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Re: About Detect Magic (FH) This is what I do in my campaign. It's not based on active points but rather a subjective DM assessment. Very faint, residual aura: -6 Residual aura of more powerful magic: -5 – 0 Magic Trinket: -4 Very weak, one-use item: -3 Weak, one-use item: -2 Medium – Strong, one-use item: -1 – 0 Weak - Strong, charged item: -1 - +2 Weak, permanent item: 0 Medium – strong permanent item: +1 - +3 Very strong permanent item: +4 Artifact: +5 - +6 I don't have any rules for hiding magic, but I suppose you could always take IPE: Detect if you really wanted to.

Re: Seeing through invisible You want a story explanation for it, Sean? That would depend on the campaign in question and the way invisibility works there. I thought Clovis just wanted a game mechanics way to do it. The Detect could be "Detect Bending of Light" or something similar. As far as 'Detect Invisibility' being unfair to the invisible character, I don't see that. Invisibility is only 20 active points. The Detect, once you add in Ranged and Targeting, is right around 20 active points as well. Also, I wouldn't allow the 'sense' adder here. So, you'd have to concentrate to detect an invisible intruder -- that means you'd already have to be suspicious in order for this to work. Invisible opponents could still spy on you, so long as they didn't give themselves away somehow.

Re: Seeing through invisible

Re: Good resource for travel distances/day? This is what I do, who knows how realistic it is. Afoot (12 hours/day, includes rest stops) 30 miles by road 25 miles over easy terrain or trail 20 miles over rugged terrain (hills, forest, etc.) 10 miles over very rugged terrain (jungle, mountains, etc.) Encumbrance 0-10%: -0% 11-25%: -25% 26-75%: -50% 76-99%: -75% Lowest Recovery is 1-6: +0% 7-8: +10% 9-10: +20% 11-12: +25% 13+: +30% Force march allows travel up to 18 hours/day, requires an EGO roll, and gives a -1 to all actions on the following day, including EGO rolls. This carries over to the next day if force march continues. Trailblazing skill increases movement by 5% per point made by for the group, to a maximum of how quickly movement would be taking place on a trail. Mounted (12 hours/day) Light mount: 40 miles by road 35 miles over easy terrain or trail 25 miles over rugged terrain (hills, forest, etc.) 5 miles over very rugged terrain (jungle, mountains, etc.) Medium mount: 35 miles by road 30 miles over easy terrain or trail 20 miles over rugged terrain (hills, forest, etc.) 5 miles over very rugged terrain (jungle, mountains, etc.) Heavy mount: 30 miles by road 25 miles over easy terrain or trail 15 miles over rugged terrain (hills, forest, etc.) 5 miles over very rugged terrain (jungle, mountains, etc.) Cart or Wagon: 30 miles by road 20 miles over easy terrain or trail 10 miles over rugged terrain (hills, forest, etc.) 0 miles over very rugged terrain (jungle, mountains, etc.) Movement values assume the appropriate TF, without it, movement is cut in half. Switching out mounts twice a day doubles movement. Forced movement is possible as well, instead of an EGO roll, use Animal Handling. Riding skill increases movement by 5% per point made by. Animals get one free level of encumbrance.

Re: Multiple Attacks Multiple power attack seems cheaty to me and I normally wouldn't do it that way. Sweep works well if you really want your dragon (or anyone, actually) to attack multiple times in a phase. If you don't see the dragon as doing a sweep maneuver per se, I'd do Ghost Angels thing of giving the dragon extra speed, but I would limit it further: +1 Speed, only to attack with tail or wings, -1. This would give the dragon an opportunity to use its extra limbs in combat, but in a way that doesn't seem cheaty like multiple-power attack (i.e. You get to attack twice ... just because!) or odd for a large creature on a single opponent (sweep). Generally, you should actually think about dropping the claw/claw/bite D&D mechanics completely when switching to Hero, although the +1 speed, only to attack with x seems like a good compromise. Edit: If you really want the two claws mechanics, perhaps the way closest to D&D to do that is a 2-shot autofire. Claws: 2d6 HKA, 2-shot autofire +1/4.

Re: EGO Rolls and PRE Attacks (2) Well, it kind of has to be both PRE or EGO, whichever is greater, at least the way I do things. Certain types of creatures (giants, say) have a really high PRE but a low EGO, and they are of course brave. A giant wouldn't be scared by a little human most of the time, although I suppose elephants are scared of mice... I think they just have a Vulnerability to PRE attacks v mice, though.

