Jump to content

Golden Age Champions Discussion Thread


Darren Watts

Recommended Posts

  • 2 weeks later...

Gang, online reviews are quite literally the life's blood of online sales. If you liked Golden Age and have any desire to see a Silver Age (let alone a Bronze, Iron or anything else), please please please go put up a review on one or more other sites. I'd love to write more for Hero, but unless we can build a larger audience for the next book I literally cannot afford to. dw

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A] Thank you, mrinku. I'll try to find the time to do one myself.

 

B] Please be careful of perpetuating a perception that Australia and New Zealand aren't covered in this book. They're mentioned as part of the discussion of the former British Empire, which comes before the section on Eastern Asia and the Pacific (which section clearly focuses on the Asian part of the Pacific); and Australia's contribution to the war effort is noted a number of times in the textual description of the war, and the timeline of events.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Lord Liaden said:

A] Thank you, mrinku. I'll try to find the time to do one myself.

 

B] Please be careful of perpetuating a perception that Australia and New Zealand aren't covered in this book. They're mentioned as part of the discussion of the former British Empire, which comes before the section on Eastern Asia and the Pacific (which section clearly focuses on the Asian part of the Pacific); and Australia's contribution to the war effort is noted a number of times in the textual description of the war, and the timeline of events.

 

Australia became the major base of operations in the South West Pacific Command under General Douglas MacArthur.  There was some concern that Australia might have been invaded, and if Japan had won the Battle of the Coral Sea it could have been.  (See Rising Sun Victorious "Samurai Down Under" for details).  Fortunately the Port Moresby Invasion Force turned back and Japan lost the opportunity.  However if Japanese Supers had been involved it might have made it possible, and a group of Australian and American superheroes might have to contend with a Japanese Invasion.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, Lord Liaden said:

A] Thank you, mrinku. I'll try to find the time to do one myself.

 

B] Please be careful of perpetuating a perception that Australia and New Zealand aren't covered in this book. They're mentioned as part of the discussion of the former British Empire, which comes before the section on Eastern Asia and the Pacific (which section clearly focuses on the Asian part of the Pacific); and Australia's contribution to the war effort is noted a number of times in the textual description of the war, and the timeline of events.

 

Oh, don't worry. I'll leave that to this thread ;)

 

As we discussed above, a while ago, my annoyance was mostly that there was room in that section to add a line or two. Canada and South Africa got mentions in their regional zones. The overall coverage of Australia and New Zealand in the book is quite fair.

 

Besides, here I can air my parochial gripes and know that Darren reads it! I can always hold out hope for a second printing or errata! :)

 

Hmm. Turns out I *can't* add a real review at Drivethru RPG as I didn't purchase the product there. I've left a general comment review, though. Made sure to mention that it has a new cast compared to the previous editions, and has extensive campaign notes.

 

Soooo... why can't we add reviews on the HERO store?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Cassandra said:

 

Australia became the major base of operations in the South West Pacific Command under General Douglas MacArthur.  There was some concern that Australia might have been invaded, and if Japan had won the Battle of the Coral Sea it could have been.  (See Rising Sun Victorious "Samurai Down Under" for details).  Fortunately the Port Moresby Invasion Force turned back and Japan lost the opportunity. 

 

It's highly unlikely that the Japanese could have won the Battle of the Coral Sea in terms of their strategic goals. To achieve them, they would have had to engage land-based allied aircraft as well as the naval forces.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 29/10/2017 at 5:42 PM, DreadDomain said:

Hey guys, finally got my hardcopy of Golden Age Champions here down under. I gave it a first read and it is in my opinion a very enjoyable book. I am not a “reviewer” by any stretch of the imagination but here is how I would summarize my thoughts.

 

Cover

Personally, I have never been a fan of Storn’s arts but even if the colours are a bit too washed out for my taste, this piece came together quite well. For roleplaying books, I generally like covers depicting team action with a central villain and this one delivers exactly that. However, it looks like the piece wasn’t quite balanced for a wraparound cover. My main gripe is the gap right in the middle of the cover in between Bulletproof, Seahawk, the title and Doctor Twilight. The title couldn’t have been slightly bigger (the font is good but it looks a bit tame) or even better, Seahawk and the big Robot could have been moved to right a notch to at least bring Mara mostly on the front cover with the robot being knocked back over the spine to the back cover. In comparison, the back cover is very well balanced. I quite like to see “Darren Watt’s…” in the title. Nice touch.

 

Layout, Graphic and Arts

The book looks good. It has the same graphic design as HERO 6th (as opposed to Champions Complete or Strike Force) and I believe it suits the book very well. Aside from the section with the timeline and the equipment tables where it is sparse for good reasons, there are quite a few pieces of art throughout the book and although art is always subjective, I find most of it contributes to the Golden Age feel. To top it all, some of the art is surprisingly large, a bonus! I also greatly appreciate that most character sheets fit on a single page.

All in all, I find Golden Age Champions looks better than Strike Force (and I like Strike Force). Compared to GAC, I believe SF is blander, with sparse, mostly small piece of arts and generally poorer character sheet layouts. I am still disappointed the KS missed the full colour stretch goal. GAC would have been glorious in colour! If there is ever a full colour version of the book, through Drivethrurpg or otherwise, I will jump on it.

