Wyrm Ouroboros

Re: THE BOOK OF DRAGONS -- What Do *You* Want To See? What I'd especially like to see is that the ecology is taken into consideration. A dragon is the top large-prey predator in a huge area; other such predators, especially 'animalistic' ones, are going to either be dragon food (as the dragon kills them to eliminate the competition), fled, or few in number. Intelligent predators, including humans, are going to have to adapt. The other thing I'd care to see is a realistic dragon -- see the 'How many Dragon's teeth adorn YOUR shield?' thread for my thoughts on this. But in no wise, if they're intelligent or not, should dragons or other top threats be even so mild as 'difficult' kills...

Re: Hammerspace Or, if you want the Bag of Holding itself ... hm. Interesting thought. Recall that a BoH always weighs the same, no matter what it has in it -- and the more it can carry, the more that 'the same' weighs. I think I'd define it as this: Bag of Holding: Extra-Dimensional Movement (This Bag of Holding Space), 0 END (+1/2), Continuous (+1) (50 Active Points); Gate (-1/2), OAF Universal (Bag, -1), Only to Carry X Amount of Space That Weighs Y (-Z), Always Weighs P (-Q), Must Fit Through Bag Opening (-A). So. Weight & Space Carried and Disadvantage 50kg, 0.5m^3 space (-1) 100kg, 1m^3 space (-3/4) 200kg, 1.5m^3 space (-1/2) 400kg, 2m^3 space (-1/4) Bag Weight and Disadvantage 50kg (-1) 25kg (-3/4) 12.5kg (-1/2) 5kg (-1/4) Opening Size and Disadvantage 10cm x 10cm (-1) (4" square) 20cm x 20cm (-3/4) (8" square) 40cm x 40cm (-1/2) (16" square) 80cm x 80cm (-1/4) (32" square) Mix and match. A bag that carries 50kg, weighs 50kg, and has a 10cm square opening is going to be sort of crappy; the only 'advantage' you have is that you aren't probably carrying a bag a foot and a half on a side -- but that'll cost you 10 points. However, if it carries 400kg, weighs 5kg, and has almost a three foot on a side opening -- enough to hide 4 people, in fact -- it'll probably be worth the 15 points you're spending...

Re: Major NPCs from your campaign...who got ganked before their time. Deathstalker was a kickass DFV in a post-heropocalypse game -- the guvmints nuked the gathered heroes/villains, much like what COULD have happened in DC's Kingdom Come futuristic storyline. Any case, using Powers and doing the vigilante thing was illegal, and they came down hard on everyone. She was Pittsburgh's ass-kicker, pistoleer with speed/dex/int boosts, could channel power through her signature weapons to convert their bullets into plasma, that sort of thing. So a bunch of the Powers, both heroes and villains, are being held in Mt. Weather, an underground holding tank until they can be sent on to the international court for disposition. They decide to break out in the middle of lunch, and Deathstalker grabs guns and starts shooting the marine guard company like nobody's business. They, of course, shoot back, and she gets hit a few times. Still shooting from on top of one of those big double-sized lunch tables with the built-in benches, she gets blown into the wall when the just-freed TKer concussion-blasts the place. Let me extract and quote the various portions ... Re: the 'little people', one of the other heroes, coming to break them out, had shrunk to 'pebble' size and bored a hole down through the rock and concrete into the cafeteria; even dazed, damaged, and shocked as she was, she could still spot him. One side effect of her boosts was a sapping of her abilities; after a typical 20 minute boost, she had massive migraine headaches as her biology strained to catch up with her powers. But this time, there's real head trauma... It never got played out beyond that point, really; as the GM, I was of two minds whether or not she'd live. She was a fantastic, kickass character -- but callously letting her die would have underscored the fact that the game world was lethal, and punches weren't going to be pulled...

Re: Ultimate Adaptation VPP's the way to go. Granted, some stuff isn't usually allowed in a VPP, as 'GM permission only' -- but considering you're restricting the pool considerably, I think it's a good idea. You MIGHT want to make it pretty sizeable, for those times when the only way to adapt is to have the legendary 'Desolidification, Only Vs. X'. Toss the guy into the Sun, and sure, he'll survive....

