Panpiper

I go with a more heroic scale.  20 is "maximum" in that it's the max you're likely to encounter in the real world.  It's not the max a human could possibly be.  I reject that idea.
 
5-8:  People of Wal-Mart
8-10:  Average couch potato
10-12:  Average healthy 30 year old in reasonably good shape
13-15:  Top 10% of your high school (when grown up)
16-18:  Top college performers
20-23:  High performing professionals
25+:  Best of the best
 
So let's say you've got an 18 Dex.  You could be a scholarship athlete at a big Division 1 school.  You could play basketball for Duke, or football at Alabama.
You've got a 15 Strength?  You might have been a high school wrestler, and you've stayed in shape as you matured into your adult body.
20 Presence?  You're a skilled trial lawyer in a large city, respected among your peers.
25 Dex?  Nike makes commercials with you in them.

In the medieval world, "wealth" was defined primarily as regular income--mostly generated from agriculturally productive land, but sometimes from other things. For a heroic fantasy campaign I assigned a specific income level for every point of wealth, and set a ceiling on the max points the PCs could spend. Every so often I'd increase the ceiling. Adventuring was a high risk/high reward activity that had boom and bust cycles...sometimes they had tons of money; a couple times they lost almost everything. Wealth gave them a steady base.
 
Also, wealth took time to manage. Characters had to explain how they were getting the wealth, and then deal with issues related to the source--spending some time managing the store, visiting the farm, or whatever they did to get the money.

He-man is especially appropriate since he never actually kills anyone with that magic sword. It is obviously STUN-only.
 
The elves in The Silmarillion are absolutely champions-level superheroes, standing up to Morgoth himself.
  The portions of the Thor movie that took place in Asgard and Jotunheim depict a fantasy champions world.
  There is the anime interpretation of Dante's Inferno for inspiration. The comments on Youtube are priceless.
 

Re: Silly question, How much damage do nukes do
 
Yet people survived the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs just a few hundred yards from ground zero.
 
If I had to design a clean Tac Nuke, it would go something like this:
 
(Total: 843 Active Cost, 130 Real Cost)
 
Killing Attack - Ranged 5d6, MegaScale (1" = 1 km; +1/4), Explosion (+1/2), Nonselective Target (-1/4), Attack Versus Limited Defense (Flash Defense ; +1 1/2), Does Flash, sight group, rather than STUN (+0), (225 Active Points); 1 Charge which Never Recover (-4), OAF Bulky (-1 1/2) (Real Cost: 35) ["Killing Flash" is necessary to make this conform to the shape of the rest of it]
 
plus
 
Killing Attack - Ranged 5d6 vs ED, MegaScale (1" = 1 km; +1/4), Explosion (+1/2), Nonselective Target (-1/4), Penetrating (x2; +1) (187 Active Points); 1 Charge which Never Recover (-4), OAF Bulky (-1 1/2) (Real Cost: 29)
 
plus
 
Killing Attack - Ranged 5d6 vs PD, MegaScale (1" = 1 km; +1/4), Explosion (+1/2), Nonselective Target (-1/4), Double Knockback (+3/4) (169 Active Points); 1 Charge which Never Recover (-4), OAF Bulky (-1 1/2) (Real Cost: 26)
 
plus
 
Killing Attack - Ranged 5d6, MegaScale (1" = 1 km; +1/4), Explosion (+1/2), Nonselective Target (-1/4), No Normal Defense (+1), Does BODY (+1) (262 Active Points); 1 Charge which Never Recover (-4), OAF Bulky (-1 1/2) (Real Cost: 40)
 
I would roll 5 dice plus a single STUN multipler, and apply that number to each effect. Assume 3's on all dice. First, Flashed for 15 phases - Flash Defense. Then the heat wall, 15 BODY 30 STUN - rED; minimum 5 BODY 10 STUN unless rED double hardened (humm, should have put "No KB" on that one). Next the shock wave, 15 BODY, 30 STUN - rPD, with 21" KB. Finally the gamma kicks in, 15 BODY 30 STUN unless character has LS vs Radiation. That's at ground zero, reduced effect for each km away from ground zero.
 
Lethal to normals without some luck and good cover, survivable by some supers.
 
