Supers: Character balance

[Stix4armz]

Originally Posted by tbrock1031

My usual rule of thumb is that the character before powers should be roughly a 100 to 150 point character. That should give you a character who is able to manage in the situation with his powers negated while leaving plenty of points for powers.

Oh, do you have a copy of either GCA or GCS? Either one should be able to assist in the making of abilities for your powerset, particularly in checking the math. (IMO, GCA is better at it, but folks love GCS because it's free.)

Thanks, that's what I was looking for. 100-150pt character seems a tad low to me, but I've never played a supers game either.

I don't have either of those programs, I just use a calculator and scratch paper.

To clarify for everyone else, I was looking for opinions on what the balance should be between the power and the person. The above answer said 100-150pts for the person, spend the rest on the power. What sort of guideline do you guys use?

[Michael Thayne]

Originally Posted by Stix4armz

Hey guys I have a quick question. How do you do about building your character for a Supers campaign?

Templates are your friend. In the supers game I'm running right now, some members of the opposition are built on more than 1000 points, but I would not have been able to figure out how to build most of those characters without consulting templates in published books, not just Supers but also Monster Hunters. Not that I used any template as written, I removed things, added things, even combined templates as necessary in order to fit my vision of the character, but templates are where I started.

The campaign I'm joining is 1000/-100/-5 (which is the highest power level I've ever played in, another part of the problem). I'm doing okay building my power, but my real question is how do you build the guy who has the power?

Its going to be more like Heroes or X-Men: The Last Stand than comic book supers like Superman or The Flash, people from all walks of life start manifesting all sorts of powers. So how many points should I allot for the character before he becomes super? Is there a good guideline or is it more a matter of preference?

Thanks for the input, suggestions, or snarky comments in advance!

Heroes and X-Men: The Last Stand are very different. I've only seen 1st season Heroes, but based on that, I'd say most of the characters are built on about 250 points, with Peter and Sylar being completely impossible to build in GURPS (a feature, not a bug, of GURPS because both characters are insanely over-powered). Claire, for example, is probably built on 50 points or less minus her powers, with powers consisting of some forms of Regeneration and Unkillable, along with maybe some minor bonuses like Recovery. Hiro is likewise built with 50 points of mundane abilities, with powers that would put him over the 250 point threshold except he's piled on the limitations that make them unreliable.

X:TLS on the other hand, may theoretically feature "normal" people but in reality, their ability to survive crazy situations seems to go way beyond what their powers out to allow on paper. Some, notably, have no real defensive abilities, and are probably relying on Luck, Dodge, etc. for survival. So the cinematic X-Men characters would probably weigh in at 150 if not 250 points without their powers, with some, like crazy-badass Wolverine and cinematic gadgeteer Beast likely coming in at more.

So it's really a matter of personal preference. Some people like to keep the non-powered part of their character strictly realistic. Personally, though, I think some "realistic" traits are just too good to pass up when you have that many points to throw around.

I'd put most of my stats at 12+, possibly much more if I was leaning towards someone more like Wolverine or Beast. DX will help you hit with your powered attacks, and help defenses some too; IQ is optional for some character concepts but should still probably be bought up if you'll be using it at all since it also raises Per and Will; HT is vital for staying alive and remember half of what you're paying for is the Basic Speed boost; if you don't buy up IQ then Per will help you avoid surprises and Will will let you resist mind control AND help with power stunts; and of course you should always buy Basic Speed up to the nearest whole number. Luck and Combat Reflexes are also strongly recommended, though less important if your powers have a strong defensive component.

On the other hand, if you really want to to stick to the idea of a normal person with powers, some of the basic GURPS genre books have templates for realistic characters (Horror especially is good for this). You could take one of those templates and then spend all your other points on powers. I don't care for that style, though.

[Refplace]

The normal person could be anythng from a negative point charecter (say a wheelchair bound intelligent but not cinematic thinker type) to a wealthy politician with tons of contacts, patrons, allies and skills.
Just pick your person based on what you want to play and outline it.
Then pick your powers and out line them.
The merge and build to suit. I usually over build nad have to trim points.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Asta Kask

And putting points in valuable skills where they don't. Leadership, Tactics, Intelligence Analysis... all the superstrength in the world won't help you fix a reactor on the verge of a breakdown.

Same with Batman vs the super-powered DC guys.

[Figleaf23]

Originally Posted by B9anders

The way Cap America stands up to guys like Thor, Vision and Iron-Man is basically with lots of Luck, Serendipity and Destiny.

He also has an indestructible shield and evidently skill levels that make it perform almost as well as an animated ally.

[Nosforontu]

Originally Posted by Stix4armz

The campaign I'm joining is 1000/-100/-5 (which is the highest power level I've ever played in, another part of the problem). I'm doing okay building my power, but my real question is how do you build the guy who has the power?

It really depends on just how central his power set is to the build compared to the rest of the guys life is at the end of the day. Superman for example probably has 99% of his points invested in his power set while Batman has a huge percentage of his points invested in Quick Gadgeteer, Gizmos, Multimillionaire, and talents.

