Derek Hiemforth

I agree that it's a bit unclear. My reading is that if the lesser and greater powers both work at Range (and therefore it could be described as "A Linked power that works at Range"), then the lesser power gets the greater power's Range for free. In other words, I think the Linking can increase the Range of the lesser power, but it doesn't grant Range to the lesser power.

I think you logically have to treat it as separate powers. While the RAW may not be totally explicit about this, I think it's clearly implied by both the way Limitations apply to Life Support, and by the cost table for Life Support (where each type has its own cost or cost range, rather than saying "+x points" in the manner that, say, Invisibility does).

I've been asked to weigh in on this discussion, so here I am, weighing in. How Darkness vs. Mental that is Perceivable to Sight and Hearing (or Sight and Mental, or Invisible Power Effects, etc.) works is the sort of detailed Power-interaction detail that I deliberately left out of CC as much as possible, in order to avoid page count devoted to rarely-occurring situations. For the vast majority of such cases, I reasoned, the best answer will depend on the SFX and the game and GM. However, the release of CC doesn't mean any of the rules regarding rare corner-cases in the 6E rules set changed (other than in the handful of minor changes CC specifically introduced, none of which were Sense-related). CC was just silent about them for the sake of brevity. So I agree with Steve, because this is a matter of clarification of how the 6E rules work, and this area of the 6E rules was not (intentionally) changed in CC (or in FHC, AFAIK). So when looking for clarification of the "RAW" 6E rules engine, his answer referring to 6E1 and 6E2 also applies to CC and FHC. However, I also agree with Cantriped, because the rules of the game are however the GM chooses to apply the RAW. And also because his take seems logical enough to me that -- were I a player in that game -- I would feel no strong urge to dispute it. My own answer to this situation would be, "Darkness is weird; it depends on the Special Effects of the Darkness and the Mind Scan." By affecting a particular Sense Group (such as Mental Senses), the Darkness pretty much has to be perceptible to that Sense Group, at least in the negative, for targets within the Darkness area. In other words, if I create an area of Darkness vs. Normal Sight, and you're within the area, you're going to know that you can't see out of the area. It's hard to imagine how it could be any other way. However, the visible effect of the Power, as perceived by those not in the Darkness area, is not subject to that consideration. For example, you could certainly have a Darkness vs. Normal Sight where it was not at all obvious from outside the area why the targets within the Darkness couldn't see, or even that they couldn't see. Using that same logic, I can certainly imagine a Darkness vs. Mental where someone with Mind Scan outside the affected area wouldn't even know the Darkness was there, even though someone with Mind Scan inside the affected area would be unable to Mind Scan out of it.

If you're the narrator, then as long as you have access to the world, your players can play in your game.

This is correct. Alternate forms are built on the same Total CP as the most expensive form (or fewer) [not the same Total CP as the true form (or fewer)]. Sorry about that! (In my defense, 6E1 makes the same mistake... )

I don't really have an equation to suggest, because I would never use a Rule of X. I agree with basically all of the cautions against numerical "effectiveness ceilings" described on CC page 190.

Ideally, I think you'd want each element in the equation to generally be close to equal. For example, say you've got one character with CV 8, SPD 5, DC 12, and a PD+ED/5 of 5, and a second character of CV 7, SPD 8, DC 11, and a PD+ED/5 of 4. By the formula, they'd be "equal." But because the second character increased their SPD substantially by lowering their other three factors slightly, they're not that equal at all. This kind of tomfoolery is a little harder to manage if each element in the equation is "weighted" the same.

This is how I built them in Champions Complete:

Yeah, I took one look at the thread and determined that I had no interest in participating in the thread or returning to the site.

Have you seen Champions Complete?

How exactly is basing STR Min on an Active Point formula more realistic than simply assigning a reasonable-seeming STR Min?

I didn't read it as an attempt to be authoritative about what the rules as presented in CC say or don't say... (added emphasis mine) I took that to mean that psyber264 was describing one GM's application of the rules. So to the extent that Mental Powers work that way "by default" in that campaign, psyber264 is correct. I'm totally fine with there being no single default assumption. Personally, my default assumption would be that -- unless the GM specifies otherwise as a campaign ground rule -- Mental Powers are assumed to work on minds that are similar to the minds of the most common character type(s) in the campaign setting. So, say, in a setting that was mostly similar to the real world but included rare aliens, Mental Powers would...: Work normally on humans Mostly work on sentient aliens whose minds were fairly similar to humans, working less well (or not at all) on sentient aliens that were more different Work with declining effectiveness on animals as the animal minds became more removed from humans (so pretty well on apes, not as well on rabbits, still less well on birds, etc. Barely work (if at all) on plants; you might get some vague sense, but certainly no more than that Not work at all on machines If you want Mental Powers to work more narrowly than this overall, you can take a Limitation. If this only curtails the effectiveness (for example, they only work on young humans, and still don't work against plants) then it's a bigger Limitation; if it curtails some effectiveness while expanding others (for example, they don't work at all against humans, but work normally against machines), that's a smaller Limitation. But that's just how I'd run it.

