Scott Ruggels

Here are some examples: Third Party 5e Books: Pathfinder Homebrew using various template files stat block Even for the amateur Pathfinder and 5e Homebrew, it adheres to the publisher's style guide for font, page layouts and style of artwork (Digital paintings). This is why I am saying that "New Champions Material", cannot be Black and white, or Line and tint illustrations. The Illustration need tobe full paint, for the most part, and look like frames from a DC or MCU Movie. Comic art that looks like the 80's and 90's in a book not from the 80's and 90's will look amateurish and cheap.

Oh, there will be grilling. Looking forward to a flame cooked triple cheese burger and some fresh potato salad, and a tall glass of iced tea with no sugar.

The weather today is gorgeous but very dry. So no private fireworks are permitted, but then It’s California. Going to do a bit of shopping. I do miss the opportunity to engage in pyromania, but on balance, a lovely day.

Just finished watching the First Season of The Lincoln Lawyer on Netflix. My mother and I enjoyed it quite a bit. Very well written.

Here is some added detail from my old 3rd through 4th edition campaign: Northern Magical Support, the Package would have been on top of one or two military packages. Midlands Mages. Magic skill roll, was just to kick the spell off. It was a magic talent, there were no subtractions from the power of the skill. a blown roll was a misfire. there were no side effects. The spell just did not go off. Below is a segment about Magic as it was in the Jaggiri Culture. This is what I mean about Cultural flavor of magic. Hope this helps illustrate what I meant.

Confetti rule?

Exactly so. Without that, it's basically The Fantasy Trip, or that FASA WW2 game, which name escapes me. What has become evident to me, away from this board, and mostly on the HERO Discord, is that people still want to play, primarily superheroes in the system. Other genres are discussed, but the LFG notices are all about Champions games. SO it's pretty clear that the main audience whether I like it or not, is Superheroes.

The costs is around $3000 for a painted, full color cover image, to start. A "Name" artist can charge much higher. full color interior images start at around $400 per quarter page, these days, and you can see how the costs increase with the page count. Then you need people, fluent in Indesign, or other page layout, and handling the prepress, for color bleeds so you can hyave that printed color from the spine to the outside margins, top to bottom. Not cheap.

Shows you wat 7 years of testing and engineering will get you, From a barely functional Pistol, to a smooth, pleasant to shoot pistol.

Man, I miss discussions like this.

I never capped damage or points. I was miserly about rewarding experience. Spell advantages and limitations were cultural, and often mutually exclusive.

I think that I may try a one shot for second or Third edition Champions to see if anyone wants to try out Superheroes. At least try and get their feet wet with the Hero System.

Back in the days of USENET, before BBS's and Forums, there was a group called REC.GAMES.FRP.ADVOCACY, where the Philosophy of Tabletop RPGs was discussed. There were two factions that would argue incessantly: The Simulationists, and the Dramatists. I was firmly in the Simulationist camp. That factionalizing was originally caused by the publication of Amber Diceless. Of course no minds were changed, but it helped refine and sharpen our arguments. My position still has not changed. I ran a lot of Con games as well, but this is why I always emphasized "The Team". If that situation happened to someone in one of my Games and the BBEG took them out, the next person on the team would be expected to step up. Casualties In my experience add to the tension of the game. But to each their own> Running Cyberpunk, or D&D 5e, if I get a TPK, well that's life. It's not something that happens a lot in Hero (Even in Fantasy Hero), so next session the Character wakes up in a barred wagon. "Start planning your escape". To each their own, and welcome!

I do not disagree. You found a group where that works. I think my high school group read mostly different comics (We liked X-Men, but didn't read Teen Titans until later, but we had a slew of independents we read) We started like The Avengers, and ended up more like an Image Comic of some sort? Also Agreed. Even if the editor was different, it had still a lot of input from the original Hero Games folks. and it kept that breezy style. I still like it as my favorite edition, but I can do Fred if need be. Danger International, and Justice Inc. I think were high points of Hero writing. It might be worth getting the PDFs when they are on sale just to read, though I find staring at a screen for long periods, a little painful. YMMV. There's the rub. Good Layout and good art are expensive. really expensive, and it's not something that Hero games as is can afford. Again, I suggest some sort of crowd funding, though for my target, I'd look at layouts like some of the Pathfinder, or the Third Party 5e books, like Age of Antiquity. IMO. The problem with Champions Complete was how it was organized. They wanted to keep it short, but it's a bit haphazard. No disagreement here. Genre supplements should have a similar cover dress as the Genre they support. The Blue & Yellow, while subdued, and in keeping with the main rulebook, Kind of make it hard to find and pull off the shelf when needed. Pathfinder certainly had some damn pretty books.

