Altair

Pretty much this. 
 
HERO can be pretty daunting, but from what I can gather, it's much more internally consistent than say, D20, which makes no sense. You learn it, because it's there, but D&D is actually a pretty terrible first roleplaying game from a mechanics standpoint. HERO's actually not that complicated, but its content isn't always elegantly communicated. 
 
That's not a criticism of DOJ, which is 3 people as I recall, but an observation. Companies like Fantasy Flight and WoTC have departments dedicated to visual communication; of course they're good at this.

I'm really uncomfortable with this line of reasoning. Frankly, there is nothing in HERO that requires high IQs, though there might be a correlation between people with a STEM focus and HERO system mastery. My hypothesis has more to do with the way that information is presented than anything else; simply put, until 6th edition, HERO has had a very dense presentation, and that's just not an effective way to communicate information to everybody. For some learning styles, it's great!
 
But it is entirely disingenuous - and frankly unworthy of this community - to posit that people who "get" hero quickly must have a higher IQ than others. 

Where my handle comes from: Started as a Valentine's day joke with my wife (she likes foxes, I like wolves)
 
First RPG I played: Imagine
 
First RPG I GMed: Shadowrun (3rd edition)
 
Currently playing: Monster of the Week, Pathfinder
 
Currently GMing: Rotating short-term games to try out new systems, including Uncharted Worlds, The Strange, and Feng Shui 2

Hey Rose, I'm still alive and kicking. eepjr has inspired me lately to revisit the HERO material by persistently grinding through Fantasy HERO material, and I've been making some mechanical improvements to the site here and there, so I still have a hand in the HERO jar but I'm no where as active as I once was.
 
Long story short, my wife and I had another baby a couple of years ago, and that, plus work, other kid, etc, I just don't have the free time I used to have. I started using Fate and Fate Accelerated for my (seldom) game sessions mostly due to the greatly lessened time it takes to work up material.
 
I still love the HERO System and it is still my favorite game system of all time. Just, y'know, life happens.
 
 
 
How did you come up with your 'handle' (forum name)? Long story short, it was my handle for Mechwarrior a very long time ago, that I then used to replace a different handle I had used for years that I discovered was very similar to one used by a hacker with a bad reputation. It just sort of became my net persona, unintentionally. 
What was the first tabletop RPG you played? Actual table top was D&D Red Box; I was 10. But my real intro to the hobby was Joe Dever's Lone Wolf; if that hadn't of hooked me I would not have been interested when the opportunity to play D&D was offered.
What was the first tabletop RPG you GMed? Also D&D Red Box.
What are you currently playing/GMing? My Pathfinder Fate Accelerated hack, though on an extremely spread out schedule. We play every now and then when the stars align, usually in bursts of a few sessions. Over the last year I've also played in some one offs of Edge of Empire, Pathfinder, and Marvel Heroic Roleplaying, and we play a lot of board and card games. Netrunner, Pathfinder Adventure Card Game, Warhammer Quest, Descent, Sentinels of the Multiverse, and Smashup most recently. I'm currently looking forward to the new Netrunner Mainframe board game, and the Sentinels of the Multiverse Oblivaeon kickstarter.

Yo, I just left Cleveland not too long ago. I ran the Cleveland State University gaming club for a while - you can probably still find some people around that scene. Some really good people out there, though a lot of the local community is more LARP-focused, which is not everyone's thing.
 
Also, welcome everybody!

Please allow me to introduce myself, I am a man of wealth and taste.

Take look here.
 
http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/78834/Kazei-5-HERO-System
 
Also, a preview PDF is here:
 
Kazei 5 Preview

What's up, everybody? I don't know if I still count as "new" - I started with a flurry of posts - but I've definitely been lurking more since autumn hit. I'll chime in about play styles, rethinking various mechanics, and trying to be mindful of different viewpoints. Also, Papercraft. 

 

Anyway!

 

How did you come up with your 'handle' (forum name)?
It's an alias that I've used, based on a V:tM character. I actually don't use it on the internet much; I went with it here because I was a little intimidated coming on to these forums, and didn't want a handle that I really use elsewhere just in case. This was incredibly needless - this is one of the most welcoming online communities I've encountered, RPG or otherwise - but by the time I'd realized that, I didn't want to change my handle and confuse people. 

What was the first tabletop RPG you played?
D&D 3.0, a Dark Suns campaign. It was kind of a toxic atmosphere, very "make fun of the new kid for not knowing the rules/rolling low," but I loved it anyway. I'd also been playing RPGs through LARP for a year or two by that point, so it wasn't really my first RPG experience.

What was the first tabletop RPG you GMed?
My roomate was running a Vampire: the Dark Ages campaign. He invited a bunch of people over for the first session, and then didn't show up. After waiting for an hour, he called me, gave me some sketchy details that I didn't write down, and said he'd be there soon. He was not there soon, so having very little idea what I was doing (I had not played any tabletop at this point), I gave it a shot. Went really well, much to my shock.

What are you currently playing/GMing?
I'm GMing a game set in the Mass Effect universe, based (loosely at this point) on FFG's Star Wars engine, that's been going for a little under 3 years, and wrapping up soon.
I'm GMing a 1-player game for my S/O that's nominally set in Numenera, with a custom system (as she loathed Numenera's) that's heavily influenced by Planescape: Torment, and the unappreciated Nier.
I'm about to start playing in an L5R game (again, with a custom system, as the GM has tried every edition, and isn't satisfied with any of them), and I'm super stoked for that.

It was suggested that maybe we create a thread for new people who are posting and especially for lurkers.
 
