Mutants and Masterminds Tweek

[Xeviat]

I'm seeking to make two changes to M&M for a casual game I'm going to be starting up. The premise of the game is that all 4 players will be playing themselves six years ago, when we were all in college. The difference is that they've just developed super powers. Hillarity insues.

I want to consolidate the defenses, and I'm not 100% certain on the effects. I want to merge Defense and Reflex, and I want to merge Toughness and Fort.

Immediately, this will affect the way the Defense/Toughness trade off works. Rather than a Defense/Toughness trade off, characters could have a total defense cap of PLx3, with an individual maximum of PL+5 and a minimum of PL-5 (so things aren't min/maxed too much; this is generally a preference of mine so you don't run into Attack +0 Damage +20 PL 10 characters).

Then, the Fort, Ref, and Will scores would be static defenses, and attack and damage would be rolled. All attacks would have a roll of some sort, there would be no "no attack" modifier. This may affect the balance of some powers, meaning they'd have to be made more expensive. For instance, traditional attacks would roll Reflex to hit and then Fort for damage, where as condition attacks might only target one. Thus it might be more effecient to wear someone down with conditions rather than attacking two defenses.

One compromise would be if damage affects all defenses, not just toughness like in the original system. Then damaging someone makes it easier to take them down with another attack.

Could this make for a more consolidated system (I've seen characters with average defense and toughness but poor reflex, and that seems strange to me; armor provides a toughness bonus, not an AC bonus in M&M, so I see little reason to have a distinction between dodging a punch or a bullet vs. shielding yourself from an explosion), or am I yet again splitting hairs?

[Ninja D!]

In a way, you are splitting hairs.  But that's what customizing a system to your own game is all about.  Keep at that, anyway.  I wish I could offer more hard support here but I don't have the book nor the money to buy it (though I would love to someday).

[Pellanor]

I haven't looked at the system recently enough to help you out very much. The one thing I'm worried about is that Will might become devalued.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

You've got a point that Defense and Reflex are conceptually linked, and I certainly think you could get away with merging them so long as you either don't change the total cost or understand what it does to the game if you do.

But I don't see it for Toughness and Fortitude: Toughness is a body's ability to hold together, Fortitude is its ability to keep its systems working.  This is why undead can ignore bothering with Fortitude (I've never been quite sure about machines).  It's also why objects have Toughness but no Fortitude.  My opinion would be leave these as they are.

[Xeviat]

Yeah, it would be odd to have Armor increase Fort. I'll keep Toughness and Fort separate then.

But how can I handle the previous Toughness/Defense pairing? Should the Toughness cap affect the Defenses, since the Defenses are all used for to hits?

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

But how can I handle the previous Toughness/Defense pairing? Should the Toughness cap affect the Defenses, since the Defenses are all used for to hits?

I'm confused.  Most types of attacks have an attack roll in addition to requiring a save.  The only exceptions I can think of are Perception range, which I've never liked, and Sense Dependent, which just substitutes Reflex for Defense and thus is rendered moot by your changes.  So where are you getting "no attack" attacks?

UPDATE: Also Area attacks, but that's exactly the same situation as Sense Dependent: replacing Defense with Reflex.

But I think I've figured out your question.  Is this it: "What do I do about the Defense/Toughness tradeoff when I've decided that Attack rolls should also target the Fort and Will scores directly?"

[Xeviat]

Yes, that's the question SM. I want to go a little 4E STYLE and have attack vs. Fort/Ref/Will. You're right, though, that most attacks attack defense and then a save (be it toughness, fort, ref, or will).

I really want to consolidate Defense and Reflex though, as it doesn't make sense for dodging to be two different things. This would make non-damaging powers have to cost 1 point extra since they only target one defense now instead of two.

You've given me something to think on.

[Xeviat]

Here is the totality of my Mutants and Masterminds changes. If anyone sees anything that is going to be massively glaring, please let me know.

First, all characters will begin with a number of points to buy their starting ability scores and any feats, complications, and possibly powers that they can explain as natural talents. For instance, if someone's character was an Elf, then buying low-light vision (super sense) would be acceptable. Ability scores cannot naturally exceed twenty.

Then, characters will still get a number of PP per power level to buy everything else; they can still buy ability scores, but non-enhanced ability scores are still capped at 20 (which I am basing as the "human pinical" based on the approximation of Int = IQ/10). Attack bonus, Defenses, Damage, and skill ranks are all capped at power level, but the total bonuses are capped at PL+5. Generally, the only way to reach this +5 cap is to have high ability scores. Ability scores and skills can be raised above their PL caps (to PL+5) through the Enhance power.

The Defense trait has been dropped. Standard attacks are Attack vs. Reflex, then Damage vs. Toughness, Fort, Ref, or Will. The "no save" extra is being modified to allow you to remove the Attack or the Damage roll; this represents the Perception attacks not having attack rolls, or the standard no-save. All attacks generally have to target one defense; I say generally because affects with minor effects might be accepted without a roll (such as minor auras), but this will be case by case.

