USPD updates

[Monolith]

Is there any chance we will see the new Advantages, Limitations, and Adders from USPD added to the templates?

Here is a list of what is new:

New Advantages:
• Page 19: No Turn Mode

New Limitations:
• Page 10: Inaccurate
• Page 100: Physical Manifestation
• Page 225: Levitation

New Adders:
• Page 10: Affects Porous
• Page 164: Mobile Perception Point
• Page 164: Multiple Perception Point
• Page 251: Multiple Combat Effects
• Page 251: Varying Combat Effects

[rjcurrie]

My guess is that Dan will not be adding them as his attention has turned to v2.0 and all of these can be easily handled with Custom Modifier and Custom Adder.

[Monolith]

Originally posted by rjcurrie
My guess is that Dan will not be adding them as his attention has turned to v2.0 and all of these can be easily handled with Custom Modifier and Custom Adder.
They could be added with Custom Modifiers and Adders but they should not have to be. Part of the covenant between the buyers and the seller should be that the software will be updated to take advantage of rules from new books as they are released. So far that has not been the case for Champions, Star Hero, Terran Empire, TUV, and now the USPD.

The software is supposed to make our gaming lives a little simpler but the constant tweaking of the templates which is required every time I want to implement a rule from a new book has become more of a hassle then it is worth. I suppose it is a simple thing if you are a programmer and understand how to make new templates but for those of us who do not it is nearly an insurmountable task.

I do understand that these things might be in version 2.0, but that is still 6 months away and offers no assistance to those of us using the program right now.

[Simon]

I think you're putting words in my mouth, Mono....

My main concern in maintaining HD is in applying and following the myriad rules of the system. In this, I <i>do</i> pay attention to the supplements (frex: the "change" to Charges that came about as a result of TUV).

When it comes to adding in every little ability/adder/modifier that folks come up with in the supplements, that is something which anyone can do and is not something which I am likely to concentrate on much at all. The only exception to this would be in the case of "functional" Modifiers which affect the way an ability should format and the rules logic that applies to the ability....for example: AOE, Reduced END, Ranged, etc.

The templates are freely editable. Anyone is capable of creating a custom template which includes the new abilities/mods/adders defined in any of the supplements. You can even send it into Ben and he'll post it up on the Free Stuff page for everyone to enjoy.

I will endeavor to maintain the rules in the current version as much as possible, except in intermediate periods like this, where any "new" rules will go into the next version. Case in point on this are the changes to Charges that came out in TUV....HD v1 was modified to reflect those changes, as they represented changes to the way the system should act when applying Charges.

[Monolith]

Dan, if find your use of the word "anyone" to be a little to easy for you to type. Anyone cannot create a new TF system to match the one in SH/TE. Anyone cannot rewrite the Fringe Benefit system to allow for modifiers costing more than 10 points. Anyone cannot rewrite an entirely new WF system. Anyone cannot write a new Computer Programming or Systems Operation skill. The use of "anyone" really only means people who have enough basic programming information to be able to do the task. I would assume that number to be far less than 50% of the people who actually use the program.

For those of us not playing a standard Champions game, or do not have your "anyone" skill to rewrite a template, HD becomes nothing more than a 20mb hard drive paperweight. And this will only get worse when all the new skills, talents, and abilities in Fantasy Hero are added to the list.

[Simon]

Originally posted by Monolith
Dan, if find your use of the word "anyone" to be a little to easy for you to type. Anyone cannot create a new TF system to match the one in SH/TE. Anyone cannot rewrite the Fringe Benefit system to allow for modifiers costing more than 10 points. Anyone cannot rewrite an entirely new WF system. Anyone cannot write a new Computer Programming or Systems Operation skill. The use of "anyone" really only means people who have enough basic programming information to be able to do the task. I would assume that number to be far less than 50% of the people who actually use the program.

For those of us not playing a standard Champions game, or do not have your "anyone" skill to rewrite a template, HD becomes nothing more than a 20mb hard drive paperweight. And this will only get worse when all the new skills, talents, and abilities in Fantasy Hero are added to the list.
Anyone can simply click "Custom Skill", or "Custom Modifier" or what have you, if they do not have the appropriate template with the ability pre-defined.

[rjcurrie]

Right, you simply create any of the new abilities you need with custom abilities, and put them in prefabs if you want to use them over and over again. And of course, you call just edit the Display field of an existing ability that has the same cost structure and use that. The Power Skill is particularly useful for this sort of thing.

Rod

[Derek Hiemforth]

I think this is all a gray area. It is impractical (and probably undesirable) for Hero Designer to be updated every time a book comes out with every permutation of Power Modifier that appears in that book. On the other hand, there are some Power Modifiers that clearly become at least quasi-official, as they're used in multiple books and are clearly quite useful. (Things like No Turn Mode, Affects Pourous, and Mobile Perception Point.)

