assault

Re: Retcon the CU

Back to the original topic of the thread...

One change I would make would be to tweak the worldwide distribution of supers a bit. In particular, I would increase the prevalence of supers in Australia, New Zealand and any other relatively significant market for Hero Games products in order to give a bit more freedom for GMs to fit their campaigns into the CU.

Re: "Teen Champion" to Regular

It seems to me that the most obvious change in the builds would be the presence of Power Frameworks. If you can handle that transition smoothly, the rest is really just the equivalent of giving them experience in big chunks rather than a point or two at a time.

So how would you handle that?

Let's see:

VPPs (apart from gadget pools) are a bit of a worry. I would recommend discouraging them in favour of Multipowers, at least at first.

Given that, we are talking about ECs and Multipowers.

Multipowers aren't too difficult. Converting a normal power to an MP is really just a case of paying the slot costs. The character simply becomes more versatile over time. You could even fold a couple of powers into the Base in this case.

ECs are a little trickier. It's easiest if the characters are actually gaining raw power. Basically, you let them spend their "experience" as points in the EC's Base. You end up with a sub-optimal EC for a long time, but it still would save points.

An example:

Solar Boy initially spends 40 points each on EB, Flight and Force Field.

He decides he wants to put them into an EC.

After 10 experience, his EC looks like this:

EC - "Solar Powers"

10 Point Base

40 1. 10d6 Energy Blast

40 2. 25PD/25ED Force Field

40 3. 25" Flight

As he gets more experience, he builds up the base, boosting the various slots appropriately.

Eventually, his EC looks like this:

EC - "Solar Powers"

40 Point Base

40 1. 16d6 Energy Blast

40 2. 40PD/40ED Force Field

40 3. 40" Flight

Along the way he could also have added slots.

Obviously this is an example only, and you would have to manage things carefully. You might also want to allow a partial rebuild at some point to fix some of the wonkier side effects of this kind of build.

The point is that the character can "mature" incrementally, without any big shocks.

Re: How to handle RKA?

"Don't try to consider Bats and Supes as equals... they each have their place' date=' but not really together." [/quote']

 

Of course the real problem with this is that Supes is so much more powerful than almost any other super!

 

Batman fits in quite well with the likes of Green Arrow, Hawkman, Aquaman and even the Atom. That is, about half of the "original" JLA are at more or less his power level.

 

Then there is Green Lantern, who is basically a normal guy with an ubergizmo. Neutralise that, and he's toast. But he's probably the closest match to Superman.

 

While the Martian Manhunter is more or less at Superman's power level, he was originally a street level detective character who just happened to have overwhelming powers. Conceptually, then, he was more like Batman than Superman, and probably shouldn't have anything to do with the latter.

 

Wonder Woman... oh well.

 

The Flash... well, he's just kind of silly anyway.

 

Frankly, it's Superman who is out of place in the JLA.

Re: Dr koo

is there any where to find the stats of Dr Lirby Koo ' date=' hes mentioned in some old Champions products.[/quote']

 

I don't think there are any.

Re: Retcon the CU

Sure. As I said above' date=' virtually every super-world uses a gimmick. The fact is that most people will never know that magic is the reason superhumans are running around in the CU either. As with your Forerunners it's just a back-story which has no significance.[/quote']

 

The other aspect of my back-story is that it's very recent. In fact, it's really more an idea for an alternative Kirby-esque setting than an integral part of my "main" world.

 

Traditionally I didn't have a back-story at all.

 

Come to think of it, while I've whiled away many hours writing timelines, I've never actually used one of those in a campaign either.

 

For what it's worth, my current timeline pretty much goes:

Way back when: Forerunners visit.

~1530s First Phantom homage begins career.

1930s First known superheroes (Phantom homage, Mandrake homage...)

~1954 Golden Age sputters out.

Probably some kind of Silver Age.

Late 70s Bronze Age starts.

80s Peak of Bronze Age.

Early 90s Bronze Age tapers off.

Early 00s Supers start to build up again.

 

Obviously it's short on details, but I've never quite been happy with any set of them that I've put together.

 

The 80s Bronze Age heyday corresponds to the last time I was regularly playing Champions, of course.

 

I gave the Bronze Age a few years before that to allow for various NPCs to establish themselves.

 

The biggest problems are that I don't really have a Silver Age, or a reason why the Bronze Age tapered off.

 

EDIT: I've never considered having a Registration Act. I have considered banning "Mutant" as an origin.

