Discussion of Hero System's "Health" on rpg.net

[zslane]

If I buy a campaign setting, I still need adventures, unless the setting includes some basic ones.  Adventures can outline or refer to a setting, the way WotC's Forgotten Realms adventures do, but I can buy an adventure and be playing as soon as PCs are ready.

 

Yes! Agreed, 100%.

 

The core campaign setting book should be like the Savage Worlds settings which introduce Plot Point campaigns. The "big picture" of the setting's overarching storyline is outlined, along with a few starting adventures. From there, subsequent supplements add more Plot Point adventures and flesh out the game world along the way. Other supplements can concentrate on more focused subjects: alien races, divine pantheons, campaign-specific starships, whatever. I mean, that's why I talk in terms of a product line rather than just a book or starter set. A vibrant (and vibrantly supported) campaign setting needs all of the above: core book, gazateers, bestiaries, adventures, gear books, etc. Just like White Wolf did with each of their World of Darkness lines.

[Spence]

There's also a certain irony with Spence's (accurate) analysis of the Fantasy games and why Fantasy Hero struggles, when you consider that M&M and other superhero games are basically old school Champions with different mechanics. Champions so dominated the genre throughout the 80's and 90's that it effectively became the "D&D of Superhero RPGs".

 

Typically, a Superhero RPG will provide:

 

Creating a Character 

Typical archetypes (which largely show how to make versions of copyrighted heroes without mentioning them by name)

List of Powers

List of Power modifiers

How combat works

Environmental dangers

Some sample heroes

Rogues gallery

Brief discussion about campaigning (which largely comes down to "use the comics as a baseline guide")

Short adventure (which traditionally starts with a bank robbery )

 

Certainly Mutants & Masterminds doesn't appear to offer anything different to 3rd Edition Champions in that regard. I've just read Paragons & Prowlers, which has some interesting ways of doing things, and it also conforms to everything mentioned above.

 

Believe me, the irony is not lost on me

 

While I stick to Fantasy for my talking points, I am actually far more interested in Superheros.  As in Heroes, not people with powers.

 

And I agree that M&M for the build side is basically Champs before unification.  I mean M&M still has advantages and limitations tied to specific powers instead of the next step making them all available to all power sets.   I personally cannot play M&M because I just cannot wrap my head around their Conditions instead of damage mechanic. It simply doesn't click for me.

 

As far as adventures, they are miles ahead of Champs.  Their Emerald City setting includes a full campaign.  Not just a setting, but an actual playable story line.  Pretty much a setting book with a plot point campaign.

 

But where they really excel is the ability to create a setting book plus campaign that is complete enough to run, but incomplete enough to be plugged into any existing campaign.  Hero has never understood that distinction and all of their products fall to the compulsion to neatly tie off any and all threads. Shades of Black is one of the best, if not the best of the Champions adventures.  But if your world doesn't have Talisman or the Champions, specifically Witchcraft, or prominent magic, a lot of the needed background has to be completely reworked. 

 

The included campaign Emerald City Knights on the other hand is designed as a spring board into a super world and is build to allow you to keep or discard many things about the "world" and allow maximum customization of the game world while still being playable "out of the box".

[zslane]

Aside from DC or Marvel, I'm not sure I've ever seen a published superhero universe that gained a whole lot of traction in the RPG marketplace. The DIY ethos is strong in that genre. All the Champions players I knew just cherry-picked stuff from the Enemies and organizations books, often renaming things, for their own campaigns. I've never seen the Champions Universe used lock, stock, and barrel. That's not to say nobody has done so, it's just that it doesn't seem to be the norm.

 

But fantasy and sci-fi products from just about any other publisher tend to have richly described settings that players either find interesting enough to play in, as written (more or less), or they don't really bother with them at all (D&D notwithstanding, which has its own peculiar, decades-old usage traditions). In order to succeed the way I envision, I think you have to pretty much stick to a non-superhero genre, probably either fantasy or sci-fi for greatest potential marketplace acceptance. Any superhero setting, no matter how richly detailed, will probably not find much traction with gamers, especially now that the MCU and the DCEU have acquired so much mindshare.

[Brian Stanfield]

I'm going to go on a tangent here for a minute, but there is a point. What do you suppose the median age is of the regular HERO forums participants like us? Or of HERO gamers in general? Is early-to-mid-50s a generous estimate? People who started with Champions when they were in college? Have there ever really been new gamers introduced to HERO, or has it been the same people, decade after decade, purchasing the new editions  out of a compulsive need to keep up-to-date with the new stuff? I'm just curious, and I'm not judging, but we may be over-estimating the good-old-days of HERO.

