John Desmarais

Re: campaign idea up for debate

Disclaimer: Note I am Roman Catholic and believe in the bible' date=' not in this story, I hope you are not offended by it.[/i']

 

 

I have an idea for a campaign and wanted some thoughts on it. The basic background is the early 1300s Europe. Pope Clement V orders the arrest of the Knights Templar for what is now slightly controvisial reasons. This is where the FH stuff comes in. It turns out that Jesus was actually a Merlin figure who was bringing a "heaven", a world with magic, to the people. Although early on there was the miracles(spells) being performed and apostles spreading the word but surely enough, the cardinals wanted to keep the magic to themselves. The cover up would be made and the promise of heaven after death became a drive to follow the cardinals. One order, the order of the Holy Grail and the Spear of Christ, The Knights Templar, would be the protectors of the true heaven. Waiting for their moment; it would arrive as their demise grew near. They would let out the secret, bring magic upon the world and open their eyes to the Garden Of Eden. The Garden of Eden was a remote valley hidden from view by magical spells. The few people who had broke down this barrier had grown up in the Garden of Eden. Over time these people would become the High Elves, people who were immortal and near perfect. Not as innnocent as Adam and Eve, but the certainly see themselves as better that human. As the garden is opened their blessings subside and the look to the humans as the culprits to blame. But the humans aren't the only threat, the Dwarves also appear. The Dwarves are the descendants of Cain the killer of Abel and inherite his curse, the short burly bearded appearance of the Their father Cain. Through their time in hiding they capture any High Elves who wander away from Eden and torture them to the point of Orkhood. Deamons and other kinds of mysterious creatures arise throwing the middle ages into complete turmoil.

The Elves/Dwarves/Orks/etc/... really feels forced - like it was shoehorned in because someone in marketing said you can't sell a fantasy setting with Elves.. I'd drop them. Other than that it sounds interesting.

(Any resemblance between your fiction and my religion is purely coincidental and can not possibly effect my faith).

Re: The Return of the Golden Age

One more to add to your list. The Golden-Age Invaders (the All-Winners Squad) is visiting the modern era. Alex Ross and Jim Krueger, penciled by Steve Sadowski

http://forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?t=125258

Re: Spell Point Systems

What kind of Spell Point Systems do you use in your Fantasy Hero games?

All spells must have an END cost. Spell casters have an END Reserve for spells to draw from. END Reserve only recovers after something that has at least a passing resemblance to a night's sleep.

Re: [Hooks] News articles that could be Pulp Adventures

Because the Tunguska event simply can not be over used in a pulp game:

http://www.livescience.com/space/scienceastronomy/070626_st_tunguska_crater.html

Obviously the work of Geiskapitan, or some other master villain.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,285314,00.html

Re: What Age?

Retcon Golden Age. This is the Golden Age as portrayed in comics written long after the Golden Age had ended. The definitive titles (for me) were the Invaders and the All-Star Squadron books by Roy Thomas.

This is also my favorite style of Champions game - and it also seems to be the hardest to find other players who are interested in.

Re: Thoughts on Early Modern Magic

Hi. I'm starting up a campaign in a setting that draws on a blend of Early Modern European history rather than the medieval and classical sources that fuel 'standard' fantasy. Does anyone have any thoughts or advice on this topic?

More specifically does anyone know about Renaissance magic or have any ideas about how to stat it up. I'm thinking of a fairly ritual heavy system which requires quite a bit of research and preparation and much reliance on the proper celestial influences. (After all you can't curse someone to have indigestion unless you know the state of their humours). Combat applicable magic would mostly consist of useful amulets providing e.g. combat luck, with a healthy dose of 'summons' such as angelic, ghostly or demonic spirits and alternative schools in the form of witchcraft and shamanism.

I'd also like to thank Spence and Captain Obvious for the rules sets on black powder weapons they've posted, its only fair because I'm going to steal from both sets.

Have you read Shadow of the Lion (Mercedes Lackey, Eric Flint, & Dave Freer)? It's a fantasy set in 16th century Venice (there is also a sequel and a spin-off book; the spin-off is by Dave Freer alone and set in Scandinavia).

Re: FH book compatability

The Revised FH book will, according to all information currently available update the page references to 5ER and fix typos.

 

The Fantasy Hero Grimoire I and II work with Turakian Age specifically.

 

Any updating the FHGS need build wise would have to be cross referenced with 5ER, not FH.

 

I have entertained the idea of going through both books when I get around to reviewing them (July for I and Oct for II) and offering up any changes to Darren and Steve if they wanted to divulge the information as they did with USPD1, Revised (in the Free Items section IIRC).

Yeah, what he said. (I obviously misread the initial question).

Re: FH book compatability

So' date=' will the earlier Grimoire books be able to be used with the revised FH (ie...without alot of reworking the numbers)?[/quote']

 

Depends on which books you mean. 4th edition stuff is pretty similar, but pre-4th edition Fantasy Hero was a very different beast.

