Killer Shrike

"And thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass through the fire to Moloch" "First, Moloch, horrid King, besmeared with blood Of human sacrifice, and parents’ tears; Though, for the noise of drums and timbrels loud, Their children’s cries unheard that passed through fire To his grim idol. Him the Ammonite Worshiped in Rabba and her watery plain, In Argob and in Basan, to the stream Of utmost Arnon. Nor content with such Audacious neighborhood, the wisest heart Of Solomon he led by fraud to build His temple right against the temple of God On that opprobrious hill, and made his grove The pleasant valley of Hinnom, Tophet thence And black Gehenna called, the type of Hell."

This is a topic to post interesting / unusual things, ideas, (brief) news clippings, and oddities that might provide fodder for use in the context of the Here There Be Monsters setting...(everyone is welcome to post interesting stuff).

That went in well before the end, but I don't recall the issue / release #.

Assuming you collectively agree your cadre needs a name, I would advise against including a number. As soon as you mint a name with a number in it, someone will quit or we'll get +1 player and it wont make any sense.

Each version of the character is online, and can be called up. I post links to them here on the forums. All of the later posts where you see a picture of your character, if you click the picture it will take you to the version of the character that was "active" in the time frame. For instance; click Murgy's face (don't worry, he's into getting his face clicked ) I wont have time to do it this week, but it will be available before the next time we play.

When we start new arcs, I'll add a section to the campaign page with the characters as they are when the arc starts. We'll continue to use this club on these forums for ongoing management...and changes that occur within an arc...it is significantly more convenient.

Aw shucks.

(click it)

So, bad news, my biz trip to Toronto got extended; I'm leaving a day early and coming back a day later. So, I'm flying out Saturday 7/13 (the day we would be gaming). I'm pretty bummed about it, but can't be avoided. Hopefully you guys can coordinate some other gaming related activity. See ya'll when I get back.

5e book to consider: Ultimate Skill

http://www.killershrike.com/HereThereBeMonsters/Paradigm_Abilities_Talents.aspx#Luck

Sure, that (modifiers modify the dice result not the resolution target) would work. For instance a character with 5 OCV could hit on a 5+ if the target resolution were modified, but it could instead be stated as hit on a 10+ on a "3d6+5" attack roll...with the target's DCV acting as a penalty to the dice result. Thus a 5 DCV target would impose a -5 penalty to the dice result...which is the same odds as 10+ on a 3d6 roll, but the semantics of bonuses being a + and penalties being a - is maintained.

I've never really understood the mental hurdle some people seem to have with roll high for effect, low for resolution. However, the 3d6 roll under scheme can be flipped around to a 3d6 roll over; the distribution is the same on either side. So, for instance, an 8- familiarity is the same odds as a 13+ familiarity (2.9 : 1 odds). An 11- is the same as a 10+. A 14- is the same as a 7+. Just flip everything around. Where it gets semantically weird is that bonuses lower the roll and penalties increase the roll...+1 OCV would take a 8+ to 7+ and a -1 penalty would take a 8+ to a 9+. This is probably why the original designers opted for 3d6 roll under...to keep bonuses expressed in +'s and penalties expressed in -'s. But, it's not insurmountable if you want a roll high all the time model.

