Markdoc

Re: A days journey It should be pointed out that the 30 miler is a test - designed to weed out young, very very fit men who have been training for it. And even if you select only young, very, very fit men ('cos no-one else actually makes it into Commando training) and even if you train them for 39 weeks prior to throwing them into the 30 miler .... 60% of them fail. It's not an example of what people, by and large can do - it's an endurance test showing what the fittest of the fit can do if they push themselves. cheers, Mark

Re: Zeppelins To be fair, like a lot of the cool military tech that inexplicably gets cancelled, the people pushing it never got around to explaining how they could make it work. The cool picture everyone has seen shows a little bitty airship In contrast the Hindenberg, (which was about half the size of the Empire state building and about 4 times larger than the blimp in that sketch) and which used hydrogen, giving it an 8% greater lifting capacity than modern blimps had a lifting capacity of ..... drum roll .... about 10 tons. Technology has improved, but helium still weighs exactly the same as it did 70 years ago, so those kinds of numbers won't change.* They never could expand how they could increase lifting capacity 50 fold, increase safety, armour the vehicle ... heck, basically anything. After all it wasn't congress that killed the program - DARPA itself asked for the program to be defunded, and the reason seems to be that they had come to conclusion it couldn't work. cheers, Mark *And yes, I know that WALRUS was technically not a blimp, but a heavier than air craft using helium for added lift - but the numbers still don't add up.

Re: Real Life into Hero. Fair point, but the model he was using is specifically listed in the rules as giving a +1. So I did. I also considered whether to have the size penalties for not moving, but didn't because in my game that only applies to targets that would normally have a DCV. You could still argue that it should apply ... I'm kind of ambivalent to that. cheers, Mark

Re: Real Life into Hero. Having shot lots of soft-nose bullets into living flesh, I can assure you that the "big hole" thing is an urban legend. A soft-nose 9mm hi-power round makes an entry hole in living flesh just big enough to force your finger in and an exit hole big enough to maybe force 2-3 fingers in. Plenty of blood and certainly rapidly lethal, but rifle and handgun bullets don't make big holes, nor do they, sorry to say, "knock people off their feet" any more than cars explode into gigantic balls of flames if they slide off the road. That's hollywood stuff. cheers, Mark

Re: Real Life into Hero. Well, a 12" (30 cm) target has a DCV of 0 increased to 6 (due to size) and you get -4 for range (25 M). You also get a -3 for unfamiliar weapon, for a "total target number" of 13. On the plus side, you were braced (+2 to offset range) set (+1 OCV) you were shooting a colt python, which gives you +1 OCV, and there's an undefined "environmental modifier": you are at a shooting range, nobody is shooting at you. I normally give that a +3 for "ideal conditions" giving you a total bonus of 7. So if you hit 6 out of 15, that's 40% (roughly 9 or less) suggesting you have an OCV of 4: slightly better than average. A lot of GM's don't use environmental modifiers or only give penalties - which seems a bit odd to me. Even if all things are equal, it's easier to hit a target if you have all the time in the world and no-one is shooting at you, but we don't usually drop a penalty on OCV for "in combat" - combat is assumed to be the default setting for use of OCV. So I give a bonus. My dad, who had a lot of combat experience, and also trained cadets at the range after the war for many years, stated that you could reliably cut a soldier's effective range by 2/3rds to 3/4 if you were comparing shooting at the range with shooting in combat - so if you hit 2/5 at 25 meters at the range, you could reasonably be expected to hit nothing at 25 metres in combat and 2/5 at 6-8 metres (which based on real-life shooting figures, is actually pretty good). cheers, Mark

Re: Considering: Sliding the KA scale for Weapons I'm inclined to agree with the prior posters - I have simply long since dropped d6-1. 5 points buys you a DC in the procession 1 point, 1/2d6, 1d6. Given that that gives you a range from hatpin (1 pt) to murderous, but skilled berserker with a greatsword (4d6) that's plenty of granularity for most heroic games. cheers, Mark

