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So this is a well made video but I feel like it's singling out one specific example but there are multiple ways to mitigate damage, and wolverine is a bad example because even though he's rank 4, he has a power that specifically allows his damage to be rank 5, so in this system him and Dormammu would in theory be a close fight. Dormammu has one powerful tool in his belt, Shield of Seraphim, that lets him as a reaction throw up a 20 point shield that blocks all attacks less than 20 damage, and if they exceed 20 damage, the shield is destroyed instead of him taking damage. And it can be triggered as a reaction.
Yes, that is true, but the idea here is that in the context of the comics, Wolverine would never be able to come close to taking down Dormammu. Also, a Battle is usually a team of heroes against the big bad, meaning that yes, he can mitigate the damage from Wolverine, but the other 5 heroes will surely take him out in the first round. He only gets the 1 rwaction
I didn't want to jam all my commentary into one post, because they get quite long as it is. The next issue we ran into, is that narratively certain ranks, as described in the book, feel like bigger leaps in power than others. The way my DM here said it felt to him was something like this: Rank 1 -> Rank 2: 2x, Rank 2 -> Rank 3: 2x, Rank 3 -> Rank 4: 3x, Rank 4 -> Rank 5: 3x, Rank 5 -> Rank 6: 4x Trying to math that out, because the multipliers are constants in places and increase in others, it's not quite exponential, nor factorial, it's some crazy thing that probable works best with step functions, and would be hell for players to just calculate easily on a character sheet. An easier fix, and IMO a more narratively satisfying one, is that there are inconsistent jumps in power between ranks, and we can smooth things out if we just add more ranks. Instead of: Rookie -> Street -> City -> Country -> Planetary -> Cosmic I proposed: Rookie -> Street -> City -> Country -> Globetrotter -> Planetary -> Galactic -> Cosmic This brings the ranks up to 8, and IMO adds some important narrative distinctions. I think there's a big difference between a character like, say, Black Panther, and Cable (maybe there's a better example). I'm thinking of characters whose stories take them into areas defended by characters for mysterious purposes, with the expectation that they'll get what they come for even if stopped by a regional defender. However this hero may not be strong enough to stop a planetary invasion on their own. That's the idea behind the Globetrotter rank is to allow that niche. The Galactic rank is for heroes that regularly take part in intergalactic conflicts, but they aren't the kind of beings that the universe bands together to thwart. I'm thinking of heroes like Nova (or maybe Captain Marvel) as compared to cosmic threats like Thanos (w/ some gauntlet assembled) or Galactus (though maybe Galactus needs a rank higher still?). Adding these ranks makes the scaling, if exponential: 1 -> 2x -> 4x -> 8x -> 16x -> 32x -> 64x -> 128x vs the DM's intuition of: 1 -> 2x -> 4x -> 12x -> 36x -> 144x This smooths out progression at each rank while having it end up at "roughly" the same place (144 / 128 = 1.125 so there's a 12.5% difference at the top end). What's worth noting is that book doesn't seem to be going for a tier list ranking of power level (else you'd see weird things like outerversal beings, etc.). The ranks are defined more in terms of what a character's responsibilities are, rather than what they can affect, create, or destroy. The primary purpose of ranks is to figure out what kind of stories it makes sense to tell for that character. With that out of the way, we've been kicking around a 10 rank system (since 10 is a nice round number and all) that would capture this nicely. Here's my best attempt to narratively describe each rank in a system like that: 1. You've recently acquired your powers. You might have to stop a local criminal and save someone's life, or be home before curfew. This is more of a coming of age story about coming to grips with your powers. The book describes this as an "origin story". This rank sounds suited for a "Smallville" like campaign about choosing who to trust in knowing your powers, keeping secrets, while learning to balance life and being a hero. 2. You have the hang of your powers and life / hero balance in general. You have a schedule where you patrol streets, and stopping robberies for you is a regular Tuesday night. Villains might include a new kingpin, corrupt police, and other things that affect your area of patrol, while straining the hero / life balance you thought you had adjusted. 3. You're so experienced at doing the hero thing that you can jump in at a moment's notice, costume at the ready. Wherever you happen to be in the city, that's where you can be called. You stop higher end bank robberies, deal with things like "the Kingpin" himself, provide aid during natural disasters, and stop accidents like train derailments. You've almost given up on a personal life in exchange for the life of a hero, which frees you to deal with bigger plots which can affect large masses of people. 4. You've become so famous that forces like S.H.I.E.L.D can call on your for affairs that affect the whole country. While you may not want to be away from your primary city, you're dealing with threats so massive they'd affect your city too. These may be stories your character takes on permanently, like Captain America or Black Panther, or maybe reluctantly (Spider-Man: Far from Home) but they're regular enough that they're a newly consistent staple in your hero life. 5. You're a hero of such experience that you can combat other notable heroes in order to fulfil certain plot points. We need this artifact from Wakanda to stop a terrible future? The question isn't "if" we're going to beat Black Panther to take it, if necessary, but HOW we're going to beat Black Panther to take it if necessary! If you're a hero, narratively, that can walk into a country and grab what the plot demands, thwarting its heroes, and other support infrastructure, then this rank is where you belong. 6. There's a planetary invasion and the Avengers are off helping Nova Corps secure an infinity stone against another of Thanos's invasions! No big deal. A hero of your stature has the pull and connections to contact remaining heroes, coordinate a defense network, and lead the charge in fighting the invaders head on, either via bombastic powers or strong technology. If traveling to other countries to make contacts, gather things, and so on, are wrote plot points that merely facilitate how you deal with the big bad, rather than being the source of conflict, then this is the rank for you. 7. You're now helping Novacorps fend of Thanos. You travel to, and communicate with, other planets as easily as you used to travel to and communicate with other countries back home. Instead of frantically defending countries against alien invasion, you defend planets, or even solar systems. Your actions turn the tide of battles involving armies formed by multiple planets on either side of a conflict, and your presence makes everyone in the battle take note. 8. You're so trusted by the denizens of the universe itself that you can call on all of them as easily as you coordinate countries to defend the planet against alien invasion. Your role is the Sisyphean task of managing fundamental aspects of nature - things like the infinity stones, or Galactus. If Galactus eats a planet, you have a lot of pull in determining which one (even if he has to be coordinated there by force). If the stones have to be gathered to deal with an extra-dimensional threat, it's you that's trusted to use them and put them back responsibly, because it's you on the front lines with the gauntlet fighting the things that would rip the fabric of the universe asunder. 9. The universe?! You're thinking too small! Don't you know there are other dimensions at stake? At this rank, you're a trusted ambassador to other dimensions. You take part in their conflicts, whose ripple effects would destabilize the universe itself. While you may interact with divine beings, like Eternity, at rank 8, here mingling with them is a regular occurrence. 10. Dimensions are great, but have you heard of the MULTIVERSE? This rank is for people who are called to intervene in multiversal level effects which may bring you into contact with Beyonders, the Living Tribunal, and so on. You may have to deal with multiversal events which could destroy one or more universes in the multiverse, thwart beings who have amassed the powers of their universe (infinity stones +) to wage war on others. Here the intent is that the stakes are so high that the only escalation above you is the Living Tribunal, and - failing that, the One Above All (who is probably your DM at that point lol). As a note, I don't really know what to do with time travel since it's so weird. The MCU describes time travel as a way that other universes can be constructed, so the TVA is kind of multiversal? On the other hand, maybe you have a universe with alternate timelines as part of its universal package. I'll admit, I'm in over my head on this one, so fit it where you think it makes sense. TL;DR some of the ranks in the 6 rank system are huge jumps in power. Adding more may smooth out progression both mathematically and narratively. I think I can argue easily for an 8 rank system, but I've described what the narrative for a 10 rank system might look like.
The explanation of each Rank through 10 is spot-on, and how the game SHOULD have been structured from the start. Regarding time travel, I mentioned in another video that I hate time travel because it's so complex that nobody ever handles it properly. So I avoid it. I a character like cable is used 8n my campaign, the time travel would be shoet/term or temporary, to maybe re/do a Battle or jump ahead post-battle or something.
Great work! But everyone seems to trip up that this game is NOT about leveling up. If you want to run Origin > Year One > Full Fledged Avenger, that’s fine. But you don’t see every version of Spider-Man trying to become Cosmic Spider-Man. You don’t see Daredevil working out so he can someday arm wrestle the Hulk. The heroes deal with challenges equivalent to their Rank and team up and give it all they got whenever Galactus shows up.
