Fixing Palladium

 Okay. Previously I stumbled and fell during my last Versus Battle. Hitting the Palladium/Megaverse system's major flaw in combat. Combat. With 19 characters in play, ten of them animals, it became impossible for me to keep track of who was doing what to whom, at the beginning of the fourth action of round 1. 

The actual problem I was having is that with actions and initiative. Normally after initiative is rolled for the round everyone goes through their first actions in initiative order. Then everyone goes through their second action and so on and so forth. Until everyone has had all of their actions for the round. Then you move onto the next round.

In Heroes Unlimited player characters start with 2 actions per round, but can quickly gain more through skills or powers. Most appear to have 4, at first level. The highest I've seen around first level is The Gargoyle, with 9 actions; a character I was planning on having turn up in later rounds of the versus battle in question.

Keep in mind that the combat round is 15 seconds long.

I remember from my teens having a great deal of fun playing this game. But then we were a small group of players and having more than a handful of foes was rare. When half the characters are being controlled by other people a lot of the weight of running combat is shared; Versus battles drop all that weight on my shoulders.

Someone must have had a similar problem to me. So I did some research, and yes. Lots of people. Looking at their solutions was not helpful. Most people just rewrite the system into another system and change things that I wanted to keep.

My self brief was thus:

1. Keep everything that makes the system the system. So no adding or removing bits.
2. Make it work.

I spoke to friends and people online, I wracked my brain for a solution for two weeks. Nothing. 

I tried looking at Actions as if they were Action Points, but that changed nothing. I tried looking at when an action would take place in a 15 second round. But that also didn't change anything and, if anything, added more complexity.

They, April 3rd I dozed off in front of the TV and dreamed of going through a box of books and folders that my poor parents are still storing for me. It was a battered blue folder which I once painted a streaking aura around a humanoid figure that caught my attention. The paint had almost immediately peeled off but in my dream it was whole. Inside was a system I had designed in my late teens; a super powered wrestling system. If you've ever seen a wrestling match, and I haven't been a fan since I was a kid (I loved Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks; I lost interest when they retired, which dates me) it has a pattern in which whoever "has initiative" inflicts their opponent with a chain of blows, bounces, throws and pins until something goes wrong. Then the tide turns and the initiative reverses. In this system I had created I had attempted to model this. It was simple. Whoever wins initiative does their stuff until they screw up and fail a roll. Then the other guy gets to do their thing until they screw up and then the round ends and initiative rerolls. I'd never figured out how to get it to work with more than two fighters but that's because I was asking the wrong question.

When I woke up I realised I had my solution. To both problems.

The solution to the Palladium problem is to change how Actions work in the round. Instead of everyone taking their first action in initiative order, and then everyone taking their second action, and so on and so forth. Now whoever wins initiative gets to use as many actions as they wish until...

• They fail a roll.
• Or they run out of Actions
• Or they decide to stop for whatever reason.

At which point the next person in initiative gets to use their actions. And so on down the line.

When everyone has gone once, rinse and repeat until everyone is out of actions or nobody wants to act any more. Then the next round begins.

If someone has to dodge they lose a future action but the result of their dodge roll keeps until they either get to act or they are attacked again and choose to reroll. Which will cost another action.

And that's it. Simply reframing the combat sequence eases the burden. Or does it. Let's go to round 2 of that combat that confounded me and see what happens:

You could just scroll down to look at what I wrote previously, but the long and short is that the White Knights are being paid to kill architect Spirit Planque, who turns out to be a gadgeteer gizmoteer with her own set of light power armour. Ms. Fury gets wind of this and attempts to intervene.

At this point The Alpha, 6 mooks and 5 dobermans represent the racist fash. Versus Ms. Fury and Spirit, along with 5 feral housecats who followed Fury and seem to think this is their fight too.

This Guy

Suddenly a 6'6" figure in what looks like archaic armour over metal bursts out of a side passage into the unfinished basement. 

This is the Steel Goth, a cyborg freelancer with the White Knights.

