Steve Jackson Games - Site Navigation
Home General Info Follow Us Search Illuminator Store Forums What's New Other Games Ogre GURPS Munchkin Our Games: Home

Go Back   Steve Jackson Games Forums > Roleplaying > GURPS

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Old 12-18-2020, 04:06 PM   #11
Prince Charon
 
Prince Charon's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2012
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

Quote:
Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
I have a strong dislike for supernatural durability. It feels like it should be a metatrait built of various other pieces, and as such its hard to tweak. It does include some nice abilities, but its for some very specific purposes.
I'd say that you're right, but I'm not sure how to pick it apart into a metatrait. It looks like it should be built out of several Immunities and some other advantages, but I'm not sure what the others are.
__________________
Warning, I have the Distractible and Imaginative quirks in real life.

"The more corrupt a government, the more it legislates."
-- Tacitus

Five Earths, All in a Row. Updated 12/17/2022: Apocrypha: Bridges out of Time, Part I has been posted.
Prince Charon is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-18-2020, 04:17 PM   #12
Anthony
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

Quote:
Originally Posted by Prince Charon View Post
I'd say that you're right, but I'm not sure how to pick it apart into a metatrait.
There's no way to have exactly the same effects as supernatural durability, but there's ways to accomplish the basic purpose of 'unstoppable monster until you hit its weak point'; the easiest is just high levels of defenses.
__________________
My GURPS site and Blog.
Anthony is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-18-2020, 07:09 PM   #13
Jareth Valar
 
Join Date: Aug 2013
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

We've never liked HPT being an all or nothing advantage. We saw somewhere that someone house ruled it to be a leveled advantage (1-4) costing 3 CP/level. Each level reduced shock penalties by 1.

This has been extremely more playable for our games.

Just throwing it out there and giving credit to whomever posted the HR.
Jareth Valar is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-18-2020, 07:12 PM   #14
Otaku
 
Otaku's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2011
Location: South Dakota, USA
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

Quote:
Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
I’ve always felt that the way to survive combat in GURPS was avoiding getting hit, rather than avoiding the shock penalties, so I don’t think I’ve ever used High Pain Threshold on a PC. As a GM, I’ve used Supernatural Durability on a monster that did physical attacks, and it made quite a mess of the PC who got to fight it in a narrow tunnel, although he survived after extensive medical treatment. This was in my Laundry Files campaign, where healing magic was, to say the least, inadvisable.

Have these advantages saved the day in your games?
Maybe it is the difference between 3e and 4e, but your experience seems most unusual to me, johndallman. ;)

Pain is a factor in adventures, be they low CP value or high CP value outings, regardless of whether the setting is gritty realism or four-color flights of fancy. Even in silly settings, pain matters (though maybe not as much).

If you show me a combat-oriented character without High Pain Threshold, whether I'm the GM or a fellow player, I'll want to know the reason for excluding it. If it is intentionally your Achilles Heel, okay. GURPS combat has a reputation for being deadly, and whether or not it is earned or unearned, if the setting and CP values allow for fantastically high Active Defenses, Damage Resistance, etc. I assume the GM will be planning on challenging such things.

It was a 3e campaign, there were other partially mitigating factors, but seeing our frontline fighters - who all lacked High Pain Threshold - kept getting knocked down, nearly leading to a TPK. Even without falling, the shock penalties hampered their offense. I was the ranged fighter, and HPT was one of my long term goals, but yeah, I was okay without it because I wasn't getting hit most of the time. ;)
__________________
My GURPS Fourth Edition library consists of Basic Set: Characters, Basic Set: Campaigns, Martial Arts, Powers, Powers: Enhanced Senses, Power-Ups 1: Imbuements, Power-Ups 2: Perks, Power-Ups 3: Talents, Power-Ups 4: Enhancements, Power-Ups 6: Quirks, Power-Ups 8: Limitations, Powers, Social Engineering, Supers, Template Toolkit 1: Characters, Template Toolkit 2: Races, one issue of Pyramid (3/83) a.k.a. Alternate GURPS IV, GURPS Classic Rogues, and GURPS Classic Warriors. Most of which was provided through the generosity of others. Thanks! :)
Otaku is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-18-2020, 07:53 PM   #15
AlexanderHowl
 
Join Date: Feb 2016
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

The only fighter designs that I have seen without HPT have had Berserk instead.
AlexanderHowl is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-18-2020, 08:22 PM   #16
Fred Brackin
 
Join Date: Aug 2007
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

I played a genetically engineered warrior/accoutant early in 4e and he had HPT but he had lots of things.
__________________
Fred Brackin
Fred Brackin is online now   Reply With Quote
Old 12-18-2020, 09:34 PM   #17
AlexanderHowl
 
Join Date: Feb 2016
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

A good alternative build to Supernatural Durability is High Pain Threshold [10], Recovery [10], Regeneration (Very Fast; Bane, Occasional, -30%) [70], and Unkillable 1 (Achilles Heel, Occasional, -30%) [35]. It gives most of the functionality of Supernatural Durability for 25 CP less and it gives the enemy a reason to give the characters some breathing room, as a couple of minutes can negate any damage done to it except by its weakness. For a psycho killer, attacks by virgin teenage girls would likely qualify as an Occasional threat.
AlexanderHowl is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-19-2020, 06:51 AM   #18
ericthered
Hero of Democracy
 
ericthered's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: far from the ocean
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

I've seen a lot of High Pain Threshold on characters. I don't know that it ever mattered much, but such characters tend to be played more fearlessly than others, at least in combat. It always catches me off-guard when its added.
__________________
Be helpful, not pedantic

Worlds Beyond Earth -- my blog

Check out the PbP forum! If you don't see a game you'd like, ask me about making one!
ericthered is online now   Reply With Quote
Old 12-19-2020, 09:17 AM   #19
johndallman
Night Watchman
 
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

Quote:
Originally Posted by Otaku View Post
Maybe it is the difference between 3e and 4e, but your experience seems most unusual to me, johndallman. ;)
My hand-to-hand combatant characters tend to be martial artists or fencers. Looking through past characters I can only find one who works off armour and shield, and he was a dwarven bard rather than a professional warrior. His methods were based on having Wealth for good armour, plus high shield skill.

Last edited by johndallman; 12-19-2020 at 01:07 PM. Reason: Improve the English.
johndallman is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-19-2020, 10:02 AM   #20
whswhs
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Lawrence, KS
Default Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week: High Pain Threshold and Supernatural Durability

I ran the combat monster in a GURPS Supers campaign. She had no HPT and only modest DR from her costume. What she relied on was Basic Speed 12, Enhanced Time Sense, DX-19, and Dodge-16. She went by La Gata Encantada and the other players called her "crazy cat girl." I think she's the only combat specialist I've run in GURPS.
__________________
Bill Stoddard

I don't think we're in Oz any more.
whswhs is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Tags
advantage of the week, high pain threshold, supernatural durability

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Fnords are Off
[IMG] code is Off
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 08:18 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.9
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.