Converting Characters to CORPS
Some Spells for CORPS
Some Monsters for CORPS
Some Vampires for CORPS

Trademarks
Hero Characters to CORPS
 Points
 Characteristics
 Skills
  Levels
  Task Difficulties
  Combat Levels
GURPS Characters to CORPS
 Points
 Characteristics
 Skills
 Advantages and disadvantages
 Task Difficulties
Unisystem Characters to CORPS
 Characteristics
D20 Modern Characters to CORPS

"Suddenly, the game system changes. You are now able to grab someone and run."
����- Me, when we switched from Champions to DC Heroes

Trademarks

Notes on Converting Hero Characters to CORPS

Conversion between CORPS and Hero isn't trivial. The intents of the systems, the underlying philosophies, are different, and you can't plug numbers into a formula. There's a lot of tweaking involved. Your CORPS character won't be able to lift the same amount, do the same damage, or take the same punishment -- but maybe it will work out in the end anyway.

Suggestions here are only suggestions. These seem suitable to how our group creates Hero characters, but your mileage may vary.

Points

My suggestion is to double the base number of hero points (50, 75, or 100) and use that as the number of APs supplied to the characters. The number of SPs is usually half or two-thirds:

Hero	CORPS
50-pt character	100 APs, 50 SPs
75-pt character	150 APs, 100 SPs
100-pt character	200 APs, 150 SPs
Superheroes	200+ APs, 200+ SPs, and two Natural Aptitudes.

Characteristics

Hero is a system where a zero-cost attribute (10 in the system, but it costs zero) is (heroic) "average" and characters buy statistics up and down from that average. CORPS is a system where a zero-cost attribute is nothing. (I notice that Hero has moved away from the idea that average people have stats of 8, which is a shame, but it makes the math so much easier.)

In Hero, costs scale linearly; in CORPS, they scale exponentially. The intents are different. There's no simple mathematical conversion.

The breakpoints for the games are different. For example, the breakpoints in Hero tend to be stats of 10, 13, 15, 18. In CORPS, they are 4, 6, and 8 (unless you do a lot of punching).

Option 1: To start converting your Hero character, divide the stats by 3, rounding. Then adjust as desired. (Yes, I know this won't work for a Hero character with all 8s. But it's a starting point.) CORPS WIL has some of the aspects of Hero Presence; try averaging them, see if you like the result. Give the minimum value for POW unles you're using it in your game.

Option 2: You could try these conversions:

CORPS	Hero
Str	Str/2 (-1 for a woman)
Agl	Dex/2 (-1 for a man)
Awr	Int/3
Wil	(Ego+Pre)/5
Hlt	Con/2
Pow	1

Option 3: Or these, which are almost the same: These have the advantage of taking breakpoints into account. These do okay for heroic characters.

Hero	1-3	4-6	7-8	9-10	11-13	14-15	16-18	19-21	22-24	25+
CORPS	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10

Skills

Skills in CORPS are a lot looser than in Hero, and can be defined in multiple ways. For instance, Hero's Computer Programming could be considered as the Trade skill, Programming, or as Computer Science and subdivisions. I imagine the first as representing a kind of community college approach and the second as a more university-oriented approach. Or Acrobatics could be considered either a subskill of Theater or its own Entertainer skill.

Here is a rough table of conversions; the CORPS skill tree is taken from the one I generated for an SF campaign. Note that some of the fine distinctions simply disappear. Most knowledge skills become, well, knowledge skills.