 

 

EDIT: Also, it's important to remember that magic is very campaign setting specific (Turakian Age magic is very different from Valdorian Age magic which is very different from Tuala Morn magic, etc, etc) - and Fantasy Hero doesn't actually describe a setting. So, even though the 4th edition Fantasy Hero stuff is reasonably compatible "rules-wise," the spells written up in it may or may not actually work in a given setting? What kind of setting are you wondering about?

Re: Typical NPC

In the back of Monsters' date=' Minions, and Marauders there is a section for Human Adversaries. They say the are generic character sheets representing "typical" human NPCs and enemies. Now my question is are these what is the average out there? I ask this because most of them are 75+ points and some are over a 100 points. So basically if I have a city and it has City Guard and the players encounter a basic patrol. I can use this template for the guards? [/quote']

 

Probably, but it depends. In a game where the PCs are typically 150 points, 75-100 is a good "competent" normal.

Re: Marvel Characters

As usual, I'm going to assume this has been done 10,000 times before, and as usual, I'm not up to reinventing the wheel.

 

Can anyone link to Marvel character writeups?

 

Say, Spider-man, the X-men, (including Magneto) and so on?

http://www.herostuff.net/gnborh

It's mostly 4th edition, but the differences twix 4th and 5th are minor.

Re: Attacks OK Defenses No Way?

I've never had any problem with multiple defenses in a Multipower - so long as the powers make some type of conceptual sense relative to the character (how else would you build the Invisible Woman from the Fantasic Four?).

Character's with variable defenses don't bother me in the least (as opposed to say, variable Speeds - lord I hates it when people try to muck up my speed chart).

Re: The Question write up?

I've always been a fan of The Question but don't know much about him, other than what people have stated.

 

He did start as a Charleton Comics character and evenutally mad it to DC when they bought all the characters.

 

Rorschac is based on this character. Orginally the newly aquired Charleton character where going to be used for the Watchmen but something happened with the deal and they made "new" characters that had a strong resemblance to the Charleton characters.

 

Other than that I'm blank.

Re: Watchman.

Originally, Alan Moore had wanted to use the old Archie MLJ heroes. Dick Giordana suggested using the Charlton heroes. Unfortunately, since he wanted to kill off a bunch of them (and DC was just starting to integrate these characters into the DCU), this plan had to scrapped in favor of the now familiar Watchman analogues.

• The Comedian (Edward Blake) is based on Peacemaker.
  
• Doctor Manhattan (Jon Osterman) is derived from Captain Atom.
  
• The Nite Owls (Hollis Mason and Dan Dreiberg) are based upon Blue Beetle.
  
• Ozymandias (Adrian Veidt) was inspired by Thunderbolt.
  
• Rorschach (Walter Kovacs) was based on the Question (and possibly Mr. A.)
  
• The Silk Spectres (Sally Jupiter and Laurie Juspeczyk) are based on Nightshade.

Re: Your "2007" Pet Gaming Projects

Greetings Herophiles' date=' it is time for this years [b']Your "2007" Pet Gaming Projects[/b]

I'm adapting a series of old D&D adventures into a Fantasy Hero campaign. I'm still a little stuck on where to set them (I actually kind of want to use Turakian Age as the backdrop) but my next campaign (hopefully starting up in the next month or so) will be an adaptation of these adventures (in the order below):

1. B2 Keep on the Borderlands
   
2. A1 Slave Pits of the Undercity
   
3. A2 Secret of the Slavers Stockade
   
4. A3 Assault on the Aerie of the Slave Lords
   
5. A4 In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords
   
6. G1 Steading of the Hill Giant Chief
   
7. G2 Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl
   
8. G3 Hall of the Fire Giant King
   
9. D1 Descent Into the Depths of the Earth
   
10. D2 Shrine of the Kuo-Toa
    
11. D3 Vault of the Drow
    
12. Q1 Queen of the Demonweb Pits

The mechanical parts are pretty easy; for each monster just substitute the equivavlent Beastiary critter, and traps just get re-written using the description in the adventure as a conceptual start. I've still got to some up with a good segue from B2 to A1, and from A4 to G1 (anyone got any good ideas? Or ideas on the best part of Ambrethel to set them in?)

I've also cobbled together a few character building and magic use guidelines that I hope will capture the good parts of the old D&D flavor without losing what I like about Hero. It should be fun.

Re: Any advice for a CSI-style campaign?

Many good suggestions, thanx.

 

I don't believe anyone has yet addressed the question of how to describe the crime scene to the players, though. Let's say the crime scene is a family murdered in a home. How should I describe this to my players?

Start with only describing the painfully obvious (which limits the number of detail you throw out in the initial description). Make the PCs drill down for specifics.

When I design scense like this I usuaully make a list of everything that discoverable and what skill (and modifiers if applicable) I expect to be able to be able to discover it. You'll need to kind of keep track of the various odd knowledge/science skill the PCs have on you own though. You don't want to bog things down too much with extraneous dice rolls, but someone with SS: Entomology is going to notice the odd bug behaviour that someone without it is not going to notice - even though the only dice roll you'll probably want from them is Perception.

