sindyr

Re: First meeting of game group to consider HERO System

• I will also bring up another way that Hero System is mechanics first, story second: the fact that movement is treated differently in combat from out of combat.

I want to post a clarification as I may have either miscommunicated or misunderstood the above bit.

From several of the threads I have come to understand (possibly incorrectly, but consistently) that most of what can be done in the scene the characters find them selves in is controlled by the effects that they have pre-purchased on their character sheet. (Although I understand that VPPs give you much more flexibility, although at a very high cost. I have also heard that Power Skill rolls can be useful for new stunts, but always with the caveat that that only works the first few times, after which you better be able to sink the CP/XP into that effect.)

The two examples I have used before, that seem relevant both happen to use the concept of teleport: the Packrat, who can teleport anything from his house to near him, and Blink, who can teleport anything near him anywhere else near him.

With either character you can't simply buy the Teleport power and call it a day. You actually have to know exactly what your character "ought" to be able to do in every possible given situation ahead of time, and prepurchase that. You can't just say to the GM I want to be able to TP *anything* from X to Y, you have to prethink out all the possible effects of every potential item you might teleport to every potential place you might use as a destination.

Because if you don't, or you miss one, then the Rules As Written will not permit you to do in the Story what you didn't purchase the Effect for.

And that's really the crux of what I was saying: unless the GM does Hand Waving or fudging, if he runs the game according the the rules and philosophies of Hero System, then what controls what a character can do is what the player has purchased.

That makes it very easy for a player to get into a sitaution where he thinks he *ought* to be able to use his power in a simple and rational way, that the *story* supports, but the *mechanics* do not.

If GM disallows that use of the power, that means the mechanics are coming first and the story is coming second.

So if Blink's player buys every TP related effect he can thinks of, but finds himself realizing that he can takes out the gas tank of the chase car by TPing a lit match into it - I have to say, that makes sense. Sure, the player will have to make a to-hit roll, but in STORY terms, TPing a lit match to a point behind you is no different from TPing an empty cup into the dishwasher. (And both require equal to-hit rolls)

What HERO says, however, if I have this right, is that even those two uses are the same thing in terms of in story use of an ability - ie, both are uses of move X to Y, in out-of-the-story terms, one of them, if the to-hit roll is made, will cause a big explosion - and I believe that means you need to use a power/effect from the Hero System that creates such an effect, instead of TP - something like RKA, w/AOE, limited by must have a lit match with you and a gas tank at destination.

It therefore seems fully acurate to me that inasmuch as the rules as written prevent you from doing anything other than the specific effects you have prepurchased, even in cases where the story support the use, the fact that the mechanics don't, that is a clear case of the mechanics trumping the story.

And the only way to prevent such a thing that I can see is to use VPPs.

I suppose your could turn it around and blame the player - Blink's player made the error by not choosing a VPP so when the time came, he didn't have the option he wanted.

The other possibility is a game in which you buy NOT the teleportation effect, but the actual in game ability to Teleport things, with all that that would entail.

Hopefully that clear it up a bit.

Been reading all the responses to my various threads, thank you very much.

And I will most likely contact some white knights in the near future. Thanks.

OK, let's say I am on board with the idea that most Masters of X need VPPs whether X is Teleportation, Speed, Magic, Fire, etc.

My question is what's the most cost effective way to build them?

Let's say a character of 350 total points (200/150). Say he drops 50 on his characteristics.

That leaves 300 points.

Now assume that this Master of X can changeup his effects at will, no roll, zero phase action. That's a +2 right there. Just for the heck of it, let's say he also takes his power to 0 End, +1/2.

Assuming he has a limited class (like Fire), that's a -1/2.

So if I have this right, right now we are looking at Pool costs and Control costs, and the control costs. Control costs are X2.5 /1.5 at the moment.

So for 300 points, you get 2x Pool and 1x Control (x1.6) , or 2x + 1.6x = 3.6x = 300, x = 166 point in the pool and 83 points times 2.5 divided by 1.5 = 138 point pool cost, ofr a total of 304 total point for the VPP.

Is that right?

Which means your are spending 300 points and getting to use 166 points - you are losing almost half. While I get that this is a cost because of the flexibility, that is NOT my question.

My question is what other limitation can be put into place on the control cost that can offset the bloody high advantages?

Again, we are talking Zero phase changing, no roll required, and please, no charges or focuses.

What about the limitation, yellow things cannot be affected? ;p

Suggestion for further limitations MOST welcome. (Maybe instead of a roll to change the powers, every power requires a power roll to use?)

