6th Ed Slower Character Development

[Tywyll]

So I've been looking at my 6th ed books some lately and I've noticed that it feels like character development would be much slower in a 6th edition game. Characters start with more points, but things (often) cost more (yes, individual characteristics are often cheaper but without figured characteristics many builds need to spend more points). With the over all point cost increase, there has not been an equivalent increase in xp gain. So it seems like a campaign characters might start more powerful (or equivalent) but over all it will take them longer to improve.

 

Is this a fair assessment?

 

Yes, I know GM's can give more xp, etc etc but I am talking about RAW. 

[Doc Democracy]

I don't think advancement would be appreciably slower.  Yup, the new system costs more to establish some baselines but the vast majority of improvements cost the same as before. 

 

I think it would only be improving combat values that would cost more/take longer and I am pretty sanguine about that.

 

Doc

[Killer Shrike]

1. the "power" of the player characters is relative to the norms of the setting and opposition...starting with more or less points doesn't really mean anything without anything external to compare it to. In this context, while players may start w/ more points going by the suggested values, so do the opposition. So, in the end, status quo.

 

2. "individual characteristics are often cheaper but without figured characteristics many builds need to spend more points": if you are intent on inflating stats to the absurd levels typical in previous editions published material, sure. But if you take a beat and realize that getting rid of figureds was intended to remove the inflation that was caused by people buying up primary's to take advantage of point recursions, and just buy primary and secondary characteristics to reasonable levels that are appropriate to describe the character I think you'll find that you'll spend about the same or less points on characteristics overall. 

 

3. I haven't found character progression to be slower in 6e, relative to 5e or 4e, to the point that I would consider it a problem. However, I have a bias...relative to other games I find Hero System progression to be slow in general and I prefer this, personally. I don't like games where characters "level up" fast as it destroys the ability to tell a consistent narrative in long play mode which is my preferred approach. Gross power ups...zero to hero...is fine for movies, short novels, board games, etc...but unsatisfying (to me) for more weighty formats. I prefer a more natural feeling character progression where characters get better (and worse) in ways that make sense to the events of the story / the things they've been through. 6e is no better or worse in this regard in my experience than 5e or 4e. 

[dsatow]

Yes, it slows down certain progressions.  It does not affect damage progression, as the costs to increase damage have stayed the same.  Increasing one's CVs has changed slightly.  Increasing one's OCV + DCV would normally cost about 8 points (9 points for Dex -1 for Spd).  The effect of buying up your CV would also give you benefits in tripsheet placement and Dex rolls (like breakfall and diving for cover).  Placing the conversation solely on CVs, raising OCV and DCV by 1 is 10 points.  Likewise, most combat skill levels have gone up in cost by about 2 points.  So, in changing CVs, the difference is about 1 extra game session for most people assuming at least 2-3 xp per session.

[Killer Shrike]

58 minutes ago, dsatow said:

Yes, it slows down certain progressions.  It does not affect damage progression, as the costs to increase damage have stayed the same.  Increasing one's CVs has changed slightly.  Increasing one's OCV + DCV would normally cost about 8 points (9 points for Dex -1 for Spd).  The effect of buying up your CV would also give you benefits in tripsheet placement and Dex rolls (like breakfall and diving for cover).  Placing the conversation solely on CVs, raising OCV and DCV by 1 is 10 points.  Likewise, most combat skill levels have gone up in cost by about 2 points.  So, in changing CVs, the difference is about 1 extra game session for most people assuming at least 2-3 xp per session.

 

The goal of raising CV is not to reach a specific number but rather to remain competitive with the average CV of the campaign.

 

And thus the counter argument there is that a given character does not need to advance their CV to the same levels as earlier editions to be competitive unless everyone else is also, and as raising CV costs more for everyone across the board the speed of progression is internally consistent. A rising tide lifts all boats.

[Hugh Neilson]

A lot depends on the "advancement" desired.

 

D&D is very much a "zero to hero" model.  Most of its d20 descendants are similar.

 

If the average CV, defenses and DC of the campaign continue to rise, the PCs simply need to match that rise.  Most growth of character power is an illusion, as the opposition simply grows in power to match the PCs - the world becomes more powerful as they do.

