VnV - Weird Dreams Potato Oblivion

Another one of those things from 1999, originally posted on the WebRPG VnV forum.  I'm not sure I even want to give this an introduction, other than that. :-)

This is for VnV 2.1.

Speaking of weird dreams. I had one recently. The setting was something like the Shadowrun universe without the cyberpunk (magic + corporate dystopian state). Apparently, some squatters had managed to eck out some turf and were trying to live peaceably. Then some gangers came and tried to evict them forcefully (mostly, the gang was just showing off their power). Somewhere in there, our reluctant hero became protective and was trying to keep everyone safe by telling them where to go, how to hide, how to resist where the could, etc., etc.

Then our hero made a wrong turn and came to face with the gang leader. (The leader and his cronies had been striding arrogantly through the chaos spreading FUD). Faced leader to leader, the gang leader conjured his most devastating spell (see below) to demonstrate how truly futile resistance was (and because he wanted to show off). This is when our hero discovered his own powers. Everyone (including our hero) was startled when the animated spell object simply returned to normal and fell limply from the sky. Naturally, the gang leader (having to save face) tried again. This time, our hero had a bit more understanding and a few seconds later the animated object turned upon its summoner and his cronies obliterating them completely and demoralizing the villains who then fled the scene in a panic.

Magical Spells / Psionics / Mutant Power: By spending one action per turn, the character can automatically duplicate and take control of any magical or psionic energy released into the environment within (I+C)/5 inches of himself. The character gains the ability to use the power in the future, just as if he was the original user (using his own Level, Attributes, etc.). The character does not understand the power, however, and can never really improve or modify it beyond very tight restrictions (certain powers are more flexible than others). Note, the character does not gain the full power of the original user, merely the power demonstrated. For example, if someone broadcast thoughts to the character, the character could duplicate thought casting (and in this case block the thought caster by shutting down the power) but would not be able to read thoughts until someone tried to read his mind. Note also that the energy must be “released into the environment”, which typically does not occur in contact-based powers (where the energy moves directly from attacker to victim) nor does it relate to abilities inherent to an object (he could not affect a magical sword for example).


Potato Oblivion: This terrible spell is nearly impossible to master and anyone who does is therefore granted significant respect. Through fell magicks, the caster can take an ordinary bag (typically empty potato chip bag after which the spell is named) and animate it. The animated bag expands as it flies around until it is the size of a small car. Anyone passing through the opening of the bag (typically as it swoops into him, engulfing him), is never seen again. It does not have great range, but it is hard to dodge.

VnV - Gamma World Death Machine

The Gamma World Death Machine is an iconic bit of RPG lore, and classic sci-fi horror.  Again, this was something I had originally mocked up for WebRPG, back around 1999.  These things are deliberately overkill, in any game system.  By today's standards, these would be the boss monster that your Level 60 Guild joins with other Guilds to try to take down.

Death Machine

Roving engines of destruction, Death Machines were employed by all sides in the great wars before the Apocalypse. Their exact size, shape and weaponry vary, but they are all super-heavily armored, mount scores of weapons, and have the most powerful artificially intelligent systems available at the time. Some have been trapped for uncounted years and gone slightly insane. Some continue to follow their original directives, and yet others have gone rogue, following their own initiative and wants.

A typical Death Machine is 20m x 30m x 10m in size, bristles with ports, barrels, nozzles and drums, is painted flat black in color and speaks in a booming malevolent voice. It weighs in at 60 tons and the combat systems can coordinate any number of targets simultaneously. They are at least 4th level and gain experience normally.

