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What makes a complete game "complete"?


Brian Stanfield

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To be fair, there were a lot of things I liked about New Millennium, including that simplified approach that kept the size of the game at a ready-to-play-by-Friday size. 

 

Didn't like Fuzion a lot, though. I might have, if it weren't for the oversights in what got left out,  but we will never know now, will we?  :lol:

 

 

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5 hours ago, Tywyll said:

While I certainly appreciate HERO for this, I'm not sure how much of a selling point this would be to new players who don't have the experience of being hemmed into a class or game designer choice to compare that new found freedom to. In fact, as has been my experience, even with gamers who have numerous systems under their belts, that level of freedom can be offputting if they aren't willing to really invest in the system. I suppose for every 1 system convert I've created, I've seen 10 or so players who just floundered with that sort of freedom. 

I find this sad.  People have become so used to being "hemmed in", that they've forgotten how to be free.  They've been "institutionalized" like Brooks in Shawshank Redemption.  Like the Israelites leaving Egypt, they have to wander in the desert for forty years to shake off the slave mentality.

 

People have been playing role-playing games probably for almost as long as there have been people.  They just didn't have formalized rules until the late 1970's.  Formalized rules are a good thing, so you can have fairness, and don't have to argue about everything ("I got you!"  "No, you missed!").  Unfortunately, formalized rules can also take away the freedom and creativity that you can use when you don't have formalized rules.  So the best situation is a system of formalized rules that preserve the full flexibility of being able to build and do whatever your creativity can come up with.

 

In the case of new role-players who have no interest in reading the rules, and have no desires and goals regarding spending their XP - or how they want their characters to grow - it sounds to me like people who really don't want to play.  Or maybe they just haven't grasped the basic concept of role-playing games.

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1 hour ago, PhilFleischmann said:

I find this sad.  People have become so used to being "hemmed in", that they've forgotten how to be free.  They've been "institutionalized" like Brooks in Shawshank Redemption.  Like the Israelites leaving Egypt, they have to wander in the desert for forty years to shake off the slave mentality.

 

People have been playing role-playing games probably for almost as long as there have been people.  They just didn't have formalized rules until the late 1970's.  Formalized rules are a good thing, so you can have fairness, and don't have to argue about everything ("I got you!"  "No, you missed!").  Unfortunately, formalized rules can also take away the freedom and creativity that you can use when you don't have formalized rules.  So the best situation is a system of formalized rules that preserve the full flexibility of being able to build and do whatever your creativity can come up with.

 

In the case of new role-players who have no interest in reading the rules, and have no desires and goals regarding spending their XP - or how they want their characters to grow - it sounds to me like people who really don't want to play.  Or maybe they just haven't grasped the basic concept of role-playing games.

 

No, that's not right at all. These are people who have roleplayed numerous systems for years. But they are also adults who with limited time, jobs, and other constraints. Being dismissive of player realities won't help sell the game. 

 

As many have said in this thread, throwing a tool kit out for people doesn't really work (or else we wouldn't be having this conversation and HERO would be the RPG leader). Creativity thrives on limitations, check any creative writing course or book on the subject. Analysis Paralysis is a real thing, and it limits the acceptance of this and any other open source systems. We have to take that into account if we are going to attempt to broaden the game's appeal. 

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I certainly did not intend to be dismissive of real-world time constraints - I have them, too.  But it seems to me most people interested in role-playing games, who are actively involved in an RPG campaign would at least take the time to read *some* of the rules of the system they're playing in - even if only the specific parts relevant to their character.  They don't have to buy the book - the GM can lend it to them.

 

And likewise, I would assume that players interested in the game have some goals for their character.  And they would get at least a little bit excited about gaining a few XP to spend, and put at least a little thought into what they might buy with them, or what they're saving up for.  If they were interested in the previous game session, it seems to me that at some point they would think, "Boy, it sure would have been handy to have Skill X in that last adventure, maybe I should buy it with my new XP," or "My X Skill roll was not quite up to the challenge last time, maybe I should buy it up," or "This X-limitation on my power was annoying, maybe I should buy that off," etc.

