AlHazred
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Posts posted by AlHazred
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Another thing to remember with HERO is "special effects trumps mechanics."
If a character wanted to take "Unusually Tall" as a DF, I'd make the points above. Then, if they still wanted it, I'd say, "No problem!" and give it to them at 5 points. A 5 point Complication should be a problem about 1 in 4 or so scenarios, so I'd give him 3 scenarios to fart around.
Then, I'd have a scenario where the PCs are called in on an odd case. A woman reports that her husband has been "replaced."
They go to a small town in the East Hinterlands. Describe the distinctively quirky bed & breakfast they stay at: it's got a door lintel made of deer antlers, but it's pretty tall -- even "Tall PC" barely scrapes under.
They check on the guy. He matches his old photos, and his biometrics check out. Her only indication that he's different is he's "too tall." If the PCs manage to get his old medical records, they can find that he does appear to be three inches taller than they would indicate. He claims his wife is suffering from dementia brought on by years of hard drinking before she quit, and there's evidence to support that.
Run it as a body snatcher scenario. The sherrif is tall; has he been replaced? They can't get cell reception in the town, except way out in the woods, where it's dark and creepy. Does one PC go alone to make his call and check in? When they do, they get a call from HQ -- there's something wrong with the PC dossiers, could the group check up on... The call cuts out and now the PC has no bars.
Going back to the B&B, the "tall PC" cracks his head on the lintel, clearly a good three inches too short for him to walk under...
Basically, Complications are a way to mess with the PCs. Every GM messes with the PCs, but HERO gives them control over how you mess with them. So, this player is basically saying, "My height is going to come up often as something of a problem. Make the most of it."
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Worked up for a Fantasy Hero thread, these are pretty nightmarish.
CAVEAT: They make use of packages I made up for other games and posted on the Boards. Your mileage may vary.
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If it saves you some time or gives you inspiration, I remember that somewhere on the Web is a bunch of Shadow World conversions done back in the day (unless I'm misremembering, it's to 4th edition Hero System). I believe QM used to link to the conversion.
EDIT - Checking the Wayback Machine, I found this from an old [Compilation] post that didn't survive the transfer:
Jason's (Hierax's) website is defunct, but he did upload a characteristic conversion document, which I've attached.
One of the threads linked above can still be found on the Wayback Machine:
http://herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?t-14277
But the other is gone.
Mainly, it appears Hierax had a bunch of material written down. You might try dropping him an email to see if he can share his stuff.
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Aha! Kulthea! That's a worthy conversion! I remember fond nights spent adventuring among the lands of Emer. Of course, we used the RoleMaster system at the time; very clunky and time-consuming. Can't wait to see what you do with it!
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Amusingly, I've done various Elf and Dwarf packages for my high fantasy game, and recently re-uploaded the World of Darkness vampire and werewolf packages. I wonder what they look like all strung together, with the Ninja Hero ninja and Fantasy Hero pirate packages?
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You are taking the correct approach: always ask yourself "how is this really complicating the character's life?" With Distinctive Features, you also ask yourself the additional question, "is this truly distinctive?"
Distinctive Features for being an alien would not be worth many (any?) points in several Space Opera settings, because just being "an Ornithopteryx" isn't distinctive enough to make the character easy to identify and follow. Distinctive Features for being a mutant is generally only worth points in superhero games where "mutant detectors" and "anti-mutant hysteria" are factors.
You have to be Distinctive for a reason that implies it's a problem. Being really tall as a Distinctive Feature implies one of the unusually tall people you might find in the Guiness Book of World Records or Ripley's Believe It or Not, who need supports and medical attention. "My character has unusually bright red hair" is never going to be a Distinctive Feature in my games because the public isn't against that. If I developed a campaign setting where gingers were actually thought to be soulless, and anti-ginger hysteria had led to the formation of roaming "vigilante posses" who travel around killing them in secret, then it becomes a Distinctive Feature.
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AmeriForce One has been replaced by national team The Praetorians, which is "led" by the All-American, now in his sixties and a cyborg; unknown to the public much of his brain has been replaced by computer hardware programmed by the regime. Other members include the young techno-Mage known as Acolyte, the son of Defender and Witchcraft; Glorygirl, a patriotic brick/martial artist; and Shotput (previously Marble Man of Ravenswood Academy).
