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gorgonarcher · 10 months ago

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Game 3 - Hero System

Champions is the first game I actually played a session of and that character was basically a blend of Wolverine and the protagonist to the 1980s TV show werewolf.

To this date Hero System remains probably the most well-thought and designed pure-point-based character creation system. However, this comes with a caveat that it expects you to do that work for every NPC using the same system as PCs use. And, well, it's a lot of burden on the GM.

I've also heard recently that the developers (Steven Long et al) have gone the way of Kevin Siembada in terms of "my way or the highway" to the point of banning people from the Hero forums that even mildly question recent decisions.

So, to start, in the old days a superhero character would get 250 points to build a character, 150 for free, and 100 with a set of disadvantages (now called complications).

As the game started adding things like perks, more skills, talents, and other such things, they realized they needed to expand the point pool to account for all the different ways they gave to fill out characters. Also, it was proving difficult to make all the disadvantages relevant to a game. There were a lot of characters that were bloated with "just for the points" complications that just bogged down games. Eventually the devs made the decision for the proportion matched with disadvantages to also be reduced.

In the most recent edition, 6th, the standard superhero is built with 400 pts, 75 of which were paid for by complications. With a maximum value to each complication of 40. But I think, instead, I'm going to go with a Powerful Heroic character at 225 points. This will put the character on level with pulp and fantasy characters.

I'm also going to use the "Normal Characteristic Maxima" limits for characters, meaning that she will be limited to "human" limits. (You can tell be the quotes that the upper limits of these are still a bit beyond what you can expect from a human being).

I'm going to follow some of the considerations here:

And some of the budgeting suggestions here, though I make break these, especially since these are for Standard Heroic and I'm doing Powerful Heroic and I'm not entirely sure I'll be sticking specifically to one of the three recommendations or not.

So, when doing Hero System, I prioritize the elements I want first and spend on those, then I spiral out to get the other elements to fill in the story of the character. Sometimes I start with Disadvantages, and I think I'll do that here.

Complications

Note, I find it more interesting to have a number of smaller complications usually, because having one or two big ones means that you have fewer story beats to work with. Yes these are treated as disadvantages and they will create legitimate obstacles or problems for in game, but also these are storyline elements. You are allowed to have more complications than the point limit for your power level, but anything over the limit will be for 0 points, so you take those purely for the story.

So, 50 points of Disadvantages

I'm going to go with the assumption that gorgons are rare, potentially unique in most people's experiences. This justifies taking a Distinctive Feature.

An important thing to consider with Hero System and similar games is to buy your disadvantages according to how you want them to impact the game.

If I want just to be a unique individual, for example. Someone easily pointed out and identified. Then I'd take the +0 option for reaction. In this case most NPCs will treat her as just any other person though the snakes for hair are a thing.

Likewise there's the extent of how distinct I want them to be and this is also relative and sort of asking "how much trouble do you want this to be".

For example, let's consider these pictures of Cael:

Some of these are more human looking than others, but any one of them could be considered "easily concealed" dependent on the other entities present in the world.

If there are snake-beings like lamia or naga in the setting then all four might fall under "noticed and recognized" and "easily concealable". If the setting is almost entirely human, then all four might be "Major Reaction/Prejudice" with the first two pictures being "Easily Concealable", the third being "Concealable" and the last being "Not Concealable". At least under normal circumstances.

In this case, I want a human-shaped gorgon, maybe slight scaling and I'm going to say "Concealable" since she'll have to cover most of her skin and conceal her hissy hair with some effort.

I'm also going to say "Major Reaction or Prejudice" but not extreme. Let's say that while gorgons specifically are rare or even unique, that there are other people touched by spirits who have odd physical features like this. So while they might not know exactly what she can do, they recognize her as spirit touched.

The major reaction is not necessarily good or bad and will vary from place to place. The feature is detectable by common senses like sight and hearing so no points are taken off for that. An example of this would be like how mutants in X-Men can be detected with special gear but most can pass for human. I am going to lean into the variation by culture though and say that some cultures just accept spirit-touched people with a shrug.

So the final complication looks like this:

10 - Gorgon, snake-hair and slight-scales: Dist Fea, Concealable, Always Noticed and Major Reaction, Feature is not distinctive in some cultures.

For the next part, I'm going to lean in on the idea that there are spirit-touched people who have expectations of them and I'm going with a Psychological Limitation.

