sinanju

I've got this idea for a fantasy game (or novel, I suppose) in which all the classic fantasy "races" exist: elves, dwarves, goblins, orcs, giants, minotaurs, etc. Everything but humans. They're all the creations of a long-gone Ancient civilization. They were created at slaves, cannon fodder, "monsters" for hunts (the Ancients liked the most dangerous game), and playthings. Except humans. Because they're like breeds of dogs--unless you carefully police their bloodlines, they quickly degenerate into mongrels, i.e., humans. Given that the Ancients vanished long ago, there are a LOT of humans. They are, in fact, the majority of the humanoid population. All the other races exist as well, but mostly in their own lands, where they've carefully controlled their breeding for all these centuries. Sometimes they practice "exposure" of infants who aren't X enough. Sometimes they simply expel (or otherwise ostracize) someone who doesn't meet their standards. A lot of "elves" and "dwarves" wandering the world outside their own enclaves aren't *really* elves and dwarves, at least according to their own kind (though these individuals wi'l probably never admit it, and might even fight you for saying it). If you're sufficiently "off" from the ideal, you're a half-elf or half-orc or whatever. And even more reviled.
 
In fact, the only ones more reviled than half-breeds are complete mongrels--i.e., humans. Yes, they're the largest population, and they're not as strong as dwarves (on average), or as graceful as elves (on average), and so forth. But they're tough and overall pretty successful as a race, and they breed like rabbits. And with no regard for lineage--well, except the sad few who occasionally try to claim there's a Human standard, but even most other humans are like, "Dude--give it up. We're all mongrels. Embrace it."
 
Which handily explains why the various other races (or sub-races, if you like) all have fairly specific descriptions. If they don't meet that standard, they're not really that race. And why humans come in all shapes and sizes and colors (hair, eyes, skin). And why, of course, every race is convinced that *they* are the pinnacle of humanoid forms, and everyone else is inferior. Good enough for a traveling/adventuring companion, maybe, but you wouldn't want your sister to marry one. Especially those humans.

Wow! I love this idea. Next time I run a fantasy campaign, I very well might steal this idea! (Nothing publishable, though, so your IP for your novel is still safe!  )

I've got this idea for a fantasy game (or novel, I suppose) in which all the classic fantasy "races" exist: elves, dwarves, goblins, orcs, giants, minotaurs, etc. Everything but humans. They're all the creations of a long-gone Ancient civilization. They were created at slaves, cannon fodder, "monsters" for hunts (the Ancients liked the most dangerous game), and playthings. Except humans. Because they're like breeds of dogs--unless you carefully police their bloodlines, they quickly degenerate into mongrels, i.e., humans. Given that the Ancients vanished long ago, there are a LOT of humans. They are, in fact, the majority of the humanoid population. All the other races exist as well, but mostly in their own lands, where they've carefully controlled their breeding for all these centuries. Sometimes they practice "exposure" of infants who aren't X enough. Sometimes they simply expel (or otherwise ostracize) someone who doesn't meet their standards. A lot of "elves" and "dwarves" wandering the world outside their own enclaves aren't *really* elves and dwarves, at least according to their own kind (though these individuals wi'l probably never admit it, and might even fight you for saying it). If you're sufficiently "off" from the ideal, you're a half-elf or half-orc or whatever. And even more reviled.
 
In fact, the only ones more reviled than half-breeds are complete mongrels--i.e., humans. Yes, they're the largest population, and they're not as strong as dwarves (on average), or as graceful as elves (on average), and so forth. But they're tough and overall pretty successful as a race, and they breed like rabbits. And with no regard for lineage--well, except the sad few who occasionally try to claim there's a Human standard, but even most other humans are like, "Dude--give it up. We're all mongrels. Embrace it."
 
Which handily explains why the various other races (or sub-races, if you like) all have fairly specific descriptions. If they don't meet that standard, they're not really that race. And why humans come in all shapes and sizes and colors (hair, eyes, skin). And why, of course, every race is convinced that *they* are the pinnacle of humanoid forms, and everyone else is inferior. Good enough for a traveling/adventuring companion, maybe, but you wouldn't want your sister to marry one. Especially those humans.

I've got this idea for a fantasy game (or novel, I suppose) in which all the classic fantasy "races" exist: elves, dwarves, goblins, orcs, giants, minotaurs, etc. Everything but humans. They're all the creations of a long-gone Ancient civilization. They were created at slaves, cannon fodder, "monsters" for hunts (the Ancients liked the most dangerous game), and playthings. Except humans. Because they're like breeds of dogs--unless you carefully police their bloodlines, they quickly degenerate into mongrels, i.e., humans. Given that the Ancients vanished long ago, there are a LOT of humans. They are, in fact, the majority of the humanoid population. All the other races exist as well, but mostly in their own lands, where they've carefully controlled their breeding for all these centuries. Sometimes they practice "exposure" of infants who aren't X enough. Sometimes they simply expel (or otherwise ostracize) someone who doesn't meet their standards. A lot of "elves" and "dwarves" wandering the world outside their own enclaves aren't *really* elves and dwarves, at least according to their own kind (though these individuals wi'l probably never admit it, and might even fight you for saying it). If you're sufficiently "off" from the ideal, you're a half-elf or half-orc or whatever. And even more reviled.
 
In fact, the only ones more reviled than half-breeds are complete mongrels--i.e., humans. Yes, they're the largest population, and they're not as strong as dwarves (on average), or as graceful as elves (on average), and so forth. But they're tough and overall pretty successful as a race, and they breed like rabbits. And with no regard for lineage--well, except the sad few who occasionally try to claim there's a Human standard, but even most other humans are like, "Dude--give it up. We're all mongrels. Embrace it."
 
