Killer Shrike

Today, depending on who you are talking to, "Pathfinder" can mean various things.
 
There's the rules themselves, which are basically settingless in the same way that D&D rules have always been settingless. You can use them to run a D&D-esque game in a setting of your own making. The default setting of Golarion may be referred to as idea anchors or examples, but the core classes and monsters and what not are pure D&D. Anything that they were able to repackage, legally speaking, got repackaged. In some places where something was explicitly not OGL permissible such as Illithid some other thing takes the place of that (broadly, aboleths or cthonians fill a similar niche) or a wink wink nudge nudge SRD equivalent is available (for instance, paizo can't publish stuff with Beholders, but if you wanted to run an old D&D module using Pathfinder rules you could easily drop in an SRD "Evil Eye"). It is d20 compatible, and while there are some idiomatic differences between them, it takes very little experience with either variant to translate between them.
 
Pathfinder offers variant implementations for D&D core classes, and then a whole bunch of other additional classes riffing on the same ideas in various ways. So, a D&D 3.x Wizard and a Pathfinder Wizard are not 100% line by line identical, but they are clearly "the same". Overall, the Pathfinder classes are famously more powerful than their D&D 3.x equivalents. Power creep across the board is a common theme. Of course the monsters also tend to be a bit powered up, so it's basically a wash. A rising tide lifts all boats. Some classes of course benefit more than others, and disparity in class power balances are rife. There are rather famously issues such as "Multiple Ability Dependent (MAD) vs Single Ability Dependent (SAD)", "Martial - Caster Disparity", "Wealth Per Level issues" and so on which are relevant to all of D&D 3e, D&D 3.5, and Pathfinder.
 
They differ in details, but the broad strokes are clearly the same. D&D 3.x has far more in common with Pathfinder than it does with either AD&D 2e or D&D 4e. 
 
Aside from the rules, you have the setting of Golarion and the adventures set within it...most notably the Adventure Path's themselves which are 6 issue adventure arcs with a theme which usually but not always start at level 1 and end around level 20 and present themselves as a thing where you in theory start running the campaign when the first book drops, and keep pace with them so that your group is ready for the next part of the adventure just as paizo is releasing the next book in the cycle. That's a conceit which is held over from the early desperate days of paizo trying to leverage their periodical publishing model to get some product out the door to keep making payroll; I don't know of anyone who actually starts a new Adventure Path on release and tries to keep up with the release schedule. In reality, the Adventure Paths remain available the same as any other gaming book, and it is much more common to buy into a past published Adventure Path and run it. None of the Adventure Paths are 100% perfect, some of them are highly regarded while others are not, but somewhat similar to how Magic the Gathering themed blocks roll out year after year, basically two themed Adventure Paths roll out year after year. If you don't like the current one, just wait six months and maybe you'll like the next one. There's a subgroup of players who just play Adventure Paths, and that's what they think of when you say "Pathfinder".  In some cases, there are players who do exist who have only ever played in Pathfinder Adventure Paths and don't really know much about gaming beyond that...asking such a player if "Pathfinder is D&D" may well draw a blank stare. 
 
Then there's Pathfinder Society, which is a thing unto itself. It's an "organized play" model, and the bookkeeping involved to keep things "fair" and allow characters to be portable is quite tedious but makes sense if you understand what its trying to prevent. It evolved into its own sort of ecosystem, and for some players PFS play is all they know and this is "Pathfinder" to them.
 
So, Pathfinder is a D&D variant. Mechanically it is of the 3.x era and thus is dissimilar to the current rules system that bears the D&D brand, but that doesn't invalidate it's D&D pedigree. Conceptually, the ideas of the Pathfinder setting and the metaplots within that setting and the expressions of protagonists / antagonists within the race / class / level semantics intrinsic to D&D and its successors are purely "D&D" and only make sense in that odd niche of fantasy fiction spawned by D&D. However, if your first experience with D&D was 4e or 5e, then Pathfinder may not seem like D&D to you...maybe. Many people can't separate a game mechanic from the fluff draped around out, or the content of a fictional setting from its mechanical underpinnings. That speaks more to their own imprecision of thought than to the actual facts of the matter however.

At some point in the last few years my son happened to get into my boxes of Pathfinder stuff and became fascinated by it, particularly the art. About the same time, I was getting into Fate. Of those two contemporaneous occurrences was born my Pathfinder Fate Accelerated hack ( http://www.killershrike.com/Fate/Fae/Pathfinder/Menu.aspx ) and over the years I've run a few adventures set in Golarion using my hacked Fate Accelerated rules. We played yesterday, as a matter of fact.
 