YMMV

Re: Silly question, How much damage do nukes do
 
If I remember right, on the old message boards we statted out a 1 Kiloton Nuclear warhead as doing around 13D6+1K damage (the Fireball, in either case) with a 1 megaton doing around 15 or 16D6K.
 
I write nukes up with both Area of Effect and Explosion limitations. That way the basic AE Radius is Ground Zero where the main damage is applied, then for each Hex (or multiples of Hexes after, most likely) the damage drops off significantly.

Re: Silly question, How much damage do nukes do
 
According to Weapons: An International Encyclopedia from 5000BC to 2000AD, for a 200Kton warhead, the heat will vaporize metals up to 1.7km away, melt metals up to 2.5km away, burn and melt rubber and plastic up to 5km away, burn and char wood up to 5.8 km away, cause third degree burns at up to 7.6km, second degree burns at up to 10.5km, and first degree burns at up to 15.3km.
 
The blast will cause total destruction at up to 1.3 km, destroy massive structures at up to 1.6km, cause widescale destruction at up to 1.7km, damage multistory buildings at up to 2.2 km, wreck factories at up to 2.8km, wreck dwellings at up to 3.5km, overturn vehicles at up to 4.5km, damage brick houses at up to 5.4km, and damage wooden buildings at up to 9.4km.
 
Radiation at 1.6 km (1 mile) will be 2730 RAD (enough to kill 100% of those affected within hours), and at 3.2 km it will be 3.4 RAD (which will cause practically no effect in and of itself).

Re: Silly question, How much damage do nukes do
 

GURPS damage is an arithmetical progression, HERO is logarithmic.
 
3x10^8 dice in HERO is more than the energy output of the universe over its lifetime, I would expect.
 
Keith "Hasn't done the math, though" Curtis

At extreme levels of range, perhaps an archer also needs Telescopic Sight abilities to deal with at least some of their range modifiers? This wouldn’t be an issue with shorter ranges, but would when you get to the outer edge of a bow’s range.
 
An archer may have a ton of penalty skill levels, but they wouldn’t do much good if they can’t clearly see the target, would they?

I can't help because I don't know, but I just wanted to say good on ya' for looking to credit the original poster.  

Yes, eventually (i.e., for Legolas-level characters). For starting heroes, I'd probably cap it at +4 to offset range penalties.
 
 
Yes, eventually. For starting heroes, I'd again probably cap it at +4 to offset called shot penalties (even that makes a High Shot a normal chance).
 
 
That's fine. It's no "worse" than a melee fighter adding damage to their swords from hand-to-hand martial arts maneuvers. However, I might only allow Extra DC to be bought with XP (especially if they also have bonuses to offset range, and bonuses to offset called shots, etc. as a starting hero).

In fact, that's a point in general; how much I would allow of any of these things depends in part on how many of these things they have.  Eventually, they can have them all, but they shouldn't have them all when they start -- even if they can afford the CP cost -- or they won't have any room to get better.
 
All that said, these are still the relatively "normal" ways of building a skilled archer. As characters grow in power/skill, they're more likely to have things like Combat Archery and Rapid Archery, or even to "buy-off" the Concentrate Limitation on their bow as a "Nimble Archery" Talent or the like.

Here are the rules of thumb I have been using for a long time now.  They seem to be working:
Character Benchmarks - Famous fictional fantasy characters and their characteristics.  I stole it from someone's site.  If anyone knows whose it is I will add an appropriate authorship.  It is possible to argue with the characteristics for each of theses fictional characters.  That isn't important.  The important part is the relative comparisons. For my campaign, Nyonia, I provide the following rules and information for the players: Characteristics Combat Skills So far we have had everything from a well armed and armored knight (chainmail + breast plate), sword master (fighting with two blades), archer, and a martial artists/monk who fought with a pair of clubs/fighting sticks.  Everyone had their moments in combat.  Everyone had the crazy hard fight and everyone had the chance at a one shot.

The key word in my OP was "aspires" to a Legolas like competency. My problem is that I can easily build a starting character nearly that powerful without any sort of cheese whatsoever. Some strength to wield a decent bow, a few ranged martial arts maneuvers, a few combat levels with said maneuvers, several penalty skill levels for range modifiers and eight penalty skill levels for called shots. That leaves plenty still for characteristics and skills. My question is just how close to Legolas would most GMs be comfortable with for a character in a Fantasy game? I suppose Christopher's "It Depends" answer is an answer of sorts.

