Day 8 of the Character Creation Challenge - DC Heroes Role Playing Games

 

Day 8 is DC Heroes Role playing game by Greg Gordon. It was published by Mayfair Games.

I enjoyed playing a Blackhawks game at North Texas PRG Con last year. It is a game system I have collected for years, enjoying reading the modules and rules.

For the #31dayCharacterCreationChallenge I will be following the rule books as written. For this character I will perform a character build where I chose the Stats.

To do this I need to have a character in mind. This is the opposite which is a blank sheet and then after rolling take of the pieces to create something with. This is the opposite, you need a character concept then you fill it in. So I need to figure out my concept for me to play.

I look at my DC graphic novel collection. The majority is Batman and Elseworlds reimagings of Batman. The original Manhunter Special Edition, JSA Liberty Files, Doctor Mid-Nite, the Golden Age, Gotham Central series and Watchman are there as well. On my Kindle is the Challengers of the Unknown. I have fond memories of the Original Suicide Squad, Vigilante, The Question, and Task Force X. I do have other graphic novels of Superman and Teen Titans but my favorite characters are the low level characters. I won’t call them ‘Street Level” characters because DC does a wonderful job of not having all of them be street level crime stories.

I mentioned earlier the fun Blackhawks Convention game so I have played at that level too.

So it will be a lower level physical ability DC character like Batman, Nightwing, Robin, The Question, Rick Flag Jr., Bronze Tiger, Manhunter (Mark Shaw), Vigilante, Judomaster, Peacekeeper, Comedian, Nite Owl, and Rorschach.

I will use a character I had made and played before as the concept. He is the Machinist. I played him in a PBEM V&V 2.1 game.

Mac Gaunt had super powers in that game. He won’t in this one. I will be changing his name as I am only using his character concept. This is not a character translation exercise; I will be making a new character from an old concept.

My character will start with 250 Hero Points.

First is to select a Limitation. I like how they gave Batman the Catastrophic Irrational Attraction: Seeks Justice. That is a something I can work with. Mac Gaunt believes that secrets are what destroy the world. Crimes are done in secret; The Elite keep their power through secrets; and the down trodden are keep down by secret.

Limitation: Catastrophic Irrational Attraction: Revealing the secrets which prevent justice

Motivation is Seeking Justice

Catch Phrase / Descriptor: “I will remove the mask of Injustice”

That provides 30 more Hero Points. I now have 280.

Now I need to decide Background. He is human. This provides 0 Hero Points

Wealth, he is Affluent. This provides 0 Hero Points but he will be able to purchase up to $5,000 for each Hero Point he spends.

Job, he is a Research Analyst for the NSA.

I decide that Mac Gaunt will be slightly better in Attributes as a being character than NPCs for U.S. Army Ranger and Spy. So start with their Attributes. I decide to increase his Dex as Mac Gaunt is at the top of human dexterity. I spend exactly half of my Hero Points on Attributes.

Now for Skills and I will not have any powers, because of this I am choosing the Batman Option.

The Batman Option: Players have a special option which increases the costs of buying Attributes, but greatly reduces the costs of buying Skills. This is the Batman Option, because Batman would have picked this if he was created under the rules in DC Heroes.

A character created under the Batman option pays the same 25 additional Hero Points to link a Power, but no Hero Points to link a Skill.

However, later the cost of raising an Attribute is usually much higher with this option. Therefore, a character created under the Batman Option can start out many more skills but will be slower to develop than other characters.

I refer to the Spy NPC in the Gamemaster’s Manual. I take all of the skills that the NPCs which are:

·         Charisma: 3

·         Martial Artist: 3

·         Military Science: 3

·         Spy: 3

·         Thief: 3

·         Vehicles: 3

·         Weaponry:3

I pull up my old character sheet and mark the skills I have on it with the skills this package covers. I am missing Mechanics, Electronics, Climbing, and the Gadgeteer power (which there is an equivalent skill).

Reviewing the list I find that climbing is covered under Acrobatics and Gadgeteer becomes Gadgetry. That leaves Mechanics and Electronics which could be covered by Scholar.

I want to increase the Dex based skills to match his Attribute of 4. I review if dropping any sub skills would boast the AP but none do. So it is either add Scholar and have my Dex skill at 3 or not add scholar. This is because I am saving 25 Hero points for connections. What is the fund of playing in the DC Universe if you don’t have any connections? So I won’t bring over the Mechanic and Electronics skills now. I will be my first advancement if game play shows that I need to make my Gadgetry better.

Here is my list of skills matching to the concept.

Here is my updated skills list with *linked to Attributes marked

·         Acrobatics*: 4

·          Charisma: 3

·         Gadgetry*: 3

·         Martial Artist*: 4

·         Military Science: 3

·         Spy*: 4

·         Thief*: 4

·         Vehicles: 4

·         Weaponry:4

Now it is time to add connections. Since his job is at the NSA, I add it at high level. My background for Mac is he worked as a spy for Checkmate before quitting so he could go to work for the NSA. So I add Checkmate as a low level connection. I also add Amanda Waller as a low level connection. The connection occurred when she was one of the leaders of Checkmate but I added her as a shout out for my love of Task Force X. Finally I need a Batman connection. I decide to add Ra’s al Ghul as low level connection. This is from the time period that Ra’s was being shown as a Character doing the wrong things for the right reason. This was when he was an environmental activist borderline terrorist.

Connections

·         NSA (High)

·         Checkmate (Low)

·         Amanda Waller (Low)

·         Ra’s al Ghul (Low)

Now it is time to add equipment. Any equipment that is publicly accessible in the real world can be bought from Star Labs in the DC Universe. Everything is a gadget has to be bought with Hero Points instead of money.

Sigh, I am out of Hero Points.

I start to make a list that I can buy starting with my lab so my Gadgetry sub skill Build Gadgets can be used effectively, I think start to make a list with a pistol and spy equipment. Then I stop.

Knowing that I won’t be actually playing Mac Gaunt and the fact he feels unplayable stops me from going further. The rules did warn that it was better to use DC Characters first before making your own. I thought that was to get a better feel for the game but now it appears it was by design. I can’t figure out the DC Character math. I match the example of how to build the character but Mac has lower Attributes that Nightwing but I had to spend 120 Hero Points and Nightwing shows 93 for his. I decide to build Nightwing following the character creation rules. His attributes alone would cost 516 Hero Points not 93. So the book is showing only the starting Hero Points and not the experience he gained to increase his Attributes to what they are today.

In full disclosure I am a CPA and work in Industry as an accountant. Even in college when I was an accounting major, these Stat build games where the characters in the modules and resource books don’t add up drives me crazy. I can forgive being off by 1 or 2 points as that was always rounding but this is 423 points!!

So I am stopping Mac Gaunt where he is. I don’t know whether I should have double the Hero Points to 500 or what. The rules do tell how to do that. Maybe I need a seasoned GM to walk me through the character build process or to guide me to just play Nemesis instead (he is so under used in DC Comics it would feel a lot like playing my own character as there are very few comic issues to tell me other.

I am so MEH about this character I am not even bothering to come up with a code name. Here is Mac Gaunt.