Duke Bushido

As one of you already knows, my job gives us the week of July 4 off. The youth group is, of course, off all summer. We have played a _lot_ of Champions this week. Final game of the week (I called off the Sunday--the normal-- game because, well, I have other things to do, I'm afraid. ) Red Cloak's player: Okay, I want to unleash my Cloud of Fear, but I want to make a presence attack out of it. Me: sure; no problem. Describe it for me. Red Cloak (per description): [eyes begin to glow, clouds begin to circle overhead and the sun seems to dim just a little] Red Cloak's player: I let the Dark Spirits slip just a little bit into me, and my voice becomes raspy and like rocks grinding as I start chanting the incantation for the cloud of fear. The wind starts to pick up and the air feels electrified. Slowly long ribbons of fog start to ooze out from beneath my cloak, and they bring the smell of burning brimstone... Two other players look at each other with clamped lips and big knowing eyes. A third catches on and begins to giggle Red Cloak's player: It's a _spell_, you idiots! A spell! At which point the entire table lost it. I love kids.

Back home we referred to them as "dump eagles."

Considering that you have to buy it for x amount of active points, and that I am talking about the redundant and out of place nature of martial arts as a special case in an otherwise-universal system, I felt it was understood that the amount of naked advantage purchased and any appropriate modifiers would be model a usage restrained to various permutations of fisticuffs and the occasional "Hi-yah!" Forgive the mistake of the assumption, please. And as I mentioned earlier, I learned decades ago not to tilt too long or too hard at this most sacred of windmills. In spite of an over-arcing desire to see all things unified and equal and reduced to their bare and equal minimums, there has always been a silent "except the really Batman stuff" affixed to the end of that particular desire, and I know better than to point it out too terribly often. (it is good to see you back, Sir. I see you brought Manic Typist with you. :) )

All right folks, and thank you in particular for the idea, DialN, I present UltraViolent (sic), invisible assassin and death-dealing berserker: Thanks again, DialN; the youth group kids are going to love it! Duke

You get NND with _everything_ if you buy the naked advantage. As for the rest of the list, the regular combat maneuvers provide you with these things. You add your extra seasonings to make them "martial." Or, they are martial because you say they are martial. Martial arts is a selected SFX _that you have to pay for_ under the rules for abilities that anyone can buy so long as they don't call them "martial."