Re: How do mutants work out? It is essentially a question about power level. If someone has an 'innate power' and no way to explain it -- I mean, Spider Man DID get nailed with 'mutant hysteria' a few times -- they're a mutant. They can glow, they have butterfly wings, they can turn 2D for fifteen seconds, whatever. They are frightening, or at least they weird the normal person out; think of how much attention someone who's just got significant scarring gets. But run the numbers. Make mutation, oh, 1/10th of 1%. Out of 6 billion people, that's 6 million mutants. 95% of the world's mutants are that 'Normal plus 25 points in powers' sort, however -- 5.7 million, scattered across the globe. Out of the 300k left, 95% are the 'Normal + 75' power folk. Out of the 15k left, 5% have some serious combat-use powers; the other 95% are 'rainmakers', people who can do something neat, but don't have the ability to walk into a potentially lethal fight and walk out the other end alive. You're now down to 750 people across the globe with significant power and combat capabilities. Of those 750, you need maybe 50, tops, to band together and start committing terrorist attacks 'in the name of mutantkind' to attract a some of the 15k -- and spook the Normals enough for some of them to KKK and thereby give a bad name to ordinary, decent black people ... err, I mean household mutants. "He can turn paper-thin!! You never know when he'll slide under the door and kill you all in your beds!! Kill him!!!" *insert mob noises*

Re: X-Men: The Next Generation campaign on Hero Central X-Activity needed ... badly!!

Re: Enchanted battle axe I disagree; I like the way you've got it there, Matt. Typically, Foci require a half-phase action of 'prep'; this is what buying Fastdraw is for, after all, to change that to a 0-phase action. Putting 'Restrainable (must have full and open hex of space to wind up, -1/2)' on the wall-bashing power is, in my mind, a very elegant way of phrasing it. I might actually switch it to a 2" cone, just because that gives a bit more sense of 'here's the windup, and the pitch...' Defining it as 'Conditional -1/2' or 'Restrainable -1/2' is a matter of semantics, really. I'd say restrainable; guards getting up tight around you is going to prevent it just as readily as being dropped into a bloody outhouse. Curufea's question is, of course, also appropriate; your setting rules for 'real weapon/armor' may nudge this down another quarter, half, or even full point; I imagine this is a two-handed head-whacker... IMO, good job.

Re: New Magnetic Power Don't quote me, but roughly ... Magnetic VPP: 85 Power Pool, Control Pool (42 Base); No Roll (+1), 0-Phase Action (+1); Control Pool Active Cost: 126. Mutant Magnetic-Derived Powers Only (-1/4): Control Pool Real Cost: 100. Total Real Cost: 185 Points. The reason that 'Mutant Magnetic-Derived Powers Only' is only a -1/4 (as compared with 'magic only' or whatever, -1/2?) is because you can explain almost everything via magnetics, and especially if you use Foci to work through. But this would let you do pretty much everything you have, and a lot of stuff simultaneously, depending on your disads. I'd STILL give your GM control over approval for the pool skills; just write up a few more, give them to him, and say you might want to fiddle with advantages/disadvantages as you go along. OR, better yet, clear Powers with him. 'Okay, he's learned TK, Force Field, and EB/RKA pretty well. I'd like to work on Flash now...' Because the character is only 15, let the powers develop along with him; be WILLING to take it slow with the refinements, unless you happen to have the world's foremost master of magnetism teaching you how. A willingness to do these things, note, is how you get the GM to OK the VPP. As for Affects Desolid, that's mostly an F/X thing. But I can theorize anything but magic...

Re: Mass Effect Campaign Setting Well, you know -- it was the girl-on-girl hawt seXXX0rz, or so I've heard...

Re: How do you become a Jedi Interesting philosophy, if sadly wrong. Simply put, the Jedi made the same mistake their Sith opposition did -- they went to an extreme. In the case of the Jedi, though, it was extreme personal isolation, which is exactly what you're recommending. Love, anger, passion -- all are powerful tools for the Force User. It is what you do with those tools that makes you good (Jedi) or evil (Sith). Great passion, shown brightly, can bring enlightenment and joy to billions; great passion, given to destruction, can bring death to those same billions. A true Jedi can be compared to those who seek Zen enlightenment. That Zen, that 'emptiness', is a singular flash -- simultaneously encompassing a moment and forever. Who you are after the moment of enlightenment is not who you were before that moment; even though it is an instant later, it is a lifetime, an incarnation, apart. During the search for the Zen moment, however, the student and master both do what life requires; they chop wood, they carry water, they eat and drink, they love and marry and have children and get old and, well, eventually die. Life does not stop because they seek that moment; life does not stop because they have found it. During that search, the Jedi learns to attune themselves to the universe, to the Universal Force. They learn to guide it and let it guide them; eventually, perhaps, some of them experience the moment of enlightenment, and it transforms them. Most of them do not, no matter how much they learn to guide the Force, or how much the Force can guide them. This does not stop them from yet seeking that moment. I've not read all the books in the EU, though I've obviously seen all the movies. In the movies, I've seen nothing that makes me believe any of the Jedi portrayed to have experienced enlightenment. What I've read of the books, I can only say four -- Zonoma Sekot, Vergare, Anakin Solo, and Jacen Solo. Both Zonoma Sekot (or rather its representative) seemed to contain the settled core and peaceful awareness I've come to associate with enlightenment; Vergare, though she certainly seemed to have played politics with grace and viciousness, held the same inner core and awareness. Anakin Solo gained that core, that awareness, and a unifying and consuming channeling of the Force during his last battle with the Yuuzhang Vong; Jacen Solo (Anakin's long-time practice partner) achieved a similar core and awareness during his last battle as well, though his unifying channeling of the Force was fortunately not so all-consuming as Anakin's. A Jedi seeks the ah-ness of that moment, the deep understanding of the universe, the instant of emptiness within which is the sum total and distinct individualism of all things. The knowledge and power of the Force is a secondary thing to that search, a form of practice and seeking that dims in comparison to enlightenment. A Sith, on the other hand, seeks but the knowledge and the power of the Force itself. For a Jedi, the Force is the journey, not the goal. For a Sith, the Force is the goal, not the journey. But I bet you that Jedi write a lot of haiku... A dark lightsaber Cold and heavy in my hand Why do I have it?

