AmadanNaBriona

quite a difference bit of a shift from 83 body eh? just to note tho...the Earth isn't a big dirtball... once you hit bedrock its stone, or its molten form, which I assume would have the same body per hex (19) but less DEF. and how the hell do we figure out the DEF and Body of all that pesky water covering 70% of the surface? I'd assume that the Death Stars main gun is in fact a megascale attack... look at the size of the focusing dish. its just a really WIDE beam...maybe a megascale AOE Line attack? I kinda figure that if you burn a kilometer (or 10 kilometer, or a 100 kilometer) size hole straight through the core of a planet, it'd go boom. I may be wrong tho And Dammit...I forgot a planetbuster in my original post... The LEXX

Eaters of the dead, etc Yes, 13th Warrior was entirely a retelling of the Beowulf story. One of my all time favorite movies too. Studying the truth behind myth has been an enduring intrest of mine at it played right in to it. Speaking of which, it got me thinking about how some of my pet theories could be applied to a realistic fantasy game... Mind you some of these take a few liberties with fact.... Dwarves/giants/ogres/goblins etc... especially veiwed from the perspective of the Norse cultures... could all be "mutants" in the real world meaning of the term... IIRC, the glacial areas of extreme northern europe are one of the main sources for radioactive ore... which could also tie in to some of the tales of them being mighty magical smiths. Anyone recall the tale of the dwarf who was forced to forge his captor a magic sword that always slew his foes, but was cursed to also slay its wielder? I could just imagine a pissed off smith forging a blade alloyed with a radioactive ore to spite his captor. Hell...maybe thats why Excalibur was sheathed in a variety of heavy dense objects while between owners. And it was said straight out that Excalibur's scabbard was more vaualbe than the blade, because it protected the bearer. Over on my favorite islands, the early Myth cycles had the bronze age Tuatha De Dannan warring against a marauding race from the sea.... children of chaos and old night, The Formorians. They were deformed, some missing limbs and eyes, some part man and part animal, and a few abnormally beautiful. Their leader Balor had one great eye whos gaze was death. Compare and contrast this to Norse myth and you may begin to see paralels. The Aesir went to war with the Vanir, gods of the elves, led by Odin who sacrificeds his eye for mystical power. In Celtic culture, leadershad to be unblemished. In Norse culture, a failure to die in battle was dishonorable. Many nordic sagas deal with various shapeshifters, like the berserks and the ulfwerenar, who took on some aspects of their animals in battle. Woah... you're all smart out there...better cut this rambling short before I end up writing a novel... As long as we are thinking about neadertals and australiopithicus as surviving, we can use cryptozooology to keep a few other remenants around. Who says dragons aren't the Coleceocanth of the middle ages? I'd probably say one of the giant crocodillians, ala Julian May (The Saga of the Pliestocine era) And don't forget about Nessie the plesiosaur

I should be able to cobble together a write up for the how to's of Hnefetafl (thanks AlHarazad for the proper spelling...it was eluding me). We've play tested most of the rules variations I've seen proposed, and come up with a nice fairly balanced way to play. Incedentially... The rules were a big questionmark or a long time, but a historian eventually found a version of the game that was still being played into the relatively modern era, in Sweden, I think...tho don't hold me to it. I can't see any way of heroizing it, off the top of my head, other than the obvious... contested INT rolls, with Tatics, KS: Tafl (or fidchell, or...?), and or an appropriate Analyze as compimentary skill. Gambling might be appropriate for the base skill, but I wouldn't pay it that way... Like chess, there's no luck involved, unless you consider bluffing, syching or tricking your opponent to be lucky I could see a magical board providing extra skill levels with tatics, with a trigger for the next battle fought...maybe even Clairsentience, precog applying to the next battle... perhaps only the winner of the match gets the benefits. I like the idea of a commander chalenging his opposite to a game the eve before battle. OK...maybe I can come up with enough ideas for an article on it...let me get back to it next week when I'm out of crunch time

a thought A good source for ideas for subtle "realistic magic" is the vast body of modern pagan literature. While it runs the full range from thoughtful to dreck, even some of the lousy ones, from a practicing pagan perspective, are still great sources for gaming ideas. Almost all of my nortern magic comes from books on Asatru, runecraft, and the old sagas.Good books include "The Crones Book of Spells" which has nothing but incantations, page after page, intended more for their poetic value than as actual spells, and "Magic Alpahabets" which I found incredibly inspirational in my worldbuilding (besides...I love the idea that the code my warrior priestesses of the raven use has its origins with the Inquisiton ) I think the Neandertal Orcs is a great idea... reminds me of the 13th Warrior aka Eaters of the Dead, one of my favorite realistic fantasy movies and books.

