Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

[Steve]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

Ranged Normal Attack kind of lacks pizzazz though. I prefer Energy Blast.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

Call it squiddlebop for all I care, as long as everyone uses the same term in the end.

[Chris Goodwin]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

Call it squiddlebop for all I care' date=' as long as everyone uses the same term in the end.[/quote']

 

Careful, that's how we got FREd...

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

Actually, terminology is one of the things that's intrinsically flawed with d20. For example, all SFX are pre-determined by the spell description. Cone of Cold. Lightning Bolt. Ball of Fire. Then a player decides to get cheeky and says "MY magic missile is really a dagger of ice!" This generates the well known and much feared long, slow stare from the DM (i.e., me).

 

"It what now, sorry, I had crazy in my ears. Couldn't hear you properly. Ears full of crazy. It's rampant. What?"

 

"MY magic missile is different, because I want it to be! HA HA!"

 

"Er... okay, look. Tell you what. I don't care what the bloody thing looks like so long as the mechanics remain unchanged. A magic missile is a magic missile; if people try to determine what it is, they get the same roll as they would any other time. Fair enough?"

 

"YAY! I'm different!"

 

*long, suffering sigh* Then, just to make turnabout fair play, they introduced a Feat in Player's Guide to Faerun: Spell Thematics. ALL of your spells somehow resemble your theme; ice, smoke, exploding monkeys, whatever. As the player's was "ice" we went ahead and made them take the requisite feat, which conferred a nifty bonus. And the crowd wonders: "Nice anecdote. Where are you going with this?"

 

AHA! Just wait, says I, and all will be clear! As previously established, visuals and mechanics are separable in D&D so long as you tool around with the SFX within reason. Makes sense. According to a friend of mine, visuals & mechanics within HERO are intrinsically linked, one is built from the other, the Reasoning Game Engine theory.

 

Discuss.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

No, in D&D the two ideas are directly coupled. You take the effect and it comes with a mechanic. To change or extend an effect or reuse a mechanic you have to first decouple the mechanic from the effect.

 

In HERO they are intrinsically decoupled and you couple them together to suit the effect and the mechanic you want.

[Steve]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

I suppose we could just simplify things even further with two Powers: one that is called Normal Attack and one that is called Killing Attack. Then whether it is a HTH attack or a ranged attack would be part of the SFX description.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

I suppose we could just simplify things even further with two Powers: one that is called Normal Attack and one that is called Killing Attack. Then whether it is a HTH attack or a ranged attack would be part of the SFX description.

There have been long running discussions on this sort of thing.

 

Not to rehash old ground, but personally Id like to see a single Attack power cover HKA, RKA, EB, and HA, configured w/ Adders & Advantages as needed.

 

Id also like to see FF, FW, Armor and Damage Resistance rolled into a single Power called Mitigation.

 

Id also like to see Invisibility, Images, Shapeshift, and Darkness rolled into a single Power called Occlusion.

 

Id also like to see EDM rolled into Teleport -- its just transdimensional TP.

 

Id also like to see FTL gotten rid of in favor of MegaScale movement.

 

The list goes on....

[Curufea]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

You can do all that. It only changes the groupings of descriptions in the rulebook.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

You can do all that. It only changes the groupings of descriptions in the rulebook.

Im not talking about organization; Im talking about complete restructuring.

[Curufea]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

So do it.

I don't understand you're problem here.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

So do it.

I don't understand you're problem here.

Im not understaning you're lack of understanding. If I were the Line Developer of HERO Games, I would do it. However, Im not so I can't.

[Susano]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

AHA! Just wait' date=' says I, and all will be clear! As previously established, visuals and mechanics are separable in D&D so long as you tool around with the SFX within reason. Makes sense. According to a friend of mine, visuals & mechanics within HERO are intrinsically [i']linked[/i], one is built from the other, the Reasoning Game Engine theory.

 

Discuss.

 

Basically it is as KS said. The special effect comes later, after you build the mechanics part of the attack. So your 10d6 Energy Blast can be fire, water, cold, or cosmic energy. Often, however, the desired effect of your "special effects" decides how a power is built. So if you're attack is a cloud of gas that knocks people out, best look at NND. Of course, there are always more than one way to build something, so if you're magic missiles are darts of ice, that can be either an Energy Blast or an RKA.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

AHA! Just wait' date=' says I, and all will be clear! As previously established, visuals and mechanics are separable in D&D so long as you tool around with the SFX within reason. Makes sense. According to a friend of mine, visuals & mechanics within HERO are intrinsically [i']linked[/i], one is built from the other, the Reasoning Game Engine theory.

 

Discuss.

visuals & mechanics are decoupled like KS said.

 

A Teleport power is a Teleport power no matter how you dress it up, it always "Works" the same.

