HS 6e is mechanically the best version of the rules; dissenting views welcome

[Christopher R Taylor]

Transfer 3d6 Stun.

 

IN any case, even if I were to accept the false argument that Comeliness never actually did anything in the game, you still handle it by saying "this doesn't seem to do anything so its optional" not "I'm deleting this and I'm in charge so you can all suck it"

[Gnome BODY (important!)]

1 minute ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Transfer 3d6 Stun.

Defend your "giant paragraph" claim or relinquish it, sir. 

[dsatow]

Figured Characteristics vs. Non Figured Characteristics

I was originally in the figured characteristics camp until I used the non-figured characteristics for a few games and found it wasn't bad.  The best thing about it now, was the ability to aid OCV or DCV without affecting one's position in the tripsheet.  Another advantage I've found is that many times when instructing new players to the game, the question would come up "Why is my Dex/Str/Con so high?"  The answer would be, "Because its more efficient".  By uncoupling that, the Hulk doesn't need levels or a high Dex to get the great OCV, he just buys a great OCV.

 

Transfer

I do feel that transfer should have stayed in but maybe with a higher cost much in the same vein as why Regen was brought back; it's annoying to buy two powers and then have to laden them with limitations to link them when the original implementation worked and no one really complained.  Is it a deal breaker?  Not for me, but it is annoying and I understand why it was done, I just don't think it really needed to be done.

[Ninja-Bear]

Afasik you can still create a custom Power in 6th-so you could bring back Transfer and COM. Though I get it if you liked those as official.

 

Also I’ve found now that with the decoupled CV from Dex, you can set the range you want a lot better than before. 

[Lucius]

9 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

(why get rid of Comeliness, again?)

 

Because

STR

DEX

CON

INT

EGO

PRE

OCV
DCV

OMCV

DMCV

SPD

PD

ED

RED

END

BOD

STUN

 

Do you want to explain to a non-Hero player that Hero has seventeen characteristics and you think that's NOT ENOUGH?
It's my own opinion that Hero would benefit from FEWER characteristics, not more.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary goes and buys some Striking Appearance

[Christopher]

14 hours ago, Killer Shrike said:

Well if you think that I am a troll rather than a long standing supporter for the game and those who play it, and that I am trolling rather than asking people who don't like 6e to itemize the problems they have with the ruleset that cause them to express a general dislike for it at one end of the spectrum up to using terms like "detest" at that other end of the spectrum, then you misunderstand me.

I was honestly asuming you were using that by accident/innocence. You are not the first one on this forum to make this mistake. It is a honest mistake to make. But you are the first one not to change the title on being informed of it.

However I have to point out that this is far from the first time I saw a long term participant of a forum from turning to trolling all of a sudden. I have not yet figured out the how and why, but my experience tells me it is possible. One does not exclude the other.

 

"Convince me" and it's Synomyms are like most of the stuff Neo-Nazis say: You can not use that without putting yourself into that despised group and I was pointing out you were/are doing that to yourself.

Edited January 30, 2019 by Christopher

[Doc Democracy]

11 hours ago, assault said:

 

OK, at the risk of a derailing the thread, could you provide some details?

 

I will resist the temptation to derail the thread.  I have mentioned in other places things that I think would bring the system up to date and be more modern.  I am not sure what I would really pull for but there is no unifying mechanic for things in the system - the mechanic for skills is different from the system for skills resolution (even when the skill is actively opposed), the speed chart (one of my favourite aspects of the game) creaks a little and there might be some thought on how that might work in a modern system. 

 

Even D&D has upgraded and modernised how it goes about things (such as the use of advantage - taking the best of two rolls, etc) and I think it would behove HERO to recognise it probably did not get everything right in 1980 and have a good think about how the mechanics of the system might be brought up to date and deliver a system that better reflects the accumulated gaming knowledge of three decades.

Doc

[sentry0]

I was under the impression that COM was replaced by Striking Appearance.  This is a good move IMO because it replaced a CP sink with no official game effect with one that has an actual official mechanic associated with it.

