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I'm new and a old hand at Justice Inc.


Pestigor

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I just had a few questions as I'm thinking about getting back into hero, and I loved Justice Inc. 

 

We use the 5e version of Pulp hero with 6e rules right? and we use the 5e to 6e conversion document?

 

I haven't bought any books yet but before I drop some cash on PDF's I would like to know wht I need to run Pulp Hero.

 

Thanks

 

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Welcome back.

 

You seem to have identified the basics for the rules. Other things I recommend:

  • Hero Designer (software): makes it so much easier to create characters
  • 6E Bestiary: Lots of animals and creatures, already built for 6E. You may not use them all for pulp, but that's OK. Depending on the tone of your game, you may be able to use more than just the obvious.
  • 5E Masterminds and Madmen: a villain book for Pulp Hero. The characters would need converting for 6E, but you already knew that
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I'm not sure how available the original 6th edition corebooks (Vol 1 Character Creation and Vol 2 Combat and Adventuring) still are, but the gist of the system is in both Champions Complete and Fantasy Hero Complete.

 

The Hero Designer software, useful for creating and keeping characters, works for both 5th and 6th edition.

 

A major change in the 6th edition was changing the pricing of Characteristics and eliminating Figured Characteristics (so buying extra CON for example no longer raises your END.) But a 5th edition character runs in 6th pretty much the same, it just might cost different for the same abilities.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

House of the Palindromedary

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I'm not sure how available the original 6th edition corebooks (Vol 1 Character Creation and Vol 2 Combat and Adventuring) still are, but the gist of the system is in both Champions Complete and Fantasy Hero Complete.

 

The 6E1/6E2 PDF bundle is available in the store for $30 (http://www.herogames.com/forums/store/product/69-hero-system-6th-edition-bundle-character-creationcombat-and-adventuring-pdf/). Physical books are more difficult to come by (primarily 6E1 in my experience).

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I had a blast writing it, and a blast just figuring stuff for it out. Things like, "How do you hide a lost city in a reasonable and not done to death way?" "How much space *is* there in a major opera house that no one really sees but the stagehands?" "What's a cool way to hide a villain's base in plain sight?" "Where do all those guys go to learn kung fu in the 30's?" and so on.

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It shows.

 

Frankly I'm tempted to use the two books (with an upgrade of the power level) as the basis for a superhero setting. The characters and places are just a bit stronger than those of the official CU. Of course theoretically the two are compatible - but for obvious reasons the Pulp material tends not to be acknowledged in the Champions material and vice versa. It can't be assumed that GMs will own both.

 

But I do. :celebrate

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I have to agree Kharis2000 -- if you hadn't mentioned Thrilling Places, I was going to -- definitely one of the better written sourcebooks for that kind of thing, and much more useful than most of the competitors.  Kudos on a brilliant bit of work!

 

(Edited to add:  And Mutants and Masterminds was excellent as well.  I was in two minds about whether to pop for it or not, given that a lot of times things like that are not very well done, but I'm glad I did.)

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(Edited to add:  And Mutants and Masterminds was excellent as well.  I was in two minds about whether to pop for it or not, given that a lot of times things like that are not very well done, but I'm glad I did.)

Did you mean, Masterminds and Madmen?

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Perils and Palindromedaries

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Steve and Rob's work definitely makes Pulp Hero a worthy successor to Allston's work on Justice Inc.

 

In my view, Pulp Hero occupies an interesting position within the Hero System product ecology. If we imagine a product like Dark Champions, but broader in scope, called Action Hero, then we would probably describe Pulp Hero as its inter-war/pre-atomic-age offshoot. Kind of like how Galactic Champions is the far-future, cosmic-level offshoot of Champions. It's not even really a genre so much as a block on a timeline and a spot on a power-level scale. You can be playing in the "pulp era", and at "pulp action" power levels, but be playing in any number of genres: horror, crimebusting, exploration, (early) scifi, etc.

 

And I think that is the one glaring weakness of most "pulp" game products out there. Pulp gaming books attempt to explain the entire literary era and present it as if it was a single gaming genre, even though they often go out of their way to describe all the distinct literary genres that fit within its purview. What we don't usually get is a focused pulp-era setting designed to give players a specific pulp-era adventure experience (pick a genre, please). White Wolf comes pretty close with Adventure! and its Aeon Society setting, and Pulp Hero dips its toes in those waters with its Empire Club. It's too bad neither of them spawned much in the way of follow-on material specific to these settings.

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That broad scope was, I feel, made necessary by the understanding that because pulp systems and settings tend to not be the big sellers in an overall product line, to maximize their appeal, they need to present as broad a front as possible. If the line had 'caught' and taken off, I had ideas for a version of the Empire Club based out of Hudson City (no relation) and more. 