It isn't stated. Because the book is silent about it, it's tacitly up to the GM to decide how broadly Mental Powers should apply.

I know I'm in the minority on this, but I'll toss it out there anyway... In this day and age, where almost everyone has (or can borrow) access to the Internet and a printer, I think maybe RPG books still include things they really don't need to anymore. For example, does anyone photocopy blank character sheets out of books anymore? Couldn't that be left as a free downloadable extra on a website? In Champions Complete, I tried to make the examples as useful as possible (by having the example characters match the ten superhero archetypes, by having the example powers show how to recreate Powers from older editions of the game or create some of the most famous comic book superhero powers, etc.) But even there, I wonder... Those things are probably useful to folks when they're first starting out, but once they've been playing a while, does that chapter turn into 28 pages of wasted space that they just carry around with them now? Would it be better to have a free "Examples" download for folks? So I don't know... Part of me wonders if maybe books would benefit from focusing more on only including things that you'll always need, and deferring stuff you'll only need at first (like examples) or only use once or twice (like an adventure) into downloadable freebies.

This may be beyond your control, but if there's anything you can do to encourage the players not to read the GM's Vault material, I suggest doing it. I think VB -- even more than most books -- really benefits from some of the GM's Vault stuff remaining unknown to the players until their characters discover it through play. I also recommend liberal use of the Hot Spots For Cool Heroes. I think they add a lot to the "feel" of a VB game.

I think a lot of folks (including me, at times) overcomplicate this stuff. The short, SHORT version (as they would say in Spaceballs): If it would be fun, allow it. The goal of the game is to have fun.

I'm following CC, unsurprisingly. Honestly, though... I didn't personally have anything against Classes of Minds -- removing them was an editorial decision. But it didn't bother me to see them go, either. They make logical sense, but I could see why someone might also say that they're an unnecessary layer of complexity. Generally speaking, you can just have Mental Powers work against the targets you'd expect them to work against, and if they only work against a smaller group than that, give 'em a Limitation. It only starts getting sticky in settings where there are more than one wide class of targets you might employ Mental Powers against (such as a technologically-advanced game where both Humans and advanced Machines are extremely common). In that sort of setting, I might use Classes of Minds. However, I'd probably do something different with the Alien Class of Minds. Depending on the campaign, I'd probably either make every sentient species its own Class of Minds, or I'd make every sentient species part of the same Class of Minds. Singling out only Humans in a setting where many sentient species are common would seem odd...

I'm pretty lenient about it. As long as it makes sense for the character to have it, and it makes sense why it's in the Framework and not bought normally (makes sense in a way other than, "Buying it outright is too expensive!" ) I tend to allow it. The main abuse of it I watch for is the "Hey, I've got a few extra points, so I'll stick a slot with 60 points of Power Defense in my attack Multipower so I can Abort to it!"

I've used a house rule, in grittier campaigns, that you not only take a minimum of 1 STUN for every BODY you take (like the rules describe), but that you can't Recover that STUN until you Recover that BODY. In other words, you're always down at least as much STUN as you're down BODY. This makes it so that you're just not as "tough" when you're injured as you are when you're uninjured. It takes less to knock you out when you're nursing a ruptured spleen...

Correct.

Unless, of course, you have a GM...

Steve has repeatedly told people that CC is based on the Basic rules, and doesn't contain the full HERO System rule set. This is incorrect. CC is not based on Basic, and doesn't omit anything (at least, not intentionally), except Classes of Minds and the Absolute Effect Rule, which were both removed by editorial directive, not my choice. Why he has told people this, I don't know. Perhaps he's not familiar with CC's contents, and believes it is based on Basic. But I agree that it is confusing people, and that it would be much better if the company spoke with one voice on the matter. Does CC contain everything 6E1 and 6E2 contain? Of course not. But does it contain all the rules? Yes. (With the two small exceptions noted above.) Perhaps Steve and I have different viewpoints on what constitutes a "rule."

Seems like it could be either of those solutions, or neither, depending on the SFX. Can you provide any more details to go on?

About four months, but that included wedding planning, a wedding, and a honeymoon. So really, closer to three months. Of course, that was just the time from acceptance of the proposal to turning in of the manuscript. That doesn't include editing, layout, etc.

I was actually thinking of using the cliche, but turning it on its head. I'm considering having a "hook" scene early in the scenario that starts out seeming to be a classic/routine comic book bank robbery, but quickly turns into, or is revealed to be, something different and more unusual. I want the scenario to include a mix of familiar supers tropes and less "expected" fare, and was thinking of using the "bank robbery" as the point where things really transition from one to the other.