D20 Supers Question

Ok, I only skimmed through the preview of D20 Supers via Asgard6.

But, if you want a Hulk-like super character who can pick up 100 tons (let's assume that this is a medium load for him), basically what you do is create him with an 18 Strength and 25 ranks in Super Strength?

Is this correct?

For this, you get D3 + 29 points of damage or 31 points on average with a punch. The power of your punch is always about the same, 30 to 32 points of damage.

Greater Energy Blast on the other hand at 23 ranks does a maximum of 20D6 or 70 points of damage (depending on level).

So, for a lesser cost in ranks, you can do more than twice as much damage?

A "Moderate Energy Blast" does 10D6 maximum, or more average damage than the punch from a Hulk-like character.

Am I missing something here?

Well, first of all, bear in mind that the stuff in Asgard was revised and edited before the final draft was put on sale. Some of the costs were upped, others were reduced.

Also, the usefulness of a power is hard to balance in every situation. If you're in the middle of a crowd fighting a badguy, you don't want to fire your energy blast that will hit a huge swath of innocents. Having high strength would probably be more useful, since you'd be able to just hit your opponent.
However, if you're out in the middle of nowhere, and your opponent can run away from you, an energy blast that can reach hundreds of feet would be much more useful than being able to smash him up (though, with super strength, you could do stuff like throw trees at him).

And, if you're trying to sneak into the badguy's place, neither super strength or an energy blast would be as useful as invisibility or intangibility.

So, as an example, lets take 2 10th level characters, one of whom wants to be able to shoot stuff, the other of whom wants to be able to beat stuff. Now, person A could a Wizard 8/Hero 2, or perhaps person B could be a Barbarian 7/Hero 3, but for the sake of just examining the powers, we'll make them both straight Hero. Remember that the most Hero Points you can spend on a single power is equal to your character level +3, so the highest anything will get here is 13 Hero Points.

Person A, the Blaster
With his 80 HrPs, he gets these powers. We'll assume that he shoots electric energy blasts, so all his energy-based abilities are based on electricity. He ends up having 22 extra hero points after getting all these key powers, so he'll probably take something like Heightened Defenses for more AC.

Attack, Energy (13 HrPs): Activated. As a standard action you can shoot a ray or 5-ft. wide line of energy to Medium range, dealing up to 4d6 points of energy damage. Base rank 1. Close (2 ranks), medium (1 ranks), line (1 rank), increased damage x3 (6 ranks), adjustable (2 ranks).

Elemental Resistance (13 HrPs): Persistent. You gain energy resistance 20 against your chosen form of energy. Base rank 2. Increased resistance x9 (9 ranks), greater resistance x2 (2 ranks).

Energy Absorption (12 HrPs): Persistent. Whenever your Energy Resistance would reduce damage from your chosen element, you gain 3 temporary hit points for every 5 points of damage resisted. These temporary hit points last for 10 minutes. At any given time, you cannot have more than 10 temporary hit points from this ability. Base rank 8. Faster absorption x2 (4 ranks).

Heightened Accuracy (11 HrPs): Persistent. You gain a +7 bonus to attack rolls with your energy attack. Base rank 1. Increased effect x6 (12 ranks). Affects only a single attack form (2 HrP reduction). This is for when he wants to use the ray version of his energy blast.

Shield (9 HrPs): Activated. You can create a shield of energy in front of yourself, granting a +7 bonus to AC and a +3 bonus to Reflex saves against attacks coming from a chosen 180-degree arc. As a free action once per round you can reassign the angle of the arc. The shield moves with you, covering the same angle unless you choose for it to move or disappear. Base rank 4. Mobile shield (5 ranks).


Person B, the Tank
He also has 80 HrPs to play with, so he gets the following key powers.

Heightened Constitution (12 HrPs): Persistent. You gain a +8 bonus to your Constitution. Base rank 3. Increased effect x3 (9 ranks).

Heightened Defenses (natural armor) (12 HrPs): Persistent. You gain a +6 natural armor bonus to your AC. Base rank 2. Increased effect x5 (10 ranks).

Heightened Strength (9 HrPs): Persistent. You gain a +6 bonus to Strength. Base rank 3. Increased effect x2 (6 ranks).

Immunity to Critical Hits (8 HrPs): Persistent. You are immune to critical hits. Base rank 8.

Invulnerability (12 HrPs): Persistent. You gain DR 5/+2. Base rank 1. Increased resistance x2 (2 ranks), greater resistance x2 (8 ranks).

