Killer Shrike

I've allowed a "Focus of Opportunity" modifier for half Lim value for many years. A normally -1 Focus is worth -1/2 with "...of Opportunity" applied, a normally -1/2 Focus is worth -1/4, and a normally -1/4 Focus is worth -0, etc.

Works fine.

I've allowed a "Focus of Opportunity" modifier for half Lim value for many years. A normally -1 Focus is worth -1/2 with "...of Opportunity" applied, a normally -1/2 Focus is worth -1/4, and a normally -1/4 Focus is worth -0, etc.

Works fine.

Hey all, thanks for the concern. The host was having issues for a chunk of time yesterday but they seem to have gotten it worked out.

I have no immediate plans to take the site offline, and keep paying the upkeep year by year. So, it will be there for the forseeable future, unless I keel over dead or it becomes untenable for some reason.

Cheers!

I have the Dark Sun boxed set in storage somewhere and played it back in the day, but have not looked at it in a very long time. What I mostly remember is that I liked Dark Sun as an idea but didn't like the implementation of it as a D&D setting.

At the time, I thought it would have been better draped around a bespoke system rather than trying to stretch AD&D 2e to power it. It always struck me as more of a "mood" setting...the essense of Dark Sun is in its feels rather than its mechanics IMO. If I were going to run a Dark Sun or similar campaign I don't think I would use a well-defined mechanical model like the Hero System or even some version of D&D...the rules of such heavier games will inevitably conflict with elements of a more feels based setting. I would tend to reach for a more narrative system like Fate or Cortex for something like that because the "fiction" comes first and mechanically significant things like "you sterilize the planet in a square mile to cast this spell" are handled by the expedient of dropping a single Aspect or Complication on a scene.


However, for the sake of using the Hero System to do it...off the top of my head the quirky thing that differentiated it significantly from vanilla dnd is the magic system. The rest of it is either avialable (psionics) absent (dieties) or easily adapted from similar things (feral halflings, thrikreen, half giants, etc).

I wrote up a sketch of an ambient magic system by request on these boards twenty-ish years ago but cannot find it w/ a search...it my have gotten culled. I never bothered to put up anything more than an allusion to such systems on my site because, frankly, I don't like that sort of magic due to the amount of effort it puts on the DM / GM to consider how much "mana" or whatever is available in every square inch of real estate or scene or whatever scale you prefer to work at.

However, a straightforward way to do defiler-like magic is to make all spells cost END, require them to be paid from an END Reserve with no REC, and make all practitioners buy a Transfer (5e) or linked Drain+Aid (6e) targetting vegetation / life that deposits into the END Reserve. Dial in the particular behavior you like ranging from "exactly the same as Dark Sun" to "similar enough". The ability to drain life on a glacial fade back in a radius is quite powerful unto itself, so modelling it exactly would be costly. If you wanted to defray the cost, you could subsidize it similar to the core Fantasy Hero divide spell costs by 3 notion or encumber it with various limitations.

Another similar option would be to instead have the draining of environmental vitality be a mandatory Side Effect on such spells. Similar outcome, different feel. The first is definitely deliberate and premediated...you drain life to fuel a magical battery. The second feels more like a lamentable but unavoidable consequence. [shrug]

If I were going to pursue such a project, I would model it both ways, and if I thought of other ways as I went I'd do them too. Then I'd make a character and do a variant for each potential system, and potentially at different point levels to assess viability over apprentice / journeyman / master. Then I'd pick the one I liked best given the pros and cons, and I'd go from there.

The tip jar is still active ( https://www.killershrike.com/Donate.aspx ) and contributions are appreciated.

However, as I see it there are three scenarios where the site would go down:
1) Money -- currently not an issue.
2) Tech -- the infrastructure of the site is quite old at this point, and is a legacy / organic frankenstein of 3 decades of web tech. It's definitely not mainstream, and hosting options have dwindled accordingly. There's a variety of ways this could become an issue.
3) Bus factor of 1 -- I'm the sole maintainer, and while I'm healthy I am also in my fifth decade of life. I also have a busy professional life. So, I could get sick or die on the one hand, but also if a significant amount of work needed to be done to overcome Tech issues I might be too busy to actually commit the time to it. I'm also not particularly keen on going thru the effort of trying to hand it all off to someone else either. Its been a vanity project from start to finish, feels weird to hand the reins over to someone else. Also, the time and frustration of such an undertaking is not appealing either.

