Discussion board. Hello!
Campaign doc is here
Greetings fellow Testers!
I've been working on a Hulk-like bruiser who shoots energy blasts a whole bunch (barbarian (invulnerable rager) paired with alchemist). The morale/alchemical stackable bonuses between rage and mutagen get pretty sick.
For any fellow DBZ fans, it's my stab at Broly. I'm calling him Broccoli Rob.
I don't have herolab or anything of the like, so it might take a bit before I'm able to parse him over from my excel sheets into a board-friendly output.
I will say this about him at level 6 though. He's hilarious. Baring fisting it for a cool 1d6+13 damage before I've picked up a lick of gear. I lol'd. =)
Hey Dal. I agree that power levels might increase pretty exponentially but then... You're superheroes!
As long as things don't get broken because of a flaw in the system I'm happy because supervillains will be built on the same basis after all
How's Wraith coming along, Ictoo?
*wanders in*
So I heard that the world is in need of a few more good superheroes? :)
Dotting, will have to give some thought as to what sort of character I'd like to try and make for something like this...
Hey LL! The good (and bad) thing is that the world always needs superheroes :)
My plan here is just to run a few combats before kicking off a full game, so you wouldn't even necessarily need to think of a character concept that you might end up playing longer term - this is just a test run with no build up or backstory. So maybe just think of a concept or two that might inspire you, or even if there are any heroes you are aware of that you'd think you'd like to replicate in this PF/hero mash-up.
For example, Ictoo is playing around with Wraith, a spiritual swordsman, but also his take on Iron Man which is a Synthesist/Kineticist. I've put together a more than serviceable Captain America clone as a Shield Champion Brawler/Slayer and also a Punisher-inspired Trench Fighter/Inquisitor.
The good thing about Gestalt rules (and the other bits and pieces thrown in here) is that it really opens possibilities for cool characters.
Want some kind of teleporting swordsman (ala Nightcrawler?) - Swashbuckler/Conjuration: teleportation wizard.
How about the Human Torch? - Custom race (with alien rules) Fire sorcerer/Quinggong monk.
Any abilities and spells can be fluffed in whichever direction you want too. Magic Missile could be an unerring plasma blast, Mage Armor could be your suit's automatic deflector shields raising.
Go nuts!
Hi everyone :)
I'm *still* working up Katrina Blaise, alien pyrokinetic!
I blame (in order): BBC iPlayer, this being my first ever gestalt character and my complete unfamiliarity with kineticists!
So, just applying crunch now, should be able to post her soon and participate in test combat :D
JZ, been looking at the equipment, specifically the armor... there's not much there from an equipment standpoint. Whilst class powers (synthesist) can help to some extent, what do you think about costumes in general? I'm thinking DD's suit but also Kingpin's suits. Iron age heroes did tend more towards bullet-proof vests, but X-men still wore their combat lycra during that time iirc!
Any appetite or mileage in a 'costume' section of the armor chart?
I'm more than open to suggestions Fiendish. Did you have anything in particular in mind?
My thinking behind the armor was that I didn't want to mess about with established armor too much. If someone wants to buy Splint Mail but fluff it as combat armor then that's cool.
I did introduce the alternative though where ballistic armor provides a bonus to touch AC vs guns (since they will be widely available) but only half that bonus to normal AC vs melee weapons and traditional missile weapons. So similarly if you wanted to buy a light undercover vest but fluff it as spandex, absolutely! This might be slightly more iron age in terms of tone, but you can bet Spiderman is still going to be swinging around in his skin tight morphsuit.
So are you saying you'd like more variety within that ballistic armor section, or a third section entirely for costumes?
Also, you may or may not find this useful, feel free to use, amend or ignore as you like :)
I put together a character sheet that can be copied and pasted and formatted for the boards here.
The character on the sheet is a Hulk-inspired hero who can make himself large (with enlarge person and later by turning into a Giant) and further bolster his Strength or Con (with Urban Barbarian rage)
One thing that helps is that I've got HeroLab and have made (but sadly never gotten to play) a few gestalt characters in the past so it shouldn't take me too long to get some sort of crunch done :)
I do have at least one idea for an Animorphs-inspired character, which would probably be a Druid/Monk build. Can we freely choose Chained or Unchained versions of classes as needed?
Yep!
lol
Broccoli Rob is a dream come true. He is just so gosh darn silly and wonderful at level 11.
Lol is your superhero name really going to be Broccoli Rob? What does that mean?