Hero	CORPS Equivalent
Acrobatics	Entertainer/(Acrobatics) or Theater/(Acrobatics)
Acting	Theater possibly with Acting secondary
Animal Handler	Entertainer/(Animal Handler) or the AWR Trade Animal Handler/(type of beast)
Astrogation	Astronomy/(Astrogation)
Biological Analysis	Biology/Biological Analysis
Breakfall	Theater/(Catfall)
Bribery	Economics/(Bribery)
Bugging	Electronics/(Security Systems)
Bureaucratics	Investigative Research/Bureaucratics
Climbing	Climbing
Combat Driving	Make a tertiary to vehicle skill
Combat Piloting	Make a tertiary to vehicle skill
Computer Programming	Computer Science/* or the Trade Programming
Concealment	Hunting/(Stealth) or invent new subskill
Contortionist	Entertainer/(Contortionist)
Conversation	Psychology/(Interrogation)
Criminology	Investigative Research/Criminology or Academic Criminalistics
Cryptography	Mathematics/(Cryptography)
Deduction
Demolitions	Chemistry/(Explosives) or Engineering/Demolitions
Disguise	Theater/(Disguise)
Electronics	Electronics
Forensic Medicine	Medicine/Forensics
Forgery	Art/Forgery
Free Fall	Survival/Free Fall
Gambling	Mathematics/Probabilities or Gambling/Specific game
High Society	Sociology/Status
Interrogation	Psychology/(Interrogation)
Inventor	?
KS: Jump Math	Mathematics/Jump Math
Lipreading	Entertainer/(Lipreading)
Lockpicking	Locksmith/(Lockpicking)
Mechanics	Mechanic the AWR trade, that is
Mimicry	Entertainer/(Mimic)
Navigation	Survival/Water or Sailing
KS: Niche Math	Mathematics/(Niche Math)
Oratory	Theater
Paramedic	First Aid
Persuasion	Psychology/(Seduction)
Planetology	Astronomy/(Planetology)
Riding	Equestrian/Beast type
Security Systems	Electronics/(Security Systems)
Seduction	Psychology/(Seduction)
Shadowing
Sleight of Hand	Theater/(Pickpocket)
PS: Spacer	Trade AWR Spacer
Streetwise	Investigative Research/(Streetwise)
Survival	Survival
Systems Operation	Electronics/(Systems Operation)
Tactics	Military Science/*
Tracking	Hunting/(Tracking)
Trading	Economics/(Barter) or appropriate Trade
Vac Suit	Survival/Vacuum or Spacer trade/Vac Suit
Ventriloquism	Entertainer/(Ventriloquist)
Weaponsmith	Machinist/Weapon repair
Xenology	Sociology/(Xenology)

If anyone is interested, I'll put up a "Hero Skill Tree" which exists only to convert Hero into CORPS terms. It will be quite similar to the one used to create the chart above.

Levels

But skills in CORPS are also more precise, because you can have secondary and tertiary skills. So let's consider only the final skill levels.

Hero Games says that a roll of 11- is a Bachelor's degree, the minimum to be a professional; BTRC says that a skill of 6 is a basic Bachelor's degree with so-so grades. I've chosen to take this as the point of equivalence. Looking at cumulative chances of making specific rolls (rounding to the nearest 10% for cumulative probability), you get:

Hero Skill (%)	CORPS Skill
8- (25.9)	3
9- (37.5)	4
10- (50.0)	5
11- (62.5)	6
12- (74.1)	7
13- (83.8)	8
14- (90.1)	9
15- (95.4)	9
16- (98.1)	10
17- (99.5)	10
18- (99.5)	10

(I didn't extend this into skills greater than 18 (Hero) or 10 (CORPS), because most Hero skills in our group fall in the 8-15 range.)

That conversion is great for intelligence-based skills or actual professions (professional skills in Hero), but notice that most specialized jobs and trades actually only have skills of 3-5 in CORPS terms -- see the example characters in 1st edition. In Duty/Authority, required skills start at 3. (This is a high-school equivalency, which is quite reasonable for a topic where the student is ignorant upon leaving high-school.)

Hero Package Deals should be converted as a Duty/Authority set.

Task Difficulties

Skill levels in Hero tend not to be as high as those in (say) GURPS, so if you want to think about converting task difficulties, I would hazard a guess that the default task difficulty in Hero is 5. If Generic Joe has Familiarity, he has a 25% chance of completing a task. If we assume same Joe is using Aptitude, that's a skill of 1 versus difficulty 5, or 30%. Close enough.

If you're modifying a Hero adventure, the additional difficulty is the inverse of half the Hero task modifier, rounded down. For example, if a particular system is Security Systems-3 to defeat, it is a difficulty 6 (5+3/2, rounded down) task.

