smoelf

I have completed and published the digital version of The Jolrhos Codex!  Its up on DriveThruRPG in the Hall of Champions section.  I hope to have it up here on Hero soon as well as in print.
 
The Codex is the rewrite of my old Fantasy Codex, with doublechecked math, new spells, streamlined layout and content, and specifically built to be for my Fantasy Hero campaign setting rather than generic.  Also added are Bard Songs and Priest rituals, as well as campaign rules for building spells.  As a result its slimmed down, but has more content.
 
The full spell builds (and NPCS, songs etc) are all in hdc files that are bundled with the book.  Because of this, there is no preview (I cannot figure out how to make a preview available with the zip bundle).

Hello everyone! We have a variety of projects going on at Hero Games right now, both for quarter one of 2021 and for the year as a whole. I wanted to let you know about them, get your input, and ask if there is anything you would like to see created by Hero Games in the coming year. Of course, I can’t promise you we will act on those suggestions! Only that we will listen and do what we can, given the limited time and resources that we have. Please feel free to comment.
UPCOMING NEW RELEASES
The following three projects have been turned into us, have been approved, and are in various levels of production right now. (If you have submitted a project to us and don’t see it listed here, don’t be alarmed! We simply haven’t gotten to it yet. These things take time.)
Western Hero: Rough and Ready Roleplaying – This is a joint project between Kestrel Arts and Hero Games. Written by Christopher Taylor and based on work by Matt Forbeck, it’s an exhaustive, rules complete 276 page Hero System 6th Edition book. It has already been through layout, editing, and (due to the subject matter) sensitivity reading, and will be made available physically and electronically through DriveThruRPG, Amazon, Indie Press Revolution, and the Hero Games store. A Hero Designer Character Pack for this product will also be available for sale.
Institute For Human Advancement: Pride & Prejudice – Written by Thomas Stadley, this book is a 50,000 word Champions 6th Edition source book detailing the history, structure, agents, and technology of the infamous Champions Universe villain organization known as the IHA. It is currently being edited by AC, and will be made available physically and electronically through DriveThruRPG and Amazon, and electronically through the Hero Games store. A Hero Designer Character Pack for this product will also be available for sale.
The Hero System Book of Templates II – Written by Christopher Hackler, this is the sequel to Chris’ popular Hero System Book of Templates. I’m editing this book myself right now, and it’s excellent. At 33,000 words it’s even better than the original, and extremely useful to new players. It will be available in electronic and physical form from DriveThruRPG and Amazon, and electronically from the Hero Games store. A Hero Designer Character Pack for this product will also be available for sale.
SECTIONAL BOOKS
Steve Long and I have come up with a new publication concept for releasing Hero System books, and we are going to try applying this concept to a couple of projects this year and see it works out, financially as well as artistically. I’m calling these “sectional books,” as they will be released in sections that stand alone as electronic products, but can be combined in the end and released as a complete print-on-demand book on DriveThru and Amazon. The stand-alone products won’t have any original artwork, but the final book they will be combined into will have an original cover and at least some original interior artwork (though they will be softcover black-and-whites).
Subject matter for these books will be selected in part based on their suitability for the format: meaning, they can be released in sections, then those sections can be combined into a unified, consistent final product (not a magazine or the like). The first two will be written by Steve, and will be Champions International – a collection of chapters about imaginary countries with exist in the Champions Universe – and Martial Enemies, which will detail a wide variety of martial arts characters suitable for Champions, Ninja Hero, Pulp Hero, or any of a number of other genres. He’s already turned in the first section Champions International: Lugendu, which AC is getting ready right now.
If the sectional book projects goes well, Hero Games will launch a Patreon account to support even more work in that vein, plus provide exclusive content to Hero System fans who choose to become backers. (But we’ll have to see how the project goes before I commit to that!)
KICKSTARTER
At this point I don’t have any plans in 2021 a Kickstarter project. I’m willing to hear suggestions if you folks have any. But please keep in mind that the Hero Games KS account is reserved at this time for “big” projects. By this I mean comparatively large, rules-complete works which require no additional books to play. So I mean projects that are like Champions Now or Fantasy Hero Complete, but not Book of the Empress or Champions Villains III. I’m open to the idea of licensed intellectual property projects; though, again, I can’t make any promises. Actually getting licensed IP is an extremely difficult and time-consuming undertaking that I have only succeeded at twice (once here at Hero Games, and once at my own imprint High Rock Press); though behind the scenes I tried one dozen other times over the years unsuccessfully. Success requires either a perfect alignment of circumstances, or large sums of money; and the former is by nature unlikely, the later - nonexistent.
HALL OF CHAMPIONS
So far you fans have contributed forty creations to our Hall of Champions DriveThruRPG community content program! Please continue, feel free to contribute to the creative legacy of Hero Games, and maybe make a few bucks along the way.
-Jason Walters, Publisher

Many years ago I bought Ptolus and my group really wasn't into it.  The DnD version just didn't strike them as they couldn't do "what they wanted" with the classes, spells and story etc.  My group is really about having the mechanics support the roleplaying they do.  So I started a new campaign and decided Ptolus Fantasy Hero Version would be the meal.  
 