In this case, we're going to say that she has an urge to always prove her worth or match up to the expectation of her. Perfectionism isn't quite the right idea so let's phrase it "Living up to Expectations".

Once again, model this by how often you want to deal with it. The book has some suggestions for what the different frequencies mean.

The intensity of the urge is also something to choose to your taste. I don't want it to be obnoxious and for some psych lims, "Total" is going to be obnoxious if it is all the time. There are psych lims that can be Total and still fun however: A "Code vs Killing" in superhero games is considered "Very Common Total" because it is something some heroes won't do for any reason and if they kill someone accidentally, then they have a breakdown. It's a thing that's always a factor.

Meanwhile, an uncommon phobia might totally shut you down and force you to avoid something but due to being uncommon, it's not common enough to be obnoxious. Plus, you don't shut down completely, as with the Code vs Killing, you just go out of your way to avoid it. For example, a person with a total phobia for wolves would refuse to go into the Wolf Woods.

Also, a reminder, the frequency is not about how common the situation is in the world but rather how common the situation will be in the game. Wolves might be a very common animal in the world but they won't often appear in the game, or rather won't often share a screen with the person who has the phobia due to them requesting the phobia be uncommon. At least if the GM is reading properly.

In this case, I think the urge to perform is going near constant, so I'm taking Very Common for frequency, but I'm going to make it a Moderate urge, so that it is something she can shake off with a pretty easy EGO check. This causes the disadvantage to look like this.

15 - Living up to Expectations: Psych Lim, Very Common Moderate.

That's 25 of our 50 points.

I want to do a vulnerability or other physical limitation just for the differing structure, but I also want to build up to the psych lim with a social limitation. Which works in very much the same way as a Psych Lim.

Secret Identities and Public Identities are a subset of Social Limitations and they used to be their own unique complications before they were folded in under the general umbrella of social limitations.

In this case, she comes from a culture where being spirit-touched is distinctive and the reputation is that they are either heroes or monsters, nothing in between. This is the source of her psych lim, so I could leave at just a psych lim, but there might be cases where she has a higher expectation of herself, or where society might have a higher expectation of her. Also, she can travel away from this society but not travel away from herself. The two are similar and overlap, but are still different.

The people of her society are going to either expect her to do dangerous tasks on demand or else label her as a thing to be actively hunted if she goes against their demands. But again, other cultures might be worse and just instantly peg her as a monster, or better and just consider her a person.

So, I'm going to put this as follows:

15 - Spirit-Touched, Hero or Monster: Soc Lim, Very Frequent, Major, Not Limiting in some Cultures.

This gives us 40 out of 50 points. So, for the last thing, we're going to do something physical, and we're still going off the idea of her being Spirit-Touched.

What if she's more affected by exorcisms and similar type effects? Now, there's two ways to do this: Vulnerability and Susceptibility.

Vulnerability is when something affects you far more than it does a normal person, but it will still affect a normal person. Susceptibility is when the effect doesn't affect most people and is mostly a you problem. In this case, I'm going to take a nod from Nioh 2 where Purity effect still has a negative impact on humans, it just doesn't affect them as severely as it does a yokai.

I'd say the spirit-touched thing is probably influenced by my playing Nioh 2 a bit recently, but also I had the same terms and concepts with a gorgon back three or four years before Nioh 2 came out and I had ever heard of the series. Still, probably a mix of both to be honest, the old idea coming to the top due to recently playing a lot of Nioh 2.

Anyway, I could take that as a vulnerability, but I'm also going to note that some purification stuff does nothing perceptible to humans but will affect her. So Susceptibility is probably much more what I'm looking for. If something is severe enough to affect human, that can just be bought to that level.

This case we're going to say these are directed exorcisms and purification tools, like salt or holy water. The person saying them has to be willfully aiming these prayers or items at her. So she could stand next to an exorcist affecting a demon and be fine, but if some panicky peasant starts praying at her she'll find herself touched.

Also note that the dice assume basic damage and other types of damage would use different scaling. 3d6 normal damage (which doesn't kill as easily) is roughly the same value as 1d6 killing damage (which targets a different defense). In this case though, we're going to go with a Drain effect. So that instead of targeting either STUN or BODY like normal and killing attacks do, it'll target "Power Defense" which almost nobody has.

