Doc Democracy

Re: Toolkitting: Relative versus Absolute I have also been thinking of constructing some tables (possibly to allow card play) where I can group my heroes and villains based on their relative merits of strength speed and agility. These would allow players to accept standard effect style results or go to dice or card play where they might achieve much more or much less than their abilities might suggest. One day I will have so much time I will be able to throw my time away like I did when I was 20 or so.... Doc

This is something that has been tickling my brain after reading a couple of threads (one on criticals in this forum and one that turned into a debate on blocking etc) Anyway, a lot of the time that we have issues is because there is a problem in fitting the HERO as designed into the game being played. One of the main switcheroos is the Batman versus the BatGod depending on solo title or JLA... Has anyone ever thought of running the game on a relative basis? This would obviously be most useful for those people doing dimension hopping style games but might be useful in other ways as well, for one-off adventures where the GM can mess with the common baselines of the game. It would take the game to be designed this way from the get go. Instead of buying 20 STR, you would buy +10. In a game where baseline STR is 10 this comes to the same. In a game where the baseline STR is 30 then this same purchase is worth 40. What this does is set the Hero apart from the crowd. In the solo Batman title where the average villain protagonist is running about with OCV 5 then Batman really only needs 7 or so to stand out. In the JLA adventures where the average villian is hitting OCV 8 or 9 then Batman needs to be 10 or 11 to get the feel that the design demands. In an absolute game then the Batman needs to purchase for the high level adventure if he is not to look silly but then is so beyond the street level protagonists that he loses his roots. In the relative game he gets what he needs in both keeping himself a credible threat to both the Joker and Darkseid. Doc

Re: Criticals Why is this not balanced at the other side of the damage tree? On a roll of 18 each die has a maximum value of 1, On a roll of 17 each die has a maximum vlaue of 2, etc.... Doc

Re: Advice Required: Indistructible Force Field I'm with Rentauri. However, I am presuming it was not a found item but a created one, paid for with points on the character sheet. I think I would go for a sit-down talk with the player pointing out some home truths. First about the mistake and how the character distorts the game for everyone else, Second about how such a useful thing is going to attract attention. Unwelcome attention. As such, you suggest that the character loses the item (though retains the best defence in the game - perhaps 7 or 8 DEF). How that happens is up to you and the player - I think that theft is a bad way unless the player is cool with that. I like donating it to a high level patron, giving the character some favours to draw on long term or something like that. However, for the good of the game it has to go.... Doc

Re: Santa Is AWESOME I have seen sixth edition rulebooks on the iPad and they are fantastic! Not so good on the kindle but at least I now always have them to consult. never again will I have to say I dont have the books in front of me.... Doc

Re: Santa Is AWESOME So what did everyone else get? I did not get any gaming stuff but my wife did shell out for a kindle - not the big size but the one with 3G access. So far it has done a pretty decent job of converting me from my paper based ways... Doc

Re: Mad Skills

Re: Mad Skills And that is the real opinion part of your message. 'no added benefit'. Real entrepreneurs (and game designers) do not simply provide the things that people say they want (the evolution of what they have seen before). They revolutionise things and show people that they need something today that they never concieved of a need for before that. :-) I want revolution, not evolution in my gaming materials. Specially the APG type stuff... Doc

Re: Summoned Creatures (who are worth a darn) on a Budget. I think the thing you have to think about with Summon is that the summoned creatures should be specialised. You summon them to do a job - not to be a general handyman - and that is your choice when you design them - with limited points you get effective specialists or general handymen. If you summon a specialist to do a task it is not specialised for it is unlikely to do very well - so you have a variety of specialists for a variety of tasks.... ...and they can all be slavishly loyal. :-) Doc

Re: Things I May Have Forgotten I was thinking of painting the target as it works for semi-guided missiles where it would indeed lower the target's DCV. As Thia's description does not require such guided missile effect then I would not do it via suppressed DCV. Doc

Re: Rocky's One-Hit-KO Punch I do not like giving villains the HERO style powers - it too often works against players and they do not appreciate it. HERO points etc are for players to get advantages. I prefer to build the villains such that the heroes need to use their HERO points to win, not balance it off against HERO points used by the villain. As such, I would not give the villain a hand of cards. I would possibly provide the villain with a way of disrupting the accumulation of cards, or of nullifying individual cards held by the player characters. So, the players have a hand of cards. In a combat they need to do something productive story wise to accumulate cards into their hands and other things to play cards on the table (in TORG they have approved actions each round and if you are successful at an approved action you get to put a card into your card pool on the table). It is cards on the table (in the pool) that allow you to do stuff. The villain, if he/she/it accomplishes something productive and they will do this less often than the players as he will act less often, may affect cards in players hands but not on the table. So something like discard random card to very specific stuff like 'lose a brick/ace etc'. I would go with the poker hands for cowboy games as poker goes with cowboys. Does not go with most superheroes or sci-fi...and so becomes a generic thing rather than something that adds genre flavour. Doc

Re: Things I May Have Forgotten Surely sixth edition makes this easier. DCV suppress, only for those that can percieve the paint (maybe a 1/4 limitation?).... Doc