Thanks.

I have learned a lot from you guys, but as I think I have mentioned, written two-way communication is my nemesis, I really do not function best this way.

Is there any Hero System expert that out of the goodness of their heart would be available to a spoken conversation or two by phone or Skype? I am a computer consultant, so I am potentially available at any time of the day or night from 9am to 9pm EST, anyday. I have unlimited long distance to North America and Western Europe, so I can foot any bill for this call.

I would especially love it if I can ask some questions not just about specific mechanics of the game, but its general principles and philosphies.

I appreciate it.

OK, at 6:30 EST our gaming group will get together to consider using Hero System to do our upcoming supers RPG we want to do. This is what I had planned on telling them, more or less:

• In Hero System, you buy effects, not powers. If you want a power, with all that entails, you need to buy a VPP.
  
• In Hero System, there are several ways to design the effects your character has. What you choose for effects is what you get, no more and no less.
  
• If we play Hero System, I am recommending that we have the following house rules:
  
  • A way to get unlimited range on a power for a fixed cost.
    
  • A way to turn a relevant dice roll to an impossibility or certainty.
    
  • A way to gain a *trumping* ability for power conflicts.
    
  • Players can redesign their characters freely in between session, as long as the core concept of their characters remain the same and as long as the redesign does not invalidate something that their character has already done. This way players do not have to stress over getting their characte design perfect before play.
    
  • A way to use actions points for special moments of success, vis-a-vis the house rule found here: http://web.archive.org/web/20041209182908/www.armlesstigerman.com/intro/pulp/playersguide.html
    

  [*]I will be also raising the posibility of treating the points much more loosely, such as a player buys teleportation, but gets the other TP effects for free. I will be explaining the downside of this as well.

  [*]I will be mentioning that Blood of Heroes/MEGS is also an amazing system, in which you can actually buy powers, not effects, and that we should consider that as well.

  [*]I will also bring up another way that Hero System is mechanics first, story second: the fact that movement is treated differently in combat from out of combat.

Is there anything else I should bring up, or any other considerations I should put out there?

Thanks.

Re: Can this be done x 2

I'd like to be able to summon Barbwire. Hmmm...Pamela...

 

Sorry, did I say that out loud?

She not a spring chicken anymore, but still...

humminah-humminah-humminah...

OK guys, I think you have finally been able to pound the truth of the situation into my head. In Hero System, if you want a hero that can do certain *effects*, you simply buy those effects as per normal. If you want you hero to be able to have a certain *power* and be able to do any effect with that power, even if you don't think of the effect on character creation but later, you *have* to get a VPP.

(It occurs to me that it's really confusing and seemingly incorrect for Hero System to call, for example, Energy Blast a Power. It's NOT a Power, the power's are the in-game story abilities of the character. Energy Blast is an Effect. Case in point, your Hero may have a superspeed Power that includes several Effects, such as HKA(fists of speed), Teleport(faster than the eye can see), EB(chuck an object at superspeed at baddie), Envirinmental Control (control over air), etc. The character has *one* power - superspeed - but many power stunts or tricks he can do - the Effects he has purchased.

I STRONGLY recommend that 6e makes this much more obvious but no longer alling things like Absorption, RKAs, Invisibility, Flight powers because right there you are creating confusion. Just about everyplace the book uses the word powers, it NEEDS to say "effects", and that is true for "power" advantages, limitations, frameworks.

None of these are powers the way stories themselves use the word, or even most gamers. If you are going to have a game that separares effects and powers this completely, the concpets in the rules book NEED to be used *precisely* and exactly *accurately*, and I am surprised this hasn't come up before. If any of you agree, please make sure this suggestion winds up in the proper place for consideration for inclusion in the development of 6e.)

In Hero, VPPs are simple the way to guarantee that when the time comes and you want to be able to use your power in a in-game consistent way, that you will have a out-of-game mechanical way to justifiy rule-wise the effect's use.

I have three other questions, but I think they are difted enough they deserve their own threads, so will start them.

Thanks again everybody.

Re: Can this be done x 2

Sindyr' date=' I've asked for a list of stuff in the house that is out of the ordinary. Can I assume there is nothing out of the ordinary in the house?[/quote']

 

Let's assume that there is nothing in him house that can't be bought at a walmart, grocery store, electronics store, or online for under 500$.

 

Not that he has ALL that stuff now, but if he thinks he is going to need something, he just has to buy it and from that point on, he has it in his house.

