Alternative approach to mental powers

[Doc Democracy]

I have never really been happy with mental powers in HERO.  I have been creating characters since 1982 and never really had a "mentalist" that played well or felt balanced - either too powerful or too easily overcome.  There has aways felt like a watershed where the mental powers were too weak, then suddenly they become overwhelming.  It is also the fact that they never, to m, played in a satisfactory way.

 

I was out cycling on Sunday when the glimmerings of another way filtered through to my brain and I failed to write it down and am now scrabbling to reconstruct the golden vision...

 

One of the problems with mental powers is that they can remove agency from players and, for me, the worse outcome that it massively reduces the potential of players to engage in creative play. 

 

I was thinking that the use of mental powers should be an opportunity to be very social, more so than physical combat because it is personality based.  Right now it is all about rolling a bunch of dice that achieve levels of effect.

 

I am sure I was thinking that mental powers might be closer to the mechanics of an entangle.  So you need to target the opponent's psyche, then you apply the power which may have some defence and a pool of effect.  I was thinking that the mentalist would "spend effect" to achieve things like getting a character to do something, make them see something or make them feel something.  Once the effect pool is depleted there needs to be a new attack to apply a new pool of effect.

 

The cost would be variable - depending on the level of effect desired, and the targeted characteristic. I think that there should then also be a roll where the affected player might bring in facets of the character that will give them bonuses.  I do not think that a villain, for example, should be allowed to make a character with a code versus killing, and little mental ability, to kill someone.  As such, I would have massive effect cost modifiers for trying to go against such total psychological complications.

 

I had thoughts about active and passive pools of effect.  So active pools would need the mentalist to apply effects each time they have a phase and would be aware of the depletion of the effect pool.  In passive pools the mentalist might give an instruction such as "defend this door from intruders" and each time the victim has to obey this command they can deplete the pool.  The victims player can seek to find things that deplete the power more quickly by finding things that trigger the social drives of the character - "these are my friends", "my [NPC] is in danger", "I cannot let my nemesis escape".  The mentalist would have to use an action to check in on the status of the effect and would be unaware if the pool depleted unexpectedly.

 

I am looking for a way for those players impacted to want to explore the character of their character because that might give them a better chance of escaping the effect of the mentalists power.  I want the mental powers interaction to be more than just make a break-out roll, this gives the player a feeling of progress and agency and potentially be interesting for other players to listen to.

 

I am sure, on Sunday, this was more detailed but I would be interested in hearing what folk think.

 

Doc

[DentArthurDent]

47 minutes ago, Doc Democracy said:

The victims player can seek to find things that deplete the power more quickly by finding things that trigger the social drives of the character - "these are my friends", "my [NPC] is in danger", "I cannot let my nemesis escape". 

I haven’t had time to really consider the entire system you’re proposing. But this section is brilliant!!!

 

[Lord Liaden]

Hmm... I'd have to think further about what you propose, but at first glance it seems to me that what you're going for is more about how the mechanics of Mental Powers are perceived and applied, than about how they function. For example, having a "pool of effect" that diminishes over time and use, or renewing the pool of effect for longer duration, could just be another way of looking at progressive Breakout rolls when paying or not paying Endurance to maintain the Mental Power.

 

I always consider how the emotions and principles of a given character toward a particular situation or the people involved in it, will affect the required Level of Effect. Significant changes to the situation may mean a bonus to the next Breakout roll, or another Breakout roll immediately at the time of the change, or negate that use of the Mental Power altogether if it now requires a higher Level of Effect. So player actions and interactions are often integral.

 

I'll give this some more thought.

[Christopher R Taylor]

I had the same concerns you do, plus a frustration with making people not remember mental powers, a standard effect in nearly every single source material for mental powers in any genre.

 

So, I proposed a system of using mental powers that worked more like transformation attacks: you pay for the dice based on the power and extent of the effect rather than a flat pile of dice.  So, making someone protect someone they love or read their surface thoughts: 3 points per d6, etc.  It was met with derision and contempt and people yelling that using mental powers with cumulative did everything you need and shut up.

 

Maybe you'll fare better, I hope so.