 

Now, that being said, I'll be more positive. When I played D&D I was always into the modules more than the settings. Once TSR began developing Forgotten Realms, The World of Greyhawk, etc., I bailed. I gave them all of my allowance faithfully, buying every supplement, but even I could see the money grab going on. And then they came out with 2nd Edition and I ditched. I also happened to pick up Fantasy Hero, the first edition, and loved it! I wasn't so worried about any particular setting because I was just fascinated by the system and how I didn't really need to buy all the stupid supplements that TSR kept offering as if there was some kind of escalating arms race of new content that made things more chaotic rather than fun. They drove the marketing paranoia that if you didn't have the absolutely latest supplement then your character would get outclassed by everyone else. They're doing the same thing with 5e now, and I quit playing it all over again, for the same reasons, after a brief stint at my FLGS. Fantasy Hero is still far superior to all of it. 

 

Now, a confession: I actually don't want​ someone else's game world. At all. I like to borrow ideas, but that's about it. I want to play in my fantasy world (or superhero setting, or pulp setting, etc.). I wanted to love Turakian Age, but I only love some of it. I don't like their magic. I like some parts of Valdorian Age, but I really don't like Narosia or Atlantean Age for other various reasons of taste. I'm not saying they aren't good settings, but I want to have things the way I see them in my imagination. I'm uncomfortable with conforming my imagination to someone else's rules. I like Christopher Taylor's adventures (Lost Castle, Two Kings Keep, etc.) because they give good content, and suggest locations for the adventures, but aren't too heavy-handed in forcing conformity to an existing world. 

 

So what do I want? Again, I'll rely on my favorite-all-over-again standby, Justice Inc. It really, really helps that it was written by professional novelists who had a passion for the setting. But what it does is present a campaign book, a great starting point like the Empire Club, and a handful of adventures and plot seeds, and that's it. They didn't over-do it. Their use of a choose-your-own adventure style intro is even useful to show how the rules work. They gave enough of an idea to run with, and left it up to me to see the rest. Heck, one of the adventures is 2 pages, but is complete! If I want to drop the Empire Club into Hudson City, I can. Or I can drop it into Des Moines, Iowa for all it matters. The adventures are what make that product so damn good!!! I don't need to buy into an entire world to play them, and I can play them the same night I read them. 

 

The other extreme, as has been said, is to use an existing world. The Monster Hunters International model is commendable, but may be a bit too late. Think of all that has happened in the last 20 years that has made the fantasy/sci-fi genre explode in popularity: the ​Lord of the Rings movies (and, unfortunately, the Hobbit too), all the Marvel/DC movies, the rebooting of Star Trek and Star Wars (excluding those unfortunate Lucas-made prequels), Harry Potter (which brought fantasy to a whole new generation of kids looking for ways to play in that world), and even a brief gem of Firefly (and its excellent movie Serenity). A whole new generation of kids have grown up in a world where fantasy/sci-fi is not only accepted, but it actually the norm. If I was a kid today I would buy any game that had any of these things on the cover. Monster Hunters International, unsurprisingly, trends toward an older audience, and remains stagnant. Imagine if someone from HERO had the balls to get licensing rights from Harry Potter back when 5th edition came out?! Even now there are a bunch of Firefly games out there, but Star Hero could have really won out if someone were thinking "younger" at HERO. 

 

So, now the company is back to xeroxing copies of the books at a building in Nevada (I exaggerate, sorta) to ship out one at a time to whoever happens to order it. Sounds like the early '80s all over again. What's my whole point? I want adventures, as has been pointed out, but not necessarily dense settings. I'd love some outlines, plot lines, maybe some background assumptions (magic system, tech level, classes or professions, etc.) to build from, but adventures are more important for me. As has been said, if you can hook people, new people, with a good story and a quick and easy-to-learn version of the rules, and then point them to a big new world of possibilities in the core books, that seems to be the best plan. A product line would be great in the big picture, but I'm not inclined to follow the same money-grabbing model of D&D or Pathfinder. I loathe the idea of forcing a world on people rather than introducing them to some new possibilities and broad strokes.

 

And dangit, now I'm getting myself all wound up. I'll have to write something myself, as Christopher Taylor points out. But first I have to write a damn dissertation and get it out of the way. Until then I'll keep complaining and dreaming. I'll try not to whine though.