Excellent haul! I'm quite excited for you. I also have to level with you: Cyber HERO is-- if you're a fan of the genre during the era in which it was written-- kind of a disappointment. It always felt like there was a _lot_ left behind on the author's notepads somewhere. I can't validate this, but I have heard a couple of times that there was a proposed "Companion" to expand the material, but it never happened owing to the unfortunate death of the / one of the authors. But if you _are_ a fan of the genre, I'm going to recommend a Hero Plus book to you: Kazei 5. You really have to wear your anime-filtering glasses when you read it, and (wow, this is probably going to be unpopular) I never felt it was strong enough to stand on it's own (the 6e version is about number 30 in my "read next" line, and may or may not be better; I don't know), but if you can filter out the cat girls / Japanophile stuff, it really is a _solid_ companion to Cyber HERO. Let me clarify: this isn't just a fan work or some little nothing like I might stamp out! The author (Surbrook) is a professional game book writer and an _excellent_ researcher. He just has a large "Asia is the bestest" steak that comes to light in his Asia-centric works. It's not glaring (i'm not calling him a weaboo or anything like that; we're all fans of something, after all. My own "bestest" is adjectives. Adjectives are the bestest! ). At any rate, it's a solid work, and feels right at home blended into Cyber HERO. Another recommended source is the original Talisorian games (before the re-named rerelease) CyberPunk 2013. The second edition was re-named CyberPunk 2020 (same rules, really), and while it delved a bit deeper into play and the environment, it chose to use the artwork from the European release of 2013, and it really lost a _lot_ of the feel of American CyberPunk in doing so. I don't know much about European CyberPunk (Japanese CyberPunk, excellently mastered in the horribly-managed 80s cartoon series "Bubblegum Crisis," is very much like American CyberPunk, only without the social pretense of "upbeat enthusiasm" and a bit less "quiet desperation," and a crap load more actual robots. Can't recommend the 80s series (at least, what actually made it into the public) enough. The 90s (early Oughts?) remake was lovingly done by someone who really liked the original, but it really misses the mark on "feel." I'm guessing it was done by someone who didn't actually remember the 80s. That being said, there used to be a _wealth_ of websites for fans of CyberHERO (back during the days of web rings and the Circle of Heroes), some of which _may_ survive in some form today (the ones I've looked for are either dead or Facebook pages). The Wayback Machine is your friend. Personally, I think Tuala Morn is awesome, and is hands-down one of the best things to come out of 5e. I know that Turakian Age features an awesome campaign setting and lots of political intrigue and a well-understood and known world, and Tuala Morn doesn't, and honestly, that's why I like Tuala Morn better. I didn't build a rope-climbing, axe-swinging, scroll-wielding, wilderness survivor keen to find the stolen sacred statuettes that ensure the prosperity of his village through bountiful harvests for a thousand years to come for him to instead just go sit in the Senate and listen to debates about the situation between the Republic and the Trade Federation. Now to give Steve his due, _unlike_ Lucas, Steve's writing demonstrates that he most definitely _does_ know how a government works; he knows how more than one government works, and he knows how to add some fictionalized bits to replace the more boring realistic bits: Turakian Age _ain't_ a bad thing. I just like Tuala Morn much, much more. Oh: and while it's my second-favorite sourcebook (right after Western HERO), in the interest of honesty I have to point out that Star HERO was a 3e book. It borrowed heavily from Robot Warriors, modified into equipment and vehicle creation. I didn't care a lot for that aspect of it, but it worked. It also had the advantage of being a 3e book: it was the last complete playable stand-alone game under the HERO banner. (Man, I wish Super Agents had gotten that touch!). I don't say that to give you a history lesson, but to point out that there's not a _lot_ of advice on running the genre or building a universe. Instead, there are rules on running that game and it gives you a universe. Keep that in mind. Still, I've had lots of fun with it. Depends on the sorts of adventures you'd like to run. Given the core of roleplaying gamers are into Fantasy, definitely FH, and honestly, I'd recommend all three editions 3-5. I haven't read (in spite of owning) FH 6e yet, as too many people have told me it wasn't different enough from 5e to bother with, but I am sort of a completionist in that regard, and I'll get to it anyway. Eventually. For Pulp, Fantasy, or Sci-Fi, I really suggest an old 3e book called "Lands of Mystery." While it actually is an adventure and actually presents a world, there's also a lot of nice advice for creating a world in which to adventure. It's from a "game play" point of view as opposed to a science point of view, so the focus is on keeping things enjoyable, physics be damned, and it's a quick read. I haven't read the 5e Hidden Lands yet (#2 on my list), but I'm hoping it's an expansion of this work. At any rate, I'd recommend all the genre books from 5e, same as I do from 4e. _However_, they are written for the most part by Steve. There is _nothing_ wrong with that, as the man does some fantastic research, and he can crank out some words. Which actually leads to the problem.... In his enthusiasm to provide you with _all_ the knowledge and _all_ the options, these massive books also put a lot of work on _you_, as he makes no preferences, and instead leaves you with a couple hundred options. Putting them together into something cohesive? That's on _you_, Buddy. Still, the information is fun to read, and nice to have. I also recommend the GURPS 3e and 4e genre books, as they tend to be high-water marks in the industry. After that, I'd suggest the Ultimates books, all of them. They have the same problem as the 5e genre books, though: you are presented so many ways to do so many things that ultimately, you may end up more perplexed than before you started. But let me tell you, they _do_ bring out the inspiration! If you have the 5e rules, you really don't need Dark Champions. The 5e rules are rather like all the ideas of Dark Champions leaked out and stained the core rule book. Stained lovingly, if you must, because I don't intend that to be insulting in any way. I didn't like Dark Champions for a lot of reasons (and I'm in the minority) not the least of which was the record level of min-maxing characters with builds such as "Desolid: only versus Damage" (My paraphrasing; not an actual build presented that I remember). This supplement was written by Steve, who would later go on to write the entire 5e book and the vast majority of the supplements. As you would expect, he brought his ideas forward and-- well, this isn't about a review of the new rules. Let's just say "I didn't like the feel the first time; expanding it didn't help." As others have noted, this can be used as the basis of modern Heroic-level campaigns. All you have to do is remove all references to crazed homicidial mania the heroes presented and the overall "crushing" of the theme, and put that into the CyberPunk Book. After that, it's pretty much, as suggested, "Action HERO." In 4e, anyway. As 5e attempts to rip out all the rules from everywhere and put them into one book (and then present "rules options" in the genre books anyway, in spite of itself) in a sort of "let's re-do what 4e did" methodology (which wasn't a bad thing, mind you!), the 5e "Dark Champions" is pretty much just the theme of lunatics and gun nuts gutting drug pushers while the bad guys vivisect prostitutes and catholic school students while somehow remaining "above the law." The Good Guys smash their kneecaps and light fire to their genitals while filling their abdomens with incendiary rounds because burnt pork smells awesome. Yep. That's got "heroic action" written all over it. What can I say? It was a product of it's angsty "we're so totally in love with vigilantes and antiheroes right now!" times. Yes: Dark Champions has not only a lot of heroic-level rules, but it's also the biggest taste of "what's to come" in terms of the rules. Can't argue that. However, if you've got all the other genre books, you'll see that a lot of Dark Champions' rules mods came from. DC does make a nice "all in one place" presentation, as it includes all but the most genre-specific stuff from the other volumes. Good deal. It's been my personal favorite sourcebook for many, many years simply because it is precisely what I want to see in a sourcebook, and laid out in a very appealing way. Sure, it's mostly for "Westerns" in terms of the campaign and adventure suggestions, etc, but when you get right down to it: there are a lot of gun battles in ancient Philadelphia even today, and a lot of frontiers in Star HERO, so my copy has seen _lots_ of use. That's number 4 on my "read next" list, actually. I got the PDF in the BOH a while back; I'm half-heartedly looking for a print copy. I've never owned that book (not into the alternate dimensions thing), and I really prefer reading books to staring at lighted screens. Someone else a while back recommended it as worthwhile, so I figured I'd give it a shot.