As for the Defense tradeoffs, my thought is to allow characters to have a trade off in Defenses as long as their total defense bases (before ability scores) does not exceed PLx4, and all Defense bases must be within +/-5 of PL. This way characters can have strong points and weak points. Reflex might deserve some extra weight because it is targetted more than other scores, but since it is just as costly to ignore it as it is to ignore the other defenses, it is probably fine.

Lastly, I am considering drastically reducing the points per level and having attack, damage, and defenses scale with level. Mostly this is just to save time for character creation, because almost every character I have seen keeps these scores maximized (except attack, characters I've seen generally only use Attack Specialization on their primary attack, or Attack Focus on their attack type (melee or range), unless they're explicitly an all around martial character who needs raw attack bonus). I don't 100% like this, though, since it breaks the nice skill level guidelines chart; I'd like to know if anyone sees any massive problems for this. I'd still allow a Character Drawback to reduce some scores, if a character's concept requires it.

As for skills, I didn't suggest scaling skills because I want to alter the skills so that there is no defensive uses of skills. Mostly this requires a chance in Sense Motive and Perception (Bluff vs. Sense Motive, Stealth vs. Perception), but that is a simple change in having those target Will (which sounds okay for Bluff, but feels odd for Stealth). This way a character's choice of skills defines their abilities, while their defenses are handled automatically. Otherwise a character is encouraged to have Sense Motive and Perception high to cover themselves, and they are punished if they don't keep these up because a skilled Bluffer or Stealther will never fail against them after a certain point. This allows the skill benchmarks of training to still be used, without punishing characters.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

Then, characters will still get a number of PP per power level to buy everything else; they can still buy ability scores, but non-enhanced ability scores are still capped at 20 (which I am basing as the "human pinical" based on the approximation of Int = IQ/10). Attack bonus, Defenses, Damage, and skill ranks are all capped at power level, but the total bonuses are capped at PL+5. Generally, the only way to reach this +5 cap is to have high ability scores. Ability scores and skills can be raised above their PL caps (to PL+5) through the Enhance power.

So are you saying you can exceed PL caps for Attack, Defenses, damage, and skills by having high ability scores?  Doesn't that unfairly penalize low-ability concepts?

I think you can justify Will vs. Stealth by rationalizing Will as one's ability to concentrate past distractions, which would definitely improve senses.  There are probably situations where it wouldn't make much sense (high-Will animals), but unless you want to create an Awareness Defense I think it's just the nature of game systems that you're going to have to cut corners vs. their relationship to the real world.

[Xeviat]

The window is only 5 points (ability score of 10 to 20), and most real world concepts are going to be in the 10 to 14 range. Super powers can extend the ability cap as high as having a modifier of PL+5, and I would be more than willing to let the Enhane power be used to shore something up to the PL+5 cap.

I think low ability concepts, though, are generally willing to accept the consequenes of the low score. That's why a low score gives you points back. I do think I'll be using the 4E Str/Con for Fort, Dex/Int for Ref, and Wis/Cha for Will. The Mighty power feat will be applicable on all attack powers to determine what stat boosts attack and damage for that power (using the standard escalating cost of Mighty for ranged and perception based attacks).

But if I let Cha apply to Will, then Stealth vs. Will won't make sense at all.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

I think low ability concepts, though, are generally willing to accept the consequenes of the low score. That's why a low score gives you points back. I do think I'll be using the 4E Str/Con for Fort, Dex/Int for Ref, and Wis/Cha for Will. The Mighty power feat will be applicable on all attack powers to determine what stat boosts attack and damage for that power (using the standard escalating cost of Mighty for ranged and perception based attacks).

Sounds better this way.

But if I let Cha apply to Will, then Stealth vs. Will won't make sense at all.

This is one of the reasons why I hate mental ability scores.

If you're going to let people accept the consequences of not getting all they can out of their ability scores then why can't you let the same thing happen to people who don't buy up Perception and Sense Motive?

[Xeviat]

Okay, I think it won't be too terrible for skills to oppose skills, even though some people won't buy them up. Other people in the group probably will, and all you really need is one person to cover you.

What did you think about the auto scaling?

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

What did you think about the auto scaling?

In some senses it works, in others it doesn't.  I'm worried that it doesn't take into account builds that A) acquire only partial amounts of those stats (such as focusing on one kind of weapon and taking a lot of Attack Specialization) and B) that only hit their caps after having activated some power (growers are a good example).

[Xeviat]

True, I forgot about alternate form characters and such. I'll leave out the autoscaling, and only go with the merging Defense and Reflex and switching the saves to static Defenses. This will save characters 1 to 2 points per level, but I don't think I need to change the 15 points per level over that.