Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

[Eisenford]

Ok so here's where I'm at:

 

I love the Hero System and its versatility. Typically speaking, with new players I take an approach of "tell me what sort of chracter you want to run and I'll help you build it", which works fine for introducing people to the rules and such. The problem that arises is that even with my help, the players (and myself) do spend a good amount of time (2-4 hours with a good, somewhat experienced RPG player) creating these PCs, which translates into a good amount of grief when a PC dies. This in turn makes me want to run a game that errs on the side of not letting my players die, which makes for ultimately a less rewarding game, when the threat of an actual player death doesn't seem real.

 

What I'm getting to is this: I'd like some advise on how to simplify or otherwise make the character creation process more streamlined so that we can make these characters more quickly, and hopefully therefore less of a drama bomb when something happens to them.

 

I want the players to feel like they're special in game (otherwise what's the point of a system where you can do ANYTHING?); there has to be a happy medium in here somewhere.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

What Genre are you playing in normally?

 

some genre's benefit from the creation of good Templates to work with. Fantasy, for example, can take the bulk of Character Creation and distill it down to picking a couple Package Templates to fill out most of the character - Race, Culture, Profession - and leaving only a small portion left for the Player to Customize their Character.

 

For superhero using the legions of prebuilt Powers from the Champions Powers (or UNTIL Superpowers Databases) for the bulk of a Character can drastically reduce the time invested.

 

Otherwise, it's just experience of building that can reduce time. I don't take much more than an hour for even high point Superheros at this point.

 

Also - get Hero Designer - it removes the tedious counting numbers up part of Creation which can be a real time user.

[Rapier]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

Player death should not be a common occurrence, IMO, in ANY game. Players (myself very much included) get rather attached to their characters and it can be fairly traumatic event when they die.

 

My first question would be what kind of campaign you are running? Heroic? Superheroic? Realistic? Black-and-white? Gritty and grey? Four colour?

 

My second question is what kind of AP ranges do the characters have, and what are their average DEF?

 

Thirdly, how do the opponents stack up against the players in number and power?

 

Have you considered using some of the generation template charts in Champions?

 

What about using some of the pre-generated powers in Champions Powers?

 

Did you know that you can create pre-generated Package Deal for certain occupations (eg Cop, Marine, School Teacher)?

 

CharGen is always going to take a while. It's the most time consuming aspect of Hero. Do you use Hero Designer? HD has cut down my CharGen time by a factor of 8 (at least). It's well worth the cost.

[IndianaJoe3]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

What sort of game are you running where characters die frequently?

[Ghost Archer]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

What sort of game are you running where characters die frequently?

 

Suicide Bomber Hero?

[megaplayboy]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

Unless you're playing Paranoia, the PC death rate should be prohibitively low, ranging from once or twice a year for "gritty" games like low fantasy, urban vigilante or cyberpunk, to maybe once per campaign for bronze age supers or high fantasy.

[Kraven Kor]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

WWII: Pacific Theater HERO?

 

What you need are prefabs. Make lots of prefabs for your campaign that have the common types of powers and SFX already built where all you need do is set the AP / levels of the power.

 

Then you aren't reinventing the wheel every time you create a character.

 

(This is assuming you use HERO Designer. If you don't user HERO designer, the amount of time it saves in character creation is more than worth the price of admission.)

[Ternaugh]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

Just how often are the PCs dying? I mean, are you trying to emulate Paranoia, or something? I mean, character death is pretty difficult to achieve in most forms of Hero, and there's usually lots of options to heroically rescue a dying character. Remember, too, that most players will generate an attachment to any character that they play for a long time, no matter what the game system.

 

Some suggestions:

1. Revisit your campaign assumptions to see if the lethality level is what you really want. If it is, prepare your players in advance to expect that character death is something that could often come up.
   
2. Encourage the players to have a few reserve characters already made. You might want to have the various characters rotate "onscreen" in different adventures, to alleviate some of the emotional distress of losing a character. I usually give a bit of experience to offscreen characters as well, to balance power levels, and encourage the switching. This troupe style also works well when some characters have to heal normally over a long time. See Ars Magica for a game system built around the troupe style.
   
3. Remind players of character options that might save a dying comrade, like First Aid rolls, and the like. Encourage good in-character behavior with roleplaying rewards.
   
4. Consider using something like Heroic Action Points (6e2 287) to allow for times when the dice seemed cursed. That fatal hit might be reduced to an incapacitating wound, for example (if you allow HAPs to work against a damage roll).
   
5. Allow a last dying heroic action for the PC when all else fails. Often, if you work with the player, you can get the needed buy-in to reduce the angst, and can really add enjoyment to the campaign.
   

 

JoeG

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

For the ultimate (and most cynical) removal of angst from character death, change the character name, drop as many points as needed to get to the replacement character's reduced points available (unspend the last X xp to get there), and bring in a new character identical to the old character.