So...tl;dr:

I'm glad people still get value out of it, I appreciate kind words and also contributions to the fees, but don't fret about kicking in on costs. The service outage wasn't due to an unpaid bill or anything on my end, the hosting company was just having a bad day or rotating servers or experiencing overbooked virtualization or experiencing multi phasic solar flare ups due to mercury being in retrograde, or something like that.

👍

The tip jar is still active ( https://www.killershrike.com/Donate.aspx ) and contributions are appreciated.

However, as I see it there are three scenarios where the site would go down:
1) Money -- currently not an issue.
2) Tech -- the infrastructure of the site is quite old at this point, and is a legacy / organic frankenstein of 3 decades of web tech. It's definitely not mainstream, and hosting options have dwindled accordingly. There's a variety of ways this could become an issue.
3) Bus factor of 1 -- I'm the sole maintainer, and while I'm healthy I am also in my fifth decade of life. I also have a busy professional life. So, I could get sick or die on the one hand, but also if a significant amount of work needed to be done to overcome Tech issues I might be too busy to actually commit the time to it. I'm also not particularly keen on going thru the effort of trying to hand it all off to someone else either. Its been a vanity project from start to finish, feels weird to hand the reins over to someone else. Also, the time and frustration of such an undertaking is not appealing either.

So...tl;dr:

I'm glad people still get value out of it, I appreciate kind words and also contributions to the fees, but don't fret about kicking in on costs. The service outage wasn't due to an unpaid bill or anything on my end, the hosting company was just having a bad day or rotating servers or experiencing overbooked virtualization or experiencing multi phasic solar flare ups due to mercury being in retrograde, or something like that.

👍

I have the Dark Sun boxed set in storage somewhere and played it back in the day, but have not looked at it in a very long time. What I mostly remember is that I liked Dark Sun as an idea but didn't like the implementation of it as a D&D setting.

At the time, I thought it would have been better draped around a bespoke system rather than trying to stretch AD&D 2e to power it. It always struck me as more of a "mood" setting...the essense of Dark Sun is in its feels rather than its mechanics IMO. If I were going to run a Dark Sun or similar campaign I don't think I would use a well-defined mechanical model like the Hero System or even some version of D&D...the rules of such heavier games will inevitably conflict with elements of a more feels based setting. I would tend to reach for a more narrative system like Fate or Cortex for something like that because the "fiction" comes first and mechanically significant things like "you sterilize the planet in a square mile to cast this spell" are handled by the expedient of dropping a single Aspect or Complication on a scene.


However, for the sake of using the Hero System to do it...off the top of my head the quirky thing that differentiated it significantly from vanilla dnd is the magic system. The rest of it is either avialable (psionics) absent (dieties) or easily adapted from similar things (feral halflings, thrikreen, half giants, etc).

I wrote up a sketch of an ambient magic system by request on these boards twenty-ish years ago but cannot find it w/ a search...it my have gotten culled. I never bothered to put up anything more than an allusion to such systems on my site because, frankly, I don't like that sort of magic due to the amount of effort it puts on the DM / GM to consider how much "mana" or whatever is available in every square inch of real estate or scene or whatever scale you prefer to work at.

However, a straightforward way to do defiler-like magic is to make all spells cost END, require them to be paid from an END Reserve with no REC, and make all practitioners buy a Transfer (5e) or linked Drain+Aid (6e) targetting vegetation / life that deposits into the END Reserve. Dial in the particular behavior you like ranging from "exactly the same as Dark Sun" to "similar enough". The ability to drain life on a glacial fade back in a radius is quite powerful unto itself, so modelling it exactly would be costly. If you wanted to defray the cost, you could subsidize it similar to the core Fantasy Hero divide spell costs by 3 notion or encumber it with various limitations.

Another similar option would be to instead have the draining of environmental vitality be a mandatory Side Effect on such spells. Similar outcome, different feel. The first is definitely deliberate and premediated...you drain life to fuel a magical battery. The second feels more like a lamentable but unavoidable consequence. [shrug]

If I were going to pursue such a project, I would model it both ways, and if I thought of other ways as I went I'd do them too. Then I'd make a character and do a variant for each potential system, and potentially at different point levels to assess viability over apprentice / journeyman / master. Then I'd pick the one I liked best given the pros and cons, and I'd go from there.