Yes, the Focus of the game is definitely just in enjoying the moment and having fun. However, many players still enjoy leveling up and seeing their characters(especially ones they create) power up with time. With rules missing for resources and extraneous items, etc, the only real way to see this growth is tk rank up, so there are options for those players who would like to do this
It’s an RPG. Leveling up is such a cornerstone of RPGs. True you don’t have to go all the way to cosmic but still. I want to level up to a certain point and i agree their should be special rules in place for bosses and NPCs
I think you're looking at this from the wrong angle. The problem isn't how health points are calculated - it's the bottleneck at rank 6. There just no way Xavier and Magneto are on the same level as Dormammu and Thanos. They should allow cosmic villains to go up to rank 8 or even higher. Dormammu at rank 8 would have 11 more powers. Put 8 into Sturdy 4 and Uncanny 4 (heck, you could houserule those powers even higher), and suddenly Wolverine's +5 melee multiplier is down to 1. Put some of the extra 10 ability points into Resilience and Vigilance for higher hit points, give him two more traits - then he might be a threat. I'm really enjoying you're videos, btw. They've been really helpful in deciding to buy the game.
Thank you so much! Yes, actually the main reason for all the problems I've found so far are because of the bottleneck in Ranks. My friend Logos added a comment under this video explaining a possible house rule for ranking to 10 with examples and explanations. He breaks it down in deep detail! Glad you're enjoying the videos! I'm trying to do one every couple of days while the game is still fresh to get people to focus on these issues when they play, and see if they can offer up their own ideas as well!
Since health doesn't naturally go up with rank, even if you add ranks to add more detail to the hierarchy, you aren't going to see a health difference unless you have these characters put all their extra points into resilience. This is why the main thrust of the project is to have ranks offer solid baseline stats to make them narratively accurate, while allowing stat choice to add variance on top of that. For example, any rank 6 hero PERIOD should be able to take a Thanos punch as a matter of narrative. But that means such a hero probably isn't too worried about being jumped by Daredevil, and this is independent from the hero's resilience stat. More resilience might be the difference between taking a Thanos punch and trading blows with Thanos, but baseline they should be able to eat one punch.
@logos8312 Hard disagree, I'm afraid. Xavier is a rank 6 telepath for a reason, but there's no way he's going to take a punch from Thanos. A few years ago, he couldn't even walk! But my main issue is that you're changing the rules for every character in every game when, from what I've seen, you just need to extrapolate on what's already there to fix the problem characters. Bullets shouldn't hurt Dormammu (from what I've seen of him), but as is, an AIM terrorist could damage him. (If they got a shot in before he squashed them.) More hit points aren't going to change that. At rank 6, you can't do much about that without losing the theme of the character, but bump him up to rank 8, so you can give him more powers (like Sturdy), and he's more like himself. And no extra math is needed.
Apparently, future products will introduce entities that exceed the rank system. I believe they will be described as Rank X and treated as essentially untouchable with standard combat mechanics. Galactus is an example that has been mentioned in this context. This doesn't change the issues identified in the vid, but it's something to keep in mind.
I think the problem also includes an issue of character design. Dormammu has NO damage reduction at all, sort of crazy for a Rank 6 bad guy! While I see the provided Character Templates as useful I intend fully to modify them to fit my campaign. I'll stick to most of the rules but if I need an extra Trait, Power or Ability Score to round out my villains, so be it. I'm experimenting with adding some additional house rule powers to boost defense ... Hardened 1-4 [adds 1-4 levels of Health DR], Mental Fortress 1-4 [adds 1-4 levels of Focus DR], Piercing 1-4 [nullifies Hardened power of same or lower rank] and Undeniable Intellect 1-4 [nullifies Mental Fortress of same or lower rank]. I'm a bit uncomfortable with boosting Health and Focus totals, especially Focus, when reducing damage by a 'super set' of powers might do the trick as well. These new powers let you boost DR and nullify just those DR boosts in a way that links nicely to existing methods. The only issue is the cost of the new powers and Rank requirements. You can also make glass cannons by having characters get DR from Hardened but see them lose it all to a character with the appropriate level of Piercing! You can also blend defenses with say Sturdy 1 and Hardened 2, for Health DR of 3, or 1 if the opponent has Piercing 2. It does mean a character can get 8 levels of DR, making them practically immune to the appropriate damage type but that might be appropriate for characters at that level and if their opponent has 4 levels of the counter power, their DR is halved! I'm also toying with the idea that Fantastic attack results don't double damage, they just add 1 to the Damage Multiplier [which stacks with any other applicable Damage Multipliers.]
Those are some great ideas - I'm waiting for the X-Men Expansion to see if they introduce new powers that can do some of those things - but for my next campaign I would definitely use some of those powers you created there. The game is absolutely missing something to balance out some of the mechanics, and players shouldn't have to homebrew so much on their first play!
@@headlesshammerhead My take is that, although the game provides an outline for character creation, the real focus is to use existing Marvel characters in Marvel adventures. The powers are totally written from that perspective. We get errata on Character stats, when, frankly, a good GM would just tweak them to fit their game without worrying about what the 'official' stat line is. So at this point balance is not really a thing baked into the game, it's baked into the adventures they test & sell.
@@PrimarchX yeah, that's a great point... It is obvious that their goal here is for people to play their favorite existing Marvel characters, but for them to brush off the potential that creating new characters, especially villains, can have is a failure of the highest order
What would happen if I would simply multiply the hp of named enemies by the number of player characters, and maybe double or triple it again for big bosses and campaign bosses, but leave the damage on the same level? Does it sound broken? So for example with an enemy like Thanos if I have 4 players and this fight will be the Endgame I just multiply his HP by 12 (4 for player X 3 for campaign end)
I think that could definitely work... As far as making a boss worthwhile in an adventure... For consistency with power levels, though, be aware that doing it this way would still allow level 1 characters to take down someone like Dormammu with good strategy and with lucky rolls. So if you don't want El3ktra to be able to take down a God, another method may be necessary for those kinds of fights
Fantastic Video. Thank you very much. You are shockingly wrong - adding square math to this game fundamentally misunderstand every goal Matt Forbeck had for the game - to make it accessible to people who do not carry a graphing calculator in their shirt pocket and for the game to move quickly (both goals he achieved and your system would utterly dismantle).
Thank you. As stated in the video, this is one of many possibilities for fixing something that is undoubtedly in need of fixing, as it does not work as intended in its current form. I say in almost all of my videos that the goal of the game is to keep it simple and quick-moving, with a focus on Role-playing rather than mechanics, but there are many crucial details - like Vehicle rules - glaringly Missi g from the Core Rulebook... Scaling combat is unbalanced and does not work as intended, making for a need for house rules. What I present here is simply one of the options members of my play group proposed. There are other rules that we are testing in one-shots that will be videos on their own. Nothing in this video (explicitly stated at 9:00 and other points in the video) is set in stone, everything is a suggestion, and they are not even necessarily the rules I will be using. It's simply a proposed example.
I also did a video on Karma that explains how Karma can be used by heroes and villains to mitigate some of the damage issues. That's another proposal were considering. I have a feeling you haven't yet played an adventure... Once you do, I think you will agree with me that Forbeck didn't QUITE achieve his goal, and a 1.5 or 2nd edition is something that the publisher should consider.
@@headlesshammerhead I have run this game and I love it - I came at you in comment but to be clear I love the game and love your commentary (even though I think you are wrong) - I also think the problem you are talking about is happening in your game and not in mine because I know how to use Interpose and you don't
I also think this is happening because you fear a 15 minute Boss Fight and I am looking for it - you want a 2 hour fight because DND has trained you for it - I will take the 15 minute boss fight and move on and tell the next story - I think you want the 2 hour boss fight because it is a comfort blanket for you and your group (what you are used to)
Very interesting i think i will just give my villains karma equal to rank. And houserule they can use a reaction to do the recovery action. That may simplify it. Thought?
That's definitely a start... But consider that a rank 6 would have 6 karma in that case, and therefore can heal 30 x 6 = 180 total. If you are up against 4 heroes who each deal 50 damage on lucky rolls in the first round... There goes all your karma. Maybe also consider how much you award the villain for monologuing. That's a pretty viable option, too
I'm not sure where the 30 comes from but for recovery action you total the die role and multiply by rank. But does seem like some tweaking may be needed. Of course this is all early speculation 😊 preciate the convo!