So here is what I would like to suggest everyone post as an introduction:
 
How did you come up with your 'handle' (forum name)? What was the first tabletop RPG you played? What was the first tabletop RPG you GMed? What are you currently playing/GMing? I hope this thread gets pinned.
 

Having a baseline is so, so important. "Cool, 20 strength - what does that even mean?" Context is massive.
 
Hope it goes well with your wife, BDH!

Thanos is apparently Mick Ignis
 
Who also did this

I think he"d be better as Captain Marvel.

100% agreed.   After all, Finnish Mythology is the only one where ( a ) characters use crossbows, and ( b ) we are often informed of the color of the gods' socks.
 
Fortunately I've dug up a good many so far -- Finnish, Slavic, Baltic, and Etruscan, to name four I've already written up. And there are several others I haven't gotten to yet that will hopefully pan out for full chapter treatment (or decent coverage in the Miscellaneous chapter; or if not in MH, then in Legendary Hero). Going a bit further afield, there's also Armenian and various mythoi from the Caucasus (which are fairly European-esque), and important but often overlooked faiths/deities from the Classical era, such as Mithras and Cybele.
 
Lots of fun stuff to read, lots of research to do, lots of writing yet to come.  Once I'm past chemo and have a bit more stamina on a daily basis, I'm getting back to MH with a vengeance.

give it to him

http://www.herogames.com/forums/files/file/268-%7B%3F%7D/
 
Not the greatest, but for somebody who hasn't touched foamcore in over a decade? One could do worse. I'm pretty pleased thus far.

I made a parking garage (now somewhat worse for wear after some mooks got put through it), and a skyscraper out of foam core.
 
I also got some extra counters from the excellent card game Heroes of the Multiverse, which I used to track END, and my homie used to track the points put into his character's absorption power. Our new player used them to track STUN & BOD. 
 
I enjoyed having them around.

Kinetic energy has a serious consistency problem accross genres. Not its fault, really - as a friend of mine once said, it's not a superpower if it doesn't violate one of the laws of thermodynamics. 

Yeah I definitely think its best to avoid complications in the first few episodes; add in stuff as you go along.  Knockback probably should be first, because its so much fun.  Endurance later, along with more complex recovery mechanics such as drains etc.

I'm really uncomfortable with this line of reasoning. Frankly, there is nothing in HERO that requires high IQs, though there might be a correlation between people with a STEM focus and HERO system mastery. My hypothesis has more to do with the way that information is presented than anything else; simply put, until 6th edition, HERO has had a very dense presentation, and that's just not an effective way to communicate information to everybody. For some learning styles, it's great!
 
But it is entirely disingenuous - and frankly unworthy of this community - to posit that people who "get" hero quickly must have a higher IQ than others. 

Oh, for sure! I picked that example, because in my experience, remembering the common bonuses and power attack tends to be what most of my newbies have spent their time on. It might not be that way for everybody, but in my experience, that's what playing a fighter tends to look like. 
 
No argument that there's a lot in HERO - I mean, I'm at that stage where I can't remember how this ish is supposed to go - I forgot that STUN multipliers are a thing on literally every Killing Attack I rolled. So, yeah. Lots of stuff!
 
My point was, that in my estimation, that "new game barrier" was pretty big for people learning Pathfinder too. Maybe skewed, because this was in a college gaming group where most of these lovely little newbies hadn't played tabletop RPGs before, so it kind of illuminated just how much stuff I'd taken for granted as being natural.
 
We'll see how much that holds true for teaching HERO to people without advanced math-y degrees!
 
Also, I ordered some damage trackers from the card game Sentinels of the Multiverse, that I plan to use to track END, and maybe STUN and BOD too. I found that I really liked that tactile element in the card game, and want to see if it translates well to HERO combat.
 
THREAD FORK: what kinds of peripherals/aids do people tend to use? What have you found useful?

I'm really uncomfortable with this line of reasoning. Frankly, there is nothing in HERO that requires high IQs, though there might be a correlation between people with a STEM focus and HERO system mastery. My hypothesis has more to do with the way that information is presented than anything else; simply put, until 6th edition, HERO has had a very dense presentation, and that's just not an effective way to communicate information to everybody. For some learning styles, it's great!
 
But it is entirely disingenuous - and frankly unworthy of this community - to posit that people who "get" hero quickly must have a higher IQ than others. 

<mumbles something about being far more related to personality types, mindset, and misinformation than IQ score>

I'm not sure those lists are fair. Bonuses from flanking aren't character specific. In Hero, they'd have to keep track of facing. Power Attack, while it may be character specific, it's a maneuver. In Hero, they'd have to remember penalties from a Haymaker, plus any skill levels they may have, plus any martial maneuvers that may be applicable.
 
Maybe I used a bad example, let me try it this way: In Pathfinder you have a number you need to hit the bad guy. You hit that number you roll your damage dice, add damage modifiers and that's what you do. In Hero, you have a number, you hit it, he may block you, you may not get through his defenses, he may dive for cover, etc. If you do hit him you roll your damage dice, count body, roll STUN Multiplier, apply defenses. It's a much more complex system and takes a lot longer to get through.
 
The other advantage to Pathfinder is that you start simple. At first level you don't have a lot of options and things mucking up the work. As you get more familiar you gradually get more options. In Hero you're in the deep end from the start. 
 
I don't want to make this sound like I'm complaining, Hero is my favorite system, and Pathfinder my second favorite, but combat in Hero can be a LONG affair.

So, after this conversation, I decided to watch Man of Steel, hadn't yet. I totally agree, that was overkill.
 
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In unrelated news, I very, very badly want a character who does double knockback now.