No combat respect

[dustytomes]

Am I alone in making story based characters that get no Respect in combat?

 

I have yet to have a Character survive 2 turns of combat with a major villain with out being KO'd or the other characters swooping in and saving my bacon. Our Game Has lots of non-combat role playing so I still have a lot of fun its just Combat thats been anti-climatic for me.

 

Any Ideas on how to get some Respect in combat?

[ghost-angel]

Re: No combat respect

 

CSLs, especially a group of 3pt CSLs in your most often used attacks can help even the playing field.

 

DCV is another.

 

Or, brute force it and just sink points into STUN.

[JmOz]

Re: No combat respect

 

I ran a archer (Higherst CV's, lowest damage and defense, lots of exotics) for a couple years, the power that saved me alot of grief was a combat luck based damage reduction

[Thia Halmades]

Re: No combat respect

 

Amazing what a few "+1 STUN Multipliers" can get you on a basic killing attack. I'm with GA; CSLs are your big solution here; and either get hit less or be able to soak more punishment (depending on theme and points available).

[Cygnia]

Re: No combat respect

 

What's your character skilled at/powers based on to start?

[dustytomes]

Re: No combat respect

 

Black Jack

 

Player: Dusty

 

Val Char Cost

15 STR 5

20 DEX 30

15 CON 10

12 BODY 4

13 INT 3

13 EGO 6

15 PRE 5

12 COM 1

 

3/23 PD 0

3/18 ED 0

4 SPD 10

6 REC 0

30 END 0

28 STUN 0

 

6" RUN 0

2" SWIM 0

33" LEAP 0

Characteristics Cost: 74

 

Cost Power

30 Repulser Powers: Elemental Control, 60-point powers

30 1) Blast Off: Leaping +30" (33" forward, 16 1/2" upward), combat acceleration/deceleration (+1/4), Reduced Endurance (1/2 END; +1/4), Surface not needed (+1/2) (60 Active Points)

90 2) Repulser Ray: Energy Blast 12d6, Reduced Endurance (1/2 END; +1/4), Double Knockback (+3/4) (120 Active Points)

30 3) REPULSER Field: Hand-To-Hand Attack +6d6, Costs END Only To Activate (+1/4), Damage Shield (+1/2), Double Knockback (+3/4) (75 Active Points); Hand-To-Hand Attack (-1/2)

30 4) Repulser FIELD: Force Field (20 PD/15 ED/8 Mental Defense/5 Power Defense), Costs END Only To Activate (+1/4) (60 Active Points)

1 Polarizing Shades: Sight Group Flash Defense (3 points) (3 Active Points); OAF Fragile (-1 1/4)

1 Low level repulser field: Gliding 1", Persistent (+1/2); no Noncombat movement (-1/4)

1 Low level Repulser field: Damage Resistance (3 PD), Hardened (x2; +1/2)

Powers Cost: 213

 

Cost Martial Arts Maneuver

1 Weapon Element: Clubs

4 Martial Disarm: 1/2 Phase, -1 OCV, +1 DCV, Disarm; 25 STR to Disarm

4 Choke Hold: 1/2 Phase, -2 OCV, +0 DCV, Grab One Limb; 2d6 NND

3 Takedown: 1/2 Phase, +1 OCV, +1 DCV, 3d6 Strike; Target Falls

3 Martial Grab: 1/2 Phase, -1 OCV, -1 DCV, Grab Two Limbs, 25 STR for holding on

Martial Arts Cost: 15

 

Cost Skill

30 +3 Overall

3 Combat Driving 13-

3 Criminology 12-

3 Deduction 12-

3 Interrogation 12-

3 Lockpicking 13-

3 Persuasion 12-

3 Security Systems 12-

3 Shadowing 12-

3 Stealth 13-

3 Streetwise 12-

3 Computer Programming 12-

Skills Cost: 63

 

