Barwickian

Re: Drakine pics (and other ones also)

Was unexpectedly busy the last few days, but will try to know a few more dragonfolk images together in the next day or two.

(It isn't entirely out of the goodness of my own heart - if I can make a few extra shiillings as a character artist, I'll be happy, but I need to get a good selection of sample images together first. Doing this sort of thing help build up my sample gallery - and it's fun.)

Re: Drakine pics (and other ones also)

Just a rough test - is this the kind of thing you're after? I can't remember all the details of drakine offhand - just humanoid dragon-men.

If not, no probs. If yes, let me know any special requests you have (weapons, clothing or accessories, poses, etc). I don't have the time to do you a full scene for free at the moment, but I can do you 2-3 character sketches if they're not too complicated (I'll release them under my usual non-commercial creative commons licence).

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Re: Drakine pics (and other ones also)

Give me a day o two, I can probably make some for you.

Re: Fantasy Art Thread

Great pictures, Storn - and you're right, that is good feedback.

Here's my latest render...

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Re: J'kara

Don't really know West Africa (I know East Africa), but Ga is spoken in Ghana, Ewe and Yoruba in different parts of Nigeria. Most tribes will have their own languages, though some may count as dialects of a related tribe's language; I think most of them are in the Bantu family, but I wouldn't swear to that.

Wikipedia should help.

Re: STR Minimum: somewhat overcooked?

Use the Brace rules!

Now having read the brace rules, yes, those make perfect sense. D'oh!

Re: STR Minimum: somewhat overcooked?

I have long felt that the STR Minimum' date=' for almost all weapons, is way too high. I just made for a flat -5 to Str Min across the board. It was a quick and easy way to put the STR Min in its place. I'm sure you could get more exacting or precise, but it seemed to work pretty well for the campaigns I've used that house rule in since I implemented it.[/quote']

 

Simple, elegant and easy to remember without recalculating point costs. I see you idea, I steal it and I would rep you for it if I didn't have to spread some around first.

I've just been creating some mook soldiers for my players' pulp heroes to roll roughshod over.

I figured average normal characteristics are 8, so a typical soldier might have physical stats of 10-11 to represent his ongoing training and PT.

Then I came to arm them. But under Pulp Hero writeups to fire a simple bolt-action rifle requires a STR minimum of 13 (Springfield) or 14 (Lee-Enfield or Gewehr 98).

Now, the stat comparison table lists STR of 11-13 as being a typical weightlifter and 14-20 as an Olympic class weightlifter.

I don't see that level of STR being needed to shoot a (roughy) one-third of an inch calibre rifle accurately. Hell, I used a Lee-Enfield as a 14-year-old cadet, and was rated first-cass with it.

The obvious reason for the high STR Mins is to apply them to PCs, who are invariably made of stouter stuff than normals.

I disagree with this approach, and have no problem reducing the STR minimums to a more reasonable levels for normals. I'm aware that'll increase the cost of guns in my campaigns slightly, and make my stuff somewhat different from pubished material. I don't have an issue with that.

But I am wondering what others think of the the discrepency and how you deal with it.

I can see four approaches:

(1) Use the rules as is. Mooks unable to meet the STR minimums are penalised.

(2) Give mooks enough STR to meet the minimums for their equipment and damn the characteristic comparison table. STR 14 isn't musclebound giant.

(3) Ignore STR minimums for mooks. Such things are meant for PCs only. Of course a soldier can fire his primary weapon without penalty.

(4) Reduce the STR minimums to a more reasonable level for normals. Yes, that means PCs will rarely be troubled by them, but they're heroes, dammit!

(Oh, and for what it's worth, I see 10 as being a reasonable STR minimum for a bolt-action rifle or a 12-bore shotgun, varying up or down by a point depending on the weapon's reputation for recoil. STR 14 might be ability to shoot a Bren gun without the bipod...)

Re: HERO System Martial Arts

I have a question.

I see the book on my shop. But the price is too expensive. It costs 28,60€. ( for a $29,99's book !! )

For this huge price, I get HSMA at once.

In other side I can buy it from the website but when will it arrive ?

I find it fairly quick - a couple of weeks usually, sometimes 3 weeks.

Of course, I don't have a local game shop to support, so my only option is online ordering.

