zornwil

Boomerang. With those stats and abilities, he's always coming back for more somehow, often through a fancy or indirect attack of some sort.

I suppose the main question is (and sorry, don't have USPD in front of me, it's at home and I'm at work) when does the Gravity Cancel stop working? I'd go with a couple ways to handle this (and sorry in advance for not directly answering your questions but I think this gets there) - call weightless "10 pounds" in a super-heroic game for the purposes of throwing and such - otherwise it's just going to get crazily abusive - also consider where/how the Gravity Cancel stops working - if the person leaves the field of it, their increased weight should affect what happens whenever it kicks in (ouch! they're going to fall from a tall distance!); I wouldn't get physics-crazy/accurate on it, I'd just make a genre-accurate ruling on this If the characters keep doing this though and seem to have the capability to pull it off too much of the time, it may make sense for them to buy a power that requires them both and the setup and basically does a teleport (megascaled if you really want this weightless thing to go flying) fairly cheaply (there would be significant limitations). I just think it could end up being too strong a tactic, but of course that also depends on how likely they are to strike and how much coordination it requires that they can perform, so it may not require creating a new power either.

I'm missing something - why all the additional attributes/rules when you can just make it SFX of the COM on a case-by-case basis?

Depends on how the power would be used, I'd be inclined to go -1/2 to -1 if it's more of a combat thing and you're losing out on ever stacking attacks, but if it really is just for interrogation and the like, it's pretty much no longer a disad at all in my view, or -1/4 at best. I suspect it's the latter, so...-0 or -1/4 if so.

Well, for what it's worth, since you asked... Nope, no sir, I don't like it, I don't like it at all. Just call me Mr. Horse. I don't see a good reason to have a massive STUN strike knock someone totally out. Why? Because if the character paid for all that STUN, that should not be dismissed. People consider both CON and STUN points when building characters. Of course, I suppose if your concern is STUN inflation, fair enough, you'll certainly put a stop to that. But I think having lots of STUN for some characters and "unrealistically" resisting such damage is good heroic RPGing.

I have lots of house rules, since you asked they are at http://www.asterick.com/realschluss/x-champions/house_rules/index.html . But highlights are covered below. As to "why", it's to fix things I perceive as broken or less than ideal and can be made closer to ideal with no massive effort. Or, in a few cases, campaign-specific things. Highlights would be: Mental and Supernatural Defenses - mental I do like most people, I just think it should be derived with no "entry" cost, that seems unfair to regular people and doesn't make sense to me - it also corrects for those situations where you think a character should have 20 or higher EGO but no "special" MD beyond what they should have just based on EGO; supernatural was/is to make the supernatural stuff more differentiated and to make it so the subjects of purely supernatural (no material element involved beyond that invoked by belief) attacks resist based on INT; MOST IMPORTANTLY, SD replaced Power Defense COMPLETELY as the arbitrary non-Mental/Energy/Physical catch-all special defense, I felt the "Power Defense" idea was so vague it was senseless, so this gives it a different grounding (I think most Power Defense things reflect more supernatural things, and if you do NOT want them to, you should be using Phys/Ener/Mental) Martial Arts - I've discussed this elsewhere, in a nutshell I don't want big bricks to get cheap martial arts maneuvers as such (yes, I know they can just buy cheap CVs - that's a good and different thing in my book), and I want low-STR people to have easy access to martial arts (in fact you can be totally normal, get martial arts cheaper in my game, and buy up damage classes for a very effective character with low STR) Perks - Contacts were modified mainly for my game and also because the cost increases (though they weren't quite as bad as people made them out to be) in 5th were outrageous to me, when you compared loyal contacts to Followers, it ended up being cheaper to just buy a follower who is well-connected and in the organization you want - made no sense Inherent - that was a silly thing introduced into 5th with very limited application in my view, no reason to start to differentiate it in my view Adjustment Powers - i felt they were generally overpriced for what they did, and I felt the genre put them more as a normally at-range thing Classes of mental effects - this was one of the worst changes in 5th in my view; it was good as a discussion point, but to have to buy separate classes, including "aliens" (what rationale is there besides convenience for that as a category???), and pay the same price as for people is ridiculous in most games; I dropped them and left it in the traditional case-by-case (meaning based on character concept) basis. In a modern game, selecting only aliens or only animals is of course a limitation. Many 5th edition changes I didn't like, so ignored and house-ruled them away. They all related to things I didn't see as broken prior to 5th - Aid, Healing, Regen, Shape Shift, EC, they all worked just fine, never had an issue. I added an invulnerability power, like many people, with some limitations, in order to model those instances so common in the genre where a particular type of attack(s) has no impact whatsoever on someone. I am NEVER (well, okay, barring unforeseen circumstances) going to allow "does BODY" at only +1 on an NND. VPPs - I added some logic to make these model more the way I think they work best in fiction, where trading the powers in a VPP is either a lot more costly or you can try to trade them out as you go for penalties on the likelihood they'll function as expected - this models both the sorcerers who try to concoct a new spell in the middle of combat and the gadgeteers who try to jury-rig a device to do something different in combat. Disads - added campaign-specific ones such as "Alumni of Xaviers' New School for the Gifted" and "Unregistered" Combat - made actions in a phase simultaneous to just get a little closer to fictional combat where people shoot each other at the same time; weirdest thing I suppose is that I "stack" STUN and BOD damage, so that defenses strip off the BOD damage FIRST, and then any remaining defenses act against STUN, or, if none, the remaining BOD gets through and all the STUN goes through, the reason being I just like how this works in terms of letting more STUN damage through and making BOD damage pretty important/meaningful (i.e., it's not just meaningful that you dealt STUN and some BOD, it matters whether you dealt that same STUN with a LOT or a LITTLE BOD now) Multiple Power Attacks - just seem too abusive without more controls, so I made it so you have to buy some advantages to use them END and at range - I thought they both worked just fine in the older rules at 1/5 for END and -1/3" for range - with END I tweaked further to run off of the base cost and that seems to work a little better for my own thoughts Experience and Reputation - added a system to more discreetly award XPs but also to allow character growth via reputation (it also shapes certain things, like you don't get a Presence Attack until you graduate to the first Reputation Level, you can't get a base until further up than that) - this Reputation thing just seems more consistent with heroic fictional lead characters