Which handily explains why the various other races (or sub-races, if you like) all have fairly specific descriptions. If they don't meet that standard, they're not really that race. And why humans come in all shapes and sizes and colors (hair, eyes, skin). And why, of course, every race is convinced that *they* are the pinnacle of humanoid forms, and everyone else is inferior. Good enough for a traveling/adventuring companion, maybe, but you wouldn't want your sister to marry one. Especially those humans.

I've got this idea for a fantasy game (or novel, I suppose) in which all the classic fantasy "races" exist: elves, dwarves, goblins, orcs, giants, minotaurs, etc. Everything but humans. They're all the creations of a long-gone Ancient civilization. They were created at slaves, cannon fodder, "monsters" for hunts (the Ancients liked the most dangerous game), and playthings. Except humans. Because they're like breeds of dogs--unless you carefully police their bloodlines, they quickly degenerate into mongrels, i.e., humans. Given that the Ancients vanished long ago, there are a LOT of humans. They are, in fact, the majority of the humanoid population. All the other races exist as well, but mostly in their own lands, where they've carefully controlled their breeding for all these centuries. Sometimes they practice "exposure" of infants who aren't X enough. Sometimes they simply expel (or otherwise ostracize) someone who doesn't meet their standards. A lot of "elves" and "dwarves" wandering the world outside their own enclaves aren't *really* elves and dwarves, at least according to their own kind (though these individuals wi'l probably never admit it, and might even fight you for saying it). If you're sufficiently "off" from the ideal, you're a half-elf or half-orc or whatever. And even more reviled.
 
In fact, the only ones more reviled than half-breeds are complete mongrels--i.e., humans. Yes, they're the largest population, and they're not as strong as dwarves (on average), or as graceful as elves (on average), and so forth. But they're tough and overall pretty successful as a race, and they breed like rabbits. And with no regard for lineage--well, except the sad few who occasionally try to claim there's a Human standard, but even most other humans are like, "Dude--give it up. We're all mongrels. Embrace it."
 
Which handily explains why the various other races (or sub-races, if you like) all have fairly specific descriptions. If they don't meet that standard, they're not really that race. And why humans come in all shapes and sizes and colors (hair, eyes, skin). And why, of course, every race is convinced that *they* are the pinnacle of humanoid forms, and everyone else is inferior. Good enough for a traveling/adventuring companion, maybe, but you wouldn't want your sister to marry one. Especially those humans.

I've got this idea for a fantasy game (or novel, I suppose) in which all the classic fantasy "races" exist: elves, dwarves, goblins, orcs, giants, minotaurs, etc. Everything but humans. They're all the creations of a long-gone Ancient civilization. They were created at slaves, cannon fodder, "monsters" for hunts (the Ancients liked the most dangerous game), and playthings. Except humans. Because they're like breeds of dogs--unless you carefully police their bloodlines, they quickly degenerate into mongrels, i.e., humans. Given that the Ancients vanished long ago, there are a LOT of humans. They are, in fact, the majority of the humanoid population. All the other races exist as well, but mostly in their own lands, where they've carefully controlled their breeding for all these centuries. Sometimes they practice "exposure" of infants who aren't X enough. Sometimes they simply expel (or otherwise ostracize) someone who doesn't meet their standards. A lot of "elves" and "dwarves" wandering the world outside their own enclaves aren't *really* elves and dwarves, at least according to their own kind (though these individuals wi'l probably never admit it, and might even fight you for saying it). If you're sufficiently "off" from the ideal, you're a half-elf or half-orc or whatever. And even more reviled.
 
In fact, the only ones more reviled than half-breeds are complete mongrels--i.e., humans. Yes, they're the largest population, and they're not as strong as dwarves (on average), or as graceful as elves (on average), and so forth. But they're tough and overall pretty successful as a race, and they breed like rabbits. And with no regard for lineage--well, except the sad few who occasionally try to claim there's a Human standard, but even most other humans are like, "Dude--give it up. We're all mongrels. Embrace it."
 
Which handily explains why the various other races (or sub-races, if you like) all have fairly specific descriptions. If they don't meet that standard, they're not really that race. And why humans come in all shapes and sizes and colors (hair, eyes, skin). And why, of course, every race is convinced that *they* are the pinnacle of humanoid forms, and everyone else is inferior. Good enough for a traveling/adventuring companion, maybe, but you wouldn't want your sister to marry one. Especially those humans.

I'm a player in Greysword's game. And also in the game run by the player whose PC is flying around the world and having off-screen adventures. I want to say I appreciate Duke Bushido's long response to Greywind, because I think he's right on the money.
 
It's your game. You make the rules. Things cost whatever you think they should cost.
 
Also, you're going to make mistakes. Deal with them, learn from them, and move on. I'm running a Champions game as well. Mine is the only one in our gaming group that ISN'T part of the multi-GM campaign. We have characters in Evergreen City, OR and Zion, FL as well as San Angel, NM (that campaign folded, but the characters and events are part of the collective campaign background), and Gotham, NY. They're set in the Champions Universe, with the baggage that entails. I didn't want that, so my game (based on the Wild Cards novels) is set in Hudson City, NJ following the release of the Wild Card virus on July 4th, 2019. Separate world, with no history of costumed supers. One of the PCs had, among other powers, Healing with Resurrection. But he got in the habit of using it to revive anyone who was killed during an adventure, and that cheapened death and made the stakes a lot lower. You failed to save the hostages? No problem! Just bring them back to life! You weren't cautious enough with your phenomenal cosmic power and killed some bystanders? No problem! Just bring them back to life!
 
That was my mistake. I allowed that power. So I took that power away from him, and let him spend the points on something else. So there are technically NPCs walking around alive in Hudson City who should still be dead. Whatever. I fixed my mistake and moved on.
 
 

Even if you can't generate a PDF, you should still be able to produce HTML or RTF character sheets--and then *save* them as PDF.

I'm a player in Greysword's game. And also in the game run by the player whose PC is flying around the world and having off-screen adventures. I want to say I appreciate Duke Bushido's long response to Greywind, because I think he's right on the money.
 