 

Writing, Editing and Proofing

The writing is colloquial, easy and fun to read. It is full of atmosphere and simply put, makes me want to play Golden Age Champions.  Chapter 1 and 2 set the scene nicely by introducing the real world Golden Age of comics and describing the themes and tropes. I appreciate that it doesn’t overdo it and we quickly jump into game elements. There is a nice selection of “before the war” and “during the war templates” but I would have liked to see the Heroic Archetypes developed to the level of what was done in the Champions Super-Hero Gallery. It would have made it easier for people to jump in with builds themed around the era. Also, it doesn’t seem to indicate a preferred starting point total for characters.

Chapter 3 describes the state of the world complete with a 56 pages timeline listing events unfolding between January 1938 to December 1949. A full 12 years of plot seeds! It follows with Chapter 4, Gears and Technology covering weapons and vehicles (real, unusual and weird). This section is low on fluff and high on game stat tables. Chapter 5 covers gm advice and campaigning in the Golden Age by breaking the era into smaller periods, each with slightly different outlook and focus. This chapter is only 20 or so pages but it is dense with campaign ideas. These 20 pages really make you want to play Golden Age Champions. It felt a bit weird to move from timeline (chapter 3) to game stat heavy gear (chapter 4) to then a higher-level campaigning kind of timeline (chapter 5). I have a feeling it would have flowed better to have the timeline after what is now chapter 5.  

Chapter 6 is all about new characters which are diverse and have interesting backstories. The “after the war” blurb is a very nice touch but it seems a lot of them end up dying of cancer (is there an in-story rational to it?). All in all, this is an excellent chapter that introduces cool characters, complete with nice, large pictures (ok, some are very average but they are mostly good) and backstories packed with plot seeds. The write-ups are good and focused, not too simple but not too complex (or convoluted) like we might see sometimes in some HERO supplements. They all seem to bring something to the Golden Age canvas.

If there is something I really appreciated, is that Darren doesn’t shy away from making a stance from time to time. When he describes the Retro versus Period modes of play, he tells us what mode he believes we should choose and why. He does similarly throughout the book around different topics. Too often have we seen in HERO supplements the author laying out options in front of us without making an authorial decision, as if staying at the “toolkit” level was required.  

Generally, proofreading is a bit weaker in GAC that it is in usual HERO books. Not that I took note of any of them but I believe there more typos, formatting error and such then what I am used to. Thankfully, not to the point where it took away from the pleasure of reading the book. GAC loses some brownie points because it lacks an index (disappointing since 6E has one of the best index for a RPG).

 

Summary

It is always easy to point out what could have been done better, what could have been included and in what order or count the number of typos in a book. I have highlighted a few things I would have liked for Golden Age Champions but in the end, suffice to say that the book is easy and fun to read. The writing, supported by the layout and the art, brings the golden age atmosphere to life in a way that makes us want to jump in. The book offers a ton of plot seeds and colourful characters to populate many stories and campaigns.  Simply put, it jumpstarts the imagination and makes me want to play Golden Age Champions.

 

Onwards to the Silver Age!

 

23 hours ago, Darren Watts said:

Gang, online reviews are quite literally the life's blood of online sales. If you liked Golden Age and have any desire to see a Silver Age (let alone a Bronze, Iron or anything else), please please please go put up a review on one or more other sites. I'd love to write more for Hero, but unless we can build a larger audience for the next book I literally cannot afford to. dw

 

Darren,

 

Was my mini review posted here a month ago helpful in any way? The answer can be no, I won't be offended.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
On December 1, 2017 at 1:24 PM, assault said:

 

It's highly unlikely that the Japanese could have won the Battle of the Coral Sea in terms of their strategic goals. To achieve them, they would have had to engage land-based allied aircraft as well as the naval forces.

 

There were very few aircraft in Australia in the Summer of 1942.  And most of the military forces were in training.  Veteran Australian division and U.S. Army divisions were on their way, but it would be weeks to months before  they arrived.  Of course the Japanese Army would have had to be willing to commit 10 to 12 divisions, and Yamamoto would have been willing to commit part of his carrier force to the invasion, neither scenario likely.

 

Things might be different in a Superhero Universe.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Cassandra said:

 

There were very few aircraft in Australia in the Summer of 1942.  And most of the military forces were in training.  Veteran Australian division and U.S. Army divisions were on their way, but it would be weeks to months before  they arrived.  Of course the Japanese Army would have had to be willing to commit 10 to 12 divisions, and Yamamoto would have been willing to commit part of his carrier force to the invasion, neither scenario likely.

 

Things might be different in a Superhero Universe.

 

There weren't *enough* aircraft in Australia in the Autumn of 1942, but they were there, in sufficient quantities to be a threat to relatively small carrier borne forces. Their air and ground crews were well trained too.

 

The Militia divisions had been in training for a while, but aside from their air defence units are basically irrelevant to my point.