They are so in love with it and have really went crazy with Hero and Ptolus.  One is a rogueish type with decent skills and got his first follower.  He runs atop the rooftops and is a half-elf who only needs to sleep 3 hours a day.  He is super active and came from the Warrens (a slum type district). 
 
The next player chose a Necromancer type player who was using Vampiric Touch (heal by draining body).  He learned later that he was gaining corruption from doing this and decided to find religion.  We created something called the Sisters of Mercy where the third sister was the sister of retribution and justice.  He has been able to heal the corruption by doing good deeds for the church and gives me another plot hook.
 
The last player is a face man who is a gambler who took 25 points of luck.  He likes to flip a coin and decide what to do, great fun.
 
Thank you to the forums for the ideas about the story.  I used many and they are working for a Demon named Deimos, they haven't put it all together yet.  They have been collecting items for him to make a huge summons and after about 20 sessions are now starting to see the light. 
 
Three of the four in my group have been gaming together for 40 years the other about 20.  I think the combination of this system and our experience have made this one of the best campaigns we have ever played.  We are all dreaming about it and really really roleplaying.  One of the guys really was a min/maxer and that was all he cared about, but now he is really doing some cool things.
 
We are using the hard recovery where they only get recovery of body every two weeks.  It makes the game grittier and they don't charge into many combats.  Also the Prescence mechanic and social combat have been unbelievably well received.  Can't say enough about how much we are loving this game.  We all looked at each other the other night and said, "I wish we had started playing this game years ago"!
 
Thanks again.  If you interested in more I can post more info.  If you looking for a great City to adventure in for Hero, Ptolus is the way!
 

Racial packages with pre-allocated points is how I have approached it in the past as well.  Curiously, in D&D, I saw lots of player pick non-human races for the free racial abilities, but in Hero non-human races weren't as popular once they had to pay for those abilities.

Or if you want to play a fantasy game but don't want to learn a whole new system.  
 
 
It doesn't have to be.  I say this over and over again, but it doesn't have to be!  
 
If all we present is the "homebrew everything" approach, which we've done for 31 years, we're going to find ourselves losing people, which we've been doing for at least 21 years.  
 
And no, "dumbing it down" isn't the only alternative to "homebrew everything".  There's a massive excluded middle.  
 
And not wanting to homebrew everything isn't a result of video games giving people the attention spans of overcaffeinated squirrels.  It's a result of growing up and having more responsibilities and less time.  
 
(Shoug, I'm not trying to imply you've said any of the above, but those are all objections I've seen raised when I've tried to say: we don't need to homebrew everything!)
 

It is a quality piece of software and definitely (more than) worth its $25 asking price IMO if you are either a GM or the type of player who likes just making characters for fun. 
 
It has what I consider to be a very mild learning curve (but I'm probably not the best gauge for that). It is a literal tabula rasa when first opened with no character selected...
 

 
You get started by either selecting an existing character sheet from disk (if you have downloaded one, for instance) or by making a new character selected from the types of characters HD has the character creation rules for...such as 6e standard superheroic or heroic, or a vehicle, base, etc...
 

 
Once you've picked the type of character, you are presented with a tabbed interface and you basically go from tab to tab filling in the parts of your character...
 
Note: I changed my preferences to have the tabs go down the right side, so your UI would look slightly different out of the box (if i recall correctly they default to run across the top), but it should be equally as obvious what the tabs are regardless.
 

 
ProTip: I would recommend saving your progress frequently as you go (Ctrl+S), as you should for any long form content development.
 
When you want to see a character sheet for the character, using the "Current Character" menu option select an Export Template and Preview the character sheet.

 
There are lots of export templates, targeting different options such as html (viewed / printed using your browser of choice), plain text, rtf, etc. Some come w/ HD and a lot more are available in the downloads section of this site, catering to different levels of verbosity, style preferences, and so on. When you are getting started, I would recommend a default HTML template and you can get more discerning later when you have a better idea of what you want. 
 
Personally, I use custom html templates nearly exclusively, but do sometimes output other formats when i have a particular reason to.
 