I don't particularly love Golarion. It's ok, for me. But the maps and art and material is copious and well done. I'm not whipping out difficult to replace Darlene Greyhawk maps or trying to scrounge player copies of resources that exist only in out of print books. It works out because its convenient and I happen to have a pile of content and pdfs for it and can easily acquire anything I happen to be missing if I decide I want it. For instance, when we played yesterday the binding gave out on my physical copy of "Magnimar, City of Monuments"; if that had happened to my nearly 30 year old physical copy of "The City of Greyhawk" I would have been quite incensed. But, whatever, if I care I can get another copy of Magnimar, City of Monuments, and if not I've got the pdf in cloud storage.

I crib the main bits from Adventure Paths and modules set in the Varisia region, and we go. It is a Pathfinder game in the setting and metaplot sense, and very much not a Pathfinder game in a mechanical sense. Does it also qualify as a D&D game? Sort of. In an existential sense, it is. In a historical sense, it wouldn't exist in a vacuum as it is entirely a derivative. In a practical sense, it isn't really as you would not be able as a player to drop into a D&D game of any edition and apply any of the mechanical knowledge attained from playing in my game.
 
I think that's the crux of it...is D&D a set of mechanics or is D&D a set of ideas or is it the combination of both that constitutes D&D? I'm of the opinion that the essence of D&D is the set of ideas, and the mechanics are largely irrelevant. People who agree will probably agree that Pathfinder is D&D, and those who don't won't. 

Pathfinder started out as D&D 3.75 but since then it has grown in it's own direction. Totally familiar, yet somehow strange in relation to D&D.

That also reeks of "We're bored with conventional game mechanics, so let's invent some really off-beat mechanics nobody's ever seen before to wake us out of our funk."

That was a very common practice in the 1990s, with Vampire: the Masquerade being particularly guilty of this. I see precious little value in coming up with new terms for things like characteristic, skill, advantage, disadvantage, experience point, game master, campaign, and so forth. It's not like anyone owns trademarks on these generic terms, necessitating a search for unique replacements. RPGs should use the established terms unless there is a profoundly good reason not too (which, in my experience, is almost never the case). The pure metagame terms used during play don't need to be drenched in setting sauce (let your skill and spell names do the heavy lifting there), and I find it annoying when they are.

I included a section on Critical Hits in my "Lethality Guidelines" 
 
http://www.killershrike.com/fantasyHero/HighFantasyHERO/shrikeLethalityOptions_Unofficial.aspx
 
