Discussion of Hero System's "Health" on rpg.net

[massey]

I completely disagree with Pathfinder and Hero System being very similar in complexity. I can the core Pathfinder to a gamer and by looking at the classes get a idea of what they want. Unless you have someone familiar or at least has Fantasy Hero available has to build everything from scratch. Easy enough for a veteran of course. Not so much a beginner. I'm not saying Pathfinder is rules light by any means. It's somewhat annoying that similar bonuses don't stack with each other. Nowhere near as much math imo then the Hero System. 

 

It's no so much not wanting to read material. It's the sheer amount of material. The size of 6E did no favor to gaining new bloodin the hobby. Already some were unwilling to read one large book with 5E. Two large books. Complexity and crunchiness for the sake of it was and never will be a selling point. Think about it someone offers you the Fate Core, Savage worlds Core and the 6E core. Being objective and new to the hobby would you really want to read two big books that look and read like school textbooks. Versus the smaller ones that look and read more like rpgs. It's up to Hero Games and other rpg companies to cater to what the fans want. Which so far leans more to rules light and less crucnhy. 

 

That's a matter of presentation though, not the rules themselves.  6Ed 1&2 were arguably a failure from a "bringing people into the game" kind of way.  But at its core it isn't really any more complex than 5th or 4th.  It's just presented badly.

 

Hero is not a hard system when you strip away all the excess.

 

Hero has Str, Dex, Con, Int, Ego, Pre.  Pathfinder has Str, Dex, Con, Int, Wis, Cha.

Hero has Body, Stun.  Pathfinder has Hit Points.

Hero has DCV, OCV.  Pathfinder has to hit bonus and armor class (with a lot of components to them).

Both have an extensive skill list.

Hero has Powers with Advantages and Limitations.  Pathfinder has an enormous list of pre-built special abilities.

 

Pathfinder has a lot of pre-generated stuff that takes a while to learn, and the "best" builds require combining a bunch of different templates together.  Some bonuses stack, some don't.  Meanwhile, Hero just has its big list of Powers, that are always the same.

 

Complexity-wise, I think Hero is a little simpler.  It's just front-loaded.  You see all the moving parts, because Hero hasn't been good about providing a good user interface.

[massey]

Personally, I like guns. I'm a casual gun bunny. He did get carried away, IMO. But, my criticism had almost nothing to do with his politics. Those are just an odd quirk. I couldn't finish it because I felt it was just badly written and overly purple. In other words, I found his prose and narrative style painful to read.

 

I only read the first one.  It really seemed to be "we're shooting our way through the Monster Manual".  I could almost feel the game stats behind the creatures.  The book was okay, but the series wasn't something I was interested in continuing.  I'm a fairly conservative person, so I'm used to reading books where the author's politics are way different than mine.  Unless they beat me over the head with it, I can ignore it.  But I'm not interested in reading anybody's anvil-on-the-head political stuff.  I could get a feeling where this guy was, politically, but I didn't think he was too heavy handed with it.  Again, it just read like a game book.

[massey]

I completely disagree with Pathfinder and Hero System being very similar in complexity. I can the core Pathfinder to a gamer and by looking at the classes get a idea of what they want. Unless you have someone familiar or at least has Fantasy Hero available has to build everything from scratch. Easy enough for a veteran of course. Not so much a beginner. I'm not saying Pathfinder is rules light by any means. It's somewhat annoying that similar bonuses don't stack with each other. Nowhere near as much math imo then the Hero System. 

 

It's no so much not wanting to read material. It's the sheer amount of material. The size of 6E did no favor to gaining new bloodin the hobby. Already some were unwilling to read one large book with 5E. Two large books. Complexity and crunchiness for the sake of it was and never will be a selling point. Think about it someone offers you the Fate Core, Savage worlds Core and the 6E core. Being objective and new to the hobby would you really want to read two big books that look and read like school textbooks. Versus the smaller ones that look and read more like rpgs. It's up to Hero Games and other rpg companies to cater to what the fans want. Which so far leans more to rules light and less crucnhy. 

 

I want to address this again.  The basics of Hero are pretty easy.  The game's problems have stemmed from a failure to convey those core concepts to new players.  I could teach a new player to play the game in 5 minutes.

