The issue of super strength

[BlightCrawler]

I am a big supers fan and am perusing the crop for d20 out there. The biggest concern I have with d20 supers is the issue of super strength. For instance: The Thing, is hugely strong. With a d+d style strength, he will always hit, and always do a ton of damage. The ton of damage makes sense (although I dislike the +75 damage type of thing). With his huge strength, he would probably have a +40 or something to hit. This just doesn't seem all that accurate to me. To make matters worse, I suspect that the damage would be 1d3 +75. Why roll?

Well, the easy solution, play a non-d20 super game Seriously, you're sure to avoid potential cludgey system fixes to get around problems like this.

Silver Age Sentinals, as with the others, also does not have Strength give you an attack bonus.

A real problem, would be The Hulk, who is strong enough to lift an aircraft carrier (which is what, 100,000 tons?).

 

[RangerWickett]

Assuming he could lift 100,000 tons (which I think is way too high for an aircraft carrier, but I'm just guessing), that requires a Strength of 115 in D20.

Using FCTF, let's see what we can do. Since the Hulk is uber-tough, we'll make him 40th level. Mind you, in an actual game you might not really need to make the character this strong; you might play at 10th level, where he'd be strong enough to lift an 15 ton 18-wheeler. But if you really want a Hulk, he'd be tough.

So let's stat him. At 40th level, he has 240 Hero Points, and can have up to 43 HrPs in any given power. We'll assume he starts off with a 10 Strength before his powers.

Heightened Strength (this is the version that grants an attack bonus as well as damage and lifting). 21 Hero Points gets him a +14 to Strength.

Super Strength (the version that provides no attack bonus). 42 Hero Points for a +42 bonus to Strength. But no attack bonus.

Mighty Lifting (this just increases lifting capacity, not damage or attack bonuses). 12 Hero Points grants an effective +55 bonus to Strength for the purposes of lifting, carrying, and throwing. No bonus to attack or damage.

So, with only about a third of his total Hero Points, we can cover the Hulk's strength, putting him up to an effective total strength of 121. Enough to lift two aircraft carriers.

Then again, I would never want to play a character that powerful, but the rules let you if you want.

 

[sfgiants]

Hey, thanks for all the info. I must admit that it is very kind for all you designers to provide some info. It is much appreciated. A couple more questions regarding super strength: how much would it cost to get The Thing style strength (cost as in Hero points, or xp etc)? Would it be possible to do this for a starting character?

Mostly I ask, 'cause I may not be bothered so much by a few of the results of super strength if it isn't so darn easy to get it.

 

[RangerWickett]

What do you mean by Thing-style strength? Myself not being a Fantastic Four fan, I don't know what his strength is like.

And really, in a game with super powers, the concept of a 'starting character' is flexible. In this game, you might have only been a hero for a week, but you might be a 20th-level character. Character level does not actually denote experience, just power.

 

[Forrester]

Generating the Big, Slow, and STRONG

This is an interesting problem . . . let me throw out a thought or two. I'm not familiar with Supers systems other than 4CTF, but I'm sure that most systems have SOME system that allows people to throw around buses without automatically hitting with them.

I think there the way 4CTF handles it is just fine, but there's a big problem, and one that I've noted before: from a max-minning point of view, there is no reason that a character shouldn't buy up at least SOME Super Speed while they're creating their tank, except for pure role-playing reasons. It's so cheap . . . why not at least bump up to a movement rate of 60' or 70'?

Now, I know that Ranger wants to avoid Hero "classes" (The speedy guy, the Big Strong guy, etc), but may I make a suggestion? If someone wants a certain Schtick (which may be a set of Speedy abilities, or a set of Strength abilities, or whatever), allow them to increase their max ranks in it if they avoid (or buy at an extremely increased expense) opposing Schticks.


For example, it seems a bit silly that the Hulk has to be 40th level. That's a bit high . . . but it's necessary for the Hulk to be able to lift what he needs to lift.

But we also know that the Hulk isn't exactly Speedy Gonzales.

So . . . what if the Hulk were to take the equivalent of "Big, Slow, and STRONG" Schtick. His max ranks in the Strength abilities increase by x1.5, but he is forbidden from buying any Dex abilities, Speed abilities, or Mind abilities. Or maybe he can't buy more than 4 ranks in any of them, or . . . whatever.

What do you think?





PS I think the Thing can throw around buses pretty easily, but I doubt he could bench-press an aircraft carrier. I'd probably put his lifing strength as that of a colossal dragon.

 

[Beale Knight]

d20 Super / Mega Strength

I can’t believe I’ve let a discussion on super-strength go for four days without throwing in my 2 cents.

Short answer to the first question: When I designed Comic Book Super-Heroes I set up a Feat called Combat Super Dodge. It’s prerequisites are a Dex of 17 or a Dex of 14 + 4 Ranks in Tumbling. It may also be gained free as a benefit of having 5 Skill Ranks in a particular Martial Arts style. This feat removes a foe’s Strength bonus when he tries to hit you. It’s easy for Super-Hero types to get and has proven very popular. Of course if you DO get hit…………(think Spider-Man or Shang-Chi fighting the Thing)

Longer Answer to the second question (Thing level Strength)
CBSH uses three different takes on super/mega strength. First briefly, in CBSH characters receive Super points with which they buy and improve super-powers (there’s two other uses so Non-Powered characters have a use for them).

