Chris Goodwin

These are people who have managed to survive to adulthood in an environment that is actively trying to kill them in at least a thousand different ways.  I'd give them the familiarities with the full skills.

I've always thought those were meant for our more... hygienically challenged brethren.  A die as a reward for using the soap!  

I've always thought those were meant for our more... hygienically challenged brethren.  A die as a reward for using the soap!  

Some years back, my FLGS sold novelty soap in the shape of a d20, with an actual d20 at the center of the clear soap. I bought one for a Christmas present for my niece, who counts soapmaking and Pathfinder among her hobbies.
 
Dean Shomshak

My biggest stumbling block with a lot of modern RPGs is the 500 page rulebooks you need to memorize just to start playing. Pathfinder 2 is 600+ pages, Shadowrun is a mere 300+ pages, unless you want to go with 5th edition which is 500. Numenera is two books clocking in at 400 pages each, Shadow of the Demon Lord is pushing 300(quite the lightweight!). Even the 5e D&D player's handbook is 300 pages, with another 300 for the dungeon master's guide. Fantasy Hero is only 250 which makes it practically a modern marvel though it still feels like a 'build your own fantasy game' kit. Also, props to Hero Basic which is 120 pages. It's the only thing that got me started into Hero.
 
The old D&D box sets(BECMI) were around 50 pages for the players and 50 for the DM books. The advanced D&D books? 100 pages for 1e players book and 120 in the DMG, with another 100 pages of treasure and tables. Even the GAZ setting books were about 60 pages a pop with modules clocking in at 30.
 
So yeah, I think the old red box D&D was probably the sweet spot. A light afternoon of reading the rules, 5 minute character creation, and a blank fantasy sandbox to play around it.
 
 

I'll have to remember this and try it once I am caught up on the books I have bought. 

In all honesty find weakness was completely unbalancing in the older editions.  Removing it from 6th edition was in my opinion a good thing.  It was expensive, but if the target did not have lack of weakness it allowed you to reduce their defenses to next to nothing.  If the target did have lack of weakness it made it useless.  
 
In 6th edition instead of using find weakness you can use skill levels to increase your damage even in a super powered game.  While the mechanics are different the end results are similar.  In both cases the target takes more damage from your attacks.  Using skill levels to increase your damage is better balanced because the amount of damage it is increased is based on how much you paid for skill level.  With find weakness the amount of damage increases is based on how much the target paid.  
 

Already done.
 

Talk it over with your players and figure out if they're actually onboard with this first.  The possible "twist value" isn't worth the possible "this isn't what I signed up for" factor.  And once you've had that conversation you're in a perfect place to transition into mining them for ideas which will be vastly better than anything we can give you since they'll come from the people you're playing with and who best know their own tastes. 

👍 Nice short synopsis. 
 
I've actually been enjoying the manga/anime/RPGLit where the exist in a world where delving is an Adventurers actual job and the characters actually know they have levels and level up.  To me it was a bizarre premise but oddly turned out to be fun to read. 
 
 
It is amazing how this line of thought repeats every so many years.  But the best part is the idea isn't met with the hostility and outright anger it used to. 

Marketing wise, being "Generic" is about as attractive as the store brand Macaroni & Cheese.  Rather than Generic is has to be specific, and maybe  even a bit trendy, hence Manga. Another YouTuber explained that  going after a niche market, while still servicing your core market is a winning strategy. We aren't trying to toss the old fans and bring in new ones. We are trying to attract new players to the existing group. I suppose you could do a VERY abbreviated Turakian Age, centered in one geographic area, if there is a desire/requirement to use existing IP. Or any of the other ones, BUT the game must have pre-gens. simple explanations and no legalism in the base rules. Show slim stat bars in the books and extended , point costed stat bars in the Appendix.

An understatement if I ever heard one about US Comics.  It has been years since they have published any worth reading.  I check every so often to see if they may be making a return, but they just get worse. 
 
I do actually read more manga these days as well as lite novels.  RPGLit as well. 
Some are better superhero stories than anything current in comics, and there are several Fantasy ones that would be great in a RPG using Hero.

This is exactly the situation. We aren't getting new players. If you judged by this forum alone the audience for Hero is the same Audience that was around in 199, minus deaths and gafiation.  Fortunately, this is not entirely true, but the growth is limited. The Discord Server seems to be attracting new players, but their question seem to be of the same sort of questions that most new players are asking, or they are asking how to make (Popular D 20 Based system's) flavor into Hero.  Sure it can be done, and that miiiiiight be a way to bring in new blood, but I am not so sure.  But since newer players are just now discovering virtual table tops like Roll 20, Fantasy Grounds and TTS,  because of the current plague, something simpler, and "complete" needs to be prapared, and available as a PDF or SRD for the online players.  No telling when we can get back to face to face.

