FANTASY HERO -- What Do *You* Want To See?

[i3ullseye]

Just had another one.....

 

Everyman packages tailored for race and culture. human children might not learn mining, but dwarven children shoul have an 8- for example.

[Muawijhe]

Probably already been covered earlier, but it's late, I'm tired, and not in mind to flip and read-read back through all the old posts...but maybe some new powers (or examples of old ones) fitted in new and interesting ways to a fantasy campaign (aside from just spells).

 

Think of classic RPG games like Legend of Dragoon where the characters can transform into quasi-dragons, or midieval Japan (classic Chanbara period) where samurai from different schools have different forms of ki or energy strikes with their swords.

[Arthur]

I'd like to see some discussion on genre-crossing. It's very popular to take characters from, say, a modern-day special ops squad and drop them into a Fantasy world. One of the appeals of a universal system is the support for games like that. Sometimes it's fun to machine-gun dragons...

[danbuter]

My suggestion is don't limit yourself to the DnD races. Add in a few extras, including the obvious wolfen or cat-men, as well as a few oddities (insects, small fast reptiles like the T'sa from Alternity, etc.).

And I'm a sucker for pricing guidelines, just how peasants are taxed, medieval warfare, the effects of magic on warfare, etc.

[Whiplash]

Harder to break?

 

Any chance for a sentence or two about "Breaking Things"? Currently, any bozo with a dagger can chop down a tree in a few slashes. Well, maybe not, but its pretty bad. Any 2d6 attack, which nearly any Heroic PC can produce, can chop down a Large tree in about 6 hits, and there are no prohibitions (except what I set) against even arrows from being used for the same purpose.

 

To be realistic, the body of the tree (11) ought to really go up by a factor of 5-10, or the DEF increased (though thats not realistic either). Other things may or may not be ok, but I've encountered the tree problem in play, so I KNOW its a bit off.

 

W.

[Whiplash]

Variety of magic and gods?

 

Apologies in advance if this has been discussed. I'm lazy and don't want to read through 14 pages of replies.

 

I am struck by the vast variety of magic styles out there. Will Fantasy Hero sample magics cover these?

 

Examples:

 

Wild fantasy: the older FH was like this. Wizards could put up glowing force fields, and fly around hurling fireballs.

 

Tolkeinish: magic has very little visible effects and its hard to tell what is magic. Gandalf touches the One Ring, which he has known about for years, and does not know it is the One Ring. He only knows it does magic because he SAW it do it. Except for when he fought the balrog, we don't see him do much. Wild fantasy is very inappropriate.

 

Wheel of Time-like: Also, Sword of Truth-like. Zelazny's War World too, where magic was seen as ribbons that got formed into patterns. Magic is sort of a flow. You don't really have to gesture, incant, hace foci, etc. You see flows of magic and can channel it and bend it to your will. There seem to be no gods, and magic is almost "scientific". Very far from chicken guts and mystic words.

 

Chicken guts, bat wings, love charms, very low power for the most part. Gods, demons, spirits.

 

I'd love to see a sample god. Zeus, and Thor perhaps. Artemis and Freya. Anubis. Isis. A sample from these traditions of Greek, Norse, and Egyptian at least.

 

When I think of styles of magic, I hope its not "Fire mages" and "Life mages" and the sort of stuff we got with the previous Fantasy Hero. That stuff is okay if there is room, but the above stuff is more important.

 

One last thing: sample races that are "nearly human" are okay. Like D&D style elves. But Tolkein elves, that can tell a sparrow from a finch a mile away. They can walk without leaving footprints and walk atop snow, not slog through it. They don't need to sleep, they never grow old, you meet them frequently at thousands of years old. They have all sorts of subtle but expensive powers are very important too. I'd like to see someone take a stab at doing a usable form of that type of thing as a sample race also instead of some very generic, vanilla ones like we got with the older FH.

 

W.

[Yamo]

Currently, any bozo with a dagger can chop down a tree in a few slashes.

 

Check the description for the Real Weapon Limitation on page 328 of HERO 5th. Problem solved.

 

I'd love to see a sample god. Zeus, and Thor perhaps. Artemis and Freya. Anubis. Isis. A sample from these traditions of Greek, Norse, and Egyptian at least.

 

I do hope you don't mean stats for a god. Oy! Leave that nonsense in D&D where it belongs, I say. I would prefer that HERO not trod that path at all and leave the Munchkin Monster Manuals (aka god stat books) to WotC.

