Hero System Lucky 7th Edition?

[steriaca]

Another rule to think about for 7ed. Mental Blast and mental attacks which does STUN and/or BODY damage use EGO instead of CON to determine if the character is stunned. I don't think we need MSTUN, MBODY, or MREC. (If it is needed, MEND, MSTUN, MD, and MREC for a mentlist based campaign, but thoes are optinal stats.)

[Cantriped]

...Building a flashlight in HERO for The Dark Detective is basically a nightmare - and then: Why not just get OIF NIghtvision goggles (with UV- und IR-Vision) and be done with it? Sure, it's not a flashlight and it won't light up the area like Change Enviroment, but it's less of a headache and cost not END.

 

Instead just add a "Gadgets" department and put there "Flashlight - 1 point" and be done with it!

...

One of my biggest pet peeves about HERO is that Change Environment is supposed to be this super versatile "catch-all" power for all the things that can't be done with another power... yet there are any number of actual environmental effects that it cannot be used to duplicate, such as Light, or Gravity. Instead... Light is supposed to be built using Images for some god awful reason. As for gravity, we could write a doctorate paper shorter than the "accurate" power construct for that effect. A major overhaul/expansion to the rules for Change Environement would be on my wishlist for 7th edition.

 

One of the other big "wishlist" items for me in a 7th edition about be an overhaul of the rules regarding Size categories and Area of Effect powers. The rules should take into account that not every combatant is going to be human-sized. I think most Attack powers which do BODY (except mental attack powers obviously) should have a default Area which can be expended or contracted through a modifier, and attacks targeting larger or small creatures should only use the rules for attacking an Area if the creature is entirely encompassed by the area affected by the Attack.

[assault]

Honestly, I don't think a 7th edition is viable at the moment.

 

To put it simply, reworking the rules would be a massive investment in time and effort, without any obvious payoff.

 

This is especially so if isn't a publishable (profitable) product, but rather a resource for a bunch of other simpler rule sets.

 

"A bunch of"? OK, maybe it's only one "other simpler rule set". But they would actually be "the rules", and the bigger set would just be a bunch of options.

 

In any case, I can't really see the need to rewrite the rules, but then, I only use a subset of the current ones anyway.

[TheDarkness]

Actually, the CSB must out of necessity come first. It is the API that allows everything else to be built. Without a complete description of the game system, authors can't write any books for customers. Whether or not a lot of CSBs would be sold is immaterial. It doesn't even need to be productized at first, as long as it is available in some form (like a PDF) to product authors. But regardless of whether or not it gets sold as a product, as a specification document it must exist first.

 

Currently 6e1/6e2 serve as the CSB, but I don't like those books. I don't like the presentation and I don't think the CSB needs that many words or that many pages. It needs to be streamlined and simplified to be more like the 4e HSR. Note that I'm not referring to the rules or mechanics themselves, but merely the way they are described and presented.

 

Once we have the new 7e CSB, then the hypothetical killer campaign setting can be developed and sold as a product line ala MHI.

 

Once we have the new 7e CSB, supplemental books can be released that use the system to create pre-built "stuff" (monsters, villains, vehicles, spells, weapons, martial arts styles, etc.).

 

All of this can be developed in parallel and sold in some sort of interleaved fashion, ideally on a monthly basis. But the 7e CSB is the foundation upon which everything is built.

 

Lastly, it is not necessary for every book/product to have the same sales potential or identical sales "success". The CSB would likely have a low sales expectation, but if it was a POD product, that wouldn't be an issue.

The reasons I disagree are twofold:

 

1) The company needs a product or products whose sales can be built upon, which means producing and publishing another core rule book will be a burden mostly bought by the same people who were buying it before, minus the people who prefer an earlier edition

 

2) Whatever the core rules are do need to be established, but not initially as a product(and not really that different than we have now), but as an engine to produce not campaigns, but games. Focus on an initial game produced this way needs to be used to increase the market for the core rule book.

 

Before the release of the core rule book, those who are interested in publishing material can certainly be provided with the core to work with, but publishing costs, and publishing a new rule book for Hero does not pay.

 

As an engine for producing new games, Hero has some huge advantages. Since the core engine doesn't change, balance issues are mitigated before release by the very nature of the system, as opposed to, for example, 40K, where every new addition totally unbalances the game and engenders another new addition.

 

In this sense, I am sort of changing my view. The core rules should remain largely unchanged, most of them are absolutely fine, like 95%. But a few need to be sorted out, and all patches replaced with permanent fixes.

