Why is it so slow in here?

[Ninja-Bear]

For clairity, when I said premade, I meant anything premade for any genre, not just fantasy.  By anything, I refer to villian books, power books, setting/city books, bestiary books, or even the premade weapon lists.

 

Here is the deal about the snobbery (if there is any).  Many people acknowledge that our hobby as a whole is shrinking, and this particular game system already has a negative image, you know too difficult.  Snobbery on these boards a can alienate potential new players before they even had a chance to play the game.  And I hope that I'm qrong about the snobbery too.  Perhaps i read into things, I asked to see if I was correct or not.  Thanks all.

[Kraven Kor]

On using premade stuff vs. making your own and "snobbery:"

 

Honestly, I think it is more a symptom of my own OCD and sheer laziness that I can't quite use any pre-published settings and modules.  I know it seems odd quoting laziness as the reason why I make everything myself, but if I make it myself I know how to use it in general; where with modules and such I have to read and re-read and make notes and...  yeah...  

[Ninja-Bear]

Oh and its not if make up your own that makes you a "snob". Its when you look down on others for using premade is when I fet alittle irked. : )

[NuSoardGraphite]

I engage in a fair bit of "snobbery" on here, but its system snobbery, not created vs premade snobbery. i use premade stuff myself whenever it is relevant to the game i'm running.  how could i not?  it makes things so muh easier.

 

The fantasy campaign i run is based on a pre existing campaign setting from ICE,  shadow world.  i like that particular setting enough that i feel it better to work on conversions thant to switch to one of hero's specific settings (though i want to examine turakian age a bit closer...i might use it) so i completely understand those who convert settings or modules to use in their games.  heck doing conversions from other games to hero is one of the most fun exercises one can do with the system!

[Nadrakas]

I engage in a fair bit of "snobbery" on here, but its system snobbery, not created vs premade snobbery. i use premade stuff myself whenever it is relevant to the game i'm running.  how could i not?  it makes things so muh easier.

 

The fantasy campaign i run is based on a pre existing campaign setting from ICE,  shadow world.  i like that particular setting enough that i feel it better to work on conversions thant to switch to one of hero's specific settings (though i want to examine turakian age a bit closer...i might use it) so i completely understand those who convert settings or modules to use in their games.  heck doing conversions from other games to hero is one of the most fun exercises one can do with the system!

I'm working on converting Eclipse Phase to Hero...I like the setting, but want it in Hero.

 

~ M

[Jhaierr]

The fantasy campaign i run is based on a pre existing campaign setting from ICE,  shadow world.  i like that particular setting enough that i feel it better to work on conversions thant to switch to one of hero's specific settings (though i want to examine turakian age a bit closer...i might use it) so i completely understand those who convert settings or modules to use in their games.  heck doing conversions from other games to hero is one of the most fun exercises one can do with the system!

 

I remember when they used to have Fantasy Hero stats for Shadow World! I'd love to have a FH 6E version of that setting.

[NuSoardGraphite]

I remember when they used to have Fantasy Hero stats for Shadow World! I'd love to have a FH 6E version of that setting.

I originally began using shadow world because i was looking for a new fantasy game to switch to (was tired of the limitations inherent within D&D) and decided on using rolemaster and i purchased shadow world on a whim because it was the companion setting for the system i chose.  it's mere coincidence that a couple of years later, i would adopt hero as my primary system and would continue to use shadow world as my primary game setting.

 

The odd thing was that i normally dont like most premade settings.  very few appeal to me completely.  shadow world was essentially perfect in my eyes and i have a difficult time moving away from it. (Anotther setting i find to be fantastic is exalted, but as it progresses through editions and is acquiring author changes, i'm beginning to find it less fantastic and more and more pretentious as time moveson)

[PaycheckHero]

For clairity, when I said premade, I meant anything premade for any genre, not just fantasy.  By anything, I refer to villian books, power books, setting/city books, bestiary books, or even the premade weapon lists.

Then your category is so extremely broad that I imagine virtually no one falls into the category. I've never heard of anyone who disliked every one of those. A set Of measure zero is pointless to worry about.

