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

[Killer Shrike]

1 hour ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Oh, and I don't see that Damage Negation was even needed or useful to the game, although it is an interesting concept, its both too cheap and too expensive at the same time (see Shrike's analysis of Reduced Negation for how it can be too expensive).

It was certainly not needed. It can sometimes be useful. This is counterbalanced by the downside that it can also sometimes be problematic. I certainly understand why some people opt to not use it. I've found that it has niche utility as a character design tool, subject to GM veto.

[megaplayboy]

When it comes to determining which edition has the best game mechanics, it's not between 6 different editions, it's really between 4: pre-4th edition Hero System, 4th edition, FRED, and 6th.  There are several core mechanics which are largely consistent between editions: combat hit resolution, skill resolution, most primary characteristics are retained, 5pts per DC/d6, use of Advantages and Limitations, effect-driven power building/design and the basic utility of Disads/Complications.

Pre-4th edition Hero is a messy hodgepodge of different mechanics(1st edition FH, e.g.), so I think it's automatically dead last in terms of mechanics.  5th edition is effectively a refinement of 4th and there aren't too many changes, so I think 5th slightly edges 4th in that regard.  It then comes down to a personal preference of whether one likes the mechanics changes from 5th to 6th, which were the most significant since the changes from 3rd to 4th edition.  I like that the stun lotto from killing attacks was toned down, because a lot of players were prone to abusing that mechanic.  The elimination of figured characteristics was a big change. It simplifies the math and allows a bit of diversity in character design.  I generally like the tweaks to advantages, limitations and power frameworks, and changing the way disads/complications work(in terms of taking a smaller amount of them and not straining to come up with plot complications for every PC you build, just to meet an arbitrary "budget" number).   

The main critique of the mechanics of both 5th and 6th would be that, overall, the dizzying plethora of tweaks and options makes the game dauntingly complicated for new players.  I think 6th basically takes the complexity as far as it can go and still be remotely playable.  If I was playing for the first time, I'd prefer 4th.  But as an experienced player/GM, I like 6th better, because I know my way around the system and I think it works more smoothly and consistently.  

[Sean Waters]

So...much...to...say...

 

Do we need COM?  No, we don't need COM.  I liked COM and I'd have preferred it to be left in as a sidebar, perhaps with other optional Characteristics, like Passion, Soul and Spirit (sort of Str/Con/Dex for magic).  Hero is all about options and building what you want.  I mean I almost always spent a few points on COM, even though it never really did anything in the games we played, just for colour.  I can do without it or build it with limited PRE, but it was a useful shorthand for 'good looking'.  Ah well.

 

Figured characteristics, pretty much the same.  I liked figured characteristics, but I can build characters without them easily enough, although that took a little getting used to.  It even makes sense that we do it the 6e way, for the reasons that Hugh and others have expounded.  I'm not sure they would have been easy to leave in as an option though because that would substantially change the point cost of characters.  OK if everyone is built that way, less so if only some want to do it.  I still remember my mind being blown by the character Ogre in 3rd edition who was Dex 18 (24 points), Spd 4 (12 points) and had 3 overall combat levels  (24 points) - yeah, I can remember that from decades ago, can I remember where I put my keys?  Anyway, that made him OCV/DCV 6 + 3 levels, which inevitably went into OCV.  If you binned the levels and increased his DEX to 30, you would be spending an extra 36 points (30-18)*3 but you got back the 24 points from the skill levels and didn't need to spend the 12 points on SPD, so that was 36 points saved.  Ogre was now DEX 30 and had OCV/DCV of 10!

 

So, yeah, I can see the sense in getting rid of figured characteristics.

 

I think some powers are probably better and some worse, from my point of view.  I’d be surprised if even the most ardent fan of 6e didn’t have some gripe, however minor.  In a way, I don’t think that 6e went far enough in breaking everything down and putting it back together more logically.  I’m not a fan, for example, of compound modifiers, like Focus, which means that your Magic Stick can be taken away from you but you get UBO, sorry UOO, for free.  There are other examples.  Many other examples.

 

I think that 6e probably is the best Hero has so far achieved, mechanically, but, at the same time, I don’t think that Hero is as good as it could be – and I’m not just talking tweaks.

 

Things like the way that grappling works, to the complete lack of a mechanic to address ignoring opponents in combat and acting as if they were not there.  I’m also not a fan of balance as a justification for a rule.  I’d rather we have a realistic rule (for a given value of ‘realistic) and a sidebar on how to mitigate the harsh.

 

I also don’t think that you can entirely divorce substance from style.  “Technically a great game!” is never going to sell, and I want Hero to sell, so lots of new content comes out.  I have a much longer list of gripes here, which I will not rehearse in full, but it starts with the constant repetition of the phrase ‘unless the GM decides otherwise’, or something similar, followed by the fact that Book 1 was Character Creation.  Can we say “Barrier to entry”?  I have suggestions.  I imagine you can imagine.

 

 

[TranquiloUno]

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

 

First off, Ben Grimm is not superhumanly fast, but would have been DEX 23 (at least) and SPD 4 or 5 (minimum) in Hero standards.  That inflation started early on.  Now, if every character dropped by 2 SPD and 12 DEX (4 OCV and DCV, they would be balanced against one another , and "typical Super" would be DEX 11, SPD 3.  That would work, but you'd lose utility of all prior writeups, so it will not happen.

 

In 6e, those examples you provide can be DEX 12 and spend tons of xp on OCV and DCV.  How is that markedly different?

 

So my rogue can buy +3 DEX for 9 points, and get that -1 OCV limitation for 5 points?  Maybe I should take +3 DEX, no Figured plus that Disad and get +1 DCV, better initiative and better DEX rolls for 1 point?  Of course, this also reflects the huge difference between a limitation or sellback and a disad/complication.  My rogue is still out the price of DEX (can't repurpose points to be better at something else), and did not get all the benefits of that DEX.

 

I find "he buys DEX and DCV, but not OCV" much more intuitive, and way better balanced.

 

Hmmm. Agree to disagree. Just because published materials had silly stat inflation doesn't mean I need to do that. Losing utility of prior writeups...doesn't really make one or another rules version mechanically superior nor is it something I honestly personally care about.

 

My point is: I don't think it IS markedly different. At all. I think the "actually playing the game" parts are functionally identical for my purposes.

 

"Neater and cleaner" however you have convinced me of.

 

I find, "What's your actual character concept and how can we effectively model that in the system so you get the results you want", to be fairly intuitive and balanced across all version of Hero I've actually played (4th and 5th) and I suspect that is still very much the case in 6th.

 

Like, in your example, you've chosen to deliberately play a character who is bad at certain things. So you've taken Disads and such to reflect that. So you can play your concept. Because, we assume, playing a Rogue who isn't (as) good at fighting is what you are wanting to play.

Maybe you get a point break, but..if we're playing standard fantasy stuff then you being a good rogue won't impact me being a good druid and neither of those will both the fighter. But so long as you get to play your concept, and the in-game effects of that concept match up to how you think it should work it's all good.

 

I think you're counterpoint may likely include: In prior editions with figured stats PCs that know what's up can cheese things around to make their characters more efficient than other characters and functionally be better in every way.

 

My counter point would be: I care less about theoretical build issues than I do playing the game. And I'm happy to have a GM give feedback on PCs being too good, too cheesy, too efficient or otherwise overshadow other players.

To me that happens, can happen, in all games, and the only real thing to stop it from happening is...a GM. Which most games have.

 

But, yes, you've sold me on neater and cleaner, for certain (what I consider) fringe case "concepts" like "guy who is average at Dex but good at fighting, but not as good at defending, but definitely isn't using skill for any of that".

 

So, again, thanks for those examples. Much clearer now.

 

 

[Sean Waters]

You could have created a character of a given concept in any edition of Champions or Hero, and they would have played similarly.  You can certainly game the rules, but then you always could and always will be able to: even actual reality is played better by some people than others.

 

The difference would be that in 1st edition Champions the character would have been mechanically woollier (to use a technical term), 6e more precisely defined.  You had to bend the rules or just make stuff up in Original Champions to get some of what you wanted, 6e has almost all of the bases covered, but they are both recognisably the same system, which is remarkable: almost every other game system that has run to several editions that I can think of has made major changes to the way it works over the years.

 

We should probably rejoice now.

[Christopher]

On 1/30/2019 at 11:12 PM, Sean Waters said:

Yeah, but you knew what I meant

No I am honestly not sure what you are talking about.

 

On 1/30/2019 at 11:12 PM, Sean Waters said:

That's the thing though: mechanically, building a character that can shapeshift is no longer a matter of deciding how many different shapes they can assume, it is deciding if they still look like their normal selves in infra red and sonar .

Except that is the same kind of question it always was. You get 1 Alternate Form. With it costing more to have more forms.

