With a few sessions of our new V&V campaign under our belts, and without a rules upgrade imminent (but would love to see it one day!), and having looked at John's stuff and one of Majestic's suggestions, and being a bit of a rules tinkerer (I have a wee credit in the Pulp City miniatures rules as part of the Games Development Team), I thought I would add a couple of extra options to our selection.

Aim and Slam were inspired by John, but done differently, hopefully for simplicity, and similarly Dodge was inspired by Majestic, but toned down somewhat.

Comments and criticism welcome!


Combat Maneuvers

Aim: Requires one Action to use and declare a target; the next action by the character using Aim must be an attack against that target or the benefits are lost. With the Aim attack, add +4 to the to hit roll required.

Dodge: Use with Evade, with PR cost = 2; adds +1/10 of Agility (rounded down) to Evasion bonus.

Power Up: Uses an Action, PR expenditure (variable) and must declare a target; the next Action by the character using Power Up must be an attack against that target or the benefits are lost. With the Power Up attack treat die rolls less than the Power expended for Power Up as being equal to the Power spent (to a maximum of the die result). Power Up can only be used to affect dice for Carry Capacity-based damage or damage from powers; for example, if using a sword, only the base HTH damage could be affected, not the extra dice/damage from the sword itself. Devices, Magic/Psionic Items, and technological weapons cannot be affected.

Slam: Add velocity damage to damage from an unarmed HTH attack; half of the extra damage from velocity is applied to the attacker using the Slam.

a goldmine of convertable material on the subject is Herogames's Ultimate Martial Artist (for 5th edition)

maybe temporarily blinding or deafening strikes, martial throws/legsweeps, nerve strikes, killing strikes, etc.

OK, after a few quick thoughts, how's this sound:

Stunning Blow: By making a special attack, you can stun your target. You're target, must make a save vs. END (d20), or is stunned by your attack, and acts as though fatigued until the effects of the attack can be shaken off, or for 15 minutes - the difference (1 minute per point) you failed your save by. Sound reasonable? I'm working Death Blow (thanks for the Idea Bill), and Deafen.

dsumner wrote on Mar 28^th, 2012 at 5:08pm:


I like it, but think the amount of time the person is stunned is a bit too harsh.  I think it would be better to have it be 30 (or even 25) minutes, minus E.  That way a normal human is still stunned for 15-20 minutes but a super (especially someone with a high E) can shrug it off far quicker.

either way, it translates to "waaay after the fight is over" . are usual wake-up rolls applicable?

Bill Kropp wrote on Mar 30^th, 2012 at 4:18am:


They're not knocked out, just stunned. They can "shake it off" by making their saving throw.

another way to represent nerve strikes would (rather than ko potential) be to let them bypass Invulnerability or Armor (partially or in full) or possibly prevent rolling with the damage (or requiring a save to roll)

dsumner wrote on Mar 30^th, 2012 at 9:01pm:


Unless you're the Mandarin. He did it to Iron Man once

also, these super-martial-artsy tricks make good extra abilities for when you roll under the 20% for Natural Weaponry.

Stunning Blow 2.0: By making a special attack, you can stun your target. You're target, must make a save vs. END (d20), or is stunned by your attack, and acts as though fatigued until the effects of the attack can be shaken off (1d6 turns). Sound better than the first version?

I'm still tinkering with Death Blow, but I'm thinking it would work like this, the character would make a HTH attack, with a Death Touch carrier attack. I still need to flesh out the details though.

Also, I agree with Bill.  Hero System Martial Arts was one of the books I kept when I got rid of my Hero collection.

AlabasterKnight wrote on Sep 3^rd, 2012 at 12:52pm:


That seems reasonable. Will amend the text. 

dsumner wrote on Sep 24^th, 2012 at 5:47am:


Next time Thunderbolt finds himself confronted with a questionably 'innocent' opponent { Young Justin.. in his Boost rampage } or female foe { like when he confronted Razor... briefly, 'Shawn is very chivalrous and hates hurting women' }... I will use this!

These remind me of the way you could stun your opponent in Street Fighter II.  I used to love using a sweep atack with Blanca, and the opponent would then have little birds flying around their head.  As soon as they'd recover, I'd hit em' again with the same move! 

I've got a few new ideas if you you guys are interested in me posting them, I will. And any feedback on them would be appreciated.