Re: [HoE] Balance of Power(spoiler marshals only)

["Steve Crow" <crow_steve@hotmail.com>]

>I had this problem with my posse, 1 doomsayer, 2 sykers, 1 witch, 1 200 
>year
>old gunfighter, as you can imagine this group wipes the floor with 
>everything
>they meet. I tend to give my extras slightly better stats than the books 
>give
>them and more guns and ammo, as well, as armour. this makes it a bit more 
>of
>a challenge for them also Dont forget that every time a person dies they 
>come
>back as undead on a roll of 1 on d10, this can be most annoying after you

Ummm, they don't come back as undead under any and all conditions, do they?  
I do recall that those killed by War's (or Death's? something like that) 
walkin' dead do.

At best, I'd figure that someone has a 1 in 10 chance of coming back 
Harrowed.  But you don't come back from Harrowed ASAP after dying, do you?  
*goes back to books to check...*

The problem isn't really that my extras lack guns, just that they're not 
necessarily very good with them, and that they're relatively slow.  The 
"quick" combat system can really hose them over.  Drawing an Ace is nice, 
but in a group of 5-6 characters where, say, half of their total cards are 
or better cards, and your extras draw that single 7 or less, you can pretty 
much kiss most human extras bye-bye before that 7 ever kicks in.  Not 
necessarily a kill, but from stun recovery checks and what-not.  Just doing 
12 points of damage (using the simplified system) is enough to force a TN 7 
Vigor check on each person hit.

Another problem with giving the extras tougher weapons is that some of them 
are Speed 2, which just aggravates the aforementioned problem.  Even if you 
actually just deal one card per extra per round (although this can get 
unwieldy with 10+ extras), they're going to be dead before they get to the 
second card of that Speed 2 action.

Or you can do Quickness checks for all 10+ extras, but this tends to get 
unwieldy as well.

>just plugged 10 combine and 3 of them suddenly jump back up to eat your
>brains. all you have to do is fudge your baddies a little so the posse Dont
>feel like gods among men, without becoming a posse killer every session. 
>and
>Dont forget light modifiers the-6 my group got for night fighting against 3
>zombies was a real bad experience for them. they think nothing of taking on
>10 - 15 combine but 3 zombies in the dark really caused them a problem.
>                                                     deadlander

How are you forcing the unlit night fights?  My group (wisely, IMO) doesn't 
travel by night, and maintains a campfire during sleeping.  Granted, this 
has a slightly higher chance of attracting "wandering monsters" due to the 
illumination, but I tend to try to avoid "wandering monsters".  Not only 
because it slows down adventuring, and I'm not big on the "pointless battle 
ensues when creatures wanders by," but because HoE doesn't to-date have that 
many suitable creatures.  How many Dogs O'War packs, zombies, and random 
scavvies can you fight?

Besides, as noted above, a fight in the dark is tougher for the Pcs.  Given 
that, the characters probably are wise to keep a campfire going.  In this 
case, they're making the decision to opt for more, easier combats over 
fewer, more dangerous ones.

I'll keep the night-fighting thing in mind, though...

---

Steve Crow

"Worm Can Opener Extraordinare"

Check out my website at:  http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/4991/


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