Re: Stealth and Perception Sure, most of the group failed their roll and were looking elsewhere. But one guy saw him. One guy seems to -always- see him. Let's say in this example that there aren't any other factors. This is more of a role-playing thing, though. If the players want to respond as if it's a threat, how do I say "No, you don't think it's a threat?" If that's the case, then why even bother rolling perception at all? It seems that the GM decided ahead of time that no one would notice. The act of rolling at all shows that there is a chance that the players notice the bad guy. It just seems like in order to stealth past a group that is actively searching for you, you have to be stealthy beyond belief, like maybe 20-. Although I suppose that is realistic. Maybe I am complaining for no good reason. I agree with the "If no one is on watch, take the best PER roll guy and have him only roll" thing. But I was thinking of a case where everyone was on watch.

Hi, So, let's say your super-stealthy bad guy is trying to sneak past the party. He's got a 15- stealth and range penalties for PER are maybe -2. He rolls an 11- and succeeds by 4, so that's -6 to the party's perceptions to notice him. Sounds fine so far... unless the party has 10 people or so in it (including pets and henchmen). In that case, isn't -someone- in the group very likely to notice the guy, given that most of them have 12- and 13- PER rolls? and if not this phase, probably next phase? it just seems like someone always shouts out "I made mine by 5" or by 6 or whatever. Is this a problem for stealthers, or perhaps just realistic in that its hard to get by a large group of people all looking for you. It just seems like "Mr. Super Stealthy" could even be invisible and its impossible to sneak by. Unless he was invisible to sight and hearing with no fringe, but that feels like cheating almost. Does anyone else ever encounter this situation?

Re: Characteristic inflation For NCM fantasy games at least, I feel that making DEX cost 4 is an important step to limiting the 'everyone has 20 DEX' syndrome. Even then it is still a bargain for many character types. STR should cost at least 1.5, if not 2. CON, although equally bad as far as points gained per points spent, is not much of a problem in my experience, so I normally keep it at 2. It doesn't do anything unless you get hit, so it seems less prone to abuse. Also, ED is generally less important than PD in the games I play. I tend to only very rarely let people raise their stats with experience points. About Tolkien v Gygax, Tolkien is a huge influence, definitely! But, unfortunately, he didn't record the stats for his creatures anywhere. He definitely gets the prize for "Biggest influence upon the gaming world by a non-gamer." Heck, maybe even "Biggest influence" period. As a gaming system, 1st edition D&D is ... shall we say dated? And full of ... quirks? But as gaming resources go, those books are excellent, far better than later editions of the game. I can't imagine ever having a use for the 3rd edition books (haven't seen 4th yet), but the 1st edition ones are still useful to me sometimes.

Re: Characteristic inflation Well, we only need this if we're playing in the same campaign. Seriously, though, it doesn't matter much to me how other people (or even Hero officially, for that matter) does their monsters and NPCs. I have my method. I base everything off the Monster Manual, 1st edition. Gygax is the man. So, for me, giants have to be strong, tough, not too tough to hit, but able to hit easily themselves (due to high hit dice). Agreed. Yikes, I'd never give giants extra speed, with my set-up, that would make them too deadly. Hey, excellent idea. Also a great idea! Yes. Gygax has already spoken, though, so for me, there is no reason to think.

Re: Characteristic inflation I completely agree, and I think the only way to solve this problem is to make your own monsters. Hero is the best game system out there, imo. It is what it says it is: "The Ultimate Gamer's Toolkit." But, that's all it is. It gives you the tools, and it's up to you to do a ton of work before you can actually play. The system is great, the source books are mostly useless, imo. I wouldn't use any monster that came out of a book. Edit: For giants, the best thing to do is make them DEX 8 or lower, and give them a ton of combat levels, like 6-10 (like, +8 OCV with all attacks, 40 points). It doesn't matter if it's "point effective" or not, it's an NPC.

Re: Analysis: Attack Vs Limited Defense Energy Blast AVLD should probably have 'Does Body' for free, unlike NND. I think that would solve the problem. So, the total advantage would just be +1.5.

Re: Killer Shrike's Increased Leathality System I do a number of things to increase lethality: raising base weapon damage, adding critical hits, using bleeding and impairment. I also use a 'death by stun' rule that forces people to make CON checks or die when they reach -30 stun. I also have changed the impairment rule to cause impairment at 1/3 Body instead of 1/2 Body.

Re: How would you use a true name as a vulnerability? A pysch lim as has been stated is not a bad idea. Another idea is to make an anti-demon spell (I assume we are talking about demons here) with the limitation: "caster must know target's true name", -1.

Re: Critical Hits? Well, my critical hit and fumble charts are weak compared to the way other people do them, so it's not so bad having them happen often. In order to get max damage, for example, you have to roll really well on the critical chart. +1 or +2 damage (up to max) is a more common roll. I enjoy the random element, but I made the charts weak so they wouldn't unbalance combat too much.