It's your game. You make the rules. Things cost whatever you think they should cost.
 
Also, you're going to make mistakes. Deal with them, learn from them, and move on. I'm running a Champions game as well. Mine is the only one in our gaming group that ISN'T part of the multi-GM campaign. We have characters in Evergreen City, OR and Zion, FL as well as San Angel, NM (that campaign folded, but the characters and events are part of the collective campaign background), and Gotham, NY. They're set in the Champions Universe, with the baggage that entails. I didn't want that, so my game (based on the Wild Cards novels) is set in Hudson City, NJ following the release of the Wild Card virus on July 4th, 2019. Separate world, with no history of costumed supers. One of the PCs had, among other powers, Healing with Resurrection. But he got in the habit of using it to revive anyone who was killed during an adventure, and that cheapened death and made the stakes a lot lower. You failed to save the hostages? No problem! Just bring them back to life! You weren't cautious enough with your phenomenal cosmic power and killed some bystanders? No problem! Just bring them back to life!
 
That was my mistake. I allowed that power. So I took that power away from him, and let him spend the points on something else. So there are technically NPCs walking around alive in Hudson City who should still be dead. Whatever. I fixed my mistake and moved on.
 
 

Sorry, GB(i)-- my fault entirely.  Between the lighting and the storm and trying to read that tiny little phone screen, I mistook Greyword's post for yours.  No offense intended.
 
 
So then, Greysword:
 
 
I've used this before, but it's a helpful calming thing to remind yourself of when deciding to listen to the "expertise" offered by relative-- or even complete-- strangers:
 
Ex:  Former.  No longer have the properties of something:  "ex-wife," "ex-convict," etc.
 
Spurt:  A small amount of fluid expelled forcefully.
 
Thus, and expert is nothing more than a has-been drip under pressure.  
 
 
Here's the thing:  If you are learning with modern materials-- i.e., one of the last couple of editions, then yeah: it's overwhelming.  Not that there's a great change to the _essence_ of the game, but there is a _massive_ leap up in terms of the verbiage!  There are just--- just...  so _damned_ many _WORDS_!  And they all seem to contradict each other!  Or go off on tangents!  Or you find a run of five paragraphs that say the exact same thing over and over and over, but with entirely different _words_!
 
Yeah.  I get it.  The newer editions are tedious and nitpicky to an almost-insurmountable degree.
 
So here are a few things to keep in mind:
 
A staggering chunk of those words exist _entirely_ for one particular niche of players.  Another chunk exists for another niche of players.  Still another is for another niche of players.....
 
You see, this "system" started out as a playable game.  Somewhere along the way, the writers realized the same thing the rest of us did:  Holy Crap!  It's universal!  We've accidentally designed something that can be used to simulate _anything_!  So right away, they started doing that:  Espionage was written during the second Edition of Champions; Justice Inc and Danger International were written during the third, as was the original Fantasy HERO.  The pirates game never made it beyond buying ad space in some gaming magazines in the 80s, and that makes me kind of sad.    All of these games were Champions-- every last one of them.  There was some selection made of what to include and what not to include, some new text to flavor the game away from supers and into whatever they were publishing, and it just _worked_.  They made complete stand-alone games, each with its own unique flair.
 
Then someone thought "hey!  It's all the same basic running gear, but each of these games adds an element or two of its own. (Dude, even the -- well, how about this?  Did you know that the rules for Drowning were in an adventure supplement for Champions during the third edition?  Seriously:  _everything_ added something, sometimes for flavor, sometimes because "Wow.  Suddenly we need that."      So someone combed through everything published at that time (officially, anyway.  Stuff from gaming mags that were not Adventurers Club-- Heck, that's another one!  That was an in-house gaming magazine for HERO Games.  A lot of what is now official rules came from a damned supplemental magazine that the bulk of the players back in the day didn't have.  Lots of us had never even _heard_ of it!--
 
anyway:  scour all the published works, pull all the rules and tweaks, and rub them together until all the flavor scrubs off and they fit together like the stones of a pyramid.  Cool!  Now that we've stopped away all the flavor, we don't really have a game anymore.....  Well, not one that will catch anyone's eye.  Let's call it a System: You can use this system to design your own campaign from the ground up, using all the features from the mighty thing that Champions has managed to become!
 
Well, you couldn't, really, because all you had was a system, completely devoid of worlds and benchmarks and, beyond "how to do damage," no real suggestions on how interaction with the world in general worked.  (sadly, it's still kind of like that, even with _all_ those extra words....).  The solution then was the same as it is now:  Let's publish some genre books!  Let's publish some settings!  let's toss out some sample characters!  Oh-- and let's release an additional product that is pretty much this system rule book plus the "campaign book" for superheroes all in one cover (which we all loved, wether we used it or not.  In fact, the only thing we didn't love was Jaguar  Seeker.)  Damned shame the genre books didn't sell well, because I ended up having to crib from Rolemaster to get anything _close_ to an "official" Pirate setting, and even calling it that was tenuous at the absolute _best_...
 
Anyway, this was when the problem kind of began:
 
How does the world work?  What's the world like?  What do I have to _build_ in the world?  I know walls can be broken if they take enough damage; do I need to stat them up in the system?  Wait-- there's a way to stat them up in the system?!  Crap!  Now I gotta build all the damned walls!
 
It was in there, so you _had_ to use it, right?
 
 
No.  It's not right.  It's wrong.  Fundamentally.  Chronically wrong.  And the absolute absence of guidance on the subject of how the world and character affect each other-- beyond stats and damage-- that keeps this error stuck to this flavorless system like flies on a dog turd _to this day_.  What error?  "It _can_ be done.  Since there's a way to do it, then it _must_ be done."  That's crap!   That's nothing more than an interesting unplanned result that stems from making a _generic building system_.  It's generic.  It builds things.  But when you built your character, you didn't build his teeth, his hair, or his winning personality. You simply _decided_ them.  You didn't build how tall he was, how much he weighed, or if he was stripped like a zebra on one side and like a tiger on the other:  You _decided_ that.
 
