7th Edition thoughts

[Hyper-Man]

The problem with writing books geared to GMs is that it cuts your available market down even more. Out of a group of four or five players there might be one or two GMs.

 

There also might be one or two more that have never GM'd before but would like to try if they could find more published info on HOW to GM.

[Christopher R Taylor]

I agree very much that more support material is a good idea; the more stuff that lets a GM and players just drop it in and play is definitely needed.  That said, players (such as me) are adding stuff to the catalog.

[zslane]

Most players, especially aspiring Hero System GMs, have little trouble establishing limits for things once they've seen them getting exploited. But few will feel comfortable changing/setting the costs of things. That is a hardcore, low-level architectural modification that few are legitimately in a position to employ without messing other things up in the process (I've played with my share of self-appointed "experts" who felt they knew better than Steve and George and freely changed costs to the detriment of the campaign). Making that a standard part of setting up a campaign and playing the game will put this system beyond the reach of even more RPGers.

[ghost-angel]

I would do this:

 

First:  STR at 2 per point.

 

Next:  Flip by 90 degrees the "axis" between HA/B and HKA/RKA.  There are now two attack Powers: Hand-to-hand Attack (HA) and Blast (B ).  They both cost 5 points per DC, and you define at the time whether your attack is Normal or Killing, the same as you define whether it's Physical or Energy.  (Bonus:  the abbreviation for Hand-to-hand Attack, Killing becomes HAK.)  The only difference between HAN and HAK is that the latter is Killing; the only difference between BN and BK is that the latter is Killing.  

 

The (again, optional) rules for adding damage:  The HA Power can't add more than your base STR damage in DC, whether it's Normal or Killing.  There becomes an additional "all other bonuses" category, between Skill Levels, Maneuvers, etc., that also can't add more than your base damage in DC.  

 

The character with 30 STR (40 points) and 2d6 HAK (30 points) would then have 4d6, having spent a total of 70 points.  If not using the optional rule, the guy with 10 STR and 3d6+1 HAK (50 points) would then have 4d6 as well, having spent a total of 50 points.  

 

Hugh and ghost-angel, I'm particularly interested in your input on this.

 

Locking the bonuses to "only adds base dmg based on str" may inadvertently create a situation where people buy STR just to get their "base" up to compete with Ranged Characters, who have no such restriction.

 

In a 12DC game the Ranged Character just spends 60 Points and has a Ranged Attack. The Hand To Hand Character will have to buy up STR to at least 20 if only to get to 12DCs with a combination of Martial Damage, Skill Levels, and Hand Attack Damage. Whether that makes sense for the concept or not.

 

What you're going to see is every non-brick hand-to-hand based Character immediately be forced to spend 20 Points in STR to get to a minimum of 12DCs after all factors are added in. For no conceptual reason at all.

[ghost-angel]

Does this mean I need to quit wasting money on champions products to get more fantasy products?

 

Yes.

 

Historically Champions products sell better than any other genre product of a similar nature. Chapions Villains books? outsells Fantasy Villain books. 5E gave us no less than 5 NPC books (Conquerors Killers And Crooks; Arcane Adversaries; Evil Unleashed; Villains Vandals And Vermin; Cops Crews And Cabals) dedicated to Just write-ups of characters. That doesn't even count Everyman (also nothing but NPCs);

 

Other genres only ever got One NPC book. Fantasy Hero gets a pass on the four "monster" books, which provided more in the way of creatures than NPCs, it barely counts.

 

champions got almost all the organization books, which really sucks. The Pulp line could have produced all kinds of books on secret societies. Fantasy likewise could have produced a ton of material. But Hero players consistently Don't Buy Those Books.

 

Steve frequently lamented that Pulp Hero did awesome, and the other Pulp books did just dismally, pathetic sales. It annoys me.

[Greywind]

And the monster books can actually, easily, be used in just about all genres.

[Ndreare]

I find even the champions villains books can be used in all genres.

I have used them to represent pantheons is some of our higher power games. The players have to play the political games with these evil overlords or evil gods.

When done this way the players never need know who or what the character ever was. After all how can a player know that Darseveroth the Lord of War is actually just a re-skin on Dr. Destroyer?

[Christopher R Taylor]

Part of the reason there were no more Fantasy books is that there weren't more fantasy books written.  Lots of champions books written.

[Greywind]

On the other side of that, if there was more demand for fantasy books, they would probably get written.

[mhd]

OT: Which kickstarter?

