chiralman

Re: godless fantasy I apologize if I offended you. I won't be goaded into an argument. It's ok to disagree with me, lets just stay on topic. I'll respect your POV, it's quite helpful. I'd agree though, far better to close this topic before any flaming (including your last post) can ruin a, thusfar, adult and constructive conversation. I already admitted my ignorance in some of the words I've chosen and I can assure you that no insults were intended or intentional.

Re: godless fantasy On that note, I would endorse a system where magic is the 'summation of life force' and can be used as some manifestation of what, for lack of a better word, could be ectoplasmic energies or the like. However it would take a GM more skilled than myself to actually keep a 'balancing' of all forces whereas energy from one place would have to be drawn from another. True, that could all be handled by the 'black box' but one would have to think that such things would adversely (and randomly?) affect the players at times as much as help them should there be a wizard among them. So back to 'secular magic' and 'pagan magic', I would agree with arcady but this time avoid the semantic error of dubbing 'arcane magic' as 'pagan prayer magic'... it's not so much a matter of perspective (or semantics) as much as who, or what, would be the occult source. The way that the entymology would have me go with this would be to point 'pagan magic' (non-prayer magic) directly to a god-antagonist... namely a 'Satan-like source', and as far as this goes Satanism would go far to difine the parallel since you wouldn't have to 'worship Satan' in order to use such black arts. By definition anything that is used countered to a chosen benevolent god's approval would be 'black' or 'arcane' magics. Thus the source which could explain the origins of 'non-prayer magic' could really be a god-antagonist who would rather remain inconspicuous. Sorry again for leaning toward Judeo-Christian examples... but again, I'm just using it as a reference where you could replace 'Satan' with any 'anti-god' you prefer... thus making 'magic' and 'prayer' in fantasy games interwoven in many regards. Now would that make all wizards suspect in a religeously centered world order? For me it would have to... wizards would be summarily outlawed in many cases, especially around towns which are unified on the diety worshipped. This is where many societial actions of the older references I've seen point directly to. 'Witches' are evil and 'Priests' are good, as far as classic literature goes. 'Magic' perverts nature and 'Miracles' give way to furthering the strength of faith of the worshipper. ...and is it possible for a priest archtype and a wizard archtype to co-exist in the same party for very long? Interesting...

Re: godless fantasy Ah, ok. "Secular" works better for what I'm trying to say. I actually do know that so it was a poor choice of words I was using. I see your point and fully agree with it. Thanks.

Re: godless fantasy Well I'd rather just keep 'real theology' out of the game world. No need to complicate or even potentially offend some player down the road so I would just avoid that pitfall all together. However, as I said, my perspective is from my own personal experience and thus I'm soliciting outside opinions. By 'pagan magic' I'm simply differentiating it from 'priestly magic' which is more or less magic that is 'granted' from an outside influence and not to be as easily manipulated to the caster's will. At present, the gist of all this is for me to keep the Turakian Age setting intact and universal without ignoring the pantheon, yet prepared enough to work such differences in the various sources of player powers. I think that there is way too much cultural investment in religeon to devoid any fantasy game from the religeous dimension.

Re: godless fantasy Ah... ok then here's a question. Where do priests glean their favor from if the gods are possibly uninvolved? Is it a willpower thing (such as the faith-based healing link in our modern world of medicine). As I see it, I think this beyond a mere 'black box' question. I think that there should be some justification as to how and why priests and cleric-types get their powers only if they pray and only if they're faithful... there has to be some subject of their devotion... doesn't there?

Re: godless fantasy Good points all, however lets turn the perspective over a bit... Suppose that you were an obscenely powerful being, benevolent or otherwise, and you observe those devoted to your appeasement as 'holy' enough to help out on a regular basis. Now you see that those who are devoted to your appeasement are only a single decision away from corruption. That decision is solely reliant on when ('if' would be rare as far as gaming goes I suppose) the individual sees his life as one of 'slavery', vs. 'servanthood' to a god. Upon looking around, that individual can see similar benefits from other routes available in the genre. How do you keep your subjects in check? I'm sorry if this is abstract, I don't think it is. Suppose we replace politics for religeon here for a minute. (...and the first one to switch this thread to a religeon vs. politics board will get ploinked!) But suppose that some rich kingdom observes a smaller, independant, country that is rich in resources and not under the kingdom's rule. What is most likely to happen? Invasion, overrule and enfoldment of the weaker into the stronger in most cases I'd guess... thus is the history of man. Now as an obscenely powerful being, wouldn't you want to destroy all traces of 'pagan religeons' (i.e. magic) in order to keep the 'mana pool' pure? It would be in the interest of any single god to make followers of the whole world... imagine what a polytheistic scheme would do. It would be war between gods and no 'pagans' could possibly hope to stand up in power without an obscenely powerful sponsor of their own. I'm having trouble comprehending a way that gods and pagan magics can co-exist for very long. For reference, ancient Israel was commanded to 'destroy every witch' among them in order to keep God's people from straying. I suppose I'm biased to that point of view as a reference. (please don't turn this into a religeous debate... PLEASE don't turn this into a religeous debate... I'm only illustrating with the Israel example...)