 

--You start with a set amount of points.  The GM will tell you how many.  The more points you have, the more powerful you are.  Joe Average is right around zero points.  A TV cop from a drama series might be 50 points or so.  A TV cop from an action series might be 100.  An action movie star might be 150.  A low level superhero might be 250.  Go up from there.  Superman might be 1000 points.

--Here's a list of how much each thing costs.  You can spend your points on whatever you like.

--Build your character close to this "campaign averages" chart and you won't go too far wrong.  You won't find yourself missing anything important, or unable to affect the bad guy.  Stray from this and you might find out you forgot to buy any defenses, or something else important.

--Characteristics help define your physical body, how strong and fast you are.  Skills are things you know how to do, like programming a computer or picking a lock.  Talents are special tricks that only a handful of people can do, like being double jointed.  Perks are useful extras you can have, like being rich or being buddies with a Senator.  Powers are things normal people can never have, like flying or shooting death beams out of your eyes.

--Skills work by rolling 3 dice, adding them together, and rolling under a certain number.  See that "13-" on the sheet?  You're successful if the 3 dice add up to 13 or less.  The higher the number, the better your skill.

--Hitting people in combat works by rolling 3 dice, adding them together, and rolling under a certain number.  Think of it like a skill roll, but the difficulty is determined by how good a shot you are, and how nimble the other guy is.  Your base chance is 11-, or 50/50.  If your attack value (normally OCV) is higher than his defensive value (normally DCV), then the attack is easier.  If you're 2 higher, then it's 2 easier.  So from 11- to 13-.  If your attack value is lower than his defensive value, then the attack is harder.  If you're 2 lower, then it's 2 harder.  So from 11- to 9-.

--Damage is determined by rolling the damage dice, adding them all together, and then subtracting defense.  Remember that you only do damage if you hit.  So it's a 10D6 attack.  Roll all 10 dice.  Add them together.  What did you get?  40?  Good roll.  Now subtract the guy's defense.  It's a physical attack, so you use PD, for physical defense.  He has 22.  You did 40.  So he takes 18 Stun, because it's a normal attack and it does Stun damage.  Did you do more Stun than his Constitution?  No?  Then he's not seeing little birdies fly around his head.  If you did more than his Con, he'd lose his next action.  If he gets to zero Stun, he's unconscious.

--The Speed chart determines when you go.  You have a Speed 4, so you will act on segments 3, 6, 9, and 12.  When the gamemaster is doing a combat, he's going to call out what segment it is.  When he says "segment 3" (or 6, or 9, you get the idea) you raise your hand and tell him that it's your turn.  If multiple people go on that segment, you go in order of who has the highest Dexterity.  If your Dex is tied, it usually goes in order of who is paying the most attention and yells out their action first.

 

That's the basics of the game.  Now you're ready to play an intro scenario.  Different Powers will work a little differently, but it explains how they work under their entry.  There's no need for you to read them all unless you want to.  Since you don't have Duplication, or Faster Than Light Travel, there's no need to bother with them.  There's some other stuff, like normal attacks doing Body damage, people getting knocked back into things, and getting tired by spending Endurance.  But you don't need to worry about that right now.

 

Oh, Advantages and Limitations.  These are things that make basic Powers much better or much worse.  They're proportional, so they increase (or decrease) the cost of the Power as a percentage.  A +1/4 Advantage makes a Power a little better, so it's only a little more expensive.  A +1 Advantage basically doubles how good a Power is, so it doubles the cost.  Limitations restrict a Power from what it can normally do.  You can create almost any ability you can imagine by fiddling with Advantages and Limitations, but don't worry about that at the moment.  You can make a perfectly effective character without ever messing with them.

 

----

 

There.  That's my 5 minute explanation.  I kept it fast, and kept it simple.  Hand a guy a pre-generated character, and go to it.

[Christopher R Taylor]

I could teach a new player to play the game in 5 minutes.

 

 

I agree, the only barrier to Hero play is building a character where its easy to freeze up from having too many options.  but if you give people pre-built simplified characters and then help them build their own when they are interested, no problemo.  The actual game play is super easy and doesn't require any lookups for even a slightly experienced GM.

 

Its just selling that and focusing on that simplicity is going to take an effort and some marketing to get it to happen.  That, and pre-made settings so people can just hop right in.

