Opal

I don't know how many versions of the game I may be mixing here, but aren't there sweep and multiple move bys and grab one guy, slam another, and martial throws?

There's a lot of ways for a sufficiently superior hero to hold many lesser foes at bay!

And once you've done a dramatic one, Roll that PRE Attack!

1 hour ago, assault said:

I don't see any play benefit to shifting that range. It feels like theorycrafting to me.

Like I said, I played in campaigns where the assumed speed was "shifted" - generally, if your power set didn't include superhuman speed, you didn't go above 20/4 (and if nothing else like that, Normal Characteristic Maxima disad).  One benefit was that it aligned the PCs with the "meaning" of the stats.  Another was having slightly less basket-case levels of disads or some more points to flesh out a powerset.

So, yknow, 15 years of doing something is not theorycrafting anymore.

I also took those characters to conventions, and they still worked.

You can shift campaign assumptions, and get good results, but you can also defy them and get good results...

At least, you could.  I assume NCM is gone and the points saved by backing off 3-10 DEX and a point or two of speed would be trivial in 6th.

3 hours ago, Cygnia said:

I guess now that D&D uses 6 sec rounds, but back in the day when rounds were a minute...

Of course,  Champions it would be an hour later:  "OK, segment 5, DEX 30? ... 23?..." 

Maybe, in spite of being between the attacker and the ones hit, she wasn't in the AE? 

Then there's those AEs that roll to hit everyone in them...

...and, maybe...

"not the face" +5 DCV, 5 combat luck, limitation: look like a putz (can't make PRE attacks for the rest of the fight)

On 3/11/2023 at 4:06 PM, Christopher R Taylor said:

But ..you can spray away  like a nutjob and not hit anything with multiple attack maneuvers. 

Which is weirdly realistic, in itself.

On 3/7/2023 at 6:29 AM, Hugh Neilson said:

"You can't take a DEX higher than 20 or a SPD higher than 4 for a normal human - that's min-maxing".  The reality was that you can't build an effective character without superhuman reaction times and agility

You can.  Enough levels, or the right power set, and finesse the speed chart just a bit...

Even the super-efficient 23/5 is 16 points the 20/4 character can put into 5 martial arts levels, or 4 & a DC, or 2 all-combat if they're more diverse combatants.

On 3/7/2023 at 10:08 AM, LoneWolf said:

The way the groups I play with handle that is for everyone to limit their stats especially DEX and SPD.  Our normal SPD is 4.

That works.

DEX/SPD is relative, if everyone backs off a little, you don't miss it. The groups I was in, '84-99 were like that.

Android Multiform? So, like Cutey Honey, then. 😘

ROCK-M

and 

SOCK-M

Yes, I cooked up something of the sort c1986, I think, for an oddball science-fantasy campaign and again after the BBB and Ninja Hero.

They were more a mix of melee and ranged, rather than any dedicated ranged-only. 

...trying to remember details, I think there was less to do with a ranged art, like Skill levels could cover a lot.  But I did create some full-move element maneuvers that seemed to fit well.

15 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

.  I ...decided that Skill Levels-a thing that already existed and already did what skills do- were the way to go. 

 

Skill levels already have costing and mechanics in place for 'everything' to 'large, related groups,' to 'small, closely-related groups' to 'this one thing and no other thing.' 

 

For Supers and pulp, build straight off the Characteristic roll.  For more 'normal' heroic games, start with 9+ instead of 11+, and for grim, ultra-realistic stuff, start with 7+ Char. 

 

If you are concerned about what else they might spend their 150 points on, the don't give them 150 points.  If you are concerned about what they might spend their XP on, ... reducing awarded XP along the way

So you've long since tried using skill levels in place of skills.  And with good results?

I like the idea of setting different base rolls, too.  Like, instead of just the standard 11- or 9+cha/5, also having 8- or 6+CHA/5 for checks requiring some training or familiarity (and 14- or 11+cha/3 for "everybody knows/can do that" but roll because there's a consequence for failure on the first try) or like 5+cha/5 or 2+cha/10 for "well, actually it is rocket surgery."  Not just to calibrate skill as level cost but as a more intuitive, less open ended principle than just penalties. 

