Matthew Martin

13 minutes ago, L. Marcus said:

Disney might get into the fracas, as well -- I heard that they used D20 as the basis for, for example, their Star Wars KoTOR games. And I bet Disney's lawyers are better than Hasbro's.

    Nothing to arbitrate there--the KOTOR games were based off the d20 Star Wars RPG, and copyrights and licensing rights to all SW RPGs rest with Lucasfilm. They could rerelease any of them, just like they did with the WEG RPG a few years back, and even build new derivative works. I expect it's probably just not worth their time.

https://www.facebook.com/jodi.roma/posts/10229479545681340

Praying for him and his loved ones.

  I was going to order Enchanted Items and Thrilling Hero Adventures from the online store, but when I tried to check out, I got a message that THA couldn't be shipped to my address. Any idea what's up?

The Day After Ragnarok (HERO 6E version) defines it as a Minor Transform under the Naga write-up (p. 108).

  There was a brief moment last night when a $16 or so copy was on Amazon. It's gone now.

  (No, I didn't buy it; I bought the MegaBundle on the last day Hero Games offered free shipping, lo those many moons ago.)

Re: Nook/Kindel And Hero. Cheep PDF Hero System Books Without Trouble?

No that is odd. Same book and same model. Everytime I went back to BOTD it would open to the cover page.

 

I wonder if it matters were I placed it. I save my pdfs in documents were do you save yours?

I've got mine in Documents, transferred by sending it to my Kindle's e-mail address. I haven't yet transferred any Hero PDFs through the Send to Kindle program I downloaded to my laptop, or downloaded any directly onto the Kindle.

Re: Nook/Kindel And Hero. Cheep PDF Hero System Books Without Trouble?

I use kindle fire, without major issue. Although the HERO preferred format with the side bars requires moving the page with my thumb rather than just taping like a normal book. All is all it is okay, I read The Book of the Destroyer on Kindle fire in normal time.

 

PS: Kindle does not remember your page number for pdfs.

Strange. I was reading The Book of the Destroyer on my Kindle Fire yesterday, and it was restoring the document to where I left off whenever I brought it up. Did you mean something different?

Re: Nook/Kindel And Hero. Cheep PDF Hero System Books Without Trouble?

My Kindle Fire handles the HERO PDFs just fine, aside from screen size and ratio.

EDIT: And Tasha, there are actually a handful of PDFs that are cheaper on DriveThruRPG than they are in the HERO Store. The Ultimate Base is still at the 50% level, for example. I was actually coming over here to ask if DOJ was aware of this.

Re: MYTHIC HERO: What Do *You* Want To See?

Also, count me as another fan of Legendary Hero as a separate book. Aside from the topics you mentioned, Prester John might be a good candidate for inclusion, as well as some of the more fanciful saints such as St. Christopher and St. George.

Steve mentioned in last week's chat that saints are a no-go for either book. Depending on how broadly one defines the term, this would exclude Michael, Gabriel and Raphael, who are all honored as saints by the Catholic Church (and the Orthodox Churches as well, AFAIK).

Re: MYTHIC HERO: What Do *You* Want To See?

I'll second those who think that there's no need to writeup an omnipotent' date=' omniscient being, but that angels, demons, and other of the lesser beings would be good to have. I think the potential for offense turns on whether one represents the material charitably or not. Just as a reminder, there were a number of writeups for some of this kind of material in PA Hero, and I think that was generally well-done. It could be updated and/or revised for wider use in other Hero settings without much trouble. I can think of some very cool Champions adventures flowing from the unleashing of the Four Horsemen and the periodic aid of (Arch)angels in an attempt to put those monsters to rest.[/quote']

 

Well, there's also the fact that the HERO System (or any game system) can't even handle angels and demons as traditional Christian theology understands them. The workaround's simple enough--these are folkloric or literary versions, and represent the kinds of powers and capabilities these beings are commanded/allowed to manifest by God in the kinds of situations heroes will encounter them.

Re: What if Steve Long is an agent of Empress Istvatha V’han?

I now have to wonder if Osiris, Small Fuzzy Guardian of the Universe, was placed next to Steve Long not as protection for Steve . . . but as protection for the universe.

Re: THE HERO SYSTEM GRIMOIRE: What Do *You* Want To See?

How about "White Magic" as the opposite of Black Magic, even if it's just a sidebar on how to build it by borrowing spells from other categories? Give the forces of Good equal time!

Re: Excerpted PDFs

One idea that comes to mind is Lucha Libre Hero without the Sidekick section. It might grab interest from HERO fans who are curious but don't want to rebuy the rules, or non-HERO fans who'd pay for the genre material but aren't interested in the system.

Re: FANTASY HERO -- What Do *You* Want To See?

Chapter Two: Character Creation: A discussion of creating Fantasy characters using the HERO System, including detailed coverage of Templates, Skills, Powers, Complications, and more. I'll start with Ch. 2 of the 5E FH and rearrange, rewrite, buff, and polish from there.

