AnotherSkip

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooohhhhhhh!!! Hmm I _may_ have to talk to my Gm about this one he want's to run a Technocracy game.....

try here: http://www.trimira.com/hero_stuff/fantasy_hero_random.html Its Fourth Edition but relly the changes should be minimal. Moreso with FH than anything else. Hmm if you have a copy of the Example theif character take him and wrangle him around to be a fighter, then start back there and wrangle him around to be a Wizzer, then a Healer, then a Thei... waaaaiiiit a minnute! then just steal him and viola you have four characters.

Saaay Mark, look like you need to rebalance Humans if everyone want's to play them. (yes im kidding)

I also happen to think that perhaps Han Solo was able to once use a light saber does not mean that the Lightsaber is more than a Universal Focus. Your buddies and your enemies can use it too. If Han carried it around he would have to 1. pay for it. 2. Buy off/change the "Does not believe in the force" Psy Lim, due to the use of a symbol of the "Hokey Religion" (unless he was trying to "dispell" the religion with that tool). 3. Find some way to insert it into his character concept.

Actually there are a few more subject i would Like to suggest. Since NCM (Normal Characteristics Maxima) was just noted by you as being in the purview of the Gm to set, how about a discussion of that since most Fh Games are Heroic? especially "balancing various Nonhuman races" as well as a few possible notes on different disadvantages (like "Age" for certain races being a disadvantage based upon youth, not old age)

hmmm sounds decent so you are saying that for 3 base points you get 9+(stat)/5 right? Are you considering having them as a sort of long term learning experience? Also can you buy a Familiarity(8-) with some magic skills? What about 3 and five point skill levels, or heck Overall skill levels? The main point is that instead of having 10 skills @ +1 you can have 10 skills at +1(one at a time) plus DCV, or OCV or ECV. Something to consider for long term campaigns Besides: Im Skippy, Thank You very much for recognising my innate mastery of magic.

I think part of the problem with NCM is it is a suggested guideline for building a normal in a Supers World. Then it became the default and now it is waaaaaaaay wacked. But heaven knows we definately need a base/guide line in this game, otherwise we would need a string of code just to let everyone know what the hell we were talking about. NCM is justifiable as a concept, but not necessarily defendable as a genre convention or a real world concept. Age is a limitation for some but an advantage for others. For Conan (or Cohen) it is a limitation, for Gandalf it is an advantage. (heck I built a Dwarven mentalist with the Age 40+ limitation so he could have an EGO of 26 to get that ECV of 9, runty gimpy freak that he was) And no not all fighters have 20 STR. in The last group I was in Str ranged from 13 to 37 even in the same character!!!! (13 Str plus 24 point VPP) only one person in the group had consistiently 20 Str and that was the Dwarven priest w/o his Str from his Magics (otherwise it was 37 also). The dual blade weilding fighter had 13, the eagle warrior had 15 the Axe fighters had either 18 or 23

Well my suggestion would be to list the skills necessary and then leave off the points/results. IE a barbarian could have 6 skills (survival, Riding, AK:BArbarian Lands, Tracking, PS Barbarian etc...) minimum proficiency would be an 8- proficiency but someone who wanted to be a good tracker would spend the three points to be good at the skill. Of couse see the Bullseye-> Package deals thread for other Skippy Suggestions

double post

try starting with a template and Fill-in-the-Blanks Though Hero lends itself to this much less than many other games *cough*DND*cough*White*Cough*Wolf*Cough* Ahem since you are building a "pregen" character it doesnt matter if it is cliched and not the masterpiece of art usually build. Try thinking of it as a step.

Actually my first (and so far only) was a 4th Champions session. It went far more toward the players end(excessive success) than I thought it would. But then it was a one shot, with group of villians and heroes with no attempt to really "balance" them. I had some decent limits but other than that, I let them go free. The Villians were prebuilt, the characters were Johnny on the spot and even with a point balance (250 each) me being experienced, and most of the other players newbies, they wiped the floor with me. HEAVEN! after the second Phase I started TRYING to clobber them! most CV's were 6, DC's were mostly 12 with 1 18max , (the shrinky MArtial Artist had 10 DC attack with a DCV of 12, the "space ship" had a DCV of 4, OCV of 6-8 and could move through to get the 18DC. Poor Vilians had to teleport out of their own base!