 

(And I would track his money so that he doesnt just buy everything.)

 

But seriously, Sean, you are making me feel guilty - get some sleep, this can wait until tomorrow dude - it's only rpging. Sleep is more important.

Re: Can this be done x 2

I answered that. It's a VPP. End of discussion.

 

Any other questions?

Yes, I thought I was right. You *can't* do it without VPP. And probably also right that many if not most realistically modeled characters would need a VPP to correctly model their wide range of options.

The things is, other systems by giving not "effects" but "powers", do not require such a thing.

I am not directly saying one is better than the other... but I do kind prefer buying one power as opposed to buying an *everything* power because the system doesn't let you buy any actual powers, just effects.

Re: Can this be done x 2

If you want to have an unbounded set of diversely useful objects you can call to you (any object I can convince my GM I OBVIOUSLY had in my house, despite never having given any indication of it previously; I mean, why should I have to declare what things are in my pocket, err, I mean house before whipping them out in combat?) then you want the construct in the game that gives an unbounded set of diversely useful options: VPP. If you want to have a predefined set of diversely useful options, that can be an MP. VPP is I have unboundedly diverse choices on the fly, MP is I predefine my choices.

 

This isn't a weakness of Hero system. For a weakness of Hero system see STR, DEX, and maybe HA.

Well, the only issue I have is that so many typical powers require a VPP to fully emulate what the should be capable to model them in the reality of the game world, or else you again run afoul of the mechanical limitation without a good internal story justification.

Therefore, if you build most A-list supers, especially with start CP, even BIG starting CP like 500 points, you wind up needing to use VPP in many of them to truly capture their range of options.

On the other hand, maybe having VPP's required for all non-2d characters (as Sean put it) is just part of the Hero system way.

Re: Can this be done x 2

I'd be astonished if you couldn't find something that the system didn't do well in those circumstances, but all you are really testing is the ability to predict what you are going to come up with. The VPP genuinely does solve this (limited, of course to teleport applications).

 

I'm not going to write up a MP in detail as I should have been in bed hours ago, but you'd need to include RKA and EB with variable sfx and indirect, an entangle, a summon and a transform. You might stick in a drain to cover odd chemicals you have at home. You might do a slot for change environment. Obviously you will be wanting a TP UAA too.

 

That will probably cover almost everything.

Well of course, you have no obligation to miss valueable sleep and come up with the actual writeup of the ability... On the other hand, I can't really comment until I have such a writeup in front of me..

Re: Can this be done x 2

You gave me a point limitation, without a Special Effect, a series of desired end results, and without fully comprehending the underlying Reason From Effect concept.

 

I'm laughing.

 

 

OK. Your power was "I can 'teleport' any object within 1000 feet to anywhere else within 1000 feet" correct?

 

Telekinesis (40 STR), Affects Porous, Fine Manipulation, Increased Maximum Range (4,000"; +1/4), Invisible Power Effects (Fully Invisible; +1) (180 Active Points)

 

I even made it so you can grab the water out of a bucket. Little more than a 1000 feet actually.

I apologize, we are talking about a different power at this point on this thread.

I don't know how to define it in Hero System terms (and the challenge is to do it without using a VPP), but what it does is wherever in the world teh Packrat is, he can teleport any object from his house to any spot near him, within say 30 feet. He doesn't even have to know where the thing is in his house.

For one example, if the Packrat find himself in the dark, and there is a flashlight in the Packrat's house somewhere, even if the Packrat cannot remember where in the house the flashlight is, he can teleport to himself - or to any place within 30 feet of him.

Obviously, if anyone surrounds the Packrat with a Hardened Forcefield, it would probably stop this power, unless he buys ArmorPiercing or something.

But anything the Packrat has at his house he can TP to him (or a point within 30 feet of him.)

How do you build that in such a way that the Packrat's player can later say "I told you I was getting an X, and putting it in my house, now I want to TP the X to me" and the GM cannot say "you didn't by that effect".

Re: Can this be done x 2

Anyways' date=' my point was that the broad mechanical effects of 'I can call to me any thing that happens to be in my house' is simply unboundedly versatile. You have clearly defined it as such, and made clear that to you the idea of a thing being in your house and unable to be called to you is unacceptable. [/quote']

 

I sincerely can't agree that it unboundedly versatile, because I can't call something to me that I haven't at some point had myself or someone else put in the house.

 

Still, it is *very* versatile.

 

That is a text-book example of something that should be a VPP. Just like the guy that can shapeshift into anything should have a VPP for physical advantages of the chosen form.