Cost Perk

7 Fringe Benefit: Concealed Weapon Permit (where appropriate), COP 8- Contact, Federal/National Police Powers, Weapon Permit (where appropriate)

Perks Cost: 7

 

 

Total Character Cost: 372

 

Pts. Disadvantage

10 Dependent NPC: Julie Morgan-Althor (skip trace, ) 8- (Infrequently), Normal, Useful noncombat position or skills, Unaware of character's adventuring career/Secret ID

20 Normal Characteristic Maxima

15 Hunted: organized crime boss of the week 8- (Occasionally), As Powerful, NCI, Capture/Kill

10 Distinctive Features: Mutant Not Concealable, Always Noticed, Detectable Only By Unusual Senses

5 Distinctive Features: "LOVE" and "HATE" tatoos on hands Easily Concealed, Noticed and Recognizable, Detectable By Commonly-Used Senses

20 Psychological Limitation: Obsessed With Crimefighting Very Common, Strong

20 Psychological Limitation: Overconfidence Very Common, Strong

10 Reputation: reckless vigilante, Frequently (11-)

5 Reputation: ex-cop, 8-

15 Enraged: when takes BODY damage in combat Common, go 8-, recover 11-

15 Social Limitation: Secret ID (Mark Miller) Frequently (11-), Major

5 Hunted Demon: 8- (Mo Pow, Watching)

Disadvantage Points: 150

Base Points: 200

Experience Required: 22

Total Experience Available: 17

Experience Unspent: 0

[ghost-angel]

Re: No combat respect

 

huh. I'd question your campaign... because that looks like similar to a lot of my characters combat wise.

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: No combat respect

 

Other than slightly low defenses for what, I'm assuming, is a campaign running around 12DC attacks (or a low DEX for the defenses he has, or something like that), I can't for the life of me imagine why this character ...

wait. 15 Con? He's easily stunned, that probably isn't helping matters any. Past that ... I can't see why that character is such a powderpuff.

[Gideon]

Re: No combat respect

 

I have to agree with Ghost-Angle and CrosshairCollie on this one.

 

There are very few things i can think of to "improve" your character, And to be honest I don't even think these are all necessary, but here's what I came up with:

 

1) buy up the ED portion of his forcefield to 20,

2) buy up his Con to the 18-20 range.

3) buy his Rec up to 7 or 8

4) buy his Stun up to the 32-36 range

5) buy up his DCV by 2-3

[Dreadnought]

Re: No combat respect

 

I'd have to agree with CrosshairCollie and ghost-angel. He looks like he could do some serious damage, and he has respectable defenses with his force field up.

The problems I can see are:

-he runs into END problems pretty fast

-since the "standard" dex for 350 point champions is 23-26, he won't go first very often, so he runs the risk of getting knocked out/stunned before he can get his force field up

 

My recommendations:

-buy up his CON and/or END. Lets him last longer and makes him harder to stun

-buy him some lightning reflexes to let him get the drop on his enemies. Getting hit with that Repulsor Ray before my turn in Segment 12 would ruin my day, especially if I hit a wall.

 

 

Unless your campaign uses significantly different guidelines than a standard champions game, that should let you go from being one shotted to being the one shotter.

[Hermit]

Re: No combat respect

 

Yeah, I'll join the others who are saying the CON definitely needs to go up if you can do so.

[Narratio]

Re: No combat respect

 

I'm looking for some sort of dodging or combat awareness on the write up and don't see it. The best way of surviving combat is to not get hit, that's why you have Bricks. So you need some better speed and manouvres. And try to keep the odd half phase handy, to duck those nasty blows that your pet Brick should be taking for you.

[Balabanto]

Re: No combat respect

 

Your +3 Overall levels are destroying you.

 

That could just as easily be +3 with Energy Blast (6 points)

 

+1 with Elemental Control (5 points, and you can use those for DCV)

 

+8 CON (Raising it to 23, also costing 16 points, raising your END)

 

That also raises your REC to 8, while spending nothing, and gives you 2 points of ED, which raises your combat respect level. It also gives you 5 points of much needed stun.