 

That was easy!

 

I prefer low PC lethality. If you want a high lethality game, I'd go with the suggestions above of templates. Ideally, I'd probably have a series of templates that use up all but 10 or 15 starting points, and all but 10 or 15 points of complications, to make character creation more cookie cutter. A Call of Cthulhu style game is extremely frustrating if it takes 4 hours to build a character and averages 40 minutes of play to kill it. Such a game should have pretty cookie cutter character creation.

 

The down side, at least in my experience, is that players become attached to their characters because they invest in them. Characters that take little work and have short lifespans tend to be much less fleshed out - why make all that investment in a character with the expected life span of a fruit fly?

[ayinde]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

No one stays dead in comics

Hear is one I like use a house rule “no body was found” the player may chose to elude death for his character. The character is taken out of play upon death but may be brought back later in a story. The player and gm must come up with a comic logical explanation for the character not being dead as was believed. Character must stay dead for at least the story arch

Upon the characters return to play the gm places 60 cps worth of draw backs these can be injurys social issue or what ever seems to make since at the moment. If the player wants he can just subtract points from his character.

Comic ref.

Bucky is dead ---> nope he's the winter soldier and till now was brain washed

Roady is dead ---> now he is a cyborg ---->(player buys off drawbacks) he is a normal human again

jean gray don't get me started

book ref.

Gandoff dies -----> now he is the white wizard

tv ref

buffy died twice and well just got better the first time and was brought back with magic the second time

 

ps

this set up is even better if you keep a stable of extra characters that way in the mean time just play some one else

[Eisenford]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

First off, sorry for taking so long to reply; I've been slammed at work all afternoon.

 

In any case, the genre is a paranormal game with supernatural/science fiction elements working together. Players are typically around 150 base, generally set up with one power/a small suite of powers and the rest is skills/attributes as the player likes. I orignally ran the group as part of a paranormal investigations team working for the Chicago PD, so the players had to buy a small suite of skills pertaining to being police officers.

 

As far as lethality, it's not so much that I want the game to be a "killer" game or anything, I just want to feel like I can kill characters off and it not be as big of a deal. Thanks for the advice so far, I'll look into the Hero software, that seems like a good idea.

[prestidigitator]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

Dude! Whatever, guys. The OP was about long, difficult character creation. Now that we've heard everyone and his uncle's opinions of how lethal the OP wants to make his campaign, how about getting back on topic? :-/

 

I agree with the suggestions about supplying templates and packages. In some ways they can form a set of guidelines (e.g. if you have a fixed set of races in a fantasy campaign), but they can also be a great aid for simple character creation.

 

A printed sheet of campaign guidelines can be very helpful, and I also suggest throwing together some quick summary tables of some of the more relevant characteristics, skills, equipment, and other system elements for your campaign (Everyman Skills, what types of equipment/weapons will be available both to start and eventually in the game, etc.). For example, in a fantasy game where encumbrance is used, it may be a key point for players to consider when designing their characters, so having a copy of the encumbrance chart at hand and not having to thumb through the book for it several times is a good help.

[Uncle Kudzu]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

In any case' date=' the genre is a paranormal game with supernatural/science fiction elements working together. Players are typically around 150 base, generally set up with one power/a small suite of powers and the rest is skills/attributes as the player likes.[/quote']

 

...hmm. I was about to ask if you were using a 6th Edition Supers setting, so I could HIGHLY recommend the new Champions book (it has a great set of rapid-build templates in the back for making all sorts of balanced super-heroic characters in a matter of minutes instead of hours)...still might be worth your time to look at it...

 

- Uncle K.

[Eisenford]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

Additionally, I like the whole "they come back next story arc with some disads", that might be a suitable compromise.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

First off, sorry for taking so long to reply; I've been slammed at work all afternoon.

 

In any case, the genre is a paranormal game with supernatural/science fiction elements working together. Players are typically around 150 base, generally set up with one power/a small suite of powers and the rest is skills/attributes as the player likes. I orignally ran the group as part of a paranormal investigations team working for the Chicago PD, so the players had to buy a small suite of skills pertaining to being police officers.

 

As far as lethality, it's not so much that I want the game to be a "killer" game or anything, I just want to feel like I can kill characters off and it not be as big of a deal. Thanks for the advice so far, I'll look into the Hero software, that seems like a good idea.

 

A few Templates/Packages for modern archetypes will help speed up Character creation - and NPC creation along with it.

 

If you want to minimize your work as a GM pick up Urban Fantasy Hero, Dark Champions and possibly Star Hero for guidelines along modern/paranormal/sci-fi elements to build from like Soldiers, Detectives, etc.

 

It has the added bonus of creating a certain level of consistency through the game world to know that all Soldiers have at least X-Skill Set and all Monster Hunters have specific Knowledge Skills and the like. As well as abilities and such for supernatural elements.