Combat Levels

How good are fighters? This one's tougher. Let's think about two average people pounding on each other for a while. Neither has any skills at what he or she is doing, so it's a straight slugfest (assuming no dodges or kicks):

• In Hero, each combatant hits an average of 62% of the time, does an average damage of 7 STUN and 2 BODY, and has a recovery of 4. That works out to a net loss 4.75 STUN pips per Turn, or unconsciousness in a little less than a minute (8 or 9 phases at SPD 2).
• In CORPS, each combatant hits with an average of 1 DV, skill to hit is 1 (AGL Aptitude) and difficulty of the task is 1 (AGL Aptitude). First to go has a 100% chance of hitting, though this goes down as they accumulate impairments (one per non-lethal hit) to arms, legs, and chest. Note that under CORPS rules, people with average stats just can't knock each other out; they can't do enough damage to even require a WIL check (unless one of them tries a called shot, extra damage, to the head). But they can quickly get to the point where neither one feels like swinging any more...

If you want a ball-park figure, an average (competent) cop (in Hero) has an OCV of 5. (Taken from the write-up of Veronica Halstead in Normals Unbound.) The average cop in CORPS (according to 1st edition) has a Pistols skill of 5. The OCV equals the cumulative skill level for a weapon.

For weapons damage, see the BTRC book Guns! Guns! Guns!. It contains info for converting weapons between CORPS and Hero.

Converting Animals

I was looking at Lands of Mystery with an eye to converting the dinosaurs and other creatures. Use the above guidelines with the following differences:

• To convert strength, multiply the animal's strength by 2/5 (that is, divide by 10 and multiply by four). The rationale is that Hero animals usually have a strength determined solely by the GM's desire to inflict damage. I mean, does anybody think a T. rex had a strength of 50? I seriously doubt it could lift 25 tons, but it could do 10d6 of damage. This conversion turns dice of strength damage into DV of punch damage, which is good enough. If the animal has a significant amount of armor, make the damage combination damage. For animals with growth, use the strength after figured characteristics are added in.
• To convert teeth or claws, use the damage class of the attack. That is, a 2d6 HKA does DV 6, a 1d6+1 does DV 4.
  • If you're using pre-4th edition rules with damage such as 2x1.5d6, then add DV 1 for each additional attack. For example, 1.5d6 is DV 5 plus 1 for the additional attack, gives a bite of DV 6.
  • If you're using 4th edition rules or later with the limitation "reduced penetration", just use the damage class of the attack.
• For AWR the value given in Hero INT is the animals cognitive ability. Convert that to CORPS as above, then subtract 1. For every additional +1 to perception, add 5 points to "sensory INT" and then convert.
• For WIL, average EGO + PRE + CON, and convert.
• For HLT, use BODY before any bonuses for powers are figured in.
• If the animal has Growth, give it 0.1 Toughness for every 5 points of Growth, and subtract 1 from its HLT score.
• If the animal has Shrinking, give it 0.5 Frailness for every 5 points of shrinking, and add 1 to its HLT score.
• If the animal has resistant PD, it will need some AV score.

The stats for a T. rex in the Hero Bestiary convert as follows:

str	48 * (2/5) = 19
agl	18 * (2/5) = 7
awr	(4 + 15) * (2/5) = 7(0)
wil	(4+30+38)/3 * (2/5) = 24 * 2/5 = 9
hlt	29 * (2/5) - 6 = 6
bite	2.5d6, reduced penetration = DV 8
Toughness: 0.4

Comparing it to the "thrasher" in DreamTime, it's not a bad fit. The HLT is too low ("thrasher" has an HLT of 7, rather than 6), the STR is a bit too low (should be 22), and the bite is a tad too lethal. (DV 8 instead of DV 6.) It's not quite tough enough, since "thrasher" has a toughness of 0.2.

So these are only suggestions, but they might help you make use of some of that Hero stuff lying around when you create your CORPS scenarios.

Notes on Converting GURPS Characters to CORPS

Converting GURPS to CORPS isn't trivial either; I've been looking at it a bit over the past few days (because I accidentally bought Time Travel Adventures instead of Time Travel).

Points

Here I'm assuming 100 AP and 50 SP. Since I'm not as familiar with GURPS as with Hero, I felt free to take more liberties.

