Spence

The thing with Hero system is that the game has not changed all that much throughout the editions. The majority of the changes were how much things cost and the way powers were purchased.  For the most part the stat blocks are fairly close to when the game first came out other than cost. You can probably take most of the 4th edition source books and use them without really converting them to the new editions.  
 
You could probably take the write up of a villain from a 4th edition Champions source book and use it straight out of the book.  While the cost may be different and you may need to adjust a few things they would be minor compared to what you need to do with any other game system.   Try using a 1st edition AD&D monster is a current edition of D&D or a Pathfinder game.  Most of the game terms have changed and even those that kept the same term were drastically changed.  
 
This is why I kept all my old Hero System source books and often still refer to them.  The Fantasy Hero books for 4th edition had a lot of ideas for spells that can still be used even in 6th edition rules.  Mostly when you convert it is changing the cost and maybe taking advantage of some of the new powers, advantages and limitations.  
 

That has been the problem with all the lines.  Even the MCU from the beginning. 
Yes, the MCU in the first few phases was awesome, but they still painted themselves into a corner.
 
In the headlong rush for the epic universe save they skipped right by years of fantastic stories. 
TV series or movies, Hollywood thinks every show has to be a EPIC!   Instead of entertaining. 
But they don't seem to realize that they always leave themselves with nowhere to go.
 
 

Turning the evil villains into "misunderstood quasi-Heroes" has been an ongoing theme of both Hollywood as well as US comics for years so this isn't a stretch. 
 
They make a "Good HEROES" movie and do block busters, then they do a sequel that is still "Good HEROES" and the trend continues.
They do "not heroes" and the first movie does fantastic because it was a "Superhero Movie", but the sequel under performs and things slide after that.
 
The overall effect is obvious to real people but seems to escape the twit/social media 'verse.
 
People flock to entertaining movies with HEROES that are on the side of doing good.
While the audience will enjoy a monster/bad guy movie that portrays a bad guy as bad and will be ultimately defeated.  But they tend to avoid sermonizing movies or movies that glorify evil as good.  Or arrogance as virtue. 
 
Like when they falsely compare Captain Marvel to Top Gun. 
 
In Top Gun Cruise played an a$$ that literally everyone except his backseater hated.  The movie portrayed (that portrayal being good or bad depending on the viewer) the journey of pilot from arrogant idiot to humbled self-aware professional.  What some would call the Heroes Journey with the lessons painfully beaten into him including being the reason his arguably only real friend died due to his arrogance.   
 
Captain Marvel has none of than, she is simply perfect at all times.  Captain Marvel was just a arrogant a$$ that discovered they were overpowered and became an overpowered arrogant a$$.  Nothing in her personality or actions changed from start to finish.  I guess the only difference in personality and behavior after breaking free from their control was who she decided to target as "bad guys".  Every time she appears in any show it is as a arrogant and self important B.  Not even trying to use basic courtesies because all should kowtow to perfection.  Such a great character destroyed by poor writers and political agenda.

Let the Championsing Begin!

OK all, you saw the news post about Champions Begins: An Introduction to the Hero System.
 
If you haven't grabbed a copy yet you need to now. 
 
This is brilliant and exactly the tool to intro a Champions game. 
 
 

I like how the second guy here says that he can't wait to see what CD Projekt Red does with an unlicensed property . . . Cyberpunk 2077. Yeah, totally original universe that isn't licensed right there.
 
Credibility as any kind of expert on the genre went out the window with that one. He just did a bit of reading on the internet and made a profanity-filled rant video for hits.
 
Also, I always want to punch people the second I hear the word "cuck" come out of their mouth.
 
My take: I've never played the Witcher games. I've never read the books or stories. I've seen the show. When I watched it, I didn't say, "Hey! This reminds me of Elric." I've read the Elric saga five or six times. I don't care about the superficialities, numerous though they may be. It looks like less of a direct rip off of Elric, and more of a grabbing of random tropes (buff potions before combat, monster hunting, etc.) from pop culture generic fantasy, a la D&D, Warhammer, that were themselves already borrowing heavily from Elric and other sources.
 
It's about the execution, the particulars. Ideas are a dime a dozen.
 
It would be very interesting to see an analysis from an IP law attorney, but just for academic reasons.

Just like Avengers: Endgame, Spider-Man: No Way Home is fan service raised to the level of art. The character interactions and story arcs, the callbacks and Easter eggs, are used so smartly to enhance the overall story, rather than just for nostalgia appeal. The payoff is joyous for the people who know and love and have followed the various iterations of Spider-Man in comics and movies over the decades, but the film is still a fine story for people without that depth of familiarity. It stands on its own as a quality movie.

All of my games are like this.
 