CRITICAL HITS Some other games have a concept of "critical hits"; strikes that randomly do more damage than normal. The HERO System tends to shy away from "random" and lacks such an option natively. However different variations of critical hits have been suggested at or described as possible options in some supplements over the years, and some play groups have versions that they use. Described below is my version of "critical hits", which I call the "Rule of Three", that I've used successfully for years. I also describe a Critical Hit concept based on a "lucky die" mechanic, and a mechanic based on degree of success. NOTE: You should probably only implement one kind of Critical Hit rules in a given campaign; two or more can get severely out of hand. RULE OF THREE If a character (PC or NPC) rolls a natural three on a 3d6 roll under type of check then they have the option of either taking "max effect" or an "epiphany". MAX EFFECT If the three was made for an Attack Roll max effect is the maximum possible damage or effect with that attack (treat all effect dice as having rolled 6's). If the three was made for a non attack roll, not only does the character win any opposed roll (even if the opponent made their roll by more) or succeed at their task, but they do so in a stylish looked-cool-doing-it fashion which is also justification for gaining a "Display of Power" bonus to a Presense Attack made sometime within the next few actions against anyone that observed them. EPIPHANY The character has a flash of insight regarding the skill or ability that they rolled a three for and their competency with that ability is expanded. The character gains +2 character points to allocate towards a bonus with that skill or attack. For attacks this translates into a +1 OCV Combat Skill Level with that attack. If a skill this translates into either a +1 or +2 with that skill depending on whether the skill is on the 3/2 or 2/1 costing model. If the three was rolled for a familiarity, the familiarity becomes a full skill instead. This can not be used to upgrade existing levels; for example a character could not opt to bump an All Combat level to an Overall Level with the 2 free points gained in this fashion -- the 2 pts must be spent specifically for the task they were gained from. However, levels gained in this fashion can themselves be upgraded later with experience. For example a 2 pt +1 OCV level with a specific kind of pistol could be upgraded to a 3 pt "Pistols" tight group level later on. LUCKY DAMAGE DICE Some other games have the idea of a "lucky die" which is rerolled and cumulatively added if its max value comes up. In other words, if the lucky die is a d6, then if it rolls a 6 it is rerolled and the result adds to the original 6; if another 6 comes up it is rolled and added in again and so forth until it stops rolling 6's. The HERO System already grants more damage to a 6 when doing Normal damage in the form of +1 BODY inflicted but Killing damage gets no such consideration. In the interests of increasing lethality you as the GM can decide to up the ante further by implementing a "Lucky Damage Dice" House Rule for Killing damage. You can specify that this rule applies to all Killing damage dice, which is a powerful / dangerous kind of critical hit that will occur often and can result in one-hit kills vs. even protected targets, or you can specify that only one die (represented by a physically different die) is "lucky" which is much less extreme. DOVETAIL WITH LUCK POWER Alternately, you can converge this with the Luck Power and allow characters to buy Luck dice defined as "Lucky Damage Dice" instead of the normal function of Luck dice, and a character can roll as many Lucky Damage Dice on a given attack as they have purchased up to the limit of the attack (a character with 3d6 Lucky Damage Dice using a 2d6 Killing Attack would only roll 2 dice but both would be "lucky"; if they later picked up a weapon that does 4d6 Killing they would roll 4d6 and 3 dice would be "lucky"). CRITICAL SKILL / DEGREE OF SUCCESS Some games feature a mechanic whereby more skilled attackers inflict more damage due to their increased skill. The HERO System allows this to some extent if Hit Locations are being used since a more skilled attacker can overcome to hit penalties for choicer hit locations, but using Called Shots can result in a total miss which can seem very odd in practice. An alternative to relying on Called Shots (and even Hit Locations in general) is a mechanic whereby characters that hit by more than they needed inflict more damage. The base mechanic is +1 Damage Class per 1 point a character made their Attack Roll by; thus in a 3 OCV vs 3 DCV scenario, an Attack Roll of 10 is made by 1, which grants the attacker +1 Damage Class. This is easy to remember and scales evenly, but doesn't overly reward characters that make truly impressive to hit differentials. BASIC EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 This can be scaled up or down by the GM to suit their campaign by varying the ratio of extra success to extra damage; for instance a GM could set the ratio at +1 Damage Class per 2 points a character makes their Attack Roll by. LESS EXTREME EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 0 1 1 2 2 3 3 4 4 5 A GM could also make hitting by a little not make much differenct but hitting by a lot being extremely lethal by basing the to hit vs DC ratio on a Fibonacci sequence instead as displayed in the following table. Basically using this kind of progression hitting by 5 or less is not much different than the basic progression (and is in fact more moderate overall), but an Attack Roll that hits by 6 is more comparatively deadly, and anything that hits by 7 or more is almost absolutely fatal. FIBONACCI EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 Any other progression of this sort is equally valid based on the GM's preferences, of course. The following displays the same concept on an exponential progression which is easier to remember and more consistent with HERO System doubling rules but would result in excessively higher damage if on the same scale as the Fibonacci sequence; thus this chart is based on a progression of hitting by 2 more than needed per step. EXPONENTIAL EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 2 4 8 10 Extra DC: 0 1 2 4 8 And so on; it's just a numbers game. Any approach that is easy to remember and apply at the table that rewards hitting with a margin of succes at a rate acceptable to the GM and players is equally valid for that group.

Unless you are making other characters pay points for a mechanical build out for backpacks and belt pouches and so forth, there's no reason to make a "Ysoki" character pay points for a variant SFX of a backpack.
 
Is this a heroic game where equipment costs money not points?
 
 
 

name ref: Ed "Killer Shrike" Hastings
 
url: http://www.killershrike.com/FantasyHERO/FantasyHERO.aspx

Thanks, Shrike.
 
Much appreciate you posting your interesting Critcal Rules, and look forward to using the Epiphany rules.
 
