greypaladin_01

Well....  the couch is also the DM Bed 

Yeah I guess the IMMEDIATE after game is just to chat with my player and get her input on how the session went.   What she liked or didn't and such...but the notes come soon after that.... either that night or next day.

Currently I am only running a solo game with alot of sandbox elements so process tends to go like this.

- Going into session have notes for MY general story plan for the overall story.  Also have a few generic mini-encounters and sheets for them on hand to use as needed.

- During session make short hand notes of anything that goes different from the plan  (usually MOST of it)  as well as name of on the spot NPCS and events.

- After session do quick review of notes and write up something a little more clear and I keep those sheets in sequence in my binder for the game.  Kinda like a history of the game.

- Lastly:  every few months I review the notes and update the master computer file that i keep for the shared campaign.

...having 3 or so differnet single character campaigns going in same city that are happening similiar-ish time frames.   What the heck was I thinking?  :D

Thank you!  Definitely a good start.  They are grid based but the grid looks more hidden so with hex overlay it could still work.  Nice!   If anyone else knows good sources for more things like this I would appreciate it. 

Also good modern/cyberpunk city maps would be great too

Depending on how you wanted people to pay for them.  I would go with Focus or even Followers for some.   The drones could also be done as small vehicles with Computer to run them.

I am working on a Champions game that is a mixture of Supers, Cyberpunk and PostApocalypse wastelands.   I am trying to find good hex grid (or blank) maps that I can use with online Virtual Table Tops for my player.  Does anyone have any good suggestions.  Almost everything I find is either D&D/Fantasy or Square Grid covered.

That is pretty much what I was thinking as well Archer.   I do enjoy toolkitting and the OP ideas for mental powers certainly are another approach, but I was offering this up as a way to give more flexibility to the mental powers as they exist as a compromise for people that are not satisfied but also don't want to build-from-scratch.

Also in comics there IS prescident for mentalists that are trying to Read/Control Minds but are just not able to overpower someone's defenses fully but can manage a lesser effect and rolling effect dice first and then just making the most of what you rolled for a phase seems a good way to simulate that.     "I wanted to make him surrender but my roll was only good enough to make him blow up a car and threaten instead of shooting at the crowd"

I fully admit that I am up way to late and tired but having read through all of this, there are certainly some interesting (if unfinished) ideas for alternate systems that I hope to review more after sleeping.

However, I had one thought as far as the all or nothing nature of Mental powers as they currently stand in the game.

Instead of the mentalist declaring the intended effect level and THEN rolling dice, what if they make their attack, roll the effect dice and see what level effect they CAN get, then declare what they want to do from there.   This would simulate the mentalist getting a "lock" but perhaps not as much a lock as they wanted but could still try to get some lesser effect if they choose.

I always had a soft spot for the bulk of the 4E Champions team, but I also admit that all of New Millennium got the short end of the stick by fans.   While it is VERY image in places, it is a very viable campaign and there are many elements of it that I like better than what we ended up with in 5/6E.

Also, other than licensing issues, I really don't see how most of the changes  (everyone by Defender)  were really any better than their predecessors.   While the 5E+ team are viable characters in their own right, I still don't see how a little more care to flesh out backgrounds from 4E team could not have made them just as viable.   (Except maybe Jaguar,  while he is a good example of Multiform character he was the weak link of the team to me.)

Seeker just gets no love.... he doesn't even get a name anymore.   Kinda shame... he was product of the times, but was always one I liked as a kid back in the 4E days.   Plus as mentioned before Watchers of the Dragon went a LONG way to softening some of the goofy hard edges while keeping the spirit there.

Glad I could help!   I remembered the section as well... I just had to check through a few books to find it.   Advantages to having read and re-read so many of the books over my life.  Made narrowing it down quicker

Hi Lord Liaden,

The specific mention you are looking for was 5e Millennium City book.  Media & Entertainment section / Superworld & Other Magazines... page 39, second paragraph.

Hope it helps!

That is what I thought as well.  Especially as I looked through more of Villains 2 and found ALOT of editing mistakes and typos.  I fear the proof reading on it was not as good as it could have been. 

But enough changes have happened that I wanted to check with the rest of you to make sure I wasn't missing something out of 6E.

Thanks!