Third comment for an easier way we could do this with a lot less math using ideas from our buddy Vase. Instead of complicated formulas, do four things: 1. Add 30 points of health per rank, making the hp formula: 30 x (rank + resilience) + 10. Ditto for focus. Again, if rank + resilience < 0, treat it as 0. 2. For every difference in rank, deduct 1 from your damage multipliers, i.e. if a rank 4 is hitting a rank 6 with an attack, deduct 2 from the damage multiplier of that attack. Remember if the multiplier is 0, the attack deals no damage. This deduction stacks with powers that do the same. 3. Allow villain karma to absorb 30 points of damage, give them 1 per player by default and allow them to add more. 4. Use the 10 rank system I outlined in another comment. Now we can analyze the Wolverine vs Dormamu issue again. Before: Dormamu has 150 hp, Wolverine can crit for: (5 x 6 + 14) x 2 = 88 (this is a basic attack, not using his melee attack abilities which can do substantially more!) Wolverine is critting Dormamu for over half his health. With an ability, easily 2/3 his health. With the changes: After: depends on Dormamu's new rank, I'll call him 9 for simplicity since he does rule his own dimension, but it's more complicated than that. Plausibly a rank 9 character is one expected to tangle with the likes of Dormamu and win, rather than being Dormamu's level. Up to DM narrative. Dormamu's health: 30 x (9 + 5) + 10 = 430, Wolverine crits for: ((5 - 5) x 6 + 14) x 2 = 0 due to no multiplier. This is consistent with the intuition that Wolverine probably wouldn't lay a scratch on Dormamu just due to the kind of being that he is, without some plot armor helping him out (mystical claws or something that would bring his rank up). If Dormamu was treated as rank 8, he would have: 400 hp, Wolverine would crit for: ((5 - 4) x 6 + 14) x 2 = 40 or only 1/10 of his health with a base attack, which again sounds right if Wolverine wanted to attack Dormamu and "hurt him" given the narrative. The system is now really resilient for dealing with high rank difference threats, how well does it do for low rank difference threats? Let's look at the Mandarin example again. Before: Mandarin has 90 hp, Wolverine crits for 88 on a baseline attack (same calculations) almost killing him in one hit. Actually killing him if he uses a skill. Now: Mandarin has 30 x (5 + 3) + 10 = 250 hp, Wolverine crits for ((5 - 1) x 6 + 14) x 2 = 76 on a base attack. But now Mandarin has a karma point to spend to reduce that damage by 30, so he's actually hit for 46. Over 1/5 on a skill use likely but manageable in a party of 4, especially given Mandarin's other abilities. I think all these rules in the system combined should ensure thematically appropriate battles for low and high rank difference villains, allowing the DM greater flexibility over how they can plan out boss fights (avoiding anti-climactic one shots, etc.).
@@headlesshammerhead Thinking about it more today, there is an issue in that lower ranks are hit by this harder than higher ranks. If you have a rank 1 goon with no weapon bonus or power bonus, they just wouldn't be able to hit a rank 2 character, which seems odd. Probably all of them will have a weapon but if the rank 2 character also has sturdy, they're still not getting hit for any damage. Plausibly you might have to decrease the multiplier by 1 every 2 ranks or something. I don't know how I'd fix it.
@@logos8312 Ugh. Yeah, it's a real problem... I really don't know how they went from 25 ranks and increasing stats per Rank in the playtest, to just 6 in the Core Rulebook
@@headlesshammerhead I think they had issues with damage scaling vs health. Imagine heroes with 25x damage multipliers and no scaling health except resilience! Numerically they had to keep the numbers small to keep things manageable. And really it's not the few ranks that makes this problem, it's rank 1 that uniquely makes this problem. Rank 2 fighting 3 drops a 2x multiplier to 1x. Can still hit the enemy. Rank 3 fighting 4: 2x multiplier. Etc. Rank 1 fighting rank 2: 0x multiplier So powers like mighty and weapons are now MANDATORY for rank 1's to deal with rank 2 bosses, and they only get weaker, relatively, after you gain a lot of ranks.
Dormammu has Shield of the Seraphim. This power and other damage reduction abilities/powers should be used and considered as well if you want to ensure your big bad boss doesn't get one shotted. Not sure if that was factored into this or not.
I will use the hp boost but don't know about the damage. But will try both. I was thinking increases every to levels except 5-6. They would increase both level.
Yeah, I'd say that before you start a full campaign, run a couple of one-shots or some Danger Room style battles to see which ones work for you. And test out both low levels and higher levels to get a good range.
Hey everyone! I'm the Logos guy from the vid and I'd like to go over some of the math stuff in more detail with you, and bring all of you into the conversation! The first thing that stood out to me when looking at this, is what the ranks are meant to mean "narratively" for the game. The meanings of the ranks roughly go like this: Rookie -> Street Level (Daredevil) -> City Level (Ms. Marvel) -> Country Level (Black Panther) -> Planetary (Thor) -> Cosmic (Silver Surfer) *Note, these are all examples used from the book (pg. 18). Given Odinforce, Thor could definitely be cosmic level, it's not clear where Galactus ranks if there are only 6 ranks (odd given Silver Surfer is his herald). Lots of issues, but I don't want to focus on that just yet. What is immediately relevant is that the progression is "nonlinear". Protecting a city vs protecting a street is a ton more responsibility (and you know what they say about power vs responsibility!). Protecting a country is far bigger than protecting a city, dido for planetary and cosmic. Despite the nonlinear power / responsibility narratively given to us about rank, we see something odd in the stats which the video pointed out. 1. Damage scales linearly (rank + skill/item mod) x M 2. HP doesn't scale inherently AT ALL So we're expected to believe that these heroes that go from protecting their streets to protecting planets in intergalactic conflicts only linearly grow in power, and take no extra beating whatsoever unless they spend all their time bulking up like Drax? Something is off! If you're an intergalactic protector, you need to take a punch from Thanos every once in a while. If you can take a Thanos punch, you're probably not getting ganked by Daredevil (would you even feel it if he hit you?) At this point, stats need to start matching the narrative, and we have a lot of ways of doing it, but to keep things easy to compute for players, the three basic categories we're going to talk about are polynomial scaling vs exponential scaling vs factorial scaling. Here I'm going to nitpick the video slightly to say that (R + Rank^2) isn't exponential scaling, it's quadratic scaling instead. One one hand this is like a "it's LE-VEE-OOH-SA, NOT LE-VEE-OH-SAA!" point, but I wouldn't bring it up if the discrepancy wasn't super helpful, so let's see how. Polynomial scaling with rank is anything of the form: ar^p + br^p-1 + cr^p-2 + ... + constant; the idea is that you're raising ranks by fixed exponents and adding things together, like in our example involving rank^2. We're fixing a power of 2 and applying that to the rank. Exponential scaling with rank is anything like: b^rank; the idea now is that the rank is being used as an exponent itself rather than having an exponent applied to the rank. "OK Logos that's all very interesting and jargon filled, why do we care?" Great question! To sum up the biggest difference between these two types of progression, and why you'd pick one over the other as a DM in a system like this, it boils down to one simple question: Do you want ranks to represent constant multipliers in growth, diminishing multipliers in growth, or increasing multipliers in growth? What do I mean by multipliers in growth? Let's suppose we want a street level hero to be roughly twice as strong as a rookie (or have 2x power). Let's suppose we want a city hero to be about 2x as strong as a street hero, and so on for country, planetary, etc. If each rank is EXACTLY twice as strong as the old rank, this is where an exponential system will come in handy (that's their job in math). If you give heroes an HP formula like: 30 x 2^(rank-1) (throw resilience in there somewhere) then this means that a hero starts at 30 hp at rank 1 and doubles it every time they rank up, so the base HP progression looks like: 30, 60, 120, 240, 480, 960 This works because assuming Daredevil can hit at about his HP level, (say 40-80 damage usually) a cosmic being like Thanos or Dormamu won't really feel it at all! This is because Thanos, baseline, is roughly 16x Daredevil's strength and that's not getting into Thanos's resilience, etc. So far so good but TL;DR is exponential scaling is for if you want ranks to represent the SAME multiplier in power. What if you want ranks to have relative diminishing returns? The gains you get from going from rookie to street aren't quite the gains you get from going from planetary to cosmic. If that's how you view the system, you'll want to use some kind of polynomial scaling (though you'll want to keep it easy for your players!). To see how this works, let's look at perfect squares. 1^2 = 1, 2^2 = 4, 3^2 = 9, 4^2 = 16, 5^2 = 25, 6^2 = 36 Note that exponential scaling with a base of 2 (2x per rank) has rank 6 at 32x stronger than rank 1, while using squares has rank 6 at 36x stronger than rank 1. If you only have 6 ranks you can make exponential scaling or polynomial scaling end with your heroes being more powerful (just use 3x per rank, or use rank^3 etc. until the end looks right). Because the big difference isn't really where the power level "ends up" what is it? The big difference is that the increases in power happen EARLIER for rank^2 than 2^rank. Going from rank 1 to rank 2 is a 4x multiplier in power, rather than a 2x multiplier in power. Going from rank 2 to rank 3 is a 2.5x multiplier, 3->4 is about a 1.5x multiplier (less than 2x now), etc. The relative scaling between ranks decreases per rank. So you use a system like this if you think most of your power is gained at lower ranks, and tapers off at higher ranks. So the really big question for polynomial vs exponential scaling isn't how low ranks relate to high ranks (either work) but rather how higher ranks relate to each other. In polynomial scaling, a rank 5 is much closer to rank 6 in power than it is for exponential scaling (every previous rank is 1/2 as strong as the next one, no exceptions). The opposite of polynomial scaling is something like factorial scaling. I'm not going to get into the jargon around factorials, because there's a really intuitive way to explain it for people. Let's suppose you want rank 1 -> rank 2 to be a 2x increase in power. You want rank 3 -> rank 4 to be a 3x increase in power, rank 4 - rank 5 is 5x, and so on. Each rank is a BIGGER boost in power than the last. This system, if you increase the multiplier by exactly 1, is a factorial increase. So if the gap between Daredevil and Spiderman is smaller than the gap between Emma Frost and Thanos, then this is the system you might want to use. For a little jargon, the formula for this is: "rank!". The "!" in math is the factorial relationship. And with that, you now have a tool, as a DM to make the scaling nonlinear so it narratively makes sense, with the ability to match it according to your vision of power increase according to what the ranks represent. Constant multiplicative growth: exponential, relative diminishing growth: polynomial, and relative increasing growth: factorial.