 

On 1/30/2019 at 11:12 PM, Sean Waters said:

 I mean, I can not think of a single example of a shapeshifter that looks like its normal self on sonar but can actually fit through a six inch hole because it is long and thin to the touch group.  That might allow you to do some interesting things but is very very unhelpful if you are trying to actually run a game with a shapeshifter whose player did not think of all that.

Passing through small holes in barriers is Desolidification or Shrinking.

You seem to be mixing up Shapeshifting the SFX and Shapeshift the Power.

 

On 1/30/2019 at 11:12 PM, Sean Waters said:

If you just want to look different to normal sight but like yourself to other senses, that's Self Only Images, to my mind.

And again you are mixing up the SFX and the Power.

That is just not a point to start a Hero Rules discussion. If you can not accept that simple seperation, there is no basis to even start a discussion.

 

On 1/30/2019 at 11:12 PM, Sean Waters said:

it is deciding if they still look like their normal selves in infra red and sonar .  If you just want to look different to normal sight but like yourself to other senses, that's Self Only Images, to my mind.  Or if you want to look like something different to long range radar, ditto.

What is it with those completely overspecific examples? Shape Shift like all Sense Affecting powers deals with whole Sense Groups by default.

Limiting it down to specific senses is at best a minor Limitation. At worst a -0.

 

A very common example are Shape Shift (and Invisibility) that Covers sight, but not smell. Examples like:
Star Trek Hologryphic Disguises

Any disguise/stealth Skill in a Command and Coqnuer

Mystiques Shape Shifting in X-Men (2000); but not the one in the followup film.

 

In your mind for some reason those require a completely different power, rather then just Shape Shift that covers less Sense Groups.

[Killer Shrike]

On 1/29/2019 at 6:07 PM, Christopher R Taylor said:

 

Actually in the discussion quite a few mechanics and ways of using comeliness were offered, and ignored.  All he had to do was say "this is optional" and leave it at that, not simply delete a state because you don't see how to use it.

 

Comeliness as a characteristic did nothing, aside from sometimes allowing a complementary skill roll, maybe, if the GM allowed it. It had no utility. All of the practical things that it might accomplish in theory were handed as either a PRE attack or a skill roll using a skill most likely based on PRE. If one wanted to make an ability that represented a character using their looks in some game-affecting way, it would typically be done by buying conditional PRE or an Ego Attack or some kind of Mind Control depending on what was being modeled. You'd then end up either wanting to pay a tax (albeit a small one) to buy up your COM or receive a rebate (albeit a small one) purely for concept reasons to dial in a level of COM to justify your super sexy or super ugly sfx power constructs.

 

In a game system founded on paying cp (character points) for mechanical effect, an ability that has almost no measurable mechanical effect is questionable.

 

Conceptually, it also runs counter to the meta concept at the foundation of the system of separating mechanics from sfx. How things are perceived is at the essence of sfx, and the way a character is perceived by others (which seems like a good working definition of COM) is thus sfx...what impact that has on game play might take a variety of mechanical forms ranging from none to a situational bonus or penalty on interaction skills to justification for custom abilities, from character to character.

 

Also COM as it was defined just didn't work or make sense. It was used, if at all, as some sort of measuring stick. My character has a 14 COM, yours has a 16 COM...how is the difference between those two values quantified in any meaningful way? Mechanically, they aren't really even to the very limited extent that COM has mechanically quantifiable value. Most likely, it would be _interpreted_ to fuel the narration of the emerging story; your character is slightly more attractive than mine, and that somehow has some subtle influence on the narrative...perhaps the plot hook packaged as a femme fatale the GM is vamping around with latches on to your character instead of mine. However, each of our characters also has a block of text called "Appearance" or "Description" along with other not-that-useful-but-expected-due-to-conventions-of-the-era-when-the-game-system-originated descriptive factoids such as Hair and Eye color, height and weight. What a character looks like can be entirely defined therein without need of a stat, and serve the same narrative interpretation purpose as COM.

 

There's also weird things like animals and objects.

 

My character has a really nice car. It's beautiful. It looks much better and more essentially car-ish than your car. If I park my car next to your car and passerby's are made to look at them both and choose which they'd rather drive, my car would win. My car has 20 COM and a Distinctive Feature Disadvantage "Super Amazing Looking Gorgeous Car". That makes sense, right? No? Vehicles don't have COM? But my car is really sexy!

 

My architect character designs a building so beautiful the Taj Mahal is torn down in embarrassment. What COM should that be? Buildings lack COM, no matter how attractive or homely? A shack has the same effective COM as a mansion (ie, 0)? That's odd.

 

Or my knight character rides an amazingly awesome looking stallion. This thing makes Shadowfax and run of the mill unicorns look like broken down swaybacked nags. All the fillies and mares want to get with my knight character's stallion; he is literally a stud. My knight's stallion has a COM of 35. It's better looking than a supermodel...uh...wait...that's awkward.

 

There's also the awkward issue of subjective beauty. Even if you hold discussion of gender preference at bay with a 10 foot pole, you'd still run into speciation. My alien character is a jello like blob, but I assure you it is considered quite the hotty by other jello like blobs of its own alien race; fleshy humanoids tend to be a bit repelled however. My dwarf character is quite handsome to dwarfy maidens; his stocky wrists and waistline plus his luxurious eyebrows are a triple threat. Humans, elves, and basically every other non-dwarf may not share the commonly held esteem for his attractiveness, of course. Etc.

 

Anyway, in 6e, if you want the sfx of your character being so good looking it has concrete mechanical benefit, you are of course free to buy an ability (or more than one ability) that models that sfx. The Striking Appearance ability provides a fine out of the box zero effort option that works very well in practice, but more elaborate power constructs are as available as they ever were without the unnecessary appendix of a useless characteristic attached to them.

 

Of course, if you are determined to have COM, you can add the characteristic back (assuming you are the GM). The Hero System is a toolkit; it is expressly intended that a GM can change things including adding or removing characteristics.

 

Quote

Transfer worked fine (needed some adjusting of cost, but was fine).  If you want to vary the parts of the power you can buy aid and drain as needed.  Now instead of one streamlined obvious power that is used constantly in all sorts of genre origin and literature, you have to build a giant paragraph of text.  That is not an advancement, its a step back.

 

I like Transfer, and have allowed it as a custom power (which has been available in the Hero System all along). It works the same as it did in 4e and 5e, but if pressed I cold present the 6e equivalent expressed as a combined drain / aid. I don't recall specifics, but I'm pretty sure that some of us on these boards did just that back in the day arriving at several variants (of course, this is the HS we are talking about) with some subtle nuances, but basically a straight port of Transfer re-expressed with 6e semantics.

 

It is in keeping with improving the system to break down compound base powers into a more atomic version that is then modified or combined modularly with other "building block" powers. Ultimately, it makes for a more flexible system overall, though at the expense of verbosity and the density of mechanical elaboration that looks so precisely defined and yet so unsightly on character sheets.

 

I think in retrospect it would have been cool for Transfer to be added to the Custom Power examples at the back of the book along with Venom and Slipperiness. It's an easy example of a custom power in 6e and would have provided the subtle suggestion of "hey, those of you who miss a power that was nixed, here's the ok by the rules as written way to retain them". An APG entry would also suffice. But alas and alack, page count considerations, or perhaps SL just hates the power and purposely killed it Harbinger style with extreme prejudice; I don't know.

[Ninja-Bear]

I started Champions in 4th ed so I didn’t understand some of the powers that were listed when I bought Enemt 1-3.  I didn’t realize some of the powers from 3rd came with freebies that 4th eliminates and a few which were added.  So as I mentioned before (I believe in this threa) that if you are comfortable with the way 3rd builds characters and aren’t too worried that certain things comes with freebis (I’ll have to look for specific examples at home later) then earlier editions are fine-use them! 

 

I think a neat neat test though would be to find a 6th ed character that has some unique but playable concept and see how difficult it would be to translate into earlier editions.  And how difficult would it be?

[Duke Bushido]

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

Before I forget, if you hover the mouse just above the top left of the quote box, there's a little square with arrows in it.  You can use that to move the quote, or click on that little box and the quote can be deleted with the delete key.  It took me quite a while to figure that one out.  You can also copy the quote with that little box.

 

Thank you, Hugh! I'll have to practice it later, though: I've _no_ intention of getting in as deeply as I did last night.

 

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

 

 

I believe Steve considers the APGs part of the "core rules" as optional.  I doubt they would be folded in to core rules, as Steve has indicated he views these as needing more oversight, and likely not appropriate as default rules.

