Markdoc

Re: Younger PCs; Older Players I don't have a problem with that - but of course, it's going to affect the game you play: any game where a child or young adult is in what we think of as "adult situations" is going to acquire a darker overtone. But I've met a 13 year old combat veteran who was charged with war crimes, so it's hardly stretching the bounds of reality to have such situations in game. There is something about putting a child in that situation that twangs at the nerves a bit, but on the whole I think that's a good thing. cheers, Mark

Re: Hmmm. More on Special Effects It is - if the special effect is appropriate - reduced ... as it affects the character in question. That's how the power works. Ummmmm ... no. You asked how much protection 9 AP offers. The answer by the rules is "none". Surprise, surprise - a 9 point power doesn't cancel a 20 point one. However the construct itself will in fact cancel invisibility if you buy sufficient to cancel invisibility. Seriously, how hard was that to work out? . I'm not seeing the problem here. Have you never had adjustment powers in your games? No handwaving required: yes, the power you describe above is rules legal, but it wouldn't work as you describe, since the "only powers affecting the character" means that most powers would be entirely unaffected - until they were used on the character in question. As for reasonably common way to shut off the drain, the build I mentioned shuts off automatically as soon as it no longer affects the character - can't get more common than that. Of course if someone tried the unlimited version, as GM, I'd just say no. I don't allow uncontrollable, continuous killing attacks vs hardened flash defence (smell) either Yes, it is possible to build abusive powers. This is not news. Shrug. The only absolute in Hero is that there are no absolutes in Hero. I have already noted that there are some build that would evade the construct I outlined, and also noted that I see that as a feature, not a bug. Of course if the character wanted personal resistance to his area affect power, he'd need to buy personal resistance. The same applie if he had bough an area affect atomic fireball. I really don't see where all your comments lead: they mostly seem to be asking "Does this standard build play like a standard build?" The answer is "Yes: it's a Hero system standard build. It plays exactly like a Hero system standard build and yes, Hero system rules apply." cheers, Mark

Re: Fantasy Economies: How closely should we examine them? Sure, of course. I don't agonise over it, but when placing people/villages/cities/castles, in-game there has to be a reason for them to be there and that usually entails some sort of economic consequences. When designing cultures and societies, I usually start with magic and politics but economics is not far behind. These things are not doe purely for geek credits, but because understanding things like where the trade routes are, who has the money and how much, what sorts of things are valuable, etc not only aids verisimilitude and depth, but makes it harder for the GM to be thrown off stride, by players' queries and acts as a valuable series of plot hooks in its own right. When I play in games where economies or societies don't seem to make any sort of sense, that doesn't mean I can't enjoy them; it just means we're in a kill-them-take-their-stuff kind of of game and I play it on those terms. cheers, Mark

Re: Animal Sacrifice Yup. What they said. "Blood of a virgin queen" is probably what I'd define as "Expendable, Extremely Difficult to obtain new Focus" which is why it's worth more than pig's blood. cheers, Mark

Re: Hit Locations It's relatively limited in that: 1) I have been shot once 2) I've seen one guy shot and killed 3) I've talked to maybe a dozen guys who have been shot in hospital. A trauma surgeon or paramedic in a large US city could probably rack those numbers up over a busy weekend (OK, maybe not #1 ) Anyway, I like an active life cheers, Mark

Re: Hit Locations The shrapnel thing was entirely my own fault: as a kid, I was into chemistry (my dad was a science teacher, who helped with getting "reagents" ). Things were (literally) different then. We had a shop in my town called "scientific supplies" that sold .. well, you can guess from the name. Back then home-making explosives was considered good clean fun for red-blooded young boys*. We upped the ante, by deciding to make "depth charges" for fishing by putting our explosives inside a larger can filled with junk metal. We had the foresight to scrape a shallow trench before detonating our prototype (thank god!) but I had overlooked the fact that the hand that set off the charge was - briefly- out of the trench. I put a 3 inch nail right though mine and still have a pair of neat round scars making the spot. cheers, Mark *we also home-made napalm, giant fire balloons (my favourite!), 3-stage rockets and a giant iron-framed kite that flew over a kilometer high - probably a real air-traffic hazard!