If you would like a hand with the costs let us know, I would be willing to kick ya a few bucks to help ensure the site stays online.

Hey all, thanks for the concern. The host was having issues for a chunk of time yesterday but they seem to have gotten it worked out.

I have no immediate plans to take the site offline, and keep paying the upkeep year by year. So, it will be there for the forseeable future, unless I keel over dead or it becomes untenable for some reason.

Cheers!

Hey all, thanks for the concern. The host was having issues for a chunk of time yesterday but they seem to have gotten it worked out.

I have no immediate plans to take the site offline, and keep paying the upkeep year by year. So, it will be there for the forseeable future, unless I keel over dead or it becomes untenable for some reason.

Cheers!

Hey all, thanks for the concern. The host was having issues for a chunk of time yesterday but they seem to have gotten it worked out.

I have no immediate plans to take the site offline, and keep paying the upkeep year by year. So, it will be there for the forseeable future, unless I keel over dead or it becomes untenable for some reason.

Cheers!

For me, the best part about Hero and other "universal tookits" is that they are toolkits. When inspiration strikes for a one off or campaign I can slap together enough to get going and then spiral out from there. I don't want to be tied to a specific genre or setting, I want tools to whip up materials for whatever wacky idea I come up with.

Thus I prefer a solid framework and maybe some scaffolding, and I'll figure it out from there. I'll cobble together what I want, bend to purpose this or that if necessary, homeroll to fill gaps, and discard the rest...until next time. Conversely, I don't like games or materials that have too many assumptions or opinions baked into them, because they get in my way or provide unwanted friction. I also don't like things that are too specific or niche.

Reasoning from that position, I thought the Ulitmate books got way too specific to be marketable or necessary. The Ultimate Skill book was significant and useful, but that's a very cross-cutting consideration for the game system. The Ultimate Martial Arts book is also a very useful favorite and tellingly also cross-cutting. However, while some of the archetype AT books (the Ultimate Brick and so on) had a useful tidbit or crumb here and there, they were overall unecessary IMO and had little to offer. They were also predominantly Champions / supers oriented. A single Ultimate Archetype book with a chapter per significant comic book AT branded as a Champions supplement would have been better IMO, if it was even necessary. I seem to recall the Champions book itself having a section on AT's which could have been expanded if desired. Thus, I don't have any interest in an entire book on sth like Ultimate Power Armor or whatever.

As to settings, I prefer gazeteer / skeletal setting books. Give me the big picture, set up the main themes, and set the hook of the setting -- what differentiates it. If I'm interested I'll take it from there and detail it only as necessary, and allow my players actions and impulses to collapse the waveforms on the rest of it. The more the official material or I describe, the more resistance the setting has to emergent play and player agency. I like just enough to run the game and inform my decision making, not enough to get in my way or slow play while I scramble to look up what the name of the 3rd barber of this particular made up city is named in canon. I also avoid licensed settings for the same reason. I don't want content, I want ideas, hooks, and tools. Less is more.

Thus, I'd rather see a single book with a compendium of mini-settings or samplers for genre settings. As a for instance, the D&D 5e product Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft is not actually about Ravenloft (the adventure Curse of Strahd is a much more pactical supplement to run a game set in Barovia / actual Ravenloft as its commonly thought of). It's actually a sort of Horror genre book with a bunch of mini horror settings in the form of various Domains of Dread. In a similar vein, Fate has a collection of "World of..." books which collate clutches of mini settings with a loose theme per book. I like that sort of thing a lot of better. I recognize that's a less common preference, but I'm unlikely to shell out money for multiple Star Hero setting books while I would consider buying a single book with a collection of less densely described settings.


I do have a fondness for Cyberpunk / Dystopian near-future stories. I played and ran a lot of Shadowrun 1e, some Cyberpunk 2013 and Cyberpunk 2020, and many cyberpunkish themed homerolled settings / games. The linked to MetaCyber material being one of them. I'm a busy person and not as plugged in to the day to day of the hobby as I used to be, so I often find out about these things too late, but I would definitely plunk down a chunk of money for a Cyberpunk 6e kickstarter if I became aware of it in time to back it.