Re: How to handle RKA?

perhaps we overestimate both the number of characters with rDEF' date=' and the extent of their rDEF? [/quote']

 

The simple fact is that most supers shouldn't have rDEF. Unfortunately, in the game, that's a good way for PCs to get taken out, and a way for them to easily take out lots of NPCs.

 

Combat Luck is a good compromise, since it makes characters less fragile without loading them up with excessive defences.

 

The real issue, of course, is guns. While they aren't huge attacks, they are as common as dirt. Every character can reasonably expect to be facing them fairly frequently. Sooner or later, one will hit them. The question is: what should happen then?

 

---

A note on the defences of the early JLA.

 

More or less invulnerable characters:

Green Lantern

Martian Manhunter

Superman

 

Characters with "normal" level defences:

Atom

Batman

Flash

Green Arrow

Hawkman

 

Intermediate cases:

Aquaman

Wonder Woman

 

At least 50% of this extremely powerful team can notionally be taken down by conventional firearms. Arguably, that could be 70%.

 

Incidentally, GL's defences were a bit erratic in his first few years. Potentially, he could have been stunned by a bullet, even if his ring would have automatically prevented it from killing him!

 

Doing an analysis on the defences of the early Avengers would probably give similar results. The second lineup was particularly vulnerable.

Re: Retcon the CU

Would you have liked it better of DoJ had said the Gods Celestial created super-humanity? Would it have made any difference to anything? To me no.

This is one of the key points in my CU. The Forerunners left Earth and the rest of the solar system littered with little enclaves of superbeings. In particular, the "Trans-Plutonian Worldlets" are the primary origin of the various "aliens" that periodically visit Earth. Furthermore, the ability of humans to exhibit mutations, or benefit from radiation accidents is probably due to Forerunner meddling.

So the Forerunners are probably the primary source of superpowers, but certainly aren't the only one. Nor is it especially likely that any players would ever find out that they even existed in my game. (I suppose they might if I ever thought of an appropriate plotline).

My super-Demographics vary radically from those of the CU, too. Supers are much rarer. Or at least they are more heavily concentrated in specific areas - the "little enclaves of superbeings" I referred to above - and rarely encountered outside them.

Of course, since my universe hasn't been published, I have the freedom to vary the above guidelines according to my mood.

That's probably the real difference between my CU and the official one!

Re: International Heroes

Who is your PNG hero "Assault" ? I have created exactly ONE hero in Papua New Guinea. A "werevelociraptor" called "Velociraptor" (Duh !)

My PNG hero is a Phantom homage called the Grey Ghost.

When I was living in PNG in the early 90s, the Phantom was the only comic that I saw, apart from a few copies of an old Batman and the Outsiders issue. The superheroic imagery that appeared in various ads on TV and so on was very obviously influenced by the Phantom.

Historically there was enough piracy in the East Indies to support a Phantom style pirate chaser, and New Guinea is a reasonable enough substitute for the African elements of the Phantom myth. Unfortunately, it would probably make more sense for such a character to have been based in West Papua rather than PNG, but still...

Re: Which villain needs an overhaul?

Didn't Vahn make a personal apperance? What kind of emperor send poor troops and themselves to an unknown world to conquer it. SHe sounds as tactically brilliant as Fozzy Bear.

I think people should actually reread her entry in CKC.

She doesn't just invade with grunts. She is accompanied by her "trained corps of superhumans" as well. They are numbered in the "dozens", at least.

One thing that has occurred to me is that while she can travel between dimensions, it's not clear that her subordinates can do so without her. While it would make her empire somewhat unworkable, it is quite possible that her presence is actually necessary to invade, or even scout, a target world.

It makes you wonder what her "empire" is actually like.

Re: Which villain needs an overhaul?

Ahh' date=' Poland, using horseman against tanks.[/quote']

 

Irrelevant side issue: every major army in the world had horse cavalry in 1939. Why? Because they were militarily effective. They could do everything infantry could do, and were more mobile. They only ceased to be used when there was enough motorised transport to go around, and when it had equivalent cross-country performance.

 

The famous "Polish cavalry charging tanks" legend refers to an incident when the tanks and cavalry blundered into each other around a blind corner.

 

And, incidentally, Poland had a sizable force of tanks - about 900 to Germany's 2700. A quite reasonable force given the relative size of their economies.

 

To bring it back on topic:

 

The thing that bugs me about Istvatha V'han is the conquering whole dimensions idea. What is a "dimension"? Is she really conquering whole universes? Or is she mainly conquering things that are more or less "pocket universes"?

 

Either way, her forces would still potentially be outrageously powerful.

 

More importantly, though, is there a reason why she attacks Earth, rather than some other planet?