Edited June 12 by Christopher R Taylor

[Doc Democracy]

4 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

It was met with derision and contempt and people yelling that using mental powers with cumulative did everything you need and shut up.

 

Maybe you'll fare better, I hope so.

 

I will go find that thread.  I am sorry you got that response, we are usually better on the boards but there is a little bit of conservatism in us all.

 

I might do better if I could remember my revelation in full...I feel a little bit like Jack Black.  #Tribute

[Doc Democracy]

9 hours ago, DentArthurDent said:

I haven’t had time to really consider the entire system you’re proposing. But this section is brilliant!!!

 

 

Thanks DAD. 😁

 

If I could get it all brilliant I could probably lose a lot of money publishing RPGs.  I am sure my idea was brilliant, it even made me cycle faster...

[Chris Goodwin]

During the run-up to 6th edition, I had an idea to treat the Mental Powers with a sensory component (mainly Mind Link, Mind Scan, and Telepathy) as if they were Detects.  Detect and Transmit Thoughts, Detect Target Location, and Detect and Transmit Memories, respectively.  Telepathy becomes a hostile version of Mind Link, which would be built as a Detect with Transmit. 

 

The idea goes back to Justice Inc., in which the psychic abilities deemed most available to characters of the era were effectively Detects or Skills, further considered to be the equivalent of No Conscious Control.  You could attempt to deliberately focus and use them, but doing so was at a big penalty.  (In fact, the Mind Link power more or less was a straight import from Justice Inc. to 4th edition via Strike Force.) 

 

There's nothing inherent to anything about them that requires a diced effect vs. EGO, other than the need to balance attacker and target and to provide some form of resistance.  

 

These could be combined with either Mr. Taylor's notion of Transform-like mechanics (bringing back a diced effect after all) or something like the penalty structure in the Images power.  (The Light Illusions power in the Champions II supplement was diced...)

 

We don't seem to have any trouble with STR vs. STR dice contests for "grappling".  So why not EGO vs. EGO similarly for Mental Powers?  Along these lines, another suggestion I had for a "body control" power in the pre-6th discussion was using Telekinesis, making it EGO vs. EGO rather than STR vs. STR.  There's nothing in principle that would make this "wrong", but I think there was a conceptual gap that I couldn't seem to get people across, as there was a lot of pushback.  We seem to do okay with Entangle as a mental construct, using EGO vs. MD/BODY though.  Consider the EGO vs. EGO Telekinesis (or rather, Psychokinesis) to exert mental force rather than physical force, and assume that it can't be used to lift targets into the air unless they can fly under their own power.  (Consider: Psychokinesis is to Telekinesis as EGO is to STR; Mind Control is to Psychokinesis as Animate Object is to Telekinesis.)

 

If we really wanted to keep diced effect, we could bring back negative Characteristic values, and use Drain or Suppress EGO in conjunction with Detect/Transmit Thoughts.  Getting someone's effective EGO down to 0 or below has certain effects, including not being able to resist when you tell them to do something.  We could easily change the effects of EGO, EGO+10, EGO+20, and so on, to become EGO 0 to -9, EGO -10 to -19, EGO -20 to -29, and so on.  (Looks like levels of unconsciousness...) 

 

If we still had Figured Characteristics we could postulate a "mental REC" with a base value of EGO/5 + PRE/5, which one might use to recover "Mental STUN" (or call it Mental Resistance?). 

 

(I like the idea of giving PRE something to do in Mental Powers, and I'd also suggested for Alternate Combat Values, basing a Combat Value on each of the Primary Characteristics.  STR/3, CON/3, INT/3, and PRE/3 were all considered by me.  Alas, Combat Value came apart in the Great Decoupling as well.)

Edited June 21 by Chris Goodwin
a word

[DentArthurDent]

Mental CV and REC?  Very interesting.  
It almost seems like a system for Mental Combat.  Which would be pretty easy, using AVAD or other advantages.

I can image two Masters of Mysticism punching and dodging, knocked to their knees, and drawing on their last ounces of power!

[Sean Waters]

There's problems with mental powers, and the main one is that players often hate being told they are mind controlled.  They shouldn't, as it is an excellent opportunity to both role play and see if they can subvert the intention of the command (3 wishes, anyone?).