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That broad scope was, I feel, made necessary by the understanding that because pulp systems and settings tend to not be the big sellers in an overall product line, to maximize their appeal, they need to present as broad a front as possible. If the line had 'caught' and taken off, I had ideas for a version of the Empire Club based out of Hudson City (no relation) and more. 

 

When I run Pulp Hero the Empire Club is always based out of Hudson City.   I have a modified version of the HC map with no interstates and more rail added to reflect the 1930's.  Works great.....

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That broad scope was, I feel, made necessary by the understanding that because pulp systems and settings tend to not be the big sellers in an overall product line, to maximize their appeal, they need to present as broad a front as possible. If the line had 'caught' and taken off, I had ideas for a version of the Empire Club based out of Hudson City (no relation) and more.

 

If by "pulp systems" you mean broadly scoped genre supplements attached to a generic system, then it should be no surprise to anyone that they aren't big sellers. Those types of books don't provide you with a game to play. They give you a history lesson, some period gear lists, and a smattering of adventure ideas. I don't think that is the kind of product that is ever likely to "catch on and take off." Don't get me wrong; I feel that the Pulp Hero books you and Steve produced are chock full of wonderfully written, high-quality material. It's just that very little of it constitutes what I would call a "Pulp RPG Game".

 

An example of how to do it right is Call of Cthulhu. It is a pulp-era horror RPG with a distinct tone, style, and setting. That is a pulp RPG. Genre books are not RPGs. They are just "idea books" which have limited sales potential no matter the genre, and no matter how brilliantly written.

 

If I were to create a pulp game product for the Hero System, I would choose a specific pulp-era genre (e.g., Doc Savage style world-spanning action/adventure), and take selected bits and pieces from my omnibus edition of Pulp Hero to build a focused setting around it. The goal wouldn't be to teach would-be GMs how to build their own pulp campaigns, but to give them one they can play with the moment they finish reading the core book. Inventive GMs will kit-bash their own ideas into the setting and "make it their own," but the idea is for the official product line to do most of the heavy lifting for them in terms of world-building and adventure seeding.

 

Is there a market for such a product? Maybe. I don't think Hero Games has ever really tried to find out. The Hero Games paradigm has rarely been setting-based, it has always been rules/ideas based, leaving all the setting creation to the players. In order to find out if an actual pulp-era RPG can succeed, one must produce one first...

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An example of how to do it right is Call of Cthulhu. It is a pulp-era horror RPG with a distinct tone, style, and setting. That is a pulp RPG. Genre books are not RPGs. They are just "idea books" which have limited sales potential no matter the genre, and no matter how brilliantly written.

 

<snip>

 

Is there a market for such a product? Maybe. I don't think Hero Games has ever really tried to find out. The Hero Games paradigm has rarely been setting-based, it has always been rules/ideas based, leaving all the setting creation to the players. In order to find out if an actual pulp-era RPG can succeed, one must produce one first...

I'll second the motion on Call of Cthulhu -- they "did it right," and as a result Chaosium has stayed in business, almost exclusively because of that line of products, despite some serious mismanagement and bad guesses along the way.  And their products are always outstanding.

 

And on that last comment, I don't think Hero Games is the only guilty party.  GURPS tried with Cliffhangers (good "idea book," but GURPS has always been sort of "meh" for me, and they never supported it with much else), and Chaosium recently released a BRP volume entitled Astounding Adventures which has the potential to be the start of something like that, but probably mistimed it pretty badly since we seem to be in the doldrums again with regard to pulp roleplaying and publishing.  They certainly haven't followed it up with anything else, and it wasn't a completely self-contained book like CoC was -- you need the BRP rules to really play.  Back in the day, Chaosium released the first edition of Call of Cthulhu, which was a complete game right out of the box, not requiring anything else in order to play, and then followed it in short order wtih Shadows of Yog Sothoth, which was clearly designed not only as a fun adventure, but also as a teaching mechanism for Keepers to use as they designed their own campaigns.  Sort of the same paradigm orginally followed by D&D in the early days.  And, as a result, we all had a clear and generally agreed upon concept of what "eldritch horror" was supposed to look like.  We've grown well out of that nowadays, I suppose, but I have to wonder if Chill or some of these other horror games would have done as well if there had never been a Call of Cthulhu to sort of break trail.

 

There was some kind of global adventure campaign that someone came up with, though I can't for the life of me recall what it was called now, but it was centred around a "club" of some kind that supported exploration (and, if very vague memory suffices now, had some kind of secret "war" going on as well), but it never quite struck the right note, I think.  Maybe that's the problem.  Since no one has yet actually published a self-contained pulp game, playable out fo the box, everyone is left sort of fumbling around for a concept they can hang their hat on.  I mean, I look at a lot of these adventures being published and somewhere inside I'm saying "this is pulp," and "this isn't," but if asked to express what I think pulp is, it's a lot harder -- those gray areas tend to really expand to the point where they derail me.

