D. Rex
Magic Eight Ball
I dont thinking quite follow how multipower works.
I think I pick powers as slots, and assign my pool of points between them.
Can I redistribute points at any time?
I dont thinking quite follow how multipower works.
I think I pick powers as slots, and assign my pool of points between them.
Can I redistribute points at any time?
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
Think of a Multipower as . . . bullets in a revolver. Or arrows in Hawkeye's quiver. Each slot is a different kind of bullet/arrow; you just need to define what that slot is.
There are two kinds of Multipower slot: Fixed and Variable. A Fixed slot costs 1/10th of the cost of the power in it, and the Variable one costs 1/5th the power costs. That doesn't cover the cost of the Pool itself. Allow me to show an example.
Using Psy's power pool, she has a 75 Active Points power pool. That means that the highest cost of a power that can go into it is 75 AP. Once I allow you guys to raise your powers above the 75 point limit I set, this pool cost must be raised before any powers in the pool can be raised.
In her power pool, she has three slots. Each one is a Fixed slot, costing her 4 CP per slot after her Limitations drop the cost down.
Attack Powers
-- / MP Energy Manipulation: Multipower, 75-point reserve, (75 Active Points); all slots Restrainable (-1/2), Only In Alternate Identity (-1/4) / 43
7 / Energy Spike: Killing Attack - Ranged 5d6 (75 Active Points) / 4f
7 / Standard Blast: Blast 15d6 (75 Active Points) / 4f
7 / Cone Attack: Blast 10d6, Area of Effect (10m Cone); No Range / 3f
The Pool itself is 43 points, dropped from the 75 Active by the two Limitations of Restrainable and Only in Alternate Identity. That drops each Slot cost from the base of 7 points to just 4, and in the case of her Cone Attack, it is 3 points because it is set with another Limitation of No Range.
The Fixed Slot means that the power must be used at the full cost of the slot, and cannot be reduced in level. If you want, you can buy a power that is not the full Active Point level, leaving you points in the Pool available to power something else so long as the full pool points are not used up. So you could have a power at 30 AP and another power running at 45 AP, or a single power at 75 AP at any one time. You can switch slots as a free action on your turn (assuming you didn't buy any Limitations on the Pool to prevent that). So using Psy's Pool as an example, she can hit a target with her Standard Blast then go to Area of Effect shot on her next phase without losing an action.
Does that help?
Psychie
Princess Psychie
Just to explain some more, the Limitations on my power pool mean that I can only direct my blasts from my hands, so if someone were to Entangle me, I can't shoot lasers from my eyes or something like that. Also, it is only in my Hero Id, so I have to use my Instant Change to activate my powers, transforming me from a 'normal' looking person to the purple glowy lady.
Silanon
Four Thousand Club
Hereby, I shall claim my own little post in this thread. Expect a ton of stupid questions moving forward... a first concept is somewhat in the works, I'll post a first impression when I get there.
Short question: The book I have gives approximate numbers for how many points should roughly be spent in the different areas. Psychie's are pretty far off from those, but are they generally a decent place to start looking?
Short question: The book I have gives approximate numbers for how many points should roughly be spent in the different areas. Psychie's are pretty far off from those, but are they generally a decent place to start looking?
D. Rex
Magic Eight Ball
Yes it does. Is it possible to redistribute points during down time? Like for example, "switching my freeze ray for an ice thrower" and take points from blast to put more into entagle?
Also, how many books are there that are useful for this? I only have one.
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
Welcome Sil! Glad to have you here.
Keep in mind that Psy's character has some of her stats bought as powers, so that might skew her numbers closer to be in line with what you are looking at in the book. She is also fairly low on her skills, but that can be explained by her background as a simple grad student in college.
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
Well, if you hit someone with a ice Entangle, it doesn't go away if you switch slots to a freeze ray Blast. It will continue to hold the person in question until such time as they escape or break out somehow.
There are several useful books in 6e that I can share with you on Dropbox. I'll upload the ones that I have.
D. Rex
Magic Eight Ball
I meant like points for the slots.
If I have 10 in blast. And 20 in entangle. Could I later switch those points around to have 20 in blast and 10 in entangle or 15 in both? Or once I purchase the powers I can't move around the levels (not fixed or variable, but like assigned to a slot).
And thanks for the books!
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
If you use Variable slots, which are more expensive to buy but more flexible, you can change the number of points you assign up to the max of your power pool number. So if you want to only use 35 of your 75 points in a Blast, or have a weaker Entangle with only 40 points in it, you can as opposed to a fixed slot that has to use the full value of the slot as you bought it.
Also, you are welcome. The other books should be showing up soon on the Dropbox site.
