zippercomics

Re: Herophile Fantasy art Good question. The answer to which is, "I have no idea". Never really thought of it. lol.

Re: Herophile Fantasy art That's very cool. Thanks! Now, if I could figure out how to colour, that would be sweet. Thanks for your feedback, guys! It was a nice ego boost (which, admittedly, it wasn't intended to do, but it worked out well anyway).

Re: Herophile Fantasy art Yes, I think you're right. In relation to the other art I do, he is pretty broad and big in the upper body (which was my intent), but I spent so long trying to get the proportions of a human body right that doing a non-human body is ... well ... alien to me. Practice makes perfect, or some junk. Thanks for the notes!

Re: Herophile Fantasy art This isn't anything too exciting. It's just a Dwarf. I drew it as a racial example for my fantasy hero world, which - in retrospect - wasn't too logical. I mean, if I say "Dwarf", this is pretty much what people see, right? anyway, here it is. I apologize for the lightness of it - I'm not a very good inker.

Okay, here goes. I'd like to develop a Star Hero campaign world. I love the actual Star Hero suppliments, and I may cop out and use them (as they're quite well written and would likely serve my purposes), but the sadistic side of me still feels more comfortable playing in a game world I made up. That being said, making a game world can be a lilted experience if one doesn't have the wisdom to get feedback during the process. Therefore, herodom, I emplore you; is this logical!?! Here goes ... Humans. Semi-distant future. I'm thinking 2080 or the sort, at the latest. We've sent ships to the moon, and we've sent ships with passengers as far as Mars. But we haven't done much more than that. Then, bang, one day, a space telescope of ours receives a message from - *gasp* - alien life! Here's the watered down reason why. The Philli. An intelligent, super-advanced race of scientists and thinkers who've discovered a threat known as the Baraggi many generations ago. The Baraggi are super-aggressive expansionists who send "Generation Ships" out at random intervals to simply find land, take it by force, and then repeat the process. They've been spreading like a plague out of the outer rim, and the Philli have faced them on more than one occassion. That being said, the Philli have learned the wisdom in tracking the Baraggi, and were saddened to learn that this race has a Generation ship aimed right at little ol' Earth. One ship of Baraggi will be enough to take Earth out, no problem. That's not good because we're just defenseless little pups in a galactic sense, plus it would make for a great launching platform for the Baraggi to move on to Phillus next. And they don't want that. But that being said, the Philli don't subscribe to the beliefs of "First Contact". They've always accepted that there's other life in the world, and assume that much of the galaxy thinks that they do. So, they literally just show up at Earth one day and say "hey, we're the Philli, and in about 10 years a ship full of hostile aliens is going to show up and screw this joint up bad; you guys wanna bail? We'll show you how". And there it is. Humans get first contact, get thrown all sorts of tech, blah blah blah. My problem is this. Does any of this really fly in the face of sociology or just plain logic? Does any of it sound like a cop-out, or a blatant copy of something I haven't read yet? I'm trying not to make the Philli sound like Vulcans, so I should point out that they're QUITE emotional. They're often refered to all "child like", in that - despite their high intelligence and technology - they're impulsive and socially not that quick on the uptake. Critiques are encouraged. Thanks, herodom!

Re: Depths of Space - Original Setting I could help you put it into Adobe, although given a bit of time to research the solutions, you'd likely find it's easy for you to do as well. Adobe.com offers a few free document conversions where they'll PDF any Word document via an online forum. Worked well for me when I did it. I also use PrimoPDF, as it just saves docs as PDF files. Still, I'm sure that the layout formats that people on these boards have brought up would be the best solution. I myself am toying with the idea of offering my really crappy science fiction setting as a PDF, if not for any other reason than it's an easier medium to deliver in than a website.

Re: Skilled with a pen? I might be able to help. There's a few little complications, but if you're not looking for totally professional quality art, I may be able to assist. Here's some background: I used to do the character artwork for World Maker's Global Guardians website, on a pro-bono approach. It took me hours to do each sketch, but I lost my confidence after a few years, and gave it up (sadly, I don't take criticism well, which is something that doesn't behove any artist). I was enrolled in an art school, but I had to drop out for financial reasons. My artwork is very comic booky, and like I said, it's not professional quality. I work best when I have inspirations. I'm no where near the calibre of Storn or some of the other artists on this board (Keith comes to mind, as well as a few others, I'm sure). Stylistically, I'm trying to head to more exageration of key features in my work. I found that all of my men had the same face / different hair formula, and I've tried to tweak that. Generally exagerate a feature or two to bring out the personality in it. I have no examples on line, currently, of my work. At least, none that are recent. Let me put it this way, though. I'm free. I don't have a good scanner, but I might be able to wrangle one up. Lemme know. If you give me a week or so, I'll be scanning some racial examinations for my fantasy hero site. that'll let you see some of my "work" to decide if it's non-sucky. Thanks.

