Freedom City

[narutoanbu]

WTF?!?! Why? You better have a damn good excuse! OR I WILL

[Joseph Barros]

Yeah, no problem. Finding time to do stuff other than playing video and RP games gets tough. That's why I stopped committing to more than 1-2 a month a long time ago. Don't want to miss out on living real life just to play make-believe every weekend sat AND sunday.

All this does is speed up what is left of the paragons campaign. Freedom City won't be quite as "open" a game world in that actions of the characters will usually make ripples, not waves. Usually. Sometimes you guys have a way of making the ripples into tsunamis. Point is that Freedom City will be a bit more easier to have people come in and out of. Rather than one looooong ongoing story. It will be a combo of short and medium ones with some background stuff that will be ongoing, but nothing huge like the PRA and anti-paranormal paranoi that is targeting a member of the group.

This means a lot of loose ends will be left loose until a future point in time when we can resolve them. I'm thinking at the conclusion of the Zodiac War we will begin Freedom City. Then one day we will return to Paragons at power level 10. Same characters, just aged maybe 4-5 years.

[Joseph Barros]

Oh and I think Freedom City won't have as rough of a challenge level. A) You're gonna be more powerful and B) It's easier for me to keep things balanced at level 10. I like to take the skeleton of someone else's work (the crunch) and build my own story around it (the fluff). I'm just not putting the time in to tweak the powers of the villains to make them scary but not invincible. So far it's been fun and forced the team to get creative in some awesome ways, but I think Freedom City will be overall will be a much more balanced campaign as far as combat is concerned.

Though, as usual with me, if your first inclination is to just burst in guns blazing all the time there will still be consequences and repurcussions.

Stephen's been at it for awhile, but the rest of you should get started. As you've seen the review process can be tricky if I see anything that will trivialize the stories or encounters. We'll be finishing the zodiac war in about 3 sessions. Possibly 4, possibly 2 if I get surprised by ya'll.

So get crackin' because if you only give me the minimum amount of time to review your character (1 week) and it ends up being really fucked up then you just might end up spending the first session character building.

[mrdent12]

So for freedom city, are we all starting as a team or will it be similar to paragons in that we all do our own thing and come together to tackle big problems?

[Joseph Barros]

Up to you guys really. The theme of Paragons is you guys creating the world as you go from scratch.

Freedom City however is an already well established world with many generations of super heroes and super hero teams. You can either be a part of/applying to join a pre-existing team, collaboratively come up with your own, or neither. Just got to let me know in advance.

[redbstrd]

Ok, I'm tossing around an idea for my character. I'll develop the back story more if the general concept works. The source of inspiration should be clear enough...

He would be a janitor who got exposed to an alien biological substance when there was a leak at the scientific facility where he worked. The undetected alien cells bonded with him, forming a symbiotic relationship. Weeks after he was laid off - with a heavy severance package to ward off the threat of future complications - the alien parasite began manifesting itself. He found that the symbiote greatly increased his physical prowess and thrived on his adrenaline. To feed the symbiote, the janitor began engaging in increasingly reckless behavior, leading the symbiote to develop further. Within a year of having the alien parasite in him, he started to engage in crime fighting and took the step of joining a superhero team when facing ordinary criminals diminished in its excitement.

Pathogen

PL 10 (150 pp)

Abilities: STR: +10 (14/30), DEX: +10 (14/30), CON: +10 (12/30), INT: +0 (10), WIS: +1 (12), CHA: +0 (10)

Skills: Acrobatics 4 (+14), Climb 4 (+12), Drive 1 (+11), Intimidate 11 (+11), Notice 8 (+9), Sense Motive 4 (+5), Stealth 2 (+12), Survival 4 (+5), Swim 2 (+10)

Feats: Attack Focus (Melee) 5, Benefit: Wealth, Dodge Focus 2, Endurance, Evasion, Fearless, Uncanny Dodge (Hearing)