 

I included a section on Critical Hits in my "Lethality Guidelines" 
 
http://www.killershrike.com/fantasyHero/HighFantasyHERO/shrikeLethalityOptions_Unofficial.aspx
 
CRITICAL HITS Some other games have a concept of "critical hits"; strikes that randomly do more damage than normal. The HERO System tends to shy away from "random" and lacks such an option natively. However different variations of critical hits have been suggested at or described as possible options in some supplements over the years, and some play groups have versions that they use. Described below is my version of "critical hits", which I call the "Rule of Three", that I've used successfully for years. I also describe a Critical Hit concept based on a "lucky die" mechanic, and a mechanic based on degree of success. NOTE: You should probably only implement one kind of Critical Hit rules in a given campaign; two or more can get severely out of hand. RULE OF THREE If a character (PC or NPC) rolls a natural three on a 3d6 roll under type of check then they have the option of either taking "max effect" or an "epiphany". MAX EFFECT If the three was made for an Attack Roll max effect is the maximum possible damage or effect with that attack (treat all effect dice as having rolled 6's). If the three was made for a non attack roll, not only does the character win any opposed roll (even if the opponent made their roll by more) or succeed at their task, but they do so in a stylish looked-cool-doing-it fashion which is also justification for gaining a "Display of Power" bonus to a Presense Attack made sometime within the next few actions against anyone that observed them. EPIPHANY The character has a flash of insight regarding the skill or ability that they rolled a three for and their competency with that ability is expanded. The character gains +2 character points to allocate towards a bonus with that skill or attack. For attacks this translates into a +1 OCV Combat Skill Level with that attack. If a skill this translates into either a +1 or +2 with that skill depending on whether the skill is on the 3/2 or 2/1 costing model. If the three was rolled for a familiarity, the familiarity becomes a full skill instead. This can not be used to upgrade existing levels; for example a character could not opt to bump an All Combat level to an Overall Level with the 2 free points gained in this fashion -- the 2 pts must be spent specifically for the task they were gained from. However, levels gained in this fashion can themselves be upgraded later with experience. For example a 2 pt +1 OCV level with a specific kind of pistol could be upgraded to a 3 pt "Pistols" tight group level later on. LUCKY DAMAGE DICE Some other games have the idea of a "lucky die" which is rerolled and cumulatively added if its max value comes up. In other words, if the lucky die is a d6, then if it rolls a 6 it is rerolled and the result adds to the original 6; if another 6 comes up it is rolled and added in again and so forth until it stops rolling 6's. The HERO System already grants more damage to a 6 when doing Normal damage in the form of +1 BODY inflicted but Killing damage gets no such consideration. In the interests of increasing lethality you as the GM can decide to up the ante further by implementing a "Lucky Damage Dice" House Rule for Killing damage. You can specify that this rule applies to all Killing damage dice, which is a powerful / dangerous kind of critical hit that will occur often and can result in one-hit kills vs. even protected targets, or you can specify that only one die (represented by a physically different die) is "lucky" which is much less extreme. DOVETAIL WITH LUCK POWER Alternately, you can converge this with the Luck Power and allow characters to buy Luck dice defined as "Lucky Damage Dice" instead of the normal function of Luck dice, and a character can roll as many Lucky Damage Dice on a given attack as they have purchased up to the limit of the attack (a character with 3d6 Lucky Damage Dice using a 2d6 Killing Attack would only roll 2 dice but both would be "lucky"; if they later picked up a weapon that does 4d6 Killing they would roll 4d6 and 3 dice would be "lucky"). CRITICAL SKILL / DEGREE OF SUCCESS Some games feature a mechanic whereby more skilled attackers inflict more damage due to their increased skill. The HERO System allows this to some extent if Hit Locations are being used since a more skilled attacker can overcome to hit penalties for choicer hit locations, but using Called Shots can result in a total miss which can seem very odd in practice. An alternative to relying on Called Shots (and even Hit Locations in general) is a mechanic whereby characters that hit by more than they needed inflict more damage. The base mechanic is +1 Damage Class per 1 point a character made their Attack Roll by; thus in a 3 OCV vs 3 DCV scenario, an Attack Roll of 10 is made by 1, which grants the attacker +1 Damage Class. This is easy to remember and scales evenly, but doesn't overly reward characters that make truly impressive to hit differentials. BASIC EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 This can be scaled up or down by the GM to suit their campaign by varying the ratio of extra success to extra damage; for instance a GM could set the ratio at +1 Damage Class per 2 points a character makes their Attack Roll by. LESS EXTREME EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 0 1 1 2 2 3 3 4 4 5 A GM could also make hitting by a little not make much differenct but hitting by a lot being extremely lethal by basing the to hit vs DC ratio on a Fibonacci sequence instead as displayed in the following table. Basically using this kind of progression hitting by 5 or less is not much different than the basic progression (and is in fact more moderate overall), but an Attack Roll that hits by 6 is more comparatively deadly, and anything that hits by 7 or more is almost absolutely fatal. FIBONACCI EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 Any other progression of this sort is equally valid based on the GM's preferences, of course. The following displays the same concept on an exponential progression which is easier to remember and more consistent with HERO System doubling rules but would result in excessively higher damage if on the same scale as the Fibonacci sequence; thus this chart is based on a progression of hitting by 2 more than needed per step. EXPONENTIAL EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 2 4 8 10 Extra DC: 0 1 2 4 8 And so on; it's just a numbers game. Any approach that is easy to remember and apply at the table that rewards hitting with a margin of succes at a rate acceptable to the GM and players is equally valid for that group.

