The Rules Discarded Along the Way

[unclevlad]

The converse also holds. 

 

A haymaker can be a double fist hammer strike, OR a braced spinning snap kick.

 

A kick can be the above, or a quick jab...a simple Strike, not a haymaker.

 

So defining a Kick maneuver is IMO far more obfuscating than useful.  

[Joe Walsh]

On 2/27/2023 at 12:52 PM, unclevlad said:

On Haymaker's -5 vs. Kick's -2/-2...-5 DCV makes Haymaker pretty easy to disrupt.  Doing a haymaker, you're a sitting duck...if you're doing it in combat.  It's also very expensive to counter it with CSLs;  they have to be 3 point CSLs or higher, and even -3 DCV is still pretty severe.

 

52 minutes ago, unclevlad said:

The converse also holds. 

 

A haymaker can be a double fist hammer strike, OR a braced spinning snap kick.

 

A kick can be the above, or a quick jab...a simple Strike, not a haymaker.

 

So defining a Kick maneuver is IMO far more obfuscating than useful.  

 

That's seems like really solid reasoning. If, as other sections in HSR imply, the 4e Haymaker was intended for more than just punches, then having a separate Kick would have been seen as redundant...until you consider the different OCV/DCV mods. But if the modifiers for Kick were seen as unbalanced vs. the harder-to-overcome Haymaker modifier, that resolves the conflict...and may also help explain why Kick never made it to the non-Champions 3e Hero System games.

 

We may never know for sure what the thinking was back then, but as far as I can tell that's a reasonable explanation given that it's clear in other ways that 4e needed at least one editing pass by someone who didn't know the game at all.

 

I'm still thinking of reintroducing Kick someday, though, just to see how it goes.

 

Flying Tackle (or maybe just call it Tackle) is a shoe-in, I think.

 

The idea of making Grab and Hold work as Duke discussed is intriguing, too.

 

I like the idea of a Killing Blow for the masses, too. I just need to think about it a while longer.

 

[Duke Bushido]

Okay.... 

 

Because tracking all of this on the phone screen isn't working out, just to clear up a couple of things, I present the (incomplete, but with all entries) maneuver charts from the first four editions:

 

1e

(and for the guys on the other thread, Steve "Force* Goodman is listed exactly like that on the dedications page) 

 

Punch

Haymaker

Kick

Block

Dodge

Grab

Mover By

Move Through

Martial Punch

Martial Kick

Martial Block

Martial Dodge

Martial Throw. 

 

That's right; by the book, you had to have martial arts to throw someone.  You might have a STR:30 and a successful grab, but you can't just chuck that Viper goon without yelling "heeya!". And you can't yell heeya if you aren't qualified. 

 

Fortunately, we ignore that completely.   There were rules for throwing things, after all, maneuver or not.  One of the examples included "uncooperative character.". What more do you need? 

 

2e:

This one is odd, as there is the maneuver chart:

 

Punch

Haymaker

Kick

Block

Dodge

Grab 

Move By

Move Through

Martial Punch 

Martial Kick

Martial Block

Martial Dodge

Martial Throw

 

I say it is odd, because while this is not exactly combat maneuvers, there is an additional chart of actions that lists their combat time:

 

Move By

Move Through

Haymaker

Kick

Other Combat Maneuvers

Full Move

Leaping

Change Clothes. (full phase, by the way.  A SPD:4 character can change his clothes in three seconds.  Amazing. 

 

Recover from being stunned

Half Move

Find Weakness

Missile Deflection 

Making an atrack

Acrobatics

Turn on a Power

Turn off a Power

Shift Multipower 

Danger Sense (no time, but the fact that it is listed on a chart of player-selectable actions implies that it isn't as automatic as it should be) 

 

Soliloquy (also no time; never fails to be hilarious) 

Presence Attack (no time, even if your violent action is attacking someone or something.  Yes; Davien tried to exploit this - constantly!  House rule: violent action _can_ be an attack, but all the rules of an attack apply.) 

 

And my favoritw: GM asks you to make a roll.  (also no time, if you were wondering.) 

 

Champions II gave us mental combat maneuvers:

 

Mind Block

Ego Evade

MIndbar 

 

Note that there are no allowances to make these Martial, so no Ego Ninjas, please. 

 

MIndbar was just amazing.  It really was. Kind of like pinning an opponent's arms so he could not punch, but grabbing him by the mental power so he can't do that. 

 

C2 also gave us some nifty new Combat Maneuvers:

 

Dive for Cover 

Pulling a Punch 

Rolling with a Punch (this one was so overlooked, in spite of having "Heroic-level characters" written all over it in lipstick. Red.  Mine, because I loved it so much....) 