In true Toriyama fashion, it's a pun. All of the saiyans in Toriyama's dragon ball series are named after vegetables. Kakarot (Carrot), Raditz (Radish), Vegeta (Vegetable), Nappa (Cabbage), etc.
The character he's designed after is 'Broly'. Which means Broccoli.
Broccoli Rabe is a leafy green veggie.
Broccoli Rob? Well. He's just puntastically awesome.
Well I'm sure he can team up with other well respected heroes like Arm Fall-Off Boy and no one would bat an eyelid :)
^ Wow.
Anyhoo I might've missed this on the Google group discussion but do we need to build these templates at various levels (1, 6, 11)?
If you can LL. Although let me know when your level 1 is done and I'll throw up a map and a few goons
Some interesting ideas here! I've tweaked wraith a little, I'm also trying to get my synth blaster up and running hero labs is having a hard time think its time to move over to paper for it.
I suppose we'll be running combat at 1,6 and 11 but as JZ said lets get at least level one going and see how it pans out. We could all die to a shotgun :P
Ictoo, I know you might need to calculate things manually, but doesn't that character sheet template help to make sure you haven't missed anything?
So how are these builds coming on guys?
I should have something put together before I head to work this afternoon!
:D Awesome.
I'll start work on some maps.
For future reference - for granted companions (ACs, eidolons, familiars) do they or will they get any beefiness of their own or do you imagine that they'll be able to help hold their own as is? For example I know with the mythic rules it's harder to keep companions relevant and able to survive but I'm not sure how it works with gestalt stuff.
Well I didn't envision them getting any special advancement beyond the usual.
Having said that, because this game is using alternative bonus progression from the Unchained book, you will be able to be a bit more liberal with your purchases since you will already be getting magical boosts that you would normally have to put have for yourself
Okay, thanks! Don't think I'll be going with the AC for the druid half this time but I might do something for a different character if inspiration strikes.
Also I got some work done but the monk half of the idea isn't really doing it for me after all so I'm going back to the drawing board...*sigh*
I have all the class choices figured, just need to incorporate race, figure out how to make an alien even, pick the boons, and the other homebrew-y stuff that's not just straight-up making a character with gestalt rules.
Since I can't access any of the google documents at work, that rather limits my windows to give that all a gander and I keep forgetting to forward it all to my work email.
Soon though! Soon!
Brock "Broccoli Rob" Roberts will be ready to punch some faces!
Nearly there!
Just need to do a bit of polishing and ol' Broccoli Rob'll be ready to rumble.
Does this pass for building a race, JZ?
Type Humanoid (0 RP)
Size Medium (0 RP)
Base Speed Normal (0 RP)
Ability Scores Flexible (2 RP) (+2 Str, Dex)
Language Standard (0 RP)
Battle-Hardened (4 RP) +1 bonus to CMD
Cat's Luck (1 RP) Once per day, when a member of this race makes a Reflex saving throw, it can roll the saving throw twice and take the better result. It must decide to use this ability before attempting the saving throw.
Defensive Training, Greater (4 RP) +2 dodge bonus to armor class
Fleet-Footed (3 RP) Members of this race receive Run as a bonus feat and a +2 racial bonus on initiative checks.
Fast (1 RP) Members of this race gain a +10 foot bonus to their base speed.
Relentless (1 RP) Members of this race gain a +2 bonus on combat maneuver checks made to bull rush or overrun an opponent. This bonus only applies while both the member of this race and its opponent are standing on the ground.
*cracks knuckles*
*cracks neck*
*rolls shoulders*
*flash of light accompanied by tight zoom and cymbal crash into slow motion sweeping pan shot*
Sup.
Those race points all look in order to me. Which brings me back to whether the additional ability points mutants get and the additional starting boon for human balances
Still checking in, sorry for being a slowbie on this. I will definitely get something finalized this weekend if it kills me!
Well. The answer is kinda yes and kinda no.
I think the race points have much less chance of ramping out of control if the race traits and such are limited to non-advanced, non-montrous at the start. Maybe open up the advanced options at level 10 (presuming a 20-level tree ala Pathfinder).
It's also not clear if existing race traits can be lost as the leveling goes. Could I drop a Base Speed (Normal) later on for the faster one for instance?
It raises a lot of questions.
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The cleanest solution might be to just let the race points be after character creation and not accrue additional rp's as you level.
And honestly, the whole idea behind race building is kind of to build a whole race, not just perfectly tweak race bonuses and stats and such to fit one individual character.
