AtomicGladiator

Thanks! Appreciate that.

As I said, I am not really familiar with D&D. I assumed that the Monster Manual was akin to something like the Hero Bestiary. Shades of Black DOES require characters from the Hero Bestiary, but they are not main characters, so they are not my complaint. If D&D publishes adventures that do not include the most important characters, that doesn't make it right. I've played HERO games for years. I've seen a few times when adventures would suggest the use of characters from other books, but I've never seen one where the MAJOR characters were not included in the adventure. Most adventures included everything right down to the agents. (I do recall that the Genocide sourcebook used a character from "Champions of the North" as a top henchman for one of the leaders. But it was hardly a character integral to any particular plotline.) If the new policy is not to include the major characters, it's a policy I don't like, and I'm voicing a complaint against it. I love the HERO system and I'm happy to see it resurrected by the group that is putting out the new books. I want them to be financially successful. And the product, Shades of Black, is otherwise a fine one. If you have all the other books, I would recommend it. But I want to discourage HERO from assuming that everyone has these other books when they put out an adventure. Or, at very least, a disclaimer so that you know what books are required. I'm still curious about what books are required for the "Battlegrounds" adventure. There is no disclaimer on it, and I'm certainly not buying it until I know.

Thanks! I hadn't really gotten into the enhanced senses in 5th Edition yet. I just got the book as a Christmas present. It looks like this is an area where things have some considerable changes. Or maybe it's jut been too many years since I played Champions. I don't remember Nightvision, and I'm not sure how exactly it differs from Ultraviolet vision. I'll have to dig into this a bit, looks like. The weird thing is, if I buy darkness vs the smell/taste group then add the individual senses of Normal Sight, UV and Night vision it is actually fewer active points than if I buy the Sight sense group and give it the 1/4 limitation. That's using the new version of Hero Designer. Hmmm...

Have only looked at Dr. Wraithe so far, but thought I'd offer some comments. Since I'm running the TS&P adventure, I wanted to make sure that the character remains the same power level, even if the points go over the original point cost. You have done a great job balancing out things. But the new telekinesis costs make his tk attack an 8d6 attack instead of 10d6. I think the TK should remain at 10d6, especially since you've boosted his EB to 13d6. For my purposes, I think I'll increase his multipower reserve to 75 points so the TK can be 10d6 but leave the other slots as you have them. Not the most efficient, but it keeps his power level where I want it. I don't want him shooting 15d6 energy blasts. The other thing I remember doing with Dr. Wraithe when I played the adventure the first time (so many years ago) is using his clouds of darkness. They blocked normal sight and UV, but allowed IR vision to see the heat patterns within. That worked out well with Helios' IR vision, since he could target any enemies within the dark clouds. I'd like to keep the darkness the same way. However, being new to the 5th edition, I can't figure out a way to buy darkness that only affects normal sight and UV. Hero Designer won't let me do it unless I buy another sense group for the darkness as well. The only thing I can think to do is to buy the darkness as affecting all of the Sight Group and then giving it a limitation stating that it doesn't affect IR vision. Or am I missing something?

Thanks to all involved in these conversions. I am starting up a new campaign with a couple of guys from my old campaign and some new players who have never played before. I decided that the old "To Serve and Protect" adventure would be a good choice for the first major adventure in the campaign. It's really one of the best ever written, I think. So this saves me some time and helps get the juices flowing.

Glad you see my point. I'm also glad to find out that the same problem exists with Champions Battleground before I bought it. If it was labeled at some point, I certainly cannot find that disclaimer now. I had been considering buying that one, but there seems little point since I don't have the other needed books. What other books are needed to play that adventure? but I do not agree that it is unusable. It would not be that difficult to provide write-ups yourself. One of the reasons I buy adventures is so I don't have to work that hard as a GM. And Shades of Black provides specific tactics which use specific powers for these villains. I could substitute other characters but I'm unlikely to come up with the proper mix of powers without more information than is provided. Still, "unusable" is too strong a term. It would be more accurate to say that without these characters, the product is "unusable as intended". Semantics aside, my point is that it is unreasonable to ask me to shell out an extra $40 or so to play this adventure. Yes, of course that would help support HERO, but worthy as that may seem, that wasn't my goal in buying the adventure. I'd be more inclined to buy future products as a satisfied customer.

I don't knw D&D, but the Monster Manual sounds like a "basic" source. If the characters I'm talking about were included in 5th Edition rulebook, I would have no complaint. I really don't complain much about the "minor" characters not being included. But the two MOST IMPORTANT characters are not included, each published in a different book. It seems a bit much to be forced to buy two $20 something books to play an adventure that costs half that. Maybe as you say, I am the target audience for this kind of money-making tactic, but it didn't work for me. I think the opposite has happened, and a lot of people have stayed away from the excellent "Shades of Black" because of this. I know I certainly will not be buying more HERO products until I am sure they are relatively complete as sold. It IS a well-done adventure, has a lot going for it including great maps and detail, but it is just unusable as a stand-alone product, and should have been labelled as such.

I noticed in the HERO news the comments that the e-book "Shades of Black" has not sold very well. I'm one who bought it, and think it is a really well-written adventure, with great graphics. Unfortunately, I can't use it, because it requires at least three other Champions books, none of which I have. The two most major villains are not included, and many of the minor ones are left out as well. If this was an Adventurer's Club adventure, maybe I might have expected that, but it certainly caught me by surprise after paying for the adventure. I might suggest to HERO that adventures should include stats for all the characters, or at least the major ones. I can't help but think that word of this has gotten out and that is why the book hasn't sold well. It's simply not usable as it is. If HERO doesn't want to include stats for the main characters in a book, at least a disclaimer would be appreciated. If you buy software that requires another program to use it, it generally says so on the box. I think HERO should be upfront about this and post notices that using certain adventures requires buying other books that contain the characters for the adventures.