Happy New Year everyone!   I have started to slowly gather up 6th edition books and have started to look through them.   I have noticed there were a lot more changes from 5th to 6th than I original thought.   But I found something on Pantera's  (Eurostar) character sheet in Villains 2 that I cannot make sense of and was hoping someone might help me figure out what I am missing, or if this was a typo.   I am including some stats for sake of clarification, I hope this is not a violation of terms or copyright to do so.

Pantera has STR 30 and HKA 2d6 claws at 0 END.   But the book says with STR the claws are 6d6 HKA.   Now, the Questions....

1 - My understanding is that you can only add +1d6 to a HKA for every 15 STR you us in Superheroic.  This means she should only have a 4d6 HKA with STR.

2 - Buying 0 END for the HKA does not get rid of the END used for STR, so it will still take 2 END for her to claw someone (unless not using her STR at all and just using the 2d6 base HKA

3 - Because the HKA has an advantage (0 END) does that mean that the STR does not add at the +1d6 KA per 15 STR anymore and has to use the more complicated charts to figure out how many DCs get added instead?

I am worried right now that my 3rd - 5th HERO rules in my head are getting in the way and I am missing something here and any clarifications would be much appreciated.   ((  I only just recently found that HKA are no longer limited to only doubling with STR and that was a major surprise.

So to confirm a character with STR 45, double knockback would pay 35 points for the STR and then 23 points for the double knockback.

As far as END costs go, they would have 5 points for using the STR and 3 more when using DB KB as well?

Perfect!  Thanks for the help!

I am hoping for some clarification on purchasing Double Knockback for STR.   If a character has 45 STR, do you calculate the cost for the Double Knockback advantage based off the 35 points spent on STR, or the total 45 of the stat?

Thank you all for your help!

Hey!  I am going to try and necro this thread for a moment.  In reference to the APG Piercing power, how would you consider having it interact with Hardened?   It seems that there should still be a rule to allow for defenses to be able to resist the ability, but if you can purchase individual points or reduction, then how much should a single level of Hardened resist?   Any thoughts?

While not exactly what OP was requesting, there is always the Champions In 3D method (4e book about alternate realities) method.  One of the worlds in the books was Backworld, basically Earth-3 from DC.  The Champions and PRIMUS were evil and the normal Champions villains were the heroes, with changes to personality and such.  So there is always doing some What If with existing enemies to make new heroes.  

Although I assume the OP is looking for heroes as examples and idea generations, so that might not work as well.

As Lord Liaden mentioned HERO has risen from the ashes before in the 4e / New Millenium / 5e era, so hope is not lost.   Anothe book that has not been mentioned for heroes is the original (and new) Strike Force books.   Probably one of the very first books with alot of heroes in it that I came across.

24 minutes ago, DShomshak said:

Getting back to Babylon 5:

 

I had the honor of hearing J. Michael Straczinski talk at Norwescon, and one of the things he talked about was how he makes stories. B5 fans may find some of it familiar.

 

You start with characters. As you create each character, come up with answers to these questions:

 

Who is the character?

What does the character want?

What impedes the character from getting/doing what he/she/it wants?

What does the character do to try overcoming those impediments?

 

And that's your story. Good advice for GMs and players as well as TV writers or novelists.

 

Dean Shomshak

 

 

That sounds like "character creation 101" to me.  But something that seems to never really be considered enough by most games or players.

Thank you for that overview.   I still find it disappointing that the company has not managed to give some full examples in 6 editions, but what you put there is very helpful to get started. 

Personally I have never really worried about criticals with HERO.  But I suppose you could easily do something where you define what would count as a crit and then give a few DCs onto the weapon to simulate the crit multipliers.

As far as the 'type' of damage that really would not matter for most things since it is more Special Effect.  However you might have your skeletons get +5 Armour (not vs Blunt) or something to help simulate the d20 effects.

Not sure how much this helps you.

All the camp of Adam West's Batman... without any of the humor or well...

What did I just watch?  ...and how do I unsee?

That would be very helpful.   I am still reading over the various rule sections but I admit that most of it is leaving me scratching my head a bit.    In many ways I do wonder if come 7th edition  (whenever that time comes)  it might be a good idea to focus on the user-friendliness of the game.  Making sure to give more examples of various pieces of HERO working together.   Most editions have had a short combat example.  But I think combat example, skill use scenario and vehicle examples for both combat and perhaps skill sequences for crew would all benefit from extended examples.

In the meantime, perhaps this is something people on the boards here could assist with.  It seems like a good resource that could get put in the downloads (maybe?) section for reference.