Commando Hero

[Alverant]

Has anyone ever tried running a Commando Hero campaign? I tried running Dark Champions before but some of the characters were TOO dark (read anti-social and some were worse than the goons they killed). DC:A didn't feel right either. I'm trying to find a balance between the two. Commando Hero sounded like it might fit, but all I found was a segment in the 5th ed Viper book. So any experiences and suggestions would be helpful.

[csyphrett]

Re: Commando Hero

 

This is going to sound stupid but have you looked at GI JOE, especially the early hama years. I also reccommend the old Special missions series if you can find that. I dont know about the recent stories that are out but some of those old ones should give you something to work with.

 

Then you can branch out into trying to find stuff that will suit you.

CES

[kahuna's bro]

Re: Commando Hero

 

or the original animated series

[IndianaJoe3]

Re: Commando Hero

 

Has anyone ever tried running a Commando Hero campaign? I tried running Dark Champions before but some of the characters were TOO dark (read anti-social and some were worse than the goons they killed). DC:A didn't feel right either. I'm trying to find a balance between the two. Commando Hero sounded like it might fit' date=' but all I found was a segment in the 5th ed Viper book. So any experiences and suggestions would be helpful.[/quote']

 

Well, nothing in the Hero rules requires you (or your characters) to wear... oh.

 

It sounds like you want a modern action-adventure setting, which would fall under Dark Champions. You'll need to figure out what elements you want to include or exclude, and make sure the characters fit in with that. If you want a less-lethal campaign, you may want to either set resistant defenses relatively high, or re-construct guns with Blast instead of Killing Attack.

 

UNTIL: Defenders of Freedom is the good-guy counterpart to the VIPER sourcebook, and is still available from the Hero Store.

[BarretWallace]

Re: Commando Hero

 

Has anyone ever tried running a Commando Hero campaign? I tried running Dark Champions before but some of the characters were TOO dark (read anti-social and some were worse than the goons they killed). DC:A didn't feel right either. I'm trying to find a balance between the two. Commando Hero sounded like it might fit' date=' but all I found was a segment in the 5th ed Viper book. So any experiences and suggestions would be helpful.[/quote']

 

That sounds a lot like what we did for our Special Forces campaign in college. Point totals for the characters were fairly high I think (at least 100/100 if I remember correctly, if not more), because we were playing highly skilled soldiers. 5th Ed. hadn't been released yet at that point.

 

Anyway, we used hit location rules and the GM never fudged the dice in our favor, which compensated nicely for relatively powerful characters. Each of us also played two soldiers, both to fill more roles within the team and to keep us occupied if one character was killed or incapacitated. (Yep, we had fatalities, although there were a lot of close calls too, saved only by timely first aid. Also, in spite of playing skilled soldiers, planning and stealth (when possible) were orders of the day. Even when fighting swarms of schmucks, eventually even an idiot could get lucky with an AK-47 or emplaced machine gun. We also avoided swarms of enemy when possible for that exact reason. Even the best soldiers are dead meat if they allow the enemy enough time to respond and organize.

 

Hmm...don't know if that was helpful, but hopefully it gives you an idea or two.

[NanoEther]

Re: Commando Hero

 

Speaking of Special Forces, that probably should have been a better title...

Commando has, well, other connotations

[Alverant]

Re: Commando Hero

 

This is going to sound stupid but have you looked at GI JOE, especially the early hama years. I also reccommend the old Special missions series if you can find that. I dont know about the recent stories that are out but some of those old ones should give you something to work with.

 

Then you can branch out into trying to find stuff that will suit you.

CES

 

No, not stupid. I remember the comics. (The cartoon was fun but that's to DC:A what DC:A is to regular DC. I mean, no one ever got hurt. Bad guys surrendered when you pointed a stun laser gun at them.) I loved how they concluded the continuity with their WWIII story line.

 

But I'm still trying to get a grip in what I want for a DC campaign (if I want to run a DC campaign at all) then I have to adjust it so it's something all the players want to play too. That's proving to be pretty hard given their personalities and RPG styles. I know I prefer the "role playing" part in an RPG and some of the players prefer the "game" part. I'm looking for someone who ran an actual "Commando Hero" campaign to let me know how it turned out.

[Alverant]

Re: Commando Hero

 

Speaking of Special Forces, that probably should have been a better title...

Commando has, well, other connotations

 

Hindsight is 20-20. But that's what was used in the Viper sourcebook. It's a feeble excuse, but that's what happened.

[Alverant]

Re: Commando Hero

 

It sounds like you want a modern action-adventure setting' date=' which would fall under [i']Dark Champions[/i]. You'll need to figure out what elements you want to include or exclude, and make sure the characters fit in with that. If you want a less-lethal campaign, you may want to either set resistant defenses relatively high, or re-construct guns with Blast instead of Killing Attack.

 

It wasn't the lethality I minded. It was the characters. They were an untrustworthy bunch who only knew each other by their vigilante IDs. That made it difficult to make story arcs for each character since they would be handling each one solo even though the others characters could help IF they knew each other. It was like the Heroes TV show in the first part of the first season. All these story lines running around with little connecting each one. Even if they did bump into each other it was mostly through GM fiat and felt like the proverbial "two ships passing in the night". Two characters were at the same location at the same time but neither knew the other was a teammate.

 

The other big problem was that I like my protagonists to actually be decent people deep down. If they saw a house on fire, they would be the type to check to see if everyone got out, or at least call 911. Some of the characters here would start roasting hot dogs (that's assuming they didn't have something to do with starting the fire in the first place). Some of the players like the "game" part in RPG and use their characters to cause mischief because after all, "it's only a game". There's nothing wrong that. I've done it a few times myself, but it didn't sit right with me. It felt like I was being a jerk just for the sake of being a jerk. I prefer the "roleplaying" part of RPG where the character acts more like a real person and makes decisions based on what they would do instead of what the player wants them to do. But the campaign has to be fun for them too. So I have to figure out how to make everyone happy.

