Brian Stanfield

Wow! That whole process was almost as complicated as making a Champions character by hand . . . 

Well, at the very least, there are still nearly 2,000 sets of MHI dice available in the store!

One of the mistakes made with  GURPS as it developed was the continual adoption of skills and subskills. Overwhelming, in the end. Hero benefits from a smaller, broader selection, I feel.

I would really not want to make skills even more granular. A lot of the skill categories were set in early Champions editions. Then they exploded with Espionage.  But skills in 6e have gone from the general “television episode” level to professional level granularity, especially medical skills. The difference between a retinal scanner and a trip wire may be vast, except both will succumb to a wire cutter just the same. I think the whole concept of skills has been subject to overthinking and legalism lately. 

I've mentioned this here before but I missed MtG by a week.  One week, on my weekly visit to the FLGS, a couple of my friends were opening their first decks of this new card game that had just come out.  I missed my next weekly visit.  The week after that there were no MtG cards available to buy in the state.  About a year or so later, one of those friends had to declare bankruptcy to resolve his credit card debt from buying MtG cards.
 
I don't really resent MtG or CCGs for blowing up the way they did.  I've spent a lot of time and money on CCGs like Shadowfist and Dune, though these were better multiplayer games and weren't as pay-to-win than MtG was.  And CCGs generally do not have the scheduling and GMing problems that RPGs do.  Plus there is a segment of the gaming population that is really uncomfortable with the improv aspect of RPGs.
 
RPGs are of course not as expensive as CCGs, but I've noticed that class based RPGs have a business advantage over Hero in that you can sell new class splatbooks forever.  In a business sense, class based systems are a feature, not a bug.

Rumor,is they arent allowing OGL or fan-created stuff for DnD1, meaning that if you want to contribute or create something for publishing, you will still have to write it for 5e.
 
As for card games- and do keep in mind that this is entirely a personal opinion: given the toll they have taken on the RPG hobby and the changes they have caused in gaming stores and tables lost to card games, I dont care if all card games dry up and blow away.
 
 

They have bounced off the table and onto the tile floor a few times, without damage to either the dice or the tile.
 
She hasn't flung them at a brick wall or anything, and has twice denied me the opporrunity to slingshot them at a rifle target (sinning steel type), so all I can offer is a bounce onto a tile floor.
 
The idea was that they were injection moulded at a oressure sufficient to remove the air and increase their density a bit, then fired while in the pressurized mould (preventing shape change and potentially bumping the density up a bit,  they are heavy- as you would expect-  but nit freakishly so.
 
They were then glazed and retired enough to set the glaze-  it is the possibility of the glaze cracking that worries me at this point, as the dice have proven to be quite sound.  They still looked brand new the last time she played (four months ago, maybe?).
 
 

I'm working up a Star Wars Hero game with my regular group.  I'm going to charge 1/5 the normal point cost for Vehicles (including ships), Followers (including droids) and special gear (including lightsabers for Jedi, other special gear like Mando's beskar armor and jet pack).  Normal weapons, armor, medical equipment, tools, etc., are at no point cost. 

I do not want to go even further off topic, but I want to say that I believe it.  My Traveller-on-Champions game is still going, albeit every-other-month the last four years, but it is still going- we still have half (three) of the original players, and and,currently four "new guys".  There have been a lot of people drop out and drop in over the years- I mean, at this point, it is the RPG os Thesius, but it is still going-- and it started in the mid-nineties ('94, I think?).  And I live on the east coast. In the sticks, amongst the hicks.
 
I have no doubt that a good GM- who can both draw and do math on the fly, and fills his world with background, culture, and imagery, and operates on the west coast, in a city- could have a group going for way longer than I can.  I know just how wierd it is that I can find players _at all_ where I live, but I do.
 
In fairness, though: I had one group dwindle away (the Stateboro group) durning Covid, and another group ran through three six_month campaigns and drifted off one at a time (work, job changes, etc), but I have picked up the youth group....
 
I would think a guy willing to run a game where RPGs and comic books are still a happening thing would have no problem finding and retaining players.
 
 
 
 
Back on track:
 
I understand where you are coming from, but ultimately, he is getting what he paid for: he isnt going to snap a bowstring on his magic, and a thief isnt going to slide his magic from its sheath while he sleeps.  He doesnt have to do maintenance on his magic-  in short, he always has it.
 
A guy who buys "good with sword" doesnt get a guarantee that he will always have a sword, or that it is a good one, or that he gets to keep it.
 
And so on and so dorth, of course.e
 
 
 
 
I will have to go back upstream and refresh my memory.  I am not doubting you; I am just old.
 
 
 
 
Eh.  It hapens.  It's pretty easy to overlook, since you arw generally a pretty good sport about most things. 
 
