TheEmerged

Re: O.m.a.c. For the same reason transporters in Star Trek weren't used to eliminate aging -- because the writers didn't stop to consider the logical extensions of what they were doing.

Re: DEX: and the Marvel Universe Speaking as someone from the "Batman & Captain America are Dex 30" school, my own conversion of Spiderman (Arachnaman) clocks in at DEX 53, with the campaign-max DEX defined as being DEX 60. The difference is that he doesn't have the speedster tricks -- but this is how he's depicted in the comics, as being virtually untouchable by non-area attacks. Nightcrawler I'd peg in the same territory -- except he has some actual speedster tricks. Sure, he "teleports" instead of running fast, but in practice most of the effects are the same. In game mechanics, does it really matter if your +DCV levels are due to running out of the way or teleporting? Beast I've got pegged in the 43-48 range. I know he's been shown in the RPG materials as being on Spidey & Nightcrawlers level, but I don't see this in the way he's depicted most of the time. Daredevil I view in the high 20's. Someone earlier suggested 28, sounds about right to me.

Re: Super humans populations in cities Actually, for NeoChampions I use a "genre convention no-prize" I originally created for the Emergence campaign: novadom is 'contagious' -- the chance of any particular person become a nova (person with superpowers) is directly proportional to the amount of contact they have with novas, and how powerful those novas are. For example, my fictional city of Michtendorf was home to Hyperion (campaign equivalent of Superman/Captain Marvel), in his prime one of the 5 most powerful novas on the planet. Over time, Michtendorf has become the 'nova capital of the world', at least in part because of his presence there. As more novas arrived there, there was more nova contact going on... To put it another way; on a global average about 1 in 1,000,000 people are novas. However this is skewed greatly from place to place; in Michtendorf (population roughly 2 million) it's about 1 in 20,000. Cincinnati Ohio (which is still in the Top 10 cities in America size-wise in the campaign world) has about 30 novas of various power level in the area (including the PC's).

Re: Physical or Psychological Disadvantage? My rule of thumb: if it affects how a character acts, it's psychological. If it affects what a character does -- or doesn't -- it's physical. If it affects how people react to the character, it's social. My "rule of pinky" as I jokingly call it goes like this: if the above rule causes conflicts, rule by the kind of problems this causes the character. Take myself as an example. I'm noticeably eccentric, to the extent it causes social problems for me (I annoy people, people stop bringing up certain topics around me, etc.). On the surface this might sound more psychological, but the problems it causes are not of the "do I do this, or this?" variety -- they're of the "who and how badly do I annoy?" As such, this is properly a social disadvantage. I'm somewhat nearsighted & mildly 'cross eyed'. This does not affect me socially -- it's slight enough to be imperceptible to anyone but an eye doctor doing a test on me. However it definitely affects my abilities, such as hitting a moving baseball with a bat (because I have to guess which ball is real). As such this is a physical disadvantage, and a slight one at that. I have an associate who is manic depressive; she is (mostly) able to control it with medication. While the cause of the symptom is physical and could be perceived as being a Dependency, I'd rule it as Psychological -- because the problems are caused in decision making. ================================= One major cavaet to the above is that I'm very careful about allowing either "double dipping" or "tomato effect" -- allowing the character to get disadvantage points for the same thing twice, or allowing 'extra' disadvantage points for a category by redefining the category (the way tomatoes are legally considered vegetables in order to avoid a tax).

Re: Who Came First the Superhero or the Supervillain? *Most* of the novas that erupted the day of the Emergence (September 20, 1972) were heroic -- most notably Hyperion (campaign equivalent of Superman/Captain Marvel), generally viewed as the first nova. At least one of the 'first novas', Gunner, started out a heroine but became a villain. However, technically he was not the first nova -- but telling more would be a campaign spoiler.

Re: How to build a drag chute? One of the PC's in the current campaign has the -10" KB, only reduces up to half of KB power. In his case it's not a focus but a representation of his ability to control his momentum. You might also want to add Gliding, Trigger, Uncontrolled with a Continuing Charge if you want this to function when he's unconscious and falling.

Re: Favorite Abuse RE: Autofire Entangle. I adopted a house rule on this one a long time ago: an Entangle can never have more BODY than it could potentially have from a perfect roll: a 3d6 Entangle for example can never have more than 6 BODY; a 3d6 Entangle with the +d6 adder could go to 8 BODY, or 10 BODY if you have it twice, or 12 BODY if you had it the maximum 3 times.

Re: Green Lantern VPP is the traditional answer to this question. However, no small percentage of its effects as shown in the comic are simple Telekinesis representing "force manipulation". The fact that it looks like women instead of a giant hand (or boxing glove) is either just a special effect or a representation of a higher Power skill (GM's call).