 

Add SFX then defines the visuals: Star Trek Transports, Hyperspeed, Dimensional Hops, Shadow Walking ... they all work the same (same Mechanic) but act differently (different visual).

 

Reasoning From Effect means "What am I doing? Ok, whay mechanics simulate that, Ok, that's what I'll use." And the mechanic has nothing to do with the SFX of what you're doing, it's just an enabler.

[Curufea]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

Im not understaning you're lack of understanding. If I were the Line Developer of HERO Games' date=' I would do it. However, Im not so I can't.[/quote']

 

Ah - Changes to the official published version is what you're meaning.

 

I'm of the school of thought "I want it this way - suggest it, if it isn't accepted, do it for my own personal use anyway".

 

Actually, I tend to do things for my own use first, then sometimes realise other people may find it hand - then get around to suggesting it.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

Ah - Changes to the official published version is what you're meaning.

 

I'm of the school of thought "I want it this way - suggest it, if it isn't accepted, do it for my own personal use anyway".

 

Actually, I tend to do things for my own use first, then sometimes realise other people may find it hand - then get around to suggesting it.

I dont think anyone familiar with my work could suggest that I have a problem departing from canon when it serves my purposes, but if I implemented all of the sweeping system changes I think should be made I would soon discover that I was playing a completely different game, my work would not be readily usable by others, and any potential new players would have to be "handled" to bring them up to speed on my version of the rules.

 

Thus, while I'll forge off into frontiers with insufficient rules coverage, I usually leave the areas that are well established largely in place.

[i3ullseye]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

I remember one classic discussion in our gaming gorup that this whole thread reminded me of.

 

There I was, Reginald the Anatomist... from the Necromancer Handbook (2nd Edition AD&D). It was tough to get the GM to allow me to play a necromancer in the first place, but the concept was the classic renaissance surgeon, experimenting in the macabre to understand how the human body works and fix it.

 

The discussion erupted in our group when I aksed about a cosmetic change to one of my spells. Already i had a negative energy blast that was much like Magic Missle (don't recall its exact name right now) but would actually heal an undead if hit with it, since it was negative energy. I asked if it could look like a small screaming black skull shooting out form my hand... and people went crazy.

 

The spell clearly said it was a black beam, and most players started thinking I was trying to manipulate the rules. All I wanted was a skull. The way the spell would function would not change, its damage, its effectiveness, its level... everything would be the same. But the basic idea that i wanted it to LOOK personalized was call for cries of heresy.

 

In the end, I went with the stock black beam. It was better to safe group unity, and apparently save some sanity for the less courageous of that bunch, than to be original and have ANY spell look even slightly unique.

 

Don't even want to recall how many hours that discussion went on either. Pointless. I had one ally in the discussion, and he played HERO also, so he understood the basic differrences between cosmetic and real changes.

 

I don't hate AD&D, or D&D. Many fo the things I didn't like from 2nd edition they did fix in 3rd. I actually think D20 is a great idea, and a great system. the OGL is a brilliant marketting move... Ryan did it to emulate the whole Windows paradigm... that anything can run as long as you have Windows underneath. D20, especially Wizards books themselves, have been some of the most graphically appealing books I have ever seen.

 

But for all that, you still have people locked into the mentality that what is written is exactly what must occur. No deviation, and no variance.

 

GREAT: Feats..... CON: Everyone tries to maximize the combat feats alone in most campaigns, even to the point of takign entire character class levels just to get an exclusive feat that by concept they woudl never truly have.

 

GREAT: Prestige Classes..... CON: People plan their character paths and assume that at a given level (the minimum to meet the requirements) it is their right to take this class. They are an amazing in-game tool for special orders and select fields of expertise... but they shoudl occur within the game reference, not be a target that people build their characters to hit.

 

In all actuality, if you run a game with the Dungeon Masters Guide, a Players Handbook... and one Campaign reference for more Feats and Prestige classes, D20 can still be an amazing game. It is easier to learn, and has the benefit that at any convention, 9 out of 10 people can sit down and game with you. It is when you add eight bazillion extra books into the mix, and instead of them conforming to the basic rule set, they deviate and in many cases break them, you get a real mess.

 

I highly reccommend the Ebberron campaign seetting book. The whole contest they ran to pick that one I thought would end up with more Forgotten Realms type diluted crap, and I couldn't have been more wrong. But beyond general scope books, I am not a fan of Modules or Villain books or any thing of that nature.

 

Ok, long winded this one... so let me actual give some constructive ideas in a follow up thread post hehe....

[i3ullseye]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

Ok, now suggesting for actually moving from D20 and into HERO.