[Ragitsu]

Not buying that.

 

Considering nothing is being sold, refusal of a nonexistent sales pitch seems odd. A viewpoint/opinion was offered forth: that is all.

 

When it comes to procedural shows, what used to be a few minutes spent getting to know a client/case in an organic fashion before delving into it (such as with MacGyver) is now narrowed down to a dozen seconds or so of dialogue plus a quick flashing of facts such as name, age, and occupation (such as with Burn Notice). I used these two shows because they're often compared with one another, but similar examples bound for other procedurals separated by tme (such as police procedurals) and films based around protagonists in similar fields.

 

--- --- ---

 

As for video games? A multitude of features have become more common or even standard/inherent which cater towards mindsets short on patience.

 

Regenerating health (no one has the time to locate health packs/med kits and play more cautiously).

Regenerating/infinite ammunition...especially with weaponry which is not energy based (why be selective with your shots when the game has got your back?).

More frequent checkpoints and auto-saving (who has the time to manually save and be penalized for failing to go about things in an intelligent fashion?).

No death at all. Your character merely "falls unconscious" and rises on their own (why feel as if death means anything?).

A built in GPS/inertial compass regardless of whether or not it makes sense in regards to the setting (the player has to be pointed to their destination at all times lest they get frustrated at actually attempting to navigate).

NPCs constantly telling you what to do (same deal as the omnipresent navigation system).

Difficulty which automatically shifts down (what are these "consequences" you speak of?).

Pay-to-win (why bother with grinding and working out strategies on how to beat a boss/puzzle when you can plunk down actual moolah for a victory?).

 

These features existed before, of course, but the presence of more than one of them at the same time is becoming especially apparent.

 

--- --- ---

 

More and more videos on Youtube regarding subjects of all sorts utilize hurried speech and choppy editing for transitions. Heaven forbid someone take a second or two to catch their breath on camera before transitioning to another sentence/string of sentences.

 

--- --- ---

 

We're in a society of increasing demand and convenience. We want it, and we wanted it five minutes ago.

 

That such an attitude could trickle over to pencil-and-paper gaming is not an unreasonable proposition.

 

(I could go into more examples of what i've observed, but I don't want to derail the thread further away from HERO and tabletop RPGs in general.)

[bigdamnhero]

I could teach a new player to play the game in 5 minutes.

It takes me 10 minutes, but I guess I'm just slow.   5 minutes to go over the character sheet: Characteristics, Movement, Skills, Skill & Char rolls (core game mechanic), basics of Powers, Complications, etc. The another 5 minutes to go over combat: Turn/Phases, here's your list of attacks, Attack Roll (same as Skill & Char Rolls), Normal Damage, Defenses, Killing Damage. At this point, I've got it down to a prepared speech.

[zslane]

However, he seems to really like guns in his writing.  It is almost jarring the level of detail firearms and things related to firearms get when compared to other story elements or subjects in his books.

It's a little ironic. With a simple substitution of a couple of words, you get the following analogous criticism:

 

"However, the game designer seems to really like combat in his game. It is almost jarring the level of detail combat and things related to combat get when compared to other character actions or activities in his game."

 

Of course, nobody in our hobby ever makes that complaint about RPGs, though it seems like a completely natural one to make. I guess it is acceptible to have this imbalance in our games; we just don't like it in our source literature?

[bigdamnhero]

Actually I do know a few RPGers who complain about the amount of attention typically given to combat. (They're LARPers/"story" gamers/drama queens majors.) But your point overall is fair. A large part of it I think is due to the fact that failure/success in character interaction or skill checks rarely results in character death, so players are more invested in "exactly how much damage did I take?" than they are in "Exactly how good did I stick the landing on my Acrobatics Roll?"

 

As for MHI, the problem (to me) wasn't that the characters in the book shot a lot of guns; it was that the author spent paragraphs - even entire pages IIRC - describing each and every one of them in loving detail, often in far greater detail than he used to describe the characters holding them. Seriously, it was bordering on "I'll be in my bunk." I own guns, I shoot guns, I like guns...but that level of gun porn was just creepy. To be fair, he toned that down a good bit in the 2nd book, tho the anti-gubment paranoia was still thick and heavy.