D. Rex
Magic Eight Ball
They showed up! And I got them copied over to my personal one
Also! I been meaning to ask. We gonna need flight a lot in this game? Like is it recommended for our char to have high mobility?
Anyway, I think my character would be considered a gadget ever? I think that was something mentioned in the multipower thing.
I'd have a multippwer for weapons.
Entangle
Change Environment
Blast
Barrier
Would I have a separate multipower setup for a suit?
Flight
Defense powers
Stat enhancements
And stuff
Would advanrages like AoE be something I can turn in and off, like a ice grenade that uses entangle. Or would that need its own slot?
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
Give me a few to take my daughter to school, and I'll happily address these questions with my best recommendations.
D. Rex
Magic Eight Ball
Cool beans! Hope she has a good day! Drive safe.
I'll be sure to have plenty more questions as I explore the labyrinth of powers and modifiers.
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
You are probably looking at two Multipowers; one for your main attack weapons and one for your more utilitarian stuff.
In the book Hero System 6th Edition: Equipment, starting on pg 155 is an example Multipower of a archer using different kinds of arrows Hawkeye style. That might inspire you as to some different kinds of slots of a Multipower that you can use. Another thing you may want to look at is the Utility Belt on pg 186. I've used many slots from that to good effect in several of my characters.
If I were writing this up, I'd use something like this for your attack powers: a 75 Active Point MP using either the OIF Limitation (meaning that it is a device that gives you the power, but it is harder to remove from you) for a -1/2, or go with the OAF Limitation (meaning that it is a device that can be more easily removed or taken from you in combat if someone makes a successful Disarm roll) for a -1. Lets assume the OAF. It will look like this:
37 MP Freeze Ray Gun (75 Active Points) All Slots OAF -1
3f Cold Blaster 15d6 Blast
3f Ice Block 7d6 Entangle
3f Freezing Ray 5d6 Killing Attack - Ranged
3f Ice Wall Barrier, 20 Pd 20 Ed, 10 meters long 4 meters high
3f Ice Blast Grenade 12d6 Blast Area of Effect 4 meters +1/4
You have a couple of choices on how to power these guns. Either buy an End Reserve as a power pack, or buy each slot with Charges that would be like actual bullets in a gun. If you go with 16 Charges on a slot, that is a 0 point Limitation, and most fights do not last long enough to go through that many Charges, and they don't cost Endurance.
Those are just a few examples of possible slots for your ice gun. The Equipment book has tons of great gadget ideas that you can look at, remembering that you have a total Active Point cap of 75.
Now, for your movement powers.
What do you want to do? Run really fast on jet skates? Fly with jet boots like Iron Man? Jumping? Swinging on web lines like Spider Man? Teleporting? Also, will this mode of movement be your primary means of getting around, or will you have a vehicle to depend on to get you to disaster/active crime scenes? If we look at Psychie's character, she has a MP for movement powers, one with combat flight, one with a high speed in atmosphere flight to get her across the city at Mach speed, and a slot for FTL travel to go into space and fly around out there.
You can have a MP for your movement powers, too. One slot for combat movement, one fast non-combat movement, and maybe ones for Swimming or Tunneling.
For your defense, I'd recommend you go with layers. One would be a bodysuit of armor, bought as Resistant Protection with the OIF Limitation on it. If you go with 10 Pd 10 Ed defense, that would cost you 20 CP. Next is a gadget that I came up with that I really like. A Force Field belt that operates on Continuing Charges, 6 Charges that last for 5 minutes each. As I said up top, most fights do not last more than a few rounds, so a minute or 5 minute Continuing Charge would be long enough; so long as you don't activate it too early before going into a battle.
This Force Field could be easily incorporated into a Utility Belt MP, and if you buy a 30 AP Multipower with the OAF limitation (gadgets are easier to lose, after all), your pool would only cost 15 points, and a 10 Pd 10 Ed Force Field would only be 1 CP for that slot.
D. Rex
Magic Eight Ball
That is pretty helpful. I think I'm starting to understand how it works.
Using that ice gun MP as an example.
Would that MP only apply to that particular weapon, or whatever is on my body at the time that can use such projections?
If used an Endurance Reserve as a power source for my main power weapon, would I need a separate MP if I wanted to have a smaller sidearm that used charges or a smaller power pack?
I was also thinking that the slots would basically represent like a dial. Where I turn it to do varying degrees of effects. Tuning it to whichever effect is desired at a time.
Would adding modifiers only effect certain slots or everything? For example if I wanted to add AoE effects or Penetration?
Would it be doable to add Cumulative modifier to Entagle or change environment? So I would be using like a beam to further freeze something to make it more difficult to break out of, or making the change environment effects stronger or wider with every subsequent turn its used?
I did see the utility belt! And it could certainly be very useful. Being gadget based, it definitely seems like a staple.