 

It seems to me that not being interested in XP is like not knowing to unwrap your Christmas present.

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47 minutes ago, PhilFleischmann said:

I certainly did not intend to be dismissive of real-world time constraints - I have them, too.  But it seems to me most people interested in role-playing games, who are actively involved in an RPG campaign would at least take the time to read *some* of the rules of the system they're playing in - even if only the specific parts relevant to their character.  They don't have to buy the book - the GM can lend it to them.

My personal experience is that the members of my group who are problematic in this respect are problematic because they're not independently motivated.  They won't do a thing during non-game time.  Even leveling up is done at start/end of a session.  So they've adopted the mantra of "I'll learn as I play" because they won't learn outside play. 

This infuriates me to no end.

 

47 minutes ago, PhilFleischmann said:

And likewise, I would assume that players interested in the game have some goals for their character.  And they would get at least a little bit excited about gaining a few XP to spend, and put at least a little thought into what they might buy with them, or what they're saving up for.  If they were interested in the previous game session, it seems to me that at some point they would think, "Boy, it sure would have been handy to have Skill X in that last adventure, maybe I should buy it with my new XP," or "My X Skill roll was not quite up to the challenge last time, maybe I should buy it up," or "This X-limitation on my power was annoying, maybe I should buy that off," etc.

 

It seems to me that not being interested in XP is like not knowing to unwrap your Christmas present.

I'm around a hundred XP into my current Champions character and am at a point where I'm not really spending it anymore.  The character very effectively does the things I want her to be good at doing, and with a large group I'm not interested in stepping too far outside her current role. 

I've seen a similar thing in a different game, where the pistol-wielding eccentric character was highly effective right out of chargen at the things the not-pistol-wielding eccentric player was interested in doing.  As a result, they weren't motivated by bonus XP and didn't really get excited by mechanical progression.  That state of affairs lasted around a year, until the player and character learned that revolvers were possible in-setting and started greedily accumulating XP to work towards making their own. 

And in treadmill-progression systems like D&D, I've seen players explicitly request the party not level up because they've realized it requires them to learn new abilities that don't actually make them stronger relative to their foes. 

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8 hours ago, PhilFleischmann said:

best situation is a system of formalized rules that preserve the full flexibility of being able to build and do whatever your creativity can come up with. In the case of new role-players who have no interest in reading the rules,

 

I tend to agree with this, which is why I play the version with 72 pages of rules instead of approximately one-thousand, seven-hundred and ninety-five pages of rules (vol 1&2, Martial Arts, Skills, APG 1&2.  Other blue books not counted).  I rather like the one with 130 pages of rules (6e Basic), but even that has "no" and "must" a lot more than I care for in my games.  And apparently it left powers out-- I can't remember off the top of my head, but I think it was Negation.  That could have been summed up handily enough to take up another page or less.  Not sure why it was left out.  :-/  We currently have a system that, to paraphrase, 'preserves the full flexibility of being able to build and do whatever you want,' so long as you want to do it _this_ way.  

 

But I won't quibble about this: for one, Tywill summed up the crux of the problem better than I could have, and for two, I am truly positive that you had no actual intent to slight people who simply don't have the time to eighteen-hundred pages of text only to find out that they didn't actually get a _game_, and now have to sit down and make the universe.  At the end of the day, that's a damned hard sell.  :lol:

 

8 hours ago, PhilFleischmann said:

have no desires and goals regarding spending their XP - or how they want their characters to grow - it sounds to me like people who really don't want to play.  Or maybe they just haven't grasped the basic concept of role-playing games.