After you have the basics down (make a standard character), HD offers a plethora of other features if you want or need to get fancier. You can turn a "character" into a template from which you can make future characters...for instance imagine you made a "Goblin" character representing a baseline gobbo for your setting...you could make it into a template from which you could later create a new specific named goblin and add on to the baseline...you could go further and have layers of templates that stack one upon the next, such as a baseline gobbo template, a gobbo champion template built on top of that, and a gobbo chief template built on top of that, layering up the abilities from one to the next. I think the utility of this is fairly obvious in settings where you have lots of stock characters which are mostly defined by what they are plus some individualization, such as most fantasy settings. 
 
You can also make or use prefabs, the term used by the app for lists of pre-made abilities, gear, etc, which can be loaded up and used conveniently within the tabs for skills, talents, powers, equipment to quickly whip up characters without having to copy and paste common effects (such as your campaign's definition of a long sword or basic fireball spell, etc) from one to next.
 
Pro Tip: heavy use of prefabs can put memory pressure on the app, so I suggest loading up the ones you need when you need them.
 

 
One of my favorite features is the ability to define and reuse custom campaign settings that can be applied to all characters in a given campaign. This is hugely convenient and offers a lot of flexibility and is worth checking out if you get that far. I use this feature very heavily; one of the first things I do when setting up a new campaign is go into HD and make a campaign ruleset and then bang out a few baseline characters for that campaign (such as average person, average PC, average "thug" opposition, etc) as part of the dialing in process.
 

 
And so on...the summary is HD is basically an industrial grade power tool for Hero System character creation and management (an aspect of HD that doesn't get talked about as much but which is in my opinion its most significant value add), and like many power tools it does have its sharp edges and beginners traps, but it richly rewards time spent learning its nuances.
 
 
-----------------------
My user preferences menu:
 

 
I no longer remember what the defaults are, but I recommend upping the max RAM allowed to the app using the conveniently provided slider if you are in the habit of keeping a bunch of characters open (such as all of the PC's of your campaign and the current crop of NPC's / bad guys) and have them auto-load on HD start.
 
 
 
 

Sigiriya, Sri Lanka
 

 
Sigiriya was constructed on a rocky outcrop 650 feet (200m) above the jungle, initially as a 3rd century BC Buddhist monastery. Then 800 years later, King Kasyapa built an opulent palace there and covered it in frescoes. The palace was surrounded by gardens, pools and a mirrored wall that was polished so brightly the king could see his face in it.
 

 
 

 

 

 

 
Sigiriya means lion and the city is fronted by a huge lion entrance – sadly missing its head.
 

 
 

 

@smoelf and @Shoug 
I'm right there with you. Consider using HERO System Basic for a gaming group, and get some people together to run a few simple activities. Either use pre-gen characters you build, or have them all take a whack at making simple characters. Then just run them through a battle. No backstory, no reason, just a McGuffin battle so they can all try out the system. Maybe start off first with a Skills adventure (break into the McGuffin-storage), which then leads to the battle in a second adventurelet. Nobody will care that there's no story--everyone will be more interested in kicking the tires on the system and will be happy enough to just run through some stuff. Not even "Session 0," more like "Session alpha."
 
I'd also recommend, if you haven't already, getting HERO Designer. It's immensely helpful for whipping up characters quickly. Or if you are interested in a supers game, try the Character Creation Cards. They allow you to whip up characters in minutes, and then you can go right into playing. My recommendation, though, would be to start with simple heroic-level characters and very simple challenges. The Powers in a supers game can quickly get overwhelming for new players and especially new GMs, though not impossible if you're all ok with just winging it!
 
I think if most of us look back on when we first started gaming, most of us just jumped right in to try stuff out without knowing many rules at all. Just do that. Have fun, don't look for too much accuracy, and just get them used to figuring out when to roll dice, and how many. I'm actually just now GMing my first HERO campaign ever. I have a group of entirely new players, and an entirely new GM (me), but we've met 4 or 5 times now and they have enough fun to keep coming back. I'm doing Pulp HERO in 6e, so the characters are heroic skill-based players. It makes the game so much simpler! I've been letting different characters have the spotlight (time for your detective to detect, time for your fixer to check his mob contact, and your silent film star to unload a ferocious PRE attack on the mook, etc.) and then making sure I take time out with each activity to explain the what and the why of the dice resolution. They all get to watch as well as participate, and then learn as they go. AND it helps reinforce some of the things for me as the GM as well. 
 
Just another 2¢ nugget. I hope it helps you get over the first hurdle of trying to get through that first game. Let me know what you think, or how it goes, and what you think would help for the first time players. I have all sorts of pages from the PDFs printed off and laminated for their reference, but I never know what they really need (and neither do they, since they don't know what they don't know . . . know what I mean?). 