 

Mental powers , at least the troublesome ones like Mind Control and Mental Illusions and Telepathy are scary easy to beat for cheap with skill levels in Breakout Rolls and breakout Rolls make the powers really pretty random so mental powers are (as mentioned by others) often all-or-nothing.

 

You'll be shocked to hear that I do not have a set of alternative rules to offer.  I have thought about it but it's hard to find something that works.  If it is a game with a lot of mental powers, I'd probably just have the players build a second character that is their mental form and use normal combat rules on the 'Psychic Plane', where time runs faster.  Maybe.  IIRC that is sort of how the original Shadowrun did Netrunners.

 

I do not like PC Mentalists because then either the villains all have mental defences or you can't have a complicated and cunning plot: one successful use of Telepathy or Mind Control and the game is up.  Having said that I had a Telepath come a cropper when they read a victim's mind and saw him attacked by a vigilante who the Hero then went after.  The vigilante was not actually the attacker, but had jumped in to rescue the victim but the vigilante was the only one the victim saw.

 

Even with an episodic game a single decent effect roll and a poor breakout can stop the Monster Of The Week in the first segment of combat.

 

My advice, if you are a GM planning to use mental powers against PCs is:

 

1. Lie and,

2. Get the player on-side.

 

Say you want to subvert a member of Team Alpha.  Run the mental combat against a PC without the player there and see what level of effect you get.  If the Mind Control gets them, take the player aside and explain that their character has been replaced by a duplicate working for the enemy, give them some script pointers and let them have fun.  If the villain fails with the mind control, do a one-on-one session with the PC and the villain to see how things work out, or just don't tell the player what happened and tell them they had strange and disturbing dreams - they were in a room and someone was trying to batter the door down to get at them.  players might not like their characters being mind controlled but they surely do love being co-opted to the director's department.

 

 

[Gauntlet]

One thing I have noticed when people use Mind Control, they have a tendency to use all or nothing commands. I want you to attack your cohort, or defend me your enemy, or completely run away. When playing a mentalist with Mind Control you should definitely utilize smaller commands much more. Thinks like changing who of their enemies they are attacking, which attacks they might be using, be worried about END, or don't be worried about END at all and continue to push. Things like this would have a much lower requirement and still can greatly affect a combat.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Yeah the best use of mental powers is not overwhelming but subtle and tricky.  I had a great player who would ask about special senses bad guys had (if anyone was aware of them) so he could use his mental illusions more effectively.  That's the kind of thing that makes for an effective mentalist; its lazy to just try to brute force people into things.

[Gauntlet]

And I believe that people having the tendency to utilize mental powers to overwhelm their opponents is why the powers seem either useless or overwhelming.

[Sean Waters]

4 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Yeah the best use of mental powers is not overwhelming but subtle and tricky.  I had a great player who would ask about special senses bad guys had (if anyone was aware of them) so he could use his mental illusions more effectively.  That's the kind of thing that makes for an effective mentalist; its lazy to just try to brute force people into things.

 

Agreed, but in combat brute force tends to win. 

 

Out of combat, subtlety is often far more effective.

[Gauntlet]

4 minutes ago, Sean Waters said:

 

Agreed, but in combat brute force tends to win. 

 

Out of combat, subtlety is often far more effective.

 

But I will say that a mentalist many times is a support character. By using his mental powers, he/she can support the other brute force cohorts. Doing things like having the opponents switch their targets so that they attack the hero less vulnerable for their attacks. I actually love playing that type of character as it is rather neat directing the combat so that your team wins. By working this way, I make sure that my mentalist is rather effective in combat.

[Duke Bushido]

Briefly,with apilivies to all who may have mentioned these already:

 

Some things that I do that are not specifically RAW to balance out the switch-like effectiveness of mental powers:

 

When commands work againat a Psych Lim or trigger a Disadplication, I have found that "automatic breakout roll" doesn't really dwliver the nuance I want (because it, too, is a switch) so instead the effectiveness dice (remember: I play 2e, where EGO powers are throwing around _huge_ dice pools looking for Multiples instead of ten to 40 points over), the effect pool is compared to the target's EGO (or INT for certain powers- again: 2e) _plus_ the point value of that Disadplication, and will xontinue to be so compared until the wnd of the Turn in which the Psych Lim (or what have you) stops being triggered.