I've got two GMs both wanting to run Fantasy Hero who are both very new to Hero, and "I" don't know what to tell them. They don't understand the power level effects of things to make a judgement on their own. 

As someone who has run a lot of Fantasy Hero and plenty of folks who want to play archers.  Here is what I usually do:
Allow up to +3 vs  Range Allow up to +3 vs Hit locations Allow up to +4 with bows OCV no higher than a 5 Generally the bows can only do up to 1 1/2 d6 RKA There were characters that were able to shot 3/4 way across the gaming table.  If the target is unaware then the archers almost always would take a head shot (and usually connect).

The problem is that the system doesn't define 3-level differentiation very often.  So, if a full die is 3, is a half die 1 or 2?  
 
An alternative is to define a custom adder, which HD allows.  For Aid, for example, you can build a "-1 pip" to create the equivalent of 2d6-1.  It won't be reflected in what the standard effect indicates, but it's recorded and priced properly.  A custom adder is allowed to have a negative cost.
 
That said:  I think the system is wrong in the first place.  It's rounding you down twice...first, making standard effect 3 instead of 3.5, then rounding 3 down to 1.  But standard effect was never written to be average...2d6 standard effect is 6, when the average is 7.  Realistically, defining the 1/2 die standard effect as +2 is much more fair.
 
I'd also, I think, be OK with eliminating many of the intermediate steps, at least on the lower-cost-per-die powers...basic Blast, cosmetic/minor Transform, Aid, etc.  Higher cost...Mental Blast, most AVADs, major/severe Transform, Drain, etc...the half die level feels like it's plenty.  It might be that my use of the system is for supers ONLY...but a problem with it is trying to cover everything under the sun.  

I simply ignored the point cost of the spell. I would limit rolls to 16 or less, but subtract nothing from the role due to difficulty of spells, but add difficulty due to environmental factors and situational difficulties. Such as if the spell require gestures and incantations and was done in cold weather thst imposed Dex minuses, then the same minuses applied to the magic rolls. Too much math made things a serious bother for me so I tended to ruthlessly simplify magic systems. I am an artist and therefore am afflicted with math anxiety and an aversion to numbers, so modt minuses we’re applied to all similar activities. 

A good place to start is that the demon has absolutely no concern for anyone but themselves.  If the action will not benefit them in some way they simply will not do it.  If something will result in a minor benefit to them, but causes major disaster to everything else they will do it.   They can and will pretend to do something nice, but in the end it will benefit them.  
 
Next they look at all others as competitors and they always try to screw their competitors. They use every opportunity to reduce someone else’s plans and resources in case they would be used against them.  Anything another creature has can be a threat to you, so never let anyone get ahead. You never allow anyone to gain more from something than you do if you can help it.  
 
Last is the utter lack of trust in anyone.  You are a monster and so is everyone else, no matter what they say.  Everyone is going to turn on you so doing it first is just being smart.   Good is an illusion that only the weak fall for.  There is no joy and the only comforts you can have are those you take for yourself. You are utterly alone because everyone is going to betray you.     
 

If you truly have no idea what someone or something evil is like I congratulate you on your happy life.  Try watching a couple of episodes of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Criminal Minds or maybe something on the Holocaust.  If all else fails....watch the news almost any night.

It means they don't pay taxes. Now that is EVIL !

Exactly like those, thank you!

Something like these?
Combat Chart-portrait.pdf Combat Chart-landscape.pdf

Here's an idea.  Fantasy Hero gives the GM a lot of leeway in designing their magic system.  So, how about this:  all spells take RSR for no Limitation value.  
 
"Tier 0" spells require a Magic Skill Roll at no penalty.  
 
"Tier 1" spells require a Magic Skill Roll at -1 per 20 Active Points. 
 
"Tier 2" spells require a Magic Skill Roll at -1 per 10 Active Points.
 
"Tier 3" at -1 per 5 Active Points.  
 
Additionally, casters can take various KS, PS, SS, and so on, related to the types of magic they can cast.  Someone with KS: Fire Magic and SS: Chemistry might be able to use both of those as Complementary Skill Rolls to their Magic Skill when casting fire spells.  
 