We're going to say that these things drain her Recovery, meaning it makes it harder for her to recover spent Endurance or heal from injuries. 1d6 of Drain = 2d6 of Normal Damage, as far as point value is concerned.

We also have to decide whether this is a harm she takes instantly on first contact or whether it continues over time while exposed. In this case, I think the idea of her trying wash off purified salt or get away from someone praying at her is a good idea. I am going to go ahead and go with per phase. Some explanation on time here:

A Turn is 12 seconds. A segment is one second. A phase is a segment on which you act. Characters have a "Speed" attribute ranging from 2 to 12 which is how many actions a character gets on each Turn. So a person with Spd 2 (average human) has two actions in a turn, Segment 6 and 12. So, per Phase would mean the damage happens every time you are exposed in a segment when you have an action.

For frequency, again, this represents with how often you want to deal with it. Not how common the actual phenomenon is, though that can play a factor. In this case, we're going to assume that while the use of prayers and purified substances is well known, most people don't know how to properly perform the prayers or purify things enough to affect spirit-touched (and only have mild impact on actual spirits) plus it's likely that our character is primarily seen as a decent person. That said, enemy mystics would use this against her.

So, with all that in mind, I'm going to mark this as "Uncommon" giving us the following. This comes to a total value of 20. However, because this goes over the 10 points we have left, we only get 10 points out of it. If I wanted I could change the "per Phase" to "Instant" instead, but I think we'll keep it for the pure drama. You're fine to do this. I do like to notate when I went over using parentheses.

10 (20) - Exorcism Sensitivity: directed prayers and purified substances. Uncommon, 1d6 Recovery Drain per Phase.

Complications Total

The complication wrap comes to the following:

10 - Gorgon, snake-hair and slight-scales: Dist Fea, Concealable, Always Noticed and Major Reaction, Feature is not distinctive in some cultures.

15 - Living up to Expectations: Psych Lim, Very Common Moderate.

15 - Spirit-Touched, Hero or Monster: Soc Lim, Very Frequent, Major, Not Limiting in some Cultures.

10 (20) - Exorcism Sensitivity: directed prayers and purified substances. Uncommon, 1d6 Recovery Drain per Phase.

So now we move on to abilities.

Priorities

First, let's set our priorities:

1 - Basic Characteristics 2 - Snake hair 3 - Archery 4 - Consider petrification stare 5 - fill out details.

Characteristics

I do like to start with characteristics to make sure my character's stats are at acceptable levels for me. In prior edition you would have Primary characteristics and Figured characteristics which would be dependent on the Primary characteristics but which could bought above their basic level. In 6th edition, however, everything is bought directly.

The characteristics are as follows:

And some basic comparisons can be found here:

High priority here would be:

OCV/DCV

SPD

DEX

Next would be:

INT

EGO

PRE

DMCV

STUN

Then:

REC

END

Finally:

STR

CON

BODY

OMCV

So I'll go with the following (Cost in parentheses):

STR 13 (3)

DEX 20 (20)

CON 15 (5)

INT 13 (3)

EGO 13 (3)

PRE 15 (5)

OCV 4 (5)

DCV 6 (15)

OMCV 3

DMCV 5 (6)

SPD 4 (20)

PD 7 (5)

ED 7 (5)

REC 8 (4)

END 30 (2)

BODY 12 (2)

STUN 34 (7)

Total Cost: 110

That leaves us with 115 points for the rest of the characteristic.

Snake Hair

Now, I could leave this at just the Distinctive Feature, but let's actually give it some mechanical benefit as well as a social disadvantage. I'm going to start with a sensory advantage.

I'm going to apply an increased arc of perception to vision to 240 degrees. Not quite 360 degrees, but a bit more than the usual range of senses. I could purchase it for just normal vision, but instead, I'm going to purchase it for the entire vision group on the idea of also getting thermal vision, or as the game calls it "Infrared Perception" which is one of the pre-built senses.

10 - Snake Hair, Many Eyes: Increased Arc of perception 240 degrees to the vision group.

10 - Thermal Vision: Detect Heat Patterns/Traces, Passive

And because snakes scent the air with their tongues:

19 - Snake Tongues: All For Normal Scent, Discriminatory (5), Analyze (5), Microscopic: 2x Magnification (6), Rapid x10 speed (3)

That makes for 29 points.

