About 6th edition

[tiger]

Well

 

When I first saw the thread about making a new edition of the Hero System I was less than amused. Having been more than burned out on the fact that some game manufacturers seem to "redesign" every few years, HG wanting to didn't sit well. Looking over the threads on the different ideas being thrown around didn't make me feel any better. Besides, call me a purist but no figured characteristics ARE YOU NUTS!! Then add in the fact that instead of 1 rulebook there were going to be, kind of gave a PH and DMG feel I didn't need.

 

Well the books made it back from the printers and were ready to be purchased and I figured what the heck. Having read/looked over the books I have to say Looks like I was wro...mist...not exactly accurate on my initial feeling.

 

While I still miss the figured characteristics , I have to say that it turned out very well. It's the usual well written and well thought material we've come to expect from HG. While some of the changes will take getting use others are hardly noticeable. While some characters 5th edition characters will come out quite different, others will hardly be changed.

 

Looking at the two books You can easily see why they decided on two Volumes. With one coming in over 450 pages and the other 300 you can see that one volume would close to 800 pages. This would not only be a bit expensive but would cause all sorts of printing problems, although Id love to see it

 

Overall a great job and was well worth buying. Already knee deep in converting characters and such. I have to say I recommend the books and looking forward to going over the Advance Player's guide when it arrives next week. So Great Job Steve!

 

OH!!! I think we should call this one George or maybe Horatio

[Sean Waters]

Re: About 6th edition

 

I agree entirely - I think this is a significant step forward for Hero and the books - and contents - are very nice.

[Steve Long]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Thanx for the kind words, and glad you're enjoying the books!

 

Heh... Horatio. I think I've managed to get most people behind my use of 6E1 and 6E2. They're not flashy, but everyone knows what we're talking about.

[Reality]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Overall, I like the new edition; the cover is reminiscent of the 4th Edition color scheme, which is nice (though I thought the 5th edition cover looked very sleek and professional).

 

I did notice something that took me off guard; the Age Complication went missing. I still have the 5th Edition, so I can find it if I need it, but still, I wish they'd left it in the 6th edition book. I don't have the Advanced Players Guide; maybe it's there.

[Tasha]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Overall, I like the new edition; the cover is reminiscent of the 4th Edition color scheme, which is nice (though I thought the 5th edition cover looked very sleek and professional).

 

I did notice something that took me off guard; the Age Complication went missing. I still have the 5th Edition, so I can find it if I need it, but still, I wish they'd left it in the 6th edition book. I don't have the Advanced Players Guide; maybe it's there.

 

I would assume that's because Characteristics Maximums are no longer a Complication, so it would make sense that the Age Disad would disappear as well. I never really liked it as a Disad anyways. It was something that only affected the character during char gen or when spending exp. Better to allow the player to choose their own maximum and have a real complication like (Phy Comp: Aged -3 Dex rolls, Running in excess of 4m costs 2x end, etc) That has a real effect on the game and it is something that regularly comes up.

[Sean Waters]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Aye - to create an 'old charatcer', just buy STR down and INT up - or, for most 'old' reality templates, but STR down, INT down and put the points into 'Change Environment: makes the air smell like cabbage'.

 

 

 

 

Oh what have I said NOW?

[mayapuppies]

Re: About 6th edition

 

[Crypt]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Looking at the two books You can easily see why they decided on two Volumes. With one coming in over 450 pages and the other 300 you can see that one volume would close to 800 pages. This would not only be a bit expensive but would cause all sorts of printing problems, although Id love to see it

 

oh you may still have all in one volume =>

http://cryptmaster.free.fr/H6pics/new/

Now it includes APG.

Total = 460+320+ 200 = 980 pages

 

(all bought PDFs, of course)

[mayapuppies]

Re: About 6th edition

 

oh you may still have all in one volume =>

http://cryptmaster.free.fr/H6pics/new/

Now it includes APG.