Well I just bought my official copy. Looks like he put it up without the covers.

As I've been asked to hold off on the Adventurers Club project, I think my next project is going to be to tear down and scan an _actual_ 1e Enemies book. The one in the store is a 2e book in a 1e wrapper. Then maybe a 1e Champions rules book. That one won't take much: the one in the store is great (I could use that scan to print a book in better condition than my copy of 1e ), but it's got 2e character sheets in it. :/

Never mind, Brian: Take a look here:

It's in Jason's hands right now. He said he plans to release it in the HERO store and-- was it Drive Thru? One other site. I can check my e-mail and get back to you. But no; I'm not sure when. I know he dropped a hit that he was currently working on something else, so it's possible he got busy and didn't put Western up right away. Personally, I'm a bit anxious to buy an official copy. For what it's worth, he might not want to release it as it is and may be tinkering with it. I included the covers as separate bits, but I did _not_ put the covers onto the bulk of the "book." I didn't want to create load time annoyances for folks using phones and cheap tablets at the gaming table. They will _have_ the covers, but they won't have to wade through the covers just to look something up in the book. It's possible Jason didn't like that and is doing further work to the files; I really don't know.

You are quite right, but the problem with Tform is that you have to pay points for that ability. Now you can take it and pile limitations on it about time limits and work stations and raw materials, etc., but you are paying points to do what the points you spent on "smithy" or "forge" or "boatwright" already say you can do. And of course you've still got to pony up for tools, station, time, and material. Then you have to decide what sort of a T-form this is. Is "ore to sword" minor, cosmetic, or major? How long before it turns back? In one hundred years, will my glass bottle be sand again? Do I watch as my house slowly takes root and sprouts leaves to become a tree because I only bought my T-form recovery rate at X level? I hate to say this, because of the digression it can result in, but this is one of the points HERO has never successfully nailed down. In this case, however, the system doesn't break down as much as do the players. Our zealous insistance on defining not just our characters and abilities in game terms, but every tiny thing in our universes, means that everyone will now and forever have their own unique take on the "right" way to do something, and generally have some sort of sound reasoning behind this belief. Now if you're just asking opinions, I don't fall into the "if it can be broken it must be statted-out camp. I also tend to come down heavily, particularly in Heroic games, that if it can be done with a skill, then it _should_ be done with a skill. Not to say I won't allow some sort of magician to raise a house of stone from the ground beneath his feet (definite T-form there; no "summon: houses" in my games ) but the one built with a skill is going to be a real, permane t-until-it-rots house, while the other can be dispelled or will turn back within the rules of the particular build used. A horse you break and train yourself is going to have more benefit to your character in the long run than the one conjured up with Summon: trained riding horse. " That's just the way I tend to run things, of course, and I cannot (and will not) tell you it is any better or worse than any other. It also means you don't have to be a wizard to build a house. And of course, someone went to a great deal of trouble to establish and refine the skill system (such as it is) for us to devalue it by insisting that we shouldn't use it any time it's appropriate.