games why not a variation on Hnestafl (I know I'm butchering that...I'm sure I'm missing a bunch of letters in there). It was the main strategy game in pre-chess Northern Europe, and had Irish (fidchell)< Scottish (Ard Righ) and Welsh (Brandubh, I think) variants (Not to mention Saxon, Danish, Swedish and just about bloody everywhere else). Its played on gridded board with an uneven number of squares, with the defenders trying to get the king off the board while surrounded by an enemy force twice the size of the defending one. Working from online resources, any decent gamer can come up with a playable variation. I've spent hours playing our adaptation of it. I still plan on making the Saxon style board....Its on a 19 by 19 grid, with tons of troops, complex layouts, and a special "elite guard" around the king of uncaptureable peices. I figure it should take several hours to play agame out on that spread. And FYI... The "Magic Chessboard" listed as one of the 13 treasures of Wales in the Mabinogion was most likely a Tafl variation of some sort And The heros of the Ulster cycle were always playing Fidchell... especially when hungover.

further thoughts Even as a plot device, I like pointing out things, and my Planetbuster would probably be similar to the above write up....maybe a few shifts in the megascales, and I'd probably throw in some AP & Penetrating, just to add insult to injury, but in a campaign I'd tend to prefer the ID4 style blasts...something that'll level a city or so per shot, punch holes in the crust, and with repeated pummelling eventually crack the crust and do bad things...it's a little more "heroic" in that you do have a chance at stopping it even after it starts firing... the Body by weight, +1 body for X2 weight has always been a HERO convention that I've had issues with. The earth having only 83 body is just the extreme example of that wierdness. There are others. A motorcycle has only 5 less Body than a railroad car. My games have ALWAYS used damage by the hex...including our old startship combat system (we had to cook something up may years ago, way back when pre-1st ed. SH). It required mapping out the ships, but as old Traveller players, we did that kind of by habit anyway. it gave us the luxury of using device malfunctions and the like... It was nice knowing exactly what parts of the ship were damaged, what sections decompressed, which NPC's were reduced to vapor...etc. Wasn't even that hard to do... basically after mapping the ship, just break down each floor into a 6 by 6 grid. If there are multiple levels, randomize the floor, roll a die for where on the appropriate facing, or an X die and a Y die from the top or bottom. the only trick then is figuring out what angle the shot comes at to figure how it penetrates. easier than it sounds, and very up close and personal. it could be a lot more refined (and was at the time....I'm recalling things from a campaign over 15 years ago)

I just picked up Bestiary, and haven't gotten a copy of the new Star Hero yet, as funds are tight, and Fantasy got first pick. But as I was flipping through the Bestiary, I noticed the Engine of Destruction, and was wondering whats up with the incredibly weak main gun? In my old SH campaign, I had crew served weapons that did more damage. 10D6 AP, even x4 AP, still deosn't pack much wallop by my book. if a hex of dirt has 0 DEF and 10 BOD and Stone has 5 DEF, 19 BOD, then it'd punch what...3-4 hexes of dirt or maybe 2 hexes of rock per shot. Even if you let the guns use " Casual" Damage to puch through dirt to bedrock, It'd still take about a bazillion years to burn a planet. unless, of course, you use the "body by weight" tables.... in which case.... lets see, the Earth weighs 5,976,000,000 Teratons metric... that comes out, unliving body, by weight, to about 83 body. OK...that makes it really easy to blow up Seriously, for the EOD, you really should add some sort of megascale AOE, to at least allow it to scorch the planet , wipe out cities, and cut large patches of landscape apart....maybe another slot in the multipower. Anyone have anything interesting to say on the topic of planet killers? I've always enjoyed the threat of them.... Berserkers, Tyrannids, Mechanoids, Wave Motion guns, the Death Star... they have a fine pedigree.

oops that second book should be titled "Matadora" My bad.

Good fiction Steven Perry's Matador series ( The Man Who Never Missed, Matador, Machiavelli Interface, Albino Knife, Black Steel, Brother Death, The 97th Step, and a couple of others in the same universe) presents a future society setting that is basically nonjudegmental about sexual preferences. Most of the characters, male and female, are portrayed sympathetically as bisexual. It his future, its more a matter of attraction and desire than any particular labels. Generally, the bad guys show some form of "nonexceptable" deviancy, such as pedophilia, and often it is the factor that eventually destroys them. Oh...and its a damn good series as well, especially if you're looking for ideas for a martial arts oriented Star Hero game. Long before the first edition of SH came out we had our house "Space Game" set in a modified version of his world.