If the teleporter needs to attune to specific objects to call them or the shapeshifter needs to practice to learn to form claws, shrink, grow, etc. specifically then MP works just fine.

 

...just make sure that the attunement does take *too* long to the point that it seems unrealistic... of course that's much more open to interpretation, if we are not talking days or weeks or months

Re: Can this be done x 2

Again' date=' you're thinking backwards.[/quote']

 

If that's true, then you should be able to make this power I described on 100-200 points, and I should not be able to come up with a reasonable use that isn't covered.

 

Please do.

Re: Can this be done x 2

If you buy teleport with extra mass you can grab a heavy object, teleport with it over a villain and drop it on them (and you drop too unless you have another movement power or you bought the TP UAA so you could move stuff without you moving too).

 

I think you are seeing Hero as far too restrictive. It isn't.

Maybe I am. Maybe it's like American Laws - there are tons of them, but no one really makes you obey them until you start causing a real problem.

You say it is too convenient that the cat knocked over the flashlight and broke the bulb but you want a power that you don't want restricted which is...convenient. Maybe the cat didn't knock over the flashlight, and the GM should respect that. Maybe the cat did, and you should respect that.

Well, it would be kind of weird if the player didn't own a cat. But even if he did what I am saying is the GM should *roll*, not decide, to see if the cat did knock it over. And not just for the flashlight, but for anything.

Course if the flashlight is in a drawer, the cat should NOT be rolled for.

Seriously, what sort of stuff do you keep in your house? No one here is going to say 'Sure, you can TP anything in your house to you' without knowing what it is you'll be teleporting. No GM would - that is simply allowing you to make up stuff and justify having it. List, please. If it is 'normal household stuff' - knives, forks, kettle, cans of food, bed linen, flashlight, toolkit, matches, the cat, no need to list it. Just the stuff you know is going to be greeted with, "Now wait a damn minute...!". You know, like the rolls of barbed wire you keep unrolled and spread out in the spare room.

The idea I think is that the player would give a list of stuff that they were putting in there house for future TP use to the GM. The GM has every right to question items on the list, like plutonium, but should also not be overly strict - a set of walkie talkies the player mentiones ahead of time on the list, is probably OK. As is a closet full of batteries of all size.

Actually, it would be kind of cool to roleplay the character going to this guys house, walking through corridors with stuff that "might come in handy one day" piled here and there.

Re: Can this be done x 2

Most non-rare things that have a minor effect of the world' date=' like a shovel, get picked up by the transform.[/quote']

 

I very willing to be proven wrong - can you write up this power with transform and whatnot - 100-200 points - and *then* I will see if some rationally expected use would not be covered?

Re: Can this be done x 2

No' date=' really, some characters are just 2D power wise, I've given you a couple of examples. It is absolutely true that many characters who have a lot of XP will consider a VPP, but that is far from inevitable.[/quote']

 

Okay, that's fair and true. Some character can be built to do what the player intends without needing a VPP because the player's future uses are pretty limited - like the Brick for example - if he is supertough and superstrong, you may get no complaints or unusual uses from the players.

 

But an *awful lot* of powers aren't quite so 2d - teleportation, superspeed, magic (depending), Element Mastery (fire), Friction Control, Light Manipulation - many staples of powers are quite easily used creatively.

Re: Can this be done x 2

So your story truth requires that you be able to have infinite flexibility' date=' which in game mechanics is pronounced "Variable Power Pool". [/quote']

 

Story truth *in general*, not mine, requires that powers have *realistic* flexibility, that's my point.

Re: Can this be done x 2

I would argue that the objects that would break even a simple MP would not be story-truth appropriate for the character to have put in his house.

Like what? Most any non-rare thing is something the player can say "I wish I had a shovel at home - GM, as soon as I get back to my home, I am going to pick up a shovel at the local hardware store and put it in my house."

I mean, it makes sense for many things not to be in the house the FIRST time he wants them, but (If he can get home soon) that can be quickly rectified from that point on.

Re: Can this be done x 2

That is the first sign that the power is defined way too broadly and is probably too versatile for anything short of a VPP.

Maybe I misunderstand you, but it's saying like you mean one of the following:

1) The player is asking for too much power (too broadly and too versatile = too powerful??)

This is only true by circular defintion - it certainly isn't more powerful than Superman. It's too much power only *inasmuch* as Hero System can't model it without a VPP. Of course, that's no different from simply saying that "Hero System has a weakness - it cannot model versatile powers with VPPs"

2) Anyone who wants the kind of potential versatility that having a certain ability can be used for in real life needs to always take VPPs.