Super Health (8 HrPs): Persistent. You gain a +4 bonus to all Constitution-based checks and Fortitude saves, plus an effective +8 Consititution for the purposes of endurance and holding your breath.

Super Strength (12 HrPs): Persistent. You gain a +6 bonus to damage rolls and Strength-based checks, and an effective +12 Strength for the purposes of lifting, carrying, and throwing. Base rank 2. Increased effect x5 (10 ranks).

Super Strike (5 HrPs): Persistent. Your unarmed attacks are considered to have a +3 enhancement bonus for the purposes of defeating damage reduction. Base rank 1. Increased effect x2 (4 ranks).



Comparison:
First of all, you'll note that the cost of the energy blast has been racheted up from the Asgard preview. When we had a 20th level character shooting 15d6 damage laserbeams from his eyes every round, we realized we had to fix that. So the damage differential isn't that bad (d3+10 averages as 12, while 4d6 averages as 14). If the tank uses a sword or something, instead of his fist, he's even better off. Actually, the tank could probably use some pretty big swords, dealing as much as 2d8+10 per hit (average 19).

But really, it comes down to your niche. The blaster is good at blowing things up, and is more like a sorcerer. The tank is more like a fighter. Depending on the situations, powers will have different values.

Oh, and to make the Hulk . . . well first, to be true to the comics, he's probably 40th level or higher, but we'll make him 20th. Now let's min-max a Hero's strength and melee capability. He has 160 HrPs to play with.

Gain Feat (2 HrPs): Hulk gains the Exotic Weapon Proficiency (giant melee object) feat.

Gain Feat (2 HrPs): Hulk gains the Exotic Weapon Proficiency (giant thrown object) feat.

Gain Feat (2 HrPs): Hulk gains the Leap of the Clouds feat.

Heightened Accuracy (1 HrP): Persistent. Hulk gains a +1 bonus to attack rolls. Base rank 1.

Heightened Constitution (22 HrPs): Persistent. +16 Constitution. Base rank 3. Increased effect x7 (21 ranks). Only when in Hulk form (worth double for high ransk, 2 HrP reduction).

Heightened Defenses (natural armor) (19 HrPs): Persistent. +10 natural armor bonus to AC. Base rank 2. Increased effect x9 (18 ranks). Only when in Hulk form (1 HrP reduction).

Heightened Strength (22 HrPs): Persistent. +16 Strength. Base rank 3. Increased effect x7 (21 ranks). Only when in Hulk form (worth double for high ranks, 2 HrP reduction).

Increased damage (19 HrPs): Persistent. Hulk's unarmed attacks do an extra +20 damage. Base rank 3. Increased effect x9 (18 ranks). Only when in Hulk form (worth double for high ranks, 2 HrP reduction).

Invulnerability (17 HrPs): Persistent. DR 25/+1. Base rank 2. Increased effect x12 (12 ranks). Greater resistance (4 ranks). Only when in Hulk form (1 HrP reduction).

Mighty Lifting (9 HrPs): Persistent. Effective +40 strength for lifting, carrying, and throwing, and can wield weapons and carry items as if he were a colossal creature. Base rank 2. Increased effect x7 (7 ranks). Only when in Hulk form (1 HrP reduction).

Rage (22 HrPs): Activated. Can go into a berserker rage as a free action, gaining +14 Str, +14 Con, a +7 bonus to Will saves, but a –2 penalty to AC, lasting 18 rounds. Hulk becomes fatigued afterward. Base rank 4. Increased effect x6 (24 ranks). Automatically occurs when assuming Hulk form (worth double for high ranks, 2 HrP reduction), irrational rage (worth double for high ranks, 4 HrP reduction). Note that since rage requires anger, he cannot enter rage without assuming his large Hulk form, see Sizeshift below.

Sizeshift (1 HrP): Uncontrollable activated. Whenever damaged or angered, Bruce Banner must succeed a Will save (DC 15) each round, or assume his Hulk form, which is a large, green version of himself. His gear does not change size to fit (0 HrP reduction), unrestrained change (1 HrP reduction).

Super Strength (22 HrPs): Persistent. +12 bonus to melee weapon and hurled weapon damage rolls, and a +12 bonus to Strength checks and Strength-based skill checks. Additionally, an effective +24 strength for the purposes of determining how much she can lift and carry. Base rank 2. Increased effect x11 (22 ranks). Only when in Hulk form (worth double for high ranks, 2 HrP reduction).