 

Yes; I am not disputing that: certainly a game can be played with what's in just the two books, and for years and years and years.  But the commonality of the APGs being referenced for official rulings suggests that they are at least as official-- wow.  How do I say this correctly?  I could go with "you know what I mean," but I think history has shown how poorly that works in the written word.   it demonstrates that they are to be viewed with the same weight as the core rules?  Officially endorses them as actual canonical rules?  I wish I could express that better.  I guess we can do with "you know what I mean."  Ugh.    Realistically though, I accept that they are not "mandated as essential to the game."  I just see a great deal of suggestion that they should be.

 

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

The Martial Arts book bugs me, as both the ability to build maneuvers and the ranged martial arts rules should, in my view, be part of the core rules.

 

Well this goes back to the APG thing:

 

Do you think they should be core rules because you like them?  Because you personally _want_ them to be?  (I'm not being as ass here; I'm asking you to think about your feelings on this before answering.  That's all.)  

 

Or do you find them to be necessary for creating and running a successful campaign?  Are there concepts that can't be built without it?

 

Are they more valid than anything in the APG, or truly essential to the HERO System experience?

 

For what it's worth, I think they should be simply because the vast majority of HERO players (myself and others (maybe) excluded) find martial maneuvers, etc, essential to their appreciation of the game.  For what it's worth, I find them to be a set of the .... What's the most correct without sounding like I'm trying to insult the idea?  Objectionable?  Disliked?  Let's go with "objectionable."  Personally, I find Martial Arts to be one of the objectionable things that led to so much consolidation in 5 and 6: it's a special set of one-off rules specifically for that thing.  Like Instant Change, Transfer, and a few others: because they had special, one-off rules, they were torn apart and cobbled out of something else in an attempt to force some kind of "universal power."  If the others can't be core rules, then MA, as done at least until 5e (I openly admit that I have not read 6e MA, for a number of reasons, not the least of which are expense and a general lack of interest in HERO martial arts system.  If I can ever find an inexpensive used copy, I will probably read it, simply because, no matter what I think of the current rules set, I _am_ a HERO fan.  It's like patriotism: it doesn't have to make sense; it's just how I feel )

 

Two quick things here:  Yes: I know I can grandfather in these powers as-is.  I know I can use the existing official powers to cobble up the same effects.

 

2  (I didn't number that first one; sorry-- on a small roll and trying to stem it) you asked  in a previous post if a HERO-designed spell was different from a D&D spell.  I said "yes," and here's more-or-less why:

It doesn't feel magic (which, thinking about it, may be a _huge_ part of why I have so much less issue with Fantasy HERO than any other fantasy game).  I wish I could express this technically, but that's an odd thing about impressions and feelings.  I will, however, attempt to offer and example:

 

Given:  I am not especially comic-book savvy.  What I know has been picked up by years of gaming with people who are, my nieces and nephews, my own kids, and the movies of the last decade or so (well, since Iron Man, who I always liked.  Him and Flash).

 

The two big guns of comics are Marvel and DC.  Marvel likes to break everything down into some sort of pseudo-science.  That's fine: that's their schtick.  They like the sci-fi angle.  DC doesn't do that nearly as much:  It's freakin' _magic_, okay?  When a DC wizard says some backwards words or whatever, magic happens, and there's no real reason for that other than "I know how to do magic."  Marvel wizards do something that creates a resonance with something else and irritates the space-time continuum until it forms an ectoplasmic scab that can be peeled back to gain access to the nervous system of some multi-dimensional brain which will respond by sending it's "demon-like anti-bodies," and some special amulet effectively hypnotizes it so that it will do your bidding...

 

One sounds like magic.  It feels like magic.  One sounds like--- well, _technically_ magic, in that there's no other way to make any of that happen, but it has science written all over it (badly) in that it has to be broken down and explained and presented as something that makes a kind of sense, something that anyone can probably do, given the right equipment.

 

And that's huge.  That's the difference between "Instant Change" and "Transform, Minor, self, clothes-only; uniform and clothes you were wearing only."  I mean it's _huge_.

 

Granted, it's not huge if you derive the bulk of your enjoyment from formulas, ratios, real values, or -- well, if the "meta" of the game is the most important part of the system to someone, it won't matter much.  We can talk mechanics all day (which I'm still trying to _not_ do until I can read Basic), but easily half of my issues with the mechanics are the _massive_ change in the _feel_ of the game that the have created.

 

The same thing happens each time some power or construct with a unique rule or set of circumstanced gets replaced by a cobble from something else:  The end result is the same, but the _feel_ is not.  Those things are no longer special; they are just something you bent, folded, prodded, and stretched out of something else.

 

Years ago, I posted the comment that in order to achieve a perfectly balanced game, you needed a character with two abilities (and possibly a name): Affect Environment and Resist Environment.  It got laughs (not the original intention) and it got a few insults and derisive comments (also not the original intention, but hey-- people are like that sometimes), but ultimately, that's what beating everything into a price-perfect, mechanics-perfect "balance" leads to.  Dull.  Those four-stat role playing games with a deck of cards deterring "yes" or "no" and you pull whatever you want out of thin air, because none of it matters since it's all the same.

 

3) because I forgot I had a third;  I apologize.  I've brought this up before, and as before, I'm not going to pursue it too far (or at all, since -- and please, I ask that _no one_ take this personally: I'm not huffing off; I swear it.  I just have too much to do with the small amount of evening time I have to come back to this incredibly interesting but unbelievably time-sucking thread. I wish I did have the time to enjoy it, but the timing was just awful for me) and the responses are generally along the lines of "well it's really what the first guys had in mind."  I don't doubt that.  I can't really, as I've never met them and likely never will.  I openly admit that I'm jealous beyond measure of those who have.

 

I also postulate that as a defense, it's invalid.  If we believe Lucas, the three or so "revisions" he has made to Star Wars were his original intent.  He _intended_ for Greedo to shoot first, so he re-did the movie and made it happen.  Did it make the movie better?  Did it make Solo a better character?  Rehtorical.  I don't want to side-track this further.  He added Storm troopers on lizards and some other CGI that really didn't look like it belonged there.  His original intention.  Again, did it make the movie better?  Did it make it more enjoyable, and easier to lose yourself in?

 

The guns disappeared from ET.  That was just weird.  I don't know if that was an original intention or not, but it happened.  The guy who made a bajilion dollars on Post-it notes was looking to make a high-pressure, nigh-unbreakable glue.  The guy who invented Saran Wrap--- I don't remember _what_ his original intention was, but it wasn't helping my leftovers postpone toxicity.   Either way, these people had an original intention and ended up with something unique and wonderful.  I don't think any of these creations would be improved by chucking out the results and continuing to pursue the original intention.  I think something that's already wonderful ends up losing out.

 

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

 

 

I don't think it is fair to disparage players who "don't build to concept" if the system rewards some concepts and penalizes others. 

 

Point of order: (I think that's right)  I did not disparage anyone.  I humbly apologize if it came off that way; it certainly wasn't my intent.  My comment was intended as something along the lines of "some people aren't willing to stick so tightly to a concept that they lose cost effectiveness."  That's all.  Some concepts, upon beginning, end up not being worthwhile, for whatever reason, to complete down to the most specific detail, and at some point players will strike a compromise with themselves between getting the end result they want and budgeting.  Nothing wrong with it, and we've _all_ done it.   I thought the inclusion of the word "strictly" would let that come across: they _are_ building to concept, just not as _strictly_ as they might have wanted to at the outset of character generation.  No biggie.

 

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

I think you said PRE when meaning COM. 

 

You are absolutely right, and thank you.  Thank you for the correction, and thank you for not leaping all over a simple mis-speak as the reason everything I have ever said is totally invalid.  I love the people here!

 

 

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

Luck could use better definition as well, but at least it does nothing.

 

Like COM, or so I'm told.

 

Honestly, I don't think it needs more mechanic or more specificity or more "make it a six-modifier derivative of something else."  Like so many other things, it is my sincere belief that it is _better_ with a unique mechanic, because "Luck" in the sense it is used in the game _is_ a rather random, who-knows-how-that-happened kind of thing.  Turning into "Transform, Major, entire history of the universe where events leading to this specific moment alter the outcome of the character's die roll by -6" or some such thing, or putting a character-controlled "switch" on it take away from that "the universe is smiling on me and I like it" feeling.

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

BTW, from any interactions I have had with Steve, "suck it" is the exact opposite of his attitude to other gamers in general, and Hero gamers in particular.  SETAC had, IIRC, no input to the COM decision - Steve had made his decision on that because it did not fit with "Characteristics".

 

There is no need to defend Steve of the SETAC here because, Brother, I had no _doubt_ that it wouldn't have gone down in such a manner.  Whatever I think of his newest incarnation of the game, I have never at any point doubted that he truly loves it, as much as I know I do, and I know he values the opinions of other folks who could be considered.. well, it sounds odd for a hobby, but "expert-level" knowledgeable of the game itself.   No; I don't think anything he did was as much as a thumbed nose.  If nothing else, not taking advice was most likely him volunteering to be the bad guy so no one else had to.