Here's a tiny example of what I mean about the side-effect of making a generic building system:  There are special rules for making vehicles.  
 
You don't need them.
 
No; seriously:  even if you want to build a vehicle, the rules are completely superfluous.  Why?
 
Because you don't pay for what your character _is_; you pay for what he can _do_.  No; that's not the same as "you pay for what your character _will_ do; but we'll get into that later.  
 
You can declare that your character is female.  You don't pay extra for the ability to produce milk during late pregnancy and through infancy.  You don't even pay extra to have breasts!    Seriously!  You can have as many as you want, no charge!  Have twelve of them!  Your character can be that three-breasted mutant from Total Recall; it's _totally free_!
 
Same if you want to be an alien, a poodle (which explains those twelve breasts, I suppose), a robot----   or even a _car_!  Yep.  Free car.  How about that.  You know what's even funnier than that?  You're going to use those same Powers from the same Powers section that you used to build your character when you decide to build your vehicle!  The difference?  "Special rules."  Dude, there is only _one_ Vehicle rule:  Total the cost and divide by 5; that's the price in points of your vehicle.  Anything else is money blown on supplements for a lot of years.  And I've got to level with you, I don't usually agree with that one _actual_ special rule, either.  What if I don't want to charge points at all?  What if I think it should be full price?  But that's for another time and place.  Right now, the point is demonstrating that the system, as presented way back in the original fifty-something pages, as presented in the modern 9-textbook edition, the system is universal.
 
You know what else?  Even though those rules exist, they tell you right there amongst them that it's not aways appropriate to use all of them:  you're not going to charge a Cowboy _any_ CP for his wagon, are you?  Do you have to stat up his horse, just because he wants one?   Well, no; that's been done in numerous bestiaries over the years, but that's beside the point:  All you need to know about the horse relates to little more than movement, encumbrance, damage-soaking ability, and flavor.  You can build _those_ with CP, but the horse isn't a character, so why bother?  Besides, you're either going to "just let him have one" or he's going to buy it with money.  Fine.  It's all good.
 
 
There you go:  The special rules; why you don't need them, why there's only one, and why the rules tell you that they're not important.
 
 
But I've drifted a bit:
 
I started off commenting that so much of the new stuff is niche fluff (and I am a poet, it seems    ).  I stand by that.  I don't know why, but there will always be a subset of people having fun who want to make sure they are having fun the correct and approved way: they don't want _any_ vagaries, _any_ unanswered questions, or _any_ reason to have to make a decision on their own:  they want the official word on _everything_, period.  Appeasing those folks is probably 2/3 of the current verbiage.
 
Then there are those people who are more into the building stuff thing, and they want to know how _everything_ works, in absolute detail, so that they can pick just the right thing to build that one particular dimple-headed weasel pin on the sprinkler just off the fairway for the 14th hole.  Yep; it's there.  Gotta be built.
 
Then there are the math junkies-- don't get me wrong:  math is an impor  part of the game.  It just happens that there are those people for whom it's the _best_ part of the game, and there is lots and lost of "must cost this" and "must use that" and "must be done thusly" and "this mixed with this will always mean that" detail in there, to ensure that they are all using the exact same formulae.  Of course, once you're armed with that, and your favorite part of the game is the math-- well, the universe as a whole is pretty great place to practice, so let's start building stuff!
 
And of course, another big chunk of all that extra verbiage is examples.  People have _never_ not appreciated examples; people have _never_ stopped asking for them.  I can't think of a single person who has ever said "thanks; no more examples, please.  We've got it down cold."
 
So the book is _filled_ with stuff about building and statting and how to use this with that and that this can only be that and on and on and on, and there is so much stuff in there that _is_ statted up that you start to think that it _must_ be statted up.
 
Ignore the crap out of all that.
 
Go back to the basic idea:  _You_ are playing your game, as are your friends.  _You_ have to be happy, as do they.  _We_ are faceless people on the internet (except for Sentry, who is a very dapper-dressing shorthaired tabby, as you may have noticed.  He's also very good at typing for a guy with no fingers).
 
If you are playing one of the latest editions, never forget that there is _no_ actual official game for them: they are the generic "HERO System," and as such, it's left entirely up to you to decide not just your world, but how it works.  How are walls broken?  Is it when they take a certain amount of damage?  Is it when they are hit twice?  is it when a character decides to smash one down?  (I'm going to level with you: Steve's decision years ago to use the power Tunneling as a means of smashing down doors and walls set a god-awful precedent for which I _still_ haven't forgiven him:  tunneling _requires_ that you know the defense, thickness, and body over every door, wall, or whatever in the universe if your character decides "me likie instant door smash power!"
 
Here's a thing, though:  You can say "no."
 
You see, in spite of all the genre and setting books published since the "HERO System" came to be, there is _nothing_ telling you what the inviolable rules of your world actually are.  In a nutshell, HERO GMs aren't designing an adventure:  They are designing _a game_.  _They_ decide how the world works.   _They_ decide what is and is not going to fly in this game.  Better still: while the official rules stop just short of admitting that they are not actually a game, they do whole-heartedly encourage you to build your own world-- your own game-- anyway you want to.  (They also stop just short of telling you that you sort of _have_ to).
 