[Tasha]

I only read the first one.  It really seemed to be "we're shooting our way through the Monster Manual".  I could almost feel the game stats behind the creatures.  The book was okay, but the series wasn't something I was interested in continuing.  I'm a fairly conservative person, so I'm used to reading books where the author's politics are way different than mine.  Unless they beat me over the head with it, I can ignore it.  But I'm not interested in reading anybody's anvil-on-the-head political stuff.  I could get a feeling where this guy was, politically, but I didn't think he was too heavy handed with it.  Again, it just read like a game book.

 

His politics as presented in the book didn't bother me. During the MHI Hero System Kickstarter, I encountered his personal Blog. OMG was that a nasty place to visit. I buy and read books from many conservative authors, but the ones that have come out with hateful points of view I tend to abandon.

[Christopher R Taylor]

You know I try really hard to be patient with politics when they raise their ugly head but seriously?  Let it go people.  Focus.  Everything you take for granted about politics or think is so certain while your opponents are ogres.... half the country thinks the other way.  Lets just play a game and talk about it huh?  So we don't have to deal with this crap everywhere, every day, in every setting, on every topic 24 hours a day until we snap and go postal?  

 

Please?

[Zephrosyne]

It's a little ironic. With a simple substitution of a couple of words, you get the following analogous criticism:

 

"However, the game designer seems to really like combat in his game. It is almost jarring the level of detail combat and things related to combat get when compared to other character actions or activities in his game."

 

Of course, nobody in our hobby ever makes that complaint about RPGs, though it seems like a completely natural one to make. I guess it is acceptible to have this imbalance in our games; we just don't like it in our source literature?

Actually, I don't see your point.  I wasn't referring to the author's level of detail when it comes to combat.  I was referring to his level of detail with one very specific thing: firearms and things pertaining to firearms (e.g. scopes).  That is far more specific than "combat."  If you are going to make an "analogous" comparison, shouldn't you compare something similar in scale.  For example if in Dungeons and Dragons there was a tremendous amount of detail with swords and things pertaining to swords (e.g. scabbards) compared to everything else such as character actions (including combat) or other activities.  Your analogy would be more on point. 

[Vondy]

Actually I do know a few RPGers who complain about the amount of attention typically given to combat. (They're LARPers/"story" gamers/drama queens majors.) But your point overall is fair. A large part of it I think is due to the fact that failure/success in character interaction or skill checks rarely results in character death, so players are more invested in "exactly how much damage did I take?" than they are in "Exactly how good did I stick the landing on my Acrobatics Roll?"

 

As for MHI, the problem (to me) wasn't that the characters in the book shot a lot of guns; it was that the author spent paragraphs - even entire pages IIRC - describing each and every one of them in loving detail, often in far greater detail than he used to describe the characters holding them. Seriously, it was bordering on "I'll be in my bunk." I own guns, I shoot guns, I like guns...but that level of gun porn was just creepy. To be fair, he toned that down a good bit in the 2nd book, tho the anti-gubment paranoia was still thick and heavy.

It was an unseemly window into his personal fetish. Much like watching an episode of Sledge Hammer, but played straight with no worthy humor.

 

For me, I'm a very character and story driven GM who builds Pro From Dover combatants. This may be because my longest running group had drama majors who played war games in it. Even when we played a war game they were trash talking and solliloquy'ing their commander's inner monologues. So, we had caped telenovelas and crime dramas with big brawls mixed in. I tend to leverage background skills really heavily in my games. Most of my characters havr no fewer that 5-6 area, knowledge, and professional skills (each). And most of those are personality and flavor flourishes more intended to define the character than to ever be useful in play.

[Vondy]

You know I try really hard to be patient with politics when they raise their ugly head but seriously? Let it go people. Focus. Everything you take for granted about politics or think is so certain while your opponents are ogres.... half the country thinks the other way. Lets just play a game and talk about it huh? So we don't have to deal with this crap everywhere, every day, in every setting, on every topic 24 hours a day until we snap and go postal?

 

Please?

Almost everyone who referenced the MHI books has openly stated that the politics weren't what bothered them about the book. For me, they were shrug worthy. We're really talking about he fetishistic devotion to describing guns and ammo in great detail. Even resident gun bunnies find it off putting. Another example would be Laurel K Hamilton's page plus descriptions of every character in her books hawtness. And, she writes just as grossly purple prose as MHI guy. She held back for four books before jumping the shark, but jump it she did. I read books by author's whose politics I disagree with all the time... if they can write. The hammer and tongs most of us are going at him with is, quite simply, that his writing sucks.