 

Well let's us step back just a minute, a little further back so we can look at this from more of an "outside" point of view than we usually do, what with all of us here being pretty well-entrenched HEROphiles and all that:

 

Going back to the hectic world we live in-- Hell, I'll be sixty next month, I work two jobs totaling just over eighty hours a week, and I hustle side work on Sunday afternoons when I can get it.  I'm not too terribly unique, really: most of my players work in the 60-hours-a-week range.

 

A lot of people don't _want_ that kind of investment.  They want someone to prepare them a game in which they can enjoy a little escapist fun.  Villain-of-the-week type stuff; simple scenarios; maybe even >gasp, I say< a little murder-hoboing.  They want to get together with friends, shoot guns, blow stuff up, and otherwise let off some steam.  They want to be devil-may-care, live for some fun right now kind of people.  They just aren't interested in looking at "where do I see this character in a year?  Two?  Even if we're talking game time, there are a lot of people that just don't _want_ to invest in a second life because the one they are already living just sucks the joy from them.  Escapism, as simple as possible.

 

I can live with that.  It's not my bag, but I totally _get_ where it comes from.  There's notthing wrong with them-- Hell, Im the exact opposite.  To this _day_ I prefer to start out with 250 point supers and _grow_ the character, but I have to level with you: that growth occurs a crapload slower than it used to!   :lol:

 

 

Just food for thought. ;)

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, Gnome BODY (important!) said:

My personal experience is that the members of my group who are problematic in this respect are problematic because they're not independently motivated.  They won't do a thing during non-game time.  Even leveling up is done at start/end of a session.  So they've adopted the mantra of "I'll learn as I play" because they won't learn outside play. 

This infuriates me to no end.

That sounds a lot like what I said before:  They don't really want to play.

 

I would say the same thing about any game, or indeed any hobby.  If you're not willing to learn the rules and strategy of chess, then you don't really want to play chess.  If you don't want to learn how to play golf, then you don't really want to play golf.  If you don't want to learn to play piano, then you don't really want to play piano.  There's no instantaneous, magical way to get the knowledge into your head without making the effort to learn it.  Pick any hobby or any human activity.  If you don't have sufficient motivation to go to medical school, then you don't have sufficient motivation to be a doctor.  Anything in life worth doing is going to require work.  Fortunately, learning the Hero System is much easier than medical school.

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1 minute ago, PhilFleischmann said:

That sounds a lot like what I said before:  They don't really want to play.

 

I would say the same thing about any game, or indeed any hobby.  If you're not willing to learn the rules and strategy of chess, then you don't really want to play chess.  If you don't want to learn how to play golf, then you don't really want to play golf.  If you don't want to learn to play piano, then you don't really want to play piano.  There's no instantaneous, magical way to get the knowledge into your head without making the effort to learn it.  Pick any hobby or any human activity.  If you don't have sufficient motivation to go to medical school, then you don't have sufficient motivation to be a doctor.  Anything in life worth doing is going to require work.  Fortunately, learning the Hero System is much easier than medical school.

Oh no, they really want to play.  They love playing.  I can assure you of it, I've seen all the do-nothing-outside-game-time players get together and cheerfully organize a session before.  Setting, system, characters, the works.  But only during game time.  They just really don't want to spend non-play time on play-things.  They want to play TTRPGs, but only in one or two 4-8 hour chunks a week and not at all outside that. 

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On 2/20/2020 at 8:09 PM, Brian Stanfield said:

Monster Hunter International was a great attempt at capitalizing on some popular fiction, but they ended out on the wrong side of public opinion when this guy started spouting off about his politics. I was at Origins last year and the author, Larry Correia, was supposed to make an appearance but had to cancel because of a bomb threat! People are still angry at this guy, years later. Jason Walters won't even utter the name of the game anymore. I think maybe this left a sour taste in DOJ's mouth. But I just saw that Savage Worlds has a Kickstarter for their own version of MHI, so clearly there's still interest in the franchise. Looks like DOJ simply dropped the ball, yet again, on something that has real potential but no support. 