I haven't played morrowind (my old and busted computer can't handle it) but from what I recall of Daggerfall, it'd work as a spell skill system... besause you're only buying magic skills (admitedly, 6 of them)with points, then paying for spels with gold, I'd make a couple of recomendations... All spells require a SR at -1/5 pts (Forces fairly high skill rolls to compensate for the lack of points spent on spells) Give all spells a limited form of Increased END cost, say, about X5 end, with the multiplier being reduced by X1 for every 2 points you make your spellcasting roll by... so if you have way more skill than the requirements of the spell, the ENd cost goes down, then also allow 1 point levels with casting specific spells You're still gong to havre to figure out a pricing scale for spells..If I recall right, it was more expensive to add additional effects to a spell than just up the power level...but I'll admit its been a while since I played the game. The END cost still isn't quite the way it was in game, but may be a workable compromise to fit it into HERO. Good luck

Oh yeah... forgot a couple of other bits.... I still haven't figured out how to do plate deforming under impact, but it does happen, and REALLY sucks... plate is far and away the best armor I've ever fought in, protection-wise, but i recall watchinhg a fight where a bloke took a real haymaker to the side of his helmet...not only did it stun him, but it also snapped his chinstrap, rotated the helmet about 90 degrees, and dented it in so bad they had to cold chisel it off his head... while he sat there with his concussion and bled. And I am a touch boggled by the Armor listing in the new FH...why bother listing Studded leather armors if they are identical to the non studded forms? Why is the one type of armor classically called scale listed under reinforeced leather instead of scale? And real cuir-bouilli is heavy (like saddle weight) stewed in hot liquid till the leather polymerizes (sp). its just under plate for rigidity. Its bloody tough stuff, IME. No one whos ever seen it will ever mistake it for anything other than armor. Oh and on the bashing/slashing/peircing thing.. as a note... double mail and 6 in 1 both take Impact rather well, as does reinforced 4 in 1 (my gorget was reinforeced 4 in 1 with vertical spines of double mail, and I took several shots to the throat that it stopped beautifully)

my experiences addressing Petes thoughts... From my experiences as another long term reenactor... Armor penalties are all about Penalty Skill levels... The first time I fought in full plate, I was knocked on my ass so hard I had to have two Marshalls help me to my feet. The fellow who did so, however, was capable of doing a kip in his armor. Of course he was also a judo instructor... veteran warriors should have PSL's to counteract some or all armor penalties. Bodies in plate floating? I recon its possible, but probably not until decomposition produced enough gas to add the extra lift...and assuming the body cavity isn't breached. (ewww) Guns are extant in my game, and uncommon enough that "proofed" armor isn't in common manufacture... I do my guns as Penetrating, with Extra DC reduced by range to represent "Point and Blank" impact. I do proofed armor as Hardended, with a limit on the hardneding "only vs gunfire" (-2)...actually I may end up posting my stats for guns in a new thread. Act to the activations rolls, etc... I've thought them up to add "fear and loathing of mass combat". That and almost every suit I've ever worn has had had weak points...its kind of a requirement to be able to move. And while there is a bit of manuvering to take hits on armor, it becomes nigh impossible with too many fighters around..more of a hope and pray situation... although I used to block with the back of my gauntlets on a regular basis when fighting with my bardiche. I agreee that the basic rules work well for grunts and "casual" combats and the like. My campaign aims for a lot of dirty gritty realism to counteract some of the fatastic elements. They aren't actually even in the same category... it's combat realism vs background reality.