 
 

There is an interesting dichotomy here, in my view.  There are various ways to view character points.
 
Of course, we start with "here is how we will balance PCs against one another - they all have the same resource to spend".  Point balance isn't perfect, but it's a starting point.
 
We also know that the value of many abilities differs between games.  A game focused on combat devalues non-combat skills and abilities.  There is little point buying interaction skills if a group's mantra is "role play it" and the success of such interactions will be judged by the GM's interpretation of how persuasive/charming/whatever the player is. Drill down to individual abilities and their utility becomes even a broader spread - Breathe Water in a seafaring pirates game seems a lot more useful than playing in a Dune campaign, and is essential if we are playing in Aquaman's Atlantis.
 
But there is another angle, which is where I think Scott ends up. As a player investing, say, 20-30 points in skills at trading, I am not going to be happy if the game revolves entirely around monster-hunting and dungeon-crawling.  As a GM, I will suggest that part of my job is to look at those 20 - 30 points and either figure out how I am going to build in game aspects that will allow those abilities to shine - to be worth their cost in-game - or to tell the player "really, based on the themes of this game, those abilities are not going to come up much - why don't we just call PS: Trader a background skill - no point cost, but if it comes up once or twice in the campaign, your character will be a master trader". 
 
We talk a lot about only saving points from limitations that truly limit, and not getting points for complications that don't cause issues.  We don't, in my opinion, look at the other side nearly as often - points spent need to carry in-game benefits commensurate with their spending.  The GM's job includes both sides of that equation.
 
By contrast, we've all heard some variant of the poor GM who runs a game for the Master Trader and the Artillery Mage that focuses entirely on close-quarters combat, frustrating both players because their abilities are almost never useful.

Again, 20 year campaign, and I never cared/worries about balancing mages against fighters. That would have been dumb.  What I did do, was to balance "camera" or "spotlight time" So that each character got their turn in the spotlight, and contributed to the sessions. When I ran large groups, it was small teams of characters that got attention. This satisfied the players, a lot more, and other character were appreciative of having an Artillery Mage, or long range sniper in the party, and the mages were appreciative of party members that could trade3, and avoid having the party swindled, or ambushed, or otherwise disadvantaged, due to the Military/ Academic nature of mages in my old campaign. worrying about character balance may be something to worry about in Champions, but in Fantasy, it's far more situational.

The current campaign, which is a PBP on Discord, has no magic. So the players got free stuff from their employers. Mostly bronze tipped spears, and salvaged bows, but they had to pay a few silver for these  thick, gray wool, blankets, which most people wear as cloaks against the cold, and roll up into burritos under the carts of the caravan they are guarding, when it's not their shift. 

The spell caster is not using equipment, whereas the archer is.  I may well be mistaken (and apologize appropriately if I am), but I had thought we were discussing charging for equipment.  In you example, the archer- at my table- would have paid _zero_ points to chuck arrows into the citizenry.
 
However, he still has the peoblems associated with using equipment: he can target one person, suffers for lack of skill, equioment needs maintenance, can break, can be taken away, has finite ammunition, requires both hands-- if it is a longbow, he likely takes a penalty for setting, penalties for attempting to fire and stay behind cover and all those other things,
 
The wizard who bought the ability to his magic missile suffers no real chance of not being able to use it whenever he wishes, is never going to lose it- best of all, after taking a recovery or two, the archers arrows are not automatically replenished.  The wizard takes a breather and lobs a few more bolts of damage, etc.
 
Looked at from the other end, you are charging the archer two points to get screwed in relative ability.
 
 
 
I suppose this all boils down to the level of realism you are looking for in your Martial Arts game.  From my perspective, this makes complete sense: weapons were invented for a pretty solid reason: they give considerable advantage over the guy who isn't using one.
 
Weapons still exist to this day for that very same reason.  Weapons have continued to evolve because we want advantage over the guy who has last year's weapon.  Revisit the thoughts in the Star HERO thread about swords in sci-fi.  Even today, long before star-spanning human empires and FTL travel, we have stopped carrying swords.  Why?  Because as a whole, we have learned that brandishing a sword is a good way to get shot- once upon a time, by an arrow, and then by a lead pellet, then a shaped lead projectile from much further away, then depletes uranium, then large hypersonic steel or tungsten rods-
 
The barefoot monk- while fun to play in a game heavy with barefoot monks, has realistically little chance against a flamethrower, or a knife taped to the end of a stick.
 
 
Now as far as the more popular and inlmpressively unrealistic martial arts games, I really can't discuss those knowledgeably: they have zero appeal to me, as the source material has zero appeal to me.  I am more along the lines of the old Ginsu commercials:
 
"In Japan, the foot can split wood.  But it can't cut a watermelon!"
 