[TheDarkness]

Another rule to think about for 7ed. Mental Blast and mental attacks which does STUN and/or BODY damage use EGO instead of CON to determine if the character is stunned. I don't think we need MSTUN, MBODY, or MREC. (If it is needed, MEND, MSTUN, MD, and MREC for a mentlist based campaign, but thoes are optinal stats.)

I think my main thing here is I don't think mental damage should be pooled with physical damage a character takes in a round. STUN I can totally deal with, but BODY, to me, seems like an ill fit. That said, that is my view, not meant to say, NO, YOU ARE WRONG, YIELD UNTO ME THE INTERNET AND LEAVE IT FORTHWITH AND FOREVER!

[TheDarkness]

One of my biggest pet peeves about HERO is that Change Environment is supposed to be this super versatile "catch-all" power for all the things that can't be done with another power... yet there are any number of actual environmental effects that it cannot be used to duplicate, such as Light, or Gravity. Instead... Light is supposed to be built using Images for some god awful reason. As for gravity, we could write a doctorate paper shorter than the "accurate" power construct for that effect. A major overhaul/expansion to the rules for Change Environement would be on my wishlist for 7th edition.

 

One of the other big "wishlist" items for me in a 7th edition about be an overhaul of the rules regarding Size categories and Area of Effect powers. The rules should take into account that not every combatant is going to be human-sized. I think most Attack powers which do BODY (except mental attack powers obviously) should have a default Area which can be expended or contracted through a modifier, and attacks targeting larger or small creatures should only use the rules for attacking an Area if the creature is entirely encompassed by the area affected by the Attack.

Oh, change environment. Such a can of worms. Am I correct that being made prone generally requires its use? As opposed to, say, knockdown rules? Maybe I have that wrong, but it seems like a power that has to be used for a number of things there should actually just be rules for.

[TheDarkness]

Honestly, I don't think a 7th edition is viable at the moment.

 

To put it simply, reworking the rules would be a massive investment in time and effort, without any obvious payoff.

 

This is especially so if isn't a publishable (profitable) product, but rather a resource for a bunch of other simpler rule sets.

 

"A bunch of"? OK, maybe it's only one "other simpler rule set". But they would actually be "the rules", and the bigger set would just be a bunch of options.

 

In any case, I can't really see the need to rewrite the rules anyway, but then, I only use a subset of the current ones anyway.

I getcha, as a player/GM. I think the main focus of the conversation is on increasing the market, and thus, the players and GMs. The company itself cannot afford to market it enough to do that, even if such a marketing campaign would work, because the system itself is a tough nut to crack for most gamers.

 

However, I think there is a value add for everyone if Hero is used to design a system that allows quick and easy construction of NPCs and characters and items that work for both the sub-system and the full system.

[TheDarkness]

Do you think Hero needs a new power called "Megaskill"? Basically priced so that it is the equivlent of a normal skill rolling with a -10 to make an impossible skill roll, the skill selection is designed to be generic as possible. You MUST define Megaskill when you buy it.

 

The defenitions are:

 

Science! (science skills)

 

Doing Things! (profesinal skills)

 

Spy/Detective Work! (deuction, stealth, shadowing, and other skills useful in a big city)

 

Athletics! (climbing, breakfall, acrobatics, ks: all sports, ps: all sports)

I'll have to think about this. My view thus far has been:

 

What does Hero normally do when a character needs an array of some related powers, the combined cost of which, if bought individually, would be high, but whose relative value based on what could be used at once should probably be adjusted lower?

 

Generally, the answer is pools.

 

Except for skills, where all manner of strained solutions have been used, like the martial arts patch that stylistically looks like Hero's heavily simplified cousin, but whose core is actually, compared to everything else, priced out by a magic eight ball.

 

Which I find strange, since skills generally are far less system breaking than powers.

 

As far as I can tell, the only reason the martial arts patch exists is because to actually build the moves using the system is too expensive.

 

I'll have to think about the idea of a megaskill.

[assault]

I think that 5e (5ER) was better than 6th when it came to "snap together" builds.

 

In 5th you could budget: this many points for characteristics, this many for skills & perks, this many for powers (and break down the latter as appropriate),

 

6th makes it harder to do this for characteristics.

 

An interesting example of the difference between the editions is in the respective Champions genre books. Both have "superhero gallery" type systems designed to help build basic characters. But the 6e version is fiddly, with lots of moving parts. The 5e version is: "one of these, one of these, one of these and one of these. Done."

 

Neither system is ideal, but the 5e version involved less head scratching, and both systems only produced "first draft" characters.

[TheDarkness]

I think the problem is, even the simplest Hero system is far more complex than most gamers are willing to jump into.