I included a section on Critical Hits in my "Lethality Guidelines" 
 
http://www.killershrike.com/fantasyHero/HighFantasyHERO/shrikeLethalityOptions_Unofficial.aspx
 
CRITICAL HITS Some other games have a concept of "critical hits"; strikes that randomly do more damage than normal. The HERO System tends to shy away from "random" and lacks such an option natively. However different variations of critical hits have been suggested at or described as possible options in some supplements over the years, and some play groups have versions that they use. Described below is my version of "critical hits", which I call the "Rule of Three", that I've used successfully for years. I also describe a Critical Hit concept based on a "lucky die" mechanic, and a mechanic based on degree of success. NOTE: You should probably only implement one kind of Critical Hit rules in a given campaign; two or more can get severely out of hand. RULE OF THREE If a character (PC or NPC) rolls a natural three on a 3d6 roll under type of check then they have the option of either taking "max effect" or an "epiphany". MAX EFFECT If the three was made for an Attack Roll max effect is the maximum possible damage or effect with that attack (treat all effect dice as having rolled 6's). If the three was made for a non attack roll, not only does the character win any opposed roll (even if the opponent made their roll by more) or succeed at their task, but they do so in a stylish looked-cool-doing-it fashion which is also justification for gaining a "Display of Power" bonus to a Presense Attack made sometime within the next few actions against anyone that observed them. EPIPHANY The character has a flash of insight regarding the skill or ability that they rolled a three for and their competency with that ability is expanded. The character gains +2 character points to allocate towards a bonus with that skill or attack. For attacks this translates into a +1 OCV Combat Skill Level with that attack. If a skill this translates into either a +1 or +2 with that skill depending on whether the skill is on the 3/2 or 2/1 costing model. If the three was rolled for a familiarity, the familiarity becomes a full skill instead. This can not be used to upgrade existing levels; for example a character could not opt to bump an All Combat level to an Overall Level with the 2 free points gained in this fashion -- the 2 pts must be spent specifically for the task they were gained from. However, levels gained in this fashion can themselves be upgraded later with experience. For example a 2 pt +1 OCV level with a specific kind of pistol could be upgraded to a 3 pt "Pistols" tight group level later on. LUCKY DAMAGE DICE Some other games have the idea of a "lucky die" which is rerolled and cumulatively added if its max value comes up. In other words, if the lucky die is a d6, then if it rolls a 6 it is rerolled and the result adds to the original 6; if another 6 comes up it is rolled and added in again and so forth until it stops rolling 6's. The HERO System already grants more damage to a 6 when doing Normal damage in the form of +1 BODY inflicted but Killing damage gets no such consideration. In the interests of increasing lethality you as the GM can decide to up the ante further by implementing a "Lucky Damage Dice" House Rule for Killing damage. You can specify that this rule applies to all Killing damage dice, which is a powerful / dangerous kind of critical hit that will occur often and can result in one-hit kills vs. even protected targets, or you can specify that only one die (represented by a physically different die) is "lucky" which is much less extreme. DOVETAIL WITH LUCK POWER Alternately, you can converge this with the Luck Power and allow characters to buy Luck dice defined as "Lucky Damage Dice" instead of the normal function of Luck dice, and a character can roll as many Lucky Damage Dice on a given attack as they have purchased up to the limit of the attack (a character with 3d6 Lucky Damage Dice using a 2d6 Killing Attack would only roll 2 dice but both would be "lucky"; if they later picked up a weapon that does 4d6 Killing they would roll 4d6 and 3 dice would be "lucky"). CRITICAL SKILL / DEGREE OF SUCCESS Some games feature a mechanic whereby more skilled attackers inflict more damage due to their increased skill. The HERO System allows this to some extent if Hit Locations are being used since a more skilled attacker can overcome to hit penalties for choicer hit locations, but using Called Shots can result in a total miss which can seem very odd in practice. An alternative to relying on Called Shots (and even Hit Locations in general) is a mechanic whereby characters that hit by more than they needed inflict more damage. The base mechanic is +1 Damage Class per 1 point a character made their Attack Roll by; thus in a 3 OCV vs 3 DCV scenario, an Attack Roll of 10 is made by 1, which grants the attacker +1 Damage Class. This is easy to remember and scales evenly, but doesn't overly reward characters that make truly impressive to hit differentials. BASIC EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 This can be scaled up or down by the GM to suit their campaign by varying the ratio of extra success to extra damage; for instance a GM could set the ratio at +1 Damage Class per 2 points a character makes their Attack Roll by. LESS EXTREME EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 0 1 1 2 2 3 3 4 4 5 A GM could also make hitting by a little not make much differenct but hitting by a lot being extremely lethal by basing the to hit vs DC ratio on a Fibonacci sequence instead as displayed in the following table. Basically using this kind of progression hitting by 5 or less is not much different than the basic progression (and is in fact more moderate overall), but an Attack Roll that hits by 6 is more comparatively deadly, and anything that hits by 7 or more is almost absolutely fatal. FIBONACCI EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 Any other progression of this sort is equally valid based on the GM's preferences, of course. The following displays the same concept on an exponential progression which is easier to remember and more consistent with HERO System doubling rules but would result in excessively higher damage if on the same scale as the Fibonacci sequence; thus this chart is based on a progression of hitting by 2 more than needed per step. EXPONENTIAL EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 2 4 8 10 Extra DC: 0 1 2 4 8 And so on; it's just a numbers game. Any approach that is easy to remember and apply at the table that rewards hitting with a margin of succes at a rate acceptable to the GM and players is equally valid for that group.

