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Star HERO Edition Comparison?


GM_Champion

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Hi all,

 

1) if anyone's search-fu is awesome, I would like links to any threads here comparing the Star HERO editions.

 

2) I'm interested in particular if the pages/chapters in each edition for subgenre selection/campaign design have held up well, considering the passage of time in real life makes future predictions obsolete fast (compare 1990s looking at Cyberpunk vs. Transhumanist sci-fi written in the last few years, or Cyberpunk 2020 vs. Sarah Newton's Mindjammer (there's a Traveller version if Fate is troublesome to convert to HERO).)

 

In short, does the advice of (especially) 3rd edition Star HERO hold up as well as Allston's 3E Strike Force does?

 

Likewise for 5E Star HERO and any other editions I missed. (6E is the most recent, but being almost 10 years old, how has its explanation of Transhumanist sci-fi survived in 2019?)

 

Thanks in advance! (No wrong answers!)

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  • 10 months later...

1) I'm not aware of links to forum threads that compare the various Star HERO editions.

2) I can only refer to Star HERO 6E, and cite specific Powers that are appropriate to Transhumanist sci-fi. Note: Transhumanism isn't explicitly discussed in Star HERO 6E, but Cyberpunk is discussed. Here are a few page references from Star HERO 6E that discuss "transhumanist" topics without stating the term:

 

  • Cyberpunk genre: pp 16 - 18
  • Transform power: pp 82
  • Alien Species chapter, specifically, Creating Alien Species, Super Intellects and uplifted animals: pp 150
  • Computers as Characters: pp 193
  • Biotechnology: pp 197 - 198
  • Nanotechnology: pp 199

 

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  • 3 months later...
On 11/1/2019 at 11:16 PM, GM_Champion said:

In short, does the advice of (especially) 3rd edition Star HERO hold up as well as Allston's 3E Strike Force does?

 

I'm not sure anything does. 

 

I thought 3rd edition Star Hero was a little on the weak side, and also suffered some for being the last product out the door before 4th edition.  If I'd been in charge of Hero Games at the time, I'd probably have taken out all of the game mechanics, released it as a genre book for 4th edition, and included notes on how to use it with 3rd edition (Champions and Danger International), and also used it as a sort of "back door upgrade" for 3rd to 4th edition games.  I'd done a lot of other SF gaming with Hero at the time, using other SF RPGs converted, with a group that was extremely good at doing that sort of thing.  

 

The starship rules didn't fit with the earlier vehicle rules in Champions II, the mecha rules in Robot Warriors, or the vehicle rules in 4th edition.  They would probably work pretty well as an alternative system, if none of the other systems were desired.  The technology section was pretty good, between the equipment guide and the section on tech levels.  The advice on campaigning suffered a lot for there being so little of it (7 pages); the stuff on technology and tech levels generally likewise (5 pages); and there were also small sections on designing societies, and the use of aliens in games.  It includes a bit of sample setting, along with a sample campaign framework and adventure.  Nothing at all on space science or designing planets. 

 

All of the things it suffers for were artifacts of making it a "complete in one" third edition era standalone game, and of it coming out so closely before 4th edition.  Not the book's fault, nor the authors'.  Also, GURPS Space came out around the same time, and was probably a better Star Hero than Star Hero 3rd edition was.  

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9 hours ago, archer said:

IIRC in Battletech, 2014 was the year that humanity first discovered hyperdrive.

 

That made real-life 2014 more than a little disappointing.

 

I remember feeling distinctively cheated when 2000 rolled around Where were the flying cars and trips to the moon? All we got was people fretting over the Y2K bug!

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