Further, the Mages' Guild has a ranking system.  Mages of the First Circle cast their spells as listed above.  Mages of the Second Circle move everything down one level in difficulty, so that Tier 0 and 1 spells are at no penalty, Tier 2 spells are at -1 per 20, Tier 3 are at -1 per 10, and then they gain access to Tier 4 spells at -1 per 5.  And so on. 
 

If I am building a character for a Fantasy game, and the magic system imposes a strong probably of failure if my mage tries to do as much damage as my fighter or archer build could do without risk of failure (other than hit probability), then I am NOT building a mage. Done deal. Yes, there are loads of utility spells one could have a mage around for, but I am not interested in playing the jack-knife support character. I want to be able to shine when push comes to shove.
 
Now it may well be thematically appropriate for your campaign setting that magic is NOT particularly useful in a combat situation. Gandalf did use a sword. But it is germane only to a rather small subset of fantasy RPG settings I think. The VAST majority of people playing such games (usually using other systems) have mages either at the top of the damage dealing spectrum, or on par with other character archetypes.

For heroic / gritty levels of play, I normally apply a skill maxima across the board, which incidentally applies to magic systems that require skill rolls.
 
Skill Maxima is one of the rows in my "Assumptions" checklist I use for various campaign settings; you can see it in detail along w/ links to various "paradigms" such as High / Epic / Low fantasy, and a worksheet for you to fill in your own if you wish, here:

http://www.killershrike.com/FantasyHERO/HighFantasyHERO/campaignParadigms.aspx
 
And here is an example from an actual campaign:

 
Assumptions The following options are assumed to be in effect for this paradigm. Option
Selected Option
  No NCM   X NCM Powers Available O   Powers Not Available Super Skills Available O   No Super Skills Available Combat Luck Allowed X   No Combat Luck Allowed No Deadly Blow Allowed   O Deadly Blow Allowed   Literacy Standard X   Literacy Not Standard No Weapon Familiarity   X Weapon Familiarity No Armor Familiarity X   Armor Familiarity No Transport Familiarity   X Transport Familiarity No Skill Maxima   14- Skill Maxima No STR Minima   X STR Minima Superheroic CSL Conversion   X Heroic CSL Conversion   No Encumbrance   X Encumbrance Knockback   X Knockdown Generalized Damage   X Hit Location Damage No Long Term Damage X   Injury & Impairment Damage Normal Damage Default   X Killing Damage Default No Long Term Endurance   X Long Term Endurance END Cost = Active Points / 10 X   END Cost = Active Points / 5   Equipment Costs Points   X Equipment Doesn't Cost Points* Bases & Vehicles Cost Points   X Bases / Vehicles Don't Cost Points* Followers Cost Points   X Followers Don't Cost Points*   *Resource Pools as described in the Starting Character guidelines are in effect
O: By Origin X: Selected  
 
@Mr. RNote: as you are interested in using my Metier magic system, it might be relevant for you to know that I consider it to be a low to mid power level magic system and suggest it as being serviceable for Sword & Sorcery and Epic type settings.

I played in such a campaign some years back. The characters 'started' at 600 points. (!!!) The campaign lasted five years running weekly, and ended when we resolved the main quest that involved literally saving the universe. We had a technologically ignorant Tarzan, a super Vampire, a Sorceress, and my character, essentially a melee tank who was an Immortal, like literally. He resurrected once from a nuke.
 
It was more than a little freeform, and wildly fantastic. We could hop dimensions, we dealt with godlike entities both malevolent and benign, we vanquished Godzilla like threats, confronted armies and demon hordes.

That campaign remains my favorite campaign of any I have ever played. The GM too told us that ours was the only campaign he had ever run in over thirty years that had ever successfully run it's course by completing its ultimate quest.

My (starting) character in that game, Vestige.
https://www.mediafire.com/file/fr1y4w14hd7k0gh/vestige.hdc/file
https://www.mediafire.com/file/lstc7tmc59aiclh/Vestige.pdf/file
 
We are now playing D&D. 

Oh! Look! A half page of basic guidelines meant to give people an idea of relative balance. I shall then with my superbly honed rules lawyer talents, interpret this then to mean a half page of iron clad rules rife with loopholes to exploit, so I can legally create the most godawful combat monster and lay waste to the very idea of game balance.
 
Anyone taking this approach to an attempt to give people an idea of what I consider reasonable would be kindly invited to NOT play in my game.