Whats' the Hero System Value Proposition?

[dsatow]

Here are the selling points to me

• Common Die system - uses only 6 sided dice
• Symmetrical system - the system does not have special rules for every power or ability.  Once you understand the core rules, all powers and abilities generally act the same.  You don't need to reference core rule books.  Mind control and mental illusions generally act the same.  Their mechanic is similar though not the same as Blast.  All 90% of the skills operate using the same mechanic.  This is unlike D&D where every spell and class ability has different effects.  If you understand the core rules, you can GM or play the game without the rule books.  This also leads to Simple Extrapolation - in that based on the similarity of mechanics, its easy to come up with a mechanic for a situation which may not have been covered in the game rules without being very unfair.
• Granularity of combat - has a fairly detailed combat system with being bogged down in minutia.  D&D, people just basically hit and do damage with it.  In HERO, you can throw a punch or a kick but they are different with different effects.  Take a monk for example.  Monks in D&D do an array of attacks but they are mostly the same.  They can be described as punches, kicks, elbows, headbutts, etc.  But in HERO, your punch vs. your kick has different modifiers.
• Original point based system - It has the original, most popular point based system which can allow you to create anything but still manage to do play balance.  Though you can skew play balance using the rules, 90% of the time, the points tend to show unbalanced powers.
• One of the oldest game systems still actively played and produced - This is for good reason, though HERO supplements are slower these days, it is still an active game system.
• Best portrayal of superheroes - It may not always have the best modules or production value for comic books, but it does the best at reproducing the comic book feel in game play.

 

Some of the bad points

• Requires math - Math being one of the worse subjects in US schools, this might be good for students but many adults don't like doing math.  Make math fun, play Champions!  Personally, I think its ironic, in high school we'd always ask when are we ever going to use the math in real life, but when we become adults, we complain "Math is hard".
• Has reputation for being a power gamer game - To be honest, I don't see this.  It attracts power gamers who try to abuse the system to get as much power as possible but ultimately they generally fail.  On the contrary, I see D&D and Pathfinder with stacks upon stacks of magic items to be more power gamer prone.  When you have best build guides, you generally have a power gaming problem I think.
• Difficult for newbies - Personally I don't think this is true.  The hardest part is the generation of powers.  All the other mechanics seem fairly simple to me.  And in teaching this game to many others, I find that its easy to teach how to play.  To be honest, the toughest thing for newbies is that they slow down the game and more experienced players can get a bit perturbed at that.

[Chris Goodwin]

Usable grappling rules that take advantage of unified combat mechanics.  

[megaplayboy]

I think game/play balance is one of the unique value propositions for Hero. A lot of other universal systems aren't necessarily as good at it. Hero is practically obsessed with it!

[Tech]

I haven't played another system in a long time, so if my up-coming point isn't accurate, oh well...

 

One of the big points I've heard stressed from the players that have been in the campaign over time is that in a Hero Games Champions game, an experienced player character can play with a new character just fine. Yes, the experienced character with 300 xp is more versatile, but can still play with the 0 xp one.

[zslane]

 

Some of the bad points

• Requires math - Math being one of the worse subjects in US schools, this might be good for students but many adults don't like doing math.  Make math fun, play Champions!  Personally, I think its ironic, in high school we'd always ask when are we ever going to use the math in real life, but when we become adults, we complain "Math is hard".

 

The Hero System makes use of simple grade school math (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division). The problem isn't that grade school math is hard, it is that people are intellectually lazy. Fortunately for them, we now have these things called computers that can do all the math for them.

 

Of course, even when the math is done for them, the computer isn't going to do any of the heavy lifting of effective character design and efficient point use for them. For folks too lazy to do the kind of math they mastered by 4th grade, the even more complex matter of designing a good character using the system's building blocks will forever plague them.

 

Not every game system is going to be well-suited to every type of player. I have never had a problem with the fact that the intellectual demands of the Hero System naturally restricts its player base.

[dsatow]

Math in Hero is interesting.  It leads to a lot of other uses than basic math if you get into the system and most people who choose HERO over other systems will tend to do these things.  Calculating how much you can carry, non combat multiples, or distances actually deal with doubling which helps in understanding binary math.  If you want to know how much a 17 strength can carry, its 25kg x 2^(Str/5).  In D&D, the probability curve for a d20 is a straight line, or 5% per increment, but in Hero, with 3d6, it's a bell curve.  Heck, I've found that people who play Hero a lot tend to add faster (a skill you need when rolling 20d6) and sort numbers faster.  Minor algebra is used when dealing with to hit.  Instead of the original OCV - DCV +11 => 3d6 to hit, people manipulate it to OCV+11-3d6 => DCV to hit or think of it as (3d6 -11) = X where X+ OCV = DCV hit.