Characteristics

To convert stats, use the value (gurps_stat - 1)/2, rounded down. While this doesn't convert an average person fairly, it should convert most PCs (since GURPS PCs tend to have high stats).

Strength	calculated from ST.
Awareness	calculated from IQ; a physical advantage such as "keen hearing" or "good sense of smell" may be necessary.
Will	calculated from IQ, but remember that a GURPS character's willpower caps at 14, possibly modified by Will advantages. That means that (in this conversion), the highest a converted GURPS character's Will can be is 6, unless they are Strong-Willed.
Health	calculated from HT.
Power	If the campaign involves magic or psionics, give the character some amount of Power; otherwise leave it at 1 or 2.

Skills

This is difficult, because GURPS characters tend to have obscene levels of skills.

Skills can be converted in a seat-of-the-pants fashion.

• To convert regular skills, use a formula of (gurps_level*2/5), rounded nearest.
• To convert weapons skills, use a formula of (gurps_level/3), rounded nearest.

You'll have to pay particular attention to skills and defaults to map them onto a skill tree. One suggestion for creating a new skill tree is to make each section of the GURPS Basic rulebook a section of the skill tree.

Advantages and disadvantages

Advantages and disadvantages are generally easy to convert. They fit fairly well into the CORPS model. The only problem is determining how much of each you need.

A reasonable rule of thumb is that one level of a GURPS ad/disad is one level of a CORPS ad/disad. If the (dis)advantage does not occur in levels, use 5 points as the cost of a level.

Feel free to modify this according to the description. For example, Overconfidence is a 15 point disadvantage, but requires the PC have a chance to fail in many circumstances. In this case, it should be of a level equal to the character's WILL, usually level 4 or 5, or the GM should be strict in applying negative modifiers to the player for making WILL rolls against the psychological limitation.

Task Difficulties

If you want to convert adventures, you'll need to consider how to convert task difficulties. What seemed to work for me was the following:

1. The default difficulty of all GURPS tasks is 6.
2. Difficulties are modified by half the GURPS value, rounding down. That is, if a lock is (for example), Lockmithing-5, the difficulty is increased by (5/2) rounding down. Therefore, this lock is a difficulty 8 task to pick.

Science Fiction Weapons

Just because I was noodling around with Guns! Guns! Guns!, here are some of the standard GURPS SF hand weapons done for CORPS. I'll present them in GURPS format, then 3G3 format, then CORPS:

NAME	Type	Dmg	SS	Acc	1/2D	Max	Wt	RoF	Shots	ST	Recoil	Cost	TL
Stunner	Stun	Sp.	10	3	12	20	1	3~	40C	-	0	800	9
Needler	Imp	1d+2	9	1	100	300	1	3~	100	-	-1	800	8
Gauss Needler	Imp	1d+2	10	4	100	300	1.5	12	100B	-	-1	2000	8
Laser Pistol	Imp	1d	9	7	400	500	2	3~	40C	-	0	800	9
Blaster	Imp	2d+6	10	6	-	300	2	3~	20C	8	-1	2000	9

Most of it is straight conversion, except that you can't calculate the Inherent Accuracy from the GURPS data. The only difficult part is the Stunner; in GURPS terms, it knocks a person out if they fail a roll of HT-3. For an average person, this is 7-, or a little less than 20%. Given the CORPS knockout method (Damage doubled as difficulty for a WILL roll), I chose to give it a CORPS DV of 7. Under the rules, the maximum difficulty for knockout on a head shot is 12 (DV of 6); this allows for stunners to penetrate some armor. Also, given the way the sonic beam spreads, I'd suggest you treat the effects as whole-body impairment, but calculate knockout as if the head had been hit (unless there's no chance of that). For a person of WIL 4, this results in knockouts 50% of the time. This is nowhere near as frequent as in GURPS (especially with PCs), but stunning in CORPS is more significant, so I can live with it. (If you dislike it, make up a new rule to suit yourself.)