 

The 7th Division and bits of the 6th Division were back from the Middle East by the time of the battle. (Two brigades of the 6th Division were garrisoning Ceylon.) The 1st Armoured Division was in the middle of being equipped, but was well-trained. Again though, these units are basically irrelevant.

 

The US army units sent to Australia during this period were basically National Guard units - incompletely trained and equipped, and not yet combat ready. (That's "incompletely equipped" by US standards, of course). The Marines that would land on Guadalcanal in August were a different matter.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

53 minutes ago, assault said:

 

There weren't *enough* aircraft in Australia in the Autumn of 1942, but they were there, in sufficient quantities to be a threat to relatively small carrier borne forces. Their air and ground crews were well trained too.

 

The Militia divisions had been in training for a while, but aside from their air defence units are basically irrelevant to my point.

 

The 7th Division and bits of the 6th Division were back from the Middle East by the time of the battle. (Two brigades of the 6th Division were garrisoning Ceylon.) The 1st Armoured Division was in the middle of being equipped, but was well-trained. Again though, these units are basically irrelevant.

 

The US army units sent to Australia during this period were basically National Guard units - incompletely trained and equipped, and not yet combat ready. (That's "incompletely equipped" by US standards, of course). The Marines that would land on Guadalcanal in August were a different matter.

 

For what might have happened see Rising Sun Victorious by Peter Tsouras "The Samurai Down Under".

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

OK, genuinely my last try here. Golden Age Champions was a labor of love for me, and I'd have been delighted to do more like it, but without reviews and public support from fans post-Kickstarter sales simply won't happen, and without those the entire operation is pretty much non-viable. So if you have any interest at all in further Hero products like GAC, please go post a review somewhere you buy or get info about RPG products.  We're more than two months in and Dread's review above is still literally the only one on the Internet that I can find.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Darren Watts said:

OK, genuinely my last try here. Golden Age Champions was a labor of love for me, and I'd have been delighted to do more like it, but without reviews and public support from fans post-Kickstarter sales simply won't happen, and without those the entire operation is pretty much non-viable. So if you have any interest at all in further Hero products like GAC, please go post a review somewhere you buy or get info about RPG products.  We're more than two months in and Dread's review above is still literally the only one on the Internet that I can find.

Darren, apologies but I have only been around sporadically. I could start a thread on rpg.net with my review if it helps. I would ask that The Herodom jump in so I'm not just a lone voice in the dark.

I could also try to post a formal review on rpg.net although I have no clue how it works.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, DreadDomain said:

Darren, apologies but I have only been around sporadically. I could start a thread on rpg.net with my review if it helps. I would ask that The Herodom jump in so I'm not just a lone voice in the dark.

I could also try to post a formal review on rpg.net although I have no clue how it works.

 

They have a submission form on their web site for "formal" reviews.  It's pretty straightforward but can take a couple weeks before the review will appear on the site.  So, if you want a review to be seen quickly, a new thread is the best bet.  If you want to to remain easily found, submitting it as a true review is the best bet.

 

I haven't written one myself simply because I haven't had the free time.  Too busy actually running a GAC game in what little free time I have.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, mrinku said:

Darren, have you tried sending review copies to commercial sites like Rock, Paper, Shotgun?

We've sent them to a number of sites. I never heard of Rock Paper Shotgun before just now, and see no sign that they review non-electronic games at all? Are we talking about the same thing here? dw

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's not their core, but it comes up now and then. But they were high on the hits when I searched on "RPG reviews"; on reflection they're probably not a good one to send a review copy to, but maybe you could interest some of the gamer or geek journalists in writing a feature piece on Golden Age or Superhero games? Those sites are always looking for material and you'd just need one or two sympathetic writers. The more widespread coverage of the big sites might make up for such an article being a sideline.

 

Rpg.net would be the main PnP one, I guess.

 

Drivethru is my own go-to shopfront, but as I mentioned above they only let you post a review if you've bought the product off them. I put a discussion "review" on the product page comments, but since I bought it off Hero I couldn't post a review proper..

 

Also... it's not really my field but possibly you guys need to make the Hero Games shopfront more visible to searches. A simple search on "superhero RPG" gets no mention of Champions, though it is mentioned in the "best of" lists that appear. The Mutants & Masterminds website shows up, as does a kickstarter for Superhero 2044 (!!!).

 

Likewise, searching on "golden age superhero RPG" gives me no sign of any edition of Golden Age of Champions. You may benefit from a bit more discoverability.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/3/2018 at 1:53 AM, Darren Watts said:

OK, genuinely my last try here. Golden Age Champions was a labor of love for me, and I'd have been delighted to do more like it, but without reviews and public support from fans post-Kickstarter sales simply won't happen, and without those the entire operation is pretty much non-viable. So if you have any interest at all in further Hero products like GAC, please go post a review somewhere you buy or get info about RPG products.  We're more than two months in and Dread's review above is still literally the only one on the Internet that I can find.

 

Anyone know how long it takes rpg.net to post a submitted review? (Assuming an actual person curates the reviews, I'm sure the the holidays slow things down)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Unfortunately, your content contains terms that we do not allow. Please edit your content to remove the highlighted words below.
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...