 

Its my personal belief that people who play and prefer Hero tends to become more math savvy.  

[themrgreendude]

For someone who has tried and dabbled into HERO, this has been a great thread to read. Over the years I have purchased a lot of Hero books. Ever since I laid eyes on FRED, but never played. Correction I have played in three Hero 6E games at a con, two of which were ruined by Jason Walters. Now that I have a continuing medical issue keeping me off my feet for at least 3 months, I am diving into Hero again. So this thread is helpful and insightful, to me at least. One thing I thought was interesting was, Isn't the HERO System also considered a toolbox for RPG's? That parts of it can also be used in other RPG's? 

[Joe Walsh]

I've not heard that term used that way. I have heard HERO System termed a "toolkit," meaning you use the core rules to assemble/create the game you want.

[Ninja-Bear]

Well Dsatow you haven't met me yet.

 

And Im glad I never played Zslane seeing that Im not up to his level.

[Ninja-Bear]

Speaking of math, Hero has nothing on 2nd grade common core!

[Spence]

So, as I understand the question.  What is it that sets Hero apart.  That one thing that makes Hero Hero that no other system has. 

 

Understanding that I am answering the question based on the RPG's I am aware of and have read/played.

 

The answer is Time. 

 

Sure Hero has it's toolkit properties and 30+ years to refine their universal creation rules.  But there are other systems that are arguably toolkits as well.  Mutants and Masterminds leaps to mind and does it very well.   GURPs simulates it by cranking out supplements by the metric ton.  Savage Worlds and FATE do it by reducing specific detail and focusing on the broad brush and wide view. 

 

My only personal reason to not play M&M is the damage system.   Neat idea, but I personally find it too cumbersome to use in actual play.  Trying to keep track of 29 "conditions" is bad enough, but having to also track combo's of them has pretty much ended any interest when we tried it.   Some peeps love it, but for us the constant stopping of the game to reread blocks of text was the show stopper.  If they were in any way intuitive....

 

But all of the mentioned systems can simulate Superheroes very well. 

 

And none of them determine acting order using Time.

 

Pretty much every RPG out there handles turn order the same.  An initiative order is established and each character completes their actions in that order.  Most have a way to "interrupt" and a laughable attempt to simulate "attack of opportunity".

 

Only Hero actually uses time to determine order of play.  A faster character doesn't just get to unload all their actions first and a slightly slower one doesn't have to just suck up multiple hits.   

 

Time adds tension.  Tension defines Heroic. 

 

One of the very first games I played back in the day had our heroes in a car pursuing Viper agents in their cars.  The battle as we exchanged fire as we passed the slower Viper car in pursuit of the big bad in the lead car was just awesome.

 

No RPG system I am aware of uses time in this manner and as a core mechanic. No other system distributes actions throughout a turn instead of simply having each character simply do everything possible at once.

 

So for me the one big thing is Hero's time management.

[Joe Walsh]

Good point Spence. The speed chart can be a liability in the eyes of many folks, but it does serve a purpose. It's stuck around this long for a reason!

[zslane]

I love the Speed Chart. It's what gives combat that panel-by-panel action feel.

[Hyper-Man]

The Speed Chart can be cumbersome at the game table if everyone treats a character's individual Phases as the default 'round'.  I think the better idea is to think of the HERO Turn as the default 'round'. That way players can step back their focus on individual Segment by Segment action.  No one should be spending 10 minutes deciding the best course of action for 1 Phase worth of action for their character (unless maybe it's the BIG BOSS fight at the very end of a long storyline).

 

HM

[Spence]

The Speed Chart can be cumbersome at the game table if everyone treats a character's individual Phases as the default 'round'.  I think the better idea is to think of the HERO Turn as the default 'round'. That way players can step back their focus on individual Segment by Segment action.  No one should be spending 10 minutes deciding the best course of action for 1 Phase worth of action for their character (unless maybe it's the BIG BOSS fight at the very end of a long storyline).