Hmmm... The "leader" of the outfit has a computer brain, and there's a technomancer on the force?! Who's really in charge here?
The Elder Worm nation idea and an unleashed Death Dragon are probably too world-shaking for my intentions.
Who's to say they have to be obvious about it? Being obvious about it lost it for them the first time, at least in the case of the Elder Worm...
The more I think of it, the more I like the thought that Doctor Destroyer does simply and truly die of natural causes.
Yes, yes, "dead," of course...
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Thank, AlHazred. Are these for 5e or 6e?
Sorry, these are 6E. While I intended to do them in the 5E era, I never got around to it until several years ago. Honestly, these should be just as usable in 5E, as I don't think any of the powers I used changed that much between editions.
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I ended up scanning in most of my material, which was an unusual bit of foresight on my part. In many cases, the files are the only version of specific supplements that I can still find.
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EDIT - Fixed a typo in the new Kindred pdf. If you were the one person to download it before I reuploaded it just now, please download it again.
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I've redone the pdf so that it contains a brief description of the package deal, and basically made it look more like an official Hero product.
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I've redone the pdf so that it contains a brief description of the package deal, and basically made it look more like an official Hero product.
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Skills
HârnMaster uses a big list of skills, some of which are "Automatic" (this is the equivalent of Everyman Skills in HERO). Here's the list of skills and what I consider to be HERO System equivalents. "Automatic" skills are indicated with an asterisk (*).
Hârn Skill HERO Skill
Physical Skills
Acrobatics Acrobatics
Climbing* Climbing
Dancing PS: Dancing (PRE-based)
Jumping* extra Leaping meters
Legerdemain Sleight of Hand
Stealth* Stealth
Swimming extra Swimming meters
Throwing* WF: Thrown, Combat Skill Levels
Communication Skills
Acting Acting
Awareness* Perception (General)
Lovecraft Charm
Mental Conflict Mental Combat Skill Levels/OMCV/DMCV
Oratory* Oratory
Rhetoric* Persuasion, Presence Attacks
Singing* PS: Singing (PRE-based)
Language Language
Combat Skills
Unarmed* WF: Unarmed, Combat Skill Levels, Martial Arts
Riding Riding
Axe, Blowgun, Bow, Club, Dagger, Flail,
Net, Polearm, Shield, Sling, Spear,
Sword, Whip WF, Combat Skill Levels (by Weapon Familiarity Group)
Lore/Craft Skills
Agriculture PS: Agriculture
Alchemy PS: Alchemy
Animalcraft Animal Handling
Brewing PS: Brewing
Ceramics PS: Ceramics
Cookery PS: Cooking
Drawing PS: Drawing
Embalming Forensic Medecine
Engineering Mechanics, SS: Engineering
Fishing PS: Fishing
Fletching Weaponsmith (Muscle-Powered Ranged)
Folklore KS: Folklore
Foraging Survival
Glasswork PS: Glassworking
Heraldry KS: Heraldry
Herblore PS: Herblore
Hidework PS: Hidework
Jewelcraft PS: Jewelcraft
Lockcraft Lockpicking
Masonry PS: Masonry
Mathematics SS: Mathematics
Metalcraft PS: Metalcraft
Milling PS: Milling
Mining PS: Mining
Perfumery PS: Perfumery
Physician Paramedics
Piloting Transport Familiarity (per vehicle group), Combat Driving
Seamanship PS: Seamanship
Shipwright PS: Shipwright
Survival Survival
Textilecraft PS: Textilecraft
Timbercraft PS: Timbercraft
Tracking Tracking
Weatherlore KS: Weatherlore
Woodcraft PS: Woodcraft
Special Cases:
Physical Skills:
Condition: This is basically the Hârnic way to buy up your damage-taking capacity. In HERO, this converts to BODY and STUN.
Skiing: The easy way to convert this to HERO is just to use Transport Familiarity: Skiing. On the other hand, it would be possible to make a new skill, Skiing, similar to the optional Parachuting skill (Hero System Skills, page 364). To meet Design Goal 1, I think I'll use the TF.
