? Geek will eat itself. One-true-way-ism has been an unfortunate byblow of RPGs since the earliest home-brews. As the rules became more sophisticated and people gravitated towards fandom of a particular system, system snobbery gave way to genre snobbery. Such snobbery is bad form, though, IMHO.

Re: 100-point wonders Ummm...whatever floats your boat. 100 pts per side Heroclix is an interesting tactical exercise, but I wouldn't want to do it often. When I first discovered Champions, I'd been running a V&V game for a couple of months. My best friend was notoriously resistant to trying out new things. I kept pestering him to at least try to write up a character. Being utterly unaccustomed to the notion of Disads (this was 1982) and stubborn as hell, he converted his favorite V&V character at 100 pts exactly. Odd thing is, it was a fairly accurate conversion. He got better, incidentally.

Re: Developing Shadowrun Hero, could use some input! IMHO, it's not Shadowrun magic without the potential for the caster to harm his or herself through failure to properly deal with the spell's drain. The mechanics of mana vs. physical spells will take some doing too. The easy access to astral space enjoyed by SR mages is something to consider as well. Obviously, the best approach isn't to try to model everything exactly, but just to capture what feels right. But even that's going to take some doing. I'm entirely certain I'd just give up and play Shadowrun (or adapt it to something less point-based, like Savage Worlds), but YMMV.

Re: I love The Ultimates

Re: I love The Ultimates Here's the "high concept" blurb. The rest of the notes are still in the working stages: Agents of IMPACT The year is 1985. Ronald Reagan has just begun his second term as President of the United States. The Cold War seethes quietly, with occasional flareups in the third world. Behind this, another war rages. A war of individuals rather than armies. A war without conventional battlefields, fought in a world largely unto itself. The world of IMPACT. Superhumans have been a fact of human existence since at least the early 1960s. While many are undeniably colorful, this is not a world of independent costumed crimefighters. The vast majority of superhumans act as some form of government operative (the precise form depends on the government and the agency in question). Most of the remainder are freelancers, mercenaries and terrorists who often fight the battles the former category cannot. Those who remain on the fringes gravitate towards criminal enterprises and the occasional, very rare vigilante. The PCs are operatives of IMPACT, the Inquiry into Metahuman and Paranormal Abilities, Capabilities, and Technologies. IMPACT was originally created as part of the Defense Department's Office of Scientific Intelligence as a response to the emergence of superhumans. Nicknamed "Project Boo-Book", its importance grew as the global ramifications of superhumans became clearer. Today, IMPACT acts as the US Government's primary resource for dealing with the shadowy world of metahumans, ultratechnology, and the supernatural. IMPACT's role is to keep abreast of scientific and technical advances worldwide, also monitoring the activities of known metahumans, constantly assessing the level of threat each poses to the United States and the global balance of power. In keeping with this mandate, IMPACT operatives also investigate "strange occurrences", assessing their threat level and taking appropriate action (see also, "shoot it or recruit it").

Re: I just can't get into Cosmic Level play Hey! Pre-Crisis Lois knew Kryptonian Kung Fu (or judo...one of those martial arts thingies that were sprouting up in the comics in the 70s). And she turned herself black once! And OK, I got nuthin'.

Re: I love The Ultimates The campaign I'm re-working on at the moment (Agents of IMPACT) is not directly inspired by "The Ultimates" (for one thing, I originally came up with it in 1992), but a lot of what's gone on in comics (notably Ellis's run on "Stormwatch", Morrison's "New X-Men", as well as "The Ultimates" and "Ultimate X-Men") strongly influenced the current version, which was originally "The Champions Universe And The Six Million Dollar Man Meet WildCATS During An Episode Of The X-Files".

Re: Hip-Hop Culture Heroes/Villains For an interesting take on Hip-Hop in an RPG setting, I recommend giving Key20 Publishing's Wyrd Is Bond a look. It's urban fantasy, not supers, but I COULD actually see Rap as a form of incantation magick for a street level game. (Yes, I know, this reverses my earlier take on the matter somewhat. It's all about the execution, and WiB is beautifully executed.)

Re: Hip-Hop Culture Heroes/Villains I try to avoid such things. Not because of any sort of race issues but because I'm 100% convinced that the superhero genre automatically makes any sort of popular music utterly uncool. It's worse than when country artists try to cross over and end up looking like stereotypically bad 80s bands with a keytar player and a horn section. Even KISS were lame in the comics. It's one of the unbreakable rules of the universe.