 

BUT, for designing, they almost all are quite versatile.

 

This is why I favor the idea of using it to build a system that, for all intents and purposes, appears simpler, but is actually built off of the full system and entirely compatible with it. Make invisible the actual builds for most powers except the simplest,

[assault]

This is why I favor the idea of using it to build a system that, for all intents and purposes, appears simpler, but is actually built off of the full system and entirely compatible with it. Make invisible the actual builds for most powers except the simplest,

 

A basic power is worth 75 points.

This buys 75 points of an unadvantaged power, 60 points of one advantaged the +1/4 level, and 50 at +1/2.

 

A bit much, but it gives round numbers.

 

Limited at the -1/4 level, it would cost 60 points. 50 points if limited at -1/2.

 

So most powers would cost 50, 60 or 75 points...

 

Unfortunately the numbers are unpleasant at lower power levels.

 

Some rounding could be possible, or the issue could be dodged by carefully selecting which powers you pre-build and how you build them.

 

The goal would be: here is a list of powers. Select this many points worth of them.

 

Only addition would be involved, and usually only 3 or 4 picks would be needed.

[TheDarkness]

A basic power is worth 75 points.

This buys 75 points of an unadvantaged power, 60 points of one advantaged the +1/4 level, and 50 at +1/2.

 

A bit much, but it gives round numbers.

 

Limited at the -1/4 level, it would cost 60 points. 50 points if limited at -1/2.

 

So most powers would cost 50, 60 or 75 points...

 

Unfortunately the numbers are unpleasant at lower power levels.

 

Some rounding could be possible, or the issue could be dodged by carefully selecting which powers you pre-build and how you build them.

 

The goal would be: here is a list of powers. Select this many points worth of them.

 

Only addition would be involved, and usually only 3 or 4 picks would be needed.

Yes, though I think what the point value is for a basic power would vary a bit from genre to genre and point level to point level. From there, depending on the genre, I'll use fantasy as an example, there are options based on race, options based on what a characters focus us, generic options, a certain amount of options that can be picked from lists outside one's own, and options based on the point level of the character(the last mostly to keep balance instead of having players spend all their points on some big power). All listed in text, not in Hero accounting, but with Hero accounting underlying it.

[Tasha]

I think that 5e (5ER) was better than 6th when it came to "snap together" builds.

 

In 5th you could budget: this many points for characteristics, this many for skills & perks, this many for powers (and break down the latter as appropriate),

 

6th makes it harder to do this for characteristics.

 

An interesting example of the difference between the editions is in the respective Champions genre books. Both have "superhero gallery" type systems designed to help build basic characters. But the 6e version is fiddly, with lots of moving parts. The 5e version is: "one of these, one of these, one of these and one of these. Done."

 

Neither system is ideal, but the 5e version involved less head scratching, and both systems only produced "first draft" characters.

 

I disagree. IMHO 6e makes it FAR easier to budget a certain amount for Characteristics. There's no figured characteristics mucking up the cost of the secondaries. So now brickman With their 60 strength pays the same number of points for the PD, REC and STUN as Flamehead the Energy projector does. Make it so that Bricks, Martial Artists and Speedsters can move points from their Powers budget to Characteristics. Then you end up with characters basically spending nearly the same points on their characteristics.

[Hugh Neilson]

What is needed is a game, a prefab system, built off of the full system.

 

Something where characters can be made easily and fairly quickly right out of the gate. Characters that are off of prefab power builds, not just more prefab characters. Not all gamers use prepackaged adventures all that often, and if they don't, they also probably don't always use prefab characters. If you have a system that makescreating new characters, NPCs, and enemies simple and fast, and those creations also just happen to entirely work well for games using the whole entire system, it saves EVERYONE, new Hero players and GMs using the prefab system, and old ones using the full system, a huge amount of time, whereas the full system can be used for those cases where someone wants a lot of flexibility in design and granularity, instead of using it for every single creature and person populating the campaign.

 

I would not go so far as prefab characters either - prefab abilities, and racial/profession templates to make character creation about selecting abilities rather than designing them, I think, would be the "powered by Hero System" game.

 

Pathfinder doesn't have a game world built into the rulebooks. The game world is detailed in another book that is separate from the main rulebook. Foes/Monsters are detailed in a third book etc.

Pathfinder does have a world partially baked into its design - the character races, classes, feats, spells and gear (both magical and mundane) are essentially part of "the world". Pathfinder also had the advantage of a ready market right out of the gate, so "buy a stack of books" worked for them. How many other games in the past 10 or 20 years have gone with the "here, buy three books and you can start playing while we write a pile of additional rulebooks for you"?

