'mundane-flavored superpowers'

[RadiantPhoenix]

People aren't nerfing Evasion and Tumble because they're mundane flavoured, they're nerfing them because the party Rogue was using them to defeat the DM's precious NPCs.

A friend of mine is (or at least was) an AD&D player (it ran in the family), and his complaints about evasion totally were along the lines of, "how do you completely dodge a space-filling fireball without moving out of its space?"

(He also complained about magic powers other than spells, but I think that was more of a, "well, my wizard didn't get to do that, so...")

[hyzmarca]

And did you reply "duck and cover?"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0K_LZDXp0I

Since combat mechanics are an abstraction, it's perfectly reasonable to explain it as finding an a space that the fireball can't fill, weather that be behind a concrete slab, or in a trench, or whatever Indeed, hiding behind large heavy things or in holes is the standard mundane method for dealing with explosions and fireballs, assuming that you can't get out of range in time, in real life. It actually works, too.

[Prak]

Given that every core prestige class that basically says "have a few levels of rogue and then take this" is magical in one way or another, I'm perfectly fine with saying that the rogue flickers into the plane of shadow for just a moment.

[sabs]

Hiding inside an old Refrigerator
I always knew Indiana Jones was a rogue.

[icyshadowlord]

I wonder how many bitches would cry foul if you put Beowulf in D&D.

He wasn't even a demigod yet he could hold his breath for fucking ever and beat a monster who won against all the king's champions with his bare hands,
then killed the thing's mom and finally KILLED A DRAGON ALONE WHILE BEING AS OLD AS MY DEAD GRANDPA. Also "strength of 30 men in one hand".

[Maxus]

Eesh. I remember a while back, I calculated Beowulf at 35 Str in D&D 3.5...

My memory's coming up short here. Did it actually say that about the strength of 30 men in each hand? Because I figured Beowulf's strength as being 31 times a normal man's lifting capacity.

Also, imagine what would happen if someone put Roland out there. You know, the guy who did this when he was way injured. Didn't Mearls actually try to cite Roland as an example of what they were striving for? Because I'm totally down for knocking holes in mountains with a single mighty swing.

I just don't think the D&D Next Dev Team remembers that part of the story.

[icyshadowlord]

I wouldn't be surprised if I recalled right (or wrong) about Beowulf's strength, but dude did kill an adult dragon with only one guy helping him, while he himself was fucking old.

[Username17]

There is almost no pushback on mundane characters hitting things and doing damage. Hit points are all abstract and shit, and when you inflict some number of them that's just a number. If you happen to be tough enough and do enough damage with your fists to punch out Godzilla, that is perfectly OK for a "mundane" character to do. Where the mundane character gets fucked is when there is some sort of required ability to affect the enemy, because mundane characters aren't allowed to have such abilities.

So if the enemy was an intangible ghost or an evil dream or a tunneling worm that killed people with psychic storms or something, DMs would throw an actual shit fit if you could do anything about it at all. But you're just trading punches with a giant lizard, there are few if any limits on how many "hit points" the character can inflict.

Beowulf would possibly receive censure for lifting heavy objects or for swimming long distances in chain mail or for holding his breath for an hour. DMs wouldn't even blink at him rolling to hit and rolling for damage and killing Grendel's Mom.

This is a major portion of why Rogues maintain playability in a high level wizard environment so much better than other martial characters. Their shtick of "do a large amount of burst damage by making attack rolls with damage bonuses" is a lot less subject to being nerfed on the fly than other things a mundane character might conceivably be able to do.

-Username17

[Aryxbez]

See, random people on the internet, and the actual pro game designers..

People aren't nerfing Evasion and Tumble because they're mundane flavoured, they're nerfing them because the party Rogue was using them to defeat the DM's precious NPCs.

Though arguably, those things need revisions anyway, so for the "actual pros" I think it be to address. Whereas Mike Mearls, I wouldn't even think to call him by that title, so not sure why you chose that phrasing.

Unfortunately, I think what Frank said earlier about Charles Atlas Superpowers and like, seems to be true. Since even if martial characters have largely defined abilities in what they can do, they won't be able to operate "off the record" of their abilities defined parameters, performing fiat. Though least if those abilities cover decent array of level appropriate actions, then least have consistently cool things can do without needing fiat (such as use of super strength to chuck houses, but maybe not redirect rivers).

I think a good few sidebars would help DM's be put in line of the kind of tone these Charles Atlas abilities are supposed to be in the first place. So, when they're trying to push the rule that a line effect shouldn't keep going through a barrier (despite the force of the attack being the same as the magic variant), they'll be barking up the wrong tree of tone and style of the game.