 

If it has stats, you can kill it. The last thing I need are HERO munchkins being officially encouraged to tell me the story of the time their 4000-point dark elf barbarian beat Thor to death with his own hammer. I get enough of that from the D&Ders, thanks.

[Whiplash]

Actually, yes I do mean stats for a god

 

In the mythologies I mentioned, the gods are not all powerful. They may not even be any more powerful than a high powered super. Hercules certainly had a high, but limited strength, and he was stronger than any of the gods. Ares was a god of war who fought in wars. While he swayed the results, he didn't just wipe out the other side in a blink. Often, people hid from gods and thwarted their desires. They had superior senses but weren't all-knowing. I suspect that Dr. Destroyer would toast Hermes. Maybe not Thor or Zeus.

 

For consistency of the Hero universe, and to follow comic-book tradition, the gods should probably be modeled as upper tier supers and treated as such, just as they are in DC and Marvel. But I'd like an eye kept on their true mythological capabilities as well. That will make them plenty powerful enough for Fantasy.

 

One of the styles of fantasy it is very legitimate to run, and not munchkin at all, is the "Greek mythology" style of campaign where you interact with gods and demigods.

 

Its such a big subject, it deserves its own book.

 

W.

[Monolith]

Originally posted by Whiplash

Actually, yes I do mean stats for a god

There are writeups for two gods in CKC (Lei Kung & Guan Di) already, and an avatar as well (Anubis). I personally do not think the game needs writeups for gods, but as CKC mentions, it is fairly simple to make them. I am sure Fantasy Hero will discuss gods, and give some general guidelines on how to handle such beings in a fantasy enviroment, but I do not think you will see actual stats for them. The Hero Universe document talks about them being between 2,500 and 7,500 character points in design. That's Dr. Destroyer at the bottom end and no one we currently have stats for on the higher end.

 

One of the styles of fantasy it is very legitimate to run, and not munchkin at all, is the "Greek mythology" style of campaign where you interact with gods and demigods.

You might want to get a copy of Mythic Greece by Aaron Allston. It has writeups for the Greek gods, and the demi-gods such as Heracles and Theseus.

[Lord Liaden]

Originally posted by Monolith

There are writeups for two gods in CKC (Lei Kung & Guan Di) already, and an avatar as well (Anubis). I personally do not think the game needs writeups for gods, but as CKC mentions, it is fairly simple to make them. I am sure Fantasy Hero will discuss gods, and give some general guidelines on how to handle such beings in a fantasy enviroment, but I do not think you will see actual stats for them. The Hero Universe document talks about them being between 2,500 and 7,500 character points in design. That's Dr. Destroyer at the bottom end and no one we currently have stats for on the higher end.

 

 

You might want to get a copy of Mythic Greece by Aaron Allston. It has writeups for the Greek gods, and the demi-gods such as Heracles and Theseus.

 

Mythic Greece is a generally excellent campaign book for fantasy gaming in the Age of Heroes, and has writeups for almost all the mythic gods. It's written under first edition Fantasy HERO rules, which are substantially different from the current unified system, but Mr. Allston has posted updates to much of that material to 4th Ed. HERO System (which is pretty easy to update to 5E) on his website. You can find the site by clicking on "Hero Links" at the top of this page, then on "Other Links".

 

Another of ICE's "Campaign Classics" series, Mythic Egypt, stats out much of the Egyptian pantheon in 4E terms. These gods are actually more suitable for fantasy campaigns with a strong flavor of the classic myths; although they have tremendous magic powers, most of them are not that much better in combat than the great legendary heroes. As you pointed out, Whiplash, gods in legend could be thwarted or even injured by mortals on occasion. This is where their interpretation differs from the comic-book style god, who are often designed to be a match for powerful superheroes in a stand-up fight.

 

The different possible uses for gods in a fantasy campaign - omnipotent unseen manipulators or confrontable foes, omniscient or fallible, etc. - IMHO warrants a "god sourcebook" covering all elements of using gods in a campaign, maybe even all campaigns. After all, various interpretations of "gods" have appeared in comics and sci-fi as well: mutants, aliens, cosmic entities and the like.

[AnotherSkip]

Originally posted by i3ullseye

Just had another one.....

 

Everyman packages tailored for race and culture. human children might not learn mining, but dwarven children should have an 8- for example.

 

Dude i think you are waaaay off target on this one. i MUCH rather prefer it the way it was in 4th FH. take Racial and Cultural packages that best define the character add in whatever else you felt you needed and go.

 

Not: All Dwarves(or insert favorite race) MUST be this way.