No, its just a handful of fantasy PC's from various campaigns, run with different systems.  I wrote each up in the various systems as a compare & contrast exercise. I recently did D&D 5e 2024 versions as a further point of comparison. They are "feel" conversions, trying to match the core idea of each character with 3rd level equivalent options across the board, reinterpreting as necessary to fit the idiom / mechanics of the relevant game system.

All seems fine to me, the main thing I would point out is that when I laid out the original styles for the magic system, for each I really focused on the implications of the modifiers along the following lines. 
how magic of that style would "feel" and appear to those with supernatural senses what sort of magics it would lend itself to (some modifiers rule out certain things entirely, make other things more or less practical) given that it takes a lot of study and commitment to learn these styles, what sort of personalities would be drawn to which style if learned scholars or opininated wannabes were to have a conversation about various styles, what would their talking points on the subject be?  
I was really linkening it to how in the real world different styles of doing the same basic things are complex combinations of purpose, approach, congruence, influence, quirks, preferences, the personalities it draws to it, the sub-culture of "inness" and "outness" that forms around it, etc.
 
You see it in say cooking styles, art styles, musical styles, role playing styles, pretty much all human endeavors where there is more than one way of doing more or less the same thing, styles of going about it form.
 
Martial arts styles provide a clear touchpoint for Metier (a word meaning basically "what are you good at" and chosen non-accidentally to name the magic system ). Imagine the difference between say Karate and Boxing or Wrestling and Tai Chi. That of course breaks down further into substyles...what kind of Karate compared to what kind of Boxing (etc).

In the same way, you might consider that at least some of the variants you are defining are derived from, sects of, or influenced by an older style. Maybe an angry student sets up a rival style to spite their teacher. Maybe a practitioner develops a variant because their old master died before finishing their training and they had to figure it out themselves...but came to a different outcome. Maybe an old style fell into disuse or disappeared entirely, but a prodigy rediscovered it and tried to bring it back...but got parts of it "wrong" resulting in a new strain. Maybe a once in a generation talent comes along and says their style is the style of no style (Variable Advantage + Variable Limitation) and leaves a counter legacy of syncretionism. Really, theres no end to it. 
 
That's one of my favorite things about defining magical / martial / practical traditions in game settings...at a certain point it crosses over into world building. Starting from, mechanically I want a character to be differentiated by doing a certain kind of thing in a certain way...and this isn't a personal quirk its a thing other characters can also do...and how did the knowledge of how to do this become a thing and how is it perpetuated from past generations to future generations...and we're world building.
 
Anyway, I'm glad to see you are still getting enjoyment out of the material. I've had a fondness for Metier since I wrote it as I think its a neat system, and it makes me happy that at least one other person agrees.

I'm going to try to tease this apart a bit...
 
I've gathered that you are a pre-4e guy from other posts. I personally did not play 1e thru 3e. I do own some of the games of that era which I acquired later as a curiosity, but never played them. Of the ones I am passingly familiar with, they were definitely games, what I would today call a "boutique game" in the sense that they catered to a specific niche or subgenre. But regardless of labeling or categorization, they were definitely games first, with rules to support the playing of those games.
 
4e went a different direction and harvested those games to create a generic, universal, role playing system. Perhaps they realized that some other game company had kind of eaten some of their lunch, but I digress. We'll just call it a "universal" game system.
 
Universal game systems are not games. They are not meant to be played as a game. They have no default content or bespoke mechanics for specific special snowflakes suitable for a specific setting and nothing else. Instead, they focus on providing a framework of rules to be applied to conceivably any game in a variety of genres (perhaps all genres depending on the ambitions of the game designers). They are fundamentally aimed primarily at GM's in the more old school role as combination amateur game designers and arbitrators (as opposed to the more mainstream later trend towards GM as merely facilitators). Their "value proposition" is not "this a fun game in and of itself that you can just buy and run sessions with in our prepackaged setting using our prepackaged content". The value proposition is "you can use this framework to make and run any kind of roleplaying game you want to, and you and your players won't have to learn a different rules system every time you switch genres or settings". 
 
So, the purpose of the core rulebook of a universal system is not to be fun or fluffy or flavorful, its purpose is to be functional and balanced and broadly applicable. Its primary audience is not players or even casual GM's (who, really, would be better off playing a more prepackaged game) but rather propeller head GM's who specifically seek out universal systems because they place a high value on a toolkit type of system that provides them with the tools to craft the games they want to run. 
 