 

Without more information, it's a little hard to make sense of her actions.

 

As for the hypothetical Tyrannid universe... there is no reason to believe that her military forces would have any more knowledge about *how* to travel between dimensions than I do about how to make a 747. All that could be learnt from the troops would be the fact that such a thing was possible.

 

Scouting versus blind invasion: it's possible that interdimensional travel is difficult and uncontrolled enough that scouting parties would effectively be being dropped in "blind" anyway. If they are lucky, they mightn't attract attention to themselves, but if they aren't they might find themselves appearing the in middle of a busy city street in rush hour. So scouting might be a bit of a haphazard affair. That's not really an argument for blind invasion, though.

 

Personally, I would treat the situation about like Darkseid's invasion of Earth. Yes, there are/were scouts and agents in place before hand. Yes, the invasion was lead by serious superpowered beings. But most of the invading forces were expendable grunts. I think that the documented V'hanist forces are probably in the latter category. But that raises questions about their superpowered leaders...

Re: International Heroes

I've been known to have American characters show up...

(My game is set in Australia, so Americans are "international"!)

Unfortunately, my game is more generally "on hiatus" than real, but I have characters sitting in my files from New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Hong Kong and the UK. I also have a bunch of Atlanteans, aliens and other characters not associated with any terrestrial nation.

Memo to self: design a scenario in New Caledonia or French Polynesia...

Because my game is set in Brisbane, I tend to use the Pacific as a setting more than Asia. As a result I haven't really bothered with characters from Indonesia or Sri Lanka or where ever. I probably should.

Re: Every Good Golden Age Supers Campaign Needs:

Female crimefighters who wear skirts.

Female crimefighters who wear swimsuits!

http://www.toonopedia.com/phanlady.htm

http://www.toonopedia.com/blackcat.htm

Re: Every Good Golden Age Supers Campaign Needs:

Hans Odin from X-Venture comics.

...

In any case, I happen to like villains who are admittedly evil yet still will keep their word if their word is actually given. Relentlessly evil, treacherous villains get boring after a while.

Fair enough.

I didn't doubt you could come up with one, but I didn't think he would be quite that obscure!

The honourable villain is a good thing in a game, of course, but I don't think they were all that common in the source material. Particularly during the war, when the enemy were the enemy, period.

Re: Every Good Golden Age Supers Campaign Needs:

an "honorable" Nazi (a soldier' date=' natch) whose more loyal to Germany as a whole than Hitler as an individual.[/quote']

 

Could you provide an example from the source material?

Re: A Presidential candidate has MS

It depends on how deeply you are going into the Buffyverse, but the existence of the Initiative in season four suggests that the US government knows that the supernatural exists and has at least attempted to respond.

That doesn't rule out a candidate with links to Wolfram and Hart.

Re: Is Iron Man a power gamer type character?

Anyways' date=' Tony Stark has a damaged heart, spinal injury, neural damage and a recovering alcohlic. No GM I know would allow me to make a character with those Disads. Although, he did let me use some of his Hunteds, etc. and make the powered armor as a vehicle at the time.[/quote']

 

A lot of these disads were acquired during play. Most weren't really there in the original version of the character. Just the heart thing, IIRC, but I don't know what else showed up in the first couple of years.

 

In any case, Disadvantages are Disadvantages, and if they are worth the points they will limit the character. So there's no balance problem, necessarily.

 

On the other hand, of course, Disads should really be handles for roleplaying, rather than some kind of golf handicap. Having too many Disads that are too similar too each other can be a bit of a pain. It's a bit like having five DNPCs, all of whom have identical personalities.

 

So Stark's limitations could be a bit of a nuisance for the GM, but aren't inherently unbalancing. I personally wouldn't let a character take the full set, but taking a couple of them would be OK.

 

Building his suit as a vehicle is another story.

 

I'd take a good hard look at a character constructed along those lines. The kind of "good hard look" that involves lots of red ink.

 

In any case, power armour characters are tough enough without resorting to munchkin builds. Buying a lot of your stuff through an OIF is very efficient.

 

So: Is Iron Man a power gamer type character?

 

Not necessarily, although he's one of the kinds of character power gamers are likely to be attracted to.

 

Of course, dumb power gamers who play this kind of character are easy to hose. It's the smart ones you have to look out for. But they, at least, have the potential to become some other kind of player.

 

Just take away his armour, and see what happens.

Re: Which villain needs an overhaul?

The main villain I want to see again is Shamrock. However, I would rather not see him at all than have his background tweaked too much. As it is, he's a nice grey area villain who can actually be an ally for some heroes.