[Jhaierr]

I originally began using shadow world because i was looking for a new fantasy game to switch to (was tired of the limitations inherent within D&D) and decided on using rolemaster and i purchased shadow world on a whim because it was the companion setting for the system i chose.  it's mere coincidence that a couple of years later, i would adopt hero as my primary system and would continue to use shadow world as my primary game setting.

 

Hmmm, I wonder.... We have been talking in other threads about Fantasy Hero needing a "standard setting." I wonder how difficult it would be to work out a deal with Terry Amthor and have Shadow World be it?

 

Just a thought. Shadow World might be very, very tightly wrapped in Rolemaster now...

[NuSoardGraphite]

Hmmm, I wonder.... We have been talking in other threads about Fantasy Hero needing a "standard setting." I wonder how difficult it would be to work out a deal with Terry Amthor and have Shadow World be it?

 

Just a thought. Shadow World might be very, very tightly wrapped in Rolemaster now...

Honestly, i dont think it would be very difficult at all.  mr. Amthor has made the setting first and foremost one that can be used as a campaign for any game system. while the books are laden with rolemaster stats and mechanics, the vast majority of the books are detailed descriptions of the world itself and its inhabitants and could easily be adapted to any setting.

 

Heck, mr. Amthor hasnt even updated the setting to the current edition of rolemaster.  he mostly uses RM2 with conversion notes for RMSS and the current edition (i believe ice is preparing to releas another new edition as well)

[PaycheckHero]

Discussions of giving Hero a standard world always remind me of one of the more insightful articles I've ever read.  It was a long-time Hero contributor discussing the differences between Hero and Exalted on the white wolf boards, and when I went to look for it just now I find it's gone.  I fear I didn't save it, and I don't even have the name of the author.  Stupid of me.

 

In discussing rules problems in Exalted, one of his points was that ultimately White Wolf doesn't do mechanics well and Hero doesn't do settings well.  I suspect that's true if your standards are high enough, and for a standard setting to be a vehicle for attracting people it would have to be rather good.  And it makes me think that there are a lot of pitfalls in giving FH a default setting.  The obvious one is that the only reference standard setting is the D&D one, and that's trademarked and copyrighted to the limits of what the law allows.  Any other setting is going to have to be original, but I admit I've never seen an original setting from Hero that I wanted to run.  Can Hero create one that won't alienate as many people as it attracts?  I don't know, but my experience with certain aspects of how Hero Games handles setting-specific things like magic make me very dubious.  I hate the "buy every magic spell as a superpower" system and think it throws away the reasons I like FH, but it shows up over and over again in official material.  It was the standard magic system in 4e (and I think it was also in 3e, but I don't have a copy of 3e FH ATM), and has show up as recently as the MHI worldbook.  It's OK if you like it, but I would be no happier to have it be built into some standard setting than I am with the standard D&D system.

 

Harry Truman, that famous role-player, once said that "if you give 'em a choice between Republicans and Republicans they'll take Republicans every time."  I worry that the sentiment here is similar--an official setting will end up giving 'em D&D, and they'll choose the real thing instead.  Or it will be something not D&D but not original enough to really attract people to itself, and at the same time will not attract people to the ability to do what Hero does well.

[Tasha]

Back in the days of 1st Edition Fantasy Hero there was a snippet of a Campaign called The Western Shores that many Hero Players/GM's were excited about. Unfortunatly, instead of expanding and detailing the world we got books full of spells and magical items.

It think it would be more correct to say that Hero's obsession with being a "Tool Box" has gotten in the way of their publishing a great Campaign world. Hero has had a lot of great authors that were very focused on Mechanics, but not as focused on the things that make a fun gaming world. We have had glimmerings of greatness.

IMHO Champions New Millenium was one of Hero's Best Game worlds ever. Never before or after have I read a gaming world that made me want to play and run in that gaming world as much as CNM did. Perhaps if the "Western Shores" would have been expanded it would have been as compelling as CNM. Who knows. I guess you could also group Aaron Allston's Strike Force in the Game Worlds that make you want to play or run in that universe.

[Old Man]

I think what's really gotten in the way of designing a great original Hero world is the expense.  To really create a great atmospheric setting requires all the production values necessary to draw the reader in: artwork by Brom, full color poster maps, lots of illustration and graphic design, and above all, sourcebooks full of details.  Hero books tend to look like they were done in Microsoft Word.  And I think that's actually an extension of the dying grognard attitude--they don't want to pay for color art or sourcebooks, they don't want to pay for another copy of the rules, they deeply resent the idea that there is a 'standard' or 'one true way' campaign, and so on.