 

HM

 

I hear what you are saying, but that s more of a player issue than a game system issue

 

Many games suffer their own versions of this, including D&D, any edition.  The real issue is non-attention by the people who are supposedly playing.   That is why I am really down on devices at the table.  I mean if you want to text with your boyfriend, feel free to leave the table and sit over there. You obviously are not playing the game and so on 

 

For most games if a player repeatedly goofs off and then wants to spend 25 minutes deciding their move I simply say, "Ironfist holds his phase, phase 8 you're up".   I do this is any of the games I run.  If we are in action, dramatic action such as battle, you should be ready to go when your turn pops up.  And the phrase "What happened" just chaps my hide.  You were sitting right there, weren't you paying attention? 

 

Another thing that irks me is the player that thinks we are playing chess and as long as he keeps his finger in the marker he can measure and remeasure all day.   It is Superheroes in a super-fight.  No you cannot measure everything before making a decision.  Falling short is classic supers.

 

I once had a player start counting to see which bystander he had enough movement to get to.  Really?  Heroes act and then we see if they succeed.  We are talking role playing not munchkinville.

 

Decide on an action and then we all get to see if you succeed.

 

grrrrr..... rant over.

 

Sorry Hyper-Man.  Just one of my buttons. 

[zslane]

The real issue is non-attention by the people who are supposedly playing.

 

Yes, exactly.

 

This was always the number one time waster in all the Champions campaigns I ever played in. For some reason, these players assumed that if it wasn't their character's Phase that there was no reason to pay attention to what was going on. Needless to say they were the least combat-effective players/characters in the group. They weren't following the flow of the action, not tracking the ever-changing situation and state of each teammate and adversary, and not planning what to do while others were taking their Phase.

 

I liken them to the idiots who wait until they reach the register before looking up at the McDonald's menu to ponder what to order. And, of course, they always have paralyzing difficulty deciding what they want.

[Hyper-Man]

I hear what you are saying, but that s more of a player issue than a game system issue

 

Many games suffer their own versions of this, including D&D, any edition.  The real issue is non-attention by the people who are supposedly playing.   That is why I am really down on devices at the table.  I mean if you want to text with your boyfriend, feel free to leave the table and sit over there. You obviously are not playing the game and so on 

 

For most games if a player repeatedly goofs off and then wants to spend 25 minutes deciding their move I simply say, "Ironfist holds his phase, phase 8 you're up".   I do this is any of the games I run.  If we are in action, dramatic action such as battle, you should be ready to go when your turn pops up.  And the phrase "What happened" just chaps my hide.  You were sitting right there, weren't you paying attention? 

 

Another thing that irks me is the player that thinks we are playing chess and as long as he keeps his finger in the marker he can measure and remeasure all day.   It is Superheroes in a super-fight.  No you cannot measure everything before making a decision.  Falling short is classic supers.

 

I once had a player start counting to see which bystander he had enough movement to get to.  Really?  Heroes act and then we see if they succeed.  We are talking role playing not munchkinville.

 

Decide on an action and then we all get to see if you succeed.

 

grrrrr..... rant over.

 

Sorry Hyper-Man.  Just one of my buttons. 

 

I am in total agreement with you.  Individual Phase decisions should always be quick!.  I was just speaking about the initial cause is all.

 

HM

[Tech]

Agreed Hyper-Man. I dislike for someone to spend more than 30 seconds deciding what they want to do. Perish the thought if you're not paying attention while sitting there: happened twice and they're not joining anymore. Do your cellphone games later! What - the game and camaraderie isn't interesting enough that you're playing a cellphone game during the hero battle? Understand that I am known for being very patient. However, if one person isn't paying attention, it's affecting everyone else and steps have to be taken.

 

Granted, there are legitimate times for many reasons someone needs an occasional large amount of time but those are far and few between, including the rare "I must take this call. Can you hold the game for a bit?"  Sure, real life happens.

 

Okay, that was off-topic. Back on topic. Ummmm.....

 

[On topic] Once you know the game well, creation of characters - whether players or NPCs - comes quickly. It's been already mentioned in this thread and others that the game can be intimidating but someone who knows the rules can teach a newbie quickly. The fact that the Hero System has been around so long (and in the Gamer's Hall of Fame some time ago) shows it's longevity.