Any chance of some short corruption rules, given the importance of that element in archetypal works of Epic Fantasy (LotR), Dark Fantasy gaming (Warhammer, AFAIK) and Space Fantasy (Star Wars)? They could even apply to magic in some flavors of S&S Fantasy.

Chapter Four: Magic: A discussion of all sorts of issues pertaining to magic -- creating magic systems, creating and using spells, implications of magic use, etc., etc. -- for FH. I'll start with Ch. 4 of the 5E FH and rearrange, rewrite, buff, and polish from there.

I'd like to see some notes on things like the 'subtle magic' discussed in FH's section on Epic Fantasy and the LotR RPG, even if it's only a couple of paragraphs on how to use Change Environment. Also (though this may belong in Chapter 2), some focus on PC qualities of character and magical gifts that aren't as flashy as the 'wizards throwing fireballs' (or 'sorcerers summoning demons' for the S&S crowd) that fantasy gaming magic often gets reduced to, the kind of stuff that shows up in fairy tales and epic fantasy. It's been a long time since I last looked at FH5E, so forgive me if some of this is already there.

Re: Martial Arts Resources

Do you have specific series titles?

Was this addressed to me? If so, then I'd suggest the Clone Wars cartoon Vols. 1 & 2 directed by Genndy Tartakovsky (to be distinguished from the CGI The Clone Wars series currently airing), specifically Vol. 1, Chapters 7 (Asajj Ventress vs. Count Dooku), 12-13 (Mace Windu takes on a battle droid army and seismic tank single-handedly), 18-19 (Assaj Ventress vs. Anakin Skywalker) and 20 (General Grievious makes his first appearance against four Jedi), and Vol. 2 Chapters 23-25 for the most lightsaber/wuxia-esque action. The Prequel trilogy also features some lightsaber duels and an emphasis on the Jedi as monastic warriors. Selected comic books may have similar thematics and styles, but I'm not sure which ones offhand. Information on Jedi fighting styles, for gamers who want ideas on fictional/mystical swordfighting techniques, can be found in Jedi vs. Sith: The Essential Guide to the Force.

Please note that while I know Star Wars well, I know wuxia mostly secondhand--I learned most of what I know from Ninja Hero 5E and seeing Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon--so I may be completely off the mark here.

Re: Martial Arts Resources

Hmm....some of the Star Wars material (especially the Tartakovsky Clone Wars cartoon) might be worth considering for 'wuxia/martial arts in Sci-Fi/Space Fantasy.'

Re: APG Discussion thread

No. What you have is a way to make a power work at some lesser or greater proportion than normal in certain circumstances.

Fair enough. I always figured that the 'proportion of target's stats' would be unbalanced without careful controls, but I thought you might have found a way to do it.

The actual Proportional sounds like it should be more elegant than having to buy variously limited (or advantaged) levels of a single power, which is quite nice.

Re: APG Discussion thread

the Proportional advantage/limitation.

Does this mean what I think it means? Do we finally have a way to model those video-game "reduces target to half HP BODY or STUN" powers?

Re: Escapist "High Adventure" column about Hero

Nice summation of the history and current state of the game.

And thanks for your review of the BBB in DRAGON #162, back in the day, which was key in selling me (and probably many others) on the HERO System.

Re: Update to 6ed?

Apparently it's very unofficial' date=' since no one seems to be using it. I don't see the need for a nickname, personally (I think the abbreviation 6E is fine). But if there must be one, the one I've liked best of those I've seen is DBB (for double blue books)...[/quote']

 

As the one who coined that term, I favor using DBB for the book set, and 6E for the rules themselves. This distinction may be pedantic, but it might come in handy if the Basic Rulebook becomes a major entry vector. ("If you want to give HERO 6E a try, start with Basic and then, when you're ready, get the DBBs.")

Re: One Last 6E Preview: The Covers!

6E1 - 466 pages

6E2 - 322 pages

 

At least according to PDF

Nitpick: Don't the PDFs include front and back covers as two additional pages, making the 'actual' page counts 464 and 320? (Those numbers divide evenly into 16, which makes that more likely.)

And we expect liveblogging of your readthrough.

Re: One Last 6E Preview: The Covers!

I like it.

Unleash the DBBs (Double Blue Books)!

Re: D & D Diatribe

Calling in Mark Hughes as a witness against D&D is like calling Jack Chick as a witness against gaming (or Catholicism, or a host of other subjects . . . ).

Matthew L. Martin

Originally posted by Lowly Uhlan

Too add just a little;

 

The Nazgul were called Ulari in quenya, the "high" elvish language. The LoTR CCG by Decipher has names for all nine on each of their cards, don't know what the source for those names was.

IIRC, the names on the Decipher cards are just Quenya for "First Ringwraith", "Second Ringwraith", etc., as a way to get around the 'no given names'.

As for the origins, I think one of the LotR Appendices specifies that three of the Nazgul were Black Numenoreans.

Matthew L. Martin