[MH] Point Inflation

[GodBeastX]

Originally Posted by Andreas

I don't really see how those paragraphs answer the question. The issue is not having extraordinarily powerful PCs. The issue is the abilities of the opponents being scaled up to compensate. While he is extraordinarily powerful, the human opponents Blade fights do not tend to have navy SEAL combat skills . Even many of the vampires that appears in the movies would probably lose to an MH Cultist equipped with weapons effective against vampires.

You don't need threats that powerful to make them too dangerous for normal people or even normal police officers to confront and as you noted in a later post, the scaling up has not prevented a large scale police or military response being enough to reliably defeat almost all threats in The Enemy.


There is nothing wrong with being your own Van Helsing, but it seems to me that your character won't seem quite that competent if even Slow Zombies and Cultist minions have stats and skill levels that high.


You could significantly scale down MH without getting anywhere close to that.

When I say scale the threat, I mean, scale it to meet a challenge of a 400 point player. That doesn't mean zombies are 400 points too. Points don't equal effectiveness. And certainly 1 zombie is just fodder in general. Let them have to deal with hordes! You've seen the mummy right? Brandom Frazier had to fight a bunch of mummy guards, not just one!

[Nymdok]

Originally Posted by GodBeastX

That's the trope and genre conventions. Why does R2-D2 Beep Boop when they clearly have the ability to make him talk? Because little droids beep! Why doesn't everyone just get Battlesuits from Iron Man in Marvel? Because that's Iron Man's role. The monsters are hiding out because they are waiting for their story script to be passed to them that says they are all going to hatch their evil schemes in tandem instead of all at once so the heroes can level up and only be challenged enough to keep the fight interesting instead of dead.

But you don't point all that out IC. When someone asks about the elephant in the room you waive a hand and tell them weather balloon. Why don't demons just walk around killing humans out in the open?

Option 1) Because tanks have 1200 DR and 6dx50 (2) pi++ inc depleted uranium main guns for you if those fragile apes get serious?
Option 2) Because even though they are evil, for some reason god lets them only go so far with evil, sort of like the book of Job in the bible? And that's just far enough to let heroes be challenged but not lose?
Option 3) Because humans might discover their weaknesses in time and exploit them on the whole?

etc etc etc...

Why doesn't the rest of the world do the PCs job? Because then the PCs would have nothing to do =)

This post is win.

Furthermore, dont worry about the points. They really are just there to help differentiate characters from EACH OTHER, not the world.

As for skill levels, having enemies suitably challenging to your heroes is NOT point inflation. Remember that a large purpose of Combat(or any skill check) is to provide drama and tension.

If there is NO risk of failure there is no tension.

Consider the opposite end of the spectrum. If some Foe in a MH game had, Karate at (hypothetically) 50 and did (again hypothetically) 25d damage there would be no tension there either because there would be no chance for success.

Nymdok

[Anders]

Pretty much. Dungeon Fantasy and Monster Hunters both work only if you don't apply the "common sense" test. They are not for people who demand realism.

[VariousRen]

I don't think there's point inflation going on, I think it's a way of conveying genre conventions using by using game mechanics.

Consider a low point, grim horror game. You're a lowly 50 point character, weapon skill 13 wielding your trusty baseball bat as you search for supplies in the back of a gas station. A zombie comes flying out of a back room, arms flailing. It's taking AOA(Double) for the chance at 2 hits, but only has a weapon skill of 8. Your parry and dodge aren't going to be great, so retreating is a major part of your defensive strategy. Come your turn, you can take a telegraphed attack for +4 and have a skill of 12 to hit the skill. Good, but not great. An AOA(Determined) would give you a very solid skill 16 to hit, or an AOA(Strong) would make sure you get through the skull DR and hopefully put the zombie down. If you fail though, you might be in for a world of hurt...

Now consider your monster hunter 400 point character. The same zombie charges you, swinging twice with a rapid attack and weapon skill 11 for likely hits. Your own defense scores are plenty capable of knocking them to the side though. In return, you can send a single telegraphed swing into the skull with with skill 11 and still be ready to defend against attacks from the other zombies, which are sure to be surrounding you.

Basically by increasing the skills for both combatants you are encouraged to take skill penalties from modifiers like unstable footing, rapid attacks, lighting penalties, ect. In turn this encourages cinematic, mobile, unique combat encounters because both parties can absorb the penalties without missing 80% of their hits.

[Kalzazz]

Note, I actually find most of the baddies under powered with the assumption they may face heroes armed with modern hardware. I think 'Hmmm, I am not so sure what a party of heroes would so well accomplish that a platoon of National Guardsmen would not accomplish'

I found the general concept worked much better when the heroes in question were 500pt and were packing TL 2 gear. 50 point militia armed with segmented plate and short swords is majorly different than 50 point militia armed Interceptor body armor and Bradley IFVs

I also tended to fully kit out the more humanoid foes with nice gear, or at least rifles instead of sidearms for cultists and swords and axes and such so some of them could get the juicy swing damage (being a super strong vampire is lame if your just doing unarmed attacks for Thr)

As a note, I don't actually consider cultists to have native skills as strong as Navy SEALS. Cultists however are touched by the Warp or the Elder Gods or whatever and thats how they get skill 14! There actual native skills are more like default

A SEAL team touched by the Warp or such? Then THAT would be boss level scary

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Anders

Pretty much. Dungeon Fantasy and Monster Hunters both work only if you don't apply the "common sense" test. They are not for people who demand realism.