I've always held a special place in my heart for clerics and their usefulness in dealing with the undead. That was old school and I choose to keep it in my new FH campaign. I want to thank Steve and co. for preserving that part of the genre in FH, and IMHO he handled the 'turning the undead' part particularly well. However I really never liked meddling with the whole god issue, not that it bugged me as a Christian, but just because it made things unnecessarily muddled... especially when there were other 'magics' around that could be had by 'secular magic-users' in what is traditionally a polytheistic world in the genre. So, I'm asking for opinions about the age-old quandry. Why would polytheism and magic co-exist? Not that it couldn't, but that I desire to put that last peice into the puzzle... even if it doesn't exactly fit well. I want to keep the clerics and paladins, so I was thinking of making the 'gods' ubermages who took leave of this plane to be lords of other dimensions... yet that still doesn't seem to fit in with the magic schema. What if a cleric 'woke up' and realized that such powers can be self-derived... that would make for a great campaign theme... but it may also cause the so-called deity to eliminate the character 'in his wrath' (and to shut him up to cover up the truth), but it could happen I guess. How can I justfiy 'prayer magic' as being separate from 'secular magic' in order to preserve the novelty and usefulness of the cleric's role in the genre? Thanks for your opinions. Ron

Re: 4th Edition still OK for a NEWBIE? See above (three copies? Duplication in effect.)

Re: 4th Edition still OK for a NEWBIE? To answer the question, yes, the 4th Edition rules are just as good as the 5ER. The 5ER actually has little new material (other than power examples and a few rules tweaks and clarifications). The only thing that I would recommend 5ER for is if you are planning to run a heroic level game other than a superheroic game. The 4ER is 'Champions' based and more biased for superhero play. Otherwise if you can get the 4ER and then any suppliments you want you should be all set. And to that I will go ahead and add that if you have the 4ER and any kind of imagination you should be ok to run any genre that you want without spending another penny. That's the great legacy that the authors of the original Hero System left for us.

Re: 4th Edition still OK for a NEWBIE? see below (repeat response... what gives?)

Re: I Can't Believe He Played That! This really isn't PC, and it's truly not being insensitive on purpose, but one dude built 'Quad-Balloon', a parapelegic kid who could... well... float silently and get the drop on bad guys. He didn't like it that I brought out Black Claw almost immediately. The same dude made a character called 'Ninja'. Nuff said. His brother made a character called 'The Electric Bard'. Ooooh, flee in terror evil-doers. Too funny.

Re: All the superhero PCs I've ever played No time for detail here, but this was just too much fun to pass up. These are all for Champions in no particular chronological order: Boltmaster/Electrolord/Boltlord/Electromaster, my first and I just couldn't settle on a name, don't you hate that? Wildcat MindMaster/MindHunter (no originality points) Muskrat (my coolest and longest lived) Buzzsaw (ended up getting reprogramming and killing Muskrat) Blue Angel Silent Swordsman Moonbeam (want to forget that name soooo bad) Lightguard (another cool concept that kept getting better) Labrynth Sting (a buddy stole him for another campaign) Mindshadow (lasted a long time) Magknight Commander Microman Derringer Shadowhawk (no originality points) Acrobat (LOVED THIS CHARACTER!) Barricade Wildshot (LOVED THIS CHARACTER) Arealist PowerBeast! (a woman who could morph into a huge, ugly energy being... cool) Nowhere Man Thunderfist (no originality points) Golem Wire Flex Feedback Heatseeker Hotzone Reptilian (great concept character, but no originality pts) Whisper (again NOP) Sonicator Gauntlet Runt Saint Glacier Snare Evader (LOVED THIS CHARACTER) Barrage MindForce (NOP) Penance (the darkest, baddest PC I've ever conceived and played) Mallet Goon Fly-Tech Impact Behemoth Phantasm (NOP) The Primative Flashpoint (LOVED THIS CHARACTER) Heavyweight ...there's more, I'm sure of it. Thanks for helping me empty my mental closet and take a good look at how much of my long term memory is taken up by retaining this garbage. ;-) I've got character ADD, what can I say?

Re: Dungeon World Maybe DungeonWorld is really the elemental plane of Earth that has been invaded at different times by forces from Air, Fire and Water and thereby justifying these elements. The tunnels can be attributed to a Purple Worm/Sandworm kind of being and the populations can be sent as prisoners by otherworldly magical judgement tribunals... kind of like how Australia got started. Just some thoughts.