I also like to order the PDFs as a bundle with the printed book, so I can carry Hero in my laptop.

Re: Big, High Res map of Arduna / Ambrethel

i alrady have the big res free stuff, but as you stated it lacks all the details

i could also print all the maps from pdf, cut and paste them in a big sheet of paper, then scan again... x_x

If you have a dedicated graphics program (even a low-cost one like PaintShop Pro), there's no need to do the printing and rescanning - simply open the PDF in your graphics program and resave as an image file. You can then compile all the image files into one big one (rescaling and moving selections around as necessary), and add the missing details by hand.

Of course, this would be strictly for your own personal use: you wouldn't be able to publish or redistribute it without Hero Games' permission.

Re: Pulp Art Thread

LOL - that never occurred to me. But she's not far off in appearance.

Re: Mistery Men music

The Players are here for adventure! Adventure music can set the mood far better. Sound tracks' date=' movie themes, this is what you want to inspire heroic deeds.[/quote']

 

Any recommendations? I have very few soundtracks in my collection: Gladiator, LOTR trilogy, reimagined BSG, Conan the Barbarian and Blade Runner (the latter on vinyl) are all that sprin to mind.

 

I have heard good things about the Predator soundtrack, but whether it's suitable for pulp, I'm not sure.

 

Indiana Jones occurs - I figure it'd give players a lift if they heard that riff as they do something cool.

Re: Cramming: A real Life explanation!

Read that a few days ago and was fascinated.

I first encountered the 'memory palace' concept in Katherine Kerr's Deverry novels and thought they were cool, and didn't find out until years later that they were an ancient technique. I hadn't realised until ths article they were still being used - and this is one of the best explanations of them I've read.

Re: Kazei 5

Yes there is. But it's not all that great (it's missing ship-to-ship combat' date=' for example.)[/quote']

 

Which is in keeping with the source, at least. Serenity is unarmed. Though there are a couple of nice chase scenes and the use of its engines to wreck a reaver ship. And then the claimx of the movie: I am a leaf on the wind.

 

There's already a Serenity RPG. It uses the Cortex System as a basis and thus uses the same system as the Battlestar Galactica RPG (IIRC.)

 

Yes, it does. I haven't played the Serenity RPG, but I have played BSG. Not a bad system for cinematic play, with some nice metagaming elements (the system's equivalent of heroic action points can be used to provide nice plot elements - Player: "I take cover behind the crates." GM: "What crates?" Player spends hero points. GM: "Ah, those crates!")

 

BSG does have starship combat rules, though I don't know how easy they'd be to use with Serenity.

Re: Historical Late Medieval Period RPG

Partly as a result of this thread, I've done something I've been putting off for far too long: updating my medieval farming calendar.

So instead of the major overhaul I've been failing to find the time to do, it's had a little spruce up.

Among the changes are removal of the Harnic references - I'll upload a dedicated Harnic farming calendar shortly (but not tonight).

Anyway, the new medieval one is here: http://www.penultimateharn.com/history/medievalfarmingyear.html

Re: Pulp Art Thread

And a villainess. Same creative commons licence.

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Re: Mistery Men music

I tried getting some period music for my pulp game - 30s big band jazz, mainly. Tried it out on one of the players outside the game and he begged me not to use it in game - said all he could picture when he heard it was Tom & Jerry.

Re: Kazei 5

The new version of Kazei 5 is still on my wishlist. I have the 5e PDF, and have read many of the associated stories on Susano's website. It's a great setting, and the fiction provides a great backdrop into the world. But I still haven't used it in a live gaming environment.

As far as Traveller goes, I think it was my second RPG. I played Classic Trav and MT extensively, though avoided much of the rebellion stuff by using MT rules in the CT era. Didn't think much of the TNE rules at all. Loved GT, and have as-yet-unused PDFs of the Traveller Hero books Comstar put out.

If I do run Traveller Hero, it'll be in the Classic Traveller era again. There's still so much to explore in that setting, and I have the advantage of players who didn't start gaming until the late-90s. It's all new to them. I can update the setting as I see fit. I can run Twilight's Peak/Secrets of the Ancients and The Traveller Adventure, and I'm sure they'll enjoy it.

