FTJoshua

Again, awesome posts, thank you. No choices made yet but I'll post them when they happen. As far as the ambush goes, the gov't set out to kidnap all the loved ones to bait the heroes; the heroes were tipped off to this and got almost everyone to safety, but a few stragglers were left behind; these stragglers were then used as bait. Re: fun. Of course fun must come first. I'm not sure if the campaign is out of control or not. Sometimes it seems like it. But other times it is so rich with roleplaying and storytelling. Now that you mention the fun/game aspect, I wonder if the PC's would actually enjoy winning? They've always been a hard-luck lot and seem to enjoy it that way (the players do anyway; the PC's might disagree). At the moment, my instinct is to give them plenty of legitmate, in-character, in-the-moment warnings from other NPC's. Then if they insist on going through with it, I needed those first few posts about what I should plan for in terms of security, response, etc. After THAT... Well, we do have one idea: We were going to bring in one or two other people for the night who like role playing but not combat, and have them play senators/congressmen, etc. The PC's would present their case, and the NPC-players (with nothing to lose or fear) could really hammer the PC's into being specific about their plans. It seemed like an awesome role-playing opportunity, and heck, the PC's might even beg off after five hours of questions they can't answer.

That's what I'm thinking. I just don't see this being successful. Maybe approaching the right people at the right time and proving that they can be a force for good...maybe then. Maybe.

Yeah, I have rethought that. No links.

One other thing: The thinking is that, since the some of the public (at least in Arizona and California) is aware of how strong these mutants are, if they can prove to the public that they will do what the public wants, the public will endorse them, thereby tying the hands of the government. The PC's think that if they tell the American people, "Tell us what we can do to prove we're here for YOU," the people will throw out 100 suggestions, the PC's will pick the one most people want, and go solve it. That will "prove" the mutants are here to help where the Fed has been unable to. Neat idea. Admirable, even. Likely? I just think the PC's are not up to date on American psychology.

WOW! You guys rock. 1. Everything that's been said is exactly what I am afraid of. I just don't see success as an option. 2. The initial assault to take out the PC's was based on one particular high power mutant, Damage Inc., who--in the public eye--is a loose cannon, a barbarian, no regard of human life. The local government finally got the wheels turning and lured him and the rest of the PC's to a remote location where they tried to destroy them. Loved ones were killed, but no PC's. 3. Damage feels that all we have to do is march into the captiol building (or wherever congress is in session), tell them that we are going to give the people what they want, and then enforce it. He thinks, for example, that if we get on TV and tell the American people, 'No taxes? Done! A wall between Mexico and the US? Done!' then most Americans will applaud the appearance of 9 mutants who can "finally get something done." I, personally, totally disagree that this would happen. 4. Capturing the Congress won't be hard, I don't think; we do have access to a super stealth plane that is supposed to just sort of drop us off on the building, and in we go. What happens after that, though, seems deadly. All of your comments have been megascale helpful, because I've been unable to express to the "team" why this is doomed. But some of them really do believe it will be that easy. Also they are fresh off a victory where they took out tanks and Blackhawks, and managed to down 2 jets before the jets could dump their dumb bombs. The deaths of loved ones is also fueling the fire. Quick backstory, by the way: The campaign is similar to X-Men in the "racist" attitudes of most humans vs. mutants, but in our campaign, it is much stronger. There is no School for Gifted Youngsters; it would be burned to the ground by angry mobs. Previously, there were IMPS, who were mutant police. But they were just as corrupt as any other govenmental body, and the PC's, by luck, were able to televise their brutality and corruption, and bring about their end. So they figure they can do the same on a national level. Any more help will be appreciated. I will probably send the team a link to this thread. THANKS!

In my last post, I asked for help designing or finding tanks and related military weapons used to go after some high-powered PC's. The PC's survived the attack, and have now determined to "take over the country" by marching right into the Congress and announcing their intentions. They seem to think that since they are (they believe) among the most powerful beings on the planet, there is nothing that can stop them. Maybe that's true, maybe it isn't; here's my question: What is the liklihood of success? These are 9 or so PC's from 300 pts to more than 700 pts. But I figure the U.S. Gov't is would stop at nothing to get rid of them once their intentions are clear, even if what they are proposing would ultimately help the world. So what kind of defenses/offenses would be brought to bear in this scenario? Assume there is nothing more high tech than what we publicly know the military has, or might have. Or, do you think they would succeed? Thanks! All opinions welcome & needed!