Of course the counter to that is the TEAMS gageteer turning off the safety procols and luring an invading group into the Danger Room. Staple event in Death Duel with the Destroyers.

i dunno about the "all you fight is Kings and Dragons and Ogres and Trolls" there are some very dangerous combinations of "low points" critters that are _very_ dangerous. That being said the highest character in our recent campaign just got past 200 points _after_ aiding a town defeat 2000 out of 3000 Zombies. Yes we had a _ton_ of help. but there were dammably few of us who even at 175(75+75+25xp) could take on a Zombie mano a mano even with all the goodies we have. especially my 200 point mage. we pulled every trick in the book we could think of to slap around that army before it seiged the town: Grass fires splitting off little groups Rolling boulders down hills ambushes traps and that was with 46 PC(6) and NPC 150 point+ people working together. Man it was UUuuuuuuuuuuuugly Still managed to save most of the townfolk

look is that Tetsujis doppleganger? Anyways I have run across scenarios where the Gm Whupped up on 6 160-190 point characters with 30 point NPC's. Good group tactics+a scenario where the NPC's had the advantage(Ranged monsters vs HTH PC's) PLUS Stupid player tricks made the thing terrible. However that is not necessarily what happened here. Given the difficulty of game balance, and a general inexperience on both parties side many different things could have happened. however i will agree with the possibilty that GEE WILLIKERS they MIGHT be thoughtless hack and slashers. Groups like that happen, as shocking as it may be and unfortuneately most of them do seem to spring from AD&D. Over the years i have been playing I have heard of _One_ (count them: one) Group that actually was tactically competant enough to force the Gm to use Rolemaster Dragons vs AD&D 14th level characters (yes with firebolt tables results for 'bleeding' results) out of the dozens of groups I have played in and contacted with that is it. One. Not very good odds bubba. Perhaps a post on the comparitve heroes and monsters of the scenario would make a decent difference in opinion.

Well you _are_ essentially forcing the characters to take up to a -5 for little benefit, an unknown percentage of success and the possiblity of pretty severe failure. Is this in order for them to get around a Gm contrived plot or are the players just trying to jack around with the balancing mechanics or is it an attempt at realism? Frankly I would go with either Gm fiat on number of possible successes based upon results of rolls or something else rather than a chart/calculation heavy set of results.

Well you _are_ essentially forcing the characters to take up to a -5 for little benefit, an unknown percentage of success and the possiblity of pretty severe failure. Is this in order for them to get around a Gm contrived plot or are the players just trying to jack around with the balancing mechanics or is it an attempt at realism? Frankly I would go with either Gm fiat on number of possible successes based upon results of rolls or something else rather than a chart/calculation heavy set of results.

Suscceptibility: X2 effects: from Pre based attacks by pretty girls only to cause unconsiousness or nosebleeds?

One of the thnigs I did was Multipower the Disciplines/Gifts. Cheap, sligtly more limiting than straight powers and it fits some of the rules notes (no Domminate five times per turn with Celerity 5 for example). Mage? Mage would have to be a VPP with a -1/2 Limitation: Dots in chosen Spheres. Kinda cheezy like VPP: Level based magics(-1/2) for capturing the AD&D mechanics.

Actually I think that they would have run no matter what the oppositions stats were. Robbing is one thing, stand up shoot em ups are another.

Must Say "They Call me Trinity" and "They Still call Me Trinity" are dammnably good. Quigly is pretty decent as is Rustlers Rhapsody. And dont forget: The Wild (x2-4) West, and Back to the Future III for streampunk ideas

I would also suggest David Brin's "The Postman" There are a few more of Steven Kings Bachman stories that are small scale apocalypstic. and for a fantasy apocalypse Earthdawn (alien/deamonic invasion) place ED under games Annnnnnnd *Drum Roll* Mecedes Lackey-Valdemar series (Spoilers) the Griffon Books goes into the main details as much as anyone has. (Two warring mages, a peaceful one creating for the joy of life. The other essentially a number cruncher who cared not a whit for anything but the end results) Though of course much fore and post shadowing occurs in the Winds Trillogy, the Last herald Mage Trillogy as well as the Storms Books. To give an example, imagine if the magical equivalent of a nuclear bomb went off that was like a hammer blow to the magical energies of the world. Now then imagine two of those went off and wherever the ripple efects of those collided a wild magic effect occured. Then imagine that those effects were coming back through time to recreate themselves and the "side effects" of another apocalypse, unless the heroes can stop it.