 
So...   your GM-ing?  You're doing it pretty much correctly:  don't _ever_ think "but I have to charge points for this!"  And damn it, don't _ever_ think "I am not supposed to charge points for this!"  Because both of those are completely right and wrong, all of the time.  You, Sir (I assume; forgive me if I'm wrong), are _building a game_-- not just a world in which you will have adventures, but you are building a game-- it uses whichever HERO mechanics you chose to use, of course, but HERO didn't build the game:  _you_ did.  So straight-up, _YOU_ decide how that game works.  Go with your gut.  You'll get better at it over time.  If your gut says "having to buy with points a special permission to use a skill that I bought with points is kinda 'tarded, then _your game_ doesn't do that.  If you decide that in your game, licensing to practice the Professional Skill you bought with points is free, then it is, period.  If you decide it isn't, well then it isn't, _period_.   You don't have to waffle and wonder, because neither way is superior to the other, no matter how many math is thrown at you (yes; that's on purpose) or how much of complaints you get (that, too) from those of us outside your game that something else is better.
 
We are faceless people you will never meet who get together and argue about the rules on this board because it's not legal to vent frustration in person anymore.     We are not running your game; we are not playing in your game; we will never be doing either of those things.  Screw _us_.  Do what _you_ feel is right for _your_ game.
 
That kind of applies to your friends, too.  I mean, don't screw _them_, or at least do it in a different sense of the word.   The key is "be fair."  Now despite what you will hear from us, "Fair" doesn't have a _damned thing_ to do with math: You have three people that you owe one item each.  You have a diamond, a hockey puck, and a live animal.  You have _no_ tools.  distribute these things fairly amongst the three people.  _Math_ says get some tools and cut each item into thirds.   It's just not always the best consideration.
 
"Fair" doesn't mean "equal portions" every time you say "fair."  "Fair," so far as I am concerned, means _equal chances_; equal opportunities.  if you decide that something works a certain way in your game, let _everyone_ know that.  It doesn't even have to be right away-- Hell, some things just don't come up, period.  I can't tell you what they are because it's different for each and every group.  But when it does come up, tell _everyone involved_, and don't waiver from it.  Those who want to do something about it will; those who don't want to do anything about it have _made a conscious choice_, and as such, will have to deal with the results (if there are any) of that choice.
 
I'm not a difficult GM.  Hell, I must be fairly decent: up until a few months ago, I was running three different groups.  I've got a "summer" group that, after summer, started just showing up at my house on Sundays, still wanting to play.  It doesn't mean I'm particularly _good_ either, but I think I'm doing _something_ right.
 
Don't sweat the whole "what do I charge for?" and "what do I don't charge for?"  Pick an answer.  Want some suggestions?  Take time to think it over.  No; you don't have to break out diagrams and run extensive "what if" testing.  Just give a few minutes to think about what impact your decision could have on the rest of the game.  Then decide.  Then stick with it.  Give it three or four or even five sessions.  if it works, write it down and keep doing it.  If it doesn't, take a mulligan and try something else-- give everyone a chance to alter their initial reactions / decisions based on your new decision.  My only suggestion there is a one-minute timer (I like the sand timers, personally, but that's just me).  If you _need_ to think it over, use that timer.  Make your decisions, right or wrong, before the timer runs out:  The only thing worse than a "bad" decision is holding up the game.  Let your players know up-front that this is a "in-the-moment fix" for the problem at hand; that you're going to continue on with this decision, but if it doesn't work out, you will change it later.  Retcon where you have to.
 
Case in point:   There's a play-by-post going on (a couple of them, I think) on this board right now, GM'ed by the guy who wrote the San Angelo stuff (some of the all-time most successful 3rd party Champions campaign settings and supplements for Champions).  _He_ took a mulligan:  Early on, one of the characters transformed into an "anime magic girl."  The GM had NPCs working with this-- referring to the infestation of these things in some part of the setting.   Some time later: "Mulligan."  There are no anime magic girls-- at least, no _other_ ones.  You know what?  The players ran with it.  No problem.  (and it saved me from having to look up what an anime magic girl was to keep following the story, so... win/win?  )
 
 
_Don't_  worry about not being happy with your decision at first.  if you're not, probably the players aren't, either, and if you have to change it, then it's quite likely they will be okay with it.   _Do_ remember the stuff they liked _and_ the stuff they didn't like.  Both of these things are invaluable going forward, as they will help you guide your decisions in the future.  
 
And above all else, remember that you're not going to get better at being a GM without actually _being_ a GM.
 
Oh, here you go:
 
There's a guy with an unusual voice on youtube-- Puffin something or other.  He has _tons_ of horror stories about his early experiences as a GM.  Most are animated, and none are particularly long.  If you need a confidence boost, I _totally_ recommend you check out some of his stories.   These days?  Well it turns out he's still a GM, and apparently a pretty good one.    
 
 
I tell you all this-- way more than I intended to-- because if there is one thing that this hobby needs more than anything, it's good GMs.  Unfortunately, none of us start out instantly good; we just like to remember it that way.
 
 
 
 
Everyone should.  Not everyone does, but I've always felt it was important for aesthetic reasons as well as plausibility:  it happens all the time in real life.  I have two degrees-- spent years earning them-- spent thousands on them.  I don't use them.  Seriously: my job is so damned far away from my education that it's mind-numbing, but here we are.  (for the record, I like my job, so it's all good).  I work with a kid who went to school on the company's dime to get a CDL.  He doesn't use it.  The company has no need for him to use it; he has no interest in using it.    Every human being I have ever met has talents and abilities that they simply do not use, ever.  It's an interesting study into the people you know: what they _thought_ they might want to be.  Perhaps even what they want to be, but for whatever reason probably never will be.
 
I think a lot of the reason some people don't do this with their characters is their own personal tendency to focus on something else:  the math.  Or "effectiveness."  Or perhaps they just didn't have the points to do everything they wanted to, and plan to grow the character with some EP down the road.  It doesn't matter; the point is they don't do it, and I always find it a bit disappointing.    I mean, if nothing else, it says so much about the character's background, hints at their personalities, and suggests some potential role-playing points.
 
There's another thing that I don't hear mentioned on this board very often, so I'm going to mention it here to you:
 
You will see a _lot_ of "if the player took x skill or x power, then he should get value for that and I have to arrange it so that blah blah blah."
 