Well there's something we haven't seen in a _while_ in a Luck thread: a new idea!

I would totally love to do that, but my stuff is useless to anyone playing new stuff, and with the strains on my free time currently, and at my age, I am _not_ committing the entirety of the new rules to memory for a project that, considering the market share, has little chance of seeing an audience of greater than 99 people. Now anyone interested in some old stuff, them I can help.

For what it's worth, I use it pretty much the way you do; that's pretty much how it's written up in the 2e rules, after all, and those are the rules I use. However, there are _tons_ of interesting suggestions all over the board for "de-randomizing" Luck, and for taking the GM out of it completely. The Luck threads tend to get really interesting, and really, really long.

Well, another "Up yours, Foggie!" Day has come and gone. I sincerely hope the rest of you slept better than I did.

Interesting. It brings to mind a mechanic from a totally forgettable rules-light western game I finished reading a couple of months ago (In my nonexistent free time, I'm adapting and expanding on a rather generic adventure from the rules book). Seriously, I honestly couldn't remember the name of that game if you offered money: it was that forgettable. But it had an interesting mechanic. I seem to recall it was one of those "cinematic" type systems (but again: I don't actually remember. Man was it unimpressive). I don't even remember how it affected the "regular" skill / attack roll, but along with the "skill check" dice players threw two additional dice of different colors from each other and the skill check dice. One was labeled "good luck / good things the other was, as you've already guessed, bad juju. subtract the bad from the good and do a thing with it. Wish I could remember the thing.... Maybe it modified your roll up and down? Removed penalties or somehow changed the scene? Lord, but it was forgettable-- the adventure was the only interesting thing in the whole dad-gummed book. It's not really going anywhere, but your comment made me think of the "roll the good and the bad and total them" aspect. If only I could remember what they were actually _for_, though.....

Pretty much the same here. Sometimes I'll also use the success level as bonus initiative dex when determining order of actions in the phase, on the idea that the guy with the tactics skill has worked himself into an advantageous situation in that regard. Ive also used it when a group is trying to locate a target on the move: "no; I don't think he would go that way. Sure, it makes sense at first blush, but based on what we know about him and what we've seen him do, I'd bet anything that he's somewhere in this area...." That sort of thing. And as above, as a complementary roll in appropriate situations.

Good Lord, that's a _glorious_ idea, at least in terms of revenue for the company. And honestly, if there is one Fandom with enough math guys to figure out some core principles, I'd have to say it was this one.

LL: Still out of rep, I'm afraid, but that was worth repping. I'll have to come back to you.

Dude, I'm out of rep for today, but I wanted to say "thanks." Thanks. Duke

You, my friend, have just shifted the tectonic plates. Get ready for a tsunami.......

