Jkeown

How would you model damage that cannot be healed with Healing? The target would have to rely on his REC instead of drugs, spells or paladin Good Touch effects.

A simple +1 seems too expensive. I was thinking about something like Penetrating, where 1 pip per die couldn't be Healed.

Maybe model it on Difficult to Dispel, requiring extra healing to be used against it? Arrgh!

Calamities are spells that got away. In short, someone rolled an 18 under just the right (or wrong) conditions, and now things suck. The ambient magic gathers together at some other time, minutes or centuries later, and a Calamity results. They are self-aware, often angry, magic spells. Attempts have been made to domesticate them, with universally disastrous endings.

They have one character sheet, with many variations depending on the nature of the original spell.

Calamities.pdf

It doesn't matter if this was your first time using this method as much as it matters if they understood you were using and were okay with this method.

Good point. I think they enjoyed it. At least, when it was revealed (rather nicely) they didn't call me on it. I think they realized what had happened, adjusted their thinking quickly and moved on to damage control. They want revenge, and this Saturday, they get it, they'll have to break into the bad guy's secure point and take it out on them. Not me. That's how it should work, methinks.

This was my first time trying this method. In the past, I'd roll to hit OMCV, Roll Effect, describe the new situation and the players would be looking for ways out of the Images, Mental Illusions, what-have-you. No longer. Now I'm going to play smarter. I'm kinda tired of being argued with by a few difficult players.

I have all of my player's character sheets (thanks, HERO Designer!). So I know their CHA by heart. This past Saturday, one of them was attacked by a Mentalist who scored +30 on her Mental Illusions Roll (rolled pre-game, mind you). I said nothing about an attack, just played another hour or two of the game getting input from other players as if nothing weird was going on. After the Player revealed their safe house and many important and terrible things had been done over the course of 2 Illusionary hours, he snapped out of it with help from another player (1 Phase later in game time).

Then they learned he'd been under the influence the whole time. The bad guys beat them back to the safe house, nearly killed some campaign NPCs and made off with Arachne's Tapestry and the Important Mysterious Female NPC.

I think I did okay, but the pre-rolling feels dishonest. Hearing 18 dice hit the table really clues a bunch of PCs to the notion that bad doin's are afoot.  

Your thoughts?

I have stuff going back to Mythic Greece at home, but here's my PDF collection.

All good ideas! I like the ones based on Invisibility. I hadn't even gotten close to that. I've just dug a hole for myself with it, is all. My current Ravenna game has a Mortician (Hunter of the Dead), a Noble Wild Raccoon Healer, a Nightstalker (Magic Detective), an amnesiac wizard with a strange Svartalfr companion, and a Half-Golem Wall of Meat with a love of Shotguns.  I want to introduce Absentia as a place of sanctuary, but messing with player's memories without an actual power construct is asking for heat.

Game is weird enough as it is. Started with a hillbilly Shadow Cult and might end with the destruction of Indianapolis.

I have a Hidden Place in my Urban Fantasy game (Ravenna) called Absentia. People from Absentia (Demonym: Absentees) are often forgotten shortly after they are encountered.

Is this a Constant Mental Transform (editing/removal of memories (EGO+1))? Or more of a Complication? Both? I'm torn.  

It should be noted that Absentees can remember each other.

Seems like it leads to this ungainly awful thing (I may be applying Constant improperly):

Forget Me:  Major Transform 4d6 (Person With Memories To Person Without Memories, Meeting Again), Trigger (Activating the Trigger requires a Zero Phase Action, Trigger requires a Turn or more to reset, Character does not control activation of personal Trigger, Misfire; Leaving; +1/4), Area Of Effect (3m Radius; +1/4), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2), Constant (+1/2), Uncontrolled (+1/2) (120 Active Points) Real Cost: 120

Or maybe I'm overthinking it and it's just this:

Social Complication:  Forgotten Soon After Parting Very Frequently, Severe, Not Limiting among Absentees 20 Character Points.

I like this a great deal. Especially the no resurrection stuff. I look forward to the spells themselves. Certainly, you've put more thought into this than I did the Maelstrom Magic System for Ravenna/Caleon/Etc. 

So... doing a new worlds-spanning Bad Guy organization for all of my homebrew settings. They take the limbs of undead horrors (or craft "fresh" ones) and add them to the living (sometimes with their permission, often without). I've decided Differing Modifiers are the way to go for this Ritual Weirdness. Attached, please find my initial notes on the matter. Let me know, if you would, if I'm employing DM properly. Maledictors.pdf

 

 

I can post a few examples from my own Exalted work, if you like.