And now we're going to move on to Archery

Archery

All campaigns will have some weapon familiarity or skills be common to all characters, but I'm not going to spend assuming that.

First, Weapon Familiarity.

I am going to give her familiarity with all Common Ranged Weapons for 2 pts

2 -Common Ranged Weapon Familiarity: Thrown Rocks; Bows; Crossbows; Javelins and Thrown Spears; Thrown Knives, Axes, and Darts.

Now on to other things for increased skills, we're going to start with Combat Skill Levels. Combat Skill Levels can be applied to OCV, DCV, or Damage. And we'll add some Penalty Skill Levels to counteract common penalties.

9 - CSL: All Bows 3 levels

4 - Ranged Skill Levels: 2 levels with Bows to counter ranged penalties.

4 - Targeting Skill Levels: 2 Levels with Bows to counter act penalties to target specific parts of the body

Total so far: 19

One path would be to take the Martial Arts rules and determine specific attack styles, but instead, since this is leaning toward Fantasy, I'm going to build her archery style with powers. And sense this is a Heroic level game, I'm going to go with a Multipower.

A multipower is a pool of points that can be assigned to the powers under it. So you can't use all the powers simultaneously but if you have the points to power two powers, then you can use them together. And yes, this includes using two attacks in one combination.

We're also going to apply a limitation to this in the form of a Focus because she needs a bow to use it. A lot of heroic games wouldn't require characters to pay points for their weapons, but we're going to do so for a signature weapon. Foci modify costs dependent on how obvious they are and how easy they are to take away from the character. A bow is Obvious and Accessible so this is an OAF which is a -1 modifier... which I'll get to in a moment. As a note, being able to permanently lose the focus would reduce the cost further. We're basically buying the option where the focus would be lost temporarily for one story.

We have the further option to apply the limit of "Charges" to this, but I don't think I'll go with this, have a cinematic idea of infinite ammo.

So since all powers in the pool will need the bow, this limit applies to the base pool of points. I'm going with a 30 point pool which is then modified. So what we do is take 1 and add the total value of all limitations and divide the cost by that number. In this case 1+1=2, 30/2=15.

I have called this the game that taught me algebra for a reason. Thankfully most of the math is in character creation, not gameplay (but there is a substantial amount there as well.)

15 - Bow of the Exorcist: Multipower: 30pt pool, OAF: Blessed Bow

Now, each slot in the multipower, and there can be as many slots as you have points for, will have their cost divided by 5, if we're allowed to adjust how many points go into them, or by 10 if it is a fixed cost.

First we'll have a basic attack for up to 2d6 killing attack, each d6 of KA is 15 points so this comes to 30 pts. To look deeper, the Ranged Killing Attack typically has Ranged advantage and the limitation that it doesn't add Strength, but we typically assume that when we say RKA. Since the focus limitation applies to the whole power, we reduce it to 15 as above, and then we're going to make this variable so we're going to divide that by 5.

Killing attacks target resistant defenses and go straight to BODY and get multiplied for STUN damage where as Normal attacks do STUN damage and do a portion of that as BODY based on dice rolled. (a 1 on the die is 0 BODY, a 6 is is 2 BODY, all other results are 1 BODY)

3v - Arrows: up to 2d6 RKA, Focus: Blessed Bow

The versatile allows the damage to be any of the following:

1 point, 5 points allocated

1/2d6 or 1d6-1, 10 points llocated

1d6, 15 points allocated

1d6+1, 20 points allocated

1.5d6 or 2d6-1, 25 points allocated

2d6, 30 points allocated

This allows us to represent different degrees of focus on just dealing damage. Note that the focus only reduces the cost of the power in terms of character creation, not how many points it uses in the reserve. 2d6 RKA with an OAF has a "real cost" of 15 but it has "active points" of 30 and that is what matters to the Multipower reserve.

Then we'll have a Blessed Arrow for striking spirits. This will have the Advantage that it "Affects Desolidified" we're only going to affect a single special effect/version of Desolidification: spirits, not all of them (like say someone able to turn into gas or a living hologram or a swarm of nanobots). So this is a +1/4 Advantage. I'm still going to make this as a killing attack but it won't be as strong as the prior one because the Active Points can't go over 30.

