Combining Heroic/Superheroic scale

[Heroglyph]

I've been running a few low level supernatural adventures (think Hellboy, Underworld, Blade, etc)

Originally, I built them on the superheroic scale, but had a cap on 3 for Brawn and Agility (That is about where I'd put Hellboy's Brawn or Blade's Agility)

But, I've recently shifted over to using the Heroic scale for abilities, with max human at X4, and anything beyond human at X5. I really didn't ever see them encountering any creatures that could lift over 100 tons that a normal X5 in super heroic scale could give.

That is the only thing I have changed.

Power costs remain the same as regular BASH UE rules. My question is, do you think mixing a Heroic scale cost with a superheroic powers cost, is OK? I'm not sure if they would cost differently in Heroic

P.S. I know I could use the houserule: Heightened, but wanted to see if I could just change the scale.

[BASHMAN]

As long as you change the scale for EVERYBODY there is no balance issue with changing the scale at all.

[Heroglyph]

Thanks! That is good to know. Just ran an adventure with friends this weekend, doing it this way for the first time, and didn't really notice any balance issues.

The Mummy Minions weren't overpowered. The Serpent God's priests were the most dangerous with burst attack spells. But, in the end the heroes were able to over come the supernatural threat of the Vanguard Emissaries of the Novus Ordo Mundi
(aka VENOM).

On a side note, after the adventure I ran using BASH, another friend was running a Runequest adventure (which we haven't played in years) but the combat was so slow and grueling , that everyone wanted to switch over to the Fantasy BASH rules.
So, BASH has earned a few more converts : )

[Harrigan]

Barging in here -- I'm not seeing these Heroic & Superheroic Scales in Bash! UE. Are they described somewhere else, or am I just overlooking a section?

[BeardedDork]

Different books.

BASH Fantasy and BASH Sci-Fi are written at Heroic scale, wheras BASH UE is written at Superheroic scale.

[BASHMAN]

Correct. They aren't 100% compatible, either. But you can port stuff between them without much difficulty. I for instance, ran a BASH! Fantasy adventure for my party and only did a few minor conversions in my head as I ran it.

The main difference is in the Stats, and that at Heroic Scale, all characters have to keep track of Energy which limits the use of Magical powers and highly exerting things like fighting with two swords. The other major difference is Soak. In BASH! for superheroes, Soak is 2d6 xBrawn+Armor, with add-ons for Size & Density Increase.

In Heroic Scale, since the characters are mortal men whose skin cannot turn aside sword blows, they have no natural soak at all. (This is because when I first tested it, the barbarian was immune to sword thrusts, which was not very realistic, IMO). Instead, Soak only comes from Armor of some sort. Size also affects it, but it very unusual for a person to have Size large or small enough to impact this.

Different fantasy & sci-fi races, of course, are another matter, as all Halflings or Ewoks would be small, and all Wookies and Ogres would be large, for instance. But in Legends of Steel, all PCs are human anyway, so that isn't much of an issue, outside the odd freakishly-large human character.

[Heroglyph]

I didn't port over any of the wounds, EC, etc. Just changed the scale benchmarks, and it seemed to work out fine. Had to bump up beginning pt totals a little to make up for extra cost to get equivalent ability scores but that was it.