What sort of books would you like see published for Hero System?

[mrinku]

Duck Champions  might be more of a homage to Darkwing, though

 

The whole anthropomorphic field is wide open... from Loony Tunes slapstick, fairly straight adventure such as you get in Carl Barks Ducks, and often deadly serious combat aka TMNT and Usagi Yojimbo (quick shout out for the upcoming crossover miniseries!).

 

I THINK I'm right in recalling that the 4e transdimensional sourcebook (Champions in 3D) had a Looney Tunes dimension.

[IndianaJoe3]

Duck Champions  might be more of a homage to Darkwing, though

 

"I am the terror that flaps in the night! I am the PRE Attack that does Knockback! I am Darkwing Duck!"

[Joe Walsh]

The whole anthropomorphic field is wide open... from Loony Tunes slapstick, fairly straight adventure such as you get in Carl Barks Ducks, and often deadly serious combat aka TMNT and Usagi Yojimbo (quick shout out for the upcoming crossover miniseries!).

 

I THINK I'm right in recalling that the 4e transdimensional sourcebook (Champions in 3D) had a Looney Tunes dimension.

 

It's just a one-pager without much detail, but yeah, it's in there!

[massey]

My dream products for Champions would include:

 

-Champions Complete-style slim version of the rules with basic setting and characters.  Similar to the 4th ed Big Blue Book, something you could buy and play all by itself.

 

-Champions World Book, a quick overview of hero teams, villains, fake countries, evil organizations, and a timeline.  Include a lot of quick-start character writeups (not a Steve Long-style 4 page character sheet, just something that can fit on half a page) of most of the characters.  Pattern the world off of a mix of Marvel and DC to appeal to the most people.  Give people a solid idea of what is out there

 

-Bronze Age Champions, the GM's Guide,  Information on how to run a superhero game.  What to do, what not to do.  Why your custom villains, Sergeant Rape-Kill and Captain Iron Age are not appropriate for a standard 4 color superhero game.  When to cheat.  Common comic book tropes.  How to adjust a classic genre to the expectations of modern players.  Expanded use of the power skill, and when to allow players to do things that aren't on their character sheets.  Running combats smoothly and telling a dynamic story.  As well as default methods of modeling certain special effects, and other "house rules" to use in a standard Champions game.  When people ask "how do I make XYZ?" it's right here in the book.  "What does it mean when I have a mutant power?"  Page 87.

 

-Villain books.  From disposable goons, DNPCs who have radiation accidents, former heroes who turn bad, to scheming mad scientists, you can always use more villains.

 

-Campaign City books.  From Seacoast City to Southtown.  Metro City to Portsmouth.  Empire City to Lakeshore.  City books can be smaller, but a 100 page sourcebook for each one with details about why these places are important.  Give GMs and players a real feel for this setting as though they had read comics about it, or at least seen some cartoons set there.

 

-Adventure Packs.  Hero teams should be introduced with a starting set of half a dozen adventures.  Don't introduce heroes as just NPC groups, people's eyes glaze over when they see that.  "I'll never play as these characters, and I'll never fight these characters."  Instead, let hem play as the Justice Squad, with an adventure arc all ready to go.  As an example, an X-Men pack would have stats for 7 or 8 of the main characters, as well as a character sheet for Magneto and 3 or 4 of his evil mutants.  It would have a 3 game adventure where he's trying to do something and the heroes must stop him.  It would also have rules for the Sentinels, Bolivar Trask, and Henry Peter Gyrich, with a 3 adventure series with them.  And then it might have Arcade or Mojo with a 1 or 2 session adventure to fight them as well.  It should have enough stuff that a GM could buy one of these books and hand out characters to players and start running immediately.

 

It should all tie together as part of a cohesive whole.  Artwork, design choices, font and book formatting, everything should match.  The "build your own" of the basic Hero system would remain, but this would be a fully assembled world, ready to go.  Power levels would be fairly consistent across the board (you don't need 30D6 Dr Destroyer to even exist when the proposed heroes are all 12D6 characters), and unusual power constructions would not normally show up.  If "poison touch" is defined as Drain vs Stun on one character, then it should be the same on other characters as well.  No need for somebody else to have a No Range NND RKA that Does Body.  Keep it consistent.

 

From there, I'd branch out into other time periods (Golden Age, Silver Age) and other settings within the game world (Savage Land, Galactic Champions, Mystic World).

[mrinku]

+1 on the miniatures. Plastic multipart ones, please!

[Tasha]

So Tasha, you want to actually have a full game built upon the foundation of Hero, sans the part of Hero that is supposedly the big draw to the system? That is both bold and, coincidentally, sort of like the project I am working on. I admit that I never envisioned keeping the Power building rules out completely. I always figured a sort of mini-rules presentation, methods of pre-generating characters with a very D&D-esque Race/Class system (mechanically done for my project), and the support material to tweak interest in the system. After that, I thought about tutorials on how to do it yourself by starting simple and increasing complexity. The idea of expanding that idea to an entire product line and omitting the "here's how YOU do it" aspect did not occur to me. Interesting.