It's called "pay to win." Video game addicts-- particularly phone games-- are so used to this that they don't even notice it anymore. Note I say the _addicts_. The ones that I have to dodge with heavy equipment because they can't even look up long enough to cross a damned highway. Casual video gamers -- again, especially the phone ones-- just seem to gripe and complain about how they can't get ahead, and how they refuse to pay money to win, and can't win because of it... but don't actually stop playing, either, so..... That's a new one on me; I rather like it. But here's the thing: I'm not going to knock someone for their choice in entertainment. Seriously: I'm not going to do it. Besides, as I said, I'm playing a collectable text book name now. We can't deny it: we keep saying "but the core rules are only these two books" and then turn around and say "No; that's not how you do it. Consult textbook three or four to see the "proper" way to do it. Gah-- I think I have a digression _reflex_ anymore.... No; that's not it. I'm off this week (plant closes for a week around the fourth, and another week around Christmas) and I have no idea what to do with myself..... As I was saying: the game ("Magic: The Marketing" is my personal favorite derision ) itself doesn't bug me. But as noted above, the "junkies" bug the Hell out of me. I remember the days when RPG groups were sucking up tables at local shops (I was blessed with access to an indoor Rec Center on the military reservation I lived near back then-- awesome place to have games and recruit players and air conditioning that made it possible to hang meat in there!), and I remember a time or two when two-- sometimes three-- small groups would awkwardly-- but willingly-- share a big table, splitting the rate and trying to keep the volume down enough to not disturb each other. I don't think the Magic "Crackheads" have a clue what "share" means. In my recreational driving range (90 miles is my "recreational range," as I live in farm country), there are only three game stores (and all of them kind of suck, but they have tables). And it's nothing to go to the closest one (forty-some miles from here) and see all twelve tables held up for Magic games, most of them with only two or three players at each table. Offer to split the rate with them so a group of five can use the other end of the big twelve-seater? Good God, you'd think you just offered to open a wound and sexually violate their kidneys! Making it worse, I've seen _two_ (and _only_ two!) groups of Magic players clean up behind themselves. The rest will willingly pay the "slob charge" when they leave. I've watched more than one group, in a hurry to get their fix, tell the staff they'd clean it themselves, then walk over to the table and just brush it all onto an empty chair, and even the stinkin' floor. Seriously, looking back, it really makes that "crackheads" remark seem much more appropriate.... Now again, that's _not_ saying "all magic players," but I have to say that it seems to apply to any of them I've seen under twenty-five or so--and again, I haven't seen all of those people, either. I only live in one place, after all. To reiterate: I don't have anything against the game itself (though it's decidedly not for me), but the players I've encountered tend to leave a bad taste in my mouth. Honestly, they bug me more than the wargaming / model builder hobbyists. (Nothing personal, Scott). Now I don't dislike these guys: most of them are _ridiculously_ cool people with incredible_ talent, and love for you to admire their work and generally will answer up to one-point-five million questions about it without losing their exuberance. The thing is: I need a table for two hours-- my big group, maybe four hours if there's going to be more than two combats. The war-game / model builder guys-- they need the table for four to five hours just to get set-up for their game. Then they need four more hours (sometimes six) to play their game. Then they need another two hours to tear it all down and take it to their car. It would likely take more hours to do by themselves, but I've never seen a war-game group that wouldn't happily assist in tear-down and clean-up; the model builder himself though, doesn't seem to want any help putting it together for whatever reason. These guys are all great (if ridiculously loud when the action gets hot, but I think we probably all do that whether we are aware of it or not), but the nature of their play style (I really like war gamers who don't have a model-builder in their group! ) means that whatever table they rent (and sometimes two, because sometimes the models are just that big!) is locked-up for that entire day; possibly two or three if there's a tournament. And if there are say... three groups there.... It used to bug me, but hey: If I had the talent and the time, my Champions set-ups would likely be very similar, so..... Unlike the Magic kids, though, those guys are actually _using_ the space, so it's easier to take your "no table today" lumps. Crap. Damned Digression Reflex again... I agree completely. I want to go just one bit more off-topic and address your last comment, because while it is secondary, it is also an _equal_ factor in my hated of piracy! If you (that's the general "you;" not the personally-acusatory one. We good?) continue to _steal_ the damned books and the PDFs, the places that you might go to actually _use_ them are drying up from lack of income. There was a time when I had SIXTEEN-- yes, SIXTEEN-- game stores within a hundred miles of where I sit as I type this. Now there are three. Do I lay it all squarely on the feet of PDF piracy and illegally-sourced scans? YES! No; of course I don't. But I can't help but wonder what would happen if every person who ever _posted_ a copy for piracy went out and bought five copies of everything he posted. Just five. Sure, I'd bet that if every person who downloaded a pirate copy bought one instead, I'd _still_ have sixteen game stores within an easy half-day round trip from me. Sure: the hobby collapse in the late 90s / early Oughts hurt a lot, but the piracy plays a bigger role than any pirate is ever going to take the time to think about. Problem is we are all complicit in the demise of the game store. You can't walk in and have the sales guy hand you a PDF. They sell books. Yes; I _love_ the books. I'm one of those old farts who _prefers_ the books! But I've been working on cataloguing my collection lately, and I've got way more PDFs than I do books. Why? I can afford them a hell of a lot better, for one. I still try to go back and _get_ the books, but it seems nothing gets re-printed anymore (and why would it? You can buy the PDF, after all-- even if, like me, you just _want_ the book!), meaning that usually I'm stuck with the PDF. In fact, since I switched jobs last year, I've found myself with a bit of extra "mad money" have been trying to rebuild a collection I had to toss out for personal reasons (no; I'm not going to talk about it). I had everything from 4e and back (save the Dark Champions stuff: I had the Dark Champions: Heroes of Vengeance book and knew there was no way in Hell I had any interest in the rest of that product line: I play _HERO_, not MURDERING LUNATIC. That, and-- well, it doesn't matter. Didn't like; still don't, moving on). It is _easier_ to find thirty-year old books than it is to find eight year old books. Seriously. Not just easier, but _way_ easier! I attribute this to the fact that there were no PDFs: publishers had to print more than four hundred books. What do modern game companies do? They print enough for pre-orders (I assume) and maybe a hundred or so for an upcoming con, and then 400 more, and that's it? Hell, it's really hard to know there's a chance to preorder unless you're online every damned day. To fill in the "gap" of demand, they make PDFs. A digital file-- not a book I have to scan and then clean out the watermarks my scanner installed or anything like that before I can post it to a pirate hub of some sort, but a file that I can quickly tear out the DRM (well, _I_ can't, but I can hit at least two people who can by walking out the street and throwing a rock) and toss it onto my favorite pirate hub. In this way, the game companies are-- unwillingly, I admit-- complicit in making piracy that much easier: it's way less labor-intensive than it used to be! Crud; I _am_ sorry. I keep wandering, but _damn_ do I detest the theft of intellectual property, and doubly-so for the damage it causes my favorite hobby. I know the feeling. Duke