[mrinku]

Yeah, thinking about it, it's basically baked into traditional Superheroes that the story IS the characters. Once you have your heroes written up and some villains built to run against them (half of which are chosen by the players as Hunteds anyway) it's largely a matter of quickly throwing together dot points to sketch out the fight scene.

 

In effect, the Champions campaign IS provided by the Enemies books, which goes a way to explaining why they have been more important to the line than an official setting (Dark Champions works differently, but isn't 4-colour).

 

@Brian: 51 here, so I'm spot on for your demographic

 

(Slightly atypical as I started with 1st Ed Traveller and never much took to D&D. But medieval Fantasy was never a core interest either.)

 

I think there's a seed of truth about the age of HERO players, but then it becomes behoven on our generation to teach our kids and let them spread the word. New players generally discover PnP roleplaying through D&D, same as forty years ago, but typically get curious about other games at the store.

 

The difference these days is that store might be Drivethru RPG and instead of seeing the game on a shelf and flipping through it, they'll see it on special and check out the quickstart rules.

 

(Oh my. I just realised that aside from Star Wars, it's also the 40th Anniversary of Traveller this year.)

[Brian Stanfield]

But fantasy and sci-fi products from just about any other publisher tend to have richly described settings that players either find interesting enough to play in, as written (more or less), or they don't really bother with them at all (D&D notwithstanding, which has its own peculiar, decades-old usage traditions). In order to succeed the way I envision, I think you have to pretty much stick to a non-superhero genre, probably either fantasy or sci-fi for greatest potential marketplace acceptance. Any superhero setting, no matter how richly detailed, will probably not find much traction with gamers, especially now that the MCU and the DCEU have acquired so much mindshare.

 

This is my general impression as well. I may be off my rocker, but I'm one of those "don't really bother" people who'd rather think up my own world, superhero, fantasy, or sci-fi. Good adventures, though, would be great! Or perhaps licensing chances with some new popular entertainment (John Wick, for example, would be a great game all on its own). I know there are problems with licensing, and it probably can't be a money-maker, but it's more about finding new eyes to see the game at this point. Chances must be taken, or as you say, I'm afraid HERO will wither away in obscurity. 

[Brian Stanfield]

Sorry for what seems to be so much pessimism, folks. I'm really not trying to be a downer. I really am​ hopeful for some improvement, otherwise I wouldn't even bother to write anything about it. I think we all want the same thing in the end: for the game system we love so much to flourish (again?).

[mrinku]

I think so, Brian. I do think so.

 

Hey, relevant to something I talked about a few posts back about Champions setting the standard, in the Champions Compete text, when talking about Special Effects (p6-7) and how in Champions you choose what that is for a power, it still goes on to claim "Most roleplaying games don't work this way." 

 

That's a bit out of date, at least in regards to its own genre. Thanks to Champions itself, pretty much EVERY modern superhero game does it the HERO way.

[Lucius]

Imagine if someone from HERO had the balls to get licensing rights from Harry Potter back when 5th edition came out?! Even now there are a bunch of Firefly games out there, but Star Hero could have really won out if someone were thinking "younger" at HERO. [/font]

You could have more balls than a guy living across the street from a golf course, and think like a toddler, and it wouldn't help. What you would need is one smooth talker and several million dollars to blow.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Checking the palindromedary's saddle bags

[phoenix240]

You could have more balls than a guy living across the street from a golf course, and think like a toddler, and it wouldn't help. What you would need is one smooth talker and several million dollars to blow.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Checking the palindromedary's saddle bags

 

Yeah, some of this should be in the 'dream Hero books" thread. Licensing rights to major IPs are expensive and risky. Or at least not a guarantee of success. Many Licensed games flop. The audience between mediums (book, movie, TV show) and rpg aren't automatically transferable and its a big investment/risk. 

 

And again, could the implications that its just the old fogeys and weirdos that like Hero DIY aspect that are holding it back be failed back a little? I think we'd all like like to see it more popular but not so much at the cost of what endears us to the system. 

[Spence]

Now, a confession: I actually don't want​ someone else's game world. At all. I like to borrow ideas, but that's about it. I want to play in my fantasy world (or superhero setting, or pulp setting, etc.). I wanted to love Turakian Age, but I only love some of it. I don't like their magic. I like some parts of Valdorian Age, but I really don't like Narosia or Atlantean Age for other various reasons of taste. I'm not saying they aren't good settings, but I want to have things the way I see them in my imagination. I'm uncomfortable with conforming my imagination to someone else's rules. I like Christopher Taylor's adventures (Lost Castle, Two Kings Keep, etc.) because they give good content, and suggest locations for the adventures, but aren't too heavy-handed in forcing conformity to an existing world.