Focus probably would need a rehash as well due to its dual "HP" / "Manna" nature, meaning characters need it to use powers and they also need it as health against mental attacks, etc. I will be doing a separate video on Karma and Focus.
@@headlesshammerhead I do have another question when calculating Damage, when you calculated Dormammu damage, for the Modifier x 2, you did 8x2 would that be because of his 4 Melee on top of Mighty 4? Cause Mighty doesn't add to damage if I recall but was wanting to make sure because I am a fan of these changes and your videos, and I look forward to your Focus and Karma video cause I am making a Hack of the Game/System for a Sonic the Hedgehog based game I been meaning to run
@@headlesshammerhead So damage calculation would be: Marvel Die Roll x (Rank[x2] + Multiplier) + (Stat x 2)? So a Rank 4 character with 7 Melee rolls a 5 with Mighty 3 would have something like 5 x (16+3=19) + (7x2=14) for a total of 109 Melee Damage? I do like the propose math and scaling, but the examples are a bit confusion to be honest, then again math isn't my strongest subject😅
Correct. But rank is squared (you did it right in your calculation, but wrote x2). There is an alternative way to avoid all this math, and it's with Karma. That will be in my next video tomorrow!
@logos You should just put a spreadsheet together with what the stats would be for each rank/modifier choice. That would probably make the house rule more palatable for anti-math folks.
@@JScottGaribay Having a list of stats that remove the math under the hood, giving the players no visibility of the math would not help people that don’t like math? Seems sus.
@@NicholasBacon-oh9ju This entire method proposed in this video guarantees that only math wonks will like this game - thinking that a spreadsheet fixes that is ludicrous (and part of the original problem - not understanding that square math guarantees regular people will hate the game is just indefensible)
@@JScottGaribay it’s not ludicrous to think “if your character is this rank with these stats, this is your hp/modifiers” is better than “take this number and do scary math on it” lol. And since the math proposed by the game can cause impossible situations like negative hp, with no safeguarded minimums explicitly indicated, it’s a problem that needs to be addressed.
I think you could scale it down a bit and make it simpler and still get the same results: asking players to do extra math can be problematic. But say you introduced this formula for boss monsters only and then at the end of the formula you slap a /2 for their damage unless it’s a fantastic result. So. Ranked 4 villain rolls a 4 (4 ((4*4)+4)) /2 + modifiers = 40 damage on a single attack before modifiers come into play. Idk maybe something like that to make it easier on the players So in your example dormamu would deal about 176 damage in one attack. Double that on a fantastic. Maybe players character can earn access to that much HP if they get to level 5 or 6. Not sure. Just random ideas. And course cosmic vs cosmic you can do what you’re doing and remove the /2
@@5exp477 yeah, this was one suggestion from one of my players. We tested it but never actually implemented it because it was way too much math and made things very tedious... In a future video I'll talk about how we did it.
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Yeah, I'm not trying to criticize the creators, not try to change the rules(well...), but the combat as it stands WILL prove to be a big problem at higher ranks for sure...
It feels like that this RPG was rushed out, from what I can tell the core rulebook is more so a Player handbook if we compared it to DND. Lots of powerful options for the player, but when we get to the DM side of things, not much tools or options is given, hell not even a sample adventure is bundle in with the main book.
I agree 90%. Everything you said about the book and how it is lacking for the Narrator is exactly right. BUT they had literally almost two years to test, retreat, then a year to analyze the feedback from the Beta testing that they did books for. They definitely weren't rushed. My group figured this out in 3 days.
@@headlesshammerhead True, I forgot about the 2 year long playtest! Yeah so they had plenty of time and got lazy I guess cause this type of stuff would surely have been brought up in playtesting done by the devs, but guess they just wanted to keep things simple with the math at the cost of poor balancing. I am working on tweaks here and there and this videos Def's help. Curios, would this new HP and Damage calculation works well with the Anger Power? And what are your thoughts on the Super-Speed Lightning Actions (aka +1 Action and Reaction) Power?
@@Evendur6748 so Anger just adds a Modifier bonus, which is added after all the multipliers, so it doesn't do much. The big one would be Mighty 1-4, because these add to the multiplier. But I think it still makes sense, because someone like Thor Odinson is a God and should have more powerful strikes, even if he is Rank 5. I don't think it would be too much of a problem, though, even with Mighty 4.
@@Evendur6748 as far as Reaction modifiers, those are also OK, because fast characters are not usually also strong. If there was a fast AND strong like Superman, it would fit in thematically. And reactions could be game changers, like Skulk, for example. That is really a big problem for lower-level characters and for the Narrator because with no limits, it can allow a single PC to avoid ANY physical or direct energy damage every round. I'll review this in another video
@@headlesshammerhead also it's worth noting that if you make the multipliers increase nonlinearly baseline, these modifiers become less meaningful! Accurate 4 at rank 6 would be 32 + 4 (or a 12.5% damage boost) at rank 6 if you have exponential damage scaling (base 2). Accurate 4 at rank 6 would be 36 + 4 (or an 11% damage boost) at rank 6 if you use quadratic damage scaling. As of now, they're basically MUST HAVE powers because if you're only getting 6x from ranks (tops) then adding an extra 4 to that is a 66% increase in power from taking those skills. It goes from being flavorful to mandatory and starts to crowd out bonuses from things like weapons, etc. You shouldn't have to be mighty 4 insane hulk levels of strength to be a good melee fighter. A strong iconic sword (maybe you make one up with a strong modifier to solve the issue?) and good prowess should get you a good chunk of the way there. But the difference between 6 + 2 and 6 + 4 is a roughly 20% damage difference before looking at modifiers (which straighten things out a little but not completely).
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So this is a well made video but I feel like it's singling out one specific example but there are multiple ways to mitigate damage, and wolverine is a bad example because even though he's rank 4, he has a power that specifically allows his damage to be rank 5, so in this system him and Dormammu would in theory be a close fight.
Dormammu has one powerful tool in his belt, Shield of Seraphim, that lets him as a reaction throw up a 20 point shield that blocks all attacks less than 20 damage, and if they exceed 20 damage, the shield is destroyed instead of him taking damage. And it can be triggered as a reaction.
Yes, that is true, but the idea here is that in the context of the comics, Wolverine would never be able to come close to taking down Dormammu. Also, a Battle is usually a team of heroes against the big bad, meaning that yes, he can mitigate the damage from Wolverine, but the other 5 heroes will surely take him out in the first round. He only gets the 1 rwaction
I didn't want to jam all my commentary into one post, because they get quite long as it is. The next issue we ran into, is that narratively certain ranks, as described in the book, feel like bigger leaps in power than others. The way my DM here said it felt to him was something like this:
Rank 1 -> Rank 2: 2x, Rank 2 -> Rank 3: 2x, Rank 3 -> Rank 4: 3x, Rank 4 -> Rank 5: 3x, Rank 5 -> Rank 6: 4x
Trying to math that out, because the multipliers are constants in places and increase in others, it's not quite exponential, nor factorial, it's some crazy thing that probable works best with step functions, and would be hell for players to just calculate easily on a character sheet. An easier fix, and IMO a more narratively satisfying one, is that there are inconsistent jumps in power between ranks, and we can smooth things out if we just add more ranks.