We are definitely close kin in this matter. My story is almost identical to yours. I seriously suggest getting a physical copy of the books. I've got 6e1 and 2 and Basic. Basic is really excellent, and after reading that a little bit, everything clicked for me. The game is actually quite elegant.

smoelf, you should dial it all back. Buy the first edition Fantasy Hero pdf from the store and see if you can run that.  It IS a complete game and was written to be played from that one book.  Ignore the 6E right now.
 
Fantasy HERO is easy to get your head round.
 
In fact, ignore that, buy Justice Inc, my favourite of the complete games.  It is a simple task to play some pulp.  When you have played that a few times and gotten your head round the basics in there, the 6E books then just open up the opportunities to do more, or add to what you have been doing. 
 
You've gotta get your toes wet but you should not need to go out your depth to do that.  Not now all those PDFs are just sitting there...
 
Doc

You know, HERO had a kind of thing for a while, adventures did not just give something for the GM to run but added something to the system, like Scourge of the Deep gave rules and hints about adventuring under water.
 
It would be a great thing if we published adventures which had two purposes.  One would be something to run.  The other would be advice on setting the game up for a particular game style.
 
So instead of a 24 page adventure book, you get a 48 page supplement.  These could build into a library of guidance on games to play using HERO.
 
This is something short of complete games, or games in a book but might meet Shoug's type of need.  A helping hand on setting the game up to play the adventure if that is the style of game you want.
 
I SO want to do something Hall of Champions related.  I need to get my group on this....we must have the skills between us to get something workable (including typesetting, design, ideas and artwork).
 
Doc

I couldn't agree more with this. I recently got physical copies of the sixth edition books and, after like 2 years of distant admiration and occasional futile glances at the PDF on my phone, the game finally clicked. At least, the general philosophy of the whole character point system and the very basics of combat started to make sense. I still haven't played nor do I have really any idea how I should actually use this system at the table. It doesn't help that I'm a relatively inexperienced GM when it comes to systems which require preparation, I've been playing Fate and FU all these years, and not very often.

Though, seeing as the core books already lack this "Missing Chapter," I think the next best option would be to release a kind of starter kit. I don't mean anything that would have parts or anything similar to Hero Basic, I mean... I'm talking about a magazine, on the thicker side. A magazine containing these micro-adventures with prebuilt characters and stuff. The magazine would contain 3, maybe 4, unique genre studies: Champions, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, and maybe something spicy like Weird West or Psionic Zombie Apocalypse. You can copy the character sheets out of the book, but the expectation would really be that you safely tear out the pages you need to use: things like character sheets, maps, and maybe some other stuff.
 
On the one hand, it can be called a kind of stand alone short tales style adventure book made for use with Hero System, but on the other hand, it can be called a collection of educational adventures best used with Hero Basic. I'd buy one the moment I found out such a thing existed. I might not even necessarily run the adventures, just read them and get a feel for what an adventure is supposed to look like, what a character is supposed to look like, what the range of Combat Values ends up looking like, what the range of SPDs is supposed to look like, etc. I would use it like a rosetta stone just to get a basic ballpark of how I am going to put together my game.

I really wish such a thing existed.

I’ve almost given up trying to explain my thoughts over the years.  It is almost as if I speak a different language.
 
I don’t understand the constant referral to the need to change the rules as they are written.  5th Ed, 6th Ed, Basic Rulebook (both rulesets), Fantasy Complete and Champions Complete.  They are all fine as written.  The rules are fine.
 
I say again.
 
THE RULES ARE FINE.
 
The problem is not the rules themselves. 
The problem is that understanding how the rules actually work in play is not straight forward.  They are easy, once they click.  For some people that is not an issue, they get it just from reading the book.  Some people get it from reading a super battle walk through.  Some people get it from a detailed description of a power build. 
But the majority don’t. 
 
The issue is not another rewrite of the rules. 
 
The issue is the need to add the missing chapter.
 
A short pre-generated micro-campaign with pre-generated PC’s, equipment, adversaries and so on.  Initially presented with NO POINT BUILD TOTALS VISIBLE.  Just the in-play stats. 
 
The idea is for the new to hero players to read through the playing rules, NOT THE BUILD RULES, and then play.
 
I’ll expand using Fantasy Complete, mostly because I can crib off of D&D and everyone will get my meaning.
Reorganize the rulebooks, not by rewriting, but by reordering.  Or at least to limited editing to make the flow work.  Basically move “Core Concepts And Game Basics” (page 7-10) and “Character Creation” (page 16-152)(not pages 153 & 154) behind “Combat” page 187. 
 