Re: Could your Champions character beat... Well, my own take on Cap would be similar to Trebuchet's, but with a higher SPD (8 as a minimum) and either a VPP "tricks" pool or a load of martial artist tricks (insert "Disgustingly Powerful Ninja" joke here). Speaking first of my actual characters (I'm usually GM) Stefan Sashkey. Stefan is a Spectre-level character, the kind you can imagine playing dodgeball with planets during the Silver Age (if he weren't an Iron Age/Pulp character). If Stefan had a reason to fight Cap, Cap wouldn't stand a chance. But then, the chance of this happening are low -- Stefan is more of a behind-the-scenes plotter than a fisticuffer. The Disruptor. All Cap, but the Disruptor would be able to escape before being captured. The Disruptor simply isn't on Cap's level in terms of combat prowess or points. Now in terms of strategic capability they'd be an even match -- TD could have done Cap's job coordinating during the JLA/Avengers climax. SythRyss, the psionic kobold. Again, the physical confrontation goes to Cap -- which isn't saying a whole heck of a lot. Where things getting interesting here is in debate/oratory, where SythRyss could give Cap the fight of his life even without the benefit of his telepathy, telempathy, mind control etc etc. ========================= PC's in the campaign I'm running: even all four of them ganging up on him with the benefit of their 32 henchmen, it would require luck or a very, very good plan. Either Nurock or Hexadecimal would have a chance of taking him down if they could get around his defenses -- no easy task, giving his martial skills. Sting would suffer from the "Fesic" liability; he's used to (and built) to fight groups, not single hardened targets. And we discussed The Disruptor above.

Re: The Akane Tendo Culinary Institute My main problem with this type of concept -- from a GM's point of view, not a roleplayer's -- is that they tend toward multiple disadvantage categories. There are times when it is called for; to use the example in question the Physical (can't cook, at all) and PsychLim (must convince people to eat his/her attempts to cook) stretch the margin of what I'll allow to nearly the breaking point -- expecting me to also allow a Reputation (lousy cook) breaks it. Insert argument about changing the points to disadvantage ratio (from 200/150 to 250/100 for superheroes for example, or from 75/75 to 100/50 for heroic) here.

Re: Sexuality and the Silver Age RE: Scarlet Witch's outfit. Okay, I started comics during the Silver Age and frankly, her outfit wasn't as racy as Wonder Woman's or Black Canary.

Re: A New Look at Martial Arts Well, speaking *only* for myself, I've always felt the +1 OCV for 2 pts thing is too cheap; I pretty much require the 3pt level. As for your suggestions, let me chew on them for a bit...

Re: Intelligent multipowers Regarding the defense pool example: it was my understanding you can only change the way a pool is distributed once per phase...

Re: Help with a character's powers Well, you *could* build the power with Reduced Penetration and fiat that the "second half" is applied to PD instead of ED. You could also build two seperate blasts -- one to PD and one to ED -- and link the second one as part of a designed multiple-power attack You could also build it as a single attack with Limited Variable Effect and having the character take 3-shot autofire, defined as only being 2 shots of different effects than 3 shots of the same effect. Add on Concentrated Autofire and a +1 OCV for the second shot to have the same OCV roll and you've got a plan. /humor on And since this is HERO, you could also build it as Transform -- Person to Person with less STUN than they had a while ago /humor off

Re: Animate Shadow, how would you build? Maybe I'm just testy today, then -- I was referring to the use of the 2nd-person "your", which seemed to imply you were saying that either I or the original poster were running a run-of-the-mill campaign, as in boring and unoriginal. No insult taken if no insult meant

Re: Animate Shadow, how would you build? I hope you didn't mean that the way it sounded.

Re: Intelligent multipowers I've run this as a -0 switch on the pool = "No choice of which slot is used, appropriate choice is automatically used". Of course, I wouldn't then allow seperate limits for "only vs water" or somesuch on the slots...

Re: YOUR FRIENDS: Cost You Points, or Get You Points? Most of my friends aren't points -- but that's more of a statement about the number of people I have contact with than the quality of friendships. I happen to have Butler County Ohio's equivalent of Kevin Bacon for a mother -- you know, 6 steps and all that? She's probably no more than 2-3 steps removed from anyone in this county. She would definitely require the "contact has significant contacts" adder. Heck, if you wrote her up in HERO she'd have to have Well Connected and would still probably have 30-50 points in contacts... I jokingly paid points for my dog Buster Seeker when I wrote myself up, but in truth he doesn't behave well enough to be considered a follower. My main issue would be that most of my contacts wouldn't be much good to an adventurer. You want a house built? I know enough people with the right skills to get it done. You want to raise a posse? I know a few ex-cops but that's it...

