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Ndreare

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  1. Like
    Ndreare reacted to unclevlad in IYO why is GURPS better for Low powered campaigns and HERO is better for High powered campaigns?   
    150 STR can lift 25M tons...which, according to 1 site (searching for world's heaviest objects) is about 1/2 the weight of the Great Wall of China.  All 13,000 miles of it.   So, not quite Pluto, but still essentially a practical infinity.
     
    There's aspects that don't.  That's a big one;  lifting STR is exponential, whereas damage is linear.  What I do is say, ok, the high STR is enough to justify more damage, in and of itself...so you can get a 12d6 punch without Class 100 STR, which is VERY high end.  For me, it's 1d6 per 5 points of STR over 20, is built in.  Your choice of HTH MA additional damage, or HA/HKA, or a mix.  So, a 35 STR gives a base 7d6.  35 is 15 over, so, let's say, +3 DCs HTH with martial arts.  Your +2 DC strikes include Basic, Fast, and Martial...so you're at 12 DCs.  And 14 DCs with some penalties, if the GM's cool with that.  
     
    Defenses also are an issue, because you've got to manage that LARGE amount of STUN now.  For 20d6, 77+ STUN happens 20% of the time, and 80+ STUN happens 10%.  If you go with a 28 CON, you need to reduce at least 50 STUN, and that's hard to do.  Along similar lines, the risk related to any defensive hole grows.  No or low Power Def?  10d6 Drains will HAMMER you.  20d6 Mind Control will turn you into a complete puppet.  
     
    Essentially, at lower power levels, a substantial amount of the cost of a special attack can be countered by the built-in baselines, or with minor purchases...this is analogous to the first several dice of a Blast are about overcoming defenses.  But once you've done that...it's all smacking down the poor schmuck on the receiving end.  And, sure, the GM can recognize it, and not use Mental Illusions very often, if at all, but this only goes so far, in my book, before it starts feeling contrived...the GM just handing you things you can handle.
     
    All point-buy game systems have their sweet spots...areas where the mechanics work well.  Hero's not great at the lower end;  the fact that Heroic rules let you use equipment at no point cost, is a strong indicator.  And too high, and...you can do it, but just recognize that when building an 800 point character, you should *not* expect "twice the power" of a 400 point character.
     
     
  2. Like
    Ndreare reacted to unclevlad in IYO why is GURPS better for Low powered campaigns and HERO is better for High powered campaigns?   
    It isn't your phone, Ndreare.  Not quite sure what happened, but OP's post formatting got *mangled* somehow.
     
    GURPS doesn't scale well to a high-power game.  For example, to get even moderate super strength in GURPS is incredibly expensive, IIRC.  GURPS Basic Lift is (STR * STR / 5) pounds.  Hero's max lift is pretty much GURPS' 2-handed lift, which is 8 * BL.  A 30 STR in Hero can lift 1600 kilos...3500 pounds.  3500 / 8 = 440.  x5 = 2200  SQRT(2200) is 47...which is 370 points.
     
    And that's just 1.6 tons...really not that exceptional.  But GURPS' STR scale means a fourfold increase in lifting STR requires doubling your STR score.  
     
    Similarly, defenses in GURPS are actually fairly expensive.  If you want to blow off a .30 caliber light machine gun, t'll cost you.  Make it a .50 cal...LOTS more.
     
    I do think GURPS is much better for lower-power games because its skill system is far better.  That said, setting up a GURPS character is also FAR more complex...even in just the base rules, the knobs and tweaks are far more complicated.  I have a copy of the GURPS 4E PDF...somewhere, I can't find it at the moment, could be on a different computer.  And a copy of the character builder tool...but even with the tool, it was like...whoa.....this is work!  I was building one of my favorite character types...the 'heavy' martial artist.  Good STR, fairly good defenses.  It was kinda tricky...and got expensive fast, I thought!  
     
    To be sure, some of that is far less experience...I vaguely remember a game that was gonna get run in GURPS, but basically, yeah, I've only read the rules.  There's tricks, I'm sure...but OTOH, most melee-only characters are a piece of cake to set up in Hero.  An issue with 6E in particular is trying to be everything at once...GURPS does too, by definition, but it's about 2 levels MORE complicated.
     