 
This is a shame.  But the reasons are completely understandable.  However, Hero if they do want to attract more new players to the systems and products, they might consider offering a prize, or a contract to people submitting such products directly to them.  Leave Villain and monster supplements to Hall of Champions, but a complete background with NPCs Monsters, Spells and equipment, and a nice explanation of how combat works, ala The Fantasy Hero Primer, could be made into a slim, attractive product, and then Hero could see through sales, what is attractive and serve their market accordingly.  Grow the business back  slowly, through metered support to the various games, or release a new one if there is no interest. The books should be thought of in the size and page count of Champions I. Complete, but flexible, and cover original background material, or a low page count distillation of one of our illustrious GM's Homebrew campaign (not Champions*). givi9ng a discussion of how to GM it, and what players need to know. Low page count, Nice but not expensive printing, and some nice art, that is relevant to the text, and not Public Domain art that is vaguely r3elated to the subject. 
 
*If it is Champions related it needs to be a set up for new heroes, and have something related.  The problem with Champions is the Current slate of American Comic Books is unattractive, badly written, and that whole industry may go away.  Manga might be more of a positive example, and would attract the current fan audience, however acquiring rights and permissions would be a bureaucratic mess, what with the language and legal barriers, but it would not be insurmountable.  In fact, you may want to skip any sort of character creation within that Manga Based product, and just provide them the characters from the story. I think the licenses would be a little cheaper than anything American. 

This is a fair assessment. I mean, I kinda like the way 6e supplemental material is structured from a spiritual standpoint, with categorized resources that remain relatively genre neutral. I think they fit the paradigm of the game well, "Here's a book that covers *all kinds of creatures* that your GM may want to use, here's one that covers all martial arts." 
 
But I think you're completely right. I think Hero is a game that depends on it's players to be confident gamers with solid experience and deep gaming wisdom. The GM has to hold all these complications that can have variable "frequencies" in his mind, and there's all kinds of Pandora's Box mechanics in the game that need to be used with caution and wisdom or they can get incredibly weird. Even Speed, one of the fundamental cool parts of the game, can't be used correctly without having a strong understanding of how disparities therein actually *feel.*
 
I absolutely agree that, *if* relevance with a newer audience is a concern, simplification and content supplements are not the answer. *Stand alone games Powered by The Hero System* are the answer. If you already Grokk Hero System, these games will be transparent, narrowly focused genre supplements. But to the larval acolyte, these games must be opaque, shielding them from the vertigo of peering into the abyssal well of dark power that is the whole, unbridled Hero System. The core 6e volumes should be referenced only within the introductory or conclusory texts of the game book as "The toolkit that will unlock omnipotent homebrewing capabilities," never as a required or even an optional reference manual for actually playing the game. It should stand on it's own two legs, and prove the fun that is possible with the Hero System as a "Game" and not a "System."
 
 

If you aren't going to Homebrew everything. The everyone else neds to step up and  make "powered by Hero" types of books. And to "work" properly they need to be put together in an organized fashion for GMs, similar to how 5e D&D does it.  I am an artist, not a writer, much, so I'll have to leave that to others.  But I do believe in this modern age, there needs to be a bit more handholding.

Random Falling Anvils/Pianos/Boulders: Blast 12d6 vs. PD, Indirect (always from above), AoE (2m radius)

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!)
 

Absolutely.  I have been arguing that point for what?  20 years or more?
But while the official DOJ product has not shifted course, the new Hall of Champions gives us a path to add suitable content.
I am currently working on two projects that I hope will help. 
One is a Superheroic starter mini-campaign vaguely set in the CU.  By vaguely I mean the particulars around it will be extremely easy to shift to another world as required. 
The other is a D&D/C&C old school fantasy mini-campaign doing the same. 
 
The covid has really slowed me down since my ability to play test items has been effectively shut down,  And before someone trots it out, I have never been able successfully run or play virtually or remotely. 
 
 

If you use Hero for a fantasy RPG setting (akin to traditional D&D or C&C), once the players "grok" Hero and move away from simply replicating the reference system.  Their spells, skills and such it becomes one of the best of that type of RPG I have ever played. 
 
 

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 doesn't look like anyone has so far.  
 
Probably a Multipower with various normal and Megascale Teleport powers, potentially including (spoiler) from the later novels, plus a goodly number of memorized locations.  Probably also a Power Skill: Teleport Tricks.  
 

Random Falling Anvils/Pianos/Boulders: Blast 12d6 vs. PD, Indirect (always from above), AoE (2m radius)

Resistant defenses have always stopped the BODY and STUN from Killing Attacks.  🙂  Armor, Force Field, and Damage Resistance were three Powers that could grant a character resistant defenses.  
 
For first edition Fantasy Hero, the Shield effect (basically, Force Field) was used for magical armor/resistant defenses.  Mundane armor was just armor, not a Power or spell effect.  
 
(There's a difference between game mechanics and Powers.  Resistant defenses and killing damage are game mechanics; HKA, RKA, Resistant Protection, Armor and Force Field (up through 5th edition) are Powers.  The Powers aren't necessary for the game mechanics; all Powers are is formalized ways for characters to add the game mechanics to their character sheets by spending points.)

6e2 p. 103.

If you're asking about something like a saving throw, most likely not unless the poison description calls for one.  Most of them have listed defenses against them.