All of them.  I have never run a "short" campaign.  My players all _like_ starting at the bottom and growing the character-- even when we are doing supers.  They like starting out as 1965 Spiderman and ending up as Not-Evil Thanos.  And since they like that, that's what we play.  Fantasy games run the same way.  Our Sci-Fi games usually end up with players laying the foundations of empires by the time we wrap up, and cyberpunk games usually end with the PCs toppling some of the mightiest corporations on the planet, staring from their humble characters stealing from street vendors just to stop their stomachs from rumbling.
 
I don't want to be seen as kidding here, but for most of our gaming lives, we kinda thought that this was the _point_ of a campaign:  the creation and growth of the characters.  because of this, that's how we did it.  We like it.
 
And now that I am thinking about it, that's probably one of the reasons I detest urban fantasy fiction overall: the characters are _not allowed_ to grow to any level that would draw the world's attention to the existence of this hidden magical world living amongst them. 
 
 

This is something I have never understood.  They are fantasy RPG's so everything has to be whimpy. 
 
One of the reasons I stopped playing a lot D&D, C&C, etc. was the built in nerf factor that IMO plagues the fantasy roleplaying TTRPG. 
I have read many books as well manga and watched anime where the fantasy hero was actually bad a$$ed.  Being hurled through stone walls, betting cratered into the ground complete with newly made hole.  
 
Fantasy player:  errrr wizards can't use warrior weapons!  
Fantasy reader: Gandalf??
 
Sure, if you want to recreate everything that the traditional FRPG's did wrong, you are there.
But if you want to actually use a system like hero to build a great fantasy game with HEROES!  Than why the devotion to nerf?
 
There are some great anime with epic characters wielding combinations of weapons and magic.  From augmenting their personal abilities to casters invoking massive spells.  
There are a lot Isekai shows that center around players in games and they show how different types of casters and warriors can work together in a "party".
 
I just don't get the whole need to intentionally destroy a game just to reflect earlier disappointments. 

Actually, the books were out long before the video games AND the plots aren't the same. The makers of the games claim they are continuations. the series is actually just based on the books, spurred on, no doubt, by the popularity of the games.

I've heard others make this case before, but I don't see it.  Other than having white hair and the name White Wolf, very little can be said to be directly taken from Elric in my opinion.  Sapkowski stole from Polish history and literature for stories.  There is no Order/Chaos dichotomy (Chaos is more pronounced for TV).  Geralt is a monster hunter, Elric is mainly a mercenary.  Any other character similarities draw from general loner hero adventure tropes.
 
If written well (as with every other media), an Elric series could be successful.  Doom Patrol is filled with characters who are depressing and filled with self-loathing like Elric, and it's doing pretty well.  He's not Thomas Covenant gloomy, but he's close. 
 
Wait, nevermind, nobody's close to Thomas Covenant depressing. 

There are several ways to do this.
 
1 - One is Reflection: it instantly is fired back at them 
2 - Another is just blast with the Variable Special Effect advantage with a limitation that they can only use it after they have been exposed to that special effect (within x time period) (probably a -¼ at most)
3 - You can do a variant with that gives them absorption that gives them END which they can only use to fire off the #2 option, so that they literally are only able to use it with an absorb.  This would negate the limitation (since they already cannot use it without the absorb) and I'd build with an END Reserve that has no recovery, just a potential power source for the blast.
4 - You could build a multipower with various blasts in it with the "only after having been exposed to a special effect" limitation on it, with each slot a different kind of attack.  This gives you options that the #2 does not such as a KA, a drain, etc.  This could work the same way as #3, drawing only from the non-recovering END Reserve.
 
There are others, I'm sure
 

Before anyone can give a really good answer you may need to clarify your question.
 
I get hit by and electrical bolt and immediately reflect an electrical bolt back at my attacker.
 
Is very different than
 
I grab onto a power source, absorb energy and then convert it into an electrical bolt to shoot at someone.
 
 

In short Duke the Pandemic has been misrepresented to be scarier than it is. 

Notice how this statistic is by itself? Seems a lot scarier than when it compared to other causes of death.  As my dad always said “ figures don’t lie but liars figure.” 

Well you trolled as hard as you can, I'll give you credit for that.

I'm glade it is doing well and as soon as it releases for general viewing I will most likely see it. 
As for the MCU movies cratering, well they are.  Spider-man may now be linked to the MCU, but it is still being made like the old MCU movies.  Actual heroes doing heroic things. 
 
Don't worry, they will "fix" Spiderman soon.  The next movie will still do well because the audience will expect more of the same, but after they get blindsided, they will not go to the next. 
 