That… works (?).

This is going to be a long one. A Roleplaying Game to me, consists of three elements: Good players, good roleplay, and a good game. We will not discuss the element of good players, because that is highly subjective and completely based on local conditions. Roleplay So let’s talk about role-play then. Of the GM’s I have played with, very few were good at encouraging “immersive”, or “deep” roleplay. Very few of us are professional, or even good actors. Save Matt Mercer‘s group of Hollywood professionals, that have set crushingly high expectations for gaming groups since Critical Roll started, most of us muddle through by setting up a framework for a personality in our heads and that framework is as elastic or rigid as our imagination can create. Allowances should be made in this department for the various levels of comfort, as well as skill of the participants, as was said before, we aren’t professionals. In the case of the immersive roleplay, much thought was given to constructing that personality and making that framework as solid in one’s mind as they could, using one’s observations of other people, movies, and literature, to be able to respond to the external outputs the game in an internally consistent fashion. This was far beyond the “funny voice” level, and would produce a sensation of sitting in the back seat of one’s skull, watching the game while the character took the wheel. It’s rare, but when it happens, it was deeply satisfying. I have heard that the writers of novels often experience this sort of thing, where the character takes over the writing. Of the GM’s that I have played with, Carl Rigney was one of the few that actively encouraged this. There were a couple of others, but I have also run across GM’s who discouraged this, or have had players in the games that were deeply uncomfortable, so allowances had to be made. I however still would approach constructing character personality frameworks in the same way, but with less detail, and some distance in those situations. But I still consider roleplay to be very important. So this is why I take a dim view of “genre emulation”. Most of you that discuss Champions are enamored of the Silver Age of Comics. The silver edge got its flavor due to the restrictions of the comics code authority. The code of the hero was just an in world justification for the restrictions imposed by the Comics Code. In the previous Golden Age, the influence of the pulps were still omnipresent, with Justice dealt from the barrel of a .45. As goes The Shadow, so went Batman. The exception was Superman. His writers, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, understood that having a powerful character like that killing his enemies, would look unacceptably oppressive. So Superman was kinder in his actions than the rest of the superheroes of the Golden Age. That was a reflection of his personality, not the genre. Comics themselves are a medium not a genre. There used to be many genres in comics, such as westerns, war, horror, comedy, romance, as well as superheroes. The comics code was blanketed over all of them. The attitude at the time was that comics were for juveniles, and should not include things outside of what would build good moral character. Horror comics withered and after the early 70’s vanished. The other genres in comics faded away as well, leaving just superheroes for the most part. At that time I was reading mostly wore comics, such as G. I. Combat, Weird War, and Sergeant Fury reprints, and most of them were entertaining in the same way Combat! Or Rat Patrol were, sanitized for television. I didn’t read a lot of superheroes consistently, but would pick up the occasional Spiderman, or Fantastic Four. By then I had started reading my parents paperbacks, and enjoying pulpy Alistair McLean novels. But what the Code did was to blunt Batman’s vengeance, and turned him from a two gun vigilante, to a gun control advocate. He’s still the most popular comic book character even today, and is single handedly keeping DC comics afloat, but the change the code brought to him is also still with us. The Code also changed other heroes, or eliminated some (especially those that took injections or pills to activate their powers). Code also applied to the villains as their threats became more abstracted, or goofy. The edges had been filed off. There was no spice any more. Now I talked about, in another thread, how Stan Lee felt so strongly about a story about drug abuse in an issue of Spiderman that he ran it without the approval of the Comics Code Authority, and the logo did not appear on the cover. That did not kill the comics code. The comics code faded for another reason and that was the direct market. Once dedicated comic book stores appeared insufficient numbers to support a market, other publishers appeared. These are the days of Pacific Comics, Comico, First, Eclipse, and others, that produced books of near equal quality to those of the big two, often with the same artists, who given a chance to flex their muscles, produced very pulp flavored stories. The Big two continued to produce their work in the same fashion, but also took advantage of the direct market, when DC took a chance on a couple of projects that ended the silver age: The Dark Knight Returns, and The Watchmen. As I said before, comics is a medium, and these changes in comics not only gave rise to other publishers, but also other genres returned to the shelves. Image Comics appeared as the result of disagreements between Artists and Marvel comics. Gritty violent, and Sexy, comics returned to how they were before the code. This coincided with when a lot of found and played Champions. It’s how our local games went from sort of Silver Age to what came after. So, I put out this history lesson to illustrate comics are a medium, and a so is a game system. I am of the opinion that genre emulation is the responsibility of the GM, and not the game system per se. A game narrowly tailored to emulate Chris Claremont X-Men, or Marv Wolfman Teen Titans, would be kind of limited outside of those narrow definitions. I personally chafe at comics code limitations imposed on my characters and it is one of the reasons why I walked away from comic book style games and return to fantasy or 80s movie action. Putting outside limitations, through the Meta of the game, above the game world