In a universal game system product line, genre books and settings and supplements are the proper home for the fun and fluffy and flavorful. 
 
Now, as many (including myself) have said over the years, DoJ were slow to cater to the market of GM's and players who wanted a prepackaged setting with sufficient rules to run with bundled with IP. Looked at more charitably they stuck with their core competency and were quite successful at it for a good stretch of time. DoJ turned out a staggering volume of mostly high quality products for many years. I've always been impressed with the output and overall consistency. However, sadly, excellence does not always translate into profit. There's a reason why there are fewer top quality steakhouses than there are fast food joints. Catering to the lowest common denominator tends to pay off bigger than going the other way. Alas and alack, we live in an imperfect world.
 
 
Yes, I remember the Fuzion system. It was not a HS game, it was Champion IP on a different game system. There were actually some good ideas to be found in it, but the execution was bungled spectacularly. Apparently the kinks in the Fuzion system did get smoothed out and it is used by a number of boutique games...for some reason it took root in the anime space.
 
 
Are you grounding this in a comparison between 5e and 6e or between pre-4e and 6e?
 
Because, if you are coming from a 5e to 6e perspective, this just doesn't track. Most of 6e is copy and pasted from 5e and then elaborated on with FAQ entries and posts from the rules questions subforum. The actual systemic changes are few. Compared to edition shifts in most other roleplaying games, where often a new edition is nearly or entirely a new game, the shift from 5e to 6e is relatively mild.
 
 
This has been the case as of the publishing of 4e, so nearly 30 years running now, and it was directly stated in the 4e rulebook that this was the game designer's intent. This is a direct quote from the 4e rulebook:
 
DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS
The main object of the game is for the players and the GM
to have fun. We like to think of the Hero System as a Game
Construction Set, where each GM can create his own unique
campaign world. Perhaps it's based on a favorite novel or
movie, or a combination of several sources, or a completely
original vision. In any case, the Hero System lets you
customize it.

Designing a set of roleplaying rules is a process of making
numerous decisions. How do we represent combat? What
numbers do we use to determine your chance to hit? In
constructing these rules, we used a relatively simple set of
guidelines. We wanted to keep the mechanics simple,
encourage roleplaying, and create a flavor similar to that in
books, movies, and comics. Most important was giving the
game the "flavor" of a good action novel or a movie. When
realism conflicted with that goal, we put realism in second
place. Then we tried to reduce the rules to the simplest set
of numbers we could come up with, so that the game
mechanics wouldn't get in the way of having fun. Finally, we
tried to put in rules that would encourage storytelling on the
part of the players and the GM.

Above all, we wanted the Hero System to be flexible and
open-ended - capable of simulating any real or fictional
situation. This flexibility means that there is potential for
"minimaxing" and distorting the rules. We could have put in
a lot more "don'ts", but that's not the way we wanted the rules
to be. We would rather let you make your own decisions
about what is permissible. If you want to allow the characters
to travel through time, it's silly for us to say "no you can't."
After all, you've paid your money for the game, so why
shouldn't you alter it any way you please? As a consequence,
we've asked for a lot of decision-making from the
Game Master. It may be difficult for you to tell your friends
that no, they can't have a character with Extra-Dimensional
Movement or Precognition. But they'll probably understand
if you explain your reasons for your decision.

This leads to the most important design idea we worked
toward: that we wanted a game that could stimulate everyone's
creativity. The HERO system is intended to be a tool
for you to use in designing your own campaign game. We
hope you'll use it that way.
 
 
 
Um, yeah, it's a thing for playable-games-with-settings using a universal rules system to indicate something like "powered by Fate!" or "GURPS Wildcards" or "d20 compatible" whatever. This has been a thing nearly as long as there have been universal systems. It's exactly the same as a video game using a particular generic video game engine, like Unreal or Unity, saying so on its marketing and a loading screen.
 
 
You know you don't have to read it cover to cover, right? Just read the chapter intros and the "characters and the world" chapter, and the first few pages of the combat chapter. Then pick a character you are familiar with from entertainment or an earlier edition game and then try to make a 6e version of that character. There are lists at the beginning-ish of each relevant section of the book that you can quickly peruse, then pop over to the write ups for things that seem likely and read those snippets. You will likely have a working character pretty quickly. Make a second character in the same way; should go a little faster now. Then set up a little scenario where one of the characters you made attacks the other character you made, working thru the necessary combat rules as you go.
 