 

Unfortunately this drives away new players.  Tuala Morn is an outstanding setting, graced with an all-black cover that does little to encourage the curious to even pick it up let alone give a hint about what's inside.  Even if the new player is unusually rich, and they buy Tuala Morn and FH and the separate rules and fistfuls of d6s, and figures out how to play the game without being scared off by the 'difficult' math, there's still no published adventure or pregen character sheets for them to use. 

 

The time from purchase to play for FH is measured in hours even for experienced RPGers.  It needs to be measured in minutes or there will be no new players.  That's not possible without some kind of setting, pregen adventures, and pregen characters.

[Nadrakas]

"Sigh"...it's too bad that a Good Product couldn't just "Be Done" by someone (Fans Perhaps) and put out a Setting.

 

 

~ M

 

Edit: Replace Good Product with "Product We're Wanting"

Edited December 16, 2013 by Nadrakas

[Chris Goodwin]

"Sigh"...it's too bad that a Good Product couldn't just "Be Done" by someone (Fans Perhaps) and put out a Setting.

 

 

~ M

 

Edit: Replace Good Product with "Product We're Wanting"

 

Nothing's stopping anyone from writing something up and publishing it.  DOJ's terms for doing so are extremely liberal.

[Tasha]

I am not totally convinced that we need color artwork. FATE has great layouts in all of the books, but no Color pages inside. They DO have some really nice artwork inside the book. Also the Covers for all of the FATE stuff are very compelling and make you want to open the book to see what is inside. Heck, Perhaps what we should look at is a "Hero System in 4 pages or so" that tells how to play and what all of the Skills do in a Sentence or two. Call it the quick start rules. Include Iconic characters at a starting point value including quick writeups of their Abilities and Spells, and point the people at Champions Complete for the Character Gen and more complete rules.

[Nadrakas]

Nothing's stopping anyone from writing something up and publishing it.  DOJ's terms for doing so are extremely liberal.

(BTW: Where is " DOJ's terms" -- I looked, but I can't remember where they are...)

 

I have the software (Adobe CS2 + Indesign...and Corel Draw x6) and I suddenly find myself with a lot of free time.  I would be willing to work with other people and assist with something like this or...

 

 

I am not totally convinced that we need color artwork. FATE has great layouts in all of the books, but no Color pages inside. They DO have some really nice artwork inside the book. Also the Covers for all of the FATE stuff are very compelling and make you want to open the book to see what is inside. Heck, Perhaps what we should look at is a "Hero System in 4 pages or so" that tells how to play and what all of the Skills do in a Sentence or two. Call it the quick start rules. Include Iconic characters at a starting point value including quick writeups of their Abilities and Spells, and point the people at Champions Complete for the Character Gen and more complete rules.

...this.  (B&W works well, if the Artwork is of good quality, the books are well laid out, and what is put out is a quality product).

 

Thoughts?

 

 

~ M

[Chris Goodwin]

(BTW: Where is " DOJ's terms" -- I looked, but I can't remember where they are...)

 

Right here.

[Nadrakas]

 

Right here.

And thus I am blind.  Thank you.

 

~ M

[Nadrakas]

So if I am reading this right (I believe that I am...)...

 

From the License: "A. Grant Of License: DOJ hereby grants to LICENSEE a license to publish NAME WORKS using the HERO System rules to define characters, abilities, technology, places, and events in those products, subject to the terms, conditions, and restrictions set forth in this Contract."

 

A LICENSEE can create Presets, but can't actually reprint the Rules/Powers from any of the Hero System Books (ie: Hero 6e v1 & 2, Champions Complete, etc).  Sounds fair enough.  Create plenty of well thought out (and explained) Presets and point back to one of the Hero System books (Thanks Tasha.  Which book?  H6e V1 or CC? TBD...).

 

 

~ M

[Jhaierr]

Honestly, i dont think it would be very difficult at all.  mr. Amthor has made the setting first and foremost one that can be used as a campaign for any game system. while the books are laden with rolemaster stats and mechanics, the vast majority of the books are detailed descriptions of the world itself and its inhabitants and could easily be adapted to any setting.