I tried to keep that in mind when making Broccoli Rob. Battle-hardened, Cat's Luck, and Fast aren't all that amazing, but they really fit the source race from DBZ. It's easy to see how that race-building process could be broken and abused though.
I totally agree with that Dal and honestly I'd like players to use that kind of flexibility to create memorable and interesting characters as opposed to just trying to squeeze out every mechanical bonus.
Although of course there would be that temptation.
I will probably remove the ability to accrue race points per level based on your feedback Dal.
Have lit from class to class to class combo, now settled on Brawler/Oracle to accommodate JZ's request for someone melee! This is now set in stone as if I prevaricate any longer my head will explode :p
If I may take the opportunity to give an alternate viewpoint on the alien race?
Katrina will be (penciled so far)
Race: Auroran (16 RP)
Aberration (3 RP)
Darkvision 60 ft
Flexible attributes (2 RP)
+2 STR +2 CHA
Flight (5 RP)
(40 ft, poor maneuverability)
Energy Resistance (1 RP)
Fire Resistance 5
Energy Resistance (1 RP)
Cold Resistance 5
Greater defensive training (4 RP)
(+2 dodge AC)
My thoughts on the above were to take flight at 5 RP now, then improve speed to 60 ft when 2 more RP were obtained, much as Rob suggested improving the base speed. If you remove the RP progression then it makes it an unattractive choice as both standard and mutant races DO get progression over time.
Alternatively (and perhaps preferably from a balance standpoint to stop exploits) you can 'lock' the different alien species available (sourcebook heaven!) and make the progression of racial abilities/usage of RP static (energy resistances increases, speed progresses, fixed feats progresses etc).
What do you think?
You know, I was thinking about this a bit more and it feels like the extra boon that humans get and the extra stats that mutants get wouldn't be all that hard to assign RP values to. They don't have to be upfront and disclosed to the players, but having invisible values might help just in balancing the 3.
And then all three could improve at the same rate, though I do still think that unless you take some preliminary steps with aliens like FZ suggests, there'd remain some pretty significant opportunities to twist the race building to the point of breaking. At least it'd be more so than twisting extra boons or stat points.
OK I'll take a look at it. Different question then; is the alien race building more attractive than the other races to the point where it is too good to ignore?
I think the alien race is a lot more attractive simple because you can make your own race, something you never really get a chance to do. Also because you can in a way tailor your hero to be something extra (fly at level 1 and such)
But there is still some attraction to the other options, this is after all a play test to see what works out. Maybe this could mean buffing the other picks?
I don't know, it becomes a bit of an arms race then. That is, I don't want to keep boosting other options to bring them up to the alien level, I'd rather bring that down in power so they are more equal.
So then if we focus on reducing the flexibility/power level of the alien option... given that most of the mutant races have RPs of 13/14 or so, perhaps limit the alien down to say 12 RP. You could still seed the universe with 'known races' to provide flavor and NPC backgrounds for the game/campaign setting, but also give players a chance to create their own non-OP race.
I'll be honest, my main reason for picking alien was wanting a flyer at level 1. Not game-breaking (you could of course pick a Strix and re-fluff if you needed an existing race), and after I built the race I wanted and had RP left over I have to admit I found myself thinking 'what would be *useful*?' rather than 'what would be thematic?' like I should have been. For my race I picked up greater defensive training simply because I had the points left and who doesn't like a freely stackable bonus to AC!?
So does reducing the RP bring the alien option more in line with the other race options? You could still then keep the +2 RP every 4 levels to match the mutant attribute boosts (which are quite attractive!)
I agree. I think reducing the RP to a point where they may actually be below the mutant (core/advanced) races is OK because of the added flexibility of abilities not normally available such as flight.
So if we think mutants are kind of OK, aliens can be reduced to 12 and have some premade options, then what if anything do we do with humans?
OK, prevarication has now ceased, character finally generated!!
JZ: Costume-wise I got hung up on them when I was looking for pics for inspiration, we're focusing on iron age anyway so I think black leather with optional trenchcoat is the mandatory uniform ;p I've gone with a refluffed chain shirt as a sort of reinforced costume (focused on ballistic resistance).
The character sheet is very handy :)
Can't decide on Midnight or Noir as a superhero name, so please anyone vote if you are so inclined!
It people want colourful costumes, go for it! The xmen exist in this world, skimpy spandex and all!