We had a great session Saturday; will detail it as time permits in the Trick of the Night thread...but I wanted to capture the XP b4 I forget. Joey got 0 XP as Scything was playing a tennis tournament (and went on to win 1st place singles, so good job), Steve got 5 XP to apply to Baretta for his combined efforts playing Baretta and piloting Joey in Scything's absence, Killroy got 3 XP, everyone else got 4 XP. Murgatroyd got MVP which is the second win for him. Drew rolled a nat '3' on a sight PER check and chose to take a +1 to Sight PER 2 pt level instead of max effect. If I forgot something relevant, update me. Given the team is in the middle of fighting off an assault, no XP spends between this and next session. Sit on that XP a bit. After you guys get clear of the current danger, I want to have a team discussion, and lay the ground for Arc 4. I expect that Arc 4 will take us into late September / October. I'm currently thinking the PC's will be in the 190-200 point range going into Arc 4, but that's still a bit soft. Currently, Murgatroyd and Killroy have strong character developing threads that will actively drive Arc 4...which will have an arcane / secret societies / eldritch theme. I may be able to work in some of Joey's back story, but that's a stretch goal for me and not 100% essential so long as the character continues to grow into his projected curve; Arc 5 will have a nordic theme and Joey's story will play out heavily therein; given Joey and Drew are a duo I'll be working Drew stuff into Arc 5 as well. Depending on where that ends up and other factors, WilyQ may put Drew aside somewhere in Arc 5 and switch over to his original character Miles Hendricks...that's just a maybe but its out there as a possibility. For the rest of the characters, for those of you who have some character development bits you want to specifically work into the next arc, such as any big XP spends to anchor into emergent game play or character arc defining elements, now is the time to start talking about it. For players that want to switch characters going into the next arc, now is also the time to be deciding that and putting forth character concepts. In either case you can ping me via personal message using the board's capability for that and start a convo. I want to make sure Baretta gets some focus time; but we don't have to "force it". It's up to you Steve where you want to grow her personality wise. Similarly, vampires are just kind of the monster of the week for this arc, but if Jack stays with the group, then obviously dealing with vampires on an ongoing basis is going to be a thing...you guys have made a powerful enemy. It definitely can play thru into Arc 4 furthering the theme of secret societies. As Baretta has a sub-theme of hating vamps due to one of her pre-hunter final girl situations having Jack and Baretta continue to carry the torch of vampire hate into Arc 4 makes sense and will work fine. Looking forward to seeing some chatter. I hope you guys are having as much fun playing in the campaign as I'm having running it!

I would recommend that you run a lower pointed, more heroic / street "supers" campaign at the tv-show superheroes level first before trying to run a movies level superhero campaign.

I thought it made sense and was justified in the situation. Don't let the haters get you down.

@WilyQuixote texted me that he'll be there. So see you guys tomorrow at 5pm...hopefully @L0rd_Magg0t will show up also.

What is peoples availability for gaming this Saturday?

I read Fall; or, Dodge in Hell... by Neal Stephenson earlier this month when it was released. As a long time fan of N.S. it was a satisfying tie up for Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and Reamde. But maybe not as approachable as a first N.S. book and while very good not his best work.

This one is a little more my style:

I actually do think PER should be separated from INT; I've talked about that in the past. I don't mind that PRE allows PRE Attacks and interaction skills at 1 point because I'm ok with incentivizing / subsidizing socially capable characters in an otherwise very combat heavy system.

I've said several time that I think the "go first" aspect of DEX should have been split off into a separate secondary stat, call it "Initiative" (or just let lightning reflexes cover it entirely, similar to striking appearance and killing off COM), and DEX would then be priced at a 1:1 ratio. It REALLY bothers my that it's the one hold out among primaries with an inconsistent costing.

Yes, I don't suffer from the delusion that points == balance. I think that they do provide a tool to help find equivalence, but it requires GM discretion and in the end could be dispensed with. I think it mostly offers some common ground between players and GM...the rules suggest this is worth 5 points and I might think it's over costed and you might think it's under costed, but now we are having a conversation about something concrete vs cowboys & indians argumentation.

Ya. I've been doing narrative and rules lite games for the last six to seven years (Fate Accelerated is a favorite; if you haven't checked out my Pathfinder Fate Accelerated stuff you might find it interesting), and only just came back to the Hero System by request of @WilyQuixote (who is a Hero System diehard player) and @Scything who became Hero System curious after years of hearing about past Hero System campaigns and from looking at stuff on my website. I think the essence of the HS is the SPD chart, the 3d6 bell curve for resolution, a pool of D6 for effect, separate STUN and BODY stats, maneuvers have CV modifiers built into them, sandboxy point buy vs class / level / tree. More limited things cost less than less limited things. Mechanically similar things use the same rules vs being arbitrarily redefined. The rest of it is largely embellishment, for me.

Nah, not my first or even tenth rodeo. My hair is asbestos coated...fireproof, and I lost my mind long ago so I'm past the initial shock of having lost it.