Re: Permanent transformation

Re: Creature: Grandfather-of-all-the-Reptiles

Re: Help me refine NoNameYet It's a good example, actually - by RAW, no, they would not be able to use it: the rules specifically don't allow modifying multipower slots in the same way that you can modify single powers - which is reasonable, because you are getting a 90% discount on the cost of every slot after the first. But as a GM, I'd consider allowing that one, simply because it is restricted to modifications of a single power: HKA and the way you have built it precludes it being a swiss-army knife power*. It's definitely way out there in GM's option territory, but doesn't strike me as abusive - and I'd allow it only after pointing out to the character that it was not rule slegal and I was allowing it only because it was well-designed for game balance. That would put him on notice that if he started started adding on other powers, I'd go with RAW and say no, purely on game balance reasons. Here's a counter example - Ancestralweaponsguy is allowed to use his MP with martial arts. His buddy builds Awesomekipowersguy who has a MP with various Aids, Flight, Barrier, HKA and RKA, defined as a martial art. Should he be able to use martial arts with it to get a cheap boost? If you answer yes, a variety of pretty abusive builds are permitted, since you are giving the character two stacking price breaks - letting him add cheap levels and DCs onto cheap slots. If you answer no, you are in the unfortunate position of saying "special effects define how a power works mechanically". After all, if Ancestralweaponsguy can use martial arts with his multipower, shouldn't Blowsstuffupguy be able to use a ranged martial art with his spells multipower? I always start with examining the mechanics of a power before I look at special effect. So it's not "a sword". It's "HKA 1d6+1, Armor Piercing - special effect, sword" cheers, Mark *Good example - guy who built a magic sword that had a blade that turned into a lightning bolt (sort of a fantasy light saber). In blade form it was decent sized HKA. In lightning form, it was an AVLD that ignored most resistant defences. So if they have good resistant def, use the lightning - if they don't, use the blade.

Re: News Story/PlotHook: Post Apocalyptic Gas Explosion Oh. I thought you were referring to this:

Re: Need list of skaldic kennings Actually when I was a kid and could devote a whole day to such pursuits, yeah, I read the whole trilogy in a single sitting. I doubt I am the only one to do so. cheers, Mark

Re: Blowing Up Prootwaddles, or Character Self-Destruction

Re: Need list of skaldic kennings Off topic but interesting (to me anyway ) is the way this kind of word-play persists in West Scandinavian languages. All of them are noun/adjective poor compared to English, or even German. To some extent, this is compensated for by making compound words, but there is also a strong element of punning involved - something you find in kennings. I was thinking about this yesterday: on the way to work, I passed a van belonging to an office-cleaning firm. The company is called "Rengøringsagenter" which means "Cleaning agents" in English. Cleaning agents are things like disinfectant, soap, etc. However the Danish word for these sort of agents is midler and disinfectant, soap, etc are called "rengøringsmidler" in Danish. The word agent is used, but only in the context of secret agent or legal agent - it's an import from English. The reason I mention this is that the company name - to a Danish person - means "Agents who clean, with an inbuilt pun on the english translation". This kind of secondary meaning is highly prevalent here and one reason it's so hard to become fully fluent. It's equivalent to the practice of upper class english gentlemen from centuries past, to making puns that were only comprehensible if you also spoke greek and/or latin. French does this too with French/English puns (probably all languages do) but it's especially prevalent here. Bear that in mind when looking at the kennngs: some of the more incomprehensible one may well be puns. cheers, Mark

Re: Need list of skaldic kennings See my edited comment - I was thinking initially of works that contain kennings or scholarly discussions of same - but many (far from all) of them have been gathered in the poetry database. cheers, Mark

Re: Need list of skaldic kennings Damn. That's a toughie. The definitive sites are Jörmungrund and Septentrionalia, but neither of them will take you very far if you don't speak at least Norse/Danish. I honestly don't think that much of this has been translated into english, ever: it's primarily of interest to academics and those who work in the field can of course read old norse - where translations have been done the bulk of it is into Danish or Bokmål. Probably your best bet is the secondary scholarship section of Septentrionalia, where at least you can find english translations of some works. If all you want however is lists of kennings, devoid of context, then there's the database of Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages. That's the largest English-language collection I know of (and a jolly handy reference to puzzling these things out). Edit: go to "database" and you'll get a list of topics including (on the right side) "kennings." cheers, Mark

Re: Requires another power limitation?