As for Prak_Anima's suggestion that martial characters should be "huffing" a powersource secretly, I find that rather damning. I feel that martial character should be able to exist in the Fantasy game space, seems lame when their power is coming from something that isn't their own, plus training (like magic, divine, pact with a demon etc.). Since otherwise, the idea of Kratos or Luke Cage, being gods or jail juice, is basically just backstory. Which that seems to be a problem with DMs, they're basically favoring some backstories (we use magic!) over another (I train super hard).

Since, I'm kinda bouncing back and forth to agreeing, yet not wanting to. Even in 4th edition, effective characters would start to fall into certain energy types (Cold, Radiation, Thunder), and alas becoming more like gadgeteers with their dependency on magic (swag = RNG increasers) to become more effective at their combat roles.

Lastly, for Evasion, it does have the clause's of having room for evading in the first place. So it sounds like these martial abilities just need to be better defined for situations (such as if it's denied in a grapple).

[tussock]

Hmm. D&D nerds unconsciously favouring the studious character over the brutish one. On account of they grew up being studious D&D nerds, and not foozeball players. There could totally be something in that.

[Username17]

Every character has everyman skills. That is to say that they can open doors, move furniture, hammer pitons into stone, present gold coins, find evidence, and do all kinds of other stuff based merely on having thumbs and human agency. These are meaningful adventuring skills and everyone has them. But they are also fundamentally a major component of phlebtonium-free characters. At the point that rigging up a set of ropes and pulleys to get a treasure chest up or down a cliff is no longer an important part of your adventuring career (for example: the place you are trying to get treasure into or out of is a cloud castle miles above the ground, a kelp fortress at the bottom of the sea, or an ice keep in another universe altogether), the mundane character no longer has meaningful contributions to the adventure.

Just as the mundane character expires as a combat archetype the moment they are confronted with BBEGs who, like Bavmorda in Willow, have "you must have a special ability to counter this ability or you automatically lose" abilities; the mundane character expires as an adventuring archetype the moment their default abilities no longer get things done. The mundane character simply exists on borrowed time. Sooner or later you literally do have to get phlebtonium or GTFO. This makes many people sad, but it is nonetheless true.

-Username17

[Prak]

I think I was more pointing out that the major CAS characters have non-mundane power sources. Buffy still needs to train, and that's where a lot of her ability comes from, but she does still have the Slayer template that boosts her strength, healing, speed and resilience, and is integral to being able to do much of anything in her milieu. Thing is big, stony, and hits things really hard.
That's a perfectly mundane skill set. He has a non-mundane power source in that he was hit by cosmic radiation, but his skill set is completely mundane.
Hulk is the same way. He runs around being big, strong and unstoppable, but that's all he does. The fact that he can cave in a tank in one blow, or withstand an artillery barrage just means his numbers are big. You can take into account that he probably has DR and Regeneration/FH, but even so, his abilities are just "normal abilities times X."
About the only CAS character I can think of who doesn't rely on phlebotinum that people forget about is Batman, and when you look at most of his incarnations, or the most popular ones, at least, he does have phlebotinum, it's just not flashy. He has doctorates in at least ten fields, and still had time to train. Add in the fact that he is a gadgeteer with super science abilities, and you're forced to reconcile this somehow. He is super intelligent, and possibly has an unbreakable will, these are his powers. In marvel, they would just recognize that he is an undetected mutant.

[echoVanguard]

The mundane character simply exists on borrowed time. Sooner or later you literally do have to get phlebtonium or GTFO. This makes many people sad, but it is nonetheless true.

-Username17

This might be a bit of a thread derail, but what do folks think of the idea of "magic items you must be a mundane to use"? In other words, maybe a sweet ring of telekinesis only works if you actually have no magical abilities at all. AD&D had some items like this that only worked if you were a fighter, or had extra effects if the user was a fighter.

Purely a thought experiment.

echo

[RadiantPhoenix]

This might be a bit of a thread derail, but what do folks think of the idea of "magic items you must be a mundane to use"? In other words, maybe a sweet ring of telekinesis only works if you actually have no magical abilities at all. AD&D had some items like this that only worked if you were a fighter, or had extra effects if the user was a fighter.

Purely a thought experiment.

echo

Because your levels are still irrelevant.

Instead, it would be better to have an, "artifact-user level," that's like a caster level, but goes on fighter types, and lets you unlock, "the true power of," items. Something like the idea from that 'Weapons of Legacy' splatbook, but designed as a buff to fighters rather than to all characters.

[Username17]

...and once you have levels of "artifact user" you are not a phlebtonium-free character anymore, so the exercise is futile. Hal Jordan is nominally a mundane guy underneath the power ring of vast cosmic power, but that doesn't actually matter in any real sense. He's a Wizard, not a Fighter.

So either the artifacts aren't level dependent, in which case your actual character doesn't even matter; or the artifacts are level dependent, in which case you're just a Harry Potter wizard who needs to hold their wand in order to cast spells.

-Username17

[Aryxbez]

Hmm. D&D nerds unconsciously favouring the studious character over the brutish one. On account of they grew up being studious D&D nerds, and not foozeball players. There could totally be something in that.