1. Robotic Body, 
1. Heightened Strength, 
2. Body Power (self-repair lets it “heal” at the normal healing rate up to original hit points)
3. Doesn’t look anything like a human
2. Invulnerability: +60
3. Force Field
4. Body Power (Fast Recovery)
5. Adaptation: PR = 0
6. Heightened Attack
7. Heightened Expertise: all attacks
8. Lightning Control
9. Body Power (Boosted Initiative)
10. Flight
11. Heightened Endurance B
12. Heightened Intelligence B
13. Heightened Senses: IR, UV, low-light, thermograph, ultrasonic, infrasonic, +12 against range mods., chemical and radiation sensors. All sensors have a range of at least 1 mile. Radar with a range of 250 miles.
14. Mutant Power (can use all powers once per phase at PR = 0 and no “to hit” penalties. If uses any single power or weapon system more than once per phase, apply normal multiple attack rules against that one power or weapon system.)
15. Weapon Systems. It can use any and all of the following weapons:
• Death Rays (4 units): Death Touch at 2 mile range. Attacks as Paralysis Ray. If the victim makes both saves, he still takes 1d20 damage. 
• Lasers (18 units): Attacks as Light Control attack with base “to hit” of 12, 2d12 damage, 100 mile range.
• Blasters (10 units): Power Blast attack to a range of 25 miles for 2d20 damage.
• Mini-missile Launchers (4 units): fire missiles which mount HE warheads. Range of 6000", speed of 1500" per turn. Target takes collision damage from the 150 lb. missile, plus 4d10 explosion in 8" radius. Missiles are intelligent, have normal sight, IR sight, and radar. They can dodge incoming attacks, or pursue targets that evade. They attack HTH + 5 as 4th level characters. Each launcher has 100 missiles.
• Nuclear Missiles: 10 intercontinental missiles with small nuclear warheads, 4 intercontinental missiles with large nuclear warheads.

VnV - Roaches with Bazookas

Way back in 1999, we had WebRPG as our social media platform for VnV, and I wrote a few things.  I have no memory of what started this, other than it was some kind of Gamma World conversion, and probably a joke comment someone made off hand.

Roaches with Bazookas

Even before the Apocalypse, a number of scientific enclaves were studying and experimenting roaches and other insects to determine what made them so hardy in hopes of breeding some of these traits into the human genome. One of these enclaves had several “successes” of sorts, and when the Apocalypse arrived, they were well prepared. Years later, the members of the enclave emerged from their hidden shelter and began to scavenge the country-side. They became nomadic pillagers, and little could stand before their physical and intellectual talents. While over time, their secret knowledge began to wane, they are still incredibly tough.

The Roaches have bodies about 6' long. The have three pairs of limbs. The top two pairs are well adapted for object handling, including three fingers and opposable thumb. The hind limbs are designed for bipedal movement. The Roaches can move on all six limbs, and do so very quickly. Their natural chiton is very thick, and small spaces can be hollowed out for storage. Because of the contaminants of the environment, their physiology is highly variable.

Insect Powers

• Heightened Strength A
• Heightened Endurance A
• Armor A
• Special (extra limbs. Bipedal w/4 arms allows one extra attack per phase at PR=0. Quadrupedal movement grants +30" ground move, Hexapedal movement grants +60")
• Heightened Senses: Compound eyes grant +5% to sight detection rolls, no facing penalty to side, rear facing penalty reduced by half, ultraviolet vision

Adaptation: PR = 0 (hey, ancient mutant radioactive roaches are tough!)
Body Power (Universal Digestion): They can and do eat anything.
Heightened Expertise: they are combat monsters and gain +4 “to hit” with all attacks





Apparently, my Google-Fu is not up to snuff, as I couldn't find a picture of a cockroach holding a bazooka. About the best I found was Ant Bazooka.

Converting the Garrote to MP

Based on a G+ thread raised by Toric

I mostly republished this as a teaching exercise in things you can do with the MP rules.  There is an official version of the garrote in the MP edition of Intercrime Hostile Takeover, but frankly I don't feel like it captures the lethality of the VnV source weapon, nor does it capture the flavor of the "enigmatic deadly assassin weapon" either.  So, anyway, here you go.

Toric opened the can of worms

The VnV version of the Intercrime Assassins are equipped with garrotes. I'm not sure how to build a garrote in MP. In the module, the garrote is +1 to hit, must make special attack from behind to the neck, HTH damage to power only, target must make a d20 save vs Endurance or be knocked out and then if strangulation continues for one turn past when the target is knocked out, the target is dead.

My monologue on modelling the garrote

Well, now you've opened that old "Fort Save or Die" can of worms :-)

One of the most brilliant parts of VnV 2.x was the ability to create powers and abilities that broke the rules, without actually breaking the rules. Lovely and flexible toolkit, that.

Abilities like Death Touch and Garrote in 2e are literally "save or die" abilities - they break every design rule behind things like Hit Points, Power Score, Stun Points, Recovery Saves, blah, blah, whatever you want to call it by game system.