The MCU movies did not immediately crater because people base their movie decisions on the last of a series that they saw and anyone with a viable brain cell pays no real heed to "critics" or "reviews".  And these days "awards" are generally 180 out from the quality of a movie.  The more awards the crappier the movie.  If you go and see a movie and it is fantastic, when its squeal or follow-on movie releases you will generally go see it as well. But if it sucks hard enough to change the moons orbit, you will not be back for #3. 
 
The last several MCU movies (with the exception of the latest Spiderman) have accelerated in a screaming downward spiral.  And most people, including me, don't even consider Spiderman movies as part of the same studio output.  The last three Spiderman movies have been an anomalous throwbacks to the great writing and storytelling of the MCU phase one type of movie.  
 
It is possible that we could still see good MCU movies, but with them doubling down on the rhetoric I doubt it.  
 
 
 
 

Happy Merryneum!
 

I just finished the Witcher.
 
I also finished the Triumph of  Hercules and now watching Hercules against the Moon Men. I really am liking the Italian sword and sandal movies. Also they give a devious GM ideas for Fantasy.

Indy523
 
Here is the link to HD's documentation. 
https://www.herogames.com/files/file/9-hero-designer-documentation/
 
While I like to do all of my Hero stuff design the old fashioned way, I still use HD frequently.  Especially when I am prepping for a game.  It is the best "character builder" of any tabletop RPG I have ever used.  And I have used a lot of them. 
Plus, true to being Hero, you use it to make everything, not just characters. 
Plus Plus, it has a built in ability to add customized items.
Plus Plus Plus, it works for both 6th and 5th editions. 
Plus Plus Plus Plus, if you are familiar with html and such you can create any kind of export format (character sheet) you want.
 
I'll admit that last item is not in my ball park, but I have seen some great character sheets being built. 
 

Spider-Man making over a billion world wide draws a pretty stark comparison between it and the previous three MCU films.  Some characters are just more liked, and they also went with a more reliable cast and crew for this one as well.  The formula is this:
 
1) Pick a director who loves the material and is an established quality
2) Cast it with great talent
3) Write a solid, enjoyable story that honors the source material and the fans
4) Focus on entertainment, not checking off special identity and narrative boxes
 
When they stray from this, they stumble.  When they stick to it, they succeed.  All the other excuses and explanations offered fall short.
 
Oh, it also helps if you stick with beloved, time-tested characters.

An example of fan service that serves fine film making, rather than detracts from it.

I'm glade it is doing well and as soon as it releases for general viewing I will most likely see it. 
As for the MCU movies cratering, well they are.  Spider-man may now be linked to the MCU, but it is still being made like the old MCU movies.  Actual heroes doing heroic things. 
 
Don't worry, they will "fix" Spiderman soon.  The next movie will still do well because the audience will expect more of the same, but after they get blindsided, they will not go to the next. 
 
The MCU movies did not immediately crater because people base their movie decisions on the last of a series that they saw and anyone with a viable brain cell pays no real heed to "critics" or "reviews".  And these days "awards" are generally 180 out from the quality of a movie.  The more awards the crappier the movie.  If you go and see a movie and it is fantastic, when its squeal or follow-on movie releases you will generally go see it as well. But if it sucks hard enough to change the moons orbit, you will not be back for #3. 
 
The last several MCU movies (with the exception of the latest Spiderman) have accelerated in a screaming downward spiral.  And most people, including me, don't even consider Spiderman movies as part of the same studio output.  The last three Spiderman movies have been an anomalous throwbacks to the great writing and storytelling of the MCU phase one type of movie.  
 
It is possible that we could still see good MCU movies, but with them doubling down on the rhetoric I doubt it.  
 
 
 
 

I'm glade it is doing well and as soon as it releases for general viewing I will most likely see it. 
As for the MCU movies cratering, well they are.  Spider-man may now be linked to the MCU, but it is still being made like the old MCU movies.  Actual heroes doing heroic things. 
 
Don't worry, they will "fix" Spiderman soon.  The next movie will still do well because the audience will expect more of the same, but after they get blindsided, they will not go to the next. 
 
The MCU movies did not immediately crater because people base their movie decisions on the last of a series that they saw and anyone with a viable brain cell pays no real heed to "critics" or "reviews".  And these days "awards" are generally 180 out from the quality of a movie.  The more awards the crappier the movie.  If you go and see a movie and it is fantastic, when its squeal or follow-on movie releases you will generally go see it as well. But if it sucks hard enough to change the moons orbit, you will not be back for #3. 
 
The last several MCU movies (with the exception of the latest Spiderman) have accelerated in a screaming downward spiral.  And most people, including me, don't even consider Spiderman movies as part of the same studio output.  The last three Spiderman movies have been an anomalous throwbacks to the great writing and storytelling of the MCU phase one type of movie.  
 
It is possible that we could still see good MCU movies, but with them doubling down on the rhetoric I doubt it.