 

Most Hero games have caps to various key elements.  These can be raised as the campaign progresses, and we see the PCs get more powerful (as do their adversaries).  There's a bit of pushback in some systems now - for example, D&D's move to "bounded accuracy" instead of constantly rising AC and BAB, to maintain some threat from mooks as the heroes advance.

 

Practically, if we dropped the OCV and DCV of every character in a game by 3, dropped their DCs by 3 and their defenses by 10, they would interact in much the same way after this "deflation" than before.  Only their relative power over some arbitrary baseline (normals, for example) would change.

 

The focus on growth in power often decreases any focus on actual role playing and character personality.  I've seen some games keep the xp, but keep the caps largely constant.  Characters grow in breadth, perhaps growing up to the caps in any areas they did not initially max out, but do not increase in overall power. 

 

The system can accommodate many different styles.

[dsatow]

3 hours ago, Killer Shrike said:

 

The goal of raising CV is not to reach a specific number but rather to remain competitive with the average CV of the campaign.

 

And thus the counter argument there is that a given character does not need to advance their CV to the same levels as earlier editions to be competitive unless everyone else is also, and as raising CV costs more for everyone across the board the speed of progression is internally consistent. A rising tide lifts all boats.

 

As Hugh said, it depends on the campaign.  Most GMs of HERO probably generally keep the power level consistent, which is fine, but the XP usually get spent somewhere else.  Where the power (CVs, SPD, def, and damage) level remain consistent, I find that other areas begin to rise. After a while, even Mongo, the mentally retarded alien from planet Pugg is equivalent to a genius or a jack of all trades or has tools/wealth/etc.

 

Personally, lately I try to target the players to a big bad at the end of an arc and then let the players spend to take on that villain.  In my current campaign, they are aiming at Dr. Destroyer plus a mystery threat that they won't really know about until Destroyer is dealt with.  In between, they fight lower level big bads.  they've just thwarted Viper's US take over and now will be beefing up to fight Mechanon.

 

[Gnome BODY (important!)]

12 minutes ago, dsatow said:

As Hugh said, it depends on the campaign.  Most GMs of HERO probably generally keep the power level consistent, which is fine, but the XP usually get spent somewhere else.  Where the power (CVs, SPD, def, and damage) level remain consistent, I find that other areas begin to rise. After a while, even Mongo, the mentally retarded alien from planet Pugg is equivalent to a genius or a jack of all trades or has tools/wealth/etc.

If I might ask, what genre(s) do you play where you're experiencing that issue?  I haven't seen that happening in the Champions games I've been in, so I'm just blindly hypothesizing here but I suspect it's mainly linked to genre.  Or more properly, linked to the ability to spend XP on powers. 

Because I've observed that most characters in my group have been buying up powers, with only the "skillier" characters taking talents/perks/skills and generally just to fill obvious holes in their skill selection ("Oh, my tech girl should have Security Systems too.").  But I suspect that if buying powers isn't an option, there's really not much to spend XP on besides damage, CV, Characteristics, and talents/perks/skills.  And if there are caps on CV, damage, and maximum skill roll, that really doesn't leave much to invest in but diversification of talents/perks/skills. 

[dsatow]

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

If I might ask, what genre(s) do you play where you're experiencing that issue?  I haven't seen that happening in the Champions games I've been in, so I'm just blindly hypothesizing here but I suspect it's mainly linked to genre.  Or more properly, linked to the ability to spend XP on powers. 

It usually depends on the age of the campaign or the amount of games under the belt of the player.  I've played in campaigns with characters closing in on 4 digit of XP.

[Nolgroth]

Having run a 6E game way back when it came out, I would say your assessment is mostly fair. The difference is pretty small though. You could award R.A.W. experience awards and the players would not feel cheated or hampered.

[Tywyll]

On 12/28/2019 at 4:54 AM, Nolgroth said:

Having run a 6E game way back when it came out, I would say your assessment is mostly fair. The difference is pretty small though. You could award R.A.W. experience awards and the players would not feel cheated or hampered.

 

It isn't so much about feeling cheated per se, it is just a curiosity about how characters develope since costs have increased mostly but xp remains constant. Hero was already a slow growth game (which is neither good nor bad) and it seems like it is now an even slightly slower growth game. 

[Greywind]

If you want it faster award more XP. It is, after all, your game.