[Vondy]

I agree, the only barrier to Hero play is building a character where its easy to freeze up from having too many options. but if you give people pre-built simplified characters and then help them build their own when they are interested, no problemo. The actual game play is super easy and doesn't require any lookups for even a slightly experienced GM.

 

Its just selling that and focusing on that simplicity is going to take an effort and some marketing to get it to happen. That, and pre-made settings so people can just hop right in.

Hero's core mechanics and concepts are simple. The books, however, read like a doctoral dissertation on how far you can push those basic elements. New players need Hero 101, a freshman's course, not the third year law student's bar preparation courses. I was able to ramp up quickly on 5e and 6e because I've been playing Hero for years. A new player? The books are a disquisition rather than a treastie.

[Ragitsu]

You know I try really hard to be patient with politics when they raise their ugly head but seriously?  Let it go people.  Focus.  Everything you take for granted about politics or think is so certain while your opponents are ogres.... half the country thinks the other way.  Lets just play a game and talk about it huh?  So we don't have to deal with this crap everywhere, every day, in every setting, on every topic 24 hours a day until we snap and go postal?  

 

Please?

 

Well said.

[bigdamnhero]

You know I try really hard to be patient with politics when they raise their ugly head but seriously?  Let it go people.  Focus.  Everything you take for granted about politics or think is so certain while your opponents are ogres.... half the country thinks the other way.  Lets just play a game and talk about it huh?  So we don't have to deal with this crap everywhere, every day, in every setting, on every topic 24 hours a day until we snap and go postal?  

 

Please?

Agreed to a point. But there's "politics" and then there's outright bigotry and straight-up hate-mongering. I got no problem with the former.

[Tasha]

Hero's core mechanics and concepts are simple. The books, however, read like a doctoral dissertation on how far you can push those basic elements. New players need Hero 101, a freshman's course, not the third year law student's bar preparation courses. I was able to ramp up quickly on 5e and 6e because I've been playing Hero for years. A new player? The books are a disquisition rather than a treastie.

 

Agreed with 6e. I love that I can look in those books and get a good ruling about nearly anything that anyone might choose to do in the system. Those books aren't good for the beginner. BTW that lifeless Textbook approach to things is one thing I don't like about Steve's Writing style. He can really suck the life out of anything and turn it into a textbook.

 

I am wondering what you thought of Champions Complete (and or Fantasy Hero Complete). I thought they both did a great job of drilling down into 6e to make a game that is learnable by a new player.

[Tasha]

Almost everyone who referenced the MHI books has openly stated that the politics weren't what bothered them about the book. For me, they were shrug worthy. We're really talking about he fetishistic devotion to describing guns and ammo in great detail. Even resident gun bunnies find it off putting. Another example would be Laurel K Hamilton's page plus descriptions of every character in her books hawtness. And, she writes just as grossly purple prose as MHI guy. She held back for four books before jumping the shark, but jump it she did. I read books by author's whose politics I disagree with all the time... if they can write. The hammer and tongs most of us are going at him with is, quite simply, that his writing sucks.

 

Hell the politics IN the books weren't what bothered me. I found the books to be fairly enjoyable, though a bit long on the gun porn. It was when I found his blog during the MHI Kickstarter that I found out that his politics were such that I couldn't support him. Also his involvement in the Hugo Award fiasco hasn't done much to improve my opinion of the man. I am a huge fan of Laurel K Hamilton (she also has conservative leanings), David Weber lost me due to his impenetrable later books. This stuff came up because we were talking about MHI upthread. 

[Zephrosyne]

Tasha, on 20 Mar 2016 - 05:56 AM, said:

Agreed with 6e. I love that I can look in those books and get a good ruling about nearly anything that anyone might choose to do in the system. Those books aren't good for the beginner. BTW that lifeless Textbook approach to things is one thing I don't like about Steve's Writing style. He can really suck the life out of anything and turn it into a textbook.

 

I am wondering what you thought of Champions Complete (and or Fantasy Hero Complete). I thought they both did a great job of drilling down into 6e to make a game that is learnable by a new player.