 

And the famous Coordinating an attack. 

 

Those last two-- especially that last one-- weren't really maneuvers as much as they were options, but as Hugh noted above, this game has been riddled with semantics issues since its inception) 

 

Then one final maneuver, just for you Speedster, the Multiple Move By.  (Multiple Move _Thriugh_ was not listed, but hey; knock yourself out.

 

Out cold. 

 

Champions III gave us Shockwave, which is _kind of_ a maneuver, in as much as the character takes a specific action and suffers a CV adjustment 

 

It also gave us the awesome Centipedemobile.

 

We also see the first example of losing experience points forever, way back in 2e, even before Fantasy HERO made it part of enchanting an item, yet the "but the points will be gone forever; that isn't true to the game" argument still comes up when I mention things like stealing foci. 

 

But back on tooic:

 

The last entry for 2e is Espionage! (emphasis not mine, but as it is part of the title, it is apparently mandatory).  You may remember this as the game that gave us the exhaustive Skill list that found its way into 4e.  Also, you may not remember it at all.  If you don't remember it, it is the game that introduced the Hit Location Chart, the Time Chart, Package Deals and "knowledge skills" and roll-your-own skills, also re-introduced in 4e, and with us ever since.

 

And of course, it introduced Flying Tackle. 

 

Here we go:

 

Flying Tackle

Other Combat Maneuvers

Maneuvers

Half Move

Full Move

Acrobatics

Leaping

Bracing

To "set" 

Set and Brace

Drawing a pistol

Firing a gun

Reloading. (half phase.  Not even "varies.". Automatic? Revolver?  Cap and ball?  Half a phase, done) 

 

Preparing a grenade 

Throwing a grenade

Making an attack

Recover from stunned 

Take a Recovery 

Open a door

Starting a car

Soliloquy (still no time!) 

Presence Attack (still sporting the "no time" loophole!) 

Making a Skill roll

GM asks you to make a roll

 

Whew.

 

At some point, I am going to put all of those into one chart. 

 

Again. 

 

Of course, I will have to include "combat modifiers" on p29, since it includes a number of actions as well:

 

Autofire v 1 target

Autofire v many targets

Burst fire 

Bracing

Set for 1 phase

Bracing and setring

Made a half-move

Surprise Maneuver

Double Firing

Snap Shot

Attacking with off hand

Using unfamiliar weapon

Using unfamiliar weapon

 

(omitted those things without CV mods) 

 

As I think about it, 3e is huge. 

 

Maybe later.  I am going to bed. 

 

Really rough day. 

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Maneuvers such as Double Fire are part of why most of us were very surprised when it was announced that multiple attack and combined attack had ALWAYS been in the rules, don't you know?  In the penumbra, or something

[Joe Walsh]

Espionage! is the gift that kept on giving.

 

[Duke Bushido]

Yep.  Espionage was awesome and underrated, possibly underpublished, but so far ahead of its contemporaries in many ways.  It is a shame it didn't get any first-party support; the third party support might have kept coming. 

[Duke Bushido]

Okay, finally home, and all I want is the bed... 

 

Since that's not likely to happen (the people not in their sixties working manual labor 12+ hours a day since both of his assistants missed their court date seem to think that is time for a rave in the living room), I am going to at least get started. 

 

3e, from Champions:

 

This time, all of those unlabeled charts from 2e have been cleaned up and broken into three distinct charts, each with their own heading.  However, for this project, I am going to list anything that either imposes a CV modifier or takes precisely full or half segments, as these are _all_ things you can elect to do in combat that affect your options by being selected. 

 

And of course, soliloquy and rolling dice, because the fact that are on the chart at all amuses me. 

 

Here we go:

 

1. Punch 

2. Haymaker

3. Kick

4. Block

5. Grab

6. Move By

7. Move Through

8. Other Attacks

9. Martial Punch

10. Martial Kick

11. Martial Block

12. Martial Dodge

13. Martial Throw

 

14. Recover from being Stunned

15. Half Move

16. Throwing Someone

17. Find Weakness

18. Missile Deflection

  Make an Attack (I did not number this one because - yeah...) 

19. Soliloquy 

20. Presence Attack

 GM asks for a rolling (not number) 

 

21. Auto fire one target

22. Auto fire Many Targets

23. Brace

24. Move and Attack

25. Set

26. Spread Energy Blast

27. Surprise Attack

28. Surprise Maneuver

 

 

There we go. 