So, applying an Advantage is just like applying a limitation except you multiply instead of divide. So, we can do up to 20 pts of RKA, which when modified by the 1/4 advantage becomes: 20x1.25= 25. We also want this to be variable, so we now apply the OAF mod of -1...and I'm going to look at the chart rather than look at rounding rules and it comes to 12... and because this is a variable slot... we now divide by 5 and I have to check the rounding anyway... it's mathematical rounding so 12 rounds down (13 would round up) meaning a cost of 2.

2v - Blessed Arrows: up to 1d6+1 RKA, Affects Desolidification: Spirits.

1 point, 6 points allocated

1/2d6 or 1d6-1, 12 points llocated

1d6, 19 points allocated

1d6+1, 25 points allocated

Now, at this point the gorgon COULD fire an arrow that does 1d6 RKA and 1d6-1 RKA Affects desolidified. But there's no reason to do that here. You'd just use a 1d6+1 RKA Affects Desolidified or 2d6 RKA normal. So lets add some other options. How about a skill for nailing limbs to surfaces. That sounds like an Entangle.

So that it can pair with both our other abilities, it will have Affects Desolidified: Spirits, and I'm also going to mark it with "Cannot be Escaped with Teleportation" for +1/4.

Every 10 points of Entangle give 1d6 of BODY and 1 PD/1 ED (Physical and Energy Defense).

Affects Desolidified (+1/4) and Cannot be Escaped with Teleportation (+1/4) come to a total Advantage modifier of +1/2. So 20 points becomes 30 points. Then comes the OAF bringing the cost to 15 and divide by 5 for a variable slot and you get this:

3v - Spiritual Pinning: Entangle, up to 2d6 BODY 2 PD/2 ED, Cannot be escaped with teleportation, affects desolidified.

1d6 1 PD/1 ED - 15 points allocated, very fragile but forces the target to waste time breaking it.

2d6 2 PD/2 ED - 30 points allocated, not much stronger but might hold longer.

Now, we can pair 1d6 RKA with 1d6 Entangle OR 1d6-1 affects Desolidified with 1d6 Entangle, or a 2d6 RKA, or a 1d6+1 RKA affects Desolidified, or a 2d6 Entangle

Now I'm going to add four variations of a Purification arrow similar to the susceptibility our character has, but intense enough to affect humans. We're going to do a STUN only attack and an END drain (on the assumption that most spirits will have similar REC drain susceptibilities that she has).

First the STUN only, this will be a normal attack where 5 points = 1d6 of effect. STUN only is a -0 limitation because the game believes the benefits and drawbacks even out. But then I will also add "Affects Desolidified: Spirits)" for a +1/4. Which means it will be up to 4d6 and having a similar cost to the Blessed Arrows

2v - Spirit-Stunning Arrow - STUN only up to 4d6, Affects Desolidified: Spirits.

1d6 - 6 points allocated

2d6 - 12 points allocated

3d6 - 19 points allocated

4d6 - 25 points allocated

Note that the basic arrow we started with will have better max possible stun than these, so the second version will be a version that does not affect spirits. In Nioh 2 terms. Same basic situation but up to 6d6.

3v - Soul-Stunning Arrow: STUN only up to 6d6

1d6 - 5 points allocated

2d6 - 10 points allocated

3d6 - 15 points allocated

4d6 - 20 points allocated

5d6 - 25 points allocated

6d6 - 30 points allocated.

Now the Drains. Drains, as stated earlier are 10 points per 1d6 and we're going to do that will work against insubstantial enemies and one that won't. The first one is going to be up to 2d6 and on up to 3d6. Note that this attack does not target normal defenses. And the final products will look like this.

Also note that this is END drain, so each point of drain rolled will drain 5 points of END. Because it drains character points and END is 5 points per 1 character point.

2v - Spirit Drought Arrow: up to 2d6 END Drain, Affects Desolidified.

1/2d6 or 1d6-1, 6 points allocated

1d6, 12 points allocated

1d6+1, 19 points allocated

1.5d6 or 2d6-1, 25 points allocated

3v - Soul Drought Arrow: up to 3d6 END Drain.

1/2d6 or 1d6-1, 5 points allocated

1d6, 10 points points allocated

1.5d6 or 2d6-1, 15 points allocated

2d6, 20 points allocated

2.5d6 or 3d6-1, 25 points allocated

3d6, 30 points allocated.