No; you don't.  You can try to incorporate it-- you can plan a couple of opportunities for everyone to get a spotlight here and there.  The problem is something that no one talks about _seriously_-- they talk about it, but only as an in-joke:  
 
The story-- what happens-- is almost entirely up to the players, and the players will _routinely_ screw themselves out of opportunities:   "this player took Forensics so I know that he expects to get the chance to go over a crime scene with his keen eye and intellect and maybe get a scene or two in a lab--"  Yeah; enough of that.  I have had _so_ many players take "forensics" and "detective work" that you'd think I was running a table-top TV drama sometimes.  In thirty years, I can count on my fingers the number of times those skills were actually _used_.  Seriously:  i'll set something up, and they will steadfastly refuse to follow the strings.  I don't want to railroad them, so I let them go where they want.  It's almost never to the crime scene to look for clues.  At least, not with either of those skills.  "I go to the crime scene and look for signs of Doctor Possum!"  Well Doc P ain't in this game, so they don't find signs of him.  Though they almost never go to the crime scene, or a lab, or even review the police file-- you know: they don't do anything where these skills come into play.  "I slap him around a bit"  (that was in a cyberpunk game; it was appropriate) is _not_ "forensics," no matter how you slice it.  Really old fashioned detective work?  Possibly, but the character in question didn't have that.  (He _did_ have computer programming, though, but it was an everyman in that game.)
 
If I'm running Arabian Knights HERO and you decided to buy "Barnstorming" for your character....  Well, you'd better get damned busy building barns, oil wells, fuel refineries, and airplanes, otherwise it just ain't happening.  However, I am totally fine with the idea that your character is a retired barnstormer who came here for adventure.  Whatever, Dude.  Again-- I file this one under "interesting things my character knows how to do" and "part of my character's background."
 
 
 
 
Yeah.  About that:  by time time I type this (or read what was posted between my last log-off and this log-in), someone will likely already discussed the issues with this, but I want to bring up a couple of things here just as "teachable moments"  (I hate that term:  moments are not teachable:  they learn nothing, so you can't teach the moment.  You can't learn a moment, because it can't be captured and studied.  There is no interpretation of that phrase that means what the phrase itself means.  Sound bites are for idiots! ):
 
everyman skills:  These are things everyone can "just do" if they decide that they want to.  The list is massive, and the only reason that such skills might be listed in the rules books with pricing and such is because there will be those types of games in which these particular skills will not be common as flies.  It is _those_ games in which these skills should cost a bit:  if I were running Renaissance HERO, I would expect you to pay dearly for Hang Gliding as a skill.  If I were running Hospital HERO, I wouldn't charge a dime for CPR; I would assume that all characters in the game knew that one.  I wouldn't (and didn't) charge more than a single point for any pirate to be able to navigate by the stars, know the constellations, have extensive knowledge about the lore of the constellations-- all in a single one-point bundle.  The only reason I charged at all was because not all the characters were sea-faring veterans: there were a couple of new "recruits" and a foreigner on working passage.  Only two veteran seamen.  The _plan_ was to make this bundle free, but you know players....
 
In our space opera, _everyone_ gets Vac Suit Operations at 11-.  Everyone. It's a travel-heavy game in a travel-heavy setting; every NPC has it at 8 or less.
 
In your game, it's up to _you_ to decide what's an everyman skill, and what isn't.  Same with equipment.  And of course, computer programming is _not_ the internet.  The last two computers I wrote programs for were an Apple IIe and a C-64. (Mail Order Monsters was _the_ game, by the way  ).  Yet here I am, surfing the internet, and not using HeroDesigner because the help forum has demonstrated to me that you pretty much have to be able to write code to use the damned thing anyway, so even if I wanted it, it would be useless to me.
 
"The laptop was free" is liable to start a fight on this board, where we still can't agree if smartphones are free or if they cost eighty-six points.    (they're free at my table; not at others' )
 
Anyway, I highlighted this and picked at it to make a point:  if you want to GM-- and I can't recommend it enough: I became a GM the way I think a lot of people did:  our GM moved, and we still wanted to play.  However, no one wanted to be the GM: they all wanted to play.  I bit the bullet because I wanted to play to, and I figured someone else would also want to GM eventually, so i'd get to play when that happened.  It never happened (well, it _rarely_ happened / happens), but you know what?  I have come to really enjoy it.  It's been a much greater creative outlet than being a player ever was, and I think it's even helped my writing over the years-- it's given me a sort of insight for what people do and don't want to know about a story or situation.  It's helped me appreciate the background plots that must remain running-but-hidden and when and how to drop clues.  It's helped me hone an ability to jump back and forth and just drive players nuts when they realize that they have everything they need but that one little detail that holds everything together....  It's just been great, and I think everyone should at least take a stab at it.  
 
 
 
 
No; you're not.  You're at a loss for confidence to make a decision, I think, but there's only one way to work on that, and to work on it, you have to remember that it's _your_ game, and you get to decide those things as carefully or as arbitrarily as you want, and so long as you're fair about it, and you are conscientious about learning from bad decisions as you go forward, and are willing to own up to a bad decision and _change it_, then I promise: you _will_ get better, which will bring more confidence, which in turn will make you better, etc, etc, etc.
 
You've already got some experience:  look at what your GM decided: computer programming to surf the web.  How do you feel about that decision?  What would you do differently in his place?  If you had been the GM to make that decision, would you be willing to change it, and how would you do it?  What player input would solicit in making such a decision, and how would you solicit it?  How would you present the decision?
 
See?  Experience, and you didn't even have to do _anything_ to get it.  
 
 
 
 
Please don't.  No RPG on the market has _ever_ had enough GMs.  Stick around.  Ask questions.  Listen to advice.  Decide what you use and what to ignore.  Hell, even that decision is practice for GMs.    Besides, you'd be missing out on a lot of fun.
 