 

1st- show the players how much more colorful combat is. Show them how their attack level and magic sword ranking are often negligable, but which martial art maneuver they use can make all the differrence in the world. Let them knwo that catching the opponent off guard, or actually beign faster than your opponent, really matter for a change. Let them know that a single dumb initiative roll wont lead to them being skewered by a lucky critical hit roll.

 

2nd- let them be far more creative with their characters. Instead of asking which class they want to play, ask them what they want to be. Package professions are great, and certainly have a good place in most fantasy games (same with racial packages), but using those to get to what they want instead of the reverse will open some eyes right away

 

3rd- show them how NOT using a class system, or levels, can truly allow for a far more enjoyable and creative character.

 

I ran one campaign for about 2 years, 2 to 3 nights a week (yeah, there was nothing to do where I was astationed) and these are a few thigns that really stood out and people liked.

 

Apprenticing- All characters started at 50 points, with 25 in disads. A basic 75 point character. But during the first few weeks, i accellerated their XP gain. Each week they earned 10 HP, plus whatever XP they had actually earned during that time. How they could spend it was limited however.

 

Every point needed to be justified. Working out with weights? You coudl spend it on physical abilities. In the library? You coudl increase or gain knowledge skills. Since this is a magic realm, you could even justify some minor powers, some perks and talents also. During this time I also gauge what they are doing during this time and see if any disadvantages are earned.

 

And believe me, they are earned. When you make an enemy or a hunted during this formative stage, it holds MUCH more weight than just writing something on a character sheet when you create it.

 

This gave me another strong control point. I could pick which magics were available. They could learn nothing unless they apprenticed to someone who coudl teach them. Lock picking? Priestly Magic? Arcane Magic? Many things I wanted to keep a clamp on were never an issue.

 

Further, thought they all fell under 2 strong characters (I actually had them act as henchment to these 2 legendary heroes for about 2 months) they sought out desired skills on their own form various sources. If one player finds his admittance into the thieves guild, you are set. Teh other characters might not have the same access. Now you don;t have a game where everybody can pick a lock. You get skill divrsification from the players just by nature of limiting the early availability.

 

During this early period they gain 25 HP (plus experience) and 50 Disads. This brought them right up to 150 point characters by the end, but when they say theyc an pick a lock, they can tell you the guild member who taught them, and what trials they had to go through to earn that skill. When the local swordsmaster is hunting them, they can tell you WHY and even recall the words of the challenge on that fateful day.

 

Another big hit was creative magical systems. Their possible schools of study were limited by what was local to them. Fire and Ice were these, and I think 3 others. One favored warriors, and there were NO real churches. That meant i kept healing magics to a minimum from the very start. there was personal healing in the warrior school, but not a lot of ways to heal an ally, and this was central to the early part of the campaign.

 

Part of that early campaign was seeking out one of the few remaining members of the Church of St Akeem. This was a church who coudl still heal, but was unlike anything the players had seen before. Picture huge barrel chested Sinbad looking brutes with massive Scimitars. Each one was a warrior priest. This magic was based on Presence!

 

Yes you read that right, Presence!

 

The skills were mostly combat oriented, or minor food and water creation, but they coudl also heal. Spells were NEVER a simple affair however. Loud chanting, spinning, waving arms whildy. Imagine the most possessed genie of the lamp image you can, and thats a low key priest in this order. They dominated the room wherever they went, and when they did ANYTHING magical, everyone knew it.

 

Another thing to keep in mind if the pet optiosn in HERO system. Bulding that tiger that follows you, and giving yourselves a mind link makes for a FAR more interesting (and fun) combo than a typical pet in most D20 based system. because here we have rules to customize and also balance that, and you shoudl exploit that to really pull the players into the world you make for them.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

A quote that has served me well in life is:

 

Small minds concern themselves with small things.

[Curufea]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

Mine's always been "KISS"

[Lucius]

Fixin' what's broken

 

Killer Shrike:

 

And while we're at it, how about getting rid of Desolidification?

 

Moving through things is obviously a form of Tunneling, No Normal Defense.

 

Invulnerability is just the next step up on Damage Reduction, although of course you have to balance it just as you do with No Normal Defense....

 

 

And if we can put range on STR and have Flight Usable Against Others, do we need Telekinesis?

 

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary remarks: "Watch out. These two will simplify the game out of existance given a chance. Or maybe complicate it into complete obfuscation. Depends on his mood...."

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

And we were having such a nice conversation, too.

 

Killer Shrike: I'm new, so I really don't understand. Can you explain, in small words, what your changes would actually do to improve the game? I'm not going to be ready to start flipping out House Rules just yet, as I need to master RAW first, but I'm at least curious.

 

i3ullseye: Good morning, thanks for joining the thread! Actually the transition bit I have down already. Interestingly enough, the mechanics you described for getting people invested in the story are very similar to the ones I already did for my primary campaign. That home-built world is the one which has actually caused the strife which made me want to switch from d20 to HERO.