and environment presented, makes building that personality framework a lot more difficult due to its impact on suspension of disbelief. Cops shoot to kill, homeowners shoot to kill and my super cannot? If there is a good inworld, plausible, reason I can go with that. But there are other Meta reasons that will make things difficult to remain in character, and cause some to tune out. The Prime Directive in Star Trek is supposed to limit the actions of the Federation, but even with that in place, Kirk still did what he thought was correct, and Picard deferred to it more. This shows a difference in personality. Now, in current year Universal Systems, and Toolkits don’t seem to be popular with the new gamers. So I agree with producing limited versions of Hero to cover specific genres, but having mandatory, specific, disads, or complications above what the world offers is I feel, to limiting. Leave that to the GM to negotiate with the players. Genre conventions I believe should be more suggestions and ideas, rather than hard rules. The Game Champions was described as the Super roleplaying game. I still think the game aspect is very important, at least to me. I discovered Champions at a wargaming convention (Origins) in 1981 when it was released. I was an avid Tabletop gamer, and after games of General Quarters, and Mustangs & Messerschmitts, I was told by a friend to go check out this game about Superheroes. The rest we all know. What made subsequent games of Champions so compelling was how elegant the system was. It was a tactical, small unit wargame for superheroes! A normal wargame is a rather (supposedly) a rational, and analytical affair, with the occasional bruised ego causing tempers to flair. Roleplay gives context and stakes to the conflict, adding a usually safe emotional element to it. That is what made Champions and most other Roleplaying games that came after so compelling. The challenge of a good tactical puzzle for me, with the emotional turmoil for my character is irresistible. It was addicting, and why I eschewed other Roleplaying games ( unless I was paid: see Cyberpunk), until I moved to L. A. and involuntarily dropped the hobby for a while. The problem I have with most modern RPG systems, is that many of them have minimalist rules, and push combat into theater of the mind, and I have a big problem with that. I used to be involved in MUD’s, MUCK, and MUSHs. Some of them expressly had no native combat system. In those, conflicts had to be resolved through group consensus. Fights were posted has elaborately written poses, and the target either agreed with the pose, or nulled it with an equal or greater elaborate pose as written. It was a realm where the rule of cool, or most forceful ego won. It was deeply unsatisfying, especially in a realm where most people thought the spotlight was on them. It led to a lot of conflict and scenarios would detonate due to arguments. Probably due to my war gaming background, anything that wins due to the rule of cool, is going to piss me off. Less of a problem, but still a large problem, is that combats in theater of the mind situations, can be subject to a large Assumption clash. If two of us are imagining a conflict in a vaguely defined environment then differences between how we imagine that environment will cause problems or lead to dissatisfaction. Even differences in life experiences will lead to problems. “They” have no experience with firearms and their assumptions are based on movies and television. I, however, have a massive gun collection, and have trained as armed security for an armored car company, so arguments will arise. Conversely, if “They” who is a HEMA enthusiast, versus me, who waved a foam sword at friends once or twice, will also lead to assumption clash, unless I automatically defer to them. This is why reasonably detailed tactical rules, to me are so important to reduce assumption clash as long as things are not too abstracted. It’s the level of abstraction, that modern rule systems favor, that caused me problems, when they ignore ranges, cover, concealment, distances one can run over time, Reasonable CEP for ranged weapons over whatever ranges, visibility, lighting conditions, melee weapons, melee skills of each opponent, etc. This is why , tactically I am finding Cyberpunk Red lacking, when compared to Cyberpunk 2020, where I had a hand in researching, testing, and tuning the combat and hit location rules for. When I thought that WW2 rules were a bit lacking, I spent the money to acquire the Uniforms and weapons of WW2 participants, and headed out into the woods with like minded participants to figure out how it looked and how it felt. I was not in shape enough to take full advantage, but I got a good idea of what it was like and how it felt to be in the field, and how the weapons worked, of various types, and various periods, from WW1 to the present. My experience kind of back handed the rule of cool. It also precluded the assumptions of a few game designers, and left me unsatisfied with most modern, and “collaborative storytelling” systems. It denied me plausible, believable , escapism. Another "dislike" are Narrative control system outside of dice. Action Point, Hero Points, ect.. This pulls me out of immersion, and often is reflected by a "rule of Cool situation. It changes the scenery, or the universe and bends it towards the player, which I find objectionable as the environment is the universe the characters inhabit, and using an authorial meta to change it, just feels wrong. We all have slightly different ideas and reasons for gaming, and it is fine that we pursue them. But in talking about Hero and Champions, without the Speed Chart, hex grid, and separated special effects from damage, it’s not Champions. It still needs that wargame framework underneath the roleplay to keep it solid. 5e and the resurgent war hammer have shown that maps and minis are still quite popular. Strict Genre emulation and embracing modern minimalism, I think would be a mistake to impose on Hero. Genre presented as a book is one thing but I think the big error of Champions Now was imposing one GMs house rules and genre enforcement onto the entire rule book was why it missed the mark, at least for me. Taking a route like “Powered by Hero” but hiding the mechanics more is probably the correct path. I rambled, but at least I didn’t rant… much.