(Conceptually I love the idea of complimentary skills, I just don't want to bother with rolling the dice for them).

Neat ariticle on Wired.com (http://www.wired.com/culture/design/multimedia/2007/05/ff_weta)

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

And (to get kind of back on topic) the Challengers are almost ideal for Pulp conversion. Just swap out the Atomic-Age Pseudo-Science for Pulp-Era Wonky-Tech and you're basically done.

Re: Any advice for a CSI-style campaign?

As per Steven Long's suggestion' date=' I am re-posting this advice request on this board. It was originally on the Other Genres board.[/i']

 

I'd like advice from anyone with experience at running a campaign in the style of the TV show, CSI: crime scene investigations.

 

How do you design the adventures? How do you keep the players on track without railroading them or resorting to deus ex machinas?

 

Also, I'd like to know how to verbally describe crime scenes in order to give the players all the necessary info and clues without creating an infodump which gives away the game at the start. How much detail should I offer when the PCs arrive on the scene? How much should I make them work for? How should perception rolls be used? How should PS: CSI skill be used? When would it be necessary to make rolls?

 

The show relies heavily on indirection; the CSI guys often misinterpret the facts early in the investigation and have to reformulate their ideas as they proceed. Any advice on how to achieve this effect with players?

First question. Do you have Dark Champions? (The forensics skills get a really beafy treatment in this book, with losts of info on using them in a forensics heavy game).

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

I like that name. Is it a reference to something that I'm not catching, or just a name you came up with?

 

Scott Baker

The Challengers of the Unknown were a group of (comic book) adventurers created by Jack Kirby for DC back in the mid 50s. They had a noted influence on the origins of the Fantastic Four (another project Kirby had a hand in). Both groups were foursomes who resolved to band together after surviving a crash landing

There was even a nod to this during the DC/Marvel Amalgam project - Challengers of the Fantastic, a merging of the two teams.

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

pulp fantastic four is easy you just don't give them super powers...

... and call them the Challengers of the Unknown.

Re: drain

a character who get attack by a long time drain dex (for the example) 5 points per years +2 1/2.........................can he put is experience point in is dex before the years finish

hope i am clear

english not my first language

stef

Yes, but if the character is currently missing 10 points of DEX then he still is missing 10 points of DEX (but now it's 10 points missing from the new total).

Re: dungeon

You'll probably get this too late, but right now on the History Channel:

Cities Of The Underworld : 02 - City of Caves Airs on Tuesday May 22 01:00 AM

Discover an ancient secret that dates back to the dawn of time lurking beneath the city of Budapest, Hungary. The caves beneath Budapest were formed during the Ice Age and everyone from the cavemen to the communists has moved their city into the depths of this parallel world. Join host Eric Geller as he gains special access into this sealed-up time capsule where he'll uncover a top secret World War II hospital, find the source of the boiling healing water used by both the Romans and the Turks, and see the layers of support added throughout the centuries to keep today's world from falling into the one buried below. Watch as the technological marvels that allowed construction of one city upon another are revealed.

I'm sure it will get repeated though.

Re: Another "stimulating" power build question

Locus, my dimensional distortion guy should (in my opinion) have a way to "bend space" in front of someone/something, dictating their path regardless of their speed or mass.

 

If a speedster with +75" of -insert movement power here- zips by and tries to smash Locus with a trash can, what's the simplest way to model "shaping space" in front of the speedster so that he effectively runs/flies/leaps around Locus instead?

 

This would be applicable to non-deflectable ranged attacks, flying tackles, move-bys, and other nasty attacks that should be avoidable (again, in my opinion) if you can make a straight line in 3D space follow a different path.

 

Thoughts?

A very high DCV with the special effect "I didn't dodge, you went around me."

Re: Newbie to the HERO system

Call me stupid' date=' but what does the term "Four Color Superheroes" mean? I've seen it a few places on this site, but never heard of it outside of that.[/quote']

 

Four color is a reference to the four basic colors used when printing comic books: cyan, magenta, yellow and black.

 

As used now in reference to comics it refers to a style of comic or character that is far less "grim & gritty" than what has become popular in recent years. For the most part, your typical Silver Age superhero comic (particularly those published by DC) is a good example of "four color". (Comics from this era, unlike modern comics, were printed using a four-color printing technique, which is where the association comes from).

Re: Creating my own fantasy World

It's a good start' date=' Nightlord. It's interesting that you start with the gods and work down from there. When I'm building a world, I usually start with the geography and work up -- building cultures and people who are shaped by the world. But that's just one way to do it. Creating a mythology and working from there is certainly another way. I'll be watching this thread to see where you go from here. [/quote']

 

Actually, if he comes up with a really really strong creation myth (or myths), starting with the gods and working down could end up with a really interesting world.

 

"Why are there mountains over there?"

 

"Because Xethor wanted them there."