Questions (and answers?) about Supers rules

[novaexpress]

Hello,

While reading the rulebook, some questions popped up to my mind. I hope you could help me to find an answer. And i'm pretty sure it could help other people asking the same questions about the rules.

1. Does anyone of you have some benchmark as to the resistance of material? If one of my Super wanted to destroy a double-glass window, a wall, a car, or a rock with a fireblast, what would be the resistance of the target?

2. Does anyone of you have some benchmark about armours? What would be a kevlar, a knight plate, a vehicle armor plate?

3. Does any character have 1D in all and any Aptitudes, or only the ones he got at the creation? And if the former, could he have 1D as well in Aircraft for instance, meaning he could do a Straitforward action (for a pilote) like taking off, even if his profession is not pilote?
In summary, if a character can't have 1D in very specialized or complex Aptitudes, does he have nevertherless a chance to succeed. And if yes, how do you handle this if he has no die?

4. Plant powers : it is said that the character can control a number of plants equal to how many dice he has in the power. Does it mean 1 category of plant per 1D in the power? Or really 1 plant per 1D in the power? I suppose it is the first case, because I can't see any character attack with 3 or 4 straws. ;-)

5. Mimic : If a character with Mimic Substance succeeds in mimicing a wall of brick, what would be the number of armor dice offered by the rocky material?

6. Super Strength: one of my players doesn't find it right that a guy with 2D in Fighting makes the same maximum amount of damage than a Super with 2D in Super Strength? What is your opinion or advice?

Thanks you in advance for your replies.
Cheers.

[Dragonfly]

Howdy novaexpress,

Here are MY answers to your questions:

1) On benchmarks for the resistances of materials. I asked this awhile back, but got no answer, which is fine, as SUPERS! is designed for the GM to make such calls. What I tend to do is not assign Resistances, so much, as Target Numbers that have to be beat with a roll. This is what I've been toying with:

Wood Wall = TN 6
Brick Wall = TN 9
Concrete Wall = TN 12
Reinforced Concrete Wall = 15

2) On Armors - it's not really that type of game. I'd say most ancient and conventional armors would be at 1D (leather/light chain) - 2D (plate/kevlar).

3) All characters have all Aptitudes at 1D. As Narrator, you can decide whether or not you are going to allow a roll at all. It's your call. So, all characters have Medicine at 1D. A Brain Surgery TN, however, is going to be much higher than 1D can make. As Narrator, you might not allow a character with pilot to even attempt to fly an alien fighter, but maybe you'd let him after an alien spent a little while explaining the controls.

4) I interpret the plant control to be 5 plants (not types). So - not five pieces of straw, but certainly 5 trees. Or one wall covered with vines, 3 trees, and a venus flytrap.

5) As for mimic, I assume it's a maximum of however many dice you put in the power. The GM would have to adjudicate the yield of different substances. I'd recommend something in the vicinity of 2D for Wood, 3D for Brick, 4D - 5D for concrete, 6D - 7D for steel, etc.

6) I'm cool with the damage that Super Strength does. It's relatively consistent with other Supers games that I play. A character with a 30 STR in Champions, for example, does 6d6 and can lift a car over his head. A character with a 15 STR in Champions and an offensive strike does 7d6 of damage (but can only lift the equivalent of two men over his head). Some one like Spider-Man would be doing 4D damage from Super Strength. That's already better than someone with Fighting 5D can do, because Aptitude rolls cap at 18, no matter what. Low levels of Super Strength can still be useful (for lifting, or for Attack/Defense, if you've already blown your Fighting for either purpose earlier in the round).

Hope this helps!

Best,

Dragonfly

[novaexpress]

Hi Dragonfly,

Thank you for your replies. It's helping me a lot. Especially for the benchmarks and the Aptitudes.
And I haven't thought about the fact that Aptitudes are limited to 3D and that you can't use the same way of defending yourself during a fight.

I'm going to run my first scenario maybe next week or the week after. So, I need to be prepared for the several questions that my players won't hesitate to ask (they're kind of nitpickers).

[Dragonfly]

Hi novaexpress!

I'm glad my comments are helping.

Just to be clear: you CAN attack and defend with Aptitudes. It's just that they are capped at a result of 18 (max).

As for the benchmarks for materials - I came up with those a long time ago, before I was very proficient with the system. Your bringing up the issue made me rethink things. Rather than simply Target Numbers, I think those should probably be Ratings (like what you use for Mooks and Disasters). I'm going to think about the exact values and get back to you.