[Ninja-Bear]

1 hour ago, Lucius said:

 

Because

STR

DEX

CON

INT

EGO

PRE

OCV
DCV

OMCV

DMCV

SPD

PD

ED

RED

END

BOD

STUN

 

Do you want to explain to a non-Hero player that Hero has seventeen characteristics and you think that's NOT ENOUGH?
It's my own opinion that Hero would benefit from FEWER characteristics, not more.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary goes and buys some Striking Appearance

I agree that we could use lesser characteristics however, it still doesn’t mean that COM can go too.

[Ninja-Bear]

Wasn’t another contention of COM was when it was negative? Because people usually bought down COM for ugliness then bought up PRE for fear based attacks. So in effect you got points for not really hindering you.

[Hugh Neilson]

9 hours ago, Gnome BODY (important!) said:

That's horribly verbose. 

"Drain STUN 3d6 + linked triggered (no time, immediate) Aid STUN 3d6 self only, both Unified Power, 30+36 AP, 24+13 real" is a third that length and conveys the same information. 

 

 

I think we all develop shorthand means of writing out powers and other abilities, but I agree with the book providing more, rather than less, detail so it is fully illustrative.

 

Part of the issue, though, is perception.  Consider this a Fantasy Hero spell.  Does that "wall of text" really compare unfavourably to a D&D spell (even if we tacked on whether it has range and how much END it costs)?  Several posters in the past have suggested a "Playing Sheet" which would not show all of the mechanics, just material for play.  There, we might simply see "Drain and Aid 3d6 STUN, Ranged, 7 END", or just "Transfer 3d6 STUN, Ranged, 7 END"

 

9 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Transfer 3d6 Stun.

 

IN any case, even if I were to accept the false argument that Comeliness never actually did anything in the game, you still handle it by saying "this doesn't seem to do anything so its optional" not "I'm deleting this and I'm in charge so you can all suck it"

 

An abbreviated version of an in-play sheet would work just fine.  The mechanics will still be looked up on occasion (likely the first time the GM says "but you have already enhanced your own STUN  by the maximum 18 CP of 9 STUN (defensive power, so it is halved), so your transfer is useless until some of it fades").

 

As to COM, why not also add BUFF?  It also does nothing, so you could also make it optional.

 

Given that one of the very valid complaints about Hero is that it is 2 giant tomes (like, say, a Player's Handbook and a DMs Guide) and therefore far too large to ever be salable (which is why games with a PHB and DMG don't sell very well, or so I assume), I disagree with your view that it would be a good idea to add optional rules that do nothing.  I would rather have seen a sidebar for those who want to retain figured characteristics, although here again I agree with the logic that, with the pricing fixed, we don't need figured characteristics.

 

[Hugh Neilson]

5 hours ago, dsatow said:

Figured Characteristics vs. Non Figured Characteristics

I was originally in the figured characteristics camp until I used the non-figured characteristics for a few games and found it wasn't bad.  The best thing about it now, was the ability to aid OCV or DCV without affecting one's position in the tripsheet.  Another advantage I've found is that many times when instructing new players to the game, the question would come up "Why is my Dex/Str/Con so high?"  The answer would be, "Because its more efficient".  By uncoupling that, the Hulk doesn't need levels or a high Dex to get the great OCV, he just buys a great OCV.

 

Transfer

I do feel that transfer should have stayed in but maybe with a higher cost much in the same vein as why Regen was brought back; it's annoying to buy two powers and then have to laden them with limitations to link them when the original implementation worked and no one really complained.  Is it a deal breaker?  Not for me, but it is annoying and I understand why it was done, I just don't think it really needed to be done.

 

The ability to enhance OCV and DCV are a major benefit, allowing constructs that were problematic in prior editions.  I will go out on a limb and say abilities that enhance accuracy or protect the target from being hit are considerably more common, across genres, than Transfers.  Transfer is still easily replicated, while "Enhance OCV" never was.  Another benefit of losing Figureds is that adjustment powers no longer have to drain/aid the cost of Figureds without actually altering those Figureds.

 

42 minutes ago, Ninja-Bear said:

Wasn’t another contention of COM was when it was negative? Because people usually bought down COM for ugliness then bought up PRE for fear based attacks. So in effect you got points for not really hindering you.

 

Another orphan mechanic, indeed - IIRC, you had to pay points to drop COM below 0 and start getting additions to fear-based use.  I suppose we could have renamed it "Appearance", and let you decide whether your 50 APP was Helen of Troy, or Hideous Beast.  But that's Striking Appearance.