 

 

Yikes! I didn't know anything about this guy, what a rabbit hole. Glad to get some perspective on the line. Sorry it didn't work out for DOJ, but I think being tied to a devisive franchise would probably not have been helpful long term. 

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

Oh no, they really want to play.  They love playing.  I can assure you of it, I've seen all the do-nothing-outside-game-time players get together and cheerfully organize a session before.  Setting, system, characters, the works.  But only during game time.  They just really don't want to spend non-play time on play-things.  They want to play TTRPGs, but only in one or two 4-8 hour chunks a week and not at all outside that. 

 

Pretty much this. 

 

And, though I don't like it or agree with it, there is nothing inherently wrong with this. Casual gamers are still gamers, even if I find it incredibly frustrating. We can't just ignore that (probably quite large) portion of gamers because they don't game like we do. 

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Going back to a Complete game, I have to say, I'm not super into the idea of a game that doesn't include some kind of supernatural powers or at least high tech/cybernetics. Spies, cops, detectives all of that has always left me cold and pulp has no interest to me except the supers of that genre.

 

I never got to play Espionage or the other earlier Hero games so they don't hold the same interest to me. Even if I had, I probably would never have been interested in them because of the above.

 

However, I was looking at a copy of 1st Edition Star Hero that I recently got from ebay and I found it hella complete. Not only did it have all the important rules from hero, character creation, combat, etc. It include space ships, space combat, computers, aliens, several pages of high tech gear, a setting and an adventure, all in 192 pages. It even had a small section of powers, 16 pages I think of trimmed down common physical and mental powers so you could still run aliens and psychics in your setting. Obviously they dumped a lot of powers and a lot of modifiers, but the fact that they crammed that in there certainly made me feel like I could run a game with just that book if I had nothing else. I also liked how it discussed how to run different kinds of sci-fi campaigns if you don't want to use their setting.

 

I was always a fan of Tri-Stats (another 'universal game system') hardbacks Ex-Machina and Dreaming Cities. These were well produced books with the core Tri Stat system and then three different settings each based on those rules, showing you how you could use the rules to make different campaigns.

 

Not entirely sure where I'm going with this, other than to say I think any book should have options for different kinds of games. I'm not sure Action Hero is the right call, honestly, because I can't think of any game that didn't include powers/supernatural elements has ever been a major force in the gaming community. At the very least, I would expect the complete game to include at least some mental powers for psychics (prebuilt is fine), some pregenned zombies and/or alien invaders, and maybe a few spells for an urban fantasy style game (if you want to stick to the modern era).  

 

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

My personal experience is that the members of my group who are problematic in this respect are problematic because they're not independently motivated.  They won't do a thing during non-game time.  Even leveling up is done at start/end of a session.  So they've adopted the mantra of "I'll learn as I play" because they won't learn outside play. 

This infuriates me to no end.

 

This, to me, is another "RP" vs "G".  I can see, especially in a game that does not follow the typical D&D "zero to hero" progression, players being quite happy with the character they have designed, without needing an extra power, bonuses to hit or damage, etc. etc. etc. every few gaming sessions.  If we look to the source material, we see many examples of characters who don't continually manifest new and more powerful abilities.

 

Now, we could simulate these materials with xp.  They don't gain new powers and abilities, but they gain Contacts, Reputation, Favours, etc.  Of course, they also LOSE things, something that RPGs as a whole never simulate.  That "gains that evolve through gameplay" model can be simulated with xp, or simulated without xp. 

 

So to me, not wanting to keep rebuilding and adding on to the character is not:

 

9 hours ago, PhilFleischmann said:

They don't really want to play.