 

When I personally think of "pulp," I generally think of something like Indiana Jones, The Lost Temple of the Incas, or The Mummy, which is a fairly narrow definition of pulp.  Things like The Rocketeer, generally seem to push more towards the super hero genre (afterall, Batman doesn't actually have super-powers -- he's just a gadgeteer on steriods with some martial arts training, but he's definitely included in the "super hero" set now).  And that is part of the problem; there seems to be a lot of "mission creep" between "pulp" and "super heroes" which kind of "hurts" both game worlds for me (though what I mean by "hurts" is even more vague -- "detracts?"  "lessens focus?"  "makes the game concept less appealing?"  I'm just not sure).  On the other hand, maybe I'm just too narrow-minded in my interpretation.

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Doc Savage is basically a superhero. Doc Savage is classic pulp. I don't see a crossover conflict there.

 

After all, "Pulp" as we use it here refers to an era, not a genre. It encompasses many different genres including proto-supers like Doc Savage. Basically, pick a literary genre template from the pulp era, be it horror, lost-world adventuring, crimebusting, planetary romance, or what-have-you, and base a campaign around its style, tone, and plot structure. Voila! You have a pulp game.

 

The only reason golden age superheroics isn't usually lumped in with pulp is because it's the genre you get when you cross the WWII bridge from the pulp-era side. You could conceivably run a pulp-era costumed crimefighting game with characters exactly like Batman and his rogue's gallery and I feel it would feel appropriately pulpy. The fact that Batman survived the pulp era and transitioned successfully into the silver age of superheroes doesn't expunge his pulp origins. Similarly, I feel The Rocketeer is pulp through and through. He's a hero/protagonist in the same tradition as Indiana Jones. It's just that he has moxy and a rocket pack rather than education and a whip.

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Doc Savage is basically a superhero. Doc Savage is classic pulp. I don't see a crossover conflict there.

 

After all, "Pulp" as we use it here refers to an era, not a genre. It encompasses many different genres including proto-supers like Doc Savage. Basically, pick a literary genre template from the pulp era, be it horror, lost-world adventuring, crimebusting, planetary romance, or what-have-you, and base a campaign around its style, tone, and plot structure. Voila! You have a pulp game.

 

The only reason golden age superheroics isn't usually lumped in with pulp is because it's the genre you get when you cross the WWII bridge from the pulp-era side. You could conceivably run a pulp-era costumed crimefighting game with characters exactly like Batman and his rogue's gallery and I feel it would feel appropriately pulpy. The fact that Batman survived the pulp era and transitioned successfully into the silver age of superheroes doesn't expunge his pulp origins. Similarly, I feel The Rocketeer is pulp through and through. He's a hero/protagonist in the same tradition as Indiana Jones. It's just that he has moxy and a rocket pack rather than education and a whip.

 

Perfectly stated.  And also why I love Pulp games. 

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New Pulp Hero products

 

Pulp Hero World Travelers

 

Pulp Hero Crime Busters

 

Pulp Hero Weird Mysteries

 

Pulp Hero Horror Tales

 

Pulp Hero Other Worlds

 

Did I miss any?

 

Not really.  There was a significant block of series revolving around Ace pilots as well as Soldiers/Soldiers of Fortune and G-Men/Spies that could be looked at as their own thing or wrapped into one of the more general titles you listed.  

 

But, like many things like this, figuring exactly where to draw the line is a matter of preference and opinion.

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Pulp Hero probably shouldn't be a "brand" per se. Let's pick a genre, say, globe-spanning adventure, a catchy brand title like Relic Hunters, and fill it out as an Indiana Jones style campaign setting with lost civilizations, evil cults, competing Nazi artifact collectors, and so on. The goal would be to create and sell a specific setting, with all the usual support material (adventures, organization books, books full of gear and wild inventions, ancient artifacts and supernatural relics, etc.) building up a complete product line like Monster Hunter International.

 

Now, I'm not saying that Relic Hunters is the product line we all want. It's just a hypothetical example of the form of product I would like to see going forward.

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While I approve of anything that lets me see more Tia Carrere I have to object to Relic Hunters. True Indy is a perfect example of the glob trotting adventurer so is the Saint. Hence the reason I went with World Travelers. Zslane is correct about some of the things that should be included, but a genre book needs to be a little more open. So while there should be Nazi treasure hunters and cults, there should also be international crime syndicates, and spys. That way the heroes could be the Indiana Jones ripoff, The sailor bumming through the south china sea, and the reporter searching the globe for the hottest stories.

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