 

Breakout rolls are made from an EGO (or INT- last reminder: 2e) baaed on the Characteristic value _plus_ the points value of any triggered Disadplication beforedoing the divide-by-five-and-add-nine thing.

 

Successful or not, any Breakout Roll of under 16 will permanently reduce the effectiveness pool by an number of points equal to 16 minus the total rolled. 

 

(NOTE:  if the power level of the game is higher, we use 14 instead of 16.)

 

The Egoist may elect to offset this reduction by paying an equal amount of END to maintain the original value.  Note that this must be paid _per phase_ he continues to maintain this level (he may stop paying the offset END at any time, at which point the effectiveness pool will drop to its current reduced level), and that this END expenditure is necessary even if the power has been bought at zero END cost.

 

Penalties, reductions, and the effects of triggered Disadplications (which come and go even during a single instance of the power being applied) are null and void if the Egoist has dropped the attack against the target and successfully hit him with a new attack (which, of course, requires we-rolling a new effectiveness pool).

 

 

There are a couple of other minor tweaks (Berserk Characters are affected one level higher than the effect roll a)does, unless they were already specifically rage-targetting the Egoist (this one helped stop all those BS "Berserk when Mind Controlled" builds players would hand in an as excuse to go full murder-minded rather than try to be a superhero in a tough situation), and some other minor rules), but by and large, these tweaks have taken away a _lot_ of the "you are mine forever" that happens the moment you cross that threshold with your effect roll.

 

Hope something there helps you.

 

Good night.

 

  

[dmjalund]

I had a thought for alternate Mental Powers to more match the comic books. Remove MCV. Any attack that can target you - hits. Penalties and Bonuses apply to Effect rather than MCV (as in DC)

[Sean Waters]

One thing that can make Mental Powers more exciting is Cumulative.  Instead of a 12d6 Mind Control, go for 8d6 Cumulative.  The first hit is unlikely to do anything because it is building for the second - just like damage normally does.  If someone knows that an enemy is messing with their mind they are likely to target that enemy to prevent them getting control*.  It becomes tactical rather than random.

 

It also makes Mental Defence more effective, so functionally cheaper to buy something you might not use that much.

 

Couple of other ideas: 

1. You could allow opposed Mental powers to reduce the Cumulative total.

2. You can introduce 'Mental Manoeuvres', anyone can reduce the Cumulative total rolled against them by (Ego/5)d6 as an attack action.

-both of those would only work against Cumulative totals before the full desired effect has been reached.

3. Allow a Mental Dodge (+3 to MDCV as an action, can abort) to try and avoid a Mental attack.

4. You could require Cumulative totals to be maintained until they take full effect, so is the attacker is Stunned the Cumulative total goes away.

 

The point is you are then giving players options and they like options.

 

You could get rid of Breakout rolls and introduce a fade rate, like Adjustment powers, making the process less random.

 

* I'd get rid of the rule that a target does not know they are being attacked until the Cumulative reaches its designated total, or Limitation it away.

[Gauntlet]

10 hours ago, Sean Waters said:

One thing that can make Mental Powers more exciting is Cumulative.  Instead of a 12d6 Mind Control, go for 8d6 Cumulative.  The first hit is unlikely to do anything because it is building for the second - just like damage normally does.  If someone knows that an enemy is messing with their mind they are likely to target that enemy to prevent them getting control*.  It becomes tactical rather than random.

 

It also makes Mental Defence more effective, so functionally cheaper to buy something you might not use that much.

 

Couple of other ideas: 

1. You could allow opposed Mental powers to reduce the Cumulative total.

2. You can introduce 'Mental Manoeuvres', anyone can reduce the Cumulative total rolled against them by (Ego/5)d6 as an attack action.

-both of those would only work against Cumulative totals before the full desired effect has been reached.

3. Allow a Mental Dodge (+3 to MDCV as an action, can abort) to try and avoid a Mental attack.

4. You could require Cumulative totals to be maintained until they take full effect, so is the attacker is Stunned the Cumulative total goes away.