 

I think adding that game setting and intro adventure creates a hook. Pathfinder didn't need that hook - buyers largely knew what a D&D game entailed, and Pathfinder simply continued that. But on the big picture - we need a product the gamer can skim through, sit down and play - I think we are in agreement.

 

I note even the new D&D had adventures/adventure paths right out of the gate. Pathfinder has indicated the appetite for APs seems endless.

 

Actually, the CSB must out of necessity come first. It is the API that allows everything else to be built. Without a complete description of the game system, authors can't write any books for customers. Whether or not a lot of CSBs would be sold is immaterial. It doesn't even need to be productized at first, as long as it is available in some form (like a PDF) to product authors. But regardless of whether or not it gets sold as a product, as a specification document it must exist first.

Yup. But the strategy can be implemented by creating one or multiple games using the current 6th Ed system, so a 7th edition (ie a huge investment in updating the system with no short-term matching revenue stream) is not needed.

 

Currently 6e1/6e2 serve as the CSB, but I don't like those books. I don't like the presentation and I don't think the CSB needs that many words or that many pages. It needs to be streamlined and simplified to be more like the 4e HSR. Note that I'm not referring to the rules or mechanics themselves, but merely the way they are described and presented.

That was part of the "Complete" project.

 

Unfortunately the numbers are unpleasant at lower power levels.

Yes and no. I don't think it's the end of the world if we were to provide abilities that cost 3 points, 5 points, 47 points, etc. You buy enough to get to your available character points. Some could certainly appear in increments, depending on the desired feel, whether available for purchase with significant granularity (in half DCs or 1 point of defense increments) or only one size, or a few (Fireball - that's how much damage a fireball does - unless we also have a Minor and Major Fireball spell).

[Roter Baron]

What I like about 6th Edition is that it did away with figured characteristics, Now it is possible to build Stoneman the Wall with Dex 6 (being four tons of wieght and having 6 inch broad fingers really kills your fine manipulation and agility) but with an OCV of 12 and DCV of 4 (nobody misses him but his oversized hands seldom miss either).

 

In 5th and 4th edition a reallyy molasses slow brick has Dex 14 - or the equivalent of a quite good gymnast.

[TheDarkness]

 

I would not go so far as prefab characters either - prefab abilities, and racial/profession templates to make character creation about selecting abilities rather than designing them, I think, would be the "powered by Hero System" game.

 

Exactly. I think the constant cry in Champions for NPCs and characters and equipment builds is based around the fact that builds are so slow to do, so GMs need so much added support, so people running the full system are often definitely going to buy prebuilt worlds and such, which is ironic, the game where it is more possible to create whatever you imagine leads to reliance on so much supporting material.

[Cantriped]

Pathfinder does have a world partially baked into its design - the character races, classes, feats, spells and gear (both magical and mundane) are essentially part of "the world". Pathfinder also had the advantage of a ready market right out of the gate, so "buy a stack of books" worked for them. How many other games in the past 10 or 20 years have gone with the "here, buy three books and you can start playing while we write a pile of additional rulebooks for you"?

I have almost every core Pathfinder book in the PRD, and amongst them the only scraps of actual world or setting design baked into the system are the names, domains, and favored weapons of a dozen or so deities they plugged in so that clerics have something to hang their class features on. Nowhere in any of the books do they discuss the name and history of the world, or any places that exist, nor do any of the deities they included get so much as a paragraph of description. The Races and Classes are written generically enough to be shoved into almost any setting. What Pathfinder does have baked into it is a "Campaign Type": Pathfinder is designed to run High and Epic Fantasy. Anything else requires a huge amount of toolkitting.

 

The actual "Campaign Setting" book for Pathfinder is called in Inner Sea World Guide, and it is over 300 pages long. Golarion (the world presented in Pathfinder) has thousands of pages of descriptive text, not one paragraph of which was presented in the Core Rulebook, the Game Mastery Guide, or any of the "Advanced" this or "Ultimate" that books.

 

Pathfinder isn't unique in this trend either. I owned and ran 3.5 DnD before moving to Pathfinder. Aside from giving a whole two pages or so of descriptions of deities from greyhawk, and some lip service to Greyhawk being the "default" campaign setting... DnD 3.5 didn't actually describe a campaign setting either, only a campaign type (epic to high fantasy).

 

Exactly. I think the constant cry in Champions for NPCs and characters and equipment builds is based around the fact that builds are so slow to do, so GMs need so much added support, so people running the full system are often definitely going to buy prebuilt worlds and such, which is ironic, the game where it is more possible to create whatever you imagine leads to reliance on so much supporting material.