The military is coming down hard on our heroes, no pulling of punches. Is there a website somewhere that shows military technology (such as air-to-surface and surface-to-surface missiles, heavy machine guns, tanks, etc.) in HERO terms? I have found great non-HERO info on the Navy website, and there was some info in the Dark Champions weapons list. Any other 4th Ed. books I should look at? Or, I'll take write-ups too if anyone has them. Here's the hardware being brought to bear so far: (6) UH-60 Blackhawk Helicopters, equipped each with 16 Hellfire missles (4) M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System tanks, each with 12 surface to surface missles (6) M1A1 Abrams tanks (65 tons) with AP rounds, smoke rounds, etc. (2) F-A18 Hornet fighters, equipped with 6 AGM 65 Maverick guided missles and 1 Vulcan 20 mm cannon I'll take hardware suggestions too. Thanks, all!

All very good points. A lot of those I hadn't thought of exactly, and this helps clear up why I have the opinion I have. Primarily I agree with the inside vs. outside aspect of the two.

HISTORY: Special effects can hurt some PC's more than others, e.g. a vulnerability to fire. A PC could, therefore, take more damage from "magic" effects, or "mental" effects. PURPOSE of thread: A friend and I are going to be debating magic vs. mental powers soon. I'd like to hear other opinions from Hero Gamers. It is not a debate that we can turn to the Hero rules to solve since it isn't necessarily a rules question. I perceive mental and magic as being two entirely different things with vagely similar trappings. To me, a Mental power comes from the mind; it cannot function without an actual, tangible brain behind it. Magic, on the other hand, is more ethereal, intangible, more powerful, more dangerous, and less specific than a Mental power. Rules-wise, the two function in much the same way; ego attacks, mental illustions, etc., are all easily used for Magical effects. But that doesn't make them the same thing in my opinion. Thoughts?

~ Bring plenty of (drink of choice) ~ Disadvantages are there for a reason; use 'em once in a while. ~ Have your players draw a thick, impervious line between what a CHARACTER says and how he/she behaves, and what a PLAYER says and does; likewise for a GM and NPC. ~ Know when to stop playing. Sometimes, an adventure gets so totally out of control that you have to say, "Sorry guys, I gotta stop it here. We'll pick it up next week." Better to think about what to do than risk ruining the adventure. ~ On the other hand, if you are flexible, roll with those PC punches and give them the appropriate consequences. ~ Speaking of consequences...they are a fact of life. They must be a fact in RPGs as well, especially if you're a hero. Did anyone mention "Have fun" yet?

Good Old Pathos We were in Africa, and about 6 tribesmen were shadowing us. Pathos rushes over, determines they don't speak English, and draws a line in the sand with his 22d6 EB, against the wishes of our martial artist. The warriors run off. An hour later, we walk into a canyon area, look up, and notice about 1,000 of these warriors with spears and such, ready to make us pay. Pathos, looking around at them and knowing it's all his fault mildly offers this apology to the team: "Hm. My bad."

As usual, I don't have the book with me; but isn't the "interdimensional teleport" aspect of the VPP just a cinematic effect of Harbinger "just happening to have" whatever gun he needed at the time? My understanding was that the VPP was not cosmic at all, it functioned as a special effect similar to the Vanishing Teleport also mentioned in DC. It's still technically a Teleport, but the effect is that the PC had to be able to get from point A to B; likewise, Harbinger doesn't really reach across dimension, he just always happened to bring the right gun for the right occasion. I always thought it was just kind of a Never Run Out Of Bullets/Hollywood gimmick.

I'm fond of charges. It depends how much combat you are expecting to see. We only have one, maybe two fights in a session, and it's rare they go more than 2 turns lately. Plus you save END. Does your GM allow rounding up? (Except Speed, of course.) As has been pointed out here before, Hero favors the Brick. You get a lot more for your Strength investment (PD, REC, STUN) and CON investment (ED, REC, END, STUN) than you do for, say, EGO. Combat skill levels are cheaper than DEX, but it depends on your concept. And I am big fan of Extra Damage Classes with Martial Arts rather than Hand-to-Hand attack, for example, since it adds to STR, damage and Killing dice.