Total = 460+320+ 200 = 980 pages

 

(all bought PDFs, of course)

Now that is a bible

[Crypt]

Re: About 6th edition

 

One more book and it will be a cube

[VegasNomad]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Actually, from what little I've read, I see plenty of reasons not to buy 6th edition and to just stick with the 5th. Characters with all previous editions were basically compatible with each other, but 6th edition has several changes in mechanics that worked perfectly fine before. Since I'm actually capable of critical thought and am not a raving fanboy, unless I see some compelling reasons to buy the new books (why TWO books to buy anyway??), I'm going to stick with the 5th edition...and this is from someone who's bought every previous edition when it came out. I'm really disappointed.

[kefkakrazy]

Re: About 6th edition

 

I haven't bought 6e yet, but probably will once my income picks up.

 

That being said, about figured characteristics: ANY misgivings I felt about that change were utterly banished when I was playing around with an Excel version of a character sheet (one of the freebies off of the Herogames website). I took the character I was working on, set his figured characteristics to static values (so that the current values would be unaffected by changes in the base characteristics, but the base values and point values would still be tracked).

 

As a whim, I set his STR to 10,000. And saw, to my horror, that the value for his total character points spent... had gone negative. The hell? The same with CON. Either this spreadsheet's math is wrong, or the total point value of the figured characteristics of each of those two stats are actually worth more than the stats themselves cost.

 

So yeah. Not going to cry over figured characteristics.

[Tasha]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Characters from the earlier editions will still work in a 6e game. Depending on the Genre you could get away with running them unchanged and unconverted. Heck any superheroic characters would still work as well.

 

The goodness comes when you build new characters. You find that you don't have to buy that 33 dex just to get that base 11 CV and you can now have OCV and DCV that doesn't match (not inc Skill levels which you must apply to one or the other during a phase).

 

The rules are taking 2 books now for 2 mechanical reasons. One is because there is MUCH more art in 6e than in any other edition of the books, and secondly they set the books in a slightly bigger face (which makes many of us older games very happy!), both of those inflate page count beyond a single volume's size.

 

I am complete love with the 6e rules, they are quite nifty and the books are total works of art that are Very functional. More functional and easier to read than both 5e and 5er rules. As I get used to the rules and write up more NPC's I am finding more ways to use the new powers and abilites and Characteristics.

 

They aren't perfect and I do have some quibbles about certain aspects of the rules, but overall I am very happy. I think our gaming group is also happy with the way the rules are working out as well.

[VegasNomad]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Well I am borrowing the books from a friend to look them over. I dunno though, from what I've seen I don't feel compelled to spend $70 to go to 6th edition (Ok cheaper if I buy it online but hey, support your local gaming store!). I'd love to see a concise summary of the various changes. I am already not thrilled about the points inflation issue people are talking about but will have to see more to form a better opinion. I do remember the days of the Enemies books with all the 200-300 point villains and how absolutely wimpy they'd be in many current games.

 

 

Characters from the earlier editions will still work in a 6e game. Depending on the Genre you could get away with running them unchanged and unconverted. Heck any superheroic characters would still work as well.

 

The goodness comes when you build new characters. You find that you don't have to buy that 33 dex just to get that base 11 CV and you can now have OCV and DCV that doesn't match (not inc Skill levels which you must apply to one or the other during a phase).

 

The rules are taking 2 books now for 2 mechanical reasons. One is because there is MUCH more art in 6e than in any other edition of the books, and secondly they set the books in a slightly bigger face (which makes many of us older games very happy!), both of those inflate page count beyond a single volume's size.

 

I am complete love with the 6e rules, they are quite nifty and the books are total works of art that are Very functional. More functional and easier to read than both 5e and 5er rules. As I get used to the rules and write up more NPC's I am finding more ways to use the new powers and abilites and Characteristics.

 

They aren't perfect and I do have some quibbles about certain aspects of the rules, but overall I am very happy. I think our gaming group is also happy with the way the rules are working out as well.