That's interesting, Tasha; I guess different strokes for different folks.  I actually like the "textbook" quality of Steve's writing.  I just never needed rules to be written in a manner that is entertaining.  If I want entertaining reading, I'll read a novel.  I more partial to the rules being clear (as far as how they are written), which I think Steve does very well.  Steve being the writer is a big decider, if not the biggest decider, in whether or not I purchase a Hero System product.

[Roter Baron]

The HERO System has never been more player-accessable and successful than with Champions 4th edition and especially the HERO System Rulesbook. Champions was basically nothing more than the rulesbook plus a superhero sourcebook plus one great introductory adventure plus some villains to get you started. The rulesbook had 218 pages, ALL the rules and was maybe alittle light on ordinary creatures.

But then you had the sourcebooks: Ninja Hero, Western Hero, Fantasy Hero, Horror Hero, Cyber Hero (okay, that sucked!) and the GREAT Dark Champions series - still the best in Iron Age Supers Gaming!

 

That was the version that my group played almost exclusively (except for a little Red Box D&D) in the 90s.

Then came 5th edition. Presentation was not up to standards of the industry and the stuff - Fantasy, Champions, Space - felt lackluster and a little "been there, don't that", with the exception of the long awaited Pulp Hero and maybe Dark Champions, though including Espionage in it did nothing to me. And Fnatasy Hero was really supported with interesting settings for the fisrt time (though we all still love Western Shores - a World Book on that is really missing!).

Illustrations in some of the books ranged from okay to WTF!, especially when compared with other companies.

 

6th Edition seems like only Champions (yes, there is Star Hero, Fantasy Hero and Monster Hunters) and - to be frank - the published adventures do nothing for me. The Enemy Books are TOP NOTCH and really at least at the same level as other products - I would say as good as DC Aaventures (M&M version). I think that is a major accomplishment for a superhero-game that is not based on any kind of comic-book world!

 

What I would like to see is more stuff like Monster Hunters: Settings that run on the HERO engine (and included that engine!), so that you can exploit one strength of the Hero System: One rules-engine for all settings.

The problem still is, and that is the reason why I believe that HERO can never comptete with other setting unrelated/ universal games, is that you have to really think and put a lot of effort into ypur character BEFORE you start the game. Sure, you could just explain the rules and hand out pre-fabs, but where is the sense in that if one of the strenghts of the system is supposed to be: Create whatever character YOU want?

 

My group really likes Savage Worlds. One of my hard-core Herophiles said the other day: "I'd really like to play HERO again, but this (SW) is really good. I can created my character like I want him to be and it doesn't take an hour to do so!"

and before you start with: "Hey, I can make a character in 15 min!" - Yes, we play since 1988. We can do that, too. But not a character that is original and LIKE I WANT HIM TO BE.

 

And frankly, I do not have the time to run HERO anymore. One of our last fights in FH against some orcs took the whole evening (4 players, some orcs). I like fighting ors. But not if that is all I do that evening. With Labyrinth Lord or SW we can clear a whole dungeon a night, with FH we call it a night after room 3!

 

My solution for HERO - none. Or make it way easier to handle (yes, less detail and different rules).

My solution for me and my group - no HERO. But I can't do M&M either. And SW is not very suitable for supers gaming. ICONS is ho-hum. Too bad for me and my group - no supers-roleplaying for a long while now.

[phoenix240]

The endless fight is one experience I haven't had from Hero barring coaching first time players. Barring that the longest Heroic Hero System fights I've had (involving about a dozen combatants all totaled) took an hour. That was a huge, complicated battle. Most take about 20-30 minutes about the same as any other game. And significantly less than Exalted 2nd a "simpler" system by some claims where a four on four battle took 3 and a half hours.  

 

Now I have a long Superheroic fight but it was meant to be huge. It involved three full teams of superhumans and squads of mookss that took place across a shopping mall the size of the Mall of America. In a comic it would have been the entire issue or more and was broken up with some role play side scenes. But it did take awhile to settle but was incredibly fun not a slog like the Exalted battle. 

[Christopher R Taylor]

I don't really understand why people love making characters quickly, since once its made all that's left is play.  To me, making the character is part of the fun, its like a game in its self.