Which is what I was guessing many pages ago.

Re: Can this be done x 2

Beyond that, perhaps be a little patient. I play a shapeshifter in my current Hero game. There's a few things I want to be able to do that are just going to have to wait on points (what, I can't make claws? Dang it!).

Even the claw thing I could buy as needing to investing time learning to shape claws in one's flesh - waiting on the XP is explainable in a way that seems to me believable.

However, in a game where I routinely TP all kinds of stuff from my house, to not be able to get the flashlight is not at all believable, especially as such weirdnesses pile up (First the flashlight, then the fridge, etc...

To say nothing about teleporting the SAME item I have previously teleported (like maybe a chair) but in a new way that is intended to cause a newly thought of effect (like above the baddie's head). Nope. Note allowed.

Re: Can this be done x 2

This is an intrinsic limitation to any point-based system. If you don't have points left over' date=' you don't get new abilities. If you want to consistently be using fairly minor effects you did not pay for specifically, that's the Power Skill. If you want to consistently add major effects, that is a VPP.[/quote']

 

I think you are either missing my point, or demonstrating it.

 

In a non-effects based system, you spend your build points for the SFX (like teleport) and then get to continually come up with creative ways to use and leverage the base power/ability.

 

Example: You buy TP in Hero, you can move someting from A to B if that's all it does. You buy TP in, say, MEGS, you can move an object above a baddie and drop it on them, without having to know before that later you would use teleport that way.

 

The only way to get that flexibility of creative power use in each character is to make each character get a VPP.

 

If every character is infinitely versatile, frankly I think that makes for a boring game. Why does Captain Omnipotent even need teammates?

 

You have misunderstood me. NO ONE IS ASKING FOR OMNIPOTENCE. All that's being discussed is the illogic of not being able to use a limited power in a new or novel way simply because you hadn't imagined that use when you built the character. This is NOT THE SAME THING as an unlimited, unbalanced power. It's basically a function of *real life*.

 

As we have left off the clear mechanic for building the near-infinitely versatile character, you buy a Multipower and you add slots for new items you buy for your home with experience. Not enough xp? You have not located the barbed wire, or paid for it, or figured out how to reliably store it so it can teleport to surround someone. More practice and time, and more xp, will solve that.

 

So we STILL have the same problem - the barbed wire is in my home, but I can't teleport it because I have no XP/CP to add to my character sheet.

 

Let's review the issue. Many others have noted that, if the flashlight is of minor impact, the GM would logically allow it to be accessed, possibly with use of the power skill. Let's look at some possible issues with the flashlight, though:

 

- you don't recall where you left the blasted thing - you recall using it when you were in the basement and the light burned out while you were looking for your barbed wire, and now you don't remember where you left it.

 

The power allows you to teleport stuff from your house. You do not need to know where in your house it is.

 

- the batteries are dead, or the bulb is burned out.

 

This is way too fishy when it happens each time - the coincidences pile up when players realize that it's just a thin veil of the GM saying NO.

 

Now, what I *would* do is either keep track of the battery levels in the flashlight ahead of time, or simply make a roll to randomly determine tah battery levels. That's fair. But simply using it as a cheat (IMO) to deny a playing is zero different from saying "You dont get to do that". It's way to transparent.

 

- that #@*& CAT - he knocked the flashlight off the table and the bulb broke!

 

Same as above, too darn convenient and transparent and still does not respect the truth of the game world that maybe the cat didn't do that at all.

 

Just the top of my head. And the flashlight likely won't weather the first 12d6 attack very well...

 

Which is fine as long as you ROLL and don't kill the flashlight by FIAT.

In a story, the writer sets these limits. In a game, they are set by the rules. In how many works of fiction (movies, books, comics, whatever) does the character with the versatile power suite solve the problem every time with no issues? he, too, is limited in what he can and cannot do.

 

If he is not, the story has no drama, and the game has no real interest. It's just a matter of figuring out how my SFX can somehow deal handily with whatever the challenge may be.

I agree that you need drama and conflict and players that face challenges, but none of this will have any true impact if the integrity, ayhtneticity, and internal logic of the game world is not respected.

The sanctity of the truth of this imaginary world is paramount to me. As important as balance and drama is, and it IS, balance and drama is worthless if you have a world that you simply can't believe in.

Re: Can this be done x 2

Stop worrying about points.