Frankly a Human Raised by Dwarves would be very different than a Dwarf Raised by Humans. Some sort of sense dictates this.

 

perhaps a sugestion for phrasing would be "Dwarven Children should have the option of having an 8-."

 

But if My dwarf came from 18 solid generations of Smiths that never touched a piece of ore bigger than his head and never spent one minute inside of mine the last thing I think he might know would be mining. A human who's family has been miners for generations might be able to "out mine" the dwarf simply because he grew up in that environment.

 

Frankly though, i go with family and the region adolesence was spent in to determine what the characters main influences are for determining what his every character skills are. Other factors contribute but in the end those are the main factors i like.

 

And hey while we are at it, suggestions for how to reasonably determine what is race and what is culture when setting up the game world. Some discussion of what to base these everycharacter skills upon. Should everyman skills be determined based upon Kingdom, Race, Friends, Region, Religion, Village? Should the Gm look for a common thread to link these together?

Keep in mind we are in some cases building from the planetary core up and there may be no cases of even a common tech or ideology to link the regions together.

[eepjr24]

Chop down a tree?

 

Originally posted by Yamo

Check the description for the Real Weapon Limitation on page 328 of HERO 5th. Problem solved.

 

Ahh, Mr. Yamo. I respect that you have an opinion on the matter, but you should realize yours is not the only one. I have read the passage you quote. Perhaps I am a bit dense, but could you tell me where on that page it tells me (as a GM or a player) how many swipes with a dagger it takes to cut down a tree?

 

I am not asking for this information exactly, but guidelines, or something more specific than the hand waving the subject is currently given would be nice. The object and body tables are a good example, or the stength chart.

 

- Ernie

[Monolith]

Re: Chop down a tree?

 

Originally posted by eepjr24

Perhaps I am a bit dense, but could you tell me where on that page it tells me (as a GM or a player) how many swipes with a dagger it takes to cut down a tree?

I believe this is the part of the passage Yamo was referring to:

 

"Similarly, some weapons just can't damage some things (or only damage with difficulty) - for example, it's not normally possible to hack through a brick wall with a knife."

 

What that means is, if a weapon has the Real Weapon Limitation, you must treat it like you would a weapon in the real world. A knife can carve initial into a tree, it can even strip the bark off a tree, but unless you have six months to do the chopping it will not "cut down a tree."

 

I hope that makes sense?

[Talon]

Originally posted by Yamo

Check the description for the Real Weapon Limitation on page 328 of HERO 5th. Problem solved.

 

I'd like to see something more than "some weapons don't cut well through some things"; perhaps some guidelines or even concrete examples for:

 

-- Cutting a stone wall with a sword

-- Cutting a sail with arrows

-- Cutting an oak door with swords

[Blue]

I'd like a lot of what people have suggested so far. The big things for me are...

• Armor Suits and Partial Coverage
  
• Cost of equipment--A big list of monetary costs for things would be nice. I hate guessing how much something should cost.
  
• Personal equipment Destruction and Decay. Swords do break during fights. Also, how many years can you use a shield before you have to buy another? That last one could be an optional rule, since it requires more upkeep.
  
• Magic Item destruction--since it would not likely decay. How hard is it to destroy the Staff of Hurtin-Stuff?
  
• Critical and Fumble rules for weapons and spells. If I remember correctly there were already optional rules for this sort of thing in FH. But I guess I'm a freak for those goofy critical charts (Remember Dragonquest? "Congratulations, it's a bleeder!"). Though that's my own sick personal taste.
  

I'll be back if I think of more. You've been warned!

[Heroman]

A couple ideas, in case they have not been covered...

 

1) Government structures - Across the large range of campaign styles there are a great number of potential government styles. Providing a large list would help campaign designers (a) think about the different styles and ( actually have the real name for them. I was kinda disappointed that I did not see that in the SH sourcebook; it took far to generalized an approach in talking about governments and could have used a list of already exisiting styes (unless you are coming out with The Ultimate Empires sourcebook )

 

2) Common magical styles/limitations - Why start from scratch? It would be great to list common methods magic has manifested to add flavor to the game without needing to look up other game's resources. Identifying things like vodoo, tarot, divine, etc magic and listing expected power limitations will help any GM in his campaign creation.

 

3) Cool character sheet Well, I bet this will come out on the website after the book is out (keeps ya from destroying the binding too at the copy machine) but a nice fantasy flavored sheet would be nice, maybe with proper emphasis on areas important to a hero. I wish SH/TE had a cool ship character sheet...

