Joe Walsh

If you were using In The Labyrinth, once you had allocated stats, you had to pick Talents and spells based on Int.

It was kind of a double points system. Buy Int with points, buy talents/spells with Int.
 
 
Superhero 2044 didn't use random tables, at least in the core rulebook.
 
George acknowledged the influence of Wayne Shaw in allocating powers.

Other than the left/right corner issue above, all of the noted typos and such have been fixed and a copy has been saved.
 
In a separate copy of that file, I made the following additional changes for consistency:
 

The accuracy pass is done! 🎉
 
(No guarantees that it's a perfect verbatim copy, of course, but the text-only copy of Espionage! is in pretty good shape now.)
 
Now to make a copy of the file so we have an unedited edition, and then make the obvious typo corrections and such which I've noted below (and any others I notice):
 
 
My goal with this pass is to make no substantial changes. I just want to correct obviously wrong things like typos and such.
 
So, do the questionable-to-me items from page 35 qualify? I'm not sure. What do you think? This is repeated verbatim in all subsequent 3e games, which makes me think it's right. But to me it gets the left/right corners backwards. Or am I thinking about it wrong?
 
 

I still play old editions.  I dabbled in 4e for a year or two, but douns myself eight back in 2e shortly after, and I have never seen anything in newer editions compelling enough to make me change.  Given the compatibikity backwards and forwards, if something I want does finally come along, I will likely just double the END cost and drag it backwards.
 
 
 
If it is any help, I can tell you what I see.
 
I see pretty accurate comic book characters (so far as I know, anyway) and pretty accurate pulp-esque Latern B Jaw versus the Swami type character builds.
 
 Obviously, this is all from one point of view: my knowledge of comic books is pretty thin, and at sixty-three years old, even what I do know is pretty dated (I wasnt a comic book kid, and did not become a comic book adult).
 
 
So let me skip ahead to my 4e experience:
 
Everyone had every defense.
 
There is no softer way to say that:  by the third oe fourth character, everyone had some od everything, defense-wise.  It hasnt changed in the rules, so I suspect that is still kind of the way that the game is played: "stadanrd defense package" or some such thing.  No matter what you want to call it, everyone had a little bit of everything, "just in case."
 
Sam, your character's name is Crowbar.  His powers are based on turning his body to iron.  Your powers are Growth, Density increase, plus 20 STR only in HERO ID, resistant hardened PD and ED.  This all makes sense.. I get the Knockback Resistance, and thank you for not foing overboard on that.
 
Explain the Flash Defense?  Okay, fine; your sunglasses are super sunglasses.  Explain the EGO Defense?
 
"Well, it is so much cheaper to mind control someone now, so I figur3d I had better take some, just in case...."
 
On top of the 30 EGO?!
 
"Well, it is so cheap  to mind control someone now....  I figured I would buy a few dice of that, and a higher EGO gives me a higher OCV--"
 
You're a brick!  You are -literally- a human boat anchor!  How does mind control fit into that?!
 
 
Things like that.
 
 
The old methods lead- at my tables; do remember this is anecdotal- to people more comfortable playing to type:  bricks didn't buy EGO defense because Ego powers were _expensive_!  People wanting to build an Egoist character went all-in.  I mean, they _had_ to if they wanted do be a real threat.  You didnt have that Egoist PC who also had an,incredible STR and a few martial arts maneuvers.  You got the comic-classic (and pulp classic) mental powers guy.
 
The TLDR version is that I found the total investment in mental powers required to be effective resulted in players much more comfortable in building characters who better-exemplifies the actual sort of character they wanted to play with a lot less dabbling in Ego Powers "because they are more effective now."
 
 
 

While reviewing through more of the Champions (and Fantasy Hero) 3rd Edition rules, I noticed that Mental Powers worked a bit different from what I am used to.   I was curious if anyone knows the reasons for the change, and what peoples thoughts on keeping the older style in modern games would balance and feel like.
 
I am used to all Mental powers operating against EGO values, unless purchased otherwise of course, but in 3rd it seems that while Mind Control works vs EGO,  Illusions and Telepathy work against INT.    At first it seemed strange to me but thinking about it more, I feel that at least for Illusions it is "working out the inconsistencies"  not as sure about Telepathy.   I do also like the idea of having EGO not being the ONLY stat that matters for mental abilities, but was hoping for some input from people more familiar with the older rules.   
 