It was the Red Dwarf episode with the Psychadelic Squid as the villian if that helps at all.......... the cutscenes were hilarious.

And definately after finding out about that "little miss" post game discussion you immediately kick yourself and "try" to remember to be more hack and slashish. really even "modern day" 3E modules are not realy that different. I was in a Low level adventure and not only does the module _not_ follow the rules-as-written(a Sepia's Snake Sigil that does not radiate magic), has many areas of hidden "hack and slash loot" that is so inconsequential to the main story that actually fiding out about the information that leads to the next part of the adventure (like important story details) only nets you 1/10th of the xp needed to go from 1st to second. Enough that if you only found the story hooks and never encountered any monsters you would have to hit 10 flippin story pointers to gain a level, and that would only get you second level. Needless to say we actually go _out_ of our way in order to risk life and limb(what story characters ever do that anyways? "Hi, I need a battle so i can level!") for the benefit of leveling. Complete reverse of the story characters paradgrim(advances plotline in order to do more things). The main problem is that if you have too much of a set value for all monsters whether or not they are true obstacles or incidentals. Hero has Xp based upon the ends, 3E has it based upon the means. And sadly dont even really consider things like Tuckers Kobolds in their Xp allotment. if I ever wanted to really really mean in 3E I would have a Tuckers Kobolds dungeon and only allow charactes of 10 levels or higher for the players. Net result 0 XP for the whole adventure of making thier lives miserable. In Hero is not allowed by the rules.

part of the fact of the matter is the same problem with some of the styles of the game. unless you choose FR _and_ have all the books and histories together it's not gonna make sense. Secondly some people (and i agree with this in some ways) believe that no one except the Gm should have the DMG. if the players know what to ask for and how much then they will want everything to be "by the book". For example in first edition AD&D most magical items had command words. Sure you could maybe tell how powerful an item was and maybe one of the weaker powers with identify but in the end you needed to do "mage things" and spend time pouring over musty old books and experimenting with the items is question to get even something as simple as a Wand of magic missiles to work. Part of the mystique of the game was lost in mass merchandising. People becam Gm's without "training" and did what they wanted. People learned from those people and pretty much the game became a series of expediencies. Identify got more or less unoficially house ruled as telling _everything_ about an item "Okies this is a Wand of Fire the command word is 'Flaming Shite', it has 55 charges and needs to absorb charges from a Wall of Fire from a mage 16th or higher Level." When the intent behind identify was "This wand can cast burning hands and contains medium power." That is the problem with random Charts, you really need to create histories behind each item. Take, Sting and Orcrist for example. These are famous blades with histories, not some random junk. And Spells and mages? Don't even get me started!!!!

Okies now that it is one post, And it's no longer setting off my ADDH ill comment: 1 minor suggestion: edit the funky posts to Nothing(ie delete and enter: S. B.). Or ask like B. Seeman or another moderator to delete them. Looks good, I would suggest unless you are going to stick to the KH system for building i would not worry about some of the size conversions to points. Frankly the few sizes duplicated on the chart i would not worry about, maybe a few could get a 1 point cost break. Also was there not a note on the vehicles that could not enter the atmosphere you could strap on whatever you could move with the engines on the outside of the hull (and so long as you did not mind it getting shot at...). A few times we had "meteroric armor" in addition to the other defenses. Otherwise for example combining 16 and 17 KH HS for Hero Purposes is just dandy IMNSHO. The Hero system IMNSHO is better suited to originality not conversion. Speaking of the combat capacities in the SH and KH systems How would you describe the various offense and defense systems?