     
  3. Like
    Ndreare reacted to LoneWolf in IYO why is GURPS better for Low powered campaigns and HERO is better for High powered campaigns?   
    I have to agree with Christopher on this.  Hero system has a lot of optional rules that can allow you to run any type of campaign you want.   I have been in many low powered champions games and have never found them lacking.    
     
    If you want a gritty granular campaign it is a matter of setting up the campaign parameters and making sure people understand that is the game, you are running.  This usually means imposing campaign limitations on powers especially defenses and stats.   Just because the average SPD in most Champions game is 5 does not mean it has to be that way.   Simply let the players know what is appropriate for the campaign and enforce that.  
  4. Like
    Ndreare got a reaction from GoldenAge in HERO SYSTEM + ChatGPT   
    The rules cannot be copyrighted. But the presentation is. 
     
    Like uncleanlad said the math is off (looks more like guess work), however as a GM I see this as a very valuable tool, I subscribed to ChatGPT at the $20 level and have been using it for games and even recording actions the player took and seeing what it spits out for what the bad guys are doing in the background while being ignored by the players. You can have it make NPCs for you in a hurry and even ask it to assign personalities to them (I have done this). I really do not care about point costs of bad guys or NPCs of any sort. I simply want stats so the encounter can feel consistent to the players. 
     
    PS: After a little while it does tend to get weird and needs reset/moved to a fresh thread.
  5. Thanks
    Ndreare got a reaction from Ninja-Bear in Attacking at the beginning of a phase   
    Our table has allowed attacking as a half phase to be anywhere in your movement for decades. It has never broken the game and let's characters take advantage of cover. 
     
    We have however also house ruled Frameworks can only be changed before attacks,  not after. 
  6. Thanks
    Ndreare got a reaction from DentArthurDent in Attacking at the beginning of a phase   
    Our table has allowed attacking as a half phase to be anywhere in your movement for decades. It has never broken the game and let's characters take advantage of cover. 
     
    We have however also house ruled Frameworks can only be changed before attacks,  not after. 
  7. Thanks
    Ndreare got a reaction from Duke Bushido in Attacking at the beginning of a phase   
    Our table has allowed attacking as a half phase to be anywhere in your movement for decades. It has never broken the game and let's characters take advantage of cover. 
     
    We have however also house ruled Frameworks can only be changed before attacks,  not after. 
  8. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Doc Democracy in Could Rules for Hero Gaming System Be Getting To Complicated?   
    Ach - I have tried Discord so many times and bounced off it every time.  It feels chaotic to me and cannot understand its value over a forum like this.  I guess I am old now and cannot get my head round these new-fangled things.  😞 The shame is that the community is so small now that the spread cross different platforms dilutes the community further.
  9. Like
    Ndreare reacted to xanthur in HD6 font size - Windows 11   
    There was a forum from 2017 on changing font (see below). Do you have an updated version of this "for Dummies" or a YouTube video that I can follow to duplicate? 
     
    Also, do you have a webpage that shows the various export formats? Are there non-.hde formats that you can download and edit? 
     
    Thanks!
     
    "To use, you need to launch HD from the command line (or create a batch script) with the following:
    javaw -jar HD6.jar [font size] for example, the following would set the default font size throughout the application to 18pt:
    javaw -jar HD6.jar 18
  10. Like
    Ndreare reacted to n5dkj in HD6 font size - Windows 11   
    I actually run HD6 on both of my machines, a Windows 11 laptop and a MacBook Pro. I never worried about font size on the Mac, since I can read everything fine with the defaults, but it occurred to me this morning that I didn't know if creating a shortcut on the Mac was even possible. It is, so I thought I would share the process in case it is helpful to anyone else.

