Doc Democracy

Re: Happy New Year Yeah. Happy New Year every one - I know mine started in the best possible way and the rest of the day has been pretty happy and relaxed too... :-) Doc

Re: 2008 Projects Nice to see that The Man is working on New Year's Eve... Doc

Re: 2008 Projects Does this not suggest that the title needs some thought? If hero-knowledgable players dont respond to a title that has Hero-specific terminology then what chance does it have with the wider gamer community? maybe it needs to be something like The Ultimate Campaign Setting or The Ultimate Campaign Environment or something more WYSIWYG?? Doc

Re: Invisibility Questions

Re: Lets talk about Multiforms, true forms focus My thought on multiform with hugely inflated point costs was to impose an END cost on points above the base form to maintain the inflated form. That means you get a bonus on your team-mates but that comes at teh cost of exhaustion - and there should be some exhaustion that feeds back to the original form so that if you are forced out of your expensive form your original form is in bad shape due to the exertion as well. Doc

Re: Fair vs Concept I think that I am a pretty freeform GM. I will allow anything that 'feels' right for the character that I dont think will break the game for the other players. I will allow powers that exceed campaign limits (I think of those limits as something where the players know they have to come to me and ask rather than a definite no) as long as they do not overpower the game. I would never have two players pay different point costs for the same abilities - multiform skews things due to the framework but the point costs are essentially the same once the framework is removed - Dex still costs three points per point for the Hulk form and the Bruce Banner form - active points differ. I make sure that if someone chooses a framework that saves them points that I point out to them why it has saved them points - because it is more limiting in some fashion that they often have not understood/appreciated - and make them aware that the limitation WILL come up in play - even if that completely screws their character. I will then ask them whether they are OK with that and whether they'd like to consider other, more expensive, options. I also try to point out why I think that their character would make the game less enjoyable for me and for other players unless I did enforce the limitations that they have chosen to take. It's like I never banned blade venom in Runequest, just made the players aware that if they used it routinely that they were in effect letting me know that in their Glorantha that blade venom was an common and acceptable thing and that they could expect ALL of their opponents (rather than just the really nasty ones) to use it routinely as well. It was amazing how quickly blade venom became something that was no longer de rigeur for PCs in my RQ games. Doc

Re: Lets talk about Multiforms, true forms focus I'm with the screen time aspect. What is the form in which much of the gameplay will take place. In some games (and with some players) you might find that Bruce Banner is the form that gets the play and the utility. In that game I would probably go for Bruce Banner as the true form, in a more combat oriented game (player) then the Hulk form would be the true form. I think that demonstrates for me that the context of the game and the player would have the deciding say in this - it is impossible for me to do it on a character by character basis. Doc

Re: Fair vs Concept Personally, I want to stay as true to concept as I can though the obverse of that is making sure what you give the player due to concept does not unbalance the game. I have no problem in breaking the rules for concept but I have issues with breaking the game we are playing... Doc

Re: Prolly not a new Q: The thing about Hero is that you can make the game exactly what you want. The problem that you see here is partly because players can tailor things exactly how they want and, given that they are gamers, tailor it so that they are as weakness free as possible. Now, the one major thing in the game that leads to the maxed out attack is the fact that defences are constant - your forcefield has to choose between ED/PD and sometimes a few of the exotic things like PD or ED. Players tend to go headlong into the score more points than the PD or ED of the opponent and start scoring off the STUN or BODY (depending on the genre!). One way to get a different model is to link some of the defences of the players (and NPCs) to their attack modes, so that if they are using lesser powers their defences are higher and if they are using more offensive stuff their defences are lower. That way they can begin to choose what to do, take some risks or go underground. Another possibility is to rate the defences differently against different special effects - Ultimate Energy Blaster does a lot of this kind of work for you but you can do it yourself and differently to get the feel that you want. You might decide that a fire energy field works a bit better against cold based attacks and water/fluid based ones while the screen of force does well against physical type attacks it does less so against sonic ones. This works best in play if you are confident enough to consistently award bonuses and deficits according to special effects as it should not slow down the game too much. Otherwise you could tabulate it and sort it out that way - thought that is guaranteed to add time to combats - not an attractive proposition in Hero unless it provides LOTS of the colour that you want. There are lots of other ways to make things better - dont allow simple vanilla energy blasts - have them bound up with standard effects such as fire blast - added effect -3PD versus next physical based attack - type stuff. Adds variety and strategy to the fight as players try to combine effects to weaken the opponent for a final KO blow. Doc

Re: Not Dead Yet Like you said (as did I), it depends on what the OP wanted to be accomplished in those two rounds. If it was simply conyinued attacks, then I think that the uncontrolled continuous on one or more powers works best - shouldn't matter what damage is done prior to the trigger or subsequently. If it is supposed to be more complex and dependent on the situation then I might be tempted by a summon - though, again, you have the problem that a well timed/lucky attack would also take down the summoned creature. Matter of build I suppose. Doc

Re: A little build help. As it is a racial ability thing you could decide tocreate a perk for the race. When you buy the perk - race:[whatever] part of that perk is immunity to petrification. You can look at the costs involved in KS's methods and decide that such a perk is worth 10, 15, 20 points or whatever. It is a way of introducing an absolute to the game and probably the perk can only be bought as part of the race:[whatever] package dfeal that also includes Distinctive Looks and possibly even certain racial limitations etc. Doc