[lemming]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Well I am borrowing the books from a friend to look them over. I dunno though' date=' from what I've seen I don't feel compelled to spend $70 to go to 6th edition (Ok cheaper if I buy it online but hey, support your local gaming store!). I'd love to see a concise summary of the various changes. I am already not thrilled about the points inflation issue people are talking about but will have to see more to form a better opinion. I do remember the days of the Enemies books with all the 200-300 point villains and how absolutely wimpy they'd be in many current games.[/quote']

 

Thread with Conversion Notes PDF attached in thread with the concise summary. (2 pages)

[bigbywolfe]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Actually' date=' from what little I've read, I see plenty of reasons not to buy 6th edition and to just stick with the 5th. Characters with all previous editions were basically compatible with each other, but 6th edition has several changes in mechanics that worked perfectly fine before. Since I'm actually capable of critical thought and am not a raving fanboy, unless I see some compelling reasons to buy the new books (why TWO books to buy anyway??), I'm going to stick with the 5th edition...and this is from someone who's bought every previous edition when it came out. I'm really disappointed.[/quote']

Since you don't seem to think there is a compelling reason are you implying that everyone who has bought it is a "raving fanboy" not "actually capable of critical thought"? Or was that jsut a poor way to phrase some other idea I'm missing?

[Tasha]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Well I am borrowing the books from a friend to look them over. I dunno though' date=' from what I've seen I don't feel compelled to spend $70 to go to 6th edition (Ok cheaper if I buy it online but hey, support your local gaming store!). I'd love to see a concise summary of the various changes. I am already not thrilled about the points inflation issue people are talking about but will have to see more to form a better opinion. I do remember the days of the Enemies books with all the 200-300 point villains and how absolutely wimpy they'd be in many current games.[/quote']

 

For once the point inflation isn't because of power creep. The point inflation is to pay for the decoupling of Secondary Characteristics (ie Figured Chars) from the Primaries. In fact some characters may actually be less powerful depending on how much point savings they were getting from their Figureds.

 

There are a ton of little changes meant to bring consistancy to the rules (ie all of the multiple attack types now have the same mechanic). Some new powers and advantages to give better flexability for character gen. Some name changes to encourage players to think about those abilities differently they had (ie Energy Blast, becomes Blast) Name Changes meant to provide consistency of Concepts (ie Complications instead of Disadvantages, Psyc Complication instead of Limitation (to differentiate between Power Limitations and Character Complications) things like that. Over all it's a great package.

[tiger]

Re: About 6th edition

 

oh you may still have all in one volume =>

http://cryptmaster.free.fr/H6pics/new/

Now it includes APG.

Total = 460+320+ 200 = 980 pages

 

(all bought PDFs, of course)

 

I though of printing them off and spiral binding them. But Kinkos told me that they used their biggest spiral on the revised 5th edition...so.....

[Tasha]

Re: About 6th edition

 

I though of printing them off and spiral binding them. But Kinkos told me that they used their biggest spiral on the revised 5th edition...so.....

 

I used a Spiral bind for 6e1 (which was printed 2sided on 24lb Laser Printer bond in color ). for 6e2 I had them use this plastic Coil binding. I wish they had that particular binding for something as large as 6e1 as it the binding feels very strong and allows me to fold the cover all of the way to the back. Unfortunatly Coil Binding only has supplies for coils of up to 1.25" in Diameter. Plastic Comb binding (which I used on 6e1) will accomodate books of up to 2" (I used the 1.5" comb IIRC though it may have been the 1.25" comb)

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]34290[/ATTACH]

 

PS I also have the Hard covers. I just went this way because I couldn't wait for the books to ship and I didn't want to buy a Kindle DX to read the PDFs

[Opal]

Re: About 6th edition

 

As a whim' date=' I set his STR to 10,000. And saw, to my horror, that the value for his total character points spent... had gone negative. The hell? The same with CON. Either this spreadsheet's math is wrong, or the total point value of the figured characteristics of each of those two stats are actually worth more than the stats themselves cost.[/quote']The math isn't wrong, but the character isn't 'legal' at that point. 2nd-5th, it wasn't permitted to 'buy down' more than one figured characteristic. Typically, for instance, you'd buy CON until at least one of your figured characteristics was where you wanted it to be, then top off one or two others. STR, OTOH, you'd usually buy to the level you want, and just take the PD, STN, and REC and be happy with 'em.

