Why Our Group Rejected HERO, but play it now.

[live_it_out]

I played Champions in the 80's when it was one paperback rulebook about 150 pages or so. It was easily my favorite game. I quit playing in college and came back to the game after many years, when people were skeptically calling for a 5th Ed. on the boards.

As I tried to get back into Champions, I found that there was a "HERO System Book" and a "Setting Book for Champions." It may sound silly now, but that really confused me. I didn't understand what it meant. It made me reticent to try it thinking that if I couldn't understand that, the rules might be confusing too. "What's a setting?" I thought. Sure now I'm an insider and it just makes sense, like using a mouse makes sense. But when I first picked up a mouse, it was weird too.

Then I saw 5th Ed. and how big it was. I balked and bought d20 and Savage Worlds instead. I didn't like d20 but we've been playing SW ever since.

About 5 or so years later, which is last month, I wanted to play supers, which in my opinion need a lot more grit than Savage Worlds currently does. After determining that the wording of Mutants and Masterminds was just too confusing for my players (even though the concepts themselves made a lot of sense), I picked up Hero's Sidekick.

I knew if I showed the group the size of 5th Ed. they would have never tried it. Sidekick impressed them though. It had all the rules we needed to run my supers setting and was not to much to learn. I have been getting people to buy it ever since and we're planning on running a 6 month campaign soon. After we know the system well enough to not need to look things up every day, we'll probably move on to 5th (or 6th) Ed.

That's one man's story, Steve. Hope it helps as you think through 6th Ed. Obviously I'm in support of a simple initial book with supplements that allow the system to be broadened. Otherwise I might have eventually tried 5th Ed., but my players never would have.

[Thia Halmades]

My understanding is that a "sidekick" type book is already planned for 6th. So no need to worry on that front.

[live_it_out]

One thing I didn't mention is that when I first tried to get back into Champions after a lot of time away, the books didn't say "Champions" on them, they said "HERO."

But in my mind I kept saying, "I don't want to play HERO, I just want to play Champions. Now I have to learn two things, HERO *and* Champions?"

Sure, like I said before, it sounds silly now. But at the time it's a big part of what kept me from getting into HERO.

[CourtFool]

I have heard people say they do not play Hero because it is just for supers.

[Akiva]

I ignored HERO for the longest time specifically because I thought it was superheroes only. I knew that it was related somehow to Champions; I figured it was just rebranded. I still maintain that HERO shows its superheroes roots too much for a system that's supposed to be universal. I'm hoping this is one of the things that Steve corrects in the 6th edition.

As to the original poster, I went the opposite: I was attracted by the sheer bulk of the book. I did, however, pick up Sidekick for my players because I also thought that they'd balk at it. When they did see the main rule book, they said held up their copies of Sidekick and said, 'Why did you give us this? We want that.'

Guess I shouldn't have underestimated them.

[archermoo]

I ignored HERO for the longest time specifically because I thought it was superheroes only. I knew that it was related somehow to Champions; I figured it was just rebranded. I still maintain that HERO shows its superheroes roots too much for a system that's supposed to be universal. I'm hoping this is one of the things that Steve corrects in the 6th edition.

As to the original poster, I went the opposite: I was attracted by the sheer bulk of the book. I did, however, pick up Sidekick for my players because I also thought that they'd balk at it. When they did see the main rule book, they said held up their copies of Sidekick and said, 'Why did you give us this? We want that.'

Guess I shouldn't have underestimated them.

I would've responded with "I'm willing to pick up the tab for Sidekick. If you want the full rules you gotta pick 'em up yourself." :)

[CourtFool]

I accept that not everyone likes Supers. I judge a system based on how well it can handle Supers, because I think the genre really stretches a system. Fantasy often has magic and sci fi often has psionics. If a system can pull off Supers well, in my opinion, it can usually pull of magic and psionics well.









I give five posts before someone provides examples to the contrary.

[SAVeira]

I would've responded with "I'm willing to pick up the tab for Sidekick. If you want the full rules you gotta pick 'em up yourself." :)
That is my rule these days. Purchased half a dozen, when they first came into my FLGS.

