Strengths of HERO?

[Vondy]

With strength costing one point per point and being exceptionally cost effective for figured characteristics Hero is the STRONGEST OF THEM ALL

[Lamrok]

Why I like Hero:

- Once you have a group of players who know the rules, you can hop from genre to genre effortlessly. 4th edition and earlier versions of Hero always struck me as very easy to learn, as long as you weren't playing a Supers game. 5th edition has added a lot of chrome, and ramped up the learning curve a bit, I think.

- Vanilla-flavor Hero System combat tends to produce combat results that mimic movies and books a lot more than real life. That's my aim when I GM, and I appreciate a game system that produces results appropriate to my GM style. As others have said, there are ways to easily adjust this.

- You can build exactly the character you want.

- The rules cover non-combat situations very well. All of the games I play in have a very strong non-combat emphasis, and Hero handles this easily.

- If Hero ever does a Weird West version, well, Hero has the perfect person to write it. Steve Long is one of the best known Deadlands writers. Other than that, I completely agree with Zorwil's comments above.

As for learning curve, it didn't seem too bad the last time I pulled newbies in. Genre can make a big difference, though.

[Arthur]

Originally posted by Nero's Boot

<snip intro>

Well, a lot of folks have given some really well-thought-out answers. I've just skimmed them. I have my own take on this. A lot of it, I'm sure, has already been pointed out, so this is from The Department of Redundancy Department.

1) Other than the genres mentioned on this site (supers, sci-fi, and fantasy), are there any other genres HERO does well? Would the system handle a mecha-based campaign easily? Could it do spaghetti Westerns? Could it do horror?

HERO doesn't really lend itself to a genre-by-genre breakdown as far as what it excels at, other than supers. It really shines there, and when you run supers, you can tell that's what it was originally designed for.

It's probablyt better to think in terms of power levels. HERO is at its best in the range of comic-book superhero levels. Now, that covers quite a spread, so don't panic!

It starts to show problems at the low end and at the high end. I wouldn't use it for a Joe Normals game (but who wants to play that?), nor for godlike power levels (once you get much past the "lifting skyscrapers" level it starts to show problems).

Having said that, it handles quite well almost any fictional setting with characters of your typical roleplaying power levels. Really, who wants to play powerless dweebs? That's no fun. At the other extreme, Phenomenal Cosmic Powers (tm) gets boring.

2) How intuitive is the HERO system? Is it easy to learn, or will I have to put some effort into absorbing it?

I learned the game about 20 years ago (oh FINODH I'm old!!). As best as I can recall, it SEEMED impossibly complex at first. However, it didn't take long at all before the basics of the system started sinking in. One or two play sessions is all it really took, IIRC. As others have pointed out, when you start up, ignore most or all of the optional rules! That will give you about the same situation I was in 20 years ago with 2nd Ed. Champions.

3) How "realistic" would you say HERO is? Is it more Four Colors and high-powered like Aberrant and Exalted, or is it more low-powered and gritty, like Godlike or AFMBE? Or is it capable of scaling between the two extremes?

Not familiar with those games. I'd say it does best at the low to medium powered superheroes. Something along the lines of Spider-man is just about dead on for what Hero emulates best. It has a hard time with characters like the Silver Age Superman. If anything, it works better at slightly lower than average comic-book than at slightly higher. That is, it does characters like Doc Savage and The Shadow better than, say, the Silver Surfer.

[zornwil]

Originally posted by Arthur
It starts to show problems at the low end and at the high end. I wouldn't use it for a Joe Normals game (but who wants to play that?), nor for godlike power levels (once you get much past the "lifting skyscrapers" level it starts to show problems).

I learned the game about 20 years ago (oh FINODH I'm old!!). As best as I can recall, it SEEMED impossibly complex at first. However, it didn't take long at all before the basics of the system started sinking in. One or two play sessions is all it really took, IIRC. As others have pointed out, when you start up, ignore most or all of the optional rules! That will give you about the same situation I was in 20 years ago with 2nd Ed. Champions.

Stuff snipped from above for brevity.

Re the comment on Joe Normals games quoted above, Arthur, just curious, what would you play for such a game, or is it something you haven't considered? Same question re godlike power level. Just wondering, I'm always curious what other systems people find strong for particular purposes.