 

Heck, mr. Amthor hasnt even updated the setting to the current edition of rolemaster.  he mostly uses RM2 with conversion notes for RMSS and the current edition (i believe ice is preparing to releas another new edition as well)

 

How much would you say that Shadow World is dependent on, say for instance, the way spells work in Rolemaster? Is that really a big part of the setting? I know there is Essænce, but I don't think that's related to the Essence, Channeling, and Mentalism sources at all.

[PaycheckHero]

Whenever anyone (including me) says "XXX drives away new players," I always wish I could actually test the assertion. I rather suspect that we know a lot less than we think about that, since it usually comes down to extrapolations based on very different systems. I doubt the audience for hero is the same as it is for Fate Accelerated, and I doubt that extrapolations based on the latter audience are very reliable for the former.

 

Be that as it may, it's worth asking which kind of settings we are talking about here. There are (at least) two basic kinds of worlds out there; let's call them generic and boutique. A generic world is designed to allow as many stories as possible to fit somewhere, while a boutique world is not. Metaphorically, a generic world is like rice, while a boutique world is like curry sauce.

 

The archetypical generic world is that of D&D. As annoying as it is that Arneson and Gygax threw in something from just about every fantasy story they'd ever read, it did make a world where you can put most stories somewhere without that much trouble. It's malleable, thanks particularly to being very overcomplete with enough stuff for several different complete settings, and you can customize a long way simply by leaving out whichever parts you want to deemphasize. (It also eventually became it's own genre, but let's leave that for another time.) Like rice, it fits in with a lot of stuff. Not everything, though; if it does what you want, a boutique setting is almost always more interesting and memorable than a generic fantasy setting.

 

An early example of what I'd call a boutique setting is Glorantha. Is Glorantha a better world than D&D? Absolutely! It has coherence, it was designed rather than conglomerated, it has a distinctive flavor, etc. However, it was a burden as well as a blessing to Runequest. Suppose I *don't* want to tell a bronze-age story where magic is accessible to everyone, the Gods are very involved with the world, and iron weapons are magical? I *could* rip stuff out of Glorantha, but in doing so I'd probably kill it. I'd still like to get a chance to play Runequest someday, but to be honest I probably wouldn't consider doing so unless the story is in Glorantha, and not every story fits in Glorantha. People do come to RQ specifically because of Glorantha, but I would bet that the number of people who avoid it because of Glorantha is larger. Not even because they don't like it, but simply because their latest campaign concept doesn't fit. It's a good bet that it would fit easier in the generic D&D world, even though that world is far less flavorful. Actually, *because* that world is less flavorful; Glorantha is more like curry sauce, and once you put enough curry sauce in a dish it tastes like curry no matter what else you do.

 

I trust my point is clear: there is a difference between a great setting and a great default setting. If you give Hero a great boutique setting, no matter how great it is I doubt you'll get enough people to look at it to discover that Hero isn't tied to any setting at all (unlike either D&D or Runequest). But a great generic setting doesn't really grab ahold of you like a great boutique setting does--that's the curse of being a great generic setting. Doing it right means it isn't as flashy.

 

Now this leads up to an interesting point: the strength of generic *rules* like Hero isn't generic settings; D&D, after all, is quite tied to the dominant generic setting. The strength of rules like here is that because the rules are generic, the settings don't have to be. Hero doesn't shine by doing what D&D does but better, it shines by doing what D&D does abysmally. It shines by supporting a wide variety of boutique settings, not a generic setting. Here is an example of what happens when you take a great boutique setting that doesn't resemble D&D and force the D&D rules on it: Pirates Of Dark Water, D&D Style. I feel bad about using that as a negative example, because he's worked very hard to do justice to the setting. But the rules are simply fighting him--he has to force the characters into classes, he has to interpret the many original humanoid aliens (that's the show bible's terminology, in spite of the fact that it's fantasy) in terms of D&D races (Bloth is a half-ogre), and so on. I'm thinking of doing that in hero, and if I did I'd be able to make notes on the cartoons and build directly from the source material rather than having to figure out what the closest D&D approximation is. (Viva Hero.)