I included a section on Critical Hits in my "Lethality Guidelines" 
 
http://www.killershrike.com/fantasyHero/HighFantasyHERO/shrikeLethalityOptions_Unofficial.aspx
 
CRITICAL HITS Some other games have a concept of "critical hits"; strikes that randomly do more damage than normal. The HERO System tends to shy away from "random" and lacks such an option natively. However different variations of critical hits have been suggested at or described as possible options in some supplements over the years, and some play groups have versions that they use. Described below is my version of "critical hits", which I call the "Rule of Three", that I've used successfully for years. I also describe a Critical Hit concept based on a "lucky die" mechanic, and a mechanic based on degree of success. NOTE: You should probably only implement one kind of Critical Hit rules in a given campaign; two or more can get severely out of hand. RULE OF THREE If a character (PC or NPC) rolls a natural three on a 3d6 roll under type of check then they have the option of either taking "max effect" or an "epiphany". MAX EFFECT If the three was made for an Attack Roll max effect is the maximum possible damage or effect with that attack (treat all effect dice as having rolled 6's). If the three was made for a non attack roll, not only does the character win any opposed roll (even if the opponent made their roll by more) or succeed at their task, but they do so in a stylish looked-cool-doing-it fashion which is also justification for gaining a "Display of Power" bonus to a Presense Attack made sometime within the next few actions against anyone that observed them. EPIPHANY The character has a flash of insight regarding the skill or ability that they rolled a three for and their competency with that ability is expanded. The character gains +2 character points to allocate towards a bonus with that skill or attack. For attacks this translates into a +1 OCV Combat Skill Level with that attack. If a skill this translates into either a +1 or +2 with that skill depending on whether the skill is on the 3/2 or 2/1 costing model. If the three was rolled for a familiarity, the familiarity becomes a full skill instead. This can not be used to upgrade existing levels; for example a character could not opt to bump an All Combat level to an Overall Level with the 2 free points gained in this fashion -- the 2 pts must be spent specifically for the task they were gained from. However, levels gained in this fashion can themselves be upgraded later with experience. For example a 2 pt +1 OCV level with a specific kind of pistol could be upgraded to a 3 pt "Pistols" tight group level later on. LUCKY DAMAGE DICE Some other games have the idea of a "lucky die" which is rerolled and cumulatively added if its max value comes up. In other words, if the lucky die is a d6, then if it rolls a 6 it is rerolled and the result adds to the original 6; if another 6 comes up it is rolled and added in again and so forth until it stops rolling 6's. The HERO System already grants more damage to a 6 when doing Normal damage in the form of +1 BODY inflicted but Killing damage gets no such consideration. In the interests of increasing lethality you as the GM can decide to up the ante further by implementing a "Lucky Damage Dice" House Rule for Killing damage. You can specify that this rule applies to all Killing damage dice, which is a powerful / dangerous kind of critical hit that will occur often and can result in one-hit kills vs. even protected targets, or you can specify that only one die (represented by a physically different die) is "lucky" which is much less extreme. DOVETAIL WITH LUCK POWER Alternately, you can converge this with the Luck Power and allow characters to buy Luck dice defined as "Lucky Damage Dice" instead of the normal function of Luck dice, and a character can roll as many Lucky Damage Dice on a given attack as they have purchased up to the limit of the attack (a character with 3d6 Lucky Damage Dice using a 2d6 Killing Attack would only roll 2 dice but both would be "lucky"; if they later picked up a weapon that does 4d6 Killing they would roll 4d6 and 3 dice would be "lucky"). CRITICAL SKILL / DEGREE OF SUCCESS Some games feature a mechanic whereby more skilled attackers inflict more damage due to their increased skill. The HERO System allows this to some extent if Hit Locations are being used since a more skilled attacker can overcome to hit penalties for choicer hit locations, but