 

In 1st Ed, that loophole was still open. Few GMs let you get away with it, such characters were more of a "Murphy's Rule" joke, but they were technically possible.

 

Anyway, the net result of figured characteristics was that all characters saved some points, and 'Bricks' saved a lot. Typically, non-Bricks used Power Frameworks so got a similar level of point savings (and primary stats lost their figureds if put in frameworks, so you didn't have characters 'doing both' - at least, not efficiently).

 

6e did away with the one Power Framework that was most nearly comparable to the savings granted by figured stats, so the game is probably still more or less balanced, just at a higher level of total character points across the board.

[IndianaJoe3]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Well I am borrowing the books from a friend to look them over. I dunno though' date=' from what I've seen I don't feel compelled to spend $70 to go to 6th edition (Ok cheaper if I buy it online but hey, support your local gaming store!).[/quote']

 

Well, the Basic Rules are only $20.

[Ninja-Bear]

Re: About 6th edition

 

I do remember the days of the Enemies books with all the 200-300 point villains and how absolutely wimpy they'd be in many current games.

 

Remeber to though that some of the "inflation" comes from people buying more skills and perks to flesh out the character. I have the original enemies books and classic enemies for 4th and had compared them before. One example is martial arts, and the way they were bought changed the cost for characters. Also, I'm not sure when the automaton powers were introduces but the really changes the way one buys the minuteman mk1 from (i beleive Enemies I). Now I'm not saying that simpler villians are bad. And when I create my own mastermind I would use the mastermind option. It is easier to use the mastermind option than to write out everthing.

 

People are talking about powers being changed as if it is a new thing. Looking over my books, I can tell you that it has happened before Steve Long took over Hero System. Did you know that at one time Shrinking automatically halved your running? Extra limbs automatically gave you pluses in hand to hand ? Amd according to a optional rule in the Gadets book, absorbtion could be used for defense for the measly extra 3 points per die.

 

Now do I think all the changes are good ? No. But I'm not surprised though that there are changes.

[Vondy]

Re: About 6th edition

 

Personally, I wasn't thrilled with it at first. But its grown on me and I like the good things it brings to the table more than the negatives. Its a solid system and worth the investment. I understand if someone is happy with 5ER and wants to stick with it. Its also a solid system. For some the negatives may outweigh the positives. In the end, that's a subjective calculation. In my case, I only have one supers legacy game and its a prose heavy online game with no die rolls. We built characters and are just going for it. That one is using 5ER.

 

Almost all my materials are for real world settings. They may have some noir, occult, romance, and pulp elements thrown in, but overt powers(incl magic) aren't usually in play. As a result, heroic talents and super-skills are about as fancy as I get. I think this is because I didn't grow up on fantasy, space opera, or even comic books. I grew up on biblical heroes, folk heroes, and action heroes. Its produces a different perception and aesthetic. It also produces a different set of desires in terms of what you want a system to be able to do. 6E handles the games I want to run somewhat better than 5ER did.

[RexMundi]

Re: About 6th edition

 

It not only handles that game better, it handles the opposite End better as well, And I've been with Hero products, from the ground floor, 1st year you could get them, til now. That's a long time to have a comparative baseline to measure improvements against. 6e, IS a better game. It scales better, and allows you to do more, with less. We didn't lose anything terribly important, and if it was something that was Insanely important to you (Comeliness for example), then you can add it back in (the toolkit rules are there), or modify what IS there to fit your Ideal better (setting up Striking Appearance for example, to be on the same Scale, as Wealth).

 

~Rex ....who btw, didn't switch to Fred Revised, but did switch, to 6e.