Realism is a spectrum for many features, not an either/or.
As long as everyone is on board with what genre aspects are swept under the rug and which may be enforced or lamp-shaded, it's all good.
Even crotchety me can get behind some absurd setting rules as long as they're clearly stated before game.
Like the Buffy-verse, most humans are barely sapient delusional victims. A few are self aware potential heroes, sidekicks, etc.
Some unnamed force(s) behind the scenes are holding back the otherwise unstoppable waves of evil leaving only the "lesser" stragglers for heroes to combat.

[Andreas]

Originally Posted by GodBeastX

When I say scale the threat, I mean, scale it to meet a challenge of a 400 point player. That doesn't mean zombies are 400 points too. Points don't equal effectiveness. And certainly 1 zombie is just fodder in general. Let them have to deal with hordes! You've seen the mummy right? Brandom Frazier had to fight a bunch of mummy guards, not just one!

I certainly was not objecting to letting them face hordes of zombies. What I questioned was the individual capabilities of enemies such as Slow Zombies and Cultists.

Originally Posted by Nymdok

As for skill levels, having enemies suitably challenging to your heroes is NOT point inflation. Remember that a large purpose of Combat(or any skill check) is to provide drama and tension.

If there is NO risk of failure there is no tension.

Consider the opposite end of the spectrum. If some Foe in a MH game had, Karate at (hypothetically) 50 and did (again hypothetically) 25d damage there would be no tension there either because there would be no chance for success.

Nymdok

Having powerful heroes face powerful foes is indeed not point inflation. Enemies such as demon lords and angels are supposed to be very powerful. However scaling up the skill levels of foes such as Slow Zombies seems quite a lot like point inflation to me.

Also even very low skill foes can contribute significantly to the risk of failure and the tension. For example, even if Cultists (for whom the description says that they tend to serve more powerful foes) only had a skill level of 8, the 400 point heroes could still not afford to ignore them if they are attacked by them from behind while they are fighting the Cultist's demon lord master.

Originally Posted by VariousRen

I don't think there's point inflation going on, I think it's a way of conveying genre conventions using by using game mechanics.

.....

Basically by increasing the skills for both combatants you are encouraged to take skill penalties from modifiers like unstable footing, rapid attacks, lighting penalties, ect. In turn this encourages cinematic, mobile, unique combat encounters because both parties can absorb the penalties without missing 80% of their hits.

In my experience, genre conventions for such fiction tend to have the heroes and certain very agile foes behave like that. Far from every foe and certainly not foes like slow zombies.

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

As a note, I don't actually consider cultists to have native skills as strong as Navy SEALS. Cultists however are touched by the Warp or the Elder Gods or whatever and thats how they get skill 14! There actual native skills are more like default

A SEAL team touched by the Warp or such? Then THAT would be boss level scary

That does not work very well for some kinds of Cultists. For example Cultists serving a powerful rogue Psi. Another issue is that you might want to know how high their basic stats are in situations such as when one of the heroes dispels the demonic magic used to buff the cultists. Also The Enemy even says that "there’s nothing particularly “special” about them".

[Kalzazz]

I did say I have never actually run straight by the book MH

However, through tons of experience running modern GURPS, 12-14 seems to be the sweet spot in skill for AKM toting goons by the bushel basket such that they can often get a few potential hits and not whish all the time, but also not drill PCs with hundreds of rounds and crits

Since Joe Generic cultist (or street thug or whatever) should have around skill 6 instead of 12-14, I throw some kind of flavor text in to help explain it if anyone asks

If their lackeys of a rogue Psi? He tweaked something in their minds etc or helped them deep immersion learn gunplay or deadened nerves etc

And sure, I'd let say an area effect restore mind spell free them from the effect. I'd also let the PCs shoot them, talk past, sneak past etc

[VariousRen]

[QUOTE=Andreas;2041357]
In my experience, genre conventions for such fiction tend to have the heroes and certain very agile foes behave like that. Far from every foe and certainly not foes like slow zombies.
QUOTE]

True, not every foe will fight in the same way, but it still suggests a way of thinking in that genre. If a cultist runs at you and tries to stab you, they'll hit unless you react and stop them somehow. You can't rely on normal misses to protect you, you have to put your opponents in a situation where the penalties make a difference.

High skill levels forces you to handle problems through hyper-competence, instead of exploiting enemy incompetence.

[Randyman]

If the intent is "cultists, slow zombies, etc. should be less capable relative to the PCs", then use mook rules for those opponents. If the intent is "cultists, slow zombies, etc. should be less capable because the PC's should be less capable", use MH4 for PCs and scale opponents according to the advice given in the same volume.