Personally, I like Midnight
Hey guys, I think I'll need to take a rain check on this for just a bit until my work schedule settles into something approaching normal; right now I feel a little like a yo-yo and it's made it hard for me to properly focus on making a character :(
I'll still keep an eye on things since this is on my Campaigns page and hopefully JZ can work me in later at some point?
Well I don't see this game actually kicking off in terms of an actual campaign for a little while because I want to iron out some wrinkles and work on the story
Having said that, you've already helped a bunch with your advice and feedback on build so thank you very much LL!
I think I've done next to nothing that's actually been helpful so far haha, but thanks! As I said, I'll still be watching and I'll try to give feedback (and finish a character) as I can :)
JZ: Costume-wise I got hung up on them when I was looking for pics for inspiration, we're focusing on iron age anyway so I think black leather with optional trenchcoat is the mandatory uniform ;p I've gone with a refluffed chain shirt as a sort of reinforced costume (focused on ballistic resistance).
For what it's worth, I think they did a great job with Black Widow's costume in Age of Ultron. It's clearly a costume, but it looks both functional with all her pouches of trick bombs, wire, tazers etc, but it also looks funky with the Tron-like blue lighting.
That's the kind of thing I was imagining for Midnight/Noir.
Also - Damn that ballistic AC is high at level 1! You're going to make all the goons fire like Stormtroopers lol
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Miss
The blast is deafening and and the roar from the barrel sends a rush of super-heated air washing over you before it is almost instantly followed by dozens of metal buckshot pellets. Midnight twists instinctively away from the blast and feels the rain of concrete down on her back as the shot rips into the wall of the building behind her.
I am working on V.03 of the doc by the way. It will include some refluffed skills and probably adjusting down to 12 RP to begin with for extraterrestrial races.
Although this is about the same amount of RP a mutant effectively gets (Core races are around that mark) extraterrestrials have unlimited flexibility in how they use them. Maybe no race characteristic that costs more than 5 - that removes things like Large size and Damage reduction 10/magic which would be probably too crazy.
Hopefully Ictoo will make a human or mutant though just to balance the team out!
Fiendish, I've just noticed in your stat block that you are refluffing a chain shirt to provide ballistic protection instead. You wouldn't be able to do that, the ballistic armors are there for that instead.
So your chain shirt would provide +4AC vs 'normal' attacks and +2 vs firearms leaving your stats at:
AC 19 =10 +4 (Dex) +4 (Armour) +1 (natural) +0 (Shield) touch 14, flat-footed 15
Ballistic AC 16 =10 +4 (Dex) +2 (Armour) +0 (natural) +0 (Shield), flat-footed 14
Natural armor wouldn't count for firearms unless it was not being resolved as a touch attack - i.e. you were outside the touch attack range increment.
In fact thinking about it, I think the ballistic armors are going to start at around 500gp because the fortification ability is so good.
Does that seem over priced to you guys?
A couple of updates to put in the doc later on:
Extra-terrestrial
We are not alone in the universe. For some this was a world-shattering revelation – quite literally. Since the invasion Earth has been a beacon among the stars as an intriguing place full of nobility and generosity, but also riches and opportunity. Aliens of all kinds have been appearing through holes ripped in reality. Some of benign intentions of communication and exploration, others are far more malevolent.
Players may create their own race with a total race point value of 12 points. No race attribute with a value of 6 or more may be selected. Their alien anatomy is constantly adjusting to Earth’s atmosphere and consequently they gain an additional 2 race points at level 3 and every three levels thereafter. These points can be stored or spent immediately upon acquisition.
New skills
Knowledge (Meta) Int: Trained only.
You are educated in a field of study and can answer both simple and complex questions. Like the craft, profession and perform skills, Knowledge actually encompasses a number of different specialties.
-Meta (the origins, abilities, class features and legends of superpowered individuals and extra-terrestrials)
Note: this only applies to ‘costumed’ heroes or villains. Extra-terrestrials that use base statistics from monsters from the PF core game, will still fall under their respective knowledge skill. For example, if the party were to encounter a Siren, it would be classed as an extra-terrestrial but as a magical beast, would require knowledge: arcana to identify.
I'm going to be making my 'iron man' as a human. I've got an idea for a caster type that i'll put together as a mutant as that just fits.
My hope we to make three different classes from three of the race choices. Tonight i'll put up my 'iron man' Name pending.. I'm stuck on Crimson but i don't think it fits.
Also Midnight or Noir is looking good, shes very good.
Also Also JZ that +1 was from studied target sorry, what did you think of Wraith? (I'll have to stat him down to 12 points now also tho)