Movement wise, I think a jetpack or rocket boots would be pretty fun. While sliding around the ice on skates is cool and all, I don't see it as offering the same degree of versatility as flight.
But! That would strongly relate to how I approach defense. Of which there is four main ways I can really approach it.
1. Bodysuit. Nimble and fashionable! It would be much easier to use and less bothersome than big armors. Much easier to maintain and do normal stuff in. Though it might be harder to justify being well defended without the force fields.
2. Ironman style armor. Nifty technology and great protection. And can incorporate some of my powers into it. Not too much, not too little. But perhaps more cumbersome and more like to be damaged and need repair.
3. Samus Aran style Power Armor. Big beefy and tanky. More cumbersome, more expensive, and I would need to get in and out. But cool and could probably fit a lot of abilities into that bad boy.
4. Small mech. Biggest, beefier, and tankiest. Could go head to head with some tough threats without worrying about my mundane squishy nature being a burden. It would definitely venture into using Vehicle Points, but if got 400 vehicle points I could probably make a pretty compact vehicle that is tough and has plenty of goodies to take advantage of. Of course, much harder to repair and do normal things with.
Do you have a recommendation on which would be good? And if I went with a smaller one, would I be able to upgrade as the rp goes on to scale with the baddies and not waste points? For example, starting with a bodysuit, and working my way up the grades as things get harder?
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
It can be used to represent multiple weapons, just like how the utility belt is many different gadgets.
One Endurance Reserve can be used to be the power pack for a whole slew of items, just make sure it is large enough and with a good Recovery in it to last.
That is a good way to look at the Multipower.
If you put the Advantage on the actual MP, that would affect everything with that Advantage inside the MP, but remember that the Active Cost of the pool will go up with each one. Or, you can buy a particular slot with an Advantage, such as Autofire or Armor Piercing. The one example I gave up in my earlier post showed one power with Area of Effect on it, but that was only on the one slot, not the whole thing.
Cumulative would be well suited to a Transformation Attack, where you are trying to freeze a person or object solid that has a lot of Body, and you won't be able to do it in one roll. Like freezing a whole lake, or a Tyrannosaurus Rex (just an example; don't read too much into that). Entangles are simpler to make tougher; just hit the target again, and poofta! They are still stuck. I am not sure how it would work with Change Environment. I'll have to read up on that combo.
1. Bodysuits can be easily concealed, but would realistically represent a smaller level of defense than a larger suit.
2. Flexible, and provides good defense, with the bonus of being able to wrap a lot of gadgets into it.
3. Starting to look into the Vehicle option here, but you can still do it as just character points.
4. You would be the main target for a lot of damage being done by the bad guys since you are so big and nasty. Make sure it is tough enough to handle the pummeling.
I personally like the Iron Man suit level. It can be bought with the Cosmetic Transformation Attack for the Instant Change to be able to switch from your civilian Id into your Hero mode at the touch of a button. Much like Iron Man is able to do in the later films of the Avengers series.
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
Another quick comment on this one is if you went with Charges, if you put them on the individual slots, each slot would have its own number of charges, while if you put it on the Pool itself, then the whole shebang would be affected by the number of shots you'd have available.
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
I have a few chores to do around the house, but I'll be back online later on to answer more questions.
D. Rex
Magic Eight Ball
Mp with weapons and Power Pack:
Good! That will make buying and managing such things much easier.
Advantages and Modifiers:
Then I'm going need to take a good look at my pool then and see if its best to spend extra to effect all or just the slot.
Autofire will likely be applicable to most. Since its essential a ray gun. Could just hold the trigger and ppppppeeeeeeewwwwww for most of those things.
*Side thought. Can autofire be used to fire multiple times at the same target, and if so and used with something that had Cumalitive, would each attack of the volley add to the cumulative total needed to make the effect? Cause that could be pretty mean, if it works as mechanically as it sounds. Like autofire an entangle on the same dude, and stack them entagles.
And a autofire cumalitive barrier could just constantly be throwing up and reinforcing walls of ice making it almost impossible to get through. Though casting it every turn could be basically the same effect.
Transformation attack:
I definitely want this. Its one of the best things about a freeze ray. If it is expensive. I could use that instead of a killing attack, since the end result is the same. Thiugh if I'm fighting waves of minor enemies, it might be pretty hard if it also doesn't have autofire or an AoE.
Change Environment:
This is also one I could go ham with. Coating an area with ice or creating a think fog or blizzard. I'm not entirely sure how useful it is yet though as I don't have a full understanding of the mechanics. Transformation and Entangle could probably do similar things to an area without needing to invest in a third power.
Tyrannosaurus Rex: You always got to watch out for those D. Rexs.
Armor:
Iron man style was definitely what I was thinking. And that it can be concealed like that makes it all the more appealing.