 

 

I'd love to see that, as well!

Updated. More to come.

Chaos Effects.pdf

Thanks! There's a bit of Zelazny in there already... but I'll look into the others.

I modelled a great deal of Caleon on various Role Master concepts. Healing, Arcane Magic, crafting materials, the use of "essence" and the Pale. Played Shadow World for years in HERO, but was very exposed to and still employ a lot of their conceits.

Here are some notes. No proper HERO constructs yet. Those will follow hard upon when I get home. I just started writing this an hour ago. 

If it sucks, remember I just started writing this an hour ago.

If it's really good, then remember that I just started writing this an hour ago.

Suggestions welcome. It can't get too weird!

Chaos Effects.pdf

Expanded... made some corrections.

Pioneer Campaign Notes.pdf

_{Thanks for the alert!}

Attached are my notes for the Star Hero game that starts this Saturday.

The Player Characters are the Crew of a Pioneer (the Far Star II) vessel going off to search for habitable worlds, while having a secret mission of finding previous surveys that did not return.

Think of it as a bit of Traveller, with a heaping helping of Star Trek with a pinch of Saturday Morning cartoons sprinkled on top.

There will be one episode a week for a long time. I'm only up to Season 2, Episode 14, and I'm certain I've got more ideas, but I thought I'd let you guys see it and find out if I'm missing a trope or two somewhere. Note the general lack of detail. This is purposeful, as no "module" or "adventure path" survives contact with my group. They do not like rail-road plotlines and "So you do this..." kind of leading from their GM. So... they are very open ended.

If anything does not make sense, feel free to ask... If anyone wants to use these seeds, please do! I'd love to hear how your players tackled these situations.

Edit: Oops!

Pioneer Campaign Notes.pdf

John,

Thanks for the reply! At present, that's exactly what I'm trying to do. The project suffers from a decided lack of organization and my tendency to jump around like an exothermic Swamp Waddler of Sigma Ustafal. The 2600CE Player's Guide (of which that PDF is a small part) is at 233 pages.

The idea of arranging traits by world of origin is an interesting one, tackled by Jason Kemp in Flynn's Guide to Alien Creation. I have that book, but I admit to only being slightly influenced by it. Perhaps I should re-categorize and do this more in that style than the GURPS-like implementation I've used so far.

Hey, you! Are you writing an alien race, genetic tweak or radical splice? You need fresh genes! Try this handy work in progress of stuff lifted from better authors (plus my own fevered imagination). Some of the game mechanics are a bit spurious... especially on Desolidification. If Desol doesn't protect against damage, I don't make you buy Affects Physical World (APW) with your other attacks. Quite often in 2600CE, Desol is a mental power, so they aren't protected against Mental Powers, and do not have to buy APW with it. (That's still experimental, however, I've yet to see it in play.)

I plan on expanding it, adding more detail and eventually writing up all the critters mentioned in a Stellar Bestiary at some point.

Species Traits.pdf

I'm converting GRAmel's Tropicano to HERO. Seems like the coolest idea for Dark Champions/Danger International. Please have a look at the reviews on your favorite PDF site. My group only plays HERO and PFRPG, so a lot of conversion will be required.

If there is interest, I'll post my conversions.

I have that. "Enter the Dream Realms" uses Extra-Dimensional Movement. But I couldn't find any other way to let someone live out huge tracts of time aside from Mental Illusions.

So... working on a system for Ravenna based loosely on (read: stolen from) H.P. Lovecraft's Dreamlands cycle.  I think (and since I'm the GM, I'm right) that a person can use a Mental Power on themselves as easily as they could a targeted Power. This person could cast Mental Illusions and live out minutes, days or years in a dream based on the +30 EGO result that allows Illusionary Time to take effect. One could even use the +30 result on others to force or invite them into this dream.

This is very like the film Inception. Question is... is this within the rules?

Such a spell would make use of Transdimensional, limited targets (Sleepers Only) and certain Area of Effect and Line of Sight modifiers, but I think I'm on to something.

I'm writing this using my own Megadungeon guidelines - Vast Underground

Vast Underground.pdf

Here's a thing I started on today. No hint of a plot yet. It's written with my home campaign, Caleon, in mind, but might be convertible once I'm done.

Ancient Regio.pdf