Maestro

I really would like to see what you guys could come up with for Maestro's stats. The ones on other sites that I've seen seem more than a bit low for a guy who destroyed Marvel Earth single handedly.

When did he do that? I thought Maestro just took over the world after most of its heroes died in some sort of holocaust. It wasn't established that Maestro himself defeated the likes of Thor, Surfer and Iron Man. In any event...

How about this:

Fighting: INCREDIBLE (40)
Agility: EXCELLENT (20)
Strength: UNEARTHLY (100)
Endurance: SHIFT X (150)
Reason: REMARKABLE (30)
Intuition: EXCELLENT (20)
Psyche: EXCELLENT (20)

Health: 310
Karma: 70

BODY ARMOR: Same as Hulk; Amazing (50)protection against physical attacks and Remarkable (30) protection against energy attacks.
REGENERATION: Shift X (150). Regenerates 15 points of health per turn. Like the Hulk, regeneration occurs even while Maestro is in combat, and even in rounds where Maestro has sustained damage.
LEAPING: Same as Hulk. Class 5000
ADRENALINE SURGE: Same as Hulk--Maestro gains 5 points of strength per turn he is combat. This does not affect his health. If combat ceases, Maestro's strength decreases by 5 points per turn. Again, this does not affect his health.

Comments: I basically upped his Fighting, Agility, and Endurance by +1CS from my write-up for the Hulk, and gave him Shift X regeneration instead of Unearthly regeneration. I think this is pretty indicative of his power; if I started Maestro at Shift X strength, he would waste the Hulk, and that shouldn't be, since the Hulk hung with him for a long while before finally falling.

Ah well, I hadn't read the comics, but I had a few people tell me he took over the whole earth.

Hmm... for his Adrenaline Surge you don't have it +1CS per turn?

Maestro
F:40
A:10
S:150
E:150
R:10
I:30
P:30

Health:350
Karma:70
Popularity:-10
Resources:100

I would then put all his powers as hulk but up one cs. In the comics it stated that his power was increased by the radiation fallout

Hulk also has monstrous body armour not amazing

Well the current stats on this site lists him as having MN True Invulnerability... you think he warrants actual TI?

Yes and no. The hulk is shown taking on almost every heavy hitter at once withought slowing down yet in another issue he is been knocked out by the rhino. I think if you want to use TR put it at inc. otherwise I would use monstrous body resistance.

Punstarr Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Ah well, I hadn't read the comics, but I had a few
> people tell me he took over the whole earth.
>
> Hmm... for his Adrenaline Surge you don't have it
> +1CS per turn?


No. I changed that for the Hulk as well years ago in my campaign. In game play, giving the Hulk a +1CS to strength per turn made him unbeatable (he achieved Shift Z strength in 4 turns), and I don't think that's an accurate write-up of his overall power. Characters like Hercules and Wonder Man should give him a hard time, but they MRP wrote him up, he could brush them off like pieces of lint.

I think the only character who should have TI is Aquarian, whose power actually negates the force of blows directed against him. Giving characters like Hulk or Thor T.I. opens up a can of worms I don't think Marvel ever intended to create. Just my two cents.

As for the Hulk's body armor, Peter David retconned the Hulk so that a big part of his durability is the result of regeneration, not the hardness of his body (according to David, the Hulk has ALWAYS had regeneration--but the Hulk regenerates from minor injuries so fast that many observers thought that the Hulk hadn't been injured at all). So I think it is pretty inaccurate to give the Hulk Monstrous body armor AND regeneration. My compromise was to give the Hulk Amazing body armor, and Unearthly regeneration (which actually makes him more potent than Monstrous body armor).

BTW, I think Marvel's limitation that regeneration only works when the character with that power is not fighting is wrong. Wolverine heals during combat all the time. So does the Hulk.

Well remember also that Regeneration has no rank. You heal your End Rank every 10 rounds, so each round you heal 1/10th of your End Rank.

That said, I agree that regen should occur whether in combat or out of combat. Unfortunately, the Marvel RPG regen system doesn't allow for fast healing on the level that Peter's talking about.

True... but still, 5 per turn... isn't that the opposite extreme? Too slow?

I forgot to mention that in my campaign, you only do maximum damage on a Red result. You do -1 CS damage on a Yellow or Green result. As such, combat takes significantly longer. And with the Hulk regenerating 10 points of health a turn (even during combat), he's pretty hard to put down.