A highschool kid with little life experience might only have had perhaps 50 points before getting a 950 point upgrade. Which could include simple mundane things like bumps in attributes and skills that he has picked up since then. On the other hand a Mission impossible agent who gets super powers might already have been worth 200-400 points and already at least mildly cinematic.

Ultimately your "mundane" point total in some ways is going to represent how grounded your character is in the normal world and its importance to the character. One thing I have heard frequently about superman for example is that Superman is who he really is and Clark Kent is who he pretends to be. Considering almost all of his points are allocated for Superman things I can easily believe it.

[dataweaver]

Originally Posted by Stix4armz

To clarify for everyone else, I was looking for opinions on what the balance should be between the power and the person. The above answer said 100-150pts for the person, spend the rest on the power. What sort of guideline do you guys use?

It depends on what everyone else is doing. Really, it does: there's no way to assign X points to powers and everything else to other traits and know with any degree of certainty that the result will be balanced with anyone else in your group. Especially with a Supers game, do not design your character in a vacuum.

What you really need to do is to identify somethng that you want to be able to do better than anyone else, then figure out how much that will cost and set than many points aside; then spend the remaining points however you like. To do that, you need to know what everyone else is planning, and you need a sense of what you want. Without that information, I really can't provide anything more specific.

[Winged]

Unless your playgroup is big on surprising each other with your characters or something I would consider asking the other players what kind of super they are thinking of. While having a "balanced party" is not always necessary, I think it is usually more fun when players don't accidentally have very similar backgrounds or powers. Think how weird it would be if there where 5 batmans (batmen?) on a team, they would all be constantly trying to out sneek/hack/detective/whatever each other all the time and after a few combats I'd bet they would probably wish they could buy a superman with their incredible combined wealth. If nothing else you may think of a power set or character that would interact interestingly with one of your fellow player's character's.



I would also talk to the gm a bit more. Ask him or her how battle oriented he or she thinks your character should be, or if he has any ideas for a back story or powerset that would fit conveniently in the world he is building.

Finally ask yourself what kind of powerset just sounds like fun to play and just expand on that.

I for example have always wanted to play a character with both retainable wild talent and super lucky so that he could theoretically learn almost any skill the team could need him to use on a moments notice. From here I would come up with a way to explain how he is doing it, in this case I would justify it by saying that he is actually able to use some kind of super long range, wide area mind reading that only works on learned skills and is actually just copying the skill sets of others downloaded right from their brains. Now that I know I'm working with some kind of strange telepath who can manipulate his own mind, I may throw in some other stuff that matches that theme, perhaps with a focused attack he can wipe people's memories, or when he is near a person try to hear their conscious thoughts, maybe he can temporary give himself certain mental traits though modular abilities.

[Lex_BR]

Supers games have nothing to do with character balance, its about niche protection more than any of that.

Superman can take care of the incoming nuclear missile but he needs batman to use his computers to hack into the missiles guiding chip to find out where it came from and who is to blame.

Its about every character having their chance to shine.

Dont try to out tank the major tank, out-speed the main speed guy etc...
Pick something to excell at and it should be fine


Pro tip though, 1000 points is going in way over your heads for a first game, our group started off like that but quickly realized that niche protection, having to work together and character balance are a lot easier with lower powered heroes. I would advise 300 to 500 points to start with

[Jasonft]

Originally Posted by Lex_BR

Dont try to out tank the major tank, out-speed the main speed guy etc...
Pick something to excell at and it should be fine


Pro tip though, 1000 points is going in way over your heads for a first game, our group started off like that but quickly realized that niche protection, having to work together and character balance are a lot easier with lower powered heroes. I would advise 300 to 500 points to start with

I agree with both of these points. In a supers game you have to be very careful with group dynamics. Talk things over with the GM and the other players about what the campaign is going to be like FIRST. Make supers that work well together and cover each others' blind spots somewhat. 1000 points will be unplayable otherwise.

Supers in a cinematic universe are a lot different than a 'real world' setting like Wild Cards. Find out which type of world you are in.

Re: The Superman/ Batman in a group together - Do not underestimate the high point agent type. In anything other than combat the agent (Batman in this case) is going to run circles around the Brick. Superman can punch in the front door of the hidden base but needs Batman to find the base via investigation first.

For character building I agree with the thought of building the normal person they were before the origin first. Unless something real weird is going on 150 points should be overkill for this. Once that is done build on everything else.

I commonly start with all stats at a base of 12-13 for a super and then adjust for concept. Fit and Very Fit work quite well especially if you are using the extra effort rules. If your character is expecting to be shot at or punched on a regular basis you need HT at a minimum of 13, and ideally at 15+ for consciousness and death checks.

Luck and Serendipity are a must at least in small amounts. Being able to declare the sniper who surprised you (no dodge roll!) shot just as you stepped past a tree (thus hitting the tree) will save your life. It also explains how the villain keeps getting away, but them's the breaks.