 

(I do have the Until sourcebook. But some players don't like the UN. I could adapt it to Primus but they're a joke in other campaigns as a bunch of lazy thugs who show up after the fight is over and they've finished their donuts.)

[csyphrett]

Re: Commando Hero

 

In my opinion, you're going to have problems no matter what happens.

 

The only experience I have had with this type is a one shot Suicide Squad side adventure to the main game, complete with neck braces.

 

Your guys are going to have to buy in that they have to work together, or this type of game will quickly be some of them shooting the others in the back.

 

So I guess you need to weed out all the psych lims like casual killer, loves to lie, etc and reward for gaming.

 

Then maybe set down and build the characters together so only one is the ace pilot, one guy is the sniper, one guy is the heavy weapons guy.

 

And kill the ones that cant get with the program in game.

CES

[Michael Hopcroft]

Re: Commando Hero

 

Have you considered setting your Commando/Special Forces game during WWII? There's a wealth of source material, no question of the morality of what the PCs do (what is more moral than taking down Hitler?), and plenty of interesting things to do over the course of a raid scenario. There's still a lot of room for shades-of-gray and character interplay (you should really consider finding The Guns of Navarone for an example of a failure-is-not-an-option raid gone wrong that forces the raiders to abandon the plan and improvise to get the necessary job done).

[Certified]

Re: Commando Hero

 

Do to the modern usage of the term I am required to post the following...

 

Commando Hero: Lead a crack squad of pantsless soldiers deep into the bush.

[brionl]

Re: Commando Hero

 

Do to the modern usage of the term I am required to post the following...

 

Commando Hero: Lead a crack squad of pantsless soldiers deep into the bush.

 

I think you mean, "stupid usage". Commando is a perfectly valid word for this sort of thing.

[Certified]

Re: Commando Hero

 

I think you mean' date=' "stupid usage". Commando is a perfectly valid word for this sort of thing.[/quote']

 

As it seems my ability to convey sarcasm has run low I've enlisted the help of one Mr. Gervais to help illustrate my previous comment.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CXJObRJohc

[Certified]

Re: Commando Hero

 

Sorry for hijacking the thread for a few posts.

[Doctor Agenda]

Re: Commando Hero

 

Hindsight is 20-20. But that's what was used in the Viper sourcebook. It's a feeble excuse' date=' but that's what happened.[/quote']

 

This is actually a case where the terminology is spot-on. See, if you're wearing really tight uniforms, like GI Joe or COBRA, pantylines can be an issue, and the solution is obvious.

[counterveil]

Re: Commando Hero

 

moquif, my question would be: Are you running the group as a fairly disparate set of individual mercenaries / freelancers / private security contractor types that are brought in for various jobs by unknown "employers"? If so, that's going to lend to the sort of borderline sociopathic behaviour you're seeing. It's a similar issue with Shadowrun, Cyberpunk, and similar games where players are basically at the fringe of society, more often than not acting as criminals or working for them.

 

If you want more of a team cohesiveness you could try running the party as a pre-set team of personnel working directly for a government and/or firm that actually performs psychological tests on would-be employees. As it is, getting into a special ops or commando unit already requires a battery of psychological tests to ensure that they're not hiring a bunch of people who will go hog wild at the first sign of something they can shoot. In fact, based on people I know in military special ops, I would argue that their battery of tests specifically target for employment the type of person who *would* go charging into a fire to rescue civilians - the heroic type of person you're looking for. I can't speak so much to the private sector as I don't know anyone in that capacity.

 

Given that, you could prevent players from taking certain Complications that pertain to sociopathic behavior, or even *require* them to take Complications that cause them to act in an heroic manner. A sort of Code of Honor or Code of Conduct, so to speak. Penalties for not playing their character would really be up to you and what you feel comfortable applying to your players.

 

On a similar note, I would recommend enforcing some type of conformity to the player skillset. You could set up some kind of "Commando" package that everyone is required to take. Most teams have fairly similar training across the board with room for some specialization; this allows teams to be flexible in whom they can apply to a given job, but also allows for other team members to take up the slack if someone is injured, incapacitated, or killed on a mission. From a meta-gaming standpoint, this helps people feel some degree of unity in background and helps form the basis for the Team rather than the Individual. I'm not sure if there's a HERO rulebook that gives such a package, but you could look at GURPS (yes, I said it) Special Ops for some ideas on skillsets and apply that to your HERO game.

 

At the end of the day, it's likely that your players are looking to you to enforce some type of conformity to your game. You may have to get a little heavy-handed at some points, but I've found in the past that it helps to get the less unruly players under the umbrella, and that draws the rest in. YMMV, and good luck!

[Trencher]

Re: Commando Hero

 

If you want the players to focus more on the game rather than play "grand theft auto hero". Base the villain group of something they dislike in real life and just exaggerate it. Also if they play nice and have honorable characters let it show in game by some npc's being impressed and admire them. Also tell them that your not going to write an story or adventure just for them to play out their destructive impulses, they can do that with video games. Tell them what you want, they will have to listen or be game master themselves. Last but not least make sure you got several types of goons and don't be afraid to make some of them weak, 8 body and no armour is perfectly acceptable when the players are using 9mm guns. One of the most frustrating things in Dark Champions can be that its so difficult to shoot people.

[TheDude2371]

Re: Commando Hero

 

I know this may be pimping a competing company's product, but I would seriously consider having a look at GURPS Special Ops, if you can get your hands on a copy. It actually has a list of undesired Disadvantages/Complications that would not be appropriate for a SpecOps character.