 

4) Pathos (Pantheons? dunno) Some good diety/pantheon design tips would help in flushing out brand new dieties/demon structures.

 

5) Hero Designer thoughts. OK, ok, probably not your area, but as this is probably only the second book with a heroic focus (SH I think is the first) for the 5th, adding in $ cost of items, weight, etc with encumberance rules and displayed nicely on the sheets would be cool

 

-Scott

[Old Man]

Maybe a few sample thugs.

[i3ullseye]

AnotherSkip- .........

 

Actually, a dwarf would LIVE in the tunnels and mines. So they really should know something about potential cave ins and navigation. 8- isn't much, but it woudl be enough for basic survival. Sort of like us nowadays, we shoudl have 8- communications systems. We may not all HAVE phones, but we all know how to use them.

 

[AnotherSkip]

ON TOPIC:

Hey Steve, How about this: training time guides for the realistic campaigns. Perhaps a suggested setting prices to Ap and setting prices based upon Skill level/difficulty ratio as well as building times.

 

 

OFF TOPIC:

Originally posted by i3ullseye

AnotherSkip- .........

 

Actually, a dwarf would LIVE in the tunnels and mines. So they really should know something about potential cave ins and navigation. 8- isn't much, but it woudl be enough for basic survival. Sort of like us nowadays, we shoudl have 8- communications systems. We may not all HAVE phones, but we all know how to use them.

 

 

Yeah, In YOUR world. You still are nowhere near dead in the black for my campaigns.

 

I have "dwarves" raised on a Seacoast as well as islands, no mining, no caves, stone huts at best, (for those too poor to afford better). In addition since the world I have often requires ambassadors to spend if not their lives but generations of their lives away from their preferred community those children often lose what they had tying them to that. There will allways be reasons for races to travel and live far away from their "homlands".

 

It's something like assuming that just because there are mountains in Colorado, all Coloradans know how to Ski. And by the inverse All Texans (because there are "no mountains" in Texas) do not know how to Ski.

 

I see it as kinda like assuming that every woman in California is a Blond beach bunnie. _Not_ the smartest way to go. Try to look at your races as conglomerates of individuals, not being stamped from a mold(unless they really _are_ stamped from a mold).

 

(mutters about Ron using a Telephone from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets or was is Prisoner of Azkaban?)

 

Sure you could arge for a communication sytems roll, if everone you know has any idea what a DSL is or what a basic part of a FON system is, or any one of a hundred other things, that are a part of basic communications systems. Do you even know where to begin to try and hook up an additional phone line if you have the room for it? Do you know which wires are what?

 

i reserve 8- for the apprentice levels , 11- for the journeyman, and stat based for master level people. I know enough electricians to know that, partioning it out in the manner listed above is what I consider a basic concept.

How much you _have_ to know to get it up there is the really shocking thing that most people miss. Yeah sure just because _your_ dad was a body shop mechanic does not mean you get Mechancis at 8-, I didn't.

[keithcurtis]

For racial and cultural packages, why not just treat them as suggestions? i.e. All Dwarves should have a minimum Mining 8-, but if the player has a compelling reason why not (example: raised in a city by a Dwarvish ambassador), he shouldn't be required to take it. It's a default, not a requirement. All the player needs is a reason not to have a part of the package.

After all, there aren't bonus points for package deals anymore, so it's not like cheating. The package is there to give you a "standard" dwarf (or whatever) from which modifications can be made.

 

Keith "apologies if this has been mentioned, I came into the conversation late" Curtis

[Steve Long]

In fact, a lot of the 60-odd Package Deals I've written for FH have "options" and "variants" listed, so there's plenty of precedence for the alterations Keith suggests. Just like the rules themselves, a Package Deal can serve primarily as a "default" from which to make variations, if you want.

[James Gillen]

I forget if this has been mentioned, but some discussions of how the combat manuevers work with medieval equipment would be needed. For instance, it's already been stated that you can't use Rapid Fire with a crossbow, but what about a longbow?

[Osprey]

Blood World: "Ean"

 

Aaron Allston's "Blood" Race were originally from a fantasy world.

Having not read his Champions yet, I don't know if The Blood are back. Still, I'd LOVE more info on EAN. (Like the Proper Pronunciation).

 

A Fantasy Backdrop with Mutants!

It might satisfy ALL my Gamers!!

[James Gillen]

Second on the Blood!

[Talon]

Something else I'd like to see: a long playtest period! I'd hate to see this one get a shortened playtest due to scheduling issues.