The book order would change from:
·        Table of Contents
·        Introduction
·        Core Concepts
·        Core Concepts and Game Basics
·        Character Creation
o   Results and Recognition
o   Heroic Action Points
o   Experience Points
o   Movement
·        Characters and the World
·        Combat
·        Equipment
·        Swords and Sorcery — Fantasy Roleplaying
·        Appendix 1: Playing Other Genres
·        Appendix 2: Summary & Reference Tables
·        Index
To a the new order of:
       ·        Table of Contents
·        Introduction
·        Core Concepts
·        Core Concepts and Game Basics
o   Results and Recognition
o   Heroic Action Points
o   Experience Points
o   Movement
·        Characters and the World
·        Combat
·        Micro-Campaign
·        Character Creation
·        Equipment
·        Swords and Sorcery — Fantasy Roleplaying
·        Appendix 1: Playing Other Genres
·        Appendix 2: Summary & Reference Tables
·        Appendix 3: Micro Campaign Build sheets.
·        Index
 
All of the chunking dice actual playing rules would be presented first and just before the “micro-campaign”.  While all the “how we build characters and stuff” would fallow on the heels of the “micro-campaign”. The micro-campaign would have all of the setting, creatures, equipment and pregen characters plus prebuilt advancement abilities to allow the PC’s to advance on a loose equivalent of first through third “level”.   All presented as end items with NO BUILD POINTS DISPLAYED.  An added appendix would have all that for when the new players become curious. 
 
The idea is:
·        New players buy book.
·        They read the “rules”.
·        They PLAY the micro-campaign.
·        They then read the Build Rules and Campaign Build advice.
·        They then go on the either expand the micro-campaign or build their own unique world now that they actually can see how thing work in play.
 
In my opinion this is why Hero is fading fast. It placed the cart before the horse and is too proud to admit everyone is driving cars. 
Anyway, my 2 cents.
Again......

This is not doing anything like an Easy Mode, nor is it removing any of the build rules.  Just a re-order of presentation and adding the completely missing play part. 
 
Everything that you liked and preferred is still there. The only difference is that new players will have actual context on how the rules actually interact before trying to build. If a new player will not read the build chapter after playing the mini-campaign, then they will never have bothered to read it as is. 
 
But the current method of what is basically simply repeating the exact same thing and expecting a different result isn't working.  There really isn't anything wrong with the rule system, which leaves changing presentation.  Both information and visual.  I am only referring to the information side based on what I have personally experienced.
 
Most of the gamers that I know and have tried to sell on Hero simply don't read further than the first part of CharGen. 
But a player that plays a game is much more to likely to read the rest of it.
 
This is mostly babble of course and I don't have any great magical insight.  But I do know that people now approach things entirely different than we did. No computers, no internet and somewhere between 3 and 30 channels that you could only watch real time unless you recorded them on a tape.  In the winter I can remember going to bed early because I'd finished my last book and there was nothing (as usual) interesting on TV.  Wading through a textbook was nothing to stave off boredom.  Today?  There is no boredom, not like there was.  You have access to thousands of informational feeds from a multitude of sources today.  
 
Either the difference is acknowledged and the method of delivery is adapted to the new realities or we just give up. But to be candid, having Hero types constantly falling back on "I didn't do it that way and anyone that isn't up to my personal vision is just not worth having as a gamer" doesn't help.  We are at the point where there needs to be change.  I had hoped that the creative commons would open that door, but instead it is a crippled version of creative commons that will not produce adventure material taking place in the actual Hero settings. 
 
I really don;t know why I keep returning for more self punishment.

This tactic reads like a lunatic fantasy from my perspective. It's the same fallacious in the same way as "You need at least 5 year of industry experience to get any jobs in the industry." 

The only way I can possibly play Hero at all is to learn it and GM it for my friends. It's taken me years of shallow bites into Hero System before I could even comprehend it well enough to say that I understand the basic premises of the system. I am now gearing up to play it with m friends, and I can see all the pitfalls before I even walk into them. I wish I could just tag along in some group somewhere and learn how they handle damage maximums or CVs or SPD. 

Z makes an _excellent_ point here, Greysword, as does Brian, right here:
 
 
 
But I feel that they both stop just a tiny bit short of what you really need to hear.  I am not saying that they are wrong, because they aren't.   I think they might be just a bit blinded by the tendency of the last couple of editions to include words like "must."
 
There is _no_ "must."  There is _nothing_ you _must_ do, period.
 
You're the GM!
 
No-- don't anyone start thinking that you know what I'm thinking.    This isn't a God Complex thing; I'm actually going somewhere (and apparently it's not "to bed."    )
 
You are the GM, which means that you are tasked with, as Z said, developing a mastery of the rules.   You are _also_ tasked with creating and bringing life to whole stinkin' _world_!  I mean, my wife was in absolute agony to push out a seven-pound baby, and you've got to drop an entire planet and seven billion adults to live on it?!   Of _course_ it's rough!
 