This brings the final set of archery abilities to look like this:

Archery

2 -Common Ranged Weapon Familiarity: Thrown Rocks; Bows; Crossbows; Javelins and Thrown Spears; Thrown Knives, Axes, and Darts.

9 - CSL: All Bows 3 levels

4 - Ranged Skill Levels: 2 levels with Bows to counter ranged penalties.

4 - Targeting Skill Levels: 2 Levels with Bows to counter act penalties to target specific parts of the body

15 - Bow of the Exorcist: 30 pt reserve, OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

3v - Arrow: up to 3d6 RKA, OAF: Blessed Bow

2v - Blessed Arrow: up to 1d6+1, Affects Desolidified: Spirits (+1/4), OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

3v - Spiritual Pinning: Entangle, up to 2d6 BODY 2 PD/2 ED, Cannot be escaped with teleportation (+1/4), affects desolidified (+1/4). OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

2v - Spirit-Stunning Arrow - STUN only up to 4d6, Affects Desolidified: Spirits (+1/4). OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

3v - Soul-Stunning Arrow: STUN only up to 6d6 OAF: Blessed Bow: (-1)

2v - Spirit Drought Arrow: up to 2d6 END Drain, Affects Desolidified (-1/4). OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

3v - Soul Drought Arrow: up to 3d6 END Drain. OAF: Blessed Bow

Total: 52 points

Consider Petrifying Gaze

With 27 points left, considered and put aside for now.

Fill Out Details

So now we're going to fill out details.

First, let's increase her movement.

4 - Running +4 meters, total 16m

2 - Leaping +4 meters, total 8m

And we're going to give her familiarity with some common melee weapons. Weirdly, this doesn't include Staves, but oh well.

2 - Common Melee Weapon Familiarity: Unarmed Combat; Axes, Maces, Hammers, and Picks; Blades; Clubs; Fist-Loads; Polearms and Spears; Two-Handed Weapons

I'm also going to give her some resistant defenses related to her scales.

9 - Resistant Protection: 3 rPD/3 rED

Then I'm going to give her some skills:

3 - Knowledge: Exorcism, INT-based

3 - Stealth, DEX-based

3 - Deduction, INT-based

This leaves one point remaining, which I am going to do as a Perk for being a trained spiritual warrior.

1 - Fringe Benefit: Official Exorcist

The Final Character looks like this:

Altogether Now

Characteristics

STR 13 (3)

DEX 20 (20)

CON 15 (5)

INT 13 (3)

EGO 13 (3)

PRE 15 (5)

OCV 4 (5)

DCV 6 (15)

OMCV 3

DMCV 5 (6)

SPD 4 (20)

PD 10/3 (5 - plus Scales)

ED 10/3 (5 - plus Scales)

REC 8 (4)

END 30 (2)

BODY 12 (2)

STUN 34 (7)

Characteristics Total: 110

Skills

3 - Knowledge: Exorcism, INT-based

3 - Stealth, DEX-based

3 - Deduction, INT-based

9 - Combat Skill Levels: All Bows 3 levels

4 - Ranged Skill Levels: 2 levels with Bows to counter ranged penalties.

4 - Targeting Skill Levels: 2 Levels with Bows to counter act penalties to target specific parts of the body

2 -Common Ranged Weapon Familiarity: Thrown Rocks; Bows; Crossbows; Javelins and Thrown Spears; Thrown Knives, Axes, and Darts.

2 - Common Melee Weapon Familiarity: Unarmed Combat; Axes, Maces, Hammers, and Picks; Blades; Clubs; Fist-Loads; Polearms and Spears; Two-Handed Weapons

Skills Total: 27

Perks

1 - Fringe Benefit: Official Exorcist

Perks Total: 1

Powers

9 - Scales: Resistant Defense, 3 rPD/3 rED

4 - Running +4 meters, total 16m

2 - Leaping +4 meters, total 8m

Total: 15

Senses

10 - Snake Hair, Many Eyes: Increased Arc of perception 240 degrees to the vision group.