LOL Actually, I fully appreciate the toolkit idea...I just find myself in the position of wishing for more ideas for adjusting the current ruleset...largely due to HERO I have been a lifetime tinkerer where rules are concerned. Part of why I like Steve Long is that uses the same kind of nonlinear thinking to create effects that Arron Alston used to display. My games tend towards the high powered as well... my campaign is dark fantasy, fairly realistic and grim, but with strong magical overtones. The reason I asked about packages and NCM is that my magic system is an Order/Chaos balance scale similar to the one is L.E. Modesitt Jr's Recluse series, and I structured both sides of the magic using packages. I split the nature of being into three aspects, Body, Mind, and Spirit, and subdivided these into 17 parts, called "anchors" further divided as Core (common to all members of a species), Prime (central to ones self), and Minor (based on environment, current state, etc). a normal "nonmagical" human has all of the anchors is a rough state of balance between order and chaos. in order to channel magic, which has its root in chaos, one must have one or more of these channels "corrupted". I call these Broken Anchors. This is either inborn, usually due to chaotic influences on the parents (kind of like radiation related birth defects) or deliberate, due to some practice designed to break one or more anchors (this is the basics behind initiation ceremonies, magicial apprenticeships and the like). The more broken anchors, the more power available. However, the influence of chaos is corrosive on intact anchors (a required Transform SE) so the use of Magic, like hard drugs , leads you down the dark path. Ordercraft, on the other hand, involves (by rigorus discpline, focus, and often help) "hardening" your anchors so they are resistant to chaos. One of the main benefits characters recieve from Ordermastery is increased Maxima, as well as Powers and disads related to the aspect that has been ordered. For example, a character who has an Ordered Body will be unaging, immune to disease, resistant to toxins, as well somewhat resistant to harm (Damage Reduction) and will heal quickly. On the flip side, ingested toxins will cause a strong systemic backlash as they purge the toxins (steer clear of the booze) They have a couple of weird vunerabilities as well, and very little "random factors" in their body...they have a HARD time breeding...and their genetics are rather odd. Some races are defined as Naturally Ordered or chaotic in one or more of their Aspects... this accounts for most of the "Immortal" races, such as the Sidhe or the Scaileanna. I cooked up a system for this in 4th edition, using packages. With FREd, the chaos magic becomes easier, but the ordercraft gets a bit harder. I plan on a "retraining" campaign, where the heros have an option to start at a lower power level then boost up, but I want it to be nice and tidy. I just wondered how other folk out there were handling situations similar to this? As to the rest? I like most of it...Deadly Blow solves some of the issues I've had with lethality (Try running a game based in Steven Brust's Draegaera, or Lankhmar, or any other "rogue" campaign without some system to increase max damage on small weapons). My point with the Dwarf example was a bit unfocused, but part of my problem has been with racial and environmental packages all along. A 250 point immortal Sidhe will have considerably less options, due to the size of his package, than the short lived 250 point human adventuring with him.

my 2 cents IMHO, based on several years of live steel fighting experiences, I have to say that I don't like the category special rules...they're all a bit to final in effect, and reduce the effects of armor to rather unrealistic levels. I do like the "Special Manuvers for Weapons" on FH pg 188... they feel a lot better to me. Blunt Trauma in chainmail does suck...I've fought mainly in a chain hauberk for the last 5 years or so since I started going the way of the Galloglaigh, and I've had ribs broken (Body damage) from solid sword hits, never mind maces or the like. And I ALWAYS parry peircing weapons, like my buddys lucern hammer....it'd be suicide not to. For my new campaign, I've been toying with a couple of ideas that seem to increase the realism, but may add too much bookkeeping... #1) adding 15 - activation to all basic armor...the hit locations are large enough that there are probably chinks that can be exploited. #2) allowing CSL to be used to lower the activation roll for a hit... I have yet to decide if it'll be one or two levels per step on the activation chart #3) make armor semi-ablative... any hit on armor where the DC exceeds the DEF drops the activation roll for that location. This is the heavy bookkeeping part...I may make up a new hit location chart for keeping track of this and individual wounds for healing purposes. This allows armor to be damaged with heavy use without just whittling away the body till it falls off... This was inspired by the "trial by combat" scene in Game of Thrones where the merc whittles away the fully armored knight by hacking at his feild plate till he opened a hole, then going for it.

thanks Shrike Been meaning to take a look at your site anyway...seen several of your posts, and it sounds like your thought processes are compatible with my own.

OK...so I've been playing Hero for over 20 years now (gulp!), and I just recently picked up FREd and began converting the campaign world I've been working on in for the last 5 years while I lived in the mountains with no gamers nearby. Now that I actually have access to players, I'm finding some of the changes a bit boggling. Specificaly, I'm trying to wrap my brain around the modifications to package deals, as in the new Fantasy ero, there seems to be more of an emphasis on them, with less of a point break, and higher power levels to boot. As my setting was designed to rely on packages rather heavily, its throwing a wrench into my conversion work... I'm having to rethink quite a lot. has anyone come up with interesting ideas for pointing out increased charateristic maxima or other tweaks to the new package systems? And as an aside, hinted at before...whats up with these power levels? I was testing out a couple of bits that didn't ring true in my head, and threw together a Warhammer style "Dwarf Slayer"... Dwarf, Warrior Culture, Mountain Environment, and Light Warrior packages. Then I paid out the extra for the over Max characteristics, distributed the levels, slapped on a couple of extra penalty levels, combat luck, and Deadly Blow (Monster hunter)...and wound up with about a 200 point charater (less than 20 points spent outside of packages) that , on testing, droped a charging Bestiary T-Rex with one, single, 2 battleaxe aimed multipower attack to the head... even without a critical. Now...I see this mainly as part of the ongoing problem Hero has with underpowering muckin' huge critters... but even so.......