Re: 5E martial arts questions For the arm numbing we have simply gone with either a STR drain or a Running drain (it'll fade by itself) with the special effect that either an arm or a leg has been numbed. In most cases, that will simply be special effects - if an arm is numbed, the martial artist can still attack/defend with one arm for a few phases, or limp along at reduced speed. In a few cases (for example where two handed weapons are used or a technique requires two hands) then that weapon/technique can't be used - that's why you get the "requires two hands" limitation, after all. As for the disguising his own martial arts, I can see several options - not using characteristic moves - this would penalize but not prevent a KS: martial arts roll, since the same style will also be obvious in basic maneuvers or, as suggested, acting (though I'd give it a -2 penalty in a skill vs skill roll, since it's not usually what acting is used for - and allow him to take a penalty on his DCV and/or OCV - to reflect fighting differently to the way he has trained - as a bonus to his acting roll. If he chooses to do the latter, he might reap some payback later, if they fight again: "Actually, I have some bad news for you. I'm not actually left-handed." That should be worth at least a one time +3 for surprise maneuver! cheers, Mark

Re: Requires another power limitation? I'd agree with the others: this is a campaign rule. That doesn't mean I think it's a bad idea - just that it's not something I'd enforce with limitations on specific spells of the kind you suggest. In my current game, all human spellcasters* must take requires a skill roll, costs Long Term Endurance, Concentration, 1/2 DCV and Extra time full phase as limitations on their spells - no exceptions. Because of the full phase limitation no spells may be used in multiple power attacks and they can only be cast one at a time. But that's a game design decision meaning that spellcasters who want to cast must use up LTE and be at 1/2 or 0 DCV for at least a full phase, for each spell. Those limits were put in place to specifically gimp mages who want long term protection spells and warrior mages, so that strong guys with swords would have a useful role to play. I'd take the same route with what you want - but I wouldn't use "must buy X points first" because it's a non-limiting limitation in play. Think of some limitations that would enforce wht you want, or simply make a GM ruling "You have to buy spells up this tree". You could also apply the same rationale to (for example) fighting "feats" or martial arts. Cheers, Mark *and all player characters are human. I make the distinction because some non-humans can cast spells without these limitations - in these cases the spells are natural powers for them and they have their own problems to compensate, like the fay suffering injury from iron and burning up in sunlight.

Re: Fantasy Hero 6E - initial impressions

Re: Requires another power limitation? Well, would you allow a character to take "cannot use air powers" as a valid limitation? It would certainly prevent him from buying any air-based spells, but then he'd probably design his character with that in mind, so it wouldn't disadvantage the character in practice. Same with this approach: it's unlikely the player would buy useless spells just to reach that point total, unless there are very few spells in existence - he'll just take 20 or 30 point of useful spells - at which point he really isn't suffering any disadvantage. He's just getting a price break. cheers, Mark

Re: Requires another power limitation? Or, if you want an in-game mechanism, set up a game specific-rationale that spells are written with the assumption that you already know the prior spell (-0 limitation). You can do this several ways. If you are using a skill roll, specify that if you don't know the pre-requisite spell, that gives you a -5 on your skill roll. So a guy trying to cast a Fire Ball spell without learning Fire Control spell and Fire Bolt spell, is at -10. He's diving in at the deep end. If you are not using RSR, give the spells an activation roll (14-/11-/8-) with side effect. So a guy trying to cast a Fire Ball spell without learning Fire Control spell and Fire Bolt spell, has an 11- chance that it will generate a nasty side effect, but only an 8- chance if he knows Fire control. These limitations are -0 since they affect all casters equally and because if you have the correct spells (which most casters will), you are not limited at all. cheers, Mark