 

Then buy +2 Range Skill levels with Energy Blast for 3 points. Now you don't take a -2 from the first 8" and have a -2 out to 16". Your DCV is now twice as effective, because your 8 is effectively a 10, assuming you keep the EC level in DCV, and you should, unless you're going to finish an opponent off. Your massive movement allows you to zip up to people and fire at them with an OCV of up to 11 from 8" away. The 2 points of ED will also help you here because it makes you slightly harder to hurt, enabling you to take a 14d6 energy attack once without being stunned. It will hurt like the devil, but you'll still get another action in. Your goal with this character is to stay away from hand to hand combat, you don't have the strength to face off against grabbers and martial artists, and you have enough EB to spread the martial artist out of existence.

 

That's what I'd do.

 

I'd also never have bought this character a suboptimal martial art in a superhero game in the first place. That's a complete waste of points. As roleplaying oriented as it may be, the way the hero system is set up, joe guy at a dojo doesn't really have any maneuvers. Those points would have been better spent on his DEX, or his SPD.

 

As it stands, you have 17 experience points you can spend. If you want to keep the Overall Levels...they're nice, but they're not really appropriate for an energy blaster. You really don't have enough of a skills list to justify their need. And really, only the mightiest of heroes should be able to go "Have to...concentrate" and throw their levels into ECV if they're not mentalists themselves.

 

You should spend those 17 points as follows, regardless of whether you rearrange the levels. Buy +2 Range Skill levels with the EB for 3 points. Buy 2 levels with Flight for 6 points. Those you can use for DCV, or to alter your turn mode, and trust me, with the distance you fly in a turn, you NEED to alter your turn mode. That leaves 6 points for CON, which will raise your END and your ED, and leave you with 2, for +1 with energy blast.

[casualplayer]

Re: No combat respect

 

First off, if you aren't getting combat respect it's because you aren't using your insanely powerful Repulsor blast effectively enough. Got a teammate who can make Force Walls? Put one up behind the villain, repulsor blast the baddie and watch him take 12d6 + FW PDd6 for a one-two knockout.

 

Put another way, if your game is 120 pt attack powers and ~30 pts in defenses, you're doing great to last 2 Turns!

[assault]

Re: No combat respect

 

Other folks have pretty much covered things.

 

My $0.02:

1. Always assess your character's ability to take damage when you are designing them. If it's too low, your character will spend a lot of time napping.

2. Your character is a ranged combat expert. If he spends too much time up close and personal with close combat specialists, he will tend to lose.

3. As casualplayer mentioned, 120 AP is a big attack. A lot of my characters would have trouble with attacks like that flying around, and I'm inclined to build them fairly defence-heavy.

 

But mainly:

4. Buy up his CON.

5. Use tactics. He's got very nasty attacks, and should use them properly.

[Alibear]

Re: No combat respect

 

I'd sink some points into that sucker's speed at some point too.

 

4 speed is slow by most campaigns standards; is it slow in yours too?

[Kevin Schultz]

Re: No combat respect

 

Minor min/maxing suggestion:

 

EGO is costed on the assumption that you're paying for OECV. As you aren't a mentalist, there's no reason to pay for this. Change your EGO to Defensive Only (-1). That'll save you 3 points.

 

Defensive EGO and Defensive PRE both do the same thing. Change your PRE to Offensive Only (-1). That'll save you 3 points as well.

 

With the additional 6 points, do some of the things recommended above. (personally, I'd recommend putting 2 points into Defensive EGO, and 1 point into a "Strong Will" Mental Defense, but that's just a thing I do with all my characters.)

[Kevin Schultz]

Re: No combat respect

 

And yeah - your martial arts are neat, but they don't have any real synchronicity with your primary combat capabilities; they don't stack, and so that's 15 points not being used to help you blast stuff. I'd recommend modifying that to include the following:

 

• Flying Dodge - Can usually be justified in most martial arts, as it's really just "move and dodge".
   