Re: Hit Locations

Re: Cybernetics and Bioengineering: what are YOUR limits? Meh - at this point, I'd consider going full-body cyborg. cheers, Mark

Re: Hit Locations It's actually pretty hard to KO - or even stun - someone with hits to the arms/lower legs. Your STUN multiple is only 2x, which means you need to do more than 5 BOD to stun a relatively robust, unarmoured normal. Give him a chain shirt and you need to do more than 8 BOD. These are not light blows! So the idea that these represent pain and shock is pretty reasonable to me. cheers, Mark

Re: Hmmm. More on Special Effects I doubt it: in play it's simplicity itself (it's always on) and it falls to the GM to adjudicate effects. As an objection that's pretty weak sauce. Yup, but to a far lesser degree than the "defense" paradigm previously suggested. In truth, you'll never avoid some uncertainty when working with SFX. And as noted, a simple build avoids that particular uncertainty entirely, so I guess we've solved that problem.

Re: Hmmm. More on Special Effects Actually not only a different ballpark, but one designed for a different-shaped ball. First off, it's a mechanical construct: it's not "immunity to everything with this special effect" - it's specifically a drain that will offer good protection under defined circumstances. Secondly, although it may work out at 3 points per +1 (I did that on purpose, the original draft had an odd divisor ) but it's over 10 active points per +1. That greatly changes how it interacts with the rest of the rules. You can't easily cram 30 points of "SFX defence" built like this into your average power framework (I see that as a plus: it's relatively powerful effect - far more than I'd allow for 3 real points ... or 1 real point with a focus!)

Re: Hmmm. More on Special Effects Ummmm ... because ED works against defined mechanisms? As does PD, MD, etc? Buying +5 ED, only vs fire, is pretty straightforward. If the attack goes against ED and the SFX is fire, then you know where you are.

Re: Star Wars: Technological Stagnation? Dude, it's Star Wars. The place where spacecraft fly like they're maneuvering on wings and make "vroom, vroom" sounds in vaccuum. The place where you can transfer psychic awareness in a bag of blood. The technology is the same because otherwise it wouldn't look "star wars-y". That's it. That's your answer right there. I seriously doubt that the concept of "what does it mean that technology isn't evolving?" came up at even one focus group. Watching people trying to apply logic to the Star Wars Universe is like watching a blind man on a speeding bus trying to eat jello with a katana. cheers, Mark Edit: One thing has definitely changed though - that female Jedi would totally kick Yoda's ass!

Re: Hmmm. More on Special Effects

Re: Hmmm. More on Special Effects That's precisely why I do not want SFX as a mechanic in my games Is Chloroform a poison? Yeah, technically it is. Is water a poison? Well, yes, under some circumstances, it is. So is oxygen. The problem with SFX-based mechanics is that SFX always have the potential to be pretty nebulous. None of the suggested cures for the special effects problem seem any less poisonous (the reverse, actually) than the original problem. cheers, Mark

Re: Shoule NASA be nixed? Rather than over-bureaucratized, I think it has been over-politicicized, with programs being scrapped or starved of funds because they went against the Administration of the day's political agenda, while new programs were swiftly thrown together by the administration without consultation with NASA. A perfect example was Bush's vision for a successor to the shuttle, a manned mission to the Moon and a start on a manned mars mission. Three major challenges .... and no new budget for any of them. NASA was apparently supposed to carry all this stuff out with whatever change they could scrounge from behind couch cushions. Ideally the agency would be turned into less of a political chew toy and given some autonomy. But still, while NASA is not functioning optimally, right now there is nobody else who could take over its job. And I think all of the rest of the universe is a little too important to simply ignore. cheers, Mark