 

But there are more than a few who do want to get it over with as fast as possible, so I'm working on making that easier for Fantasy Hero at least.

 

The thing about Savage Worlds is that it looks easy, but its also very limited and simple.  Its like Hero system 3rd edition; yeah its quick and easy but its also limited, and the GM has to just make up stuff to fit the empty gaps.  The system annoys me in that its so abstracted and imprecise, but some people  prefer that.  After all, D&D still has Armor Class and Hit Points.

[Roter Baron]

I dunno. maybe we think and rethink plans too much and too long ...

 

Problem with Champions fights generally was the lenghth but even more the misfurtune if someone got knocked out (epspecially -11 STUN) very early in the fight. 20 years ago we gamed on Saturdays starting at 2 or 3 pm and keeping at it till 1 am or so. Them it wasn't a huge thing to sit back and read a comic-book for half an hour or so.

But today it is Sundays from 3 or 4 pm to about 8 pm. Sitting around for one hour can really kill the evening.

 

Our main complains with SW is thst the damage system is highly erratic with its exploding dice. Even I as the gm cannot really say if a amage roll of - say 12 is inconvenient (hard hit, you're Shaken) or if you already down for one or two Wounds. And a Wound is HUGE in SW - nothing like a few BODY down becaus eit implies a minus on everything you do.

 

It gets even more complicated regarding the outcome becaus ethe players can use bennies to shrug the damage off by rolling their Vogor die hwich might mean that a terrifying-now-your-mush-damage of 30 might deal 6 Wounds - or none if you rae lucky. Likewise. two rolls of 12 might mean that you are dead.

 

Clear, a heroic character taking 12 unlucky Body to the head is also quite dead, but I as a GM know it. In SW, it is more an educated guess.

[zslane]

Agreed with 6e. I love that I can look in those books and get a good ruling about nearly anything that anyone might choose to do in the system.

I totally understand where you're coming from there. On the other hand, I honestly feel that one shouldn't ever feel the need to go looking through the books for a ruling on nearly anything. Ever. The core mechanics are so straight forward that the answer to just about any question flows naturally from them and one rarely needs a trip to the texts for a ruling. It is only because the 5e/6e books tried to have a definitive value/answer for everything that players have felt compelled to turn to them for every question they have. I think that is a profoundly misguided departure from what made the system so amazing (and so different from its contemporaries when it first arrived on the scene in 1981). In other words, I'm not inclined to soften the Written Like Textbooks criticism with praise for their reference book qualities. The Rules As Reference can be collected as a 16 page booklet for those who know what they're looking for and need one fast place to find it (barring searching a PDF, of course). The brand really doesn't need the core rulebooks trying to serve that purpose to the tune of 800 pages.

 

As for CC and FHC, I think the stripped down approach was much needed and a step in the right direction. However, I sort of feel those books took a step backwards in terms of the progress made with the structure of the product line when the 4th ed. made the formal split between rules books and genre supplements. CC and FHC merged them back together, which I feel is a mistake even though I understand the perceived marketplace pressures that drove things in that direction. I think the performance of brands like Savage Worlds demonstrates that separating core system rules from genre/setting material can still succeed handsomely in the marketplace.

[Vondy]

I don't really understand why people love making characters quickly, since once its made all that's left is play.  To me, making the character is part of the fun, its like a game in its self.

 

But there are more than a few who do want to get it over with as fast as possible, so I'm working on making that easier for Fantasy Hero at least.

 

The thing about Savage Worlds is that it looks easy, but its also very limited and simple.  Its like Hero system 3rd edition; yeah its quick and easy but its also limited, and the GM has to just make up stuff to fit the empty gaps.  The system annoys me in that its so abstracted and imprecise, but some people  prefer that.  After all, D&D still has Armor Class and Hit Points.

 

I love making characters. I don't care how long it takes insofar as it doesn't feel like work. However, I do want to be able to organize characters to single page in clear English. I do not want power descriptions to look like a paragraph-sized blocs of jargonized programming code. Or for a character to take up multiple pages. Almost all of my 4e characters fit on a single page. 5e approached as "options for 4e" can usually accomplish one page write ups, too. That is much harder to accomplish in 6e. And, there is more to creating characters than mechanics. I think about them more as people than a pile of stats.