 

You see here is where I think there is a major breakdown.   Most people think that there are only two options here.

 

1 - A fully developed campaign world with every I dotted and T crossed. 

2 - Nothing.  A complete emptiness that must be filled by the GM.

 

But there is a third option, and that is the semi-developed setting that has a very comprehensive and complete for play Player Character option system in place, but just enough world sense to hang adventures on it. The world setting can actually be completely abandoned with no impact or used if the GM has no time to build their own world. This third option is the one that all the successful games are currently using.

 

Most people think that D&D 5th's Forgotten Realms is an example of #1, and would be correct if you were talking about 3rd or 4th edition.  But step back and look at 5th Ed.  What is really in the Sword Coast setting book?  Or any of the other adventure books? 

 

I think that the major issue with Hero is 2 things. 

First, all setting information is either nothing or too overwhelmingly detailed to be actually playable without an actual University Course and years of study. 

Second, the firmly 1990's founded ironclad and will never ever change belief that adventures are simply not viable regardless of any information that may come to light at any time in the future until the sun burns out. 

 

Hard bound full color $30 to $50 per unit adventure books fully supported by add on maps and markers are not something tossed out as a loss to entice people to buy $50 rule books.  I'm just saying.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Its tough to walk the line between a ready campaign world and forcing people to follow a certain exact path in that world.  I'm trying to do so with my Jolrhos setting: giving the campaign world the way I run it and complete for GMs to just start running, but flexible and open enough they can make their own world out of it.  Frankly once you've bought the books I don't care what you do with them, but I hope you enjoy playing the setting because I've found it rewarding and fun.

[zslane]

But there is a third option, and that is the semi-developed setting that has a very comprehensive and complete for play Player Character option system in place, but just enough world sense to hang adventures on it. The world setting can actually be completely abandoned with no impact or used if the GM has no time to build their own world. This third option is the one that all the successful games are currently using.

 

I'm not quite sure what "semi-developed" means, but it sounds like a euphemism for "half-assed" without intending to. A heavily-developed campaign setting does not restrict players to only a fixed set of adventures. Instead, it offers so many elements of inspiration that compatible adventure ideas just flow naturally from it. I would consider the Star Wars universe and the World of Darkness as examples of heavily-developed campaign settings, but they do not in any way restrict the adventures you can have. They provide rich narrative frameworks (like the rebellion against the Empire, or the twelve scheming vampire clans) that establish critical contexts for the game experience. Without those frameworks, all you have are bland settings that players have to populate with good ideas of their own just to make them interesting.

 

The truly tricky part is in coming up with a campaign setting that captures the imaginations of players and makes them want to play in it. If you do a good enough job of it, players will give just about any game system a try just to play in that world.

[Brian Stanfield]

I'm not quite sure what "semi-developed" means, but it sounds like a euphemism for "half-assed" without intending to. A heavily-developed campaign setting does not restrict players to only a fixed set of adventures. Instead, it offers so many elements of inspiration that compatible adventure ideas just flow naturally from it. I would consider the Star Wars universe and the World of Darkness as examples of heavily-developed campaign settings, but they do not in any way restrict the adventures you can have. They provide rich narrative frameworks (like the rebellion against the Empire, or the twelve scheming vampire clans) that establish critical contexts for the game experience. Without those frameworks, all you have are bland settings that players have to populate with good ideas of their own just to make them interesting.

 

The truly tricky part is in coming up with a campaign setting that captures the imaginations of players and makes them want to play in it. If you do a good enough job of it, players will give just about any game system a try just to play in that world.

 

 

The Star Wars example is a bit tricky (and I'm not familiar with the other one). People are already deeply invested in that setting for decades now. People will jump at the chance to play in that setting. But I'm not apt to jump at a setting that someone else spends a lot of time populating with stuff that I may or may not like. This is what I meant by "restricting" players when I made that comment. I feel restricted in the few setting books that are available (Valdorian Age, etc.) because they have specific commitments to magic, culture, etc. that I'm just not that into. Part of the point of roleplaying is that people do​ want to populate their worlds with their own ideas . . . to a degree. 