 

If we never had COM, and Striking Appearance had developed as skill levels to interaction skills, or limited PRE from the outset, I will suggest that no one would have been clamouring to make that a characteristic.

[Sean Waters]

3 hours ago, Lucius said:

 

Because

STR

DEX

CON

INT

EGO

PRE

OCV
DCV

OMCV

DMCV

SPD

PD

ED

RED

END

BOD

STUN

 

Do you want to explain to a non-Hero player that Hero has seventeen characteristics and you think that's NOT ENOUGH?
It's my own opinion that Hero would benefit from FEWER characteristics, not more.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary goes and buys some Striking Appearance

 

I never thought that it did though, and I don't think that most new players did either.  It has the same six characteristics that D&D does (more or less) plus Comeliness, or it did.

 

Everything else was a figured characteristic, and did not really feel the same: it certainly did not feel a burden.  Most games have the equivalent of defences and initiative and hit points, they just don't call them characteristics, but they are there.  Hero set up its shop front and centre.

 

Anyway, we never used to include OCV/DCV/OMCV/ODCV - that is a 6e innovation, so if you want to argue that the system presents too many characteristics then they should be re-classified for a start.  You argue, sir, against your own position.

 

To argue against my own position, I did not feel that COM was ever necessary and there are certainly other ways you can represent it, but I simply liked it being there.

 

We also never used RED in our games, but we did have REC. ?

[Doc Democracy]

I'm up for re-classification.  I have broken things into four groups, the first impacts on the starting rolls for skills, the second is all about acting/reacting and how effective that might be, the third is about the condition of the character and the last is outside combat because those numbers are routinely advantaged in some way where other numbers are not.

 

Characteristics = STR, DEX, CON, INT, EGO and PRE

 

Combat numbers = OCV, DCV, OMCV, DMCV, SPD

 

Health indicators = STUN, BODY, END, REC

 

Defence numbers = PD, ED, PowD, Mental D, Flash D (all potentially advantaged with resistant, hardened etc).

 

You think breaking them up into groups like this would help in presentation terms?

[Sean Waters]

I think, on balance, my view is that, mechanically, Hero has not changed since it was first edition Champions.  It has a simple but effective mechanic that it has stuck to, despite a number of people pointing out that rolling high for good makes more sense.

 

What has changed is the way the powers are presented, and whether that is better or not is a matter of debate.  Certainly some of the powers are more logically presented but I have a problem with some of the maths (mainly how you go about calculation a modifier value - there seems to be some inconsistency and unfairness) and the detail.

 

By 'detail' I mean that, for example, Shapeshift is now a sensory power.  That sort of makes sense, I suppose, but it is confusing for new players and some old players too: actually building something that can change shape, as most people would understand the concept, is not straightforward.

 

Everything takes a lot longer to actually read, understand and build now.  1eChampions was a slim volume and you could still do (almost) everything that you can do with 6e, given a bit of imagination and a following wind.  I'm pretty sure there are bits of 6e I've never actually read.

 

If we are referring to 'build mechanics' therefore, well, it's Betamax vs VHS: Betamax may be technically better, but VHS is the one that actually gets used.  Got used.  Maybe I should have gone with DVD and BlueRay, but even that is showing my age.  How about Apple abandoning the Lightning Connector for USB C?  6e is definitely the best iteration in some respects, but not when it comes to excitement and fun, which is what the mechanics should be aimed at achieving.  The last time I really felt that was when I got my hands on 4th edition Champions, the Big Blue Book.

 

In summary, the actual game mechanics have never really changed - what we appear to be arguing about is the build mechanics.

 

The build mechanics have improved in some areas, not so much in others.  They have certainly become more complicated, which can be a barrier to entry.  I daresay if I went back to 4th edition now it would seem more limited, so in that way, 6e is better, but then I'm an addict and I'd get 7e if it came in 4x500page lever arch files.  I don't think all the changes have been for the better and I don't think all the things that could do with changing have been.  6e is (build) mechanically different.  I think I'll leave it there.

