Kyrinthic

Re: VPP active point costs

Re: VPP active point costs Those things will be true as well if you are not prepared with your VPP, if you took melee powers, you are in the same place that brick is, and if you took ranged ones you are standing next to the blaster. You still have all the potential to have the wrong powers if you arent prepared. And when you are, well, you still have to compensate for being 30% behind to start. Thats the thing, given infinite real points and a 60 active point limit, the person who buys every power in the game can buy them all at 60 AP, the VPP can get the same thing but at 40 AP. Now obviously no game has infinite points, but in every other aspect of the game, the cost of versitility is real points. you want two different attacks? spend points for them. you want a high speed and a whole bunch of different attacks, spend points, or buy a multipower, which just costs points. But always, no matter how you go about spending the points or what powers you buy, each one can be 60 AP. Unless its a VPP, which means you spend points for them first (VPPs are crazy expensive in real points), but then you are limited by the AP. It just seems to stand out as an anomaly to me, but at least it sounds like the recognized that and fixed in in the newest version A cosmic level power pool really is a whole different matter, and those characters aren't necessarily being compared to other equally pointed characters anyhow. A cosmic power pool lets you do whatever you want, instantly, thats a pretty big differents from 'you can do things in a certain range as long as you prepare beforehand'. A big old cosmic power pool, by the books, would leave you with less than half the AP of the other similar power level characters. And lets face it, superman did not hit half as hard as batman or aquaman, they just arent built at the same levels. Sure, a cosmic power pool is all kinds of awesome, but really, a 150 active point power that lets you bring 60 ap attack powers to bear will not compare favorably to a 150 point multipower no matter how well you pick your powers. But again, a small cosmic power pool for cool utility powers is great, but it will fail as a main attack power compared to the other options. -Kyrinthic

Re: VPP active point costs Are you trying to say a fitting enemy must always have a weakness that can only be easily exploited by a guy with a vpp and not the rest of the team? I cant say that I agree. Because basic attacks are the easiest to compare. Sure there are a ton of other effects, all of which will benefit from 30% more active points to build with. the list you show could just as easily be a multipower and do everything on it better. Yes, I get that you _can_ build something new for every fight, but you are still working under a set of limitations as to what you can bring with you in each fight, and how much preparation you have for a given fight. Only very rarely will it be enough more carefully built to exploit enemy weaknesses that it will be better than the 30% higher active point power set build with an elcon or a multipower. You can do a ton with a 20 point VPP from utility, but thats really a whole other discussion, I'm referring to trying to build a character that actually wants to use a vpp as a primary combat power, and really having a lot of trouble seeing how it could be competative in combat. Out of combat sure, but then out of combat your skills are likely as important as your powers, and again, there isnt a lot that a 20 point vpp or a well rounded group of heroes couldnt do anyhow. And of course it ends in pretending I dont have a lot of imagination because I use easily compared power types. Sure, you keep feigning superiority because your actual arguments dont hold water. -Kyrinthic

Re: VPP active point costs Spending more I get, a VPP is god aweful expensive, and impossible to reduce the cost, but thats ok, its very versitile. Versitility is great, if you have the chance to prepare for it. I mean if you GM only throws guys in with vulnerabilties you can find in advance and exploit on a regular basis, I could see a reason why being 30% behind the rest of the party could make sense. But, most competant GMs will have villians that have weaknesses exploitable by other members of the party that dont have a VPP, or villians with no weaknesses, or weaknesses you cant find out in advance at least as often as the first option. And its got to be a pretty damn big hole in their defenses before a 40 point attack bought to exploit it is as strong as a 60 point generic attack in the first place, and if you cant find one of those holes literally every fight, you will be the team chump. As for having a good mix of utility powers, ie, an EB, an RKA, a flash, an entangle, and whatnot, well, a multipower is going to be the way to go, and your toolbox will be plenty big enough to deal with the situations you come across, you will have a higher AP cap, and you will have spent less points than the guy trying to work with a VPP. As for the book saying that the control cost affects active points, I didnt see it anywhere, I only see it in hero designer, which was why I though at first it was a bug, but really couldnt find confirmation one way or another. -Kyrinthic

Re: VPP active point costs Yeah, this is 5th edition, I actually have a focus limit and a timeframe limit (cant change during combat) on the control cost, to keep it a form of being prepared rather than reacting, the real point cost is like 75ish. I was really just concerned about the 'active point' aspect. Ie, if I make a 12d6 energy blast, its 60 active points, regardless of how many limits I put on it, or what framework I build it in, except, according to the HDC program, if I do it as a VPP, its 90 active points. I get that there is a level of utility to VPPs, but I still dont really get why it gets labled as active points when other frameworks dont put an active point label above the cost of the powers in the pool. I compare it to a multipower because a multipower with ~10 slots costs roughly the same as a vpp once you add in skill cost to change the pool powers, and performs in the ballpark of the same function. Its less open ended, but it loses points from disads a lot better. I think my best bet is to show my GM the 6th edition rules and see what he thinks about it, or remake my character with a multipower, slightly less versatile in order to be effective at the same power level as the rest of the group. -Kyrinthic

Re: VPP active point costs Oh, I get how they work thats why I like it, I just dont understand why the character creation tool lists it as 90 active points. That is making my GM not want to let me have it at full value, and while versitility is fun, I dont think its worth having 40 point powers in a 60 point game I thought perhaps I was reading something wrong or the HDC was giving an incorrect number. I tried doing searches through the forum, and while there are lots of posts on comparing VPP with other frameworks or debating about how good / bad they are, nothing else seems to reference this AP cost I am seeing. I mean if I build a 60 point multipower with 5 fixed slots, it doesnt show that as 90 active points, but it shows a 60 point vpp with a 30 point control cost as 90 active points. -Kyrinthic

Good afternoon, I am in a campaign where I have chosen to build a gadget character, with a VPP. I built him with a 60 point VPP (and like 15ish point control cost after some limitations). I cant change powers in combat, All my gadgets have a focus, etc. Now the hero designer shows this as being 90 active points. If I read the rules correctly, I can only make a 60 active point power with that pool, not a 90 point one, why would it be listed as a 90 active point power? Building a multipower does not add the slot costs to the active points of the pool cost for example. All of this is in 5th edition. Am I reading something wrong, or am I supposed to suffer a 30% performance hit by trying to use a VPP, on top of its significant cost? -Kyrinthic