 

So I think maybe Spence's comment, similar to mine, is an acknowledgment that we want adventures, not necessarily complete worlds. We want there to be some pages of ideas to work with, but we want to color them ourselves. I don't want to have to learn an entirely new world if I want to try something a little different. I can't mix Valdorian Age and Turakian Age without some serious work on my part, at which point I might as well create my own world. I can borrow from those settings, but that's still a lot of work on my part. If, however, there are a bunch of interconnected adventures in a campaign book, with a loosely defined setting, I don't have to re-learn or adapt anything. I can just play the adventures, or add them to an existing setting, or whatever I choose. 

 

As we all have mentioned, the trick is to come up with something that is readily playable with a minimum of time invested. Get them playing first, and then let the world(s) build up around them as they expand their understanding of the intricacies of the game itself. 

[Brian Stanfield]

Second, the firmly 1990's founded ironclad and will never ever change belief that adventures are simply not viable regardless of any information that may come to light at any time in the future until the sun burns out. 

 

Hard bound full color $30 to $50 per unit adventure books fully supported by add on maps and markers are not something tossed out as a loss to entice people to buy $50 rule books.  I'm just saying.

 

I'm not exactly sure what that last paragraph means. Are you saying that HERO doesn't want to waste money by providing adventure books? Or are you saying they shouldn't? Or that D&D does, and takes a loss that HERO can't? I'm not being argumentative, but I'm reading that sentence a couple of different ways.

 

What I've noticed as I look at all the old 1e-3e materials is that they actually did provide adventure books. Lots of them! They were short, simple, and they worked! The only thing I would change if that idea were resuscitated today would be to locate them in more fleshed out environments, but not complete settings. For Champions, as has been noted, most people don't want complete settings anyway. But if there were a bunch of 50-page adventure books available, they could be place just about anywhere: Hudson City or New York City, Valbora Bay or New Orleans, San Angelo or San Francisco, or in your own home-town (my favorite option, since everyone is already familiar with that setting). 

[Brian Stanfield]

This. I know artwork is expensive. I know finding good artists is difficult. It is a sad fact that Hero is not a brand that the gaming community at large loves so much that they will accept a "amateurish" (to borrow your phrase) presentation just to get the rules. It is rather the opposite. That's why Champions: The New Millennium was such a memorable product to me. It still had issues with typesetting and editing, but it immediately drew the audience into the world with a combination of a comic book story and a near montage of the world's history presented by newspaper clippings and such. It was brilliant.  You can hate on the Fuzion* rules all you want to or dislike the Image-esque setting presented but Champions the New Millennium was just plain more interesting to read. It's a lesson that Hero Games could have taken from to create their own books.

 

*And the splitting of character creation rules over three books didn't help.

 

 

@Brian & Nolgroth

 

For me art work is meh.  I prefer content or crunch for my money. 

 

BUT!

 

I think you are spot on about needing the books to use modern layout stays and relevant art.   When I compare Champions Complete (240 pages, $40), Mutants and Masterminds Heroes Handbook (232 pages, $32.95) and the Mutants and Masterminds Deluxe Heroes Handbook (317 pages hardback, $39.95) there is no contest on which one I would pick up.

 

 

As far as graphics go, Hero Games was among the MOST attractive RPG products of its day with 3e and 4e. The BBB even had cover art by George frikkin Perez! The interior art was top notch as well and layout good. 3e had largely new art commissioned for it from Denis Loubet, Mike Witherby and Pat Zircher (who would go on to be the main character illustrator through 3e and 4e). Mark Williams still pencilled the cover art (pretty much the last hurrah for the original Champions artist), but Mike Witherby inked it, and the difference shows.

 

(Actually, I'd rate 3e's graphic design quite well against any of the modern RPGs.)

 

There's also a certain irony with Spence's (accurate) analysis of the Fantasy games and why Fantasy Hero struggles, when you consider that M&M and other superhero games are basically old school Champions with different mechanics. Champions so dominated the genre throughout the 80's and 90's that it effectively became the "D&D of Superhero RPGs".

I've run out of "likes" for the day, so I can't hit everybody's posts. Sorry! Theres too much good stuff going on!

 

Nolgroth, my experience with New Millennium was not a good one. I never played that version, but I have looked at it and I couldn't figure out where the beginning was! There was so much art for art's sake, and it was awfully engaging, but I couldn't find the content. I guess I was expecting more HERO content (and I think I'm not alone in this expectation). It was pretty, but I think the content suffered from the form.