 

I would say the same thing about any game, or indeed any hobby.  If you're not willing to learn the rules and strategy of chess, then you don't really want to play chess.  If you don't want to learn how to play golf, then you don't really want to play golf.  If you don't want to learn to play piano, then you don't really want to play piano.  There's no instantaneous, magical way to get the knowledge into your head without making the effort to learn it.  Pick any hobby or any human activity.  If you don't have sufficient motivation to go to medical school, then you don't have sufficient motivation to be a doctor.  Anything in life worth doing is going to require work.  Fortunately, learning the Hero System is much easier than medical school.

 

If you don't want to role play, you fall into a purely mechanical style of gaming based on power and abilities, focused on making your character consistently "better" and you roll play.  But someone who simply wants to role play that eccentric scientist may well realize his vision of the character right out of the gate with his base points and complications. 

 

Or his character may grow over a few story arcs, but eventually reach a point like:

 

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

I'm around a hundred XP into my current Champions character and am at a point where I'm not really spending it anymore.  The character very effectively does the things I want her to be good at doing, and with a large group I'm not interested in stepping too far outside her current role. 

 

I've seen a similar thing in a different game, where the pistol-wielding eccentric character was highly effective right out of chargen at the things the not-pistol-wielding eccentric player was interested in doing.  As a result, they weren't motivated by bonus XP and didn't really get excited by mechanical progression.

 

That does not mean they don't want to play.  It means that they want to play this character, fully realized, without becoming more powerful, or more versatile.  They want to PLAY THIS CHARACTER, not grow it into a different character.  Because:

 

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

Oh no, they really want to play.  They love playing.  I can assure you of it, I've seen all the do-nothing-outside-game-time players get together and cheerfully organize a session before.  Setting, system, characters, the works.  But only during game time.  They just really don't want to spend non-play time on play-things.  They want to play TTRPGs, but only in one or two 4-8 hour chunks a week and not at all outside that. 

 

Guess what?  None of these approaches are badwrongfun.  Or, if one is, so are all of the others, if we view them from another perspective.

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On 2/25/2020 at 8:48 AM, Hugh Neilson said:

A lot of the issue is presentation.  In Hero, we tend to see

...

Cone of Frost

Concentrate:  1/2 DCV throughout

Components:  Gestures 1 handed throughout; Incantations to activate; Arcane Focus Ring of Frost Wizardry

Skill Roll:  Magic skill, -1 per 1d6

Endurance:  1 per 1d6 every phase

 

The mechanics are exactly the same, but they are presented in a more familiar format, focusing on how the spell will work in the Hero-Powered Game, not how it was constructed using the Hero System Build Rules.

 

This is a brilliant post, Hugh.  I've run through the character sheets of D&D and HERO and the spell cards vs. the book write-ups between the systems and I keep coming away with presentation being the primary problem for players.

The numbers of stats and derived stats and attributes you have to track in D&D is within 1 or 2 of Fantasy HERO.

Last Sunday I'm playing D&D with a group of veteran players and we still had to look up several items during the session.  The combat maneuvers are simpler, but overall game play is about the same level of complexity.

 

HERO, minus the build your own custom powers bits, isn't any more complicated, but it is perceived as overwhelmingly complicated.

 

I think you're really on to something here.

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I forget who first said that Hero (as opposed to a game powered by Hero) has its complexity front-loaded into character creation, so it is the first thing the player sees.  They can build an ineffective fighter or wizard in D&D, but the system makes it harder to do so, and provides easy, generic starting character "templates".  RESULT:  Hero appears more complex.

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1 hour ago, ScottishFox said:

I think you're really on to something here.

 

A lot of us have been suggesting this approach for years now. It's not rocket surgery, it's just common sense.

 

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

They just really don't want to spend non-play time on play-things.

 

Okay, but are they actually learning the ins and outs of the HERO System with their learn-as-they-go approach? I've observed that there is a pretty high correlation between players who aren't interested enough to invest non-game time on the game (not even to read up on the rules) and those who never come to really understand the game system.

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13 minutes ago, ScottishFox said:

I wouldn't say it's common sense if the product has been moving in the opposite direction for a couple decades.