Re: Rocky's One-Hit-KO Punch Nice Sean but it is a bit too "generic for me". I think that I would be inclined to make cards a bit more genre specific (thus requiring a bit of artistic merit). They also need some way to be made into 'working hands'. In a superhero game I think I might have something more like a happy families deck with the JLA, the Avengers, the Legion, the Fearsome Five, the Injustice League etc etc. If you can put together a team, you get a bonus, otherwise you use the attributes of the team to get bonuses - match a brick, martial artist and a energy projector for a bonus, if they are from the same team you get extra. Match three bricks for a bonus etc etc. It would be a job to get the right balance for these and to make sure that the card collection did not overcome the actual game but it could be an interesting addition that would provide the opportunity to do things like a KO punch but they would only be able to accomplish after some level of effort. Doc

Re: Rocky's One-Hit-KO Punch Well, in torg you build up cards an d when you have the right hand you can do amazing things. Perhaps for this kind of thing, you need to get a prop set for things like this. As things happen in an adventure the player gets cards and depending on the set you get a bonus for a one-off attack. So, when someone triggers a psych disad you get a card, when someone smacks you down, you get a card. Some events might allow cards to be swapped. Ultimately you get a chance to spend the cards and go for the big KO. Doc

Re: One Sun, Many Sungods? I like the fact that the gods are all the Sun God. They all have a direct link to the physical entity called the Sun by the mortals which is why the Sun is so powerful and the followers of the various Sun Gods have access to strong magic. It is when many Gods overlap that you get the greater deity feel. However, the Sun Gods do not know each other. They are in different dimensions and their followers tap into that dimension to get access to their deities magic. A pantheon is a set of gods who are all accessed through the same dimensional vibration. If something happens to the Sun then it affects all of the Sun Gods but possibly in different ways.... Doc

Re: (5E) Origami summon build lots of these kinds of thing need to be thought carefully about the effect you actullay want. For example, a fire and forget shuriken I might be inclined to create as an Area of Effect attack, END only to begin, continuous and uncontrollable, only affects one target at a time, target may avoid by making a DEX roll, continuous removed if shuriken destroyed or target hit. The idea is that there is a large area of effect over which the shuriken might fly. Its target can run out of the area, avoid the attack each and every phase it happens by making dodge rolls, shoot it out of the air or simply allow it to hit. This could be a low level STUN only annoying attack and costs lots of points. It would be a nice multipower slot and is not too abusive as it uses a lot of expensive advantages to get its effect. To get your inexperienced character I would not base it on summon but on a set of multipower slots which are designed to get the effect you want. Each slot might be quite expensive and limited in its use. As you get more experienced, you would want to move to a VPP which would provide the kind of flexibility you need and give you flexibility over raw power. Doc

Re: SusAn Haven't looked at the latest rules on this but I always remembered it as lowering to SPD 1, but even so, that is voluntary reduction to SPD 2, not a powered reduction to SPD 0. :-)

Re: SusAn Intgeresting, people were talking about suppress BODY to simulate death (nice lateral thinking there) but I was wondering if suppress SPD might not be a way to go. Often environmental effects like drowning inflict damage based on the SPD of the character. If the SPD is zero, such stuff does not happen. It makes sense (in a twisted kind of way) that the character has no SPD and so does not bleed, or drown. That needs to be extended to poisons such that they stop working until the SPD rises again. So a suppress plus an adder to make it SusAn?? Another option? As an aside, I was wondering why poisons etc were not based on the characters SPD. If you're metabolism is high then you should run through the poison process more quickly as well, and disease. Does that make sense?? Doc

Re: This will require some explaining

Re: Superhero Glider Cape I am thinking that gliding and flight do bring their complications. What about a teleport, activated (need to grab cape), only to get to ground/level surface, takes time, visible (people would be able to take pot shots while drifting down). Doc

Re: What Are You Listening To Right Now? Followed by http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-a8MguIMmCI&p=964EBF99574D30C1&index=3&feature=BF in the oddest mix ever...

Re: What Are You Listening To Right Now? A huge favourite of mine...

Re: SPEED Beyond 12

Re: SPEED Beyond 12 Frustration and spotlight hogging were my experiences of speeds in double digits. The players with such characters just seem to go too often if everyone else is not also up there. My games rarely see a spread among the heroes greater than 3 speed and lower than that if the maximum speed is not 8 or 9. Doc

Re: New to 6E. Wow! Amazing system My advice is to keep it very simple when you introduce them. You should get them used to the basic system without worrying too much about the cost of stuff. I would get a character sheet with no cost numbers on it, get most of the basic rolls and calculations and, if you can manage it an evocative image of the character. That way they can concentrate on OCV versus DCV and the basic combat options and skill rolls. I would also make all of the characters myself (after discussion on what they want with the promise of one or two re-write opportunities in case things do not work out in play). The powers can be introduced piecemeal by your wizard and various NPC people and monsters. Soon enough they will be interested in making their own characters and you can provide them with either the Basic rules like Steve said or, if you think they are strong enough, the full on character creation rules. Doc