10 - Thermal Vision: Detect Heat Patterns/Traces, Passive

19 - Snake Tongues: All For Normal Scent, Discriminatory (5), Analyze (5), Microscopic: 2x Magnification (6), Rapid x10 speed (3)

Total: 39

Bow of the Exorcist Martial Art

15 - Bow of the Exorcist: 30 pt reserve, OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

3v - Arrow: up to 2d6 RKA, OAF: Blessed Bow

2v - Blessed Arrow: up to 1d6+1, Affects Desolidified: Spirits (+1/4), OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

3v - Spiritual Pinning: Entangle, up to 2d6 BODY 2 PD/2 ED, Cannot be escaped with teleportation (+1/4), affects desolidified (+1/4). OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

2v - Spirit-Stunning Arrow - STUN only up to 4d6, Affects Desolidified: Spirits (+1/4). OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

3v - Soul-Stunning Arrow: STUN only up to 6d6 OAF: Blessed Bow: (-1)

2v - Spirit Drought Arrow: up to 2d6 END Drain, Affects Desolidified (-1/4). OAF: Blessed Bow (-1)

3v - Soul Drought Arrow: up to 3d6 END Drain. OAF: Blessed Bow

Total: 33

Powers Total: 87

Grand Total: 225

Complications

10 - Gorgon, snake-hair and slight-scales: Dist Fea, Concealable, Always Noticed and Major Reaction, Feature is not distinctive in some cultures.

15 - Living up to Expectations: Psych Lim, Very Common Moderate.

15 - Spirit-Touched, Hero or Monster: Soc Lim, Very Frequent, Major, Not Limiting in some Cultures.

10 (20) - Exorcism Sensitivity: directed prayers and purified substances. Uncommon, 1d6 Recovery Drain per Phase.

I'd probably use the first few points of XP to fill out skills with RP stuff and to give her more character. One advantage of doing a multipower like this is it is really cheap to add new powers. There is something to be said for adding some of the martial maneuvers in as well, but the Combat Skill Levels and Penalty Skill Levels cover a lot of what those would do.

This presents a fairly more fluid way to approach martial arts than using the martial arts mechanics. It works well with weapon-based and power-based martial arts, but still the martial maneuvers provide a lot of efficient and low cost prebuilt combinations.

Also note that if she has a normal bow instead of a blessed bow, hers or someone else's, she can't use her multipower at all and she would only use the bow's basic capabilities plus her combat skill levels. If I wanted to further heighten her skill with spirit arrows, I could also give her Combat Skill Levels specifically with that multipower, which would stack with those on bows in general.

#character creation #ttrpg #archer #gorgon #roleplaying games #tabletop roleplaying game #tabletop rpgs #Hero System #Champions #Point Buy #The game that taught me algebra.

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inkskinned · 1 year ago

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the thing about art is that it was always supposed to be about us, about the human-ness of us, the impossible and beautiful reality that we (for centuries) have stood still, transfixed by music. that we can close our eyes and cry about the same book passage; the events of which aren't real and never happened. theatre in shakespeare's time was as real as it is now; we all laugh at the same cue (pursued by bear), separated hundreds of years apart.

three years ago my housemates were jamming outdoors, just messing around with their instruments, mostly just making noise. our neighbors - shy, cautious, a little sheepish - sat down and started playing. i don't really know how it happened; i was somehow in charge of dancing, barefoot and laughing - but i looked up, and our yard was full of people. kids stacked on the shoulders of parents. old couples holding hands. someone had brought sidewalk chalk; our front walk became a riot of color. someone ran in with a flute and played the most astounding solo i've ever heard in my life, upright and wiggling, skipping as she did so. she only paused because the violin player was kicking his heels up and she was laughing too hard to continue.

two weeks ago my friend and i met in the basement of her apartment complex so she could work out a piece of choreography. we have a language barrier - i'm not as good at ASL as i'd like to be (i'm still learning!) so we communicate mostly through the notes app and this strange secret language of dancers - we have the same movement vocabulary. the two of us cracking jokes at each other, giggling. there were kids in the basement too, who had been playing soccer until we took up the far corner of the room. one by one they made their slow way over like feral cats - they laid down, belly-flat against the floor, just watching. my friend and i were not in tutus - we were in slouchy shirts and leggings and socks. nothing fancy. but when i asked the kids would you like to dance too? they were immediately on their feet and spinning. i love when people dance with abandon, the wild and leggy fervor of childhood. i think it is gorgeous.

their adults showed up eventually, and a few of them said hey, let's not bother the nice ladies. but they weren't bothering us, they were just having fun - so. a few of the adults started dancing awkwardly along, and then most of the adults. someone brought down a better sound system. someone opened a watermelon and started handing out slices. it was 8 PM on a tuesday and nothing about that day was particularly special; we might as well party.