Re: Not Dead Yet This is probably the line I'd follow. I'd decide exactly what it was that I wanted the creature to be able to do after it died and have uncontrolled continuous power(s) that are triggered on death. The body continuing to move is simply SFX of that and no extra damage to the body etc will have any effect on the powers. Doc

Re: How to: Maintain shared pool of divine magic I accept that it is not necessarily on the character sheet of any particular player or NPC but it exists and making it an independent IIF makes it as real as that magic sword, just a lot more interesting. Doc

Re: How to: Maintain shared pool of divine magic Just skimmed the thread but has anyone addressed the issue of where the End Reserve actually is? I was thinking of an independent IIF. Essentially there is this ball of potential somewhere on the God Plane that adepts can tap. It is possible someone could come and steal it but they'd have to find it first... Doc

Re: Social versus Physical/Mental Conflicts I've been thinking about the whole thing of social combat and Sean has indicated a useful point, that not all social combats are equal - they do not all start at the same point or finish at the same point - physical combats are different - they have the same beginning and end point - full stats - stats below zero. I think there is a useful role for disadvantages to play here. You have a 25 point code versus killing - you are not going to be persuaded to kill someone, you will not countenace someone killing for any reason. However a huge persuasion defeat might allow you to overlook someone being killed for good reason - execution of a very bad man who, if left alive will undoubtedly kill again. If you have lesser degrees of code versus killing you may be persuaded at lower social levels. Again this would take work to set up and would be individual to each character and campaign but it would provide a huge extra tier to potential roleplay opportunities. Doc

Re: Social versus Physical/Mental Conflicts

Re: Social versus Physical/Mental Conflicts

Re: Adding a special effect Ghost Angel told you

Re: Adding a special effect What he said... Doc

Re: Adding a special effect Of course you are, whether it is adding to existing or simply switching one for another you are changing the special effects of the attack. The advantage comes in being able to manipulate the special effect to take advantage of a specific weakness of an opponent. Doc

Re: Adding a special effect

Re: Hitting or attacking Endurance I was thinking of imposing a power on someone that was always on and cost 3xEND or more - something like images with no range and a fixed effect - so the person would glow like faerie fire and lose END hand over fist.... Not sure how I would accomplish it though - transform to bestow a power? Possibly even twisting the naked advantage to a naked limitation where you make their own powers cost more END. So something like x4 END, usable against others? It requires some twisting of the head to get there but it is a definite tiring power.... Doc

Re: Adding a special effect Well, changing the special effect and changing which defence an attack works against are completely different things. This is quite fundamental to the system. The player decides which defence he thinks any particualr attack should work against. If he chooses PD or ED then there are no alterations to the cost of the power. If he chooses a more exotic (less common defence) such as mental defence or flash defence then he pays a premium. If he decides that defences do not normally work against his attack except in special circumstances (NND) then he pays a premium. if he decides that the larger of PD or ED will count then he'd get a cost break and if he decided it worked against the combined PD and ED then that cost break would be even larger. That has very little to do with deciding on special effects for the power. In a core Hero rules campaign the special effects should have little impact on the mechanics and be apparent simply in the description of the action (which is not to say they are unimportant - SFX are superheroes and have a big influence on the impact of magic in the game). Small pros and cons can be requested and granted/inflicted by the GM on the basis of SFX. The ultimate Energy Projector provides a framework to allow SFX a much greater role in the game and provides guidelines on costs for those. However. as has been pointed out - the relative costs of SFX will vary from game to game and genre to genre. That is upfront work for the GM. In your example the changing/adding SFX for an attack has a price because it is understood that some defences will be bought as weaker against certain SFX and that some powers (such as desolid) do not count against certain SFX. Thus there has to be a cost associated with that to reflect the added utility. I gave you the example of a an NPC who had bought their desolid as vulnerable to fire. So perhaps it is a cold elemental - fists, blades and other weapons slide through the creature with no impact while the cold reaches out and drinks the warmth of its opponents bodies. However it has been noticed that it flinches from the torches. Your character calls out a spell that coats his sword in a wreath of flames and attacks. Now. Assume the sword has been bought as a 6D6 EB (bladed weapon SFX) counts against PD. If that wreath of flames is bought by adding +1D6 EB to sword attack (flames SFX) counts against PD then against a normal opponent it would be a 7D6 attack counting against PD. That does not stretch the rules at all. it would also mean that the 6D6 do not have the flame SFX and would not affect the cold elemental but would deal 1D6 damage to it as its desolid does not count against that flame SFX die of damage. If the wreath of flames has been bought as (variable SFX) then the sword would take on the flame SFX and against a normal opponent would continue to deal 6D6 against PD (can't remember the rules on this, I can see it counting against ED - he has paid extra for it after all) and in this case would also deal 6D6 to the cold elemental as all 6D6 go through the desolid defence. I would not allow the simple purchase of an extra D6 with different SFX to get round the cost of purchasing variable SFX for the existing attack. Doc

Re: Adding a special effect They are an addition in the sense that, in those instances where SFX are not important, all the dice stack for the purpose of overcoming defences and causing stunning.

Re: Adding a special effect I can see the advantage of the Multiple special effects, usable by others (I hadn't thought of the personal applications - though that was not included in the initial request). If it were simply granting powers then I'm not sure that transform is any more mechanically clunky than a naked advantage - which might not provide more than a partial special effect for a power too large for it to accomodate. I suppose the textual write-up (as opposed to the mechanical) for either would be similar up to the point of changing special effects on personal attacks - which the multiple SFX would accomodate far more easily. Doc