Instead of:
Rookie -> Street -> City -> Country -> Planetary -> Cosmic
I proposed:
Rookie -> Street -> City -> Country -> Globetrotter -> Planetary -> Galactic -> Cosmic
This brings the ranks up to 8, and IMO adds some important narrative distinctions. I think there's a big difference between a character like, say, Black Panther, and Cable (maybe there's a better example). I'm thinking of characters whose stories take them into areas defended by characters for mysterious purposes, with the expectation that they'll get what they come for even if stopped by a regional defender. However this hero may not be strong enough to stop a planetary invasion on their own. That's the idea behind the Globetrotter rank is to allow that niche.
The Galactic rank is for heroes that regularly take part in intergalactic conflicts, but they aren't the kind of beings that the universe bands together to thwart. I'm thinking of heroes like Nova (or maybe Captain Marvel) as compared to cosmic threats like Thanos (w/ some gauntlet assembled) or Galactus (though maybe Galactus needs a rank higher still?).
Adding these ranks makes the scaling, if exponential:
1 -> 2x -> 4x -> 8x -> 16x -> 32x -> 64x -> 128x
vs the DM's intuition of:
1 -> 2x -> 4x -> 12x -> 36x -> 144x
This smooths out progression at each rank while having it end up at "roughly" the same place (144 / 128 = 1.125 so there's a 12.5% difference at the top end). What's worth noting is that book doesn't seem to be going for a tier list ranking of power level (else you'd see weird things like outerversal beings, etc.). The ranks are defined more in terms of what a character's responsibilities are, rather than what they can affect, create, or destroy. The primary purpose of ranks is to figure out what kind of stories it makes sense to tell for that character. With that out of the way, we've been kicking around a 10 rank system (since 10 is a nice round number and all) that would capture this nicely. Here's my best attempt to narratively describe each rank in a system like that:
1. You've recently acquired your powers. You might have to stop a local criminal and save someone's life, or be home before curfew. This is more of a coming of age story about coming to grips with your powers. The book describes this as an "origin story". This rank sounds suited for a "Smallville" like campaign about choosing who to trust in knowing your powers, keeping secrets, while learning to balance life and being a hero.
2. You have the hang of your powers and life / hero balance in general. You have a schedule where you patrol streets, and stopping robberies for you is a regular Tuesday night. Villains might include a new kingpin, corrupt police, and other things that affect your area of patrol, while straining the hero / life balance you thought you had adjusted.
3. You're so experienced at doing the hero thing that you can jump in at a moment's notice, costume at the ready. Wherever you happen to be in the city, that's where you can be called. You stop higher end bank robberies, deal with things like "the Kingpin" himself, provide aid during natural disasters, and stop accidents like train derailments. You've almost given up on a personal life in exchange for the life of a hero, which frees you to deal with bigger plots which can affect large masses of people.
4. You've become so famous that forces like S.H.I.E.L.D can call on your for affairs that affect the whole country. While you may not want to be away from your primary city, you're dealing with threats so massive they'd affect your city too. These may be stories your character takes on permanently, like Captain America or Black Panther, or maybe reluctantly (Spider-Man: Far from Home) but they're regular enough that they're a newly consistent staple in your hero life.
5. You're a hero of such experience that you can combat other notable heroes in order to fulfil certain plot points. We need this artifact from Wakanda to stop a terrible future? The question isn't "if" we're going to beat Black Panther to take it, if necessary, but HOW we're going to beat Black Panther to take it if necessary! If you're a hero, narratively, that can walk into a country and grab what the plot demands, thwarting its heroes, and other support infrastructure, then this rank is where you belong.
6. There's a planetary invasion and the Avengers are off helping Nova Corps secure an infinity stone against another of Thanos's invasions! No big deal. A hero of your stature has the pull and connections to contact remaining heroes, coordinate a defense network, and lead the charge in fighting the invaders head on, either via bombastic powers or strong technology. If traveling to other countries to make contacts, gather things, and so on, are wrote plot points that merely facilitate how you deal with the big bad, rather than being the source of conflict, then this is the rank for you.
7. You're now helping Novacorps fend of Thanos. You travel to, and communicate with, other planets as easily as you used to travel to and communicate with other countries back home. Instead of frantically defending countries against alien invasion, you defend planets, or even solar systems. Your actions turn the tide of battles involving armies formed by multiple planets on either side of a conflict, and your presence makes everyone in the battle take note.
8. You're so trusted by the denizens of the universe itself that you can call on all of them as easily as you coordinate countries to defend the planet against alien invasion. Your role is the Sisyphean task of managing fundamental aspects of nature - things like the infinity stones, or Galactus. If Galactus eats a planet, you have a lot of pull in determining which one (even if he has to be coordinated there by force). If the stones have to be gathered to deal with an extra-dimensional threat, it's you that's trusted to use them and put them back responsibly, because it's you on the front lines with the gauntlet fighting the things that would rip the fabric of the universe asunder.
9. The universe?! You're thinking too small! Don't you know there are other dimensions at stake? At this rank, you're a trusted ambassador to other dimensions. You take part in their conflicts, whose ripple effects would destabilize the universe itself. While you may interact with divine beings, like Eternity, at rank 8, here mingling with them is a regular occurrence.
10. Dimensions are great, but have you heard of the MULTIVERSE? This rank is for people who are called to intervene in multiversal level effects which may bring you into contact with Beyonders, the Living Tribunal, and so on. You may have to deal with multiversal events which could destroy one or more universes in the multiverse, thwart beings who have amassed the powers of their universe (infinity stones +) to wage war on others. Here the intent is that the stakes are so high that the only escalation above you is the Living Tribunal, and - failing that, the One Above All (who is probably your DM at that point lol).
As a note, I don't really know what to do with time travel since it's so weird. The MCU describes time travel as a way that other universes can be constructed, so the TVA is kind of multiversal? On the other hand, maybe you have a universe with alternate timelines as part of its universal package. I'll admit, I'm in over my head on this one, so fit it where you think it makes sense.
TL;DR some of the ranks in the 6 rank system are huge jumps in power. Adding more may smooth out progression both mathematically and narratively. I think I can argue easily for an 8 rank system, but I've described what the narrative for a 10 rank system might look like.
The explanation of each Rank through 10 is spot-on, and how the game SHOULD have been structured from the start.
Regarding time travel, I mentioned in another video that I hate time travel because it's so complex that nobody ever handles it properly. So I avoid it. I a character like cable is used 8n my campaign, the time travel would be shoet/term or temporary, to maybe re/do a Battle or jump ahead post-battle or something.
Great work! But everyone seems to trip up that this game is NOT about leveling up. If you want to run Origin > Year One > Full Fledged Avenger, that’s fine. But you don’t see every version of Spider-Man trying to become Cosmic Spider-Man. You don’t see Daredevil working out so he can someday arm wrestle the Hulk. The heroes deal with challenges equivalent to their Rank and team up and give it all they got whenever Galactus shows up.
Yes, the Focus of the game is definitely just in enjoying the moment and having fun. However, many players still enjoy leveling up and seeing their characters(especially ones they create) power up with time. With rules missing for resources and extraneous items, etc, the only real way to see this growth is tk rank up, so there are options for those players who would like to do this
It’s an RPG. Leveling up is such a cornerstone of RPGs. True you don’t have to go all the way to cosmic but still. I want to level up to a certain point and i agree their should be special rules in place for bosses and NPCs
Awesome. Thanks for the background details. It breaks it down for anyone who wants to explore further than what I touch on in the video
Absolutely good pooints!
Thanks! Glad you think so!
You videos are very entertaining.
Thanks! I spend s lot of time on them!
I think you're looking at this from the wrong angle. The problem isn't how health points are calculated - it's the bottleneck at rank 6. There just no way Xavier and Magneto are on the same level as Dormammu and Thanos. They should allow cosmic villains to go up to rank 8 or even higher. Dormammu at rank 8 would have 11 more powers. Put 8 into Sturdy 4 and Uncanny 4 (heck, you could houserule those powers even higher), and suddenly Wolverine's +5 melee multiplier is down to 1. Put some of the extra 10 ability points into Resilience and Vigilance for higher hit points, give him two more traits - then he might be a threat.
