5th edition powers

[PhantomLoki]

hello i am trying to figure out how to do powers for 5th edition.

i am new and not really understanding how to do it with the instructions made by the book any advise would be much appreciated.

 

thanks

[Hyper-Man]

Well, what is the plain English description of the power you want to create?

[Lucius]

Well, what is the plain English description of the power you want to create?

 

That's the first step. Until you know what kind of power you want to create, you can't do anything. In Hero we "reason from effect," that is, decide what we want an ability to do, and only THEN figure out how to make that happen in game terms.

 

For instance I want to create an ability for a character named John Lee Pettimore III (Yes, if you know the song Copperhead Road, the character is based on that song.) He's in a game of Monster Hunter International, a game using the Hero rules that I can only recommend if the guy running it agrees to make some adjustments to either the monsters or the character's starting points, or if you don't mind your characters getting regularly chewed up in  Total Party Kills. My friend, who's been running this character complains "These monsters can one shot us, but we can't one shot them." And he has a point. I want to make an ability that keeps a character from being taken out in one shot by overwhelming damage.

 

I'm going to call it "Too Ornery to Die!" Somehow, by luck or stubborn refusal to quit or some other factor, the keeps going after attacks that would have taken down a lesser man. The vampire tosses him aside before he's fully drained. The monster underestimates him and swats him aside contemptuously with less than full strength. The giant spider's bite fails to inject a full dose of venom. You can think of it as the power to be the hero of a story and not just a victim.

 

Now, once you know what you want, you can look at the list of Powers (and sometimes Talents, Skills, or even Characteristics) to find something that has the kind of effect you want. A common example used when people describe Hero System is to point out that there is no "fireball" or "lightning bolt" Power. If you want a character to attack with fireballs, you might chose the Power called "Energy Blast" which does damage at range, apply the Power Modifiers that make it work like a fireball (such as making it an explosion over an area) and call it "Fireball."

 

One thing that can confuse people is that the NAME of a Power doesn't have to matter in terms of how it works in the game world. For example, there is a Power called Darkness. You can use it to do what it sounds like, create field of darkness that light does not penetrate and in which, or through which, you therefore cannot see. You could ALSO define it as "vs Radio" and create an area in which you are jamming all radio and radar transmission. It's no longer dark, but the Power used is still "Darkness."

 

There are a lot of Powers that defend against damage, but the one I want to use for this effect is called Desolidification. As you have hopefully guessed, this DOES NOT mean that John Lee Pettimore III is going to resist damage by turning into smoke or something; it just means he's going to be unharmed. This costs 40 points - a lot, but there's a way to make it cheaper.

 

After choosing a Power, you can apply "Power Modifiers."  There are Adders, which add to the cost and make a Power more effective in some way. There are Advantages, which multiply the cost and can make it considerably more effective; for example if I want John Lee Pettimore III to be able to protect someone else with this ability to survive the unsurvivable, I could use the Advantage "Usable By Others." I won't, because that doesn't really make sense for this ability. And finally there are Limitations, which divide the cost and make it in some way less effective. I plan to apply several of those.

 

I start with the Limitation "Cannot Pass Solid Objects" since our redneck gun loving anti-hero here isn't going through a wall without putting a hole in it. This has a Limitation value of -1/2 (Limitations are annotated with a minus sign and Advantages with a plus sign, to keep us from confusing one with the other.) I add "Only to Protect Against Damage that would bring to Negative BOD, or Negative STUN, or otherwise incapacitate." (in other words, "one shots") for -1. Side Effects is a Limitation that says something bad will happen, or might happen, when a Power is used; I take Minor Side Effects because it will often make sense for the character to take SOME damage even though the way the Power works it's supposed to stop all of it. Side Effects is worth -1/2. I take No Conscious Control for -2, because the character can't just decide to use this ability; we're going to trust the guy running the game to let it come into play when needed. And finally, I will limit the character to three miraculous escapes a day; that's the Charges Limitation, and for 3 Charges it's -1 1/4.

 

That's a total Limitation value of -5 1/4. If you have the Hero Designer program it does the math for you but if you want to do it yourself it works like this:

 

ACTIVE POINTS equals Base Cost of Power plus (Base Cost of Power Times Advantages.)

 

In this case, I had no Advantages so Active Points is 40, same as the Powers basic cost.

 

REAL COST (the price you pay in Character Points) equals ACTIVE POINTS over (one plus total Limitation value)

 

In this case 40 / (1+5.25) = 6 (round it off, rounding down if it's at something point five.)

 

 

And that's as much math as you would likely be expected to do, and it's all "front loaded" in the character creation process. And even that is not necessarily mandatory; at first John Lee Pettimore III had NO Powers, and was all built on Characteristics, Skills, and Talents. It's the Powers that get complicated.

 

Now tell us what kind of power YOU want to build, and you'll probably get several suggestions from different people on how to build it. And they may even all be right, there is often no one "right" way to construct a power in Hero.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Just as there is no one, single, ideal palindromedary tagline

[NuSoardGraphite]

hello i am trying to figure out how to do powers for 5th edition.

i am new and not really understanding how to do it with the instructions made by the book any advise would be much appreciated.

 

thanks

Hero uses a powers construction system. So as mentioned first you come up with the idea for the power, then you choose the basic Hero power that comes closest to the power you want to design, then you customize it with Advantages and limitations if nessecary.

 

Once you figure out how to write up powers and begin to explore the games quirks and limitations (there are few once you become proficient) it becomes rather difficult to go back to other game systems.

[Doc Democracy]

There are LOADS of threads on the boards on the philosophy of character creation in HERO and more ways to do it than there are members on the boards.  :-)

 

The others have given what I think is the best general way.  Think of what it is you want to do.  Describe the character in words and go into a bit more detail about the powers - ignore the rules and try not to think in game terms.

 

Then go to the rules.  If you are still struggling then bring each and every one of those to the boards and there will be a variety of suggestions on how you might want to go about it.  Most of them will be legal, rules as written, some might suggest you stretch the rules, all of them will give you insight into how the system can be used.

 

So dont leave yourself as a one-post member.  Get back to us and get our brains working on this stuff.

 

:-)

 

Doc

[Ninja-Bear]

Also I myself it took awhile to get the hang of special effects. And there is nothing wrong with building a power x and realizing in play that build y or z may be better. And sometimes builds can come done to preference too. And welcome!