 

It sounds like, for you, they're that tool in the box that you don't need. You're clearly not concerned about balance between players, and if you're group's ok with that then there's no reason in the world you should be concerned.

 

Have your players build the characters they want, that work for the stories the group wants to tell. If something comes up in play that they should have let them add it. The points only matter if you care about them.

 

Use the rules to determine outcomes; To help define effects to the extent that you need a system for that.

 

Stop worrying about points.

Maybe that is the key for me and my group. Maybe we need to play this game backwards.

Instead of focussing on points, maybe we should just decide what powers with what limits each has, and then build that, however many points it needs in the System.

Of course, then we have to do any balancing ourselves, as opposed to a game like BoH/MEGS, in which I believe you can use points to buy powers instead of effects.

Plus if we have to do all the character creation balancing work ourselves, we could just stay in Torg.

But it's an interesting idea I will bring up when we meet.

Re: Can this be done x 2

Pretty easy' date=' a moderate to large multipower with EB, RKA, HKA, Flash, Images, Entangle, Maybe some Stretching and season to taste with a handful of other powers most with Variable Advantage and Variable SFX and you can simulate most gear a GM would care about; Add a transform for other minor things (There's your deck of cards), toss in teleport and you're set.[/quote']

 

I bet that any non VPP you could design beforehand, I can (after you do that) come up with an item I could put in my house that wouldn't be covered in a story-truth appropriate way. Then we are back to the GM saying, "well, you can't teleport *that*."

Re: Can this be done x 2

this could be done

you just need to figure out what the heaviest thing in your house would be

the fridge,water heater and bath tub would the heaviest things at say 200 kg and pay the points for it

now I would not charge you any points other than the base/vehicle perk points

but you would have to pay for anything unusual, like that hanging 16 ton wt set for the villian that threatens you with a banana

There's another use I hadn't even thought of - teleport something heavy like the fridge above something fragile, like the bad guy.

This is what I mean, there are so many potential uses, I could not hope to think of every single one of them beforehand.

Re: Can this be done x 2

if you are going to give your player the points to pay for said effect

then all is well

This only works when either the player or the GM knows all the logically doable effects beforehand.

And what with human creativity and the playing field being a richly detailed world where the possibilities are only confined to one's imagination, I am fairly certain that while what you say may work in theory, in practice there will ALWAYS be a use that hadn't been considered when the power was purchased, that if the GM restricts the player from doing, seems bizarrely limiting and not at all respectful of the integrity of the story and its continuity and logic.

Re: Can this be done x 2

OK so I think I am getting the following from people replies:

1) Some people have never had this problem.

Not sure how to use that to help me, unless its a subtle way of saying Bad Sindyr! You play differently!

2) Everybody should play to have fun, its all about drama.

Same problem, this rah-rah mantra does NOT stop the illogic of the base issue of atificially reduced useability with no in game logic from ruining things.

3) Sindyr, you are trying to power game and make abusive characters. -or- character that can actually do what their powers suggest are too powerful for anything other than fiction!

I know this not to be true, in other game system I have both GMed and played incredibly more powerful characters than Mr. I Can TP Stuff From My House. (this sentence makes me lol)

4) VPPs *are* the solution to someone wanting to use their ability broadly without wanting to stay inside the lines of their pre-thought limited uses.

The problem here is that *every* power set ultimately *should* be able to have some versatile use - I *want* the player's coming up with new ways to leverage their abilities. Plus I don't want to be, "Here's *your VPP, Fred. Here's *your* VPP, Sam. Here's *your* VPP, Jack" etc.

Hero System is a complex game which is perhaps the perfect system for quantizing the effects a character has on the game world. Problem is, as it seems to turn out, by disallowing all non prebought effects you turn a story game into more of a tactical wargame without the board, I think, where the only moves your character really has are the one's you have prethought and prepurchased.

This isn't necessarily a bad thing - even D&D isn't a *bad* roleplaying game. But I am wondering if I need a game that , for sure, has balancing CP versus powers as a priority, but doesn't place that goal that of respecting the internal logic of the truth of the game world, and which defines powers in terms of their *internal game-world" effects. For example, you limitations on what you can teleport is based on *in-game* factors, like distance, mass, line-of-sight, familiarity, possible a skill roll, and *not* based on what the story effect of each teleport would be. One that is, for lack of a better word, story-effect agnostic, letting the chip fall where they may in order to embrace and emphasize the integrity and reality of the game world.

I am still processing all this, and I continue to thank all of your for help me.