My condolences. I realize that there are fans here-- we all play HERO because we like _games_, after all-- but the CCGs over all just have zero appeal for me. I tried getting into Jyhad back in the day, but I just couldn't do it. I also understand that they represent a much higher profit margin for store owners than do RPGs or even war-games, and it's frustrating. But that, my friends, is what HERO and other RPGs are up against: Something that with an initial investment of under twenty bucks and twenty minutes you can have up and running. HERO's current answer to Collectible Card Games is a Collectable Textbook Game with an initial investment of slightly more than twenty bucks and a month's worth of study. Even Basic: you need to _know_ the rules to play HERO simply because of their complexity. And in the last two editions, you've got to know where those damned sidebars are and which ones are which.

Honestly, two skill levels, two PSLs, 4 dice of damage-- maybe even a naked advantage or two-- boom. I have a hundred and fifty maneuvers, because I'm an amazing guy who can run with his arms flapping behind him. "Martial Arts" and special martial maneuvers are SFX, period, and this is the one place where it's perfectly acceptable to pay points for SFX while being able to apply your normal skill levels to _only the one thing_ that you ponied up for the special effect. Sure: it's a fun exercise. The more I think about it, the more I understand _why_ it has always been so popular with the majority of the fandom: It's something else to tinker with-- let's face it, we _all_ like to tinker and cobble and build. If we didn't, we'd have abandoned HERO _decades_ ago. While we can make grand and lofty speeches about the appeal of the open-ended design and the specificity of build control and the fact that you're not locked in to something--- at the end of the day, there are a _lot_ of open-ended universal system out there, and most of them are less work. We stick with HERO because it requires the most tinkering, and we love it. So yes; I understand why the Martial Arts rules caught on. Unfortunately, being attractive doesn't mean that have any place in a system that flat-out doesn't need them.

Thank you so much for that. Every now and again, something gives me that Zoolander moment: "I feel like I'm taking _crazy pills_!" Martial Arts has been doing it to me for year, but it's such a sacred cow for the bulk of the fandom that I don't poke it very often. It's easy enough to just ignore (and in the last three editions, ignoring it has saved me the cost of an entire book or two each edition!)