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Sojobo
2010-09-02, 09:57 PM
Anyone playing this? I was curious about everyone's opinion about the new version.

I personally am in love with the Affliction effect, since there are so many powers that can be modeled with it. Granted, the lack of a lot of premade powers in DCA is daunting my newer players, but I love it.

The new attributes (Fighting in particular; what exactly does it measure? Natural ability to be like "hey, don't mess with me"?) took some getting used to, as were the much smaller (and more expensive) menu of skills.

I like the standardization of -2 for minor circumstance bonuses and -5 for major. I also like graded checks and the more intuitive degrees of success/failure. Makes running things smooth and inconsistent.

One stumbling point was the huge number of conditions: I had to create a cheat sheet handy to keep them sorted out, but since they power the Affliction effect, I don't mind.

Also, I love the elimination of most Drawbacks and the importance Complications play in the game now; it makes the game a bit more narrativist, which is to my liking. One of my players wasn't a fan of the lack of hard set Knockback rules (though from a GM perspective using complications for it is great). He's still working on creating a Move Object based power to replicate it.

I know a lot of people aren't a fan of the new Impervious rules, but since my game group never took high ranks of it anyway (being invincible to mooks was fine with them; they liked to be challenged by villains) it wasn't a problem for us.

Overall, it simplified and streamlined a lot of rules and kept the game fun, and character generation is still crunchy fiddly as ever... perhaps a little bit more so. Haven't gotten a chance to playtest all the DC characters yet, and haven't gotten a chance to test out the new grapple rules (grab, i guess its called now), but all in good time.

Thoughts?

Jyokage
2010-09-03, 08:16 AM
I've always loved the versatility of M&M, and the new rule set, although a bit different than 2, has been more than adequate for creating everything I've ever attempted.

Sojobo
2010-09-03, 10:52 AM
How do you feel about pp cost? I noticed now that skills are so expensive, and how certain powers were re-priced, that its a bit difficult to build characters at PL10, 150 pp. Maybe my players and I are still getting used to it, but its especially difficult to make like an effective paragon type character at that many points.

Drascin
2010-09-03, 10:53 AM
Oh, 3e is already out? Might need to give it a look, then.

Project_Mayhem
2010-09-03, 10:54 AM
I hadn't heard about this. How much of a reshuffle is it?

Grynning
2010-09-03, 11:37 AM
I just took my first gander at it on Wednesday night. Just to clarify for some people - there is no M&M 3rd edition book - it's called the DC Universe RPG now, but the system is a new edition of M&M.

It's been reworked pretty significantly, but it's still the same basic game. d20 system attributes are gone, replaced with just buying the bonues a d20 style attribute would give you. I was surprised at how drastically they pared down the number of powers, until I realized that most of the powers they removed were just fluffed versions of Blast or other powers from 2e. I like how all the status effects have a SW saga type condition track (Bad->Worse->Out), though the OP is correct that there are a lot of them, all of which are bought through one power (Affliction).

I was very pleased with most of the renditions of the DC characters, except Superman, who I think got shorted in some respects. My boy Ollie and his girl Dinah were done very well though, that's what I was really looking for.

In response to one thing from the OP - I think the Fighting attribute is just like base attack bonus in D&D. It's just how good you are at hitting things, represented by training, instinct, etc. It's just what they used to call "Attack" in 2nd ed.

Sojobo
2010-09-03, 11:47 AM
Yup, what's available now is DC Adventures - however, it uses M&M3e and the system is supposed to be identical (barring errata changes) to the future M&M3e core rulebook. And frankly, since I'm using the pdf for the most part, there are a LOT of errors, haha. But its alright.

And yes, the small number of premade powers can be a turnoff to people who aren't used to building their own powers from effects, a la the Ultimate Power method. Pretty much every form of energy control (cosmic, hellfire, etc.) were simply arrays off of a Blast effect with different descriptors, so including every one wasn't as important as, say, including DC universe info - which I frankly could have used a bit more of.

I'm sure a powers book a la Ultimate Power is in the works, and then there are the Heroes and Villains sourcebooks for DCA, with what like 300 different characters? Freaking nuts.

Sojobo
2010-09-03, 11:55 AM
@Grynning: About Fighting, yeah, thats how we figured, just took some getting used to. As was the splitting of Dexterity (manual dexterity, hand eye coordination, range attack) and Agility (speed, balance, initiative checks, range defense). Also, the entire Dodge and Parry defenses and the elimination of Reflex saves took some getting used to, as well. There were so many times I would say "make a reflex save" and my players would... and then we'd stare at the dice and realize what we'd done.