Sorry, should've posted that. 24 OCV base + 7 CSL = 31 (if all applied to the OCV) + 2 OCV with Sacrifice Throw is his best shot. Also, I realize now, we always just assume the DEX/3 plus 11 in our OCV. So I always figure my base is 24 rather than 13+11. Hope that clears it up. Or have I really screwed something up?!?

No, not really. A year or so ago there was a post here with a link to Normal Characteristic Maximum comparisons, like how a 13 STR would equate in the real world, how a 15 DEX would equate in the real world, etc. In looking at that chart, which made a lot of sense to me, those 35-plus DEXs seemed too potent. And if we shaved them down, there'd be more points for skills, strength, whatever. There's not a lot of contention about it in our group, it was just something that came up that I'd been meaning to throw out to the Herophiles.

Our superheroic campaign has lasted about 15 years all together (with some months and a year here or there off). Having started playing using Champions 3 -- and not reading it correctly -- we ended up with some PC's that are beyond superheroic. Felix, created in about 1989, has a 40 DEX with +7 Combat Skill Levels on his Martial Arts. His highest OCV is 33, which is the highest in the group, but all of the other "old guys" have 29 to 32 for high OCV's. The "younger" PC's have about 24 to 28 as highs. Technically, this isn't a problem, since the GM can just pile on the DEX and CSL's as needed. My problem is that, as I understand the system, those scores are just WAY off the chart. We have discussed ways of bringing these OCV's down to more respectable level. The theory is that the oldest (i.e. most powerful) PC's should generally always be able to hit a human without a problem. That means we only need a 21 OCV. But the campaign has both old and new PC's; how do we lower everyone's OCV fairly, so that the young PC's can still take on a human, but not be so tough as to take on an older PC? The House Rule is a single Young PC shouldn't be able to defeat a single Old PC. But we can't just say, "Okay, everyone take 20 off your DEX!" If we uniformally lower DEX, someone is going to get screwed at the bottom of the totem. Any ideas?

I wrote up a list, from 2d6 to 25 or more d6 listing the average roll, and pick the one that I want for the villain, depending on the defense I will be fighting against. I may only need a 2 or 3d6 Drain, since none of the PC's have Power Defence; but I might need a 15 or 20d6 Energy Blast because of high ED's. Having that simple list handy when generating villains has helped a lot. On the other hand, I also tend to create whatever I bloody well want to create, and let the PC's worry about it. If my villain is a puss, I've learned a lesson. If my villain is TOO strong, I can get him out of the fight any time I want. Motivation and characterization will rule the day over power levels for me.

Aren't most limitations self-policing anyway? Activation, Costs END, Always On, Concentrate, etc. A lot of them, if not most, are just there, no matter what the GM or player wants to do. An activation is always going to require activation, Costs END is always going to cost END. Those do limit the power, regardless. A focus, on the other hand, must be actively removed by the GM; preventing a PC from entering his Hero I.D. is the GM's job. In our campaign we take limits to both reduce cost and add depth, but we don't take them just for giggles.

split it Our campaign splits it down the middle in a way. We do keep very accurate records on points, and expect that everyone's totals come out right. There's also a spoken rule that the three "old" characters -- the PC's who have been around for 15 years -- should never be able to be easily defeated by a "new" PC. Within those confines, we let points go here and there if it's not a major deal. But, then again, we're all notoriously honest, so we won't beg for that 1 last XP to allow us one more SPD or whatever; we'll wait till the next adventure. In any event, I agree that if you trust the players and they trust you and each other, go for it.

The powers basically sound like: Telepathy, Mind Control and Desolid. (By the way, how many points are we talking here? This guy won't be able to do much else by the time you're done, point-wise.) I guess there are modifiers you could add. As usual, I don't have book here, but off the top of my head: (-x meaning minus whatever limitation level seems appropriate to you.) *Desolid, -x, only to inhabit a humanoid form, -x, requires an attack roll/skill roll/activation (or some such thing, to simulate the "jump" into another person) *Mind Control, -1/2, linked to Desolid, -x, only vs. target being inhabited *Mind Control, -1/2, linked to Desolid, -x, only vs. target being inhabited. I do not vouch for the mechanics of this in absence of a book. Also, I'm not sure a desolid PC can use mental powers. Other folks here on the boards doubtless know a more elegant/practical way, but that's essentially what it sounds like to me.