 

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

 

 

Definitely sarcastic -

 

Thanks for clarifying.  I suspected, but it seemed so out of character for you in an otherwise-sincere conversation (you know: before the yelling and condemning start when people refuse to admit to themselves that even though they have nothing more constructive to add, they aren't willing to listen anymore, either.  

 

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

The first is whether they are balanced in 6e.  I feel like they are, but they have limited testing.

 

I will accept your word on this, as I haven't play tested 6e at all except in my head.

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

The second is whether they were balanced in 5e.  Given the Figured's alone cost more than buying STR or CON to get them, I consider that they were objectively overpriced.  You had to spend MORE to have an 8 STR and high PD, REC and STUN than if you bought a higher STR.  Spending more and getting less is objectively unbalanced.

 

As I noted, I am more-or-less in agreement here: when the SETAC was happening, I was rather hoping to see Base Characteristics cost-adjusted to resolve this issue.  Boy was I surprised.

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

  Figured was one of the few where I would have seen some merit to that sidebar, 

 

Thanks for that tidbit, you old Softie, you. ;D  Seriously though: thanks for that tidbit.  It tells me that weren't simply outright opposed to Figureds, even if you didn't care for them.  Why is that important?  I don't know.  Just more of that "feel" stuff, I suppose.  Thanks for the support of COM, too.  

 

 

8 hours ago, Hugh Neilson said:

 

To Ego vs Mental?  I would say all power issues should change to "Mental" to reflect mental combat rather than Ego.  But that's just nomenclature.  That said, we don't have STR attack - we have HTH attack.

 

Not disagreeing with you.  Sort of a side-eyed way to point out that for all the emblandening (it could be a word!) of power names and descriptions (accept for "Blast."  Why is that not "Ranged Attack" or "Ranged Normal Attack" yet?!  Sure, you can blast someone with a gun, colloquially, but you can't blast them with an arrow or a sling.), it seemed really odd not to rename all the "EGOx" powers.

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

Good grief Duke - you churn out the words!! 

 

Personal weakness:  I just can't resist a sincere, civil exchange of ideas or opinions.  Promise, it'll be the last one in this thread, simply because I'll never get my scanning project advanced if I don't keep my sorry butt out of this thread!    The truth, though, is as soon as I realize something I say _might_ lead to a question, I try to provide clarification on that, too.  I work very hard on not being too terribly vague whenever I can avoid it.  I do it, ostensibly, to add clarity and prevent misunderstandings.  I have no idea if it actually works.  

 

So, for productivity-related reasons, I announce here that I won't be back to this thread, even for a read, because it's too tempting to keep participating.  You guys are _awesome_ at civil exchange, and it's such a welcome change of pace to the rest of the internet.  Doesn't help it's about a subject very dear to me.

 

With that in mind, no one need feel compelled to respond to anything I've said, unless you want to open it up for discussion amongst people who aren't me.

 

(and, nothing personal, but I'm going to have to "unfollow" the lot of you, just to get rid of that little tempting announcement I get when someone puts something up here)

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

I understand what you are saying.  There was a very deliberate decision made in 5th Edition to try and clarify what the HERO System is, a generic set of mechanics that could be utilised to deliver a game in multiple genres.  Those genres were then described (with guidance on how to apply the HERO System) as how to play a game within those genres.

 

Totally get that.  Also, I am assuming that's a typo and you meant 4e.  

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

That is where things diverge - the actual rule options in one set of books and how those rules might be applied in a different set of books.  The Big Blue Book combined the HERO System with the Champions genre book.  I reckon 5th Edition and Champions covers the same ground but better.  6th Edition further evolved the rules, breaking things down so that different genres might be more closely emulated.

 

Yep.  Got that, too.  Please, though, please continue.

 

(I must be tired; that gag was a lot funnier to me than it should have been)

 

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

I think the big mistake people make with HERO is that they think they need to use the rules that exist or have watertight arguments on what they will or will not allow players to use. 

 

Oh Lord, yes; this very exact thing.  But to be fair, the examples in the book support that very assumption.  Look at how many powers are built _seemingly_ (he added, so as to not be accused of saying something he did not ) around the idea that "this Advantage or Limitation can be used in this situation and therefore we are going to apply it" as opposed to "this is the concept; which modifiers most easily help me achieve it?" Killer Shrike did a real good one (I think) with his recreation of "Find Weakness" (something that, like so many others have confessed, I don't really miss to begin with, but the rules aren't just about me, obviously.  Slap a Stop Sign on it and put it back.

 

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

The genre books missed a trick in that they did not begin with an overview of the things that they would utilise and the things that they would gloss over (for the betterment of the game experience). 

 

 

Agreed.  Whole-heartedly agreed.

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

 

HERO suffers when the GM does not put in enough thought into what they will and will not utilise in the game they want to run.  Hugh's vision of games Powered by HERO would do that for the GM.

 

Agreed _mostly_.  That is to say, there are currently three "games powered by HERO" that I'm aware of (MHI, CC, FHC).  MHI and FHC come closest, which honestly makes sense, since CC is Supers, and with Supers, well-- it's no-holds-barred when it comes to special abilities.  But still, even FHC goes more into the HERO System over-all than it really needs to just to be a Fantasy Game.  More accurately, while presenting decent Fantasy themes, etc, it kept recalling the generic nature of the HERO System to the forefront.  Perhaps that's a slightly more accurate assessment.  Granted, this may have been a licensing requirement; I don't know.  However, I _do_ agree that such a concept-- games powered by HERO-- that focuses specifically on those rules the author finds relevant to his game.  However, to me this re-enforces the need for optional rules (like the above-mentioned sidebar for figured characteristics) in the core rules volumes, so that the author might more-specifically tailor the game he imagines.

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

In first edition Policeman 14 or less covered much of the detail that might take 10 lines of skills in the usual 6th Edition game - separating out all of the elements of being a policeman.

 

I mentioned before that I try to be open-minded, and I can't blame that issue on 6e.  That has _always_ been a problem with HERO: the skills stop where you say they stop, and that's going to vary from group to group.  The folks who prefer the super-crunchy, ultra-precision approach: well, skills are going to get broken down, possibly ad infinitum, with the end result that a skilled individual is going to be some kind of expensive.  Then there's the technical folks: the folks who _know_ that you don't just take "crack shot" as a skill, that it is not even going to be group-relevant (crack shot with pistols, for example), but unique to each individual weapon because of whatever reason they will likely know better than I do.

 

Perhaps it's a maturity problem: when I was twenty-one, skills were easy.  I didn't know enough about most things to get really carried away with breaking them down further and further, making each aspect a specialty.  For example, "Detective work" made perfect sense to me.  The real-life forensics shows and detective shows came about, and I learned a lot more.  "Physician" was perfectly acceptable once upon a time.  Now you've got specialties, sub-specialties, research, and don't go to a GP for so much as a hang nail.

 

It's not a 6e problem.  It's a HERO, "make exactly what you want" problem, compounded by both player creativity, GM demand, and the real-world knowledge of everyone in the group.  No matter what, we like to push and push until we get something as "real" as we can.

 

Personally, I think adding things like "Familiarity" and "Proficiency" actually made this problem worse, via the implication that a general knowledge base was not good enough to be an actual skill, leading to the idea that to be a "real" skill it had to be specialized down to "Suckling: Left hind teat, 14-".

 

For what it's worth, more than another Player's Guide, I think HERO-- any edition-- would benefit greatly from a _GM_ guide, or at least a hand-holding "how to build a campaign" guide, _especially_ for new players, even if they have extensive experience in other systems.  An advice book, though, perhaps, for example, demonstrating how to manage different "levels of realism" via creating skills: the sort of theme or feel that would lead to "Physician" as being just as acceptable as "Kidneyologist."

 

But I won't blame that on any edition, save the first, which created the problem, then all the ones after the first that never had any solid advice on how to resolve it.  Notice I don't think we need a mechanic or a rule to do it for us; I just think some advice would go a long way here.

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

 

  If you want transfer - you know how it is built in 6th Edition - you can simply write 3D6 END Transfer.  You know how it works.  If you want instant change, you can write instant change - you know how it works.  There is no NEED to play the maths games.

 

I agree, and I don't.    No; I don't want to be a contrarian.   No; really.  I don't.  But unless you "Create this power from whole cloth," (by which I mean "import" ') ) _then_ you don't have a problem.  You fly totally in the face of what the new edition is about, which is also okay: it's your game, after all.  But if you use it in terms of a specific edition which doesn't already include it, then you have build it _somewhere_, just to make sure it follows the terms of that edition.  When you get right down to it, the changes made in 6e are largely _because_ of the "maths game."  