I run Pathfinder right now precisely because it has redundant amounts of pregenerated content. I love HERO system more than any other game, but I just don't have the time and energy to generate every single asset myself. The Champions Universe is the only setting in the 6th edition line-up that has even close to enough material to actually run a campaign in, and I must admit to a preference for Fantasy HERO. Though I've run a Champions Universe campaign and it was pretty fun pitting my Heroes against Cateran and having Captain Chronos pulling strings behind the scenes.

[Chris Goodwin]

Don't forget that D&D and Pathfinder provide magic systems and monster books, both of which imply a ton of worldbuilding.  D&D's planar cosmology also builds into its implied setting, and they have multiple published settings and have for years.  We have grimoires and bestiaries but they are generic by design.  We also have the Hero Universe, which I've never had the slightest interest in, and which I understand didn't sell well.  

 

More later.

[TheDarkness]

I run Pathfinder right now precisely because it has redundant amounts of pregenerated content. I love HERO system more than any other game, but I just don't have the time and energy to generate every single asset myself. The Champions Universe is the only setting in the 6th edition line-up that has even close to enough material to actually run a campaign in, and I must admit to a preference for Fantasy HERO. Though I've run a Champions Universe campaign and it was pretty fun pitting my Heroes against Cateran and having Captain Chronos pulling strings behind the scenes.

I getcha. And, just to be clear, my intention wasn't to denigrate using pregenerated content, but more, in Hero, it's just a ridiculous amount of work to do almost all generation, character or equipment, for everyone, including the people generating the books, adventures, etc. I really think that it would benefit from a sub-system that read like a system like pathfinder, but was actually just Hero, but without all the dangly bits showing.

[Roter Baron]

I have gmed Conan D20 till 14th level, a LL campaign that started at 1st level and ended at 15th, a D20 Modern campaign that lasted till the Sc reached 12th level and played D&D in the 17th to 20th level range.

 

So, I would say that I am quite experienced with high level adventures. Still By-the-Book-PF kills me!

I once tried (for an adventure that I wanted to write for a possible publication) to build the biggest and baddest Red Dragon that the system has.

 

I gave up after one hour of crunching the crunch and statting the stats. And the critter wasn't even close to be finished.

I could have done that with HERO in that time easily - espeacilly with a Monster Handbook handy that basically gives me quite imposing dragons that I just have to make more imposing and dangerous.

 

PF has a lot of crunch and rules and extra rules. But it's all pre-made. That seems to be the advantage.

[zslane]

We all enjoy the convenient luxury of having no practical means of putting our opinions to the test, which means each of us gets to sit comfortably with the self-satisfying conviction that we are correct. Given the variety of conflicting views I see, it is fairly apparent that each of us is mostly convincing only ourselves.

 

Regardless of its prospective merit, the only thing we can be fairly certain of is that there will be no 7th edition.

[Tasha]

Don't forget that D&D and Pathfinder provide magic systems and monster books, both of which imply a ton of worldbuilding.  D&D's planar cosmology also builds into its implied setting, and they have multiple published settings and have for years.  We have grimoires and bestiaries but they are generic by design.  We also have the Hero Universe, which I've never had the slightest interest in, and which I understand didn't sell well.  

 

More later.

 

IMHO not really. They just listed as many monsters/ animals as they could. Those monsters fit Golarion as much as they do on Greyhawk and any other D&D like Medium to High Fantasy world. They are generic in their own way.

 

The Magic System is similar. They do mention deities, but you can just as easily substitute Earth's Mythological Deities or any Deities the GM has in their head.

 

 

[Tasha]

I getcha. And, just to be clear, my intention wasn't to denigrate using pregenerated content, but more, in Hero, it's just a ridiculous amount of work to do almost all generation, character or equipment, for everyone, including the people generating the books, adventures, etc. I really think that it would benefit from a sub-system that read like a system like pathfinder, but was actually just Hero, but without all the dangly bits showing.

 

I have been saying the same thing for years.

[Tasha]

We all enjoy the convenient luxury of having no practical means of putting our opinions to the test, which means each of us gets to sit comfortably with the self-satisfying conviction that we are correct. Given the variety of conflicting views I see, it is fairly apparent that each of us is mostly convincing only ourselves.

 

Regardless of its prospective merit, the only thing we can be fairly certain of is that there will be no 7th edition.

 

What we could do is develop our ideas into a product. THAT is what we could do.

[Chris Goodwin]

What we could do is develop our ideas into a product. THAT is what we could do.

 

For me it tends to be less "product" and more "stuff I write and put in a Google Doc for free" but that's pretty much my thinking.