supers: nine options

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Irish Wolf

Other hand, you have to watch how that's portrayed in the game. A lot of people seem to think combat PTSD is all "Charlie's in the trees!" and war flashbacks. And while my roommate does get his share of flashbacks, especially around July 4 when everyone around here insists on using weapons-grade fireworks starting in late June and continuing until about July 6 or so, his displays largely as anger issues and an inability to sleep at night (because night was when insurgents would attack the base). He's been home since 2010, when he was sent back to the States due to severe combat PTSD, so it's not the sort of thing that wears off quickly, either.

Well, that's the sort of thing that Smallville would handle with a Distinction, I think. And then you would have things like

d4: Earn a Plot Point when you Increase the opposition's Afraid or Angry Stress Pool when it's used against you

d8: Earn a Plot Point when you Choose to have a sleepless night and not Recover your Afraid or Exhausted Stress

At least, that's how I would guess it would be done.

I expect there are relevant traits in GURPS, Hero System, and Tri-Stat, at least; and in FUDGE you can invent faults to represent them.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Irish Wolf

Other hand, you have to watch how that's portrayed in the game. A lot of people seem to think combat PTSD is all "Charlie's in the trees!" and war flashbacks. And while my roommate does get his share of flashbacks, especially around July 4 when everyone around here insists on using weapons-grade fireworks starting in late June and continuing until about July 6 or so, his displays largely as anger issues and an inability to sleep at night (because night was when insurgents would attack the base). He's been home since 2010, when he was sent back to the States due to severe combat PTSD, so it's not the sort of thing that wears off quickly, either.

I can barely explain how mine manifests to my therapist. Depicting it as an actor in a way the audience gets it would be very challenging. The shorthand is that combat patrols are the first time in my life things made sense, and now I have to live the rest of it without that

[whswhs]

I've done some testing of different systems by trying to build a sample of six characters: a telepathic spy, an indestructible man, a master of stealth, a speedster, a powerhouse, and an inventor with a personal flight device.

* FUDGE seems to produce acceptable builds.
* Mage: The Ascension doesn't seem able to provide reliably usable abilities at the levels I'm looking for. I'm ruling it out.
* Mutants and Masterminds has restrictions on strength and toughness that make two of those concepts unworkable right off the bat. I'm ruling it out.
* Smallville produces tolerable writeups and adds a lot of biographical detail, though it needs some tweaking for a campaign where the characters don't already know each other from the start. But there's often a conflict between the story rationale for a life path and the things I want a character to get from it.
* I used Villains and Vigilantes to work out the initial concepts, which it did pretty well. But it doesn't cover some important ideas—for example, you can do invisibility, but not simple sneakiness.

Most of the others are more complicated to apply, so I've been putting them off. I'm not sure about the complexity of Savage Worlds; I've just been setting it aside because it's really unfamiliar, more so than any of the others.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by whswhs

* Mutants and Masterminds has restrictions on strength and toughness that make two of those concepts unworkable right off the bat. I'm ruling it out.

I'm confused by this statement. While it's certainly possible that M&M isn't the right system, it doesn't have any particular restrictions on strength and toughness.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Anthony

I'm confused by this statement. While it's certainly possible that M&M isn't the right system, it doesn't have any particular restrictions on strength and toughness.

On page 24, in "Hero Creation," there is a table of power levels. And there are sentences that say "Your hero’s total Toughness saving throw modifier cannot exceed the campaign’s power level" and "Ability scores are limited to a bonus no greater than the campaign’s power level +5. Strength is restricted by the Save Difficulty limit to a bonus no higher than the campaign’s power level, as is Constitution by the maximum Toughness limit. This means a limit of (10 + twice power level) for Strength and Constitution and (20 + twice power level) for other ability scores."

That's in the second edition, copyright 2005-2008, which is what I have.

I'm looking at a campaign that would be around Power Level 2. So no more than STR and CON 14 and Toughness saving throw modifier +2.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by whswhs

I'm looking at a campaign that would be around Power Level 2. So no more than STR and CON 14 and Toughness saving throw modifier +2.

Um... why do you think you're looking at a PL 2 campaign? I'd put the described campaign somewhere around PL 7 (which is not to say that the PL system is without flaws. Also, 2e is a lot different from 3e, which is what I assumed you were talking about by default).

[corwyn]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Um... why do you think you're looking at a PL 2 campaign? I'd put the described campaign somewhere around PL 7 (which is not to say that the PL system is without flaws. Also, 2e is a lot different from 3e, which is what I assumed you were talking about by default).

I agree, pl2 seems odd. A regular beat cop is pl 3. A character with no points spent at all with a light pistol is pl 3.

Also, while the core book has a rigid limit on toughness and damage, a supplement (as well as core 3e) allows trade-offs. Toughness + defense = 2 x pl, damage + attackbonus = 2 x pl.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by corwyn

I agree, pl2 seems odd. A regular beat cop is pl 3. A character with no points spent at all with a light pistol is pl 3.

Also, while the core book has a rigid limit on toughness and damage, a supplement (as well as core 3e) allows trade-offs. Toughness + defense = 2 x pl, damage + attackbonus = 2 x pl.

The PL system does contribute to characters feeling a bit same-ey, I would be tempted to not use it at all. Another advantage of 3e is that it dissociated PL from points.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Um... why do you think you're looking at a PL 2 campaign? I'd put the described campaign somewhere around PL 7 (which is not to say that the PL system is without flaws. Also, 2e is a lot different from 3e, which is what I assumed you were talking about by default).

I haven't kept up with M&M. I was in an M&M campaign, and didn't find the power definitions and character creation process quite satisfactory. So 2e is the version I have.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Um... why do you think you're looking at a PL 2 campaign? I'd put the described campaign somewhere around PL 7 (which is not to say that the PL system is without flaws. Also, 2e is a lot different from 3e, which is what I assumed you were talking about by default).

Well, I was looking at a rough equivalent of one of my sample characters. Mr. T. C. Mits [The Celebrated Man in the Street] costs 2 points in M&M 2e. My character had 5x normal lifting ability, which is Str 22, which costs 12 points. She was +4 to hit with her fists, which I took as two ranks of Attack Specialization for 2 points (since both V&V and M&M are d20 systems). She had a motorcycle, which is 2 points. That gets us to 18 points. Her violent temper in combat looked like a disadvantage worth +3, which means a 15 point base is sufficient. So I figured that two levels, or 30 points, was a generous allowance for a streetlevel character. Except that it seems to limit Str to 14, which isn't very impressive.