 

The point is you are then giving players options and they like options.

 

You could get rid of Breakout rolls and introduce a fade rate, like Adjustment powers, making the process less random.

 

* I'd get rid of the rule that a target does not know they are being attacked until the Cumulative reaches its designated total, or Limitation it away.

 

I have seen this utilized and definitely agree with you.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

I had a thought for alternate Mental Powers to more match the comic books. Remove MCV. Any attack that can target you - hits. Penalties and Bonuses apply to Effect rather than MCV (as in DC)

 

Typically a mentalist will have 3-8 MCV over the average target, which means they are extremely unlikely to miss in any case.

[Gauntlet]

I am not sure if other people allow these items:

 

1st - Overall Skill Levels can be utilized for OMCV and DMCV

2nd - You could allow characters that are not mentalist to still dodge mental attacks

3rd - You could allow characters that are not mentalists to still block mental attacks

[Chris Goodwin]

Hugh Neilson had once proposed to start MCV from a base of 0 rather than 3.  Characters would buy bonuses to hit with their Mental Powers and penalties to opponents' Mental Powers attack rolls.  Mathematically it's more or less the same as starting everyone from a base of 3, and eliminates any questions about whether a non-mentalist can sell back OMCV.

[Christopher R Taylor]

In a mentalist campaign I would allow people to buy training (basically 1-2 point perks) that let them dodge or block mental attacks but not have any mental powers.  I think one of the balance issues with mental powers is the way they kind of bypass defenses for most people (and that's the way they work in just about every source material from comics to books to movies, etc).  That's why most games don't give any MD as a base.  And the 0 MD starting point suggests that maybe OMCV and DMCV should start out at zero as well as Mr Neilson suggests.

[Sean Waters]

24 minutes ago, Chris Goodwin said:

Hugh Neilson had once proposed to start MCV from a base of 0 rather than 3.  Characters would buy bonuses to hit with their Mental Powers and penalties to opponents' Mental Powers attack rolls.  Mathematically it's more or less the same as starting everyone from a base of 3, and eliminates any questions about whether a non-mentalist can sell back OMCV.

 

I suppose that the difference is that you can Drain 3 OMCV, but not 0 OMCV.

 

You might also the same logic to OCV or DCV. Why not start at zero?

 

I'm a game with no psionics, remove M(?)CV (or don't allow players to change it).

[unclevlad]

2 hours ago, Sean Waters said:

 

I suppose that the difference is that you can Drain 3 OMCV, but not 0 OMCV.

 

You might also the same logic to OCV or DCV. Why not start at zero?

 

I'm a game with no psionics, remove M(?)CV (or don't allow players to change it).

 

Because the vast majority of players will use their OCV and DCV...unless they just never enter combat at all.  As was noted, there's no game reason for someone with no mental powers NOT to sell back the OMCV.  He can't use it at all, so there's no downside to it.  Starting from 0 just removes the option.

 

3 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

I think one of the balance issues with mental powers is the way they kind of bypass defenses for most people (and that's the way they work in just about every source material from comics to books to movies, etc).  

 

And it's dirt cheap.  As noted...a 6 OMCV attack on a 3 DMCV means 14-, which is 90% likely.  Mental defenses...well, you don't expect normals to have anything, but still...mental training does always come across as very unusual/exotic.  

Telepathy can easily become a storyline breaker...so much so that writers contrive to make them unavailable, for one reason or another.  Mind control is a serious, potential character hoser...my personal take is, someone mind controlling someone else to commit a crime serious enough to draw significant reprisal, or put the victim at risk...that would be a death penalty crime, if it could be proven.  In-game, it's completely stripping the character from the player, at least for a while.  This needs to be really, really rare, and many players, I think, will be very upset/frustrated if you do it to them.

 

On another front, the problem is the spread of defenses that have to be considered.  PD, ED, resistant vs. nonresistant, hardened....then mental and power?  And flash?  It's really hard to cover everything even somewhat.

[Grailknight]

Since it's incumbent on me as GM to make Disadvantages count, I just ruled that every OMCV sold back was a -1 to Breakout rolls. Surprisingly, the discussion never came up again.