All stats can be improved at a Super point cost of 2 per stat point increase (this is the “super”-strength, along with potential super-dexterity, -constitution, and yes even super-intelligence (Professor Richards) wisdom and charisma). This is pretty cheap in itself, but it adds up quickly and makes very high stats prohibitively expensive.

The Mega-Strength super-power is divided into the Multiplied Strength Increase and the Relative Size Increase. From what RangerW said, it works in a similar way as FCTF.

The MSI actually multiplies whatever your super Strength stat is, and to get MSI your Strength must be at least 20. Each time you spend Super points to get MSI you get the next in a progression of multipliers: x1.5, x2, x2.5, x3, x3.5, and x4. The cost is 5 super points higher each time: 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, and no steps can be skipped (105 total Super points to go from x1.5 to x4). So if a PC begins at 1st level with an 18 Strength he can “super” it up to 50 at a cost of 19 Super points, which is, alas, 1 more than 1st levels of the Standard Power level get. That’s a hell of a bonus (+20) but it pretty well means that PC can’t ever do Anything else except be super strong.

The Relative Size Increase gives the PC a carrying capacity of a larger size creature. It advances is stages like MSI, each Size category being a stage (Large to Colossal), no stages may be skipped, and a PC must have at least a 20 Strength before being able to gain the RSI. Because the bonus is smaller, the Super point price of RSI is cheaper than the Multiplied Increase: 3,6,12,15. A 1st leveler with an 18 Strength could spend 7 Super points to get a Strength of 20, with its +5 bonus, and the carrying capacity of a Large size creature with a 20 Strength (Heavy Load = 267-400 lbs). This opens to door for later Strength increases and the character can get some additional super-powers.

So if the Thing can lift 100 tons (long) over his head; that’s 224,000 pounds. As a medium sized being, Ben can get this either by raising his Strength to 66 (+28, 235,520 lbs) using direct point increasing and a few mulipliers. This would take 58 Super points (assuming an 18 for starting strength) and until about level 9 under a Standard Power level campaign. Alternately he could raise his Strength to 46 (+18) and add the Colossal Relative Size Increase (235,520 lbs) for 44 total Super points. This would take until about 7th level.

Same result in what he can lift, different ways to get there, different bonuses. And the cost can be adjusted by more factors than could easily be listed, some standard d20, some CBSH stuff.
Either way it’ll take some time before Ben builds up his strength to the level we’re most familiar with. But using the CBHS Advanced Starts and Varying Power Levels rules he could have it instantly.

If you’re planning on running a Super d20 game, you’ve already got lots of choices from lots of sources about how to work things like Super and Mega strength, and will soon have more. So somewhere there’s sure to be some satisfactory answers to your questions (even if this wasn’t one :> )

(edited for paragraph seperation - didn't intend to write a book)

 

[Forrester]

Re: d20 Super / Mega Strength

I can’t believe I’ve let a discussion on super-strength go for four days without throwing in my 2 cents.

Short answer to the first question: When I designed Comic Book Super-Heroes I set up a Feat called Combat Super Dodge. It’s prerequisites are a Dex of 17 or a Dex of 14 + 4 Ranks in Tumbling. It may also be gained free as a benefit of having 5 Skill Ranks in a particular Martial Arts style. This feat removes a foe’s Strength bonus when he tries to hit you. It’s easy for Super-Hero types to get and has proven very popular. Of course if you DO get hit…………(think Spider-Man or Shang-Chi fighting the Thing)

That's very, very interesting . . . I like it! I wonder if a feat like that might work in D&D. At least, something similar.

I think you'd have to make it so that if you used it, you lost your OWN strength-bonus to hit, though, or else it'd be a little on the cheesy side.

Hmmmmm . . .

 

[Great Umbrage]

The easiest method would be to treat armor as DR.

In this case, Str would only add bonuses to damage, not to attack. This makes more sense, in consideration of the D&D rationale for Str bonuses to attack. Namely, because in D&D, armor adds to AC, Str is added to reflect aiding in punching through armor. The other reason for Str bonus to attack is in allowing the character to exert more control over his weapon, but this really goes back to "Can I punch through the armor with this weapon?" not "Can I catch the enemy with this weapon?"

Mutants & Masterminds, I think, allows for a much higher lifting capacity bonus from super strength while lowering the increase in damage. This only skirts the issue, since at higher levels, the bonuses would outweigh the random factor.

In addition, the Hulk can only lift 100 tons, not 100,000, and he can only lift that when enraged. In general, Marvel characters are weaker in terms of lifting capacity than DC characters...Superman can easily lift a cargo-laden large plane (several hundred, if not thousand tons), while the Hulk, supposedly the strongest Marvel character, cannot...unless he gets really really P.O.ed.

In any case, 4CTF does have a good idea about what to do with super high bonuses...i.e., making them random. Anyone come up with something with a little more polish, though?

 

[Vigilance]

well... I make no claims to "polish", but Vigilance does most everything you discuss...

Armor grants DR, although Str does still give attack bonuses...

spending Power Points on the Brawn Power allows you to increase your lifting capacity as much as you have Power Points for...

 

[Endur]

Super Strength for Comic Characters

Its hard to determine how strong comic book characters are. Partially because it changes from issue to issue.

In some comic books, the Hulk is strong enough to hold up a mountain. In others, he's nowhere near as strong.

In some comic books, Superman is strong enough to move the planet. In others, he's nowhere near as strong.

This is probably why I prefer to play characters that players create, not the ones from the comic books, because we have more freedom to set limits.