[Christopher R Taylor]

If someone is consistently slow in responding or not paying attention between phases (fiddling with phone, etc) I will declare they hold their phase and move on to the next person after a bit of a wait.  They can act when they figure out what they want to do, later but until then let's keep moving.

[Scott Ruggels]

We have periodic discussions on here about what should be done to get more people playing Hero, but I don't recall anyone talking about why anyone would want to play Hero instead of any of the other RPGs.

 

What do you see as the compelling reason(s) people should play Hero instead of something else?

 

Keep in mind it can't be, "You can make any kind of character you want!" because you can do that in a lot of other RPGs.

 

To me, the attractiveness of Hero, was the flexibility of the system. You could make anything. because of this, and the proximity of the original hero games Employees, and at the time, the plethora of game shops, and conventions, the system spread widely. By their example, other people picked it up and played it, and it spread.

 

There were so many Fantasy Hero Campaigns locally in the 80's and 90's. Champions could be had at any gamer con within 400 miles. There were even hero specific fanzines, like  Rogue's Gallery, and such. People would try, small, one off Science fiction campaigns of limited duration.  From the conventions, champions seeme to have grown from it's origins ( get it) and spread, with the conventions, so that you got  geographical bright spots of Chapions in the SF Bay Area, where it began, to Los Angeles, The upper Midwest,  Central Texas,  And the Middle of the Atlantic Coast. Hero flourished then it was played. At least until the implosion of the table top hobby with the introduction of CCGs in the Mid 90's. (IMO Magic The gathering, sucked most disposable gamer Income into collecting cards and building decks).

 

If you want  The Hero System to Flourish, it has to be played, rather than talked about. When I first sat down to play a session at the con it was introduced at, I was handed a basic Flying energy blaster character, complete with the comic book artwork in that first Edition  character sheet.  The play was fairly quick at the time, as I had come from Various FGU systems, and  D&D (without the "A"). At the end of the session, I was hooked, and the group of us from the same High School bought copies of that first edition with the mark Williams cover. I was hooked, and Played until the last campaign ended when the GM moved to japan to teach engineering, in the mid 1990's.

 

If you want more people to play, there have to be more examples out there to play with.  The Company itself needs to have more of a presence at game cons and  run official, introductory events.  Each of the genre's might be represented, BUT with the prevalence of superhero movies now, both Marvel and DC, (Though with DC, the Animated fare has better game fodder) it would be stupid NOt to emphasize Champions. Recent background books have gotten a bit esoteric, much as comic books themselves have of late, But the current Marvel movies have the same sort of energy and ferment  that Marvel Comics had in the 80's during the classic X-Men, and John Byrne's run on Fantastic Four.  For a good convention run, all you really need is a mat, some counters, pre-prepared Character sheets, prepared villains, and a Look up sheet with the attack formula and speed clock printed out, so people know what phases they act on, per turn. To get people to play will take work, though to inspire people to want to come back, or buy the game and run it themselves.  On paper, Hero is a hard sell, compared to the minimalist systems of FATe, and such, and  the ubiquity, and publication beauty of Pathfinder, or D&D 5e, but when in play, the transparency of Hero, and the fact that all the mechanics are available on the sheet. makes play a lot more understandable at the table, without the delay of looking up rules, like you do in pathfinder, or the tyranny of the "rule of Cool" in FATE.

 

Another option is Roll20.net, but that would take more work, but has the potential of more rewards. I joined Roll20.net a couple of years ago at the request of an associate from Hannover, Germany. After a rather unsatisfying experience with FATE, we switched to Pathfinder, which to me,comes across as d7D with the serial numbers filed off, but even still, the experience has been enjoyable.  Finding players was fairly easy, as the playerbase on Roll20.net was world wide> even though the gm was German, the game was held in English, and that gave us a mix of Canadians and Americans, as well.  So, even though I never bought anything in the way of Pathfinder or D&D 5E stuff, after a couple of years i became somewhat conversant in both systems, though still prefer Hero.  I might suggest taking a look at what Roll20.net offers, as it is a fairly reasonable Tabletop Simulator, with decent GM's tools, tools that get better if you buy their premium service.  Also if you get the premium Service as a GM, you get access to Roll20.net's scripting language back end, and this is how the spreadsheet style character sheets work. This is where the hard work of being a Hero GM on Roll20 would apply. Currently there is no support for Hero, and as such it would take a fiar amount of effort to write the character sheet scripts. On the other hand, the dice rollers that come native with Roll20, will hardly get a work out. The Help files needed would be simple, and unlike pathfinder, would not need the massive PDFs or what have you that exist under the help tab. The simplest solution would be a sheet explaining turn order, a sheet explaining how to calculate "to Hit", and a sheet on character creation, and maybe a list of basic powers and objects.  More information would not be unwelcome, but getting enough out there to support new players, who join with an experienced GM would not be and insurmountable amount of work.