In game play, this has allowed the Hulk to overcome most Class 100 type opponents eventually, but not easily (which I think is reflective of the comics). In battles against Thor (Hulk's biggest rival, IMHO), the battle is about even, but Thor wins more often than not(again, this is reflective of comics, in that most agree that the Hulk is stronger but Thor is more powerful overall).

Punstarr Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Well remember also that Regeneration has no rank.
> You heal your End Rank every 10 rounds, so each
> round you heal 1/10th of your End Rank.
>
> That said, I agree that regen should occur whether
> in combat or out of combat. Unfortunately, the
> Marvel RPG regen system doesn't allow for fast
> healing on the level that Peter's talking about.


I think Unearthly rank endurance (the Hulk has Unearthly endurance, so he heals 10 points per turn in my campaign, even in combat situations) is pretty fast. Suppose Wolverine slashes the Hulk with his adamantium claws. The claws cause 20 points of damage. In 20 seconds (2 turns), those wounds are completely healed.

I should mention that Thor's Fighting rank has been downgraded from Unearthly to Incredible in my campaign, but his body armor increased to Incredible. As such, Thor cannot execute multiple attacks as easily as before. He can still do it better than the Hulk (especially when Thor wields his hammer), but it's not a given, like it was before. I think Thor having Incredible fighting is more in-line with the comics. Most comics readers agree that Captain America is a much better fighter than Thor.

My main point is that you can't apply a rank to Regen, since it's entirely based on your Endurance.

But what if Wolverine (and he probably would) attack the Hulk 2-3 times per round? That's 40-60 damage dealt per round with only 10 being regenerated.

> Most comics
> readers agree that Captain America is a much
> better fighter than Thor.

They do? Come on, man. There's absolutely no justification for that being true... Thor has been fighting for thousands of years.

Epyon Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I forgot to mention that in my campaign, you only
> do maximum damage on a Red result. You do -1 CS
> damage on a Yellow or Green result. As such,
> combat takes significantly longer.

Doesn't that make fights in your games drag out too much though? My players don't like combat to last very long at all.

Epyon Wrote:

>Suppose Wolverine slashes the Hulk
> with his adamantium claws. The claws cause 20
> points of damage. In 20 seconds (2 turns), those
> wounds are completely healed.

So, you also changed the length of a turn in your campaigns, too, or was that a typo?

Well, in comics, I have seen Cap outfight Thor many times. Sure, Thor has been around for thousands of years, but it's not like he's been spending that time learning a whole bunch of martial arts disciplines. Thor is a master brawler and wrestler, and his skill with a warhammer is startling. But if you were to deprive him of his superhuman strength, I think Cap would beat him after a tough fight. Marvel, I think agrees--in recent Handbook write-ups, they rank Cap's fighting skills above Thor's.

Martial arts disciplines... why is it so many people equate how good a fighter one is to how much kung fu they know? Fighting is far more primal than that... skill is skill, no matter what "style" you practice. At it's core, it's how well you are able to inflict harm upon another being. Thor is far better at this than Cap. Cap is faster and more agile, but has nowhere near the sheer amount of fighting experience as Thor... and experience is a truer fighting teacher than any ancient Martial Arts master in some monastery. The comics you speak of have difficulty conveying this because the easiest way to show fighting skill in sequential art is to show the character bouncing all over the battle as a lightning fast whirling dynamo of kung fu. It's very hard to portray Thor's kind of fighting and make it look more skilled, so belief should be carefully suspended in this case. Not much in the universe is going to be a better fighter than a several millenia old viking warrior god.

Having trained in martial arts for a long time, and having sparred with opponents of many different disciplines (including non "kung-fu" type martial-arts, such as boxing and wrestling), I can say that experience is not as big a factor as you might think. I have bested opponents with far more experience than I, and I have also been bested by opponents with far less experience than I. Experience is a factor, yes, but just because Thor is a thousand years old doesn't mean he has it all over Cap.

Also, consider this. Rare is the occasion that Thor is faced with an opponent that truly requires all of skill and strength. Only a handful of mortal beings possess the power to pose a serious challenge to Thor. How much experience is Thor getting when he's usually beating on people like you or I might beat on a scrappy but overmatched kid? Meanwhile, Cap regularly faces opponents who are vastly more powerful than he is. But Cap finds a way to win almost every time.

Also, how many times in Thor's mag do you honestly find him using his superior fighting skills? Thor is a tremendous brawler and hammer thrower, but I don't recall him exactly wowing the audience with his martial prowess very often.