 
 
 
But back to the point:
 
Dude, HERO GMs are _rare_.  Seriously.  HERO _players_ aren't that common anymore, unless you're willing to make them yourself, but the GMs are _way_ more rare.
 
Players _want_ to play.  Hell, GMs want to play.  And if I read your posts right, at least two of your players are already HERO-knowledgeable, meaning that not only do they know the system, but they know how rare the GMs are.
 
Use that.
 
 
Seriously:  you said yourself that there is a _lot_ to learn, and gave KnockBack as an example.  So you know you have a lot to learn.  So do your system-skilled players.
 
 
Now I'm an old man-- I just turned 60 Friday past.  I know things aren't the same now as when I was a kid, but when _I_ went to school, they taught Calculus.
 
 
But they didn't teach it in _first grade_.
 
They taught single-digit addition in first grade.  By the end of first grade, you could add a short list of three-digit numbers.  You could even subtract one three-digit number from another.   It was pretty cool, really.  I mean, I felt damned _amazing_ by the end of first grade!
 
But there was no Calculus.
 
 
Let's take another look at what Z and Brian had to say:
 
"There are simply too many options in the game."
 
"It's about as thin as you can get, and still include all the advice and such that the book covers."
 
Both of these are completely right, but they don't include everything you need to know to really learn this system:
 
You can change that.
 
Seriously.  You can solve the "too many options in the game" thing.  You can solve the "it's as thin as you can get" thing.
 
Lose 'em.  Ditch 'em.  Throw them out.   You want to make that book even thinner?  Rip out some of that advice that the book covers.  Too many options?  Hell, there's a universal _cure_ for "too many" of _anything_, and I don't even have to tell you what it is!
 
 
Get with your group.  Tell them your dilemma.  Think of it this way:  You just posted about some unhappiness in that you don't think the group communicated enough with you or each other to make the sort of characters you were hoping to see.   It goes two ways, my friend:  You have to communicate with them about the sort of game _not just that you want_, but the sort of game with which you're _capable_ at this point.
 
Having trouble remembering knock back rules?  Lose 'em!  Just flat get rid of them!  Tell the guys honestly, though:  "Look, I have got a _lot_ I need to get under my belt, but the best way to learn Spanish is to move to Spain, so I'd like to go ahead and run a game, but I have _got_ to set some tight edges on what we are and aren't going to use from the rules, at lest until I get the basics rock solid."
 
Tell them "I have a lot of trouble keeping Knock Back straight; I'd kinda like to just not do it this time around.   Multipowers are killing me.  Can we just go ahead and agree that we are going to use the powers in the slots at either 1/2 or Full strength, at least until I get better at mathing it out on the fly?  And maybe we can drop Linked.   Also, I've got some problems remembering everyone's Complications and keeping it all straight, and I'm just not ready to deal with Succeptible _at all_.  Tell you what:  let's put another 25 points on your base and drop 25 points of complications, okay?  Your points totals don't change, but it takes a lot off of me to keep up with."
 
Or even "I'm not ready to keep up with so much mechanics.  Can we do a 300 pt game instead?"
 
 
Seriously.  You can actually _do_ that!   And I'm going to level with you: the _majority_ of players-- HERO players in particular-- are pretty cool with it!  They _want_ to play, and you're willing to run.  You're being honest with them, and presenting individual examples of your problem areas.  Even if they aren't happy, they are going to respect that.  Be _honest_:  "Okay, let's build powers with no more than two modifiers each; I don't even understand what the hell half of the things on your sheet _are_, let alone how to deal with them."
 
 
Two of two things is going to happen:  You are going to get a lot of understanding people who are willing to make at least a _few_ concessions to your problems.  There's no price for that, either-- that's just _gold_.
 
Another thing that's going to happen is you are going to get a lot of suggestions-- _GOOD_ ones, I mean; not just "well you need to read this and study that and memorize this"-- you are going to get _solid_ suggestions if you've got rules-knowledgeable players.
 
I bet if you told them up front "Guys, I keep forgetting about knock back / never remember how to figure knock back--"  I'd be willing to _bet_ that someone is going to say "how about we tell you what it is, until you get the hang of it?  We'll roll our damage and calculate our knock back, and give you the result."
 
I don't know if it will help you, but it's still a solid idea.  Hell, someone might decide to keep track of it for the bad guys, too!  "Okay, Player Two, you take eight points of BODY"  Then Player Two says "and one inch knock back" and you keep on rocking:  "Player One, you take eleven points of BODY."  and Player Two chimes in with "and no Knock Back."
 
I won't say that will happen, but I _can_ say I have seen it happen, and at more than one table.
 