[prestidigitator]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

It has the added bonus of creating a certain level of consistency through the game world to know that all Soldiers have at least X-Skill Set and all Monster Hunters have specific Knowledge Skills and the like. As well as abilities and such for supernatural elements.

 

I like that one! A basic guideline on how broad or detailed to make Knowledge, Professional, and Science Skills for various types of character and level of proficiency in a given campaign. That's a good way to synchronize player and GM expectations, I think.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

I always get upset when a good player dies. They're people, after all. Now, when player characters die on the other hand its much less disturbing.

 

All joking aside, try working with fewer points; it streamlines every thing, and as everything is relative, its not really all that noticeable.

 

You could even try something more radical, like TraitDriven HERO

[Greywind]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

As far as lethality' date=' it's not so much that I want the game to be a "killer" game or anything, I just want to feel like I can kill characters off and it not be as big of a deal.[/quote']Players will always take exception to this.

[Tasha]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

Players will always take exception to this.

 

Yeah even when we were playing Lethal game systems like CarWars and Paranoia, players would be very attached to their characters. I mention CarWars because the system (at least the PocketBox edition) only gives drivers 3 Hits (with up to 9 if you buy over the top armor). Players would be pretty upset when their star autoduelist would die.

 

I think that the idea of character death can be overdone by GMs. You don't have to kill PCs to prove that combat can be deadly. Combat has a dangerous tension even when you are playing SilverAge Champions where NO character dies. Sacrifice NPCs if you need to show how nasty the monster of the week is. Like others have pointed out Hero is not really designed to be a lethal system. You can push the rules in that direction (ie Hit Location, Disabling/Imparing wounds, etc), but it's still pretty forgiving as far as PC death goes.

[Greywind]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

I've been thinking of using the old "What Rough Beast" updated, as an introduction in a supers game, letting the players start with the UNTIL agents that go in before the heroes are called in.

[Utech]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

I think it's great if you and your players enjoy having the real threat of PC death hanging over the table. Very dramatic.

 

In order to speed up character creation, I suggest that you create more than one character at a time. Give your players three or four character sheets and build that many characters all at once. You'll probably find that you can build three or four characters simultaneously in just a little more time than it takes to build one. As your players look over the different possible Characteristics levels, Skills, Powers, etc., they'll find that they don't have to pick one or the other -- they just assign one thing they want to one character and another thing they want to another character.

 

After you have three or four characters in the bag, pick one to start with and play until he pops off. Then you just whip out the next character in your stack and you're good to go.

[casualplayer]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

The game sounds very Delta Green/Call of Cthulhu. Bodycount is to be expected but the main characters should buy lots of abilites reflecting Plot Immunity or Resilience. Combat Luck, Luck Luck, Mental Defense, maybe even low level Regeneration Looked Worse Than It Is. Or have the team salted with Redshirts to soak the dramatic death.

 

For character creation for street level Hero, a Skill shopping list is huge. Nothing leaves a sour taste in your mouth like forgetting a concept-crucial skill during creation. And for stats, instead of worrying precise numbers initially, consider just having the player say "hindered (6-8,)" "average (9-11,)" "good (12-14,)" "great (15-17,)" "phenomenal (18-20,)" "inhuman (21+)" and pegging the numbers yourself during creation. You get to hit the range that the player wanted but you get a little budgetary wiggle room if other areas leave you short on points.

[prestidigitator]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

They're right: don't kill the PCs. Why kill them and end it quickly when you can do things like maim them, disable them, cripple them, and drive them utterly insane? THAT'S the Call of Cthulhu approach if I recall correctly.

[prestidigitator]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

You could even try something more radical' date=' like[b'] TraitDriven HERO [/b]

 

Hmm. Even if that's not used entirely, I think it might provide a good starting point. Either have the players assign the "trait points" and then use them themselves to help guide where they put the points, or do it as the GM then hand the character sheets to the players and let them tweak them from there.

 

I find it's always a tough balancing game when I don't have enough points for everything I want, and choosing between different things in that circumstance is tough. Having a guideline like that that'll remind me how much of the overall character I wanted to be dedicated to a particular thing might really be helpful.

[FreeDice]

Re: Cutting the Drama Out of Character Creation

 

Another option is to take a page out of the 5th Edition Champions book (I think that was the book).

 

Have a dozen package deals in three different categories, and let them pick one of each.

 

Say, X points in Characteristics, Y in Combat/Magic/Whatever, and Z in Background.

 

Then, have a dozen package deals in each. You pick one for Characteristics (Strong Hero, Tough Hero, Fast Hero), one for Combat (Fighter/Ranger/Mage), and one for Background (Mercenary, Noble, Craftsman). Takes five minutes, you're done, and you can slowly add more and more groups until they have hundreds of competitions.