Did anyone have actual experience with these rules in play?   How did they feel at the table vs the more current design version?

The accuracy pass is done! 🎉
 
(No guarantees that it's a perfect verbatim copy, of course, but the text-only copy of Espionage! is in pretty good shape now.)
 
Now to make a copy of the file so we have an unedited edition, and then make the obvious typo corrections and such which I've noted below (and any others I notice):
 
 
My goal with this pass is to make no substantial changes. I just want to correct obviously wrong things like typos and such.
 
So, do the questionable-to-me items from page 35 qualify? I'm not sure. What do you think? This is repeated verbatim in all subsequent 3e games, which makes me think it's right. But to me it gets the left/right corners backwards. Or am I thinking about it wrong?
 
 

Other than the left/right corner issue above, all of the noted typos and such have been fixed and a copy has been saved.
 
In a separate copy of that file, I made the following additional changes for consistency:
 

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/jan-6-rioter-pink-beret-identified-ex-spotted-viral-fbi-tweet-rcna82286

Too much math for this artist. Also you need a glossary, especially for non standard abbreviations. 

Oh, you've met him.

Ans then later on we find out he burned it down himself to kill the vampires that ran the place?  And now he is on the hunt for the mastermind behind pop sensation Britany Spears?  And he doesn't know the difference between a fedora and a trilby?  And he has a full beard that somehow stops growing just below his jawline?
 
That guy?
 
 

I think that back in the day we had packages count separately from regular Disads for purposes of diminishing returns. 
 
 
Nope!  It's the Drizzt do'Wolverine character with dual katanas, duster, mirrorshades, and a backstory that includes striking out on his own at age 3 after the orphanage he lived in (where he was sent after his parents died) was burned down, leaving him the sole survivor of at least two different tragedies.

I dont usually so PDF reading,  sure; I am glad I have them, and in cases like T5, where I haven't been able to find affordable paper copies.  It isnt even an aesthetics thing (though it kind of is that as well).  The fact is that, even though it is part of my job and hanging out here, stafing at a screen is actively unpleasant for me.  It isnt too far removed from staring into a 15 watt light bulb for hours on end.  Unpleasant.
 
I am not going to type out all my thoughts on T5- so far I have more than I ever want to type (which is saying something, I think), and I am exactly 54 pages into this 656 pqge book.
 
I did want to take a moment to share my excitement that there is now an official size for the one-credit coin.  (Yes; Miller seems,to have taken a few tips on how-to-Steve EDIT: page count reference; not a control freak reference.  Thanks for the PM, Hero.     ).  For what it is worth, on page 54, we have a nice size chart (presumably to get us Americans a quick metric refresher) demonstraring that the one-credit coin is 7 milimeters.  This actually seems kind of small, doesn'r it?  Well, I thought it seemed rather small.
 
At least until I scanned across the chart and discovered that the average human is 1.5 MIlLIMETERS tall!
 
Coins don't seem so small now, do they?
 
 

Illinois To End Book Banning

Oh, Dude!
 
Did you ever ask the right guy.
 
Problem,is still the same, though.  File was done at 1200 DPI (for hyper-crisp printing) and my computer still hates Dropbox.
 
I think I still have your address, but just in case, shoot me a PM and I will get a flash Drive in the mail.
 
If I can get the scanner up and going again, I would like to give you at least the correct 1e character sheets as well.
 
 

I agree, 50 points + disads is good for characteristics + skills alone...
 
 
...so would it be a good approach to offer Wild Talents from JI and the Magic system from FH as separate options that each included a note as to how many base points should be added if the option is included? +25 for each, or +15 for Wild Talents, +25 for Magic, or whatever makes sense as the base-line case.
 
 
 
I'm sorry about that, Chris.
 
 
 
Wow, thank you! That's a huge help.
 
 
Good idea! Hopefully it won't be necessary, though.
 
 
Oooh, that sounds good! Let's normalize RPGs fitting in one saddle-stitched book again.
 