using Called Shots can result in a total miss which can seem very odd in practice. An alternative to relying on Called Shots (and even Hit Locations in general) is a mechanic whereby characters that hit by more than they needed inflict more damage. The base mechanic is +1 Damage Class per 1 point a character made their Attack Roll by; thus in a 3 OCV vs 3 DCV scenario, an Attack Roll of 10 is made by 1, which grants the attacker +1 Damage Class. This is easy to remember and scales evenly, but doesn't overly reward characters that make truly impressive to hit differentials. BASIC EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 This can be scaled up or down by the GM to suit their campaign by varying the ratio of extra success to extra damage; for instance a GM could set the ratio at +1 Damage Class per 2 points a character makes their Attack Roll by. LESS EXTREME EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 0 1 1 2 2 3 3 4 4 5 A GM could also make hitting by a little not make much differenct but hitting by a lot being extremely lethal by basing the to hit vs DC ratio on a Fibonacci sequence instead as displayed in the following table. Basically using this kind of progression hitting by 5 or less is not much different than the basic progression (and is in fact more moderate overall), but an Attack Roll that hits by 6 is more comparatively deadly, and anything that hits by 7 or more is almost absolutely fatal. FIBONACCI EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Extra DC: 0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 Any other progression of this sort is equally valid based on the GM's preferences, of course. The following displays the same concept on an exponential progression which is easier to remember and more consistent with HERO System doubling rules but would result in excessively higher damage if on the same scale as the Fibonacci sequence; thus this chart is based on a progression of hitting by 2 more than needed per step. EXPONENTIAL EXTRA DAMAGE SEQUENCE Hit by: 0 2 4 8 10 Extra DC: 0 1 2 4 8 And so on; it's just a numbers game. Any approach that is easy to remember and apply at the table that rewards hitting with a margin of succes at a rate acceptable to the GM and players is equally valid for that group.

I allowed it as an option for many years in a variety of genres and it works very well in execution, at least in my opinion and that of the players in various games who used it. It makes its usefulness quantifiable and puts it entirely into the control of the player. It is direct probability manipulation as opposed to hand-wavium.
 
Don't get me wrong, I think that the vague version of Luck in the HERO System offers something as well, as a sort of deus ex machina power. The Intervention ability in Here There Be Monsters is a direct re-casting of the by-the-book Luck power for instance. It's essentially a "miracle" power; roll the dice and hope for the best.
 
However for most "lucky" sfx characters, the direct dice result manipulation version is more practical and gets less tiresome, again in my opinion.
 
A good indication of it's efficacy is that in my experience back in the day players who knew what was up did not bother taking the standard Luck power in RAW, instead relying on skill bonuses or skill levels with the sfx of "lucky" and other such crab-wise attempts to model luck as succeeding more often than average at various tasks. The occasional newb might take Luck, but would invariably be disappointed with it in practice and regret taking it. I offered up the original version of the point based variant for a player wanting a probability manipulating super, and it worked out well and became available for later games. Players started to take it here and there...not so many as to indicate that it was too good and not so few as to indicate that it sucked...it sat nicely in the "goldilocks zone" of providing good value for the cost but not so much as to make it stupid to not take some.
 
 

I'm not sure why you think you'd need both.
 
With Personal Immunity, you're immune. The Power cannot effect you even if Reflected, etc. Only you are protected.
 
With Selective Targeting you can elect not to target some people who would otherwise be in the Area, including yourself. You can thus avoid targeting allies. But you are subject to the power if it is for example Reflected.
 
Lucius Alexander
 
Palindromedary Immunity

You might consider a triggered effect instead of Damage Shield. 