I'd not thought of taking it that far before.  I'd always circle back to some kind of over-skills, where you just create some 5 point skills as broader, bundling together multiple 3-point skills, and some 10 point skill groups that bundle multiple 5-pt skills, ...And then have a limited number of those that encompass all possible skills.

I think part of it is that I calibrated my idea of point totals to the original Champions.  So 100+100Disads seems like a basic superhero, and 0 with maybe a disad and some points shifted around is a normal.

And, like, the cost of powers didn't change, and the typical 8-12 DC attack didn't change.... but point totals just kept inflating....

So if skills (or whatever) aren't priced to fit into 200-ish supers and 0-50 pt normals (and -25pt incompetent DNPCs) and 75-100 pt adventurers, I find it pretty off-putting.

11 hours ago, Ragitsu said:

A skilled player can make a Human Fighter interesting.

A skilled Dungeon Master can make players excited over a humble Potion of Healing.

A less badly designed game doesn't require mastery to make up for its failings. 

A new player shouldnt be punished for choosing a simple, common, relatable heroic archetype.

A GM shouldn't need to resort to Monty Haul to keep players engaged.

It's interesting. 

Apparently the first use of "teleportation" only goes back to 1931 and was, indeed, used to describe unexplained or psychic phenomena, like, y'know, your keys moving from where you were sure you left them to a spot you'd just checked a moment before.

It wasn't until the 50s, that is started being used to describe matter transmitters and other nominally  scientific but very unconventional means of transportation. 

The closely related words/concepts apportation and dematerialization go back to 19th century mediums, though. 

You'd think that something as strongly associated with magic would be much older, but no.

53 minutes ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

The reason you cannot ever buy off your roll is that you might face something so challenging that it requires a roll at a significant penalty

I think I meant in a more existential sense.

Like, skills seem to exist for the roll, not for what you accomplish with them, if that makes any sense?

Or, to put the same thing another way, they're disabling.  Lacking a skill or failing a check grinds the action to a halt or selects you out of the current scene.

(Sorry, I'm way down the "should skills even exist? Prolly not" rabbit hole at this point. )

(Also, wrong place for it.)

Seems like everyone in Star Wars had universal translator... And everyone in Star Trek literally did (IAF: communicator badge thingies).

And you could always buy off the Activation Roll...

... that's another thing, why can't I buy off the roll for my skill? Pay 5 pts instead of 3 and just keep the corners on my cheap dice longer?

(This isn't a response to anyone, just me continuing to ramble.)

I've been going on about skill levels as/vs skills because levels do fit with the rest of the game.  You can define a level as a +1 in almost anything you can roll, its open-ended.  And you can define it broadly or narrowlyAs you buy a broader level, the cost per +1 goes up, but the cost per thing you're able to add to goes down. (And there's an upper bound, the 10pt overall level that has ultimate breadth). From +1 OCV with your EB for 2pts, to +1 with your whole multipower for 3, to 5pt all OCV levels. Why? Free points? No, because you're getting less, you're not going to use every attack every phase, you're really only ever getting two points of benefit.  Call it diminishing returns or redundancy, but, at best, you're not overpaying. 

Skills are sorta similar in structure, you can define almost any skill into being, and some are broader or narrower. But, instead of paying more for a very broad skill or a lot for a theoretical upper-bound omniskill, narrow skills are just vaguely expected to give better results, oh, and provide complementary skill checks (which, hey, a bonus, don't skill levels do that) And you just buy more of them. The more skills you have on your sheet the less likely it is you'll use a given one in a given session - and the more likely there'll be some you /never/ use, at all. 

And, while a level makes you better at something (1 Skill level say takes you from 13- to 14-), a skill doesn't (defining into being another KS skill means you make your same INT check with it), but it does make everyone else bad at it. 

(Lockout, "creating incompetence")

...sorry, I don't have a point or conclusion... just trail'n off...

23 minutes ago, Steve said:

I could also see an argument for buying a Skill Enhancer like Linguist and then just buying single points in different languages and calling them full fluency

 And there's already been a "Universal Translator" in at least one version of the game, right?

....Yeah?  But instead of skills? Or even just as a thought experiment around how much should skills cost/how many skills there should be?

Like Overall Levels at 10 pts for +1 to anything have been a feature, from Champions 1st through Hero 6th, right? A solid benchmark.