Perhaps, definitely heard this was the case back in the day of D&D's introduction. However, even I who some point adopted the way of nerdom, have favorred Martial might over magic. Ironically, thinking the spellcasters the boring concept, of wimps relying on magic, where mighty warriors relied on their skills to defeat their foes, deflecting magic/lightning, blocking Dragons breath, and hurling themselves, taking down armies! Course in D&D, always sad to find couldn't really do the first two things.

As for the Hulk, he also has jump induced flight (leap a mile), super strength for various means (likely better designed as a class ability that ups strength for X purposes, like in Mutants & Masterminds), Immunity to diseases/viruses/suffocation or Water/space breathing. Though I'd also mention strength to mind control, but that's basically just Good Will progression/Iron Will, and apparently has Ghost Hunter feat (interact with astral forms). Apparently at one point capable of punching so hard to create a dimensional rift, or something like that. So, he's not all just big numbers, though true he will use them often to take on most challenges.

The mundane character simply exists on borrowed time. Sooner or later you literally do have to get phlebtonium or GTFO. This makes many people sad, but it is nonetheless true.

This might be a bit of a thread derail, but what do folks think of the idea of "magic items you must be a mundane to use"? In other words, maybe a sweet ring of telekinesis only works if you actually have no magical abilities at all. AD&D had some items like this that only worked if you were a fighter, or had extra effects if the user was a fighter.

As I recall, that's basically a gadgeteer character, one who's powered on their swag, ela Ironman, Green Lantern, Lion-o?, He-man? and Stargirl.

When I'm speaking of the "mundane guy" in this context, not talking about some guy that relies on pitons and rules/polleys, screw that, this be Charles Atlas superpower, he'll rapidly climb/run up/throw himself up that mountain really quickly. He can do supernatural thing, but his power source/backstory isn't that of magic, within context of the setting, it's considered more or less "mundane" to those who have the sufficient training to do these things. It's a difference of flavor that feels more appealing to those who like the fighting man, even as he's wrestling King Kong, deflecting mountains, and using MURDER VISION.

[Username17]

When I'm speaking of the "mundane guy" in this context, not talking about some guy that relies on pitons and rules/polleys, screw that, this be Charles Atlas superpower, he'll rapidly climb/run up/throw himself up that mountain really quickly. He can do supernatural thing, but his power source/backstory isn't that of magic, within context of the setting, it's considered more or less "mundane" to those who have the sufficient training to do these things. It's a difference of flavor that feels more appealing to those who like the fighting man, even as he's wrestling King Kong, deflecting mountains, and using MURDER VISION.

But you can't actually have that. As previously established, a mundane flavored power does only what it says it does, if that, and definitely not any more. While a phlebtonic power is generalizable into new situations because it opens up new physical realities in the narrative, a Charles Atlas Power fucking doesn't.

So even if you had "mountain throwing" as an ability, you still wouldn't be diverting rivers or punching trees into log cabins. In fact, if there wasn't a convenient mountain around, it wouldn't do anything at all. Charles Atlas Superpowers should be "Do Paul Bunyan Crap" but there aren't and cannot be because your ideas of what constitutes cool and situational Paul Bunyanism is rarely if ever going to coincide with your MC's. A Mundane Flavored superpower by definition isn't bringing in any new flavor, so in actual play it's just a 4e power that does some narrow and specific thing and has some numbers attached. That's all it will ever be. That's all it can ever be, because if an ability doesn't have a flavor it's not something you can extrapolate into a new situation.

If you don't gain any new flavor from your powers, the only flavor you have is the fact that you have two thumbs and working knees. Which means that you get to get in line to hammer pitons, tie knots, and pry up floorboards with a crowbar. Whether you "spinning death cut" does a thousand "hit points" of damage or not. You still get to need a fucking blue key if you want to open the blue door.

-Username17

[Mask_De_H]

Or you could cut/punch/smash through the area around the Blue Door and go through that portal.

Now if putting the Blue Key into the Blue Door is the only way to open the demiplane and there is a gaping nothing behind the Blue Door otherwise, then the CAS guy is fucked.

[hyzmarca]

Or you just dip the yellow key you bought in town in a bucket of blue paint. The door won't know the difference.

[Prak]

As for the Hulk, he also has jump induced flight (leap a mile), super strength for various means (likely better designed as a class ability that ups strength for X purposes, like in Mutants & Masterminds), Immunity to diseases/viruses/suffocation or Water/space breathing. Though I'd also mention strength to mind control, but that's basically just Good Will progression/Iron Will, and apparently has Ghost Hunter feat (interact with astral forms). Apparently at one point capable of punching so hard to create a dimensional rift, or something like that. So, he's not all just big numbers, though true he will use them often to take on most challenges.

You might find the Hulk PrC I made interesting.