This is why a LOT of DnD spells changed from "save or die" to "does X number of hit points damage" or "save every round to shake off the effect" between DnD 2e to 3e, and even more from 3e to 3.5e - players hate having their characters taken out by "save or die" effects. It just sucks.

Now, "save or die" effects are also anathema to point-buy game systems, because the entire function of a point-buy system is to have a certain inherent balance to things.

Somewhere on the MHG forums, someone did a brilliant breakdown of how the damaging powers of Mighty Protectors could be reconstructed using Power Blast as the root, plus Modifiers. It turns out the various damaging powers - including Death Touch - are balanced against each other.

Now, speaking of Death Touch, you can see how it changed from VnV to MP as an example of what I mean how "save or die" sucks and doesn't play well with point-buy.

MP Death Touch does Hit Point damage. It's heavily unavoidable, so the target can die quickly, but now the number of hit points actually matters. Behemoth, with his phat pile of HP, can no longer be wiped out instantly by a failed EN save (and, given his EN is 11, he's at even odds of instant death). Instead, Behemoth can soak a LOT of zaps from MP Death Touch.

So, six-of-one, half-dozen-of-the-other. Same as was seen in DnD, the "I am a god!" effect players used to enjoy inflicting on enemies is gone, but the "Well, that SUCKED!" effect players used to suffer from "save or die" effects is also gone.

However, as +Jeff Dee points out, MP remains unusual (like it's predecessor) in that it retains a built-in mechanism for allowing players to "break the rules" without breaking the rules.

That is, the Miscellaneous Modifier (p. 92), which is a catch-all for "the player came up with something not well represented by any other combination of rules, so let's make something up, and give it a cost based on how much it torques the game."

Soooo, to answer your question, to recreate a garrote, I might go something like:

Garrote - Paralysis Ray: EN Save at -2 (15), Modifiers: Accuracy +1 (+2.5), Gear (-5), Requires Special Attack (-5), Negated by Adaptation to Asphyxiation, or Life Support (-5), Different Damage Type (Special) (+10), Requires 2 Hands (-2.5), Miscellaneous Modifier (if target is knocked unconscious, attacker can spend entire next round continuing to strangle the victim, and the victim dies, end of discussion, game over, roll up a new character) (+20) (30 CP)

MP - Annihilator from Death Duel with the Destroyers

I was thinking one day about why anyone would exile General Ar Torrester rather than just kill him.  I mean, if history has taught us anything, it's that people with skills and leadership qualities can be dangerous, even in exile.

Then it occurred to me:  Annihilator can put on a spacesuit, climb aboard an assault shuttle with a crack strike squad, then simple disintegrate holes in enemy spaceships - he can literally destroy an enemy armada by venting them into space.

Annihilator could wipe out an enemy spacefleet by himself.

That is the kind of weapon that gets put into a box and kept track of, because it is too valuable to destroy, and Heaven forbid, someone would find a way to use it again some day.

Mighty Protectors

Strength 16 (Carrying Capacity 312 lbs., Basic HTH d6+1)
Endurance 11 (Save 10, Heal 1.0)
Agility 32 (Save 14)
Intelligence 13 (Save 11)
Cool 17 (Save 11, Initiative d6+1)

Hit Points 24
Power 72
Physical Defense 6
Mental Defense 3
Move 24 (see below)
Inventing Points 7
Wealth d8+1
Luck 10-
Weight 220 lbs.
Total Cost 89 + 216 - 20 = 285