Re: Animate Shadow, how would you build? One of the PC's in the campaign I'm running has a similar power, which I've built as a Slavishly Loyal (+1) summon. This assumes that the shadows all have the same abilities, regardless of whose shadow they are.

Re: The Essential Bad Silver Age RE: That infamous Brave & Bold Issue. I'm far from the only person that remembers this; it's been picked by several "silly silver age" lists as one of the most absurd moments in comic history. And I have this issue stashed away at home. /sarcasm on I've long joked about having multiple copies in safe-deposit boxes, with instructions for them to be mailed to appropriate people should I disappear suddenly /sarcasm off What's going on? There's something stealable in Gotham, and Batman is trying to convince Copperhead that he's too distracted to guard it. WW & BG keep giving him more and more outlandish gifts -- but when they write their secret identities on slips of paper and tell him where they've hidden them, Batman realizes it's gone too far -- they've actually fallen in love with him! It gets worse from here, believe me...

Re: Rewrite your PC(s) as Iron Age Villians! Okay... Space Captain and Green Man. His parents and siblings killed in a union riot, poet Jerome' St. Francis realized that sometimes the pen could only survive when protected by the sword. He discovered legends of an artifact from the lost ages, and spent his inheritance searching for it. To his horror, he realized it had been hidden... on the planet Mars! With the help of a rogue inventor, he travelled to the red planet, only to find it protected by a guardian of immense power and speed. However, using his wits he managed to trick the guardian.. ...just in time for the rogue scientist to try and steal the artifact for himself! In the ensuing scuffle the artifact is split in twain; Jerome' becoming empowered by the Bright side, the evil Dr. Void by the Dark side. Recognizing his failure to protect the artifact for its prophesized recoverer, the Green Man (who is anything but little) decided he was bound by honor to help Jerome' recover the other half of the artifact and the rest of his powers. Jerome' was thrilled to discover he could fly through space on his own now, and chose to dress in a stylized "shining armor" appropriate for the space age. Returning to Earth, they sought similar-minded companions to found a new superhero team -- one dedicated to fighting not just against the enemies of Peace & Freedom, but *for* the American Way. The PC's are Nurock -- empowered by the dark stone -- and Sting, the insectoid protector of the Twin Orb. I switched out a dark-agey martial arts origin for the silver-age SF origin as well. E pluribus Unum. Janie was born to a travelling family, and developed an endearing love not just for America but the individual character of the states that comprised it. One day as a teenager, her family was visiting Alaska when they found themselves about to be hit with an avalanche! "If only I could be as large as Alaska!" she wished -- and suddenly, she was forty stories tall! At first she thought this was her only ability -- and then she found she could become as small as Rhode Island, as tough as Pennsylvania Steel, as volcanic as Hawaii... and so on and so on and so on... Eventually she realized her powers gave her a duty to protect those states, and so became their champion in deed and in image. Hence was born E Pluribus Unum -- the ultimate flag-suited heroine, whose outfit changes with her powers, both reflecting the state she's chosen at the moment. Hexadecimal -- hey, after her 16 forms and AlphaBeth's 26, why not go for 50? The Constructor. Handsome (even at his advanced age), popular, respected, and beloved -- one of the first superheroes has chosen to given the benefit of his experience to this young group of heroes. He is renown not only for his technical saavy and power to make even the most mundane of items high-tech wonders, but also for his respect for life. AKA The Disruptor, one of the most hated & reviled villains in history, also one of the ugliest novas known...

Re: Creation philosophy Eggshells and Sledgehammers -- have to remember that one. I've always called it d2 myself: "Whoever blows their first roll..." Now, having played the opposite extreme (where battles regularly creep into the 2nd turn), I'm a fan of the middle ground. I purposely guide the players toward the "4-5 hits" territory when building their characters and build the opposition accordingly. The lowest DEF among the players is 20, and that's for a character with a permanent Darkness field... Average is around 30, although everybody agrees they should add 5-10 DEF in the near future.

Re: Rewrite your PC(s) as Iron Age Villians! Me Grimlocke love challenge This is going to take a bit to do right...

Re: a Villian game Villain campaigns are fun if you have the right kind of player -- which, thankfully, I have You do have to be more proactive as GM. I've found it helpful to develop a series of opportunities and let the players decide which to pursue. You also find yourself having to create more material, because (/sarcasm on) for some unknown reason (/sarcasm off) DOJ has decided they aren't going to publish much in the way of NPC heroes.

Re: Rewrite your PC(s) as Iron Age Villians! Um, the PC's in my campaign ARE villains, and are relatively Iron Age. Does that mean I need to write them up as Silver Age Heroes ?