 
 
 
 
 
Only you can solve that, Sir.  Stick with your guns, advise them that if it doesn't work out, you will try something else.   Be honest with them:  Tell them you are learning how to GM. Solicit feedback after the third game (never the first or second:  they'll be too happy to try to "play" you with their characters that fresh), and every third game or so after that until you feel you have a handle on your group.
 
 
If you are still around, keep posting.  But don't give up!  That's only practice for getting good at quitting.
 
 

It could have been enhanced by SI manipulation - letting memories slip where Carol failed (trying to drive her down - she really isn't good for much and needs the Kree/the SI) only to have her recognize that her strength comes not from succeeding every time she tries, but from never giving up - every time she fell, she got back up.  That's strength, not weakness.  That was the sense I got from that final mental montage where every scene we saw previously, (that looked like failure) was extended to her getting back up, ready to keep trying, even while everyone around her was telling her "you can't do it - give up".  Rediscovering that inner strength was her real victory.  After that, she knew she had nothing to prove to Yon-Rogg.
 
To me, the scene hammered that pretty heavy, and I did not want or need it beaten into my head any more than it already was.
 
But I would agree no scene in Captain Marvel matched the Wonder Woman scene where she climbed the ladder out of the trench and walked across No Man's Land.

The Enterprise sure as **** is a military vessel. They have a military system of ranks and chain of command. They operate under military discipline. They are tried, when necessary, in a court *martial*, not a civilian court. The ship is heavily armed, and provides military defense for the area of space in which it operates. The Captain is vested with the power, on his own authority, to wage WAR on other powers. That is a military vessel, no matter how much they may pretend otherwise. And none of this a "rewriting" of Starfleet--this is all straight out TOS.

I always thought it was ludicrous that they had civilians (especially dependents) aboard a military vessel in the first place. (And the Enterprise was canonically THE ship to spearhead the defense of the Federation, so arguments that it's not a warship will fall on deaf ears. That said, here are some possibilities.
 
1. There's nothing to prove definitively that they're carting around the SAME civilians all the time. The Enterprise (and other Federation vessels) might well routinely transport scientists and other specialists from one world to another as and when they have the space to do.
2. Perhaps a lot of the scientists doing research on the Enterprise are civilians, not Star Fleet. Perhaps they book time aboard a starship that will be in the area they want to investigate. They book time to use the sensor arrays, probes, and whatnot, the same way various organizations or individuals will compete for time in observatories or on research ships today.

The Enterprise sure as **** is a military vessel. They have a military system of ranks and chain of command. They operate under military discipline. They are tried, when necessary, in a court *martial*, not a civilian court. The ship is heavily armed, and provides military defense for the area of space in which it operates. The Captain is vested with the power, on his own authority, to wage WAR on other powers. That is a military vessel, no matter how much they may pretend otherwise. And none of this a "rewriting" of Starfleet--this is all straight out TOS.

How can Bob and Helen not know about Jack-Jack's powers? I haven't rewatched the original to be sure, but I seem to remember Jack Jack demonstrating at least one to his mother when they rescued him from Syndrome at the end of the movie. Or did all his transformations only happen in Syndrome's presence? (Plus the numerous frantic voice messages from the babysitter, culminating with "Your child has...SPECIAL NEEDS." That's a pretty blatant clue, even if she got memory-wiped afterward.

Several critics thought so.  Bird himself has stated he's not even libertarian, let alone a follower of Ayn Rand (those two things aren't synonymous, btw).  But then I've noticed that many critics of Ayn Rand have no real idea what she was talking about in the first place.

"Not telling your troops the whole plan..."? She didn't even tell them she HAD a plan other than jog away from the oncoming fleet til they ran out of gas. Part of being a good leader is giving your troops reason to trust you even when they don't know your plans. She failed miserably at that.
 
 
 
He didn't NEED a communicator. He could have APPEARED TO REY (or anyone apparently, as everyone within range could see him as if he were really there) anywhere in the galaxy (apparently) and said, "I changed my mind. Send someone to get me."
 
 
 
The order had no idea where he was and, apart from Kylo, no other Force sensitives we know about, now that Snoke is dead. (Speaking of which, is he DEAD dead, or only MOSTLY dead like Luke and Yoda and Obi-Wan and Vader?) So they'd have had no way to find him. Why on earth would Leia or Rey "lose contact with the rebellion" if they went to visit Luke? Rey didn't. She had a magic maguffin that allowed her to find Leia (or whoever held the other magic maguffin) anywhere in the galaxy. (And why wasn't Leai being baked alive by the sheer wattage of whatever broadcast that thing was generating to be detectable at galactic distances?)
 
 
You're assuming the books were destroyed. We don't know that. Rey might have taken them. Yoda may have "destroyed" them with lightning so Luke wouldn't discover that they're gone. Just because the "wisdom" of the Jedi was lacking (which I agree with), doesn't mean that she can't learn from their history--and I'm assuming at least some of those books are histories/logs/diaries/etc.
 
 
We're not talking about Rey. We're talking about Luke Skywalker, who saw the potential for redemption in a man whose crimes were literally legendary. A man who'd destroyed the Jedi, murdered countless people, and...well, all of it. He confronted THAT man with no intention of ever killing him. He confronted him ready to die in the attempt to redeem him. And THAT man, THAT Luke Skywalker, would never have tried--even for a nanosecond--to murder a sleeping boy because he feared with that boy MIGHT do.

I've seen speculation that the characters who got derezzed are the ones who will all ultimately survive when the credits roll on Infinity War Part 2. The idea being that many of the characters left alive at the end of this film--Iron Man and Captain America, primarily--are, as has been said, on the downside of their contracts. (Evans is about done, and RDJ's contract was up several movies back but there's no guarantee he'll stick around.) So...MAYBE resurrecting the "dead" heroes (and the countless trillions all over the universe who died with them) will require a sacrifice by one or more of the survivors of THIS film. If Captain America or Iron Man have to die, doing so in order to save half the universe is not a bad way to go.