If you think of lacking a skill as a penalty to a roll, like an 11- or a normal 10 stat or general skill, taking a -5 or -8 or -11 whatever conveys that, then an upper bound for "character buys every skill," should reasonably be around 50 to 100 points. (And that fits the very old power design maxim that 50 points should be good, a power you can hang your superhero cape on, and 100pts sgould be just wonderful)

Now, I know at some point there was an explicit rule that you can't add levels if you don't have the skill - but, like some other rules about skills, and many skills, themselves - it seems like it's there to justify skills, when they don't really fit the game that well. (And it also sounds like an early iteration of the "buy it the most expensive way" maxim.)  Maybe? 

IDK, I'm just noodling around the wrong side of a long-settled issue.

38 minutes ago, GM Joe said:

You're right, for decreasing the cost of buying skills in bulk, Skill Levels (and Enhancers) do the job. I just wish many characters didn't have any reason to buy in bulk in the first place.

Ultimately, each skill lets you make some 9+(some char)/5 or less check that, otherwise, the GM wouldn't have let you make.

But, like, why not? 

If 1 lousy point gets you an 8-, why not a 6- or a raw stat check @ 5 less?  If you have some similar skill why not that a lesser penalty?

Actually, I doubt there's much of a problem with that last idea.

But, if not having a skill can be dealt with as a penalty, then having one is the same as levels - and levels have a cost structure that recognizes diminishing returns.  And, y'know, Hero scaling. 

I don't want to revisit the  conspiracy to eliminate all cost breaks, but, yeah, that was the point.  EC and figured characteristics reflected the inherent downside or diminishing returns of a reasonable tight or straightforward concept from the effectiveness pov (and thus also encouraged them, because, yes, they're desirable in a narrative sense, too), but were perceived as powergamey free points.

On 2/17/2023 at 9:52 AM, Old Man said:

To this day I don't understand why, out of all the frameworks, EC was the one to get axed. 

I think maybe because its the framework most like figured characteristics?

Supers that rely heavily on stats, and thus "save points" on figured characteristics - martial artists, speedsters, and especially bricks - have some obvious/consistent abilities.  Like, they're going to be doing normal, physical, damage.  There are obvious ways of dealing with them.  The same is sorta true of EC types, once you throw an ice blast, the rest of your power suite is a tad predictable, and if an arid environment shuts it down, it probably shuts it all down.

An a la carte set of powers, not so much.

20 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

There are myriad little problems, but I think the most important one is lock out. 

 

Look at the example given above: for every single skill created, you are making the rule that 'no other skill does this.'.

 I like to say adding to a skill list "creates incompetence." Your 1st ed character with Detective Work was a competent Detective.  Then the game adds Deduction, well, you're no Sherlock anymore but you can still be Sam Spade.  Then Criminology, Conversation, and Shadowing are added - and what can your Detective even do?

38 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

character did not have the skill, then he made a characteristic roll.  It was Miller's stance that a list of skills could not possibly be assembled that would cover even a portion of what a character actually knew, and that listed skills-those skills actually on the character sheet-represented those things at which the character was exceptionally-well trained or learned

And that reminds me that Hero already has Skill Levels, and why couldn't we just use those?

29 minutes ago, Scott Ruggels said:

Wait…what?

"Blow all tanks!"

1 hour ago, Old Man said:

 

What's interesting to me about that era is that aside from D&D, only Gamma World used polyhedrals.  Every other TSR RPG ran on percentile dice.  And yet each one was its own system.

 It was interesting how similar games from the same company could be, like Boot Hill to Top Secret and D&D to Metamorphosis Alpha to Gamma World to EPT.  Stormbringer to RuneQuest to Call of Cthulhu.  IDK, was it just saving design effort?  Anyway, a game would use a lot of basic mechanics of a prior game, all the time.

When Chaosium just admitted that and called their Core System "Basic RolePlaying," well, that was the beginning of an era, I think.  Hero, d6, Interlock, Storyteller, etc...

...d20 was kinda the end of that era. 

7 hours ago, Cygnia said:

Actually, I go down lots because I'm a sub....

If we're casting about for nice things to say about D&D of that era, 2e had nice art and 1e had nice sales numbers.