  
• Ranged Martial Arts - having two of these (such as Long Range shot and Offensive Shot) are a good way to get your ranged penalties down and your CV up.
  

 

EDIT - oh - in terms of character design: you're also spending a LOT on your single attack for that not being an a MP. If you can get away with it, I'd recommend taking that down to 60 active, then purchasing levels of Martial Arts damage to push the damage back up to 12d/120 active. (martial Arts can also represent just the fact that you're innately good with something, rather than training.)

[Thia Halmades]

Re: No combat respect

 

I'm looking for some sort of dodging or combat awareness on the write up and don't see it. The best way of surviving combat is to not get hit' date=' that's why you have Bricks. So you need some better speed and manouvres. And try to keep the odd half phase handy, to duck those nasty blows that your pet Brick should be taking for you.[/quote']

 

Which only works if the party Brick actually takes the damage, instead of aborting every time an attack comes in.

[assault]

Re: No combat respect

 

EGO is costed on the assumption that you're paying for OECV. As you aren't a mentalist' date=' there's no reason to pay for this. Change your EGO to Defensive Only (-1). That'll save you 3 points.[/quote']

 

Eww. Cheesy.

 

Also, EGO covers general willpower stuff, not just ECV. Putting a limitation like this on it presumably means it can't be used for this purpose.

[assault]

Re: No combat respect

 

If I was to try to summarise what people are saying, it's that the character is poorly balanced. Basically, in some areas he's very strong, and very weak in others.

 

Of course, none of us are playing in the game he is in, so for all we know he might be perfectly balanced in that setting. Except, of course, that you've told us that he keeps doing Sleeping Beauty impersonations in combat. That's a big indicator that he isn't balanced right.

 

Another big danger sign is that he has Normal Characteristic Maxima. NCM is one of my pet hates, as in my experience it tends to encourage an excessively narrow understanding of what "normal" means in a superheroic world. Or, to put it more bluntly, characters with NCM suck, and I ban it in any game I run.

 

Tactics, of course, is the in-game part of the question. Designing a character is only the beginning. It's what you do with it that counts.

[Cygnia]

Re: No combat respect

 

In order to maximize tactics and teamwork, who else is in your party? A baddie entangled or flashed ahead of time could be a sitting duck for those repulsors of yours...

[Kevin Schultz]

Re: No combat respect

 

Eww. Cheesy.

 

Also, EGO covers general willpower stuff, not just ECV. Putting a limitation like this on it presumably means it can't be used for this purpose.

 

Here's my claim: there's no way to use a character's will offensively that isn't some sort of power. All other rolls are to resist an influence on a character's actions, which by definition is defensive. I'm also comparing the cost to INT, which for 1 point per level gives you PER and INT-based skill rolls. In comparing it to that, "DECV + willpower checks" sounds comparable.

 

EDIT - besides, cheesy would be buying EGO down to 0, and then buying "Defensive EGO" back up to 10, for a savings of 10 points.

[Kevin Schultz]

Re: No combat respect

 

Oh, and in looking at the build - your Damage Shield needs to have Continuous (+1) on it to be book-legal.

[aylwin13]

Re: No combat respect

 

In order to maximize tactics and teamwork' date=' who else is in your party? A baddie entangled or flashed ahead of time could be a sitting duck for those repulsors of yours...[/quote']I'm in the same game as Dusty, and have two characters on the team. One is a 'porting, shadow (darkness) manipulator; the other has a "tractor" beam (40 STR TK beam). Both of these will definitely work well to set up targets for Black Jack. The problem is that the characters have just come together to become the New Champions. They really haven't done a lot of work towards congealing as a team. That will definitely come.

 

I do think that there are some great suggestions for tweaks to Dusty's character. I'd certainly look into using some of them.