However! If the party needs a tank. Or just someone to soak up some hits, I wouldn't mind making up a tough mech suit to fill that roll. And it could be used to differentiate me from Luminary as an energy projector role.
And it wousbe tough, after all the whole theme is his equipment is that it was designed for deep earth hazards and pressures. So even the smell mech suit would be like a large diving suit.
Though between vehicle points and several MPs, I would have less to invest in his personal abilities and skills. Which I haven't even explored yet.
QuickSmasherEXE
Less is More
Thanks, hopefully I can present some high quality writing.
Through the power of the *ahem* free market, I have managed to acquire some books. That said, I don't know where exactly to begin with them, so I still greatly appreciate the help.
A brick sounds fun and good, there's definitely a simple elegance to simply beating the heck out of people. However, I think the mentalist roll sounds a bit more interest. I'm currently reading through the section on creating illusions and that sounds like something I'd be interested in.QuickSmasherEXE Just from my point of view, Bricks are the simplest of characters to work. They charge into the fight and hit the bad guys as hard as they can until they don't move anymore, shrugging off the counterblows with their inherent durability.
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
It is up to you, but I would think that putting the Autofire on a slot and not the pool itself would be best. Some powers Autofire just will not be applicable with, and there is the occasion that you want to have a higher active point power in the slot that is not Autofire to be able to deliver a harder punch.
Using Autofire with Cumulative on a Transform would be hideously expensive, which will make the power almost useless. For Autofire, it is normally a +1/4 Advantage for 2-3 shots. But with attacks that do not go against normal defenses (PD and ED) it is an additional +1, and since a Transform works against Power Defense, that would apply. Cumulative is a minimum of a +1/2, so at best you would be able to afford a 1 and 1/2d6 Severe Transform, which is not nearly enough to be able to turn a person into an ice statue.
If you kept the Cumulative but dropped the Autofire, you could have a 3d6+1 Severe Transform that is Cumulative, or a 5d6 Severe Transform for a one-shot attack.
Normally Autofire is attached to Blast or Killing Attacks, and they apply one at a time against the target's defenses. If you add Armor Piercing, you reduce the target's Defense by half and you tag them 2-3 times (assuming you hit, that is). That would give you a potential 8d6 Blast Autofire 3 shots and Armor Piercing. In most cases, that will be effective in a firefight.
This one is tricky. If you want to be able to alter the effects you buy, it gets expensive quickly. Being able to do something simple like ice the floor and make it slippery is doable, but adding to it the ability to control the weather is going to ramp the cost up fast.
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
Bricks are cool, but so are mentalists. A high enough level of Mental Illusion can even cause damage to your target, assuming that they believe what they are seeing is real. Psychie is right in the fact that even a low level Mind Blast can usually do damage to your target, since most characters don't buy up their mental defenses.
I have a mentalist written up that I can tweak to fit in this game already if you would like to look at it; perhaps it would be a good starting point to work with.
D. Rex
Magic Eight Ball
Your wisdom is invaluable!
Im that case, it does sound like limiting autofire to blast and killing would be the smarter move. I dont mind investing in points, but not to the detriment of other things or for diminishing returns.
So I will probably need your help making a char that isn't bad be ause I don't yet really understand the numbers and relation fully. Like, I don't know how big a difference there is between 3d6+1 compared to a 5d6.
Also! One if my bigger elements of confusion is... What does the +/- 1/4,1/2, 1, 2 mean?
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
That is the cost multiplier or subtractor for your Active Points. The way it works is that if you have a +1/2 Advantage, you multiply the cost of your power by 1 and 1/2 to get the new Active Point cost. So if you have a 10d6 Blast with Armor Piercing, it will cost you 75 AP instead of just 50 like a normal 10d6 Blast would normally be.
Limitations are just the opposite. You take the Active Points of your power and divide it by 1 plus the level of the Limitation. A Focus Limitation at a -1/2 would drop the 75 AP power to just 50 points.
Sherwood
Luna's Concubine
And when working your Advantages and Limitations, you multiply your Advantages first, then the Limitations are applied after.
D. Rex
Magic Eight Ball
So if I had a limitation of a -1, I would divide the number by 1 + 1 (2)? So something normally 100. Would be fifty?
I think I see. So its best to look at it like percents. A 1/4 advantage basically increases cost by 25%. And limit refunds 25% from total.
So as an example...
Cost: 100
Advantage: 1/2
Limitation: 1/4
(Cost X Advantage) ÷ Limitation
That would go to be a total cost of 120.
Or! Would the fractions cancel out. +1/2 and -1/4 coming to a ultimate +1/4. Making it 125 instead.
In regards to odd numbers, when the total has a decimal, is it standard practice to round up or round down?