Re: Gyren Dark Magic, as reflexive effects I think that "amoral" is a good word to describe it, but as this is developed, I'm finding that even I am falling into the trap of just defining them as "evil". It's pretty easy, after all. Gyren are typified for their wanton sexual activities, the dark magic and the means by which they gained it, and for their dietary habits. The earlier certainly doesn't make them evil by any measure; I mean, just because they're functionally horny little devils doesn't mean they're any better or worse than the next guy. It DOES mean that, in the very protypical standards of the Morwold fantasy world, they're seen as outsiders and "deviants" for those desires. But not evil. It's the conspicuous consumption and the dark magic that I think will have this race put into the "evil" category, and I'm falling into some pretty overt holes while trying to develop that. I've described the Gyren on the website as having been almost cannibals, who - while they don't eat other Gyren - they do / did eat other humanoid races during their infancy. It's a pretty oblique thing that I don't think any culture would misconstrue as anything BUT "evil". The thing is, I may be off base in that: I see "evil", generally speaking, as a matter of perception. Kinda like most comic book badguys probably don't see themselves as evil, even though everyone else does. Now, in regards to that consumption issue, the Gyren are resisting that. So it's not absolute, and it's put into place so that an aspiring player could play that "Gyren who's resisted his base impulses". I hope. The magic, I like what's been presented here. I think I'll write it up as having a "dark side effect". That's a very neat idea. Plus, I agree that the social limitations are pretty severe, which I hope offsets their natural powers.

Re: Storn's Art & Characters thread. Too cool. He looks so relaxed ... *sigh* Just a question, if you don't mind - and it's for anyone who can help - but where do you come up with the designs for armor and the like? I'm trying to do character sketches of races for the creatures / species in my fantasy hero world, and I'm trying to make sure that I evoke the kinds of protypical postures and "types" of each race. To that end, I'm having trouble finding examples of what fantasy clothing / armor should look like. Do you have a resource? I remember you saying how you used clothing designs for superhero costumes, but I don't think that'll help me in this case. Mainly because I can't fall back on the tried and true "spandex" that makes drawing heroes easier than drawing people in full baggy garb. Sorry for posing this here, it just seemed relevant to the topic. Ry / Inspired one day, not so much the next ...

Hi. Okay, here's the spell I'm trying to build. I'm kinda drawing a blank on the general effect, and I'm gunning for simplicity here, so any advice is appreciated. The spellcaster waves their hand over the blade of a knife they're using (gestures, OAF: Knife) and it takes on a black, smoking appearance. The next strike with that weapon - hit or miss - discharges the energy into whatever it strikes. The effect is a chilling cold that burns people of Godly or Holy intent. In other words, it hurts "good" people, but has no effect on evil ones. That's a subjective term, sure, but I'm hoping I can make it work. Any advice?

Re: Gyren Dark Magic, as reflexive effects I'm not sure that it would be. As my experience with Fantasy Hero is extremely limited, I may just be worrying about an imbalance that simply won't exist. I'll have to watch for that. This is, of course, assuming that Gyren Shroud Magic is bought at 1/3 Real Cost, as will the spells of typical mages.

Hi again! I must seem like a newb at this point ... I've built another race for my fantasy hero world (see "Shamanism" thread if you want to know what I mean by "another), who have magical effects and abilities that aren't necessarily par and parcel with the rest of the world. Specifically, this race is known as the Gyren; Satyr-men who are carnivorous, sexually voracious and otherwise violators of all the social graces the "civilized world" holds to. Naturally, this makes them seem evil, which I'd like to avoid categorizing them as. However, I am leaning them that way; I haven't done it well yet, but I'm trying to build a race that seems victimized and vilified for their culture, and while they seem evil, a truely adept reader will pick out that it may be as simple as a cultural difference, and that the Gyren aren't really "evil". Anyway, part of what gives the rest of that world the notion of evil is that Gyren are one of the only races with natural, innate ability to manipulate "Dark Magic", or "Shroud Magic". Again, the quick backstory is that in the First Age, the Shrouded Spire rose up in the North. No one could ever reach it, so nothing's known about it. It seems ironic that the Gyren arrived as a race near the same time, so naturally, a lot of people made that connection. Shrouded Spire = evil, and Gyren can cast Shroud Magic. Hmm ... I haven't developed the Gyren package yet, but I'm thinking of giving each of them a small pool of points from which to buy Shroud Magic spells (which no one else can buy). Simple stuff, little effects, but Magic in so much that it manipulates Arcanum. I'm thinking it won't require Gestures, Incantations, Foci, or the like, however. In other words, Mage A raises his hands, says the words, snaps the fishbone, and a fireball comes from his hands. The Gyren just raises his hand, and bang, out comes the Shroudsphere. Is that unbalancing, first off? To give one race "superpowers" where others don't have them? I keep thinking to myself, "Hero is a game where the characters will have the same points, so how can it be unbalancing". But then I think about pitting a 150 pt warrior against a 150 point Gyren warrior, and I worry that the earlier will get smote by the latter ... Anyway, I ramble on. Any thoughts? Is innate magic as part of a package deal a bad idea? For that matter, is the story idea itself terrible? Thanks again!

Re: Shamans, or "restrictions on spell schools" And I intend to do the same - to some degree - once I get information of use up on my website. So far, it's just basic race descriptions and the sort. I'm barely into this project, and already I find myself wanting to deviate from the standards I've already subscribed to. Therein, though, I think the true strength of peer review will come in. I can be a bit sensitive when it comes to critiquing my own work, or having it examined, but you guys represent the best and most level-headed cross section of players out there, and it's for your enjoyment and mine that I'm building this. If only I like it, I'm only half way there. Anyway, I'll post the link when I'm more comfortable putting it up there.

Re: Shamans, or "restrictions on spell schools" That's cool stuff, dude. I really like that, and if you don't mind, I'd like to borrow your descriptive method. Also, I agree with what's being said here. I like the idea of making the Ogren Shamanism into a presence based skill, which would follow along with what my religious spellcasters would be using anyway (Shamanism and Religious magic, after all, are almost the same thing ... just different translations, right?) Thanks!

Re: Shamans, or "restrictions on spell schools" Damn. That's a buzz-kill. Oh well.