I also think you'll have to go illegal if you want the beast to do anything outside the base. I don't have the book handy but I believe you can't have these base characters go out and perform like regular flexible Summoned and Followers and the like. But yeah, I'd go for it this way if it's a one-shot.

Hmmmm, interesting, I like this notion and would be interested in seeing a definitive rules approach. It may not be a Steve rules question but you might want to put a shot out to Steve in the title of a thread here and get his opinion. If it's a single power, I'd go at least -1, and if it really is going to be played limited enough (but I don't think so given your statements) it could be as high as -2. I would go -2, for example, if it were going to be a "true" EB which simply had varying advantages and lims but never was used to, for example, simulate TK or simulate a Flash. However, if you're coupling this with power stunts and getting a lot of extra flexibility, -1 seems wholly adequate. You know, I really like that you are addressing this issue the more I think about it. What you're really coming up with, I feel, is the crux of what an EC really is in most super-heroic stories! It's the ability to manipulate this one single "trick" or element in all sorts of ways, and I think in comics in general, those elementals really work that way, with their big blasts being powerful but simple, and the "technique" stuff being less powerful but more ornate. So if we find a good solution to this, I think in super-hero games it should REPLACE Elemental Controls (yeah you heard me right) at least 50% of the time or maybe even 90% of the time. Basically you create this power base with a number of points and the distribution of your element can vary within those limits. The key difference between this VPP and EC is really that there is a better governance than in regular VPPs, more flexibility than ECs, but overall a tighter conceptual framework, if it were fleshed out correct. And as we think about it, it also illuminates the fundamental similarity between VPP and EC, and calls into question the two separate frameworks. I would suggest in fact that it may be possible to create a singular framework which replaces both but serves both functions. Perhaps it would be something like an EC with an open-ended number of slots. I don't know. I just wanted to throw some thoughts out while it strikes me and see what strikes back.

The question starting this thread is well-answered...so...time to hijack this thread... no, not really, but given the topic I would just add that for nearly all mental powers, I make "visible" to mean that it's visible only to mentalists, and the affected party usually only if they have some ability at figuring such things out, but I don't make it visible otherwise. TK is a bit different necessarily, and in this event I only require that someone observing would see the person directing the TK, but there's no sort of requirement for my games for the TK to manifest in such a way that there's a visible link between the person and the object per se. I just think mental powers work best as "semi-visible" by default. Full invisibility for me usually means you don't realize it's happening. But this is by no means the HERO rules. I just mention it as I've found it works well. I always feel mentalists get a bit of a short end of the stick otherwise, as they're usually not much in the physical world and making them too obvious makes them even bigger marks then they already are. Heck as it is the villains in my campaign have a tendency to knock out lemming's mentalist in the game early on, if her effects were more obvious it'd be even harder on her.

Oh sure, since I already bought Star Hero a while back, and have been on the fence on the other two, NOW they're all in a reduced bundle. Good idea, seriously.

Q: Grotesquo Boy, what do you call that feat where your tongue hits the lamppost so hard that debris flies off and knocks out your opponents? EDIT - whoops, and A: I was on Mars for most of the time, but recently came home because of that news.

Q: Who was that complaining about Heidi's services? A: Status meetings, I'm delighted!