 

There exists a set of players of unknown size and unknown percentage of total players-- perhaps a small number; perhaps almost all of the players-- we will never know for sure because we can't poll all of them-- to whom the maths game (I'm practicing, but I'm American enough that "Maths" sends up all kinds of "wrong" alerts in my mind. Weird, since "Mathematics" doesn't bother me at all.  ) _is_ the point of the system, or perhaps better stated, their favorite part of the system.  The author of the last two editions seems to be in that camp, given the direction he has taken the game: it's more number-balanced and whatever other qualities of maths are attractive than ever before.  The same could be said of uniformity: more disparate things are being jammed into single mechanics or group mechanics than ever before: the number of "stand alone" mechanics is lower than ever before, and the number of powers is higher than ever before.  So clearly, more uniformity.  And uniformity, of course, makes it easier to do the maths all back and forth.

 

For me, that's....  well, it's not directly _opposite_ of what I liked about HERO: there were some maths issues I had (mostly those that lead to "cost effective" builds, as discussed briefly above in a couple of places, by many people), but the move to uniform mechanics certainly _is_... well, again, not opposite, but ---

 

doesn't matter.  I won't be back to discuss it any time soon anyway.  

 

 

Maths.

 

Nope.  Still feels wrong.  Sorry, Doc.  I really tried.  

 

 

 

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

Would I like a Golden Age book that does not facilitate me to write a Golden Age campaign but delivers a version of the rules that push the bold strokes of four colour comics, broad skills that have little detail and a fast and loose way of playing?  Absolutely.  Huge time saver.

 

I am told that my supers campaigns are all essentially that.  It's habit now, what with decades into the setting and feel, but it started by accident: I knew nothing about comics except what I _thought_ they were, and that was pretty much it: simple stuff from my childhood like Captain Marvel (the real one) bopping Dr. Silvana on the noggin, etc.  Funny how that turned out.

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

The other reason I would buy those games ahead of other systems that do the same is that I would know they were both built on a consistent base and that,with a little bit of work, I could consistently add elements to those games that I wanted, properly costed.  In other games it would simply be changes made by sticking a finger in the air.

 

Again, I'm totally for the "games powered by HERO" concept.  While it was meant as a quip, I think Hugh may have inadvertently created Saran Wrap Post-it Notes (regardless of what his original intentions were.  )

 

1 hour ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

Dont peer too closely at the detail.  Pull back, ignore the stuff you don't want, aren't interested in.  The system is robust enough to cope with that.  

 

6th provides you with more options than previous editions, no one says that you have to use them all...

 

understood.  One of my primary grievances is the _elimination_ or twisted alteration of what I want to use.

 

Though I freely accept that I may well be a minority casualty.  Certainly I am on this board.  Given results of the polls I've seen since I came back by the board, though, I don't think we've got more than fifty-ish regularly-active members, though.  One out of fifty makes me a statistical hiccup, I think,  as opposed to a legitimate subset.

 

1 hour ago, Killer Shrike said:

I intend to respond to all the legitimate points that con-6e posters have put forth in order of their posting in due time,

 

You're a heck of a guy, KS.  Much respect to you. If it helps, feel free to skip me, simply because I can't afford to come back to this thread anytime soon: it has cost me two full evenings already, and I'm falling behind on promised deadlines.

 

 

1 hour ago, Killer Shrike said:

 

but it may take a while as the responses are lengthy and I have limited time in the day to do so. 

 

I know the feeling!   that's why I'm bowing out now.

 

9 minutes ago, Sean Waters said:

the complete lack of a mechanic to address ignoring opponents in combat and acting as if they were not there. 

 

I have argued before (unsuccessfully, you should know, to perhaps prevent you from expending a lot of effort there) that there seems to be a subtle-yet-pervasive drive to rule and mechanic the role-playing aspect into irrelevance.  I'm not saying "there is a conspiracy to eliminate social interaction."  I'm just saying it sure _feels_ like it.  Fact is, not everything needs a mechanic.  In fact, some things, like the reaction to someone who's kinda cute, or homely, but with a twinkle in his eye, can _not_ be done with a mechanic, as it is purely social interaction, and like Soylent Green, will vary from person to person.

 

 

9 minutes ago, Sean Waters said:

I’m also not a fan of balance as a justification for a rule.

 

Ditto.  Doubly-dittoed (two whole copies! ) when people can't agree on what "balanced" is, or what needs balancing.  Something wins; something loses.  In this case, the direction of "balance = maths (Still trying, Doc! )" was chosen.  Maths does not directly equate to things that aren't number... able?  Let me try again: assigning numerical values to words first requires that everyone agrees on the numerical value of each letter, then you can total them and get the value of the word.  Except for those folks who think that each number represented by the letter should be a _digit_, and reading those numbers as digits is how you derive the numerical value of that word.  Though doing either of those things means we've completely left behind those people who think the numerical value of the word should be based solely on the number of times it appears printed in a given newspaper on a certain date---

 

Or, put the way that I mentioned up-thread somewhere, before we can agree that Characteristics are now "better balanced," we have to agree that they are now priced correctly. Ultimately, that, too, has to be based on someone's opinion, and someone else will always disagree, often for equally-valid reasons that are different from the first guy--

it's all infinite regression, and honestly, the only "balance" I can effectively judge is if each player had the same level of fun (which is also subjective, I'm afraid), and that has precious little to do with whether or not a single point of STR is properly priced against a single point of Mental Defense or Flight.  Numbers are not subjective; this is one-hundred percent true.  Assigning them to subjective things, however, does not make those things less subjective, no matter how much maths we do.  (Okay, now if one you British folks would pop me a note:   I am one-hundred-percent certain "how much maths we do" is completely incorrect.  Am I right?)

 

9 minutes ago, Sean Waters said:

 

I also don’t think that you can entirely divorce substance from style.  “Technically a great game!” is never going to sell,

 

    

 

(This laughter is not a "ooh, Burn!" or any other sort of pile-on derision based on that comment.  This laughter is because that comment was funny as hell, in any context.   )

 

 

 

Dammit.

 

Another entire night shot on this one single thread.

 

 

Crap.

 

 

 

Good night, all.

 

 

Duke

 

 

[Duke Bushido]

8 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

 

 I've _no_ intention of getting in as deeply as I did last night.

 

 

 

Well so much for that crap.....

 

 

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

Comeliness as a characteristic did nothing, aside from sometimes allowing a complementary skill roll, maybe, if the GM allowed it. It had no utility. 

Again, even if that were the case (and it was not), that's not a reason to delete it from the game.  Even if it had no utility, it was a role play stat and this is a role play game.  You don't get rid of something without good reason to do so.  As in "this is bad for the game" not "derp, I don't see how to use this!"

[Spence]

I started with 1st ed back in 83ish, been a long time ago.

 

Slowly worked my way up through to 3rd edition between deployments. Back then there was no such thing as "ordering through the internet" or even having knowing that something new had come out until you got home and made it to an actual store.  Providing they carried it.

 

Got 4th Ed as the BBB Deluxe with the HeroMaker Software.  Heromaker was cool, but I didn't use it much since a computer couldn't fit in my seabag.   But I really liked 4th Edition.  For me it played easy and fun and really didn't change that much.  Some of the best games I ever played were using it.

 

5th Edition.  I actually went straight to 5th Ed Revised (Fred).  I discovered it on one of my returns to the US and bought it mostly because it was the new edition.  But overall the changes were fairly minor.  I was never able to put my finger on it but Fred always seemed to lack that "something" that readily returned when we went back and played 4th.   Fred was fun but 4th always seemed funner ?

 

The came 6th Edition.  When 6th hit the streets in 2009, I was no longer in the Navy (retired in 2004) and was able to get back into some solid gaming.  I picked up most of the books, concentrating on Supers and set off to play Champs.  I was determined to use the "active supported" line so it would be available to people playing.  But 6th was a dramatically different game.  To me it feels totally different from the cinematic and  superiffic game I had enjoyed all those years.  Once again, I find it impossible to point to why.  But the entire feel was different.  Pulling out 3rd or 4th and playing a game had that old superiffic feeling return in a rush and the I'd hear the groans and laughter as Superdude got knocked through a wall.  But the 6th Ed games just didn't gel.   I stuck with 6th, because it was the supported version.  Even when the game changed from superheroic art to video game art.   But by that time, Hero had become something I talked about and my gamer friends nodded and made sympathetic noncommittal noises until we played D&D , CoC or one of the GUMSHOE games. 

 

Since 6th is essentially out of the Physical game business and since I have pretty much given up hope that they will ever actually support it with actual playable adventures.  I will be returning to 4th Edition.   I have worked up two campaign frames, one for Supers and one for a fantasy sword swinging campaign but have been continually hitting walls in NPC/Creature design.  Running around in circles as I flipped between 5th and 6th edition for rules and design. 