one time i hosted a free "paint along party" and about 20 adults worked quietly while i taught them how to paint nessie. one time i taught community dance classes and so many people showed up we had to move the whole thing outside. we used chairs and coatracks to balance. one time i showed up to a random band playing in a random location, and the whole thing got packed so quickly we had to open every door and window in the place.

i don't think i can tell you how much people want to be making art and engaging with art. they want to, desperately. so many people would be stunning artists, but they are lied to and told from a very young age that art only matters if it is planned, purposeful, beautiful. that if you have an idea, you need to be able to express it perfectly. this is not true. you don't get only 1 chance to communicate. you can spend a lifetime trying to display exactly 1 thing you can never quite language. you can just express the "!!??!!!"-ing-ness of being alive; that is something none of us really have a full grasp on creating. and even when we can't make what we want - god, it feels fucking good to try. and even just enjoying other artists - art inherently rewards the act of participating.

i wasn't raised wealthy. whenever i make a post about art, someone inevitably says something along the lines of well some of us aren't that lucky. i am not lucky; i am dedicated. i have a chronic condition, my hands are constantly in pain. i am not neurotypical, nor was i raised safe. i worked 5-7 jobs while some of these memories happened. i chose art because it mattered to me more than anything on this fucking planet - i would work 80 hours a week just so i could afford to write in 3 of them.

and i am still telling you - if you are called to make art, you are called to the part of you that is human. you do not have to be good at it. you do not have to have enormous amounts of privilege. you can just... give yourself permission. you can just say i'm going to make something now and then - go out and make it. raquel it won't be good though that is okay, i don't make good things every time either. besides. who decides what good even is?

you weren't called to make something because you wanted it to be good, you were called to make something because it is a basic instinct. you were taught to judge its worth and over-value perfection. you are doing something impossible. a god's ability: from nothing springs creation.

a few months ago i found a piece of sidewalk chalk and started drawing. within an hour i had somehow collected a small classroom of young children. their adults often brought their own chalk. i looked up and about fifteen families had joined me from around the block. we drew scrangly unicorns and messed up flowers and one girl asked me to draw charizard. i am not good at drawing. i basically drew an orb with wings. you would have thought i drew her the mona lisa. she dragged her mother over and pointed and said look! look what she drew for me and, in the moment, i admit i flinched (sorry, i don't -). but the mother just grinned at me. he's beautiful. and then she sat down and started drawing.

someone took a picture of it. it was in the local newspaper. the summary underneath said joyful and spontaneous artwork from local artists springs up in public gallery. in the picture, a little girl covered in chalk dust has her head thrown back, delighted. laughing.

#writeblr #warm up #this is longer than i wanted i really considered removing that part about myself and what i went thru #but i think it really fucking bothers me that EVERY time i talk about being an artist #ppl assume i just like. had the skill and ability to drop everything and pay for grad school.#like sir i grew up poor. my house wasn't a safe space. i gave up a FREE RIDE TO LAW SCHOOL. for THIS. bc i chose it.#was it fucking hard? was i choosing the hard thing?? yes.#but we need to stop seeing artists as lazy layabouts that can ''afford'' to just ''sit around and create''#when MANY - if not MOST - of us are NOT like that. we have to work our fucking ASSES off. hard work. long and hard work #part of valuing artists is recognizing the amount we sacrifice to make our art. bc it doesn't just #like HAPPEN to us. also btw it rarely has anything to do with true talent.#speaking as someone with a chronic condition i hate when ppl are like u have it easy. like actively as i'm writing this my hands r #ACTIVELY hurting me. i haven't been posting bc my left hand was curled in a claw for the last week #this isn't fucking luck. after a certain point it's not even TALENT. it's dedication & sacrifice.#''u get to flounce around and do nothing with ur life'' is a narrative that is a direct result of capitalism #imagine if we said that about literally any other profession.#''oh so u give up 10 yrs of ur life to be a doctor? u sacrifice having a social life and u get SUPER in debt?#u need to work countless hours and it will often be thankless? well i wish i was that lucky''#we should be applying that logic to landlords ONLY #''oh ur mom and dad gave u the money to buy a house? and all u did was paint it white and rent it? huh.''

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