    Press ⌘-{SPACE} to bring up the Spotlight search, find Shortcuts.app, and launch it.
    Click Shortcuts->Settings in the Menu bar, select the Advanced tab, check "Allow Running Scripts," then close Settings.
    Click the + icon at the top center of the Shortcuts app window to create a new shortcut.
    At the top of the new window, type a name for the shortcut, such as "HERO Designer."
    In the search box at the top left of the window, type "Run Shell Script," then select it from the list of matches.
    Replace the 
    echo "Hello World" with
    cd ~/HERODesigner java -jar HD6.jar 18 replacing the "~/HERODesigner" with the path to the folder where Hero Designer is stored and the "18" with the desired font size.
    The default choices should be fine for the remainder of the options. Close the new shortcut window.
    If you wish, you can right click the new shortcut in the main Shortcuts window and change its icon and/or add the shortcut to the dock.
    To run the shortcut, click on it in the dock or right click it in the Shortcuts.app and choose Run.

    Just like above, it the shortcut doesn't work, the most likely causes are a broken JRE installation or an incorrect folder path.
  11. Like
    Ndreare reacted to n5dkj in HD on Android?   
    I've been working in software development since the early 80s. I spent about 10 hours last week trying to get HD6 to run on my phone (Pixel 7 Pro) before throwing up my hands and giving up. I might try again someday, but Android really isn't friendly to this kind of thing without root access. Since I'm not willing to root my phone, I certainly can recommend it to anyone else.
  12. Thanks
    Ndreare reacted to Christopher R Taylor in Could Rules for Hero Gaming System Be Getting To Complicated?   
    If you get the "Complete" versions of the books, you get 4th edition level brevity with 6th edition detail, I think its the best of both worlds.  Could do with a bit better presentation and tone, but they do the job for rules.  Hero's biggest problem is lack of market presence and too few adventures.  We independent people are trying to fill in the gaps, but the company really needs to step up.  You cannot even find Hero on the shelf anywhere, sitting on line and offering POD is not good enough for a game company.
  13. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Chris Goodwin in Could Rules for Hero Gaming System Be Getting To Complicated?   
    I think that if anything it's gotten less complicated since, say, third edition.  Mainly from capping Disadplications, changing the way END costs were figured and modified, having more powers (so you wouldn't have to go down rabbit holes to create certain effects) and in 6e, eliminating Figured Characteristics. 
     
    YMMV on whether anyone in particular agrees with or likes the changes, but they're less complicated than they used to be.  (And I'll note that back in the 80's we didn't have software for building characters with; we had to scrawl them out on cave walls by lamplight from a lamp made out of a rock and animal fat.)
  14. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Susano in Strike Force Organizations   
    In 2016, I was lead writer for Aaron Allston’s Strike Force. It is one of the highlights of my game writer career. I had hoped to be able to continue work in Aaron's world by developing something I wanted to call "Strike Force Organizations." And now, I can.
     
    Note: This product will be dedicated to Aaron (of course), but also Darren Watts, as when I first discussed this, he wanted to develop the section on the Circle.


  15. Like
    Ndreare reacted to sentry0 in HERO System Mobile   
    I released the 2.1.10 build of HSM the other day.  There's not much new for people to play with other than a new toast message look and feel (toast messages are the little pop-ups that appear on the bottom of screens for some actions).  Under the hood, I ripped out an entire UI library as it is apparently not being supported by the upstream devs any longer.  There may be some look and feel changes but they are minor, like the buttons on the Combat screen look a little different.
     
    Patch Notes:
    Upgraded toast messages
  16. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Doc Democracy in Greyhawk HERO   
    Did you agonise over the details like I am? 🙂
     
    I think my game will start next year and will probably start with the Fate of Istus....
  17. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Gauntlet in Greyhawk HERO   
    I converted the Against the Giants (G1 through G3) to Hero and of course they are from Greyhawk. I am planning on doing the entire Greyhawk campaign series consisting of Scourge of the Slave Lords (A1 through A4), Against the Giants (G1 through G3), Decent into the Depths (D1 through D3), and ending with Queen of the Spiders (Q1).
     