Storyscape, core ruleset to be designed by Robin D. Laws. I didn't even care all that much about the mapping part -- doesn't make sense unless there are multiple tables or a huge one and I'm not a big fan of detailed maps in any format. But the parametrized rule system sounded intriguing. Apparently the GM could adjust some parameters at the start of the campaign to adjust lethality, magic use etc.

And with mechanical help, having umpteen different parameters for some rolls really blends in the background. Although given Laws' predilections, the parameters themselves were probably just generic "-2 for distraction/windspeed/fog" instead of detailed simulationist stuff.

 

I think you could do something interesting pretty cheaply, maybe with a GM => tablet, player => phone setup (the latter preferably optional). Don't think the game industry has the money for that, though.

 

 

The problem with writing books geared to GMs is that it cuts your available market down even more. Out of a group of four or five players there might be one or two GMs.

Out of four to six players, we rarely had more than one rulebook for any system anyway. Even when there was a separate "player's handbook". Is that much different in other groups?

[Ndreare]

In our group I have always provided the books. Originally it was because we had a history of the GM providing the books. Then it was because I got an awesome job and could more easily afford to waste money.

But I have never seen or been in a group were the players purchased more than a single book.

[Christopher R Taylor]

On the other side of that, if there was more demand for fantasy books, they would probably get written.

 

Maybe.  It takes someone with the ideas, drive, and materials to write one.  People are focused on Champions and superhero stuff, which is perfectly fine but not so much on fantasy.  I think if FH had more support material and adventures, it would do considerably better.   In my opinion, Hero actually does Fantasy better than Superheroes.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Out of four to six players, we rarely had more than one rulebook for any system anyway. Even when there was a separate "player's handbook". Is that much different in other groups?

 

 

The last time I tried to teach people Fantasy Hero and ran a game with strangers, nobody bought anything, they just downloaded it all from Torrent.  And I ran the game at a game store to make it that much more likely people purchased books.

[ghost-angel]

Part of the reason there were no more Fantasy books is that there weren't more fantasy books written.  Lots of champions books written.

 

No - it's because no one BUYS them. I kept asking why we didn't see more Fantasy material, kept getting the answer "no one buys them."

 

Some of the worst selling Champions Products still sold better than most any other genre's book.

 

It has nothing to do with ideas or no one wanting to write them. It has everything to do with Hero Players primarily not buying anything that isn't directly related to Superheroes.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Well so far my stuff is selling pretty well  I'll keep putting it out.  I suspect the "nobody buys" is related to the "nothing out there to buy" in that without a ready supply of easy to use "drop in and play" materials, there's no point in buying a Fantasy Hero supplement.

[Ndreare]

I am glad your stuff is selling well. I would like to see more. And you are right, people want ready to use material.

[bigbywolfe]

Well so far my stuff is selling pretty well  I'll keep putting it out.  I suspect the "nobody buys" is related to the "nothing out there to buy" in that without a ready supply of easy to use "drop in and play" materials, there's no point in buying a Fantasy Hero supplement.

You suspect wrong. There was multiple fantasy settings for 5E Hero and even the best selling ones dd not do as well as the Champions stuff.  This is from the people who ran the company.  

 

I suspect your idea of stuff "selling pretty well" is no where near what is needed support a company let alone justify investing more in an area that did not sell as well last time.

[Christopher R Taylor]

You're right I'm not making millions off my work.  Its a start.  But I don't think you understand the point I was trying to make.  Oh well.

[Greywind]

It's selling well enough that you will continue. Congrats.

 

It isn't selling well enough to support you or a business.

[mhd]

The last time I tried to teach people Fantasy Hero and ran a game with strangers, nobody bought anything, they just downloaded it all from Torrent.  And I ran the game at a game store to make it that much more likely people purchased books.

I got that a lot in the D20 times. Although it came a bit with the territory, if your whole business model is about crunchy splatbooks, you're going to find that people will download stuff if they just need it for that one feat or class to finish their "build". Some HERO books have a similar issue, if I mostly use it for reference when creating stuff a PDF serves fine, too. Especially considering that reference hardcopys are usually quite expensive and heavy to lug around.

 

In my experience this was less the case with the books you're more likely to read from cover to cover (or at least large bits). So setting information or background splats fared better. Heck, everyone probably knows a White Wolf completist, whether it's about Vampire clanbooks or Exalted don't-even-wanna-know supplements.

 

This has two sides: If you're already in a bad position to publish (good) printed works, you're more likely to focus on reference stuff instead of expositionary material. Which is one reason why there are no more interesting GURPS products.

 

I'm not really an industry insider, but what seems to work is either stuff you need at the table (core rules, adventures), the aforementioned reading material (background exposition, setting guides, kickstarted coffee table books) or stuff that's more convenient to buy than wait for a download to appear (often rather tiny stuff, e.g. a few pages of M&M powers, a Dungeon World playbook, a class).