 

But reading this thread and writing this response makes me realize two things.

1) I will be using 4th Edition.  I have 4 copies of the BBB and every 4th Edition book in either hardcopy or PDF.

2) I can't answer the OP about which edition is "mechanically best", but I can say that I believe 4th Edition is funner

Edited February 1, 2019 by Spence
spelling

[Killer Shrike]

1 hour ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Again, even if that were the case {"Comeliness as a characteristic did nothing...It had no utility."} (and it was not) 

 

Maybe you already have done so and I missed it (I'm still catching up on a non-skim of the posts), but could you itemize or explain what you felt it did do, mechanically speaking? I.e. what utility did you find it to have, for you?

 

Quote

that's not a reason to delete it from the game. 

 

Well...it also isn't a reason to keep it.

 

Quote

Even if it had no utility, it was a role play stat and this is a role play game. 

 

Not to get all Spockish, but that is a wonderfully illogical statement to me. Arguing that a characteristic need only exist and nothing more to merit inclusion in a game is definitely an unexpected vector. I would have thought that we could all at least agree that a characteristic should measure something of meaning and provide something of value to actually playing a game to merit inclusion in that game, but apparently I was wrong about that.

 

My point of view is that everything in any kind of system (game or otherwise) should be there purposefully, to provide utility; useless things are superfluous, they are drag. If a thing doesn't provide enough utility to justify its existence in the model, it should be isolated and excised. If something is not part of the solution (whatever the system is intended to do or whatever service it is meant to provide), then it is part of the problem and should ideally be removed to optimize the system. This is fundamental to modern design and engineering; get rid of what doesn't work, keep what does.

 

Quote

You don't get rid of something without good reason to do so. 

Me, I'm the sort of person that gets rid of things. If something doesn't have a purpose in my life or house or office, it will soon be gone. If I think it might one day have value and it would be hard to replace, I'll pack it off to storage. Otherwise, donation or trash. Everything must justify its existence in my existence, so to speak. I have a few things that have some nostalgic value, but the ones that don't also have some pragmatic value are on borrowed time. 

 

I'm the opposite, I need a good reason to keep something. Or three reasons if we're being honest, at least two of which should be good reasons.

 

Quote

As in "this is bad for the game" not "derp, I don't see how to use this!"

 

I think it was bad for the game in the same general way that a mole is bad on a human. Sure it may or may not metastasize and kill the host, but it still provides no value to them and is unsightly at best. 

 

If you could set aside your exasperation on the subject of "to be or not to be, alas poor COM, I knew ye well" and peruse them in full, I did mention several reasons why I think it was bad / undesirable for the game system, 100% derp-free I promise. Ok, maybe 85% derp-free. Mostly derpishless.

 

My perception is you have some kind of emotional attachment to the idea of COM, for some reason that baffles me. Why isn't it sufficient for you to simply describe what your character(s) look like generally and have attractiveness or lack thereof be descriptive in the same way as the character's height, build, hair and eye color, gender, apparel, etc? Why do you so strongly want the system to make you / let you assign a numerical value to it? If the outcome of a social interaction where your character's appearance might matter mechanically (ie the outcome is decided by dice being rolled vs lips flapping) are resolved either as a interaction skill roll or a PRE attack, why wouldn't you prefer your character's exceptional (good or bad) appearance to be mechanically represented as a direct modifier to either (ie why is Striking Appearance not an adequate substitute for you for characters whose appearance is so impressive it changes social outcomes)? 

 

What is so special about "comeliness" as a characteristic for you, vs expressing the idea of appearance in some other way? I'm not being snarky, I'm genuinely curious to hear your viewpoint.

[Killer Shrike]

1 hour ago, Spence said:

But reading this thread and writing this response makes me realize two things.

1) I will be using 4th Edition.  I have 4 copies of the BBB and every 4th Edition book in either hardcopy or PDF.

2) I can't answer the OP about which edition is "mechanically best", but I can say that I believe 4th Edition is funner

Ahoy, shipmate! Or gangway, swabby! As you prefer. (I'm a former Marine)  

 

Yeah. I don't know if 4e was intrinsically "funner", but I do know that I personally and definitely had more fun when playing and running 4e games. However, I think that was largely a product of where I was at in my life when playing 4e. High school followed by the military, followed by easy success as a software developer during the glory days of the dot com boom, no kids, the energy of youth, a succession of good gaming groups...it was just a good time in my life despite the hardships and tragedies and so on. Certainly it was more eventful...the lows may have been more frequent but they were short lived and the highs were stratospheric. 

 

If someone were to make the statement "4e was the most fun version of the rules!" I might nod and privately agree that it was for me as well based upon my own life experience. But lightning in a bottle is difficult to capture, even harder to contain. I don't think that if I were to start up a new 4e campaign I would magically recapture that fun in the current time frame; I think I would constantly be irritated by the grit of running into things (or gaps!) in 4e that were improved upon in 5e, 5er, and 6e.

 

It would be an interesting experiment however. If you do move forward with your campaign, I'd love to read a campaign log or similar of it.

[Ninja-Bear]

KS btw CC has Power Transfer written up as you suggested for custom power.

[Ninja-Bear]

I remeber in 4th ed trying to build marbles for my ninja to be able to cause someone to fall. Not automatically, a Breakfall roll to avoid it would be fine. I remeber that the official way was something like 90 act points. Well past the 60 pts we played with. Any other method was heavy GM territory. I looked at Slick’s build and don’t feel that Entangle works well at all.  Now that 5th changed CE, it works for me. 

 

So I ask, how would you build this in 3 or 4th ed?

 

 

[Killer Shrike]

On 1/29/2019 at 9:58 AM, Toxxus said:

I like 6e, but there are a few changes that I felt were not conducive to Fantasy Hero play.

 

1-  Encumbrance being based on strength means you can run around in full plate with effectively zero penalty.  Just watch an episode of Knight Fight to see what a full suit of armor does to DCV and END costs.  They do 90s rounds and the knights are dripping sweat and gasping for air after the 1st round.

 

So, in 4e Encumbrance a character with 20 STR could ignore the END loss of carrying up to 25 kg, but not the -3 DCV / DEX penalty.

 

In 5e, a character with 20 STR would still not spend END or suffer a movement penalty when carrying up to 96 kg and would suffer only a -1 DCV / DEX penalty. However LTE, mentioned as an aside in 4e, is more tightly integrated with specific values directly mentioned, and there is also a suggestion that a character losing END to encumbrance may not be able to get recoveries if the GM so decides. But, yeah, a high STR character is less troubled by Encumbrance than they were in 4e, almost to the point of it not being a problem at all.

 

In 6e, the 5e section is basically copy and pasted, and then extrapolated upon with more detail, edge case coverage, etc (which is a true statement for much of the rules text), but works the same. 

 

So, if this is an issue for you, then it isn't a 6e issue, it is a 5e issue. 

 

However, having said that, what is important is not a chart of specific values, it is the idea that carrying things is tiring, and a mechanical definition of what that means (in this case, movement, Dex and DCV penalties, lost END and LTE). How much a character's STR or other attributes should offset those penalties is merely an implementation detail. 

 

If you basically agree with the mechanical impact of being encumbered on a character but disagree with the effectiveness on STR in reducing that impact, it is the work of a few minutes to knock out a table with more agreeable values (or just use the 4e one if you like those numbers better).

 

You could also go a completely different route if you prefer; for instance back when I ran my long running FH campaigns I used an alternate arms and armaments system which included armor proficiency etc ( http://www.killershrike.com/FantasyHERO/HighFantasyHERO/armamentsNotes.aspx#DEFENSES ). It was dialed in the way I wanted it and worked well for my groups. However, if I were going for a different feel for a different campaign, and wanted to dial up more realism I might handle that by dialing in a harsher Encumbrance or I might handle that by dialing down available character points (making high STR less common by lowering the tide across the board) or dial down NCM, or add a STR Min for armor, or whatever I thought would accomplish the outcome I was looking for. When using HS I always turn the dials to adjust things to exactly what I want for a given campaign, and have done that in 4e, 5e, 5er, and 6e. The toolbox nature of the HS is my favorite thing about it.

 

This is very much a "season to taste" thing, IMO...dialing in realism is a campaign to campaign consideration on all fronts. Encumbrance, being a "simulation of reality" subsystem falls into this consideration.

 

As far as a comparative analysis between editions, I recall 4e FH (which I played and ran a lot of) as being generally grittier, whereas when we upgraded to 5e things got a little more capes and plates. As far as Encumbrance specifically goes, I mildly prefer the 5e / 6e implementation as it is a bit more polished and scalable as it uses percentages vs flat weights, and includes movement penalties which seems logical. Overall, it seems like a more polished treatment to me than the 4e version.  