I'm really enjoying you're videos, btw. They've been really helpful in deciding to buy the game.
Thank you so much! Yes, actually the main reason for all the problems I've found so far are because of the bottleneck in Ranks. My friend Logos added a comment under this video explaining a possible house rule for ranking to 10 with examples and explanations. He breaks it down in deep detail!
Glad you're enjoying the videos! I'm trying to do one every couple of days while the game is still fresh to get people to focus on these issues when they play, and see if they can offer up their own ideas as well!
Since health doesn't naturally go up with rank, even if you add ranks to add more detail to the hierarchy, you aren't going to see a health difference unless you have these characters put all their extra points into resilience. This is why the main thrust of the project is to have ranks offer solid baseline stats to make them narratively accurate, while allowing stat choice to add variance on top of that. For example, any rank 6 hero PERIOD should be able to take a Thanos punch as a matter of narrative. But that means such a hero probably isn't too worried about being jumped by Daredevil, and this is independent from the hero's resilience stat. More resilience might be the difference between taking a Thanos punch and trading blows with Thanos, but baseline they should be able to eat one punch.
@logos8312 Hard disagree, I'm afraid. Xavier is a rank 6 telepath for a reason, but there's no way he's going to take a punch from Thanos. A few years ago, he couldn't even walk! But my main issue is that you're changing the rules for every character in every game when, from what I've seen, you just need to extrapolate on what's already there to fix the problem characters. Bullets shouldn't hurt Dormammu (from what I've seen of him), but as is, an AIM terrorist could damage him. (If they got a shot in before he squashed them.) More hit points aren't going to change that. At rank 6, you can't do much about that without losing the theme of the character, but bump him up to rank 8, so you can give him more powers (like Sturdy), and he's more like himself. And no extra math is needed.
@@a.l.dowdall1097 yeah, Logos put a sample 10-rank summary in another thread. I will create one in pdf and make it analysis for download at my store
Apparently, future products will introduce entities that exceed the rank system. I believe they will be described as Rank X and treated as essentially untouchable with standard combat mechanics. Galactus is an example that has been mentioned in this context. This doesn't change the issues identified in the vid, but it's something to keep in mind.
I think I would really like this game.
Yes!
I think the problem also includes an issue of character design. Dormammu has NO damage reduction at all, sort of crazy for a Rank 6 bad guy! While I see the provided Character Templates as useful I intend fully to modify them to fit my campaign. I'll stick to most of the rules but if I need an extra Trait, Power or Ability Score to round out my villains, so be it.
I'm experimenting with adding some additional house rule powers to boost defense ... Hardened 1-4 [adds 1-4 levels of Health DR], Mental Fortress 1-4 [adds 1-4 levels of Focus DR], Piercing 1-4 [nullifies Hardened power of same or lower rank] and Undeniable Intellect 1-4 [nullifies Mental Fortress of same or lower rank].
I'm a bit uncomfortable with boosting Health and Focus totals, especially Focus, when reducing damage by a 'super set' of powers might do the trick as well. These new powers let you boost DR and nullify just those DR boosts in a way that links nicely to existing methods. The only issue is the cost of the new powers and Rank requirements.
You can also make glass cannons by having characters get DR from Hardened but see them lose it all to a character with the appropriate level of Piercing! You can also blend defenses with say Sturdy 1 and Hardened 2, for Health DR of 3, or 1 if the opponent has Piercing 2. It does mean a character can get 8 levels of DR, making them practically immune to the appropriate damage type but that might be appropriate for characters at that level and if their opponent has 4 levels of the counter power, their DR is halved!
I'm also toying with the idea that Fantastic attack results don't double damage, they just add 1 to the Damage Multiplier [which stacks with any other applicable Damage Multipliers.]
Those are some great ideas - I'm waiting for the X-Men Expansion to see if they introduce new powers that can do some of those things - but for my next campaign I would definitely use some of those powers you created there.
The game is absolutely missing something to balance out some of the mechanics, and players shouldn't have to homebrew so much on their first play!
@@headlesshammerhead My take is that, although the game provides an outline for character creation, the real focus is to use existing Marvel characters in Marvel adventures. The powers are totally written from that perspective. We get errata on Character stats, when, frankly, a good GM would just tweak them to fit their game without worrying about what the 'official' stat line is. So at this point balance is not really a thing baked into the game, it's baked into the adventures they test & sell.
@@PrimarchX yeah, that's a great point... It is obvious that their goal here is for people to play their favorite existing Marvel characters, but for them to brush off the potential that creating new characters, especially villains, can have is a failure of the highest order
What would happen if I would simply multiply the hp of named enemies by the number of player characters, and maybe double or triple it again for big bosses and campaign bosses, but leave the damage on the same level? Does it sound broken? So for example with an enemy like Thanos if I have 4 players and this fight will be the Endgame I just multiply his HP by 12 (4 for player X 3 for campaign end)
I think that could definitely work... As far as making a boss worthwhile in an adventure... For consistency with power levels, though, be aware that doing it this way would still allow level 1 characters to take down someone like Dormammu with good strategy and with lucky rolls. So if you don't want El3ktra to be able to take down a God, another method may be necessary for those kinds of fights
Fantastic Video. Thank you very much. You are shockingly wrong - adding square math to this game fundamentally misunderstand every goal Matt Forbeck had for the game - to make it accessible to people who do not carry a graphing calculator in their shirt pocket and for the game to move quickly (both goals he achieved and your system would utterly dismantle).
He did not achieve it - there are contradictions in the math that cause a need for a new calculation. So where’s the achievement?
Thank you. As stated in the video, this is one of many possibilities for fixing something that is undoubtedly in need of fixing, as it does not work as intended in its current form.
I say in almost all of my videos that the goal of the game is to keep it simple and quick-moving, with a focus on Role-playing rather than mechanics, but there are many crucial details - like Vehicle rules - glaringly Missi g from the Core Rulebook... Scaling combat is unbalanced and does not work as intended, making for a need for house rules. What I present here is simply one of the options members of my play group proposed. There are other rules that we are testing in one-shots that will be videos on their own.
Nothing in this video (explicitly stated at 9:00 and other points in the video) is set in stone, everything is a suggestion, and they are not even necessarily the rules I will be using. It's simply a proposed example.
I also did a video on Karma that explains how Karma can be used by heroes and villains to mitigate some of the damage issues. That's another proposal were considering.
I have a feeling you haven't yet played an adventure... Once you do, I think you will agree with me that Forbeck didn't QUITE achieve his goal, and a 1.5 or 2nd edition is something that the publisher should consider.
@@headlesshammerhead I have run this game and I love it - I came at you in comment but to be clear I love the game and love your commentary (even though I think you are wrong) - I also think the problem you are talking about is happening in your game and not in mine because I know how to use Interpose and you don't
I also think this is happening because you fear a 15 minute Boss Fight and I am looking for it - you want a 2 hour fight because DND has trained you for it - I will take the 15 minute boss fight and move on and tell the next story - I think you want the 2 hour boss fight because it is a comfort blanket for you and your group (what you are used to)
Very interesting i think i will just give my villains karma equal to rank. And houserule they can use a reaction to do the recovery action. That may simplify it. Thought?
That's definitely a start... But consider that a rank 6 would have 6 karma in that case, and therefore can heal 30 x 6 = 180 total. If you are up against 4 heroes who each deal 50 damage on lucky rolls in the first round... There goes all your karma. Maybe also consider how much you award the villain for monologuing. That's a pretty viable option, too
I'm not sure where the 30 comes from but for recovery action you total the die role and multiply by rank. But does seem like some tweaking may be needed. Of course this is all early speculation 😊 preciate the convo!
Third comment for an easier way we could do this with a lot less math using ideas from our buddy Vase. Instead of complicated formulas, do four things:
1. Add 30 points of health per rank, making the hp formula: 30 x (rank + resilience) + 10. Ditto for focus. Again, if rank + resilience < 0, treat it as 0.
2. For every difference in rank, deduct 1 from your damage multipliers, i.e. if a rank 4 is hitting a rank 6 with an attack, deduct 2 from the damage multiplier of that attack. Remember if the multiplier is 0, the attack deals no damage. This deduction stacks with powers that do the same.
3. Allow villain karma to absorb 30 points of damage, give them 1 per player by default and allow them to add more.
4. Use the 10 rank system I outlined in another comment.
Now we can analyze the Wolverine vs Dormamu issue again.