Re: Help me refine NoNameYet Because the rules specifically say they can't? And the rules do say that they can't. They specifically differentiate between martial arts and haymakers in the adding damage section - you can haymaker a martial maneuver or a simple power, but you can't haymaker a power to which you can also add a martial maneuver. There is a good design reason for this. There are a number of limitations on what you can and can't add to multipower slots and on permitted advantages/limitations and on how you can use the powers. These all reflect the fact that you get a big price discount, so they are not as flexible as simple powers bought straight. There are also limitations on martial arts for exactly the same reason. If you try and price out pretty much any maneuver, you'll find it costs more to build it as a power than it does to buy the maneuver. But the vast majority of maneuvers are pretty much the same - some DCs + some CSLs, in different combinations, so buying them as straight powers is grossly inefficient cost-wise. If you had to buy a decent range of maneuvers at full cost, it would be impossible to build a usable martial artist on the same points as other characters, because you would be buying DCs plus levels over and over again. The solution was the current martial arts system, which is a sort of framework - you get your "powers" at a substantial price break, but that is countered by the requirement to buy at least 10 points worth plus the fact that most characters will have more than 10 points worth: the more you buy, the more redundancy eats away at your cost break. The break-even point is around 20 points of martial arts maneuvers. So what you are suggesting is allowing people to buy a sort-of framework (for which they get a price break) and using it to boost another framework - for which they also got a price break. That's unbalanced and not surprisingly, not permitted. You can of course buy CSLs straight and use them at the same time as either framework, but that's OK, because now you are paying full price ... and that's what I recommended he do. cheers, Mark

Re: Help me refine NoNameYet If you want to look here, you can find martial maneuvers adapted for multipowers You'd need GM permission to use most of these manuevers, since they include CSLs, but they are rules-legal. This is the old 5th Ed. version, courtesy of the wayback machine (since my site went away) but it should be trivial to convert them. cheers, Mark

Re: What Have You Watched Recently? Finally saw Inception last night. Awesome, awesome movie. Even if some of the "twists" were signalled well in advance, there was enough going on that it didn't really matter. cheers, Mark

Re: Help me refine NoNameYet You can't add martial arts DCs to anything you feel like, sorry. From page 101, 6E2 " Each Extra DC adds one Damage Class to any Maneuver (such as Martial Strike, Killing Strike, or Martial Throw)". DCs bought with martial arts add to that maneuver, not just anything you like. How are you going to do a martial strike with an Ego Attack? Or an Aid? Likewise weapon elements apply specifically to weapons, and in a heroic game, only to weapons you buy WF with (page 93, 6E2). There's no such thing as "WF: multipower", nor is there any suggestion anywhere in the martial arts rules that martial maneuvers bonuses or DCs can be applied to powers: which makes sense, of course - they are explicitly described as skills. You can't combine "martial strike" with "Invisible Power Effects (Inobvious to [sight and Hearing Groups]; +1/2) for up to 60 Active Points" - it's a skill. It doesn't have any active points. It's why there's no discussion about "adjustment powers vs martial arts" in the rules either - you don't Drain or Aid skills. Finally, in the Ultimate Martial Artist (page 99-103) different ways of building martial arts are discussed, including building martial arts with powers and power frameworks. Nowhere is it suggested you can combine the two - in fact the rules explicitly forbid it: you can't buy a power outside a multipower and then add it to different slots in the multipower (6E1, page 399) or use it by itself. You can only add to a multipower slot if you have bought the power only to add to that one slot and nothing else. So no, it's not rules legal to combine martial arts and multipowers. I don't see a reason a GM couldn't make a house rule to allow it if he was feeling really, really nice (though that means in you could also buy martial arts for spells, which seems a bit odd), but it's certainly not rules-legal, nor particularly balanced. You can buy DCV by itself - in fact, I specifically recommended that he did so - but that's a whole different thang. cheers, Mark