You said it yourself:  There is a metric assload of system to learn.   Why the Hell would you force yourself to learn it all at once?      If you're not having fun, keep whittling away until you've got something you can enjoy.  As you get confident with that, add another thing or two when you're ready.  Nobody really likes to admit it, but that's how _most_ of us learned to play:  start with first edition at a whopping fifty-something pages, play it a couple of years, then they add a few pages to the next edition.  Hell, I wouldn't want to force myself to memorize ten text books, either!  
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

@Ptolus
 
So I am following this one and haven't decided on which selection. 
From the tidbits I have seen, the city layout is very close to one I need for one of my own ideas.  A good map is worth it's weight in gold.  I should clarify, a good usable map.  Hudson City is a fantastic city setting that also has a usable map so I have used it in almost all of my games that are set in the industrial age.  for me any game that has a investigative element really needs a good map with a minimum of names streets.  I can flesh out and place buildings, but streets need to be named so they can be identified on the fly.  Vibora Bay is almost good.  The book is well done but the map is not a city map.  It is a snapshot taken from Pluto. 
Ptolus has been around for a while and has evolved.  From what I can tell it will have an actual usable map. 

World builders have always been a minority. 
 
My first Champions GM was an _excellent_ GM, and alousy world builder.  Pretty much all of our D&D was module-based, and all of our supers stuff was straight from comic books (I've never seen a larger comic collection in my life) 
 
There was a plus side to it, though: 
 
My original Traveller GM was a dedicated world-builder.  We were essentially using the "a traveller system" to play in a completely unique universe doing interesting and fun things. 
 
My second Traveller GM... We were using Traveller to live out his Star Trek fan fiction....   That was mercifully brief.... 
 
If it hadn't been for Jim"s inability to put together a solid world,--  and don't get me wrong:  he had the time, as he was the only real trust-fund kid I ever knew.  I don't think he even considered a job until his mid-thirties, and even that was just to meet people.... 
 
Anyway, he had the time, and I know for a fact that he _tried_, over and over.  He was just terrible at it... 
 
But if it hadn't been for this lack of talent, I would have never known the depth and breadth of the amazing published Traveller universe, which seems to have something for everyone. 
 
To be perfectly straight, even through all the incarnations of Traveller and the dozens of different people I've played under, I've never seen any homebrewed world that rivals it.  People who think it's about space merchants and royal intrigue haven't really paid a lot of attention to the other materials, but I don't evangelize it because I'd rather you didn't sit down with a predisposition to negativity anyway.  It's not going to be fun for you or anyone else if you do, right? 
 
I started this to state quite clearly that if everyone could build a world on their own-- and they can't, and few who can are able set aside their personal wants to create the broad appeal needed to entice enough people to keep coming back, year after year--   
 
If everyone could do it, there would never have been a shortage of material for _any_ game, ever. 
 
HERO is dead, and it's dead for lots of reasons, all of which none of us are ever likely to know, but targeting the extreme minority audience of "people with time, desire, and ability to craft their own worlds" strikes me as a likely contributor.  I could be wrong, but the resulting play model of "scour the planet looking for a GM wo can also build an interesting world and is maybe willing to travel a few hundred miles a week" couldn't have been great for the success of it. 

Actually, I like "by default", followed by "options to vary from that default".  That way, the GM knows what setting the dials moves him away from.
 
I could see deletion of the Speed system paragraph entirely.  It is one very specific element of the system, where the preceding paragraphs are about the system overall.  Calling in "the crowning feature" is, I think, over the top marketing hyperbole - there are numerous system elements of equal, even greater, importance.
 
I would also note that our pitch clearly targets experienced gamers familiar with D&D (1st level wizards; defences are real).  Let's play with it a bit.
 
OK, exactly 300 words.  It cost me the Speed chart (and a "The" to squeeze in those last three words), but this is my elevator pitch.
 

Yes, this is the approach many of us have been advocating for some time.
 
Where I differ slightly from the general take on this notion is that I emphasize the importance of the provided setting more than anyone else does. To me, there is no game without a setting, and it will be the setting (which obviously also implies a genre) that catches people's attention and makes them want to play the game. It is also the setting which makes it a concrete game, and not just another generic book full of genre advice and unconnected examples.
 
In addition, I think that for anything like this to have lasting, meaningful impact on the the brand and the marketplace, these games have to be planned out and marketed/advertised as full product lines so that potential customers feel that they will be investing in something with a future; i.e., games that will continue to be supported and expanded upon for years to come.

I have completed and sent Western Hero to Hero Games to look over and build a cover for.  Its a complete book with all you need to build characters and play the game (minus powers and modifiers etc, as not applicable in a heroic game) with a full campaign setting adapted from the original Western Hero 4th edition, plus tons of adventure ideas, campaign tips, background, maps, etc.
 