So, when all is said and done, the Hulk has an effective strength for lifting and throwing of 90 (104 while he is in rage, which he usually is), plus he can use things like busses as weapons. With his unarmed attacks, he gets a +18 bonus to-hit, which is strong, but not as good as a fighter of the same level (since the Hulk is just a big brute with huge hands). His unarmed attacks deal 1d3+40 points of damage per hit, however. He has about 230 hit points, but also has damage reduction 25/+1, so it'll be nearly impossible for everyday people or weapons to kill him.

When raging (most of the time), this goes up to a +25 to-hit, 1d3+47 damage, and 370 hit points.

RangerWickett said:

Attack, Energy (13 HrPs): Activated. As a standard action you can shoot a ray or 5-ft. wide line of energy to Medium range, dealing up to 4d6 points of energy damage. Base rank 1. Close (2 ranks), medium (1 ranks), line (1 rank), increased damage x3 (6 ranks), adjustable (2 ranks).

…

Heightened Strength (9 HrPs): Persistent. You gain a +6 bonus to Strength. Base rank 3. Increased effect x2 (6 ranks).

…

Super Strength (12 HrPs): Persistent. You gain a +6 bonus to damage rolls and Strength-based checks, and an effective +12 Strength for the purposes of lifting, carrying, and throwing. Base rank 2. Increased effect x5 (10 ranks).

…

Comparison:
First of all, you'll note that the cost of the energy blast has been racheted up from the Asgard preview. When we had a 20th level character shooting 15d6 damage laserbeams from his eyes every round, we realized we had to fix that. So the damage differential isn't that bad (d3+10 averages as 12, while 4d6 averages as 14). If the tank uses a sword or something, instead of his fist, he's even better off. Actually, the tank could probably use some pretty big swords, dealing as much as 2d8+10 per hit (average 19).

But really, it comes down to your niche. The blaster is good at blowing things up, and is more like a sorcerer. The tank is more like a fighter. Depending on the situations, powers will have different values.

Click to expand...

Ok, so the Tank has to use up 21 HrPs compared to the 13 HrPs of the Energy Blaster to average a little less damage. He had to buy both Heightened Strength (3 per) and Super Strength (2 per) to get into the ballpark damage of the Attack Energy (1 per).

And, the Energy Blaster could have increased his damage even more if he didn't want to go out to medium range and do a line, etc.

The Tank's strength for the most part has no range (unless he picks something up and throws it).

He increases his damage by about a third if he uses a big weapon, but what if he uses a car? Does it increase even more?

This Tank has an equivalent Strength of 30. Slighty stronger than Captain America, nowhere near as strong as Spiderman.


It must just be me. I do not quite see where the balance lies, nor do I see these guys as overly super.

Even with you changing the EB costs, it still seems a lot more effective than Strength. Plus, as 10th level characters, these guys seem a lot less powerful than supers that you read in the comic books. For example, Captain America is a Martial Artist pushing max human strength and dexterity. Your 10th level tank is just a tad stronger, but has no martial arts, no superior human dexterity, no indomitable will.

Granted, supers in the comic books have a lot more experience.

But, Captain America had maximum human strength day one. Spiderman could pick up a car day one. The Thing could pick up a plane day one.

Your solution for this is to have the Thing be a 20th level hero (class) or something on day one?

Huh?

Seems kind of high. What about DC Heroes? Are Superman, Wonder Woman, Flash, and Green Lantern 50th level heroes?

What about the superhero with a single impressive power? He gets 80 HrPs as per your example, but can only use 13 of them. And, the power is no more impressive than that of his fellow heroes unless he restricts it to lower the HrPs.

I must be missing something.

Superman would be somewhere in the ballpark of 50th level. Indeed, to really capture all the crazy stuff some comic book characters do, you probably would need them to start at 20th level or higher. It's not much different than letting a player have a Dragon PC with an equivalent character level of 20. Superpowers can mean that racially you are just stronger.

Now a lot of mutants from the X-Men probably reach a cap of powers at maybe 10th level. Wolverine might have something like 12 levels of Hero, Prof X and Magneto would be much higher, but Cyclops, Jubilee, Gambit, Archangel, Iceman . . . they'd all have maybe 5 to 10 levels of Hero.

As for balance, an energy blast costs a base of 1 for 1d6 damage at a range of 10 feet. A normal person can do 1d6 points of damage at a range of 10 feet with a spear or polearm easily enough. Every 2 ranks thereafter increases the damage by another 1d6.

If you're just going to have one power, and try to hurt people up close, an energy blast does more damage than a physical attack powered up with a super power, true. However, the target might have energy resistance, and if you fire a line or cone version, the target gets a save for half damage. But yes, if you're just trying to deal damage, take an energy blast (or some other form of attack power). However, energy attacks can't lift fallen debris, or subdue monsters, etc. It's a balance of utility vs. power.