[Toadmaster]

I accept that not everyone likes Supers. I judge a system based on how well it can handle Supers, because I think the genre really stretches a system. Fantasy often has magic and sci fi often has psionics. If a system can pull off Supers well, in my opinion, it can usually pull of magic and psionics well.









I give five posts before someone provides examples to the contrary.

Only 2 posts :eg:

GURPS works well for a lot of things but 4 color supers isn't one of them unless the 4th ed Powers book really changed some stuff.

[jtelson]

Only 2 posts :eg:

GURPS works well for a lot of things but 4 color supers isn't one of them unless the 4th ed Powers book really changed some stuff.

Grim, bloody, lethal Supers it does quite well though.

JT "I swear I didn't know it would blow right through him and the cops behind himand the school behind them, errr sorry" Elson

[archermoo]

Only 2 posts :eg:

GURPS works well for a lot of things but 4 color supers isn't one of them unless the 4th ed Powers book really changed some stuff.

Well, he didn't say that that ONLY systems that could do supers could also do magic and psi. Just that a system that COULD do supers well is also likely to do magic and psi well. ;)

[James Gillen]

I knew if I showed the group the size of 5th Ed. they would have never tried it. Sidekick impressed them though. It had all the rules we needed to run my supers setting and was not to much to learn. I have been getting people to buy it ever since and we're planning on running a 6 month campaign soon. After we know the system well enough to not need to look things up every day, we'll probably move on to 5th (or 6th) Ed.

That's one man's story, Steve. Hope it helps as you think through 6th Ed. Obviously I'm in support of a simple initial book with supplements that allow the system to be broadened. Otherwise I might have eventually tried 5th Ed., but my players never would have.

I've been saying over and over again: This is what Hero Games needs to do. Emphasize the product that will actually get people into the game before giving them all the bells & whistles and end up scaring them off with a big black bulletproof monolith of a book. ;)

JG

[TSandman]

That is my rule these days. Purchased half a dozen, when they first came into my FLGS.

For my part, I bought 5er and Sidekick... gave Sidekick to a friend (after reading it as a primer to 5er), got two other players to buy 5er...

now the funny part... the guy I gave Sidekick to is my FLGS Store manager, who happens to be a longtime player in our group...

If you want to know where I'm going with that, I'll just say that when nWoD got out some years ago, we each got a brand new book for christmas...

He's planning to do a One Shot game himself and I intend to to all my future games with Hero... if it really take off, most of us will have the Big Book (be it 5er or 6er at that time)..

[Akiva]

I would've responded with "I'm willing to pick up the tab for Sidekick. If you want the full rules you gotta pick 'em up yourself." :)

That is precisely what I said and one of my players immediately went to Amazon and bought the 5ER, Dark Champions, and the Ultimate Skill. And, after showing them how much easier life is with the HERO Designer, they bought copies of that, too, which I thought was good except for the side effect that they then decided they wanted to rebuild their characters in the Designer rather than actually start the campaign that night. Ah, well, they ended up with far better builds and, hopefully, we're going to start this Wednesday.

[archermoo]

That is precisely what I said and one of my players immediately went to Amazon and bought the 5ER, Dark Champions, and the Ultimate Skill. And, after showing them how much easier life is with the HERO Designer, they bought copies of that, too, which I thought was good except for the side effect that they then decided they wanted to rebuild their characters in the Designer rather than actually start the campaign that night. Ah, well, they ended up with far better builds and, hopefully, we're going to start this Wednesday.

:thumbup:

[archermoo]

I've been saying over and over again: This is what Hero Games needs to do. Emphasize the product that will actually get people into the game before giving them all the bells & whistles and end up scaring them off with a big black bulletproof monolith of a book. ;)

JG

Well, the schedule already has the 6e Basic Rule book coming out shortly after the main 6e books. I think actually releasing it BEFORE the main rulebooks wouldn't be feasible, nor desirable. Before a good job can be done on making a basic version of the rules, the full version would already need to exist. At that point it would mean delaying the release of the full version of the rules just so that it comes out after the basic version. That doesn't sound like a winning strategy to me. :)

[Steve Long]

Folx, I definitely appreciate the information and insights, but please let's keep this forum for rules issues only. If and when we want input on issues of presentation and the like, have no fear, we'll ask for it. ;)