Abilities

• Disintegration: A) Disintegration Ray, Damage 2d10, Range 16”, PR=2 (20 CP)
• Durability: Hit Points +7 (7 CP)
• Experience Levels: Attack +2, Defense +2, Skills +2 (20 CP)
• Flight: Acceleration 64, Top Speed 256 (87 MPH, or 174 MPH with Push) (20), Modifiers: Fast Acceleration (+5), Hyper-Flight (Warp 10) (+10) (35 CP)
• Force Field: A) Personal Force Field (Force Bubble), Protection Kinetic 6, Energy 6, Biochemical 6, Entropy 6, PR=16 (20), Modifiers: Area Effect (7” dia., Adjustable, Perimeter) (+7.5), Range (EN”) (+10) (37.5 CP)
• Heightened Agility: AG +18 (included above)
• Heightened Attack: Damage +4 all attacks (17.5 CP)
• Heightened Initiative: Init +4 (10 CP)
• Knowledge: Native Language (Native, Literate), English Language (Fluent, Literate) (4 CP)
• Power Blast: Damage 2d10, Range 14”, PR=1 (20 CP)
• Regeneration: Heal 1 Hit Point per round of rest (17.5), Modifiers: Unlimited (+5) (22.5 CP)
• Speed: Acceleration 24, Top Speed 48 (96 with Super Speed) (2.5), Modifiers: Fast Acceleration (+2.5) (5 CP)
• Super Speed: Add +1 turn per round, PR=2 per round (10 CP)
• Wealth: d8+1 Wealth roll (7.5 CP)

Gear
None


Weaknesses
Low Self-Control: Arrogant and ruthless; no compunction about killing  (Uncommon, Character Hook) (-7.5 CP)
Nemesis: Hunted or opposed by various factions on this backwater planet Earth, as well as worthy opponents back in Civilization (As powerful, Rare) (-7.5 CP)
Personal Problem: Works for Dr Armageddon (Rare) (-5 CP)



Combat Summary
Initiative: d6+4/d6+4 (avg 15/7)
Unarmed: Attack 19-, Damage d6+5 (avg 8)
Power Blast: Attack 19-, Damage 2d10+4 (avg 15)
Disintegration Ray: Attack 19-, Damage 2d10+4 (avg 15)

Living Legends

PHYS 16 (CON 22), REFL 22, DEFT 22, INTL 11, COOL 11, VITL 16, Mass 100 Kgs (d4 Mass effect), Fame 6

Multi-Power
a. Disintegration: 1d10 untyped (43), Range [12”] (+0), NRG Cost [1 per use] (-2), Multi-Power (-3) [25 CP]
b. Power Blast: 2d8-1 Energy [pure energy] (37), Range [12”] (+0), Multi-Power (-3) [25 CP]

Shield: 6 vs. Biochemical, Blunt Kinetic, Energy, High Temperature, Low Temperature, and Sharp Kinetic (7), Innate (+3) [10 CP]

Armor Generation: 5 vs. Biochemical, Blunt Kinetic, Electromagnetic, Energy, High Temperature, Low Temperature, and Sharp Kinetic (13), Area Effect [13" dia., shapes, perimeter] (+9), Brittle (-4), Range [12"] (+3) [38 CP]

Heightened PHYS: +6 (6), CON Only (-3) [4 CP]

Heightened Speed: +2 levels (34) [34 CP]

Speed Bonus: Ground move x2 (3), top speed and acceleration (+3). Acceleration 16”/turn, top speed 48”/round [4 CP]

Flight: Acceleration 20”/turn, top speed 288”/round (16) [16 CP]

Regeneration: 1 Hit Point per round of rest (8) [8 CP]

Skills
Leadership: (COOL/G), +2 levels, d10 effect (5) [5 CP]
Shield: (DEFT/G), +0 levels, d10 effect
Tactics: (INTL/S), Interstellar Space, +2 levels, d8 effect (5) [5 CP]
Weapon: (DEFT/G), Disintegration and Power Blast, +1 level, d12 effect (2) (+3) [3 CP]

Weaknesses
Low Self-Control: Arrogant and ruthless; no compunction about killing  (Uncommon, Character Hook)
Nemesis: Hunted or opposed by various factions on this backwater planet Earth, as well as worthy opponents back in Civilization (As powerful, Rare)
Personal Problem: Works for Dr Armageddon (Rare)

Villains and Vigilantes

Identity: Zorbac Ar Torrester
Side: Destroyers
Sex: Male
Experience: 15,699
Level: 5
Age: 104
Training: end.

Powers:

1. Flight: 176 miles per hour or 774" per turn, plus Hyper-flight.
2. Power Blast: Range 14". Damage 1d20. Power cost 1 per attack.
3. Heightened Agility: +18
4. Speed Bonus: +86" per turn to ground movement.
5. Force Field: Defensive screen and force bubble use only.
6. Regeneration
7. Disintegration Ray: Range 16". Damage 1d20. Power cost 2 per shot.

