Well, in the comics (which V&V simulates), some heroes COULD attack while non-corporeal.  The Vision would frequently use his eyebeams while ghostly, and Phantom Girl from the Legion would punch through a solid object, and hit a dude, all while in phantom form (by solidifying her fist at just the right moment).

But it was always hard for me to buy Hawkeye (say) hitting Kitty Pryde WITH A NORMAL ARROW because he was so accurate, he could hit a ghost...

True, Vision also had that 'forehead gem' that he used as well. :)

But in the comics the Vision wouldn't simply go non corporeal permanently and then level the playing field with eye beams, which is what a player would do. *Laughs*

So making it possible to hit him (albeit with a minus) is perhaps more game balancing?

Ahhhhh the dreaded "non-corporeal" rule discussion.....that one is always a tough call. Making it so non-corporeal is a perfect defense is risky because then it becomes the uber-power, making it so that the person possessing it is completely invulnerable in combat. I suppose there can always be certain attacks that non-corporealness doesn't protect against such as mental attacks (emotion control, mind control, certain psionic attacks) but no one wants to feel utterly ineffective in a fight. A compromise would be to make it always possible to hit someone with non-corporealness on a natural 1 on the die roll. That could be represented by catching the target in a miniscule moment when they are corporeal, perhaps right before or after they launch a physical attack. Definitely an area that I have seen debated many times...

  Yeah, I like the idea of a Non-corporeal character being able to be caught by someone when their concentration has waned for just a second, and the attack- through luck or skill- is able to hit 'em fair and square.

I even like the "comic booky-ness" of it.

EDIT:  Doh!  Just went to the game this character (incipient) is from to get his stats and stuff- and my access as a character had been deleted!

Luckily I had posted it in another game, but if not...!

It really made me appreciative of this format.

Well done Guardian, well done!
This message was last edited by the player at 12:14, Sun 27 Nov 2011.

In reply to Incipient (msg #8):

Yeah Stormstrike's write-up went bye-bye as well! Fortunately I was able to pull everything except his chainmail write-up from the Character Creation thread. I am definitely missing playing V&V!

Wow that is a drag. The GM removed all the characters. The character creation thread is still there. So anyone with characters in that game should go and grab what they can from the character creation thread.

In reply to The Guardian (msg #10):

I'm not sure it was the GM. It looks like they haven't been on the game since August.  It might be some type on inactivity thing, especially since the site update.

I went and grabbed my other guy from the "They Might Be Random" game just in case that's what is going on.

Let me know if you still have a character name to add. Let's see if we can't reruit the rest of the VnV players who have particpated in games on RPOL.

It's interesting that the new RPOL server keeps popping up the games I unsub'd from, but I got promoted to GM & then the GM dropped out & instead of working well, I didn't have full access & we wound up moving to a completely different forum -- but w/o all the previous posts!  Owww, basically this was a critical hit on that game.

As for Hawkeye shooting the non-corporeal hero/villain, I say 'Heck yes he does!'  Maybe the person had 'phased in' for a second, or whatever.

But I'm only talking about Hawkeye, b/c you have to give props to the guy running around with a bow & arrows fighting with Thor, Hulk, Iron Man, Giant Man, Vision, Scarlet Witch, etc.
:D

Forgot to ask -- Just started a player (this one) with "Dimensional Travel" (option 3) power.

What I am slightly confused by is: can Element Zero jump from one place to another in this reality, or just from the same place back to the same place on this reality?

Is this open to debate/discussion?

Kitty Pryde is phased out and throwing plates from the cupboard at Hawkeye for not putting the milk away. Hawkeye gets angry and shoots a normal arrow, but the roll to hit indicates success. The GM decrees that the arrow went through Kitty, and slammed into the wall receptacle causing Kitty to take damage from the sudden arcing. Or maybe the arrow had such velocity that air friction caused it to be hot enough to do damage from the heat.
That's the GM's job. Make stuff up to describe the results as indicated by game mechanics, dice rolls, and player actions.
Like the Dimensional Travel question, one of the first players in the game I've got on here had the ability to travel to and from an alternate dimension. The GM decided that the particular dimension did not directly correlate as far as time and distance. Basically, one could stick an ice cube in that dimension while they were standing in New York, then spend the day traveling to LA by train, then retrieve the ice cube. Time did not flow in the alternate dimension and distance was multiplied by an enormous amount. However, the GM made this choice in order to deliver more utility to the character. If the character seemed a good fit in the game without this advantage, the GM could have ruled that there was only one place in the alternate dimension so that was the only place you could step in to or out of. Which would mean it would be useless for travel purposes.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:09, Fri 09 Dec 2011.