Powers:
Alien Symbiote (Container, Active 18) (PF: Innate) [1 pp]
Concealment 3 (Sense - Sight, Smell; Flaws: Blending, Passive) [2 pp]
Elongation 2 (Elongation: 10 ft., range incr 20 ft., +2 Escape & Grapple) [2 pp]
Enhanced Constitution 16 [16 pp]
Enhanced Dexterity 16 [16 pp]
Enhanced Strength 12 [12 pp]
Enhanced Trait 5 (Feats: Attack Focus (Melee) 5) [5 pp]
Growth 2 (+4 STR, +2 CON) [6 pp]
Morph 3 (Single appearance - Symbiote Costume, +15 Disguise) [3 pp]
Snare 10 (DC 20; Flaw: Range (Touch); PF: Obscure Sense 3 (Sight, Hearing)) [13 pp]
AP: Symbiote Spray (Fatigue 10) (DC 20 Fort; Drawback: Power Loss (Must be breathed in); Flaw: Action (Full); PF: Affects Insubstantial 2 (Full Power), Subtle 2) [1 pp]
AP: Tongue Lash (Trip 10) (Extra: Knockback; Flaw: Range (Touch); PF: Improved Throw) [1 pp]
Super-Senses 6 (Smell - Accurate, Acute; Darkvision; Sight - Radius) [6 pp]
Super-Strength 3 (+15 STR carry capacity, heavy load: 6.4 tons) [6 pp]
AP: Leaping 2 (Distance: x5) - and - Super-Movement 2 (Wall-crawling 2 (full speed)) [1 pp]

Combat: Base Attack Bonus: +5 (Ranged: +5, Melee: +10, Grapple: +25); Snare +10 (DC 20 Ref), Symbiote Spray (Fatigue) +10 (DC 20 Fort), Tongue Lash (Trip) +10 (DC 20), Unarmed Attack +10 (DC 25); Defense 20 (Flat-footed: 14), Knockback: -5; Initiative: +10

Saves: Toughness +10, Fort: +10, Ref: +10, Will: +6

Drawbacks: Vulnerable: Sonic Attacks (Uncommon, minor)

Totals: Abilities 12 + Skills 10 (40 ranks) + Feats 7 + Powers 91 + Combat 26 + Saves 5 - Drawbacks 1 = 150

Complications: Alter Ego, Adrenaline Junky

Personality: The hero isn't incredibly smart, lacks substantive formal education, and often acts with a feral animal cunning when using the symbiote. As such, he doesn't develop sophisticated tactics and can act rather recklessly.

Build notes: His powers are built into a single Container structure that he can turn on with a free action. Active Containers give no discount to the powers inside: they just activate together and can't be used separately. The structure itself has the Innate power feat since it is an entity to itself and the powers are normal to the virus. Nullify doesn't work on it, but the GM can get around that with a little creative explanation (and awarding an HP) if necessary. All of his powers have the Alien and Biological descriptors.

In combat, he's a beast. He's quick, strong, tough, and has better than average saves. He has a few interesting powers, such as his Fatigue ability. He can spray the symbiote virus into the air through his pores. It's almost undetectable by itself and makes the target sick since the parasite isn't compatible with most peoples' physiology. It even affects incorporeal targets as long as they breathe (so Life Support grants immunity to the attack).

[narutoanbu]

I like him. is it based losely on venom?

[narutoanbu]

Hey Can someone help me understand the Time and value chart when it comes to flying and leaping and stuff? Cause i dont get how rank 3 flight is 50 feet when 50 is on the rank 5 line. and with leaping Im not sure how rank 1 doubles your jusp speed when its only got a value of one? so what would a rank 2 be? thanks in advance.

[redbstrd]

Yep, he definitely is based on Venom without the webbing.

[narutoanbu]

Hey Can someone help me understand the Time and value chart when it comes to flying and leaping and stuff? Cause i dont get how rank 3 flight is 50 feet when 50 is on the rank 5 line. and with leaping Im not sure how rank 1 doubles your jusp speed when its only got a value of one? so what would a rank 2 be? thanks in advance.