But for now, back to the Pulp game. In a way, it has a Traveller connection - Firefly on a tramp steamer. You can't watch Firefly and tell me Joss Wheedon never played Traveller. And I know I'll be reworking some of my old Trav ideas to suit a coal-burning tramp rather than a starship.

Re: Nostalgia: Anybody Else Covert Old Gaming Material?

I've used the old Corgi paperback RPG Dragon Warriors with D&D3e, GURPS, C&S and will almost certainly use it with Hero at some point. I love the setting.

Mongoose have recently republished Dragon Warriors. I don't know if there are any changes between their version and the '80s one.

I'm currently working on a Hero/Harn conversion for 6e. And I've contemplated a Glorantha Hero conversion. The TSR's 80s British prozine Imagine also had a very nice serialised AD&D campaign world called Pelinore that I've often thought of working with again, but never got round to doing much with (though I still have my folder with the original articles and my supplementary notes and maps). I did use Pelinore for a fairly short-lived Rolemaster game back in the 80s.

I have to say, when I convert stuff, I don't worry too much about direct stat/skil/power conversions. It's more the mood and feel that I'm interested in, so my conversions are at best informed or inspired by the other system. Why box Hero in by trying to emulate a different set of rules too closely?

Re: Pulp Art Thread

And a two-fisted hero. Also a creative commons share-alike non-commercial attribution licence. Required attribution: http://www.penultimateharn.com.

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I don't know if there's as much interest in home-made art in this forum as in the Fantasy Hero forum, but since I'm preparing a 6e pulp game, I'll pop some images here - and encourage others to do the same.

First up, the Professor. Creative commons share-alike non-commercial attribution licence. Required attribution: http://www.penultimateharn.com.

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Re: "real" Magic resources

Since thread necromancy seems effective...

Richard Kieckhefer - Magic in the Middle Ages

Claire Fanger - Conjuring Spirits: Texts and Traditions of Medieval Ritual Magic

Elizabeth M. Butler - Ritual Magic

These are all readable. Kieckhefer's the most scholarly. Good luck sorting through all the New Age codswallop on the hunt for this sort of material.

Re: Question on resistant PD/ED?

Bon. Parsque je comprends vous avez des ennuis avec l'Anglais un peu. Aussi, vous aves les problemes avec le systeme d'Hero un peu. Mais vraiment, votre comprehension d'Anglais et tres bon, et vous apprendez le systeme d'Hero a bientot.

Re: Tell me whats changed in 6th edition please

There is a good degree of cross-compatibility, if you're aware of the rules differences.

Not all Hero support books are rules-intensive; I bought several 5th edition books after 6th came out. But in some cases, you'd be better served by asking your shop to get yoy a copy of the 6th edition book - in particular, Hero System Martial Arts (written for 6th edition) is rules intensive and gives you updated material from both the older Ultimate Martial Artist and Ninja Hero (so you get two books in one). Likewise the 6th edition bestiary is character-intensive, and combines creature from the 5th edition Bestiary with ones from Minions Monsters & Marauders and the Asian Bestiaries.

If I were you, if you're seriously thinking of getting a 5th edition book to support your 6th edition rules, I'd ask about that particular book's compatibility on these boards.

Re: LOTR thoughts

There's still lots of places to come up with more epic antagonists. Angband is presumably sunk but the Tol Fuin isn't' date=' and it was under the control of the Shadow when it was the Taur-nu-Fuin. All sorts of baddies could be roaming around the far north. There are still infestations of wights in Arnor and goblins and giants in the Misty Mountains, and Sauron is thought to have had a hideout east of Rhun, from whence he originally came.[/quote']

 

Mount Gundabad (whence the goblins came for the Battle of the Five Armies) is likely still active. There are presumbaly still dragons in the north. Carn Dum, though long abandoned, may still be a haven of evil. The men of Dunland may be broken, but not gone completely.

 

Am I showing my ICE Middle Earth roots to much? I still have a far greater softspot for playing in 1640TA than the Fourth Age...

 

Having said that, the idea of new strife within Gondor is appealing - and I love the name 'Sons of Denethor', Savinien. Repped.

 

However, Tolkein's point, quoted by Zane, remains: these are enemies of a far lower order than Sauron and the Nazgul.