Some games I just skim as a scholarly exercise looking for interesting bits of game design, but if I decide to give a game a try this is what I do to learn the rudiments of the system quickly. If I like it, I'll go from there and deepen my knowledge. If I don't I move on.
 
 
Abstract base mechanics that you modify with pros and cons to model a particular effect is the essence of the Hero System power model and is kind of the thing it is recognized as innovating. So...you're saying you don't like what many would consider to be a fundamental feature of the game system.
 
 
Not sure if serious. Yes, a generic game system is generic. On purpose. 
 
 
So, yeah, I think you might like Basic if you did like 4e. It's a sort of spiritual successor of Hero System #500. 
 
But, I'm actually surprised that you are a Hero System gamer...because you seem like you'd prefer something more packaged or simplified. I don't mean that in a bad way, I mean it in a congenial there's probably a game system out there you might be happier with sort of way.
 
Although, maybe that game is Champions 3e and you've already found it.
 
 
Ya, I saw Sean related activity. Having been gone myself I didn't realize he had been gone as well. 
 
I've been working and raising kids and playing other games, mostly. I'm currently on a hiatus between gigs, so sort of revisiting some old stomping grounds. 
 
 
Yes, I noticed your posts. I didn't have anything new to contribute so I didn't comment, but I appreciate hearing when people get value out of some of my contributions. I'm glad it is working out. My players always enjoyed it. 
 
 
It's definitely more appropriate to a campaign with a cinematic or superheroic tone.
 
 
Well, for heroic / more realistic campaigns I find that a Skill Maxima is useful to discourage over specialization. It has proven to work well in heroic games. I think I first encountered the idea in the Valdorian Age.  A Skill Maxima works exactly like a Characteristic Maxima; a character can buy up to the maxima at normal price, and then pays a premium to go over the maxima.
 
On that note, when laying out the campaign guidelines for a new campaign I use a "paradigm" chart of options with more cinematic / superheroic things on the left and more gritty / heroic things on the right. I fill it in opting for one side or the other to help dial in the setting. One of the line items is "Skill Maxima". Here is an example of one:
 
http://www.killershrike.com/HereThereBeMonsters/Paradigm_Assumptions.aspx
 
 
You, drift off subject? Never! ?
 
 
Ok, I'll admit that I laughed a bit. Solid burn. However, I would point out that 6e is simple, to the extent that any version of the Hero System can claim that. In the same way that geometry is simple. You may have fallen in love with geometry via Euclid but find topology or differential geometry to be hopelessly embellished; never the less they are still simple in their fundamentals and extend geometry's power to handle more complex problems.

Having read 6e, I can confirm the implication that it covers more situations. However, as the Hero System is a toolkit GM house-ruling and tinkering is ever present and a feature rather than a sign of a flaw; in that vein 6e also has more dials and levers a GM can spin and pull so it is also better (in the sense of more configurable) in that regard.
 
 
Actually, I found that 6e was slightly simpler (or at least smoother / less friction prone) to use in play after we got over the initial "new edition" bumps of re-familiarization. The main thing I noticed is that rules arguments became very rare; people came to trust and expect that the rules covered something and thus the first impulse was to look something up rather than argue about it; the detailed indexes (also a 5e feature) helped enormously in this regard, and more often than not the rules did indeed cover it (to a much greater degree than was true in earlier editions) or at least had enough coverage that an obvious conclusion could be drawn.
 
Now, don't get me wrong, I have no problems making rulings. I don't do it as much as I used to as I'm older and not as quick on my mental feet as I used to be, but I'm the sort of GM who is comfortable just winging it or making things up as we go for lighthearted or non-serialized sessions. I never struggled to make rulings in this or any other system, but I would much rather focus on keeping the story moving so every ruling I don't have to make during actual gameplay is welcome. 6e was a marked improvement over 5e and 4e in this area thanks to the rigorous diligence and attention to detail of the author and presumably editor(s) and playtester(s). 
 