 

28 (ish) combat "maneuvers." 

 

So many other books.... 

 

 

So here we go! 

 

We did the other 2e game, Espionage!, above, and Espionage! became Danger International, and it is all nice and alphabetical, so sure.  

 

From DI:

 

Attempting to eliminate redundancy from Champions, we will add 

 

29: drawing a gun

30. Firing a gun

31. Flying Tackle

32. Full Move

33. Leaping

34. Making a roll (variable) 

35. Maneuvers (?) 

 Opening a door is a half phase, but it doesn't seem like a typical combat maneuver, so it isn't numbered. 

36. Preparing a grenade 

37. Reloading

38. Starting a car 

39. Take a Recovery

40. Throwing a grenade

 

41. Burst Fire 

42. Controlled burst

43. Off Hand attack

44. Surprise move. 

45. Cover (a target) 

46. Disarm

47. Hold (someone you have grabbed) 

48. Killing Blow

49. Strike

 

 

 

On to Fantasy HERO:

 

Dialogue, I feel, is an outgrowth of Soliloquy, and so is not numbered. 

50. Drop pack

 Fire a Bow is an extension of attack, so... 

51. Throwing a Spell (is not covered by Throwing grenades for some reason) 

52. Club Weapon

53. Charge

54. Flail

55. Lance Charge

56. Pin

57. Retreat (you won't find that cowardice in Champions!) 

58. Ride By (not like a drive-by) 

59. Shield Block

60. Trip (emphasis so that it catches Hugh's eye, as well as everyone that has ever told me it isn't possible without Martial Arts) 

61. Unhorse (but not Dismount) 

Use Sligh, like fire bow, is just another attack, and so not numbered. 

 

That is going to do for now. 

 

Good night. 

 

 

[Grailknight]

Flying Tackle has no need to be redone though. It's right there in Hero Designer.

 

Flying Tackle:  1/2 Phase, +0 OCV, -1 DCV, 2d6 +v/10 Strike; You Fall, Target Falls; FMove

[Christopher R Taylor]

Sweep was in an earlier edition and I cannot remember where.  Basically multiple attack, but as a maneuver for melee weapons.  Maybe Fantasy Hero.

[Duke Bushido]

Sweep is wierd. 

 

I remember seeing it long hand (paragraph description) in more than one edition, but I don't remember _ever_ seeing it in a maneuvers or combat options chart.  😕

 

 

 

[rravenwood]

Sweep was introduced in the original Fantasy Hero, as one of the 3-point Weapon Maneuvers characters could purchase.  In 4E Champions / HSR it became one of the optional combat maneuvers.

[Duke Bushido]

Thanks Double R! 

 

 

[unclevlad]

On 3/2/2023 at 7:18 PM, Grailknight said:

Flying Tackle has no need to be redone though. It's right there in Hero Designer.

 

Flying Tackle:  1/2 Phase, +0 OCV, -1 DCV, 2d6 +v/10 Strike; You Fall, Target Falls; FMove

 

That's a martial maneuver, tho.  The argument is for a standard maneuver.

[Hugh Neilson]

Well, a Move Through is ½ phase and FMove, -V/10 OCV and -3 DCV, does STR + V/6 and the attacker takes damage.

 

What if we drop the damage to –v/10 like the Martial maneuver, give it the Move By’s “attacker takes 1/3 damage” and add in the Fall elements to get a normal Tackle?

[Duke Bushido]

18 minutes ago, Hugh Neilson said:

What if we drop the damage to –v/10 like the Martial maneuver, give it the Move By’s “attacker takes 1/3 damage” and add in the Fall elements to get a normal Tackle?

 

 

 

And... Done. 

Works for me. 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Has to have that grab element, though.  Its not really a tackle if you just crash into them. -3 DCV is a bit heinous of a penalty (basically a normal person has nearly no chance whatsoever of missing them), and I think some OCV has to be sacrificed, because its not a carefully targeted attack and its pretty easy to Ole them aside if you are ready.  So I'd say maybe -1 OCV, -2 DCV.

[Grailknight]

A quick perusal of football highlights tells me that a tackle does not have to have the grab element. But we make just be using different definitions of the word while thinking of two very different acts.

[Scott Ruggels]

I gotta say, that this has been one of the most entertaining threads on this forum in years. Thank you all.