Maybe have two kinds of noncorporeal.

A The same as the book.

B Reworked so that the can't attack like they can with A but they are unhittable for some the powers that can now affect them.

Had a player who had ethereal but wanted to be able to physically move stuff.
I disputed (as GM).
Next char idea was a out of body travel w/same thing; wanted to be physically able to do stuff.

I try to be flexible as a GM, but players who only want to find the flawed rule(s) and exploit those get me annoyed.

(However I still chuckle about my friend's Half-Orc Physical Adept in Shadowrun that could throw stars way deadlier than people shot bullets!!)

So, apart from the attached game mechanics, what is the difference between an Android Body and a Robot Body?

Eh?  when you say "attached", are you saying the rules in the book?

Robot Body gives extra weight (2-5x) & 2d10 Str and an extra 'Device' power, plus can regain power from Electricity, and less likely to go to sleep.

Android gives 2d10 End bonus + Body Power.

Both Android & Robot Body have to be repaired, not healed.

Another similar power -- Bionics -- can give a player 1 - 6 (!!!) extra powers, as Ebony Reaper has, which the player & GM create.

Does that help, or are you looking for something else?

No no.   I mean ignore the rules, ignore the game mechanics.

Conceptually; what's the difference?  what is the difference between an android and a robot, on a creative writing/roleplaying level?

I think androids appear more human.

An example (if you know Marvel comics) could be "The Vision" (android) and Ultron (robot).  Or Data (from Star Trek) is another android.

The main idea is that androids often are concerned with what it means to be alive, and they may have biological needs and emotions.

Robots generally have very different goals/aspirations, generally none having to do with biological envy and inquiry.  Not a ton of examples of this that I can think of (Red Tornado from DC comics);  Asimov had the sentient robots with the positronic brains which have rules about their behaviors.  I also recently read Robopocalypse which had AI's which bring many independent robots to 'life'.

Generally the robots seem concerned with their own independence, logic, they have some 'software or hardware' defined goals/missions, possibly rules they must obey, etc.

The main issues I'd see in roleplaying them would be:
Androids -- what does it mean to be a 'unique' biological creature, 'who am I' question, plus relationships
Robots -- fulfilling their mission programming, bypassing their programming, (not) relating to biologicals, etc.

Don't forget some of the most famous androids of film!

The Bladerunner androids (Extremely well done), and the Android that goes crazy in Aliens.

I think generally the concept is that Androids are made to be human replicas while Robots are machines, built to do tasks.

It's possible to bend the ideas a bit (Touken has done this very well in the "Battle for the Bay" game), but I think that is the difference in a nut shell.

Great.  That all makes a lot of sense.  Thank you all, for your contributions; I really like the flavor difference that you have given me there.

Yeah, I would hold up two examples from sci-fi shows... Data is an Android... the Robot from Lost in Space is, well, a Robot.  :)

I guess you could say that Robots tend to be metal and obviously mechanical... while Androids, while not 100% HUMAN appearing always, are more "human-like" or organic. Robots are machines; Androids are artificial people.

The problem I seem to have is, I'm unlucky with online dice servers.

Like, all of them.

Literally I can be rolling 1's and 2's in a D&D game and 17's and 18's in V&V.  Why can't the two reverse?  :/

Not much to be done about it, but it sometimes gets to the point where I want to design my characters to be incompetent boobs, just to reflect how they will actually play when the electronic dice start chugging.  :(

I'm the same way...

Until I go onto the OOC of the game and actually say I'm rolling poorly & always do.  The game almost always begins rolling better, as if to spite me.  Still, I'll take being proven wrong and rolling well versus any other option :)

"I missed -- it's a diceroller bug!"  heh

I was thinking a possible rule variant for character generation.

Each character rolls 1d6+2 for powers. But each character rolls 8 times for available powers to choose from that list.

They then are allowed to keep 1 less than they roll on the 1d6+2.

They also roll a weakness and can keep an extra power if they keep it.

That way characters that generate only a few powers have a better chance to come up with a character that can fit a concept they want to play. It also helps balance them a bit.

As us that one d6 roll really alters the player's chance to come up with a cool character.