Yes, the end users can use Custom Adder or Custom Modifier for these, manually typing them in every single time. But once they become clearly in common usage (as I think the three examples above are), it would probably be a good idea to actually put them in Hero Designer.

Perhaps something could be worked out where a modifier that Steve blesses as sufficiently "official" could be added in an HD update. (Perhaps modifiers that have appeared in two or more books, or some other logical criteria.)

Dan, would it make any difference (or even be possible) if someone offered to do the mods on the "master" template for you? (Or some other solution that let the community contribute the updates to the product?)

For non-modifiers, like the customized versions of Skills, I agree that prefabs are probably sufficient (unless they start showing up in book after book or something). Anyone could make a prefab with all the custom Skills from a genre book and stick it on the web site for all the world to download for free. :)

Just my .02. I don't consider it a make or break issue either way, although it's definitely on the "nice to have" list. :)

[Heroman]

If anything, I would rather see each core rules as the only ones added to the HD by default.
For each book which comes out, I think it would be more appropriate for it to worked up in HD in a way that it could be a separate purchase, but contain the key stuff from the sourcebook. Each supplement should contain all the special stuff from the book; the packages, new adders/modifiers, weapons & equipment, skills, samples, etc to be a more comprehensive addition. This would be great if it could be done by The Community, but I would guess this to be a conflict of interest with the HD supplement sales.

While bug fixes and rule corrections should obviously be kept up from an expected maintenance level on HD, I agree it is impossible to expect new stuff added based on the genre supplements. If a supplement affects the core rules to a level where an errata/faq change is made on the core rules, I would hope that it would get incorporated.

This of course, would detract time and attention from v2 which may implement a smoother update process/user modification process.

One thing which might be nice for the 'v2' is the ability to define new adders/mods in a prefab or similar construct, making them available when the prefab is loaded.

[Talon]

Originally posted by Heroman
One thing which might be nice for the 'v2' is the ability to define new adders/mods in a prefab or similar construct, making them available when the prefab is loaded.

This is why I pushed for a looser template model for V2 (where you didn't have to have a predefined parent->child chain of tempaltes). If you could load these optional modifiers along with house rules and whatever, I think this problem would go away. As long as there's the issue of overlap, the problem will likely remain. I haven't felt tempted to hand-edit the V1 templates because each one would have to be done separately.

[tiger]

I thought Dan had said that he was working on a "loser" parent-child templete chain for V2

[Simon]

Originally posted by tiger
I thought Dan had said that he was working on a "loser" parent-child templete chain for V2
"loser" parent-child template chain? How non-PC ;-)

I will definitely have a "looser" template structure....with each template being able to specify a "parent" template. I may have some more "amorphous" structures tossed in there, but that will be dependent on time.

[Talon]

The scenario I foresee is:

Template A modifies standard heroic template to include FH stuff.

Template B modifies standard heroic template to include TUV stuff.

Template C modifies standard heroic template to add house rules.

Template D modifies FH template to include FH-specific house rules.

If these templates have to be hand-tweaked to work together, they are less likely to be used.

[Simon]

Originally posted by Geoff Speare
The scenario I foresee is:

Template A modifies standard heroic template to include FH stuff.

Template B modifies standard heroic template to include TUV stuff.

Template C modifies standard heroic template to add house rules.

Template D modifies FH template to include FH-specific house rules.

If these templates have to be hand-tweaked to work together, they are less likely to be used.
That's a standard "parent-child" relationship....that will definitely be a part of the new template structure.

Additionally, I'll have the "base" templates structured in a similar manner. Specifically:

There will be a base-level template (likely just a copy of the current StandardSuper.hdt) which defines all of the "starting points" for abilities.

Each of the built in templates will then extend the base-level template, defining only those items which are different.

Frex: <ul><li>There will be a Supers template that will extend the base-level template. It will not need to redefine anything, as the base-level template will contain all of the super-heroic rules. Each of the power-levels for supers will extend this Supers template....the only thing that they'll need to define will be the starting point levels.<\li>
<li>There will be a Heroes template that will extend the base-level template. It will redefine all items which use END, setting the AP per END value to 5 (rather than 10) and take care of all other rules conversion from Super-heroic to Heroic. Each of the power-levels for heroes will extend this Heroes template, simply defining the point levels.</li>
<li>There will be a Bases template that will extend the base-level template. It will remove a lot of the Characteristics defined in the base-level template and add in some of it's own (the base-specific characteristics).</li>
<li>...And so on...</li>
</ul>
You can then use any of these templates (at any level from base-level up to the point-specific templates) as your "base" when constructing your own template.

Hopefully this makes sense.....