flatline wrote:What happens when the typical character isn't dependent on equipment to do/receive md/mdc? Can sd/sdc remain the norm?
--flatline
Yes.
I addressed stuff like mages, a bit, but let's say you have a hatchling dragon. He's a MDC tank, that inflicts MD naturally in several ways.
He's awesome.
But he's not omnipotent.
Part of the issue, I think is that people want to play RPGs like they were action movies... but they don't really play them like they were action movies.
In most action movies, the heroes are far and away superior to the enemies that they face.
The hero fights various numbers of rather easy opponents who present no real challenge, and/or faces various obstacles, then eventually faces some large challenge. This is the norm for action movies.
This is also why some people use what they call "mook" rules, where they have generic villains have reduced stats and capabilities, so that the heroes can easily defeat them with no real risk. This actually IS a lot like an action movie in some ways.
The only problem that I have with mook rules is that there's no need to gimp opponents down to be weaker than they're supposed to be when you can (and should) simply use less powerful opponents.
For example, I've seen people complaining that it's too hard to take out CS Grunts in combat, so they gimp down the CS grunts the PCs face, using reduced MDC instead of the full MDC that the grunts should have, except for cases where the PCs fight a "boss", who has normal or better stats.
But they gimped down the new Heavy Deadboy armor, instead of simply using the old-style light armor with only 50 MDC, or instead of using bandits in Plastic Man and Urban Warrior instead of using CS grunts at all.
Anyway, the point is that a lot of people who say that they're looking for "cinematic action" don't us gimp rules, but they don't really follow the standard movie formula either.
They want to play Zorro, only they also want every fight to be a challenge... even though Zorro dominates almost every battle effortlessly. Zorro's main problem was never winning swordfights. His main challenge was keeping his identity secret, winning the ladies, saving the day, and so on.
Basically, they want two conflicting things: they want their characters to be impressive, like movie characters are, but they also want most of their battles to be easy wins, like movie battles are.
And they don't feel impressive when they have an easy win, because they feel it was TOO easy... but at the same time, they don't feel impressive when every battle is an even match, because then they just feel
average.
Which is the problem people get into with Rifts, especially with MDC.
They want their characters to be powerful enough to be impressive, but they also want to be challenged.
So they gear up, and they get badass OCCs/RCCs, and they try to make supreme badass characters... but their standard is already skewed, because they view MDC as the norm, with low-end MDC being "weak."
When it's really all relative.
You have a straight, from-the-book SAMAS character, and he's a veritable GOD compared to most of the (normal humanoid) inhabitants of Rifts Earth.
You have a vagabond with a Wilk's 320 and a suit of Plastic Man armor, and he's damned near a demigod.
You take a fancy, souped-up Mega-Juicer, though, and there's still stuff out there that can drop him without breaking a sweat, or sometimes even breaking stride.
In Rifts, the fact that something out there can kill you doesn't make you weak: the fact that something can kill you is inevitable.
Anyway, back to the Dragon.
He's MDC.
Sometimes, you'll need MDC foes to throw at him.
Neither of these things mean that MDC is common overall.
Say your dragon is a wanderer, and he travels from town to town as his general deal, like an Old West gunfighter, or like David Banner in the Hulk TV show, or any number of other classic heroes.
The standard setup in Rifts is that most towns have a defender or group of defenders that have mega-damage capabilities.
So he might run into one town, and find that the local protector is also a dragon. They make friends, the other dragon says he could use the PC's help with a problem, and the PC agrees to help. Maybe the NPC dragon needs help with a technical problem, like building a mine, or maybe he needs help because of an enemy that is encroaching on his turf, and the enemy is too tough to handle on his own. So the two dragons team up, solve the problem or stop the enemy. Then the PC dragon finds out that the NPC dragon is really a bad guy, and the favor was actually a bad thing for the PC to help with. Like maybe the dragon plans to use human slaves in the mine, or maybe the enemy enroaching on the territory was less evil than this dragon turns out to be, or whatever.
So then the dragons fight each other, and the PC wins.
Maybe he kills the other dragon, in which case the town is now easy prey for enemies. Maybe the PC dragon decides to become the new protector, maybe not.
Maybe the NPC dragon escapes, and become a recurring villain.
Maybe the PC forced the NPC dragon to promise to behave better in the future, and finds a way to make it stick.
There's an adventure, with some potential to be a campaign, depending on how it turns out.
Of course, the PC dragon there is alone in that scenario, but the basic plot could easily enough be adapted to a group.
Of course, the more powerful the party, the less likely the scenario. If you have a party of 6 hatchling dragons wandering around, it's unlikely that they'll find a village with 6 other hatchling dragons protecting it, and it'll be more of a stretch each time they find something that powerful protecting a town.
So beyond a certain power level, it doesn't work as well, not over the long term anyway.