    I am in the process of running a campaign that goes through all of these modules in Fantasy Hero.
  18. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Doc Democracy in Greyhawk HERO   
    I did not. 😞 My friend is the HD person and I only beg his time when we are definitely going to play the game.  Not there yet.
  19. Like
    Ndreare got a reaction from Cloppy Clip in Skills House Rules and Considerations?   
    Thanks for the feedback. I am thinking we will go to roll high next session. I will try the +3/+5 levels and see how it works. The group is coming out of D&D, so they do prefer the roll high system. 
     
    I will tweek it a little based on this feedback. But I think I will go 11+ as success instead of 10+, just so the unmodified die roll is 50/50. I am planning to allow them to Take 10 on non-contested rolls, so the differnce between 11+ and 10+ would make a differnce once penalties are applied.
  20. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Doc Democracy in Greyhawk HERO   
    Not finalised yet but I wanted to begin thinking about what character sheets might look like (it helps me focus on what needs to go on them)...had to take a snapshot to avoid going over space...
     
     

  21. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Doc Democracy in Skills House Rules and Considerations?   
    Have a look at the character sheet template I was thinking of using...
     
     
  22. Like
    Ndreare got a reaction from Doc Democracy in Skills House Rules and Considerations?   
    Thanks for the feedback. I am thinking we will go to roll high next session. I will try the +3/+5 levels and see how it works. The group is coming out of D&D, so they do prefer the roll high system. 
     
    I will tweek it a little based on this feedback. But I think I will go 11+ as success instead of 10+, just so the unmodified die roll is 50/50. I am planning to allow them to Take 10 on non-contested rolls, so the differnce between 11+ and 10+ would make a differnce once penalties are applied.
  23. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Doc Democracy in Skills House Rules and Considerations?   
    Oh.  I forgot.  I did not write down characteristic values.  STR of 10 was not worth writing on the sheet, it is default implied.  A STR of 15 or 20 was written down as STR +1 or STR +2.  This was useful as it neat STR bonuses to a skill roll could just be added, it also meant hitting someone was a matter of adding that many dice to the damage roll.
  24. Like
    Ndreare reacted to the_blunderbuss in Skills House Rules and Considerations?   
    I've done exactly as Doc Democracy comments: everything is target 10, most things are presented as bonuses or penalties to the rolls. It's worked like a charm so far. It is a fairly simple thing to do assuming you understand the probabilities involved. The only thing that I feel benefits from a little chart is something to create the equivalent probability to "succeeding by half" which is, again, fairly simple to develop.
     
    A few examples:
    - Attribute rolls with an Attribute value of 8 to 12 are +0 to the roll (these are the default so it's best to make them +0)
    - Attribute rolls with an Attribute value of 3 to 7 are -1 to the roll
    - Skill default is -6 to the roll
    - Skill familiarity is -3 to the roll
    - Skill opened normally defaults to the equivalent Attribute Roll
    - Buying a +1 to a Skill Roll gives you (literally) +1 to the Skill Roll
    - Combat rolls are 3D6 + OCV against 10 + DCV
    - Rolls can be modified by positive circumstances (adding to the roll result) or negative circumstances (subtracting from the roll result.) Use the same number you used before to modify the TARGET of the roll, to modify the RESULT of the roll now.
     
    And (for the most part) Bob's your uncle.
  25. Like
    Ndreare reacted to Doc Democracy in Skills House Rules and Considerations?   
    I found, in this situation it was indeed all about presentation.  I fixed on the idea of rolling 10 or higher, when no modifiers were active, to be a success. 10 is the normal difficulty.
     
    Everything on the character sheet was presented as +something.  So Stealth +2 meant that when rolling stealth you rolled 3D6 and added 2.  I had hero character sheets, Stealth +2 equates to a 13 or less roll, Stealth +4 would equate to 15 or less.
     
    A difficult (+3) task meant the difficulty number rose to 13.
     
    I also worked on campaign average for combat.  The average was CV 5 for a heroic fantasy.  So melee attack +3 was OCV 8 and parry +4 was DCV 9.
     
    Combat worked the same as skills with defensive numbers adding to the difficulty of a combat task. In the above example attacking at +3 meant rolling 3D6 and adding three to beat a combat difficulty of 10+4.
     
    Sheets looked VERY similar to D20 stuff but it was pure 6th Edition HERO they were playing.
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