 

A few things that are worth mentioning in your initial review: d20 is a good system, but the fatal flaw is its gross lack of flexibility. Skills are limited in their application; you often find yourself struggling to match things up, but can't justify creating an all-new skill because (gasp) no one had ever taken it in the first place.

 

All magic works one way and introducing a new spell requires groping around blindly in the dark, clinging to other spells as a guide post to how to build your new spell. You have to worry about duplication and toe-stepping. If you want a new magic system, you can't build one, because you have no LEGOs. You have to pretend you have LEGOs and then write down what you imagine your LEGOs would look like, if you had them to begin with, which you don't.

 

Second, you are correct in that on paper, a PrC is a great way to introduce a 'special unit' (such as the one my PCs are in) but there are no rules to build a PrC. In HERO I can build a Class Package Deal, call it "Order of the Silver Crescent" and be golden from then on. Poof. If I want a new Elf package, I can build a new Elf package. If my 'Drae' only look like Drow, but have totally separate benefits, I can reflect that, too.

 

I got more out of reading the first 50 or so pages of Fantasy Hero last night than I've gotten out of any racial supplement ever introduced for d20. And that's saying something. 50 pages vs. about 600? Yipes.

 

Agreed: d20 books are pretty. And that's the best thing I can say about them, sad to tell. They're very, very pretty. They have beautiful hard back covers (CURSE YOU SOFTBACK!!) and gorgeous interior art work. Do you know what I don't care about? Artwork. It's great for flavor, but it isn't a primary trait I should be judging a book on. I say this because I don't pull books down from my shelf and show off the artwork to my friends. I pull books down from my shelf to look up a rule or roll a mechanic through my head. I'm really not in the marketing demographic here. I want my books to contain Killer, not Filler.

 

Which isn't to say that d20 doesn't do some things very well. It does. It creates a strong, structured environment in which to introduce new players. It gives (at first blush, until you tinker with it) a simple combat structure that allows you to swing, manuever, and cast spells. It has a simply laid out magic system that only starts about two fights a session. It has excellent creature sourcebooks. All good. But all flawed, because (to invert KS's sig) it's all built on a flawed system.

 

But those are my thoughts on it, and the whole reason I flipped in the first place. So I have some pent up bitterness.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

And we were having such a nice conversation, too.

 

Killer Shrike: I'm new, so I really don't understand. Can you explain, in small words, what your changes would actually do to improve the game? I'm not going to be ready to start flipping out House Rules just yet, as I need to master RAW first, but I'm at least curious.

 

Oh, that wasnt directed at you for the purposes of implementing house rules; it was just a comment to the general idea of "Ranged Normal Attack" vs EB -- if I were to write 6th edition, there would just be "Attack", or maybe "Inflict Damage" rather that HKA, RKA, EB, HA.

 

As far as how it would improve the game, the main benefit would be to remove redundancy and a common source of confusion. Theres no reason to have 4 Powers with the exact same mechanic differing only in Range and how dice are counted, IMO.

 

Don't worry about it when running your game. Nothing to see here, move along, just a hedge.

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

Killer Shrike: Actually, I was wondering about that myself. You're simply suggesting that we boil it down to one core ability, then parse it out depending on how the individual wants to handle range, damage capacity, etc., yeah? That makes sense to me, and would simply adjust the terminology, instead of the point expenditure.

 

Good enough. I may even explain it that way to the PCs. Thanks!

[Guest taxboy4]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

I know there are lots of more structured discussions on this post but for more, I just can't get over my hatred of

 

Hit Points (come on - fall 30 feet, dust yourself off and fight again)

 

Combat (boring, effort in subtraction, and fight until you nearly dead with no side effects)

 

Levels - ugh.....

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Fixin' what's broken - switching from d20 to HERO

 

taxboy4: Welcome to my dilemma. This, among many other things, is why I'm in the process of flipping to HERO. I finally got a copy of Fantasy HERO last night, and that's going very well for me. I can say with some matter of satisfaction that it's the best supplement book I've read in ages, despite not having a hard cover and high-profile artwork. I read books for the actual content; I don't give a whit about artwork. Even though it's gone, I have difficulty missing it. If anything, some of the more basic black & white stuff is more interesting to look at, since it isn't the same old, same old.

 

Combat is something else entirely. In d20, the Hydra was built - get this - to reward players for taking Improved Sunder, which is odd, since Sunder specifically says you have to be holding an item, but you can Sunder a creature's neck. Does that mean I found the rules decaptitation? I doubt it. Because there are no such creatures. The bulk of your combat does revolve around swing, hit, deal damage, next.

 

I want cinema in my fighting, and I want the players to add to the cinema. HERO does that. d20 does not.