As to the question of 'one-trick ponies,' I'll admit, it's hard to have a character who is just good at one thing and nothing else. For one thing, that's hard to balance. If you just want an energy blast that costs 20 Hero Points, you can't get it until 17th level, even if you don't plan to get any other super powers. Now, you could be a 14th level Fighter/3rd level Hero, but if you don't want any skills or combat abilities either, and ALL you want is the energy attack, you could just be a Hero 17 and just not use most of your Hero Points.

However, most comicbook heroes have all kinds of small extra abilities that aren't really noticed as powers. Y'know, Gambit can move and dodge really well, and Storm has great charisma to command a tribe who thought her a god. A lot of the small things are up to you to decide, but if, out of 160 HrPs, you only want to spend 20 HrPs, you could use the other 140 HrPs for small stuff like increasing your attack bonus, your AC, your ability scores . . . y'know, low-key stuff that wouldn't necessarily be recognized as a power.

It seems to me this kind of thing could be solved via a Natural Weapons power. Basically, an attack that does 1d6 per 2 ranks or some such, and requires a normal attack roll. This could be used to represent attacks such as Wolverine's claws or the enhanced attacks of a super martial artist. The drawback compared to ranged attacks is it takes a normal attack roll (rather than ranged touch) and that you have to get in close. The advantage is you gain your strength bonus and can use iterative attacks via a high base attack bonus.


Leroy Van Camp III

"Where you come from is gone. Where you thought you were
going to weren't never there. And where you are ain't no
good unless you can get away from it."

Ministry, "Jesus Built My Hotrod"

D20 Supers Question/Comment

I'd like to say right off that I was quite pleased with the content. I thought it was very well done.

I do have a question and a question/comment though:

Do levels in Hero class increase the maximum skill rank a character can have?
Thus, would a Hero9/Rogue1 have a maximum of 4 ranks in a skill or a max of 13 ranks in a skill?

Why is elemental resistance (referred to as energy resistance in some laces) so expensive? It takes huge amounts of points to be somewhat resistant to all the different types of energy. Tank characters in comics are usually highly resistant to most or all forms of energy attacks, yet the cost to simulate that in the game is prohibitive. A measly five points of elemental resistance (equivalent to a 1st level spell) for each of the six energy forms will cost a character thirty-six hero points. That's almost half of the hero points for a Hero10 character. Add on a little damage reduction and the cost skyrockets even more. What's worse is that energy attacks ignore the natural armor bonus to AC that most tanks would have. The only defense against energy attacks most tanks in the game will have is high hit points, and those can be worn down by continual attacks from even low-level blasters.

I think elemental resistance should either cost less (3 HrP's per 5 resistance per element) or energy attacks shouldn't be touch attacks to represent the chance that the blast will bounce off of armor.

Anyway, that's my opinion. Take it for what it's worth. Just to reiterate, I think overall that it's a very well developed product. Kudos to the designers.

Elemental Resistance. Hmm. Well, mostly I didn't see many heroes really having this power. Some of course do, like the Human Torch, or Iceman, but for the average tank, I just envisioned them having a lot of hit points. The issue of multiple elemental resistances never came up in playtesting, but . . .

Well, bear in mind this is preliminary and rough, but you bring up a good point. With elemental resistance spells, you can react to what your opponent is hitting with, but with an elemental resistance power you just have to hope that your opponent will try to hit you with the wrong type of attack. Also, yes, a lot of heroes are shown wading through fire heroically, being unharmed by the flames. I'm sure they could endure freezing cold or electricity much the same.

So . . . instead of requiring you to take elemental resistance multiple times, you can choose as a house rule to make the following change.

Extra rank cost: 2
Multiple: Yes
Effect: Diverse Resistance. Choose another type of elemental energy. You gain energy resistance against that type of energy equal to half your primary energy resistance (round down). So if you had fire resistance 15, you could gain cold resistance 7.

Extra rank cost: 2
Multiple: Yes
Effect: Greater Diverse Resistance. Pick one of the energy types you chose for Diverse Resistance. Increase the resistance of that energy to be equal to your primary resistance, instead of 1/2. Thus, if you had fire resistance 15, you could also have cold resistance 15.

I think that these enhancements might be worth more in a fantasy setting, where elemental attacks are much more common than in the modern day. For a fantasy setting, where magical elemental attacks are common, increase the cost of each enhancement by 3.

Of course, I just made that up, so don't think it'll necessarily be balanced, but I think it should work.