Before: Dormamu has 150 hp, Wolverine can crit for: (5 x 6 + 14) x 2 = 88 (this is a basic attack, not using his melee attack abilities which can do substantially more!)
Wolverine is critting Dormamu for over half his health. With an ability, easily 2/3 his health. With the changes:
After: depends on Dormamu's new rank, I'll call him 9 for simplicity since he does rule his own dimension, but it's more complicated than that. Plausibly a rank 9 character is one expected to tangle with the likes of Dormamu and win, rather than being Dormamu's level. Up to DM narrative.
Dormamu's health: 30 x (9 + 5) + 10 = 430, Wolverine crits for: ((5 - 5) x 6 + 14) x 2 = 0 due to no multiplier. This is consistent with the intuition that Wolverine probably wouldn't lay a scratch on Dormamu just due to the kind of being that he is, without some plot armor helping him out (mystical claws or something that would bring his rank up).
If Dormamu was treated as rank 8, he would have: 400 hp, Wolverine would crit for: ((5 - 4) x 6 + 14) x 2 = 40 or only 1/10 of his health with a base attack, which again sounds right if Wolverine wanted to attack Dormamu and "hurt him" given the narrative. The system is now really resilient for dealing with high rank difference threats, how well does it do for low rank difference threats? Let's look at the Mandarin example again.
Before: Mandarin has 90 hp, Wolverine crits for 88 on a baseline attack (same calculations) almost killing him in one hit. Actually killing him if he uses a skill.
Now: Mandarin has 30 x (5 + 3) + 10 = 250 hp, Wolverine crits for ((5 - 1) x 6 + 14) x 2 = 76 on a base attack. But now Mandarin has a karma point to spend to reduce that damage by 30, so he's actually hit for 46. Over 1/5 on a skill use likely but manageable in a party of 4, especially given Mandarin's other abilities.
I think all these rules in the system combined should ensure thematically appropriate battles for low and high rank difference villains, allowing the DM greater flexibility over how they can plan out boss fights (avoiding anti-climactic one shots, etc.).
Yeah this is definitely a good possible alternative fix
@@headlesshammerhead Thinking about it more today, there is an issue in that lower ranks are hit by this harder than higher ranks.
If you have a rank 1 goon with no weapon bonus or power bonus, they just wouldn't be able to hit a rank 2 character, which seems odd. Probably all of them will have a weapon but if the rank 2 character also has sturdy, they're still not getting hit for any damage.
Plausibly you might have to decrease the multiplier by 1 every 2 ranks or something. I don't know how I'd fix it.
@@logos8312 Ugh. Yeah, it's a real problem... I really don't know how they went from 25 ranks and increasing stats per Rank in the playtest, to just 6 in the Core Rulebook
@@headlesshammerhead I think they had issues with damage scaling vs health. Imagine heroes with 25x damage multipliers and no scaling health except resilience!
Numerically they had to keep the numbers small to keep things manageable. And really it's not the few ranks that makes this problem, it's rank 1 that uniquely makes this problem.
Rank 2 fighting 3 drops a 2x multiplier to 1x. Can still hit the enemy.
Rank 3 fighting 4: 2x multiplier.
Etc.
Rank 1 fighting rank 2: 0x multiplier
So powers like mighty and weapons are now MANDATORY for rank 1's to deal with rank 2 bosses, and they only get weaker, relatively, after you gain a lot of ranks.
Dormammu has Shield of the Seraphim. This power and other damage reduction abilities/powers should be used and considered as well if you want to ensure your big bad boss doesn't get one shotted. Not sure if that was factored into this or not.
I will use the hp boost but don't know about the damage. But will try both. I was thinking increases every to levels except 5-6. They would increase both level.
Yeah, I'd say that before you start a full campaign, run a couple of one-shots or some Danger Room style battles to see which ones work for you. And test out both low levels and higher levels to get a good range.
You guys did a great job. I will try a couple one shots.@@headlesshammerhead
@@josetavares135 thank you so much
Hey everyone! I'm the Logos guy from the vid and I'd like to go over some of the math stuff in more detail with you, and bring all of you into the conversation!
The first thing that stood out to me when looking at this, is what the ranks are meant to mean "narratively" for the game. The meanings of the ranks roughly go like this:
Rookie -> Street Level (Daredevil) -> City Level (Ms. Marvel) -> Country Level (Black Panther) -> Planetary (Thor) -> Cosmic (Silver Surfer)
*Note, these are all examples used from the book (pg. 18). Given Odinforce, Thor could definitely be cosmic level, it's not clear where Galactus ranks if there are only 6 ranks (odd given Silver Surfer is his herald). Lots of issues, but I don't want to focus on that just yet. What is immediately relevant is that the progression is "nonlinear". Protecting a city vs protecting a street is a ton more responsibility (and you know what they say about power vs responsibility!). Protecting a country is far bigger than protecting a city, dido for planetary and cosmic. Despite the nonlinear power / responsibility narratively given to us about rank, we see something odd in the stats which the video pointed out.
1. Damage scales linearly (rank + skill/item mod) x M
2. HP doesn't scale inherently AT ALL
So we're expected to believe that these heroes that go from protecting their streets to protecting planets in intergalactic conflicts only linearly grow in power, and take no extra beating whatsoever unless they spend all their time bulking up like Drax? Something is off! If you're an intergalactic protector, you need to take a punch from Thanos every once in a while. If you can take a Thanos punch, you're probably not getting ganked by Daredevil (would you even feel it if he hit you?)
At this point, stats need to start matching the narrative, and we have a lot of ways of doing it, but to keep things easy to compute for players, the three basic categories we're going to talk about are polynomial scaling vs exponential scaling vs factorial scaling. Here I'm going to nitpick the video slightly to say that (R + Rank^2) isn't exponential scaling, it's quadratic scaling instead. One one hand this is like a "it's LE-VEE-OOH-SA, NOT LE-VEE-OH-SAA!" point, but I wouldn't bring it up if the discrepancy wasn't super helpful, so let's see how.
Polynomial scaling with rank is anything of the form: ar^p + br^p-1 + cr^p-2 + ... + constant; the idea is that you're raising ranks by fixed exponents and adding things together, like in our example involving rank^2. We're fixing a power of 2 and applying that to the rank.
Exponential scaling with rank is anything like: b^rank; the idea now is that the rank is being used as an exponent itself rather than having an exponent applied to the rank.
"OK Logos that's all very interesting and jargon filled, why do we care?" Great question! To sum up the biggest difference between these two types of progression, and why you'd pick one over the other as a DM in a system like this, it boils down to one simple question: Do you want ranks to represent constant multipliers in growth, diminishing multipliers in growth, or increasing multipliers in growth?
What do I mean by multipliers in growth? Let's suppose we want a street level hero to be roughly twice as strong as a rookie (or have 2x power). Let's suppose we want a city hero to be about 2x as strong as a street hero, and so on for country, planetary, etc. If each rank is EXACTLY twice as strong as the old rank, this is where an exponential system will come in handy (that's their job in math).
If you give heroes an HP formula like: 30 x 2^(rank-1) (throw resilience in there somewhere) then this means that a hero starts at 30 hp at rank 1 and doubles it every time they rank up, so the base HP progression looks like: 30, 60, 120, 240, 480, 960
This works because assuming Daredevil can hit at about his HP level, (say 40-80 damage usually) a cosmic being like Thanos or Dormamu won't really feel it at all! This is because Thanos, baseline, is roughly 16x Daredevil's strength and that's not getting into Thanos's resilience, etc. So far so good but TL;DR is exponential scaling is for if you want ranks to represent the SAME multiplier in power.
What if you want ranks to have relative diminishing returns? The gains you get from going from rookie to street aren't quite the gains you get from going from planetary to cosmic. If that's how you view the system, you'll want to use some kind of polynomial scaling (though you'll want to keep it easy for your players!). To see how this works, let's look at perfect squares.
1^2 = 1, 2^2 = 4, 3^2 = 9, 4^2 = 16, 5^2 = 25, 6^2 = 36
Note that exponential scaling with a base of 2 (2x per rank) has rank 6 at 32x stronger than rank 1, while using squares has rank 6 at 36x stronger than rank 1. If you only have 6 ranks you can make exponential scaling or polynomial scaling end with your heroes being more powerful (just use 3x per rank, or use rank^3 etc. until the end looks right). Because the big difference isn't really where the power level "ends up" what is it? The big difference is that the increases in power happen EARLIER for rank^2 than 2^rank.