Weight: 220
Basic Hits: 5
Agility Mod.: -
Strength: 16
Endurance: 11
Agility: 32
Intelligence: 13
Charisma: 17
Reactions from: Good:-2 Evil:+2
Hit Mod. (1.4) ( 1 ) ( 3 . 1 ) ( 1 . 1 ) = 4.774
Hit Points (24)

Damage Mod.: +4
Heal.Rate: 1.25 per day or turn
Accuracy: +5
Power (72)
Carrying Capacity: 572
Basic Hth. Damage: 1d8
Movement Rates: 145"/774" flying
Det. Hidden: 10%
Det. Danger: 14%
Inventing Points: 6.5
Inventing (39%)

Boilerplate

Mighty Protectors and the Monkey House Games logo are trademarks owned by Monkey House Games, ©2017 Monkey House Games. All rights reserved. Made in the U.S.A.

Villains and Vigilantes, Living Legends and the Monkey House Games logo are trademarks owned by Monkey House Games, ©2010 Monkey House Games. All rights reserved. Made in the U.S.A.

Unofficial Living Legends Companion written by Patric L. Rogers, Copyright © 2010-2017 by Monkey House Games. All rights reserved.  (Note: For compatibility reasons, and because Jeff Dee asked me to, I used only the core Living Legends rules on this character, and not any of the optional rules I developed in the Companion, e.g. skill cost saving rules.  I did the original LL hack back in 2011.)

Death Duel with the Destroyers written by Bill Willingham, published by Fantasy Games Unlimited.

Converting Mighty Protectors to Marvel Superheroes Advanced Set and vice versa

Converting Mighty Protectors to Marvel Superheroes Advanced Set and vice versa.

(see also FASERIP, and scroll down to the "linked systems" section)

MSH has power ranks that are neither linear, nor geometric, in progression, but do a good job of capturing the flavor of the source material.

MP has geometric progression, where essentially every 2.5 CP doubles the qualitative value, even while adding only +1 to the effect.

Now, this applied across the board. So, someone with IN 15 is twice as smart as someone with IN 12 and four times as smart as IN 9.

The translation between games gets a bit weirder when you realize in MSH +1 Column Shift increases success by +5%, and MP success increases +5% with either 2.5 CP or +6 to a BC. (Unless it's Knowledge, where +15% to a Specialization is 2.5 CP, and +15% to a Skill Background is 5 CP…)

(Image poached from Brian Adam's MP Writeups Blog)

Anyway, let's just use the BC Table to make it all work

MSH Rank	Strength Range	MP BC Range	MSH Examples
Feeble		7 or less
Poor		6-8	Hulk’s Agility
Typical		9-12
Good	300 to 600 lbs	13-16	Talented Athlete
Excellent	600 to 1200 lbs	17-19	Thor’s Agility, Dodgeball Champion, Tough Mudder Endurance Champion
Remarkable	1200 lbs to 2 tons	20-25	Captain America’s Endurance
Incredible	3 tons to 20 tons	26-34	Olympic Gymnast, Captain America’s Agility
Amazing	21 tons to 60 tons	35-39	Spiderman’s Agility
Monstrous	61 to 100 tons	40-41	Hulk’s Endurance
Unearthly	100 tons to 200 tons	42-44	Thor’s Endurance
Shift-X	200 tons to 400 tons	45-47
Shift-Y	400 tons to 800 tons	48-50
Shift-Z	800 tons +	51+

Strictly speaking, I exaggerated the Unearthly and higher range, because otherwise the geometric progression of MP literally collapses it to “ST +1,” instead of a range.

Another quirk of MP is that while the qualitative value doubles, the quantitative value, that is the effective die roll, only increases by 1.

This means you get a weird effect, such as we all know the Hulk can smash thru battleship armor without breaking a sweat (after all, the Hulk’s Strength is Unearthly, while Super-Heavy Battleship Artillery, which can destroy a battleship, is “merely” Amazing), but in MP this equates to approximately +3 damage, which given that common, everyday steel has an SR of 11, means that in MP the Hulk isn’t guaranteed to breach a bank vault door, let alone destroy a battleship with one punch.