As to the whole Martial arts thing. The old guys would remember Bruce Lee films, and talk about them, but when we "?post Star Wars" watching kids saw them, they looked like cheap home movies with spastic camera work. The visuals had all the cheapness of a television Western. Our preferences were more in the direction of Samurai films (see FGU's "Bushido" by Charette and Hume).  So we were happily playing Champions and Bushido, when in the pages of Alarums & Excursions, Robin D. Laws poured effusive Praise on a Hing Kong Film Directed by John Woo that was showcased at the Toronto Film Festival (some time around 1986.   The Microscopic budgets of the 1970s, had ballooned into something that allowed for much better cameras and editing, and a focus on the here and now.  Every year John Woo had a new film out, and by extension, other directors like Tsui Hark, and Ringo Lam would show up at the Toronto Film festival, and through the distribution, that the festival granted, show up on repertory movie houses like the Alamo Draft House in Texas, the Beverly Cinema in Los Angeles, and The New Varsity in my home town.  Concurrently with the Hong Kong renaissance, was the 80s action movies, often low budget films starring martial artists cast as ninja's. Carolco (Menachem Golan and Yoram Globus) made a pretty penny making these weekend starters, until they decided to try something artistic and the whole thing fell apart.   There was a solid 10 years of films from the mid 80s until 1996, when Hong Kong was handed back over to the ChiComs, and the CCP Government declared several subjects in film immoral, and Chinese cinema became as boring as woke cinema is today, for the same reason. Hero, having Aaron Allston basically delivering his well loved houserules delivered to them on a Silver platter, decided to capitalize on the then current zeitgeist, published Ninja Hero, and Martial Arts became it's own subsystem. Gamers who had seen these movies, were very quick to incorporate martial arts into all the games. The Hero rules were less about comics and more about movies, with Fantasy Hero, Espionage, and Danger International, and JUstice Incorporated (and Aarons "Landws of Mystery")

[dmjalund]

i would put Tackle in with the same element as the Shove maneuver

[Christopher R Taylor]

Every football tackle I have seen, the tackler grabs the opponent and brings them down, its not just running and bashing into someone.  Here's the definition of tackle from the dictionary:

 

Quote

 

to try to take the ball from a player in the other team, or (in rugby or football) and do this by taking hold of the player and making them fall

--Cambridge English Dictionary

 

a: to seize, take hold of, or grapple with especially with the intention of stopping or subduing

b: to seize and throw down or stop (an opposing player with the ball) in football

--Mirriam Webster Dictionary

 

 

If its just bashing into someone, its a move through.

[Scott Ruggels]

On 3/3/2023 at 10:21 AM, Duke Bushido said:

Sweep is wierd. 

 

I remember seeing it long hand (paragraph description) in more than one edition, but I don't remember _ever_ seeing it in a maneuvers or combat options chart.  😕

 

 

 

 

Sweep was the three hexes to one's front, and a roll,  I had characters who's levels and such were based on Sweep in the Fantasy Hero game.

 

[Hugh Neilson]

2 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Every football tackle I have seen, the tackler grabs the opponent and brings them down, its not just running and bashing into someone.  Here's the definition of tackle from the dictionary:

 

Assuming that's what we want, why not start by combining  a Grab and a Trip, so -2 OCV, -4 DCV which ends up with the target grabbed and tripped.  As the user also falls, let's give back 1 DCV so it's only -3.

 

No damage (you are already combining two elements), and no full move. Those are for the the Martial version (we may need a Football Martial Art ).

 

[Duke Bushido]

1 hour ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 (we may need a Football Martial Art ).

 

 

 

Gotcha covered:

 

5 skill levels with football-like maneuvers. 

 

Martial artist must shake jowls and drool slightly doing his best Joh Madden impression yelling ' Now that's FUUT BWAWL!!! "

 

Done. 

 

Hee-yah! 

 

[Ninja-Bear]

5 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Every football tackle I have seen, the tackler grabs the opponent and brings them down, its not just running and bashing into someone.  Here's the definition of tackle from the dictionary:

 

 

If its just bashing into someone, its a move through.

True but at the end of the tackle for game purposes is the tackled person still grabbed? More I think about it, a grab is required.

1 hour ago, Duke Bushido said:

 

 

Gotcha covered:

 

5 skill levels with football-like maneuvers. 

 

Martial artist must shake jowls and drool slightly doing his best Joh Madden impression yelling ' Now that's FUUT BWAWL!!! "

 

Done. 

 

Hee-yah! 

 

Been done already. Ninja Hero 4th ed. Now giving it to Sledge is fun! 😁

[Christopher R Taylor]

Yeah, I remember that fun bit in Ninja Hero

 

Quote

Assuming that's what we want, why not start by combining  a Grab and a Trip

 

I like your idea of a Grab Through better, it fits well.