Pardon snippage. First comment above, excellent idea, I think I would take advantage of that time and again. I would pay a few dollars extra just to avoid the wear and tear on my own printer. Hey - here's a tangential idea - what if there were some way where if you buy a hardcopy HERO book in a store you could send in some coupon or other identifier from the book with $5 (or some-such) and get the electronic version on CD sent to you? Probably too much overhead, but would be useful and I think this method would reduce piracy - especially if the CD lacked pictures or some-such "niceties". Re the second comment, I have been involved in e-presales though for physical materials, and if there's sufficient "buzz" around the product they tend to work very well. That buzz may be already here in the HERO personal network sufficiently enough to make it worthwhile, at least as a pilot.

Q: Let me know what you're bringing to the game tonight, I don't want everyone bringing the same thing. A: Vagabonds really bug me.

Re: Re: difficulty of system? I would say I thoroughly disagree regarding rules abuse. I think M&M is not only as easy to abuse but harder to determine abuse in given much of the all-or-nothing nature of powers therein as well as the lack of definition in many powers (which is also a strength, but you can see some of the confusion caused that is typical of a first version of a product). I think HERO is much easier to police as the points are better balanced and the text of 5th edition gives MUCH good detail on powers and things to look out for. As far as confusion, hard to say. I think if you try to learn everything, yes, it is one of the more confusing games out there, but my sense is that as the text is better explicated than most games, the confusion is under check if you just start out without using options and stick to the essentials.

I can add on one comment more - if I don't get to browse a book (at least a reference or RPG or nonfiction book anyway) before buying, it's much less likely I'll buy it. I've only bought 1 or 2 of the Digital Heroes because it isn't clear to me there's enough content of interest. With SoB, I should add on something important - the reason I knew there were sufficient maps is because I'm in the playtest group, so that motivated me to buy it. Were I not in that group, I may not have bought it as I may not have been sure the maps (number/type) would be worthwhile.

To answer this question differently, I ONLY bought it on the understanding of the maps included. If that helps put the puzzle together...great...if not...ignore!

Oh, and I suppose if everyone broke the law but nothing bad happened, that'd be okay? Well, that's the kind of moral relativism I've learned to expect in this society... No, if they're not playing my way, they're playing wrong. I've tried to be nice, I've tried to be patient with you all. But you ALL KEEP playing the wrong way. In fact you keep using that new big black book, too. Therefore, I'm going to invade your houses. One-by-one. Please send me your addresses and I will occupy until you've learned to play the right way. Trust me, you'll be happier.

I suppose in some part this issue is related to the fact that END is lumped into the system somewhat uncomfortably as opposed to being a raw building block; in other words, some powers automatically cost END, others don't. We don't have a system with everything not including END and you purchase that as an add-on. I'm not complaining, just thinking aloud about the crux of the END issue.

But that's the crux of the issue. Why wouldn't Area Effect normally cost more endurance than a single shot with no area when the energy is disbursed over a greater area? If I have a 6d6 EB Area Effect, wouldn't that normally epend more energy and endurance than a 6d6 EB with no Area Effect? You don't turn the Area Effect advantage off anyway, once you buy it, remember an advantage may have some variability built-in but you can't normally just shut the advantage totally off. If you want to use less END, just shoot a lower spray. Now you (and I) might think that a 6d6 power is the same END whether with Area or not. But my point is that it's in the eye of the beholder, and I could very easily envision it either way. HERO could have provided a standard "costs END/does not cost END" per advantage but elected not to, I presume, for both balance and complexity. Balance because in theory anything with more gusto to it should have some corresponding END impact (a 6d6 AP EB is still more powerful than a 6d6 non-AP EB). Complexity because breaking it out for each advantage costs more. In theory, the cost of the advantage should take into account it is also bumping up END. If you say some advantages do not cost END, perhaps the advantage should cost a bit more? I have no problem with the idea, I just think it's complex enough and potentially unbalancing enough that it constitutes a deviation from the rules and I would not propose changing the core rules to suit that. Now, similarly, I would argue, why wouldn't limitations decrease END required? But I must assume here that it's a balance issue given what that would mean in pushing END costs even lower. I might try it out myself and change my system from 1 END/5 base to the standard if I throw out enough advantages and include enough limitations that would not cost and would cost END respectively.

Ah, didn't realize that was do-able in Acrobat. Thanks, will pursue.

Thanks, sorry it took so long.

Q: So I hear you have a plan to kill Takophanes? A: Meet my mother, the cow!

Re: Re: SoB - extracting graphics (legal purposes) Because I want to blow it up to hex size = 1/2 inch or 1 inch - note there are many small hex maps that need to be bigger. It's a pain to go and reproduce them bigger manually.

I can't open the PDF in Adobe Photoshop - understandably - so am asking how others have extracted the maps to make blown-up print size ones where applicable? I understand I could take a screen snapshot and use that. No problem. But looking for better methods. Please note the purpose is solely for personal game-play. I just want to use the maps in my games.