I tend to think it is also a poor choice for stopping a sword, too, and functionally hillarious for stopping a bullet.
 
In all honesty- while your points make me wish I could still acces this site through my computer so I couos use a proper screen and keyboard to discuss them, I have to call attentionntion to fact that you are making my point that "balance via character points" is absolutely nothing less than a deeply-held mythology with a devout religious core that refuses to accept that.
 
 

Yeah, that's why I made casters more like warriors: you pay points to be able to use the weapon, not the weapon its self.

This is in my Field Guide, but I found a way to make a compromise between the two systems.  Most gear is just found, you don't have to pay for the sword you pick up off the Ogre Baron.  But if you want to make a magic item, you have to have the points to pay for it up front (balanced by any complications) then you get the item.  BUT if you lose it, you do not lose the points.  They are either set into xps, or you get an equivalent replacement, or something of that sort.  The points are an earnest, a barrier to gaining the power, but are not permanently put into it.

Oh , you are one of those that think math is fun.  I see. 
 
In all seriousness, I ran a Fantasy Hero campaign for nearly 20 years, and equipment handling became detailed. I  ROTC on the 1980s and WW2 re-enacting in the 90s an no matter the nation, combat and sustainment gear was between 70 and 120 lbs. so for most normal people, that was their hiking carry limit.  Generally, what wasn’t weapons or armor was sustainment equipment (camping gear).  I just carried that through to FH.  So this kept encumbrance reasonable. Anyone wearing heavy plate had animals to carry the sustainment gear, and sometimes servants to set it up. But often a long cloak, was all one had for sleeping rough.  

If you paid points for something you could reasonably expect to retain it or get it back with a little effort.  If you bought it, you had to account for it, but it could be taken or lost permanently due to circumstance. A lot depended on the skills and attitude of the party. 
 

And because it’s fun!

One of the ways I balance magical items is with complications, and treat them as pre-6th hero, where complications reduce the overall cost.  So that sword is magical, but it LOOKS magical, so it has distinctive looks.  It has a reputation as being cursed.  Turns out it really is cursed; it has 2d6 Unluck.  And its hunted, by demons who want to take it back to hell, so you have a small chance of a demon showing up to get it.   That kind of thing.

I played with players paying points for everything just for an experiment. I just treat every object like a power with lots of limitations. This way I don’t really have to sort out “magic items” as opposed to mundane, found items or purchased items, etc. it’s not a perfect system, but when I’m trying to teach points build to new players it helps them learn how things fit together. 
 
It rationalizes some of the usual problems, but ha its own drawbacks of course. the main problem is how to treat lost items. They get their points back of course, but special heirloom items or magic items may have more of a story arc built into retrieving them, and so on. Found and purchased items, of course, are the most problematic with this approach, so as @Dr.Devicesays, it requires some trust. 

Mundane equipment:  Characters can start with gear reasonable and appropriate based on their concept and skills for no cost in points or money. 
 
Special, specialized, extra powerful stuff: By which I mean magic items.  I've always been on the side of characters paying points, but I'm not sure how tenable that is.  If they pay points to start with them, but characters who find them in play can't afford the point cost hit but get to keep them anyway, it's unfair to the former.  I'm still working on that one.  Maybe one-fifth point cost for both?  That sounds more fair and more doable. 

In the modern Fantasy game I ran a few years (okay, couple of decades?) back, the characters had to pay points for any innate abilities, spell casting ability, or signature magic items (one character had a family heirloom magic sword). Then they had a small gear pool— a set of points to use to buy any mundane (or commercially available magical) items that they would have with them during an adventure. We didn't track exact levels of money for the game, but they had to be able to justify the items based on their current (approximate) level of financial solvency. We also discussed the kinds of things their business ( a small security/private investigation agency) kept on hand, for them to trade out adventure to adventure. There was an understanding that anything purchased through the gear pool could be easily taken away, but equally easily replaced through purchase/looting/etc. Easy come. easy go.
 
When things got rough (usually toward the end of an arc), they could take the opportunity to "gear up," and have double the Gear points viable for their pool. There needed to be an in game explanation/justification for the temporary power up. Since my group and I had a high level of trust, that was never a problem.

My buddy keeps finding HERO books at Half Price Books, including Star HERO at one point. Keep your eyes peeled!

Do you hear that noise? That sucking noise is the money leaving your wallet! 😁

Well, great.
 
Now I gotta hunt up a hardcover Star HERO.
 
Thanks a lot, Brian!
 

 
 

Handy blog post if you need to dispose of those pesky pulp heroes:
 
Villain’s Toolbox – a list of deadly methods for murder

Okay, guys; rhis is _inspired_.   Really it is.
 
Nice find, BJB!