mattingly Posted June 7, 2012 Report Share Posted June 7, 2012 A decade ago, the United Worlds and Vorn were at war. Just as we never knew why they attacked, we never knew why they withdrew from U.W. space, but given the losses suffered, we were glad they did. The Vorn remain a weight on the minds of U.W. military planners, but life goes on for everyone else. From the domes covering the frozen wastes of Tawhirimatea to the lush jungles of Yewel, humans the other races of the U.W. live, work and squabble on dozens of inhabited worlds, deal with the everchanging Jodoni demenses, wonder about the aloof, cryptically prescient Ethereans, and worry about what was important enough to the Vorn to have them retreat when their victory was nearly certain. Fires of Heaven by veteran game designer Patrick Sweeney is a massive 258 page gameworld for the HERO System 6th Edition, with details on every aspect of the United Worlds, alien races, starship design and combat, psionics, and more. The Fires of Heaven Patrick Sweeney 258 pages $24.95 BWG636 978-1-61318-636-7 www.blackwyrm.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted June 7, 2012 Report Share Posted June 7, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven Is there a pdf of this book? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattingly Posted June 7, 2012 Author Report Share Posted June 7, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven The PDF will be up within the coming week or so. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Manic Typist Posted June 7, 2012 Report Share Posted June 7, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven .... you know what? This sounds interesting enough that I could actually buy it. Best compliment a customer could make, I guess. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norm Posted June 15, 2012 Report Share Posted June 15, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven Rock on!!!! I have been waiting for this since the Project WyrmStar announcement. Will get it when the PDF/Print combo is available. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest dr. strangelove Posted June 15, 2012 Report Share Posted June 15, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven Here are some reviews of the EABA version of Fires of heaven: http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/14/14733.phtml http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/14/14969.phtml Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted June 15, 2012 Report Share Posted June 15, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven Rock on!!!! I have been waiting for this since the Project WyrmStar announcement. Will get it when the PDF/Print combo is available. I don't think Blackwyrm does those. I can't recall seeing them available for purchase that way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norm Posted June 15, 2012 Report Share Posted June 15, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven I don't think Blackwyrm does those. I can't recall seeing them available for purchase that way. Some they do, some they don't.... At least on the Hero Store. This one they did. https://www.herogames.com/viewItem.htm?itemID=263972 Just bought it. Noticed that the Print is $24.95 and the Print/PDF combo is also $24.95. Dave, Tina, and Company... PM if that is a mistake and we can re-run my card. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattingly Posted June 16, 2012 Author Report Share Posted June 16, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven No mistake. Enjoy your purchase. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted June 16, 2012 Report Share Posted June 16, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven ... I want money to spend ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nolgroth Posted July 20, 2012 Report Share Posted July 20, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven Anybody review the Hero version yet? I'm somewhat interested in buying, but have heard some negative comments about it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NuSoardGraphite Posted July 28, 2012 Report Share Posted July 28, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven Indeed. I'm interested in anything that could add more meat to my own Space Opera campaign setting (which is a conglomeration of about 5 or 6 different sci-fi RPG's all rolled into one) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stacie.Winters Posted August 13, 2012 Report Share Posted August 13, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven ... I want money to spend ... Me too... I feel so left out of the fun. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zen Archer Posted August 13, 2012 Report Share Posted August 13, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven It's been on my list to check out for a while now, but with new glasses and Dragon*Con coming up, it'll have to be on the back-burner for a little while longer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lawnmower Boy Posted August 15, 2012 Report Share Posted August 15, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven As near-future, nearby space opera, Fires of Heaven just didn't work as well for me as Terracide. There you go, that's my opinion, and where the heck is my cheque, Grady? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xavier Onassiss Posted August 20, 2012 Report Share Posted August 20, 2012 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven As near-future' date=' nearby space opera, [i']Fires of Heaven [/i]just didn't work as well for me as Terracide. There you go, that's my opinion, and where the heck is my cheque, Grady? That's all sorts of flattering, LB. I'm really glad you liked Terracide. To be fair, based on my reading of Fires of Heaven, it was written with very different goals in mind than Terracide. FoH appears to be a strongly "traditional" SF RPG, with all of the classic elements you'd expect: alien races playable as PCs, psionics, artificial gravity, a strong interstellar government, and so on. In short, FoH embraces most of the tropes which Terracide deliberately rejects, and treats them very thoroughly. Judging by all the other new SF RPGs I saw at GenCon this year (about a metric exaton) the traditional approach is still very popular. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Theros Posted November 3, 2013 Report Share Posted November 3, 2013 Is this book done so that there are no necessary need for Star Hero book and only by buying this one will allow me to GM? (I have basic books from Hero System) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mkultra Posted May 2, 2014 Report Share Posted May 2, 2014 Is the PDF available for purchase? If I purchase the print version from Blackwyrm is the PDF bundled with it. Sorry for the necro, I've been away from Hero for quite some time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted May 2, 2014 Report Share Posted May 2, 2014 I just checked and there is a Book & PDF combo available in the Hero store for $24.95. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mkultra Posted May 3, 2014 Report Share Posted May 3, 2014 Thanks. Now I feel stupid. I looked there and didn't see it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vondy Posted May 4, 2014 Report Share Posted May 4, 2014 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven As near-future, nearby space opera, Fires of Heaven just didn't work as well for me as Terracide. There you go, that's my opinion, and where the heck is my cheque, Grady? If one were to read this in reverse: if you like near-future, nearby space opera then Fires of Heaven might be for you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vondy Posted May 4, 2014 Report Share Posted May 4, 2014 Re: Star Hero Setting: The Fires of Heaven FoH appears to be a strongly "traditional" SF RPG, with all of the classic elements you'd expect: alien races playable as PCs, psionics, artificial gravity, a strong interstellar government, and so on. In short, FoH embraces most of the tropes which Terracide deliberately rejects, and treats them very thoroughly. Judging by all the other new SF RPGs I saw at GenCon this year (about a metric exaton) the traditional approach is still very popular. Here's my question: what does "traditional" mean? Are we talking vintage pulp scifi ala Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon, and Lost in Space? Or the 1960's and 1970's style science fiction ala Star Trek and Star Wars? There are some real differences of nuance between the two. Or, are we talking about space opera vs. harder styles of science fiction? Of late, I've been missing the vintage style science fiction. I think its what Trek started out as, but quickly lost sight of. I'm trying to figure out whether FoH fits what I'm actually looking for. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xavier Onassiss Posted May 5, 2014 Report Share Posted May 5, 2014 I may not have been clear on that; when I said "traditional" I was referring to SF RPG's rather than SF as a whole. Take a look at original SF RPGs (as opposed to those based on licensed properties) and you'll see a lot of the same tropes coming up repeatedly, and receiving similar treatment. Most of them seem to owe a lot to classic Traveller, Star Frontiers, or both. Traveller, in particular, is such a large, well developed iconic setting that it's hard to create an original SF RPG without borrowing something from it. I know, because I bloody well tried not to, even deliberately avoiding doing things "the Traveller way" whenever possible. Forget about it... that stuff just creeps in everywhere. I've looked at a lot of original SF RPGs in the space opera sub-genre: Shatterzone, Diaspora, Thousand Suns, Stars Without Number, Bulldogs, and yes, Fires of Heaven, just to name a few. I saw Traveller's influence in most of them, and shades of Star Frontiers in some of them as well. When I said "traditional" that's what I meant. Most SF RPG designers seem to gravitate towards a common set of assumptions for space opera. They're kind of generic, IMHO. IIRC, the author of Fires of Heaven once described the setting as "Traveller meets Star Trek" so make of that what you will. At this point, I've enjoyed both for many years, had my fill, and moved onward.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vondy Posted May 5, 2014 Report Share Posted May 5, 2014 I may not have been clear on that; when I said "traditional" I was referring to SF RPG',,, classic Traveller, Star Frontiers, or both. Got it. Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lawnmower Boy Posted May 5, 2014 Report Share Posted May 5, 2014 The problem with Fires of Heaven is pretty typical of SF roleplaying. You have a big setting, lots of adventure hooks (Hey! Here's Orphan of the Galaxy, wouldn't that be cool?) and no clear adventure path for the players to track. So you end up with a bunch of mercenaries sitting in a bar waiting to be sent to shoot somebody, only they hijack the spaceship and go to the frontier planet and have a wilderness adventure that ends up being a dungeon crawl though the Lost Dread Space Cavern of the Ancient Elves until everybody loses interest because the rogue can't do a proper backstab with his his Very Big Gun and the GM is as happy as everyone else because it's getting tiring coming up with excuses as to why the Space Patrol doesn't come and arrest everybody. The alternative to this kind of setting tends to be equally directed. It's the Space Crusade and the DNA-Larceny Aelphs are loose in their space hulk! Go kill them, or the Dread Speaker of the House will kill you from a galaxy away with his Magico-Psionics! Terracide fixes that pretty neatly with a Space Apocalypse. Postapocalyptic roleplaing's main problem is that after three sessions immature players are finding turbolasers in abandoned USAF facilities, while mature ones are rolling dice to see if they can build a windmill. Space apocalypses are different, because you can make building a space-windmill into a pretty cool hard SF roleplaying adventure. Or so it seems to me. Ahem. Cheque, Grady? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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