Re: Bows Another point - the seperation between "war bows" and "hunting bows" is a totally arbitrary one in terms of design. Warbows do tend to have heavier draws and fire heavier arrows (and thus have shorter range) but they're not built for that. Nor are hunting bows built for longer range: fire a lighter arrow from a "war bow" and you'll get more range. The differences are that bows built especially for war exist only where there are archers trained specially for war (ie: guys who train to use big, heavy bows) and because in war you can expect to be shooting at armoured men, who are trying to kill you: you don't want to just lightly wound them and you usually don't have the leisure to maneuvre close for a killing shot. Thus, big heavy arrows, with specialised killing heads. But the bows themselves, pull notwithstanding, are built exactly the same way. You could very easily use them for hunting ... but why bother? A lighter bow and a simple broadhead is cheaper, less fatiguing to use, less fatiguing to carry, and just as effective, if all you want to do is kill an animal. We know that for war, arrows with specific weights and heads were produced for specific tasks, so I have no problem with allowing different arrows. I don't care too much about extra range - although a flight arrow will outrange a lighter hunting arrow, which will itself outrange a heavy armour-piercing arrow, the extreme end of a bow's range is usually irrelevant and the differences in effective range are not that great. So it's easy enough to simply allow AP arrows (which trade off AP for a range penalty CSL), broadheads (which trade off reduced pen. for a +1 STUN mod) and flight arrows, which trade off DC for a a range bonus - with ordinary arrows being a straight HKA. Combine that with differing numbers of DC for pull, and you are pretty much there. cheers, Mark

Re: Bows Years ago, I asked my martial arts teacher to demonstrate a particular technique and then asked him what it was called. He said "Sankyu" and I said "You're welcome!" Oh, I suffered for that .... but it was totally worth it. cheers, Mark

Re: Cybernetics and Bioengineering: what are YOUR limits? It is. Over the years, I've known several intelligent well-trained people who stated confidently that "Computers will never be able to do X". The common feature is how swiftly they have been proven wrong. cheers, Mark

Re: Looking for conversion material Another idea from the D&D world is the Book of 9 Swords (also called Bo9S, or Book of Weeanboo Fightin' Magic ). It was basically the D&D sourcebook for anime-style super swordsmen, but the "powers" they have are basically spells, and most would fit well with martial magicians or Ki-powered warriors. cheers, Mark

Re: Conan: The Current Movie in Progress..... I loves the comic series, but Slaine is an RPG now? That actually sounds kind of cool ... cheers, Mark

Re: The Chrysanthemum War (character suggestions sought) You don't need to put up with any crankiness - drop me a PM with your email address and I'll mail you the entire campaign in .pdf format. I made it into two files - one for the campaign with all the background, maps and scenarios and one just for the NPCs cheers, Mark

Re: Looking for conversion material Runequest has been done - it has a relatively small list of spells (though there's a ton of fan-created stuff on the net, it's often pretty esoteric) and they're all on that link. However, you could grab one of the pathfinder books, if you have a yen for D&D'ish stuff, or try hunting down some oft he older Tekumel stuff. The spells themselves are not really special, but they are atmospherically described and have great names, which adds to game atmosphere. cheers, Mark

Re: Skill's in Frameworks - how did you made it? I've done this multiple ways, for multiple characters - immortals, people with computer downlinks in their brain, people with spirit guides, etc. The simplest way (GM's permission only!) is a VPP. You need to be careful with this, since even a relatively small VPP can give you multiple skills with stupidly high skill rolls when a few limitations are stacked on. As a GM, I only allow this when the VPP is max. about 11 active points (a CHA-based skill with +3 to the roll) and preferably smaller. In addition there needs to be some sort of limitation (skills the character could reasonably acquired in a long life, skills common to police .... whatever, but there needs to be something) Another approach (and quite rules legal) is to buy cramming several times, allowing the character to swap skills. The downside of course is that you only get an 8- roll, but for general out-of-combat tasks, that's usually sufficient, and it essentially gives you basic skills in everything. The third approach, if you need a really broad range of skills ....is to buy a stupidly high roll with a general skill. So instead of trying to buy Biochemist, organic chemist, nanochemist, molecular biology, pharmacology, etc, etc just buy "Chemistry, 20-". Sure, you may take a -8 for attempting to analyse alien nanochemistry, but that still gives you a decent base roll. cheers, Mark

Re: Superhuman women less attractive in 6th Edition?