Also, I have uploaded a file of The Greatest Guns Who Never Were, a file containing almost 50 fictional characters of western and western-inspired background from books, comics, movies, television, and radio, from Hopalong Cassidy to Mal Reynolds and all points in between.  Its free in the Downloads section and includes full Hero Designer write ups as well as a pdf containing them all and some notes on how they were made.

As a fan of Cypher and having ran it a few times, it has as much similar to Hero as D&D does. Could you use Hero to emulate Cypher? Yup, just like you could with D&D. But Cypher uses a different resolution system, it has players making all of the rolls, difficulties are assigned in stages of 3, etc. 
 
 
One of the reasons Monte can do that is name recognition. He also worked on 2e and 3e D&D for quite some time, and built a reputation from Malhavoc Press, which, IIRC, originally co-produced Ptolus. Most of his books are Kickstarted, and make some serious money, allowing him to have a real art and design budget. I would love to see Hero have this kind of budget, but I believe  it would also require some serious design changes that may make some long term fans unhappy.  Stat blocks should change a bit and become a bit more organic, fonts may have to change in style and size, and book organization may be a bit different depending on the designer. On the other hand, art should emulate the genre, and the books should have a unified look that carries through a genre (fantasy books should have a similar branding that's different from supers, for example). Raising the graphic standards of the books would be a bit pricey, but the books would veer away from looking like a Word document and more in-line with what's on the market. Additionally, resources like design files, could be shared with the Hall of Heroes contributors like so many other companies do. 
 
 
I don't  think that that dumping vehicles/bases and the like is necessary. Instead, I think they need to be simplified and streamlined. In a book about zombies, it would be nice to have base rules to represent fortifications, or vehicles to use and modify in hopes of escaping an infested area. The power sections could also be simplified, having only what was needed rather than a bunch of listings that weren't needed. Again, in the case of a zombie game, give the basics of powers needed to create the zombie horrors you need, plus maybe a few powers that heroes might access (psychic/magic/etc.), but leave the rest as Talents that PCs can access. 

Hello all,

Two questions for the more seasoned GMs out there.

1. What map scale to you customarily use? I know it's suggested that 1" (hex) can be two meters. I'm seriously thinking of just making it a 1:1 ratio for ease of calculating map movements, range modifiers, etc. I realize that's it's up to the GM discretion, of course, but I'd love to hear your thoughts.

2. In preparing for your campaign, how do you do it? Do you create a Word/text document and just have it on a nearby screen? Being 52 years old, I love analog, so considering just printing out my session and putting it into a binder. Easier to reference back to previous sessions if I need to.

2b. Do you use bullet points in creating your campaign/session? I'm leaning towards this because we know that things always change within a game, so I figure it's easier to be more flexible this way. Of course, if there's any soliloquy that needs to be spoken, I could type it up word-for-word, etc.

Any and all help would be greatly appreciated!

I’m not sure if you realize that Monte Cook got his start at Iron Crown Enterprises working on various HERO games. So the similarities are not incidental. One thing he does really, really well is create specific settings for his games, and then present them with lavish artwork that is undeniably eye-catching. When was the last time (if ever) you could say that about any HERO game?
 
 

Back onto poo.
 
One of my current games, the one with my ersatz Ancient Egypt and Akkad, is called the Shitting Curse. For reasons... 
On two occasions the players have attempted to weaponize bags of flaming poo. It didn't work. (no, this isn't why it's called the Shitting Curse.)
 
And then back onto fantasy names.
 
Just last night I was working on a system to come up with fairly consistent sounding names for gnolls. (Gnames for gnolls?)  It's for the above mentioned campaign, the players are about to wander across ersatz African savannah and gnolls happen to be the main inhabitants.
 
I went into it with a definite idea - I wanted the names to sound like a mix of laughter and growling. I already had one name - Heeyahee. It occurred to me to write out a list of sounds that I wanted to work with. I jotted down: Hee, Hai, Ha, Har, Her; Yee, Yai, Ya, Yar, Yer; Gee, Gai, Ga, Gar, Ger; etc. When I had 10 of those little lists I started putting the syllables together. Overall it's turned out alright, I have a decent list of potential names for NPCs. But a few of them turned out... poorly. For instance Garyee. It's Gary. We all know it'll be Gary the instant the players hear it. Gary the Gnoll. Then there's Yeehar. Yeehar has to wear a cowboy hat.
 
Will my players remember any of the names? God no. Except for Gary and Yeehar, of course. Do I intend to have fun at the players' expense by having the NPCs be offended when the foreigners mangle their names? Yes. Yes I do.