Re: New Magnetic Power

Re: Mass Effect Campaign Setting Biotics, as well as the other skills used in ME, all use time-based recharge. I'd actually avoid the charges thing, and go with the same sort of setup that was proposed for your weaponry -- perhaps part of what biotics need to do is purchase seperate END (as an END Battery) which runs their biotics. Your enhanced biotic tools can then boost the Battery's REC directly, instead of messing with trying to figure out the personal END.

Re: How do you become a Jedi

Re: "Mystic Dart 'only vs living beings'." But yeah, it wouldn't affect the undead, either.

Re: New Magnetic Power Magnetics can control sub-atomic forces; it really can do virtually anything. It's just a matter of getting the control that fine...

Re: Star Wars Hero Resources Yeesh; Greatly Impairing physlim of the oil bath??

Re: Mental regen Is this Mind Control or a Mental Transform? If it's the former, say "Breakout Roll" to him, and make sure you take every chance you're allowed, which at some points may include your character's friends pointing out how crazy you gotta be. If it's the latter, get the GM to CLEARLY DELINEATE which kind of transform it is -- insta-heal or gradual heal. If it's the latter, then every game month you get back your REC in Transformed BOD (or EGO, or whatever for a mental Transform) -- and you'll hopefully be able to move on to the legal issues in a few months. If it's a insta-heal 'snap' transform ('Prince to frog' spell), make sure YOU KNOW what the magic bullet is -- and it SHOULD be something that's reasonably possible to happen, as per the Transform rules. Then watch events like a hawk. If your character hasn't been Transformed to LIKE all of this (and it doesn't sound like he has), I can very easily see him deliberately hunting down what needs to be done to reverse the effects. Another Mentallist, or even just a good psychologist/psychiatrist, may be able to say what'll help 'cure' the effects; these sorts of Transforms are, essentially, 'just' Strong psych lims. Use what's available. Also, since it's pretty clear that the GM has a) taken this long past the point where it was enjoyable and never bothered to tell you how it could be broken, I'd request a retcon back to whatever point you could have broken it. If not, well -- I'd personally become a lot more polite during games.

Re: New Magnetic Power Ah, I see. Well, you sort of go with 'what part does the brain control', and 'am I good enough to target just that part' sort of questions -- stuff that may require skill rolls and the like. This could include stuff like an END/COM/PRE drain (causing the brain to have the digestive system act in certain manners) as well...

Re: Powerframe&Maximum Points All such restrictions are defined by the GM. If you're going with a 75 Active Points max, then yes, the Powers in a framework are restricted to the maximum of 75 Active Points. Your costs, of course, should vary. Some GMs may run this differently -- your MPow's total AP is 75 points, or the AP on your VPP is 75 Active Points. It's up to the GM, so ask him. Or her...

Re: New Magnetic Power Depends on what you're wanting to do, going by the read. If it's just a quick 'zot' to induce a flow and read the brain's functionality, I'd call that 'Detect Brain Function'. If you're wanting to cure stuff, that'd be a mental Transform. Otherwise, your AVLD magnetic-vs-bioelectric attack is spot on. Further refinements would, of course, enter into the Mental Powers areas...

Re: Various Powers at Edge of System

Re: Favorite Anti-Brick tricks? Didn't bother to read the whole thing, but ... passing throw. I mean what, 5 points, and you're somewhere else and the target is on the ground??

Re: Jedi Ghosts and fade-to-deaths? Bah. 50 CP and a 'radiation accident'. And if the GM is feeling generous, not even 50 CP.

Re: New option: Absolute Abilties, help please *skims the thread* I think you should go back to playing Amber diceless.

Re: Various Powers at Edge of System ... sorry. I agree with Trebuchet on this one.