Some minimal 3G3 conversions:

Name	DV	IA	Init	RC	Mass	Clip	Action	RoF	AV	BP
Stunner	21	+2	+4	2/0	.46	40	SA	3	3	?
Needler	15	+1	+5	2/1	0.46	100	SA	3	4	?
Gauss Needler	15	+1	+4	2/1	0.68	100	AB	12	4	?
Laser Pistol	10	+3	+5	3/1	0.91	40	SA	3	2	?
Blaster	33	+2	+4	2/1	0.91	20	SA	3	3	?

The same, after converting to CORPS:

Name	DV	Init	RMod	Size	TL	Mass	Extra Clip	RoF	Clip	AV	Cost
Stunner	7	+2	+2	?	15	0.46	?	3	40	3	800
Needler	5	+3	+1	?	13/14	0.46	?	3	100	4	800
Gauss Needler	5	+2	+1	?	13/14	0.68	?	12	100	4	2000
Laser Pistol	3	+3	+3	?	15	0.91	?	3	40	2	800
Blaster	11	+2	+2	?	15	0.91	?	3	20	3	2000

Notes on Converting Unisystem Characters to CORPS

I quite like the settings of Eden Studios All Flesh Must Be Eaten, but I'm not crazy about the Unisystem. I like CORPS better. So, supposing you're crazy in the same ways I am, here are some starting thoughts on going from one to the other.

I'll concentrate on characteristics here, because skills and advantages/disadvantages can be converted without too much thought (although it's more than I want to give them right now.)

Characteristics

The Unisystem uses Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Perception, and Will as the main characteristics. Humans range from -2 to 6 and most values can be mapped as follows:

AFMBE	CORPS
-1	1
0	2
1	3
2	4 or 5
3	6
4	7
5	8
6	9
Each +1	+1

That's not perfect, but it will do for most characters. Convert the level 2 to the traditional average character, based on sex.

(If you try to convert based on lifting capacity, you get unreasonable numbers, since the games have different ideas of the maximum that an "average" person can lift.)

The actual mappings to the six CORPS characteristics are:

AFMBE	CORPS
Strength	Strength
Dexterity	Agility
Constitution	Health
Intelligence	Awareness
Perception	Physical advantages/limitations to modify AWR
Will	Will
Essence	POW Calculate as Essence/7, round up. Therefore, a normal has 2, but a Norm with 15 points in attributes has a POW of 3.

Notes on Converting D20 Modern Characters to CORPS

Why convert from D20 Modern to CORPS? Because D20 Modern adventures are free, of course.

Attributes convert roughly as GURPS attributes.

Notes on DC and Task Difficulties

The D20 Modern game sets task difficulties (generally) at 5, 10, 15, 20, and 25. Each 5 points of difficulty class represents about 25% likelihood for an untrained character--that is, an attribute 10 character asked to perform a DC 5 task has a 75% chance, DC 10 50%, DC 15 25%, and so on. Above DC 10, the chance relates to attribute level.

Given this, a simple task conversion is not too difficult. The equivalent of an attribute 10 character is an aptitude 1 character in CORPS. It works out reasonably well::

DC	Probability for attribute 10	CORPS Difficulty
5	80%	2
10	55%	4
15	30%	5
20	5%	6
25	-	7
30	-	9
35	-	10
40	-	12

So by this scale, something Challenging (DC 20) is still possible for Joe Average. Something Formidable (DC 25) is even possible for someone with Familiarity with the relevant skill, if they take enough time to prepare. (Not likely, but possible.) However, I chose to have the more blatantly superheroic tasks jump up in difficulty. That's in keeping with what I think is the tone of the D20 Modern game--but feel free to adjust them for yourself; bump them up by 1 or 2 if your characters are skilled and will make hash of these chances.

Consider the alternative case. According to the D20 Modern SRD, breaking into a secure computer system is DC 25. On my chart, that's difficulty 7, so any professional hacker (that is, skill 7) can do it with the proper tools and preparation. In your game, that might be nonsense. Perhaps you should have the discontinuity at DC 20, rather than 30, so DC 20 is difficulty 7.

Or you can do (D20 Modern/5)+2, which is just easier:

D20 Modern DC	CORPS Difficulty
5	3
10	4
15	5
20	6
25	7
30	8
35	9
40	10