 

Spence, I think if we are thinking of new eyes for the HERO System, artwork really does matter. As you say, Champions vs. M&M is no comparison. So art helps draw them in, but I agree with you, system crunch does matter more in the long run. For existing HERO fans, it really doesn't matter. Half my pdfs don't even have the covers provided. Who cares? Just give me the crunch. But books on a shelf in your FLGS out to look enticing. And, as you say, professionally done.

 

Mrinku, I respectfully disagree with the quality of the 3e presentation. There are some things I like about it when I went back and looked at the book last night. The section headings and layout were very clear (as opposed to New Millennium, which still makes me dizzy). But the artwork is still not all that engaging. It may be better in some parts compared to the older stuff, but compare it all to 5e Ninja Hero, or 5e Thrilling HERO Adventures, for example. The cover for 6e Fantasy Hero is amazing, and 6e Star Hero is also truly wonderful. The interior art may not be up to the same standards, but they certainly draw the eyes, which is the first step in getting them off the shelves. 

 

There are so many resources for design and layout these days, some of it even open source, there is no excuse for lousy book design. As has been pointed out in other threads, even having a decent font, for Pete's sake, makes a huge difference. Fantasy Hero Complete just doesn't look fantasy-y to me. Appearance does matter in a market when the goal is new customers. HERO may have had the reputation as the superhero gaming system back in the day, but it's a new millennium (*groan*) and HERO needs to update it's image and standards if it doesn't want to die off.

[Brian Stanfield]

You could have more balls than a guy living across the street from a golf course, and think like a toddler, and it wouldn't help. What you would need is one smooth talker and several million dollars to blow.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Checking the palindromedary's saddle bags

 

 

Yeah, some of this should be in the 'dream Hero books" thread. Licensing rights to major IPs are expensive and risky. Or at least not a guarantee of success. Many Licensed games flop. The audience between mediums (book, movie, TV show) and rpg aren't automatically transferable and its a big investment/risk. 

 

And again, could the implications that its just the old fogeys and weirdos that like Hero DIY aspect that are holding it back be failed back a little? I think we'd all like like to see it more popular but not so much at the cost of what endears us to the system.

Sorry, my intent was not to offend anyone. These were the ramblings of a guy with insomnia at midnight! 

 

Lucius, I was just spitballing here. Obviously those were all just crazy extrapolations, but my point was simply that as DOJ stands pat, they've watched the resurgence and domination of the fantasy/sci-fi world as spectators in the cheap seats. There are a lot of smaller, indy games who have gotten some marketing rights from big franchises that are popular. Perhaps the money problem is why those games don't go more mainstream, so your point is well-taken here. But I think that there has to be some effort to think along these lines. HERO won't be selling a generic superhero game when there is HeroClix available, with DC and Marvel franchising. I know it's not an equal comparison, but it's an example of why Champions won't be discovered by anyone below the age of 50.

 

And Pheonix240, I don't mean to imply that it's "you people" who are killing the game. I'm one of those aging fans who loves the DIY aspect of it. It's "you people" who are actually keeping that game alive, because nobody new is buying it. I'm trying to understand what you mean by "failed back a little," but I'm guessing autocorrect may have changed it from "scaled back a little." Just a guess on my part, and I apologize if it seemed I was being too aggressive in my condemnation of existing fans. And yes, if I had known there was a "dream book" thread I would have taken those ideas there. They were really just hyperbolic examples spewing from a sleepy mind.

 

So my point all along has been to find introductory ways to attract new people, but never at the expense of the system itself. DOJ is standing pat on what they've got now, and that's not a growth model. That is a status quo model which will keep aging as fans like us keep aging. In a few decades we won't be around to keep these discussions alive. I think we need to take seriously a way to resuscitate HERO's presence in the market. There are so many young people now who are into gaming, fantasy/sci-fi content of any sort, it seems like there ought to be some effort to attract them to the system.

[mrinku]

Mrinku, I respectfully disagree with the quality of the 3e presentation. There are some things I like about it when I went back and looked at the book last night. The section headings and layout were very clear (as opposed to New Millennium, which still makes me dizzy). But the artwork is still not all that engaging. It may be better in some parts compared to the older stuff, but compare it all to 5e Ninja Hero, or 5e Thrilling HERO Adventures, for example. The cover for 6e Fantasy Hero is amazing, and 6e Star Hero is also truly wonderful. The interior art may not be up to the same standards, but they certainly draw the eyes, which is the first step in getting them off the shelves. 