 

Well, I think it is common sense once you sit back and break down (and understand) what makes the direction of 5e and 6e so misguided.

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

Oh no, they really want to play.  They love playing.

Fair enough.

 

Then the main concern is what zslane brings up:  Are they indeed gradually learning the game system?  If so, then I guess all is well.

 

Maybe it's my own vestigial remnant of the D&D "box" that I still want my character to get better, more skilled, more powerful, over time.  I want those experience points!  And I want to spend them sooner or later, to gradually improve my abilities, or maybe to buy new ones.

 

OTOH, I think that's also part of my desire to play a hero - something very much not in the D&D box.  I want to be one of the good guys - not just to say it and be recognized for it, but to actually do as much good and heroic work in the fictitious world I'm playing in.  And the more powerful I am, the more good I can do.  I want to rid the world of evil and create my own line of hair care potions.  I want to eventually defeat Kal-Turak/Doctor Destroyer/etc.  And I can't do that as a starting-level character.  I don't just want to be, as some here have put it, a "murder hobo".

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On 2/25/2020 at 7:15 AM, Tywyll said:

 

And actually this would be something that could be produced via the license. If your setting/adventure guide had all the character creation templates (ala what's in Champions 5th or 6th but keyed to X genre), all available talents, powers (spell system/psychic system/etc), gear, plus an adventure...and a note saying  you need X Complete to play, that would be the closest we could come to making a 'Complete Game' for HERO.

 

So this is the other model I suggested earlier, but nobody has really bitten. It seems like, instead of a bunch of different independent games, we could instead keep the same independent settings, and in those books tweak all the dials and levers to offer the templates, gear, powers/spells, power levels, etc., so it's basically a ready-to-play game supplement to the core rules. This may make more sense in the big picture.

 

No matter the approach, however, there's always going to be a problem of narrowing down some items while still needing to remain vague and open about others:

  • Want all the rules included in one book, and abilities and gear pre-generated? No problem, but what if you want to play a variation of that game and don't have the appropriate gear? Let's say you are playing Action HERO but you'd rather include mad scientists with super psychic powers or something. Well, you're going to have to buy the core rules to modify the game yourself.
  • Want to write a game book that takes all of the variations into account? Well then you're going to have to sacrifice brevity for the sake of being more inclusive. Action HERO may include a section on all the different genre variations, and perhaps even include a resource guide for each variant. The game will be more complete, with no need for any other books, but the game itself will necessarily be a longer book. You may even have to create several different settings for the different versions of the game.
  • If you do more of a setting/campaign book, then you don't need to present the rules since you'll be depending on the core rules to take care of that. Now you have more space to play with, either in terms of different variations on the genre. But you're asking people to buy more than one book, with the possibility that they'll be overwhelmed by the relentlessly wordy core rules presentation. And you still may have to include more than one setting, which makes things more complicated.
  • You could do a different setting/campaign book for each possible variation of the genre, offering each as a supplement to the core rules. Each book would be a complete game based on the core rules, but by itself would be unplayable. It would be like all the GURPS genre books: great resources, but not actually rules in and of themselves. Many problems are solve by this approach, but it still requires the core rules, with can be daunting.

I'm trying to find a happy medium, which may not actually exist. But it's fun (for me at least) to consider the approaches in light of what's been done before, and perhaps even more importantly, what hasn't been done before. 

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On 2/25/2020 at 7:22 AM, Tywyll said:

 

Almost every major game these days needs multiple books. Pathfinder, D&D, WoD,  HERO. I can't think of any big name releases out now that don't use a multiple book format. Exalted 3rd ed maybe, but that rulebook is like 900 pages, so that ought to have been multiple books!

 

Even FATE has multiple rule books, Dresden Files was released in two books, my list goes on.

 

There are a few one and dones, but they are all indie releases or oldschool games really. 