 
The only thing that I can see 6e making harder during character creation would be if you were trying to duplicate a power that had been removed. Otherwise, not so much; it's the same as it ever was but with more control over characteristics, and more options included in the core rules that previously required ownership of a supplement to know about.
 
I don't exactly lack character creation experience; I've written up an absurd number of characters for the Hero System over the years. It's actually kind of depressing, to consider how many man hours of my finite existence on this planet were allocated to that task. I can't speak for others, but for my own part and from my own experience, making characters in 6e is overall easier than making characters in 5e and 4e. We're not talking about massively easier (nothing can compete with Hero Designer on that front), but an overall improvement. One of the things that contributes to this is that it is much less necessary to flip through a pile of supplements looking for an obscure modifier you recollect seeing in a genre book or sidebar example. There is still some of that, but the consolidation of such things from 5e into the core rulebook makes it a much less common occurrence. Additionally, there are subtle improvements here and there within power write ups that ease usage of them. There isn't really a killer feature or example to point to, it's more of a dusting and tidying up of the place, a Martha Stewartization of sorts. Now, some might make the "polishing the brass on the Titanic" reference here, but that would just be mean spirited.

Forgot about this one. In yesterdays session the PCs had a small press conference, thier first, and the media asks Gravitic, the Grandmaster of Graviolis what the source of his superhuman powers are.
 
In his typical 4-color voice, Gravitic answers,
 

"Why, my super HUMANITY, of course!"

Why dont you call somebody in charge?
 
This happened in yesterday's champions session.
 
One of the players is the Silver Avenger of Millenium City, John Wrath (Agent of PRIMUS!!!!).
 
The player was up all night trying to get several projects wrapped up, making last minute changes to an emulator due on Monday (he's a UCSD Computer Science student), and his car disintegrated the day before as well. He's frazzled and off his game, and had to show up a couple of hours late because he was getting his car taken care of (but hey, he showed, which is more than some players would have done ), so he's joined the game in progress and hasn't quite gotten his brain fully engaged yet.
 
 
Now keep in mind, this is our 4th session of play. His authority has been well established heretofore. He's been to PRIMUS HQ on several occasions and the generals of that backdrop have been fleshed out, though not all the specifics have been ironed out as yet. The motor pool, R&D, and the Station Chief have all had some work, and some of the necessary facilities such as holding cells and questioning rooms, and private rooms from which to enter ones personal information in the process of getting sanctioned by PRIMUS have been covered, and other facilities alluded to. However, so far its been a place to stop in on in the pursuit of the story, rather than an ends unto itself. So, basically, as something comes up where it would make sense and serve the story, PRIMUS HQ turns out to have something suitable to support it.
 
In this particular session, the party met up at PRIMUS HQ. ALL of the PCs other than John Wrath have a jealously guarded Secret ID and have no way of getting in touch with each other, and several of the members had initially refused to sanction in fits of paranoia. This has hampered the forward progress of the storyline considerably. To make a long story short, in game events lead to the group meeting at PRIMUS HQ, and the remainder of the PCs went through the sanctioning process. Then the group finally rallied together and moved forward in one direction, assisting the Silver Avenger in the investigation of the supercrime which had initially drawn them all out to combat in the 1st session.
 
So they follow up a lead regarding a suspicious security guard who was fired from the plant that was struck in the 1st session, after one of the security guards at that location said it was kind of suspicious that the criminals seemed to know where all the cameras and security devices were located -- he suspected an inside job.
 
The PCs find this guy, a total story-serving mook criminal, and after some questioning John Wrath takes him into custody.
 
John Wrath gets a call from PRIMUS Dispatch notifying him that a superhuman wanted for questioning with a general APB out on him has been spotted overflying the city.
 
John Wrath is harried from riding herd on the PCs and this is clearly one too many straws on his back. He says through his mike:
 
"Uh....Why are you telling me? Dont you know I'm busy? Why dont you call somebody in charge?"
 
Out of character we all laugh at him, one of the other players says Out of Character something the effect of "You are in charge, you idiot--You are the gawd damn SILVER FRICKING AVENGER! You are THE person in charge of handling crap like this for the entire CITY"
 
So the player of John Wrath says, "What? Im obviously too incompetent for that kind of responsiblity! Besides, if Im in charge, why does the Station Chief keep yelling at me?"
 
The group laughs at him
 
The other players says "Because he keeps having to pick up your slack, thats why!"
 