Re: New news from the Post-Apocalypse RPG front kieth curtis has been doing PA-HERO for about as long as I have, so you might want to check out his site too. His stuff is much prettier and I think he actually keeps his up to date. Plus, if I'm not mistaken, he springboards off of Thundaar the Barbarian! Gotta give him props for that! I don't think that you need to buy Star Hero just for the radiation rules. There was an older copy of the Star Hero pre-writes on the old Red October BBS boards. I know the ROBBS is still up, but I don't know if it still has the Star Hero (1st ed?) documents. >>OH! And don't forget to check out the Gamma World WebRing. There's a TON of source material from my brothers over there (where it all began for me).

Re: New news from the Post-Apocalypse RPG front If you haven't checked it out yet (and if its still up), I did a LOT of work and conversions over a few years and posted my Wasteland Hero project on the web. It covers a lot of material to consider for a post-apoc game, I tried to keep it modular for whatever kind of game you'd want to run. There might be some useful stuff in it for you. I ran a very successful PBeM for a few years with the rules, and those posts are still available at the 'wastelandhero' room in yahoogroups. I haven't updated the material for a few years, and be advised that it is written for 4th edition... most of it is source material anyway, and therefore rules insensitive. Consider it a gift to use, steal, or ignore... http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Park/3440/rpgs.html There's also a link to it in the 'Other Genre' Links. I always felt ripped off waiting for Bruce Harlick to give me the go-ahead to write this for Hero 4th, but such is life. Hope you enjoy it.

Re: All HEROes Must Be Eaten: zombie survival horror I created and ran a PBEM called 'Not Quite Dead!' (I think), and yes it was easy to put together and very easy to HERO-ize. All you need are zombie stats (available in the Bestiary, I used 4th edition) and a plot (I started with panic and everyone in town had to get to the nearest shelter which happened to be the police station... this is before I even saw RE2... plus this got everyone 'together' which is not always easy to do). As for lethality, just use the hit locations and don't allow rDEF higher than say 3 (or whatever Kevlar is), make sure you allow only one or two 'above average' stats per PC, always count bullets, and off you go. You MUST keep the zombies interesting, and then it won't matter if its one or one hundred. Personalize them... that's the value of AFMBE (I found a zombie generator on line somewhere, since I ran the game a few years ago around Halloween, I can't remember where but a Google search might help). Ron

Re: Some Package Deals I need help on. The various Peoples are Elves (FH) Dwarves (FH) Kobolds (Dog People, I got it) Lizard Clan (FH) Duck Clan (Mine) The rest of the citizens in the Suikoden world are Human, however their environments, homelands, and customs differentiate them. >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Duck Clan? (snicker) All I can hear is King Arthur answering Sir Bedamir: "What else floats?" "A DUCK!" (with conviction) Sorry, I know I'm not helping. Carry on.

Re: Magic Items Sourcebook? I absolutely admire Hall's stuff. The guy is brilliant. I have been hordeing his work for a long time... he stuff was originally posted on the Red October BBS wasn't it? He's put in a lot of work, and his resources are free. He deserves a lot of credit! And thanks for the heads up on that schedule, Doug. Ron

Is there an enchanted items chapter in "Gadgets and Gear"? Is there a "Magic Items" sourcebook in the making? How about any useful links? Thanks a ton Ron

Re: A Bathroom Swimming, only for things that fit in the potty? giggle giggle...

Who's that cool porcupine/thorny/quill-filled orange/tan dude? Boy do I want to construct a character based on him! The first time I saw the sidebar pictures I just kept refreshing and refreshing until I'm sure I saw all of them, but this is the first time I saw that dude. Cool!

Re: Compiled list of H5E modifications and edits Fantastic work guys! Thanks. Steve I was also wondering if you had anybody submit any outlines for a Wasteland Hero genre book. The link to my site is in the Other Genres section of your links page (I can't believe its still there... and even more I can't believe the link still works!). But theres still hits o-plenty for the free documents I offer for Wasteland Hero and that means that there's still interest. A lot of work is done, but a there's a lot of work that could still be added and edited. Just a thought. I can be reached at ronald_miller@hotmail.com. Thank again guys.

Steve, Having been out of gaming for a few years, I finally got around to ordering H5E last week and just now I was reading about the upcoming revised edition. Now, yes, I'm way late for just now ordering H5E so I accept the condescending look that you might be giving me... however, when the next edition comes out will there be a list of changes made from the currently available edition? Is there a current downloadable list of methods and edits available? Many thanks, and keep up the excellent work. Its fantastic to see the Hero Website alive and well... especially after tolerating years of inactivity from the former residents. You and your team have really revived this excellent product and I thank you for that.