 

I guess I was mostly pushing how well it stood up against the opposition in 1985 or so (and cover aside, I think it pips 4e, too) 

 

And directly comparing it to its most current successor (though I forgot to mention that). I love the product to bits, but the interior art in Champions Complete is really second rate (cover is good) and they didn't even work in the very basic superhero layout rule of a character illustration for each example character on the page they're presented. This really annoyed me in the 6e Enemies books, too. It should be NAME at the top, picture underneath, then the rest of the stuff. Not "sometimes over the page" or "anywhere we think it fits". Seriously.

 

I'm glad to hear that art standards for 5e products were better, but that's not really so modern now.

 

However, regardless of our respective assessments of 3e's design and art, I think we are on the same page as far as Champions needing a better look. Other genres can skate by with so-so art, but you REALLY have to present decent visuals for superheroes.

[Brian Stanfield]

I guess I was mostly pushing how well it stood up against the opposition in 1985 or so (and cover aside, I think it pips 4e, too) 

 

And directly comparing it to its most current successor (though I forgot to mention that). I love the product to bits, but the interior art in Champions Complete is really second rate (cover is good) and they didn't even work in the very basic superhero layout rule of a character illustration for each example character on the page they're presented. This really annoyed me in the 6e Enemies books, too. It should be NAME at the top, picture underneath, then the rest of the stuff. Not "sometimes over the page" or "anywhere we think it fits". Seriously.

 

I'm glad to hear that art standards for 5e products were better, but that's not really so modern now.

 

However, regardless of our respective assessments of 3e's design and art, I think we are on the same page as far as Champions needing a better look. Other genres can skate by with so-so art, but you REALLY have to present decent visuals for superheroes.

 

 

In lieu of being able to "like" your post, I'll just say, "I like this post."

[zslane]

But I'm not apt to jump at a setting that someone else spends a lot of time populating with stuff that I may or may not like.

 

Right, but we're not trying to sell you on the Hero System, are we. You are already a member of this tribe. Appealing to existing players is not on the critical path. What is needed is a product line that will appeal to the casual RPGers who don't want to build most of the campaign world themselves, and want something compelling to play right out of the box. If it allows them to inject their own stuff later on, great, but that's not the design priority.

 

One way to look at it is this: write the kind of amazing campaign setting that you'd want to play in, and then publish it. If it strikes a chord with the general RPG population, then it will be doing the job we need it to do.

[Nolgroth]

Nolgroth, my experience with New Millennium was not a good one. I never played that version, but I have looked at it and I couldn't figure out where the beginning was! There was so much art for art's sake, and it was awfully engaging, but I couldn't find the content. I guess I was expecting more HERO content (and I think I'm not alone in this expectation). It was pretty, but I think the content suffered from the form.

 

Well there is the obvious "to each his own" kind of statement, but that's not really a useful answer. I was able to follow along in Champions: TNM. I thought it was no more difficult than some of the more esoteric comic book layouts. That said, it isn't the specific book/format that should be copied but the concept of making the page "pop out" in some way. Using a comic book format for a comic book game was brilliant. Hero Games could have followed the concept to make their products just a little more dynamic. Encyclopedia are for reference and ultimately that is what Hero Games books are. That doesn't incentivize a would be consumer to pick up the product and get excited about it, barring previous experience with the system. That's what I was really trying to get at. I just happened to think that Champions: TNM did a great job at it.

 

As to the content, a lot of people would have loved to have seen Hero in those pages. I am one of them, though I am far, far away from being a Fuzion hater. I actually like the system and would have liked to see more done with it from the Hero perspective. I am seriously considering picking up the Champions: TNM PDF products (lost my physical books to relocation relocation syndrome) from the store and soon, because I want something that is mid-way between the exhaustingly crunchy Hero System and the gooey goodness of Fate. It isn't a perfect solution, but it is well within my margin of error for usefulness. All that is an aside to the relative "health" of Hero. Or is it?

[Lucius]

Sorry, my intent was not to offend anyone. These were the ramblings of a guy with insomnia at midnight! 

 

Lucius, I was just spitballing here. Obviously those were all just crazy extrapolations,

I'm sorry if I came off as belittling you.

 

 

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Here, have a palindromedary.

[jdounis]

I think before embarking on making the next Fantasy product powered by HERO we should really delve into what a player(new or experienced) wants from a Fantasy RPG system/product not just in content,and that could be

in the form of a poll here or in some other major RPG site.For me:

 

I highly value Support and here HERO really shines, no other RPG save Savage Worlds has such an active support from the 

writer/publisher, the vast majority of "I take your money and never update or support my product again"(errata,rules questions) has the place that deserves. 