The the player of John Wrath says, "Well if Im in charge, I should have an office or something!"
 
To which I reply, "You DO have an office -- the Office of the SIlver Avenger, Millenium City."
 
The player is suprised and says, "Really? Where's that at? Do I have a secretary?"
 
Pretty much the whole table bursts out at once with variations of, "ITS AT PRIMUS HEADQUARTERS YOU IDIOT"; where the entire party had just met up and left together from before all of this transpired.
 
And I respond with something along the lines of, "Your office is at PRIMUS Headquarters on the top floor, and yes you have a secretary, but they cant keep the position filled because you are too much of a hard ass on the help, so they keep rotating admin personnel in and out. You are never actually in your office because you are too crusty and hard charging to do office work--thats for pencil pushers and sissys after all. You are JOHN WRATH, leader of the Growling RECONDOs in Vietnam, who followed that up with 10 years of teaching uneducated natives of pisshole countries how to overthrow thier oppresive governments for the benefit of the CIA, who's been a Silver Avenger for 18 frickin years; you're a FIELD OPERATIVE, a WORLD FAMOUS "SECRET" AGENT, with a liscence to kill and cigar. You live for this crap! Now are you going to respond to the APB or not?" (ie, I reminded him of his own character concept )
 
Once he got his head in the game, things took off, but we all laughed ourselves silly over his initial confusion...

Theres no way Im going to read thru the 5 gazillion posts on this thread -- I gave up after the 20th or so
 
However, in the interests of responding to the original question, and all heavily IMO:
 
I like to use ECs for characters that have 1 basic "POWER" -- and I mean a Power in the comic book sense rather than the Hero Games sense -- like Fire Control, or Force Field Generation, or Telekinesis, with many different "stunts" conceivably usable concurrently -- like Flight, FF, EB etc.
 
The HERO System classifies each "stunt" as 1 or more Power Constructs, but conceptually all of the EC slots stem from 1 actual "Power". If you take down one Power Construct with an adjustment, you are in effect taking down their 1 big Power and all the Power Constructs attached to it. Thus the EC adjustment double jeopardy.
 
Mechanically, Im not real happy about the obvious illogic of Armor not being a legal slot while 0 END FF is at the same point cost, (although Armor is also Persistent and Invisible, and thus obviously superior aside from the fact that many NND's define FF as a defense), but Im not so unhappy that I worry about it
 
Another big plus to an EC is that unlike VPPs and MPs which are Active Point sensitive, EC powers have no upper end AP issues. In fact, you have a direct motivation to have all the slots in the EC to have a certain AP level as the point rebate is a halving of the lowest AP in the EC. In campaigns with AP caps this isnt noticable so much, but in campaigns without AP caps, a character with an EC can be quite powerful. What a MPP character gets in expandibility and flexibility, the EC character makes up for with well-roundedness.
 
As a complete aside I think its interesting that arguments aside, when looked at as a whole, characters based on all 3 frameworks and without can compete with each other at the same point level, based more upon the design skills of the characters creator than the strengths or weaknesses of the frameworks themselves. IME, of course YMMV

So, given the givens of the current state of reality, I think it is probably best to postpone face to face sessions until things have returned to normal. If social distancing becomes the new normal for more than a couple weeks I'll look into getting an online virtual table top type of solution going. 
 
In  the meantime, I've been chipping away at adding more meat to the Cortex Plus Heroic port. I did more character writeups , more Ability Trait writeups, and filled in the details on how dice pools are formed, how plot points work, and so on. In days to come I'll be porting over setting content, vignettes, npcs / monsters, and so forth. It might be of interest to some of you, and of course feedback is welcome.  
 
Obviously, I hope all of you & your families are well. Stay healthy and safe!

I'm looking into online gaming alternatives for my D&D game. I've used Fantasy Grounds for D&D, but I don't know how well it will support Hero or Cortex Plus. It may be easier to do the game mechanics portion through talking like we do in a face-to-face game. We certainly all have dice and can roll them and declare our results. We can save video for maps and our lovely faces. This assumes of course everyone has access to the necessary hardware: computer with camera and software. We can always go on hiatus if need be.

Thank you for the updates. I’m working from home right now, and my daughter is out of school through early April. I think we should plan on social distancing being a thing for at least another 2-4 weeks.