Communication Skills:
Intrigue*: This is “the ability to assess and/or act effectively within a social/political situation over a period of time.” This has no specific equivalent in HERO System. I could see using Deduction skill or the optional Analyze: Motive (Hero System Skills, page 78-79) skill for the “assess” part, but the “act effectively” would be some sort of PRE-based skill. I’m thinking it might make sense to rename Streetwise and use that, per Design Goal 1.
Musician: in Hârn, this is broken out by specific instruments. It might make sense to use the optional Musical Instrument Familiarity skill from Hero System Skills, page 362, plus PS: Musician (PRE-based).
Script: In Hârn, each Script is a separate skill and literacy is a big deal. It might make sense to break down Literacy, so each script would represent a separate 1-point investment in (one of your) Languages.
Ritual Skills: These are used to successfully perform invocations (basically divine-magic spells). For the various Ritual skills (each god’s is specific) I’ll make a Ritual Skill as a variant of the Power Skill.
Combat Skills:
Initiative* This is the determiner of who goes first in a combat round. In HERO, we use SPD and DEX. Buying up Initiative skill in Hârn is basically the same as buying Lightning Reflexes in HERO.
Lore/Craft Skills:
Astrology, Runecraft, Tarotry: The best fit for these and similar skills (I’ve seen Palmistry in the materials) is the Divination skill from Hero System Skills, page 355.
Law: As “Knowledge of local law,” this is obviously KS: Law. But it also includes the ability “to settle tenant disputes,” which implies a PRE-based component. I think I’ll rename Bureaucratics and use that, per Design Goal 1.
Weaponcraft: This translates pretty closely to the Weaponsmith skill in HERO System, but where HERO has the Muscle-Powered HTH specialty, Hârn has them broken out by Weapon Familiarity Groups. Also, the Hârn version of the skill includes the optional Armorsmith skill from Hero System Skills, page 354.
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Design Goals
1. Elegant solutions trump accurate-but-crunchy solutions. This means strict accuracy might suffer in the interest of making something easy to use during gameplay.
2. Source fluff has higher significance than source crunch. So, the description of a spell should inform the Hero version more than the HârnMaster implementation of said spell.
3. Try to maintain compatibility with other Fantasy Hero campaigns. That means, don't make new rules items to convert things if there's a way to do it under the rules as they exist in core Fantasy Hero. Caveat: Advanced Players Guide I and II material is fair game.
Step 1: Character Generation
Characteristics
Many HârnMaster characteristics map directly.
HârnMaster Hero
Strength Strength
Stamina Constitution
Dexterity Dexterity
Intelligence Intelligence
Will Ego
Hârn Agility is the ability to move the whole body; this loosely translates to Hero System Speed.
Hero System Presence sort of maps to two Hârn attributes: Voice and Comeliness.
Hârn uses several attributes that map to Hero System Perception rolls: Eyesight, Hearing, and Smell. In converting characters, I would convert those items associated with one of these stats into a corresponding bonus to Perception rolls. Skills and other things dependent on them I would base instead on Hero System Intelligence. Alternatively, I need to consider whether Hârn uses the "Perception As A Characteristic" alternative rule listed in the APG II, page 8 and 10, although that conflicts with Design Goal 3.
Hârn uses one attribute that is difficult to convert directly, namely Aura -- "Hârnic philosophers believe that all living things have Aura and that the physical body is simply a place where the immortal spirit currently resides. High Aura indicates high psychic ability, and is the most important attribute for psionics and magic (although Will and Intelligence are also vital)." AUR influences ability at the various Magic skills and psionics, and also occasionally comes into play in Ritual skill and the associated religious invocations. Maybe convert it to Presence? Or, I may have to make it a new characteristic, although that conflicts with Design Goal 3.
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Probably ten years ago (or more) I was put in the hot-seat to run a Fantasy Hero game for my regular Saturday group. At the time, I had just purchased the HârnWorld basic folio for $5. This was a great product with an index, a beautiful setting map, a gazetteer, and a sample castle map; so, I used a random location from the setting and began a Zombie Apocalypse Fantasy Hero game.
