AlHazred

A while back I worked up a prefab file in Hero Designer for the implants a Space Marine undergoes in the Warhammer 40K universe. I tried working backward from the description of the effects in this article. I did it for 5th edition Hero System, and then never ended up using the prefab -- the campaign for which I made it never got off the ground. Then I ran into a user on RPG.net asking about Warhammer Space Marines in Hero System 6E. I dusted off the file, updated it, and uploaded it to the repository. You can find the package here; it contains the prefab and a printout of the package deal in the old Hero 5E text box format. I also did up the Space Marine Power Armors (or is that Armours?) the same way, trying to reason backward from the descriptions. I'll have to find the file and update it as well.

Don't reference books that I haven't bought and may not purchase. Don't provide non-canon material even if it's logical. Give me lots of psionics. Actually, scratch that last one. If psionics is a factor in the setting (such as Traveller or Babylon 5), then please give me lots of psionics. If it's not (such as Star Trek, or Battlestar Galactica), then please give me none.

So, way back in the day (1992, to be exact), there was a computer game called Darklands, and it was the first (and, IMO, the best) open-world sandbox computer game ever developed. In Darklands, the player created a party of adventurers who wandered around medieval Germany in the 1400s. There was a meta-plot, but for the most part you journeyed around, getting quests from merchants, saving caravans from bandits, and destroying robber barons preying on the citizenry. It was a blast. Anyway, the character creation options were strict. You basically chose careers, each career giving you some skills but also advancing your character's age -- go too far and aging starts to take its toll on your stats, end too early and your character is woefully incompetent and likely to die. There was no real "magic" in the game, per the standards of ordinary fantasy. Instead, people could call upon saints for aid at certain times (not reliable, but of definite help when the circumstances called for it). And instead of wizards, alchemists would brew potions you could throw to cause an explosion, a cloud of smoke or gas, or improve your stats for a time. I always liked the alchemy system in the game. You weren't limited by "power points" -- instead, you had to pick up alchemical ingredients in the markets, and then spend an evening making what you wanted. Having a good alchemist in your party is a key part of winning the game, since a bad one will ruin components and potentially cause expensive messes at the inns where your party stays. A while back, I adapted the alchemy system for my 5E fantasy game. When 6E came around, I wasn't running fantasy anymore so I left it unconverted. Since I'm putting all of my stuff on the website, I figured I'd polish off the prefab file and post it. The system works in two parts. On the Equipment tab are the actual potions, some of which are really potent. In order to avoid legal issues, I give only a brief one-sentence description of the potion's effect, although it should be obvious what it does from the power block. On the Powers tab are the alchemical formulas. These are what the alchemist character actually buys with points. Once he has a formula in his repertoire, the alchemist must purchase the necessary ingredients (given in the formula description) and then find a nice, quiet place in which to do alchemy; inns will do, although if the roll is failed for a Medium or High Risk potion, it is likely damage will result, always including exposure to the effects of the potion itself. All alchemical operations carry some risk, although Low Risk formulas are unlikely to cause harm to passers-by. The alchemy roll is made at -1 per 5 Active Points, as all potions are tricky to create. The END cost for the formula is in Long Term END. The Extra Time modifier has been applied to each formula, reducing the time increment from 1 Day per 10 Active Points, to 1 Hour per 5 Active Points, essentially making it the same as the penalty to the Alchemy Skill roll -- in the game, alchemists can make one attempt per night. In a game adhering closely to the computer game, the GM should allow the player to try to make more than 1 potion of any given kind per night (but only one Alchemy attempt per night), at a penalty. I'd use the Charges chart on 6E1 368, and for each step down I'd modify the Alchemist's skill roll penalty by -2, so an alchemist attempting to make 6 potions at once would be at -8. This prefab makes use of the "Alternate Enchanted Item Creation Rules" on page 320 of the Fantasy Hero 6E book. The package includes the prefab file, an alchemy document (giving real point costs, Alchemy Skill roll modifications, and Long Term END costs for all of the formulas) and a potions document (giving the effects of each potion, price and weight). The package can be found here.

So, this is too late for me, since the PCs in my long-running Traveller HERO campaign have been in-play for five-six years, but I got to thinking about the actual game-within-a-game of character creation. In Classic Traveller, the system was infamous for the completely random way you generated your PC. You might have joined the Army, but you could come out of the service with a decent Computer skill, or entered the Navy and become an Air/Raft driver -- if you came out at all. The Survival roll each four-year term (or each year if you used the advanced character generation tables in Book 4: Mercenary, Book 5: High Guard, Book 6: Scouts, and Book 7: Merchant Prince). However, at the end of character generation, you know how many years your guy actually saw action, or traded on other planets. HERO System, on the other hand, is highly customizable character creation system. You spend your points exactly where you want to (assuming the GM lets you) and you play exactly the guy you intended to. But the character has no actual history but what the player made up -- if the player is unfamiliar with the Traveller setting and assumptions, the character's intended background could be wildly at odds with Traveller standards (one of my players made a cyborg ex-marine, assuming Traveller space marines would be much like the Space Marines in Warhammer 40K...) If I had to start again, I'd have players go through the advanced character generation tables for their selected service. Several articles were published in RPG magazines in the 80s and 90s providing advanced character generation for CT players in non-military careers. I'd keep track of the character's history, and make a note of skills rolled each year. Then, when the player was done (mustered out, or failed a survival check and "invalided out"), I'd collate all of the skills and provide a list of potential skills for the player to spend their "profession points" on. I've been considering either a 25- or 50-point profession pool out of the starting allotment, with another 25-50 points as "hobby skill" -- other things the character picked up on the side. This would provide a character a relatively detailed history -- especially so if the GM does the homework of applying the various "police action" / "counter insurgency" / "trade war" results to his campaign's history and determines what places the character has been and what people have been met. Additionally, the character's skills will correspond to the events in the character's past. And there's plenty of room for character modification to the generated history. A player who previously had no real idea what his character's history was like might say, "Actually, I thought he'd see more combat." Then the GM and player can work together to modify the random history into something more meaningful and relevant. It beats the old "my character has been bumming around Regina for 20 years doing nothing to nobody" cases that I had...

I haven't seen it yet (considering going on Monday), but I've heard that the movie can sit next to Blade Runner, The Fifth Element, and Star Wars. If you put them all on the same shelf.

I've finished uploading the Talislanta material I'd converted. I always meant to convert a bunch more, but time is limited. I'd love to see what other people are doing with the stuff. I see the Black Savants are becoming popular.

I took the opportunity to upload a new version of the battle dress suits. I got rid of complicated Linked limitations, and went instead with a Unified Power (powered system) limitation -- when you run out of juice, you're stuck with just the basic functions of an articulated metal chassis, namely that it occupies space and has mass.

Thanks! Should be fixed.

As I said above, the Talislanta books have been made freely available online, by the creator of the setting. You can find them here, at the Talislanta Library.

I've started reuploading the mass of material I had posted in the previous iteration of the board. I'm taking the opportunity to go over everything -- I'm fixing errors, cleaning up ugly power designs, and generally trying to bring my experience in HERO to bear on the materials. I've started with the Traveller material (since that's my home game) and Talislanta material (since that's always been a favorite setting of mine). As always, please let me know if and how you use the stuff, and feel free to make suggestions/requests for more!