 

Unfortunately, HERO System doesn't have the FLGS presence that the games you mention have. D&D used to be under one cover, but they soon learned, with AD&D, that people will buy every book TSR created, and beg for more! One of the reasons I switched to Champions, and ultimately Fantasy HERO, was because D&D was coming out with a 2nd edition, and I refused to give them all of my allowance all over again just to get the same game I already had. The appeal of Fantasy HERO was that it was a one-book game! They released a Bestiary, which was actually pretty helpful but not necessary for playing. The ideal of the one-book game made HERO System appealing. Justice, Inc. is probably the best thing HERO System ever released, in my opinion, as a one-box game. It's brilliant, includes just enough to keep it open to many variations, and also includes a campaign book with lots (and lots) of adventures and plot seeds. Box games are out of vogue now, except for D&D's basic set. But I've given up that idea, which has been covered in great depth here.

 

DOJ would not be well-served with yet another multi-book set. The 6e rules are out of print anyway, and Champions/Fantasy HERO Complete are barely present in physical form. My idea in this thread is to try to create a one-book game that can be taken to conventions, game shops, or whatever, and sold as-is as a complete game that new players can pick up and quickly play. As the system is now, this is impossible, even with Champions Complete, since there is no setting and no pre-built anything provided for new players. 

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2 hours ago, zslane said:

 

A lot of us have been suggesting this approach for years now.

 

Yep. 

 

I have said it before, but everyone seems to think I'm kidding.  I didn't buy any of the 5e NPC books because I can't read the damned things.  My eyes are fine, and I've been playing Champions since the first edition, but the last two?  Got the rules and some of the genre and setting books.  Everything else is just gibberish.

 

What you see as Hugh's example is pretty much what my power / spell write-ups look like when they get finalized, because it's not just easier on my players,  but on _me_. 

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2 hours ago, zslane said:

Okay, but are they actually learning the ins and outs of the HERO System with their learn-as-they-go approach? I've observed that there is a pretty high correlation between players who aren't interested enough to invest non-game time on the game (not even to read up on the rules) and those who never come to really understand the game system.

One does, one definitely does, one definitely doesn't, and one seems to but they don't talk rules outside their own character so they may just have learned a subset of the rules. 

It still irritates me because I feel their decision is selfishly costing the group game-time every time we start a new game.  But "the things I can't change" and all that, unless I feel like running PARANOIA. 

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4 hours ago, Brian Stanfield said:

Want all the rules included in one book, and abilities and gear pre-generated? No problem, but what if you want to play a variation of that game and don't have the appropriate gear? Let's say you are playing Gunslingers of Venus but you'd rather include mad scientists with super psychic powers or something. Well, you're going to have to buy the core rules to modify the game yourself.

 

Yes, precisely. And this is the only approach that has any chance of real success, IMO. And the ""all the rules in one book" idea only refers to core rules, not every possible expansion of the game (more gear, more creatures, more whatever). The core book is just the start, even though it should be complete enough to get a campaign started.

 

(BTW, I altered the generic non-game reference to a concrete, setting-based game reference for conceptual clarity.)

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

One does, one definitely does, one definitely doesn't, and one seems to but they don't talk rules outside their own character so they may just have learned a subset of the rules. 

It still irritates me because I feel their decision is selfishly costing the group game-time every time we start a new game.  But "the things I can't change" and all that, unless I feel like running PARANOIA. 

 

In my group, I only have one experienced gamer, and he only knows D&D, but I basically told them "tell me what you want to do, and I'll show you how to do it." I actually don't want them to think about the rules first, and then their options second. So I'll try to sneak the lessons in as we go. No, they don't read the rules much, but I want them to get used to the idea that there probably is a rule for what they want to do. I may trick them into looking for rules on their own eventually, but really I just want them to (for now) enjoy the process of gaming and to realize that there are certain structures and rhythms to gaming that are worth learning and refining. 

 

I think they actually keep showing up for the food and booze.

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