Re the 2nd paragraph, I just wanted to say how true it is that it does seem pretty complex but it's not so when you get to it. That's because the system is pretty consistent internally.

[TheEmerged]

Originally posted by zornwil
Stuff snipped from above for brevity.

Re the comment on Joe Normals games quoted above, Arthur, just curious, what would you play for such a game, or is it something you haven't considered? Same question re godlike power level. Just wondering, I'm always curious what other systems people find strong for particular purposes.

Re the 2nd paragraph, I just wanted to say how true it is that it does seem pretty complex but it's not so when you get to it. That's because the system is pretty consistent internally.

Well, I'll answer for myself there. The best "over-powered" system I've ever used would probably be the DCU one -- the original one where you had 9 attributes in a 3x3 block, not the recent d6 one from West End. Granted, the formula for disadvantages & advantages broke down and the equipment rules had some flawed assumptions but both were easily house ruled around.

As for the best "normal joes" system -- I actually have to give the nod to GURPS here. GURPS breaks down the weirder you get but for normal people in a moderately normal world it actually surpasses HERO. Of course, GURPS starts breaking down very fast unless your campaign scope is very narrow so overall HERO is far superior -- but this *is* one of the two narrow areas I have to give it the edge in (the other being psionics, which is balanced within itself but not relative to magic, martial arts, technology, etc. within GURPS).

[Agent X]

Originally posted by TheEmerged
Well, I'll answer for myself there. The best "over-powered" system I've ever used would probably be the DCU one -- the original one where you had 9 attributes in a 3x3 block, not the recent d6 one from West End. Granted, the formula for disadvantages & advantages broke down and the equipment rules had some flawed assumptions but both were easily house ruled around.

As for the best "normal joes" system -- I actually have to give the nod to GURPS here. GURPS breaks down the weirder you get but for normal people in a moderately normal world it actually surpasses HERO. Of course, GURPS starts breaking down very fast unless your campaign scope is very narrow so overall HERO is far superior -- but this *is* one of the two narrow areas I have to give it the edge in (the other being psionics, which is balanced within itself but not relative to magic, martial arts, technology, etc. within GURPS).

If you use DC Benchmark philosophies in Champions, Champs can work pretty well for high-powered games.

[Killer Shrike]

Ive run HEROs at point levels from 125 to over 1000, with the majority spent in the 125-250 range and the 350-500 range, and many different genres, though predominantly "high" fantasy and supers.

Ive found that the HEROs System can handle all point ranges, but requires more optional rules to do gritty (mostly combat and injury options), and more GM adjudication to do cosmic (as freakier things pop up).

The beauty of the System to me is that 12 years later I still find new things to do with it, and still encounter interesting ways to express powers & abilities. Its never gotten old, stale, or boring to me like other game systems have. It constantly engages my creativity and helps me to express my imagination.

FWIW, YMMV

[RealmForge]

Yep. Hero can do it all.

As a sidebar, if you are going to dip into your wallet to pick up the core rulebook, I also highly recommend the Hero Designer CD. If yer willing to hold off for a little bit, I believe 2.0 should be out by the end of the year (correct me if I am wrong). This will greatly aid you with the learning curve issue because it allows you to focus on character creation without having to deal with the math as well.

[Lupus]

I have one thing to add to this list of exceptional points. Probably the most important thing, I've found.

AS A GM, YOU MUST KNOW THE SYSTEM BETTER THAN YOUR PLAYERS DO.

If you have a player who has a better knowledge of the system, they can run rings around you as a GM, and snow you under with bull. Or remember rules useful to them, but conveniently forget the bad ones.

Actually, you don't have to have a /better/ knowledge of the system than your places, but you do need to know it well enough that you at least know where to look something up. Otherwise, it just takes too long to do that during a session. But I'd recommend that any GM, especially new ones, do not run for players who know more than them, unless those players are very, very good and very helpful and actually act as an aid to the GM. Even then... it messes with power dynamics. I feel my position as a GM is undermined if I'm not the absolute authority on the rules.

So - make sure you know the rules before you run, and have a working knowledge of the book so you know where to look stuff up. Also get the resource kit. That GM's screen is handy with all its tables. It's also double-sided, so the same tables are on each side. The li'l maps are handy, too.

(Oh yeah... if you get into HERO, make sure you have a nice fat bank account. You'll end up buying a lot of stuff for it.)