 

And I guess I've argued myself to my main point: I suspect a good generic setting is more friendly to the beginners everyone thinks are out there waiting to play hero (I'm not so sure, but let it be so for the sake of argument), but it also doesn't make hero shine; it doesn't give them the best *reason* to switch to hero. It does no good to make it easier if easier isn't compelling. CU is generic--it works, but I don't think I've ever heard anyone say that they started playing Champions because of CU. On the other hand, what I've heard of Gestalt (I don't own it yet) was awesome, the kind of world that makes you want to play in it. I'd say the world of Gestalt is a better setting--but as the Hero default setting, it would be problematic. It's a boutique setting.

 

If there were no practical obstacles, I'd say that FH would be better served by multiple great boutique settings than one generic ones. Make them stand-alone books if you will, but however you choose to present them it at least sells Hero for what it is best at. But that has the problem that multiple books are expensive. They're even more expensive if you realize that a lot of the better boutique settings are licensed adaptations, and I'm not sure how many of those are within Hero's reach right now. They also, by being great boutique settings, don't get out of your way. CU is probably better as the default hero setting, even though Gestalt is a better world.

 

I'm not offering a simple take-home answer, only pointing out some issues that aren't yet being discussed when we're talking about a standard setting. Draw your own conclusions as you will.

[Jhaierr]

If I weren't so busy with grad school, I would love to work on a setting. Something that could be sort of generic high fantasy without actually being generic. Sometimes the settings that are created are awesome, but they are very niche-like.

 

I have plans for a fantasy world that I'm working on with a friend of mine that I really want to create as a sourcebook, but it's a long process that is on hold until school is done.

[Tasha]

So if I am reading this right (I believe that I am...)...

 

From the License: "A. Grant Of License: DOJ hereby grants to LICENSEE a license to publish NAME WORKS using the HERO System rules to define characters, abilities, technology, places, and events in those products, subject to the terms, conditions, and restrictions set forth in this Contract."

 

A LICENSEE can create Presets, but can't actually reprint the Rules/Powers from any of the Hero System Books (ie: Hero 6e v1 & 2, Champions Complete, etc).  Sounds fair enough.  Create plenty of well thought out (and explained) Presets and point back to one of the Hero System books (Thanks Tasha.  Which book?  H6e V1 or CC? TBD...).

 

 

~ M

 

Since the company sees Champions Complete as THE rules book then it should refer back to that book. Besides directing people to spend $40 on a book is much better than giving them sticker shock from a much more expensive rules books (6e1 and 6e2 are needed to provide the whole HS rules) of course the other problem with 6e1 &2 is that they are OOP with no reprint on the horizon.

[Old Man]

And I guess I've argued myself to my main point: I suspect a good generic setting is more friendly to the beginners everyone thinks are out there waiting to play hero (I'm not so sure, but let it be so for the sake of argument), but it also doesn't make hero shine; it doesn't give them the best *reason* to switch to hero. It does no good to make it easier if easier isn't compelling. CU is generic--it works, but I don't think I've ever heard anyone say that they started playing Champions because of CU. On the other hand, what I've heard of Gestalt (I don't own it yet) was awesome, the kind of world that makes you want to play in it. I'd say the world of Gestalt is a better setting--but as the Hero default setting, it would be problematic. It's a boutique setting.

 

If there were no practical obstacles, I'd say that FH would be better served by multiple great boutique settings than one generic ones. Make them stand-alone books if you will, but however you choose to present them it at least sells Hero for what it is best at. But that has the problem that multiple books are expensive. They're even more expensive if you realize that a lot of the better boutique settings are licensed adaptations, and I'm not sure how many of those are within Hero's reach right now. They also, by being great boutique settings, don't get out of your way. CU is probably better as the default hero setting, even though Gestalt is a better world.

 

I think you're right in that generic settings won't do much to attract players so much as just not scare them off.  All the good settings, IMO, are recognizably fantasy but have some sort of critical distinction.  Dark Sun, Planescape, Eberron, Spelljammer, Shadowrun--every single one of these has swords, magic, elves, and dwarves, but they're certainly not what you might consider generic fantasy. 

 

Personally I think FH's sweet spot is going to be mid- to high-level fantasy.  Mythic Greece, for example, or Malazan, or Charn, or even Bas-Lag.  Ultimately I think Hero would be best served with several 'boutique' settings as you describe, but right now there isn't even one that's set up to use as a starting point.