Dark Twilight! [OOC]

[Dureign]

I don't read a lot of comic books, so my knowledge of the Hulk is limited to the animated world and movies. I turn to my buddy, who is a comics nut, and he tells me that Hulk absolutely can regenerate, though usually he never has to (its near impossible to inflict wounds on him large enough that he has to regenerate).

My buddy also plays M&M, and he also said he'd absolutely NOT allow Hulk to have a huge (17+) Toughness and also have large ranks of regenerate. I kind of agree; for the sake of actually being able to challenge the Hulk, I think some of his iconic powers have to slide (including his iconic power of being the STRONGEST EFFING THING IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE). If Hulk ever does get hurt enough to have to heal up, he can always Power Stunt a Self Heal (and Self Heal is way more effective than Regeneration, IMO).

I don't mind if you take 3e Impervious, or if Kevin allows, one of the variants in the Armor Power Profiles. Half-Effect Immunities are also fine, because they are expensive enough to actually appropriately match the level of utility.

Another option is simply not use all those extra points. If the build has everything you need, just put it down and back away. M&M can't handle too much optimization, its not D&D.

[Mark Reuter]

My time ran out @ the library. I went with Persistent Regeneration 3 and Impervious Toughness 13. I believe that puts me over by a point. I arrayed the "Playing Nice with Banner" powerset with the "Hulk is the strongest there is" powerset, since he can't use both at the same time. It cost me about the same, but now I can use all the powers in either set without limitations (no arrays or flaws). The way I figure it, since the Hulk is being hunted a LOT, he needs Bruce's intellect to help him survive.

[Dureign]

@Mark: That low level of Regen and Impervious are fine with me. Hulk is good to go.

@Kevin: Could you put that index of character sheet links on the front post of this OOC thread, along with all the House Rules, for ease of reference?

[Mark Reuter]

Well, if it's OK with Kevin, the variant I like the best is the one in which you reduce the degree of failure by one for any attack that is less than or equal to your Impervious toughness. I was never fond of the "all-or-nothing" mechanic in either edition. If we adopted that rule, Hulk will have Impervious 17 and no regeneration. I would much prefer to go that route.

[Mark Reuter]

One of the reasons the Hulk MIGHT need regeneration is because of attacks built like Wolverine's claws (resisted by Dodge, not Toughness). Yes Wolverine's claws are formidable, but he shouldn't be able to takedown te Hulk with one attack.

[Belial666]

My buddy also plays M&M, and he also said he'd absolutely NOT allow Hulk to have a huge (17+) Toughness and also have large ranks of regenerate.

That impression is kinda off. A toughness-shifted opponent gets no more effect off regeneration than a normal one. That's because A) toughness-shifted opponents will get hit more often and thus get more bruises compared to how much they can regenerate and B) if you face a tough but slow opponent, you power attack. That negates their tradeoff with your tradeoff so there's no difference.

[Dureign]

My buddy is the kind of guy who runs M&M simulations (like, I think, Elric's thread here on the ATT?), so I trust him when he says Toughness shifted guys + High Regen = fights that never end.

Because if you think about it, high Toughness means less chance of multiple degrees of failure; Regen begins to bog down when having to deal with multiple conditions (-1 Toughness and Dazed and Staggered... and with Lethal Damage, Injured and Disabled, etc). And we all know Defense shifted characters are more likely to get higher degree conditions (Stagger) than Toughness shifted characters.

EDIT: Also, in my own experience gaming, the problematic powers I've encountered first hand, that I at first were ok, were a) abuse of Concealment, and b) high Regeneration. Which is why I look out for those two specifically. And I've played with so many Toughness Shifted/Effect Shifted characters that I KNOW those characters are annoying as hell to deal with if the opposing side isn't optimized to deal with that kind of threat (aka, any typical plot driven GM built NPC team may not automatically be mechanically optimized, cuz, you know, STORY)

[timothy]

I know this is confusing because of 2 gm's being involved, but I would like a clarification.

I was told that I shouldn't take 2 pts of regen with impervious 15.

The Hulk can take 3 pts of regen with 17-20 toughness & 13 impervious.

I have no problem with dropping the regen, mostly took it because it was a part of the other write-ups I looked at & Marvel's statement that Luke has faster than human recuperation.

I do, however, feel like there should be some sort of consistency between Kevin & Dureign on the issue of regeneration and toughness.

[Dureign]

@timothy: You are absolutely right, that probably got ruled on WAY earlier before Kevin handed over mechanics issues to me. I apologize for that.

I'm not that familiar with Luke Cage (other than he's really tough), so I don't know the level of his regenerative abilities. If it fits the concept, you could do something similar to what Hulk has... but I personally start getting antsy if Regeneration gets close to or higher than 5 if the character is already Toughness shifted.

[Mark Reuter]

I can drop the regeneration. No biggie! Like dureign said, one can always powerstunt a self-heal if necessary.

[SuperCracker]

Also keep in mind that anyone on Zenith's team has a medic. A REAAALLY good medic.

[timothy]

It's not a big deal. I'm not even sure that it would be that big a deal for the character. Marvel's fluff is that he heals three times as fast as a normal human so I put that in as regen 2. I am personally good with just saying that it allows him to recover from injuries faster between missions.

I just wanted some clarification on the guidelines since they seemed inconsistent.

I am happy with Luke as is & frankly, was happy with him before I boosted him slightly for you. Don't see a need to change him & not someone who gets his shorts in a knot over having points left over or not being fully optimized in every area.

The Hulk does regenerate, thouh I'm not sure that 3 points is going to make a huge difference at his dpl, particularly using the impervious rules Mark prefers (which I think tends to underpower the penetrating advantage). But if he wants to put points into it, cool.

Edit: looked at the alternative toughness rule & realized I misread it. It doesn't really change the value of penetrating. My bad...

[Sakuro]

Belial, Wolverine has Persistent Regeneration 5. Had to drop it down from 10 when Dureign said the Weaken Toughness's Limited "Doesn't Affect Energy Barriers" wasn't worthy of a Flaw.

[Belial666]

"Healing Factor", Immunity 3 [Aging, Disease (Half Effect [-1/r]), Poison (Half Effect [-1/r])], Regeneration 5 [Extras: Persistent (+1/r)] * 22 PP

I meant that you'd mispriced the regeneration. The Immunity part costs 2 pp. The persistent regeneration part costs another 10 for rank 5... so it should either add up to 12 PP, or his persistent regeneration should be 10.

[Sakuro]

Thank you for pointing that out.