I'm still convinced some abilities are overpriced: eg. Presence, possibly Intellect. There just aren't a lot of skills Presence gives bonuses to... will require more play to decide on this.

I'm also not a big fan of how your active defenses (Dodge and Parry) are HALVED when you are flatfooted vulnerable (forgot those damn conditions), which hugely penalizes people with a lot Dodge and Parry disproportionately more than those who are, say, Toughness shifted without a lot of active defenses. Still waiting to see how this plays out, but I think I might make Vulnerable either -2 or -5 circumstance penalty on defenses instead.

Jyokage
2010-09-04, 03:46 PM
Actually, I liked how it reinforced the idea that non-invulnerable characters need to have superior planning and battlefield control, because they are susceptible to things like getting shot by a group of thugs waiting to ambush them.
Superman breaks down into a warehouse through the roof. Batman sneaks in, taking out the guards one at a time, till the scattered few remaining get clustered together, blinded, then beaten to a pulp. It's a different kind of modus operundi, ya know?

Gorgon_Heap
2010-09-04, 04:12 PM
That makes sense.

So - the powers have been downlabeled for simplicity's sake. Are the changes mentioned in above post making playability and different. Because I have to tell ya, I loved how simple, quick, and easy game play was in 2e.

Sophistemon
2010-09-04, 05:34 PM
I'm a fan, personally, although I'm running into the same trouble that I had with the second edition, that being paranoiac second-guessing regarding the math. I'm holding out for a reliable character generator, myself. Fingers crossed and all that.

Cainen
2010-09-04, 06:30 PM
Most of the changes are quite good, or at least a wash. Devices are MUCH easier to handle now and lack the bean-counting typical of its previous incarnation, though I don't think you can still make fatigue effects from extra effort apply to the device.

On the other hand, losing Sneak Attack, nerfing Impervious, which was already somewhat of a disadvantaged power, and making Tripping just a wee bit more expensive to build thanks to having trip be a second-tier Affliction bother me. More important is the increase to skill cost without truly reducing the number of skills characters with a focus on them take. The streamlined list is a lot nicer, though, so it's not a total loss.

Sophistemon
2010-09-05, 10:32 AM
Is it wrong that I'm more interested in the actual 3rd Edition books than I am in the DC Adventures stuff? Also, in regards to my earlier post about a character generator, I found this (http://www.atomicthinktank.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=37265). It's not done yet, and apparently there are still some kinks to be worked out, but the creator, Ski, seems set on making it work. It might be worth a look if you're into that sort of thing.

Beleriphon
2010-09-05, 11:05 AM
I'm a fan, personally, although I'm running into the same trouble that I had with the second edition, that being paranoiac second-guessing regarding the math. I'm holding out for a reliable character generator, myself. Fingers crossed and all that.

Try Hero Lab, it'll cost you but you get free unlimited updates for the tools. It's also awesomely easy to use, I paid for everything M&M 2E for Hero Lab and it works perfectly. I have high expectations for that program's next data set.

Sophistemon
2010-09-05, 12:26 PM
Try Hero Lab, it'll cost you but you get free unlimited updates for the tools. It's also awesomely easy to use, I paid for everything M&M 2E for Hero Lab and it works perfectly. I have high expectations for that program's next data set.
There's an idea. I think that I'll look into that.

Any chance you could provide me with a ballpark price?

Or I could not be lazy and look it up myself.

Thirty dollars for the base program and one game? I'm pretty okay with that.

I'm a little worried that buying supplements could get expensive fast, but I guess you cross that bridge when you come to it.

Thanks for letting me know about it, Beleriphon.

Beleriphon
2010-09-05, 09:15 PM
There's an idea. I think that I'll look into that.

Any chance you could provide me with a ballpark price?

Or I could not be lazy and look it up myself.

Thirty dollars for the base program and one game? I'm pretty okay with that.

I'm a little worried that buying supplements could get expensive fast, but I guess you cross that bridge when you come to it.

Thanks for letting me know about it, Beleriphon.

Supplments are pretty good, 2E had one data pack for the base game, and then one data pack for everything else. So all told about $50, since you get one game system's base data set included in buying a license. Pricing is reasonable too, given that M&M 2E had the base game data set, and for an extra $20 you got everything else from all of the other books that they could convert, as fast as they could convert them. I think I actually ended up with rules for more books than I physically own.

As a bonus you can download it and get full access to character creation, but no saving or printing without buying a license. So it's super easy to build a character, check your math and then just transfer to paper. Although I like the way it works since you can use it to run games in addition to making characters, if you enjoy using software at the table.