 

I really need to get some more information of Savage World's Plot Points. What book(s) would be a good place to start looking? 

Yes, I would like to see that. Because new gamers need something that gets them into the action now and simplifies character generation. They can always include the nitty gritty under the hood stuff for the people who DO want to customize further.

 

Plot Point Campaigns. I really love Necessary Evil. It's well put together and is pretty easy to convert to Hero. The Deadlands PP books are supposed to be good too.

 

PS sorry if I replied to this one before. I don't remember if I have and my original post keeps getting likes so...

[bluesguy]

PS my original post keeps getting likes so...

 

Because you are brilliant

[Chris Goodwin]

Because you are brilliant

 

Agreed.  Tasha, you are one of the great Hero minds.

[phoenix240]

If there was going to be some sort of "official" Hero Setting I'd think it should be either Supers or something else sort of "gonzo" that includes a variety of things (high tech, different kinds of magic, psionics, etc) to highlight the flexibility of the rules and how buying a stack of books for such a setting isn't required. I don't think it should be totally 'black box' the the mechanics and construction hidden so Hero System comes across as just another House System like Palladium or d20. The idea  that the purchaser can customize, expand and even make their own material without getting on supplement treadmill. 

 

When I've sold the system to people that has been  a major part of the draw, even with the younger gamers. It doesn't have to be in the forefront but making it a part of the product when a good idea, IMO. 

[Ninja-Bear]

Phoenix240 Rifts is now supported by Savage Worlds. But some sort of Gamma World could work or Thunder the Barbarian too-Magic and Super science!

[Ninja-Bear]

+1 on the miniatures. Plastic multipart ones, please!

You mean multipart as in glue together pieces? Well let's not go that far . I hate glueing pieces together. Plastic would be great too.

[Ninja-Bear]

Tasha I think that a really good beginners book would have in the back not only the "engine under the hood", but also an exlpaination of why builds were used and what Rules were and weren't used. Tell the reader why Lethal guns are still bought as Normal DC instead of killing attacks for example. As a beginning game, what optional rules are not used? Stuff like that.

[phoenix240]

Phoenix240 Rifts is now supported by Savage Worlds. But some sort of Gamma World could work or Thunder the Barbarian too-Magic and Super science!

 

I didn't meas Rifts specifically but a setting similar to it in how how includes such an extensive variety of things and abilities, "gonzo" for lack of a better term. 

[mrinku]

You mean multipart as in glue together pieces? Well let's not go that far . I hate glueing pieces together. Plastic would be great too.

 

The more parts the less I have to cut things up to do conversions

 

You could design them to be push together with pegs and holes. But having easily swappable heads, arms, torso and legs is a pretty important thing for individualised character models, especially for supers where every character is usually very unique.

 

(I'd even go as far as swappable hands. Doing a wrist peg that lets you rotate the hand vs the arm is pure gold as far as action poses go!)

 

Regarding a streamlined setting as an intro to HERO... a lot of what is being discussed strongly reminds me of the old 3e self-contained games. I'm most familiar with Justice Inc; package deals (templates), no power building (but Talents), heroic scale. Justice Inc itself may not be the best setting to use, though.

 

Danger International could be a good one, however, especially if you pitch it in terms of the action movie genre.

[Spence]

GURPS got in first with that a few years ago.

Didn't know that. I don't like GURPs to play but their supplements are usually pretty good.

[phoenix240]

Well, since my last post may have been misconstrued let me try to be clearer. If there is an official setting I'd think it should be designed to highlight Hero System innate flexibility and inclusiveness so cotain a variety of special effects, races, etc, similar to some of the more 'gonzo' setting like Rifts. 

 

 I don't think the construction elements should be totally hidden or even jettisoned. Pared down or references more as suggestion and example than part and parcel with play but not abandoned as, IME, that was an is, still a major draw to Hero System over House Systems. 

[mrinku]

GURPS has GURPS Lite, which gives you enough to make a character and run the game in 8 pages of free rules.

 

HERO could easily copy that - the current 2 page summary download is neat, but not enough to allow you to grab the sourcebook of your choice and start playing, as GURPS Lite often will (depending on setting. It works best with those that aren't Power heavy, but then that's GURPS in general).

 

You'd just need the basics for making a 75 point Heroic character, the core game mechanics and maneuvers, most of the skills, some of the talents, maybe aan example spell/power or two, short medieval and modern equipment lists and you'd pretty much be fine.

[Ninja-Bear]

Phoenix240 I get the gonzo setting idea. Rifts was the first thing that came to mind. Trying to think what other settings there are that could have the gonzo effect.

[Cantriped]

GURPS has GURPS Lite, which gives you enough to make a character and run the game in 8 pages of free rules.