 

I still wonder whether we can't improve the presentation of reference material. Things like powers & monsters might benefit from a more database-y display than just PDFs or ePub, even if those are decently indexed and linked. Basically the electronic equivalent of ring binders, like AD&D 2E and HarnMaster tried to use them.

[Greywind]

I find it's usually a case of "why should I spend the money when I can download it for free?"

[Sean Waters]

1. Will there ever be a 7th edition of Hero System?

2. If there is, should the system move towards simplification and less complexity, or towards extending the modularity introduced in 6th?

3. Are there any glaring "legacy" mechanics from previous editions crying out for revamping and revision?

4. Should the product be less "generic" and more oriented towards specific settings?

5. Should there be more characteristics? Fewer? About the same number? What about rules for optional stats?

6. Should complications be revamped, or even removed/made optional? Should power limitations and complications be merged, at least in some instances?

7. Should costing be simplified? Should costing for advantages and limitations be made more granular(i.e., +/- 0.1)?

 

 

That's enough for now.

 

1. Yes.  'ever' is a long time.

2. Why can't it move toward both?  For that matter, can we just clarify something?  Hero IS a simple system, with a complicated character generation system.  You can make the character generation system a lot simpler, quite easily, and probably should, if you actually want the game to sell lots.  You can then publish the character generation system 'with gritty bits' as something people can buy if they want to.

3. Yes, yes there are.  Quite a few.  You can generally identify them by their proximity to the words "unless the GM rules otherwise" or "for the sake of balance".

4. Personally I used to quite like the genre books with a full set of rules in that still came in at only 250 pages.  I think the actual rules set could be hugely streamlined without causing any real problems and that is all you need to play a genre book - along with a character generation and advancement system appropriate to the genre.  Have the 'full' character generation system as a stand alone product (and that could also be substantially streamlined without losing crunchiness).

5. The characteristic count seems about right.  You could change it again, but, it covers most things reasonably well.  I think there is nothing wrong with some genre specific characteristics, like Mana or Faith or Sanity: it makes more sense than using the existing ones just because they are there, or shoehorning them into an unfamiliar niche.  On the other hand there is an excellent argument for removing quite a few characteristics, or bits of characteristics, and simply using skill levels instead.  Similarly is is questionable whether mental combat values should really be a part of the standard characteristic set.  What I'd do is zero all characteristics and let people have the points to build them back up with.  They can,of course, start with a pre-costed template.

6. Complications should be revamped substantially as there is no real balance there at present.  I don't think we should be merging complications and limitations, even slightly.  I think that limitations need looking at too, again because of balance issues.  'Only vs arrows' is a -1/2, is it?  Gosh. 1/3 of all ranged attacks are arrows.  Who knew?  I'm pretty sure that you can have a generic system for building both complications and limitations that should inform how it all works.

7. Costing is only an issue for character generation.  I know I keep harping on about that but it is important.  Increased granularity sounds good, but if you actually work out what it means, the actual benefit of it is marginal at best.  The best way to simplify the system is to remove fractions which terrify some people.  Give advantages and limitations a whole number value where +1/4 is now +1.  (Advantages +4) x base cost then divide by four.  OK, that isn't removing the fractions so much as moving them somewhere less obvious, but it just might work.  It LOOKS simpler.

 

Oh, and 'Hi'.  Are those new curtains?

[Mzimwi]

PLEASE - if you must have three categories for advantages, have an opposite for each category. The disadvantages are VERY limiting. I would strongly prefer that the categories be based on point cost of the power - perk, 1-5, talents, 6-20, powers, 21+ with the understanding that perks are for everyday people, talents are for heroes and powers are for superheroes and mythic powers. Of course, I'm new, so I'm still getting the hang of it.

[Greywind]

Disadvantages are only as limiting as the player wants them to be and as limiting as the GM makes them be.

[ghost-angel]

You're right I'm not making millions off my work.  Its a start.  But I don't think you understand the point I was trying to make.  Oh well.

 

It doesn't have to be "millions" but it does have to be enough to support a fully functioning business model.

 

I sell records as a side business. It does pretty well for what it is. It is not a business I can pay bills with. That makes it a bad record business. Makes it a great hobby business.

 

Fantasy Supplements did not sell enough to support the cost required to create them - that means they didn't sell well. I think some of the books never did end up turning a profit.

 

Almost every Non-Champions Product sold pretty badly from a "We need to sell these so that we can continue to pay people to write books and print books and keep the lights on" point of view.