Re: Takofanes help

It doesn't matter how powerful your characters are when they're fighting Tak.

They will lose, unless they find the Wonder Widget. And then they will win, assuming at least some basic competence.

The idea of cutting a deal with the Crowns of Krim is interesting, although Tak might well end up taking them over, which would be unfortunate, to put it mildly.

And if the PCs can take Tak down in a head to head fight, the GM should probably make him more powerful.

Re: How important is heroism in your campaign?

On the Silver Age thing:

I'm currently reading the DC "Showcase Presents" Green Lantern volume. It reprints a whole bunch of early Silver Age Green Lantern stories.

Hal Jordan kills.

It's not explicit, but he does.

On the other hand, there are cases where he probably should, but doesn't. In particular, Sinestro gets off lightly a time or two.

But the Qwardians are on the receiving end of GL created tsunamis on at least two separate occasions.

I won't bother discussing the very silly "romantic" subplot between Hal Jordan and Carol Ferris. It makes Superman and Lois Lane's relationship seem sane.

And incidentally, GL only occasionally does things beyond the capabilities of a 350-450 point character during these early issues. The cases when he does so are usually when the villain has already unleashed his doomsday weapon before GL gets there!

Re: How to handle RKA?

How much would those 2 be? In points?

Points are irrelevant to NPCs.

I recommend going with Standard Effect and abolishing the Stun lottery. Its results are highly inappropriate to the superheroic genre.

It's OK in heroic games, though.

Re: Robot with an adamantium shell?

Admantium Plating: Physical Damage Reduction' date=' Resistant, 75% (60 Active Points); OIF (-1/2) 40RP[/quote']

 

OIF??? You're kidding. How/why?

 

Aside from that, most of the other builds people are coming up with are horribly expensive for a 350 point character.

 

The vehicle option might work, but I personally tend to frown on builds like that.

 

I might try it anyway, tomorrow.

Re: Power Armor 'themes'

I was thinking about going for a different feel than your standard 'Iron Man' style armor maybe giving the armor a theme of some kind. One that popped into my head was a scorpion styled armor' date=' [/quote']

 

There is plenty of scope for other animal themes - birds, bugs, etc.

 

You could also use:

* armour optimised for a particular environment: water, underground...

* armour with a limited power set. For example, armour that doesn't enhance strength, or doesn't have blasters.

* armour with a specific special effect: magnetic powers, flame powers, etc.

* armour with weird powers: mental powers, magical powers, growth(!?) etc.

* armour with an archaic appearance: medieval knight, 17th century cavalier, etc.

* relatively light armour, where the abilities of the person inside it become important.

* clumsy or defective armour.

 

I'm sure other people will come up with some others.

Re: Robot with an adamantium shell?

One thing to consider is re-imagine the concept and "move the goalpost".

I've been trying to work out ways of making the character more "robot-y". The thing that bugs me the most is the absence of Life Support, so I've been focussing on ways of shaving enough points to buy some.

That pretty much means finding an excuse for sticking some limitations on his Multipower.

One possibility is to play with the Adamantium concept. You see, adamantium is difficult to work, so it's conceivable that a fair bit of the robot's equipment might actually be external to its body. Essentially, you would give its multipower a focus limitation, since its flight unit, for example, would be at least notionally able to be separated from its body. Unfortunately, of course, since he's a robot, it's not likely that he would spend much time without his equipment, so part of the limitation wouldn't really apply.

Still, it might be possible to do something along these general lines.

Justifying an external structure for his strength enhancement stuff might seem a little iffy, but some kind of exo-skeletal structure would work.

Essentially, his "shell" would become something more like a skeleton.

Hmm... an adamantium skeleton... where have I heard that before???

Re: Robot with an adamantium shell?

30 INT 20

15 EGO 10

Try 28 INT and 14 EGO.

You save 4 points with no serious drawbacks.

Drop these points into PD and ED.

Re: Robot with an adamantium shell?

Try something like this:

Points Item

125 Characteristics

25 Skills

75 20PD/20ED Armour, Hardened(x1)

4 Knockback Resistance

10 Life Support - Self-contained Breathing

70 Multipower Base

9 Slot 1. Flight (Multi)

2 Slot 2. Megascale Flight (Ultra)

12 Slot 3. Energy Blast (Ultra)

2 Slot 4. +20 Strength, OEnd, No Fig Chars (Ultra)

16 Misc/Tuning

===

350 Total

The Endurance cost of the EB will be a problem.

I don't have the book in front of me, so the numbers are a bit approximate.