If you mean, the bionic implants and chemical infusions that give the official Champions supervillain Ripper his powers, they're only mentioned in relation to Ripper. His last write-up was published in VIPER: Coils Of The Serpent. There isn't a great deal of description there, though.
 
Champions Online did a little more with Omicron tech for that MMORPG. I might be able to find something about it online, if that would interest you.

The 4e UMA wasn't some class splatbook. It expanded the hero system combat engine itself. Most of this stuff later became defacto hero system fundamentals in 5e / 6e. It's a really good book. There's some overlap w/ Ninja Hero which is also very good, but UMA was very broadly applicable.
 
Seriously, take my word for it, it's good. 
 

 

I've heard HERO folks swear by UMA just like I hear GURPS folks swear by GURPS Martial Arts, and I do understand that additional combat maneuvers can be critical to some campaigns. But every time I read through those books my eyes just glaze over. I feel like I'm probably missing out on something, but it's just not apparent to me what it is.
 
Someday I'll have to make a point to be a player in some campaigns that use the material in those books to good effect. That may help me see more clearly what bits may be useful in my campaigns.
 
 

The 4e UMA wasn't some class splatbook. It expanded the hero system combat engine itself. Most of this stuff later became defacto hero system fundamentals in 5e / 6e. It's a really good book. There's some overlap w/ Ninja Hero which is also very good, but UMA was very broadly applicable.
 
Seriously, take my word for it, it's good. 
 

 

Agreed. And that's the one exception to my not using Ultimate books.
 

I considered (and still do) Ultimate Martial Artist to be compulsory for 4th Edition. My 4th Edition kit that I took to every session away from home was the slim George Perez  cover Hero System #500 rulebook, UMA, and the Bestiary.
 

Given the givens, if I were to play 4e again, I'd backref 5th editions Ultimate Skill. It's almost entirely relevant to 4e and was a very welcome extension for the system, particularly heroic level play.

I considered (and still do) Ultimate Martial Artist to be compulsory for 4th Edition. My 4th Edition kit that I took to every session away from home was the slim George Perez  cover Hero System #500 rulebook, UMA, and the Bestiary.
 

Second to the above. Complex MP's (generally those with more than one flex slot) I use the same rules as suggested above, you get some time to decide and then I move on. This is the same rules that i use for VPP's that can be changed in combat. If it is a consistent problem with a player who refuses to pre-calculate oft used combinations, I use something like https://e.ggtimer.com/ and give them 30 seconds or a minute. At first it seems harsh, but most people get the point pretty quickly, figure out their common scenarios and I drop the timer.
 
If the player has trouble with the math, I have zero problems building it out for them or giving them an Excel sheet that allows them to do it themselves pretty easily (yes, it's custom per MP, but not that hard to do). I do find that some people just don't like the math aspects and that's fine since I have been doing this long enough that it's trivial now.
 
- E

Quick side point about STR.  If you want any kind of realism at all, STR can probably be stopped or slowed WAY before 50.  That's 25 tons.  Like the argument about modeling on Atom, Ant Man, and Giant Man, uber-STR is modeled on Superman lifting an entire (big) plane.  Uhhh...problems.  How much force are Superman's hands exerting on the metal skin?  Or the "pick up and throw a building"...the building material at the point of contact will fail under the stress WAY before that.  Not to mention maintaining grip.  Even something like a car...grab it by the bumper, the bumper probably just rips off.  
 
Realistically the doubling every time is fairly ludicrous from the get-go.  They just did it, IMO, because all the major models were the uber-cinematic mega-STR "freaks" like Hulk, Thing, and Superman.  Trying to price this level at anything close to sane, would be hugely expensive, or create something too complex.  

GURPS has a lifting STR, that's basically proportional to STR ^2.  (Basic Lift, the amount you can lift, in pounds,  in 1 hand in 1 second...that is, a simple basic action...is STR^2 / 5.  Max lift is both hands, and 4 seconds.  It's 8x basic lift.  These basically translate to a Haymaker.)  I like that approach for street level stuff.  STR 10 GURPS can struggle with 160 pounds, but it's taking all they've got.  STR 20 can lift 640.  World-class lifters can go higher but not that much, so the scale works fairly well so far.  It breaks down if you want serious STR, because STR 40 is only 2500 pounds.  That's not even "lift a small car" level.  BUT, if you want to keep a more realistic game...I think it's worth considering.  
 
EDIT:  that said, I do like abstracting lifting STR as a roll, just because trying to estimate weight, or force needed to accomplish something, is unreasonable for most GMs.