 

6e vs 5e doesn't really add much, but the graphing of weight to STR provided is arguably better for players who are mathically challenged or don't want to whip out a calculator.  

 

Quote

2-  Fourth Edition had the right idea with weapon costs.  STR min has to be based on weapon effectiveness or any sensible player will cherry pick the best item.  6e dropped the +1 to hit inherent in almost all swords and retained it only for great swords.  Why would anyone use a STR min 12 sword instead of a str min 10 mace when they do exactly the same damage?

 

Weapon / Equipment lists are just examples of power constructs to me...the are nothing more than pregenerated content in the same way that published characters are just pregenerated content. They may be useful as examples, or not, but they are not the "system", they are a product of the system. In the same way that a hot dog is not the hot dog factory, a published power construct called "sword" is not the power building system that allowed it to be produced; I or someone else can flog that same power building system to implement a different power construct and call it "sword" or "Ularean Arming Sword" or whatever.

 

Anyway, I also did not care for pregenerated weapon content in 5e FH which is what motivated me to write up the alternate system I mentioned previously, which was focused on making every weapon and armor have a distinct purpose / effect. 

http://www.killershrike.com/FantasyHERO/HighFantasyHERO/shrikeArmsArmament_Weapon.aspx

 

In later years, I went the other way and dispensed with weapon and armor lists for gear based campaigns, and just churned out custom weapon / armor (and gear) item by item as needed when making characters. At that point I was basically entirely Hero Designer based so we'd use Prefab files for a given campaign among the group which fully dispensed with the need for a gear list...just printing out the prefab provided a gear list if needed. Here is a basic example of this from 6e: http://www.killershrike.com/HereThereBeMonsters/Paradigm_Gear.aspx

 

 

Quote

3-  Barrier being a power you can abort to makes anyone with that spell/power nigh invulnerable.  Compounding that with the created barriers being persistent for no extra cost means you can build your own castle in a couple hours.  I've had to GM alter it to cost end to maintain and be limited to INT/5 instances with BODY max = to 1/2 highest of PD/ED to keep it halfway civilized.

 

This was also true of Force Wall, which Barrier is a copy & paste then modify version of. The more significant issue is that Barrier is Instant vs Constant, making it less taxing on a character. 

 

I always treated FW as a Yield sign power, and Barrier even more so. I was always careful to encumber PC power constructs based on either with sufficient limitations to keep it from breaking the game. 

 

From a comparative edition analysis perspective, I think that the 6e version is overall a move in a better direction because it finally decouples the mechanic from the sfx. In practice it didn't go far enough; I'm not convinced that entangle and barrier are not really the same power crying out to either be made unified or for one to replace the other entirely; but progress is progress.

 

Quote

There are things I like a lot about 6e, but the rule books are MASSIVE. 

 

Yes, the verbosity is unarguable. However, for games run at my own house it was a non issue, and I would take an abridged version for ease of reference when gaming elsewhere, and by the time 6e came out I had transitioned into pdfs on a laptop that I used at the table (in fact, most games I had HD open in the background with relevant characters open, and would "print preview" character sheets via an html export format as necessary rather than print them out on paper before a game session), so the physical bulk of the books was not an impediment for me usually. 

 

I do wince every time someone carelessly opens one of them; I am terrified the binding will split.

 

Quote

Normal players are not going to choke through those things to learn how to play.

 

It's been my experience that "normal players" wont read a rulebook for any game no matter how thick or thin. It's been my experience that "normal players" are generally lazy and will exert the minimum amount of effort required to play a game, showing up (maybe on time, maybe even remembering to bring their copy of their character sheet) and expecting to be entertained. It's been my experience that "normal players" learn how to play a game (usually poorly) via osmosis and repetition in real time as the game is being played over multiple sessions...sort of an OJT.

 

It has also been my experience that good players  are committed to the game and take the initiative to learn and get better at the game by a variety of means because they personally want to.

 

A good player who really wants to learn the game but is not a strong reader or is intimidated by something as trivial as the width across a book's spine, is usually ok with reading 6e Basic (or Sidekick before it), or maybe one of the "Complete" books. If not, they can pick it up at the table as the game progresses. 

 

Wasn't an impediment to me, though I wont lie, I silently judge people who balk at the thickness of a book. My favorite author is Neal Stephenson, I read technical manuals and computer science books for fun and profit, I've gotten rid of more books that I've consumed and discarded than many small libraries even have on their shelves. Reading is like my super power. It is not the size of a book that I care about, but rather it's tediousness. 

 

Also, the 6e core rulebooks are laid out and presented as reference works, much like an encyclopedia or a medical or legal reference. Though some sections are a bit more discursive, for the most part they are meant to be used by looking something up in the index, flipping to the referenced pages, and following any in text page references from there as necessary until your question is answered or your rules dilemma is resolved. 

 

Admittedly, like the boiled frog in the parable of making frog soup, I was in the pot while the heat got turned up and thus acclimated. In other words, coming from less verbose editions, I assimilated the core concepts of each edition and any differences over the previous edition in an organic way and thus was not faced with the prospect of trying to learn the system for scratch from two large tomes. 

 

Anyway, yeah, the density of the text, which was kind of played for laughs in the 5e and 5er era (remember the bullet-stopping video?), progressed to the need to split the book in 6e. My solve for the issue was just to buy a lot of copies of 6e basic and give them away, in the same way that I bought a lot of copies of Sidekick and gave them away during the 5e era. Players appreciated it, and it was the right amount of knowledge for most newbies. 

[Killer Shrike]

1 hour ago, Ninja-Bear said:

KS btw CC has Power Transfer written up as you suggested for custom power.

 

Ya, that's a pretty standard Drain / Aid composite approximation of Transfer. I mean I think it would have been useful to use Transfer as an example in the "Creating New Powers" section of the rulebook. There are two powers described in that section, Slipperiness and Venom. For each an example is given of describing the general intent of the proposed new power, then using existing powers and modifiers to approximate the effect and dial in an approximate pricing, and then simplify / recast the approximated effect into a unified power with the ugliness of the original build sublimated into a more elegant write up. I think that the usual Drain / Aid construct would have been a good candidate for that treatment as a welcome simplification for those who liked the convenience of Transfer ala 5e and also as a way to draw peoples attention to the existence of the Creating New Powers rules which despite having been present in 4e (though more abbreviated...the "Designing New Powers" text in the back of the book) and 5e (in virtually the same form), most people seem to be unaware of.

 

 

[Doc Democracy]

7 hours ago, Christopher said:

Passing through small holes in barriers is Desolidification or Shrinking.

You seem to be mixing up Shapeshifting the SFX and Shapeshift the Power

 

Christopher, you are not reading properly.  Sean said that to pass through a small hole while looking like something else to sonar, which neither Desolid or Shrinking would do, but is easily achievable via shapeshift.

[Doc Democracy]

4 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

That is to say, there are currently three "games powered by HERO" that I'm aware of (MHI, CC, FHC).  MHI and FHC come closest, which honestly makes sense, since CC is Supers, and with Supers, well-- it's no-holds-barred when it comes to special abilities.  But still, even FHC goes more into the HERO System over-all than it really needs to just to be a Fantasy Game.

 

This.  Fantasy HERO Complete does not deliver a game, it delivers a nuance of the HERO system focussed more on designing a fantasy game than ANY genre.  It narrows the options.  What it does not do is deliver you Thieves World, or Glorantha, or Dark Sun.  It makes none of the design decisions that would deliver the ‘feel’ you are grasping for.

 

I completely understand your concern of everything feeling the same, that to me is the work of the GM.  You work under the hood, taking the infrastructure and then you apply a skin over that which you present to the players.

 

If you are doing a good job, the players are not choosing between a 2D6-1 killing attack with 1” range and a 1.5D6 killing attack with AP.  Instead they are in a blacksmiths deciding whether they want to buy the Dwarven Long Axe or the Th’Kreen Glass Duelling Blade.  The stats might influence that but the magic is right there.  If the book was doing a good job, then the GMs job would be to understand what is under the hood and help players experience the created world in a consistent way.  Because it is HERO underneath, the GM would be able to tell the player that while this blacksmith does not have the Th’Kreen Glass Lance (which delivers the same wicked cuts but at a range) he does know of a Th’Kreen glass maker who might be willing to deal with humankind (and can build the stats consistent with everything else, knowing just how much advantage access to such a weapon might give over other players etc).

 

Doc

[Doc Democracy]

5 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

Assigning them to subjective things, however, does not make those things less subjective, no matter how much maths we do.  (Okay, now if one you British folks would pop me a note:   I am one-hundred-percent certain "how much maths we do" is completely incorrect.  Am I right?)

 

Even though Duke said he was not going to peek, I don’t believe him...

 

the phrase “no matter how much maths we do” reads fine to me....

[Ninja-Bear]

Gotcha KS. I miss read your post.