He's there to fuck some shit up and stuff. Since Masked trouble has arrived he's going to do as The Alpha asked and deal with Ms. Fury.

His initiative is 19 and the highest this round, matched by Mook#2, but the Goth has a way higher PP.
(Instant House Rule: with Initiative ties, tiebreak by highest PP)
He has a total of 5 actions and goes first.

His first action is to move. He can move up to 130' per action, based on his Spd. attribute. He easily covers the distance to Fury and goes for a flat out punch. He rolls 11 (10+1) versus a parry of 17 (9+8). His blow is deflected and play passes to Mook#2. Goth has 3 actions left.

Mook#2 has 4 actions and is already in melee with Spirit. She swings her cricket bat at the armoured architect; 4 (3+1) versus 18 (14+4). Which is a miss. She has 3 actions left.

The next initiative is 16, which is Fury and Spirit. Fury has a PP of 24, and Spirit only 13. So Fury goes first.

She has 4 actions. Facing off against both The Alpha and the Steel Goth, as well as any number of dogs, she claws at Alpha, who attempts to parry;  9 (3+6) versus 5 (1+4). Alpha takes 25 damage.

She then goes for Goth in the same way, he goes for a dodge, burning an action (down to 2); 26 (20+6) versus 22 (18+4). She penetrates his armour (AR18) and does 56 damage (because she Crit.). Still a great dodge roll though; that's a keeper.
Finally Fury dances away, getting some distance from the two racists. Since her Spd. is 140... hold on I need a map...

This'll do? The fight is around that obvious elevator shaft on the right hand side of the map. 10' squares.

...Fury runs from the duet to Spirit's side. This leaves her one action, in case she needs to dodge.

Spirit gets to go now and, recognising Fury as an ally, otherwise ignores her. Spirit has 6 actions while armoured and takes full advantage of them. There's a manoeuvre that robots and powered armour can do, called a Volley. Basically shoot a set of weapons at a single target. So Spirit points her right hand at Mook#3 and her left at Mook#6; the guys with the guns. 

Her first volley, against Mook#3, is 19 (17+2) versus 3 )1+2). Mook#3 takes 26 damage from 9d6, as 3 finger lasers and 1 finger blaster, all at full power strike him. This reduces his SDC to 0 and takes 2 points off his Hit Points. This is less than 10% of his HP so he suffers no impairment. But damn that hurt!
Her second volley, against Mook#6 this time, is 21 (19+2) versus 11 (9+2). Mook#6 takes 68 damage (another Crit.). He drops. Dead.

Even with all this, Spirit has only used a couple of her actions. So she swings a punch at Mook#2; 8 (6+2) versus 15 (13+2). Her armoured fist is deflected with a parry. Spirit has 3 actions left.

Next we have Mook#4, Mook#5, and Cat#1 all on 12 initiative. I don't have the PP scores for the animals so decide that they'll go last. Mook#4 is higher than #5 so that's the order we'll go in.

Mook#4 rushes in to swing at Spirit; 1 (1+0) is a miss. This cost Mook#4 two of his four actions.

Mook#5 decides to stick to the plan and also rushes in to swing for Spirit. 4 (1+3) is also a miss. This leaves them with 4 actions.

Meanwhile Cat#1 attacks Dog#1. 8 (5+3) versus 7 (5+2), for a hit. Doing 4 damage. Confident in its prowess the cat attacks again; 15 (12+3) versus 19 (17+2) which is a miss. Cat#1 has no more actions left.

Next is initiative 11, which is Dog#4 and Cat#3. I roll a die and it's Dog#4 who goes first. Dog#4 attacks Cat#4; 20 (16+4) versus 11 (7+4) for 9 damage. This brings the cat to 0 SDC and deals 2/3rds of its HP. The doge keeps on its attack; 19 (15+4)... the cat burns its last action and dodges; 21 (17+4).

(Instant House Rule: You can wait to see your opponent's attack roll before deciding if you want to roll to dodge.)