 

HERO could easily copy that - the current 2 page summary download is neat, but not enough to allow you to grab the sourcebook of your choice and start playing, as GURPS Lite often will (depending on setting. It works best with those that aren't Power heavy, but then that's GURPS in general).

 

You'd just need the basics for making a 75 point Heroic character, the core game mechanics and maneuvers, most of the skills, some of the talents, maybe aan example spell/power or two, short medieval and modern equipment lists and you'd pretty much be fine.

 

I see that claim/desire posted frequently... but I don't think Hero Games actually can/should attempt to release a free-version of the rules.

 

It is almost impossible to cut any more from 6th edition than CC/FHC did and still have a functional ruleset (even for limited-use play).

Unlike other systems (such as Pathfinder) which can make money selling pregenerated content and optional rules for their core ruleset (because you cannot easily generate such content yourself); Hero Games cannot afford to give up the core ruleset because of its toolkit-like nature. The aforementioned systems can usually just choose to omit extra options that the system can function perfectly well without (like certain classes in the case of D&D 5th edition Basic); Hero has very few game elements that can be cut without significantly impairing the system's functionality. You might be able to save a few pages if you cut most of the Talents, and any/all genre advice/example game elements... but I don't believe that you can still have a functional version of Hero System without the Powers & Modifiers systems (you can't explain any of the equipment, or at least a quarter of the combat/environment rules without making reference to them) 

 

So the issue is: Once you've got a functional version of the core ruleset (such as CC, FHC, or 6e1&2), you don't actually need anything else to run pretty much any campaign you want, and it defeats the purpose of such a publication to include a less-than-functional version of the core ruleset (Since consumers will be likely to judge the entire system based on however much of it you initially present to them). For example, you don't actually need Champions​ to run your 'One-Punch Man Hero' campaign, Fantasy Hero​ to run your 'Lord of the Rings Hero' campaign, or Star Hero​ to run your 'Star-Trek Hero' campaign. A competent GM who is familiar with the source material and their primary rules reference can run any of said campaigns with just CC, FHC, or 6e1&2. Best case scenario they save you a little time and consolidate your research, worst-case they are essentially entirely unnecessary or even unhelpful (the former is more often the case when home-brewing a setting, the latter when adapting an existing setting to Hero).

 

The exception to my above comments would be that if Hero Games ever does finally close its doors for good. I hope the release some version of CC/FHC to the public domain first. It would be sad to see the system forgotten evermore because whomever holds the IP can't afford to do anything with it (or bought it only to keep others from using it).

[phoenix240]

I'd like to see how Hero System's mechanics could be massaged to handle some of the more stylized suggestions in this thread like One Punch Man where there is one character who is literally unbeatable (probably be more of an issue for GMing advice) or Invincible where the vague 'trope' of superhero gaming that all archetypes are viable is a little skewed and FISS types are dominant. 

[Jagged]

a homage to Duck Tales called

 

Duck Champions

I once made serious inroads into a Toon Champions game. The main villain was going to be Ducktor Doom!

[HeroicTaco]

On 6/15/2017 at 6:55 AM, Lord Liaden said:

Essentially what steriaca says above, but for my part I particularly want the rest of the official Champions Universe fleshed out with all the books that were planned. But by all means, bring out everything announced on all the past planned publication schedules.

 

Sorry to necro this thread but happened to bump into it. Recently managed to get my hands on quite a few Champions sourcebooks (notably Champions Universe, Beyond, the 3 Villains, Book of the Destroyer, Book of the Empress, Mystic World and a few more) and I've been loving them. Really cool setting (that I first bumped into in Champions Online). 

 

What books were planned for the setting? And where can one find the mentioned publication schedules?

[dsatow]

I was just looking up the wiki for The Expanse novels (if SyFy or Amazon/Netflix won't renew it, I might as well start over on the novels) and noted the following:

 

Quote

Ty Franck began developing the world of The Expanse as an idea for a massively multiplayer online role-playing game. After a number of years the idea shifted to become the setting for a tabletop game. Abraham, who had already written several books on his own at this point, noticed the depth of the setting that Franck had created and thought they should make a book series out of it, "People who write books don't do this much research".

 

I wonder if they would be willing to write it up for HERO.

[Cantriped]

On 5/8/2018 at 10:50 AM, HeroicTaco said:

 

Sorry to necro this thread but happened to bump into it. Recently managed to get my hands on quite a few Champions sourcebooks (notably Champions Universe, Beyond, the 3 Villains, Book of the Destroyer, Book of the Empress, Mystic World and a few more) and I've been loving them. Really cool setting (that I first bumped into in Champions Online). 

 

What books were planned for the setting? And where can one find the mentioned publication schedules?

I think the only supplement for the Champions Universe still slated for publication is the organizations book. But I could be wrong.

[Spence]

On 5/26/2018 at 6:36 AM, Cantriped said:

I think the only supplement for the Champions Universe still slated for publication is the organizations book. But I could be wrong.

 

Is that a real thing?  Or rumor? 

I'd really like to know.