[sentry0]

3 minutes ago, Doc Democracy said:

I'm up for re-classification.  I have broken things into four groups, the first impacts on the starting rolls for skills, the second is all about acting/reacting and how effective that might be, the third is about the condition of the character and the last is outside combat because those numbers are routinely advantaged in some way where other numbers are not.

 

Characteristics = STR, DEX, CON, INT, EGO and PRE

 

Combat numbers = OCV, DCV, OMCV, DMCV, SPD

 

Health indicators = STUN, BODY, END, REC

 

Defence numbers = PD, ED, PowD, Mental D, Flash D (all potentially advantaged with resistant, hardened etc).

 

You think breaking them up into groups like this would help in presentation terms?

 

There are print templates in the download section that arrange characteriatics into groups much like the ones you have identified.

 

[Sean Waters]

2 minutes ago, Doc Democracy said:

I'm up for re-classification.  I have broken things into four groups, the first impacts on the starting rolls for skills, the second is all about acting/reacting and how effective that might be, the third is about the condition of the character and the last is outside combat because those numbers are routinely advantaged in some way where other numbers are not.

 

Characteristics = STR, DEX, CON, INT, EGO and PRE

 

Combat numbers = OCV, DCV, OMCV, DMCV, SPD

 

Health indicators = STUN, BODY, END, REC

 

Defence numbers = PD, ED, PowD, Mental D, Flash D (all potentially advantaged with resistant, hardened etc).

 

You think breaking them up into groups like this would help in presentation terms?

 

I think that is a very helpful approach: it looks less daunting and breaks learning characteristics and their interactions into chunks people could understand.  I mean, there is no right way to do this and no way that will be ideal for everyone, but I think improvements could be made.

[Doc Democracy]

15 minutes ago, Sean Waters said:

By 'detail' I mean that, for example, Shapeshift is now a sensory power.  That sort of makes sense, I suppose, but it is confusing for new players and some old players too: actually building something that can change shape, as most people would understand the concept, is not straightforward.

 

Interesting because I now find Shape Shift to be a pretty straightforward power, though I went through a lot of confusion before arriving at my enlightened state.

 

I really like the idea that, if bought cheaply people with different senses might 'see' the real you and that it provides for all kinds of stuff.  I can really get into the detail of that.  Whether detailing that detail means that it ends up being too expensive for what it is, is another matter completely....

 

I sometimes think that we have driven detail into the system and that has caused some inflation because differences often have to be reflected in point costs for us to believe it is 'real'.  For some powers, that makes them far more costly in points when compared to more straightforward powers.  I like to use the Blast Standard.  How useful is this power compared to an equivalent amount of points spent in Blast.  Obviously this is a relatively unsophisticated comparison but it is a beginning in thinking about costs.

[massey]

I jokingly answered earlier in the thread, but now I'll answer for real.  This is going to come across as kind of rude.  Sorry.  No offense meant to anybody here.

 

 

 

6th edition is inferior because it is designed by a committee, based upon a false promise, and a fundamental misunderstanding of the underlying system.  It's the product of endless tinkering without an achievable goal or a clear direction.  I'll try to flesh out what I mean by all that, but some of it is conceptual and may be rather hard to explain.

 

Everything up to 4th edition was led by the original designers, and there's a logic to how everything was costed.  Power X is about twice as good as Power Y, so it should cost twice as much.  There's a basic concept of balance built into it from the very beginning.  All the powers and characteristics are roughly scaled with one another.  It's not perfectly executed, but it's pretty close.  Moreover, there was a philosophy to how it was balanced.  They valued certain abilities more than others, and so those were costed higher.  These ideas were internally consistent with each other.  Combat abilities are more valuable than noncombat abilities.  Flexible powers are more valuable than those that are more limited.  Therefore these things cost more points.  If you built characters as they intended, and played the game as they intended, it had a wonderful balance.  4th edition Champions was almost perfect.  And again, it was true to its philosophy.

 

Now with a system as complex as Champions, you'll never get a perfect balance.  There are just too many moving bits and pieces, and a powergamer will find the most efficient builds possible, while a person who has never played before will waste points on things that may never come up.  That is unavoidable.  But later editions didn't understand that.  5th edition, 5th edition revised, 6th edition, Champions Complete, all of them have tried to tweak the system to achieve some perfect balance that just isn't possible.  And the biggest problem is, these changes didn't follow the original pricing structure of the system.  The changes were made by people with a different philosophy of how the system should work.  And those changes don't quite mesh with the underlying system.