My favorite line of his from any of his movies was when he played a detective interrogating the protagonist of the film (I don't remember the movie well, or the hero). They've been at it for hours and the hero won't confess, and wants to leave. Gunny explains why that's not gonna happen.
 
Gunny: "I'm divorced with no charisma! I've got NO PLACE to be!"

I have always hated the trope that superpowers can be drained, transferred and the like, as if they were a brightly colored liquid you can pour from one glass to another. Whether you were born with your powers (Superman, the X-Men, etc) or acquired them in an accident (Spider-Man, the Flash, etc), as far as I'm concerned they're always inherent, as much a part of you as your ability to see or breathe. No advantage/limitation required--or allowed. Just as I can prevent you from seeing by covering your eyes, or gouging them out if I'm feeling particularly nasty, but can't "steal" your power of vision or acquire it for myself (short of very advanced surgery to physically take your eyes and graft them into myself), so too are your superpowers. So a generic "mutant powers drain" is a no-go as a power in any of my campaigns. Ditto for handy, generic power dampeners for use by the authorities.
 
So if you've captured a superstrong villain, you're gonna need some way to restrain him that doesn't depend on simply "taking away" his superhuman strength. A strength-reducing drug cocktail that works on anyone, or keeping him sedated (chemically, psychically or electronically), or simply using bonds strong enough to hold him are your only options.
 
 

No, I think you're right. I hate the *generic* power-draining gag. Your example is exactly right: The "drain flight" power or "power suppressing ray" rubs me the wrong way. A *specific* SFX affected specific (SFX-related) powers is another matter. If you have Mighty TK (tm) and you can just reach out and grab someone in flight and hold them in place, or keep them grounded, I've got no problem with that. You're physically restraining them from moving, regardless of their means of flight. If you can point a raygun/wand/your finger at anyone with flight powers (of any kind) and turn that power off for 20 minutes...I have a serious problem with THAT.
 
But I'm more exercised over the common trope of someone's powers not just being suppressed, but STOLEN. Not only do I not have them anymore, now YOU have them. It's absurd. It's like all the nonsense on the Flash tv show about stealing someone's speed. How do you do that, exactly? Well, apparently, it's possible because the Speed Force (tm) comes from a giant invisible cable. You just unplug it from Barry and plug it into yourself! Or something.
 

And it could so easily have been derailed.
 
Mrs. DeVoe: "Judge, that man is an imposter! My husband is buried in XX Cemetary. I don't know who that is, but he's lying! Test his DNA! Let me ask him questions about our life together!"
 
So, apparently Barry is a legal formalist. Yeah, the judge released him (though of course it isn't that quick or easy), but it was based on fraudulent testimony by an imposter. But hey! Legal!
 
Also...how dumb are those metahuman crooks? Look, it's Barry Allen, recently incarcerated former Central City CSI tech and metahuman. A speedster, no less! And NONE of them came to the conclusion that he was the Flash?

Yeah, I very much hope they get a third season of Travellers.
 
I liked Wild, Wild West as a kid. Yeah, parts hold up and parts don't. My favorite villain was always Dr. Miguelito Loveless. But my favorite line from the whole series came from Victor Buono. He has captured West and has him strapped to a table. On a table next to him is, like, every gadget he's *ever* used on the show. All of which, presumably, they took off him while he was unconscious. Buono says, "Mr. West, I'm surprised you don't clank when you walk."

I'm mainlining TRAVELERS on Netflix right now. I'm halfway through the second season. I really hope it gets picked up for a third season.
 
Time travelers from a horrible, apocalyptic future are downloaded into the minds of people in the (our) present--hundreds of years before their time--who were about to die. They take over their bodies and lives and work as teams to perform various missions that they hope will allow them to prevent the awful future, or at least improve it. It's a one-time, one-way trip. The nature of time travel generally prevents "do-overs" so if a mission fails, it fails. There's lots I could say about this series, but SPOILERS.
 
I really like this show.

"Not telling your troops the whole plan..."? She didn't even tell them she HAD a plan other than jog away from the oncoming fleet til they ran out of gas. Part of being a good leader is giving your troops reason to trust you even when they don't know your plans. She failed miserably at that.
 
 
 
He didn't NEED a communicator. He could have APPEARED TO REY (or anyone apparently, as everyone within range could see him as if he were really there) anywhere in the galaxy (apparently) and said, "I changed my mind. Send someone to get me."
 
 
 
The order had no idea where he was and, apart from Kylo, no other Force sensitives we know about, now that Snoke is dead. (Speaking of which, is he DEAD dead, or only MOSTLY dead like Luke and Yoda and Obi-Wan and Vader?) So they'd have had no way to find him. Why on earth would Leia or Rey "lose contact with the rebellion" if they went to visit Luke? Rey didn't. She had a magic maguffin that allowed her to find Leia (or whoever held the other magic maguffin) anywhere in the galaxy. (And why wasn't Leai being baked alive by the sheer wattage of whatever broadcast that thing was generating to be detectable at galactic distances?)
 
 
You're assuming the books were destroyed. We don't know that. Rey might have taken them. Yoda may have "destroyed" them with lightning so Luke wouldn't discover that they're gone. Just because the "wisdom" of the Jedi was lacking (which I agree with), doesn't mean that she can't learn from their history--and I'm assuming at least some of those books are histories/logs/diaries/etc.
 
 
We're not talking about Rey. We're talking about Luke Skywalker, who saw the potential for redemption in a man whose crimes were literally legendary. A man who'd destroyed the Jedi, murdered countless people, and...well, all of it. He confronted THAT man with no intention of ever killing him. He confronted him ready to die in the attempt to redeem him. And THAT man, THAT Luke Skywalker, would never have tried--even for a nanosecond--to murder a sleeping boy because he feared with that boy MIGHT do.