Going from rank 1 to rank 2 is a 4x multiplier in power, rather than a 2x multiplier in power. Going from rank 2 to rank 3 is a 2.5x multiplier, 3->4 is about a 1.5x multiplier (less than 2x now), etc. The relative scaling between ranks decreases per rank. So you use a system like this if you think most of your power is gained at lower ranks, and tapers off at higher ranks. So the really big question for polynomial vs exponential scaling isn't how low ranks relate to high ranks (either work) but rather how higher ranks relate to each other. In polynomial scaling, a rank 5 is much closer to rank 6 in power than it is for exponential scaling (every previous rank is 1/2 as strong as the next one, no exceptions).
The opposite of polynomial scaling is something like factorial scaling. I'm not going to get into the jargon around factorials, because there's a really intuitive way to explain it for people. Let's suppose you want rank 1 -> rank 2 to be a 2x increase in power. You want rank 3 -> rank 4 to be a 3x increase in power, rank 4 - rank 5 is 5x, and so on. Each rank is a BIGGER boost in power than the last. This system, if you increase the multiplier by exactly 1, is a factorial increase. So if the gap between Daredevil and Spiderman is smaller than the gap between Emma Frost and Thanos, then this is the system you might want to use.
For a little jargon, the formula for this is: "rank!". The "!" in math is the factorial relationship.
And with that, you now have a tool, as a DM to make the scaling nonlinear so it narratively makes sense, with the ability to match it according to your vision of power increase according to what the ranks represent. Constant multiplicative growth: exponential, relative diminishing growth: polynomial, and relative increasing growth: factorial.
Curios, would Focus be calculated any different or just Vigilance x 30 as normal?
Focus probably would need a rehash as well due to its dual "HP" / "Manna" nature, meaning characters need it to use powers and they also need it as health against mental attacks, etc.
I will be doing a separate video on Karma and Focus.
@@headlesshammerhead I do have another question when calculating Damage, when you calculated Dormammu damage, for the Modifier x 2, you did 8x2 would that be because of his 4 Melee on top of Mighty 4? Cause Mighty doesn't add to damage if I recall but was wanting to make sure because I am a fan of these changes and your videos, and I look forward to your Focus and Karma video cause I am making a Hack of the Game/System for a Sonic the Hedgehog based game I been meaning to run
It was a mistake. It should actually be Marvel Die x 10 and the Modifier should be +4.
Mighty adds to the multiplier, so the 10 includes that
@@headlesshammerhead So damage calculation would be: Marvel Die Roll x (Rank[x2] + Multiplier) + (Stat x 2)?
So a Rank 4 character with 7 Melee rolls a 5 with Mighty 3 would have something like 5 x (16+3=19) + (7x2=14) for a total of 109 Melee Damage?
I do like the propose math and scaling, but the examples are a bit confusion to be honest, then again math isn't my strongest subject😅
Correct. But rank is squared (you did it right in your calculation, but wrote x2).
There is an alternative way to avoid all this math, and it's with Karma. That will be in my next video tomorrow!
@logos
You should just put a spreadsheet together with what the stats would be for each rank/modifier choice. That would probably make the house rule more palatable for anti-math folks.
Yeah, I may do that and put it up with the other documents I've created for download...
It would not.
@@JScottGaribay Having a list of stats that remove the math under the hood, giving the players no visibility of the math would not help people that don’t like math? Seems sus.
@@NicholasBacon-oh9ju This entire method proposed in this video guarantees that only math wonks will like this game - thinking that a spreadsheet fixes that is ludicrous (and part of the original problem - not understanding that square math guarantees regular people will hate the game is just indefensible)
@@JScottGaribay it’s not ludicrous to think “if your character is this rank with these stats, this is your hp/modifiers” is better than “take this number and do scary math on it” lol. And since the math proposed by the game can cause impossible situations like negative hp, with no safeguarded minimums explicitly indicated, it’s a problem that needs to be addressed.
I think you could scale it down a bit and make it simpler and still get the same results: asking players to do extra math can be problematic.
But say you introduced this formula for boss monsters only and then at the end of the formula you slap a /2 for their damage unless it’s a fantastic result.
So. Ranked 4 villain rolls a 4
(4 ((4*4)+4)) /2 + modifiers = 40 damage on a single attack before modifiers come into play. Idk maybe something like that to make it easier on the players
So in your example dormamu would deal about 176 damage in one attack. Double that on a fantastic.
Maybe players character can earn access to that much HP if they get to level 5 or 6. Not sure. Just random ideas. And course cosmic vs cosmic you can do what you’re doing and remove the /2
Also you would need to change healing and regen rules. Maybe add new power that double them or Square you’re healing / regen
@@5exp477 yeah, this was one suggestion from one of my players. We tested it but never actually implemented it because it was way too much math and made things very tedious... In a future video I'll talk about how we did it.
Yea well the GM would have to do it that way. Thats what I mean. Like only the GM would be doing that math. It is a a bit though yea
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Oh man, this might stir up some controversy!
Yeah, I'm not trying to criticize the creators, not try to change the rules(well...), but the combat as it stands WILL prove to be a big problem at higher ranks for sure...
This game needs a lot more work
Yes, definitely so.
Mannamu 11:18
Ah, yes. The very formidable Mannanu. The son of Mork and Dormammu.
Seems very complicated...
Just jump to 8:56 and Review the summary of the changes. It's not too bad
Cool But Why The Ugly Ai ``Art´´
@@thesmilyguyguy9799 hi thanks for the comment. I can't afford to pay an artist to use their art, and since I don't wanna steal original art, I use AI
@@headlesshammerhead Just Uess Art For The Comics???
[No Hate]
@@thesmilyguyguy9799 if I don't pay the artist royalties, then it's stealing
@@headlesshammerhead ok Kinda Get Your Point
@@thesmilyguyguy9799 yeah, I'm an artist also and I would prefer someone use AI than my art without my permission or royalties
It feels like that this RPG was rushed out, from what I can tell the core rulebook is more so a Player handbook if we compared it to DND.
Lots of powerful options for the player, but when we get to the DM side of things, not much tools or options is given, hell not even a sample adventure is bundle in with the main book.
I agree 90%. Everything you said about the book and how it is lacking for the Narrator is exactly right. BUT they had literally almost two years to test, retreat, then a year to analyze the feedback from the Beta testing that they did books for. They definitely weren't rushed. My group figured this out in 3 days.
@@headlesshammerhead True, I forgot about the 2 year long playtest! Yeah so they had plenty of time and got lazy I guess cause this type of stuff would surely have been brought up in playtesting done by the devs, but guess they just wanted to keep things simple with the math at the cost of poor balancing.
I am working on tweaks here and there and this videos Def's help. Curios, would this new HP and Damage calculation works well with the Anger Power? And what are your thoughts on the Super-Speed Lightning Actions (aka +1 Action and Reaction) Power?
@@Evendur6748 so Anger just adds a Modifier bonus, which is added after all the multipliers, so it doesn't do much. The big one would be Mighty 1-4, because these add to the multiplier. But I think it still makes sense, because someone like Thor Odinson is a God and should have more powerful strikes, even if he is Rank 5. I don't think it would be too much of a problem, though, even with Mighty 4.
@@Evendur6748 as far as Reaction modifiers, those are also OK, because fast characters are not usually also strong. If there was a fast AND strong like Superman, it would fit in thematically. And reactions could be game changers, like Skulk, for example. That is really a big problem for lower-level characters and for the Narrator because with no limits, it can allow a single PC to avoid ANY physical or direct energy damage every round. I'll review this in another video
@@headlesshammerhead also it's worth noting that if you make the multipliers increase nonlinearly baseline, these modifiers become less meaningful!
Accurate 4 at rank 6 would be 32 + 4 (or a 12.5% damage boost) at rank 6 if you have exponential damage scaling (base 2).
Accurate 4 at rank 6 would be 36 + 4 (or an 11% damage boost) at rank 6 if you use quadratic damage scaling.
As of now, they're basically MUST HAVE powers because if you're only getting 6x from ranks (tops) then adding an extra 4 to that is a 66% increase in power from taking those skills. It goes from being flavorful to mandatory and starts to crowd out bonuses from things like weapons, etc. You shouldn't have to be mighty 4 insane hulk levels of strength to be a good melee fighter. A strong iconic sword (maybe you make one up with a strong modifier to solve the issue?) and good prowess should get you a good chunk of the way there. But the difference between 6 + 2 and 6 + 4 is a roughly 20% damage difference before looking at modifiers (which straighten things out a little but not completely).