 

One difficulty i see with further evangelizing has been monetary.  Pathfinder and FATE are the most common  games run on Roll20.net, and i believe that it is because the systems are freely available. Most of pathfinder can be found online.  I do not think there is a freely available version of hero available as a free PDF, even a stripped down version, that could be used by online players wishing to play or run a Hero based campaign on Roll20,net.  On the other hand, a GM might make something available to his players privately. who knows.

In short, I don't think a high concept slogan about Hero is going to be as attractive to new players as much as an opportunity to play, and the resultant word of mouth  would be to increase the fortunes of the Hero System.

 

--Scott

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

A lot of modern game systems can do just about any genre, but almost none of them do more than a handful very well.  Hero does nearly every genre very well.

[Jagged]

The reason I am playing D&D at the moment and not Hero System is purely because of the easy availability of D&D content. Plus the widespread support for the game system and materials.

 

It's the same reason I am currently playing fantasy and not superhero. I play online (using Maptool) and there is infinitely more fantasy material than modern.

 

So more easily accessible stuff for the gm is the one thing that would make a real difference for me. The difficulty for us is also that there is tons of stuff that is free too. Great for me, not great for games publishers.

[TheDarkness]

Judging from some of the comments I've noticed lately, I'm wondering if a concentrated effort to encapsulate Hero games(as in adventures and scenarios) on roll20 so that there' more resources there might not be a step in the direction of moving to spread the game.

[Joe Walsh]

So more easily accessible stuff for the gm is the one thing that would make a real difference for me. The difficulty for us is also that there is tons of stuff that is free too. Great for me, not great for games publishers.

 

I've heard similar comments about Fate and Savage Worlds -- there's so much high-quality stuff out there for them that it's easy to get started...and to keep going. Not to the level of D&D, of course, but plenty for most purposes.

[dsatow]

So, as I understand the question.  What is it that sets Hero apart.  That one thing that makes Hero Hero that no other system has. 

 

Understanding that I am answering the question based on the RPG's I am aware of and have read/played.

 

The answer is Time. 

 

Sure Hero has it's toolkit properties and 30+ years to refine their universal creation rules.  But there are other systems that are arguably toolkits as well.  Mutants and Masterminds leaps to mind and does it very well.   GURPs simulates it by cranking out supplements by the metric ton.  Savage Worlds and FATE do it by reducing specific detail and focusing on the broad brush and wide view. 

 

My only personal reason to not play M&M is the damage system.   Neat idea, but I personally find it too cumbersome to use in actual play.  Trying to keep track of 29 "conditions" is bad enough, but having to also track combo's of them has pretty much ended any interest when we tried it.   Some peeps love it, but for us the constant stopping of the game to reread blocks of text was the show stopper.  If they were in any way intuitive....

 

But all of the mentioned systems can simulate Superheroes very well. 

 

And none of them determine acting order using Time.

 

Pretty much every RPG out there handles turn order the same.  An initiative order is established and each character completes their actions in that order.  Most have a way to "interrupt" and a laughable attempt to simulate "attack of opportunity".

 

Only Hero actually uses time to determine order of play.  A faster character doesn't just get to unload all their actions first and a slightly slower one doesn't have to just suck up multiple hits.   

 

Time adds tension.  Tension defines Heroic. 

 

One of the very first games I played back in the day had our heroes in a car pursuing Viper agents in their cars.  The battle as we exchanged fire as we passed the slower Viper car in pursuit of the big bad in the lead car was just awesome.

 

No RPG system I am aware of uses time in this manner and as a core mechanic. No other system distributes actions throughout a turn instead of simply having each character simply do everything possible at once.

 

So for me the one big thing is Hero's time management.

Aces and Eights does not have a time chart but does use time.  Every action you take takes a certain number of seconds.  Firing a gun, starting a sprint, going out to a full run, slowing from run to a stop, etc.  It looks very interesting but never played.