 

As an example, let's go to 5th edition, written by Steve Long (somewhat prophetically named when you see the size of his manuscripts).  He had his own ideas about how the Hero System should work, and he modified it.  Adders became much more common.  The pricing structure for some powers was changed, but not for others.  And while some of these changes were arguably good, others were not so great.  It was clear that he was seeing the system in a different way from the original authors, but it was a modification of their system and not one built from the ground up with his own ideas.  Long's philosophy appeared to be based around trying to make everything fit around a certain core set of game mechanics.  Instant Change was removed as a Talent and modified to be a "My clothes only" Transform.  Shapeshift was turned into a sense-affecting power.  But one of the most glaring examples here is Damage Shield.  In 4th edition, Damage Shield was a +1/2 advantage you applied to a power.  If anybody touched you, or if you touched anybody, they were hit with that power.  When 5th edition hit, it suddenly required you to purchase the advantage Continuous (+1).  But, you didn't actually get the benefit that Continuous granted, which is that somebody hit with a Continuous power will be affected by it every single phase.  No, you had to pay a +1 advantage tax because now you've got to change your Energy Blast to a Constant power before you can apply Damage Shield.

 

Why is this a problem?  Because it's a different game philosophy stacked on top of the previous one.  While both follow the idea of "you get what you pay for", 4th edition was more focused on comparative effectiveness, whereas 5th added costs with the idea of making powers conform to a certain format.  A 10D6 Energy Blast with Damage Shield in 4th edition was 75 points.  That's the same as a 15D6 Energy Blast.  Quite expensive, but you got the benefit that you could hurt your enemy when it wasn't your phase, without an attack roll, depending on what they did.  Still might be too expensive though.  In 5th edition, you had to buy it Continuous first.  So now that power became 125 points, the same as a Twenty-five D6 Energy Blast.  No power-gamer in the world would choose a 10D6 Damage Shield over a 25D6 EB.  The two aren't remotely comparable.  There are other problems as well.  The cost of Major Transform had previously been based upon the cost of RKA, the logic being if you can kill them, you might as well be able to turn them into a frog.  5th ed wisely dropped having Cumulative be a +1/2 advantage (RKA is cumulative by default), but it added requirements that you had to pay more to affect different types of targets.  Instead of "turn target into frog" the standard Transform became "turn human into frog".  To affect any target, you had to buy another advantage. 

 

In this way, the cost structure of 5th edition became less consistent, more concerned with form than function.  Abuse wasn't eliminated at all, the nature of the abuse just changed.

 

I wasn't active on the boards during the time that they were soliciting suggestions for 6th edition.  I think I had an account here but I had wandered off.  But as I understand it there was a lot of discussion about what changes people wanted to see made.  And while I like most of you guys just fine, good lord do I disagree with a lot of you over how the game system should work.  I see questions on the Hero System Discussion page, and many of the suggestions are overly complex and extremely point inefficient.  But some people feel like they've got to dot those "i"s and cross those "t"s.  Again I wasn't involved in any of the discussions, but when I flip through the 6th edition book, I'm reminded of the adage "too many cooks spoil the broth".  6th compounds some of the mistakes of 5th edition and doesn't look back.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

Interesting because I now find Shape Shift to be a pretty straightforward power, though I went through a lot of confusion before arriving at my enlightened state.

 

Its kind of counter-intuitive in a way, because shape shift to have a different physical form goes against sight, not touch.  I get the logic (he LOOKS different!) but honestly sight should be for color and pattern, and touch should be for shape.

[massey]

Long story short, 6th edition is chasing the white whale.  Players have complained about small cost discrepancies with things like figured characteristics.  "Strength is too efficient!"  Yeah... kind of.  Buying your strength up is efficient, except unless you're a brick you're still paying for dice damage that you aren't going to use.  In a 12D6 game, buying a 30 strength isn't abusive, because a 6D6 punch isn't enough to get through anybody's defenses.