Cat#3 attacks Dog#3. 13 (10+3) versus 8 (6+2) for 2 damage. It attempts another attack, but misses; 5 (2+3) versus the 8 dodge from before; no point rerolling. Cat#3 has zero actions left while Dog#3 has 2.

Now we're down to Initiative 10 and, excluding dodging, 9 character have acted at least once. 

Mook#3, Dog#2, and Cat#5 are up next. Let's stick with that order.
Mook#3 is hurting, having taken hit point damage. There are no morale rules but I decide then an there to roll d%. If I roll over his remaining HP he runs. So he has a 24% chance of staying in the fight. I roll an 80. He runs. He has 3 actions remaining and an Spd. of 24. That's 72'.

Dog#2 attacks Cat#2; 18 (14+4) versus 6 (2+4). Cat#2 is hit for 10 damage. That's enough to bring the cat to 0 SDC and 2/3rd HP.

Cat#5 attacks Dog#5; 23 (20+3) versus 21 (19+2). This is yet another crit. For 12 damage. Doge is fine; still has SDC.

And Initiative 9: Cat#2 and Cat#4.
Cat#2 runs away.
Cat#4 is out of actions.

Initiative 8: The Alpha and Mook#1. The Alpha has 13 PP to 11, so they go first.
They run after Ms. Fury. They have a Spd. of 178, so they can easily keep up. They swing their bat at Ms. Fury, who parries; 20 (17+3) versus 15 (7+8) for 18 damage. She rolls with the blow; 23 (17+6), reducing the damage to only 9.
He then swings again; 14 (11+3) versus 9 (1+8) parry. For 14 damage. She rolls with the blow again; 16 (10+6), reducing the damage to 7.
A third swing; 21 (18+3) versus 25 (17+8) parry. Is deflected.
Alpha is out of actions.

Mook#1 was standing with her boss swinging at Ms. Fury. But now the battle has shifted she's rushing after them. With a Spd. of 28 it's going to take them a few of their 5 actions. All 5 of them will make her as fast as Ms. Fury with just one. She ends up out of actions. 

Initiative 7: Mook#6 is dead so just Dog#1 who retaliates against Cat#1. Cat #1 has no actions left. I can either rule that it can borrow an action from Round 3, or it's flat footed and has to hope that the doggo rolls under 5. I go with yes. (Instant House Rule: You can borrow a single action from the next round. If you want. But only the one.) 22 (18+4) versus... 23 (19+4). 

Initiative 6: only Dog#5 remains. It attacks Cat#5; 18 (14+4) versus 10 (6+4), for 4 damage.

We've been around once. 
Mook#5 has 4 Actions and will go on Initiative 12
Spirit, Steel Goth and Mook#2 all have 3 Actions and go on Initiatives 16, 19 and 19 respectively.
Mook#4 and Dog#3 have 2 Actions and go on Initiatives 12 and 5.
Ms. Fury, Dog#1, #2, #4, #5 and Cat#5 all have 1 Action left and go on Initiatives 16, 7, 10, 11, 6, and 10.
Everyone else has 0, or fewer, Actions.

Back to Initiative 19: Steel Goth fires his eye laser at Spirit. 19 strike (16+3) versus 10 dodge (6+4) for 7 damage to Spirit herself, bypassing the armour. This is barely more than a quarter of her SDC. But she is the squishiest person in the fight (ignoring the animals). Goth then rushes forward and pops his forearm blades to strike at Spirit with his right. 8 (6+2) versus 11 parry (7+4).

Mook#2 swings her bat at Spirit; 10 (9+1) versus 23 parry (19+4). Mook#2 still has 2 actions remaining.

Initiative 16 again: Ms. Fury holds her one action.
Spirit volley fires her beams at Steel Goth; 9 (7+2), versus... well zero. Steel Goth knows his armour can tank the hit and just stands there. All 80 points come off his armour's SDC. Roughly 9% of its total.