[frobones]

So I took a gander at the DC Adventures Book to get a feel for the 3e rules coming up. It does seem to simplify things. I only skimed through it, but it looked like they consolidated a lot of the skills - kind of like the transition from D&D 3.5e to 4e (they even have their own version of Second Wind). Miscellaneous things like rules for throwing are unbelievably simple. It's as simple as Joseph looking at his damage chart on his GM screen. There's a table with ranks, kind of like the Time and Progression table. You simply take the rank associated with your strength and the rank associated with the weight of the object, subtract the two ranks - the resulting rank (which also as a distance associated with it) is how far you throw the object.

They've added a few abilities. In addition to Strength, Dexterity, etc there is also Awareness, Agility and Fighting. As for powers, they provide only the very core effects. This is nice cause its less to deal with mechanically and promotes creativity in players to combine these very basic core effects to create some unique and nifty powers. It's like they give us lego blocks and we have to create something cool. Some of us may build a simple hut with them, while others build the sistine chapel. They do give example combinations though, and they are all powers we are familiar with from 2e.

One change I think we should factor in immediately is their change to failed toughness saves. As Joseph experienced today through Capricorn, it's very easy to get stunned locked in the game. In 3e, on the fail of 5 or more, they change the stunned condition to a dazed condition (standard or move action on that turn). This will prevent the heartache of being stun locked that can easily happen and seems like a feasible house rule we can use in our 2e game right now.

I say lets jump into DC Adventures ruleset when we transfer from Paragons, it's practically a preview of 3e rules that we plan to transition to anyways. We can still use the Freedom City lore. However, we do face a dilemma when we upgrade to 3e rules - all the pre-made heroes/villains for the GM to use will be slightly outdated. While most of the powers can be thematically bridged between the two versions, there might be a few hiccups. The change isn't as drastic as D&D 3.5 to 4e. I would assume it's more like D&D 3.0 to 3.5e.

[narutoanbu]

Sorry for double post. comp froz had to press retry and it re sent. hey wats the power rank cap per power level? I thought It was the power level rank but it seems that im wrong. and cant seem to find it in the core rules. anybody know off the top of there head?

[redbstrd]

Almost all movement powers work the same way (with Leaping and Teleport being the exceptions). Flight starts with a base 10 mph, so you look up the rank on the line to see what the value is on the Time and Value Progression chart on page 70. Multiply that value by 10 mph. Speed works exactly the same way (multiply 10 mph by the value on the chart). Swimming is similar but slower (multiply 2 mph by the value on the same chart), as is Burrowing (multiply 1 mph by the value on the same chart). Space travel is the same but faster (multiply 1 times the speed of light by the value on the chart).

Leaping works differently; it's the oddball. You consult the same chart but glance at the line that is one number larger than your Leaping ranks.
For instance, for rank 1 you look at line 2 on the chart (which is 2), so you jump twice as far.
For rank 2, you look at line 3 (which has the value of 5), so you jump five times as far.
For rank 5, you look at line 6 (which has the value of 50), so you jump fifty times as far.
For rank 9, you look at line 10 (which has the value of 1,000), so you jump 1000 times as far.
The book's explanation isn't great, but if you compare their examples with the method I explained, they should check out.

The other oddball movement powers, Teleport, uses the Extended Range chart on page 69 instead.

Edited for clarity...

[frobones]

Aug 21, 2010 23:07:14 GMT -8 narutoanbu said:

Hey Can someone help me understand the Time and value chart when it comes to flying and leaping and stuff? Cause i dont get how rank 3 flight is 50 feet when 50 is on the rank 5 line. and with leaping Im not sure how rank 1 doubles your jusp speed when its only got a value of one? so what would a rank 2 be? thanks in advance.

Because rank 1 Flights starts you at 10mph. So rank 3 Flight is two steps up on the Time and Value Progression table, landing you at 50mph. The rank on the table does not correlate with the rank of the power.

[frobones]

Aug 21, 2010 23:25:10 GMT -8 redbstrd said:

Flight starts with a base 10 mph, so you multiply its ranks by 10 mph on the Time and Value Progression chart on page 70 of the core book.

This confused even me, what do you mean you multiply its ranks by 10mph. I thought you simply took the value listed on the table that corresponded to your ranks in flight. So Flight 2 would be rank 5 (25mph) on the table, Flight 3 is rank 6 (50mph), etc.