I agree, 50 points + disads is good for characteristics + skills alone...
 
 
...so would it be a good approach to offer Wild Talents from JI and the Magic system from FH as separate options that each included a note as to how many base points should be added if the option is included? +25 for each, or +15 for Wild Talents, +25 for Magic, or whatever makes sense as the base-line case.
 
 
 
I'm sorry about that, Chris.
 
 
 
Wow, thank you! That's a huge help.
 
 
Good idea! Hopefully it won't be necessary, though.
 
 
Oooh, that sounds good! Let's normalize RPGs fitting in one saddle-stitched book again.
 

I should have been doing something else 😅 but I went ahead and added the firearms from Justice Inc.  I put them on a new sheet, and while I double-checked the entries, you should probably take a pass over them yourself just to make sure no typos/OCR errors crept in.  There is one entry which is inconsistent but which I kept as-is from the book: the Nambu Type 11 (pg 62) lists OCV as "+2/1", and while that's probably supposed to be "+2/+1" like some of the other weapons, I didn't want to assume that it wasn't supposed to be "+2/-1".  I also left space for "Made In" info for the shotguns, although the book doesn't provide that.
 
Hope that's helpful!
Firearms for Hero System 2e - JI ADDED.xlsx

The group that Christopher Taylor and I were part of back then came to a consensus that 75 points wasn't enough to start with, so pretty much all of our games went with 100.  IIRC we kept Disadvantage values and diminishing returns as written in the heroic level games, and further if we were combining anything and the games had slightly different rules then the version in the game we were using took precedence. 
 
Joe, this is making me want to do more work on my "Hero System Third Edition" I've got in my Google Drive.  Not that I need to be distracted from my Star Wars Hero game or the D&D game I've taken on. .

LOL!  Espionage! also having that slipped my mind - but then again, I only purchased a used copy of Espionage! within the past decade, and never actually played it.  We played Danger International back in the day, so that's a little more burned into memory.
 
As far as hollow-point ammo, I'm no weapons expert, so I don't really know myself.  Looking at 5E Dark Champions, that book suggests that such rounds do added damage (from +1 BODY pip to +1D6 depending on the caliber) as well as +1 STUNx.

Is it OK to talk about heroic-level 3e Hero System here as well?
 
I just wanted to say that I'd completely forgotten that in 2e and 3e heroic-level games the value of Disadvantages are initially 1/2 as much as their equivalents from Superheroic (rounded in favor of the character, naturally), and then the value of multiple similar Disadvantages declines twice as fast. That's quite a difference from 4e+, and I like it.
 

Looking back, the way disadvantages start at half their values from Champions struck me as surprising given that heroic hero system also decreases the value of additional similar disadvantages twice as quickly as Champions. The net result is that you're likely to end up with 1/3 or even approaching 1/4 the total value of Disadvantages as you would in Champions. Certainly the maximum is half the total value, and you'll only achieve that if in both cases you only choose dissimilar disadvantages. Which jibes with Champions' 100 points vs. Espionage's 50 points -- half.
 
OK, fine. So a few months later Justice Inc comes along and in it characters start with 75 points, or 3/4 the points of Champions (probably so they can buy psychic powers and Weird Talents more easily). But they still have to deal with that same ceiling of 1/2 the Disadvantages value. Should it have been a ceiling closer to 3/4?  Or does it not matter in practice?
 
It's just something I want to put some thought into so I can understand it fully. Maybe I'm missing something. Certainly I don't recall major complaints about this issue back in the 80s. But, there it is, so I want to understand it.
 
If you've worked through this already, please share!

Is it OK to talk about heroic-level 3e Hero System here as well?
 
I just wanted to say that I'd completely forgotten that in 2e and 3e heroic-level games the value of Disadvantages are initially 1/2 as much as their equivalents from Superheroic (rounded in favor of the character, naturally), and then the value of multiple similar Disadvantages declines twice as fast. That's quite a difference from 4e+, and I like it.
 

I haven't shared this in a while, so here's my current development notes. Note that I do plan to stick with the Espionage! versions of the Language and Martial Arts skills. They are important to the appeal of Hero System 2e to me.