You can see where Brian Adams ran afoul of this by looking at his various MP adaptations of Marvel characters. Brian made the reasonable design decision to give characters like the Hulk and Iron Man enough raw power that they can reliably destroy most targets (in MSH, Iron Man’s Repulsors exceed Super-Heavy Artillery in damage potential, and still don't match the Hulk’s Strength without overload mode), but this also means that effectively, in MP, Iron Man’s Repulsors have the “in world” equivalent power of the Death Star for power output (given geometric progression).

MP is not unique to this problem. It certainly goes back to the early days of gaming, where VnV 2e had the same geometric progression, but the dice scaled differently. In VnV 2e, it felt a little less weird where Behemoth did 6d10 damage, and Mountain Man - 8× stronger than Behemoth - did 9d10, or effectively +16 damage. I mean, yeah, of course 8× stronger is +16 damage!

Jump to MP, and 8× stronger is +3 damage. Erk.

(Hero System, at least thru 5e, when I stopped playing, had its similar problem where ×2 in-game power resulted in +1d6 Stun, +1 Body, which doesn't feel like ×2, either.)

(model Spiff Zaya)

Basically, just don't think about it too hard :)

Now, tangentially, MP does have a mechanic to help retain the feel of both “reasonable power,” AND “reliable damage,” i.e. Heightened Attack (and its cousins Natural Weaponry and Weakness Detection).

For my build of the Hulk, I would do something like this:

• Strength 42
• Natural Weaponry Attack +4, Damage +10

This gives him an average damage of 23 points, which is a 16-foot deep hole in an “average” steel wall, with one punch.

So, there you go. Some notes on converting from Mighty Protectors to Marvel Superheroes and back again.

(model unknown)

(MP Android Body)

MP - Water Walking

This is one of those "just thinking out loud" kind of blog posts, and sharing to see what you think.  My daughter is 5, so I've seen a lot of episodes of PJ Masks lately. One of Gecko's powers is "Super Lizard Water Running."

The ability to run, walk, or stand on water gets modeled in lots of different ways. Some games, like Champions, modeled it as a modifier to Flight, while others, like Mutants and Masterminds, as a modifier to Super Speed. And GURPS, which pretty much has a power for everything, just has a power for walking on water.

Might Protectors buries "Water Walking" under the Speed ability, as a modifier.

This creates a bit of an odd duck, where for 2.5 CP a character can buy:

Speed: Acceleration 16, Top Speed 16 (-5), Modifiers: Fast Acceleration (×2) (5), Water Running (+2.5)
Final Cost: 2.5 CP

Now this is an "odd duck" for a couple of reasons. First, it doesn't always make sense to modify a character's top speed, especially since highly agile (like the basilisk lizard) or strong characters (like Gecko), might normally be able to move faster than 16.

Second, it's a toss-up if it's implied the character has to keep moving the whole time, or implied that "Water Running" also includes "Water Standing."

I think the solution is a side-step called "Physical Ability: Water Walking."

Physical Ability (Water Walking): The character can move across the surface of water, as if it were dry land. This includes the ability to stand, walk or run. The character can voluntarily sink at any time. Cost (2.5 CP)

This is essentially identical to the Speed Ability Modifier.

I considered a more fine-grained split, like "can move across water as long as doesn't stop moving" for (+2.5 CP) and "can stand on water" for (+2.5 CP). I don't think this is inconsistent with Mighty Protectors, overall.

However, the precedent of "multi-medium movement mode" has been established under both Flight and Speed, where the power can also be used underwater for (+5 CP). With the two Modifiers under Speed, the precedent already written, making "can stand on water" cost extra is both overkill and excessive hair-splitting.

For a character like Gecko, modeled after lizards, such as the water-running "Jesus lizard," the player and GM can decide as a SFX that he has to keep moving and can't stand still, but there isn't any CP benefit to it.

Similarly, I have a gadgeteer, written up in Heroes Unlimited (of all things) (Mighty Protectors hack in development), who made boots that allow her to stand and walk slowly on water, but running results in her breaking the fragile water tension, and sinking.

Following that same precedent, however, I'm choosing to interpret "Speed usable for running on land and swimming in water" does not automatically confer water walking. The ability to move ones limbs quickly enough to produce rapid swimming speed isn't the same as being able to walk on water.

So, what do you think?