Best,

Eletarmion

[Simon W]

I'm going to run my first scenario maybe next week or the week after. So, I need to be prepared for the several questions that my players won't hesitate to ask (they're kind of nitpickers).

SUPERS! is not a great game for nitpickers, because it doesn't cover everything, by default and you'll have to make some rulings up on the spot. You really need to make sure your players are on board for a fast-and-loose game before you start or there is a danger you may lose them straight away. If everyone is on the same page, SUPERS! is one of the best super heroic rpgs around. Well, in my book, anyway.

[Dragonfly]

Hey folks:

This is me trying to come up with some house rules for breaking things. Tell me what you think:


Breaking Things by Eletarmion, on Flickr

[Dustland]

I'll take a stab at #6 also:

This is actually why I like Supers. You have examples in comics and movies all the time of super quick guys battling incredibly strong guys, and the outcome is never easy to guess. When games try to weigh the value of speed/skill/accuracy vs raw power, someone always feels screwed. Supers just says that each style of fighting has its own merrits, and if you have the same level of talent as the other guy, regardless of the power in question, you'll be equally matched.

[novaexpress]

Hi guys,

Do you use bonus/malus in your Supers games?
I know that the system doesn't use them, but I read that in the Vulnerability disad, the character has 2D less to defend against his vulnerability.
And I wondered if I could use the same way to signify bonus/malus for an action.
Maybe something like Minor Hindrance/Advantage = +/- 1D ; and Major Hindrance/Advantage = +/- 2D.

But I'm not sure wether bonus/malus dice wouldn't make the game to heavy.
Espcecially if one adds the rules for Specialisations for Aptitudes, and Competency dice, and possibly a Wild Die.

Actually, my trouble is that one can simulate the bonus/malus rule when one uses the Difficulty scale (just by chosing the Difficulty) ; but it's not possible in case of opposed rolls.

[Dragonfly]

Hi novaexpress,

Yes, I was going to say that you can control the difficulty of an action simply by setting the Target Number, but I see your point about opposed, unopposed actions.

I guess you could impose bonuses and penalties to opposed actions, but I probably wouldn't go so far as to subtract dice. I'd probably give a flat modifier. This would keep it in line with the way unopposed actions work. Would you increase the difficulty number of an unopposed action by adding +3 to the Target Number? Then add three to the Resistance roll of an opposed action of equivalent difficulty. I'd rather add a bonus to the Resistance than subtract a penalty from the attack, but it really doesn't make a difference (except, perhaps, psychologically for the players).

Best,

Dragonfly

[novaexpress]

Thank you for your reply Dragonfly.
I thought about setting flat modifiers. But I reckoned that +3 (or -3 to the active character's roll ) is equivalent in average to add (or remove 1 die).
Actually, the probabilities are rather 3.5, but for simplicity's sake...
That's why I talked about adding or removing 1D.

[Dragonfly]

Hey folks,

I playtested my breaking things rules, and didn't like 'em. Too easy for Wasp to punch a hole through a brick wall. :-/

I've revised my values. Here they are:


Supers-BreakingThings by Eletarmion, on Flickr

[Simon W]

Perhaps thin board/plywood should be 2. With a hefty kick, I think even a normal should be able to break a sheet of ply in one blow. You could then have thick board/medium wood at 3. The rest seem ok.

[novaexpress]

Great job, Dragonfly!
As soon as I try the ratings in a scenario, I will give you a feedback.

Regarding the bonus/malus, I noticed they already existed in the rules, for the Full Defence and the Full Attack.
Only the malus point isn't mentioned in the rules.
I guess I will use a flat modifier as you suggested. Maybe something from -1 to -6 according to the situation.
And I'm thinking as well about using a Wild Die as in WEG system. So, an open D6, and in case of a result of 1, discard (can I say that for a roll of dice?) the 1 and the best result amongst the other dice. If the character has only one die, it is automatically a wild die, and in case of 1, it is a critical failure and something bad happens.

[novaexpress]

Hi,

How would you handle falling damage?
Flat damage per meters?
Dice to roll against Fortitude?

[Dustland]

For falling damage I default to my DnD days, 10'=1D6 (so ~3meters=1D6). Can be resisted with a number of Aptitudes(ex:Athletics), Powers(ex:Webs), or Fortitude, but deals damage directly to Fortitude.