I am not sure you can compress Hero, unless one does start walking back through the editions. You are correct about Champions Now, as a near miss. For me, it felt off and felt oddly constrained, in a way Champions 2e and 3e didn’t. Those two made possibilities seem not only endless, but attainable with a pencil and a character sheet. Champions Now seemed to have constraints, and a bit of the “one true way”-ism that removed a lot of those feelings of possibility. I could suggest, you go back to an edition of Champions that is close to your page count, and just adjust the calculations to suit? Then rewrite and reorganize from there?

We'll see. as I said, I'll watch the first episode, but if its the usual "current year Disney tropes" I will not watch further.

U nade this chart for Hit Locations, back when Fantasy Hero was new. Hope this helps.

Bryce Nakagawa is insightful about things like that. He’s someone you want around to take apart and examine a game. Looking at what you said, basically, you have te-created what Duke has done for his youth group, except he used second edition Champions (though he might use third for his Traveller game. )

“If”, would be acceptable, but the Tiny baby should be sitting on the throne, no?

The opposite is also true. Westworld and Altered Carbon had great first seasons then it all fell apart. As for Willow, a new trailer came out, and yet again, Female lead, and deconstructing poor Willow. I’m done with Disney.

For example?

…But the APG is for 6e? I don’t play 6e😁😁😁

I am unreasonably hostile to social combat focused games. I understand the appeal to some folk, especially after a player in a game left the table, never to return, after finding a flute in the lair of a young dragon’s lair. She still games, but it’s all about romance and social status. Not. My. Thing. That being said, two games I know that had developed social systems were both from the same designer, Paul ( now Pauli) Kidd. The first, Albedo, based on a comic by Steve Galacci, had a Ties and Antipathies system that was used to see how you fit into your organization, or how easily you made friends, or instantly disliked someone. The system was changed in subsequent editions, and I think a different company is publishing is now. The other game, Lace & Steel had a much more advanced system, but the game was based more in the 1640s. Combat was a custom card based system where each card was a sword move, ( parry, riposte, stop thrust, ect. ). You were dealt a hand of cards, the GM or you opponent had a hand as well. You would pick a card from your hand an place it face up. The opponent would do the same simultaneously. The results determined. For every successful hit, the victim would have to discard a card of their choice and their hand would be reduced by each hit. When you were out of cards, you were out of hit points. What was interesting is the same system was used for social combat at the ball. When out of cards, Lady Delvigne would have to flee the dance floor, or Lord Montrose would challenge you to a duel. The Magic system used a different deck of cards. Quite innovative at the time, and playing the sword fights with the cards was something we did in line waiting for a movie. The problem I have with social focused games, is I cannot think on my feet verbally, and I had an awful time socially in highschool, retreating games about killing things and war, so I did not end up blowing up the school. Games like En Garde really made me grit my teeth. A lesser concern, but still significant, is, do systems for social combat step on roleplay? This is just my own damage, and I am not a fan of that sort of game. Not at all sure what a Hero System approach would be, mechanically for a game focused on social combat would be, more than just opposed skill rolls.