She keeps pouring it on; 18 (16+2) versus zero. Still not enough to penetrate his armour which takes a further 63 damage. She considers using her last action but instead decides to hold it back for a potential dodge.

Initiative 12: Mook#4 and Mook#5. Mook#4 swings again, this time at Ms. Fury. 6 (5+1), versus a parry of 13 (5+8).
Mook#5 swings for Spirit; 7 (4+3), versus a parry of 21 (17+4). He's not having much luck.

Initiative 11: Dog#4 goes for Cat#4; 19(15+4) versus it's last dodge of 21.

Initiative 10: Dog#2 and Cat#5. The dog no no longer has a cat to fight so it runs over to it's master, using it's last action to do so.
Cat#5 attacks Dog#5 18 (14+4) versus 16 (12+4) for 2 points of damage.

Initiative 7: Dog#1 attacks Cat#1; 15 (11+4) versus the previous dodge of 19.

Initiative 5: Dog#3 attacks Cat#3; 15 (11+4) versus... Cat#3 takes an action from next round and rolls dodge 16 (12+4).

Third go around. 
Mook#5 has 3 actions left and is still on initiative 12.
Mook#2 has 2 actions and is still on initiative 19.
Ms. Fury, Spirit, Mook#4 and Dog#3 have 1 action apiece and are on 16, 12 and 5 initiatives.

Mook#2 is still attacking Spirit and is getting frantic. 12 (11+1) versus 14 (10+4). 1 action remaining.

Ms. Fury and Spirit hold actions.

Mook#4 swings again at Fury, 15 (14+1) versus who fails to parry with a 13 (5+8), so she burns her action to dodge; 7 (1+6). Ouch. She takes 3 damage.
Mook#5 is still swinging for Spirit; 4 (1+3), a categorical miss.

Dog#3 attacks Cat#3; 18 (14+4) versus 16 dodge from last round. For 9 damage. Then again 23 (19+4) for 7 damage. Which brings the cat to 1 HP remaining.

Only Spirit, Mooks#2, #4, and #5 have any actions remaining. #5 with a whole 2.

Fourth go around.

Mook#2 keeps attacking. 6 (5+1), versus a parry of 7 (3+4). No luck.

Spirit full volley fires at Mook#2; 22(20+2), a crit. Versus 21 (19+2) dodge, with an action borrowed from the future. 132 points of damage. Mook#2 falls.

"No!" yells Mook#5 and rushes to Mook#2's side and attempts to begin first aid. But Mook#2 is a charred corpse. Ironically Mook#6 is only unconscious/in a coma and will die in 10 hours unless the receive medical treatment in that time.

Round 2 Ends.

So that was somewhat easier. Still lasted longer than I wanted though. The important thing is that there was only 4 go-arounds rather than the 6 I'd have to do as per the RAW.

So overall I'd say it's a success.

So round 3...

As the slain Mook falls a horrific winged form swoops in at 400mph and slams into Steel Goth, lifting him off his feet and hurling him into the nearest wall.

Gargoyle crits and does 388 damage, through Goth's armour. Which is enough to scrap him. But rolling an 24 to pull their punch they leave them at zero HP rather than -78. They then pounce on The Alpha, first hitting him with a restrained strike for 70 points of damage, then again with a crit for 208 damage. A 17 to pull their punch leaves him also at zero HP.

Gargoyle steps away from the defeated villains and pauses to let everyone take in her majesty.

Everyone except Ms. Fury fails their horror save. The Cats scarper, the Mooks leggit, and the dogs gather around their fallen master. Combat ends.

"We should go" Ms. Fury says to Spirit, after making sure that nobody else is going to die. "Leave these nuckle heads for the po-po".

"Not yet sister!" says a voice that none there recognise. Turning they see a winged woman in glowing armour, with an equally glowing sword and shield. hovering above the slain mook. She levels the blade at Spirit. "This one has taken a life and must be judged!"

"Who are you?" Fury demands.

"Why dearest Allecto, I am Tisiphone, but many call me... Nemesis!"