The campaign lasted for eight years over three distinct phases (my group calls them "seasons"), over which time I picked up more of the HârnWorld line of castle and city maps. Looking back on it, I kind of regret the way I stumbled into it. Hârn has some great intrigue metaplot going on, and plenty of highly-detailed, plausible-feeling location modules, none of which I was able to really use because I was in the process of destroying the world. I found a basic Hârn Hero conversion online, but I ended up doing a bunch of conversion work myself. Eventually I made a HârnHero document that circulated among my group and a few select people on the Internet.
So, I'm currently working to finish up my Traveller Hero campaign after the next "season" of play, and was casting around for what to run after that, and my mind turned to Hârn. There's been a huge amount of additional material published since then, and a ridiculous amount of high-quality free supplementary material. I dusted off the old conversion material and immediately got the bug to finish it off. I'd never actually completed the conversion to my satisfaction, and rereading it, I had a different design focus back then. So, I'm going to go over everything and work up a series of pdfs and Hero Designer templates/prefabs/package deals to do a proper HârnHero 2.0 conversion.
Comments and questions welcome!
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Updated for the new forum. Also recreated the counterpart Kindred thread.
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I worked up some of the old World of Darkness stuff that I owned into Hero terms. My plan was to allow players of my High Fantasy Hero game the opportunity to play those "races" if they wanted to; plus I knew it would be an excellent opportunity to cut my teeth on 6E Hero, which is different enough I felt the need to practice.
I started with vampires, as they're pretty straightforward in the World of Darkness. I never got around to working up all the various Vampiric Disciplines, but you could make those easily enough. It clocks in at 211 points, which is pretty reasonable for a vampire, I think -- the one in the Bestiary is just a crazy number of points.
I've uploaded this as a Package Deal here
EDIT: Updated post, removed non-operational links, uploaded package deal to new Download section, updated link.
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I will say that the 5th edition GM screen that came with the pack was the single greatest Hero product I owned before Hero Designer came out. That thing was awesome with the charts and tables. And six panels portrait-oriented, too! Come to think of it, the tables haven't changed that much. I should dust it off and see how close it is to 6th edition stats...
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So, it got approved and should now be accessible. Plus, here's a pdf.
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Sure, no problem.
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Apparently, there's an issue with the upload. Here's the file.
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Screw it, here you go.
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Well, this is weird. If I look at my content, I have no files submitted. If I click the link I posted, this is what I see.
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That's odd. If I click the link it takes me right there. I wonder if there's a permissions issue?
What I'm Working On: HârnHero v2.0
in Fantasy Hero
Posted
I've not forgotten this thread. As a weekly update, I'll mention I'm in the process of applying the materials above to a Hero Designer template.This is proving to be somewhat time-consuming, but I'm eager to do this right and if I get the template out of the way it'll be easier to build up the Package Deals for the professions.In the meantime, I should talk about Perks.
Perks
Lordship
This perk functions much as it is in Fantasy Hero, page 130, except there's no need for so many ranks -- Hârnic kingdoms are tiny compared to most fantasy campaigns, and have correspondingly fewer ranks.
Value Feudal Rank
1 Squire
2 Knight
3 Baron/Baroness
5 Earl/Earla/Count/Countess
8 King/Queen
10 Overking/Overqueen/Pendragon
The Lordship Fringe Benefit doesn't confer any actual lands; Barons or above (and any knights lucky enough to be landed) should also pay for a Base Perk which covers the size of any lands held.
Military Rank, Guild Member, Money, Positive Reputation
These perks function exactly as in Fantasy Hero page.131 and 132. In Hârn, money is even scarcer than in most fantasy campaigns -- somewhere I read that the total amount of coined money floating around the isle of Hârn is probably on the order of a few 10s of thousands of silver pence.
Religious Rank
This won't just reflect your rank for social purposes, but also indicates what rank of invocations a character would be able to learn. Because even laity in a church can learn (a few) invocations, even the laity must pay for rank.
Value Rank Min Ritual Skill Title
1 I 8- Laity
2 II 10- Acolyte / Lay Grandmaster
3 III 11- Priest
5 IV 12- High Priest / Abbot
7 V 13- Bishop / Archbishop
8 VI 15- Primate / Cardinal
10 VII 17- Pontiff (if applicable)