 

Buying up primary characteristics to boost figureds tends to result in a small point savings, relative to the overall cost of the character.  A 350 point hero with high primaries may end up saving 20 to 30 points versus a character with lower primaries who bought up his figured characteristics.  This is a real discrepancy, but it's less than 10% of the character's cost.  6th edition separated primaries from figureds, but then they were faced with the idea that maybe figureds were overcosted to begin with.  So Stun and End became a lot cheaper.  But then the cost structure of Endurance Reserve was all screwed up, because you could just buy regular End for really cheap.  The limitation Increased Endurance became an easy way to save points, because the price on that didn't change, but End itself is way cheaper.  Which means that the value of the Charges limitation is all screwed up now.

 

You can't change one fundamental aspect of the system without affecting the others.  And that's what they did in 6th.  Recovery became 1/2 cost, Endurance became less than 1/2 cost.  That means I can pump both those stats up higher than a 5th ed character, and take x2 End cost on all my powers for a -1/2 (or x3 for a -1) for significant savings.  You went from somebody saving 20 to 30 points (between 5-8% of total character cost)  by buying up their primaries to saving between a third and half on their primary power set.  6th edition is rife with problems like that.

[dsatow]

Just a side note

 

Before 4th edition came out, I got to see 'test copies' in 86.  The test copies went to a lot of people and their feedback was used in the development of the game.  However, the final say in what the change should be is by the author or authors as 4th was written by three authors (George MacDonald, Steve Peterson, and Rob Bell).  5th and 6th had more of a single author in Steve Long.  By 5th/6th forums were more popular and Steve Long was on the forums, but it is incorrect to say that 4th didn't have input from a lot of people.

 

 

[TranquiloUno]

16 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

A skilled combatant who is not an olympic gymnast.  An olympic gymnast who is not a skilled combatant. 

 

A high OCV character with low DCV. 

 

High, rapidly recovering STUN and END as a viable option to higher defenses and reduced END.

 

 

 

 

So...first: Thanks for the examples.

 

Second: I'll take issue with them but...I mean...it's all pretty minor. The main thing being: I think you can totes emulate all of those in 4th if you wanted.

 

You buy combat levels to create a skilled (*skill* levels, in *combat*, even) combatant who doesn't have insane Dex. Also campaign limits factor in.

So "skilled combatant who doesn't have maxed campaign Dex" = buy some combat SKILL levels and there you go.

 

High OCV v Low DCV...kinda the same as above? (Also...is this really a character concept?)

Buy more OCV (overall combat levels- only for OCV and\or Dex - only for OCV) and leave Dex and default DCV low.

 

Maybe it's a sniper\hunter. Maybe it's a dwarven berzerk who doesn't care about his own safety.

Easy to simulate. In 4th\5th.

 

Olympic Gymnast that isn't a skilled combatant?

Super easy again.

Either buy up Acrobatics to the "Olympic" level while leaving Dex reasonable, then do not buy any WF or combat levels.

Or if the actual concept is "my character is an Olympic gymnast that sucks at combat" then take a Disad "sucks at combat" and workout a CV penalty with your GM.

 

The last one...I..guess? I didn't know that was a thing! But can't you just take PD with the special effect ("My character rapidly recovers Stun")? To create a functionally similar effect in our special effect based system?

 

I'll totally grant you those are some things you can do by default in 6e that you'd have to do the Hero System way in 4th. But...is that really so troublesome?

 

 

[massey]

18 minutes ago, dsatow said:

By 5th/6th forums were more popular and Steve Long was on the forums, but it is incorrect to say that 4th didn't have input from a lot of people.

 

 

Then it's a good thing I didn't say that.  I said it was led by the same people who created the game originally.

[Duke Bushido]

5 hours ago, Ninja-Bear said:

Wasn’t another contention of COM was when it was negative? Because people usually bought down COM for ugliness then bought up PRE for fear based attacks. So in effect you got points for not really hindering you.

Dude, take it from me:  in a world where comeliness matters (like the one we live in), being ugly is one hell of a hindrance. 

 

When the doctor first told us it was going to be twin girls) couldn't sleep for two nights.   I cried all night, begging God on my soul that they not look like me. 

 

You don't have to be "striking," just a little prettier, to make a world of difference.  Same goes with ugly. You don't have to have much of it- doesn't even have to be memorable or scary-- for things to be far more unpleasant than they are for the bulk of the people you see every day.