[Killer Shrike]

On 1/29/2019 at 11:39 AM, TranquiloUno said:

I guess I'd be wondering "Mechanically" "Best" for....what? And "best" compared to...?

 

Best at being the most consistent, comprehensive, balanced, and organized body of rules text extant for the game system in the abstract.

 

Also best at delivering on the self-identified design goals / intent of the game system, as described in the "Design Considerations" section of the 4e rulebook and elaborated on in the "Meta-Rules of the Hero System" section of the 5e and 6e rulebooks. 

 

Your approach seems to be to come at it from a more "bottom up" or applied perspective (what does it do, what is it used for, etc), which is fine of course and a pragmatic and valid approach, but that is not where I'm coming from.

 

Some context may be in order...

 

I prefer a unified and elegant system of high level abstractions from which conceivably many possible outcomes or applications are possible, vs a more organic collection of concrete / purpose built subsystems. 

 

The Hero System undoubtedly started as the later, emerging from a collection of cherry picked / amalgamated mechanics from a variety of different boutique games to cobble together a unified or "universal" system in the form of 4e. 

 

4e was IMO a very good system with a lot of work done towards abstracting things taken from the various sources to form a cohesive system...certainly to a much higher degree than was common for the hobby at the time. I fell in love with it / had my mind blown as soon as I perused it at a book store and bought it for myself with birthday money. However, the game was indisputably a cobbled together aggregation of subsystems, and vestiges of the various predecessor games were visible (particularly superhero telltales).

 

5e did an excellent job of resuscitating and polishing 4e, and then 5er started to make meaningful steps to standardize, abstract, unify, genericize, and modernize the game mechanics, without losing ground on staying true to the core concepts and design goals of 4e. In turn 6e continued to progress in that direction.

 

I was glad to see this progression, as the toolkit or "Game Construction Set" (as 4e quaintly described it) and its underlying meta rules / design methodology are by far the most important and meaningful aspect of the game system to me. Over the decades the Hero System has proven to be the most comprehensive framework available for me to conceivably apply to any genre and at nearly any power level to model conceivably any kind of character and resolve conceivably any kinds of conflict therein, if I am willing to put in the effort to define or dial in what I want. I feel that it is the design precepts behind the Hero System that have made that possible, as much as if not more so than the rules themselves. Each edition's consecutive commitment towards distilling and refining and shaping the mechanics of the game to improve its ability to deal with disparate genres and power levels and character concepts and conflict resolutions has been the gift that keeps on giving, for me.

 

The impact of the games commitment to crunch and corresponding struggles with accessibility and marketability and subsequent dwindling player base are saddening. But in my mind, the publication of 6e represents a high water mark in the game's history, as the most realized expression of the game's intent and capabilities. Even if no one ever used it to run even a single rpg session, as an example of game design or cohesive rules text, it was the most thorough and replete edition of the game printed. 

 

Quote

So then, for 6e, what is it best at? <snip some interesting pragmatism that I can more or less agree with>

 

As it happens, I did in fact run games using 6e and found it to be quite good at all the same things that 5e and 4e were good at. I think 6e offers some compelling features and improvements, particularly in the realm of granularity and extra (extreme, often) clarity around rules interactions that in earlier editions relied more on GM's making spot rulings. But it is kind of like a newer year version of the car you already own...it smells better and has some updated gizmos and a better stereo which can be pretty cool and more safety features of course, better gas mileage, but it performs the same basic function as your old car without the nostalgic charm and the seat you've got worn in just right, so if the old car is still getting it done for you and you don't want a new car payment, then drive it till it dies is a viable strategy. 

 

If I were committed to a 5e or 4e campaign and were playing with a group who were happy in one of those editions and did not want to upshift, I might retroport some features from 6e but would be perfectly content to remain at 5e or 4e if people were having fun.

 

Quote

I will speculate baselessly that: A) You run fun games that your players enjoy and B ) You ran fun games in 4e and 5e as well.

 

Your baseless accusations will not stand! Wait, yes, actually both A and B are true statements. 

 

Quote

So...for any additional work that would go in to learning the updated system, re-stating anything that needs re-stated, what's the IRL fun or ease of use that you're getting with 6e that you don't with 4e?

 

Well,  6e turned out to be ideal for the Here There Be Monsters setting ( http://www.killershrike.com/HereThereBeMonsters/Concept.aspx ), as compared to earlier editions of the rules. As it happens, that setting was an update of a way back in the day setting we had called Demon Hunter FBI, which was 4e era. Now, Demon Hunter FBI was a lot of fun and worked great, but the game play was a little more cinematic than was originally intended as the intent that I and the co-creator of the setting had at that time was something closer to X-Files intermingled with Beyond the Supernatural, the movie The First Power, and other similar gritty horror source material where there were supernatural things, but they are extremely off the grid of mainstream consciousness. 

 

Revisiting it many years later and applying 6e to the problem space, I found that the extra granularity and characteristics streamlining was beneficial at the heroic scale. Some other areas that proved to work a bit better in practice in 6e was variable power pools, which were much easier to dial in at the low power level and still be useful. Resource Pools were another big enabler which greatly enhanced gameplay and modeling characters (but that wasn't new to 6e, it originated in 5e Dark Champions). It wasn't all rainbows and lollipops, there were some rough edges which I've discussed elsewhere in the past. But on the whole, it was more pros than cons. Nothing earth shattering; but an overall trend towards smoother character creation and gameplay with the occasional surprise or curveball in the form of something that was well understood per earlier edition functionality but which turned out to work slightly differently in the new version.

 

Having progressed to 6e, I would find it to be a step backwards to go back to 5e or 4e, but I could do it. I would recommend trying 6e, obviously, but I also understand people for whom it isn't worth the effort or expense. What I am taken aback by is not people preferring an earlier version of the rules, but rather when people express strong negative opinions or disregard towards 6e which seems unwarranted to me personally.

[Tech]

Reading through this, no one is changing their opinions based on personal preferences being stated. I think it was Lord L who said he's just tired of debating nowadays (correct me if I'm wrong.) I agree. For the most part, I don't bother debating anymore.

 

I will say that 6e went to two books whereas 5th was one. I haven't bothered to look at other genres or systems - not interested. I'm sure D&D has alot of books but I'm not talking about D&D: I'm talking about this system. I've heard the complaints of new people saying it's like reading an encyclopedia and I believe there's validity in such a complaint. Whether it's a better system than before or not, did 6e make it easier for new players to enjoy it?

 

My major concern isn't which edition people is using or debating who thinks which edition is better. No. I'm looking for whether or not this system will ultimately disappear because of lack of advertising or interest. When Champions 1, 2 and 3 were going strong, I saw advertising. What about now? Are we reaching new players still, is my big concern. I've heard some current players introducing family or friends to the system and I'm glad, but it's still in because of the current players.

 

I've got the (relatively) recent Champions Complete. It was a single book at 250 pages (vs 5th ed at 372 pages) and contained enough to get new players interested.

 

So, is 6e mechanically etc? I have my preference; others differ and that's fine. I think the more important question is are more players joining us, and whether this system will be around in ten years, whether 1st - 6th, 7th, rebooted system, etc.

[Doc Democracy]

39 minutes ago, Tech said:

I think the more important question is are more players joining us, and whether this system will be around in ten years, whether 1st - 6th, 7th, rebooted system, etc.

 

It is not a terrible question but we live in a different world.  I would like to think there will be more people playing the game that I want to play but I think if I want to GM, I will always find players if the game pitch is good enough.

 

I grew up in a time when, if there were no copies of a book in my local store then it was essentially impossible to buy it.  Now the internet has changed everything.  Right now, I can take a PDF to a local store and have a hard copy printed.  I can have 3rd, 4th, 5th or 6th Edition printed as often as I want.  I will always have access to those books.  It is likely that anyone that wants the book will always be able to purchase a copy and print it out.

 

I do not think it is likely that games will ever disappear any more.  The system will always be around.

 

I think this means that game companies do have to re-think how they survive - re-selling old editions is easy.  Doing new things can be easier but when all the old editions are available, are there other things they need to do?  I think that the driver to produce a new edition - rather than re-print the old stuff a company would tart things up and publish a new edition.  If the need to have hard copy reduces, why go to the effort of doing a new edition.  This is probably doubly true of HERO where there are lots of things that are essentially the same??

 

I think the things that come out of this kind of discussion are the kinds of things that might sell, and thus might motivate talented people to produce text.  As such I think it is good to talk.  We might not necessarily change anyone's mind and talk past each other but it might inspire something the rest of will buy some time down the line.  It is especially good to talk when the discourse is polite, even when it gets robust.  So much more chance of positive outcomes.

 

Also, what else would I do when I was sitting at home?  Just watch TV, much more interesting to interact with folk all over the world who share an interest with me.  ?

 

Doc