 

The next thing i look into a Fantasy RPG is the Scale of characters,if it is low that really sucks and drives people away. for example how much different is the lowest powered being from the highest

powered being, if an RPG answers "Mr.Inevertouchedasword has a Swords Skill of 0 and MusashiSama has a skill of 2" i am really reluctant to continue because it really limits my world.HERO is the best here.

 

Third is the Skills system, for me it's the first thing i look in a system to determine how much differentiation can be in PCs/NPCs i highly value system with rich Skill options that can really model a character and

just not another Killing Machine. HERO shines here too with many options, so a careful packing and some premade skills specializations is a must for me, for example Knowledge(Demonology), Knowledge(Ways of Magic)

with a somewhat extensive review on them, and what a roll can bring to play will give a great flavor and players love that. 

 

Next comes the Magic System here the real problems begin with HERO opening the Pandora's box, D&D apart from being the first pen and paper Fantasy RPG, had a spell list with a good definitions of what

each spell can do and how you can magic users can cast them that made an impression into players that still compare its spells with every other RPG, who has not thought of making a Magic Missile into HERO.

In other words those defined spells constructed a lore around them and even new players are excited about them and really get into the mood.HERO gives you the option of constructing every spell imaginable

and/or using a premade set constructed with the same system, but the critical question here is if should this option exist in a Fantasy RPG product out of the box? That section is that needs the most attention

and can really make a Fantasy RPG shine or not.

 

The basic bestiary is already done and I think its sufficient, all that is needed is to put maybe 30-40 one page monsters in the basic rulebook ala Savage Worlds.

 

Now for the lore/campaign setting, I don’t think there is much a need for providing a full campaign setting in the rule book, or even half of it, for example you can pick up Savage Worlds rule book and play in your world in a matter of two hours, it’s a product that shines and highly praised, D&D has Greyhawk elements in PH but not a campaign setting. You can play with the 3 basic books and never ask again about Greyhawk,MY-WORLD-SANDBOX-GAME it’s a big thing in Fantasy RPGs don’t forget that.

 

 

So to conclude, IMHO a HERO Fantasy Product must:

·         Wrap up skills into appropriate Fantasy skills but in great extend.

·         Use those skills to define character guidelines through Templates(classes like,but not restrictive)

·         Define the Magic System carefully, put a good number of premade spells in the book, with fluff in them don’t overload the player with Power creation.

·         Put a sufficient number of adversaries/monsters in the book.

·         Put hints of a campaign setting there.

• Put one sample adventure hinting the campaign setting, ala Call of Cthulhu.

 

Now after this product a player/GM Is directed to purchase the full 6^th Edition Rules/Bestiary/Grimoire/Campaign setting for next level of flexibility.

[Brian Stanfield]

I'm sorry if I came off as belittling you.Lucius AlexanderHere, have a palindromedary.

No worries. I was getting ahead of myself anyway.

[Brian Stanfield]

Well there is the obvious "to each his own" kind of statement, but that's not really a useful answer. I was able to follow along in Champions: TNM. I thought it was no more difficult than some of the more esoteric comic book layouts. That said, it isn't the specific book/format that should be copied but the concept of making the page "pop out" in some way. Using a comic book format for a comic book game was brilliant. Hero Games could have followed the concept to make their products just a little more dynamic. Encyclopedia are for reference and ultimately that is what Hero Games books are. That doesn't incentivize a would be consumer to pick up the product and get excited about it, barring previous experience with the system. That's what I was really trying to get at. I just happened to think that Champions: TNM did a great job at it.

 

As to the content, a lot of people would have loved to have seen Hero in those pages. I am one of them, though I am far, far away from being a Fuzion hater. I actually like the system and would have liked to see more done with it from the Hero perspective. I am seriously considering picking up the Champions: TNM PDF products (lost my physical books to relocation relocation syndrome) from the store and soon, because I want something that is mid-way between the exhaustingly crunchy Hero System and the gooey goodness of Fate. It isn't a perfect solution, but it is well within my margin of error for usefulness. All that is an aside to the relative "health" of Hero. Or is it?

Sorry, I'm not questioning your taste. Your point, like Mrinku's on Champions 3e, is well made. The comic book layout was dazzling, more so in New Millennium. I agree that this concept should be used more. Justice Inc. and Pulp Hero(to a lesser extent) used images from the time period to spice up the text. That principle could have been applied to all their products a lot more, imho. Good artwork is a good hook for indecisive and wandering eyes.